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Today no less, at the local Apple store I got a kernal panic "You need to restart your computer" message. All I did was put OmniDazzle on a new Mac Pro.

What surprised me was that I had only ever seen the kernal panic only once before after using OS X daily over two years... and that was when I was trying to crash it. (Hint: disabling network adapters and enabling others while connected to an SMB share can cause unpredictable results under 10.3)

While changing the crash message is interesting, it's not something that will make that much of a difference. I'm not going to say that OS X doesn't crash; after all, I managed to crash one by doing something rather safe. It's just not going to be a practical joke that has a quick payoff.

I can guess where that comment comes from as ex Opera win32 user and now Omniweb for OS X user.

Those Opera guys and other commercial (opera free now) developers keeps "inventing" things to keep the sales up and their users can't stand when a free/opensource software copies the idea/invention and months later one of its fanboys say "Why pay for a browser? Are you stupid? Look Firefox has tabs"

I guess you know the deal already ;)

I wonder when will those graphical tabs invented by Omni group http://www.omnigroup.com/images/images-5/gallery.j pg will be "included" in some free/opensource browser or usual suspect Apple Inc. and when will some guy will say I am stupid for buying a browser and "????" has that feature already. :)

As a funny note, that improved printing looks like part of MS IE for Mac (OSX/OS9) which was abandoned by Microsoft.

That business model (Mac-only software vendor) does quite well. Those vendors typically understand how to make Mac software more..."Mac like" than say, a primarily Windows software vendor who ports their software over to work on a Mac. Many Mac users like the specific user experience they get with a Mac because of the particular way the software interacts with the O/S. There a lots of companies (ex; The Omni Group) that do well because they specialize in that market. Nothing wrong with knowing and specializing in a particular market. Not every software vendor has to be a supersized-take-over-the-world-large company to be successful. I for one, look to Mac specific software companies for software first, as they will typically implement it in a way that is more useful to me, as a Mac user.

On the Mac side of life, OmniWeb gives very fine-grained control down to site-by-site settings. The paranoid can set up a restrictive set of defaults, then add features like cookie storage or JavaScript to trusted sites, ad-blocking overrides, etc.

Veering even further off-topic (go ahead, mod it!), I wonder how things will shape up if ad-blocking as effective as OmniWeb's becomes more mainstream. My guess is that ad-blocking will be outlawed, by the same dim bulbs who brought us the DMCA...

Two words telling where it's a good idea to get a full-screen window: Tabbed browsing.

I'm afraid I don't follow. Most modern screens are so big that you simply never want to see a web page rendered to the full width. Either the page is rigid, so you're going to get a ton of white space, or it flows with the width, so the text part is going to be so wide that you can't read it anymore.

If your problem is that you don't get enough vertical space for your tabs, well, you're not using the right browser :-)

There's one application on my PC where I want 100% screen usage: IntelliJ. But that's simply because it doesn't really support multiple windows, like Xcode does.

Lovely thing is, considering the audience of Slashdot and how receptive they've become to the Mac... development of more technical applications for the Mac will happen. It's a market that individuals or small teams can grab big chunks of, because at the moment competition is still sparse. Macs may have small marketshare, but if they're poised to take off, some Mac developers are going to make a killing.

Buy an introductory book on Cocoa programming, read and re-read the Apple HI guidelines, get used to how first class Mac apps like Omni Group work, and get your piece of the Apple pie.

The thing is though one has to understand that the Mac community is a tiered structure. At the top ...

Interesting post. If you look at the Mac Community 10 years ago, the "Top technical elite" had almost entirely bailed off the platform.

It was the "very vocal ignorant" zealot-type users that pulled Apple through their dark days. They felt that Apple was getting a bad rap in the press (although it was deserved IMO), and formed this "Evangilista" group which involved flooding the airwaves with denials and counter-arguments to any bit of news which might be perceived as a negative to Apple. The fact that Apple rebounded just validated this behavior and mandated that it must continue.

So, when the technical users returned for the nice UI and Unix-underpinnings of OS X, they're probably scratching their heads over why every silly little Apple lawsuit is worthy of essays worth of Brand-Loyalist attention, or even makes the papers at all. But at this point everyone in the computing press (not just Dvorak) understands that riling up Mac users = Page Hits and Attention. That is why ever little bit of minor Mac news becomes a major trade story.

Another issue is that Apple themselves thrives off these super-loyalists. A key element of their product strategy is based on the fact that there's a large group of wealthy Appleites that will buy anything they put out for a maximum premium. I saw these stats recently that showed that over 40% of Omni users are already running on Intel Macs. Omni is a small developer favored by the super-loyalists, but that's an astounding level of uptake even among that crowd. So, tossing the zealots an occasional pile of red meat really only helps Apple.

I suspect, but can't prove, that the "Evangilista" still exists (formally or infomally, sponsord by Apple or not). There's several Slashot users that one can count on only seeing when there's some bad Apple news to spin.

I expect you are just using Visio as an example, but if if Visio is what you are after, in particular, it's worth having a look at Omnigraffle The pro version imports and exports Viso files and it is certainly nicer to use. I haven't used Visio for a couple of years, so Graffle may even be more powerful.

Omniweb was the first place I saw this feature, and that was a year or two ago. It's resource-heavy, but if you're a visual person, you might find it useful when manipulating a lot of tabs.

I liked it enough to register Omniweb.

Omniweb was the first place I saw this feature, and that was a year or two ago. It's resource-heavy, but if you're a visual person, you might find it useful when manipulating a lot of tabs.

I liked it enough to register Omniweb.

Check you Applications directory and see if you've got OmniGraffle installed. I think the standard version comes bundled with shipping Macs.

The pro version supports visio xml.

If you like Visio, you might want to take a look at Omnigraffle (http://www.omnigroup.com/ which is for Mac OS X. My apologies if you already know of it (and I'm just a satisfied customer - no connections to the company).

Best regards

Charlie

Uhh, every Cocoa app supports built-in spellchecking using the system spell-checker. Don't believe me? Get a real browser.

I have not used it for years, but have a friend or two who have used Visio and think Omnigraffle has gotten quite good - you can download a free trial.

I have to imagine you've heard of it already as it's really well known, but just on the off chance you had msised it I thought it deserved a mention.

I don't know what you have in mind to do with the program but there are some other pretty impressive design/drawing packages on the Mac, a friend just used one recently on a basement design - sorry I can't remember the name offhand.

There's a Mac program called OmniGraffle, which is much more capable than Visio and which is also easier to use. There's also OmniGraffle Pro, which is generally more than is needed, but either way, there's no need for Mac users to get Visio.

There's a Mac program called OmniGraffle, which is much more capable than Visio and which is also easier to use. There's also OmniGraffle Pro, which is generally more than is needed, but either way, there's no need for Mac users to get Visio.

I figure 90-95% of all the spreadsheets I see don't do any calculations, they're just used as a way to put things in columns.

This is exactly the reason that one of my favorite apps, OmniOutliner (Mac OS X) was created.

"when the Excel product manager got up on stage at MacWorld several years ago and said, "We've found that 85% of our customers use Excel just to make lists and outlines," we (Omni) said, "Shoot, that'll be our next product. We can do a GOOD job of making lists and outlines, and sell it for a lot less."" -- Wil Shipley, Omni co-founder

It seems like there might be a market opening up in the "things that people are already misusing Office for" sector.

The site preferences and preview features both seem like they were ganked from OmniWeb 5, which has both for a while now. Same with the improved content and pop-up blocker.

Well, now that people are finally getting up to OW's level, I'm going to be VERY interested in what the OmniGroup comes up with next to compete.

As I believe at least one poster has pointed out, thumbnail image tabs have been around in Omniweb on the Mac platform for a while.

Thumbnail tabs aren't for everyone or every application. But they're more than a visual gimmick if you use them properly. A picture is worth a thousand words -- and you can only get about two words on a tab without clicking it. I find a row of iconified web pages easier to sort, particularly before you get really zeroed in on something. If you're a visual person, this might be the case with you, too. All you need is screen real estate and RAM.

Anyway, thumbnail tabs are more than gimmickry if you use them properly, and if you process information visually. I tend to use Omniweb for heavy lifting, and Shiira or Safari for everything else.

I think it's more sensible for me to post the marketing blurb by the Omniweb guys themselves:

Omniweb Features

I hope that gives a vague idea - but somethings like the Workspace feature are best to be seen in action:

Press F2, and you get your ebay workspace with it's own history and set of pages up
Press F3, and you get your online comics all loading up in their own tabs come up.
Press F1, and you get your news + slashdot workspace. etc. etc.

The thumbnail tab browsing can be turned to text/thumbnail depending on preference. I normally use text tabs, not thumbnail - I can fit more tabs in that way :-).

The best bit really is that if the browser does crash (and unfortunately, it does at times), when you restart you are pretty much exactly where you left it, including history, so you can use that back button. The only issue you will have is if the site you were browsing has sessions, then it won't necessarily 'just work' - you'll have to log in again.

I hope that helps a little.

Sid

A shot from OminWeb's website: http://www.omnigroup.com/images/images-5/features/ tabs.png

And Shiira on OS X has a similar feature called tab exposé: http://hmdt-web.net/shiira/screenshot/en#tabExpose

. . .which in itself is still a copy of OmniWeb for Macintosh; which has had this feature for a while now. ;) (http://www.omnigroup.com/applications/omniweb/)

a feature call Quick tab which shows thumbnail view of all open tabs in a single window.

Sorry IE7. Omniweb beat you to that one.

Looks like the ripped the feature of Omniweb, only without implementing it so well.

I'm glad to see Microsoft continuing to innovate in the up-and-coming field of Web browsers.

Omnigraffle is for OS X; the article is about Linux.

You can import&export MS Viso Files with Omnigraffle Pro (by http://www.omnigroup.com/), which is even better than that. MS Project is AFAIK accesible by Merlin (by http://www.projectwizards.net/en/merlin/). Only Access is missing, where I tend to agree, that causes major headaches - for linux migrations, too. But since most Access-"databases" are so bad, they should be replaced anyway.

If one of the reasons you're using your windows machine is to run Visio, run run run to http://www.omnigroup.com/applications/omnigraffle/ and get the latest version of omnigraffle. Quite simply, it kicks Visio's ass up and down your screen, across the keyboard and out the paper tray of your printer.

Or OmniWeb :)

Lots:

iGet (geat file transfer tool) is alread shipping as a Universal Binary.

BBEdit (killer text editor) is alread shipping as a Universal Binary.

SpamSieve (best Bayesian antispam) is alread shipping (its plugin) as a Universal Binary.

OmniWeb (world's best browser) is in testing (likely to be ready immediately upon Intel Macs shipping).

And many others, etc. etc. etc. Only the huge, slow-cycle behemoths will really be lagging. But the real question is, when will FinderPop go Intel-native? That will dictate my own Intel migration timeframe...

I must admit I haven't seen the Firefox interpretation of this yet but it sounds like they just ripped off Omniweb.

You make some good points, but let's not think Microsoft innovated here! That would be news.

Omniweb is one of those innovators -- you can see the image of the tabs there, as is Shiira (tab exposé)

heck even the Mac can't hold its own against Visio (plus OSX requires the much more expensive Illustrator just to match CorelDraw...)

Actually, have you looked at OmniGraffle? Some swear it's better than Visio. (I haven't used enough of either to any comparison.)

OmniWeb

Because it has recognized talent and some big-name backers behind it?

I can understand a healthy amount of skepticism about this system, but some of the comments here have gone beyond "healthy amount" into Sad Bitter Monkey territory. The web page isn't that bad, although it's certainly not that good. If you look at the "About" page you'll see the look they're presumably really trying for, though, and it's hardly a work of eye-bleeding terror.

And, enough with the accusations of stealing from Firefox. Most articles other than Business Week's, like this and this and this, refer to it as being Mozilla-based. This isn't a shell game. They're not hiding anything. Wait until they actually, oh, release the damn browser before whining about MPL violations.

I'm not really sure I'm interested in Flock, given its "social browser" focus, but I think they're on the right track: the new frontiers in web browsing aren't rendering. Sure, there's work to be done in improving engines to be fully compliant with W3C standards, and in keeping up with new standards as they happen, but the most interesting browser out there right now is the Mac-nly OmniWeb, and that's entirely because of its UI innovations. It does stuff other browsers don't do.

So c'mon, guys. Put a sock in the hip "they're out to scam you" cynicism for just a bit. Their business model may prove non-existent, the company may be a flash in the pan, but all the evidence suggests that they're sincere in trying to do some cool stuff in a new Gecko browser. More power to 'em.

Mac equivalents include WhatSize (free), OmniDiskSweeper (commercial and no reason to buy it, as WhatSize clones it completely), and even the Finder.

Amen. Actually, by the standard set by Mac browsers, Firefox for Windows and Linux suck too. But I guess that's just because the Mac has better browsers: Safari set a new standard for nimble (fast, small, and simple) web browsers, and OmniWeb is, well, God.

No, ask any pro developer, that "webkit" is heavily modified for Omni Group.

There is also great Omni SDK's in action, omni network SDK etc.

Or... I should be using latest webkit now just because I updated Safari.

http://www.omnigroup.com/developer/ will show what Omni group is and why they are that much respected.

Also why its customers insist on using it while its coded for webkit 2 now, I mean webkit 2.x modified now. :)

"Pretty good give away. Opera is a good third browser, after Firefox and Safari."

Let's not forget OmniWeb which is OS X-only and exists as a wonderful showcase of efficient multithreaded Cocoa programming and a damn good browser. It's not free, but after giving it a test drive I can't imagine why I wouldn't pay for it if I had the cash around to do so at the moment. I like Safari...well, actually...I love Safari, but OmniWeb makes Safari look like a broken down Land Rover on a er...nevermind. While OmniWeb is the Concorde roaring overhead.

Due to my small laptop screen, I have to say that if they added an option to display Tabs at the top of the screen (as opposed to the drawer they currently reside in), I would probably go sell crack on the street to pay for it now.

I record NPR and PRI shows via RealAudio streams to .m4b (bookmarkable AAC) using Audio Hijack Pro on a Mac mini. I used to use Total Recorder Pro on Windows. TRP worked, but AHP has better auto-naming facilities so I can be lazy about deleting old stuff & still find the new. It also is able to "hijack" just RealPlayer's PCM output so I can use the computer for other audio stuff. TRP pretends to be a soundcard driver, so any other audio is recorded too.

Finding a stream with a high enough bitrate to sound good that stays up during a popular show like Car Talk is tricky, but doable.

I'll be switching to an FM tuner with an outdoor Winegard PR-6000 aimed at KQED and an Edirol UA-1A (out of production so I've linked the similar UA-1EX).

Outdoor antennas are cheap. A good chimney mount is going to double my cost, but the total is still cheaper than an indoor Terk & it'll actually work. If the PR-6000 or PR-5030 can't pull in that distant station Antenna Performance Specialties makes what many claim are the best around. $219 for the APS-13 might seem like a lot, but compared to an Audible.com or Sirius subscription, it's not too bad & a good strong FM signal sounds pretty good below 15kHz. I'm tempted to get one of these just for pure outrageousness of a 200" boom, but it's overkill for KQED from Santa Cruz-- need a rotor to really justify it.

I'll be using a cool 70's brushed-aluminum-faceplate Kenwood KT-5300 with analog "big knob" tuning that I got for $30 before I found the crazy FM DXers page that reviews every old radio & has info or links on tweaking them for better selectivity.

If I end up wanting to record another station, rather than getting a Radio Shark and hacking on an external antenna connector, I plan to just get more tuners & switch them with a repurposed Keyspan USB->serial adapter and some relays.

If you use a Mac, the best browser for cookie management has to be Omniweb. Here's a screenshot. See the little cookie icon at the bottom of the browser window? When you click it, that sheet with the red/yellow/green dots drops down and lets you accept/deny cookies on an individual basis. Just set the default to 'deny all' and then selectively accept the ones you want as you need them. It's very slick. The last time I used Mozilla I had to dig through the preferences constantly to achieve something similar. Only one other browser that I've used (iCab) has anything close, though I must admit that I've never tried Firefox.

That might not work too well if any of those sites have an ad from doubleclick or some such. I use Omniweb. There's a little cookie icon at the bottom of the window. Not only does it tells me the site domain dropping the cookie, but it also lists the domain the cookie actually belongs to. You can selectively accept/temp/deny each cookie individually. That way, you can set the browser to deny all, then when you find you need a cookie, click the cookie icon and turn it on. If you only want it for one session, use the yellow temporary selection. Most importantly, I can accept cookies from ebay, and deny ones going back to mediaplex even though both cookies are being presented on the same page. It's perfect. Mozilla can do something similar, but the last time I used Moz, I found the interface for doing it a lot less usable.

Granted they have ported from other platforms to OS X, but the folks have massive expertise in C, C++, ObjC and ObjC++.

http://www.omnigroup.com/games/

Contact them and explain your set up and get some useful feedback from folks with a lot of experience.

From building the AT&T Wireless Axsys system for years dealing with a massive amount of various toolkits, this group has the background to help. Not to mention they understand OpenGL inside and out.

I haven't actually used it enough to compare it, and I have no real experience with Illustrator. I don't have too great of needs when it comes to vector graphics. Mostly making diagrams consisting of circles, arrows, boxes and text. For that purpose you really don't need anything too fancy, but I found OmniGraffle much easier to use and line up objects to make them look good than Dia (although running dia remotely on a dual xeon vs OmniGraffle on my ibook was a big plus for dia).

As for CMYK, I know there are options for it. I haven't played with it much. Check out http://www.omnigroup.com/applications/omnigraffle/ for more details. While its OSX only, I presume you use those enough if youre involved with desktop publishing you have macs available. I'd reccomend downloading their free demo and giving it a try. If nothing else its much cheaper than illustrator depending on your needs.

Phil

I use OmniGraffle 3.0 for doing diagrams and charts. It works absolutely fantastic for that (once you figure out the somewhat strange shapes palette so you can import several thousand additional figures). It's easy to use and the output is beautiful, I love the nice vector shadows and such, they print out really nicely. I wouldn't use this app for designing logos or other artwork though, it's pretty much strictly a diagraming program, I suppose that's why it supports Visio file formats, but not Corel Draw formats.

BTW, Apple G5 and PowerBook G4 systems have shipped with OmniGraffle (and OmniOutliner plus some other third party software) for the past couple years, so you might already have it preinstalled (or at least available in the "additional software" bundle on the CD that shipped with your G5 or PowerBook).

Doubt it can replace illustrator. Do not believe it supports CMYK. Many export options. No clue about the last one, but you can almost poke around the website.

Its not a post against Apple or Safari. Just look at that movie:

http://www.omnigroup.com/applications/omniweb/gall ery/movies/07_rss.html (quicktime embedded of course)

And this is screenshot

http://www.omnigroup.com/images/images-5/features/ newsfeed.png

What Apple did is, to take that feauture and really extend it, making a OS framework level RSS renderer (or whatever) that any coder, newbie, dashboard guy can use.

Also Omniweb is a professionally coded, shareware browser, Safari is "free". Omni group is a legendary NeXT company and they don't tell anything against it. Lots of other developers use their documented frameworks which are free (for non pro use I guess)

I wrote all above since its hugely different from Konfabulator thing, against misunderstanding. I still think Apple owes a "thank you" to those guys, as an Apple owner.

What Microsoft does is, literally STEALING or, more politely "COPYING". I know Apple kinda jokes about Longhorn and believe Apple and MS does not "hate" each other but at least on RSS part, Microsoft stole it without shame.

Also don't forget Apple does whatever they can to help opensource.

Its not a post against Apple or Safari. Just look at that movie:

http://www.omnigroup.com/applications/omniweb/gall ery/movies/07_rss.html (quicktime embedded of course)

And this is screenshot

http://www.omnigroup.com/images/images-5/features/ newsfeed.png

What Apple did is, to take that feauture and really extend it, making a OS framework level RSS renderer (or whatever) that any coder, newbie, dashboard guy can use.

Also Omniweb is a professionally coded, shareware browser, Safari is "free". Omni group is a legendary NeXT company and they don't tell anything against it. Lots of other developers use their documented frameworks which are free (for non pro use I guess)

I wrote all above since its hugely different from Konfabulator thing, against misunderstanding. I still think Apple owes a "thank you" to those guys, as an Apple owner.

What Microsoft does is, literally STEALING or, more politely "COPYING". I know Apple kinda jokes about Longhorn and believe Apple and MS does not "hate" each other but at least on RSS part, Microsoft stole it without shame.

Also don't forget Apple does whatever they can to help opensource.

I believe that OmniGraffle lacks some of the features of Visio, but if all you need is a good diagramming package then it's worth a look.

Disclaimer: I haven't used Visio since Microsoft bought it, and I preferred MetaDesign back then...

Y'know, it might've been a good idea to avoid the UA spoofing in the default settings, and offer the ability to set a custom UA string on a site-by-site basis, like another browser I could mention... It seems to me that if a user is savvy enough to be using Opera, they're savvy enough to grasp the concept of UA strings.