Tweak Mac OS X Lion 10.7 – Hidden Folders, Dock, Launchpad, iCal and Address Book design

Aug 16, ’11 1:01 PM

I was one of the first folks to update to Lion when it became available on the app store. This is normally not my M.O. as I usually wait for the first few patch fixes to come out for any operating system. However, for Lion I was very excited because of the prospect of a better Apple Mail. Along with Apple Mail came a new iCal and a new Address Book. All of the UI enhancements closely resembled the iPad. While this was not terrible I was a bit annoyed that we didn’t have the ability to customize the appearance of iCal and Address Book back to the old look and feel. The new look had a leather appearance with torn sheets design. It looks very un-apple and feels a bit clumsy to use.

I also noticed there were a few nuances that were quite annoying. Apple by default now hides your Library folders and doesn’t allow you to mess with them. Another annoying component was the fact that Launchpad while extremely useful was very cumbersome to update and move apps around. I also noticed that if you “X”-ed an app you were actually removing and deleting it from the app directory. The only way to really organize everything was to use folders and I didn’t want to mess with my main app directory structure.

I also still never liked the 3d look of the dock. In snow leopard I actually changed it to 2d which I thought was much nicer but for some reason Lion returned it back to the 3d dock.

Last but not least was the unfortunate font issues with Apple pre-installed fonts, namely Helvetica Neue. This one was a simple solution as all you have to do is use the LinoType version of the font and you are set.

Display your library folder in Mac OS X Lion

Open the Terminal app and type

chflags nohidden ~/Library/ 

The Library folder will reappear in your user folder.

Customize and hide apps from Launchpad from the Preference Pane

http://chaosspace.de/launchpad-control/

Change Mac OS X Lion Dock Theme to 2D

Open up the terminal and type

defaults write com.apple.dock no-glass -boolean YES

Now reload the dock by typing

killall Dock

Remove Mac OS X Lion iCal and Address Book Leather Design

http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/39514/lionbleacher

And lastly, Mac OS X Lion GrowlMail for Apple Mail 5.0 Notifications Update

I posted this last week however, here it is again here

GrowlMail 1.3 for Mac OS X Lion 10.7



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Apple Mail 5.0 Notifications: GrowlMail for Mac OS X Lion 10.7

Aug 4, ’11 8:01 AM

GrowlMail 1.3 for Mac OS X Lion 10.7

UPDATE: New post Tweak Mac OS X Lion 10.7 – Hidden Folders, Dock, Launchpad, iCal and Address Book design

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OFFF.ws Barcelona June 2011

Feb 1, ’11 9:48 PM

Back in 2007, I went to OFFF.ws (archive link here). OFFF is a design conference which inspired me more then any other. I have gone to tech conferences such as PC Expo and Internet World at the Javits, BD4D before it moved to Europe only. OFFF.ws has been mostly Europe but did make a stop in New York at BMCC.

The crazy part about this conference that makes it stand out against the rest is their ego doesn’t raise the price beyond $100 (euro, but still). When I went it was $70 USD. Unbelievable value.

What sold me was that they always get a lineup that is full of my design heroes. To name a few – Rob Chiu (aka the Ronin), Joshua Davis, Chris Hewitt, GMUNK, ISO50, Kyle Cooper (from se7en and Tron legacy fame), Hillman Curtis, Motion Theory, Psyop, Buck, Stardust, Takagi Maskatsu (see youtube video above), Tronic Studio, and Troika.

It was a coldddddd few days when I trekked out there. They took up a couple of auditoriums and the entire outdoor area was for sponsors and for some of the artists hawking their warez.

I happened upon Rob Chiu (video after the break) whose 2007 Reel  (not the updated one) used to be my “break out of my funk get motivated and do something reel”.  Maybe he will see this in his analytics or something and send me the link because it is no longer live. I even searched vimeo and youtube but nada.

Anyway, Rob is a really talented and ultra humble guy. I had told him that I watch his reel for inspiration and he was a bit shocked.

Here is the opening titles for OFFF NYC 2007

OFFF New York Titles from Rob Chiu on Vimeo.

This year the conference is being held in Barcelona. I made a promise to myself this year to blog more but not only just to write about things I find but about challenging myself and writing about my experiences. I am casting down my own gauntlet.Time to brush up on my Spanish. ;-)

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Medical Records.com featured on MASS HIGH TECH

Jan 28, ’11 3:17 PM


I am a little late to the party on the congratulatory message to my good friend, Durjoy “Ace” Bhattacharjya, CEO of Medical Records.com. Mass High Tech Business News featured MedicalRecords.com as part of their weekly Startup Watch: Five you should follow.

MedicalRecords.com:
Founded in 2010, Cambridge-based MedicalRecords.com is an online
directory to help physicians find and choose the best EMR software for
their practice.

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Project: Tweets of the Union

Jan 26, ’11 6:56 PM


Introducing, Tweets of the Union, a twitter political meme streaming site. We are following #hashtags and people such as, President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, State of the Union, Republican, and Democrat and a bunch of others. We will be adding all political figures with Twitter accounts as we find them.

I finally found a minute to breathe and actually cranked out a fun project. From concept to completion it took about a day. With some help from Nathan Lebovic and some GPL and Twitter API code we were able to turn this around quickly. Nathan works crazy fast

I hope Huffington Post sees this or one of my readers might send them a ping if they know them.

We have some other quick memes that we want to put together.

I really have no rhyme or reason as to why I did this. There is no defined ROI except personal satisfaction of completing a project. I have been feeling a creatively stale lately. While I am doing a lot of great work at the USTA some of my favorite work gets delayed or priorities change. Sometimes the pitch work we do is more exciting then the final result.

I have a few other projects I am trying to launch (see right rail). Hopefully, this is the year I break the barrier and through some fancy time management I am able to crank through them.

I think some of the ideas have potential but most are just for fun. Time will tell.

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Nike Better World – Congrats Duane

Jan 7, ’11 11:51 AM

http://nikebetterworld.com/lib/img/logo_sml.jpg
Nike Better World

I asked Duane King (my good friend) what’s the motivation behind the not so traditional framework.

His reply – “Eh, I just like to make things that people explore.”

And we love exploring it, Duane. Keep up the awesome work.

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2010 USOPEN.ORG

Aug 30, ’10 7:09 PM

Extremely proud of this years website. Props to the entire USTA Advanced Media Group and to my good friend who joined me in this creative pursuit, Woody Batts.

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WWDC 2010 Apple Keynote Live??

Jun 7, ’10 9:03 AM

So there are a bunch of rumors that there is a live video. So far every link that is available has been false.

Live Stream – commentating only I believe
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/applelivekeynotes/v3

Here is where you can track coverage of the event through live blogging

TechCrunch – http://techcrunch.com/2010/06/07/apple-2010-wwdc-keynote
LiveTechEvents – http://livetechevents.com/
TheAppleBlog – http://live.theappleblog.com/
Gizmodo – http://live.gizmodo.com/
Engadget – http://www.engadget.com/2010/06/07/steve-jobs-live-from-wwdc-2010
MacLife – http://www.maclife.com/article/news/live_blog_wwdc_2010_keynote
MacRumorsLive – http://www.macrumorslive.com/
SlashGear - http://live.slashgear.com/
MacObserver – http://liveblog.macobserver.com/
CrunchGear – http://www.livestream.com/crunchgear

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I’m a little OCD about grids..

May 21, ’10 8:03 AM

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Vintage iPod Dock

Apr 22, ’10 11:51 AM

Now that's a panel...
Retro Thing: The Coolest iPod Dock Ever

I don’t know about the coolest but it is certainly cooler then anything I have seen at Best Buy.  The secondary markets created by all of these products is just fascinating to me.  They build niches within niches.  I wonder if people stumble upon these ideas as they are going about their daily day or if they know they need to develop something to capitalize on the moment.

Would be an interesting study.  I mean we know that Belkin is an accessories manufacturer and they have a product plan in place knowing that things like this will be developed and that they need to move on it quickly.  I am just wondering what manufacturers actually get product plans from Apple in advance so they can plan for the next version of their device.

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