Suppose you have a Java Swing application which you can start by typing the following on the command line: java -jar myTerrificSwingApp.jar If you want to make that application start from the Finder in OSX, there are a lot of options which range from ugly to convoluted. If you need a quick fix, here's how to do it. …

I used to use Password Gorilla to store my passwords, because it can run on both Mac and Windows. Because my password database keeps growing, Password Gorilla is becomming a very slow starter, even on my new solid state disk. A few weeks ago I learned that KeePass is a much more modern application, and is available for …

A lot of companies like to sell you applications to put DVD's on your iPhone. Usually these apps are just wrappers around existing tools, and are pretty expensive if you consider you can do it for free. And you don't need to be a computer wizard either! The steps are simple: 1. Use …

About a week ago, I was a bit bored and decided to see what Twitter is all about. I created an account, and I Tweeted for a week. I tried to keep to the original idea, where a Tweet should answer the question "What are you doing"? Looking back, my tweets include Coffee, Podcasts, Global frustration, Small …

I recently found an old harddisk which used to be in one of my old PC's. I discovered some FLAC files on there, which were rips of old CD's I used to have. iTunes is not too happy with importing them into my library, and the original CD's are in a box in a deep dark corner of my garage. I searched for a converter and …

My wife bought me a playstation 3 last year, and I've enjoyed many hours of gaming on it, finishing Tomb Raider underworld, and now making decent progress in Ratchet and Clank: Tools of Destruction. I was a bit sceptical about the DLNA capabilities of the PS3, because I read a lot of bad news on this fairly new …

"Remote Desktop Connection.app" allows you to see the desktop of a remote Windows machine on your mac. This application will not update itself automatically, unless you have it installed as part of the Microsoft Office for Mac suite. If you've downloaded the 1.0.3 version you probably did not notice that …

There is a nice and clean way to automatically mount network shares each time you log into your Mac. It's called the "Bonjour Mounter", a simple application which runs on login, and mounts the drives you configured it to mount. No more, no less.

Did you know that your installation of Leopard comes with a built-in performance monitor? It's called "Instruments" and you can attach it to any process currently running. In the screenshot you see here I attached it to an instance of Eclipse while running some unittests. Instruments has some nice templates …

For people wanting to have an interactive whiteboard but don't have the money, Johnny Chung Lee has found the solution. Using a Wiimote, he can track an infrared lightsource (like an LED) and use that to control the mousecursor. I tried some software on the Mac and the PC, and I actually got both to work without too …