tech.nocr.at » time machine

Turn Any NAS Drive Into A Time Machine Drive

Frank — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:20:08 +0000

Time Machine is a great built-in feature in OS X. When Apple first announced that they would be offering the ability to backup and restore your files and system with the ease of use that we have come to know and love from Apple I was ecstatic. Then I found out that you had to have a physical drive connected to your machine to utilize it, or you’d have to purchase an expensive Apple made NAS product (Time Capsule) to use it without a physical drive connected to the machine.

Many hacks have been released that allow you to use any NAS drive as a Time Machine drive. All you really need to do is some shell code and create a sparse image, but now someone has taken all of the dirty work away from you and released a simple AppleScript that will get you up and running with any headache’s.

[Link to Time Machine NAS AppleScript]

Turn Any NAS Drive Into A Time Machine Drive originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/13. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Leopard Secrets

Frank — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 03:48:50 +0000

Is that genius bar annoying the crap out of you? Kill it with secrets. Secrets is a preference pane you add to Leopard that allows you to play around with all sorts of options that Apple never wanted you to play with.

Did you know that you can enable an expert mode in Disk Utility that will let you explore many more file formats? Or enabling HD movie trailers in Frontrow? Best of all, How would you like to backup to a network share using Time Machine? All this and a whole lot more is waiting for you.

[Link to Secrets]

Leopard Secrets originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/09/23. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

OS X 10.5.5 Available Now

Frank — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 01:56:33 +0000

Apple today released the 10.5.5 update to their Leopard OS. The update contains a long list of fixes for the core OS as well as app fixes like iCal, Mail, MobileMe, and Time Machine. Here’s a list of what’s included:

General

Includes recent Apple security updates.
Addresses stability issues with video playback, processor core idling, and remote disc sharing for MacBook Air.
Addresses an issue in which some Macs could unexpectedly power on at the same time each day.
Resolves a stability issue in TextEdit that could be found when accessing the color palette.
Improves Spotlight indexing performance.
Fixes an issue in which contacts might not sync properly with PalmOS-based devices.
Improves iPhone sync reliability with iCal and Address Book.
Includes improvements to Active Directory.
Improves Speech Dictionary.
Fixes Kerberos authentication issues for Mac OS X 10.5 clients that connect to certain Samba servers, such as Mac OS X Server version 10.4.
Includes extensive graphics enhancements.

Address Book

Addresses stability issues that may occur when creating a Smart Group.
Resolves a printing issue with address cards containing information that spans more than one page.

Disk Utility and Directory Utility

Improves reliability when rebuilding a software mirror RAID volume in Disk Utility.
Improves reliability of server status displayed in Directory Utility.

iCal

Updates iCal to more accurately handle repeating events.
Improves performance when choosing meeting attendees.
Resolves an issue in which the “Refresh All” option may be dimmed (“grayed out”) in the contextual menu for certain calendars.
Fixes issues with read-only calendars.
Addresses an issue that prevents an invitee from moving an event to a different calendar.
Resolves an issue with syncing published calendars.

Mail

Addresses performance issues related to displaying IMAP messages.
Resolves an issue with SMTP settings for AIM, Compuserve, Hanmail, Yahoo!, and Time Warner Road Runner email accounts.
Addresses stability issues that may occur when dragging a file to the Mail icon in the Dock.
Addresses an issue with the “Organized by Thread” view in which the date does not appear when the thread is collapsed.
Resolves an issue in which RSS feeds could temporarily disappear from the sidebar.
Improves Mail robustness when sending messages.
Improves reliability when saving drafts that have attachments.

MobileMe

Improves overall sync reliability.
Improves Back to My Mac reliability.

Time Machine

Improves Time Machine reliability with Time Capsule.
Addresses performance issues that may affect initial and in-progress backups.
Fixes an issue in which an incorrect alert message could appear stating that a backup volume does not have enough free space.
Time Machine can now back up iPhone backups that are on your Mac, as well as other items in (~/Library/Application Support).

OS X 10.5.5 Available Now originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/09/15. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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10.5.2 Is Here

Frank — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 14:00:28 +0000

The latest release for Macâ€™s latest OS, Leopard, is now available. The Update fixes a whole slew of bugs and quirks which have been plaguing the OS.

After installing 10.5.2 itâ€™s also recommended that users install the 48.9 megabyte Leopard Graphics Update 1.0 to fix some other issues that will speed up you system.

While you can visit Appleâ€™s site here to get a full list of bug and security fixes, these are the highlights:

Resolves Airport issues that result in kernel panics when running certain programs
Updated Stacks option adds “folder view” for all of us annoyed at seeing a document or file instead of our folder of choice.
You can turn off menu bar transparency (that should thrill many) and overall menu translucency has been reduced.
Fixed an issue where set-up assistant could randomly start up
Adds a menu bar option for accessing Time Machine
Additional RAW and iSynch support for new devices

All in all a worthy update.

10.5.2 Is Here originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/02/12. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Dark_AleX Brings 1.50 To The PSP Slim

Frank — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 14:50:06 +0000

If your a fan of the homebrew scene on the PSP then the name Dark_AleX rings a bell. He has done a lot for the homebrew scene, and his latest project certainly looks good.

Time Machine, as the app is named, will install the 1.50 firmware onto your PSP Slim. Why would you want to do this you ask? Well, 1.50 is the most hackable of all firmwares, ,allowing you to virtually do whatever you want on your PSP. Check out the video of 1.50 running on the Slim.

Dark_AleX Brings 1.50 To The PSP Slim originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/02/04. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Macworld Keynote

Frank — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 19:59:46 +0000

Just like was expected the blog-o-sphere went crazy over the Macworld keynote by Steve Jobs. Almost every blog was live-blogging the event, live-blogging the live blogs, and live blogging the live blogging of the live blogging (you get the idea).

This is why I wanted to wait until all of the mass hysteria over the keynote was done and over with before I weighed in on what happened. Unfortunately the iPhone coming to Canada didn’t happen as I thought it would. I guess the whole ComWave Apple trademark dispute still hasn’t been resolved. Apple has a lot of money, and money can always buy you what you want.

Here’s my lonely take on the 4 things SJ talked about.

Time Capsule: A brilliant idea in my opinion. Time Machine has become the single feature of Leopard that made the upgrade worth-while. A built in backup solution that just works and works well, is something that every major operating system was lacking. Time Capsule takes it one step further. You no longer need to have a dedicated drive connected to each of your machines to preform backups, with the Time Capsule (essentially a airport extreme with a built in hard drive) backups can now be done over the network. With a 500gb and 1tb model set to ship, you should be able to backup all of your macs without a problem. I wonder how long it’s going to take some crafty hackers to create an open source version of this so that we don’t have to be limited to the dedicated unit.

iPhone and iPod Touch: Nice features but in my opinion stuff that should have been there from the beginning. An SDK was long over due, and the basic iPhone apps like Mail should have been on the iPod touch right out of the gate. Plus, what the hell is the deal with the $20 charge for the touch features? Just because they can call anyone they are being penalized. I really thought the Canadian thing would go through, but I’m sure they still have a stickler with ComWave which has been using the name iPhone here well before Apple introduced the product.

AppleTV and Movies: This was probably the single rumour that had been floating around that was correct. We all knew that Apple was planning on getting it the Movie rental business. Revamped AppleTV’s and free firmware upgrades for current AppleTV owners will bring Movie rentals right to your TV without the need of a computer. The AppleTV upgrade will allow you to purchase or rent movies directly from it’s interface without having to use iTunes on a separate computer. You can also subscribe to podcasts and videocast right on the unit. Fox also announced that they will be shipping DVD’s with embedded digital copies of the movie so you no longer need to rip em to watch them on your iPod.

Macbook Air: I want one, i want one, and i want one. Now that i got that out of the way. The worlds lightest laptop. I don’t know how that justify doubling the price when you move to a solid state drive, but it’s one hell of a jump from $1700 to $3000 based on a hard drive choice. I wonder how many will flock to purchase these units.

I was expecting something completely out of left field, which we didn’t get. Call me crazy but I think this was one of the most over hyped Macworld keynotes I have ever seen. Yes the Air is nice toy but it’s still just a notebook.

Macworld Keynote originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/01/15. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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Time Machine Over The Network

Frank — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 16:33:23 +0000

One of the most useful additions to Leopard that I use religiously is Time Machine. One of the only problems I have with it is that I must have a physical disk connected to my Mac in order to use it. Now I have a massive 3TB worth of network storage at home, why can’t I use that for my backups? Enter iTimeMachine which lets me do just that. This simple 2 button utility makes your shared network drives shown up in Time Machine’s possible backup destinations list.

Now I warn you now, it’s not the most user friendly application. You need to mount your share, fire up Time Machine, fire up iTimeMachine, quit Time Machine, go into Time Machine’s setting in the System Preference panel, change the the disk to your network share, then restart Time Machine. Are you dizzy yet?

It took me a few attempts before I got all of the voodoo and rubber chicken waving down pat, but it did work. It’s not perfect, but if your like me and want to use your network storage for your Time Machine backups it’s all you’ve got.

iTimeMachine

Time Machine Over The Network originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/01/08. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.