SDLMESS inherited it’s keyboard handling code from mainline MESS. Mainline MESS uses the Scroll Lock key to toggle between User Interface modes. On the Mac, SDLMESS has a conditional compile to use the Insert key instead of the other key. This worked well before the new Apple keyboard.

The new Apple keyboard has removed the Insert key and replaced it with an fn key. A press on this key is never sent to the operating system. It changes a mode internal to the keyboard. This is good and bad for SDLMESS on the Macintosh.

Thankfully SDLMESS has no hardwired keys in the software. All keys can be reassigned in the tab menu. But the one catch-22 situation is the User Interface Mode toggle key. If this key is inaccessible, you are stuck with no access to the tab menu. About a year ago I saw this situation with some Macintosh laptop computers and submitted a patch to assign the keyboard mode key on the command line or inside the INI file. The switch is uimodekey. Since I have the new keyboard I changed it to ITEM_ID_DEL. This is the key directly below the fn key. This is a good way to solve the problem.

There is also a benefit to the new Apple keyboard. Apple has been assigning many different functions to the function keys (F1-F12) over the past few years and SDLMESS also assigns functions to the functions keys. Since Mac OS X would take precedence, SDLMESS would never receive the keydowns and it would look like SDLMESS was malfunctioning. If you hold the fn key and then press a function key, SDLMESS will receive the keydown and the system will ignore the key. You can even reverse this in the system preferences.

When I hold down the shift and press the eject key on my Macintosh keyboard I notice the DVD tray slides out at a tenth of the speed it usually does.

My first computer, the Color Computer, came with a variety of keyboard commonly called a chicklet keyboard. The name comes from the shape of the individual keys.

I always liked the keyboard. When I recived my CoCo 3 I shipped off my old CoCo to my uncle in Los Angeles. He used the computer for a few years finally upgrading to an Atari ST mega. When I got the computer back I found he had replaced the keyboard with an after market keyboard with more proper keys. This was a common thing to do, a lot of people didn’t like the keyboard.

Recently Apple released a new keyboard that is really nice. I asked my wife to get it for me for xmas. It uses flat, laptop style keys and is very low profile. It reminds me a lot about the original CoCo keyboard. I am really loving it. It’s was a really great present.

Sometimes people have a meta conversation about negotiating. Sometimes those same people talk about the carrot and stick method of negotiating. Those people really anger me.

Mostly because the “carrot and stick” term is a bastardization of the proper term “carrot on a stick”. Thankfully they mean completely different things.

Carrot and stick usually means you’re going to play nice until a certain point where things get nasty. This represents oppression to me.

Carrot on a stick usually means you offer niceness in front of the other party, and if they grab for it, you move a step away, hoping for the first party to make another grab. This represents cooperation to me.

I’ve noticed people using either term are not using it incorrectly. That makes me feel a little better. Nevertheless, I’ve got a lot of carrots here for the people who insist on using it.

Oh, Dan Trachtenberg (regarding Episode #37), why did you have to dislike my favorite game! TRON Deadly Disks for the Intellivision is super fun.

I really liked the arcade version of the game based off the TRON movie. The four mini games: Tank, Lightcycles, MCP cone and the spiders were all good. I was also dissapointed there was no disc game included. It would be many years before I saw Discs of TRON in an arcade.

But when TRON Deadly Disks was released for the Intellivision I was hooked. A really good single player game.

Dan did like Utopia, so at least we can agree on that.

My oldest daughter, Bethany, was very upset with us this Thanksgiving. She didn’t want to sit at the kids table. At Twelve she was the oldest child during the occasion.
As far as I know The Kids Table is an institution in this country just as large as Thanksgiving itself. Bethany had the audacity to ask me to switch places with her so she didn’t have to sit at that table. I think that really speaks towards to my lack of parenting skills for not instilling in her a proper respect for me. Only time will tell how that turns out.
On the drive home, my wife and I were talking about how mopey she was during dinner. Bethany promptly declared in her future household there will be no such thing as a kids table. The indignity of separating the children will not be tolerated.
Needless to say, my wife and I had not had a laugh that large in a long time. Jeanette, my wife, suggested I blog about this because something this good needs to be remembered for the future.

When I was much younger, I think around nineteen years old, I climbed half dome in Yosemite National park. I did it with my brother and sister. It was really fun. You don’t have to be a hard-core rock climber to scale half dome. After the Spring rains the park attaches cables to the side of the rock so just about anyone can go up it. I’ve have always wanted to return.
This Summer I took my two daughters to Yosemite. My intention was to show them Nevada and then Bridal Veil falls. Sadly I could only go as far as the observation bridge. I am too overweight and out of shape to even make it to see the falls. Luckily my younger daughter had enough of this “hiking” so we turned back. My older daughter wanted to go on and see the falls up close. We spent the rest of the day at Mirror lake.
But I felt I let my older daughter down. I asked her if she wanted to ever go to the top of Half Dome. She enthusiastically said yes. We set a date for the following summer to make our attempt. She reminded me I’ll need to do a lot of training to get into the proper shape.
Now Summer is long gone. We’re well into Fall. I’ve finally started getting into shape. Thirty minutes a day on a treadmill is how I am starting. I’m not sure if I’ll be ready by this Summer, but I wont know if I don’t try.
As a side note. While at Mirror lake, we heard a helicopter. It’s never a good thing to hear a helicopter in Yosemite. It is almost always the sign of something terrible has happened. We found out later that week a man had fallen off the cables leading to the top of Half Dome. It’s a dangerous thing to do, so care should be taken.

I listen to a lot of Leo Laporte’s podcasts. I really enjoy all of his work. But listening to his Windows Weekly podcast is becoming more and more difficult.

Leo and his cohost sometimes talk about Windows Home Server. An OEM version of Windows designed to manage the ever increasing notion of having more that one computer in your household. The product does seem to fill a a nitch. But what bothers me is Leo never mentions how Apple is solving this same problem. And how Apple’s solution is much better for the home user.

So what problems is Windows Home Server trying to solve? Mainly aggregation of content. A single place for your media so they can be accessible from multiple computers. It also offers a place for backups to go. Sometimes I think Leo is disappointed in Apple for not offering a similar product.

It is an antithesis for someone to expect Apple to require a server (a separate machine running separate software) for these abilities. If you want to share pictures, you turn on picture sharing in iPhoto, and they automatically appear on other machines in your network. If you want to share music, you turn on music sharing in iTunes and your music automatically appears on other computers in your network. No server necessary. That means no configuration necessary. That is the Macintosh Way.

Apples backup solution (Called Time Machine) is just as simple. Plug in an external hard drive and it asks you if you want to backup to it. No server, no configuration necessary. Sure it is not centralized, but for storage of backups that isn’t even encouraged.

I have been using MacSOUP for a long time. It really suits my style. Most people prolly couldn’t live without MIME, but I find it very cumbersome.

At work I have to use Mail.app. I find it to slow for my tastes.

Whenever I do have to use MIME, I usually use the web mail provided by my ISP.

It turns out I am easy to impress. My favorite Leopard feature is the new hash comment style in AppleScript. This allows AppleScript text files to use she-bang style shell scripting. Really cool stuff.

I should really upgrade soon.