File2Folder for Mac OS X

A free utility called File2Folder for Mac OS X has been released today from Mac Apps SA. This handy utility is used for sorting primarily movie files into sub-folders with the same name as the movie file, it will however work for any file type thrown at it. Check it out here

Convert AVI Video Formats to MVIX player compatible format

If you’re like me and still have an old Mvix 760HD media player you probably also (like me) don’t want to part ways with it, why? simply because it remains to be one of the best little players ever built.

Mine is now over 5 years old and still working like a charm. The only problem is that the MVIX is unable to cope with many / most of the new file formats floating around like .mkv, .flv, .mp4 etc BUT there is now finally a free piece of converter software that converts all these formats into a simple avi / divx format that your trusty old MVIX will play without a problem.

So if you want to see your MVIX serve you for another few years to come download SUPER © to Convert AVI Video Formats to MVIX player compatible format.

Stop being misled by the plethora of software companies out there who lie and charge a fortune for their video converters which DON’T work and download SUPER © for FREE and convert faster and more accurately than ever before. Let me also add, it also converts quicker than any of the paid converters out there and deals with batches like it was born to do so. So kick those stubborn video formats into MVIX format today with SUPER ©.

File to Folder Bash Script for Linux or OSX – Movie Sorting / Scraping

Here’s a handy little bash script for sorting a folder on your hard drive that contains multiple movies or files of any type for that matter. What this script does is move each file into a sub-folder with the name. This will work on any Unix / Linux or Mac OS X environment.

I wrote this script in preparation for sorting my movie folders so that when my media player jukebox feature comes along it will fly through the scraping of movie information from the online movie databases. I’ll admit this File to Folder Bash Script for Linux or OSX is very crude but it works and it is fast, really fast. One day when I have more time I’m sure I can make it an app but for now this will do what you need. I gain a lot of free knowledge, scripts and utils from the open source community so this is simply my little back to the community.

This script will move the movie, its corresponding .srt, .jpg, .xml file etc all into the same directory. It will work on ANY file type you throw at it.

1) Download file2folder.zip

2) Extract file2folder.zip

3) Copy the file “file2folder” to your movie drive. If you have movies sorted into sub-folders A,B,C etc then you need to copy the “file2folder” file into each relevant subfolder.

4) Change to your subfolder

cd mymoviefolder

5) Give the script execute permissions

chmod +x file2folder

6) Run the script

./file2folder

7) Smile at the fact it was so damn fast that you couldn’t even leave your desk to make a cup of coffee

Just remember that you need to put this file into each sub-folder where you want to run it and you need to also give it execute permissions in each sun-folder you place it into.

Install OpenSSH on Xtreamer Prodigy

The Xtreamer Prodigy is a great media player. What is really great about it is that it’s an open system based on a Linux OS so you can modify and hack it to your hearts content. The latest firmware 3.0.5 does not have openSSH installed and personally I prefer using SSH to connect to any Linux servers. There is a mod pack for Xtreamer products called XMP but for some reason the XMP pack will not install OpenSSH on Xtreamer Prodigy so I found my own way of installing SSH.

If you’re not sure what you want to achieve by installing SSH or don’t know your way around Linux then simply don’t do this.

This took me a while to figure out and I hope this guide can help anyone who wants to get openssh installed on their Prodigy. The XMP install method for OpenSSH simply does not work as it cannot find the openssh package in the ipkg repository.

First make sure you have IPKG installed, do this by first connecting with Telnet

telnet your.xtreamer.ip.address
user: root

wget -O /tmp/ipkg-install http://download.xtreamer.net/ipkg/ipkg-install

Now install IPKG

sh /tmp/ipkg-install

Now download the OpenSSH package

wget http://ipkg.nslu2-linux.org/feeds/optware/oleg/cross/stable/openssh_5.9p1-1_mipsel.ipk

Now install OpenSSH and when asked about generating RSA keys enter Y

/opt/bin/ipkg install /tmp/openssh_5.9p1-1_mipsel.ipk

Now before starting SSH you need to edit the SSH config file

vi /opt/etc/openssh/sshd_config

Find the following two lines in the config file

#PermitRootLogin yes
#PermitEmptyPasswords no

Change the above lines to: (important to REMOVE the #)

PermitRootLogin yes
PermitEmptyPasswords yes

If you are not familiar with the VI editor press i to enter insert or edit mode make your changes press ESC when done Press :w! and ENTER (this writes the changes back to disk) Press :q! and ENTER (this quits VI) Now you can start SSH

/opt/etc/init.d/S40sshd start

Now you can SSH into your Prodigy with any SSH / Terminal client and copy files between your Prodigy and your PC. user: root pass: <<< none

BE AWARE: the default on the prodigy is user: root with no password so if your Prodigy is not behind a firewall on your LAN you are opening up yourself for attacks from the outside.

If you’re not sure what you want to achieve by installing SSH or don’t know your way around Linux then simply don’t do this.

To be able to now connect to your Prodigy with an FTP client like Transmit, Cyberduck or Filezilla, you also need to install the OpenSSH SFTP Server.

wget http://ipkg.nslu2-linux.org/feeds/optware/oleg/cross/stable/openssh-sftp-server_5.9p1-1_mipsel.ipk

/opt/bin/ipkg install /tmp/openssh-sftp-server_5.9p1-1_mipsel.ipk

/opt/etc/init.d/S40sshd restart

Cleaning utilities for Mac OS X

There’s quite a few cleaning utilities for Mac OS X out there for cleaning up your Mac computer from unused files which are taking up space or caches which are slowing your Mac down. Some of these utilities are free and some paid for. After having looked through several myself I found Onyx to do everything I need and it’s free and fully supported on all versions including OSX lion. Onyx may not have all the iCandy of some of the other apps but it performs all the maintenance tasks you could possibly need and you can download it for free here.

Disable OS X Lion Resume and Window Restore Completely

Are you tired of OS X Lion continually reopening a bunch of documents every time you open an application? Here’s how to Disable OS X Lion Resume and Window Restore Completely.

Open System Preferences > Click on General > an UNCHECK the box that says “Restore Windows when quitting and reopening apps”. No more annoying resume features.

Download OS X Mountain Lion Galaxy Desktop Wallpaper

Apple is already forging ahead with a new version of their Operating System OS X, having released a preview build of OS X Mountain Lion to developers.

This has already met with much criticism in their support communities because a lot of issues, bugs and annoyances in OS X Lion have not been addressed in 3 updates to the current Operating system. I hope that Apple has not fallen into the same “rapid release” scourge that is plaguing the software world these days, a model that seems to focus on pleasing shareholders versus satisfying customers.

OS X Mountain Lion, much like OS X Lion, already promises over 100 new features. I’m not sure new features is what the OS needs right now, I would much rather have Apple fix many of the problems in Lion rather than introducing even more features without an OFF switch. One such feature in OS X Lion is the resume / versioning feature which has no simple off switch other than to go and fiddle with terminal commands.

I can already see one improvement to OS X Mountain Lion and that is the sexy new galaxy desktop wallpaper which personally looks better to me than the one they created for Lion. So if you want a new high res desktop background now for Lion or Snow Leopard (or Windows), you can Download OS X Mountain Lion Galaxy Desktop Wallpaper directly from this link.

Paste from TextEdit into Nano in OSX

I ran across this problem myself and Google did not reveal a clear cut simple answer to pasting text from TextEdit or another application into the GNU Nano text / terminal editor and it’s actually so frikkin simple.

So how do I

paste from textedit into nano

? Simply copy your text from your other application like TextEdit, click into your nano terminal window and right click on your mouse and then choose paste.

If you are using a Macbook or a Mac Trackpad hold down two fingers on your trackpad and click, this gives you a right-click menu and then simply paste your text.

The usual paste keyboard command that you are familiar with on a Mac ie. CMD+V does not work in Nano.

It still boggles me that the Mighty Google with all their advances and constant changes to algorithms which are meant to IMPROVE our search experiences, still produces results with pages that have little to no relevance to what you searched for. Hopefully this simple answer will get a decent placement eventually.

Edit the Locked Hosts File in OSX Lion

Some OSX users may find the need to

Edit the Locked Hosts File in OSX Lion

and it’s actually very easy to do. Open your terminal application and type the following command

sudo nano /private/etc/hosts

Then enter your administrator password Your basic hosts file will open with the following contents

##
# Host Database
#
# localhost is used to configure the loopback interface
# when the system is booting.  Do not change this entry.
##
127.0.0.1       localhost
255.255.255.255 broadcasthost
::1             localhost
fe80::1%lo0     localhost

Now simply move to the last line of the file (underneath fe80) and proceed to type your new entries one per line for example

##
# Host Database
#
# localhost is used to configure the loopback interface
# when the system is booting.  Do not change this entry.
##
127.0.0.1       localhost
255.255.255.255 broadcasthost
::1             localhost
fe80::1%lo0     localhost
127.0.0.1       mymac

To save your file in nano click CTRL + O on your keyboard, this will write the file Now click CTRL + X to exit Nano and now run the following command from terminal to test your changes to the hosts file

nslookup mymac

Terminal should answer you with 127.0.0.1

Paste from TextEdit into Nano

Let’s say you have a bunch of entries you want to add to your hosts file and you already have these in a plain text file and you don’t want to sit and retype them one by one. Simply open that list with TextEdit.app highlight your entries and hit CMD+C on your mac keyboard.

Now click inside the Nano Terminal window and right-click > paste OR if you are using a Macbook / Trackpad hold down two fingers and click to get the right click menu, then choose paste, hit CTRL+O to write the changes, and CTRL+X to exit Nano.

Easy as pie

Disable Resume Feature on OSX Lion

Many people don’t seem to like the new

resume feature on OSX Lion

. I guess a lot of it stems from our old ways of doing things, we have all grown up to know that when we start up a computer it starts up all good and clean and fresh. Now with Lion you can leave a bunch of apps open and simply shut down and the next morning when you start up everything is just how you left it. I think with time I might actually just adjust to this feature but for those who wish to disable resume feature on OSX Lion here’s how.

Open terminal and type the following command:

chflags uchg ~/Library/"Saved Application State"

then Press return

To reverse this change, do the following:

chflags nouchg ~/Library/"Saved Application State"