How to get gorgeous new Apple TV screensaver on your Mac

One of the coolest features of the new Apple TV is its absolutely stunning new screensavers, which fly you through some of the most gorgeous locations in the world.
Apple hasn’t announced any plans to bring the screensavers over to the Mac yet, but they’re such a perfect fit that developer John Coates created a new Swift app that lets anyone get the beautiful backdrops on their desktop.
Here’s how to do it:

1. Download Aerial from Github.
2. Open the .zip file and double-click Aerial.saver to install.
3. Go to System Preferences >> Desktop & Screen Saver >> Screen Saver
4. Select Aerial
5. Click Screen Saver Options to customize which scenes Aerial uses.

The app has a couple of nice extras, like Auto Load Latest Aerials to keep you up to date. There’s an option to play a different aerial on each display if you use multiple screens, and you can pick favorites to have only certain aerials play.

Via: GitHub

How to Start the Mac Screen Saver with a Keyboard Shortcut in OS X

Now, after you've installed the new Aerials screensaver, wouldn't it be nice to have a keyboard shortcut to start the screensaver. Though it's possible with hot corners, I prefer keyboard shortcuts.

Part 1: Create a Screen Saver Automator Service for OS X

1. Launch Automator, found in the /Applications/ directory
2. Choose to create a new “Service”

3. Use the search box to find “Start Screen Saver” and drag that into the right side panel
4. Change “Service receives” to “no input”

5. Go to the File menu and choose “Save” naming it something obvious like “Start Screen Saver”

Now that you have created a service that starts the default screen saver, you need to assign a keystroke combination to initiate the service. Be sure to pick a keyboard shortcut that is unique and easy to remember.

Part 2: Set the “Start Screen Saver” Keystroke for Mac OS X

1. Open System Preferences from the  Apple menu
2. Choose the “Keyboard” preference panel then go to the “Shortcuts” tab
3. Select “Services” from the left side menu
4. Locate the newly created “Start Screen Saver” service you made, and click on the ‘add shortcut’ button to set your keyboard shortcut to use – in this example we used  Control + ⌘ Command + Option + ↓ , but you can set whatever you want

5. Exit out of System Preferences and test out your new screen saver keystroke

You can try it out by hitting the set keyboard shortcut sequence, which will now initiate the screen saver immediately

Above instructions are sourced from the below web pages:

• http://www.cultofmac.com/394501/how-to-get-gorgeous-new-apple-tv-screen-savers-on-your-mac/
• http://osxdaily.com/2014/07/10/set-screen-saver-keyboard-shortcut-mac/

Thanks to the original authors

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Import mails from Apple Mail.app to Microsoft Outlook.app

First of all, why I wanted to move from Apple Mail.app to Microsoft Outlook?

Personally I like Apple Mail.app very much for its simplicity and clean UI. But using it for work has some hick-ups:

1. There's at least a minute delay in receiving emails. So when there's a very active conversation happening via email, my response sometimes gets delayed.
2. The main problem is that I had to rely on many other internal portals to a) check for availability and room booking, b) view members of a delivery list, c) view a person's contact details.
3. Also I like the Lync (MS Communicator) integration in Outlook. I can see if a person is available on Lync before I send any email.

Basically I feel Mail.app is efficient only for emails.

Though I've already decided to move to Outlook.app, I couldn't switch immediately because I had to move my seven years of work emails (> 6GB) properly to Outlook before I start using it actively.

I had serious problem importing the native mailbox (.mbox) file format used by Mail.app. There were a lot of work-arounds I found on the web, but nothing worked perfectly for me. Finally I had almost made up my mind to purchase the software emailchemy, which was recommended by many people for this mail migration. But I was a bit hesitant to spend $50 for a software that I would be using only once.

Then the great google guided me to a Microsoft forum where I found a perfect solution for my problem. Here's how I migrated my emails from Mail.app to Outlook.app

Converting the Mail.app's .mbox packs to the .mbox format that's understandable by MS Outlook

• Download a small app called emlxconvert located here: emlx to mbox
• Your Mail.app mbox folders will be in /Users/<your user name>/Library/Mail/V2/Mailboxes
• Go to that directory in Finder and then search for all .emlx files in that directory.
• Select all the .emlx files in that directory and drag them into the emlxconvert window and click 'Save Mbox'
• After choosing a destination for the .mbox file the email messages are saved as a single .mbox file that can now be imported in to Outlook 2011

Now importing the mbox to Outlook

• In Outlook 2011, go 'File' -> Import -> Select 'Contacts and messages from a text file' and click the right arrow at the bottom of the window.
• In the next step, choose 'Import messages from an MBOX-format text file' and click the right arrow at the bottom of the window.
• Now select the mbox file that we earlier saved using emlxconvert and click 'Import'
• Outlook then will import all your old email in to a folder called mbox. You can then rename the folder or move the emails to a different folder.

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Disable Inline Attachment in Mail.app

The Mail.app in Mac, by default, adds the image attachments as inline in the email message. This could be very much annoying, sometimes, when we need to send a bigger sized images as such.

There's no straight way, in settings, to disable this. But we can use command-line for this. Here's the command for it.

Quit your Mail.app before you try this command on Terminal

defaults write com.apple.mail DisableInlineAttachmentViewing -bool yes

If you would like to revert back to inline image attachment

defaults write com.apple.mail DisableInlineAttachmentViewing -bool no

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Spotlight Indexing Search Disabled - Solution

Having changed my office laptop to a MacBook Pro, I noticed that there were quite a lot of options that were disabled for some internal IT reasons. One such feature, which I like and use the most in Mac is the Spotlight feature.

Here's the steps that I followed to enable the feature, without having to reach my very busy IT team.

The first thing to check if SpotLight is enabled is to look at the file /etc/hostconfig

Check if the highlighted property "SPOTLIGHT" is enabled in this file. If not, add it.

 AFPSERVER=-NO-
 AUTHSERVER=-NO-
 TIMESYNC=-NO-
 QTSSERVER=-NO-
 SPOTLIGHT=-YES-

After you have verified the hostconfig, check if the file ".metadata_never_index" is there in the root directory. If the file exist, delete it. This is a ZERO byte file but exist just to disable the index functionality.

d--x--x--x   8 root  wheel          272 Oct  3 07:22 .DocumentRevisions-V100
drwxr-xr-x   2 root  wheel           68 Jul 26 02:20 .PKInstallSandboxManager
drwx------   5 root  wheel          170 Oct  1 14:15 .Spotlight-V100
d-wx-wx-wt   3 root  100035085      102 Oct  1 14:23 .Trashes
drwx------   5 root  wheel          170 Oct  1 14:21 .com.apple.NetBootX
----------   1 root  admin            0 Jun 21 03:17 .file
drwx------  27 root  wheel          918 Oct  4 15:15 .fseventsd
-rw-------   1 root  wheel        65536 Oct  1 14:15 .hotfiles.btree
-rw-r--r--   1 root  wheel            0 Oct  1 15:26 .metadata_never_index
drwxr-xr-x@  2 root  wheel           68 Jun 21 04:13 .vol
drwxrwxr-x+ 51 root  admin         1734 Oct  2 23:02 Applications
drwxr-xr-x+ 63 root  wheel         2142 Oct  3 09:19 Library
drwxr-xr-x@  3 root  wheel          102 Oct  4 09:19 Network
drwxr-xr-x+  4 root  wheel          136 Oct  1 14:48 System
drwxr-xr-x   7 root  admin          238 Oct  2 21:29 Users
drwxrwxrwt@  3 root  admin          102 Oct  4 11:32 Volumes

Just to be on the safer side, I moved the file to my desktop.

 $sudo mv .metadata_never_index ~/Desktop/

Now, having removed all the configurations that blocks indexing, just start the indexing using the below command:

 $sudo mdutil -i on /

That's it, now I could see the Spotlight already started indexing :)

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Enabling Tamil Font support in Android

I've been looking for a solution to enable tamil fonts in my android (HTC Magic). Finally I found a simple solution by doing a very simple config change in Opera Mini browser.

1. Download 'Opera Mini' from Android Market

2. Open Opera Mini

3. Open the configuration page by typing "config:" in the address bar and hit 'Go'

4. At the bottom of the page, you'll see an option 'Use bitmap fonts for complex scripts'. Select 'Yes' for this option

5. Save the change and restart your 'Opera Mini' browser.

Enjoy reading tamil on your Android

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iPhone 4 - The cool gadget. But I still love my HTC Magic.

Since when Apple announced iPhone 4 model, I was waiting to hold that. In fact, this eagerness came in me since when Gizmado revealed the (argumented) iPhone prototype.

Fortunately, all three Telco's in Singapore launched iPhone 4 on the same day - unlike the earlier launch of iPhone where M1 and Starhub started distribution after a long time since SingTel was the sole distributor. I have a M1 connection for ~3 years and I don't like to move out of M1 as I had never faced any problem with M1.

On July 30th iPhone4 was released in Singapore. I had the invite from M1 to collect the phone immediately after the release (i.e., 12am of July 30). But I know I can't be the first set person to collect iPhone 4 as I can't find any reason to go out of home at midnight. Also I wanted to buy the iPhone 4 for my wife as a surprise gift. Also I know Singaporeans are so gadget-savvy and I expected too much crowd. Just as I expected, the next day I read the news that the queue stretched along the orchard road from M1 Shop @ Paragon.

Besides my tight schedule at work, I found some time to collect the iPhone 4 at M1 Shop @ Plaza Singapore.

Okay.. stories aside, let me compare iPhone 4 with my 1.5 years old HTC Magic (HTC Android).

• First thing I love about iPhone 4 is it's retina display. What a crystal clear text and pictures that it displays. Marvelous.
• Size: I like my HTC Magic. I think magic is sleek and easily holdable than iPhone.
• Connectivity: I don't see any difference. Both phones provide good connectivity.
• Apps: Definitely iPhone has a lot of apps available. Though there are not as many apps for Android as iPhone, but I could find android app for all my needs. So I am quite happy with android.
• Communications: like Mail, Messages, chat, etc., I definitely love Android. Though iPhone is comparable with android, for some reasons I love to use communications tools in my Android phone.
• Entertainment: I don't think anyone can beat iPhone (~ iPod) when it comes to entertainment. In fact I still stick to iPod touch for music or movies on the move. Onething I really like to get for my android phone is an application similar to iTunes. I wish I don't copy any music or movies manually. I like the way how iPod / iPhone syncs with iTunes. I am looking for such a tool for a long time.

So as to conclude, I like, in fact love, my HTC Magic rather than the new iPhone 4. Still iPhone 4 is real cool gadget for sure.

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Dhasavatharam - Review- A great disappointment

Today, I watched the movie Dhasavatharam with some kind of expectation. But now I feel it's a great disappointment.

First, let me explain the story briefly. After the 15 mins of 12th century,  the story comes to 21st century. Hero Kamal (character name: Govind) plays role of a bio-tech scientist working on a bio weapon project in US. Govind realizes how crucial effect his bio-weapon can cause to human life and he quits the project. Then finds that his project director has sold the virus (bio-weapon) to some terrorist. Hero then steals the virus from the lab. Inspite of the chase from project director, hero seeks help of his friend. By mistake the case, in which the virus is kept, is sent to India by his friend. 

Person who bought the virus appoints a agent villain (Filcher , another character by Kamal) to get back the virus. Hero and villain fly to India in chase of the virus.  Chase of Hero and Villain to get the bio-weapon is the complete story.

Now, my review about this movie is:

I read some news that Oscar films has invested about 90 crores for this movie. I would definitely say, waste of 90 crores just to prove Kamal's talent. 

The first 15 minutes in the movie, Kamal plays a role of a Vaishnav (Perumal) devotee during 12th century (Kulothunga Chola period). The picturization of this 15 minutes was excellent. Art director has really put a lot of effort to actually bring the Kulothunga Chola period to reality. Kamal's acting in this character was also perfect. I thought this movie has something to deal with archeology or something. Till the climax I was waiting for some reason and explanation for this 15 minute scene. The first disappointment is, I couldn't find any reason for this character. There was not even a single explanation for this 15 min scene.

There were a lot of unnecessary roles in the movie. I think, Kamal has introduced a lot of characters unnecessary just to show his talent in acting. Ten characters that Kamal has done are:

1. Hero Govind - Reasonable

2. Villan Felcher - Reasonable

3.  RAW officer - Balram Naidu - Reasonable

4. Nambi - Okay - But what's the need of this 15 mins scene ?

5. Asin's Grandma - Reasonable

All the other roles below are unnecessary. But Kamal's acting is really EXCELLENT in all these roles. But what's the use of these characters?

6.  Avtar Singh - Okay - Acceptable

7. Poovaraagan - Kamal's acting and this characterization are excellent. Reason ?

8. George Bush - Oops :(

9. Tallest man - Kalif Ullah - Miserable 

10. Japanese martial arts expert - Just used for the climax.  

My question is: does Kamal thinks acting in multi-faced characters as technically advanced thing ?

Asin's character - A talketive character. But I used to wait for Asin to shut her mouth in the movie.

I expected this movie to have lot of technical aspects. Talking about it, I would say the Tsunami scene was excellent and it bought a tsunami as live to our eyes. But except the 10 characters and few other scenes I don't see any thing technical.

Kamal should have worked still on the screenplay to make the second-half of the movie interesting. Lot of dragging scenes in the second-half. 

All I could say about this movie is: WE ARE NOT THE VICTIM FOR KAMAL TO PROVE HIS TALENTS.

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