Well… Once again apple messed up letterbox with the update for mail. At this point it seems that the letterbox website is down and there is no snow leopard 10.6.5 update yet.

Thus, the next best option is to use Widemail plugin instead. Accomplishes the same goal with other bells and whistles. It seems to me that apple needs to add this as a feature for the next OS release, Lion.

Go Download the Letterbox Beta 5 by Aaron Harnly

To install, simply do the following:
1. Quit Mail
2. Copy Letterbox.mailbundle into ~/Library/Mail/Bundles
3. Restart Mail.

That’s it! Another quick fix. Thanks Aaron!

It’s a manual install, but for those of you who want the widescreen or vertical view for mail in snow leopard, the wait is finally over, and this time with no hacks. Go download Letterbox beta 4 for Snow Leopard, it works in 64bit mode and functions great as far as I can see. Thanks so much for your work Aaron!

UPDATE: OSX 10.6.1 Update Kills Letterbox for Apple Mail, No Worries… Here is the Fix.
This is in reference to an earlier post that gets letterbox working for Apple Mail on Snow Leopard.

Here is how you get letterbox working in 10.6.1:

1. Open the file called Info.plist found here: (user)/Library/Mail/Bundles (Disabled) /Letterbox.mailbundle/Contents/Info.plist
   
2. Inside this file at the bottom is a key with the 2 strings in it which looks like this:
   <array>
   <string>225E0A48-2CDB-44A6-8D99-A9BB8AF6BA04</string>
   <string>B3F3FC72-315D-4323-BE85-7AB76090224D</string>
   </array>
3. Erase those lines and replace it with this:
   <array>
   <string>225E0A48-2CDB-44A6-8D99-A9BB8AF6BA04</string>
   <string>B3F3FC72-315D-4323-BE85-7AB76090224D</string>
   <string>99BB3782-6C16-4C6F-B910-25ED1C1CB38B</string>
   <string>2610F061-32C6-4C6B-B90A-7A3102F9B9C8</string>
   </array>
4. Save and close that file, also close mail if it is open.
5. Move
   (user)/Library/Mail/Bundles (Disabled) /Letterbox.mailbundle
   to
   (user)/Library/Mail/Bundles/Letterbox.mailbundle
6. Open Mail back up. Then letterbox should be working again!

If you have any questions, feel free to post a comment.

Why in the world, since all macs now are delivered with wide screens, does apple’s mail app not have some type of setting to allow you to view mail in a widescreen, vertical, landscape, letterbox layout?

Before snow leopard there were a couple of options. But because of “Snow Leopard”, these mail pligins have all been KILLED!

Until a couple hours ago! There is a BETA version of Letterbox. You can go and download it from the letterbox website.

I just downloaded and installed it, make sure to follow all of the steps, and it works perfect for me! Thanks Aaron Harnly! You are officially the man!

Snow Leopard Box

Well, the upgrade has been easy, yet the snow leopard hurricane left devastation in its path. It seems that with every OS upgrade, there is a process that all the application developers have to follow in order to be compatible with the new OS. There are always some that are just behind the 8-ball. Thus, here are the latest casualties, applications that DO NOT work with snow leopard, and if you have not yet upgraded, and any of the following are important for you, then you may want to wait. I will also post fixes when they come out.

(Updated September 1st)
Applications that need Fixes to Work with Apple’s OSX 10.6 OS, Snow Leopard

Apple Mail – Wide Mail Plugin:
- Wide Mail Plugin (There are no updates yet, Snow Leopard is not compatible)

Remote Desktop Connection:
- Initially does not work. You have to install the new BETA version. Download “Remote Desktop Connection for Snow Leopard”
- I would also recommend repairing disk permissions:

1. Open “Disk Utility”
2. Select the disk that OSX is installed on
3. Select “First Aid” tab
4. Click “Repair Disk Permissions”
5. Restart your computer

Logitech Mouse Control Center:
Problem: If you find that your logitech mouse functions no longer work, your right! They don’t. Don’t fret. It is a simple problem. you just need to make the following links to the control center.

1. Open Terminal
2. Copy and Paste the following: ln -s /Applications/Utilities/Expose.app /Applications/Expose.app
3. Also copy and paste this: ln -s  /Applications/Utilities/Spaces.app /Applications/Spaces.app

If you need to install or wish to upgrade or re-install the Logitech Control Panel 3.0, you need to do the following in order for it to run on Snow Leopard:

1. Download the latest version of Logitech Control Center for Mac
2. Right-click (Option-click) the LCC Installer and select “Show Package Contents”
3. Navigate to Contents > Resources > Logitech Control Center.mpkg and run this file
4. The installer will run and then request a reboot

The truth is, when it’s all said and done, OSX 10.6 Snow leopard is great. Quick install, much quicker, only $29, and the best part, is that my 14.7 GB of free disk space has turned to 28.8 free GB. Wow! An OS upgrade that actually gives you MORE by giving you less! Thanks Apple!

Snow Leopard is here, and what’s great about it, is that it gives you something that OS developers never give you… Less.
With 7 gb less in footprint size, OS 10.6 has been slimmed down, and lost a lot of weight. A lot of times, OS developers (Microsoft) get in the false mindset that we as the end-users just want more features. While features are nice, a lot of times we just want stability, streamlinedness, clarity, and speed. Forget the features, give us speed.

I think apple got it right. They gave us what we wanted, even if we didn’t know what we wanted.

If you are for productivity, stability, and all around “Ahh… that’s nice” moments, then Snow Leopard is for you.

What has been updated or changed in version 2.2.1?

• Bug Fixes
• Improved Stability for Safari
• Baseband upgrade to 02.30.03
• New Feature: On screen progress bar while installing the new firmware (Yay…)
• Multiple Accounts for downloading from App Store
• A fix for an issue where some images saved from Mail didn’t display correctly in the Camera Roll

It seems as though it is a conglomerate of bug fixes and the such.

Have you ever been on iTunes looking for new apps and just been left with an emptiness feeling? Wishing that there was something more out there? Some kind of program or site that could help you find new iPhone Apps and fresh apps that a community gives approval for? Well… it is sure that iTunes does NOT provide that. And after searching the web, I was convinced that there is nothing out there that could compel me to believe that there is a site that could provide everything that iTunes was missing. Until one day…

I came across a site called FreshApps. They claimed to be the different one… The site that could help you find cool new iPhone Apps. Well… at first I was a little bit skeptical. The site’s first impression was good, with clean design and the content was so easy to find. But the site seemed to be nothing more than a good looking iPhone ranking site. That is, until I noticed that they have taken it much farther than that.

You see, the idea behind FreshApps is that users, like you and I make apps fresh! That means if you like an app, or if you have downloaded that app, you make it fresh! And the more people make it fresh, the better the chances of it showing on the homepage, where Apps are ranked by their freshness. But, according to the site, they do not rank just by most freshness. Because if they did,  then all the classic apps would always be on the homepage, like Wikipanion, Google Earth, Remote, etc. But, FreshApps instead takes into account the activity that surrounds the App. For example, if an app has been recently made fresh a whole bunch of times, and there is some conversation about the app on the site, then that app is made more fresh overall! Which means that new, unpopular apps that are good, will be able to compete with the app giants! That is why I think FreshApps is so different, and so much more applicable than iTunes when trying to find some good apps.

They also have a lot more to add then just that… You can also rank apps by the most discussed, or the highest freshness, or the newest. Not only that, they also have a powerful RSS feed, the best I have found. Finally I can have a comprehensive Apple iPhone Feed.

Criticisms:
Fresh Apps is by far the best thing I have seen yet, but, there still is room for improvement.

• I would like to see a more robust search. Not just tag’s or keywords.
• A more powerful commenting system, maybe similar to that of Digg.
• An iPhone web friendly version of the site.
• A more powerful user area.
• The ability to suggest Apps based on current apps that other users have that you also have.
• Faster loading times… I know the site is in beta, but I would like to see faster load times for the images.

Overall, I am a FreshApps fan. I have found better iPhone Apps on Fresh Apps then I ever have on iTunes. I can already think of 4 or 5  good apps that I found, just through Fresh Apps, that I would have never found through iTunes.

The Top Five Apple Apps for Web Developement:

1. Coda:
   Beautiful Design, simple intuative interface, and a transmit like ftp. You just can’t beat that! Overall I love Coda, I wish it was not so unstable. Out of all of the programs I run, the most UNstable is Firefox, followed by Coda. But besides that, Coda has everything you need as a web developer, except CSS. Which is where #2 comes in.
2. CSS Edit: I have tried every CSS editor out there, and none compares to CSS edit. It takes a lil’ getting used to, but once you get used to the instant changes being realized on your live HTML page, there is nothing better! I love the X-ray | Inspector combo, absolutely invaluable. It allows you to find those pesky weird CSS errors quickly by being able to click on the area that has problems, then inspect them. Along with a simple interface, and tabbed browsing, makes CSS Edit a gem for web development.
3. SnapNDrag: Some people may wonder why I have a screen capture program as my #3. Well, because it also doubles as my color picker. SnapNDrag is a screen shot capture program that allows you to choose the area to shoot by selection, window or whole screen. It auto saves in a simple stage where you can grab your newly taken image and drop it wherever you like, Photoshop, Finder, etc. I find myself using this tool many times a day, even for simple color grabs. I’ll warn you though, if you try it, you will definitely find it in your dock to come.
4. Clean Text: This simple program is like the old notepad for windows, but way more powerful for a web developer. You can take your text then remove all formatting, then you have numerous options like replacing tabs with spaces or visa-versa. It works wonders with text that needs to be pasted into WordPress or your favorite blog webware. Try it out, you will Love it!
5. Free Ruler: I know there are other great programs out there, but this is my list, and I want Free Ruler on it! Simply becuase I use it all the time.When developing in CSS sometimes widths can be decieving, and also making sure images will fit in a certain area, all that and more, is where Free Ruler comes in. It is FREE, and it pops up on top of anything allowing you to measure whatever you need. I find it critical in my Web Development process.
6. WAIT! Hold the Press. I had to add one more…
   Pixadex: I use a lot of icons in webdev, because of that, I find pixadex is a brilliant way to organize all of my icons and famfamfam as well! Easily export them to png with the size that you want. Pixadex is a wonderful tool and should be owned by every graphic designer and front end web developer. Pixadex is now combined with CandyBar, so don’t get confused by the name.

Well, that is the list…
Here is a quick Obvious Honorable Mention List:

• Firefox
• Dreamweaver
• Photoshop
• Quicksilver

Feel free to add your own list in the comment area! I doubt you have a better list.