Software – Page 6 – Walt-O-Matic

Firefox: Problem Loading Page

All of the sudden, Firefox started reporting it had problems loading pages and that the proxy server was refusing connections. Problem is, I don’t have a proxy server. …the problem, however was my own doing and very easy to fix.

I was checking mail in GMail, and when I went to my Sent folder, I got a loading message and then nothing. I went to check some other random website and got the message: Problem loading page with a more detailed message of:
The proxy server is refusing connections
Firefox is configured to use a proxy server that is refusing connections.
Check the proxy settings to make sure that they are correct.
Contact your network administrator to make sure the proxy server is working.

Odd. I don’t use a proxy server. So I try Safari. Things are working.

I shutdown Firefox. Re-open. Same thing.

A google search showed that a small number of people were having this problem, and they were being redirected to preference screens, virus checking their systems, etc.

That couldn’t be it — things were working just a moment before.

Cause & Fix
The cause of the problem was an accidental click on the Tor button in my browser’s status bar, which subtly switched me over to using Tor for web browsing. Only problem was, I hadn’t started the Tor virtual tunnels.

Firefox was correct – it was using a proxy server that wasn’t responding. I just hadn’t realized I’d activated it.

Simply clicking the “Tor Enabled” once put it back to “Tor Disabled” and suddenly Firefox was working again.

Guess I just happened to bump the mouse at just the right place on the screen. Opps.

Anyhow, it was a five minute mystery, and since I suspect others have fallen victim to their own demise and not been able to figure out why, or worse, giving Firefox a bum rap, I’d share the solution so others can get back to browsing.

Great XSLT Tool for OS X

Found an awesome tool for performing XSLT transformations on Mac OS X. It’s called XSLPallette, and it worked flawlessly where web browsers fell down hard.

While working on some XML and XSLT stuff, I ran into some strange problems where transformed XML content was making Firefox spin its wheels forever and Safari was having problems rendering XSL variables.

I wasn’t engaged in a browser war shoot out, I just wanted to know that the XSLT was correctly transforming the XML into the desired output. As various tools were slowly slipping from my fingertips, I figured I might just have to go back to the command line.

But then I discovered XSLPalette. It’s a “free, native, XSLT 2.0, XPath 2.0, and XQuery 1.0 debugging palette” for OS X (and it’s a Universal Binary).

All I have to say is that, as a developer, I’m impressed with the ease this tool provides for trying different XSLT engines. I does basically one thing, and that one thing very, very well. I like that in developer tools.

You give the palette an XML file, and XSLT file, select the engine, and it does the transformation, showing you messages along the way, in addition to the transformed output, a collapsible view, and a browser-like rendered view.

Walt gives XSLPalette a thumbs up!

Registry Mechanic PCTLicHelper.dll Missing

Got a message from Registry Mechanic that the file PCTLicHelper.dll was missing or corrupt. Here’s the workaround until PC Tools fixes the problem.

I’m an avid fan of Registry Mechanic and can’t say enough nice things about the product.

I recently downloaded Registry Mechanic 6 (version 6.0.0.750 w/ engine 2.0.0.560), installed, and ran it. It worked great – I even like the slightly sleeker interface. However, after doing the Smart Update, Registry mechanic displayed a message that C:\Program Files\Registry Mechanic\PCTLicHelper.dll is missing or invalid, and it suggested I uninstall and reinstall.

The uninstall worked fine. The reinstall worked fine. The re-running worked fine. But upon another update, I got the same error message.

My next thought was that the file might be getting deleted accidently during the upgrade, and to simply install the software, copy the file to a safe haven, do the upgrade, and put it back. No such luck, the file doesn’t exist in the pre-upgraded application. This is a new file needed by the latest upgrade, and judging by the file name, I believe it’s highly related to PC Tools’s license scheme that is subscription based.

A little experimentation with uninstalling and reinstalling shows that the fault lies in the Smart Update’s getting of the updated Registry Mechanic. I suppose they wrote the code but forgot to bundle the DLL.

Simply uncheck the entry that says Registry Mechanic 1.43Mb, but leave all the other items checked. You’ll be able to scan just fine.

I tried reporting this problem to PC Tools at their website support page, but that reported an error: Fatal error: Undefined class name ‘datetime’ in /home/shared/include/tickets/rawmessage.php on line 222. I guess they have bigger problems than they thought.

After calling their USA support line, 1-800-764-5783, I got a recording that said they could also be reached at support@pctools.com. That would have been nice to have on the website somewhere obvious.

This trivial issue aside, Walt gives Registry Mechanic a big thumbs up!

UPDATE 22-Feb-2007: As Mike suggested, I got the latest update this morning and this time there was an updated program, a PC Tools License Helper, and a revision to the white list. I installed the update, and Registry Mechanic worked just fine. I never did hear back from PC Tools about the issue, or its website being broken.

UPDATE 24-Feb-2007: This morning got an email from PC Tools informing me that the problem had been fixed and to simply reinstall, commenting there was no need to re-enter license information. They made no comment on the fact that their website was broken, other than to generically tell me it was a “great source of knowledge for future questions.”

Restoring Normality to OS X – Right-Click, Expose, Sleep, and Passwords

My MacBook Pro wouldn’t sleep, draining my battery each night. It wouldn’t ask for a password after a screen saver. Here’s why, how I fixed it, and what caused it to happen in the first place.

Ok, let’s start off by stating out right this was my own darn fault…

I’m using a MacBook Pro (Intel) running OS X 10.4.8, and my personal habit is to charge the system way up to full, then use the battery until it’s virtually drained, and repeat. Somehow I’m hoping that this will get me longer battery life, but that’s another story.

OS X is really smart in that while you’re working it pops up a dialog box telling you that you’ve got ten minutes of battery life left, and that you should go get your adapter and plug in the laptop. It’s so smart, in fact, that if you do that, it will close the dialog without you even have to click. Very clever.

But Apple is also treats you with a little respect. If you dismiss the dialog box, it’s not going to remind you any further. You know about the condition of the battery, as you just acknowledged it. To perpetually remind you would not just be insulting, but get in the way of what you were doing. I can’t count the number of times I’ve acknowledged the state, finished an email leisurely, and then gotten my adapter. I like that. I like not being nagged.

With that kind of interface comes responsibility, and I neglected mine. I allowed myself to get distracted by other things and it took me a moment to realize what had happened when the screen went dark and wouldn’t come back with a flick of the touch pad. I had accidentally allowed my battery to completely drain.

Turns out you don’t want to do this. It’s not going to damage your computer, but at the same time it isn’t going to leave things in a very valid state.

First, let’s give some credit to Apple — the moments after I plugged in my power adapter, the disk whirled up, and within a few seconds my screen came back to life, I lost no data, and my internet connections were still functioning. In the laptop’s last dying breath, it had preserved its state to disk, recovering when it had power.

The immediate concern is a disk repair; although the file system is journaled and your data won’t get corrupted, if it was in the middle of doing something where it hadn’t gotten that data to disk yet, that data is lost. This can result in minor file system problems which are easily corrected by booting your original OS X install disc and using the Disk Utility (rather than the install program) to repair the volume structurally, and then repair permissions.

But things doesn’t necessarily stop there. It is possible that your system, because of lack of power, lose some important system settings. The best analogy I can make for PC users is when your CMOS battery dies and your system “forgets” all the settings for the time and drives. While this doesn’t happen on the MacBook Pro, the following things did happen — and here’s how I corrected them.

1. The “Place two fingers on trackpad and click button for secondary click” stopped functioning. Solving this was merely a matter of going to the Keyboard & Mouse preference screen and toggling it off and back on.

2. The function keys, F9 – F12, stopped invoking Expose. Solving this was merely a matter of going to the Dashboard & Expose preference screen and setting the keyboard shortcuts back, they became unassigned.

3. The laptop stopped going into sleep mode when I closed the lid; apparently the power management subsystem had gotten confused. If something like Firefox was running GMail, this was enough to keep the system running (even though the back light went out). I’d awake in the morning to find my battery drained, leading to more problems of this nature. The laptop’s “sleep” led wasn’t “breathing” and pulsating as it does when hibernating. The solution was to reset the power management: Shutdown, Remove Battery, Hold Power Button for 5 Seconds, Insert Battery, and Boot.

4. When the laptop was woken up or coming out of a screen saver, it was not prompting for a password, as I had configured it to do. The solution was to Reboot, Hold Down Option-Command-P-R (that’s four keys at once!), wait for the chime, and release all four keys letting it boot as normal, then, sign on and go to the Security preference screen and toggle “Require password to wake this computer from sleep or screen saver”

I’m happy to report, the Mac is back working perfectly.

Oh, and a tip for people who want to put their Mac to sleep real quick, even with the above problems you can do this, press Option-Command-Eject. You’ll have to close your lid and re-open it to wake.

Internet Explorer 7 — Zoom Bug

Internet Explorer version 7 has a nasty little problem selecting text when the page is zoomed. Try it yourself, then switch to Firefox.

Adding to the list of why IE7 is a nightmare, try this… I was using version 7.0.5730.11.

Bring up your favorite web page and double click a word on the page, not a link, but a word. It highlights that word, yes? Good. It should.

Note that one of the features that CSS is designed for is so that the user can override the appearance. Say for instance, I’m blind as a bat, and I would like the font larger so I can read the web page without strain.

Hold down the Control key and roll your mouse wheel. You can zoom-in and zoom-out. Again, very handy.

Now, double click a word on the page. Surprised?

That’s right the code that handles what you highlighted is misaligned with where the text is rendered. This means if you’ve zoomed in, as I did, in order to copy something, you can’t do so with any degree of precision.

Yet another annoyance from the people who want to take over your desktop.

Parallels Beta – it works, again. (build 3120)

Parallels beta, build 3120 solved all the problems that I was experiencing with build 3094.

Parallels is wonderful. Parallels beta is even more amazing.

However, when I went to try build 3094, things did not go well at all. It screwed up my screen sizes, hosed my computer, and in general, it was the first time I’d seen a beta that acted, well, like a beta.

I updated to build 3120, today, and everything is happily back to normal and running great. It did require a reboot after installation to get the virtual bridge working.

I can’t wait to buy the next version when it goes official. Even better, I can’t wait if they give it away as a free update to existing owners.

Opera 9.10 for OS X

I was looking to do some cross browser testing on a project I’m working on, so I fired up the latest copy of Opera that I had on my Mac and it informed me there was a new version.

Problem was, I couldn’t download the new version from Opera’s Site. They must be swamped or something, cause it totally failed with Safari, Firefox, and even Speed Download.

Even the torrent sites didn’t seem to have it, which is odd, because Opera has a built in Torrent client!

The only working mirror I was able to to find was here: Opera_9.10_Setup.dmg.

Where is &_= Coming From? (…not a typo…)

Server not responding to AJAX requests? Finding “&_=” being appended to your messages? Here’s an easy fix to solve that.

I recently was playing with Prototype, the JavaScript framework that implements an AJAX object to send Request to do a cross-browser XMLHttpRequest.

My server was reporting problems with the messages being sent from AJAX, and after a quick debugging session, I found that everything AJAX was sending had a “&_=” appended onto the end of it.

This clearly looks like a bogus parameter, say appended to a GET sequence, designed to pacify something. A little bit of digging on Google, and it appears it was introduced to resolve an old problem in Apple’s Safari.

Problem is, Prototype is still sending it, and when I sent an XML message to my server, the SAX parser didn’t take too kindly to the extra cruft at the end of the document.

If you open up prototype-1.4.0.js, and jump to line 631, you’ll see a line that looks like this:
if (parameters.length > 0) parameters += '&_=';

…removing it solves the problem. I found this more elegant than making my server pre-process an XML message.

The Pits, Getting Closer

I’m offering a sizable cash reward for the Adventure Game known as The PITS which was hosted on The Source back in the 1980’s. Today I got an interesting clue that it might be written in A-Code, a generic adventuring gaming language.

This week I got a surprise letter from a gentleman named Jeff Walker who remembers playing the adventure game called PITS on The Source back in the early 1980’s.

For those who don’t know, I’m offering a cash reward for information and source code to the PITS. That’s right, if you can Google and find it, even in some public area, and it’s the game I remember playing, you’ll get a hunk’o’cash.

Jeff helped me recall some more details, and he got me in contact with Tom Walker who had far more information on The Source than I had before.

He then got me in contact with a guy named Fritz Thane who believes PITS was actually constructed using the old ADV550 engine. I’m thinking a good lead at this point is the A-Code adventure writing system.

Looks like I’m now researching generic game engines for adventure systems.

Review: Huey by Pantone (Color Calibration)

Pantone’s Huey device is great for color calibration on both OS X (Universal Binaries!) and XP. Problem is, it only works for the primary screen, leaving dual-monitor systems wanting.

I’ve started doing quite a bit more with Photography and Photo Editing these days and decided it made sense to purchase a device to color correct my screen, providing me true Pantone calibration for color control.

I purchased Pantone’s Huey, a USB device with a color sensor that looks at your monitor and makes the necessary adjustments to the color space and gamma in order to render true colors. In theory, any two screens that have been calibrated will have images that look the same, and any content that is professionally printed will look exactly like it did on screen.

NOTE: IF YOU HAVE A DUAL-MONITOR SYSTEM, THE HUEY IS NOT FOR YOU. I GOT BURNED BY THIS.

In virtually every way, the Huey is an exceptional device. It supports OS X with a Universal Binary, it supports XP, it’s installation and use is trivial, it can even monitor the lighting in the room in real time and make adjustments to your display dynamically.

Rather than re-hash the capabilities, Keith Cooper did an excellent write-up of the Huey.

Where the Huey falls short is that it’s software seems incapable of addressing a secondary screen. Most high end graphic artists have video cards that provide dual monitors. And the most painful thing to see happen is the dragging of an image from one monitor to the other and seeing the whole color space be different. Dual monitors are supposed to be an extension of the workspace.

The Huey only calibrates the primary monitor. Sure, you can do multiple machines, each with it’s own primary monitor, but if your desktop looks like the scene from the matrix, you’re out of luck, even though both OS X and XP allow independent screen profiles.

If you are determined, persistent, and lucky, it is possible to save a calibration setting, swap which monitor is the logical primary, calibrate, save, and switch back, then manually load those profiles. However, this isn’t always workable as the screen calibration drifts, not to mention it’s affected by the ambient light as well… hence the reason the Huey has a room light sensor.

Given that this is a software issue, not a hardware one, combined that most graphic cards these days support dual monitors, I think the oversight (please tell me it’s not deliberate) is an atrocious one.

Despite that, if you’ve got a single monitor system, or you do all your graphical editing on a single display, the Huey is a wonderfully quick device that does its job well and is highly portable. Professionals will want better, but the professional consumer (prosumer?) will find the Huey enjoyable and non-intrusive to work with.

The only other downside is to get software updates, you have to register online.

Walt gives the Huey color calibration device from Pantone a thumbs up, but hopes they add dual monitor support.