mhk's blog

Probably everyone uses tools and software which will add a menu bar icon. And soon it’ll start to be very cluttered over there in the top bar.

I was looking for weeks if not months for a simple tool which will make a folder where I can put those icons I seldom use. A week ago I found one: http://www.macbartender.com/ (free while the beta, costs about 7.50CHF when you buy a license while the beta, will be about 15.00CHF after the beta)

You then easily can put the icons into a folder:

Then your menu will look a lot less cluttered and even when you have a lot of text menu entries you’ll still be able to access all those menu bar icons.

To be honest: 15.00CHF would be a bit too much for this handy tool, but while it’s beta you can get a license for 50% off, so I grabbed one. All in all I found myself to use it quite often and I’m happy with it. Try the beta and make your own opinion!

When you leave your Mac, you shouldn’t leave it unlocked. As long you have the ⏏ on the keyboard you are fine.

⌃⇧⏏       ctrl+shift+eject

is the solution. Or you can try http://www.gkoya.com/2006/11/23/locktight-for-mac-os-x-intel/

Remember when I posted about graphical tools for git? Sourcetree then was shareware. This is not true anymore, sourcetree has become free and is also available in the App Store. It features git and hg support, collaborates with github and bitbucket. Even if you are addicted to the command line you should take a look at this!

I just encountered a rather interesting issue while doing some shell scripting under Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard. While this code perfectly runs:

#!/bin/sh

function foo {
  echo "blabla"
}

foo

It won’t under linux

/path/foo.sh: 3: function: not found
blabla
/path/foo.sh: 5: Syntax error: "}" unexpected

The solution is to change “#!/bin/sh” to “#!/bin/bash”. And then it works under both systems.

Something small but powerful for the shell junkies like me:

echo -ne "\033]0;Blabla\007"

This will change the tab title to “Blabla” and make it easier to find the appropriate window, which sometimes can end up in a hide and seek game.

So I was browsing in the Finder.app of Mac OS X and noticed I need a shell right in this folder. That for, take a look at go2shell (freeware). Just drag&drop the app from the app drawer to the finder, then if you want a shell in the open directory, click on the funny looking face and happy hacking!

So, I was working on my computer and forgot that I had something in the laundry (or similar), and then the sun set and the laundry was still in the machine and didn’t sun dry. Does this remind you of something? Well, I searched for a little tool that does remind my to get my tea, to empty the laundry etc. and found Menubar Countdown (GPL, OpenSource). It just puts you a little clock in the menubar (hours:minutes) and that’s it. No fancy animations, no disturbance … just what I need.

Sometimes it’s really hard to focus. We all know it, we all have it and we all regret it later when the work was not done.

That’s where Isolator (freeware) comes into play. It blurs and darkens the other windows on your Mac which I think is useful when you’re working on a big screen (like my 23″ I have at home). It somehow forces you to not constantly switch around and enforces a tunnel sight onto your work.

SCM means Source Code Management and is not much of a magic when I tell you that basically it’s not much more than using CVS, SVN, git or mercurial for instance. These are very powerful tools indeed and sometimes a CLI just doesn’t feel intuitive in world where we judge the tools by their look&feel and sincerly a visual diff is easier to understand. Also I wanted to make a translation of my post over at G+.

Mac OS X

Free/FOSS

Gity App

It is FOSS (GPLv3) and runs 10.6 and 10.7. Frankly I didn’t run into any limitations but probably because I’m not using all git’s power and complexity. I think this is a good tool for daily use.

http://gityapp.com/

Gitx

Also FOSS (GPLv2) but with a very simple interface, in my opinion a bit too simple so I can only recommend it for the very very beginner, though a very good app.

http://gitx.frim.nl/

Gitti

Gitti is free of charge, but I’m not sure how the development is going on. It is noted as ‘Beta’ which could mean that the final version may be shareware. However I found the interface a bit disturbing: I don’t see the changes in the commit area which makes it hard to know what to write in the commit message. On the other hand I found the Configuration area quite interesting.

http://www.gittiapp.com/

SmartGit

SmartGit is also free and provides also clients for Windows and Linux. You may use it free for non-commercial use, but the interface looks more like a tool from a few years ago. Oh, and the log buttons opens a new window. Probably not the worst client for code review but … no, I’m not convinced.

http://www.syntevo.com/smartgit/

Gitbox

Well, it’s not exactly shareware though $39.00 (50% discount for students), it just restricts you to three projects in the sidebar, but if you remove a project from the sidebar and add a other one, it works. Unfortunately it lacks of an integrated diff view.

http://gitboxapp.com/

Shareware

Tower

Unfortunately it is shareware and costs €49.00 but on the other side you can test it for 30 days. You get 50% discount as a student. The earlier beta versions were free of charge, but you were forced to update every 30 days or so.

http://git-tower.com

SourceTree

SourceTree (€45.00, 21 days trial) brings the most complicated interface I think but also feels like it uses the whole power git provides. It also supports mercurial, so if you ever happen to use both, you should consider this GUI. Oh, but I don’t like the icons, the look too candy to me.

http://www.sourcetreeapp.com/

Sprout

Sprout is only sold via the Apple App Store for $35.00 but doesn’t make a good figure. The log doesn’t show any changes in the code which disappoints. In my opinion it’s not worth testing, but the low version number indicates there might be some changes in the future.

http://gitmacapp.com/sprout

Windows

Since I no longer use Windows I just googled a bit.

Free/FOSS

tortoisegit

When you know tortoisesvn, you’ll know your way around tortoisegit. It’s FOSS and brings a redmine bugtracker plugin.

Linux

Well, I never used any GUI for git under Linux, but I’d like to point out to two good looking: qgit and gitg. You should find them in your distros repo.

Android

FOSS

agit

Yes, there is a git client for android! But it costs you something like CHF 2.20. I didn’t try it out, I followed the instruction to build your own agit and I didn’t managed to get it work. Maybe you are more lucky than I am.

Crash course!

Well, finally we got some tools to work with but the code also should find its way to a centralized place. I suggest to have a look at setting up your own server and then setting tortoisegit if you use windows and github.

There’s also my tutorial for setting up redmine (a bugtracker with git support) on debian or you can take a look at gitorious which provides hosting for code for free. And if you’re still thinking that this is soooo complicated, have a look here.

Finally I’d like to point you to the most valuable document for entry level git user: Everyday GIT With 20 Commands Or So

Final words

If you happen to use a GUI I didn’t mention or found other good or interesting stuff, let me know. I acknowledge that this post is a bit long on Mac OS X apps due I use this daily, I’d be really happy if you write a post about linux GUIs and I’ll link to your post, I promise!

Personally I use Gity and maybe I’ll buy Tower one day, depending how much I’ll use git. I also like to thank my friends over at NGAS for their support!