botWerks » nerd

small optimizations

sulrich — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 03:10:15 +0000

i’m increasingly impressed with the impact of the seemingly small optimization of adding flashblock to my browser (chrome | firefox). things are just snappier. life is just a little bit more efficient and my browser interaction experience, just that much better. sometimes it really just is the little things.

poking at chromium / firefox 3.6

sulrich — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 15:50:16 +0000

i’ve come to the conclusion that chromium for the mac is close enough to start poking at consistently. now, i need to find a way to make this honor the default cocoa keybindings and support for ctrl-a/f/n/p + w would go a really long ways towards making me happy.

the speed is quite frankly mind-boggling. javascript apps scream, rendering is honored appropriately, java support is dicey (keep safari handy) and the interface is really snappy.

this week gives me enough breathing room to poke at the latest firefox 3.6 build as well. this is the default workhorse browser for 99%+ of what i do. frankly, i don’t know what i’d do without the “it’s all text” add-on. given the amount of wiki editing and integration with online systems that i have to handle on a daily basis. if i could get this for chrome, i might be sorely tempted to jump ship. firefox 3.6 carries with it the attendant hassle of a new release in terms of add-on support. but fortunately i’ve been able to hack or cajole all the major ones for me into submission. there’s some decided improvement in rendering speed. but beyond that, it looks pretty much the same to me. which is more than ok, it’s a solid performer in the workflow.

save yourself the $4 & the irritation

sulrich — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 03:22:39 +0000

don’t get sucked into buying the augmented reality issue of esquire. about the 3rd time you hear “boo-yaa” from robert downey jr. you’re pretty tempted to throw the magazine through your monitor. cute and clever? yes. tedious as hell? definitely.

vonage dial script

sulrich — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 13:06:08 +0000

before i dropped vonage a month or so ago for the comcast triple play. i used to use this schell script bound to a quicksilver action to dial my phone. eliminating the need to deal with a pesky phone dial pad.

note, this grabs the phone number to dial from your system clipboard. (note the use of the pbpaste command. users of non-OS X platforms should adjust to something appropriate. i seem to recall the gnome had something similar.

in the interests of posterity.

vonage dial