The new Google Maps app is simply amazing, by far the best mobile map app that I’ve used even if you take accuracy off the table. I used it this morning and its vocal driving directions are actually better than Apple’s app. They give more detail in road names and things like that and honestly I think the voice is better and more natural too. If you have an iPhone and haven’t tried it out, you really need to. The Verge has a good write-up about what’s new.
Category Archives: Software
Calling iPhone App “Gas Cubby” Users — I Need Your Help!
Do you use Gas Cubby on your iPhone? If so, would you mind helping me out by sending me an export of your data?
I’m writing a new WordPress plugin that will allow you display data similar to Gas Cubby’s data on your website. You’ll have the option to manually enter gas fillups and such, but you’ll also be able to import from the Gas Cubby app. I’ve been using my data as a test and it’s working great but I’d appreciate being able to use a larger sample size.
If you’d like to help me out, here’s how:
- Open up Gas Cubby and press the left arrow until you get to “All Vehicles” shown at the bottom.
- Tab the magnifying glass in the upper-left so that it says “Search” at the top.
- An “Export” button will now be shown in the upper-right. Press it.
- An e-mail prompt will show up. Send the e-mail to “gascubby” at this domain (viper007bond.com).
While there isn’t really any personal data in the export file other than perhaps your gas station location if you fill that in, I still promise not to share this information with anyone. I’ll only be using it for testing in my local machine’s WordPress installation.
Thanks!
Sublime 2: Open New Tabs On The Right
One of the few things that bugged me about my favorite text editor, Sublime 2, is that new tabs would open up next to the current tab instead on the far right. Since I usually have about a half-dozen tabs open at once, this made keeping them in a sane order frustrating.
Thankfully Stylishmedia has written a simple little Sublime 2 plugin that makes new tabs open on the right side. Perfect. 
Two Handy Sublime Text 2 Plugins
After using EditPlus for the better part of a decade, I made the switch to the totally awesome Sublime Text 2 text editor a few weeks back. One of the great things about Sublime is it’s support for plugins.
Two such plugins I’d like to recommend are SublimeBrackets and SublimeTagmatcher. Both improve how the highlighting of opening and closing items are handled.
By default, Sublime just underlines paired brackets. When you have a ton of code, this can be really hard to see. SublimeBrackets changes this to something more apparent:
Much better, right? I personally use the solid background green style.
SublimeTagmatcher does something similar but for HTML tags. When you have your cursor inside of an HTML tag, it will highlight both the current tag and it’s opening or closing counterpart. This is helpful for making sure you have the correct number of opening and closing tags.
Restoring “http://” To Your Firefox Address Bar
Lifehacker has a great article on how to stop Firefox from greying out everything but the domain name in your address bar. While I personally don’t mind it and infact think it’s a great anti-phishing feature for the average user, one thing I don’t like is the removal of the protocol, i.e. http://, from the beginning of the address bar. I know they’re trying to conserve space, but screen real estate is not something that I am lacking.
So here’s how to once again show the protocol in your Firefox address bar:
- Type
about:configinto your address bar to access a list of Firefox configuration options that are not exposed through a normal settings panel. - Paste
browser.urlbar.trimURLsinto the search box to find the parameter we’re going to change. - Right-click the row and select “Toggle” to change the value from
truetofalse. - Close the tab and go back to a normal tab, such as this blog post. You should now see the protocol in your address bar once again.
Whoever Said Chrome Used Less Memory Than Firefox Was Lying
Okay, so it has been open for a week or two but come on. You really need 44MB of RAM to display a single tab that has only ever displayed a single webpage?
Not that it really matters since my desktop has 16 gigabytes of RAM (10.5 of which is in use), but still…
What Online Backup Service Do You Recommend?
About a month ago, I asked on Twitter for suggestions for online backup services as I’m tired of manually backing up and I never do it often enough. I was suggested Mozy, but I was also suggested a lot of alternatives. However I was leaving on a business trip basically the next day, so I never got around to reading the Tweets and they eventually slipped off my @mentions list.
So now I’m asking how I should have done it in the first place — on my blog. What online service do you use to backup your data? And before anyone suggests it, Dropbox is out of the running as it’s too expensive for actual backup (it’s great for sync though!).
Thanks!
Why Can’t Apple Make A Decent Windows Program?
Comon Apple, I get that Windows is a competing platform and you’d rather spend your time working on your own stuff, but if you’re going to force me to use iTunes with my iPhone, at least make iTunes not suck. I’ve ranted about iTunes before and while iTunes 10 seems more stable and less laggy so far, it’s still far from perfect.
I mean they can’t even manage to get the little things right. For example, their new logo has horrible transparency:
A simple thing to fix (look at all of the other icons there doing it just fine), but no, Apple had to not bother.
Wow, It Sure Is Hot Here…
According to the AniWeather Firefox extension, it’s rather hot here right now:
Thankfully it refreshed a few minutes later and went down to 75F because I was really hot!
Looking For Firefox Addon: Make Bookmarks Buttons
I only have a few items in my bookmarks toolbar and I’m looking for an addon that will allow me to place those bookmarks (in icon-only form) in my normal toolbar. I already have an addon that makes the bookmarks button toggle the bookmarks toolbar (better than nothing) and I know I can customize my menu to get the bookmarks in my normal toolbar, but then they show up with labels, a big “Bookmarks” button, and the last bookmark hidden by an expand arrow. Does anyone know of such an addon?
