Performing unit conversion queries using Google's search box.

Imagine if you could that offline, or even be able to have this functionality available to incorporate it in scripts or other programs as well. Imagine you could have this functionality as an extension in Mac’s AlfredApp.

Introducing Metric: A Unit Conversion Library for Java

I needed this functionality to develop an extension for Alfred, the most wonderful Mac launcher, and I wanted it to work offline, without having to retrieve the results from Google or another online source. So I created a Java library that’s capable of performing unit conversion queries expressed in natural English. I called it simply Metric, made it open source, and published it on Github. You can clone it, fork it, play with it or contribute back if you will. The code is fairly well documented and organized. The library includes some supporting sub-libraries that may be used independently in other projects, including a plural/singular inflector for the English language.

Metric meets Alfred

The original goal of developing a library like Metric was to use it as an Alfred extension. Alfred (http://www.alfredapp.com/) is a wonderful productivity application for Mac, much like Quicksilver or Google’s Quick Search Box, but  a little bit better in my opinion. You can grab a copy of Metric as an Alfred extension here. After you install this extension, you can type unit conversion queries on Alfred using cv as keyword.

Performing a unit conversion query with Alfred

This Alfred extension shows the results of the conversion using Growl, but I guess if you already have a Mac chances are that you Growl installed. If not, you can get it here.

Links and resources

• Metric source code repository on Github
• Unit Conversion extension for AlfredApp
• Alfred App and Growl

The drop-down menu used to switch accounts when multi-login is enabled.

Once you enable multiple accounts, the account name that appears on the top-right area of the window now features a drop-down menu that allows you to switch accounts. You may be thinking that you cannot use two accounts really at once, but that you would only be able to easily switch. But this is not the case. You can actually keep two or more different tabs or windows in your browser open at the same time with different Gmail accounts.

A word of caution

Google is not shy about warning you of the drawbacks of this new setting and the care you need to take when using the different available Google services from each account you are logged into. First of all, not all services currently support the multiple accounts setup, so they will default to the primary account, which is the one you logged into first, and the one from which you setup the login for the extra accounts. Also, offline Gmail and Calendar are not supported if you enable this new feature.

Clearly, you need to be specially aware of what you are doing and what it means during your workflow. This is particularly true while using the Gmail service, because you could end up sending an email from the wrong account! This is where Gmail themes come very handy. You can apply different themes to different Gmail accounts, to visually and instantly distinguish where you are standing at.

Anyway, surely this new quirk is very welcome. I wonder why Google is always hitting the nail in the head, and I certainly hope they keep performing that way.

Google Chrome running on Leopard

I received with great joy today the news that Google’s web browser, Google Chrome, has been officially released for Mac (and Linux), even if it is still tagged as beta.

Since its first appearance in the web browsers scene more than a year ago, Google Chrome has been a source of innovation the area, with isolated processes per tabs, a revolutionary javascript engine, and the great news that its source code would be freely available as open source.

Sure that many were worried by its controversial privacy-violation practices, but the openness of its source code will always allow anyone with the know-how to modify it to their own needs, and that of the worried ones (me included to some extent, I’ll give you that). Indeed there’s a project called Iron which offers precisely that: Google Chrome for the privacy fanatics.

But just as about anything that’s new, Chrome for the Mac and Linux has several shortcomings compared to its Windows version that most people are accustomed to. The Apple Blog notes a few of these issues, at least those that affect Mac users, which are probably the same features not present yet in the Linux version as well. The most striking absence, at least for me, is Gears, of which I have become extremely dependent since Gmail offline appeared. This one even comes as a great negative surprise, since Chrome is the only browser that comes with Gears bundled, and being both (Gears and Chrome) from the same provider, I kind of assumed that they were inseparable

Not everything is bad news though. Google Chrome for both platforms integrates itself very well, or so they say. At least for the Mac I can confirm it. Google Chrome feels more like a Mac app than Opera does, which is kind of surprising if you take into account that Opera has been around for the Mac since, well, forever, I guess. And according to the official announcement in Google Chrome’s blog post about this beta release, Chrome seems to blend just well with a variety of GTK themes.

I really hope that this browser and the open source project behind it continue to improve. This news today is indeed a big step, and I’m sure those differences in feature sets will become smaller with time. I also hope that projects similar to the Iron alternative appear for other platforms too. Its open source nature makes it possible for this to come true.

Having migrated to Mac not so long ago, I am aware that Apple’s default picture managing software already had this feature, although I cannot really say how it worked. I did try iPhoto for a few hours on my first days with my new MacBook, but I immediately hated it for trying to hide my pictures from me. Picasa at least respects my organizational scheme at the file-system level, instead of imposing me one, and I am still able to access my pictures through Finder.

As Picasa recognizes faces, you can add information about this people as you tag them. It can even use (and sync with) your Google Account contacts if you are signed in to Picasa Web Albums. It would be nice though, if it gave you the choice in Mac OS X to use the system’s address book instead, or alternatively. And as a side note, face recognition is not the only new feature of Picasa 3.5, also including in the package geo-tagging with a Google Maps panel withing Picasa’s interface, and more. For the time being, this new version has only been released for Windows and Mac in its English version. Non-English speaking users, or Linux fans, will have to wait a bit. Not to say that Mac people should be completely happy though, because I am still waiting for Picasa to port the very nice picture viewer that it installs on Windows.

In the mean time, I can enjoy watching a slideshow of pictures with me and my girlfriend in it, or detailing how my niece’s face has changed over time since she was born just a few years ago. Face recognition rocks. But beware, if you are a fanatic of organization, it can get become addictive!

PS: I wanted to include a screenshot, but I don’t feel right to publish an image with lots of pictures of faces and names of actual people, without their consent, and painting black areas over names and faces renders the screenshot useless for its original purpose. So I am going on without it. If you want to see it working, download the program and give it a try.