rooSwitch Lite shipped with a disk image that was created using FileStorm. Previously I was using DropDMG, which is great, but I wanted something that let me use a background and position 128×128 icons on it. FileStorm was pretty easy to navigate with the UI, but I wanted to have this scripted. I had a hard time with some of it, so I’m posting my script here in hopes that it helps someone:

The script is then invoked from my “package.sh” shell script via “osascript”. That line looks like this:

Disclaimer: I’m not an AppleScript guru. I barely get around with it. I just wanted to post this because I found FileStorm’s examples lacking in some areas (although this is based largely on their examples). Again, hopefully this helps someone.

Tip ‘o the hat to Jonathan Wight for educating me in the ways of SubEthaEdit’s “Copy as XHTML” magic.

A free version of rooSwitch is now available! rooSwitch Lite 1.0 is a free version of rooSwitch that does just about everything rooSwitch does, but limits you to which applications you can switch. I’m pretty excited about this release and really hope folks give it a try and find uses for it.

A four minute screencast is available here.

There’s more information on the lite versions web page. Please give it a go and send me feedback.

Enjoy!

Screencasts aren’t easy. I wanted to have this ready for the 1.1 release but didn’t. Here it is, 24 hours late (click to play - requires QuickTime 7 and is ~15MB):

This is the first of hopefully many highlighted use cases for rooSwitch. This was written by myself and exists in the forums here. Again, if you’re using rooSwitch in an interesting way please talk about it in the forums.

My PowerBook is 10 months old now and instead of paying $300 for two more years of AppleCare for it, I decided to “trade it in” for a MacBook. I’m now at the point where my PowerBook is sold but I’ve yet to get my MacBook. I need to move the critical data (Mail and friends) from my PowerBook to my iMac for temporary usage and then later from the iMac to the MacBook. Migration Assistant is great, but it’s overkill for this. rooSwitch to the rescue.

Here’s what I did on my PowerBook (rinse and repeat per application):

1. Quit the application
2. Drop the application on rooSwitch
3. Close the rooSwitch window
4. Copy the new .rooSwitch bundle for this app to my iMac

1. open the new .rooSwitch file
2. “restore” the ‘default’ profile

Why does this work?

rooSwitch will use relative paths if it detects the files being switched are in your home directory. When you drop an application on rooSwitch it creates an initial backup of the data as it exists at that time. The applications being switched were already on both machines.

For those curious, I moved the following applications:

• Mail (this was the important one)
• NetNewsWire
• OmniOutliner (just the settings, not the docs. The docs are already on shared storage)
• K.I.T.
• Feeder
• ecto

I just published rooSwitch 1.1. As previously mentioned, the new features are:

1. Fast switching by moving files instead of copying (copy is still the default)
2. Per application preferences (move data for one app but copy for another)
3. Automator action to switch. This is cooler than it sounds With this you can pass in multiple rooSwitch files to the action and it’ll switch all the applications to the same named profile. So if you had two applications with “@home” and “@work” profiles you could easily switch them at the same time.
4. AppleScript support.

Direct download here

I’ve been using Hazel since I learned about it the week of WWDC. Hazel introduces itself as

Hazel is your personal housekeeper. Set up rules for any folder that could use some organizing and cleaning. Hazel does its work automatically and quietly in the background letting you focus on the your real tasks.

I have Hazel doing the following things:

1. Automatically empty my trash after the items have dwelled in there for a week.
2. Color new downloads blue (I do this for downloads that have existed for < 4 hours)
3. Delete downloads after 4 days
4. Color downloads that will be deleted in the next 24 hours red
5. Color recently worked on projects green (anything in the past two days)

Hazel is $16 and comes with a 14 day trial.

It’s clear that I need to be publishing the different ways people are using rooSwitch. I’ve been waffling on how to do this: Blog?, Forum? or static page? Today I installed some forum software over at http://roobasoft.com/rooSwitch/forums. Give it a look. Register a new user and add something useful .

The goal for the “rooSwitch Usage” discussion is to take some of the cooler entries and blog about them and potentially give them some space on the main rooSwitch site.

I’m not sure how this will turn out, but it’s in your hands now. Fire away.

I’m trading in my PowerBook for a bottom of the barrel white MacBook (I plan to add a 7200 RPM drive and 2GB of RAM sometime after purchase). If you need a PowerPC laptop, give mine a gander over @ eBay: 15″ PowerBook 1.67 Ghz 80GB 1.5GB SuperDrive Airport

If you “buy it now” ($1200 US) and you let me know that you read about it via my blog I’ll refund you the shipping (A $30 VALUE!!!11!!!11). I’ll also be sure to give you the coveted “A++++++” feedback on eBay (insert smilie face).

Why sell it? The PowerBook has two months left before its AppleCare runs out and I don’t want to shell out the $300 clams for AppleCare. I also don’t want an Apple laptop that isn’t covered by AppleCare. In case you’re wondering, yes, I have another PowerPC based machine (a mini), so I don’t need the PB for testing PPC bits.

I used the award winning iSale to create the post. It’s quite nice (disclaimer: I’m not an eBay connoisseur, but it seemed to make a clunky web based entry system a lot more enjoyable). If you’re going to post to eBay give iSale a try. They’ve got a pretty generous demo where you can post and monitor three items for free.

I’ve had two batteries for my PowerBook for about three weeks now. Every time I went to switch out the dead battery for the charged one I would fumble around for something to release the old battery with (nickels and quarters work well. In a pinch, a credit card works too). Just a few minutes ago I slapped myself on the forehead with this “they probably designed it this way” realization. You can use the replacement battery to pop out the dead one. See picture:

This might be common knowledge, but I didn’t know it. Oh, and this is a 15″ PowerBook G4. Not sure if this works on Mac Book (Pro)’s or not. If you have a MB(P), feel free to drop the answer in the comments.

rooSwitch 1.1 has been “almost done” for about three weeks now. Last night it became feature complete. I still have a healthy sized list of bugs to take care of. I’m pretty excited about this release. The new features, in order of coolness (I’m the judge), are:

• Preference to “move files” instead of the default “copy files”. This makes switching “instant” (Disclaimer: it’s only *instant* if the .rooSwitch and the files being switched live on the same disk partition)
• Per application preferences. If you had one application that you wanted to move files for and others that you wanted to copy files for. You’d override the defaults using the per application preferences (see screenshot).
• AppleScript support.
• An Automator action for switching.

If any of those features seems nifty to you, feel free to request access to the 1.1 betas @ http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rooSwitchBeta/ If you request access, minimally mention you saw the 1.1 announcement here and maybe mention how you use rooSwitch or what feature interests you.