Piclens adds Firefox 3 and YouTube Support

If you haven't seen the PicLens extension for Firefox then I highly recommend you check it out over at the their site. It doesn't add a huge amount to your browsing experience but what it does add, it adds very well. It allows you to browse photos from sites like Google Image Search, Flickr and Facebook in a full screen enviroment that looks superb, and as the title says it now supports videos via YouTube. The latest beta also works with the newest Firefox 3.05b.

Using Quicksilver To Browse Files

How to use Quicksilver as an entirely mouse-operated alternative to Finder...

Using Quicksilver to browse your files is fairly simple, and only takes a couple of minutes to set up. The first thing that needs to be done, assuming you already have Quicksilver installed and running, is to open up the plug-ins window to install the two add-ons you'll need.

The first plug-in you'll need is called Constellation Menus. Constellation provides an alternative interface to the normal Quicksilver for when you want to use the mouse rather than the keyboard. Unfortunately, the plug-in is still in beta, but from my experience it seems stable enough for normal use. Secondly, you'll need to install Abracadabra Triggers (also still in beta), which allows you to use mouse gestures, in exactly the same way as is available in Opera or Firefox as Quicksilver triggers. This basically means you can set your computer to do anything you want in response to mouse gestures no matter what application you're using.

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It's worth nothing here that you can use the built-in Quicksilver mouse triggers rather than installing Abracadabra if you'd rather. A guide to setting up normal Quicksilver mouse triggers can be found here.
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The next step is setting up a Quicksilver trigger to launch your “file browser”. In order to do this open the main Quicksilver window and select the “Triggers” section. Select “Custom Triggers” from the left hand box, click the the + symbol at the bottom of the window and select “Gesture” from the drop down menu.

You should see a screen that looks something like this...


The box which appears to to help you set up the trigger acts in exactly the same way as the normal Quicksilver interface. In the first box select the folder you want to be opened when you activate your trigger, your home folder is probably a good bet, and in the the second box choose “Show Radial Menu”. Instead of using your home folder you can use “Finder Sidebar Items” to show the same locations that appear at the side of every Finder window. In order to use “Finder Sidebar Items” make sure “Proxy Objects” is selected under the Quicksilver section of the Catalog tab in the main window. Now click on the small grey square in the triggers column and use your mouse to draw a simple shape in the box provided… as an example mine is a circle. At this point it's probably also worth selecting “Abracadabra” in the preferences pane and choosing a mouse button to hold down when making the gesture for true mouse-only operation. Everything should be set up now, so you can close the Quicksilver window and try out your trigger.

Hold down the appropriate button on your mouse and make the gesture to see a screen something like this…


Single clicking on a folder opens it in a new Finder window, double clicking opens the folder in a new radial menu above the current one and right clicking opens a radial menu with all the possible actions Quicksilver can perform on it. If there are too many items in a folder to display at once a click the small arrow in the centre of the menu to 'flip' through the items in the folder, you'll see what I mean when you do it.

To see what I mean by the above paragraph take a look at the image at the beginning of the post.

Once you reach an item you want to open, or perform an action on, single click to perform the default Quicksilver action, or right click to being up a menu with all the possible actions. And there you have it, an easy to use file browser inside Quicksilver… but for best results make sure to play around with both the Abracadabra and Constellation settings to find the set-up which suits you best.

Enjoy…

Quicksilver – An OS inside an OS

This is my first post following my decision to move back to using Mac after years of XP and just about every version of Linux known to man. I suppose I should start with saying how excited I am to get my new 20" Intel iMac, but in reality it's been a few months since I've bought it so I'll jump straight in with my latest discovery – Quicksilver.

If you're using a OS X and you haven't heard of Quicksilver then head straight over to http://www.blacktree.com/ and download the latest version… you won't regret it.

At it's most basic level Quicksilver is an application launcher, and a very good one at that, but using Quicksilver as just an application launcher is like only using your computer to play Solitaire… although to be fair that comparison may be underplaying just how much Quicksilver can do. In many ways Quicksilver acts, as the title of this post says, as an operating system within Mac OS X. You can use Quicksilver to do virtually anything you want with your files… move them, organise them, create them, delete them, compress them, extract them and so on.

Quicksilver also integrates with any number of programs you're probably already using, if you want to change playlists in iTunes without having to switch applications then Quicksilver can do that for you with just a few keystrokes. The same can be said for sending quick notes via Mail, taking screenshots, searching the web and even making phone calls on your mobile via bluetooth. The last of which is what I'm going to explain how to do now, as an example of one of Quicksilver's innovative features.

The first step is obviously to download and install Quicksilver the same way you would any other program. Once the program is installed select “Plug-ins…” from the application menu. Select the Bluetooth module, Phone Actions and the Address Book plug ins from the list and Quicksilver should automatically install the plug-ins, without you even having to restart the program to begin using them. Once that's done select the preferences tab in the main Quicksilver menu and make sure the “Enable advanced features” box is checked. Now close the Quicksilver window and you should be good to go.

Open Quicksilver's interface (the default shorcut is Ctrl-Space) and type the name of one of your contacts. When the correct contact is selected press either the right arrow or slash to bring up your contacts details. Use the arrows to select the number you want to dial and hit tab.


Now type "dial" and select the “Dial with…” option. Hit tab again, select “Bluetooth” and watch as your mobile phone lights up on your desk and starts calling.




And if this sounds complicated at first, believe me, when you get used to Quicksilver it takes about two seconds to start a call without your fingers ever leaving the keyboard.

And this really is just one example of the thousands of different actions Quicksilver can be used for. So start exploring…