Olifante's Lair

TweetDeck vs. Twhirl

(scroll to bottom for Iain's reply to my nits with TweetDeck)

Earlier today I lamented on Twitter that I get an error whenever I try to favorite a tweet using Twhirl or TweetDeck, my favorite and 2nd favorite Twitter clients for OS X. Shortly after, a Iain Dodsworth replied, pointing out that TweetDeck hasn't yet added the ability to favorite tweets, so might I not be a tad mistaken?

Well, Iain turns out to be the TweetDeck creator, who apparently pays close attention whenever the word TweetDeck is tweeted. So sorry, Iain, I am indeed mistaken: while Twhirl gives me a "limit exceeded" error whenever I try to favorite a tweet, TweetDeck doesn't yet have that functionality. It does have a button labeled F which is currently greyed out but which will presumably allow you to set favorites at some point. So for the moment, I use Twitterrific on my iPhone whenever I really want to favorite something.

Since I caught Iain's attention, I profitted from the occasion to send him a message outlining some of the reasons why, much as I like some of TweetDeck's functionality, I still prefer Twhirl. Here's the list of my nits to pick with TweetDeck:

1. Twhirl is more compact. In TweetDeck, all tweets take the same vertical space, regardless of whether they're one-liners or five-liners. This means I can see more Tweets in one Twhirl column than in TweetDeck. One simple way to regain vertical space would be to move the Reply/D/R/F buttons from below the pictures to the left or right of the pictures. Each tweet would now only be as high as the user's pics.

2. Re-ordering groups with the move left/right buttons is cumbersome. Either implement drag-and-drop for column re-ordering or add a pop-up menu where you can drag the column names up and down to their desired positions, instead of having to move them one step at a time.

3. The "All Tweets" column becomes less useful when you have created your own groups. Whenever I add someone to a group, I now see their tweets in two places. This might be the intended result for some people, but not for me. I don't have everyone I follow added to a group, only the ones I pay more attention to (friends, acquaintances, gurus). This means I have to filter the tweets I've already read when I scan the All Tweets columns for lower priority tweets. A simple workaround for this problem would be to create an "Ungrouped" column and allow me to use that instead of the "All Tweets" column.

4. Allow me to fit more than one group in one column. I don't have TweetDeck running all the time, so some columns are empty or mostly empty much of the time, such as the "Direct Messages" one.

5. Allow me to resize the width of each column, so I can fit more on the screen at the same time.

6. When I click on one of the fast access buttons (Replies/Direct/Twitscoop/12seconds), do not add a duplicate column if one already exists.

7. Allow me to mark a tweet as a favorite ;-)

Notwithstanding these nits, TweetDeck has several appealing features, such as:

1. Being able to place the people you're following to different groups and display each group in its own column.

2. Built-in search, including the ability to create a self-updating search column (I presume this is how Iain found my tweet).

3. Built-in URL shortening, with the ability to choose your favorite service (currently I mostly use http://is.gd).

4. Built-in support for TwitScoop, letting you see what are the "hottest" words being tweeted in the twittosphere.

5. Built-in support for 12seconds.tv, a cross between twitter and seesmic, where instead of posting 140 character status updates you post 12 second videos. Haven't tried it out yet, though.

6. Update: I forgot to mention one of TweetDeck's conveniences, which is the nifty Twitter API status indicator in the lower right-hand corner. This is useful whenever there's trouble in the twittosphere.

On the other hand, Twhirl has a few tricks of its own up its sleeve:

1. Support for Seesmic, which is currently the dominant video micro blogging platform. Nevertheless, I've tried Seesmic and found it a bit boring, with too many rambling monologues. Perhaps the 12 second limitation could prove as liberating as the Twitter 140 character limit.

2. Support for friendfeed, Paul Bucheit's wonderful life feed aggregator.

3. Ability to crosspost to Pownce and Jaiku.
   Update: I just checked out my Pownce account, and it seems like only some of the tweets sent using Twhirl are reaching Pownce, so this feature is only half-working (and I'm not talking about tweets sent via other clients, which of course won't be automatically crossposted to Pownce). I can't confirm whether the same happens with Jaiku, since I don't have an account there.

I really enjoy these last two features, so for the moment Twhirl has my heart.

2008-09-22 Update -- Iain's reply

Iain replied via email 10 minutes after I sent him an email, but I was busy writing this post so I didn't notice it. Here's his answers to my nits:

1. Twhirl is more compact
   Iain: removal of tweet buttons implemented in next version

2. Re-ordering is cumbersome
   Iain: due to be implemented in a near future version

3. "Ungrouped" column
   Iain: All Tweets column is removable in the next version, good idea on the ungrouped column - I'll get that implemented

4. More than one group in same column
   Iain: unused columns are removed from view in the next version

5. Resizable columns
   Iain: working on this - BUT I have to be careful to not ruin the look of TweetDeck, I've tried different height tweets and they completely ruin the feel

6. Buttons add duplicate columns
   (this nit was missing from my first email to Iain, so no answer from him yet)

7. Favorite tweets
   Iain: implemented in next version

På Marken

Here's a new piano piece, dedicated to my good friend Hans Verner Poulsen.

Paa Marken by olifante

Using Automator to move all Opera tabs to Firefox

Although I was interested when Automator.app was announced as one of the new features in Tiger, for some reason I never got around to trying it out. I guess I feared it would be more complicated than it actually is. You just need to learn a couple of new words: Action and Workflow.

An Action is an indivisible task, such as "New Folder", "Play DVD", "Get Current Webpage from Safari", "Set iTunes Volume". Automator comes loaded out of the box with hundreds of actions for most of the applications bundled with Mac OS X, such as Finder, iTunes or Safari. Actions may accept input and produce output: For instance, "Text to Audio Files" expects a text string and returns a file. Many Actions do not expect input or produce any output.

A Workflow is just a sequence of Actions, where the output of one Action is passed as input to the next action.

Having grasped these profound concepts, I then tried to figure out how to automate a repetitive task that I perform regularly. I often want to transfer all open tabs from Safari and Opera to Firefox, which is were I like to consolidate my tabs and save them for later reference with "Bookmark All Tabs".

Unfortunately, none of Automator's bundled Safari Actions let you handle tabs, and there aren't any Actions for 3rd party apps such as Firefox or Opera.

Luckily, there's a very handy Action called "Watch Me Do", which lets you record a sequence of Events (i.e. mouse clicks and keyboard presses) and thus replay your interactions with any application, regardless of whether it is supported by an Automator Action. This is what the resulting Workflow looks like:

Uploaded with plasq's Skitch!

Only the shortcuts might require some explaining, although they're pretty basic:

• ⌘L focuses the location bar and selects the current URL (works in most browsers)
• ⌘C copies the selected text
• ⌘W closes the current tab
• ⌘T opens a new tab
• ⌘V pastes text from the clipboard

The penultimate Event is recorded as "Type ' " for some reason, but actually stands for pressing Return on the keyboard, which opens the URL in the newly created tab. The rest is pretty self-explanatory.

The last Event is needed to return focus to Automator, allowing me to interact with the dialog box which is opened by the next Action in my Workflow, "Loop", which allows you to repeat the first Action of a Workflow any number of times. I don't want it to go on forever, so after moving one tab from Opera to Firefox it asks me if I want to continue. Fortunately, since focus has returned to Automator, this is as simple as pressing Return on the keyboard.

This is just skimming the surface of Automator. Actions are actually small programs written in AppleScript, so you can create your own Actions to automate your applications. Some non-Apple applications are very AppleScriptable, while others are not (Opera and especially Firefox, I'm looking at you). To investigate the AppleScript Dictionary of an application, just fire up "/Applications/AppleScript/Script Editor.app" and open that application with "Open Dictionary".

You can also download new Actions from several sites, such as Apple Automator Actions, Automator World, automator.us and Automator Actions.

If you're not a big fan of AppleScript or are just plain lazy (a.k.a. healthy), fear not. Unix mavens can use the "Run Shell Script" to do all kinds of unix hackery to their heart's content, while Python fans such as myself can download the "Run Python Script" from Apple itself.

For Anders

For Anders by olifante

I'm publishing another piano piece, this time dedicated to my friend Anders Bech, who acted as a mentor when I started playing the piano 20 years ago in Denmark. Here's Anders having fun with a Keith Jarrett piece (from the Köln Concert, if I'm not mistaken):

Anders introduced me to several easy piano pieces which I came to enjoy a lot, including my first modern piano pieces (by composers such as Paul Hindemith, Harald Genzmer, Aram Khatchaturian and Igor Stravinsky) and my first jazz piano pieces.

For Anders

Like "Sorrow for Sara", "For Anders" was typeset with LilyPond 2.10.33-1, assisted by LilyPond Tool for jEdit.

Sorrow for Sara

Sorrow for Sara by olifante

Copyright © 2008 Tiago Castro Henriques, some rights reserved

In Memoriam Sara Custódio, 1990-2008

Sorrow for Sara