springcleaning
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Feedly promises 'seamless' transition after Google Reader to its own backend
If you (like many of us at Engadget) are in a state of shock facing the end of Google Reader this summer, there may be an easy replacement. RSS app/service Feedly posts on its blog that it has been anticipating the shutdown of Google's service for some time, and invested in building its own backend. Dubbed "Normandy" it is intended to be a clone of the Google API running on Google's own App Engine, set to swap in on July 1st when the service ends. Even better, in the comments Feedly states it will open the API for other 3rd party clients once everything is stable. The only bad news? If you're considering jumping onboard you're not the only one -- Feedly's servers are pretty crushed right now, so you know, just test the waters out some time in the next few months.
Disk Art visualizes hard drive space usage
When an email from the Clean Cut Code, the makers of Disk Art, showed up in our inbox yesterday, I jumped at the chance to take a peek. I'm a huge fan of Grand Perspective's space visualization software and am always happy to try out another app to see how it compares. Disk Art, which is launching at US$0.99 (regular retail $4.99), aims to provide a "colorful and interactive map" of your drive, help you find "large unwanted files." On the positive side, Disk Art is quite pretty to look at. Its drive/folder selection screen (following image) is especially eye-catching. And while I wouldn't quite call the disk presentation "art" (see the screen capture at the top of this post), it's pretty enough with block patterned layouts. The problem with Disk Art is that it's not terribly good at performing the task its meant to complete: detecting disk use so you can identify and remove unneeded files, especially big ones. That's because Disk Art uses a hierarchical presentation. You have to navigate up and down the file system to find those large files. Compare and contrast with Grand Perspective which shows all the files at once, regardless of where they are in the file hierarchy. With Grand Perspective, you see what's big and unwieldy because the larger items immediately catch your eye. Everything is out there, so you get that sense of, forgive me, perspective. With Disk Art, you're looking at Folders much more often than you're looking at files. You can see which folders are taking up more space, but it's hard to detect the outlier files -- the ones most ripe for deletion. Admittedly, Disk Art does make it easy to collect files for deletion. It provides a handy drag and drop area, so you can add files that you want to mark as ready-for-trash. Grand Perspective's take on this is to reveal items in Finder, letting you drag them directly to the trash, plus a handy Rescan option lets you take a second look after you've deleted an item so you can pick the next most-ready target in your clean-up. Both apps let you scan either folders or entire disks. And here is where Disk Art does succeed better. Its scanning progress window (towards the top of this post) is much prettier and glossier. It's a pity then that the rest of the app just doesn't feel as functional to me.
Spring clean your Mac with Erica and Steve: A TUAW live chat
Join us as we chat about breathing new life into your current Mac. As many of us have experienced, our once speedy Macs eventually seem to slow down and start wheezing. Most of the slowness can be avoided or reversed with a little spring cleaning now and then. During today's live chat, we'll be sharing tips, answering questions, and letting you jump in to help share your own expertise with others. Feel free to comment, ask questions, and otherwise be part of the crowd, but be forewarned that being snarky or mean to your hosts or other guests will cause the banhammer to descend on you. And here we go! <a data-cke-saved-href="http://www.coveritlive.com/mobile.php/option=com_mobile/task=viewaltcast/altcast_code=de06d8bc9d" href="http://www.coveritlive.com/mobile.php/option=com_mobile/task=viewaltcast/altcast_code=de06d8bc9d" >Clinic: Spring Clean Your Mac</a>
Friday TUAW Clinic: Spring clean your Mac with Erica and Steve
Spring is the traditional time to shake off the clutter of winter and do some cleaning. With Mac owners, it's a good time to think about doing the same thing -- getting rid of the junk that piles up on your machine, cleaning out excess log files, etc... To get you prepared for some spring Mac cleaning over the weekend, Erica Sadun and I will be hosting a live "clinic" tomorrow at 11 AM EDT here on TUAW. We'll start at 11 AM sharp, but you may wish to arrive a few minutes early to log into the CoverItLive system, which is what we'll be using to host the talk. Throughout the chat, we'll be capturing questions and providing answers as best we can, and we always like to hear from our readers about their favorite Mac spring cleaning tips. See you here tomorrow morning bright and early! And don't forget to bring your can of Lemon Pledge!
Download now, or forever hold your points: Potential delisted Xbox Live Arcade titles
Our Xbox-toting brethren at 360 Fanboy recently came across a list of Xbox Live Arcade titles which may be up for expungement in Microsoft's spring cleaning of their online store. The list (available after the break) includes all titles that fulfill the first and second criteria of Microsoft's new standards -- that is, they've been available for six months, and currently hold a 65 percent or lower average score on Metacritic. A steady conversion rate (the number of people who purchase the complete title after downloading the demo, a figure only Microsoft has access to) is the only thing standing between these games and a date with the delete button -- so if you've been holding out on downloading Shrek-N-Roll, you may want to pick it up in an expedient manner.
Spring Cleaning now Universal
Spring Cleaning, the system optimization, cleaning, and uninstaller utility from Smith Micro is now a Universal Binary. Completely rewritten from the ground up, version 9 introduces a wealth of new features and tools, such as a Task Scheduler, Permissions Fixer, a Housekeeping Scripts Runner, Spotlight Index Rebuilder, System Cache Cleaner, and others, in addition to a reworked interface. $49.99 for the package, or $19.99 for upgrades. Requires OS X 10.4. Although I can't vouch for this application, I will recommend OnyX for folks looking for something similar, and for free. I usually make sure to crack OnyX open every month or so for a bit of housekeeping of my own.(via Macworld)
