Borkware Quickies

Making "edit all in scope" work (Xcode->Hacks)

Sat, 23 Aug 2008 14:27:00 UTC

Xcode's "Edit All in Scope" feature is inexplicably tied to visible syntax colorization (actually, only Edit All in Scope for object pointers is tied to this, scalar variables and pointers work fine otherwise). So if you're not getting the Edit All in Scope menu item to enable, make sure "Color indexed Symbols" is turned on in the Xcode "Fonts and Colors" preferences.

This advice brought to you by a DTS incident.

Changing MyCompanyName (Xcode->Hacks)

Fri, 25 Jul 2008 13:16:07 UTC

You've probably noticed that source files generated from within XCode include a comment block header:

//
//  TapDance.h
//  Groovilicous
//
//  Created by markd on 7/25/08.
//  Copyright 2008 __MyCompanyName__. All rights reserved.
//

With the __MyCompanyName__ placeholder. There is no UI to change this, for obvious reasons. (Why would anyone want to easily and conveniently change something they'll otherwise need to edit in each and every source file they create. That's unpossible). The obvious solution is to drop to the terminal and run the straightforward command:

% defaults write com.apple.Xcode PBXCustomTemplateMacroDefinitions '{"ORGANIZATIONNAME" = "Borkware";}'

Seemple, no? Zee trick, she is doone.

Seeing extended attributes with 'ls' (Unix->General)

Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:54:04 UTC

Sometimes you see an @ after the directory permissions in an ls -l:

% ls -l ~/junk/SnapshotRepository.sparseimage
-rw-r--r--@ 1 markd  markd  135270400 Jul 24 20:38 /Users/markd/junk/SnapshotRepository.sparseimage

That means there's some extended attributes. use ls -l@ to see them:

% ls -l@ ~/junk/SnapshotRepository.sparseimage
-rw-r--r--@ 1 markd  markd  135270400 Jul 24 20:38 /Users/markd/junk/SnapshotRepository.sparseimage
	com.apple.diskimages.fsck	       20

Turning off Xcode's "Undo past save" warning (Xcode->General)

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 00:46:58 UTC

For some reason, Xcode thinks that an undo past the last save is something horrible that you need to be warned about. After living with unstable software, cmd-S is a habit, and undoing past it is No Big Deal. Really. Here's how to turn it off:

% defaults write com.apple.Xcode XCShowUndoPastSaveWarning NO

Making naked memory autoreleased (General->General)

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 15:52:30 UTC

(courtesy of Godfrey van der Linden, two ways of having autoreleased memory but not making the user of that memory be aware of ObjC objects)

static void *tempCopyOf(void *data, UInt32 size) {
   void *buffer = NULL;
   if (data) {
       buffer = malloc(size);
       if (buffer) {
           bcopy(data, buffer, size);
           [NSData dataWithBytesNoCopy: buffer  length: size  freeWhenDone: YES];
       }
   }
   return (buffer);
}

This works in a AutoReleased environment but it is long winded.

static void *tempCopyOf(void *data, NSUInteger size)
{
   void *buffer = NULL;
   if (data) {
       buffer = [[NSMutableData dataWithCapacity: size] mutableData];
       bcopy(data, buffer, size);
   }
   return buffer;
}

You can choose to check the buffer is not null but this avoids the more complicated malloc then alloc call of earlier.

Toggle 'screen's visible bell on and off (Unix->General)

Tue, 27 May 2008 19:48:58 UTC

Assuming ^t is the hotkey, doing ^t ^g will toggle the visible bell on and off.

Multiple Objects in one document (Photoshop->General)

Sat, 10 May 2008 00:58:01 UTC

Say you have two Smart Objects from ACR or something, and now you want them into one document so you can do some layer mask nonsense. To get them into one file do this:

Open up both files
Bring the source file up, shift-drag the layer from the palette
Drag into the image area of the target document

Opening webview links in the user's default browser. (WebKit->General)

Fri, 09 May 2008 17:46:49 UTC



...
  [someWebView setPolicyDelegate: self];
...

- (void) webView:(WebView *)webView
decidePolicyForNavigationAction:(NSDictionary *)actionInformation
         request:(NSURLRequest *)request
           frame:(WebFrame *)frame
decisionListener:(id)listener {
    NSURL *url = [request URL];
    if (url != nil) {
        [[NSWorkspace sharedWorkspace] openURL:url];
    }

}  // decidePolicyForNavigationAction

Reverting opened, but unedited files (Perforce->General)

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 17:50:44 UTC



 p4 revert -a

will revert all files that haven't actually be edited, leaving the edited opened.

(Thanks to TVL for this one)

Turning off the executable bit in Perforce (Perforce->General)

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 17:47:31 UTC



p4 edit -t text [file_list] 
p4 submit

(Thanks to TVL for this one)

Printing network traffic (Unix->Hacks)

Thu, 13 Mar 2008 21:42:09 UTC

% sudo tcpdump -Atq -s 0 -i en1

-i en1 will display traffic on your airport card. Use en0 (or nothing, for most systems) for built-in ethernettage.

You can add a host line to limit output to a particular host

% sudo tcpdump -Atq -s 0 -i en1 host zombo.com

(thanks to Dan Jalkut for this one)

Eating Brains (Debugging->gdb)

Tue, 11 Mar 2008 19:54:13 UTC

You can turn on Zombies to catch uses of objects after they have been released. Here's an easy way to do it in the gdb console:

  % gdb build/Debug/Snorkfizzle.app/Contents/MacOS/Snorkfizzle
  (gdb) set env NSZombieEnabled=YES
  (gdb) fb -[_NSZombie methodSignatureForSelector:]
  (gdb) run

Then exercise your app and trip the error.

Running a window modally (NSWindow->General)

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 23:54:36 UTC

  // I am the very modal of a modern major general.

  int blah = [NSApp runModalForWindow:[self window]];

and then elsewhere, like in your OK or cancel button

  [NSApp stopModalWithCode:NSOKButton];

Getting OS version from the command line (Unix->Random)

Mon, 11 Feb 2008 20:37:36 UTC

% sw_vers -productVersion

10.5.1

Varargs in Objective-C (General->Random)

Sun, 27 Jan 2008 22:54:55 UTC

This processes a nil-terminated sequence of strings:

- (void) snorgWaffle: (NSString *) start, ... {

    va_list argList;
    va_start (argList, start);

    NSString *string = start;

    while (string != nil) {
        NSLog (@"Done did saw string '%@'", string);

        string = va_arg (argList, NSString *);
    }

    va_end (argList);

} // snorgWaffle

and can be called like

[self snorgWaffle:@"red", @"planet", @"zeitgeist", nil];

Launch Services admin tool (Random->Random)

Thu, 20 Dec 2007 19:44:38 UTC

If you need to poke around ~~Lunch~~ Launch Services, use the lsregister tool that lives in /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Frameworks/LaunchServices.framework/Support

Today's date as a string (NSString->General)

Tue, 04 Dec 2007 16:00:26 UTC

The general solution for converting a date to a string is NSDateFormatter. Sometimes you need to generate a date string in a particular format easily. For instance if you need "December 4, 2007", you can use:

[[NSDate date] descriptionWithCalendarFormat: @"%B %e, %Y" timeZone: nil locale: nil]

(Thanks to Mike Morton for this one)

Binary Searching in a sorted NSArray (NSArray->General)

Fri, 23 Nov 2007 03:10:00 UTC

How do you binary search a sorted NSArray? Use toll free bridging to CFArray which actually has a binary search function:

    NSMutableArray *sortedArray = [NSMutableArray arrayWithObjects: @"Alice", @"Beth", @"Carol",@"Ellen",nil];
    
    //Where is "Beth"?
    unsigned index = (unsigned)CFArrayBSearchValues((CFArrayRef)sortedArray,
                                                    CFRangeMake(0, CFArrayGetCount((CFArrayRef)sortedArray)),
                                                    (CFStringRef)@"Beth",
                                                    (CFComparatorFunction)CFStringCompare,
                                                    NULL);
    if (index < [sortedArray count])
    {
        NSLog(@"Beth was found at index %u", index);
    } else {
        NSLog(@"Beth was not found (index is beyond the bounds of sortedArray)");
    }
    
    //Where should we insert "Debra"?
    unsigned insertIndex = (unsigned)CFArrayBSearchValues((CFArrayRef)sortedArray,
                                                          CFRangeMake(0, CFArrayGetCount((CFArrayRef)sortedArray)),
                                                          (CFStringRef)@"Debra",
                                                          (CFComparatorFunction)CFStringCompare,
                                                          NULL);
    [sortedArray insertObject:@"Debra" atIndex:insertIndex];
    NSLog([sortedArray description]);

    //note: NSArray indices and counts were typed as unsigned.  With the move to 64-bit, they are NSUInteger.
    //CFArray indices and counts are CFIndex, which was SInt32 but also will move to 64-bit?
    //Why was it ever signed and will it remain so?

Muchos Thankos to James Hober for this one.

Gus Mueller chimed in saying that if you use CFArrayBSearchValues, be sure to sort with CFArraySortValues rather than using the Cocoa sorting routines (or at least the comparison) - they treat diacritic marks differently, leading to strange errors. From Gus, a quick objc addition to NSMutableArray:

- (void) cfStringSort {
   CFArraySortValues((CFMutableArrayRef)self, CFRangeMake(0, [self count]), (CFComparatorFunction)CFStringCompare, NULL);
}

Making a Cocoa moby file (General->Random)

Sat, 29 Sep 2007 20:40:36 UTC

% cat /System/Library/Frameworks/Foundation.framework/Headers/*.h > ~/moby

% cat /System/Library/Frameworks/AppKit.framework/Headers/*.h >> ~/moby
% chmod 444 ~/moby

Sorting with Selectors (NSObject->General)

Sun, 02 Sep 2007 23:34:45 UTC

You can sort mutable arrays by providing a selector that is invoked on each of the elements of the array. I always get confused about NSOrderedAscending / NSOrderedDescending (I think they're actually backwards, but that's just me). Here it is in a nutcase:

Given this sort command:

    [themStitches sortUsingSelector: @selector(compareByRowLocation:)];

And this selector on the BWCrossStitch class:

  - (NSComparisonResult) compareByRowLocation: (BWCrossStitch *) thing2;

Figure out which is lesser or greater, and return one of these. Note that self is the object's logical value, not the actual value of the self pointer.

NSOrderedAsending if self < thing2
NSOrderedDescending if self > thing2
NSOrderedSame if self == thing2