UPDATE: (11 August 2006) No need for this tip anymore. The httpmail plugin is now a universal binary.

A poster at macOSXHints has noticed that you can run some older non-universal plugins on an Intel Mac by forcing Mail.app to run under Rosetta.

HTTPMail, a plugin that allows you to download your email from Hotmail’s web interface into Mail.app, is the focus of the tip.

This plugin won’t work if Mail.app is running natively on an Intel Mac. But it will if you force Mail.app to run under Rosetta:

1. Use Finder to locate Mail.app in your Applications folders.
2. Hit Command-I or Command-Click and select “Get Info” from the Contextual menu.
3. Check the “Open with Rosetta” box.

This also works with other PPC-only plugins like MailTypeSelect, a plugin that bring Finder-like “quick location” to Mail’s Message List.

The obvious downside here is that Mail will run like a knackered mule.

Tags: Apple Mail, Apple Mail Tips, hotmail, legacy plugins, mail.app, plugins, Rosetta

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First, I want to say thank you to all those who responded to yesterday’s post about making a donation to Hawk Wings.

Especially I want to thank the most generous donor, who wants no public recognition. You know who you are! Thanks.

I used some of that money this afternoon to buy an extra gigabyte of RAM for my shiny new MacBook Pro.

Now, the thing really feels supersonic.

I was getting a lot a spinning beach balls of death before. One GB is not enough to run all the apps that I use to blog at once — Photoshop and ecto (both needing Rosetta and sucking lots of memory), NetNewsWire and one web browser, sometimes two (all RAM-hungry apps).

As an added frustration, TextExpander and my other time-saving apps were starved for RAM, stuttering, barely limping along.

Now all that is fixed. My Mac is positively frisky. If your array of apps is anything like mine, I highly recommend investing the extra cash in more memory.

If you missed out on making a donation yesterday but want to, you still can. I am pretty sure that the PayPal button in the sidebar on the front page is open 24/7.

If you want to do a good turn but don’t have any money, head over to X Factor, read about the troubles of Mr Goma (Instant Apple Celebrity) and maybe sign the petition to get him a work permit.

Tags: Apple Mail, donations, mail.app, memory hungry apps, Mr Goma, Productivity, ram, Rosetta

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GroupCal offers full two-way synchronization of iCal events and to dos with Ms Exchange Server 2000 or 2003 and will appeal especially to the many Mac users trapped in a Windows world.

It also allows you to make full use of other MS Exchange features like booking people or resources for meetings, responding to meeting requests and viewing Free/Busy time.

Calendar synchronization is controlled from the app’s main window:

GroupCal 3 brought compatibility with 10.4.

GroupCal 3.01, released on Saturday, fixes a significant problem in 3.0 in which Exchange “Tasks” (i.e. iCal “To Dos”) were not being synchronized from Exchange into iCal. It also adds hotkeys to the Synchronize menu entries.

The latest version will run on Intel Macs under Rosetta but is not yet universal.

Designed for the business market, it comes complete with a corporate price tag. Licences range from USD 54.95 for a single user to USD 1.029.95 for 25 users. A free but crippled demo is available from the developer’s web site .

(I have no access to an Exchange server to test this. I even had to pinch the developer’s own screenshot).

Tags: booking resources, events, iCal, meeting requests, MS Exchange server, Rosetta, synchronization, todos

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Andreas Amann has updated Eudora Mailbox Cleaner, an app which can import emails into Mail.app from Eudora and Thunderbird.

The new version resolves aliases and symbolic links within the Eudora folder and the target folder hierarchy and improves the reading of binary data from Eudora mailboxes.

A new AppleScript is included in the disk image which will rebuild all the imported messages within Mail.app 2.x’s “Import” hierarchy.

It also improves the importing of nicknames from Eudora.

It is not yet a universal binary, but the app runs fine in Rosetta.

Eudora Mailbox Cleaner is free (donations not refused) and is available from Andreas’ web site.

Tags: applescript, email, Eudora, import, mail.app, nicknames, Rosetta, thunderbird

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So, you’re thinking about buying one of the new Intel Macs announced this week in San Francisco?

I am. There’s a shiny new MacBook Pro with my name on it out there somewhere. Or there will be.

The big question for me is not whether I’ll miss the FW800 port as much as I think I will (probably not), or whether I will kick myself for not waiting for the Rev B (probably), but whether Mail.app with all my favourite things bolted-on will run natively.

So I asked the developers of all the plugins and addons on the Top Ten things every Mail.app user should have list, how ready they were for the Intel Macs. Here’s the good news:

1. MailTags. Scott Morrison says that a universal binary will be available “hopefully” in two weeks. And as Version 1.2 with a killer new feature as well!
2. Mail Act-on. Two weeks will see a universal binary of this plug-in as well.
3. MailAppetizer. This has been a universal binary since July last year. Ready to go.
4. Mail Scripts. This has also been a universal binary since the middle of last year. Andeas Amann says that “the only potential problem might be the “Archive Messages” script since it packages some pre-complied Perl packages as well”. But if any problems exist, they’ll soon be ironed out.
5. Mail Stamps. Version 2.1 was compiled as a universal binary for Intels and PowerPCs. And it worked fine on his developer Intel Mac, Andrew Escobar says.
6. MailUnreadStatusBar. Masaru says that it’s not clear whether this utility will need a recompile or not, “because it isn’t supposed to depend on architecture”. It should work equally well on a PPC or an Intel.
7. JunkMatcher or SpamSieve. Michael Tsai says that at the moment SpamSieve runs in Rosetta with Mail.app and the SpamSieve plug-in running natively. But a recompiled version of SpamSieve is due out in two weeks and will be available as a free upgrade.

   JunkMatcher’s developer Benjamin Han wants to address some issues with his app before recompiling for Intel Macs. Due to time pressures, “it’ll probably be a while”, he says.

8. Take Control of Apple Mail in Tiger. It is my understanding that this excellent ebook will be just as helpful on an Intel Mac as it is now.
9. QuickSilver. Quicksilver and all its plug-ins were recompiled earlier this week.
10. Spell Catcher X. Evan Gross says he will post a recompiled beta of Spell Catcher X next week (when he gets back from MacWorld) that will also contain some new features and few minor bugfixes. The final release will be polished up and available long before most people get their hands on one of the new Macs.

Now there is no excuse for restraint.

You can find a longer list of all recompiled applications that are ready to run natively on VersionTracker’s MacIntel Resource Center.

Tags: addons, Intel Macs, MacBook Pro, mail act-on, Mail Scripts, mail stamps, mail.app, mailappetizer, mailtags, MailUnreadStatusBar, plugins, PowerPC, PPC, quicksilver, Rosetta, SpamSieve, Spell Catcher X, universal binary

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