So I set out to make Livestation Apple Remote-compatible, which was actually pretty easy with Sofa Control since it lets you write your own AppleScripts to control unsupported applications. My script for Livestation has been working quite well for a few months now, so I thought I’d put it out there in case someone else finds it helpful. It’s fairly simple, but it does let you do the following with the remote:

• Enter and exit fullscreen
• Change channels
• Quit the application

A sofa control license costs $15, but the cost was worth it to me — especially when I can extend the remote functionality like this.

Without further ado, here’s the script. (Or you can download it here in a Sofa Control import-friendly format: Livestation.sofa. If you save and open the .sofa file, Sofa Control should take over from there if it’s installed.)

Source code:

Happy media-centering!

Now, to get all your Google and Exchange calendars together on your iPhone, you can just:

• Turn calendars on for your Exchange account under Mail, Contacts, Calendars settings
• Add a CalDAV account (Choose Other for the type) with your google account email address/password and calendar.google.com for the Server

iCal Exchange still comes in handy for seeing all my calendars on the desktop, but I no longer need to sync to a computer to have the most current information on my phone. Hooray!

Secondary Google Calendars

Want to connect to your other, non-main Google Calendars too? Here’s one way to do it.

Start by adding a new CalDAV account with these settings:

Server

calendar.google.com

User Name

[ long alphanumeric string specific to your calendar ]@group.calendar.google.com

Password

Your google password

Hit Next. Verification will fail. When it does, click to Advanced Settings and delete “:443″ from the Account URL. Then, go back to Account Information and replace the long address for User Name with your google account email address. Save — verification should succeed and your calendar will be added.

When my work schedule started to include more meetings, I wanted to be able to see my whole day, work and non-work, where I look at my calendars: iCal on my home and work Macs, Google Calendar, and Calendar.app on my iPhone. While not a perfect solution (it’s read-only, and only as up-to-date as your last sync), these steps will accomplish that, and for free, without any setup or subscription costs. Read on to see how I did it.

What you need

• Microsoft Entourage 2008 set up to access your Exchange account/calendar
• iCal (Mac OS X 10.5 version)
• An account with iCal Exchange, which you’ll publish your Exchange calendar to (using iCal), so you can subscribe to it elsewhere

Steps to follow

These steps were for my setup: a work Mac with Entourage 2008 and a home Mac where I sync my iPhone. Single-computer and iPhoneless setups may also be able to find something helpful here.

1. Copy your Exchange calendar to iCal with Entourage 2008

   1. On your computer with Entourage, open Entourage Preferences, then select Sync Services (under General Preferences in the sidebar).

   2. Check Synchronize events and tasks with iCal and .Mac, then hit OK. Entourage will ask you how you want to share data between iCal and Entourage. Choose the last option: Delete information from Macintosh Address Book, iCal, and .Mac.

      Caution: Take precautions (or don’t do this) if you have a MobileMe/.Mac subscription, or a calendar named "Entourage" in iCal that you use for something else.

      Selecting the Combine information option instead will let you add events to the iCal version on this computer and have them appear in your Exchange calendar. I had events duplicate themselves whenever Entourage and iCal synchronized, however, resulting in more annoyances than just using the option above and going to Entourage whenever I want to add or change an Exchange event. YMMV.

   After a few minutes, you should be able to open iCal and see a calendar named "Entourage" containing all the events from your Exchange calendar.

2. Publish the iCal copy of your Exchange calendar to iCal Exchange

   Once you’ve verified that all your events are showing up in iCal’s Entourage calendar, publish it to iCal Exchange.

   1. Right-click on the Entourage calendar in the iCal sidebar and select Publish.

   2. In the options dialog that comes up, change Publish on from MobileMe to a Private Server, then enter your iCal Exchange information (the Base URL is http://icalx.com/public/[username]).

      You can publish to http://icalx.com/private/[username] instead to password-protect your calendar, but then you won’t be able to view or subscribe to it in Google Calendar.

   3. Check Publish changes automatically so iCal Exchange will get the updated version of your Exchange calendar whenever Entourage and iCal sync. Make sure the other information you want to publish is selected as well – checking Publish alarms will give you popup reminders on your iPhone.

   When this is working, you should be able to see an HTML version of your Exchange calendar at http://www.icalx.com/public/[username]/Entourage.

3. Subscribe to your Exchange calendar

   Now that you’re publishing your Exchange calendar to http://www.icalx.com/public/[your username]/Entourage.ics, subscribe to that URL in the other calendar applications where you want to see it.

   • Subscription instructions for Google Calendar

     Google Calendar will occasionally take a little while to update its version of published calendars. Short of deleting and re-subscribing, you can only wait for this to happen since there isn’t a way to force a refresh.

   • Subscription instructions for iCal

     In the info dialog that pops up after you subscribe, uncheck Alarms (so they don’t get removed) if you want popup reminders on your phone. To minimize the redundant notifications that can result, also check one of the Turn off alarms options in iCal Advanced preferences.

     Tip: if you’re seeing an outdated version of your published calendar, refresh all calendars in iCal (via menu item Calendars > Refresh All). I’ve seen refreshing only that specific calendar fail to update it.

   You should now be able to view your Exchange calendar in your applications of choice!

4. Sync your calendars to your phone

   If you haven’t already done so, add your Google calendars to iCal.

   Once you have all your desired calendars (both Google and Exchange) in iCal on the computer where you sync your iPhone, just use iTunes to sync your phone to iCal.

To use it, bookmark this link: Show Titles, then click or otherwise activate it to make the body element titles appear on the page you’re browsing. (I have a keyboard shortcut assigned to mine.)

script results on a Cute Overload blog post with overlaid titles

What is hover text, and why would I want to see it?

As seen in the above screenshot, some image-based blogs (and web comics like Daisy Owl) supplement their images with title content that adds a little something extra. If you don’t hold your mouse over the image and read the popup, you miss something.

So why don’t I just use my mouse?

• You might want to focus on reading instead of mouse-moving, especially when you’re catching up on a backlog of entries.
• You could be on an iPhone, which has no hover functionality.

The web developer toolbar has an option for this, at Information > Display Title Attributes.

That’s true. This bookmarklet can be used in non-Firefox browsers.

Daring Fireball’s JavaScript Bookmarklet Builder easily converted this script to bookmarklet form. (Thanks, John Gruber.)

Source code:

It’s my hope that this space will come to house useful information, particularly the visitor comments I expect to learn a thing or two from. Feel free to take a look around, subscribe to the RSS feed, and join the conversation!

Thanks for reading.