The Book of Words (2.1)

FinderPop is a Universal Preference pane that extends OS X's contextual menus using a FinderPop Items folder much as the Apple Menu Items folder used to do for the Apple menu. It has other features too:

• Control-free popup in the Finder - handy for those with one-button mice.
• a launcher that takes up zero screen real estate, merely a click on any blank area of menubar away,
• a handy filesystem browser, allowing quick and easy access to files and disks in the Finder,
• a Processes menu (Command-click a blank menubar area.)
• fast access to 'Where's that dratted file I had on the Desktop?' (Shift-Click a blank menubar area.)
• a comprehensive collection of vaguely beer-related aphorisms in the Aboutbox (and now also here.)

The Basics

INSTALLATION
If the System Preferences application is running, quit it. Strange things can happen otherwise.
Double-click the FinderPop.prefpane icon. System Preferences will open and ask if you want to install FinderPop for all users or just you. Choose, and MacOS X will install the Preference Pane.

If you have an Intel Mac or you're running 10.5 or later, FinderPop will ask you for the admin password in order to set certain permissions on some FinderPop files. This is only done once at installation time.

USAGE
Open the FinderPop preference pane. Click on the Show FinderPop Items Folder button in the Items sub-panel. Add aliases to your favourite applications, folders, documents, and whatnots to that folder. Now, every time you control-click, you'll get a few more options...

To the right is my FinderPop Items folder and the corresponding FinderPop menu. Simply put, FinderPop will try to open whatever it is you select from any of its menus. If there is a Finder selection and you've chosen an application from the FinderPop menu, FP will ask the app you chose from the menu to open the Finder selection. For example: you want the ability to Stuff the Finder Selection? Add an alias to "DropStuff" to the "FinderPop Items Folder", select your files in the Finder, Control-click on the last file in your selection, choose "DropStuff" from the resulting FinderPop submenu, and Bob's your mother's brother. Items generally appear in FinderPop Menus in alphabetical order. You can control this ordering process by inserting an ordering prefix before the item's name in the Finder. This ordering prefix consists of three characters at the start of an item's name, where the third character is a right parenthesis ')' and neither of the first two characters is a left parenthesis. This prefix text will not appear in the menu. Note that you can choose among various standard orderings in the "Sort Items in FP Menus" popup in the Appearance tab: for example, order by modification date, order alphabetically, or an ordering where applications appear first, then folders, then other documents (with alphabetic ordering in each of those sub-groups.) Note also that this setting overrides any sort order you may have specified with the ordering prefixes mentioned above. Any item inside the FinderPop Items Folder whose name ends in '-***' (that's minus-star-star-star) is considered to be a menu dividing line, following the convention set by James Walker's OtherMenu.

Extending the OtherMenu convention somewhat, any folder -- or alias to one -- whose name ends in '-!!X' (minus-pling-pling-capital-ecks) will not be expanded (i.e., there will be no submenu hanging off it.) The name displayed in the menu will not have the '-!!X' suffix, so the FinderPop menu is aesthetically pleasing (even if, like so much else, the underlying organisation isn't.) If the folder's name ends in '-!!x' (minus-pling-pling-lowercase-ecks) then, in addition to not being expanded, no folder icon will appear. Back in the days when I was receptive to all sorts of mad ideas for FinderPop, I put that no-icon thing in for someone who claimed that FinderPop was "fundamentally flawed" without it.

Any item ending in 'mbar!!!!' will only appear when you click a blank portion of the menubar.

Any item ending in 'fsel!!!!' will only appear when you have control-clicked an item (ie., there is a file or folder selected).

We freely admit that that the user interface for this really is fundamentally flawed, but until we have the time to improve this, I'm afraid we're stuck with it. Hey, you only have to do it once!

Invoking FinderPop

• Control-click or right-click somewhere - this brings up a Contextual Menu as per normal; FinderPop attaches itself onto this menu by adding the contents of the FinderPop Items folder, and optionally adding the Processes and Desktop submenus. You can choose whether the contents of the FinderPop Items folder are inlined directly into the contextual menu, or whether they appear in a FinderPop submenu. If you have the Caps Lock key pressed when the main FinderPop menu pops up, the state of "Inline FinderPop Items into Main Contextual Menu" is toggled. Remember to turn the Caps Lock key back off! If you have enabled "Control-free Contextual Menu Popup In the Finder" (Options panel), you can click and hold in a Finder Window or the desktop and a contextual menu will pop up on whatever it is you clicked on. You can also arrange to have FinderPop pop up a Contents menu if you click-and-hold on a Folder. Command-clicking-and-holding on the whitespace inside a Finder window will also pop up a Contents menu, as of course will Command-Control-clicking on either the whitespace or a folder.

• Clicking an unused portion of the menubar will pop up a FinderPop menu (i.e., the contents of the FinderPop Items folder plus optional extras.)
  (You can also set that this only happens for a control-click (or right-click) in the menubar.)

• Command-clicking the menubar will get you a Processes Menu. Holding down the Control key too will include the normally invisible background processes. From here you can switch to any process, or quit them by pressing Control-Option-Command (the cursor will change to ), and clicking on the victim process in the menu. If the app doesn't respond to the 'Quit' AppleEvent, you can really kill it by holding down the Shift key in addition to Control-Option-Command (though be warned - this blows the process away without saving opened files, etc.) Running apps that are hidden (via Command-H) appear in FinderPop's Processes menu with their icons dimmed. Note that the other FinderPop menu items (Desktop submenu etc.) are still available.

• Shift-clicking the menubar will get you a Desktop Menu listing the mounted volumes (disks) plus the contents of the Desktop Folder. (If the Control key is pressed, only the disks will be shown. I'm sparing you the 150+ items on my desktop here - and if you think that's bad, you should see my real desk! I am a firm believer in the First Available Surface filing system.

Navigating the FinderPop Menus

As usual with menus in OS X, typing a character will select the first menu item beginning with the character typed, which can save quite a bit of mousing.
Be aware that the OS X Menu Manager appears to do some very time-consuming processing if you are in a deep hierarchy and press any non-modifier key. It is not unusual to get a beachball for a few seconds, but don't worry, the menu manager will eventually come back to life. It appears to be scanning all menu items for items beginning with the character you pressed. For this reason, the use of Cmd-Option-Shift modifier keys is preferred when invoking the various FinderPop features described below. Note: this bug appears to have been fixed in Leopard!

Additionally, by pressing various modifier keys (Control, Command, Option and Shift) while traversing FinderPop menus, you can modify FinderPop's actions. The list below outlines the facilities available if there is no Finder selection while you're traversing any FinderPop-related submenu. You should notice the mouse pointer changing as indicated.

• Command (or 'r') -- Reveal In Finder or Show -- cursor looks like :
  Shows the chosen menu item (process or FinderPop item) in the Finder. If you press 'r' (as opposed to pressing Command), the action is immediate - the Finder displays the item. If you're pressing Command, then you select the item from FinderPop's menus as normal - once you've chosen the item, the Finder will display it.
  With regard to the first sentence in this section, if you want to select a menu item beginning with 'r', type Shift-'R', i.e., capital-'R'.

• Command-Option (or 'i') -- Get Info -- Displays an info-help-tag window for the currently selected item in the FinderPop menu. If you press i then this has immediate effect - the menu disappears and the Finder displays the Get Info panel corresponding to the currently highlighted item. If you're pressing Cmd-Option and you want to see the Finder Get Info panel, you have to click to choose an item. Before you click, though, FinderPop displays the help tag window for the currently highlighted item - and you can move the mouse to other items; the help tag window will update as appropriate. Different text appears depending on whether the mouse is currently over a plain file, a directory, an app, a running process, or a disk (volume.) This can be quite handy to see the creator and type of an unknown item: just Command-Control-click a blank spot in the Finder window in which the item lives, and from the ensuing FinderPop Contents popup menu, press Command and Option and mouse down to your item. Other info, such as file sizes and permissions, also appears there.

• Command-Shift-Option (or 'p') -- Preview --

  Displays a preview-help-tag window for the currently selected FinderPop menu like the two examples below.

  This behaves like the Get Info cursor above. Note that it can take a while for a graphical preview to appear if the file is big or on a slow disk!

   

  Graphical previews are done for any QuickTime-supported multimedia (JPEGs, PDFs, MOVs etc); text files are also previewed. MP3 files are scanned for embedded JPEGs. You can thank a sudden strike by the Iberia ground crew in Barcelona airport for that one. (It meant my weekend in Amsterdam got canceled so I spent the time working on this instead.) Shower-o-shaggers...

• Control-Command-Option (or delete) -- Trash --
  Displays a dialig asking if you'd ike to move the chosen FinderPop menu item to the trash (or "put away" a disk if a disk is selected.) If you press Delete then this has immediate effect - the menu disappears and the 'Do you want to move this item to the trash' dialog appears immediately. If you're pressing Ctrl-Cmd-Option, you have to select the item by pressing the mouse button before the 'Move to Trash?' dialog appears.
  Note that if the item you chose to trash is an alias, only the alias will be moved to the trash.
• Command-Control-Option (or delete) -- Quit or Kill--
  When you're mousing over FinderPop's Processes menu, you can quit a process by choosing it after pressing delete so the cursor goes into kill mode. You can also quit background-only apps. (To see background-only apps, have the Control key pressed when you move the mouse onto the Processes menu title, or press Control and Command while clicking a blank portion of the menubar.) Note that running apps that are hidden via (Command-H) appear in FinderPop's Processes menu with their icons dimmed.
  If the Shift key is not pressed, then FinderPop will send a 'quit' AppleEvent to the process, giving it a chance to quit in an orderly fashion by asking you if you want to save any modified documents, for example. If Shift is down, FinderPop will kill the process via _KillProcess, which basically blows the process away. Any unsaved work in that process will be lost, so caveat user!
• g -- grab-and-drag the FinderPop item under the cursor, just like the old OS 9 FinderPop. The Grab cursor looks like .
  This has immediate effect - the instant you press 'g', the menu disappears and the item is available for dragging.
• q -- on Leopard, display a QuickLook panel of the selected FinderPop item. Similarly, this has immediate effect - the instant you press 'q', the FinderPop menu disappears and the item is quicklook-ed.

• TAB -- Info Window -- (10.4 and later only!) Pops up a floating info window on whatever you select from the FinderPop menu, looking like this image. It displays a little preview of whatever it was you'd selected; plus some basic info on the file/folder/volume. If the item is a picture or an MP3 file, various useful bits of info are also presented, as in the example. If the item is a file, the preview sub-panel will display the first few lines of the file (if it's a text file), or optionally a hex dump of the first hundred or so bytes in the file if you option-double-click the Preview area. If the item is a folder, a really small representation of its contents will appear there. (You can't yet select items in that mini-contents-representation.)

  From this info-window, you can:
  
  • Click on the Trash icon or press Delete to move the item to the trash. You will not be asked to confirm, so be careful!
  • Click the magnifying glass icon or pressing R will reveal the item in the Finder.
  • Click on the Info icon or pressing I will ask the Finder to display information about the item. (Holding down Shift while clicking or typing will reveal the item in the Finder and get info on it.)
  • Press Escape or click the Dismiss button to dismiss the info window.
  • Press Return or Enter to open the item (double-clicking the preview also does this.)
  • Click the item's icon or preview area to open it. Command-clicking it will reveal it in the Finder.
  • Option-double-clicking the preview area toggles a hex dump of the first 0x68 bytes of the file's data fork (if the item is a file.)
  • You can also control-click the icon to bring up a new contextual menu for the item. (Click-and-hold for control-free popup works too.)
  • Drag-and-drop of the icon works. As usual with drags on the Mac, dragging to the menubar and letting go aborts a drag, you can Command-Tab to the Finder or another app while dragging. If you're dragging to the Finder and want to Copy or Alias the item instead of moving it, use the Option key modifier to get the Finder to Copy, and the Command-Option modifiers to get the Finder to Alias.
  • Double-clicking the pathname string will copy the path string to the clipboard and dismiss the dialog.
    
  • You can move the FinderPop Info Window by its titlebar or by dragging from any non-button item.
  • Command-clicking the filename or pathname texts will pop up a Contents menu of the item's parent folder.

  This may eventually evolve into a shelf thingy, but at my rate of development... well, don't hold your breath...

  Sorry about the crappy icons, they're the best I could find/cobble together on short notice. Hey... any graphic artists reading this who'd like their names to appear in the FinderPop AboutBox? Submissions gratefully received!
  I'll add more features to this dialog if requested - suggestions welcome.

If there is a Finder selection, FinderPop automatically changes the cursor if it's over a menu item representing a folder while traversing a FinderPop related menu. The cursor will change to a to signify that the Finder selection will be copied to whatever directory you select. Note that if you do select a folder in this case, FinderPop will always ask for confirmation:

(Pressing the initial letter of a button has the same effect as pressing the button, thus pressing the m key corresponds to a click on the Move button.)

The cursor will revert to the normal arrow cursor if copying would be impossible (for example, if the destination disk is write-protected, or if you were attempting to move a folder into one of its offspring.) If you manually force another cursor by pressing Command/Option/Shift/Control etc., then of course that forced cursor takes precedence.

All these modifier key chords are good piano practice, if nothing else.

Hints & Tips (or: "You know much that is hidden, O Tim.")

• • Command-Control-clicking in a Finder window (or the Desktop) will pop up a Contents menu (i.e., the contents of the folder corresponding to the window.) This can be very handy because it's sometimes easier to find a particular item in a sorted FinderPop menu than in a Finder window! If you command-control-click (or command-click-and-hold) a Finder icon corresponding to a folder, you'll also get a Contents popup menu. (There's a checkbox in the FinderPop PrefPane's Options tab which allows you to choose whether you want a plain Click-and-hold on a folder to popup a Contents menu or a contextual menu.)

• If you have the Shift key pressed when you're logging in (i.e., when your Startup Items are running), FinderPop will not install. Just like OS9 :-)

• If you have Control and CAPS LOCK pressed simultaneously when an app starts up, FinderPop won't patch that app (so menubar-clicking etc will be unavailable.)

• When switching processes by selecting something from the Processes menu, holding down the Option key will bring only that process's frontmost window forward.

• In the Move/Copy/Alias dialog, holding down the Command key when clicking any of the buttons (or typing any of the shortcut characters) will perform the button's action and then reveal the Finder window corresponding to the destination.

• In the absence of a PrefPane element for this, you can choose your own background colour for the FinderPop Info window by doing this in Terminal.app:

       defaults write com.finderpop.finderpop infoBackground -data RRGGBBAA

  where RR, GG, BB and AA are hex byte values representing the red, green, blue and alpha components of the info window's background colour. For example,

       defaults write com.finderpop.finderpop infoBackground -data 556677FA

  gives RGB = {0x5555, 0x6666, 0x7777} and an alpha of 0xFA / 0xFF == 0.980.

• Exactly the same format can be used to colour the background of the "info-help-tag" and "preview-help-tag" windows shown by FinderPop. This prefs variable is called helpTagBackground. A prefs variable called helpTagForeground allows you to set the foreground colour (the alpha portion is ignored.)
  Additionally, you can control the size of the icon displayed in FinderPop's "info-help-tag" by

       defaults write com.finderpop.finderpop helpTagIconSize -integer 128

  The example would cause FinderPop to use 128-pixel icons in its "info-help-tag" windows the next time an app is patched (these values are loaded once per app.) Setting the helpTagIconSize to 0 instructs FinderPop to not display icons in help tags.

• If you have a multibutton mouse, it is possible to get FinderPop to popup a Contents menu by clicking on a Finder folder with multiple buttons pressed simultaneously. Control-free-popup will need to be enabled too.

       defaults write com.finderpop.finderpop multiClickMaskForContents -integer 3

  ...would popup a contents menu if you clicked on a folder with both the left and right mouse buttons down. (This won't work on a Mighty Mouse, unfortunately.)

• As of 2.1pre11, Control-free popup now works by clicking-and-holding until the cursor turns into the contextual menu cursor at which point you let go the mouse button, whereupon the contextual menu appears. If you prefer the original FinderPop control-free mechanism where you had to hold down the mouse button all the time, use the following command to re-enable the original method:

       defaults write com.finderpop.finderpop originalControlFreePopupMethod true

• Buy low, sell high. Don't be like me!
  Speaking of which, I used to work for Apple on their gcc compiler team (and before that on their MPW compilers.) I left in 2002 suffering a classic case of burn-out, and promptly sold my shares for about $19 each. They have since split two-for-one and subsequently hit $200 in late 2007!
  The good news, however, is that I no longer need an alarm clock - every morning at 7:30 I wake up screaming! :-)

FAQ me!

• • Does FinderPop patch my system?
  FinderPop does not patch Mac OS X per se, instead it inserts a small fragment of code into the memory space of individual Mac OS X applications as they are being launched. This code fragment adds the various FinderPop features to contextual menus and clicks-in-unused-menubar-area.

  FinderPop does not change any of your application or system files.

  FinderPop has been tested by a gang of 40+ beta testers (see the FinderPop Beta Testing page if you would like to join them.) However, problems could still arise, such as instability in certain applications, etc. If you are experiencing problems, simply turning off FinderPop in the Preference Pane will deactivate it. If you are continually experiencing problems in a particular application, please tell me about it [ ]; you can also tell FinderPop to avoid "patching" that application by adding it to the the Excludes list in the FinderPop Preference Pane.

• • How do I uninstall FinderPop?
  If you wish to completely uninstall FinderPop, open the FinderPop Preference Pane's Etc tab, and click the Uninstall FinderPop button. If there's something bad about FinderPop that you don't like, please tell me so I can try to fix it! [ ]

• • How should I report a bug?
  If you think FinderPop made an application crash, please tell me about it! Mail me a description of what you did leading up to the crash, and also a copy of the crash log, which can be found in ~/Library/Logs/CrashReporter/application-that-crashed.crash.log

• • Is FinderPop compatible with Unsanity's FruitMenu or other CM enhancers?
  Unfortunately not. I have spent quite a bit of time on this and, eventually, on the grounds that my sanity was worth more than Unsanity, I gave up. I may well return to it at some future date. Apologies for the inconvenience...

• • Why do I sometimes see a submenu containing nothing but the words "Empty Folder"?
  This can happen because FinderPop is lazy about deciding whether a folder item should have a submenu. At the time it decides this, it only knows how many items are in the folder. It doesn't know whether the current user has permissions to see all the items inside the folder, or if all items inside it are invisible, for example. A future version of FP may fix this.

• • Why do I get a spinning beachball when I press the 'p' key for 'Preview'? (or 'i' key for info, or...)
  I think that this is down to the OS X Menu Manager's handling of keystrokes to move the menu selection (ie, pressing 'a' should take you to the first item in the menu beginning with 'a' or thereabouts.) If you are browsing a deep hierarchy and press a key, the Menu Manager appears to do a linear search of all currently visible items or something; it can take a few seconds before control reverts to the user. You can work around this bug by using only the modifier key chords - see above.

Release Notes

• 2.1 PRERELEASE 16, 24-Feb-2008 I drink with impunity ... or anyone else who invites me.
  • Fix a bug in the 'Recent Items' list (see this entry in the FinderPop Support Forum.)
  • There are too many people asking for Leopard versions to put it off any longer... rather than release this as 2.1 final, I'll make it available on www.finderpop.com (main page as opposed to beta) during the week. In the meantime, please bash on it!
• 2.1 PRERELEASE 15, 17-Feb-2008 If you can't convince them, confuse them.
  • Tweaks for 10.5.2
  • When grab-and-dragging, position the icon of the item being dragged under the mouse.
  • Also handle PNGs embedded in MP3 files (in addition to JPEGs.)
• 2.1 PRERELEASE 14, 10-Feb-2008 A witty saying proves nothing.
  • Pressing explicit keys now have immediate effect. (By this I mean pressing keys such as Backspace or Delete to bring up the 'Do you want to trash this item' dialog, or 'i' to bring up a Finder Get Info panel, TAB to switch to FP's Info panel, or 'r' to reveal an item in the Finder, will now operate immediately on the currently selected item in a FinderPop menu, as opposed to waiting for you to click the item.) If you prefer the older method, though, you can do:

         defaults write com.finderpop.finderpop immedActionOnKeyPress false

    The alternate Cmd/Opt/Ctrl/Shift modifiers method remains unchanged. Also note two new keys:

  • Press 'g' for Grab-and-Drag. Drag the selected item to other locations or programs, etc. As usual, Cmd-Tab to switch apps works during drags. Press Escape or drag the item to the menubar to abort a drag.
  • Press 'q' for QuickLook under Leopard. This is still in its early stages and because it uses qlmanage the console gets spammed with lots of messages. Sorry - will fix eventually.
  • Leopard - can now control-click on items in 'Search Results' panes (Control-free-popup still doesn't work there, sorry.)
  • If you select an item from a FinderPop menu which is an alias, ensure that if you trash the item (Ctrl-Cmd-Opt or Backspace) that we operate on the alias, and NOT the original item pointed to by the alias!
  • Fixed getting an embedded image from certain MP3 files, notably those produced by the BBC's podcasts. (Melvyn "Windbag" Bragg's In Our Time is quirky but generally very interesting.)
• 2.1 PRERELEASE 13, 3-Feb-2008 The most dangerous food of all is wedding cake.
  • Leopard - Fix FinderPop problems on cloned systems (i386.)
  • Misc UI tweaks - don't select first item when popping up in unused menubar
  • Intel Leopard contents menu of Devices and Places works now
• 2.1 PRERELEASE 12, 13-Jan-2008 The ability to quote is a serviceable substitute for wit.
  • Leopard - Contextual menu plugins in Cocoa apps should work better now (fixes MailTemplate crash.)
  • Tweaked Preference Pane; now has 'Go to FinderPop Forum' button in 'Etc.' tab.
    FinderPop Support Forum is at http://www.fnarr.net/fp.
• 2.1 PRERELEASE 11, 9-Dec-2007 I believe now would be a good time for a beer.
  • Tiger/Leopard - Control-free popup now works by clicking-and-holding until the cursor turns into the contextual menu cursor at which point you let go the mouse button, whereupon the contextual menu appears. If you prefer the original FinderPop control-free mechanism where you had to hold down the mouse button all the time, use the following command to re-enable the original method:

         defaults write com.finderpop.finderpop originalControlFreePopupMethod true

    It has to be said, however, that the new method (as used by various other utilities) is definitely better if you're on a laptop. Note that the minimum control-free delay can never be smaller than the mouse double-click time as set in the Keyboard & Mouse prefPane.
• 2.1 PRERELEASE 9/10, 28-Nov-2007 I believe now would be a good time for a beer.
  • Tiger/Leopard - fix Sort By Modification Date
  • Tiger/Leopard - fix xx) sort ordering which was broken for folders
  • Tiger/Leopard - make control-free popup more forgiving for sticky menus - click, hold, let go, browse menu
• 2.1 PRERELEASE 8, 20-Nov-2007 I believe now would be a good time for a beer.
  • Leopard: selecting something from any menu belonging to a Contextual Menu Plugin in Leopard with 2.1pre6/7 installed would cause the Finder to crash. Looks like CM Plugins are not as popular as I thought - Apple were right to relegate them to a More submenu!
• 2.1 PRERELEASE 7, 18-Nov-2007 I believe now would be a good time for a beer.
  • Leopard & Tiger: 2.1pre7 adds a sanity-check of the FinderPop prefpane path on initial install. Another alert was added to advise the user to CLOSE System Preferences before double-clicking the FinderPop.prefPane icon in the Finder as sometimes System Preferences "installs" the prefPane you double-clicked instead of first copying it to the user's "Library/PreferencePanes" folder. I have not been able to reproduce this reliably, but have seen it happen only when System Preferences was already open.
  • Leopard: Should now patch everything reliably after a first-time-install.
  • I like FDR's quote above so much I'm not going to change it :-)
• 2.1 PRERELEASE 6, 12-Nov-2007 I believe now would be a good time for a beer.
  • Leopard: automatically adding FP to the Login Items should now work all the time
  • Leopard: FP-enhanced contextual menus in Cocoa apps now work reliably
  • Leopard & Tiger: added alert in case user fails to authorise FinderPop at install time
• 2.1 PRERELEASE 4, 29-Oct-2007 No good deed goes unpunished
  • Fix a number of 10.5 issues - try to be more careful about what constitutes a contextual menu.
• 2.1 PRERELEASE 3, 25-Oct-2007 Entropy isn't what it used to be
  Got my hands on a 10.5 prerelease.
  FinderPop didn't work on either PPC or Intel. Oh dear. Spent 3 days grovelling around in gdb, nm and otool.
  On the plus side, made up some new swear-words.
  • Now works on 10.5 Leopard Intel and PPC. Lots of gnarly low-level code was completely rewritten and needs testing...
  • 10.5 PPC patcher needs to be setgid procmod. Hence FinderPop for Leopard PowerPC now asks for the admin password on first install (like Intel on both 10.4 and 10.5.)
  • 10.5 Finder no longer calls _ContextualMenuSelect, so I patch an internal system routine instead. Happily this internal routine is also called from 10.5 Cocoa apps doing their contextual menu selection. However that routine may have other non-contextual uses so I could end up inappropriately adding FinderPop stuff to non-contextual menus! If this happens anywhere, please let me know.
  • Because the 10.5 Finder no longer calls _ContextualMenuSelect, I have to cons up what "the Finder selection" is. This should be exactly the same as on the 10.4 Finder, but there may be differences. Unlikely though.
  • Completely rewritten '386 patcher to get around dyld's hissy fit "I'm not loading a bundle with a setgid executable. So there."
  • New Project Builder / XCode 3 is very pretty but incredibly slow. An advertisement for the 'Speed of Cocoa' it is not. One of my C files has about 2500 lines (I know, I know) and XCode cannot keep up with my typing as it attempts to syntax-colour on the fly. It's like being on a 9600-baud terminal again. The colours are nice though.
  • I'm seriously thinking of going back to 10.4 on my (1.42GHz PPC, 1 GB RAM) Mac Mini. Some things are prettier on Leopard, but it also seems noticeably slower. I'll play with it some more before deciding...