..idle writings from an idle mind..

Apple have very specific design rules for applications that run on OS X — you could sum a bunch of them up by saying something like “thou shalt not fuck with how the application looks”.

With the release of iTunes 10, they’ve gone and broken their own rules with awful new left-aligned window resize and close buttons; see the attached example.

While there’s many other things to dislike with iTunes 10 (just one example .. the new application icon that appears to have been created by an junior artist lacking in time, talent or both); this one is at least fixable — open a terminal window and run the following command:

defaults write com.apple.iTunes full-window -1

Restart iTunes and the buttons are back to where they ought to be.

If you decide you really prefer the new button location (what? why!?), you can reverse the above command with the following:

defaults write com.apple.iTunes full-window 0

- zac.

Quick iPhone App review – OnTheFly by ITA Software, the genius behind the fare shopping engine that many airlines use (and they’re nice enough to make it available to the public – try it out for yourself!)

The app allows you to search for fares from A to B, and allows you to define up to three airports at each end – this can help uncover fares you mightn’t have otherwise considered; e.g., flying to London could mean going to LHR, but you might find a better fare going to LGW or (heaven forfend) STN – all of them are about as inconvenient as each other in getting in to London proper, so worth considering if London is your final destination.

You can drill down further by dates (with possibly one of the best date selectors I’ve ever seen), number of pax, departure/arrival times, stops, cabin and a few other things besides. The one annoying thing is that it only offers whY/J/F cabins to be selected – no whY+.

The search results can be rearranged a number of ways – once you’ve chosen outbound/inbound flights, you can then see the flight and fare details – the fare output is particularly good as you see the underlying booking class and fare used to price up the flight, including a full breakdown of taxes and surcharges. Nice!

All in all a great app – while it would have been nice to see options for searching multi-stop fares, for the pricetag you really can’t complain .. a definite must for anyone wanting to see what fares and options are actually available without bias from airlines or travel agents!

oneworld, that fun-loving group of airlines has announced that they have a new member elect in form of Air Berlin. What’s curious about this is that Air Berlin have long been considered a low cost carrier, yet they have trimmings like long haul business class (not lie-flat yet but apparently in the works), lounges and a frequent flyer program.

Air Berlin have a laundry list of destinations in western Europe and a selection of longer haul destinations in eastern Europe, Asia, North America and the Caribbean. It’s an interesting network, but a lot of it is served from DUS and TXL – which aren’t served by any of the non-European oneworld carriers.

Air Berlin joins other members-elect waiting to join oneworld: S7 Airlines and Kingfisher Airlines.

On the way home on the tram, minding my own business when we come to a standstill between stops. Tram in front of us == teh borken. Ut oh!

To the drivers credit, he kept everyone updated on what was going on – when it became clear that the tram in front of us was not going anywhere in a hurry, he opened the doors to allow those who wanted off to walk up to the next station. Not really keen on the idea of sitting on a tram for an indeterminate period of time, I got off and used the awesome tramTRACKER app to find another way home.

This story is only mildly entertaining, however I was impressed at how quickly the problem was dealt with .. something you don’t expect from any public transit operator, anywhere, ever.

Fun times.