Dot Mac

Here is an interesting tutorial for developing .Net apps in OS X using the Eclipse IDE. The XCode equivalent is CSharpPlugin. If a native IDE isn’t important to you, running Visual Studio via VMware works just fine too.

Update: from IBM: Migrate .NET applications from Visual Studio to Eclipse: The Emonic plug-in and NAnt give .NET and C# capability to Eclipse

Why is there no basic paint application in OS X? Sure, there are dozens of free applications that do the same thing, but it seems like a useful thing to have for users who don’t need anything more complex.  After all, a drawing application was the first application created for the Macintosh, before even the operating system.  I’m sure there is a philosophical or marketing reason behind it, but I can’t think of any.

Most adult Windows users who use Microsoft’s Paint actually use it to save screen shots, which is easier in OS X with Preview’s “Grab” menu or keyboard shortcuts.

One of the nice touches of OS X is the use of the Helvetica typeface for rich-text editing in TextEdit and other programs. Microsoft’s version of Helvetica is Arial, which is basically a lower-quality rip-off of the original. (To understand my attraction to Helvetica, I recommend watching Helvetica, the documentary.)

However, in Vista/Office 2007, Microsoft released the ClearType Font Collection, a great new set of fonts, including several designed especially for viewing text on computer screens. The two I find particularly useful in this regard are Cambria, which is optimized for viewing small text, and Consolas, which is a monospaced font useful in programming and the like.

So how do you get these fonts in your Mac? Well, they come with Office 2008 for the Mac. After you install office, just go into your favorite editor’s preferences and select Cambria and/or Consolas as your default font.

If you don’t have Office 2008, things are a little trickier. This tutorial will guide you through installing the fonts in Windows and Linux – and OS X, if you install the required Linux utilities via something like MacPorts. Office 2004 users can get some of the fonts with the Open XML Converter. If you have a Vista computer, you can copy them from C:\WINDOWS\Fonts to /Library/Fonts. If you have a pre-Vista OS, you can get them with the free Powerpoint 2007 viewer. If you are still out of luck, you can always purchase them directly from the foundry.