Mac OS X on a Powerbook G4

"Hithlum"

This page describes the setup and configuration of my 17-inch Powerbook G4 named Hithlum.

Hithlum is named after the region north of Beleriand in Tolkien's Middle Earth. "Hithlum" is Sindarin for "Mist-shadow". I had originally wanted to name her Hísilómë, but the accents were just too much for the Terminal to handle.

The nomenclature of Hithlum's primary network is based upon regions of fantasy novels. Macintoshes are named after lands in J.R.R. Tolkien's works. Linux machines are named after countries in Guy Gavriel Kay's novels.

Hithlum:

Entered service on November 6th, 2005.
Standard 100GB HFS+ Mac OS X hard drive.
2x 250GB Seagate HDs attached via Firewire.
Running Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger).
LCD failed in December, 2006. Replaced.
Current status: IN SERVICE.

Hithlum serves as the primary media hub for our household in addition to its normal laptop duties. System configuration and application configuration details can be found below.

More regular updates can be found in the Hithlum Log section of my blog.

System Configuration

Leopard Specific Commands:

defaults write com.apple.dock showhidden 1 turns hidden applications semi-transparent in the dock.
defaults write com.apple.dock pinning -string start; killall Dock pins the Dock to the side ( -string end puts it on the other side or bottom.)
sudo defaults write /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.WindowServer EnvironmentVariables -dict CI_NO_BACKGROUND_IMAGE 0.62 (followed by a reboot) removes transparency from the menu bar.

Hithlum is running Mac OS X Tiger (10.4), so there's not a whole lot of system tweaking that needs to take place.

Turn off .DS_Store file creation over network connections. Be a good network citizen, don't clutter up other drives with .DS_Stores. Use:
defaults write com.apple.desktopservices DSDontWriteNetworkStores true

to turn it off. This is a per-user setting.
Automatically remove .DS_Store files from local filesystem. Add to root's crontab:
15 3 * * * root find / -name ".DS_Store" -depth -exec rm {} \;
Turn autocomplete ON, DAMNIT.
Disable SSH-1 and force SSH-2 only. In /etc/sshd_config, change:
#Protocol 2,1

to:
Protocol 2

Don't forget to restart sshd.
Speed up Cocoa apps when selecting text while dragging and dropping:
defaults write -g NSDragAndDropTextDelay -int 100
Speed up Mail by running a vaccuum cleaner on Mail's Envelope Index:
sqlite3 ~/Library/Mail/Envelope\ Index vacuum index;

Add this into user's monthly crontab.
Enable some preferences in Disk Utility:
defaults write com.apple.frameworks.diskimages internal-preferences-enabled -bool yes defaults write com.apple.frameworks.diskimages burning-preferences-enabled -bool yes

Application Configuration

My application structure is not yet fixed, so the best place to review this is in my weblog. The latest application post was made on 18 October 2007.

Resources

Macworld Review