Update: StickyBrain 3.4

StickyBrain 3.4 is now available. Free updates for registered users.

StickyBrain is your universal note manager. Use it to store all of the miscellaneous information that doesn’t fit neatly anywhere else. This third generation note manager makes it easier than ever to find and access your notes from any application.

It requires Mac OS X 10.3 or later.

Changes – StickyBrain 3.4
* iPhoto integration: StickyBrain 3.4 sports a new iPhoto image browser that lets user browse the contents of their iPhoto albums. Users can quickly scroll through thousands of photos (thumbnail size is user adjustable) until they find the photo they’re looking for. Then they can simply drag the photo to any note in StickyBrain. According to Jerry Halls, V.P. of Sales at Chronos, “Users have requested a quick and easy way to use the photos they already have in iPhoto in their notes. StickyBrain’s new iPhoto browser delivers: it’s super-fast and couldn’t be easier to use.”

Guide: Building Your Own Genealogy Website

If your curious about building a genealogy-based website, and want to know what’s out there, or at least a sample of what’s out there, We revamped MacGenealogy.org’s.

It was very lengthy/wordy before, and it’s one of the thing things we tackled over the past few weeks. It’s in a much more manageable format now, geared towards beginners, and we hope to make it very comprehensive over time. If you’d like to contribute examples you’ve made (using Mac-based genealogy applications or at least having a Mac involved at some point), contact us, or post a note in the forums (We have a Web/Online-Oriented forum). We are especially looking for critiques so that we can improve it.

January 31 2006 – this is currently offline as we are working on updating, including screenshots throughout the full process.

Release: Mellel 1.9 (50 New Features)

Mellel Word Processor 1.9 has been released. It’s a free update for existing users. Version 1.9 comes with 50 new features (You can read the press release for a listing here).

Mellel is an advanced, multilingual word processor for Mac OS X. Mellel offers many sophisticated and innovative word processing features, many of which cannot be found with other word processors.

Among the new features: New page styles, new style sets, ablility to create sets (or “collections”) of all types of styles (page, paragraph, note, and list) which can be used with a specific template or any new document, better image handling, template changes/additions, Aqua Interface, spelling changes, propagate list, outline promote/demote, new preference window, improved font handling, improved help.

Official Site

Changes:

* Page style: New page model: A new page model “tied” to breaks in the text, not to arbitrary page
positions.
* Page style: First page header/footer: Show or hide the header or footer on the first page. Makes it
easy to have numbering show only from page 2 forward.
* Style sets: Allows you to create sets (or “collections”) of all types of styles (page, paragraph,
character, note, and list). You can use a style set with a specific template or with any new document
and even switch between sets (e.g., from a draft style set to a print style set in a single step). Style
sets are saved with the document and you can lock and unlock them, duplicate, delete, etc.
* Edit style editor: You can now edit each style included in the style set directly and have all the style
options in one (big) window. There are also some improvements to style, but more on that later.
* Image handling: You now now insert images using the Insert > Image option, in addition to copy
and paste and drag and drop. You can resize images easily, manually, by per cent or numerically,
Position the image within the image frame fitted to the frame or “floating”, in the frame you can set
the image frame frame and background colour and line weight for the frame.
* Baseline shift: Very simple and to-the-point – you can shift text or images up or down relative to the
baseline. In contrast with the way it’s done with the Cocoa text engine (and thus TextEdit and co.)
the line spacing for the paragraph does not change but remains the same throughout.
* Templates: You can now create templates, open from templates, browse templates, add, delete,
save over, add template folders, and so on. You can also add a special thumbnail and description to
every template. In addition, you can also set a default template to open when a new document is
created.
* Perfect language switching: Whenever you switch languages, Mellel switches to a font that can
display text in those languages. A special option for experts allows you to highlight cases when a
font substitution occurred, so you can spot and correct this, if you want.
* Automatic backup: Saves a file automatically to a special folder. This works independently of
automatic save, and works even with untitled or unsaved files.
* Next paragraph style: You can now set the paragraph style to follow the current paragraph style
(when you press Return).
* “At start-up” preferences: You can set Mellel‘s behaviour when starting up and when switching to
Mellel fro a different application: Do nothing (just show the menus), open a new document (the OS X default) or open the template browser.
* Aqua Interface: Same as the brushed metal one, but without the brushed metal.
* Learn spelling: Yes! Now available from the nearest contextual menu.
* Propagate list: A new button on the list editing window makes it easy to populate values (margins,
symbol position, indent, char. style and variation) throughout the list.
* Outline promote/demote: You can now press Command+left/right arrow to promote/demote
items.
* Nicer preferences: New and improved preferences window.
* Font detection: Improved missing fonts detection and handling.
* Shift+Tab for stepping back between cells in a table.
* Improved help: The basic online help was improved (in appearance).
* More help: The help menu now includes several items to make access to frequently requested
items (fonts, keyboard layouts, tips) easier, and a link to Mellel’s buying options.
* Option+Delete to delete the next word.
* Cmd+, to open the Preferences.
* Asterisk added: Added asterisk to list symbols
* Better image handling: The resize handles for image frames are now blue and bigger, images
inserted into document don’t inflate the file so much, and images are now clear and not fuzzy
when inserted into a document.
* Syriac works better: Corrected behaviour of unicode range 0×0300->0×036F (combining diacritical
marks) with RTL scripts. This mainly applies to Syriac, but may be useful with Arabic too.
* Spell faster: Sometimes, when you typed very fast, the spelling engine would skip a word or two
while writing. This doesn’t happen anymore.
* No extra page break: When inserting a ToC right before a page break or page style break, no
additional page break is added at the end of the ToC.
* Misbehaving characters: Corrected the behaviour of degree sign, ohm, micro, angstrom etc.
following numbers in RTL text.
* Pasting from Mozilla, Firefox, etc.: will now work accurately (it wasn‘t our bug, really, but we’ve fixed
it anyhow.
* Plays nicely with footnotes: styling after “scanning” the document with a bibliography application
now preserves the styling in footnotes or endnotes.

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Article/Excerpt: Mac-using Genealogist (103 years old)

Interesting story at the Seattle Times: Call Helen Burcham Green one wired lady.

The Bothell resident exchanges e-mail with relatives around the world. She writes books on her Mac computer and she advises people not to trust everything they find on the Internet.

“It’s too easy to do the research, and you can’t depend upon it,” she said. “People want to take shortcuts today.”

Of the world’s computer literati, Green could be the oldest.

She turned 103 Wednesday.

She entered the computer world a decade ago after writing her first book, an extensive family genealogy that traces ancestors back to the 1400s.

(Rest of the article at the Seattle Times) (First noticed by Dick Eastman)

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Mac-friendly Genealogy Resources (YourMapsOnline/YourOldBooksAndMaps)

If your looking for large collections of high-resolution antique maps, books, documents and similiar items, check out YourMapsOnline.org.uk. and YourOldBooksAndMaps.co.uk.

They have Mac friendly versions of all of their CDs (the materials come in standard Adobe Acrobat (PDF) and graphic formats).

Although it’s mostly oriented towards the UK, they do have materials from around the world. You can sample the maps , books, etc., on their website for free. Among the materials: Trade Directories, Maps & Atlases, County History & Topography Books & Old Travel Books.

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