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Invalidating Preferences Cache in Mavericks (OS X 10.9.x)

I recently set up a fresh install of Mavericks (OS X 10.9), and copied over some of preferences (plist) files from old installation to new box ( (~/Library/Preferences).

I noticed, applications failed to use (manually copied) preferences files, instead kept throwing errors (like one shown below):

cfprefsd[xxxx]: CFPreferences: error renaming file /Users/username/Library/Preferences/com.codeux.irc.textual.plist.bPsEnTV to /Users/username/Library/Preferences/com.codeux.irc.textual.plist

Unlike previous versions of OS X, Mavericks (OS X 10.9) caches preferences files. That means, if we edit or overwrite a preferences (plist) file, we need to invalidate the cache so that applications can see the changes, and start using this updated preferences file.

I didn't want to set up everything from scratch, in this case all IRC servers, nodes and chatrooms. It is not fun editing binary plist files, even with the help of XCode :-)

To fix this problem, we need to run this from terminal:

defaults read ~/Library/Preferences/com.codeux.irc.textual

We also need to make sure preferences file has correct permission. In my case, permissions were messed up because I copied file from different disk (installation).

Permission should look like following (i.e. owner can at least read/write; umask 077):

-rw-------

I would suggest restarting the respective application, if it is already running.

Introducing Hyde

Hyde is a brazen two-column Jekyll theme that pairs a prominent sidebar with uncomplicated content. It’s based on Poole, the Jekyll butler.

Built on Poole

Poole is the Jekyll Butler, serving as an upstanding and effective foundation for Jekyll themes by @mdo. Poole, and every theme built on it (like Hyde here) includes the following:

  • Complete Jekyll setup included (layouts, config, 404, RSS feed, posts, and example page)
  • Mobile friendly design and development
  • Easily scalable text and component sizing with rem units in the CSS
  • Support for a wide gamut of HTML elements
  • Related posts (time-based, because Jekyll) below each post
  • Syntax highlighting, courtesy Pygments (the Python-based code snippet highlighter)

Hyde features

In addition to the features of Poole, Hyde adds the following:

  • Sidebar includes support for textual modules and a dynamically generated navigation with active link support
  • Two orientations for content and sidebar, default (left sidebar) and reverse (right sidebar), available via <body> classes
  • Eight optional color schemes, available via <body> classes

Head to the readme to learn more.

Browser support

Hyde is by preference a forward-thinking project. In addition to the latest versions of Chrome, Safari (mobile and desktop), and Firefox, it is only compatible with Internet Explorer 9 and above.

Download

Hyde is developed on and hosted with GitHub. Head to the GitHub repository for downloads, bug reports, and features requests.

Thanks!

Amazon Cloudfront - Video Streaming (rtmp) Issue?

Are you using Amazon Cloudfront for public/private video streaming over rtmp? Having trouble to figure out why some of your videos fail to stream (over rtmp) and throw 'Stream not found'  flash/actionscript client side errors?

I have figured out:

  • Videos with invalid chapter markers would not stream over rtmp (Adobe Flash Media Server) or via Cloudfront.
  • Adobe's FLVCheck utility suggests our videos have invalid chapter markers. I am not sure, if chapter markers in our videos are invalid or Adobe Media Server expect those to be in different format.
  • Same set of videos play fine with Quicktime/VLC player, Adobe Flash Player (over http progressive download) and html5 player (chrome or others which support H.264 videos)

I am disappointed with the fact - Adobe Media Server ceases to play (core feature) a video because of (optional feature?) chapter marker(s) which can be ignored if it is corrupt or invalid.

Thanks to AWS engineers who confirmed the case, and provided more details.

Update: Thanks to Justin Riley for sharing a solution (in comments below). He suggested to use '-map_chapters -1' to get rid of this issue. It works for me.

We’re Hiring Developers!

We have been working on bunch of products (indiereign.com, and others) for sometime. To take these products to next level, quickly and elegantly, we have recently started expanding our team.

We are starting our new development centre in Noida. We want to connect, talk to and hire smart and passionate developers (hackers) who love to work on products in a small company or a startup (like ours).

We are looking for:

  • bright and smart guys
  • one who can fit in our (small team/company/startup) culture, and becomes a great team player
  • can learn, adapt and use cutting/bleeding edge technologies
  • can inspire and mentor others
  • importantly, loves building cool, useful and scalable products/services

Experience, we would like to see:

  • Application Developer
    • Proficiency with web standards and frontend (HTML5, CSS3, JavaScript, etc.) development
    • proficiency with one ore more languages (Python, Ruby, PHP, Scala, etc.)
    • proficiency with analytical approach to problem solving
    • has worked or very interested to work on other frameworks (Django, Rails, Symfony, etc.)
  • Mobile Application Developer (iOS or Android or both) - apps/games development;

Details description can be found at http://jobs.hasgeek.com/at/allies.co.in

We are not rigid about number of years (of experience). We think experience comes out of depth, challenges one has taken, and how many great problems one has solved over the time. If someone has all that, we are happy to talk to him/her.

If you are interested or know someone who is good fit; I would appreciate, if you can connect with me (aqabiz at allies.co.in) and share details.