PowerTunes 1.0 is out!
Posted on July 9, 2008 by Brian Webster
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I’m proud to announce that today I’m releasing a brand new application, PowerTunes! PowerTunes is to iTunes what iPhoto Library Manager is to iPhoto - it will let you:
- Create multiple iTunes libraries and switch between them easily
- Keep track of a separate music folder for each one of your libraries
- Let you copy playlists and tracks between libraries without losing iTunes data such as play counts, ratings, etc.
- Merge multiple iTunes libraries together into one
- Easily share libraries and music folders among multiple users on your machine
- Find dead tracks in your library whose files have gone missing and hook them back up or delete them
- Clean up your music folder, finding orphaned music and video files that aren’t in your library
It’s very satisfying to finally ship, especially after having worked on PowerTunes in one form or another for about a year and a half now. It’s been my number one request from existing users of iPhoto Library Manager and it’s been something I’ve wanted to do for quite a while.
As is always the case, I had way more feature ideas than I could possibly hope to implement in a 1.0 release (otherwise it would never ship!). In deciding the feature set for the program, I tried to concentrate on things relating to file management. There are plenty of things I could have done involving messing around with editing tags and such, which is a very common need, but is also already covered by a lot of other apps out there. My hope is that PowerTunes’ feature set is unique enough to be useful to many iTunes users, even if they already have one or more other iTunes helper programs.
The development process was, as always, enlightening, and I definitely plan to write up a couple blog posts exploring some aspects of developing this program. The most interesting thing overall is the program’s similarity in function to iPhoto Library Manager. This allowed me to reuse a bunch of code from iPLM, but it also gave me the opportunity to look back at the way I did some things in iPLM and reimplement them in new, better ways. The result of that is now giving me an overwhelming urge to tear up iPLM’s internals and redo it to match the way things work in PowerTunes. 
So, go ahead and give PowerTunes a try! The program has a 30 day trial period during which all features of the application are fully accessible. After that, you’ll still be able to do the most basic things like open up your existing libraries, but most of the advanced functionality will be turned off until you get a license for the software.
And in case you’re wondering why I chose the name “PowerTunes” instead of, say, “iTunes Library Manager”, the answer is a) there is already a product with that name, and b) I learned my lesson with iPhoto Library Manager, whose name is really way too long. I mean come on - 9 syllables? What was I thinking?
Announcing PowerTunes private beta
Posted on April 23, 2008 by Brian Webster
Filed Under PowerTunes, News, Updates | Leave a Comment
You may have noticed things have been a bit quiet around here lately. The biggest reason for that is that I’ve been working on a brand new product for the last several months, called PowerTunes. The number one request I get from people who use iPhoto Library Manager is to have a similar program that lets you have multiple iTunes libraries. I’ve wanted to do this for a while, and finally started development on PowerTunes last year, in parallel with continuing work on iPhoto Library Manager and PlistEdit Pro. Today, it’s getting close to being ready to release, but I still need to do some further testing on it, so I’ve decided to run a (hopefully short) private beta to help work out any remaining kinks.
The basic idea behind PowerTunes is quite similar to iPhoto Library Manager: instead of just having one monolithic iTunes library where you dump all your music and video, you can instead split your stuff up among multiple libraries and switch between them. This can be useful for simple organizational purposes, and can allow you to do things such as allow multiple people to keep separate iTunes collections (and sync them with their respective iPods) without having to go through the hassle of setting up multiple user accounts to do so.
Like iPhoto Library Manager, not only does PowerTunes let you set up multiple libraries, but it also offers additional features that let you copy music and playlists between libraries, organize multiple music folders, clean out unwanted files from your music folder, fix dead tracks in your library, and much more.
iTunes 7 actually added for the first time the ability to place your iTunes library file in a different location from the default location by holding down the option key when you launch iTunes, just the same as you can in iPhoto (previously, the only way you could shift your iTunes library location was by using aliases and such). PowerTunes actually utilizes this mechanism itself, and thus requires iTunes 7 or later. Unlike iTunes, PowerTunes also ties each library to a particular music folder, so if you have music stored in separate places, it will switch the music folder location along with the library location when you change back and forth.
The main reason for want to have some other testers before a final release is that there are many possible ways one could go about setting up their iTunes libraries and music folders, including putting stuff on external hard drives, accessing stuff over file sharing or an Airport Disk, and so on. I’ve tested as much of this as I can, but there will always be setups I either can’t test or haven’t even thought of.
So, if you’re interested in helping to test PowerTunes, I’ve set up a form that you can fill out to sign up for the beta. I don’t know how many testers I’ll need or how long the testing period will take at this point. If everything works fine, it could be as brief as a couple weeks, or it could take longer if more things need fixing. So, depending on how many testers I need, not all those who signup will necessarily become testers.
Like I said before, I’ve done a lot of testing so far, but the possibility of bugs occurring still remains, so all testers will be encouraged to back up their iTunes library and music, just in case. Those who do help in testing will get a free PowerTunes license and the thrill that comes from running beta software.
So, if you’re interested, head on over to the signup form and sign up to be a beta tester. Oh, and I almost forgot, a couple obligatory screenshots.
MacSanta is coming to town
Posted on December 15, 2007 by Brian Webster
Filed Under News, PlistEdit Pro, iPhoto Library Manager | Leave a Comment
I’m happy to be participating this year in the MacSanta promotion! Generously set up by Paul Kafasis of Rogue Amoeba, MacSanta offers deals from now until Christmas on products from five new Mac software companies every day. iPhoto Library Manager and PlistEdit Pro are both being featured today (December 15th), and you can get 20% off by using the coupon code MACSANTA07 when purchasing.
Also be sure to check out the Extended Deals page, which lists all the products that have been featured so far in the month, and you can still get 10% off any of those products by using the coupon code MACSANTA07TEN anytime until the end of December (this also applies to iPhoto Library Manager and PlistEdit Pro after today). There is also an RSS feed available, so you can continue to keep up on new deals that appear between now and Christmas.
iPLM Leopard update
Posted on October 24, 2007 by Brian Webster
Filed Under News, iPhoto Library Manager | 4 Comments
Just a quick note on iPhoto Library Manager compatibility with Leopard:
- I am currently working on the update, but Apple has decided not to give developers an advance copy of the final version of Leopard until it ships, which means that I won’t truly be able to start final testing until this weekend. I’m hoping that it won’t take too long and that the iPLM update will be out sometime next week.
- Similarly to major iPhoto updates, so far the basic library switching in iPLM seems to work fine in Leopard, it’s just the advanced photo copying stuff that will need additional work, so upgrading to Leopard isn’t going to cut you off from your iPhoto libraries or anything
- The update will be free, so if you buy a copy of iPhoto Library Manager now, you won’t have to pay to upgrade, you can just download the new version.
That’s all for now, I’ll try to keep updates coming as I know more.
iPhoto 7.1 update
Posted on September 27, 2007 by Brian Webster
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Naturally, since I released an update to iPhoto Library Manager yesterday morning, Apple had to go and release an update to iPhoto about 5 hours later that broke some stuff. Worst. Timing. Ever.
A few things needed tweaking to maintain compatibility, but it wasn’t much, and I’ve posted a new update to iPhoto Library Manager (now version 3.3.2) to get everything working properly with iPhoto 7.1 You can download the new version from the main iPLM page.
iPhoto Library Manager 3.3.1 released
Posted on September 26, 2007 by Brian Webster
Filed Under News, Updates, iPhoto Library Manager | 1 Comment
iPhoto Library Manager 3.3.1 is now available for download, incorporating several bug fixes and a couple of new iPhoto 7 specific features. The new version is a free update for existing iPLM users, you can just download the new version and replace your old one with it. There were a couple common problems that people were running into with iPhoto 7, which should be alleviated somewhat with this new release.
iPhoto 7 seems to be a little flakier that previous versions when it comes to properly updating thumbnails for photos that have been edited. The thumbnail would end up reflecting the original version of the photo instead of the modified version, making it appear that the modified photos had not been copied over at all. I’d seen this happen on occasion with iPhoto 6, but it seemed to be become much more common once people started upgrading to iPhoto 7, and this update should hopefully prevent this from happening anymore.
iPhoto 7 adds the new ability to hide selected photos in your library, to help you be able to navigate your library and ignore photos you don’t need to work with at the moment. iPhoto does have an item in its View menu that will let you show/hide the photos you have marked as hidden, so you can still reveal them if you need to, then easily hide them again. However, iPhoto does not write out information for hidden photos to its AlbumData.xml file, which is what iPLM reads to display the library’s album list in its window, and is also used by iMovie, iDVD, Pages, and many other applications to let the user easily use their iPhoto photos in those applications. This behavior occurs even if you have elected to display your hidden photos in iPhoto’s interface, so there is no way to access hidden photos from other applications.
I actually filed a bug with Apple on this issue. The good news is I got a quick response, but the bad news was the response was “Behaves Correctly”. Grrrr. The explanation:
“The View > Hidden Photos option is to allow users to manage their hidden photos (photos marked hidden) without inadvertently making them available to other applications.”
So this means that if you want to access photos from another application that you’ve marked as hidden, you need to actually unhide those photos, go do your thing with them, then come back to iPhoto and mark the photos as hidden again. Of course this means that you get to be the one to keep track of exactly what photos those were, then go find them again in iPhoto to re-hide them. Needless to say, I think this is exceedingly silly, especially since the View > Hidden Photos option would allow you do exactly the same thing with much less hassle. I’d encourage anyone who’d like to see this behavior changed to provide feedback to Apple, either via bug report or the iPhoto feedback page. And as always, be polite.
But, the good news is that hidden photos are still accessible via Applescript, so iPLM 3.3.1 adds an option that will copy hidden photos, and also re-hide them in the destination library after they’ve been copied over. There are some other goodies in the new version, and you can find the full list of changes on the release notes page.
In the Spotlight
Posted on August 29, 2007 by Brian Webster
Filed Under News | 3 Comments
Not OS X’s Spotlight, this time at least. No, I’m actually being featured in the MacTech Spotlight in this month’s issue of MacTech magazine! It’s a monthly feature they do where they do a Q & A with a different Mac developer each month. So, if you pick up a September copy of MacTech and flip to the back, you’ll get to see my ugly mug along with paragraph after paragraph of my infinite wisdom*. I’m sure I’ll be getting the call to go on Letterman any day now…
*actual size of wisdom will vary, some restrictions may apply, void where prohibited
iPhoto Library Manager 3.3 released
Posted on August 20, 2007 by Brian Webster
Filed Under iPhoto, News, Updates, iPhoto Library Manager | 5 Comments
I’m pleased to announce that iPhoto Library Manager 3.3 is shipping today, with full support for iPhoto 7! (On a terminology note, I’ve decided I’m going to at least try referring to this new iPhoto as “iPhoto 7″ and not “iPhoto ‘08″. All of Apple’s docs seem to use the ‘08 nomenclature, but trying to use it myself, it just sounds/looks really weird, so I’m going to stick with “iPhoto 7″ unless it causes mass confusion and riots.)
The update is free for all users and can be downloaded from the main iPLM page. iPhoto 7 support is the major feature of this release, so functionally speaking it’s mostly the same as 3.2.6, with a couple of notable exceptions.
- The first good news is that, as a result of changes in iPhoto 7, album hierarchies can now be preserved when copying between libraries! This has been something I’ve wanted to do for a while, but just wasn’t able to in previous versions, so for iPhoto 7 users, that will be nice to have.
- I’ve made the look of the album list mimic the look of the iPhoto 7 album list, including the background color and separate sections with titles (you can click here to see how it looks). Older libraries will still be displayed with the plain look.
- Unlike in iPhoto 6, the list of events (formerly known as rolls) can now be sorted by their date in the iPhoto Library Manager window. This makes it somewhat easier to track down a particular event you’re looking to copy to another library.
So, there it is! I’ve of course tested the bejeezus out of it, but if anyone has issues that crop up, drop me a line at support@fatcatsoftware.com.
iPhoto Library Manager 3.2.6 released
Posted on July 20, 2007 by Brian Webster
Filed Under News, Updates, iPhoto Library Manager | 1 Comment
I released a minor update to iPhoto Library Manager today, bringing it to version 3.2.6. It’s a free update from previous versions, and is mostly a bug fix release. The only new feature of note is that you can now click the header of the album/roll list to sort the albums/rolls by name. This is particularly handy with rolls when you are looking for a specific one, in which case the default sort order (the order in which they were imported) isn’t usually too helpful.
In case anyone was wondering, I have not actually been working on this minor update for the entire 4 months since the last one. I’m inefficient sometimes, but not that inefficient! I’ve been spending most of my time lately working on a brand new project. Details will be forthcoming soon, but for now let’s just say that it involves something rhyming with “iSwoons”…
Welcome to Fat Cat Software
Posted on March 14, 2007 by Brian Webster
Filed Under News | 2 Comments
Well, after putting it off and putting it off (mostly because I like coding way more than website development), I finally got together a real website for my development work. I’d had my .Mac homepage and some individual product sites setup, but they were incredibly lame and there was no cohesive site for all my products, thus was born Fat Cat Software!
I’m sure I’ll have plenty of further tweaks for the site as I go along, but all the basic stuff is up and running now. I hope to actually do this blogging thing semi-regularly, with posts ranging from news and updates to various Mac tips and tricks to posts about Cocoa and other development topics.
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