Previously, I would select my desired picks and export them as TIFs to a folder in my Pictures directory. I would then apply a specific color label to indicate which ones resided in Aperture. This worked fine because I only ‘developed’ images in Lightroom, but if I ever went back and applied new develop settings or presets, none of those updates would carry over to Aperture.

With the release of Lightroom 3, much has been made of the new Publish Services, although most of this attention has been paid towards publishing images to online services such as Flickr*. Lightroom can also publish images to your hard drive and any changes made to these images can be updated with the push of a button. And these changes can be easily updated in Aperture. Here are the steps I use:

1. I created a Lightroom Publish Service set to export TIFs to a specific folder.
2. Drag my desired images to this service and select “Publish.”
3. In Aperture I import the images from the specific folder into a project. Nothing earth-shattering here.
4. If I modify any of these images’ settings in Lightroom, they will be identified as needing to be re-published.
5. After re-publishing in Lightroom (which updates the TIF in the desired folder), I return to Aperture and under the Photo menu, I hold down the option key, which changes the Update Preview menu item to Generate Preview:

This will force Aperture to reload the image, but without having to re-import the image. Now there is a live link between those photos that exist in both Lightroom and Aperture and if I make any further changes in Lightroom, it is easy to see those changes in Aperture.

When new photos are added to this Publish Service in Lightroom, just go back to Aperture and select Import to add them to the library. I keep all of these Lightroom exports in the same project and two key points if you do as well: ensure the original project is selected as the destination or a new one will be created and check that ‘do not import duplicates’ is selected.

I have only tested this with develop settings. I don’t know if any metadata changes like updated keywords will be reflected in Aperture. Since I use Lightroom as my primary asset management program, I’m not so concerned if these changes don’t make it over. I also haven’t looked at how this would work on a large scale. Of the 7000+ pictures in my Lightroom catalog, only my top picks—less than 200—are exported to Aperture. Feel free to comment if you notice any problems with this workflow.

* I find Lightroom’s built-in Flickr Publish Service inadequate because it lacks the ability to publish to a specific photoset. I use Jeffrey Friedl’s very thorough version instead.

First, while I think the Apple iPad is a cool device, I don’t really need one. I don’t downright scoff it it like I did the iPhone (umm, this crow tastes yummy) and I readily admit that I fiddled with one whenever I went to an Apple store.

With the impending move overseas and my PowerMac G5 starting to show it’s age, what I really wanted to do was downsize (and upgrade) to a new MacBook Pro. Unfortunately, my lovely wife got me an Apple gift card for an iPad for Father’s Day. I was able to convince her about my dire “need” for a new laptop and applied the card towards it.

And now I’m typing on a brand new MacBook Pro with the updated 2.53 GHz Core i5 processor. I love the unibody construction and the hi-resolution matte display is awesome.

Now that I finally have an intel-powered mac, I’ll be putting Lightroom 3 and Aperture 3 through their respective paces. Both initially seem like solid upgrades.

Secondly, I upgraded my iPhone 3GS to iOS 4 before I left—another solid upgrade. As for the iPhone 4, the move overseas pretty much denied that option. When I get back, I’ll get an iPhone 6 or something.

And a second or third generation iPad.

Well, it appears the same trick was being used again and on a much larger scale. This has even made the front page of Drudge and Apple PR has kicked in.

So how is it these bogus apps are getting approved in the first place?

P.S. Happy Fourth of July…

UPDATE: Made it.

In 2000, Bellesiles wrote a book called Arming America, The Origins of a National Gun Culture. His general premise was that the commonly held view that America’s “gun culture” dates back to colonial times was a myth and in actuality very few people owned guns until after the Civil War. Eventually academics and journalists started to questions his conclusions, and more importantly, his research methods. For a synopsis of what happened next, see this Wikipedia article, but the fallout was anything but pretty (spoiler alert):

A negative finding from an internal Emory University review led to an external investigation that was “deeply disturbed” by his conduct and found that he “willingly misrepresented the evidence.” Bellesiles resigned his tenured position at Emory, his Bancroft Prize for Arming America was rescinded by Columbia University for “scholarly misconduct”, as was his NEH grant.

I remember being fascinated with this story when it hit the blogs in 2002 and blowing off more than a few hours at work to read James Lindgrin’s devastating critique from the Yale Law Review that paints the book as nearly a complete fraud.

Why is this important again? Oh, yeah. Bellesiles has a new book coming out and here is how is publisher is marketing it:

“1877 is also notable as the comeback book for a celebrated U.S. historian. Michael Bellesiles is perhaps most famous as the target of an infamous “swiftboating” campaign by the National Rifle Association, following the publication of his Bancroft Prize-winning book Arming America (Knopf, 2000) — “the best kind of non-fiction,” according to the Chicago Tribune — which made daring claims about gun ownership in early America. In what became the history profession’s most talked-about and notorious case of the past generation, Arming America was eventually discredited after an unprecedented and controversial review called into question its sources, charges which Bellesiles and his many prominent supporters have always rejected.”

Replace ‘celebrated’ with ‘infamous’, replace ‘National Rifle Association’ with over ten independent academic researchers, journalists and bloggers, add in the part about the Bancroft Prize being rescinded, and use this quote from Roger Lane, who had originally given a positive review to Arming America:

“It is entirely clear to me that he’s made up a lot of these records. He’s betrayed us. He’s betrayed the cause. It’s 100 percent clear that the guy is a liar and a disgrace to my profession. He’s breached that trust.”

Do all those things, and maybe this marketing blurb can return from the complete fantasyland it currently resides in. I hear Jayson Blair is the mayor down there…

1. Acorn 2
2. Aperture 3
3. Adobe Lightroom 3 Beta
4. MarsEdit 3

It may be time for a new MacBook Pro…

Update: And Google Chrome

Click to see full screen on Flickr.

For the last several years, Apple has maintained a comprehensive (if not exhaustive) list of available Mac OS X software on its website. This has been a great resource for those who aren’t familiar with sites like MacUpdate or Version Tracker. However, the page hasn’t been updated since March 26—almost a month—leaving many developers to wonder if Apple may soon discontinue the service in order to shift its focus to a more locked-down distribution model for the Mac.

I’ve had a bookmark for that site since I don’t know when and found some neat stuff there. Hopefully it doesn’t go away, and double-hopeful it doesn’t go away for the reason noted.

First, some background: The first piece of software that I bought that didn’t come in a box from an actual store was NetNewsWire, way back in 2003. RSS was new to me at least and it made surfing a bit easier than actually going to every site in my ‘Daily Read’ folder and scanning for new posts. If I found something interesting that I wanted to keep filed away somewhere, I did one of two things: mark it as “flagged” in NNW or opened it in Safari and saved a bookmark in my ‘Stuff’ folder. Now and then I would go through these and move items to other bookmark folders, delete the ones that weren’t interesting anymore, or maybe blog about some of them.

Around this time, social bookmarking sites such as Ma.gnolia* and Delicious were all the rage. I think I had accounts at both of them—obviously I didn’t use them—and I think the reason was I didn’t really get (or care about) the “social” aspect of them. I just wanted something to easily track the interesting things I read. I didn’t really care what other people thought was interesting.

Along came the iPhone, which I’ve had for almost a year. My current newsreader app is Reeder, by way of Byline and the iPhone version of NetNewsWire. I’m also a big fan of Instapaper. Also around a year ago, I got started using Pinboard, the “anti-social bookmarking site.” The apps I use are interconnected to some degree: NNW on my Mac and Reeder on the iPhone (which both sync via Google Reader) can both post articles to Instapaper. Reeder can also post directly to Pinboard.

All that being said, reading and bookmarking stuff on the web goes something like this:

On My Desktop

Plowing through NNW. If the blog post itself is worth saving and I’m short on time, I just flag it. If the post is linking to a long-ish external article, I’ll send it to Instapaper. Sometimes I’ll find a link to an interesting site and then one of four things happens:

1. Interesting articles like web tutorials or new software I may want to try still get dragged the ‘Stuff’ folder in my bookmarks bar.
2. Snarky / cool / different kind of interesting tidbits get posted to my Elsewhere sideblog.
3. Or I just send it to Pinboard. I’m still trying to figure out what I should use Pinboard for. Right now it keeps really good articles I’ve come across and a holding bin for web design specific links. If there was an easy way to seemlessly incorporate my Pinboard list to feed into my sideblog, that would be huge.

I try to go through my ‘flagged’ items in NNW daily and do one of the above things with what what’s in there, or I just unflag it if I don’t think it merits permament, filed-away status.

On my iPhone

The two apps I use most on my phone are Reeder and Tweetie. I use Reeder just like NNW and a key feature of Tweetie for me is the ability to send followed bit.ly links to Instapaper directly from it’s own browser. Same goes for Reeder. Cell coverage where I work is spotty, so being able to archive links for future reference without having to go through Mobile Safari first is nice.

A note on Instapaper: the only time I really use it as it was intended (you know, to like read articles and stuff) is when I’m on a plane flying somewhere. I also you use it as a separate and miniaturized feedreader by subscribing to the developer’s Long Reads and Give Me Something to Read folders†. When I find something here, I star it for further reading or one of the steps above.

In summary (finally…— Ed.), worthy articles, posts and other assorted web goodness either gets flagged in NetNewsWire or Reeder, saved to Instapaper (from either of those two, and sometimes Safari itself), or sent to Pinboard. Or sent to my Elsewhere blog. In the case of this awesome New Yorker article about magician and actor Ricky Jay, it was nearly all four. Yes, I’m sure there is a cleaner way to do this, but I haven’t settled on what that is yet.

Now, if I can just figure out how exactly to put my desktop and iPhone versions of Evernote to good use…

* In January 2009, Ma.gnolia had a massive server crash and lost a ton of users’ data. The site went down for months and within days of relaunching, ownership received a cease-and-desist letter regarding the Magnolia name and they changed the name of the still-not-full-up service to Gnolia. Good luck.

† I found both of these from within the iPhone version of the app itself (Add Folder, then Browse Recommended Sites), but it seems this list isn’t populated anymore.

Get it here: IOGraph

I think that is Alice and the Mad Hatter having a tea party. Not sure why someone with an on/off switch on their ass was invited. No idea what that peanut-thing on maroon girl’s back is either…and not knowing is just fine with me.

Dude. I hope frog (lizard?) girl digs your helmet, because you’ve narrowed down the list of members of the opposite sex that won’t shoot Diet Coke out their noses upon seeing that getup to a rather small group.

When I was taking some pictures of another group (Batman sidekick Robin and some goth-looking chick), one of them yelled “security!” Really? Are you going to send Astroboy over here to take my camera? My son is four and hence, deep into the ‘question’ phase of growing up. I have to admit when he asked “who are those people, Dad” and “why are they dressed like that?”, I didn’t have a good answer. Well, I did. But he’s still a bit young for the judgmental and perjorative phase.

It shouldn’t be a surprise that I started blogging as a result of reading blogs and thinking, “hey, I can do that.” I started off in October 2002 with a Blogspot site (embarrassingly, it’s still there). I quickly grew tired of Blogger after about three posts, got my own domain and started using Movable Type*. In those days, I wrote mostly, and not very well, about politics: ‘fisking’ articles written by liberal columnists, making fun of people, and spending time seeing what other bloggers put me on their blogroll. Lameness abounded.

Eventually I decided that if I was cool enough to have my own domain name, my site surely couldn’t be one of the templates that came with MT. Thus began a new interest that still plagues me to this day: I dove into topics like web design, HTML, and CSS in a quest to design my own website from scratch. And in the years since, I have unfortunately found myself more often than not interested in the technical aspects† of having a website than actually writing one.

I literally started off learning HTML and CSS by hitting View Source on sites that I liked and looking at their markup and style declarations. One of the first books I got on the topic was Zeldman’s Designing With Web Standards (the orange first edition). Lots of books and blog articles later—the Taming Lists one linked above—I relaunched my site in 2004 with my very own design. Probably for the better, that design and all the archives prior to it have been lost to the ether.

Further entries were sporadic for various reasons: work, having two children, another re-design—the one you see now—sometimes months would go by without anything (or all of 2005). I’m attempting to be write more regularly and to concentrate on the writing and less on the bells and whistles‡.

I’ll probably write less political stuff, not for lack of interest by any means, but the blogging landscape as changed significantly in the last seven years. Large sites such as Red State, Big Government, Politico, and The Daily Caller are all over topics from the get go. Although it is good to see that Instapundit, one of the first blogs I started reading, is still at it. I swear that guy is a robot.

Now if I can just redo that header image, it definitely needs some kerning…

* Back then, when I had an issue getting MT installed, my question posted on the MT forums was answered by Ben Trott himself.

† Like implementing a cooler way to do these footnotes.

‡ And avoiding my temptation to convert all this work to WordPress.

Books on the way:

• The Big Short, Michael Lewis. If it was “The Big Phone Book” by Michael Lewis, it would still be on the way.
• Shibumi, Trevanian. Meant to read this a long time ago.
• Fly Fishing with Darth Vader: And Other Adventures with Evangelical Wrestlers, Political Hitmen, and Jewish Cowboys, Matt Labash

Books here and waiting, some longer than others:

• Empire of the Sun, J.G. Ballard. One of my favorite films of all time.
• The Pillars of the Earth, Ken Follett
• Cobra II, Michael Gordon and Bernard Trainor
• The Housing Boom and Bust, Thomas Sowell
• The Civil War, Vol III: Red River to Appomattox, Shelby Foote
• The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, William Shirer

Foote’s history of the Civil War took 20 years to write; about 3000 pages and 1.5 million words. And he wrote it 500 words at a time, in longhand, with a dip pen.

FOOTE: Five hundred or 6OO words is a good day for me. I write with a dip pen, which causes all kind of problems — everything from finding blotters to pen points — but it makes me take my time, and it gives me a real feeling of satisfaction. I’m getting where I’m going.

…But a dip pen, you have to dip it in the ink and write three or four words and dip it again. It has a real influence on the way I write, so different not only from a typewriter but from using a pencil or a fountain pen.

LAMB: What do you do with it after it’s written the 500 words every day?

FOOTE: I set it aside to dry; then copy it off on a typewriter, make a typewritten copy of it and then recopy on that until finally the day is over and I’m all the way satisfied with it and I put it on the stack — make a clean copy and put it on the stack. That way I don’t have to engage in something that to me is a particular form of heartbreak, which is revision. I don’t do that.

Holy smokes. Reminds me of the Truman Capote quote about Jack Kerouac writing On The Road on a single 120-foot scroll of tracing paper: “That’s not writing, that’s typing.”

Well, since #1 is done, and #2 isn’t changing..best try to get back to it.