Converting JSON into CSV

Recently I needed to analyze some JSON data. Now, I’m no data scientist, so I wanted to convert my JSON data to comma separated (CSV) and “flatten” the data… just so I could use the data in Excel. And Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! ...

29 Dec 2017

Fixing PowerPoint TIFF images and fonts

Microsoft PowerPoint 2016 for Mac (aka version 15) has a strange quirk - when I copy and paste images from Preview or most other applications, the image gets copied in Tagged Image File Format (TIFF). The image is practically uncompressed (or possibly minimally compressed), resulting in very, very huge PPTX files! Plus: Removing unwanted font references. ...

25 Aug 2017

Text Manipulation Cheat Sheet

I recently had the “opportunity” to perform some text manipulation to get data from a huge log file into a spreadsheet. I had done this sort of work a long time ago as a developer, but had forgotten over the years. So I decided to compile a text manipulation cheat-sheet for macOS. ...

26 Jun 2017

Automated script to compile Wine 2.9 from scratch

Following up on my posts, Compiling Wine 1.9 from scratch on macOS with Retina mode and Creating a wine.app bundle manually, here’s my script to automatically download and compile pre-requisite libraries, then download and compile Wine 2.9 32-bit, build the .app bundle, and even include a registry tweak to enable Retina Mode. ...

28 May 2017

Verifying downloads with a SHA-256 checksum

I recently downloaded an update to VLC, an open-source media player. The VLC download page, displayed it’s SHA-256 checksum - here’s how to quickly validate your download by comparing the checksum using the built-in macOS tools. ...

24 May 2017

Extract files from a macOS installer .pkg

Want to extract files from a macOS installer package with a .pkg extension? ...

6 Nov 2016

Finding application files in OS X

Apps, even after being removed from the Launchpad or Applications sidebar in Finder, do leave preferences and other files scattered around. Where are they, typically, and how does one find them? ...

15 Jun 2016

OS X Terminal color prompt

My previous Terminal Tweaks post had an incorrect prompt (PS1) setting, that caused lines to wrap on themselves! This is now corrected, with more details on the color options… ...

28 Apr 2016

Screen capture script for retina display with PNG optimization

Forget the complex or manual steps, or costly tools to get screen shots scaled down from a retina display. I have a shell script that triggers an interactive window screen capture, saves the screen shot (assumed to be 2x retina display), re-sizes it to 1x and compresses the PNG further! Best of all, it does not require paid software or Automator. ...

19 Oct 2015

OS X Terminal Tweaks

Some tweaks to my OS X shell (Terminal.app) that I’ve found useful. ...

16 Oct 2015