Excellent points made -- prior to checking out ServiceScrubber I was using Blacktree's Services PrefPane.
Peter Maurer
· 3 years ago
Thanks for listing these side effects -- while I have listed most of them in Service Scrubber's "Read Me" file, repeating them is a good thing, as most users don't bother reading "Read Me" files...
;-)
And to be honest, I've never even thought of the third one.
As far as creating a haxie for the same purpose is concerned, I agree that this would be a good solution for users who don't want their info.plists edited. Here's a couple of reasons why I didn't do it that way:
1. Some users don't want haxies on their computers. (Me included, BTW, but that's just my personal preference. I'm not saying that APE is a bad thing. In fact, it's the most elegant way of doing some things.)
2. Unsanity's application enhancer SDK is $100 for developers. While that's not exactly a major investment, you don't want to rely on a framework that (i) is not free and (ii) might break on future OS X versions when you're releasing software as free-/donationware.
So there you have it. Thanks again for pointing Service Scrubber out!
Jonathan Wight
· 3 years ago
Hey Peter,
I only noticed the third side effect because Service Scrubber listed one of the apps I develop multiple times.
I think the worst side effect might be the need to reapply the preferences every time an application is installed. Perhaps you might want to cache the user's settings and just have a re-apply button? That way instead of a using having to scan the list to find what applications/services he wants to disable he could just click one button.
Also - I think it would be wiser to backup the settings to a separate file, that way the user could restore the settings without ServiceScrubber just by overwriting the original Info.plist with the backup (you could also use the unix find command to find all modified applications) if ever ServiceScrubber stopped working...
Personally I'd prefer a Haxie to solve this. It seems more elegant than modifying whole bunches of applications. While Haxies can reduce system stability I think most users know they what they are getting into. You can also license APE for free if you release your software as freeware.
Well actually the best solution would be for Apple to fix the solution themselves, without Service Scrubber (or Blacktree's prefpane that Mark Grimes mentions) the services menu is practically unusable. Thanks for releasing such a great piece of software to help deal with the situation.
All Comments
;-)
And to be honest, I've never even thought of the third one.
As far as creating a haxie for the same purpose is concerned, I agree that this would be a good solution for users who don't want their info.plists edited. Here's a couple of reasons why I didn't do it that way:
1. Some users don't want haxies on their computers. (Me included, BTW, but that's just my personal preference. I'm not saying that APE is a bad thing. In fact, it's the most elegant way of doing some things.)
2. Unsanity's application enhancer SDK is $100 for developers. While that's not exactly a major investment, you don't want to rely on a framework that (i) is not free and (ii) might break on future OS X versions when you're releasing software as free-/donationware.
So there you have it. Thanks again for pointing Service Scrubber out!
I only noticed the third side effect because Service Scrubber listed one of the apps I develop multiple times.
I think the worst side effect might be the need to reapply the preferences every time an application is installed. Perhaps you might want to cache the user's settings and just have a re-apply button? That way instead of a using having to scan the list to find what applications/services he wants to disable he could just click one button.
Also - I think it would be wiser to backup the settings to a separate file, that way the user could restore the settings without ServiceScrubber just by overwriting the original Info.plist with the backup (you could also use the unix find command to find all modified applications) if ever ServiceScrubber stopped working...
Personally I'd prefer a Haxie to solve this. It seems more elegant than modifying whole bunches of applications. While Haxies can reduce system stability I think most users know they what they are getting into. You can also license APE for free if you release your software as freeware.
Well actually the best solution would be for Apple to fix the solution themselves, without Service Scrubber (or Blacktree's prefpane that Mark Grimes mentions) the services menu is practically unusable. Thanks for releasing such a great piece of software to help deal with the situation.