No more pink walls

Ok so there’s heaps of different guides out there for how to do this now and I’m sure there are better and more complete ones that this will be. But this is how it went down for me.

What you need for this:
The patched image file (tiger-x86-flat.img)
linux
A free physical hdd with at least 10gb on it
the CoreGraphics file (Optional: Needed if you want rosetta and have SSE3)

What to do:
1) Place the image file somewhere that you can access in linux. I had a problem with storing it in Windows as it is larger than the 4gb maximum file size so I’d recommend a filesystem like ext3 or similar.
2) Boot linux and make sure you can get to the image file and the harddisk you want OSX on (in /dev)
3) Type the following:
‘dd bs=1048576 if=./tiger-x86-flat.img of=/dev/hda’
and remember to replce ‘/dev/hda’ with wherever you want OS X to be installed. Everything on this drive will be wiped! And of course you need to point ‘if=’ to the location of the image file
4) Wait, took me about 5 minutes
5) Once its done reboot (and boot the hdd you just imaged, der). You will get to the Darwin Boot Loader, similar to GRUB only not. Press any key to interupt default boot
6) at the prompt type -s This will boot into single user mode for Darwin (NOTE: Not for OSX!)
7) To get into OS X single user mode type ‘sh /etc/rc’ at the prompt. If this fails as it did for me you can try editing /etc/rc to boot in single user safe mode. See bottom of this page for instructions.
8) Once a prompt appears type ‘passwd curtis’ (Enter new password)
9) Then ‘passwd deadmoo’ (Again enter a new password, make it the same as above)
10) Reboot
11) Now this time at the Darwin Boot Loader you can try a number of things. Firstly just let it boot normally. This will probably fail because of a hardware issue, if not then you’re a lucky bastard and I hate you. If it does fail, reboot again and type ‘-x’ at the Darwin Boot prompt to boot in safe mode. You can also try -v for verbose as this seems to work sometimes as well.
12) fingers crossed you will now be at an OSX logon screen. Login as deadmoo with the password you set and you’re good to go.
13) If you have a CPU with SSE3 then you WILL want to perform the following steps. If not then you’ve gone as far as you can so start playing around. These steps enable SSE3 and hence Rosetta support. This will allow you to run apps compiled for PowerPC under x86. Pretty sweet huh?
14) Get the CoreGraphics file. See top of instructions for location.
15) Unzip it and place the file inside in the following location:
/System/Library/Frameworks/ApplicationServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/CoreGraphics.framework/Versions/A/
You may wish to backup the existing copy that is in this directory first. Also you will need to do this as root (sudo).
16) change the file permissions on this to 755
17) reboot. everything should now be hunky dory for Rosetta. The easiest way to test this is to fire up iTunes, if it runs, rosetta is working.

And thats it! Let me know if there’s anything else you need

*****
Getting rc to boot in safe, single user mode:
You need to change single user mode so that the filesystem is mounted writeable as its read only by default. The instructions for doing this appear when you first enter single user mode. Now edit /etc/rc with your fav editor (nano!). You will see a line at the top saying ‘export -n SafeBoot’ or similar. Just add ‘=-x’ to the end of this. Save and exit. Type sh/etc/rc and fingers crossed you will get to a new prompt with OSX in single user mode. If not reboot and try it again, it can be tempramental, it took me 3-4 shots.

I rememberd I had two other things to say about the Mighty Mouse.

1) (And I realise this is a more generic OS X mouse thing) I CANNOT set the sensitivity of my mouse high enough in OS X! This drives me nuts. Its so close but not quite as fast as I have under Windows or Linux!

2) Before I say this, I’ll mention that I think Apple does a fantastic job on software (Hardware too of course), but who the hell writes a mouse driver that is 152mb installed?!! Its basically the same size as that last update to OS X and only adds the tiniest bit of functionality. I would really love to know what the hell is in that thing.

Finally, on a non-Apple note, I’ve registered www.monkey-labs.org for use with any projects I might decide to work on. Its also something of a communal thing so if anyone else has any projects their working on that need a home, just ask. Its not hosted anywhere yet but I want to get a CVS server hosted somewhere that I can point a subdomain like cvs.monkey-labs.org at. Anyone know any companies that do reasonable CVS hosting?

So the other evening, bored on the overnight shift, Apple decided to release their Mighty Mouse. It was about 01:30am at the time and my credit card just kept getting hotter and hotter until it was used. Two days later it rolled up at my door.

An interesting thing about purchasing an item only minutes after its release is that about 5-6 hours later, the revies start getting published. Albeit they’re mostly pretty amateur at that stage but they started to get me a little worried. For anyone who hasn’t taken a good look at these little devices, they don’t actually contain 2 buttons, they just simulate it by having touch sensitive inputs where normally there would be buttons. The upshot of this is that it still feels very much like the original Apple 1 button mouse. The downshot (?) however is the way Apple uses these sensors.

When i originally looked through the Apple site for the mouse, I assumed that these were some variation on pressure sensors that allowed it to know where the ‘click’ had come from, despite the fact that there was only 1 microswitch. Frustratingly, I was wrong. They simply detect where your fingers are located and from that assume which button was clicked. Good theory and it kinda works. The problem is that if you have your left finger resting on the ‘normal’ left finger spot when you right click, it registers as a left click. Bad logic, whether it works or not, its still poor.
When I found this out I was a little worried that the (expensive) little mouse I just bought would just be more of a frustration. I could see myself switching back to the old MS jobby and trying to flog the Mighty off to another Mac nut.

Thankfully now that its arrived I find the problem isn’t as bad as first thought, it is still noticible however. You kind of have to train yourself to subconsciously lift the left click finger ever so slightly before right clicking, other wise you don’t get the required response, even the slightest touch will trigger left. My other major gripe is that I really thought Apple would have made this, their ‘premium’ mouse, with a laser instead of just optical. This, of course, I did know before ordering though.

So my final opinion? 7/10. My standards for Apple products is high and I would have expected the long awaited ‘2 button’ Apple mouse to be a little more advanced and groundbreaking, but it is reasonable. I should also mention the scroll ball which works fantastically well! Even nicer than the old two-wheel mouse I used to use.

If anyone wants to have a more detailed look at this thing, check out this