Wooden Brain Concepts

iDupe and CaliBrate Deeply Discounted in TheMacBundles’ Holiday Bundle (Revised)

2011-11-30T09:00:00.000-05:00

Ann Arbor, MI
November 30, 2011

Ann Arbor, MI - Mac users can enjoy both iDupe and CaliBrate, two of Wooden Brain Concepts’ flagship products, at a great discount from now until Christmas. Wooden Brain Concepts, a software company specializing in practical tools for Mac home users, has partnered with TheMacBundles for an exclusive discount in this season's holiday bundle as well as in its innovative Build Your Own Bundle stores, where people can put together their own discounted software packages.

“The two products we’re making available as part of this bundle are immensely useful tools for anyone who uses iTunes and iCal,” said Loren Ryter, President. “We know you’ll agree when you try them. That's why we're working with TheMacBundles - we want to get our software in more hands.”

“iDupe is a smart duplicates scanner for iTunes. iDupe makes smart decisions about which track in a set of identified duplicates to keep, rather than relying on a single criterion, as many other similar products do. You make the final decision about whether it picked the correct one, then let iDupe handle duplicate clean up from there.”

“CaliBrate, meanwhile, is a multi-purpose utility for iCal. It allows you to perform many batch functions with events, such as removing duplicates, adding or removing alarms, modifying titles and notes, moving events between calendars, and much more. Search criteria are extremely flexible, and you can save frequently used searches for later. CaliBrate is also able to create new events from text dropped onto its ‘Magic Hat’.”
TheMacBundles was setup by Steve Becker as a “Farmers’ Market” for software, essentially a co-op where software developers can bundle their software titles for maximum exposure. Users are protected by TheMacBundles' no-fine-print policy, which means that purchasers of its bundles get the same software, support, licenses, and upgrade benefits that apply to users who pay the full price for the software. That’s why TheMacBundles motto is: “No Games, No Hype, No Middlemen...Just Great Software at a Great Price™.”

This Holiday Bundle of 14 titles has a retail value of nearly $475 but sells for only $49.95, and includes both iDupe and CaliBrate, two of Wooden Brain Concepts’ top-selling applications.

TheMacBundles
Wooden Brain Concepts
iDupe
CaliBrate

Wooden Brain Concepts has been making Mac software for well over 10 years. Besides iDupe and CaliBrate, its popular products include OmniGrowl (which provides all kinds of practical notifications using Growl) and Cast Away (a utility to customize podcast management and auto-playback on a per-podcast basis). Wooden Brain Concepts believes in affordable software and the true principle of shareware.

###

Loren Ryter
President
Wooden Brain Concepts
woodenbrain@kagi.com

OmniGrowl supports Mac App Store Growl

2011-10-06T12:41:00.000-04:00

Wooden Brain Concepts today released an update to OmniGrowl to support the new Mac App Store version of Growl, Growl 1.3.

As noted in our last blog posting, when Growl moved to the Mac App Store and became a menu bar application, OmniGrowl had ceased to recognize it as installed. This has now been fixed. Please note that OmniGrowl does require that Growl remain in the default installation location, that is your Applications folder.

As of this release, the Growl team has not yet released its developer toolkit ("SDK"), so this should be considered a provisional fix. After the SDK is released, additional compatibility improvements will follow as needed.

In addition, fixes were made for the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) Word of the Day notification.

As usual, please refer to the version history for details.

OmniGrowl and Growl 1.3 (MAS)

2011-10-04T09:00:00.000-04:00

The Growl folks today released a Mac App Store only version of Growl. OmniGrowl 4.4.2 does not recognize this installation.

A fix will be coming relatively soon, but ideally we need to wait for the Growl team to release their toolkit ("SDK") to developers first. If that does not get released in a timely fashion, we will release a provisional fix to be followed by full support for Growl 1.3.

Thanks for your patience, early adopters!

OmniGrowl 64-Bit Mode Restored

2011-09-24T06:50:00.000-04:00

WBC today released another compatibility upgrade for OmniGrowl on OS X Lion.

The main change is that OmniGrowl now runs in 64-bit mode. Support for OS X versions as old as Tiger and for PPC Macs has been retained (for now) as well.

As usual please refer to the version history for details.

OmniGrowl Roars Louder on Lion, Plays Nice with GeekTool

2011-09-17T04:55:00.000-04:00

WBC today released another compatibility upgrade for OmniGrowl on OS X Lion.

Last August, WBC released the first compatibility upgrade, then we promptly took off on vacation. But wouldn't you know it, some issues remained. We believe these have now all been fixed.

Issues with iTunes notifications and artwork have been fixed. Also, GeekTool integration has been restored with the version of GeekTool available on the Mac App Store.

As usual please refer to the version history for details.

OmniGrowl Roaring on Lion

2011-08-15T14:33:00.000-04:00

WBC today released a Lion compatibility upgrade for OmniGrowl. Most features had been working normally on Lion, but a few tweaks were needed.

In particular, time out errors related to Address Book dates checking should now be eliminated. It is also now possible to set a hidden preference to turn off the feature to quit after excessive time outs completely, or to increase the number of time outs before OmniGrowl will quit. (This "quit" feature is deliberate: the idea is if for some reason OmniGrowl is repeatedly getting stuck, there's no reason to tie up your system…)

As usual, please see the version history for details.

Note:

Early downloaders of OmniGrowl 4.3.4 with PPC Macs: please re-download the universal binary version. Dropping PPC support may soon come, but not yet! (The universal version was posted at 7 pm EDT on Aug 15.)

MoveTunes update adds features

2011-06-17T09:51:00.000-04:00

Wooden Brain Concepts today released an update to MoveTunes which adds features and improves performance.

MoveTunes now retains artwork when moving music files.

It also includes the option to copy moved tracks to a MoveTunes Moved playlist. This helps if you use smart playlists based on recently added music, because you can now exclude that playlist.

MoveTunes also now includes an option to copy the original track to a MoveTunes Removed playlist. This greatly improves performance, because now MoveTunes does not need to have iTunes remove each move track individually, which takes time with larger libraries. Instead, you can delete all the tracks from that playlist when MoveTunes is done, by selecting them all and then hitting command-option-delete.

This update fixes critical issues and also helps to improve security. It includes fixes for vulnerabilities that an attacker can use to overwrite the contents of your computer's memory with malicious code.

We're just joking about that last one. (Version histories for Microsoft Office for some reason say that every time...) But other minor under-the-hood improvements were also made. Please see the version history for details, as usual.

OmniGrowl update further improves iTunes artwork and more

2011-05-27T12:33:00.000-04:00

OmniGrowl 4.3.3, released today, adds further improvements to iTunes artwork handling.

First, the feature to add artwork found on the internet to the iTunes album has been fixed. It has been broken since iTunes 10.2.

Second, OmniGrowl will now show separate artwork for each track of an album under specific conditions. Normally, OmniGrowl only checks artwork once per album in order to reduce the drain on iTunes.

OmniGrowl has updated Growl to 1.2.2 under the hood, and now includes the Growl installer, so it can either update Growl or install it when not present.

As usual, please see the version history for details.

Apologies for Support MIA

2011-04-11T08:39:00.000-04:00

The past month have brought some big (little) changes to the home front of Wooden Brain Concepts. A newborn boy is now part of the team!

As a result, some support inquiries have gone unanswered. On top of this, we lost some email during this period due to database corruption.

As we strive to answer support emails in as timely a fashion as possible, we apologize for this.

If you have contacted support during the past month and have not yet received a reply, please send your query again.

Thanks for your understanding.

HomeBuyDB updated to version 1.3

2011-02-27T12:57:00.000-05:00

Spring is, thankfully, finally upon us!

With it comes the house-hunting season. If you've been considering buying a new home while it's still a buyer's market, you will be interested in HomeBuyDB.

HomeBuyDB gives you the tools to make sound decisions about which home to buy at what price. These are the tools that realtors like to keep to themselves!

It has now been updated for compatibility with newer versions of Mac OS X and integration with iCal and Safari. Please see the version history for details.

Another big update to OmniGrowl plus notes on MobileMe

2011-02-24T09:54:00.000-05:00

WBC today released another major update to OmniGrowl, introducing some great new features.

OmniGrowl has always provided notifications for to-dos due tomorrow or today. OmniGrowl 4.3 now allows for daily notifications of pending to-dos in iCal, up to 60 days out. OmniGrowl will tell you how many days you have left before the due date. These daily notifications do not stay on screen by default, but you can make all to-do notifications stay on screen by configuring it in Growl if you prefer.

OmniGrowl 4.3 adds a new source for concert notifications, bandsintown. Bandsintown is nice because it can, optionally, get your location from just your IP. There's also the option to get it from your city and state or country. Pollstar notifications are fixed again, hopefully for some time yet to come.

A great new feature has been added that allows you to add recently found concerts and events to iCal. This is available from a button on the Music tab and from the Tools menu.

Holiday greeting notifications have been significantly reworked and expanded. Holidays that fall on the nth weekday of a month, like Mother's Day or Thanksgiving, are now supported. There's now the option to completely turn them off in OmniGrowl. Also if you're in the U.S. you can specify whether you prefer more secular or liberal holiday greetings or not. Please make sure your country is set.

Other existing features have also been fixed or improved. Please see the version history for complete details.

In related news, Apple announced yesterday by-email that all MobileMe users will be required to upgrade to the new MobileMe calendars by May 5, 2011.

What does this mean for OmniGrowl users? OmniGrowl has supported the new calendars since January 1, 2011 with version 4.1. However there's one big outstanding problem: MobileMe sync does not currently automatically update changes to the new calendars until iCal is open. This means that if you add or change an event on the MobileMe web page, another computer, or an iPhone, OmniGrowl won't know about that change until you start iCal.

You can always set OmniGrowl to launch iCal when it starts. But since Leopard you didn't need to and now you do.

If you're not happy with this situation, please send feedback to MobileMe.

OmniGrowl 4.2 brings back traffic and more

2011-02-14T07:58:00.000-05:00

OmniGrowl 4.2 has been released.

With this release, OmniGrowl moves from Yahoo Traffic, which has been defunct for months, to MapQuest traffic, for U.S. only traffic alerts.

MapQuest traffic alerts are not only more reliable, but each one is given a date and time range, which you can choose to display or not. You can also set a radius around your zip code for traffic alerts. Afternoon traffic alerts are now also consistently given.

This release also fixes an issue where Woot, MacZot, and OED Word of the Day daily notifications would not be shown on successive days after the first launch. (Thanks to one of our crack beta testers for pointing this out!)

Finally, this release further improves custom iTunes full notifications.

As usual, please see the version history for details.

OmniGrowl 4.1.2 released, supporting authenticated RSS feeds

2011-02-02T15:48:00.000-05:00

OmniGrowl 4.1.2 has been released.

At the request in particular of Basecamp users, OmniGrowl now supports authenticated RSS feeds in the form of https://u:p@url.

This release fixes OED Word of the Day and Flight Status formatting.

It also includes a number of improvements to iTunes custom notification display formats and local album artwork handling.

As usual, please see the version history for details.

iGotta MP3 Collection Updated

2011-01-23T13:17:00.000-05:00

iGotta MP3 Collection, our freeware FileMaker database for iTunes, has been updated to version 2.5. It boasts a lot of new features, including these:

Added Limit, First, Last, Bit Rate, Settings, and About buttons to track list view.
Limit button limits current found set.
First and Last buttons show only first or last tracks in album.
Bit Rate searches for bit rates lower than user-defined limit.
Added Disc # and Disc Count fields to Track List.
Added Grouping and Last Played dates to Track Details.
New Settings layout.
New Internet Search function with defined and custom search URLs.
Support for dnuos when installed.
General layout clean-up, including adding tool tips when appropriate.
Updated WBC logos and URLs to newer versions.
Updated match field and playlist export directions layouts.

Revision 2.5.2 (01/28/2011):
We made two additional tweaks that we felt did not merit a new blog or twitter posting. But if you use iGotta and found the tab order on version 2.5 to be a problem, it's been fixed. A new download will get you version 2.5.2.

Fixed the tab order on both the track list and track detail screens.
Cleaned up the primary & related file table and file names.

New Year's Day Release for OmniGrowl

2011-01-01T15:22:00.000-05:00

To mark the New Year, fighting off a hangover, WBC today releases a major update to OmniGrowl.

OmniGrowl now supports the new MobileMe calendars, and other CalDav calendars as well. If you have switched to the new MobileMe calendars and have kept local copies, you'll want to make sure that either the local calendars or the MobileMe calendars are disabled in iCal so that you don't see duplicate notifications.

Also, by popular request, same-day event notifications are now given by default for all day events, including birthdays and custom dates from Address Book, birthdays in iCal, and Yahoo Upcoming events. Previously, OmniGrowl showed notifications for all-day events 1 week, 3 days, and the day before they occurred. If you prefer the old way, you can uncheck the option for "also on the day of event" underneath the clock on the Personal tab.

There are a few other under-the-hood changes as well, so as always, please check the version history.

Cast Away 2.9.7 released and other news from WBC

2010-12-17T16:20:00.000-05:00

Happy Holidays everyone!

Cast Away 2.9.7 has been released. It fixes a problem which could have caused Cast Away to get stuck in testing mode if not properly quit. Please see the version history for details.

We here at WBC have been very busy the last couple of months, but promise a number of updates to follow in the next several weeks.

We've updated all the alternate download links on this site, which had expired due to changes over at Apple's MobileMe. If you encounter other dead links, please report them, as one kind visitor did.

Speaking of changes at MobileMe, as many Mac users know, Apple's making a big push to get people to update to the new MobileMe Calendar system. If things work as you like them now, we'd recommend not being too hasty about this. it involves some major changes under the hood, and you might find compatibility problems.

We are aware that OmniGrowl is not fully compatible with with the new Calendar system. Making it so is a short-term priority, and we're working on it. We appreciate your patience.

There are other changes in the works that will affect OmniGrowl as well. Today it was leaked that Yahoo plans to "sunset" or "merge" a number of its services, included Upcoming. OmniGrowl provides local event notifications using Upcoming. So if it turns out to be true — and it's still too early to tell what will happen with Upcoming — either that feature will disappear or we'll need to find a comparable substitute. Suggestions are very welcome.

As for iDupe, we're working on some issues related to NAS volumes. If you use iDupe and have your music on a NAS volume formatted as FAT32 or NTSF, we'd like to hear from you about testing.

As for ThinkArch, we are waiting on MicroSoft to fix some issues involving Outlook 2011 to begin making ThinkArch compatible with Outlook. As it stands so far, it's simply not possible due to the limitations.

Finally, some of you may be wondering if we have any plans for the Mac App Store. Frankly, we haven't decided at this point. Our model is an old-school shareware model, where software is priced cheaply and people pay when they're happy. That's quite far from what we understand the Mac App Store model will be: focused on impulse buying and quite a controlled user experience. And of course given fees paid to Apple, prices would have to go up quite a lot. We invite your comments.

OmniGrowl 4.0.6 and WBC iTunes Scripts Collection Updates

2010-11-14T18:09:00.000-05:00

OmniGrowl 4.0.6 has just been released. It fixes AMG artist biography notifications.

We are aware of some potential issues with the new MobileMe calendar (introduced within the last few weeks). In order to get them resolved, we have added some extra logging related to calendars in this version. So if you are using the new MobileMe calendar and OmniGrowl and are experiencing any issues, please send your logs to support. (You can access your logs from the help menu, or with cmd-L. Only the first part where it lists your calendars by name and type is needed.)

We've also just released a major update to our WBC iTunes Scripts Collection.

It's the first big update in a while, so it gets a 1.9 version number. Since it doesn't have it's own version history page, here are the main changes made:

Added several brand new tagging scripts (Compilationify, Discsettify, Consolidate Artists, and Yearify) to the Grab-Bag.
Added a few brand new miscellaneous scripts (including Find Artwork Multi-Search and Reveal All) to the Grab-Bag.
Added a couple more switch tagging scripts
Updated all scripts to working condition, or designated them as legacy scripts.
Removed some hopelessly out of date scripts entirely.
Removed iTunes version checking (which caused scripts not to work on iTunes 10+) on some scripts.
Various other minor changes to scripts.
Updated info documents.
Updated links in these info documents.

The new scripts are pretty handy for tagging. We hope you'll try them out.

Another update hat-trick: iDupe, Cast Away, and OmniGrowl

2010-09-27T09:46:00.000-04:00

Updates to iDupe, Cast Away, and OmniGrowl have been released.

iDupe 2.8.5 fixes an issue with deep clean mode.

Many performance updates have been made to Cast Away 2.9.6, including fixes for the archive logs and time out issues when iTunes is unresponsive when Cast Away is launched.

OmniGrowl 4.0.5 fixes some bugs, and introduces a much-requested option to customize the iTunes track change full notification descriptions.

Remember that OmniGrowl is still on special for one more day as part of theMacBundles September bundle. Act fast!

The links above are to version history details.

Customer demands refund after realizing he could have stolen iDupe

2010-09-12T18:09:00.000-04:00

One of the more difficult things we have to do here at WBC is handle refund requests.

It's a dilemma for us, because most of our products don't require registration codes. We rely on an honor system and value the true spirit of shareware, which originally meant that customers paid when they were happy with the product, and continued to use it.

Often these requests come from Windows users who fail to read the rather obvious Mac-only system requirements (which are stated in red next to an Apple logo, right under the Buy and downloads buttons). It doesn't give us any joy to stick to a consistent policy on refunds in such cases.

We also know that plenty of Mac users abuse this honor system by never paying. But we even hear from people who want a refund when they realize they could have gotten away with not paying!

This exchange on the PayPal dispute system is so telling, and so tragic, that we can't resist posting it, slightly edited, with names changed to protect the "innocent."

From Buyer - John
9/6/2010 23:44 EDT
Have not received software key.
From Seller - Loren
9/7/2010 01:04 EDT
A registration email with the subject "Thanks from WBC" was sent at 11:41 PM EST on 9/6. Check your spam filters, or maybe just wait a little. There is no registration key...
From Buyer - John
9/7/2010 08:30 EDT
Then what exactly are you selling? Either issue a refund or I'll escalate this to a Paypal claim.
From Seller - Loren
9/7/2010 16:55 EDT
We are selling shareware software on an honor system. It is paid software, you indicate you paid by checking a box. I fail to understand your issue.
For details on this please see this in our FAQ.
[Complete information on our refund policy and approach to shareware is given in our FAQ.]
This was the original principle of shareware before most products started requiring codes like boxed commercial software.
From Buyer - John
9/7/2010 18:15 EDT
My issue is you're not selling a product. It's unclear on your website that you can actually use the software without even paying for it. My ultimatum still remains.
From Seller - Loren
9/8/2010 09:01 EDT
It's perfectly clear that we're selling a product and the link above explains what shareware is. Your argument is basically the same as saying if you buy something at a store and later realize you could have shop-lifted it without getting caught, you should get a refund. I'm sorry but not only is your logic offensive, but your "ultimatum" is meaningless. People like you are the reason most developers have to implement highly restrictive copy protection measures. So much for the principle of an honor system. Sigh.

iDupe 2.8.4 improves iTunes 10 and Tiger+Intel compatibility

2010-09-12T18:05:00.000-04:00

iDupe 2.8.4 improves compatibility with iTunes 10 and also with system running Tiger on intel Macs. For details please see the version history.

Pick up OmniGrowl for a Song as part of the September bundle at TheMacBundles

2010-09-02T01:27:00.000-04:00

We've long felt that OmniGrowl is one of the most useful products available for the Mac, but that it really needs more exposure. If more people had a chance to try it, they'll wonder how they managed their daily workflow without it.

For that reason, we are partnering with TheMacBundles, which is including OmniGrowl in its September bundle.

For just $49.95 you can pick up OmniGrowl along with 14 other useful Mac applications at an 85% discount off their total retail values. In other words, these apps are a steal at about 3 bucks each. Or you can "Build Your Own Bundle" and include OmniGrowl in your custom bundle. Strike while the iron is hot!

OmniGrowl 4.0.4 released

2010-08-10T09:35:00.000-04:00

OmniGrowl 4.0.4 has been released. It primarily fixes overly frequent 4info notifications due to 4info site changes. Please see the version history for details.

iGotta MP3 Collection, back from the dead

2010-08-05T13:14:00.000-04:00

Years ago WBC released a FileMaker database to import from iTunes, called iGotta MP3 Collection. Apparently it's been broken for some unknown time since iTunes' export file format changed. That was probably with iTunes 9 or some time after that. Anyway, we've updated iGotta MP3 to work with iTunes 9.2.x at least. It's been tested with iTunes 9.2.1 and FileMaker 11. The only caveat is now when importing (always from the scripts menu) you must manually select Tab-Separated Text File from the show menu. Download it here.

Update Hat-Trick: DevonSync, OmniGrowl, iDupe

2010-07-20T13:24:00.000-04:00

Releases for three WBC products are now available.

A long-overdue update for DevonSync (1.4) verifies Snow Leopard compatibility, adds the ability to select particular DEVONthink databases, and introduces other minor features and fixes.

OmniGrowl 4.0.3 improves notifications for network status changes such as dropped connections and fixes MacZot formatting.

iDupe 2.8.3 restores compatibility with Tiger Intel systems.

OmniGrowl 4.0.2 released

2010-05-14T14:52:00.000-04:00

OmniGrowl 4.0.2 has just been released. This is mainly a maintenance release.

It fixes a bug that prevented validating the Yahoo Upcoming API key on 10.5 intel machines and possibly other system configurations. (Version 4.0 did not have this bug on most configurations.)

OmniGrowl is now 64-bit compatible. Macs that are 64-bit capable now require OS X 10.5 or higher. However OmniGrowl remains compatible with Tiger on older Macs.

If using GeekTool integration, a redundant geeklet refresh (which generated excess system logging) has been eliminated. This requires GeekTool 3.0 final.

Please see the version history.