It’s been a long time in coming, but Chax 2.2 is finally available. There are two new features since the beta: an option to confirm before closing active AV chats, and a way to quickly send a snapshot from a iSight or other connected camera as an inline image or file transfer (Send Camera Snapshot… in the Buddies menu).

Safari 4 DP Users: There is a bug in the Safari 4 beta that will cause iChat and Chax to occasionally crash. Downgrade to Safari 3 to avoid these crashes. The public beta Safari 4 appears to have resolved these issues.

Changes from Chax 2.1.2:

• (New) Message history shows messages from the previous conversation in new chat windows
• (New) Send Camera Snapshot in the Buddies menu allows you to instantly send a picture from your camera as an inline image
• (New) Added option to confirm before ending AV chats
• (New) Added multitouch swipe gesture to switch tabs in message window
• (New) Hidden default SaveWindowFrames saves per-contact window positions
• (New) Hidden default ShowSenderAccount shows the active account in each conversation
• (Bug) Fixed parsing logs with some languages
• (Bug) New chat windows no longer steal focus when using auto-accept
• (Bug) Fixed unlocalized UI elements appearing in some languages

Download Chax 2.2
Download Chax 2.2 Source

The latest beta of Warp includes a couple minor bug fixes as well as a new floating pager that gives you constant access to your spaces. The pager shows you a live preview of each space; clicking on another space will switch to it. Visibility of the pager can be toggled with a hot key.

Changes from Warp 1.1.1:

• Added a floating pager that allows rapid switching between spaces.
• Click-to-warp floating window no longer appears when dragging items.
• Fixed wrapping around a single row or column of spaces.
• The Warp helper application now automatically relaunches when updating.

Download Warp 1.2 Beta 1

In using all of the great new apps appearing on the App Store, a problem I’m often running into is that some apps, typically games, will interrupt the music that I’m listening to with and begin playing their own splash screen sounds or background music. Sometimes it happens for a short sound effect and nothing else, which is doubly annoying. While it is possible to re-override the new application’s sound by double-pressing the home button and pressing play again, it is a step that shouldn’t be necessary.

With the 2.0 firmware there wasn’t any way around interrupting users’ music, as Apple provided no way of even checking if any music was already playing. Thanks to the new iPhone 2.1 firmware, we can now do this! Moreover, it is simple:

UInt32 isPlaying;
UInt32 propertySize = sizeof(isPlaying);

AudioSessionInitialize(NULL, NULL, NULL, NULL);
AudioSessionGetProperty(
kAudioSessionProperty_OtherAudioIsPlaying, &propertySize, &isPlaying);


If isPlaying is 0, no music is playing. If it is any other value, please let users continue to listen to what they chose to play! It is remarkably easy to do, so there should be no excuses about additional complexity.

I’ve also created a small sample program that demonstrates checking music status on the phone. It has to be run on a device, as checking the kAudioSessionProperty_OtherAudioIsPlaying property doesn’t return successfully in the simulator. The sample code also checks music playback status when the program reactivates, such as after the user double-presses the home button to bring up the music status. This provides a chance to start your own application’s music later on should the user desire. The source is public domain, use it as you see fit.

Download MusicStatus Source

This has been a while in coming, but it should finally be usable enough for public testing:

Enable message history by enabling the option “Show previous message history in new message windows” in Chax’s general preferences. You may notice that message history will not immediately appear after enabling this option. Message history will only be displayed after you begin to chat with other people after you enable this option, so chat with some people for a bit before determining that it isn’t working.

There are also a couple of new options that aren’t currently exposed in the preferences. At some point in the future I’ll add a page describing all of the hidden defaults that Chax currently includes. SaveWindowFrames is an option ported from Chax 1.5 that saves the window position for each contact that you talk to. ShowSenderAccount shows what account you’re using to talk to someone with for those of you who use multiple accounts on the same service and want to know which account you’re sending a message from.

The syntax for enabling hidden options in the Terminal is as follows:

defaults write com.ksuther.chax SaveWindowFrames -bool YES

Changes from Chax 2.1.2:

• (New) Message history shows messages from the previous conversation in new chat windows
• (New) Added multitouch swipe gesture to switch tabs in message window
• (New) Hidden default SaveWindowFrames saves per-contact window positions
• (New) Hidden default ShowSenderAccount shows the active account in each conversation
• (Bug) Fixed parsing logs with some languages
• (Bug) New chat windows no longer steal focus when using auto-accept

Download Chax 2.2 Beta 1

This release should fix the crashes that occur when waking from sleep or reconnecting. Also fixed from last beta are the stop screen saver options and some additional log viewer bugs. Enjoy!

Changes from Chax 2.1.1:

• (New) Quick Look support for inline image transfers (available by right-clicking an image)
• (New) Contact lists can now be sorted by user handle (View menu -> Sort Buddies -> By Handle)
• (New) New default to strip background color of outgoing messages (StripOutgoingBackgroundColor)
• (New) Russian localization (thanks to Denis Avdeev)
• (New) Options to undim the screen when receiving a message or AV invitation
• (Change) The unified contact list can now be set as the primary contact list in the Chax preferences
• (Bug) Unified contact list should now stay in sync properly with all accounts
• (Bug) Auto-replies to ICQ users are now properly stripped
• (Bug) Name notifications in the Dock now truncate better
• (Bug) Selecting “All Contacts” from the Window menu now toggles unified contact list visibility
• (Bug) Can now make all accounts invisible at once with the unified contact list
• (Bug) Fixed crash that could occur on wake-from-sleep or when reconnecting
• (Bug) Improved German localization
• (Bug) Viewing logs on a specific person will now properly reload logs
• (Bug) Exporting logs as text will now save status changes
• (Bug) Exporting log as text now gives a default name
• (Bug) Stop screensaver on event options now properly stop the screensaver
• (Bug) Find now works properly in the log viewer

Download Chax 2.1.2
Download Chax 2.1.2 Source