SUNBURN  OK, so here we go again. Looking back, we have:

7/2007, upgrade from 3 to 4: $39

8/2008, upgrade from 4 to 5: $39

And look, it's September 2009, and here's Zengobi, hat in hand, asking for another chunk of change. (I'm academic, so at least my upgrade fee is fairly modest, but I believe the non-academic upgrade fee is $70.)

IMO, this is a really bad business model: punish your most loyal customers by hitting them up every year. Each new version has had some nice features, but not enough to justify the level of cost. If this was even every other year, I'd be OK with it. But annually? A little excessive, no?

I don't even use Curio all that much, though for the things I do use it for, I can't imagine what else I'd use to do it. But at this rate, I'm going to start looking pretty seriously. I'll probably cave because generally Zengobi does a good job of keeping up on OS updates and I'll probably be missing some cool Snow Leopard only feature when 6.1 or 6.2 comes out... but maybe I'll just skip this one and wait until 10.2010 and go for version 7.

It's a nice program--version 5, I mean, I haven't shelled out yet for version 6--but if you go for it, you're going to have to think of it like an expensive subscription service rather than a single purchase, because that's clearly the developer's model.  
(Version 6.0.1)

SUNBURN  This would be GREAT if it worked with the scroll wheel! The features are very nice, it loads fast, overall, very good--but not great. Could be great...  
(Version 2.3)

SUNBURN  Billboard is very cool indeed. One minor quibble: when iTunes is paused, it detects this right away. Great. However, when iTunes starts playing again, it doesn't detect this until the next track starts. is there any way to get it to notice that iTunes is playing again before the next track starts?  
(Version 0.8.5)

SUNBURN  Yes, you're right, "return" works, so I withdraw #5. However, dragging on the Dock icon still only works for me if the app is not already running. If it's already running, dragging onto the dock icon does _nothing_.

Also, another problem, and this is a real bug: when you try, and it complains that your hard disk is too full, and you attempt cancel, it hangs. Every time. It'll sit there with the whirring progress thing for hours and hours, but it never completes, and has to be force-quit.

Maybe 2.4.6 will fix some of these--the release notes are vague.  
(Version 2.4.6)

SUNBURN  I've been re-ripping a lot of movies now with HandBrake 0.9.3 and I have to say I have a love/hate relationship with MetaX. I love that it provides a GUI for tagging and all, but the little glitches in this app drive me nuts. What glitches, you ask? Here are my primary gripes:

(1) Does not support dragging of files onto the app/dock icon properly. If MetaX is already open, dragging a file onto the icon does NOTHING. So, for MetaX to work right, it has to be already quit. Hunh?

(2) Doesn't support standard keyboard commands. In particular, command-W (to close the window) does NOTHING. The only way to close the window is to quit the app completely. Feels like a Windows app.

(3) Columns are not re-sizeable. This is particularly annoying for the left-hand column which displays search results. You just have to hope the name of the movie is less than about 12 characters or you won't be able to see it. Especially fun for sequels.

(4) TagChimp searching is horrible. Stuff you can find in two seconds on the TagChimp Web site cannot be found with MetaX. Let's say you want to tag one of the LOTR movies. To get the hit, you have to search for "Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (Extended) (Part 1)" to get the right hit. But if you have "Lord of the Rings The Two Towers (Extended) (Part 1)" (the only difference is no colon), you get... nothing. Hi, the 1980s called, they want their search query nitpicky UI back.

(5) Hand entry is god-awful slow if you need to do it, especially for chapter names. You have to go hand-to-mouse to double-click the next chapter, then hand-to-keyboard back to type it, then hand-to-mouse to double-click... and so on. How about some keyboard-based navigation?

On the other hand, I *LOVE* MetaX because there's no good alternative, and tagging with this is still one hell of a lot easier than tagging with the command line. And you simply have to love the price! So in that sense, I shouldn't complain. However, if they'd fix these, I'd happily donate $10...  
(Version 2.4.5)

SUNBURN  Larry, you have it right on. Every competing product that I can find has a trial version. This program is more expensive than most of them, too--how could I possibly know whether this is worth the extra money if I can't even try it?  
(Version 3.1.2)

SUNBURN  Cronnix is free.  
(Version 1.0)

SUNBURN  This is totally ludicrous. These clowns want $100 a year for upgrades to piece of software that STILL sucks even after years of upgrades. This is PC software with a bad UI and mediocre functionality. I'm done with what is essentially an annual subscription.

Right now, for HALF the price of the _upgrade_, I can get a bundle which includes Bookends. Even if Bookends also sucks (I haven't tried it yet, but I'm about to buy it anyway), there is virtually no way that EndNote X2 is twice as good as Bookends.

Of course, there is no way in heaven or hell that anyone from the developer will ever see this. ISI is a lumbering hulk to whom "customer service" means nothing unless you are a huge on-line library or publisher.   
(Version X2)

SUNBURN  I've been happily using Shimo for a while, though I only connect to VPN about once a month. It's a nice program and all, but $20 seems incredibly steep for a program whose main feature (for me) is just launching my VPN connection in a few less keystrokes. I would certainly pay $5 for it, but $20? Too steep for me.  
(Version 2.0)

SUNBURN  Worst. Upgrade. Ever.

You get some more eye-candy, yes. But, scrolling with the scroll wheel is now broken for journal entries, and it will no longer send entries to my blog, all I get is a dialog which says "there was an unknown error." Gee, thanks.

And they want money for this?

I think it's time to switch to MarsEdit.  
(Version 5.0.1)

SUNBURN  Uhh, I think the name "Terminal" is rather taken...  
(Version 1.0)

SUNBURN  I couldn't agree more with this. I paid for a license which said nothing about it ever expiring, and now I can't apply BUG FIXES without paying for a new license. Ludicrous.  
(Version 5.1.2)

ANONYMOUS  And the reason I'd want to pay $10 for this when I can do the same thing for free with a cron job (yes, with a free GUI, too, CronniX) would be what, exactly?  
(Version 1.0.1)

ANONYMOUS  This is fantastic. I know it seems like a small thing, but the "find" in Apple's Finder is both slower and less well-featured than this. I used to do this in the Terminal, but this is a very well-done GUI which allows me to easily reveal in the Finder, and has a great dock menu.

And it's FREE. Best cost:benefit ratio ever.  
(Version 0.7.3)