This is exactly the kind of thing we love to see here at TUAW (and thanks for sending it along, Danny) -- Glyph of the Twisted project got a job offer from Apple last week, and over on his blog, he posts a set of unboxing pics. Which might sound silly (an unboxing for a new hire packet?), but when you're talking about Apple, it's worth it. It turns out they put nearly as much thought into the design of their paperwork as they do into the rest of their projects. From the iconic folder to the way it's organized, designed, and laid out, getting a job offer from Apple isn't just super exciting, it's apparently a thing of beauty.

To tell the truth, we half expected him to turn the folder over and see the words "Designed by Apple in California." Good luck to Glyph with his job, and it warms our hearts here as Apple fans at TUAW to see that something the company never expected to be shown to the public was assembled with such care and thought.

Quick Look is a beautiful thing, and in my view practically itself worth the cost of admission to Leopard. Unfortunately, the more you get used to it, the more annoying it is when you get to a file format that Quick Look doesn't support. Fortunately, Apple was smart enough to design Quick Look with an open architecture that allows developers to write their own plugins and support more file formats, which Japanese developer Taiyo used to write two excellent plugins.

The first addresses a serious annoyance with the default Quick Look implementation on folders. If you invoke Quick Look with a folder selected in the Finder you'll get...a picture of the folder icon. Frankly, that's pretty stupid. Taiyo's Folder Quick Look Plugin fixes this by displaying the folder's contents, which is how it should have been done in the first place. Likewise, Taiyo's Zip Quick Look Plugin displays the contents of zip files.

I'm sure we'll be seeing more and more of these expansions of Quick Look in the days ahead, which will make this quintessential Leopard feature that much more useful. Both the Folder Quick Look Plugin and the Zip Quick Look Plugin are free downloads. Place them in your /Library/QuickLook/ or ~/Library/QuickLook/ folders and they should work immediately.

[via Digg]

Ever since we first saw the new Dock with its reflective surfaces and little glowing lights under open apps, people have gotten nostalgic for the old Tiger Dock and its less flashy ways. First we showed you how to de-gloss the new Dock, and now Mike at Silver Mac has cooked up a way to get those black triangles back.

Turns out it's not super hard to do-- inside the Dock app folder, there's just three .png files that serve as "Dock indicators," so all you have to do is change those (definitely back up what's there, however), and you should be in business. The Dock now scales those indicators based on size, so there's three files to replace-- at your own risk, natch-- and you're all set.

Thanks, Mike!

Hazel is one of those rare pieces of software (with a strange name) that feels like it's filling a gaping feature void I didn't even know Apple left in Mac OS X: it's a powerful, rule-based file and folder management app that brings a little bit of Automator, AppleScript and Folder Actions to the table in a way that none of those apps and features do well on their own. Hazel installs as a System Preferences Pane and, as you can see, allows you to build a list of folders on the left with a list of toggle-able rules on the right. The on/off switch on these rules is key, as they make it easy to switch between running certain kinds of rules on a folder for different workflows, jobs, times of the day or week.

Scott blogged Martian SlingShot, a Bonjour-enabled network syncing utility for your Macs, back in January, and a recent 2.0 update has brought iTunes music and playlist syncing to the table. In addition to being able to 'publish' and 'subscribe' to folders between multiple Macs on a local network (also known as a 'live backup'), SlingShot can now keep iTunes libraries and playlists in sync, watching for changes and copying over files when new additions are found.

A 30-day demo is available that allows you to publish or subscribe to one folder or playlist. Fortunately, Martian Technology LLC allows you to purchase one license for $29.99 USD on all the Macs you own, while business licensing is available upon request.

Non Stop Mac has put together an ingenious how-to on creating an Automator action to backup files to Backpack. It's a simple process that uses the genius of Backpack's page-specific email addresses to email files that are sitting in a specific folder. Head over and check out their post for the full details, as it really isn't difficult to create a system for keeping your stuff backed up, online and accessible. However, don't forget: free Backpack accounts (to my knowledge) don't allow for hosting files or images.

I actually have an amendment to offer up for Non Stop Mac's Backpack backup process. While I haven't tested this out yet, it should work in theory: instead of saving this system out as an Automator action, I bet you could save it as a folder action, then simply attach it to a folder of stuff you want to back up. In a sense, this might be a basic, one-way iDisk: you could (theoretically) save items to this folder, which would then automatically be emailed to Backpack. If you try any of this out, feel free to share your thoughts on the experience.

[via Backpack blog]

This tip could definitely be classified as rudimentary to some, but I thought it would be handy to shed some light on a folder in the Home directory that is rarely opened by many users: the Library. For those who sometimes wonder things such as where Safari stores your bookmarks or where Mail.app keeps all those messages you never reply to, your Library folder is calling your name. The Library in your Home folder is where Mac OS X stores all the data you enter into almost any and every application you use. Take a look at ~/Library/Safari, for example (the (~) stands for your Home folder). In there is just about everything Safari stores for you, including your bookmarks and history. There are plenty of other handy folders to check out in your Library, such as the Fonts folder which stores all the fonts you install, but I think the real meat of the Library is the Application Support folder. This is where most applications will store their information, such as Adium extras, Camino/Firefox bookmarks, NetNewsWire subscription information and the database file iWeb uses to create your website.

The Library is where (almost) all of it happens boys and girls, so take a look around. There are a lot of handy folders in there, but more importantly: in addition to the rest of the folders in your Home directory, the Library is one of the most vital to back up. So feel free to look around and familiarize yourself with your Library, the "guy behind the guy" of your Mac OS X Home directory.

Here's an easy tip for quickly opening the Finder location of a file you currently have open in almost any app.

Let say, for example, that you're working in Photoshop on an image that's buried a few folders deep within your Home folder. You'd like to get to that file's location, but unless you've used Dave Caolo's tip for taking control of your sidebar (or you have another trick up your sleeve), it requires clicking on the Finder icon in the dock, then digging deep into the folder system. Well to bypass all that clicking, all you have to do is command click on the small icon at the top of the image window in Photoshop to open a popup list (pictured) of the full directory structure leading to your file. As you can see, my hard drive is named Stewie (yes, I use Family Guy character names for my drives), and my Home folder is named dcharti. I could then click on any of the folders in that list to immediately open it in the Finder, making it a lot easier to boogie around in the file system.

The beauty of this trick is that it *should* work in any OS X app that has a file icon (like Photoshop) in the window's title bar (not the white menu bar which sits at the very top of OS X's desktop), and even in some apps that don't necessarily display that icon. Try it in Word and Illustrator. Then try command clicking on Safari's title bar, as it will give you a list of URLs the frontmost tab has visited (like a tab-specific history). You can even open something like a local PDF file in Safari and it will give you the directory list.

I bet this works in all sorts of other apps I haven't even tried yet, but it doesn't seem to work in database-driven apps like Mail.app and NetNewsWire. If you find some handy extras with this trick, feel free to add them to the pile in the comments.

I'm finding myself spending more and more time at Apple.com/pro, as there are some truly useful tips for getting things done in OS X. Take this tip for example, that C.K. just sent my way: Adding Automation Through Folder Actions. Y'know those Enable/Configure Folder Actions options that show up any time you right-click (ctrl-click) a folder? Well, this tutorial will help explain what those are about by getting you started with setting up a simple action that notifies you when a file has been placed in a folder. Handy for a workplace environment where coworkers are placing items in your shared Drop Box. If I remember right, you can also attach applescripts and even Automator Actions you create or download as folder actions as well, which can really open up the doors for simple folder-based automation. Check out the brief tutorial to get your feet wet with the (geeky) goodness of automating OS X.

Client Folder Maker (CFM) is a handy applescript applet for those of you who repeatedly have to create standard folder structures for any kind of projects such as websites or design proofs for clients. The applet offers a simple UI for essentially creating a folder structure template, allowing you to list all the regular folders you might need. Building websites for clients? Create a folder structure list in CFM with folder names like I have pictured and you can simply run this applet to generate all the folders you need for each project, named according to whatever scheme best suits you. It's a handy little applet if you're doing any kind of repetitive work like this, and for the mere price of $0, how can you go wrong?

From time to time I've seen an iPod stop operating and display nothing but a folder icon - definitely not a happy sign. With the holidays fast approaching, I thought it'd be a good idea to offer the iPod owners and soon-to-be-owners a refresher link to Apple's support document on this problem, in case this issue crops up with a shiny new iPod just snatched from under the tree.

To summarize, the moral of the document is: make sure you install the proper and latest iPod software using orthodox tools and methods. Use either the CD that came with the iPod or download the latest iPod Updater software from Apple's Downloads site. Also, don't use other software or means of erasing the iPod or partitioning the drive unless you really know what you're doing - playing by the book does sometimes have its advantages.

I'll go through more of Apple's support documents in the next day or so and post a roundup of links to the most common topics and problems so everyone has a good stock in their toolbelt for the gift-giving season.