Apr 27 2009
Roll your own Palm Menu
By: Brian Burnham
Now, I know most of you have Monday off, so this week I’m gonna make you work for your fun.
For all those OS X Palm Desktop users who miss the handy Palm menu icon, here’s a quick and free way to bake your own.
Two weeks ago I made mention of Menuversum. Today, using it’s ability to create custom menubar items, we’ll construct a Palm menu in OS X.
First off we need to do a little Applescripting. Create a folder in your Palm application folder called Automation (or whatever). This is where we are going to stash our goodies. Open up your Script Editor and type up a simple script like this: “tell application “Palm Desktop” to make new address” and save it out as an application called “New Address”. Do the same for Datebook and Memo. If you are in to cosmetics, you can cut and paste the Palm icon from Palm Desktop’s about box to your new scripts. Put these new scripts into a folder called “New”.
Next we’ll cough out a couple of handy scripts for the HotSync Manager. Title one “HotSync log” with this code: “tell application “HotSync Manager” to open log” and another “Users” with this code: “tell application “HotSync Manager” to open users”. Put these into a folder called “HotSync”. We’ll link these up in Menuversum in just a minute…
Now, make another folder in the Palm application folder called “Palm Shortcuts” or whatever you think you can remember. Create alias’ of the HotSync Manager and the Palm Desktop application in here. For extra credit you can throw in another Applescript or two. Make one called “Lookup Contact” with “tell application “Palm Desktop” to locate contact” and “Conuit Settings” with “tell application “Palm Desktop” to locate contact”. I should probably mention that Palm does not yet support scripting of Palm Desktop, but it works. Just don’t expect them to know what you’re talking about if you have a problem.
Now, open Menuversum. If Menuversum doesn’t come up in your System Preferences, make sure you have installed all the components in the correct places. If you have any “true” menubar icons (the ones ending in .menu) they will show up. Click the “Menu Builder” tab and drag “File Browser” from the left column to the empty box on the right. This will be your new menu.
Click on “File Browser” and navigate your way to you “Palm Shortcuts” folder. Check the “icons” box if you’re into that kind of thing. Now grab yourself a couple submenus. Name these by double clicking on them (New and Hotsync respectively). Open them using the triangle and drop a “File Browser” under each. Configure the each file Browser to point to the correct directory where we saved our scripts.
Now, I know you’ve been dying to do it so click on the blank tab at the top of the menu you’ve constructed. Chose Icon&Title. Here you can name your menu “Palm, or with some extra effort you can paste the Palm Desktop icon into Photoshop, change it’s size to 16×16 and save it as a pdf. You can select the pdf by clicking the choose button and selecting it.
Save and name your new menu using the Menu dropdown. Now head back to the Menu Bar Configuration tab and click the + and select your menu. You can arrange their order and hit “apply” to view the changes and test your menu. Save you configuration and you’re done!
Now using this method you are free to make all kinds of menus. And, if you’d like to have some more fun, try scripting the Palm Background application. And, why not be a Saint and share your menus in the forums
Wasn’t that fun? I thought so. See you next week…
Brian
