[headbirth]

I'm really annoyed with the current implementation of the StuffIt Menu and Contextual Menu.

Does anyone have or know where I can find some Applescripts to perform the same operations?

I would love to see a Third-Party produce a Menu Extra or CM to replace Aladdins.

Thanks!

[miro7]

What issues do you have with them? They basically perform all the functions as their OS 9 counterparts, though perhaps not as conveniently.

I assume that you are talking about Stuffit 7, BTW.

[headbirth]

Yes, StuffIt 7.0.1.

I have lots of issues with them, but the two main ones are:

The issue I have with the CM is that it ties up the Finder big time. multi-processing goes out the window.

Aside from taking forever to load the Menu Extra the Extra doesn't work on folders in Finder windows, only on the desktop.

I thought a couple of scripts assigned to Key Commands might work better....


Any thoughts?

[miro7]

The issue I have with the CM is that it ties up the Finder big time. multi-processing goes out the window.

Yes, you're right, but you can switch to other apps besides the Finder and still perform actions at nearly full speed--OS 9 will either be extremely slow at unstuffing (if it is in the background) or tie up the interface/finder/programs (if stuffit is in the foreground).

I'll need to check it again, but if you post-process downloads with stuffit (not a secure action under OS X--though there is a new option for this in Chimera Nightlies. I'm not sure if the option still exists in IE5) then you are not tied up in the finder (perhaps it creates its own thread this way).

Aside from taking forever to load the Menu Extra the Extra doesn't work on folders in Finder windows, only on the desktop.

My menu doesn't take long to load (on a QS G4/733) and it works in the Finder for me (I download to a folder in my /users/username that I unstuff/unzip/stuff all the time). You might want to delete the prefs or reinstall Stuffit and see if you can get this functionality back.

I thought a couple of scripts assigned to Key Commands might work better....

I'll agree with you here. I would definitely like some keycuts to make stuffing and unstuffing simplified.

Just for the record, I've got Stuffit Deluxe 7.01, and as you're talking about the menu and contextual menu, I assume that you have the deluxe version as well (we only decided that we were talking about v.7). That said, I've been meaning to play around with the included Stuffit Express and/or Drop Boxes to see what kind of automation can be had. That coupled with the drag and drop programs should be a fair alternative to any keycuts that are lacking).

[clarkgoble]

Just out of curiousity, in this day and age, why do you use Stuffit? I know it is the standard, but your Make will uncompress stuffit files, zip files and .tar.gz or files. Given that the later are easy to script and deal with, I wonder why more don't use them.

Unless you are sharing data with old OS9 computers, I'd advise using the Unix protocols.

[miro7]

Unless you are sharing data with old OS9 computers, I'd advise using the Unix protocols.

Bingo! That's one of the reasons.

Other than that, I probably don't need Stuffit Deluxe (could probably get away with dropstuff+stuffit), but I'm less inclined to use CLI commands than I would have been about 3 years ago (hacking around with Linux and before that BeOS R1/2).

I'll probably get around to using the CLI tools once I'm out of school and back into the real world again.

[headbirth]

It has greater compression (smaller files), redundancy, and just a hell of alot more features and tools. I do use dmgs alot, but StuffIt is...well was just kickbutt...