The Trove

Thanks for the continuing support. We’re set to hit 100,000 downloads any day now. The good news is that you can now download a new version of GuitarChords. Here’s a list of the new features:

1. Now supports 50 different types of chords. In earlier versions, you could only display basic major and minor chords but now there is support for 7th chords, Minor 13th chords, even things like Minor Major 7th add 11. I don’t know what half of these chords are, but hey, you asked for them, so you got ‘em.

2. Improved chord calculator to use a fret range based on linear distance. This means that if you scroll up high on the neck, it will display chords with a range of five to six frets whereas lower on the neck the fret range is three to four frets.

3. Added support to display alternative chord fingerings. When a chord is displayed, if there are alternate fingerings it will display a row of grey circles just above the fretboard. Click on the circle to display the alternate fingering.

So quit listening to me yap, and download the latest version. Also, in case some of you haven’t noticed, I’ve also released a widget called Upcoming Birthdays. It reads your Address Book and tells you when you have birthdays coming up. I’ll be making updates to that pretty soon too.

No real big news, I just noticed that the blog was empty because I hadn’t posted anything in 10 days. Guess it’s designed that way to keep me on my toes.

I’m working on the next version of GuitarChords which should be released soon. It’s got a bunch of little enhancements, but the big thing is that it will support 50 different types of chords. You wanted 7th chords, so you got ‘em. You’ll also get other far out chords like Minor Major 7th add 11.

Once that’s out the door, I’ll work on the next version of UpcomingBirthdays. The exact feature list is TBD, but my current wish list includes support of different time lengths for past and future, customizable font sizes, adjustable window size, support for other dates listed in the AddressBook, plus a few other bug fixes. Look for that in the near future.

Also, I know you’re mostly all Dashboard people, but I’m thinking about porting the GuitarChords widget over to Konfabulator so Windows people can have it. I’m just curious what kind of demand there is for something like that….

Here’s another widget for your Dashboard. UpcomingBirthdays. As usual it’s free, so download away.

This tiny widget checks your Address Book for people with an upcoming birthday or for people with a birthday that just happenend. Click on their name to start writing your own personal Happy Birthday email to them. With this widget on your Dashboard, you’ll never miss a birthday again.

As usual, here are the standard Apple installation instructions:

Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger is required. If you’re using Safari, click the download link. When the widget download is complete, show Dashboard, click the Plus sign to display the Widget Bar and click the widget’s icon in the Widget Bar to open it. If you’re using a browser other than Safari, click the download link. When the widget download is complete, unarchive it and place it in /Library/Widgets/ in your home folder. show Dashboard, click the Plus sign to display the Widget Bar and click the widget’s icon in the Widget Bar to open it.

Over the next few days, I’m moving the hosting for wubbahed.com. This should have no effect on being able to download GuitarChords or being able to read the Trove Archives, however, you might encounter difficulty posting comments or sending feedback. Will let you know when things are back to being fully functional.