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Extract Directly from Time Machine

Normally you use Time Machine to restore lost data in a file like this: within the Time Machine interface, you go back to the time the file was not yet messed up, and you restore it to replace the file you have now.

You can also elect to keep both, but the restored file takes the name and place of the current one. So, if you have made changes since the backup took place that you would like to keep, they are lost, or you have to mess around a bit to merge changes, rename files, and trash the unwanted one.

As an alternative, you can browse the Time Machine backup volume directly in the Finder like any normal disk, navigate through the chronological backup hierarchy, and find the file which contains the lost content.

Once you've found it, you can open it and the current version of the file side-by-side, and copy information from Time Machine's version of the file into the current one, without losing any content you put in it since the backup was made.

Submitted by
Eolake Stobblehouse

 
 

NetNewsWire 3.0 Speeds Up, Adds Integration

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The latest version of the popular news reader NetNewsWire is out, sporting a spiffier interface, improved performance, and direct connections to several Apple and third-party applications. NetNewsWire 3.0 lets you subscribe to RSS and Atom syndication feeds offered by media sites, blogs, search engines, and others, regularly checking for updates and aggregating the results into a compact window.

The new release, despite its major version number change, has much the same above-the-hood functionality as version 2.1. The interface revision is welcome, adding quite a bit of subtlety and shading to the previous, more quotidian look.

NewsGator, the developer, says that under the hood, they revised some fundamental parts of how the program stored its bits of news, making it more robust and quicker in handling extremely large subscriptions and quantities of news items.

NetNewsWire has insinuated itself more deeply into Mac OS X by tying into Spotlight, Address Book, iCal, and iPhoto. In Spotlight, searching on any word found within any retrieved item shows a stub within the list of Document results with a NetNewsWire icon. Double-clicking the result opens the item within NetNewsWire. Photos can be copied from a feed into iPhoto, too.

The program supports micro-formats, which are embedded structured elements within Web pages that can be interpreted by clever software. If a page includes a calendar or contact entry in this format, NetNewsWire presents you with the opportunity to add it to iCal or Address Book.

NetNewsWire 3.0 adds Growl notifications, Twitterific support, and the capability to email the contents of a news item or a link to a news item through a menu command. Also new is what NetNewsWire calls "cover art": a tiny screen capture of the home page of the Web site for the news feed you're currently viewing. Finally, you can now store news items as clippings, which are synchronized with an account you set up at NewsGator's Web site.

 

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