Viva La iPodDownload
I wrote a little while back about a nice little plug-in for iTunes called iPodDownload. It plugged a glaring usability hole in iTunes whereby you aren’t able to simply drag your music from your iPod to your computer.
For some reason, Apple have decided to reopen this hole in the newest version of iTunes. iPodDownload no longer works. There are other ways to get your music off your iPod but they all involve using separate applications or fiddling in the Finder. The nice thing about iPodDownload is the fact that it works from within iTunes itself.
As Cory points out, this is all very silly. This kind of developer cat and mouse game is also just plain frustrating.
Never fear. The French have come to the rescue. It turns out that it’s relatively simple to refill that hole.
You can follow that link to find the instructions but I’m also going to repeat them here so that they’re nice and googleable. Information wants to be free (and anthropomorphised).
First of all, download and install HexEdit, a hexadecimal file editor.
In the finder, navigate to Applications > iTunes. Control click the application and select "Show Package Contents".
Now, in the new Finder window, go to Contents > MacOS. Drag the file iTunes onto the HexEdit application.
In HexEdit select "Find" from the menu (or press apple key and F). Search for the string "iPod Download".
Here’s the important bit: change just one character of that string. Change it to read, for example, "iPod Downlood". But don’t delete or add any extra characters.
Save the file.
That’s it. Start (or restart) iTunes. iPodDownload rides again!
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2004 1:39am
Illustrations
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