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For at least 15 years, I've been playing drums as a hobby. It is a good way for me to relax and unwind. To jam, sans band, I use a first generation iPod and connect it to my electric drum set (Roland V-Drums TD-6). Recently, I moved the set to my office because my daughter was attacking and my drums were scared of her. The move was real nice… I can now work and play!
The problem was that my first gen iPod is only 5 gigs. My song collection is almost 50 gigs.
Well, the solution hit me one day. My computer is only a few feet away from my drum set, why not connect the two and play directly through iTunes.
I programmed an set of AppleScripts to change my settings on my mac to stop the screensaver, energy saver and change my audio settings to use my headphones jack for output. The other AppleScript undoes this.
My mouse, a Logitech MX Revolution, conveniently doubles as a wireless playlist/volume controller.
Also, so I can see from 5 feet away, I setup Synergy to present the song info on my 2nd monitor in as large as it can present it.
I now live without my iPod!
start.scpt
do shell script ("pmset dim 60") password ¬ "****" with administrator privileges tell application "System Preferences" to activate tell application "System Events" get properties tell process "System Preferences" delay 1 click menu item "Sound" of menu "View" of menu bar 1 delay 1 set theRows to every row of table 1 of scroll area 1 of ¬ tab group 1 of window "sound" set theOutputs to {} as list repeat with aRow in theRows if (value of text field 1 of aRow as text) ¬ is equal to "Internal speakers" then set selected of aRow to true exit repeat end if end repeat click menu item "Desktop & Screen Saver" of menu "View" of menu bar 1 delay 1 set value of slider 1 of group 1 of tab group 1 of window "Desktop & Screen Saver" to 560 end tell end tell tell application "System Preferences" to quit tell application "iTunes" to play tell application "iTunes" to activate stop.scpt
do shell script ("pmset dim 15") password ¬ "****" with administrator privileges tell application "iTunes" to pause tell application "System Preferences" to activate tell application "System Events" get properties tell process "System Preferences" delay 1 click menu item "Sound" of menu "View" of menu bar 1 delay 1 set theRows to every row of table 1 of scroll area 1 of ¬ tab group 1 of window "sound" set theOutputs to {} as list repeat with aRow in theRows if (value of text field 1 of aRow as text) ¬ is equal to "Soundsticks" then set selected of aRow to true exit repeat end if end repeat click menu item "Desktop & Screen Saver" of menu "View" of menu bar 1 delay 1 set value of slider 1 of group 1 of tab group 1 of window "Desktop & Screen Saver" to 50 end tell end tell tell application "System Preferences" to quit tell application "iTunes" to quit 
Ronnie Schwartz is the CTO and founder of RustyBrick, an agile web & mobile development firm that creates effective applications and focuses on finding the right balance between time to production and software quality to get clients in front of their customers quickly and effectively. Ronnie brings over twenty years of innovative design, programming and management expertise to the table.
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