MacResearch

The MacFUSE project has really started gathering momentum, and third party developers are now joining the party. Last week we saw the introduction of MacFusion, a menu status item for mounting MacFUSE file systems without having to use the command line. Last week also saw the introduction of Xgrid FUSE, a very interesting application of MacFUSE to accessing Xgrid controllers.

Xgrid FUSE was developed by Xgrid guru and occasional MacResearch columnist Charles Parnot. It is still in a very early stage of development — when I tried to use it, I didn’t have permission to access the mounted volumes — but it seems like it could be a very useful tool for Xgrid users. In short, it allows you to browse jobs on an Xgrid controller from the Finder or Terminal, and download results by dragging them to your local machine. You can even delete jobs by simply dragging them to the Trash.

Installation simply requires that you first install MacFUSE, and then drag the Xgrid FUSE application to your hard disk. Charles has included instructions on the Xgrid FUSE web site.

Xgrid FUSE is open source, and covered by the GPL license. Charles seems very open to people helping out, so if you are interested, get in touch.

Update: Charles has confirmed that there is a permissions problem when using Xgrid FUSE with the latest MacFUSE. He will try to fix the issue sometime this week.

Update: Charles has now released version 0.2.1, which fixes the above permissions issues.