Posts Tagged ‘Mac OS X’

Whether you’re going in for advice at the Apple Store, shopping online for new software or at a cocktail party talking about your favorite computer, someone is bound to ask you some questions about the technical specs of your Apple.  These questions could sound like: “Are you a ‘Tiger’ or a ‘Leopard,’” “Do you have the latest version of the OS,” or maybe “Which processor are you running?” 

All of this is important information, but maybe not something you necessarily commit to memory.  There is, however, a quick and easy way to see a lot of this information without needing a degree in Computer Science to understand it.  In the Menu Bar, go to the Apple and choose About this Mac.  This is going to pop up a little window that tells you some basic information right off the bat.

VERSION:  This is telling you which OS you’re running and how recent it is.  In the number, the number after the first period tells you which ‘cat’ you are.  Here’s the scheme

10.0 – Cheetah

10.1 – Puma

10.2 – Jaguar

10.3 – Panther

10.4 – Tiger

10.5 – Leopard

10.6 – Snow Leopard (coming soon)

The number after the second period let’s you know how many times the OS been updated since they made the first version.  The current OSX version is 10.5.7.  If you’re a Leopard with a lower number than that, you should click the Software Update button and the let computer get the updates from Apple.  If you’re a Tiger, no amount of updating is going to make you a Leopard and you may want to consider buying the upgrade.

If you click directly on the text of the Version Number, you can cycle through some other useful information including the Serial Number for your machine.

Under the Software Update button, we see three more fields:  Processor, Memory and Startup Disk.

PROCESSOR: The processor is the brain of the computer and determines how fast it can do things.  This is not an item you ‘upgrade’ on an older machine, just like your brain, you got what you got.

MEMORY: Mostly people will refer to this as RAM.  The more RAM you have the quicker the computer can change the task its working on and/or can think about more things at the same time.  With more RAM, you can leave more applications open at the same time without compromising performance of the one in the foreground.  RAM can be upgraded at any time.

STARTUP DISK: Is just telling you what hard drive the machine boots from.  Generally this is going to say Macintosh HD.

If you need more, in depth information like the make of your Superdrive, information about your graphics card or other specific hardware info, click on the ‘More Info’ button and you’ll see listings of all the bits and pieces of your computer.

So, when you’re considering a software upgrade and need to know how much RAM or what Processor you have OR when you’re at a party and someone asks if you’re a Tiger or a Leopard, don’t get intimidated, just tell them ‘About This Mac.’

Websites are becoming more and more like applications everyday.  Whether its Facebook, eBay, Bananas4Apples or I Can Has Cheezburger, there are sites that we all check numerous times throughout the day and it might be convenient to have a short cut for those sites right on the dock with your other frequently used applications.  Fortunately, Leopard makes this possible.

First, find the site you want to make a short cut for.  I check Facebook several (hundred) times a day, so I’m going to work with that.  First go to the site, then look for the site’s favicon.  A favicon is the tiny icon all the way on the left side of the web address for the site we’re visiting; for Apple, it’s a little grey apple, for Facebook it’s a white F in a blue square.  If the website you’re looking at doesn’t have one, you’ll see a little globe there. 

What ever the icon is, click and drag it to the dock on the right side of the dashed line, near the trash can.  As you place it down there, you should notice the other icons move aside to make room, be careful not to drop your new shortcut on top of another as it might get added to one of your stacks and will be difficult to find later.

Once we’ve got it added, you’ll see a little springy @ symbol indicating that there’s a web shortcut there. 

Click on the short cut and your website will launch.

Love your Mac, but want to do some things that the built in software won’t do?  Too cheap to buy Photoshop?  Don’t want to give Microsoft your money for Office?  Only need Illustrator once?  Check out this list of FREE applications for the Apple that will help you out with some great looking projects without tapping your wallet.

1. NeoOffice (an alternative to MS Office) – NeoOffice is a full-featured set of office applications (including word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, drawing, and database programs) for Mac OS X. Based on the OpenOffice.org office suite, NeoOffice has integrated dozens of native Mac features and can import, edit, and exchange files with other popular office programs such as Microsoft Office.  Maybe not as intuitive as iWork or Office (especially if you’ve been using Office at work for the last 10 years) but for the price (free) its hard to beat.

2. GIMP (an alternative to Photoshop) – Yes, we all need to take certain friends out of certain pictures and who doesn’t want to put Dr. Zeus’ head on King Kong’s body for comic effect?  iPhoto is just not capable of doing these essential tasks and Photoshop costs a bundle.  Fortunately, GIMP is a great program with tons of documentation online to get you going.

3. Burn – (an alternative to Toast) – Producing videos at home is becoming more and more accessible and it seems like every Tom, Dick and Scorsese is making their own movies at home now.  The problem is, iMovie/iDVD doesn’t provide an interface to carefully compress long projects, often resulting in pixilated or over compressed image.  Toast is a great program for managing the nuances of the DVD burn but, unless you’re making a living off of it, justifying the cost is a little difficult.  Try Burn and get results Marty would be proud of.

4. Inkscape – (an alternative to Illustrator) – Not everyone needs to make vector graphics, but when you do, its difficult to find a good program to use that doesn’t cost as much as a family vacation.  Inkscape is a great tool when you’re creating logos, elaborate text collages or anything that needs to be easily scalable.

5. Handbrake – Ok, not really an ‘alternative’ to anything, but it can be a life saver.  Handbrake can recover information from authored DVDs making it usable once again.  For example, you send the family’s home movies out to get captured from VHS to DVD and now that you’ve got the disc back, you realize there only really about an hour of good stuff on this 3 hour disc.  Handbrake will allow you to suck the video off of the disc and put it in iMovie so you can edit it.   Awesome.

Increasing the amount of RAM in your computer can make a noticeable difference in its performance.  RAM does not actually make the computer run faster, but it does help quicken the process of opening or switching between applications and can help you avoid the awkward pause between the time you click an application’s icon and when it actually launches.  The good news is, RAM is INNEXPENSIVE and there’s really no disadvantage to upgrading, even if its just to cover your bases.

You can buy Apple RAM from any Apple retail store or at the Apple Store online, but RAM that comes from Apple is, in my opinion, severely overpriced.  However, Apple compatible RAM is available at many companies online for a fraction of the price.  My absolute favorite place to buy Apple compatible RAM is Crucial.com.

In addition to cheap RAM, Crucial has the ‘Crucial System Scanner Tool’ which is a little program that you download on your computer which analyzes your system and decides what type of RAM you need, how much your computer can handle and makes recommendations on configurations. Awesome!  Its like having a Mac Genius right in your computer!  If you’d prefer to pick your own, there is also a function for doing so.

The only downside to this process, and it’s a very small downside, is that you have to install the RAM yourself.  Being a third party product, the RAM, itself, is not covered under your Apple Care on your Mac, BUT since RAM is one of the only parts of an Apple that is intended to be ‘user accessible’ replacing the RAM does not affect your Apple Care on the rest of the machine at all.

On the iMac, there’s a Memory Access Panel on the bottom of the screen which will give access to the RAM.  Lay the iMac down on its screen and raise the stand up, you’ll see the panel on the bottom and can remove it with a Phillips screwdriver.  Inside you’ll see some tabs used for pulling out the RAM tray.  Pull it out, and make a note of which way the RAM is facing, you’ll need to put the new ones back in this same position, fortunately, RAM can only fit in one way and if you’re observant, you’ll have no problems.  Remove the old RAM and insert the new and push the tray back in until you feel/hear a click.  (Just a warning, you might have to push those a little harder than you’d expect to, but make SURE the RAM is facing the right way.)  Tuck in the tabs and replace the door.

On most notebooks the RAM is underneath the battery that is accessible through a panel on the bottom of your notebook.  Since the notebook configurations vary greatly depending on your model and year, I recommend going to support.apple.com and searching for “replace RAM on <yourcomputermodel>” so you know you get the right instructions.  The process is just as simple, I assure you.

Now you’re probably wondering what to do with your old RAM, assuming you’ve got old RAM that didn’t get included in the new configuration.  Well, I find they make really interesting key fobs or earrings.  If you glue a magnet to the back, you could stick it to your fridge!  If you don’t have another computer that it will work in, it is practically useless, so feel free to be creative with it while enjoying the speed and efficiency of your new RAM.

Ever need to send a file to someone but its too big to push through email?  Whether its photos of your darling new monkey in the house or the Keynote presentation for the meeting with the Big Banana, there always seems to be something I want to send that’s just too cumbersome for sending via email.  Fortunately, using your iDisk on Mobile Me, you can share documents of any size with anyone, quickly and easily.

First, put the document you want to share on your iDisk, the easiest way is to connect to your iDisk (if you’re not connected already) by clicking on the Desktop to get the Finder menu bar and then selecting Go>iDisk>My iDisk.  Once connected, your iDisk should show up in the sidebar in a Finder window and you can save files to it as you would any of your local drives. 

Once the file is there, we need to log in to Mobile Me’s web interface.  Go to www.me.com and sign in.  Click on the folder icon  on the top of the screen to access your iDisk.  Now, locate the file you want to share and look for the share button in the viewer pane on the right side and click it.

Now you can add the email addresses of the people you want to share the file with and even add a note.  Using the two links below the message field, you can set an expiration date for the file or add a password.  If you add a password, make sure to mention in your message that the person needs to contact you for it, DO NOT include the password in the message field as it will negate the benefits of having the password to begin with.

Once you click Share, iDisk sends an email to your recipients with a direct link to your file, all they have to do is click the Download button and they can download the file directly from your Mobile Me.

Generally, setting up a personal domain to point to your Mobile Me website is quick and easy.  Recently, however, we discovered that following this process with a domain at Network Solutions requires a few extra steps, but is still as easy as falling out of a banana tree.

The first thing you want to do open iWeb and select File>Set Up Personal Domain on Mobile Me.  This will lead you to the place in your mobile me to enter your domain name, type it in and click Continue.  You’re going to get a screen telling you to go do some stuff at your registrar’s website and this is where Network Solutions gets a little tricky.

First, press COMMAND+T to open a new tab in your browser and use that new tab to log in to Network Solutions, then click ‘Domains’ in the sidebar on the left and choose ‘Manage Domain Names’.  This will give you a list of all the domains you have registered with them, put a check next to the one you want to point at MobileMe and click the ‘Edit DNS’ button below the list.

On the next screen, click the button that says ‘Manage Advanced DNS Records.’  Yes, it sounds scary, but its not, trust me.

The first thing we need to change is in the first section called ‘IP Address (A Records), click the Add/Edit button in that section.   On this screen, you should see the first three lines directing your domain to an ‘under construction’ page,   Delete first three items by placing a check mark in the DELETE column and then clicking the CONTINUE button at the bottom of the column.  Save changes when prompted.

Now were back at the Domains page; go down to the section called “Host Aliases(CNAME Records) and click the Add/Edit button on the right.  We’re going to create two aliases.  In the first line, the ALIAS name is * and the OTHER HOST is web.me.com. (please note the . afterwards, it is important and necessary).  In the second line, the ALIAS name is www and the OTHER HOST is web.me.com. (again, don’t forget the period aftwards.  Now, click the radial buttons next to OTHER HOST on both lines so that they are blue.

I know this is complicated to type, so here’s a picture of what it should look like:

Click the continue button in the bottom right corner, save changes if prompted and you’re all done!  The site warns that this process could take 24 hours to take effect.  In my experience, its more like 2 hours.

Now, flip back to Mobile Me (forgot you had it open, didn’t ya?) and click the DONE button.  In a few hours, traffic will be directed to your Mobile Me through your personal domain and you’re ready to go!

There are several short cuts that I use everyday, but trying to learn a lot of them at one time can be a little daunting.  With that in mind, here are 5 keyboard shortcuts you can start learning, and using, today and add to your repertoire in the future.

COMMAND+W – Close a Window

COMMAND+Q – Quit an Application

OPTION+COMMAND+W -  Close all Windows

COMMAND+SHIFT+[ (or ]) – Move Forward (or backwards) Between Tabs in Safari or Firefox

COMMAND+EJECT – Show Shut Down Dialog

As a bonus, here’s one that’s not really ‘handy’ but good to know.  This bonus tip was inspired by a friend’s frantic FaceBook message to me yesterday telling me that her cat had ‘done something’ to her computer and now the screen looked like an x-ray machine.  Its actually a fairly common problem (especially if you’ve got animals or children touching the keyboard) but you might be hard pressed to find the solution.

COMMAND+OPTION+CONTROL+8 – Invert colors on monitor.

Once you’ve done all the heavy lifting by creating Keywords and Smart Albums, sharing photos to your iPhone is quick and easy.

To share your photos to your iPhone, we actually need to be in iTunes.  Plug in your iPhone and iTunes should launch automatically.  Once the Sync screen is up, look for the Photos tab, it should be the fifth tab across the top of the page.

To sync all or part of your iPhoto library to the phone, put a check mark in the box next to ‘Sync Photos from:” and make sure the next box says iPhoto.  Then, choose whether you want to sync all your photos or just some of them. 

Although its nice to have your entire photo library at your fingettips, I think its very cumbersome to flick through thousands of pictures looking for a specific I want to show to my friend, so I highly recommend using Smart Albums to organize this process so that you can find specific photos quickly.

To sync specific albums, click the button next to ‘Selected Albums’ and then put a check mark next to the albums you want to sync.  You can also click on the Album titles and drag them to put them in a specific order. 

Once you’ve gotten all the albums selected and arranged, just click the ‘Sync’ button in the bottom right corner of the iTunes window and iTunes will sync up the photos to your iPhone.

Now you never have to be caught without a photo of your new grandchild, puppy or spouse again!

If you found this info helpful, you may also want to check out these other, related articles:

Using Keywords to organize your iPhoto library

Organizing Photos Using Smart Albums

Creating a ‘Speed Dial’ on your iPhone using Favorites

Making New Things with the + Button

Smart Albums are really cool because they update themselves based on a set of criteria that you define and now that we’ve created and applied Keywords to our important photos, we can use Smart Albums to organize them for us!

Create a new Smart Album using the + Button at the bottom of the left side of to window, when the New Item box pops up at the top, click Smart Album and give it a name, preferably one that corresponds with one of your new Keywords.  Now in the Conditions row, we want to set the first two boxes to be KEYWORD and IS then, in the third box, select the appropriate Keyword.

Now, anytime we add this keyword to a photo, the photo will automatically be added to this Smart Album.  Repeat this process of making Smart Albums for all the loved ones in your life. 

Repeat these steps for each of the important Keywords you’ve created and you’ll have a collection of Smart Albums that help you quickly find the photos you’re looking for.  Also, you could use these Smart Albums to easily sync your favorite photos to your iPhone.

iPhoto provides many great ways to organize photos for showing off the new photos of your favorite monkey to family and friends, but the continuous process of updating albums can be a little cumbersome: keeping track of which new photos have already been dragged into an album can get confusing and time consuming.  Fortunately there’s a simple way to keep all your photos organized using Keywords!

Keywords add identifying tags to photos to help us find them more easily.  To assign keywords to photos you should first make there’s a checkmark next to View>Keywords in the Menu Bar; next, go to Window>Show Keywords (Command+K).  Show Keywords will bring up a list of pre-existing keywords you’ve got in iPhoto already; most of these were probably built in to iPhoto when you got it.  We want to add some Quick Groups to help organize your photos; click the Edit Keyword button and then use our old friend the + Button to make new Keywords.  I have always recommended making a Keyword for each of your kids, your pets and, maybe, for places you’ve gone on vacation.  Once you’re done, click the OK button to return to the Keywords list.

Now, go through your iPhoto library and add keywords appropriately.  When you put your mouse over a picture, you’ll now notice a place to ‘add keywords’, click on that space and start typing in your keyword and iPhoto will fill it in for you based on your list of Keywords.  Too lazy to type?  Me too!  We can also add keywords by selecting one or more pics (remember the Shift and Command keys for multiple selections) and then just clicking the appropriate keyword in the Keyword window.  We’ll see it turn blue to let us know its been applied.  You can apply more than one Keyword to each photo, so if both kids and the dog on in the picture, apply all three Keywords.

Once you’ve applied all the Keywords you want or need, you can quickly look up those photos by using the Search field at the bottom of the screen.  Before searching, click on the little magnifying glass and choose Keyword instead, quickly move your mouse over the keyword buttons that pop up to keep them in view.  If you miss them the first time, its pretty quick, just click on Keywords again in that search field to get another try at it.  

Click on the Keyword you want to look up and iPhoto filters your library to only include that keyword.  You can also click multiple buttons to further filter your results.  For example, to show only photos of Dr. Zeus choose the Keyword with his name, to only show photos of him on vacation, choose both DR.ZEUS and VACATION keywords.