Maybe You Don't Need TWO Computers?

What's the future of computing?  Obviously, things keep changing. This article at Daring Fireball talks about one possible direction for computing. What a snazzy title:  "Maybe Instead of Two Cars, You Just Need a Car and a Bicycle." Instead of two computers maybe the second one could do a lot less, and that could be liberating, they say.

De Prez Allen Laudenslager piques our interest with, "While I haven't tried a netbook myself yet, the idea of the netbook as a partially capable 'junior' computer for travel use has some real potential for those who don't need to do everything on the road." Check out their archive for other thought-provoking pieces.

Advance Look at Google Chrome

We've heard a little about Google Chrome, and we do want to keep up with the latest in Internet technology. Well, here's a little more from both De Prez Allen Laudenslager and Jim Hamm.  Jim starts us off with, "After reading this article on Google Chrome, any potential interest I might have had in this has cooled considerably. I had envisioned it to be a download one would install, like Firefox, but apparently not. Also, Google's first focus is on netbooks, about a year from now."  Allen recommends this article.  And Jim comes up with two other links that explain the situation.

Jim continues, "The way I understand the comments, Google Chrome will be for computers with 'specific reference hardware.' Does this mean a computer has to be built to accommodate Google Chrome? Why would any manufacturer want to do this? I can't, for example, envision Apple doing this. This concept seems like a very limiting factor in Google Chrome gaining any significant market share. Maybe I'm not understanding all this correctly."

Allen's comment from the Computerworld article, "This report is claiming that the final Chrome release may only run on devices without a hard disk drive and use solid state memory in its place."

Jim has more information, "Here's a further clarification--and understanding on my part--of the difference between Google Chrome OS and Google Chrome. The first one is a web-based operating system that will be available on computers configured to handle it--such as a solid state drive. Here is an article explaining more about this concept.

"There are instructions available now on how a person can go ahead and install Google Chrome OS and run it in a virtual machine using the free software, VirtualBox.

Jim concludes with, "Now, Google Chrome is a web browser contained within the Google Chrome OS that a person, eventually, can download and install on their computer.  It will be interesting to see how both concepts fare as time goes on. The latest issue of MacLife compared several browsers, including Google Chrome, which came out well in the tests. These tests were done on a Mac."

Printer Upgrade, Download Precautions

Today’s advice is copy the settings you’ve got on Mac for your particular printer. Here’s how and here’s why.

Look at System Preferences > Print > Fax. Go to Options and Supplies to then access General and Driver. Copy these numbers. Easy way is to do a screen shot (Command + Shift + 4) and pull the target-looking lines over the parts of the window you want to copy. Then drag the screen shots onto Pages; file one set on the computer, print another set out for a paper folder in the file cabinet.

Here’s why:  Yesterday, automatically up popped an upgrade notice on Mac. Besides a little upgrade for Safari there was one for the HP printer. Of course, keep current, so click it on. Everything went well, etc. until this morning when awakening the printer and clicking to print something. The printer couldn’t find itself. It took a little hunting around, trial and error, but now all is well. It happens that this exact HP model is not listed in the long list under Printer Set Up, General, and Driver. What works for HP LaserJet P4515n is the designation HP LaserJet 4350. All is well. Keep good records.

Downloads Archive from K. Komando

From the Kim Komando website here is her downloads archive as recommended by David Passell.

He notes, "Check out the list of links to the right. On the lists summoned by any category, she has tagged, with appropriate symbols, which freebies are Windows and which are Mac. There is some fine print. The freebies may only be for a week or so, or on a trial basis. However for a collection it looks pretty promising.   Regards, David
P.S.  I said to myself I would stop browsing at 10:00 a.m. and here it is 10:17. WWW truly means World Wide Waster of Time:)"

I Inserted a Blank DVD. Now What?

Good question, David Crooks.  We'll follow John Carter's directions and view his screen shots to see how easy it is to do.



David asks, "I bought some DVD_RW on which to record data I want to save forever.  I inserted the DVD, and it did not appear on my screen.  What do you suggest?" 


"Good question," begins John.  And here for all of us to benefit from, are John's directions: 

Your preferences for what to do with a blank DVD or CD are probably not set to do what you would expect should happen.

Here's what I get when I insert a blank DVD+RDL: (the type of DVD does not matter)
To set up what action to take place when you insert a blank DVD or CD, click on the Apple icon, click on System Preferences, then click on the "CDs & DVDs" icon:
You should see this:

The top two options are set on my machine as you see them there. Here are the options:

Your machine might have it set to "Ignore" which is why you didn't see anything after inserting the blank DVD.

I you don't see any place to click on to eject that blank DVD, first launch Disk Utility (you do this by clicking on the Spotlight and typing in "Disk Utility."
Notice that without moving the mouse, the Top Hit has highlighted the application. All you need to do is  press Enter or Return to launch the application.

You should see something like this in the left side of the window:
I have my DVD drive highlighted. On the right side of the window is this:
Click on the Eject button.

After setting your preferences for what action to take when you insert a blank DVD or CD, you should then be able to work with the DVD or CD the way you want to.
Take care at this point! If you selected to open Finder so you could copy files to the DVD or CD, you might not think to look in the Places section of the Finder to see where it put a link to access that DVD or CD:  

So now all you need to do is drag files/folders into that location. Nothing is actually written to the DVD or CD yet. That only happens when you eject the DVD or CD. Notice the grey and yellow icon on the left? You click on that when you're ready to burn the contents of that folder onto the DVD or CD. And yes, you can change the title of the folder (Rename) and that name will be the title of the DVD or CD.
If you don't want to burn the DVD or CD just yet, leave it there until you have everything in this folder. And alternative is to first prepare a new folder with the contents of what you want to burn to a DVD or CD, then insert a blank, then copy the contents of the prepared folder to the Untitled DVD folder.

You can always back out and not do anything by ejecting the DVD or CD using Disk Utility, even if you have copied stuff to the Untitled DVD folder.  Doing so does NOT remove (delete) the Untitled DVD folder from the Finder sidebar. You have to move that folder to the Trash by going to your Desktop (where it lives), right click (control click) to open the options menu, and select "Move to Trash." As we say in baseball, no hits, no runs, no errors.

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Making Booklets is Easy to Do

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Going to the valley for Auntie's 90th birthday inspires me to tell you how bluesquirrel's ClickBook made a nice surprise for her and family and friends.  She gave me handwritten pages of remembrances of growing up with Mama, and I made booklets.  It's so easy to design and print them myself.

ClickBook works with PDF Workflow and automatically rotates, reduces and realigns pages into the correct order to create double-sided booklets.  I've used this program for 5 years, and besides family memories booklets I've compiled 33 booklets of my own inspirational writing, poetry, articles, and stories.  Adding photos are a cinch.

CableOne and Mac Mail

"I have been getting questions from people new to the Mac on how to set up Mac Mail to send and receive messages using CableOne," John Carter tells us.  Here he gives us step by step and illustrated directions.

Here's John's directions,  (you have to be connected to the Internet):

1. Open Mac Mail
2. In the Menu Bar, click on Mail
3. Click on Preferences.
4. In the window that pops up, click on the Accounts tab.
5. In the bottom right of the window, click on the "+" sign to add a new account.
6. In the Add Account window, Enter your full name in the top field.
7. Enter your cableone.net email address in the second field.

8. Enter your cableone.net password in the last field.
9. Click the Continue button in the bottom right. You will then get a pop-up window that appears to be an error message:

10. Click on "Setup Manually"
11. In the next window you will be setting up the Incoming Mail Server:

12. Enter the information as shown above, except use your user name and password.
13. Click Continue
14. In the next window, just click Continue:

15. In the next window you will be setting up the Outgoing Mail Server:

16. Enter the information as shown above for the Outgoing Mail Server. The Description field can be anything you like that will identify that CableOne is being used as an outgoing mail server.
17. Click Continue.
18. The next window will again appear to be an error message:

19. Click on "Setup Manually."
20. In the next window, just click Continue:

21. A summary of what you have done so far is shown next:

22. Click on the Create button to finish.
23. When you return to the Accounts page you should see this:

24. Please be sure to check the box "Use only this server" unless you have other email accounts that you prefer to use.
25. Notice that I have several other email accounts
26. Click on the "Mailbox Behaviors" and the "Advanced" tabs and set up your mail preferences the way you like them. There is no "best" way.
27. Create a test message and send it to yourself. In the Mail window, click on Get Mail if the message does not come in right away. Messages are retrieved according to the time period you set up in the General tab of the Mail Preferences (Check for new messages).   # # #

Problem with iMac Detailed

An email making the rounds hit David Passell's inbox.  David wonders if anyone else with a iMac or MacBook with an ATI X1600 GPU is having these types of problems.  A list of links on Apple Forums discussing this situation is listed below, in the event you are concerned.

The problem is described by an Australian long-time Mac enthusiast: "I am a long-time Mac enthusiast who feels a bit more "down under" than usual. I have spoken to the Australian Apple Support regarding my white Intel iMac which has had issues with the graphics card/logic board since three months (!) out of factory warranty. I purchased the machine, which had been used very little, from a friend (a fellow Mac User Group member for many years) in February 2008. It was then two months out of warranty. When I realized he hadn't taken out Apple Care I called Apple and was told that to take out Apple Care it had to be done within the original 12 months warranty period. The machine was however as new with relatively few hours of operation and nothing more intensive than web browsing and emails so I thought I'd be alright.

"The very next month, thin horizontal multicolored lines started appearing sporadically on my screen. I called support who said my warranty had expired and there were no known issues with my model so I was on my own. I repaired permissions and scanned the disk for problems but short of some incorrect permissions on occasion no problem was found. Gradually the problem worsened and the computer would sometimes freeze and the screen change to a pattern of multicolored vertical lines.
In November 2008 I actually took a photo of the screen on such a freeze using my iPhone and I have done so also on another occasion. I have attached links to the pics. I have taken the iMac to my local service agent and they cleaned it and ran tests which failed to find a cause for the problems. They suggested it may be the graphics module which is part of the logic board and can't be replaced.
The problem has now become so bad that I have had to change the background to a plain color and and turn off screensavers and anything graphic intensive. I am now down to one or two freezes & reboots per day from four to five."     This email was sent by Mikael Lindstedt.

Links:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1516765&start=0&tstart=0
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1467276&tstart=0
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2136365&start=0&tstart=0
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2181088
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1697470&start=0&tstart=0
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1974295&start=0&tstart=0
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2194641
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1878407&tstart=0
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2109263
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1726184&start=0&tstart=0
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2147082
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1609243&start=0&tstart=0
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=10473645&#10473645
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2165038
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1974295
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1995151&start=0&tstart=0

Screen pics:
http://img200.imageshack.us/gal.php?g=attachmentpe.jpg
http://img21.imageshack.us/g/img0073hw.jpg/

Non-Apple links:
http://getsatisfaction.com/apple/topics/2006_imac_graphics_card_crash_freeze
http://torley.com/macbook-pro-with-ati-radeon-x1600-distorted-video-glitches
http://www.petitionspot.com/petitions/imacrecall/
http://forums.macworld.com/index.php?/topic/114232-imac-lines-on-screen/
http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-10330060-263.html?tag=mncol
http://www.sfmslaw.com/pages/cases.php?id=779

New Site for Sharing Info

Always on the lookout for info, David Passell has signed up for the Beta release from O'Reilly Answers. Their slogan is "Clever Hacks. Creative Ideas. Innovative Solutions." David has already submitted a posting under the Linux heading at Beta Forum which proclaims, "Share. Ask. Answer." Other PMUG members might find this a useful site, and some might have tips to submit there.

Postings in the new Forum cover a myriad of geeky subjects. David was describing how handy the ScreenShot feature of QuickTime 10 can be for recalling what he did. He wrote about his experience, sent it to O'Reilly Answers and was encouraged by Tim O'Reilly to set up an account and post it.  He says he suspects John Carter uses something like it in his dock description.

This latest version of QuickTime 10 (SnowLeopard, only) has a Screen Recording feature which allows him to easily review.  He can go back through the recording with speed up to 8X to see what he's done.

I asked David how he got involved with this Beta Forum.  Initially he wrote to tell how handy ScreenShot is for Floss Manuals. "Being a Mac user, the subject of 'Paths' was foreign to me.  When I was introduced to Linux I quickly got lost. Having an OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) computer with a VNC (Virtual Networking Computing) server program I found I could go through the various paths and view them on a Mac.  There I could make screen shots and comments in MS Word, (Pages probably would have been better, but I'm cheap!)

"Unless I had a WebPage I would find it difficult to upload one to anybody.  I can stop, though, and get ScreenShots of something significant."

Perhaps you saw David's little green and white XO computer from OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) at an earlier meeting.  He works through a VNC server program.

On his Mac David starts with a program called Chicken of the VNC. "When I enter the proper IP address for the server computer I see its screen on my Mac.  From there anything I do on the server computer shows on my Mac Mini.  I can do similar things between my Mac Mini and my other computers that are networked on my router."

His philosophy is "When I write manuals I always had the feeling that if I could understand it later, anybody could. Engineers and Programmers are probably the worst to write user manuals.  They are too close to the subject and fall victim to 'I know it, so everyone else should.'"

(All of this to say:  you will want to check out that O'Reilly Answers Beta Forum.)

Hard Drive Getting Full?

If your Mac hard drive is getting full John Carter has a solution.  Consider that you may be filling up one or more of the following folders:   Movies  --  Pictures -- Documents  --  Downloads
John walks us through the steps as follows . . . and we quote:

It is easy to recover a lot of space just by adding an external drive and moving the folders from the internal drive to the external drive, and then creating a symbolic link from the external drive folder back to the internal drive. This could work equally well even if you have a laptop. For laptops, I recommend the Western Digital Passport - whatever size suits you - because they are compact and carry well. An alternative would be to purchase a 3.5" Seagate or Maxtor drive and install it in a 3.5" external case, and this might be cheaper than a Passport drive of the same capacity.

Now for the detail.  To move a folder from one location to another, you could simply use Finder to drag the existing folder to an external drive. A preferred alternative (more reliable) would be to use a command line in a Terminal:

$ sudo ditto <source_folder/> <destination_folder/> 

Only the contents of the source folder are copied, including all subfolders. If the destination folder does not exist, it will be created, and the contents of the source folder are copied into the destination folder.

Example:

$ sudo ditto /Users/jcarter/Movies /VolumesMac1_HD2/Movies

Next, you need to delete the source folder and create a link from the destination folder to where the source folder was. This has to be done in a Terminal:

$ rm -rf /Users/jcarter/Movies
$ ln -s /Volumes/Mac1_HD2/Movies /Users/jcarter/Movies

The symbolic link (specified as symbolic by the -s option) /Users/jcarter/Movies is not a folder. It is a file that pretends to be a folder. When you look at it with the Finder you actually see the contents of /Volumes/Mac1_HD2/Movies. If you use a command in Terminal to look at it you will see:

$ ls /Users/jcarter/Movies
/Users/jcarter/Movies@

At this point, although not essential, you should log out and log back in. As far as the applications that access the Movies folder are concerned, the folder is still there.

The result is you have just recovered a lot of disc space on your internal drive.

Now, if you did not have the external drive attached and powered up and tried to access something in the Movies folder with, say, iMovie, iMovie will still work but you'll have to specify a new path to work in. Not a good idea, because then you'll have multiple locations for your movies.

If you moved "iPhoto Library" to an external hard drive and the drive was not attached or powered on, iPhoto will ask to you specify a new location for your photos. Again, this is a bad idea because the new location will override the old one and it will appear as though you can't access those old photos. Never fear. You can always tell iPhoto to look in any location for photos at the time you start up iPhoto by holding down the Option key when you launch iPhoto. That brings up the menu to specify the location to look in before bringing up the application. Just be sure you specify an actual iPhoto Library path.

After moving my iPhoto Library to an external drive, I looked at the available paths for iPhoto and discovered the following:

The default location points to the original path:

The next location points to another user login on the Mac:

And the last location points to the actual path on the external hard drive:

And, here John closes off with, "May your days be merry and bright."

Make it Easier to Read

Want to "zoom, zoom, zoom"? David Passell solves the problem of trying to read emails and text on web pages that are too small to read easily.  You can use Command and +  to enlarge the image up to a point, or Command and - to reduce it.  This, however, may hide a lot of the page.  David explains and includes screen shots to show how to use the Universal Access Feature in Preferences.



"The Universal Access Feature can help you. Go to Preferences > Universal Access and notice the features on the top menu, (Seeing, Hearing, Keyboard, Mouse.) You should select the Seeing item.

Now look at Zoom and check the On button. Click on Option and you have choices. You can play with them to see what works for you. Here is how mine is set and it works well for me.

Most of us have scroll mice or the mighty mouse. I have found the most handy way to use zoom is when I browse to a site with tiny print, or someone sends me an E-mail with very small print then I can do the following:

Hold down the CMD and OPT keys and then turn the scroll wheel . One direction zooms in on the screen, the other direction zooms out.

When you get to the size you want then you release the buttons. Then the scroll wheel works in the normal way to scroll up and down on the screen image. If you move the mouse, the screen moves under the mouse. Do this until you want to examine some other part. Here is what that small portion will look like.

You can move all over the screen at this magnification. Just move your mouse.

When you no longer need to zoom around press CMD, OPT [-]

The screen display will revert to its unmodified appearance, and the mouse will not move the screen. One of the options is to 'show preview rectangle when zoomed out.' This is like a target on the screen, I find it a confusing distracting, but here is what you will see if it is selected.

If you are zoomed out, then the rectangle will move over the screen with the mouse to show the area of the screen that the scrolling in does."   So try it, and see how it works for you.

Magic Mouse Review

Apple's new Magic Mouse clicks and swipes and scrolls.  Look at it here.   Jim and Zee Hamm bought the new mouse and want to share their experience.

Jim refers to a good review of Apple's new Magic Mouse. He explains, "I pretty much agree with the writer's comments. Zee and I bought and are using the new Magic Mouse.

"Here are some of my comments. One item he didn't mention, and which I miss, is the ability to push the scroll button--like on the Mighty Mouse--and open Expose for all windows. I used that feature a lot. The other item not available is to be able to squeeze the two side buttons--again, like on the Mighty Mouse--to open Dashboard. I got around these two shortcomings--to me, anyway--by assigning a 'hot corner' for Expose to the upper left corner of the screen. I've got used to this now, and it works quick. For Dashboard, which I don't open all that often anyway, I just click the icon in the Dock.

"I was concerned the low profile might be irksome or fatiguing, but neither of which have occurred, at least for Zee or me. The mouse is easy to hold, glides effortlessly, and I really like how easy it is to scroll with the Magic Mouse. This is probably its nicest feature.

"And I also like that there is no button to get clogged up, which happened occasionally with the Mighty Mouse. The two-fingured swipe to go back and forth on open windows within a website takes some getting used to, but is handy once one gets the knack of it. You have to let go of the mouse and gently swipe two fingers across the mouse.

"Comparing the two mouses, side by side, is somewhat comparable to comparing, say, a Chevy to a new Lexus. Both work, but the state-of-the-art features in a Lexus are the coming thing. (Have you seen the Lexus ads?) The Mighty Mouse is an electro/mechanical design; the new Magic Mouse is pure electronic.

"Both Zee and I are happy we made the switch."

Get Acquainted with BIG Numbers

This stretches the brain, but that’s the fun of something new. Heard of a yottabyte?
NSA is planning to store yottabytes of surveillance data in Utah. Quoting from CrunchGear (Nov. 1, 2009)

"There are a thousand gigabytes in a terabyte, a thousand terabytes in a petabyte, a thousand petabytes in an exabyte, a thousand exabytes in a zettabyte, and a thousand zettabytes in a yottabyte. In other words, a yottabyte is 1,000,000,000,000,000GB. Are you paranoid yet?"

Writer Devin Coldewey talks about an interesting article in the current New York Review of books, detailing the history of the National Security Agency and what the future holds. Take a look; there are 103 comments posted.