Leopard Tips

More Tips and Tricks

2008-01-12T05:43:00.001-08:00

Here are a bunch of useful OSX Leopard tips and tricks I've accumulated over the last couple months.

How to Move or Remove Menu Bar Icons
Click on any icon on the right side of the menu bar while holding down the Apple key. You will be able to rearrange the order, or even remove it completely by dragging it down off the bar.

Quick Editing in iCal
Here's my favorite new tip of all. When entering or editing an event in ical, it's an extra click to have to click on Edit. To go directly to the editing panel, highlight the event and click Apple-E (for edit). Make your changes and click enter. Much faster.

Show Birthdays in iCal
If you have birthdays listed in your address book under the "Birthday" heading, you can have ical list them automatically on your schedule. Simply go into the ical preferences and select "show birthdays".

A Universal Keyboard Shortcut
Here's a keyboard shortcut that works almost everywhere - on the web, on the Mac, even on PC. When you have a series of fields (or text boxes) that you are filling out, you know you can click Tab to go from one to the next. The tip is that you can click Shift-Tab to go BACK one. This can be a huge timesaver, especially if you get in the habit of doing it all the time. I use it most when composing emails in Mac Mail, Outlook or even gMail. I may enter an address, then the subject, then decide I want to add another name in the To: box. This also works in itunes Get Info screens, and anywhere else where there are fields to fill out.

iTunes: Go to Current Song
If you are listening to a song in itunes and you don't know what song it is, just click Apple-L, and itunes will show you the current song in the library.

iCal: Go to Today
Click Apple-T to return to the current day in the calendar display.

New Help Feature in Leopard
This is a great tip that works in any program. If you forget how to do something, go to Help on the menu and type the name of the function you're looking for. If the function is accessible from the menu bar options in that program, Help will open the menu bar listing for you and point to the option you want. It's really helpful in complicated programs like Photoshop, where there are hundreds of tools hidden among the menu bar listings. Go ahead, try it now! Click on Help and type Page Setup. Don't click enter, just wait and then point to Page Setup in the result listing.

Best Way to Organize Photos
I don't like iPhoto. I know it's pretty, but I don't like that every time you edit a photo it creates a duplicate file, effectively taking up twice as much space on your hard drive. Finally I've found another program that works better: Adobe Lightroom. It's really brilliant. There's way to much to talk about here, just try it. There's a 30 day trial available from Adobe, and I'm sure you could find it on BTJunkie or Pirate Bay if you tried.

Quick Calculator in Spotlight
The calendar function in Spotlight is so quick and easy, I use it much more often than I ever used the calculator. To use it, open Spotlight (Apple-Space) and type the calculation. Example: 12*24. That's all you need to type. And if you backspace and make a change, it updates the result instantly.

iTunes Organization: Part II

2007-12-01T16:34:00.000-08:00

In iTunes Management: Part I, we talked about how to organize your itunes library by making good use of the itunes browse feature, with a focus on the genre, artist and album tags.

Here in Part II, we'll dig deeper to help you be even more organized (or obsessive, however you choose to look at it).

I should mention one item first - to show any of these fields in the itunes song list, just right click on the field headers (like on the word Artist) in the song list window and select the items you wish to see. To change any tag for any song or group of songs, highlight the song or songs and go to Get Info (Apple I).

Year

The year tag is one that most people ignore. And why not? It doesn't appear in the itunes browse panes, and it's not visible when you play a song on the ipod. Nevertheless, it is a tag you might want to make use of.

First, let me remind you about my view on putting the year in the album field (i.e. "1969 Abbey Road"). This results in albums being sorted chronologically instead of alphabetically, and allows you to see the year of a song when it is playing on an ipod.

The year field is different. It's just a year, and you'll only see the information if you show that field in the column list on itunes. So why use it? Two reasons.

The first reason is to allow you to sort songs by year. This would be especially interesting if you have a lot of songs from an artist that spread over several years or decades. For example, you may have a couple hundred Rolling Stones songs, and if you have the year information filled in for all songs, you can sort by year and see the development of their music from 60's through today.

The other reason you might want to use the year field is to make year-based smart playlists. Once you have year information for a lot of your music, it's fascinating to see what kinds of smart playlists you can come up with. How about Rock music between 1960-1969 that you haven't played in 6 months? How about Country music between 1980 and 1990? The only way to do this is by keeping the year field current.

One dilemma arises when you have a greatest hits or "best of" album. It might show up in your itunes with the year the album was released... but then you might have a bunch of Johnny Cash songs that appear to have been recorded in 2007! In this case, I like to go to each song and list the year individually. It's a pain in the neck, but I think it's worth it.

Composer

Unless you have a lot of classical music, chances are that you are not using the composer field at all. If you look through your music library, you might find that many of your songs show a name in the composer field. Beatles songs might show Lennon-McCartney. I suggest you clear out all of the composer information and start fresh.

To clear them all, select all (Apple-A) and go to Get Info (Apple-I). Click the checkbox next to the blank composer field and click OK. The composer field on all the highlighted songs will be cleared out.

So what do you do with the composer field? Anything you want... I use them for subgenres or alternate genres. The nice thing about the composer field is that it's accessible on the ipod, so that means if you label a bunch of songs "Slow Beat Techno" in the composer field, you can access that classification on the ipod. Of course you could make a playlist to accomplish the same thing, but the composer information is retained in the song file itself, while the playlist information is retained in itunes. That means if you ever have to reload all your songs, your playlists will be lost, while the tag information will be retained.

Since I use one very broad genre of "Rock & Pop" for most of my everyday music, I use the composer fields to create several alternate genres, for times when I want to browse or shuffle play only a subset of my music library. My composers are:

80's
80's Belt Ballads
Classic Rock
Indie
Fave

Fave is the best... since I have a large music library (14,000 songs), I have LOTS of artists that fit in the Rock & Pop genre. I have marked 54 artists as "Fave" and can browse or listen to just those artists by going to the composer Fave category.

Once these are set up, I make a smart playlist to find all songs with "Classic Rock" or "Fave" in the composer field.

Another nice thing about a Composer genre is that it can pull songs from other genres. For example - I could have a 70's composer genre that pulls songs from both the Rock and Country genres. Essentially I'm remixing the whole music library.

Grouping

Unlike the composer field, the grouping field is not accessible on your ipod. I use it for monthly playlists.

Each month or so, I make a playlist of songs for the month. I could just make a playlist and drag the songs into it, but I have a lot of playlists, and my itunes has crashed a few times in the past. Every time it crashes I lose all my playlists. So now I make a playlist by typing the playlist name into the grouping field of the specific songs I want, and then I make a smart playlist to find all those songs.

For example, songs for this month get the grouping tag "Dec 2007". Then I make a smart playlist to find all songs where the grouping equals "Dec 2007".

Next time my itunes crashes, all I have to do is make new smart playlists. The data is saved in each and every song file.

I also use a "next" grouping tag, to indicate songs I might consider for my next month playlist.

See most of these topics shown in the image below. More to come?
Click on image for full size version.

Kevin Dern - itunes - music library - apple - mac - osx

Managing photos in 4 easy steps

2007-11-30T09:18:00.000-08:00

Keep it simple. Here's how to get photos from your camera onto your hard drive and uploaded in four easy steps.

1. Insert photo card into USB card reader.
Here's one for SD cards and one for CompactFlash cards .

2. Open finder window and drag images into photo folder on your hard drive.

3. Rename photos. Here's one way.

4. Drag to Flickr uploader. Tag and upload.

Kevin Dern - Apple - Mac - Camera - Upload photos - flickr - acquire

iTunes organization: Part I

2007-11-27T16:20:00.001-08:00

If you are serious about your music, you may be interested in organizing your music library. I'm pretty obsessive about keeping my music organized (I have 14,000 songs and growing), so here are some of my basic tips for keeping your music organized.

Today I'll focus on what I consider to be the basics: Genre, Artist and Album.

First of all, turn on Browse by going to list view and clicking on the button with the eyeball in the lower right corner. The three columns show genre, artist and album. These are the first keys to getting organized. These columns are the foundation of your organizational system.

Genre

Why organize your genres? Because it allows you to look at or listen to a section of your library at a time. Sometimes you want to listen to just jazz, or just rap, etc. Perhaps you have some songs in your library for your mother and you don't want to hear oldies every day. Genres allows you control over what you listen to.

The Genre is the largest division of your library, and you have lots of choices. Would you prefer a few categories or many? Personally, I use "Rock & Pop" as a broad category which includes any rock or pop music I might enjoy hearing while listening to my library in shuffle mode. There are lots of subgenres that includes, like indie, classic rock, folk, etc., so I keep them all in Rock & Pop.

There are some types of music I wouldn't want to hear on a random shuffle, so much of that has been removed to a separate genre. For me, these includes most 80's pop, Christmas songs, rap, mainstream top 40 radio, soul, soft rock of the 70's, etc.

Here's my complete list of genres:

a Rock & Pop
a 80's
a Funk
a Hip Hop & Rap
a Rock & Pop w/1 or 2 songs
a Soul
Country: Bluegrass
Country: Contemp
Country: Trad
Dance
Jewish
Oldies
Oldies: Doo Wop
Oldies: Motown
Oldies: Rock and Roll
Peel Box
Techno
World Music
z Christmas Music
z Classical
z Cool Vocals
z Disco
z Gospel
z Jazz
z Mainstream Pop
z Mashup
z Musicals
z New Age
z Other
z Soft Rock of the 70's

When you import new music into itunes, each song or album will have a different genre, and if you don't change them, you'll have a million different genres, and they become useless. You can use any genres you want - don't limit yourself to what's pre-set.

To change the genre on one or more songs, highlight the song or songs you want to change. One way to do this is to click on an artist, album, group of songs, group of artists, etc. Then go to Get Info (Apple I) and type in the genre you want to use. Don't limit yourself to the listed genres - you can type anything you want.

If you want a genre to appear at the top or bottom of the genre list, just type an "a" or "z" in front of the genre name. Genres are listed alphabetically. For example - I use "a Rock & Pop" to put my favorite genre on top, and "z Christmas" to force the holiday songs to the bottom of the list.

Example:

Artist

The next level of organization is the artist list. There are fewer decisions to make here... it's just all about being consistent and keeping the list clean. Take a look down the artist list... do you see duplicates? If an artist name is misspelled in one song, it'll be listed as a separate artist. That means it'll be listed as a duplicate on your ipod too. Clean those up by highlighting both versions of the artist name and go to Get Info (Apple I). Retype the name the way you prefer it and it'll change them all to match.

Also - you should decide if you want to see the word "The" in front of artist names. It won't affect the sort order: itunes automatically ignores "The" and sorts the artist in alphabetical order by the next word. But personally, I like the clean look of all the letters lining up nicely, so I remove "The" in front of any artists that show it. That means "The Beatles" are listed as "Beatles".

A few other tricks to keep Artists looking clean:

If I have an artist who does duets or collaborations, I keep them all under the primary artist, and list the collaborator in the song title field. For example, if Alison Krause sings backup on an Alan Jackson song, the Artist is listed as "Alan Jackson" and the song title is "The Angels Cried (w/Alison Krause). This keeps all the Alan Jackson songs together. The only time I stray from this is if an artist does a lot of duets with the same person and I consider that music radically different from their normal output... then I list them as a separate artist. For example, Elvis Costello & Burt Bacharach is listed as a separate artist as the music is really different from Elvis' normal output.

If I have a lot of bootleg or alternate songs from an artist (like the Beatles or Dead), I'll list the alternates under a separate artist name like "Beatles (alt)". This is because I don't really want to hear bootlegs or alternate tracks when listening to random mix of the Beatles.

I list all artists by first then last name. I just don't like the look of the other option, "Jackson, Alan". Too messy for me. As long as you're consistent.

I don't like any artists in all caps - I retype them to keep the look consistent.

Album

I like to list each album with the year in front of it, like "1966 Pet Sounds". This keeps albums listed chronologically rather than alphabetically, and it allows me to see the year when playing a song on my ipod. Aside from album names, I use the words "Unknown", "Other" and "Live" as needed.

Greatest Hits or Best Of albums present a challenge. Do you list the year of the album release or no year at all? I don't list a year, as each song could be from a different year. But if it's an artist I have a lot of music from, I figure out which original album each song is from and label the album field appropriately. That allows me to sort by year and see the year when playing on my ipod.

If I have a lot of alternate or bonus tracks from an album, I'll list them under a different album name, like "1966 Pet Sounds (alts)".

Example:

Part II coming soon.

Kevin Dern - itunes - music - music library - OSX - Leopard - Mac - Apple

12 fantastic web-based tools

2007-11-26T13:33:00.001-08:00

Some web-based tools that I use daily:

Netvibes
This is my home page and RSS reader. I find it to be the most flexible and clean looking reader out there, and I prefer it over iGoogle and Pageflakes. Highly recommended.

Wakerupper
Don't trust the hotel or your alarm clock when you have an early wake-up planned... this site will call you for free. Takes just seconds to set up.

Del.icio.us
This has defined my use of the web over the last couple years. I bookmark everything on it and use their Firefox extension to access bookmarked pages on two different computers (Mac and PC). I use their "bundled tags" toolbar in Firefox in place of favorites or folders of favorites. This allows me to have bookmarks synced on two computers with no effort on my part at all.

Flickr
My preferred image hosting solution. I know it's owned by Yahoo now, but it's still amazing. So many options: tags, groups, sets, collections, archives, maps, notes, comments, etc. Worth the $25 a year for the pro version, but limited access is free.

LastFM
Songs I play in itunes are automatically listed in LastFM, so that I can track my listening habits on a weekly, monthly and quarterly basis. Doesn't always track my ipod plays completely, but it's better than nothing.

BTJunkie
Best source for bittorrent downloads. Find music, tv shows, movies, etc. Of course I don't personally download files off of BTJunkie but I hear it works great.

Meebo
Fantastic web-based instant messaging.

Jott
I don't use this on a daily basis, but when I use it, it's very handy. You set up an account and are given a phone number to call. Program the number into your cell phone, and then when you call you can record a message that is transcribed and emailed to you or anyone else you choose. Great when you're on the road and need to send yourself a reminder for later.

Txt2Day
Send free text messages to any phone.

Google Maps
No contest - best map site online.

Gmail
No contest - best email anywhere.

Google Finance
This is a great way to keep tabs on your investments. Fantastic, clean looking, easy to set up.

Google Docs
Google versions of Word, Excel and Powerpoint hosted online for document sharing and publishing. Really intuitive, really easy to use, really free. I find myself using this more and more often lately.

10 essential free mac applications

2007-11-26T11:30:00.000-08:00

These are the freeware programs that I use every day.

Journler

This is a fantastic journaling program. It can be used to organize notes of any kind, and it's list of features is really impressive. link

Writeroom

If you like to write (maybe more so if you don't), this is the program for you. It removes all the distractions of writing on a computer and presents you with a simple black screen to type on. it's incredibly flexible, and every option can be customized. link

Miro

Best program to download videos, You Tube and tv shows . Also best player to play back the videos in your library. link

Adium

Best chat software available for mac. Doesn't have integrated video yet, but it's coming soon. link

Skype

Best video option for mac. iChat is pretty, but Skype actually works. link

Graphic Converter

Best basic image editor. Also best program to rename or view images. link

Slim Battery Monitor

Great menubar application to replace the OSX version. Icon is smaller and provides more options. link

Vuze (Azureus 3.0)

Best bittorrent program. Easy to set up and use. link

Disk Inventory X

Figure out where your hard drive space has gone and find those memory hogging files easily. link

Yamipod

Best program to get files OFF an ipod. link

Also...

Remote Buddy (not free)

Amazing program that lets you use your remote to control any program on your mac. Works great. link

Also check out Quicksilver and Growl, programs which I consider fun but not essential.

More software lists here.

Kevin Dern - Leopard - freeware - shareware - software - Mac - Apple - OSX

Top 10 holiday gifts for Mac users

2007-11-26T10:07:00.000-08:00

Of course the #1 gift is Leopard... if someone you know uses a Mac and doesn't have Leopard, buy it for them. It's cheaper on Amazon than at Apple.

An external hard drive is essential for every computer user now, and they're smaller and cheape than ever. This one is selling for $139 on Amazon now, and it'll fit into your pocket (if you wanted to). Would work great with Leopard's new Time Machine.

A USB stick is another essential item, and they're getting cheaper every year too. Here's a Kingston 2GB for $20 - you can't go wrong.

iWork is a set of Apple programs that are not included with Leopard or OSX for free. They include a word processing program and a spreadsheet program, but the best is Keynote, the Apple version of Powerpoint. It's fantastic, and any creative Mac user would love it.

If you know a Mac user who needs a little assistance, this book might be helpful.

Here's a book to help PC users with the switch to Mac (easier than you think!).

In my opinion, the best messenger bag for the macbook is the Timbuk2 medium Commute bag. It's got lots of pockets, holds up forever, and is pretty trendy. Affordable and comes in lots of colors.

Another no-brainer is a new iPod. I recommend the 8 GB Nano - it holds a ton of music, pictures and videos.

An awesome gift for any laptop user would be the Bose noise canceling headphones. I use mine all the time, in coffeeshops, airports, etc.

A subscription to MacWorld magazine would be a great gift idea for any Mac user, beginner or advanced. It's a gift that keeps giving all year long.

Kevin Dern - Leopard - Gift ideas - Mac - Apple - OSX

All about user accounts

2007-11-15T11:12:00.000-08:00

Let's take a detailed look at the Accounts options, which can be accessed under System Preferences.

First of all, what do you need user accounts for? You might want to have several:

One for yourself, of course. This should be for daily use.

Administrator account. It's a good idea to have a separate Administrator account, so that you have a way to start up the computer without all startup programs and preferences you may eventually have in your everyday user account. Someday you may have some program conflicts, and by logging in with your Admin account, it may make it easier to figure them out. And if you have to, you can delete your primary user account someday and start over. If your everyday login is already the Admin account, I suggest you set up a second user account now, just as a backup plan.

Accounts for anyone else who uses your computer on a regular basis.

A Guest account. This is a fabulous option, new to Leopard. It allows you to allow a guest to use your computer, with access to all applications but none of your personal files. They also can't mess up your preferences or desktop settings. Whatever they do or create is deleted when they log off. To enable the guest account, click on Guest Account in the left panel and click "Allow guests to log into this computer."

About Passwords
Even if you are the only one who uses your computer, it's a good idea to password protect each user login, and to disable Automatic Login (more on that later). Why? If your computer is lost or stolen, you don't want to make it easy for someone to access your personal information. Chances are it won't happen, but don't take a chance.

Login Options
At the bottom of the list of users is a link for Login Options. Let's take a look at each option in detail.

Automatic Login: If this is disabled, you will have to type your password each time you log in. As I mentioned above, I recommend that you use this option. If you do want Automatic Login, just select the name you want to login as. When you start up the computer, you will automatically be logged into that account. If you wanted to switch users at that point, you would go to the Apple menu and select "Log out".

Display Login Window As: If you select "List of users", you'll see an icon and name for each user account. To log in, you select one of the user names (with mouse or arrow keys) and type your password. If you select "Name and password", you won't see a list of users, you'll just see empty fields for name and password. This is more secure, but if you are worried about forgetting your login name, or want to make it easier, you might not want to use this option.

Show the Restart, Sleep, and Shut Down buttons: I think it's useful to show these in case you need to put the computer back to sleep or shut down quickly for some reason. They're especially useful for travel, in case you have to turn on your laptop for airport security someday and want to shut down again quickly.

Show input menu in login window: This gives you the option to select what language/keyboard setup you want to use at login. This would be useful only if you sometimes type in different languages or share the computer with someone who does.

Show password hints: Concerned about forgetting your password? Turn this option on.

Use VoiceOver at login window: Helpful for people who are blind.

Enable fast user switching: If you often switch from one user to another, this is useful. But keep in mind that once you have two accounts logged in at once, you may be using extra RAM if you have programs open in each user account.

User Account Options
Click on your account name, and then click on Password at the top of the window, and let's take a look at the options.

Icon: To change your icon, click on it and select "Edit Picture". A small window will pop up where you can take a new photo or choose any photo from your hard drive.

Change Password: Not only can you change your password here, but you can enter a password hint. This is important! Someday you will forget your password and you'll be very happy you left yourself a hint!

.Mac User Name: Enter your .mac account information here, if you have subscribed to this online service.

Address Book Card: Handy link to your own Address Book card.

Allow user to administer this computer: If this is your everyday user account, you might want to turn this on. It will allow you to change any system preferences, install and delete Applications, etc. If you are setting up an account for a guest, you may want to turn it off so they don't mess up your settings.

Enable Parental Controls: Click this box if you want to set parental limits for this user.

OK - so now click on "Login Items" at the top of the window. This is where you can choose what applications, programs or even documents will be opened when you log in. To delete any application, click on it and click the minus sign in the lower left. To add an application, click on the plus sign and select the application from your application folder.

The checkboxes are often misunderstood. Checking an item does not set the program to start up or not, it allows you to have the program start up as hidden. If the program is checked, it will be hidden when you start up the Mac.

If your Mac is starting up too slowly, you might have too many applications listed here. Try removing some or all of them and see if that helps. You can always add them back in one at a time.

In additional to applications, you can also select any document from your hard drive to start up automatically.

Kevin Dern - System Preferences - Login items - Startup items - Leopard - OSX - Apple - Mac

How to download bittorrent files on a mac

2007-11-14T16:40:00.000-08:00

OK, so you've heard about bittorrent files, and maybe even tried to download them in the past. But it's always been a pain, trying to figure out port forwarding, etc. It never works, right?

Not anymore. I've found two programs and a few websites that make it really easy.

To find the torrent files, first search on btjunkie or The Pirate Bay.

Then download the files with either Azureus or Miro. Miro is fantastic for lots of other things, but sometimes Azureus seems to download faster.

With these two programs I've never had to worry about port forwarding... they just work. The only other tip I have is to look for files with lots of seeders. Each seeder is a person who you can download a piece of the file from. If you see a movie with 5000 seeds, it might only take a few hours to download, where if it has 200 seeds, it might take a week!

Kevin Dern - OSX - Apple - Mac - Leopard - Bittorrent - Torrent - How to download bittorrent files on a mac

How to "Right Click" on a Mac

2007-11-12T15:13:00.000-08:00

For new Mac users, not being able to right click can be one of the most difficult changes to adjust to. Of course you can "right click" on a Mac, there are just more ways to do it than on a PC.

Method 1: Use the Mouse
The Apple Mighty Mouse allows you to right click. If you don't like the Mighty Mouse (or want something less expensive), here are a couple options that are highly recommended: Mouse 1 Mouse 2

Method 2: CTRL-Click
To get the same effect as right clicking, you can hold own the CTRL key while clicking with the mouse.

Method 3: Two Finger Click on the Trackpad
If you go to the Mouse/Trackpad page in System Preferences, you can turn on "Tap trackpad using two fingers for secondary click". This allows you to tap the trackpad with two fingers side by side (but with a space in between) to get the "right click" effect.

While you're in the Mouse system preferences, you might want to turn on two-finger scrolling as well. I couldn't live without it.

Kevin Dern - OSX - Apple - Leopard Tips - right click - Mac

Add and remove dock icons

2007-11-11T20:00:00.000-08:00

It's the first thing I do on a new Mac - customize the dock. For lots of you, this'll be a "well, duh!" post - but there are some newbies out there. So here we go.

To add items to your dock, you can just drag any icon to the dock itself and drop it where you want it to be. Another option is to open a document or application and CTRL-click on the icon in the dock, selecting "Keep in Dock".

To remove an icon from the dock, just drag it out of the dock. You'll see it disappear into a poof. The application or document is still on your hard drive, it's just not on the dock any longer.

Another option is to CTRL-click on the item and select "Remove from Dock".

Other tips to customize the dock here.

Kevin Dern - OSX - Leopard - Apple - dock

Group and organize ical calendars

2007-11-11T19:58:00.000-08:00

If you have a lot of individual calendars in your iCal, or a bunch of calendars you subscribe to, it can become cumbersome if you frequently want to hide some or all of the calendars.

On my iCal, for example, I have my real events on 3 calendars, and then I have 3 calendars I subscribe to, plus birthdays that appear from my address book. That's 7 total.

Sometimes I want to see just my actual scheduled events, and not all the subscriptions. It takes a lot of clicks to turn all the calendars on or off, so I group some of them into one calendar folder so I can turn them all on or off with one click.

To do this, click on FILE and then NEW CALENDAR GROUP. Name it and drag calendars into the folder. Now you can click once to turn them all on or off. If you click the small arrow next to the folder, you will see that you can still turn each one on and off individually if you want to.

This work in printing too... when you go to print and have to select which calendar listings you want visible, you can turn groups on and off with one click.

Essential keyboard shortcuts

2007-11-11T11:52:00.000-08:00

Most of you probably know the keyboard shortcuts below, but I'm listing them here anyway. If you don't use these, you should learn them. They'll make you so much faster on the computer. I suggest you pick one at a time and use it for a day or two, then add another. Eventually you'll figure out which ones you like and they'll become second nature.

Another good way to learn these is to print them out and tape them to the side of your monitor. FORCE yourself to use them until you can do so without thinking.

Preferences.... ⌘ - Comma
Open........... ⌘ - O
Move to trash.. ⌘ - Delete
Copy .......... ⌘ - C
Cut ........... ⌘ - X
Paste ......... ⌘ - V
Save........... ⌘ - S
Print.......... ⌘ - P
Switch apps ... ⌘ - Tab
Get info ...... ⌘ - I
Quit........... ⌘ - Q
Close.......... ⌘ - W
Undo........... ⌘ - Z
Redo........... ⌘ - Y
Bold........... ⌘ - B
Underline...... ⌘ - U
Find........... ⌘ - F
Hide App....... ⌘ - H
Minimize App... ⌘ - M
Spotlight...... ⌘ - Space

Kevin Dern - OSX - Leopard - Mac - Apple - Keyboard Shortcuts

Back Up iCal and Address Book

2007-11-11T06:43:00.000-08:00

If you use iCal and the Address Book, these might be among the most important files on your computer. If something happened to your Mac tomorrow, do you have these files backed up?

If not, you should start backing up at least these two files immediately. If you backup nothing else, at least do these two. Apple makes it so easy, there's no reason not to.

I'll show you how to do this in iCal, and the same will work in Address Book.

1. Open iCal. Click on FILE and BACK UP ICAL.

2. Save the file on your computer. I suggest you save it with a descriptive name like "iCal backup Nov. 2007".

That's it.

Do the same with your Address Book, and then save copies of the two files OFF of your computer. Put them on a CD, a USB stick, or, if you have web based e-mail like gmail or Yahoo, email them to yourself.

Kevin Dern - OSX - Address Book - Backup - Apple - Mac - Leopard

How to publish an ical calendar online

2007-11-11T06:13:00.000-08:00

There are lots of reasons you might want to publish a ical calendar online:

You want your girlfriend to be able to see your schedule
You want to publish a schedule for the soccer team you play on
You're a teacher and you want to publish a calendar of deadlines for your students to access online
You want an easy way to put a calendar online for your club or organization

Why publish an ical calendar instead of using some online calendar software? Convenience. By starting with an ical calendar on your own computer, you can make changes right on your own system anytime, and they are automatically updated online for others to see. Also, by publishing it, not only can people see the schedule on a website, they can also subscribe to the calendar themselves in Google Calendars or ical on their own Mac.

So here's how to do it.

First you need a place to host the calendar. If you have a .Mac account, you're all set. If not, sign up for a free account at iCal Exchange. Once you have an account, you'll see two URL addresses on your iCal Exchange page: one for private calendars and one for public. You probably want public. Copy the address.

Open ical and click on the calendar at left that you want to publish. (It doesn't matter which ones are checked or not checked, you just need to click on the one you want). On the menu bar, click on CALENDAR and PUBLISH.

This window will pop up:

At the top, decide what you want to call the calendar.

Where it says "Publish on:", you choose .Mac or "a Private Server". If you are hosting it on iCal Exchange, choose Private Server.

Enter the iCal Exchange URL on the next line, along with your iCal Exchange username and password.

You probably want to select "Publish Changes Automatically" so that the online calendar is kept current. Then click Publish.

To find your iCal online, go back to iCal Exchange and click on Your Account on the left side. You may need to reload the page. You'll see your calendar listed under public calendars, with two important links.

The .ics link is the address someone would use to subscribe to your calendar. I know it works on Google Calendar and iCal, it might work on others as well. Here are instructions for how to subscribe to a public calendar. So you can e-mail this link to anyone who wants to subscribe to your calendar, or even create a public Google calendar that is subscribed to your calendar.

The html link will show your calendar in a web-based calendar format. Granted, it's not an attractive calendar, but it works and it's free. You can e-mail this link to anyone who you want to be able to see your calendar online.

OSX - ical - Kevin Dern - Leopard - Mac - Apple

Buy Leopard and save money

2007-11-11T05:57:00.001-08:00

If you haven't bought Leopard yet, you should know that there are less expensive options than the Apple store.

First, you can buy the disc at Amazon and save $20. Single user disc. (It's currently $109 with free shipping.)

But the better option is the Five user license, currently $189 at Amazon. It's $10 cheaper than at the Apple store, and it'll allow you to install the software on 5 computers. If you can find a few people to share the disc with you, you'll pay less than $40 each.

Lists of public calendars

2007-11-10T21:56:00.000-08:00

Earlier I described how to subscribe to a public calendar. But where do you find them? Here are some lists to get you started:

Interesting Google Calendars

Apple Calendars

iCal Share (Popular)

Google Calendar Directory
This one is tricky because Google doesn't let you see the .ics link anywhere. To subscribe to one of these calendars, it appears you would have to have a Google account and actually subscribe to one of these in your Google Calendar. Then you could go into the Google calendar setup pages and see the URL addresses for the calendars you have subscribed to. From there you'd copy the URL and subscribe to it in ical.

Kevin Dern - public calendars - OSX - Leopard Tips - ical - Apple - Mac

Subscribe to a public calendar in ical

2007-11-10T21:49:00.001-08:00

To subscribe to a public calendar in ical, you first have to locate the calendar. There are lots located on the Apple site, but there are many published elsewhere. (Lists here)

(Here's how to publish your own from iCal).

Let's say you want to subscribe to this calendar listing new DVD releases. First you have to find the calendar link. On the Apple site it's labeled as "download" but on other sites you may just see a URL. The important thing to notice is that the link ends with ".ics". If it ends with ".ics", it's a calendar you can subscribe to in ical.

On the Apple page, click on the download link. Your Mac should automatically know to open the .ics link in ical. (If it doesn't, copy the link location. In ical, click CALENDAR and SUBSCRIBE and then paste the link.)

Once you click OK, ical will download the calendar information and then show you this window of options:

Here you can name the calendar, choose it's color, and, most importantly, choose how often it should auto refresh. If you choose "No", it will never be updated to match the online version. Select daily, weekly, or whatever your comfortable with.

Click OK and you're done. Remember that you can click the checkboxes next to each of your calendars in ical to show or hide those calendar items.

Kevin Dern - ical - calendars - OSX - Leopard Tips- Apple - Mac

Save a web page on your hard drive

2007-11-10T17:10:00.001-08:00

There are lots of occasions when you might want to save a web page to your hard drive. Here are the situations I encounter most often:

I purchase something online and want to save the confirmation/receipt page
I find a long, interesting article that I want to save for offline reading later (like on a flight)
I have to do a presentation and can't take the chance that I can't load the page I want

I've used three different methods for saving web pages to my hard drive:

1. "Save page as" (works on Mac/PC, any browser)
Use the command "Save page as". This is an option on just about every browser. It saves the page as an html file on your hard drive. This used to be my method of saving web pages, but it gets confusing. I could never figure out why sometimes it was just an html file (with all images intace), and why there was sometimes an accompanying folder of all the images. It was too much trouble to worry about, so I looked for better options.

2. Scrapbook extension for Firefox (Works on Mac/PC, Firefox only)
If you're using Firefox, there's a wonderful extension called Scrapbook that allows you to easily save a web page to your hard drive, and then access them easily within Firefox. It's as easy as printing a file, and it works flawlessly. Download it here.

I find Scrapbook especially useful for pages you don't need to keep forever, like a receipt, shipping confirmation, driving directions, etc.

3. Save as PDF (Avail by default on Mac, can be done on PC, any browser)
For web pages that you want to save on a more permanent basis, there's nothing better or easier than saving the page as a PDF file. Basically you to go to FILE and PRINT (or click APPLE-P), and at the bottom left, click on PDF and select SAVE AS PDF. Then you can save the file to your hard drive, email it, whatever. It's really easy.

This can be done on a PC, but you'll have to install a PDF program first. Adobe will work, but it's a big, slow program. CutePDF is smaller, lighter and works perfectly 95% of the time.

By the way - on the Mac (or on the PC with Adobe or CutePDF), you can save to a PDF file in any program that you can typically print from.

Kevin Dern - OSX - PDF - CutePDF - Leopard Tips - Apple - Mac

Download your favorite TV shows (or YouTube)

2007-11-10T05:49:00.000-08:00

Here's how to download your favorite TV shows to watch on your mac.

Download Miro. Miro is a video downloader and player all in one. You set up your favorite shows and the software will look for new episodes daily. You can set it to automatically download new episodes or to wait for you to do it manually.

Once you have Miro installed, I suggest you delete all the default shows and channels in the left panel. Next we'll want to set up a "channel" for each show that you want to watch.

Here's what my left panel looks like:

Each RSS feed is a different show. The blue numbers show how many episodes there are to download. Each blue number shows how many downloaded shows I have yet to watch.

As for the YouTube items... I'll get those later.

To set up a channel, go to TVRSS and find the show you want to watch. You can't find every show in the world there, only shows that are popular with internet users. Click on the show name and look for a link titled "Search based RSS feed".

CTRL-click on the link titled "Search based RSS feed" and copy the link location. Then go back to Miro.

In Miro, click on CHANNELS and select ADD CHANNEL. Paste the link and click OK. You'll see a new feed appear in the left panel on the Miro window. I suggest you CTRL-click on the feed and rename it with the name of the show itself.

When you click on the show name in the left panel, you'll see a list of shows on the right panel that are waiting to be downloaded. The download is actually via bittorent, but it's much easier than any bittorrent downloading you've ever done before.

In the upper right part of the right panel, you can change settings for the show to say whether you want new episodes automatically downloaded or not.

Once a show is downloaded, you just click and watch. You can double click on the video to go full screen. When the video is over, click Delete in the lower right corner and the video is moved to the trash.

You can also use Miro to search and easily download YouTube videos. Just click in the YouTube search box at lower left and type in your search terms. A list of videos come up and you just click on the arrows to download. It's that easy. You can even save the search to show you when there are new videos that match your search terms. It couldn't be easier.

Mac - Apple - Kevin Dern - Watch TV on your Mac - Leopard - OSX - Download Youtube videos

Change Leopard startup image

2007-11-09T13:04:00.000-08:00

From the Apple support forum:

In previous versions of Mac OS X it was possible to customize the boot-up screen you see prior to logging-on. This is very useful, as its possible to have a picture with text that identifies your laptop as your property, with contact information and a reward message. Previously this start-up screen was a .jpg image located on hardrive ---> library ---> desktop pictures ---> Aqua Blue.jpg.

With the release of Mac OS X 10.5 the location and name of this file has changed. You'd think it would simply be called aurora.jpg - it isn't! You can now find the start-up image in hardrive ---> system ---> library ---> coreservices ---> DefaultDesktop.jpg. The new start-up screen must be saved as a .jpg file. After you create the jpg image you wish to see on boot-up, rename it DefaultDesktop.jpg, and drop it into your coreservices folder.

You'll need to be the computer administrator to authorize permissions to replace the DefaultDesktop.jpg file. After authentication, you'll be told an older file with the same name exists. Simply replace the older file with the newly created DefaultDesktop.jpg.

Upon log-out, your new desktop image and identification will appear under the user/password log-on box. Make sure you wrap any text around the log-on box. Good-luck!

Via

Leopard Tips - Apple - OSX - startup - login - boot - Kevin Dern

Adium vs iChat

2007-11-09T10:06:00.000-08:00

Adium and iChat are the two best options for chat on Leopard. Both work with all the major chat services (AOL IM, Apple, Google Talk, etc.). Here's a comparison.

Adium
Pro: Highly customizable, lots of skins, lots of options. Multiple accounts can be listed in same contact list window. Works with Growl.
Con: No audio or video (yet)
Update 11/11/07: Adium just released a plugin that provides video chat via a company called MeBeam. It's not a native, integrated part of Adium yet, but at least video is now available. Link here.

iChat
Pro: Audio and video.
Con: Limited options. No alternate skins. Multiple logins appear in separate contact lists. Requires additional software to work with Growl.

Winner: Adium, with ichat as a backup for when I want to do audio or video. I love how I can make Adium into one tiny window in the corner of my screen. Once Adium adds integrated audio and video (which is happening soon in version 2.0), I can't imagine using ichat at all.

Kevin Dern - OSX - Leopard Tips - Apple - Mac - Chat - iChat - Adium

A history of Apple design

2007-11-09T07:18:00.001-08:00

History of Apple designs from 1977 to 2007

15 lists of Mac software (now 20)

2007-11-08T06:57:00.000-08:00

There's a LOT of software out there... here are some lists to browse to find the perfect one for whatever you need. (now 20 lists!)

Essential Free Software for the Mac

Wikipedia list of Mac Software

BIG list of "Essential" Mac OSX Applications

10 Applications for College Students

Super OSX Menubar Items

Free Applications for Teachers

iusethis.com

35 Essential Mac Apps

30 Apps to Run Your Business By

Best Unknown Mac Apps

10 OSX Macs You Might Not Know About But Should

MeFi: Best Free Programs for a Mac?

10 Essential Mac Applications for Creative Users

Top Free Mac Applications

Free, Open Source Mac Software

10 Most Beautiful Mac Applications

Freemacware.com

Top 100 Mac Apps

Freeware OS X

Univ of Utah Mac Software List

Kevin Dern - OSX - Apple - Mac - Software - Freeware - Leopard Tips

How to take a quick screenshot

2007-11-08T06:27:00.000-08:00

OSX includes a screen grab program called Grab, but sometimes it's handy to take a quick screenshot without opening a program. OSX also has this ability built in.

To take a "photo" of the whole screen, click Shift-Apple-3, and an image of the screen will be saved on your desktop.

To select the portion of the screen you want in the image, click Shift-Apple-4, and you'll see a crosshair cursor. Use the mouse or trackpad to drag a box on the screen, and when you release the mouse button, the image will be saved to your desktop.

Then you might want to use coverflow to view and rename the files you just created.

Kevin Dern - OSX - Apple - Mac - Leopard - Screenshot

Quickly find your serial number

2007-11-08T06:22:00.001-08:00

Here's a super fast way to find your serial number... go to the Apple menu on the menu bar and select "About This Mac". Here's what you'll see.

Below "Mac OS X" you'll see which version of OS X you're running. Click on the version number to show the software build number, and click on it again to show your serial number.

This also works on the OSX login screen, but you'll see even more information if you keep clicking, including date and time, network connections, etc.

Kevin Dern - OSX - Leopard - Apple - Mac

Browsers accessing my blog - Safari Wins!

2007-11-07T20:21:00.000-08:00

Safari is overwhemingly the most popular browser among my readers, with Firefox in second place.

Kevin Dern - OSX - Apple - Leopard - Browsers - Safari - Firefox

ichat video tips

2007-11-04T18:35:00.000-08:00

With Tiger, I could rarely get the video to work in ichat. It would say the other user had "declined the invitation" or "failed to respond", and usually I'd give up and use Skype.

Under Leopard, I've been having much better luck with ichat video, but it still doesn't work all the time. Here's one tip to try to improve your chances.

ichat video takes up a LOT of bandwidth, and if you or the person on the other end of the chat doesn't have enough bandwidth, the software will give you one of the two errors above. But you can limit the amount of bandwidth that you allow ichat to use for your outgoing video.

To access the settings, go to ICHAT on the menu bar and select PREFERENCES (or type APPLE-comma) and click on audio/video at the top. At the bottom of the window you'll see Bandwidth Limit. If you leave it on NONE (default), it will use as much bandwidth as it wants. Try limiting it to 1 or 2 Mbps, or even lower. Your outgoing video quality will be much worse, but it might work.

Kevin Dern - OSX - Leopard - Mac - Apple - ichat

Leopard's improved list of recent items

2007-11-04T18:27:00.001-08:00

Leopard's improved "Recent Items" list is now much more useful than it was before. Not only does it show recent documents, but it also shows recent applications and even servers that you've been connected to.

The list is located under the Apple menu on the menu bar and can easily be accessed while in any program. You can change the number of apps, docs and servers that it remembers by adjusting it under System Preferences / Appearance.

To clear the list of recent items, go to the list itself and select "Clear List" from the very bottom.

Kevin Dern - finder - OSX - Leopard - Apple - Mac

Easily rename individual photos

2007-11-04T18:21:00.000-08:00

How often does this happen: you have a folder of photos that are either unnamed or all named the same, and you want to rename each one individually (John at party, Mary and Tom, etc.)? It happens to me all the time. I like to name photos individually so that they come up when I do a spotlight search for photos of specific people or places.

Leopard makes it easy. Just open a folder of photos in Coverflow view, and as you view each photo, click RETURN and type a new file name. Then click return again to enter the new name and use the arrow key to go to the next photo. This way you can just keep typing and moving on, without using the trackpad or mouse, and without opening any other programs. Very easy.

OSX - Kevin Dern - Leopard - Apple - Coverflow

Customize your icons

2007-11-03T17:44:00.001-07:00

Here's how to customize the look of your mac a bit - by changing icons. You can use any small image to an icon, but it is best to use an image designed as an icon. You can find icons on sites like these:

Interfacelift.com
PixelPressIcons.com
Iconfinder.net
iconlet.net
iconarchive.com

So once you've found an icon you like, download it to your computer. Click on the icon document (sometimes it's a folder) and click APPLE-I to get info (or go to FILE & GET INFO). You'll see the icon in two places: a small one at top left, and a large one at the bottom. You want to click once on the small icon at the top and COPY (APPLE-C).

Then go to the document or folder you want to use this icon for. Open the GET INFO window and click on that document's small icon in the upper corner. Then PASTE (APPLE-V) and close the window. Voila!

(Click on image for larger view.)

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern - Firefox - Safari - icons

Changing and selecting folder views

2007-11-03T17:41:00.000-07:00

The new Cover Flow feature is cool, but not especially useful for all purposes. I find it useful for folders containing images, movies and fonts, perhaps even pdf files. But I don't find it useful for folders full of other folders, applications, word and excel documents, etc.

So what do you do, keep changing back and forth? No... you can set each folder to open in either list view, cover flow, 3-column view or even icon view.

Here's how.

Open the folder that you'd like to set, and change the view to the version you prefer (the icons are at the top left of every window). Once it's in the view you prefer, go to the menubar at the top of the screen and click on VIEW and SHOW VIEW OPTIONS. There you'll see a checkbox labeled "Always open in ___". Check that box, and you're all set.

While you're there, you might as well set your other view options... what information do you need to see? If it's applications, you might want to show version and file size. For documents perhaps you'd like to see date created and date modified.

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern - Firefox - Safari - coverflow

Browsers Accessing My Blog

2007-11-02T15:08:00.000-07:00

I love Mac users... check this out, on this chart below of browsers used by people visiting my blog today, Firefox and Safari rule! Internet Explorer isn't even a contender. Finally!

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern - Firefox - Safari - Browsers

Quick Access to Applications

2007-11-01T21:17:00.001-07:00

The new Stacks feature in the Dock is nifty, but I've only found one good use for it so far. I dragged my Applications folder to the dock and now when I click on it I have an instant view of most of my Apps!

I typically use Spotlight to launch applications, but sometimes I can't remember the name of an application that I want to use, so I use this.

The only problem is that it is only showing about 60-something apps, and I have many more than that, so I don't really have it set up properly to use this. But if I used it often, I could make a folder with the apps I actually might use, and use this dock item to access them. You get the idea.

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

Showing File Paths in the Finder

2007-11-01T21:00:00.000-07:00

First of all, what is a file path? It's the path you would take to find a particular file or folder. In other words, it describes a file's location. It might in your hard drive, then in the music folder, then in an Albums folder... so the path might be HardDrive/Music/Albums/etc.

In Apple's Tiger operating system, there was only one way to show a file's path in a window: you could Apple-click on the window's name and it would reveal the file path.

In Tiger, this is made much easier.
One way is to go to VIEW and select SHOW FILE PATH. Then at the bottom of every finder window you'll see the path of whatever file you have selected.

But there's another way. CTRL-click on the top of a finder window, and select CUSTOMIZE TOOLBAR.

Then click and drag the File Path button to the finder window.

From now on, that button will appear in your finder window, and you can click on it any time to show a file's path.

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

Dictionary Access From Spotlight

2007-11-01T17:46:00.000-07:00

Here's a quick tip... to look up a definition for any word, access Spotlight (click on Apple-Space) and type the word. The dictionary definition will pop up in the results listing.

Click on the definition for a the Apple dictionary listing.

Once the dictionary is open, you can even click on "Wikipedia" for the Wiki listing.

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

Menubar Items

2007-11-01T16:23:00.000-07:00

Here's an overview of what I have in my menubar:

From left to right:

AudioScrobbler: Sends itunes play history to LastFM
Growl: Shows alert windows for lots of programs, all with the same display style.
SlimBatteryMonitor: More customizable than the OSX version
Mozy: Online backup software.
Spaces: Shows which Leopard space I'm currently in.
Airport: View available wireless networks
Volume
Bluetooth
Time & Date: Edited with instructions from Lifehacker
Spotlight: Search tool (I access via Apple-Space)

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

Amazing Screen Zoom

2007-11-01T16:07:00.000-07:00

This is a trick that you'll use every day once you get the hang of it. It allows you to zoom your entire screen image in and out with one keystroke.

By default, this is turned on in system preferences, so you might not need to do anything to make it work. Try it out now: hold down the CTRL and APPLE keys, and then click the PLUS sign to zoom in. Click the plus again to zoom in more, and use the minus sign to zoom out. Pretty amazing, right?

If you have your trackpad preferences set to allow two finger scroll, it gets even easier. Hold down just the CTRL key and scroll up and down with two fingers.

If zooming is not working for you, here's how to turn it on.

Go to system preferences and click on Universal Access.

Turn on Zoom.

Then click on OPTIONS next to Zoom.

Here's where you set all the options. The last option is where you select the option to use scroll wheel (or two fingers on trackpad) to zoom in and out.

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard Tips - Kevin Dern

Save any Document as a PDF File

2007-11-01T07:00:00.001-07:00

To save any document as a PDF, go FILE and PRINT. In the lower left corner of the print options window, you'll see "PDF". Click here and select "Save as PDF".

You can select the number of pages, page layout, etc., just as you would if you were printing to a real printer. But instead of being printed out, the document will be saved as a PDF on your hard drive.

So what is this useful for? Saving a web page receipt, a web page you want to read later on the plane, even a nice email from someone that you want to remember. Instead of trying to save it as html or text file, why not save it as a PDF that you can open easily anytime?

It's also useful if you have created a document, perhaps in Word or Excel, and you want to send it to someone else to review. By saving it in PDF format, you can be sure that the document will look the same on their screen as it does on yours, even if they have a different system, fonts, etc.

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

Find all PDFs on your Hard Drive

2007-11-01T06:59:00.002-07:00

PDFs are becoming more and more common now, and they're a great way to keep copies of web pages and important documents. But once they're on your computer, it's possible to lose track of them all.

You can create an "All PDFs" smart folder in the Finder pretty easily. Here's what it'll look like:

To create this folder, click on the search box. Type a space, just to pull up the additional search options. Click the small plus sign on the far right, and then select "Kind" and "PDF". Save this search and choose to Add to Sidebar. That's it.

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

Open Programs with a Few Keystrokes

2007-11-01T06:59:00.001-07:00

I used to use Quicksilver to launch programs, but in Leopard, Spotlight is just as fast.

To access Spotlight, type Apple-Space. Then type the first few letters of the program you want to launch. Once you see it highlighted in the Spotlight menu, click enter. It's super fast.

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

Select Items to Open at Login

2007-11-01T06:58:00.002-07:00

There are two ways to select programs to open when you log in (or turn on the computer).

One way is to go to system preferences, go to accounts, and select Login Items. But now there's an easier way.

Open any program and CNTRL-Click on the program icon in the dock. Select "Open at Login". That's it! Easy!

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

Quick Dock Adjustments

2007-11-01T06:58:00.001-07:00

Here are quick ways to adjust the dock's size and location.

To adjust the size, look for the dotted line at the far right (or bottom).

Click on the dotted line and drag up or down - the dock will automatically get larger and smaller.

To quickly change the location of the dock, go to the Apple menu (at the far left of the menu bar). Click on the APPLE and then on DOCK - you'll see options to move the dock to the left, bottom or right of your screen. Very handy!

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

About the New Airport Menu

2007-11-01T06:57:00.002-07:00

What's new about the Airport menu in Leopard? There's one main difference - it shows which wireless networks are secure, and which are not secure. That means if you are in a public place and want to find a network to log onto, you can skip the secured networks. That's a big help!

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

Get Rid of Unwanted Fonts

2007-11-01T06:57:00.001-07:00

Apple's font book is a pain... the new cover flow feature in the Finder provides an easy way to find unwanted fonts in your system. I used it to find and delete all the foreign fonts, which I never use. In doing so I noticed that many of the Asian fonts are huge, as large as 10 MB.

Your main font folder is located in Hard Drive/Library/Fonts.

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

Organize iTunes Albums by Date

2007-11-01T06:56:00.000-07:00

Lots more itunes tips here.

I'm a bit OCD when it comes to organizing my itunes library on my Mac. One of my recent organizational projects is to enter date information for all albums and songs.There are a few benefits to this. If you have accurate years on everything, you can:

View albums in chronological order, both in itunes and on your ipod. This is especially helpful for artists that you have a lot of songs from.

Sort any list of songs by year.

Create smart playlists by year, decade, etc.

Here's how I do it.

I select all the songs within an album, go to Get Info, and enter the year of release as the Year tag. You'll find that many tracks have the year the CD was released, or re-released, not the year of the original release. When you see Elvis songs from 2004, you know something's wrong!

Here's the best part. For the Album tag, I put the year of release BEFORE the name of the album. Think about it - there's no point in listing albums alphabetically. I want to see them in chronological order so I can tell the early Elvis Costello from recent Costello! So his Spike album would have the following info as the Album tag: "1989 Spike".

The results are incredible. Here's what my Elvis Costello album list looks like:

If you want to make a playlist of songs from a certain year (or span of years), here's what it would look like.

Some tips to make this easier:

I only attempt this with artists I have a lot of. Someday I'll get around to all the onesies and twosies.

I found that a lot of my tracks were from greatest hits collections. There's a tough decision to make - keep the tracks under the "Greatest Hits" album title, or relabel the album tag for each song with the original album it was released on? I use both approaches. If I have just 2-3 albums from an artist, I like to know which ones are on the greatest hits release. But if it's an artist I try to collect all of, like the Beatles, I relabel each track with it's original album release name. EITHER WAY, put the correct year on every track, so it will come up in smart playlists.

Putting in the year info for all these songs is time consuming. Here's the most efficient way I've found to do it:

In itunes browse view, with the artist highlighted, I highlight the names of the albums and songs that need year information added.

Sort the song list by name, so it's A to Z.

In your web browser, go to allmusic.com and pull up the list of all songs by that artist.

Go to Get Info for the first song, find it on the allmusic list, and type in the album name. Don't worry about the year yet, and don't enter OK.

Click Next (or use the keyboard shortcut - Apple N on the Mac - to go to the next song. Flip back and forth between the browser and itunes (or line them up side by side on the screen) until all the album names are entered. Use "Unknown" or "Other" for any odd tracks. Using "next" saves time, so you don't have to keep going back to the list of songs and clicking on Get Info.

When this is done, pull up the artist's discography on allmusic.com, and find the years for each album. Back in itunes, highlight all the songs on an album, go to Get Info, and enter the year tag, and insert the year before the album name. While you're here, you might want to copy the album art from the AllMusic album page, and paste it into itunes on the appropriate spot in Get Info.

If you are doing a lot of these and you set up both windows on your screen side by side so you don't have to flip back and forth, you can do this pretty quickly.

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern

iTunes: Organizing Playlists in Folders

2007-11-01T06:50:00.001-07:00

If you have a lot of playlists in itunes, you can organize them in folders. To create a folder, go to FILE and select NEW FOLDER. Then you can drag playlists into the folders.

The best part is that now in Apple's OSX Leopard (and with the new ipods), the same folders will appear in your iPod music config screen, and also on your ipod. Great way to organize your multiple playlists.

Here's what your iPod music config screen will look like when you have playlist folders:

Lots more itunes tips here.

Apple - Mac - OSX - Leopard - Kevin Dern