Re: A new Switcher
- From: Randy Howard <randyhoward@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 03 Feb 2006 23:51:30 GMT
raggio wrote
(in article <2006020317163875249-raggionospam@optonlinenet>):
Yea, I switched. So far so good. I picked up a mini and am having a
lot of fun using it and tinkering. I have a few questions if you folks
have time:
1) Is this the best place to get mac info, or can you all recommend
some web sites / forums that I should check out?
It seems to be a pretty good source, although you might also
benefit from other sites and newsgroups. For example there are
other mac newsgroups that focus on storage, applications,
printers, programming, etc. You may find them useful from time
to time.
You need to be aware of:
http://www.versiontracker.com
http://www.macfixit.com/
http://www.macrumors.com/
http://www.macsales.com/
http://macslash.org/
http://macspeedzone.com/html/hubs/central/macmini.html
http://www.123macmini.com/
http://www.macintouch.com/
There are also a number of very informative Mac-related podcasts
which you might want to subscribe to via iTunes, incuding:
CommandN
MacCast
Mac OS Ken
2) is it possible to force spotlight to ignore files that the current
user does not have access to? This seems like a bug to me.
Spotlight has a lot of bugs. Now is a good time to put in plugs
for add-ons you probably want:
#1 Quicksilver http://quicksilver.blacktree.com/
The single most important productivity enhancer available
anywhere, and it is free.
#2 Desktop Manager http://desktopmanager.berlios.de/
For any system without multiple monitors (and some with them),
this is a great enhancement. Linux users are used to it by now,
but most people coming from Windows love it too.
#3 Sidenote http://www.chatelp.org/?s=Sidenote
Think of this as the way postit notes SHOULD be implemented, and
it's much handier than the dashboard for this sort of thing,
while managing to take up almost zero screen real estate in the
process.
#4 Hogwasher http://www.asar.com/
A decent newsreader for the Mac at last. Not free, but worth
the modest price to have a decent client on the platform.
#4 Firefox. Need I say more?
#5 Cyberduck (free ftp GUI client, although Transmit 3.5 is
smoother in operation, but isn't free)
#6 Google Earth. Wow.
#7 If you're into photography (digital) you absolutely need to
try out the very impressive Adobe Lightroom public beta.
#8 NeoOffice OpenOffice ported to run under OS X without X11
#9 NetNewsWire RSS aggregator
#10 SizzlingKeys Single coolest applet to make iTunes more
useful
#11 TextWrangler Excellent, free text editor that can also
syntax highlight a lot of different programming and web
development languages. Must have. Throw textedit in the trash.
#12 Thunderbird. Much better than Apple's Mail program, unless
you need Address Book integration for other apps, as Tbird uses
its own address book.
#13 URLWell Incredibly handy, and better than syncing
bookmarks between browsers.
#14 vlc media player
#15 mplayer media player
#16 Flip4Mac
One or more of these will get you through most problems that you
can't solve with Quicktime.
That should keep you busy for a while... :-)
4) Is it possible to prevent a user from being bale to empty the trash?
You like having your hard drive fill up? I don't know
seriously, I never even considered it.
5) How to display the number of files in a folder as well as the total
space used?
Right click on a folder, Get Info for space, number of files is
a finder option. Not sure if there is a way to see both at the
same time. Don't like that much clutter myself. Once you get
used to Quicksilver and/or Spotlight, you'll discover that
finder isn't all that useful anymore.
6) Is there an inexpensive web-cam option? I don't want to spend the
$150 on an isight now. I have read that the inexpensive USB cameras
only work in windows. Is this true? Can I use my digital camera
somehow?
Dunno. There are probably hacks to do it with various models,
try some of the links above.
7) is it possible to keep some of the dashboard widgets always open on
the desktop? I was able to do this in konfabulator in windows.
There is a hack to turn on so-called "developer mode" to drag
them out, I think you can enable several ways, including with
TinkerTool, which probably should have made the list.
8) how can I make the front row slideshow display random photos?
I don't use front row.
9) is it normal for the mini fan to make excess noise when doing
something CPU intensive? is the dvd drive normally loud when reading /
writing? Come to think of it both of these behaviors are consistent
with my IBM thinkpad.
It's a very tiny box with little air flow and almost no sound
dampening. Keep your office cooler? :-)
--
Randy Howard (2reply remove FOOBAR)
"The power of accurate observation is called cynicism by those
who have not got it." - George Bernard Shaw
.
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