Mac OS X notes

 

minimum OS X version

Update to at least Mac OS X 10.4.7, because 10.3 is not good.

reset passwords

apple article. other article. resetting user accounts requires the administrator's password. If you lost the administrator's password, you need to use the OS disc that is the closest to the version you are using.

networking

for OS 9 network passwords on OS X network, choose cleartext. it is less secure, but more compatible.

screen shots

command-shift-3 does the entire screen. command-shift-4 does a specific part of the screen (click & drag). command-shift-4-spacebar captures an element of the screen such as a menu or window (you will get a camera that highlights the area).

mac howto page: take screenshots. pages also have helpful tips on many other mac basics such as iPhoto.

ntfs-3g, available from apple.com
allows you to mount [FAT12, FAT16, FAT32, VFAT] as vfat, and ntfs as ntfs-3g. this means windows-created drives of any size as long as they were not encrypted eith EFS (what that what it was called?). if you mount the drive, you must unmount it, especially with NTFS. if it was a system drive, you cannot mount filesystems that are not in good condition (need a chkdsk /f) or were in hibernation state or did not shutdown cleanly. overall very handy, especially if you have friends over, have a thumb drive or external hard drive!

drag-n-drop

doesn't appear to work? Cocoa programs require different technique. highlight text. click inside the highlighted area and then hold down the mouse button for somewhere around 1/2 second. now you can drag.

carbon: works same way as it always did, no pause.

installing programs

  1. you will typically download a .sit or .zip or .tar.gz compressed file.
  2. uncompress it/unstuff it. with .tar.gz files that may mean uncompressing and then untarring the file to get the contents - typically this is handled as different archive types within a compression program.
  3. typically you will have either a disk image, or folders, and/or some sort of installer. for folders, drag the stuff to your home or applications folder. the applications folder is for all users, while the home folder is just for you. for disk images (.dmg), double-click on the disk image and the applications will be inside. drag the stuff into your Applications folder or Home folder. then drag the disk image into the trash (if you got it out of an archive) or move it off somewhere for safekeeping if you downloaded it raw. You don't have to keep it, but try not to clutter your desktop. The installer you double-click.

You would use the Finder to bring up the Application folder or Home folder.

just about anything can cause a macbook to not boot

yahoo answers question - in other words, take it to a mac $peciali$t.

macbook getting too hot, needs laptop cooler?

can be caused by a process eating too much CPU. check for spyware.

newline (EOL) formats

formerly, the mac used CR only.

UNIX and the new macs use LF only.

Windows/DOS use CR+LF. (if you decide to interact with this OS)

I don't know if there was any file-line-ending-conversion that was automatically done by any Mac OS upgrades or not. I should hope so. but if not, you may need a utility to do so if you have done a disk migration, such as a programmer's editor.