Welcome to the October 2007 issue of Mac Hints & Tips
Leopard Coming October 26th
Apple announced on Tuesday that its next generation operating system, Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard <http://www.apple.com/macosx/>, will be available on October 26. With over 300 new features Mac OS X Leopard updates almost every component of the operating system.
Leopard will include the completed version of Boot Camp and will cost $129.
This means lots of new Hints & Tips are coming to help you use this new operating system.
Please Donate!
I am requesting a $5-per-issue donation. I believe having these tips culled from the many various sources is valuable.
If you think it's worth more than $5, please donate more. If you believe it is worth less, then just donate what you think is fair. But please donate something.Paul Taylor
paul@mac-hints-tips.com
Your Home Folder is Special
Your home folder (or home directory) is indicated by the little house icon, and it's a very special folder indeed. It must be located within the Users folder which is at the root level of your hard disk. ("At the root level" means that you can see it as soon as you open the hard disk.)
If you succeed in moving your home folder out of this location or renaming it, the Mac will be confused to the extent that next time you start it up, it will create a brand new (essentially empty) home folder for you, and ignore the original one entirely. You will have the impression that all your personal documents, music, photos, settings, and whatever have gone west. They haven't, but it's surely a shock to the system (yours, not the Mac's).
But does the Mac OS even allow you to move your home folder to another place or to rename it? Insanely yes, as long as you're an Administrator user, which most of us are. Correcting the situation after a restart is not so easy!
Unless you want to pay someone to sort out the consequences, do not move or rename your home folder.
AUSOM News, Melbourne, Australia
Corrupted Documents
Not infrequently, I'm asked to fix an apparent problem in an application, which turns out instead to be a problem with an individual document.
If you have a persistent problem in working on a document (such as odd formatting that you can't change, or strange characters that you can't delete), one thing you should try early in the process of troubleshooting is to see if the same problem appears in other similar documents. Open a new document, enter text, graphics or whatever of exactly the same kind as caused the problem originally. If the problem does not appear in the new document, you can be pretty sure the original document is corrupted. If the document represents a lot of work, the question will be how to rescue it.
As a first step, try cutting and pasting the content to a new, empty document; that is, select the content of the problem document, copy it (Edit > Copy), switch to the new empty document, and paste (Edit > Paste). If the document contains both text and graphics you will probably have to copy and paste these separately.
If the problem persists in the new document, it is very likely that the problem is related to the invisible formatting commands embedded in the document. What you now have to do is to save the document's visible content in a way that involves simpler formatting commands, or none at all, in the hope that the cause of the problem will be left behind.
Do this via the File > Save As... menu command. In the "Save As" dialog you will very likely see a pop-up menu enabling you to select file formats other than the normal one.
First, try saving in the format of an earlier version of your application; for instance, if you're working in a recent version of Microsoft Word, try saving in Word 6/95 format.
If this doesn't produce the desired result, save in a simpler generic format. For word processing documents this would be RTF or, as a last resort, Plain Text (also called ASCII Text or just Text). RTF has the advantage that it will often retain embedded graphics, while plain text is just that -- all graphics and almost all formatting are lost.
In each case you will probably lose some of your formatting, but trying the alternatives in the above order will minimize such loss. Having finally found a format that eliminates the problem, resave your new document in the original format to continue work on it.
Sometimes, the problem will be so severe that you can't open the document at all, or that your application crashes soon after opening it. In this case, look for a feature of your application that enables you to open any document at all -- not just those created by that application. There may be a pop-up menu in the Open dialog that allows you to choose "Any File," or there may be a menu command "Open Any." In some applications, holding down the Option key while choosing the "Open" menu command will enable you to open any document.
If you succeed in opening a "foreign" or badly damaged file in this way, you're likely to see the text you recognize interspersed with nonsense text which is actually the formatting commands. A single section of text may appear several times, depending on how many alterations you made to it during editing. It may therefore be something of a chore to eliminate the rubbish and reconstruct the original document, but sometimes there is sadly no alternative. ~ Steve Cooper
AUSOM News, Melbourne, Australia
See Long Filenames
If you have some very long file names, the Finder may show only part of a name. You can place your cursor over in list or column view, and you will see the complete file name after a brief pause.
Hold down the Option key and the complete file name will show without a pause. The Option key trick also works in icon view.
Apple Barrel, Ridgecrest, CA
Startup (Login) Items
If you would like to have a particular program start automatically whenever you start your Mac (in OS X), you can, open System Preferences and click "Accounts," then click the "Login Items" button. You'll see a list of the items that start automatically when you log in.
To add a new item, drag it into the Login Items window, or, click the Plus button to call up a "browse" window. If you want it to hide itself immediately after starting up, click in the tick box adjacent to the application name. To remove an item from the list, select it and click the minus button.
DragonDrop is a utility to give me pop-up folders, like we used to have in OS 9. I want it to launch on startup so the pop-up folders will be immediately available. Since the "Hide" box is not checked, I can see the application in the doc. CopyPaste-X is the application that gives me multiple clipboards. Since I so very often have need of those clipboards, I want that application to launch automatically. Snapz Pro X is a screen capture utility that not only can take snapshots of the screen, but, also can capture videos that can then be saved as QT movies (with audio).
System Events is a faceless application that supplies the terminology for using a number of features in AppleScript scripts. Among these features is GUI scripting, which allows your scripts to perform some actions in applications that have no built-in scripting support. System Events, which is located in /System/Library/CoreServices/System Events.app, has been part of Mac OS X since version 10.1. Those interested can learn more from: <http://developer.apple.com/ documentation/AppleScript?Conceptual/AppleScriptX/Concepts/as_related_apps.html>
LCCDaemon is part of the Logitech Control Center (for my Logitech mouse). That was placed in login items by the mouse software installer. Even if you don't personally select any login items, there will be some items placed there by various installers.
The ability to remove items can be useful in trouble shooting strange malfunctions (especially application conflicts). Just be sure you know where to find the items in case you need to place them back in there.
You may find the items by searching using Spotlight or by File > Find (in the finder). I was able to find LCCDaemon with Spotlight, and I found what it is via search on the internet. But, Spotlight and Find could not locate System Events. The above information on System Events was found by a Google search on the net. Then, I looked where the info says the application is, and surely enough, there it is. Now, why can Spotlight not find it?
Apple Barrel, Ridgecrest, CA
Amateur Digital Photographer's Toolkit
As enthusiastic as I am about digital photography, I'm hardly a professional. But I am getting better -- largely because I've finally stuffed the right collection of accessories into my camera bag. Maybe the following items will help you, too.
Extra Media Card
My camera's pixel count is high enough, and storage prices are low enough, that I'm now shooting uncompressed raw images. I've also learned about the wonders of bracketing to capture images at different exposures. This eats up memory in a big way. Don't be caught with a camera that's too full to capture the perfect image.
Lens Cloth
Camera lenses get smudged. Stop by the local spectacles emporium and pick up a cloth for cleaning a dusty or smudgy lens.
Extra Batteries
If you run out of space on your media card, you can always make room by dumping images you know you won't want. But if your battery dies, there's no such easy fix. No power on earth except a freshly charged spare will make your camera work again.
The Manuals
Because I'm a Mac user, I don't generally read manuals. But my camera is a complex device, and having the manual is useful when I want to know how to make the camera jump through an obscure hoop.
Small Tripod
I drink a lot of coffee and therefore don't have the steadiest hands. If you're like me, pick up a small tripod that you can pack in your pocket. When the light is low, you'll be glad you did.
Card Reader
When shooting in the field, I sometimes bring a laptop for previewing images. Having a card reader that plugs into my PowerBook's PC Card slot is a godsend. Unlike using a USB cable strung from camera to computer, transferring images through a card doesn't pull power from my camera's battery. No PC Card slot on your laptop? A USB card reader works just as well.
Picture Rescue
If your camera's media card becomes confused or corrupted, you'll need a utility to help retrieve your precious images. Prosoft Engineering's Picture Rescue ($59) is the tool to use.
Chris Breen's Mac 911
Experiment With Smart Folders
I've just begun using Smart Folders, and already I can't live without them. Smart Folders are a great way to find files, and keep them organized. Apple says "With Smart Folders, you can organize files by what they have in common, instead of by their location on your disk. Because they use Spotlight, Smart Folders can organize files by their contents, as well by attributes that describe those contents and how they were created. For example, you can create one Smart Folder with all your spreadsheets, another with the documents you modified today, and another with the presentations that mention a specific project."
Pretty cool! To begin experimenting with Smart Folders:
In the Finder, choose File > New Smart Folder. Choose your search criteria. To search your files' names, contents, and attributes for text, type in the search field. To limit where the Smart Folder searches, click one of the listed locations, or click Others to choose another location. To search on a specific metadata attribute, use the pop-up menus.
Click Save, and choose the name and location for your Smart Folder. You can place a smart folder anywhere you can place a folder. If you do not want your Smart Folder to be in the sidebar, deselect Add To Sidebar.
From Apple: "To view the items that match your Smart Folder's criteria, click it in the sidebar or double-click it in the Finder. The folder is updated automatically as you change, add, and remove files.
To edit a Smart Folder, locate it in the Finder or in the sidebar and open it. When you are done changing the search criteria, click Save.
To change the name of a Smart Folder, Control-click it in the sidebar and choose Rename, or select the folder in the Finder and type a new name."
If you're like me, and you have lots and lots of files, or lots and lots of versions of files, Smart Folders are for you. ~ Ed Shepard
LIMac Forum, Long Island, NY
How to Completely Erase the Hard Disk -- Tips to Avoid Data Theft When Donating a Computer System
Perhaps you have decided to forgo system upgrades and get rid of your computer system and purchase a new one. If you've decided to donate your old computer to a charity, local group or school, it's important to make sure your computer's hard drive is completely free of data.
In the "no good deed ever goes unpunished" department, you need to ensure that you don't donate more than you planned. The last thing you want is to pass on a computer when sensitive business information, or even personal information such as stored passwords, personal documents, and credit card numbers that could be retrieved. When you donate a computer, you really don't know where it may end up, or if it will go through the hands of a malicious person with the capability to restore previously recorded and deleted data.
There are many ways to go about ensuring your data can never be retrieved. Obviously, you can choose to physically smash the drive, but there are alternatives that enable you to keep the system intact so you can donate a complete system.
Key Terms To Understanding Disk Wiping
Format: to prepare a storage medium, usually a disk, for reading and writing.
Hard drive: a magnetic disk on which you can store computer data. The term "hard" is used to distinguish it from a "soft" or "floppy" disk.
Erasing and Formatting
Simply erasing all the data on your hard drive and formatting it is not enough security. You can spend hours going through your hard drive and deleting all the files and documents you want, but using the Delete key on your keyboard basically only removes the shortcuts to the files, making them invisible to users. Deleted files still reside on the hard drive, and a quick Google search will show many options for system recovery software will allow anyone to reinstate that data.
Formatting the hard drive is a bit more secure than simply erasing the files. Formatting a disk does not erase the data on the disk, only the address tables. It makes it much more difficult to recover the files. However a computer specialist would be able to recover most or all the data that was on the disk before the reformat.
For those who accidentally reformat a hard disk, being able to recover most or all the data that was on the disk is a good thing. However, if you're preparing a system for retirement to a charity or other organization, this obviously makes you more vulnerable to data theft.
For some individual users and businesses, a disk format may be something you consider secure enough depending, of course, on the type of data and information you saved to your computer. As long as people understand that formatting is not a 100 percent secure way to completely remove all data from your computer, then they are able to make the choice between formatting and even more secure methods. If you have decided a disk format is a good choice, at the very least you should do a full format rather than a quick format.
Disk Wiping Options (aka Data Dump)
Disk wiping is an even more secure process than reformatting. The term "disk wiping" is not only used in reference to hard drives but any storage device such as CDs, RAIDs, thumb drives, and others. Disk wiping is a secure method of ensuring that data, including company and individually licensed software on your computer and storage devices, is irrecoverably deleted before recycling or donating the equipment.
Because previously stored data can be brought back with the right software and applications, the disk wiping process will actually overwrite your entire hard drive several times with data. Once you wipe your disk, you will find it all but impossible to retrieve the data which was on the drive before the overwrite.
While disk wiping algorithms differ from product to product, they all will generally write the entire disk with a number (zero or one), then reformat the disk. The more times the disk is overwritten and formatted, the more secure the disk wipe is, but the trade-off is the extra time to perform additional rewrites. Disk wipe applications will typically overwrite the master boot record, partition table, and every sector of the hard drive.
The government standard (DoD 5220.22-M), considered a medium security level, specifies three full iterations to completely overwrite a hard drive. Each iteration makes two write-passes over the entire drive; the first pass inscribes ones (1) over the drive surface and the second inscribes zeros (0) onto the surface. After the third iteration, a government-designated code of 246 is written across the drive, then it is verified by a final pass that uses a read-verify process.
There are a variety of products available for different operating systems that you can purchase or freely downloaded online to perform more secure disk wipes. If time to perform the disk wipe is a consideration, there are also tech security companies who offer disk wipe services.
Did You Know...
In 2003 two MIT students purchased 158 used disk drives from various locations and found more than 5,000 credit card numbers, medical reports, detailed personal and corporate financial information, and several gigabytes worth of personal email and pornography on those drives.
How to Format a Hard Disk
Format actually means to prepare a storage medium, usually a disk, for reading and writing. When you format a disk, the operating system erases all bookkeeping information on the disk, tests the disk to make sure all sectors are reliable, marks bad sectors (that is, those that are scratched or otherwise damaged), and creates internal address tables that it later uses to locate information.
Drive Genius 1.1.1
Requirements: Mac OS X 10.2 or higher. Shareware $99
Drive Genius is an OS X utility designed to provide storage management. Featuring an easy-to-use interface, Drive Genius is packed with powerful tools such as a drive optimizer, a comprehensive repair facility for analyzing, repairing and rebuilding volumes, plus excellent testing capabilities with media surface scanning, performance benchmarking and data integrity checking. It can be used to initialize drives, create and delete partitions, and erases them securely as per Department of Defenses standard.
Track Destroyer 1.2.1
Requirements: Mac OS 10.2 or later.
Unlike some other privacy-protection tools that only delete the files and thus can be easily recovered by some data-recovery tool, Track Destroyer completely removes those files from your hard disk without the possibility to recover them by any practical software or hardware methods.
Hard Drive Erasing
To erase a Macintosh hard drive, boot with a Mac OS X install CD and use the Disk Utility on the drive. Apple Tech Note 107437 gives this procedure for Mac OS X Systems:
Note: This refers to a full Mac OS X 10.2.3 or later CD included with a computer, not to the update-only 10.2.3 CD.
Steps for Zeroing Data
These steps assume you have a Mac OS X 10.2.3 or later CD:
For a more secure method of erasing of data, you can select the checkbox "8 Way Random Write Format" instead of or in addition to selecting "Zero all data." This process could take several hours.
Also for those wanting to "Clean" individual files, note this section from the technote:
Secure Empty Trash
You can securely empty the Trash in Mac OS X. While in the Finder, from the File menu choose "Secure Empty Trash."
Note: When you securely empty the Trash, the deleted data cannot be recovered by disk utilities. You should only do this if you have a backup or you are sure you will never need the data again.
For machines which boot only Mac OS 9 or less, use either Drive Setup, Apple HD SC Setup, or Internal HD Format, and select the option to zero out and/or low level format the disk. These programs are usually in the Utilities Folder on the install CDs for the various versions of the Mac OS. Apple Tech Note 21103 has more information.
ShredIt is cross-platform: it is an ideal choice for the multi-platform office. There is a ShredIt version for Mac OS X, Mac OS 9, Mac OS 8, Mac OS 7, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows ME, and Windows XP. You can wipe a file or erase a hard drive with this easy-to-use File Shredder -- computer privacy software that shreds data so it can't be recovered. On CD-ROM and Floppy Disk for $19.95
Throwing data in the computer trash does not remove the file contents from the hard drive; the data can be recovered by someone else. Users who want to erase a hard drive before disposing of a an old computer can be confident that using ShredIt Hard Drive Cleaner will erase the hard drive so the data cannot be recovered by the next owner.
Users who need to dispose of confidential data on an ongoing basis appreciate how easy ShredIt is to use. Just drag the file on to the ShredIt icon and ShredIt File Shredder will wipe the file data so it can't be recovered.
ShredIt shreds everything. It will erase a file, folders, disk free space, files you've already deleted, hard drives, external hard drives, and even a floppy disk.
Apple Barrel, Ridgecrest, CA
4 Things You Can Do before a Hardware Disaster Strikes
As reliable as Macs maybe, some do break down -- just like televisions, microwaves, and most other electronic devices. But your Mac has an advantage that most other products don't -- it may be able to warn you before a problem escalates from minor annoyance to complete disaster. It can also help you figure out which of the many hardware components that makeup your Mac is causing a difficult-to-diagnose symptom. You can try these preventative steps at home:
Monitor SMART Warnings
SMART is the self-congratulatory name for a drive-monitoring technology that, with some luck, will warn you of an impending hard-drive failure. The technology is built into the drive; certain software can access the data and report the results to you. The best of these utilities are the ones, such as A. Julian Mayer's free SMARTReporter that continually check a drive's status and send you an immediate warning if a problem is detected.
Unfortunately, your Mac can access SMART data only for ATA and SATA drives, so forget about using it with your external FireWire or USB drives. And even when it's working as intended, SMART is not all that smart. A drive can still fail without warning, which is why you still need to back up your data.
Check Your Mac's Memory
The symptoms of a defective memory module can be subtle. Everything may work fine most of the time until -- bang! -- a seemingly inexplicable crash or data loss occurs. That's why it pays to periodically check the integrity of your Mac's memory especially if you've recently added new modules. Kelley Computing's free utility Rember is an excellent choice. It's based on a command-line program called Memtest, by Tony Scaminaci. While Memtest doesn't have Rember's friendly user interface, it can be run in the Mac's single-user startup mode, a bare-bones environment that allows for a more thorough testing of memory. In either case, expect to wait several hours for dependable results.
Check Other Hardware
The installation disc that came with your Mac includes a special program called Apple Hardware Test.
On Intel-based Macs, you access it by holding down the "D" key at startup when the disc is in the drive. The software runs a set of diagnostic checks on several of your Mac's hardware components. Alternatively, for the most complete suite of tests available, try TechTool Pro 4, from Micromat (www.micromat.com). (TechTool Pro 4 is one of the tools included in Micromat's $229 TechTool Protégé, a 1GB FireWire drive loaded with emergency utilities.)
Neither Apple Hardware Test nor TechTool Pro can fix hardware problems. You'll still need to replace or repair defective parts. But either can help you determine whether a given problem is due to a specified hardware component.
Read Messages
If you're still stuck trying to diagnose a strange symptom or error message, launch OS X's Console utility. From here, you can read the log files that OS X maintains. These logs record messages detailing almost every significant event that happens on your Mac, especially those that signal a problem. The two most critical logs are console.Iog (which opens by default when Console is launched) and system.log (which you can open by selecting Open System Log from the File menu).
Although much of the content of these logs will make little sense to most users, check especially for recent messages that refer to a hardware component or to a hardware-related technology (such as FireWire, USB, or Bluetooth). Such messages can mean that the cited component(s) is a contributing cause of the symptom. For external components, you can easily confirm this by disconnecting a device and seeing whether the symptom goes away. ~ Ted Landau
MacWorld Magazine
Reset a Lost Mac OS X Password
Many times every month we get calls from designers or IT managers who need to reset a lost administrative password on Mac workstations. Apple has provided an easy method to reset a lost password, although you'll need to have a Mac OS X Install CD/DVD to take advantage of it.
Step 1
Start up from a Mac OS X Install CD. This hardest part of this technique may be laying your hands on a Mac OS X Install CD when you need one. Use a version that is closest to the version of Mac OS X you have installed.
Hold the "C" key as the computer starts to boot from the CD.
When the installer starts, choose your language, and you'll proceed to the welcome dialog.
Step 2
Choose "Reset Password" from the Utilities menu. Tip: In previous versions of Mac OS X (10.2 and 10.3), you can find the "Reset Password" option under the Installer menu instead.
Step 3
Select your Mac OS X hard disk volume. Select the user name of your original administrator account.
Important: Do not select "System Administrator (root)." This is actually a reference to the root user. Do not confuse it with a normal administrator account.
Enter your new password and click "Save."
Step 4
Quit the "Reset Password" tool, and restart your Mac. Once your Mac has restarted, you should be able to log in with the newly changed password.
CreativeTechs.com
Apple Newsletters
Apple supplies a number of email newsletters. To me, the most important one is Apple eNews. To subscribe, go to <www.apple.com/enews/subscribe/> and select the newsletters you wish to subscribe (or unsubscribe) to.
Mouse Droppings, Corvallis, OR
View a Folder's Images
In previous versions of OS X, if you wanted to look at all the images in a folder, you had to open the folder, select all the images, and then drag-and-drop them onto Preview's icon in the Finder or the Dock.
In Tiger, a subtle change has made this process much easier. You can drag and drop a folder onto Preview's icon.
Just hold down Command/Option while you drag (this command forces any program to try to open anything you drop on it). You can drop the folder onto any Preview icon, whether it's in the Dock, the Finder's toolbar or sidebar, or even the Finder itself.
When you drop the folder, Preview opens a new window containing all the images inside it -- the drawer displays a thumbnail for each one. Each PDF file, however, opens in its own window.
This new feature also lets you quickly find all the images that are sometimes hidden within an application. An application is nothing more than a special type of folder. Just hold down Command/Option and drop an application (TextEdit, for example) onto Preview's icon.
Preview displays any images it finds in a new window. Just be careful about trying this with large applications such as DVD Studio Pro. The process of collecting all the images can take a very long time. If you run into trouble, click on the Cancel button in the dialog box to stop the process. ~ Rob Griffiths
LIMac Forum, Long Island, NY
Control Multiple Macs Using One Keyboard
Some designers (especially web developers) have more than one computer on their desk. Often they'll use their powerful desktop workstations for the big projects, while they use their laptops to test web pages, check email, or change their iTunes playbacks.
Julien Robert's free Teleport utility lets you work on multiple Macs using a single shared keyboard and mouse.
One computer has the keyboard plugged directly into it, while Teleport allows you to control the other Mac over a network connection.
Once installed on both computers, you almost forget it is there. Just drag your mouse to the edge of one display and suddenly you are controlling the other Mac. You can even drag and drop files between them.
Once you have Teleport installed on both Macs, you can adjust the positioning of your two Macs screens very much as you would control screens attached to same computer. Teleport is a Mac-only utility.
But what if you have a Mac and a PC side-by-side that you'd like to control with a single mouse and keyboard?
Another free utility called Synergy provides this same functionality between Macs and PCS.
Design Tools Monthly
Eject Key Activation Delay
Users who have installed the recent OS 10.4.9 update have probably noticed that it introduced a delay between the time the Eject key is pressed and when the eject function is activated. This delay also carries over to the Control/Eject shortcut for bringing up the Shutdown dialogue. Whereas a delay might be useful in preventing accidental presses of the Eject key, the Control/Eject combination is far less likely to be pressed accidentally, so the delay is a bit of a nuisance.
Fortunately, the shutdown dialogue can be summoned quickly without waiting for the delay. Instead of using the usual simultaneous Control/Eject combination, use Eject/Control. That is, press and hold the Eject key first, and then quickly (before an eject is triggered) press Control.
And if you'd like an immediate eject action, use Eject/Option in the same manner as above. The same seems to apply when you wish to sleep the machine immediately; use Eject and then Command/Option.
I suppose I should be grateful that the option of bypassing the delay is there, but I'm not sure I like the complexity of key combinations where the order in which the keys are pressed matters.
I see no reason why the usual convention of a simultaneous (or modifier-first) Control/Eject, Option/Eject or Command/Option/Eject couldn't be used for their respective functions, given how unlikely it is to accidentally press those combinations.
These revised shortcuts work as described on my MacBook Pro. However, I can't access the instant-eject feature -- I think that's because I have a second DVD-R in the machine, and Option/Eject is reserved to open that second drive.
macosxhints.com
Ethernet and AirPort
Q: Is it possible to hook up an Ethernet switch to an Apple AirPort Extreme Base Station in order to connect more than one computer with an Ethernet cable? Will the router in the base station assign an IP address to each of the wired computers? ~ Stuart Landay
A: Sure -- that's one reason Apple included the Ethernet LAN port on the back of the base station. To get the full lowdown on how to set this up, I strongly suggest that you download Apple's very helpful "Designing AirPort Extreme Networks" PDF document.
For those of you who are averse to reading documentation, the basic idea is this:
String an Ethernet cable between your DSL or cable modem and the base station's Ethernet (WAN) port. Run another Ethernet cable between the base station's Ethernet (LAN) port and one of the ports on the switch. String yet more cable between the switch and the computers you want to connect.
Run the AirPort Setup Assistant (in /Applications/Utilities). If the answers you provide work, great. If not, launch the AirPort Admin Utility (also located in the Utilities folder), select the base station, and click on Continue. In the Internet tab, choose Connect Using Ethernet, and then, from the Configure pop-up menu, choose either Using DHCP or Manually, depending on your circumstances. If you have a dynamic IP address, you'll pick Using DHCP. If you have a fixed address, you need to configure things manually, entering that IP address as well as the sub-net mask, router address, and DNS servers in the appropriate fields.
As for assigning IP addresses to your computers, that magic happens in the Network tab. Enable the Distribute IP Addresses option and choose either Share A Single IP Address (Using DHCP And NAT) or Share A Range Of IP Addresses (Using Only DHCP). If you choose the first option, the base station will dynamically serve, by default, IP addresses within the range 10.0.1.2 to 10.0.1.200. The second option lets you define the specific range of IP addresses if that's what you want.
Now you need to configure the computers you're connecting to that switch. If you've decided to share a single IP address, open the Network preference pane on each computer, choose Built-in Ethernet, click on the TCP/IP tab, and choose Using DHCP from the Configure IPv4 pop-up menu. The computers will then grab dynamic IP addresses as needed from the base station via the switch. If you're sharing a range of addresses, choose Manually from the Configure IPv4 menu and assign a specific address within the range you specified in the AirPort Admin Utility.
You'll also want to enter 255.255.255.0 in the Subnet Mask field, 10.0.1.1 in the Router field, and the address(es) of your DNS server(s).
Chris Breen's Mac 911
Don't Forward Other People's Email Addresses
Q: I got an email forwarded to me with text and photos and a lot of email addresses it was also sent to. How can I forward it to others without all those email addresses showing?
A: First, click the forward icon, address it, then select the offending text at the top that contains the addresses and hit the delete key. I like to use the Auto Text Cleanup–Remove Quoting from the Edit menu of Entourage 2004 to further tidy up the outgoing email. If you want to complete the effort, edit the subject line, which would include "FW: " indicating a forwarded email. Feel free to correct any spelling errors. Then send the email.
LIMac Forum, Long Island, NY
Email Your Current Document
Here is a fun one. You can send any open document as an email attachment by simply dragging the icon in its title bar onto your email application in the Dock. Make sure to save first. Try it!
Design Tools Monthly
Email Vertical Lines
Q: How do I get rid of the vertical lines in the email?
A: You refer to a forwarded mail with quoted material, the default situation with Apple's Mail. In Mail's Preferences, click on Composing and un-check the option, under Responding: that would increase the quote level. The body of the original email would still be quoted, but no vertical line will show, as that keeps track of the quote levels.
LIMac Forum, Long Island, NY
Remove Quotes in Mail
Q: From time to time, I want to excerpt something from an Apple Mail message, but if the message has been circulating for a while, it's cluttered with vertical lines in the left margin (from forwarding it and responding to it). Is there a way to remove them? ~ John Christopher
A: For people who don't know, those vertical lines represent quote levels in Mail. The more lines you see, the more times an email exchange has included that bit of text. While Mail doesn't offer a command to eliminate them in one fell swoop, you can remove them one level at a time.
Just select the quoted text you've excerpted, hold down Command/Option, and press the apostrophe (') key. With each press, one level disappears. (This is also available via a menu command -- Format: Quote Level: Decrease -- but having to invoke a menu command multiple times is less than convenient.)
Another option is to use Devon Technologies' free WordService 2.6.1 (macworld.com/2614). Download this service and drag it to your Services folder (your userfolder/Library/Services). If you don't find a Services folder in this location, create one. Log out of your account and log back in again. Now select the quoted text and select Mail: Services: Format: Remove Quotes. To apply even broader formatting changes (for example, to wrap text and remove quotes), select the text and choose "Reformat" (Command/Shift/7) from the same submenu.
Finally, if you want to remove the quote levels by hand, select the quoted text, drag it to the desktop to create a text clipping, and drag that clipping into a new email message or text document. This process strips the text or quote-level formatting.
Chris Breen's Mac 911
Drag-and-Drop PDF
Any file you could normally convert to PDF through Acrobat's File > Create PDF > From File menu item can also be converted by simply dragging it onto Acrobat's icon on the Desktop or Dock. It doesn't matter whether Acrobat is running or not -- it will launch if necessary. One advantage to this approach is that you can drag multiple files onto Acrobat at the same time and each will convert to PDF and open into a new window.
Design Tools Monthly
Update PDF Forms with Acrobat's Replace Pages
It takes a lot of time to add bookmarks, hyperlinks, form fields, buttons, and other interactive elements to a PDF. Inevitably however, you'll need to change your design. How can you update your PDF when the original layout is modified?
We'll often catch designers painstakingly copying form fields from the old PDF into a newly created PDF -- or worse, rebuilding all those interactive elements by hand. There is a much easier way.
The full version of Acrobat provides a "Replace Pages" feature that allows you to swap out the PDF background, yet retain all your time-consuming interactive elements.
In your existing PDF, choose Document > Replace Pages. Select a newly created PDF with your updated design, and indicate which pages you want to replace. Acrobat inserts your new design while the original form fields and interactive elements are maintained in exactly the same locations.
This feature should save a few designers an hour or two.
Design Tools Monthly
Live Trace & Live Paint at Once
Often, after you use the Live Trace feature in Illustrator CS2 to convert a bitmapped image into a vector object, you'll want to use the Live Paint feature to color it in. You can save a step by choosing Object > Live Trace > Make and Convert to Live Paint. Illustrator will use your current settings for Live Trace and then convert the tracing to a Live Paint group. ~ George Penston
Adobe CS2 How-Tos via Design Tools Monthly
Easier Circles in Illustrator
In Illustrator, if you know where a circle should begin, you can press the Command key while using the Ellipse tool. This lets you begin the circle's arc exactly where you click, instead of at a virtual "corner" of an imaginary enclosing box. Use this tip when tracing a template that has rounded corners.
Design Tools Monthly
Finding Your Hidden Tools
There are lots of tools hidden behind other tools in Illustrator. This makes it easy to totally forget where some of them are. To quickly refresh your memory, Option/Click on any tool in the palette, with a small arrow to its lower right, to reveal the next hidden tool down with each click. Or you can click on any of these tools, and hold down your mouse until all tools hidden under it are revealed in a pop up. ~ Jeff Witchel
LIMac Forum, Long Island, NY
Easy Named Tints in InDesign
In InDesign, you can easily create a new color swatch that is a tint of an existing color, and the tint will change color when you change the color it's based on. In the Swatches palette, choose the color you want to start with, type a percentage in the Tint box, then immediately click the "New Swatch" icon at the bottom of the palette. The new color will be named the same as the original color, with the tint percentage added to the name. ~ Erica Gamet
InDesign Magazine via Design Tools Monthly
Hidden Features of Nested Styles
When making Nested Styles in InDesign, the default "up to" option is "Words." But there are many preset options hidden in the pop-up menu that appears when you click the word "Words", and you can have a style continue up to any character. To use your own stop character, just type it over "Words." If you type more than one character, InDesign will stop the style if it encounters any of those characters. ~ David Blatner
InDesignSecrets.com via Design Tools Monthly
Keyboard Shortcuts for Tracking/Kerning
By default, when you use Option and Left Arrow or Right Arrow on selected text, you increase or decrease tracking values in increments of 20/1000 ems. On the other hand, if you do the same with the insertion point in between two characters, the increments will be applied to kerning. This value is far too high for precision work. In Preferences > Units & Increments, change the Keyboard Increments value for Kerning (and, missing in the interface, Tracking) from 20/1000 of an em to 1/1000.
To speed up tracking and kerning, you can use Option/Command together with the left or right arrows and the increments will be multiplied by 5.
LIMac Forum, Long Island, NY
"Indent to Here" in InDesign or Quark
Ever find yourself wanting to create a quick hanging indent for a drop cap or bulleted list? The special "Indent to Here" character in QuarkXPress or InDesign makes it a snap. Type this character in a text block and all remaining lines of the paragraph are indented to that point.
To make things easier, Quark and InDesign use the same shortcut: Command/backslash (\).
InDesign also lets you access this feature from the menu bar:
InDesign CS2: Type > Insert Special Character > Indent to Here.
InDesign CS3: Type > Insert Special Character > Other > Indent to Here.
Note: The "Indent to Here" character is indicated by a dagger symbol when the "Show Hidden Characters" feature is turned on.
CreativeTechs.com
Where Are Your Pictures and Music?
Did you ever wonder where OS X puts all the pictures and music you have in iPhoto and iTunes? Most of you probably know this, but for the few who are still learning I thought I'd give you an overview.
The pictures are filed neatly in folders that you can access and backup on external media.
My iPhoto Library has become very unwieldy, with over 1400 pictures in it, and I was lax about labeling all of them as I imported them. Some of these are very important to me and I would hate it if I lost them, like my PC-using daughter does. I have had to send her replacements any number of times.
You can find them like this: User/Pictures/iPhoto library/Originals
There you will find folders divided into years and subfolders containing all your original pictures. It's simple to drag and drop and transfer to other media, either an external hard drive or CD or DVD. But learn a lesson from me and label each import as you do it, that way you can find any picture you need with the search box located in the lower right corner in the iPhoto window.
Also, I have discovered that I can send pictures to this same PC-using daughter through iPhoto when she is unable to open them as an attachment. Her husband has installed such a firewall that it will not open an attachment, even one forwarded from another PC. If my nephew sends pictures of his toddler son I have to import them into iPhoto and email from there to send them to my daughter.
To locate your music it works in a like manner: User/iTunes music/Artist name/Album
Of course, this is not necessary to back up your iTunes; you have a couple of options for that. You can make a playlist and burn to a CD or DVD. Set the preferences in iTunes to burn either as Audio, MP3, or Data CD or DVD. Open iTunes and open the preferences in the drop down menu under the 4 iTunes name. Open the Advanced tab and you should find a window in which you can make choices about how you want this burned. Make your selections and hit "OK." Then all you have to do is select your Playlist and burn it. You can also sort the music in your iTunes by Artist, Album, or Genre by clicking on the column label. The File menu also contains another handy feature. You can burn your entire library with one click. Depending on the size of your library, you can burn on CDs or DVDs. or choose just your purchased music to back up.
You can print a playlist to go with your burned CDs. and format it to suit your needs. Under the Print tab you can make selections to print inserts for jewel cases of the songs only or one with album covers included.
With iTunes open, highlight one of the songs and go to Show Info under the File tab. This opens up a window that gives you all sorts of information about that particular piece. Sometimes your imported music will have incomplete information and you can complete this to show what you want, including changing the genre. You also can import album artwork either from the web or scan your own albums and include them and you can set the window to show the artwork as the music plays.
Always look through your menu selections on the different programs to find a few ways to personalize them to suit you. ~ Barbara McKeel
AppleCore, Memphis TN
Export Slide Show from iPhoto
There are two ways I know to export a QuickTime movie slide show from iPhoto.
One way is to create a folder of pictures. Pull down the File menu (in iPhoto), select "Export," choose "QuickTime." Make the settings you desire. Be sure the check box for "Add currently selected music to movie" is checked (if you want music in the slide show).
The other way is to open a folder of pictures, click on "Slide Show," and a Slide Show folder will be created. You can then Export that slide show to QuickTime. But, it is a much slower process than is the first method, and (I believe) the file will be larger.
The Help file tells you how to add music to the slide show, but (at least with iPhoto 5), it can be a little misleading.
If you open a "slide show" folder and click on the "Music" button (at the bottom right of the iTunes window), you will see a dialog window showing music selections That dialog window shows the available playlists. There is a horizontal bar with a small dot at the middle of the bar. That is a movable divider between the playlists and the songs in the selected play list. You can drag the divider bar up or down to show more or fewer songs.
The instructions say that you can pick a "song" from that list. Actually, you can pick a Playlist (created in iTunes), and all the songs in that playlist will be added to the slide show. Or you can choose a single song.
If you are exporting from a normal folder (not a slide show folder), click on the "Play" button at the lower right of the iTunes window. The resulting dialog window has two options, "Settings" and "Music". Adjust the Settings the way you want them, click on the Music option, choose a song, then click on "Save Settings."
From a normal picture folder, you cannot use a playlist for music in the slide show you export to QuickTime. The Help file does not mention this, but actually, you will get a QuickTime video with no audio track. I found that I had to select an individual song (not a playlist) in order to insure that the resulting QT movie has an audio track. Well, if the slide show is not a long one, one song is enough, anyway.
I found an alternate way to select a song. Open a normal folder of pictures, and open iTunes. Then click-drag a song from iTunes into the folder of pictures. A dialog box will ask if you want to assign that song to the folder. Click "OK."
Then your exported QT movie will have the desired song in it. That trick did not seem to work when exporting from a slide show folder.
If you want to make the length of the song fit the length of the slide show, you use iTunes or QuickTime to show you the length of the sound track. You can multiply the number of slides by the selected time for displaying each slide to calculate the length of the slide show. There may also be some time between each slide depending upon the selected transition effect. With some experimenting, you can adjust the length of the video to match the length of the song. Of course, if you have appropriate software, you can edit the sound track to shorten it or expand it. But, that's another subject. ~ Cyrus Roton
Apple Barrel, Ridgecrest, CA
Taking Out iPhoto's Trash
Q: Recently, I went through more than 2,000 photos in my iPhoto library and deleted the not-so-good ones in order to free up a little space on my hard drive. Alas, when I went to the Trash to empty it, none of the deleted photos were there. It seems that while I deleted them from the library, they are still buried somewhere on the hard drive. Where? ~ Gary Patterson
A: As you've discovered, your deleted iPhoto images don't appear in the Finder's Trash. Instead, you'll find them in iPhoto's own Trash. To truly remove iPhoto images from your hard drive, select the images that you want to delete from your iPhoto library and press the Delete key on your Mac's keyboard. This transfers the pictures to iPhoto's Trash, which you'll find at the bottom of the Source list. To really get rid of the images, Control/click on iPhoto's Trash icon and choose "Empty Trash." This gets rid of the images for good.
Notice that I said to select each image in your iPhoto library. If you select an image in an album or a slide show and press Delete, you remove the image from the album or slide show but not from your iPhoto library. There's a trick for this as well. Select an image and press Command/Option/Delete; the image will disappear from all albums and slide shows, as well as from the iPhoto library, and will then appear in iPhoto's Trash. Again, empty this Trash to delete the image from your computer.
Chris Breen's Mac 911
Emailing Photos
A topic that seems to need revisiting quite frequently is that of attaching photos to email messages. It's not hard to do this when you know how, and using Apple's photo and email software makes it even easier.
Photos from iPhoto
Assuming the photos concerned are in your iPhoto library, start by selecting them in the main iPhoto window. To select more than one, hold down the Command key while clicking the desired photos one by one.
Now, click the "Email" icon at the bottom of the iPhoto window. You'll be asked to choose a size for the photos. (This will be used only in emailing the photos -- your originals will remain unchanged.)
On clicking the "Compose" button, you'll find that the Mail program opens, and in a few seconds you'll be presented with a "new message" form into which your photos have been inserted. You then simply address the message, add your own text, and send the email.
(If a program other than Mail opens when you try the above, you need to open Mail, go to the Mail > Preferences menu, click the "General" icon, and set "Default Email Reader" to "Mail." If you actually prefer to use a different email program, you can make that choice here.)
Other Photos
Now let's assume that rather than being in iPhoto's library, your photos are somewhere else on your hard disk, perhaps on your desktop.
In your email program, open a new message, address it and type your text. When you're ready to insert the photos, simply drag them from the desktop into the body of your message, above or below your text as desired.
Sizing the Photos
Large photos can be quite annoying for people who have only a dial-up Internet connection, so it's important to make sure that the photos you're sending are large enough to show the required detail, but no larger.
No matter which method you used to get the photos into your message form, Mail allows you to "downsize" them. As long as you imported the photos at something other than "small" size, you'll find a pop-up menu at the lower right corner of the message window, enabling you to choose a smaller image size. At the bottom left corner of the window, you'll see the resultant message size. If you select a different image size, you'll see the effect immediately in the message window. (This resizing function is available only to users of Apple's Mail program.)
A Few Assorted Notes
Sometimes, when you see the photos in your email message, they appear to be covered by a blue haze. This simply indicates that they are still selected. Click anywhere in the message window but away from the photos and their appearance will return to normal. You can enter "returns" to add space between photos just as you can with paragraphs of text. You can also cut-and-¬paste to rearrange photos and text blocks if you wish.
If you would rather see your photos just as icons, Control/click a photo and from the contextual menu, choose "View as Icon." Note that this affects only the way that you see the photos -- your correspondent may see them as photos or icons depending on the settings in his particular email program. (Some grumps deliberately choose not to view images in email messages, so you have to rely on their spotting the attachment icons.) ~ Steve Cooper
AUSOM News, Melbourne, Australia
6 Recent Improvements
It has now been more than eighteen months since I wrote about iPhoto. In that time there have been many improvements and changes which have made this marvelous picture database application far more flexible and useful. Some of these improvements are detailed below.
Select Photo Library on iPhoto Startup
This is a recognition by Apple that many people found huge libraries of photos too difficult to handle and that some simple method of breaking them up was necessary. My method is simplicity itself. I just break my photo libraries into years. As each new year starts, on the 1st January, I begin a new iPhoto library. And I maintain other sub-libraries as well, such as for the wife's jewelry. The principal point here is that most of us operate with more than a single iPhoto Library. How then to switch between libraries, to create libraries and to delete libraries?
In the past this function was handled, and handled very well, by third party software such as iPhoto Manager. In recent upgrades, Apple has written this function directly into the iPhoto software which makes the operation of changing libraries that much neater and faster. As you start up iPhoto hold down the Option key and the "Choose Photo Library" dialogue will appear.
Once you click "Choose Library" you are taken to a standard navigation box to find your library. In my case I've chosen to call my libraries by names which make it easy to work out what they are and to identify them as iPhoto libraries.
You can create a new iPhoto library directly from that dialogue as well. To delete iPhoto libraries is pretty simple. Exit iPhoto, select the iPhoto library to be discarded from your directory displayed in the Finder Window and click the "Delete" key.
Sending Pix to Trash from an Album
If you've worked with iPhoto for a while, you will recognize that you don't need more than a passing interest in photography to amass a vast array of pictures, even after weeding out the duds and discarding them. Pictures from recent trips, pictures of the grandchildren and just general pictures that come your way and you want to keep; together they add rapidly to a large number. Now when you want to eliminate a picture it gets hard to find. In the past you had to go to the Library itself to select the picture and send it to the trash. That's OK until you get to a few hundred photos when finding it (unless it's keyworded) becomes difficult. By far the easiest way is to find the unwanted picture in the album to which it has been allocated. Unfortunately in the past deleting a picture from an album did just that. It was deleted from the album. It remained in the library.
But no longer. To remove a photo from an album, as before, select the photo in the album and click the Delete key. However the photo still remains in library and in any other album in which you had previously placed it.
If you want to remove the photo from the library and every album in which it appears by sending it to trash, then once you select the photo in an album, use Command/Option/Delete and the picture will now appear in iPhoto trash and nowhere else.
To empty the iPhoto trash you must complete the separate operation using the menu call iPhoto > Empty Trash or Shift/Command/Delete.
Enhancement Operations in iPhoto6
In editing a picture, some of the operations are a little different from the past. To go into edit mode, select the album in which photos to be corrected are stored and click the edit tool from the tool bar at the bottom of the window. Move to the photo that needs attention. ~ Dick Johnson
AUSOM News, Melbourne, Australia
iTunes Library Files
If you've poked around a bit in the iTunes folder that's inside your Music folder (despite having been warned not to), you'll have noticed a couple of iTunes Library files sitting in there along with the iTunes Music folder. Additionally, if you've upgraded progressively from earlier versions of iTunes, you are likely to see a Previous iTunes Libraries folder with some more Library files inside. You'll then wonder whether some of these couldn't be thrown out.
Let's first look at the functions of the two principal Library files:
The iTunes Library file is a database of the songs in your library and the playlists you've created. Some song-specific data is saved in this file. If you delete this file, iTunes creates a new empty copy when next you open the application, but any playlists, song ratings, comments, or other information you created is lost. The iTunes Library file is used only by iTunes.
The iTunes Music Library.xml file contains some (but not all) of the same information stored in the iTunes Library file. The purpose of the iTunes Music Library.xml file is to make your music and playlists available to other applications. In Mac OS X, other iLife applications (like iPhoto, iDVD, and iMovie) use this file to make it easier for you to add music from your iTunes library to your projects.
Obviously you shouldn't trash either of the files described above, but what about others that might be lurking close by? A few more notes may help you figure out which of these might be trashed:
AUSOM News, Melbourne, Australia
iPod Passes the Test
I recently completed the transfer of 8500 photos from the iPod (where they'd been accumulating during six weeks of travel) to my Mac at home with a huge sigh of relief. As a storage device, the iPod worked almost flawlessly. (Mine's the original "iPod photo" 30GB model-the first with a color display). The only problem I had was that it often took a long time (overnight) to recharge after a photo transfer, and sometimes even then would report that it wasn't charged. This never caused a real problem, but was a bit unnerving at times. I suspect it's a simple charging software problem, but of course that couldn't be attended to as long as photos were stored on the unit.
At the end of each day's travel I would transfer the contents of memory cards from our two cameras to the iPod via the Apple Camera Connector and after disconnection, check the iPod to confirm that the photos really had been successfully transferred, before erasing the cards ready for the next day's shooting. With all photos safely on the iPod, it would be plugged into the charger. With two or more camera batteries and a couple of mobile phones also to recharge there was sometimes a battle for power-point space, but we always managed somehow.
The only real problem I encountered in the process was during the final transfer to my Mac at home. There I learned that even though the iPhoto Library to which the photos were being downloaded was not on my startup partition, the process required that the startup partition have enough free space on it to accommodate all the photos at once. (No visible files were involved, but I could see the free space being used up and later released again by watching the startup partition's Get Info box). By Murphy's law it didn't have enough free space, of course, so a bit of messing around was required to get the job done -- the final few "film rolls" were copied to iPhoto manually. This was a simple enough process but might have troubled a novice. Again, the transfer of so many photos took rather longer than I had expected-clearly the iPod's hard disk is nowhere near as fast as the Mac's own disk.
If there was one useful tip I learned from this experience, it was to engage the iPod's "hold" switch while traveling, so that it didn't flatten its battery playing music into non-existent headphones if its buttons were accidentally pressed during transport.
Committing six week's worth of travel photos to any electronic device requires a leap of faith, but in the end, the iPod did what was required and took up far less space than an arguably more trouble-prone laptop. I'd do it again. ~ Steve Cooper
AUSOM News, Melbourne, Australia
Copy Documents with an iSight
"To get the $100 rebate, you must include the product's UPC label or a photocopy." "We'll need a copy of your insurance card before we can process that claim." "Do you have a copy of your receipt?" What do you do when you need to provide some sort of documentation but don't have access to a photocopier or a fax machine? The built-in iSight camera on the Intel iMac, MacBook Pro, and MacBook, along with Apple's Photo Booth software, could be the solution. Because the iSight has a very short focal length, you can stick a document or any other official object a couple of inches in front of it and get a nice, sharp picture of it.
To do so, open Photo Booth. Don't select any effects. Hold your object -- box, document, business card, or whatever -- up to the camera. Move it as close or as far away as you need; the iSight will quickly put it in focus. (Don't worry if you're trying to capture text and it reads backward on screen; you can take care of that later.) Hold your object steady by resting your elbow(s) on the table, and click on the Camera button to begin the three-second countdown.
Once the picture is taken, drag it to your desktop from Photo Booth's tray. You'll see that it's a JPEG file. If you aren't trying to capture text, you can use that JPEG as is. If you are trying to capture text, double-click on the image to open Preview, select Tools: Flip Horizontal, crop as needed, and save the file. ~ Jay Lindell
Chris Breen's Mac 911
Remove Stains
To remove severe fading and staining in an image, add a Levels adjustment layer in Photoshop and click the "Options" button in its dialog box. Check "Enhance Per Channel Contrast" and click on the "Snap Neutral Midtones" checkbox. ~ Katrin Eismann
Photoshop User Magazine
Filter Gallery Tips
When using Photoshop's Filter Gallery, you can zoom and pan within its preview. By default, the "Hand" tool is active (for panning), but holding down the Command key gives you the "Zoom In" tool, and Command/Option gives you the "Zoom Out" tool. Just click to zoom in or out. To make the preview pane a bit larger, you can close the pane containing the list of filters by clicking the disclosure triangle that lives just outside the top right corner of the filters pane. ~ John Feld
Design Graphics Magazine via Design Tools Monthly
Exact Highlights & Shadows in Photoshop
In Photoshop, you can tell exactly where to drag the Levels sliders (both Highlight and Shadow), by turning off the Preview option, then holding down the Option key when dragging the sliders. As you drag the sliders, Photoshop will show you exactly which parts of your image will blow out to white or black. ~ Ben Willmore
Design Tools Monthly
Quick Zoom in Photoshop
Instead of Command/Shift/Clicking multiple times to zoom into an area in Photoshop, try holding down those keys and dragging a marquee around the area of interest. It will then fill your window. To return to fit-in-window view, press Command/0.
Design Tools Monthly
Easily Load Presets
An easy way to load presets into any palette in Photoshop (Actions, Brushes, Patterns, Swatches, etc.) is to double-click the file containing the presets in the Finder or in Bridge. The preset's content will automatically load into the appropriate palette in Photoshop. (You'll find Adobe's preset files in the Photoshop CS2/ Presets folder.) ~ Michael Ninness
Photoshop User Magazine via Design Tools Monthly
See Histogram in Curves
When making a Curves adjustment in Photoshop, you can also see a histogram of the image, to judge the effect of your adjustments. Just choose Window > Histogram to open the Histogram palette, either before you open the Curves dialog, or even while making your adjustments. ~ Matt Kloskowski
Photoshop User Magazine via Design Tools Monthly
Mac Hints & Tips is a compilation of tips found in Mac user group newsletter from around the world, as well as many Mac-related books, magazines, websites, and individuals. Following is a partial list of some of the contributors with links to their websites. To all who have contributed to the Mac community, we all give many thanks for sharing their tips and expertise.
Mac User Groups:
Mouse Droppings, newsletter of the Corvallis Macintosh User Group in Corvallis, Oregon, one of the oldest and most active user groups in the country, and the home of Phil Russell, a highly respected Macintosh writer and the main source of hints and tips published by me over the years, as well as other MUG newsletters throughout the world. www.cmug.com
Apple Barrel, newsletter of the Ridgecrest Apple User Group, Ridgecrest California. www1.iwvisp.com/croton
AppleCore of Memphis, newsletter of the Apple Corp of Memphis, Memphis, Tennessee. www.memphisapplecore.com
AUSOM News, newsletter of Australia's largest Macintosh User Group, Apple Mac Users' Society of Melbourne Australia. www.ausom.net.au
LIMAC Forum, newsletter of the Long Island Mac Users Group in Seaford, New York. www.limac.org
Websites:
CreativeTechs.com -- "Left brain support for right brain professionals." Friendly expert computer support for Seattle area creative teams. www.creativetechs.com
InDesignSecrets.com -- The Indepentent Resource for All Things InDesign. Hosted by David Blatner and Anne-Marie Concepcion authors of many, many books, this is your one-stop shop for infomation, podcasts, and videocasts of all things InDesign. www.indesignsecrets.com
MacOSXHints.com -- Tips submitted by readers. www.macosxhints.com
Books:
Adobe Creative Suite 2 How-Tos, written by George Penston. Clear but concise explanations of the features and functions of '100 Essential Techniques' you may already be marginally aware of, but may not understand how to use. Published by Adobe Press.
Publications:
Jay J. Nelson's Design Tools Monthly -- An executive summary of graphic design news which includes Mac news and rumors, new software and hardware announcements, upcoming seminars and shows, interesting websites, and other valuable information. You may request a free sample copy of this monthly newsletter by going to www.design-tools.com or calling 303.543.8400.
Dynamic Graphics Magazine. Graphic design ideas, inspiration, and information to help graphic designers produce successful, professional, attention-getting publishing projects from start to finish. www.dynamicgraphics.com
InDesign Magazine, a complete resource for InDesign professionals. Published by Creativepro.com in PDF format. www.indesignmag.com
Macworld Magazine. The ultimate resource for Mac users. Each issue is packed with practical how-tos, in-depth features, the latest troubleshooting tips and tricks, industry news, and is home of Chris Breen's Mac 911 columns. www.macworld.com
Photoshop User Magazine is the newsletter of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals. If you use Photoshop, you should belong to NAPP. Find them on the web at www.photoshopuser.com
If you are not a member of a Macintosh User Group, I highly recommend that you find one in your area and join. User groups are the greatest source of information and help available to all Mac users -- from novices to experts. You can find one in your area by going to apple.com/usergroups/find