PC Guy with a Mac

Why did I buy this thing?

Archive for January, 2008

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My First Macintosh Support Question Answered!

Published January 9th, 2008 in Apple Questions Answered | 1 Comment »

Even though I can’t bill this customer $1500 for tech support (to make up for the purchase price of the MacBook and upgrades), I was awfully impressed with how fast the answer to this question came to me, AND it was correct:

Hey Brian,
I’m trying to put the shared (server folder) on (the) Mac but am not sure how to create a shortcut on the desktop. Any suggestions?

My response (and someone needs to get me a cookie while I pat myself on the back, STAT):

..go to Finder -> Go and select Connect to Server. Here, you can enter:

smb://192.168.10.1

..and select Connect to access the file server. If you hit the Plus sign next to the server address, the address will be added as a “Favorite Server”.

Thank you Jennifer at MAC Presents for allowing me to share my wisdom with you (smiley) In all seriousness though, any of my readers out there who know of a better or more exacting way of getting Jennifer’s Macintosh connected to a MSWindows Small Business Server 2003, please leave a comment!

Final Thoughts on iMovie

Published January 6th, 2008 in Unlocking the Mac-steries | No Comments »

I was able to finish the importing of both my Christmas 2007 videos as well as my son Braeden’s two-year birthday party from DV tape to the MacBook’s hard drive without a hitch.

Editing the video worked very well and was very intuitive. Even though I have gone through the same type of processes before with regards to importing and editing movies, I feel that if I was totally clueless on the process that iMovie would have made things very simple for me to understand and utilize.

I am disappointed that I am missing out on a lot of the advanced features that were originally included in iMovie (as mentioned in my previous posts), but I guess I can’t miss what I never had.

Switchers Guide to Mac OS X Software

Published January 6th, 2008 in Apps, Mods and Tips | No Comments »

I’m not sure how I stumbled upon this little gem of a web site, but thinkmac.net offers some very useful tips and information on the Mac operating system.

For PC guys like me, they offer the Switcher’s Guide to OS X Software, which is a listing of Mac-based programs that will get those “not in the know, in the know” very quickly.  I particularly like their love of open-source.

Screen Capture Options in OS 10.5

Published January 6th, 2008 in Apps, Mods and Tips | No Comments »

The gang over at MacWorld outline further screen capture funcitonality with the Leopard operating system. You can read up on the functionality here or make a cheat sheet from the following:

  • Command-Shift-4 : Allows you to drag the cursor to make a selection box of the desktop area you wish to capture. This area is automatically saved as an image file.
  • Command-Shift-4-Spacebar : This command is supposed to allow you to drag the selection region around the desktop, but I cannot get it to do this. When I perform this command, a camera icon appears and captures the entire desktop to an image file. Anyone tell me what I’m missing?
  • Command-Shift-4 and Shift key : This command series locks in the selection area vertically or horizontally.
  • Command-Shift-4 and Option key : This command allows for a region resize that is both vertically and horizontally proportionate.

UPDATE 20080106 – I took a look at the movie available on MacWorld’s site (same article referenced above, just scroll down to the bottom) that outlines the commands above, but I still cannot for the life of me to get Command-Shift-4 to work. Oh well, I have been able to live my life without it up to this point so far, so I guess I’ll press on…

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