Mac OS ® X Snow Leopard
Contents
1. 48 OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies Setting Up a Screen Saver sese eene 50 Putting Widgets on the Dashboard esee 52 Giving Buttons Menus and Windows a 56 Spaced Out Defining Screen Spaces 59 Adjusting the Keyboard Mouse Trackpad and Other Hardware 63 Styling Your So nd ee regi n px nere e Erici Cd te eS na 71 Changing sound effects ccccccscesscessesseeseceseessecesecsseceseenseeseeeseeenes 71 Choosing output options essere eene enne nnne 72 Choosing input options esssesseeseeeeeeeeeeen nennen nnne 72 Chapter 4 What s Up Dock 73 A Quick Introduction to Using the Dock eene 73 The default icons of the 74 DASH ALKA tec p eee lieet 77 Opening application menus in the 78 Reading Dock icon body language eere 80 Opening files from the Dock ccccccesesseeseesceesseeseceseeesseeseeseeeseeenes 81 Customizing the Dock iaieiiea eene nnne nennen enn 81 Adding Dock ICOnsS er o pie e e ce e re a iese 82 Removing an icon from the Dock sse 84 Resizing the Dock 5 iei eee Wen ettet2. essere 290 Printing a document esses eene nnne nnne 291 Choosing among different printers eese 292 Choosing custom 292 Saving custom settings nente 295 Preview and PDF Options sss eene 295 Just the Fax eee nemine pne ete e aee 297 Chapter 15 Sharing Your Mac and Liking It 299 Introducing Networks and File Sharing essen 300 Portrait of home office networking sese 301 Three ways to build a network eese 302 Setting Up File Sharing ct tetro rer i eee eeu 304 Access and Permissions Who Can Do What 305 Users and groups and guests cccccccssccsseceeseeesseseseeesenseesseeeseeess 306 Creating Users ccccscssscsssesssessecssessscesscssscsscssseseseaeesaessaessseesseesaees 308 Mac OS X knows best Folders shared by default 315 Sharing a folder or disk by setting permissions 316 Useful settings for permissionS sesessssssssseseeesresssessrersressresseesee 320 Unsharing 1 amp r ieie 322 Connecting to a Shared Disk or Folder on a Remote 323 Changing Your Password esses eene ener 326 Changing your a
3. MacOS X Snow Leopard Learn to Get More and Do at Dummies com Start with FREE Cheat Sheets cer Cheat Sheets include ov Checklists Charts Common Instructions And Other Good Stuff To access the Cheat Sheet created specifically for this book go to www dummies com cheatsheet macosxsnowleopard s t Get Smart at Dummies com Dummies com makes your life easier with 1 000s of answers on everything from removing wallpaper to using the latest version of Windows Check out our e Videos lllustrated Articles Step by Step Instructions Plus each month you can win valuable prizes by entering our Dummies com sweepstakes Want a weekly dose of Dummies Sign up for Newsletters on Digital Photography Microsoft Windows amp Office Personal Finance amp Investing Health amp Wellness Computing iPods amp Cell Phones e eBay Internet Food Home amp Garden Find out HOW at Dummies com Sweepstakes not currently available in all countries visit Dummies com for official rules MacOSX Snow Leopard FOR DUMMIES by Bob Dr Mac LeVitus WILEY Wiley Publishing Inc Mac OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies Published by Wiley Publishing Inc 111 River Street Hoboken NJ 07030 5774 www wiley com Copyright 2009 by Wiley Publishing Inc Indianapolis Indiana Published by Wiley Publishing Inc Indianapolis Indiana Published si
4. sssesssseeeeeeeeenennennennn 203 Browsing the Web with Safari eese eene 204 Navigating with the toolbar buttons 206 Bookmarking your favorite pages 207 Using the terrific Top Sites page sss 209 Simplifying surfing with RSS feeds sss 210 Searching with Google sess 212 Checking out Help Center eesssssssseeeeeeeeenennennennn 214 Communicating via iChat eese eene 214 Chit chatting with iChat esses 214 Chatting with audio and video sese 216 Remote Screen Sharing 217 Chapter 10 E Mail Made 221 Keeping Contacts Handy with Address 221 Adding COontacts eret E Tet age a ree agi Tio 222 Importing contacts from other 224 Creating a basic group cceccescesscescceseessceseceseeeseeeseceseceseceseenseesaees 224 Table of Contents Setting up a Smart Group based on contact criteria 226 Sending e mail to a contact or group seen 227 Sending and Receiving E Mail with Mail sese 228 Setting up Mail edendo oninia 228 COMPOSING new message eren 229 A quick overview of the toolbar seen 231 Working
5. or Did it boot and so on Talking about com puters for long without hearing the boot word is nearly impossible But why boot Why not shoe or shirt or even shazam Back in the very olden days say 1958 or a little earlier starting up a computer required you to toggle little manual switches on the front panel which began an internal process that loaded the operating system The process became known as bootstrapping because if you toggled the right switches the computer would The legend of boot pull itself up by its bootstraps This phrase didn t take long to transmogrify into booting and finally to boot Over the years booting has come to mean turn ing on almost any computer or even a periph eral device such as a printer Some people also use it to refer to launching an application booted Excel So the next time one of your gearhead friends says the b word ask whether he knows where the term comes from Then dazzle him with the depth and breadth of your not quite useful knowledge 15 16 Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics Figure 1 4 See which version of Mac OS X you re running ee 2 Click the More Info button to launch the System Profiler application This app shows you much more information including bus speed number of processors caches installed memory networking storage devices and much more You can find more about this useful program in C
6. See Chapter 19 Chapter 1 Mac OS X Snow Leopard 101 Prerequisites None 7 for what those everything elses are A really stubborn crash doesn t happen often and less often under OS X than ever before but when it does forcing your Mac to turn off and then back on might be the only solution A few things you should definitely NOT do with your Mac In this section I cover the bad stuff that can happen to your computer if you do the wrong things with it If something bad has already happened to you I know I m beginning to sound like a broken record see Chapter 19 1 Don t unplug your Mac when it s turned on Very bad things can happen such as having your operating system break See the preceding section where I discuss shutting down your system properly Don t use your Mac when lightning is near Here s a simple life equa tion for you Mac lightning dead Mac Nuff said Oh and don t place much faith in inexpensive surge protectors A good jolt of lightning will fry the surge protector right along with your computer as well as pos sibly frying your modem printer and anything else plugged into it Some surge protectors can withstand most lightning strikes but those war riors aren t the cheapies that you buy at your local computer emporium Unplugging your Mac from the wall during electrical storms is safer and less expensive Don t forget to unplug your external modem network hubs pr
7. Warning icon Just kidding Macs don t explode or spew with the exception of a few choice PowerBook 5300s which won t run Snow Leopard anyway But I got your attention didn t I tell you once again It is a good idea to read the Warning icons very carefully 5 6 Mac OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies These icons represent my ranting or raving about something that either bugs me or makes me smile When I m ranting imagine foam coming from my mouth Rants are required to be irreverent irrelevant or both I try to keep them short more for your sake than mine Well now what could this icon possibly be about Named by famous editorial consultant Mr Obvious this icon highlights all things new and different in Mac OS X Snow Leopard Where to Go from Here Go to a comfortable spot preferably not far from a Mac and read the book The first few chapters of this book are where I describe the basic everyday things that you need to understand to operate your Mac effectively If you re new to Macs and OS X Snow Leopard start there Even though Mac OS X Snow Leopard is way different from previous Mac operating systems the first part of the book is so basic that if you ve been using a Mac for long you might think you know it all and okay you might know most of it But hey Not so old timers need a solid foundation So here s my advice Skip the stuff you know you ll get to the better stuff faster I didn t wri
8. em shrink and place em in the Dock and make em grow View buttons Choose among four exciting views of your window Icon List Column and Cover Flow Find out more about views in Chapter 5 Quick Look Slideshow button Gives you a quick peek at the contents of the selected item If more than one item is selected it gives you a quick peek of one item and next and previous buttons so you can view the others slide show style Action button This button is really a pop up menu of commands you can apply to currently selected items in the Finder window Window title Shows the name of the window 1 Search field Type a string of characters here and Mac OS X Snow Leopard digs into your system to find items that match YY Hide Show Toolbar button Causes your computer to melt into a puddle of molten silicon slag Just kidding This button actually does what its name implies hides or shows the toolbar and Sidebar of a window Toolbar Buttons for frequently used commands and actions Window Resizer Click and drag here to resize the window 1 Icon Resizer Use this slide control to change the size of the icons in this window Note that this control only appears on windows in the Icon view which you find out all about in Chapter 5 1 Scroll bars Use the scroll bars for moving around a window Sidebar Frequently used items live here Forward and Back buttons These buttons take you to the next or
9. which you can use as a stor age place for icons if you want To make things even more confusing the Desktop is a full screen rep resentation of the icons in the Desktop folder inside your Home folder Don t panic this is all explained in more detail in Chapter 6 Dock The Dock is the Finder s main navigation shortcut tool It makes getting to frequently used icons easy even when you have a screen full of windows Like the Desktop the Dock is a great place for things you use a lot such as folders applications or particular documents Besides putting your frequently used icons at your fingertips it s almost infinitely customizable read more about it in Chapter 4 Icons Icons are the little pictures you see in your windows and even on your Desktop Most icons are containers for things you work with on your Mac such as programs and documents which are also represented by you guessed it icons Windows Opening most icons by double clicking them makes a window appear Windows in the Finder show you the contents of hard drive and folder icons and windows in applications usually show you the contents of your documents In the sections that follow you can find the full scoop on Snow Leopard windows which are very different from Mac windows in previous OS releases 1 Menus Menus let you choose to do things such as create new folders duplicate files cut copy or paste text and so on I introduce m
10. you use the scroll bars to see the hidden icons that are visible in the back window 29 Chapter 2 The Desktop and Windows and Menus Oh My A scroll new world Yet another way to see more of what s in a window or pane is to scroll through it Scroll bars appear at the bottom and right sides of any window or pane that contains more stuff icons text pixels or whatever than you can see in the window Figure 2 3 for example shows two instances of the same window Dragging the scroll bar on the right side of the front window reveals the items above Font Book and iCal and below Photo Booth and Preview which you can see in the expanded window in the background Dragging the scroll bar on the bottom of the window reveals items to the left and right such as Expos iChat iCal and iTunes Simply click and drag a scroll bar to move it up or down or side to side And yes the scroll bars also look a bit gumdrop like As best as I can tell Steve Jobs Apple s charismatic CEO has a thing for gumdrops Scroll area Applications 27 items 311 43 GB available D Address Book AppleScript Automator Calculator ANOO 24 Applications kd 27 items 311 43 GB available ber Chess DVD Player e 2 Font Book Front Row Expos iCal _ RJ f Image Capture Sync iChat cai En iTunes x iy op bis a Photo Booth Preview n a Mail ickTime Player 4x
11. After that is a date with the Dock And last but certainly not least you discover some additional tasks that will make life with Snow Leopard ever so much easier So get comfortable roll up your sleeves fire up your Mac if you like and settle down with Part I a delightful little section I like to think of as The Hassle Free Way to Get Started with Mac OS X Snow Leopard Chapter 1 Mac OS X Snow Leopard 101 Prerequisites None In This Chapter Understanding what an operating system is and is not Turning on your Mac Getting to know the startup process Turning off your Mac Avoiding major Mac mistakes Pointing clicking dragging and other uses for your mouse Getting help from your Mac ongratulate yourself on choosing Mac OS X which stands for Macintosh Operating System X that s the Roman numeral fen not the letter X pronounced fen not ex You made a smart move because you scored more than just an operating system upgrade Mac OS X Snow Leopard includes several new features to make using your Mac easier and dozens of improve ments that help you do more work in less time In this chapter I start at the very beginning and talk about Mac OS X in mostly abstract terms then I move on to explain what you need to know to use Mac OS X Snow Leopard successfully If you ve been using Mac OS X for a while some of the information in this chapter might seem hauntingly familiar some features that I describe haven t change
12. I ve ever known If that doesn t turn on your Mac and it probably won t keep reading Apple in its infinite wisdom has manufactured Macs with power buttons on every conceivable surface on the front side and back of the computer itself and even on the keyboard or monitor So if you don t know how to turn on your Mac don t feel bad just look in the manual or booklet that came with your Mac It s at least one thing that the documentation always covers These days most Macs have a power on button near the keyboard notebooks or the back side iMacs It usually looks like the little circle thingie you see in the margin Don t bother choosing Help Mac Help which opens the Help Viewer program because it can t tell you where the switch is Although the Help program is good for finding out a lot of things the location of the power switch isn t among them Of course if you haven t found the switch and turned on the Mac you can t access Help anyway D oh What you should see on startup When you finally do turn on your Macintosh you set in motion a sophisticated and complex series of events that culminates in the loading of Mac OS X and the appearance of the Mac OS X Desktop After a small bit of whirring Chapter 1 Mac OS X Snow Leopard 101 Prerequisites None 13 buzzing and flashing meaning that the operating system is loading OS X first tests all your hardware slots ports disks random access memory R
13. Movies and Music in QuickTime 262 Viewing and Converting Images and PDFs in 263 Entertaining with Front eene enne nnne nennen 264 Importing Media e Re Pen ecc ee ttes 266 Chapter 13 Words and 271 Processing Words with TextEdit essere 211 Creating and composing a document 272 Working with text ni terrere ice a ee pate Ye tu 273 Adding graphics to documents eese 215 To alu EVE 277 Installing new fonts esses eee enne nnne 278 Types oLfOnDts cnc He ee rere e E Rea eere 278 Managing your fonts with Font 279 Ki Mac OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies Part IV Making This Snow Leopard Vour Very Own 281 Chapter 14 Publish or Perish The Fail Safe Guide to Printing 283 Before Diving In i tereti i n eee ed 283 Ready Connecting and Adding Your Printer sss 284 Connecting your printer esssesseeseeeeeeee nennen nennen 284 Setting up a printer for the first time 285 One last thing Printer sharing esseeeeeeeerennn 288 Set Setting Up Your Document with Page Setup 289 Print Printing with the Print Sheet
14. and watch movies and videos Network share and go online Set up and use a network share resources and browse the web The keyboard shortcut for Help appears on the Help menu as 3 but you really need to press 4 98 to open Help through the keyboard Just so you know this is the only shortcut I can think of where the menu doesn t display an up arrow 4 88 to let you know you need to press Shift You can find out much more about keyboard shortcuts in Chapter 2 To use Mac Help simply type a word or phrase into the text field at the top right and then press Return or Enter In a few seconds your Mac provides you one or more articles to read which theoretically are related to your question Usually For example if you type menus and press Return you get 15 different help topics as shown in Figure 1 6 Chapter 1 Mac OS X Snow Leopard 101 Prerequisites None 2 eoo Mac Help 31 8 ED Q menus Help Topics KW About application menus amp Key symbols Changing the language shown in menus and messages K Changing button and highlight colors amp Shortcuts for menus K The menu bar amp Menu basics amp If a menu doesn t appear in the correct language Learning to use applications amp Personal preferences amp Shortcuts for Front Row Using a Mighty Mouse If you can t use a menu item E amp Manually feeding the paper when you print Figure 1 6 amp Cha
15. independent publication and has not been authorized sponsored or otherwise approved by Apple Inc LIMIT OF LIABILITY DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY THE PUBLISHER AND THE AUTHOR MAKE NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES WITH RESPECT TO THE ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS OF THE CONTENTS OF THIS WORK AND SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES INCLUDING WITH OUT LIMITATION WARRANTIES OF FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE NO WARRANTY MAY BE CREATED OR EXTENDED BY SALES OR PROMOTIONAL MATERIALS THE ADVICE AND STRATEGIES CONTAINED HEREIN MAY NOT BE SUITABLE FOR EVERY SITUATION THIS WORK IS SOLD WITH THE UNDERSTANDING THAT THE PUBLISHER IS NOT ENGAGED IN RENDERING LEGAL ACCOUNTING OR OTHER PROFESSIONAL SERVICES IF PROFESSIONAL ASSISTANCE IS REQUIRED THE SERVICES OF A COMPETENT PROFESSIONAL PERSON SHOULD BE SOUGHT NEITHER THE PUBLISHER NOR THE AUTHOR SHALL BE LIABLE FOR DAMAGES ARISING HEREFROM THE FACT THAT AN ORGANIZA TION OR WEBSITE IS REFERRED TO IN THIS WORK AS A CITATION AND OR A POTENTIAL SOURCE OF FURTHER INFORMATION DOES NOT MEAN THAT THE AUTHOR OR THE PUBLISHER ENDORSES THE INFORMATION THE ORGANIZATION OR WEBSITE MAY PROVIDE OR RECOMMENDATIONS IT MAY MAKE FURTHER READERS SHOULD BE AWARE THAT INTERNET WEBSITES LISTED IN THIS WORK MAY HAVE CHANGED OR DISAPPEARED BETWEEN WHEN THIS WORK WAS WRITTEN AND WHEN IT IS READ For general information on our other products and services please contact our Customer Care Department within the U S at 877 762 2974
16. outside the U S at 317 572 3993 or fax 317 572 4002 For technical support please visit www wiley com techsupport Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats Some content that appears in print may not be available in electronic books Library of Congress Control Number 2009929459 ISBN 978 0 470 43543 4 Manufactured in the United States of America 10987654321 WILEY About the Author Bob LeVitus often referred to as Dr Mac has written or co written more than 50 popular computer books including iPhone For Dummies GarageBand For Dummies and Dr Mac The OS X Files for Wiley Publishing Inc Stupid Mac Tricks and Dr Macintosh for Addison Wesley and The Little iTunes Book and The Little iDVD Book for Peachpit Press His books have sold more than a million copies worldwide Bob has penned the popular Dr Mac column for the Houston Chronicle for the past ten years and has been published in dozens of computer magazines over the past 15 years His achievements have been documented in major media around the world Yes that was him juggling a keyboard in USA Today a few years back Bob is known for his expertise trademark humorous style and ability to translate techie jargon into usable and fun advice for regular folks Bob is also a prolific public speaker presenting more than 100 Macworld Expo training sessions in the U S and abroad keynote addresses in three coun tries and Macintosh trainin
17. AM and so on If everything passes you hear a pleasing musical tone and see the tasteful gray Apple logo in the middle of your screen along with a small spinning pinwheel cursor somewhere on the screen Both are shown in Figure 1 1 Figure 1 1 This is what you ll see if everything 8 is fine and dandy 3 when you turn your Mac on PCs Here are the things that might happen when you power up your Mac Everything is fine and dandy Next you might or might not see the Mac OS X login screen where you enter your name and password If you do press Return or Enter after you type your name and password of course and away you go p If you don t want to have to type your name and password every time you start or restart your Mac or even if you do check out Chapter 16 for the scoop on how to turn the login screen on or off Either way the Desktop soon materializes before your eyes If you haven t customized configured or tinkered with your Desktop it should look pretty much like Figure 1 2 Now is a good time to take a moment for positive thoughts about the person who convinced you that you wanted a Mac That person was right Blue black gray screen of death If any of your hardware fails when it s tested you might see a blue black or gray screen Some older Macs played the sound of a horrible car wreck instead of the chimes complete with crying tires and busting glass It was exception ally unnerving which
18. AT I Safari Spaces Stickies 3 x System Preferences TextEdit Time Machine Utilities Scroll arrows 30 Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics ar You can scroll in the following four ways Click a scroll bar and drag The content of the window scrolls propor tionally to how far you drag the scroll bar Click in the scroll bar area but don t click the scroll bar itself The window scrolls either one page up if you click above the scroll bar or down if you click below the scroll bar You can change a setting in your General System Preferences pane to cause the window to scroll propor tionally to where you click For what it s worth the Page Up and Page Down keys on your keyboard function the same way as clicking the grayish scroll bar area the verti cal scroll bar only in the Finder and many applications But these keys don t work in every program don t become too dependent on them Also if you ve purchased a mouse trackball or other pointing device that has a scroll wheel you can scroll vertically in the active front window with the scroll wheel or press and hold the Shift key to scroll horizontally Alas this horizontal scrolling with the Shift key works in Finder windows but not in all applications For example it works in Apple s TextEdit application but not in Microsoft Word Click a scroll arrow at the top or bottom of a scroll area By default both arrows appear
19. Backups and Other Security Issues 357 Backing Up Is Not Hard to Do sese 358 Backing up with Snow Leopard s excellent Time Machine 358 Backing up by using the manual brute force method 361 Backing up by using commercial backup software 362 Why You Need Two Sets of Backups ccccssssssssseesseesecsseeeseeseenseesnees 363 Non Backup Security Concerns essen 364 All about vir ses 4 viet retten detis aeree ee 364 Firewall Nay sinisen ensi eie ie riie 366 Install recommended software updates 368 Protecting Your Data from Prying 369 Blocking or limiting connections seeeseeeeeeeneenn 369 Locking down files with FileVault esee 369 Setting other options for security esses 370 Chapter 18 Utility 373 Calc latOE3 5 eden couse a a aa e a aE NEN 373 Activity MoN OT 374 376 Audio MIDI Set p detenti et ea tarn ri caahavacsabavechebonceuasuess 376 GolorSync Utility 5 3 cod eto reet heces le t v Pant 376 Digital Color Meter ioi RID HIT BB EAR 377 Disk Utility ett iet a SEE CD ee NIRE due 377 First Ve 378 ID
20. CLE 378 bete iei te od anal 378 ADD H 378 Gu M 379 Spo evicsactucesaa E EA 380 Grapher eed en ease AS ds ARE eene ee ve ude cod 380 Java Preferences e dr AER ERR 381 Keychain ACCES iis e eee T 381 Migration Assistant cccccccesscesessscesseeseceseceseceseceseceseesseeeeeseeeesseeseeeseeees 382 System Profiler isis nee ee e te Ue 383 2 ste 383 XIV Mac OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies Chapter 19 Troubleshooting Mac 05 385 The My Mac Won t Boot Blues esses 385 The ultimate startup disk The Mac OS X installation DVD 386 Booting from a DVD ROM sessseeseeeeeeeenene ener nennen Question Mark and the Mysterians esses Step 1 Run First Step 2 Safe Boot into Safe Mode sse Step 3 Zapping the PRAM sessesseesseeeeeeenenenne nennen Step 4 Reinstalling Mac OS Xu eesesseescesecesscesecessessesseeneeeseees Step 5 Take your Mac in for repair If Your Mac Crashes at Startup nennen Part Ul The Part of Tens eese 397 Chapter 20 Almost Ten Ways to Speed Up Your Mac 399
21. Chapter 21 Ten Ways to Make Your Mac Better by Throwing Money 1 407 Chapter 22 Ten Or So Great Web Sites for Mac Freaks 413 Appendix Installing or Reinstalling Mac OS X Snow Leopard Only If Vou Have To 421 Introduction ou made the right choice twice Mac OS X Snow Leopard and this book Take a deep breath and get ready to have a rollicking good time That s right This is a computer book but it s going to be fun What a concept Whether you re brand spanking new to the Mac or a grizzled old Mac vet I guaran tee that reading this book to discover the ins and outs of Mac OS X Snow Leopard will make everything easier Wiley Inc the publisher of this book couldn t say as much on the cover if it weren t true About This Book This book s roots lie with my international bestseller Macintosh System 7 5 For Dummies an award winning book so good that now deceased Mac cloner Power Computing gave away a copy with every Mac clone it sold Mac OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies is the latest revision and has been once again completely updated to include all the Mac OS X goodness found in Snow Leopard In other words this edition combines all the old familiar features of previous editions but is once again updated to reflect the latest and great est offering from Apple as well as feedback from readers Why write a For Dummies book about Snow Leopard W
22. Desktop After a quick look around the Desktop you get a look into two of its most useful fea tures windows and menus Windows are and have always been an integral part of Macintosh comput ing Windows in the Finder or as a PC user would say on the Desktop show you the contents of the hard drive optical drive flash thumb drive network drive disk image and folder icons windows in applications do many things The point is that windows are part of what makes your Mac a Mac knowing how they work and how to use them is essential Menus are another quintessential part of the Macintosh experience The latter part of this chapter starts you out with a few menu basics As needed I direct you to other parts of the book for greater detail So relax and don t worry By the end of this chapter you ll be ready to work with windows and menus in any application that uses them and most applications games excluded do 24 Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics Touring the Finder and Its Desktop Figure 2 1 The default Snow Leopard Finder and Desktop ee The Finder is the program that creates the Desktop keeps track of your files and folders and is always running Just about everything you do on your Mac begins and ends with the Finder It s where you manage files store documents launch programs and much more If you ever expect to master your Mac the first step is to master the Finder a
23. aa 84 What should you put in YOUR 85 Setting your Dock preferences sessseseeeeeeeeennennennnnns 86 Chapter 5 The Finder and Its 91 Introducing the Finder and Your Desktop sese 91 Getting to Know the Finder Menu eese eren 94 Navigating the Finder Up Down and Backward 96 Belly up to the toolbar sssssseseeeeeeeeneennne enne enne 96 Moving through folders fast in Column 99 Perusing in Icon view nete e na erase echec 101 Listless Try touring folders in List view sess 102 You gotta go with the 104 Like a road map The current folder s pop up menu 104 Going places with the Go menu sseseeeeeeeereeernnennn 106 Customizing the Finder Window esses eene enne ener 107 Adding folders to the Sidebar essen 108 Setting Finder preferences sese nennen 108 On using View Options esses nennen nnne 111 Customizing the Finder with Folder 116 Knowing Thy Finder Icons sess enne enne 117 Aliases Greatest Thing Since Sliced 119 Cre
24. at the bottom of the scroll bar as shown in Figure 2 3 You can set your General System Preferences so that you see one arrow at each end of the scroll area as I explain in Chapter 3 YY Use the keyboard In the Finder first click an icon in the window and then use the arrow keys to move up down left or right Using an arrow key selects the next icon in the direction it indicates and automati cally scrolls the window if necessary In other programs you might or might not be able to use the keyboard to scroll The best advice I can give you is to try it either it ll work or it won t Hyper Active windows To work within a window the window must be active The active window is always the frontmost window and inactive windows always appear behind the active window Only one window can be active at a time To make a window active click it anywhere in the middle on the title bar or on a scroll bar It doesn t matter where you click with one proviso You can t click the red yellow or green gumdrop buttons or the clear Hide Show button of an inactive window to activate it Look at Figure 2 4 for an example of an active window in front of an inactive window the Applications window and the Utilities window respectively
25. ating aliases ccccscccsscssscessessscescesseesseeseesseesesesecessceseeeseesseesaees 120 Deleting alidS s eerte eee eere 121 Hunting down an alias s parent 122 Digging for Icon Data in the Info 122 Table of Contents Ix Part I Snow Leopard Taming Or Organization ot Smart People ducha 127 Chapter 6 Organizing and Managing Files and Folders 129 Understanding the Mac OS X Folder 130 Understanding nested folders sese 131 From the top The Computer folder sess 132 Peeking into the Applications 133 Finding fonts and more in the public Library folder 133 Let it be The System folder sse 134 The usability of the Users 1 134 There s no place like Home essere 135 Your personal Library card eese 137 Saving Your Document Before It s Too Late sese 138 Stepping through a basic Save 139 Looks like Save acts like Save why s it called Save As 144 Open SeZ CREE 146 With a Quick eit e eerte e aes 148 With drag and drop eese eene Ea 149 When your Mac can t open a file sese 149 With the applic
26. ation of your 151 Organizing Your Stuff in Folders essen 152 Files versus folders dee i e Ree elutes 152 Organizing your stuff with subfolders sees 153 Creating new 1 eene nnn 156 Navigating with spring loaded folders 156 Smart Folders uu ec eee er PIU ded 157 Shuffling Around Files and Folders eene 160 Comprehending the Clipboard essen 160 Copying files and folders cccccccscsssesscesscsseeesecesecsseesssceseeeseesaees 161 Pasting from the Clipboard sse 162 Moving files and folders essen 163 Selecting multiple icons eessssssssseeeeeeeeeene nene 164 Playing the icon name game Renaming 166 Compressing nee rede r 167 Getting rid of ICONS aahon ere e ir r tee SEHR ees 167 Finding Your Stutf eina 168 The Search box in Finder Windows esee 168 Using the Spotlight menu sss 170 Chapter 7 Dealing with 0155 173 Comprehending Disks 173 Some disks need to be formatted first sss 174 Moving and copying disk icons 175 x Mac OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies Surprise Your PC Di
27. ccount password on your Mac 327 Changing the password of any account but your own OM VOUr cies eerte dei tiii eive ilv iid 327 Changing the password for your account on someone else s Ma tienne tie ecd n dida 328 Five More Types of Sharing enne 329 Printer Sharing auos citi rere RE newton devas 329 Internet Sharing eese EE nnne nn se nn 329 Web Sharing sess eene nnne nennen nennen nentes nnns 330 Bluetooth Sharing ete etr a ER ERR ee a TEE 331 Screen Sharing te RO REI RD Be Er DR UH o ec seeds 333 Chapter 16 Features for the Way You Work 335 Talking and Listening to Your Mac esee 335 Talking to your Ma eesin iiaa e eriei 336 Listening to your Mac read for you seen 340 Table of Contents Automatic Automation sss eere nennen nennen 342 AppleScript EIE 343 Automator era 344 A Few More Useful 347 Universal ACCESS ie edet iei i dee SEEN 347 se ished Sade t t e E ERE o a res 350 Bl et otlliz eere arte e o ree 351 IDE turco ete aO ette fa te eere Een vectes 351 Automatic Login Accounts System Preferences pane 352 Boot Camp amas ires rater REPETITA 352 Part U The Care and Feeding of Vour Snow Leopard 355 Chapter 17 Safety First
28. cted to the Internet to use Mac Help you do need an Internet connection to get the most out of it Chapter 9 can help you set up an Internet connection if you don t have one That s because OS X installs only certain help articles on your hard drive If you ask a question that those articles don t answer Mac Help connects to Apple s Web site and downloads the answer assuming that you have an active Internet connection These answers are the Support Articles denoted by a plus sign as shown in the lower part of the window in Figure 1 6 earlier in this chapter Click one of these entries and Help Viewer retrieves the text over the Internet Although this can sometimes be inconvenient it s also quite smart This way Apple can update the Help system at any time without requiring any action from you Furthermore after you ve asked a question and Mac Help has grabbed the answer from the Apple Web site the answer remains on your hard drive forever If you ask for it again even at a later date your computer won t have to download it from the Apple Web site again Chapter 2 The Desktop and Windows and Menus Oh My In This Chapter Checking out the parts of a window Dealing with dealie boppers in windows Resizing moving and closing windows Getting comfortable with menu basics D chapter introduces important features of Mac OS X starting with the first thing you see when you log in the Finder and its
29. d from earlier versions of Mac OS X But if you decide to skip this chapter because you think you have all the new stuff figured out I assure you that you ll miss at least a couple of things that Apple didn t bother to tell you as if you read every word in Mac OS X Help the only user manual Apple provides anyway Tantalized Let s rock 0 Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics NING s If you re about to upgrade to Snow Leopard from an earlier version of Mac OS X I feel obliged to mention a major pitfall to avoid One very specific misplaced click done while installing your new OS could erase every file on your hard drive The appendix describes this situation in full and loving detail and it contains other important information about installing Snow Leopard that can make upgrading a more pleasant experience Gnawing to the Core of OS X The operating system that is the OS in Mac OS X is what makes a Mac a Mac Without it your Mac is a pile of silicon and circuits no smarter than a toaster So what does an operating system do you ask Good question The short answer is that an operating system controls the basic and most important functions of your computer In the case of Mac OS X and your Mac the operating system 1 Manages memory Controls how windows icons and menus work 1 Keeps track of files 1 Manages networking Does housekeeping No kidding Other forms of software such as w
30. e that For Dummies authors have to follow I think Anyway it s better if you read the parts in order but if you already know a lot or think you know a lot feel free to skip around and read the parts that interest you most Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics This first part is very very basic training From the mouse to the Desktop from menus win dows and icons to the snazzy but helpful Dock it s all here A lot of what you need to know to navigate the depths of Mac OS X safely and sanely and per form basic tasks can be found in this part And although old timers might just want to skim through it newcomers should probably read every word Twice Part II Snow Leopard Taming Or Organization for Smart People In this part I build on the basics of Part I and really get you revving with your Mac Here I cover additional topics that every Mac user needs to know coupled with some hands on step by step instructions The part starts with a closer look at ways you can organize your files and folders followed by a chapter about using removable media which means ejectable discs mostly CDs and DVDs Last but certainly not least is a chapter about all the Snow Leopard applications such as iCal Address Book and Mail that help you keep your digital life organized Part III Do Unto Snow Leopard Getting Things Done This part is chock full of ways to do productive stuff with your Mac In th
31. ell Snow Leopard is a big somewhat complicated personal computer operating system So I made Mac OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies a not so big not very complicated book that shows you what Snow Leopard is all about without boring you to tears confusing you or poking you with sharp objects In fact think you ll be so darned comfortable that I wanted the title to be Mac OS X Snow Leopard Without Discomfort but the publishers wouldn t let me Apparently we For Dummies authors have to follow some rules and using Dummies and Mac OS X Snow Leopard in this book s title are among them And speaking of dummies remember that it s just a word I don t think you re dumb quite the opposite My second choice for this book s title was Mac OS X Snow Leopard For People Smart Enough to Know They Need Help with It but you can just imagine what Wiley thought of that C mon that s the whole point of the name they insisted Besides it s shorter our way 2 Mac OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies Anyway the book is chock full of information and advice explaining every thing you need to know about Mac OS X in language you can understand along with timesaving tips tricks techniques and step by step instructions all served up in generous quantities What Vou Won t Find in This Book Another rule we For Dummies authors must follow is that our books cannot exceed a certain number of pages Brevity is the soul of wit and al
32. enu basics later in this chapter you find details about working with menus for specific tasks throughout this book Whereas this section offers a basic introduction to the Finder and Desktop Chapter 5 explains in detail how to navigate and manage your files in the Finder You find out how to use the Finder toolbar navigate folders and sub folders and switch among views among other things But before you start using the Finder it will help you to know the basics of working with windows and menus if these Mac features are new to you I suggest you read all of this chapter and pay special attention to Chapter 5 later 26 Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics Anatomy of a Window unl Figure 2 2 A typical Finder window in Mac 0S X Snow Leopard Windows are a ubiquitous part of using Mac When you open a folder you see a window When you write a letter the document that you re working on appears in a window When you browse the Internet Web pages appear ina window so on For the most part windows are windows from program to program You ll probably notice that some programs Adobe Photoshop or Microsoft Word for example take liberties with windows by adding features such as pop up menus or textual information such as zoom percentage or file size in the scroll bar area of a document window Don t let it bug you that extra fluff is just window dressing pun intended Main
33. etterman rip off but does include heaping helpings of tips optional software great Mac Web sites and hardware ideas Appendix Last but certainly not least I cover installing Mac OS X Snow Leopard in the appendix The whole process has become quite easy with this version of the system software but if you have to install Snow Leopard your self it would behoove you to read this helpful appendix first Icons Used in This Book 5 Little round pictures icons appear off to the left side of the text throughout this book Consider these icons miniature road signs telling you a little some thing extra about the topic at hand Here s what the different icons look like and what they all mean Look for Tip icons to find the juiciest morsels shortcuts tips and undocu mented secrets about Snow Leopard Try them all impress your friends When you see this icon it means that this particular morsel is something that I think you should memorize or at least write on your shirt cuff Put on your propeller beanie hat and pocket protector these parts include the truly geeky stuff It s certainly not required reading but it must be interesting or informative or I wouldn t have wasted your time with it Read these notes very very very carefully Did I say very Warning icons flag important cautionary information The author and publisher won t be respon sible if your Mac explodes or spews flaming parts because you ignored a
34. g seminars in many U S cities He also won the Macworld Expo MacJeopardy World Championship three times before retir ing his crown Bob is considered one of the world s leading authorities on Mac OS X From 1989 to 1997 he was a contributing editor columnist for MacUser magazine writing the Help Folder Beating the System Personal Best and Game Room columns at various times In his copious spare time Bob heads up a team of expert technical consul tants who do nothing but provide technical help and training to Mac users via telephone e mail and or a unique Internet enabled remote control soft ware which allows the team to see and control your Mac no matter where in the world you may be If you re having problems with your Mac you ought to give them try You ll find them at www boblevitus com or 408 627 7577 Prior to giving his life over to computers LeVitus spent years at Kresser Craig D I K a Los Angeles advertising agency and marketing consultancy and its subsidiary L amp J Research He holds a B S in Marketing from California State University Dedication This book is dedicated to my wife Lisa who taught me almost everything I know about almost everything I know except computers It s also dedicated to my children Allison and Jacob who love their Macs almost as much as love them my kids not their Macs Author s Acknowledgments Special thanks to everyone at Apple who helped me turn this book aro
35. hapter 18 a About This Mac Mac OS Processor 2 4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo Memory 2 GB 1067 MHz DDR3 Shutting down properly Turning off the power without shutting down your Mac properly is one of the worst things you can do to your poor Mac Shutting down your Mac improp erly can really screw up your hard drive scramble the contents of your most important files or both If a thunderstorm is rumbling nearby or you re unfortunate enough to have rolling blackouts where you live you might really want to shut down your Mac See the next section where I briefly discuss lightning and your Mac To turn off your Mac always use the Shut Down command on the menu which I discuss in Chapter 4 or shut down in one of these kind and gentle ways 1 Press the Power key once and then click the Shut Down button 1 On keyboards that don t have a Power key press Control Eject instead and then click the Shut Down button that appears or press the Return key which does the same thing Of course most Mac users have broken this rule several times without any thing horrible happening but don t be lulled into a false sense of security Break the rules one time too many or under the wrong circumstances and your most important file will be toast The only time you should turn off your Mac without shutting down properly is when your screen is frozen or when your system crashed and you ve already tried everything else
36. iDVD 09 For Dummies by the technical editor of this very book Dennis Cohen and his brother Michael all three titles are from Wiley The Mac advantage Most of the world s personal computers use Microsoft Windows But you re among the lucky few to have a computer with an operating system that s intuitive easy to use and dare say fun If you don t believe me try using Windows for a day or two Go ahead You prob ably won t suffer any permanent damage In fact you ll really begin to appreciate how good you have it Feel free to hug your Mac Or give it a peck on the disc drive slot just try not to get your tongue caught As someone once told me Claiming that the Macintosh is inferior to Windows because most people use Windows is like saying that all other restaurants serve food that s inferior to McDonald s We might be a minority but Mac users have the best most stable most modern all purpose operating system in the world and here s why UNIX on which Mac OS X is based is widely regarded as the best industrial strength operating system on the planet For now just know that being based on UNIX means that a Mac running OS X will crash less often than an older Mac or a Windows machine which means less downtime And being UNIX based also means far fewer viruses and malicious software But perhaps the biggest advantage OS X has is that when an application crashes it doesn t crash your entire com
37. ike this 1 For keyboard shortcuts I write something like A which means to hold down the 88 key the one with the little pretzel and or symbol on it and then press the key on the keyboard If you see something like 36 Shift A that means to hold down the 3 and Shift keys while pressing the A key Again for absolute clarity I never refer to the 38 key with the symbol I reserve that symbol for the amp menu Apple menu For the Command key I use only the 88 symbol Got it Very cool Foolish Assumptions Although I know what happens when you make assumptions l ve made a few anyway First I assume that you gentle reader know nothing about using Mac OS X beyond knowing what a Mac is that you want to use OS X that you want to understand OS X without having to digest an incomprehensible technical manual and that you made the right choice by selecting this particular book And so I do my best to explain each new concept in full and loving detail Maybe that s foolish but oh well Oh and I also assume that you can read If you can t ignore this paragraph 4 Mac OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies How This Book Is Organized Mac OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies is divided into six logical parts num bered surprisingly enough 1 through 6 By no fault of mine they re numbered using those stuffy old Roman numerals so you see I VI where you in my humble opinion ought to see Arabic numbers 1 6 It s another rul
38. ing a Windows system and displays a menu called a contextual menu where you Control clicked In fact if you re blessed with a two or more button mouse such as the Apple Mighty Mouse you can right click and avoid having to hold down the Control key I use the five button Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer 3 0 and recommend it highly Drag Dragging something usually means you have to click it first and hold down the mouse button Then you move the mouse on your desk or mouse pad so the cursor and whatever you select move across the screen The combination of holding down the button and dragging the mouse is usually referred to as click and drag Choosing an item from a menu To get to Mac OS menu commands you must first open a menu and then pick the option you want Point at the name of the menu you want with your cursor press the mouse button down and then drag downward until you select the command you want When the command is highlighted finish selecting by letting go of the mouse button ES If you re a longtime Mac user you probably hold down the mouse button the whole time between clicking the name of the menu and selecting the command you want You can still do it that way but you can also click the menu name to open it release the mouse button drag down to the item you want to select and then click again In other words OS X menus stay open after you click them even if you re not holding down the mouse button After yo
39. inters and other hardware that plugs into the wall as well lightning can fry them too Y Don t jostle bump shake kick throw dribble or punt your Mac especially while it s running Your Mac contains a hard drive that spins at 4 200 revolutions per minute rpm or more jolt to a hard drive while it s reading or writing a file can cause the head to crash into the disk which can render many or all files on it unrecoverable Ouch Don t forget to back up your data If the stuff on your hard drive means anything to you you must back it up Not maybe You must Even if your most important file is your last saved game of Call of Duty 2 you still need to realize how important it is to back up your files Fortunately Mac OS X Snow Leopard includes an awesome backup utility called Time Machine Unfortunately you need either an external hard drive or an Apple Time Capsule device to take advantage of it So I beg you Please read Chapter 17 now and find out how to back up before something hor rible happens to your valuable data I strongly recommend that you read Chapter 17 sooner rather than later preferably before you do any significant work on your Mac Dr Macintosh says There are only two kinds of Mac users those who have never lost data and those who will Which kind do you want to be 18 Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics Don t kiss your monitor while wearing stuff on your lips For
40. is section you discover the Internet first or at least how to get it working on your Mac and what to do with it after you do Next you look at the digital media side of things with chapters about music video games and digital photos Finally you look at Snow Leopard s built in tools for writing namely TextEdit and fonts Part IV Making This Snow Leopard Your Very Own Here I get into the nitty gritty underbelly of making Mac OS X Snow Leopard work the way you want it to work I start with the ins and outs of printing under OS X Then I move on to somewhat more advanced topics such as file sharing creating and using multiple user accounts and why you might want to and the lowdown on numerous Mac OS X Snow Leopard features Text to Speech speech recog nition automation and more that can make your computing experience even more pleasant Introduction Part V The Care and Feeding of Your Snow Leopard This part starts with a chapter about backups and security which not only stresses the impor tance of backing up your data but also shows you how to do it almost pain lessly Then I introduce you to a handful of useful utilities included with Snow Leopard and explain when and how to use them Finally I tell you how to avoid most disasters as well as what to do in the unlikely event that a major mishap does occur Part VI The Part of Tens Finally it s The Part of Tens which might have started life as a L
41. ke a gander at the top of a window any window You see three buttons in the upper left corner and the name of the window in the top center The three buttons called gumdrop buttons by some folks because they look like well gumdrops are officially known as Close Minimize and Zoom and their colors red yellow and green respectively pop off the screen Here s what they do 1 Close red Click this button to close the window Minimize yellow Click this button to minimize the window Clicking Minimize appears to close the window but instead of making it disap pear Minimize adds an icon for the window in the Dock To view the window again click the Dock icon for the window that you minimized If the window happens to be a QuickTime movie the movie continues to play albeit at postage stamp size in its icon in the Dock I discuss the Dock in Chapter 4 Zoom green Click this button to make the window larger or smaller depending on its current size If you re looking at a standard size window clicking Zoom usually makes it bigger I say usually because if the window is larger than its contents clicking this button shrinks the window to the smallest size that can completely enclose the contents without scrolling Click the Zoom button again to return the window to its previous size Some people still call the Zoom button by its Mac OS 9 name Grow PCs Figure 2 3 The same window twice in the front window
42. l that So I wish I could have included some things but they didn t fit Although I feel confident you ll find everything you need to know about Mac OS X Snow Leopard in this book some things bear further looking into including these Information about some of the applications programs that come with Mac OS X Snow Leopard An installation of Mac OS X Snow Leopard includes more than 50 separate applications mostly found in the Applications folder and the Utilities folder within it love to walk you through each one of them but that would have required a book a whole lot bigger heavier and more expensive than this one This book is first and foremost about using Mac OS X so I brief you on the small handful of bundled applications essential to using Mac OS X Snow Leopard and keep the focus there namely iCal Address Book Mail Safari TextEdit and the like as well as important utilities you may need to know how to use someday For what it s worth many books cover the applications that come with Mac OS X Snow Leopard as well as applications commonly bundled with Snow Leopard on a new Mac such as iLife the one my publisher sug gested I recommend is Mac OS X Snow Leopard All in One For Dummies written by Mark L Chambers which is by sheer coincidence of course also published by Wiley Information about Microsoft Office iLife iWork Adobe Photoshop Quicken and most other third party applications Okay if a
43. ll the gory details of all the bundled read free Mac OS X Snow Leopard applica tions don t fit here I think you ll understand why digging into third party applications that cost extra was out of the question Information about programming for the Mac This book is about using Mac OS X Snow Leopard not writing code for it Dozens of books cover programming on the Mac most of which are two or three times the size of this book For what it s worth Dennis Cohen my technical editor and his brother Michael wrote a great book about Xcode 3 the development environment included with Mac OS X Snow Leopard It s called The Xcode 3 Book and by sheer coincidence is also published by who else Wiley Introduction 3 Conventions Used in This Book To get the most out of this book you need to know how I do things and why Here are a few conventions I use in this book to make your life easier When I want you to open an item in a menu I write something like Choose FileOpen which means Pull down the File menu and choose the Open command v Stuff you re supposed to type appears in bold type like this Sometimes an entire a sentence is in boldface as you see when I pres ent a numbered list of steps In those cases I leave the bold off what you re supposed to type like this Web addresses programming code not much in this book and things that appear on screen are shown in a special monofont typeface l
44. might be why Apple doesn t use it anymore Re The fact that something went wrong is no reflection on your prowess as amp Macintosh user Something is broken and your Mac may need repairs If this is happening to you right now check out Chapter 19 to try to get your Mac well again 14 Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics Figure 1 2 The Mac OS X Desktop after a brand spanking new installation of OS X ift OX TE Poo If your computer is under warranty dial 1 800 SOS APPL and a customer service person can tell you what to do Before you do anything though skip ahead to Chapter 19 It s entirely possible that one of the sugges tions there can get you back on track without your having to spend even a moment on hold Prohibitory sign formerly known as the flashing question mark disk Most users eventually encounter the prohibitory sign shown in the left margin which replaced the flashing question mark on a disk icon and flashing folder icon back in Mac OS X Jaguar This icon means your Mac can t find a startup disk hard drive network server or DVD ROM con taining a valid Macintosh operating system See Chapter 19 for ways you can try to ease your Mac s ills Kernel panic You shouldn t see this very often but you might occasion ally see a block of text in four languages including English as shown in Figure 1 3 This means that your Mac has experienced a ker
45. multaneously in Canada No part of this publication may be reproduced stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic mechanical photocopying recording scanning or otherwise except as permit ted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act without either the prior written permission of the Publisher or authorization through payment of the appropriate per copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center 222 Rosewood Drive Danvers MA 01923 978 750 8400 fax 978 646 8600 Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department John Wiley amp Sons Inc 111 River Street Hoboken NJ 07030 201 748 6011 fax 201 748 6008 or online at http www wiley com go permissions Trademarks Wiley the Wiley Publishing logo For Dummies the Dummies Man logo A Reference for the Rest of Us The Dummies Way Dummies Daily The Fun and Easy Way Dummies com Making Everything Easier and related trade dress are trademarks or registered trademarks of John Wiley amp Sons Inc and or its affiliates in the United States and other countries and may not be used without written permission Mac OS and Snow Leopard are trademarks or registered trademarks of Apple Inc All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners Wiley Publishing Inc is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book Mac OS X Snow Leopard For Dummies is an
46. nd its Desktop Check out the default Mac Finder and Desktop for Mac OS X Snow Leopard in Figure 2 1 The Finder is the center of your Mac OS experience so before I go any further here s a quick description of its most prominent features 1 Desktop The Desktop is the area behind the windows and the Dock where your hard drive icon ordinarily lives The Desktop isn t a window yet it acts like one Like a folder window or drive window the Desktop can contain icons But unlike most windows which require a bit of navigation to get to the Desktop is a great place for things you use a lot such as folders applications or particular documents Menu Window Icons Finder w Go p 4 4 E Mon 2 49PM Minimize Zoom Cycle Through Windows Bring All to Front Moves Dock Desktop Chapter 2 The Desktop and Windows and Menus Oh My 25 Some folks use the terms Desktop and Finder interchangeably to refer to the total Macintosh environment you see after you log in the icons windows menus and all that other cool stuff Just to make things confus ing the background you see on your screen the picture behind your hard drive icon and your open windows is also called the Desktop In this book I refer to the application you use when the Desktop is showing as the Finder When I say Desktop I m talking about the picture back ground behind your windows and the Dock
47. nel panic the most severe type of system crash If you restart your Mac and see this message again look in Chapter 19 for a myriad of possible cures for all kinds of ailments including this one Chapter 1 Mac OS X Snow Leopard 101 Prerequisites None D Figure 1 3 ME You need to restart your computer Hold down the Power button If this is for several seconds or press the Restart button what you re Veuillez red marrer votre ordinateur Maintenez la touche de d marrage enfonc e pendant plusieurs secondes ou bien appuyez seeing sur le bouton de r initialisation si C Sie dazu d things Eischaitaste einige Sekunden gedr ckt oder dr cken Sie die definitely Neustart Taste AYU a F 22920 0 Y VI M 7 notfine and WU SN Vier dandy pum uil ar How do you know which version of the Mac OS your computer has Simple 2 1 Choose About This Mac from the menu the menu with the symbol in the upper left corner of the menu bar The About This Mac window pops up on your screen as shown in Figure 1 4 The version you re running appears just below Mac OS X in the center of the window Version 10 6 is the release we know as Snow Leopard Puma and 10 0 as Cheetah If you re curious or just want to impress your friends Mac OS X version 10 5 was known as Leopard 10 4 as Tiger 10 3 as Panther 10 2 as Jaguar 10 1 as Bootthis Bootthat booted my Mac and
48. nging a certificate s trust settings You have questions Support Articles Mac has Q Pro applications on PowerPC computers may quit unexpectedly on launch or A Paes eae T i answers Found 15 Help Topics 7 Support Articles PET Now here s a cool feature I like to call autornatic visual help cues Here s how they work 1 Type a word or phrase in the Help menu s Search field 2 Select any item that has a menu icon to its left such as the Secure Empty Trash item in Figure 1 7 The automatic visual cue an arrow appears pointing at that command in the appropriate menu 22 Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics PCs Figure 1 7 If you choose an item with a menu icon an arrow points to that item in context E Fie Edit View Go Window EGON About Finder c Preferences 36 Menu Items Empty Trash Secure Empty Trash Empty Trash THE mm Secure Empty Trasi Secure Empty Trash i E Move to Trash Help Topics amp Removing files and folders from x Services If the Trash contains folders of r Preventing deleted files from bei Shortcuts for working with items Increasing disk space Conserving iDisk storage space Locking documents Using an ExpressCard with a por If the speech feedback window d Transferring files between two Show All Help Topics Although you don t have to be conne
49. obvious rea sons Use a soft cloth and or OmniCleanz display cleaning solution 1 love the stuff made by RadTech www radtech us to clean your display Point and click boot camp Are you new to the Mac Just figuring out how to move the mouse around Now is a good time to go over some fundamental stuff that you need to know for just about everything you ll be doing on the Mac Spend a few minutes reading this section and soon you ll be clicking double clicking pressing and pointing all over the place If you think you have the whole mousing thing pretty much figured out feel free to skip this section catch you on the other side Still with me Good Now for some basic terminology Point Before you can click or press anything you have to point to it Place your hand on your mouse and move it so that the cursor arrow is over the object you want like on top of an icon or a button Click Also called single click Use your index finger to push the mouse button all the way down and then let go so the button produces a satis fying clicking sound If you have one of the new optical Apple Pro mice you push down the whole thing to click Use a single click to highlight an icon press a button or activate a check box or window In other words first you point and then you click point and click in computer lingo Eternally yours now Mac OS X is designed so you never have to shut it down You can configu
50. ord processors and Web browsers rely on the operating system to create and maintain the environment in which they work their magic When you create a memo for example the word processor provides the tools for you to type and format the information In the background the operating system is the muscle for the word processor performing crucial functions such as the following Providing the mechanism for drawing and moving the on screen window in which you write the memo Keeping track of a file when you save it 1 Helping the word processor create drop down menus and dialogs for you to interact with Communicating with other programs And much much more stuff that only geeks could care about 11 Chapter 1 Mac OS X Snow Leopard 101 Prerequisites None So armed with a little background in operating systems take a gander at the next section before you do anything else with your Mac One last thing As I mention in the introduction I m only repeating it here in case you normally don t read introductions Mac OS X Snow Leopard comes with more than 50 applications And though love to tell you all about each and every one I have only so many pages at my disposal If you need more info on the programs I don t cover may I again recommend Mac OS X Snow Leopard All in One For Dummies written by Mark L Chambers iLife All in One For Dummies written by my old friends Tony Bove and Cheryl Rhodes or iMovie amp
51. p and the Help 19 Chapter 2 The Desktop and Windows and Menus Oh My 23 Touring the Finder and Its 24 Anatomy of a Window eaaa oea ie ena nennen entente nnne nnne nnne 26 Top the window to 28 A Scroll new eer che ese pi ce ine 29 Hyper Active windows essent 30 a 31 Working with WindOwS cccccccsssccessscsseceeeeseeessseeeeseecsseeesseeeseseesseessaeees 33 Opening and closing windows esses 33 Resizing windOows esses eene nennen enne nnn 34 Resizing window panes esses nennen 34 Moving windows 34 Shuffling windows esses eene eene tnnt nnns 35 Men Basics E 37 The ever changing menu 37 Contextual menus They re sooo 38 Recognizing disabled options essere 40 Navigating submenus sessi nnne 40 Underneath the Apple menu tree eene 41 Using keyboard shortcut commands eese 42 Chapter 3 Have It Your 45 Introducing System Preferences essere 45 Putting a Picture on the
52. previous folder displayed in this particular window If you re familiar with Web browsers the Forward and Back buttons in the Finder work exactly the same way The first time you open a window neither button is active But as you navigate from folder to folder these buttons remember your breadcrumb trail so you can quickly traverse backward or forward window by window You can even navigate this way from the keyboard by using the shortcuts 38 for Back and 8 for Forward 28 Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics EMBER E The Forward and Back buttons remember only the other folders you ve visited that appear in that open window If you ve set a Finder Preference so that a folder always opens in a new window or if you forced a folder to open in a new window which I describe in a bit the Forward and Back buttons won t work You have to use the modern OS X style window option which uses a single window or the buttons are useless This frosts me If you hide the toolbar the Sidebar is also hidden whether you like it or not Conversely if you want to see the toolbar you have no choice but to also see the Sidebar So if you want to hide the toolbar and see the Sidebar or vice versa you re out of luck If I had my druthers hide the toolbar which I rarely use and keep the Sidebar which I use constantly For some unfathomable reason Apple doesn t allow that Top o the window to ya Ta
53. puter and you don t have to restart the whole computer to continue working By the way with the advent of Intel powered Macs a few years ago you can now run Windows natively That s right you can now install and run Microsoft Windows on any Mac powered by an Intel processor as described in Chapter 16 Don t let that UNIX stuff scare you It s there if you want it but if you don t want it or don t care like most of us you ll rarely even know it s there All you ll know is that your Mac just runs and runs and runs without crashing and crashing and crashing 2 Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics A Safety Net for the Absolute Beginner Or Any User In the following sections I deal with the stuff that the manual that came with your Mac doesn t cover or doesn t cover in nearly enough detail If you re a first time Macintosh user please please read this section of the book carefully it could save your life Okay okay perhaps I m being overly dramatic What I mean to say is that reading this section could save your Mac Even if you re an experienced Mac user you might want to read this section anyway Chances are good that you ll see at least a few things you might have forgotten that might come in handy Turning the dang thing on Okay This is the big moment turning on your Mac Gaze at it longingly first and say something cheesy such as You re the most awesome computer
54. re it to sleep after a specified period of inactivity See Chapter 16 for more info on the Energy Saver features of OS X If you do so your Mac will consume very little electricity when it s sleeping and will usually be ready to use by pressing any key or clicking the mouse in less than a minute On the other hand if you re not going to be using it for a few days you might want to shut it down anyway Note f you leave your Mac on constantly and you re gone when a lightning storm or rolling blackout hits your Mac might get wasted So be sure you have adequate protection say a decent surge protector designed specifically for computers if you decide to leave your Mac on and unattended for long periods See the section A few things you should definitely NOT do with your Mac elsewhere in this chapter for more info on lightning and your Mac Frankly if plan to be away from mine for more than a day usually shut it down just in case But because OS X is designed to run 24 7 don t shut it down at night unless the night happens to be dark and stormy Chapter 1 Mac OS X Snow Leopard 101 Prerequisites None 9 Double click Click twice in rapid succession With a little practice you can perfect this technique in no time Use a double click to open a folder or to launch a file or application Control click Hold down the Control key while single clicking Control clicking is the same as right click
55. sks Work To0 essere 176 Burning CDs and DVDs c tie e rta ed aee eH PR PE 176 Burning On the fly ar de dc 178 Creating a Burn Folder sese 181 Getting Disks out of Your Mac sese 182 Chapter 8 Organizing Your 185 Keeping Track With iCal essere nnne 186 Navigating iCal views esee nennen nennen 186 Creating calendari Sosno renen es e Nae ei ee e hE o SE i S S 187 Grouping calendars sese eene eene enne 188 Deleting a calendar or 8Youp ssssssessseresersssssresseesresssessrereresssesseesee 189 In any event ien 190 Todo Of nott do oS cer tte et ees esee oe Pt ee eve dues 192 Are You Available oo cccecccccssssccccessscecessnceecesseeceesseeecesseeeeeesaes 193 STICKIES 5 ets etate aberit 193 DS YING amine mpan nih ae Tee HH 194 Part Do Unto Snow Leopard Getting Things Dol icc eeepc orien vecchie 197 Chapter 9 199 Getting Connected to the Internet 200 Setting up your modem ssssessesseeseeee nennen nennen 200 Your Internet service provider and you 201 Plugging in your Internet connection 202 Starting a MobileMe account
56. taining the window metaphor many information windows display different kinds of information in different panes or discrete sections And so without further ado the following list gives you a look at the main features of a typical Finder window as shown in Figure 2 2 I discuss these features in greater detail in later sections of this chapter Quick Look Slideshow button Minimize Zoom Windows title Hide Show Toolbar button Close Forward button Search field Back button View buttons Action button Toolbar BobLeV Co 4I Bue Cele a DEVICES L4 Macintosh HD SHARED ll ld Bios Desktop Documents E Las ES A Applications 1 Documents SEARCH FOR 1 Today Library Movies a Y Yesterday a 1 Past Week JE 4 88 9 items 299 82 GB available Sidebar Scroll bar Icon resizer Window resizer ar Chapter 2 The Desktop and Windows and Menus Oh My 2 7 If your windows don t look exactly like the one shown in Figure 2 2 don t be concerned You can make your windows look and feel any way you like As I explain later in this section moving and resizing windows are easy tasks Chapter 3 explains how to customize certain window features Chapter 5 focuses on ways you can change a window s view specifically when you re using the Finder Meanwhile here s what you see clockwise from top left Close Minimize and Zoom gumdrop buttons Shut
57. te this book for myself I wrote it for you and would love to hear how it worked for you So please send me your thoughts platitudes likes and dislikes and any other comments You can send snail mail in care of Wiley but it takes a long time to reach me that way and I just don t have time to respond to 99 976 of it If you want a response your best bet is to send e mail to me directly at SnowLeopard4DummiesGboblevitus com lappreciate your feedback and I try to respond to all reasonably polite e mail within a few days Did this book work for you What did you like What didn t you like What questions were unanswered Did you want to know more about something Did you want to find out less about something Tell me I have received more than 100 suggestions about previous editions most of which are incorpo rated here So keep up the good work So what are you waiting for Go enjoy the book Part Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics The 5th Wave By Rich Tennant The odd thing is he always insisis on using the latest version of MAC In this part D I believe it s important to crawl before you walk in this part you get a look at the most basic of basics such as how to turn on your Mac Next I acquaint you with the Mac OS X Finder with its Desktop windows icons and menus oh my Then you find out how to make this cat your own by customizing your work environment to suit your style
58. therine Crocker Executive Editor Bob Woerner Layout and Graphics Claudia Bell Sr Copy Editor Barry Childs Helton Christine Williams Technical Editor Dennis Cohen Proofreader Evelyn W Gibson Editorial Manager Leah Cameron Indexer Infodex Indexing Services Inc Editorial Assistant Amanda Foxworth Sr Editorial Assistant Cherie Case Cartoons Rich Tennant www the5thwave com Publishing and Editorial for Technology Dummies Richard Swadley Vice President and Executive Group Publisher Andy Cummings Vice President and Publisher Mary Bednarek Executive Acquisitions Director Mary C Corder Editorial Director Publishing for Consumer Dummies Diane Graves Steele Vice President and Publisher Composition Services Debbie Stailey Director of Composition Services Table of Contents ntroduction ed Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard Ihe BASIS a d Chapter 1 Mac OS X Snow Leopard 101 Prerequisites None 9 Gnawing to the Core of OS X nennen enne nnn 10 A Safety Net for the Absolute Beginner Or Any 12 Turning the dang thing on esssssssesseeeeeeeeeee nennen 12 What you should see on startup 12 Shutting down properly esses enne nnne nnns 16 A few things you should definitely NOT do with your Mac 17 Point and click boot camp sese nennen 18 Not Just a Beatles Movie Hel
59. u click a menu to open it you can even type the first letter or letters of the item to select it and then execute that item by pressing the Spacebar or the Return or Enter key A menu remains open until you click something else Go ahead and give it a try I ll wait Not Just a Beatles Movie Help and the Help Menu One of the best features about all Macs is the excellent built in help and Mac OS X doesn t cheat you on that legacy This system has online help in abun dance When you have a question about how to do something the Mac Help Center is the first place you should visit after this book of course 20 Part I Introducing Mac OS X Snow Leopard The Basics Figure 1 5 Mac Help is nothing if not helpful Clicking the Help menu reveals the Search Help field at the top of the menu and the Mac Help item which opens the Mac Help window as shown in Figure 1 5 Finder File Edit View Go Window DOJ search LB l Mac Help Mac Help Index K Mac Help Learn the basics about your Mac New to the Mac Start here SOLVING PROBLEMS Learn about your computer s devices Get to know the display keyboard mouse and other devices Get to work Set up your work environment and learn about the built in applications Have fun Problems with connecting to the Internet Problems with passwords More topics Other resources www apple com Play music organize your photos
60. und in record time Keri Walker Janette Barrios Greg Joz Joswiak Jennifer Hakes Khyati Shah Christine Wilhelmy Teresa Brewer and all the rest I couldn t have done it without you Thanks also to super agent Carole still Swifty to me McClendon for deal making beyond the call of duty yet again You ve been my agent for over 20 years and you re still a treasure Big time thanks to the gang at Wiley Bob Is the damn thing done yet Woerner Rebecca Whipcracker VIII Senninger Andy The Big Boss Man Cummings Barry Still no humorous nickname Pruett and my technical editor Dennis R Cohen who did a rocking job as always and all the others Thanks also to my family and friends for putting up with me during my all too lengthy absences during this book s gestation And thanks to Saccone s Pizza Rudy s BBQ Taco Cabana Diet Coke and ShortStop for sustenance And finally thanks to you gentle reader for buying this book Publisher s Acknowledgments We re proud of this book please send us your comments through our online registration form located at http dummies custhelp com For other comments please contact our Customer Care Department within the U S at 877 762 2974 outside the U S at 317 572 3993 or fax 317 572 4002 Some of the people who helped bring this book to market include the following Acquisitions and Editorial Composition Services Project Editor Rebecca Senninger Project Coordinator Ka
61. with stationery 232 Checking your mail 234 Dealing with sp nennen nnne i nnne 234 Changing your preferences sessesseseeeeeeeeeere eren nennt 235 RR UR 236 Mailboxes smart and plain essere 237 Sign here Please ccccsscssesscsssssscescssscssscsssesseeceessaeessesssesseeeseees 239 Take a Quick look and Slide show me some photos 241 Chapter 11 The Musical Mac 243 Introducing iTunes eie gehen o brides 243 Working with Medi 2 2 eiii eee dedu 246 Adding songs aneen Na GRE E ORE 246 Adding movies and Vid 0S cscccsccesscesssesscesscsscesseeseeeseenseeeseeaes 248 Adding pOdCaSt nennen en i 249 Listening to Internet radio cece eesessseescseseeeseeeseceeeesecessenseeneees 250 All About Playlisten n nr a o nF 251 Creating a regular playlist eese 252 Working with smart playlists ccccccscssscssesseesseeseeeseeeseeeeeenes 253 Burning a playlist to 254 Looking at two specific playlists sess 254 Backing Up Your iTunes Media essen 257 Chapter 12 The Multimedia Mac 259 Watching Movies with DVD Player 259 Playing
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