Updated on 2/10/2012: You can easily use the MacBook, MacBook Air, or MacBook Pro in what’s commonly called clamshell mode, when the laptop lid is closed but the machine is hooked up to an external monitor, keyboard, and mouse, effectively turning your portable Mac into a desktop. Doing this is easy, here’s how to get … Read More
When shopping around for an external monitor, I was asked “What’s the maximum resolution I can get out of my MacBook with an external LCD display?” by a friend of mine. Well the answer depends on which MacBook you have, what video card it has, and what type of video interface you’re going to use … Read More
I frequently get asked about the purpose of .DS_Store files by Mac users and Windows System Administrators who have a few Mac’s on their networks, where seeing the files turn up when hidden files are made visible. Here is my explanation as to what a DS_Store document is, what happens if you delete them, and … Read More
Do you come here often? How about subscribing to our RSS feed, or follow us on Twitter! Both feeds will give you up to date posts directly from OS X Daily, so check them out. Subscribe to OS X Daily via RSS Follow OS X Daily on Twitter Our Twitter account is pretty new but … Read More
Ever wondered what shell you are using? It’s not unusual to want or need to know, and I’ve gotten this question multiple times, but the answer could be different for everyone. The easiest way to find out what shell you are using type the following command at the command line prompt: echo $SHELL Yes, that … Read More
mdworker is short for ‘metadata server worker’ and if you’re still confused don’t feel bad. mdworker is basically the core technology behind Mac OS X’s awesome search engine Spotlight, it spiders meta data from your Mac and its files and creates a readable index so that you can find things practically instantaneously via Spotlight (command-spacebar). … Read More
Reader Mathew Prairen asks a common question about opening files that has a remarkably simple answer: “I have a few image files from my PC that Preview refuses to open, is there any way I can force Preview to open these images?” If you want to force open any file with virtually any program, simply … Read More
Reader Adam Smith writes in with the following question: “I am a new Mac user, and I love OSX! I have a MacBook Pro 15″. I would like to know though, is there a way that you can lock a MAC? Like in Windows, you can hit the shortcut “Windows Key + L”. Is there … Read More
Hello all you loyal OS X Daily readers! Recently we have been receiving a large number of Mac OS X related questions in our inbox. Normally our staff would try and respond with an answer to the best of our knowledge. However, sometimes we get a question we absolutely do not know the answer to. … Read More
