Whenever you launch the Terminal in Mac OS X, you may get a little message: “Welcome to Darwin!” or a “Last Login” time – well, after you’ve seen it a few hundred times you might be sick of it, or perhaps you’d prefer something more amusing, meaningful, or even useful to yourself and other computer … Read More
If there’s one annoying thing about the QuickTime Player on earlier versions of Mac OS X it is the lack of fullscreen movie support by default. Fortunately modern versions solve that problem, but if a Mac is running a prior version of OS X and has an older version of QuickTime Player, what should you … Read More
Backups. A dreaded word because it is tedious and boring. You say it and people go fleeing in all directions plugging their ears. So what do you do? Have no fear Mac users, Carbon Copy Cloner is here for you to make Mac backups easy. Say hello to your newest friend, Carbon Copy Cloner. Carbon … Read More
Navigating around Mac OS X is significantly easier than competitive operating systems, and that’s largely thanks to the Dock, Expose (Mission Control), Spotlight, and the improved Finder, which is the OS X file system. Of course there are also third party apps that people swear by, such as Quicksilver, but with so many great features … Read More
We all know that Photo Booth is great fun and is sure to entertain our friends and family with the goofy effects. But what if you want to take pictures using your iSight from the command line? Unfortunately Apple doesn’t provide this option (at least that we know of), but thanks to a crafty individual … Read More
Hidden from the casual Mac user is a spiffy command line utility that allows you to view, configure, and troubleshoot your Mac’s wireless connection, entirely from the Terminal of MacOS and Mac OS X. This command has a help file but is otherwise but not much documentation, and judging by the obscure location of the … Read More
Safari is my browser of choice in Mac OS X, I like Chrome and FireFox a lot but it doesn’t have the same Apple polish to it, and page rendering seems speedier in Safari (my opinion, no intention on sparking a browser war here). If you’re a Safari user, here are some key strokes that … Read More
The command line in Mac OS X can be a very powerful and fun tool, so it’s good to know how to maneuver around if you find yourself in it. By default, the Mac OS X Terminal uses the Bash shell, which is what these keyboard shortcuts are intended for. So if you’re ready to … Read More
Spotlight is one of my favorite features of Mac OS X, I probably use it more than even the Dock. Being able to hit command-space to quickly locate documents, emails, and launch Applications is endlessly useful. For some of us, it’s necessary to be in the terminal, and wouldn’t it be cool to have this … Read More
Want to manually adjust the backlighting on your MacBook Pro keyboard? You can do that easier than you might think. With the push of a few buttons, you can turn the brightness of the keyboard backlighting up, or you can turn the brightness of the keyboard backlighting down (or even off). The secret is simply … Read More
Mac users may find it helpful to automatically launch an application upon system start of Mac OS X. Basically this means as soon as the Mac is done booting, the approved auto-launch apps will open themselves once the user has logged into the Mac and the Mac OS desktop has displayed. You can add as … Read More
If you own a Mac laptop, you’ll want this great app. CoconutBattery provides the usual current battery charge information, but that’s not what makes it cool. Anyone that has owned a device operated by rechargeable batteries can tell you that over time the capacity diminishes. That is what makes CoconutBattery so unique, it provides detailed … Read More
The Mac OS X command line interface is home to thousands of programs that the average user doesn’t know exists. Leveraging years of hard work by the GNU foundation and others in the open source community, Apple designed a wonderful OS that doesn’t “need” any use of the command line. While using the command line … Read More
Want to search for available wi-fi networks quickly and easily from a Mac? Have you ever been on the road with your MacBook, MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, iBook or PowerBook and needed to find a Wireless access point quickly to send a quick email, post an important blog entry, or check the latest news? Me … Read More
