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Compare Versions of a Word Document with Microsoft Word

Mar 15, 2010 - 1 Comment
DOCX files

Do you have two Word doc files that you need to see the differences between, and compare the two easily side-by-side to review changes? You can easily compare Word documents against each other with the Microsoft Word app in Mac OS X and Windows, Word of course is part of the Microsoft Office Suite, and … Read More

How to Enable the Firewall in Mac OS X

Mar 12, 2010 - 6 Comments

If you want to beef up the security on your Mac with a simple settings adjustment, you can enable the built-in software firewall. This offers a layer of protection by blocking many ports for common protocols, incoming connections, and other potential attack vectors. Generally, the Mac OS X Firewall is not necessary to use for … Read More

Play Movie Files Directly in Their Icons Using Finder of Mac OS X

Mar 9, 2010 - 5 Comments

Do you have a large directory of movies? Not sure what each video file actually is? If you’re in thumbnail view at a large enough resolution (looks like 68×68 is the threshold for me) or you’re viewing the folder in Cover Flow view, you can play movie files directly within the Finder of Mac OS … Read More

See a Preview of Fonts in Cover Flow & Quick Look of Mac OS X

Mar 8, 2010 - 2 Comments

Want to get a quick glance at a font style or a preview of the appearance of a font face before you install the font on a Mac? There are multiple ways to do this, and we’re going to show you two methods to see previews of fonts using the Finder of OS X. The … Read More

Compare Two Files with FileMerge in Mac OS X

Mar 4, 2010 - 11 Comments

FileMerge lets you select any two files and it will compare the two, pointing out any differences between the files. If you’re a developer you already know why this is wildly useful, as it makes tracking down major and minor code changes remarkably easy. Apparently FileMerge is a survivor from the days of NeXTStep, and … Read More

Minimize App Windows Into Dock Icons with a defaults String in OS X

Mar 2, 2010 - 8 Comments

If you’re tired of having your Mac Dock full of thumbnailed versions of minimized windows, you can change the Dock’s minimize behavior with a simple Terminal command that will minimize windows into the parent applications Dock icon. You can then tell which windows are minimized by looking for the diamond next to the window name … Read More

Use the Tab Key to Switch Between Dialog Buttons in Mac OS X

Feb 26, 2010 - 28 Comments

Would you prefer to use the keyboard to speed up navigation around your Mac? That’s what the Full Keyboard Access setting allows for. Using a Keyboard option, you can have the Tab Key able to switch between dialog buttons, fields, screen items, controls, and anything else in a dialog box within Mac OS X. This … Read More

Time Machine Backup Delayed? Here’s Why & How to Fix on Mac

Feb 25, 2010 - 2 Comments
Time Machine in Mac OS X

If you haven’t backed up with Time Machine in a while, the latest backup status will change to ‘Delayed’ and the menubar icon will have an exclamation mark in it reminding you to backup soon. There can be a variety of reasons the backups become delayed, and if you’re curious why this happens we’ll go … Read More

Force Preview to Open an Image File on Mac

Feb 24, 2010 - 1 Comment

Preview is one of my favorite Mac apps, but recently Preview.app was refusing to open some image files for what seemed like no reason. I wasn’t even able to drag the image file onto the Preview icon to open it, which is usually something that works if the Open menu doesn’t. I know the images … Read More

Find a Fast DNS Server with NameBench

Feb 23, 2010 - 26 Comments

There’s no shortage of DNS Server options out there, with Google DNS, OpenDNS, your own ISP’s, and the gazillion of others available to use. The question remains though, which of these DNS servers is going to be fastest for you? And how do you know which is fastest? That’s where NameBench comes in. NameBench is … Read More

Disable Dock Bouncing in Mac OS X

Feb 19, 2010 - 8 Comments

The bouncing Dock icons are a nice GUI feature that let you know an app is launching on the Mac, but for some people those little bouncing icons are just really annoying. Additionally, Dock icons will bounce to notify you that an alert is active in the app, or the app needs your attention. If … Read More

Change Font Smoothing Settings in Mac OS X

Feb 18, 2010 - 6 Comments
Font Smoothing example in MacOS

Mac OS X simplified the font smoothing settings (anti-aliasing) for Mac OS and all apps running within it, but for some the change is unwelcome. If you feel like your screen looks different, or that fonts look a little unusual and text looks different too, it probably does, and the change can be very profound … Read More

How to Move a Home Directory to Another Location on a Mac

Feb 16, 2010 - 10 Comments
Finder

Changing the location of your home directory is pretty easy in Mac OS X, and it can be desired for a variety of situations to store a home folder elsewhere on a Mac, or even on another drive. This is valid and works the same in all versions of OS X.

Disable the Crash Reporter Dialog in Mac OS X

Feb 15, 2010 - 2 Comments

If you’re a developer (or anyone else) you may quickly get fed up with the Crash Reporter Dialogue box that pops up when an app melts down and crashes in Mac OS X. If you’re pestered by the crash reporter dialog window, then you can quickly turn the window on and off with a defaults … Read More

How to Quit the Finder

Feb 12, 2010 - 36 Comments

At its core, the file and folder explorer of OS X known as Finder is essentially an application like any other on the Mac. Accordingly, users can quit the Mac OS X Finder in a few different ways which we’ll cover here, but perhaps the fastest way is to just launch the Terminal app and … Read More

How to Disable Access to System Preferences on Mac

Feb 11, 2010 - 9 Comments
System Preferences in Mac OS X

In some situations, you may wish to disable access to the System Preferences on a Mac. Often this is for lab environments or public use workstations, or perhaps for locking down a particular workstation for various reasons. While a common approach is to create a new user account that has limited access to system features … Read More

Change the Delay When Dragging Windows Within Spaces on Mac

Feb 10, 2010 - 8 Comments

Spaces is a really nice feature of Mac OS X that lets you place different windows and applications within their own workspace. Dragging a window to a new Space is just a matter of holding onto the window and pulling it towards the end of the screen. You may have noticed that there’s a delay … Read More

Lock the Dock in Mac OS X

Feb 8, 2010 - 11 Comments

If you need to prevent the Dock icons from changing or being modified on a Mac, you can use defaults command strings to lock down the OS X Dock and prevent any adjustments or changes to how it appears on screen.

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