appleJAC Macintosh Users

Creating a Slide Show for Windows Users

Q: I need help with is a slide show.  I have a batch of genealogy photos I want to put on a DVD so that other people to whom I give the DVD, Windows users included, will be able to see the slides, with them controlling the slides, that is, clicking to go to the next one.  Music would be nice.  I also want to put captions on each of the slides.

A: I have a couple of options for you.  One is low tech and the other is state of the art.

First Option

Create the presentation in whatever you are comfortable in.  Powerpoint, Keynote, iPhoto,.... whatever makes sense to you.  Then Print the document to a PDF file.  Acrobat is universal and plays exactly the same on Macs or PCs.  Version 7 or higher even lets you "play" the document as a presentation.  Low tech, but effective.

Second Option

Prepare the slides as an iPhoto Slideshow.  Select the images, add music, and then import this into iDVD and make a DVD of it.  The DVD gives the added benefit of being able to add music and make it look very professional.  It also allow it to be played on any DVD player, even without a computer.  If you want t make it even fancier, go from iPhoto to iMovie first and add captions, transitions, and music there, then take it to iDVD to burn it.

Member Question on Keyboard Shortcuts

Q: Is there any key on the macbook keyboard that performs this function of deleting material to the right of the cursor?

A: if you use the Function (fn) and "delete" key combination, you get a Right Delete.

Q: Is there any place that would have such keyboard information?

A: for a great program DoubleCommand to reassign your "Enter" key to Right Delete, try this link.

in fact, there are almost 10,000 cool tips and hints at Macosxhints which are searchable with keywords.

Thanks to appleJAC Board Member Tom Piper for the answers.

Edit an Album at a time in iTunes

Q: When I copy and put in by hand the album art in iTunes, is there any way to do it for an entire album?  I am currently putting the album art, that is not available at iTunes store, in one cut at a time.

A: In iTunes, select all the songs in the album you want to add art for.  Press Command-I (for get info.)  iTunes will ask if you really want to edit all of these together, click Yes.  Now you will see a panel that lets you make a change to all the songs information at the same time.  Just click the box next to the Album Cover box, past in the cover and press OK.

Question on Mounting a Drive

Q: I inadvertently put one of my backup drives off line.  I tried to find a way to put it on line again but ended up just restarting.  Is there some other easier way, without rebooting that I'm missing?

A: Go to Disk Utility, select the offline drive and press the Mount button.

Question on Photos for a Screen Saver

Q: In system preferences, when I work on the desktop photo, if I select something from the albums above the line I can use the option to change it every 30 minutes, although then the photos seem distorted to me.  But if I choose one of the random iPhoto albums that are below the line, it won't let me use the automatic change every 30 minutes feature.  Why?  Any reason that the photos would be distorted?

First off, if you have selected fit to screen, it is going to stretch the photo to fill the screen.  If the relative ratio of width to height is different from 16:9., one side gets stretched too much.

In iPhoto, you cannot make them change over time.  But if you go to iPhoto and export the same photos to a folder, place the folder in the pictures folder of your user, and select it, it will let it change.  This is because it doesn't really access iPhoto if you choose one of the photos from there. It copies it out.   Choosing a group that changes would require iPhoto to export them all and it will not do that automatically.  That is why you need to help it a little.

Accessing my iDisk on .Mac

Q:  Can I give windows users access to the public forder on my iDisk?

A:  Sure, all it takes is the right URL for any web browser.  The general link is as follows:

"http://homepage.mac.com/member_name/.Public/filename"

just use your member name to replace the member_name portion and use the name of the file you want them to see to replace filename.  Files and folders that are in folders on your iDisk other than the Sites folder must have the top-level folder name, preceded by a period, and appended to the URL prefix.

The only the following folders can be accessed are:

• Music
• Movies
• Pictures
• Public
• Sites

But remember, if you give someone access to a folder other than Public, they need to have your password so the best option is to put the files you want to share in the Public folder.

Locked Files

Q: While doing my backup this am got a message that a certain file could not be backed up because a jpg file on it was "locked." What does that mean?  Could access the file with no trouble.  How do I change that?

A: If you do a get info on the file, you should be able to uncheck the locked check box.

Delete my Mail Attachments

Q: How can I delete attachments without deleting the messages themselves?

A: Select the messages in question, then go to Message>Remove attachments. This will create a duplicate copy of the message without attachments. The original message, including attachments, will be marked for deletion or moved to the trash mailbox, depending on your settings. Once you purge your messages or empty your trash, the attachments are not recoverable.

Where's my Mail?

Q: I use an IMAP mail server. Where are my Apple Mail attachments stored?

A: They are stored on the mail server and also cached on your computer with messages in your Inbox (INBOX.imapmbox). This is different from Eudora, which stores attachments in your Attachments folder, separate from the messages. Apple Mail’s Inbox is stored in your home directory, in this location: Library>Mail>IMAPusername @yourmailserver>INBOX.imapmbox (where username is your username and yourmailserver is your mail server’s hostname, such as po14.mit.edu).

If you’ve created subfolders on the IMAP mail server, their .imapmbox files can be found in the INBOX folder, in the same location as your INBOX.imapmbox file.

What is an RSS Feed?

Q: What is an RSS Feed?

A: RSS is a format for syndicating news and the content of news-like sites, including major news sites like Wired, news-oriented community sites like Slashdot, and personal weblogs. But it's not just for news. Pretty much anything that can be broken down into discrete items can be syndicated via RSS: the "recent changes" page of a wiki, a changelog of CVS checkins, even the revision history of a book. Once information about each item is in RSS format, an RSS-aware program can check the feed for changes and react to the changes in an appropriate way.

In Savari, when you see the RSS icon in the link bar of the browser, press the icon and see the RSS feed for the site.  Then you can save the feed as a bookmark to get back to it quickly.

Question on Hard Drive Enclosurers

Q:I plan to buy a hard disk enclosure along with a hard disk to attach to a laptop and I have a few questions.

1. Do I need a an IDE cable to connect the disk to the enclosure? Neither the disk I plan to get (Seagate Barracuda) nor any of the enclosures I have checked out mentioned anything about shipping with one or whether one is required.

A: Every one I have ever worked with comes with the internal cable

2. Should the jumper settings on the hard drive be set to slave?

A:  No, they all work much the same.  The jumper on the drive needs to be set to Master.

3. Is it possible to boot from these external enclosures? (The laptop contains both USB and FireWire ports)

A: It's great to be a Mac user here.  Firewire will work to boot any mac with a firewire port.  If you have a newer mac. a very new mac, it will even boot to the USB2 port.

Members ask about Sharing a Printer

Q: I have a single printer and two Macs.  Can I use it on both without unplugging it?

A: Sharing printers in Mac OS 10.2 or later is relatively simple.

1. From the Apple menu, select System Preferences.
2. Click on the Sharing icon.
3. In the Sharing window, click on the "Services" tab.
4. Click on the "Printer Sharing" checkbox to select it.

Printer sharing should start automatically and any printer appearing in your Printer Center printer list is now available to every computer on your local area network.

In Mac OS 10.3, the procedure is similar to the one used for 10.2 except that it's possible to exclude printers that are not connected directly to your computer. In Mac OS 10.2-10.2.8, users could share printers directly connected to their computer plus printers which they were connected to on their LAN. Users accessing shared printers on another user's computer would often find that the LAN printers would appear in their printer list several times, which was confusing. Mac OS 10.3 allows users to share only the printers attached via USB.

In Mac OS 10.4 the printer sharing setup is different than in earlier versions of the Mac OS. Go to the Apple menu, select System Preferences and then click on the Printer & Fax icon. In the window which appears there will be 3 tabs, the rightmost one being the Sharing tab. Click on Sharing tab to reveal a list of the printers currently configured for use by the computer. Check the Share these printers with other computers checkbox and then check the boxes to the left of the printers which are to be shared by other users.

One real benifit of doing this is that is still gives you access to the printer utilities made by the manufacturer.  If you choose to share a printer through your airport, you loose that ability.

Thanks to Mark Snell for the question idea.

How to use the sound input port?

Q: I'm damned if I can find ANYTHING to stick in the in-put jack on the Mac Book that will record. I'm still futzing around...using a USB headset for skype calls...but I can't figure out what hell that jack is FOR.

A: On a MacBook, the default input device is the built-in mic.  If you want to use the port on the machine, all you have to do is go to System Preferences:Sound, select the Input tab, and select the Line in as the active input port.  That should make it work.

Is Someone using my Email Address?

Q: A friend of mine told me that she was getting Spam emails from me and that someone might be using my email address.

A: This sounds like a serious case of virus infection. Not necessarily in yours or your friends computer but someone else who just happens to have your e-mail address, as well as your friends, in the typical mail application address list. These virii/worms/whatever often tend to mine the infected computer for things that look like e-mail addresses and then sends mail to these people while at the same time spoofing the return address as another name on the list. This e-mail would also carry a copy of the worm/virus, that if opened, would infect the next victim's computer. Using the hypothesis that one name on the list might be familiar to another name on the list increases the chance it would get opened.

What to do about it? There isn't much you can do. One of your friends has an infected Windows machine. I don't think this stuff propagates through the Mac platform. Which friend? Hard to say. If one of your e-mail acquaintances happens to complain of a suddenly slow computer, they might be the one.

Thanks to appleJAC Digest Editor Bruce Heerboth for the great answer.  This is another reason that "Friends don't let friends use Windows"....

Learn More about Airport Networks...

One of the presentations at the July appleJAC meeting was about setting up Airport networks.  In the presentation, setting up a single basestation and multiple base stations was discussed.  In addition, Extending your network with an Airport Express was discussed.

Apple's AirPort uses the 802.11g wireless standard to deliver data rates — up to 54 Mbps. It supports both Macs equipped with an AirPort Extreme Card and Wi-Fi-compliant 802.11g Windows PCs, as well as Macs with the older AirPort Card and 802.11b Windows PCs. Using Airport, everyone in your family can surf the web wire-free because AirPort provides simultaneous wireless Internet access via your DSL or cable modem for between to 10 and 50 computers depending on the Airport you select.

As promiced, the slides from the presentation have been made available on the appleJAC website.  Near the end of the presentation, one of the slides includes links to more information about setting up airport networks.

These included:

Apple's publication Designing Airport Networks

Apples Airport Support Page

If you have further Questions on Airport Networking, be sure to add them into a comment to this post.

Looking up old Articles on the Site

Q: How do I look up old articles on the website?

A: Let's say you are looking for an article about one of our members, Tom Piper. There are a couple of ways to go about finding it. Easiest is to look in the Month it was created. June in this case. On the right side of the site, near the bottom, there is a topic called Archives where you can bring up a month at a time.

Another way is by Category. On the right side of the site, near the bottom, are the categories. In this case "Members" is the category.

Once you find the article, click Permalink just under it. That goes to the physical link to the article. That's the one that never changes. You can bookmark it or send it in an email to others. It will always remain the same.

Don't forget, the webmaster welcomes comments. Under each article, you can click on comments and add your thoughts. Feel free to expand on the topic or just tell me I am all wet whit the post.

Questions about Quicktime vs Quicktime Pro

Q: Should I upgrade from Quicktime to Quicktime Pro?

A: So what do you get with Quicktime Pro?

Watch movies full screen? Save your favorite movie trailers on your computer to watch over and over again? Create compelling slideshows—complete with a soundtrack? Record video and share it with friends and family?

You can do all of that — and much more — with QuickTime 7 Pro. Available for Mac OS X and Windows XP, QuickTime 7 Pro offers a perfect solution for anyone who enjoys watching, recording, creating or sharing high-quality multimedia.

And as a powerful application ideal for creating high-quality audio and video content, QuickTime 7 Pro lets you create H.264 video, capture audio and video, create multi-channel audio and export multiple files as you continue to playback or edit video. Powerful and easy to use, it’s also very affordable. You can upgrade to QuickTime 7 Pro for just $29.99.

If you use iMovie or FinalCut Pro, it is not needed to edit native DV video but Quicktime Pro allow you to edit other video formats (AVI in particular) and to save to the AVI format. It also allows you to do basic video editing without an application like iMovie. Nice for triming a clip without opening and importing it into an edit application.

One real benifit of Quicktime Pro is the ability to save quicktime movies to your harddisk. Without Pro, you can view them but with Pro, you get to save in multiple formats.

It’s a snap to upgrade to QuickTime Pro. You simply purchase a registration code that gives you access to additional capabilities.

Questions on Extending An Airport Base Station

Q: I have an airport network for my and my wife's macs here. Her room is directly above my den, which is in the basement, and so she gets a good signal. If I go up into our dining room, living room the signal is weak and if I go into the family room, I get no signal. Is there any equipment that I can get that will enhance the signal within the house? Thanks.

A: There are a couple of ways to go about this. First off, if you have an Airport Extreme with an antenna port on the back, you can get an antenna to enhance the signal from the extreme. It just plugs in and the airport recognizes it. MacWireless sells them. In theory, this is an easy solution but I must tell you, antennas are dependent on the place they are located. If you were extending the network over an open area, that works great but extending in a house seems to be less reliable. These antenna cost from about $30 and go up to over a hundred.

In my opinion, a better solution, if you are using an airport extreme is to extend the network with an airport express. This works through a technology built into the airports called WDS. WDS stands for Wireless Distribution System.

WDS is described in IEEE 802.11. An airport access point can be either a main, relay or remote base station. A main base station is typically connected to the wired Ethernet. A relay base station relays data between remote base stations, wireless clients or other relay stations to either a main or another relay main station. A remote base station accepts connections from wireless clients and passes them to relay or main stations.

For what you want to do, an Apple Airport Express can act as a relay base station. Keep in mind that each base station will provide signal for a 50 to 150 ft range. If you locate the Express within that circle, it then extends for the same distance. In this way, if you placed an Express on the upper floor, connect it to the Extreme with WDS and it will extend the range.

Also, I'd like to put in a request to have one of our meetings, or a class from you, take us through step by step setting up a network with an Airport Extreme device. That would really be helpful. (Plus a session, or the same one, on picking up a wi fi connection with your laptop.)