appleJAC Macintosh Users

Twain Sane makes old scanners new again

 From Tom Piper, appleJAC Editor

With the advances in Leopard, a number of USB devices became inoperable . . . my portable flatbed bus-powered CanoScan N656U scanner was on of them, and it is a nice simple ease-to-use quality scanner.

I found a great TWAIN SANE Interface for MacOS X (http://www.ellert.se/twain-sane/) that really works well with the new Adobe Photoshop Elements 6 . . . previously, it couldn't even see an attached USB scanner, now it knows it by name. On the other hand, although Image Capture sees the scanner, and activates it, it seems unable to capture the image.

if you didn't already know about this free set of utility drivers, it is very successful in assuring continued use of some older equipment . . .

Want to change your Macs Logon Name

One thing that has been a problem for a long time is finding a way to change an incorrectly typed short name for your user logon.  Here is a trick I saw in MacLife magazine......

The only works in MacOS 10.5.  Start by going to System Preferences: Accounts.  Click on the lock icon near the lower left and type your password to be able to make changes.   Next control-click on the user name and a selection opens called Advanced Options.  Select that option and see the dialog box below.




There are only two things you dare change and they must both match.  First, change the "Short Name" to the new name you want to use.  Then in the field "Home Directory", change the part of the name after "/Users/" to match the short name you used.

A couple of warnings.  Only do this if you have a complet backup of the user folder.  My recommendation would be to use a Short Name that contains no spaces.

Make your New Apple Mighty Mouse act like your old Mouse

So you have a new mac with one of those new fancy Mighty Mouse mice but as hard as you try, you just can't get used to all the button locations. If you feel more comfortable in using a standard type Apple Mouse, you can adjust the settings to make the Mighty Mouse not quite so mighty.  Just set the System Preferences for Mouse and Keyboard like the window shown here.

With those setting, your new mouse acts just like the old but you can still use the ball to scroll.

Lesa's Graphic Secrets for MUGs: How to resize images from digital cameras

This is the first in a series of tutorials on dealing with and editing digital images. This month Lesa explains how  resolution works and when you need to worry about it. Using the affordable, yet powerful, Adobe Photoshop Elements  6, she'll show you how to resize an image fresh from your digital camera for both print and email. Hope you enjoy the tutorial! 

Read the full article from Lesa.

Creating X-Axis Chart Labels in Excel 2008

Q:I must say the new version of Microsoft Office has suddenly made me less productive. I can't even make the most simple charts in Excel (Which was easy before).

Can you make a chart from this data that shows:
1. Number of images in columns
2. Number of images is the vertical axis
3. Year is the horizontal axis and labeled as such (not 1,2,3...)

I've ordered a book on Microsoft Office but it's not out yet.

A:  It's a bug in Excel 2008 but there is a work around......

Okay, here's how to do it (explanation courtesy of Bob Greenblatt — there's no way I could have figured this out on my own!):

To specify a range of cells as the labels on the X axis, click on one of the data series in the chart (for example, click on one of the colours in a bar chart).

When you do, you will see a range appear in the floating formula bar. In my case, the range in the formula bar was:

=SERIES(Summary!$A$5,,Summary!$B$5:$R$5,3)

The space between the two commas is where the X axis labels are specified. In my case, for whatever reason, Excel didn't pick up the labels when I created the chart. I added the range of cells containing the X axis labels (cells B3 through R3) like so:

=SERIES(Summary!$A$5,Summary!$B$3:$R$3,Summary!$B$5:$R$5,3)

Wireless Printing with Airport

All of Apple's airport products now have a USB port that can be used for sharing a printer.  The real problem is finding out if the printer you have (or are thinking about purchaseing) will work connected this way.  This is where iFelix comes in.

The website called iFelix has an exhaustive list of printers that have been tested with Apple's Airport technology built on Bonjour.  Not only are working printers listed, but they also list printers that they know for sure does not work. 

In my experience, sharing a printer this way is a great way to wirelessly print from a laptop.

Creating Web Clip Widgets

Leopard makes it easy to create a Dashboard widget from a segment of a web page. For example, you can capture a “new releases” list from a media website, or the “latest posts” field from an Internet discussion group. These Web Clips appear, automatically updated, whenever you open Dashboard.

Click on the Web Clip button.  The entire page darkens save for a bright rectangle. Drag the rectangle from its center and edges until it covers the segment you want to capture. Then click Add and Safari sends your Web Clip to Dashboard.

(If Safari doesn’t display the Web Clip button, choose Customize Toolbar in Safari’s View menu and add the button to Safari’s toolbar.)

Now the Web Clip appears as a new widget in Dashboard. You can still edit it: Move your cursor over the widget’s lower-right corner until a small letter i appears. Click it to resize or reposition the content, or customize its border using built-in styles.

Create an iCal Event from Apple Mail

Leopard is smart—smart enough to recognize dates within the text of an email in Apple Mail.
When your cursor hovers over a date in the body of an email, a dotted rectangle surrounds the date, and a small arrow appears. Hold on the arrow, and up pop two iCal options: Create New iCal Event and Show This Date in iCal.

Choosing Create New iCal Event generates a dialog box. Its default name is the subject line of the original email, though you can change it here. You can also specify the location and duration of the event and add additional notes. When you’re finished, choose Add to iCal. Leopard adds the date to your calendar—without even opening iCal.

Not sure if you’re available? Choose Show This Date in iCal. This opens iCal at the date in question, but doesn’t add the event to your schedule.

So your Scroll ball on your Mouse won't......

Although your Mighty Mouse never needs to be fed or watered, you may occasionally find that you need to clean it.

If your Mighty Mouse is covered in fingerprints or its surface has become soiled, it can be gently wiped with a clean lint-free cloth. If necessary, moisten the cloth using only water, making sure not to oversaturate it. Be aware that the mouse contains electronic components that may be damaged if water drips from the cloth into the mouse via the seam around the scroll ball or around its underside.

The same procedure can be used to clean the scroll ball on your Mighty Mouse if it has become discolored or dirty. Use a clean lint-free cloth lightly moistened with water. Wipe the ball and the surrounding area, making sure to rotate the ball itself to ensure complete coverage. If the scrolling feels rough or if the scroll ball isn't scrolling up, down, or side-to-side, hold the mouse upside-down and roll the ball vigorously while cleaning it to help dislodge any particles that may have collected on the internal hardware.

For a QuickTime movie demonstration, click here (the movie is approximately 600 KB).

ColorSync Utilities

Mac OS X contains a number of useful utilities that can enhance creative workflows. In the root-level folder /Library/Scripts/ColorSync are editable AppleScript utilities that perform various common design tasks.

Say, for example, you have a collection of images in a directory that you would like to prepare for the web by embedding the sRGB color profile. Rather than open the images individually to assign the profile, you could use the "Embed chosen profile" script instead by simply dragging-and-dropping your collection of images on that script's icon in the Colorsync folder. A real time-saver when dealing with hundreds of images. And, because these scripts are editable, you can customize them to be specific to your workflow needs.

Knowing When to (Force) Quit

With the Force Quit command in OS X, you can escape from “frozen” applications on your Mac without shutting down the whole computer or disrupting work in other programs.

If an application hasn’t responded for a while to mouse clicks, trackpad scrolling, or other persuasive actions, click on the Apple menu and select Force Quit.

A pop-up window lists all the applications you currently have open. Stalled applications are listed in red and say (not responding) after the application name. Scroll up and down through the list with the arrow keys, or just click on an application name to select — then click Force Quit to exit only that program. You can restart the application from your Dock or Applications menu, but any unsaved changes may be lost.

But there’s an even easier Force Quit trick: Simultaneously press Command-Option-Esc and the Force Quit pop-up appears — an especially useful trick if your Finder has frozen and you can’t select the pull-down Apple menu.

Importing Photos into Events in iPhoto 08

Q: I've been doing some image "house cleaning" on my office PC, in preparation for the iMac.
I've backed up about 6,000 images to a network drive.

Now, I can still just access these images from Windows (on the mac), but I thought I would want to pull some of these into iPhoto for all the obvious reasons.

But If I pull 5K images into iPhoto '08, it's gonna try to put these in events and they are just not organized in that manner. And I'd be left with a hell of a lot of sorting/merging/spitting.

What is the best way to import them and make events that make since?

A: Did some testing....

I created this file structure......

I selected the Folder called "Import Test" and it created these events.

This verifies that iPhoto will create an event for each folder it finds.  I would hone the organization of the files as they are on the drive now and then just do one massive import and let iPhoto handle the rest.

iPhoto, Aperture: Yellow exclamation marks appear on some book images

When you design a book or order prints, a yellow "exclamation point" warning symbol indicates any low-resolution photos or images in a book. This warning lets you know that edits you have applied to these images have reduced the pixel density to a point that they may not print well.

This happens most often due to cropping. If you crop too much, there may not be enough remaining pixels to get a good printed result.

To improve a photo's print quality

• Choose a smaller print size. In a book layout, you can do this by increasing the number of photos per page.
• If you previously cropped the photo, revert to its original version and crop off a smaller portion, or leave it uncropped.
• If you positioned a photo within its book frame by zooming in on it, zoom out of the photo.

A digital photo is made up of millions of individual dots of color, called pixels. A photo's "resolution" is the number of dots per inch (dpi) that it contains. Some photos may look jagged or blurry when printed if their resolution is too low.

A Few iPhone Tips and Tricks

After working with the iPhone for a few days, here are a fw tips and tricks that I have found.  THe first one I figured out but the next two are from Mac Rumors.

Folders in Mail

I wondered how I could create folders to put some of my email in on my account.  Normally, I use POP to check my email and I found no way to have any other folders show up on a POP account.  I then tried using the IMAP server for the same account and found that any folders I created on the IMAP server show up on the iPhone.  This allows me to save a few emails in a folder to refer to later.

Here are a few I found on MacRumors

Safari Web Browser

I just found this today and thought it was a really useful feature. I was reading TUAW on my iPhone and got to the bottom of their news feed and wanted to go to another site. I was beginning to scroll back up to the top to get to the URL entry field and accidentally hit the top bar, the one with AT&T and signal strength and the time and battery life and found myself at the top of the page staring right at the URL field. So amazingly simple and brilliant.

In short:

1. You're at the bottom (or anywhere) of a webpage on your iPhone and want to go to the URL field.
2. Tap the top bar with the time and battery life indicator.
3. Boom! You're at the URL entry field!

Typing a Period (or and other Punctuation)

When typing, here's a quick way to input a period. Click on the .?123 button and slide your finger over to the period (or comma) and release. A period will be written, and the keyboard will go back to letters. Alternatively, click the .?123 button with your left thumb and tap the period button with the other. Again, you'll get the period and the keyboard will switch back to letters.

iPhoto: How do I change the theme or type of my book, card, or calendar?

If you would like to change the theme of your book, card, or calendar to another theme but are concerned that this change may affect your images and text, you can make a duplicate copy of the book and make your changes to the copy. That way you can compare the original to the modified copy to see if any data was lost.

Please follow these steps to duplicate the book, card, or calendar:

1. In iPhoto, Control-click (hold down the Control key and click) the item you would like to duplicate in the Source column on the left and choose Duplicate from the shortcut menu (or select the item and press Command-D).
2. Click the Themes icon in the bottom left of the screen. A message will warn you that text may be lost. Click OK.
3. Browse the various themes and templates for your book, card, or calendar and make your selection. You can also change the cover type of your book.

Be sure to preview your selection before you place your order to confirm that the text and images look right. Here's how to preview:

1. Select your book from the Source list on the left.
2. Choose File > Print or press Command-P.
3. Click the Preview button on the bottom left. This will create a portable document format (PDF) file and display the file using the Preview application.
4. If you are happy with the book, close the PDF file, return to iPhoto, and click the Buy Book button.

iChat: Which third-party USB cameras are compatible with iChat in Mac OS X 10.4.9 or later?

For iChat video chats in Mac OS X 10.4.9 and later, you can use a third-party USB camera which is UVC compliant (or, of course, a built-in or external iSight camera).

This article tells which Logitech cameras are UVC compatible.

See Hidden Info about your Files

Want more info on your files than the standard icon view provides (after all, it just gives you the file’s name in icon view)? Then turn on Show Item info. This adds an extra line of information below many files and folders that can be very useful. For example, now not only do you get a folder’s name, but just below the name (in unobtrusive light-blue, 9-point type), you’ll see how many items are in that folder.

If the file is an image, the Item Info shows you how big it is. MP3 files show how long the song is, etc. To turn on Item Info for your current Finder window, press Command-J to bring up its View Options. Then turn on the checkbox for Show Item Info. If you want to show the item info for every window (globally), then choose the All Windows button at the top of the dialog.

From Scott Kelby’s “Mac OS X Tiger Killer Tips,” packed with cool inside secrets, slick workarounds, undocumented shortcuts, and sneaky tricks to help you use Mac OS X.

Sorting Apple's AirPort Menu

This tip comes from Jeff Gamet at the Mac Observer

Apple's AirPort menu item gives you quick access to the available WiFi networks near your Mac, but it lists those networks alphabetically. I think viewing the network list by signal strength makes more sense, and someone at Apple must agree.

To view WiFi networks by signal strength instead of alphabetically, simply hold down the Option key while you click the AirPort menu item. The list of networks will rearrange itself so that the strongest signal is at the top of the list and the weakest is at the bottom.

Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a way to make this the default view, but at least the Option-click feature is easy to remember.

Want Firefox to be your default browser?

Apple has a new knowledgebase article on this:

Learn how to change the default Mac OS X email and Web browser applications with Mail and Safari, in Mac OS X 10.3 or later.

Note: If you are accustomed to using Internet preferences in earlier versions of Mac OS X, note that Internet preferences is not included with Mac OS X 10.3 or later. In Mac OS X 10.3 or later, use Mail and Safari to change your default applications.

Choosing an email application other than Mail

1. Open Mail (/Applications/Mail).
2. From the Mail menu, choose Preferences.
3. Click the General button.
4. Choose your desired default email application from the Default Email Reader pop-up menu.
5. Note: You may need to set up the email application with your email account information. This information is not automatically exported from Mail.

Choosing a default Web browser other than Safari

1. Open Safari (/Applications).
2. From the Safari menu, choose Preferences.
3. Click the General button.
4. Choose a different browser from the Default Web Browser pop-up menu.
5. Safari and Mail shouldn't be deleted

After changing your default application, you should not delete Safari or Mail, even if you do not plan to use them. You will need them if you wish to change your default settings in the future.

So, if you like Foxfire as a browser, make it your default.

Is Spotlight not finding things you know are there?

Spotlight: How to re-index folders or volumes

Want to re-index a folder—or even an entire volume—for Spotlight (part of Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger)? Just do this:

• From the Apple menu, choose System Preferences.
• Click Spotlight.
• Click the Privacy tab.
• Drag a folder or even an entire volume (your hard drive) to the list.
• Remove the item or volume you just added.
• Spotlight will re-index the contents of the item you initially dragged to the list.

Note: You can only add folders or items to the Privacy tab that you have ownership permissions for. For more information about ownership and permissions, see this article and this one.