muse

Ted Landau March 2005

Recently, a friend of mine requested help in solving a printing problem in Mac OS X. The road to the solution led me to reflect, yet again, on the nature of troubleshooting Apple's OS [Note: If you are a MacFixIt Pro member, check out my September 2004 column for a different take on this subject.] Mac OS X has a well-deserved reputation for being reliable. But, when things do go wrong, you may have to traverse some huge potholes to get to the solution. In many cases, even seasoned troubleshooters abandon any attempt to find … Read more

Ted Landau

Ah, the bliss of living in today?s wireless world. With my AirPort Base Station, I have been freed from the tangle of Ethernet cords that used to emanate from my collection of networked computers and printers. Gone is the need to run Ethernet cables behind walls, so as to avoid unsightly cables along the floor. With my AirPort Express, I can even play songs from my Mac?s iTunes Library on my audio equipment in the next room ? without any wires connecting the devices. My Bluetooth-equipped Mac connects to a Bluetooth mouse completely untethered. My mobile phone ? … Read more

Originally posted Wednesday, February 9th

Ted LandauFebruary 2005

I am a long-time hard-core AppleWorks user. Yes, I use Microsoft Office when I have to (which is actually fairly often; it?s pretty much required for the books and magazine articles I write). But I retain a fondness for AppleWorks and use it whenever I can.

My relationship with AppleWorks goes way back ? to when it first arrived on the scene as ClarisWorks. I was a reviewer for MacUser ? and was given the assignment of comparing a bunch of ?integrated software? packages. The competition included ClarisWorks, Microsoft Works, BeagleWorks, GreatWorks (from … Read more

Ted Landau January 2005

Years ago, while watching syndicated reruns of Star Trek, I was certain that some scenes were being cut from each episode. Sure enough, a few days later, an article in the newspaper confirmed this. The reason? Not censorship, but lack of time. More specifically, when the episodes first aired, the number of minutes devoted to commercials was several minutes less (per episode) than was presently the case. To make the reruns accommodate the increased commercial time, the station deleted a few scenes from each episode. This practice is now fairly common, and you will notice it … Read more

Ted Landau December 2004

I've been taking digital photos for several years. And my biggest dilemma has remained the same: what to do with the pictures after I download them to the computer.

Most of my photos remain in my iPhoto collection, unedited and unprinted. Occasionally, I have used iPhoto's print service. It has worked well overall, but there are some downsides: I don't like how long it takes to upload the photos, it takes several days for the pictures to return and -- if a picture does not come out the way I expected -- I … Read more

Ted Landau November 2004

Serendipity. The dictionary defines it as "making useful discoveries by accident." Serendipity was in full bloom for me when I attended O'Reilly's Mac OS X Conference in Santa Clara, CA last month -- where I happily and "accidentally" discovered several outstanding new software programs.

But before I get into that, for those of you not familiar with the O'Reilly conference, I highly recommend that you check it out when next year's event rolls around. The conference solidly hits a very appealing sweet spot: While obviously geared toward the … Read more

by Ted Landau

A recent news article declared the floppy disk to be officially dead. Although you can still buy these disks, it is true that floppy drives have entirely vanished as built-in drives on today's computers. They were doomed by their slow speed, low capacity, and relatively poor longevity. Mac users, of course, can say "I told you so!" -- Apple gave up on the floppy drive when it first introduced the iMac back in 1998! [True, at almost the same time, Apple stumbled by initially backing DVD drives in preference to CD-RW drives; but that'… Read more

by Ted Landau September 2004

Apple makes no secret of the fact that "beneath the surface of Mac OS X lies an industrial-strength UNIX foundation." It's touted on an Apple Web page titled, appropriately enough, "Based on UNIX." What is somewhat less clear is exactly what this implies for the typical or average Mac user. By "typical" or "average," I mean the Mac user who is about as interested in delving into UNIX as the average mobile phone user is interested in understanding the &… Read more

[Plus: Macworld Expo: past and future]

by Ted Landau

This another two-topic column. The first part considers the merits of replacing a perfectly working second generation iPod for one of the new fourth generation models. I consider some other iPod issues along the way -- and even throw in a music-related mention of the AirPort Express. The second part continues my reflections on Macworld Expo following the event that ended last month in Boston.

Moving on up: The new iPods

I replace my Macs about every 3 to 4 years. As I have two Macs, a desktop and a PowerBook, … Read more