[nylug-talk] My PC laptop dies. I am having to use a Mac.

[H. G.]

On 10/20/07, Brandorr <brandorr at opensolaris.org> wrote:
>
> Well, I need to know:
>
> - Fusion or Parallels?


Parallels.  (But really, choose to your taste.)

- How do you do system administration of the underlying OS?


Depends.  What are you trying to do?  Its designed to be stupid simple.
Don't like an app? Drag it out of Applications and into the Trash bin.
Passwords and users are managed by NIS(I think).  So to get at user,
group and etc. information, you'd use the 'nicl' utility.

'nicl . -list /' will give you a readout of the top level NetInfo directories.
'nicl . -list /users' shows you the users the system recognizes.

- What is the best browser? Opera, Safari, Ffox, or Camino


Again, your taste.  (I'd recommend Opera.)

- Are there any good IMAP clients that index your stores for fast searching?


Grab your favorite open source imap client using MacPorts or Fink.

- Is fink the way to go for Opensource apps?


Up to you.  I use MacPorts.

- What is the best terminal program?


iTerm (http://iterm.sf.net)

- What is the best program for keyboard shortcuts? (I want to be able
> to pop up terminal windows with a few keystrokes.)


Quicksilver. (http://quicksilver.blacktree.com/
) It will take some getting used
to, but Quicksilver is _the_ way of doing this on the Mac.

- What the heck is widgets/dashboard? It seems like a waste.


Agreed.  You can Google around to find an article telling you how to
disable them.
Though some websites do provide widgets which will run in your Dashboard, so
its not _entirely_ pointless.  You can run iStat Pro in your Daskboard to
give you
running 'top' information: see which processes are consuming the most
memory,
CPU time, available disk space, network activity, etc.
(http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/status/istatpro.html)

- Are iCal, iChat, etc worth using?


*shrugs*  Only way to find out is to try.  You can always remove them if you
despise
them.

- What is supposed to be so good about Mac OS X?


Nice GUI + UNIX infrastructure, with a lot of the standards you'd
expect from a UNIX
machine.  All your favorite programming environments are easily
accessible in a terminal
(many terminal apps to choose from); there is also the integrated X
server.  Not the
newest X around, but it does quite well for SSH X sessions.  Run Photoshop
and Illustrator
problem-free while at the same time spawning a make process with gcc
instances crunching
away.

- RSS Reader?


Got me there.  (Safari?)

- I hear that Macs make good developer laptops. Why?


Same answer as the "whats supposed to be so good about them".
UNIX programming environment with the addition of an nice GUI
if you need it.  If you want to use Mac native tools and compilers,
you can download Xcode.  If you want GNU stuff instead, you can
get it through Fink or Macports.


- Are there any "must have" apps I should go download?


For media, there is VLC, if you want, but if you'd prefer to use Apple's
own player (Quicktime), you can download Perian (http://perian.org/) to
give Quicktime support for more formats, ie., Windows stuff and DivX
stuff.  I think Colloquy is a decent and pleasant IRC client.  Nowhere
_near_ as powerful as irssi, and I don't think it packs half the features
of XChat, but it will do the job nicely if all you want to do is just chat.
(http://colloquy.info/)  I recommended iTerm already; its a better
Terminal than Terminal.app, which is the native Mac OS X Terminal
accessible under 'Applications/Utilities'.  Also, a lot of Mac programmers
swear by Textmate, (http://macromates.com/), but if you're a vim or
emacs man, then just pop it up in iTerm.  I know I might be forgetting
some, you'll get more suggestions from others.

Oh, yes, the excellent iStat Menus.  If you hate the Dashboard, then
iStat Menus (http://www.iSlayer.com) will give you running top information
in your menubar, at the top of your screen.  You get one-click drop down
menu info on CPU, disk, memory, network, time, whatever.  Its nice.

P.S. I didn't break my Viao on purpose, it's just that my hd is
> spewing smart errors.


My condolences.

On 10/20/07, Zachary Whitley <mail at zacharywhitley.com> wrote:
> > Brandorr wrote:
> > > Anyone know a UG or mailing list where I can get help?
> > >
> > >
> > What exactly is the problem?
> >
> _____________________________________________________________________________
> > Hire expert Linux talent by posting jobs here :: http://jobs.nylug.org
> > The nylug-talk mailing list is at arallenylug-talk at nylug.org
> > The list archive is at http://nylug.org/pipermail/nylug-talk
> > To subscribe or unsubscribe:
> http://nylug.org/mailman/listinfo/nylug-talk
> >
>
>
> --
> - Brian Gupta
>
> http://opensolaris.org/os/project/nycosug/
>
> _____________________________________________________________________________
> Hire expert Linux talent by posting jobs here :: http://jobs.nylug.org
> The nylug-talk mailing list is at nylug-talk at nylug.org
> The list archive is at http://nylug.org/pipermail/nylug-talk
> To subscribe or unsubscribe: http://nylug.org/mailman/listinfo/nylug-talk
>