New switcher questions and comments

[Xenious]

So most of my standard questions have been answered by my "in a nutshell" book, but I have a few other questions and some comments which may help new switchers.

Questions:
1) My display seems like the gamma is too high or the contrast is too high. Is there a way to adjust this with some configuration file or hack?

I do find it nice that Apple hides a lot of things that aren't needed, but I don't like that there aren't detailed video card adjustement options. It's not the monitor (new 23") because when it was plugged into my Windows box it wasn't this gamma high.


2) Is there a weather tool that has live information and weather alerts/radar maps, etc?

Coming from windows I'm used to Weatherbug which would pull live data from a weather monitoring station just down the road a mile or two. Right now I'm using Konfabulator's weather plug-in for basic information.


3) Entourage 2004: Anytime I switch folders within the app it re-expands all the organized views (Last week, monday, etc). Is there any way to make it remember? Outlook always kept the last settings viewed.


4) Fire: Anyone know of a skin to make it look like trillian?

5) iPhoto: How does everyone use it? Just for pictures they took? As a picture browser?

I'm disappointed that it isn't quite like an iTunes for pictures. I would rather it left all my pix in on big folder rather than copy them off to another one.

---

So here's my comments and tips

1) iTunes migration from a Windows machine: This is really really easy. All I did was copy over my iTunes music folder to my Music folder on the Mac. Once I started up iTunes it read in the database and was ready to go. I was very impressed on the cross platform functionality.

2) Keyboard, Mouse: I found that for a switcher a Microsoft mouse and keyboard plus Intellitype and Intellipoint makes all the difference. Very nice and familiar. Yea 5 button mouse!

3) Entourage: Microsoft needs to be ashamed at their migration tools. It would not be hard for them to make a .pst file importer or even have Entourage use pst files. They should be ashamed. I did manage to move all my email with the use of an IMAP server (very cool), but exporting and importing contacts via tab/comma delimited files really sucks. It can't seem to get it right.

Thanks for any tips, I'm loving the new OS...
-jim

 

[King Cobra]

--> 1) My display seems like the gamma is too high or the contrast is too high. Is there a way to adjust this with some configuration file or hack?

System Preferences > Displays (or Monitors for older versions of OS X) > Color > Calibrate...



--> 2) Is there a weather tool that has live information and weather alerts/radar maps, etc?

A bunch of applications/scripts to test

 

[MikeLaRiviere]

1) My display seems like the gamma is too high or the contrast is too high. Is there a way to adjust this with some configuration file or hack?

Mac gamma is always higher, as any graphic designer will always tell you. Mac users, of coure, feel that the Windows gamma is too low. You can, however, adjust it in System Preferences > Displays > Color. Choosing sRGB Profile will give you a Windows-like gamma. Alternatively, you can calibrate the screen yourself.

2) Is there a weather tool that has live information and weather alerts/radar maps, etc?

WeatherPop is a toolbar application that will display the weather, real-time, for you. Get it at http://www.VersionTracker.com.

5) iPhoto: How does everyone use it? Just for pictures they took? As a picture browser?

I'm disappointed that it isn't quite like an iTunes for pictures. I would rather it left all my pix in on big folder rather than copy them off to another one.

I use it just for the photos I took, or that others took, as you said. I'm somewhat confused about your next statement, because iTunes copies your music in the exact same way iPhoto does. You can always delete the source file in either program. Hope this helps.

Mike LaRiviere

 

[jsw]

WeatherPop is a toolbar application that will display the weather, real-time, for you.

Agreed. Fantastic app. You can also get it from the source at http://www.glu.com/products/weatherpop/index.html.

 

[emw]

Questions:

5) iPhoto: How does everyone use it? Just for pictures they took? As a picture browser?

I'm disappointed that it isn't quite like an iTunes for pictures. I would rather it left all my pix in on big folder rather than copy them off to another one.

I use iPhoto mainly for storing pictures I've taken and sorting them into meaningful categories.

I also use it as a simple image editing tool for removing red-eye and other simplistic tasks that don't require the power of a Photoshop or something like that.

I wish it were a little faster loading up - I should probably fork over the cash for iLife to get the newest version, but I've been too cheap.

 

[Xenious]

I use it just for the photos I took, or that others took, as you said. I'm somewhat confused about your next statement, because iTunes copies your music in the exact same way iPhoto does. You can always delete the source file in either program. Hope this helps.

Mike LaRiviere

Cool thanks all for the tips. Per iTunes though you can tell it to keep your library in a different folder or can't you tell it to leave the file where it is on your drive?

I'm getting there with OSX. As a very technical person (IT staff now IT manager) it's a bit of a change to let go and have a simpler interface (terminal and unix goodies set aside). It took me about a day to "move in" and I'm still getting things installed and setup, but I'm very very pleased.
-jim

 

[Horrortaxi]

You can put your music in any folder/drive you want. Just tell iTunes where it is.

iPhoto--I just use it to hold and organize my pictures. They go from the camera or the scanner into iPhoto and if I need to use of of them (adjust resize, print, whatever) I drag it out of iPhoto (which makes a copy) and work with that in Photoshop. It's just like keeping regular photos in a drawer. It's got more power than that, but I don't use many features (yet).

Entourage 2004--Microsoft has a lot more things to be ashamed of than just this. But they're not ashamed and won't change so accept them the way they are or move on.

"Moving in"--I like that.

 

[Xenious]

Ok one more question...

Is there any way to have it sort folders then files? I don't want to sort by type, but I would like all my folders to be grouped together at the top of a finder view.

So when you would normally see this:
abc.jpg
bbc.txt
My Folder 1
My Folder 2
xyz.jpg

What I'd like to see is this:
My Folder 1
My Folder 2
abc.jpg
bbc.txt
xyz.jpg

I realize this is probably blasphemy to OS X and Unix, but is it do-able?

 

[7on]

not really.

you can name all your folders with a space (as long as they're not system folders/OS folders) at the beginning. But I don't recommend that.

give it a couple of weeks and you'll grow into it. And if you think about it, having everything alphabetized together is more logical. Not to mention if Apple had folders organized at the top they'd be criticized for stealing from Windows.

You'll get used to it.