Help: Mac newb question(s) -- multi session dvds, hebrew

[Am3822]

Hi folks,

I've finally got my MBP (15.4/2.33), and I'm fairly happy with it. There are, however, a few issues that I bother me --

1. For some reason, I don't see the contents of multi-session dvd's properly (i.e. I see only the files from the original session).

2. When I'm switching to hebrew, I cannot type English characters (for those who don't know, under windows, using the shift key results in uppercase English letters).

Thanks in advance,

Am.

PS Admins: if this is not the right forum, please feel free to move it to the proper place.

 

[mkrishnan]

With respect to the multi-session DVDs...how were they burnt? They should read fine if they were correctly finalized... if you used one of those programs that makes a DVD act like a hard drive so that you can drag and drop files one at a time to it... then even on Windows, those disks can only be read properly by the software that wrote them.

If they were finalized... you might try opening it in Disk Utility to see what it shows you. It should show you each session individually as a "partition" of the DVD.

With respect to Hebrew -- first, look at the keyboard viewer that you can enable in the international menu to see if there's something similar on Macs. Otherwise, set the keyboard shortcuts for changing input language in system preferences to ones of your liking so you can quickly toggle back and forth between English and Hebrew....

 

[Am3822]

Thanks for the quick reply.

The dvds were burned using nero express on a pc -- each session was closed (i.e. it was not a drag-and-burn thing), but the disc itself was not. Will 'finalizing ' the discs (assuming it can be done) be of any help?

 

[mkrishnan]

The dvds were burned using nero express on a pc -- each session was closed (i.e. it was not a drag-and-burn thing), but the disc itself was not. Will 'finalizing ' the discs (assuming it can be done) be of any help?

Mmmm, it might. I'm not entirely clear on how this works. I know Nero only very vaguely. I'd try seeing what Disk Utility shows you first.

 

[Am3822]

Will do (the disk utility thing). I don't think it's a superdrive issue, because I checked the dvds using the same external dvd-burner that had been used to create them under windows.

Oh well, no one has said it's going to be easy.

 

[emptyCup]

2. When I'm switching to hebrew, I cannot type English characters (for those who don't know, under windows, using the shift key results in uppercase English letters).

You can use the Keyboard Input Menu as mkrishnan suggests to handle this system-wide or use a multilingual word processor like Mellel. There is also a Language... menu in Word if you are using the Mac version.

 

[Am3822]

You can use the Keyboard Input Menu as mkrishnan suggests to handle this system-wide or use a multilingual word processor like Mellel. There is also a Language... menu in Word if you are using the Mac version.

I'd been told by other Mac users that the Hebrew support in Word 2004 (Mac) is as good as non existant. Tomorrow I'll download NeoOffice, and see how it works.

I think that there might be some misunderstanding -- I can get Hebrew characters, and right-to-left typing (for example in FireFox), but I cannot combine uppercase English characters with Hebrew characters the way I am used to doing under Windows. In order to type any English characther (upper or lower), I have to change language, with command-space.

 

[emptyCup]

I'd been told by other Mac users that the Hebrew support in Word 2004 (Mac) is as good as non existant. Tomorrow I'll download NeoOffice, and see how it works.

I only mentioned Word because that is what most Windows people use. I like Mellel. Since Redlex is an Israeli company I would suppose it handles Hebrew well. It is not free however. Best wishes.

 

[Am3822]

Thanks again for the information. Actually, Mellel is not that pricey ($35 for the educational license, word costs ~$180 here).

 

[Am3822]

Hebrew problem -- solved

SIL International provides a nice free application (PPC, but it doesn't matter much) called Ukelele that helps configure keyboard layouts easily. Worked like a charm.