Newbie Questions

[UWF404]

Bare with me on what may be dumb questions. I switched to MAC 6 months ago and love it! I still have my PC desktops but my PB laptop totally kicks azz.

I've never been able to figure out the following:

1. In Windows I can click on any item and hit my delete key to send to trash. Can this be done on Mac?

2. When I download files from the internet or view a PDF online it always saves them to my desktop??

3. In Windows defrag keeps the hard drive performanc tuned up. Is this needed on a MAC?

4. In Windows I can view my folder files as thumbnails. Can this be enabled in MAC?

5. Right click & save to saves any file to directory you specify in Windows. What is the easiest way to do this in MAC?

Thanks all!

 

[emw]

1. Use Command-Delete

2. Change your default download folder in Safari. Edit: note that without the plugin mentioned below, Safari downloads the PDF file before displaying in Preview, which is why it is on the desktop (you're default downloads folder).

3. Generally, there are scripts that run cleanup automatically on the Mac. You may want to grab a free application called Onyx (from versiontracker.com) and occasionally run Repair Permissions on the Mac to keep things flowing smoothing.

4. Yup. Click View -> As Icons (Command-1) in the Finder.

5. Not sure exactly what you mean by this. Do you just want to move a file to a different location? If from Safari, you can Ctrl-Click to pick a Save As... directory.

 

[RBMaraman]

1. In Windows I can click on any item and hit my delete key to send to trash. Can this be done on Mac?

2. When I download files from the internet or view a PDF online it always saves them to my desktop??

3. In Windows defrag keeps the hard drive performanc tuned up. Is this needed on a MAC?

4. In Windows I can view my folder files as thumbnails. Can this be enabled in MAC?

5. Right click & save to saves any file to directory you specify in Windows. What is the easiest way to do this in MAC?

First, it's Mac, not MAC 😉 🙂

1. Click on the file you want to delete, hold down the Command Button (Apple Key) and press the Delete Button.

2. You can dowload a plug-in that will display the PDF in a browser instead of downloading it. Check VersionTracker (http://www.versiontracker.com) for that plug-in.

3. No need to defrag a Mac. Leave your PB on overnight, sleeping, and the OS automatically runs special maintenance scripts.

4. Click View in the Menu bar, then click As Icons.

5. On the web? Right-Click on the Mac = Hold down the Control Button (Ctrl) and Click with the mouse.

 

[Makosuke]

First, it's Mac, not MAC 😉 🙂
2. You can dowload a plug-in that will display the PDF in a browser instead of downloading it. Check VersionTracker (http://www.versiontracker.com) for that plug-in.

Actually, no special plug-in is necessary; the latest (7.0) version of the free Adobe Reader has this functionality built-in. Just go to Adobe.com, find it, and install it--should take care of the rest for you (though I believe it only works in Safari... not positive).

 

[Benj]

3. No need to defrag a Mac. Leave your PB on overnight, sleeping, and the OS automatically runs special maintenance scripts.

Is this right? If I leave my iMac in sleep mode it will wake up and do this? Also, if I use Backup to schedule a regular backup (d'oh) will the iMac wake up and do it or does it need to be "awake"?

Thanks in advance....

 

[robbieduncan]

Is this right? If I leave my iMac in sleep mode it will wake up and do this? Also, if I use Backup to schedule a regular backup (d'oh) will the iMac wake up and do it or does it need to be "awake"?

Thanks in advance....

It needs to be awake. The cron daemon in OSX does not wake the machine up. You can schedule wakes ups and sleep in System Preferences though...

 

[5300cs]

It needs to be awake. The cron daemon in OSX does not wake the machine up.

A little off topic: A few years ago I read about a cron app that was in Linux that would run cron jobs when the machine was awake. The usual cron waits until 3am or something, assuming that the user isn't on the machine, so it can maximze it's usage of the CPU. People realized though, that users were putting their linux boxen to sleep at night, so they developed a version of cron that did it while the machine was still awake. Does anyone know if that is in Darwin, or even what I'm talking about? 😀

 

[robbieduncan]

There are a number of cron daemons (and cron-like) daemons like anacron that will run a "missed" cron job when the machine is available (i.e. turned back on or woken from sleep). Unfortunatly the cron on OSX is not one of these 🙁

 

[varmit]

Any file that is accessed that is smaller than 20 MB gets defrag when it is used (i believe this is still in OS X). For the cron jobs, you can use MacJanitor to do these jobs when you want to do them. www.versiontracker.com is the best place to find software for your mac. You can search for what you want the program to do and it will return all that do what you put in the description.

There are many options when clicking on things in websites. If you do a Ctrl+click, you get a drop down menu where you can choose to download something. But if you just want to skip doing that and just download, Option+click just starts to down load it. Also, with pictures off the internet, you can just click and hold, drag it to the desktop and let go and it will sent it to your desktop (or if you hold the pic over the harddrive or folder, you can then navigate to where you want to store it.) Apple+click and be used to open another tab in the browser for a certain link.

Also, If you want to know what is in the site, maybe get a flash movie off a site, in Safari, Click "Window" that is accross the top, and then "Activity". This shows the activities going on in each site, and you can pick something out to download, such as a flash or enbeded movie.