Shuffle January 2007 by EmiratesMac.com

TIVGGMF January 2007 issue #3

Monthly Newsletter from EmiratesMac User Group

>Mac 911 >Review: Parallels >Photoshop tutorial: Good as Gold!

Buying a Mac on Souq.com

MJ visits the Mother Ship!

Contents

TIVGGMF January 2007 issue #3

Contents

The photograph on the cover is taken by Fatima Hadi (efatima). Fatima wields her camera as though it were an extension of her eye. Her photos have an easy, natural flow that sometimes cause the viewer to forget that the are looking at a photograph, and not actually at the scene. She is arguably Apple’s biggest fan and supporter in the Mideast. Quite possibly, her home contains more Apple products per square foot than any plot of real estate outside of Cupertino. You can find Fatima online at http://justfatima. com/.

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A word from the editor Comic corner Hidden gems among Apple’s Developer Tools MJ visits the Mother Ship Cooking with Apples Review: Missing Sync Inquisitor - spotlight for the web Mac 911 - solutions to your most vexing Mac problems Tips and tricks for EmiratesMac.com Adobe Tutorial: Good As Gold Review: Run parallel operating systems on your Intel Mac Interview with a Mac-loving graphic designer How do you explain how great Mac is? What Google has to offer a Mac user Guide to buying a Mac on Souq.com Join EMUG

3 4 5 6 8 9 10 11 15 16 18 21 22 24 26 28

Shuffle is sponsored by:

For more information go to http://www.appleme.ae

Want to write for shuffle?

f you’re reading this and you’re a member of the EmiratesMac User Group we hope you will consider contributing. We’re looking for any type of articles you would be interested in writing, from something about the history of Apple and their products, reviews of hardware or software, essays, tutorials, or hints and tips. The people who write for shuffle now are just ordinary users just like yourself. If you would consider writing something for shuffle, send us an email (emiratesmac@mac.com) or leave a message with your idea at EmiratesMac.com.

Want to advertise in shuffle?

his newsletter is the only publication in the United Arab Emirates that is dedicated completely to Apple products, such as Macs and iPods. By advertising in shuffle you reach a dedicated audience of Mac and iPod users. We strive to make shuffle a high-quality magazine-style newsletter that people will want to read because it’s so good. Wouldn’t you want to be associated with that? If you’re interested in sponsoring shuffle, or buying advertising space, contact us at emiratesmac@mac.com.

Editorial

A word from the editor New Beginnings...

n the previous issue I said that we had some exciting things coming for this issue, the first issue of 2007. It’s new beginnings in a number of ways. Perhaps the biggest change is the new look for the newsletter. One of our more recent EMUGers, Latifa, has worked hard for quite some time testing out different options and this is the result. We hope you like it as much as we do. Latifa didn’t have a simple task, that’s for sure. But we gave her a pretty open mandate which included something about a contemporary and simple design that has something of an Apple-style to it. Personally I think she did a wonderful job and shuffle now has a very appealing and professional look. We can also announce that we now have a sponsor for the newsletter. Apple IMC Middle east is supporting the production of the newsletter. For a start, it enables us to acquire some much needed equipment and consumables, and perhaps if we can get more sponsors on board, we can eventually distribute copies of shuffle to EMUGers, stores, cafes, and other places. In the Mac world, MacWorld Expo coming up next week in San Francisco is of

course the talk of the town. What will Apple announce? Will we see some new Mac? New software? New iPods? Perhaps even an iPhone? Obviously I don’t know more than you do, but a safe bet is we will see a new iLife and iWork suites. After that it’s a bit more tricky. I think we’ll see some updates of computers but my guess is that it’s the minis who are in line to get a Core 2 Duo makeover and perhaps even more. I think it’s pretty likely there will be an iPhone sooner or later but not next week. And perhaps they will show some new glimpses from Leopard but I’d be very surprised if they actually started shipping Leopard. Whatever news are announced it’ll no doubt be exciting and surprising. Our next issue of shuffle is out on February 2nd and I’m sure it will be full of MacWorld Expo news.

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Comic Corner

Comic corner Geekculture. com has generously given their permission for EMUG to reprint their comic strip in our newsletter. Go to http://www. geekculture.com/ joyoftech/ to see a new comic strip every day. Make sure you also check out all the other features on the Geekculture. com web site.

Blaugh.com has generously given their permission for EMUG to reprint their comic strip in our newsletter. Go to http://www. blaugh.com to see a new comic strip every day. Use the code â&#x20AC;&#x153;blaughâ&#x20AC;? when you shop at www. Godaddy.com to get 10% off your purchase.

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Hidden gems among Apple’s Developer Tools

Hidden gems among Apple’s Developer Tools by Magnus

ou may not be aware, but Apple gives away their Developer Tools for free (developer. apple.com/tools/). All you have to do is register for a free online membership in the Apple Developer Connection (ADC) and then you can download the Developer Tools. Once you have installed the Developer Tools you have one more folder on your hard drive. The folder is called “Developer” and it’s full of different goodies. Obviously the main purpose of everything in Developer Tools is to write code and develop software, but some of it may be interesting in even if you are never going to develop software. XCode XCode (in Developer > Applications) doesn’t really belong here because it’s not “hidden”, it’s the core of the whole Developer Tools package. If you don’t know what XCode is, it’s what’s called an IDE or Integrated Developer Environment. Basically that means it’s an application which programmers use to write their code, test their code, and compile the code into double-clickable applications or whatever it is they are developing. If you want to develop any kind of software with your Mac, chances are you’ll end up using XCode sooner or later. Core Image Fun House Arguably Core Image Fun House (Developer > Applications > Graphics Tools) is the most fun and potentially also useful application out of the ones mentioned here. Repeat After Me The manual for Repeat After Me (Developer > Applications > Utilities > Speech) says “Repeat After Me is a tool that is designed to improve the pronunciation of text generated by the Text-To-Speech (TTS) system, by means of

editing the pitch and duration of phonemes”. So what does that mean? “EmiratesMac”, for example, turns out to be “_1EHmUXrIXts _m1AEk.”. Not exactly something you can read easily, I would imagine. But that’s how the Mac sees the text that it speaks. You can then edit the phoneme-text and experiment to see how your changes affect the way the Mac speaks the text. FileMerge Have you ever had two pieces of text and wondered what exactly is the difference between them? With FileMerge (Developer > Applications > Utilities) you have to wonder no more. The utility takes two text files and displays them side by side, showing you the difference between them. Many text editors have similar functionality built in but even if it doesn’t, FileMerge gives you quite advanced functionality. Pixie Pixie (Developer > Applications > Graphics Tools) is a simple magnifying glass application. Run it and it will show you a small part of the screen magnified up to 1200%. This will let you inspect up close one or more pixels somewhere on the screen which could be helpful if you’re working on a web page and something doesn’t align correctly, and other similar situations. That’s just a small selection of what’s available when you install the Developer Tools. And since it’s all free what do you have to loose more than some space on your hard drive?

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MJ visits the Mother Ship

Part 1 of 3

by Mohammed

During a recent visit to California I had the great pleasure of spending some time at Apple’s headquarters and some other tech companies in Silicon Valley. I wrote about my experience and here is the first part, in which I introduce you to the Mother Ship.

ppleholic has been abducted. Yes, you read it correctly, abducted. Aliens known as iMen took me away in their Mother Ship on the 25th of November 2006. I know a lot of you don’t believe in abductions or even aliens, and most of the time people who are abducted never have proof of them ever been taken. This time I have proof of their existence, and in this series of articles you will know all about them. I am going to tell you about the way they live, where they eat, how they act, and most importantly how amazing they are. My proof is not only words but also pictures, cause pictures is worth a thousand words. I do know one thing, being abducted by iMen and held hostage in their Mother Ship was the most amazing experience I have ever had. This is one abduction where I wish they took me away for good, and took me in for adoption and the chance of never having to come back to reality for the rest of my life.

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First of all let’s get this cleared up - the Mother Ship is real. It’s huge, breathtaking, nothing like I have ever seen before. These Aliens are the most advance species in the world. They are the most innovative aliens on the face of any planet. They have the most advanced technology that any human has ever seen, and every month they tend to share some technologies with us humans. They have brought us things like iPods, and integrated light and motion sensors in computer, and so much more. They made operating systems fun, good looking and more stable, and made the old operating systems made by humans look like garbage. They call Apple the Mother Ship, and they tried to brain wash me before I left there, so that I don’t tell on their location; but it seems like I was too excited that there is no way any brain washing machine can take away that memory from me. Located in Cupertino, California, USA, Apple Headquarters is in the heart of Silicon Valley. It’s not far from where Apple got started some 30 years ago. The Mother Ship was an oval-shaped area and very wide in diameter. It consisted of six buildings in a loop, Hence the name Infinite Loop as its street. Each building is designed for specific tasks. One is made to develop the most advance operating system on the face of this planet, Mac OS X. We know this as the most virus free, stable, and sexy operating system behind the machines it controls. Another building is

MJ visits the Mother Ship for building the hardware, and another building is like the Big Boss’ den and for visitors to pay their respect to the all mighty innovator. Other than these six buildings that makes up the Mother Ship, there are other little “space ships” buildings around the vicinity. They are there to protect the Mother Ship from any harm, by building other amazing gadgets to impress the mere mortals on planet earth. They got a building that is specifically made for the creation, development of the famous iPod. They got a separate building too that deals with just the software that integrates the iPod with our computers; this software is called iTunes. Very interesting don’t you think? After being abducted for a whole day in that place, I fell in love more with the Mother Ship and the Aliens that live, work and eat there. For someone like my self, who loves Apple: breathes, eats, drinks and dreams of nothing but Apple, a day in the Mother Ship is a day no Appleholic would mind dying happily and peacefully after. After seeing what I have seen, and heard iMen talking about Apple, and sharing thoughts and experiences with me about their lives as aliens, I have gotten to love Apple more than I ever thought any human can love a product, a machine, and a whole culture. This culture that Apple people have is not a myth, it’s a reality, specially when you get to live a life with Apple all around you, with MacHeads such as I and you sharing the same love, interests, rumors, dreams and last but never least use the same products that iMen develop just for us. I Mohamed Jawad, better known as Appleholic, have been around and inside the most amazing, most innovative company on the face of this planet. I was not disappointed a bit, I was nothing but amazed, amused, thrilled and even speechless the

whole day. I am well known to be very talkative and always have something to say, specially when it deals with Apple; but that day, I could not think of anything. Speechless is what I became, and was overwhelmed, dazzled of the one places every Appleholic on this planet would dream to be in. I could confidently say after being in the Mother ship that it was the one Abduction no MacHead would ever want to be brought back to earth or even reality.

In part two of this series we will continue along on my journey at the Mother Ship.

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Recipe

Cooking with Apples Apple, Cheese and Walnut Salad By Crystal

Salad 8 cups torn mixed salad greens 2 medium apples, halved, cored and sliced 1/8-inch thick 1/3 cup crumbled blue cheese 1/4 cup coarsely chopped toasted walnuts Vinaigrette 3 tablespoons olive oil 2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar 2 teaspoons Dijon-style mustard 1 clove garlic, crushed Fresh ground black pepper, to taste

Method In large bowl, combine salad greens and apple slices. In small bowl, whisk together ingredients; set aside. When ready to serve add vinaigrette to salad; toss gently to coat. Arrange salad on large platter; sprinkle with cheese and walnuts. Crystal is the founder and editor of EmiratesBaby.com. She writes about various kinds of issues of interest to parents in the UAE. Crystal will be bringing us a new recipie based on apples in each edition of the newsletter. She promises it will be an exciting and mouth-watering mix of dessert, main courses, snacks, and more.

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Review

Review: Missing Sync by Magnus

alm has long been seen by many as the PDA platform that works best with Macs despite Palm dropping support for Mac in 2004. They still ship Palm Desktop which is now up to version 4.2.1 Rev D, but apart from some vital fixes it doesn’t seem to have been significantly improved for years. If you have Microsoft Office for Mac, you can sync Entourage with a Palm device and it works well. We tested Missing Sync for Palm OS version 5.1 together with a Treo 650 smartphone. Missing Sync works with a lot of different Palm OS devices as well as Windows Mobile and PSP devices. New in 5.1 The main news in version 5.1, released in March 2006, is that it is now Universal Binary, meaning it runs natively on Intel Macs. Among the other news we find: fixed numerous issues syncing PIM conduits, and updated assistants to include information about Tungsten TX and LifeDrive. Even though the release notes doesn’t say so directly, arguably another improvement in 5.1 is stability. I’ve not personally used Missing Sync before but after talking to some long-time users, it seems like 5.1 fixes some stability issues that have been present in recent 5.x versions. And using it for a number of weeks I’ve had no problems. On Versiontracker and Macupdate, Missing Sync 5.1 gets mixed reviews, ranging from “dangerous” to “fantastic”. I wouldn’t say that users’ opinions posted on these sites should be taken too seriously but they can be an indication on the performance, functionality, and stability of a piece of software.

Conduits Missing Sync comes with a lot of conduits for all kinds of documents formats and applications. In fact, there’s a rather long list of supported conduits. A conduit is basically a piece of software needed for the sync software to be able to connect to and sync with another document format or software. Installation and setup What can I say? No problems at all. I downloaded Missing Sync (about 20Mb) and started the installer. When starting up Missing Sync it took me through a wizard that step-by-step asked questions about how I wanted the software configured for use with the Treo. Pictures and music Missing Sync comes with support for syncing iTunes and iPhoto with your Palm device. You pick albums in iPhoto and playlists in iTunes

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Review Missing Sync is available for purchase and download at www.markspace. com for $39.95. Mark/Space provided a copy of Missing Sync for our review. Since we wrote the review, Missing Sync has been updated to version 5.1.2. It’s a free update for owners of version 5 and it’s available from www.markspace. com/downloads. html.

that you want to put on your device and Missing Sync transfers all the data for you. In Missing Sync you can choose where the photos and music should be stored, whether internally or on a storage card. A good idea is obviously to buy a large storage card to save the internal memory. One thing to remember if you’re syncing over Bluetooth is to have patience. Music and photos are going to take time so don’t expect a quick sync. Obviously that’s not Missing Sync’s fault, but it’s something to keep in mind. Photos from iPhoto are automatically resized to a size appropriate for the Palm device. Since the screen on my Treo is 320x320 it doesn’t make much sense to put 3000x2000 pixel photos on there. Folder sync A nice feature of Missing Sync is that you can select a folder on your hard drive which you can sync with your handheld device. Save or copy a file into that folder and on the next sync it’s

Inquisitor

Spotlight for the web by Magnus

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placed on the handheld as well. It’s an easy way to transfer certain files to the mobile device. Wrapping up I found Missing Sync to be an excellent product. It installed without problems and I’ve run

it for a few weeks now, syncing a few times per day without any issues. Music from iTunes and photos from iPhoto flow smoothly across to my Treo. Events from iCal and contacts from Addressbook sync without problems as well. But it’s with mixed feelings I say that everything went so well because this is something that Palm should put in the box of any Palm-powered device they sell. This is not something that customers should have to pay extra for. That said, if you own a Palm device and a Mac and want to sync the two, there is simply nothing else around that compares to Missing Sync.

If you’re a Safari user you probably use the Google search box in the menu bar quite a bit, don’t you? Have you ever wished for some more functionality, some better options? There is something small, simple, and free that will change the way you search in Safari. It’s called Inquisitor and it’s basically a plug-in for Safari that enhances the search-box functionality. The developer claims that Inquisitor learns from what you search for which should mean you get better results over time. I haven’t used Inquisitor long enough to really see if that is true or not. The software also flags websites that you’ve visited previously and keywords you’ve used before show up before the rest of the results. Inquisitor is now available in version 3.0 beta 2 and it’s free from www.inquisitorx.com/safari.

Mac 911

Solutions to your most vexing Mac problems by Christopher Breen Remotely PowerPoint I recently bought a MacBook, which comes with Front Row and an Apple Remote. Is there any way to use that remote for Microsoft PowerPoint presentations?--via the Internet You’ve got a couple of options when it comes to controlling PowerPoint presentations with the Apple Remote. The first is a bit of a kludge: you can export your slides from PowerPoint as graphics files, import them into Apple’s iPhoto, and use Front Row and the remote control to play them as an iPhoto slide show. To do so, open the presentation in PowerPoint and select File: Save As. In the resulting sheet, choose JPEG, PICT, or TIFF from the Format pop-up menu; then provide a name. Click on Save, and each slide will be saved as an individual graphics file inside a folder that has the name you just provided. Next, drag those files into iPhoto’s library. Click on the Last Roll entry, select the images you just added, and choose File: New Album From Selection. Select the album and click on the Play button at the bottom right of the iPhoto window. In the Slideshow window that appears, disable the Automatic Ken Burns Effect option. Click on the Music tab and disable the Play Music During Slideshow option. Click on Save Settings to dismiss the window. Now fire up Front Row, choose Photos, and select the album you created. When you click on Play, Front Row will try to play the presentation as a slide show. To prevent this from happening, click on the Play/Pause button to pause the presentation. Then use the Forward and Previous buttons to move from slide to slide. While this solution works OK for basic slide shows, it has a couple of flaws. First, you’ll have to put up with the

gray Front Row navigation overlay. Second, any music and video elements in your presentation will be lost in iPhoto. Your second option, which avoids these pitfalls, is to use the Apple Remote to control PowerPoint natively. To do this, I get help from IOSpirit’s Remote Buddy ($13), which uses plug-ins to control a bunch of applications, including PowerPoint; Apple’s iTunes, Keynote, Photo Booth, QuickTime Player, GarageBand, Expos√©, and DVD Player; Elgato’s EyeTV; VLC Media Player; RealPlayer; and Adobe Reader and Acrobat Pro (see “Who’s Your Buddy?”). I’ve tried Remote Buddy on my Intel Mac mini, and it works as advertised. A free 30day demo is available for your testing pleasure. If you’re a do-it-yourselfer, you can create your own plug-ins, using the included Behaviour Construction Kit or using Xcode and Cocoa with the free SDK. Remote Buddy also works with Keyspan’s RF Remote for Front Row. Managing .Mac and IMAP I’d like to use Microsoft Entourage to create e-mail messages and save them as drafts when I’m offline, and then send them later via my .Mac account. But, whenever I save one of these drafts, my iBook wants to connect to the Internet--a problem when I’m using a dial-up connection while on the road. How do I make it stop?--Sibylle Eichstaedt By default, Entourage IMAP accounts are configured so that messages, drafts, and junk mail--as well as inbox messages--are stored on the IMAP server. If you have an always-on broadband connection, this isn’t a problem; Entourage saves everything to the server in the blink of an

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Mac 911 eye. But when you’re logged off and your Mac is configured to use a dial-up account, it’ll try to connect to the Internet every time you save a draft. To put things right, open Tools: Accounts, double-click on your .Mac account, click on the Advanced tab, and deselect the Store Drafts In This IMAP Folder option. (You’re welcome to deselect the sent-messages and junk-mail options, too.) Your drafts will now be stored in Entourage’s local Drafts folder, and your iBook won’t try to establish an Internet connection. You can do the same kind of thing in Apple’s Mail: open the Accounts preference pane, select the IMAP account, click on the Mailbox Behaviors tab, and deselect the Store Draft Messages On The Server option. Dual-monitor MacBook Pro Is it possible to use a 30-inch Apple Cinema Display and a 23-inch Cinema Display at the same time with a 17-inch MacBook Pro?-Richard Troxel It is. You could try using Matrox’s DualHead2Go ($169) to split a VGA signal and send it to two attached monitors. (Blogger Aniel Sud describes doing so.) But there are two catches: I honestly don’t know whether the DualHead2Go has enough power to drive the 30-inch Cinema Display (Aniel was using two Westinghouse 17-inch monitors). And the picture in this setup will be split between the two monitors, so windows and dialog boxes that would normally appear in the middle of a single monitor may straddle the two. The preferred way to handle this task is to install an additional video card. You could do this with an older PowerBook via its PC Card slot and a device such as VillageTronic’s VTBook ($249) or Digital Tigers’ SideCar Mac ($1,299). Unfortunately, the MacBook Pro doesn’t have a PC Card slot. Apple may have been forward-looking in equipping the laptop with the faster ExpressCard/34 slot, but there are precious few ExpressCards out there and no ExpressCard video cards. A Digital Tigers rep said that an ExpressCard version of the SideCar may be available by the time you read this.

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Go mono, young man I can hear out of only one ear, so I’d like to adjust my iPod’s left-right balance. I can’t see a way to do this on the iPod itself, but is there by any chance a balance option in iTunes?--Ross Morris Neither the iPod nor iTunes offers a balance control. But there is another solution: Go Mono. The next time you’re ripping music into iTunes, go to its Preferences, select the Advanced pane, and click on the Importing tab. Choose the encoder you like from the Import Using pop-up menu, and then select Custom from the Setting pop-up menu. In the resulting window, choose Mono from the Channels pop-up menu. Then rip away. You can also convert songs already in your library to mono. To do so, select some tracks in your iTunes library and choose Advanced: Convert Selection To Name Of Encoder. The files will be encoded so that all the music is offered in both the left and the right channels (see “One Track Mined”). To avoid compressing your files with different encoders (and thus altering the sound more than you need to), use the same encoder the files were originally encoded with (unless they are uncompressed AIFF or WAV files). You could reencode your entire library, but it would be much easier to get a cable with a male stereo miniplug on one end and a female miniplug jack on the other; it will combine the two stereo signals in one mono signal. Plug your headphones into this cable, and you’re good to go. iSight alternatives Other than Apple’s iSight, which Web cameras can I use for video chatting?--Beth Belmonte By default, iChat supports the iSight and FireWire Web cams. You can also video-chat your way to happiness with a USB Web cam (assuming it’s compatible with OS X, of course) if you get a copy of Ecamm Network’s iChatUSBCam ($10). This utility convinces iChat to accept input from USB cameras. It also enables videoconferencing on Macs that iChat doesn’t natively support. Ecamm provides a list of the

Mac 911 cameras that iChatUSBCam works with. Note that many of those USB Web cams require the open-source Macam driver to work with OS X. Better living through iPhoto sharing I often travel with my laptop and store trip pictures in iPhoto. When I return home, what’s the best way to transfer my photos from my laptop iPhoto to my desktop iPhoto?--H. Thomas Staton There are many ways to do this, but I prefer the sharing method. For this to work, the two computers must be able to talk to each another over a Bonjour network. First, launch iPhoto on both computers. On the laptop, enable the Share My Photos option in iPhoto’s Sharing preference pane. On the desktop Mac, turn on the Look For Shared Photos option in this preference pane. On the laptop, create a new smart album that’s defined by the dates when you loaded your travel pictures on your laptop-Date Is In The Last 2 Weeks, for example. On the desktop Mac, select the laptop’s shared photo library, click on the triangle to reveal that library’s albums, choose the smart album you just created, and drag its icon to iPhoto’s Library icon. The photos will be copied from one Mac to the other. Unlike iTunes, iPhoto allows you to copy shared files. There are other ways to accomplish your goal. You could use iPhoto’s Share: Burn command to burn photos to a recordable CD or DVD. You could sync a color iPod to your laptop, turn on photo synchronization in iTunes, enable the Include Full-Resolution Photos option, plug the iPod into your desktop computer, and copy those images from the iPod into your iPhoto library. Or you could set up a traditional network, mount your desktop Mac’s hard drive, select the album you want to export on your laptop, choose File: Export, click on the File Export tab in the Export Photos window, enable the Full-Size Images option, click on Export, and choose your desktop Mac’s networked drive as the destination for the exported photos. Wielding power wisely While I was away on an extended business trip, my home network--the one my wife depends on to get her work done--went kablooey. As I was far from home and largely unable to pro-

vide the tech support she so desperately needed, she called in a local expert to put things right. He not only put the network back together, but also reworked the power setup for my home office’s complex system of computers. In this month’s Tools of the Trade, I ask that you do as I say rather than as I did, and get your Mac power system in order, too. UPS Delivers You need dependable power that protects your computers from power surges and brownouts, and keeps the juice flowing long enough for you to save your work and shut down your machines properly. An uninterruptible power supply (UPS) does just that. In the bad old days, I relied on one UPS to keep multiple Macs and a load of peripherals on the job. Bad idea. The pro brought in two APC Back-UPS 1200VA UPSs ($200) and did the right thing: He connected the computers and monitors to the power ports (on the back of one UPS) that are supplied with a battery backup, so they’ll stay alive when the rest of the office goes dark. Other peripherals that need to remain alive during blackouts-- external hard drives, switches, routers, and the DSL modem-also get a backup battery outlet, on the other UPS. The laser printer, which sucks enormous amounts of power when starting up and printing, is plugged into one of the power receptacles that provides surge protection but no battery power. Nonessential peripherals--the ones I can live without during a blackout, such as my iPod and PDA chargers, scanner, and PVR-- also get surge protection but no backup. Although I no longer use a modem, you might. If so, take advantage of the phone-line connector on the back of your UPS: electrical spikes can travel through phone wires, too. Take a Test Even though I was already

Senior Editor Christopher Breen is the author of Secrets of the iPod and iTunes, fifth edition, and The iPod and iTunes Pocket Guide (both Peachpit Press, 2005). Find Chris’ books at www.amazon. com and www. peachpit.com.

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Mac 911 using a UPS, I had never bothered to find out if it worked properly. Turns out that the one I had was shot from being so overloaded. Had I cut the power to it to see if its backup functions really worked, I would have discovered the problem and divided its load among a couple more UPSs. I’m lucky enough to have two electrical circuits in my office. The pro took advantage of this and split the UPS units and various power strips I have between those circuits. Previously, I overloaded one circuit while leaving the other twiddling its little electric thumbs. Not smart, as this creates a potential fire hazard.

Terrific tagging Because I import music from a variety of sources, my iTunes library has become cluttered with unsorted MP3 and AAC files that lack album, track, and even artist and song-name information. Fortunately, there’s a great tool for labeling MP3 files, so you don’t have to do it all by hand: Jay Tuley’s free iEatBrainz will look for your music files’ “digital fingerprints” on the free MusicBrainz database and give you a list of possible matches. You can quickly select the right ones and import the information you need. In conjunction with Chaotic Software’s Media Rage ($30), it allowed me to label and add artwork to 450 unsorted song files in my iTunes library, in less than two and a half hours. If you’re like me and cannot imagine having your Mac on without iTunes being open, this tool is definitely a must.--Bill Urbina

Continued from page 21 - “Interview with a Mac-loving graphic designer”

EM: What’s the thing you like the most about Macs? CE: Dependability.

EM: We’ve seen the portraits you have made that are on EmiratesMac.com. How did you create those? CE: I’ve been into caricatures as early as high school but I never thought it would be profitable until one of my college friends commissioned me to make caricatures of a whole hospital department. I start by drawing the main lines of the face by hand with a black and white version of the picture in front of me so I can take on the shadows and highlights better. This first step is the most tedious since it will define the level of similarities of the portrait and the photograph. After I’m satisfied with the pencil work, I scan the hand-drawn portrait into my Mac and redraw it on vector based software such as Illustrator or Corel Draw - the reason for this, aside from the digital conversion of the portrait, is that the lines here are much more flexible and I can adjust them as I please - line thickness, stroke style, color... - as opposed to drawing by pencil. Color rendering follows either by Photoshop or Illustrator, depending on how the client will want it to look, be it cartoony, realistic, exaggerated, etc.

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EM: What’s the thing you like the least about Macs? CE: Aside from the big price tag, nothing else. EM: What’s the thing you like Apple to come up with in the future? CE: An iPhone and (holds breath) a 12-inch widescreen MacBook Pro with Intel Core 2 Duo. EM: Apple and Macs are not very well known here. What do think should be done by Apple IMC and others, like Emiratesmac, to increase the knowledge and awareness? CE: More advertising. There’s nothing like visual presence everywhere. Apple is getting beaten here by PCs because they get saturated with advertising. Its not like Apple has nothing to prove, it has more to show and I think Apple carriers here are doing a poor job on getting that message across. As for Emiratesmac and EMUG members, spread the word!

Tips and tricks

Tips and tricks for EmiratesMac.com by Magnus

e continue our series of tips and tricks for how to do certain things at Emiratesmac.com. User reputation and infractions For each post a number of small icons are displayed at the lower left corner of the post. Starting from left, the first icon tells you whether a user is online or not. The second icon that looks like scales is for you to add to a user’s reputation. Every user has a reputation level (a number) which depends on how long they’ve been registered on the site, how many posts they’ve made, etc. Basically the longer you’re registered and the more posts you make, the higher your reputation becomes. Other users can also add to a reputation by clicking on this icon and filling in a brief form, saying they approve or disapprove of the user and the post. The third icon is for reporting an infraction for a post. It could be a spam message or a violation of some other rules for the site. And finally it’s the icon for reporting a post for violation. It lets you send a message to the administrator or a moderator saying that you think a post has violated the site’s rules.

Subscribe to calendar I’m sure you use and love iCal, right? How about keeping up with Emiratesmac events and dates in iCal, wouldn’t that be nice? Well you can do just that. If you go to the Events page on the site, and look for where it says “Note! You can also subscribe to our iCal Calendar”. Click on that link and iCal should open and ask if you want to subscribe to the calendar. Subscribe to pictures with iPhoto I know many of you are very interested in the Gallery we have on the site, and some of you even upload photos regularly. The Gallery has it’s own RSS feed and you can subscribe to it with iPhoto. To do this, you choose File > Subscribe to photocast inside of iPhoto, then you type in http://feeds.feedburner.com/emiratesmacgallery. That will now show you the most recently uploaded photos to the Gallery. Rate pictures Continuing on with another Gallery tip, we turn to rating pictures. You can rate every picture uploaded on a scale from one star(“Terrible”) to five stars (“Excellent”). And it’s as easy as opening the picture you want to rate and clicking on the “Rate file” text, then on the number of stars you want to give the picture. Rating a picture is a nice way to say to someone else that you really liked (or didn’t like) their picture.

Etiquette As more users register for the site and engage in discussions it is important that we all act in a nice way toward each other. EmiratesMac should be a place where users are friendly and anyone can visit without having to experience bad language and personal attacks. Here are a few suggestions for making EmiratesMac.com a nice place for all: • If you have a question, search through the site first. • Don’t use bad language. • Quote something from the message you’re replying to. • Don’t assume others will have the same knowledge and experience you do. • Do let Adminstrator or Moderator know if you think someone has done something you feel is inappropriate.

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Tutorial

Adobe Tutorial: Good As Gold

By Zaid

ou can build-up a type effect by using Photoshop’s built-in layer styles. Although I’ve used Arabic font “AXtLEna” for the 18th Gulf Football Championship that will be held in few days in Abu Dhabi, you can apply these same steps to a non Arabic font that suits the occasion something like Goudy or Trajan font will do. Note: I have used Photoshop CS3 on my machine. However, even if you are a user of Photoshop 7, 8, or 9 the effect will work fine.

STEP ONE On a white background, type a word or phrase in black. Position it in the middle of your canvas - preferably, keep the text layer selected. Zaid Al-Hilali is an Adobe Certified Instructor operating from Dubai. You can reach him on 050 736 2306.

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STEP TWO From the bottom of Layers Palette, click on Layer style button and choose Drop Shadow from the list.

Tutorial

STEP THREE Apply Drop Shadow to your text and keep the default settings if you like. STEP FIVE Click on the Color Overlay in left Styles pane, click on the small color rectangle to get the Color Picker window. In the Color Picker, typein the C: 0, M:19, Y:100, and K:0 to achieve a dark yellow color and click OK button.

STEP FOUR Click on the phrase Bevel and Emboss in the left Styles pane, then apply these settings in the Structure section: • Style=Inner Bevel • Technique=Chisel Hard • Depth=3 • Direction=up • Size=2. Now in the Shading section apply the following: • Angle=151 • Leave the “Use Global Light” selected. • Set Altitude to 37º. • For Gloss Contour select “Ring - Double” from the drop list. • Change the Shadow Mode Opacity to around 60%. Back in the left pane click on the Contour checkbox to apply a stroked like edges.

Finally, click the OK button to close down the Layer Styles window. You can insert an image underneath your text as an extra step and perhaps add a sparkle here and there on the text to add the shine. ADOBE PHOTOSHOP CS3 In the middle of December 2006, Adobe released a beta version of Adobe Photoshop CS3. Arguably the most interesting piece of news about Photoshops CS3 for Mac users is that it is now Universal Binary, meaning it will run at full speed on Intel Macs. If you have a licensed copy of Photoshop CS2, you can download and try the beta from http://labs. adobe.com/technologies/photoshopcs3/

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Review

Review: Run parallel operating systems on your Intel Mac By Magnus

M We tested Parallels on an Intel iMac 17” with a 1.83GHz Core Duo processor and 1Gb RAM, with 512Mb dedicated to the Windows XP in Parallels. Parallels Inc., the makers of Parallels Desktop for Mac, provided us with a copy of the software for the review. Parallels Desktop for Mac is available for purchase at www. parallels.com for $79.99. From their web site you can also download a 15-day trial version.

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ac users have pretty much always had some interest in being able to run Windows on their Macs. Many of us work in organizations which require some type of Windows software for various tasks but we don’t want to give up our beloved Macs. There has been various solutions to this problem over the years, including SoftWindows and Virtual PC. None have been satisfactory mainly because they’ve been emulation-based, meaning they translated Intel code into what the Mac understood, making them slow and full of problems. With the advent of Intel-based Macs that’s not necessary anymore. BootCamp Apple themselves introduced BootCamp with which you can install Windows on an Intel Mac. And BootCamp works very well but it requires you to re-boot when you want to switch operating system. BootCamp also requires you to partition your Mac’s hard drive into one part that is dedicated to Windows, and then the rest for Mac OS X. And presently you can only install Windows XP with BootCamp. Enter Parallels Desktop for Mac. Virtualization Parallels takes advantage of the Intel processor’s virtualization support. Basically this means one Intel processor can act like it was really distinct

processors and run different operating systems on the different virtual processors. Even Apple sort of recommends Parallels (www.apple.com/ getamac/windows.html) and there have been recurring rumors that upcoming Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard will have some kind of virtualization in it but Apple has denied those rumors. Setup Installation is a breeze really. Parallels takes you through the steps with a wizard and gets it all set up and running for you. There are some questions to answer and options to select along the way but nothing too technical and most users shouldn’t have a problem with getting through it. Once Windows is installed, Parallels Tools are installed. It is a set of utilities and drivers that installs into Windows XP and makes the integration between Mac and Windows. With Parallels, the operating system you install becomes one file on your Mac’s hard drive. This means it’s easier to manage for copying and backup, and you can have as many separate operating systems as you want installed. This could be great for web developers, for example. They could have any number of virtual computers and run them with Parallels, checking web pages in the different environments.

Review

Running Parallels Once it’s all set up, Windows running in Parallels is really like Windows running on any regular PC. On our test Mac everything wasn’t as snappy as on a good-spec PC but that’s not to be expected. That it runs as fast as it does is a small miracle in itself, I think. It’s fast enough for what most users do with their computers. I installed Adobe CS2 and Microsoft Office 2004. Photoshop will certainly never be any speed demon in Parallels but it runs well enough to be used occasionally. Windows runs in a window in Mac OS X but it can also take up the full screen. The mouse goes between Windows and Mac without problems, and in the future there will even be drag and drop support (see sidebar). I have an external monitor hooked up to my iMac and I have Mac OS X set up so it spans the desktop across the two monitors. In Parallels I could not figure out how to get Windows to do the same, but I could run Windows fullscreen on one display and Mac OS X on another, conveniently going between them. Obviously most users would want Parallels so they could run Windows on their Macs. But with Parallels you can actually

run any number of operating systems for Intel processors. To get information between Mac OS X and Windows in Parallels, you can share a folder. In the same way you can share folders between Macs on a network, you can share a folder on the Mac so that Windows has access to it as well. It’s a convenient way to transfer information between the two operating systems. Since you can run many operating systems in addition to Windows with Parallels, I tried installing the latest version of Ubuntu Linux and it installed, booted and worked just fine. After finding a solution in the web, even networking works just fine from Ubuntu. Apple’s slogan “It just works” could be equally applied to Parallels Desktop for Mac. Downsides So what are the downsides to Parallels? Not many that I could find really. It’s an amazingly stable technology and after using it several times per day for a few weeks I did not have any crashes or anything like that. For what it does it very stable. There seem to be some issues with getting Parallels to work in some network environments.

In early December 2006 Parallels released a public beta version of Parallels Desktop for Mac, build 3036, and it reportedly contains a number of new features that shows some of what is to come. Among the bigger news is that Parallels can now use a BootCamp partition as a virtual drive and can boot directly from it. Graphics performance has been improved, and users can drag and drop files and folders between Windows and Mac. A feature called Coherency will apparently show Windows applications as if they were Mac applications. In the beta we also find Transporter which should make it easy to migrating virtual PCs from VMware or Virtual PC VMs to Parallels virtual machines.

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Review BootCamp and Parallels on Intel Macs is actually not the first products for Mac with which you could run DOS/Windows without software emulation. Back in 1994 Apple introduced the Power Macintosh 6100 DOS Compatible which had a card with a 486 processor on it. It was discontinued in 1996.

For example, since it does not have a physical network adapter it may cause problems in networks that filter access and traffic based on what’s called MAC addresses. For most users graphics may be the biggest drawback. Don’t expect to play any of the latest, graphics-intensive games with Parallels, for that you need BootCamp. Wrapping up One thing is for sure, buy as much RAM as you can afford and that your Mac can take. I would say 2Gb is the bare minimum of RAM your Mac should have to comfortably run Parallels. Think about it, you’re basically running two operating systems at the same time and they both need RAM. Bottom line though, Parallels is amazing. It’ makes running Windows alongside Mac OS X as easy as it can be. With Parallels Desktop for Mac you can keep using your favorite computer (Mac) running the best operating system in the world (Mac OS X) but also get access to the most common operating system in the world (Windows).

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Interview with a Mac-loving graphic designer

Interview with a Macloving graphic designer By Magnus

harles Epres is a member of the EmiratesMac User Group and an active user on Emiratesmac.com. We got the opportunity to talk to him about what he does, Macs, and other things. EM: Tell us about yourself! CE: I’m Charles Epres, a 25 year old native of Manila, Philippines. I’ve been in graphic design for over 5 years and on my 2nd year here in UAE. Married to an equally Mac-crazed lady named Michelle and we plan to bring Maccrazed kids as well into this world. EM: Can you remember the first time you saw or used a Mac? CE: The first time I saw a Mac was back in 2002 when I did large format printing for my thesis and I was amazed at how the iMacs looked at that time. My first job gave me the chance to work with a Mac, a very old PowerPC G3 - the one with the beige casing and horizontal CPU. I even questioned the reason for using such a machine for it was still in OS9 and Windows XP back then was such a big hit. It just seemed to me during my days with it that it was impossibly dependable. Save for the

rare hiccups and the crappy GUI, it worked like you want it to work: efficiently. When OS X was released, I wanted to upgrade the system but the G3 had very limited resources and was obviously out of OSX’s range. Since then, I was hooked to Macs and everything related to Apple. EM: You are obviously a very talented artist. What do you do for work? CE: I’m working as a senior graphic designer in a publishing / advertising firm right now and on my free time, I do photography. EM: Can you tell us something about how you use Macs in your work? What is your workflow like? CE: The whole graphic design department is run by G5s, the reason being CS3 is not released yet and the Adobe Creative Suite works better *for the moment* with PowerPCs. We only use one Windows machine to open buggy files such as Word, Excel.... er, Microsoft files to be exact. The workflow is basically to open the files either by Macs (if its fine) or with Windows (if its buggy), do the entire creative work i.e. graphic design, layout, color proofing & final artworks on the G5s, juggling the files from one software to another until it reaches approval. Finally, PDFs are sent to a *mother G5* that handles the final processing of the files for digital plate printing and eventually, final printing in production. Continues on page 14

Charles Epres is a Mac-crazed graphic designer based in Abu Dhabi. He works in a wide range of areas including Corporate Identity, Visual Solutions, Print Media, Illustration, and Multimedia. Website: http:// charlesepres. tripod.com E-mail: acutabove@gmail.com Mobile: +971-508350312

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How do you explain how great Mac is?

How do you explain how great Mac is? By EmiratesMac.com community

n a thread on EmiratesMac.com (www.emiratesmac.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1725) we asked “how do you explain how great Mac is to someone who has never used a Mac and has very little knowledge about Mac and Apple? We’re not talking iPod here, that’s a totally different ball game, we’re talking Mac. Without showing something on a Mac, just talking about it, how you explain how great Mac is?” The question produced some really interesting and inspiring answers so we thought we’d highlight a few here. If you have something to contribute, please log in on the site and post your reply. Acutabove kicked off the commenting with some very valid points: “Ask the PC guy how many times he: - Updates his anti virus in one year - Gets infected with a new virus that his antivirus didn’t even knew existed at the time of update. - Restarts his PC because it crashed from that new virus or just simply, it crashed. - Reformats his system due to some unfixable system error. - Installs security upThe “Macintosh insanely great” graphic is dates and patches to borrowed from the introduction of the very first make his system more Macintosh computer in 1984. You can watch “secure”. a short video from the event at YouTube.com - Closes pop up (www.youtube.com/watch?v=izASLl0PvAk). At windows and adwares the introduction, Steve Jobs was showing off the while surfing the net. considerable graphics talent of the Mac and the - Defragments his computer “wrote” the text itself across its screen, system to make it run something pretty much not seen before that time. smoothly.

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- Keeps track of all the drivers that came along with his hardware.” MacUAE reminisce about his days as a PC user before going all-Mac some years ago: “Before converting to Macs, I remember my life as a PC user as: - I never got viruses and was always up to date. - I think I never got attacked or hacked. - My system was never hogged with adware or junk. But, that took a lot of work and effort of updating, searching for latest drivers, download latest patches and yearly purchase of Norton SystemWorks. When I moved to Macs the first few days were weird. I didn’t have to do the above which took a lot of my PC time. All I can say is Macs are just more fun to use and you have the space, time and tools to be creative about life. A PC was just a tool for games and internet for me. The Mac is a personal family system that forces you to involve it in your life rather than seclude it to mundane tasks. I am happy and will never go back.” Zaid argues that buying a Mac is the best choice for most users because with a Mac there is less need to be a computer expert: “I share views of acutabove, for a common Windows user, all you’ve stated is true. MacUAE, you were and still an expert user on Windows, to stay up-to-date with all protective add-ons. I know few people who are like you in old days, they don’t complain about any

How do you explain how great Mac is?

viruses, spyware and the like, yet they admit spending 10-15 minutes of each morning performing preventive medicine for their PC. The level of most Mac/PC users in maintaining the machine daily is at its best None. That’s why buying a Mac for the common user is preferable so he/she will keep doing what they want to perform without worrying about behind the scene issues.” According to ultrablue662, people are basically lazy and want to stay with what they’re used to (Windows): “You cant. Well, you can, but no one, especially in this country, will listen. Seriously, I’ve tried all of the above, even pulling out statistics from Wikipedia for people, and what I get is Oh, I know Mac/BSD/Linux is better. Oh really, um, if you KNOW this and its cheaper or free. This is where common sense comes into play. And no, they still use their Windoze boxes and still come to me three times a week asking me stupid questions like “How do you reformat your HD?” and “What Virus scan do you use?” People are lazy and like a comfort zone. they’d rather put up with all those problems, or spend half their time trying to get rid of them, than take two weeks to get used to something new and be happy afterwards.” EMUGer istara says that “tact and patience” is what’s required: “Honestly? You cannot explain how good a Mac is. You have to wait until they finally agree

to try one. And bear in mind given the lies that have been fed PC people about Macs over the years, it takes some pride swallowing for them to do this, and then have to admit that they were wrong, and you were right. So I think tact and patience is the best way. One of the major things that people need to be convinced about is being able to run all their regular applications. 99% of the time this is no issue, plus there is a lot of stuff for Mac that runs better and cleverer than PC equivalents.” MacAddict, another relatively recent switcher rounds out the discussion with some very pertinent observations from his own experience: “No one can tell how many crashes I had and how many data I lost with my earlier PCs. Million times I had viruses, bugs , computer crashes, etc. I tried many ways to fix and retrieve all the data i lost even if you have all the softwares that can make your PC safe from all of that, still you will face those problems no matter what. But I when tried using Mac, it was kinda of a relief from all of that. Seriously you feel like your data is in a safe place plus of course the quality of the operating system and the hardware. It’s been more than year and a half since I became a Mac user and I didn’t get any single problem with my Macs. I really wanna thank Apple for giving us the quality we’ve dreamed of. I believe you all agree with me in this.”

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What Google has to offer a Mac user

What Google has to offer a Mac user By Magnus

oogle, the online juggernaut and reigning king of everything online, has not always been known for its inclusiveness of Mac and Mac users. But it seems they have warmed up to Mac lately and they now sport quite a line of downloads and online services that are Mac compatible. They have also started addressing the Mac community directly by a blog dedicated to issues of Google and Mac (googlemac.blogspot.com/). Online services The crown in Google’s collection of online services is undoubtedly their search engine. That’s where they started and that is still at the core of most anything else they do. Gmail, for example, takes advantage of Google’s search technology to allow you to quickly sort through lots and lots of email. If you feel that Apple’s .Mac email is not enough for you, chances are Gmail (gmail. com) delivers on everything you want and more. Over time it’s grown into a fully-featured email system that can rival and perhaps trump the best of them. Curiously though, it’s still in beta after many years. Google Calendar (www.google.com/ calendar) was when first launched not working in Safari but now it is. It’s a similar situation with Google Docs & Spreadsheets (docs.google. com). Google acquired online word processor Writely in early 2006 and toward the end of the year they had integrated that software into their

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other offerings and now it’s called Google Docs. Into the mix Google has thrown an online spreadsheet. Unfortunately Docs & Spreadsheet are not working in Safari, but Google says “Safari support coming soon”. Finally we’ll mention Google Reader (reader.google.com), an online RSS reader, which works just fine in Safari and can in functionality actual rival some of desktop RSS reader applications. Downloadable software When it comes to downloadable software specific to Mac (www.google.com/mac.html) Google has improved considerably of late. The Google Notifier has seen some recent upgrades and now checks your Google Mail as well as Google Calendar. The Google Toolbar for Firefox gives you access to a number of features and functions right there in the browsers. Google Earth is of course a major application from Google, and it’s so much fun just playing around with. It’s a 30Mb download but well worth it. If you want to build 3D models, Google SketchUp is a good choice, and amazingly it’s free. If you want to have a look at what others are building, check out Google’s 3D Warehouse (sketchup.google. com/3dwarehouse). There are even some models from the UAE, including the Bur Dubai.

If you like Dashboard in Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger you may want to look at Google’s widgets. So far Google has released three widgets. One for posting to a Blogger blog, one for reading Gmail email, and one for Google searching. Google has a very nice application for photo organization and simple editing called Picasa. Picasa is Windows only, but there is a Picasa Web Albums Uploader for Mac with which you can upload photos to the Picasa online storage. So all in all Google offer a lot of online services compatible with Mac, and there’s more to come, I’m sure. They also offer quite a range of downloadable software, most of which will extend or enhance your Google experience. Tools for web masters This article has focused on Google’s services and tools for end users and we’ve been ignoring a whole other side to Google’s universe. That other side is Google’s tools for people who run web sites. There’s Google Adsense of course, which is their online advertising program, Google Analytics, online statistics, and much more. We will come back to those tools in a future issue.

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Guide to buying a Mac on Souq.com

Guide to buying a Mac on Souq.com By Magnus

W If you have a chance to actually try the Mac before buying you can get the serial number by going to About This Mac in the Apple menu, then clicking twice on the text “Version...”.

ith the arrival of web sites like Souq.com and UAE Mall shoppers in the UAE who may be interested in iPods and Macs have new places to shop at. These new shopping channels are not without their problems however and they put more responsibility on the buyer to make sure they know what they’re getting. We browsed around on Souq.com and focused on Mac computers and software. Souq has separate categories for different kinds of items, such as desktops and notebooks. Buying items on sites like this really is a case of buyer-beware. You may be able to save some money but at what cost? There are no guarantees that you actually get what you think you’re getting, that the seller is who they say they are, etc. User rating On Souq.com each buyer and seller has to be registered with the site. For each transaction both parties involved get to leave a rating. Newlyregistered users will obviously have a low rating, so someone having just a 1 may not be a problem, but beware of users with negative rating. Software If you’re buying a computer obviously you’re interested in what software is included. If more software is included you may be interested in buying the item which is something many sellers are aware of so they try to “pad” the item with soft-

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ware. What you need to make sure is whether that software is legal or not, whether you get the original manuals, and whether the software comes on original disks (usually cd or dvd). If the buyer leaves software installed on a Mac’s hard drive and says it’s included in the deal, you should ask if it’s licensed software (it may just be a trial copy) and whether the seller will sign a license transfer. In a hurry If a seller says that they are in a hurry to sell, as a buyer that’s something to be careful about. It may be that they have perfectly good reasons for being in a hurry but it may also be that there is something suspicious going on. The same applies for buyers who want to make a deal because they are in a hurry, like in this example. If a seller is offering to close an auction early, that’s something to be careful about too. An auction is supposed to run for a specified period of time and the winning bidder is whoever has the highest bid at the end of that period. Limited or no information When a seller puts an item up for sale you would think that they would describe the item as thoroughly as possible, giving detailed descriptions of its condition, features, specifications, etc. If a seller does not say much about what they’re selling, be careful. Also, if a seller can show photos of the actual item(s) for sale, that’s obviously better than them just taking something from a manufacturer’s web site. Many sellers are lazy and they just take a picture from a web site, which obviously is not satisfactory. If you’re buying something you want to see the actual item.

Guide to buying a Mac on Souq.com

Non-responsive seller Many web sites have some function for buyers to ask questions of sellers. If a seller is not answering questions or takes a very long time answering them, that may be something that puts up a flag in your mind. I noticed one auction for a Mac where a question was asked on June 12th but on July 3rd there was still no answer. Remember it’s your responsibility to ask any questions before the deal is done. If you don’t make sure to ask all the necessary questions before bidding or buying, it’s your fault. Don’t count on a seller being willing to accept any returns once the deal is done, especially on an auction site.

•

History of item Sellers should describe how old an item is and what the history is. This would include things like where and when it was bought, how has it been used since, etc. If a seller cannot account for an item’s history, it may be cause for concern. This is especially important when you’re buying something that is still under warranty. One way you can check yourself on aspects of a Mac’s history is by its unique serial number. To decode the serial number you can use the Chipmunk web site (www.chipmunk.nl/klantenservice/applemodel.html). It will tell you when the Mac with a particular serial number was manufactured, where it was made, and exactly what model it is.

•

If you’re selling So what if you’re a seller, what can you do to make the process easier? Here are some suggestions: • Describe the item well, with all relevant details and remember the condition of the item, how it has been used, etc.

•

One way to include the complete specifications is to include the System Profiler output. You find this by going to the Apple-menu > About This Mac > More Info. This starts the System Profiler and from there you can save that as a text file and include in your listing. Include real photos of the actual item. Pictures from manufacturers’ web sites are good, but real photos are better. If the item has scratches or other blemishes, be honest about that in the description and try to capture them in the photos. If you’re selling a Mac or an iPod (or anything with storage) make sure you empty the drive and restore it to factory defaults. On a Mac this means running the Mac OS X installation again after reformatting the drive. If you’re including software, make sure you describe what it is, and whether you will transfer the license and if the original disks and handbooks are included. Be prepared to answer questions.

Wrapping up As I said in the beginning, there is certainly room for bargains in this type of transactions but it’s not as easy as many people think. As a buyer, it’s your responsibility to make sure that you know what you’re getting by asking questions. As a seller, you should describe the item as honestly as you can, and be willing to answer questions. Remember that in this type of buying and selling there are few set rules so be prepared to be flexible.

If you’re buying an older Mac it may be a good idea to check out the model’s history to find out when it was introduced, discontinued, etc. Apple-History (www.apple-history.com) is a great web site which has comprehensive details on all Mac models ever sold.

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Join EMUG • • • • •

Membership EmiratesMac User Group is a non-profit, community organization which aims to spread knowledge about Apple products in the United Arab Emirates, and increase the knowledge and skills of its members. Presently, membership in EmiratesMac User Group is free. That may change at a future date when membership terms will be reviewed. Membership benefits and special offers are subject to change at any time and will be reviewed annually by EmiratesMac and participating businesses. To see the latest details, go to http://www.emiratesmac. com/usergroup. Memberships are renewed on an annual basis and the membership period is January to Decemeber. New membership cards will be issued each January for members who wish to remain in EMUG. After applying for a membership, you can pick up your membership card at an EMUG meeting or other event.

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Want to meet other Apple users? Want to learn more about your Mac or iPod? Want to help others with their problems? Want to have some fun? Want to save some money on your Apple purchases?

To become a member • • •

Go to http://www.emiratesmac.com/usergroup and sign up, or; Fill in the form below and fax it to +971-2-6664289, or; Fill in the form below and mail it to EmiratesMac. PO Box 70263, Abu Dhabi, UAE.

Member benefits • • • • •

5% discount on any product in a MacStore in UAE. This offer is not valid in conjunction with any other offer or promotion, and limited to one item of the same type per invoice. At participating Salam Studio & Stores in UAE, members can get special offers and sign up for a customer loyalty program. 5% discount on any finished goods product, e.g. Macintosh computers, at Computer Direct Access (CDA) in the UAE. This offer does not apply to accessories, iPods, or software. The right to participate in members-only events, and discounts at select EmiratesMac-organized events. Access to a dedicated discussion board on www.EmiratesMac.com where you can interact with other members, ask questions, and put in suggestions for activities and anything else about what we do.

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Please provide as accurate and complete information as possible - Please print!!

Name:

PO Box:

Username (if registered at EmiratesMac.com):

City:

Email:

Phone:

Website:

Mobile:

Instant Messaging:

Note: Your membership will be processed as soon as possible and you can pick up your membership card at a future EMUG event. Membership details and benefits are subject to change at any time. If you have any questions or concerns, go to http://www.emiratesmac.com. Membership in EMUG is currently free but a membership fee may be introduced in the future at which point you can decide whether to continue to be a member or not.