Maciverse

Parental Controls On Your Mac

Dan — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 11:47:17 +0000

As the internet remains a Wild West of content where users are free to “stumble upon” content areas of many different classes and computer tasks are continually being moved internet based platforms, more and more parents are interested in locking down the computer experience of their children.

Included in Mac OS X Leopard are Parental Controls that will allow you to keep track of what applications your children can use, how they view the desktop and finder, the websites they can or can not visit, as well as who they can email and instant message.

These controls provide a sense of security for parents that are worried about what their children may “digg” up while learning new ideas on the computer.

To setup Parental Controls on OS X Leopard:

Open System Preferences and then select Accounts

Next, unlock the settings so that you can make changes by clicking the Lock in the lower left corner, enter your password to confirm the unlock request

Select the user account on the left navigation for the account you’d like to apply Parental Controls. If you haven’t already setup an account for the user you’d like to restrict, you can also do that from the Accounts section of System Preferences
Once the account is selected select Open Parental Controls

Now that the Parental Controls option is open, you can select the System setup you’d like available to the user. Simplify Finder, Limit availability of Applications, lock down the dock and creation of CDs, etc.

The other tabs across the top will allow you to limit the content available to the user included what they view on the web, Mail & iChat will limit who they can talk to, and Time Limits will restrict access during certain times of day or limit the length of time they can compute and browse the web.

Additionally, if you’re still concerned about what the user may be trying to get at, you can setup logs to report back on their computing behavior.

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Email Multiple Photos from your iPhone

Dan — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 15:36:22 +0000

One of the features that was lacking on the iPhone with its 1.0 and 2.0 Operating systems was the ability to share or email multiple photos in one message.

Thankfully this was one of the features that was added with the the latest update to the iPhone OS. To email multiple photos from your iPhone you must have iPhone OS 3.0 installed, so if you haven’t already updated your software be sure to check for updates in iTunes.

To send multiple photos in an email from your iPhone:

Open the Photos application and select an album you’d like to share photos from
Next, click the button in the bottom left corner to interact with your photos.

Touch the pictures you’d like to send in an email (a red check will confirm that the image is selected)

Click the Share button in the bottom corner and then select Email from the pop-up option

Your iPhone will now open an email message and allow you to select the individuals you’d like to send the email to. Enter any text that you’d like to go with the email and send away as normal.

You can also quickly and easily copy and delete images by following these steps.

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Google Quick Search Box and Twitter

Aaron — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 04:44:15 +0000

In a previous post, I mentioned that you can post to Twitter using Google’s Quick Search Box.

This article assumes two things. First, you have a Twitter account and second, you have Google Quick Search Box installed on your Mac.

Let’s set up your Twitter account information on Google’s Quick Search Box. To do that, go to QSB Preferences.

From here you can change some of the Quick Search Box’s basic behavior. To enable sending status updates to Twitter navigate to the ‘Accounts’ tab

Next, click the ‘Add Account’ button. You can enter two types of Accounts. Your Google account for Gmail and Google Documents or your Twitter account.

Enter your Account name and Password and then click ‘Setup’

Assuming you’ve typed in your account name and password correctly, Google Quick Search Box will inform you that for some account types, the Quick Search Box can also search it’s items, but you need to enable it on another tab. As of this writing, Twitter is not searchable from the Quick Search Box so you can close this warning and close the preferences Window.

At this point you can now ‘tweet’ from the Quick Search Box. To do this, open the quick search box either by clicking on the Dock icon or using its keyboard shortcut. The default is command-command.

Now that the Quick Search Box window is open, it will search your system on what you type, just like Spotlight. To send a tweet though, you need to start with a space. A space tells the Search Box you want to do something with what you’re typing.

Once you’re finished typing, hit the tab key and the menu switches a list of actions.

Hit the Arrow key to select your action, in this case ‘Send Twitter Status’ and press return. In a second or two, you’ll be notified if your tweet was successfully sent to Twitter.

That’s all there is to it from start to Tweet. Although it takes a little setup, posting to Twitter from the desktop becomes very quick and easy to do.

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iPhone: Using Maps to Avoid Traffic

Dan — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 11:29:04 +0000

If you’re one of many Americans that have long commutes to and from work every day then you must also seek for a faster way home when ever you can take it. The iPhone in your pocket, may be just the tool you’re looking for to help you decrease your time wasted in traffic jams.

Maps

Since the original iPhone was released one of its built in apps has been Maps. Maps combines the latest Google Maps technology and offers it to users right on their iPhone.

Maps include satellite photos, can pin point you based on your GPS location , track your movement, route you to your destination, and even show you the traffic conditions on the roads you commute on everyday.

To view the current traffic conditions you’ll need to enable the feature.

Open Maps and click on the small button to the right. This opens up your Map display options.

Once your Display Options have opened, touch the Show Traffic button.

Your map should now include green, yellow, and red lines over the major roads in your area

With the feature enabled, you can see the overall flow of traffic along your path to and from work. I’ve found that its often faster to change my rout and avoid any red traffic if I can end up closer to home with just green traffic along the way. I’ve often saved 10 to 15 minutes on an average 1 hour daily commute by doing this.

The Google Maps color legend is detailed as followed:

Green: average speeds greater than 50 mph
Yellow: 25 – 50 mph speeds
Red: less than 25 mph speeds.

Keep Checking that Map

If you’ve tried to use this feature before and found that the traffic details for your commute just weren’t included in Google Maps, keep checking back. Google recently added more roads to their traffic data and continues to improve the service.

Try it out, and let us know how your iPhone and Google Maps are helping you save time on your daily commute.

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iPhone 0S 3.0 New Feature: Podcast Controls

Dan — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 12:07:54 +0000

As you may already know, Apple released an update to the iPhone software (3.0) that include a number of new features such as copy & paste, voice memos, and many others.

Over the next few weeks, Maciverse.com will periodically spotlight a new feature of the latest iPhone OS.

Podcasts

Shortly after installing the iPhone OS update, I found myself listening to one of the podcasts that I subscribe to. When the Podcast loaded up, I noticed that Apple had added a few things to the Podcast User Interface.

Now, when you start listening to a Podcast, 3 buttons will appear below the play status bar. The first new button is an envelop. Clicking this will open up mail and include in the body of the email a link to the podcast you’re listening to as well as text letting people know this is something you’d like them to check out.

These buttons aren’t available on normal songs, so it doesn’t appear that Apple is hoping to increase sales by allowing individuals to spread the word easily about everything they like and listen to. The effort must be to help spread the word on Podcasts and their popularity.

The next button is a 30 second skip back button. This is a great feature for listening to podcasts that often cover subjects and include detail that you’d like to listen to a time or two again to make you sure you got the point of the discussion.

The final new feature is the ability to speed up, or slow down, the speed at which the podcast is playing. Click the 1x button will change it to 2x (double the speed). Clicking it again will reduce the speed to 1/2x (Half speed). I’m not sure how often this feature will be used, but maybe people just wanted to hear their podcasts as if they were being done by Alvin and the Chipmunks.

Overall, its nice to see Apple continually try and add features and capabilities to the user experience. Let us know if there is a new feature in the iPhone OS that you’ve found and we haven’t covered.

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How to Get Map Directions on your iPhone

Dan — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 21:32:05 +0000

Apple announced last week their latest version of the iPhone (3g S), as well as the upgrade to the phone’s operating system. One of these features includes the capability for full turn by turn direction software from GPS companies like TomTom. While this is a nice upgrade to the iPhone, current users (as well as those that aren’t willing to pay for additional features and support) can get accurate driving, walking, and public transit directions on their standard iPhone 3g.

Directions with Google Maps

To get started with directions on your iPhone, open Maps and follow these steps:

First, have the phone find you’re current location by selecting the small location button at the bottom left hand corner. Once your location has been found, the map will reload with a small pin drop showing where you’re currently located.

Next, click the Directions button and enter the address or name of the place you need directions to in the END: field.

Set your current location as the start point by selecting the Start field and then clicking the Address Book icon

Select the Bookmarks button at the bottom of the screen and then pick “Current Location” from your bookmark list.

Click the Route button to see the route to your destination and details about distance and length of travel

Select how you’d like to get to your destination (Car, foot, or public transportation)and click start to get your first instructions for your route. Click Next, to see each turn you’ll need to make while in route to your destination, and watch your location pin follow along the route as you follow the provided directions.

If you need directions that your iPhone has all the tools needed to get you to where you need to be. If these steps seem a bit to time consuming or not as vocal as you’d like, keep your eye out for the latest releases from Apple and GPS mapping service providers for their direction software. Below is the TomTom latest advertisement of their software.

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Google Chrome Released for Macs (Developer Build)

Dan — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 03:54:29 +0000

Its been a while since Google originally released their own web browser, but at that time the software was only available for Windows machines.

We’ve posted in the past ways to download and build the Open Source version of the Chrome browser Chromium, but Today Google officially released a Developer Build of the browser for OSX and Linux.

Head over to the Chromium Blog to access the link for the download of the browser. But be warned that the browser is still missing a lot of features, including the ability to watch youtube videos and other flash supported features.

THe browser so far seems to do a fair job of rendering web pages, but the application is a bit clunky on my machine. I also prefer the Safari 4 UI for the tabs up top over the current design for Chrome.

Let us know what you think about the the initial developer release of Google Chrome for Mac OS X. Will it be enough to get you to ditch Safari or Firefox?

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Get a Free iPod Touch

Dan — Wed, 27 May 2009 13:28:40 +0000

Each year, Apple offers a special to college students before the school year starts to encourage them to purchase Apple products. In previous years, if you purchased an Apple computer as a college student, you got a free iPod Nano.

It seems that Apple has a surplus of iPod Touch models, as they’ve increased the incentive for buying Apple products.

This year, if you are a college student, faculty, or staff & you purchase an Apple product before Sept. 8th, you will get a free iPod Touch.

Head over to Apple’s website on getting your free iPod touch with a purchase of a Mac for more details.

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Quick Tip: iChat Theater

Dan — Mon, 18 May 2009 01:31:07 +0000

One of the less used applications that comes with every Apple computer is the chat program iChat. Alternatives such as Adium are often used now that many individuals have chat accounts with multiple messaging networks (ie. AIM, MSN, Yahoo, Facebook, etc.)

Although alternative messaging systems are available, iChat has a number of built in features that users can take advantage of. Previously we’ve detailed how to share your screen with others via iChat and now you can share files, presentations, movies, and other “Quick Look” capable files.

iChat Theater

To share files, movies, and other content while messaging with friends and family:

Open iChat
Select File from the menu bar and then Share File with iChat Theater

Select the file you want to share
Open a video chat with whom ever you’d like to share the content

Now your video chat session with whom ever you’re messaging with will be able to see the contents of the file you’re sharing with them. Making it an easy platform for sharing and discussing files.

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The Little Search Box that Could

Aaron — Tue, 12 May 2009 04:01:18 +0000

In the Case of the Slow Mac part 2, Spotlight and its background counterpart were eating up all the system memory. The obvious solution was to disable Spotlight. But without Spotlight, OS X takes a giant leap backward to before Tiger (OS X 10.3 anyone?) and leaves a gaping hole in terms of functionality. Also, as storage continues to increase in size Spotlight helps you search through all of your stuff. But the increase in storage also means an increase in stuff for Spotlight to search through and index. Often you don’t need Spotlight to search through your content because you’re searching for something. For example, you can use Spotlight to search for an Application and once Spotlight finds it, you can then open the application. This is usually faster than opening the Finder, navigating to the Applications Folder, finding the Application and opening it. Depending on your system, it may be slightly slower than finding the application on your dock.

Earlier this year, Google released a small application called the Google Quick Search Box (qsb) for the Mac. This experimental app blends searching the web (via Google of course) and your own content as seamless as possible. Qsb takes a different approach than Spotlight in that it doesn’t index the content of your files. But where it lacks in content it more than makes up for in actions. In other words, not only can you search for files, applications, contacts, and the web, but you can also act upon what you’ve found and search for actions right within QSB. Let’s take a look at a some examples.

Like Spotlight, QSB has a hot-key combination, and a menu bar item with which to search. When you fire up QSB, you get a small field to enter your search:

As you type, QSB will display results, these could be applications, actions, or other items too. For example, if I type ‘it’ into the box, I see the following:

Search Results

Not only can I open iTunes, I could adjust the volume, or search google for ‘it’ or a host of other things. I could type in the name of my favorite website:

and QSB opens it in my default browser. When I’m done for the day, I can have QSB shut things down for me:

Shut Down

That’s all well and good, but let’s not forget that this is Google, so QSB can also connect to your Google Account. You can search your gmail account for messages from QSB:

Searching Gmail

Finally, QSB supports plugins and one of the more recent plugins is support for twitter. That’s right, you can tweet from QSB, though it isn’t entirely obvious how to do that at first. What you have to do is start by typing a space in the Quick Search Box. This tells QSB you’re not searching but rather creating text for an action:

Typing a Tweet

Once you have your tweet (keep in mind the character limit), hit the tab key or the right arrow key and you’ll be presented with an action to update your twitter status.

Updating Your Twitter Status

QSB is a handy application that can take the place of Spotlight most of the time and it does quite a bit more. If you need to search your documents for your great Aunt’s gingerbread recipe, QSB isn’t going to help much (unless it is on Google Documents). But QSB can help you launch Mail or Skype to ask her for it again. You can download QSB from here.

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