The Official Journal of the Volume 23.03 March 2006 1 Meetings Update ALL MEETINGS ARE HELD AT: (unless otherwise indicated) Turnbull House, 11 Bowen Street, Wellington When: Monday 27 March, 2006 Time: 7.10 pm till 9.30pm (doors open 6.50pm) WelMacs’ main meeting this month will cover the first things you’ll come across when using a Mac - whether you’ve just switched from using Windows or Linux, are a beginner Mac user - or just want to learning more about the Apple operating system before you take the plunge. Featured in the meeting will be snippets of Terry White’s “Mac OS X Train- ing for Windows Users” DVD, and a review of the Apple “Switch” campaign... as well as an opportunity to relate your switching experi- ence. There will be a few spot prizes as well. Following this we will have a break for supper then our usual Mac Help Desk session. Kapiti Area Meeting For those members living at or near the Paraparaumu area, our next Kapiti meeting will be a dinner at the Rita King Cottage at St Marks Church in Rosetta Road, Raumati on Monday 3 April 2006. New Media Users Group Check <http://nmug.welmac.org.nz/> Digital Video Users Group 7–9.30pm, Monday 10th April 2006 at Turnbull House, 11 Bowen Street, Wellington. Cover Photo: One of the compelling reasons for some people to purchase a Macintosh Computer is the iLife suite of applications that comes with the computer. This is the topic of this months meeting and the cover photo of the iLife 2 3 President's Report Hi folks. able to attend one, so we will contact you to confi rm your preference once we The AGM managed to know which ones we will be running. convince me to stay on If you aren’t able to use the form as president for a fi fth for some reason, please e-mail or tele- year. I hope you aren’t phone me with your details. getting tired of me yet. We will be using three rooms: the Large Gallery, Small Gallery and Turn- Committee Changes bull Room, all of which are on the fi rst At the AGM, the previous committee fl oor. Allocation of topics to rooms will was re-elected with very few changes. be determined according to the number See the list on the back cover for de- of registrations. tails. We have added two new commit- We will be supplying a limited num- tee members: Peter Kirby and Lesley ber of computers for the workshop. At- O’Cain. Welcome, and thanks for vol- tendees can also bring their own laptop unteering! computers, but please don’t bring large Workshop desktop computers. WelMac will be running a workshop Depending on number of attendees on Saturday 29th April at Turnbull and available computers and tutors, we House, from 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. intend to structure the “Basics” work- There will be a half hour lunch break, shop as a hands-on tutorial session with and a light lunch is provided. The fee to two attendees and one tutor per com- attend is $30 per person. puter. The other workshops will be more We are offering a selection of four in the form of a seminar with a higher topics. These are subject to suffi cient ratio of attendees to computers. registrations. These workshops are somewhat of • Macintosh Basics. an experiment to gauge interest and • Productivity (MS Offi ce). to see how well we can run them given • Graphics (Photoshop, Freehand). the facilities available at Turnbull House. • Video (Final Cut Pro). We are hoping that the reduced fee If there are other topics you would compared to previous years will make like to see covered in future work- it a more attractive prospect to many shops, please let me know, or use the members. If there is suffi cient demand comments on the registration form to we will continue to hold workshops request another topic. throughout the year. Advance registration is essential, If you intend to travel to the work- and numbers are limited. If possible, shop by car, note that parking may be please use the form on the web site: an issue. Street parking is free on Satur- http://www.welmac.org.nz/ days, but there is a two hour time limit workshop.htm in most areas. This may mean having to The form allows you to register for move your car at the lunch break. The several workshops, but you will only be Clifton Terrace car park is reasonably 2 3 close, and is free on weekends. as the applications typically used on these computers are taking longer to Intel Mac Models be converted to Universal form, which Apple is rapidly introducing new Mac is required to allow them to run at full models based on Intel processors. speed (if at all) on Macs with an Intel The iMac is now only available with processor. an Intel processor (Core Duo at 1.83 There are rumours of another Apple or 2 GHz). The G5 model is no longer media event around April 1st (Apple’s available. 30th anniversary), which may be an The Mac Mini with Intel processor opportunity to introduce the “Mac- was announced within the last month, Book” (replacement for the iBook). and is already available here. The G4 There could also be a radically different models will presumably only be avail- iPod in the works, with improved video able while stocks last. playback. The Mac Mini Intel models are more expensive than the G4 models, but they Teething Trouble are considerably faster (for applica- As always with new computer mod- tions which are available in “Universal” els, there have been a few problems form), have built-in Airport Extreme reported in Internet forums by people and Bluetooth as standard, digital and who have bought the new Macs with analogue audio input and output, and Intel processors. Some of these might include the Apple remote control and be faults with individual computers, Front Row software, allowing them to be while others are likely to be software used as part of a home entertainment issues that will be sorted out as Apple centre. Maximum memory capacity is is able to fix them in new versions of now 2 GB. The high end model includes Mac OS X. a Superdrive. A nice change is that they On the software front, the “Rosetta” now have four USB ports instead of two, emulation system has been put through reducing the need for a hub. its paces. This facility allows Intel Macs The Mac Mini uses a slower proces- to run most applications written for sor and less powerful video hardware PowerPC (G3/G4) processors, as long than the iMac or MacBook Pro, but its as they don’t require the advanced performance should otherwise be quite features of the G5. close to the other models. User reports indicate that Rosetta The MacBook Pro has been in rela- works reasonably well: a rough guide- tively limited supply overseas and has line is that if you were upgrading from a not reached New Zealand in quantity three or four year old G4 Mac to a new yet. This should improve over the next Intel Mac, your old PowerPC applications month. would run in emulation on the Intel Mac Replacements for the iBook and the at a similar speed to how they ran on 12” and 17” PowerBook G4 models have the old computer. not yet been announced, but they are Memory is a critical issue: Rosetta likely to be appearing soon. needs a lot of it, so if you are planning to The professional desktop and server be dependent on PowerPC applications machines (PowerMac and Xserve) are probably a little further down the track, continued on page 13 4 5 Get smart about OS X security by Glenn Brynjulson he events of the past month have shown us that malware writ- ers are busy creating Trojans, viruses and worms for the Mac. WhileT Apple’s most recent patches may have stopped the “safe file” exploit, Apple can do only so much to keep you safe. Your best bet, as always, is to practice safe computing methods. What follows is a checklist of things you should already be doing to keep your computer safe from Internet threats and less obvious “threats” in your home or workplace. Lock Down Login The Admin account - the one cre- ated when you first started your Everyone - I mean everyone - should new Mac - has a number of security disable automatic login in the Secu- features left wide open for your rity preference pane. convenience. Having the machine log in automati- Unfortunately, that convenience cally means that anyone with access enables anyone with access to the to your machine can trash or modify account (your 6-year-old niece) to your Home folder at will. Is there trash your entire Applications folder, anything in your Home folder that and it could enable malware attach- you’d like to keep? ments to use your Admin privileges Forcing yourself to log in each time to install itself. also helps you remember your Moving Admin password, which is useful when you lose that slip of paper under the key- If your main account is already the board. (You don’t do that, right?) Admin account, follow these steps to move the Admin privileges to If you work in an office, you also another account: will want to check the box next to “Require password to wake this With the Accounts preference pane, computer from sleep or screen sav- create the new account - let’s call it er.” Just remember to activate the “Fred” - and give Fred administra- screen saver or put the computer to tion privileges, under the pane’s sleep when you leave to get a cup Security tab.