Mac360 | Tips and Tricks

I have a nasty email habit. I bounce spam. If you use Apple's Mail on your Mac, bouncing spam is easy and fun. I set up a couple of filters in preferences to redirect spam to a specific Mail folder, then bounce it back to the spammer. Does it help? Probably not. But not every spam email I bounce bounces back to me. And I feel better. What if you have legitimate email you send and it bounces back to you? Full Story »

For all the time and trouble and expense we go through to find really cool and easy to use file finders and app launchers, sometimes the best is just built in. So it is with the Mac's Dock. No, not the Application part of the Dock. Love it or hate it, the Dock is easy to use. The Dock is also easy to customize, and with a couple of simple steps, can be a one click app launcher and file finder without having to clear away windows to find the Finder. Full Story »

We live in the age of multiple computing devices-- Mac, PC, iPhone, BlackBerry et al. So we need seamless synchronization of important data between devices. We love our Macs. We love Address Book. We love Google's free and easy Gmail. How do we get our contacts in Address Book to sync with contacts in Gmail? And make the whole shebang set it and forget it. How? Another Mac utility to the rescue. Full Story »

If you're like me then you're taking more photos than ever, and printing fewer than ever. The fine art of printing beautiful photographs has largely been supplanted by email and Facebook. We share photos, but we don't print photos as much. Mostly. So what happens when you want to print a digital photo? iPhoto has plenty of options, but the process is so complex you need a How To Print Using iPhoto For Dummies book. There's an easier way. Full Story »

A visit to my next door neighbor became and adventure to make our Macs browse faster. At my urging, he switched from a Windows PC to a Mac a few years ago. I asked if all was going well. He said yes, except he thought Safari was rather slow (he uses Firefox on Windows in his office PC). Safari? Slow? That seemed like a strange observation so I took a look at his Mac. Indeed, browsing in Safari was, well, a little slow. So was Firefox. Why? Full Story »

My next door neighbor and her husband started their own home business last year. So far, it's going well. At my urging, they switched from a Windows PC to a Mac, and so far I haven't had to fix much. Until last week. They asked me if I could design a logo for their business, since I have Photoshop on my Mac. I gave them a dozen different designs and they were thrilled. But I didn't use Photoshop. Full Story »

How valuable is your Mac? Does it have a few thousand photos in iPhoto? Are there a few thousand songs in iTunes? What about downloaded movies and TV shows? Do you have priceless video clips stored in iMovie? And what about documents? Most of us store our most valuable files somewhere in the Documents folder. What are all those files worth to you? What's your Mac backup plan? Here's the best, most flexible, most affordable Mac backup plan ever. Full Story »

After two years of waiting, my wife bought an iPhone. She had a BlackBerry on Verizon. Now and iPhone on AT&T. So far, so good. No dropped calls. She loves the apps but she has one complaint. Ringtones. Her BlackBerry had a specific ringtone for family, friends, and co-workers. She paid for those ringtones. Moving them to the iPhone seemed to be a chore so we started from scratch. Full Story »

If you're like the average 21st century computer user, you have too much stuff. Not just computer stuff. Stuff stuff. Closets of stuff. Garages of stuff. Storage lockers of stuff. How do you keep track of all that stuff? Yet another Mac utility to the rescue. MYStuff can track your home inventory (good for insurance purposes), and product warranties, and PDF documents. Even what you spend on your stuff. Full Story »

Love it or hate it , I'm more convinced than ever that Apple is on to something with the so-called closed architecture of the iPhone and iPad. Maybe the same measure of control should be extended to the Mac. What's the problem? Mac users suffer from an abundance of choice. We have more utilities that do more of the same things over and over. Worse, we're willing to pay money for the privilege of a solution in search of a problem. Full Story »

If the U.S. Postal Service is losing money, it's not my fault. I'm doing my best to help support all those postal workers by sending things the way God intended. Via truck and a my neighborhood postal worker. Helping my cause is a nifty Mac utility which plugs into a scale and gives me mailing options to help reduce the cost of using the good old US of A's USPS. sendIT is the tool. It ain't pretty. But it works. Full Story »

I've been a school teacher for 20 years. My universal observation is that the smartest kids don't always get the best grades. Well organized students do better in homework and get better test scores. If you have a child in school, whether kindergarten, high school, or even college, one of the best things you can teach them is to manage their homework assignments. The end result is almost always a smarter student with better grades. Does it help to have a Mac? Full Story »