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Who would have thought that I would be posting so much Mac related content?!? Who knows I may be a convert yet!

I have been fortunate enough to have a MacBook Pro allocated to my department which I then keenly allocated to myself for some play time Two days in and so far I am liking the latest OS X iteration.

The first thing i did was to setup and install Wndows XP using Boot Camp as I knew I would need some of the useful Windows only applications I use. This process was almost easier (if not easier) than installing Windows on a PC. Simply run the Boot Camp Assitant in OS X, set the Windows partitions size, insert a genuine Windows install CD and off you go. Your Mac will then boot initiating the usual initial Windows setup screens followed by the graphical Windows setup Wizard. Once the process is complete all that’s left to do is install the required drivers using the OS X Leopard install CD and your dual boot MAC-Windows computer is complete.

Boot Camp setup guide can be downloaded here.

Boot Camp is a great feature; however having to reboot each time to use your Windows apps is a bit of a pain. Enter VMware Fusion! VMware Fusion allows you do run a virtual OS machine under OS X much like Parallels or the archaic Virtual Desktop from Microsoft. VMware fusion was able to use my already setup Boot Camp partition as a virtual machine so setup was minimal. All that was needed was to install VMware tools once logged into Windows to allow the virtual machine to run alot smoother and use Macs inbuilt devices. VMware fusion can be run in Unity mode, which allows Windows applications to be run directly from the Dock or the VMware applications menu when the virtual machine is running (examples below).

Unity mode is nice however, I prefer full screen mode so I have allocated my Windows virtual machine to the second space in OS X. This means using the shortcut keys or Expose I can switch between full screen OS X and full screen Windows XP. Below are screen shots of OS X Leopard spaces with VMware assigned to the second space. The screen cap. looks a little odd as at the time I was also playing with multiple monitors with different screen resolutions.

I like the apple dock but I also like to organise it my way. OS X Leopard has introduced dock stacks, which allow you to sort applications, documents, downloads, etc. into folders in your dock and display them using the predefined fan, grid or list effects. I love this new feature however it looked a little plain. So over to my mate Google to find out how to pretty it up. I found a bunch of icons which the author has called Drawers which look awesome as stack icons. I will post a how to on this soon…

Other useful application I have installed which I will post about in the near future include:

- iAlertU
- iRed Lite
- WinClone

The next project, OS X Leopard on a PC…

written by Andrew Greenlees \\ tags: apple, Fusion, Leopard, Mac, MacBook, Operating System, OS, os x, Virtual, VMWare

ClickView - Check it out!

written by Andrew Greenlees \\ tags: ClickView, Remote Access

DO NOT copy and paste from Word to WordPress without clearing formatting options.

written by Andrew Greenlees \\ tags: formatting, Microsoft, Word

Part 2…

With all Mac access completely offline and LDAP authentication for some odd (and at this point unknown) reason not able to hold a constant connection, I decided to use and configure the Directory Services Active Directory (AD) plugin. I could see the advantages and disadvantages of using the AD authentication method. However, my main concern at this point was to relieve the pressure on me from the powers to be with a quick-fix solution.

The main advantages would be a single set of user credentials for all computers (Mac & PC) in the school and easy (mapped) access to the users Windows hosted home folder. The disadvantage was that with the time constraints I was unable to find a way to map the users Windows home folder, Mac home folder and possible other AFP mappings at login. The workaround I used was to create a shortcut to the servers AFP path on all the Mac computers, which allowed users to list the directories that they had access too. During the coming holiday break I will be investigating further to find a solution.

So, I bound the XServer to AD without any hassle, opened Workgroup Manager, selected AD as the search path, authenticated and the users populated from AD. My colleagues and I then went to each Mac one by one and bound them to AD using a unique name. The only problem we ran into was that AD requires that the time on the client computer be the same (or close to the same) as the Domain Controller. With the occasional hassle, we synchronized the time settings on all Mac clients to our Domain Controller, which then enabled us to successfully bind.

With that all done I am now waiting for a full class login to occur to test the server reliability and authentication method. We will be purchasing a copy of Leopard server in the not too distant future and with the installation of this server upgrade, I am contemplating rolling back to the LDAP authentication as it allows for more flexibility and customisation considering the somewhat unique options our Mac network requires.

This is definately not the last I have seen of this issue…

written by Andrew Greenlees \\ tags: AD, Mac, Network, OD, OS, Relationship, Windows

Recently our OS X Server crashed and burned. A Mac tech. and I tried put our heads together and attempted to bring the system back life and restore its previous state. The file system and user data was all intact however, we could not consistently keep the network services (AFP, Open Directory, etc.) running. We even went as far as trying a complete rebuild on an alternative XServe then restoring the OD and Directory Services settings but this was also to no avail. Let me give you some background as to how our Mac network WAS setup;

We are primarily a Windows based domain. The only pocket of Macs we have are for our Photography and Visual Arts departments (and an odd Mac Book here and there). The original setup was conceived well before my time at my current company so up until I was thrown into the guts of the Mac network when the whole system went down my knowledge of the server setup was on a need to know basis. The XServe had a Directory Services LDAP connection to our Windows 2003 LDAP server and had a custom binding to pull user information from Active Directory. I never completely explored the custom mappings but from what I have been told it was a fairly intense setup to provide the out of the ordinary needs at the time.

This is my first job where I have had to support Macs so my knowledge was very limited but from the start I found the setup to be somewhat odd. The Macs would always take a considerable amount of time to startup (which I worked out later was due to Directory Services taking an age to authenticate), user accounts would randomly stop working or be denied access to applications. The main method behind the madness was to allow users to maintain their Windows based home folders, but also have a network mapped home folder on the Mac server when logged into a Mac computer. I had always wanted to reconfigure the server myself but without the necessary time or expertise I stopped myself from opening that can of worms. But with the server now down for the count I was forced to commission my plan…

More blabbering to come….

written by Andrew Greenlees \\ tags: active directory, afp, apple, ldap, Mac, os x, server, xserve

Imagine it, a Mac and a PC playing well together…

To be continued…

written by Andrew Greenlees \\ tags: Mac, Network, os x, PC, Windows, YouTube

I recently installed the latest Release Candidate of Firefox 3 (RC3). Firefox 3 checks the compatibility of your installed add-ons to see if they will function correctly. During this process I was reminded of a few add-ons that I had installed some time ago and rarely use. My current list and why I use them is as follows:

ColorfulTabs - This is mainly a cosmetic add-on although it does make distiguishing between tabs a little easier when you have numerous tabs opened. However, this add-on is not supported in Firefox 3 so I will be uninstalling it.

Download Statusbar - Tidies up management and monitoring of downlooads in Firefox by adding a downloads bar above the statusbar when you start a download.

DownThemAll! - Configurable download manager/accelerator for Firefox. I have only just installed this plugin but is seems quite good so far. Comparable to Free Download Manager.

English (Australian) Dictionary - Because I am AUStralian!

Extended Statusbar - Opera like statusbar that displays speed, percentage, time and loaded size. Helpful but once again is not compatible with Firefox 3 as yet.

Fast Dial - Allows fast access to your favourite pages using a thumbnail list of user defined favourite sites. I have this set as my home page.

FaviconsizeTab - The width of the specified tab is resized to the size of the icon (removes name). I use this to minimize the space taken up by the tab that I generally always have open throughout the day.

Google Reader Notifier - A Google reader icon is added to the bottom right hand corner of Firefox and notifies you of new posts. I use Google reader as my main RSS feed reader so this add-on is very helpful for me. This add-on is not yet compatable with Firefox 3 so I will be trialling the alternative Google Reader Watcher soon…

GooglePreview - Inserts a website preview window into Google and Yahoo search results. Helpful to identify pages that you have already visited.

iMacros for Firefox - Record and replay Macros in Firefox. Handy for those repetative tasks.

Image Zoom - Adds zoom functionality to images in Firefox. Save the eyes trying to desifer an image, just zoom in!

Link Alert - Changes your cursor to indicate the file type of a link. This add-on allows you to select from a list of predefined file types and add your own.

Nightly Tester Tools - Used for testing the latest build release of Firefox. I use this add-on to force FIrefox to install incompatible add-ons to see if they will work.

PDF Download - Presents you with an option to either download the PDF, view it with an external app. or view it as HTML. This add-on was mainly helpful for me when my Firefox Acrobat Reader plugin was playing up.

PicLens - Transforms Firefox into an amazing photo and video gallery viewer. This add-on is one of my favourites (see PicLens in action).

Pronounce - Pronounce English words. A voice will say the selected word using the correct pronunciation.

Split Browser - Splits your browser window according to where you specify. Very helpful for making comparisons.

Taboo - Allows you to save you current open tabs, their location and even partially filled in forms.

TwitterFox - This add-on notifies your at set intervals of your Twitter activity. I haven’t been able to get into Twitter so I was hoping that this add-on might help me use it more.

VideoDownloader - Download embedded video and audio from websites. This add-on does not work with Firefox 3, boy do I miss it! (alternative - Flash Video Resources Downloader).

Thats it! I can safely say that I do somewhat use all the add-on that I have installed. While writing this post I found many other add-ons that might prove themselves useful Stay tuned for an update…

written by Andrew Greenlees \\ tags: add-ons, browser, Firefox, Internet, RC