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The Skinny on Pages' TOC

Posted 2010-03-15 16:40 in Product-Info by Kali Hilke

Pages is one of those apps that really filled a void in my world. Word was slow and cumbersome (and pre-version 2008 for Mac, not very pretty) and AppleWorks never transitioned into the vibrant OS X Cocoa world.

While I know the application pretty darn well by this point, I’m always excited when I learn something new. Case in point: the automatically-populating Table of Contents feature.

If you’re writing a paper that needs a Table of Contents, there’s no reason to do it manually. When done correctly, the TOC will display your Heading styles and apply a page number to them, and then update on the fly while you’re making changes. If you haven’t used it before, you should—but there are some initially perplexing things about the formatting, so here are some tips:

  • Heading styles are found in the Styles Drawer, the window that appears to the right or left of the document you’re working on. (Note: if you don’t see it, click the View icon at the top of your document and select Show Styles Drawer.)

  • Each page of your document should be its own Section; select Section Break in the Insert menu to break out each page.

  • Once you have broken out your pages into Sections, your TOC should show each Heading (Heading 1, Heading 2, etc.) with an assigned page.

  • To edit what is shown in the TOC, click on the Documents section of the Inspector, and select TOC. There, you can check or uncheck any number of options to show.

  • The individual Section preferences are found in the Layout section of the Inspector. This is where you can designate your pagination.

  • You can control your pagination by selecting either “Continue from previous section” or “Start at: [put your page number here]” under Section in the Layout part of the Inspector.

  • Important: If you want to have your document start at ‘1’ after the TOC, you need to select “Continue…” on both the cover page (if you have one) and the TOC and select “Start at: 1” on the first actual page of your document.

  • The font, font size, line spacing, etc. are all editable in the TOC using the Text section of the Inspector. And even though they are linked, you can make your page numbers a different size than the rest of the text in the TOC.

Anyone else out there a Pages fangirl or fanboy? Send us your comments!

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Tips to Know Before You Upgrade

Posted 2010-03-02 12:44 in Product-Info by Rebecca Kraemer

I received of my least favorite types of emails yesterday. One of our customers purchased an upgrade to Snow Leopard for his Intel-based Mac running 10.5. He spent some time discussing his current setup with the sales associate in our store and it sounded like the upgrade was appropriate. Unfortunately, after installing Snow Leopard, the customer realized that his copy of Tech Tools does not work with 10.6, and his copy of CS2 asked him to reinstall.

The answer? Well, there are plenty of alternatives to Tech Tools, including the opportunity to download a newer version right from Apple’s website. However, while CS2 may run in 10.6, it’s known to be a bit buggy and Adobe does not have public plans to upgrade it any time soon since they’re up to CS4 at this point. This news did not make my customer happy.

Since there is a wide range of computer users and not everyone is tech-savvy, we try to stay informed on compatibility issues and we try to ask our customers the right questions before selling them new software and upgrades. Unfortunately, we’re not perfect (but man, do we try to be!). There are some important steps that even the most technophobic can take to try to ensure a smooth upgrade process.

First off, know what you have! The idea of “tech specs” or “system requirements” often makes people shudder, but it’s really just about comparing apples to apples. Start by knowing about your computer. Go to the Apple logo on the top left of the screen and select “About This Mac”. This will bring up some very useful information right off the bat. Under “Mac OS X” a version number is displayed (i.e. 10.6.2). This version is your operating system. Next, you’ll see the processor speed (i.e. 2.66 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo); this lets your know what type of processor you have and how fast it is. Below that is “Memory”, aka RAM (i.e. 8GB 1067 Mhz DDR3); this lets you know how much RAM is installed on your computer and what type of RAM it is. So, we already have three pieces that are vital to know about before upgrading or buying new software: Operating System, Processor and RAM.

Now, click the “More Info…” button. This opens System Profiler, which gives you more than you will ever need to know about your Mac. Let’s look at the really important parts. On the left-hand column, under “Hardware”, click on “Memory”. This shows the breakdown of your individual pieces of RAM. On my MacBook Pro, for example, I have two slots with 4GBs each. If you see that a bank is empty, that’s a good way to know that you have an opportunity to upgrade the RAM.

If you have an Intel-based Mac and head to “Serial-ATA”, this will display information about your hard drive and optical drive. On a PowerPC laptop or older desktop the hard drive can be found under “ATA”. For the hard drive, you can find out the capacity of the drive, how much space is used and how much is available; the latter is very important when purchasing new software. If you’re looking to purchase a computer game or graphics intensive application, it’s also important to check “Graphics” to see what video card you have (i.e. NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT). Take some time to play around in System Profiler to see the many other bits of information you can glean about your computer.

The last step is to consider the applications you use. Click on your Finder icon in the Dock (the smiling blue face) and that will open a Finder window. Now, click on Applications and take some time to scroll through your applications and make a list of the applications that are really important to you. Right-click and select “Get Info” on the important applications and make sure you also write down what version number they are.

Now that you know your operating system, RAM, processor speed, video card, hard drive space and a list of important applications, you’re ready to check your compatibility options. First off, go to the webpage for the software that you want to purchase. For example, if I want to purchase Snow Leopard I would go to the Snow Leopard upgrade page on our website. or to Apple’s webpages with spec info. Now look for “tech specs” or “system requirements”. In this section, you should find requirements for operating system, RAM, processor, hard drive space and potentially, video card. Depending on what type of software it is, there may be additional requirements as well. Now take that list and match it to the list you made of your computer’s specs; does your computer meet or exceed the specifications? Great!

It should be noted that if you’re looking at old software (for example, a piece of software that says it’s compatible with 10.3.9 or later), you might still want to check if it will actually run in the much newer operating system that you most likely have. If you cannot find this on the manufacturer’s website, Google is your friend!

If you are looking to upgrade the operating system, the last step is to now look at your list of important applications. Go to the websites for each of those applications and make sure that they’re compatible with the operating system you’re looking to upgrade to. I always suggest getting this information directly from the manufacturer/developer so you can see the clearest picture: either it’s certified to work or it isn’t.

Once you do start Googling, you’ll most likely end up with a grey-er answer and that’s when you really have to weigh your options; is it worth the risk or not? In the example I used with the customer above, he’s a photographer and CS2 is vital for his business. CS2 is unsupported by Adobe in 10.6, but, as Google will tell you, it does technically run—but it’s also technically buggy. For this photographer, “buggy” is not an acceptable potential outcome, but for an average consumer or hobbyist it might be.

Hopefully, this article has helped demystify the idea of compatibility and system requirements. I hope you all feel empowered to learn more about the specifications of your system. We’re also always here if you need advice and it’s incredibly helpful if you are able to bring us specific information about your system and the applications you use. We can help you make an informed decision as to what software and upgrade options are right for you!Know Before You Upgrade

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Don't Forget the Surge Protector!

Posted 2010-02-23 11:18 in Product-Info by Gary Peters

If you are thinking of purchasing a new computer setup, one important component that is often overlooked is a good surge protector. While locally we only have to worry about lightning a few times a year, power spikes can still happen at any time, and for the investment put into a brand new machine it is better to be safe than sorry: AppleCare does not consider lightning or electrical damage to be repairable under warranty!

Surge protectors are used to protect electronic devices from power spikes, and should not be confused with power strips (some power strips do have surge protection built-in, and most of the time this will be labelled clearly, but never assume it to be built in if there is no indication).

Generally speaking, picking the surge protector with the highest Joule rating is going to be the best bet. Higher Joule ratings mean that the surge protector can absorb more energy (such as from a lightning strike or power spike) without failing.

It is also important to note that surge protectors also do have a finite life span, so your 10-year-old one probably isn’t up to par anymore (even if it’s never warded off a lightning strike), not to mention it likely has a lower Joule rating than the ones available today.

We’ve got a good selection to choose from in store, my two favorites being the Belkin 12-Outlet Surge Suppressor (rated at 3990 Joules) which is perfect for your home setup, and the Belkin 5-Outlet Mini Surge Protector with 2 USB ports (for your iPhone or iPod!) for your portable setup.

Both are attractively priced at $24.99, so if you are buying yourself an awesome new Mac setup, don’t forget the silent warrior who sits behind the desk—the surge protector!

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Dealing With Duplicates in iTunes

Posted 2010-01-20 10:13 in Product-Info by Katie Wilhite

I opened iTunes this morning when I got to work, and kept hearing the same song twice; I just upgraded to a unibody MacBook and ended up importing some songs twice in the migration. As much as I like Dave Brubeck and Amy Winehouse, I didn’t want to hear duplicates all day.

With about six thousand songs in my library, I didn’t want to go through one-by-one to remove all the duplicates. Thankfully, iTunes does have a feature that isolates duplicate songs. Unfortunately, though, there is a fair amount of manual labor involved.

When in iTunes, select “Show Duplicates” from the File menu, which will then reveal all the duplicates in your library. This will show you the songs with duplicate titles. If you’re like me, you’ll have several versions of the same song, so holding down the option button on your keyboard while in the File menu will reveal “Show Exact Duplicates.” This will show only files with identical titles AND identical lengths, file sizes, etc. This way, I didn’t lose each different version of these tunes.

Now that you’re showing duplicates or exact duplicates depending on your situation, you’ll need to manually go through the list and remove the duplicates by clicking on them, then pressing the delete key on your keyboard. iTunes will ask if you’re sure first, don’t worry.

This can get old quickly. A systemwide trick for selecting nonconsecutive multiple items in any window is to hold down the command key (yours may have an Apple on it) while clicking on the items. With all the duplicates highlighted, press Delete, and you’ll be left with a clean iTunes library. Don’t forget to check through the items now found in the trash to make sure you didn’t delete something you didn’t mean to. It’d be a good idea to let Time Machine back up your computer before hitting the delete key!

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All About Screenshots

Posted 2009-12-24 12:51 in Product-Info by Matt Klein

Many of us already know of the ancient keyboard shortcut ⌘-Shift-3 to capture your screen to a picture file. It’s been around since System 7, and it’s still with us. We’ve made some significant progress over the years. The ⌘-Shift-3 trick captures a full-resolution image of your screen and places the PNG file on your desktop. From there, you can open and edit the image as you see fit.

It’s rare, though, to need a full screenshot. For these situations, I use ⌘-Shift-4, which turns the mouse pointer to a crosshairs to allow for precision selection of a portion of your screen. I often find myself writing documentation for company procedures and posting the information to our company wiki (powered by Mac OS X Server), and taking screenshots is a very effective way to visually convey knowledge. I love saving the step of cropping in Preview.

⌘-Shift-4 is more powerful than it might seem, though. You can press the key combination and then press the space bar. The mouse pointer changes to a camera, and individual windows and menus are highlighted when you hover over them. Clicking the mouse yields a screen shot of just that window or menu.

The Grab application, found in your Applications folder, allows you to take a timed screenshot by selecting “Timed Screen” from the Capture menu.

These tips can be taken a step further by taking the screenshot and automatically copying it to your clipboard for pasting wherever you’d like. Simple add the Control key to the shortcuts above and you can paste the screenshot directly into any application.

Snow Leopard takes this concept a bit further by allowing you to record video of your actions on screen in QuickTime Player. It records your voice and your screen by default, and it’s my new favorite tool for producing training materials.

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