tutorial

Tutorial: Getting into Login Items: Part 1

Ted Landau August 2005

If you've never used Login Items, it's time to give them a whirl. They are among the most convenient shortcuts in Mac OS X. Actually, even if you have never created a Login Item, you may be using them anyway, as a result of applications that automatically add themselves to your list without exactly telling you.

And for those already familiar with Login Items, there may still be some tips and tricks of which you are unaware.

In this two-part tutorial (concluding next month), we explore all about Login Items. Using a Q&… Read more

Solving an issue where the Date/Time setting reverts to 1969

Some users power up their Macs to find they are re-living the year of the first moon landing, with the date and time setting reverting to Dec. 31st, 1969. The problem can be temporarily resolved by simply using the Date and Time System Preference pane to correct this setting, but the erroneous date/time may return the next time the system is restarted, causing significant issues with file creation dates, some date-reliant applications and more.

This problem generally has three causes, which can manifest singly or in tandem:

A faulty PowerBook/iBook primary battery that must be replaced Corrupt or … Read more

Mini-Tutorial: Backing up Mail.app mail

Old e-mail messages are usually among the neglected components of a healthy backup routine. Despite their general tendency to contain sensitive, important information, and the utility they can serve when searching for old contacts or other data, many users fail to properly preserve previously viewed or sent messages.

In addition, having too many messages in your Mail.app database can cause significant performance issues, both when refreshing the entire list of messages, as well as when performing routine searches of recent items, or even launching and operating within Mail.app.

Here are a few simple solutions for quickly backing up … Read more

Troubleshooting Tools: File Utilities

Originally posted August 2nd

Dan Frakes July 2005

Our monthly Troubleshooting Tools column, penned by MacFixIt Contributing Editor Dan Frakes, covers products that can help you maintain and fix your Mac.

For the most part, you work with your files in Mac OS X, not on them. But there are times, especially during troubleshooting, when instead of editing the contents of files, you need to change file settings: permissions, file types, extensions, or even obscure attributes such as visibility. There may also be times when you want to manipulate files -- move them, rename them, and so on -- in … Read more

Mini-Tutorial: Re-installing Apple applications from a Mac OS X disc/update package using Pacifist

For various reasons, applications originally installed by the Mac OS X Installer disc (DVD or CD) -- Mail.app, Activity Viewer, etc. -- can become unusable. This can occur due to user deletion, corruption of drive sectors, and other problems. Unfortunately, some of these applications are not available as standalone downloads.

However, virtually all of these applications can be restored with the use of a shareware utility called Pacifist, which will extract the application file(s) in question from the various .pkg containers on the Mac OS X installer disc and put them back in the proper location on your … Read more

Troubleshooting Tools: Pseudo

Dan Frakes June 2005

Our monthly Troubleshooting Tools column, penned by MacFixIt Contributing Editor Dan Frakes, covers products that can help you maintain and fix your Mac.

 

There are times when you, as a troubleshooter, may need to modify files that aren't owned by you -- most frequently when the files you want to work with are owned by the OS itself ("system" or the "root" user). For example, perhaps you've found, by reading a site such as MacFixIt or by being told by someone a bit more savvy than you, that editing … Read more

Troubleshooting Tools: Memtest and Rember

Dan Frakes May 2005

Our monthly Troubleshooting Tools column, penned by MacFixIt Contributing Editor Dan Frakes, covers products that can help you maintain -- and, if necessary, fix -- your Mac.

 

One of the most serious problems that can afflict your Mac is "bad memory" -- the common term for a defective RAM chip. Although the vast majority of RAM modules work perfectly, making RAM troubles a rare malady, it can be quite frustrating when you're one of the unlucky ones. At the worst, bad RAM can prevent your Mac from even starting up. But it … Read more

Troubleshooting Tools: AppleJack

Dan Frakes

Today marks the first installment of our monthly Troubleshooting Tools column, penned by MacFixIt Contributing Editor Dan Frakes. Each month, Dan will talk about one or two products that can help you maintain -- and, if necessary, fix -- your Mac.

 

For the most part, Mac OS X doesn't need a lot of day to day maintenance -- it crashes less than the "classic" Mac OS, and individual application problems are less likely to affect other applications and the operating system itself, so most users will find that serious file, drive, and directory damage … Read more

Tutorial: Ten ways to stay out of trouble

Ted Landau March 2005

Many troubleshooting articles focus on how to get yourself out of some troubleshooting jam. In this article, I instead want to look at the other side of the table: How to keep yourself out of trouble in the first place. I will not be covering here any of the oft-cited maintenance routines (such as repairing permissions or running cron jobs). Instead, I will be covering even more basic advice that is also, in most cases, even more simple to do. Despite this, it is advice that is too often ignored...at the user?s peril.

Back … Read more