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My review copy of David Pogue's Mac OS X: The Missing Manual, second edition, arrived yesterday. A full review is coming in Moore's Views & Reviews, but an initial perusal indicates that this "version update" of the Mac OS X book that I consider to be the one to have if you're only having one, is something to put on your Christmas wish list, if you can't resist running out and buying it right away. 
As the cover blurb notes, Apple advertised some 150 new features in Mac OS X 10.2, "but for once it underestimated. Jaguar is a different animal entirely. It's faster, more powerful, and much more customizable -- but it's still comes without a manual." The first edition of Mac OS X: The Missing Manual was deservedly the best-selling computer book of 2002, selling 100,000 copies in its first six months on the shelves. Mr. Pogue is, incidentally, also the No. 1 best-selling Macintosh author, also deservedly so. And the second edition is no quick and dirty makeover. Content has been expanded from 581 to 712 pages (the price has also gone up by five dollars, to $29.95). The extra pages were needed to cover stuff that wasn't included in all OS X 10.1, such as Sherlock3, iCal, iSync, .mac, the built-in firewall, Internet sharing, Rendezvous, enhanced Windows compatibility, virtual private networking, iTunes3, DVD Player, Inkwell, and iChat. Over the past ten months, my copy of Mac OS X: The Missing Manual, first edition, has become a dog-eared from frequent thumbing, and it's the reference I reach for first when I have a question about OS X. I have half a dozen or so other Mac OS X books, and they have all proveed helpful and useful, but the Pogue book is my OS X reference of first resort. So far I've just do the second edition a cursory skim, but it appears that David Pogue's claim that "just about every page has new material on it" is well-founded. At this juncture it looks like another job well executed. Bravo. For more information about the book, including Table of Contents, index, author bio, and samples, see: http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/macosxmm2/
Mac OS X: The Missing Manual, Second Edition David Pogue ISBN 0-596-00450-8,
Also available at Amazon.com here. OS X printing and Imagewriter II Image Writer and X
From Scott Crick Hi Charles! I'm very interested in your posted observations about running Jaguar on your Pismo. You experience with speed seems to be pretty much the exact opposite of mine. I have two primary Macs: a G4/933 w/ 512 Mb of RAM and a Pismo/400 w/ 320 Mb of RAM. I run Mac OS X 10.2.1 on both of them exclusively. While Jaguar on my Pismo is understandably slower than my G4 in most ways (especially anything having to do with screen-redraws such as scrolling and the like), I have found Jaguar to be absolutely a godsend on my Pismo. The speed difference between 10.1.x and 10.2.x is amazing! Startup is much faster and overall system performance is much better! My Pismo is my primary computer (I use it for just about everything except for some games and my software development). I use Office X, FireWorks, DreamWeaver, Chimera and more and don't find performance unacceptable at all. I'm really curious to know what the major difference in our experiences is (especially considering your Pismo is faster and has more RAM than mine). Thanks for your great OS X Odyssey series! I enjoy reading it, even if we don't always agree.
Sincerely,
Hi Scott,
Perceptions of speed are quite subjective. My observations about OS X sluggishness on my Pismo have been mostly relative to the performance of OS 9 on the same computer back to back. However, I have noticed that OS 10.2.x both starts up and shuts down more slowly then OS 10.1.x did on this machine.
Since you have noticed sluggishness in scrolling and other Finder related activities similar to my observations, it sounds like we're fairly much on the same page there. Those issues are very important main in the sort of work I do with computers. You are also using a completely different suite of applications from the ones I use, so it's hard to make comparisons there.
Glad you're enjoying the Odyssey.
Charles OS X printing and Imagewriter II From Bill Dickhardt Charles, I seem to remember you saying that your only printer is an Imagewriter II that you don't use very often. Well, if it is Appletalk enabled and you can get your hands on an Ethernet-Localtalk adapter there are CUPS based (hence 10.2 required) drivers that claim they will allow you to print from OS X applications (printing from Classic apps already works using the AppleTalk ImageWriter driver, at least the last time I checked) to the ImageWriter (I, II and LQ supported). The drivers and installation instructions can be found at the following site: http://www.linuxprinting.org/macosx/imagewriter/ I haven't tried it myself but I thought it might make an interesting excercise for you or anyone else who had an old IW printer lying around.
FYI,
From dxtr Hi Charles, If I remember right this should be helpful.... http://www.linuxprinting.org/macosx/imagewriter/
seeya
Hi Guys;
Thanks for bringing this to my attention. The ImageWriter lives!
See Shareware Beat today for more details
Charles
The OS X Odyssey archives may be accessed here: Note: Letters to Moore's Mailbag may or may not be published at the editor's discretion. Correspondents' email addresses will NOT be published unless the correspondent specifically requests publication. Letters may be edited for length and/or context. Opinions expressed in postings to Moore's MailBag are those of the respective correspondents and not necessarily shared or endorsed by the Editor and/or Applelinks management. If you would prefer that your message not appear in Moore's Mailbag, we would still like to hear from you. Just clearly mark your message "NOT FOR PUBLICATION," and it will not be published. CM
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