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If you're new to the iMac and are looking for a good beginner's reference, or know someone else who is, Martin C. Brown's iMac FYI is the book for you. Indeed, this new release from Muska & Lipman Publishing will make an excellent desk reference for newbie users of any Macintosh -- not just iMacs.
And this book IS for beginners. It isn't larded with a lot of geekspeak, and proceeds from the assumption that the reader is completely inexperienced with iMac, or even computers in general, and starting with the basics, explains in plain English how to do everything necessary to get the best out of the machine, from the first startup to things like setting up a network and editing movies. iMac FYI is structured in a question and answer format, proposing and then answering 99 questions that a new Mac user might ask, and following a natural progression from each question to the next. These questions are subdivided into seven category sections,: 1. Setting Up and Getting To Know Your iMac (1-12)
For a sample of the book's format and content, see the appendix, "Top 10 iMac Tips," below. Martin says the questions have been adapted from actual client queries and public forms. As well as directly answering the questions, he says: "I've also tried to talk around the subject, some of the thinking behind the decisions that have been made, and other issues that you might want to examine when considering the question." The author also suggests that some of the questions address issues posed by experienced users and network managers trying to integrate Macs into their existing networks, which I guess would apply to such persons experienced only in PCs. However, the "all skill levels" target readership cited on the book's cover is misleading. "Beginner to Intermediate" would have been more descriptively accurate. A sampler of issues addressed in iMac FYI include:
iMac FYI is illustrated with screen shots, however in some cases they are reproduced in such a small size as to be only marginally useful. This is, I suppose, a necessary consequence of printing the book in the size of a standard paperback novel, which, along with the relatively low grade paper stock, were presumably in aid of keeping the book's price down to $14.95. However, I am not really registering that comment as a complaint. Computer books of this sort have a short half life, and printing them in a large format on glossy stock is arguably wasteful. The book's small size makes it compact and handy to keep on the desk beside the computer for quick reference. IMac FYI is not the sort of book one necessarily thinks of reading cover to cover, but doing so would be a worthwhile exercise for any new iMac user. Martin Brown's style is light and conversational enough to make reading this book through something one might conceivably do (it's only 248 pages of body text, plus a glossary and index), and one who did would (a) have a good basic grounding in iMac techniques, and (b) have a good idea where to look for quick reference on specific issues. What iMac FYI covers is the essentially the same ground that used to be addressed by owners' manuals, back when computers came with real manuals. I learned to use my first Mac, a Mac Plus, by reading books, and some of the best books came with the machine. There was a manual for the Mac itself, another for the system software (6.0.1), and yet another for the HyperCard application that came bundled with the system. On-line help is simply not an adequate substitute for a good print manual, not least because you have to have of the computer working before you can access online help, which is problematical when what you need help with is getting the machine up and running. A logical progression of books to read for someone learning the Mac from the ground up, as it were, would be: iMac FYI; then perhaps David Pogue's The iMac For Dummies; then on to more advanced looks like Pogue's Mac OS 9: The Missing Manual, Rita Lewis and Bill Fishman's Mac OS In A Nutshell; or Gene Steinberg's Mac OS 9, The Complete Reference. IMac FYI will be well worth its modest $14.95 price to almost any new iMac user, and Mr. Brown has done a commendable job of making Mac basics explicable to neophytes. It may be just a wee bit early to mention Christmas, but this book would also make a great companion Christmas gift or stocking stuffer for someone who will be getting a new iMac for Christmas. Martin C. Brown is a 12 year Mac veteran, and the author of five computer books. He personally owns a blue and white G3 Power Mac, the lime iMac BV, a tangerine iBook, and old PowerBook, and an even older Power Mac. Mr. Brown was and IT manager, with 18 years of multi-platform (Unix, Windows, MacOS, BeOS, EPOC) administration and programming experience in Perl, Python, Shellscript, Basic, Pascal, C/C++, Java, JavaScript, VBScript, Awk, among others.. He helped fund the largest ISP in the UK - Demon Internet Services - and was technical consultant to the Internet Technology Group plc, the third largest UK ISP. Martin was the chief technical architect of the first-ever online configuration and pricing system for computer equipment, on the HP Computer Systems Buyers Guide. He worked for the UK Government body responsible for IT in education (NCET), the BBC, and the GCHQ, where he instructed employees how to use the Internet as an operative research tool. He is now a full-time writer. The author's iMac support site can be viewed at http://www.mcwords.com. Additionally, an iMac question & answer page is located at http://www.mcwords.com/projects/books/imac/question.shtml. Κ iMac FYI
iMac FYI sells for $14.95 and can be purchased online at http://www.mlstore.com or at booksellers. For more information, visit Muska & Lipman Publishing's Website at: http://www.muskalipman.com or call 513-924-9300 Appendix Top 10 iMac Tips Excerpted From iMac FYI by Martin C. Brown Muska & Lipman Publishing Learn how to use the keyboard Although the mouse is a vital part of the iMac, there are quicker ways of performing certain operations that don't rely on the mouse. Your iMac will use the same keyboard commands in nearly all applications: Apple-O - Opens an existing file
Learn how to use the keyboard and mouse If you hold down the Control key while clicking on the mouse, you'll bring up a contextual menu; this gives you extra options according to your task. For example, when you click a file it will let you make an alias of that file. If you want to create an alias of a file in another folder, hold down Option and Apple while dragging the file or folder to the folder where you want the alias. If you want to get rid of that message when emptying the trash, hold down Option while selecting the menu option. Changing your Appearance The Appearance control panel controls all sorts of different aspects about your iMac's appearance. Everything from the picture or color used for your desktop to the fonts used to display the menus and information in the Finder is controlled through that panel. Make some simple Backups Nobody likes losing files -- especially if it's a latest project or a new novel! The easiest way to backup the important documents on your machine is to use the Synchronize control panel; create a new folder on a removable disk and then set the synchronization between the folder you want to back up and the folder on the removable drive. If you don't have access to a removable drive, check out Apple's iTools (http://www.apple.com/iTools), which provides storage for your files on a server at Apple, along with Web site space and an e-mail account. Quick tricks for diagnosing problems If you're suffering from strange crashes or freezes, then try the following: Rebuild your desktop: Restart your iMac and hold down Option and Apple until you see the prompt Run Disk First Aid: There's a copy installed in the Utilities folder of your new iMac Using sleep and shutdown If you don't like waiting for your machine to start up each time you want to use it, then put your machine to sleep instead. This switches your iMac into a low power mode that uses less electricity and switches off the monitor. Recovering from sleep takes about 10 seconds, compared to the minute or so it takes to boot up normally. To put your machine to sleep, select Sleep from the Special menu in the finder, or use the power key and click the Sleep button. Improving DVD playback Do you like watching movies, but dislike the jumps? Then try the following:
Getting quick access to applications and documents The Recent Applications and Recent Documents menus in the Apple menu give you quick access to the last 10 applications or documents that you opened. If this isn't enough for you, then you can increase the numbers using the Apple Menu Items control panel. If want to disable the entries, set the values to zero. If you want to create your own custom application menu, then just create a new folder in the Apple Menu Items folder that contains aliases to all the applications you want to use. Protecting your files from other users You can use the Multiple Users control panel to set up individual users on your iMac. Each user will have their own set of preferences and their own Documents folder to store their files. Each user is secure; unless they want to share items with other users, they wont have access to any of your files. Better still, you can set it up so that your account can only be opened using your voice! Playing games against other iMac users If you want to play a game head-to-head with a user on another iMac, then you can connect the two machines together using a simple cross-over Ethernet cable, available from your local computer store. Plug each end into the Ethernet port on your iMac and you should just be able to start playing. Just make sure you practice!
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