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Charles Moore Reviews - Simply Mac OS X
The last OS X book I reviewed here, two weeks ago, was a very big book - John Ray and William C. Ray’s nearly 1500 page “Mac OS X Unleashed.” This time, we’re reviewing the smallest OS X book I’ve checked out in this series of reviews -- Richard Hill’s “Simply Mac OS X” at a tiny 221 pages by comparison. 
Simply Mac OS X, which is the first in a series of books from MacUnlimited, a Mac specialist ISP in the U.K., and publishers of the online magazine MacUnlimited.com, with the goal of helping back users with information, guidance, and getting more from their Macs. The author, Richard Hill, has been a Mac user since 1988, and is former deputy editor of the UK Mac magazine, MacFormat, and editor of Mobile Computer User and WAP magazines. Simply Mac OS X is subtitled “A Complete Guide To Mac OS X. “ After reviewing five substantially weightier tomes on the topic, I was very interested to see how well a just a bit larger than pocket-size, 221 page volume would compare. A guitar player friend of mine used to say that the guitar is a paradoxical instrument. You can learn a basic three chords in a single afternoon, which will allow you to play an amazing variety of simple songs, but the guitar is a very difficult instrument to play well. Richard Hill begins by making a similar observation about OS X: “You can grasp its basics and start using it productively within minutes -- but it also has a staggering list of features and tools which can take far longer to learn.” British understatement. The book is laid out in six sections, plus a Forward, a Preface, and an Introduction. There are no appendices or index. You can check out the book’s table of contents in the appendix to this article. The lack of an index could be viewed as a serious shortcoming in a reference work, (and that’s the way I tend to view it), but the table of contents in this case gives you a reasonable indication of each chapter’s contents. Still, an index would have been nice. This would be an excellent choice of an OS X book for someone new to computers and who is intimidated, or just not interested in, the nuts and bolts and arcane minutiae of computer systems, and particularly not Unix. The book remains almost exclusively focused on the Aqua GUI, with just a single paragraph devoted to the Console and the Process Viewer respectively, and two on the Terminal, with the main advice given being to “use with great caution. “ this is definitely not a book for Unix geeks or would-be Unix geeks. However, it’s a great book for your mom, or anyone else you might know who would like a clear, accessible, and non intimidating handbook to help them get up to speed on OS X and stay there. Indeed, the first chapter, “A Journey Inside Your Computer,” deals with the very elementary basics, and is explicitly addressed to “anyone who has never, or only rarely, and used a computer before,” explaining things like the difference between hardware and software. If you have any experience with computers at all, you can skip the entire Section I -- “Computer Basics. “ Section II, “ Welcome To Mac OS X,” beginning with Chapter 4 -- “Before You Start,” deals with points you should address before installing Mac OS X, such as making sure your hardware is supported, and getting information you will need for setup, like your Internet connection particulars, and e-mail configuration data. Chapter 5 walks you through installing Mac OS X, while Chapter 6 deals with setup issues. Chapter 7, “Explaining Mac OS X,” provides a brief overview of what you will encounter on your first start up, before you move on to Section III -- Elements Of Mac OS X.” In this section, chapters 8 through 11 detail these elements: windows; the Dock; the menu bar; the Desktop; and “added extras” -- e.g.: Spelling and Services; Disk Copy; Grab; Mail; Stickies; Text Edit; and Help Viewer. Section IV, Chapters 13 through 16, is dedicated to the OS X Finder and how to get the best from it.Topics covered include OS X’s three Finder view modes; a whole chapter on the Finder toolbar, and another on the Finder menus. There’s also a chapter on working in the Finder. Section V, “Applications in OS X,” contains Chapter 17, which briefly reviews all of the applications and utilities included in Mac OS X, such as Acrobat Reader, the Calculator, iMovie, iTunes, Mail, Stickies, and Text Edit, to name a few, but don’t expect in-depth instructions on how to use them. It’s just an overview of their functions and features. Chapter 18 does the same with AppleScript, Color Sync, the Console, Disk Copy, Grab, Process Viewer, and the Terminal. Section VI, “Guided Tours,” provides tips on customizing OS X, File Sharing; going online, and connecting peripherals. Chapter 20, on file sharing, goes into considerable detail, and provides a good tutorial and reference on the topic, as does Chapter 21 on taking OS X online respectively. Chapter 22, on peripherals, contains useful and helpful information. So does Chapter 23, which covers working with Classic mode in OS X. Chapter 24 is a brief tutorial on working with fonts, and the final chapter, 25, contains a discussion of how OS X works. In my experience, the British do inexpensive paperbacks extremely well, and Simply Mac OS X is no exception. The book is well-designed and pleasant to read, with lots of white space, and the text broken up with subheads and horizontal lines separating topics. As is de rigeur, Simply Mac OS X is illustrated with screen shots (plus a few photographs). In a book of this size, they tend to be reproduced fairly small, but they enhance textual explanations of processes and functions. On almost every page, you will also find marginal notes offering more information and cross references for specific topics, as well as helpful tips, some specifically addressed to users migrating from Windows, or users upgrading from the legacy Mac OS. Simply Mac OS X is a very different sort of book from the previous five Mac OS books I’ve reviewed here. If you’re looking for in-depth and exhaustive tutorials on configuring and using every feature in OS X, or on learning Unix command line operations, this isn’t the book for you, and you’ll be far better served by one or more of several other available titles. However, if you, or someone you know are/is overwhelmed and frustrated by technical detail and jargon, and just looking for an accessible reference on the basics, Simply Mac OS X will serve you well as an inexpensive help resource to keep beside your computer as you climb the OS X learning curve. However, it doesn’t live up to its claim to be “ a complete guide to OS X,” but it is a useful, more limited guide. I’m giving “Simply Mac OS X” a three-smiley Applelinks rating. I might have given it four, acknowledging the book's low price, had it not been for that “complete guide,” come-on, which I think is misleading. given the actual content. What’s there is quite good, but there’s an awful lot that isn’t there. Another demerit is the aforementioned lack of an index, which is a serious omission in a reference book, and there’s really no excuse given the easy to use index generators available these days.  Simply Mac OS X For more information, visit: Appendix Simply Mac OS X Table Of Contents Foreword by Karen Harvey, editor of MacUser Preface Introduction I Computer Basics 1. A Journey Inside Your Computer 2. Meet The Mac 3. Keys And Controls II Welcome To Mac OS X 4. Before You Start 5. Installing Mac OS X 6. Setting Up Mac OS X 7. Exploring Mac OS X III Elements Of Mac OS X 8. Windows in Mac OS X 9. The Dock 10. The Menu Bar 11 The Desktop 12. Added extras IV The Finder 13. Finder Basics 14. The Finder Toolbar 15. Menus In The Finder 16. Working In The Finder V Applications In Mac OS X 17. Everyday Applications 18. Deep Down And Dirty VI Guided Tours 19. Your Personal Mac 20. Sharing Your Mac 21. Mac OS X Online 22. Go Go Gadget 23. Living With A Legacy 24. Just My Type 25. How Mac OS X Works
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