Past Meetings
May 29, 2009 - Hammondsport Mac Users Group
TOPIC: VIRTUAL CULTURE (art, music and literature on your Mac)
ATTENDING:Tom B, Bob S, Bill N and Jack H. During lunch, we learned about each other's first paying job and what lessons were learned from that experience.
ART
A folder of photos can be easily
viewed by using Preview's slideshow
feature. We looked at some interesting anamorphic art on Painted Trucks and
Sidewalk Chalk Drawings.
Trucks
Chalks
ArtScope
- SFMOMA uses this viewing device to allow viewers to peruse a mosaic of its
entire art collection and take a virtual museum tour. A recent
article in TidBITS looks at a variety of virtual browsing methods used by
art museums, including the Metropolitan and the Louvre.
Using a freeware called Pencil
along with a stylus and USB Wacom
tablet, Tom gave a demonstration
of drawing on his PowerBook Titanium G4. The pressure-sensitive feature allows
line thickness to accurately reflect subtle changes of pressure from the drawer's
hand.
The onionskin feature of Pencil allows you to draw simple animations and play
them back via the built-in viewer as well as export the finished work as a QT
movie.
Corel
Painter X is a more sophisticated software featuring a myriad of art mediums
and tools, including such things as fluid watercolor,
painterly oil mixing and reflective
chrome.Download 30-day
free trial (retail $399, educational discount prices as low as $99 or search
eBay for bargains $45+). An older version Painter 4 (made by Fractal) works
well with OS 9 or OSX Classic. A demo download of Painter 4 can be downloaded
here
and used indefinitely. Just capture your finished work with Command-Shift-4
(be sure you have a copy of OS9 installed on your Mac.)
MUSIC
---iTunes - Tom gave a demo of the
basic functions available, including playing a CD
---GraceNote - get CD track names & data instantly
---RocketFM
- play internet radio via radio transmitter to your home's FM radios and stereo
systems. More
info
---EQ by track
---Audacity freeware
to make live recording - demo of Emily playing
piano in Alabama
---Two great Blue Grass sites recommended by Mary here
and here.
LITERATURE
---Library
(local) Audio Books to download (MP3) - need your Library card and PIN #
---OverDrive
Media Console for Mac or Windows - free download
---Silly Saga
of using Library Audio Downloads
---Ebooks -Take Control
series - complete books in PDF downloads for small fee
---FM/MP3
Car Player - $8 to play your MP3 audio books or music via car FM radio
---Eucalyptus
- the 'library to go' via iPhone
---Project
Gutenberg - free downloads of many classics
---------------------------------------------
OTHER DISCOVERIES:
My First Mac
- informative website for first time and veteran Mac users with articles such
as:
10
Little Known Cool Mac Tricks
- - - Pocket Sized Address Book (see
example)
- - - Make Anything a PDF
- - - Instant Dictionary
- - - View Lots of Images Side by Side Full Screen
- - - Use your Laptop as a Baby Monitor + five more
MacTipster
- more cool tips and shortcuts you never knew about your mac here
Shortcuts
- - - To select a specific word,
double-click it. To select the entire sentence or paragraph
triple-click.
- - - Command+Option+Control+8 - freak
your unsuspecting friends out by inverting the colors on their screen. (This
is actually an accessibility feature in OS X that helps vision-impaired users).
- - - Command-Shift-A to quickly open
your Applications folder
- - - Dock Apps Pop-Up - drag a copy of the Applications
folder to Dock - then click and hold on dock folder to launch a vertical
column of all apps
Calculator Modes (found in applications
folder) - go to Menu > View
and select mode:
Com+1 = Basic Com+2
= Scientific Com+3 = Programmer. Also
options for paper tape, speak results, etc.
Software
Caffeine - free
program that puts a tiny coffee cup on the right side of your menu bar. Click
it to prevent your Mac from automatically going to sleep, dimming the screen
or starting screen savers. Click it again to revert. Hold down the Command key
while clicking to show its prefs
menu. (download
240k)
AppFresh
- free app that quickly gives you the update
status of all your Apple and non-Apple applications (download
1.6mb)
iGlasses -
small app that gives you control over several
features of image quality for built-in iSight cam and other webcams (demo
download 875k)
- buy for $9.95
- top
downloads - see what is
currently popular with other Mac users
Hardware
Logitech LX5 USB Wireless Optical Mouse - left/right
click, 4-way scrolling, on-off power switch, uses two AA batteries - $15 (no
tax/no shipping) - search eBay for this item - brand new! Works great w/ iBook,
PowerBook, MacBook, etc.
News
USB 3 - 10x faster than current USB 2 - read CNET article
Mac
OSX Java Vulnerability - read about this current issue and how to protect
yourself until a fix is released by Apple. (See how
to disable Java in popular web browsers)
*Update 6/15/09
- Apple fixes Java vulnerabilities for 10.4.11
(80mb) and 10.5.7
(158mb) - No restart is required, but all browsers should be quit before installing
the updates.
Apple
Evolution - see a photo of every Apple product ever released on one page.
Historical note: do you know the significance of the Apple logo with the
missing bite? Does it link back to original sin in the Garden of Eden when
humans first exercised free will by eating the forbidden fruit from the tree
of knowledge of good and evil (Gen 2:16-17)? According to a 2009 interview with
the logo's designer, Rob Janoff, it had no religious connotation at all. An ad
for the Apple -1 (1976) shows the original price as $666.66 and encouraged
the buyer to 'Byte into an Apple'. See picture of the Apple
1.
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