Easy Mac OS X Lion - Kate Binder [28]
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Tip: The Widget Underground
Want to be just a little bit subversive? Use this feature to avoid ads on web pages by turning the pages into widgets—and cropping out all the area occupied by ads.
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Automatically Updating Your Widgets
If you use more than one computer, MobileMe now gives you a convenient way to make sure your favorite widgets are installed on all your Macs. If you’re a MobileMe member, you need never again experience the frustration of not having just the widget you need.
Choose Apple menu, System Preferences.
Click the MobileMe button in the System Preferences window to display the MobileMe preferences.
Click the Sync button.
Click the check box labeled Synchronize with MobileMe and then choose Automatically from the pop-up menu.
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Note: Dotting Your Mac
Apple’s own online service, MobileMe, has lots of other benefits—your own website, synchronization of iCal, Address Book, and Safari’s bookmarks, Internet backup for your important files, and much more. To learn how to set up a MobileMe account, turn to Chapter 9, “Living Online.”
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Creating Custom Network Locations
Network locations are groups of network settings, each saved with a descriptive name so you can switch all your settings with a single click and get online or on the local network instantly no matter where you happen to be. After you’ve created a location, to use it, all you have to do is choose it from a pop-up menu.
Choose Apple menu, System Preferences.
Click the Network button to see your choices.
Choose Edit Locations from the Location pop-up menu.
Click the Add Location button, give the location a descriptive name, and click Done.
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Note: Naming Names
Just to be sure we’re all on the same page here, a descriptive name (see step 4) is something like “Joe’s office Ethernet,” rather than “New Location 4.” It tells you where and under what circumstances the location setting is applicable.
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Tip: What’s in a Name?
To change the names of your locations, choose Edit Locations from the pop-up menu again.
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Choose the network interface you want to set up from the list at the left.
Make the appropriate settings for that network interface.
Click Apply to switch to the new location.
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Note: A Time and a Place
You can use locations to save settings for different situations as well as different places. For example, if you have both a cable modem and a dial-up account, create a location for each so you can switch to dial-up if the cable connection goes down.
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Chapter 6: Organizing Your Life
Mac OS X includes several programs that work together to keep you organized: Address Book and iCal. Address Book is a contact manager where you can store your friends’, family members’, and colleagues’ names, addresses, and phone numbers along with their instant messaging IDs, websites, email addresses, and more. iCal keeps track of your appointments and a to-do list, and it can both publish and subscribe to online calendars so you can share them with others. And all the data in Address Book and iCal is available to your iPad, iPhone, or other devices so you’re never without it.
In this chapter you’ll learn how to create and organize contacts in Address Book and how to use the program to view a map of a contact’s address. iCal Tasks show how to create appointments and to-do lists and how to invite Address Book contacts to events; how to search calendars; and how to publish, subscribe to, and print calendars.
Working with Contacts and Schedules
Adding Contacts to Address Book
Mac OS X’s Address Book is accessible systemwide, meaning its information can be used by other programs such as iChat, Mail, and even Microsoft Word. Adding contacts and sorting them into groups is easy, and Address Book has an up-to-date selection of information fields, including places to stash online messaging IDs.
Click the group name to which