Easy Mac OS X Lion - Kate Binder [59]
Start up System Preferences and click the Date & Time button.
Click the Time Zone button.
Click the map near where you live.
Choose the nearest city from the Closest City pop-up menu.
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Tip: Blink Blink
Another useful setting in Date & Time preferences is located on the Clock tab. Check the box marked Flash the time separators. Then, if the colon stops blinking, you’ll know your Mac is frozen and you can restart it.
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Note: Today’s Date Is...
To see the full day and date, click the menu bar clock to reveal its menu. You can also open the Date & Time preferences here, as well as changing the menu bar clock to an analog icon instead of the standard digital display.
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Click the Date & Time tab.
If you have a constant connection to the Internet, check the box marked Set date & time automatically.
Choose the nearest timeserver from the pop-up menu.
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Note: More About NTP
To learn more about how network timeservers work, you can visit the Network Time Protocol website at www.ntp.org. There you’ll also find links to lists of alternative timeservers, including servers around the world.
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Color Calibrating Your Monitor
It wasn’t all that long ago that computers had grayscale monitors, but now it’s all about color. To make sure color looks right on your screen, however, you need to calibrate your system. Here’s how to create a color device profile that tells your Mac how your monitor displays color and makes appropriate adjustments.
Choose Apple menu, System Preferences.
Click the Displays button.
Click the Color button and click Calibrate. The Display Calibrator Assistant opens.
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Note: Managing Color
The software components that translate color between your Mac and your monitor comprise a color management system (CMS). In its full-fledged form, a CMS ensures consistent color throughout your system, from scanner to monitor to printer.
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Click the Expert Mode box to create a more precise profile; then click Continue.
Make the monitor settings shown in the window and click Continue.
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Tip: Where to Start
The Color tab of the Displays preference pane includes a list of profiles. If one of those matches, or is close to, the monitor you’re using, click to select that profile before you start the calibration process. You’ll get a more accurate profile that way.
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Follow the instructions on the Native Gamma, Target Gamma, and Target White Point screens, clicking Continue after each screen.
If you’re an admin user, check the box to make the profile available to all users of this Mac; then click Continue.
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Note: A Step Further
If you’re in the market for truly accurate color, you’ll have to spend a little to get it. Look into a colorimeter such as i1Display (www.xrite.com), which sticks to your monitor to “see” the color itself as you create a monitor profile.
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Enter a name for the profile and click Continue. The Display Calibrator Assistant saves the profile.
Click Done.
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Note: Greek to Me
Native Gamma, Target Gamma, and Target White Point, used in the Display Calibrator Assistant, might sound very technical, but they simply refer to how your eye perceives the lightness, darkness, and overall color cast of your monitor’s display.
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Forcing an Application to Quit
When a program isn’t working right, your first tactic should be to quit and restart it. But sometimes a program is so off-track that the Quit command doesn’t work. Then you can force the program to quit. This doesn’t affect the other programs that are running, but unsaved changes in documents within the problem application are lost.
Choose Apple menu, Force Quit.
Choose the program you want from the list and click Force Quit.
Click Force Quit again.
Click the Close button to dismiss the Force Quit dialog box.
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Note: In the Olden Days
Apple used to recommend that you restart