Book Description
Mac OS X Killer Tips is not another newbie book. OS X Killer Tips speaks directly to the daily Mac user who needs to get the most out of their Mac NOW. "Nothin' but sidebars!" Time is money. And a lot of experienced users find themselves trying to save time by skimming through larger computer books in order to pull out the useful nuggets of info that are often placed within what we call sidebars (i.e. those Note/Tip/Warning boxes). The Killer Tips series was developed by Scott Kelby because he recognized how useful non-beginning technology users find those cool "I didn't know THAT" sidebars that are peppered all over the other computer books out there. This book is all about speed; showing the Mac professional how to get more work done faster, while actually increasing quality. The whole concept is to help make the reader faster and more productive than ever using their Mac. In an ever-tightening and competitive marketplace, this kind of book is sorely needed.


About the Author
Scott Kelby is president of NAPP, the trade organization for Adobe Photoshop users. NAPP has thousands of members around the world. Scott is editor-in-chief of both Photoshop User magazine, and Mac Design magazine. Scott serves as training director for the Adobe Photoshop Seminar Tour and is the technical chair of the largest Photoshop gathering, Photoshop World. Scott is one of the leading Photoshop trainers in the country today and trains thousands of Photoshop users across the country each year. Scott is the author of Macintosh... The Naked Truth, Photoshop 6 Down + Dirty Secrets, Photoshop 7 Down + Dirty Secrets, Photoshop 6 Photo Retouching Secrets, and Photoshop 6 Killer Tips.

FROM OUR EDITORS

The Barnes & Noble Review
With the arrival of large amounts of native software, including Photoshop and Office -- not to mention the speedy new Mac OS X 10.2 -- Mac users are increasingly moving away from Classic and into Mac OS X.

But, if you￯﾿ﾽre like most of them, you￯﾿ﾽre still exploring this big new operating system. There are plenty of nooks and crannies you haven￯﾿ﾽt worked your way through, and plenty of productivity tips you haven￯﾿ﾽt discovered yet. Wouldn￯﾿ﾽt it be great if someone put them all together in one book? Well, who better than Mac Design magazine editor-in-chief Scott Kelby?

Not long ago, Kelby discovered a great formula for a bestseller. ￯﾿ﾽWouldn't it be great if there was a book where the whole book, cover-to-cover was nothing but those little sidebar tips? No long paragraphs explaining the Hierarchical File System. No detailed descriptions of how to configure a LAN, or different ways to partition your hard drive -- just tips -- short and sweet, to the point. [And] most importantly, they've got to be ￯﾿ﾽKiller Tips￯﾿ﾽ￯﾿ﾽ the kind of tip that makes you nod and smile while you're reading it, and as soon as you're done you have to call all your Mac buddies￯﾿ﾽ￯﾿ﾽ

Yes, we￯﾿ﾽre talking stuff you don￯﾿ﾽt already know. Undocumented keyboard shortcuts. Insider secrets. Faster, simpler ways to do the stuff you do every day. Most authors use tips like these to spice up their books. Kelby￯﾿ﾽs Killer Tips books are all spice.

Mac OS X is full of great stuff, and nobody￯﾿ﾽs more of a Mac advocate than Kelby (whose last book, Macintosh...The Naked Truth, was an old-fashioned ￯﾿ﾽslam those PC weenies￯﾿ﾽ manifesto for true believers.) But Kelby knows that even OS X has its annoyances and rough edges -- and Mac OS X Killer Tips shows exactly how to eliminate them.

Kelby shows how to turn off automatic software updating (have you noticed how it always opens when you￯﾿ﾽre five minutes from deadline)? Want a shortcut for creating new folders now that Control-N won￯﾿ﾽt do it anymore? Can￯﾿ﾽt figure out how to delete a locked file? Tired of being asked if you really want to empty the trash? Can￯﾿ﾽt stand seeing that ￯﾿ﾽround microphone thingy￯﾿ﾽ every time you open a speech-enabled application? Don￯﾿ﾽt want to be asked for your password anymore? Kelby covers it all.

Chances are you haven￯﾿ﾽt quite relegated Classic to the dustbin of history yet -- so you￯﾿ﾽll appreciate Kelby￯﾿ﾽs full chapter of Classic tips. Did you know that you can rebuild the Classic desktop without even opening Classic? Or that you can replace your Dock￯﾿ﾽs ratty, jaggy Classic icons with nice OS X eye candy? Or that you can set up a second Classic system folder (perhaps a trimmed-down version for running just one or two Classic apps that don￯﾿ﾽt need to be weighed down with all those Control Panels and Extensions)? Or that you can tell a ￯﾿ﾽCarbonized￯﾿ﾽ application to run in Classic just once -- perhaps to access a peripheral that doesn￯﾿ﾽt have Mac OS X drivers yet?

By the way, Kelby has resisted one gigantic area of potential tips: Mac OS X￯﾿ﾽs UNIX underpinnings. You won￯﾿ﾽt learn how to grep anything here; there are no breathless discussions of Perl scripting. (Only once does he come anywhere close to the Terminal Window, and for a good cause: repairing a damaged volume that might be making your Mac flaky. Once you￯﾿ﾽre done with that, you can type reboot, ￯﾿ﾽand go on to live otherwise productive lives knowing [you] cheated death, used UNIX, and lived to fight another day.￯﾿ﾽ)

The absence of UNIX tips might be a problem for the growing number of technical folks buying Macs nowadays. But it￯﾿ﾽs likely to be a blessing for the vast majority of Mac users, who could care less about UNIX except insofar as it lets Mac OS X run more stably and smoothly than Classic ever did, and would rather see the pages spent on information more directly useful to them. And Kelby has used his pages well. Bill Camarda

Bill Camarda is a consultant, writer, and web/multimedia content developer. His 15 books include Special Edition Using Word 2000 and Upgrading & Fixing Networks For Dummies®, Second Edition.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Not another newbie book, Mac OS X v. 10.2 Jaguar Killer Tips speaks directly to daily Mac users who need to get the most out of their Mac right now.

Reasoning that experienced Mac users often try to save time by skimming their computer guides for nuggets of useful info relegated to "sidebars" -- those concise Note/Tip/Warning boxes that pepper the main text -- Scott Kelby developed New Riders' Killer Tips series to be nothing but sidebars. The result: lean, mean, pared-down help that doesn't waste time on abstract theory or rambling discussions. This book is all about speed -- showing impatient Mac addicts how to get more work done faster for maximum productivity with their OS X 10.2 systems.