Questions about OSX

Posted:
in macOS edited January 2014
Okay, I'm not a newbie, I've had mac's forever. I now have the 1.3 PB G4. This is my first foray into OS X, having upgraded from system 8.1 I have wondered around the computer, yet I'm still frustrated and confused by certain things. I'm going to pick up the missing manual book I think. But in the meantime, or until I pick up the book, hope to get some words of advice here. First off, what the heck is a home folder? I'm used to just having a hard-drive icon on the desktop, and am confused about home folder with my name onit. And with expose, with the listed things on the left of a window there is desktop. Yet when clicking on desktop, the items I have sitting on my desktop appear, but the Hard Drive does not. It seems non-linear to me I guess. I'm used to having folder, double clicking them and having certain things nested. I.E. system everything under the hard drive or in a separate folder on the desktop. Also, I'm confused as to what mounting and unmounting a disk image is. I never did this with 8.1 And I have no idea what terminal is either. I realise this all makes me sound like a complete novice, and gladly admit that I may be. However, it's just frustrating because it seems to me the orginization/hierarchy of things is more complicated than simple from 8.1 Thanks for responses, and yes I still love my mac. Just tryiing to understand it's orginizational level and a few programs better.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 13
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    Missing Manual is an *excellent* start, but here's a short primer in the meantime:



    MacOS X is based on Unix, a venerable, rock solid and rather ubiquitous OS in many forms (Linux, BSD, etc, etc). Unix is, from it's core outward, *multi-user*. This is important to remember.



    What's even more important to remember is that MacOS used to be *single user*. This is a huge change, and it permeates everything from top to bottom in your new OS.



    Most obviously, you now have a 'home folder'... this is a folder designated as *yours*. Anything you could do with your old hard drive, you can do in there. Think of it like your sandbox. You're free to install, delete, or change anything in there.



    Why not just let you have free roaming access to everything like the old days? Security, security, security. You see all these Windows viruses out there? They rely on there being the assumption that 'the user is always right'... even if 'the user' is a malicious script from elsewhere. MacOS Classic (for lack of a better term for everything before MacOS X), also relied on this model, but had some sanity checks in place that helped a lot. Being pre-Internet helped a lot too.



    Nowadays you simply have to have good security, and Unix provided that base.



    But yes it makes things a little... different. Even a single user can gain benefits from this without worrying about security though... System is now completely out of your control... and that's a good thing. Apple has reserved System for itself to muck with... the things in there are considered basic to the booting and operation of your machine. No more wondering "if I remove this, will it boot?" No more setting Extensions Manager to the base Apple set to track down conflicts... System *is* the base Apple set.



    So where do you add things? Two places: the top level Library is analogous to your old System Folder. Add or remove things there and they affect all users equally. Or, if you want to have it just affect you, you'll notice a Library in your home folder. Add or remove things there, they only affect you.



    /System: Apple

    /Library: All users

    ~/Library: Just you



    Note the odd notation above... '/' is the directory delimiter in Unix. So /Library means 'the Library folder at the top of everything'. '~' is a shorthand notation for 'your home folder', so ~/Library means 'the Library folder in your home folder'.



    Which finally gets us to the Desktop. You found your Desktop folder in ~/Desktop, and you're right, it doesn't have your hard drive or other such icons in it. Why? Because ~/Desktop is just for you, and hard drives are machine-level entities - they affect everyone. Look in your Finder Preferences, and you'll see checkboxes for Hard Drives, Removable Media, and Servers. These are simply to make Classic users feel at home. It's a little sleight of hand that OS X does for folks upgrading... I have them turned off, and have for years.



    I hope this gets you going a bit.
  • Reply 2 of 13
    ast3r3xast3r3x Posts: 5,012member
    OS X is so amazingly better than pre OS X it's unbelievable. It will take time to get used to but once you do you'll never want to go back, even if your PC friends are still impressed with OS 9, they will be more impressed with OS X!



    If you are in the finder, under the "Finder" in the menu bar there is preferences to turn on any thing to be show on the desktop. Basically OS X forces you to be a more organized person. Not really but it sure helps giving you your own folders for documents, pictures and stuff without having tons of folders spread across your desktop and hard drive.



    **Still bitter OS X makes it so difficult to share music between users.



    Most important thing to remember in OS X I'd say (although what do I know really?) is that you should repair permissions every once and a while or if you have any problems. You can read up on trouble shooting techniques in the Genius Bar...there is a sticky with common problems and solutions at the top of the page.



    Don't be afraid to use the help menu...it'll help you learn apps and how to do stuff and things
  • Reply 3 of 13
    meecesmeeces Posts: 160member
    Thanks so far for replies. I think my biggest thing is the change in orginizational structure. Until I get used to it, the old 'single user' system seemed better just because it felt simpler. I went and picked up missing manual book today(updated for 10.3) Several recommended it, so hopefully it will help. Back when I had my Mac LCIII, I had the macintosh bible, and I remember that book with fondness, and just glancing through missing manual, I get the idea it will help me like the old one did. I've had the powerbook since the day they announcened the revisions, so I can work it. It's just frustrating because it doesn't yet have the 'old familiar feeling'
  • Reply 4 of 13
    crazychestercrazychester Posts: 1,339member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Meeces

    Thanks so far for replies. I think my biggest thing is the change in orginizational structure.



    If you haven't already, try switching to column view in finder. And you know how the old OS was forgiving of stupidity? Yeah well, OS X pretty much maintains its Buddha-like calm no matter how how stupid you get with it. I know, I've tested it out! In other words just poke around and try things out (but not in terminal unless you know what you're doing).
  • Reply 5 of 13
    torifiletorifile Posts: 4,024member
    Cali ~= Kali.... Hmmmm....



    http://www.blaine.k12.wa.us/training/Data/index.html



    That is for Jaguar, but it's probably a good place to start.
  • Reply 6 of 13
    messiahmessiah Posts: 1,689member
    When you stay at a hotel, you and everybody that stays there has access to all the facilities, like the restaurant and the pool etc.



    But only you have access to your room, and you don't have access to anybody else's.



    Think of your computer as the hotel. The facilities are the apps. Your room is the Home folder.



    The trick is figuring out where you are leaving all your personal belongings - are you leaving them in the lobby for all to see, or are you leaving them safely in your room?



    I keep everything in my room (Home folder). That way I always know where everything is, and it's makes it a lot easier when I need to back stuff up.
  • Reply 7 of 13
    lucaluca Posts: 3,833member
    I kept everything in my home folder for a long time, but I find it easier to use the root level of my hard disk for storing things. Just what I need, with folders that fit MY way of organizing things.



    The way I see it, my computer is not a "hotel" where I only access my room. It's my house, and I put stuff where it belongs, not where I'm supposed to.



    So, on the root level of my hard drive, I keep folders for Documents, Movies, Pictures, Sites, and Games, in addition to the required Applications, Users, System, and Library folders. I allow various things to get automatically thrown into my Home folder, like my iTunes library or my iPhoto library, but all the files that I have direct control over, I keep in the root level.



    Now, some may argue that this isn't the "proper" way to use OS X. Two months ago, I would have agreed. But the point is that OS X is flexible and you can use it however you want. Now that my Home folder is unused, I find the clunky sidebar to also be useless, and along with that, the clunky metal frame around Finder windows. I just wish you could do a systemwide kill of the sidebar, because I hate it. I just click the little capsule widget at the top-right corner of all Finder windows, and organize things by Icon view rather than Column view. It works great for me.
  • Reply 8 of 13
    kraig911kraig911 Posts: 912member
    hmm I really like the sidebar



    I myself was amazed at the difference moving from OS 9 to OS X at the time I had never even worked on a g4, we had g3's everywhere I worked so g4 was considered revered but unnecessary, but now its g5 all the way heh. And using OS X was a BI**H then on a g3 but now its really grown and become apart of my daily life. The subtle things like icons and highlighting are all back now next popup folders or whatever they were called, I've gotten so used without them but still it would be nice But if you really wanna know whats best about OS X... open up all your apps at once, and leave them that way oh and dont' worry about absolutely having to turn it off unless you wanna do the right thing and save energy, just let it sleep, restart when you have too.
  • Reply 9 of 13
    The problem with treating X as your 'house' is when others come over and also treat your house as their own. Soon they start putting things in all your rooms, and they yell at you if you try to move them and they can poke around all your private stuff. Same in X. When you suddenly share your computer (significant other, sibling, general internet user account, etc), you have to start dealing with permissions, and files that aren't where they should be, can be modified, or not modified by others. You'll encounter problems like not being able to delete/move a folder because someone has something that you can't write to. I personally leave all my media files (graphics, mp3's, movies, literature, etc) on a separate partition that I can disable permissions on altogether and keep my system drive 'properly' arranged.
  • Reply 10 of 13
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    And of course the counterargument is "But I'm the only one using my machine!"



    Well, so am I. But I give research demos on it. I don't want folks at a conference poking around my private files, so I have a 'demo' user account that I use for public demos. No one can see anything outside of that account. This is a good thing.



    There are many many reasons to have a multi-user system, and as many reasons to *use* it, and do so effectively.
  • Reply 11 of 13
    amorphamorph Posts: 7,112member
    I set Finder windows to open to Home by default, and now it's an extra trip to get to the root level. So I keep all my stuff in my user account, because it's the most natural thing to do. Going up to root level requires navigation.



    It's barely distinguishable from OS 9 in practice, as far as my feeling that I'm the only person using the computer.
  • Reply 12 of 13
    lucaluca Posts: 3,833member
    I have a guest account on my computer. However, it's a "Simple Finder" account so they can't access my stuff anyway. Everything remains hidden except for a few applications like iChat, Safari, QuickTime, etc.



    Also, I have two hard drives. All my files can't fit on the hard drive I have OS X installed on, so there's not much point in trying to move everything into my home folder anyway. How can I create folders that are viewable only by me that aren't in my home folder? Do I just change the permissions? Although Simple Finder is pretty good, anyone can open files that aren't in my home folder by using a different application, i.e. Preview or Safari. Just use another application's "Open" command and they'll probably be able to get to almost everything.
  • Reply 13 of 13
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Luca Rescigno

    I have a guest account on my computer. However, it's a "Simple Finder" account so they can't access my stuff anyway. Everything remains hidden except for a few applications like iChat, Safari, QuickTime, etc.



    Also, I have two hard drives. All my files can't fit on the hard drive I have OS X installed on, so there's not much point in trying to move everything into my home folder anyway. How can I create folders that are viewable only by me that aren't in my home folder? Do I just change the permissions? Although Simple Finder is pretty good, anyone can open files that aren't in my home folder by using a different application, i.e. Preview or Safari. Just use another application's "Open" command and they'll probably be able to get to almost everything.




    1) Set the permissions on the files to be Read/Write by you, None for everyone else.



    2) Make an alias to that secondary folder and place it in your Home.



    3) There is no step 3.



    You can now access everything through the Home folder, but no one accessing the drive directly can use your files.



    Alternately, you could do what I do an simply move your Home over to the other drive... I have a 6GB drive with 10.2.6 and 10.1.2 boot volumes, and an 80GB drive with all the user home folders. It requires a bit of behind the scenes trickery to make it transparent, but it works beautifully.
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