The blog of Steve Root

  • Useful Mac Shortcut Key (show desktop)

    Part two of my notes of moving from Windows to Mac – read part 1 here

    One of the most popular posts in the blog is the shortcut key in windows to ‘show desktop’. I love shortcut keys, but they’re all different on the Mac so I’m having to learn them all over again.

    Here are the one’s I’ve found so far along with their Windows equivalent;

    Action Mac Windows
    Show Desktop Fn + F11 Ctrl + DownArrow Windows Key + D
    Lock Screen (when going away from my desk) Ctrl + Shift + Eject Windows Key + L

    For some things though, I’ve found I need to use a shortcut where I used to use a key. For example, “Delete” on windows, is the delete key. It removes the character to the right, as opposed to the “Backspace” key, which removes the character to the left. My Macbook Pro doesn’t have a delete key, but the action is available using Fn + Backspace.

    It also doesn’t have a right mouse button… I’m still learning to live without that but haven’t quite memorised the shortcut. I’m also finding gestures a little hard. While I’m remembering to use two fingers to scroll the page (my previous HP had a scroll function on the right side of the mousepad area), I’m finding a feeling of fatigue in my fingers similar to that I remember from learning to type or play the guitar. I like the principle of the gesture control though, so I suspect I’ll wonder how I managed without it once I’m used to it.

    Update May 2012 – For some reason Fn + F11 isn’t working for me any more. So, I looked in [apple menu top left of screen] > System Preferences > Mission Control and I see the shortcut is: [ctrl] + [down arrow]. Maybe I got it wrong before, maybe I changed it and forgot, maybe it changed with an update… but this is what it is for me now.

  • Notes from moving from Windows to Mac

    318-macbook_pro_13inch.pngMy trusty HP laptop (nx6325 circa 2006) has finally reached retirement.

    Actually, as a PC it was running fine. It’s processor was expensive for it’s time (a 64bit dual core AMD) and routine improvements (memory to 1.5GB, hard disk to 256Gb, 2 replacement batteries) had extended it’s life nicely. The reason for replacing was the screen backlight becoming to dim to work effectively. For years I’ve been using it connected to a desk monitor for everyday use and it only became apparent this month when I needed to display a document on my laptop monitor alongside my desktop monitor while I worked. While I have a reputation for spending little money on computers and extending their life beyond many others it wasn’t worth buying a new screen or replacing the backlight… at least, not for work. I may well play with doing that just because I can, but I can’t be without a decent laptop for work.

    So, what to go out and buy? A mac! Well, no, at least, I thought a mac would be far too expensive and then I’ve got all the incompatibility issues to deal with. That was, until I spent my mandatory several hours investigating models, options and prices. To cut a long story short, the cheapest 13″ Macbook Pro worked out for me to be the best option for price and performance. Note here, I said “for me”. My needs are quite specific. I expect my IT hardware to last a long time (I look after it, I’m happy to pull it apart and repair/update things, I don’t need the latest & greatest processor or connectivity ports). I compared Sony Vaio, Asus, Toshiba, Lenovo and hunted through reviews on many different IT sites. As a quick summary:

    The Macbook Pro won on a combination of:

    • Screen Size I wanted no more than 13″ screen. Smaller than my last laptop, more portable
    • Battery Life claimed 7hrs, but I take that with a pinch of salt from all manufacturers. It does declare a WattHour of 63, equal to one of the HP options and greater than many others.
    • Build Quality (+2 for the aluminium body, -1 for the screen’s glossy surface and for two of my friends who’ve both managed to crack theirs… maybe thats co-incidence though)
    • Connectivity I think the thunderbolt connection will be a common standard in the future, as USB is today. I could be wrong (SCSI only ever got popular on Mac desktops if I remember correctly, Firewire never made mainstream PC’s) but I decided that was another nice to have feature
    • My programming hobby – a lot of ruby stuff is written on Mac, so the tutorials lean that way. Easier to bug fix (well, I don’t use windows for programming anyway – I dual boot my old laptop into Ubuntu)
    • LearningAs the key IT person in my small business, it’s good for me to know about the alternatives. Maybe Mac is really really good and our next office PC’s will be replaced with Macs. I have a friend who’s whole business runs on Mac, including their web servers, business databases, everything. If Mac could help me be as successful I’d be very happy!

    It lost on:

    • It doesn’t include Windows (having to buy the licence is an additional cost)
    • Battery isn’t easily/user replaceable. I gather that’s a side effect of getting so much battery in such a small laptop. I just about decided I could accept that compromise.
    • I’d have to almost relearn how to use a computer (all my shortcut keys!)
    • I don’t really want to be seen with a Mac
    • I have a feeling some of the ways the Mac expects me to work will be at odds with my penchant for OpenSource software, using hardware for more than the 3 year lifecycle IT salespeople seem to work to, and so on.

    It was equal on:

    • Price. Yes, really. 832 ex VAT against 992 ex VAT for a compariable (for me) HP Elitebook. Although, I did need a copy of Windows & Parallels/Fusion to run it, along with a few adapaters to connect the Thunderbolt to HDMI, VGA & HDMI.
    • Processor the Intel core i5-2415M was better than some options, but slightly under some of the latest releases. However, my work isn’t that taxing (the CAD design images can be left overnight to render).

    On the subject of price, I bought it from a local (Whitstable based) company called Serviceweb who are Apple Authorised Service providers. The total order was for;

    • Macbook Pro 13″
    • Magsafe Power Adapter (one for my desk, spare for home and travel)
    • Displayport -> VGA Adapter
    • Displayport -> DVI Adapter
    • Displayport -> HDMI Adapter
    • Parallels Desktop 7
    • Windows Pro7 64Bit
    • Apple Remote

    and the total cost 1095 + VAT (1314 inc VAT @ 20%).
    Considering that even for the HP I would have needed to buy a second power adapter the Mac was surprisingly well priced.

    So, I’ve spent a couple of days using it so far, and so far, so…. average. Yes, average. I’m learning the new shortcuts quick enough. I knew it would take a while to get used to that. However, I’m also finding a few bugs. Or perhaps they’re not bugs, maybe they’re ‘features’ as no easy solution is jumping from google searching. Anyway, more on those next post, along with the essential shortcuts I’m discovering.

  • My name (root) – most dangerous word in computing?

    I haven’t posted for a while, I know. I’ve been busy doing other things is all. Some of which you may hear about soon, others only if I get around to posting about it.

    One thing I have done recently is set up an http://about.me page. For most people, that’s a very easy thing to do. If the name you want hasn’t been taken you’re good to go. For me, picking the name sroot turned out to be quite a challenge!

    I’ve always had problems with my name and computing. On unix and linux, ‘root’ is the name of the super user. ‘root’ is god. ‘root’ can access anything, do anything, delete anything. When a server gets hacked, the last bit you want hackers to get access too is the ‘root’ account. Many services often prevent anyone registering the name root. Many prevent people registering anything that contains the string ‘root’. I first remember noticing this when I tried to get a hotmail account. ‘steveroot’ and ‘rootskitchens’ were simply not allowed.

    When I tried to sign up for an about.me page, I figured the failures being displayed were because of my name. I like the about.me site, so I persevered. I emailed their support and they helped! It turns out the name was blocked by the AOL namespace. I don’t really know what that means, but I guess their usernames connect with AOL services in some ways and my name failed to be accepted. What’s most impressive, is that for this FREE service, they actually took the time to find a solution. I genuinely expected to be told, ‘you can’t have a name that contains root, try using a nickname, or maybe remove the last letter like steveroo’.

    Having had them go to so much effort just for little old me, I hope my about me page http://about.me/sroot does them justice.

    By the way, I’ll keep that page up to date with things like my twitter name, social media spaces and any other big projects I may be working on.

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