Mac OS X Hacks

• Rael Dornfest & Kevin Hemenway
• O'Reilly
• 0596004605

Order (or just read more about) Mac OS X Hacks  from Amazon.com

Here we have a rather well done little book that I wasn't going to bother to review because I assumed that it was just a boring collection of the same old tired hacks one can find on dozens of web pages. The very idea of even opening such a book made me tired, bored, uninterested. I just didn't think I could even bear to read it, never mind review it.

Once again, I was wrong.

The first thing I liked about this is something we are starting to see more frequently: some use of color in the text. Photos and screen shots are still black and white (still too expensive to do that much yet), but section headings are nicely set off in purple. Such a small thing, and probably something that will become very common soon, but it enhanced my reading experience.

If this really was the boring collection of so called hints I thought it was, the purple text effect wouldn't have been enough to keep me going. But I did keep going. Yes, a lot of it was stuff I already knew, and some of it (the movie editing, for example) is stuff I have no real interest in. But all of it is practical: there's none of the silly "turn your scroll bars into cartoon characters" kind of nonsense. The authors obviously use their Macs to do real work, and the tips and hacks reflect that. Would you expect to find instructions and examples of using MySQL and PostgeSQL? This has those. It also has instructions for using a Bluetooth enabled phone as a modem, and enough other esoteric hacks that you'll surely find more than enough value for your money.

Interestingly, I couldn't find a single thing I disagreed with either. Every time I thought that a little carelessness had crept in, the next paragraph gave the very caveat that had bothered me.

Nicely done. That's almost always true of O'Reilly books, but it still needs to be said.

Publish your articles, comments, book reviews or opinions here!

Learn Mac OS X Command Line

Jump to Comments

Many of the products and books I review are things I purchased for my own use. Some were given to me specifically for the purpose of reviewing them. I resell or can earn commissions from the sale of some of these items. Links within these pages may be affiliate links that pay me for referring you to them. That's mostly insignificant amounts of money; whenever it is not I have made my relationship plain. I also may own stock in companies mentioned here. If you have any question, please do feel free to contact me.

Specific links that take you to pages that allow you to purchase the item I reviewed are very likely to pay me a commission. Many of the books I review were given to me by the publishers specifically for the purpose of writing a review. These gifts and referral fees do not affect my opinions; I often give bad reviews anyway.

We use Google third-party advertising companies to serve ads when you visit our website. These companies may use information (not including your name, address, email address, or telephone number) about your visits to this and other websites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of interest to you. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, click here.