Hope the first day of school went well for you!

If you are having any problems with your MacBooks..
Such as network connection problems, printer problems, etc..

FRET NOT!

SMU Macness has organise an one and only Configuration Session exclusively for you tomorrow!
Details are as follows..

Date: 09 January 2012
Time: 2.30pm to 5.20pm
Venue: SOA/SOL SR 3.5

See you there!

#Update 2 Sep 2011: The Guide has been updated with improvements for Printers.
- Updated Keychain Access settings for Wi-Fi: WLAN-SMU
- Printers instructions improvements for Macs with Lion upgraded from Snow Leopard
- Minor Printers instructions improvements for locating HP Printer Drivers file

School is starting soon, and you need to configure your Macbook before going for class?

No worries! The new Configuration Guide which we have specially prepared for you is out now!

Do download it simply by clicking on the “MAC CONFIGURATION GUIDE” on the right-hand side of the page or through this link: http://db.tt/x0Qj8axA

If you do need any help, feel free to drop by our Macness Configuration Sessions below:

(1) Monday, 15 August
- 2pm to 3.30pm @ SOA/SOL SR 2.2
- 3.30pm to 5pm @ SOA/SOL SR 2.5

(2) Tuesday, 16 August
- 2pm to 3.30pm @ SESS SR 3.1
- 3.30pm to 5pm @ SESS SR 3.2

See you there! (:

Validity, soundness, ad hominem, appeal to popularity, more and more fallacies – I’m sure all these terms are familiar to SMU students who have gone through an Analytical Skills course. With hundreds of terms to remember for the course, I am sure some (if not all) of us struggle to remember these terms and keep the information organized. Still fine for you? Make that a few times the information with the usual 4-5 CUs you take each term. Can’t handle it? MyThoughts comes in at this point to help you with the problem.

To put simply, MyThoughts is a Mac app that turns your classic mind map into an electronic one. Mind maps have long existed simply for the sake of organizing your knowledge and information. Turning a mind map into an electronic one has its advantages – no more erasing, re-organizing a branch, or even re-drawing an entire map when you re-organize your thoughts. Yes, MyThoughts allows you to make all these changes in a few clicks and keep your map as clean as ever.

Open up MyThoughts and you will be greeted by a “Thought” bubble right in the centre.

The clean and intuitive interface

This basically defines the appealing interface of MyThoughts – simple, clean and highly intuitive. I like to call this bubble the “central thought”, or simply the main idea if you like. So perhaps you would want to put “Analytical Skills” in.  How to do that? Duh, simply click on the word that you want to change!

Navigation is very easy. If you want to add a new branch to your idea, just click on the current branch and the “+” signs appear on either side of the selected object. Clicking on that will bring you to a new branch where you can enter your sub-idea. And so the process goes on and on. Everything works simply by clicking around your map.

Want to include the definition of ad hominem on a certain branch but fear cluttering up the mind map? This is where the Notes feature comes in. The Notes feature allows you to add more detailed explanation, examples to any branch on your mind map. These longer notes do not appear on the mind map itself but are contained in another interface. Once you have created a note, a Note symbol will appear beside the branch and navigating there is as easy as a single click.

Top: The Notes symbol as seen on the mind map

Bottom: The Notes interface for viewing and editing notes

There are also other features (mainly aesthetics) for you to explore, but one that I find particularly useful is the ability to export your mind map as Word or PDF. This allows you to share your maps with others who either don’t own a Mac or the application. What’s more – the Notes are exported too and the links are set up automatically on the PDF.

However, the app is on the pricey side ($49.99 on Mac App Store). While there are loads of colors and shapes to choose from, the app seems to lack templates and other features to allow you to mark certain points more easily. Overall, the app is useful for students but the price may be a major turn-off for most.

Pros:

• Clean, simple and intuitive interface
• Electronic mind map has its inherent benefits
• Notes function is highly useful in avoiding clutter
• Ability to export to other formats

Cons:

• Pricey – $49.99
• Lack of more advanced features
• Only for people who believe in the use of mind maps

Version Tested: MyThoughts 1.3.0 on MacBook Air 13” (Mid 2011) on Lion OS X 10.7.1

Learn how Parallels Desktop can benefit you in SMU with cool features like Remote Access to your Parallels Desktop using iPad/iPhone.

2 lucky participants will walk away with a pair of tickets to the Singapore Night Race at Marina Bay Street Circuit on Friday,23th September 2011.

In addition, we will be unveiling a SMU student only Parallels Desktop promotion at the workshop.

Get a free 8GB thumb drive for the first 50 to purchase the SMU student only Parallels Desktop promotion with Pro Studio.

Limited slots available! Sign up now at http://tinyurl.com/4y8n86h

Although we see an ever-increasing number of Mac users in SMU, many of us still require the use of Windows for various modules in SMU (e.g. CAT, MS, Stats, etc.), or Internet Explorer for certain online SMU services. Also, even though Office:mac 2011 is the most cross-platform compatible version of Office by far, we still run into issues at times with our professors’ Powerpoint slides, our friends’ copies of project work, and so on. So yes, you’d probably still need to use Windows some time or another.

The three common ways to run Windows are:

1. Bring another Windows laptop
2. Use Boot Camp
3. Virtualization*
   * Software that allows Mac users to run Windows concurrently with Mac OS X

However these solutions can come with their own problems. Bringing another laptop to school is a hassle. Running Boot Camp requires you to reboot your Mac each time you need to run Windows; which is not the most elegant solution. So this brings us to the last option, Virtualization. Virtualization has never been the first choice. It has always had the bad rep of slow performance, even on the most powerful computers. So how does Parallels Desktop 6 perform?

Running Windows on Parallels is like running Windows

The above is not a typo. Running Windows on Parallels like almost like running Windows on a normal PC. This is not a surprise, as many sites have stated that Parallels Desktop 6 is by far the fastest virtualization software for the Mac, beating rivals such as VMware and VirtualBox.

Windows 7 running on the Mac OS X Lion.

Any software that works on normal Windows PC will work on Parallels Desktop 6. Performance of the software is as close to a performance of a Windows PC as virtualization can go. Software that is frequently used, such as Microsoft Office Excel, runs without a hitch. In fact, I have used Parallels Desktop 6 for the module, Computer As An Analysis Tool for an entire semester without any problems.

Running Excel for Windows on Parallels

Coherence

What’s the main problem of running Windows on the Mac? The answer is simple for me, it just doesn’t look right. This brings me to one of my favorite feature, Coherence. Coherence allows Windows to melt into the background of Mac OS X, making Windows Applications look like native Macintosh Application, providing a more Mac Like experience.

Which program is running on Windows, and which is running on the Mac?

Conclusion

Virtualization has come a long way since the days of its buggy release. Parallels Desktop 6 has proven to be a reliable software suitable for daily use in school. Highly recommended if you need to run Windows programs on a day to day basis.

*Parallels Desktop 7 was announced not too long after this review was written. You can purchase your copy from Pro Studio at a special student rate for a limited time, so go drop by their store on campus today! There are exciting new features in PD7, so look out for our review coming soon!

Najiah: Happy apple fangirl (:

Time Machine

by NAJIAH

Ever wondered how you can travel through time? Well, with Apple’s Time Machine, you can! Cheesy (hurr). Well, digitally anyway.

Apple’s Time Machine is an awesome invention; it allows you to back up, only without the hassle! No more painstaking manual dragging of folders you wish to save and checking if the right files are there or not.

As Apple’s website copywriter says, “Time Machine automatically saves up-to-date copies of everything on your Mac – photos, music, videos, documents, applications, and settings. If you ever have the need, you can easily go back in time to recover anything.”

Simple reasons why you should use Time Machine

1. Painless way to back up your files

2. It’ll save you when your Mac crashes (Seamless migration to a new Mac)

3. Ability to access your files via another Mac when you don’t have your own (say you lost it / it died / it got stolen)

So do develop the habit of regularly backing your Mac up! I had a friend whose MacBook fell onto the ground and died. Thankfully, she’d backed it all up just the day before on my advice, via Time Machine and could easily transfer the data to her new Macbook Pro. #Truestories (:

So let’s figure out how to start using it:

1. Acquire an external hard disk of at least the same capacity as that in your Mac

2. Plug it into your Mac

3. Load System Preferences -> Time Machine and switch it on

4. Click ‘Select Disk and select your external hard disk, and click ‘Use for Backup’

5. Click on Options in the Time Machine preferences pane and select any folder you wish to exclude in your backups

6. Start backup! (:

Do note that the very first time you do it, it’ll take a while depending on how much stuff you have to backup.

You can always start a backup with this icon in the menu bar.

Using Time Machine itself:

1. Plug in your hard disk with Time Machine backups

2. Load Applications -> Time Machine

3. Scroll through time!

To see a certain date, use the bar on the right! To restore the file right click and restore it.

So, don’t wait till just before exams to backup your Mac, juuuuuuust in case it crashes.

Wei Zheng finally got a Macbook Pro in his own hands two years ago. Prior to that, he was drooling over Macs since time immemorial. <3 his Mac but the occassional Win7 craving remains.

Virus Barrier Review

By TOH WEI ZHENG

Think your Mac is immune from malicious attacks? Think again! Although the OS X architecture is (still) much more secure than Windows, with Mac usage steadily on the rise, hackers now find it more worthwhile to seek out exploits in OS X to steal valuable personal data. Recently, trojans designed specially for OS X were discovered, breaking the myth  that the Mac is safe from loopholes and threats. Also, even though current computer viruses pose no harm to Mac users per se, they may unwittingly spread these undetected pathogens to their friends on Windows when sharing files across platforms. A good security product is therefore a wise investment for the Mac user.

Eyeing this nascent market, familiar Windows antivirus brands such as Norton and Kaspersky have started touting Mac versions of their products on the market. However, the real pros swear by longtime Mac player Intego and its VirusBarrier X6 suite.

VirusBarrier provides the same features that one finds in a usual Windows product: real-time scanning, firewall, anti-phising and other surfing safeguards amongst others. However, unlike its Windows counterparts, it scans for threats found in both platforms (three actually, if Linux is included).  As an added bonus, it scans any iOS device that is plugged into the computer. It also allows flexibility with six preset configurations for the user to choose, depending on the network environment one is in. The default settings usually gets the job done by nipping threats in the bud.

One bugbear is the cookie filter, which is sometimes overzealous in its job to protect user privacy. I had problems logging on to certain sites when I first installed VirusBarrier, and it took me a fine deal of research before realising that overprotective Big Brother was actually causing the problem! Having to choose between limited Net access and reduced functionality, I picked the latter eventually.

This overprotective attitude resurfaces when I used Airport to share my USB dongle connection with friends. Whenever another computer attempted to connect to my laptop, I never failed to see repeat popups warning me of an intrusion, and I had to press ‘ignore’ several times before the connection was finally made. This caused sufficient annoyance for me to disable the anti-intrusion function temporarily. That said, although there are cases whereby VirusBarrier makes itself too helpful, I found it reassuring that it consistently keeps a lookout on any potential threats.

A side function which I found particularly useful was a recent addition of traffic flow on the taskbar. With this, I know exactly how speedy is my Internet connection, something that is particularly useful to monitor whether one’s ISP really provides the speed it claims to consistently, without having to run a speed test specially.

Although certain functions require some refinement, VirusBarrier remains one of the best solution for the Mac, with rave reviews from the Mac community. VirusBarrier X6 costs roughly S$45 annually for students. What’s even better is that the subscription covers TWO Macs, so one could split the cost with a fellow Mac user!