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Operating Systems Books Media Businesses Software Book Reviews Apple

Running Mac OS X Panther 175

Posted by timothy from the running-panther-sleeping-bear dept.
honestpuck (Tony Williams) writes "Many years ago I bought a second hand Ford Cortina in dubious condition. I kept it running with the assistance of a marvelous volume purchased at a specialist bookstore that was referred to as "the shop manual." It wasn't much help teaching you how to drive or how to park but if you needed to know how to perform an oil change, flush the radiator or bleed the brakes it told you all the details. Now James Duncan Davidson has given me a shop manual for Macintosh OS X Panther." Read on for Williams' review of the O'Reilly published Running Mac OS X Panther. (And for the curious, here's what google has to say about "Ford Cortina.")
Running Mac OS X Panther
author James Duncan Davidson
pages 292
publisher O'Reilly and Associates
rating 8/10 - Excellent book, a little thin on details in a few places
reviewer Tony Williams
ISBN 0596005008
summary A good shop manual for those running Panther

This volume assumes you know how to use your Mac, how to perform all the routine changes that are easily accomplished with the GUI. Davidson also assumes you don't want to know how to get a movie running as your desktop, or get an Exposé blob floating on the screen or any of the usual sort of 'hacks' or 'hints.' What he gives is a good guide to lifting the hood and performing serious mechanical work or tweaking the performance of your Mac with enough background information so that you can feel confident taking your own steps.

It was good after a few near misses to read an O'Reilly book that was once again well written, well edited, tight and crammed full of information pitched at just the right level. Davidson has done an excellent job with this book.

Davidson starts with a little history, and from the viewpoint he presents, this is not a waste of space; he spends his time explaining exactly how we arrived at the current version of the Mac OS.

Then we have a chapter titled "Lay of the Land" that explores the file system, including both the Finder view and the view you get from the command line. It also explains the four file system domains and the 'Library' directory. The third chapter is a quick (20 pages) look at the Terminal and shell.

Then we get 'Part II: Essentials,' which is the 120-page core of the book. This starts off, logically, with system startup and the login (and log out and shutdown). This is followed by short chapters on users and groups, files and permissions, monitoring, scheduling and preferences and defaults before a marvelous long chapter on the file system. Davidson goes into great detail and closely covers each of the topics, making sure that you get all the details not just 'recipes.'

Part III ("Advanced Topics") starts with a chapter on Open Directory that I found particularly useful. It includes coverage on Kerberos and single sign-on that explains it well, as well as the command-line Open Directory tools. The chapter on printing could have had a bit more guts. It covers the obvious but leaves out such joys as CUPS apart from a half-page sidebar; since sharing printers has caused me more than a little grief I would have appreciated more detail here. The final chapter on networking is better, and provides more useful detail.

It must be said that this section concentrates more on user level detail and leaves out real information on server level software and options. Given the target group for this book, and that a book has to draw a line somewhere, this is quite fair.

Davidson has picked his topics well, almost everyone will find all of Part II useful and educational. Part III is perfect for people wanting to run Panther in a corporate environment. He has balanced the command line and GUI well, pointing out where you can do a job with both and explaining the details.

Oreilly's page for the book has a table of contents and index but no example chapter. If you go to Davidson's page at O'Reilly there is a link to a short excerpt on scheduling tasks as well as several earlier articles Davidson has written for MacDevCenter.

I would recommend this book to any Panther user with a moderate amount of experience. It is not for the newcomer to the Mac, perhaps, but everyone else will benefit from this book.

You can purchase Running Mac OS X Panther from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page
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Running Mac OS X Panther More

Running Mac OS X Panther

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  • Cortina == Gag! (Score:3, Funny)

    by webwalker ( 15831 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:15PM (#8941303) Homepage
    At least the interface on OSX looks better. The poor Ford looks like something a stylist would produce as revenge against his employer.

  • For the curious... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Lev13than ( 581686 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:18PM (#8941340) Homepage
    Movie running as a desktop [macosxhints.com] (one method)
    Exposé blob [macosxhints.com]
    How to Bleed Brakes [stoptech.com]

  • Prophylactic comment. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Guano_Jim ( 157555 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:19PM (#8941347)
    Just to get this out of the way.

    You can buy a multi-button mouse that will work with OSX.

    But you have to leave your parents' basement to do it.

    • Re:Prophylactic comment. (Score:5, Informative)

      by The I Shing ( 700142 ) * on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:24PM (#8941400) Journal
      I agree. I have bought cheap two-button scroll mice at Office Max that were free after rebate and they work just fine in OS X. No driver installation was necessary.

    • Re:Prophylactic comment. (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:33PM (#8941508)
      But why would you do that? Having only one button is so much more productive. I refuse to buy a PC until they remove all the unncecessary mouse buttons!
      -- MacFreak
    • You can buy a multi-button mouse that will work with OSX.

      Yes, but how do you replace the built-in single-button pointing device on an iBook or Power book with a built-in multi-button pointing device?

      • Re:Prophylactic comment. (Score:5, Informative)

        by JHromadka ( 88188 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:40PM (#8941577) Homepage
        With this [macupdate.com].

      • Re:Prophylactic comment. (Score:5, Informative)

        by the phantom ( 107624 ) * on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:40PM (#8941586) Homepage
        This may not be exactly the solution you are looking for, but ctrl+click = right click.
        • You seem to fail to understand the difference between a pointing device and a combination of pointing device and keyboard shortcut. Hint: you can operate a three button mouse comfortably with one hand.

          Besides, while three mouse buttons do not confuse me, five choices of non-standard function keys combined with a single mouse button definitely do. Talk about counterintuitive.

          Control-click may do the same thing as a right click, but it is not a right click.
          • Yeah? Do a non-continous selection with one hand on your three button mouse. Open an URL in a new window/tab while using the opposite of the default behaviour of focusing.
            • Yeah? Do a non-continous selection with one hand on your three button mouse. Open an URL in a new window/tab while using the opposite of the default behaviour of focusing.

              What's your point? That there are obscure key/mouse combos that some small number of people use? What does that prove?

              And how does an already unintuitive feature get better by adding another two modifier keys (Fn and Command) to the already confusing set of set of modifier keys (Control, Shift, Alt, AltGr)? Even Windows UI designers
              • Obscure? Hardly. I use these features almost all the time. You don't because you can't and are confused by mice with only one button. And what's that prattle about "another two modifier keys"? Have you ever used a Mac?
      • Unless you're talking about IBM keyboard nipples, PC laptops with multiple buttons are impossible to use quickly and accurately. You have to tuck your thumb all weird under your hand. Right-click-drag, for example, is incredibly difficult.

        You can't do it with two hands, even if you want to.

        The MacOS solution is vastly preferable, for laptops only. Click-hold brings up a context menu. If you don't like the delay, ctrl-click. There is no way you can convince me that that is more inconvenient than a two-button trackpad. If you try, I'll suspect that you're lying.

        The second I hit a desk, of course, I plug in my Microsoft Intellimouse Optical. My thumb and pinky drive the cursor, while every suitable finger has a button conveniently placed. Totally different excercise than a trackpad.
        • Correction, YOU can't do this, but those of us who have mastered the use of our opposable thumb have no problem.

          Having said that, I found the lack of a second button on the powerbook very frustrating, for about 2 hours until I mastered the art of ctrl-click. There's that darn opposable thumb again.

        • Right-click-drag, for example, is incredibly difficult. You can't do it with two hands, even if you want to.

          How so? Have you tried using your left-hand thumb or index to click and your right index finger to drag? If there's any fault with the touchpad in normal notebooks, it's that often the middle button is missing. After I got used to Konqueror's opening links in a separate window when mid-clicked, I don't want to use any other method for clicking on links. The simultaneous clicking on both buttons to s

          • Well, you can. You're right. If you're using your right index finger to point, your right palm is covering the right click button on any PC laptop I've seen. You can lift your right hand, and press the right click button with your left thumb or index finger.

            That is a big annoyance for me. I feel that at that point, the control button is a whole lot easier to reach. When I use a PC trackpad for an extended period of time, I find that my right thumb hurts from reaching underneath my hand and poking sideways.
        • The MacOS solution is vastly preferable, for laptops only. Click-hold brings up a context menu.

          And it could continue to do that if Apple put three buttons on their laptops. If you don't want to use the three buttons, you can continue to use just the left button with key combinations.

          But in real life, just about everybody plugs a three button mouse into their desktop Mac because it is simply more intuitive and usable that way: a button for pointing, a dedicated button for context menus, and a dedicated b
    • But you have to leave your parents' basement to do it.

      Not necessarily. You could also order one over the Intarweb[tm].
    • for my 12" powerbook G4 HOWEVER since I found THIS [ragingmenace.com] I don't even bother anymore. The right side of the trackpad is vertical scroll. The bottom edge is horizontal scroll. I set a finger tap in the lower left corner to right mouse button click. I set expose up to "choose all apps" and "clear off desktop" with taps in the other corners. With practice, it's a lot faster than a mouse.

  • So what you're saying is... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Hamster Lover ( 558288 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:22PM (#8941377) Journal
    ...to keep my Mac running smoothly I have to periodically bleed the brakes and change the oil?

    What a lot of work, I'll just stick with Windows.

  • Have you noticed... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by WwWonka ( 545303 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:22PM (#8941382)
    ..that Mac OSX users now think they know 'Nix, and that 'Nix users think they know Mac now?

    • Re:Have you noticed... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:30PM (#8941472)
      ..that Mac OSX users now think they know 'Nix, and that 'Nix users think they know Mac now?

      It's "*nix", Windows boy.

    • Re:Have you noticed... (Score:5, Informative)

      by kelzer ( 83087 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:34PM (#8941519) Homepage

      ..that Mac OSX users now think they know 'Nix, and that 'Nix users think they know Mac now?

      If you're refering to Davidson, it might interest you that he's actually a fairly recent convert to the Mac. He worked for Sun for quite a while, contributing quite a bit to parts of the J2EE spec and the Tomcat webserver (as well as creating "Ant").

      • Re:Have you noticed... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by hak1du ( 761835 )
        If you're refering to Davidson, it might interest you that he's actually a fairly recent convert to the Mac. He worked for Sun for quite a while, contributing quite a bit to parts of the J2EE spec and the Tomcat webserver (as well as creating "Ant").

        And how does working on Java (whether at Sun or elsewhere) make him a UNIX expert?
      • If you're refering to Davidson, it might interest you...

        Nope. If he was referring to Davidson, he wouldn't have been talking out his ass like that.

    • Re:Have you noticed... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by jared_hanson ( 514797 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:48PM (#8941679) Homepage Journal
      ..that Mac OSX users now think they know 'Nix, and that 'Nix users think they know Mac now?

      Umm, no. The "average" Mac user only wants to use his/her computer efficiently. These people don't consider "knowing" the computer as more important than actually using it for work.

      The only people who are big UNIX geeks running Mac OS X came from other *NIXes like Linux or BSD. These people have a right to assert they know UNIX because in most cases they do. In turn, anyone who can figure out UNIX can figure out the Mac overlay in no time at all. (hint: it's simple for a reason)

      I suspect you were trolling, and I bit.
    • I'm one of those people. I've got 4 Linux machines and a BeOS machine and I'm going to get a mac for the parents to use.

      Do you really think that I won't be able to figure it out?
    • In German, "nix" is colloquial for "nothing". So the question "Do you know *nix" can be easily misconstrued...

      How do you guys pronounce "*nix"? "Nicks"? "Star-Nicks"?
    • I've been a *nix geek for about 20 years, and have used Mac at home for almost that long... When I first got OS-X, it took me about 20 minutes to find the damn shell window. Then, it took about 3 seconds to realize it was a BSD system. The 'terminal' application now lives in my dock.
    • I think you only really see that on slashdot, because well, that's the slashdot crowd. I've never heard someone say "i know unix cause i have a mac" besides the people that actually do know unix stuff.
    • ...that Windows users think they know jack now?
    • I learnt Perl and bash with an OS X box.

  • Panther Maintenence (Score:5, Informative)

    by Hornsby ( 63501 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:24PM (#8941407) Homepage
    For anybody running Panther, here is a set of indespensible tips [macdevcenter.com]. I go through the steps outlined in that article about once a month, and it keeps my G4 laptop purring like a kitten. The steps about regenerating the prelink binding are especially relevant to performance.
    • And all along, I thought that Mac fans were just spouting nonsense about being user-friendly. I can see the conversation now:

      Mom: "My computer is running slow!"
      Me: "Did you regenerate your prelink binding like I told you to?"

    • Re:Panther Maintenence (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I love the bit where he uses sudo to execute a command and then says this "Don't worry about the lines of text that will scroll on your Terminal. This simply means that the command is doing its work."
      And there I was all this time worrying about things I do when I am root.

  • Has to be said: (Score:5, Funny)

    by hot_Karls_bad_cavern ( 759797 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:26PM (#8941422) Journal
    How to run it:

    Plug it in. Turn it on. Bam, OSX mopping that ass up with easy-to-use goodness. Go ahead mod me down, you'll change your mind once you use OSX.

    • Windows Switcher (Score:5, Insightful)

      by millahtime ( 710421 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @02:56PM (#8941790) Homepage Journal
      "you'll change your mind once you use OSX."

      A buddy of mine is a Windows Admin. HE eats, sleeps and breathes Windows. He even got on me for my BSD servers over Windows ones. Then someone talked him into a Mac. Within 24 hours he was a complete convert. He actually said and I quote "What the hell was I thinking!?!?!?!?!"
      • well, i can relate to your friend.. since i am usually one to agree with people when they say "it's too good to be true" with computer technology.... and i was once told asked by a windows user why i make using a mac sound too good to be true...

        i really didn't know what to say because i never did realize that i was praising the OS.. it just comes as a suprise to me now, since i use OSX as my #1 OS, that windows users can accept applicaiton lockups/freezes, viruses, security holes on a regular basis and go

    • Re:Has to be said: (Score:4, Insightful)

      by killjoe ( 766577 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @04:12PM (#8942902)
      What you say is pretty much true for the client but the mac os x server needs some serious work IMHO.

      I am waiting for the Mac OS X server administration book. The PDFs at the apple web site are lame and only walk you through the GUI.

      As long as I am griping... When is Apple going to get off their ass create a ports collection for apple. For those who are wondering here is the current state of the art for mac flavor of bsd.

      Darwinports: Does not resolve dependencies. Very limited.
      Fink: Does resolve dependencies and less limited but still fewer ports then freebsd.
      Pkgsrc: Lots of ports, resolves depencies but you are likely to get lots of errors when building them on mac.

      • Re:Has to be said: (Score:4, Informative)

        by OmniVector ( 569062 ) <see my homepage> on Thursday April 22, 2004 @07:51PM (#8945159) Homepage
        Darwinports: Does not resolve dependencies. Very limited.

        WHAT?? this is coming straight from the mouth of a darwinports contributor. it supports dependencies, including specific versions, build dependencies, run dependencies, and even config-level dependencies. darwinports is also much more pure to the bsd roots than fink. fink puts things in /sw, which is not a file system hierarchy standard, whereas darwinports puts them in /opt, where the file system standard says they belong. if you take a look at freebsd some time, you'll know just now anal people are about sticking to the hierarchy specs unlike most linux distros which can't agree on squat (/usr/bin, /usr/local/bin are never the same per-distro).

        darwinports also has superior gtk-app support, including gtk2 versions of most apps (abiword, gnumeric, gimp, pan, and more) long before fink did. some fink still doesn't have.

        in spite of all this, darwinports was *almost* included in panther, but for some reason was pulled last minute. i do hope that 10.4 ships with darwinports, as it is the official opendarwin-supported project, and with mac os x being based off darwin and all i would imagine they'd pick the official one.
        • I'll give it another look. I had all kinds of problems with it first time I tried.

          As for the hierarchy I am less concerned about that. Pkgsrc (netbsd) puts everything in the /usr/pkg prefix. That's because it strives to be platform independent. The debian folks are very strict about hierarchy as are the freebsd folks.

          Sad to say Mac OS X is a weird mishmash of stuff. Some logs are in /var/log some logs are in with the application. Same with config files. Mac OS X being what it is I almost prefer that the p
      • I am waiting for the Mac OS X server administration book. The PDFs at the apple web site are lame and only walk you through the GUI.

        Panther Server is sweet, but I certainly agree that Apple seriously needs to get on the stick and produce some decent documentation, not to mention training materials for their certification tests. Punch in pretty much any Microsoft exam number in the search field at Amazon and it takes a day to go through all the results. Try that with an Apple exam... nothing.

        There are so

  • Wait for the OS X in a nutshell (Score:4, Informative)

    by Tibor the Hun ( 143056 ) on Thursday April 22, 2004 @04:18PM (#8942999)
    I have been looking at such books, but I have to say I like the "OS X in a nutshell" version better, because of their nice and extensive Unix command appendix.
    The Jaguar edition has been out for a while, but I'm waiting for the Panther edition.


  • "Drives Like Fun! Saves Like Crazy!"
    Maybe Panther can adopt this as theirs - although maybe just overseas... [engrish.com]

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