shuffle April 2007 content

[Magnus]

A word from the editor
Finally in print
by Magnus

This is a very special issue of shuffle for many reasons. First, this is the first ever issue of that is being printed and distributed to various locations around the Emirates, which is very exciting. So it’s with strong feelings I write this editorial. On one hand this can mean great things for our user group in terms of getting publicity and signing up new members to our community. On the other hand it also means there is more pressure to keep producing a high-quality newsletter each month. I am convinced that we’re up to the task and increased membership numbers should mean we can share the job of writing articles between more members which would be good. Second, the same day this issue comes out, EmiratesMac User Group is organizing its first major event, the Special AppleTV Event. A lot of work has gone into getting it all arranged and we hope as many people as possible will enjoy it. I would like to extend my sincere thank you to the people who have worked hard on this event and to the sponsors who support us. We hope to be able to make this sort of event into a recurring feature since we believe there is a pent-up demand for Apple-related events of this kind. Third and final, it’s now one year since our web site went live. It was in early April 2006 that EmiratesMac.com first came to life. In that brief period of time, we’ve reached over 700 user registrations on the site, we’re seeing some 12,000 unique visitors per month, and by all accounts, the site is growing all the time. As a good example of how popular the site is, right after Apple had announced the iPhone in January we received an email from a sales executive at one of the largest mobile phone retail chains in the Emirates. The question they had for us was “Can you please let me know your Company Details and the proposed distribution model for the Ipod Phone. Also if you could indicate its availability as well as proposed cost price/selling price it would be helpful in evaluating the opportunity.” And we get similar kind of requests at least a few times per week, I guess showing that we’re having an impact. So we hope you enjoy a printed shuffle, an AppleTV event, and increased activity on the site. And remember, this is just the beginning.

[Magnus]

EmiratesMac.com's One Year Anniversary
by Magnus

On this the one year anniversary of EmiratesMac.com, we celebrate by having an Apple TV Special Event as well as our first issue of shuffle in print. It's an exciting time in our brief history and we thought we'd look back to be able to gaze into the future.

Started as a blog
EmiratesMac started as my personal blog in October 2005 when we had just moved to the UAE. We wanted to buy a Mac mini and it was hard to find information online and elsewhere about where to buy one, what the prices where, etc. In frustration with that I started a blog which still lives on today (emiratesmac.wordpress.com) although it's not updated for about a year now. Over time some people started visiting the site again and again and a small community formed around the blog. In early 2006 I thought we should do more with EmiratesMac so we bought the domain and web hosting and then the site you know today was born. You can see what the first version of the site looked like in the picture.

First big hits
We went through some serious growing pains over the first few months, and we installed various systems to manage our site. Eventually we settled on what we’re currently running and things were in many ways easier after that. During the first few months the site had some terrific spikes in traffic when we reported on the upcoming opening of a MacStore in Abu Dhabi, and when we covered the actual opening of the store. This established us after just a few months in search engines and got us some much needed traffic from the UAE, the Middle East, and beyond. Summer started to set in and some of us thought about establishing an Apple User Group. We actually submitted all the paperwork to Apple in May, but it took a lot longer than we thought to get any response from them.

Starting the User Group
It was actually not until August 2006 that we heard back from Apple and got registered as an Apple User Group. We're still the only Apple User Group in the UAE, registered or not, and one of very few registered groups in the Middle East. Our first meeting was August 8th 2006 in Abu Dhabi and a total of four people attended. Around the same time we published a preview of Arabic Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger, which again got the site a lot of interest from all over the world. That post is still the most read post on the site, and probably will remain so for a long time.

End of 2006 and 2007 so far
The rest of 2006 and early 2007 saw a steady climb in the interest for the site. We had a few smaller spikes in interest, for example when we published the timeline for the Arabic localization of Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger and Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard. We’re hoping that with the new things we’ve announced and some things we’re still working on, that more people want to sign up on the site, become user group members, and join our community.

Congratulations
Congratulations are in order for everyone who has worked hard on EmiratesMac.com and everyone who has visited us since we started. We’re nothing without your help and support, and we’re looking forward to a successful future.

[Magnus]

Open Source Applications on Mac OS X
by Dandantheitman

This month’s article was inspired by an incident that occurred in early February this year at the Apple Store on 5th Avenue, New York. It’s also inspired by a post I made on EmiratesMac.com, regarding Apple taking on Microsoft on the desktop. Now it occurred to me whilst reading the article that the line regarding sales figures and who owns what has become very blurry. I know a lot of guys who own Apple hardware but run Linux or BSD on top of it. I even know know one guy who uses Apple hardware for Windows XP only. A prime example of a company that helps blur the line is Terra Soft Solutions with their Yellow Dog Linux (www.ydl.net). For years Terra Soft has made a Red Hat derivative purely for Apple Macs using the PPC architecture. Likewise, not all PCs sold by vendors such as Dell and HP ultimately run Windows. Sure, 99% of them are Windows by default, but chances are when a Linux or BSD user gets their hands on the computer the Windows OS will not even be given the chance to boot, let alone register.

The Scene
It was early February and I had just arrived in New York. I was flying out to Jordan and I had five hours till my flight was due to leave. Then my PowerBook decided that it had had enough. Fours hours left till my flight was due to leave and I was scheduled to be in Jordan and Iraq for almost five weeks. Five weeks without Mac OS X = bad news. I went down to 5th Ave. store with the broken PowerBook in hand. The Genius at the Apple Store confirmed it was DOA (dead on arrival), probably the motherboard. So I headed over to a one of the sales guys and pointed at a 15-inch MacBook Pro and said “I want one of those, with the none-glossy screen, a USB modem, 3GB of RAM, and 2.16GHz should be just fine”. He rang it up and I was done. Whilst I was walking away a new Mac user approached Dave, my sales guy, and said she had just converted to Apple, but couldn’t open any of her Office documents, and couldn’t afford MS Office, was there something she could use instead? Dave said sorry, but if she was a student she could try and get a discount on the Apple version of Office for Mac. Not wanting to see a fellow Mac user in trouble I said “How about Open Office?” Both Dave and the new Apple convert turned around and looked at me very puzzled. I explained what Open Office was, how I had used it for over three years on FreeBSD, Linux, and Mac OS X, and had had no problems thus far. I also spoke about a few other open source applications that I liked and that she should consider. Dave left happy, the co-ed left with a list of web sites where she could turn her Mac into an open source power house and I headed for the sales counter to go grab and pay for my new MacBook Pro.

Open source applications
So what does the situation for open source application look like on Mac OS X? Are there applications that you should be using, or even Mac OS X specific open source applications that you should consider using? Or do you just want to turn your Apple Mac into “Castle open source”, like mine? Also see “What is open source?”.

Open Office
Open Office is an open source office suite based on Star Office by SUN Microsystems.
Apple recently released X11 for Mac OS X (www.apple.com/macosx/features/x11). It’s the X Windows System that allows developers to build graphical Unix/Linux -based applications and is based on the XFree86 project. While you may not be a programmer, knowing how to install X11 on your system can allow you to run the hundreds of applications available under X11. One of the most important, with regards to usage, is probably Open Office. Open Office is available for download from www.openoffice.org and is freely distributed under the GPL. Open Office has 100% compatibility with Microsoft’s Office suite both from an opening and saving perspective. The developer community has also kept a lot of the Microsoft hot key functionality so for those of you who are making a direct move from Microsoft’s Office suite you will not be disappointed by the look, feel, and usage of the product. In addition Open Office provides built in export functionality for the portable document format (PDF).

E-Mail Clients
Microsoft Entourage, Novell Groupwise, and Lotus Notes all are available for Mac OS X. However none of these are open source. Apple does of course provide its own Mail application, which also is not open source. For people looking to connect to corporate groupware solutions such as Groupwise and Exchange then there is really only one choice for an open source email application and that is Evolution (forge.novell.com). Evolution is the default email client for Novell’s corporate desktop SuSE Linux Enterprise Desktop and Red Hat’s corporate desktop Red hat Workstation. For an email solution where you need only POP or IMAP email, then your choices are limited. GNUmail (www.collaboration-world.com/gnumail) is an open source version of the default Mail.app. It is currently in its 1.x release cycle and development is going strong, especially on the GNU/Openstep OS. As far as applications go, it still looks pretty rough around the edges but give it a few more release cycles and I have no doubt it will be a serious contender to the Apple Mail app. The second, and quite possibly my favourite email app, is Mozilla Thunderbird. It runs on Windows, Linux and Mac OS X and it uses the mbox mail format so mail can easily be shifted between any of the above mentioned platforms and can be transferred to proprietary email solutions such as Entourage. Thunderbird has various themes which can be enabled to give it a different look. There is a Mail theme so it appears like Mail.app, as well as an Outlook theme so that it appears like Outlook. Thunderbird, like Evolution, also has its own built-in anti spam filter which uses an adaptive learning process.

Web Browsing
There are many open source web browsing alternatives to Safari, the default web browser shipped with Mac OS X. By far the most popular is Mozilla Firefox. It is based on the original Netscape engine and has achieved a massive adoption rate since its release. It is now the default web browser of almost all of the major open source operating systems, including those from Novell, Red Hat, Canonical, as well as Mandriva.

Music and DVDs
I am sure that most Apple users are quite happy with iTunes, but should you desire to take a dip into the open source world of music and video playback then the player of choice is Mplayer (www.mplayerhq.hu). Mplayer has a huge developer following, has hundreds of video and audio codecs. Unfortunately it won’t play your DRM encrypted music or video downloads from iTunes but it will play pretty much anything else under the sun. The player also has a variety of skins which allow it to appear as anything from Microsoft’s Windows Media Player to AMP or even iTunes.

Picture Editing and Touch up
Perhaps the de-facto standard on Macs for picture and graphical manipulation is Adobe Photoshop. The Gnu Image Manipulation Program or GIMP for short (www.gimp.org) is attempting to take a bite out of its market dominance. GIMP, like the other applications that I have mentioned here, is open source and is the default image manipulation program of all of the commercial Linux vendors. Running the GIMP on Mac OS X requires the user to implement the X11 framework, as mentioned in the Open Office section. Novell has a dedicated section to the GIMP in their cool solutions website (www.novell.com/coolsolutions). You can even get GIMP looking like Adobe Photoshop with the same menus and shortcuts with GIMPShop (www.gimpshop.net).

Instant Messaging
Spending a lot of time on the Internet and having to support a lot of different customer sites to support, I tend to do a lot of instant messaging and it has become a business tool more than anything else. Of course everyone that I have to help and provide support to won’t use the same messaging app. I need to maintain Hotmail, Yahoo, Gmail, Jabber, iChat and ICQ user accounts. If you are in a similar situation, or maybe you just have multiple friends/family that all insist on using different messaging networks then you will understand this scenario. To remove the headache of having to run an application for each network I use Adium (www.adiumx.com). Adium is an open source app that allows me to log on to all of my required networks, and more through a single application. One interface to manage six messaging solutions, and as it is designed to be used on Mac OS X, it has that slick Apple feel which we all know and love.

The terminal
Now this may not pertain to some of you. Initially one of my biggest gripes from moving over from Linux to Mac OS X as my primary desktop was the lack of tabs for my terminal screens. When I first started using Mac OS X I had as many as seven or eight different terminal screens open at one time! As I was logged into that many boxes, my desktop became massive, and me and Expose became very close friends. At this point I went hunting and starting looking for a terminal application that allow me to use tabs. I found iTerm (iterm.sourceforge.net) and I was hooked. Iterm was written for Mac OS X using Cocoa and gave me all of the tabbed terminal functionality that I was looking for and more.

There’s plenty more
There are many more open source apps for Mac OS X that deserve a mention, but the list is to large for me to even begin to scratch the surface of here. The open source stack on Mac OS X is however not a topic I am finished with, and I look forward to returning to this topic in the very near future.

SIDEBAR
Dandantheitman is a true globetrotter, flying around the world with his Apple notebooks and Nintendo Wii. Some critical facts about him: Employer: Transocean International; Age: 30; Affiliations: EMUG, Dubai LUG, OpenBSD Contributor; Hair Length: Bed Head; Pairs of Sandals: 4 (I purchased a new pair in light of the toffee debacle). Disclaimer: The views expressed within this article reflect those of the writer, and may not represent in whole or part the views of EmiratesMac User Group or its affiliates.

What is open source?
by Magnus

Dandantheitman’s article talks about open source software for your Mac, but what is open source? It’s not an easy question to answer, but at the heart of open source software is the principle that the source code, what the programmers write, is available openly for anyone to look at. So although open source software is typically free as in available at no cost, the critical freedom is that no one party controls and conceals the code. You could, for example, download, change, and make your own, personalized copy of Open Office. You can’t do that with Microsoft Office, or even Apple’s Pages. If you’re interested there’s lots more to read online (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source). The Open Source Initiative (www.opensource.org) also has a lot of information. With its BSD heritage, Mac OS X has become a popular platform for open source development, something that is arguably to the benefit of us Mac users.

[Magnus]

Appleseed: Tiger On iPod
by Dandantheitman

So you have just upgraded to the latest video iPod and you are left wondering what you should do with the 20GB iPod Photo that you bought just over a year ago and are about to retire. Sure you could give it to your younger sibling, place it (like I often do) in the IT gear dumping ground, a large but not quite so cunningly hidden box in my home office, or try something innovative and maybe put it to use. Straight away it could function as a 20GB external storage device, but that seems somewhat beneath the world’s best selling digital music player. How about you install Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger on your iPod and use it as an emergency boot device?

Let’s do that! Step one: Plug your iPod in to your Mac and start up Disk Utility (located in the Applications>Utilities folder). Now re-partition your iPod, the file system choice should be “Mac OS Extended (Journaled)” and please label the drive as iPod (you will see why later). Performing this operation will wipe the contents of your iPod so make sure you have synced it with your iTunes before hand. Now insert the Mac OS X install disc one into your DVD ROM drive and double click the “Install Mac OS X” icon. You will have to go through the language and license section first before you reach the choose destination volume. Now when you are looking at the choose destination screen you should have several choices. One will be your Mac hard disk, the other will be your iPod. Select the iPod and continue on as normal. Apple will now install Mac OS X on the iPod. Please be aware that an install will take longer than a conventional installation of Mac OS X. Once the installation is complete, fire up your Terminal (in Applications>Utilities) and type the following :

sudo bless -verbose -folder "/Volumes/ipod/System/Library/CoreServices -bootinfo"

This will make the iPod a bootable device. Once this is complete, put your iPod in a safe place, preferably somewhere in your laptop bag. Now at some point of time or another your Apple Mac OS X is going to crash on you and it will refuse to boot, and of course it will be when you needed that file you had stored on it the most, which is always the way it works. Like my laptop failing on me five hours before an extended trip to the Middle East. Now grab that 20GB iPod and plug it in to the laptop and turn your Mac on. As you have two bootable hard disks your Mac will ask you which one you should boot from. Select the one labeled iPod (remember what I said about the name earlier?), and hey presto! You now have a working copy of Mac OS X and have access to all of your data.

[Magnus]

Blackberry and Mac
by Magnus

You’ve probably heard of Blackberry and perhaps you wonder what the big deal is. Perhaps you also wonder how it would work with your Mac. In this article I’ll try to straighten some of those question marks.

Push email
What arguably turned Blackberry devices into such a big hit was push email. It basically means that emails are “pushed” to the mobile device from the server as soon as it arrives there, the device doesn’t have to check for email every number of minutes. Other devices are doing the same thing now, but I would argue Blackberry still does it better than others. The other thing that contributed to Blackberry’s success was good keyboards. Sure they are small but you can thumb-type pretty fast on them, and in my view they’re better than on the other devices I’ve tried.

Cheap Blackberry on Souq.com
I wanted to see what the big deal was with Blackberry and I found a cheap, older model on Souq.com for 265Dhs. It’s a model that’s not sold new anymore but it was not much money so I thought I’d try it out. Around the same time Etisalat opened up Blackberry connections for individuals. It was previously only available for businesses.

Blackberry and Mac
Perhaps it surprises you to know that the sync software that links Blackberry with a Mac is available for free and it’s pretty good. You can find more information about PocketMac for Blackberry and download a copy (www.pocketmac.net/products/pmblackberry). The software syncs contacts, calendar, bookmarks, notes, and more. You can sync with Entourage, iCal, Addressbook, Stickies, Now Contact/Up To Date, as well as Safari. I sync with iCal and Addressbook primarily, for calendar and contacts, and Stickies for notes. Syncing has so far worked effortlessly without problems. I’ve actually had less problems with syncing the Blackberry than I’ve had with most other devices I’ve owned.

Email
So what about the push email, Blackberry’s claim to fame? I entered my .Mac account name in the setup wizard and it picked up all the details right away. I added my password and about 10 minutes later I started getting getting emails on the Blackberry. Since .Mac’s email is IMAP all emails are stored on the server, which means that emails I’ve received on the Blackberry are still available to me from my Mac. And it also shows what I’ve read and not read, which is really helpful. Getting your regular email “pushed” to you like this really makes you realize how much email you do get, which can be both a good and a bad thing.

Wrapping up
So far I’m very happy with my Blackberry. The keyboard is great for typing, it does email on the go, and even some web browsing even though the screen is tiny. I follow my RSS feeds with Google Reader on the Blackberry. And the synchronization with Mac has been a pleasant surprise, both in terms of calendar and contacts, but also for email. More recent Blackberry devices than mine have more features and I’ll consider upgrading at some points, I’m sure. For now I’m very happy with my Blackberry and how well it works with my Mac.

SIDEBAR
Mark|Space has just released a beta version of Missing Sync for Blackberry. You can download a copy from www.markspace.com/missingsync_blackberry.php. In the January 2007 issue of shuffle we reviewed Missing Sync for Palm.

[Magnus]

Emiratesmac.com tips and tricks
by Magnus

We continue our series of tips and tricks for how to do certain things at Emiratesmac.com. The intent is to tell our users about some of the perhaps less well known features and functions on the site in order to make their experience with the site a bit better.

Quick links
One way to find your way around the site fast is by the Quick Links menu. You find Quick Links in every navigation bar present in the Forums section of the site. You get one-click access to the posts that have been made during the day, you can edit your signature, profile, and options, you can check your private messages as well as subscribed threads.

Link to latest post
I’m sure you know that the ten most recent posts are shown on the site’s home page in the “Recent Threads” box. You can click on the thread title to go the thread. Did you know you can go straight to the latest post in that thread? You do that by clicking on the little blue icon with a right-pointing arrow on it. That takes you straight to the last post made in that thread.

Avatars
An avatar on the internet is simply a little picture that is a user’s representation of himself or herself. It’s a common feature on forums and blogs, where you after you set up an account can choose a picture that shows up as a small thumbnail usually besides the posts you make. In addition to your signature the avatar is possibly the best way to let your personality come out in your activities on the site. This feature is also available on EmiratesMac.com. You change your avatar from the User CP > Edit Avatar. Recently we uploaded a number of ready made avatars that you can just choose from. There is as before the option as well where you can upload your own picture. As of now you can choose from hundreds of avatars in the categories of iPod, Newton, Mac, and original Mac icons.

[Magnus]

Experiences of a Apple Fan in Dubai
by Senthil

Like me, most of you would have moved to Dubai from various parts of the world, I’m sure. Some of you would have moved in from the “Apple – Developed market” and some of you from the “Apple – Developing market”. I assumed when I moved to Dubai that I am coming to an “Apple – Developed market”. You must be wondering what am I talking about so let me take the pleasure of elaborating this point since the crux of this article lies in these two key terms.

Developed or Developing
What I mean by “Apple – Developed market” is when the below mentioned criteria are met. If the criteria are not met then it’s a “Apple – Developing market”.

1. Apple has a direct presence in the market.
2. Apple Store is a Pilgrimage centre for Apple fans.
3. Apple has multiple distributors and resellers.
4. All Apple products are available.
5. All Apple compatible and Apple related life style products are available.
6. Active and Passionate Apple user groups exist.
7. Active secondary market.

In a “Apple – Developing market”, you obviously would not have Apple directly present but is represented by an IMC (Independent Marketing Company) which means no multiple distributors and the available products are probably only those which have a high profit margin and one that pays a hefty premium for the life style products. Lastly there would likely not be a secondary market for customers wanting to upgrade their beloved Apples. Now where does UAE stand, it’s for all the readers to guess.

My experience
My experiences moving to Dubai as a Apple fan is something which I want to share with all Apple lovers. Why do I want to share? Let’s say like all Apple Fans, I am keen on showing off that I am an Apple Fan, like to share, and also on the side show how creative I am. Isn’t that what Apple Fans are perceived as? If not then that’s the way we should be perceived. What do you think would be the experiences of an Apple fan in Dubai? Positive or negative? Let me guess, some of you have already slotted your experience as positive and some as negative. Could there be any other feeling? Apple fans are used to extremes. Extremely positive or extremely negative. There is nothing in-between for an Apple fan. He or she mostly falls in love with all Apple products and universally hates all the products of the Wintel world. But then we are not talking about Apple products and Wintel Products, are we? We are talking about my experience in Dubai. Immediately you must be thinking, why should I be bothered about his experience in Dubai? You are not sure if I am an Apple fan, not sure if I qualify to write about experiences in Dubai, etc.

Introductions and First Experience
Without further ado, let me introduce myself as “The greatest Apple Fan on earth”. Simple, isn’t it to qualify as a Apple fan and since I moved to Dubai recently and penning down my experience, it is automatically qualified “Experiences of an Apple Fan in Dubai”. Good. All introductions and necessary justifications given about me qualifying as a Apple Fan and also qualifying to write about my experience. Finally the real stuff rather than all that rambling. Once you are settled with the mundane job of setting up your house, your Mac, iPod and other stuff, you start the first thing any Apple fan does - hunting for all things Mac. What does one come across? Surprise! Apple is present in UAE. Did we hear that right?

Conclusions
This is the start of a series of articles on this subject, that I intend to present to my fellow Apple fans in the UAE. In this part I laid some of the groundwork in terms of my assumptions and a brief introduction. The next part will be all about Apple’s presence here.

[Magnus]

Google’s tools for web masters
by Magnus

In the January issue of shuffle we published an article called “What Google has to offer a Mac user” in which we covered some of the things that a Mac user can take advantage of in what Google offers. This time we’ll turn our attention to what Google can offer web masters, or more correctly anyone that designs and publishes web sites. These tools are not particular to Macs, in fact they all work on any platform. What we do know is that many EMUG members publish on the web which means Google’s tools are of great interest.

Tools for anyone
First let’s make it clear that these tools are not just for professionals. Obviously you’re probably not that interested in advertising on the web just for your own holiday snapshots, but the other services are of value to you at any level of web publishing. There are analysis tools with which you can see who has accessed your site, tools for placing ads on your pages and make some money, and much more.

Webmasters’ Tools
A good starting point is Google’s Website Central and the Webmasters’ Tools (www.google.com/webmasters/tools). These tools include Google Sitemap which can be an invaluable tool to help figure out how Google indexes your site. In a sense it shows you what Google sees of your site and it can help you diagnose problems. In essence you help Google to see your site in the way you want the search engine to see it. Some say that this means limiting Google’s indexing of a web site, which may be true. I say that the sitemap feature is still worth checking out. You can also control how often Google will crawl your site. If you don’t update the content on your site very often you can tell Google to visit it less often, thereby saving on bandwidth. That can be important if you have limited bandwidth. Google also offers a blog focused on their services for webmasters (googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com).

Tools for advertising
If you want to advertise on the web, Adwords is one of the more popular services you can use. Adwords (adwords.google.com), is a service with which you can essentially buy certain keywords that when people search for them your ad will be displayed in Google’s search listing or other web sites. Different key words will cost you different amounts per click, and there are various ways you can decide how much you will spend, including a daily budget limit. The basic principle is that you pay more for clicks on popular keywords on popular sites. Look at Adsense as the opposite of Adwords meaning it’s for you to display Google ads on your site. Set up your account (www.google.com/adsense) and select what types of ad you want, what the colors should be, and Google will give you a piece of Javascript code that you paste into your pages where you want the ads to appear. Then the ads will be displayed automatically and targeted at what your site is all about, depending on how Google interprets the content. If other users click on the ads on your site then you get a certain payment. Different ads pay different amounts, and you can play around with different settings to try to maximize the reward. Once your earnings have reached a certain amount, which you can control, Google will send you a check. But don’t think that just sticking some Google ads on your site will turn you into a millionaire.

Analyze your traffic
Google Analytics (www.google.com/analytics), has many tools that can help you analyze your web site’s traffic. It can tell you how many visits it gets, from where people are connecting, if they are new or returning visitors, and much more. It displays the traffic in different kinds of charts and graphs and gives you a quick overview of how your site is doing. You can monitor many sites with Analytics and all you have to do is put a small piece of Javascript code in your web pages and set up the details on the Analytics site. If it sounds complicated it really isn’t. One of the more interesting functions in Analytics is Site Overlay. With it you see a view of your actual web site, and for each link on a particular page, Analytics displays how many clicks that link has received. You can use this as a way to analyze your site’s navigation, e.g. what links you have and where they are located.

Build your own search engine
Finally we’ll cover Google Co-op. You can use Google Co-op (www.google.com/coop) to build your own version of Google’s search engine. You can control which sites are included in the search results, and a number of other parameters. The customization also includes including Google’s results in your own layout and design, so it looks entirely like your own search engine. We use it on a number of sites, including www.middleeastmac.com and www.emiratesblogs.com.

Ever expanding toolbox
Google offer us a seemingly ever expanding box of tricks and sometimes it feels like it hard to keep up. What is clear is that they have much to offer regular users as well as those who publish on the web. There’s bound to be something in Google’s arsenal that is of interest to you. If you find something of particular use, please tell us all about it at EmiratesMac.com.

SIDEBAR
There are various Dashboard Widgets that connects to Google’s services. One that I can recommend is Stats for Adsense (http://www.tigerwidgets.co.uk/statsf...se/index.html). It displays statistics from your Adsense account covering the last week. It makes for an easy way to keep up with your progress to making the first million.

SIDEBAR/BOX
Webmasters’ Tools: www.google.com/webmasters/tools/
Adwords: adwords.google.com/
Adsense: www.google.com/adsense/
Analytics: www.google.com/analytics/
Co-op: www.google.com/coop/

[Magnus]

Hint: Apple’s Backup
by Magnus

If you have a .Mac account you also have access to a pretty good backup utility appropriately named Backup. You can download it from www.mac.com/1/solutions/backup.html. There is a choice of a number of ready-made backup plans, like backup all your iLife files, but you can also create your own plan. With a custom-made plan you can backup only your selection of files and folders. For most users, one of the templates will probably suffice. Your backup can go to another location on your Mac’s hard drive, an external hard drive, a network location, or be burned to a CD or DVD.

[Magnus]

Hint: Network Utility
by Magnus

In your Applications>Utilities folder resides an application that rarely gets the exposure or usage it really deserves. It’s called the Network Utility and it can do all sorts of network-related things. It’s main role is in helping you troubleshoot problematic network connections. With the Network Utility you can, for example, Trace your connection to some other machine on the internet. The results of that trace can tell you where the problem is, if the connection is slow or unreliable. You can also send a Ping to another computer, to see if it responds and how fast it responds, again helping you find problems with a connection. With Whois you can look up who has registered a domain name. Netstat also shows you detailed information about the network interfaces on your Mac and their status. So the next time you are having networking problems, perhaps Network Utility can help.