Now that the dust has settled on the initial install of Jaguar, here are a few subtle discoveries that have been enjoyable to find:
- iChat had left me cold until we started using Rendezvous here around the O’Reilly campus. Man, is iChat fast! I’m quickly changing my mind about this client app. Working on a quick Rendzvous article for later this week.
- You can cycle through your open applications using CMD + Tab.
- One Dock improvement that is more useful than I had originally thought — 10.2 includes a mini application icon in the lower right corner of each minimized document residing on the Dock. It has really helped me identify what’s what quickly.
- You can now “Hide Others” by using Option+CMD+H.
- iSub support!
- CUPS printer configuration is available via Web browser (like it is on other Unix systems): http://localhost:631/ (you need Web serving turned on in Sharing sys pref, of course).
- Software Update now has an “Installed Updates” tab that shows you what you’ve recently added to your system.
- “Get Info” is incredible. Wanna have some real fun? Do Get Info (CMD+I) on a QuickTime file, then watch the movie with Get Info’s preview.
OK, back to work … Thanks to Chris Stone for helping me compile today’s list.
Your favorite discoveries?
Anyone know of a good (free) VPN server for 10.2?
I'm looking for one i can easily set up on my desktop (G3 233, and 10.2 runs well on it, i'd like to see WinXP do that! :P) so i can ditch WEP on my wireless LAN.. Any thoughts?
JtM
Anyone know of a good (free) VPN server for 10.2?
Well, don't know of anything you can just click and run. But maybe you could look at vtunnel for SSH and see if you could cook something up.
Some Tidbits not just for Jaguar (10.2)
Some of the tidbits mentioned in this article are nothing new.
CMD+TAB has allowed you to switch between open applications since Mac OS 8 and it certaintly works fine in previous versions of OS X.
The Get Info window for 10.2 is nice in that you can have more than one open at a time, but the QT movie preview "tidbit" is nothing new. That also works great in 10.1.5 and earlier versions. Did you know that you can even preview a QT movie in the finder window while in Column view? That too has been around, since 10.0. A minimised movie will even continue to play while in the dock, also been around for a long time.
Perhaps if you have never tried these features in earlier versions it may seem neat, but for some of us who have been using OS X for awhile (since the beta for me) it's not all that exciting.
It's nice to see that you like these features and it's great to see that Apple is improving on a great OS, but let's not forget that some of these features are nothing new, they have been around for a long time, just getting more and better exposure now.
Some Tidbits not just for Jaguar (10.2)
You're right about command+tab being around for a while shadow9600, but what you might not have noticed is that in 10.2 command+tab will switch to the *last used*application, allowing you to easily go back and forth between two apps your're working in without haviing to go through all open apps...
--Chris
Some Tidbits not just for Jaguar (10.2)
Also in 10.1.5 You can hit CMD-TAB to cycle through your applications and you can go back "up" the list of open apps using CMD-SHIFT
Some Tidbits not just for Jaguar (10.2)
CMD+SHIFT+TAB works to move the selection from right to left.
Some Tidbits not just for Jaguar (10.2)
Whoa ...
Sorry, I forgot to say "last used" application :)
As for ...
"Perhaps if you have never tried these features in earlier versions it may seem neat, but for some of us who have been using OS X for awhile (since the beta for me) it's not all that exciting."
geez, gimme a break.
--Derrick
Anyone know of a good (free) VPN server for 10.2?
PoPToP might work. It runs on Linux and *BSD so I'm guessing that in 18 months when the GNUOSX guys have caught up with their Jag mods, they'd have a chance to port it.
Some Tidbits not just for Jaguar (10.2)
Thanks for point that out! I hadn't noticed that task-switching in 10.2 now goes in order of an application stack rather than order of icons in the Dock. I still like LiteSwitch X's implementation better, but I'll see if I can get used to the Dock now.
Get Info omission
I've read many columns celebrating the new powers of Get Info and not one of them noted that users can no longer change a file or folder icon using this tool. It used to be a matter of copying the icon from one info window (which is still possible) and pasting into another. Most disrupting for the MANY visual types who use macs and who organize their files w/ custom icons...
Get Info omission
You can still copy the icon from Get Info for one file and paste it into Get Info for another file to copy the icon. You just can't use the same Get Info window like you could in previous version that didn't support multiple Get Info windows. Now you have to open a Get Info window for each file instead of just clicking on the second file when you're ready to paste thus reusing the first Get Info window.
There must be some happy medium between Get Info window reuse and having multiple windows.
Get Info omission
Actually that doesn't consistently work in 10.2 anymore... (it will copy from the first window, but not consistently paste into the second - specifically for system directories like Applications or Documents. When it does work, the changed icon disappears on restart.)