Year: 2011

Categories
Opinion

The Lion Sleeps Tonight

A previous article said Lion would be released July 14th. That date has come and gone, but where is Lion? Steve Jobs in his presentation at WWDC said Lion would ship “some time in July.” When in July? Guesses from July 6th to July 14th to July 26th have all been thrown in the air. Even the best Apple pundits have been stumped.

I think an unintended consequence of releasing software as download only has presented itself: there is no physical stock of install discs to tip the Apple community as to when a release will definitely happen.

What does it matter? Well, for one, Mac Geeks such as myself are forced to check the rumor mills constantly for some sign of Lion approaching. It also shows just how much control Apple has over its products. I must admit that they have been playing their hand very close to the chest to have fooled so many websites. Another implication is that those wishing to prep his or her Macs for the upgrade have no idea when they’ll need to get it done by.

However, sources are now guessing more confidently that July 26th will be it.

What do you think? Will uncertainty cloud the release of future download only upgrades, or does it not matter to know when an OS upgrade will release?

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Categories
News

Apple’s Back to School Promotion

What is Apple’s Back to School Promotion? Basically, the deal is that when you purchase a new qualifying Mac with Apple education pricing from June 16, 2011, through September 20, 2011, you’ll get a free $100 Back to School Card. You can use the Back to School Card on the Mac App Store, the App Store, the iTunes Store, and the iBookstore.

If you buy a Mac after the June 6, 2011, you are eligible to request an up-to-date upgrade. The upgrade will allow you to upgrade to Lion for free. You must request your Up-to-Date upgrade within 30 days of purchasing a new Mac computer.

Who qualifies for this promotion? College students or students accepted to college, parents buying for college students or students accepted to college, or faculty or staff members at any grade level qualify.

How do you get your $100 Back to School Card? First, you must shop for a Mac at either the Apple Online Store for Education, the Apple Retail Store, the Apple Authorized Campus Store, or call 1-800-MY-APPLE. Second, you will either get your free Back to School Card with your order automatically if you order it at the Apple Retail Store or Apple Online Store or you’ll have to submit your claim online and get your code via email. Third, you will enter the code on your Back to School Card in your iTunes Account to redeem the $100.

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Categories
News

How to: Prepare your Mac for Lion

If you want to upgrade your Mac to OS X Lion, you don’t have to worry about going to the store and having to install a bunch of discs from a box; you can just go to the Mac App Store and buy Lion for $29.99. You also need to prepare your Mac for Lion. Your Mac must have an Intel Core 2 Duo, Core i3, Core i5, Core i7, or Xeon processor for your Mac to be able to run Lion. You can check to see what processor your Mac has by clicking the Apple icon on the top left of your display and choosing About This Mac. Your Mac must also be up to date with the latest version of OS X Snow Leopard. Click the Apple icon and choose Software Update to install version 10.6.8 if you haven’t done so already. After you have done those steps, you can open the Mac App Store and purchase OS X Lion.

There have been questions about the pricing and availability of OS X Lion to business customers and education customers. Apple decided to give business users Volume License contracts at the same $29.99 per license with a minimum of 20 users. Maintenance contracts for extra support will be available for $49.99 with a minimum of 20 users. For education customers, Lion will be included in the Apple Software Collection. The Apple Software Collection will contain Mac OS X Lion, iLife, and iWork for $39 per license with a minimum of 25 licenses.

You are still able to use the same mass installation techniques people use today to deploy Mac OS X. To install Lion on multiple systems on a network, you can simply copy the Install Mac OS X Lion application to the target system and run the installer. Administrators will also be able to use the System Image Utility included in OS X Lion Server to create a NetInstall or NetRestore image.

If you bought a Mac on or after the June 6, 2011, you are eligible to request an up-to-date upgrade. The upgrade will allow you to upgrade to Lion for free. You must request your Up-to-Date upgrade within 30 days of purchasing a new Mac computer.

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Categories
Average Joe's Tips

The Basics and More: Dictionary

Basics of How to Use:

The Dictionary application given to you by Apple is an everyday application that is very simple, but I am going to show you how to get the most out of this everyday application. Like any Dictionary you just type in the word and a definition appears, but with this not only a definition, and thesaurus appear, but also information from Wikipedia about the subject you searched. For people who have trouble seeing the font on the computer you can easily enlarger or shrink the font by clicking the small or large A on the Top Menu Bar.

Things to Note

Some important things to note are that the dictionary and thesaurus will work without Internet, but the Wikipedia section of the dictionary will not. Another thing that is great about Dictionary is that when you read a definition and there is a word that you don’t know, you can select that word and it brings up that definition.

Conclusion

It is obvious that this application is very useful for everyday life whether it is understanding complicated words or expanding your vocab.

 

Stay connected at my new twitter handle to stay updated 24/7 @TRMGaveragejoes and @realmacgenius What do you think? Let us know in the comment section.

Categories
News

How to: Virtualize Mac OS X Lion

A virtual machine (VM) is a software implementation of a machine that executes programs like a physical machine. VMs are separated into two major categories; these categories are based on their use and degree of correspondence to any real machine. A system virtual machine provides a complete system platform which supports the execution of a complete operating system. A process virtual machine is designed to run a single program, which means that it supports a single process. Any software running in a virtual machine is restricted and it cannot break out of its virtual world.

 

The virtualization story for Mac OS X is about to change, a lot. This is a positive change as Lion’s licensing changes the rules for virtual machines. In some circumstances for certain enterprise deployments, virtual Mac OS X environments are held in a very high light. By giving access to Mac only applications, the demand increases without having to supply Mac hardware on a one-to-one basis.

 

Leopard started the virtualization for Apple. Apple began to permit limited virtualization of Mac OS X, with two major caveats: you could only run VMs on Mac hardware (no blade server racks full of HP gear serving out Mac desktops). By doing this, it cost a steep price because you needed a Mac OS X Server license. Since it was so expensive, few people took advantage of it.

 

Lion’s new EULA is prepared to change all the rules. 10.7 users will be allowed to run one or two virtual Mac instances on each physical Mac. The tools will be helped by VMware Fusion, Parallels, VirtualBox or others. The people that will benefit from this are developers, IT managers and others who need to keep a known-good test environment or try out new apps in a controlled fashion. Like this article? Hate this article? Leave a comment and we will let you know as soon as possible.