Product Description
The book that Macintosh industry experts rave about, Mac OS X Power Tools, has been completely updated for version 10.3, Panther. If you want to go beyond the basics, this unique book provides extensive background information on the hows and whys of the OS, and then shows you how to get the most out of it through specific examples. Author Dan Frakes walks you through step-by-step instructions on how to customize, optimize, and maintain your Mac OS X system–better, faster, and more simply. Topic coverage includes customization, networking, security, file sharing, Unix, the latest features, extending OS X with third-party software, and much more.
 | US $22.67 End Date: Sunday May-20-2012 10:47:10 PDT Buy It Now for only: US $22.67 Buy it now | Add to watch list |
This book IS NOT WIMPY! It’s really comprehensive — there’s something in here for everyone, but less for beginners, more for those who are familiar w/ OSX. Author does a good job of differentiating system-configuration variations and his companion web site is icing on the cake.
Very well-written, very well edited, very well organized. Like a piece of century-old furniture, it’s hard to find computer books with the overall quality of this book these days.
Amazon User Rating: 5 / 5
Being familiar with the author’s expertise on the subject I found familiar ground, he answered my questions (even a few questions that I didn’t know I had) in a way that was understandable and within the realm of my possibility. I would reccomemd the book to all that are not that versed in the new operating system. There are many books on the market and this is my recomendation, you will find yourself referring, and finding, the information it holds. Go buy it!!
Amazon User Rating: 5 / 5
Unfortunately, this book contains large amounts of tedious information and is far too shallow to be called “Power”-anything. Perhaps it was silly of me to expect this book to “go beyond the basics” as was claimed.
For example, I was very interested in using SSH to remotely and securely log in to my PowerBook. In the index, SSH is listed as page 434. However, page 434 is about File Sharing and only barely mentions SSH (“…I’ll talk about [it] later in this chapter…”).
It’s not until 14 pages later (on 448) that SSH is directly discussed. Even then, the barest minimum of information is given: enable SSH, grant access to yourself, and use the ssh command to connect to localhost. Beyond that, there’s nothing — no discussion of ssh-keygen, RSA/DSA auth, or SSH tunnels.
Absolute beginners who want a little bit of everything in a thick book will probably satisfied; others who want to truly “go beyond the basics” and “become a power user” will be disappointed.
Amazon User Rating: 2 / 5
As the author of Mac OS X Power Tools, I’d like to make a quick comment, as I feel that M. Christianson’s “review” misrepresents this book. As I’ve tried to make clear in the introduction to the book, it is written for the typical beginner to advanced beginner who is looking to become more of a power user. It covers the necessary basics and then goes well beyond them to help readers truly understand the inner workings of Mac OS X and how to best take advantage of its power and flexibility. However, if you’re searching for advanced information on SSH tunneling, key generation, RSA authorization, and similar IT-level topics, this isn’t the book for you. Instead, I highly recommend Mac OS X Unleashed by Ray and Ray, an excellent and exhaustive book that covers many of the advanced Unix underpinnings of Mac OS X.
Amazon User Rating: 5 / 5