Mac help... lots of questions... :]

[youdontknow]

Salut

so, today i bought an iMac 17-inch 1.83Ghz Intel Core Duo, well, that is what the box says.

So i was wondering, beings as i am a student and i live in a city apparment, i get alot of people popping in to say hi and end up 'checking' their myspaces or emails or whatever... so first up:

how do i hide my porn... haha.

its not just porn i have private stuff that needs to be kept private.

i looked into it and the sites that explain seem to be explaining it to a pro and not a mac virgin like myself...

so how can i put a password/hide private files from peeking eyes?

please make it simple, as Mac's are a whole new world to me

Merci


BLx

[BrandonSBCA]

Try this.

HideOut


http://mac.softpedia.com/get/Security/HideOut.shtml

[--O2--]

make a second user profile, call it guest or whatever you want - that will keep all the files in your account locked.

let me know if you need instructions i can explain in detail

(i'm a die hard mac user for 15 years now, and that's the easiest way with the current setup)

[BrandonSBCA]

make a second user profile, call it guest or whatever you want - that will keep all the files in your account locked.

let me know if you need instructions i can explain in detail

(i'm a die hard mac user for 15 years now, and that's the easiest way with the current setup)

I thought the password would be cute, then you'll have people who use your computer trying to guess the password and get frustrated and leave.

[InvisibleThrills]

Or you can put everything in a folder, name it something like "Documents" or something that you would normally see and then click Apple + I to "get info". Then go down to "Ownership & Permissions" and then select "No Access" and now whenever you want to access you just type in your password. And now it is hidden!

[noelie]

Get a PC and use Microsoft Private Folder.





Sorry I couldn't resist that...that's what all the Mackers do to the PC users here whenever they post an issue.

Good luck with your new Mac.

[JohannBessler]

You could launch a New Disk Image and encrypt it. Then just put all the files you want in there. Drag the Mounted Disk (NOT the unmounted one!!) to the trash every time you need to unmount it.

The Disk Image will be as large as you want it--even a couple of gigs. Don't forget your password!!! As far as I'm able to discern, it's completely unhackable.

[BrandonSBCA]

Get a PC and use Microsoft Private Folder.





Sorry I couldn't resist that...that's what all the Mackers do to the PC users here whenever they post an issue.

Good luck with your new Mac.

I was going to do that but I decided to try to help, since I'm not familiar with the Mac OSX Tiger interface I just looked on google.com for it. Didn't want the Mac users to attack me with threatening PM's.

[iklier]

Sorry if this is unclear this was written as it came to mind. If you have any questions just ask.

Hidden Folder

The Mac OS X by default will hide any folder with period prefix. However the Finder will not allow you to rename this with this prefix. So the terminal is your friend.

1. Go to the Macintosh HD>Applications>Utilities and open the terminal application
2. Terminal will open a command line interface window. By default the directory the terminal is in is your home directory.
3. For the sake of simplicity we will create a hidden directory within your home directory. To do this type "mkdir .coresystem" this will make a hidden directory called .core system in your home directory.
4. Now to quickly access your newly created "stash" Go to the Finder and select "Go to Folder..." from the Go menu. In the box that pops up enter "~/.coresystem" and click go button and voila your "stash" window should open.

It should be noted that this directory will be indexed by Spotlight(Apples search system), will appear in the Go menu's Recent Folders, also any files opened from that directory will appear in the Apple Menus Recent Items section, and finally they will appear in the recent documents, items, etc sections of the apps used to view said images, video, etc.

[WYSIWYG]

Nor ALL the MC people on this forum knock wondoz people. We all have our preferences for the computer we wish to use for various reasons! I have been a MAC user since 1988! Serves my needs wekk, except that in the last several months all the videos I used to watch on here in Quicktime are now WMA files....... Oh well, liife "sucks" sometimes! Used to be this site was more MAC friendly than it is now.

[b_o_n_n_i_e]

You can also change your Spotlight settings:

Open System Preferences > Spotlight
Then Click on "Privacy", then add the folder you don't wanna be seen or searched.

Otherwise, the "no access" step suggested by invisiblethrills works fine.

[noelie]

Nor ALL the MC people on this forum knock wondoz people. We all have our preferences for the computer we wish to use for various reasons! I have been a MAC user since 1988! Serves my needs wekk, except that in the last several months all the videos I used to watch on here in Quicktime are now WMA files....... Oh well, liife "sucks" sometimes! Used to be this site was more MAC friendly than it is now.

Aaaaaaaahhhhh does WYSIWYG need a huggy wuggy?

[--O2--]

Aaaaaaaahhhhh does WYSIWYG need a huggy wuggy?

I think he just wants a viable windows media player for the mac, like the rest of us.

[Keeland]

. . . . all the videos I used to watch on here in Quicktime are now WMA files.......

Download the free plugin Flip4Mac that plays WMA files through QuickTime. M$ apparently sprung for this third-party software after it dropped Mac support of media files. It can't play Windows Media stuff that's crippled with M$'s digital rights management, though.

[Keeland]

its not just porn i have private stuff that needs to be kept private.

You could launch a New Disk Image and encrypt it.

1. Launch Disk Utility that's inside the Utilities folder inside the Applications folder.

2. At the top left, click on the drive or drive partition you are using.

3. Go under File in the menu bar to New, then slide the pointer to the right, to Blank Disk Image.

4. Give the disk image a name, make it any size you wish to and change Encryption "none" to Encryption "AES-128 (recommended)." Leave it as read/write disk image.

5. Click Create.

6. Type in the password twice, and if you are NOT using Keychain, untick "Remember password (add to Keychain)." And if you don't know what Keychain is or don't use it, also untick it.

This creates two icons (if you created it to the desktop you'll find it more easily). One of the icons is the file, with the name ending in .dmg. The other icon is of a hard drive. Double-click the hard-drive icon — it's really just an encrypted folder.

When you are done with the [b]hard-drive[/ib] icon, drag it to the trash or eject it with a right-click. You can drag the icon ending with .dmg to any folder you wish. The next time you want to open it, double-click it. It will ask for your password, and the hard-drive icon will appear on the desktop, no matter where the .dmg file is.

If the .dmg becomes too small to hold everything you want, create another disk image that's larger and drag everything from the old one into the new one. Then trash the old .dmg file.

If you think you might forget the password, write it down or you'll be locked out forever.

[youdontknow]

Try this.

HideOut


http://mac.softpedia.com/get/Security/HideOut.shtml

hey brandon, i tried that software, but it says after it has downloaded it to my desktop that it cant find the application. this happened with some other software i tried to download, am i doing something wrong?

x

[Keeland]

. . . it says after it has downloaded it to my desktop that it cant find the application. this happened with some other software i tried to download, am i doing something wrong?

How are you loading the software? This is an example of loading an older version of Firefox, but any software that comes in a disk image is loaded the same way. After it's loaded, you can eject the drive icon and trash the .dmg file. Click the thumbnail.

[youdontknow]

well, i downloaded it again and its on my desktop it has a sheet of paper with 'Hide-Out! v.2.1.sitx' as its file name

hmm.

[mojoe54]

[QUOTE=WYSIWYG;2172227]Nor ALL the MC people on this forum knock wondoz people. We all have our preferences for the computer we wish to use for various reasons! I have been a MAC user since 1988! Serves my needs wekk, except that in the last several months all the videos I used to watch on here in Quicktime are now WMA files....... Oh well, liife "sucks" sometimes! Used to be this site was more MAC friendly than it is now.[/QUOTE

My friend turned me on to flip4mac. It's shareware that allows you to play wmv files on your Quicktime Player-- now I see all those vids that I couldn't before.

[sheep]

[QUOTE=bootyboi;2175948]

Nor ALL the MC people on this forum knock wondoz people. We all have our preferences for the computer we wish to use for various reasons! I have been a MAC user since 1988! Serves my needs wekk, except that in the last several months all the videos I used to watch on here in Quicktime are now WMA files....... Oh well, liife "sucks" sometimes! Used to be this site was more MAC friendly than it is now.[/QUOTE

My friend turned me on to flip4mac. It's shareware that allows you to play wmv files on your Quicktime Player-- now I see all those vids that I couldn't before.

I never had any problems with opening .wmv files with windoze media player but I d/l flip4mac and everything got screwed up so I trashed it.

[Keeland]

well, i downloaded it again and its on my desktop it has a sheet of paper with 'Hide-Out! v.2.1.sitx' as its file name

hmm.

.sitx files are compressed with Stuffit. You can download the free Stuffit Expander, as a .dmg file, here. Then you'll have to double-click the downloaded Stuffit Expander .dmg file, double-click the hard-drive icon that appears and drag the application to the application folder, where in this case the icon you drag turns into a folder.

You can then open this folder and drag the v.2.1.sitx file to the Expander icon or double-click the v.2.1.sitx file. You might be interrupted in this by a licensing notice the first time you run Expander.

At one time Stuffit was the de facto standard compression program for Mac, but fewer people need or want it now. Still, some downloaded apps still use it.

[JohannBessler]

well, i downloaded it again and its on my desktop it has a sheet of paper with 'Hide-Out! v.2.1.sitx' as its file name

hmm.

Double-click the file; it should de-compress.

By the way--you want to be sure to download the Universal Binary version, instead of the PowerPC version.

[Keeland]

By the way--you want to be sure to download the Universal Binary version, instead of the PowerPC version.

That version from the link is both.

[youdontknow]

ok, so a few more questions:

- i am still having trouble downloading some items, they download to my desktop, but when i click them they say there is no applications

- secondly, is it possible to download normal msn for macs? i have mac:messenger, but i have to say i am not a fan, i cant use/see webcams, and there are other things that dont work with it?

[sheep]

ok, so a few more questions:

- i am still having trouble downloading some items, they download to my desktop, but when i click them they say there is no applications

- secondly, is it possible to download normal msn for macs? i have mac:messenger, but i have to say i am not a fan, i cant use/see webcams, and there are other things that dont work with it?

1) What kind of items are you d/l?
2) Sorry. Microshaft tries to blackmail us into getting a windoze machine or they dont know how to write for the Mac. Dont know which. Use Yahoo or if you're talking to another Mac user iChat is fantastic. Where I live msn network is up and down like a whore's drawers on a saturday nite but i dont have any problems with AIM or Yahoo IM.

[youdontknow]

1) What kind of items are you d/l?
2) Sorry. Microshaft tries to blackmail us into getting a windoze machine or they dont know how to write for the Mac. Dont know which. Use Yahoo or if you're talking to another Mac user iChat is fantastic. Where I live msn network is up and down like a whore's drawers on a saturday nite but i dont have any problems with AIM or Yahoo IM.

ah, the problem is, i am from france and no one over here has aim and few people use yahoo.

the items i am trying to download are regular ones. for example, i downloaded something called iview, i forgot why. and when i double click the icon on the desktop a popup box appears and says There is no default application specified to open the document "iview399*****"
this often occurs with many of my downloads.

[sheep]

ah, the problem is, i am from france and no one over here has aim and few people use yahoo.

the items i am trying to download are regular ones. for example, i downloaded something called iview, i forgot why. and when i double click the icon on the desktop a popup box appears and says There is no default application specified to open the document "iview399*****"
this often occurs with many of my downloads.

Aha! You have downloaded a windoze application or as those peeps call an executible file. Anything ending with ***** is windoze. That is why you cant open it. Try iPhoto which is probably on your computer and part of iLife '06. It is a photo management suite. If you are a professional photographer you will want aperture.
http://www.apple.com/aperture/
Why microshaft decided to call it iXxxx like all the Mac apps is a mystery to me. I guess they arent very creative.