Kevin Cullis: How to Start a Business Mac Version

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Here is a list of some of the best tips for using iCal on your Mac.

• Calendar colors. Keep the number of colored calendars to a maximum of 4-6 and add metadata (tags or special characters) in your ToDos and Events to further “drill down” what you are doing. This can be great for searching content or calendar items
• “Pencil-in” things with special characters. Digitally “pencil in” your appointment with special characters (such as ¿, -, , ???, or the simple # character) at the beginning of the event name. Seeing the special character means you can quickly identify those items that are not “in stone” just yet. This also helps when searching for lists of items.
• Numbers (minutes or list). Adding a number  and a dash (1-Event) can show you how much time you expect your efforts to take in a ToDo list or can be a numbered list.
• Hidden event popup. Just drag and drop the event window to a new location.
• Add additional lines of event text. One of the hidden features of iCal is using the OPT + Return key to add another line of text in the event title. You can sort of add “tags” to you title.
• Google Maps direction and mileage. I cut and paste certain directions AND the total mileage (for IRS tax purposes) into the notes section for documentation and when I sync the info with my iPhone.
• Travel time alarm. If I have to travel to an event and it’s local I add time in before the event of when I need to leave for the event. Such as a 45 minute alarm and needing only to travel 35 minutes giving me 10 minutes of “grip and grin” time with others. If you have a flight to catch, use a separate event with an alarm so you can catch your flight.
• Presentation File Opened on alarm. If you are giving a presentation have iCal set an alarm to open up the presentation that you are giving. Just make sure you don’t move the file.
• Repeatable events. You can repeat the events. Changing the event repeat rate, daily, weekly, or more brings up further options to choose from.
• Invite others to an event. By inviting others using Mail program you can get multiple people
• Notes. In the Notes section of an event enter in both the address of the event and the phone number, each will become links that will access either the phone or Google Maps when you click on one or the other.

Here are some tips for ToDo lists in iCal

• Printing a ToDo list in iCal. Do a Command – P to print out iCal and then select “List” from the drop down menu. Under the Options pane you’ll then have a check box for the ToDo listing.

Apple Mail program data detectors. Using Mail’s data detectors you can

• Mail’s data detectors. Using Mail’s data detectors can help preload iCal events into iCal. Mouse over a date and a drop down arrow will give you a choice of “Create an iCal event” or “Show this date in iCal.” I prefer the “Create” menu as I can make changes to the event right in Mail.

Mail detectors. Set up correctly (you can keep the field names such as data and address, but it is not necessary). Data detectors REQUIRE almost the exact field names as Address Book has it:

• Date: October 25, 2010 – 6:30PM-9:30PM, or Oct 25, 2010 at 5:30 AM
• Address: MacGetit.com, 123 Main Street Unit B, Anywhere, CO 80000 (if you place your name first, it will show up as a contact, if you place your company name it shows up as a company, i.e. it connects with the address one line above the street, whatever you have there it will take that).
• Fax: 303-555-1234
• Phone: 303-555-2345
• Cell: 303-555-4567

Terminal tips for iCal. iCal defaults events to 30 minutes of duration. Using Terminal, you can change the default to 15 minutes.The defaults command below sets it to 15 minutes. You should quit iCal before running this to see the result. Open Terminal, enter the following and press return:

defaults write com.apple.iCal 'Default duration in minutes for new event' 15

Then open iCal. New events entered by double clicking or pressing Command-N will have the default time of 15 minutes. Obviously, you can set different values. To remove this setting altogether, enter the following in the Terminal and re-start iCal:

defaults delete com.apple.iCal 'Default duration in minutes for new event'

Related articles

• Put Your iCal Calendar On Your Desktop With Blotter [Review] (cultofmac.com)
• Week Calendar 3.0 Is A Powerful iCal Alternative for iPhone (macstories.net)

If you are a Mac person and have been living out of the country and been away from the Internet doing hiking you’re probably have missed that Apple is releasing Snow Leopard and today Apple announced that it ships Friday, August 28th.

So, crank up your credit/debit card and get:

• Snow Leopard (10.6), single version
• Snow Leopard (10.6), 5 user version
• Snow Leopard (10.6), Server version – in an Unlimited client version for $499, compared with “desk fees” or per-user fees for each desktop or laptop computer that will be accessing a Windows server that can run you into thousands of dollars for a small business.

If you want to know what has changed, take a look at the Enhancement page. Also, check the “specs” of your Mac to see if you qualify for the upgrade. Nothing like purchasing something that won’t work.

So, for those that want to upgrade ensure that you take a couple of steps before you install it.

• Back up your Mac. before you do the upgrade/archive install. Make multiple copies of things, such as your data, i.e. burn a few DVDs of your data, sometimes files go get corrupted.
• Clean up your hard drive and applications. Be aware that the more applications that you have loaded on your Mac the more chances are that there will be incompatibilities with Snow Leopard and will “break things” after installing it. If your business relies upon critical applications I suggest that you follow your critical applications vendor’s web site to see when they say it will be Snow Leopard ready. If not, wait a few months Get rid of those apps that you don’t use any more.
• Check out application compatibility. You need to check out if your application is compatible with Snow Leopard, otherwise you’ll be up the creek.
• Back up your Startup Disk. Using Apple’s Disk Utility follow those instructions to keep your Mac running smoothly, especially if there are critical uses of it for your business you can revert back to your current version of your Mac OS. Average users may not need this.

Lastly, Apple always has “easter eggs” in new releases that are not documented and it’s always fun finding them. Sometimes they’re bugs, but the “easter eggs” are nice little features that can make your life on the Mac more fun.

You know a good entrepreneur copy cats mediocre ideas, a great entrepreneur gives credit where it is due. I’d love to take the credit for this information, but I can’t, but I am willing to pass it along as it’s good information to entrepreneurs.

The article “16 Apps That Make Sharing Large Files a Snap“ by Yakuel is a great start to understand the many aspects of sharing large files. The one solution they did not cover is GetDropBox.com, which I’ve come to like, but after reading the article I’ll take a look at the others to see if they fit my needs.

And you?

If you want to get better discounts than Apple Business can provide, buy all of your software from Amazon.com. There is no hassle about which discounts you get at what level of pricing and you get the same support from Apple. In most cases you might be able to download a trial version while waiting for the delivery of the software and then just enter in the license key if it requires one.

For instance, Apple’s Aperture cost $199 at the Apple Store online, you might be able to get a 5% discount calling Apple as a business, but Amazon has the current version for $157.49 as of today, a 21% discount. Amazon also have other avenues that might sell it even cheaper.

In these tight times any savings helps in the long run.