TekkieBob - All Things Tech!

New to the Mac? Had a Mac for years? Either way you need to know the "in's and out's" of the System Preferences of your operating system. Getting under the "hood" of your Mac need not mean getting you hands dirty. Don't worry, you don't need to be a computer geek or even slightly nerdy to master your Mac's look and feel. 1 What this series will cover Putting stickers all over the outside of your laptop is not the only way to customize it. In the next several blog posts, we will discover many obvious and also some hidden treats in the System Preferences . Want to control how often pictures change in your screen saver? Or perhaps you type the same response to emails, over and over again? Or maybe the screen dims too quickly for your taste. All of this is can be under your control. Apple sets your Mac's settings out of the box to work in a generally easy manner. But you are you , why don't you make your Mac work the way you want ...

For you FileMaker  Pro Advanced users out there... If you have several date fields and would like to calculate years elapsed (for example a person's age) here is a custom function that will do it. Of course it is a simple calculation and could be typed each time you need it in a calculation field, but this is designed to be used in several places where needed. Examples: Age  Years of service since hire date Years married You get the idea. /**  * =====================================  * YearsElapsed ( startDate )  *  * PURPOSE:  * Convenience function for working with  * dates to calculate age or years elapsed to current date.  *  * RETURNS:  * (number)  *  * PARAMETERS:  * startDate = Field reference  *  * EXAMPLES:  * YearsElapsed ( dateBirth ) = 46.7  * YearsElapsed ( dateHired) = 2.7  *  * DEPENDENCIES:  * ...

Often it is useful to show a person's age or years elapsed since a start date.  For example: Hire Date: 4/1/2012 - Years of service: 1.5 Here's a formula for Numbers that will do the trick: =IF(ISBLANK(cellReference),"",DATEDIF( cellReference ,TODAY(),"D")/365.2425) Replace the cellReference with the actual cell reference. i.e.: (A1)  So here's the breakdown: =IF(ISBLANK(cellReference),""  --- this checks to see if there is a start date in your referenced cell.  For example say your spreadsheet has a cell (A1) that holds a date of birth, but it is not yet referenced, this will result in an empty string. (Blank cell) Otherwise, it calculates the years:  DATEDIF( cellReference ,TODAY(),"D")/365.2425) DATEDIF compares two dates. The first date is your cell reference i.e.: (A1) The second is the current date according to your computer, iOS device: TODAY()  returning the Day -  "D" Then the difference is divi...

Fed Up - Full Hard Drive Syndrome Getting the "Start-up disk is full" warning?  Here are some tips that can help you reclaim some drive space. Backup, Backup, Backup Backup (as in save important stuff just-in-case) before you do anything that will significantly impact your computer's internal storage.  If you have an external hard-drive with at least 2x the capacity of your internal drive, consider using Time Machine to create automatic backups of your data.  Time Machine, built into your Mac, will automatically check your computer every hour for changes and back them up incrementally.  This means it will only save changes, not re-copy all of you data over again.  You can use an external drive physically attached to your machine (USB, Firewire, Thunderbolt) or storage on your network, often referred to as Network Attached Storage or NAS.  One of the best and easiest solutions is to use an Apple Time Capsule.  It is easy to configure and you can "...

Duplicates!!! When you control+click (or right click if you have enabled that option) on Mountain Lion, and there seems to be several duplicate applications listed and/or apps you no longer use, here is a Terminal shell script that will fix that.  Just copy and paste the code below in a Terminal window. /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/LaunchServices.framework/Versions/A/Support/lsregister -kill -r -domain local -domain user (Terminal can be found using Launchpad or Spotlight) After pasting, hit the Return key and allow time to run, then type "killAll Finder" without the quotes, and Return.  This will rebuild the "Open With..." menu.   If you do not see an immediate effect on the lists, restart your Mac.   Should be no need to restart. (Thanks, JK) Duplicates and old apps gone! If you wish, you can make a Service that will do it using Automator as well: Open Automator (Launch Pad or Applications folder) Create...

Change the Default Font of Notes App in OS X Mountain Lion : The new Notes app in OS X Mountain Lion features a default font that is hard to read and looks a bit goofy. If you want a more professional looking font that’s easier on the eyes, you can easily switch the default font from “Noteworthy” to the always classic Helvetica. From the Notes app, pull down the “Format” menu Open the “Font” submenu followed by “Default Font” and select “Helvetica” for the cleanest looking font, or choose “Marker Felt” to match the default Notes font in iOS Changes take effect immediately. Helvetica is shown below: Formatting can be lost as you’ll see in this video: You can change it in the iOS Notes app too .