rEFIt: A Graphical Boot Menu for Your Mac
Even though Macs come in way fewer versions than PCs, they are not gaming consoles. If you’re a tinkerer by heart, like me, you like to experiment with your Mac. Why not? It’s a fine and powerful machine. Some people just can’t get enough of Mac OS X, but why not go all the way, ditch Boot Camp and try installing another operating system like FreeBSD or GNU/Linux yourself? Or do you want to try out a Live CD (bootable CDs containing an operating system that boots running in RAM, from the medium itself) without the hassle of special key bindings? That’s where rEFIt comes in. Most of you are probably familiar with the standard inflexible text boot interfaces, which let you choose the operating system upon boot. But come on, it’s not a PC we’re using, it’s a Mac. Why not make it more useful and prettier at the same time?
Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard – January 2009?
Mac OS X Leopard 10.5 debuted in October 2007. We’ve seen a lot of new functionality and a revamped UI. After no more than half a year, the Internet stays true to its roots — we found a lot of data and rumors about the upcoming release, Mac OS X version 10.6. According to a recent article at OSnews, numerous sources state the name of the new release will be ‘Snow Leopard’. So let’s take a look at what kind of Apple goodness could await us in the first month of 2009.
What is Darwin?
I am very happy about the direction in which the Mac OS X GUI is going, although sadly many Mac users aren’t interested in (or don’t know about) the “lower levels” of the Macintosh Operating System. Have you ever wondered why the Terminal greets you with the words “Welcome to Darwin”? Why do BSD and Mac OS share certain bits of code? Why does Wikipedia describe Mac OS X as a graphical operating system? Today we’re going to take a look at the underlying open source technology which powers your fancy Leopard OS – the hidden core set of components, named Darwin.
5 Fun Free Mac Games (you’ve never heard of)
Everyone likes to kill some time playing a computer game every once in a while. Why not today? I think the lack of Mac games is actually a positive thing: it forces us to become casual gamers, and because of this, we tend to appreciate the time spent playing games more than hardcore PC gamers.
I have compiled a list of five games you probably have never heard of. All the games are playable even on a low-end MacBook and more importantly, simply fun! So log out of your Facebook account, shut down that e-mail client and do your brain a favor by getting your game on.
OpenOffice 3 to Provide Native Mac OS X Support
For many Mac newbie users, X11 can be a real pain.
Basically, the X11 window sytem is what OpenOffice was made for. OpenOffice, by being free, makes a perfect alternative to other office suites for the Mac, especially Microsoft’s much heralded Mac Office. So, the developers decided in September of last year to make a decent official port for the Mac.
