Interrupt19 » Work and Organization

How to Print with an iPad

David Balogh — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 12:00:08 +0000

One of the iPad’s mysteries is printing. There’s no USB cable to attach to a printer. No built-in way to transfer stuff to a printer via WiFi. Not even in the iPad’s iWork suite is there a “Print” function.

If you were to use an iPad for any sort of business or educational purpose, what are you supposed to do?

Here are your iPad printing options:

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Managing your Blackberry on OS X

David Balogh — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 12:00:47 +0000

Before the iPhone, the smartphone of choice was a Blackberry. Even now Research in Motion’s offerings are a great competitor. Yes, the iPhone has the interface, touch surface and the app store that RIM envies but the Blackberry is still standard issue in the enterprise world. Many of you who have a work cell phone most likely have a Blackberry.

What if you have a Blackberry and a Mac? Not a problem. Here’s a simple way to sync your Blackberry’s contacts, music, photos and email with OS X.

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Impressions after playing with an iPad:

David Balogh — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 12:00:59 +0000

iPad, iPad, iPad. That’s the big focus in the news, on the internet and in all the Apple websites. Now, don’t get me wrong – I think its a pretty sweet device and I’ve spent some time playing with one. However, to call the iPad “Revolutionary” is a bit of a stretch – for now.

The following is a list of 10 observations I noticed about the iPad after playing with one for a little bit. Hopefully they will help you in deciding if one is for you or not.

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10 Ways To Keep Yourself, and Your Mac Secure

David Balogh — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 12:00:56 +0000

OS X running Safari was hacked again at Pwn2own by Charlie Miller for the third year in a row. Tired of Apple’s (and other software companies) lackluster approach to securing their product, he announced he will not be disclosing vulnerabilities to them anymore. He’ll gladly show Apple how he finds them, hoping they will begin scanning and patching OS X.

While this doesn’t translate into a tsunami of OS X malware, nor is it a threat of impending doom, it reminds us that OS X is not the invulnerable OS you may think it is.

Since turning off the computer and hiding under a rock isn’t an option, follow these 10 tips to keep yourself secure.

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Easily Transferring Large Files over the Internet

David Balogh — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 13:00:37 +0000

Sending someone large files isn’t as easy as attaching them to an email. If you’ve ever tried that, you’ll remember the cryptic “Mailer Daemon / Postmaster Failure” notice you received shortly after. This notice means the email didn’t go through and was dropped. Why? Because many email providers have limits on their attachment size. Go over that limit and your email will be dropped.

How then are you supposed to send a large file to someone? What if they are three time zones away, or in another country? You’ll still use the internet, but you won’t be using email.

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Run a Home OS X Server with Dynamic DNS

David Balogh — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 13:00:02 +0000

Ever thought about starting up your own website? Need to access your home computers from the outside world? Set up a security camera system and want to view it remotely? Since most internet service plans have a dynamic or changing IP address, any reason you can think of to contact your home network has to work with an IP address that could change at any moment.

You can solve this problem with Dynamic DNS. Here’s how it works:

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Six Ways To Improve the iPad

David Balogh — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 13:00:13 +0000

There’s a little bit of disappointment in Apple’s iPad announcement. Many were expecting an earth-shattering new device and all they got was an oversized 3G iPod Touch. As a follow-up to my recent article, Why you should relax about the new Apple Tablet, I’m going to explore why I’m not sure about the new iPad. There’s a great deal of potential in it, yet the first generation isn’t quite there yet.

Here’s six things the Second Generation iPad could use, and the likelihood we’ll see it:

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How OS X Works With Non-Apple MP3 Players

David Balogh — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 13:00:14 +0000

There are other .MP3 players out there besides the iPod. Sandisk makes the Sansa line, Creative makes the Zen series, Sony has its Walkman, ARCHOS is popular and don’t forget about the Zune.

Not everyone’s .MP3 player is an iPod (or iPhone). Some are recent switchers, new to the Mac. Others wanted something less expensive or received it as a gift. Whatever the reason, a huge question for you is “Does my non-Apple .MP3 player work with OS X?”

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Secure Emails with Thunderbird, Mail and Gmail – Part 2

David Balogh — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 13:00:31 +0000

In part one, we looked at turning on SSL to encrypt the reading and sending of emails. This secures you from eavesdropping on your local and / or ISP network. The minute your email goes through a non secure connection, which is quite often, its not secure anymore. The way to guarantee that your private emails remain private is to encrypt the email itself.

Encrypting emails sounds like something extraordinarily difficult that only spies do. I think that once everyone sees just how easy it is to encrypt emails, it’s surprising that more people don’t.

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Be A Google Search Ninja with These 9 Tricks

David Balogh — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 13:00:17 +0000

Searching the internet is tricky. Looking for a common term like Apple, OS X and Mac will give you way too much information. You already know that you should get specific and descriptive. What if you still find way too many results that don’t satisfy your search? Or worse, results that have nothing to do with what you’re looking for.

Here are 9 Google tricks that will make you into a super search ninja.

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Don’t Let Winter Ruin Your Laptop

David Balogh — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 13:00:15 +0000

As the weather turns cold, the days grow short, and white flakes fall from the sky, we know winter is upon us. You know about winterizing your car, insulating your home, preparing your yard, keeping the pets inside and bundling yourself up. Did you think of your Mac?

Surprisingly enough, there’s a few things about the wintertime and your Mac to be aware of:

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Avoid Presentation Embarrassment – Keep your Mac Awake

David Balogh — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 13:00:54 +0000

You’ve probably attended one of these presentations before. The speaker is busy talking about quarterly projections, a new product or the slide currently being shown. After 2 minutes, the screen goes dark. Or worse, a slideshow of the 4 month old in the bathtub.

With presentations, there’s so many things to worry about: Did I wear the right outfit? Will I remember my speech? Am I forgetting something? What if I stutter, stumble or otherwise confuse my words?

With your concerns elsewhere, its almost inevitable that you’re going to forget one huge and potentially embarrassing detail during your presentation – Keeping your computer from going to sleep..

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Put a Stop to 9 of OS X’s Most Annoying Behaviors

David Balogh — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 13:00:32 +0000

At some point in time, after you’ve been using a Mac for a while, you’re going to discover some of OS X’s annoying tendencies. I’m not talking about the spinning beach ball or the scary kernal panic screen. Too much of those indicates a problem with your system and it needs to be looked at.

These are the normal little things about OS X that just get in the way, bothering you enough to wish they weren’t there. Now I’ll show you how to get rid of them:

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First Impressions of Google Chrome’s OS X Beta

David Balogh — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 13:00:54 +0000

Does the world need another browser? Isn’t Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari and Opera enough? Does Google have what it takes to make a functional browser that’s enough to compete with the likes of Firefox, Safari and IE? Or is there a more ulterior motive: What better way to track web experience than with a Google browser (and now Google DNS service) reporting back to the mothership..

Being the curious type, after hearing of the OS X version going into Beta, I decided to have a look at Google Chrome for OS X. Here’s some of my first impressions and experiences with it:

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Get your iCal / Sunbird / Lightning Calendar into Google Calendar

David Balogh — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 13:00:16 +0000

iCal, Sunbird, and Lightning are great applications but they only work locally on your computer. It’s not anyone’s fault – its just the way they were designed. Google Calendar makes for a great back-end when you want to sync calendars across multiple devices, like iCal at home, your Blackberry / iPhone, and your work computer(s).

But what do you do if you’ve been using a calendaring system like iCal or Sunbird/Lightning for years, locally, on one Mac?

Recently, a reader asked such a question on a previous article and here is how you do it.

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