Maria’s Guides

Links worth following.

Here are the links of interest to readers of my books for the week ending March 22:

• TidBITS Safe Computing: Should Mac Users Run Antivirus Software?
  Rich Mogull presents his views on whether Mac users should use antivirus software. On TidBITS.com.
  (tags: virus macos apple leopard)
• BlackBerry or iPhone: Which Horse Will You Back?
  Interesting article about the competition between the BlackBerry and iPhone. On CIO.com.
  (tags: apple iphone blackberry cellphone)
• Is your Airport Extreme suddenly Time Machine-happy?
  Yes, the latest update appears to have enabled Time Machine to recognized hard disks attached to AirPort Extreme via USB. On The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW).
  (tags: apple AirPort TimeMachine backup Leopard MacOS)

Links worth following.

Here are the links of interest to readers of my books for the week ending March 8:

• Mac Automation: Save websites to iPod for later
  A great how-to explains how you can use Automator to save the text contents of a Web page for offline reading on your iPod. On The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW).
  (tags: Apple Macintosh web ipod)
• Things I Learned At The Apple Store
  Great first-person experience on a first visit to an Apple store. On Burbia.com.
  (tags: Apple Mac shopping funny)
• Things I Learned At The Apple Store — Part 2
  The second part of the Apple Store article on Burbia.com.
  (tags: Apple Mac funny shopping)

Links worth following.

Here are the links of interest to readers of my books for the week ending February 16:

• Time Machine and Airport Disks, redux
  Andy Piper provides text and screencast about Mac OS X 10.5.2’s ability to see AirPort disks — but not allow them to work with Time Machine. On The Lost Outpost.
  (tags: apple macos leopard TimeMachine AirPort)

Links worth following.

Here are the links of interest to readers of my books for the week ending February 9:

• Two New Anti-Scraping WordPress Plugins
  Information about two WordPress Plugins that can help prevent or reduce the negative effects of feed scraping. On PlagiarismToday.
  (tags: wordpress plugins copyright feed plagiarism)
• 5 Steps: How Not to Look Like a Spam Blog
  Great article of tips for legitimate bloggers to build blogs that don’t look like they’re splogs. On PlagiarismToday.
  (tags: splog blogging copyright wordpress)
• How YOU Can Make the Web More Structured
  Tips for using Meta tags to help build an Internet database. On ReadWriteWeb.
  (tags: howto Internet tagging Web2.0 webdesign)

Links worth following.

Here are the links of interest to readers of my books for the week ending February 2:

• Time Wasting Blog Comments, Comments Policies, and Comment Etiquette
  Good article about creating a comment policy on your blog to prevent marketing and time-wasting comments. On The Blog Herald.
  (tags: blogging comment Web2.0 WordPress)
• Increase Page Rank By Revitalizing Your Old Posts
  Another great post for bloggers from the Blog Herald. This one explains why and how to update and revitalize older posts. A must-read for anyone with posts over 2 years old in their blog.
  (tags: blogging Google Web2.0 WordPress SEO)
• What Is Sucking Your Blogging Confidence Away?
  Yet another great post on the Blog Herald about blogging. This one tackles, among other things, handling mean-spirited comments by readers. Apparently, I’m not the only one who deletes them ruthlessly.
  (tags: blogging WordPress comments Web2.0)
• Magnetic websites
  A great post by Miraz Jordan with some easy-to-follow advice for bloggers and Webmasters. On Tikouka.
  (tags: webdesign web advice blogging)
• Introducing Prologue
  Automattic has introduced Prologue for WordPress, which enables WordPress.com users to create a Twitter-like microblogging environment on their blogs. On WordPress.com.
  (tags: wordpress twitter blogging socialnetworking)
• A color toolbox
  Article covers a number of tools you can use to work with colors. On The Unofficial Apple Weblog.
  (tags: design colors MacOS)

Learn now to connect your Mac to the Internet with Bluetooth and a smartphone.

Peachpit Press has published my most recent article for them, “Setting Up Your Mac to Use a Smartphone’s Internet Connection” on their Web site. The article explains in detail, with step-by-step illustrated instructions, how to use a smartphone like a Treo to connect a Macintosh to the Internet.

If you use this technique, be sure to check out “Ping to Keep Your Connection Alive” on this site to prevent your connection from dropping due to inactivity.