A couple more tips you might want to add that took me about a week to figure out:
I have a couple Firefox shortcuts that I used ALL the time on my PC, but when I moved to Mac, I had a very hard time finding out how to do them.
The most useful keyboard shortcut, in my opinion, is the ctrl-enter in Windows within a browser. It adds http://www. and .com to the proper places if you enter the domain name only. So, if you want to go to Google, you just type ‘google’ in the address bar and hit ctrl-enter. The Mac equivalent is command-enter.
The second shortcut was more difficult to discover on Mac. It’s alt-D in windows, and it jumps the cursor to the address bar and highlights all text, so you can then use the shortcut above to go to the site of your choice - all without touching your mouse. The Mac equivalent is command-L, which is a little harder to do easily for me (so far) but it’s invaluable.
Try out these shortcuts and you will soon realize they are great tools.
Drew, a recent commenter, keeps his spare PC around so he can use DVD Decrypter and 3GP Converter for DVD ripping. Well Drew, that PC is about to become a door stop.
Handbrake and Instant Handbrake can handle all your DVD ripping and conversion for portable devices. Instant Handbrake is specifically designed to make it easy for you to convert video to be played on your iPod with Video.
Here’s a video that shows some of the more intricate details of dealing with the Trash Can on the Mac. (Note:uninstall apps are not required, but can be helpful in keeping your system and file structure clean.)
For the Switcher who is reluctant to leave behind the power and control of Trillian, you may find iChat a bit limiting, both in its features and its inability to connect to multiple IM networks.
iChat is a solid application, but it only connects to the AOL Instant Messenger network and Apple’s .Mac network (which requires that you pay $99 a year for a .Mac account…)
If you want multi-network support on OS X, you have a couple of options: Fire and Adium.
What the Duck?!
Both are free and open source, so you have no risk in trying them out. And while both are solid instant messenger clients, if you’re a former Trillian user, you’ll quickly realize - as I did - that Adium is the only way to go.
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