Hands-On Review--Mac OS X: The Missing Manual, Panther Edition

by David Pogue (O'Reilly 2003). Okay, it's so easy to learn Mac OS X that Apple does not include a manual. While this is true for most Mac users, it's not true for all, especially newbies coming from the Wintel world who are used to manuals. Even long-time avid Mac users like the staff of Macs Only! don't know all there is to know about Mac OS X and a manual is very helpful from time to time for things like networking, security, Terminal, Unix commands and the web applications, other than Safari of course. Panther (Mac OS X 10.3) has lots of new features like Expose, FileVault and VPN and does a number of things differently than previous versions. David Pogue's Mac OS X: The Missing Manual, Panther Edition covers all of this.

Mac OS X TMM, Panther Edition's 773 pages are divided into 21 chapters, a table of contents, introduction, six appendices and an index. The chapters are organized into five parts. The first two parts cover the basics of Mac OS X. The third and fourth parts get under the hood and cover the components and technologies in Mac OS X, including security, Mac OS X's firewall, FileVault, Expose, networking, details on printing, Unix and the Terminal application. The fifth part covers Mac OS X online, including web sharing, VPN and SSH.

We didn't read every page but rather skimmed through it, pausing on chapters where there was something relatively new to us. The book is well-written and very clear. However, some things are insufficiently covered--take FileVault, for example. Pogue covers the basics of where is it, what it does, why to use it and the steps to enable and disable it. FileVault deserves a bit more attention since many people, including us, have had significant problems with it. There's no warning and no set of recommendations on how to avoid problems. With regard to Expose, most people will read about references to "The Blob" in Expose but this odd feature is not mentioned.

Mac OS X TMM, Panther Edition is an excellent manual for those who are not familiar with Mac OS X and its features. It is a very good reference for those familiar with Mac OS X but not Panther. However, one will need to consult other references if real detail is needed on any of the complicated aspects of Mac OS X.

Mac OS X: The Missing Manual, Panther Edition (2004) by David Pogue published by O'Reilly. $29.95.