Leopard Pocket Guide

What Apple Should Do

Apple should include this book with every Mac sold. Or, to be environmentally friendly, Apple could email the PDF as a “thank you” to every Mac user who registers with Apple. Either way, the publishers get paid (direct from Apple), Apple strengthens its cult following, and Mac users learn a ton of cool shortcuts productivity boosters.

What I Like About the Book

• Small size. About 200 pages and small enough to fit in my pocket. Perfect reading when I get stuck waiting in a line or in traffic. Just kidding about traffic!

• Keyboard shortcuts all in one place. I typically learn shortcuts one at a time, usually by accident. Or sometimes a friend looks over my shoulder to offer an idea. It’s convenient to have the shortcuts in one spot. Accelerated learning.

• No assumptions. I’m an old MCSE, very comfortable with the Microsoft way and the Windows tradition. I’m still learning the Macintosh way. The book avoids Mac-background assumptions without dumbing things down too far. The level of detail is right.

What I Don’t Like About the Book

• I’d like to know more about the inner workings of Mac OS X, how some of the design decisions were made, and… What am I talking about? Meeting that request would expand the book beyond 1000 pages. I think it fits the “Pocket Guide” moniker very well in its current form.

• No mention of Ruby or Rails. Given that Rails was one of the driving factors behind my Mac purchase, I would have liked to see a paragraph (at least). AppleScript got a full page, but Rails has more influence in the world of the Web. Maybe the author will correct this in a future version of the book.

The Mac OS X Leopard Pocket Guide is not for everyone. If your goal is to dig into questions of operating systems architecture and protocol stack design, pass this up for a different volume. But if you want to get things done right now, consider this book.