Looking at Mac OS X Applications


With Mac OS X, you use applications built on any of three different frameworks: Cocoa, Carbon, or Classic. The diversity of these frameworks reflects the parentage of Mac OS X: the traditional Mac OS wedded with NeXT’s Unix genealogy. The different frameworks exist because each enables an important type of applications to work with Mac OS X.

This state of bliss did not always exist. For many years, Apple wanted to move to a completely new style of Mac OS but couldn’t. Apple couldn’t just orphan the applications upon which Mac users had come to rely. Plus, Apple could not get enough application developers to agree to completely rewrite all their software for a new Mac OS that required them to use development tools and programming languages not in common use.

Regardless of the merits of the two programming languages best supported by these new development tools, Objective C and Java, neither is used for such mainstream applications as Microsoft Office, Adobe Photoshop, Macromedia Flash, Internet Explorer, Netscape Communicator/Navigator, and so forth. The developers of these applications were unwilling to invest time, human resources, and money to rewrite their products from the ground up for a new Mac OS, and then commit to maintaining the new Mac OS version in parallel with a Microsoft Windows version written in a different programming language. Doing this would wipe out a core reason that the developers remained committed to the Mac platform, namely that each application’s Mac OS and Windows versions share a great deal of program code. Typically, only about 20 percent of the application needs to be written specifically for Mac OS or Windows; the rest is shared.

Apple has addressed these concerns in Mac OS X. Developers now have a choice. They can update their existing applications to benefit from the new Mac OS X features. They can develop innovative applications by using the new development tools. They can also do nothing, at least for a while, because most existing Mac OS 9 applications still work in Mac OS X just like they do in Mac OS 9.

Some may quibble as to whether there are two, three, four, or even more types of Mac OS X applications. The conservative, literal quibblers say that there are two application types: Cocoa and Carbon. Most of the rest say that there are three (including Classic as the third type). Some split the Cocoa family into Objective C and Java. Finally, some include BSD Unix command-line applications as another variety. In this Chapter, we discuss the following types of applications that you can use in Mac OS X:

  • Cocoa applications are programs written from the ground up by using the new development tools provided by Mac OS X; these Cocoa applications require Mac OS X to run. No one really expects to make Windows versions of Cocoa applications.

  • Carbon applications typically are programs that have been around for a while. Most likely originally developed for Mac OS 9 or earlier, Carbon applications can still run in Mac OS 9 (with the addition of the CarbonLib system extension) in addition to Mac OS X.

  • Classic applications are applications originally made for Mac OS 9 or earlier. Classic applications run in the Classic environment of Mac OS X, an emulator of sorts, known also simply as Classic. Most, but not all, Mac OS 9–compatible applications work well in the Classic environment. Those applications that require extensions (not the shared library kind) may be either fully or partially incompatible. Turn to Chapter 17 for information on Classic.

Cocoa and Carbon applications benefit from the major new features of Mac OS X, including protected memory, preemptive multitasking, multithreading, and built-in multiprocessor support. Because Classic applications do not have these features, it is strongly recommended that Classic applications be abandoned in favor of Cocoa or Carbon applications as quickly as possible. (This means you Quark users!)

Preinstalled applications

Apple preinstalls various useful applications with Mac OS X. Some of these applications are in the AppleScript folder or the Utilities folder, which are inside the Applications folder. Table 5-1 lists the applications provided with Mac OS X 10.3 and identifies the applications that are normally located in an interior folder of the Applications folder. The contents of your Applications folder may be different, because Apple adds and subtracts from the bundled software as time passes, and someone else who uses your computer may install additional applications.

Table 5-1: Included Applications

Name

Folder

Brief Description

Address Book

Applications

Lets you manage an address (postal and email) and phone book. Integrated with LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol) directory searches and linked to Mail and iChat. (See later in this table.)

Calculator

Applications

A very basic calculator, controlled from the keypad or with the mouse.

Chess

Applications

A graphical front end for GNU Chess; a pretty decent chess program with multiple difficulty settings and both 2-D and 3-D views.

DVD Player

Applications

The default application to play DVDs. Will not work if your computer doesn’t have a DVD drive.

Font Book

Applications

A font management program. Use it to preview, activate, and deactivate fonts.

iCal

Applications

A calendar management app; basically, a digital appointment book.

iChat

Applications

Instant messaging (IM) client.

Image Capture

Applications

Download photos from compatible (USB) digital cameras. Comes with a series of AppleScripts to automatically reformat and arrange pictures.

iMovie

Applications

Digital video editing application.

Internet Connect

Applications

Manage PPP application for dial-up Internet connections.

Internet Explorer

Applications

Microsoft’s Web browser.

iPhoto

Applications

Still video editing and cataloging application.

iSync

Applications

Used to synchronize data between cell phones, palm pilots and your computer.

iTunes

Applications

Play songs from audio CDs, MP3 files, and Internet radio stations. Burn recordable CDs on Macs equipped with CDRW drives.

Mail

Applications

Flexible email application. Supports multiple accounts and personalities; links to Address Book.

Preview

Applications

View graphic and PDF files. Also used to access print preview from applications.

QuickTime Player

Applications

Apple’s application to play, create, and edit multimedia files.

Safari

Applications

Apple’s Web browser.

Sherlock

Applications

Searches various Internet locations for information. Sherlock can search for movie times, plane tickets and more.

Stickies

Applications

Create and manage notes windows.

System Preferences

Applications

Control Panel application for your System Preference settings.

TextEdit

Applications

Styled-text editor (a miniword processor).

Script Editor

AppleScript

Record, create, and edit AppleScript (and other OSA scripting system) files.

Activity Monitor

Utilities

Shows processor, memory, and network usage and currently running processors. Allows for termination of processes to help with troubleshooting and repair.

AirPort Admin Utility

Utilities

Change individual settings of an AirPort base station device, including settings that aren’t changed by the AirPort Setup Assistant application (described next).

AirPort Setup Assistant

Utilities

Guides you through providing an AirPort base station device with the settings it needs to get a wireless AirPort network connected to the Internet.

Audio MIDI Setup

Utilities

Central control for routing audio and MIDI.

Bluetooth File

Utilities

Bluetooth short-range wireless data transfer utility. Exchange

Bluetooth Serial Utility

Utilities

Utility to create serial connections between devices: often used to access modems in palmtop computers or cell phones.

Bluetooth Setup

Utilities

An assistant designed to help set up Bluetooth. Assistant

ColorSync Utility

Utilities

Verifies and repairs ColorSync ICC (International Color Consortium) profiles. These profiles are used to synchronize color input and output between various device types (monitors, scanners, printers, and the like).

Console

Utilities

Presents a window to the Unix console log for your session, letting you see messages from Mac OS X and applications. This tool is primarily useful to programmers and system administrators only. Remember that underlying everything you do in Mac OS X, you are really running a Unix system.

DigitalColor Meter

Utilities

Presents the RGB (or other) color information for the pixels under the pointer.

Directory Access

Utilities

Set up the LDAP services and authentication protocols used by Directory Services and Mac OS X.

Disk Utility

Utilities

The Swiss Army knife of disk control applications. Used to burn discs, verify, repair, and format disk volumes, create disk images.

Grab

Utilities

Used to take screen pictures, either of the entire screen or a selection.

Installer

Utilities

Used by Apple and some software developers to install new software and updates to your computer.

Keychain Access

Utilities

Used to store and retrieve your user IDs and passwords for files, remote sites, servers, and so forth.

NetInfo Manager

Utilities

Used to administer a NetInfo server configuration.

Network Utility

Utilities

A collection of network and Internet utility programs.

ODBC Administrator

Utilities

ODBC (Open Database Connectivity) configuration.

Print Setup Utility

Utilities

Configure, register, and monitor printers.

StuffIt Expander

Utilities

Freeware utility that expands StuffIt and Zip archives, as well as a number of other formats.

System Profiler

Utilities

Utility to report how your hardware is configured and what software you have installed. This is a handy diagnostic tool when tracking down hardware and software problems.

Terminal

Utilities

This is your window into the Unix command line environment. See Chapters 25-27 for further information.

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Understanding Packages

Although all Mac OS X applications appear in the Finder as a single icon, many of them actually consist of a collection of folders and files. These compound applications are variously known as packages, bundles, or application wrappers. The terms are synonymous. Examples of such applications are as close as your Applications folder. Almost every application included with Mac OS X in the Applications folder is one of these application packages. Put simply, a package is a structured collection of files and folders that looks to users like a single file.

In Mac OS X, application packages have the name extension .app. You don’t ordinarily see this name extension because Mac OS X hides it (unless you deactivate that option in the Finder Preferences window, as discussed in Chapter 4). You can also see the name extension in the Finder’s Info window. (Choose View Show Info and then choose Name & Extension from the Info window’s pop-up menu.)

Packages can be stored on volumes that have the Unix File System (UFS) format as well as on volumes that have the Mac OS Extended format (also known as HFS Plus). Thus, they are considerably more flexible than traditional Mac applications, which aren’t packages. An application that isn’t a package generally has a two-part file and extensive Finder information, with the part known as the resource fork being equivalent to an application package’s Resources folder. The problem with two-fork files with extensive Finder information is that they must be stored on volumes that have the Mac OS Extended format. The traditional two-forked applications can’t be stored on volumes that use the UFS format. Because of this, Apple hopes to wean application developers away from the use of resource forks, and packages are the means to do so.

When you double-click an application package, say, Preview, it opens and runs; however, Preview is not a single file. You can see what we mean if you Control-click the Preview icon in the Finder and choose Show Package Contents from the contextual menu. Doing this presents a Finder window with a folder icon named Contents. Opening the Contents folder, you see that it contains a Resources folder, and opening the Resources folder reveals the various files and folders containing the resources used by Preview, as shown in the following figure.

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The Mac OS folder of the Contents folder contains the file that actually runs when you double-click the application icon in the Finder. The PkgInfo file contains the Type and Creator information so familiar to experienced Mac users. The really interesting file is the one named Info.plist in the Contents folder. Info.plist is an XML (eXtensible Markup Language) property list, hence, the extension .plist. This property list includes much of the information traditionally found in Macintosh application resource forks, such as type, creator, version string, short version string, and language.

For Cocoa applications, the resource folder contains a number of files ending in .nib. These are NeXT Interface Builder files. NIB files contain the interface description information (such as window dimensions, buttons, and the like) in a classes file and the actual binary data in an objects file, both named with the .nib extension.

You also see a file called COPYING — that’s just a license file from an organization named GNU (Gnu’s Not Unix), which is required to be included with any code distributed based upon their libraries and tools, such as the libraries and Objective C compiler that NeXT brought to the party.

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Installing applications

In addition to these preinstalled applications, there will come a time to add new tools to this digital toolbox. Installing additional applications is a great way to expand your options. There are a few different methods of application installations, although most are very self-explanatory. Typically, a set of paper instructions or a digital text file will accompany the application. The text file usually has a name like Read me or Installation instructions. Read these instructions carefully, because there may be exceptions to the rules we present here.

The easiest method of installation is the drag-install. This method is commonly used when installing an application from removable media (CD-ROM, DVD, etc....) and from downloaded disk images. If a drag installation is called for, it will be indicated in the instructions or via a visible note within the disk that says “drag this folder to your hard drive to install.” Simply drag the specified folder to your applications folder to copy the required data there. You do not need to copy the application to the applications folder, although that location makes the most sense. Regardless of the location to which you copied the files, after the copy is complete, launch the newly copied application. If the application has to perform any additional setup functions, it should do so at this time. The application will copy files to various locations within your system and then proceed to ask for a serial number if needed, in addition to bugging you with the ubiquitous registration page. (We hate those things too.) Figure 5-1 shows the Microsoft Office install disk’s contents. It’s pretty obvious what to do from the window’s instructions.

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Figure 5-1: The drag-install is the easiest install method available. Simply drag the folder to the desired location, and go to work!

The old-fashioned method of installation is the installation program. Normally titled something like Setup or Install, they are programs that go through the install process, querying for various bits of input from the user as they do. Each installation program is unique, but most require users to agree to a legal copyright agreement, insert serial numbers, and then select the destination drive to complete the process. Figure 5-2 shows the Adobe Photoshop installation screen in action.

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Figure 5-2: The installation program method is a commonly used technique for adding programs, although it tends to feel a bit old-fashioned.

Removing applications

In the event that you no longer want to have an application stored on your hard drive, simply drag the application item out of the Applications folder, and deposit it into the Trash icon in the Dock. After emptying the Trash (Apple Menu Empty Trash), the application in question will be gone. Just as with trashing a document you no longer want, be sure that you really want to throw it away. The item won’t come back from the digital graveyard very easily. Many applications spread various bits of themselves around in other folders in the system. You usually don’t have to worry about them, but you may want to fully eradicate an application. The best place to look is in the Application Support folder. This folder is the standard dumping ground for extra files generated by an application. You will find Application Support just inside the main Library folder (Hard Drive/Library/Application Support). Inside Application Support, you may find some items related to the deleted application. You can trash these files, but again, be careful, as you may be deleting files that are affiliated with the wrong application.




Mac OS X Bible, Panther Edition
Mac OS X Bible, Panther Edition
ISBN: 0764543997
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2003
Pages: 290

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