Apple/Mac Links

On the fire-marked date of 5 February 2004, I became the moderately proud and occasionally mercilessly critic owner of a PowerBook 15", and in late 2004 I embarked my sister on this adventure by buying her a PowerBook 12". In November 2006 by boss was then kind enough to buy me an iMac 21", and finally in January 2007 I couldn't resist the urge to buy "my parents" a lovely Mac Mini. July 2007 saw the beginning of a long goodbye to my PowerBook 15" and its taking over by its worthy successor, a MacBook Pro 15". Finally, in October 2008 my dad got himself a 2-yr contract with a major Italian mobile operator and an iPhone 3G thus came along, which pretty much makes ME an iPhone owner. In the meantime I became sort of a safe haven for Apple switchers/converts of the astronomical world, who frequently come to me to ask about this and that. While throughout this time faring rather high in my wildest dreams has been finding the guts to install a "proper" (free AND open source, non proprietary, as you wish) operating system such as some linux flavor on such nice pieces of machinery! For the time being, I entertain myself trying to make the most of my beloved open source software under Mac OS X! PS : I also own a rather pretentious but stunningly beautiful blue iPod mini and two extremely handy iPod shuffle (1st and 2nd gen, respectively). Following an ill-judged shopping spree on my side as I was visiting California, my sister has also had for some time an iPod nano 3rd gen, now become a 4th gen thanks to the nice folks at London's Regent Street "flagship" Apple Store after the 3rd gen battery "blew up".

General

Apple and Apple Store : Official Sites

Mac World and Mac Addict : Mac Magazines

Apple and Mac OS X topics on Slashdot.org

Mac OS X Hints and Getting OS X going : tips' repositories about Mac OS X

Mac OS X Notes : a few OS X tips for Unix users

OS X Tips : setting up your OS X from scratch for those with "a certain amount of UNIX-savvy and geekiness"

Apple and GNU downloads for Mac OS X

the legendary Fink and Fink Commander or the niftier MacPorts and Porticus : bringing the full power of open source to Mac OS X, in a debian-like sort of way

XQuartz : X11 (or rather X.org) unleashed from Apple's corporate strictures.

Want to play AVI and/or DivX movies under Mac OS X using QuickTime? Since Apple's boasted digital audio and video superiority doesn't make it for a truly versatile player in the peer-to-peer DRM-free age, you're better off installing a bunch of free codecs like the ones provided by divx and 3ivx. And while we're at it, the VLC player might also save you most of QuickTime headaches.

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