How to Share Printers on Mac

A lot of people have difficulties connecting their Macs to preferred printers. Part of the reason is following the same protocol used with Windows OS, which in this case doesn’t apply. Here is the valid way of ensuring a successful Mac to printer connection, and even connect several MacBook to the same printer network.

Sharing One Printer

Apples printer connection procedure is directly connected to its in-built Bonjour Protocol. On the apple menu, go to System Preference and Click on the Printers & Scanners option. This will direct you to another pop-up box with the list of printers in your created network. You only need to select the specific printer you want to connect to and confirm successful connection via the Sharing Preferences option. Note that the Bonjour Protocol works seamlessly with Linux OS. However, you will need additional software to successfully link the Windows OS system.

Sharing to a Wider Printer Network

This tip is especially useful when connecting additional Macs on a printer with no in-built Wi-Fi connection. You follow the same procedure; on your primary MacBook, go to System Preferences then Sharing and Click on Printer Sharing. Once more you get a list of printers you can share and you can tick the option ‘Share with Everyone’. Only those MacBooks with access to your established network will be able to print to your device.

Then on every Mac you want linked to your printer, go to System Preferences and select Printers and Scanners. There should be a Plus (+) button on the bottom of the Pop-up window. The shared printer will appear which you can connect the extra Macs to; you will identify it because it will be the only printer that is ‘Bonjour Shared’ on the network. You can also change the name of the printer by customising it to include your name for easy identification.

That’s all there is to sharing any Mac to a Printer and even add more MacBooks to your network. Just follow the above laid out procedure and from the list of Printers provided you can make all the changes and customisations required. Linux OS is universal thus works seamlessly with all other OS platforms; it’s only the Windows OS that will need additional features to ensure successful connection.

 

 

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How to Zoom in on a Mac

Whether you want a closer look of the details on an image or magnify words on a web page, there are tricks you can use to zoom in on a Mac. With just the normal Mac accessories you have at home, zooming in and out is pretty easy. Here are some tips you can try to make the zoom feature work for you on Mac.

Zooming in/out on an iMac or Macbook

The accessories you need here are an Apple keyboard and a mouse (with a mousewheel). Press and hold the ‘Ctrl’ key on your keyboard then scroll the mousewheel up or down. Instantly, the screen size on your Mac/iMac will increase or decrease with these actions. This comes in handy when editing images and ant to quickly check the details say at 100% resolution.

Zooming using the Trackpad on Mac

If your mouse is not available, it’s still possible to zoom in/out on your Macbook instantly. Once more hold down the control key and use your two fingers to swipe up or down on your Trackpad. Swiping up immediately zooms in any page on the screen, swiping down restores the screen’s size.

You can also alter the font size on a page without affecting anything else. On your MacBook, use the command button and then press the + button to enlarge the font or – to minimise them. This is a very handy trick when reading passages on a page or when you zoom in to remove destructions like images or web videos.

Zooming with a Magic Mouse

If you upgraded to the new cordless Magic Mouse, you can still zoom in and out easily like you did with the mousewheel. Press and hold the Control button then slide any finger towards the top or the bottom of the magic mouse. This will increase or decrease the page you are using instantly.

How to Activate Zooming on Mac/iMac

In case these shortcuts are not working, perhaps your Zoom feature is turned off on your iMac or Macbook. To fix this, click on the apple logo then go to System preferences, Accessibility then click on Zoom. Tick the box that says “Use keyboard Shortcuts to Zoom” then choose Full Screen under the Zoom Style option. This should activate the above explained features, if your around London then consider contact core tech for help. .

How to Change your Profile Picture on a Mac Computer

The profile picture selected for use on your Macintosh or Mac computer is displayed every time you log in as your user account icon. This profile picture is also used when you access the popular Mac applications, IChat and Address Book Card. As your profile picture is usually selected on the initial set up of your computer it is likely that you might desire to select a new picture at some point during the lifetime of your computer.

Changing the profile picture on your Mac computer is simple, especially if you follow the steps outlined in this article. It is possible, using the methods outlined to swap your existing profile picture with a picture already saved on your computer, a picture taken using an application on your Mac or with an image selected from the internet. Simply follow the method described below and you will be enjoying a new profile picture in no time.

Firstly, you will need to log into your Mac as normal, ensuring you use the profile for which you wish to change the picture. Once you are logged in, locate and select the Apple menu. From this menu you will need to select ‘System Preferences’. After choosing this menu option you should see a box with lots of icons, you need to select the ‘Accounts’ icon which is a picture of two shadow profiles side by side. Selecting this will take you to where you can edit your profile picture.

Now you have selected the ‘Accounts’ icon you should see another box which displays your existing profile picture along with other details such as your full name. If you wish to change your profile picture with one already stored on your computer you can simply hover the cursor over the image currently being used. Doing this should present you with an ‘edit picture’ button. Pressing this will present you with a box displaying some recent pictures that you have on your hard drive, press the ‘choose’ button to browse through your entire hard drive, ensuring that you press open when you have found your desired image. You can also at this point take a new picture using your Mac’s camera. Simply select the camera button and take your photo. If you have found a picture from the internet that you would like to use then you simply need to copy this picture over to your accounts window. Navigate to the website that you wish to use, click on the desired image and drag it over to the existing profile picture in the Accounts menu. You can drop the image (release the mouse button) once a ‘plus’ symbol appears.

Whichever method of selecting a profile picture you have used, you should now see a window which allows you to modify your chosen image. You should see a slider which allows you to zoom in or out on your chosen picture and you can also move a frame around your image to adjust the position. Once you are happy with your new profile picture, press ‘set’ and you are good to go.

 

 

 

How to Check Your Hard Disk Space on a Mac

Checking your hard disk space is easy on a Mac, and can let you know how much space you have left to install new games or programs, store media or download large files. If you are considering buying a new computer, checking how much hard disk space on your current machine has been used is a good way to get a sense of whether you need to look for one with more memory, or focus on other features. A few easy steps is all it takes to check hard disk space on a Mac.

1. Click on the Apple icon and then choose the option About This Mac from the menu that will appear – it will be at or near the top of the list of options. A window displaying the current OS X version and some other basic information about the machine will come up.

2. Locate the More Info button on this window and click on it. This will give you more information than just the basic overview, which is what comes up by default.

3. Select the Storage tab at the top of the expanded window that pops up. This will display how much of your space is used for various purposes using an easy to read colour coded bar, which will allow you to make smart decisions about how best to clear up more space if it’s needed, and give you a sense of roughly how much of your storage you have used up.

4. To get the exact total amount of available hard disk space press Command + Option + Spacebar to bring up a Finder window – the exact total will be displayed at the bottom of this window.

 

 

6 Different Ways to Create PDFs on MAC OS

Even an experienced MAC user may be unaware of the operating system’s strong focus on facilitating PDF creation. There are in fact six different ways to create PDF files on MAC, all of which you’ll find outlined below.

1. Creating a PDF from an Existing Document

The use of open source software such as OpenOffice or NeoOffice can allow MAC users to create PDFs from existing documents without losing any information. In the ‘General options‘ page, you can choose to export the whole document, part pages, or/as well as bookmarks. Settings can also be determined in regard to zoom ratio and page layout using the ‘Initial view‘ option page and in respect to security (password protection) in the ‘Security Option‘ page. So in addition to creating a simple PDF version, open source programs can allow more detailed customisation of said documents.

2. Using ‘Print’ to Create a PDF

A PDF file can be created simply by opening the file you wish to create a PDF of and then selecting ‘Print‘ or hitting ‘Command+P‘. This will open the print dialogue box where you will find a ‘PDF‘ drop-down selection (towards the bottom left) with the option ‘Save as PDF‘. Clicking this will allow you to save the file and determine file attributes such as title, as well as enforce password protection. The print dialogue box also offers easy compression, encryption and emailing (depending on the selection you choose).

3. Creating PDF files from Web Pages

Depending on your web browser, there are two ways to create PDFs from a web page. Using Sunrise is arguably the quickest, as this browser has the option to ‘Save Entire Page as PDF’. If selected, this will automatically save the entire page to the default download folder.

The other option is to use Firefox’s PDF Download extension, which enables PDF creation in-browser and/or emailing of said file to the specified output email.

4. PDF file from a picture

A picture(s) can easily be converted to a PDF format by ‘previewing‘ the picture(s) in finder and then using the print dialogue box to save (by selecting the save as PDF document option).

If you wish to generate a PDF of all images in a directory, simply drag the ‘directory icon‘ to the ‘Preview icon‘ and simultaneously hold down ‘Command + Option‘ keys. Next, highlight all of the pictures and choose ‘Print selected images‘ from the ‘File‘ menu. Finally, choose ‘Save as PDF‘.

5. Create a PDF from Helps

It is also easy to create PDF versions using MAC’s built-in online help system ‘man‘. One way is to view the instructions of for example, the download tool ‘curl‘ (using the ‘man curl command‘), and then use the ‘man-t curl | open -f -a Preview.app command‘ to convert those instructions into PDF. These PDFs can then be opened or read using the ‘Preview‘ program.

6. Your Network as a PDF Creator

If you use web-based word processors such as Zoho Writer or Google Docs, these will often have a built-in ‘Generate PDF’ option. Similarly, you can also use PDF creation services (through your network) to create PDF versions of existing documents. You will be required to upload this document and then be offered the option to save the PDF version. Examples of websites offering this service include: ExpressPDF, Zamzar, and PDF Online.

Otherwise if you need Mac support please contact core technical solutions.

 

How to Download Microsoft Word for Mac

Follow the instructions below to purchase and download Microsoft Word for Mac (please note that Microsoft Word cannot be purchased individually, you must purchase it as part of a Microsoft Office for Mac package).

Before you begin it is advised that your Mac Operating System is up to date, you can check this by selecting the ‘Apple Menu’ on your Mac and clicking ‘Software Update…’. Complete any updates before beginning Step 1.

1. Visit the Microsoft for Mac websiteOpen your browser and navigate to http://www.microsoft.com/uk/mac/products or if you are a student you can visithttp://www.microsoft.com/uk/mac/office-university

2. Review the product offering
On the ‘products’ page you will be able to review several different package options, all of the packages include Microsoft Word for Mac. There are also different payment plans depending on if you would like to pay monthly or pay the total amount up front. When you have made your decision click the ‘Buy Now’ button to purchase.

3. Complete the purchase
Follow the directions on screen to complete the purchase using your preferred payment method.

4.Download the Microsoft Office for Mac package
Once your purchase is complete you will be prompted to download the installer, download the installer and open it to begin downloading the Microsoft Office for Mac package.

5. Enter your product key
The package may take some time to download depending on your internet connecting and the age of your machine. Once the download is complete, open the Microsoft Word program. Using your Microsoft account details, log in to the installer and enter the product key to activate your purchase.

You can now use Microsoft Word on your Mac

How to delete Locked Files on a Mac

Deleting most files on a Mac is usually straight forward but there are occasions when the system will not allow the user to complete the task without some additional input. One of the more common reasons for this is signified by the message, ‘The operation could not be completed because the item (its name) is locked.’ This is a safety feature, to stop the user from deleting a file that they either do not want to, or should not, remove. So the first question would have to be, do I really want to delete this file?

If you are quite sure that the answer is yes and you have Mac OSX 10.1 or later versions, then the first step is to simply try the following, which will delete locked files: press Shift-Option, or Option key at the same time as emptying the Trash.

If your machine has OSX 10.0 to 10.0.4 then you will need to unlock the file first. By clicking on the file you want to delete this will give you access to the File menu, here you will need to select ‘Get Info,’ followed by the ‘General’ option. This brings up a tick box labeled ‘Locked,’ which needs to be de-selected. The file can now be deleted by moving it to the Trash and then emptying it.

If a file cannot be unlocked using this method then there may be an issue with the permission granted to the user to do so. Click on the file once more and this time select ‘Ownership & Permissions’, the option ‘You Can’ needs to read ‘Read and write.’ To change this you may need to enter your OSX password, but after this the document can be unlocked and removed as normal.