Mac OS X Tiger Killer Tips
Scott Kelby
New Riders
368 pages
$29.99 US $41.99 CAN
ISDB 0-321-29054-2
Scott Kelby must be knocking ’em dead, as he currently has ten “Killer Tips” books to his credit. If they’re not selling, then publishers won’t be clamoring for him to keep cranking them out.
Well, I’m still alive after reading Kelby’s latest “Killer Tips” reprise, Mac OS X Tiger Killer Tips. MyMac.com publisher Tim Robertson reviewed Kelby’s Killer Tips for Panther late in 2002 and loved it. I also had a review copy of Killer Tips, and found it worthwhile, although it didn’t set my hair on fire. I found Kelby’s writing style cute for several pages, but it soon became cutesy.
After reading Killer Tips Tiger Edition, I can see that Kelby has his style, and he’s sticking to it. Cuteness pervades the book from start to finish, and I found my face turned sore from wincing regularly.
When is a tip not a tip?
I draw the line at calling a simple description of an application preference a tip. Devoting half of page 183 to telling the user how to turn off Dock magnification is a tip only if you’ve never laid a mouse to the Dock menu before. Unfortunately, Killer Tips has more than a few of such “tips,” and I found myself paging through the book looking for real honest-to-God tips. This reviewer feels a “tip” is good information that’s somewhat unknown, hard to find, and otherwise obscure. Anything else is just Help File regurgitation.
Happily, there are some fine tips to he found. Many OS X’ers don’t know you can send SMS text messages via iChat, or that the included BlueTooth File Exchange will send photos to your BlueTooth cellphone. A fair number of the Spotlight tips are not well documented elsewhere, yet are useful and easy-to-use.
Mac OS X users searching for real tips will do well to haunt the MacOSXHints.com web site. Webmaster Rob Griffiths has tip books out that truly merit the name.
Conclusion
If you’re rarely read manuals, never simply experiment with your Mac, or are just an OS X newbie looking for some fun shortcuts, then you might profit from reading Kelby’s Mac OS X Tiger Killer Tips. Advanced readers will probably find “Killer Tips” too basic. Both types of readers may find the writing style too corny.
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