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Location	Des Moines, IA
Occupation	Student
Mac	Mac mini G4
AIM	notwolffenstein
Website	wolffenstein.com

I am an administrator of Applepedia. I switched from PCs to Macs in August 2005 and have specialized in helping others make the transition to Macs. I mainly use my Mac for academics, audio production, and programming.

Macs

I have a Mac mini. It was upgraded to 1GB RAM and a Newertech miniStack v1 external 250GB 7200RPM hard drive enclosure.

I gave my big brother an iBook G4 as a Christmas present. He never used a computer before, but he quickly learned how to use it and loves it.

Unsorted Info

Creating a User-Friendly Guest Account

Having a guest account is useful for other people that want to check their email or send a quick instant message to a friend. By creating a seperate account just for guests, you protect your personal data as well as minimizing malicious system damage. Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger) has individual account parental controls on bundled apps and Finder from the Account preference pane. The ability to use a limited version of Finder is especially helpful in creating a guest account, but it can also be a thorn in the administrator's side to set up. The basic gist is that you should setup a new account and configure it as desired, then enable Parental Controls and adjust as necessary. Personally, my guests always ask where is the web browser and AOL Instant Messenger? This is how I resolved it.

1. Create a new account in the Accounts preference pane. I named the account "Guest" and did not specify a password. Do not enable any Parental Controls.
2. Log out your current account, then log in the guest account.
3. Configure the account as necessary. I changed some settings in System Preferences like keyboard modifiers keys, no shortcut keys to Dashboard, and random wallpaper on login.
4. Although Safari can be used, I configured Camino as the browser my guests will use. Since Camino has the Mozilla Gecko engine that powers Firefox, it performs and renders similar to the Windows version of Firefox. So if someone wants to show me a funny YTMND, they won't get mad with the browser's performance. I set the homepage to Google.
5. Configure an instant messenger client. I used iChat AV, even though Adium is much better. Adium does not have easy guest logins; the user has to do multiple steps in order to access their buddy lists. iChat is restricted to AOL Instant Messenger, but it can do an easy login as well as support most proprietary features of AIM.
   1. Open iChat AV and walk through the wizard. I used John Doe as a name and my AIM account as the default (in case if the guest has to message me but can't remember my screen name). I can't remember if a password is needed, but I entered my password so then I could change the window position. iChat has a "feature" where it won't save the window position if no account is logged in.
   2. In iChat preferences, ensure the AIM account is enabled and will login to the account when iChat is launched. If you entered a password, delete the password from the same screen.
   3. Quit iChat, then relaunch it. You should get a simple login window asking for an AIM screen name and password. If not, check iChat preferences.
6. Set the web browser and instant messaging client to open on login. This can be done either from the Accounts preference pane, or from the context menu of the app's Dock icon.
7. Log out the guest account, then log in an administrative account and turn on Finder & System Parental Controls for the guest account. Click the Configure.. button, enable Simple Finder, deselect all applications, then enable access to the web browser and instant messaging client.
8. Confirm settings, then log out the administrative account and log in the guest account to confirm desired settings.

From a security standpoint, this is not the most secure method available, but it is the most practical compromise. The user can potentially change the browser's homepage to a malicious website, or use the guest account to transfer illegal content to others. In the future I would like the ability to lock out application preferences, or even better, a frozen-state account that reverts to the desired settings on every login. A frozen-state account would mean no maintenance for the administrator, and more security and privacy for the user as their data is deleted with no possible recovery. This is not possible unless the Mac is part of a OS X Server-powered local network. That's one aspect of the computing experience that Linux and Windows does better, sadly.