Q. When I choose a printer, I see the same printer twice
when running Classic. One of the printers I see doesn’t work. How do I get rid
of the second printer?
A. Many users still required Classic to run legacy
applications. They could be sales or accounting applications, which may never
be written for Mac OS X. By the way, Classic is not supported on the new Intel
Macs – they’re “greyed out” so you can’t open them. The double printer
you’re seeing is the result of setting up the printer twice.
Normally you would setup a printer using the “Printer Setup
Utility” (located in the Application’s Utility folder). You could choose Print
from a Mac OS X application and choose “Edit Printer
” from the pull-down list
of printers. When the “Printer List” appears, you choose Add and Browse for a
printer. When you select a printer, your Mac will attempt to find the
appropriate PPD (Postscript Printer Description). You should note that if it
can’t find it, you can manually choose one by navigating to the PPD file. If
you want the Mac to find it, put it in
“/Library/Printers/PPDs/Contents/Resources/en.lprog”. You can also rename the
printers in the Print Setup Utility, if you have more than one printer of the
same model.
The next time you start Classic, it will review the Mac OS X
printer list you’ve built and make those printers available to Classic
applications. The older applications can use the Mac OS X printer queues.
However, when you’re in Classic mode, (you’ll see the old multicolored Apple in
the top left corner), some applications require you to set up a printer with
the “Chooser.” These applications cannot use the Mac OS X queues. When you
create a “Classic” printer queue using the Chooser, you’ll see the printer only
in Classic.
The only way to remove the doubly defined printer is to
Trash the “LaserWriter8 Prefs” file from the Printing Preferences (located in
the System Folder’s “Preferences” folder). Remember, when you restart Classic,
it will rebuild the LaserWriter 8 Prefs when it starts.
If the Mac OS X print queue loses your job, then the Classic
application doesn’t support this method of printing. You’ll have to use the
Chooser to set up the printer and you’ll be seeing double again. You can always
rename the Mac OS X queue as mentioned above.
Q. I’ve recently switch over to Mac OS X Mail and I want to
import my mail. Is there a way to get my old messages or are they gone forever?
A. There are a couple of methods for importing some or all
of your messages. Mac OS X employs the standard “mbox” format for email. Mbox
is an old UNIX format for storing email messages. The messages are concatenated
(a ten-dollar techie word meaning joined one after another) starting with a
“From” and ending with a blank line. Apple’s Mail, Microsoft’s Entourage and
Mozilla’s Thunderbird, all support mail in this format.
If you’re coming from a PC (it’s about time if you are) and
you’re using Microsoft Outlook, you can install Mozilla’s Thunderbird (or
Netscape Mail) and import your messages. The mbox messages will be stored in
your Mozilla folder in your folder under Documents and settings. You can send
the files that have the same name as your Mail folders (ignore the .msf files
– they’re indexes). Add “mbox” to the end of the files (you can do this
when they’re on your Mac).
If you’re coming from a Mac, you’ll find your messages in
various places depending on your program. Netscape stores messages in “/System
Folder/Preferences/Netscape Users/[your name]/Mail.” Again, as on the PC, the
mbox files don’t have the “.mbox” extension. Most of the newer mail
applications store messages in your “Documents” folder. On Mac OS 9, the
Documents folder is at the top level of the hard drive. On Mac OS X, you’ll
find the Documents folder in your home folder (“/Users/[your name]/Documents).
When you’ve copied your mbox files to your mac, launch the
new mail application and drag and drop the mbox files onto the messages pane.
In Entourage, drop the files on “On My Computer” and they’ll import into your
“Database” file (which is in “Microsoft User Data/Office X Identities/Main
Identity”) in your home folder. If you’re using Mail, you can choose Import
from the File Menu and then select “Other” from the list. You will then
navigate to the folder which contains your “.mbox” files so that they can be
imported.
Timothy Mitra assists companies in mastering information
technology in pre-press, print and web design. Do you have a question you would
like answered by the IT guy? Please contact him at: E: tim@it-guy.com C:
416-278-8609
