two questions - sleep mode and ical

[flaith]

hi all
two questions, one probably silly and one definitely silly

1. sleep mode - what is it? does it use much power? does the hdd spin up? can i throw my sleeping pbook in my bag and wander around? is it a good idea to never (or almost never) turn my pbook off and just leave it on sleep mode all the time?

2. ical, very nice I like it. only thing is that before i run it the icon in the the dock always has the wrong date - mine has 17th july. surely i can get it to display the current date.

and while i'm on dates, in the toolbar i can only get the day and time, not the date, day and time like the options say i can ??

thanks...

 

[akm]

2. ical, very nice I like it. only thing is that before i run it the icon in the the dock always has the wrong date - mine has 17th july. surely i can get it to display the current date.

For this query, see: http://outtacontext.com/life/archive/000301.shtml (See post 'A Birthday Present from Apple')

 

[mad jew]

Sleep mode essentially means that only power is being supplied to the RAM and everything else is turned off as far as I know. You can pretty much treat your PowerBook/iBook like it's off when it's sleeping; throw it in a bag and carry it 'round etc.

I don't think there's a way of showing the right date in iCal unless the app is running, sorry.

And I have no idea why your day/time wont show the date. How big is your screen? Has the menu bar run out of room (a problem on 1024x768 screens)?

 

[Jay42]

1. Yes, the sleep feature of Mac OS X is great! Many people claim it to be their favorite feature. I rarely turn my powerbook off. The only times I do are for updates that require a restart and if I know that I will be away for a long time (as in more than two weeks). I often sleep my powerbook and store it in my bag for plane trips or just going to the coffee shop. As for power, some people have claimed to have a powerbook sleep for almost a month on a single battery charge, so its not much (hd doesn't spin).

2. You do have to start iCal to display the correct date. One option is to have it start and autohide automatically when you start the computer. Go to the apple menu>system prefs.>accounts and click on the startup items tab. You can add and subtract apps that start up automatically and click the little check boxes to hide them when they start.

You can adjust the date and time in the menu bar in sys prefs. as well.

EDIT: whoops, little late.

 

[flaith]

excellent - thanks guys

i went with jay42's solution in the end - i use iCal alot so there's no problem having it running all the time. The only thing that bothered me then was the RAM i might be using by having it running (i only have 512 so i'm a bit conscious of that). but the same solution presented itself - i put Activity Monitor into the startup tab and changed it's icon to Show Memory Usage, so now i can keep a track of which apps are using all my precious memory (dashboard mainly!!) solved.
- How do i close dashboard completely so it gives back all that RAM???

also thanks to mad jew for the sleep tip - no shut down for me from now on!

as for the date in the menu bar - i am running 1024 (pbook 12) so maybe that's why the date won't show. I've played around with all the icons and no joy. i would like it but i have the date in the iCal icon now so i guess i can get by on that

 

[Jay42]

- How do i close dashboard completely so it gives back all that RAM???

Either left click the dashboard icon and hold it down and choose quit. Or hold the apple key and tap the tab button at the same time. Highlight dashboard and hit q.

 

[flaith]

thanks again jay42

only problem is that neither works
- when i hold down the mouse button on the icon i don't get a Quit option
- when i command-tab i don't see the dashboard - even if it's running...

 

[stridey]

thanks again jay42

only problem is that neither works
- when i hold down the mouse button on the icon i don't get a Quit option
- when i command-tab i don't see the dashboard - even if it's running...

The easiest way to disable Dashboard is simply never to use it. It's not actually its own application, it's part of the Dock, and once you bring it up for the first time after login, it loads all its widgets. Opening Terminal and typing

killall Dock

will restart the Dock, effectively quitting Dashboard (until you bring it up again). If you want to disable dashboard completely, there is a way. I can't remember it off the top of my head, but if you're interested I'll hunt it up (or maybe somebody else knows).

Edit: Instructions to disable Dashboard can be found here

 

[flaith]

hmmm interesting stridey

killall Dock works alright but now to get a bit fussy i want to automate it so i don't have to go into terminal and start typing

i'm a recent switcher - does a mac have 'batch files'??

i tried to add a keyboard shortcut but i don't think i can 'pass in' the command

so how about a "killall Dock widget" - that would be doable and really handy, right?
have it on the desktop in the corner and when your activity monitor shows memory is low just click it!