Tips And Memories

Original IBM Selectric Typewriter

Instead of individual typebars that swung up to strike the ribbon and page in a traditional typewriter, the Selectric had a typeball and you could remove it and put on another one to change fonts. At that time I had a job that required me to type page long equations. When I got that new IBM I thought I was in heaven.

Here in Austin, TX where I live we have a store that buys and sells computers and parts and a friend of mine was standing in line at the counter along with a couple of women in their 50’s and a young man around 19. The young man was cleaning out his late grandfathers work room and had some items he wanted to sell. The last item he placed on the counter was an original IBM Selectric. He said “I don’t know where the monitor is and I can’t figure out where it would plug in, but is it worth anything like this?” My friend and the two women in line looked at each other and just smiled.

The Dock

A typical Dock

When it comes to the Dock I hear all kinds of comments. Some people love it and some hate it. Some want it to show, to be on the bottom of the screen, on the sides, to be hidden, whatever. Since we are dealing with an Apple product we have choices.  

The best place to start is with the Apple Menu. From the menu select Dock and make your basic choices. Where do you want the Dock placed and do you want it always present or hidden until you roll your cursor over it’s location which brings it forward.

Finding the Dock Preferences

Then, from that same screen, choose Dock Preferences, where you have more choices. Size refers to the size of the Dock, not the icons. Magnification happens when you roll over a specific icon in the dock. The best thing for each individual to do is experiment until you are happy.

Dock Preferences window

And, in case you don’t know, to remove an icon from the Dock just drag it off the Dock onto the desk top and release it. It will disappear with a poof because all the icons in the Dock are just aliases. The actual application icon remains in your Applications Folder unless you trash it.

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