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Windows to Mac Migration Guide/Advice?

Posted by Cliff on from the switching dept.

Harpa wonders: "Having spent more years than I care to count living and working with various Windows machines, I'm about to get my first Apple (an iBook). While eagerly waiting for the machine to be shipped, I'm starting to realize that changes I'm going to have to deal with may involve more than getting used to one less mouse button!I'm wondering if any Slashdot folk can help. What does an old-time Windows user have to learn/unlearn? To what extent can my Apple live happily with my existing PC's, my printer, my network? Everything I've found so far seems to be either geared for people who've never used a computer before or for existing Mac users. Is there any info available that supports us 'converts'?"

2 of 394 comments (clear)

  1. Learning/Unlearning goes both ways! by mh101 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I got myself a PowerMac a month or so ago. I've found that there were actually more things I had to temporarily unlearn going back to work, than I had to unlearn going to the Mac.

    One of the main things I had to unlearn on the Mac was pressing home/end to go to the beginning/end of a line - in OSX, they go to top and bottom of the document. Ctrl-left/right arrows are what are used instead.

    But after only having had my Mac a few days, I started doing Mac things without thinking. I kept (and still do!) reaching for the F9 key. You'll see what I mean soon enough. :) Aside from the eye candy (or iCandy?) aspect, that's a very useful feature - one keystroke, and you can see _every_ open window at once. A related question... anyone know of a free Expose clone for Windows XP?

    I think the biggest issue for me was switching my Windows iTunes library over to Mac iTunes, since even though my music is stored on a shared network drive, Apple's pathnames are different than Windows.

    --
    Duct tape is like the Force. It has a light side, a dark side, and it holds the universe together.
  2. Learn to trust the Mac with your files by wimbor · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The largest problem for me was starting to trust that the machine would handle all my files correctly.... Seriously...

    I've always been very 'file-centered', meaning that I wanted to have control of where my files would go on a hard drive. In DOS and later Windows you had to... or you lost track of everything. If I copied digital pictures to my Windows machine, I would copy them myself to the correct location, and then tell my photo editing program where they are located.

    The drag and drop functions of iPhoto and iTunes take care of your files for you, so you work the other way around. You let the application handle the file copying and archiving. These programs are meant to be very easy for users. A lot of functions on the Mac work that way, and I really had to get used to this.

    In the beginning I would try to copy pictures myself to the correct directory, only to find that when I imported them in iPhoto, not a link but the entire file was put into the iPhoto library. I really had to 'unlearn' wanting control these actions myself..