Rating: 
Summary: This book is the perfect companion to your Macintosh.
Review: Having switched to the superior Macintosh platform a few years ago I was left wondering exactly how to do things. The Macintosh is painfully easy to use but there are times when you need help "thinking differently". As a long time Windows user I had to "re-learn" a few things in order to achieve the objective of a fluid computer-user dynamic. Because of the Macintosh, and this book, using computers is fun again!This book is simultaneously educational and enjoyable! Imagine that, a *computer book* being enjoyable! This is not your father's Fortran/Cobol, dryly written instructional book, that's for sure. David Pogue's writing style is both thorough and concise. He writes with a wry and immediately likable levity that simply makes you enjoy reading about Mac OS X. His writing for NYTimes.com, O'Reilly & Associates and various "For Dummies" books has undoubtedly helped hone his technique. If you're a person switching to Mac OS X from Mac OS 9 you'll find the "Where'd It Go" section immensely helpful. It details the differences between OS 9 and OS X and how to find that certain program or preference you used before. It also has a "Where'd It Go" for Windows users, which shows how to do things "the Mac way" and help ease the migration from Windows to Mac OS X. Even if you're completely new to computers, this book will undoubtedly alleviate your fears and help you get to working with Macs in a very fast manner. It's a great "In A Nutshell" type book, but unlike some of those books it bridges the gap between complete novice and intermediate user needs. If you're looking for an advanced/expert book or one covering unix then you'd probably want to look at O'Reilly's "Learning Unix For Mac OS X" or "Mac OS X In A Nutshell". Even though this book is written for novices and intermediate users, it covers some unix/terminal commands. It also covers how to use the web, FTP, SSH/Telnet, VPN, Firewall, networking, burning CD's and DVD's, making mp3's and playing them and so on. But it does so in an easy to understand fashion. The nice thing about this book, besides how easy it is to read and all the things it will help you do, is that it can be read from front to back or can be read by skipping around at your whim. Once you read this book you'll be able to do nearly anything on your Macintosh. And that's what its all about. Pros: 1) very intelligently written
2) thorough, without being boring
3) concise and to the point
4) lots of "how to's" with actual screenshots from Mac OS X
5) covers all aspects of using a Macintosh
6) very current (covers the latest version of OS X called "Jaguar" as of 2003)
7) great index Cons: None
Rating:
Summary: top drawer
Review: Here's your Jaguar reference manual - but take the time to read the whole book. David Pogue is that rare technical writer who has style, not heavy handed humor or thinly veiled geek-speak. I bought the first edition, upgraded to Jaguar, and felt compelled to add the 2nd edition; worth every penny.
Rating:
Summary: This book should come with your Macintosh!
Review: That title basically sums up how I feel about this book. When I purchased my iBook last year, it came with a 20 page (or so it seems) brochure (not a book/manual) of how the machine works and how to operate it. I was new to Mac's and the new OS X, so I felt quite lost. Thankfully, I had heard about The MIssing Manual books. Mr. Pough has a wonderful ability to get technical things written in a manner of which I could understand and apply. I have learned alot about the OS and would highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to learn more. He also has a great website filled with additional info not found in the book. Apple should take a lesson from Mr. Pough.
Rating:
Summary: the only manual you will need....
Review: This book touts itself as " the book that should have been in the box." and that is true. It is terrific; straight forward, to the point, without the stupid humor that you find in other books. As a first introduction to Mac's unix based OSX, I found it comprehensive and ended with a thorough understanding of the operating system. I bought it thinking that it would be my first OSX manual, but after reading it, I think it will be my only OS X manual. The only drawback may be that it doesn't go into detail on the iLife apps of iphoto, imovie, idvd, but that is probably because Mr. Pogue has written separate books on these applications. I plan to purchase those books also.
Rating:
Summary: I just hope there's a third edition for 10.3
Review: I finally (finally) picked up Mac OS X: The Missing Manual. I've been meaning to grab it since I first heard that David Pogue wrote a book on OS X; I've been a fan of his for a while. I remember reading his stuff in Macworld - on System 7, even - when someone gave me a subscription (many) years ago, and his New York Times columns have generally been pretty good as well. Mac OS X: The Missing Manual is exactly what you'd expect if you've read any of his other books or columns - it's clear and straightforward without seeming dumbed down. His writing tends to be fairly light and often funny, making for particularly readable technical books. That's not to say it's without substance, though - within the first chunk of this book (which is pushing six hundred pages) I'd already had a dozen of my exisiting questions answered as well as plenty I hadn't even thought to wonder about. It seems pretty definitely directed at people who've been using Mac OS for a long time and are switching to OS X. Given what OS X is, it's not surprising that it takes some getting used to, despite vaguely looking like Mac OS. If you've never used OS 8 or 9 and don't have any existing Mac habits to unlearn, you might not even need a book like this - but I suspect it would still be pretty useful. Pogue also takes time to address issues people might have switching to OS X from Unix or Windows, but the focus is on comparisons to older versions of Mac OS. As the title implies, Apple documentation tends to be slim to non-existent, and this is by far the most thorough OS X book I've seen yet. It functions exactly as promised - I keep my copy on the shelf over my desk, and when I have a question about something I remember from OS 9 or why something I know from BSD doesn't work under 10.2, I can just look it up. The second edition is more of the same - the book is bigger, fatter, and covers Jaguar. It was published in October 2002, so it's not quite up to the minute, but it's certainly not outdated yet. I shelled out another twenty bucks when I first saw it, and I don't regret it - the only major complaint I'd had about the first edition was that its usefulness was somewhat impaired when 10.2 came out. It's possible I'll feel the same way about the second edition when faced with 10.3 - but maybe Pogue will write another book. I would recommend this book for just about every OS X user, regardless of how recently you switched - people who installed it back during the public beta will probably get just as much out of the second edition as those who just bought their first ever Mac. However, you'll probably find it more useful if you're coming from older versions of Mac OS than if you've just switched from another Unix or Windows, but that's not to say it isn't worth reading in those cases. It's relatively [inexpensive] for an O'Reilly book - 712 pages, list price is [$$$] - so you can't really go wrong.
Rating:
Summary: Great book, great authors
Review: David Pogue is a technology columnist at the New York times and he has brought together a stellar group of Mac experts to write a very useful and fun book on OS X through 10.2, I have already learned many new tips that make my Mac more fun and easy to use.
Rating: 
Summary: Very good manual
Review: You do know that Mac OS X is Unix, right? I love telling Mac people this - so many of them still don't know. I also love that Apple has gone in this direction. It's wonderful, because it opens up whole new worlds for Unix folk. It also helps the Linux software market and vice versa: if you write software for one, a port to the other should certainly be a lot easier than a port to Windows. I am of course not yet experienced enough to make a complete judgement of this book's value. I do have a little Mac experience from the early 90's, but I'm more than weak there. So I really appreciated that the author expects that some of his audience will have no Mac background at all. Throughout the book, it's evident that he has that in mind, and there is even a whole appendix devoted to people switching from Windows. Well, that's not exactly my thing either, but I still found it helpful. Of course it is difficult for someone so intimately familiar with Macs to avoid knowledge assumptions entirely. There are a few places here and there that make reference to things you just wouldn't know about if you have never seen a Mac at all. Still, I suspect that someone with even less Mac exposure than I have would not get completely confused. The Unix related chapters are accurate and reasonable. There's not much of anything really geekish, but I really didn't expect that from this sort of book. In general, the book is written well, with a light hearted style and enough humor to keep it from ever being dull. I suspect that this will be by my side constantly as I start exploring this wonderful new world of Apple operating systems.
Rating:
Summary: Very worthwhile
Review: I poured over this book for a week when I got it and I'd have to say it is in hot competition with the Ray et al. Mac OS X Unleashed book for the winner of the "must have" category. This book is probably best for the Mac OS X Aqua power user who wants to get the most out of the Aqua environment in Jaguar, including how best to run Classic apps without cramping OS X's style. You probably couldn't go past this book for its great design, excellent writing style and breadth of handy tips. If you want to go further, say: set up your computer as a mail server; learn the basics of using mySQL or get a command of the CLI, then Ray et al.'s Mac OS X Unleashed is probably more for you - but then again, you could do what I did and get them both - I'm really glad I did!
Rating:
Summary: Great book to keep as a manual for OS X
Review: This book is indeed the missing manual. Much different than his "dummies" books, this is a little heafter and focused more on advanced problems and activities.
Mr. Pogue does still keep to his light and easy to read writing style. This book will not be one you will necessarily read through, though you may skim each chapter for important topics, it will serve as an indespensible bookshelf companion and guide to discover many secrets and tips of OS X.
Rating:
Summary: Shouldn't even be necessary.
Review: When you read this book you realize why Apple doesn't include "instructions" anymore. The whole point of the Mac OS (I thought) was set it & forget it. Imagine an operating system that takes 700+ pages to explain. How much worse can Windows be? That said, Pogue does his usual excellent job. I give this 4 stars because I downloaded one of the shareware programs he reccomends and it crashed OS X so badly I had to wipe the drive clean and start over--and yes, I'm writing this review in OS 9.1!
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