Features, features everywhere, and a new guide needed to explain them. Citing the more than 100 new features in Mac OS X v.10.3 (Panther), O’Reilly & Associates announced “Running Mac OS X Panther,” James Duncan Davidson’s tome that promises to “take you deep inside Mac OS X’s core.” It’s available now with a US$39.95 list price.
The new book is aimed at experienced users who want to dig into Panther and customize it. It’s organized into three parts: Getting Started, which introduces the new OS; Administration Essentials, which takes you through the tools needed to keep Panther purring at optimal speed; and Networking and Network Services, in which you learn how your Mac uses Panther to communicate with networks internal and external. Topics covered include task scheduling, using HFS+ and the Journaled filesystem, hacking plist files to tweak preferences, delving into NetInfo, LDAP, and other Directory Services, and managing networking.
“You’ll learn how to get the most out of the pretty GUI as well as how to dive into the Unix layer of the system to take fine-grained control when you need to,” promised Davidson.