From Windows 7 to Mac

After some works, I am above to transfer most of the data from PC to Mac. In the process, quite some challenges have been resolved, perhaps it is good to write down so that I could remember what I had done earlier...

1. Word / Excel / Powerpoint
   The first major problem is to read the documents! Preview comes with Mac OS Lion is a read only program. Many options are available in Mac, such as iWork, NeoOffice or even Microsoft Office for Mac but all of them would still have certain compatibility issues.
   
   The conclusion is to use the native Windows Word, Excel and Powerpoint and it is the only solution can guarantee 100% compatable....
   
   So, the 2nd day I setup a VMWare Fusion with MS offices...
    
2. Synchronization of Outlook / BlackBerry / HTC Flyer
   The 2nd major problem is the synchronization for the above. A very common answer from my friends is to go cloud (either Google or MobileMe). Personally, I don't like to much private information goes Cloud and I prefer to keep them locally...
   
   Then, the sync program from BlackBerry supports both Mac and PC. However, the sync program from HTC only supports PC (Outlook)! Luckily, because of the Office documents problem above, MS office is there and I just need to migrate the pst folders as what I did previously for my new PC.
   
3. iTune
   iTune is a headache in the begining. I was trying to sync with the iTune in Windows because the HTC Sync only supports Windows. Lot of issues with library path which makes sharing iTune library between Mac and Windows impossible. Then the solution is to use free tool 'Easy Phone Tunes' from Market.
    
4. iPhoto and Picasa
   I was suggested to iPhoto in Mac but it is not really a nice job to re-manage all the Photos again in a new photo manager. From the web, transferring from Picasa Win to Picasa Web may also cause problems. So I have used the Picasa in Windows (VMWare) as of now... Maybe when I have time, I will try to migrate to iPhoto or Picasa in MAc.

After all, I am still happy with the Mac experience till now. Some of the things come with Mac are really nice and I have been looking for these for a while.

1. Native Unix Command
   This is really nice and i dont need to setup the cygwin anymore... SSH is also built-in...
   
2. Virtual Desktop
   The Mission Control is the Virtual Desktop implementation in Mac. Currently, I have setup two desktops such that one for Mac and one for VM... I can also configurate the VM such that it will always start in the Desktop 2.
   
3. Chinese input and Chinese Hand Writing
   Chinese Input (倉頡) is still not yet as good as my Palm CJKOS. However, it is still useable. It comes with a code lookup tool and I can always use the Hand-writing or paste a Chinese charater to look up the code. Not only it just looks up the code for 倉頡, but it also looks up the codes for the other in-use method...
   
4. Time Machine
   Backup feature is something I need to spend time in my PC for long and I don't have a good solution yet. It is either too much of work for a backup or the solution does not backup / restore very well.
   Time Machine is great. It is just automatic and restore is not difficult at all.



5. Dictionary
   Finally there is an OS comes with a nice dictionary ("New Oxford American English". and "New Oxford British English").

Of course, lot of other issues are still pending...

1. Java / Eclipse / BlackBerry / Android SDK
   Apple is using it own development framework. Transferring the workplace from Eclipse BlackBerry SDK to Coca is not straight forward at all...
   
2. Firefox Multitouch gesture
   Firefox, which is my favorite browser in Windows, does not support the Multitouch festure in Lion, waiting for the update.
   
3. Native office application
   NeoOffice.... but also no time to try.
   
4. Finder and Keyboard Shortcut
   I missed the 'Windows' + E to open the Windows Explorer. Mac does not provide the exact same short-cut to open Finder...

I fixed my iTunes

Following the purchase of the new laptop, I had setup all the software again.

It was so troublesome and I got probelms for every software that I installed, including iTunes.

After the installation of iTunes 9.0.3, it started without any major problems. But the GUI showed Chinese. Then I changed the GUI language to English.

After the switch of the language, the iTunes could not start! It showed "iTunes cannot run because some of its required files are missing. Please reinstall iTunes." when I started it. iTunes could not start, of course.

With so many uninstall and install, it did not work. The same error message kept. Then I decided to dig into details - I monitored the iTunes configuration.

I found that the language preference was actaully written into registry HKCU\Software\Apple Computer, Inc.\iTunes\LangID.

Nothing would be there with the default language was being used, while it would added / updated when another prefer language was used. When I set the iTune to English, iTunes could not start with the error message about. When I removed the registry, or change to 1028 which was the LangID for Chinese, iTune could start.

The miracle began here. I tried to switch every possible languages to see what happen. Simplified Chinese - did not work, English (UK) did not work also.

Next, I tried Swedish. iTunes could start !
I changed my preferred language to Swedish, iTunes could start!

And last but not the least, the language of the interface was still in English.
An iTunes installed on a Windows 7 with Hong Kong as system locale should use Swedish as the preferred language so that it displayed English properly.
This is so unbelievable!!!

Funny....Anyway, I don't really care.

But, the voice over did not work again!