الأربعاء، 15 مايو 2013

How to connect game controllers to your Mac

If you have a gaming controller lying around, chances are you can use it with your Mac.
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While the Mac platform has not been noted for catering to hard-core gamers, there are still many popular gaming titles and gaming accessories available for the Mac OS. If you own a Mac and have a few games you would like to try, then you might also be interested in getting a gaming controller or two up and running with your system. While the Mac's keyboard and mouse ought to be enough for most purposes, having a dedicated gaming controller can give you the feel of playing with a gaming console.

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Of the game controllers available for home computers, only a few are officially supported on the Mac, but you can often get others, like those for the PS3, Wii, or Xbox, working just fine. To use any of these controllers with your system, you will first need to connect it to your system physically, and then install a driver package to make use of the controller's inputs.
For factory-supported devices like the Logitech F310 Gamepad and the Belkin Nostromo SpeedPad, drivers are available from their manufacturers; however, for unsupported devices like Wii Remote, PS3, and Xbox controllers, you will have to use a third-party driver package.
The easiest of these unsupported remotes to configure is likely the Xbox controller, which can be (physically) connected directly via USB or with a relatively cheap receiver for wireless Xbox controllers. If you have a PS3 controller, you'll need to follow a quick procedure to establish a connection to your Mac. First, connect the controller to your Mac, and then open the Bluetooth system preferences and make sure Bluetooth is both on and discoverable. Next, hold the PS button on the controller for a few seconds, then unplug the USB cable, and the controller should appear in the Bluetooth system preferences and be available for use in a number of games and programs. A Wii Remote can also be connected via Bluetooth.
Once the gaming controller is connected, you can use one of several software driver packages to configure its inputs. The first is Joystick Mapper, with which you should be able to configure most gaming controllers. The second is the Tattiebogle driver for Xbox controllers, which should work for both wired and wireless (using the receiver noted above) controllers.
For Wii users, the program DarwiinRemote and the Wjoy driver should allow you to crudely connect and configure the motion-sensitive Wii Remote, but if you have trouble establishing a connection using these drivers in OS X 10.8, then you can try a test build of DarwiinRemote that should work in the latest version of OS X.
A final couple of driver options for these controllers are GamePad Companion, which is available in the Apple App Store, and USB Overdrive, which has been a long-standing option for configuring USB input devices on the Mac platform. These last tools are useful especially if you have a controller that only has driver support for Windows. When connected to the Mac, the button inputs will be registered, and universal drivers like USB Overdrive should be able to recognize them and allow you to assign global or application-specific settings to them.

Questions? Comments? Have a fix? Post them below or e-mail us!
Be sure to check us out on Twitter and the CNET Mac forums.
Originally posted at MacFixIt
Topics:
Tips,
Mac OS X
Tags:
Xbox,
game controller,
Mac,
gaming,
OS X,
PS3,
Wii
Topher, an avid Mac user for the past 15 years, has been a contributing author to MacFixIt since the spring of 2008. One of his passions is troubleshooting Mac problems and making the best use of Macs and Apple hardware at home and in the workplace.
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Five ways to right-click on a Mac trackpad

Are you using the best way to perform a right- or secondary-click on a MacBook? Take a look at these five options to see if there might be a better way.
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(Credit: Matt Elliott/CNET)
My friend and old boss Ben Patterson answered a reader question on his blog about the various ways in which one can right-click on a Mac trackpad. I read the post and was surprised that my preferred method of right-clicking was not covered. Although my method is a derivative of one of the four Ben outlined in his post, I still count it as a separate and distinct manner of right-clicking. Without further ado, let us discuss the five ways in which you can perform a right-click on a Mac trackpad.
1. Click with thumb while making contact with two fingers
This is how your intrepid blogger initiates a right click. Since my index finger is usually mousing about on the trackpad while my thumb lies in wait to click, I simply drop the ol' middle finger down next to my mousin' finger and click with my thumb to perform a right-click. I use it because requires the least amount of movement from my standard mousing-and-clicking posture; my index finger and thumb remain in their usual position, leaving me to move only my middle finger down to the surface of the trackpad.
2. Click with two fingers
Instead of placing two fingers on the trackpad and using your thumb to right-click, you can simply use your two fingers to click the trackpad.
3. Assign the bottom-right corner
If the two-finger right-click methods feel awkward to you, you can assign the bottom-left corner as a right-click zone in System Preferences. Launch System Preferences from the Apple menu and choose Trackpad. Next, click the Point & Click menu item at the top and you'll see a Secondary click item. By default, it's set up to click with two fingers, but you can set it to click in the bottom-right corner.
(Credit: Screenshot by Matt Elliott/CNET)
4. Assign the bottom-left corner
See above but change bottom-right corner to bottom-left corner.
5. Click the trackpad while holding down the Control key
This last option requires two hands, but should you want to involve your off hand in the right-clicking procedure, you can hold down the Control key when clicking the trackpad to perform a right-click.
(Via Here's the Thing)
Topics:
Computers and hardware
Tags:
Mac,
trackpad
Matt Elliott, a technology writer for more than a decade, is a PC tester, Mac user, and amateur photographer based in New Hampshire.
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How to create an OS X installer from Apple's Internet Recovery

You can create a standalone OS X installation drive without having purchased OS X from the App Store.
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Since its move to online purchasing and distribution of its operating system software, Apple has no longer included gray recovery DVDs with its Mac systems. Instead, if you wish to reinstall OS X you simply reboot to the OS X Recovery HD and use the tools there to format your hard drive (should you choose to), then run the installer to download OS X from Apple's servers.
While convenient for those with fast broadband connections, sometimes you may find yourself in a location without fast Internet and would benefit from having a way to reinstall OS X from scratch. Granted, the use of Time Machine makes restoring from backup relatively easy, but if for some reason you need to repartition the hard drive or install a new one on your system, you will first need to install OS X again.
One easy option (which I have discussed before) is to purchase OS X from the App Store, then create a boot drive from its contents. However, this requires you to purchase a separate license of OS X. The copy of OS X that is included with your Mac is not considered a retail purchase, so unfortunately you will be able to access it only through Apple's installer. However, there is a small workaround that you can use to capture this copy and put it on a USB drive for use offline.
Apple Discussion Communities member "keg55" outlines the method for doing this, which involves installing OS X to an external drive, then removing the drive before the installer can complete, thereby preserving the installation image.
  1. Get an 8GB or higher USB drive and plug it into your Mac.
  2. Restart to Recovery mode by holding Command-R at startup. (Internet Recovery by including the Option key here will also work.)
  3. Choose the option to Install OS X and select the USB drive as the destination.
  4. Proceed with the installation and monitor the download. When your Mac automatically restarts, it will display a black screen with no video output for a second or two. At this point, unplug the USB drive.
With the drive unplugged, your Mac will boot normally to its internal drive. Now you can reattach the external drive, on which you should see a folder called "OS X Install Data" that contains a disk image file called InstallESD.dmg. (If this is missing, then you likely waited too long to unplug the drive.) Copy this file to your computer, then use Disk Utility along with the standard instructions for creating an OS X installation drive to restore the contents of this image to your USB drive.
Once finished, you should be able to reboot your system with the Option key held down, then choose the USB drive which will load the OS X installer and allow you to reinstall OS X without the need for connection to the Internet.

Questions? Comments? Have a fix? Post them below or e-mail us!
Be sure to check us out on Twitter and the CNET Mac forums.
Originally posted at MacFixIt
Topics:
Mac OS X,
Troubleshooting
Tags:
Mac,
Recovery HD,
OS X,
Lion,
Mountain Lion
Topher, an avid Mac user for the past 15 years, has been a contributing author to MacFixIt since the spring of 2008. One of his passions is troubleshooting Mac problems and making the best use of Macs and Apple hardware at home and in the workplace.
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