Author Joe Kissell has been informing and entertaining Mac users for years through his books, TidBITS columns and Macworld articles. He's recently finished a pair of books for the Take Control ebook series that will help you learn how to keep your Mac running at its most efficient pace, as well as tell you what to do when something does go wrong.

In the first book, "Take Control of Maintaining Your Mac, Second Edition" (US$10), Joe describes actions you can take weekly, monthly, and annually to enjoy top performance from your Mac. He also tells you what not to do, illustrating tasks that take a lot of time and provide few benefits.

The second book is an update to Kissell's "Take Control of Troubleshooting Your Mac" (US$10). Joe's expertise really shines in this ebook as he tells you what to do with Macs that won't turn on, how to react when you're getting repeated kernel panics, and actions to perform when internet connections go down or printers are balking.

If you already own an earlier edition of either one of the books, you can get a discount on the upgrade. New buyers can bundle the two books for just $16 for a top-notch set of guides.

In the interest of full disclosure, TUAW blogger Steve Sande has written several titles for the Take Control series.

Whenever we write about Mac OS X utilities for system maintenance, our readers always remind of us one freeware utility that does a lot of work at no cost -- OnyX from Titanium Software.

This multifunction application does verification of your Startup Disk and System file structure, performs a lot of miscellaneous tasks for system maintenance and cleanup, and lets you configure some hidden parameters for the Finder, Dock, Dashboard, Exposé, Safari, the Login window, and even some of Apple's applications.

The improvements in OnyX 2.0 include faster operation, and deleting the applications cache, Internet cache, and logs has been improved. Most of these improvements are due to the application now being complied with the latest version of Xcode. One new feature lets you rebuild Mail's envelope index in the automation panel.

While the version 2.0 download is only available for Leopard, you can also download earlier versions for Tiger, Panther, and Jaguar. Support is pretty good; it's done through Titanium's forums and there are always answers available for most of your questions.

If you don't use OnyX, what's your favorite free Mac system maintenance utility?

Maybe this is a coincidence, coming as it does on the eve of a big Apple announcement... it could be meaningless, just regularly scheduled inventory maintenance, the BB version of the yellow sticky note. Sure, that's probably it -- nothing to see here. Yeah. No reason at all to think that Best Buy's website downtime could have anything, really, to do with the anticipated introduction of new Apple laptops tomorrow... right?

As if our conspiracy generators weren't already in full gear: suppose it is related. Could Best Buy be getting an exclusive deal on the $900 laptop outside of Apple's own stores? [Note that many sites are now reporting the "$899 MacBook" may in fact be a Cinema Display.]

Thanks to Horza for the tip

All the way since back when I started using a Mac, the program that's been most recommended to new Mac users in my experience isn't Adium, Transmit, or Quicksilver (although those are certain all terrific apps/reasons to be a Mac owner) -- Cocktail is the one that I've seen on the Top 10 Mac apps most often. And there's no question that while Adium and those other apps might be flashier or more UI-driven, Cocktail is the nitro you toss in your car's fuel line to supercharge all of the stuff under the hood. From disk repairs and standard maintenance, to network optimization and cache and log file clearing, Cocktail is exactly the kind of program you buy a Mac for -- it gives you control over almost everything going on in your computer.

They've just updated to 4.1.4, with a whole slew of optimizations to show for it -- the application itself has shrunk in size by 50%, and there are lots of upgrades for faster and more reliable performance. Additionally, compatibility with FAT32 volumes have been addressed, and they've upgraded Automator actions, so they've given you even more ways to control everything you've got.

Great app, well worth the $14.95 for a single-user license. All the other signature Mac apps will let you do your daily tasks in style and with a little flair, but Cocktail is the one that will help you do them quickly and cleanly.

We've all awaited the .Mac to MobileMe switch for a while now (some more than others). However, Apple's 6 hour time table for upgrading to MobileMe turned awry and led into an almost 24 hour up, down, up, up, down cycle.

If you're like most users experiencing the 24 outage, then you haven't been able to login and experience MobileMe first hand. So why not take a look at our gallery? We've got pictures of the entire MobileMe suite of web applications and user preferences: from the login screen to storage partitioning.

Most of us know that we should perform regular maintenance on our Macs, usually simple things such as doing backups and shaking pizza crumbs out of the keyboard. But did you know that there are a number of UNIX System Tasks that are available for keeping your Mac running at peak performance?

A lot of Mac users don't want to pull up Terminal and type arcane text into the command line, so MacDentro has a GUI front end that you can use to run those commands and keep your Mac cruisin'. IceClean, now at version 3.0.6 has menus for OS X Maintenance, Cleanup, Security and Network, and Utilities, all of which are packed with menu choices or keyboard shortcut equivalents that make mundane maintenance chores simple to perform.

There are other apps available -- Maintenance and MacJanitor come to mind -- that perform similar tasks, but neither of those programs comes close to the depth of capability of IceClean.

The price is right, too - it's free, although you might want to send the MacDentro folks a donation if you find yourself using IceClean regularly. Download IceClean here.

Tip of the hat to our very own Victor Agreda for this find!

Like everyone else, we here at TUAW are excited and champing at the bit to get at Leopard. Unfortunately, we have about another week to go; however, that gives everyone time to get ready. In that spirit we present this TUAW Guide to Getting Ready for Leopard.

Keep in mind that I don't actually have access to Leopard, so all of the following advice is based on past OS X upgrade experience rather than the actual upgrade to 10.5. Nonetheless, I'm reasonably sure these steps should ease the transition from Tiger. As always, reader comments and suggestions are welcome.

While attracting dirt and grime is a hazard of owning a notebook, the neat-freak and 'oh my gosh this is expensive computer equipment' portions of my brains have always been bothered by how icky my MacBook Pro can get over time. I've tried a few products that are designed to protect one portion or another of a MacBook Pro from dirt, and Power Support's Track Pad Film is just such a product. It comes as two separate pieces - one for the mouse button and another for the track pad - and Power Support sells them as a two-pack so you get a backup in case you make a mistake or have a friend who could use some track pad protection.

Since the Track Pad Film is basically a clear sticker that is designed to allow you to still use your MacBook's track pad, application is pretty simple. Some people prefer to wash the heck out of their hands, while I personally just peel back the underside of the sticker and apply without ever actually touching the film. There isn't much to say about how well the film protects your track pad and mouse button: it's a clear sticker, so those two components are pretty well covered, as long as you applied them properly. 'Nuff said.

In terms of the performance of the actual piece of film that covers the track pad, I have a mixed opinion: for the most part, the track pad still responds fairly accurately. I'm a dual-mode notebook mouser myself - I can use a track pad or a USB mouse with almost equal comfort and precision, so I'm not one of those people who's dead in the water if I have nothing but a fingertip to steer with. However, I notice at random times that my trackpad accuracy momentarily goes out the window - for a stroke or two on the pad, it might pick up only half the normal distance the mouse would typically travel, or the mouse might get a little shaky on the screen, as if Mac OS X is having a hard time understanding exactly where my finger is and where I want the mouse to go.

Overall, if we had an official rating system on TUAW, I would give the Track Pad Film a 7 out of 10. It's a decent product that can certainly help protect one's track pad from dirt and general wear and tear, but this occasional drop in accuracy is a big ding for this blogging power user.

I found Track Pad Film in a Colorado Apple Store for $12.95, but you can also order it for your MacBook/Pro (including a version specific for the black MacBook) from Power Support.

Unlike Windows, OS X is great at taking care of itself. Built in periodic maintenance such as cron jobs (a holdover from the FreeBSD on which OS X is based) and on-the-fly disk defragmentation of the journaled file system make OS X essentially self sufficient when it comes to keeping itself running smoothly, so much so that many users never even consider running third party maintenance tools.

However, for older systems and systems in special usage cases such as computer labs, the built in tools aren't always enough to stop system slowdown and other issues. That's where programs like Yasu come in. Yasu, standing for Yet Another System Utility, is a donationware utility designed for administrators of large groups of systems and allows easy running and automation of cache and log cleanup, permissions repair, and other similar activities.

YASU 1.3.9 fixes some early issues with Intel/PPC compatibilities, and is availalbe from the developers site.

The 'Repair Permissions' function of Disk Utility has been under quite a bit of speculation as of late. There are those in one camp, such as John Gruber of Daring Fireball, who believe repairing (restoring, resetting, etc.) permissions is not much more than voodoo, while others in the support end of the Mac OS X community swear by it as the first line of defense. So what's a confused Mac OS X user to do when trying to draw up a formidable troubleshooting game plan?

Heading over to Dan Frakes' Repairing permissions: what you need to know article at Macworld is a great first step at trying to cut through all the confusion. Dan dissects virtually every aspect of the permissions repair process, from explaining what exactly 'permissions' are, to a few specific situations when it's a good idea to add the operation to your troubleshooting tool-belt. It's an informative read that helps demystify this much-debated aspect of Mac OS X.

Remember that 'Mac Maintenance Quick Assist' Apple Support document we found that seemed to be aimed at those new to Macs and computers in general? You know, the one that recommended fundamentals like dusting your computer and using file names that actually mean something? Well, John Gruber today fortunately pointed out that the document has been slightly edited, as it no longer recommends questionable voodoo repair permissions tactics, nor disk defragmenting (Mac OS X automatically does most of that work itself automatically) or "restarting your Mac every few days just for kicks". Three cheers for sensibility.

Disk Utility is a great maintenance and troubleshooting tool for those times when your Mac starts acting up. Repairing permissions can sometimes be handy (even though its true validity is in question as of late), but using the Verify and Repair Disk operations is often a more useful tactic. However, until Mac OS X 10.4.3, you had use Disk Utility to verify or repair your Mac's drive from some sort of an external source. You either had to plug into another Mac in Target Disk mode, or reboot and use the install disks that came with your Mac - not the most friendly process to your workflow. But now, With 10.4.3 and later, you can start up Disk Utility right from within Mac OS X and chose the verify option to make sure system level elements like your file catalog are all in order. One warning though: it is completely normal for your Mac to temporarily freeze or 'seize up' at the beginning of running this operation (you should get the infamous beachball), as this Apple support document explains. After a little while, depending on your Mac's speed and all that jazz, it will come out of its daze and you can continue working/chatting/surfing while it finishes the disk verification process.

This is a really handy tool, perhaps even more valuable than checking permissions, and should be a welcome addition to any Mac maintenance arsenal.

Maintenance, the Automator action that performs many system repair and clean-up tasks, has been updated to version 3.5. New features include:

• Ability to automatically restart after Maintenance has run
• Ability to automatically view the results file
• Time stamp added to results file

Also, for a few versions now, Maintenance has included an AppleScript that I believe performs the same tasks for pre-Tiger 10.4 versions of Mac OS X. Included with the download is a ReadMe PDF that explains what each task is and when/why you should run them.

Maintenance is free and available from Automator World.

Apple has released a "Mac Maintenance Quick Assist" support document that is more or less a 10-step guide aimed at beginners for taking care of their Mac, both inside and out. These steps include good, basic practices such as using relevant names for files instead of "DSC_00001.jpg," while also recommending that you occasionally clean your Mac (duh).

I was surprised to see a few tips make this list, however. The first: Check for viruses. "Macs don't get anywhere near the amount of viruses that Windows PCs are prone to, but that doesn't mean that they can't get infected," reads tip #8. I guess the guys who wrote this article didn't get the memo from the team who made the "Macs don't get viruses" TV commercials. The other odd tips deal with Mac maintenance stuff, like repairing permissions and defragging your hard drive. I was under the impression that, since Panther, Mac OS X defragged itself. On the permissions topic, there has been a lot of chatter over the last couple of months about whether repairing permissions is actually useful. Just check out the pseudo-series John Gruber had on the topic.

All in all, I think I was actually a little frightened by evidence of even cheesier one-liners making their way into Apple's support docs: "As a Mac user, you won't have to do windows, but you will need to do some housekeeping!" Yuk yuk.