Frequently Asked Questions

As you can imagine, we get a lot of questions asking just about everything. While some questions are general, others are more specific.

A common theme is that we often get asked the same questions about the same things. Instead of leaving everything a guessing game, we'd rather just answer our most frequently asked questions here.

Can't find an answer here?

If there's something you're just itching to know, feel free to contact us and let us know what's on your mind. Or, if you've got a great idea for an article you'd like to see done, request it by e-mailing one of us.

What is MacZealots.com?
MacZealots can best be described by our slogan — Knowledge is power. ™ We present the good, the bad and the ugly with the hope of providing the most detailed information on the subjects we cover.

Like our colleagues at A List Apart, MacZealots.com believes that through knowledge and education comes power. If you take the time to educate yourself on a particular subject, you can use that knowledge and experience as power. We seek to pass this knowledge on to you, the reader.
Is MacZealots.com a blog?
Not at all. MacZealots.com is a web site, not a blog. Allowing comments is a similarity that MacZealots.com shares with blogs, but the site itself is not a blog.

A blog traditionally offers content from a single author's perspective, and is often frequently updated with little scraps of information aggregated from all over the Internet.

Who are the MacZealots?
Ryan J. Bonnell, Justin Williams and Emily Hambidge — all students of Purdue University. For their individual biographies, see the authors page.

What software or CMS powers MacZealots.com?
See our colophon for the glue that holds our site together and the software that does all of our heavy lifting.

Does MacZealots.com provide tech support?
As much as we would like to? No. MacZealots.com is not a community resource for seeking technical help. However, user submitted problem-solving solutions are welcome.

If you've come here looking for information on getting answers to fixing your tehnical problems, setting things up, or using a piece of software that we have not written about yet, you might have better luck browsing Apple's tech support documents or searching online.
Additionally, if you have a large-scale project that you need assistance with, we are available for consulting on a professional basis. Please contact us so that we may assess what is required for your project's success.
I'm having problems viewing your new site
We recently switched servers (29 April 2005) but your computer or ISP's DNS may not be updated yet. The solution? First clear your brower's cache, then flush the Operating Systems' DNS Resolver cache.
On Windows 2000/XP, run this command from a DOS prompt Start → Run ...
ipconfig /flushdns
On Mac OS X 10.1+ open /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app and execute this command:
sudo lookupd -flushcache
After reloading our site in your browser, you should be hitting our new server. If you are still having problems, you can access our site thru its IP Address: http://maczealots.com/
I really like something you wrote. Can I link to it/repost it on my site/print it in my MUG's newsletter/create a shrine for the site?
First of all, thank you for your interest in our work! It's a great honor when someone requests a republication of the site's content. Our rules regarding this are very basic and easy to abide by:
  1. Link away. If you're simply linking to a page, thank you in advance. We may or may not see the clickthrough in our stats, so if you're feeling especially generous, send us a link to your post about the site.
  2. If you would like to reproduce our work, please just ask us first. We have never turned down someone who asked to reproduce our work.
  3. You must credit the site as the origination of the content. All we ask is for a link to the page on MacZealots.com where you found the information.
  4. You must leave the original contents intact. If you wish to reproduce a short part of the piece, or present it in segments, that's perfectly fine. If you wish to annotate it with your own comments, that's also fine, as long as you clearly distinguish between original and annotated information.
  5. You must either send us a link to the reproduced work (if online) or a copy of a paper reprinting. This is not to monitor the quality, but rather to look at how the content is being used and how we can better serve the people who use the information we publish.
  6. If you choose to ignore these rules, you can expect a cease-and-desist letter from our legal department.. It's not our goal to sue people, but reprinting work without permission (and especially without recognition) does not sit well with us at all, and that will be reflected in legal actions against your publication.
With that said, we welcome people who would like to share what they have found on our site, and we look forward to hearing from you!