Today is the big day for Apple fans. Steve Jobs will deliver his much anticipated keynote at Macworld 2008 and hopefully deliver some news about great new Apple products. The Macworld conference almost always delivers some upgrade to existing Mac computers and often some new models are released which brings a surge to sales. With so many people buying their first Mac computer these days, I put together a list that I hope will help get new users up and running in a hurry. This is by no means an exhaustive list but rather a list that works well for me. If you’re an Apple user, please share with everyone anything I’ve missed in the comment section below so we can help get our new friends comfortable with their new systems.

Installing And Setting Up Software

Run Software Update From System Preferences

Macs tend to come pretty up-to-date but it is always a good idea to run software update from the System Preferences pane. A restart is typically required so get this out of the way right off the bat.

Install Lots Of New Software

There are a ton of lists out there for must-have Mac software but there’s quite a bit of overlap. Not only that but our individual needs vary quite a bit. In short, here’s a short list of the apps I always install in the beginning:

• Adium X - Instant Messaging
• Adobe Reader - PDF Viewer (Preview works but not always)
• Firefox - Web Browsing
• GMail Notifier for Mac - If you use a GMail account
• Stuffit Expander - Uncompress .sit files
• Textwrangler - Text Editor
• vlc, Flip4Mac, and Divx - For all your video playing needs
• VMWare or Parallels - Run Windows inside OS X (Requires purchase. I use VMWare)

Configure Dashboard With Useful Widgets

Dashboard (press F12 to bring it forward) comes stocked with some useful widgets but there are thousands out there to choose from. Use it to display sports scores, webcams, system health and more! Browse the selection over at Apple.com for more.

Configure Time Machine For Automatic Backups

Time Machine is a great tool that now comes with Leopard. It will create backups for you automatically but you’ll definitely want to dive in and configure it to your tastes.

Activate Your Spaces

Spaces is a new feature in Leopard as well that will give you numerous virtual desktops. I often have iTunes loaded in one, Internet programs like my email and a browser in another and what I’m actively working on (this blog for example) in a third. It’s a great way of staying organized and keeping your screen decluttered.

Modify The Settings For Corners

You can set up your new Mac to do things when you move your mouse to the corner of the screen. I have all four corners set up to do something convenient (launch Dashboard, show the desktop, etc) and I encourage you to do the same. Lifehacker has more information on setting up this feature.

Enable Start-Up Programs

If you’re switching over from Windows, you will soon be looking around for ways to start programs automatically at boot up. Again, Lifehacker has a good tutorial for start-up apps.

Configure The Terminal App

The terminal is a very useful app that you’ll likely use a bit with your new system. It comes by default with black text on a white background. We can do better than that! Fire up terminal and change the window settings to make it a little larger and perhaps white text on an opaque background. Also add this app to your dock so it’s quickly available.

Tidying Up And General Housekeeping

Change Your Desktop Wallpaper

There’s a number of great sites for wallpaper but I really like InterfaceLIFT. They have a large selection of high-res, widescreen images for you to browse through.

Import Bookmarks Into Safari and Firefox

This one is self-explanatory but take the time to go through them and clean up the list so you’re off to a fresh start.

Add Applications To The Dock And Tweak It

Open up your hard drive and navigate to your Applications folder. Drag the applications you’ve installed to the dock and spend some time thinking about the order you’d like them in. Also, a lot of people have complained about the reflective dock so take a look at this post for more information.

Copy Music Into iTunes And Download Album Art

Another self-explanatory one but it has to be done. If you have an iTunes Music Store account, you can easily download album art for your music if you haven’t already. It really makes the cover-flow view look great!

Organize Your Photos In iPhoto

iPhoto is a great app if you take the time to organize your photos. I like to create folders for mine and dump them in so I can easily find what I’m looking for. If you just have all of your files in one big folder, now’s the time to spend a while organizing them to start your Mac experience right!

Set Up Your Printer And Fix The Dock

Setting up your printer will be a piece of cake. Once finished, print a page and you’ll notice a printer icon is left in the dock. I’m not sure why but it doesn’t go away by default. Right click the icon and select to auto-quit and you won’t see it again.

Import Your Contacts Into Address Book And Use iSync

Importing contacts into Address Book can sometimes be tough if you have a text file (csv). Make it easy by using the Address Book Importer. This free software lets you map the fields in your source file to the Address Book fields and you’re done in seconds. Also, fire up iSync and pair it with your cell phone. Since you’ve added all of these contacts, why not easily have the same data on your phone? A list of supported phones can be found here at Apple.com.

Turn Off Bluetooth To Preserve Your Battery

If you’re on a laptop and you’re not using Bluetooth for a keyboard/mouse, cell phone, etc. then turn it off. Although the battery usage is rather small, there’s no sense in keeping it on when you’re not using it. Click the little Bluetooth icon in your menu bar and you’ll see the option to turn it off.

Educate Yourself On Your New Mac

Learn The Mac Keyboard Shortcuts

Keyboard shortcuts are one of those things that will drive you crazy if you don’t take the time to learn them. Dan Rodney put together a great list for us on his site.

Need More Help? Visit Some Forums

Take 3 minutes and register an account for free on the three forums listed below. Here you’ll get answers to just about any Mac related question you can think of. There are many more forums but I’ve really enjoyed these three:

• Mac NN Forums
• Mac User’s Forum
• Mac-Forums

Learn Some Unix Commands

As you go on your new Mac, you’ll inevitably run across some Unix commands that you haven’t heard of. Fire up that terminal and type “man command” (replacing command with the command you’re looking to read about). A handy manual will appear and you can read more about it.

What Else Do We Need To Do?

There you have it. That’s what I do when I get a new Mac but I’m sure there are some other things that will be helpful to our newest Mac users. If you have something helpful to share, please do so in the comments section below.

If you find this article helpful, please consider Digging It. Thanks for the support!