Zit Seng’s Superwall

Nowadays, Apple picking up awards from a “PC” magazine isn’t very surprising anymore. This time, Apple has once again swept up all the awards from PC Magazine’s 21st Annual Reader Survey in all the categories of Desktop and Notebook computers. This is in the September 2008 issue of PC Magazine, which I don’t normally read but happened to chance upon a copy in my workplace yesterday.

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This is the start of “Week 1″. It is the second week of school at NUS because the semester started with “Week 0″. Yes, how very much like computer people to start counting from zero. Week 1 is where orientation is over and classes officially start. Week 0 at NUS wasn’t overly crowded. Today, I’m seeing congestion everywhere.

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The new school year at NUS has started. Many people are buying new computers. Some of them will be buying Macs, particularly since they have gotten quite popular in the last few years. Now, how do you get it working in NUS? Most official help resources are going to focus just on Windows XP or Windows Vista. So here you are, my concise guide to getting a couple of basic things setup to work in NUS.

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This is a little collection of information about using Mac computers in NUS (and SoC). The Macs work pretty well here, as long as you know how to get it configured correctly. There are four main configurations covered here:

1. Wireless Network
2. Exchange Email
3. Network Drives
4. Printing

That should be pretty much the main things you’ll need to know.

Wireless Network

There are two main wireless networks in NUS: One that goes by the NUS SSID and the other NUSOPEN SSID. This section is about configuring the wireless network with NUS SSID. This is a secure wireless network were your over-the-air traffic is encrypted. NUSOPEN works like Wireless@SG (login through a web-based captive portal), is insecure and trivial for anyone to sniff your private network traffic. Don’t use NUSOPEN.

1. Start System Preferences.
2. Click on Network (under Internet & Network).
3. On the left panel, click on AirPort.
4. Click on Advanced…
5. Click on the + sign.
6. For the Network Name, enter NUS.
7. For Security, select 802.1X WEP.
8. No need to enter the User Name and Password now. It doesn’t seem to be remembered anyway. Make sure 802.1X is set to Automatic.
9. Click Add.
10. The new NUS configuration will probably be listed at the bottom of the Preferred Networks list. Drag the NUS item to the top of the list.
11. Click OK.
12. Click Apply.
13. Your Mac should now automatically try connecting to the new NUS wireless network. If it does not, choose NUS in the Network Name selection box.
14. The 802.1X Authentication window appears. Enter your NUSNET account details.
15. You’re done. If you want to login automatically to the NUS wireless network, continue: Quit System Preferences completely. Restart it, click on Network, then click on Advanced.
16. Click on the 802.1X tab. On the left, click on User Profiles, then WPA: NUS.
17. For User Name and Password, enter your NUSNET account details.
18. For Authentication, deselect TTLS and EAP-FAST. These are not used in the NUS wireless network.
19. Click OK. Then click Apply. Quit System Preferences.

Ok, you’re done.

If you’ve a N95 or N95 8GB, configuration information is available here. The information will probably be useful for most modern Symbian based phones (Nokia, Sony Ericsson, etc). iPhone users can refer to Lester Chan’s guide.

For Linux Users, check SOC NOC and Linux & Open Source @ NUS.

Exchange Email

Here’s how to access your NUSNET Exchange email from Mac OS X’s Mail application.

1. Start the Mail application.
2. Press Command-comma.
3. Press the + sign.
4. Type in your Full Name and Email Address. The Password is not necessary at this point.
5. Click Continue.
6. For Account Type, choose Exchange.
7. For Description, enter NUSNET or anything you like to describe this account.
8. For Incoming Mail Server, enter imap.nus.edu.sg.
9. For User Name and Password, enter your NUSNET account details.
10. For Outlook Web Access Server, enter exchange.nus.edu.sg.
11. Click Continue.
12. For Description, enter NUSNET Outgoing or anything you like.
13. For Outgoing Mail Server, enter smtp.nus.edu.sg.
14. Check the Use Authentication checkbox.
15. For User Name and Password, enter your NUSNET account details.
16. Click Continue.
17. Your Account Summary window should look similar to this. Click Create.

You’re done. The Mail application should now connect to your Exchange account, grab the list of folders, synchronize email, etc.

Network Drives

NUSNET provides one network drive, often referred to as the H: drive in Windows. SoC users also get another network drive from their SoC UNIX account. To access these drives from your Mac:

1. Go to Finder, press Command-K.
2. For the Server Address, enter the following: smb://nts09.comp.nus.edu.sg/com/comlaizs. This is the format for SoC staff users. For students, this is something like smb://fs5.nus.edu.sg/stuhome/u0x/u0×0xxxx.
3. Just click Connect.
4. You will be prompted for authentication. Entier your NUSNET account username and password here.
5. Then click Connect.
6. You’ll see your network drive in Finder.

The Server Address for your NUSNET network drive tend to be varied, depending on whether you are staff or student, staff of which faculty, student undergrad or postgrad, etc. If you have more information to share, I’d be glad to update this page. You can also login to a Windows machine (and into your NUSNET account), and check how the H: drive is mapped using the NET USE command.

The Server Address format for SoC UNIX users take the following format: smb://sunfire.comp.nus.edu.sg/<userid> (for students) and smb://suna.comp.nus.edu.sg/<userid> (for staff).

Printing

Here’s how to configure printing to the printers/print queues in SoC.

1. Start System Preferences.
2. Click on Print & Fax.
3. Click the + sign.
4. If there is no Advanced button in the toolbar, you may have to add it there before continuing. Right-click the toolbar (or Control-Click), then drag and drop the Advanced button to the toolbar.
5. For Type, select Windows.
6. The URL is the complicated bit. Make sure you get this right. The URL has the following format: smb://<nusnetid>:<password>@nusstu/nts27.comp.nus.edu.sg/<printername>
   • where <nusnetid> is your NUSNET account name
   • <password> is your NUSNET account password
   • change nts27 to nts09 for staff users
   • <printername> is the queue name of the printer which you can find listed at SoC Printers or Print Queues.
7. For Name, enter anything you fancy to help you remember what print queue this is.
8. Same for Location, whatever you fancy.
9. For Print Using box, choose either the Generic PostScript Printer driver, or select the specific printer driver for the print queue. You can find the list of printer types at SoC Printers or Print Queues.
10. Click Add.
11. Usually fine to leave the option settings unchanged.
12. Click Continue.

That’s it.

Other Stuffs

Here’s a bunch of other miscellaneous information that you may find useful.

• NUS Dialup (still on dialup?!):
  • 6557-1070 for students
  • 6657-1090 for staff
• SoC Dialup:
  • 1800-7761022 toll-free for both SoC staff and students
• NUS VPN:
  • The older Cisco VPN based on IPSEC protocol is deprecated. Best not to use it.
  • The newer Web VPN: http://webvpn.nus.edu.sg/
• SoC-VPN:
  • Head over to https://noc.comp.nus.edu.sg/vpn for more info.

That’s it.

I’m not a new comer to the Mac. I’ve been using an oldish PowerBook G4 for the last 2 odd years. But just switching from that PowerBook to the new MacBook has been so fascinating that I’ve been wondering why didn’t I get the MacBook any earlier. I’ve been doing new things with the MacBook that I’ve never tried before with the older PowerBook, and along the way I’m discovering how many more cool things that I’ve been missing out previously. Even simple things like email using Mac OS X’s Mail application has made the mundane daily routine more productive and interesting.

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Last weekend, I ordered a MacBook, my first ever original Apple product. The MacBook arrived earlier than expected, and it was really cool. Today, I ordered my second ever Apple product, the MacBook again. Unfortunately, it wasn’t because I was so impressed with the first that I had to order another, but that there was a defect with the first one and, oddly enough, the fastest way to get it fixed was to buy another. Sadly, my otherwise pleasant experience with Apple has been marred by this hardware defect.

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I’ve finally clicked the “Buy Now” button and followed through to order the MacBook 2.4GHz. It will be delivered in a couple of days. It has taken me quite a long while to decide on going ahead with the MacBook. Originally, I was actually looking at the MacBook Air. Then, there was the consideration of, if I were to get the MacBook, whether or not to wait for the upcoming model refresh. Well, here’s the story of how I ended up clicking “Buy Now”.

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Look at how this baby is all over the Mac notebook. I think she totally wants to own this Mac. Nevermind that it is a bit dated and no where as slick as the latest MacBook Air. Nevermind that she actually doesn’t have very much use of the Mac. At least not in the traditional sense of what the notebook is intended to be used for. But still she is having so much fun with the Mac. That’s even before she has figured out how to open the notebook!

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Yes, by now it must already be in Singapore shops, although I haven’t gone around looking. I did notice the “pre-order” link at the Apple Singapore Store has been removed, and the “2-3 weeks” delivery is now “8-10 business days”. Yeah, so they are now really shipping in volume and catching up with the back orders.

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Finally, I laid my hands on the real MacBook Air. It isn’t mine, but well, it’s my first sighting of the real thing in Singapore. It’s actually a bit of an anti-climax. The MacBook Air is exactly as I have expected it to be. After so much media attention on the new gadget, tons of detailed reviews on the Internet, just reading about it is almost as good as having held it. The most spectacular thing, as we have already all known, is the thinness. However, as it has become “expected”, the thinness failed to evoke the “wow” factor now. It is definitely still a pretty cool notebook. Should I get the MacBook Air? Ang Pow money hasn’t added significantly to my MBA fund leh.