Customize Your Mac

This little how-to will show you some cool things you can do to your mac.
**I take no responsiblity if you mess up your mac**

Note you must be an adminstartor for most of these changes
Also more will be posted I'm feeling lazy.

A must for any mac user

Download here:
http://projects.tynsoe.org/en/geektool/download.php

Do a little research to fully understand Geektool.
After you read up try these different shells without quotations

Display Weather:
"curl --silent "http://xml.weather.yahoo.com/forecastrss?p=02066&u=c" | grep -E '(Current Conditions:|C<BR)' | sed -e 's/Current Conditions://' -e 's/<br \/>//' -e 's/<b>//' -e 's/<\/b>//' -e 's/<BR \/>//' -e 's/<description>//' -e 's/<\/description>//'"

Uptime:
"uptime"

Current Date:
"date"

Calender:
cal

For more commands do a google search

another helpfull log to have is the crash log (Make sure you go to file not Shell) :
/private/var/log/system.log

Quicksilver is another must for any mac user, improves productivity:

Download here:
http://www.blacktree.com/

again do a little read up

its pretty simple just assign a hotkey to bring up the menu then type the name of whatever you want to find

kinda like spotlight but better

Now your ganna have to be carefull with what you do but you should be alright:

First go to /system/library/coreservices/dock.app <-- dont open dock.app but control click then show package contents

from there click contents/resources/english.iproj

Then drag dockmenu.strings to your desktop (it may ask you to authenticate type in your password)

once you have a copy of the dockmenu delete the one from the english.iproj folder.

open up the copy from the desktop and now you can change the text displayed from the dock.
there will be sort of like two columns the one on the left you dont wanna change, but teh one is qoutations you can change.

for example the first line reads:
TURN_HIDING_ON = "Turn Hiding On" ;
the part you can change is ^that

have some fun wit those and get creative.
When your done save it then drag it back into the english.iproj again authenticate

Now i believe all you have to do to see the changes is open up terminal then type
"killall Dock"

you may need to restart you computer I dont remeber.

This one isn't too much of a big deal but i thought it was cool
go to /system/library/coreservices/loginwindow.app <--show package contents then click loginwindow

the terminal will run a command let it do its thing and in a second or two the login window will pop up. you cant move it but you can still click on it, to close it just close the terminal window

This is acually pretty easy.
its best if you have photoshop or some photo editing program to do this step.
first go to /System/Library/Coreservices/loginwindow.app <--"Show package contents"
then go /System/Library/Coreservices/loginwindow.app/contents/resources
find the file 'MacOSX.tif"
Copy this file to your desktop then open it in your photo editing program.
next delete the old MacOSX.tif from the resources folder you may have to authenticate this just type in your password.
save your editing image and place it back into teh resources folder again your going to have to authenticate.

if you did this right restart you computer and log in agian then check the about this mac and your image should be changed to whatever you changed it to.