The Mac OS 8.6 Book: The Beginner's Guide to Apple's Most Widely Used Operating System

The Mac OS 8.6 Book says a great deal about Mac OS 8.6 from the user's point of view. If you're wondering how to get something done or how to use a particular feature of this operating system, the answers you need are in these pages. Covered subjects include the contents of the System Folder, the Finder's features, typography, printing, and memory management.

You'll find particularly good coverage of networking: the book shows you how to configure file and printer sharing on an AppleTalk network and explains the ins and outs of Personal Web Sharing. It also walks you through the process of getting connected to the Internet. More information on hooking Macs to Windows boxes on local networks would have made this book a standout.

The Mac OS 8.6 Book tends toward the elementary end of the difficulty scale, giving lots of attention to basic skills and features while including only broad-brush coverage of AppleScript programming and other advanced capabilities. This book includes better-than-average coverage of Sherlock, including its new ability to let the user choose from among a series of search engines to which to submit a query.

You may also want to look into The Little Mac Book and, for true newcomers, Mac OS 8.6 Visual Quickstart Guide. --David Wall