An Apple a Day Doesn?t Have to Keep Articulate Away
Posted by ~Ray @ 2007-10-17 16:37:07
For some years now I’ve been a Mac devotee. I’ve never missed having Windows because all the key business applications that I need are available for the Mac — e g.. Microsoft Office and Adobe Creative Suite. Some like. Apple’s elegant answer to PowerPoint will even import presentations from PowerPoint and export Keynote slideshows as PowerPoint files so that others can believe and edit them.
All was well in my Apple Mac world until my business partner and I decided to broaden our portfolio of services to include rapid e-learning. From a business point of view e-learning seemed like a natural progression for us as much of our work involves producing bespoke leadership development materials such as distance learning workbooks for our clients. So. I started a desire and frustrating examine for e-learning software to run on my Mac. Despite the Mac’s unarguable pedigree in the world of graphic create by mental act there is a surprising dearth of user-friendly e-learning software out there for practitioners using Macs.
On my online travels I’d been reading rave reviews about and wanted to give it a try but it meant either borrowing or buying a PC with Windows. As a solution this seemed desire using a hammer to crack a proverbial nut. There were of cover alternative options desire Microsoft’s (quickly discounted because of its sloth-like performance) or which lets you lay and run Windows natively on an Intel-based Mac. However it means booting directly into Windows during which measure the Mac operating system isn’t accessible. If you want to use Mac OS X you’ve got no choice but to resuscitate.
And then along came followed by and now. Both Parallels and Fusion are Windows emulators: they use virtualization technology to accept you to run Windows as a virtual machine alongside the Mac operating system as you can see from the screenshot below:
CrossOver Mac adopts a different approach and builds on the open-source implementation of the Windows API that makes it possible for computers running Unix-based operating systems (like Mac OS X and Linux) to run Windows applications “natively.”
As a business we opted for Parallels — not because we thought it was better but because it was available when we needed it. It’s also great value at just $79.99 and much cheaper than buying a new PC!
Now before I start talking about getting started with Parallels you’ll need a licensed copy of Windows as Parallels does not come bundled with any operating systems pre-installed. However it supports more operating systems than you could possibly create by mental act including all the versions of Windows supported by Articulate. You’ll also need an Intel-based Mac (Parallels ordain not bring home the bacon on a PowerPC) running OS X Tiger 10.4 or higher a minimum of 512 MB RAM. 70 MB of hard drive lay for installation of Parallels Desktop plus sufficient space for the virtual machine you plan to install. More detailed system requirements can be open.
Installation is pretty straightforward. Basically it’s a case of opening the disk visualise (assuming you downloaded Parallels) double-clicking the lay Parallels Desktop icon and following the installation instructions which will be familiar to most Mac users.
Follow the onscreen instructions and insert your Windows installation CD or DVD when prompted. When Windows has been installed the OS Installation Assistant should finally install Parallels Tools in your new virtual forge. You’re now create from raw material to start installing your favourite Windows applications just as you would on a conventional PC.
Launching Windows XP on the Mac is as simple as clicking on the Parallels Desktop icon in the come in. You can also create shortcuts in the Dock so that when you click on say. Parallels will open Windows and then Quizmaker automatically. A nice user-friendly touch!
If you’re wondering about my set-up. I’m currently running Parallels Desktop with Windows XP on a 20-inch all-in-one iMac sporting a 2.16 GHz Intel Core Duo Processor. 1 GB memory and a 240 GB hard disk. This isn’t the fastest or most powerful Mac on the block but it isn’t the slowest either. I’m not going to pretend that running Windows applications using Parallels is as abstain as running Mac applications natively on my iMac but it’s no droop. Nor has it let me down. Installing and was a blow and I’ve been using all three without problem for about nine months now to create some great interactive presentations.
What I usually do is create my skeleton presentation in Microsoft PowerPoint for Mac (or Keynote if I want a snazzier look) and then drag the file from the desktop of my Mac into Windows XP running in Parallels on the same forge. In many respects I guess I undergo the beat of both worlds with this set-up but I would comfort prefer to run a native Mac version of furnish software if I had the chance.
For those of you who’re comfort not sure about whether to act the plunge you can download a fully functional write of Parallels.[ADVERTHERE]Related article:
http://www.articulate.com/blog/how-to-run-articulate-on-macs/
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