Network Utility
Network administrators and geeks alike will appreciate Network Utility. This application provides a simple, streamlined, graphical user interface for network services that typically run in a command line interface.
There are eight tabs that run across the top of this application, allowing easy access to Info about your NICs (Network Interface Cards), NetStat, Ping, Lookup, Traceroute, Whois, Finger, and Port Scan.
The Info tab will allow you to see information about different NICs (Network Interface Cards) connected to your computer. Use the drop-down menu to select, for instance, your AirPort card. The Hardware or MAC (Medium Access Control) Address, local IP address, Link Speed/Status, Vendor, and Model will be listed for your viewing pleasure. You will also be able to see how many Packets have been sent and received, as well as how many send/receive errors have occurred. You can also see how many packet collisions have happened on your LAN (Local Area Network).
For network admins, or for the average Mac user trying to troubleshoot a networking issue, the Network Utility application is incredibly useful. In addition to giving you a range of tasks that previously had to be implemented in the command line or with third-party apps, you can start one task in one tab and move to another tab to start another without stopping the first task.
ColorSync Utility
ColorSync allows you to set, update, and create color profiles for different monitors. This task is mostly used in the creative market, where graphic designers need to ensure that the colors represented on their monitors are as true as possible.
There are five buttons that run across the top of the window that provide the different tasks: Profile First Aid, Profiles, Devices, Filters, and Calculator.
Profile First Aid allows you to verify and repair your ColorSync color profiles so they match the specifications set for in the International Color Consortium. The Profiles tab allows you to see all of the ColorSync profiles that are currently installed on your computer. By Clicking on a specific color profile you can see the Name, Path to the .icc file, Class, Space, PCS, Version, Date of Creation, Size, and a Lab Plot.
The Devices tab allows you to see all of the ColorSync devices that are currently registered. When you click on a specific device, you’ll see the ID number, Factory set color profile, current color profile, and the scope of the color profile attached to the device (normally affecting any user of the machine). The Filters tab lets you see and modify existing Quartz composer PDF filters so you can use them to customize color in a file. These PDF filters are available for the rest of the operating system to use.
The Calculator tab lets you easily convert between RGB, HSV, HLS, Lab, Luv, XYZ, Yxy, Gray, and CMYK color values. The Calculator function also copies some of the functionality of the DigitalColor Meter (located in the Utilities folder) by allowing you to click the magnifier glass, pick a color anywhere on the screen, and see the value that corresponds to that color. This, unfortunately, doesn’t allow you to get Hex values for colors, which DigitalColor Meter does.
We hope that this how-to has allowed you to gain a better understanding of these five Mac OS X Utilities, and how they can better serve your daily computing experience.
