Lock computer?

[Sunnz]

Well I usually put it in my backpack and I walk around the school, alot... however I do turn it off when I am about to go home since it would be a 20~30 drive...

In my case, I usually shut it down when it is about 10% battery, and is usually the time I go home... sounds ok?

BTW, as soon as I went home, I plug it back to the adaptor, and I always leave it plugged in when at home even if it is on green for days... would that consider as bad for a Mac? I have heard from PC friends that they remove the battery when using their laptop at home to save battery life... is that true? Does it apply to Macs?

[Bluefish]

I think that whatever you do with a battery, the lifetime of it will keep reducing. If you store it in a locker, it will reduce, and if you use it all the days it will reduce.
I have my adaptor plugged in almost ever, exept for when i sit in the sofa or are wardriving in the city. I havn't noticed any problems..

[ora]

...edited out bad advice... seems its ok to run plugged in

[lurk]

Actually cycling the battery as you are describing is what will burn the battery up and leaving it plugged in is totally OK. Now in the old days batteries did not have the voltage regulation circuitry that modern Li-polymer batteries have what you say was true, but not today. In fact if you tried to use that old style regimen for charging a modern battery it would burst into flame. That is the real reason for the voltage regulation in newer batteries, the nice side effect is that you don't have to worry about running with the "green" light on whatsoever.

[Sunnz]

By old, how 'old' did you mean? 5 years? Or 30 years? My friend's laptop is about 4~5 years old... it is a PC too.

[lurk]

Old also varies by expense, but NiCad batteries were the worst in this respect. Newer means Lithium-Ion and Lithium polymer batteries. In between these is NiMH which has less memory problems but still is not wonderful. It will say what it is on the side of the battery.

[machwh]

Hi - I've documented a was of setting things up so that you can lock your screen using a simple key-chord here:

http://www.markwheadon.com/blog/2009...creen-mac-os-x

Cheers,

Mark

[simbalala]

This AppleScript will lock the screen providing you have the “Lock” icon displayed in your menu bar. You enable that through Key Chain Access preferences. I use this with a QuicKeys keyboard shortcut to lock the screen.

tell application "System Events" to tell the front menu bar of process "SystemUIServer"
	set foundMenu to false
	set menu_extras to value of attribute "AXDescription" of menu bar items
	repeat with x from 1 to the length of menu_extras
		if item x of menu_extras is equal to missing value then
			tell menu bar item x
				click
				tell first menu item of front menu
					if name is equal to "Lock Screen" then
						set foundMenu to true
						exit repeat
					end if
				end tell
			end tell
		end if
	end repeat
	if foundMenu is equal to false then
		keystroke return
	end if
end tell