Book Image

The macOS User Administration Guide

By : Herta Nava
Book Image

The macOS User Administration Guide

By: Herta Nava

Overview of this book

Apple is pushing the capabilities of its technologies to help users achieve high performance, including improvements in its OS running across all Mac systems, macOS, and new technologies such as M1 Silicon chips. This book walks you through macOS from a system administration and support point of view, exploring its latest features. The book starts by explaining macOS architecture, installation, and startup processes to enable you to get started with the OS. You'll learn how to manage users and discover techniques for user security and privacy. Moving on, you'll get to grips with the macOS file system and learn to manage disks, volumes, and partitions for effective file management. Most of the examples covered in this book are from an administrator's perspective; however, when relevant, a standard user's perspective is also presented. You'll find illustrations for Mac systems running macOS 11 (Big Sur), and when necessary, for macOS 10.15 (macOS Catalina). Finally, you'll explore advanced topics such as networking and using command-line tools for administration tasks. By the end of this macOS book, you'll be well-versed with macOS features, administration tasks, and best practices. You'll also be able to apply the concepts to increase your chances of success in obtaining Apple certifications such as Apple Certified Support Professional (ACSP).
Table of Contents (19 chapters)
18
About Packt

Optimizing storage space

macOS provides tools to optimize the space in your system volume to keep your storage in an optimal condition, have enough free space, keep your Mac clutter-free, and perform important organizational tasks. This requires you to dedicate time to do some cleaning and organizing. macOS provides you with useful tools that you can take advantage of to make this task easier and quicker.

macOS's Storage Management tool offers you the following actionable recommendations to help you optimize your storage:

  • Store in iCloud
  • Optimize Storage
  • Empty Trash Automatically
  • Reduce Clutter

You can access the Storage Management tool through Spotlight or the Storage tab in the About This Mac tool we saw earlier in this chapter (Figure 6.5). Click the Manage... button beside the system volume (usually Macintosh HD). Then, you will see the interface shown in Figure 6.36:

Figure. 6.36 – Storage Management

When the tool opens, you will see the types of files you have and...