Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
When someone you know has a birthday, you can send a quick e-mail to wish him a happy birthday. (I'm excluding family and
good friends whom, of course, you'll call.) While sending an e-mail is no big deal, MacBook Air gives you a way to automate
this task, so let's check it out, just for fun:
1. Choose Launchpad
→
Utilities
→
Automator.
The Automator application appears.
2. Click Workflow and then click Choose.
3. In the Library branch, choose Contacts.
4. Double-click the Find People with Birthdays action to add it to the workflow pane.
5. In the Find people whose birthday is drop-down list, choose Today.
6. In the Library branch, choose Mail.
7. Double-click the Send Birthday Greetings action to add it to the workflow pane.
This action enables you to specify a
message and an image to include with the message.
8. Type a birthday message and click the image you want to use.
You can also vary the images by selecting the Random
Image for Each Recipient check box.
9. Save the workflow.
Be sure to run the workflow each day.
If you're like me, you won't remember to run the birthday workflow. That's okay; MacBook Air can do it for you. In Automat-
or, choose File →Save As, choose Application in the File Format drop-down list, and click Save. Open System Preferences,
click Users & Groups, click your account, and click Login Items. Click the Add button (+) to open a Finder window, choose
your birthday reminder application, and click Add. Every time you log in to MacBook Air, it automatically looks for contacts
with birthdays on that day and sends them your greetings.
Merging duplicate contacts into a single card
Despite your best organizational efforts, you might end up with duplicate items in your contacts list. This is par-
ticularly prone to happen when you import contacts from another program. Not to worry, though — Contacts
has a handy feature that not only seeks out duplicate contacts but also enables you to merge them into a single
card.
In Contacts, choose Card →Look for Duplicates. Contacts examines the cards to see if it can find two with the
same name. If it finds two such cards, it displays the dialog shown in Figure 4.9. Click Merge, and Contacts
combines the data from both cards.
4.9
You see this dialog if Contacts finds duplicate contacts.
Printing an envelope for a contact
You're probably so used to e-mailing and instant-messaging people these days that it comes as something of a
shock when you find you have to — gasp! — send something by postal mail. If you're just dashing off an in-
formal note, a handwritten envelope will do the trick. However, for more formal correspondence, you should
send the envelope through your printer to make the address look more official.
