I’ve already braced myself for the hordes of people saying “You call that a tip? Everybody knows that.” Yes, they come in hordes.
Wireless was the feature that really made laptops take off. I work in a variety of places, including my home, the public library, coffee shops, friends’ houses, etc. Each place has its own wireless network, though most of them have more than one to choose from. By default, AirPort looks for previous networks; if it can’t find one, AirPort asks you if you want to join an open network.
However, if you’d like a little more control over this (say there are two networks in an area that you use frequently…or, much more likely, you use a network called “linksys” at your local coffee shop, but you don’t want to use “linksys” at home), well, AirPort is more than happy to oblige.
Fire up System Preferences and go to the Network pane. Choose AirPort from the “Show:” drop down list and make sure you have the AirPort tab selected. The first drop down reads “By default, join” and the value is probably set to automatic. Switch that to “Preferred networks” and an ordered list of networks you’ve joined will appear. You can add, remove, and edit existing networks, plus reorder them by drag and drop. Set up correctly, you can make sure you’re always on the right network—not only convenient, but better for security too.
