Mac OS X: The Missing Manual, Tiger Edition

Sherlock

Let's face it—Sherlock is an aging hero, soon to take its final bow. At one time, it was a cutting-edge Web tool that was fine-tuned to bring you certain popular kinds of up-to-date Web info, without the waiting and ads of a Web browser. But in Tiger, Dashboard serves the same purpose with quicker startup, far more modules, and much better looks.

Across the top of the Sherlock window are what Apple calls channels: toolbar icons, much like Dashboard widgets. Each brings you one targeted kind of Web information.

Among the channels that can safely be retired are Stocks, Phone Book, Flights, Dictionary, Translation (all of which are now in Dashboard), and Internet (a basic Web search, supplanted by Safari's Google toolbar). Even Sherlock's eBay tracker is a lame duck, since Dashboard has some terrific widgets that do the same thing. (Check apple.com/downloads/dashboard.)

But three remaining Sherlock modules are still useful, in some cases because they're not yet available as Dashboard modules. Here's a rundown.

Figure 21-15. Type your city and state—or zip code—into the box at the top, and then press Enter. After a moment, a list of movies near you appears. Click one to see the theaters where it's playing (in the second column); click one of those to see today's show times (last column). You even see the address of the theater, the movie poster, the movie's rating and length, a description, ...