To help you get started doing something useful right away with your Macintosh, this book is divided into short projects that act like recipes in a cookbook. Each project states a common problem you may face when using a computer, explains how your Macintosh can help you solve that problem, and then lists all the steps you need to follow to solve that particular problem in a way that only a Macintosh can.
By teaching you how to do something fun and useful right away, using hands-on instructions, you'll learn how to achieve specific results with your Macintosh. Think of this book as a combination tutorial and reference guide. As a tutorial, this book can teach you how to use your Macintosh. As a reference guide, it can provide step-by-step instructions for helping you solve different problems using your Macintosh.
You don't have to follow this book in any specific order, just as you don't have to follow a cookbook in any specific order. Feel free to jump around—follow along with the projects that show you how to do something you find useful, and skip the projects that you don't care about. Nobody really needs to know everything about their computer to use it; you only need to know just enough to be productive. By following the projects in this book, you just may surprise yourself with how you can have fun while learning to use a computer all at the same time.