Firefox went missing

[digilink]

Ok, I'm new to Mac, but not new to computers. I have plenty of Windows and *NIX experience. Maybe someone can help me out, I'm suffering from what appears to be a serious PEBKAC.

 

I bought a new Macbook running Leopard and I've spent the last few days trying to learn the Macintosh way of doing things. The one button mouse is about to drive me crazy, and many of the keyboard shortcuts I'm used to are performed differently or just aren't present at all.

 

I downloaded Firefox and Thunderbird, my email and browser client of choice. Apple email was not very intuitive to me and Safari is good, but I still prefer Firefox. Being excited that there was a native OSX install available, I immediately downloaded this "dmg" thing.

 

Here's where I'm a little lost. Why in the world do they package things this way!!!????? As I understand it, when you "install" something from the dmg file, you are supposed to then drag it to the applications folder!!??? That is crazy! Anyhow, I rebooted my Macbook this morning and Firefox was nowhere to be found. Not in the apps folder, not on the desktop, not in the bar. I searched for it using spotlight and found the original dmg file that was used to install it (I never deleted it off the desktop, yet it was missing when I rebooted) and went through the install process again.

 

It put the Firefox icon in the bar and I was able to launch it as normal.

 

What am I doing wrong? Perhaps I just don't understand the Mac way of application/system management, anyone have a good tutorial for me to follow? Thunderbird is missing as well

 

EDIT:

Good god.... I just figured this out. That make this so insanely easy that it's stupid. I had to drag the firefox logo into my applications folder from the disk image.

 

I'm used to dpkg/apt in a Debian environment (I run 2 Ubuntu linux dekstops at home and a Debian server), is there anything close like that for Mac? Seems like I saw something somewhere that suggested there may be. I don't want to install linux on here, although it may come to that.

 

Their way of installing things is the stupidest thing I have ever seen, or I just need to get used to it

[Danyel]

Hi Digilink:

 

Installing programs on the Mac is different (like the slogan: "Think Different").

 

Sometimes, you drag the Application to the Applications folder, but other times you double-click to install the package.

 

My only pet peeve is there is not a standard way to Uninstall programs. Sure, you can drag the Application to the Trash. Sometimes there are other files in other locations that are associated with the Application.

 

--danyel

[digilink]

(like the slogan: "Think Different").

 

That's a good way of looking at it! So far I'm very happy with my Mac, just have to get used to doing things differently. I was very happy with (and still am) with linux, but I was missing my beloved iTunes and was tired of dual booting so I just took the plunge and bought a Macbook. Now I'm going to attempt to create my own Hackintosh, my desktop machine is very comparable in specs to that of a Mac pro.

[Danyel]

Hi Digilink:

 

Happy to hear took the "plunge" and got a MacBook. Are you still able to run Linux (with Parallels or VMWare)?

 

I'm very happy with my OSx86 PC (or "Hackintosh"). Dual booting with Mac OS X and Windows (but mainly on the Mac). Benchmark and specs *very* similar to Mac Mini Core Solo.

 

--danyel

[digilink]

Are you still able to run Linux (with Parallels or VMWare)?

 

Haven't tried yet. That's on my "to-do" list. I just got it Monday, so I'm still learning how to use it