As I’ve said so many times — and I bet some of you are bored — I’m a devout believer in the backup religion. Whenever I create mission-critical files, such as interviews for my two radio shows, I make two backups immediately. Take that literally. I will even postpone a bathroom visit to start the process, because most of those interviews are one-of-a-kind events, and I do not wish to be forced to repeat the process. And that assumes the guest is gracious enough for another go-round.

In addition to the immediate backup, I’ve been using SuperDuper! for clone backups on my extra drives. However, the current version of this application is not quite Leopard compatible, so, for the time being at least, I’ve decided to subsist on manual file backups and, of course, Apple’s Time Machine.

Now, aside from the fancy (and perhaps overdone) 3D visual effects, the concept behind Time Machine is based on common sense. Most Mac users don’t backup files, and of those that do, only a small number actually try backup software.

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When some of you first saw the Leopard version of the menu bar, I bet there were a few grumbles about its near-invisibility with some screen backdrops. Indeed, I suppose Apple’s interface designers took the hint and made it less transparent as time passed. At least, that’s what it seems based upon what Steve Jobs presented at the last WWDC and the finished product released last week.

So if you stick with the standard space travel motif that represents the heart of the Time Machine interface, the menu bar remains gray, with a slight level of translucency, and the labels are all clearly visible. The same holds true with the traditional Mac OS X ocean blue background. Some colors, however, may present obstacles to proper menu bar display, and you just might not want to use them, at least until Apple or someone provides a tool to kill the transparency effect. But even if Apple doesn’t come through for you, a third party will take care of it for you, because there are lots of things buried in the system that you can access via the appropriate command line, courtesy of Terminal.

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You just knew it had to happen. Within a day or two after Apple releases a major product or product enhancement, all bets are off. The ugly face of whatever it is they delivered comes to the surface, and, before long, you begin to wonder how such an abject failure can actually succeed — until you begin to separate facts from fiction of course.

Now most of you know that I have written several fiction books with my son, Grayson, and a lot of factual books and articles too. So I think I know how to separate one from the other, but I sometimes wonder if others have the same set of values.

Take a headline I read this week from Jason O’Grady’s PowerPage site, where he points his readers to an article he co-authored with David Morgenstern over at ZDNet, a CNET affiliate, entitled “Apple says to Archive and Install Leopard.”

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Night Owl Rating:

The first time you gaze at the Leopard upgrade kit, you wonder how something that does so much fits into such a small box. But Apple has taken its environmental pretensions to heart and reduced the extra stuffing in many of its latest software packages — except, of course, for the new Logic Studio, which is positively huge — and rather heavy to boot!

There’s even a tiny manual that contains something more than a short installation guide for once. In its 80 pages, you actually learn about many of the ultra-slick features that Apple has wrought in Leopard. But you’ll still need the Help menu if you want to explore matters further.

What you really want to know, though, is just how loudly this cat roars, and it’s deafening!

Indeed, the most telling comparison I can make between Mac OS X Leopard and Windows Vista is the fact that the former installs reliably, works as advertised and then some, and doesn’t possess any invasive online activation and forced upgrade schemes. In recent days, for example, it’s been reported that Windows OneCare, which is supposed to protect your PC, also happens to turn on automatic updating behind your back, without your permission.

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