My guess is that in the next two or three months most of us will have installed Lion. I'm also guessing that at least those who need to run some older PowerPC programs (which require the use of Rosetta) will have at least two operating systems on their Macs.

For years I've read what you should do before you upgrade your Mac operating system. I've taken only one or two of those recommended steps, but I don't recall ever having a serious problem with an upgrade. Of course, my experience has only been with Mac OS X so I missed all the fun with the OS 7 and 9 experiences.

This year I am more seriously preparing for an operating system upgrade. I'd like to clean up my Mac and I'd like to be more prepared for the demise of PowerPC apps in Lion. However, I'll wait two or three weeks after the formal announcement to see what problems arise.

I'll install Lion on a new partition of my internal hard drive which I will have set up using Disk Utility, but you could do the install on a separate external drive. In either case you will need to have two partitions on your backup drive, one for the Snow Leopard volume and one for the Lion volume.

1. Consider Magic Trackpad or Magic Mouse
I've already replaced my mouse with a Magic Trackpad. It took a very short time to get used to the Trackpad and I think you'll find navigation around your Mac to be much easier.

2. Update to OS X 10.6.8
You should download and install the Combo Update, 10.6.8, because it contains enhancements to the Mac App Store for the Lion upgrade, contains the usual fixes and a couple of problems with 10.6.8 that have now been corrected.

3. Make A Bootable Backup
It's a good idea to make a bootable backup in case there's a problem with installing Lion or some software doesn't work correctly.

4. Test Your Backup3.
Boot from your backup drive and test a couple of files.

5. Classic and PowerPC Apps
This is a the biggie, at least for me. Joe Kissell (see below) says that if you're going to upgrade your old PowerPC apps to newer Intel-native apps, IT'S ESPECIALLY IMPORTANT TO DO SO BEFORE UPGRADING TO LION, as the process of converting your old data to work with the new app may, in some cases, require Rosetta (which is not in Lion).

Go to System Profiler>Software>Applications and sort the apps by Kind so all Classic and PowerPC apps are grouped together. I moved a couple Classic apps to a separate drive so I can run them, if need be, from an old MacBook. Looking at the PowerPC list, I determined which apps I want to upgrade to newer Intel-native apps, if possible. I'm in the process of going to the developer sites to see if I can download newer versions which will run on Lion. For those that can't, I'm putting them in a new separate folder, Applications - Power PC, so, if need be, I can run them from the Snow Leopard partition.

6. Repeat Step 5 for Login Items in System Preferences>Accounts

7. Check RoaringApps
Go to roaringapps.com to check the status of your favorite apps' compatibility with Lion. It will also give you the developer's website address.

8. Run Disk Utility
To make sure your main startup drive is in good shape, Use Disk Utility>First Aid>Verify Disk. If there is a problem, boot from an external drive and go to Disk Utility>First Aid>Repair Disk.

9. Update Your Duplicate
Now that your main hard drive is in the shape you want, make a new bootable backup immediately before you start to install Lion

What should you do after you upgrade an operating system? Other than the perennial advice to run Repair Disk Permissions, I've never done anything. But I recently read Joe Kissell's e-book, "Take Control of Upgrading to Lion", tinyurl.com/3z5xvgs, and discovered that there are a number of steps you should at least consider doing after you've completed the installation of Lion. I recommend you get the book (which also covers what you should do before you install Lion), but here's my very condensed version of what Joe recommends.

1. STOP MAKING A BOOTABLE BACKUP!
Yes, this sounds a bit crazy, but you don't want to overwrite the last bootable backup you made before installing Lion until you're satisfied that Lion is working properly. In addition, if Spotlight is indexing, your backup will take a long time.

2. Deal With Spotlight
Your Mac will be pokey the first time Lion starts up because Spotlight will begin indexing or re-indexing your files. This could take several hours, depending on the extent of your files and the speed of your CPU and hard drive. If you are eager to start playing around with Lion, you can either live with the sluggishness or you can temporarily disable Spotlight until you're ready to do something else. Some people have suggested you just wait for a few hours. Knowing myself as I do, I'll live with pokey and start using Lion immediately.

Incidentally, during the indexing process you'll will see a pulsing dot in the center of Spotlight's magnifying glass icon. Clicking on the icon will display an estimate of the remaining time. Who knew?

3. Run Software Update
When Lion starts for the first time, it should automatically run Software Update to see if there are newer versions of Lion or any software installed with it, such as iLife, iTunes, and iWork. If it doesn't run, go to the Apple icon> Software Update and run it. If you get an alert window, I suggest clicking on Show Details just to be cautious before installing the updates.

You also should check for updates for all apps that you regularly run, normally by running the app and looking for a software update command somewhere in the menu bar. Alternatively, go to the developer's website. In any event, combine this step with Step 8 below.

You also should go to the Software Update pane of System Preferences and set up an automatic check of updates

4. Reinstall Java Runtime
Java runtime is no longer installed automatically when you install Lion.You may have some apps which require a Java application. The first time you run such an app, it will prompt you to install a Java runtime. You can also open Java Preferences (in your Utilities folder) which will prompt you to download Java runtime. In addition, you can download it from support.apple.com/kb/dl1421.

5. Consider Using A Standard User Account
Since a user account with administrator privileges has so much power, many experts recommend that you use a standard (non-administrator) account for day-to-day use. I don't because it's simpler to use an administrator account and I back up my Mac with SuperDuper and Time Machine, but you might want to consider it.

6. Consider Turning On Guest Access
A guest account enables a user to log on without a password. When the guest logs out, all information and files in the guest account's home folder are deleted. It's a handy way to handle temporary visitors, such as grandchildren, and protect your files. Parental controls can be enabled. You can set up a guest account through System Preferences> Users & Groups.

7. Review the Incompatible Software Folder
If the Lion installer finds software that might cause a problem or will not run under Lion, it probably will put it into an Incompatible Software folder at the top level of your home folder. This is a good place to see if you need to get new versions of your software.

8. Open All Apps, Utilities & Preference Panes
This is another biggie. I have never done this when I have upgraded to a new operating system, but Kissell recommends it and I know some experienced users do this. I think I'll start out with the apps, utilities and preference panes that I use a lot.

All you do is launch each app, etc. and see if it works. Spread the task out over a couple days since the it does seem a tedious one.

9. Re-commence making bootable backups
Yes, it's now time to again start making bootable backups. Setting up a schedule for automatically making backups would even be better.

Other Stuff
10. Mouse/touchpad scrolling
Apple changed the scrolling direction on touchpads and mice. When you scroll down, the content moves down and the scrollbar moves up. It's a heated issue for some users. John Gruber in Daring Fireball says to try it for a week and recommends two free apps. tinyurl.com/3vtmrd8. Also, take a look at David Pogue's thoughts on the issue. tinyurl.com/44q8loe. To go back to the old way, go to System Preferences>Trackpad>Scroll and Zoom. Look for the "Scroll Direction: natural" option.

11. Learn the new multi-touch gestures
Spend 10 minutes playing around with the new gestures. A two finger left or right swipe takes you to other pages. A three finger left or right swipe takes you to other applications. It takes a little bit of time to get used to gestures, but I think it's faster and more direct than a mouse. For example, to go to a prior Safari page, you just do a two finger left swipe on the trackpad. With a mouse, you reach for the mouse, move and position the mouse up to the left where the left-facing triangle is in the menu bar, and finally click on the triangle. Which is easier?

Conclusion

The steps I've indicated take a little bit of time and it may be that you would not have had any problems if you hadn't taken the steps. But you will never know and you do know that you've cleaned up your Mac a bit.

P.S. For help in installing Lion, there are two excellent resources, Dan Frakes Macworld article, "Installing Client; What you need to know", tinyurl.com/3qsltex and in Joe Kissell's e-book, "Take Control of Upgrading to Lion", tinyurl.com/3z5xvgs.

— Mark S. Bazrod, Editor