Any Mac Users Out There - Need Points Calculator

[WolfpackFan]

Well after being a PC user all my life and having worked in IT for 35 years supporting PC's, I've broken the ranks and purchased a Mac. I was just tired of fighting virus' and spyware. The biggest regret though is I will no longer have CaskBill's fine DVC-Planner program. I use this program all the time. So, is there anything similar for Mac's? If not, are there any websites that do a similar function. I'd hate to have to go through and manually compute points every time I plan my trips.

Thanks.

 

[tedisney]

Welcome to life as Mac user!

I believe there is a point calculator right here on wdwinfo.com.

I prefer the one on Tagrel's site:

http://www.tagrel.com/dvcCompChart.shtml

 

[sparkyboy]

It's hard sometimes to make the change, but even though I now use PC I still miss my old MAC SE. Check out tagrel.com/dvccompchart.html to see if this might help you.

 

[erionm]

There is also a point calculator on the member website.

 

[WolfpackFan]

Thanks everyone, the Tagrel site looks like it will do the job. Now if it was just as easy to get my iTunes library moved over to the Mac .

 

[Cruelladeville]

If you figure out iTunes, let me know. It seems to have a life of its own. I love my Mac, but why some tunes insist on loading to my iPod every time I hook it up, and others will never load, I just don't get that. I mean, I can only stand to listen to Fanfare for the Common Man(by Copeland) just so many times before I lose my mind. It was great during the Olympics, but enough!

 

[cogero]

I love my Mac. Wish everyone was Mac compatible. I switched for the same reason

 

[mckryan]

I am missing DVC Manager and Caskbill's program, too!

 

[vicki_c]

There's another program - Mousemanager, I'm pretty sure - for the mac. The Developer's name is Ian, but I can't remember is his last name. Google it and it should come up. This is not just a pts calculator but tracks your points by use year, more like Caskbill's program I think.

 

[Ksp]

If you have an Intel Mac, you could load Caskbill's program on the windows side of the machine; just a thought. I still use XP on the Mac for one program - Quicken - it doesn't run as well as the Mac side, though.
Thanks to everyone who posted programs that the Mac can use - I will try them!

 

[WebmasterDoc]

MouseManager is available for Mac users. You can download a free copy at http://www.mousemanager.com/download/download.html .

You could also run Caskbill's planner from a windows partition on a mac. Caskbill's programs are currently being upgraded and are available at http://www.caskbill.com .

 

[mckryan]

Noooo....no partitioning, no Windows!! I can't stand any more Windows! LOL I'll have to look into Mouse Manager, meanwhile I'll keep my DVCManager and Caskbill's programs on the lone PC in the house.

 

[UrsulaDave]

Noooo....no partitioning, no Windows!! I can't stand any more Windows! LOL I'll have to look into Mouse Manager, meanwhile I'll keep my DVCManager and Caskbill's programs on the lone PC in the house.

Woo Hoo! Be strong! Avoid Windows at all costs!!!!!!

-- Dave

(long live Mac)

 

[WolfpackFan]

Day 3 as a Mac owner and I absolutely love my mini. It is running great. I have finally gotten everything copied over from my old laptop and about to let DD have it (her laptop died last week, which gave me an excuse to get the Mac, which I've been wanting to do a long time). I've even got all my iTunes files (thousands literally) and photos all setup. I decided to just use the simple points calculator at the Tagrel site. I installed Mouse Manager but it was way more than I needed. I keep track of my points using an Excel spreadsheet (using NeoOffice on the Mac).

 

[wildernessDad]

I use tagrel's website and an excel spreadsheet. So far so good, although it doesn't track points from multiple subcontracts.

 

[WolfpackFan]

I use tagrel's website and an excel spreadsheet. So far so good, although it doesn't track points from multiple subcontracts.

What I do is I have one sheet per contract. Each sheet has a running total by use year of points used, borrowed, banked, etc. And I have at the bottom of each contract sheet all of my reservations. I then have a front recap sheet that summarizes the points totals for each use year, gathering the information from the contract sheets. The front page is setup like a vertical calendar with one line per month. Then I type in any reservations I make on that front sheet (I even include non-DVC trips). That way at a glance, I know when my trips are planned and what the current status is of each contract and use year. It really works well. On that front recap sheet, I've even gone back to years before we joined DVC and entered our past vacations. It's basically a calendar of our life for the last 10 years or so .

 

[mckryan]

Woo Hoo! Be strong! Avoid Windows at all costs!!!!!!

-- Dave

(long live Mac)

LOL Dave! I'm staying strong. We will probably always have one PC in the house - just because. Plus, I can't do "deposit at home" with USAA without a PC, unfortunately. But, no worries, DD is getting a Macbook for college next fall, and I'll almost always choose the Mac over a PC when I need a computer.

 

[WolfpackFan]

It's funny - I started off with computers with an Apple II. Then I went the PC route for many years. Now that I'm retired - for the first time in many years, we no longer have a PC in our house. I have a Mac mini and my wife is using a laptop which I've installed Ubuntu Linux on (all she uses is web and email).

 

[WolfpackFan]

Regarding a Mac based points calculator - well it's turning out to be not as easy as I thought. The problem is I've checked out a number of the web-based points calculators and none of them let you plan past 2009. This was no problem for CaskBill's program. Disappointing. I don't know if Mouse Manager will do this or not. At first glance it seemed much more complicated than what I need. I may have to install it and give it a try. Or I may have to look at one of the Mac PC solutions like VMWare or Parallels. The problem is my mini only has 50GB free. I imagine if I installed one of these programs, it would take up a lot of disk. Any suggestions.

 

[vicki_c]

You can't plan past 2010 because Disney hasn't released the 2010 charts/planner yet, I believe.

Only BLT info is released as far as I know. I tried to do a quick calculation of points for January 2010 and I couldn't find the information anywhere.