Ask TUAW: Mac as WAP, limiting Time Machine, recording cable and more

This time in Ask TUAW we'll tackle questions on using your Mac as a WAP, limiting the amount of space Time Machine uses, recording shows from a cable box on your Mac, accessing the Mac partition from Windows in Boot Camp, and more.

As always your suggestions are most welcome, and questions for next week should be left in the comments. And now, to the questions!

ywamer asks

Is there a way to turn my Mac and wireless router into an open internet point? Is there software that could handle this? Obviously, I could just keep my wireless signal open, but that would jeopardize my security. What I'd like to do instead is to offer others who are nearby access to my broadband connection at, say, certain times of the day, and to maybe limit the number of people getting on at once. Also, a nice way to block sites, such as illegal sites or file-sharing sites that could potentially get me in trouble would be ideal. Any ideas?

Well you can turn your Mac into a WAP pretty easily (you'll want the Mac itself to be connected to your DLS/Cable Modem etc by wired ethernet). However, to get all the security you want will require you to set up the built-in ipfw firewall, which can be quite complicated. Fortunately we recently mentioned a helpful piece of software, WaterRoof from haneynet.com. It won't be easy to get all the settings right but with WaterRoof you can do most of what you want to do.

Charles asks

Is there a way to limit the amount of space Time Machine uses?

Time Machine will use whatever space is available on the selected volume. So I agree with the reader who suggested that the best way to limit it is to create a specific volume of the size you want with the Disk Utility. Fortunately, Leopard's Disk Utility is able to do this non-destructively.

Benny asks

Does anybody know of a (free is preferable but cheap is acceptable :-)) way that I can record television shows from my cable box to my MacBook? Also would it be possible to put them on my iPhone for the long commutes to work?

It depends on your cable box. If you have a cable box with a FireWire port you can actually directly record the digital stream with iRecord. There's a nice explanation of what's going on in this hint over at Mac OS X Hints. If you do this you'll end up with m2t files which can be converted to an iPhone readable format with VisualHub ($23.32).

If you don't have a cable box with FireWire you'll need some hardware. Several of us here at TUAW have had reasonably good experiences with the EyeTV Hybrid (~$150) from Elgato. If you use EyeTV it will allow you to export in a format suitable for the iPhone.

Adam asks

Is there software out there that lets you view your Mac partition when in Vista on Bootcamp? I am hoping to be able to somehow access particular files when in Windows, including my iTunes library.

Windows can't read a Mac HFS+ formated volume so you'll need Windows software like MacDrive ($50). There's also a free application hfsexplorer that does something similar. Since I try to say out of Windows as much as possible I haven't tested either myself.

Ruud asks

I'm using leopard and every time when I use Quicktime in full-screen modus (to play a wmv stream) the dock appears after a while. Tho only solution I found was disabling full screen and turn it on again, but that only helps temporary because the dock keeps coming back up. So is there a way to resolve this or is it possible to active and disable the full-screen modus with the apple remote?

This really shouldn't be happening. Nonetheless, I can think of a couple of work arounds. First you could set the Dock to hide automatically in the Dock preferences. Of course it will be hidden the rest of the time as well, but I presume it will then not interfere with your QuickTime viewing. As far as I know, there's no way to invoke full screen with the Apple Remote. You can, however, use a third-party remote application like Remote Buddy (€19.99) to do this.