for getting py files to open in idle by defaultexcept choose cgi file in my www folderand go through the same procedure setupmaking cgi scripts executable complication on maclike any unix derived systemis that programs that you run must be explicitly marked executable (on windows it follows from the file extensionlike exe the examples/www folder may not have the cgi files marked executable (nor have several other technical things rightthe example program examples/www/cgifix py is used to give direct unix/mac/linux executability to cgi files for in the finder open your www directory you can open cgifix py in idle and run it note the comment that the file cgiserverscript was created this is used to lauch the local server importantparticularly if you later copy in cgi script from windows machineor if you create any new cgi script in the www directorymake sure it becomes executable (and possibly fix some other technical thingsby launching cgifix py again if you forget thisand the file is not executablenothing happens in the browser when you try to run itand the error message in the server window is very unhelpful it says file not found make sure you make new cgi files executable (with cgifix py)running it extra times does not hurt terminal use (optionalto use the hands-on python tutorialthe information above should be sufficient to get your mac usage going terminals are quite useful in other contextsthere are many things that can be done from such window that cannot be done from the finder or with an app if you would like bit more backgroundread on navigation os and unix (from which os is derivedhave concept of the current directory directory is the older term for folder from when there were not pictures of folders in graphical interface you start in your home directory my login id is anhso my home directory is /users/anh substitute your login id for your machine the slashes separate nested directories the top hard drive directory is /which contains the directory users which contains usershome directorieslike my anh shorthand in terminal for your home directory is the terminal shows system prompt when it is ready for user input the prompt can be set to show many things the end of the prompt is often before that is often some indication of your current directorylike for the home directory if you want to see the full name of the current directory enter the command pwd single commands are executed after you press the enter key you can list the contents of directory with the ls command unix tends to abbreviate words in commands if you use the ls command in your home directoryyou should see desktopdocumentsdownloadslisted to change directoryuse the cd command followed by the directory you would like to change to you can use the full name of the directory starting with /but more commonly you just indicate where to go relative to where you are now desktop is subdirectory of your home directoryso from the home directory you can just enter appendices