Mac Forums Sunday Chat

Slydude

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Join us tonight for the October 4, 2015 Mac-Forums Sunday Chat. Look for the forum roundup, Apple/Mac news, and a few tips and tricks to round things out. See you there.

Show Notes

Member HRodMusic reminds us that that going to the Purchased Tab in the Mac App Store and holding the "option" key allowing one to cancel the update and re download.

There’s an interesting thread in the forum now regarding the pros and cons of ad blocking software. It’s an interesting read. So far my thoughts are best summed up by member Vansmith’s comments in post #20.


Apple pulls some older software from users Purchased Software tab As you can tell from later posts in this thread this seems to have been temporary.

The current version of iTunes is missing the power search feature. Kirk McLaren points out that it’s possible to use Google to power search the iTunes Music Store. This probably works for other search engines as well. This can be done because the iTunes Store content has webpages.


Fixit app pulled due to its breaking an nada by disclosing insist teardown of new Apple tv

Amazon appears to have decided to stop selling competing video streaming devices such as the Apple TV and Google’s Chromecast if they aren’t easily compatible with its streaming service.

If you are upgrading to the recently released El Capitan make sure to have an exit strategy should you decide to go back to an earlier version of OS X. The best way to do this is either through a clone of your existing installation or by creating a bootable El Capitan flash drive

The C10 site has a series of 8 tips for El Capitan users.

1. Auto-hide the menubar
2. Use Split View window resizing
3. Delete files immediately Use the Command Option Delete Keyboard shortcut.
4. Pin sites in Safari Open the site in a tab. Right click the tab and choose Pin Tab. Pinned tabs update in the background so the information is always up-to-date. Pinned sites appear as small buttons left of the first tab. If you forget what is pinned there scroll over the buttons. Names of the sites appear as tool tips.
5. Mute all tabs in Safari and
a. Open a new tab that is not playing any sound.
b. Click the Mute All Tabs button in the URL address bar.\
c. All open tabs in your Safari window will be muted.
d. Click on Mute All Tabs again to restore sound to all tabs.
6. Find your cursor by shaking your mouse or trackpad. Shaking the mouse or quickly moving your finger on the trackpad forces the cursor to get larger This is a great feature if you are using a large monitor or dual monitor
7. Enable the three-finger drag gesture
8. Use a gray background in Safari Readers

I neglected to include the addition comments about using smart devices as remote controls. We'll address that next week.
 
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Slydude

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Join me tonight for the Mac-Forums Sunday Chat. Look for the forum roundup, a Mac tip or two, and probably an IOS tip or two. I'll also complete my thought on the pros and cons of using smart devices as remote controls for various devices.

Members 281,487 Welcome to our newest member, wk390107

Sometimes significant changes in network equipment leads to significant delay in connecting to networks. Clear old network settings and re-enter info for your networks of choice.

Good discussion of backup procedures / questions

FileVault issues continue under El Capitan

Methods for playing Music on the Apple watch

Macworld points out two different methods of playing music using your Apple watch. The Now Playing glance acts as a controller. Swipe up, then swipe sideways until you see it. (If you don't see it, add it to your Apple Watch in the Watch app on your iPhone, in the Glances settings.)

Use Siri
A quicker way to launch music—and a better one if you're running, for example, and can't tap your watch's tiny display—is to use Siri. If you have "Hey Siri" enabled (Settings > General > Hey Siri, on the Apple Watch), just hold your watch up and say "Hey Siri, play Grateful Dead." Or, press the digital crown to activate Siri, and give a command. Siri searches your iPhone—this can take a few seconds—and starts playing the artist, album, song, or playlist you requested.

One problem with Siri is that it searches both your iPhone and Apple Music, even if Apple Music is not visible on the iPhone. So you may start playing music that's not on your device, and use data without any warning.

Return the downloads window to iTunes 12

iTunes 12.3 now has an Activity Window, which is, for all intents and purposes, the same as the previous Downloads window (with a slightly different display). To view this window, choose Window > Activity Window. When you start a download, you’ll see it in the window.
 
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Slydude

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Join me for the Mac-Forums Sunday Chat at 7:00 p.m. Central Time tonight. We'll have the usual forum roundup and a few tips as usual. Haven't decided on the exact tips yet but I know I'll include a tip on how to create a playlist of internet radio station favorites.

Show Notes

Members 281,637 Welcome to our newest member, supcumps

Member Markz716 has provided a concise summary of the process for installing Windows 10 under Boot Camp

Several years ago I wrote about creating an Internet Radio Favorites playlist so one did not need to keep scrolling through the entire list of internet stations to get to a favorite one. The process involved creating a playlist, ending a station you don’t like in the iTunes radio list, then login at the info for that station and replacing it with the url for a favorite station. Here’s a new procedure that works with iTunes 12.3 under El Capitan.


  1. Create a new playlist labeled something like Internet Radio Favorits.
  2. Right-click the playlist and choose Edit Playlist
  3. In iTunes sources (Music, Video, etc) click the three dots if necessary and select Internet Radio.
  4. School through the categories till you find a favorite station.
  5. Drag that station to your new playlist.
  6. Drag in additional stations as needed then click Done

If you are using Apple Music you may have noticed that the Power Search feature of iTunes now takes you to the Apple Music tab in iTunes rather than executing a power search.

Using the Power Search feature it is possible to search for alternate versions of a song. If someone is not using Apple Music the iTunes Power Search function behaves as it did previously. As a bonus clicking the arrow button next to the price of a song brings you several options — one of which is Other Versions. You can also choose to preview the version selected or get previews of all versions. The length of previews range from 30 to 90 seconds


Stay tuned next week suggestions for using one click to both launch iTunes and play specific content in one click.

Cult of Mac has a few thoughts about the new Mac hardware including some of the display changes giving new Macs a wider color gamut.


Cult of Mac has some thoughts on the new 4K iMac. Principal criticisms are use of the 5400 rpm drive and that if users opt for an SSD you should get more capacity for the buck. The base configuration of the 4K iMac has 8 GB of ram. Overall there seem to be fewer configuration options than with the 5K iMac but the cost is also somewhat lower. Starting price of $1100 for the 4K model versus $1800 for the 5K model.

Apple new keyboard Magic track pad 2 and Magic mouse 2. Kirk McElhearn has some thoughts on the new Apple keyboard and Magic Trackpad 2
 
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Slydude

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Join me at 7:00 p.m. US Central time for the weekly Mac-Forums Video Chat. We'll have the usual forum roundup, a few IOS and OS X tips. As promised I'll include a method for using a single double-click to play certain content in iTunes.

Mac-Forums Show Notes 10/25/15

Members 281,839 Active Members 2,042 Welcome to our newest member, gennyshafer


There are a number of problems being reported by some adopters of El Capitan. Some of the problems reported by users include more beachballs, issues with Microsoft Office for Mac, as well as some issues with landscape printing. See this Cult of Mac summary There are also issues with AirDrop, Wi-fi issues, as well as some issues with iTunes not allowing users to click on anything.

Edward Brawer, developer of uBar, has taken an interesting approach to handling folks who circumvent the registration process. The software gives users one month use free as a demo beyond that point users who continue to use the program without registering are greeted with window titles in Klingon. “I made it so that if uBar detected that the registration mechanism was circumvented, after 10-15 hours it would begin substituting any app or window title with… Klingon.”

Google s entering the subscription video streaming game today with the introduction of YouTube Red. The new $9.99-per-month service will give customers ad-free access to all of YouTube’s content, but the company plans to charge customers extra if they sign up through iOS. To compensate for the App Store’s 30 percent take on all in-app purchases, Google raised the price for iOS users to $12.99 per month. YouTube Red replaces YouTube Music Key and gives users a simplified way to access Play Music and YouTube content through the same interface, sans ads.

Users Mac Mail may discover an interesting “glitch”. If you enter Mail’s Preferences, go to the “Viewing” tab, and select “Use classic view” the program behaves as you’d expect producing what is essentially a two pane view with the mailboxes and list of messages showing.

Should you try to go back to the three pane view by selecting the Viewing tab and deselecting “Use Classic Layout” it almost works. The actual message, in the third pane, is far enough off screen that most of it isn’t visible. The solution is to hover the curser over the divider till you see a double sided arrow. Click the dividing lane and drag it to the left until more of the message is showing

Kirk the iTunes Guy has some thoughts on the new touch features introduced with the most recent iPhones. In essence, his primary criticism is that it is difficult to know which apps support the new features. In some cases the options which are available may not be the ones that would be most useful.


Kirk the iTunes guy has some tips for moving your iTunes content to a NAS drive. He discusses some of the pros and cons of do9ing this as well as providing a fairly straightforward procedure for completing the process.

It is possible to use an Applescript that both launches iTunes and plays content from a playlist with a single double click. Use these code snippets at your own risk. Backup your data first.

--This code snippet tells iTunes to play the playlist whose name is in quotes. If iTunes is not running it is launched by this command. Keep an uncompiled version of the script around to easily use it with several playlists. Simply change the name of the playlist and save it as an application in Script Editor.
tell application "iTunes"
play playlist “Name of playlist”
end tell

This code snippet is only really useful once you have determined that the drive with your iTunes media is mounted. The first snippet is useful if your drive is directly connected too the Mac
Code - Directly Connected Drive

--This code snippet checks to make sure that the drive with you iTunes Media is mounted. If no the shell script is executed. Find the /dev/disk number by launching Disk Utility with the drive mounted then select the drive in the pane at the left.
tell application "Finder"
--Mounts the iTunes folder and extra "iTunes Movies" folder if the iTunes folder isn't mounted
if (folder "[iTunes]" exists) is false then
do shell script "diskutil mount /dev/disk3s2"
end if
end tell
--This code snippet tells iTunes to play the playlist whose name is in quotes. If iTunes is not running it is launched by this command. Suggest renaming the finnished application to the playlist it will play

tell application "iTunes"
play playlist “Name of playlist”
end tell

One if the problems Kirk mentions about moving your iTunes files to a NAS is that iTunes reverts to the default media location if the NAS share isn’t mounted when iTunes launches. Any media that you add when this occurs isn’t added to the NAS but tot he default location (usually the internal drive). Here’s a script I use to take care of that problem.

Code - Media on Network Share
The following code sample works to mount an iTunes media folder that is stored on a network drive. Substitute the IP address of your network drive in place of the XXX.XXX.XX.X pattern. Substitute your user name on the network share for “user” and your password for “password”. Do not remove the quotes.

—Quits iTunes if it was left open from previous login. Without this iTunes would be open too early and default to the Media folder on the boot drive
tell application "iTunes"
quit
end
tell
--Finder mounts the iTunes folder and extra "iTunes Movies" folder if the iTunes folder isn't mounted
tell application "Finder"

if (folder "[iTunes]" exists) is false then
mount volume "afp://xxx.xxx.x.x/Media/iTunes" as user name “User” with password “Password
end if
end
tell
 
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Slydude

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Join me tonight for the Mac-Forums weekly video chat. 7:00 p.m. Central Time. We'll have the usual forum roundup, OS X and IOS tips and assorted Apple news. Hope to see you there.

Show Notes / Talking Points

1,601,815 Members 282,279 Welcome to our newest member, Franklin58


Setting up App Store account without a credit card


TechRadar has quite af Mac / Apple related info this week.


The most interesting numbers are the iPad ones, though. Shipments were 9.9 million during the quarter, a drop of 19.5% over the previous year. It's still a big business – more than $4 billion per quarter – but that's the first time iPad shipments have dropped below 10 million since 2011. It's also the first time that iPad sales generated less money than Mac sales.



The article includes some reason for the slump in sales as we’ll as some thoughts about why the iPad Pro might not be the answer to the slumping sales.


With the next generation of Apple TV slated to ship October 30, 2015 TechRadar has some suggestions for accessories Suggestions include a game controller, Bluetooth keyboard, charging stand for the remote etc.



A new report from Strategy Analytics says that global smartphone shipments grew only about 10% since last year (the slowest growth since the 2009 recession).This phenomenon is being attributed to maturing mobile device markets in the US, China, and Europe. Despite slowing smartphone sales, both Apple and Samsung have seen slight increases in smartphone sales from the same Q3 period last year.


Kirk the iTunes Guy has a good explanations of changes that iTunes 12 make to the Library.xml file which used to be the method for sharing the iTunes library with other applications. Apple programs such as iMovie now read the iTunes library via he iTunes Library.itl file. That method has changed relying on the Library.iti file. The XML file is no longer written by default.so you can’t use it as a means of recovering the library unless you re-enable the feature in iTunes>Preferences>Advanced.


That same article discusses dealing with duplicate entries in the iTunes library. Kirk doesn’t use iCloud Music Library on his main iTunes library; IIn his view iCloud Music Library is a disaster. It duplicates tracks, alters metadata (such as changing song ratings to album ratings), changes artwork, and more. I wrote about this back in July, when iCloud Music Library was first introduced, and I haven’t seen much evidence to suggest that it’s any more trustworthy now.


Cult of Mac has some thoughts / how dos on El Capitan’s feature that deletes selected files immediately.



The new apple TV as some nice aerial view screensaver included. These screensaver can be used on your Mac courtesy of developer John Coates. Coates created a Swift app that lets anyone get the beautiful backdrops on their desktop. Directions here


iOS transition animations on the iPhone 6s Plus look considerably slower and more jerkythan those on the smaller iPhone 6s. If you are experiencing jittery transition animation try the following fix: Go to Settings > General > Accessibility > Increase Contrast, before switching on Reduce Transparency. Smooth animations should be back.


The IOS version of Safari can save web pages as PDFs for offline reading. Essentially the process involves going to the site in question, and tapping the share button. Once the file is saved your IOS device will launch iBooks.
 
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Tune in for the Mac-Forums weekly video chat at 7:00 p. m. Central time tonight. Expect a forum rundown, a bit of Apple news, and a few tips. We'll also have my initial impressions of the latest 27 in. iMac.

Members 282,728 Welcome to our newest member, Jamila31H

Some users do not like using the new Apple TV remote for navigating through longer lists of content due to the amount of swiping that is needed. Some users find the older remote more useful in this situation because you can hold down the arrow buttons to scroll quickly. The good news is the old remote will work with the new Apple TV.

Overview of Disk Utility in El Capitan


New report suggests Apple may have sold nearly 7 million watches to date. These sales numbers outstrips all other vendors’ combined smartwatch shipments over the past five financial quarters. Apple was the only smart watch vendor to ship more than 300,000 units in Q3 2015.

David Pierino atCult of Mac has a photo of a new Apple TV remote that’s reportedly been dried from a users nap. This leads to questions about just how Apple tests the durability of the remote.

Cult of Mac writer Rob LeFebvre has some thoughts on audio settings you might want to tweak on the new Apple TV. A downward swipe while a video is playing brings up numerous audio options. Another option allows you to boost loud sounds, enhance dialog, or control where audio is output.

If you’re using the new Apple TV Rob also has some thoughts / tips and tricks that just might make you an Apple TV Remote power user. The tips cover re-arranging app icons, deleting apps, faster swiping and entering alternate characters.

Suppose you want to move your user account from an old Mac to a new one but for whatever reason can’t run Migration Assistant immediately. Here’s a solution that might save you a few headaches with permissions on your files:


  1. On the new Mac create a user account with the exact same user name and password as you are currently using on the older Mac.
  2. Complete setup for the Mac with your iCloud password etc.
  3. Continue using your Mac until you can run Migration Assistant.
  4. Before you run Migration Assistant backup any files you’ve created with the new account.
  5. Run Migration Assistant - Because the account names are identical you will be asked what you want to do. There is an option to replace the user account on the new machine with the user account from the older Mac. This is the option you want to choose.

I have only noticed this option in El Capitan though it may have been present before now. User this at your own risk. It has had limited testing.

Machine Speed Shootout - Preliminary Findings

2008 MacBook Pro with 8 GB of ram and 500 GB SSD vs. Late 2015 5K 27” iMac w 3.3 GHZ Core I5 processor and 8 GB ram. Note these are simply initial impressions further speed comparisons will follow in the weeks to come.


Transferring my existing El Capitan installation to the new Mac took just under 90 minutes with the MacBook Pro SSD in a USB 3 drive carrier.

I haven’t tested boot time for the new machine which has a 2 TB Fusion drive. I don’t expect much of a difference in boot time since the OS is kept on the Flash portion of the Fusion drive. Boot time is not a major consideration for me since I do not reboot very often.

On the new iMac Handbrake converted a 12.08 GB m2t to 5.13 m4v in 1:39:40 with conversion parameters set to Apple TV 3 preset. That same conversion, the same parameters. The same conversion is currently running on my 2008 MacBook Pro since 9:35 this morning. By the time I finish writing this post the conversion will have been running for 11 hours and Handbrake estimates there is another half hour to go. Final data is in: The MacBook pro took 11 hrs. 22 min. to perform the same conversion

The graphics card in this model seems to have no trouble driving the 5K display and an external 24” monitor simultaneously. Stay tuned for more.

I am loving the feel of the new keyboard and mouse. Normally I don’t like things this small but in this case it works.

BTW as I mentioned during the show I’ve liked most Apple monitors in the past with the exception of one 17” CRT. I’ve usually used other monitors due to cost but I love this new 5k display. The picture quality is remarkable.
 
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Slydude

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Join me at 7:00 p.m. tonight for the Mac-Forums Sunday Video Chat. As usual we'll have the forum roundup, an Apple/Mac new roundup, as well as a few tips and tricks to make your Mac use easier. We'll include a bit of info about this week's issue with the Mac App Store.

Members 283,128 Welcome to our newest member, KrystalBro

The iPad Pro has launched. there is a discussion of the pros/cons here,. It includes a link to the Ars Technica review and a discussion by some of our distinguished forum members.

You might also find this Cult of Mac Leander Kahney's first impressions the iPad Pro helpful. First impressions with the big and beautiful iPad Pro

MacWorld’s Glen Fleischmann looks at the changes that have been made to Disk Utility under El Capitan. These changes include loss of the ability to set up a RAID. CD/DVD burning has also been removed. In a thread started by Mac-Forums member tired retired the question gets asked on whiter Apple has lost its competitive edge. I mention this thread because it has some information about whether or not the RAID features which used to be present in OS X are missing. Apparently they aren’t if you boot normally but are if you boot from the recovery partition.


if you press Command-L, iTunes, the currently playing item is displayed.. If you've started listening to music, for example, from your Music library, iTunes will show you the currently playing track in the overall Music library. If you're listening to a playlist, iTunes beams you back to that playlist.
Learn to use the power of Command-L, and iTunes will be just a tiny bit better.

Even though the new Apple TV contains either 32GB or 64GB flash storage, you can’t “send” files from your current library to the Apple TV. You have to rely on Home Sharing to get content to the Apple TV. The upside to this is that one can access libraries access multiple devices. For example, you may have your music library on the computer you use regularly, but store your videos on a dedicated device, such as a Mac mini. If so, you can select either device from the Apple TV and access its content. In fact, if you’re running out of storage on your Mac and have another older Mac, it would be useful to convert it to a media server. Set up iTunes on the old Mac, perhaps add an external hard drive, and add, say, all your videos to that iTunes library. Since videos take up so much space, you could still have room on your main Mac for your music.


But there are also different codecs. Unlike music, where the codecs don’t change very often, video compression is constantly being improved and tweaked. The new Apple TV has, in particular, a limitation regarding what types of videos using the MPEG-4 codec. But I doubt many people have used MPEG-4 in a very long time. If you do use have videos encoded with MPEG-4, you may need to convert them to H.264, which seems to be the codec that will be

Michael Tsai Spam Sieve, About This Particular Mac has a bit to say about the problems some users experienced with apps purchased from the Apps Store that wouldn’t launch.
 
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Slydude

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It's Sunday chat time again folks. 7:00 p.m Central time as usual. Look for a forum roundup, tips and tricks and whatever else comes to mind.

Here are the show notes from the Sunday Chat.

Welcome to our newest member, RosalineSl

Recovering from lost FileVault credentials

Pros and cons of copying files vs. moving them potential.


If you are experiencing network / connection drops when using AirPlay make sure that you are on an 802.11n network. This should reduce the number of dries significantly. From Apple. More tips for improving AirPlay performance Johnny Evans Computerworld

Johnny Evans at Computerworld site has another article at ComputerWorld has an article that might be worth a read if you are considering an iPad Pro. 7 Apps that illustrate the productive potential of the iPad Pro

Move your Photos library to an external drive. iMore website has this procedure for moving the iTunes library to an external drive. The procedure is similar to what would be used with other Apple apps.

  1. Quit Photos
  2. Find the library file in your User folder/Pictures) and copy the file to external drive
  3. 3. Option click Photos when launching. It will ask you where the library file is located.

In about two weeks I hope to have an extended piece which includes tips for passing Macs you no longer need on to others. We'll look at some of the technical issues, possible beneficiaries of your Mac donations, and a few other considerations.
 
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Sorry folks. No Sunday chat tonight. Still a bit under the weather. See you next week.
 

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Been a little bit of a hectic day but we'll do a short Sunday video chat tonight at 7:00 p.m. as usual. Look for a forum roundup, and a few tips and tricks as usual. Show will probably be audio only unless I figure out whatever is tripping up Google Chat and my FaceTime camera between now and the start of the show.

Show Notes

Members 284,202 Welcome to our newest member, gordonlw

How to archive email using the Apple Mail app. http://www.mac-forums.com/switcher-hangout/330001-macbook-pro-mail-program.html

Use symbolic links to help manage space on an SSD http://www.macworld.com/article/2148490/slim-down-your-ssd-with-symbolic-links.html

Rob Griffiths doesn’t like the single line of characters used to enter passwords on the new Apple TV. He has figured out how to bring back the password entry grid that has been on other versions of the Apple TV. The solution is to wake the Apple TV with one of the older remotes (silver 0r white) not with the Siri remote included with the Apple TV 4. You can use the Siri remote once the grid appears.

John Kelt at Mac Observer has a piece declaring the 2013 Mac Pro a.k.a “trash can” a failure.
And for good reason. Those machines are just better than the trashcan Mac. Right now, a cMP simply spanks the trashcan Mac's performance. For example, with regard to top end performance, processor-wise, you can get a maxed out 12-core 3.46GHz cMP model that is just as fast as the top end 12-core 2.7GHz trashcan Mac.
In most every other important way, the cMP simply trounces the trashcan Mac. For storage, you can get larger capacities (e.g., 2TB, 4TB, and up) as well as way faster SSDs (e.g., running at near 6GB/sec). Video card options for the cMP obliterate the top end options on the trashcan Mac.

Is Adobe foreshadowing the end of Flash? (dead link removed) Not quite but they do acknowledge some issues and seem to be starting to suggest that content creators move to other web standards such as HTML 5. It seems likely that future support will be confined mainly to security updates.


Tip to help if you are rebuilding the iTunes library.remember to export the xml file from the old library. This should allow you to reload playlists without having to recreate them from scratch.

The good news is that (assuming it isn't the playlist files that are the problem), once you have re-imported the music into this new library, you can export the library file from your old library (under the file menu, this will result in an XML file) and them "import playlist" from the File menu while you're in the new library (File->Library->import playlist) and it will import all the old playlists. http://www.mac-forums.com/showthread.php?t=329907&p=1689776&viewfull=1#post1689776


If you find that some video editors like MPEG Streamclip are having difficulty saving video files you have edited try editing the file in QuickTime Player X. If all you need to do is trim video and save the result it can handle even some files that other editors complain about. Scroll to the first place you want to edit and press Command Y to split the clip. Move to the second point and do the same thing. Swlwct the area to delete then press the delete key, For more editing tips see here
 
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The Mac-Forums weekly video chat is back. 7:00 p.m. Central time as usual. Join me if you can for an assortment of Mac and IOS tips as well as whatever else comes to mind.

Show Notes

Welcome to our newest member, atrdriver

FAT 32 drives can’t be read by TVs etc. if they have a GUID partition table. Check Disk Utility’s setting before formatting.

General discussion on the ins and outs of recycling tech gear.

Showing Markup tools in Preview gives you access to several selection tools in addition to rectangular selection. These tools are still present in El Capitan and can be activated by doing the following:

1. Open a document in Preview and see if the Markup toolbar is present. It has icons for the editing tools.
2. If it is not present Press Shift, Command, A simultaneously (this command is in the View menu).
3. The selection tool is usually on the far side of the bar and look like a rectangular selection. Click there. Lasso is one of the option.


Google has released information regarding the top search terms in 2015 for a variety of categories. It also posted the top ten search terms for a range of categories, with Apple taking three out of the top four slots in consumer tech. As last year, the latest iPhone model – the 6 last year and 6S this year – was the top search, while the Apple Watch climbed from #8 to #3 and the iPad Pro took 4th place. Samsung also got three places, with LG, HTC, Nexus and Microsoft getting one apiece.

Two Monitors or One Monitor and Spaces MacWorld contributors Rob Grfifiths and Kirk McElhearn a.k.a. the iTunes Guy both often have a large number of apps open at one time. Rob manages this by using multiple monitors while Kirk makes use of a single monitor and the Spaces function in OS X.
 
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Slydude

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My area is currently under several severe weather watches for the remainder of the evening. The Mac-Forums Sunday Video chat will be postponed until Monday December 28, 2015 at 7:00 p.m. Central. When the time comes you can find the show here
 

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It's the first Mac-Forums Sunday Video Chat of 2016. Join me at 7:00 p.m. Central time tonight. We'll have the forum roundup, a few tips, and a non-technical discussion of Mac security.

Show notes

Welcome to our newest member RXhaw

If you are new to the continuity features check out this Apole overview for tips.


One of the topics covered in that overview is Forwarding SMS messages to your Mac. It’s nice to be able to start a conversation on your IOS device and continue it on your Mac where you have access to a full-sized keyboard.

If you use the builtin screenshot program in OS X. It saves files in .png format. If you want to change to another format it can be accomplished easily by using Terminal and following the directions here. You can change location of the screenshots following the directions here. If, like me, you're allergic to Terminal you can change this setting using Onyx or several other utilities.

Thanks to member Harryv2448 for posting an excellent overview of Online security for Macs. Here’s a link to the post which contains an excellent summary as well as a few excellent tips. That page as links to most of the major browsers, siacussions of which things such as Jave might be needed, as well as some general security tips for online banking.


Normally when I refer to Kirk “the iTunes Guy” MCElhearn it’s for something he’s written about improving/using iTunes. This time he has some has some thoughts about using the iWork and iCloud for collaboration on documents

Here’s another useful article from Kirk about using Plex as a media server. Although the article focuses on use of the Mac Mini as a sever, numerous other Macs could serve the same function. If you’ve gotten a new Ma c recently and want an interesting use for the old one this might be right up your alley.
 
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Join me for the Mac-Forums video chat at 7:00 p.m. tonight as usual. We'll have the usual forum roundup, a tip for copying DVDs in El Capitan and whatever else comes to mind.

Welcome to our newest member, quinterodiego

member Surfbull asks about burning DVDs Copying DVDs in El Capitan is possible but the process is slightly different . In the past you could do this directly from within Disk Utility. There are alternatives :Copy DVDs using El Capitan There are also other alternatives covered in this forum thread

Deleting multiple emails under IOS 9



  1. Go to mailbox that contains the mail you want to delete.
  2. Tap clear circle next to mail you want to delete.
  3. Tap trash can

Member Wormslick read a story about Wi-Fi assist chewing up useer’s cellular data. if you are concerned about this take the following steps:
If you are concerned about data usage it is easy to turn it off.
1, On your iPhone/iPad go to Settings> Cellular.

2. Scroll to the bottom of the list. If the button is green tap it to deactivate the feature.

Originally Posted by chas_m

IIRC there is an indicator in the "menubar" of the iPhone when Wi-Fi Assist is active: if you see the Wi-Fi strength indicator AND the "3G" or "LTE" indicator and the Wi-Fi appears "grayed out," this means that you are using cellular data because the Wi-Fi signal is too weak at the moment. Normally Wi-Fi Assist isn't on for long; as you move around or if the Wi-Fi signal returns to proper strength, the Wi-Fi Assist turns itself off.

For some reason, apparently since the release of iOS 9.2,
iOS devices that use iCloud Music Library now download every new track you add to your iTunes library. Tracks added from Apple Music don’t download, only those you physically add to the library (by adding files downloaded from sources other than iTunes, or ripped from CD).You can find a more detailed description here.


The iPhone 7 rumors are flying in conjunction with CES. If you're interested you can find comment over at Cult Of Mac. I don't have any insider information but here are the things I think most likely to appear in the next iPhone:
1. Better waterproofing
2. Wireless charging
3. Change / elimination of the headphone jack. This would allow for a thinner design. IIRC Apple already has a patent for a modified design of the standard 3.5 mm. jack. If they didn't go that route look for headsets/earbuds that connect via lightning or bluetooth to replace the current Apple earbuds.
 
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Join me at 7:00 p.m. tonight for the Mac-Forums Video Chat

Show Notes

Welcome to our newest member, RustyGorma

IOS 9.3 has been seeded to developers. This is not the public beta so it may be a while before this release makes it into the wild. The release includes some new features. See Apple’s summary here and Cult of Mac’s summary here. Some of the new features include:


  1. Night shift which uses the device clock and your location info to sense when it is sundown. Evenings and nights the device shifts to warmer display colors which are less likely to trick your brain into staying awake.
  2. Education users will now have a multi-user mode on iPads. You can have a roster of students with accounts on the same iPad with each student having their own data. I’ve wanted a feature like this for a while. Hopefully they will extend this to home users. I think families with multiple children would like this option.
  3. Starting with iOS 9.3, you can pair multiple Apple Watches to a single iPhone.

There are some interesting wallpapers on the Apple site as part of their Start Something New ad campaign. These should look great on retina display Macs.

If you have a fourth generation Apple TV Cult of Mac’s Rob Lefebvre has some thoughts on using VLC to play video on the Apple TV. Although the Apple TV doesn’t have storage for media files Rob has some suggestions for solving that issue. Generally involves using media server like Plex and pointing VLC to that.

If you are interested in digital audio but confused by the discussion of file formats compression methods, bit rates etc. check out this Macworld article by Kirk “The iTunes Guy” McElhearn.
 
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No Sunday chat this Sunday folks. Things got a bit hectic around here today. See you next Sunday.
 

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We'll have the chat this week but I'm going to push it to Monday February 8, 2016 at 7:00p.m. Had something come up at the last minute today. Besides, wouldn't want to ruin anyone's Super Bowl.

February 8, 2016 Mac-Forums Video Chat 7:00 p.m. tonight.

Show Notes

Members 286,738 Welcome to our newest member, NoraToussa
Tech radar review of El Capitan features http://www.techradar.com/us/how-to/computing/apple/52-os-x-el-capitan-tips-and-tricks-1305433



Correcting errors in the OS X user dictionary http://tidbits.com/article/16241


When having iPhones or other devices with the Touch ID home button repaired make sure the repair is handled properly. Some users have reported that when these devices are repaired subsequent IOS updates may produce an “Error 53” message thus bricking the phone.


Apple today launched a new Repair Extension Program that addresses video issues on some late 2013 Mac Pro models, according to an internal notice obtained by MacRumors. Apple has determined that graphics cards in some late 2013 Mac Pros, manufactured between February 8, 2015 and April 11, 2015, may cause distorted video, no video, system instability, freezing, restarts, shut downs, or may prevent system start up.


Apple or an Apple Authorized Service Provider will repair eligible Mac Pro models affected by the video issues free of charge until May 30, 2018. Apple lists a turnaround time of about 3-5 days.


Apple says both graphics cards must be replaced on Mac Pros exhibiting any of the problems listed above. AMD's FirePro D500 (high-end model) and D700 (built-to-order) GPUs are affected. AMD's FirePro D300 GPU on the base Mac Pro is not listed.


Macworld’s Jason Snell has some interesting thoughts about drops in iPad sales which have continued for 10 of the last 11 quarters.. Current sales are about 48 million units annually down from a high of 80 million.



Kirk “The iTunes Guy” has a piece on his site addressing some of the problems El Capitan and Apple TV cause for some users with motion sickness issues. Turning off animations helps for some but not all users. In addition to the motion issues he address the need for more control over things such as fonts in IOS.
 
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Join me at 7:00 p.m. Central for the weekly Mac-Forums chat. As usual we'll have the forum roundup, a few tips and tricks as well as whatever else comes to mind.

Show Notes

As of about a half hour before show time we are just shy of 287,000 members. Welcome to our newest member, icloudx


If you don’t have time to visit Mac-Forums daily why not subscribe to the e-mail newsletter. You’ll get a weekly roundup of forum activity including links to the most active threads.


Cult of Mac’s Kilian Bell has some interesting thoughts on the prospect of 2016 Mac laptops using Intel’s Skylake processors. According to the article, most of intel’s annual chip announcements result in speed improvements of about 10%. Some projections suggest that the Skylake processors will result in a 20% speed boost, faster data paths, and possibly better battery life.



I’m not in the market for a notebook anytime soon but if I were I’d keep the following two things in mind: Even if Skylake processors are used in new Mac models we’ll have to see real-world numbers, with real-world apps before we have a good idea the final benefits.


Last week I mentioned that some users who had replaced the Home / Touch ID button on some iPhone models were then receiving an Err 53 message which appeared to essentially ‘Brick” the device. This error message, which is produced by iTunes, gives little clue about the possible causes. Not all devices with touch ID are affected. The iPhone 6 and 6+and iPads with Touch ID can be affected as well. Here’s Cult of Mac’soverview of the Error 53 situation



“If you’ve ever had a part replaced by anyone other than the Apple Store, don’t update your iPhone’s software. Only Apple Stores have hardware capable of re-establishing an authentic connection between the your Touch ID and your iPhone’s Secure Enclave.”


One of the selling points for Snapchat has been that photos disappear automatically after a period of time. When users discovered that it was possible to take screenshots of a chat, thus preserving a picture indefinitely, Snapchat countered by letting users know when someone was trying to sneak a screenshot. Now say Snapchat users have found a workaround to that feature:If you are a Snapchatu user you may want to be aware of this procedure which makes use of Airplane mode to complete the screenshot without the other user getting a warning.



Kirk McClearan did a recent appearance on the MacVoices podcast in which he discusses the pros and cons of creating a lossless iTunes library in some depth. If you’ve been wondering about such things as whether the benefits of lossless audio outweigh the time needed to re-rip your collection this is the place to start answering those questions. The Kirksville site also has links to several articles related to lossless audio.


For myself, I’m sure that some listeners can hear the difference between lossless and lossy formats whereas others may not be able to hear the difference. Results will depend upon your listening habits and the gear that you are using to play your music. Switching your music from a lossy format to a lossless one is probably going to be time consuming given the need to re-rip the music. Before you do that to your entire collection re-rip just a few tracks and play them on your gear to see if you notice a difference.


If you’ve ever read an audio magazines reviews/conclusions about somme audio gear and wondered how they arrived at some of their conclusions you’re not the only one. The Kirksville site provides us with an exam,ole of just how far off track some of these sites / articles can go.



Finally a reprise of two tips I’ve mentioned before that also seem to continue to be relevant:

  1. Explore the Option key’s many uses When you choose menu items in the Finder or in many programs the available choices may vary if the option key is held down while the menu is accessed. The volume icon in the menu bar for example raises and looses volume but holding down the Option key while clicking that icon allows toy to change audio inputs/outputs without opening the Sounds preference pane.
  2. If you are storing Time Machine backups on a Time Capsule / other network device and find that Time Machine is reporting difficulty accessing the files there may be a simple fix. Locate the Time Machine sparsebundle file on your network device and double-click it. If the finder can “see” it it will mount as a disk drive and Disk Utility can be used to try and repair the file.
 
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Join me tonight for the weekly Mac-Forums video chat. Check out the usual forum roundup, Mac and IOS tips and Apple news. You don't need anything special to view the chat but I think you need the Google Talk plugin to join in.

Show Notes

Welcome to our newest member, gdejaynes


Apple ordered to create a back door into an iPhone. This thread is a good summary of things so far. Opinion has been all over the place so to speak. It is worth keeping up with this issue. No matter which side of the debate you support, everyone has a stake in this issue. I’ll have more thoughts on this next week after thinking about it a bit more.


Wireless Printer Reconnection tips This thread is about Canon printers specifically but the tips should apply to other makes/models as well. Before you reset the printing systemm try the tip involving shutting off the router and all devices then rebooting the router.


This week Kirk the iTunes guy McElhearn takes a look at problems associated with iTunes playlists. With playlists organized into folders Changing / editing a playlist can cause it to get out of the order it has been set. Edit a playlist whose name starts with A isn’t at the top of the list but has been moved to the bottom. Changing a playlist view, for example, also changes the view order. Playlists not in folders do not seem to be affected. Until this is fixed the easiest solution is to quit and relaunch iTunes. This puts things back in order till the next time a playlist is edited.


That same column as a tip for having a song repeat more than once in a playlist. Simply drag the track you want repeated from the main library listing to the playlist multiple times. This doesn’t result in multiple copies of the track. Basically you are moving pointers around rather than copying the track. I must admit this never occurred to me.


Johnny Evans at Apple Holic lists nine IOS tips many users may not be aware of - especially of one is not a power user. A few of my favorites include:



1. Here’s shortcut to requesting the desktop version of a site. tap and hold down the reload button in the URL bar and then tap the Request Desktop Sit command that pops up on-screen.
2. To access Safari’s list list of recently closed tabs tap the two squares at the bottom right of the Safari window to open tab carousel view, and then tap and hold the + symbol at the bottom of that and you’ll enter the Recently Closed tabs screen.


Shared Reminders
Do you use shared lists on iOS devices friends, family and colleagues create shared lists to help them be more productive? If not try it.


1. Open Reminders and tap to create a new list. Add items to the list and name it in the usual way.
2. Now in the generic Reminders view listing all your notes select the new list, tap Edit and then select Sharing. You should add the email of the contacts needing access to the list.
3. Adding others using the Add Person command. Now everyone in the group can share and add new items (or completed items) to this list.

Johnny Evans at Apple Holic also has a wealth of good mail tips. for IOS 9 users. Well worth a quick read.
 
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Join me for the weekly Mac-Forums Video Chat at 7:00 p.m. US Central Time. Look for the forum roundup, a few tips and tricks, as well as whatever else comes to mind. I'll probably continue my discussion of Apple's fight with the federal government over iPhone decryption.

Show Notes / Links

Welcome to our newest member, MandySolom


The legal battle over whether Apple should be forced to decrypt an iPhone belonging to one of the San Bernadine terror suspects goes on. The government is essentially asking Apple to create a “key” that would unlock that phone. Essentially Apple is being asked to bypass its protections against rapidly guessing users pas codes You can find more information here

Apple considers this order a violation of the Constitution . Numerous teach companies are backing Apple in this dispute.


Apple has a fix for this issue posted on their website. The problem seems to revolve around a file called "Incompatible Kernel Extension Configuration Data” is installed. If you have version 3.28.1, you need an update. This article describes a series of Terminal commands that can be applied as well as mentioning that the problem can also be fixed by booting in recovery mode and reinstalling OS X. Thanks to member gsahli for posting that link.

Regular users of Pages know that importing text into the program via Copy/Paste sometimes results in all sorts of formatting issues that can be difficult to correct. See this Mac-Forums thread for example. Mac-Forums member Dysfunction suggests using the Paste and Match Style command (Cmd + Opt +Shift + v).

9 to 5 Mac has reports that OS X 10.10.12 codenamed Fuji will include Siri on the Mac. We’ll have to wait and see how useful it will be on the Mac.

This weeks trip to Kirksville talks about how one can have two different iCloud Music libraries. It’s not as simple as launching iTunes with the Option key down. You must also associate the new library with a different Apple ID. Any music associated with the first Apple ID must be associated with the second Apple ID if it is to work properly. See the article for additional details.

Bonus links: You can also find tips on updating your iCloud Music Library and how to update your iCloud Music Library


The 9TO5Mac site has a summary of the rumors that the next major release of OS X will bring Siri to the Mac
 
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