tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55148969039052611672024-03-04T21:36:12.805-08:00The Mac GuyDiscussions of all things Mac, iPhone and iPad related. If you would like to ask a technical question email me at paultscott@gmail.com or follow me on Twitter @paulmacguyscott
The Mac Guy is an independent blog and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc.”Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.comBlogger85125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-38217095320229027852015-11-12T11:26:00.001-08:002015-11-12T11:26:48.428-08:00Apple TVThe more I use the new Apple TV the more I like it. The previous model was likable and easy to use but we had no options for live content. Now with a full app store and a community of excited developers the sky is the limit for this set top box. It was surprising to hear the bump in price to $169 or $199 depending on memory configuration but with the updated remote control and additional features it is well worth the price point in my opinion. <div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXCGd6fAlzG17fUlh9wO1DHWdsvIPdW_Qer0oekHr0Do8jjnPEDHYwCJaDMjj7ZuEHKgik6yEkNTM_NNBtziNuCKzSBJuvs1_DADheUNjpG8nns0SBIHupD37QkndAQiPmwb-zRDUVi5sF/s1600/Unknown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXCGd6fAlzG17fUlh9wO1DHWdsvIPdW_Qer0oekHr0Do8jjnPEDHYwCJaDMjj7ZuEHKgik6yEkNTM_NNBtziNuCKzSBJuvs1_DADheUNjpG8nns0SBIHupD37QkndAQiPmwb-zRDUVi5sF/s1600/Unknown.jpeg" /></a></div>
<div>
The first surprise was the remote control and updated HDMI. The new HDMI port allows the Apple TV to turn on some TV's and control the volume with no configuration. It just works out of the box. Apple TV setup is a breeze if it works well. If not try rebooting your phone and tap the phone on the TV again to do the setup. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
While it is still 1080p and not 4k don't worry I am sure there is good reason for this. One being the 4k standard isn't fully defined yet and Apple doesn't want to have to make changes or tell users sorry your 4k device doesn't work with the 4k standard. Waiting until the standards are settled is just fine by me. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Downside of the setup process is users still have to login to each app one at a time and go to a webpage and enter the code to authorize the Apple TV to the app. If you have multiple Apple TV's at home this is a task that will have to be done for each. I would love to see Apple store authorizations in iCloud and family sharing so this only has to be done once and the whole family can use it. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We have live TV shows. I watch TWiT every week and now I can watch it live without having to Airplay to the Apple TV from another device. The odd thing that has disappeared from the Apple TV lineup is Podcasts. So now I can watch live shows on my AppleTV but I can't go back to my Podcast app and listen to some on my phone and have it sync with the TV and just work. I assume Apple will release a podcast app soon. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Airplay while it has always worked well sometimes was slow to connect or would fail to connect from time to time. These issues seem to have been resolved and Airplay connects quickly and stays connected now. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The remote control needs better indication of what is touch surface and what isn't. With the buttons in the middle it is hard to orient the remote in a dark room. Siri also still feels very beta. She can do some cool context aware searches but certain things she just apologizes for not being able to do and sometimes just displays info on screen and doesn't speak a response. When asking about weather one might expect to hear a response and not just see it printed on screen. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Overall AppleTV is a nice upgrade but it isn't what it does today that has me so excited about it. It is what is going to come over the next year or so that is going to make it a ground breaking set top box. The more I use it the more I like the user interface and the ease of navigation. More capabilities from Siri and I might just remove my other set top boxes. Now Amazon needs to put their app on the Apple TV so I don't have to switch sources to watch content from Amazon or I may just stop buying form Amazon all together. </div>
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-60521105822628686232015-10-21T11:38:00.002-07:002015-10-21T11:39:44.227-07:00The Magic of Apple's Newest Keyboard & Trackpad<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDfEqSPMv1cgAWthULFR2ZKgmr7ed2Jsz06OnwYxm0l0ukuq0eXRXITq4YI_KtjYLvU6Wd8HwzzAIE9GcUA3-DLwZlYNv0JaHaUfLt1kYukUfZGCdxFz16zMHGOJ5topW0RJ8QBO17YX0s/s1600/IMG_2179.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="199" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDfEqSPMv1cgAWthULFR2ZKgmr7ed2Jsz06OnwYxm0l0ukuq0eXRXITq4YI_KtjYLvU6Wd8HwzzAIE9GcUA3-DLwZlYNv0JaHaUfLt1kYukUfZGCdxFz16zMHGOJ5topW0RJ8QBO17YX0s/s320/IMG_2179.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Last week early orders of the new Apple Magic Keyboard and Magic Trackpad started arriving at door steps even before they started arriving in stores. I have now spent a couple of days on the new Magic Keyboard and Magic Trackpad and here is what I have found.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The keyboard with the new internal butterfly mechanism and larger key caps feels very nice to type on. Quick lightning charging and simplified paring makes it an excellent keyboard for daily use. It came nearly fully charged and I plugged it in for a few minutes to see the new auto pairing feature. Only time will tell how long internal battery will last but in four days I haven't seen the battery percentage drop at all yet. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Taking it out of the box and plugging it in to the computer with the lightning cable made the keyboard automatically pair with the computer making it even simpler to setup than going to Bluetooth and entering the six numbers that appear. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Plus who hasn't had that moment when they realized they needed a new keyboard and mouse and had turned off the feature to automatically open the app to connect a keyboard and mouse when one wasn't detected and been stuck going to look for a wired keyboard and mouse to setup the wireless ones? </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well now just plug it in and it pairs and is ready to go. Then you can unplug it at your leisure. The thing some people may not like about the much thinner and smaller physical keyboard size is now like on the mobile computers the up and down arrow keys share a single key cap. Sorry gamers I know you won't be crazy about that. Even I am not a huge fan of it. Although now my laptop and desktop keyboards have the same approximate feel to them. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
It also struck me that Apple had an opportunity to add a finger print reader to the keyboard or trackpad and didn't do it. I can unlock any other iOS device and use credit cards with my finger print. I really would have expected to see the keyboard include a finger print reader so Wallet can be used from my desktop and finally be able to use Apple Pay from my desktop. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The TrackPad is a huge improvement. It has a much larger surface area and features Force Touch. Allow users to have left click, deeper left click, right click, and a whole host of gestures to make the desktop more useful. As developers start taking advantage of Force Touch I am sure we will see it more in desktop applications. It takes a little getting used to the Force Touch feature as I occasionally end up clicking too hard when trying to drag a file somewhere and force touch instead of left click by accident. I am sure it is an adjustable setting. For now I am just trying to get used to lightly tapping on the trackpad to see if I get used to it before I start changing settings. I try to test out the defaults first to see how it works before I start customizing the experience. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Overall the new Magic Keyboard and Magic TrackPad has made my two year old iMac feel newer and give me access to all of the features of OS X 10.11 and I am sure as time goes on we will see more features take advantage of Force Touch. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Now the new Magic Keyboard is a price jump of about $20 to $99 and the Magic TrackPad increased in price from $69 to $129 a $50 price increase over the previous models. So far I have only replaced two of the three keyboards and trackpads I use given the price jump. However, I believe the devices are worth it given you will not be buying replacement batteries again and given how long the previous models lasted these new devices will likely last many years to come. So think of it as a long term investment in your technology and it is the piece of technology you touch as much as or more than your smart phone so it should feel good to use. </div>
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-49177879150272057912015-10-16T13:02:00.001-07:002015-10-16T14:20:28.436-07:00Payanywhere.com Credit Card Processing<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuJgJEjJwWHQZJrEGRZOjMYeWjCXUzFirjk3jfqqm-5CHYTxSR5Jcahd_51gL2aChHMOca8woHK0enmvtnvcicJ6lpgpbuOEvXGoIE9cqtA-nb_iwfp2Eju7rGH42oA1pSEHex7TbRQYKP/s1600/payanywhere.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuJgJEjJwWHQZJrEGRZOjMYeWjCXUzFirjk3jfqqm-5CHYTxSR5Jcahd_51gL2aChHMOca8woHK0enmvtnvcicJ6lpgpbuOEvXGoIE9cqtA-nb_iwfp2Eju7rGH42oA1pSEHex7TbRQYKP/s1600/payanywhere.jpg" /></a><br />
<span style="background-color: black; color: white; font-family: inherit;">My consulting business has been growing and people are starting to ask if they can pay by credit card. I had a system I setup in 2012 but only rarely used. So I dusted off the old Square reader and tried it. It didn't work anymore and needed to be replaced. So off to the Apple Store to get a new reader. I asked for a reader and was handed a payanywhere.com reader. I didn't look too closely at the package and noticed it wasn't what I thought when I got home, but they offered lower rates than Square so why not setup an account and give them a shot.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;"><br />
</span></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: black; color: white; font-family: inherit;">The device looks nice and is packaged nicely but the service from the company is horrible and tech support is useless. The initial limits were too low to be useful. I could initially only sell $10 or less at a time and a low daily and monthly limit. So even a poorly attended garage sale wouldn't make this device useful. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: black; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Emails from the company are poorly phrased and don’t make requirements clear. I had a three day delay because they said they may ask for a document. They never asked for it just expected me to send it because they said they may want a copy of my business license and three months of bank statements. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: black; color: white;">My first interaction with the chat system listed the wrong business hours and disconnected me when it was stated to be open but were not really open at that time. The first support person I talked to lied to me and told me Square doesn't have a customer service line. I didn't know that I never needed it. (It was a lie they do have one and they were helpful.) It had taken days to get any sort of response which has slowed my ability to do business and take payments. Ultimately I went out a bought a new Square reader to process payments from my clients. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: black; color: white;">When requirements were finally made clear I was asked to email or fax my bank statements. I don’t own or use a fax machine anymore and haven’t for the last decade. The tech suggested I go out and pay Kinko’s or someone else to fax it for me. Would you want to give your bank statements to strangers to fax? Email isn’t secured or offer an encryption option. So the bank statement request is protection for them but not for the merchant. It would be trivial to put an upload button on the secure site to upload a document that is requested. The second support tech was kind and tried to be helpful but wasn’t really able to do much or advance the issue. I let her know I was on a time crunch because a client had been trying to pay me for days while I spent hours sorting this mess out. This is of course costing me money and time. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: black; color: white;">Finally this morning they raised my limit but to a lower limit than I had requested which still doesn't make the device overly useful. I used Square to take care of my clients and while on the phone with Square support I asked if these transactions would work. They said if they have questions they will ask me but none of their procedures are designed to impede merchants or business. Unlike PayAnywhere who's entire system is designed around throwing up roadblocks and impeding business. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: black; color: white;">Finally to top off this entire mess the product packaging promised $5,000 in free transactions when signing up. I used my own credit card as a test on a $1.00 transaction to make sure everything worked and they charged me for it. So much for the first $5,000 in free transactions. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: black; color: white;">For me and my business I am going back to Square and will patiently wait for my new reader to come and they supplied me with a $10.00 credit for the $10.00 reader I purchased so I could continue to take credit card payments. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: black; color: white;">So for Square they get an A for customer service and as for PayAnywhere they get an F for customer service and I am canceling that account and will not recommend PayAnywhere to anyone for any reason. I am not alone in this opinion doing a quick search on Google later many review sites have given PayAnywhere poor reviews and there are always hundreds of former customer comments about a myriad of issues around using the service. </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Lucida Grande, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 12px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Lucida Grande, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 12px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Lucida Grande, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 12px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Lucida Grande, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 12px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Lucida Grande, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 12px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Lucida Grande, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 12px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Lucida Grande, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 12px;"><br /></span></span>Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com29tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-57427113567920537712015-09-12T00:09:00.002-07:002015-09-12T00:09:48.919-07:00Quick Tip for Burning DVD's in 10.11 El CapitanWe are just a week away from the release of OS X 10.11 El Capitan. For those that still use a DVD drive and have need to burn DVD's. Here is a quick tip to keep you working. The new Disk Utility Application is no longer a way to burn a DVD.<br />
<br />
First Insert the DVD you want to make a copy of and open the New Disk Utility Program and choose File / New Image / Image From <name copy="" disk="" of="" to="">. </name><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1mZuk31wIBmGVz2f6ixjnXPQAeAWlhLJ6D-OFw63dn9GCi7shB6jsMc6T7CZeWgubtPS9wL1sYZbmPo63vSPUFNwTwHmd1B2zgy0lTRtMIMNukJceCfFr7HYEqBRnoSIp67cNJHLNitqB/s1600/Screen+Shot+2015-09-11+at+11.27.29+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="173" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1mZuk31wIBmGVz2f6ixjnXPQAeAWlhLJ6D-OFw63dn9GCi7shB6jsMc6T7CZeWgubtPS9wL1sYZbmPo63vSPUFNwTwHmd1B2zgy0lTRtMIMNukJceCfFr7HYEqBRnoSIp67cNJHLNitqB/s320/Screen+Shot+2015-09-11+at+11.27.29+PM.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
Place the image file on your desktop or wherever you would like to save the file.<br />
<br />
Next Single Click the Disk Image Go to Finder and choose File Burn disk Image "Name of the DMG file.dmg"<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWrpTLUd65NEZyAXSpwWLuRd6dAreKu0MW5rTysGKfJ9sXjGeF3fdVnucjhzvCw2jXGBoRT_zo8mszSoNgZAK6SDKfTc2YDS4UTMBgSJDIM_Wcxxne9g0TcxZ6bYr2Lw1Er1UC9_Wk1jxD/s1600/Screen+Shot+2015-09-11+at+11.28.48+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWrpTLUd65NEZyAXSpwWLuRd6dAreKu0MW5rTysGKfJ9sXjGeF3fdVnucjhzvCw2jXGBoRT_zo8mszSoNgZAK6SDKfTc2YDS4UTMBgSJDIM_Wcxxne9g0TcxZ6bYr2Lw1Er1UC9_Wk1jxD/s320/Screen+Shot+2015-09-11+at+11.28.48+PM.png" width="315" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
Insert a blank DVD and click Burn.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4MVC6ORhgqjclxh3-g3Tnwcgz4Ab70FyeOV6uznBKON0YJQ0KTdhep9EgYEqRabBD6NSyfQkD8z7rxi2KJjhiErQ8AQYTtPANpSVGstPRQdzLjNTr4kP8E9ub1J-6T4JU3XnK0eeoA2yZ/s1600/Screen+Shot+2015-09-12+at+12.06.21+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="104" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4MVC6ORhgqjclxh3-g3Tnwcgz4Ab70FyeOV6uznBKON0YJQ0KTdhep9EgYEqRabBD6NSyfQkD8z7rxi2KJjhiErQ8AQYTtPANpSVGstPRQdzLjNTr4kP8E9ub1J-6T4JU3XnK0eeoA2yZ/s320/Screen+Shot+2015-09-12+at+12.06.21+AM.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
You will then be able to burn disks again.</div>
<br />
<br />
<br />Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-60804408989561804382015-06-06T12:47:00.000-07:002015-06-06T12:47:20.077-07:00Predictions for WWDC 2015We are just two days away from the next Apple World Wide Developers Conference and the latest announcements from Apple. I thought I would quickly share my predictions for what we will see coming from the land of Apple.<br />
<br />
<div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Everyone likes to try and read the tea leaves to figure out what the center piece of the show might be and believe Apple tends to add hints to the invitations and graphics. If that is true the center grey square on top of the colors looks a like like an Apple TV as seen from above. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisKTF0GR1zZJtwbFsq3K39q-Iwu9CQSSlgbunEBfWxBQiToBDzbqHHvaD_69-Q334Pi46TJsXDSSf2T0FJkSGRkJvoiOEsfoBuBsAm0UrYAe5eVZdyuySX3IdO1TlrPIWeu5sNQw-SKZq9/s1600/Unknown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisKTF0GR1zZJtwbFsq3K39q-Iwu9CQSSlgbunEBfWxBQiToBDzbqHHvaD_69-Q334Pi46TJsXDSSf2T0FJkSGRkJvoiOEsfoBuBsAm0UrYAe5eVZdyuySX3IdO1TlrPIWeu5sNQw-SKZq9/s200/Unknown.jpeg" width="181" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirdftnLT8kmOOa4dJZK4D8zV2YR-tFKHA6AaEb0DaJGVPkEioi1Gjsk73giV4bgkRJi5KgqIpTD9INcWj0nGNcjlS208Nn70NmsuIN4CF0XgIGkFZ_2z8S7VGdsLVpgUORIx3d7ekpGgmB/s1600/WWDC-2015-logo-900x506.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="223" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirdftnLT8kmOOa4dJZK4D8zV2YR-tFKHA6AaEb0DaJGVPkEioi1Gjsk73giV4bgkRJi5KgqIpTD9INcWj0nGNcjlS208Nn70NmsuIN4CF0XgIGkFZ_2z8S7VGdsLVpgUORIx3d7ekpGgmB/s400/WWDC-2015-logo-900x506.jpg" width="400" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirdftnLT8kmOOa4dJZK4D8zV2YR-tFKHA6AaEb0DaJGVPkEioi1Gjsk73giV4bgkRJi5KgqIpTD9INcWj0nGNcjlS208Nn70NmsuIN4CF0XgIGkFZ_2z8S7VGdsLVpgUORIx3d7ekpGgmB/s1600/WWDC-2015-logo-900x506.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
There are a few givens for every WWDC, we will see a new version of iOS and a new version of OS X. Since last year HomeKit was introduced we will certainly get an update and see some new devices rolled out to support HomeKit. HealthKit has been around for about a year now as well so I would expect we will see an update for HealthKit as well. Since ResearchKit is just a few months old we should expect to see a little more information on it as well. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
The Apple Watch will get an update and release a new WatchKit API to allow developers to write native apps for the now 1 1/2 month old technology. The watch will get a smart leashing feature to remind you to not forget your phone and Find My Watch will be added to iCloud. Apple Watch will also likely get some integration with HomeKit to allow users to control their home from the Watch and the watch to work with Apple TV iBeacons to allow users to setup scripts to fire when a device enters a specific area.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
The new iOS 9 is rumored to get the Snow Leopard treatment with many under the hood enhancements and optimizations to allow it to run better on older hardware. We will certainly get a few new features in addition to the optimizations. Rumors include enhancements to Siri to make it more Google Now like, transit directions, enhanced traffic information, Split Screen Apps coming to iOS, rootless mode to enhance security, multiuser mode, force touch support, improvements to iMessage, updated keyboard with fixed shift key, enhancements to iCloud, additional support for Enterprises, and support for the San Francisco Font. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
OS X 10.11 will likely include rootless support for enhanced security, San Francisco Font, additional UI cleanup, Siri Support with Proactive support the Google Now like interface for iOS devices, iOS like Control Center, additional iCloud enhancements, additional support for Enterprises and more.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Enhancements to Swift language and more apps that will be smaller, more powerful, and more secure. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Apple Music, I believe we will see a whole new version of iTunes called Apple Music to manage your Music and separate apps to handle Movies, Podcasts, etc. Rewritten from the ground up in Swift it will be simpler and work well with iOS devices. These apps will all be mirrored in new versions on iOS. iTunes Music and Beats will merge into a streaming music service that will be free to iTunes Match users and include curated radio stations built by artists and DJ's. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
iCloud will receive stability and speed enhancements to make the Mac and iOS devices work better together and extend features to the Apple Watch. It is unlikely but I would like to see more collaboration features for iCloud users. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
A new Apple TV could be in the mix tied to HomeKit and the modifications to iTunes and other services. The developers conference would be a great time to announce it and release an AppKit for Apple TV allowing developers to start writing for the Apple TV.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I do not expect to see new hardware since the Macbook Pro and iMac just got an update. The Macbook was just released and it would be much too soon for an update yet. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
So I expect the following from a long WWDC Keynote:</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<ul>
<li>WatchKit API revison</li>
<li>HomeKit update and technology rollout</li>
<li>HealthKit update</li>
<li>Research Kit update</li>
<li>iOS Update</li>
<li>OS X Update</li>
<li>Apple Music new iTunes and other apps for OS X and iOS</li>
<li>iCloud enhancements</li>
<li>Apple TV</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
As I write this I am thinking more Apple needs to have a couple of more events this year. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
A media event to rollout Apple Music, Apple Movies, Podcasts, Streaming Music with apps for iOS and Android, the new Apple TV with live streaming services could be a stand alone event. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
A rollout for new iPhones and iPads around the launch of iOS 9 and OS X. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-62935183612359350972015-05-12T19:37:00.000-07:002015-05-12T19:38:32.201-07:00Two weeks and one trip with the Apple Watch<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpsY1S__behVoklDKJlifFWaAyv4lI49eGAtc_rcCFBNt7JtZMJBznk6Au9sQLYTxjeRcFQpVzLs9Ka1Q8MOj47XQhMz8HioMs0PTo2IeWuZfHlMyQxFI_VQcDazQwbJ-uwewUkhqgS4EK/s1600/IMG_1485.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpsY1S__behVoklDKJlifFWaAyv4lI49eGAtc_rcCFBNt7JtZMJBznk6Au9sQLYTxjeRcFQpVzLs9Ka1Q8MOj47XQhMz8HioMs0PTo2IeWuZfHlMyQxFI_VQcDazQwbJ-uwewUkhqgS4EK/s320/IMG_1485.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
I will admit I have really been excited since the Apple Watch announcement to get a smart watch on my wrist to make my life easier. I was a little envious of my Android friends that already had smart watches. I didn't care that they looked clunky or cheesy. I just wanted access to data quickly on my wrist.<br />
<br />
I eagerly ordered my watch on April 10th and hoped it would arrive on April 24th and to my delight it did come on Friday April 24th at 1:40 in the afternoon. By 2:15 I had it unboxed, paired to my phone and begun the task of configuring my watch.<br />
<br />
Setup was pretty easy and after asking it to mirror my iPhone for preferences I just had to wait for apps to install and the watch to be completely ready but I could wear it in the mean time. I thought the look didn't matter but after slipping the stainless steel watch with milanese loop on my wrist I realized the look does matter.<br />
<br />
For the most part my watch goes largely unnoticed looking like a normal but somewhat large watch. When it gets attention is when I do something that a watch doesn't do and even a Android watch still lacks. Paying for purchases at the store with Apple Pay, or answering my phone when my phone isn't in easy reach just to name a couple of examples.<br />
<br />
So far I use my watch as a quick way to:<br />
<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>triage my notifications</li>
<li>answer my phone</li>
<li>check a recent voicemail</li>
<li>pay at stores with Apple Pay</li>
<li>find a local Starbucks and pay for my coffee</li>
<li>request an Uber car</li>
<li>scan my boarding pass at the air port</li>
<li>check into my hotel from the car so everything is ready when I arrive</li>
<li>check the weather</li>
<li>monitor my activity levels</li>
<li>keep tabs on the weather</li>
<li>turn lights off and on in my home with Hue</li>
<li>as a remote for keynote or powerpoint</li>
<li>quick email triage</li>
<li>monitor my workouts</li>
<li>use Siri to set reminders and appointments</li>
<li>check what is next on my calendar </li>
</ul>
<div>
I'm sure there is more that I do with it but it has become so enmeshed with my daily life I am already starting to not think about it. I just put it on as soon as I get out of bed and wear it until I am ready to go to sleep. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The battery life is even better than expected. I have gone past 18 hours of using my watch and still had 25% of my battery left to spare. I haven't needed to use the Power Reserve Mode yet after two weeks of heavy use and charging nightly. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7yA0yYMm2_zSmFmeHuajxGlzz4ICDpRZgAhHTVceJ_baNdEXZt1zqPll3PqSoMlXHoQhQ48YAG6jMjFZQWZfE9b5boTezKAA3ZCFlqWpUSKkFVypNeXn3u5heqkVL_lk2W-MadNHms9Dh/s1600/IMG_1578.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7yA0yYMm2_zSmFmeHuajxGlzz4ICDpRZgAhHTVceJ_baNdEXZt1zqPll3PqSoMlXHoQhQ48YAG6jMjFZQWZfE9b5boTezKAA3ZCFlqWpUSKkFVypNeXn3u5heqkVL_lk2W-MadNHms9Dh/s320/IMG_1578.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div>
A few things I found surprising in the watch was the ability to Ping my phone when I leave it somewhere. Something I do quiet a bit at home and in the office. Although less now that my phone doesn't leave my pocket nearly as much during the day. The phone and watch also mirror each other in Do Not Disturb and Airplane modes. Of course once you put it in airplane mode you will need to access both devices to get them out of airplane mode. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The watch faces are delightful and while there are not many of them, they are all customizable and all look good. Mickey faces opposite directions in the morning and in the evening. The animations for the moon and the planets are very smooth and rolling the digital crown can show where the planets will be or were on a given date.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
As for the things I am not crazy about, the load times for third party apps is quiet long. I am sure it is to preserve the battery life but wouldn't it benefit battery life more to load quickly so I can get back to whatever else I might want to be doing? I wish there was a setting to allow the user to set how long the watch face stays active when it is being viewed and to be a little more lenient when I put my arm down or change position to not think I have turned away and turn off the screen immediately. I wish the sensors on the watch did more. After seeing the new Jawbone UP 3 having temperature sensors to measure both ambient and skin temperature. As well as a bioimpedance sensor which could be cool add ons for the quantified self. I want my watch to tell me when I am getting stressed and encourage me to call down a bit. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The things we don't know yet, will it be upgradable? I would love to see an Apple watch update program which would make sense for the price point and peoples tendency to keep watches. I know as Apple develops the watches they will get thinner and they styling will be enhanced. It would be great if people who wanted the new style could just buy a new watch but people who like the style they have be able to upgrade the internals when a faster CPU, more memory, improved battery, or more sensors become available. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The OLED display is absolutely beautiful and is easy to read in bright light. The watch fit and finish feels like a very high quality and something I could wear for a long time to come. Overall it is a beautiful watch with a lot to like. Now that it is getting into the hands of developers something that is already useful is going to go crazy with possibilities. As time goes on Apple will loosen the reigns a bit and let developers take the watch even further. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The Apple watch was an excellent 1.0 device from Apple and I am excited to see where it goes in the future and how it will tie in with HomeKit and other future Apple technologies. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<br />
<br />Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-39819403703576415742015-03-01T23:45:00.000-08:002015-03-01T23:45:01.258-08:00Predictions for the Apple Spring Forward EventI love writing prediction pieces, it is fun todo and gives me a chance to imagine what I would design or like to use if it was made available. We already know Apple is going to talk about details of the Apple Watch. We will finally get pricing on the mid range and high end watches, as well as ship dates and pre-order dates. I can't wait to line up to get my Apple Watch.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3JrdyAmqhnyu_J8_yHjJO60m3S1WyUJFV14nlCRI3723J_9kv_jlSoG2yoN0EZlah_LTF0u9eKnV7f5Fnn1xy9wWHE0sEcXBMGBHIQiC9R8rReLTAZL_963xW-j6bpyIBCeOt38cN4UUS/s1600/applewatch.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3JrdyAmqhnyu_J8_yHjJO60m3S1WyUJFV14nlCRI3723J_9kv_jlSoG2yoN0EZlah_LTF0u9eKnV7f5Fnn1xy9wWHE0sEcXBMGBHIQiC9R8rReLTAZL_963xW-j6bpyIBCeOt38cN4UUS/s1600/applewatch.jpeg" height="200" width="200" /></a></div>
Analysts are predicting 5 million units have been made, I think that will not cover the opening weekend demand for the new device. I bet sales will be strong and supplied constrained until summer. The entry level watch and mid tier the big sellers with just a few high end watches being sold. Estimates that the high end watch being around $5,000 is probably not far off base. For that price Apple I believe will announce the devices to be the most upgradable device ever with internal component upgrade options in the future for a substantially more modest price or the Edition and maybe the mid tier watches.<br />
<br />
The demos will of course include some highlights from developers doing some amazing things with the watch software. I hope some of the health information rumors are just that rumors, I hope the device has the ability to monitor stress levels and remind the wearer to calm down. I know this writer could use that reminder from time to time. I will be surprised to see if it can monitor blood pressure but heart rate should be fairly simple.<br />
<br />
I will say that accessories for the Apple Watch will also sell very well. I would bet that most owners of the mid tier and edition models will probably choose two or three band options and the price of the magnetic bands or more modern clasps will certainly be higher than what we see with traditional watch band tech.<br />
<br />
Overall I expect that Apple watch to be a huge hit and outsell the rest of the smart watch industry and likely take the traditional watch industry by surprise. Even if a small percentage of iPhone owners buy Apple Watches it will still be a huge market.<br />
<br />
The big surprise will come in the form of the One more thing. Apple never just rolls out one item at these events. The rumor mill has been loaded with talk of a pen, a 12" iPad, and a 12" Macbook Air. I am just seeing a flashback to the iPhone announcement when Apple announced three new products and they are all the same thing.<br />
<br />
My prediction is the iPad Pro 12" and the Macbook Air 12" will actually be the same device. A <br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdXiPDr7KdiMb1xQC1LK8NXadWVSGwHSVgrco94UAdspe_JnjmblJ4-TWOf5AsIokMgYrljCxPdjreJRcHu8x5gd2B0mee73FRCeZCBrYrZNjYgNBkEwdQi7pL7Y02odzc5Hxghbg9tbZQ/s1600/ipad+pro.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdXiPDr7KdiMb1xQC1LK8NXadWVSGwHSVgrco94UAdspe_JnjmblJ4-TWOf5AsIokMgYrljCxPdjreJRcHu8x5gd2B0mee73FRCeZCBrYrZNjYgNBkEwdQi7pL7Y02odzc5Hxghbg9tbZQ/s1600/ipad+pro.jpeg" /></a></div>
modified version of iOS and OS X, with better multi-tasking and enhanced UI for better touch interface. When docked with the keyboard it would behave like a Macbook Air, when undocked it would behave like an iPad. The ability to run both OS X and iOS Apps. Not with emulation but by putting both an ARM processor and Intel processor in the same machine. Toss in a high quality pressure sensitive pen and you have a strong competitor to the Microsoft Surface tablets. Which I have used and find them to be likable devices. Some elements of the UI are still too small to be effective for touch but I am sure Apple UI designers would address and correct that.<br />
<br />
I could envision the workflow being something like quick communications and notifications coming in on the watch. Slightly longer interactions and light work, pull out the 10" iPad tablet for single tasking work and entertainment. Then the larger tablet for serious work, multi-tasking and laptop replacement when traveling for days and the large desktop machine for the heavy duty computing tasks and large amounts of data storage.<br />
<br />
I hope to see a new announcement regarding AppleTV. Something that will give the cord cutters a reason to rejoice and some new technology around home to make home automation easier and more user friendly. They may even throw in an announcement on upgrades to iCloud for enhanced security and maybe a new feature or two.Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-34036709938149160322014-10-09T17:17:00.001-07:002014-10-09T17:18:23.356-07:00Traveling with TechI wrote a piece on traveling with technology for Hosts Global this month. You can find the post here!<br />
<br />
<a href="http://hosts-global.com/travel-tips-traveling-with-technology/">http://hosts-global.com/travel-tips-traveling-with-technology/</a><br />
<br />
Please go on over and read it there. I will be back here writing again soon.<br />
<br />
Paul "TheMacGuy" Scott<br />
<br />Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-91675651982440669292013-09-30T14:33:00.001-07:002013-09-30T14:34:06.653-07:00Netflix App Won't Display login screen on iOS<br />
So you recently upgraded your iOS device or just added Netflix and want to watch a show on the go. However when launching Netflix you only see a spinning wheel and no login and now shows.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Here is a simple fix to solve the problem. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Go to Settings and Choose Safari:</div>
<div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAPDjNxOL-rPKMHgIqFRICHQHuehPTB7R0aamMdDEy0jjFMP1w_TZs6cqem-yMf4upAJS2Xgqh0EU6QNWyJmp9JS5qo8Zd9GpMsyDyEwovnqvRM-tMu7RDm30p2S_bmxaOfh1EnaTsqbeg/s1600/IMG_3479.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAPDjNxOL-rPKMHgIqFRICHQHuehPTB7R0aamMdDEy0jjFMP1w_TZs6cqem-yMf4upAJS2Xgqh0EU6QNWyJmp9JS5qo8Zd9GpMsyDyEwovnqvRM-tMu7RDm30p2S_bmxaOfh1EnaTsqbeg/s320/IMG_3479.PNG" width="180" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Next in Safari Change Block Cookies from Always to From third parties and advertisers</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Finally click Clear Cookies and Data.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuWQkjCMYYIAABXeedV7miwTf7wTQXeNsepk6nIPElnsYG2U42BjyfHFLFABvbJbsQ7gDdsPBXw8z_Y2RdARuwTXn1Q73Bee6CsCFFIVJw2KrHFI7SGLNTwh1X3NxlqBtzIS3Wr_EMxcFS/s1600/IMG_3480.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuWQkjCMYYIAABXeedV7miwTf7wTQXeNsepk6nIPElnsYG2U42BjyfHFLFABvbJbsQ7gDdsPBXw8z_Y2RdARuwTXn1Q73Bee6CsCFFIVJw2KrHFI7SGLNTwh1X3NxlqBtzIS3Wr_EMxcFS/s320/IMG_3480.PNG" width="180" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Now reopen your Netflix application, login and enjoy the show!</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
</div>
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-34234782913983023322013-09-30T14:24:00.001-07:002013-09-30T14:24:55.048-07:00Trouble with iMessage, FaceTime or Push Notifications?<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
There have been some anecdotal reports online that have indicated issues with iMessage on iOS. Below I have a few fixes that may correct the problem. I ran into this personally with one iPad and one iPhone in the last few weeks. Both times I had to resort to deactivating and reactivating. </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
Some users have reported that turning their iOS devices off and back on fixes the problem, while others indicate that the solution has not worked for them. In testing with my devices experiencing difficulties, the following steps didn't fix the issue but could and are simple: </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
1. Turn off iMessage in Settings > Messages </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
2. Reset networking settings in Settings > General > Reset </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
3. Reenable iMessage in Settings > Messages </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
iMessages do not appear to be failing back to SMS when this happens either. They just eventually appear as a failed to send in iMessage. Or if it is right after an update awaiting activation will appear in the iMessage and FaceTime System Preferences panel. </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
If these procedures above don’t work. Download Red Sn0w to your computer and perform the following steps:</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
Get RedSn0w here <a href="http://www.iphonehacks.com/download-redsn0w">http://www.iphonehacks.com/download-redsn0w</a></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
1.) Connect device via USB cable</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
2.) Open RedSn0w</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
3.) Click on Extras</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
4.) Click on Even More</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
5.) Click on Deactivate</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
6.) Phone will show activation screen again. Open iTunes on the computer</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
7.) iTunes should detected the device and attempt to activate it. </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
8.) Device will reactivate with new tickets and Push, iMessage, and FaceTime should go back to normal. </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
Hopefully this should resolve any issues you may have with iMessage or FaceTime. </div>
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-78087045852903600902013-08-27T18:59:00.000-07:002013-08-27T18:59:03.815-07:00Using an iMac as a display for other MacsThere is a feature on modern Macs known as Target Display Mode (TDM). Users who have an iMac and a Macbook Pro and may want to use their iMac as a large external display can follow these few short steps to use the iMac as an external display.<br />
<br />
First make sure your iMac and Macbook Pro supports Target Display Mode by checking the chart below and make sure you have the support cable type.<br />
<br />
<br />
Target Display Mode Compatibility List<br />
<br />
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" id="kbtable" style="background-color: white; border-collapse: collapse; border-left-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-spacing: 0px; border-top-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0px !important; width: 75%px;"><tbody>
<tr id="header"><td style="background-color: #e2e2e2; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; font-weight: bold; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
<b>iMac Model</b></div>
</td><td style="background-color: #e2e2e2; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; font-weight: bold; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
<b>Cable Supported</b></div>
</td><td style="background-color: #e2e2e2; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; font-weight: bold; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
<b>Port on Target Computer</b></div>
</td></tr>
<tr id="even"><td style="background-color: #f1f1f1; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
iMac (27-inch Late 2009)</div>
</td><td style="background-color: #f1f1f1; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Mini DisplayPort to Mini DisplayPort</div>
</td><td style="background-color: #f1f1f1; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Mini DisplayPort or Thunderbolt</div>
</td></tr>
<tr><td style="border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
iMac (27-inch Mid 2010)</div>
</td><td style="border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Mini DisplayPort to Mini DisplayPort</div>
</td><td style="border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Mini DisplayPort or Thunderbolt</div>
</td></tr>
<tr id="even"><td style="background-color: #f1f1f1; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
iMac (21.5-inch, Mid 2011)</div>
</td><td style="background-color: #f1f1f1; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Thunderbolt to Thunderbolt</div>
</td><td style="background-color: #f1f1f1; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Thunderbolt</div>
</td></tr>
<tr><td style="border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
iMac (27-inch, Mid 2011)</div>
</td><td style="border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Thunderbolt to Thunderbolt</div>
</td><td style="border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Thunderbolt</div>
</td></tr>
<tr id="even"><td style="background-color: #f1f1f1; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
iMac (21.5-inch, Late 2012)</div>
</td><td style="background-color: #f1f1f1; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Thunderbolt to Thunderbolt</div>
</td><td style="background-color: #f1f1f1; border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Thunderbolt</div>
</td></tr>
<tr><td style="border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
iMac (27-inch, Late 2012)</div>
</td><td style="border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Thunderbolt to Thunderbolt</div>
</td><td style="border-bottom-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(161, 165, 169); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; padding: 4px;" valign="top"><div style="margin-bottom: 18px; padding: 0px;">
Thunderbolt</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br /><div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Plug your Macbook Pro into the iMac with a MiniDisplay cable to Thunderbolt cable and press ⌘-F2 on the display machines keyboard it will become a monitor for your laptop. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Note: Both machines must be on and you must have both computer on 10.6.1 or higher. The machine running in TDM will continue to run all programs in the background and will stay awake as long as it is in Target Display Mode.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
To get out of target display mode press the ⌘-F2 keys again on the machine keyboard acting as a display.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The camera, USB, Firewire, or other Thunderbolt devices are not available to the computer connecting in Target Display Mode. Just the display is accessed and used as an external monitor.</div>
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-11848452160811866202013-08-16T12:24:00.002-07:002013-08-16T12:28:15.053-07:00Sending Group Emails from iPad Quick Tip<br />
Something that has been missing from the iPad since the beginning has been the ability to send email to groups from the Mail app. There are a number of apps in the app store like MailShot or MailShot Pro that will help you create lists to send group emails from your iOS device.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
However, with this quick tip I will show you a way to do it on your own. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
1.) Create a new Contact with the name of the group you wish to have. You can do this in Contacts on your Mac, in Outlook on your PC, or on your iPhone directly.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
2.) Under the new Contact Name you created enter the email addresses you want in your group in a single email field with a comma separating the addresses. For example email.1@domain.com, paultscott@gmail.com, email2@domain.org, email3@domain.net, and on through your entire list. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBYRQaOkhuetNdNdjEPviar2bfPsXq2PG7VKYZbmm2mwqcCzF_jzQQz3nqW-Tq_71qtb7ISYn2mJaOSCUrjsjwHzIoQhJEZJXBfj7wtjg-0Pke7FdRsQvOBIQCEj3Cj9lQ9ZxPhsiLAMBd/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-08-16+at+12.18.53+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBYRQaOkhuetNdNdjEPviar2bfPsXq2PG7VKYZbmm2mwqcCzF_jzQQz3nqW-Tq_71qtb7ISYn2mJaOSCUrjsjwHzIoQhJEZJXBfj7wtjg-0Pke7FdRsQvOBIQCEj3Cj9lQ9ZxPhsiLAMBd/s320/Screen+Shot+2013-08-16+at+12.18.53+PM.png" width="260" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div>
3.) Open your mail client and type in the group name you select. your recipients will all get the email. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheH37Pof7noA1hUkBt9dp4eEwDeqwKatFSHKTBP6XJDpPrD-0MQfgucmct_Kf96Fh0v4zb4_P8qoZjIT-pn2tsibZ5GPXhSGv5mr33szzPmxYUQM7PYAxU-i4cjA2k1D-iWZdIWZVtCpL7/s1600/IMG_3413.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheH37Pof7noA1hUkBt9dp4eEwDeqwKatFSHKTBP6XJDpPrD-0MQfgucmct_Kf96Fh0v4zb4_P8qoZjIT-pn2tsibZ5GPXhSGv5mr33szzPmxYUQM7PYAxU-i4cjA2k1D-iWZdIWZVtCpL7/s320/IMG_3413.PNG" width="180" /></a></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifeLg0jVZbrEmX-rGg4d2e7IR9b7abw2aaq4902c58mhbIlYSp1D5-YgoCbkrKeLJdKeqQ3nCSbsKWYAbOTDGISIf39ilocRAwdQethRxeAnTRZnb-ucby1gKIGO7vwvZ_dQ3yC_fJzfoP/s1600/IMG_3414.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifeLg0jVZbrEmX-rGg4d2e7IR9b7abw2aaq4902c58mhbIlYSp1D5-YgoCbkrKeLJdKeqQ3nCSbsKWYAbOTDGISIf39ilocRAwdQethRxeAnTRZnb-ucby1gKIGO7vwvZ_dQ3yC_fJzfoP/s320/IMG_3414.PNG" width="180" /></a><br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
To ask Apple to add this as a formal feature please goto <a href="http://www.apple.com/feedback/" target="_blank">http://www.apple.com/feedback/ </a>and ask apple to add group mail lists to iOS.<br />
<br />Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-13322461703772887022013-08-16T12:09:00.004-07:002013-08-16T12:10:59.664-07:00Fitbit Flex ReviewI have had a few weeks now to spend with my Fitbit flex and for those that know me I love these high tech pedometers. I started with the Nike+ shoes and app and have steadily upgraded as new devices have come to market.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHun4T7d7WzBd2p4iEPIBnMMVoufquQIDX9TvkfYRQyyywU6Nwy-3otwP8O-nqifH8EXnTe8wlu3D7W7rEtal_HRjHHf5BaiESB1e2KQ_0XHfV8zRiD_amj6Y67513mRhFyVo0cCO9rDaL/s1600/Unknown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHun4T7d7WzBd2p4iEPIBnMMVoufquQIDX9TvkfYRQyyywU6Nwy-3otwP8O-nqifH8EXnTe8wlu3D7W7rEtal_HRjHHf5BaiESB1e2KQ_0XHfV8zRiD_amj6Y67513mRhFyVo0cCO9rDaL/s1600/Unknown.jpeg" /></a>The new Fitbit flex is smaller than its predecessors and slides inside a wrist band. No more forgetting to clip your Fitbit to your belt or put it in your pocket and virtually no chance of loosing it during the day. Wrist bands come in multiple colors and sizes plus are adjustable so users can make sure they get the color they like with a comfortable fit.<br />
<br />
The new Fitbit flex is water resistant and according to the company is ok it take it in the shower. I still take it off when I swim laps in the pool just in case it isn't truly that waterproof yet.<br />
<br />
The Flex seems to suffer from a shorter battery life than its older cousins that are still for sale. Flex also now has a different charging cradle than previous models so if a user finds they have a dead battery on a trip they are out of luck unless users bring along the special charger.<br />
<br />
Flex has dropped showing how many floors the user has climbed in the course of the day. That is a huge disappointment, I used to skip elevators so I could take the stairs to get my floor climbing count higher for the day. Once climbing 14 flights of stairs twice to get a 25 floors in a day badge.<br />
<br />
All of these devices the Fitbit, Up, Nike Fuel, and others use a ramification element to keep the wearer engaged and make the device fun to wear and use. Also with historical tracking and a social aspect users can track what they did and compete against friends. Fitbit has also found the key to keeping people engaged also lies in integrating with other applications. Tying Fitbit into scale applications, blood pressure apps, diet applications so entering data in one place pulls everything together. Users can in the Fitbit dashboard see how many calories they consumed and how many they should burn. Allowing users to make better food and exercise choices. For me when I pay attention to these apps and log the food I eat I tend to loose weight and be healthier myself.<br />
<br />
While wearing the Flex I have noticed I record more footsteps when wearing it on my non-dominate hand like the company recommends. While walking with a Fitbit One and a Flex the Flex did read fewer footsteps over the course of a day.<br />
<br />
I haven't been using it much lately since I lost the charger and have to order a replacement since every Fitbit I have ever had has a different charger. I still like the device and I like the social aspect. It encourages me to walk more.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BGO0Q9O/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B00BGO0Q9O&linkCode=as2&tag=the00b1-20" target="_blank">Fitbit Flex Wireless Activity + Sleep Wristband, Black</a><br />
<div>
<br /></div>
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-86590264358775397772013-07-03T12:55:00.000-07:002013-07-03T12:55:47.405-07:00Air Display Review<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9V6KvqQFzz4jTXkQkkGT2xfH30kEwRlLPLWfhj9cx3foLZ3vqgyFNWdC_wZpaZusAaG3sxXjkITQaZNP7_AxvTC-eFhpTeAlsMDHkkk6QCO355lOKxj1uW_nuSvRCq_BsSr9LwXQ294xX/s193/Screen+Shot+2013-07-03+at+12.50.38+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="190" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9V6KvqQFzz4jTXkQkkGT2xfH30kEwRlLPLWfhj9cx3foLZ3vqgyFNWdC_wZpaZusAaG3sxXjkITQaZNP7_AxvTC-eFhpTeAlsMDHkkk6QCO355lOKxj1uW_nuSvRCq_BsSr9LwXQ294xX/s200/Screen+Shot+2013-07-03+at+12.50.38+PM.png" width="200" /></a></div>
AirDisplay is a great app if you are looking for an extra screen while you are working on your laptop. AirDisplay can even turn a users Macbook into an extra display for an iMac. However if you are running an older Macbook Pro with Nvidia graphics there are some known issues with the graphics driver that can cause the device to not be able to drag and drop files etc. until the user has disabled Air Display.<br />
<br />
AirDisplay costs $19.99 and is available on the iTunes store for iPad and iPhone. The software that installs locally on your Mac is free and instructions for where to get the software and how to install it are included in the AirDisplay app.<br />
<br />
Once the app is installed on the iOS device and on the Mac they auto detect one another as long as they are on the same network and connect. Once that is completed users can open Display Preferences to decide which side to place the extra display on. The touch screen still reacts like normal on the iOS device. If the user has an application with tool bars like Photoshop it is a convienent control surface. Reach over tap the tool you want and return to work without having to move the mouse to the other screen.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVdzP2_NHQaBqTYcYN-M_mdRCMdh1eUlEH9KWTuhhyH7YKzRBLieBNrEb9NL8-4T0bM5XmS57lCsQB23NeVjMicc0X9JcR30VxO_l2AkDVxufjUpq_XXmgtNuUzRu6jT_zD1H09uh6Nafx/s639/Screen+Shot+2013-07-03+at+12.51.03+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="204" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVdzP2_NHQaBqTYcYN-M_mdRCMdh1eUlEH9KWTuhhyH7YKzRBLieBNrEb9NL8-4T0bM5XmS57lCsQB23NeVjMicc0X9JcR30VxO_l2AkDVxufjUpq_XXmgtNuUzRu6jT_zD1H09uh6Nafx/s320/Screen+Shot+2013-07-03+at+12.51.03+PM.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
I recommend using the AirDisplay app while plugged into external power to preserve the battery on the iOS device. This is a great application that grants road warriors a second screen while on the go or a convenient extra screen while working on a desktop.<br />
<br />
With AirDisplay and Mavericks in the future a user could have a multi screen laptop completely wirelessly. The main laptop screen, a second iOS device screen with control surface and an AirPlay Display hanging on the wall. The flexibility becomes limitless.<br />
<br />
For the $19.99 price tag AirDisplay is the best among the remote screen applications and well worth the investment.Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-54322338495487508512013-07-03T08:30:00.000-07:002013-07-03T08:30:31.239-07:00Samsung Galaxy Tab ReviewWhile eagerly awaiting the release of iOS 7 so I can review it and publicly discuss it I decided to see what life was like on other other side of the fence. So I have spent the last week with the Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 to see how it really stacks up against the iOS universe I have lived in for many years. First the device itself feels nice until you spend a lot of time holding it. The 16:9 aspect screen is awkward for typing and holding for long periods of time.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKyZDoZrRlgk4FB5qoiNcNJxDpu1jhckGsTTj_PMdaBbj7VfLz3hPtqPCJTa5Xs-LPbCHJhilHsPLmiJ7tfr0NRGli1fymC0hKW16UmujPxXX5ENq3dHrRp-qfReB3qpLHWvyuOCi1e8eH/s273/Unknown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKyZDoZrRlgk4FB5qoiNcNJxDpu1jhckGsTTj_PMdaBbj7VfLz3hPtqPCJTa5Xs-LPbCHJhilHsPLmiJ7tfr0NRGli1fymC0hKW16UmujPxXX5ENq3dHrRp-qfReB3qpLHWvyuOCi1e8eH/s273/Unknown.jpeg" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
This device is not running the latest Jelly Bean version of Android and is using the Samsung TouchWiz UI which seems to make the device harder to use than the competition. After installing quiet a few apps it seems hard to find applications easily without going into the search.<br />
<br />
The Samsung keyboard was laid out so badly I immediately had to install the generic Google Keyboard to make it useable though the reach on that wide a screen is still a little awkward.<br />
<br />
Speech recognition is fast and accurate reducing the need to use the keyboard as long as the user is in a quiet environment to use it.<br />
<br />
Samsung seems to be canabalizing their own lines and competing with themselves. When I went to purchase the unit I asked for a Galaxy Tab 2 and the salesman who worked for Samsung not Best Buy tried to steer me into the Note 2 which is apparently very close in specs to the Tab. The note got a quad core 1.4 Ghz processor vs the Tabs 2 core 1Ghz. Otherwise they have the same screen, battery, and software.<br />
<br />
The device is not running Jelly Bean at the time of this writing and according to sources Samsung will support Jelly Bean on this device but that is the end of the road. Just over one year after being released Samsung will abandon future software updates for the Galaxy Tab 2 and apparently focus on other devices like the recently announced Tab 3 and Note 2.<br />
<br />
The Play Store itself supports so many devices with different specs it is sometimes frustrating to find the right app. Users choose an app only to be told the device is incompatible with the app the user is trying to install.<br />
<br />
To date I haven't had any luck with setting up streaming to another device using DLNA or ShareAll features. This may be another limitation on TouchWiz like not supporting multiple user logins to a single device. Airplay requires no configuration and just works. Samsung will happily sell you yet another $99 puck to attach to your TV to stream content and mirror screens that only work with their tablet.<br />
<br />
Third party apps do exist that should allow the device to use Roku Mirroring or DLNA. Some apps one would think should be available on the Galaxy Tab 2 are amazingly not available. Amazon Video Streaming reports as incompatible with the Tab.<br />
<br />
The Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 requires a lot of fiddling and customization to make it a half way comfortable product to use. The stock Android experience would be far better on this device. I believe the device is too complicated for the average non technical user if they wish to stream video to TV's or do more than surf the web and check email it seems to require a lot more effort than the iPad or even the Google Nexus Tablets.<br />
<br />
Using both my iPad and Galaxy Tab 2 together there is a lot to like about both devies. Some elements of the UI are pleasant to use while others need to be baked a little longer. Spacing of apps needs to be expanded and probably fewer per page to make apps easier to find.<br />
<br />
Most of the things I liked about The Galaxy Tab are features that are generic Jelly Bean. I enjoy using Google Now, I like the speech recognition on the device and easy of accessing Speech Recognition.<br />
<br />
I even spent a little time online with Samsung tech support to try and figure out a few of the features I couldn't get to work. Support just kept telling me the feature I wanted wasn't available on the Samsung Galaxy Tab 2. Maybe in the future the feature will become available.<br />
<br />
It seems as though Samsung is slow to update their devies and not all devices even get updates even when they are only about a year old. If you want the real Android experience users are better off sticking with other devices like the Google Nexus Tablet.<br />
<br />
The Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 is probably fun for geeks that like to fiddle with their gear but if you just want it to work reliably and not have apps maybe work and maybe not then you may be best to stick with an iPad or at least a stock Android device.<br />
<br />
For me I will be sticking with my iPad and iOS devices. I like the Google Apps on it and still get access to Google Now cards. I might take another look at the Nexus as a second tablet. But if you are not getting the pure Android experience on the tablet you are not getting the most out your tablet.Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-79906192129267977662013-06-29T10:18:00.001-07:002013-06-29T11:41:21.665-07:00OS X Preview Quick Tips<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
This week I want to share a few Preview Quick Tips. </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 24px;">
<b>Opening multiple PDF’s in a Single Window</b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WRiTM0_fXbE/Uc8pssWoO2I/AAAAAAAAFFg/emxM_FnNlcA/s320/Screen%252BShot%252B2013-05-04%252Bat%252B2.01.36%252BPM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WRiTM0_fXbE/Uc8pssWoO2I/AAAAAAAAFFg/emxM_FnNlcA/s320/Screen%252BShot%252B2013-05-04%252Bat%252B2.01.36%252BPM.jpg" /></a></div>
<br />First when opening multiple PDF documents in one window open Preview, Preferences, General and change the Open Groups of files in the same window default to Open all files in one window. Select a group of files, right click and choose open. All PDF’s in the selection will open in a single window. </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
The default setting of Open groups of files in the same window opens a window for each group of files you select. If you pick three files, skip a file, pick two more, skip a couple and pick one more it will open in three Windows.</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/--wbxgkRfr3w/Uc8pshvf2LI/AAAAAAAAFF0/0oXRHFq5u3I/s320/Screen%252BShot%252B2013-05-04%252Bat%252B2.04.33%252BPM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/--wbxgkRfr3w/Uc8pshvf2LI/AAAAAAAAFF0/0oXRHFq5u3I/s320/Screen%252BShot%252B2013-05-04%252Bat%252B2.04.33%252BPM.jpg" /></a></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 26px;">
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 26px;">
<b>Merge multiple PDF’s into a single Document</b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-pDN9eHI-DqA/Uc8ptRJH7FI/AAAAAAAAFGA/Qk6Ed9CjWUY/s320/Screen%252BShot%252B2013-05-04%252Bat%252B2.25.36%252BPM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-pDN9eHI-DqA/Uc8ptRJH7FI/AAAAAAAAFGA/Qk6Ed9CjWUY/s320/Screen%252BShot%252B2013-05-04%252Bat%252B2.25.36%252BPM.jpg" /></a></div>
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br />Simply print to PDF all the documents in the single open Window</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
Choose Print</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
Choose All Pages</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
Click the PDF button select Open PDF in Preview. </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
The new document will be opened in Preview all pages as one single document.</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 24px;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 24px;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 24px;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 24px;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 24px;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 24px;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 24px;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 24px;">
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UrvQPX6VtVY/Uc8ps75jSTI/AAAAAAAAFFo/zix-XoLLtG4/s238/Screen%252BShot%252B2013-05-04%252Bat%252B2.13.31%252BPM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UrvQPX6VtVY/Uc8ps75jSTI/AAAAAAAAFFo/zix-XoLLtG4/s238/Screen%252BShot%252B2013-05-04%252Bat%252B2.13.31%252BPM.jpg" /></a></div>
<b><br />Want to delete a page from a document or move a page somewhere else in a document?</b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
Click the view Menu button and choose Thumbnails. </div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
Highlight the page you wish to delete and press the delete key on your keyboard. The selected page will disappear. If you want to move a page simply drag the page thumbnail to another location in the document.</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; min-height: 14px;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-CLAwcDwoMIU/Uc8ptKnKyQI/AAAAAAAAFFk/iSmtvVu9F_U/s320/Screen%252BShot%252B2013-05-04%252Bat%252B2.14.24%252BPM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-CLAwcDwoMIU/Uc8ptKnKyQI/AAAAAAAAFFk/iSmtvVu9F_U/s320/Screen%252BShot%252B2013-05-04%252Bat%252B2.14.24%252BPM.jpg" /></a><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-CLAwcDwoMIU/Uc8ptKnKyQI/AAAAAAAAFFk/iSmtvVu9F_U/s320/Screen%252BShot%252B2013-05-04%252Bat%252B2.14.24%252BPM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /></a></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 24px;">
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>How to Sign a Document?</b></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 24px; min-height: 29px;">
<b></b><br /></div>
<br />
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-N-8KHGXOq8M/Uc8QmXLNNeI/AAAAAAAAFE8/3D2Bp_HeWj0/s1156/Screen+Shot+2013-06-29+at+9.43.42+AM.png.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="119" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-N-8KHGXOq8M/Uc8QmXLNNeI/AAAAAAAAFE8/3D2Bp_HeWj0/s320/Screen+Shot+2013-06-29+at+9.43.42+AM.png.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
First you will need to create a signature the first time you sign a document. After that the signature is stored encrypted in the keychain.<br />
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/--WAX6u8PTwM/Uc8RgJZQL3I/AAAAAAAAFEY/_6xhIYzcpYc/s42/Screen+Shot+2013-06-29+at+9.54.21+AM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/--WAX6u8PTwM/Uc8RgJZQL3I/AAAAAAAAFEY/_6xhIYzcpYc/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-06-29+at+9.54.21+AM.jpg" /></a>Click on the Edit button click the signature pull down and choose Manage Signature.</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-E0WB4JY2Pcg/Uc8ScfeR5mI/AAAAAAAAFE0/cCPoTYZ_bCA/s467/Screen+Shot+2013-06-29+at+9.58.53+AM.png.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="253" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-E0WB4JY2Pcg/Uc8ScfeR5mI/AAAAAAAAFE0/cCPoTYZ_bCA/s320/Screen+Shot+2013-06-29+at+9.58.53+AM.png.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
Click the plus button to add a new signature. Your web cam will tun on a display a video with a line. Write your signature on a piece of blank white paper and hold it up to the camera with your signature on the blue line. Once the computer captures your signature it will be displayed in the preview area. Click on to create your signature.</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
Once the creation of the signature is done for the first time all that needs to be done is the following steps to sign a document.</div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1MoCc0jvsrk/Uc8B1Db0ZzI/AAAAAAAAFD4/3dpo0PnrcC8/s1167/Screen+Shot+2013-06-29+at+8.45.50+AM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="132" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1MoCc0jvsrk/Uc8B1Db0ZzI/AAAAAAAAFD4/3dpo0PnrcC8/s320/Screen+Shot+2013-06-29+at+8.45.50+AM.jpg" width="320" /></a>You can use Preview to sign document without printing and scanning. Simple click on the edit button in preview and choose the signature icon.</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PC6CCWVGIBI/Uc8B1hz8PsI/AAAAAAAAFEA/7l6Z6ssk7tg/s1165/Screen+Shot+2013-06-29+at+8.46.03+AM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="121" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PC6CCWVGIBI/Uc8B1hz8PsI/AAAAAAAAFEA/7l6Z6ssk7tg/s320/Screen+Shot+2013-06-29+at+8.46.03+AM.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-59473729897382814322013-06-29T07:58:00.001-07:002013-06-29T08:08:30.017-07:00iShower ReviewedThe iShower from iDevices is probably one of the handiest devices I have ever reviewed. The first unit I tested was faulty and had to be replaced after a few weeks but iDevices RMAed it for me right away with no problem. In the few days I didn’t have my iShower it just wasn’t as much fun to take a shower. This device pairs with up to three devices over bluetooth and has a long range. It worked over 50 feet away from my phone and I got great sounding music. The iShower is water resistant, not water proof it can’t be submerged but it can hang in the shower or be placed pool side. The device can hang from a provided hook or be held by a fold out handle. Pairing the first device I found to be a little confusing but once I got it working the operation of the device was simple.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9r-UEyU_iY6PV5NiQzDCTs-hs1vt_wVd1lK1uby3hVC1GS-sk5xjX-gLkTJkE5izEiLHvA0QU6XEdnBbAAqtAl_-4cf4JEayXo2tiuapbJHYoesZB2OwT_Md95Rcuw6iWU2PMv7G4_OvK/s1600/IMG_1522.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9r-UEyU_iY6PV5NiQzDCTs-hs1vt_wVd1lK1uby3hVC1GS-sk5xjX-gLkTJkE5izEiLHvA0QU6XEdnBbAAqtAl_-4cf4JEayXo2tiuapbJHYoesZB2OwT_Md95Rcuw6iWU2PMv7G4_OvK/s320/IMG_1522.jpg" width="239" /></a></div>
<br />
The iShower will display the time if the clock button is pressed or the volume adjusted so you won’t be late getting to work if you start rocking out to music in the shower. The buttons are large and easy to operate with play/pause, forward and back in the middle and the up down volume on the bottom right of the device. I leave my iPhone on the dock in the morning to continue charging and when I turn the shower on I press power on the iShower and play to start whatever music or podcast I was most recently listening to the night before.<br />
<br />
The iShower runs on four AA type batteries and seems to have a relatively short battery life in my testing. After the first set of included batteries I switched over to rechargeable batteries. When a phone call is coming in the music will pause to alert you of an incoming call. The iShower doesn’t play the ring of the caller but if you happen to be close enough to your phone to answer it you can probably hear the ring anyway. As soon as the call goes to voicemail play back automatically resumes.<br />
<br />
What could be added to make the iShower more useful and fun? First better battery life and possibly a rechargeable battery system to save on replacing batteries and by switching to non replaceable batteries remove one more point water could leak in. I think a microphone and Siri button would be useful as well for those that have voice activated smart phones. Being able to change playlists or artists while in the shower would be fantastic. Caller ID display would be nice on the display as well so you can decide if you want to jump out of the shower to grab that important call.<br />
<br />
Overall the iShower from iDevices is a great device and I would recommend it to anyone who is a music lover and has a bluetooth device to play music. After my shower I can pause the music and pick up where I left off when I get in the car.<br />
<br />
The iShower is $99 dollars and is available through <a href="http://www.ishowerin.com/">http://www.ishowerin.com/</a> or from <a href="http://www.amazon.com/iDevices-iShower-Bluetooth-Speaker-Devices/dp/B00852IPD4?&linkCode=wey&tag=the00b1-20">Amazon for $89 dollars.</a>
<br />
<br />
<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/cm?lt1=_blank&bc1=000000&IS2=1&bg1=FFFFFF&fc1=000000&lc1=0000FF&t=the00b1-20&o=1&p=8&l=as4&m=amazon&f=ifr&ref=ss_til&asins=B00852IPD4" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;"></iframe><br />
<br />
Nothing starts the day better than rocking out to some tunes in the shower and showers make everyone an excellent singer.
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-42434410364347479422013-06-10T17:00:00.000-07:002013-06-30T07:33:51.335-07:00Apple World Wide Developers Conference 2013<span style="font-family: inherit;">Apple kicked off the developers conference this year with an interesting video talking about design and saying no to many things so they can say yes to the right one. Apple also kicked off the designed in California tag line going on the end of commercials going forward. The video had an inspirational and exciting feel, lending one to wonder what Apple has up its sleeves in the coming months.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Apple's Numbers</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">As usual Apple led the conference with the numbers. This years developer conference sold out in just 71 seconds. Leading Apple to post all videos of sessions online the same day so the now very large Apple development community can all participate in the knowledge being shared at the developers conference. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
Apple Retail is adding a beautiful new store in Berlin. The Apple App Store is now 5 years old and has 575 million accounts with credit cards on file and to date Apple has paid over 10 billion to developers. 5 billion of that paid out in the last year alone. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
The first demo of the day came from Anki a company who is bringing Robotics and Artificial Intelligence to the real world with a video game played with real objects. You place a mat and the cars on the living room floor and you as a play can race your car around the track while the computer plays the other cars. It is an interesting use for Low Energy Bluetooth 4.0 and iOS. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
Next up Apple talked about the Mac. In the past 5 years Apple has doubled its market share to 72 million users. IT has been the number 1 desktop and notebook sold in the U.S. Average annual growth for the Mac has been 15% while the PC only grew at about 3%. Apple has also taken the top spot in Customer Satisfaction.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>OS X</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
Next they talked about OS X. 30% of users upgraded to Mountain Lion in the first 6 months compared to Microsoft only getting about 5% upgrading to Windows 8. Mountain Lion was the 9th OS upgraded released in a decade. Apple announced it would need to change the code name for the OS to carry it the next 10 years. So Apple is adopting a California theme name and calling the new OS Mavericks. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
Mavericks is focused on enhancing the OS user experience and battery savings for portable computers. Apple has added Timer Coalescing to the OS so the CPU usage is clustered together to reduce overall usage of the processor and save about 72% of the computers battery. Also adding memory compression to reduce the amount of inactive memory without having to swap out items to the disk. Reducing the load on an SSD or mechanical hard drive and speeding up the computers memory operations. Memory Compression will speed up performance by 1.4x to 1.5x.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
New to the OS is a rewritten finder that now includes tabs to reduce desktop clutter with multiple windows being opened. Finder tags to allow a user to tag files to group them in the side bar and make them easier to find later. Finder finally get the full screen mode treatment so a user can manage files more easily. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Apple also enhanced Multiple Display mode for users who prefer to have multiple screens. The dock and menu bar can now be called from any display. The full screen mode doesn't affect other displays connected to the machine. So each screen can be a different full screen app. The panning between full screen apps on a display is also independent from the other displays. Finally Mavericks gets a Airplay treatment to allow users to connect their Mac to an Airplay connected TV and use it as an additional full power display. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
Mission Control can drag full screen apps between displays as well allowing the user to decide which screen will get the full screen treatment. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Safari</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
Safari gets an upgrade with Mavericks as well a clean new home page top site flattened and lighter top site page. The new side bar with bookmarks, reading list and now links that have been shared through your social media. Linked In has been added as a service for social media as well. Safari now creates a separate process per tab so one tab crashing won't take the whole browser down with it. Shared memory and resource cache contributes to its new found speed. Webkit the engine that runs Safari is currently installed on over 1.5 billion devices. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The performance gains in graphics in Mavericks is impressive in the demo Mail had 100,000 emails in an inbox and still could scroll at 60 frames per second. This smooth scrolling has been brought into Safari as well.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">App Nap enabled on Safari puts apps to sleep when they are not visible keeping flash and other content from over using the processor and draining the battery too quickly. Reading List and Reader now scroll through from one article to the next so users don't need to close one and open the next readers can just flow from one document to the next.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Finally in Safari users will get iCloud keychain. For those that haven't adopted a password management tool this builds one right into Mavericks. Including the ability to generate random passwords automatically and save them to iCloud AES 256 bit encrypted so only the user has access to them and shared between iOS devices and Mac computers. iCloud keychain remembers Credit Cards for users as well.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<div>
<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">Notifications</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></b>
The ability to apply within the notification has been added to OS X. Deleting email can now be done right from the notification. Users can reply or answer FaceTime calls right in Notifications. Push notifications sent to iOS devices will be delivered to Mavericks as well. Notifications now appear on the Mac lock screen on wake up.<br />
<br />
<b>App Updates</b><br />
<br />
Apps and OS X are now updated in the background automatically without user intervention. No more update fatigue for OS X Users.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Calendar</b></span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> Gone is the leather and stitching in calendar. With a whole </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">new calendar look and feel Craig Federicki quipped "No virtual cows were harmed making this calendar." Calendar gets a whole new inspector and location aware meetings block out travel time prior to a meeting so users don't book meetings too close </span>together<span style="font-family: inherit;">. Weather information is now included right in the </span>calendar, in case that meeting happens to be out doors.<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Maps</b></span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> Maps comes to the desktop with</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"> 3D, fly over, info cards, and turn by turn navigation. Also </span>with<span style="font-family: inherit;"> a single click users can send directions to their iPhone. The developers have been provided with an SDK to provide mapping functions right in app.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>iBooks</b> </span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> App is </span>now coming to the Mac</span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> with </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">note taking and text books support.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The developer Preview available immediately with a final release coming in the fall of 2013.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Macbook Air</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> Next up Apple announced a new Macbook Air with </span>all day battery life, featuring a 4th Gen Core Haswell ULT energy </span>efficient <span style="font-family: inherit;">CPU, </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">40% faster graphics, and </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">2x GPU execution units. The </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">11" goes from 5 hrs to 9 hrs of battery life and the </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">13" model goes from 7 hrs to 12 hrs of battery life. This I believe </span>being tested on the machine running Mountain Lion. It remains to be seen how much more battery life will be achieved with a fully optimized copy of Mavericks running on these machines.</div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> The new Air comes with a </span>45% faster flash,</span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">802.11ac 3x faster wifi, and a lower </span>price point<span style="font-family: inherit;"> for the </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">entry level 13"</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Airport Extreme</b></span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre;"><br /></span></span></span>
<span class="Apple-tab-span"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre;">As long as Apple was touting the new MacBook Air with 802.11ac it was a great time to reveal the new Airport Extreme. The new extreme has a </span></span><span style="white-space: pre;">smaller footprint than its predecessor</span> but is much taller. The unit is capable of </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">3 stream 802.11ac wifi beam forming and simultaneous 2.4 Ghz and 5 Ghz with dual band radios.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Sneak Peak at Mac Pro</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre;">Apple treated developers to a </span></span><span style="white-space: pre;">sneak peak at its all new Mac Pro. Sporting a whole new case design 1/8 the size of its older brother, a </span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Unified Thermal Core, the entire top case is a </span>convenient<span style="font-family: inherit;"> handle, </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">new Xeon up to 12 core configuration, 1,866 Mhz DDR3 ECC memory and a Fast Internal PCI Express Flash Storage this machine is going to be fast. The system even lights up the ports when you move it to make connecting new peripherals easier.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Expandable through </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">external expansion thru Thunderbolt 2 up to 6 devices at 20 Gbps of bandwidth gives plenty of room for growth outside the case. The new system sports </span>AMD FirePro Graphics <span style="font-family: inherit;">dual workstation GPU's. Open CL offers 7 teraflops of performance and up to</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"> 3 4k displays can be connected to the system. </span><span style="white-space: pre;">The new Corvette of computers is being designed and built in the United States.</span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>iCloud</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-tab-span"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre;">The iCloud numbers are </span></span><span style="white-space: pre;">impressive</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre;"> with over </span></span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">300 million iCloud accounts, </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">35 billion app redownloads since launch, 240 million game center users, 800 billion iMessages sent, and 7.4 trillion push notifications sent to users. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Apple is announcing the </span>expansion of<span style="font-family: inherit;"> iCloud to include iWork web apps. Create </span>documents<span style="font-family: inherit;"> right in a web browser from your Mac or PC </span>without<span style="font-family: inherit;"> </span>having iWork installed. Currently this is available to developers and will be expanding to all users for free later this year.</div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><b>iOS</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> To date Apple has sold over </span>600 million iOS devices. </span><span style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">iPhone users use their phone 50% more than android users and account for a 60% share of mobile web traffic. The </span>iPad<span style="font-family: inherit;"> accounts for </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">82% for tablet market share currently. Mobile shopping on</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"> on black friday consisted of 10% iPad and 8.7% iPhone. So users are not just shopping online but shopping from their phones and tablets. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">iPhone has been #1 in customer satisfaction JD Power 9 times now. </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Windows phone beat android in satisfaction at 53% and Apple held the top spot with 73% satisfaction.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">93% of iOS users are currently running iOS 6. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Control Center</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> iOS 7 has added a new control center, simply </span>swipe up from bottom of the screen for control center. </span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Airplane mode, wifi on/off, bluetooth on/off, do not </span>disturb<span style="font-family: inherit;">, rotation lock, brightness, music controls, flashlight, timer, calculate and camera are all accessible through control center.</span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Multitasking</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>All apps now have multitasking. iOS</span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">monitors your app usage and implements </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">intelligent scheduling, </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">opportunistic updates, </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">adapts to network conditions, performs </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">coalesced updates, and </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">push triggers. All of these will make the OS feel faster by having data before the user requests it and save battery at the same time. iOS now includes a new </span>multitasking management that allows the user to swipe across all apps that are running and swipe up to end an app.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Safari</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre;">A</span>ll new tabs and iCloud tabs scroll in 3d in Safari. Now users can create an unlimited number of tabs. Private browsing has been moved into the new or change tab view for easier access.</span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>AirDrop</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>On the new share Sheet you can share with anyone near by running iOS 7. </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">This feature uses peer to peer wifi and only on latest hardware offer peer to peer support.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Camera</b></span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> The camera app is adding </span>live photo filters and a swipe gesture to witch between four camera modes. standard, video, square and panorama.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Photos </b></span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;">Photos are now </span>organized into moments </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">by location and date. The thumbnail colors allow users to quickly scroll a large number of photos and zoom in all the way to a single photo level. </span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>iCloud</b> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Photo Stream now shares video as well as still photos. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Siri </b></span></div>
<div>
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Siri gets a new user interface as well as the option to select voices. Siri can now also control phone settings and play voicemail. Siri is also learning to answer new questions, work with Twitter, wikipedia, web </span>searching<span style="font-family: inherit;"> with Bing, </span>even<span style="font-family: inherit;"> getting access to photos. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>iOS in the car</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Eyes free allowing users to push a button on the steering wheel to access Siri or iOS on the screen in the car allowing the driver or passenger to view the iOS device screen right on the cars display. iOS in the car also allow the user to </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">have iMessages read to you and respond to them verbally.</span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>App Store</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> App Store is also getting an upgrade. New organizational features include </span>looking for apps based on age range or popular apps based on location (near me). App Store now updates automatically so the user doesn't have to go download updates on their own again reducing </span>the<span style="font-family: inherit;"> update </span>fatigue.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Music</b></span></div>
<div>
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre;">Apple is Sherlocking Pandora and other streaming music </span></span><span style="white-space: pre;">services. The iTunes app now has </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Featured stations in iTunes Radio, the ability to create your own stations based on music preferences, save a history of </span>everything<span style="font-family: inherit;"> </span>you<span style="font-family: inherit;"> listened to on iTunes Radio so you can look back on past songs. </span>iTunes<span style="font-family: inherit;"> Radio will be available on all devices and will be </span>fee<span style="font-family: inherit;"> with ad support or if you </span>subscribe<span style="font-family: inherit;"> to iTunes Match for $24.99 a year it is </span>commercial free<span style="font-family: inherit;">.</span><br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>FaceTime </b></span></div>
<div>
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Apple also announced FaceTime is getting some updates including an audio only feature so if you don't want to be seen on screen or need to save </span>bandwidth users can answer voice only. Notification Syncing across all devices is being enabled. Plus new in iOS 7 Apple is adding message blocking to the phone app and FaceTime app.<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Enterprise Customers</b> </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-tab-span"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre;">There are a number of </span></span><span style="white-space: pre;">features for Enterprise customers coming in iOS 7 including an updated mobile device manager but the feature Apple choose to highlight at this presentation was per app VPN support. iOS can now be configured to launch VPN with particular applications from the phone. Saving the user time and allowing companies to secure their apps more easily.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Activation Lock</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;">Apple is also taking a step to make devices more secure if stolen. In iOS 7 the </span>Phone can't be reactivated even if the device is wiped without reentering the users iCloud ID. </span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre;">iOS 7 will be coming to the </span>iPhone 4 and later as well as the </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">iPad 2 and later coming this fall.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Apple made a lot of announcements at this developers conference. To everyones surprise no new iPad, iPhone, Macbook Pro or new product </span>category<span style="font-family: inherit;"> was announced. It is certain Apple will be holding events later this year for a new iPhone and iPad. According to Tim Cook Apple will be introducing new product </span>categories<span style="font-family: inherit;"> in 2013 and 2014. </span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-72590945391495679122013-05-29T14:22:00.001-07:002013-05-29T14:36:35.891-07:00App Crash Quick TipIf you have had an app constantly crashing on launch or asking for an admin password to repair the library on launch try the following to resolve the issue.<br />
<br />
Remove files from the following locations.<br />
<br />
Note: To find the user library folder in 10.7 and 10.8 hold down the option key, click Go in the Finder and choose Library.<br />
<br />
~/Library/Containers/<name app="" of=""> </name><br />
<br />
For instance if TextEdit keeps crashing delete com.apple.TextEdit folder and then open the app again.
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbKkF5yEWvFvWsmpDn6n-otwa_kQ5ICLJsermVLGLuNxxTdIrQMjoXQ8OUOo9j7EfCvm6xbGp9ttpE5RlCdtuvQlQkcr8G1kBRftD3IYzfFaVhDlfOgK90kp3aUYL_2yZvPrfiJqzGOLaH/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-05-29+at+2.07.11+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbKkF5yEWvFvWsmpDn6n-otwa_kQ5ICLJsermVLGLuNxxTdIrQMjoXQ8OUOo9j7EfCvm6xbGp9ttpE5RlCdtuvQlQkcr8G1kBRftD3IYzfFaVhDlfOgK90kp3aUYL_2yZvPrfiJqzGOLaH/s400/Screen+Shot+2013-05-29+at+2.07.11+PM.png" width="346" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
Also in the following folder find the folder of the app that keeps crashing and delete it.
~/Library/Saved Application State/<name app="" of="">.savedState</name><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVAd8pQtW5Ngl6Gi8cLXEUHGl5URTIIomJl8Uxci9NNMk1T36CQtFoUPlHFCeasQMfbZsESKbHBj2a3HPNVwCm66kPr91WamGeU6EjACw3HsBF767jsSPBVT9uGwWSjXo0Q38JTj77RoLs/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-05-29+at+2.13.41+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVAd8pQtW5Ngl6Gi8cLXEUHGl5URTIIomJl8Uxci9NNMk1T36CQtFoUPlHFCeasQMfbZsESKbHBj2a3HPNVwCm66kPr91WamGeU6EjACw3HsBF767jsSPBVT9uGwWSjXo0Q38JTj77RoLs/s400/Screen+Shot+2013-05-29+at+2.13.41+PM.png" width="342" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
Launch your application and enjoy!
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-78934885584223003922013-05-21T12:42:00.002-07:002013-05-21T13:10:34.106-07:00Omnis Web Hosting Not What It SeemsNormally I review products that I like and interest me so for the most part my reviews tend to be pretty positive. However, in this case I have to take issue with a company and write a bad review. The company is Omnis <a href="http://www.omnis.com/">www.ommis.com</a> I have been using them myself now for more than a year for my personal website, my podcast, and was so impressed with their pricing and promises I moved a technical group website, and the website of three companies I work for in my day job.<br />
<br />
This means I have a total of three separate paid accounts with Omnis for these several sites. A couple of weeks ago I woke up to an email sent to me at 2:15am from Omnis telling me they were slowing down my websites because I had exceeded their storage limit. I went to one of the company pages to test and found it taking three minutes to load a single page. This made our three company websites and help desk ticketing system effectively useless.<br />
<br />
Immediately I opened a chat with tech support. Tech support online told me my best bet was to call on the phone. So I called on the phone. I was told on the phone delete a site I didn't need I was over my limit. All the sites are needed and being used. I asked for a supervisor and was told I could only email a supervisor and they would get back to me in 24 hours. In Internet time that is forever for a site to be effectively down and not acceptable.<br />
<br />
All through this process I kept asking about the unlimited claim they made on the website. Below are samples from the Omnis website abut the Unmetered Data claims. It states clearly on their main page unmetered disk storage space, and bandwidth data transfer in bold with an exclamation point.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhylsQctHBI2Lda6a6zmJ6V9g2x378_8A2orXwIODUEK3qOTq1xRKpNivCbgcAM6s8X52WaHVwnuYVxpH-r1XjHnr-5CvterRjoQ8I71TOOox0w9RnD3FigOQE9TrW7DSkHKpR-KcGB2oAI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-05-21+at+9.43.09+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhylsQctHBI2Lda6a6zmJ6V9g2x378_8A2orXwIODUEK3qOTq1xRKpNivCbgcAM6s8X52WaHVwnuYVxpH-r1XjHnr-5CvterRjoQ8I71TOOox0w9RnD3FigOQE9TrW7DSkHKpR-KcGB2oAI/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-05-21+at+9.43.09+AM.png" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
On the next page where they list the price it is $5.95 a month for Linux cloud hosting which is a killer deal! In the hosting features it again states unmetered disk space, unmetered data transfer, plus other features of the service.</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxeeJSkFJcjpKEmuNKakSyuLHKnhRsI8wvn04RZ_nKX-nC9U5UUm86wBwbBmLBMyfGCrBVlLoxVRci8GvoGGAKVzHcsvApxuewxozc6uK57xiwPfbiy95_6C3Z_ib31oFqnhhyphenhyphenT6QvTwp-/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-05-21+at+9.43.45+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxeeJSkFJcjpKEmuNKakSyuLHKnhRsI8wvn04RZ_nKX-nC9U5UUm86wBwbBmLBMyfGCrBVlLoxVRci8GvoGGAKVzHcsvApxuewxozc6uK57xiwPfbiy95_6C3Z_ib31oFqnhhyphenhyphenT6QvTwp-/s400/Screen+Shot+2013-05-21+at+9.43.45+AM.png" width="218" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
So when I inquire about the unlimited claims they direct me to the terms of service agreements. To find these agreements you have to click the small web hosting link at the top corner of the screen to get a pull down to go to the policies page where six different policy agreements live which of course I had to agree to them to use the service. Buried in section 7 of the fifth agreement is where they apparently try and define unlimited. </div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
This is a direct quote from the Omnis <a href="http://www.omnis.com/policies/hosting.php" target="_blank">Web Hosting Service Agreement</a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #626569; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Geneva, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: bold; line-height: 18px; margin: 8px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=5514896903905261167" name="7" style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px; color: #656565; font-size: 10pt; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">7 Resource Allocation</a></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #626569; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Geneva, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 18px; margin: 10px 0px 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline;">
Customer acknowledges that the real-time resources allocated for hosting service are dynamically allocated based on the amount of overall resources used by Customer. Real-time resources include but are not limited to bandwidth, MySQL connections, email connections, web server CPU, and web server RAM. Real-time resources may be affected by things such as, but not limited to, bandwidth and disk space used, the number or size of configured email accounts, the number of web sites configured under hosting service, or the number of or activity on connections to MySQL databases.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #626569; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Geneva, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 18px; margin: 10px 0px 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline;">
Omnis Network uses Network-attached storage devices to store Customer's files. The nature of this type of storage requires that Omnis Network limit the number of files Customer can store with the hosting service to prevent exhaustion of the total number of files permitted on the storage device. This limit is 81920 files. Customer acknowledges that this limit exists for all hosting service and can not be adjusted.<br />
<br /></div>
<div 0px="" 10pt="" 10px="" 18px="" arial="" baseline="" border:="" color:="" elvetica="" font-family:="" font-size:="" geneva="" grande="" helvetica="" justify="" line-height:="" margin:="" neue="" outline:="" padding:="" sans-serif="" text-align:="" ucida="" verdana="" vertical-align:="">
<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: small; line-height: normal; text-align: left;">So if you are a customer and use more than the average resource of the other customers then your service this throttled with no warning. When I asked where these limitations are listed in the control panel I was told "they change all the time and are not listed anywhere". So you when you get the email and you have been hobbled then you know you went over your limit and it is too late. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: small; line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: small; line-height: normal; text-align: left;">A week after I opened a support ticket well past the 24 hours window in which I was supposed to get a response I got the following email:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: small; line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Dear Customer;</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">You may review the Web Hosting Service Agreement that you agreed to when you purchased your hosting account at </span><a href="http://www.omnis.com/policies/hosting.php" style="font-family: Helvetica;">http://www.omnis.com/policies/hosting.php</a><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Section 7 explains how the resource allocation system works. If you wish to upload files beyond the average usage of our customers, your available resources will be restricted.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">In order to maintain unrestricted resources, you will need to ensure that you keep your disk usage within a reasonable amount.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Currently, we apply restrictions once a hosting account exceeds 6.05gb, however that number is dynamic and can change at any time. If you cannot get your disk usage under that amount, you would need to purchase an additional hosting account to split up your disk usage to avoid the restrictions.</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Thank you,</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Jeremy</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">---------------------------------------------------</span><br style="font-family: Helvetica;" /><span style="font-family: Helvetica;">Omnis Network, LLC</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times; font-size: small; line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="text-align: left;">After again explaining that one single website with a lot of images and very low traffic took 20 GB of space and there wasn't a way to break up the site across multiple accounts it seemed as though a basic site with a lot of photos was not something that Omnis could handle. I moved the site off to Host Gator who offers better customer support and an escalation procedure that goes all the way to the CEO of the company, now that's service. </span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
So I emailed the sales department to explain the utter failure of tech support in resolving my issue and the additional problems I suffered after removing one of the websites. The system didn't recover right away and with another call to tech support they said it would recover within an hour. Two hours later another call to tech support to be told it could take a few more hours the system that disables the websites can't be overridden and runs on a schedule. The next day we still had slow sites and I called again. That tech was able to run the job and make it remove the restriction from our account, which still only slowly returned over a period of hours. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I got a response from the email to the sales team and it was Jeremy again from support with the following message:</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">Dear Customer;</span><br />
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br style="font-family: Helvetica; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /></span>
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">I apologize if any of our policies do not work for your business. All of our technical support representatives are empowered to make decisions and assist customers with the highest level of support, so when a ticket is escalated to management it is usually an emergency or requires an administrator to fix an issue. That is where the "escalated tickets are normally handled within 24 hours" statement came from.</span><br />
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br style="font-family: Helvetica; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /></span>
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">In your case, you simply wanted to express your displeasure with our policy, and did not agree with the support representative's solution. Those policies are put in place by the owner of the company, and will not change.</span><br />
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br style="font-family: Helvetica; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /></span>
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">You can view the policies at the page I provided. I also clearly stated that the disk usage number at which restrictions occur is a dynamic number, so we cannot simply post that number for customers to view, since the number changes every second.</span><br />
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br style="font-family: Helvetica; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /></span>
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">As a shared website hosting company offering website hosting for $6 per month, we cannot allow customer's disk usage to become so large that they dominate the resources available to the rest of our customers. That is how shared hosting works, and we will not adjust our policy or make any changes at this time.</span><br />
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br style="font-family: Helvetica; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /></span>
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">I understand that this type of hosting is not always the perfect solution for every customer, so if you feel that shared hosting is not providing you with the disk space and bandwidth necessary to host your large websites, you may need to look into a dedicated server option.</span><br />
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br style="font-family: Helvetica; text-align: -webkit-auto;" /></span>
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">Thank you,</span><br />
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">Jeremy</span><br />
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">---------------------------------------------------</span><br />
<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">Omnis Network, LLC</span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Note at no time am I referred to by my name just a generic Dear Customer; and none of my interactions with tech support by phone or email indicated they were empowered to do anything. In fact all I ever heard is what they were not able to do. Once I even asked after they told me what they couldn't do I asked what they could do and they told me again delete my sites. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I went online and did some research on Omnis and other hosting providers and see a lot of unsatisfied customers with Omnis sounding off in various forums with similar complaints. That is what finally prompted me to write about this experience in detail and now when it comes to hosting I tell my readers here, my consulting clients, my podcast listeners, and anyone else who wants support for websites DO NOT use Omnis. Choose a hosting company that provides tech support with escalation methods if you can't get help. Read the fine print and make sure unlimited is truly unlimited you don't want your website to be hobbled because it grew or became popular. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Hostgator.com offers excellent support and reasonable prices.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Godaddy.com offers excellent support and reasonable prices. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
sqarespace.com offers excellent support, great tools, and reasonable prices. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
There are a number of companies out there that can meet most users web hosting needs. Just make sure you read the fine print and the control panel has a method to monitor any limits so you can be aware of the situation before you reach the limit and not be notified until after it is too late. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Also hold your providers feet to the fire if they make claims that are not true. If they claim it is unlimited fine let it be unlimited. But if their are limits make them clear, easy to find, and easy to monitor so we aren't surprised. Don't settle for your web host over promising and under delivering.</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-6438866487634094732013-04-20T10:22:00.001-07:002013-04-20T10:22:17.373-07:002012 Toyota Camry Hybrid Reviewed<p>The 2012 Toyota Camry is the biggest piece of technology I have ever reviewed on my blog. While not technically Mac centric the 2012 Toyota Camry has some new features for geeks to get excited about and is worth talking about. </p><p>First the good in my month of driving the new Camry I have found that it is fun to drive. A combined 200 hp four cylinder and electric drive train make the 2012 Toyota Camry a snappy and responsive car while still giving me between 43 and 45 miles to the gallon. More than twice the fuel economy of my old 2000 BWM 740iL with an interior and handling that feels comparable to my older luxury sedan. </p><p>From the moment you walk up to the car when the interior lights up when detecting the smart key fob in my pocket and the door unlocks when you just touch the door handle the tech in this car feels special. Sliding into the driver seat and seeing the instrument panel come to life at the touch of the power button. </p><p>If your phone is paired to the car you get a notification that your phone has connected on screen. If I forget my phone I get a reminder the connection didn't occur and can go back and get my phone. The bluetooth allows me to listen to music, use my phone, and use my phones Internet connection to connect my car to Pandora, iHeartRadio, Open Table, and other applications. The car even supports over the air updating of the software. </p><p>I have held on to this review for a little over a year before I released it. I decided to spend some time with the car and after the initial wow factor wore off and some of the issues started to show I would see how I felt about my car. </p><p>I still like the car overall. I will say Toyota needs to issue software updates quicker for these\</p><p> cars. So far I have only gotten one major update to the car. The issues I have encountered have included a number of software bugs I have discovered over the last year. Some of them took six months to encounter. </p><p>1.) Voice recognition degrades over time until it resets and then it works again for another month. </p><p>2.) When listening to music using bluetooth and using navigation the banner showing Bluetooth information blocks the part of the screen that shows the next street name to turn on. Also when in resetting the fuel economy monitor the bluetooth banner covers the update and reset buttons. </p><p>3.) Since the upgrade to iPhone 5 when plugging the iPhone into the USB port music control doesn't work consistently and you can't use the Apps while the phone is charging. </p><p>As a quick tip to work around the above problem. Plug a USB charger into the power adapter for charging only and continue to use Bluetooth to Internet access. </p><p>4.) On the iPhone 4 initially the car couldn't read text messages but with an iOS update I started getting text messages and iOS notifications read to me. After the move to iPhone 5 and iOS 6 the text reading feature became hit and miss. </p><p>5.) Last year with iOS 6 Apple announced Eyes Free and last month Chevy announced an over the air update to make Eyes Free work. So far Toyota is still silent and Siri Voice recognition is much better than what is built into the car and can evolve much faster. </p><p>6.) A couple of times the audio system has just cut out and no matter which source I choose no audio would work until I pulled over and turned off the car and restarted it. </p><p>Some of the things I think Toyota could have done better was with ambient lighting inside the car. Some of the lights are a blueish white and some are green. Changing them to one consistent color would be much nicer. Also lighting all of the buttons in the car would be helpful. At night finding door lock buttons and other window controls is difficult. </p><p>The car could also use parking sensors. For all of the tech on board not having that just feels like a huge oversight. </p><p>The gas milage is incredible. Over a year I have averaged about 42 miles per gallon and only have to go put gas in my car about once a month. Getting 600 miles to a tank of gas also saves time in not needing to go to the gas station. The hybrid batteries charge from the engine and the brakes so you don't have to plug the car in or do anything extra. So you get the full benefit of the hybrid system without having to do any extra steps. Engine performance still feels peppy as well.</p>Over all I do like the car and like where Toyota is heading with the Camry. It has an excellent fit and finish and is worth the investment if you are in the market for a new car. Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-21576890022464412142013-01-27T12:37:00.001-08:002013-01-27T12:40:38.736-08:00The Value of AppleCare PlusI have mentioned this before both on the podcast and in a number of Mac User Group meetings I have spoken at in the past. I do feel the need however to post about this again this week for reasons that will become abundantly clear in a moment. <br />
<br />
AppleCare plus for your iOS devices is a must have for people on the go that rely on their devices. For $99 users get two years of coverage against device defects and against accidental damage. Let messy that one more time for emphasis. If you accidentally damage your device apple will replace it for $49 dollars. For the two year coverage of the device if you drop it on the ground and it breaks or if it falls in water Apple will replace the device for $49. <br />
<br />
I just happened to be talking to a friend last Monday about AppleCare and stated I never really use it in the six years I have carried an iPhone or the three years I have carried my iPad. The very next day my phone slipped out of my hand and fell on its edge on a concrete parking lot. The result was disastrous. <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
After getting over the initial shock and surprise I didn't worry about it. I just picked up my phone opened my Apple Store app and through the cracked screen booked an appointment with a genius. I went right up to the store on my way home and they swapped it out in about twenty minutes. I paid for my replacement and bought a case to make sure it doesn't happen again. As soon as I got home I restored my phone from my iCloud backup and within about four hours of breaking my phone I was back in business and no one would have known it even happened if I had not posted it on Twitter. <br />
<br />
Finally a few years ago I had my trusty 2007 MacBook Pro that was my primary computer. In the three years I owned the machine it went back for service for a few issues. One was a recall for a bad graphics chip, next a bad battery, later another motherboard for a different issue, then a broken lid latch that was keeping my machine from closing. Finally one night the hard drive started acting up so I Carbon Copy Cloned my hard drive to an external and booked an appointment. <br />
<br />
Due to the number of issues I had experienced with this one machine Apple opted to replace my computer with a brand new 2009 MacBook Pro. Thanks to my AppleCare warranty I got a new machine and immediately bought a new warranty. Laptops and handheld devices go with us everywhere and sometimes take a beating. Again I can't stress enough the importance and peace of mind The AppleCare plus warranties bring for someone who constantly relies on technology for daily life. <br/><br/><div class="separator"style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnvdYPHv0y_Xb6FNcWccqgLB3axZ8ExtI2hliJUsIpBRh4C8V-NVT0s5UklaqgKmLTwFwZM860nl5DHcl5mz0_V7AwpiTDhdLdZ81Vk_zXyLKh8isU2ttijtE5-6QVSyAvqw8FIpBiioW-/s640/blogger-image-1386525652.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnvdYPHv0y_Xb6FNcWccqgLB3axZ8ExtI2hliJUsIpBRh4C8V-NVT0s5UklaqgKmLTwFwZM860nl5DHcl5mz0_V7AwpiTDhdLdZ81Vk_zXyLKh8isU2ttijtE5-6QVSyAvqw8FIpBiioW-/s640/blogger-image-1386525652.jpg" /></a></div>Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-26906423802993483262012-11-04T15:53:00.001-08:002012-11-04T15:53:58.803-08:00A Little Something to Share EventApple sent out invites to the press and in an atypical move decided to live stream the event. I certainly hope they continue to do this going forward. It makes it much easier for me to cover as a blogger. They started with the numbers. More than 5 million iPhones were sold on opening weekend. Over 200 million devices are running iOS 6, making it the fastest upgrade rate in history. Over 125 million documents have been uploaded and stored in the cloud in the last year. iMessage users have sent 300 billion messages in the last year. Currently iMessage averages about 28,000 messages per second. Over 70 million photos shared with Photo Stream sharing. Finally in the area of numbers Mac has out grown PC for six straight years. Apple now has the number one desktop and the number one notebook computer in the US. Apple has also been rated number one in satisfaction and reliability.
In new news Apple is releasing a new version of iBooks for the iPad. In addition to the traditional page turn they have now added a continuous scroll option for those who would prefer vertical scrolling. Ties to iCloud have been improved with better bookmark syncing and the ability to update books. Also with new social media features quotes can be shared with Twitter and Facebook. iBooks also now has support for 40 languages. Also iBooks Author has been updated with additional themes and the ability to embed fonts.
Apple started with revving the 13” Macbook Pro dropping one pound of weight, adding dual microphones, dual Thunderbolt, and USB 3 ports. Also adding a Retina Display to the line up and tossing in an HDMI port. Now apple has two Retina Display notebooks in the lineup making them both the highest resolution laptops made. The 13” display has a resolution of 2560x1600 with four times the pixels as the previous model. The new display has a 178 degree viewing angle, and with the new laminating process glare is reduced by 75%. The 13” comes with an Intel HD Graphics 4000 integrated graphics card and no discrete graphics card like its 15” sibling. The new 13” has shed some weight, thickness and the optical drive.
The updated Mac mini gets the Ivy Bridge architecture with an Intel HD Graphics 4000 card, USB 3, up to 1TB hard drive or 256GB of Flash storage, and Bluetooth was upgraded to 4.0. Entry price $599 and the server version is $999 with 2 1TB hard drives. The Mac mini is the most energy efficient desktop made today.
The iMac is truly a thin, fast, and drool worthy machine. Sporting an incredibly thin 5mm edge and utilizing a process called friction stir welding to fuse the back and chin of the machine together. Friction stir welding is apparently a method used in aero space, and other industries. Also by making the screen thinner and removing the air gap between the glass and the LCD panel improves color, reduces glare, and makes the over all image look better. To top it off Apple is now color calibrating each individual panel in the factory. Finally they have added dual microphones to the iMac for beam forming. The system supports up to 32GB of RAM and up to a 3TB hard drive or 768 GB of Flash.
The Apple Fusion Drive is a build to order option on the new iMac. It pairs a 128 GB Flash drive and 1 to 3 TB of spinning storage to take advantage of the speed gains of SSD while keeping the large capacities of traditional hard drives. There is some software magic going on under the hood with this device. According to Apple Mountain Lion evaluates and moves programs and data between the flash storage and the hard drive to optimize performance. According to the benchmark numbers the Apple Fusion drive is only slightly slower than an SSD alone. Hopefully it will be nothing like the disappointing hybrid drives we have seen from Seagate. Finally even with more power and a brighter screen Apple has managed to reduce the power consumption of the iMac by 50%.
100 million iPads have been sold since the launch of iPad in 2010. 2,500 schools are using iBooks in their curriculum as replacements for standard text books. Over 80% of the High School Core curriculum is now available on iBooks. Apple introduced a minor update to iBooks Author to include embedding of fonts, new templates, a mathematical expressions module and multi-touch widgets. The iBooks app itself now includes updates so books can be updated after they have been downloaded to a device.
In a stunning move Apple introduced a 4th generation iPad just seven months after the launch of the retina iPad 3rd generation. With a beefed up A6X CPU, improved graphics chip, FaceTime HD Camera, expanded LTE capabilities, improved wifi performance using MIMO, and sporting the new compact lightning connector. It doesn’t seem like a huge update just an incremental change mostly aimed at getting rid of the aging dock connector. The new 4th generation iPad is priced at the same price point as the previous iPad. Also new adapters were announced a USB, Secure Digital, HDMI, and VGA to lightning connectors.
No surprise at all is the new iPad Mini. With an all new design it is as thin as a pencil and weighs the same as a pad of paper at .68 lbs. LIke the iPhone it is available in white/silver or black/slate. It is a 7.9” diagonal screen with a resolution of 1024x768. It is the same pixel count as the iPad 2 in a smaller form factor. This is a 162 pixel per inch display which isn’t quiet retina. It seems strange as Apple pushes retina displays into every product the newest one is missing a retina screen. It is also interesting they didn’t take the opportunity to make the Mini-iPad a 16:9 screen.
It was never mentioned if either of the new iPads contain beam forming microphones to improve performance of audio pickup for Siri and dictation. All new Apple products in the handheld or tablet categories are at least coming with Siri.Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-10987738678096441302012-10-14T17:28:00.001-07:002012-11-04T16:06:29.261-08:00iPhone 5 in The Real WorldI have now been carrying an iPhone 5 for several weeks now of real world work and reading the evaluations of others. First of all as Apple is prone to hyperbole when promoting its products and Apple users tend to have very high expectations and Apple critics tend to be hyper critical. This tends to create an echo chamber of comments that exacerbate complaints that have merit and create ones that don’t.
Just the other day I was in a local electronics store and listened to the sales girl behind the counter tell a customer she didn’t want to trade up an iPhone 3Gs to an iPhone 5 because the maps were terrible. This customer had an investment in apps and the sales person was pressing her to look at other phones. I asked the sales girl. Have you used an iPhone 5 yet? She told me honestly no, everything she was sharing was just what she heard. I pulled my phone out and showed them how it worked. Once the sales girl actually held my phone and played with it a little she changed her tune. Now the customer still couldn’t buy the iPhone 5 because the store didn’t have any in stock which likely had more to do with why the sales girl was steering this person away from an iPhone 5 than anything else.
<strong>Maps</strong>
<img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtnAvP31tLfpvQqYH5dvWVLVDdDU-3bi9WfhyOCfU-Q-BSA8ViUThw1D70PCEx4ZlK1vx58_iNYv7XLGfq3PnfoF96a3NtUfEIfF9pvCG0IusaZcpzj3oQe6dWGQV2jGGOojfHauJdJm2G/" alt="PastedGraphic-2012-10-14-15-05.png" width="56" height="57">Maps should not have been advertised as the best mapping system ever. It is a good mapping system don’t get me wrong and I have been using it for weeks, using my car navigation, Google Maps, and Apple Maps together. So far in both cities I have tested it in the mapping system and turn-by-turn works fine in the areas I tested. The integration with Siri makes it easier to get direction and it seems as though the iPhone 5 uses far less power when giving turn-by-turn directions. The mapping system also includes a report a problem button on the settings page. If a user fiends a problem they can report it and it will be fixed.
A week after launch Tim Cook issued an apology for the issues with the iPhone maps suggested a few alternatives for users while Apple Maps is being worked on. Apple has acquired several companies and worked years on this new mapping system. It will improve over time. I think most users complaints stem from becoming so dependent on mapping apps on our devices. We need it to work, work well, and work every time. The 3D features are stunning and the 3D renderings of building footprints is helpful when navigating.
The other huge loss was mass transit direction built into Google Maps. When requesting mass transit directions Apple Maps lists the apps that have the information and allow you to download and install them.
The best feature has to be the information card that includes Address, Phone number, and Yelp information with beautiful photographs and subtle Tim Burns effects and dissolves making the cards feel elegant.
<strong>Battery Life</strong>
<img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL1gk73ur1KwUnEvw-UqwiROiiXZ4FgoV0Is1zYVi01zUevVhsYVOtowFwwLPynlGEIk40ye95oZQbkrRYfy1Er919QMUqpyRGrvk-zJ-XjtjYspdrxZpSmdCknztg7NNINbfI3wuffCg3/" alt="PastedGraphic1-2012-10-14-15-05.png" width="53" height="53">For the first few days with my new phone it seemed like the battery didn’t perform as well as my older phone. That could have been due to using it more as I explored the new features or older apps needing upgrades to make it work well with iOS6. It could also have been due to the lack of lighting cables available to charge the iPhone. I heard reports of people who said they had gone two days without recharging. I never got that kind of life with my iPhone 4 but I could make it through a normal usage day if I recharged while at my desk or used a Mophie Juicepak when charging times are not available.
Now with extra cables lying around and recharging at random intervals when I am not using my iPhone it seems as though I have plenty of battery power now. It will still be nice to have a Mophie Juicepak again when Mophie makes one for lightning connectors.
<strong>Scratches</strong>
People have been testing phone by scratching them with keys dropping them etc and with mixed results. I haven’t put a case in my phone, I just put it in my pocket and get it when I need it. So far I haven’t had any scratches or scuffs. Their have been a number of reports of nicks in the aluminum from drops exposing the natural aluminum under the anodized coating. We carry these devices with us more than just about anything else and it is bound to get scratches and scuffed over time. The iPhone also looks like a piece of art and we want to protect it and keep it looking nice. So far it has been durable and I have no complaints in that area.
<strong>Dock connector</strong>
<img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhujAQcvKdDIHEpn4fC1Sok_99NS4l6LVSvcg9Y-Ap8Tbo7Mbljbn2utN0uXkRxC1uYkiarq8fqCSNQ3mH_f9D3ri6J8S-LJGuQUxBikPJjkXAhOBo4iY3Dc_s0-P9K7iRGtX3eGDfZENXM/" alt="PastedGraphic2-2012-10-14-15-05.png" width="65" height="49">Dropping the 9 year old 30 pin dock for the 80% smaller 8 pin lighting connector to me isn’t about obsolescence or making us buy more devices. After all most of the dock items that are sold are sold by third parties and not Apple. I believe this was a technology decision to make the devices thinner and more user friendly by making the cables reversible. With all of the options to sync wireless, use airplay, iCloud we have plenty of ways to get data on and off our device and the lightning connector is mostly for charging. It is however digital and we might be surprised with what we see come from lightning in the next few years.
<strong>Speed</strong>
<img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkZ3ZKvMPEqgVQB9sBVKaF8Kj0aetAbhrxDv5AQ4NctYYQSyfK7D8-atW7V_BJpXurYWK_Y1pk4UoWhPkNrqoxUQhYQ1CmPMWnGco7dYHE8u1GKtjDwQy0bqxJiv1swp4hYH_Hj0KA9ONU/" alt="PastedGraphic3-2012-10-14-15-05.png" width="73" height="44">Between the 5 Ghz 802.11n, the faster CPU, and LTE wireless, this is by far the fastest smart phone I have ever used. Page loads are faster, apps open faster, it is a pleasure to use. The iPhone 5 feels so much more responsive and capable I have tried things with it I haven’t attempted before. On Oct 13th I gave a presentation at the Las Vegas Mac Uses Group delivering the presentation from my iPhone. Using an Apple TV hooked up to the projector I was able to deliver a full keynote presentation right from my phone. To demo features of iOS I would occasionally drop out of the presentation and show the mirrored desktop. Walk users through a feature and then quickly jump back into my presentation right where I left off. This is an impressive feat for any smart phone and unthinkable just a few years ago.
<strong>Camera</strong>
<img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijki61iUNwTggTv8R_sscMvJlO0z56wQECM0pb8BCwClf0cuqYxvBXlpePXRqMRtjMJq0xUfp8sF7kbTHp6FhDRx4hIVrsLkrXzgLHF4uttwilJhDFZJDosktO0DwFNfrkRJSfQ4wVUsr5/" alt="PastedGraphic4-2012-10-14-15-05.png" width="66" height="61">It is the best smart phone camera I have used and with each iPhone has gotten progressively better. Panorama’s are simple to shoot just tap on options and choose panorama from the camera app. When shooting video simply tapping on the camera button while recording let’s you take great stills at the same time. No more choosing between shooting video or taking still photos. The resolution is now equivalent to my aging DSLR and since the iPhone is always with me it is now the only camera I regularly use.
Overall we have come to expect a lot from Apple products and when we feel Apple didn’t deliver we don’t just feel let down as users. We seem to experience betral and that leads to the negative press the iPhone 5 has gotten. Despite the naysayers iPhone 5’s are flying off the shelves and millions of users are happy with their device. It is no more of an evolution than a revolution but the devices is more useful and more capable than all the ones before it. If you are using an iPhone 4s it is a good phone. Wait for your contract to end and upgrade. If you are using an iPhone 4 or older this is a massive upgrade. In two years when the iPhone 7 is out I am sure those of us who enjoy our iPhone 5 today will be ready to upgrade.
Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5514896903905261167.post-74096537914127467132012-09-16T09:33:00.000-07:002012-09-21T11:32:46.270-07:00iPhone 5 AnnounecmentOn Wednesday the 14th Apple held a press conference to roll out some new products that users have been eagerly for some time. First of course they had to start with the stats of the new Apple Stores like the new one that just opened in Barcelona Spain in a building restored using local limestone. Now being the total stores to 380 in 12 countries along with the announcement of one coming soon to Sweden making it the 13th country to get Apple Stores. <br /><br />Mountain Lion the 9th Major Release of the Mac OS and the first with iCloud built right in. PC Mag rated it as the Best Consumer OS ever. With over 7 million copies installed since the launch at the end of July. <br /><br />Apple has been #1 in notebook market share for the last three months. As of July they had a 27% market share in portables. That is a year over year growth of 15% where PC’s only grew at about 2% annually making this the 6th year in a row that Apple has grown faster than the rest of the industry. <br /><br />The new iPad has also been a hit with 17 Million iPads sold in the April - June timeframe. With a total of 84 million iPads sold through June. Last year Apple had a tablet market share of 62%. With all the new tablets being introduced they have grown to a 68% market share. iPad also accounts for 91% of all tablet web traffic with 94% of Fortune 500 companies now testing or deploying iPads. Enterprise’s have also started investing in building custom apps for their businesses. <br /><br />The app store now hosts over 700,000 apps and 250,000 of them designed for the iPad. 90% of those apps are downloaded every month and the average customer is using over 100 applications. I have over 400 apps installed on my phone and use probably two dozen of them daily, another couple dozen weekly and a handful when I travel. <br /><br />To date Apple has sold more than 400 million iOS devices and now they have unveiled there next iPhone. <br /><br />The first iPhone was released in 2007. It was hailed as a breakthrough that changed the mobile phone industry. Time magazine called it the Innovation of the year “The phone that has changed phones forever.” The first iPhone was a huge shift in smart phones. Since I got my first iPhone 3G I couldn’t imagine doing my job, traveling or living without my smart phone now. It has truly made me more accessible and allows me to do my job from anywhere. <br /><br />Apple announced iPhone was the number 1 selling smart phone. It is undoubtedly the hottest selling phone around selling more than any other single Android handset. But Apple battles back and forth holding about half of the smartphone market against Android and Windows phone. <br /><br /><strong>Beautiful Display</strong><br /><br />The iPhone 5 is all glass and aluminum and looks amazing. It is the thinnest and lightest phone Apple has made weighing in 112 grams and being on 7.6 mm thick. The Retina Display is still 326 pip with a 1136x640 with a 16:9 aspect ratio. This will be great for watching movies and looking and in portrait mode reading longer documents. The phone is no wider than the original iPhone allowing it to still be usable while being held in one hand. It adds an extra row of icons great for those who use lots of apps and in landscape mode the calendar shows a five day view of your appointments. <br /><br />All Apple apps have been updated to take advantage of the new display. If you have an app you like that isn’t optimized for the new display not to worry. Apps are now letter boxedd and centered nicely on the screen so they still look great. I would imagine the effect is much more subtle on the black phone than on the white model due to the blending of the black bezel with the black letter boxing on the screen. As far as color goes with the touch sensors integrated into the screen not only is the device thinner but the color saturation is 44% better making it compliant with the SRGB color spec and making the screen sharper and reducing glare. <br /><br /><strong>Ultrafast Wireless</strong><br /><br />With this phone for the first time any company has integrated GPRS, EDGE, EV-DO, HSPA, HSPA+, DC-HDSPA, and LTE into a single chip, single radio, and created a dynamic antenna system. This is huge for a phone and I am sure other manufactures will start copying this as fast as they can. Not only does it make for a smaller phone but it allows one phone to work anywhere in the world on any carrier. So when might we see iPhone officially on T-Mobile? I am guessing end of the year. <br /><br />In addition to the wireless tech the iPhone 5 is also getting 802.11 a/b/g/n running at both 2.54 Ghz and 5 Ghz. Moving our phones out of the very crowded 2.4 Ghz band and into the 5Ghz is sure to bring some performance improvements. <br /><br /><strong>Performance</strong><br /><br />Apple’s new A6 System on a Chip sports:<br /><br />2x CPU<br />2x Graphics<br />22% smaller and reduced power usage<br /><br />All this means that apps load twice as fast on average and brings enough power to the iPhone to compete with console gaming systems. interactive. <br /><br /><strong>Battery LIfe</strong><br /><br />All this extra power and connectivity should cost battery but according to Apple it doesn’t. The new iPhone battery allows for 8 hours of talk time, 8 hours of 3G or LTE browsing, 10 hours of Wifi, or 40 hours of music play back. We won’t know for sure until we get them in the real world but Apple is usually pretty close on the estimates for battery life. I wonder how much the newer GPS apps will drain the battery. You may want to order a new Mophie Juicepak when they are released. <br /><br /><strong>iSight Camera</strong><br /><br />8 megapixel camera with a 3264 x 2448 resolution, backside illuminated sensor, IR filter, five element precision aligned lens and a sapphire crystal lens cover. This combined with a next generation image signal processor, spatial noise reduction and smart filter that can determine what should have texture like a wall and what shouldn’t have texture like the sky will take amazing photos. The iPhone could replace many people’s point and shoot cameras. Of course as all photographers tell me the best camera in the world is the one you have with you and who ever leaves home without their iPhone? The camera also shoots 1080p HD video, with improved stabilization, face detection, and you can now take pictures while recording video. The front camera has been upgraded to 720p and a backside illuminated sensor. The camera app has been upgraded to take faster pictures and includes a panorama mode to take 28 megapixel images automatically stitched together and automatically removes echo artifacts from the image. <br /><br />Apple has also announced FaceTime will now work over cellular. <br /><br /><strong>Enhanced Audio</strong><br /><br />The iPhone 5 has three microphones one on front, one on back, and one on the bottom. This allows the phone to use beam forming to enhance noise cancelation and improve speech recognition performance. The speakers have been upgraded with a five magnet transducer to enhance sound reproduction and a new noise canceling ear-piece. Apple is also including a new technology called wide-band audio to make calls sound more natural. Think of it has high definition for your ears. The wide-band audio does require carrier support and so far it hasn’t been announced which carriers are rolling it out. <br /><br /><strong>Connector</strong><br /><br />In 2003 Apple introduced the 30 pin dock connector. Nine years was a good run for the connector but for the phone to evolve the connector had to change. Today the iPhone has bluetooth, wifi, airplay, wifi syncing and the iCloud to get data in and out of the phone. Apple has changed the old 30 pin analog dock connector a to a new digital 8 pin, durable, reversible, and 80% smaller connector called lightning. As many of you undoubtedly have many devices that use the dock connector don’t worry Apple is also selling an adapter that will convert lightning to a 30 pin dock connector to allow you to continue to use your legacy dock devices. <br /><br />This adapter isn’t cheap at $29.99 but it does include electronics built in that convert the digital lightning signals into the analog 30 pin dock signals required by older devices. <br /><br /><strong>iOS 6</strong><br /><br />Next up was another look at iOS 6. Maps have been built from ground up to use vectors for smooth transitions with new info cards that include Yelp reviews and photos. The new maps app also has free turn by turn directions. The Maps app includes 3D turn by turn directions with cinematic camera angles. The foot prints of buildings are correct making it easier to identify where you are heading. <br /><br />What’s missing from maps? Well there are no mass transit directions in the new maps app. Which is a huge omission for regular travelers to other cities who like to use mass transit or for city dwellers who like to use Google Maps to get bus and train schedules. <br /><br />The updated Notification Center now includes rapt to tweet or post to Facebook widgets. <br /><br />Safari has a full screen mode to fill the display and allows you to open your tabs on other computers from your iOS device with iCloud Tabs. Left a browser open at work and need to access a tab? Just grab your iOS device and pick up where you left off. <br /><br />Mail now includes a VIP feature to collect messages from those who are important to you in one location and to allow your device to let you know when an important message arrives and not when the lower priority emails come in. You can now also flag emails easily in iOS. <br /><br />Passbook allows a user to collect all their passes in once place. keep your movie tickets, board passes, coupons store cards, baseball tickets, and concert tickets in one place. Passbook also integrates with the lock screen so the appropriate pass is loaded when you arrive at the airport. This sounds like a great feature but looking at it over the last two days it has not been obvious how to use it just yet. We may have to wait for app developers to update apps for this feature to become more useful.<br /><br />Siri is getting smarter learning more about sports, movies, and now being able to launch apps for you. She can now find movies at nearby theaters and sort them by review ratings. Siri can find restaurants and make reservations using Open Table. Siri can even post on Facebook on your behalf. <br /><br />The iPhone 5 comes in black/slate and white/aluminum finishes. Apple has also changed pricing on the iPhones slightly. Bumping the top end phone to 64GB of storage and keeping the 4s and 4 in the lineup. <br /><br />free with contract        iPhone 4 8GB <br />$99                                iPhone 4s 16GB<br />$199                        iPhone 5 16 GB<br />$299                         iPhone 5 32 GB<br />$399                         iPhone 5 64 GB<br /><br />iPhone 5 will launch in 100 countries with 240 carriers by the end of the year. Making this the fastest iPhone launch ever.<br /><br />Preorders started last friday. Within 1 hour before ship dates slipped to 1 to 2 weeks. As of this writing it was at 2-3 weeks. <br />In Store pickup starts on Friday 21st at 8:00 AM.<br /><br /><strong>Music<br /><br /></strong>Apple has also made significant upgrades in the land of music. The music store now has 26 million songs in the catalog and customers have bought over 20 billion songs. iTunes is available in 23 countries and as of now is available in 64 countries. Currently there are more than 400 million iTunes accounts with cards on file enabling one click purchasing. More than 2/3rd of downloads are now coming from iOS devices. <br /><br />Apple is also introducing a new design for app, music, movie, and book stores to make it easier to use the stores on iOS. Apple is also adding Facebook like features and Tweet features. You can now also continue to browse while listening to previews. <br /><br />Apple claims that iTunes is the number one media player. Many people have complained that it has become old and clunky and Apple has announced that iTunes 11 will be available in October. Since iCloud was launched over 200 million subscribers have signed up and have downloaded 15 billion songs. The new iTunes has a much simpler interface. Clicking the album expands it in place and analyzes the album art to theme the expanded section. Artists can share photos right in the music library. <br /> <br />Up Next shows you what songs are coming up next. You can rearrange or jump to a song. Users can also add a song to up next from the album view by clicking a song and choosing up next. The all new mini player includes roll over for controls, search built in, see song and artist with album art, and Up Next is still built into the mini player. iCloud is built right in to the new iTunes. Now you can pick up where you left off on your iOS devices. <br /><br />The iTunes store artist page allows playing of previews while you view concert dates and artist information.<br /><br /><strong>iPod</strong><br /><br />Since the introduction of iPod more than 350 million have been sold. Apple has announced the iPod Nano and in old swift move Sherlocked an entire industry of watch band makers. But the new Nano is thin, light, has a large screen, big easy to use buttons, and a lightning connector. They have even color matched the wall paper to the color of the Nano. With a 2.5” multi-touch display you can watch movies in 16:9 aspect and use every pixel on the screen. When listening to music you can see the artist, title, track, and album art all at the same time. The built in FM tuner now has pause and record options. Bluetooth is built right into the Nano now for wireless headphones. <br /><br /><strong>iPod Touch<br /></strong><br />The new iPod Touch is great for gaming. With over 150 million Game Center users it is easy to find people to play games with and discover the games your friends are playing. The 5th Gen touch is just 6.1 mm thick and weighs just 88 grams making it the thinnest touch and almost the thinnest iPod. LIke it’s iPhone counterpart the headphone jack, speaker, and lightning connector are located on the bottom of the device. The new iPod Touch also shares the same display as the iPhone 5. The camera system from the iPhone 4s finds it’s way to the iPod Touch and gets the panorama feature and sapphire crystal lens cover. <br /><br />That is where the similarities end. The iPod Touch gets the A5 CPU with up-to 7x graphics performance improvement. Airplay now comes to the Touch along with Siri thanks to the updated CPU. The iPod Touch also gets a hidden button to attach the loop wrist strap to keep your iPod touch secure in your hand while carrying it around.<br /><br /><strong>Shuffle</strong><br /><br />The iPod Shuffle is also getting a color refresh to match the 7 new colors of the iPod Nano.<br /><br /><strong>Headphones</strong><br /><br />Apple spent 3 years in design for new headphones for the entire line of iPods and iPhones. After doing 3D scans of hundreds of ears and finding the commonalities they designed the EarPods. The EarPods don’t seal in your ear to allow outside sound in so you are not cut off from the rest of the world. Apple has also included multiple ports to optimize the sound. The rear port is optimized for midrange sound, the port in the stem for bass also allows more air flow to allow the speakers to work effectively.<br /><br />EarPods were available immediately. <br /><br />Pricing for the new iPods are:<br /><br />$49                 iPod Shuffle available in 7 colors<br />$149        iPod 16GB <br />$199        iPod Touch 16 GB <br />$249        iPod Touch 32 GB <br />$299         new iPod Touch 32GB<br />$399         new iPod Touch 64GB <br /><br />The new devices will be coming in October.<br /><br />This was a huge announcement for Apple with only a few surprises. I didn’t see any rumors about iTunes 11, I was surprised that NFC was left off iPhone 5, and after many rumors about an iPad mini none materialized and it even looks like there is no space in pricing of devices for one at this time. Apple is continuing to make products that most people want and most other manufactures wish they could make. Analysts are predicting that opening weekend Apple will sell 7-8 million handsets. Given the number of preorders and the number of people in line in countries around the world that is not an unrealistic estimate. <br />Paul MacGuy Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704058531751998196noreply@blogger.com0