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All Articles for TidBITS Feed: Apple Mac News 
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Fear not, Leopard users, Apple is still watching out for you. QuickTime 7.7 for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard closes quite a number of security holes. As is common, there’s no sense of how concerning these really are, but it’s probably worth updating if you use QuickTime in Leopard. (Free, 68.85 MB)
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With ChronoSync you can sync, back up, or make bootable backups.I’m generally pretty fortunate when upgrading to new versions of Mac OS X. While I often see people lamenting in forums how this or that feature doesn’t work, how a certain program is broken, or how they have hardware problems following an upgrade, that’s never happened to me. Until now.
I have a new 27-inch iMac, purchased in June 2011. It worked perfectly with Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, but when I upgraded to 10.7 Lion, I started having problems with the computer freezing when I viewed videos. This occurs with all kinds of videos: Flash, H-264, or QuickTime formats, as well as AVIs and MKVs. And we’re talking about a serious freeze: the entire screen freezes, except for the cursor. Music may continue playing if iTunes is running, but the only way to resolve the problem is to force a shutdown by pressing and holding the power button. Interestingly, these video-related problems occur only after the Mac has been put to sleep. If I restart the iMac, the freeze won’t happen until it’s put to sleep, then awakened.
There is information in the kernel.log, which strongly suggests that this is a problem with either the video card (GPU) or its drivers:
7/23/11 12:02:40.000 PM kernel: ** GPU Debug Info Start **
7/23/11 12:02:40.000 PM kernel: 0x00006740
7/23/11 12:02:40.000 PM kernel: 0x0000008f
7/23/11 12:02:40.000 PM kernel: 0x00000001
7/23/11 12:02:40.000 PM kernel: 0x00000018
7/23/11 12:02:40.000 PM kernel: 0x0000a880
[and so on for a few hundred lines]
This problem seems to have hit thousands of Mac users, and while Apple is trying to find a solution, they haven’t yet, leading to an increasing level of ire among some of those affected. There is, as of this writing, a 41-page thread on the Apple Discussions forum lamenting this issue, and I’ve been chronicling it on my blog, where I also posted a screenshot of a Quick Look window showing the video problem just seconds before a freeze.
How it Began -- I first noticed this problem shortly after the Lion GM (golden master) was released. I have a developer account, and had been running developer preview releases of Lion on my secondary Mac, a 2010 MacBook Air, with no major issues. When the GM was released to developers, I decided to install it on my iMac as well. I experienced several freezes early on, but since Lion was still not officially released, it wasn’t easy to find other users with the problem to know if it was common. I did find one, however, in TidBITS contributor Michael Cohen, who had also recently bought a new iMac. On the super-secret TidBITS-run mailing list for Take Control authors, he mentioned the problem, and I mentioned that I was having it as well. A quick email conversation confirmed that it was exactly the same.
Trying to Fix the Problem -- So, even though I have a new iMac, and had already purchased AppleCare, I knew I couldn’t contact Apple about this; they would say that I was running pre-release software and there was nothing they could do. I avoided watching any videos, and, finally, on 23 July 2011, after Lion was released, called Apple support.
I explained the problem, and got a very understanding support technician, who did not waste my time asking me to reset the PRAM and SMC (which I had already done), or reinstall Lion. I made it clear that there had been no problems with Snow Leopard, and it was unlikely that it was the iMac that was at cause. He made notes and said he’d get back to me.
A few days later, to my surprise, I got a call from a senior tech support engineer. My case had quickly been escalated, because the support staff clearly realized that this was a serious issue. I explained what had happened and what I had done to try and resolve it, and he offered several possible solutions. I deleted certain cache folders, and sent him some logs; he called back again, asking me to try disconnecting peripherals (check), removing third-party RAM (check), and finally to do a clean installation on a different disk (check). The problem still occurred, though it took me a while to reproduce it following the clean installation.
What’s Next? -- As of now, there is no solution. I know that Apple is working hard to find the cause, as I’ve been in regular contact with support engineers by email and telephone. While the sprawling Apple forum thread is difficult to navigate, and many people think they have found solutions (which turn out to be transitory), here’s the lowdown.
Viewing videos of any kind on new iMacs, both the 21.5-inch and 27-inch models, can cause freezes. This doesn’t happen every time one views a video, and only happens after an iMac has been put to sleep at least once. These videos can be Flash, H-264, or QuickTime formats, and viewing may occur in Safari, Firefox, QuickTime Player, iTunes or any other program.
The usual troubleshooting steps, such as resetting the PRAM or SMC, are ineffective. Similarly, a clean installation of Lion, with no third-party software installed, does not solve the problem. Deleting and/or reinstalling Flash or Java, both suggestions floated in the Apple forum, has no effect. Fiddling with RAM or other hardware makes no difference, though it may turn out that this is a hardware problem with video cards. (A specific video card bug seems unlikely, though, because many people with this problem, including myself, bought their iMacs with Snow Leopard, and did not have freezes until upgrading to Lion — the problem seems to be a conflict between the iMac’s video card and Lion.) In short, none of the “solutions” offered on the Apple forums resolve the issue.
If you have this problem, there are only two ways to avoid it:
Don’t watch videos, if possible, or do so only after restarting your iMac.
Instead of putting your iMac to sleep at night, shut it down. With Lion’s Resume feature, particularly on an SSD-equipped iMac, starting fresh shouldn’t take long, and avoiding sleep seems to be the one sure way of sidestepping the freezes. Obviously, you could leave your iMac on all the time, but that’s a waste of electricity.
Also, please, if you have this problem, contact Apple Support, so they know how many people are affected. Tell them what you’ve read, here and on the Apple forums, and try not to waste your time if they ask you to do anything complicated that has been proven to be ineffective, such as reinstalling Lion.
I’d like to give Apple a bye on this, but it’s disappointing to think that in their testing of Lion, they didn’t spot this, particularly with the newest iMacs. I know that if they had found a solution, I would have heard from the support technicians I’ve been in contact with, and I’m hopeful that they find the cause soon and issue a fix.
Operating systems are complex, and the types of problems that can occur are many. At least, in cases like this, there are relatively few hardware variables, as there would be with Windows PCs; new iMacs can have only one of three different video cards.
But a lot of iMac users — and, judging from the Apple forum thread, many of whom are new to Macs — are very angry that this is happening with brand new Macs. As for me, I take it as just another bump in the road. I don’t watch a lot of videos on my iMac, but if I needed to for my work, I would probably be somewhat less stoic.
Finally, if you have a new iMac that’s still running Snow Leopard, and you watch videos of any sort, I recommend holding off on a Lion upgrade until Apple addresses this conflict.
[Kirk McElhearn is a Senior Contributor to Macworld and an occasional contributor to TidBITS, and he writes about more than just Macs on his blog Kirkville. Kirk’s latest book is “Take Control of Scrivener 2.” Follow him on Twitter at @mcelhearn.]
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Dolly Drive: Time Machine in the cloud AND bootable backup!Here’s a welcome reversal of the usual Neuburg Curse. Typically, when I praise a piece of software, that’s the kiss of death — soon afterward, it’s abandoned. At least, that’s how it seems! This time, though, it’s the other way around: I declared three of my favorite utilities dead under Lion, only to have them come roaring back to life.
In “Preparing for Lion: Find Your PowerPC Applications,” 6 May 2011, I warned that PPC-only apps probably wouldn’t run under Lion, and gave instructions for determining what changes this might entail in your work habits. I also mentioned some primary concerns in my own life. In particular, I bemoaned the loss of my favorite calendar / reminder utility, Dave Warker’s Remember?, and two list keepers, Alco Blom’s Web Confidential and URL Manager Pro. Well, I was wrong again, and this time in a good way.
Remember? is a fantastic calendaring and reminder utility. I’ve been using it just about since I’ve been using a Mac; I recall my relief when it was ported to Mac OS X (see “Remember? Not Forgotten,” 30 June 2003). Navigation and event editing is brilliantly easy; Remember? can specify repeating events that would completely stump iCal, and it presents a superb textual list of upcoming events. It has now been rewritten as a universal binary, running on Mac OS X 10.5 or later. This update is free for registered Remember? users (registration costs $20).
Web Confidential is a password keeper reviewed years ago by Adam Engst (“Web Confidential: Securing Information of All Sorts,” 3 August 1998); the Intel version is currently in beta and the upgrade details are not yet set (a new registration costs $20). It runs on Mac OS X 10.5 or later. Final release is expected by September.
URL Manager Pro maintains URLs in a hierarchical (outline) structure, with excellent browser integration; I reviewed it in “Tools We Use: URL Manager Pro,” 24 June 2002. The Intel version is available now from the Mac App Store for $14.99; this price is slated to increase to $25 in September. It is said to run on Mac OS X 10.5 or later, though I find this claim a little mysterious, since the Mac App Store isn’t available on Mac OS X 10.5.
Being rewritten as a universal binary or Intel-native application means not only that the application will run on Lion, but also that it will run natively, without Rosetta, on an Intel machine under earlier supported systems (and so, for example, it may launch faster than before, as there won’t be a delay while Rosetta starts up).
As a programmer myself, I know from experience how discouraging it can be to have a working application broken by an update from Apple, whose attitude towards backwards compatibility ranges from somewhat cavalier to downright heartless; so it’s great to see the developers of these splendid utilities returning to them after all these years and keeping them alive despite the compatibility hurdles that this latest major system upgrade from Apple has placed in their way.
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BBEdit 10 from Bare Bones Software — All the editing power youSt. Clair Software has released Default Folder X 4.4.3, a minor update to its utility that provides quick access to files and folders within Mac OS X’s default save and open dialog dialogs. The update addresses issues related with Mac OS X 10.7 Lion, including a problem that was causing some recent Carbon-based applications, like BBEdit 10 and Filemaker Pro 11, to crash, along with bugs that prevented Default Folder X from appearing in apps running in full-screen mode. The company is still working on some Lion-related problems; in particular Default Folder X still doesn’t work with some apps, like Preview, TextEdit, and Safari; in addition, an incompatibility with Lion’s window handling currently prevents Default Folder X from running with its icon in the Dock. ($34.95 new, free update, 10.6 MB, release notes)
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READERS LIKE YOU! Support TidBITS with a contribution today!Cocoatech has released Path Finder 5.7.6; this minor update to the company’s Finder-replacing file browser corrects several issues related to Mac OS X 10.7 Lion, such as improving compatibility with non-HFS volumes and authorized file operations, removing the AirDrop item from Path Finder’s sidebar, and eliminating duplicate entries in the permission pop-up menus. ($39.95 new, free update, 18.3 MB, release notes)
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BBEdit 10 from Bare Bones Software — All the editing power youNew from DEVONtechnologies is DEVONagent Pro 3.0, a major upgrade of the company’s research-support tool for extracting and managing results from many different search engines. DEVONagent Pro 3.0 comes with many significant improvements, starting with a revised engine that provides a more natural phrase matching algorithm and adds summaries, digests, and ranking to search results. A new Plugin Assistant makes it easy to create search plug-ins, which can be edited and tested internally. DEVONagent now includes several new built-in plugins and scanners for popular search destinations like Microsoft’s Bing, the App Store, and the company’s own DEVONthink Pro Office, as well as the capability to deal with many document types, including PDF, PostScript, OpenOffice, RTF, and Microsoft Word. The new version is rounded out by a number of performance and usability improvements that make DEVONagent faster while providing a richer user experience that takes advantage of the latest technologies in Mac OS X Lion. ($49.95 new, upgrades start at $25, 22.5 MB, release notes)
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Dolly Drive: Time Machine in the cloud AND bootable backup!
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BBEdit 10 from Bare Bones Software — All the editing power youWi-Fi is often plentiful and free across North America, and plentiful and sometimes expensive elsewhere. We have long recommended Boingo Wireless here at TidBITS, as the firm has a simple fee structure for accessing for-fee or restricted Wi-Fi around the world. Its unlimited plan for mobiles ($7.95 per month worldwide) and laptops in the America ($9.95 per month) have always struck us as particularly good deals, especially because there’s no cancellation fee.
I’ve often used Boingo for heavy traveling months when I don’t want to hunt down a Starbucks or free café, or am staying at a hotel that normally charges a nightly fee, but is included at no additional cost in a Boingo subscription.
The one gall that remained has now been resolved. You used to need a separate mobile and laptop subscriptions when roaming, which made the service more awkward to log into, and more expensive than it seemingly needed to be. Now, Boingo has combined and extended those into single packages.
Its Boingo Unlimited service for the Americas and the unlimited Boingo UK & Ireland plan for those islands includes any two Wi-Fi devices, laptop or mobile, with a $5-per-month fee for additional devices. Boingo Global ($59 per month) allows the use of up to four Wi-Fi devices and up to 2,000 minutes per month. Boing Mobile now formally includes the use of two mobile devices; I believe you could previously use two devices, but now it’s an officially supported option.
You may prefer free Wi-Fi — and who wouldn’t like free instead of a fee? — but I’ve found the ubiquity of Boingo’s aggregation of many thousands of individual networks to be more than worth the cost when I travel for business purposes and need access.
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Voila Mac Screen Capture Tool is the quickest and easiestiCloud will come with 5 GB of storage as part of a free account, but Apple said when it announced the MobileMe replacement that you could buy additional gigabytes. The fees and storage sizes have now been disclosed. Adding 10 GB, 20 GB, and 50 GB of iCloud space (for totals of 15, 25, and 55 GB) costs $20, $40, and $100 per year, respectively. (For background on iCloud, see “iCloud Rolls In, Extended Forecast Calls for Disruption,” 6 June 2011.)
iCloud storage doesn’t count the storage of apps, nor any music nor books you purchased from the iTunes Store. It also excludes photos uploaded via the upcoming Photo Stream service, which could run into the gigabytes for the last 30 days’ worth of up to 1,000 photos. But music you sync using the $24.99-per-year iTunes Match service runs up your total, except songs matched in the iTunes Store, apparently. Any documents or files stored by Apple and third-party iOS apps, as well as Mac OS X software, would also count against the total. (Videos aren’t synced via iCloud, but require local iTunes Wi-Fi or USB sync to connect to computers and iOS devices.)
The iCloud fees aren’t excessive compared to similar sync and storage services. Dropbox charges roughly $120 per year (in $9.99 per month installments) for 50 GB of storage, while Amazon is just $50 per year for that quantity. Google is cheap at $20 per year for 80 GB for storage that’s shared across all services, and that ostensibly includes its still-in-beta music locker offering. However, all three companies count everything you upload against their storage quotas. That could be a significant discrepancy. (All three services offer larger amounts, and Amazon and Google have smaller quantities, too.)
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CrashPlan is easy, secure backup that works everywhere. Back upToday Apple released yet another software update, this time for its “hobby” device, the small, black, puck-like Apple TV (second generation). This latest update provides users with the capability of purchasing TV shows from the iTunes Store directly from the device. Once a show is purchased, it is available not only on the Apple TV but on any other iOS devices (or copies of iTunes) that use the same Apple ID for purchases.
Furthermore, as a harbinger of the forthcoming iCloud service’s “buy once, enjoy anywhere” capability, TV shows previously purchased from the iTunes Store now show up on the Apple TV, whether or not iTunes is currently running on the local network to which the Apple TV is attached. With earlier versions of the Apple TV software, purchased TV shows that were stored in your iTunes library could only be watched using the device while iTunes was running on your home-network-connected computer.
For example, in the past if I wanted to watch the latest “Doctor Who” episode I had purchased on my Apple TV, I had to make sure my Mac was awake, iTunes was running, and Home Sharing was active before I could sit back on my sofa and enjoy the Doctor’s latest adventure. Now, however, that show can stream directly to my Apple TV from Apple’s data center while my Mac slumbers peacefully in my home office.
Of course, on Day One of this brave new world of couch potato bliss, not all is working smoothly. My Apple TV does list most of the shows I have purchased over the years (and a few that, oddly enough, I don’t remember purchasing), but a few are missing. Moreover, when I select a purchased show, I occasionally see an “iTunes Store is currently not available” message on my TV, even though another show in my list of purchases elicits no such message. I expect such glitches to become less common as time goes on.
In addition to adding the new purchase capabilities to Apple TV, the update also provides access to the Vimeo video sharing service. Appearing under the Internet heading on Apple TV’s main menu, Vimeo allows both casual browsers and Vimeo service members to search for and view the many thousands of streaming videos that the service provides. In my brief initial test, videos loaded within a dozen or so seconds and streamed with very high quality. (Tip: if you have an iOS device, use the free Remote app that Apple provides to make typing your Vimeo search strings much easier than by navigating the Apple TV’s on-screen keyboard with the attractive, but minimalist, aluminum Apple Remote.)
Software Update 4.3 for the Apple TV arrives, as have previous updates, via the Apple TV’s Internet connection, and, like other such updates, this one should show up on the device automatically sometime within the week following its release.
However, if you just can’t wait to update your Apple TV, go to Settings > General > Update Software on the Apple TV’s main menu. The download and subsequent update process takes a handful of minutes with a reasonably fast Internet connection — which you’ll also need, of course, to begin streaming high-quality video directly from Apple or Vimeo (or Netflix, or Major League Baseball, or YouTube, or any of the other streaming services available via the Apple TV).
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CrashPlan is easy, secure backup that works everywhere. Back upCarbon Copy Cloner 3.4.1 -- Bombich Software has released Carbon Copy Cloner 3.4.1, a significant update to its popular donationware disk cloning and backup utility. Version 3.4.1 — a quick fix from the 3.4 update — includes a large number of improvements, including the capability to back up to and from non-HFS+ network volumes, perform folder-to-folder backups, and restore data directly to the startup disk. Carbon Copy Cloner 3.4.1 also provides compatibility with Mac OS X 10.7 Lion’s full disk encryption, introduces the “Cloning Coach” for advice on particular configurations or errors, adds email and Growl notifications, reports on disk performance statistics, and can automatically prune archived files to save space. Other notable improvements include the capability to automount local, network, and encrypted volumes, plus the option to sleep, restart, or shut down the Mac at the end of a scheduled task. The update is rounded out by bug fixes, security enhancements, and performance improvements. (Free update, 5.6 MB, release notes)
Read/post comments about Carbon Copy Cloner 3.4.1.
ClamXav 2.2.1 -- Mark Allan has released ClamXav 2.2.1, a minor update to the free virus-checking software. The most significant change in this release is the correction of several scheduling bugs that were affecting Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger users. According to Allan, this is also the last update for Tiger users, who are now advised to turn off automatic updates, although they will continue to receive new virus definitions. ClamXav 2.2.1 — though not the version available from the Mac App Store — now also launches its Sentry background virus checker immediately when the user asks it to do so in the settings panel. (Free from Allan’s Web site or from the Mac App Store, 13 MB)
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Transmit 4.1.7 -- Hot on the heels of the previous version is Panic’s Transmit 4.1.7, a minor update to the file transfer software that’s worth getting particularly if you use Transmit Disks, since it fixes a problem where Transmit Disk volumes would fail to mount. Also fixed is a Lion-related issue where line numbers failed to scroll in the editor. Finally, Panic made Transmit’s Favorites sidebar icons monochrome to better match Lion. ($34 new, free update, 22 MB, release notes)
Read/post comments about Transmit 4.1.7.
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CrashPlan is easy, secure backup that works everywhere. Back upWe have four more stories for you this week: news of AT&T limiting data throughput for heavy data users on unlimited plans, problems a few users are having with multiple Mac App Store charges for Lion, the FDA seeking public input on medical app regulations, and a fascinating proposal to heat residences with “data furnaces.”
AT&T to Limit Throughput for Heaviest Data Users with Unlimited Plans -- Bandwidth may be getting cheaper and more available all the time, but you wouldn’t guess it from AT&T’s latest announcement. The company says that, starting 1 October 2011, it will limit throughput rates for the top 5 percent of data users with unlimited plans — whose use is what AT&T calls an “extraordinary” amount of data. AT&T takes pains to point out that this will not apply to the 15 million smartphone customers with tiered data plans or 95 percent of those with unlimited data plans.
Beware Multiple Mac App Store Charges for Lion -- We’re not surprised that there have been some glitches in the Mac App Store distribution of 1 million copies of Lion in one day, but it’s worth paying attention when you download, since some people — undoubtedly a very small proportion — are seeing multiple charges for Lion. Most of the problems appear to be related to using PayPal to pay for the transaction. Some people are having no trouble getting refunds; others are getting the runaround. There’s nothing special to do; just stay alert after placing your order to make sure that if multiple charges do happen, you’ve documented everything for customer service at Apple, PayPal, and your bank.
FDA Seeking Public Input on Medical App Regulations -- The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is seeking public comment on new proposed guidelines for mobile medical apps to ensure they don’t pose a risk to patients. But the proposal is quite narrow; it’s aimed only at apps that are used as an accessory to an FDA-approved medical device or turn the mobile device into something that would otherwise be regulated by the FDA. Still, if you’re interested in this field, now is your chance to register your comments.
Heat Your Home by Hosting Servers (PDF) -- While an increasing amount of data and computing power is moving into the cloud, this paper by Microsoft Research and researchers at the University of Virginia proposes relocating the servers that host cloud services into residential dwellings, where the heat produced can be used to heat the home during the cold months. Most interesting is the researchers’ calculation that using their “data furnace” concept could result in savings of up to $300 per server per year, in comparison to traditional data centers. Regardless of whether the numbers would bear out in reality, I can say with assurance than a single Mac Pro and two 24-inch monitors makes my office significantly more comfortable in the winter.
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Dolly Drive: Time Machine in the cloud AND bootable backup!Bombich Software has released Carbon Copy Cloner 3.4.1, a significant update to its popular donationware disk cloning and backup utility. Version 3.4.1 — a quick fix from the 3.4 update — includes a large number of improvements, including the capability to back up to and from non-HFS+ network volumes, perform folder-to-folder backups, and restore data directly to the startup disk. Carbon Copy Cloner 3.4.1 also provides compatibility with Mac OS X 10.7 Lion’s full disk encryption, introduces the “Cloning Coach” for advice on particular configurations or errors, adds email and Growl notifications, reports on disk performance statistics, and can automatically prune archived files to save space. Other notable improvements include the capability to automount local, network, and encrypted volumes, plus the option to sleep, restart, or shut down the Mac at the end of a scheduled task. The update is rounded out by bug fixes, security enhancements, and performance improvements. (Free update, 5.6 MB, release notes)
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THE MISSING SYNC: Take it with you! The Missing Sync makesMark Allan has released ClamXav 2.1.1, a minor update to the free virus-checking software. The most significant change in this release is the correction of several scheduling bugs that were affecting Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger users. According Allan, this is also the last update for Tiger users, who are now advised to turn off automatic updates, although they will continue to receive new virus definitions. ClamXav 2.1.1 — though not the version available from the Mac App Store — now also launches its Sentry background virus checker immediately when the user asks it to do so in the settings panel. (Free from Allan’s Web site or from the Mac App Store, 13 MB)
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Fetch Softworks: Are funny Web videos burning through
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With ChronoSync you can sync, back up, or make bootable backups.
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CrashPlan is easy, secure backup that works everywhere. Back up
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Get more productive with software from Smile: PDFpen for
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READERS LIKE YOU! Support TidBITS with a contribution today!Hot on the heels of the previous version is Panic’s Transmit 4.1.7, a minor update to the file transfer software that’s worth getting particularly if you use Transmit Disks, since it fixes a problem where Transmit Disk volumes would fail to mount. Also fixed is a Lion-related issue where line numbers failed to scroll in the editor. Finally, Panic made Transmit’s Favorites sidebar icons monochrome to better match Lion. ($34 new, free update, 22 MB, release notes)
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Get more productive with software from Smile: PDFpen forThree weeks ago, in “Mac OS X 10.6.8 Suffers Printing and Audio Problems” (1 July 2011), I noted that people upgrading to Mac OS X 10.6.8 Snow Leopard had been experiencing a number of problems, most notably related to printing and audio. (For details about what was supposed to change in 10.6.8, see “Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update Preps for Lion,” 24 June 2011.)
Apple has now released a number of updates to address these problems, depending on what version of Mac OS X you’re running now. For those who have already upgraded to 10.6.8, the Mac OS X 10.6.8 Supplemental Update (10.19 MB) says that it fixes problems with network printers pausing print jobs and failing to complete, plus system audio failing when using HDMI or optical audio out. In addition, the update says that it also solves problems transferring data from a Snow Leopard Mac to a new Mac running 10.7 Lion; the implication is that the Migration Assistant Update for Mac OS X Snow Leopard has been rolled in. Apple also released Mac OS X 10.6.8 Server Supplemental Update, which presumably fixes the same problems and also improves server-side performance when using Server Monitor.
If you were cautious and haven’t yet updated to 10.6.8, Apple has now released Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update v1.1, presumably (though they don’t actually say so) to address the same problems addressed by the Mac OS X 10.6.8 Supplemental Update. So, assuming that these problems have indeed been addressed and no others introduced, it’s probably safe to upgrade to 10.6.8 now. That said, if you have no pressing need to upgrade from a previous version of Snow Leopard, I still recommend waiting a week or two to make sure no new problems crop up.
As usual, Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update v1.1 comes in four different versions; delta updates from 10.6.7 and combo updates that will work on any version of 10.6, for both the desktop and server versions of Snow Leopard. (Oddly, Apple hasn’t yet posted the Mac OS X Server 10.6.8 Update Combo v1.1; I presume it will appear shortly.)
Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update v1.1 (453.55 MB)
Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update Combo v1.1 (1.09 GB)
Mac OS X Server 10.6.8 Update v1.1 (518.28 MB)
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CrashPlan is easy, secure backup that works everywhere. Back upApple has released iOS 4.3.5 for the GSM iPhone 4 and 3GS, the iPad and iPad 2, and the 3rd and 4th generations of the iPod touch, along with iOS 4.2.10 for the CDMA iPhone 4. Both updates address a security vulnerability associated with the handling of X.509 certificates, which could enable an attacker with a privileged network position to capture or even modify data in sessions protected by SSL/TLS.
It’s interesting that this is the second small security update that Apple has released for iOS in the last 10 days (see “iOS 4.3.4 and 4.2.9 Fix PDF Vulnerability,” 15 July 2011), which implies the vulnerabilities have been quite serious, or at least well known.
The updates are available only via iTunes, and despite the minimal changes, they’re big, so allot plenty of time to download and install. To get the update, you may have to click the Check for Updates button in the Version section of the Summary pane of iTunes when your iOS device is connected, since it can take up to a week for iTunes to notice that there’s a new update (presumably Apple doesn’t see the need to check constantly given that iOS updates are unlikely to appear so frequently).
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Dragon speech recognition software for Macintosh, iPhone, and iPad!
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Get more productive with software from Smile: PDFpen forNew from Apple is Safari 5.1 for Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, which brings the company’s Web browser on par with the version installed on 10.7 Lion. Safari 5.1 includes several new features, including Reading List, which enables users to create a list of Web pages they can then examine at a later date; Resume, which automatically restores all open windows and tabs when you relaunch Safari; and a Privacy pane that makes it easier to remove browsing data from your system. In addition, Safari 5.1 supports a new process architecture that separates the user interface from rendering operations, providing better performance and more stability, particularly when using third-party plug-ins. Other improvements highlighted by Apple include private auto-fill, better search functionality, drag-and-drop for moving files from the Downloads window, improved support for modern Web technologies like HTML5 and CSS3, and new APIs for extension developers.
Separately, the company has also released Safari 5.0.6 for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, which focuses exclusively on fixing issues related to the rendering of HTML5 content, the layout of several Web sites, and general stability. (Free updates; Safari 5.1: 47.47 MB; Safari 5.0.6: 52.51 MB)
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Dolly Drive: Time Machine in the cloud AND bootable backup!
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Voila Mac Screen Capture Tool is the quickest and easiest
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With ChronoSync you can sync, back up, or make bootable backups.
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CrashPlan is easy, secure backup that works everywhere. Back upLion's new AirDrop feature lets you copy files between two computers without requiring an active Wi-Fi network, or that both machines be on the same network. It's quick, secure, and nifty. But only with the right Mac. During Lion beta testing, it was clear that some Lion-capable Macs couldn't summon the right mojo to use AirDrop, which requires relatively recent Wi-Fi chips.
Apple's Tech Specs page for Lion provides the first full accounting of which machines have AirDrop enabled. We'll give you the rundown, although you can click over there, too:
The other way to know whether AirDrop works? If it appears as an option in a Finder window's sidebar under the Favorites list.
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Get more productive with software from Smile: PDFpen forWhat seems like ages ago (that is, roughly three weeks back), we announced the release of a portion of Joe Kissell’s “Take Control of Upgrading to Lion,” containing as much information as we could provide without violating our non-disclosure agreement (see “Prepare for Lion with New Take Control Books,” 30 June 2011). At the same time we offered pre-orders for Matt Neuburg’s “Take Control of Using Lion.” (Everyone who bought them in the intervening weeks should now have received email from us with instructions how to get the free updates; if not, just look in your Take Control Library.)
Now that the big cat is out of its proverbial bag, we are pleased to announce the release of full versions of both books, available now — that’s over 300 pages of Lion-taming information! Both books are available independently for $15, but we also designed them to work together to help you upgrade successfully and get started using Lion’s new features, so you can buy them together at a 20-percent discount (you pay $24 instead of the $30 list price). Read on for details.
Take Control of Upgrading to Lion -- It’s foolhardy to dive into a major OS upgrade without verifying that you have the right software and hardware to proceed and making a backup to which you can revert if things go wrong. Join best-selling author Joe Kissell for the necessary pre-upgrade check and expert backup advice, along with suggestions on how to clear the decks of useless cruft so you can start using Lion fresh. In particular, in “Take Control of Upgrading to Lion,” you’ll learn how to:
Part with Rosetta: Understand and work around the fact that PowerPC-based software won’t run under Lion, given the absence of Rosetta.
Handle your hardware: Thoroughly check your hardware for Lion compatibility. Also, get ideas for new hardware — it might be time for more RAM, disk space, or other peripherals, particularly a Magic Trackpad.
Deal with duplication: Learn what a disk duplicate is, why having one is essential before installing Lion, and how to make one easily and affordably. Also, get help with backing up a Windows volume, should you be running Windows on your Mac via Boot Camp.
Verify that all systems are go: Test your Mac to be sure all the hardware and disks are running properly — better to discover and correct a problem now than on upgrade day — and find advice on clearing extra files and software off your disk so that you get a fresh start with Lion.
Consider a few geeky details: If you secure your data and documents with disk encryption now, or would like to do so under Lion, get advice on what to do before you upgrade and learn how Lion’s much-improved FileVault 2 will operate. Also, read what Joe thinks of partitioning and what you might want to do about it before installing.
Make a plan: Learn how to install Lion if you’re installing over 10.6 Snow Leopard, and consider the pros and cons of several techniques for how to install onto a Mac running either 10.5 Leopard or 10.5 Tiger. Also, if you have more than one Mac in your home, get ideas for downloading the Lion installer only once, but using it legitimately on your different Macs. And, if a nearly 4 GB download is unrealistic, get guidance for how to best obtain Lion now and in August (when Apple plans to release a Lion installer USB drive).
Solve problems: If your Mac won’t restart after installation, this ebook explains exactly what to do (knock on wood!).
Avoid slowdowns: Put off a few tasks (running Spotlight, turning on Time Machine) that will slow you down during your first few hours in Lion.
Get set and go: Joe reminds you to run Software Update, helps you set up an extra user account while noting a few account-related changes in Lion, discusses the pros and cons of the new FileVault 2 and gives directions for enabling it, explains the Incompatible Software Folder, provides the need-to-know-now Time Machine basics (including encryption of Time Machine backups), helps you understand what’s going on with Apple Mail plug-ins, and more.
Go beyond... Learn why the $49.99 Lion Server is interesting for Lion users, and how to complete a basic installation.
Reconnoiter with Recovery Mode: A final chapter explains the new-in-Lion Recovery HD volume, and even tells you what to type in Terminal so you can check it out. It also explains how to boot in Recovery mode, in case your Mac won’t boot and you don’t have a convenient way to boot it otherwise.
Take Control of Using Lion -- In “Take Control of Using Lion,” author Matt Neuburg looks deeply at important new features in Lion while also discussing older features and third-party options that may work better for you, all with the goal of helping you understand Lion’s benefits, learn new habits, and get back to work quickly after your upgrade. Major topics help you to:
Understand Auto Save, so you can let Lion save for you with confidence.
Learn how Resume works, and how to disable it when you want a clean start.
Figure out how to navigate Lion with the new Mission Control feature.
Enter and leave full-screen mode, and switch among full-screen apps with Mission Control.
Set up and use Launchpad, and get ideas for additional ways to launch apps.
Memorize useful new trackpad and Magic Mouse gestures for controlling your Mac.
“Take Control of Using Lion” also answers many key questions about Lion, such as:
That’s it for now, but rest assured that we have more books about Lion in the pipeline — both new books and updates to existing titles, so stay tuned!
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With ChronoSync you can sync, back up, or make bootable backups.In addition to releasing new versions of the MacBook Air and Mac mini, Apple today added a new way to display their screens in the Apple Thunderbolt Display. As you might guess, the 27-inch LED-backlit display connects to a Thunderbolt port on recent Macs, but the more interesting aspect is the additional ports on the display itself.
As with the previous Apple Cinema Display, the monitor connects to a Mac using one cable that includes the video and data connection, and splits out a MagSafe connector for powering a laptop. That connection also turns the Thunderbolt Display into a hub containing three USB 2.0 ports, one FireWire 800 port, a Thunderbolt port, and even an Ethernet port (enabling Gigabit Ethernet for the MacBook Air without the need for a separate dongle).
If you’re running a 15-inch or 17-inch MacBook Pro, you can daisy-chain two Thunderbolt Displays to extend the size of your desktop. Up to six devices (such as disk drives) can be connected via Thunderbolt on the connection chain; the two-display limit is due to what the MacBook Pro’s video processor can output.
The 27-inch display has a glossy finish, a 16:9 aspect ratio, a 2560-by-1440 pixel resolution, and 178-degree viewing angle using in-plane switching (IPS) technology. A built-in FaceTime HD camera supports HD-quality video recording and video chatting. And an ambient light sensor adjusts the screen’s brightness based on the environment. It shares the same angled stand that allows for adjusting the screen’s front-facing angle, but does not provide a way to change the display’s height.
The Apple Thunderbolt Display is available to purchase now for $999, and will be shipping “within the next 60 days” according to Apple.
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CrashPlan is easy, secure backup that works everywhere. Back upApple has released Windows Migration Assistant for OS X Lion 1.0. This new app makes it possible for users of Windows XP (with Service Pack 3), Windows Vista, and Windows 7 to migrate their profile and user data from a PC to a Mac running the company’s newest operating system. (Free download, 2.78 MB)
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Dragon speech recognition software for Macintosh, iPhone, and iPad!Apple has released a new version of its Admin Tools for OS X Lion Server. These include updated versions of Podcast Composer, Server Admin, Server Monitor, System Image Utility, Workgroup Manager, and Xgrid Admin. (Free download, 193.25 MB)
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CrashPlan is easy, secure backup that works everywhere. Back upApple’s iTunes has been bumped to version 10.4, designed specifically as a 64-bit application for maximum performance on the company’s newly-released Mac OS X Lion; the update also includes several unspecified performance and stability improvements. Apple notes that, due to the architectural changes that the move to the 64-bit format entails, third-party plugins may stop working with this version of iTunes — in which case, users should contact the individual plugin developers for help. (Free update through Software Update, 90.23 MB, release notes)
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SYNC YOUR PHONE with The Missing Sync: Sync your calendar,Along with Mac OS X Lion’s release today, Apple also updated the Mac mini, giving the diminutive desktop Mac new processors, discrete graphics, a Thunderbolt port, and more, while at the same time removing the previous model’s optical drive. The new Mac mini’s industrial design remains the same, and it ships with Mac OS X Lion pre-installed.
More so than other Macs of recent times, the Mac mini comes in three rather different models, making the decision of what to get more confusing than in the past. The models are:
2.3 GHz Mac mini: The $599 low-end model features a 2.3 GHz dual-core Intel i5 CPU, along with 2 GB of RAM (upgradable to 4 or 8 GB for $100 or $300 more), a 500 MB 5400-rpm hard disk (with a 750 GB disk as an option for $150 more), and built-in Intel HD Graphics 3000 that shares 288 MB of RAM with main memory.
2.5 GHz Mac mini: The $799 higher-end consumer model of the Mac mini provides a choice of either the 2.5 GHz dual-core Intel i5 CPU, or a 2.7 GHz dual-core Intel i7 (add $100). It ships with 4 GB of RAM standard (upgradable to 8 GB for $200), and provides a selection of storage options, including the default 500 GB 5400-rpm hard drive, a 750 GB hard drive (add $150), a 256 GB solid-state drive (add $600), or a 750 GB 7200-rpm hard drive plus a 256 GB solid-state drive (add $750). Along with the faster processors, this Mac mini includes a discrete graphics processor, the AMD Radeon HD 6630M, with 256 MB of dedicated GDDR5 memory. It should increase graphics performance by as much as two times.
2.0 GHz Mac mini with Lion Server: The $999 server configuration of the new Mac mini relies on a 2.0 GHz quad-core Intel Core i7, provides 4 GB of RAM (upgradable to 8 GB for $200 more), and ships with a pair of 500 GB 7200-rpm hard drives. You can trade out the drives for a pair of 750 GB 7200-rpm hard drives (add $100), a 256 GB solid-state drive (add $400), a 750 GB 7200-rpm hard drive plus a 256 GB solid-state drive (add $550), or a pair of 256 GB solid-state drives (add $1000). Since servers don’t generally have significant graphics needs, it too relies on the built-in Intel HD Graphics 3000 that shares 288 MB of RAM with main memory. And, of course, it ships with Lion Server pre-installed.
In terms of video specs, the new Mac mini includes a single Thunderbolt port with support for up to 2560 by 1600 resolution on a connected monitor, an HDMI port with support for up to 1920 by 1200 resolution, and DVI output via an included HDMI-to-DVI Adapter. On the audio side, the Mac mini includes an audio line-in minijack, a line-out/headphone minijack, support for the Apple iPhone headset with microphone, and a built-in speaker.
Standard expansion ports beyond the single Thunderbolt port and the HDMI port include a FireWire 800 port, four USB 2.0 ports, an SDXC slot, and a Gigabit Ethernet port. Speaking of networking, the Mac mini supports 802.11n Wi-Fi, along with Bluetooth 4.0. For those desperate for fast storage via Thunderbolt, Apple is selling the Promise Pegasus RAID systems and Thunderbolt cables now; as far as we know, they’re the only Thunderbolt peripherals available so far.
None of the Mac mini models come with an optical drive built-in, but you can add the USB-based MacBook Air SuperDrive for $79. Also still missing are a keyboard and pointing device; you can use existing devices or buy new ones from Apple as you wish.
As with most of Apple’s recent hardware updates, the new Mac mini provides welcome changes at the same price points as the previous models, although it’s possible that some people will be distressed by the loss of an internal optical drive. It is a bit surprising that Apple is so thoroughly differentiating the different models rather than just enabling customers to configure a base model with all the various options.
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Bare Bones Software’s BBEdit 9.6 -- A burly upgrade with new
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Get more productive with software from Smile: PDFpen forA major operating system update is a large, complex beast (and in this case, a beast that roars and eats gazelles for lunch). Apple touts top-tier Lion features like Launchpad, Mission Control, and extensive gesture support, but hundreds of improvements and changes abound. We’ve collected an assortment of fun and useful tips that you’ll want to try during your first few hours with Lion.
You’ll learn about even more Lion features — complete with far more detail than you’ll find here or anywhere else online — in Matt Neuburg’s 167-page “Take Control of Using Lion,” available now for $15.
Getting Comfortable in the Finder -- The Finder is typically the first thing you see when you use your computer (although with Lion’s new Resume feature, that may be less true than in the past), and you may be a little disoriented when you first try to use it in Lion. These hints will get you past those first few moments:
All My Files is a new smart folder, and you’ll be hard pressed to miss it, since it appears first in the default Finder window sidebar. (A smart folder is a saved Spotlight search.) If you prefer not to use it, you can remove its listing from the sidebar using the contextual menu or by choosing Finder > Preferences. You may find it more convenient to hide All My Files and to add your Home folder to the sidebar in its place (again, you can do this with Finder > Preferences).
To remove something from the Finder sidebar, hold Command as you drag it out. (This was actually introduced in a late version of Snow Leopard, but it continues to bedevil people; see “Mac OS X 10.6.7 Changes Finder Sidebar Behavior,” 18 May 2011.)
The default display of All My Files may catch your eye because it uses the Finder’s new Arrange feature. This cool new feature groups files, and labels each group. The Finder window toolbar contains a new Arrange pop-up menu to make grouping easy. But then what about sorting? The secret is to hold the Option key as you choose from the menu; this changes Arrange to Sort. If you sort when there is already an Arrange option in force, you sort within each group.
For a fun visual example of arranging in Lion, open the Applications folder into Icon view, arrange by application category, and then, if you have a trackpad or Magic Mouse, swipe horizontally back and forth over a category.
You can now select several items in the Finder and choose File > New Folder with [number] Selections to put them all into a new folder.
The top-level Applications folder has new permissions that make it hard to remove anything; if you try to drag something out of the Applications folder, it may stay there, and you’ll get an alias instead. The solution is to hold Command as you drag. (If even that doesn’t work, it’s because the application belongs to Apple, not to you, and you’re no longer allowed to move it.)
You may not have used copying and pasting in the Finder much in the past, as a way of moving items from one folder to another, because in the past it didn’t move them: it only copied them, causing you to end up with two copies of everything you pasted. But in Lion if you hold Option when pasting a copied Finder item (Command-Option-V), it really does move it.
When you copy one file over another with the same name, you’re asked whether you wish to replace the existing file. But now, you can also click the Keep Both Files option. The existing file appears with “copy” appended to the name.
When you’re viewing the list of results from the Spotlight menu, hover the pointer over an item to view a new Quick Look panel to preview the item’s contents.
Meeting Mission Control -- Mission Control is just Exposé by another name, with Spaces folded in (there is no longer a separate Spaces control panel or application; instead, spaces are manipulated at the top of the Mission Control screen). It’s easy to use, but here are some hints:
To add or delete a Desktop space, hold Option to make the big Plus button and the “x” buttons appear in a corner of your screen.
To navigate to a space without leaving Mission Control, hold Option as you click the space.
To get a better look at a window, hover the pointer and press the Spacebar.
You’ll probably discover full-screen windows immediately; Safari and Mail, for example, offer you the chance to turn a window into a full-screen window (look for a button near the upper right of the window). What may not be obvious is that full-screen windows occupy their own spaces, shown at the top of the Mission Control screen. You can navigate to and from them just like navigating to and from spaces (and if you have a trackpad or Magic Mouse, there are handy gestures for this). When working in a full-screen window, hover the pointer near the top of the screen to summon the menu bar. One obscure trick is that to get a window out of full-screen mode, you can simply press the Esc key.
Connect to Other Members of Your Pride -- In addition to adding AirDrop for easy file transfers between nearby computers, a few other networking features stand out:
In Lion, screen sharing is easier than before — you can now log in and control a user account, even if the computer is actively being used by someone with a different user account.
Lion eschews Apple’s 12-year-old trademarked term AirPort to describe wireless local area networking in favor of Wi-Fi, the industry-standard certification term. The AirPort menu and other items throughout the Mac OS X interface are now labeled Wi-Fi.
Lion updates the hoary software base station feature, found in the Sharing preferences pane in the Internet Sharing service, to allow the use of four channels in the 5 GHz band. Internet Sharing turns a Mac into the equivalent of a Wi-Fi router, but until Lion, it was limited to the crowded 2.4 GHz band. 5 GHz is much less crowded, and can provide a better chance at a high-speed signal, even though the signal won’t travel nearly as far an equivalent 2.4 GHz channel. Channels 36, 40, 44, and 48 are all available to Internet Sharing, as well as to Computer-to-Computer (ad hoc) networking (an option in the Wi-Fi menu).
Sadly, Apple left intact WEP-only security, which is easily broken, and causes incompatibility with some devices that have 802.11n built in, such as some Android phones.
Text in Context -- As soon as you begin working with text in Lion, you’ll begin to notice differences, such as:
Lion gains iOS-style autocorrect features as you type. When Lion detects a potentially misspelled word, an alternative appears in a small box below the one you’re typing — press the Spacebar or punctuation to accept the alternative, or press Esc or click the small X icon to dismiss the suggestion.
Can’t remember which key combination creates an e with an accent agu (é)? Press and hold a key to bring up accented alternatives, a feature introduced in iOS. You can click the accent you want, or, since your fingers are already on the keyboard, press the number that appears below the character you want.
Apple now includes an emoji font (Apple Color Emoji) for adding emoticons. To access dozens of symbols, bring up the Characters palette in an app such as TextEdit or iChat, select Emoji, and locate the picture you want.
Pimp Your Preferences -- System Preferences has a couple of hidden new features:
To reduce the number of icons shown in the main pane of System Preferences, choose View > Customize. The result is that all icons acquire checkboxes, which you can uncheck to specify that a particular icon shouldn’t appear. In this way, you can reduce the icons to those you normally use. No functionality is lost, because you can still navigate to any preference pane using the View menu.
There’s a new way to see the View menu. Instead of going into the menu bar, hold down on the Show All button at the top left of the System Preferences window.
A Miscellany of Tricks -- Here are some miscellaneous tricks you might not have known about:
You can now display a custom message on the login or lock screen (for example, your name and contact information in case the computer is found). Open the Security & Privacy preference pane, enable the “Show a message when the screen is locked” option, and enter your text.
Horrified by the new look of Mail? In Mail, choose Mail > Preferences. Click the Viewing button, and select “Use classic layout,” to restore the old tripartite display.
In the category of “Why did it take so long to implement this obvious feature?”, you can now drag a file from Safari’s downloads list to move the downloaded file to a new location in the Finder.
Auto Save already applies to a few Apple applications, and third-party apps are starting to come on board with this feature. It’s pretty obvious how to use it (mostly you don’t use it; you just save a new document once and then let the system save it from then on). But here’s one non-obvious feature: to determine how long must elapse before an autosaved document is automatically locked (so you can’t accidentally change it), access the setting in the Time Machine system preference pane (which is silly, as this lock has nothing whatever to do with Time Machine).
Do you hate “inertia,” where a window keeps scrolling after you end your scroll gesture? The pop-up menu to turn it off is hidden in the Universal Access system preference pane. Click the Mouse & Trackpad button (or just the Mouse button) and then click Trackpad Options (or Mouse Options).
Want nicer text-to-speech voices? There are now lots to pick from. Open the Speech system preference pane, click Text to Speech, and from the System Voice pop-up menu choose Customize. You can sample all voices, but the unchecked ones are not installed; selecting one and clicking OK will start downloading it via Software Update. (Hint: try the British-accented Daniel.)
Lion’s new Resume feature automatically opens any application’s documents that were active when the app was quit. That can be jarring to people who traditionally quit an app when finished with a document. To ensure that a completed document does not automatically open the next time you launch the application, hold Option and choose File > Quit and Discard Windows, or press Command-Option-Q. Alternatively turn this feature off completely in the General system preference pane; you can then ensure that an open document does automatically open the next time you launch the application, again by holding Option as you quit the application.
To prevent all applications from reopening when you restart your Mac, do not hold Option as you choose Apple > Restart or Apple > Shut Down - so that the dialog appears - and uncheck "Reopen windows when logging back in."
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With ChronoSync you can sync, back up, or make bootable backups.For those of us in the media, and especially for those of us who have books ready to ship (we’re putting the finishing touches on the update to “Take Control of Upgrading to Lion” now), today’s release of Mac OS X 10.7 Lion is the end to months of conversation and speculation about when Apple would release the new operating system to the public.
Well, that day has arrived, and we’re now seeing that Lion is on the main screen of the Mac App Store, which remains the only way to acquire Lion at the moment, for $29.99. Those without broadband access, or who have bandwidth caps that prevent the downloading of a 3.76 GB file, can download Lion at Apple retail stores (or anywhere else where high-speed Internet access is available). Users in other countries are also reporting that Lion is appearing in the Mac App Store for them.
If the download option simply doesn’t work for you, you’re not out of luck, but you will need to wait a few more weeks. In August, Apple will also start selling Lion on a USB thumb drive through the Apple Store for $69. It’s a shame that Apple couldn’t have announced this option earlier, which would have saved much consternation among Mac users.
Despite the ease with which it seems you can install Lion over Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, we still recommend moving cautiously with the upgrade. In “Take Control of Upgrading to Lion,” Joe Kissell strongly recommends running Software Update to make sure you have the latest updates (such as the important Migration Assistant Update for Snow Leopard; see “Update Migration Assistant before Upgrading to Lion,” 19 July 2011), making a duplicate before upgrading in case something goes horribly wrong during the installation process, and dealing with any Rosetta-dependent software conversions while it’s still possible under Snow Leopard. For instance, if you need to convert financial data from Quicken or email from Eudora, some conversion tools rely on Rosetta as well, and thus won’t function after you upgrade to Lion.
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Dragon speech recognition software for Macintosh, iPhone, and iPad!It’s instructive, I think, to think briefly about how Apple has aimed many of the marquee features of Mac OS X Lion largely at people who either aren’t currently Mac users or who aren’t entirely comfortable with the traditional desktop metaphor (see “The Two Faces of Lion,” 9 June 2011). That’s not to say that Lion won’t provide long-time Mac users with some welcome features, but we old-timers don’t seem to be the target audience.
I draw your attention to Apple’s targeting to contrast it with how Bare Bones Software has gone about creating the latest version of their powerful text editor, BBEdit 10. Despite the fact that we at TidBITS write far more prose than code, BBEdit has been our writing tool of choice for some years, thanks to its support for the Subversion version control system, syntax coloring of the Markdown format for styling plain text, grep-based searching, and more.
Rather than go after new users who, for one reason or another, have not purchased BBEdit previously, Bare Bones has instead thought long and hard about how to improve key features in BBEdit for existing users. (New users will also appreciate the lower price of $49.99, or $39.99 through 19 October 2011.) And while programmers will find plenty to like in this update to BBEdit, a number of BBEdit 10’s new and improved features will be of particular interest to professionals who work with non-code text, including prose in Markdown format, Web pages in HTML, and EPUB-based ebooks. Let’s go through the main new features.
Dropbox-based Sharing of Support Files -- The feature I’m most looking forward to using once I upgrade both my Macs to BBEdit 10 is Dropbox-based sharing of application support files. BBEdit maintains a BBEdit folder inside ~/Library/Application Support that contains all sorts of essential files, including text factories, scripts, clippings, and so on. Until now, it has been fussy to sync those between multiple machines, and I’m always irritated when I find myself on my MacBook without access to a recently created text factory or clipping.
To share BBEdit’s application support files, create a folder in your Dropbox folder called “Application Support” and move (or if you’re just testing, copy) the BBEdit folder from ~/Library/Application Support/ to ~/Dropbox/Application Support/. (Do this when BBEdit isn’t running; it only looks for the new location at startup.) That’s all that’s necessary; BBEdit looks to Dropbox first for its support files and, if it doesn’t find them there, reverts back to the traditional location.
One note. There’s nothing BBEdit-specific about that Application Support folder in your Dropbox folder, and Bare Bones settled on this approach for sharing in the hope that other Mac developers interested in using Dropbox for sharing support files (for utilities such as 1Password and TextExpander) would consider using the ~/Dropbox/Application Support/ folder as well. Spread the word!
Speaking of sharing, sometimes you want to give someone a set of BBEdit support files that are associated with some project on which you’re collaborating. For that, you don’t want to use Dropbox, since your collaborator probably doesn’t want all your BBEdit settings. Instead, BBEdit now offers the concept of “packages,” which are collections of scripts, clippings, language modules, and text filters, all contained within properly named folders (Contents/Scripts, Contents/Clippings, and so on) within a folder that uses the .bbpackage extension and is stored in the Application Support/BBEdit/Packages folder (local or in
Dropbox).
Plus, something that’s new to me, though not to BBEdit 10, is that you can set certain options on a per-document basis with Emacs variable blocks. For instance, since we use .tb internally as the filename extension for Markdown, if we wanted to send a Markdown-formatted article to a contributor for checking such that they’d see Markdown syntax coloring, we could add this line at the top of the file to tell BBEdit to parse it as Markdown. For an interface to this feature, choose Edit > Insert > Emacs Variable Block (these blocks can go at the beginning or the end of the file).
<!-- -*- mode: markdown; -->
Faster Access to Documents -- In an effort to make standard editing windows (which previously used a left-side drawer to list multiple open files) more like BBEdit’s project windows (which used a right-side sidebar to list multiple files), BBEdit 10 does away with the drawer entirely, relying instead on a multi-paned right-side sidebar.
For standard editing windows, the sidebar’s two panes show currently open documents at the top, with recently accessed documents listed below. For project windows, the currently open and recent documents panes are joined by a project pane that lists the files in the project (regardless of whether they’re open or have been used recently) along with a pane dedicated to a project-specific scratchpad and Unix worksheet. (The scratchpad is just a place to store random bits of text that might be useful; the Unix worksheet provides a Unix command-line environment like Terminal.)
To provide even faster access to documents in play, BBEdit 10 by default automatically saves and reopens documents that were open when you quit, much like Lion’s Resume feature. But BBEdit isn’t relying on Lion for auto-saving of documents or resuming; the feature works equally well in Snow Leopard. What’s truly cool is that BBEdit will happily quit even if one or more documents has unsaved changes, and when you start it up again, your documents will be in exactly the same “unsaved” state as when you quit. For those of us who seem to have a number of “untitled text” windows open at any given time, this is a nice touch.
HTML Markup Interface & Template-based Previews -- One field where BBEdit is particularly popular is HTML authoring, and to help those who spend their days mucking about with HTML, BBEdit 10 now offers a completely revamped and far smarter user interface. Although the basic way you insert tags quickly in BBEdit is unchanged (hierarchical menus or a floating palette), BBEdit 10 now displays a popover that lets you set all the attributes of a particular tag, intelligently presenting just the appropriate options thanks to smarts obtained from BBEdit’s syntax checker. You can even Control-click an existing tag and choose Edit Markup to edit its attributes in the popover.
The other major feature in BBEdit 10 for HTML authoring is the capability to create and switch among HTML and CSS templates for previews within BBEdit. One of the problems with the prevalence of template-based content management systems is that you’re seldom creating an entire page of HTML. Instead, you create fragments, and the CMS puts your fragment together with the core HTML template and CSS files to generate the full page. Previously, previewing fragments in BBEdit was unsatisfying at best, since the fragments never looked anything like what the final page would; now you can create and set HTML and CSS templates into which your fragments are inserted before being previewed. This feature still won’t get around the problem of previewing fragments inside dynamically generated sites, but it will solve previewing problems for a number of users.
In-Zip Editing, including EPUB -- The next major feature in BBEdit is one that probably won’t intrigue most people… until you get to the special case. BBEdit 10 can now not just look at text files inside Zip archives, you can edit those files — manually or with text filters or multi-file searches — within the Zip archives, and BBEdit will save them right back inside the archive. This is a feat of legerdemain that will no doubt be useful in a variety of situations.
But where this feature really shines is with EPUB files, which are Zip-compressed collections of HTML and CSS files, along with a few other text-based support files and any necessary graphics and multimedia files. Previously, even doing something as simple as fixing a typo in an EPUB file has meant unzipping the file, making the change, and rezipping the file with the appropriate command-line incantations to get the right MIME type. Most people who work with EPUB regularly have automated this in some fashion (we have some Automator-based contextual menu commands that unzip and rezip EPUBs; if there’s interest, we’ll happily share them). But even still, it would be far better to be able to edit the EPUB in place, without the intermediate files, and that’s exactly what BBEdit 10 provides.
Just open an EPUB file in BBEdit 10, find the correct file in the disk browser window that appears, and edit it like you would any other file. Once you save your changes, BBEdit updates the Zip-compressed EPUB file. It’s important to note that BBEdit isn’t aware of anything else in the EPUB file’s structure, so BBEdit won’t prevent you from rendering the EPUB invalid or warn you that you’ve done so. But, since BBEdit has such good scripting support, you could undoubtedly build in an EPUB validation script if you wanted.
Scripts and Text Filters, Oh My! -- One notable change that might result in some initial confusion is BBEdit 10’s new distinction between scripts and text filters. Previously, BBEdit differentiated between types of scripts — AppleScripts, Unix shell scripts, BBEdit’s own text factories, and so on. While logical at one level, the script language isn’t generally the way most people think about scripts; they think about what the script do.
To that end, BBEdit 10 separates the different types of scripts into two functional types: scripts and text filters. A “script” in BBEdit 10 is part of a workflow; it operates on multiple files or updates Subversion or something like that. In contrast, a “text filter” only manipulates the contents of the frontmost document. The two types have associated folders in /Application Support/BBEdit and you access scripts from the Scripts menu and text filters from Text > Apply Text Filter.
Although BBEdit 10 automatically tries to put existing text factories in the right folders, it may not be entirely accurate, so if you have something that’s a text filter but has ended up in the Scripts folder, just move it.
Finally, BBEdit 10 can now treat Automator workflows as either scripts or text filters, depending on what they do.
New Preferences Window and Text Colors pane -- Lastly, BBEdit 10 offers a complete overhaul of the program’s extensive Preferences window. It now lists the collections of preferences along the left, and resizes the window dynamically to hold the necessary options on the right. Some little-used options have been removed to reduce complexity, but you can still used defaults write commands in Terminal to access every last option; see Help > BBEdit Help > Expert Preferences for a full list.
New as part of BBEdit itself is the Text Colors preference pane, shown above, which enables you to create different sets of colors, which you can then attach to different types of files. This could be useful, for instance, if you wanted Markdown files to have light text on a dark background, while HTML files would have dark text on a light background. As we work with an ever-increasing number of file types, a color-based reminder of what sort of file is open could be helpful.
Separate from the Preferences window is the new Setup window, accessible from BBEdit > Setup. It’s where you can define four different sorts of permanent settings that you might need to access repeatedly: bookmarks for BBEdit’s FTP/SFTP browsers, filters for the disk browsers, search patterns for the Find window, and sites for HTML authoring. These feel a bit unrelated, but the Setup window would seem to be a good way to collect and manage them.
Pricing and Availability -- Suffice to say that if you’re a BBEdit user now, I’d recommend the upgrade highly; Bare Bones has done a good job of refining BBEdit’s interface and providing welcome new capabilities. If you aren’t currently a BBEdit user, but are looking for a powerful tool for editing and manipulating text of all sorts — even very large files — BBEdit is well worth a look. And given the new low price — see below — it’s even easier to recommend than in the past.
BBEdit 10 is available now from Bare Bones, although Apple hasn’t yet approved it for the Mac App Store. From Bare Bones (and the Mac App Store, whenever Apple sees fit to approve it), BBEdit will list for $49.99, though it’s on sale for $39.99 through 19 October 2011. Upgrades from previous versions also cost $39.99, but anyone who purchased BBEdit 9 after 1 January 2011 is eligible for a free upgrade. That free upgrade timing has the salutary side effect of syncing up with the time that BBEdit has been in the Mac App Store, so people who bought directly from Bare Bones won’t pay more for this upgrade. A free trial version is available.
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Dolly Drive: Time Machine in the cloud AND bootable backup!In Apple’s Q3 earnings call with analysts today, Apple announced quarterly revenues of $28.6 billion, the highest in the company’s history, with net earnings of $7.3 billion — also a record. All-time record-breaking sales of both iPhones and iPads, along with a June-quarter record number of Mac sales, contributed to the results.
The revenue increase was 82% greater than the year-ago quarter, totalling more than $13 billion over that quarter’s results. Operating margin was a record $9.4 billion (32.8% of revenue). Net income topped the December quarter’s record-breaking figures by $1.3 billion, and grew even faster than revenue: a 125% increase year-over-year. Earnings per share translated to $7.79.
3.95 million Macs were sold during the quarter, 14% more than were sold in the year-ago quarter. By comparison, IDC said that the overall PC market grew only 3% last quarter. The Asia-Pacific market was key to Apple’s Mac sales figures, with 57% year-over-year increase. Both desktop and portable Mac sales were “healthy” according to Peter Oppenheimer, Apple’s Chief Financial Officer. The new iMac models that Apple recently introduced helped spur desktop shipments (see “New iMac Gains Thunderbolt, FaceTime HD, and Quad-Core CPUs,” 3 May 2011).
iPod sales, as expected, were down in a saturated music-player market: Apple sold 7.5 million of them this last quarter as compared to 9.4 million in the year-ago quarter. However, these were better sales figures than Apple expected, and Oppenheimer noted that over half of iPods sold were iPod touch models. iPods still command over 70% of the U.S. MP3 player market.
Strong results were reported for the iTunes Store: almost $1.4 billion in revenue, a year-over-year increase of 36%. Strong sales of music, apps, and video all combined to contribute to these results. Apple currently claims more than 225 million accounts in the iTunes Store worldwide.
And what of the iPhone? 20.3 million of them were sold last quarter; the previous June quarter saw 8.3 million iPhones sold, meaning that iPhone sales increased year-over-year by 142%, more than double the IDC estimate of smartphone sales growth. These sales resulted in $13.3 billion in revenue. Again, the Asia-Pacific region sales were a big contributor, quadrupling year-over-year. iPhone is now available through 228 carriers in 105 countries. Oppenheimer also reported strong enterprise interest in iPhones, with 91% of Fortune 500 companies either deploying or testing the device.
iPad maintained its “incredible momentum”: 9.2 million iPads were sold last quarter, compared to the year-ago quarter’s 3.3 million. Even with increased production — 4.5 million more iPads were made last quarter than in the previous quarter — Apple easily managed to sell every iPad they could manufacture. Recognized revenue from iPad and accessories contributed $6 billion to the results. And, again, enterprise impact was significant, with 86% of Fortune 500 companies deploying or testing the tablet.
Apple did see some cannibalization in Mac sales that were attributable to iPad sales, noting that almost twice as many iPads were sold than Macs. However, the Windows PC market was more strongly affected by iPad sales than was the Mac market, according to Tim Cook, Apple’s Chief Operating Officer.
Combining all iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch devices, Apple reported a cumulative 222 million iOS device sales as of the end of June.
Apple retail stores turned in record June quarter results, too: $3.5 billion in revenue, an increase of 36% from last year. The stores sold 768,000 Macs, compared to 677,000 a year ago. One figure has remained unchanged year-over-year: about half of the stores’ Mac customers last quarter were new to the Mac. Apple saw an average $10.8 million in revenue per store last quarter, and the stores had 73.7 million visitors during the quarter. Apple plans to open 30 more stores worldwide this quarter, including its first store in Hong Kong.
Apple ended the quarter with $76.2 billion in cash on hand and marketable securities.
Wrapping up the announcements, Oppenheimer referred to a “product transition” later in the year about which he refused to say anything more. He also discussed how selling Lion and other services online is going to affect how Apple reports future revenues.
Specifically, because sales of Lion, which Oppenheimer stated would commence “tomorrow” (20 July), and sales of the iLife applications all include providing customers with future unspecified minor software upgrades and features, revenues will be “fully deferred at the time of sale” and recognized over a period of three years. Also, because Mac OS customers will be eligible for the soon-to-be-released iCloud service, Apple sees the combined value of iCloud services and software upgrade rights to be worth $22 per customer. Apple is deferring that amount for each new Mac sold and will recognize that amount over four years. Similarly, iOS device sales will also have a portion of their revenues deferred: $16 for each iPhone and iPad sold and $11 for each iPod touch sold; this revenue will be recognized over a two-year period.
Finally, Apple projected revenue in the range of $25 billion for next quarter, lower than this quarter’s revenues, even though next quarter is when the bulk of educational sales take place. Oppenheimer said that he expected increased Mac and iOS device sales over last year, but attributed the lower revenue estimate to “a lot going on in the fall,” including the introduction of iOS 5 and the undisclosed product transition. Of course, historically, Apple always provides conservative guidance in its projections; the actual figures may well differ. Check back with us in three months.
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Dolly Drive: Time Machine in the cloud AND bootable backup!Stop the presses! Wait! We don’t have presses! That’s good, since Apple has just released Migration Assistant Update for Snow Leopard, which is described somewhat blandly despite the rather irritating consequences:
This update addresses an issue with the Migration Assistant application in Mac OS X Snow Leopard that prevents transfer of your personal data, settings, and compatible applications from a Mac running Mac OS X Snow Leopard to a new Mac running Mac OS X Lion.
Although it’s unclear how prevalent this bug is (we haven’t run into migration problems during the testing of Joe Kissell’s “Take Control of Upgrading to Lion”) and Apple implies that it applies only to a new Mac running Lion, we still recommend getting this update via Software Update or the Apple Support Downloads page (where it’s a 714 KB download) before upgrading to Lion. And if you’re planning on buying a new Mac that has Lion pre-installed and migrating your data over to it from a Mac running Snow Leopard, you’d be silly not to download this Migration Assistant update first.
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SYNC YOUR PHONE with The Missing Sync: Sync your calendar,
