MacMost: Archives

A point of frustration with Numbers users is that Pop-Up Menu cells must be populated with a list of typed values. Often it is useful to get these values from another table instead. While there is no easy solution, you can simulate a dynamic pop-up with a special technique that involves creating the Pop-Up Menu in the second table and pasting it into the first. This method requires a manual update of the Pop-Up Menus when the selections change, but can handle large lists.

Since the day the iPad launched, people have wondered about the overlap between the Mac and the iPad. Lots of things, like browsing the Web, checking email, word processing and other tasks can be done just as easily on the iPad as on a computer. Pro-level apps have been the divider. Do you want to use Photoshop? Well, you need a computer for that. (more...)

Instead of placing every file in a specific folder, you can tag your files for greater flexibility. Files can have more than one tag, so you can include a file with more than one project, task or collection. You can rename and assign colors to tags. You can easily view all of the files that have a tag, search for files by tag, or even create smart folders for a single tag or set of tags.

When Apple surprised everyone with new MacBook Pros this week, the first question many asked was whether the keyboard was fixed. The previous generation of MacBook Pros were plagued by keyboards that broke easily. Often this was caused by dust that got under the keys. (more...)

Apple quietly announced, through an alert in the latest update to High Sierra, that they will no longer be offering print products like books, posters, and calendars. They have been offering such services since 2002 in iPhoto. The service will end September 30, which probably corresponds to the release of macOS Mojave. (more...)

Apple is using the term Augmented Reality to describe the combination of camera, 3D graphics and motion detection to view the world through your iPhone and see additional added elements. This can be used for practical purposes or entertainment.

Apple surprised everyone today with the release of new MacBook Pro models, and the retirement of the oldest in the line. The new models look essentially the same, but there are a lot of changes under the hood. (more...)

Dark Mode is coming in macOS Mojave, but it doesn't give you a way to write in that kind of environment. You can get that now in Pages if you simply set the background of your document to black and the text to white. Doing this requires the use of Section Masters, a shape, and changing the style for the text. You can then revert to regular colors, or copy and paste text from a dark mode document to a normal one.

Both MacRumors and AppleInsider are reporting on an analyst report that Apple may update almost every major piece of hardware in the next six months. In addition to MacBook speed updates, there may be a new MacBook Air or a new low-cost model to replace it. The iMac may get a significant update and even the Mac mini as well. A whole new line of iPhones, some with OLED displays and all with Face ID and A12 processors. Also perhaps a new iPad Pro with Face ID and no Home button. And last but not least, a new Apple Watch with a larger display and new health features. (more...)

If you hear that your Mac or other Apple product has become vintage or obsolete, then it doesn't necessarily mean that Apple has cut off all support for it. While hardware repairs will be more difficult in some cases because Apple won't stock those parts, macOs and other software will still be provided for those devices for some time. And the Genius Bar can still be helpful for many issues.

There are conflicting reports today about Apple’s relationship with 1Password, the password manager by independent software developer AgileBits. A report states that Apple is now buying 1Password licenses for all employees. But others are saying that Apple was already doing this, and has for a few years. But what is also interesting is that the report states that Apple is looking to acquire 1Password/AgileBits. (more...)

The way the Trash works is pretty straight-forward for your internal drive. But how about files on external or removable drives? Any file you put in the trash remains on that drive, but appears as a aggregated list when you view the Trash folder. You can only see files in the Trash on the same computer and user that threw them away.

Apple changed everything a while back with iTunes, proving that people would pay for online music and that the future was all Napster-pirated stuff. But services like Spotify pioneered another way to distribute music online using subscription streaming instead of buy-and-download. (more...)

If you have a large Numbers table and regularly search and filter it, you may want to use a formula and a filter to enable quick and easy searches instead. The technique involves creating a hidden column that will use a single-cell second table to search, and then a filter based on the results in that column.

Computers come with one of two types of internal storage, either a Hard Disk Drive or a Solid-State Drive, also called an SSD. Hard Drives are older and cheaper technology, but also slower. SSDs are newer, smaller, faster, but more expensive. You can also get Macs with a Fusion Drive, that is a hybrid of the two.

You can easily save a portion of a webpage or document as a streamlined PDF or Image file. However, many people take screenshots instead, which are poor resolution. Using the Open In Preview function in the Print Dialog, you can quickly and easily convert portions of webpages or documents to smooth and scalable PDFs or even higher resolution images.

Instead of dragging and dropping files to move them in the Finder, you can simply use Copy and Paste. This will create a copy of the file in the new location. But if you hold down the option key, this moves the file instead. This is similar to cutting and pasting files in other operating systems. You can copy and paste multiple files.

You can set your Safari home page to any page on any site. However, this won't actually affect much unless you also set other options in your Safari Preferences. Even then, when you quit Safari and relaunch it, you'll probably just see the same pages you had open previously, unless you close all of Safari's windows before quitting.

People sometimes use the terms Internet and Web interchangeably. But the Web is just one of the many ways you can use the Internet. The Internet is the global network of computers, whereas the Web is just the part of the Internet we use when we browse web pages using a browser such as Safari. The history of the Internet goes back further than you may think.

If you want to permanently delete files from your Mac and your Time Machine backups, you must use a special function in Time Machine to remove all of the versions of that file. After deleting the current file on your drive, you need to Enter Time Machine, look back to a time where that file existed, and then select the file to delete it from all backups.