Posts By: Gary Rosenzweig

In macOS Catalina if you are not using Apple Music you can choose to store your music files on an external drive. There are a number of methods you can use. Also learn how to clear out your Music app library to start from scratch.

If you iPhone or iPad is almost full, you may need to take the time to clean out things you no longer need. iOS makes this easy by providing a list of apps showing how much space each uses and giving you controls to delete content. You can also change settings for Messages, Photos and the Camera apps so you use less space.

Preview is a great tool for viewing PDF documents. But you can do much more than just viewing. You can fill in forms, even PDFs that don't have preset fillable fields. You can password-protect them, export them as images, merge documents, rearrange and delete pages and more.

You can use Shell Scripts to run one or more Terminal commands, but as a single file you can easily double-click to run. In this example I create one that opens three files and launches an app all with one action. Then you have to set the permissions for the Shell Script file and set it to run in Terminal. An alternative is to embed Shell Scripts into an Automator app.

Preview is a great tool for viewing image files. But you can do much more than just viewing. In addition to the annotation tools you may already be familiar with, you can also use Preview to export images into a different format, crop, resize and adjust colors. You can even import images from cameras or scanners.

We include email signatures with every message we send, but often don't put much thought into the signature itself. You can make yours stand out with some simple techniques like using colors, including emoji or clever combinations of characters, images and more.

If you need to repeat a specific set of keyboard commands or movements often, you can reduce the sequence to a single action. One method is to use Automator Watch Me Do actions, which record key presses and allow you to repeat them. You can also write a script in Automator to press keys. A third method involves using the Mac Accessibility Keyboard to record and play back the sequence.

You don't need special software to create beautiful organizational charts on your Mac. You can use the shapes in Pages and Keynote along with techniques like groups, images in shapes, and connection lines. Learn the skills you need to build any diagram design.

The Mac Color Picker will appear when you want to choose a color in most Mac apps. You'll see it when you want to set the color of text, shapes, adjust images, draw, and many more places. There are several ways to choose colors and some of them are highly customizable.

Every year Backblaze publishes the stats on their drive. So many drives! And so big. I didn't realize you could get 16TB drives now relatively cheap. Anyway, the report is at <a href="https://www.backblaze.com/blog/hard-drive-stats-for-2019/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://www.backblaze.com/blog/hard-drive-stats-for-2019/</a> 

Early personal computers made it easy to get into programming. Today's computers come ready-to-use and most people will never write a single line of code. Learn the basic concepts of coding with 6 lessons in less then 20 minutes. Use Script Editor on your Mac to write simple programs and take your first steps in learning how software works.

Sending large files as email attachments can be probematic when you have server limits and bandwidth issues on either end. There are better ways to send files. You can use photo or video-specific sharing sites. For other files you can use free file sharing services, cloud services or get your own professional server.

Status Menus, also called Menu Bar Icons, are the small menus that appear on the right side of your Mac's menu bar. Learn how to arrange, remove and add them. Find out how access hidden features and functions. Get more from third-party apps. See how you can access them with your keyboard and other tricks.

Many people decide to skip using a backup like Time Machine to protect the files on their Mac, in favor of simply using iCloud Drive and iCloud Photos. While cloud services are a great way to sync and access your files across devices, they fall short when compared to backing up with something like Time Machine. Learn why you should use Time Machine in addition to iCloud to keep your files and photos safe.

iMovie offers limited setting for exporting videos. You can use Apple's Compressor app to take high-quality iMovie videos and compress them however you like. You can also create stand-alone droplet apps to make repeated conversions quick and easy. You can do the same with audio files creating in GarageBand and elsewhere.

While playing around with building organizational diagrams in Pages, I took a detour to make diagrams that actually perform calculations using one-cell tables in Numbers. It is kinda neat. I'm calling them "Flowsheets." Take a look at this example. I'll attach the document too.

Learn the basics of using Automator on your Mac to create workflows. Automator is a useful productivity tool but it can be intimidating for non-programmers. Learn how to use Actions to build Workflows to get things done. This is a basic introduction for those who have never used Automator before.

How can you type on your Mac if you keyboard isn't working or is missing? How can you control the cursor to click on things if your mouse or trackpad is not working? There are methods to type and point that you can use in an emergency or until you get a replacement. You can bring up the Accessibility Keyboard to type using the cursor, and use Mouse Keys to move to cursor using only the keyboard. The trick is to know how to bring those up when things aren't working.