Posts By: Gary Rosenzweig

The Dock has a new section in macOS Mojave that shows recently running apps. It will also show apps that are running that are not in the permanent icons sections of the Dock. You can remove items from this new section temporarily. You can also turn this feature off.

I'm working on a demonstration of creating your own Finder Quick Action. As an example, I want to be able to select a photo file, and then have its location show up on Apple Maps.This is harder than it sounds. But using AppleScript I could get the latitude and longitude, and then using JXA I could manipulate the text a bit to make a URL. Then I could use that URL to open Apple Maps and pinpoint that location. Here are the two scripts in a text file in case you want to play with them.

A new feature in iOS 12 is the ability to quiet or turn off notifications for apps right on the lock screen or notifications screen. With a swipe and a tap, you can tell an app to stop showing notifications if you don't want them. You can also view notifications grouped by app or source, so that a single app doesn't monopolize your lock screen or notifications screen.

Mojave offers a new comprehensive method of taking screenshots and doing screen recordings. Instead of using a variety of keyboard shortcuts and methods, there is now on keyboard shortcut that will bring up a control strip with all of the options. You can capture the screen, an area, or a window. You can save to a file, clipboard or go directly to an app. You can even set up timed captures and record video.

While macOS Mojave brings lots of great new features, it also retires some. The Mail stationery templates are gone. Cover Flow view has been replaced with Gallery View in the Finder. Integration with Facebook and other social networks is gone, most likely for privacy reasons. Back to My Mac has been retired, but all sharing functions like Screen Sharing and File Sharing remain. Warnings that 32-bit apps will soon no longer work with macOS are just warnings, however. Those old apps still work in Mojave.

Version 5.2 of Numbers brings a new/old feature, Smart Categories. This is similar to the old Categories feature in Numbers prior to 2013, and similar to Pivot Tables in Excel. Using Smart Categories is relatively simple, however, as you simply groups together similar rows and allows you to see totals, averages, counts and other data pertaining to those groups.

The new Voice Memos app in macOS Mojave allows you to quickly and easily record voice memos and any audio from your Mac's microphone. It keeps a small library of voice memos and lets you go back and append to them, trim them, and edit them. They sync over iCloud with the Voice Memos app on your iPhone and iPad so it is easy to record on one and edit and listen on the other. You can also export the memos as standard audio files.

Lots of people like to have custom folder icons. And there are many ways to make them. Here's a method using Acorn.

Learn how to use Siri Shortcuts to create a simple shortcut that allows you to ask a question, and then presents a random answer. The answer is spoken and both the question and the answer are then recorded into a text file on your iCloud Drive. You can use the pieces of this shortcut to build all sorts of useful things based on your needs.

A powerful new feature of macOS Mojave and iOS 12 is the ability to use your iPhone or iPad as a camera and capture images directly to your Mac. You can grab images right in apps like Preview, Pages, Mail and others. You can also scan multipage documents. Images skip being stored on your iPhone and go directly into the app on your Mac. However, using this feature requires the latest operating systems, recent hardware, and the right settings including two-factor authentication for your Apple ID.

The iOS Stocks app is now also available on the Mac with Mojave. You can track your stocks or search for them by symbol or name. You can view charts and news for each stock.

In iOS 12 you can now turn on Do Not Disturb and have it automatically turn off using a variety of criteria. This solves the problem of turning on Do No Disturb and then forgetting to turn it off. You can choose to have it turn off automatically after an hour, later in the day, when you leave your current location, or at the end of a scheduled event in your calendar.