Posts By: Gary Rosenzweig

Siri can be a good tool to help you increase your productivity if you give it a chance. You can ask for information, search the web, get to files, folders and settings. You can also use it to schedule events, add reminders, send messages and emails. You can use Siri completely silently if you set it up right.

Here are some tips if you are ready to move beyond taking simple screenshots. You can have screenshots go directly into apps or save to a location of your choice, change the image type to get smaller files, and streamline the process with hidden keyboard shortcuts.

Came across this nice free "Markdown" text editor. But what is Markdown? You may have heard the term before. It is a handy way to create formatted text even when only plain text can be entered. Some websites use it for forums and comments, and some people just prefer markdown over modern word processors.

The Status Menus are the icons you see in the top right corner of your Mac's screen. They give you control over various settings and special functions. You can arrange, add or remove them as you like.

By default each photo placed on a Keynote slide will transition in one at a time. But you can have those builds overlap so the items appear at the same time or as each is moving. This can make slideshows look more modern and professional.

There's a new Apple II game. Really. Nox Archaist is a game much like Ultima IV, one of my favorite games of all time. It is basically a new adventure in a very similar design. You don't need an Apple II to play it. The game comes with an emulator to play it on a Mac or Windows computer. <a href="https://www.6502workshop.com/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://www.6502workshop.com</a>

When you get a new Mac, you'll be walked through some steps in Setup Assisant. After that, there will be a few thing you want to check and set up before you start using your Mac.

Here's how to see how much iCloud storage space you are using for files, photos, online backups and more. You'll find out how to clear out some space if you need it. You'll also learn how to purchase more storage, and even how to not have to pay every month.

I'm often asked which Mac apps I use. I create tutorials, build apps, develop websites and use my Macs for all the same things most Mac users do. Here are the more than 40 apps I use every week to get my work done.

Apple released version 11.0 of their three office apps today, for macOS and iOS. Here's a look at the new features they've included. And here are the links to Apple's lists of new features. <a href="https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207247" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">What’s new in Keynote for Mac</a> <a href="https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207243" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">What’s new in Pages for Mac</a> <a href="https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207244" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">What’s new in Numbers for Mac</a>

While most Mac users are familiar with some keyboard shortcuts, there are some simple two-key shortcuts that many do not use that are useful in apps like Safari, the Finder and text editors. Improve your productivity today by learning some new ones.

Launchpad is a way to launch any app on your Mac. You can access it with your mouse or trackpad, but also using just the keyboard. You also use Launchpad to uninstall most apps.

Remember when Macs came with a basic Paint app? There hasn't been a default app like that for a long while, but you can use Preview and Photos for most things. If you want to be able to draw with pixels, however, you'll need a graphics app. Here are some suggestions, including one that is free and easy to use.

Learn how to use Mission Control on your Mac to have multiple Desktops, also called Spaces, that make it seem like you have more than one display.

I checked out OwlOCR from the Mac App Store and I was impressed. I have no need for OCR (getting text from scanned documents or photos) but if I did, I wouldn't hesitate to use this app for that.

Check out some features of the Maps app on your Mac that you may not know about.

Learn how to search for files in the Finder. You can simply search for words in the names or contents of files, or perform more complex searches in specific locations and for dates, file types and other criteria. Lots of advanced tips too.

It is usually about 12 hours after the snow stops that I remember to set up iPhones to take time lapses of snowstorms. But this time I remembered 12 hours <strong>before</strong>! I set up an old iPhone 7 at the back of the house, and an old iPhone 7 Plus at the front. Would have loved to use my current iPhone, but I couldn't be without it for that long. This is why I sometimes keep old iPhone instead of reselling or recycling them. So here are the two videos, combined. They both are just using the standard Time Lapse setting in the iPhone Camera app. Nothing special. No tricks or filters. You can see the reflections of the TV and lights in one of them. In the other the window gets fogged up. Actually the whole window was fogged up most of the time, but the heat of the iPhone cleared a spot most of the time. Neat how that worked out. And if you look at the second one closely, you can see how many time I shoveled, and there are even some frames that include me in them.

Here are some settings you may want to check out if you are concerned about security on your Mac. Not all of these are necessary, but you may want to consider them.