MacMost: Patreon Video

I haven't installed beta 1 of macOS Big Sur on my Macs. But I do have a way to run it anyway. I installed it on an external drive. But not just any external drive. A spinning HD would be too slow. A USB thumb drive would be too problematic. So I created a small, inexpensive external SSD drive. Installing Big Sur on this external drive is tricky. Basically, you boot into Recovery Mode, and then choose to install Catalina on the blank external drive instead of "restoring" the internal drive. Once that is done, you boot to the external drive and finish the setup. Then I installed the Big Sur beta 1 "Profile" on it from the Apple Developers site. In the future, you'll be able to do the same with the public beta "Profile." Then I just let the system on that external drive update to Big Sur. All this time, the normal internal SSD on my MacBook Pro remained untouched. So I can just boot my MacBook Pro and nothing has changed. But if I want to look at Big Sur and test things out, I just connect this external drive, hold down Option during a restart, and choose to boot from the external. Shut down and reboot without the external to return to normal operation with my internal drive and Catalina. Here are the two products I used to create the external SSD for $64. <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07ZGK3K4V/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">Silicon Power 256GB - NVMe M.2 PCIe Gen3x4 2280 TLC SSD </a>  <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MNFH1PX/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">SSK Aluminum M.2 NVME SSD Enclosure Adapter, USB 3.1 Gen 2 (10 Gbps) to NVME PCI-E M-Key Solid State Drive External Enclosure</a>  As I point out in the long (too long, sorry) video, an external drive like this is much better suited for running macOS, as opposed to a cheap USB thumb drive, which is fine for storage and transfers, but not for active read+write constant access. Even better would be a Thunderbolt 3 case/adaater instead of USB 3.1. That would be faster, but more expensive and also impossible to access on a computer without Thunderboth 3.

So I installed the first beta of macOS Big Sur on my MacBook for a look around. I recorded a 20-minute look at different things so I've got the ability to look back at that recording for reference. I'll restore that MacBook back to Catalina for the time being. Here's that recording, with my commentary if you want to see it. I discovered some interesting things, like changes to System Preferences and how to customize the new Control Center. Also some hints on what changes still need to be made as the beta testing continues.

Here's my <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLFZnxFzuRk" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">rundown of today's big Apple news</a>, including macOS Big Sur and the switch to ARM processors in Macs. I hope to post a look at Big Sur for Club MacMost later today perhaps. So now that we know that Macs will really start using ARM processors in the future, I thought I'd give Club MacMost my thoughts on how this will work and what to expect over the next few years as we transition. Ask me any questions!

Adobe released a new free app called Photoshop Camera that is getting some attention this week. It allows you to apply filters to photos or your live camera shots, but in a much more complex way than other photo filter apps. It separates the background from the subject and lets you replace the background. So you can replace a cloudy sky with a sunny sky, for instance. Here's a walkthrough of the app. At the very least, it is fun to play with. Here's a link to the app: <a href="https://apps.apple.com/us/app/photoshop-camera/id1274204902" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://apps.apple.com/us/app/photoshop-camera/id1274204902</a>. I hear that it is very processor-intensive, so it will run slower or perhaps not at all on older iPhones.

Here's a handy Quick Action that will allow you to take whatever is selected and send it right to a new Preview document. This makes it even easier to do a technique I'll be showing in a future video on printing from Numbers: <a href="https://archive.org/download/strategies-for-printing-from-mac-numbers-macmost-2199/2199NumbersPrint.mp4" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">Strategies For Printing From Mac Numbers</a>. The for the two pieces of JavaScript it is simply: <blockquote>function run(input, parameters) {</blockquote><blockquote>    var se = Application('System Events');</blockquote><blockquote>    se.keystroke('c', { using: 'command down' });</blockquote><blockquote>}</blockquote>The second one is just using n instead of c. Oh, one thing I forgot to mention in the video! You need to go to System Preferences, Security &amp; Privacy, Privacy, and then look for Accessibility on the left. Unlock by clicking the padlock. Then drag and drop Numbers into the list for Accessibility and make sure it is checked. This gives permission for the Quick Action to send the keystroke. But for some reason you don't seem to need that for Preview. Or at least I don't have Preview in my list and it seems to work fine.

Remember in February when I did that video on <a href="https://macmost.com/how-to-create-simple-animation-with-mac-keynote.html" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">simple keynote animation</a>? Or how about this week when I made a <a href="http://macmost.com/create-the-double-exposure-effect-without-photoshop.html" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">double exposure effect</a> image in Keynote? Well, one YouTube commenter suggested I combine them. So here it is, that same image I used in the double exposure video, but with a very long image behind it, animated horizontally. Actually, that is what I did first. Then I realized I should also have it scale from 100% to 200% so it looks like the woman's thoughts are "flying" into the scene. All done in Keynote. Source file attached.

While it is easy to create a keyboard shortcut for most many bar items, one seems to resist this attempt at increasing productivity. Creating a shortcut for the File, Tag... menu item seems to just not work. The problem seems to lie in the little color circles that accompany the item. You can use them to assign some favorite tags to files easily, as long as you use the cursor. But with a little trick, you can get the File, Tag... menu item to work with a keyboard shortcut. Then you can apply any tag using only the keyboard.

I had previously reported that printing with the Mimeo extension from Mac Photos worked well. Now I have tried Mpix as well. I ordered a collage poster from them and was pleased with the quality and quick shipping time. <a href="https://apps.apple.com/us/app/mpix-photo-prints/id1282488470?mt=12" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://apps.apple.com/us/app/mpix-photo-prints/id1282488470?mt=12</a>

So I happened across a bunch of cheap Wi-Fi extended gadgets at Amazon and bought the cheapest one. My hope is that this $35 extender will give me Wi-Fi in the backyard without needing to run new cables or get a whole new system. Yep. Seems to work. Pretty easy to set up too. Works with an Airport Extreme, in case you were wondering. Why didn't I get one of these earlier? The only major drawback: It looks like another network, so I have to switch to it. And that means it won't work with old-fashioned file sharing, at least not without some advanced setup, maybe. But now I can FaceTime and stream Netflix while out back! Here's a link to what I bought: <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B085ZK3VJY/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B085ZK3VJY/</a> 

I use the Camera app on my iPhone to record normal things: friends and family stuff. But when I record something for work, I go with a separate app. One reason is to get the extra features such an app usually has. A second reason is so I don't need to change my video recording settings each time I switch between business or personal video recording. A third reason is so the videos are saved separately from my Photos library and I can transfer them to my Mac when I want. The app I use is ProMovie Video Recorder + <a href="https://apps.apple.com/us/app/promovie-recorder/id1184204602" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://apps.apple.com/us/app/promovie-recorder/id1184204602</a> 

A recent forum question asked about a chore chart with a scoring system. It is an interesting problem that can be solved many ways. I did it here with a second header row in one table, and a second table to keep score.

I was curious as to how much I could customize my touch bar on my MacBook Pro. Turns out you can do quite a lot with this popular third-party app. <a href="https://folivora.ai" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://folivora.ai</a> 

I wanted to play around with my new shotgun microphone and try making a video of a different sort. So here's the story of my time at Drexel University with my first Mac, a Macintosh SE.

So my mission was to find a way for two people to video chat that didn't involve them signing up for anything, installing any apps, and it must work on both Windows and an iPad. The solution I found was a rinky-dink site called Talky.io.

Apple released new versions of their three office apps for Mac. Here's a look at the new features.

One annoyance if you use Dark Mode on your Mac is that most web pages still display the same bright white versions of themselves. Hopefully in the future more sites will support a native dark mode. But until then, you can always get a Safari Extension from the Mac App Store to make things look a little better.

In tomorrow's regular episode, I'll be showing you how to use Mac Messages to screen share and then use that to read a book to a child that you may be separated from during this pandemic. This is a good idea, but it lacks two things. First, you can't SEE the child, nor can they see you. It is audio-only with screen sharing. Second, if all they have is an iPad, it won't work. It needs two Macs. So in this video I try it with Zoom. I'm just using a free account on the reader's end, and no account at all on the child's end. This works with audio AND video on both ends! So you can see the screen and the people. Plus, on the child's end I'm using an iPad. Doing this with a free account limits you in time, number of participants, and some pro features. But it works well.

My friend Jay, who many of you may remember from past appearances with MacMost, just posted a video review of one of those external eGPUs for Mac. This is one of the ones Apple sells. You can use it as a way to "dock" a MacBook to a desktop screen and setup, or as a way to super-power a Mac mini.

This is a free and unbelievably robust tool for creating all sorts of charts and diagrams.  Check it out at draw.io (or <a href="https://www.diagrams.net" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://www.diagrams.net</a>).

So you may have heard about this app you can install that gives your excess CPU power to scientists to help them do disease research. I don't know much about it, but I decided to install it and screen record it so you can see  screen record trying it out so you can see what it is about. The site is: <a href="https://foldingathome.org" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://foldingathome.org</a>  Let me know if you have tried this too, or what you think about apps like this.