MacMost: Patreon Video

10/10/18

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

9/26/18

This feature puzzles me. I can see using it in Keynote to provide narration on specific slides. The only use in Numbers I can see is maybe explaining how a sheet works to someone who didn't create the spreadsheet. For Pages, I can't see the use. You can't export it in the PDF, so maybe just for annotations?But maybe I'm just not the target audience for this feature. What would you use this for?

9/10/18

Apple added the ability to browse all of their music charts by country. I love this because you can listen to popular music from all around the world and discover new things. You can look at the charts even if you are not using Apple Music.

9/4/18

Apparently Apple gives away a free app in the Apple Store app, not to be confused with the App Store app. The Apple Store app is what you use to buy Macs and shop for accessories. But it also features an iOS app that you can get for free via an automatically-redeemed code in the App Store app.Confusing, I know. But the result is you get a paid app for free. It may be worth checking monthly to see what the offer is. In this case it is the $5 Obscura 2 photo app.

8/30/18

One of the big new features of macOS Mojave is the new Finder Gallery View. But hardly anyone is talking about how Gallery View actually replaces Cover Flow view, which has been around for a long time.Lets look at the two views and compare them. Do you think some people will miss Cover Flow, or will the new features of Gallery View win over everyone?

8/16/18

Putting away my box of power adapters after my trip to Europe. Had to take both the standard European adapters plus special Italian ones. But I probably didn't need the Italian ones at all. There is a lot of misinformation out there about these things.I also travel with a power splitter and a compact extension cord, but I am wary about using them with 220v outside the U.S.

8/6/18

There’s only one Apple museum in the world as far as I can tell, and it is in Prague, right by where I am staying. I visited there today and it is very nice. Here is some raw footage that I hope to edit into a video for the site later on. I've got some more bits too. The audio from me walking around is a bit washed out by the background sound of Stwve Jobs speeches playing throughout the museum. Unlike the many tourist trap museums in Prague, this one is all for charity, apparently. Anyone else been there? I'm glad I didn't notice the no photography sign until I left at the end! Oops.

7/25/18

You can't always take a picture from the vantage point you would like. But with image editing tools like Acorn or Photoshop, you can adjust the perspective of your photo afterward to make it look like you shot the photo straight-on.

7/20/18

My problem was that I had to change the permissions on some files almost every day. The files were created by one admin account on my Mac, but I had to then modify them on another admin account. Instead of Command+i and lots of clicks, I came up with a simpler solution using a script.Here's the code: <blockquote>set pathWithSpaces to "/Users/username/Documents/whatever"</blockquote><blockquote>do shell script "sudo chmod -R 775 "&amp; quoted form of pathWithSpaces with administrator privileges</blockquote>

7/16/18

I'm working on future MacMost episodes since I'll be going on another one of my International journeys soon (I'll be posting pictures!). So an episode scheduled for way out on August 7 takes a look at the Print extensions you can get in the Apple Store that will replace Apple's Photo Printing.I thought that Club MacMost may want to see that video now, rather than waiting for August 7. So here it is. I'll probably spend a few bucks on a variety of printing products over the next few months to see which of these is a decent service. But I also expect more services to appear as probably the presence of Apple as a first-party printing service was keeping other services away.

7/9/18

Just a quick look at Dark Mode. Is this a feature you are looking forward to?

7/1/18

So I like those notifications that appear at the top right corner of your Mac's screen. I sometimes create "right now" reminders so that I get one of those and it bugs me until I do the task.Instead of adding to my Reminders list with these, and seeing them on my other devices, I've come up with a JXA script that I can easily trigger that will put one of these notifications on the screen. Here is the script I am using: <blockquote>app = Application.currentApplication(); app.includeStandardAdditions = true; var message = app.displayDialog('What?', { defaultAnswer: "" }).textReturned; app.displayNotification(message,{withTitle: 'Reminder'})</blockquote>

6/25/18

This simple app that will come as standard in iOS 12 will let you measure things in the real world using your iPhone's camera. In reality, though, the measurements aren't accurate enough for any real use, so I'm not sure about the purpose of the app other than to show off a bit of augmented reality.

6/20/18

Want to see all sorts of data about your mobile signal strength on your iPhone. If you dial a secret number you get into a special Field Test Mode with all sorts of menus. I'm not sure what a lot of this means, but I assume you can use this to see the signal strength of your current connection, and perhaps things about your SIM card and such.Guaranteed to break the ice at parties!

6/13/18

ScreenTime is the new feature of iOS 12 that lets you view your iPhone/iPad usage and set personal limits on a device or per-app basis. It gives you tools to deal with how much time of your day you are using your mobile device, should you want to use it less. I like that Apple is giving tools for those who want them, but they are simply optional things that most of us can ignore.

6/8/18

OK, you've really got to watch this. It is just a sample. A quick demo.I'll wait... Done? Well, what do you think? Back when Animoji were introduced last year with the iPhone X, I was super excited that one day we would be able to create our own Animoji characters. And if that happened, I would try to use them in videos in place of, well, actual me. Lets face it (pun intended), there's nothing special about me. I'm not going to attract any new viewers to MacMost with my smile. That's not what MacMost is about anyway. It is about the information and learning how to get the most from your Mac, right? (Not that I didn't try to have a pretty face for MacMost, as those of you who remember MacMost from 2007 will know). So with the new Memoji in iOS 12, I can do this. I don't need a backdrop. I don't need a good camera. I don't need to worry about my hair, or if I have a big mosquito bite on my forehead (I actually do, right now, from camping). I don't know if I'm going to switch to this any time soon. But I want to keep playing with it. Maybe I'll do a few here and there like this to see what others say.

6/6/18

So in the first beta of iOS 12 it looks like Siri Shortcuts is tied in with Workflow, which is what it looked like during the Keynote anyway. But you do have the option in Settings of enabling a Siri Shortcut and it works. I demo a "What is my IP address" shortcut, which is something Siri couldn't tell me before, so that's cool.

5/23/18

Did you know you can go into a mode in App Switcher to select an app window or even a recently-used document in an app?

5/9/18

I meant to do a video on adding something interesting to the Mac's Notification Center "Today" Widgets. But I re-discovered an old and useful friend. Have you ever used iStat Menu? It is has gotten even better over the years, and I think I can use it, especially on my MacBooks.

4/30/18

Did you know the Preview app has this Contact Sheet mode that makes it easy to browse hundreds of images? It has some interesting functions too, like the ability to arrange them and close them. It could be handy as a way to find a single image to use out of many.