Maccast 08.02.2012 - Show #405
Links
V Opening
V Opening Music
* Music is Say Anything by Manda and the Marbles
* Mandaandthemarbles.com
V Sponsor
V Circus Ponies
* Notebook
* Makes the tasks of collecting, organizing, writing, and reviewing information easy.
* Clipping Service
* Add them to pages in your notebook and then in almost any app you can select text and "clip" it into your notebook.
* Works through OS X services. Right+click or go through the services menu.
V Clipping from web sites and emails have "snapbacks"
* You can link back to the original source content
* Great for finding important emails.
* Clip out the relevant info into your Notebook, but knowing you can always find your way back to that original email without having to sift through thousands of emails in Mail.app
* You can also initiate a reply from Notebook
* That's just one of dozens of powerful features.
* They have an iOS version that you can sync your documents to it and it has Dropbox support so even that's easy.
* Free trial is available
V News
V Next Apple Event September 12th
V The Mac site iMore broke the news citing 2 sources who claimed Apple would hold it's new special product announcement event on September 12th
* Several other sources corroborated the rumor including the Wall Street Journal, the Loop, and iLounge
* According to rumors it could be a whopper
* Most are in agreement that Apple will unveil the next iPhone with the device going on sales within weeks of the announcement
V There is also some speculation that the rumored iPad Mini will be shown off, although it may not go on sale until about a month later.
* Both the iPad and iPod are rumored to be getting a smaller 19 or now possibly 9-in dock connector. Possibly a magnetic style like the MagSafe.
V Finally, there are also rumors of a new iPad Touch, and possibly a new Nano at this event?
* iPod Touch with a longer 1136x640 3.99" screen
* There is some speculation that we may get 2 back to back events. iPhone in September and iPad in October
* An outside rumor that Apple with Rev the iPad 3 with thinner, cool, and less power hungry Sharp IGZO displays.
V Mountain Lion breaks download records
* Maybe it's the way Apple is pushing the update through the App Store or maybe we just have more Mac owners. Actually both probably play a factor.
* Apple says Mountain Lion downloads went over 3 million in the first 4 days it was on sale
* That makes it the most successful OS launch in Apple's history
* I'm sure the $19.99 price tag also helped.
* I did noticed they used downloads as a number and because most people will download the installer onto multiple systems there isn't a 1:1 ratio of downloads to sales.
* Recent analytics data from web firms seem to indicate that they were seeing about 5% of their traffic coming from Macs running 10.8 in the days after it's release.
* Overall as far as I can tell Apple's server farms did an excellent job keeping up with demand
* It wasn't smooth for everyone though. Some customers who recently purchased new macs and qualified for free upgrade under the "Up To Date" program received codes for the App Store download only to wind up with a copy of the Mountain Lion Server update, not the client software they were expecting. Apple ultimately fixed the mix up, but still not a happy day for those impacted.
V Sponsor
V Vimov
* Weather HD 2
* Quickview, offers a fast and elegant way to check the weather for multiple cities.
* Beautiful animations.
* Amazing maps that provide a lot of useful information
* They have a lite version, but the full version is just $0.99 so just grab that.
V Feedback, Comments and Commentary
V Upgrading to Mountain Lion
V Preparing
* As much as it feels like you want to install right away, depending on your situation, you might want to wait a week or two.
* If you can, update a secondary or non-critical machine first
V Verify your specs
* You'll generally need a 2008 or newer Mac with a discreet GPU.
V More RAM is better. Apple's paltry 2GB requirements is likely not enough. I say 4GB minimum.
* If you are doing an "over-the-top" install do you have enough free space?
V Check your apps, drivers, etc. Don't forget the little things (menubar items, preference panes, plug-ins, etc.)
* Upgrade your apps and OS software first, if you plan to do just an upgrade install
* Don't forget about drivers, firmware updates, system preferences, and menubar items.
* Don't forget about plug-ins and add-ons. Including browser extension and Mail add-ons.
* Also kernel extensions. Mountain Lion is 64-bit only, no 32-bit kernel extensions.
* Clear out the cruft. Take inventory and remove or archive anything you no loner need
V Check your disk. Run utilities, repair permissions, clean out System and user caches
V Backup, backup, backup. If you plan to erase and install remember if you only have one backup you'll have none.
* I recommend making a bootable clone
* SuperDuper
* Carbon Copy Cloner
* Verify that it does boot and that you can access files
* Also make a 3rd archive of critical files and documents
V Have a plan for recovery if anything should go wrong and give yourself time.
* The install itself shouldn't take long, maybe an hour or less, but all the prep and planning will take time
V Make the purchase
V You'll have to get it via the Mac App Store and the price is $19.99 USD
* There is no $69 USB version at the Apple Store and no indication that Apple will every sell one.
* It will download which could take a while. The Package is just shy of 5GB.
* You'll want a good fast connection. Go to a friends house, the Apple Store, or a Starbucks if you don't have one. Or consider buying and letting it run overnight.
V It will want to immediately launch and run the installer, if you want to make a bootable USB stick or SD card now is the time
* Quit the installer
* Find the Mountain Lion Installer. Applications > Install OS X Mountain Lion
* Control+Click on the app icon and choose 'Show Package Contents'
* Find the InstallESD.dmg file. Contents > Shared Support > InstallESD.dmg
* I like to copy the InstallESD.dmg file out to a backup drive for safe keeping. Or better yet make a backup copy of the entire Install OS X Mountain Lion.app file.
* When copying you may be asked to enter your admin credentials
* Open Disk Utility. Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility
V If you want to make a DVD
* Click Burn in the Menubar
* Find the InstallESD.dmg file you located earlier
* Insert a blank 4.7GB DVD and wait for it to burn
* That's it.
V If you want to make a USB key
* Find an 8GB or larger USB stick
* Launch Disk Utility. Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility
* Insert the USb stick and select from the sources.
* Go to the 'Partition' tab and give it a name. Say, "OS X Install"
* Select "Mac OS X Extended (Journaled for the format)
* Select "1 partition" for the Partition layout
* Click the "Options…" button. In the panel pick"GUID Partition Table" and click OK
* Click Apply and confirm that you want to erase the USB stick.
* Once it's partitioned and formatted go to the "Restore" tab
* Drag and drop the "InstallESD.dmg" image into the "Source" box.
* Drag the formatted USB drive into the "Destination" box.
* Click "Restore" and confirm you want to erase the USB drive.
* It will take about around 30 minutes or so to restore the image to your drive.
* Once it's finished you should have a bootable USB disk. (hold 'option' key down at startup and select your boot disk).
V Now when I tried this procedure at the end I got a "Could not restore – Invalid argument" error. You can ignore that as it should have gone OK.
* I've read you can avoid the error by mounting the ESD before starting the restore.
V If you want to avoid the manual hassle of making the Backup disk using Disk utility, there's an app for that
* Lion Disk Maker is an AppleScript app that will do it all for you. Donationware, so if you use it support the developer. Maybe give him the $40 extra you would have spent buying the Apple USB disk.
* Alternatively you may be able to use Apple's Recovery Disk Assistant tool to make a bootable USB stick.
V Upgrade (over-the-top) Install
* Disconnect any external devices, backup drives, etc.
* This is literally just run the installer and wait.
* When it finishes your Mac should reboot and if all want well you should be up and running
V "Clean" install
* Disconnect any external devices, backup drives, etc.
* Insert your boot disk (you created it earlier right) and reboot holding down the 'option' key.
* Select the Mountain Lion Installer disk and boot the Mac
V Once the installer loads choose Disk Utility.
* You have your two backups that you confirmed are good right?
* Select your main hard drive and in the Erase tab set the format to "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)".
* Click "Erase" and confirm you want to format the drive.
* Quit Disk Utility and run the installer.
* After it completes the Mac will restart and begin the setup process
* Plug in your Time Machine or cloned backup and select that as the source
* When Setup Assistant asks about Transferring Information to This Mac, choose the option to restore from Time Machine or Another Disk
* This will restore all the settings from your old Lion backups, including apps, setting, user accounts, files, etc.
* You could also opt to not transfer now and do this later using Applications > Utilities > Migration Assistant.
* For a "true" clean install I generally opt for that latter option.
* I then create a temporary admin user account at startup with a different username from my old account
* Once I'm booted into Mountain Lion I then run the Migration Assistant and only import in my User account, not Settings or Applications.
* I then run Apple's software update to check for any last minute updates
* I then start the Application install and update dance. Usually beginning with iLife and iWork.
* Then install any App Store apps
* Then other apps.
V Post install procedures
* Launch your critical apps and make sure everything is running as expected
V Check settings.
* Mail seems to turn off Mail rules for some users. So check that.
* Once that is all done I re-setup my Super Duper and Time Machine backups.
V I also keep an extra Lion cloned backup available for a week or two.
* This is helpful as i can migrate in any old settings or Application support files that i may need
* I can also reference the old system in case I forget about an App or files
V What's new in Mountain Lion
V Finder Enhancements
* Scrollbars become visible if you place 2 fingers on the trackpad
* when scrolling you get a "wider" scrollbar
* If you enable View > Show Status Bar in icon view the scale icons slider is now back.
* Launchpad now has search so it can double as an App launcher
V iCloud Documents
* If you didn't already have it set up, go to System Preferences > iCloud and sign-in to enable
* File > Open in many apps now brings up the Document Viewer with 'iCloud' loaded by default and an 'On My Mac' tab for more traditional file browsing.
* 'New Document' at the bottom of the iCloud window creates a new iCloud file for that app.
* Similarly opening an iCloud document lets you work with that file.
* Saving syncs changes with iCloud, but also all the standard OS stuff works too. Versions, Auto-save, etc.
* To add or remove files from an Apps iCloud storage just drag them in or out of the document viewer. Hold 'option' and drag to make a copy.
* You can drag files between applications via their document viewers.
* To move an iCloud file from the cloud to your Mac, open it. Click on the name of the file in the titlebar and select Move To… Under the 'Where' drop down you can choose from several areas on your Mac or choose 'Other…' to select a location.
V iOS Converts
V Notes
* No moved outside of Mail
V Doesn't yet use iCloud syncing
* Uses the IMAP still. Need to have a valid IMAP email account entered in the Mail, Contacts & Calendars system preference pane in order to use the syncing feature.
* Your iCloud (Mobile Me) email should work.
* Can create folders and drag note to move them
V Reminders
* Moved ToDos out of Calendar
* Can have iCloud reminders that sync and On My Mac reminders that stay local.
* Due Date and Geofence support
* Set priorities
V Game Center
* Login and see iOS game stats and friends
* You can add friends and respond to friends requests
* Now supports OS X games
V Messages
* Integrates iChat, FaceTime, and iMessages all under one window.
* Also still supports all the iChat protocols (AIM, Jabber, Google Talk, Yahoo!)
* All messages show up in the main window
* Your Buddy list can be accessed from the "Window" menu.
* Clicking the video button uses the services video chat, or launches FaceTime
V Notification Center
* Click the new icon at the far right of the menubar. Can also 2-finger swipe in from the far right of your trackpad to reveal (start off the pad and slide on)
* New System Preferences > Notifications pane to control setting and alerts
* have Badges, Alerts, Sounds and control which apps and how many notifications appear.
* Can manually clear all notifications, by clicking the "X", except Calendar notifications
V Scroll down in the notification pane to reveal the "Do Not Disturb" option
* Turn off badges and alerts for 24 hours or until you turn it back on.
* Notification still appear in the Notification Center
* A little "settings" button at the bottom of the notification panel gives you quick access to the Notifications System Preferences. Incidentally because of this Mountain Lion's dock cannot be enlarged to extend the full width of the screen.
V Gatekeeper
* Designed to prevent apps that are not signed with an Apple ID or purchased directly from the App Store from running on your Mac
* You can adjust the default setting in System Preferences > Security & Privacy
* Options are Mac App Store, Mac App Store and identified developers (default), and Anywhere.
* If you leave the settings at default and run into an unsigned app Mountain Lion will warn you and block it from running. This only is stopped until the first "allowed" launch of the app.
V You could change the settings to "Anywhere", launch the one app, and then set it back, but there is a quicker way for a one time exception.
* Hold down the Control key, click the app, and choose Open
* It will warn you, but the dialog will offer an Open button allowing you to launch the app anyway.
V Social Integration
* Sharing buttons everywhere
V Twitter
V Add your Twitter Account from System Preferences > Mail, Contacts, & Calendars
* Click the "+" to add an account and choose Twitter. Then enter your account info.
V Import into contacts
* When you are setting up your account there is a button to Update Contacts…
* After you give permission for it to access email addresses and phone numbers in your Address Book it will use that info to find matching contacts on Twitter and add those users Twitter handles to your Address Book Records.
V Once enabled you can tweet from Notification Center.
* You can turn this off from the Notification Center preferences, under Share Button. Uncheck 'Show Share Button in Notification Center'
* Other services include Flickr, Vimeo, and Aol.
* Facebook in case you're wondering won't be be here in the Fall. Likely along with iOS 6
V Dictation
* To enable, open up System Preferences and choose 'Dictation & Speech'
* Turn the Dictation radio button to 'On'
* The default activation key is pressing the 'Fn' key twice but you can also change it from the drop-down menu here.
* Then from any application where you can type text all you have to do is double tap the 'Fn' key and then start talking. When you're done just click the 'Done' button or tap the 'Fn' once to finish.
* The audio is converted to speech from a server, so an internet connection is required.
* I was very impressed with this feature as it worked remarkably well and was incredibly accurate.
V PowerNap
* Apple released SMC updates to enable the feature on 2011 and 2012 Macbook Airs along with an update for the Retina Macbook Pro.
* These are the only models current;y supporting the feature.
* If your Mac supports it, it is enabled in the Energy Saver System Preferences.
* Wakes the Mac hourly in a "darkened" low power state even when the lid is closed.
* Has to have at least 30% battery or be plugged in.
* Checks mail, syncs contacts, updates calendars, syncs reminders and notes, syncs Documents in the Cloud, and updates Photo Stream
* If connected to power it will also run your Time Machine backups and download software updates
V AirPlay Mirroring
* Mirror the video from your Mac to an Apple TV 2 or 3
* Great for videos, presentations, etc.
* You can now send Flash video from a web site to your big screen.
V Airplay devices also show up as an audio "output" source for the Sound preferences.
* You can now send ANY system level audio from your Mac to and Airplay device or Airplay speakers
V Safari 6
* iCloud Tabs. See all tabs that are open in all Safari browsers on all Macs and iOS devices that share an iCloud account.
* Exposé style tab view. Click the "cover-flow" looking icon
* Unified address bar. Does search and URLs in the same box.
V Mail updates
* Jump to the top of your Mail messages list by clicking in the title bar area where is says "Sort by Date"
V Assign Mail VIPs.
* Special mailbox that is a filter of messages from contacts you designate as VIP
* To make someone a VIP click the Star icon to the left of their name in an email from them
* You can also click on their address in the header and choose Add to VIPs
* Do the opposite to remove VIPs
V Web Sharing was removed
* If you ever had dreams of running an Apache web server on your Mac you could always realize those with a flip of a switch in System Preferences > Sharing
* No longer in Mountain Lion though.
* Luckily Apache is still there and setting are maintained if you upgrade, you just don't have the GUI anymore.
V Apple says just buy the $19.99 OS X Server upgrade.
* Incidentally someone told me that if you are running Lion Server and then install Mountain Lion Client that the "server" app gets disabled with a grey "don't" symbol over it.
* If you'd prefer not to run full server just for Apache you can use the command line tools or download Tyler Hall's Web Sharing Preference Pane
* He also develops the full featured Apache server management app VirtualHostX
V Closing
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