Apple is a year in with its voice to text system. I’ve been using it since release, but also continue to use Dragon for Mac which, while no longer supported, continues to work. This video demonstrates the differences and where Apple still has some catching up to do.
I have finally roped Stephen into talking about email on the latest episode of Mac Power Users. Topics include email services, apps, and strategies. Later in the show, we are joined by Rosemary Orchard and Myke Hurley to hear about two specific apps they use every day.
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If you’ve been reading my Jazz Friday posts over the years, you’ll know that the majority of featured jazz artists are Black Americans. That isn’t a coincidence. Black America is the reason that jazz (and nearly every other pop music of the last 100 years) exists. Jazz is just one of the many things for which America is indebted to its black citizens.
Racism and bigotry are not only abhorrent, they also deny American of its greatest asset, multiculturalism. Adam Neely posted an excellent video about Black America and jazz that sums it up.
In this episode of Automators, Ken Case, CEO of the Omni Group, joins Rosemary and me to talk about adding automation in the form of Shortcuts and JavaScript scripting to the Omni Group apps, as well as his first and favorite automations.
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When I first got my Apple Watch, I’d been using a FitBit for years and was very proud of my daily 10,000 steps. Immediately, however, I discovered that despite much walking, the green ring on my fancy new Apple Watch barely moved. Not only was I not hitting that target of 30 minutes of elevated heart rate a day, I realized I hadn’t even been aiming for that goal in all those years of wearing a FitBit.
So I made some changes, and now I spend time hiking up hills, riding my bike, and (until a few months ago) going to the gym to fill that elusive green ring. Even being stuck home, I’m finding ways to push myself and fill that green ring most days. I read some affirmation for this exercise this morning from cardiologist Brian Lima, who explains that when it comes to those Apple Watch rings, the green activity ring is one ring to rule them all.
Last week Bradley Chambers wrote an interesting article at 9to5 Mac about how Covid-19 demonstrated how much better Google products are for the classroom than Apple’s iTunes U. For years now, it seems like Apple has throttled back its efforts on education, which seems to me a shame. I know when I was in school, the near exclusive presence of Apple II computers (I know I’m dating myself) resulted in a lot of us getting our first computer experiences while looking at that cute rainbow icon.
I’m sure Apple has thought about this and they’ve probably got a bunch of research that explains how kids are now experiencing computers from home way before school, but there is a part of me sad to them give up this ground.
Google’s big education move, however, doesn’t just aim at Apple. As kids grow up using Google collaboration tools, I expect they are going to question the need for the Microsoft Office Suite when they enter the workforce. I’ll be curious to see what tools people are using for traditional office computing (word processing/spreadsheets/presentations) in ten years.
Now that Apple can share files and folders, I’m sorely tempted to let my Dropbox subscription expire. I’m generally not a fan of apps that embed themselves in the underlying operating system the way that Dropbox does on the Mac. Indeed on my laptop, I didn’t install the Dropbox hacks. When I need to upload a file there, I trigger a Keyboard Maestro script that gets me to the Dropbox website, and I drag and drop into the browser. Also, I don’t want to give another pile of money to Dropbox.
A few reasons are holding me back at the moment:
iCloud Doubt Dropbox has always been rock-solid and fast. I’m not aware of ever losing a file through the Dropbox cloud sync, and I’ve always been impressed with Dropbox’s synchronization speed. Is iCloud up to that? It has been stable for me in terms of file and sync integrity. It’s definitely slower than Dropbox.
Non-Apple People In the day job, I often have people I share files with that don’t own any hardware with a fruit logo. Historically, iCloud sharing has not been useful outside the Apple ecosystem. That is getting better now, but is it good enough yet?.
Apple could make this decision a lot easier for me later this month if they add additional features for iCloud sharing at WWDC. While I’ve got some time left on my annual Dropbox subscription, I’m keeping it as a backup, but I’m also trying not to use it. If I can get by a few months without having to resort to Dropbox, I’m probably good. Ideally, one cloud storage service is enough for me.
It has now been a few months since I first wrote about working from home and the opportunities to create new habits. How are you doing? Do you like the version of you that your habits from Monday and Tuesday reflect? If not, it’s okay. You have Thursday and Friday to start all over again. It’s not too late.
Everybody talks about adding artificial intelligence to their software, but this week’s sponsor, SaneBox, is artificial intelligence for your email. Imagine for a moment that instead of waking up to 200 items in your inbox, you wake up to five, and those five are the most critical emails that you need to read. You can have that experience with SaneBox.
SaneBox is the solution to so many of my email problems. What if you had an assistant who worked for you 24/7 that did nothing but sort and manage your email? Wouldn’t that be nice? That is what SaneBox does. SaneBox is the email service that adds a pile of productivity features to your email, regardless of what email client you use. For a lot of folks, email is a constant pain point, and it doesn’t need to be. With SaneBox at your back, you can:
Wake up every day to find the SaneBox robots have automatically sorted your incoming email for you so you can address the important and ignore the irrelevant.
Defer email for hours, days, or weeks, so it is out of your life until a more appropriate time. They have even added a new feature that can optionally auto-reply to snoozed email with something like, “I’m sorry, but I’m underwater right now. I’ll get back to you in a few days.”
Set secret reminders so if someone doesn’t reply to an important email, SaneBox gives you a nudge to follow up.
Automatically save attachments to the cloud (like Dropbox).
Use their SaneFwd service to automatically send appropriate emails to services such as Evernote, Expensify, or Kayak.
Move unwanted email to the SaneBlackHole and never see anything from that person again.
The list goes on, and MacSparky readers love this service. I have heard from so many readers over the years who finally figured out email when they signed up for SaneBox. Why not straighten out your email by getting a SaneBox account? If you sign up with this link, you even get a discount on your subscription.
A year ago, Apple announced a new HomeKit feature, dubbed Secure Video, where Apple would agree to store your security camera video on its servers for you without an additional fee. I like this idea. Not only do I not want to pay someone to store this data, I also don’t necessarily trust third parties with home camera footage either. Apple’s a big company. They are not going to get acquired and they have a stated interest in protecting user privacy. The whole idea of HomeKit Secure Video makes sense.
I left WWDC last year thinking it wouldn’t be long before I had HomeKit Secure Video working in my home. Well, that was over a year ago, and there has been very little progress. Logitech released a HomeKit update for their nearly $200 Circle 2 camera. I bought one as an experiment and it has never worked satisfactorily. The camera is often unavailable with no explanation of why, and it feels like Logitech dropped the ball on this one. Moreover, the price is prohibitive if you want to put several of them in your home. There are almost no other vendors supporting HomeKit Secure Video.
Things are getting better, though. Eufy, a subsidiary of Anker, recently announced that their home line of Eufy cameras is going to get full HomeKit Secure Video Support (9to5 Mac has all the details). It sounds like they’re going through an approval process right now. I have a few Eufy exterior cameras, and I’m much happier with them than my prior Canary cameras. The Eufy cameras stay connected, have an option for local storage, and seem way more reliable than anything else I’ve ever used. Best of all, their indoor cameras start at $40. There may be hope yet for HomeKit Secure Video, but it sure has taken a long time.
