Repairability vs. Sturdiness

Over the years, Apple Products have become increasingly less repairable. The latest teardown of the new iPad evidences this fact with photos of densely packed electronic components and copious amounts of glue. This led iFixit to give the new iPad a low repairability score.

I get that, but also don’t see it as big of a strike against the iPad as most people make it out to be. For years now, repairing these devices, even without the glue, has been no walk in the park. To make these devices small, they have to be dense, and things are locked together inside, so the contents don’t move around. This also leads to that sense of sturdiness you feel with an iPad in your hand.

I can’t help but feel to make it more repairable you’d lose some of that. I’d also argue that for the vast majority of us, we’re not going to take a screwdriver to our iPad at any time, no matter how repairable it is. As a result, for most of us using less glue, adding more space inside, making the device less sturdy for the sake of repairability is a cost without a benefit.

I don’t envy Apple in having to make that decision between repairability and sturdiness. I understand there is a screwdriver-wielding crowd out there that won’t be happy as Apple increasingly locks these devices down. However, I think they generally make the right decisions when you consider the abundance of Apple Stores and certified repair centers where we can get a professional to fix our devices and the fact that we buy these devices to use them every day, not take them apart.

Daisy Disk 4.5

DaisyDisk is a smart little utility to help you manage your Mac’s drive space. I’ve been DaisyDisk on my Macs for a long time. Recently they updated to version 4.5.

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The initial reason I liked DaisyDisk so much is the user interface. It uses a series of colorful concentric circles representing your drive space which is both pleasing to look at and easy to understand.

Over the years, the application got more and more powerful, making it even more of a natural recommendation. With the most recent update to version 4.5, they’ve gone entirely in with Apple’s new APFS file system. I’ve been using the latest version, and I like it. The DaisyDisk team also put together an interesting article about the top five challenges with APFS and how they solve them.

If you’ve never heard of DaisyDisk, this is a Mac app worth checking out.

Tame Your Email with SaneBox – Sponsor

This week’s sponsor, SaneBox is the solution to so many of my email problems. 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.
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The SaneBox team has been hard at work lately improving the SaneBox interface and releasing even more new tools. For instance, now you can have SaneBox send an auto-reply when you defer an email. Why not straighten out your email by getting a SaneBox account today. If you sign up with this link, you even get a discount on your subscription.

Mac Power Users 424: Workflows with Mike Schmitz

Writer, podcaster, screencaster, and avid bookworm Mike Schmitz joins us to talk about his quest to “push past average”, become more productive, sleep better, read more, and live a well-balanced life.

This episode of Mac Power Users is sponsored by:

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1Password for Mac Version 7 Beta

I’ve been running the beta of the new 1Password app for Mac for a while now, and I’d recommend it for any 1Password subscribers.

It’s hard to believe 1Password is up to version 7, but they are, and the new version adds a lot of new features. There’s a better sidebar, and there is now drag-and-drop so you can easily move items between vaults (or even share an item from the sidebar).

Tags also get better with the new ability to nest tags. I’ve started tagging passwords as we worth the family vault and it’s helping. Occasionally you may need to see a 1Password item entry while doing something on your Mac and discover the data gets covered up by other windows. They’ve fixed that now with the ability to pop out a window containing the password field, so it’s always on top.

1Password version 7 also makes changes to the typography. They’ve created their own font and added the ability to use rich text in the application’s text fields. There’s a whole lot more including a lot of under the hood work to make the application faster and more efficient.

I’m usually leery to install the first beta of key software, but I’ve been running this beta now for a week and had no problems. One password has a post that describes all of the new changes and you can download the beta right there if you are feeling brave.

The Missing iCloud Storage Bump

In my post yesterday following Apple’s education event, I mentioned that I felt the increase of free iCloud storage for students from 5GB to 200GB was a good idea, and I hoped Apple would be giving us all more storage at WWDC.

Dan Moren feels the same, but more passionately. I think the single best reason for giving us increased storage is Apple Photos. They’ve built a platform that lets us take, save, and share photos, but it requires nearly all of us to make regular monthly payments so we have enough storage. This is annoying. Our Apple devices are expensive, and Apple is hardly cash-strapped. Moreover, a lot of people (perhaps most people?) refuse to pay for extra storage. I hear from readers and listeners all the time that have a problem with it. I expect the refusal to pay is even more common with non-geeks. They don’t pay. Their photos don’t get backed up.

So let’s take the capitalist approach. Taken to its logical conclusion, paltry free storage results in people losing their photos and being understandably pissed at Apple. Google is well aware of this because nearly every advertisement I’ve seen from them that has any relation to photos always points out they have free storage. These disgruntled consumers see that and move platforms.

I’m not even arguing Apple needs to make it free across the board. Just raise the free tier to something rational. 200GB seems about right.

Power Up with TextExpander – Sponsor

This week MacSparky.com is sponsored by TextExpander, the easiest way to start automating your work on Mac, iPad, and iPhone. TextExpander is a text replacement tool. With it, you can type a phrase like “ccell” and it will automatically fill in your cell phone number. But TextExpander is so much more than that.

Using TextExpander, you can have it automatically create the date and time. For example, when I talk with someone on the phone related to the day job and want to keep notes about the conversation, I just type “xdts” which, in my head, means date and time string. Then TextExpander automatically creates something like this, “2018-03-28 06:42”. If I need to put the full date in a letter, I just type “fdate” and TextExpander puts in the current date, like this, “March 28, 2018”.

But TextExpander can still go deeper. It can use the contents of your clipboard to auto-fill in snippets. It can press keyboard keys, like the tab key, to automate filling in forms on the web or creating an email. You can get it for yourself and your team members so you can share snippets with your team members.

I’ve done so much with TextExpander over the years that I even have a page of snippets I’ve created that you can download ranging from movie to reviews to conference calls. One of my personal favorite groups is foreign thanks where you can say thank you to people in most language. Sending an email to a French friend, just type “french thanks” and TextExpander gives you “Merci”. It’s like your own, personal translator.

To learn more, head over to TextExpander.com and let them know you heard about it at MacSparky in the “Where did you hear about us” field.

Moment Lenses for iPhone Filmmakers

The Moment Lens company has a new Kickstarter campaign with a series of products aimed at people that want to shoot movies with their iPhone including a gimble counterweight, filter mount, battery case, and an anamorphic lens. I’m a fan of Moment lenses and own several of them. If you like to shoot video with your iPhone this one is worth considering. Also, I expect Moment will actually hit its ship date since they’re pretty good at making lenses already.

A Few Notes From Apple’s Education Event

I followed the live stream blogs during today’s Apple Education event and took a few notes. These observations are based on reading the live blogs. I’m sure that people in the room will have more insight as the day goes on.

That New iPad

I’m happy to see the Apple Pencil support moving down the line. It’s pretty great, and everyone should be able to use it.
I think Apple still has a pricing problem. Chromebooks are in the low $200 range. The new iPad is $300, but when you add a case/keyboard $100 and an Apple Pencil ($100), a fully rigged iPad becomes nearly 2.5 times the cost of a Chromebook. When schools need to buy them by the hundreds (or thousands), that extra $300 is going to matter.
I think the non-pro iPad has come so far that it indicates we are going to get the iPhone X version of the iPad in June at WWDC. I’d be surprised if the rumors aren’t true about adding Face ID to iPad Pro.

Swift Playgrounds

I’m glad Apple is continuing to press forward with this app. Swift Playgrounds are fun, and I’ve done a lot of coding in there over the past few years. I consider it a puzzle game as much as a coding education. My kids never got interested, but I’m guessing a lot of kids will go nuts for the new augmented reality features.

iWork

The new features in iWork look interesting. They didn’t talk much about it.
I think collaboration is where iWork needs the most attention. I’d like to see it collaborate as easily as Google Docs and it currently doesn’t.

iCloud Storage

200GB per student is great. Hopefully, they follow suit at WWDC and announce everybody gets a free 200GB. The current free offering of 5GB, particularly in light of the cost of Apple hardware, feels pretty cheap on Apple’s part.

Teaching Tools

The classroom tools look impressive. I’ve not got any experience with them and am looking forward to hearing from teachers about this. As I understand it, for the past few years Google has been eating Apple’s lunch on classroom tools.

iBooks

I’m currently in the home stretch of an iBooks media-rich Field Guide, and I was very anxious about iBooks Author today. It looks like I’m fine. They are bringing the ability to create books to the iPad, but it doesn’t appear iBooks Author is porting to iPad. Instead, it will be an additional feature in Pages. So long as they keep improving iBooks Author on the Mac, I’m good.

The iPad in Education

On MPU several years ago we had Fraser Speirs on, who spearheaded one of the first one-to-one iPad programs in a school. When I asked him about why they used iPads instead of a traditional computer with Microsoft Word he had a really good answer. “We’re making CEO’s, not secretaries.”

The iPad is an inherently more creative device than a traditional computer, particularly something as basic as a Chromebook. Apple made this point with the new “Everyone Can Create” curriculum. I think schools and teachers, like Fraser, that take advantage of that will be doing something special for their students.

Three Things You Can Do Today to Increase Your Facebook Privacy

For years I was one of those curmudgeons that refused to use Facebook in any capacity. I’ve been turned around on that a little bit because of the success of the Mac Power Users and Free Agents Facebook groups at creating a safe, fun place to talk about shared interests. They are both special communities. Nevertheless, Facebook can be a dangerous place if you care anything about your privacy.

There’s a lot of questions about Facebook lately and I’ve been receiving a lot of email from listeners on the subject. I should preface this post by saying I am hardly a Facebook power user. I log in to participate in the above two groups, but that’s about it.

Nevertheless, even this limited exposure could get me in trouble because Facebook likes to collect data. Between the news of the last few weeks plus the recent discovery that they can also collect your call and text history, I decided it was time to spend a little bit of time tuning up my own Facebook settings and thought I should share with you. So here are a few things you can do today.

1. Delete All Facebook Applications from your Phone (and iPad).

A lot of the trouble arising from Facebook starts with their mobile applications. The trouble is that your phone has a lot of information about you and Facebook is insatiably hungry for information about you. Moreover, over the years we’ve had plenty of evidence that Facebook hasn’t been a real team player on the iPhone and they’ve done all sorts of dirty tricks to make sure their app is always front and center. This is both creepy, and it kills your battery faster.

I understand for a lot of people this is asking a lot. Their phone is their primary window into Facebook, and if that is really what you want, I don’t begrudge you. However, if you can live without Facebook on your phone, I think you’re better off. I just use Facebook in the browser on my Mac (or the browser on my iPad), and it’s just fine.

2. Audit your Privacy Settings

One thing Facebook has improved over the years is exposing its privacy settings. Years ago it felt like playing a videogame to find your way to the proper screens. Now it’s all combined in your setting screen under the privacy tab. Go through it and make changes to suit your level of comfort. I would recommend erring on the side of caution. You can always go back and make the settings more open if you’re finding that the more conservative settings are getting in the way.

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3. Audit your Application Installations

A big part of the recent problems is that the Facebook API is so liberal that apps you authorize are taking a lot more information than you may think. I have not authorized any apps to access my Facebook data and given the limited way in which I use a service; I expect I never will.

You may have some apps that you want to use with Facebook and that is fine but make sure it is your conscious decision to opt in. Take a close look at the apps tab in your Facebook settings and make sure you feel comfortable with every app you’ve authorized to access your data.

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Note there is also a setting on this screen, Apps Others Use, to edit the amount of information other people’s applications can use when accessing your Facebook data. I recommend tapping the edit button and making appropriate changes. I leave very little data exposed this way.