Five games were just added to Apple Arcade, tempting people to keep their subscription as the service’s one month free trial nears its end.
macOS
Mac Memory, Catalina's Potential – TMO Daily Observations 2019-10-10
Dave Hamilton and John Martellaro join host Kelly Guimont to discuss the right amount of RAM in a Mac, and Catalina’s place in macOS history.
Pixelmator Pro 1.5 Supports macOS Catalina, Sidecar, and Mac Pro
Pixelmator Pro 1.5 Avalon adds support for macOS Catalina, Sidecar, and enhancements for the Mac Pro and its Pro Display XDR.
NYC And Cellebrite, Lightning Cables – TMO Daily Observations 2019-10-09
John Martellaro and Andrew Orr join host Kelly Guimont to discuss Cellebrite’s new partnership and other iPhone hacks like Lightning cables.
10 Features in macOS Catalina You Need to Know
MacMost has a good video on YouTube where he shares 10 macOS Catalina features. They’re smaller features that don’t get the same attention or shoutout by Apple, but they’re good to know. The first one he mentions is a feature that I noticed but was annoyed about. When you hover or long-click the green fullscreen button in Safari, it now brings up a menu window to enter full screen or tile the window to the left or right. While it makes this capability more obvious it also adds an extra step, when just dragging the window by the green button was faster. In any case the video is pretty helpful and you can watch it here.
Netflix Says No to macOS Catalina, Won't Port its App Over
With the release of macOS Catalina and Catalyst, many developers are now porting their iOS apps to the Mac. But not Netflix.
Last year, Apple Inc. software chief Craig Federighi said developers would be able to easily bring their iPad apps to Mac computers, essentially letting coders write an app once and deploy it across millions more devices. So far, the reality has fallen short for some developers and is even leaving consumers paying twice for apps. Major app developers and service providers like Netflix Inc. are also demurring on taking part, at least at this early stage.
I’ll be interested to see if Hulu ports their app over.
iCloud Drive Folder Sharing Delayed Until Spring 2020
Apple has quietly delayed the iCloud Drive folder sharing feature in iOS 13 and macOS Catalina due to unknown issues in the betas.
PSA: Don't Be Surprised if Some Apps Have Issues With macOS Catalina, Like Hazel
macOS Catalina dropped yesterday and some apps might not work with it. 32-bits apps aren’t supported but even 64-bit apps run into trouble.
Backblaze Launches Cloud Backup 7.0
Cloud storage company Backblaze is launching Cloud Backup 7.0 today. It supports macOS Catalina and gives customers a big new feature.
Jamf Has Day-Zero Support macOS Catalina
As macOS Catalina rolled out to users, Apple management tool Jamf announced day-zero support for the updated operating system.
Eight (GB) is Enough – Mac Geek Gab 783
Catalina is out and your geeks have migration and installation tips to share from their experiences. Take a listen to this episode before you upgrade, for sure. But Catalina isn’t the only topic this week, folks. Lots of iOS 13 tips and tricks, lots of other macOS stuff, and all of your questions answered, too!
Create a macOS Catalina Bootable Drive for Installation
Roman Loyola shares a tip for Apple users looking to upgrade: Creating a macOS Catalina bootable drive.
An external drive that you can use as an installer for macOS Catalina is a handy thing to have. If you have multple Macs to upgrade, it’s a lot more efficient to plug in the USB installer drive and run the installer than to log into the App Store, download the 6.5GB OS installer, and then run it.
macOS Catalina is Now Available for Apple Customers
macOS Catalina is now available to the public today bringing with it a lot of new features like Screen Time, iTunes split apart, and more.
32BitAppCheck Helps You Transition to macOS Catalina
32BitAppCheck is an app that scans for 32-bit apps on your Mac. It can help you prepare for macOS Catalina because this release will end support for 32-bit apps. It takes about 30 seconds to scan your computer (longer if you have hard drives plugged in). Once it’s finished it will present a list of all the 32-bit apps it found, which you can save as an .RTF file.
Information then collected in the app’s window begins with a list of 32-bit applications, followed by 32-bit preference panes found in System preferences. Then, you will see 32-bit system extensions, and 32-bit system frameworks. These software will include both Apple and 3rd-party software. You can then edit the information, changing fonts, and adding notes. Click Save to save the information in an RTF file. The most recent information with you edits is also saved within the app.
You can download the app here. As this is an app outside of the Mac App Store, I scanned it for malware using VirusTotal, and it appears to be clean. For an additional resource I’ve also written about Go64, which does the same thing and the UI is a bit more friendly.
WebKit Zero Day Served Malicious Ads to iOS, macOS Users via 'eGobbler'
Criminal group eGobbler took advantage of a WebKit zero day to create over a billion malicious ads to affect iOS and macOS users.
Quick iOS 13 Messages Tips; Beginning Catalina Prep – TMO Daily Observations 2019-09-30
Dave Hamilton and Andrew Orr join host Kelly Guimont to discuss some hints for iMessage in iOS 13, and we start talking Catalina prep.
macOS Mojave 10.14.6 Patches a Security Hole
Along with iOS 12.4.2 Apple is releasing macOS Mojave 10.14.6, a second supplemental update with security fixes.
If you’re running an earlier version of macOS then you will instead find Security Update 2019-005 for macOS High Sierra and Security Update for macOS Sierra available as system software updates.
The security issue as shared here fixes CVE-2019-8641: A remote attacker may be able to cause unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution.
All the macOS Wallpapers: Jaguar to Catalina
USA Today/tech has published a showcase of the Mac OS X/OS X/macOS wallpapers throughout the years. It’s very cool. By the way, TMO discovered which galaxy was used for OS X Mountain Lion back in 2012.
macOS: How to Manage Download Permissions in Safari 13
Although Apple hasn’t released macOS Catalina yet, it did update its browser to Safari 13. It has a new section for downloads permissions.
Answers and Tips for iCloud, iOS 13, iPhone 11, macOS, and More – Mac Geek Gab 781
Lots of new stuff from Apple this week… and lots of technical landmines to navigate. Thankfully, you’ve been sending your questions into John and Dave, and they’ve been doing the research to get you answers. Listen to the answers to your questions – and everyone else’s, too! Press play, and enjoy learning at least five new things… one that might even save your bacon this week!
macOS Catalina Isn't Coming Until October
Apple updated its website today, noting that macOS Catalina won’t arrive until an unknown date in October. From TechCrunch:
After a summer of beta testing, Apple is about to release the next major version of macOS: macOS Catalina. But not so fast; the new version will arrive in October, according to Apple’s updated website. As always, this update will be available as a free download in the Mac App Store.
The software release dates are all over the place this year.
New iPhone Speculation, Catalina Features – TMO Daily Observations 2019-09-04
Charlotte Henry and Bob “Dr Mac” LeVitus join host Kelly Guimont to talk about the new wave of iPhone SE speculation and Catalina features.
iPhone Hacks, Python, Particle Debris – TMO Daily Observations 2019-08-30
John Martellaro and Andrew Orr join host Kelly Guimont to discuss an iOS vulnerability, the future of Python on macOS, and Particle Debris.
The Origins of Unix - Now 50 Years Old
ars technica has posted at terrific story by Richard Jensen on the origins of the Unix operating system back in the late 1960s.
Maybe its pervasiveness has long obscured its origins. But Unix, the operating system that in one derivative or another powers nearly all smartphones sold worldwide, was born 50 years ago from the failure of an ambitious project that involved titans like Bell Labs, GE, and MIT.
A derivative of the original Unix OS, in the family tree of BSD, is the basis for macOS, iOS, and is even running in your Apple Watch.