My MPU co-host has been playing with the new Focus feature that is coming with Apple’s updated operating system. As soon as I saw this in Monday’s keynote, I knew I wanted to hear his take.
Category: Apple
On Shortcuts for Mac⇢
Yours truly, over on Six Colors:
Over the last several years, there has been a lot of hand-wringing about what Shortcuts would mean for old-school Mac automation. It is clear to me that Apple thought about this, and has designed Shortcuts for the Mac to be able to support the old and new, all at the same time. That’s not always Apple’s modus operandi, but it was the right move in this case.
Apple Announces macOS Monterey⇢
Today at WWDC, Apple announced the next version of the Mac operating system, macOS Monterey.1 It doesn’t bring as much change as Big Sur did, but I think most Mac users will be just fine with that. However, I don’t think Monterey is a release worth sleeping on; there is a lot here this year.
All Children are Loved the Same
My initial impression, right after the keynote, is that I am pleased that the almost all of the headlining features in iOS and iPadOS are coming to the Mac this year as well.
Considering a More Mindful Apple Watch
Yesterday, Khaos Tian reported that a text string saying com.apple.Mind had popped up in conjunction with the App Store ahead of WWDC.
Mark Gurman chimed in later saying that Mind is an updated version of Apple’s rather basic Breathe app.
Assuming Mind is being announced tomorrow as part of watchOS 8, I have some wishes for the app, as someone who uses Breathe more than most probably do.
I’d love to Mind be more expansive than Breathe in terms of the types of mindfulness exercises it offers. For the last couple of years, I’ve used the uber-popular Headspace app on my phone and like the variety of guided sessions it offers, especially the ones designed to be used while trying to go to sleep.
Bloomberg: New iPad Pro, iPad mini Design Under Development⇢
Mark Gurman and Debby Wu at Bloomberg:
The Cupertino, California-based company is planning to release the new iPad Pro in 2022 and the iPad mini later this year, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The main design change in testing for the iPad Pro is a switch to a glass back from the current aluminum enclosure. The updated iPad mini is planned to have narrower screen borders while the removal of its home button has also been tested
Apple Tweaking AirTag Privacy Measures, Building Android Detector App⇢
The tech giant said Thursday it’s begun sending out updates to its AirTags, changing the window of time they’ll make noises when potentially being used to track another person. Initially, the Apple device would play in three days. Now it’ll begin to play at a random time inside a window that lasts between 8 and 24 hours.
To further reassure people about its AirTags, Apple said it’s developing an app for Android devices that will help people “detect” an AirTag or Find My network-enabled device that may also be unsuspectedly “traveling” with them. Apple iPhones already have a similar alert system built into their devices. The Android app will be released later this year.
Video: How to Customize macOS System Preferences⇢
System Preferences is a pretty old part of macOS, and while we can’t fix some its more troublesome characteristics, customizing its main user interface is pretty easy:
Big Sur 11.4 Supports Full External Booting for Apple Silicon Macs⇢
Howard Oakley at The Eclectic Light Company:
I’m delighted to report that five months after I wrote that M1 Macs had problems starting up from external disks, Apple has finally fixed Big Sur 11.4 so that they now work fully.
If you have an M1 Mac, you should now be able to connect supported storage, such as an SSD, install on it any version of Big Sur from 11.2 onwards, select that in the Startup Disk pane, and boot your Mac from that external disk.
Apple Via del Corso⇢
Federico got a chance to check out Rome’s new flagship Apple Store and it is stunning.
Inside the M1 iMac⇢
The folks over at iFixit have the first part of their teardown up. This thing really is just a tiny computer in the chin with a big display above it.
macOS 11.4 is Out⇢
Mr. Macintosh has the details, but the release contains a very specific fix:
- 16-inch MacBook may become unresponsive when playing Civilization VI
Saying Goodbye to Bootable Backups⇢
Mike Bombich, writing on the Carbon Copy Cloner blog:
For decades, Mac users have taken for granted the Mac’s “External Boot” feature. Prior to Mac OS X, people could simply drag and drop the System folder from one volume to another; presto, external boot volume. When Apple made it more complicated with Mac OS X, we pioneered the “bootable backup” solution (nearly 20 years ago!), and this has been a feature we’ve reliably supported on every new Mac and every new OS since then.