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Category: Mac

Welcome to the PC Malaise Era

Welcome to the PC Malaise Era

It has long been said that from 1973 to 1983, the American automotive industry was stuck in a rut that is now referred to as the Malaise Era. This period of time, marked by some of the most underwhelming, gutless, depressing cars ever to come out of the United States, was bookended on the frontside by the energy crisis and the need for manufacturers who had focused purely on displacement and horsepower to shift their thinking to focus instead on…

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Mac utilities that bring me joy

Mac utilities that bring me joy

During the past 12+ years I’ve used a Mac, I’ve had dozens of little utilities that I swore by for a time, many of which came and went. Some were binkies of a sort, easing the discomfort of using a Mac for a long-time Windows user. Some were power toys – often to find things, run things, or sort things in ways that a Mac’s operating system couldn’t at a certain moment in time. Over the years, what would eventually…

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Tired Mac prose

Tired Mac prose

Over the last several weeks, a Skylake full of ink has been spilled over this fall’s Apple crop. Actually, the press seems fascinated with three distinct topics: Insufficient magic in the 2016 MacBook Pros Apple “sticking it to pros” by offering limited RAM in the MBP Apple “sticking it to pros” by not updating the Mac Pro desktop since 2013. Issue number 1: Beginning the next day after the announcement, I had non-technical friends asking me, “what’s the deal with poor, old,…

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An iPad Pro is not a Mac

An iPad Pro is not a Mac

Last year, Christopher Mims wrote about how Apple should kill off the Mac. Just this week, Apple alumnus Michael Gartenberg wrote that the iPad Pro is the new Mac. It’s human nature to try and match things up… to simplify, organize, and categorize data points. To say a thing is like another thing, or a thing can replace another thing. But I think doing so today only confuses normal users. A few months ago, I wrote a post about how you…

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iOS 7 – These are a few of my favorite things

iOS 7 – These are a few of my favorite things

I’ve been testing iOS 7 from the beginning, and though the UI took a bit of getting used to (and the new icon on the Photos app still makes me do a mental reset sometimes). Overall, I love the changes in it. I’d like to take a minute to tell you about a few of my favorite enhancements in the OS. Control Center – Control Center is easily one of my favorite changes – and it’s immensely useful. A flick…

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Tools to optimize working on the Mac

Tools to optimize working on the Mac

A few weeks ago I wrote about gestures on the Mac vs. Windows 8. By and large, I’ve shifted to using my Mac with most apps in full-screen, and really making the most of the gestures included in OS X 10.8. It isn’t always easy, as certain apps (looking at you, Word 2011), don’t optimally use full-screen. Word has Focus mode (its own full-screen model) and now supports OS X’s full-screen mode – but not together. Meaning if you shift…

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Windows 8 and OS X Mountain Lion – separated at birth?

Windows 8 and OS X Mountain Lion – separated at birth?

Alright – shake out the giggles from the title, and let me show you why I said that. Until recently I had been using Windows 8 every day – and recently switched to a Mac (running 10.8 Mountain Lion) as my primary computing device. The more I have used Mountain Lion – especially with apps in full-screen mode – the more certain things felt subtly similar to Windows 8. I believe that Mountain Lion is yet another step in Apple’s gradual…

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The PadFone is not the future

The PadFone is not the future

I’ve been pondering the existence of devices like the Asus PadFone and PadFone 2 recently. Not really convertible devices, not really hybrid devices, they’re an electronic centaur. Like an Amphicar or a Taylor Aerocar, the PadFone devices compromise their ability to be one good device by instead being two less than great devices. I haven’t found a good description of devices like the PadFone – I refer to them as “form integrated”. One device is a dumb terminal and relies…

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The Stigma of Mac Shaming

The Stigma of Mac Shaming

I recall hearing a story of a co-worker at Microsoft, who was a technical assistant to an executive, who had a Mac. It wouldn’t normally be a big deal, except he worked directly for an executive. As a result, this Mac was seen in many meetings across campus – it’s distinct aluminum body and fruity ghost shining through the lid a constant reminder that this was one less PC sold (even if it ran Windows through Boot Camp or virtualization software….

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The death of the pixel

The death of the pixel

It really didn’t hit me until recently. Something I’ve worked with for years, is being forced to retire. Well, not really retire, but at least asked to take a seat in the background. My daughters love it when I tell them stories about “When I was little…” – the stories always begin with that saying. They usually have a lot to do with technology, and now things have changed over the last 40 years. You know the drill – phones…

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