Those who have already upgraded to Lion have found some problems. John Carter comments, "One thing to note, is that Picasa can no longer access iPhoto library. We’ll have to wait for an update to Picasa for that fix. There are other bumps, in particular with Parallels. If you’re using Parallels with Windows (any version) be sure to only open the guest OS in the Coherence mode. You’ll go crazy trying to figure out where the guest OS window is otherwise. And don’t even bother trying to bring up Ubuntu on the iMac under Parallels on the iMac, but it does work on the MacBook Pro. Isn’t it strange how the supposedly the same operating system works different on the different hardware? Not really."
Lion Too Tough for Newbies?
This looks long, but it's worth your time. John Carter gives a lot of info on Lion. He starts out, "Jim Hamm brought an article to my attention wherein the author thinks that Lion might be too much for his senior parents to make the switch to from Snow Leopard.
"Yes, and no. There are features that have change dramatically from 10.6 to 10.7. Spaces and Expose for one (or rather two into one). When I discovered that you needed either a Magic Mouse or a Magic Trackpad on an iMac to use all those complicated finger motions, I rushed right out and bought the trackpad. I was doing just fine without it.
"In fact, for a two-finger, mouse-pushing geezer like me, a standard two-button mouse with scroll wheel is all I really need. I had trouble with the Magic Mouse when I had it, because my fingers like to tap and wiggle on the surface of things when I’m thinking about what to do next, and lo and behold if those taps and wiggles don’t mean something on a Magic Mouse - and a trackpad!
"Okay, so now my iMac has both a standard mouse right next to my keyboard and a trackpad up above it. So far, there are very few things I’ve needed the trackpad for. Let’s see if I manage to keep the trackpad past the 30-day return period.
"And my MacBook Pro? It also sports a two-button mouse with scroll wheel. That’s one gadget I can’t do without on any computer.
There's more coming as John goes on, "Anyway, back to the other features of Lion.
"If you don’t like the way Mail looks, you can switch back to the classic view.
"If you don’t like scrolling down in order to scroll up (depending on your point of view), you can change the direction of the scroll based on the direction of the scroll wheel or the direction of the fingers on the trackpad.
"If you don’t like swirling around on the trackpad to get from one Desktop to another looking for your apps, just ignore the fact that you have more than one Desktop and don’t bother trying to figure out which Desktop you’re in - it doesn’t matter as long as you know how to use CMD-Tab to switch between applications and CMD-Space to bring up Spotlight to then key in the name of an application you want to launch.
"And what does it matter that you no longer need to exit from an application when all that is needed is to close the window of an app? If the window is gone, do you really care if the app is still active or not? Well, in one way it does matter. Each app that is launched uses some memory, even if there is no window open. But, if no window is open (and that means not even hidden from view), there is virtually no processor resource used - so who cares?
"One real problem for anyone is figuring out how to get out of full screen mode so you can see that old familiar menu bar across the top of the display. Well, just press the ESC key.
"In other words, the only thing that’s changed for me so far is that I really do like the facelift in Mail.
And, wrapping it up John states, "And what about the author’s article? How did the readers take to it? You’ll have to read them to see what I mean by it doesn’t make any difference whether you upgrade to Lion or not. What you use and how you use it is all up to you. Don’t be afraid to venture into the unknown, because if you start out with fear, it will only lead to anger."
You Can Block All Ad Spying
Here's some interesting info from Prez Art Gorski. He writes about Ghostery, "This Safari plug-in (double-click on it after download to install) will allow you to block all ad spying services. To configure that option, go to a website like Macworld where Ghostery will show you the list of services spying on you, then right click on that to go to the Ghostery settings. In there, you can block all of them."
Note the tiny "ghostly" icon in the heading when I bring up this PMUG Newsblog for the following screen shot.
Get a Google+ Profile RSS Feed
What? you say as you read the title here. Yes, we need to consider the possibilities of Google+ and RSS and Twitter. Jim Hamm provides this article with simple instructions. Go to MakeUseOf newsletter and scroll down to to learn the latest. Jim explains, "I'm not much of a user of Google+ yet, but it might be interesting to see if posts to Google+ would appear via RSS in Google Reader, which I use a lot."
Mac & iPad Success
Here’s an article Jim Hamm sends from Forbes that discusses the success of the iPad. When iOS 5 is released, this will permit the iPad to stand alone and not require a “mother’ computer to connect to for updates. This will probably help in fueling even more sales of the iPad, even as Mac continues to sell very well.
Calling it "Surprised Acceptance to Focused Strategy" the article includes an interesting list of unexpected companies deploying iPads to their sales teams, others using iPads for internal company training, and even airline pilots using iPads.
Jim comments, "While I certainly enjoy my iPad, it couldn’t be my only computer yet. As more capability is built-in over time, perhaps someday. In the meantime, I’ll just enjoy the convenience -- and novelty -- that the iPad offers."
Lion Vulnerability Discussed
This Cult of Mac article declares Mac with a firewire port running OS Lion can be hacked within minutes. It goes on to say, "It's easy to secure your Mac by turning off 'automatic login' setting and shutting down the computer totally instead of putting it to sleep." Read the details.
Alphabetize/Sort with Pages
After my complaining about Pages (7-24), let's hear from John Carter who explains how to sort lists:
"Pages will only sort lists that are in a table. Here’s the process (gleaned from here):
Select the paragraphs to sort.
menu Format > Table > Convert text to table
Select the table cells, then
Inspector > Table > Edit Rows and columns > Sort …
Finally,
menu Format > Table > Convert table to text."
Why NOT to go to Lion
Now, it's time for a smile! Here's David Passell's take on why he will not be going to Lion until --
1. Others have torn their hair out (I've already lost mine) and stomped on the bugs.
2. I get another high capacity HD to totally backup my system. All the ones I have including the one in my Mini are much under the 10% free recommendation. I have lots of space on my Time Machine backup drive, but I am told I can't use it.
3. I learn more about why I should want this Latest and Greatest System. I don't buy iTunes Movies or Tunes.
4. I decide to be patient and keep all instruments like axes, clubs, and large mallets out of reach. I don't think it is true that older people become more patient :)
5. It might also help if Apple would sell install DVDs in addition to forcing people to download gigabytes. They aren't that costly.
More on Safari Security
Jim Hamm finds an article about the new Security and Privacy columns in Safari.
How to Download Lion on a Thumb Drive
Interested in downloading Lion (your new feline friend) and creating an install disc or bootable thumb drive, then look at this from MacLife, sent to us from David Passell.
Listen About Lion
"If your eyes are growing weary of reading all about the tips, tricks and nuances of OS X Lion, how about listening to them. Pull up a chair, put your headphones on, and take a listen to this podcast." This is Jim Hamm's voice you hear just now in your imagination. Try this from MacObserver.
Microsoft Office Issues to Consider
Thinking of upgrading to Lion? A careful look at the known issues may underscore the idea of waiting for upgrades in Lion, according to this article about Microsoft Office. Thanks to Prez Art Gorski for this information.
Changing Documents from Word to Pages
With a huge file of things accumulated that I wrote with Microsoft Word '97 and then Word 2004 holding up my upgrade to Lion the question is: how to change every document to Pages. More recently I’ve gone from Pages ’08 to Pages ’09, which is currently v. 4.1.
Here’s the solution, unless you can come up with something easier that doesn’t cost $$$. Click on the title of a document in the folder to highlight it, then Control Click on the title. On the little drop down menu choose Save As and select Pages.
(Pages is a good writing tool for me, with one exception: it doesn't know how to alphabetize a list, or "sort" as Word refers to the procedure under the heading Tools.)
Password Protection
Wondering about passwords, we queried David Passell. Here's his take:
"The password method I was speaking of finally bubbled to the surface. Of course MS Word, Open Office, and Pages allows you to password protect a single document, check HELP. However, I wanted to password protect a whole folder full of stuff. Like I would put it in Dropbox, but nobody else could see it (I don't know whether they could delete it though--something I don't like about Dropbox.)
Anyway what I did was:
1. Start Disk Utility
2. Select FILE > disk image from folder
• Window opens
3. Find the folder full of stuff you want to protect.
4. Click on it
• A window opens and you will see the [folder name].dmg
5. If you click on the arrows to the right of "compressed" (the default) you will have choices, but you can leave it where it is.
6. Click on arrows to the right of "encryption" and you will be able to choose 128 bit or 256 bit encryption. 128 should be adequate.
7. Click SAVE button on the lower right of the window and you will see
8. Type in a password and then again to verify it. Note that as you type in your password a graph will tell you whether it is a strong or weak password. One punctuation mark seems sufficient to raise it from Fair to Good.
9. Now you will have a [folder name].dmg folder. You could put it in dropbox and nobody but you could open it.
10. To open the folder double-click it.
11. Enter the password and OK and if you didn't make a mistake (I usually do at least once) you will see
12. Now if you click on the disk drive symbol you can access what is there.
NOTE: If you did not uncheck "save in keychain" it will open on your own machine without typing in a password.
13. When you are through EJECT the drive symbol.
Thanks, David, for your input.
How to Add Holidays to iCal
Getting holidays added to iCal sounds easy to do. Jim Hamm provides this link.
Learning About Lion
Yes, there's more to learn, but it's easy and it's fun -- so, of course, it's Mac! Helping us learn about Lion Jim Hamm sends us some useful links, along with relating his own Lion experiences. Read on:
"I did another install of OS X Lion on my MacBook Air (3 1/2 years old) and the download took 50 minutes and the install took 50 minutes - an improvement from my older MacBook Pro. Again, everything seems to be working -- sometimes a bit too much. I noticed my CPU on the Air was running at nearly 100% and wondered why? Two processes -- MDWorker and MDS -- were soaking up all my CPU cycles. A little research found that Spotlight was indexing everything on my Air. Looking at the small Spotlight magnifier icon in the upper right corner of my screen showed a small dot in the center, which indicated that indexing was going on. The report I read indicated just to let this indexing continue and it would stop in about 15 minutes. I did and it did.
"Occasionally there will be little blips in using Lion. For example, this morning my MacBook Pro, upon opening it, didn’t find my wifi network. A bit of fiddling got it going again. Zee had a problem in Safari when all of a sudden she couldn’t click a link and get it to do anything. I suggested a restart which fixed the problem. From our experience, and reading other blogs on the install of Lion, it seems the fix of the moment is to do a restart on these small blips.
"Adobe and Lion don’t seem to play well together. Here is an article with more about this.
"From reading various blogs and articles on Lion, most people seem to be pleased with Lion -- but not all. A couple of people have stated they want to go back to Snow Leopard. My impression of Lion? It’s fine, is probably the first thought that comes to mind -- and I’m glad we upgraded. If someone were to ask me if they should upgrade to Lion now, I’d say not necessarily unless they just want to experience the latest OS. The partial melding of OS and iOS is the way Apple is heading, so I thought we’d get on the bandwagon early-on and learn more about this new OS. Apparently the security of Lion has been improved significantly, which is a good thing. A couple of small blips -- like scrolling in a different direction than usual, and which I was accustomed to, and a missing scroll bar (which I didn’t miss, but other people did) -- were easily fixed and reverted in System Preferences.
"Mail is quite a bit different in Lion. I’m adjusting to the new format and not sure, at this time, that I like it better than the ‘old’ format. It is basically the same format as one sees in an Apple mobile device, so my learning curve isn’t as steep as it might otherwise have been." Jim also mentions an article about Mail.
Now Jim goes on to say, "Walt Mossberg, tech writer for the Wall Street Journal, likes the new features in Lion and elaborates on his opinion in this review. Other tech writers report similar impressions. And the price of the upgrade at $30 is certainly reasonable -- in fact, a bargain I’d say. Just think about all the development work that went into Lion, and we’re buying all this for just $30. A lot of ‘roar’ for the buck, I’d say." And here Jim gives us a grin.
But wait, Jim has found more good articles to read after you've installed Lion. First from techcrunch, and then from applegazette. (How to add your signature to a pdf caught my attention.)
Here is the very latest from Jim. View a 19 minute FREE video tutorial on the installation of Lion from ScreenCastsonline.
Stay tuned for more about Lion later. Jim seems to have been the first from PMUG to make the plunge.
The New MacBook Air
Curious about the newest MacBook Air? Examine the teardown from ifixit.
Let's Hear About Lion
The news today is full of information and comments on Lion. Jim Hamm sends this article on Lion security that introduces us to ASLR (Address Space Layout Randomization) and "security sandboxes," and this article on how to access your Library folder in Finder. He comments that Method 2 works fine.
Jim also wants us to see this from the New York Times. Their last paragraph summarizes what they're trying to explain, "The Lion upgrade, in other words, is classic Apple: innovative to some, gimmicky to others, big leaps forward, a few stumbles back. It may never be the king of the jungle. But once the world’s software companies have fully Lionized their wares, and once Apple exterminates the bugs, Mac OS X 10.7 might be something even more exotic: a fast, powerful, good-looking, virus-free, thoroughly modern operating system."
More news: Lion will be available via USB drive for $69 from the Apple store in late August.
Safari and the Cookies
Earlier we'd looked at Cookies. Now after the upgrade to Safari 5.1 the Command + Comma command brings up a new look at Preferences > Security. Go to Privacy on the bar there to bring up Block Cookies, Limit website access, and the list of Cookies and website data. After carefully opting in to Cookies only to post to my blogs and then afterwards deleting all Cookies it was a shock to see a huge list of 595 websites which have latched on to tracking my data since upgrading to Safari this afternoon. (To see the topic of Cookies go to Labels on the right side of this home page and scroll down.)
Since starting this post I've had 35 new websites latch on to my computer. Is this the way Safari is going to behave now?
Important Security Updates for Safari
"Apple patches 48 Safari bugs to deflect drive-by attacks." This got my attention just now. Computerworld goes on to say that Safari 5.1 also adds new features and updates for Snow Leopard and Leopard. These are considered "critical." Take a look for yourself.