Kibbles & Bytes Blog

Apple news, tech tips, and more…

KB Dog

  • There is something about long-distance motorcycle touring that is gratifying and fulfilling for me. Whether it is the necessity of heightened senses and safety or the freedom of the road, being out on the road with no deadline and breaking the normal routine is exciting and relaxing. We search for the interesting 2-lane roads, avoid cities and highways and end up meeting new people and places.

    Thanks for reading this issue of Kibbles & Bytes!

    Your Kibbles & Bytes Team,

    _Don, Dean, Emily & Scott_

  • LifeProof – Dive In!

    iPhone users have access to some incredible cases from large manufactures like “**Griffin**”:http://www.smalldog.com/category/?mmfg%5B0%5D=Griffin+Technology, “**Otterbox**”:http://www.smalldog.com/category/?mmfg%5B0%5D=OtterBox, “**LifeProof**”:http://www.smalldog.com/category/?mmfg%5B0%5D=LifeProof, and “**Speck**”:http://www.smalldog.com/category/?mmfg%5B0%5D=Speck. There are even those that are more unique and made out of wood, recycled aluminum, carbon fiber, and many finely crafted materials. As our buyer I’ve always wondered what goes into making a case selection. Do you simply purchase one case for everyday needs? Or maybe you buy the same case in multiple colors to match that day’s outfit? With the wide variety of sleek and slim to burly and drop-proof maybe you have a case for the different activities you engage in?

    I find that no one case can serve all my needs, but that’s ok, because there is a case made for all the activities I enjoy. Most recently I went on a trip on Green River Reservoir and realized my sleek and slim case wasn’t going to cut it out on the water. I reached out to our friends at LifeProof for an answer. They recommended the Nuud for iPhone 6. For those readers that may not be familiar with LifeProof, it’s just that: life proof. Their cases are made to withstand whatever life throws at them, be it falls, water, dust, mud, etc. LifeProof has built both their “**Fre and Nuud cases**”:http://www.smalldog.com/category/?mmfg%5B0%5D=LifeProof&mc%5B0%5D=iPhone_Accessories to withstand it all be it for your iPad, iPad mini, or iPhone 4/5/6. They’ll keep it safe in the most extreme conditions.

    !{display: block;margin-left: auto;margin-right: auto;}http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4480.jpg!

    My friends use the Fre but I noticed there was one big thing missing on the Nuud: a screen protector. I quickly had a “duh moment” and realized that was the point. It used the glass on the phone to create a waterproof seal. I was skeptical to say the least. I have a 128GB iPhone 6 and am going to put it in the water? First things first, backup your iPhone! Secondly, going against all my manly instincts I read the instructions and found they included a piece to preform a water test. You need to do this. Check all the seals, place included test piece inside and seal it up. Place the case under water for thirty minutes. I took it out, and sure enough it was dry as a bone.

    This still didn’t make putting my iPhone in the water any easier. After airdropping my photos to my iPad I felt confident that I wouldn’t lose anything (well, besides my iPhone). Fear not, it was a success. I’ve included some photos from my excursion. What a great case! The initial test was scary but after that I couldn’t get enough. The reservoir wasn’t as clear as a river may have been but it was still amazing to take videos and photos underwater. I also have to note that all the photos I took during the trip were taken with the case on and look great. I say that because I feared the case covering the lens would affect the photo quality. I can’t wait to get out on the river and take some more awesome photos this summer. If you’re headed out on the water this summer, be smart and protect your tech from all life can throw at it with a case from LifeProof.

    !{display: block;margin-left: auto;margin-right: auto;}http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4479.jpg!
    !{display: block;margin-left: auto;margin-right: auto;}http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4478.jpg!

  • El Capitan

    As I mentioned I have been using the beta version of Mac OS X 10.11 for some weeks and I thought, now that the public beta is released, that it might be a good time to review what’s new in El Capitan. I am going to do this by highlighting a few of the features that I already use and have become such a part of my Mac experience that they don’t seem new anymore.

    **Shut up!**

    What is more annoying than following a link to a web site and suddenly being bombarded with some automatically started video blasting audio? If you are like me, you may have several tabs open in Safari and finding that annoying one has been a pain. Well with El Capitan it is simple. When one of those tabs has audio, the tab shows the audio button and you can click on it to mute the audio. The address bar also has an audio icon where you can mute all or select which audio stream to mute or listen to.

    !{display: block;margin-left: auto;margin-right: auto;}http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4483.png!

    **Notable**

    The Notes app is so improved that I am actually using it more extensively now. Most importantly, a note I create on my iPhone is available on my Mac or iPad. Not only that but the things I can put into my notes are actually useful. I can add a photo, a URL, a map location or even a video to a note and it is on all my devices. Checklists, websites, ideas for the next Kibbles & Bytes and directions can all be saved. As I am planning my trip out west and find interesting places to go or places to spend the night, I can add them to my “Sturgis” note and easily use Maps to guide me to them. I think you are going to love the new Notes app.

    **Spotlight**

    Spotlight is just better. Who needs Google when you have Spotlight? Whether you are searching for a file on your drive, baseball statistics, transit information, weather, stocks or just some obscure trivia to settle a bet Spotlight is there for you and now you can ask that question in you own words. Like, “find that Note I wrote about Sturgis” and boom, there it is. Here’s a list of all the places you can search with Spotlight in El Capitan. You can turn these on and off as needed:

    Applications
    Bing Web Searches
    Bookmarks and History
    Calculator
    Contacts
    Conversion
    Definition
    Developer
    Documents
    Events & Reminders
    Folders
    Fonts
    Images
    Mail & Messages
    Movies
    Music
    Other
    PDF Documents
    Presentations
    Spotlight Suggestions
    Spreadsheets
    System Preferences

    **Shake that Thing**

    I use a dual monitor set up. I have an Apple 27-inch display and a stand for my MacBook Air that makes for one large extended desktop. Sometimes, I lose my cursor and that sometimes leads to inadvertent clicks. I never thought I would say that I would find this trick useful but with El Capitan if you jiggle your mouse or trackpad your cursor grows bigger and becomes apparent so you can get back on track.

    I’ll cover more of the new features in Kibbles & Bytes as we head towards the official release of El Capitan.

  • _Dear Friends,_

    As you read this I am heading off through northern New York and Ontario to South Dakota for the 75th annual motorcycle rally at Sturgis. I am bringing my full compliment of technology with me and I am sure it will get a good workout especially the travel and navigation apps. Our current plan is to head to the UP in Michigan, stop at the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore before we head into Wisconsin and head west through Minnesota and North Dakota and then south to Sturgis. We’ll say hello to Mt. Rushmore and Devil’s Tower, see a bajillion motorcycles and ride the Black Hills before we meander a bit to Colorado and then head back east.

    I have been using the developer’s versions of iOS9 and OS 10.11 El Capitan and as with other betas they keep getting better and better and closer to being ready for prime time. I found a bug in iOS9 that prevented my Kirkland Signature 6.0 hearing aids from pairing with my iPhone. I was missing out on some of the handy features for a couple weeks. I submitted a bug report to Apple and it was followed up upon and the latest release resolved the issue. Now I can stream my calls, music and content directly to the hearing aids. This was particularly handy as I was using GoToMeeting to interview candidates for the VBSR Executive Director opening.

    Speaking of job openings, Small Dog Electronics has several openings for service techs, retail staff and marketing assistance. You can always see our latest openings at “**smalldog.com/jobs**”:http://smalldog.com/jobs.

    This week’s Kibbles & Bytes special is a first-come, first-served ancient Mac special. We have seven used Mac Pros from way back in 2006. They only have a power-on warranty, will run Mac OS X 10.7.5 but nothing later. They have a 2.66GHz processor, 2GB of RAM, 250GB drive and a SuperDrive. No keyboard or mouse. Apple’s part # for these as MA356LL/A. Okay, I did say they were ancient, right? How’s $199 each for a “**piece of history**”:http://www.smalldog.com/wag900001924/?

  • I am taking a ride over to the Adirondacks on Saturday over to the Indian dealer so my friend can get her 500 mile service on her Scout before we leave on the big trip to South Dakota next week. Looks like great weather this weekend. I hope you have an awesome weekend and thank you for reading this issue of Kibbles & Bytes!

    Your Kibbles & Bytes Team,

    _Don, Dean & Scott_

  • Setting up Parental Controls

    Our devices are powerful tools. They provide us with endless resource options and allow us to create just about anything from anywhere. With power also comes the ability for young users to access information and content we might not want them to. Thankfully both Mac OS X and iOS on iPad and iPhones have fairly robust parental controls. I recently set up restrictions on both my Mac mini and my kids’ iPad to ensure I didn’t have to worry about what they were seeing or doing when using these devices.

    Admittedly the OS X operating system has significantly more options for restrictions and settings when it comes to parental controls. As many of us know, Mac OS X allows you to set up multiple users with different access levels, and managed parental control is one of them. Setting up a new user on your Mac is very easy. From your admin account simply go to **system preferences > users & groups** and select the **+** sign. From here you can easily set up a new account that specifically is set up as **Managed with Parental Controls,** and create a new user ID and password for the new account. This account will have a password associated with it, so make sure it’s not the same as the admin password.

    !{display: block;margin-left: auto;margin-right: auto;}http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4463.png!

    From here you can quickly and easily set multiple levels of controls such as restricting adult content on websites, what applications the user can access, and even setting time limits. For my purposes I set up my kids’ account to only be able to access specific websites. Apple makes this easy by starting you out with a default list of a dozen or so approved sites. You can add to this list or remove them all together and add your own sites. To ensure my settings were correct I tried to visit a website that was not in the list and I was quickly denied access. One great feature to this is that it does give you the ability to approve a website to the list without switching user accounts. All that you need to do is enter the admin username and password to quickly update the list. To further set up restrictions you can access **parental controls** from system preferences and adjust restrictions as needed. You can limit the time of day the user can access the machine with time limit, which applications on the computer they can or cannot access and even “**manage controls from another computer.**”:https://support.apple.com/kb/PH18571?locale=en_US

    !{display: block;margin-left: auto;margin-right: auto;}http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4464.png!

    With iOS you can also set up a number of restrictions as well. In my opinion the settings on the iPad are not as convenient as those within OS X. The biggest limitation is that you cannot set up for an individual user, so any restrictions apply to the iPad or iPhone itself. Nonetheless they are very effective and simple to set up. Simply go to **settings > general > restrictions.** From here you will be asked to set up a PIN code to access and update the restrictions and can customize many options from disabling Safari or the App store to restricting explicit lyrics. In my testing I did find some more refined restrictions such as age limits on Apps were not as effective as I had hoped. I did hope to restrict my kids from my FaceBook App by using age restrictions but regretfully it was still accessible. However you can easily restrict specific websites or even location services like you can within OS X.

    While I admit I do prefer the options within OS X, it’s good to know that no matter what Apple device your kids are using there are several options available to parents to control the content and usage of those devices. While in my house my kids might not be thrilled with the new settings, as a parent, I am much more comfortable when I hand over a device to them!

  • Apple Confuses the Street

    So, if you had over $220 billion in the bank, just posted a $10.7 billion profit on nearly $50 billion in sales and achieved a 75% market share in a totally new category you might say that is good news, right? Apple posted record 3rd quarter sales – the best in the company’s history, they increased sales and profit by over 33% year-over-year, and beat their own estimates for the quarter. Apple’s Mac sales went up 9% when all other computer manufacturers’ were declining by double digits. They sold 47.5 million iPhones and beat the Wall Street earnings estimate of $1.81 per share by posting $1.85 per share. Oh yeah, while they didn’t release actual numbers it is apparent that somewhere around 2-4 million Apple watches were sold in the face of constrained supply for much of the quarter. That’s more than either the initial sales of iPhone or iPad and more that all the other smartwatch manufacturers combined!

    Okay that’s a lot of good news and certainly paints a picture of a successful company continuing to innovate and generate profits from the money machine that is Apple. But what happened? Apple’s common stock took a beating as it usually does regardless of how good the news may be. Apple’s conservative accounting also revealed that they consciously reduced channel inventory by over 1 million units. This is probably in preparation for new product introductions in the next quarter. If they had chosen to leave those 1 million units in the channel, they would have posted significantly higher sales and profits, too!

    The concerns expressed were that perhaps the Chinese market was saturated. Please. There is a vibrant and growing middle class in China that is hungry for Apple’s products and they have just scratched the surface of the market with 40 retail stores. Sure there is some turmoil in the Chinese stock market but that is a very new and very different market and it does not necessarily reflect the state of the economy there. In fact, the Chinese stock market is up something like 99% even with the recent downturn. I agree with the several commentators that this summer sale on Apple stock is a good thing if you are an investor.

    Another hidden gem in the report is that Apple’s investment in R&D has exceeded $2 billion for the first time. You can do some good work creating new products and improving existing products when you are spending that much money every three months! Apple set an all-time record for revenue from their “services” category which includes the App Store and reported that revenue from the App Store in China more than doubled year over year.

    Apple’s quarterly financial report was mostly good news. There was an expected decline in iPad sales but that decline seems to have slowed a bit and Tim Cook continued to express a lot of confidence in the iPad. There are 35 new MobileFirst Apps from the IBM partnership and Apple expects 100 by the end of the year.

    I don’t think you can expect any company to do better than Apple has done this past quarter; they are truly remarkable results with another record-breaking quarter under their belt. Every now and then Apple stock takes a little summer vacation and you can thank the perpetual pessimists on Wall Street for the Apple stock bargains now. Our congratulations to the entire Apple team for an astounding quarter!

  • _Dear Friends,_

    Nothing beats coming home after work and having fresh berries to graze on in the yard. Yesterday after a rain storm I went out in the yard and spent some time getting wet and moving from bush to bush eating ripe blueberries, raspberries and a few lingering strawberries. I figure I have to beat the birds and other critters to this food but we share with the animals, too. Now, when it comes time for the sweet corn, however, I am not sharing with the raccoons!

    Apple posted their 3rd quarter financials on Tuesday and once again exceeded their guidance and posted record numbers. Overall sales were up over 33% and profits by 38% but Apple’s stock fell in overnight trading. Apple is held to a nearly impossible standard. It is not enough just to crush guidance and estimates, Apple must obliterate them to make some on Wall Street happy. I’ll go into the numbers some more below but I did want to congratulate Apple on another amazing quarter.

    We say goodbye to an 11-year veteran of Small Dog this week as Jaime Service leaves to take a position with the post office in my home town. Jaime has been a steady and positive influence in the company for over a decade. He has been our warehouse guy, knowing each and every product, handling our shipping and receiving and be a constant source of pirate jokes and Boston Red Sox cheering. We wish Jaime the best of luck in his new career, you will be missed!

    This week’s Kibbles & Bytes exclusive features the fully loaded Apple Certified Refurbished MacBook Air. This model has a 1.7GHz Intel i7 processor, 8GB of RAM and the big 512GB SSD drive. It comes with a 1-year Apple warranty and 90-days of free tech support, however, we are bundling it with the AppleCare Protection Plan which extends both warranty and tech support to 3-years. To make this an even more powerful bundle we are also adding in Safeware Accidental damage coverage which will provide 3-year protection from accidental damage, like when you drop your Mac and crack the screen.

    This bundle would be pretty good with the MacBook Air, AppleCare and Safeware but this week I want you to have a backup drive, too, so will include the Seagate Backup Plus Slim Portable in the 2TB size. This bundle would sell for $1899 but this week for Kibbles & Bytes readers you can get the “*MacBook Air, AppleCare, Safeware and the 2TB drive for only $1749*”:http://www.smalldog.com/wag900001917, a $150 savings!

  • Tech Bits!

    Remember starting up your old mac and having every Mac user’s nightmare? That’s right, the sad mac!

    This symbol was used on older Macs and iPods and would show up upon start up when the device was experiencing a severe hardware issue.

    Have you ever wondered how this icon came about? This image was designed by Susan Kare, a graphic designer who was reportedly asked to create the image, but was told it would not actually be seen by the user. As many of us unfortunately know all too well, this was not the case. Susan created this and countless other icons we looked at in the early days of the mac as an original member of the Apple design team.

  • A Package Manager for Your Mac

    I’m a Mac user by way of Linux. From the time I was in college around 2008 to up until the beginning of 2015, my primary computer ran various versions of Linux. My favorite was “*Linux Mint*”:http://www.linuxmint.com/. Prior to using Linux as my desktop OS I had been using it on various web servers for a few years. I love Linux. There are so many distributions to choose from, each with its own quirks, benefits and methodology.

    After using Linux for so long I became accustomed to being able to do certain things quickly and easily, especially from the command line. One of the things that made me hesitate about the jump to Mac was that many of those tools and programs I loved weren’t as easily available. I was never interested in downloading source and compiling it. Most distributions of Linux come with something called a package manager. This software knows about internet-based repositories of software and can download and install them on your computer with a few simple commands. The biggest benefit of installing software this way is that if one package depends on another, you don’t have to know what the other package is. The package manager will automatically download and install any dependencies.

    So in moving to a Mac, what am I to do? One of my favorite little command line programs on Linux was “*FFmpeg*”:https://www.ffmpeg.org/. Got a movie in this format but want it in that format? FFmpeg can do it. Want to trim some movie clip down, flip the video in the x-axis and add a watermark? FFmpeg can do it. FFmpeg can do anything, and it’s command line based, so there isn’t a lot of fluff meaning that it’s pretty fast.

    Over the weekend I had shot a 10 second mpeg-4 video with my phone that I wanted to convert into an animated GIF to share with some friends. In Linux, I’d just fire up FFmpeg and get it done in a few minutes, but my Mac didn’t have FFmpeg. I didn’t want to try to compile the source myself. That would take forever. I must’ve been out of luck, right?

    Wrong. See, there are other people out there like me who love the package managers in Linux, but also use Macs. To that end, they’ve created a number of package managers that work on Mac. One of the best and most well known is “*MacPorts*”:https://www.macports.org/. Installation of MacPorts can take some time because in addition to installing it, you’ll need to install Xcode since MacPorts relies on the C compiler that comes with Xcode. Once all that’s set up though, you’ll be a regular command line captain!

    Now that I have MacPorts, how do I get my precious FFmpeg? The first thing to do is make sure that MacPorts itself is up to date and has all the latest software repositories. This is done with the “selfupdate” command. In a terminal window you’d type:

    `sudo port selfupdate`

    MacPorts will then run through a bunch of things to update itself. Once that’s done, you can tell it to install FFmpeg using this command:

    `sudo port install ffmpeg`

    It will show you all the dependencies it will need to download, compile and install in order to use FFmpeg. Once you confirm, just sit back and let it work its magic. After a few minutes, everything will be downloaded, compiled and installed. You can now use FFmpeg just as you would on Linux.

    To convert my .mp4 to an animated GIF I used the following command:

    `ffmpeg -i movie.mp4 -pix_fmt rgb24 animated.gif`

    Voila! That command is the bare minimum to get you an animated GIF, and there are lots of other options available. For example, I needed to make the resulting GIF as small as possible, so I trimmed the clip, reduced the color space, lowered the frame rate, etc.

    To see what other packages are available through MacPorts you can visit their site and browse or search through the repository. Generally speaking though, the most popular Linux packages are almost always available under the same name as their Linux counterparts. Happy porting!

  • Greetings from Rutland!

    Hello and (woof, woof) from little Rutland, Vermont, the most recent addition to the Small Dog Family. Our Rutland store opened in May…

  • Keeping Up with Ever-changing Browser & Internet Security Standards

    Encryption is used to keep your private information safe on the Internet, whether it’s credit card numbers and contact info, your search queries, or iMessages to loved ones, by making them unreadable by anyone other than the sender and the intended recipient. The last year or so has been crazy in the realm of Internet security, with a number of vulnerabilities and weaknesses being found in various encryption methods & software. It seems to have been further snowballing lately as security professionals scrutinize all the pieces of the puzzle, but it’s all with the goal of keeping everyone’s personal information safe.

    While security professionals are improving encryption methods & software, companies like Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Mozilla are working to make sure that they’re including those improvements in their operating systems and web browsers. The Payment Cardholder Industry (i.e. credit card companies) have data security standards (“*PCI DSS*”:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payment_Card_Industry_Data_Security_Standard) which everyone from merchants (including us) to banks need to comply with to ensure that personal information and credit card data is handled securely from end-to-end. Other industries have similar requirements and many tech companies also strive for the greatest in security. Naturally, with the ever changing Internet security landscape, those standards are changing as well. Some of the most recent changes will mean that a lot of older computers, devices, and browsers will no longer be able to access some secure websites.

    So, how can you ensure that your data is secure and that your devices will be able to connect to all the secure websites you frequent on your Macs and iOS devices?

    First, it’s important to run the newest major version of OS X on your Macs and iOS on your iOS devices (iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch) that your devices will run. Fortunately, “*OS X 10.10 Yosemite*”:http://www.apple.com/osx/ is a free download and will run on Macs released as far back as 2009 (or earlier, depending on the model). iOS 8 is also a free download and will run on iPhones & iPads released back to 2011. Of course, it’s always best to verify your software and peripherals are compatible with the latest operating system version prior to upgrading to new major version (e.g. OS X 10.9 Mavericks to OS X 10.10 Yosemite or iOS 7 to iOS 8).

    Second, make sure you’re applying the latest OS & security updates. This is relatively straightforward as the App Store on iOS & OS X (or Software Update on Mac OS X 10.6.8 and earlier) will show you available updates. In OS X 10.9 Mavericks & OS X 10.10 Yosemite you can make sure important system & security updates are installed automatically (this is best if you have high speed Internet) by checking the “Automatically check for updates”, “Download newly available updates in the background”, and “Install system data files & security updates” checkboxes in the App Store pane in System Preferences. That way, you won’t even need to remember to check. Similarly, on iOS you can automatically download updates & apps by going to Settings > iTunes & App Store and turning on the “Apps” and “Updates” switches.

    Third, and most important, is to run the most modern & secure web browser you can. Apple’s own Safari browser (which is included with OS X and iOS) is fast, efficient, and has excellent integration features, but it is only kept up-to-date for the current & previous version of OS X and the current version of iOS. Fortunately, there are other good alternatives which you can run on older, and current, versions of OS X (listed below by OS X version):

    OS X 10.9 Mavericks – OS X 10.10 Yosemite (Intel):

    * “*Safari*”:http://www.apple.com/safari/
    * “*Chrome*”:https://www.google.com/chrome/browser/desktop/index.html
    * “*Firefox*”:https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/

    OS X 10.7 Lion – OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion (Intel):

    * “*Chrome*”:https://www.google.com/chrome/browser/desktop/index.html
    * “*Firefox*”:https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/

    Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard (Intel):

    * “*Firefox*”:https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/

    Mac OS X Tiger 10.4 – Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard (PowerPC G3/G4/G5):

    * “*TenFourFox*”:http://www.floodgap.com/software/tenfourfox/

    Safari will be updated automatically along with other OS X updates, but Chrome, Firefox, and TenFourFox will need to be kept up-to-date separately. Fortunately, they each offer an option to automatically check for updates, so you’re alerted when a new version is available. By doing this, you can rest assured that you’re taking full advantage of all the hard work that the security industry is putting in to keep everyone safe.

    Additionally, for those who are running an old PowerPC Mac with Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger or 10.5 Leopard, the team behind TenFourFox have done an amazing job producing a custom version of Firefox to keep your Mac compatible with new websites and recent security improvements. Other parts of a version of Mac OS X that old are going to be inherently less secure than the latest version of OS X, but a browser can help keep your old Mac useful a little longer.

    Naturally, there are still phishing attempts, insecure websites, and malicious software that you’ll want to keep an eye out for, but by keeping your OS and browser up-to-date, you’re greatly reducing risks from invisible, undetectable theft of your information.