Kibbles & Bytes Blog

As a I begin to pack for an upcoming trip I began to ponder, “What’s going to make the list as far as tech items?” Being a techy and a gear head I have a ton of stuff, plus it’s a ski trip so the gear is seemingly endless…boots, skis, poles, long underwear, gloves, helmet…and that’s just the skiing stuff. For tech, I’ll still need a computer: Mac mini or 13 inch Retina? iPhone, of course, is coming with, but do I need to bring my iPad Air 2? I also need an “*iON Air Pro 3*”:http://www.smalldog.com/product/85310/ion-air-pro-3-wifi-1080p-action-waterproof-camera action camera to record the runs, a “*backup hard drive*”:http://www.smalldog.com/category/Storage_and_Backup/External_Hard_Drives to keep it all safe, and I can’t forget the “*cables to charge and connect*”:http://www.smalldog.com/category/Cables_and_Adapters all these devices.

First comes travel: iPad Air 2 and iPhone have that covered. iPhone keeps me up-to-date around the airport, then I’ll bust out the “*iPad*”:http://www.smalldog.com/category/Apple/iPad/iPad_Air once I get to my seat for some entertainment. As we all know, there is always something that comes up that threatens to leave your devices without a charge: a delay on the tarmac, or getting stuck in a terminal with no outlet in-sight. Hello “*Just Mobile Gum++ Backup Battery!*”:http://www.smalldog.com/product/86345/just-mobile-gum-portable-usb-power-pack-for-iphone-ipad-aluminum-gray I just had my charger on the last trip and no outlet so I am not forgetting the battery again. Headphones are a must and my “*Beats Wireless Studios*”:http://www.smalldog.com/category/Beats_by_Dr._Dre/On-ear_Bluetooth_Wireless keep me cable free and the noise cancelation keeps it quiet.

Once I arrive, it is time to geek out the room. We are in a hotel this time around so I will be bringing my “*Outdoor Tech Turtle Shell*”:http://www.smalldog.com/product/85337/outdoor-tech-turtle-shell-2-0-rugged-wireless-boombox-black for tunes. Syncing that to my iPad that will keep “*Spotify*”:https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/spotify-music/id324684580?mt=8 going and work as an alarm clock so we don’t miss first chair. Then comes the most important tech component: the computer. Most rooms come equipped with flat screens so, as silly as it may sound, the “*Mac mini*”:http://www.smalldog.com/Macs/Mac_mini will be making the venture. It is smaller than my laptop, is equipped with a Fusion drive that has plenty of space for media and our daily footage, and simply puts out a display signal via HDMI so we are up and running fast. I use an iOS app called “*Rowmote Pro*”:https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/rowmote-pro-remote-control/id315316036?mt=8&at=11lb7k for mouse and keyboard, so no need to pack those.

I realize this is -totally nuts- a bit much, but it all fits in my carry-on so I know it is safe, and it is great to have a “*cold one*”:http://i.giphy.com/92wsX8GEoNTYA.gif while we sit back and watch the day’s footage.

We like to talk about backups a lot here at Small Dog. Sometimes it’s advising customers on the best backup solution for them, while other times it’s making sure our own employee data is safe. I know I’ve even written a few articles for newsletters about backing up. There are just so many options and so many things to consider.

With all that time spent talking about how to back up the other half of the equation often gets far less attention and discussion. What happens when a drive crashes, or data is deleted by mistake, or a “*planet-destroying battle station*”:http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Death_Star/Canon takes out your “*Alderaan-based*”:http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Alderaan/Canon server farm? Recovery. Last week I experienced what going through a major data recovery was like for the first time.

First, it should go without saying that if you don’t have backups at all, or have poor backups, there won’t be much “recovery” going on. In my case, I have 4 machines: My Linux desktop, “*Mac mini,*”:http://www.smalldog.com/Macs/Mac_mini “*MacBook Air*”:http://www.smalldog.com/Macs/MacBook_Air and my server virtual machine that runs on the Mac mini. Each of them uses CrashPlan to back up data to the cloud. I also used a local 80 GB USB drive to backup a small amount of larger files that were impractical to upload to the internet.

So what happened? Normally the Mac mini, and the virtual machine in it, run 24/7. Occasionally I like to take snapshots of the entire virtual disk file. This is nice to have in case I change some settings, or the virtual disk becomes corrupted. This is not part of my automatic backup because the virtual disk cannot be copied while the virtual machine is running. Last Thursday, I shut down the virtual machine to download one of those snapshots. As I started it, I noticed there were actually two large virtual disk files coming in instead of just one. The second one had a weird name on it, and appeared to be the result of a test I had run months ago. I canceled the download, found the file on the Mac mini, and deleted it permanently since it was so large, and I wanted to reclaim the space (~20 GB).

I finished downloading the other file and then went back to the Mac mini to restart the virtual machine. It booted, but I could tell immediately something was wrong. Some services I had recently installed were not running. Further investigation made my heart skip a beat; apparently what had happened was some time back in March of 2014 the virtual machine had forked and started using the second weirdly named virtual disk file. Yes…the very same one I had just deleted permanently.

At a moment like this, I have to say, the first thing I did was start analyzing potential losses. How much was on that server? Would it be ok if I lost it? There really wasn’t too much on the server, but it was hosting a blog which had some extremely important things I had written in September. It was some of the most important writing I’d ever done. Absolutely irreplaceable.

Fortunately my story has a happy ending. After fighting with the CrashPlan web restore interface, and then switching to their desktop application (which works much better), I was able to find all the backups. I needed to rebuild a new virtual machine server, copy all the data back, and cross my fingers that my MySQL database backups could be successfully imported. The whole process took about 8 hours and I’m happy to report everything is back to normal now, with zero data loss.

What did I learn here? First, while I knew that writing was important, this incident showed me it was even more important than that. Never underestimate how important your data is. The day after I restored the server, I downloaded all of the writing and took it to the print shop. It’s now safely stored in a binder. I also learned that the slower cloud-based backup had pushed me into the habit of excluding as much as I could. To increase the robustness of my backups, I now use the cloud plus two “*1TB Seagate Backup Plus Slim Portable*”:http://www.smalldog.com/product/85223/seagate-backup-plus-slim-portable-drive-usb-3-0-1tb-red drives in a “*RAID1*”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_RAID_levels#RAID_1 configuration. RAID1 means that even if one of the drives fails, I can swap in a second one without data loss. If each drive has a 5% failure rate, the chance of the entire RAID failing is now 0.25%. That helps me sleep a lot better at night!

Every since Apple introduced the AirPort wireless base station, more and more Apple technologies have taken on the “Air” moniker. I’ll go over a few of them here, leaving out some obvious choices like the MacBook Air and the iPad Air. I’m writing this issue of Kibbles using my favorite email client, AirMail, but that’s not an Apple product… 🙂

*AirPrint*
!>http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4219.png!
In the past, it was relatively easy to set up a wireless printer if you had a “AirPort base station”:http://www.smalldog.com/product/80932/apple-airport-express-base-station-802-11n-wi-fi and connected it via USB cable. But seldom was it convenient to place the base station in the same location as the printer until Apple came up with AirPrint. Now, with just about every new printer supporting AirPrint, you can place your printer wherever you want as long as it can see your wireless signal. All you have to do is set up the AirPrint compatible printer on your wireless network and print. Not only can you print from your Mac but with AirPrint you can print from your iPhone or iPad, too!

To use your AirPrint printer with Wi-Fi, the printer must be connected to the same Wi-Fi network as your iOS device or Mac, either through bridging, or a direct connection to your Wi-Fi network. You cannot both connect that printer via USB and AirPrint, that won’t work, so forget the wires and print wireless!
“*Learn more about AirPrint…*”:http://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201311

*AirPlay*
!>http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4218.jpg!
You use AirPlay to stream music, pictures and video wirelessly to an “*Apple TV*”:http://www.smalldog.com/product/80135/apple-tv-3rd-gen or other AirPlay-enabled device. I saw a bunch of AirPlay compatible speakers when I was at CES so, while AirPlay has not been universally adopted the way that AirPrint has, it is gaining some ground. As with AirPrint, you must be on the same Wi-Fi network as your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch. You can also use AirPlay from iTunes on your Mac.

Using it is easy: On your iOS device you scroll up from the bottom to access the Control Center and simply tap on AirPlay and choose the device you wish to use for the content. Later iOS devices can use “peer-to-peer” AirPlay that allows you to use AirPlay without being on the same network. In this case, you need both Wi-fi and Bluetooth active.

If you have an Apple TV you can also use AirPlay mirroring to mirror whatever you have on your iPhone, IPad or iPod touch to your HDTV.
“*Learn more about AirPlay…*”:https://www.apple.com/airplay/

*AirDrop*
!>http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4217.jpg!
With AirDrop you can share photos, web sites, your location and more with people that are nearby with an Apple device. In order to use AirDrop, both people will need to have an iOS device running iOS 7 or later or a Mac running Yosemite. iOS devices that work with AirDrop are iPhone 5 or later, iPad (4th generation or later), iPad mini or iPod touch (5th generation or later).

For AirDrop to work you need to have both WiFi and Bluetooth active and I would recommend that you sign into your iCloud account to share with your contacts. On the iOS devices, turning on AirDrop is simple. Just swipe up from the bottom of the screen to get to your Control Center and tap AirDrop. You will have three choices: Off, Contacts only (only people in your Contacts will see you) or Everyone, where all nearby iOS devices using AirDrop can see you. From there using AirDrop is simply a matter of choosing the content you wish to share, i.e. photo, video, or contact, and choose the Share icon and you will see nearby users available to AirDrop the content to. Your selected user will receive an alert and can accept or decline the content.

On your Mac it is a little different. AirDrop is available from the Finder, the Share menu, and in Open and Save windows. When you choose AirDrop in Yosemite your Mac will look for any nearby devices that are AirDrop ready. This includes other Macs or iOs devices. In the Finder, if you select AirDrop from the Favorites list on the left Finder window, you will see any nearby AirDrop ready devices or Macs. To transfer a file you simply drag that file over the icon of the recipient and they will be notified of the file transfer. From other Apps you can use the Share button and simply select the recipient from the Share sheet that appears.

Here are a few tips to keep in mind. First of all, you have to be close. AirDrop is designed to work with nearby devices and 30 feet seems to be the limit but I have noticed that it is best if you are about 10 feet or less apart. Make sure Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are on and if you are using a firewall you won’t be able to receive files if “block all incoming connections” is checked.
“*Learn more about AirDrop…*”:http://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204144

_Dear Friends,_

Grace and I went to see the movie __Selma__ on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday at the great Tropic Cinema here in Key West. Now it is probably too revealing to let you know that I am the one that nearly always cries at movies but about halfway through the movie I glanced over at Grace and she was weeping. As we left the theater to go find some dinner, Gracie was sobbing. She told me it really hit her hard since way back when, Grace and I marched with Dr. King, shook his hand and actually met Benjamin Spock, the baby doctor, at that same march. Grace was pregnant with our daughter Zoey at the time and I was an activist in the equal housing movement in Chicago. It is surprising that so many people do not know the story of Dr. King and his non-violent struggle for civil rights and equality.

We have been able to get a limited quantity of some Apple Certified Refurbished MacBook Air and MacBook Pro models. You will see more about them later but let me tell you a bit about Apple Certified Refurbished products and why they may be the right choice for you. Of course, the $100 to $400 savings is a plus but these units have been brought to Apple new product specifications and have the same identical 1-year comprehensive Apple warranty as new products. In addition, these MacBook Air and MacBook Pro units are eligible for AppleCare that will extend your 1-year warranty to 3 years for hardware fixes and extend your complementary 90 days of Apple technical support to three years as well.

Small Dog Electronics really got its start with the Apple Refurbished products and we know them well. It has been some time since we have had any in stock to offer our customers and we are very pleased to start the year out with this great selection.

This week’s Kibbles & Bytes exclusive features the Apple Certified Refurbished MacBook Pro 13″ Retina. The special this week is for a high-end unit for those that might need a bit more storage and RAM. It features a 2.6 GHz i5 processor, 8 GB of RAM and a 512 GB SSD drive and, of course, the awesome Retina display. For Kibbles & Bytes readers I am offering this MacBook Pro with AppleCare and a free Hammerhead neoprene case for only $1599! That’s about a $500 savings over a similar new MacBook Pro.

“*See this AWESOME great deal here!*”:http://www.smalldog.com/wag900001720