There is no August meeting, but there will be one Sept. 23, so make sure you have it on your calendar.

Dave Crowden has 2GB RAM that he removed from his Macbook Pro. If anyone wants it, drop him a message.

Following are a few items that may be of interest to you.

How To Customize the Mac Finder Sidebar
You can customize your Finder sidebar to include the folders and locations you most often use.  You can click on a sidebar item to go to that location, and also drag and drop items into those locations.  You can customize the sidebar in Finder, Preferences, and also by dragging and dropping items into and around in the sidebar.  Tags and Smart Folders can be used to make the sidebar even more useful.

How To Use Hidden Characters On Your Mac Keyboard
In addition to using the Emoji Viewer to type special characters, or holding a key to add accents, you can also learn some special keyboard combinations using the Keyboard Viewer.  These allow you to type some symbols like degrees, pi, the Apple symbol and accent marks using standard keystrokes with the help of the Option and Shift keys.  The Keyboard Viewer allows you to see exactly which key combinations match which characters.  This is dependent on the type of keyboard you own.

How to use Google Photos to back up your iPhone photos
It’s easy to get free protection from losing all your photos if your phone gets lost, stolen, or broken and with Google Photos.

Get the 21-app Mega Mac App bundle for just $10 
The Mega Mac App Bundle features 21 creative, multimedia, and productivity apps.

The following works with Gmail (or others) as well as iCloud.

Take Control Of Your Email With iCloud Plus Addressing
iCloud email allows you to freely add some text to your regular email address to create unqiue addresses that you can use on an as-needed basis.  So you can use a slightly different email address when you sign up for a service and easily identify if that service is sending you spam or seling your information.  You can also use this to organize legitimate email by filtering into groups that use the same address.  However, there are some downsides too.

Easily Trimming Video Files With QuickTime Player
If you want to trim some video from the beginning or end of a movie file, you don’t need to use a video editing app.  You can do it right in QuickTime Player.  Trimming is lossless and can be done with precision.  You can also cut sections out of the middle of your video and export a new copy.  You can trim in the Photos app as well, though the original full-length video is always available if you wish to revert.

Using the Mac Finder Go Menu
Many Mac users ignore the Go menu in the Finder, but there are some useful shortcuts there.  You can access some of the most most used folders on your drive with this menu and see keyboard shortcuts for them.  You can also access your Libray folder and Startup Disk through the Go menu if you know how.  The Go to Folder function lets you move around by typing, which is preferred by many pro users.

Karen Brown

There is no Mac User meeting in July, but here are some tips & tricks.

The attached article is from the July 2019 issue of Macworld Magazine.  It explains how to determine whether your software is 64- or 32-bit. When the new MacOS is released in the fall (10.15), 32-bit applications will no longer run.  There are lots of other good tips below, including 3 that were not in the TVCUC newsletter that came out this morning.  Hope you find some of this useful.

macOS Catalina: Everything you need to know

Frequently asked questions about Apple’s next operating system for the Macintosh.  Read more

Pages, Numbers, and Keynote productivity apps for iOS and macOS get major update

Apple’s new update for its iWork suite of apps includes text stylization options, expanded Apple Pencil support, and more.  Read more

The video below has lots of good information, but it reminded me that I could (and did) add money to my Apple ID account so I won’t get those piddling little 99¢ charges from Apple for a few months!

10 Tips To Get the Most From iCloud

Here are some useful tips for getting even more from your iCloud service. You can backup and sync photos from cameras using just your iPhone, create family Calendars and shared Notes, you can even add funds to your Apple account so you don’t have to pay a few dollars every month.  Read More…

Can’t download an app update? It might be time to update your Mac

If you’re using an older version of macOS, you may run into problems when trying to install the latest version of an app.  Read more

All the new ways iOS 13 protects your privacy

The best thing about iOS 13 may be all the new ways Apple is protecting you from unscrupulous data collection.  Read more 

Apple issues voluntary recall of 15-inch MacBook Pro

Laptops sold between September 2015 and February 2017 are affected.

Why You Should Use iCloud Email Rules And Not Mail Rules On Your Mac

Mail rules in the Mail app on your Mac are robust and powerful but they no longer work well in a world where we get email on multiple devices. Instead, use iCloud email rules, or filters you can set on your email server. These rules will be applied on the server before the messages get to yoru devices, so they will work properly and consistently.  Read More…

50 Mac Safari Shortcuts

Here are 50 shortcuts that will make it quicker and easier to navigate around web pages and tabs.  Learn how to use your keyboard to move around on a page, find information, and jump to different pages and tabs.  Also find out about ways to click on links with modifier keys to open them in different ways and how to drag tabs and downloads.  Read More…

Frequently Asked Questions About MacBook Batteries

Many MacBook, MacBook Pro and MacBook Air owners want to know how to properly use and maintain their batteries. But there is a lot of bad information online. Learn what to expect from your MacBook’s battery, what you should and shouldn’t do to prolong battery life, how to tell if there is a problem, how to get a replacement and how much it may cost.  Read More…

In the following tutorial, Gary talks about storing videos, and gives a short bit on using Image Capture, which we discussed at a meeting last fall.

Managing a Video Library On Your Mac

Instead of storing your videos in the Photos app with your pictures, consider storing them as files in a folder in the Finder.  You can place this folder on your iCloud Drive, on your local drive only, or on an external drive.  You can organize them using file names, subfolders, tags and comments.  You can use the Gallery view to look through your videos almost as if they were in a special video management app.  Read More…

Use Hide Instead Of Minimize On Your Mac

Many people overuse the minimize button to get applications and windows out of the way.  In most cases, it is more efficient to use the Hide command to simply hide the app. Hidden apps can be quickly and easy brough back and you won’t clutter your Dock with minimized windows.  Today using tabs in windows and autosave to easily quit and relaunch apps means you should rarely need the minimize button.  Read More…

I get lots of questions about what to do about a Mac that’s running out of space. Here Gary talks about how to find large files without having to resort to a 3^rd party program such as Clean My Mac.

How To Figure Out What Is Taking Up Space On Your Mac

When you Mac’s hard drive is almost full, you can investigate and figure out what is using the space by simply using the Finder.  There is no need to buy a third-party app to manage your hard drive. You start at the top and view all of your folders, digging down to see what is using the most space.  Then you’ll need to make some decisions about what to remove from yoru drive, being care to only remove files you don’t need.  Read More…

Karen Brown

Two days ago I sent out a link for a special $19.95 offer for iMazing.  Have no idea what was wrong with the link, but here’s a good one:  Here.

It is a good software.

Karen Brown

The following was published in iDrop News:  ZombieLoad Threat

There’s no meeting in May—have a wonderful Memorial Day.  We won’t meet again until September, but I’ll be sending out information every month.

The Best Mac Anti-Virus Software
Often people ask about the best anti-virus software, sometimes because they feel they need to have something installed, or they are required to do so by their company or school.  But macOS already comes with anti-malware software, built-in as part of the operating system.  There are three parts to this: Gatekeeper, XProtect and the Malware Removal Tool. Learn about them and find out how to make sure they are up-to-date. Read More…

10 Useful Mac Keyboard Shortcuts Most People Don’t Know
When looking for useful Mac keyboard shortcuts you’ll come across the same ones over and over.  Here are 10 that haven’t gotten as much attention, but can seriously increase your productivity. Learn how to quickly switch between windows, get typing suggestions, access app preferences and menu items, rename files and more.  Read More…

How to Customize Your Mac Desktop
There are many ways to customize how files and folders appear on your desktop.  You can manually arrange them, or have them sorted automatically.  You can change the size of the icons, the text, and the grid spacing.  A new feature in macOS Mojave is to have similar files organized into stacks.  You can also select what other icons, such as hard drives, appear on the Desktop.  Read More…

12 Tips To Help You Type Like a Pro On Your Mac
If you do a lot of writing on your Mac, here are a bunch of tips to help you type and manipulate text more efficiently.  You can use the arrow keys along with modifiers to move around and select text without taking your fingers off the keyboard.  You can also quickly delete words and lines without using your mouse or trackpad. You can complete and correct spelling, substitute a few keystrokes for longer pieces of text, and type accent marks and symbols quickly.  Read More…

How To Use Mac Hot Corners
Hot Corners are shortcuts that you can set so an action is performed when you move the cursor to one of the four corners of your screen.  You can set these up in System Preferences if you know where to look. You can use them to instantly put your Mac to sleep, trigger Mission Control and other actions.  You can also set them to work only with modifier keys.  There is a trick to knowing which corners work in a multi-screen setup.  Read More…

Safari: macOS browser now autosubmits logins. Here’s how to disable it
Apple described this Safari change in 10.14.4’s release notes as “Streamlines website login when filling credentials with Password AutoFill.”  If you don’t want this to happen, here’s what you can do.   Read more ▶

9 useful Control Center shortcuts for iPhone that you should be using
Your iPhone lets you use a calculator, takes notes, and more—all without unlocking the device.    Read more ▶

10 essential iPad features you need to start using
The iPad is a lot more than just a big iPhone.  Features like Split View and split keyboards help transform it into a productivity workhorse.  Read more ▶