Mountain Lion

, ,

Running Windows Apps in Mountain Lion

, ,

        "It's cheaper than purchasing Parallels and Windows 7 just to run a few Windows applications," explains John Carter as he sends info on Crossover.  He says, "Crossover has a new upgrade for Mountain Lion. Those Mac users who have upgraded to Mountain Lion or are waiting for the Crossover update, I can attest to the fact that the new Crossover upgrade works in Mountain Lion and you can now use Quicken 2010 (Windows app) and other Windows applications under Crossover in Mountain Lion.

        "The issue with the older version of Crossover on Mountain Lion is that the older version required X11. Mountain Lion will not run X11. Instead, Mountain Lion installs XQuartz, which is an upgraded version of X11. Without X11, Crossover will not work in Mountain Lion — or any other Mac OS X version for that matter. So, if you have something other than Mountain Lion and haven't yet used Crossover to run a Windows applications, and you want to do that, you will have to download and install XQuartz to work with the latest version of Crossover. That is, if the latest version of Crossover will run on the earlier versions of Mac OS X.
        "If you do not have a current annual subscription to Crossover to be able to download and install the latest version, it will cost you $59.95. This is far cheaper than purchasing Parallels and Windows 7 just to run a few Windows applications."
, ,

Screen Sharing Explained

, ,

        Explaining screen sharing, John Carter says, "Now that I have Mountain Lion on my iMac and having discovered that iChat has been replaced with iMessages, I poked around until I discovered that screen sharing is still available with Mountain Lion. It just wasn't as obvious to me as it was before. Now that I know where it is and how to show my Buddy list, getting to screen sharing is actually quite simple.

        "The Buddy list in iMessages is the same as with iChat, so no surprises there. If the Buddy list doesn't show up right when you start iMessages, the hotkey Cmd-1 will bring it up or put it away (it's a toggle, just like in iChat).
        "The real change is that the old iChat is now broken up into iMessages and FaceTime. You can start a video chat in either FaceTime or iMessages, but you can only start a text or voice chat in iMessages and you can only do screen sharing in iMessages. When doing a video chat in iMessages, it brings up FaceTime."
        Got it?  If not, let John Carter know.  He teaches SIGs and helps make computers easier to do! 
, ,

RSS Feed Solutions Described

, ,

        Mountain Lion no longer supports RSS feeds in either Mail or Safari, but John Carter to the rescue.  He offers this description and solution:   "If you are currently subscribed to either the PMUG website RSS or the Newsletter RSS, you should consider one of the many alternatives for receiving RSS feeds.

        "I use NetNewsWire, the free version. It works, but not quite the way I would like it to. When I was subscribing to RSS feeds with Mail, I could delete news that I didn't care to keep. You can't do that in NetNewsWire, at least not in the free version. 
        "NetNewsWire also automatically deletes old news. It seems the only way to hang onto a copy of any news item is to display it, copy it, and paste it into a document. But then, you can still go to the site that delivered the news feed and retrieve any material there by searching for the topic. Now the funny part of this is for me, I rarely go back and reread any news. I do at times refer to it to pass on information that others are asking about.
        "To subscribe to an RSS feed in Mountain Lion, you first have to have an RSS news reader installed on your computer. Next, open Safari and go to the website that you want to subscribe to their RSS feed. Click on the RSS icon. It opens NetNewsWire (if that's what you have installed) and pops up a dialogue box. In the dialogue box, enter a decent short title and a description (optional).
        "If you are still using Leopard, Snow Leopard, or Lion and you want to start right away with an RSS reader like NetNewsWire, open Mail -> Preferences and click on the RSS tab. There you will find an option to use Mail or an external reader. Click on the option to use an external reader, then in the Finder window that opens, find and click on the RSS reader, then click OK. Any new RSS feeds that come in will go to that reader. You can now delete the RSS feed in Mail. If you're using Safari as your RSS reader, do pretty much the same thing there in Safari Preferences.
        "If you choose to use NetNewsWire, when you click on a news item you will get the short version. To read the long version, you can either double-click on the entry or click on the title of the news feed - this appears if large blue letters just above the short version."
        (Click to enlarge the illustrations.) 
John winds up his instructions with,  "In NetNewsWire preferences you select to open the long version in NewNewsWire (in a separate tab) or in your default browser."
,

iCloud Conundrum

,

        "I surely don't understand iCloud in Mountain Lion," declares Jim Hamm.  He goes on to explain,  "To wit: I open TextEdit for the first time (in ML) and what appears first is not a blank page ready to type on, as in the past, but a dialog box of iCloud. It explains that documents can be drug to the box and saved in iCloud. 
        "So, out of curiosity, I tried that. Instead of actually moving a document from my hard drive to iCloud, I wanted to move a copy of the document, the same concept (in my mind) as Time Machine. I would have a document on my hard drive and in the Cloud. 
        "Nope! The iCloud dialog box wouldn't let me move a copy of the document to the cloud, only the original. I didn't want to do that.

        "After dragging and dropping one document from the Finder to iCloud, just to see what happened, under the document it showed 'Waiting' for a bit, then the title of the document appeared. The document had moved from my hard drive. I assumed this meant it was stored in iCloud. So, in Safari, I log in to iCloud and look at what's in my iCloud. The document is not there. There's not even a heading for documents there. And yes, in the System Preference iCloud pane I have 'Documents & Data' checked."
        Jim closes with, "Would the knowledgable luminaries of this forum be so kind as to explain what I'm missing in this scenario? More elucidation very much appreciated. Thanks." 

Mountain Lion Messages

     Jim Hamm's impressed with Verge newsletter info on Mountain Lion;  he notes their comments on Messages, saying, "How Messages works is a bit confusing. Read the fourth paragraph. Looks like iOS 6 will solve the problem later this year when it's released."
        You'll want to read their whole report on all the features.  The Verge gives 11 pages of illustrated info on Mountain Lion, followed by 757 comments.  

,

Mountain Lion Upgrade Notes

,

        "Well, there's more," John Carter begins.  (Of course, with  200+ features!) OK, John: you're on! 

        "The Address Book is quite a bit different. More controls to change the appearance. One control places the group list in a column on the far left next to the address list. What's still missing is a column of A-Z tabs to quickly go to a section of the address book like there is in the iPad Contacts.
        "A Reminders App, list like the one in the iPad, is now in OS 10.8. Well, not exactly like it. OS X 10.8 has a few controls that iOS 5.1 doesn't have, like displaying a small monthly calendar in the left column.
        "TextEdit also has the two new buttons (iCloud and On My Mac) in the upper left of the Open window.
        "Stickies still exists, but now there is Notes. These are the same notes that you have in the iPhone and iPad. But looks a bit different.
        "The Open window for QuickTime doesn't have the two new buttons.
        "I still prefer MPEGStreamclip over QuickTime. QuickTime still chokes on .wmv files that MPEGStreamclip has no problem with. And the latest Flip4Mac release didn't help QuickTime at all – because it wouldn't install. With great difficulty I ejected the Flip4Mac installer and then had to restart my computer to get Mail to work again. Clue: don't install the 3.0 Beta for Flip4Mac."
        No sooner had John signed off, "No time for more. I'll continue this at a later time" – than he thought of more!
        "News flash!
        "X11 is not included with Mountain Lion. If you had X11 installed for use with Crossover, Crossover will not run. Attempting to run X11 forces you to an Apple website informing you that X11 is no longer supported.
        "Apple is now using XQuartz instead of X11, but XQuartz will not work with Crossover.
        "Crossover is not yet available for Mountain Lion. So, if you depend on a Windows application running under Crossover, do not upgrade to Mountain Lion until Codeweavers has created a Mountain Lion update.
        "If you have other apps that depend on X11, check to see if it has a Mountain Lion compatible version."  And with this John does sign off — for now. 
, , ,

Mountain Lion Installation: Read About It

, , ,

        John Carter jumps right in with Mountain Lion.  He tells us, "Like Jim Hamm before me, I dove right in and updated my iMac to 10.8 today.

        "The installation was painless. I started it and walked away for the rest of the day.
When I came back, several applications needed attention – mostly updates.
        "The first surprise was a new application: Messages. This popped up in the middle of the screen all on its own. Apple's way of telling me it's there. Messages allows me to text anyone with an Apple device or PC with 10.8 for free. Messages is already available on iOS 5.1. So this is just another step toward making all Apple products look and feel the same. I doubt I will ever use Messages – unless there is someone out there who doesn't want to use Mail. Mostly, Messages is for iOS devices to avoid phone charges for text messaging.
        "The next surprise was a string of short notices down the right side of the display. These were recent updates to Calendar. And each time Jackie added a new item to the Calendar on her MacBook Air, another notice popped up on my iMac. That's because she is sharing her Calendar with me to make sure I know what she's up to. And I have done the same for her.
        "Another that surprised me was that Total Finder – an add-on to Finder – said that it was not tested on 10.8. It worked anyway.
        "After performing just a few application updates – one was NeoOffice (3.3 Beta is out, available only to those who donated within the past year), I then discovered that the App Store had a few more updates waiting for me. These were iWork, iPhoto, iMovie, and Xcode. 
        "The update for iPhoto required a database update, and I haven't seen any obvious changes. 
        "iMovie thumbnails needed to be created for the project I was currently working on – that took quite a while. And oh, by the way - iMove is LOTS faster.
        "When I opened Mail, the database had to be converted for the new 10.8. No problem. Can't see anything new so far.
        "I expected some change in Preview. When I opened it, I saw a new window. It was telling me that I could now move my existing documents to iCloud by dragging them to that window from the Finder or other app. Before, what I would see was just a Finder window. Now, in the upper left corner of the Preview window are two new buttons: iCloud and On My Mac. Aside for a complete makeover in the Preview Menu, there is now a brand new Editor toolbar with an enhanced Adjust Color pane and a Smart Lasso. 
        "Move over, iPhoto! You may never use iPhoto again to make basic changes to a photo – unless, of course, the only way to access the photo is through iPhoto. The bad part of this is, now you have something else to spend time on. As with Lion, any change you make to a photo with Preview creates a version of the file – so you can always retrieve the original. And when you click on the filename, the menu now shows an option to move the image to iCloud. Clicking on Browse all Versions shows them in the same way that Time Machine shows your backups. Wow! I like the changes I just made to that photo.
        "Remember what I said about the new buttons in the upper left of the Finder window when I opened Preview? You get the same two buttons (iCloud and On My Mac) with Pages, Keynote, and Numbers.
        "I have no idea what's new in Xcode, and even if I did, I'm sure you wouldn't be interested.
        And here John winds up his report with this, "All in all, it has been a good thing. Nothing really new to learn – except Messages. But then, I haven't read about all the new features in 10.8. I give this 10.8 upgrade a 10. Upgrading from Snow Leopard to Mountain Lion may be like trading Windows for a Mac, but going from Lion to Mountain Lion will be like adding more icing to the cake.
        "Where's my MacBook Pro? That's next!"   OK, John, keep us posted.  

Mountain Lion Roars!

You'll be seeing a lot of articles about Mountain Lion which was released this morning.  See Apple's site with a 5 minute video about the 200+ features.  Here's a USA Today's columnist's take on it. Jim Hamm sends us this link to author Galen Gruman's book.  Now, he's installed it!         "When Lion first came out, July 20, 2011, the very first day I downloaded and installed it. Not a good idea to do that the first day (let other people catch the problems), and I said "never again". Well, I must have a short memory, or not too smart (both, probably), because I just now did it again. 

        "I just finished downloading and installing Mountain Lion, and am using it now. Took 15 minutes to download and 20 minutes to install. When the install starts the screen says installing with 30 minutes, etc, remaining. As long as I can see the screen I feel comfortable that something is happening. Then, at some point, the screen goes dark. Uh oh, what's happening? A problem? The fans kick into high gear as the Mac seems to be heating up. I have to resist the temptation to start clicking keys to find out what is going on. Good sense prevails, and I do nothing but wait. Then, after 20 minutes, a screen appears, and I feel better.
        "At first glance, everything looks and feels the same as before. All of my apps seem to be working, which surprises me — even Avast, the anti-virus program works. And even a nondescript program like Radium works, which is an internet radio station, and I'm listening to it now. Mountain Lion pops up a display box and mentions that programs that are not compatible will be listed in a folder on the hard drive. I checked, and only Avast needed to be re-authenticated. As I progress along I may find some surprises, but so far so good.
        "Now I'll have to read the article to find out just what are the 25 'goodies' I got in Mountain Lion. Hope they're worth the $20 bucks..(grin)...." Jim
        And now, from the Prez Art Gorski:  "Personally, I'm going to wait a week or so before installing Mountain Lion to see if there are any critical flaws. But when I'm ready to install it, I'll refer to this guide:
        "If it's not mentioned in these articles, make sure you do a complete backup of your hard drive first. Time Machine isn't good enough, I recommend making a bootable clone using the Carbon Copy Cloner app."         Now, back to Jim Hamm who says, "Here is a very good, and simple to understand, review of the changes made in Mountain Lion. As the author states, the price is right and the upgrade process works well. No glitches observed yet -- by the author or me."           Stay tuned for more info from our PMUG members: the Mountain Lion roars! 
, , , ,

Serious Bug Discovered in Lion

, , , ,

        John Carter wants our attention now!  "I just discovered that LION has a serious bug that Apple isn’t recognizing as a bug yet.   Files disappear from the hard drive.  Do a search with the keywords “files disappearing on mac."

        "It happened to me, and it’s happening to others.  I’m still looking into it.
        "There doesn’t seem to be any fix in the future. Maybe Mountain Lion won’t have the bug. It’s totally random while at the same time appears to be completely selective. All the files in every subfolder of one of my folders are missing: e.g., folder A contains folders B, C, and D. All files in B, C, and D are missing.
        "Other folders that I know should be on the machine are now missing — stuff that I put there just two weeks ago.
        "Using Time Machine only helps if you actually use it. In my case, the folders and files in question were deliberately excluded from Time Machine — to save space in my Time Machine backup. What a shame on me!"
        John concludes for now with, "Now, I recently worked with a client who has Snow Leopard, and dozens of photos disappeared off his Mac. No Time Machine backup. Another client also claims to have missing files — and he is not using Lion. So when did this problem start, and how widespread is it?"
        Want to see John's posts on this problem on the Apple Discussion site?  Find it here.  He is posted as jrc39 and his comments are as of 7-15.  Keep up the good work, John, and let us know the resolution of the matter.  
,

Upgrading to Mountain Lion?

,

        Getting ready for Mountain Lion, Jim Hamm shares some helpful advice, "If you plan to upgrade to Mountain Lion, the TidBITS newsletter is offering two books for a discounted price of $10 each until Mountain Lion is released. At that time the book price increases to $15 each. You can read more about the offer in the following link.
        Jim follows up with "If you're planning to upgrade to Mountain Lion later this month, here is a Macworld article with preparatory steps to take before 'roaring' off to that new OS."

, ,

Gatekeeper in Mountain Lion

, ,

        "One feature coming in OS X 10.8, Mountain Lion, is Gatekeeper — an enhanced security feature," announces Jim Hamm.  He elaborates, "Recently, Macs have been attacked by malware, and we'll probably see more attacks in the future. Additional security protection is always welcome. Here are some comments about Gatekeeper.  From AppleInsider and from Apple.com 
        Here Jim goes on to quote from John Gruber of DaringFireball, posted 2-16-12. "My favorite Mountain Lion feature, though, is one that hardly even has a visible interface. Apple is calling it 'Gatekeeper.' It’s a system whereby developers can sign up for free-of-charge Apple developer IDs which they can then use to cryptographically sign their applications. If an app is found to be malware, Apple can revoke that developer’s certificate, rendering the app (along with any others from the same developer) inert on any Mac where it’s been installed.
        "In effect, it offers all the security benefits of the App Store, except for the process of approving apps by Apple. Users have three choices which type of apps can run on Mountain Lion:
 1. Only those from the App Store
 2. Only those from the App Store or which are signed by a developer ID
3. Any app, whether signed or unsigned
 The default for this setting is, I say, exactly right: the one in the middle, disallowing only unsigned apps. This default setting benefits users by increasing practical security, and also benefits developers, preserving the freedom to ship whatever software they want for the Mac, with no approval process.
"Call me nuts, but that’s one feature I hope will someday go in the other direction — from OS X to iOS."

New Approach to Introducing New OS

        An impressive one-on-one briefing given to John Gruber, of Daring Fireball, on Thursday by three top Apple men deserves special mention.  Jim Hamm sends us this article concerning Mountain Lion.  (If reading white print on dark background aggravates you remember to do Control + Option + Command with the number 8 key to toggle to an easier-to-read black print on light background.)

, ,

Mountain Lion Drops X11

, ,

        "Apple is encouraging users to install and use XQuartz instead of X11," according to John Carter.  He continues, "In fact, X11 is not included in Mountain Lion. This article explains.
        "XQuartz is a community-supported version of the X11 windowing system for Mac OS-X 10.6.3 or later. Please visit http://xquartz.macosforge.org for more information.
        "I have been using XQuartz instead of X11 in Snow Leopard and Lion for some time. However, I am unable to delete X11 (even on Lion) because it claims to be required by the OS; it seems apparent that they are sharing some of the same files. Having both installed has not been a problem. I don’t know if X11 will be automatically deleted when I upgrade to Mountain Lion.
        "For anyone using GIMP, they must have either X11 or XQuartz installed. When XQuartz is running, the menu name is still X11, so unless you look for the version info you won’t know which one is running. Both X11 and XQuartz may be running at the same time, but launching one will not launch the other.
        Here’s what XQuartz looks like in the Dock:

And here’s what X11 looks like in the Dock:

It is not necessary to run Xquartz (or X11) all the time, but once it is launched (it will launch automatically when GIMP is launched), it stays running until you manually quit X11.

When launching either X11 or XQuartz, a terminal window will also launch, but this terminal is an X11 version of Terminal.

Here’s the title bar for the X11 terminal window:

And here’s the title bar for the Terminal window:  


If you have an X11 terminal window open, you really don’t need to also launch Terminal.
        John's closing words, "You can close the X11 terminal window if you don’t want to see it, but you should not close XQuartz (or X11) if you have GIMP or some other application open that requires X11. When launching GIMP, the X11 terminal window will also open. Closing the X11 terminal window will not close GIMP."

, ,

Mountain Lion Makes RSS Changes in Mail

, ,

          Changes?  Oh, yes.  Jim Hamm must be frowning as he sends us this: "Here are a couple of articles:   One and the other one, describing changes coming in Mountain Lion. I'm gonna miss the RSS feed into Mail, which I presently use quite a bit.  He quotes this part, "Look to the right, and you may notice Safari’s first major missing feature: RSS. It looks as though Really Simple Syndication was just not simple enough for Apple; the company has excised RSS entirely from Safari (and from Mail as well), leaving feed-parsing to external applications such as NetNewsWire or Reeder. If you have such a program installed and attempt to type in or click on a 'feed://' address, Safari will automatically punt you to your respective program;
otherwise, it displays an error."
        Jim has two comments,  "Darn! I liked having the RSS feed available in Mail. This is 'progress'?" However, he goes on to say, "A new feature in Mail is the ability to designate an email from a particular sender--such as 'Moi'--as a VIP...(grin)."

,

Mountain Lion Due Out This Summer

,

        Today's news from CNET:  Apple will release the Mountain Lion this summer.  This article gives links to related stories and includes 11 screenshots of Mountain Lion developer previews.
        Here Jim Hamm jumps in, "Check out this article I saw in USA TODAY's iPad application.  Apple unveils new Mac OS X Mountain Lion.  To view the story click the link or paste it into your browser.  To learn more about USA TODAY for iPad and download, visit here."
        And here's more!  Jim says, "Here are a couple of more articles (one, two) that really explain what's coming in OS X Mountain Lion. After reading these I'm more impressed with the new OS. The first article points out a strategy that Apple is taking that is really smart, I think. If, say, a person buys any Apple device (a computer, iPhone, whatever) the OS is becoming similar on all Apple devices so the learning curve is shortened on how to use each device.  People like familiarity.
        Jim summarizes, "Apple is hoping that if, say, you own a Mac you'll be more likely to buy an iPhone rather than an Android device. Or vice versus. This way you don't have to learn a new operating system. With iCloud now keeping all Apple devices coordinated together, one can switch between devices and hardly miss a beat."
        However, there's a serious side to this.  Prez Art Gorski tells us, "OK, so you dodged the bullet this year and found that your 4 year old Mac could be upgraded to Lion. Now Apple has announced the next version of OS X (and they've changed the name from Mac OS X!), Mountain Lion. And guess what, many 4 year old Macs will not be able to install it." Read about it here. 
        "Ooooooh!  What about my computer?" you may be asking.  Look at http://www.appleserialnumberinfo.com/Desktop/index.php  so you can enter your computer's serial number and get a handy page to print out with lots of info on your model, including the $ value of it today.