PMUG membership -- is it worth it?

Do you feel like you’re getting nothing out of your PMUG membership? Are the presentations going over your head or not addressing your concerns? You’re not alone! The purpose of giving presentations at our meetings is to educate our members about possibilities. It’s like planting seeds. To actually get into details about any given topic would convert the meeting into a workshop, and workshops typically require hands-on by all students with a lot of special attention from the instructor. We prefer to scatter seeds at our meetings rather than get into digging up weeds. The meetings are then a field of possibilities, not a full service educational endeavor. We are also akin to a social club where people meet new friends and nourish old friendships.

Hence, to get anything out of the meetings, it is necessary to take notes and then go home and do research and practice. The presenter’s notes are always posted on our website and are available to all members, so it really isn’t necessary to take notes during the meeting unless you want to do your research while it is fresh in your mind.

For others like myself, we enjoy the opportunity to share what we know. If we’re not effective in teaching, it’s because we’re not trained educators. But that won’t keep us from trying.

If what you are looking for is something more like a workshop, there have been times when OLLI (Osher Lifelong Learning Institute) has provided classes that are more like a workshop.

If you need personal training on any given topic, there are a few people in the area who are available to come to your home for one-on-one mentoring for a fee. And there are hundreds of short video tutorials for free online an any subject imaginable.

The real problem regarding computers is the terminology. If you don’t understand the terms, nothing will make sense. So learning computer terminology is important no matter what task you want to do. What is a Dock? What’s the difference between a browser and a search engine? What’s the difference between a Window and a Desktop and a display? How can I find what I know is on my computer? That all comes under the heading of Computer 101. So maybe we need to offer workshops or spend a little more time in our presentations just about computer terminology and how things work together.

My take on not coming to meetings is like not going out to the garden. You have no idea what will germinate if you don’t pay attention to it.

When I go to a meeting (any club that I belong to), I might go home with only one new piece of information. And for me to spend two hours listening to the same stuff over and over to get one new idea is worth it to me. Because my friends are there.

John Carter

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Avast Antivirus

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For your possible interest, here is a current review of the Avast Antivirus program. Jim Hamm has used the free version of Avast for years on both his PC and Mac. He likes it, but it does occasionally do a popup, asking you something, or possibly to upgrade to the paid version. Often enough to be noticeable, but not aggravating -- at least for him. Whether one needs to run an AV program or not, especially on a Mac, certainly has proponents both ways. For Jim, the possible added protection is desirable. Your mileage may vary.

Snow Leopard update

7 Free Anti-Virus Tools For Your Browser: Scan Links Before You Click

We all want to avoid getting a virus on our computer, and practice safe 'surfing' on the 'net. But, if you want to add another layer of protection to your browsing, read the following article: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/7-free-anti-virus-tools-browser-scan-links-click/

I use Safari on my iPad, but prefer the Chrome browser on my computer. One other security tip I use is, if I get an email -- even from a friend -- that only has a web link but no message, I don't click it. If, say, my friend's email has been hijacked, the hackers send out nefarious links to all the email addresses in my friend's contacts, but they don't include any message, like, hey, Jim, take a look at this article on blah blah.

I'll probably use the extension for Chrome referenced in the article, just to see how it works. I'm not paranoid about internet security, but do prefer to be cautious.

Jim Hamm

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There is a NEW Sophos for Mac

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Sophos Home includes all the features of Free Mac AV with a sleek new user interface that allows you to protect all computers in your home (Mac and Windows) from a single interface. And yes, it’s still free. When downloaded and installed, this new interface, called Sophos Home, replaces the existing Sophos Antivirus application.

There is a totally new interface, in fact, two new interfaces. One is an app that runs on the computer and the other is a web interface accessed at home.sophos.com for which you are required to create a free account. Both will allow you to run a scan on the computer, but the web app is where you define or configure how Sophos checks for trouble.

From the computer app, you can only scan the computer or turn on or off a protection. From the Web interface, you have complete control of how each of your computers are protected.

There are three kinds of protection. These are Automatic Virus Protection and Web Protection. The virus protection can also check for Potentially Unwanted Applications in real time and prevent them from being installed - and you an override this if you really want to install an app that you are sure will cause your computer no harm.

In the web protection, there are three categories. These are General Interest, Social Networking & Computing, and Adult & Potentially Inappropriate. For each category there are numerous items to select one of three levels of protection for each item. These are Allow, Warn, and Block.

It is still recommended to do a full scan after installing just to let Sophos know it has done that at least once. Thereafter, it may not be needed to do another full scan since the system is being protected in real time.

The only caveat that I might mention here is that blocking some items can result in your not being able to view attached images that someone sends you. Tinkering is allowed.

John Carter

Mouse Problems?

Does your mouse seem like it is sticking and not responding to your hand movements? Try putting a piece of plain paper under the mouse. If the mouse now responds to your hand movements, the solution is to get a new surface for your mouse to move on. The older surface just wore down to something so smooth that there is no irregularity in the surface for the mouse to interact with. The surface that mouse is on needs to have sufficient irregularity in color, and the fibers in plain paper seem to work. Even a brown shipping envelop works. An extremely effective mouse pad is a smooth metal plate with a dense pattern of small, white dots all over a steel grey background.

Or, the surface that you’re working on has a lot of sludge on it and needs to be washed down. The bottom of most mouse devices has a soft plastic or rubber footing that wears off onto the surface below the mouse, or it catches dust and grinds it into the surface that eventually looks like black smudges on the surface. Just keeping that surface and the bottom of the mouse clean may be all that is needed.

John R Carter Sr

Opening Pages file returns error: index.xml not found

You might have two different versions of Pages after upgrading to El Capitan. A document created with the new Pages 5 cannot be opened with the older Pages app, and you will get the error message, “missing index.xml file.” I did a little research on the problem with the missing index.xml file. Here’s what I found at this website (I have modified the text somewhat here):

You may have 2 versions of Pages on your Mac.

Pages 5 is in your Applications folder.

Pages '09/'08 is in your Applications/iWork folder.

You have the option to open different versions of Pages depending on what you want to accomplish.

Pages '09/'08 cannot open Pages 5 documents, and you will get the warning that you need a newer version.

Pages 5/5.01 cannot open Pages 5.1 documents, and you will get the warning that you need a newer version.

Pages 5.1 sometimes cannot open its own document, and you will get the warning that you need a newer version.

Pages 5 can open Pages '09 documents but may damage/alter them. It cannot open Pages ’08 documents at all. (I believe this has been fixed in the latest Pages version.)

Once opened and saved in Pages 5, the Pages '09 documents cannot be opened in Pages '09.

Anything that is saved to iCloud is also converted to Pages 5 documents.

All Pages documents, no matter what version and incompatibility, have the same extension pages making it impossible to tell which version of Pages to use with what document. Trial and error is the only way.

Pages 5 documents are now only compatible with themselves on a very restricted combination of hardware, software and Operating Systems and will not transfer correctly to any server other than iCloud.

Note: Apple has removed over 100 features from Pages 5 and added many bugs.

OPTION: To use the older Pages app with the newer Pages 5 document, you must export the Pages 5 document (using Pages 5) as Pages ’09 or Word .docx. If you don’t want to use Pages 5, then archive/trash Pages 5 and all the new Pages documents after converting them for use with the older Pages.

It may be advantageous to have both versions since the older version has more features. You will still need the newer version for those files that require it. You may want to create a separate folder for the documents of each Pages version to help reduce confusion. If you do keep both versions, try renaming the older version so it doesn't automatically get opened when you open a Pages 5 document. This means you will have to right click on an older version of a Pages document and select the proper Pages app to open it.

It should be noted that any Pages document that has the extension .cwk can be opened with Pages '09 but not with Pages 5. If you then simply "Save" the document while opened with Pages '09, it be saved as a new document with the .pages extension and that new document can now be opened with Pages 5.

John R Carter Sr

Apple TV Cheat Sheet

If you own an Apple TV, there are some hidden features on how to use it that aren't found in the User Guide that comes with the Apple TV, and they are not even mentioned in the online manual that Apple provides. Take Control Books has a handy one page cheat sheet that reveals all the tips. Three handy tips include 1) resetting your Apple TV (without doing a power cycle), 2) putting your Apple TV to sleep (without waiting for one hour), and 3) quickly getting back to the main menu from deep into the menu layers.

http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/resources/0157/TCoAppleTV-CheatSheet.pdf

If you want the full 197 page booklet by Take Control Books, there is a link in the cheat sheet to take you there. Don't forget to use the discount code.

John Carter

Slow Spotlight?

From John Carter If it seems that Spotlight is really slow in giving up a response to a query, it is most likely due to the Mac being clogged up with lots of cache items and other stuff. This can be remedied. There are two ways to get it done.

One way is to download the free tool Onyx for Mac (specific for your version of OS X) and run all the items in the “Cleaning” tab. This is pretty complicated and takes time, but it does one extra thing that is useful and that is to check the status of your internal hard drive before allowing you to do anything else. Well, that can be done with Disk Utilities also, and you should occasionally run the First Aid tab of Disk Utility regardless.

The easier way is to clean up all the caches, launch daemons, launch agents, startup items, and saved application states in your Mac and make Spotlight run like new. To make this really easy, I have created an application that I call CleanMacCache.app (using Automator). All you need to do is download the app from my Dropbox and double-click on it to then clean up your computer to make Spotlight run a lot more efficiently.

Here’s the link to CleanMacCache.app in my Dropbox:

http://tinyurl.com/zmasdtd

After downloading the app, move it from your Downloads folder to your Applications folder.

When you run that app, Here are the prompts that you will see:

Start

While the application is running, nothing is displayed on the screen. When the operation is complete, you will see this:

Finish

If you do nothing, the app will close automatically after one minute.

Just so you know what it does, here are the Terminal command lines that it runs:

rm -rf /library/caches/* rm -rf /library/launchagents/* rm -rf /library/launchdaemons/* rm -rf /library/startupitems/* rm -rf /system/caches/* rm -rf ~/library/caches/* rm -rf ~/library/launchagents/* rm -rf ~/library/saved\ application\ state/*

So if you are curious, you can first look into any one of those folders before and after to convince yourself that it actually did something.

And to put your mind at ease that it is safe to run that app, I got all those instructions from Apple Support when I reported that Spotlight was running extra slow on my computer.

NOTE: This app will ONLY run if your OS X is up to date with El Capitan. Please report any problems to john@jrcarter.com. Thanks.

Looking to sell 5k iMac from Dec 2014 4.0GHz 27" unboxed, w AppleCare for 2 years remaining

For your possible interest, here is an offer from a member of a Forum I belong to at the Arizona Macintosh Users Group (AMUG). I don't know Jak Kevser, so any questions should be directed to him. Jim Hamm

I want to sell an unopened boxed late 2014/mid 2015 iMac 5K 27” 4.0 GHz __ 1TB SSD __ 32GB (4x8GB) OWC RAM separately and included (iMac bought w 8GB) __ fastest graphics card at the time-- AMD Radeon M295X with 4GB video RAM __ extended warrantee included (has two years left) __ new extended USB keyboard (w numeric keypad)

It is all still unboxed due to being out of town a lot this past year and other extenuating circumstances. I never got the box even opened let alone set up. (I am wanting to sell it so I can get the new 2015 version for it’s 64GB RAM capability and slightly larger color gamut)

I’d rather first entertain an offer from an AMUG person than sell on Amazon or eBay. I realize I’m taking a hit on this seemingly minor upgrade attempt, but it’s what I’d like to try to do.

This is one screaming machine, often beating the most recent Mac Pro plus a gorgeous 5K display and really fast 1TB SSD root drive.

Cheers, Jak Keyser

Info on original payments below —

Apple at list was around $4516 (w 32GB RAM) plus $383.86 sales tax for 32GBGB RAM at the time = $4,899.86 plus shipping (unknown).

I got a good discount from Adorama which saved on extended warrantee (saved $118), no taxes ($383.86) and free shipping. OWC memory saved $206 ($600 Apple - $394 OWC = $206 saved), plus you can sell the 8GB that shipped in the iMac.

DETAILS I paid $4,192.00 ( Adorama with discounts at $3,798 plus OWC 32GB RAM at $394 = $4,192) as follows — copied and pasted from invoice:

Apple 27" iMac with Retina 5K Display, 5120x2880, Intel Core i7 Quad-Core 4.0GHz, 8GB RAM, 1TB Flash Storage, AMD Radeon M295X, Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite (Late 2014) 1 $3,749.00 $3,749.00Apple AppleCare 3 Year Extended Protection Plan for iMac 1 $118.00 $0.00 Apple USB Extended Keyboard with Numeric Keypad, USA 1 $49.00 $49.00 Subtotal: $3,798.00 Shipping & Handling: Free Taxes: $0.00 GRAND TOTAL: $3,798.00

I also have 32 GB of RAM from Other World Computing for: OWC1600DDR3S32S 32GB DDR3L PC12800 1600MHz Kit (8GBx4) 1 1 $394.00 EA $394.00

iMac 5K w keyboard, warrantee, plus 32GB RAM Grand grand total: $4192.00 Info on cost if purchased through Apple earlier this year Without discounts, ordered from Apple would have been approximately $3798 + $118 warrantee + $600 (for 32GB RAM) = $4516.00 + $ 383.86 sales tax (Phx @ 8.5%) if purchased through Apple $4,899.86 plus shipping

(I don’t think custom configuration had in-store pickup at the time)

Acronis True Image 2016

For your possible interest, here is a special offer to purchase the subject computer backup program at a special price: one for $25 or four for $60. The Acronis program is available for a PC or a Mac. This would make a nice Christmas gift for someone. I've used Acronis for years on my PC (and it works fine) but haven't tried it yet on my Mac. I've used Super Duper for an image backup on my Mac, but may give Acronis a try. The pricing is certainly great.

I've known Gene Barlow for years, and he and his wife are very reputable and nice people, so have no concern in ordering from them. I'm not on any commission or remuneration basis with Gene (he doesn't know I'm sending this out). I'm just referring this offer to you since I think it is a good deal, and a good way to backup your computer -- which, I think, is a very good idea.

Jim Hamm