Starting December 2nd, there’s a bug that causes some notifications to crash your iPhone. iOS 11.2 is the fix, and we’ll show you how to apply it and avoid these 12/2 crashes.
Dave Hamilton
Dave Hamilton co-founded both The Mac Observer and <a href="https://www.backbeatmedia.com" data-wpel-link="external" target="_blank">BackBeat Media</a>, and he is producer and co-host of the <a href="https://www.macgeekgab.com" data-wpel-link="external" target="_blank">Mac Geek Gab Podcast</a>. He has worked in the computer industry since the early 1990s, doing time as a consultant, trainer, network engineer, webmaster, and programmer. He has worked on the Mac, all the various Windows flavors, BeOS, a few brands of Unix, and it is rumored he once saw an OS/2 machine in action. Before that he ran some of the earliest Bulletin Board Systems, but most of the charges have since been dropped, and not even the FBI requests that he check in more than twice a year. Dave's reachable for paid consulting at <a href="https://www.davethenerd.com" data-wpel-link="external" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">DaveTheNerd.com</a> and you can find links to him on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+ here, too.
Articles by Dave Hamilton
Use Live Photos to Get The Best Pictures on Your iPhone
Are you someone who finds Live Photos on your iPhone annoying and turns the feature off? If so, listen to this Mac Geek Gab Highlight, to learn how I had my mind blown when presented with the concept of using Live Photos as a form of “permanent burst mode”. Doing this means the best picture is almost always there on your iPhone, even long after the fact!
Updated List of WPA-2 KRACK Patches in Consumer Routers
We’re keeping an up-to-date list of KRACK-related router firmware updates so you can find out if one is available for your router. (Update, 22-Nov-2017, 1:30pm EST: Added info from Linksys about their recent KRACK updates)
macOS Sierra 10.12 Installer Download Still Available on Mac App Store
During this week’s Mac Geek Gab 679 we discussed how many people have emailed us asking for a macOS Sierra 10.12 installer download link… and no one can seem to find one. Searching the Mac App Store yields nothing and, thus far, there’s no Apple knowledgebase article with a link to it (Update: that KB article now exists). MGG Listener “Kirk van” came to the rescue with this Mac App Store download link to the macOS Sierra 10.12.6 Installer.
Cheap (Legal?) Movie Downloads and The (Self-Inflicted?) Effects of Apple's RDF – TMO Daily Observations 2017-10-18
The movie studios let you add digital movies to your library for two dollars, and Apple’s reality distortion field is still strong – and perhaps self-inflicted – and that’s what Kelly Guimont and John Martellaro discuss with guest-host Dave Hamilton on today’s TDO. Press play… and enjoy!
Sonos One: Alexa-Controlled Wireless Home Speaker
Wireless speaker company Sonos recently debuted voice support in two forms: pairing their speakers with an Amazon Alexa-enabled device like an Echo or Dot, and with Sonos’s first voice-enabled speaker, the Sonos One. We put the new speaker through its paces.
Apple Music with Sonos, Alexa, and AirPlay 2
Sonos’s new Alexa support doesn’t offer full control for Apple Music, but next year’s AirPlay 2 integration might just provide Apple Music subscribers full voice-control of their Sonos sytems.
![Sonos Announces Sonos One, a Smart, Voice-Enabled Speaker [Update]](https://www.macobserver.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/sonos-one-voice-speaker.jpg)
Sonos Announces Sonos One, a Smart, Voice-Enabled Speaker [Update]
NEW YORK CITY – Similar in size and form to Sonos’s popular PLAY:1, the Sonos One adds a six-microphone array to give it far-field voice recognition capability, and will ship on October 24th with support for Alexa baked right in.
Apple's AirPlay 2 Coming to Sonos in 2018
NEW YORK CITY – Details were sparse, but throughout the presentation, the company said the brand new, voice-controllable Sonos One would support AirPlay 2.
Alexander Hamilton Papers Now Online at Library of Congress
Alexander Hamilton is household name these days for many reasons, perhaps even moreso in my house, but likely yours just the same. The Library of Congress has now published digital versions of over 12,000 letters, legal papers, speech drafts, and more, many of which are in Hamilton’s own writing. The example shown here is a letter Hamilton wrote on November 11, 1769 when he was 12-years-old in St. Croix, telling his friend that he would “willing risk my life tho’ not my character to exalt my station.” There are some fascinating treasures within.
What to Do Now That CrashPlan for Home is Going Away
This week’s Mac Geek Gab had many listeners writing and calling in, asking for guidance on their cloud backup options now that CrashPlan has announced the end of CrashPlan for Home. John and Dave talk through various solutions including BackBlaze, B2, Amazon Glacier, CrashPlan for Small Business, and others. Listen to this Mac Geek Gab Highlight from MGG 672 to hear the advice of your two favorite geeks.
Internet problems: Is it my Wi-Fi or my ISP?
If you have internet problems, perform these quick-and-simple tests before you drop a few hundred bucks replacing your router, just to confirm that’s the issue.
Apple's Potential Movie Deal and Ways to Avoid Scam Calls - TMO Daily Observations 2017-08-21
Jeff Butts and John Martellaro join Dave Hamilton to talk about Apple’s potential deal for first-run movies in-the-home, as well as ways to avoid getting scammed by fake calls from Apple support.
How to save both Optimized and Original iCloud Photos on the Same Mac
Listener Dan has wants to store optimized version of his iCloud Photos on his MacBook Pro’s internal drive, and full-sized originals on his external drive. An interesting dilemma, for sure! In this week’s Mac Geek Gab Highlight, Dave and John talk through the solution for this one. Listen, learn, and enjoy!
How to Restore Spotlight App Launching in iOS 11 Beta
Many folks using the latest iOS 11 betas have been unable to launch apps in Spotlight search by just typing a fragment of the app’s name. We dug into this and, in this week’s Mac Geek Gab Highlight, we’ll tell you how to fix it! Listen, learn, and then subscribe to MGG if you want to hear tips shared like this every week!
Apple's Patent Struggles and The Untold History of Multitouch
In 1983 a group of musically-inclined computer scientists at Carnegie Mellon University invented multitouch… and changed the computing world forever.
How to Share iCloud Storage with Family Members Not Yet Running iOS 11 Beta
In this Mac Geek Gab Highlight, we feature a segment that teaches you how, exactly, to use your iCloud Family Plan to share your iCloud Storage with family members that aren’t yet running (or can’t run) the iOS 11 beta. Listen, learn, and then subscribe to MGG if you want to hear tips shared like this every week!
Here's Why You Still Need to Force Quit Some iPhone Apps
John Gruber penned a piece at Daring Fireball with this premise: iOS is so good at managing background apps that you never need to force quit them. He is 100% correct that this is true about iOS and most apps. Unfortunately, as with most general advice, there are exceptions. We’ll show you how to find them.
Use a RADIUS Server to Control Wi-Fi Authentication in Your Home
After our discussion about using RADIUS for Wi-Fi authentication in Mac Geek Gab 664, listener John Skinner set to work on a how-to:
If you have a Mac with a wired ethernet jack, an Airport base station capable of doing WPA2 Enterprise, and $20 (to buy macOS Server in the Mac App Store), you can set all this up! Then you will be able turn on and off access to your WiFi network, per user.
It’s that last bit that explains “why?” With Personal WPA2 Wi-Fi, everyone shares the same password. With Enterprise WPA2, each person has their own password. The RADIUS server is the key to making this happen.
How Scott Forstall Selected The People Who Would Create The iPhone’s Software
In 2005 Scott Forstall was tasked with finding people to build the iPhone and, due to secrecy concerns, Steve Jobs said he could only pick people from within Apple. From Mark Sullivan over at Fast Company:
“During all the interviews for the team, we screened for people who were growth mind-set,” Forstall told me. Forstall said he had been a fan of Carol Dweck, a Stanford psychology professor known for her theory that people exist somewhere on a continuum between “fixed mind-set” and “growth mind-set.”
eero Adds Tri-Band, Wall Plug, and Enhanced Features to Mesh Wireless
eero maintains backwards compatibility while adding new capabilities and form factors to the mesh wireless company’s line-up.
TMO WWDC 2017 Coverage Sponsor: Other World Computing
Please join me in thanking Other World Computing / MacSales.com as our sponsor for our WWDC 2017 Coverage this week. MacSales.com has great everyday prices on storage, memory, used Macs and more. Plus they have unbeatable specials on hundreds of products for your Mac, your iDevices and your life.
Mac App Store will require 64-bit macOS Apps Starting in 2018
At WWDC Monday, Apple announced that this year’s macOS High Sierra will be the last macOS release to support 32-bit apps “without compromises.”
Apple’s Rumored Siri Speaker Targets Sonos, Too
The Siri Speaker may be more of a living room device than a kitchen device.
