This is a twofer tip. You may not have known that every document window in macOS has long had a proxy icon in the title bar, next to the filename. The proxy icon is not just cosmetic. You can drag it to Mail to attach the document to a message, to a Web browser to upload it, or to any other location you can drag a document’s icon in the Finder (top screenshot, below, showing Preview in Catalina). You can also drag proxy icons from Finder windows to Open and Save dialogs to navigate to the location of the proxy icon and even pre-fill the filename when saving. Alas, in macOS 11 Big Sur, in at least the Finder and Preview, Apple chose to hide the proxy icon and the drop-down menu that lets you rename, tag, or move files using controls on the title bar (middle screenshot, below). Plus, the new title bar design tends to truncate file names. Happily, mousing over the filename expands the name and reveals both the proxy icon and the drop-down menu (bottom screenshot, below). Apple’s desire to reduce onscreen clutter makes usage more cumbersome than before, but all the functionality is still present.
(Featured image by Harrison Haines from Pexels)
https://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2021/04/Double-exposure-proxy-photo.jpg8001280F-11 Photohttps://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2023/06/PR-F11Photo-logo.jpgF-11 Photo2021-04-01 11:05:002023-06-27 20:34:36Apple Hid the Proxy Icon in Big Sur’s Finder. Here’s How to Reveal It
Along with the now-ubiquitous videoconferencing, screen sharing and online presentations have become vastly more common during the pandemic. This isn’t yet another article about how to give a better presentation or feel more confident. (Although those might happen too.) The goal of this article is to help you avoid situations that could embarrass you in front of clients, colleagues, or bosses. Follow this advice and you could avoid an unfortunate happenstance that might even cause you to be fired.
Here’s the problem. Even more so than before the pandemic, our Macs feel like personal spaces. Just as you’d add a houseplant and a special photo to your desk at work, you’ve probably personalized your Mac in a variety of ways. Custom desktop wallpaper, for instance, or a screensaver that displays favorite photos. Plus, you may carry on personal conversations, possibly even intimate ones, if you catch our drift, using the same Mac that you use for communicating with those aforementioned clients, colleagues, and bosses.
We’re not here to admonish you or nag about inappropriate behavior. (Though we will encourage you to consider some sage advice from a friend’s mother, who noted drily that you should never put anything on the Internet that you don’t want to appear on the front page of the New York Times. And that was before Twitter.)
No, as we said, the goal here is to help you avoid the embarrassment caused by people who are viewing your screen seeing things they shouldn’t see, something that the New York Times has also covered. Some areas of concern include:
Desktop & Screen Saver: Jobs have been lost by inappropriate selections for desktop wallpaper and photo screen savers. Make sure, if you’re ever going to share your screen, that randomly chosen desktop pictures and folders of screen saver photos don’t contain anything that could be problematic. To be safe, choose an Apple-provided desktop picture and a pattern-based screen saver in System Preferences > Desktop & Screen Saver.
Icons on the Desktop: We all toss files on the desktop, but if preview icons or even filenames could cause trouble—you might not want your boss seeing Resumé.doc—corral them in another folder before you share your screen. Also note that many videoconferencing apps can limit their screen sharing to particular windows rather than the entire screen, which prevents people from seeing your desktop.
Web browser tabs: Limiting screen sharing to a particular window won’t help if it’s a Web browser window with multiple tabs. Even if you avoid accidentally navigating to a tab with NSFW content, its title alone might be problematic. For safety, always start a new browser window when sharing Web content.
Open apps and documents: As with icons on the desktop when sharing your entire screen, you may not want just anyone seeing what other apps and documents you have open. Again, stick to sharing a specific window. To avoid mistakes when selecting the window to share, we recommend hiding or quitting all unrelated apps before sharing your screen.
Document comments: When collaborating on a document, some people are less than politic with their in-document comments. If comments are visible when you’re sharing a document with people who wouldn’t otherwise see them, hard feelings could ensue. Make sure to hide or resolve such comments before sharing.
Notifications: Even if you have hidden or quit Calendar, Messages, Mail, and similar apps, their notifications could still appear at an inopportune time. You might not want colleagues to know about an ob-gyn appointment, meeting with a potential employer, or racy conversations with a coworker. The solution is Do Not Disturb, easily enabled from Control Center in macOS 11 Big Sur and by scrolling up in Today view in Notification Center in earlier versions of macOS. Also, although it won’t help with online screen sharing, it’s a good idea to enable the “When mirroring to TVs and projectors” option in System Preferences > Notifications > Do Not Disturb.
This may all sound a little overwhelming, but there is one trick that will help you avoid most of these problems at once. In System Preferences > Users & Groups, create a new user account dedicated to screen sharing and presentations. In that user account, you can be sure to have innocuous desktop pictures, screen savers, clean Web browser windows, and permanent Do Not Disturb. The hardest part will be figuring out the best way to share documents you use in presentations between your accounts (try the /Users/Shared folder or an online file sharing solution like Dropbox). Then, before you start a call when you’ll need to share your screen, choose your new account from the Fast User Switching menu from the right side of the menu bar (set up that menu in System Preferences > Users & Groups > Login Options).
One final piece of advice. When you’ve accomplished what you need to by sharing your screen, stop sharing it and switch back to video. That way, you can’t accidentally do something in the shared window that might be embarrassing. Similarly, when a meeting is over or you’re dropping off for a while, it’s best to leave the call. Stopping video and muting audio are good tools, but it’s easy to click in the wrong spot accidentally and think you’re safe when, in fact, your mic or camera is still live.
(Featured image by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels)
Social Media: When sharing your screen online, would you be embarrassed if your clients, colleagues, or bosses saw what’s on your Mac—your desktop picture, screen saver, browser tabs, email notifications, or Messages conversations? Here’s what to watch out for.
https://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2021/04/embarrassed-photo.jpg8001280F-11 Photohttps://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2023/06/PR-F11Photo-logo.jpgF-11 Photo2021-04-01 11:04:002024-09-13 09:40:37How to Avoid Embarrassment During Online Presentations or Screen Sharing
Organizing a closet full of pictures doesn’t have to be a challenge. First, think about the best way to categorize or sort your prints – by subject, event or date – whatever method works best for you. It also helps to imagine how you would search for specific images in the future once the prints are digitized.
The video above shows you an easy way to prepare photos and memorabilia to be digitized and archived.
Professional archiving is our jam!
Is the idea of organizing your life in photos too daunting? Or maybe you just inherited a storage unit full of your great grandfather’s photo collection? We get it – these treasures can be a real bear to manage. Ask about our professional photo organizing services and we’d be happy to take this project off your hands.
Your story is meant to be shared – and now is the perfect time to do it! Don’t wait until it’s too late to protect those photos of your grandparents, your high school prom and that family vacation to the Grand Canyon.
https://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2021/02/Untitled-1.png321845Natalie Gunnhttps://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2023/06/PR-F11Photo-logo.jpgNatalie Gunn2021-03-08 09:48:232021-02-22 11:01:21How to Prepare Printed Photos for Digitizing?
For the most part, Spotlight works well. Press Command-Space or use the Search field in a Finder window, and it finds everything that matches your search term. Sometimes, however, Spotlight fails to turn up a file that you know is present, likely due to index corruption. To fix the problem, you can force Spotlight to rebuild its index. (Don’t do this unless it’s necessary since reindexing can take a long time and may impact the performance of your Mac while it’s happening.) Open System Preferences > Spotlight > Privacy, and then drag your drive (or the drive on which Spotlight isn’t finding files) into the list of locations that Spotlight shouldn’t search. That deletes the old Spotlight index. Still working in the Spotlight Privacy list, select the drive and click the – button below the list. Spotlight now reindexes the contents of the drive and should find your files properly in the future.
(Featured image by cottonbro from Pexels)
https://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2021/03/Reset-Spotlight-index-photo.jpg8001280F-11 Photohttps://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2023/06/PR-F11Photo-logo.jpgF-11 Photo2021-03-01 12:08:002023-06-27 20:34:13Having Trouble Finding Files on Your Mac? Here’s How to Reset Spotlight
Sadly, email is not an entirely reliable communications medium, thanks to spam filters, addressing errors, and server failures. With certain types of email, it’s worth double-checking that a message was seen. One example of that we see is with reports of phishing email, which miscreants use to try to trick you into revealing passwords, credit card info, or other sensitive information. Phishing messages can be tricky to identify—that’s their goal. If you’re forwarding a possible phishing email to us or another trusted technical contact for evaluation, remember that spam filters often catch such messages, so they may go unseen. To work around this awkwardness, send a separate message saying you’ve forwarded what you think might be a phishing message so the recipient knows to check their Junk mailbox if need be. It’s helpful if you can include the Subject line of the suspect message.
(Featured image by Mikhail Nilov from Pexels)
https://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2021/03/Phishing-forwarding-photo.jpg8001280F-11 Photohttps://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2023/06/PR-F11Photo-logo.jpgF-11 Photo2021-03-01 12:07:002023-06-27 20:34:17When Asking about Phishing Email, Make Sure to Write Separately Too
Since the earliest days of the iPhone, Apple’s Safari and Mail have been the default Web and email apps for iOS and, later, iPadOS. There was no way to choose alternatives that would be used whenever an app wanted to open a Web page or create an email message. That has now changed with iOS 14 and iPadOS 14. To switch to a different Web browser (such as Brave, DuckDuckGo Privacy Browser, Firefox, Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, or Opera Touch) or a different email app (such as Boomerang, Chuck, Hey, Gmail, Outlook, Polymail, or Spark), follow these directions. In Settings, tap the name of the browser or email app you want to set as the default. Then tap Default Browser App or Default Mail App and select the desired app.
(Featured image based on an original by Sotiris Gkolias from Pexels)
https://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2021/03/Default-browser-apps-photo.jpg8001280F-11 Photohttps://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2023/06/PR-F11Photo-logo.jpgF-11 Photo2021-03-01 12:06:002023-06-27 20:34:22Choose Your Preferred Default Web Browser and Email App in iOS and iPadOS 14
For those who cook, the Apple Watch provides a helpful Timer app that ensures we don’t forget whatever’s in the oven until it’s burnt to a crisp. Setting the timer is easy from the app’s interface, but even easier is using Siri: just hold the Digital Crown and say, “Set a timer for 8 minutes.” When the timer goes off, the watch makes a sound or vibrates and presents you with Stop and Repeat buttons. But often, when a timer goes off, you’re wearing oven mitts or moving quickly, making it hard to look at the watch and tap the Stop button. There’s a no-look alternative you may not have known about—just press the Digital Crown once (if the display is active) or twice (if the display is dimmed) to stop the timer.
(Featured image by Adam Engst)
https://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2021/03/Apple-Watch-timer-photo.jpg8001280F-11 Photohttps://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2023/06/PR-F11Photo-logo.jpgF-11 Photo2021-03-01 12:05:002021-03-31 23:13:19Stop Apple Watch Timer Alerts with a Press of the Digital Crown
We’re cautious when it comes to recommending upgrades to new versions of macOS. Apple makes the upgrade process easy—though it can be time-consuming—but upgrading can create workflow interruptions, render favorite apps inoperable, and have other consequences. At the same time, it’s important to stay in sight of the cutting edge for security reasons and to take advantage of advances from Apple and other developers. Upgrading is not an if question; it’s a when question.
We’re not saying that everyone needs to upgrade to macOS 11 Big Sur now, but if you want to, it should be safe now that Apple has released several bug-fix updates. However, there are still a few caveats, and preparation is essential.
Reasons Not to Upgrade
Some people should continue to delay upgrades to Big Sur due to software incompatibilities. Most software under steady development will have been updated for Big Sur by now, but some workflows rely on older versions of apps where an upgrade isn’t practical or possible (ancient versions of Adobe Creative Suite, for instance), or on obsolete apps that will never be updated. You may be able to learn more at RoaringApps, but those who haven’t yet upgraded past 10.14 Mojave may have to upgrade or replace 32-bit apps that ceased working starting with 10.15 Catalina.
The other app category that continues to have trouble with Big Sur are backup apps that make bootable duplicates. Catalina moved macOS to its own read-only volume, and Big Sur goes a step further by applying cryptographic signatures that make it even harder for an attacker to compromise the operating system. Unfortunately, that also makes creating a bootable duplicate difficult. Carbon Copy Cloner and ChronoSync have developed workarounds; SuperDuper remains incompatible at this point, although an older version can create data-only backups. If you rely on one of these apps for critical backups, make sure you know what you’re getting into before upgrading or reassess your backup strategy.
Before You Upgrade
Once you’ve decided to upgrade to Big Sur, you have three main tasks:
Update apps: Make sure all your apps are as up-to-date as possible. If you regularly put off updates, now’s the time to let them complete so you have Big Sur-compatible versions.
Clear space: Big Sur needs a minimum of 35.5 GB to upgrade, and as of macOS 11.2.1, the installer won’t proceed unless there’s enough space. Don’t cut this close—you should always have at least 10–20% free space for virtual memory, cache files, and breathing room.
Make a backup: Never, ever install a major upgrade to macOS without ensuring that you have at least one current backup first. In an ideal world, you’d have an updated Time Machine backup, a bootable duplicate, and an Internet backup. That way, if something goes wrong as thousands of files are moved around on your drive, you can easily restore.
After those tasks are complete, make sure you don’t need your Mac for a few hours. There’s no telling exactly how long the upgrade will take, especially if it has to convert your drive to APFS, so never start an upgrade if you need the Mac soon.
Initiating the upgrade is just a matter of opening System Preferences > Software Update, clicking the Upgrade Now button, and following the instructions.
After You Upgrade
Part of the reason to set aside plenty of time for your Big Sur upgrade is that there are always clean-up tasks afterward. We can’t predict precisely what you’ll run into, but here are a few situations we’ve noticed:
macOS will probably need to update its authentication situation by asking for your Apple ID password, your Mac’s password, and if you have another Mac, its password too. Don’t worry that this is a security breach—it’s fine.
Some apps may have to ask for permission to access your contacts and calendar even though you previously granted permission. Again, that’s fine.
If you use your Apple Watch to unlock your Mac and apps (and you should, it’s great!), you’ll need to re-enable that in System Preferences > Security & Privacy > General.
If you use Gmail or Google Calendar or other Google services, you may need to log in to your Google account again.
Websites that usually remember your login state will likely require that you log in again. If you’re using a password manager like 1Password, that’s easy.
You may have to re-enable text-message forwarding to your Mac on your iPhone in Settings > Messages > Text Message Forwarding.
Those who use Backblaze for Internet backups will find their backups have been “safety frozen.” Follow these instructions for thawing your account.
Finally, Time Machine in Big Sur now supports and prefers APFS-formatted drives, and all of Apple’s development is going in that direction now. You can keep using your existing Time Machine backup in Big Sur, but after you’re confident that everything is working well—and you have another backup—it’s worth removing your Time Machine backup drive in System Preferences > Time Machine > Select Disk, reformatting the drive as APFS in Disk Utility, and restarting the backup in the Time Machine preference pane.
Social Media: Should you upgrade to macOS 11 Big Sur? There’s no need to do so yet, but it should be safe for most people, so if you’re excited about the new look and the new features, this is a good time to upgrade. Read on for our pre- and post-upgrade tasks.
https://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2021/03/Big-Sur-laptop-mountains-photos.jpg8001280F-11 Photohttps://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2023/06/PR-F11Photo-logo.jpgF-11 Photo2021-03-01 12:04:002023-06-27 20:34:24It’s Time to Consider Upgrading to macOS 11 Big Sur
Tips for decluttering the thousands of photos on your device.
Our mobile phones have sadly become the final resting place for many of our family memories. Pictures of first days of school, fall adventures, family gatherings at home and other priceless moments in your family history never make it out of our mobile photo albums. The cloud gives us ample space to store thousands of photos – but it the number of images can quickly get out of control if not continually managed. If you take, say, 10 photos a day, every day for a year, that adds up to nearly 4,000 photos left to stagnate on your digital device.
But they don’t need to be lost and unseen. In fact, organizing and clearing your phone of clutter is similar to cleaning out a disorganized closet at home. When you’re cleaning, you will wonder what made you keep certain photos for so long, much like you might wonder why you kept a sweater from high school. No time is better than the present to sort out the mess on your phone.
Let Go of the Photo Clutter
We truly don’t need thousands of photos. If you scroll back in your camera roll, there may very well be duplicate photos, screenshots of recipes you never used or poor-quality photos. Delete these! You want your photos to tell a story about a memory you have and keeping photos that you will never use again only adds to the clutter. And clutter is the last thing you need when it comes to photo organization.
Beginning this process may be intimidating. It’s much like opening the closet you’ve been afraid to open for years, for fear that a ton of junk will tumble out. But you’ve got to let go of the junk to get to the memories that matter most.
Find Time to Delete
Spend time deleting duplicates and non-keepers while in line at the grocery store or set aside time once a week to delete photos. Just like the minimalist mantra, if something doesn’t bring joy, get rid of it.
Organize What’s Left
It takes time and computer know-how to begin the organization of your digital files, and this should also be an enjoyable process because you get to reminisce on past moments. Once you’ve sifted through which photos to keep and which photos to toss, you can begin placing the photos in folders or albums, either separated by year or by an event. This is exactly the process you might use when you are organizing your messy closet. Put winter items in one box, summer in another, and so forth.
Print them. Display them. Share them.
Next, you’ll want to get your photos off your phone and have some type of physical output made. I recommend printing your favorites and making copies for every family member who is part of the story. Of course, you can also create photo books, framed wall galleries and keepsake gifts.
https://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2021/02/main.coverphoto.png321845Natalie Gunnhttps://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2023/06/PR-F11Photo-logo.jpgNatalie Gunn2021-02-22 09:42:072021-02-22 09:42:07Tips for managing your life in photos.
Remember when we had to keep magnets away from floppy disks to avoid scrambling them? Modern storage is no longer vulnerable, but magnets and electromagnetic fields from consumer electronics can interfere with medical devices, like implanted pacemakers and defibrillators. Although iPhone 12 models contain more magnets than prior models, Apple says they’re not expected to pose a greater risk of magnetic interference. However, after a study found that one pacemaker could be deactivated by holding an iPhone 12 near it, Apple issued a support document recommending that you keep your iPhone 12 and MagSafe accessories more than 6 inches (15 cm) away from your medical device or more than 12 inches (30 cm) away while wirelessly charging. Better safe than sorry—if you have a pacemaker, don’t put your iPhone or any other consumer electronics in a breast pocket.
(Featured image by Ulrike Leone from Pixabay)
https://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2021/02/iPhone-12-pacemaker-photo.jpg8001280F-11 Photohttps://f11photo.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2023/06/PR-F11Photo-logo.jpgF-11 Photo2021-02-01 12:08:002023-06-27 20:33:24Keep iPhone 12 and MagSafe Accessories Away from Pacemakers