Skype - video conferencing

I'm still looking for a reasonably reliable video conferencing solution that my mother can use.

It has to run on OS X, the UI should work well for a low vision user, and it must "auto-answer" when I call.

I've tried iChat. Enough said. Apple would make me happy if they pulled iChat from the OS and sold it separately. Maybe they'd be motivated to make it work, and they'd encourage competition.

I really like the quality of Google Video Chat when it works. Alas, it fails far too often, the interface is a case study in UI sadism and the plugin didn't work on my 10.6 64 bit machine.

That leaves Skype, with video auto-answer. The quality isn't as good as GV, and it does crash, but I think it's more reliable than GV. More importantly, auto-answer is build it. The install was very easy.

I'll report more as I get additional experience.

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LogMeIn OS X - 32 bit only

For several weeks I was frustrated that LogMeIn didn't work on my iMac i5 running 10.6.2. I couldn't find any explanation. I made do with the almost inert Java applet or used my MacBook (10.5) to maintain my mother's Mini.

Turns out LogMeIn is not fully compatible with Snow Leopard. It only works if Safari runs in 32 bit mode.

It did work for me in 32 bit mode, but it was flaky. I switched to Firefox which is still 32 bit (the 64 bit version is in beta I think). It worked there.

Obviously LogMeIn.com isn't exactly dying to please OS X customers. This should have shown up in blazing red letters for every OS X user who logs in to the service. Practically speaking, LogMeIn is not compatible with any of Apple's newer machines.

I don't mind them not having a fix, I do mind the time I wasted trying to make their product work.

Anyone know a better (please, no VNC) remote control solution? I don't mind paying! (Yes, I know about Apple's remote control solution. It's almost as crummy as iChat.)

OS X Mail.app supports multiple sending aliases

If you want to use aliases when you send an email ...

Mail’s Email Aliases, and Complexity Hidden - Release Candidate One

... all my outgoing email appeared to come from the One True Email Address ... I looked around Mail’s account preferences for a hint as to where outgoing email aliases could be set up. Nowhere, it seemed. Could they have left that feature out? Do they want strict one-to-one mappings between incoming and outgoing addresses, and didn’t account for aliases? Surely not.

A Google search later, it turns out you can list multiple addresses separated by commas, and later those addresses will appear on a menu in the New Message window. Your selection will determine from whence that message appears to be delivered, and everybody’s happy.

This is a typical Apple move. Provide the functionality, but make it invisible and documentation free. No promises.
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Retrospect 8 - no user guide?

I have two backup systems at the moment: Time Capsule/Time Machine and Retrospect Professional (Windows). Neither is fabulous, but there aren't a lot of good choices. Somewhat to my surprise EMC fixed quite a few Retrospect Pro bugs; it's extremely complex to configure but my version works.

Problem is, I want to sunset my XP box. So I need an OS X only solution. Fortunately EMC has invested in creating a new version of the original Retrospect product. It now runs on 10.6 Intel.

I downloaded a trial version and, as a veteran user, I was able to get a hard drive backup going in minutes. Configuring the clients is a bit trickier than it used to be, but that should only take a few minutes with the User Guide ...

User Guide?

Where the @#%& is my Retrospect 8 User's Guide (Aug 2009)?!

Yes, the documentation for a SOHO backup system has been missing since March 2009 because EMC won't pay for a tech writer.

Who the #$!#$#! is going to use a backup system when the vendor won't even invest in a manual? (*cough* Time Machine *cough).

What kind of company would bring a product like this to market, then be unable to pay a tech writer to put a manual together - back in the peak of the great recession when contract writers were begging for work?

What a waste.

Update 1/2/10: Joe Kissell wrote a cautious review of Retrospect 8 in Sept 2009. He didn't mention the missing manual.

Update 3/13/2010: Still no user guide. The EMC forum responses from product support are very sad.

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When Google Voice goes bad - report here

Google Voice (VOIP with local switched connections) saves me about $1,000 a year in mobile long distance charges, so I'm a grateful fan.

The quality used to be pretty iffy, but these days it's good to Canada -- except when it's awful. Two weeks ago an echo problem forced me to revert to the higher quality but costly AT&T alternative.

I reported my problem and a few days later it resolved. Coincidence? Probably. All the same, be sure to report if you run into GV quality issues.
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Notes from the new world of video cable confusion and iMac target display mode

Once upon a time I had to know about hercules graphics cards and RGB cards and about half a dozen forgotten video standards from the dawn of the PC.

Mercifully we've more or less sorted out screen resolutions (albeit without our long promised resolution independence). Video cables though, not so much. DRM, mega-screens, and licensing struggles have blown through a half-dozen cable standards. Here's what I deal with in my own home with our new flickering 27" i5 iMac.

MacBook: Apple Mini DVI. I have adapters to VGA and DVI.

iBook: mini-VGA port, I have a mini-VGA to VGA adapter.

Dell 2007WFP (1680x1050) display: DVI and VGA

Ancient XP box: VGA

iMac G5: mini-VGA (amazingly, same as iBook)

iMac i5 27" as computer: mini-DisplayPort

iMac i5 27" as display (1560x1440): mini-DisplayPort

Dell Laptop (corporate): standard VGA and (full size) DisplayPort

Prior to the i5 I had the following adapter cables

• mini-VGA to VGA
• mini-VGA to DVI
• mini-DVI to DVI
• mini-DVI to VGA

Recently I've added these cables/adapters

• mini-DisplayPort to (male) DisplayPort 3 foot cable (from CircuitAssembly, $13)
• mini-DisplayPort to (female) DVI adapter (from eForcity via Amazon, $7)

They were both relatively inexpensive, even with shipping (which was reasonably priced in both cases). So far both of them work. I was surprised how useful using the i5 as an external display is.

Using the mini-DisplayPort to DVI (from eForcity via Amazon, $7) adapter I can connect the i5 to the lower-pixel density Dell 2007WFP. I use the Dell for easy-on-the-eyes reading and the i5 for photo, video and as a work space. It's not a bad combination.

Using the mini-DisplayPort to (male) DisplayPort 3 foot cable I can connect my Dell laptop and use the iMac as an external display (Target display mode). This is a wee bit tricky. When I first tried it my Dell blue screened, but after rebooting it was ok. This didn't surprise me, it's always been fragile about external displays. When it worked it drove the i5 at full resolution, which impressed me. The i5 went into target display mode when I plugged in the DisplayPort cable -- but it didn't return to normal mode when I pulled it. The almost-undocumented secret is to use Command+F2 to toggle display modes.

Some other tips about using the iMac as a really big monitor (from Apple, except mine didn't leave target mode when I pulled the cable ...) ...

• Applications running on the 27-inch iMac computer remain open and running while it is in Target Display mode.
• Use the keyboard of the 27-inch iMac to adjust display brightness and sound volume and to control media playback of applications running on the 27-inch iMac in Target Display mode. Other keyboard and mouse input is disabled on the 27-inch iMac while it is in Target Display mode.
• The 27-inch iMac works like any other external display while it is in Target Display mode, except that you cannot access its built-in iSight or USB and FireWire ports. To change display settings, open System Preferences on the external source computer and choose Display from the View menu.
• Mac OS X on the 27-inch iMac ignores some sleep requests while it is in Target Display mode, but forced sleep, restart, and shutdown commands will still work. If the external source goes into idle display sleep, the 27-inch iMac in Target Display mode will go dark until activity resumes on the external source.
• If you shut down, sleep, or detach the external source while In Target Display mode, the 27-inch iMac will leave Target Display mode.
• The Mini DisplayPort in the 27-inch iMac can receive only DisplayPort compliant video and audio signals. Converters not made by Apple may provide options to convert other electrical, video, and audio protocols to Mini DisplayPort compliant signals.

Incidentally, I can't use the MacBook to drive the i5 display, but I can use it with the smaller Dell display.

Phew. I hope things settle down to using mini-DisplayPort and/or DisplayPort for a while.

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Freeing up Time Capsule space – and documentation for Time Machine and Time Capsule

[See Update for the bottom line -- my original impressions were a bit off]

I bought my 500 GB Time Capsule a few weeks before Apple upgraded performance and doubled drive capacity (they probably fixed the original’s flaky power supply too).

Sniff.

In any case adding a new iMac means the TC is blinking amber – it’s short of space. I could replace the 500 with a 1.5 or 2.0 TB Western Digital Green Power drive but the upgrade looks like a pain and it would void my original warrantee (which I might need thanks to that flaky power supply).

In reality 500GB is enough for what I truly need to backup – at this time*. I just need to free up space by excluding the System and Application folders from backup. (You can’t specify which folders to include, only which to exclude.)

This being the modern era it’s quite a chore to find Apple documentation on the Time Capsule (Google is less help than one would expect). Here’s the current list I have:

• Time Capsule (Early 2009) - Setup Guide
• Time Capsule - Setup Guide
• Support - AirPort + Time Capsule: Apple’s mysteriously hard to find Support page that tries to put everything together – but mostly fails.
• Mac 101- Time Machine
• Mac OS X 10.6 Help: Disks that can be used with Time Machine
• Time Machine- Troubleshooting backup issues
• Mac OS X 10.6 Help- Disks that can be used with Time Machine
• Apple AirPort Networks
• Designing AirPort Networks: Mac OS X v10.5 + Windows
• Setting up Time Capsule for the first time
• Backing up with Time Capsule for the first time
• Restoring files from a Time Capsule backup
• Setting up and using Back to My Mac with an 802.11n-based AirPort base station, or Time Capsule
• Printing to an AirPort Extreme - Express Base Station or Time Capsule from Windows XP
• AirPort, Time Capsule- Joining an encrypted wireless network
• AirPort Extreme-Express, Time Capsule- Where to find the serial number
• Uses for the USB port of Time Capsule, AirPort Extreme, AirPort Express
• About the Guest network feature of AirPort Extreme (Early 2009) and Time Capsule (Early 2009)
• Unable to see AirPort Extreme or Time Capsule network when using a NETGEAR WG111 Wireless USB 2
• Resetting an AirPort Base Station or Time Capsule FAQ
• Printer troubleshooting for AirPort Base Stations and Time Capsule
• Time Capsule- Time Machine backups do not mount (27 character limit for Time Capsule name)
• Back to My Mac- Supported router devices

Specific references on removing backups and freeing up TC storage:

• Erase and reformat an Apple Time Capsule- Dave Taylor: Use AirPort Time Capsule UI to reformat the drive. It works, but see Update for a 10.5 bug that might impact restarting your backups. It means all backups need to be redone, see update for removing just one machine backup.
• Removing backups from Apple’s Time Machine: This is more intriguing than I first thought, but it's somewhat different from what I've read elsewhere. Proceed with caution: I'd try other methods first. Note that TM doesn't always free up space immediately - the sparse bundle doesn't auto-compact. This article and others suggest use the "hdiutil compact" command to force sparse bundle compression.
• Removing backups by deleting the sparse image bunde: Joe Kissell, author of the superb Take Control of Mac OS X Backups wrote to me about this (see Update). I purchased the eBook and he responded very quickly to this specific question.
  

Some additional non-Apple references …

• Apple - Support - Discussions - Time Machine -- Frequently Asked Questions (the best overall reference from any source)
• Apple - Support - Discussions - Restoring Your Entire System / Time ...
• Apple - Support - Discussions - Time Machine - TROUBLESHOOTING ...
• Apple - Support - Discussions - User Contributed Tips in the Mac OS X ...
• MacTech: Networked Backups Using Time Machine (detailed – to understand how this works)
• TimeMachineScheduler - set the backup interval of Time Machine: free app
• Dashboard app that shows Time Machine messages

Among other tidbits it’s useful to know that …

• When using Time Machine, the little “gear” icon in the Finder view is not what you think it is. It’s a control element for the Time Capsule interface. Nobody has ever figured this out on their own. (See the FAQ for how to restore this if you don’t see it. World’s most inane UI decision.
• If you control-click the Time Machine Dock icon (better make sure you add one to your dock!) you can “browser other backups”.
• For ease of cleaning out Time Machine backups, it’s best to use an external drive that you can reformat. If you want an external drive to do more that TM, you should partition it.
• If you back up more than one machine to a TM drive (which is what Time Capsule does) you should ideally have a separate partition for each machine. Otherwise the backup pruning algorithms have suboptimal behavior (this is what I’m seeing with my Time Capsule). The user-compiled FA
• There’s a free dashboard app that shows Time Machine messages.
• If you want to use the TC as a file share, one good approach is to create a disk image on the TC that will handle your file share files - keeps them separate from the backup sparse bundle images.

The best reference is the user-compiled FAQ.

* I have a completely separate redundant Retrospect Professional backup system with larger capacity. Yes, I have two automated backup systems, one of which has offsite rotation. Yes, I’m berserk on backups. Incidentally, the more I study this, the more I think it will make more sense to add an external 2TB drive to my primary iMac and network server than to revise my Time Capsule.

Update 1/1/2010: I find a bug in TM that caused a restore to fail. There's a workaround.

Update 1/22/2010: I finally did the clean-up and restore, and discovered a 10.5 bug that hits when you erase a Time Capsule.

Update 1/25/2010: Next time I'll remove just the problematic sparse image per the advice of Joe Kissell, author of an eBook I bought: Take Control of Mac OS X Backups

First, in the Time Machine preference pane for the Mac in question, click Select Disk and then click Stop Backing Up.

Next, if you back up to a Time Capsule or other network drive (as I'm guessing you do), you must mount that volume in the Finder. For example, select your Time Capsule in the Finder sidebar, and if its volume doesn't appear automatically in a few seconds, click Connect As and enter your credentials. On that volume you'll see a disk image for each computer you back up. Drag the one in question to the Trash and click Delete.

Or, if you back up to a locally connected drive, instead of disk images at the top level of the drive, you'll see a top-level folder called Backups.backupdb, and inside that should be a folder for each Mac. Drag the appropriate Mac's folder to the Trash and empty the Trash. Note that emptying the Trash could take a *very* long time!

CD won't mount - a fix (10.5)

My 10.5.8 MacBook wouldn't mount a blank CD. I'd insert it, but it didn't appear on the desktop or in the Finder (Finder preferences were set to show CD, DVD.)

I could eject using Disk Utility. In DU the disk showed as though it already had data, but could not be erased.

Here's how I fixed it:

1. Demonstrated the disk would indeed mount in another account (so the problem was my user account).
2. In my user account the CDs & DVDs preference pane was set to "When you insert a blank CD: Ignore". I changed it to "Open Finder" (which shouldn't be necessary, but when I changed it back to "Ignore" the blank CD didn't mount).

After the change the Preference Pane the problem resolved.

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Google calendar labs - worth a look

Google's "Labs" are often silly, but the Calendar Labs are all interesting.

I've added:

1. One on one
2. Year view
3. Add gadget by URL
4. Dim future repeats
5. Attach docs
6. Jump to date (at last!!)
7. Next meeting
8. World clock

In other words, just about all of the current lab offerings. They show on the right side of my calendar, which is fine on a mega-display. You can collapse the gadget/lab list with a single click.
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Image Capture 10.6 is one heck of a scanning app

Apple doesn't say much about the newly enhanced scanning feature built into 10.6 ...

Apple - Mac OS X - What Is Mac OS X - All Applications and Utilities

... Image Capture transfers images between your digital camera or scanner and your Mac for use in iPhoto and other applications....

There's nothing there to suggest this ...

Shoot. It's not like Apple is known for modesty. Why not boast a bit?

Good old Image Capture, which always had more abilities than most realized, is now a very sweet scanning app in 10.6. Apple has silently removed one of the OS X's bigger weaknesses -- crummy scanner support. Yeah, that was due to hardware vendors outsourcing device drivers to the lowest bidder, but users felt the pain all the same.

For years I've made do with Epson's crummy and buggy product, and I was worried how my sweet Epson V700 would do with Snow Leopard.

It took about 5 minutes to answer that question. I plugged a bright orange $10 LaCie 800-400 flat firewire cable into the i5 and the V700, then fired up Image Capture and clicked "Show Details". Everything is there, and the results are fine. (I scan to high res TIFF then post-process to archival JPEG in Aperture, or, as of today, in Lightroom beta 3.)

I didn't install anything. No apps, no drivers.

The new scanning features include automatic detection of separate items so you can scan multiple items at once. The downside is that not all scanners are supported; HP scanners are particularly problematic. Of course all HP consumer products are problematic ...

See also:

• Gordon's Tech: Epson vs. Canon scanners: who has better OS X support (how I picked the V700 - 2007)
• Gordon's Tech: Obnoxious old Epson Scan bug: EPSON Scan cannot be started
• Gordon's Tech: Image Capture for Scanning: the 2nd most underestimated OS X application (2007)
• Gordon's Tech: VueScan vs. Nikon Scan on OS X
• Gordon's Tech: Scantips advice on VueScan
• Gordon's Tech: Digital Imaging Software Review: Vuescan 8.1
• Gordon's Tech: Scanner support remains problematic in Tiger: Epson support

Update 12/27/09: It even automatically found my 4yo networked Brother MFC-7820N - with no drivers installed! It took a long time to do the initial scan - spent about 5 minutes spinning. I was about to kill the process when it completed. Subsequent scans start fairly promptly. Page processing seems slow - and I'm using an i5! The B&W 200 dpi scan PDF results are excellent though, 4 pages at 745KB with very fine post-processing. I suspect there will be glitches though, I've seen this machine have trouble switching between acting as a scanner and acting as a printer.

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Adobe Photoshop Elements - still evil

Since Aperture appears to be dead, I decided to take another look at Photoshop Elements for use with iPhoto.

I've tried it before, but Adobe's installers have been truly evil. Security mess-ups, incompatible with non-admin users, messy installs, etc.

That was then. Today I tried again with a demo version of Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 for Mac.

Yep, same as ever. A bizarre proprietary installer, no obvious uninstall, and it looks like it scatters a 1GB mess everywhere.

Next I'll look at the 68 MB Lightroom 3 Public beta and see if that installer is less evil.

Update: Yes! Lightroom uses a standard OS X installer. It puts a 91MB file in my App folder. Beautiful.

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Using a 27 inch iMac as an external display

When I bring my work laptop home, it would be convenient to use my i5 as an external display ...

Using a 27-inch iMac as an external display

... Connect a male-to-male Mini DisplayPort cable to the Mini DisplayPort on each computer. The 27-inch iMac will enter Target Display Mode and display content from the source computer.

Note: If you are connecting two 27-inch iMacs, connect a Mini DisplayPort cable to each computer and press Command F2 on the 27-inch iMac keyboard that you will use as an external display....

My work laptop has a Display port output, but not a Mini DisplayPort. Alas, modern video cabling is a complete mess. (Yes, it's all about the DRM. Oh, for the brief shining moment of VGA everywhere)

It looks like what I need is a DisplayPort to Mini DisplayPort adapter cable ($12.95). I'm going to give this one a try and update this post with my experiences.

Incidentally, Belkin sells a $30 Mini to Mini cable through the Apple store and circuit assembly sells a $13 version.

I found a quick topic review on Ars Technica as well.

Update 12/22/09: The results of my purchases. They worked.
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Aperture RIP?

The last post on O'Reilly's Inside Aperture page was from March 2009.

I don't hear about Aperture at all any more.

Looks like this product's dead.

Update: In retrospect, the extended absence of 'dodge and burn' (masking) was a pretty clear indicator that Aperture wasn't going to make it. I'd love to see a "pro" version of iPhoto. In the meanwhile I'm going to download a trial version of Lightroom and Photoshop Elements.
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Using Excel matrix operations to sum a range of inverted numbers

There’s an interesting story here about how Google makes us smarter, but I’ll try to post that one to Gordon’s Notes. This post is about sharing what I learned about Excel.

As we all know Excel is the gem of Microsoft. Word was once great, but it fell (though Word in Office:Mac 2008 is surprisingly good). Excel, which started on the Mac, has always been impressive. This time I used one of its more obscure features to solve a problem of my own creation.

The problem was that I’d asked team members to rank their top three topics in a list of about 40. So their top choice was numbered 1, 2nd choice 2, etc. I knew I’d have trouble interpreting the results, but I wanted to make the data entry process very simple.

When it came to creating a cross-topic metric I ran into the usual troubles. I couldn’t just sum them up. I’m sure there are better solutions, but I decided to sum up the inverted numbers. So if 3 people had rated a topic 1, 2 and 3 then the sum would be 1/1 + 1/2 + 1/3 multiplied by scaling factor to give a more readable result.

Thanks to Google (Google Suggest is mind blowing) I learned that summing the inverse of the non-zero (null) values in a row or column is a matrix operation (I have vague memories that there’s a mathematical name for this value), and that you can do this in Excel (credit to the hideous Experts Exchange for the key entry).

It’s a bit bizarre, but here’s what the formula looks like:

={SUM(IF(ISERROR(1/E41:T41),0,1/E41:T41))*10}

Okay, more or less looks like – because you type it in like this:

SUM(IF(ISERROR(1/E41:T41),0,1/E41:T41))*10

Then you hit Ctrl-Shift-Enter to tell Excel to treat this formula as a matrix operation.

You need the “ISERROR” function so Excel ignores the divide-by-zero (null) cells. The “E41:T41” says that the range goes from column E to T on row 41.

This formula did the job. I’d never have come up with this fix if not for Google, but that’s a topic for another post.

The iMac i5 27” screen – we’ve exceeded the vertical limit

I’m increasingly enjoying my sadly flickering i5 iMac. The performance is great, and when the screen doesn’t flicker it’s fairly agreeable.

I’m not sure I’d buy it again though – especially if Apple were to produce an i5 in a smaller form factor.

The screen is just too high. On a conventional table and chair I spend too much time looking up. A sore neck awaits.

I could move the display much further away, but then I’d be unable to read the screen.

It’s the wrong computing form factor for human anatomy. I’d like the top of the screen to be about 8-10” lower, and then grow the display area horizontally. Practically speaking the classic dual monitor arrangement would work better.

Of course that aspect ratio isn’t nearly as good for watching a movie, which mostly shows that one screen won’t work for movies and productivity.

The iMac does drive two displays of course. I think I may end up using an older 21” Dell LCD as my primary reading area, and the massive 27” screen as my photo, video and general workspace. This will take some desk manipulation …

Update 12/17/09: I'm doing better by learning to create smaller windows, and move them to the bottom of the screen. So the top half is a parking area, and the bottom half a working area. It helps when apps open new windows near old ones - Safari does this well. I'm looking forward to the connection to my external Dell however.

Update 12/22/09: I got my mini-DisplayPort to DVI cable, and now I have my Dell 2007WFP as an secondary display. It's a bit tricky to adjust the two to matching brightness levels, I found it easiest to pick a mid-range level for the Dell then use the keyboard control to adjust the i5. (Note the old iMac ambient light sensor is gone!). This arrangement is easy on my eyes, especially since I boosted my Safari font size to suit the high pixel density of the i5. It's quite a display surface, even if Emily does remind me that Al Gore's displays are much bigger.

Update 12/29/09: The enormous Apple discussion thread on this topic includes posts from customers developing flicker problems weeks after buying an i5. I decided to go ahead and apply the firmware update in case a firmware problem might be causing overheating and damage to the GPU. Of course it helps that it's about 8F outside, and fairly cool in the computer room.