Flickr has a Snapfish problem

I've been hearing reassuring sounds on app.net about Flickr's resurrection. Since I've been unhappy with Picasa Web's disinterest in Aperture/iPhoto the app.net support meant I gave Flickr a try. Not least because Aperture has built in Flickr sharing features.

I signed up for the 3 month pro service. It auto-renews, but if you "cancel" you effectively turn off the auto-renewal and continue the term of your subscription.

I liked the Aperture integration, but Flickr felt old and clumsy. Worse, the sharing settings are difficult to revise for Sets, and there's no true equivalent of Google's share-by-unguessably-large-unique-URL.

I could live with that, more or less, but Snapfish did me in. 

Twice I sent "Sets" to print via Snapfish, and twice a few photos were "unavailable" (all seemed well in Flickr). Worse, when I tried to delete my new Snapfish account, I learned terminating a Snapfish Account isn't easy. That's a flagrant violation of clause 1 of Gordon's Laws for services.

Since I couldn't delete, I set a very long password, removed all my photos, and tried to change my email to my spam account. Alas, now I was forced to enter a (fake) postal address. 

Sorry Flickr, that's too many problems; I'll suffer with Picasa a bit longer. Call me back when you have a different print partner.

Pre-Lion Macs: Go iCloud or Google?

It's been a while since I reviewed the PIM world [1], but a post on CardDav sync between MacOS Mountain Lion (10.8) and Google Contacts brought me up to speed. In particular, I thought about the special case of a pre-Lion Mac user (Snow Leopard and Leopard especially - 10.6 and 10.5). I'll assume for the purposes of this post that every Mac users also has an iOS device.[2]

Every Mac/iOS user has to choose between Google and Apple for Calendar and Contacts (and thus Email). On Mountain Lion (or Lion) the choice is more difficult; those operating systems can work directly with Apple's iCloud. So it's not a slam dunk decision [3].

On pre-Lion Macs however, the choice is fairly easy. Older Macs can't use iCloud sync or data services at all; they can only access the web interface to iCloud Contacts and Calendars. On the other hand, even old Mail.app can use Google's (troublesome) IMAP services, and old versions of iCal can more or less interoperate with Google Calendar. Google's web interface to Contacts is crude, but their Calendar web services are much more robust than iCloud calendar. If there were any doubt, Gmail and Google Docs would seal the deal [7].

So, if you're an iOS/Snow Leopard user you can (mercifully) forget about iCloud. You need to use Google; for maximal Google compatibility SL users can even install Chrome [5].

You still have one choice though. You can:

• pay for Google Apps ($50/year) and use ActiveSync [4] on your iPhone and web UI on your Mac with optional user of iCal (CalDAV) and Mail (IMAP) on the desktop [6]
• use ad-supported Google Services and use web UI on Mac and the standard sync services for iPhone or Mac: CalDAV (calendar), IMAP (Mail), CardDAV (iPhone, not Desktop alas).

I don't think ActiveSync is necessarily superior to CalDAV/IMAP/CardDAV any longer -- but it is simpler to setup on the iPhone. Still, that's not enough to choose between paid and ad-supported. The main thing you get for your $50/year is freedom from ads and phone support. The last isn't a small thing.

Snow Leopard users used to feel abandoned and left out. No longer! Sometimes lack of choice is a feature. Apple has spurned you, Google awaits with open arms. What are you waiting for?

--

[1] PIM: Personal Information Management. Always includes Calendar and Contacts; since PalmOS usually tasks and notes (or equivalents). In the 90s it was mostly PalmOS and Palm Desktop for me, in 2013 it's a bit more complex:

• Contacts: iOS/iCloud/MacOS/Win7OutlookExchange via ActiveSync + Google/MacOS via CardDAV
• Tasks: Todo.app/Toodledo via proprietary + iOS/Win7OutlookExchange via ActiveSync
• Notes; Simplenote/Notational Velocity
• Calendar: iOS/Google via ActiveSync + iOS/Win7OutlookExchange via ActiveSync

I've simplified a few of those connections. I think we're starting to hit the boundaries of human cognition.

[2] If you're Mac/Android you have to Go Google. Mac/RIM or Mac/Microsoft -- you're on your own and you're used to being hard core.

[3] I've largely gone Google myself.

[4] I don't think Google offers free versions of Google Apps any longer. I'm from the early generation when it wasn't hard to end up with a half-dozen App/Domain combinations all of which were grandfathered in to ActiveSync support.

[5] Real old Mac users may want to try Camino.

[6] It's not clear to me that Google Apps users can use CardDAV services.

[7] iCloud can still be used for iDevice backup and media services, but trusted friends tell me the backup is unreliable.

Google Contact Sync on Mountain Lion and iOS - CardDAV (Project Contacts 2013)

I'm rather late to this party [6], but around the time Google ended ActiveSync support for unpaid accounts [1] they added vCard 3 (1998) based CardDAV support [3]. Up until then one could sync iOS and OS X mail and Calendars via IMAP and CalDAV, but Contact sync was only via Active Sync. [2]

TUAW has some details and Google's iOS CardDAV instructions are here.

As we all know, synchronization is hell. Even if Apple and Google actually used the same vCard spec (probably vCard 3, 1998), and even if they agreed on newline characters, they still have to deal with distinctions between their internal data models and vCard. Some of those data model gaps are non-computable. [5]. Even thought Google and Apple have similar 'Group' models that relationship metadata is ignored [8].

That said, at least CardDAV is relatively Apple friendly. Most importantly, this standard means, for the very first time I know of [7], there's a somewhat supported way to synchronize Contacts between Google and OS X Contacts and iOS contacts.

I've begun using it on Mountain Lion. Since I use Google two factor authentication I had to use one of their totally-defeats-the-purpose-giant-security-hole-not-single-use-god-i-hate-passwords-humans-are-losing-the-battle alternative passwords. There was some kind of transient authentication glitch but on a second try it worked. After a few minutes I had all 634 of my Google "My Contacts" on my Mac. Because of the long history of my Google/Apple Contact sync efforts (See Also, below) these largely duplicate my Address Book/iCloud contacts -- but Mountain Lion Contacts.app seems to merge the duplicates when I search [9].

This looks promising in a terrifying sort of way. You can drag and drop contacts between the iCloud and Google Contact lists; they'll be copied.

So what about Snow Leopard? Many fine machines run Snowie (and should not upgrade to Lion even if they theoretically can). They're (more or less) cut off from iCloud. Does CardDAV sync work with Google now? I wonder about adopting Hsiaio's technique, but so far the answer is no (same with Yahoo CardDAV). I didn't find much research on this question, but I suspect it's a combination of 10.6 bugs and SSL requirements. [9]. There is some limited Google Contacts sync on Snow Leopard that some still use.

- fn - lots

[1] Google grandfathered my half-dozen Google Apps accounts and recently extended the termination date for non-Apps users.

[2] Google says Google Apps accounts should use "Google Sync", which is their implementation of Microsoft's Exchange Server derived ActiveSync (with different bugs one assumes).

[3] vCard over HTTP/WebDAV. vCard has been Apple's Contact/Address Book export option for as long as I can recall, so it may be a good match to their Contact data model. CardDAV is also used by Apple's ancient Address Book Server. vCard 4 2011 has old-style and XML representations, but I suspect Apple, like Google, is more or less on 1998's vCard 3.

Google's vCard implementation has limits; worse the only partly implement the 1998 vCard 3 spec: "why did Google move the ADR extended address "Oak and Pine" into the street address component? And worse still, why did it separate the two using an '\r\n' (CRLF) sequence? The VCard 3.0 specification clearly states that CRLF must be escaped by the single escape sequence '\n', not by '\r\n'".[4]

[4] Reading the last line of [3], by the way, a penny dropped. Apple changed the way they handled CRLF and vCard between MobileMe and iCloud, with near-disastrous consequences for my OS X Contacts. By Darwin, I hate the ancient DOS/unix/mac line newline debacle.

[5] Meaning data loss is inevitable, transferring a Contact between systems won't return the original. Incidentally, under my TrueName, I've spent 15 years dealing with interoperability issues in healthcare - from HL7 to TermInfo to SNOMED/RxNORM and back again via cCCD and the like. If you understand why CardDAV is hard, then you have a glimmer of a smidgen of a hint of an idea why we don't have true interoperability between EpicCare and Cerner -- and why we won't for decades.

I think the people who trudge away on vCardX are heroic figures who should be carried upon our shoulders. Forget Ive, these people do the work I rely on.

[6] The marketing/interest problem is unsolved -- largely because of the spam/advertising counter-current. I'm very interested in productivity software and I follow a number of related feeds; but I still miss news like this.

[7] Check out "See also" - lots of history here.

[8] Looking at Apple's braindead implementation of iOS Contacts and Groups I'd pin this failure on Cupertino and Apple's corporate silos.

[9] A friend of mine has a 10.6 MacBook and needs to use Google's world (as do we all). I think the easiest way to manager her Contract migration will be to get them to iOS/Google and then use Gmail web on Mac. I may put them on an account on my ML machine to help with cleanup.

[9] So which gets edited when one clicks "Edit" in Mac Contacts.app? Don't ask those questions. OS X doesn't say.

See also - via Gordon's Tech

Yeah, I've been fighting this war a long time. February 2009, almost exactly 4 years ago, was a big series of battles, but the 2008 PalmOS to iOS migration was probably the worst (later there were tools). I've read recently that Apple is an intensely siloed company -- that explains why iOS and OS X contract integration is so very bad.

• OS X 10.6: Synchronizing Address Book to Google Contacts 9/2010 - Snow Leopard sort of synchronized to Google Contacts, but Apple never finished the job.
• Migrating Contacts from Outlook/Exchange server to OS X Address Book via MobileMe: 8/2011. MobileMe was working well when Apple killed it.
• How I synchronize OS X Contacts with Google Contacts and my iPhone 1/2011: I was using Spanning Sync to connect Google Contacts to a set defined in an Address Book Group. I did that for about a year but I think it foundered on OS X and iOS updates. Eventually Spanning Sync gave up -- understandably. I still use and recommend their Contact Cleaner.
• Googaby: Novel approach to Google Contacts and OS X Address Book integration 2/2009: It's still sort-of-living, but I think Lion killed it (Lion was an impressive killer). I haven't tried it.
• OS X Address Book to Google Apps Contacs using Google ActiveSync 2/2009: It didn't quite work.
• iPhone sync to Google contacts - 3 methods and work/home implications 11/2008: Five years later we are still struggling with the same issues.
• Project Contacts: Integration across iPhone, Google and whatever 2/2009: Slow progress indeed. Contacts have been hard.
• Project Contacts: Now mixing Outlook/Exchange, PST file, Outlook/Home, MobileMe Sync, OS X Address Book and the iPhone. 5/2009. Shudder. More struggle.
• MobileMe: Integrating Work and Personal Contacts 5/2009: MobileMe was pretty good around mid-2009 and then continued to improve. iCloud still isn't up to that mark.
• iPhone Google Sync - Mail and Google Apps and Google saves my iPhone 2/2009: Did a lot that month! Google's original ActiveSync implementation saved the iPhone for me. I was ready to toss it out a window.
• Work home contact integration: Outlook to Google to OS X Address Book
• I try NuevaSync on my secondary iPhone 2/2009: They are still around. Alas, no OS X support.
• MobileMe to iCloud - Is Apple getting nervous? 5/2012: I keep reading how much better iCloud is than MobileMe. That's not my experience.
• iCloud transition went as expected - disastrously 6/2012: My Battle of the Bulge. Ugh.
• Consolidating Contacts: From Outlook to Address Book via MobileMe and the 5th Circle 9/2011: Migration from Outlook. Has to be a better way.
• Sync heck: CalDAV vs Exchange Server - a Google Apple review 2/2010: These days CalDAV might be ahead, but each has merits. I'm still on ActiveSync, but in 11/2009 I tried it the other way: Big switch on my iPhone sync: CalDAV and Exchange server.
• Plaxo - just not a good feeling 5/2009: Now we surrender everything at the drop of a hat. They are still around.
• MobileMe, Microsoft Outlook, Exchange, iTunes and yes, sync Hell 10/2008. I'm having flashbacks now.
• Palm to iPhone migration - address book and notes: 8/2008. Moving from Palm to iOS was exquisitely hard.

Facebook albums: How to choose which photo will appear on the timeline view of the album (primary photo, key photo)

I don't put that many albums on Facebook, but whenever I do I spend at least five minutes trying to remember how to change the album picture that appears on the timeline when the album is published.

The problem is there are many edit menus associated with Facebook photos. There are menus that appear on the photo, menus for photo descriptions, menus for editing albums and so on. The one you want is the edit menu associated with the timeline item, not with the album or the photo:

19+ Facebook Timeline Features and Resources You Should Know!

... To switch it with another photo, click at the pencil icon and select ‘Change Primary Photo’. You can then use ‘Reposition Photo’ if your selected picture doesn’t fit in properly."...

Now I might remember.

Brother HL-2270DW out of toner workarounds and admin screens

I just bought an HL-2270DW to replace a 2140 at drum end-of-life. This review is excellent (here is my short one), Wirecutter recommended it as best cheap laser printer and Brother drivers seem better behaved than most. User manuals are here.

I've have preferred the lower print costs of a higher grade printer, but the Brother model I considered draws too much current for many overloaded home circuit breakers.

Like most Brother printers (all printers?) it will stop printing when toner is "low" -- typically a few hundred pages short of an empty cartridge. With the 2140 I could cover an optical sensor and order a new ($$) cartridge. That doesn't work on the 2270; this page provided 3 options which I've revised here:

1. The unscrew and rotate method
2. Press the GO Button 7 times (quickly). " All of the LEDs should flash twice, and the Ready LED should turn on." Repeat to revert.
3. Use the web GUI to change the Replace Toner printer setting to "continue" instead of "stop"

I like the last one. I used Bonjour Browser to find my printer's IP address, but I don't recommend this [2]. Instead read the Network guide/manual. In OS X  I used Open Print Queue I clicked a button called "Show Printer Webpage ...". That did the trick; OS X resolves the Rendezvous URL to the correct network address.

Click printer settings (un/pw is user/access) then change the Replace Toner settings. There are other settings  and reports of interest as well [1].

I left the settings on Stop -- when the printer stops I know to order a new cartridge; I can change the settings then.

PS. The printer is supposed to come with an optional sticker that explains various flashing lights. I found mine floating about the floor. Watch for this when unpacking.

[1]

• Drum Unit is rated for 12,000 pages, memory size is 32MB.
• The Administrator pw is admin/access. You can use this to change both the Admin (admin/access) and User (user/access) credentials if you wish.
• You can give the printer a static IPv6 address (good luck)
• It has NetBIOS support (brings back nightmares)
• BRAdmin uses the printers SNMP services
• It has an FTP and TFTP server with mDNS and LLMNR (who needs all this in a home printer?!)
• It has an SMTP service and a POP3 Server?!! - presumably for notifications (but why POP3?). You just know that this would feature in some evil network hack.

From the Network Guide supported protocol list:

(IPv4) (IPv6) 1 10/100BASE-TX IEEE802.11b/g (Infrastructure Mode / Ad-hoc Mode) ARP, RARP, BOOTP, DHCP, APIPA (Auto IP), WINS / NetBIOS name resolution, DNS Resolver, mDNS, LLMNR responder, LPR / LPD, Custom Raw Port / Port 9100, IPP, FTP Server, SNMPv1 / v2c, HTTP Server, TFTP Client and Server, SMTP Client, ICMP, LLTD responder, Web Services (Print) NDP, RA, DNS Resolver, mDNS, LLMNR responder, LPR / LPD, Custom Raw Port / Port 9100, IPP, FTP server, SNMPv1 / v2c, HTTP Server, TFTP Client and Server, SMTP Client, ICMPv6, LLTD responder, Web Services (Print) APOP, POP before SMTP, SMTP-AUTH WEP 64/128 bit, WPA-PSK (TKIP/AES), WPA2-PSK (AES), APOP, POP before SMTP, SMTP-AUTH Wi-Fi Certification Mark License, Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) Identifier Mark License, AOSS Logo

I wonder if it's running Linux.

[2] After I ran Bonjour Browser ML persisted in showing the Rendezvous identifier for the printer as a "SHARED" item in the Finder left bar. I had to run BB again, and twiddle with reload services, to make it go away. I think BB might need an update -- in one config screen it refers to "Jaguar".

Update 2/21/2013: I had to do this when the "starter" toner ran out and the real cartridge didn't arrive. First times I tried setting the web config to 'continuous' instead of 'stop' it failed with a 'printer busy' message. I paused the queue and restarted the printer and I was able to change the setting.

Update 4/4/2013: I bought a TN-450 2,600 page extended cartridge, and after 200 pages I have a toner light. I wonder if it was a counterfeit -- though I did buy it through Amazon direct. Alternatively it or the printer may be defective. Alas, it's 4 days past the return period so I'm stuck.  Looking at the 1 star reviews I'm not the only user to run into this. 

Update 5/21/2013: These aren't counterfeit cartridges, we really are only getting 600 or so pages per $55 cartridge. See: Gordon's Tech: Is Brother running a scam with its HL-2270DW printer and TN-450 toner cartridge?

Sharing a credential store for a family (or small business) - and the end of the personal database

I have managed family credentials and web site data in a FileMaker database since 1996 [1]. That database now holds over 1600 records, of which at least 1200 are historical (dead accounts, obsolete urls). The historical items don't get in the way as much as one might think, and I kind of like this mini-history of the net.

This repository has survived many technology transitions. Over the past 10 years it has more-or-less synchronized with credential stores running on PalmOS and iOS. At some times I've used FileMaker sharing (web publishing and the IP based fmnet: protocol) to allow my wife to access and edit both of our credentials too. (I am too boring to have any secrets, and it's critically important that she have credential access if I'm unavailable -- as in dead.)

Alas, all things must come to an end. FileMaker and its half-baked replacement "Bento" are both dying. Filemaker Go, which I'd like to use on my iPhone, doesn't support true synchronization. Bento is supposed to have some synchronization capabilities with iOS clients, and there's some form of encryption on the desktop version, but I don't know of anyone using this product. Bento feels stillborn.

So while I could probably cobble together a solution using some combination of FileMaker licenses ($180+ each) and or FM 12 web sharing (Mountain Lion broke FM 11 web sharing [2]) -- but then I'm investing in a dead technology niche.

There are other issues with the way I use this credential store. I've been maintaining it in FileMaker and exporting to 1Password for iPhone access, but that means my iPhone repository is read-only. The update loop is slow; sometimes I don't have credentials on hand.

It's time to move.

After consultation with appnetizens there appear to be 3 solutions:

1. Use 1Password with Dropbox. (I'm still on iPassword 2, but it works similarly. I don't mind upgrading anyway.)
2. Use some other Cloud solution, such as shared Google Doc or Spreadsheet, Simplenote, etc.
3. Use 1Password on her iPhone only (see below). [1Password 2 only - see update.]

The first two require the Cloud. I don't like that - for several reasons [3].

That leaves option 3, and that only works because 1Password runs constantly on my always-active account and 1Password on the desktop can support multiple iOS clients. It's not perfect as it gives her credential access only via her iPhone; but since we do use Google Sync that's less of a problem than it might be [4].

I think we'll try option 3, which implies I'm going to treat 1Passwords as the "source of truth" and slowly archive my last FileMaker database -- and then FileMaker itself.

RIP old friend.

Update:

• I'm using 1Password 2.x - WiFi sync is complex and error prone but I was able to get it working. AgileBits really recommends DropBox. It wasn't clear from the limited documentation that it actually supported multiple devices, but it appears it does.
• I discovered 1Password 3 has local synchronization at all!  There is unidirectional iTunes based file transfer only. So option 3 only works for people with 1Password 2.

Well, that's interesting. Technology transitions are rarely smooth. It's not clear that there is a non-Dropbox solution any more. I think I'll keep Filemaker on life-support a bit longer.

 

Incidentally, There's something disturbing about how 1Password syncs. Watching the behavior it's almost as though it replays every transaction that's every occurred on 1Password desktop; implying it still keeps fully deleted credentials. When I updated the cache 10,000 records were processed for 1,500 credentials. Looking at my backup history the agilebits keychain file is growing at a rate consistent with retention of deleted credentials. I think the only way really clean it out is to delete the keychain and start anew.

--

[1] FileMaker is a survivor from the pre-net era of software, when geeks used personal databases for address books, recipes, PDF based document management, record and CD collections,  archives of thousands of stapled paper medical journal article archive indexing with pre-web "Grateful Med" MEDLINE metadata (Grateful Med), club memberships, and much more. With a relatively large user base FileMaker was then quite affordable.

I will now interrupt this post to admit that review of those web 1.0 pages, and particularly the data store transformations of the past 8 years, has given me a dose of old-guy future shock. When I started researching this topic I didn't realize I was also writing an obituary for the personal database!

It has been one hell of a ride from my 1990s FileMaker article file to Google and the Strata conference I'll be attending in Santa Clara this month.

[2] I tried reenabling Apache on ML using a freeware pref pane. Apache ran, but FM web sharing still didn't work. Looking at the FM 12 writeup I think it barely works even there.

[3] Example: An encrypted database store is forgotten in the cloud. Six years from now, when Dropbox's assets have been acquired by the Russian mafia, 2012 encryption is trivially broken. I don't want this store public even in 2019. Not to mention the LastPass breach.

[4] So why do I allow that form of Cloud use? Good question.

Removing 3500+ iCloud Contacts with no content (No Name) and Contacts.app use of 25GB of virtual memory

I suspect many people's iOS Contacts have been trashed by iCloud, but only a small percentage realize how bad things are. It may explain some of the mysterious data use and battery life problems some see.

I can't prove this of course; I'm not about to study a random sample of 100 devices. I can only go by my own disastrous experience and Emily's recent malfunction.

In my case the bug had to do with a change between MobileMe and iCloud in the handling of line endings resulting in large numbers of 'Groups' metastasizing between my devices. It was very hard to diagnose and fix that bug; since then things have seemed to go well with my use.

Emily's malfunctions seemed simple at first. I noticed she had both addresses on her device and in iCloud. I didn't expect that, but I figured it would be easy to clean up. [1]. Then I discovered about 3,500 entries in Contacts that showed up only as 'No Name'. This isn't a new problem and I don't know how long Emily had it. She never noticed, I suspect most non-geeks ignore that sort of thing. I wonder if it explains some battery life issues she's had, and even Spotlight and disk access issues on some of our older machines as these malformed entries propagated. (As noted below, during the removal process the OS X Contacts app used 25 GB of virtual memory and locked up my 27" iMac.)

Removing these malformed null-value entries was much harder than expected. Something about processing the deletes using Mountain Lion Contacts.app consumed vast amounts of virtual memory -- almost completely paralyzing my 2 yo iMac with the usual Spinning Beach Ball of Death (SPOD, SBOD, spinning wait cursor). (See: Getting control of a Mac when rogue software consumes virtual memory.)

In retrospect I think I wonder if I should have disabled my network connection, made the changes, and then reconnected and let iCloud process the cached change list. In any event, this is more or less what I did to delete them; in our home we have 1 iOS device (Emily iPhone) and two OS X devices (Mountain Lion Contacts.app and older Lion-only machine running Address Book.app) that synchronize to her iCloud account.

1. Work from our primary Mountain Lion machine, and create a local backup using the Contacts Archive function.
2. Turn off iCloud synchronization from the other iOS and OS X devices and delete all local contacts. On iOS the OS will offer the delete option, on OS X you have to delete them manually. (With iCloud sync off delete is easy.)
3. Open Safari to view changes there.
4. Because of the problems I ran into I suggest turning off Time Machine and, if you know how to do it, disable Spotlight disk indexing. At least uncheck Contacts from the Spotlight Search Results in the Pref Pane. You'll add them back in after you are done.
5. Close all other apps and log out all other users.
6. Do this incrementally - delete a few hundred, then quit and restart Contacts. When I skipped some of the above steps and tried to delete all 3,500 at once my machine locked me out. After some geek gymnastics I found Contacts.app was using 25GB of Virtual Memory -- enough to store about 1,000,000 contacts. Very little CPU was being used, but that much VM use is fatal.
7. When you're done run Contacts Cleaner if you own it.
8. Restart OS X, reenable Time Machine, Spotlight, etc.
9. On iOS (iPhone for example) reenable iCloud account. (In Emily's case this brought up the merge with local dialog -- the original small problem. See [1] for the easy fix for that, it does mean letting changes sync back to desktop as well).
10. Once that's settled down, reenable iCloud accounts on other devices. Let Spotlight catch up indexing them. You can disable then reenable Contacts search if you like

It will be interesting to see if her battery lifespan and Spotlight behaviors improve.

[1] If that's your only problem here's the way to clean it up:

1. Remove iCloud account from phone (you'll put it back).
2. Make sure only local device Contact remain.
3. Add iCloud back -- you'll get offer to merge them. Merge.
4. Clean up duplicates, easiest to do that on a desktop account using Contacts Cleaner (with my latest version I didn't disable network connectivity when doing this) or the dangerous fully automatic built-in Mac desktop duplicate remove.

See also:

• iCloud transition went as expected - disastrously 6/2012
• iCloud group replication resolved by AppleScript 7/2012
• An AppleScript to prevent the iCloud CRLF bug - normalize line endings 7/2012
• Synchronization is Hell 10/2008. Technologists underestimate this problem so commonly it has to be a universal wetware malfunction.
• Spanning Sync contacts cleaner - a quick review 1/11 (it's been upgraded since then, seems even better)
• Gordon's Tech: Getting control of a Mac when rogue software consumes virtual memory 1/12/2013

More on the No Name bug:

• Contacts with "No Name" need a mass...: Apple Support Communities
• Multiple 'No Name' contacts showing up in Address Book | MacFixIt - CNET Reviews

Getting control of a Mac when rogue software consumes virtual memory.

Adam Fields claimed something is deeply broken in OS X memory management. He says it's been partly fixed in Mountain Lion, but .. "the VM subsystem still falls over if you push it too hard".

That fits my experience when a bug with iCloud and Mountain Lion Contacts used Contacts.app to consume 25GB of virtual memory on my 8GB iMac. My system ground to a halt, even though CPU use was light. My system was locked up by disk bound memory paging.

Actually, it wasn't quite locked up. It was just excruciating slow to respond; a mouse click took minutes to process while I watched the OS X Spinning pinwheel.

I wanted to figure out what was happening, so I didn't simply power down. I was able to get control, which is how I identified the iCloud/Contacts bug and was able to gracefully quit Contacts, shut down normally, and then deal with the Contacts bug [1]

To get control I needed to get Terminal.app running. Terminal will work where most other things are frozen, and from Terminal I could control some of the usual bad actors. Note that I run with a non-admin account and I don't have root enabled.

At first I tried to ssh from a remote machine. To do that I needed to know the current IP address of my iMac; it didn't help to know the afp:// network path [2]. The only way I know to do that is to via this Mac OS X Hint. Note the hint has an error in the string, the comment versions are correct. From my remote machine I connected to iMac from the Finder and then used one of these Terminal commands (first is what I did and it works fine):

• netstat -na | grep 548
• netstat -f inet -n | awk '$5 ~ /\.548$/ {sub(/\.[^.]+$/, ""); print $5}'

Alas, that didn't help. I hadn't enabled Sharing:Remote Login for my iMac (I've since fixed that). So I had to return to my iMac and, carefully and slowly, get Launchpad [3] up and then Terminal. [5]

Since the account was non-admin I had to get Admin privileges so I could run sudo (root, superuser) commands:

•  su Admin

Spotlight is always a problem with system resources are low, so my first action was to get it out of the way. This is hard to do; I've read that the process restarts when killed but I tried anyway so I'd get a clean version restarting:

• sudo killall mds

Then I used renice to set spotlight priority to a lower value [4], first finding the process ID (it was 43702 at the time) then renicing it:

• ps -acx | grep mds
• sudo renice -n 19 -p 43702

That bought me more responsiveness. I was then able to slowly quit all running apps and gradually free up system resources until I could run Activity Monitor and figure out what was wrong with Contacts.app

[1] So there are at least two Mac bugs involved in this. One is a longstanding problem with OS X memory management that, I suspect, goes back to OS X 10.0. The other is one of several newer bugs with iCloud and Contacts. [2] That can be found by using Finder "Connect to Server" dialog from a remote machine. [3] LaunchBar and Finder weren't responding but Doc and Launchpad were slow but did respond. [4] It's annoying that renice isn't accessible from Activity Monitor -- in Windows there's a GUI for this control.  [5] I now put Terminal in the dock of my primary non-admin account for faster access next time and I enabled remote login in Sharing options: To connect use ssh username@ip_address, example "ssh molly@10.0.1.4".  If you have enabled root I think you can use "ssh root@10.0.1.4", but in my testing with ML where I have not enabled root that doesn't work.

See also:

• View connected file sharing clients' IP numbers - Mac OS X Hints
• Tutorial: Troubleshooting Spotlight | MacFixIt - CNET Reviews: 2006! Old, but sadly still relevant.
• Gordon's Tech: Spotlight indexer (mdworker) priority is too high in Lion/Mountain Lion 9/2012 - permanently setting Spotlight to lower priority. Excluding Aperture did help me.

iPhoto bug: black or all white photos when editing on MacBook Duo

I haven't used iPhoto on our white MacBook running Lion for years. I did so recently and I discovered I was afflicted by the Photo turns black while editing bug.

At first if I clicked the 'enhance' button the image vanished to be replaced by an all white icon. If I click Shadow or some other edit controls it went entirely black.

I upgraded to the very latest version of iPhoto (9.4.2) and repaired permissions/repaired database (cmd-opt-start). Now I have exactly this behavior:

iPhoto editing shadows makes displayed...: Apple Support Communities

... I am using a MB core 2 Duo at 2.16 MHz with 4 MB RAM with MacOS 10.7.4 and iPhoto '11 (ver 9.3.2) and have a problem with editing photos when I change the 'shadow or highlights'. The photo turns to black when I move the slider off the zero mark and the photo returns when I move the slider back to zero.

I had the same problem with the previous version iPhoto ('09 I think) and bought the new version '11 to try to fix the problem. The problem seemed to go away for a while but has returned. I have tried starting iPhoto using command/option and repairing the permissions, then rebuilding the thumbnails, then repair the database and then finally rebuilding the database. Each time I tried a repair, I tested the shadow/highlight edits and got the same black result. All other adjustments work fine. It is just the shadow/highlight adjustment that turns everything black ...

I moved the problematic library to my primary machine and, unsurprisingly, there were no problems at all.  I think there's a bug in iPhoto that renders it incompatible with my old MacBook's video processor. Apple is very unlikely to fix this.

Update: Aperture on the same old MacBook has no problems. If I adjust shadow in Aperture however, the image is all black in iPhoto.

This is a bug that affects rendering of at least some JPEGs following shadow/highlight edits on MacBook Duo with integrated Intel GPU.

Making Siri Useful

I'm getting more value from Siri lately. I think it's partly the enhanced noise canceling of the iPhone 5, though that may have other problems.

The trick, of course, is that I'm getting trained to use Siri. Even in my post-50 state of degeneracy, I'm a quicker study that Siri (though she does seem to be learning my voice).

I mostly use Siri to create reminders, notes, appointments or text messages while driving. This means I can't look at the screen or touch the screen; in fact the screen is usually locked. In this use case this is what helps:

• Assign relationship names (wife, etc) in Contacts. Siri cannot recognize my wife's name even with phonetic additions and multiple experiments, but she does recognize "Wife". You can do this in Contacts on OS X or even iOS, or you can tell Google directly (ex: "Steven F___ is my brother")
• Tell Siri which Contact is "You". This is very important.
• Train Siri at home (make test requests and correct errors)
• Think of what I want to say (plan it out).
• Turn off the fan (and radio of course) in my van before speaking a command.
• Press Home button and raise phone from flat horizontal towards my face then sharp pivot to my right ear (seems to help activate Siri on a locked phone). If wearing a headset, any headset, press and hold the 'call' button.
• Wait for the initial tone.
• Say what I want ("Remind me in 1 hour", "Take a note", "Make an Appointment at 9pm", "iMessage My Wife".)
• Wait for the tone.
• Speak in a measured steady pace with a brief "pause" between words (these pauses are perceptual, not usually real). 
• Use punctuation. It really helps to say 'period' when I'm done.
• After I speak, wait quietly while Siri decides I'm done.
• Use the critical words: Change and Cancel as needed. (Example: Change, or Change the ___ to...)

Incidentally, the iOS Google.app voice recognition is phenomenal. Siri is nowhere near as good, but of course the Google app isn't integrated with my iPhone. I assume it will eventually be integrated with Google's web services, but it will likely never work when an iOS screen is locked.

See also:

• Six tips for mastering Siri | Macworld - best of the tips pages - prior to this one of course.
• Gordon's Tech: Fixing Siri - When Really Sorry isn't good enough (if Siri is flailing, reset network settings. You will need to retrain.)
• Gordon's Tech: What I learned from reading the iPhone 5 manual.
• iMore published an excellent tutorial series on Siri. This link finds them as of 12/12.

Blogger's comment infrastructure - the end of anonymous

Google's Blogger has fought the good fight against spam comments for years, but it's failing now in several different ways. In the spam wars, failing to keep up is equivalent to surrender.

I assume that Blogger, like Google Reader itself, is slowly going the way of Google Reader Shares. Blogger is legacy GoogleMinus, not a good fit for the post-2011 Google. A small but dedicated team doesn't have the resources to keep it healthy.

I have looked at Disqus but $1,200 a year for SSO is too much for my budget. Other suggestions are welcome; I'd like a commenting system for Blogger that:

• Gives me control over what identity-authentication systems to enable, or, better yet, lets me define comment-rules on the basis of identity-authentication.
• Lets me blacklist authenticated users.
• Costs about $100 a year.

Anonymous comments would be nice to have, but they require spam filtering and CAPTCHA doesn't work any more. I'm afraid they are toast.

I suspect I can't get the commenting solution I want for Blogger, so I may have to switch to authentication via Google or turn them off altogether pending a future WordPress migration.

• Gordon's Notes: CAPTCHA has failed, and so anonymous comments may go too.
• Gordon's Tech: Spammers have found a hole in Blogger's comment system

Update: I've revised the title of this post, because when I actually, you know, looked at the current Blogger options they include OpenID as well as Google's authentication. Blogger comments support is still dated by current standards, but I'll switch to Google/OpenID, reenable notification for comments by email when > 2 weeks old, and leave out CAPTCHA. No more anonymous comments sadly.

Voice call audio clipping and dropouts on iPhone 5: hardware failure, bug, or network issue?

Modern voice quality is highly variable at the best of times, and I don't do all that many business calls on my mobile, so it took me a while to realize there was something very wrong with the voice quality on my AT&T iPhone 5 phone calls over the MSP LTE/3G network.

This post in a 27 page Apple Discussion thread matches my experience (emphases mine), except that many reports are from Germany as well as AT&T.  Some have problems only at particular locations. The thread describes many different issues, some of which seem to be Verizon specific or defective headphones and the like -- but this is the one I get.

https://discussions.apple.com/message/20440496#20440496 (sk1sk1)

... when on a phone call on iPhone 5, the sound from the distant party cuts in and out, drops entire words and phrases, the beginning and end of utterances, and background and ambient sound from the distant party. I can hear everything on iPhone 4, but much of the sound is dropped by iPhone 5. I’ve found a way to reliably reproduce the problem, perhaps useful for showing Apple the problem we’re having. Use Apple’s headset. Call from a very quiet location. Place a call to a call center’s greeting recording, ideally one that’s long and recorded at a varying volume, not too loud. I used Hertz On Demand here in the U.S. Set the volume to the lowest setting (important). Turn on mute. On my iPhone 5, the sound cuts in and out on 100% of the calls on every iPhone 5 I’ve tried, whereas everything is clear (though quiet) on my iPhone 4. The Genius bar had the same experience with their iPhone 5. I think the guy at this link has the best graphic demonstration of the problem: http://www.iphone5callquality.com/measurements/. You can clearly see what the phone is doing – it is discarding quiet signals. Unforunately, that includes entire words and phrases, especially if you've got the volume set low. I want to hear everything, don’t you?

One report says it is fixed in 6.1. Other fixes are dropping LTE or enabling hearing aid mode (that doesn’t work with headset though).

In my testing I switched back and forth between an iPhone 4 and iPhone 5 on a single conference call. The effect was pretty dramatic. I think it gets more pronounced after the first 6-15 seconds of a call. It feels like some kind of audio compression or background noise cancellation gone bad. Curiously, I think I can hear better when I'm on a call in my noisy van with lots of background noise at my end.

Several reports claim disabling LTE helps, though my understanding is that on AT&T's network voice always uses 3G, LTE is data only. Others say 'hearing aid mode' clears the problem up for non-headset use, but has no effect on headset. One developer reported that 6.1beta fixes the issue, another than a full factory default reset helped. Others claim improvements with a replacement phone, and many have no trouble at all. WiFi on/off doesn't make any difference. Several report problems are site specific. iPhone 5 to 5 connections are  the worst.

On the other hand, there really aren't that many complaints overall. Most users seem to be unaffected.

I suspect it's a combination of certain phone serial numbers/chipsets with certain networks. It might be fixable by a software update or a true fix might require a phone replacement. I've scheduled an Apple Store appointment and I'll share what I learn here. If the store doesn't know of an issue I'll hold off on a repair/replacement.

I've tried the 'LTE off' "fix", but since AT&T uses 3G for audio I doubt that will work. I have also tried the 'Hearing Aid' fix -- I can imagine that would help with non-headset calls. If it does I'll avoid the headset for a while.

See also: iPhone 5 Call Quality problem.

Update: from the Bouwmeester site: "HUGE NEWS from Apple Ireland: 'Your #iphone5 call quality issue is real, the next iOS version will solve it.'  but then:  "Apple: 'There MIGHT be a solution for the #iphone5 call quality issue in the next iOS but it is not guaranteed."...

Update 12/11/12: I had tolerable results both at my office and during the drive home using my Apple earbuds. Compared to my home the primary differences are different cell towers and more background noise. I don't think LTE settings make any difference for me. I do have 'hearing aid enabled' set but I doubt it makes any difference and, in any case, it's supposed to have no effect when a headset is used. I did try Settings:Reset:Resest Network Settings (you will need to reenter your wifi pw).

FWIW, I submitted a report to AT&T via email.

Update 12/12/12: I visited the local apple store, and, unsurprisingly, they hadn't run into this problem. The staffer I worked with felt it probably wasn't a hardware issue, he was wondering about a problem related to the noise cancellation function. He thought the very quiet setting of my home calls was a more likely factor than my local cell tower. He also suggested a network setting reset - which I'd done. He also wondered if my Speck candy shell was influencing the behavior of the microphone used for noise cancellation -- I'll try a call without it.

The other thing I'll try is some background mood music we bought years ago for our then toddlers -- be interesting to see if that reduces voice clipping on the incoming calls.

Lastly, I'll try lying the phone flat during some calls so the rear noise canceling microphone is either face down on a sound absorbent surface or face up.

ssspluto had a good summary in a Discussion Group Post dated 12/12/2012 - 8:19am

Update 12/14/12: I think I've traced this about as far as I can, and there is a workaround pending an Apple fix

I've ruled out a number of factors contributing to the problems I experience. For the record, I am iPhone 5, AT&T, St Paul area and I use a wired headset (Apple and 3rd party). My problem is audio clipping on my incoming audio.

I don't think my problem is a hardware issue, though in modern complex devices there is a thin boundary between software and hardware issues.

There is really only one circumstance I run into SERIOUS problems, though there are subtle issues elsewhere: a conference call on our corporate Global Conference system when I'm at home. I can connect to the same conference using an iPhone 4S and I get the normal (mediocre) sound quality of a VOIP based conferencing system.

Here are the things that don't seem to matter:

• LTE on or off
• WiFi on or off
• Case on or off
• Position of phone
• Covering or uncovering the rear background-noise-canceling headphone
• Resetting my network settings
• Model of wired earset/headset
• Restarting phone
• Background noise where I am

Here is what works

• unplug my headset when I've enabled 'hearing aid mode' and listen to the phone directly or use speaker phone.

I think there are multiple issues in this thread, but, as noted by a few contributors, this looks like an issue with the new-with-iPhone 5 noise cancellation software/hardware Apple is using and its interaction with AT&T's 3G compression in some cell towers.

The fix is 'hearing aid mode', which probably changes or disables noise cancellation when not using a headset. It is possible that a hardware problem on some iPhones is causing the noise cancellation product to misbehave, but since this is new software, and since for me the problem is so much worse with this one audio source and possibly even with selected cell towers, I'm somewhat optimistic it will be fixed with next iOS update.

I'm pretty sure Apple's engineers know what's wrong.

Update 1/9/13

The bug continues to annoy, but with the hearing aid setting I can do the problematic home-based Global Crossing conference calls on speaker phone or by old-fashioned handheld phone. In the meantime I read reports that the carriers know there's a problem, and one indefatigable Apple customer has a report from Amsterdam....

Yesterday I visited the Apple Store in Amsterdam to demo the call quality problem of my iPhone 5. Two employees from the Apple Store (an Apple Genius and a person from the Business department) made test calls with my iPhone 5 and had to admit that there clearly is a problem with the call quality. When you are on a call the incoming voice drops in and out, the audio sounds digitized and choppy.

We also tested my iPhone 4 with the same version of iOS (6.0.2). The call quality of the iPhone 4 was perfect. The Apple Genius decided to place more test calls with two of their own iPhone 5’s and experienced the same call quality issues. All test calls were made using the standard Apple EarPods.

To rule out that the problem could be caused by settings or installed apps, the person from the Genius Bar activated a brand new iPhone 5 for me. When we made test calls with this new-out-of-the-box iPhone 5 the result was the same: choppy sound on every call. The exact same effect that can be heard in my YouTube video.

The person from the Genius Bar concluded that this is a real problem that they cannot solve. He told me that he would do everything for me to find a solution for the problem and that I would hear from Apple soon. I hope that the Apple Store Amsterdam is more helpful than Apple Ireland.

 I was pretty sure Apple understood the bug and was working on a fix, but I am beginning to wonder ... 

Update 1/31/13

I think 6.1 fixed the problem I had, though I have yet to test from my home cell tower. I did a Global Crossing VOIP conference call from my car and it went well, I've seen other reports of success. I hope to test from my quiet home setting and home cell tower next week.

Spotlight indexer (mdworker) priority is too high in Lion/Mountain Lion.

Spotlight was badly behaved in Leopard, but by late Snow Leopard Apple seemed to have most of the bugs worked out.

Not so in Lion/Mountain Lion. It's hogging resources and seems ever more prone to corruption. I think, among other things, Apple set the process priority too high -- perhaps because they're now coding for SSD storage. Spotlight can paralyze my 2 yo 27" iMac; sometimes a forced shutdown is my only option (which seems to corrupt the index -- so I pay back later).

Windows Process Explorer allows adjustment of process priority, but Mac Activity Monitor doesn't. There are ways to adjust mdworker priority by editing /com.apple.metadata.mds.plist attributes of LowPriorityIO and Nice, but these seem like risky system edits. On my currently too-slow MacBook running Lion I, will, however, experiment with the recommendations on this site:

Shortcuts I use to set up a new OSX user account
Set Spotlight indexer (mds, mdworker) to a lower processor priority:
sudo defaults write /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.metadata.mds LowPriorityIO -bool true
sudo defaults write /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.metadata.mds Nice -int 20
(there are several speedups on this page I'll try on the MacBook)

I think there's more than one bug with Spotlight in Lion/ML. For example, I think performance deteriorates over time. I need to restart my ML system much more frequently that Snow Leopard.

Apple needs to give lots of attention to Spotlight in its ML maintenance updates.

See also:

• Shortcuts I use to set up a new OSX user account (Gnarlodious)
• MDS and mdworker processes gone wild: Apple Support Communities
• Is mdworker Jeopardizing Your Resources? Run It at a Lower Priority | The Grey Blog
• Tutorial: Troubleshooting Spotlight | MacFixIt - CNET Reviews: A good collection of tips and fixes. I'm going to exclude my Aperture/Image folders from Spotlight indexing; I don't think Aperture's internal search uses Spotlight and I never need to find photos using Spotlight.

Google Drive crashes on startup (Mac)

With some reluctance, motivated by my grandfathered low cost 80GB of Google storage, Google's support for multiple identities [1], and my longterm use of multi-identity Google Apps, I've switched from using Dropbox to using Google Drive. Sadly some access points block the Dropbox domain, but not web access to Google Docs. (It's hard to block google.com)

Unfortunately Google Driver is crashing on startup on my Mac. If I start manually it seems to work well enough.

I checked Common errors in Google Drive and followed the advice to reinstall. Sure enough, it told me I had a dated version of the app -- the auto-update hasn't been working. The usual copy/replace didn't work either - even after I quit the app. I had to restart, disable sync of Google Doc items, let it run through a full sync check, then quit.

I wonder if this is related to having two-factor verification enabled on my Google account -- contrary to James Fallows I run into many issues with this. I also suspect there are issues with using multiple Google identities on Chrome vs. the single identity assigned to a Google Drive.

I've reenabled sync of Google Docs, now with offline viewing as well. I'll update with a report on how it works.

[1] Everyone needs at least 3 Net identities: Corporate/Business, Personal, and Tribal. Each must be separated from the other -- though in the Surveillance Economy separation is always contingent.

Corporate spam: my current blacklist and a proposal.

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