Using Apple Locator devices (AirTags) with an older iPhone

AirTags will work with older iPhones but things are a little different. 

The trick is that they work by Bluetooth with a range of about 20 to 30 feet. The last known location showing in Find My tells you roughly where they are. The next step is to try activating the sound feature. If you see that it's working you know the lost AirTag is within about 20 to 30 feet. If it doesn't work keep moving until you start to see it working. Now you can try to listen for the sound. It can be faint. It's also short-lived. You may have to keep tapping the sound icon. Eventually you'll find the missing AirTag.

Safari on US Bank: "our system is not cooperating"

For the last few days when my wife entered https://onlinebanking.usbank.com into M1 Big Sur 10.4.2 and 10.5.1 Safari she immediately received the error message: 

Our system is not cooperating

Try connecting again 

She can access the US Bank site from a different user account using Safari on her machine. She can also get to it from from Chrome in her account. Edge didn't work at all -- it just hung.

I tried deleting Safari Cache and deleting all US Bank associated cookies/data. No change. I tried a Private window - no luck. I tried changing DNS provider - no help. I tried removing ALL Safari cache and cookie and other data - no change. I tried with our 1Password extension enabled and disabled.

So for now she's using Chrome. There's something wrong with either Safari or something deeper in her user profile but I don't know where to look next.

Unable to print from Chrome on macOS Mojave - use Cmd-Opt-P to print using system dialog

Over the the past year Google made several changes to macOS Chrome printing including hiding the "print using system dialog" option and removing their Cloud printing. I rarely use Chrome and almost never print from it so I ignored these changes. Sadly I recently discovered I was unable to print from Chrome on macOS Mojave. The error message is:

The selected printer is not available or not installed correctly. 

Check your printer or try selecting another printer.

A Google search found several reports but no good fix. Reinstalling Chrome didn't help.

There is a workaround. It turns out there's still a way to print using the system dialog. Cmd-Opt-P or holding option key and choosing Print from file menu brings up the system dialog. That works.

I don't know if this bug is Mojave specific. The workaround is good enough for me, I dislike Chrome in general. At some point I'll try Edge for macOS.

Calendars 5 for iOS: how to use Apple Contacts to complete attendee list

Calendars 5 for iOS makes Google Calendar useable -- at a fraction of the cost of Fantastical. It reminds me of PalmOS DateBk 5 and 6.

For me the main flaw is that it uses Google Contacts for the attendee names and emails. I keep my Contacts in Apple Contacts.

Turns out that if you include at least 1 local Calendar it will also use Apple Contacts. Birthdays works for this. So I included that.

This should be a setting, but I'm glad to to know of the workaround via Calendars tech support.

MindNode for iOS: how to fold a node

I like MindNode (mind mapping tool) for iOS but the UI can be opaque. I couldn't figure out how to easily collapse a tree branch ("fold a node"); I had to dig through a painful menu every time. I knew there had to be a better way but the documentation and Google were no help.

There are two better ways.

1. In settings turn on the edit menu. Then when you tap a node you see an edit menu with 'fold' as a choice. (MindNode on Twitter told me that one)

2 If the edit menu is off in settings then tap once to select a node and then tap again to see the edit menu. (Don't double tap, that doesn't work.)

I hope this helps someone. Adding some terms to help with search: gesture, tap, iOS, MindNode, tree, branch, collapse, fold, close, iPhone.

Getting photos from iPhone (iCloud) Photos.app to Lightroom, Aperture and other non-Photos products

(Original 1/31/2021, updated 7/25/2021)

Apple's approach to photography is to keep everything in iCloud and to view or edit the images from a macOS or iOS device running Photos.app (there's also some limited web browser access). There's some limited ability to share albums between family members and other groups, but this has been a mess for years and I'm not sure what parts of it are available in which versions of macOS.

This approach doesn't work very well if you want to mange your photo Library outside of Photos.app. How do you keep track of what you've have reviewed and exported within Photos.app? Photos.app no longer tracks what's on the iPhone vs. what's in iCloud; there's no easy way to know what's not been imported if you don't delete all iCloud images.

This is what I do now:

In Mojave Photos.app create smart folder for all photos that lack keyword of “Exported”

In Photos.app on iOS or macOS

1. Clean up bursts

In Photos. app on macOS (Mojave for me)

1. Start Photos.app from my macOS account

2. First pass cleanup in Photos

3. Select all images in Unexported and export as original (I export IPTC as XMP but not sure that’s useful)

4. Assign all images keyword of Exported

In Finder

1. Remove all the small .mov files that come with Apple’s live images.

Now Import into Aperture. Every so often I purge what's in iCloud, the real home is Aperture and its many backups.

Unable to update date of birth associated with an Apple ID: "... could not be changed because of a server error"

You can't change the date of birth or family relationship of an Apple ID with a calculated age of less than 13 years old. Otherwise it's supposed to be possible to change the date of birth associated with an Apple ID. I've done it before (for good reasons).

Recently I decided to get #2 child an Apple credit card. Since banks take birth dates seriously I decided I needed to correct his before applying. It didn't work!

This is what his birthday looks like on his Apple ID web page (same as in his iOS devices):

When I edit it to 4/2/1999 I get this message as expected:

The next step is an email sent to the me.com (we're old customers, pre-icloud) associated with my Apple ID:

Can you see what's weird in this email? It says the change will convert his account to a child account. But the current date makes him 17, the correction makes him 22. The email should say it's being converted to an adult account.

When I click on "approve request" I get:

Cannot change date of birth.

The date of birth for ___ could not be changed because of a server error. Try again.

I started an Apple Chat Support ticket on this a week ago. After the usual back and forth I was escalated twice and ended up with a senior advisor (not sure of his title).  After a bit of work and repetition I was told a ticket had been sent to engineering to fix the birth date and I'd hear back the next day.

It's been a week. I've not heard back. I'll try a chat again tomorrow. Fortunately I have my original ticket number.

I suspect his account entry is somehow corrupted and possibly mixed with another account. Otherwise I wonder if this is a side-effect of Apple introducing family credit cards; maybe once I got an Apple credit card all the family birth dates were locked as a side-effect.

It's not a common problem though, I found one similar report from someone trying to convert an adult to child account.

This is going to be a painful slog with no certainty of success.

UPDATE 7/13/2021: After hearing nothing back I called again and was again escalated from chat support to phone support to "senior advisor". Senior advisor said engineering had responded and said it was not actually possible to change date of birth on a child account. I believe that is wrong, it contradicts Apple's documentation saying it should be possible to change for over 13. I have asked that it be reescalated and attach the tech support ref: HT204164.

I reserved a time to call back in 3 days and was told I'd get a link to enable a direct call to a senior advisor.

PS. Related Apple Discussion.

Update 7/24/2021: Support didn't call back on the date they'd promised. There's still a server error. As noted above Support seemed unaware of the contents of HT204164. 

I'm going to have to give up on fixing this for now. I'll try again in a few months, maybe by then Apple will know how to fix the problem. I suspect it's something in their database design that will require serious work to fix. I also suspect their support team is dealing with post-COVID stress syndrome.

Update 1/1/2023: Today I was able to change his birth date without issues. Based on the original birth date he would be 19yo now, so an adult.