Eagle-eyed PMUG users keep us informed! Both Jim Hamm and Allen Laudenslager pass along some vital info. In other words, stay alert, with reasonable precautions!"Here is an article commenting about potential malware for Macs," begins Jim Hamm. The author makes some good points, and, as he notes, Macs are not immune to malware. As the Mac presence on the internet increases, we become more of an attractive target for malware. As Mr. Bott observes, every percentage point increase in Apple's share of Web traffic means about 10 million more potential customers for hackers. "This article isn't any cause for alarm, just something to be aware of. Anyone who uses a computer and surfs the net is potentially vulnerable to malware. We just need to be alert and exercise reasonable precautions," Jim summarizes the situation. More information is just in from Allen Laudenslager, "There has been a lot of news lately about Mac 'viruses' and malware, particularly something called Mac Defender*#% "First and most importantly, this is not a virus, it's a trojan horse. What it really does is fake you into downloading an app that reports a 'virus' and asks you to buy their software. The big con is to get your credit card information, not eat your data! I really liked this article for plain speak and clear explanations. I really liked Mac360's quote of Betteridge’s Law of Headlines: 'Any headline which ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no.' "A little common sense and a quick check of the internet will protect your Mac better than some 'anti-virus' software from an unknown source. "For the official Apple stand on viruses and malware, check here." And now it's Skype with problems. Apparently Skype users should have known about this since April 14 when an update for software was made available and publicized.
Fix Your Mac
He calls it fun! Allen Laudenslager sends this: "Some of us go back to the days when we literally built our own computers from parts. My first 'ready-made' computer came with three books about an inch thick with troubleshooting and repair guides. Now you are supposed to send it back to the manufacturer if anything goes wrong.
"For most users this is just fine, but some of us old timers still like to dig in and fix things ourselves. I just found the ultimate Mac Fix-it Yourself site. It includes a troubleshooting guide. Fun even if you aren't planning to fix your Mac yourself."
The Lion is Coming
The Mac OS X 10.7 Lion will be released through Apple's Mac App Store, with more to be revealed at this year's Worldwide Developers Conference, June 6-10 in San Francisco. So relates an AppleInsider article forwarded by Jim Hamm. The future without a physical disc and computer Super Drive is mentioned. Looking forward to seeing that Lion.
More on technology advances and how Apple has evolved in this article further inspires Jim to muse about changes he's seen, "So, will CDs eventually die? And somewhat analogous to this, what with the internet and Sirius satellite, it's been a long time since I've even listened to a CD. When I want a song or album, I just download it, or listen on satellite radio, or listen to music from internet radio on my Mac. And books? Printed copies are becoming less and less each year. Lots of trees saved there. Change just keeps coming in technology."
A Handy Summary of Tips
Yesterday Jim Hamm sent us a summary of 26 OS X tips that might be useful, with the notation: "To get to the rest of the tips on the website, look to the right of the 'Tap to Click' tip and you'll see an arrow to click to get you to the 2nd tip, et al."
I asked for details: Which tip did you think was best for you? "I liked tip #24: how to force quit a program." Any tip you didn't already know? "I had probably read most of them over time, but had forgotten some. This was a good refresher." Any tip of yours that they didn't have listed? "One I use all the time in Safari to quickly send a URL link to someone in Mail by doing a Shift plus Command plus I."
So there you go, your morning is launched with ideas to try!
Oooooh, Aaaaah, Innards
Fascinating photos, check out the innards of the new iMac. This is from AppleInsider and this is from iFixit. Such an invention, this nifty computer we nearly take for granted.
How to Check It Out
With scams and suspicious things in the news we can thank Art Gorski for passing along his experience. He writes, "Just yesterday I got an email from PayPal asking me to agree to a new set of terms and conditions to continue to have a PayPal account.
"If I didn't have a PayPal account this would obviously be spam I could just delete. However, I do have a PayPal account.
"This could still be an attempt to lure me into trouble, so I carefully examined the email. The Reply-To address looked OK, it ended in 'paypal.com' and not in something dangerous like 'paypal.com.ru.' I used the 'View > Message' menu in Mail to show the message as 'Raw Source.' This makes it thoroughly ugly, but will reveal all the website links hidden in the message as they really are. All of these looked OK.
"But still, I'm paranoid about 'social engineering' scams that try to get you to give up your username and password, and PayPal is a potentially very damaging one if you lose your credentials to a hacker.
"So in the end, I trashed the email and just used my normal Safari bookmark to log in to PayPal. Sure enough, the website asked me immediately to agree to new terms and conditions, so I handled it from there, since I knew it was safe to do so."
Watch Out For This
Just spotted this article from ComputerWorld about fake security software on Mac. You'll want to be knowledgeable about this threat. Apple discussions has more than 20 entries on this, with the most recent dated today, 5-2-11.
Jim Hamm sends us this from The Unofficial Apple Weblog with specifics for finding and deleting -- as well as preventing -- the MacDefender app. The article tells us to uncheck "Open 'safe' files after downloading" in Safari Preferences. And the writer closes with, "For those of you who haven't been hit by the MacDefender app, take care while downloading images for the next few weeks."
Who ARE These Mac People?
Are you a typical Mac person? Allen Laudenslager sends this survey report which is good for a chuckle, at least. He also sends a "thanks!" to John Carter for his earlier tip on how to add a link to your email. You'll find that entry back on April 1 with the title, "Mac Email Tip."
Prevent a Hard Drive Catastrophe (updated 8/26/2015)
John Carter to the rescue! This article on protecting your Mac against a catastrophic hard drive failure is still worth looking at. John refers to Macworld Hints as "THE place to look for tips and techniques about the Mac. However, you can spend a whole lot of time filtering through the thousands of submitted articles and comments to get a concise answer for your question. You might find just what you’re looking for or you might feel like you’re wasting your time. "For example, I did a search for 'time machine backup' (using the advanced search and searching titles only) and got 516 hits, the first 14 were comments and the rest were hints about different aspects of using Time Machine in connection with backups." John advises, "One of the best hints is 'Make a Bootable Backup.' This is one way to protect yourself against a catastrophic hard drive failure, but it doesn’t give you the option to boot up from an external hard drive and continue using the Time Machine disk for backups." So, read how to do it, and then do it. It's easy and it's logical.
PR Position Filled
De Prez Howard LaPittus announced to Saturday's PMUG meeting that Ann Schwab has volunteered for the PR position. Ann is now appointed to the Board and will specialize in public relations for our Mac group.
If you haven't already meet our smiling new gal, here's a little about Ann in her own words.
Ann Schwab is a new resident of 2 years to Prescott, moving from Orange County, Calif. Originally from a Naval family that moved often, Ann grew up in LA and attended college in the northwest. Working in Calif. as a speech therapist for the Anaheim High School district, she was a speech therapist at St. Jude in Fullerton for several years and at various rehab hospitals. Prior to that Ann had a banking career, but didn't find that it had enough verbal opportunities!!
"Moving to Prescott for semi-retirement, my current job is focused on school age clients and luckily I can do it in just half a week."
Ann has an adopted dog and cat who take a lot of energy. The dog is a Doberman who needs lots of walks, and luckily Prescott has wonderful trails and parks. She adds, "Bike riding is also favorite of mine and I am hoping to meet more people who ride."
She concludes, "The Mac users group was appealing because of networking opportunities, but also learning new ways to use and enjoy a computer. Most of my experience with computers was in my former life as a banker and more recently with assistive technologies for communicatively-handicapped persons. But, being at home in a beautiful place and using the computer to keep in touch with others is truly rewarding, and I am looking forward to learning more ways to do just that!"
Apple Support Communities Welcome You
Take a look at the new and improved Apple Discussion feature. Formerly the "Discussion Forum," it's been replaced with the Apple Support Communities. Art Gorski comments that when he was looking for the solution to a Mac problem that was the place to search, but this new system is a more social set of forums. Thanks, Art, for this link.
Adobe Critical Update
Adobe calls it a "critical update" and you'll want to read about it here. Thanks to Jim Hamm for alerting us this afternoon. Go to Adobe here to see what version you already have installed. Then go to this help page to specify settings you want for privacy, storage, security, notifications, playback settings, and peer-assisted networking panel. Are you giving permission for companies to access your computer's microphone and camera?
Ready to Blog
Ready to blog? Why? Why not? It's fun, it's easy. Take a tour, watch the video, read the Buzz. Maybe you've noticed this PMUG newsblog and have seen the results of the new template: "Simple." You have other choices in Template Designer.
(Double click to enlarge the following illustrations.)
| It's easy to post text, photos, links. You can restrict who can view it or set it up so it is available to all on the Internet. |
Note: you must allow Cookies in order to post to your blog, but you can delete them and change to "Never" when you're finished posting.
Like other features on Mac you will have fun experimenting and learning by doing. Take a look at other blogs and see what you like. Type "blog sites" and explore.
This is the menu bar for our PMUG blog.
This is the menu bar for our PMUG blog.
Try it -- you'll like it. If you have a blog ready to view let us know.
(The above is the April 16, 2011 handout at the PMUG meeting from Elaine Hardt.)
New IPv6 Info is Here
Boring? Sort of. But we do have a need to know. Jim Hamm keeps us on our toes with info about IPv6. Maybe a brush-up look at Wikipedia can get our brains going with the history, features, timeline, and references of the Internet Protocol. A chart lists Application Layer, Transport Layer, Internet Layer, and Link Layer. Scrolling down to the end notes it was last modified April 15, 2011. So far, so good.Now, we're ready to plunge into Jim's info. "This isn't something we need to sit up nights and worry about, but the availability of IPv4 addresses is coming to an end. Asia has recently run out. "Out of curiosity, I checked my internet connection with Cox Communications here in Scottsdale and it is only IPv4 at this time. I'll soon be back up in Prescott and will take this test with Cableone. I'd guess it is only IPv4 also, at this time. "What I wonder is, when ISPs start converting to IPv6 addresses, do the old IPv4 addresses have to be converted, or can a dual address system be operating?"
Privacy Features in Today's Update
Earlier today we found out that Apple plans to add a new privacy feature to Safari that keeps online advertising networks and other tracking tools from monitoring user activity. We posted this and we thanked David Passell for this info.
Later this afternoon after reading what MacObserver said up came notification for Security update 2011-002 for Leopard and Snow Leopard, iPhone, and Safari. Read all about it, and keep up with these great improvements.
Travel Adventure with iPad
The iPad is finding a home in outdoor sports. Jim Hamm suggests, "Take a read on this article. Be sure to watch the video on 'snowboarding with a splitboard.' Can't believe someone does that, and calls it fun. Look at some of the steep mountain sides they come down on. Mighty scary, and dangerous too. It's possible this was filmed with an iPad, but I'm not sure."
These tips for adventure travel from National Geographic conclude, "Starting in May, Apple is going to offer free travel app workshops for consumers at their 200+ U.S. stores. At these workshops, Apple instructors will show the latest and best travel apps available."
Botnet News
The FBI in an unusual move, closes in on a zombie PC gang involved in botnets. David Passell sends us this BBC news article dated 4-14-11. For more information read these two earlier reports (one) (two) about botnet crime. The second article states an estimated 2.2 million PCs in the US were found to be part of these networks of hijacked home computers.
Look at Lion
A sneak preview of Lion, Apple's new OS X 10.7, comes from Jim Hamm who mentions this About site. Going to Apple's site brings up big photos and more detailed descriptions. Read about new features such as App Store, Launchpad, full-screen apps, Mission control, Gestures and animations, Auto save, Versions (which records the evolution of a document as you create it every hour while you’re working on it), Resume, Mail 5 full-screen with improved search and Conversations that groups messages, AirDrop, All-new FileVault, and Lion Server. Sounds like fun!
Solid State Drives (SSD) Discussed
"Here is a good, understandable guide to solid state drives (SSD)," begins Jim Hamm. And now John Carter adds to the information.First, from Jim, "The article clarifies the importance of using a program like TRIM with an SSD. As I understand it, the new Mac laptops with Thunderbolt do support TRIM, and OS X 10.7 (Lion), when it comes out this summer, also supports TRIM. Whenever I purchase my next Mac laptop, it will be with SSD. I think this is the storage technology for the future, although, as the article states, spinning hard drives will be around for years." This article has a link to download or read online a 21 page "Hard Drive of the Future" booklet. John writes, "There’s no reason to wait until LION comes out to upgrade to an SDD with any OS. TRIM is not hardware dependent. You can use the Mac Disk Utility as explained here to fake a TRIM operation. In the MakeUseOf article, they identify several SSD vendors that provide standalone TRIM utilities, but probably not any that work with the Mac. "Be aware that you need to know which SATA interface to specify for the SSD. My iMac and MacBook Pro have the SATA I interface. The much faster and more expensive SSD drives are SATA II (3GB/s vs 1.5GB/s), and then the newest SATA III is 6GB/s. Please do NOT purchase a SATA II device to plug into a SATA I connector -- you do NOT get the speed advantage of the SATA II device." And John recommends we read this article.
Spring Cleaning for Mac
How do you keep your Mac keyboard - trackpad - Mighty Mouse - etc. clean? With spring cleaning in mind I queried Ruth Davis who spoke to PMUG last year. She passes along info from support.apple:
Scroll down the page for cleaning tips for iPads, iPhones, iPods, Displays, Computers and Peripherals.
Thanks to Macintosh trainer Ruth Davis, who publishes the Mac to School Tip of the Week for more than 400 subscribers. In closing she adds, "If you want to feel more confident and be more productive on your Mac, sign up for a FREE subscription to the tips at www.mac2school.com."