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BUYING
VINTAGE TECH
THE ALL NEW APPLE
TV EVOLUTION OR
REVOLUTION?

REVIEWS I HELP GUIDES I APP REVIEWS I iSNAP

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ONTENTS

Features
16
MACS AND EDUCATION
NO MORE TEACHERS,
NO MORE BOOKS?
Macworld Australia editor Anthony Caruana
gives an Apple to the teacher to nd out whats
happening with technology in education.

34

42

HOW TO BUY VINTAGE

TECHNOLOGY ON EBAY

APPLE TV EVOLUTION
OR REVOLUTION?

Old Macs, Newtons, iPods whatever oats

your boat is on eBay, and Christopher Phin
has the tips that will get it into your hands.

Its a lot more capable than the last-generation

Apple TV, but this new version still has plenty of
room for improvement, says Susie Ochs.

5
FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

Regulars
08 MAIL
12 MACMAN:
Accessibility on the Mac
14 iSNAP
22 HOT STUFF
24 BUSINESS
30 MAC GEMS
32 GADGET GUIDE
40 iOS APP GUIDE
48 SECRETS
56 HELP
60 GROUP TEST:
Network Attached Storage

Reviews
62
63
64
65
66

Synology Router
Incipio ClamCase Pro
iRig Pro Duo
Edier R1700BT speakers
Bamboo Spark

EDITORIAL

2016 I cant believe

its here already

STAFF PICKS
What bad tech habit are you
planning to break in 2016?
ANTHONY
CARUANA

recall as a kid ruminating about what

life would be like in the year 2000. I
was born in the 1960s and I remember
saying to my parents that Id be in my 30s
and so old! Back then, TV was black and
white, I played outside a lot more than
kids today and my father, who worked for
the PMG/Telecom/Telstra from the time
he arrived in Australia in the 1950s, had a
phone installed in our house.
That house was recently bulldozed,
along with a few of the places my
neighbours lived in, and was replaced by
a hideous, characterless apartment block.
Apparently thats a sign of progress.
But along the way weve also gained
a lot. The world is a much smaller place
and, by and large, thats a good thing.
The advent of global communications
networks (that my father helped build
in the 1970s and 1980s as one of
Australias representatives to the UN for
telecommunications) made it possible to
phone someone across the world. Today,
we dont even need a phone for that.
Air travel has been largely
commoditised so that interstate ights
sometimes cost less than a tank of petrol,
putting paid to the Australian tradition of
the driving holiday. I recently watched
the cancelled US series Pan Am and
marvelled at its, Im told accurate, portrayal
of air travel in the 1960s with people

dressing in their best clothes when making

transatlantic ights. I usually get on a plane
wearing shorts and a t-shirt these days!
Connectivity and commoditisation have
radically transformed our world. And while
theres a lot to be concerned about, I think
the outlook is very positive. International
political instability, volatile economies and
a rising global refugee crisis that seems to
be only a short time away from catastrophe
can make for a negative outlook.
But as 2015 draws to a close Im writing
this in mid-December I feel optimistic. I see
people reaching out to the disenfranchised.
Not everywhere but often enough for me to
believe the best of humanity is not far from
breaking through the negativity.
So, Im optimistic about 2016 and
beyond.
This months issue is chock-full with
reviews and features, but I wanted to
highlight one special thing. On page 12
is the rst column in Macworld Australia
by the inimitable Garry Barker aka The
Macman. The team here hope it will be
the rst of many
Please welcome Garry to the Macworld
Australia family.
Have safe and blessed holiday season.

Trying to control
everything from
my iPad sometimes its just
easier to get off the couch and do
things the old-fashioned way.
MADELEINE
SWAIN
Anyones
whos read my
contributions to this column
before can probably guess this:
my new years resolution would
be to break my childrens bad
tech habits
JAMUNA
RAJ
Keeping the
phone away and
having real-life conversations with
real people.
MONIQUE
BLAIR
I would like to put
my phone AWAY
when I go to bed,
as it currently resides beside my
head on charge (Im sure there is
something very wrong with this).

FEBRUARY 2016 / ISSUE NO. 215

CONSUMER TECH DIVISION (Macworld Australia & MacTalk):
Publisher Joanne Davies joanne.davies@niche.com.au
Editor Anthony Caruana anthony.caruana@niche.com.au @anthony_caruana
Subeditor Madeleine Swain madeleine.swain@niche.com.au
National Advertising Manager Lachlan Oakley lachlan.oakley@niche.com.au +61 3 9948 4941
MACWORLD AU PRODUCTION: Production Manager Jamuna Raj jamuna.raj@niche.com.au Design and Digital Prepress Monique Blair
NICHE MEDIA:
Chairman Nicholas Dower Managing Director Paul Lidgerwood Commercial Director Joanne Davies Content Director Chris Rennie Financial Controller Sonia Jurista
Subscriptions Freecall: 1800 804 160 subscriptions@macworld.com.au www.macworld.com.au/subscribe
CTP/Print Docklands Press
ISSN 2200-2375. Macworld Australia is a publication of Niche Media Pty Ltd ABN 13 064 613 529. 142 Dorcas Street, South Melbourne, Victoria 3205 Australia. Macworld Australia is published under licence from International Data Group
Inc. and Mac Publishing LLC. Macworld Australia has reprint rights to Macworld (UK & US), publications of International Data Group Inc. and Mac Publishing LLC. Macworld Australia is an independent journal and not afliated with Apple
Inc. Material appearing in in Macworld Australia is copyright and reproduction in whole or part without express permission from the publishers will result in litigation. Editorial items appearing in Macworld Australia that were originally
published in the US and UK additions of Macworld are the copyright property of International Data Group Inc, which reserves all rights. Macworld is a trademark of International Data Group Inc. Products in Gadget Guide are included for
information purposes only and carry no endorsement from Macworld Australia. This issue may contain offers and competitions that if you choose to to participate, require you to provide your personal information. Niche Media will use this
information to provide you with the products and services requested. We may also provide this information to contractors and third parties involved who provide the products and services on our behalf (such as mail houses and suppliers
of subscription premiums and promotional prizes). We do not sell your information to third parties under any circumstances, however they may retain the information we provide for future promotions, activities of their own including direct
marketing. Niche Media will retain your information and may use it to inform you of other Niche Media publications and promotions from time to time.

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i t

MAIL

HAVE YOUR SAY

LETTER OF THE MONTH

UPGRADE BLUES

STYLE OVER SUBSTANCE

I have just had the most disappointing couple of

weeks with my Mac since I started using them many
years ago, and it all seems to have been as a result of
upgrading to El Capitan recently. Apart from having to
adjust (reluctantly) to the photos software and other
visual changes, my computer seems to no longer want
to recognise some external devices. First, I did some
filming video and still recently and, as I had done
prior to the upgrade, tried to load the data onto my Mac.
No go. It didnt happen; neither iMovie nor Premiere Pro
would recognise either movie camera even though they
had done with Yosemite. The cameras are a Panasonic
DV tape and a Sony Handycam.
I then plugged my SD card from my Fujifilm X20 still
camera into the card slot on the Mac. Again, no go. I
then plugged my guitar into the Apogee Jam input and
the Mac wouldnt recognise this device either, although
it always has previously. I then had a bit of a trawl
around the Mac forum sites and discovered that Im not
alone with this issue, and that it is a known issue and
has been for some months. One contributor to the forum
suggested that a workaround is to hit the restart button
with the device plugged in. That worked for the SD card
and the Jam device, but not for getting iMovie or Adobe
Premiere Pro to be able to see the cameras. In the
absence of any meaningful advice from Apple support,
Ill have to find someone who has not upgraded and
hopefully extract the data and try it on a USB or video
disc. Or something.
If its a known issue, it would be nice to known that
Apple intends to whip the Cupertino coders into shape
and fix it.
Yours in disgruntlement

I recently posted an opinion piece

online about Apple putting style
over substance. Citing research by
Don Norman and Bruce Tognazzini,
I noted that a number of everyday
tasks had either become harder
through Apples renement of OS X
and iOS or made almost impossible
to nd.
Its fair to say theres a lot of
agreement, particularly from longtime Mac users. Heres an abridged
version of the story I published
online and some of the comments I
received
As the editor of Macworld Australia
I receive a lot of email from readers
asking questions, making comments
and sharing various points of view.
And I read forum comments (of
which there are fewer unfortunately).
Over recent months something has
become apparent to me.
Many of you are less than happy
with Apples direction when it comes
to the user experience.
Don Norman and Bruce
Tognazzini have written a long,
detailed but excellent article about
how Apple is giving design a
bad name. They cite a number of
examples where Apples attention
on creating elegant and clutter-free
interfaces is getting in the way of
functionality.
Among the examples they discuss
are the font styles that are used.
Apple has, in striving for beauty,
created fonts that are so small or
thin, coupled with low contrast, that
they are difcult or impossible for
many people with normal vision to
read.

Don Newman
Dons letter highlights something we can often miss in the rush
to upgrade and get our hands on Apples latest and greatest.
Upgrading can be fraught.
Our advice is to hold off on upgrades and check every critical
device and application before upgrading.
Virtualisation software, such as Parallels and Fusion, is handy
as you can create a virtual machine to test on. Or you can install
to an external hard drive before committing your main system.
That may be time consuming, but it will save you from being
in Dons boat and discovering something critical that wont work.

MAIL

Totally agree with Anthony. Apples iOS

devices are still very easy to use for
simple things, but as their functionality
has grown the user interface has
gone down a different path that
makes it harder and harder to use that
advanced functionality. A sign generally
of a system that isnt maturing.
And because new versions of iOS
are force downloaded (in secret) to
our devices (whenever on charge
and Wi-Fi) the ridiculous 9.0, 9.0.1
and 9.0.2 downloads all in one week
overloaded our home internet limit and
shut our broadband down; all because
immaturity led to problems, led to
three forced downloads, led to no
functionality (in my household). Ouch!
I worry where OS X may head.

Hew

I absolutely agree with the line of

your story and with Don Norman and
Bruce Tognazzini. Apple iOS and OS X
software has denitely become poorer
in features and usability. Take iTunes it
has become worse, if that is possible.
I thought each version was to be an
improvement on the last, but that is not
happening with Apple software.
Take the new inability to partition
RAID drives with Disk Utility it is
obvious that Apple needs to start doing
some user surveys to discover what we
want in the way of software. Ive doesnt
have his nger on the pulse.
Maps how do you change the
language again? Its just not intuitive
any more.
iCloud what a mess. Apple needs
to come out of its ivory tower and
realise that we dont have fast, cheap,
reliable and fat internet services, as
they obviously have at Cupertino.

Hedware

Apple is on a path to destruction. Just

as Microsoft was years ago when it
insulted and betrayed its users by

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

One of the challenges Ive faced

comes from Apples newest
evolution in software design 3D
Touch. When we rst started using
multi-touch interfaces, things were
pretty intuitive. All we had to do was
tap, tap-hold, pinch and swipe. And
we could usually tell which was the
right action based on what we were
doing or the context we were in.
But now we add Peek and Pop to
the equation. If you were a new iOS
user, would you have any clue as to
which gesture out of tap, tap-hold,
Peek or Pop was the right one to use?
According to the authors, Apple
has relegated important principles
such as discoverability (the ability to
easily discover how an application
works), recoverability (the ability
to go back a step if you make an
error), feedback (a response to an
action) and feedforward (the ability to
anticipate what will happen if you do
something in an application) in favour
of hiding anything that may clutter
the interface like a button that
makes an application easy to use.
My favourite example of this, and
one that Norman and Tognazzini
note, is the Undo command.
In most applications, Undo is
represented by a curved arrow
pointing to the left. On the iPhone,
Undo, if software developers decide
to use the option, is achieved by
vigorously shaking the device.
Think about your computing
experience over the last two
decades or so. At what point were
you taught that shaking a computer
was a good thing? This command is
counterintuitive.
Furthermore, if it doesnt work, how
do you know if youve shaken hard
enough or if the option is supported
by the application developer?
In my view, the simplication of
user interfaces is a good thing. But
it can go too far. I feel things have
tipped a little too far.

10

MAIL

HAVE YOUR SAY

refusing to provide back-compatibility
in the name of progress.
I entered the Apple world in the early
2000s with OS X 10.1, so I never had
the problems of OS 9 or transitioning
from it. At rst it was a marvellous
escape from the MS PC world so
clean and easy and with such great
forum support from Mac enthusiasts.
But as time went by, the Apple tools
were peeled away FireWire, CD/
DVD drives etc and we were told to
suck it! The iPad was launched with
an incompatible, non-printable, nonconnectable system and, since then,
OS X has apparently been manicured
to be more like iOS. Well, Ive been
staying with OS X 10.6.8 because I
dont trust anything Apple does any
more. I wont subject myself to the
problem of trying to x compatibility with
all my working applications or paying
heaps to upgrade them for no reason.

And boy! Am I glad I never touched

Aperture! Early versions of iPhoto
and iMovie were simple but genius
programs and I still run them, but I
have always chosen Lightroom as the
best and enduring program for photo
management and archiving.
Apple is just going the way of all
companies that believe in programmed
obsolescence. My plan has been
to hang on to a working bug-free
development level and refuse to be
coaxed into the future expense of
confusion, orphans and learning again.

Geoffrey Luck

MACWORLD FONT SIZE

The Macworld Australias font size and
weight has been reduced in recent years.
For those with ageing eyes, like
mine, this has made reading it very
difcult.

I suggest that to make reading a

pleasure again you step up the size
a few points and use a font that is a
bit bolder.
It may be trendy and modern to use
a microscopic thin font, but in practical
terms it is a backward step.

Paul Briton

Thanks Paul.
It is indeed a challenge to choose
the right typeface and size. Its a
balancing act. If we make the font too
large, we limit the amount of content
we can provide. But if we make it too
small, the content is hard to read.
Like every magazine, we take a
good look at the design to ensure its
meeting the needs of our readers.
The team here will certainly take
your comments on-board when we
next review the design.

MAIL

11
FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

Q Letters should be emailed to editor@macworld.com.au

with a subject header of Letter to the Editor or by post to:
Macworld Australia Mailbox, Level 8, St Kilda Road Towers,
1 Queens Road, Melbourne, Victoria, 3004. Please include
your full name and address, including state or territory.
Q Comments on stories or Forum posts on
www.macworld.com.au are also eligible for the prize.
Q We reserve the right to edit letters and probably will.
Q Letters of fewer than 200 words are given preference.

This months prize to the Macworld Australia

reader who has submitted what we think is the
most interesting letter is a WeMo Switch a
home automation device that lets you switch
off electronics from your Android and iOS
smart device via the free WeMo app. The
WeMo switch retails for $69.95
The WeMo Switch lets you turn electronic
devices on or off from anywhere. It uses
your existing home Wi-Fi network to provide
wireless control of TVs, lamps, stereos,
heaters, fans and more.
www.belkin.com.au

TERMS AND CONDITIONS. Letter of the month 1. Instructions on how to enter form part of
these conditions of entry. 2. To enter send tips or queries to editor@macworld.com.au with a
subject header of Letter to the Editor. Entries will be judged by the editorial staff of Macworld
Australia. The judges decision in relation to any aspect of the competition is nal and binding
on every person who enters. No correspondence will be entered into. Chance plays no part in
determining the winner(s). Each entry will be individually judged based on its degree of interest.
4. Employees, their immediate families and agencies associated with this competition are not
permitted to enter. 5. The Promoter accepts no responsibility for late or misdirected entries.
6. The best entry/entries as determined by the judges will win the prize(s). 7. The Promoter is
neither responsible nor liable for any change in the value of the prize occurring between the
publish date and the date the prize(s) is claimed. 8. The prize(s) is not transferable and will
not be exchanged for cash. 9. The winner(s) will be notied by email. 10. All entries become
the property of the Promoter. 11. The collection, use and disclosure of personal information
provided in connection with this competition is governed by the Privacy Notice
12. The Promoter is Niche Media Pty Ltd of 142 Dorcas Street, South Melbourne, Victoria 3205
Ph 03 9948 4900, (ABN 13 064 613 529).

12

THE MACMAN... BY GARRY BARKER

Sarah speaks
Macs and Accessability

started my absorption maybe

obsession with Apple when I
swapped my Commodore 64 for an
Apple //e in 1985. Thats 30 years ago
a sobering thought. Many Apple
computers have graced my desk since
then and I still have the 1986 Mac
Plus sitting on top of the bookcase
in my ofce as a kind of memorial to
the beginning of the great story. It
runs System 7.5 and it still works
of course.
There followed various Power
Macs then, in 1998, with Steve Jobs
back at the helm, the Bondi Blue
iMac, the rst of a great, continuing
line of all-in-one computers that have
never been matched. Along the way
there were a couple of MessagePads,
some PowerBooks, the wireless
networking revolution that Steve saw
before anyone else, a line of iPods,
then iPhones, iPads, more iMacs and
MacBooks, and still the revolution rolls.
And, of course, the operating systems
and other software, Apple TV and on it
still goes.

Looking back to the 90s, we rusted-on

Apple addicts kept a kind of desperate
optimism as we hung on to the hope
that, despite the portents and what
looked like an imminent bankruptcy
and death, all ultimately would be well.
And so it was, though back then not
even we imagined that one day Apple
would be the most valuable company
in the world.
And yet I now kick myself that for all
my fascination with the lows and the
highs of the Apple story, I gave scant
attention to one of the greatest aspects
of that culture Apples dedication to
accessibility: making its technology
available and liberating to disabled
people. Over decades Apple has given
eyes to the blind, ears to the deaf,
dexterity to the palsied and voices to
those without them. The lives of millions
of disabled people have been enriched.
At the recent National Disability
Insurance Agency conference in
Brisbane, Sarah Herrlinger, the senior
Apple executive who heads Apples
Accessibility in Cupertino, spoke to

the conferees about the companys

basic design principles of including
accessibility in all its platforms. It is
at the core of our products, she said.
We dont rely on third parties to do it
for us. It is part of Apples DNA.
As we design our products, we
think about how anyone who would
want to use them would have the
opportunity to do so and we do that
across our whole product line, whether
it be the OS X operating system in our
Macintosh notebooks and desktop
computers, in iOS in our iPhones, iPads
and iPods, and in WatchOS across
all of them. If you can use the touch
screen on an iPhone, you can use
the Trackpad on a MacBook or Magic
Trackpad on an iMac; they work the
same way, she said.
The Apple Watch is something we
are really excited about, she added,
because this is the rst consumer
wearable that is built to be accessible
to the blind. At the core of this is
VoiceOver, a gesture-based text-tovoice app that uses the speaker on the
side of the Watch, allowing a blind or
sight-impaired user to read messages
and emails and check their Calendar.
They know when a notication or alert
comes in because the Taptic Engine,
the haptic feature built into the Watch,
gives them a tap on the wrist each
time. Third-party apps for the disabled
are beginning to ow for the Watch and
other Apple devices, such as a Watch
controller for hearing aids.
In OS X on the Macintosh,
accessibility apps range from Zoom,
which allows enlargement of the screen
image up to 20 times, to Dictation that
lets the user talk (instead of typing) and
edit the text by voice commands.

GUEST COLUMN

and inclusive to help those who were

blind, added Herrlinger. But we also
wanted to support the blind with a
Braille system. So we built VoiceOver to
work with over 70 models of Bluetooth
Braille writers and 30 international

Braille tables. And also by considering

our gesture-based system from the
perspective of the blind, we were
able to make the entire gesturebased system better include new
gestures and do things that were more
supportive.
In designing Apples text-tospeech technology this same inclusive
philosophy led to support for textchallenged people, such as those
with dyslexia, said Herrlinger, or just a
hyper-productive businessperson who
wants documents read out to them
we have the tools to support you.
There is a huge amount more to
know about how accessibility opens
doors and opportunities for all manner
of people, disabled or not. It just takes
the kind of genius and technological
generosity you nd in Cupertino. C

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

And then theres Switch Control, built

into OS X and iOS, which takes us to
one of the most remarkable people
we met at the disability conference.
His name is Christopher Hills. He
is 19, severely disabled by cerebral
palsy and quadriplegia, yet hes
amazingly bright and alert with a
great sense of humour a most
courageous and determined man. He
is an Apple Accessibility Ambassador
who, despite his handicaps, runs a
successful video production company
called Switched-On Video Editing.
He has produced videos for the Able
Movement, Queensland Health (he
lives on the Gold Coast) and Control
Bionics among many others.
Hes frequently to be found
absorbed in tapping his way through
Final Cut Pro and other apps on his
MacBook Pro and a 24in Cinema
Display using Switch Control with two
switch buttons on the headrest of his
motorised wheelchair. Hills is not able
to use his hands with any accuracy, but
achieves quite astonishing dexterity
through Switch Control and taps with
his head on the two buttons.
In between times, by email and
FaceTime, he helps other disabled
people all over the world to reach into
accessibility and make their lives better
and more productive. Check out Hills in
one of his many videos, on YouTube at
http://bit.ly/1J5hiAR.
But, said Herrlinger, designing
inclusive products for marginal or
specialist groups also allows the
engineers to support other sectors in
the community. For instance, when
we designed VoiceOver for iOS we
knew that nobody had designed a
touch screen for the blind. Most touch
screens are essentially just a piece of
glass, and theres nothing scarier for
the blind community than something
without tactile feedback. So when we
looked at that for iOS devices we saw it
not as an obstacle or a challenge, but
an opportunity.
When we built VoiceOver we knew
we were doing something amazing

13

14

iSNAP

Sunset by
Sandra Lewis
Normally, when we select our iSnap winner
each month for Macworld Australia, we
conduct a short interview with the winner
where we learn the story behind the picture
and the photographer. This months winner,
a stunning sunset by Janet Lewis, is a
special one as its the last winner of this
great competition.
Over the competitions duration,
Weve seen some stunning images that
have really captured our eyes and
imaginations.
Whether theyve been shots of
wonderful scenery, people doing exciting
or funny things, or stunning architecture,
theyve highlighted the incredible creativity

of the Macworld Australia community.

One of the things Ive personally found
most interesting is the range of different
techniques people have used. Whether its
being pointed to an app Ive never heard
of before or using some good old Aussie
ingenuity to get your iPhone or iPad into
the perfect position to capture the perfect
moment, Ive been amazed at the quality of
images that have hit my inbox.
And to think, these stunning insights
into our world arent being shot with an
expensive DSLR camera and professional
lighting rig. Theyre being shot with a
mobile phone.
At a photography conference I attended

some time ago, the assembled crowd

was once asked what the best camera
was. Naturally this sparked a religious
war between the Canon and Nikon fans
in the room with some of the less popular
professional photography rigs thrown
into the mix.
The presenter proved the point of
iSnaps value with his answer (once the
furore had died down).
He said, Its the camera you have
with you.
So, keep capturing those moments,
but dont forget to let them soak into your
own memory before capturing them in your
iPhones memory.

The last iSnap prize is a Sele Tripod and Extension Pack by PADACS.
PADACS specialises in the design and development of accessories for the iPad and iPhone. Many of us
love taking seles, but it can be awkward trying to pose, hold the phone and press the button all at the
same time. The new Keep Calm and Sele On Remote by PADACS iPhone mobile accessories, makes
easy work of taking the perfect sele or group photo. It uses Bluetooth technology to pair with your
iPhone, allowing you to remotely trigger the camera and capture your sele with ease. To see the full
range of products visit www.padacs.com

Audio out

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16

FEATURE

NO MORE
TEACHERS,
NO MORE
BOOKS
BY ANTHONY CARUANA

e dont want to be accused

of stealing slogans from
previous governments, but we
are going through an education revolution.
If you look carefully at education from
the 1800s through to the 1980s, not a lot
changed.
Sure, we went from blackboards to
whiteboards and introduced overhead
projectors in the time, but all of those were
basically forms of the same educational
system, or pedagogy. Essentially,
the teacher was the font from which
knowledge would spout. They would
control which books students had available
to them and when they could access them.
Even when the internet rst appeared
in tertiary institutions in the 1980s it was
largely used as a tool for academics.
But a number of things happened
during the 1980s that created a perfect
storm such as personal computers like
the original Macintosh, the emergence of
networking standards such as Ethernet
which was invented by Bob Metcalfe
and his team at Xerox PARC and Tim

Berners-Lees invention of the hypertext

markup language, or HTML.
These and other inventions came
together to create a hitherto unimagined
capability for creativity, connectivity and
collaboration.
So, where are we today?
Education is at a tipping point.
British educator Sir Ken Robinson is
internationally recognised as an innovative
thinker. In a recent speech, he noted
that our education is based on principles
largely established following the Industrial
Revolution. We put students on an agebased conveyor belt that supposes they
all learn at about the same rate across
different disciplines.
Anyone who has spent more than
ve minutes in the presence of identical
twins will have noticed that, despite their
outward similarities, they very often have
different skills and temperaments. Any fan
of cricket will have seen that in Steve and
Mark Waugh!
The good news is we now have the
tools to enable students to explore their

world in new ways. The role of the

teacher as a distributor and controller of
information is changing. Todays educators
have to walk a tightrope where they need
to assist students in self-directed learning
while teaching them discernment and the
ability to recognise the different levels
of veracity of the information they glean
from the internet.

EDUCATION BY WIKIPEDIA
Many schools are justiably concerned
by the reliance on online tools such as
Wikipedia. Although its a great resource,
Wikipedias strength that it can be edited
by almost anyone resulting in it representing
the connective knowledge of millions of
editors is also its greatest weakness.
Entries in Wikipedia can be edited to
reect opinions rather than facts.
But the same goes for almost any other
online research.
What this reects is the increasingly
dynamic world in which we live. As Sir
Ken Robinson puts it, How do we educate
our children to take their place in the

FEATURE

17
FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

economies of the 21st century given we

cant anticipate what the economy will
look like next week?
Its not our role to formulate and set
education policy. Whats clear, however, is
technology has a huge role to play in the
future of education.

NO MORE TEACHERS?
Lets not beat around the bush. The role of
the traditional teacher is under threat. And
one of the big challenges is that digital
native students are often more aware and
more adept at using technology than their
teachers.
We spoke to students from one school,
who asked to remain anonymous, who
said they routinely bypassed the schools
internet ltering, which stopped them from
using social networks at school by using
VPN software.
The good news is that there are huge
opportunities for teachers. They now
have access to a massive treasure trove of
resources. As well as research materials,
academic papers and videos from sites

like YouTube and TED, they also have the

iTunes U Apples online education centre
that is lled with lectures, course notes
and other resources.
The beauty of iTunes U is that its not
just for school and university students.
Weve enrolled in a number of free
courses where we get access to recorded
lectures and course notes.
So, for teachers, there are some
wonderful opportunities. Not only do they
have access to classes and materials from
teachers from all over the world, but also if
they have put together a great course they
can make it more widely available.

Classrooms are no longer conned within

bricks and mortar edices. We have access
to a rich variety of teaching approaches
and resources.

NO MORE BOOKS?
Although the iPad was released in 2010,
the real revolution in digital books started
late in 2007 when online bookseller, and
now global marketplace, Amazon released
its rst Kindle e-book reader.
At rst, e-books were little more than
digitised version of paper books, but that
changed when Apple released iBooks alongside
the iPad. Suddenly, we were shown a new type
of book one that contained rich content such
as videos and audio, as well as interactivity.
A year and half after Apple introduced
iBooks, it released the iBook Author
app for OS X. Now teachers can become
publishers in their own right, creating
interactive learning materials. Using tools
that closely resemble the word processing
and presentation software with which they
are familiar, they can create their own text
books that are electronically distributed.

18

FEATURE

Although its possible to publish

books created by iBooks Author through
Apples iBook Store, the output from
Apples book creation software can be
exported and shared on school networks
where students can then add it to the
library on their iOS device.
In addition to iBooks, teachers
can work with their IT departments to
create wikis for their students. If your
school or institution is already running
a Mac with the Apple Server software
on it, the wiki functionality can easily
be enabled through a few checkboxes
and some reasonably straightforward
conguration.
Similarly, resources can easily be
shared using Learning Management
Systems. While there are some that are
commercially sold, others such as Moodle
are available as open source software.
There is, however, a gotcha with open
source software. While the software is free
to download, there is still a labour cost
and the need for expertise in setting up the
software, conguring it and then teaching
all the staff and students to use it.

Despite all these innovations, the humble

textbook isnt going anywhere. Most of the
major textbook publishers have a strong
presence in the iBook Store, following a
number of partner agreements with Apple.
And they have lifted their game, although
many parents and teachers weve spoken
with over the last year are disappointed that
textbook prices havent fallen, despite the
lower production and distribution costs that
e-books offer when compared to tree-books.

THE AGE OF THE APP

When apps rst came to the iPhone they
completely changed our conception of how
a smartphone could be used.
When the iPad came, we didnt have to
wait for apps thousands of new apps that
took advantage of the display and multitouch capability were available within a
few short weeks of its arrival.
Each month, when we prepare the iOS
App Guide, we try to nd a standout app
or two for teachers or students. The trouble
is, many apps and not just those in the
education section of the App Store are
useful in educational situations.

Most state education departments and

many independent schools publish lists of
apps they recommend for different subjects
and year levels. Weve also visited schools,
however, where students arent directed
to specic apps, but are instructed to nd
the apps they like to use in order to solve
specic problems.
For example, rather than having all the
students download the same spreadsheet
program, they can choose the app they
prefer to use. As long as they can use the
software to get their work done, theres no
pressure to use a specic app.
With some schools, weve seen students
rewarded for directing teachers to apps
that either solve specic problems in novel
ways or deliver information in a new or
more engaging way. That way, students
become part of the education process,
rather than just sponges meant to absorb
the information that ows from their
teachers.

WHICH HARDWARE?
Choosing a computer or tablet for a
student can be a difcult task. When
Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1997, one
for the rst things he did was rationalise
Apples product offerings.
He did this by drawing a grid with
four sections. He labelled one side as
professional and consumer and the other
as desktop and portable. That led to four
main product groups and anything that
didnt t into one of those four groups
was dropped. Thats why the MessagePad
and all the different computers Apple was
making disappeared from the market.
Today, Apples range is far broader. So
heres our take on whats available and
who it best suits.

FEATURE

WHO'S IT FOR?

COMMENTS

PRICE

MACBOOK

Secondary and
tertiary students

Perfect for students

who don't need lots
of power for video
editing and value
portablity.

From $1999

MACBOOK
AIR

Secondary and
tertiary students

A step-up in power,
but lacks the
Macbook's Retina
display.

From $1399

All students

As you step up
through the range,
you'll be spending
on lots of power. At
the entry level, this
is a great Mac for all
students and will serve
for at least three years.

From $1999

Students who
need lots of
power

Like the 13in, but for

students who need
a big screen and
lots of grunt. Watch
out for the weight
you'll need a sturdy
carry bag and some
muscles!

From $3099

All students

A great workhorse
for the home,
complements and iPad
for mobile use, but
consider and upgrade
to a Fusion drive for
performance.

From $779

All students

Apple's all-in-one,
particularly with the
new 4K display is a
great computer for
everyone at home.
If you don't need
portability, this is
a great student
computer that will last
years.

From $1699

MACBOOK
PRO 13IN

MACBOOK
PRO 15IN

MAC MINI

iMAC 21.5IN

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

PRODUCT

19

20

FEATURE

PRODUCT

iMAC 27IN

MAC PRO

iPAD MINI 2

iPAD MINI 4

iPAD AIR AND

iPAD AIR 2

iPAD PRO

WHO'S IT FOR?

COMMENTS

PRICE

All students

The desktop
powerhouse all-in-one.
If you've got the space
and budget, this is a
great system that will
let students work for
several years.

From $2799

For the power

hungry

This isn't likely to be

on the radar for school
use, unless you're a
system admin looking
for a powerful system
to work as a server.

From $4899

All students

If you've already got

a desktop system at
home, the smallest,
entry-level iPad is a
handy tool for working
on the go. And it's a
great e-book reader and
research tool to boot!

From $369

All students

Adding Touch ID and

more power than
the iPad mini 2, this
pocket dynamo is
a great secondary
system if you've
already got a powerful
Mac at home.

From $569

All students

Coupled with a decent

keyboard case, the
iPad Air and iPad
Air 2 make a great
laptop replacement,
particularly if you've
already got a more
powerful Mac for the
heavy lifting.

From $569 for

iPad Air, $699
for iPad Air 2

Secondary and
tertiary students

It's a tough call as

the iPad Pro overlaps
price-wise with
many of Apple's
notebook systems
and functionally with
the other iPad. But the
Apple Pencil may be
the clincher for those
looking for a pen-driven
system for annotating
notes and drawing.

From $1249

FEATURE

ESSENTIAL APPS
Once you have your computing hardware,
its all about accessorising. Given the
massive variety of peripherals and
accessories that are on the market, its
tough to work out what you really need.
Here are the ve types of apps we
think every student needs to have on their
computing device. Weve given preference
to tools that are multiplatform and make it
easy to sync content across devices.
1. A note-taking app
Being able to capture all sorts of different
information is an essential skill for
students. Were big fans of Evernote as
its cross-platform and lets you easily
grab information from websites using its
clipping tool, record audio, shoot images
and sync across multiple devices.
Microsofts OneNote is also very highly
regarded and there are others such as
Paper, which works with a stylus (called,
not surprisingly, Pencil) as well as Intuos
Bamboo app.
Any one of these will be a handy app
for students of all ages.
2. Productivity suite
When it comes to ofce suites, Microsoft
Ofce rules the roost. Although many longtime Apple fans will cringe at the thought,
almost every school and university still
relies on Microsoft Ofce for creating
documents, presentations and spreadsheets.
Coupled with the Ofce 365 cloud
service, its easy to create a document on
your iPad, assuming its connected to the
internet over Wi-Fi or cellular data, and
then pick up your work on another device.
And, for group work, its a great solution

for collaborating on les when your study

group cant physically get together.
A close second place is Apples iWork
suite with Pages, Numbers and Keynote.
All are great apps, backed up with Apples
iCloud service. Google Apps is also
popular, but both services suffer slightly
from not being 100 percent compatible
with Microsoft Ofce le formats.
Some formatting can be lost, as
Microsoft adds some extra features to
the base formats, which have been ISO
standards for several years.

Adium is quite popular. Weve used it in

the past and it lets you easily integrate
Microsofts Messenger as well as common
social messaging tools.

3. Image editing
For many years, Adobe has ruled when
it comes to image editing. Photoshop
has become a verb, as well as a noun,
for image editing. Coupled with Adobes
Creative Cloud service and a host of iOS
apps to complement the OS X counterparts,
Adobes tools are a safe, albeit expensive,
option for image editing.
Were big fans of a lower cost, but
powerful, app. Pixelmator integrates with
Apples iCloud service, so you can create
and edit images on your iOS device and then
continue working on them with your Mac.
A search through the OS X and iOS
app stores reveals hundreds of image
editing apps, but many focus on one or
two specic image transformations. Wed
recommend a more comprehensive tool so
your iOS device or Mac dont get cluttered
with dozens of smaller, less used programs.

Whether youre carrying a portable Mac

or iOS device, its important to protect
your tools.
There are literally thousands of cases
to choose from for your portable Mac.
Our advice is to take your Mac with you
when looking at options and try a few out
to see how they feel when loaded up. A
funky backpack or satchel may look great,
but lugging it around campus for a few
hours could have you wishing for the less
fashionable but more comfortable option.
Look for bags that have a protective
compartment for your notebook. Padding
on the base of the bag is a good idea as
well, so that your Mac is protected when
you drop your bag on the oor. And
separate compartments for pens, papers,
cables and other accessories make it easy
to stay organised.
With your iPhone, our advice is to
consider a more solid case that offers
protection for the screen and body of the
device and if youre planning to use an iPad
as your main mobile computing device, we
think a keyboard case is essential.
Despite all the promises of a paperless
world, students will continue to receive lots
of handouts from teachers and lecturers. A
small scanner at home is a handy tool, as
it will allow students to digitise the notes.
Many scanners will integrate with software
such as Evernote to perform optical character
recognition on the text, so you can search
through notes for specic information, as
well as saving on storage space.
As a bonus, youll have all of your
notes with you, wherever you go, without
needing to lug piles of paper around. C

5. Security software
Mac users dont live in a bubble of
invulnerability projected from Cupertino.
And while most malware targets Windows
and Android users, Mac and iOS users
arent immune to phishing scams and other
attempts to steal personal information.

ESSENTIAL ACCESSORIES

4. Communications
Skype, FaceTime, Facebook Messenger and
all the other social and messaging services
are essential for todays students.
As far as picking the best tool thats
almost impossible. Although FaceTime,
in our experience, offers the best video
quality, Skype is more widely used and
has the advantage of broad platform
availability. That means students can
connect to almost anyone in the world
regardless of what device they are using.
For instant messaging, there are lots of
platforms to choose from, but its possible
to integrate many, such as Facebook
Messenger, Google talk and others into
Apples Messages app on the Mac.

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

Of course, youll possibly also add an

iPhone to that mix and an iPod for
listening to music and lectures delivered
as podcasts while commuting to and from
school or uni.
Depending on the students needs and
budget, you may nd that a desktop system
and an iPad make a good ensemble. Cloud
services such as Ofce 365, iCloud and
Dropbox make it easy to work on different
devices and keep les synchronised.

21

22 NEWS

HOT STUFF

A selection of Apple, Mac and iOS news from Macworld.com.au

Fitbit Blaze isnt exactly comparable to
an Apple Watch or Android Wear watchs
full feature set. You can see call, text and
calendar notications on its display when
your phone is in Bluetooth range, but it
doesnt have its own app store, and it doesnt
do a whole lot more than track your activity.
But Fitbit does that one thing exceptionally
well with its other activity trackers, like the
Surge and Charge HR, so Blaze will likely be
another solid entry in that line-up.
If theres one place where Fitbit couldve
made Blaze more competitive with
smartwatches and other tness trackers,
its with built-in GPS, which Blaze lacks. A
tness watch that requires a phone nearby

FITBIT BLAZE TAKES

ON APPLE WATCH
Fitbits activity trackers are some of the

to map routes or track pace per mile isnt

The report notes that Twitter is carefully

the greatest option for serious athletes.

evaluating how expanded tweets

The Blaze is available for pre-order and

will ship in March.

eyes. Fitbit is changing that with Blaze,

a new tness-tracking watch with colour
touchscreen display that takes aim directly
at Apple Watch.
The US$200 Blaze packs in a heart
rate sensor for continuous heart rate

engagement. According to Re/codes

sources, adding large photos, video

most popular around, but the chunky

bracelets arent exactly easy on the

might affect the user experience and

TWITTER MIGHT
EXTEND THE LIMIT
FROM 140 TO 10,000
CHARACTERS

and other multimedia content to tweets

Soon you will be able to post your literary

successful.

opus in a single tweet.

has decreased user engagement in the

past. And creating a stand alone section
on the Twitter app for all this content,
or Moments, has not proven wildly
The fact that Twitter is considering

According to Re/code, Twitter is

altering one of its key features shows that

multi-sport mode and free personal trainer-

considering expanding the maximum

CEO Jack Dorsey will try anything in order

guided workouts viewable directly on the

length of a tweet from 140 characters to

to jumpstart user growth. Twitter has been

watchs screen. Like Apple Watch, Fitbit

10,000 characters. Your Twitter timeline

struggling to gain traction and become a

Blaze requires your phone to be nearby

wont get clogged with long chunks of

mass market service against competitors

to connect to GPS and offer real-time

text, however. If this Beyond 140 feature

like Facebook and Snapchat.

distance and pace data. Unlike Apple

rolls out, longer tweets will still display just

Watch, Blaze lasts ve days on a single

the rst 140 characters, but will include a

its Mac app, its clear that the companys

charge, even with constant heart rate

call-to-action to expand the tweet card and

focus remains mobile.

monitoring, and it works with Android as

read the rest. According to Re/code, Twitter

well as iOS.

is looking to launch expanded tweets some

tracking, automatic exercise recognition,

Fitbit is clearly focusing on style with

its rst smartwatch. The company is

time in March.
Twitter previously expanded the

introducing a line of interchangeable bands

character length of Direct Messages from

alongside the Blaze, including elastomer

140 to 10,000.

Even though Twitter recently updated

NEW PATENT
SUGGESTS DROPBOX
IS LOOKING BEYOND
THE CLOUD

bands in blue, black and plum for US$30,

Its the number one request we get

Dropbox has been granted a patent on a

leather bands in black, grey and camel for

from folks. They want to be able to say

new peer-to-peer le-sharing technology

US$100, and a silver stainless steel link

whats on their mind and be themselves,

that suggests it may be planning an

band for US$130. The watchs frame is

Twitter DM product manager Sachin

alternative to its existing cloud-based

also interchangeable.

Agarwal told The Verge at the time.

service.

NEWS

become a le-transfer standard in some of

devices without the need for content to

its well-established verticals.

go through its own cloud servers, the new

A peer-to-peer service could also have

technology promises faster download

implications for businesses wrestling with

speeds, Dropbox says.

data-sovereignty issues following the death

It can eliminate bottlenecks, thereby

of the Safe Harbor agreement.

increasing the speed at which content

It removes Dropboxs cloud from

items can be shared among individuals,

the conversation, allowing businesses to

Dropbox explained in US Patent

warehouse their content in places of their

Application 20150358297. Cryptographic

choosing, Keitt notes.

keys, meanwhile, add security and prevent

conicts during synchronisation.
The patent was published last month,

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

Designed to facilitate le sharing across

Of course, there are already other

of the recent death of the Safe Harbor

alternatives in that space, including

agreement, that could be especially

BitTorrent Sync. So, Dropbox will have to

important for users in Europe.

but only came to light this week. Dropbox

demonstrate that its new P2P technology is

did not respond to a request for further

not only competitive, but also as reliable as

meanwhile, aims to make it easier

detail.

its existing cloud-based offering.

for enterprises to move their existing

Though the patent award doesnt mean

Before we make any pronouncements

A newly added migration tool,

mailboxes over to WorkMail. Companies

that Dropbox will necessarily be able to

on whether this solves the data-sovereignty

that use WorkMail in conjunction with

turn the technology into a viable product,

question, Ill want to see how they plan

Simple AD can generally be up and

it does pave the way for a new service

to implement this technology within their

running on the new service in 10 minutes

focusing on the transfer of large les, says

offering, Keitt says.

or less, Amazon says.

TJ Keitt, a senior analyst with Forrester

Research.
That, in turn, could help Dropbox make

Dropbox also recently announced that

massive le formats, such as media and

WorkMail also now supports clients

its planning to add new data-storage sites

that run on OS X, including Apple Mail and

in Europe this year.

Outlook, and those that use the Microsoft

Exchange ActiveSync protocol, including

headway with businesses that deal in

iPhone, iPad, Kindle Fire, Fire Phone,

managed le-transfer space, as theyre

AMAZON WORKMAIL
CAN NOW BE YOURS
FOR US$4 PER USER
PER MONTH

giving customers more control over where

After nearly a year in preview, Amazons

and how large content is distributed [all

WorkMail hosted email and calendar

ISO certications over the past year, and

from a well-established interface], Keitt

service for enterprises is now generally

email administrators can use AWS Key

points out. This could allow Dropbox to

available for US$4 per user per month.

Management Service (KMS) to create and

entertainment rms or architecture rms

that work with large CAD les.
Dropbox could begin to push into the

Along with 50GB of mailbox storage for

each user, the service includes features
such as encryption of stored data,

Android, Windows Phone and BlackBerry

10. Companies can use it to create and
book resources such as meeting rooms
and equipment as well.
WorkMail has achieved several key

manage the keys that are used to encrypt

data at rest.
Based on Amazon Web Services,

message scanning for spam and virus

WorkMail is now generally available in three

protection, and policies for controlling

AWS regions: US East (Northern Virginia),

mobile devices.

US West (Oregon) and Europe (Ireland).

Many of those features were outlined

Looking ahead, Amazon is working

when the product was rst announced,

on interoperability support that will allow

but several new ones were added during

users of WorkMail to have a single global

preview as well.

address book. Also in the works is an

Of particular note is regional data

23

email journaling feature through which

control, which makes it possible for

companies can use their existing email

companies to choose where they want

archiving system to capture and preserve

to store their mailboxes and data. In light

all Amazon WorkMail communication. C

24

BUSINESS

HOW TO KEEP
YOUR MAC SAFE
IN BUSINESS
Buried in its October 2015 earnings
announcement was the great news that
Apple had shipped a record 5.7 million
Macs and its not just home users that
have developed a taste for Apple.
California-based cybersecurity specialist
Centrify reports that it has experienced
a signicant upswing in the number of
businesses deploying Macs.
Centrify quantied that growth recently
by sponsoring a survey of more than 1000
business professionals about their use of
Apple devices. The results demonstrate
that Apple devices are ubiquitous in the
workplace, with 45 percent of connected
professionals using them.

An interesting nding was that while

companies own 43 percent of Macs, more
than 80 percent of iPhones are actually
owned by their employees.
This survey also showed that employees
are using their Macs or iPhones just like any
other business device, even though many of
these devices are personally owned.
Centrify also asked about how
Apple devices are managed, which is
distinct from the inherent security of
the device itself.
The results include the ndings that
only 28 percent of respondents use device
management to properly congure and
secure Apple devices, only 35 percent of
companies encrypt data on Apple devices,
just 33 percent of users change passwords
at least monthly and 18 percent of
password-protected Apple devices thats
nearly one in ve have never had the
password changed!

Whats evident is that both companies and

users are exercising poor security practices
with Apple devices. In other words, the
adoption of Macs by business is way ahead
of applying best practice to managing
those Macs within the business.

SO WHAT CAN
YOU DO ABOUT IT?
For Centrify, the key to success is to
balance the security demanded by
corporate IT with the productivity benets
required by end users.
Security measures are often
cumbersome to end users, and thus can be
met with resistance or outright deance
from those they are intended to defend.
Thats why its important to link security
measures to benets for end users.
For example, Centrifys Identity Service
(CIS) Mac Edition allows companies to
ensure that end users log into their Mac

BUSINESS

provide a Single Sign-On portal for easy

access to any cloud-based or on-premises
web application without the need to
remember the access password.
In fact, Centrify ensures end users only
need their Active Directory password to
access all apps that allow for federated
authentication regardless of the device
users choose to use.
So, the key to successful integration
of Macs within a business is not to lock
them down, but to welcome them with
enlightened management tools that
provide both IT oversight and user facility.
In an era of cloud adoption, mobility
and the consumerisation of IT, it is clear
that identity has become the new security
perimeter for businesses. Defending the
corporate rewall no longer cuts it.

The user convenience of Single Sign-On

with the corollary benet of automatic
access to authorised network resources is
the carrot that makes the stick of corporate
IT security mandates acceptable.
The inherent security capabilities of
Macs and other Apple devices should
not make end users feel complacent about
their overall security.
Reviews of major security breaches in
2014 identied that nearly half related to
compromised credentials. Nothing so far
suggests that 2015 will prove any different.
Thats why effective identity
management for the Macs in your business
is essential unless you want to risk sharing
the inglorious hacker limelight with
corporate targets such as Home Depot and
Ashley Madison.

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

with corporate credentials dened in

Active Directory rather than protecting
their Mac with a weak, user-chosen
password that never changes.
CIS can also ensure each Mac is
protected with full disk encryption, with
central management of the encryption keys
needed for Apples FileVault 2 full disk
encryption feature.
These benets for IT security are
balanced with making sure the end
user has easy access to all of the tools
they need to get their jobs done. This
ensures the right applications, les and
network resources etc are available every
time they sit down to get work done all
accessed by a Single Sign-On.
To achieve that, Centrifys Mac and
mobile management solutions uniquely

25

26

BUSINESS

MOBILE DEVICE
MANAGEMENT
WITH PROFILE
MANAGER
Over the coming months well be taking
an in-depth look at Prole Manager, the
mobile device management (MDM) service
built-in to Apples Server app.
Prole Manager is a tool you can
use to take control of all the Mac OS,
iOS and Apple TV devices you own or
are responsible for. It can also help you
provide your employees with access to
company resources, such as VPNs, le
servers and email, using their own
devices, while still requiring those
employees to secure their devices in
ways that comply with your company
security policies.

WHY USE A MDM SERVICE?

Whether youre a small business owner
with just a few users and devices to
manage or an IT manager with hundreds,
youre faced with similar challenges.
How do you provide users with a unied
experience and make sure devices and data
are secure, while still handling everything
else needed to get the job done?
Depending on the size of your business,
how you answer this question can waver
between blissful ignorance and total
control.
For the small business the answer may
be, I dont manage devices. I give my
users a computer, let them set up their own

accounts, download the applications they

need to perform their jobs, and hope for
the best.
For larger businesses and educational
institutions the answer may be, I set the
computers up, make sure users have access
to the resources they need, then lock
everything down as tightly as I can to keep
users from making changes.
In the end, neither solution is very
effective. For the small business owner,
the devices arent really under control
and, for the large business, theyre under
so much control that even small changes
may require every device to be touched by
someone with administrative capabilities.

MDM gives you the ability to manage

and congure devices, manage users
access to business resources, including
apps purchased from the App Store, and
lock or wipe devices, instantaneously
and remotely without ever having to
touch them.

WHY USE APPLES PROFILE

MANAGER FOR MDM?
There are many MDM products on the
market, all of which offer excellent options
for managing devices: JAMF Softwares
Casper Suite, Ciscos Meraki Systems
Manager and MobileIrons Enterprise
Mobility Management, to name a few.

BUSINESS

27
FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

So, why use Apples Prole Manager?

For one, its built into Apples US$20
Server app, so you get far more than just
MDM when you use Server. Its the least
expensive MDM product on the market.
Additionally, as is often the case with
Apples Server app, its powerful but very
easy to use. While you do have to have a
basic understanding of how security and
device management work, you dont need
to be an IT genius to make Prole Manager
an effective solution.

SETTING UP PROFILE MANAGER

To begin our work with Prole Manager,
were going to start with a fresh
installation of El Capitan and a fresh
installation of the Server app.

A note of caution
You may already have El Capitan and

Server installed on a Mac somewhere,

but its never a good idea to play with
server congurations on computers in a
production environment, so were going
to spend a little time here setting up
El Capitan and Server on an external
drive. Once youve practised using
Prole Manager in a test environment,
you can take what youve learned here
and introduce it to your production
environment.
If you choose to throw caution to the
wind and start performing these exercises
on your production server, make a backup
and set it aside. That way you can easily
restore your server to its original state if
something goes wrong.
You have several simple and
inexpensive backup solutions at your
disposal: Time Machine, Apples excellent
backup system thats built right into your

Mac, SuperDuper, Shirt Pocket Softwares

disk duplication utility, and Bombich
Softwares Carbon Copy Cloner. All three
of these solutions create bootable backups
you can use to restore a complete copy of
your current server if you happen to make
an irrecoverable mistake.
So, if youre not going to follow the
following steps to install a fresh copy of El
Capitan and Server on an external drive,
BACK UP YOUR COMPUTER!
Believe me, its your only hope.
Before you begin a fresh installation of
El Capitan, youll want to make sure you
have the installer downloaded (or at least
downloading) from the App Store.
Open the App Store app:
Type El Capitan in the search eld.
Click Get if youve never downloaded
the El Capitan installer or Download if
youve downloaded it before.

28

BUSINESS

This will kick off the download process

and give us time to prepare a disk for
installing the operating system.

PREPARE A DISK FOR INSTALLATION

If youre using an external disk to install
a fresh copy of El Capitan and Server,
youll rst want to make sure the disk is
formatted for use with El Capitan:
Plug the disk into your Mac.
Open the Disk Utility app youll
nd it in the Utilities folder in your
Applications folder.
El Capitan has a new version of Disk
Utility that looks and works differently
than did previous versions of the app.
Locate and select the external volume
you just plugged into your Mac.
Click the Erase button at the top-centre
of Disk Utility.
Name your new volume.
Select OS X Extended (Journaled) as the
Format.

Select GUID Partition Map as the

scheme and click the Erase button.
Install El Capitan.
Locate and double click the El Capitan
installer in your Applications folder.
Click Continue and agree to the licence
terms.
Click the button that says Show All
Disks.
Select the volume you just created for
this primer and click install.
Type the Administrator name and
password for your computer and press
the return key.
Wait for El Capitan to nish installing
on your external drive.
Once El Capitan nishes the
installation, follow the steps for setting
up your fresh installation of the OS.

INSTALL THE SERVER APP

If you havent already purchased Server,
youll need to purchase and download

a copy from the App Store. If youve

purchased the app previously, youll need
to click the Purchased tab, locate and
download the app.
When the Server app has downloaded,
drag the app to the Dock and open it. Once
the Server app opens:
Click the Continue button.
Agree to the licence terms you
can leave the check in the box
that says, Use Apple services to
determine this servers internet
reachability.
Authenticate as an Administrator and
click the allow button.
Server will begin setting up
services. Once the setup is complete
the Server apps window will open
and an OS X Server Tutorials window
will open as well. Feel free to have
a look around the Server tutorials,
especially the section titled Manage
Devices.

BUSINESS

SETTING A PATH TO RECOVERY

KEEP TRACK OF YOUR

SECOND FACTORS FOR
LOGGING IN SECURELY

is totally reasonable, and you can create

a plan when you start using two-factor
logins to prevent this from happening.

BACK UP TO GET STARTED

GLENN FLEISHMAN
Im a big fan of two-factor authentication
(2FA), a password-plus-a-thing method
of reducing the risk of other people and
malevolent parties gaining access to your
accounts remotely. But I do have a concern
related to deploying a second factor on
accounts that allow it losing it!
In a recent conversation with techsavvy colleagues, I found that a surprising
number were concerned that enabling a
second factor could leave them vulnerable
to a system crash or a broken or lost phone
that contains a necessary token or secret.
Without that, they worried about being
permanently locked out of their stuff. This

Systems that use the Google Authenticator

approach of seeding whats known as a
Time-based One-Time Password (TOTP)
offer a QR (quick response) code when
you enable this form of supplementary
protection that you can scan with your
phone or tablet. Some also provide a textbased equivalent.
Google lets you set a lot of parameters
around a second factor, and change your
mind once you have.
These seed codes are used as the
basis on both the account system youre
using and in your own authentication
app to generate the TOTP. But you
can also capture them and store them
securely, so that if you lose access
to a device containing the app or it

Every site with any kind of two-step or

two-factor system offers a way out when
you cant get back in. It can vary quite
a bit. The most popular include backup
codes, alternative email and recovery
codes.
Many sites use SMS to send one-time
use codes, making it vastly less likely
youll lose full access to that factor your
phone number. In most countries, a mobile
carrier controls access to a number that can
receive text messages, and a lost or stolen
phone is an inconvenience that requires
getting that unit disabled, and having the
phone number activated on another. My
wife and I add each others phones where
possible as additional backups.
In some relatively rare cases, you may
lose control of an account, and when
you want to get that number restored, a
carrier may be unconvinced that youre
the legitimate owner. More commonly, if
youre using an alternative SMS system,
such as I described in a column in October,
you may lose access to the number and
have no recourse to obtain it.
So when setting up any SMS-based
factor, make sure theres still another way
out if the phone number in question were
to become inaccessible to you forever.

ONE STEP AFTER ANOTHER

With Amazon adding 2FA support for
regular consumer accounts, and Apple
emphasising availability during iCloud
account setup, a lot more people will
be using 2FA in the future. If you had
concerns, I hope these help alleviate
them, and you can use this information to
assuage others fears, too. C

PROUDLY SUPPORTING MAC IN BUSINESS

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

crashes irrecoverably, you can reseed an

authenticator with that same seed code.
You can screen capture or take a picture
of the QR code or copy the text. (To
decode the QR code into text when its not
included, you can use a reader like Quick
Scan for iOS.)

29

30

APPLICATIONS

MAC GEMS

NEW SOFTWARE FROM THE MAC APP STORE

MACID

TOP
PICK

SECURITY
Kane Cheshire
FREE FOR MAC, $5.99 FOR iOS AND APPLE WATCH

Over the course of a day, Ill enter the password on my Mac

many times. Whether its after my computer is resuming from
sleep or Im installing an application or changing a setting thats
locked down in System Preferences, Ill type my password in over
and over.
As we all know, a good password needs to be hard to guess
and made up of a variety of characters including letters, numbers
and symbols. That can make tapping your password in hard work.
On iOS devices, with a limited keyboard, Apples answer to that
was Touch ID. But what if I could use Touch ID on my Mac?

This is MacIDs raison dtre. Using an iOS

app, or its Apple Watch counterpart, I can
authorise system access to my Mac.
MacID has two components: a Mac application and an iOS app.
Ive installed the OS X part of MacID on a MacBook Pro and Mac
mini and the iOS app on an iPhone 6s. Although the OS X program
is free, the usefulness of MacID is limited unless you pay $5.99
for the iOS app.
Once installed, theres a short setup process to follow. In order
for MacID to work, you will need to provide it with your password.
This is because MacID works by sending your password to your
Mac, once you provide your fingerprint using Touch ID or by tapping
the authorise button when a request is sent to your Apple Watch.
Using the Automatic mode, MacID can lock your Mac when
you walk away with your iPhone. The connectivity uses Bluetooth
LE, so theres not much power drain and theres no need to go
through a complex pairing process. Similarly, when you return to
your Mac the program can unlock it so you can start working. You
can customise the settings to control the distances at which the
auto-lock features work.
If you dont have a Touch ID device such as an iPhone or iPad
you can also use different tap patters using one, two or three
fingers on your Macs trackpad. I set this up on the MacBook Pro
and it worked well and offers a free option for easily unlocking
your Mac. However, Im still wondering whether this dilutes my
Macs security.
The iOS app, as well as allowing unlocking of my Mac, lets me
remotely lock my Mac and also provides basic music controls for
play/pause and track forward/back, so I am able to lock my Mac
and fire up some tunes.
When MacID is running, it appears as an icon on the OS X
menu bar. Thats where you can customise its settings.
Bottom line. MacID worked well in my testing. Assuming youre
using a complex password on your Mac, it makes the task of
entering your password easier by using the biometric capability of
your recent iPhone or iPad.
ANTHONY CARUANA

APPLICATIONS

PIXLR

EDUCATION

PHOTOGRAPHY

Encore
$7.99

Autodesk
FREE (IN APP PURCHASES)

Those with a long

memory may remember
the classic, awardwinning 1990s puzzle
game Logical Journey
of the Zoombinis. There
are 12 puzzles each with
four levels of increasing
difficulty, while a great story, and many fun and memorable characters
make for an engaging and challenging experience.

Pixlr makes it easy to transform

everyday images into works of
art. As well as allowing you to
apply fixes to your images, Pixlr
lets you add effects, overlays
or borders. The free version
of Pixlr gives you basic photo
editing tools and over 600 effects. An in-app purchase of US$14.99 per
year or US$1.99 per month gives you the Pro version. This delivers tools
such as Influence Masks, control over specific colour channels and more.

NORTON SECURITY PREMIUM

SECURITY
Norton
$89.99 (NORMALLY $129.99)

In the past, Norton had a less than stellar reputation with Mac users when it came to security software. Back when we simply called such
programs anti-virus, Nortons products earned a reputation for slowing systems down and causing all sorts of operational mayhem.
But that changed a few years ago when Norton scrapped the software and started building a new version from scratch. In other words,
your experience of Norton Security software on your Mac from 2006 will bear very little resemblance to your experience in 2016.
I installed the five-user version on a MacBook Pro and Mac mini. Theres no CD or DVD to install from. You simply go to a website, enter
a licence key and the most recent version of the software downloads is installed. As well as including software for protecting files as they
are written to or read from your hard drive, Norton Security installs a Safari plug-in that warns you if you are visiting an unsafe website.
If Norton caused any operational impact on my system while
running I couldnt tell. When idle it used no CPU and even when
I was uploading video files, saving documents or opening files I
didnt see Activity Monitor go over 0.5 percent of CPU use.
Nortons parent company Symantec runs one of the largest
security operations centres in the world only a couple of
governments collect and analyse more security data than it does
and all that data about current threats is used to provide updates to
the software.
Many Mac users feel that they arent likely to be targets of
hackers. The reality is, we are all targets its just that some of us
are more attractive targets. Security software makes it harder for
attackers to gain access to our data. Norton Security is a good line
of defence that didnt have any discernible impact on my systems
performance.
ANTHONY CARUANA

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

ZOOMBINIS

31

32

PRODUCTS

GEAR S
GIZMOES
GOODI

GADGETGUIDE
21.5in iMac with Retina 4K display
The new 4K iMac isnt the cheapest Retina Mac you can buy both the MacBook
and the 13in Retina MacBook Pro come cheaper but it offers a much larger
screen. Measuring 4096 by 2304 pixels, thats 9.4 million pixels, providing a
vastly broader work area than a 12in, 13in or even 15in laptop screen.
The main feature of the 4K iMac is its beautiful display, powered by all sorts
of amazing technologies that allow Apple to drive those 9.4 million pixels. If
youve been through the Retina transition on an iPad or iPhone or MacBook, you
know how much nicer a screen can be when you cant see the pixels at all.
Theres also a whole lot of flexibility with a Retina display. Because the pixel
count is so high, these screens can be set to alternative resolutions without
sacrificing image quality.
Apple says that the display in this 4K iMac, as well as the recently updated 5K
iMac, offers an expanded colour space. Thanks to new red-green phosphor LEDs,
the displays can display a wider range of red and green light than before, allowing
them to display 25 percent more colours.
On the outside, the 4K iMac (and its other 21.5in sisters) looks exactly like
the late-2013 models. The biggest change on the outside of the case is the
addition of faster Thunderbolt 2 ports, replacing the Thunderbolt 1 ports on the
older models.
The 4K iMac (like the other new 21.5in models) is powered by fifthgeneration Intel Core processors, known as Broadwell. Despite the quadrupling of
pixels that comes with a Retina display, the 4K iMac was still able to outpace its
predecessors at most OpenGL rendering tests. In CPU tests, it even outpaced the

mid-2015 revision of the 27in 5K iMac.

The base storage configuration of the 4K iMac is a 1TB, 5400rpm hard drive.
Its been a few years since I regularly used a Mac with a spinning disk as its
primary hard drive and, man, did it feel slow. Starting up was slow. Launching
apps was slow. Everything just... took... longer. Yes, Apple has packed an
impressive amount of technology into this $2299 iMac, but it seems almost
unforgivable that a Retina iMac could be saddled with a slow spinning hard drive.
You can pay a bit extra to equip a Fusion Drive, which combines the
capacity of a spinning disc with a small amount of speedy flash storage, and Id
recommend that. If you regularly use large media files, youll want to opt for the
larger Fusion Drive or pure flash storage, but the cheaper configuration is a great
option for users who dont stress out their Macs quite as much.
The 4K iMac and its fellow iMacs are the first Mac models to ship with
Apples new Magic Keyboard and Magic Mouse 2 or, optionally, the Magic
Trackpad 2.
The iMac with 4K Retina display offers a lot of screen space, but isnt awkward
to manoeuvre around a table top. The prices on the three models are more
reasonable, though youll want to upgrade the hard drive to a Fusion Drive or pure
flash storage if it fits within your budget.
Apple / From $2299 / www.apple.com
BY JASON SNELL

PRODUCTS

33
FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

TarDisk Pear
Apple no longer uses hard drives in most of its current lineup of laptops, opting
for speedy flash storage. Flash storage, however, doesnt have the low price per
gigabyte that hard drives offer.
You can buy an external hard drive to lug around with you to alleviate your storage
crunch, but the new TarDisk Pear could be a more attractive solution. TarDisk Pear
is flash storage that finds a permanent home in your laptops SDXC slot, but its
not like using an SDXC card. It works with the internal storage of your MacBook,
and the result is more storage space.
TarDisk Pear is available in 128GB or 256GB capacities for the MacBook Pro and
MacBook Air. You can check TarDisks website to see a list of compatible models.
With about 123GB of data in my laptops storage, the installation took less than
10 minutes, not counting the time it took to do a Time Machine backup. TarDisk
Pear requires installation software to run on your Mac.
After backing up my laptop, I slipped TarDisk Pear into the laptops SDXC slot. It

Smart Sleeves
Protecting your smartphone or tablet over the
summer can be a challenge. Lasers Smart Sleeves
come in three sizes for smartphones, smaller
tablets and larger tablets. Each pack contains
between five and 10 sleeves depending on the
sleeve size you choose. The sleeves protect your
devices from sand, water and soil while still letting
you use them.
Laser
From $12.95
www.laserco.com.au

fits flush with the MacBook Pros case.

The TarDisk Pear software pairs the laptops flash storage with the TarDisk Pear.
When the installation is complete, a window confirms that the installation was
successful.
In About This Mac, the Storage tab shows your storage as two devices, even
though it acts as one device. In Apples Disk Utility, the total storage is seen as
one drive.
Since I installed the TarDisk Pear, its been business as usual for my Mac. It starts
up as quickly as it usually does, and I havent noticed any issues with speed. I
havent had any problems reading and writing files so far.
TarDisk / From US$150 / tardisk.com
BY ROMAN LOYOLA

Clip-Fit Armband
and Case
Carrying your iPhone while running can be a pain
particularly when you want to access the phone
while youre exercising. The Clip-Fit armband
and case safely holds your iPhone while youre
training, but makes it easy to quickly snap the
phone off for easy access.
Belkin
$49.95
www.belkin.com/au

AC1200 Amplify
There are some spots in your home where the
Wi-Fi simply doesnt penetrate. The AC1200
Amplify from Linksys is a range extender.
It takes your current Wi-Fi signal, from any
manufacturers access point, and rebroadcasts
it to extend the range. A handy iOS app helps
you to find the best spot for the AC1200
Amplify and it works with both 2.4GHz and
5.0GHz networks.
Linksys
$188
linksys.com.au

34

FEATURE

FEATURE

BY CHRISTOPHER PHIN

ld Macs, Newtons, iPods

whatever oats your boat is on
eBay, and Christopher Phin has
the tips that will get it into your hands.
It was only after Id written the rst
few instalments of Think Retro, which
started about a year ago, that I was hit by
a blinding realisation: not only could I use
this regular column as an excuse to buy
more vintage Apple stuff on eBay, but I
could legitimately write these purchases
off against tax. Fun and legal; hot damn!
The resulting uptick in my eBay
shopping since then has meant Ive got
better and better at picking out and
picking up bargains, since for me theres
innitely more joy to be had in rescuing
a lovely old Newton or LC or G5 from a
trip to the trash, and giving it a dignied
and loving retirement after a long and
useful life, than in lining the coffers of
a professional eBay seller determined to
squeeze every buck of prot from his sale.
And besides, Im Scottish, so spending
money isnt something that comes easily
to me.

Thus, this guide to buying vintage tech on

eBay was born, so that you too can play
your part in caring for and cherishing retro
tech and, quite coincidentally, picking
up for just a few dollars the tech that you
once yearned for as a youngster, but could
never afford (until now).
Im focusing on eBay here because
its what I use and its the most global
marketplace, but if you live somewhere
serviced by Craigslist, Gumtree, Freecycle
or another local equivalent, you should be
checking them out for bargains, too. Ditto
thrift stores and charity shops, and any
dedicated forums such as vintageapple
on Reddit.

BROWSE
Obviously, one way to look for retro stuff
on eBay is just to browse for it. Click the
Shop By Category button at the top left,
click See All Categories on the bottom right
of that window and then do a Command-F
search for vintage com to jump to the
link for Vintage Computing. Click the link,
then for the juicy stuff, actual computers

click Vintage Computers & Mainframes

and check the box for Apple under Brand
in the sidebar. Although Ill show you
some smarter, less laborious ways to nd
stuff, its still worth making time every
now and then to browse in this way; its
just quite fun, and serendipity can throw
up some wonderful things.
I have the list sorted so that auctions
that are about to end are shown at the
top, which is a great way to snag a
bargain, but if you check in regularly,
switching to Newly Listed lets you just
see the latest additions.

BID LOW YOURE IN NO RUSH

This stuff has hung around for decades.
Its not going anywhere and, unless youre
after something super rare, then there will
always be another one for sale soon. So:
be prepared to lose. Bid low, lose; bid low,
lose; bid low, win is much more satisfying
than Bid high, win. (Of course, if its
something you just really want or, ahem,
you have a looming deadline, you may
have to bid high or use Buy It Now.)

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

HOW TO BUY
VINTAGE
TECHNOLOGY
ON EBAY

35

36

FEATURE

FEATURE

37
FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

USE BEST OFFER

BID LOCAL

Some listings, though, have the option to

Buy It Now or make a Best Offer, which
means the seller will entertain lower prices
than the gure theyve set for buying
something outright. Its usually a sign in
my experience that they know theyve set
the Buy It Now price a little high and are
just hoping for a schmuck to pay it.
Dont be that schmuck. If theres a
Best Offer option, offer a lower bid. Not
insultingly low, as theyll reject you
outright, but low enough that if they
accept, youll be delighted maybe 60
percent of the Buy It Now price. Usually
what will happen is that theyll come back
with a higher counter-offer, which you can
either accept or counter again yourself,
and so on until one of you blinks. Theres
the option of adding notes with your
offers, so ask if theyll throw in a mouse
with the Quadra youre haggling over or
something hey, it might work.

Especially on vintage Macs, postage

can be frighteningly expensive and
downright petrifying if youre shipping
internationally so use the Item Location
lter in the sidebar to nd stuff that is
local to you. You can limit it to your whole
country, or set a smaller radius within
which youre happy to drive to collect.
Again: be prepared to lose several times
before you nd a local bargain. (Going
to pick up an eBay purchase is actually a
great excuse to explore your local area if
you need a reason.)

BID AT THE LAST MINUTE

auction before putting in a bid, which

may not be high enough to cinch the
deal? Screw extreme sports; this is my
adrenaline rush.
Of course, the danger is that youll just
forget to bid, so set a reminder, perhaps
with a quick Hey, Siri. Better still, install
the eBay app on your iPhone, add the
thing you want to your watch list, and
it will ping a notication when bidding
is about to close. And, better still, use an
Apple Watch. Youll get notications of
closing auctions, and you can even bid
right from your wrist even if your hands
are full, you have your nose, right? Theres
no excuse not to own a G4 Cube.

I hate automated sniping systems, but its

still a sad truth that the best way to snag
a bargain is to game the auction system
as much as possible. Put bids in too early
and the price has a habit of bubbling up,
as people get caught up in a bidding war.
But waiting till the dying seconds of an

Often, vintage hardware is listed as spares

and repairs or sold as seen simply
because the seller doesnt have the time or
expertise to conrm its working. Chances
are, though, it will be, and if the price is

TAKE A RISK

38

FEATURE

low enough and its easy to pick up, theres

no harm in sticking a low bid in. Even if it
proves not to work, it may be a relatively
simple x a new battery, say or you
can often make more money than it took
to buy it by stripping it down and selling
it for parts.

foolproof, but its nevertheless a good

idea since it should cut out everything
extraneous. My preferred way of nding
part numbers is with the Mactracker app
(available on the Mac and iOS App Stores)
look for Part, Order or Model Number on
the rst tab.

SEARCH BY PART NUMBER

SET UP SAVED SEARCHES

You can of course also search for specic

items. The problem with this is that
searching for, say, iMac G4 will throw
up all sorts of parts and accessories and
weird other irrelevancies rather than just
showing you a list of beautiful lamp-like
iMacs, even if you limit your search to a
relevant category. You could add further
search terms to try to narrow things down
iMac G4 17, say, for a specic size
but a useful trick is to search for the part
number of the thing you want.
True, not every seller will list it, and
some will use the wrong one, so its not

Once youre looking at a list of things

youre interested in on eBay, whether
as the result of ltering the list of
everything in a category youre browsing
or by creating a search string that nds
specically what youre looking for, you
should save it so you can easily jump
to it later in My eBay such as when
youve lost an auction by following
my bid low advice, and need to nd
another example.
You can click Follow This Search at
the top of the list of items you searched
for, which will, by default, send you

emails when new items match your

criteria, but since clearing my inbox is
a ght Im in no danger of winning
anytime soon, Id rather keep notications
like this away from Mail. Instead, I turn
these search results pages into an RSS
feed simply by adding &_rss=1 to the
end of the URL and hitting Return. I
subscribe to this in my RSS reader
currently NetNewsWire, though I used
Reeder for years and that way I can
easily see if theres anything I may want
to bid on when Im scanning my feeds in
the morning.
This works especially well for items
that are rare not because theyre inherently
unusual or expensive, but just because
theyre little hyper-specic things you
want that nobody ever thinks to sell. There
may be no matches for sale at the moment
you search for them, but subscribe to the
results in RSS and, as soon as one pops up,
add it to your watch list and then bid. C

Buy and Sell Apple

products with Macworld's
mResell

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and under warranty

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MACWORLD.COM.AU/MRESELL

40

APPLICATIONS

APP GUIDE

Cool software for the iOS & Apple Watch.

INSTAPAPER 7
PRODUCTIVITY

TOP
PICK

Instapaper

iPHONE, iPAD FREE

There was a time when reading web-based content required
patience while sifting through pop-ups, inline ads and poorly
formatted HTML. While things have improved in recent years
nothing beats cosying up with a good read later app that makes
everything look neat, clean and, most importantly, ad-free.
When I think of read later, Instapaper is the first app that
springs to mind. Thats not just because it was one of the first
such services to save web content from browsers back in early
2008, but also because it continues to offer the best experience
without the unnecessary bells and whistles of its rivals.
CLUTTER-FREE READING
Instapaper 7.1 doesnt deviate much from the established
playbook, but rather refines what already makes it a favourite. For
starters, Apples new iOS 9 San Francisco font is now an option
alongside 14 other typefaces, assuming youre not already sick of
seeing it all over your devices.
Another visual flourish is the addition of image thumbnails in
article rows, which provides welcome context from the typical rows
of text found in previous versions. If you prefer to see a snippet

of each article, image thumbnails can be

toggled off in Settings for a more traditional appearance.
A subtler enhancement is how the navigation menu now slides
over the article rows instead of appearing from underneath them.
While Instapapers navigation menu was never slow, this method
feels faster in daily use, and can be called up from Home view by
tapping the icon in the upper left corner or swiping from the left
edge of the display.
For English language articles, Instapapers text-to-speech
capabilities will now automatically use the higher quality and more
natural-sounding Alex voice for spoken American-English. Youll
have to first install this voice.
Instapaper 7.1 includes support for the iPad Pro. The previous
7.0 update introduced multi-tasking support, allowing Instapaper
to run alongside other compatible apps on a compatible iPad.
To better facilitate multi-tasking, Instapaper slightly tweaks the
appearance of grid and row cells on the iPad. One downside of
this change is youll have to choose between a grid of either text
previews or image thumbnails you can only view both while in
list view.
While Instapaper may primarily be known as a read later app,
it can also be used for saving video content for viewing at a more
convenient time. iPad owners can now take full advantage of this
functionality with picture-in-picture (PiP) support for YouTube
and Vimeo, although this only works best when jumping over to
other apps as soon as you attempt to browse another Instapaper
article, the PiP window closes as well.
Last but not least, Instapaper 7.1 also supports 3D Touch,
which can be used to preview links inside articles, or up to
four Quick Action shortcuts from the home screen. Any of the
navigation menu buttons can be configured from the app settings,
which also includes very handy new Last Saved and Random
options.
On the surface, Instapaper 7.1 may seem to offer only a few
subtle improvements, but these changes collectively add up to an
impressive update that takes full advantage of everything iOS 9 has
to offer.
J R BOOKWALTER

APPLICATIONS

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

HANDLE

SPARK

PRODUCTIVITY

PRODUCTIVITY

Handle

Readdle

iPHONE, iPAD, WATCH FREE

iPHONE, WATCH FREE

Handle is a useful app that merges to-dos,

Gmail and calendar appointments. With a hard
press on the app icon, you can create new
to-dos, emails or events. You can also preview
email. Handle is a universal iPhone and iPad
app, and it has an Apple Watch extension, but
its currently limited to Gmail.

Readdles Spark is a quality email app for

iOS, though its not optimised for the iPad
as of this writing. With 3D Touch, you can
view your calendar and a list of recent email
attachments, perform searches, and start a
new email by hard-pressing the app icon.
Within the app, 3D Touch lets you preview
email, as well as choose to reply, forward,
archive or mark messages as read.

KITCHEN STORIES

VIZO

FOOD AND DRINK

NEWS

AJNS New Media

Vizo Inc

iPHONE, iPAD FREE

iPHONE, iPAD FREE

Kitchen Stories (eng.

kitchenstories.de) is a free video
cookbook, full of step-by-step
instructions for tasty meals that
can be prepared in 20 minutes or
less. The app received an update
recently with support for the iPads
picture-in-picture mode and multitasking, found in iOS 9, plus an overhauled user interface that makes it
easier for you to create and share your own recipes.

The developers say, Just five minutes a day with

Vizo is all you need to stay on top of the world.
The app takes stories from publications like The
New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The
Telegraph and The Guardian, and condenses
them into 400- to-600-word summaries. Want
to know more about a story? Click the link and
go to the full source.

SEEDLING COMIC STUDIO

MONUMENT VALLEY

ENTERTAINMENT

GAMES

Seedling

useTwo

iPHONE, iPAD FREE (IN-APP PURCHASES)

iPHONE, iPAD FREE

Seedling Comic Studio allows you to

create your own comic book using a mix of
your own pictures with the apps custom
background and stickers. It comes with
three different storytelling themes for free,
with more available for in-app purchases of
$1.49 each.

41

In Monument Valley you will manipulate

impossible architecture and guide a silent
princess through a stunningly beautiful
world. Monument Valley is a surreal
exploration through fantastical architecture
and impossible geometry. Guide the
silent Princess Ida through mysterious
monuments, uncovering hidden
paths, unfolding optical illusions and
outsmarting the enigmatic Crow People.

42

FEATURE

APPLE TV:
BIG STEPS
FORWARD,
BUT NOT A
REVOLUTION
BY SUSIE OCHS

FEATURE

43
FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

ts a lot more capable than the lastgeneration Apple TV, but this new
version still has plenty of room for
improvement.
Apple has nally updated its Apple TV
set-top box, which had remained virtually
unchanged for years, since going 1080p
in 2012. The new version is faster, easier
to use and less frustrating, at least most
of the time. What it isnt is a revolution
everything Apple added already existed in
its competitors.
An App Store and a microphoneequipped remote for voice search are both
excellent features to have, and they bring
the Apple TV closer to the Amazon Fire
TV and Roku. But Apple still has a way to
go. The Remote app for iOS doesnt work
with this new model, for example, so were
back to entering passwords one letter at a
time by clicking with the remote thats
actually a step backward from where we
were. You still cant enter your cable-

provider credentials in one place and see a

list of all the network apps you could log
into. Without categories in the App Store,
you cant even nd a list of all the games.
Perhaps the real revolution will come
when Apple is ready to unveil its longrumoured streaming service, or even an
actual television set. What we have today
is a nice set-top box with some early bugs,
but a whole lot of potential.

THE SIRI REMOTE IS EXCELLENT

The new Apple TV doesnt appear much
different than the old one. I wish it still had
an optical audio-out jack like its predecessor
did. I used that to send audio to my circa
2001 AV receiver, which doesnt have HDMI
ports, so I could AirPlay music from a Mac
or iOS device to my stereo without having
the TV on. Many modern receivers do have
HDMI, and other workarounds exist, so this
may not bother you so much (go.macworld.
com/appletvaudioports).

Im glad it still has Ethernet last year I

had some issues getting the Wi-Fi-only
Roku Streaming Stick (go.macworld.com/
rokustick) to connect to my home network,
and having an Ethernet jack is a nice
fallback. The back of the device also has a
USB-C port, which is there for service and
diagnostic reasons, not for connecting a
hard drive full of content.
That leaves the Siri Remote as the most
noticeable hardware change. The new
remote has a touchscreen taking up the top
third it feels smoother under your thumb
than the glossy surface on the bottom
third, which helps when I mistakenly pick
the remote up upside-down. The Menu
button goes back, and theres a new Home
button that automatically takes you to
the home screen. The microphone button
is what youll hold down to enable Siri
search, to query multiple channels at
once (more on that later). Play/Pause is
self-explanatory, and the plus and minus

44

FEATURE

FEATURE

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

buttons control your TVs volume, thanks

to HDMI-CEC (Consumer Electronics
Control) and IR blasters.
If your TV supports CEC (go.macworld.
com/cecsupport), you probably wont even
have to set it up. Assuming the feature is
enabled in your TVs own settings, the Siri
Remote will detect it. Then youll be able
to use the remote to turn your TV on and
off by holding the home button down and
selecting Sleep to turn it off, or pressing
the home button once to turn it back on
and switch to the Apple TVs input. The
volume buttons should work too. If none
of that works because your TV doesnt
have CEC, you can still go to the Settings
Remotes And Devices Volume Control,
select Learn New Device, and follow the
prompts. Since I use the Apple TV almost
exclusively, this has really cut down on
how much I use the TVs own 46-button
remote control.

PERFORMANCE IS
MUCH IMPROVED
My third-gen Apple TV was the most
sluggish Apple product I still used every
single day. I had trouble with it all the
time. Often it would refuse to connect to
my network even when everything else
in the house did perfectly well. iTunes is
currently unavailable was a frequently
seen error message, preventing me from
streaming content in my collection.
(Recently iTunes let me buy a season
pass right on the Apple TV, but then
immediately claimed to be unavailable
when I asked to watch it. That was
frustrating to say the least.) Fortunately,
the new Apple TV performs much better.
I havent had problems with network
connectivity or iTunes outages since
hooking it up.
That isnt to say its free of bugs. For
example, when youre watching a show
or movie, you can swipe down on the
trackpad for more options, like choosing
an AirPlay speaker or turning on subtitles.
When Hulu auto-advances from one
episode to another, often the Swipe down
for more message gets stuck on the top
of my screen, and I have to quit and then
restart playback to get it to go away.

45

Navigation with the Siri Remote is fast

and uid thanks to the trackpad along the
top, but the real hero is the more exible
layouts that require less drilling down
into menu after menu to nd something
to watch. In Netix on my old Apple TV,
once I chose a prole (mine or my sons),
the rst screen of options held zero things
for me to actually watch; instead I had to
choose from a text-only menu with items
like Suggestions For You and Recently
Watched, each bringing me to a separate
screen of shows and movies. The Netix
app on the new Apple TV is laid out more
like the iPad app. Once Im signed in, the
next page includes side-scrolling lists of
shows and movies, under those headings
plus more, like Popular On Netix and
Watch Again.
Searching with Siri is a big
improvement too, although its got a
learning curve. Siri cant understand a
word my son says hes almost four, so
his diction leaves something to be desired
but my husband had a little trouble
with it too. I demoed it for him, asking
for Seinfeld and then ltering the results to
only episodes with Jerry Stiller" to get

a list of episodes streaming on Hulu.

Kids shows like Octonauts and Ninjago
are easy to nd if you pronounce them
clearly, but sometimes it can take a
couple of tries. The Phish documentary
Bittersweet Motel wouldnt register over
voice at all it turns out, when I did a
text search, that its not in iTunes, but
the full movie is on YouTube, which isnt
supported by Siri search.
Siri can even do a few other things,
like tell you the weather or who won the
World Series, but theres a lot she cant
do: control HomeKit devices, set timers
or alarms (no sleep timer), or deal with
calls or messages. Siri cant search Apple
Music at launch, although Apple says
that functionality is coming early next
year. An API exists (go.macworld.com/
sirisearchapi) for third-party developers
to add Siri search support to their own
Apple TV apps, but if Apple needs two
more months to make it work with Apple
Music (which already supports Siri search
on iOS), that makes me worry a bit that
universal search will be limited to iTunes,
HBO, Showtime, Hulu and Netix for a
good while longer.

46

FEATURE

APP STORE: GOOD START,

BUT ITS GOT A WAY TO GO
Unlike the old Apple TV, which threw
every available channel at you by default,
the new one comes with just iTunes movies
and TV, Music, Photos, Computers (for
using Home Sharing to stream your iTunes
library) and Settings. Everything else you
need to add via the new App Store.
The App Store is great to have it opens
up new possibilities besides the videostreaming services youd expect a set-top
box to have. But the Apple TV isnt the
rst box to have an integrated App Store.
Amazons Fire TV and Roku both sport
on-board app stores, and Fire TV even has
games you can play with the remote or a
Bluetooth gamepad, just like the Apple TV.
The problem with the Apple TVs
App Store is discovery. Besides browsing
through the featured selections, the only
way to nd apps is to search, a painstaking
text search, letter by letter. Theres no Siri
support here, no list of categories, no top
sellers list. You cant browse or purchase
Apple TV apps on your Mac or in an iOS
app. Rokus iOS app, for example, lets you
browse the channel store, and both Roku
and Amazon let you nd and add channels
via a web browser on your computer. This
could all come along later via software
updates, but its disappointing to have
such a crippled App Store to begin with.

Still, even at launch, the app line-up has

amazing potential. I tried Zova, a tness
app with free workouts (and a premium
subscription offer), which also has apps for
the iPhone and the Apple Watch. Seeing
the exercises on the big TV makes them
even easier to follow along with, assuming
you have enough room between your TV
and couch to perform moves like lunges,
planks and jumping jacks.
Moviles Play Kids is here, which
combines videos, games and fun activities
like crafts to make and drawing lessons.
The same subscription I bought in the
iPad app carries over to the Apple TV, and
parental controls let me hide any shows I
dont want my son to see. (Sorry, Caillou
you whine too much!) Unlike on the iPad,
where I have to download the shows to the
device, the Apple TV lets my kid stream
whatever he wants, but its still a more
controlled menu than, say, Netix.
Smules Sing! karaoke app pairs with
your iPhone, so you can croon into that
devices microphone while the words scroll
by on your television. (At least, until the
Apple TV screensaver comes on halfway
through Piano Man sigh.) Speaking
of music, Touchpress is a new way to
experience classical music performances.
You can see a video of a piece being
performed, while also watching the
score scroll by, and even the NoteFall

graphic, which shows the keys being

played in real time.
The App Store will surely expand
quickly, but, as it grows, Apple needs to
make sure we can nd apps that would
most interest us, in case the featured
selections dont really speak to us.
Category listings and Siri search would
be a big help, as well as personalised App
Store homepages, like the new custom
landing pages our Android-using friends
enjoy in the Google Play Store.
Bottom line. The Apple TV feels like it had
painstaking attention paid to some places
the Aerial screensaver, for instance, is
gorgeous, with gently moving videos of
lovely places around the world, from San
Francisco to New York to Hawaii. But Id
trade it in an instant for a way to type in
passwords with my iPhone, an experience
that was better on the old Apple TV.
If youre invested in the Apple
ecosystem, the new Apple TV is a worthy
purchase: AirPlay is an extremely
convenient way to mirror your Mac or iOS
devices screen to your television, and the
Apple TV is of course the only set-top box
that can play content rented or purchased
from the iTunes Store. The Apple TV may
have taken big strides to catch up to its
competitors, but real revolution isnt being
televised just yet. C

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48

SECRETS

Handy iOS and OS X

accessibility features
everyone should know
CHRISTOPHER PHIN

or a long time, Apple has had

a commendable focus on
building assistive technologies
into its operating systems, making
it easy not just for people with a
wide range of disabilities to enjoy its
products, but also for developers to
implement them in their apps.
If youre non-disabled, though,
you may never have clicked the
Accessibility pane in System
Preferences on your Mac or tapped
the Accessibility submenu on your
iPhone. But heres the thing: these
sections are stuffed full of useful
features that everyone should know
about and, happily, by the time youve
nished reading this, you will.
Were not going to show you
every accessibility feature Apple has

provided, since this particular article

isnt about accessibility as such. Were
not diminishing the value of accessibility
itself, and we hope that anyone who
relies on these features wont take it
amiss when we make the point here
that theyre also useful to people who
dont have the kinds of impairments
theyre designed to assist with.
What sort of features do we mean?
Well, lets get right to it!

ADD QUICK SHORTCUTS

AND AN ONSCREEN
HOME BUTTON
If your iPhones Home button is
broken, the best-case scenario is that
you cant use your phone while you
wait for a repair, and the worst-case
is tossing the phone entirely, right?

Wrong! Enable Assistive Touch from

Settings > General > Accessibility and
you get a oating button that persists
wherever you are in the system
(though you can drag it around out of
the way). Tap it, and you get access to
a special pop-up menu of options, one
of which by default is the Home button.
You can build your own palette of
useful shortcuts, even dening custom
gestures and, if you have an iOS
device that supports 3D Touch, you
can dene an action for a hard press
on the oating button.

DIM THE SCREEN

EVEN FURTHER
If your iOS devices screen is too
bright even at its lowest setting,
waking a sleeping partner or baby at

SECRETS

49
FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

night, say, you can reduce it further.

Make a small adjustment by toggling
Reduce White Point in Settings >
General > Accessibility > Increase
Contrast.
A more effective option is enabling
Zoom in the Accessibility menu
(Settings > General > Accessibility).
Were not actually going to use zoom
as such, but triple-tapping anywhere
on the screen with three ngers brings
up a menu: tap Choose Filter, then tap
Low Light.

USE GUIDED ACCESS

TO STOP PEOPLE FROM
LOOKING AT STUFF THEYRE
NOT SUPPOSED TO
Until everyone in the world learns
that when you hand them your phone
to show them a photo or video they
should politely do just that and not
start swiping left and right to look at
other pictures, you may need this
trick. Once youve set it up, you just
discreetly triple-click the Home button

as you pass your phone over, and

they wont be able to swipe or press
the Home button to switch to another
app. Triple click again when you get
it back and enter a password, or use
Touch ID, and its unlocked for you.
Turn on Guided Access from the
Accessibility menu in Settings and set
a passcode. Go to the app you want
to lock Photos, in our example, but
it could be anything except the Home
screen or Settings and triple-click
the Home button. From the menu that
pops up at the bottom when you tap
Options, toggle the switch to ensure
Touch is turned off, then start Guided
Access. This mode has a few other
benets, like not allowing photos
to be deleted (go.macworld.com/
disablephotosdelete).

FLASH THE LED FOR ALERTS

If for some perverse reason you pine
for the glory days of BlackBerry, you
can have your iPhone ash the LED
beside the rear camera whenever
a notication comes in; look for

the option in the Hearing section

of Settings > General >
Accessibility. Note that the ash
really is quite bright!

ADJUST THE PRESSURE

OF 3D TOUCH
Do you have a 6s or 6s Plus? If you
wish you could use a lighter or a
heavier touch to trigger 3D Touch
events, head to the 3D Touch section
in Settings > General > Accessibility.

A FEW AESTHETIC THINGS

Hidden away in Accessibility are a few
options you may want to tinker with
the role of which, as well as helping
people who have a disability, can be to
tweak the look of your iPhone. Check
out the options in Settings > General
> Accessibility to reduce transparency,
darken colours, draw shapes around
buttons to make it clearer that they are
buttons, force the keyboard in iOS 9
always to show upper-case characters
like it used to, change the size of text
and use bolder text. C

50

SECRETS

How to edit photos in iOS using

Photos Adjustments panel
LESA SNIDER

pple probably thinks that not

everyone wants to spend a
great deal of time correcting
images. Heck, lots of people are
content with a quick click of the
Enhance tool in Photos for Mac or
iOS, but that tool cant x every picture
you take.
If you want to lighten only the
shadows, darken only the highlights,
boost contrast, change colour
saturation and more, you need the
advanced editing power nestled
inside the apps Adjustments panel.
Many folks have discovered and used
that panel in Photos for Mac, but they
dont realise that it exists in Photos
on your iOS device, too. It lacks
some advanced adjustments you can
use in Photos for Mac (histogram,

sharpening, noise reduction, vignette

and so on), but its well worth using.
Since the screens on iOS devices are
so small, it takes some tapping to
reveal its hidden and outrageously
powerful controls.

SUMMONING THE
ADJUSTMENTS PANEL
ON YOUR iOS DEVICE
To open the Adjustments panel in
Photos for iOS, select a picture, tap
Edit at the upper right of your devices
screen and then tap the icon that
looks like a little dial. Once the panel
opens, tap Light, Colour or B&W to
open its respective smart slider: a row
of thumbnails that give you a preview
of what that particular adjustment will
look like once applied to your picture.

Smart sliders are smart because

dragging one adjusts a slew of other
settings (called sub-sliders) behind the
scenes. These are great for quick, basic
adjustments. For ne adjustments, you
can reveal a list of the adjustments subsliders by tapping the down-pointing
chevron to the right of each categorys
name (sub-sliders are discussed further
on the following page).

USING THE SLIDERS

To use a smart slider, tap and hold
your nger atop the tiny row of
thumbnails beneath your image and
then drag left or right. For example, to
darken an image using the Light smart
slider, drag to the right so the red
vertical line appears above the darker
thumbnails. To lighten it, drag to the

SECRETS

UNDOING WHAT
YOUVE DONE
Undoing the changes you make in the
Adjustments panel in Photos for iOS
depends on what youve done. You
can undo changes youve made with
the Light and Colour smart sliders and
their sub-sliders by tapping Cancel,
and then tapping Discard Changes in
the conrmation sheet that appears.
This strips away all the edits you
made to that image during this round
of editing, and spits you out of Edit
mode. Alternatively, you can undo
specic changes by moving each
smart slider (or sub-slider) that you
changed back to its original position,
which is indicated by a grey dot above
the slider itself.
The Black & White adjustment, on
the other hand, works like an off/on
switch, enabling you to turn off just the

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

left so the red line is above the lighter

thumbnails. Even simpler, drag your
nger left or right across the image
itself, not the slider.
Once you open a smart slider,
you can access that adjustments
sub-sliders by tapping the icon
that appears at the upper right of
the smart slider (it looks like a tiny
bulleted list). When you do, a list of
that adjustments sub-sliders, as well
as the other adjustments, appears.
As mentioned earlier, tapping an
adjustments name (say, Light) in
the list produces a smart slider while
tapping the down-pointing chevron to
its right reveals a list of its sub-sliders.
To use a sub-slider, tap its name
in the list and a slider with tick-marks
appears beneath your image. Simply
tap and hold your nger atop the tick
marks, or the image itself, and then
drag left or right. To return to the list
of sub-sliders and other adjustments,
tap the icon at the upper right of the
sub-slider. To use another adjustment
say, Colour or B&W tap its name
in the list to open its smart slider or
tap its chevron icon to open a list of its
sub-sliders.

51

black-and-white bit without undoing

any other changes you made during
this editing session using, say, the
Light and Colour adjustments. For
example, once you tap the B&W icon
to reveal its smart slider, you see a
tiny B&W label beneath your image.
Once you move the smart slider, your
image changes from colour to black
and white and the label changes from
black to grey. To restore your images
colour, turn off the black-and-white
effect by tapping the B&W label itself
(it changes from grey to black).
When youre nished using the
Adjustments panel in Photos for iOS,
you can do one of the following:
Close the Adjustments panel
by tapping its icon at the bottom of
your screen. When you do, its icon
changes from grey to black and
you can see more editing tools.
Alternatively, simply tap the Crop or
Filter icons, which simultaneously
puts the Adjustments panel away and
opens those tools.

Save the edited image and exit Edit

mode by tapping Done. Photos saves
the new version of the image and you
return to the view from whence you
came. Dont worry: you can always
restore the image to its original state
by opening it in Edit mode again and
tapping the red Revert button. In the
conrmation message that appears,
tap Revert To Original and your image
returns to the state it was in when you
imported it.
Undo your changes by tapping
Cancel. In the resulting conrmation
message, tap Discard Changes and
Photos removes all the changes you
made in this editing session (changes
you made in prior editing sessions are
preserved).
As you can see, theres more
editing power in Photos for iOS than
meets the eye. It takes a little getting
used to, but the ability to edit your
images in such powerful ways on an
iOS device, using a free program, is
awesome. C

52

SECRETS

How to print a webpage as

a PDF with links that work
GLENN FLEISHMAN

y friend Swoozy got in

touch. She needed to print
some articles shed written
for the web as PDFs, but wanted to
keep the links intact, so that those
receiving them could follow them.
Its an easy proposition with a few
options.
Web browsers render the text on
a page as rich text in different ways
you can see this when you copy text
from a webpage and paste it into a
Word, Pages or TextEdit document.
Safari seems to handle using the

built-in print-to-PDF function in OS X

perfectly well, preserving a reasonable
amount of formatting, as well as
keeping hyperlinks marked and active.
Visit a webpage in Safari.
Select File > Print.
In the PDF drop-down menu
(lower left), select either Open PDF In
Preview or Save As PDF.
In my testing of Firefox and
Chrome, just as I recall from previous
attempts, the rendered rich text
doesnt pass through Apples PDF
engine with links intact. However,

theres a third-party extension you

can use in Firefox and Chrome to help
with that: Print Friendly (printfriendly.
com/browser_tool). Its also available
for Safari.
While its designed to reduce waste
when printing webpages, its also
a very nice way to produce cleanly
formatted PDFs that retain hyperlinks.
The only thing Ive noticed is on pages
that use pop-ups and footnotes to
avoid cluttering a page, those items
are stripped out along with other
formatting. C

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unit, now that all of Apples products are
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54

SECRETS

How to access hidden

typographic characters in OS X
LESA SNIDER

f you do much typing at all

especially if you dabble in graphic
design or publishing youll
eventually need hidden typographic
characters such as , , , and
maybe even and . Back in 1984,
the geniuses at Apple predicted youd
need easy access to these characters,
so they built them right into your
Macs keyboard.
But how do you nd them until you
know where to look? In this column,
youll learn keyboard shortcuts for the
handiest hidden characters, as well as
how to locate even more using OS Xs
Keyboard and Character Viewers.

KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS
FOR POPULAR HIDDEN
CHARACTERS
Whether youre watermarking
photos, writing an essay, or
handcrafting a cookbook, the
following keyboard shortcuts are
well-worth memorising:

Option-G

Option-R

Option-2

Option-8

Shift-Option-8

Shift-Option-2

Option-4

...

Option-;

Option-[

Shift-Option-[

Option-]

Shift-Option-]

These keyboard shortcuts work in any

application and in any eld into which
you can enter text.

USING THE
KEYBOARD VIEWER
If your special character needs extend
beyond this short list, cosy on up
to OS Xs Keyboard and Character
Viewers. The Keyboard Viewer
displays an onscreen representation
of your Macs keyboard, and lets you
insert a character into your text by
clicking its key on a virtual keyboard.
More importantly, you can access
hidden characters by holding down
your keyboards Shift and Option
keys, separately or together.
To summon the Keyboard
Viewer, choose Show Keyboard
Viewer from the Input menu in your
Macs menu bar. It looks like a tiny
window with the Command-key
symbol on it or, if youve enabled
multiple languages for your keyboard,
it looks like a ag instead. If you
dont see it, head to System
Preferences > Keyboard, and select
Show Keyboard and Character
Viewers In Menu Bar.
When you rst open the Keyboard
Viewer, it matches the characters
you see on your keyboard, which
isnt very exciting. To view more
characters, press and hold modier
keys on your keyboard. For example,
if you press and hold the Shift key, the
top row of keys changes to a tilde,
exclamation point, ampersand and so
on. If you press and hold the Option
key, you see even more characters,
such as and '.

When the Option key is held down,

some keys appear in orange to
indicate diacritical marks that can be
added above some letters. To apply
these marks, keep holding down the
Option key and then click the orange
key in the Keyboard Viewer (or on
your physical keyboard) and then click
the letter on your physical keyboard
that you want to apply it to. Another
way to do it is to simply use keyboard
shortcuts; for example, to create the
umlauted u (), type Option-U and
then u. For , type Option-N and then
n. For , type Option-E then e. For ,
type Option-I then i.
Recent versions of OS X provide
an additional way to access the
accented or alternative versions of a
character while typing hold down
the letters key for a second and
youll see a list of alternatives appear
in a popup menu. To use one of the
alternatives, either type the number
that appears beneath it or click the
one you want. To dismiss the menu,
either type a different character or
press the Escape key. If no additional
characters are available for the key
youre holding, the menu wont
appear. (This menu also doesnt
appear if Key Repeat is turned off in
System Preferences > Keyboard.)

USING THE
CHARACTER VIEWER
But what if you need a hidden character
that isnt in the Keyboard Viewer? For
example, is commonly used on
audio records (it stands for sound
recording copyright), but it doesnt
have a keyboard shortcut. In that case,

SECRETS

55
FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

launch the Character Viewer, or choose

Characters from the Action (gear)
menu at the upper-left of the Fonts
palette (summoned in most apps by
choosing Format > Font or by pressing
Command-T). You can also summon
the Character Viewer by choosing Edit
> Emoji and Symbols, or pressing
Control-Command-Space, in apps
such as Pages, Keynote and TextEdit.
The super handy Character Viewer
conveniently clusters the characters
in all your active fonts into logical
groups. For example, the elusive
character lives in the Letterlike
Symbols group. Click once to see
variations of that character in other
fonts, and double-click to insert it into
your text. The Character Viewer even
remembers the characters you use
the most simply click Frequently
Used to see them. You can also add
a character to your list of favourites by
clicking the Add To Favorites button

beneath its preview on the right side

of the Character Viewer.
The Character Viewer is also your
go-to source for nding and using
the thousands of picture-based
characters in fonts such as Apple
Symbols, AppleGothic and Lucida
Grande. For kicks, grab your favourite
beverage, settle in, and then click the
Pictographs group and scroll through
the symbols youll spot playing
cards, chess pieces, dice, dominos
and even astrology symbols (great
for party invitations!). Click the Emoji
group and youll quickly become lost
in a puffy, colourful world. For access
to even more symbols, click the icon
at the upper right of the Character
Viewer to open a smaller version of
the window in which you can scroll to
the bottom for technical symbols.
Unfortunately, whereas you
can use the Keyboard Viewer in all
applications it oats above almost

everything the Character Viewer is

limited to apps that use Apples Fonts
window, such as Pages, TextEdit
and Keynote. Adobe InDesign,
Illustrator and Photoshop have similar
functions in the Glyphs panel, which
is accessible by choosing Window >
Glyphs or Window > Type and Tables
> Glyphs (depending on which app
youre using). To open QuarkXPress
Glyphs palette, choose Window >
Glyphs. If you use Microsoft Word
2016, then choose Edit > Emojis and
Symbols.
If you nd yourself using these
character-nding tools very often, save
some time and sanity by investing
in PopChar, a 30 utility (about $44)
from Ergonis that gracefully provides
all the features discussed previously
and more, in any application. As you
can see, accessing the wide world of
hidden characters is easy once you
know where to look. C

56

HELP

STM READER TIP

YOU CAN ASK THE MACWORLD AUSTRALIA TEAM

ANY MAC- OR APPLE-RELATED QUESTIONS BY
EMAILING EDITOR@MACWORLD.COM.AU.
ANSWERS THIS MONTH BY GLENN FLEISHMAN.

From Macaulay Mike Connor

For ages, Ive used the Undo button in apps to x mistakes Ive made
while using my Mac. At some point, I started using the Command-Z shortcut
for this, as it was quicker than nding the icon on a toolbar.
But I recently discovered the Undo command works in places I never
expected.
Quite by accident, by reex, I used Command-Z when I closed a browser tab in
Safari by mistake. Without any thought, I used the undo keyboard shortcut and the
tab reappeared.
It took a moment or two before I even realised what had happened.
Im sure there are other more stunning revelations out there, but as someone whos
been known to make the occasional mistake this seemed like a handy discovery.
Thanks for the tip, Mike.
There are so many hidden features in Apples software that they can pop up
almost anywhere. Of course, thats also one of the criticisms weve picked up
that many options are hidden or poorly documented.
But for nding this little hidden gem we salute you.

Q EACH MONTH, STM gives a prize to the Macworld Australia reader who submits
the best and most useful tip (undocumented tips preferred). This months prize is a
comfortable and portable STM sequel small laptop shoulder bag worth $99.95.
Your daily gear travels in sleek protective style. The sequel is the perfect, just the
essentials bag for your 13in laptop, tablet, a couple of les, cords and chargers.
Features:

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dedicated tablet slip pocket with soft nylex lining

organisational front pocket for biz cards, pens, keys, etc

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padded, non-slip shoulder pad for a comfortable carry

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and shoulder carries, and

water resistant 320D brushed poly main

fabric with 640D reinforced bottom fabric
www.stmbags.com.au

THE CASE OF THE

MISSING EL CAPITAN
HARD-DISK SPACE

On my late 2013 model

MacBook Pro, which was running
Yosemite 10.10.5, my available disk
space went from 230GB of free
space to 183GB. I have run Disk
Utility, and it tells me all is ne with
the SSD 1TB disk.
Thom Vagt
Ive seen similar problems at times
with my various Macs, and so have
many users. You should pinpoint
where the free-space reporting error is
rst, however.
OS X reports remaining storage in
multiple ways:
Select ; > About This Mac, and the
Storage tab reveals all attached drives,
along with breakdowns by coarse le
type for bootable (blessed) volumes.
In the Finder, select a volume then
choose File > Get Info (Command-I).
The General area shows data used
and remaining. The bottom of every
Finder window with the status bar
enabled (View > Show Status
Bar) shows remaining storage
on the volume that the window
represents, too.
Via Terminal, type df -h and youll
get a human-readable summary by
volume in columns marked Used,
Avail and Capacity (as a percentage).
(The Gi or Ti refers to gibibytes and
tebibytes, base 2 units for a billion and
trillion bytes, instead of the base 10
gigabytes and terabytes.)

HELP

57
FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

Removing the startup drive from

Spotlight indexing can reset a wonky
problem with the display of remaining
storage on that drive.

HOW TO MIGRATE
BROWSER-STORED
PASSWORDS TO A
PASSWORD APP

If these dont agree, its likely a

Spotlight error. Apple relies on
Spotlight to mark and calculate
remaining storage on the startup
volume. You can delete the Spotlight
index and rebuild it by following
these steps:
1. Open the Spotlight preference pane.
2. Click the Privacy tab.
3. Drag the startup volume into the
Privacy window.
4. Click OK at the warning, and the
Spotlight index is deleted.
5. Select your startup volume in the
privacy list, and click the (minus)
button.
That restarts indexing. This should
reset your storage.
If all the numbers agree, it could be
temporary caches, which in previous
releases of OS X before El Capitan,
Ive sometimes seen grow to 30GB to
50GB on one of my Macs. Restarting
clears the cache and regains that
storage space, though the same
problem can recur over time.
The command-line df program
tells you what the low-level system
thinks about storage usage on
mounted drives.

After reading your article about

strong and/or unique passwords,
I wonder if you have some advice
to make a transition to 1Password?
What is going to happen with all
the passwords I already have in
place? I use iCloud passwords
a lot; should I stop with that
practice, and what happens with
these passwords after switching to
1Password?
Nelis van Nahuijs
The good news is that the iCloud
Keychain can be accessed in OS X
via Keychain Access. The bad news
is that its not in a format that can be
directly imported to 1Password (or
LastPass).
1Password can natively import a few
text formats, like comma-separated
values and LastPass exports. But it
doesnt include any tools for importing
from Safari or from Keychain Access.
Instead, a 1Password user has created
documentation for iCloud Keychain
(go.macworld.com/1pwdkeychain)
exporting and a script (go.macworld.
com/convertto1pwd) that converts
many password-storage formats into
one compatible with 1Password.

LastPass can import a few dozen

formats (including 1Password), and
can directly import passwords from
inside browsers with the right plug-in,
including Safari.
You can also opt to convert
gradually. Whenever you visit a site
that you dont yet have in 1Password
or another app, when you submit a
login from Safari, the app will prompt
you to add the login.
LastPass offers a ton of import
options from other formats.

HOW TO REMOVE
OLD DEVICES FROM
TEXT FORWARDING
ON AN iPHONE

Do you know how to clear out old

devices that I no longer have from
the text forwarding screen?
Dan Mills
Youd think this would be straightforward,
no? I started by providing my off-thetop-of-my-head advice: You can remove
devices from your Apple ID account in
one of three places:
At iCloud.com (click the Settings
icon (icloud.com/#settings), then
any of your devices, then an X next
to the device).
The OS X iCloud preference pane
(click Account Details, then Devices,
select a device, and click Remove
from Account).
In Settings > iCloud (tap the
account name, then devices,
then tap the device and nally tap
Remove from Account).

58

HELP

Of course, none of this worked,

although its good to exercise ownership
hygiene so that devices you no longer
own or have in your possession arent
associated with your account.
Dan did this and yet the phantom
devices lingered in Settings >
Messages > Text Message >
Forwarding. Now, you can disable
them from receiving messages;
each device has a switch that can be
tapped off. But its still disturbing.
But theres an answer, found in
discussions online among users with
similar troubles: change your Apple ID
password, and the phantom devices
disappear. Whether youre using
password-only, two-step verication or
two-factor authentication with your Apple
ID, changing the password can mean
re-entering it and going through a codebased verication step in a lot of places.
But it will also solve this problem.

iCloud.com, iOS and OS X all show

you the devices associated with your
Apple ID, and let you remove them
from the account.

WHEN DOUBLE-CLICK
STOPS WORKING IN
EL CAPITAN

After upgrading to El
Capitan, I no longer have the
capability of double-clicking a
folder on the Desktop to open it;
I have to right-click and choose
Open. It doesnt matter which
mouse I am using: Apples Magic
Mouse or the MX Master by
Logitech.
Dexter Rucker
Dexter went through the Finder
preferences to make sure that he
didnt have Open Folders In Tabs set
(though that should have opened them

in tabs) and examined other potential

settings to no avail. I pored over forum
postings for any similar reports by
others and found none.
Fortunately, Dexter wrote back with
a solution one I should have thought
of, but I havent seen crop up in years:
in the Mouse/Trackpad preference
pane, the double-click speed had
been cranked down to the slowest
setting. Hes been a Mac user for
many years, so hes not a slow clicker.
As a result, his click-click! wasnt
detected, where a click click would
have been.
With some experimenting I found
a range on the slider bar where the
folder scenario does not occur, which
is four notches from fast towards the
slow position.
Thanks, Dexter for the question and
the solution that should help solve the
same mystery for others.

HELP

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

I WANT TO BE ABLE
TO READ IN iTUNES

I have older eyes and the

type in the iTunes Store is
too small for me to easily read,
even on an iMac with a large
display. Is there any way to x this?
Seth Lord

Its not just the iTunes Store; its all

of Apples stores. The iOS App Store
is the worst example of this. The
type used for app descriptions is
minuscule. And for media in the iTunes
Store app, there are issues where
there are coloured fonts on coloured
backgrounds similar to what I
discussed in the previous question
making things even harder to read.

While you cant increase the font size

in iTunes, there is a way to view things
more easily on a Mac. Open System
Preferences, then click Accessibility.
Click Zoom, and check Use Scroll
Gesture with Modier Keys to Zoom.
You can choose from the Control,
Option or Command keys.
When this option is active, you
can press and hold the key youve

selected in the preferences, and

then scroll with your mouse or
trackpad to zoom in and out on your
Mac. I use this often when I nd a
website the font of which is too small;
its actually easier than changing the
font size in Safari, because then I need
to change it back for other sites. You
can use this with iTunes when you
need to. C

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41332_1

59

60

GROUP TEST

Network Attached Storage

By Adam Turner

WD My Cloud Mirror
A jack-of-all-trades, WDs My Cloud Mirror aims to keep your
data safe and sound.
Like all the units in this bunch, this two-bay NAS gives you
the choice of combining its two drives as RAID0 to use its full
capacity, or else mirroring the drives as RAID1 which halves
your storage capacity but saves your les should one drive fail.
The My Cloud Mirror supports MacOS Time Machine
feature for backing up your Mac, or you can use WDs
SmartWare Pro for Windows. Meanwhile the WD My Cloud
app can automatically upload your photos and videos from
your iGadgets.
The ability to upload les from iGadgets is becoming
common as network drives aim to be your personal cloud,
but youll want some form of off-site/cloud backup as an extra
precaution. You can sync the My Cloud Mirror to USB storage,
a computer on your home network, another My Cloud Mirror
located elsewhere or to the cloud but only to Dropbox,
Amazon S3 or ElephantDrive.
When youre out and about, you can access your les on
the My Cloud Mirror remotely via a web browser or the iOS app.
This new second-gen My Cloud Mirror features a 1.33GHz
dual-core Marvell Armada-385 processor with 512MB of RAM,
which is sufcient for
a general purpose
NAS, but may groan
if youre looking
for a multimedia
powerhouse supporting
multiple viewers
and high-denition
transcoding video on
the y.
In terms of data
transfer speeds it can
hold its head high
alongside the more
powerful Netgear and
Synology.

WESTERN DIGITAL
www.wd.com

Seagate Personal
Cloud 2-Bay
Looking like a digital set-top box, Seagates Personal Cloud
2-Bay can blend into your lounge room.
This fanless two-bay NAS looks sealed but, like the
others in this bunch, its possible to pop it open to replace
a drive. Its an unusual design, but theres no HDMI port for
connecting to your television, just Gigabit Ethernet, USB2.0
and USB3.0 with printer support.
You can combine the two drives in RAID0 to boost
performance although, as with any NAS, if one drive fails
under RAID0 you lose all your data. Alternatively, you can
mirror the drives in RAID1 to protect your data. Unlike the
others in this bunch theres no option to disable the RAID and
lump the drives together using JBOD and disk spanning.
Macs can run Time Machine backups to this NAS, while
PCs can use Seagate Dashboard. An iOS app lets you
backup photos and videos from your iGadgets, but only
via Wi-Fi.
Away from home youve got remote access to your les via
the Seagate Media iOS app or Seagates Sdrive running on
your Mac/PC. Back at home the Personal Cloud 2-Bay acts as
an iTunes and DLNA server plus like every NAS in this group
it supports Samba, AFP, FTP and WebDAV connections.
Unfortunately, the app library only contains a handful of apps
such as Plex, BitTorrent, WordPress and IFTTT.
Under the bonnet lies a 1.2GHz single-core Marvell
Armada-370 processor with 512MB of RAM, which is ne for
basic needs. Its also the slowest of the bunch when it comes
to data transfer speeds.

SEAGATE
www.seagate.com

PROS Remote iOS uploads

PROS Looks like an AV box; wide cloud support

CONS Limited cloud storage support

CONS Lacks grunt; few third-party NAS apps

$599.99 4TB, $749.99 6TB, $899.99 8TB

$579 4TB, $719 6TB, $829 8TB

OUTSTANDING

VERY GOOD

GOOD

FLAWED

UNACCEPTABLE

Netgear ReadyNAS
RN202

Aimed at multimedia fans, Synologys DiskStation DS216play

packs plenty of streaming video grunt.
You need to supply your own hard drives for this twobay NAS, which supports RAID0, RAID1 and JBOD drive
congurations. Theres Gigabit Ethernet on the back along with
USB2.0 and USB3.0 (with printer support), but the front USB/
SD slots and rear eSATA port of the old DS214play are gone.
This NAS works with Apples Time Machine or you can
install Synologys Cloud Station backup software on your
Mac or PC. Its no slouch when it comes to data transfer
speeds, sitting neck and neck with the Netgear. For extra
protection, you can back up the NAS to USB as well as sync
les between DiskStations, computers and a range of cloud
services including Google Drive, OneDrive, Dropbox, Box,
Amazon S3, Glacier and WedDAV servers.
Synologys strong suite of iOS apps lets you access les
remotely as well as back up photos and videos. Meanwhile,
Evernote-style features let you store notes, web clippings and
a to-do list on the NAS, along with managing your calendar
and contacts.
The NASs app library has plenty of productivity offerings
like WordPress and Joolma, but in terms of entertainment
Logitech Media Server is the only third-party media server
and Synologys mediocre Download Station is the only app
for downloads. The NAS is an iTunes and DLNA server, plus
it runs Synologys music, video and photo servers supporting
the iOS apps.
The glaring omission is Plex. The lack of Plex will be a
deal-breaker in some
homes (it might be
available further down
the track), but in return
the new processor
offers hardware video
transcoding handling
Ultra HD streaming
which you might chalk
up as future-proong
due to Australias
current dearth of Ultra
HD content beyond
Netix.

Designed for prosumers and small businesses, Netgears

ReadyNAS RN202 is one with the lot.
This two-bay NAS can be congured as RAID0, RAID1
or JBOD, but youll need to supply your own hard drives. It
features two rear USB3.0 ports supporting printers along
with eSATA for connecting high-speed external drives. Theres
also a second Gigabit Ethernet port to improve performance
and reliability.
The ReadyNAS supports Apples Time Machine, plus
theres PC backup software. Netgear also offers several iOS
apps, with the ability to upload photos on the road, but it cant
match Synologys range of dedicated multimedia apps.
Behind the scenes the RN202 uses the advanced BTRFS
le system to help protect your data, but its still better
to be safe than sorry. When it comes to backing up the
ReadyNAS youll nd a third USB3.0 port on the front with a
programmable button for triggering backup schedules. You
can back up to USB devices, computers, other ReadyNASes
and the cloud but disappointingly only to Dropbox or
Netgears ReadyNAS Vault.
Netgears extensive NAS app library makes the RN202
a real Swiss Army knife. Business users have access to
WordPress, Joomla, MySQL, OpenERP, SugarCRM and
a CalDAV/CardDAV server among others. Those chasing
entertainment options can call upon Plex, Logitech Media
Server, Transmission, NZBGet, Sickbeard and more. The
ReadyNAS can also act as an iTunes and DLNA server for
streaming content around your home.
Under the bonnet the RN202 packs a 1.4GHz dual-core
ARM processor
accompanied by a
generous 2GB of
RAM a powerful
step up from
Netgears consumergrade RN102. All that
grunt helps Plex sing
while the 2GB of RAM
is especially useful
if you intend to run
several demanding
apps on the NAS. C

SYNOLOGY
www.synology.com

NETGEAR
www.netgear.com

PROS Video grunt; impressive iOS apps

PROS Powerful; extensive app library

CONS No Plex

CONS Expensive; limited cloud storage support

$369 WITHOUT DRIVES

$509 WITHOUT DRIVES

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

Synology DiskStation
DS216play

61

62

REVIEWS

download hub and media server for

the home or ofce.
Out of the box, perhaps the most
interesting feature for home and ofce
users is the ability to control network
access at both the device and
application level. For example, if you
want to limit your childs access by
time, you can restrict their iPad, Mac,
iPhone or iPod access.
Setting up parental controls, using
either the web browser or Synologys
iOS apps is easy. Using the iOS
app on an iPad mini, I was able to
choose from a list of devices currently
connected to the router and then apply
a web lter that blocks in three ways:
basic blocking for known malicious
sites, blocking of malicious and adult
sites, and the ability to create a custom
block list. I was also able to create a
schedule so that internet access was
only allowed on certain days at specic
times for specic devices.
There are also good tools for
monitoring trafc usage. In particular,
I was able to not only check my total
bandwidth use, but also look at usage
on a per device basis.

Synology Router
RT1900ac

he chances are that if youve

been looking at, or recently
purchased, a NAS, Synology
has been close to the top of your
shopping list. And, until recently, its
focus was purely on network-attached
storage for the ofce or home. In that
highly competitive market, Synology
has focused on delivering two key
features: ease of use and great
performance.
Synology has taken the expertise
it developed in the network storage
business and applied it to its rst
router the RT1900ac.
As far as specications go, the
RT1900ac ticks all the boxes youd
expect from a consumer or SMB
router. It has four Gigabit Ethernet LAN
ports and a separate WAN port for
connecting your own ADSL or cable
modem, three adjustable long-range
antennae that transmit 802.11ac Wi-Fi,
which Synology says can transmit at
speeds of up to 1900 Mbps.
Theres also a USB 3.0 port and SD
(SDXC) slot that can be used to attach
external storage devices, so you can
share digital content with others.
This reects Synologys storage
pedigree, making the RT1900ac into
a NAS. The USB port can also be
used to connect a USB modem as a

backup connection should your main

broadband go ofine.
The initial setup process was
straightforward although I do have
one small criticism. The Wi-Fi is, by
default, protected with a password.
However, its a pretty weak password,
which means an opportunistic hacker
could potentially access your network
during the initial conguration. Many
other routers weve recently rested
have a strong, unique password on
the Wi-Fi. Although the risks are small,
this is one thing Synology could do to
further secure its new router.
As with its storage devices,
Synology has eschewed the traditional
modem interface. Its Synology router
manager program is more like a
traditional, icon-driven system. Various
conguration items are accessed
either as icons on a desktop or by
dropdown menus. In addition, you
can download extra software modules
from Synology, so that you can add
just the functions you need to the
router rather than being lumbered with
a bunch of confusing features you
wont use.
For example, you can download
packages and transform the
RT1900ac into a VPN server, RADIUS
authentication server, DNS server, 24/7

Bottom line. The Synology Router

RT1900ac is neither the cheapest
nor most attractive router. But, when
you compare it, spec for spec, with
others in the market, its certainly one
of the better mid-range routers Ive
tested. Its easy to set up, offers lots of
options for monitoring and managing
clients on the network, and is
incredibly exible through Synologys
commitment to adding new modules
to the device. C

ANTHONY CARUANA
SYNOLOGY
www.synology.com
PROS Ease of use; solid network management tools
CONS A little unattractive
$229

REVIEWS

63
FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

ClamCase Pro for iPad Air 2

t took Apple a few years to realise

its customers like the idea of using
a keyboard with their iPad. And
while the iPad Pro keyboard is a great
accessory, many other companies
have been lling the gap for smaller
iPads.
The ClamCase Pro combines
a robust protective case and an
aluminium keyboard that converts
the iPad Air 2, iPad Air, iPad 2/3/4 or
iPad mini 1/2/3 into what looks like
a smaller MacBook Air. I tested the
ClamCase Pro on an iPad Air 2.
The setup was straightforward.
Once I snapped the iPad into the
polycarbonate case it was securely
held and I never felt it was in danger
of falling out. In order to use the
keyboard, I needed to pair it with the
iPad using Bluetooth. All of this was
done in just a few moments.
The ClamCase Pros battery life
can be conserved by simply turning it
off using the small switch on the left
side of the device. The iPads ports
and camera were accessible although
the slot for the Lightning port was a
little on the small side. While most
charging cables tted perfectly, I did
have one third-party cable that didnt
t through the slot.
One of my concerns was the
weight of the keyboard. In order

to keep things light, the potential

exists for the weight of the iPad to
make the case tip over. Working on
a stable surface, the ClamCase Pro
was stable. However, I did nd the
case tipped back when I was working
on my knees something that often
happens when Im on a train or plane.
With a keyboard case, the proof
of the pudding is in the typing. After
a few weeks of using the ClamCase
Pro I found it very comfortable to use
although it did take me some time to
adjust from using a full-size keyboard.
It seems to me that in order to
keep the ClamCase Pro light and trim,
there have been some compromises.
When I type on my MacBook Pro,
the key movement and overall feel
is rm. The ClamCase Pro felt a little
imsy while I was typing. However,
this didnt impact my typing speed or
accuracy. Im not a trained touchtypist, so this may be more of an issue
for faster typists.
As well as being a great keyboard
case, the ClamCase Pro offers
another very handy feature. The hinge
can ip around, so that the keyboard
ends up keys down, creating a stable
base to use the iPad Air 2 hands-free.
This was also useful when I was in
hotel rooms, using the iPad to watch
Netix and iTunes movies.

Assessing battery life for a keyboard

case is very challenging, as it depends
on how much typing you do and
whether you remember to power the
keyboard off when its not in use. I
started using the ClamCase Pro straight
form the box, without charging it.
After a couple of weeks, I was
still going strong on that charge. Id
expect to travel for several weeks,
or potentially months, on a single
charge. Charging is via micro-USB.
Bottom line. With keyboard cases,
its important to try them out before
committing to a purchase. Theres
quite a bit of difference in keyboard
feel between different models. In my
experience, the ClamCase Pro was a
great companion for my iPad Air. Battery
life, comfort and protection for my iPad
were all covered, helping to make me
more productive when Im on the go. C

ANTHONY CARUANA

CLAMCASE
www.clamcase.com
PROS Protection; battery life; good for typing
CONS Keyboard 'feel' took some getting used to
$199.99

64

REVIEWS

iRig Pro Duo

he iRig Pro Duo is a new dualchannel mobile audio and MIDI

interface for Mac and iOS (as
well as Android and PC). The unit is
black plastic, very light in the hand,
has the footprint of an iPhone and is
packed with features.
According to the folks at IK
Multimedia I will be able to record
anywhere, anytime on any device
with the smallest fully-featured dualchannel interface on the market. So
what do I get? Out of the box cables.
Five in all. USB, Lightning and Android
plus MIDI out and in. And two AA
batteries, which Ill discuss later.
The front face of the unit has a
smooth circular preamp gain control
for each channel, which takes a little
bit of getting used to. Twin multi-colour
LEDs tell me where my levels are at,
from blue through green into the red
zone. Adjacent to these are two more
LEDs, which signal MIDI connection
and activation of the 48-volt power
switch on the left side of the unit if I
need to invoke phantom power for
condenser microphones.
Two XLR/TRS combo audio input
jacks accept guitar, microphone, or
any line-level source. A stereo pair

of TRS balanced output jacks offer

connection to a monitor or a full rig.
On the right-hand side of the unit I
have a headphone socket with gain
control and an on/off switch.
I have three power options. I can
run via USB into my Mac, using a
power adapter (not included) or with
the two included AA batteries. The
tech specs tell me I can record at
least 45 minutes with these or three
hours, 30 minutes with an NiMH
rechargeable. Anecdotally, users are
claiming a maximum one hour with the
two AAs. If youre going to do a lot of
recording in the eld it may be worth
keeping this in mind.
For the test, I hooked the iRig
Pro Duo into my iMac. I connected
my Fender Strat via TRS into the left
channel, one of my old vocal mics via
XLR into the right channel. In a blank
stereo le in Sound Studio I used the
Audio/MIDI utility to assign the left and
right channels and clicked Record.
Strumming and singing at the
same time, I could see the different
sound waves forming in each channel.
Playback revealed amazing sound
delity absolute clarity and fullness
with no discernible background noise.

From my research I would presume

that this is probably due to the ultra-low
noise preamps, high-end 24-bit AD/
DA converters and a few other smarts
inside the unit, which keep extraneous
noise to an absolute minimum. The
results speak for themselves.
Bottom line. For anyone thinking of a
portable, versatile, professional stereo
recorder the iRig Pro Duo, certainly
merits your further investigation. The
unit is compatible with most current
audio/music apps, which you can
check on the IK multimedia website. C

KEITH WHITE

iRIG
www.ikmultimedia.com
PROS Exceptional quality true stereo sound; very
portable package; easy to set up and use; all
connection options covered
CONS Gain controls take a little getting used to and
the recessed dot level indication controls are very hard
to see in a dark environment; battery power may be an
issue on long sessions
$330

REVIEWS

Edier R1700BT

e really do live in an
extraordinary time. Back
when I was a lad, a decent
home sound system cost a small
fortune and was so large that it
became more than just a way to listen
to music it was a piece of furniture.
Ediers R1700BT speakers turn that
on its head. These compact speakers
can connect to iOS and other devices
via Bluetooth or to your other audio
equipment such as TVs, computers or
sound systems via RCA connectors.
Right off the bat, its important to
note these are stereo speakers and
not a surround system. However, dont
let that put you off the sound quality
was excellent out of the box.
Each speaker is equipped with a 4in
bass driver and a 19mm tweeter. The
front face of each speaker is raked at
10 degrees. Edier says this is to direct
the sound exactly at you, it creates a
better listening experience as it reduces
interference. At 254mm, I easily was
able to place them on a bookshelf so
that they were located in a single location
that allowed them to project their sound.

The two speakers are connected

via a cable. The right speaker holds
most of the smarts with the two extra
audio inputs, a power switch and
bass, treble and volume controls. This
is something I really like. Although I
can ddle with equaliser settings on
my iPhone, being able to make quick
adjustments by turning a knob is
easier.
Unlike many speaker companies,
Edier provides cables so that you
can connect your gear without another
trip to the audio store. The box
contains 3.50mm to RCA and RCA to
RCA cables.
Encased in elegant vinyl-coated
MDF with a walnut nish, the
R1700BT speakers would look right
at home in most lounge rooms.
Although Edier has, in the past,
shown some very interesting design
ideas in its speakers, this set is
decidedly plain but thats not a
bad thing.
Listening to a wide variety of
different music, including piano
concertos, pop, rock and jazz,

Bottom line. If youre looking for a

decent set of speakers for the lounge
or ofce, then its hard to go past the
Edier R1700BT. The sound quality is
excellent, they look great and wont
break the bank. C

ANTHONY CARUANA

EDIFIER
www.edifier.com
PROS Attractive; sound quality
CONS Basic remote control
$229.95

FEBRUARY 2016
www.macworld.com.au

I was able to close my eyes and feel

immersed in the sound. Unlike many
modern speakers, the R1700BTs dont
go too heavy on the bass.
Edier employs Digital Signal
Processing (DSP) and Dynamic
Range Control (DRC) to limit
distortion. I jacked the volume up
to maximum on some AC/DC and
there was no distortion noticeable to
me. The bass in that track pumped
through nicely, but I could still pick
up the higher pitched instruments
clearly. On a cheaper set of Bluetooth
speakers, there was plenty of
distortion.
I played the same range of music
on a high-end portable speaker,
priced slightly more than the R1700BT,
and Edier delivered far clearer sound.
Even spoken word podcasts and
audio books sounded great. Listening
to James Earl Jones deep timbre was
particularly satisfying.
The one thing I didnt like was
the remote control unit provided
with the R1700BT. The basic remote
has just ve buttons: mute, volume
up, volume down and two buttons
for toggling between Bluetooth and
Line In. Id have liked some basic
controls such as Play/Pause and
Forward/Back as well, as these are
functions most Bluetooth-capable
audio devices can handle.

65

66

REVIEWS

Bamboo Spark

aperless its a word that

conjures equal measures of
imagination and derision. For
as long as I can remember, individuals
and businesses have been striving
to cut their dependence on paper.
And when the iPad was released, it
heralded a new call for the world to go
paperless.
Well, that hasnt happened and it
seems unlikely to ever happen. So, a
new challenge has emerged how do
we bridge the digital and the analogue?
Wacoms answer is the Bamboo Spark.
Although it looks like a traditional
notepad folio, its embedded with some
smarts that make it trivially easy to
transfer handwritten notes to your iPad.
The Bamboo Spark looks like almost
any other folio youd pick up from your
local stationery store. Theres a notepad
on the right, a slot for holding a pen
in the middle and a packet for storing
assorted bits and pieces on the left.
When you look more closely,
however, youll notice two little things.
Theres a power switch on the bottom
edge of the device and a button
adjacent to the notepad. And the pen
that comes with the Bamboo Spark
isnt any ordinary biro its a pressure
sensitive implement that is both an
ink and a digital pen. The pen rells
have a special copper coating so you
cant just buy regular rells from the
newsagent when the ink runs out.

In order to use the Bamboo Spark,

youll need to connect it to your iPad.
Its important to note there are three
different Bamboo Spark models. Mine
came with the gadget pocket while
there are others for generic tablets and
one with snap-t for the iPad Air 2.
Connectivity is Bluetooth and the
entire process is easily handled from
within the free Bamboo Spark app
I needed to download from the App
Store. In order to sync notes between
devices I had to create a free Wacom
Cloud account that gave me 5GB
of storage.
Everything I wrote in the notebook
could be synchronised to my iPad
or any other iOS device I connected
to the Bamboo Spark. If I was taking
notes but didnt have my iPad close by,
I could still press the sync button and
my notes were stored in the bamboo
Sparks internal memory. Wacom says
the device can store up to 100 pages
of notes.
From the Bamboo Spark app,
notes can be exported to PDF, images
and WILL Wacoms language for
integrating digital pen devices. When
I chose the Export as Image option,
I was then able to direct the image to
email, Evernote, Notes, various social
media services and my AirPrint printer.
One of the interesting features was
the option to split a page of notes into
separate pieces. By using a slider,

I was able to replay how I created

the note. For example, if I had notes
from two meetings on one sheet of
paper and I synchronised that page
to my iPad, using the Bamboo Spark
app, I could replay the production of
the note, stop the playback and split
the note into two pieces the digital
equivalent of tearing a piece of paper
into pieces.
Notes from the Spark application
can also be exchanged with the
Bamboo paper application where you
can use more advanced editing tools.
This is useful when you draw a basic
diagram but then want to add to it
later. However, this kind of fracturing of
the functionality is annoying. Id much
prefer to have a single app that did
everything I wanted.
Wacom rates the Bamboo Sparks
battery life at around eight hours
enough for a days use. The folio
charges via Micro-USB. C

ANTHONY CARUANA

WACOM
www.wacom.com
PROS Bridges the gap between analogue and digital
CONS Pen refills may be tricky to get; connectivity to
other apps
$250

MAC IN BUSINESS ONLINE

AUSTRALIA

The home for business-minded Apple users

on ac orld.com.au
Whilile
e m ny ac, iPhone and iPad owners use their devices for purely
personal pur
th re are those who document, record and share as part of
the their day to day wor
h t are the most efficient and effective hardware
and software options for yourr needs? How can you start using it immediately
to drive sales, connect with col ag s, create powerful presentations,
reduce commu i
har es?
We examine the latest tech
make the best use of your t me a

e prise user
h p u
our es for your business.

Anthony Caruana - Editor of Macworld Australia

We started this section as we appreciate that technology
is a critical foundation for the success of your business.

macworld.com.au

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