iTools -> .Mac -> MobileMe -> iCloud

May 06, 2012  |  Post by: Chelanie  |  Hints & Tips, Important Tech Issues, New Technology No Comments

If you have been around Apple’s internet services for a while, you know that we’ve seen the services grow and change as the technology advances. Apple started with iTools which was a free service, email basically. The service morphed into .Mac, which was a payable service and added additional internet services, then we moved to MobileMe to include iDevice syncing and now we are moving into the cloud with iCloud. We are in the end game of MobileMe. There are a few things you need to think about before MobileMe services end on June 30th, 2012. If you haven’t moved your data, Apple has stated you will loose access to your data. This includes anything that was on MobileMe and/or your iDisk.

You will need to move all of your iDisk data to your iCloud data area, move your mail, calendars, bookmarks, and contacts to iCloud, and backup your photo galleries and website to your local hard drive or a hard drive connected to your machine.

The things that you have to take care of is moving your iDisk data, your photo galleries that reside on MobileMe and if you are hosting your website (whatever it is) at MobileMe. If you used iWeb to create your site and you use the auto publish feature, your host is MobileMe. These things have to be moved by June 30, 2012.

The iDisk is easy, move the data you have to your local machine and then if you want access to the data in the cloud, upload it to your iCloud space.

You can log on to http://www.MobileMe.com and download your photo galleries if they aren’t still in iPhoto. If you have been using iWeb, you have a couple of options:

1. Just make the jump to another web editor: i.e. Dreamweaver, BBEdit, and RapidWeaver are just a few that are out there.

2. Publish your website to your desktop and test it to see if it works. If you’ve used any of the advanced features like slideshows, blog, etc – you will either need to clean up the code to work with your new host or just start over.

I’ve gotten a lot of questions from people that say, but my domain is at … why do I have to move it. So to understand what’s happening let me give you some background. Everyone who registers a domain, has multiple layers of data that they need to think about. First you have a registrar. The registrar is the place that you initially registered your domain. Some of the most popular registrars are Network Solutions, GoDaddy, and Yahoo. There are hundreds of them out there. Second you have a host. This is where your website files reside. This may or may not be the same place that your domain is registered. Third you have two ways to send your domain to your hosting space. One is by changing the DNS (Domain Name Servers, like the post office routing your mail to you) or to Forward your domain to a specific spot. That’s where you type your address and it sends you to another place where your files are stored.

Once you’ve gotten all of that done, if you are ready you can move to Lion and iCloud. If you aren’t ready to move to Lion, then you can either move only your email to iCloud and use it or move to another service. iCloud services are free if you have Lion, or an iOS Device that came with iOS 5. I haven’t seen Apple charge anyone for services yet, but until late Friday, Apple hadn’t even let anyone know that they could migrate their email and still have access to their .Mac or MobileMe email addresses.

If you have questions, we’d be happy to help you migrate.

Censored

January 18, 2012  |  Post by: Chelanie  |  Important Tech Issues No Comments

Today is the protest (blackout) of websites that protesting the SOPA and PIPA legislation in the US House and Senate respectively. We support the protest on this legislation.

Please take the time to look at the bills and let your representatives both in the house and the senate know that this is not what we want. The largest share of people, if they do infringe on a copyright are happy to fix the problem if it’s brought to their attention. We already have laws that go through the court system that allow for those who continue to infringe on these rights. I believe anyone who has intellectual property should have a right to it and in turn be paid for their creativity, brilliance or just plain talent.

Places to get information on this subject:

• The Bill
• Oversight & Government
• Washington Monthly
• The Hill
• C|Net

Of course there is much more on the subject out there. You can always search for additional information, but please take the time to learn about this very important topic. It can change the way everything on the internet works. Do you realize how much you rely on the information out there?

Happy Thanksgiving

November 24, 2011  |  Post by: Chelanie  |  Uncategorized No Comments

May everyone enjoy the holiday and I hope you have many things to be thankful for.

May Steve Jobs Rest In Peace

October 05, 2011  |  Post by: Chelanie  |  New Technology, Old Technology, Uncategorized No Comments

First let me say my heart goes out to Mr. Jobs family. Know there are many people who hold you in their prayers tonight and also morn with you.

I personally only met Mr. Jobs once, but like many others, he has shaped much of what I do. You could call me one of the Apple devotees, since my first Mac. I spent a lot of time doing a lot of things, but it seemed, when I was able to get my first Macintosh, I found what I wanted to spend my life doing.

I started with graphics and PageMaker. Then about had an opportunity to learn the technical side of the machine. I found out that I enjoyed both the tech and the graphics and decided at that point, I wouldn’t ever use another machine if I had my choice.

Then I was given the opportunity to work with Claris Software. For those who don’t know or don’t remember what Claris Software was, it was the wholly owned subsidiary of Apple Computer that sold the Operating System, FileMaker Pro and AppleWorks. Although, it wasn’t Apple Proper, it was very much Apple. Claris became FileMaker Inc, when Mr. Jobs came back to Apple. The Operating System and AppleWorks moved back into Apple and I was able to make that transition.

Because of the Transition, I was in the Retail stores when the iMac and iPod hit the market. When the Apple Stores opened, many of the job duties that I was performing moved inside the Apple Store, leaving me without a job at Apple.

However, it opened a whole new opportunity. I still use all the Apple Products and I still get to help the end users that I did when I worked with Apple, now I just do it as my own boss. I know there are many of us who have taken what Mr. Jobs loved and created, I can say, I love what I do as well.

I get to help people take a machine and integrate it into their lives, businesses and there isn’t anything better than seeing the lightbulb when someone sees what these amazing devices can do. My most memorable Apple moment was when my Grandson was waiting for the Dr. who would evaluate his cognitive processes. He was playing a game on his iPad that did numbers, addition, subtraction, multiplication and subtraction. It took the Dr. less than 15 minutes to determine, we had no worries. It changed the way she did her job.

There are thousands of people out there that have stories like this. May Mr. Jobs rest and know that this world is better place because he was here.

Van For US Senate is launched

October 02, 2011  |  Post by: Chelanie  |  Web Projects No Comments

We have just finished the website for Van for US Senate. If you are in Arizona, you might check it out. This site includes and integrated blog/forum area so that he can get feed back from the voters he would be representing.

Announcing the Eagle Store

October 02, 2011  |  Post by: Chelanie  |  Web Projects No Comments

We would like to announce the opening of the Eagle Store. Armstrong Elementary in Highland Park has gone online. Check out the site.

MobileMe users are a target for phishers

September 01, 2011  |  Post by: Chelanie  |  Hints & Tips No Comments

For any of you who have MobileMe, please watch your emails. Remember that Apple will never have you fill out a form and return it via email. They will always ask you to log into your account and make changes.

The email asks you to upgrade your account to iCloud, remember iCloud hasn’t been released yet. Although you will soon get an email from Apple asking you to do this, they will ask you to log in not ask you to return and email with all of your specific data including credit card information, user name and password. Never send your credit card information over email. This is a security risk.

How do you know any email isn’t legit:

1. It only has a link with no text (even if it’s from someone you know). Unless you’ve just talked to the person and know they are sending a link, most of these are fake. (I have to admit, if I’m in a hurry I don’t add text to links sometimes – but I’m either on the phone or just got off with the person that I’m sending the link to.)

2. Check for a signature. Most of us have some type of signature on our emails. If the email doesn’t have a signature, there is a good chance that the email isn’t from that person.

3. If you have a question about the authenticity of an email, especially if it has to do with money, call the person that has emailed you. If you are uncomfortable calling them – either log into your account at that vendor, or if it’s not from a business and from a person, leave it. If some one is asking you for money and they don’t hear from you and it’s legitimate you will probably get a telephone call.

4. Always check the return email address. Many times it’s not the same address that it’s says it’s being sent from. In my case the email from MobileMe said it came from MobileMe@apple.com, but the return was going to sarah1986657@ a completely different domain. Apple’s domains include apple, mac and me – none of which this email was going back to.

When you have a question always ask.

Uncaged my first Lion

August 09, 2011  |  Post by: Chelanie  |  Hints & Tips, New Technology 1 Comments

This weekend, we purchased a 13 inch machine for a client. It’s the first out of the box machine with Lion that I’ve opened. Some of the first things I noticed (not unexpectedly) was there are no CDs in the package. There is a small restore partition on the drive.

I did however notice that iDvd and iWeb were not on the machine. Although there are probably a percentage of Apple users that don’t use them, I know quite a few that do.

iDVD allows you to save your slideshows, iMovies, or a combination of both projects on a DVD that someone that doesn’t have a computer could watch on a DVD player. It looks like, I’ve have another item to test in Lion. I will be one of those impacted by this decision. We use it to do yearly DVDs for the great grandparents (who don’t do computers), for promotional items, and for some of training sessions we design. So the question here is – are they adding these features to the new core pieces of iLife when the new version is available? I hope so.

iWeb doesn’t impact me at all, but I know quite a few clients that it will impact. The nice thing about iWeb is it allowed someone with little or no experience with web to create a site that was much cleaner on the front side than many of the Template base sites that you could purchase from the major hosting providers. Does this mean they are dropping everything except photo streaming, which we know is a part of iCloud. Does this add another piece to the puzzle that tells us where Apple is going in the conversion from MobileMe to iCloud?

Helpful Hints for Lion: Resume

July 28, 2011  |  Post by: Chelanie  |  Hints & Tips, New Technology No Comments

One of my favorite new features for Lion is also one of my nagging features. Resume. It’s great if an application crashes or you have to restart for a update. It’s not so fun when you’ve closed something that you need to reset (like Photoshop of Dreamweaver) and want to be able to start over with a fresh application when you open it again. There is a key command for that.

⌥ + ⌘ + Q 
(thats Option + Command + Q)

This will clear the resume feature and allow you to start with a fresh application. This is great especially if you keep multiple copies of the same document and need to clear the cache of older documents, or you’ve changed the name on a document. I have a tendency to do that all the time when designing a website. Now I can get back into my workflow.

Update 7/30/2011- I’ve found a great article from MacFixIt that will help with managing your resume feature read article

The debut of Lion

July 22, 2011  |  Post by: Chelanie  |  New Technology 1 Comments

Apple released Mac OS X.7 (Lion) on Wednesday, July 20th. The change in this release is it’s all online. By logging into the Mac App Store, you can purchase Lion for $29.99 and it will download and install on to your machine. Those who are purchasing new machines with Lion, you will no longer receive a set of disks. Part of your hard drive will be partitioned as a restore drive. You can also recover by using Command R as you start up.

The great thing about getting your software this way is there is nothing to loose. On the flip side, if your drive completely craters – then you have to find a professional that has access to the Lion installer. Most of them will be at the Apple Store or your favorite Apple Tech. You can however create your own. If you haven’t upgraded yet, after the download and before the install, you’ll want to pull the file from your Applications folder that says Lion Install. The file is about 4 GB. It will fit on a 4 GB flash drive, but barely. Then complete the install. When it’s finished installing, it will delete the files. This ushers a whole new era of how those of us that do tech work, work.

For those of us, who did upgrade yesterday, I’ve heard the download times started at about 45 minutes and extended to 15 hours. My first machine, took 45 minutes to download, and hour to install and about an hour and a half to download all the updates from all my application vendors. Don’t forget to run software up date, all of your iWork and iLife apps will need to be updated before you open them. The second machine I installed Lion on took 6 hours to download, 45 minutes to install and about 30 minutes to do all of the updates. Of course it was later in the day when everybody else seemed to be on Apple’s servers as well. The one thing I noticed on both installs was that it killed all of my bandwidth. Not just for the internet, but for my network as well. If you can, be sure to plug your machine into a wired connection to download Lion.

The first thing you want to do is backup your machine. Then make sure that you have the latest version of Mac OS X.6.6 or later. Check that your machine is at least a Core 2 Duo chip or better and that you have a minimum of 4 GB of memory. If all of these things are true, you are ready to install. I can’t stress because this is a download – be sure you have backed up your machine.

Some of the things that I’ve noticed in Lion:
1. The interface is much cleaner. Remember those arrows that allow you to scroll up and down? They are gone. The scroll bar only shows up when you need it and you have to look for it, because it’s just a little darker than the window. You can also use any of the sides of the windows to make the windows larger or smaller. Of course the reason you don’t need those scroll arrows is with a track pad, you now use two fingers to scroll in any window. This also gives you more real estate in the same space.

2. Many of the extra windows when setting up printers or other devices are all gone. It not hard to find the things you are looking for, but it will take a few times through the new windows to get use to them. I did have to delete all of my printers and re-add them, now they are all working better than they did in Snow Leopard. However, there are some color issues. If you are in the middle of a project that is color based, don’t upgrade until you can spend a little time working with your settings. My printers were working perfectly before the upgrade, so I have to spend sometime resetting my ColorSync Profiles. Need all your settings for your printer? Click the Show Details buttons.

3. On Safari, like everything else in Lion – the window has been cleaned up and you can see when it’s downloading without a window to tell you that. It has an arrow on the right hand side of the screen that turns blue as it downloads and fills the circle around it showing the percentage that has downloaded. It’s very clean and great.

4. Remember that any of your programs that still have Power PC Code in them, won’t work in Lion. There is not support for those applications. Office 2011 is the only version of Microsoft Office that will work in Lion. Quicken 2007 and QuickBooks 2010 will both need to be upgraded to the latest versions in order to run in Lion. For those that use Adobe products, both 5 and 5.5 run fine. I have a project with 4 this weekend, so will know if it runs. I know Dreamweaver CS 4 runs fine. I did have to update my java in order to get it to open. It’s a quick update. FileMaker 10 and 11 work fine, but FileMaker 6 will not work. Another project that I need to finish. Then I can get rid of 6. One of the big issues everyone is talking about is screen sharing, logmein, and remote desktop from Apple and Microsoft – I can say with certain that all except Microsoft’s Remote Desktop work with just updates for your system. Download all the latest updates after installing Lion and they all work like a champ.

5. In Mail, it looks very much like Mail on your pad. I have thousands of email that I need access to regularly, so I’ve chosen to show my list of folders, so instead of two columns I have three. Now in the second column you can see your mail sorted by date, but in the email window you can see the whole thread of the conversation. A great marriage between traditional and new work flow without taking those of us who are set in our ways into the next level of computing. Again, here the windows are very clean, giving you more real estate to view things in your windows. Although I now have three columns of stuff I look at, my message list and message area are both larger than they were before.

I know there are lots of really cool features and many people have written about them. These are the things that I’ve already gotten quite a few calls about, so thought it would help if everyone could see the little things too.

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