Getting to know John Gruber the writer

John Gruber is one of the leading experts blogging and podcasting about Apple. Recode referred to him this way “Apple obsessive John Gruber built Daring Fireball, the world’s most powerful one-man media company” If you’re into Apple you know who he is. John blogs at Daring Fireball and has a podcast The Talk Show. He’s also the creator of Markdown the popular plain text writing markup language that many of us use today.

I’m an enthusiastic follower of John’s blog and listener of his podcast. I find him to be knowledgeable about all things Apple thanks to his contacts at the highest levels of the company. What he writes is well written, always informative, and accurate.

I find it interesting to know what makes people like John tick and how they got to where they are. I’ve heard John talk about himself on his podcast but only bits and pieces never the full story from beginning to where he is now.

The other day John posted about being on Antony Johnston’s Writing and Breathing Podcast. If you would like to hear John’s full store in his words listen to this podcast. It’s excellent!

MONDAY, 10 AUGUST 2020

YOURS TRULY ON ANTONY JOHNSTON’S ‘WRITING AND BREATHING’ PODCAST

Antony Johnston — best known as the creator of the excellent and right-up-my-alley Atomic Blonde  — hosts a podcast devoted to writing, and he was kind enough to invite me on. I could talk about writing — what I do, how I do it — forever, even though, as I hope I made clear to Johnston, I don’t really fully understand how exactly I do what I do. The only thing I really understand about writing is that I need to do it.

I really enjoyed having the opportunity to talk about this. If that sounds interesting to you, I bet you’ll dig listening.

Copied clipboard manager app is back

After more than 2 years without updates, what was my favorite clipboard manager app Copied is back. I used it on my Mac, iPhone, and iPad. The great thing about it was that it synced across all my devices using iCloud. Not many clipboard managers do that.

With this update, it will become my main clipboard manager again. The new version 4.0 now has link previews, dark mode, Siri shortcuts, and improved compatibility across devices.

As a side note:

After I updated the app on my iPad and iPhone the Mac app version 2.0.7 stopped syncing. Frustrated, I uninstalled the Mac app and reinstalled it. To my surprise, the reinstalled app is version 4.0.0 which is compatible with the iOS and iPadOS apps. Remember to enable iCloud sync.

Isaias aftermath

Isaias blew through our area mid-afternoon on Tuesday and took down trees, branches, and power lines on its way. It’s pretty f**king scary watching the powerful wind and rain then hearing trees cracking. As you might guess we lost power and internet Tuesday afternoon and didn’t get it back until Friday evening.

If you’re not familiar with central New Jersey we have a lot of trees. I mean a lot of trees! We also have above-ground utilities. We get thunderstorms with strong winds fairly regularly and the occasional hurricane/tropical storm. Of course, this is a perfect formula for power outages.

When we moved here 3 years ago we had the house wired for whole house generator manual switch over. That has proved to be a wise investment. We’ve needed it several times including 4 days last week. If you live in an area with lots of trees and above ground utilities I highly recommend doing this.

Thank goodness we had no damage to our house. The other 20 acres is a different story. There are several fallen trees and branches around the property. So as you might guess I’ve been busy with the cleanup.

I have a few things I want to write about but that’s going to have to wait for a few more days.

I’ve started an email newsletter

Hello to all my followers. I want to take a minute this morning to let you know that I have started an email newsletter.

Why have I started a Newsletter?

I want to keep this blog about Apple and my experiences with Apple products and apps. That said, I have other things that I want to write about. In the past, I’ve done a bit of that on Medium. But, Medium has changed and in my opinion not for the better. That said, I will no longer be writing on Medium.

So, where am I going to write? Substack. Substack is a platform that makes it simple for independent writers like me to have an email newsletter.

What will my Newsletter be about?

It will be about things that I find on the web and feel compelled to comment on. While this may tend to be tech-heavy (not about Apple), it certainly won’t all be about tech.

Please give my Newsletter a try. If you don’t find what I’m writing about to your liking, you can unsubscribe at any time. By the way, my Newsletter is FREE.

How do I subscribe?

Click here to SUBSCRIBE

How to get the trackpad to ignore touches while typing

Do you get frustrated with how the slightest touch of the palm of your hand or thumb on the trackpad causes the text cursor to jump to a different position when you’re typing? I have and it’s been bothering me for some time.

Here’s how I solved this problem. I turned off “Tap to click” in the Trackpad Settings. Now when I’m typing and my palm or thumb accidentally touches the trackpad the text cursor doesn’t jump to a different position. I’m guessing this setting is on by default because I don’t recall having ever turned it on.

When I’m not typing, I like having “Tap to click” turned on. Since it’s not convenient to go into Trackpad Setting to turn it on and off all the time I looked for an AppleScript that I could use to toggle it on and off.

I found this one and it works fine.

Credit: Wojtek Witkowski on Github

tell application "System Preferences"
	activate
end tell
tell application "System Events"
	tell process "System Preferences"
		delay 1
		click the menu item "Trackpad" of the menu "View" of menu bar 1
		delay 1
		click the radio button "Point & Click" of the first tab group of window "Trackpad"
		click checkbox 3 of tab group 1 of window "Trackpad"
	end tell
end tell
tell application "System Preferences"
	quit
end tell

I’m using this script in Keyboard Maestro with the hotkey ⌘+⌥+9 to toggle the setting on and off. This will also work with an Alfred Workflow.

iOS and iPadOS 13.6 silently opted me into Automatic OS Updates

Michael Tasi in a blog post today pointed out a change in the toggle for iOS and iPadOS Automatic Updates that I was unaware of. Before 13.6, there was a single toggle to turn Automatic Updates on or off. I always have it turned off.

In 13.6 there are new toggles for Customizing Automatic Updates

Julie Clover

You can now decide whether or not your iPhone or iPad can automatically download iOS updates when connected to WiFi, and when those updates are installed. There’s a Download iOS Updates toggle for turning on automatic downloads over WiFi and an Install iOS Updates toggle for installing software updates overnight as an ‌iPhone‌ charges.

As I mentioned, above I always have automatic OS updates off on all my devices. I like to wait for a few days to make sure there are no issues with the update before I install it. And yes, we all know issues do happen.

Unfortunately for me, I ran into the same problem as Jeff Johnson:

PSA: If you previously had iOS and iPadOS Automatic Updates turned off you’ll want to take a minute and review your Automatic Update setting and adjust it accordingly.

I shattered my iPhone screen

I go for a 2-mile walk with my dog Charlotte every morning. I always record my walks with my Apple Watch and listen to a podcast in Overcast. A few days ago I was walking up the driveway with my phone in my hand queueing up a podcast to listen to and while doing that Charlotte decided to lunge after a rabbit and knocked my phone out of my hand. Our driveway is gravel and the phone landed screen down. Shattered!

I love my iPhone 7 Plus but it’s getting old and I was looking forward to getting a new iPhone 12 when they’re out this fall. I initially thought about a screen repair but decided against it. Instead, I purchased and new Product Red iPhone 11 with 64gb memory. I also got the Apple 11 Clear Case and Belkin InvisiGlass Ultra Screen Protector. I’m happy with my purchase but was really hoping to hold out for the iPhone 12. I’ll get over it.

I like most everything about the iPhone 11. Face ID is wonderful and swipe in place of a Home button is the coolest. The keyboard on the 11 is a bit smaller than I’m used to on the 7 Plus but I wasn’t going to spend another $300 to get the iPhone 11 Pro ($699 vs $999) to have a minimally bigger keyboard.