Today I took delivery of a new MacBook Pro, with M1 Pro processor1. In order to move all of my data over to the new machine, I decided to give Apple’s Migration Assistant tool a try based on the recommendation of John Gruber. Migration Assistant does what it says on the tin; it migrates data from one machine to another. Similar to restoring an iPhone or iPad from an iCloud backup, but there are certain advantages which really blew me away!...
Posting a few days late, considering we were traveling in Asheville for the 4th of July. The month of June came in like a lion, and went out like a lamb. I think this should have been the wheel for March? Lots of big rides up front and then a bunch of smaller ones towards the end. I suppose getting sick in the last two weeks of June contributed to that poor performance, plus a wedding, plus a motorcycle trip, plus Hamilton passing away....
A short story told in four parts. Crypto Exchange Finds a New Source of Revenue: ‘Inactivity Fee’, says Bloomberg just yesterday. Crypto Exchange Bitstamp Cancels Plans for ‘Inactivity Fee’, Bloomberg corrects us today. Bank of America plans $5 debit card fee, CBS News reveals back in 2011. Bank of America axes $5 debit card fee, CNN Money trumpets only months later. Heck, even the reasoning for the reversal is similar!...
Adam Engst over at TidBITS has covered a topic I found myself struggling with earlier this year. Complaints about website loading have been trickling in of late, and while the details vary, the commonality has been that the problems started with macOS 12.4 Monterey. Sometimes the problem was just with Safari; other times, it affected Chrome and other browsers too. In some cases, the entire page would refuse to load; in others, only portions of the page would fail....
Lots of new features this year. iOS 16 iPadOS 16 watchOS 9 macOS 13 And also a new Macbook Air using an M2 chip, the next iteration on their M-series processors. A list of thoughts: Lock Screen widgets look awesome. The ability to have a time-bound, floating widget sitting on the bottom of the lock screen showing you sports scores or when your Uber/Lyft arrives could be a killer feature; but I hope it becomes more widespread and successful than App Clips....
A trip to Key West and riding on the Overseas Highway (US Rt. 1) always makes for a good month in biking! Despite the time off for that vacation, I managed to just barely eclipse my 2021 mileage at this same point last year - 1,005 miles for this year versus 994 for last. Certainly an improvement against where I was in February or March. No video yet from Key West; I am being exceptionally lazy editing that footage....
As reported by Bruce Schneier and The Verge: The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), a controversial anti-hacking law which bans “exceeding authorized access” on a computer system, was narrowed by the Supreme Court on Thursday in a 6-3 ruling. The court said the law shouldn’t cover people misusing systems they’re allowed to access — and that claiming otherwise would criminalize a “breathtaking amount” of everyday computer use. Great news here on a couple fronts:...
Spent a solid seven days in Key West, Florida the other week, a wonderful little island at the end of the Florida Keys. For the next time I visit, here’s a nice, quick summary of all the best places to visit for food, drink, or fun. Best Places for… Food Red Shoe Island Bistro. Probably the best meal we had all week. They don’t have a long menu, but each and every item they had was excellent....
This is a rather long (at 53 minutes) video, but it has some fascinating bits of information about the heat shield deployed by the James Webb Space Telescope. This video focuses on how to precisely measure the dimensions of the heat shield, so that other scientists could model the properties of the shield in diffusing heat away from the delicate instruments in and on the telescope. Really cool tech used to take these measurements, including a laser with a spinning mirror that could blind you fairly quick....
Reporting from The Verge: In a joint effort, tech giants Apple, Google, and Microsoft announced Thursday morning that they have committed to building support for passwordless sign-in across all of the mobile, desktop, and browser platforms that they control in the coming year. … A passwordless login process will let users choose their phones as the main authentication device for apps, websites, and other digital services… … “For example, users can sign-in on a Google Chrome browser that’s running on Microsoft Windows—using a passkey on an Apple device....
