Category Archives: Free Advice

For what it’s worth …

Beginning of the end for Adobe Flash?

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This week Adobe announced that it was ending Flash development for mobile devices.

Although Adobe maintains it will still be developing Flash for traditional computers to provide enhancements “including advanced gaming and premium video”, this pretty much marks the beginning of the end.

Of course, unless you are a web or mobile developer, this means absolutely nothing to you – aside from the fact that eventually you will no longer need to download another plug-in. What you experience on the web (computer or mobile device) will just be delivered in a different format (a combination of HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript) .. all of which will be handled by your internet browser.

If you are a web or mobile developer .. and you currently use Flash on your projects .. well .. you have some work to do. You’ll need to begin the conversion to HTML5 to handle what Flash did (videos, animations, forms, etc.)

Some resources that may help …

Lynda.com – (training for HTML5, and just about anything else)

Code Canyon – (great resource for code, scripts, and more)

Mac OS X 10.6.8 Released

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Apple has released the Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update. The 1.09 Gb Snow Leopard combo patch is expected to be the final Mac OS X Snow Leopard update. Mac OS X 10.7 Lion is slated to ship some time in July.

10.6.8 addresses a number of issues, including:

  • Enhancements to the Mac App Store for a smoother transition OS X Lion.
  • Improved support for IPv6 protocols.
  • Identifies and remove known variants of the Mac Defender malware.
  • Resolves an issue that may cause Preview to unexpectedly quit.
  • Improves VPN reliability.

A corresponding update was also issued for Mac OS X 10.6.8 Snow Leopard Server which includes many server-specific improvements.

Free Advice: For Mac OS updates this large, you encounter a lot less problems if you DO NOT use Apple’s Software Update feature and instead manually download and install the stand-alone combo updater.

Getting Ready for Lion – Checklist

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Apple Mac OS X 10.7 LionWe’re about a month (or less) away from the release of Apple’s newest operating system: Mac OS X 10.7 Lion – the most significant change in the way you work with your Mac in years.

Lion is the result of lessons Apple learned in developing its iOS for the iPhone and iPad as well as built on the strength of prior Mac OSes. But before you rush to download, make absolutely sure you are ready:

System RequirementsCan your computer handle it?

Mac OS X 10.7 Lion will require a Mac with at least an Intel Core 2 Duo processor and 2Gb of RAM (memory – and please don’t confuse memory with hard disk space – and frankly, 4Gb+ of RAM would be better). Pretty much any new Mac computer purchased after 2007 will do it. Speaking of hard disk space you’ll need about 4Gb free on your hard drive as well.

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What you need to know about Mac malware

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It seems the honeymoon is over for Mac users on the malware front. While it has always been possible to do nasty things to Macs via malicious software, up until the past few days, it’s been pretty much a “proof of concept” thing.

Now we have the MacDefender (aka MacSecurity, MacProtector) scam. While not maybe a widespread issue to date, it does signal that Mac malware has left the lab and is now in the wild. There is no need to panic. We’re still far better off than our Windows cousins. According to computer security expert Charlie Miller in a recent cnet report:

There are about 10 pieces of malware that have been written for the Mac, while Microsoft says that one in 14 downloads (on PCs) is malicious.

Still, we should be aware that our days of innocence are over, and we need to begin thinking more seriously about keeping our Macs secure.

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Getting Ready for Lion – go on a Rosetta hunt

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AppleInsider has published several outstanding pieces over the last few days reporting on the first developer preview on the upcoming Mac OS X 10.7 – Lion. Anticipated to be released later this summer, in many ways it will be a radical shift in terms of user interface and functionality. (Think a merge of your iPhone and your Mac.)

In addition to new Finder, Desktop, and Dashboard metaphors, the upcoming OS says goodbye to some previous features, such as Front Row, built-in Java Runtime (not as big a deal as it sounds), and Rosetta. It’s this last one that may affect the most users. Rosetta allows you to run older software, written for the PowerPC generation Macs, on your Intel machine. So if you’ve been running, say Microsoft Office 2004 or Quark XPress 6 – which have been running just dandy on 10.6, you’re going to need to replace them before upgrading to 10.7.

Activity Monitor - Looking for PowerPC Apps

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An easy way to discover which programs you’ll need to upgrade, is to use the the Activity Monitor utility (you’ll find it, naturally, in Applications -> Utilities). This application provides a wealth of information about what’s going on inside your computer, if you truly want to get your geek on. But in this case, all you need to do is to make sure the “CPU” tab is highlighted and sort by “Kind”. All applications listed as PowerPC will have to go before you can upgrade. The applications you are checking on need to be open (launched) to show up in the list.

Don’t say you didn’t get enough warning.

Note: Since Lion is still in development, no feature set (or lack there of) is written in stone. It is possible removed features will be written back in – or more will be written out. Still it’s always good to keeps tabs on what you are running.