March 2014

March 2014
MaUsE DoubleClick
Cosmo Edition
2014 MaUsE Executive
• President : Michael Shaw
[email protected]
•Vice President: Ian Winton
Secretary & Apple Liaison:
Marcel Dufresne
[email protected]
• Treasurer: Ken Jansen
• Director: Stan Wild
• Director Jim Danaby
• Director: Brian Elston
MaUsE Contact Information:
The MaUsE
c/o Michael Shaw
237 Huntingwood Drive
Oshawa, Ontario, Canada
L1J 7C6
w w w. m a u s e . c a
DoubleClick
Produced and Edited by
Michael Shaw
Photographs by
Irma Shaw
Don’t forget to
pay your MaUsE
Membership fee.
Still only
$45 per year.
From The Editor
What you are looking at is the March 2014
edition of the MaUsE DoubleClick, the online
publication of the Macintosh Users East,
(MaUsE), a motley collection of mostly harmless
cranks who reside in Southern Ontario with their
motley collection of old and new Macintosh,Hackentosh & MacClone computers.
The DoubleClick is published using a 2.8 GHz
iMac Extreme and QuarkXPress 10. An antique
Kodak DX7590 is STILL being used for all pictures. Everything not specifically attributed to
someone else can probably be blamed on the
Editor. Back issues can be downloaded from the
MaUsE website: < www.mause.ca >. Submissions from MaUsE Club members are almost always welcome. Maybe that last bit is an
exaggeration.
Send your submissions and articles to me at:
< [email protected] >, especially if there are
files or pictures attached. I have never refused a
submission yet. Because we care about the environment, the MaUsE DoubleClick is created
using only recycled electrons: matter was neither
created nor destroyed in the process of creating
this issue. There is always room for another piece
on any Mac-related topic and Iʼll make room if
there isnʼt. I would like your submissions. But I
won't beg.
About MaUsE
Macintosh Users East.
also known as MaUsE,
is the most active
Apple-authorised MUG
(Mac User Group)
in Southern Ontario.
MaUsE is here for users of
all Apple products,
including Apple computers,
iPods, iPhones,
and iPads.
Apple, Macintosh, and the Apple logo are trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc., registered in the
U.S. and other countries.
The MaUsE (Macintosh Users East) is an Appleauthorised Macintosh user group
Michael Shaw, Editor
MaUsE Meetings are held in Room 1 at the new Whitby Public Library on
the south-east corner of Henry and Dundas West in Whitby, Ontario on the
fourth Wednesday of each month except December, July and August. Meetings start at 7:00 PM but there is an early session from 6:30 for people who
wish to discuss hardware or software issues or problems. Macintosh virus
problem are discussion from 6:58 to 7:00 PM
March MaUsE Meeting
Reminder
Many of our members have their MaUsE
Membership running from March to March
or April to April.
If your MaUsE Membership fee is due,
please try to bring $ 45.00 in cash
or a cheque for $45 payable to MaUsE
to the March 26th MaUsE Meeting.
Armor A80 : USB 3.0 Rugged Portable
External Hard Drive from Silicon Power
Ever since home computers made their appearance, there was a
need to transfer data from one to another. The Internet is one solution to this need. Security with this method is a major concern.
Another solution is to transfer the data directly to a storage media
or device. The first of these that I can remember was the 5.25"
floppy disk which held an amazing 360 KB of information. Next
came the 2.5" floppy and we were able to save 1.44 MB. 700 MB
CDs and 4.7 GB DVDs next hit the market, and are still around,
but they were for the most part not reusable once the data was
burned in. The thumb drive (flash drive) was the next evolution
and these come in a multitude of sizes. As you can see, the metric prefixes are getting well used. Starting with kilo and mega, we
have progressed into giga and tera. I am sure we will soon see peta
and exa drives as our need for speed and computing power increases. The best hardware device for transferring and saving very
large amounts of data is the external hard drive. If you were tasked
with designing the perfect external hard drive, what would you build
into it? Storage size, durability, the power source, the physical size,
and the speed of data transfer would certainly be at the top of the list.
How about a long term warranty that the drive won't fail? That should
be included. Throw in the power source and the ease of access and
connection and you would be getting pretty close to an ideal drive.
I would like mine to look good sitting next to my computer. And finally, I would want it to be resistant to accidental liquid spills and
drops. And all of this at an affordable price. Well, I don't have to
look far to find this ideal drive. It exists in the form of the Armor
A80, a 1 TB USB 3.0 Rugged Portable External Hard Drive from
Silicon Power.
Silicon Power Computer & Communications Inc. has been around
since 2003 producing flash memory cards, USB flash drives, card
readers, DRAM modules, solid state disks, and portable hard
drives. Headquartered in Taipei, their products can be found worldwide. They are in the business of making durable hard drives and
they have a good one in the A80. You can read up on the A80 stats
by visiting their web site at www.silicon-power.com. As for my review, let me take each of my previously listed characteristics and
explain how the A80 measures up.
The hard drives on today's modern computers are in the Terabyte
range. My iMac is 3 TB and it is nowhere near full. The 1 TB size of
the A80 provides me with more than enough backup space. If an
external drive is to be truly portable, it is going to have to stand up to
a few bumps and bruises. The A80 has been drop tested directly onto
a concrete floor. It has withstood falls from over a metre. This includes
tests on each of 26 contact points (8 corners, 12 cut surfaces, and 6
major surfaces). That is my definition of durable. It certainly lives up to
its "Rugged" moniker. It comes with a three year warranty to back up
its rugged claim.
The Armor A80 has a great read/write
speed since it uses the latest USB 3.0 interface. It is backwards compatible with USB
2.0. I tested an older USB 2.0 drive and
found the A80 to be about five times faster.
It thus saves you the user precious time
backing up to and from the hard drive when
transferring mass data files. If you use it as
your Time Machine drive, you will notice a
great speed improvement. There will be
fewer lags in computer use while it is waiting for Time Machine to finish its hourly
backup. It has a hot plug and play functionality. This means that it connects to just
about any USB slot on your computer. I
tried it through the keyboard port, which often does not provide
enough power to a drive, and it worked fine. The only source that
proved difficult was my old USB 2.0 hub. The drive was unreadable
through it. I tried it out on my newer USB hub which has both a 3.0
and 2.0 slot and it worked fine from both. There was quite the variety
of speeds from each of these ports. The slowest was connecting the
drive through a USB 2.0 cable to the back of my computer. Next came
the keyboard. The best speeds were through the USB 3.0 cable that
comes with the drive to the USB port on the back of my computer as
well as using the USB 3.0 port of my
hub. In case you are wondering if your
port is USB 2.0 or USB 3.0, the USB
3.0, which was released in 2008, is usually coloured blue.
The drive is compact and light weight. It
measures 13.9 cm x 9.4 cm x 1.8 cm
(5.5 inches by 3.7 inches by .7 inches)
and weighs in at around 200 g (0.55
pounds). It comes with two USB 3.0
connection cables. On one side, the
drive has a deep groove that holds its
short 10 cm USB 3.0 cable. This cablecarry design makes the drive very convenient to use on the go. You are never
without a connecting cable. The drive
also comes with a second one metre
USB 3.0 cable in case you need to connect it to the back of a desktop. This
makes it a perfect travel companion,
easily fitting in a bag or purse or even your pocket. As for appearances, the Armor A80 has a rich looking royal blue metallic colour
painted onto a high quality aluminum casing.
I saved the most unique quality for last. It is
water pressure, vibration, and dust proof in
compliance with the waterproof test. It can be
submerged to a depth of one metre under
water for 30 minutes and is still fully operational. It is up to the task of surviving unexpected situations such as rain drops or
liquid-spillage. One ambitious reviewer wrote
that he actually tried submerging the drive in
the kitchen sink overnight, leaving it under a
running shower head for about half an hour,
and dropping it from the level of his belt a few
times while walking, and the drive indeed survived it all. The cover of the drive was susceptible to dents and scratches, however, which is
why I will not go to the same extremes for my
review.
Silicon Power's Armor A80 USB 3.0 is a military grade portable hard drive
which is waterproof, dust-proof, and can withstand serious drops. It will keep
your data safe and provide fast access with its USB 3.0 connection. And the
price for this useful device? As I mentioned, Silicon Power drives can be found
world wide. In Canada, this drive sells at Canada Computers for about $99.00.
If you do some Internet searching, I am sure you can find it available from
other sources. The Silicon Power Armor A80 portable hard drive offers very
fast performance, and it’s waterproof and rugged. Despite all that, it still manages to be as compact as other portable drives that are based on a 2.5-inch
standard internal hard drive. The drive is compact and nice-looking. It makes
an excellent portable drive for travellers and home offices alike.
Submitted by Marcel Dufresne
Wanted
Video camera as monitor.
Video out and audio out via
RCA connectors.
To borrow, buy cheap or free by March 26th
meeting.
Will be used for event on March 28th
as a monitor only.
OK if tape recorder not working or battery dead.
Just need NTSC signal out for eight hours.
I dropped my Sony Handycam
which worked just fine until it hit the floor.
Chris a.k.a.
[email protected]
QXP Update News:
QuarkXPress 10.1
QuarkXPress has just released QuarkXPress 10.1, a free update for
all users of QuarkXPress 10. This version fixes all severe performance issues that were reported with QXP10.
QuarkXPress 10.1
Feature Enhancements
Besides performance fixes from all reported issues, there are also some significant feature enhancements in
QuarkXPress 10.1.
 Dynamic guides automatically appear when items that are created,
moved or resized align with other items on the page. Dynamic guides
also show when items have the same width and height as other elements on the page or when several items have the same distance to
other items to help evenly distribute elements.
 8000% Zoom, so that you can position images as precisely as possible and apply micro typography much better.
 HTML5 Animations allow you to use QuarkXPress to easily create
HTML5 animations such as slide-in from the side, fade or grow elements. Use these animations in AppStudio.
QuarkXPress 10.1 updater is available via Auto Updater and also in
the download section:
http://www.quark.com/Support/Downloads/Default.aspx
As written before, the major improvements in this version are that all
critical issues reported are addressed, most notable performance
boosts and better stability. Quark also resolved the reported quality
problems with EPS that they sometimes didn't show in the layout.
In order to enable all of you to test QuarkXPress 10 again, version
10.1 resets the 30 day Test Drive period, giving you again 30-days to
try it out (regardless whether you tested 10 before or not).
Test Drive of 10.1 is available in download section.
http://www.quark.com/Support/Downloads/
 Books are back and improved. Now you can use one or more layouts of a single project in a book. As before books can sync indexes,
table of contents and other design elements such as colors and
stylesheets. Also new is that you can export the book to one single
PDF.
 Export single boxes, partial pages or whole pages as static pixel
based images (PNG, JPG).
 Adjust QuarkXPress' UI colors to the ones you prefer using custom
Color Schemes (this one is a Mac only feature)
 And some QR Code enhancements that show you the information
is behind the code plus you can create pixel or vector-based codes.
Letters from Nowhere
from Awem Games
This is one of the many hidden object casual games. These
come in many styles, depending on what they spotlight. The
traditional hidden object game is one in which locating a
number of items, such as a bat or a candle, is emphasized.
Unfortunately for you, the picture is a hodgepodge of various items carefully blended together to make it difficult to
locate anything in particular. The item you are trying to detect is kind of camouflaged until it pops out at you and you
wonder how you could have had so much trouble finding it.
Once the items for that location are found, you then proceed to a map and work on the next location. The second
type is more of an adventure game where you roam around
locating tools and such that may help you along the way.
The third type emphasizes the mini game and the puzzles
more than the hidden objects. The main differences between the various games are the story line, the amount and
type of mini games that often have to be solved to enter the
next location, and the type of hint that is provided. Letters
from Nowhere fits into the first type as the emphasis is
mainly on the hidden objects.
It’s dark and raining outside as Audrey is making her way home. Running along in this terrible weather, she gets the feeling that someone
is following her. Arriving home, she looks for Patrick, her husband,
who hasn’t shown up yet. She waits up all night for him to return, but
he never appears. Fearing the worst, Audrey goes to the police and
files a report. They aren’t too helpful though. She continues on, believing that he will return. One day she finds a hidden letter supposedly written by her husband. Now she begins to investigate the
happenings herself. And so begins Letters from Nowhere, a pure hidden object game that accentuates finding the objects. You will be
helping Audrey track down her missing husband by completing the
Hidden Object searches through more than 30 locations
such as a police station, a garage, a hospital. You will
need to follow the key letters to unlock the mystery.
Letters from Nowhere is divided into eleven chapters,
each sectioned into episodes filled with items to find.
Click on a photo to enter the scene and use the item list
at the bottom to locate the twelve items that you need in
each area. Hints are available through a quickly recharging timer. However, there is quite a point deduction to
using the hint. There is also a score penalty if you click
too many times without finding something. Some of the
items listed in Letters from Nowhere must be paired up
before you can collect them. This usually involves finding
a missing piece and inserting it into the named object.
So, for example, if you want to get the gun, you’ll need to
put a few bullets in the chamber first. And, finally, keep
an eye out for the three hidden stamps in each area.
After you find the stamps throughout all the locations,
you will be able to unlock the Unlimited Mode. The hidden objects may be somewhat randomized, but the
stamps and the special objects will always be in the
same place when you replay the game.
When you start a mini-game, you can’t return to
the Hidden Objects Scene until you have solved
the puzzle, or skipped it, for a score penalty. As
with many Hidden Object Games, I never felt particularly drawn into the storyline of Letters From
Nowhere. I focused on moving onto the next quest
and often skipped as much of the dialogue as I
could. Objects will repeat from time to time, and
you will be replaying hidden object areas, however objects to be found are most often randomized so that the gameplay never really sinks into a
repetitive state. The main repetition is that within
each specific area of an episode, there is the
same unique interactive item to be found.
Letters from Nowhere features a bonus system that really is an awesome addition. For every chapter of the game, you’ll earn points that
go towards unlocking four bonuses. Once invoked, the bonuses go a
long way to helping with locating the especially tricky hidden objects.
Many objects are hard to see as often only part of it is in fact visible.
Buying the bonus items decreases the frustration of trying to find such
well hidden objects. The bonuses can be purchased once each chapter. The thermometer shows you where a hidden object is for a short
time. Acting like a hot/cold monitor, when your cursor gets near a hidden object, the thermometer will show a high temperature with animated fire. When your cursor is far from any hidden objects, it will
show a low temperature with ice. You need 1,000 points to buy it.
After buying the jack-in-the-box when you find it in a scene, you will
get 10,000 points. The camera takes picture of the hidden objects visible on the screen. It is limited to showing at most six objects. You
need 45,000 points to buy it. The palette shows the picture of hidden
objects in the list rather than just the word. You need 55,000 points to
buy it. I found that using these is a much better option than clicking on
the hint. If you buy any of these when you first go to a chapter then
each of the pictures shown will have the bonus in them. But pay close
attention to what they show because they do not last a very long time.
Each episode has a series of rooms to search and a few simple minigames, mostly involving easy to solve puzzles and jigsaws. Sometimes you’ll encounter an item that initiates an instant mini-game,
though these are rare.
Letters from Nowhere features a strong achievements system in the form of trophies. There are
over 35 trophies to unlock, each obtained by accomplishing a different feat you may not even realize you’re working towards. It is always a good
idea to find hidden objects with finesse in case a
trophy is at stake. Furthermore, the game features
an unlockable Unlimited Mode. Finding 50 stamps
gives you a chance to compete against others to
find all the hidden objects for each scene. Furthermore, as you complete quests involving finding
certain objects in the various different scenes you acquire experience
points, always good for bragging rights.
As far as Hidden Object Games go, Letters from Nowhere is an excellent example. It is strictly a Hidden Object Game with finding the items
being the primary purpose of the game. Things are kept fresh when
there’s three stamps hidden within each hidden object scene and the
Trophy Room provides many unique challenges to try and conquer.
Some hidden object games are too hard, and some are too easy but
Letters from Nowhere is just right. It is definitely re-playable, as the
random items change with each game. Beating your high score or
someone else is always a well met challenge. You can download a
free trial version of the game from http://www.awem.com and, while
there, have a look at some of their other excellent games, such as
Cradle Of Rome. The full version of Letters from Nowhere is $9.95
which includes all the extra play. Once you have unlocked the Unlimited Play, you can attempt to beat the all time best time for each and
every scene. The challenge here is to find all the items in the scene
rather than a limited number. Each time you find one it seems as
though an endless stream of replacements keeps the challenge alive.
Give the trial version a whirl. See why we have been playing this
game over and over again.
Submitted by Marcel Dufresne
Knowing that the majority of our members are at least
amatuer photographers, and having received requests
from various members at various times to ask for review copies of commercial Photoshop plug-ins, it has
been my wont to try to put into every issue at least one
or two articles about software from companies like
AKVIS, Alien Skin, Auto FX, Nik, or one of the other developers of
plug-ins. In some cases the requests to developers have yielded
nothing, but others have responded with great generosity and are the
source of many of the items that have shown up over the past years
as raffle items at our monthly meetings.
In this month’s issue I would like to tell you a little about a new release, Perfect Effects 8, onOne Software’s wonderful suite of 23 filters for Adobe Photoshop & Adobe Ps Elements. It is not a problem if
you don’t have the Adobe software: Perfect Effects 8 will run as
a stand-alone aplication from the same install. That is how I am
running it, as a stand-alone application and in full screen mode.
As you can see from he picture below, Perfect Effects 8 is huge.
You really have to see it for yourself stretched out on a 24 or 27inch iMac to appreciate how nice it is to have a plug-in window
that shows you everything you want to see at the same time.
There are several features that make Perfect Effects 8 easy to
learn and use. The most obvious is that when you have a picture
selected (use the BROWSE and EFFECTS buttons in the
upper right corner of the application window to select a picture
and to to invoke the magic), all you have to do to preview how a filter
will affect your image is just click on the filter name in the list of 23 filters at the left side of the window to open a set of possible results.
Running your cursor over each thumbnail will give a new preview in
the Navigator window. Clicking on it will apply it to your image.
For a full list of commercial Photoshop-compatible plugins you can
go to http://thepluginsite.com/resources/commercialps.htm
If you look at the Filters panel at the left side of the application window you will
see that it can be toggled to show Presets and Favorites. The Presets are additional suggested image treatments that enhance the effect of several of the Filters. You can create your own effects in Perfect Effects 8 by combining filters
and save them to the Favorites panel by naming them. The Presets can also be
viewed differently, much larger, in a separate window, and full screen mode, simply by clicking the button at the bottom of the Presets list.
The image above is a shot of my entire 24” iMac screen! The result of having all
of these images appear side by side is that it is very easy to quickly eliminate the
effects you don’t want and focus on the effects that best suit your purposes.
On the right-hand side of the image window you will see the Navigator, Filter
Stack, and Filter Options. This is where Perfect Effects 8 keeps track of which
filters have been applied and gives the user access to sliders to fine-tune the filter effects.
All of the features of Perfect Effects 8 are covered in the 85-Page user guide
(PDF or online) but the best way to learn the program is by playing with it while
checking out the videos on the onOne website and on YouTube. onOne Software
support (http://www.ononesoftware.com/support/) has links to live training,
archived web seminars, training videos, technical support, and user guides.
Perfect Effects 8 works with Adobe Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, Lightroom, Apple Aperture, and as a standalone application. It costs about US $100,
which is a terrific price for a suite of 23 filters that function as plug-ins and as a
stand-alone application.
You can get a fully featured free 30-day demo copy of Perfect Effects 8 from
onOne just by asking for it (http://www.ononesoftware.com/downloads/ ).
Submitted by Michael Shaw
1Password 4.0
From AgileBits
Passwords are meant to keep
our secure sites and information safe. Often they become
troublesome as we forget a
chosen password. Sometimes
we resort to writing them down
so as not to forget. This practice still leaves our data vulnerable as this list could
potentially fall into unwanted
hands. Using the same password for all your sites is also
not a good solution. 1Password offers the best resolution
to the password dilemma. My
wife and I have been using it
for many years without any difficulty whosoever. It is simple
to use and it syncs seamlessly
across our various computers
and iDevices. I first reviewed
1Password 3 in the Jan 2010
DoubleClick. This popular OS
X security application has been updated to version 4 and it has been
completely rewritten with a simple new interface and a host of new
features. This review will mainly focus on these changes. 1Password
is a cross-platform app but it does not have the same functions on all
platforms. Some are Mac specific. Any properties I refer to in this review are for the Mac platform.
1Password is a full-featured password and identity manager. It directly integrates with popular browsers and, with just one click, creates incredibly strong, unique passwords for all of your sites.
It is a password manager that brings you both security and
convenience. It is the only program that provides antiphishing protection and goes beyond password management by adding Web form filling and automatic
strong password generation. 1Password fully supports
major Web browsers, including Safari, Firefox, Chrome,
and Opera. All browser extensions share the same encrypted data which means you never need to manually
copy your passwords between browsers or from the password manager to a browser. Your confidential information, including passwords, identities, credit cards, social insurance numbers,
memberships, software licenses, and anything else you don’t want
scattered around on extra pages can be kept secure. Your 1Password
data is available on-the-go with apps for the iPhone, iPad, and Android. Everything is encrypted and secured with your Master Password, the one and only password you need to remember.
1Password offers a painless way to create, store, and enter passwords. 1Password will create and save incredibly strong, unique
passwords for every site, app, and service. Every password is like a
one-of-a-kind snowflake. A single click gives you a random, incredibly
strong new password you can save or paste into a new account. It is
secure made simple. All your data is saved within 1Password, ready
to be automatically filled in when needed. It’s the simplest way to protect yourself from password reuse, data breaches, and password
memory loss. A single click can open your browser, take you to a site,
fill in your username and password, and log you in. 1Password
can sync your data across all your devices automatically
through iCloud and Dropbox, or locally over Wi-Fi where
your data never leaves your network.
The vault is the major component of 1Password where all
your encrypted data is stored in a set of files. Normally this
data vault is tucked away with your other documents and
you need never interact with it directly. I rarely have to open
this app as the browser or the menu bar 1Password mini has
access to all data. On a Mac, 1Password 4 natively stores all your
data, safely encrypted, using 256-bit AES—in an SQLite database.
This is a new data format for 1Password 4 and one of the improvements. It ensures that that all your data is now encrypted, even item
titles and URLs. AgileBits has also engineered safeguards into the file
to slow down automated tools that could try to guess your master
password.
The newly updated 1Password 4 for the
Mac features a totally redesigned interface that brings some parity with its iOS
app and features compatibility with Mavericks. The following is a quick overview of
some of the more important improvements. AgileBits has added the highly
sought after feature of multiple password
vaults so now you can separate your business and personal password collections.
Now you can even make shared password vaults for business partners or family
members. If sharing an entire password
vault is a bit too much, you can send credentials via secure email or iMessage.
Sorting and filtering options make it much
easier to find that one password you are
looking for. You can search along many
different lines including name, frequency
used, password strength, password age,
and my favourite find duplicate passwords. Sometimes multiple URLs use the same login information. If
you have two different web sites that use the same login, you no
longer have to create a separate login item for each one. 1Password
4 introduces the ability to add multiple URLs to a single login. iOS
users are familiar with the “Favourites” category, which makes a few
select items immediately and easily accessible in a sidebar. Now you
can drag and drop your favourite items to this spot for quick access.
To go beyond being simply a password generator and keeper, 1Password has made customizable fields available for any of your data so
you can add whatever you wish to be stored with that item.
I always found that synching was the major benefit of 1Password. Any
new password, or changes to a password, were immediately available
on not only any browsers on my iMac, but also on any of my other
computers and my iPad. The new 1Password takes synching to another level. You can now sync not only from Dropbox, but also from
the iCloud or any designated folder on your computer as well as using
the local Wi-Fi. Any sync conflicts are now automatically detected,
merged and resolved. The new optional Top layout presents 1Password data as a table, with multiple columns you can move, resize, or
sort by, just as in any OS X table view. Item details are shown in a
pane at the bottom, and you can drag the divider bar up or down to
vary how much room is allotted to each portion of the window. In the
Mac version of 1Password only, the Display category has a single option: Conceal Passwords (selected by default). With this checkbox selected, your passwords will normally be represented by bullets (•). In
both the main 1Password app and 1Password mini, you can show the
passwords by holding down the Option key. The last great feature I
want to mention is the security audit. This lets you see how many
sites you have with the same password, outdated entries of over
three years or those with weak passwords.
The 1Password mini did exist in an earlier version but it has been
spruced up. 1Password mini is the ever-present menu bar companion
to the main 1Password application. It enables the browser extensions
to function and provides access to your 1Password data even when
the main app and your web browsers aren’t running. Access to all of
your login information, credit cards, folders, favourites, and the password generator are right there in your Mac’s menubar. Now you can
use a customizable keyboard shortcut to open 1Password mini in
your menu bar and Go & Fill logins or view and copy item details. You
can even anchor an item’s details so that they remain visible when
1Password mini is closed. The new 1Password browser extension
works the same way. Completely rewritten in Cocoa, the extension
behaves the same across the Safari, Firefox, Chrome, and Opera
browsers. The mini can do the following: search and display all your
logins, credit cards, identities, and most other 1Password data (although it can’t edit this info), generate new, random passwords to
your specifications, view and search previously generated passwords,
display all your 1Password favourites, folders, tags, and smart folders, open URLs in your default Web browser and fill in your stored
credentials automatically, fill in passwords, credit card numbers, and
other personal data on Web pages you’ve navigated to manually,
lock, unlock, or launch 1Password, or switch between vaults. You can
do all this with the pop-up gear menu in the upper right.
I found it was super easy to update from 1Password 3.0 to 4.0. When
I opened 1Password 4 for the first time on my iMac, it checked to see
if I already had a 1Password Data Vault in one of the default locations
(such as the top level of my Dropbox folder). Because I did, it
prompted me to enter my master password. That was it. I was now
able to use 1Password 4. When you first open 1Password on an iOS
device, it checks to see if you already have 1Password data synced
via iCloud from another device. If it finds your data
there, it asks for your master password to unlock
it, and then automatically uses iCloud sync. If not,
you’ll see a “Welcome to 1Password” screen.
Whether you are using 1Password for the first
time or updating, the instruction are clear and
easy to follow.
1Password 4 is available at the Mac App Store or
at the AgileBits web site. I would advise you to
check the app store frequently as 1Password has
been known to go on sale once in a while. Go to
https://agilebits.com/onepassword and read up on
this wonderful app. There is a user’s guide which
you can get from http://learn.agilebits.com which
will explain how straightforward it is to use 1Password. This is the one app that all computer users
should have. I no longer have any security worries. My passwords are safe and secure and
quickly available to me no matter what computer
or device I am using. You too can have this same
security.
AgileBits is a privately held Canadian company based in Toronto.
They developed 1Password eight years ago and have been updating
and improving it ever since. 1Password 4 requires an Intel, 64-bit
processor using Mac OSX 10.8.4 or later. It is $49.99 for a single user
license although there are some updating discounts available. 1Password 4 for Mac is a free update to customers who purchased 1Password 3 from the Mac App Store (MAS). Customers who purchased
1Password 3 from the AgileBits website in 2013 are also eligible for a
free upgrade (https://agilebits.com/store/upgrade?product_id9), while
website customers who purchased in 2012 or earlier will get an upgrade price of $24.99.
Submitted by Marcel Dufres
New From AKVIS:
OilPaint v2.0
AKVIS OilPaint 2.0 is photo-to-painting software
that creates oil paintings from your digital photographs. The characteristic feature of the program
is a unique algorithm of the artistic application of
brush strokes that authentically reproduces the
technique of the real brush. The program offers a
number of ready to use Presets that let you familiarize yourself with the features of the software.
The Batch Processing support lets you automatically convert a series of images with the same settings. Adjusting the
density, texture, and thickness of the brush strokes, you can not only
enhance the volume and get impressive effects, but also find your
own painting style. AKVIS OilPaint is available as a standalone program and as a plugin for Adobe Photoshop and Ps Elements.
Like all of the AKVIS software we have looked at in the past, AKVIS
OilPaint 2.0 can be downloaded for free (as a fully-featured demo)
and used for 10 days without restrictions as part of the AKVIS “try before you buy” program. You do not need to register: Just download the
full version and start your Free Trial. You can find demos of all of the
software AKVIS has for Macintosh users at this AKVIS website:
http://akvis.com/en/download-macintosh-software.php
The picture below shows the OilPaint 2.0 interface, which is similar to
that of other AKVIS programs. The user can choose Painting from
the right-hand panel and fine tune with sliders. The program also has
the ability to impose Text (for watermarking and catalogingrequirements) and Canvas textures onto the paintings it creates, with a library of 32 background surfacess that can be adjusted to various
levels of roughness to mimic any grade of cloth from linen to burlap.
The Presets tab gives access to 23 distict painting styles that can be
previewed before being applied.
Here, at right, we see the Canvas controls in action and
an example of an applied texture. Double-clicking on the
sample in the Texture Properties window opens up the library of textures and moving the light source to change
the angle of lumination will alter the background that
shows through the painting.
The left panel in AKVIS OilPaint has a Toolbar containing
three groups of tools: pre-processing, post-processing,
and additional tools. Different tools are visible depending
on the active tab - Before or After. The tools will be used
to perform actions like accentuate paint strokes, smudge
details, and crop the image. The Oil Brush tool is designed to strengthen the oil effect on desired areas. This
tool lets you make high quality strokes that look like they
were made with a real oil paint brush.
OilPaint 2.0 is available for free to owners of OilPaint 1.0.
The cost of OilPaint 2.0 is for non-commercial use as a
plug-in or stand alone package for about US $50. For
about US $70 you can have both and there is a commercial license for about US $90. The license includes 1 year
of free updates to any new versions of the product. Visit
AKVIS at http://akvis.com/en/index.php for your copy.
Submitted by Michael Shaw
This Month’s MaUsE Meeting Topic:
Gadgets !!
The next MaUsE Meeting is scheduled
for March 26th.
The topic for the meeting will be Gadgets, and we hope to
get some interesting contributions from the Membership.
Bring in your little mechanical and electrical devices anything that plugs into or talks to your desktop or portable
Mac, or your iPhone, iPad or iPod, that helps it to
do something special.
Intego
Washing Machine 2014
As a general rule I try not to pay attention to system utilities that offer to
do things for me behind the scenes, especially things that I feel don’t
need to be done. Paramount among these are the applications that
claim that they can speed up my Mac by deleting unused language
support files, developer-oriented files, cache files and extra copies of
my iPhoto images. As a general rule these applications target old files
that have not been opened or modfied within a set period of time, duplicate files, cache files, and huge files. I make an effort to keep this
sort of thing at a minimum.
Recently I received an invitation from Intego, to try out their Washing
Machine utility for (as the name implies) cleaning out my Mac. I’m inclined to trust Intego because of my past experiences with other Intego
products. Intego, with a full range of products to protect Macs, as well
as products for iOS devices, such as the iPhone and iPad, has a reputation for making the Internet a safer place for Mac and Apple users.
Intego is the only company that focuses solely on security for Mac
computers and other Apple products.
Intego Washing Machine is a utility designed to clean up your computer files and reduce the background clutter of forgotten junk, duplicate files, and all of the archived receipts, caches and support files
from applications you no longer use. The result is a computer with a
faster, more streamlined system, and better organized files. The idea is
that there are a huge number of files on your computer that could be
deleted and you would never miss them: stuff like all of those weird
Asian and other foreign languages, documents left over from applications you used on previous systems, and never updated, files you have
not opened in several years, and the extra copies of all of the songs,
videos, and images that you have accidentally saves more than one
copy of.
If this sort of thing appeals to you, consider Intego Washing Machine. I
ran the scans and found Intego Washing Machine to be very good at
what it did. The interface was easy to understand and the parameters
easy to set. In Reclaim mode it allowed me to find the and decide the
fate of caches, old downloads, languages, logs and trashed files. In
Duplicates mode the program found the extra copies of archives, folders, movies, documents, music and images. In Organize mode it offered to clean up my Desktop and put everything away where it
belonged.
Due to the fact that I do not tolerate clutter of the type that Washing
Machine targets, and because my boot drive is less than 20% full, I did
not feel the need to actually proceed to delete the files that Washing
Machine wanted me to delete. Your circumstances will determine how
useful this program is to you.
Submitted by Michael Shaw
Blue Piston Duo Flux
Bluetooth Stereo Speakers from Logiix
One of the drawbacks I have found with iDevices is the poor sound
system that comes with them. Not only is the maximum volume too
quiet, but the sound lacks any real body. As always, when a problem
occurs, industry is quick to find solutions. This problem has been answered with a profusion of speakers that can be used with them.
Many of these are not really portable in that you would not carry them
around since they are too large. They produce great sound but they
are best used in one place. I prefer to have a speaker that is more
versatile, one that I can easily take anywhere with me. Logiix has the
perfect solution for me, having come up with the Blue Piston Duo Flux
Bluetooth Stereo Speakers.
With the Duo Flux Speaker you get a portable and convenient audio
solution that’s a perfect companion piece to the iPad. The Duo Flux
gives the iPad’s audio new life in full surround sound, taking movies,
music, and multimedia to a whole different level. But this speaker is
not limited to being used solely with the iPad. It will work with any
Bluetooth-enabled audio device, like an iMac. In fact, this is the
speaker I use when watching any video with my desktop iMac. With
the wireless speaker set up, I don’t have to blast the TV’s sound
throughout the house. I just position the speakers in behind me and I
get the full stereo effect of whatever I am listening to. These two wireless Bluetooth speakers sync with each other and your device to create high definition stereo sound. There is no comparison between
them and the iPad in terms of the sound quality that comes out.
You will immediately appreciate the upgrade. The rich, deep tones of
the Duo Flux’s dual drivers, bass reflex chamber and solid metal
housing make listening so much more pleasurable. It puts the iPad’s
speaker to shame. Plus, you can now crank up the volume if you
wish.
Pairing up one speaker to a Bluetooth-enabled device is fairly easy. It
is recommended that you charge up the speakers to 100% before the
first use. Pairing up one speaker is very similar to pairing up any device with Bluetooth. All the speaker controls are on the bottom. Press
the central POWER button until it beeps. Make sure that Bluetooth is
activated on your device. Press and hold the PAIRING button on the
speaker for a couple of seconds. The list of found devices should now
show BP DUO FLUX. Select it and start enjoying the sound.
The instructions for using both at the same time in stereo mode is a
bit more complicated. After a couple of tries, I got the hang of it. I
should have watched the video showing how to pair up the speakers
first rather than later. The video gives an excellent view of not only the
pairing process, but also of what the speakers look like. I strongly recommend you take a look at this even before buying the speakers. The
video is at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfcEiVAdebo. To pair
up both speakers at the same time, you must press and hold the
POWER button of both speakers until the LED turns from blue to
flashing green (8 seconds). Leave them for a couple of seconds until
the flashing green turns back to blue. This allows the two speakers to
sync with each other. When the two speakers are connected, you will
hear the speakers say LEFT CHANNEL and RIGHT CHANNEL when
the MODE button is pressed. Use the LEFT CHANNEL to pair with
your device. Now you have pure stereo sound coming out. Once we
got the speakers set up in stereo, the sound was amazing. You can
also really make these speakers loud!
At a mere 300 grams each, these speakers are very lightweight, making them perfect for travel. Being wireless, there is no worry about cables. The battery life on
these speakers was also amazing. Logiix claims that these speakers can play up
to 20 hours and indeed they can. However, it only takes 2-3 hours to charge the
1000 mAh Lithium-ion polymer battery. The Bluetooth v2.1 range is about 10 m,
but this depends on walls and such interfering with the transmission. The speaker
is a cube of about 6 cm each side. The four anti-slip feet secure the speaker in
place. It comes with two micro USB charging cables so that you can charge both
speakers at the same time. You can use each speaker individually and pair them
with different devices, or use them together to get the best stereo sound. I like that
the speaker speaks to you when you press the VOLUME or MODE button. The
MODE not only indicates the right and left speaker, but also whether it is in stand
alone or pairing mode. The speaker indicates volume up, down and maximum.
Overall these speakers were phenomenal. We were blown away by the clarity of
sound from them. The price is USD$99.95. This price is in the range of similar
stereo speakers. You can get less expensive ones, but, as always, you will get
what you pay for. The Duo Flux provides you with superb sound and volume control. The battery life between each charge is the best I have seen. Have a look at
what others have to say about these speakers at www.logiix.net . Blue Piston Duo
Flux gives you true stereo sound in a small, travel package. Pair the two speakers
with your device and fill your room with music in glorious stereo.
Submitted by Marcel Dufresne
New From Stellar
Stellar Drive Clone v3.0
Stellar Drive Clone is a useful Mac tool to protect your
precious data proactively against any instance of data
loss/inaccessibility by creating the clone copy of your
storage media. With this utility, you can create an
exact clone of your media and restore the data from it,
in case of any media failure. The tool also enables
features, such as imaging a volume and backing up
files and folders. Create a clone of the entire hard
drive or any logical volume (partition).
Features:
Cloning: Creates clone of any Mac based volume or
the entire hard drive to another hard drive, network
drive, volume or folder. In situations of system crash,
hard drive damage etc., the cloned hard drive can be
used as a backup drive. This feature can also be useful, if you want to take a full system backup.
SSD drives: Stellar Drive Clone has extended support to clone or copy the exact contents of a solidstate drive to your Mac drive. SSD drives are
comparatively faster than traditional magnetic disks.
They are less susceptible to damage, but you may
face data loss on these drives. To avert the possibility
of any data disaster, you can create a clone of your
SSD drive using Stellar Drive Clone.
Backups: With Stellar Drive Clone, you can select the
files or folders of your choice in any partition in your
Mac and create a back up file of the same. You can
further go for ‘Schedule Periodic Backup’ (daily,
weekly, or monthly) and the software will do the task
of its own. The good thing is that you can also backup
a removable media.
Restore: With the 'Restore' feature, the software restores the volume to its original state by copying back
all the data from the cloned folder or hard drive image
file. Note that the data restoration process through
Stellar Drive Clone is much faster than that of the
manual method.
Bootable DVD: Provides option to create a
Drive Clone is a complete hard drive cloning utility that creates clone or image of the Mac
Bootable DVD, which can help you boot your
hard drive/volume. The cloned hard drive can be used as a ready-to-use copy of the origisystem, in case of any instance of system failnal hard drive, whereas the image file can be useful in restoring the data in case of any
ure or crash. You can include multiple applicadata loss / inaccessibility. Following are the key features of the product:
tions, depending upon the space in the DVD
 Cloning - Creates an exact copy of hard drive and logical volumes
and run them from the Bootable DVD as well.
You do not need to copy the Drive Clone appli-  Imaging - Creates image of any volume or entire Mac hard drive
 Restore - Option to restore volume from a folder or image file
cation to the Bootable DVD, as the application
 Tools - Create a bootable DVD and put selected utilities onto it
is included by default.
 Backup - Back up all the important files/folders in a volume
 Support - Supports latest Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks
Visir http://www.stellarinfo.com for more...
 See http://www.stellarinfo.com/mac-software/clone-mac/clone-mac-drive.php
February 2014
MaUsE Meeting
Marcel ran the meeting but everyone
who wanted a kick at the can got involved. The evening ended with a
short raffle of items donated by various sponsors and by MaUsE Cluib
Members. A good time was had by all.
Take Control eBooks
1Password
DoubleClick features an ebook from Take Control Books every month.
These ebooks have been published in PDF format and cover issues
related to Mac OS. Because they are in PDF format, these ebooks
have a lot of advantages over the traditional paper books. Electronic
books are a new experience for many people, but they provide you
with a good deal of flexibility that isn't available with printed books.
With your purchase of the ebook you get expert advice on various
topics but with an Apple perspective. These are the same expert authors of some best-selling print books. The download is immediate
and you don't have to leave your house to get it. Because it is paperless it can be purchased for much less than a paper edition. Also, if a
new edition of the book comes out, your original purchase of the book
allows you to easily update your current copy for free. There are clickable links right in the text so that your book immediately leads to other
sources on the same topic. It is readable onscreen which means you
can control the size of the print. If you use Preview you can even
highlight sections without messing up the book (use a copy of the
original if you are worried). You can even print up a paper copy of the
book if you feel the need. The catalog is very extensive and can be
accessed from
http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/catalog. They offer
free sample sections of all their ebooks and a
money-back guarantee, so try one out anytime. As
readers of the DoubleClick, you also now have access to this coupon (CPN90219MUG) which entitles
you to a 30% discount on the purchase of a book.
The book featured this month is Take Control of
1Password, Second Edition by Joe Kissell. iCloud is
a simple idea. Remembering and entering Web
passwords can be easy and secure, thanks to
1Password, the popular password manager from
AgileBits. This ebook will explain not only how to
create, edit, and enter Web login data easily, but
also how to autofill contact and credit card information when shopping online, audit your passwords
and generate better ones, and share your passwords with key people and among multiple devices.
The focus will be on 1Password 4 for the Mac, but it
also provides details and directions for the iOS, Windows, and Android versions of 1Password.
You’ll find expert advice on these topics:
 Meet 1Password: Set your master passcode and make first-run
configuration decisions. Explore usage strategies for 1Password on
your Mac, PC, iOS device, or Android handheld, and understand the
different components of the software on the different platforms. Get
lots of ideas for how to share your vault (or vaults!) among your devices and with other people.
 Master logins: In 1Password, a typical login contains a set of credentials used to sign in to a Web site. Find out how to create logins,
sort them, search them, tag them, and more. You’ll especially find
help with editing logins. For example, if you change a site’s password
from dragon7 to eatsevendragonsforlunchatyahoo, you’ll want to incorporate that into its login. Or, use 1Password’s password generator
to create complex passwords, like dGx7Crve3WucELF#s.
 Understand password security: Get guidance on what makes for a
good password, and read Joe’s important Password Dos and Don’ts.
An advanced topic later in the ebook covers how to perform a security
audit in order to improve poor passwords quickly. (For Joe’s full advice on passwords, read Take Control of Your Passwords.)
 Go beyond Web logins: For a lot of people, a primary point of
1Password is to speed the process of signing in to Web sites. But
1Password can do much more. Learn about storing and autofilling
contact information (for more than one identity, even), along with your
credit card number and security code. You’ll also find advice on storing passwords for password-protected files and encrypted disk images, plus ideas for keeping track of confidential files, private diary
entries, scans of important cards or documents, and more.
In this 151 pages book you’ll also find the answers to questions such
as:
 In addition to 1Password, should I use my
Web browser’s password, contact, or credit
card autofill feature? What about Apple’s
iCloud Keychain?
 What is the fastest way to get 1Password
to sign me in to a Web site?
 My login item used to sign me in, but it
stopped working. What should I do?
 I made a long, random password for my
bank account, but it wasn’t saved in the login
item! Where can I find it?
 How can I use one username and password with multiple Web sites, like one Apple
ID for both iCloud and the online Apple Store?
 What if I need to access my 1Password
data from another person’s computer?
 How can I speed up Web logins and filling
in shopping cart info with 1Password in iOS
or Android?
 Is it true that I can initiate 1Password login
items from keyboard launcher utilities like LaunchBar, Alfred, and
Quicksilver? (Hint: the answer is yes!)
Speed through Web logins with 1Password 4!! This ebook costs
$10.00 normally but using the coupon will make a difference. Check
this ebook out and a lot others at www.takecontrolbooks.com.
Submitted by Marcel Dufresne