Numeric Citizen Sheet

Numeric Citizen Blog

Glass is sending out emails to let us know that we can share and spread the word to our friends and family so they can join Glass too but at a reduced price. But, wait, we get nothing if they subscribe, really? Am I missing something or simply being needy?

2023-09-01 ∞

Eventually, in a few weeks, I’ll have to decide if I go with the 256GB storage tier or the next level up: 512GB1. If I to future my purchase of the 15 Ultra, I’ll probably have to go with the latter.

256GB or 512GB, that is the question

  1. I’ve been using 256GB for as long as I remember. ↩

2023-09-01 ∞

Fifty-six. 56. Already. 🧁

2023-09-04 ∞

I got an Ember coffee mug1 for my birthday, yesterday. The first thing the Ember app detected after pairing the mug with my iPhone was that an update to the mug’s firmware. It took 5 minutes to complete. Software is everywhere now guys. 😳

  1. The mug keeps the coffee at the right temperature. Great and well-design coffee mug. ↩

2023-09-05 ∞

Pixelfed is rolling out Stories. 😒🤦🏻‍♂️ I’m not a fan at all. I’m not sure that I want PixelFed to take that direction. I decided to unfollow anyone who shares one of these.1

  1. I left Instagram because it wasn’t about photography anymore. ↩

2023-09-06 ∞

Remember Apple’s Freeform?

I’m curious, is anyone using Apple’s Freeform? For what use case? Personally, I was curious about Freeform and experimented with it for a while, but then I stopped using it. I prefer using it on the iPad than on the Mac.

2023-09-06 ∞

Matte black MacBook again makes an appearance in an Apple patent Source: Matte black MacBook again referenced in an Apple patent

I would pay a little extra for a fingerprint-free matte black MacBook Air. 🤗

2023-09-06 ∞

Apple is reportedly developing a low-cost MacBook series to compete with Chromebook models in the education sector that could be released as early as the second half of 2024, according to industry sources. Source: Apple mulls low-cost MacBook, say sources

Remember when people and tech pundits pressed Apple to create a Netbook? Apple responded with an 11-inch MacBook (2008) Air and an iPad (2010). I hope they skip trying to make a low-cost MacBook and keep improving on the current iPad story instead. That being said, I understand Chromebooks are giving Apple a hard time in education. 🥵

2023-09-06 ∞

On Apps by Apple

What a strange move by Apple. This website made by Apple promotes first-party apps for the iPhone, iPad, Mac, etc. Why? Why now? I would understand in the context of being forced to allow third-party App Stores. Apple reminding people about their apps while people are getting excited by side-loading and third-party App Stores would make sense. Is Apple up to something here? They usually plan for the long run. This could be the first baby step for a more open ecosystem.1 👀

  1. Interestingly, you can launch each app with an Open button if you are visiting the website from your beloved iPhone, iPad or the Mac.  ↩

2023-09-06 ∞

While Elon Musk wants the Twitter brand to disappear from the earth’s surface, you can see the Twitter icon and references everywhere on the web. X is not taking over at all. Services or apps that depend on Twitter for logging in, news sites asking people to join them via social networks, apps offering a sharing action or whatever the needs are, most continue to use Twitter’s original branding. In support of those who refuse to let go the little bird, here’s my contribution1.

  1. Thanks to Midjourney 😜 ↩

2023-09-07 ∞

I wanted to increase my podcasts listening time. I decided to put Overcast on the first home screen page. It worked. 👌🏻🤓

2023-09-07 ∞

Early mornings are my favourite creative moments... everyone is asleep, and it is super quiet in the house. 😊👨🏻‍💻

2023-09-09 ∞

I wish there was a way to subscribe to a RSS feed within Day One. This way, I could delete my IFTTT account. 1😐

  1. IFTTT read my Micro.blog RSS feed to save a copy of my posts to my personal journal on Day One.  ↩

2023-09-09 ∞

Feeling sad this morning 😥 about the consequences of the earthquake in Morroco. I'm trying to get news from our guide to see if he is ok. 🙏🏻

2023-09-09 ∞

Episode 03 — I'm Excited and Stressed

This week, Apple will release its latest iPhone models. I'm excited. It will be an exercise of balance between news consumption, analysis and writing. It's the perfect mix for a stressful week. 😟 Learn why in this podcast episode.

Links

- My iPhone 11 Pro review: “From iPhone 7 to iPhone 11 Pro: The Return of Delights”

- My iPhone 13 Pro review: “Upgrading From the iPhone 11 Pro to iPhone 13 Pro — the Love Story Continues”

Audio 2023-09-09 ∞

⁉️This iCloud Upload of 78 items has been going on since I migrated from the 13-inch MBA to the 15-inch MBA with Apple Migration Assistant. Any ideas on how to fix this? 1🤔

  1. Annoying as hell.  ↩

2023-09-09 ∞

Why I’m Excited for This Week’s Apple Announcements

I’m super excited about this year’s iPhone announcements. It’s probably because I’m getting one of them1. I try to skip one or two iterations. I went from the iPhone 7 to the iPhone 11 Pro, then to the iPhone 13 Pro, and now the iPhone 15 Pro Max. I’m looking forward to these improvements: the cameras2 and battery life3. Sure, the Dynamic Island will be cool. Oh, and USB-C, finally4!

Can’t wait for Sept 12th.

  1. I’m getting the iPhone 15 Pro Max / 512 GB model. I’ll return my old 13 Pro to Apple for a credit. ↩

  2. Could the telephoto lens make me forget about my Nikon? ↩

  3. This is why I’m going to the Max this year.  ↩

  4. 99% of the time I use MagSafe to charge my iPhone these days. 😜 ↩

2023-09-10 ∞

Pixelfed Is Working on “Solo”

I’m really curious about this. The idea of having my personal instance of Pixelfed is tempting. I like the idea of having full control and not being at the mercy of some other admin, updating the codebase as I wish while being part of the Pixelfed federation1. It’s expected to be released on October 20th. I should start planning my domain name and username.2

  1. Of course, other instance could decide to block mine, but that’s not going to happen, unless I’m being a bad actor in the federation.  ↩

  2. Does that mean Micro.blog would need to do something in order to cross post to my personal instance? ↩

2023-09-10 ∞

My Excitement About the Upcoming iPhones Explained

Here are some more details about my excitement for the next iPhone1.

Besides the camera upgrades, here is a short list of things I’m looking forward to with the next iPhones.

  1. I’m going to the Max. It’s the first Max model that I’m getting2.
  2. I expect better battery life than the iPhone 14 Pro Max3. I want a real all-day battery life for when I travel abroad.
  3. I never liked the current chrome finish of the Pro line (since the iPhone 12 Pro)4. I like the titanium finish of the Apple Watch. I can’t wait to see the tweaked version for the iPhone5.
  4. I’m ambivalent about the rumoured action button. I’ll want to configure it for the camera capture, but I want to keep the mute button.
  5. The always-on display… I’m not sure. My wife has an iPhone 14 Pro, she disabled the always-on display because of the battery drain. I’ll see with the Max.
  6. I’m curious about the grey version, but I will go either with a deep blue6 or the darkest one7.
  7. I love the Dynamic Island. My hope is to see wider adoption by developers.
  8. Finally, USB-C. Finally. 95% of the time, I charge my iPhone with MagSafe. It’s too convenient. On rare occasions, it will be handy to grab any normal USB-C cable and plug it in. As for transfer speed, I’m not in any use cases for this8.

I’ll catch you on the other side of the Wonderlust event.

  1. Just in case someone actually care. 😜 ↩

  2. Screen content displayed is barely more than the Pro, yet, I’ll take all the pixel the iPhone has to offer. ↩

  3. At the very least, much better battery life than my current aging iPhone 13 Pro.  ↩

  4. The chrome look on anything always felt like cheap luxury to me. I prefer textures.  ↩

  5. I expect Apple to offer a different texture. ↩

  6. I’m curious about anything that is blue. I could wait until iPhones make their way to the Apple Store, but I won’t be able to last that long. I’m looking for videos in the hands-on area at Apple Park for a cue about the colors.  ↩

  7. The black matte iPhone 5 was the best of all.  ↩

  8. Will this enable iPhone-to-iPhone transfer between an iPhone 15 Pro and an iPhone 17 Pro? 🤔 ↩

2023-09-10 ∞

Since 9/11 in 2001, I look up every time I hear a plane in the sky. Every single time. And I'm Canadian. 😔 1

  1. And I have the profound feeling that we didn't learn anything about these events. ↩

2023-09-11 ∞

And It's the right time to take a screenshot 📸 of apple.com before it gets revamped and refreshed tomorrow with some new stuff. 👀

2023-09-11 ∞

Apple Wonderlust T-15 min. ✅ Focus Mode: ON.

✅ Offline at the office.

✅ Apple.com open

✅ Tv.app open

✅ CleanShot Configured

✅ NAS ready

😎

2023-09-12 ∞

Apple Wonderlust Event — My Initial Impressions

These are my impressions of Apple’s latest product announcements.

The mother nature segment was funny, and I smiled quite often. It was a great way to communicate their progress toward better environmental protection and reduced carbon footprint. Video production quality was top-notch. Aren’t tech press people tired of going to Apple Park to watch a movie?

Many comments during the presentation about the desire by Apple to see people go into their stores to buy and activate the new iPhones1.

We got a short update about the upcoming Apple Vision Pro, which is still on track for early 2024. That was expected but felt a bit short.

Onto the Apple Watch.

The Apple Watch Series 9 is a mildly interesting update. The new finger gestures are cool but only for Series 9. Too bad. I’ll probably buy a few new bands later this fall. I’ll skip this year’s updates and wait for next year’s rumoured redesign.

Moving to the star of the show. The iPhone.

The iPhone remains the crown jewel of Apple. Everything else is peripheral. The design of the Pro line is absolutely gorgeous (rounded edges, great pro finishes). The A17 Pro (bye-bye Bionic) is a powerhouse CPU! I’ll go with the 15 Pro Max with 512 GB of storage. I’ll order the “USB-C to Lightning adaptor” to keep using my excellent Cavalier microphone (see my previous blog post about the issue).

The black finish is my choice with a blue FineWoven case2. Best of both worlds. Thanks to this video, which helped me confirm my decision3. Those wallpapers are gorgeous, too! This is the first time in a while that I love them so much. I’m overall happy with this year’s Pro finishes and tones. Very classy.

I’m a bit surprised by the battery life capacity to be the same as last year’s Pro models. I was expecting longer battery life with the A17, but I guess since we get more features… something has to give. I expect next year’s iPad Pro to use a derivative of the A17 Pro announced today.

About cameras. A 5x range for telephoto, not 6x4. I’m surprised it’s not 6x. But 120mm is great for travelling. Shooting with the phone and having the preview immediately available on the Mac, just like pros are expecting. Wow. Do images on the 15 Pro line have less over-processing / sharpening? I certainly hope so. And about those immersive spacial videos to be shot on the 15 Pro but visioned on the Apple Vision Pro, coming later this year. Consider me intrigued5. The camera app has a few tweaks, judging by some video segments, for the 2x mode, where you can select the focal length. Cool.

There is no monstrous price increase, which is good. Some price adjustments on the entry-level iPhone 15 Pro Max. The speed limit of the USB-C on the non-Pro line is ridiculous6. iCloud+ storage tier at 6TB is a surprise, still 5GB7 at the entry-level, though. I like the action button flexibility.

I’ll order my new phone this Friday. That is all for now.

  1. Apparently, the vast majority of iPhone in the US aren’t bought in an Apple Store. Apple would like to improve that.  ↩

  2. I might change my mind, depending of videos from the hands-on area at Apple Park.  ↩

  3. My second choice would probably be the blue finish next in third position, the natural titanium color.  ↩

  4. 25x digital zoom apparently. Not bad.  ↩

  5. I’m still not planning to buy an Apple Vision Pro. ↩

  6. 480 mb/s. Ouch. ↩

  7. Yes, that is right, a mere 5 gigabytes! ↩

2023-09-12 ∞

Experimenting with reading my Micro.blog timeline in RSS mode with Reeder. It's surprisingly very effective for catching up on the last 12 hours of posts. It is, in fact, more effective than reading past posts on the website.

2023-09-14 ∞

Did anyone notice this new "time-based" page indicator on Apple.com?1. It is very well-designed and clever.

  1. Can be seen in the iPhone 15 Pro sub-website. ↩

2023-09-14 ∞

"Get Ready for iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Pro" on Apple.com1, is this new, or was it available for the iPhone 14 launch last year? I find this to be a great way to limit frustration on the day the new iPhones will go on sale (tomorrow). 🤔

  1. The new website feature enables anyone to build their iPhone order, including setting up the return of the older iPhone for a credit. In theory, on the day of availability, you'll click "Buy".  ↩

2023-09-14 ∞

Today is a caseless day with my iPhone 13 Pro. Best way to experience the device design and flaws1.

  1. Like the too sharp edges. The too shiny flat edges.  ↩

2023-09-14 ∞

Waiting for more interactive widgets…

✅ WaterMinder

✅ Longplay

Timery 👀

Focused Work 👀

What else?

2023-09-14 ∞

How do you get out of Adobe Lightroom? What if I want to focus on Photomator and Pixelmator instead?

2023-09-14 ∞

An Update About My New Quest of Leaving Adobe Lightroom

Yesterday night, I spent nearly an hour reading articles and forum posts about the implications of closing my Adobe Photography subscription1. The implications and how to recover my photos differ for Lightroom Classic and Lightroom CC. It’s not that hard, but it will be a tedious process if I want to keep some organization that the Lightroom catalog currently provides. I’ll put this project on my list of things to do in 2024. This will give me some time to plan for the migration2.

  1. I subscribe to the photography plan which gives me 2TB of storage, which is currently used at 110GB.  ↩

  2. Or change my mind. 🤦🏻‍♂️ ↩

2023-09-15 ∞

Ordered. I’ll wait before buying a case from Apple because I’m not sure about the new FineWoven texture and durability. Some YouTubers said the feeling to the touch is similar to suede and I’m not a fan. #iphone15pro #iphone15promax

2023-09-15 ∞

Testing Apple's USB-C to Lightning Adaptor with iPad Pro

I wanted to follow up a previous post of mine about using my Lightning-based Lavalier microphone with a USB-C device, like my 2018 iPad Pro1. I ordered the USB-C to Lightning adaptor on the day of the Apple keynote. I got it this morning. If you are wondering if it works with Ferrite and Apple's Voice Memos on my iPad Pro? No, it doesn't.😔

  1. A positive conclusion would have been a good sign on the prospect of making it work with the upcoming iPhone 15 Pro Max. Now, it's not sure at all.  ↩

2023-09-15 ∞

This is how much forests burned so far this summer in Canada. ☹️ There are still close to a thousand fires still in action. This is freaking bad for so many reasons. First, we need forests to remove CO2. In a sense, removing trees diminishes the capacity of nature to limit climate change. We lose this capability. Second, all that burning created a lot of CO2. Third, it will take half a century to regain those lost forests.😔 It's really hard to feel positive about our future.

2023-09-16 ∞

After three years of availability, I experienced the first App Clips case today. I was close to a Dairy Queen-type so I was presented with an App Clips allowing ordering from my iPhone. There aren't a lot of App Clips, apparently.

2023-09-17 ∞

Some Thoughts About Apps Support of StandBy Mode and Interactive Widgets

Many apps are getting updates today and this week. Yes! 😃 But, so far, I have found some bugs in iOS 17 to display interactive widget content once they are added. They often stay blank with a white background. Rebooting doesn't help. I don't know if it is an iOS 17 bug or an issue with the app. 🤔 One design issue: if an app supports the StandBy mode1, it should also support the landscape orientation, not only the portrait orientation. Tapping a widget to launch the app and the app comes up in portrait mode. It's bad. WaterMinder is such an example, and... Apple's Stocks app! The latter is inexcusable. In general, StandBy mode seems a work-in-press, to be honest.2

  1. this is how the StandBy mode is triggered on the iPhone. ↩

  2. Make no mistake, I do like it a lot, though.  ↩

2023-09-18 ∞

Playing with recently updated apps and their respective interactive widgets. They all come out to their default view. Rebooting the iPhone is mandatory to fix this issue. Adding another widget and again defaults to the blank screen.🤦🏻‍♂️ iOS 17.0.1, I guess, will help fix this.

2023-09-18 ∞

It's going to be a big phone. Got my Peak Design iPhone case yesterday😃. I like it. Great design1 and nice feeling to the touch.

  1. I worry a bit about the effectiveness of the case buttons when pressed against the iPhone's buttons. Lack of "travel" will diminish the pressing effect.  ↩

2023-09-19 ∞

Review of Reviews: Great Updates to Already Great iPhone but...

Today, I read many iPhone 15 Pro reviews and watched many YouTube videos too. For some reason, I get the feeling of a slight deception mood across many reviewers. Those are great upgrades, but since they are compared to last year's iPhone, the improvements are dimmed as mostly minor. A mentioned the superiority of the iPhone in the video recording field, but in the photography field, it's less clear. Sharpening seems a tad less aggressive with more natural tones. The 24MP resolution by default is a welcomed addition, and yet... it's not a home run. Device physical tweaks are unanimously welcomed, though. Maybe tomorrow, my interpretation will be different. 🤷🏻‍♂️

2023-09-19 ∞

How I Automatically Include a Blog Description in My RSS Feed

I’ve been asked a couple of times how I get this short site description to be included in every entry of my RSS feed.

I'm one of those curious who asked the question. Wondering if this could be addressed via a new plugin by @Mtt or by @manton Micro.blog base service.

2023-09-20 ∞

Where's The Magic in Adaptive Audio?

Adaptive Audio and Conversation Awareness don't click for me

I've been using Apple's new AirPods features for the past week, and I'm sad to say that I don't really understand either of them

I'm with Matt here. I fail to find the magic here. I've read Gruber's take on the AirPods Pro 2 with USB-C, and I'm afraid I don't feel anything magical about Adaptive Audio. When activated, I hear too much from the surroundings; I prefer noise cancellation. Can we get adaptive noise cancellation instead? 🤔

I feel that Apple's engineers couldn't figure out which new audio profiles to include and couldn't decide, and they suggested including both. Then, the marketing guys came in and named these profiles Adaptive Audio and Conversation Awareness. Boom. I'm half-joking here.

I'll keep trying in the next few days to find the magic.

2023-09-20 ∞

I Rarely Visit the App Store

I opened the App Store this Monday to see how Apple would promote new app releases supporting iOS 17. Then I realized that I rarely open the App Store except to go and get app updates. When was the last time I went to browse the productivity category? When did I last browse the store for popular photography apps or new utilities? I can’t even remember when I last bought an app discovered in the App Store1. I wonder if this is only me or reflects a more general trend.🤔

  1. I usually make my discoveries by external reference. ↩

2023-09-21 ∞

My iPhone 15 Pro Max is still in “Preparing to ship” state. Delivery is scheduled for tomorrow. I’m guessing the device is waiting in a warehouse somewhere near Toronto or in Canada. 🙏🏻🤓

2023-09-21 ∞

My expectations for the iPhone 15 Pro Max fit and finish and how it feels in my hands are very high. I'm looking for something similar to the iPhone 4s, iPhone 5 and iPhone 7 feelings... those never were matched by subsequent iPhones.

2023-09-21 ∞

Episode 04 — Did You Know?

Inspired by a recent podcast episode where Martin Feld interviewed John Gruber, for this fourth podcast episode, I decided to talk about my early years as a blogger.

Links:

Audio 2023-09-21 ∞

It took way too long to record, process and publish my latest podcast episode. I must tweak my workflow ASAP. It was supposed to be a "quick and easy thing", but it isn't. It is unsustainable. 😑 Why is everything so hard for me.. grrr. 😒

2023-09-21 ∞

When Journalists Aren't Any Better Than ChatGPT

In the "Craptacular Is More Like It" article, this is @gruber@mastodon.social at its best. I read the original article earlier this week and concluded that Apple had difficult times ahead with its modem development. This morning, in my usual reading routine, I read the article from Mr. Gruber, and I think it succeeds in demonstrating this: the original article wasn't any better than any ChatGPT-generated content.

Now I feel that I was deceived by the journalist who tried to fill me with unverified and barely possible facts tied together based on thin air. And you would think journalists can do better than AI-generated work? Not always. Thanks to Mr. Gruber for that one.

2023-09-22 ∞

iPhone 15 Pro Max - First Impressions

It feels great in hand, similar in fact to the weight of my iPhone 13 Pro (not the Max), which is great. The back is darker than my iPhone 11 Pro, and I love it. I'm quite happy with the darker black. It's a bit darker than I thought. It's definitively a finger magnet. It’s very soft to the touch. Rounded contours are really making a difference. The device feels more approachable. The screen is so nice. The setup process is superbly executed. An update to iOS was required before transferring the content from my iPhone 13 Pro. Yet, there were many apps which required reentering my credentials. Data transfer was estimated at one hour1. The data transfer took about 45 minutes. The Always On display is... always on. 😳 I don't know if I'll keep that option... on.

  1. At that point, the WiFi logo disappeared and I started wondering if the data was going through 5G instead. That was curious. It's not possible because my new phone didn't have the SIM call installed yet. Or maybe it was going through Bluetooth or through a point-to-point WiFi connection?  ↩

2023-09-22 ∞

Well, now one of my Apple Watch1 won’t pair with my new iPhone since the migration was completed yesterday. It’s the one that I wasn’t wearing. Rebooting the watch doesn’t help. Rebooting the phone doesn’t help. Now what? 🤔

  1. I’ve got two: a Series 6 for the night, a Series 8 for the day.  ↩

2023-09-23 ∞

Now it's confirmed: my Finch Lavalier microphone1 doesn't work with Apple's USB-C to Lightning adaptor with the iPhone 15 Pro USB-C post. I repeat: it doesn't work. It's the first official and confirmed victim of the transition to USB-C. I'll have to figure out a new solution for my podcast and YouTube video recording2. 😡

  1. a third-party review here ↩

  2. the iPhone's microphone with voice isolation could be enough.  ↩

2023-09-23 ∞

😏 I'm about to begin something special that I can't wait to share with you before the end of the week-end. I hope everything works fine1. 👀

  1. Wish me luck. Or, wish "us" look would be more appropriate!  ↩

2023-09-23 ∞

The first few iPhone 15 Pro Max images are making their way onto Glass. Mine included. 👈🏻

2023-09-23 ∞

My Interview with Manton Reece of Micro.blog

I had the chance to spend some time with Manton Reece and ask him a few questions about Montreal’s poutine, Apple’s power and the App Store, Twitter1 and the future of Micro.blog. I hope you enjoy the interview as much as I did doing it.😊

  1. I refuse to name this otherwise. ↩

2023-09-24 ∞

Here is my weekly creative summary newsletter for 2023/38, in Craft format. Website and newsletter coming up soon. 😅👨🏻‍💻

2023-09-24 ∞

I finally found THE use case for the Action Button: running a shortcut1 to 1) take a screen capture and 2) run the Apple Frame shortcut. It's super handy. The camera already has a button on the screen that is easier to grab when I want to take a picture.

  1. Haptly named "Action Button".  ↩

2023-09-24 ∞

Shot on iPhone 15 Pro Max with the telephoto lens, at 25x digital zoom. The best I could do with a lot of post-processing tweaks (tweaked the saturation, highlight, contrast, sharpening, noise reduction, etc.) 😅

2023-09-24 ∞

The usefulness of ChatGPT for me is as a replacement for using Google when I have to learn something new (eg an API). Formerly, I would have Googled, and then visited a bunch of results, and learnt a little on each page until I had built up an answer for myself.

I see ChatGPT as a Google mashup. It takes those Google results, and mixes them up to give me a more direct answer to my question. Previously, my own brain would have to do that mashup.

I do exactly the same but for a subject that I don't really know. I'm curious to know if Google's traffic is affected by this change of behaviour.

2023-09-25 ∞

I read in recent days that the Craft team is supposedly very interested and invested in AI for Craft. I'm not sure if this is good news. Notes and document-writing apps should focus on the core experience and capabilities to support the writing process. Today, I don't see AI at the core for most people (yet). AI should be a complementary feature. There are so many things to be improves and fixed in Craft; I'm afraid they spend too much time on the AI stuff while neglecting the bugs and highly requested basic features, again.😔

2023-09-25 ∞

Why do I always feel nervous when changing my Apple ID password? 😨

2023-09-25 ∞

I've recently been using Apple's Freeform for different articles I'm working on. I'm really falling in love with this app. It's a sleeper hit for me. Its apparent simplicity shouldn't put you off. Freeform is capable of supporting the creation of rather sophisticated diagrams. I really feel Apple's designers brought all their craftsmanship and attention to detail here. Everything feels in the right place.

2023-09-26 ∞

The Mac is the last platform to get my trust for an upgrade of macOS. I do iPhone and iPad in a heartbeat, but the Mac, no. I wait a few weeks so that my must-have apps receive updates. I don't want to ruin anything by upgrading to Sonoma so soon. I'll probably wait until November.

2023-09-26 ∞

💡Thought of the day: I don’t have a thing like a second brain 🧠 using a dedicated app. It’s a popular concept nowadays to build a second brain utilizing an app like Craft, Obsidian or anything else. I don’t believe in the idea of having a second brain. But let’s suppose I believed in this concept; I would argue that my second brain is inside my MacBook Air, spread in different apps, fulfilling a specific task in supporting this idea of the second brain. ☝🏻

2023-09-27 ∞

My iPhone 15 Pro Max is not overheating. But I find those reports, as reported here, a bit worrying. Could Apple fix or mitigate these occurrences with a software update or a new configuration toggle in the Settings.app? Did you experience overheating issues?

2023-09-28 ∞

FineWoven case-gate. Titanium-scratch-gate. Overheating-gate. What's next for the iPhone 15 Pro?1

  1. so far, no issue with the Max!  ↩

2023-09-28 ∞

I'm weak. 🤦🏻‍♂️

2023-09-28 ∞

Testing a post from Micro.blog as a web app 1 running on macOS Sonoma.

  1. Is this how we should call a web page saved in the macOS Dock? ↩

2023-09-28 ∞

Already at Four Web Apps in My Dock, and You?

So far, I have created four web apps on my Dock in Sonoma: Micro.blog1, Pixelfed2, Tinylytics, and Omnivore. I like this a lot3. For Omnivore, the web app provides a better experience than the "native" app, which is probably not really native4. What other apps could I set in my Dock now?🤔

  1. For Micro.blog, it doesn't make too much sense as there is a native Mac app already. ↩

  2. It's better than having a Safari tab for that. It's fast and feels native.  ↩

  3. I know, it's already possible on Windows.  ↩

  4. It feels like an iPad app on the Mac.  ↩

2023-09-28 ∞

What happens when you run Micro.blog.app and the web app side by side? Here is a peek at Activity Monitor on the memory consumption tab. There's the native app. Fine. But, for each web app, Sonoma seems to spin three other processes (Graphics, Networking, and some root process using the web app URL name). Fascinating. Native apps don't consume as much memory.

2023-09-28 ∞

Rewind is nice, but this is such a resource hog. Battery life is miserable since I run this thing on my MacBook Air. Is it worth it, just for a few possible queries a month?1

  1. I fail to see more than 2-3 use cases so far.  ↩

2023-09-28 ∞

When adding widgets on macOS Sonoma, there should be a visual cue telling me which widgets are coming from the iPhone vs from installed apps on my Mac. This screenshot shows two Dayone instances, and Fitness Totals is on my iPhone.☝🏻

2023-09-29 ∞

I've been working on my reading workflow for many months. I'm very close to publishing an article about it. While waiting for it, along the way, I created a comparison of the following read-later services:

  • Matter
  • Pocket
  • Raindrop.io
  • Readwise Reader
  • Omnivore

You can download it here: https://go.numericcitizen.me/pFscoL0x. Any comments, suggestions?

2023-09-29 ∞

Currently testing Safari profiles. I kind of like it so far. Still exploring. Currently devising work from personal life. I will probably create one for my YouTube video recording sessions too. Are you using Safari profiles? Are you using Safari at all, I might ask?

2023-09-29 ∞

What a Strange iCloud Drive Bug!

I have a folder named "Noto" in my iCloud Drive folder that keeps populating empty folders inside of it, on all my devices. Noto is a note-taking app that I tried in Feb. 2020. Today, I found out that I had more than 30K empty folders sitting there. I deleted the folders from my Mac mini, and it came back. Same with the MacBook Air. It came back. I visited all my devices to see if Noto was still installed. Nope. I reinstalled it on the iPad to see if it would populate something. Nope. I went on Files.app on the iPad to delete the root folder. Still re-appearing. On all my devices, I reinstalled Noto, to disable iCloud sync. I visited the iCloud storage section within Settings on the iPhone. The Noto folder isn't there. But, on the iPad, it was there. I deleted the item from iCloud storage management. Yet, the folder keeps coming back. What a strange bug. Help.

Update: the issue went away after rebooting my M2 MacBook Air to fix an issue with Screenflow screen recording permission request. I went back to the iCloud Drive folder and sure enough, the Noto folder didn't come back. I guess the issue is resolved.

2023-09-29 ∞

Announcing "My Reading Workflow Explained"

I'm finally publishing the details surrounding my reading workflow. It's been long in the making. More than a year. The reason? Because this workflow was full of moving parts. One example: is the read-later service. First, it was Pocket, then came Matter, Readwise, to finally settle on Omnivore. All the details are here on the Numeric Citizen I/O metablog. Feel free to comment or ask questions! 😊

2023-10-01 ∞