January 2012

October 2012 | MUGSHOT Newsletter | 1

A message fromNC— I’m writing this, even though it reveals some poor decisions on my part, to hopefully save you from some of the computer pain I am experiencing. Some time back I be-gan to have problems that required me to power off and restart my MacPro in order to proceed from the dreaded spinning beach ball. This was happening primarily when I was working in iPhoto.  I also noticed that at times Super Duper would not back up my data drive. (I have one drive for data and another for OSX, applications, librar-ies etc.) I diagnosed this as a bad drive and put in a new one. I cloned my backup data drive to the new

drive which I named “ndata” and began to use it. Naively, I left the old data drive in its bay thinking that it would do no harm since I was not using it. My machine began to act up again and I began to power off and restart it  again. This time, I took it to the new “MAC and PC Repair” store on Silver Springs Blvd. They checked it out and said they had to repair a lot of permissions and replace some corrupted system files and it was running OK. I took it home and it ran OK until I launched iPhoto. It began to have problems again. I began to wonder about the repair shop as well as about the computer. I talked to Phil and together we surmised that maybe boosting my RAM from 4 GB to 8GB would solve the problem. Maybe it was caused by my iPhoto file being so huge (over 35,000 images). I ordered another 4 GB of Ram from OWC on a Thursday evening. It was shipped (free) on Friday and arrived Monday!

I called  “MAC and PC Repair”  and told them I was going to install the extra ram and I would call again if that didn’t fix it. Anthony (co-owner with his wife Cristy)   told me to bring it in and they would install the ram at no charge. (I had already paid them $255). I took it in the next day and they installed the ram and ran some tests, They concluded that the drive I had left in, even though I was not using it, was causing problems. I could have just had them remove it, but since I hoped to be able to recover some data to replace the bad data on my new data drive, I bought a new drive and they installed it. They ran some more tests and pronounced the computer fixed. They did not charge me for installing the new drive or checking it out the second time, They seem to be very nice folks and they said to tell ........Editors note— NC’s message is an important one and I’m breaking it here, to continue on page 8 .....................

Key articles.....

Controlling your home with a touch of an iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch— page 3.

Malware on a Mac??? Understanding Gatekeeper in Mountain Lion— page 4.

How Can I Repair My Hard Drive If My Mac Won’t Start? — page 7.

October 2012

Next Meeting - Oct. 9, 2012: 7 PMBatteries For Your Mobile Devices

—presenter, Burt Stephens

October 2012

| MUGSHOT Newsletter | 2

External Backup Drive Tipsby Phil Davis

Talking to your Mac – using Dictation from Mac OS X Mountain Lion New with Mountain Lion is the Dictation feature, which translates your speech into text. Turn on Dictation by opening any applica-tion that supports it—just create a new document and go to the Edit menu and choose Start Dictation. Otherwise, you can open System Preferences, go to Dictation & Speech, and select Dictation there. m Be ready to see warnings pop up from Apple: your spoken words must be sent to Apple, where they’re converted into text and returned to you. When you use Dictation, Apple learns something about your Mac and keeps a record of what you say. When you switch off Dictation in the Dictation & Speech preference, your user data is removed from the Apple servers, so if you’re concerned about the security of your information, that’s a way to clear it out quickly.m To begin dictating, be sure to speak clearly—you don’t have to speak slowly, but don’t mumble. You’ll also have to speak the punctuation you want to use, so you’ll have to say the words “period” and “comma” where you want them to appear in the sentence. m Click Done, or remain silent for several seconds, to see your words transcribed. When the Mac isn’t clear about what you’ve said, a blue line appears under the questionable word, and you can go back in and correct it. To continue dictating, go back into Edit and select Start Dictation again or use the key-board shortcut: press fn (Function key) twice. You can also go back into System Preferences and change the shortcut. m m m m

As everyone knows by now having an external drive to backup your irreplaceable files is an important part of your computer setup. In the past I have talked about options for backing up using TimeMachine for versioned backups and Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper! for clone backups (http://ocalamug.org/wp1/learning-center/backup-tips/).

Once you have convinced yourself that backups are a good thing, you then are faced with the question “What external drive should I get?” The answer to this question depends upon several things:

1. Size of drive 2. Type of drive 3. Type of interface 4. Where to buy it 5. How to format it

Size of DriveStart by determining the size of your internal hard drive. If you don’t know this you can easily find it by clicking on the Apple logo in the menu bar and selecting “About This Mac.”

You will need to buy a drive that is at least 1 ½ times the size of your internal drive for TimeMachine backups and 1 times the size for clone backups.

Type of driveExternal drives can be bus-powered (no external A/C power source needed) or A/C powered. Unless you need the small size and portability of the bus-powered drive you should probably opt for the larger A/C powered drive. These usually have better cooling and therefore should be more reliable over time. If possible choose a 7200 RPM drives to get the faster transfer rates they provide.

Type of InterfaceYou must choose between USB (slowest), Firewire 400 or 800, or Thunderbolt (fastest). Many external drives include both USB and Firewire so that you have the ability to choose in case your computer doesn’t support Firewire. Thunderbolt equiped drives are hard to find and expensive, so the best choice for most people is a drive with Firewire or with USB+Firewire. An additional advantage that Firewire and Thunderbolt interfaces have is the ability to connect multiple drives in a “daisy-chain.” You can have two or more external drives connected to a single port on your computer.

Where to Buy a DriveYou can purchase good external drives from local stores, from on-line computer component suppliers, from Amazon, and even from eBay. However, unless you buy from a store that specializes in Mac, your drive will prob-ably be formatted for a PC. It will also have a lot of unneeded software on it. If this is the case, then you should reformat it for Mac compatibility and to remove the useless software.

One on-line supplier that I have had good luck with, and that sells Mac-formatted drives, is Other World Comput-ing (http://www.macsales.com), but there are other good ones out there.

How To Format Your DriveThis is a simple procedure and is achieved the same way for all drive types and through all connections, be they USB, Firewire, or Thunderbolt. Formatting a drive will erase all data, software, and partitions on the disk:

• Connect the external hard drive to the Mac • Launch Disk Utility, located in Applications > Utilities • Locate the new external drive name from the left hand side of Disk Utility and click on it • Click on the “Erase” tab across the top • Next to “Format:” click the contextual menu and select “Mac OS Extended (Journaled)” • Name the drive if you want, the name can be changed at any point • Click the “Erase” button and confirm again on the next pop-up window

Smaller external hard drives, SSD’s, and USB flash keys format quickly, while a larger hard drive may take a while longer. When completed, the drive will be formatted to the Mac OS X compatible HFS+ filesystem.

Final Step—Now that you have your clean, fast, formatted external hard drive, it is time to start using it for regular backups.

Some typical OWC drives shown

October 2012

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Controlling Your Home With The Touch Of An iPadby Morgan Brennan, Forbes Magazine

out a house, attaching music to the cloud service so those songs can be accessed and played from any-where in the home. Pricing for products runs the gamut,  from in-stallations of single rooms with simple controls to entire mansions fitted with every automation pos-sibility. “In the past home automation was only for luxury homes because there was a cost barrier,” ex-plains Madonna, swiping his finger across his iPad to fiddle with the programming on four conjoined television screens in the  so-called sports bar. “With the iPad and iPhone, those costs are getting lower so the average homeowner can now afford to put automation directly into the home for security, light-ing control, and entertainment.”

More developers and homeowners, including Kevin Jonas of the Jonas Brothers, have been install-ing these systems. The global home automation industry is projected to grow from  $16.9 billion in 2011 to $35.6 billion by 2016, according to Market-sandMarkets. And while only about 3% of homes in the U.S. currently tout automation systems, that per-centage is expected to grow by double-digit rates in the coming years, according to an analysis by Re-uters. “Anyone who can afford to buy an iPhone can es-sentially have a piece of automation in their home,” adds Madonna. m m m m Check out the video here!

When you step off the elevator into the 8,000-square foot Savant Experience Center, it feels less like a showroom and

more like a swanky Manhattan abode. “We wanted to develop  a space where technology blended in with the environment,” says Robert Madonna, chief executive of Savant Systems, a Hyannis, Mass.-based home automation company.   ”We built a high-end New York City ‘apartment’ and…everything is automated.” The Savant Experience Center, which took eight months to craft and opened in July, was de-signed by Thom Filicia of  TV show “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” fame. It hosts a master bedroom with a walk-in closet, a loft-like living room, a Theo Kalomirakis-designed home theater, even a sports bar. But the real draw isn’t the lavish layout (which also has a hotel room, an office and a classroom); it’s the technology that covertly operates the space.  Ev-ery “room” in the center is automated by Savant Sys-tems and easily controlled with Apple products like iPads, iPhones and iPod Touch-embedded remote controls. Toting an iPad himself, Robert Madonna offers a tour of the mock smart home. We start in the living room,where he pulls up a picture of the room on the tablet’s screen, courtesy of Savant’s TrueImage soft-ware. His finger taps a digital recreation of the floor lamp that flanks the couch. The lamp immediately lights up. He taps on more room fixtures, changing the color of the sconces bordering the fireplace and closing the window shades.  We proceed through the center, remotely adjusting lights, monitoring room temperature, checking power usage, even summoning a hidden flat screen television out of the master bedroom’s dresser. The technology works remotely from anywhere in the world. If you have an internet connection, you can control the home. Want the air conditioning running when you walk through the door on a hot summer day, flick it on using your iPhone. Madonna   founded the company seven years ago on the belief that home automation should translate into a user-friendly experience — a con-cept that has made Apple into a $632 billion pow-erhouse. For that reason Savant’s products are 100% Apple-based. (It is the only automation company that is.)  Software and hardware rolled out of Apple’s Cupertino, Calif. headquarters are eventually adapt-ed by Savant for home use. With the iCloud, for ex-ample, the company can distribute audio through-

Ten Tips for Successful Voice Dictation

Kirk McElhearn has written this article for TidBITS.The basics of how to activate dictation in Mountain Lion and iOS — The 10 techniques listed with more detail in the article are:m Speak slowly, evenly, and clearly.m Think about what you are going to say before you start.m Dictate in short sentences or phrases, but complete sentences and clauses.m In a noisy environment use a standalone microphone.m Speak all punctuation.m Say the “apostrophe” for a possessive.m Spell words or abbreviations slowly.m In iOS capitalize words by saying “cap” before the word to be capitalized.m Edit errors from the keyboard. (Except in Dragon Dictate)

There is even a bonus tip in the full article.  There is also more detail and some suggestions specific for Dragon Dictate. See the full extensive article here

A. Sypher

October 2012

Changing Notification Types in Notification Center by ChrisB, Basics4Mac

you have to edit each app separately. m m m m

| MUGSHOT Newsletter | 4

Notification Center shows on-screen banners and alerts when they come in and is a way to see all of your previous alerts. You can set on an app by app basis, how notifications work for that app. To change Notification Center settings, go to the Notifications panel of System Preferences—The left pane shows all apps that can send notifications to Notifica-tion Center. Select an app from the list and edit that app’s settings on the right. Here are the options for each app:• Alert Style. If you choose None there is never an on-screen ban-ner but the alert will still show in

Understanding Gatekeeper in Mountain Lion)By:Chris B, Basics4Mac

be one of the primary ways that Mac users acquire new apps. The existence of the Mac App store split Mac apps into two categories – those certified by Apple as safe, and everybody else. The “everybody else” category was a bit broad though. As people began to see apps from the Mac Apps Store as safe, they began to think of “everybody else” as unsafe. The fact of the matter is that there are many le-gitimate Mac apps that aren’t available in the Mac App Store. Some app developers don’t want to sell their apps in the Mac App Store or they can’t be-cause their app breaks some of the very strict re-quirements to be allowed into the Mac App Store. Really, “everybody else” can be broken down into two categories: legit apps by legit developers and the shadowy apps that no one knows much about. Here is where Gatekeeper enters the picture. Apple has created a system where developers can apply for a “certificate” to include with their apps. Apple doesn’t check out the apps that include a cer-tificate to make sure they don’t have any malware, but Apple does have the contact info and credit card information of the developer which makes it much less likely that a developer with a certificate is going to do anything bad with their apps.

When you download an app and run it for the first time, Gatekeeper takes a look a where the app came from and decides if the Mac can open it. You have three options for how Gatekeeper operates:• At its most strict setting, Gatekeeper will only al-low the Mac to open apps from the Mac App Store.• At the middle setting, Gatekeeper will only al-low the Mac to open apps from the Mac App Store or from a developer with a valid certificate. This is Gatekeeper’s default setting and probably a safe one.• The most open setting of Gatekeeper will allow any app from any source to be opened. If an app is going to contain a Trojan Horse, it will most prob-ably fit into this category.You can change Gatekeeper’s settings in General view of the Security & Privacy panel of System Prefs. m m

Notification Center. A Banner slides in, stays for a few seconds and then slides away. An Alert stays on the screen until you click a button to dis-miss it.• If you uncheck the Show in Notifi-cation Center box, the app moves to the bottom of the app list and you re-ceive neither on-screen banners nor a listing in Notification Center.• You can also turn on or off icon badges (the little number that shows on an icon on the Dock such as the number of unread messages in Mail.)• You can turn on or off sounds when an on-screen notification ap-pears.Unfortunately there isn’t any way to turn Notification Center on or off for all apps—

Back in the good old days, you never had to worry about malware on a Mac. The past couple of years,

however, have brought what seems like a steady stream of security issues. One of the most common ways that a person gets malware onto their Mac is by something called a Trojan Horse. A Trojan Horse is an app that pretends to do one thing but in-stead installs malware on your Mac. A Trojan Horse can’t do its damage alone. You have to download an app and run it for the malware to be in-stalled. Apple has taken security of the Mac very seriously the past couple of years. Gatekeeper is a new fea-ture of Mountain Lion that helps you avoid installing a Trojan Horse on your Mac.. In January 2011, Apple opened the Mac App Store as a way to pro-vide apps for the Mac that were cer-tified by Apple to be safe and mal-ware free. Over the past year and a half, the Mac App Store has grown to

October 2012

| MUGSHOT Newsletter | 5

MEMBER’S SHOWCASE

Create a Pseudo Pen-and-Ink Drawing— by Phil Davis“Have you ever wanted a stylish pen-and-ink drawing of your house that you could frame and display? If you are like me and are “artistically-challenged” the option of creating this from scratch is not on the table.”

m Using a little Photoshop magic, you can create a good facsimile of a drawing that might be suitable for framing.m There are many ways to do this, but try this. Start with the suggested settings and then play around with it to tailor the final image to your liking. Other versions of PS Elements or Photoshop can also be used with slight modifications.

Equipment & Software used:Mac Mini, Mountain Lion, Photoshop Elements 10 software

Step 1: Convert from color to black-and-white–1. Open your color image in PSE2. Copy background layer (CMD-J)3. Name this duplicate layer “working”3. Save the file as a PSD (Photoshop) file4. Select the “working” layer3. Select Enhance > adjust color > color variations4. Under “select area of image to adjust” select “saturation”.5. Under “adjust color intensity” move Amount slider all the way to the right.6. Click the “less saturation” thumbnail under image twice to remove all color.7. Select Shadows > click on Darken thumbnail at bottom right.8. Click OK9. Save your file (CMD+S)

Step 2: Apply adjustments–1. Copy the “working”layer (CMD+J)2. Name this duplicate layer “adjustments”3. Select stylize > filter > find edges4. Set opacity to 100%5. Set blending mode to lighten6. Save your file (CMD+S)

Step 3: Apply sharpening and contrast–1. Copy the “adjustments”layer (CMD+J)2. Name this duplicate layer “sharpen”3. Select Enhance > unsharp mask (100% / 1px / 0 threshold)4. Select Layers > new adjustment layer > brightness/contrast5. Move the contrast slider to +506. Move the brightness slider to -507. Save your file (CMD+S)

Step 4: Create the final product–1. Select File > “Save-as” to create a printable JPG file, or—2. Select File > “Save for web” to create a version for the web m m m m

Original

Conversion

Detail

Editor’s note: I did a quick test of Phil’s technique by using a color photo of a moose horn. The only departure from Phil’s steps was to tweak levels a bit and add a light tan overtint. Play with it... the variables are endless.

October 2012

| MUGSHOT Newsletter | 6

From DVD to iMovie to Facebook by Christopher Breen, Macworld.com

Question: I want to take home-made video of my concert per-formance from a DVD, get it into iMovie, edit clips, and post the clips on Facebook. How do I do that? The first step is to extract video from your DVD. The tool to use is the free Handbrake. This fine tool was designed to extract and convert video from DVDs. Once you’ve downloaded your copy, launch it, and in the navigation sheet that appears, select the DVD, choose the VIDEO_TS folder, and click on Open. Handbrake will scan

the DVD and seek out the main title. If there’s just the one title, you’re in business. If not, click on the Title pop-up menu and choose that main title. In the Presets pane choose the Apple TV 2 pre-set and click the Start button. By default Handbrake will save the resulting H.264 movie to your Mac’s desktop. Now launch iMovie and create a new project (File -> New Project). From the File menu choose Import -> Movies. If an HD Import Setting window appears, choose the option to import the Full Origi-nal Size movie and click OK. In the sheet that ap-pears, navigate to the movie you just ripped with Handbrake and click Import. iMovie will go about its business and eventually import the clip—either into an existing event or a new event, if you’ve cho-sen that option. Now that it’s in iMovie you can work your edit-ing magic on it to create clips. When you’re satisfied with your work, choose Share -> Facebook, enter your Facebook login information, choose the ex-port resolution of your clip, click Next, and upload your clip. m m m m

Shrink Preview files without ruining image qualityby Kirk McElhearn, Macworld.com Savvy Preview users know they can do some inter-esting things to PDFs—convert them to black-and-white or sepia tone, increase or decrease their light-ness, and more—by selecting File -> Export, then selecting one of the Quartz filters in the resulting dialog box. Reader zpjet is one of those users, but he was never satisfied with results of the Reduce File Size filter (which he’d use when trying to make PDFs small enough to send by e-mail): It made them too small and made the graphics fuzzy. After a little digging around, he found that these filters are located in the folder /System/Library/Fil-ters, and that they’re XML files that are easily edited with TextEdit (or any other text editor). Examining the file for the Reduce File Size filter, he found out why it didn’t work for him: Two of the parameters—Compression Quality and ImageSizeMax—were just too low (0.0 and 512, respectively). So he copied this file to his Desktop, made two copies of it, and then renamed all three: Reduce File Size Good, Reduce File Size Better, and Reduce File Size Best. Then he changed the parameters of each file: 0.25, 0.5 and 0.75 for Compression Quality (re-spectively) and 842, 1684, and 3508 for ImageSize-Max (ditto). (The first is A4-size at 72dpi, the second A4 at 144dpi, and the third A4 at 300dpi). Finally, he changed the default string for the Name key at the end of each file—which is what displays in the Export menu—to match its file name. He then created a /Library/Filters folder and put all three edited files in it. Now, when he opens a picture or PDF in Pre-view, he has the option of four Reduce File Size fil-ters. So, for example, let’s say he’s starting with a JPEG of a scanned A4 invoice at 300dpi, and that file is 1.6MB in size. When he exports that to PDF for-mat with the standard Reduce File Size filter, the file goes down to 27KB, but it’s quite unusable—fuzzy and hard to read. Using the Good filter produces a file that is much easier to read and only slightly fuzzy, and it weighs in at 80KB. A file produced with the Better filter comes out at 420KB and clear; Best is 600KB and almost as good as the original. m m m

THIS ‘n thatan eclectic 2-pages of tips, tricks and general good stuff!

The FAA has approved American Airlines to be the first commercial airline to have its pilots use iPads in “all phases of flight,” rather than the 35lb paper reference manuals they’re used to. Based on current fuel prices, The Next Web estimates that this will save the airline some $1.2M annually, across all of its aircraft. This month, AA’s 777 fleet will be the first to get the technological upgrade; by the end of this year, all fleet types are expected to have approval for the switch and the paper manuals will cease to be revised. This is a huge environmentally friendly move for AA: not only will the ligher tablets save fuel, based on the weight carried by the planes, but they will also save the paper needed for every manual traditionally printed and revised, company-wide. m m m m

A Quote:

“Everyone who has ever taken a shower has had an idea. It’s the person who gets out of

the shower, dries off, and does something about it that makes a difference.”

— Nolan Bushnell, Atari founder

October 2012

THIS ‘n that • THIS ‘n that • THIS ‘n that • THIS ‘n that —p2

| MUGSHOT Newsletter | 7

To boot from your OS X Install DVD, insert the DVD into your Mac, and then restart your Mac while holding down the letter ‘c’ key. Once your Mac finishes booting, use Disk Util-ity’s First Aid feature to verify and repair your hard drive. Or if you have more serious drive issues, check out our guide to Reviving a Hard Drive for Use With Your Mac.Boot Using Safe ModeTo start up in Safe Mode, hold down the shift key and then start your Mac. Safe Mode takes a while, so don’t be alarmed when you don’t see the desk-top right away. While you’re waiting, the operating system is verifying the directory structure of your startup volume, and repairing it, if necessary. It will also delete some of the startup caches that may also be preventing your Mac from starting success-fully. Once the desktop appears, you can access and run Disk Utility’s First Aid tool just as you normally would. When First Aid is finished, restart your Mac normally. Please note that not all applications and OS X features will work when you boot into Safe Mode. You should use this startup mode only for trouble-shooting and not for running day-to-day applica-tions.Boot Into Single User ModeStart up your Mac and immediately hold down the command key plus the letter ‘s’ key (command + s). Your Mac will start up in a special environment that looks like an old-fashioned command line interface (because that’s exactly what it is). At the command line prompt, type the follow-ing: /sbin/fsck –fyPress return or enter after you type the above line. Fsck will start and display status messages about your startup disk. When it finally finishes (this can take a while), you will see one of two messages. The first indicates that no problems were found.** The volume xxxx appears to be OK.

The second message indicates that problems were encountered and fsck attempted to correct the er-rors on your hard drive.***** FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED *****

If you see the second message, you should repeat the fsck command again. Continue to repeat the command until you see the “volume xxx appears to be OK” message.If you don’t see the volume OK message after five or more attempts, your hard drive has serious problems that it may not be able to recover from. m m m m

Work at a desk and own an iPhone? There are some stylish dock designs for you — these devices turn your Apple smartphone into a landline-style phone, complete with standalone handset for as low as $32. Whether you seek rad retro styling or minimalist modern looks, there’s a dock to suit your personal style in our roundup. Go here for a full run-down.

How Can I Repair My Hard Drive If My Mac Won’t Start?By Tom Nelson, About.com GuideQuestion: How Can I Repair My Hard Drive If My Mac Won’t Start?My Mac fails to start up and just ends up displaying the blue screen. Or it may log in but then fail to show the desktop. I’ve heard I should run Repair Disk, but I can’t do that when my Mac won’t start. What can I do?Answer: When a Mac fails to start up normally, one of the common troubleshooting practices is to verify and repair the startup drive. A startup drive that is experiencing problems is likely to prevent your Mac from starting, so you may find yourself in a catch 22. You need to run Disk Utility’s First Aid tools, but you can’t get to Disk Utility because your Mac won’t start.There are three methods of getting around this problem—m Booting from a different device. This can be another hard drive that has a bootable system on it, or your OS X Install DVD, which also contains the Disk Utility tools.m Safe Mode. This is a special boot-ing method that forces your Mac to perform an automatic disk check and repair as it tries to start up.m Single User Mode (fsck). This is another special startup method that allows you to run command line util-ities, such as fsck, which can verify and repair hard drives. Boot From Alternate DeviceThe easiest solution by far is to boot from a different device. The three most popular options are another bootable hard drive, an emergency startup device, such as a bootable USB flash device, or a current OS X Install DVD. To boot from another hard drive or a USB flash device, hold down the option key and start up your Mac. The OS X startup manager will ap-pear, allowing you to select the de-vice to boot from.

Screen Capture in QuickTimeBy Kali Hilke, SmallDog.comRecently, I wanted to capture a set of commands to create a video tutorial, and I was ready to download a third party application to help me record them. Turns out, in Snow Leopard and later, QuickTime (v10+) does just that — and it’s included in the OS.• Screen Recording mode is located under File > New Screen Recording• Once the window pops up, access the audio input, quality, and mouse icon settings under the arrow in the bottom righthand corner• Then, select which best suits your video (I chose “None” since I intended to use text boxes instead)• Click the red button under Screen Recording to start your screen capture• You’ll be prompted to either record the whole screen or to select a portion of the screen to capture (If you select a portion of the screen to record, you’ll need to click Start Recording to begin)* — see conclusion on page 9 bottom

*Note that the exact prompts may differ depending on your OS. The author is using Mountain Lion.

October 2012

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A message from NC—continuedThey seem to be very nice folks and they said to tell ......... all of you “any-one who comes in and tells them they are a member of OMUG will get a 15% discount on repairs”. 

What did I learn from all this? 1. If your MAC starts to act up, fix it or get it fixed sooner rather than later. It may be corrupting files that you cannot replace EVEN IF YOU HAVE BACKUP (unless you have backup that the computer could not corrupt by copying the corrupt file over the backup) 2. I found a new place to get my computer serviced here in town. (They are Apple certified but are not an Apple authorized repair shop like GatorTec) 3. I found that a malfunctioning drive can cause you problems even if you think you are not using it. Don’t be lazy like I was and leave it in. Get rid of it.

4. I found that I have to improve my backup system and I’m not quite sure what to do about that yet. 5. Phil told me about a Take Control Book (Take Control of Troubleshooting Your Mac, Second Edition) that might have helped me while I was trying to diagnose the problems myself. It only costs $10 and I think OMUG members get a discount. I should have had it. 6. Doubling my RAM did speed up the process-ing of my machine but not as much as going to a SSD would have. It turned out that RAM was not the problem.

So, where am I now with all this?  1. I spent many hours inventorying the iPhoto files to see what was good and what was bad. I have hundreds of corrupt files. What I see when I try to look at these files is the file name and all the “exif data” in the info pane. I also see a thumbnail, but where the full resolution image should be, I see a black page with a  silver triangle in the center and a black exclamation point in the silver triangle. I have hundreds of these and the daily backup is the same because the corrupt files overwrote the good backups. 2. All the files that came from my iPhone camera have been restored because I have never

deleted a photo from my iPhone. (I’m glad I bought one with maximum memory.) 3. I haven’t got to them yet, but I think I have backups on CDs and/or DVDs for my early photos (before I installed my daily backup system). 4. My eye-fi memory card automatically, wirelessly updates files in my computer (outside iPhoto) so I have backups of most photos made since I acquired the eye-fi card in June, 2011. EXCEPTION: The 8 Gig card filled up by April 6th 2012. Instead of reformatting it immediately, I started using a non eye-fi card and did not resume using the eye fi card until June 4th 2012. I am missing well over a hundred important photos in that time frame and I have not found backups on anything else  so most of those are just gone.  I hope this painful episode will keep you from having the same type experience.

—NC Sizemore, President

Editors note— Additional information on back-up strategies is located on the OMUG website. See– http://ocalamug.org/wp1/learning-center/backup-tips/

A break from the serious.....

This is what happens when a group of photographers go to lunch.....

Disclaimer— The Apple logo is the property of Apple, Inc. The Windows logo is the property of Microsoft, Inc. All tradenames, trademarks, and registered trademarks used herein are the property of their respective owners or companies. The information presented in this newsletter is for the personal enlightenment of OMUG members and friends, does not constitute an endorsement, and is not to be used for commercial purposes.

Announcements & Introductions:  Vice-President Bob Adams welcomed 18 members and 4 guests. New member Stephanie Chabau joined at the meeting.

Secretary’s Report: Minutes of the August meeting were approved as published after corrections were made.

Treasurer’s Report: Brian reported that there is $1199.60 in the bank and $100.00 to add after the meeting.

Program: Creating a movie using iMovie. Presenter: Dr. Roberto Putzeys.Dr. Putzeys demonstrated how easy it is to make your own movies by actually making one at the meeting. He suggested that you first put photos, music and videos you have selected into a folder for easy access. You should do all your editing prior to adding to the folder so everything is ready to use. You can then click and drag the components into the project window of iMovie. You can rearrange the components by drag-ging them into place. If you want to publish your movie you must select the format you want to use. It is important to keep each component short so your finished product will not be overly long for the viewers. There is a lot of information on the web site, and in the “Help” section of iMovie. “Help” for iMovie, as well as “Help” for other programs is a great resource which we too often neglect to use.

Break: We enjoyed refreshments provided and served by Della Marteny, and more of Bob Holloran’s chocolate.

Tech Tips: Phil Davis has revised the web site for use with all your Mac devices. He discussed Basic Shortcuts and has provided a comprehensive list on the web. Text editing shortcuts were explained and demon-strated as well as an explanation of the ~ key. Want to know what it does? Check the web!

Create a shortcut for your email address using Language and Text in the System Preferences, make up non-standard answers to security questions or write your own questions, find your passwords in OS-X Password Assistant, find hidden choices in menu items by using the Option Key.

Workshop: Phil Davis held the first workshop of the year on Saturday, September 15. It was well attended and he covered many Basic Concepts for working with your Mac. Phil also provided “My Mac Cheat Sheet” a handy reference list of relevant information about your Mac, Email, User Accounts and Internet. This is available on the Web Site also, in case you did not receive one at the meeting. If you have not attended these workshops you should try to get there as Phil provides information, answers questions and demon-strates valuable Mac help. Word of the day: BACKUP!

Raffle Results: 50-50 Raffle: $25.00 to Bobby Adams • $25.00 gift card to Staples– Elaine Smith • Take Control ebook of your choice– Bobby Adams • Two jars of Bob Holloran’s fabulous chocolate– Sonja Lier

Meeting adjourned at 9 PM. Thanks to all who helped re-arrange the meeting room and put chairs away.

Respectfully submitted:  Nancy Kirby, OMUG Secretary

OMUG MEETING MINUTES: September 11th, 2012, called to order at 7 PM

October 2012 | MUGSHOT Newsletter | 9

OMUG Meeting Information—

The Ocala Mac User Group meets on the 2nd Tuesday of the month at:

St. George Anglican Cathedral— Parish Hall5646 SE 28th St., Ocala, FL 34471 See www.ocalamug.org for a map

OMUG Board of Directors—President– N.C. Sizemore ncsizemore@gmail.com • 291-8778 Vice President– Bobby Adams badams0993@gmail.com • 274.0177 Secretary– Nancy Kirby nkirby1944@embarqmail.comTreasurer– Judy Rankin judyrankin@mac.com • 821-2322 Director & Asst. Treasurer– Brian Voge voge.brian@gmail.com • 622-8581 Director– Philip Davis davistech@gmail.com • 369-8432Director– Burt Stephens burtstephens@gmail.com • 873-6177 Director– Al Sypher aes@imageocala.com • 237-9501Past President– Tim Rankin rank.tim@gmail.com • 821-2322

Mac Users Helping Mac Users—OMUG Tech Support Team volunteers will try to help with your computer and software problems.Please go to http://ocalamug.org/tech-team.html for a list of help topics and phone/email contacts for the following member volunteers: Bob Adams Philip Davis (email ONLY) Nancy Kirby Dr. Roberto Putzeys Judy Rankin Tim Rankin Brian Voge

OMUG Assignments—

Fifty-Fifty Raffle– Earl Satterfield Membership– Nancy Kirby MUGSHOT Newsletter– Al SypherProgram Coordinator– Burt StephensRefreshments– Della Marteny and Ed JaworowskiWebmaster and Apple Ambassador– Philip Davis

Oh... and one last thing— BEWARE: cybercrime cartels and terrorist organizations are seeing big returns by phishing with IRS, iTunes, and Turbotax phishing spoofs. BEWARE and do NOT CLICK.

Cover photo: This month’s pursuit of brilliant fall color takes us to North Carolina’s Smoky Mountains along the Blue Ridge Parkway— Page 3: Tumbling stream in Autumn splendor surround seen enroute to Cade’s Cove area— photos, A.Sypher

Conclusion of Screen capture in QuickTime article from page 7—• From there, everything you do will be captured, and you’ll be able to stop the recording by clicking the Stop icon or by pressing Command-Control-EscapeYou can then save the movie as 480p, 720p, or 1080p quality, and there are options for iPod touch, iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPad, Apple TV, and Mac and PC compatibility.QuickTime does a great job of producing a basic screen capture. If you find that you need more options, Camtasia is nice alternative, as well as the lighter-weight Jing.*Note that the exact prompts may differ depending on your OS. I am using Mountain Lion.