shownotes_20200621

Opening
  Opening Music
    Music is Say Anything by Manda and the Marbles
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News
  iPhone 12 blanks hint at design
    Maybe.
    “Blanks” are surfacing claiming to show what the design features of this years iPhone 12 update might look like
    The biggest most noticeable thing is the shape
      Flat edges like the current iPad Pro models and reminiscent of the iPhone 4 and iPhone 5
      Not clear if that means an all glass back or not
    The not seems to be the same and it does seem to confirm the sizes 5.4” iPhone 12 and 6.1” iPhone 12 Max, iPhone 12, 6.1” iPhone 12 Pro, and 6.7” iPhone 12 Pro Max.
    Some of the blanks seem to show all models with rear triple lens cameras, though I would imagine that could be wrong. Dual lens for the 12 and triple lens for the “Pro” models.
    A leak from EverythingApplePro is claiming that the highest end iPhone 12 Pro Max could be the only model to features Apple’s new LiDAR module.
    Leaker Jon Prosser has tweeted that Apple has built a prototype of a future foldable iPhone
      Though not what you think.
      Two displays with a hinge.
      Prototype has an iPhone 11 style design, but no notch. The outer display has a “tiny forehead” to house the camera system.
      Posser says when extended the two displays are fairly seamless and it doesn’t look like just two displays stuck together.
      Apple is presumably trying to get a foldable that give the experience of current foldable designs without the drawbacks of current foldable display tech.
  New 16-inch MacBook Pro GPU
    Apple has made the 16-inch MacBook Pro even more “pro” with a new GPU option
    It’ll cost you an extra $700 USD, but you can now configure Apple’s big Pro with an AMD Radeon Pro 5600M GPU with 8GB of HBM2 memory
    And Apple claims for your 700 bucks that you’ll have a graphics option that is up to 75 percent faster than the base 5500M option.
      Geekbench 5 Metal testing from Max Tech showed massive gains over the AMD 5500M GPU with the new 5600M scoring 43144, vs the 28748 of the previous highest end GPU option.
      The 5600M also beat out the scores of the AMD Vega 48 from the 5K iMac and the iMac Pro’s Vega 56
    The new GPU should appeal to those users who need the very highest end performance.
    In addition Apple release new user installable SSD storage kits for Mac Pro owners
      1TB, 2TB, 4TB, and 8TB capacities available
  App Store rules, still pissing off developers
    It’s hard to believe that this many years in we’re still hearing news of App Store rules confounding developers
    This time around Apple pissed off the company Basecamp and their CTO David Heinemeier Hansson
    Hansson helped build the iOS App for Basecamp’s HEY email client which was approved by Apple and available via the App Store.
    The trouble came in when an update for the App was rejected
    The issue, the App requires that you’re signed up to Basecamp’s HEY email service, which costs $99/yr., to work and you can’t sign up in app.
      That’s because Basecamp doesn’t want to pay Apple the 15-30% cut for the privilege
    The thing is the guidelines, while clear, seem to also make a lot of exceptions
      Apps can offer users access to services or content they've previously purchased, they cannot "directly or indirectly target iOS users to use a purchasing method other than in-app purchase."
    The HEY app would seem to allow access to a service they’re already previously subscribed to, but Apple seemed to disagree (well after they approved their app)
    Apple said later in a statement that they made a mistake in approving the App the first time.
    There are also different rules for “enterprise” apps, but Apple says HEY is a consumer app
      As John Gruber points, out the lines are blurry here.
      Do most consumers pay to $99/yr for email service?
      What about Dropbox? Business or consumer?
    Phil Schiller said the issue is, “You download the app and it doesn’t work, that’s not what we want on the store,”
    There seem to be exceptions for “Reader” apps. Is Dropbox a “Reader” app? A business app? Netflix, Spotify?
      Apparently, “yes”. Apple defines “reader” apps as specifically: magazines, newspapers, books, audio, music, video, access to professional databases, VOIP, cloud storage, or approved services such as classroom management apps.
    Ironically the Basecamp app is also available in the App store and it too offers access to a paid subscription service bought outside the App store.
    Seems like Apple’s big issue here is that it’s marketed as an email app that can’t access email without a subscription to HEY and that subscription can’t be bought in the app.
  Could AirPower be back?
    Do we want it to be?
    Again from Jon Prosser. He says Apple may have solved the issues of overheating when charging three devices at a time
    You may remember that Apple, in a rare move, pre-announced the AirPower charging mat and then failed to deliver stating that the product could “not achieve [their] high standards” and cancelled the project
    Since the other third party have delivered similar, but less elegant solutions
    According to Prosser the culprit might have been the Apple Watch and it’s proprietary wireless charging system which required more energy than other devices
    The solution and why we may finally get this project… Apple’s A11 chip being used to manage heat.
    We never knew the price, but I’d imaging with an A11 it’s not going to be cheap (not that it ever was going to be cheap)
  WWDC is nigh
    Actually will likely be happening by the time you’re hearing this
    You can catch the live stream of the keynote Monday at 10AM PST many ways.
    Apple’s website, YouTube, the developer app
    And now via the TV App
    The Apple “events” app is now directing users to the TV app where they will be streaming the event
    What’s expected at WWDC?
      Mostly software. The updates to macOS, iOS, tvOS, watchOS, iPadOS, etc.
      Developer tools and training.
      The “big” news of the transition to ARM based Macs, but likely no new hardware announcements.
        Beyond maybe ARM based developer systems?
      Speculation from Bloomberg and Ming-Chi Kuo is that Apple’s first ARM based Mac will be a 13.3-inch MacBook Pro model and ARM based 24-inch iMac that Apple will launch in late 2020 or early 2021 at the soonest.
      Kuo also claims Apple will update the Intel based iMac line in the third quarter before releasing the ARM iMac
      It’s expected that it will take Apple 12-18 months to complete the ARM transition.
      HomePod and Apple TV updates are expected to come later this year
        Smaller HomePod and support for third-party music services like Spotify
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Feedback, commentary, opinions
  Why ARM Matters
    There was a great article over at [Tom’s Guide](https://www.tomsguide.com/opinion/arm-macbook-reason-to-upgrade)
    Performance
      Apple’s iOS CPU have multiple cores
      iPad in 2018 had 8 cores, the Macbook Pro offered 8-cores just last year with the 2019 16-inch MacBook Pro
      In addition multi core GPUs with machine learning Neural Engine cores
    Energy efficiency
      They can turn the power to the OS and tasks to maximize battery life.
      We can expect to see some nice increases in battery life on ARM based Macs
    Cooling
      This is something Apple struggles with because of their insistence on quiet machines with often underengineered cooling.
      This results in they needing to use less powerful processors and often even thermal throttle those which directly impacts sustained performance.
      Good news is ARM based processors should run much cooler and need less throttling even in Apple’s ultra-thin passively cooled designs.
    What about compatibility?
      That’s a bit up in the air, but we can assume Apple has a plan.
      Catalyst allows iOS Apps to be adapted run on Intel Macs. WWDC will likely show how Apple plans to help developers transition apps to support ARM
      iOS Apps, would likely be even more easily adapted to ARM based Macs
      We can likely assume they’ll have some sort of virtualization or emulation solution for older Intel apps to run while developers transition.
      Ability to easily cross compile will bee needed for a while.
      Windows support will probably be up in the air. Bootcamp? Not likely to survive the transition to ARM.
      There is an ARM version of Windows, so…
  Your old videos may not play in latest macOS
    Read a piece this week from [iDownload Blog](https://www.idownloadblog.com/2020/06/17/macos-catalina-video-formats-support-issues/)
    In macOS Catalina Apple has dropped native support for a number of older video codecs
    If you have old videos from Flip cameras (3ivx codec), or encoded with Sorenson or Divx, they will not play in Quicktime in macOS Catalina
    The reason is the lack of 32-bit support and Apple not updating the older codecs to support 64-bit.
    [Apple Support Article](https://support.apple.com/HT209029)
    That article lists about 28 or so codecs that are no longer natively supported.
    You’ll need to find 3rd party players or converters to get that video into a more modern codec like H.265
    A player that is a great option is [VLC](https://www.videolan.org/) Another is [IINA](https://iina.io/)
    Another little thing with old videos…
      Listener Salvador just upgraded to macOS Catalina and after upgrading you know that iTunes is now split into Music, Podcasts, and TV apps.
      The TV app has your video library.
      Salvador noticed that while all his purchased videos from Apple were showing up after the upgrade, his ripped movies were missing
      What I suspect is that the movies are there, but they have been put into the “Home Videos” section of the Library instead of in the “Movies” section.
      It’s a pretty simple fix
        Open the TV App
        Click on the Library tab
        Click on the Home Videos section in the sidebar.
        If the movies are there, select one, get info, go to the “Options” tab
        Change the “Media Kind” setting from “Home video” to “Movie”
      A great App for managing your movie metadata and setting up the right kind of data is [iFlicks](https://iflicks.app)
        After you rip your content, just run it through iFlicks. It will get the descriptions, movie artwork, director and actor data, etc. And Also set the correct “media kind” and add the movie to your Library.
  Digitizing old cassettes
    Brian is working on a project to digitize old cassettes into his Mac.
    He’s connected an old Boombox via a 3.5mm headphone cable to a USB audio input connected to his Mac.
    He’s using GarageBand to capture the audio.
    The issue he is having is with levels. The input doesn't seem to have enough gain.
    You might be able to use a headphone “booster”. Small amplifier that you place in-line between the Boombox and the Mac.
    In GarageBand the track should also have it’s own volume slider and you can increase (or decrease) the gain for that track.
    Another option might be to use the “gain” on the compressor built into GarageBand
      Applying compression to a track in GarageBand lowers the volume of loud sounds to the same level as the quieter sounds. You can then raise the gain of your compressed track, having reduced any peaks or troughs in the volume.
      Be careful not to over compress
      Really in this case you probably would only need to play with the “gain” setting to try and boost the volume level.
    GarageBand also has the option when you export to “Normalize” the audio.
      In the GarageBand preferences under “Advanced”, Turn on the Auto Normalize: Export projects at full loudness checkbox
      GarageBand automatically exports projects at the optimum loudness—that is, the highest volume level at which no distortion occurs.
Closing
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