Dorchester — Apr 11th 2017
The various new features of Apple’s recently upgraded iWorks apps, Pages, Numbers and Keynote were introduced by Euan. They include gobal font replacement through a document, bookmarks and notes, along with Collaboration and Keynote Live. These were shown by switching the projector between two computers, where we see his Airdrop to watch his presentation running from a second computer on the screen. KeyNote Live does not require the recipient to have the Keynote app and will run in a browser such as Safari. Rather than risking the Colliton Club WiFi David M used a small mobile broadband 4G wifi modem. It achieved a maximum strength 4G signal from Three and worked very well. David then showed that Keynote Live and Collaboration on all three applications require them to be stored in iCloud Drive. He recapped the way iCloud and iCloud drive work: iCloud Drive folder is like any other on the Mac but a copy of the contents is held in the Cloud. IOS devices can see the files in the Cloud within the respective Apps, but they are not downloaded until required. Files not downloaded display a Cloud with downwards arrow icon. Deleting a file from the IOS device offers the option to delete from that device or from everywhere. On the Mac moving a file out of the iCloud Drive folder warns that the file will be removed from the Cloud. However beware: deleting a files gives no warning. If it cannot be recovered from the Trash it can be recovered by logging into iCloud > Settings. Copies of all three Apps are also available on iCloud and can be used in a browser, whether Mac or PC. David “invited” Euan to collaborate on a Pages document and we could see them making changes and adding notes to each other. More than two people can collaborate on one diocument, their contributions being colour-coded.
After the break David asked about cleaning out old preferences etc. in the user Library to free up space. Mick pointed out that most of these are tiny files and use little space, so leave well alone. Euan had cleared 6 Gb from his user Library by deleting unnecessary downloaded iBooks from the iTunes store in Library > Containers > com.apple.BkAgentService > Data > Documents > iBooks > Books. If the drive has been very full, serious amounts of space can also be regained by restarting with the shift key held down (Safe Boot) followed by a normal restart. During further discussions David M then showed how to look at mobile Data usage on iPhone (a similar method works on an iPad with SIM card); how to limit which applications can have access, and how to reset the statistics, which he now does monthly to keep track of his monthly data allowance. Frustratingly, getting round the inability to copy text from Kindle by taking a screen shot and then using Abby Reader OCR failed (it works fine now!). A (free) OCR used by several members on their macs with reasonable results is LEADTOOLS OCR (from the App store).
