Mike Zornek

Airpods Pro Repair: How hard is it to ship an empty box?

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Sun, 11 Oct 2020 13:02:23 -0400

The Apple AirPods Pro earbuds I ordered in February are broken. The left pod has this really bad vibration that just never seems to never go away. It’s particularly noticeable during my walks. I had some connection issues before and re-pairing the device with the phone fixed it back then, but this new problem will not go away.

All I wanted to do was ask Apple to mail me a shipping box so I could drop them in, and have them fixed or replaced. What followed was an hour long customer support session that continues to erode my enjoyment of Apple products.

According to my support rep Apple requires a hold on the credit card to do the repair via shipping. The exact process is not 100% clear to me. It sounds like:

Apple puts on a hold on my credit card for $90.
Apple mails me a box (or provides a shipping label printout).
I mail the broken AirPod (left ear only).
Apple notices FedEx accepted my shipment and ships me a replacement left ear. (Mixed information.)
- Who knows what size ear plug they mail back?
Apple receives my shipment, inspects the hardware and releases the hold.

Frankly I find the process ridiculous. I don’t trust Apple or any shipping company enough to say that this will goes smoothly, and if does fail I don’t know who I would yell at or how to get my additional $90.

How can mailing a empty box be so hard? Why can’t they just wait until they get my broken unit to send back a replacement?

While the in-person Apple Store is an option, I’m very hesitant to drive and hour to and then an hour back to do this in person during COVID. Just does not seem worth the health risk for me or my family.

If anyone sees this and wants to add some sanity to the process, the case ID is: 101205809925.

PS: Other “fun” observations from the chat log below:

The “find serial” article is exclusively for iOS 14 (and I am still on iOS 13) so it was not very helpful.
Love that auto posting reminder that I have not typed for 30 seconds.
This session took more than an hour.

Apple's Gatekeeper Developer ID Program Needs a Transparency Report

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Sun, 09 Aug 2020 17:08:38 -0400

On Tuesday, August 4th, Apple published a global kill signal to the certificate system that allows Charlie Monroe’s applications to run on macOS. These apps are part of the Gatekeeper program that lets a registered Apple developer distribute their software outside the Mac App Store. Without a Gatekeeper signature, macOS makes it somewhat difficult for a user to launch a non-signed app and is not considered a sustainable way to distribute commercial software.

However, if the kill signal has been sent out by Apple, the signed apps can never be launched again. Instead users are presented with an alert like the following:

There is a good collection of reactions to this event on Michael Tsai’s Blog.

Apple did restore Charlie’s certificates. You can read more about it from his own blog: A Day Without Business

Catching up on the matter myself, I can’t help but think not only should Apple turn off its automated execution of such bans but they should also move to a more nuclear-launch type system where at least two people need to turn their key. This is an incredibly destructive event for the third-party vendor like Charlie. It’s unprofessional of Apple to have this connected to an automated system.

Additionally, if Gatekeeper is truly about protecting the users, I don’t see why we can’t have a transparency report listing the identifiers that have been disabled and why. A lot of people keep saying Apple does not abuse this power, but there is no proof to this; it is a closed system. We only know of Charlie’s situation because he posted it on Twitter. Considering it wasn’t too long ago when the App Store Guidelines down right threatened you about going public I don’t know if we can give Apple the benefit of the doubt here.

I know many look to Gatekeeper as a saving grace, a last ray of hope that the Mac will somehow remain the open computer platform they originally fell in love with. They hope Gatekeeper will help avoid an App Store-only future. I hope so too.

Adding a formal, descriptive transparency report would restore a lot of faith in the Gatekeeper system after this week’s events.

Apple's EU Antitrust Investigation is Long Overdue

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Tue, 16 Jun 2020 17:58:01 -0400

European Commission:

The European Commission has opened formal antitrust investigations to assess whether Apple’s rules for app developers on the distribution of apps via the App Store violate EU competition rules. The investigations concern in particular the mandatory use of Apple’s own proprietary in-app purchase system and restrictions on the ability of developers to inform iPhone and iPad users of alternative cheaper purchasing possibilities outside of apps.

The investigations concern the application of these rules to all apps, which compete with Apple’s own apps and services in the European Economic Area (EEA). The investigations follow-up on separate complaints by Spotify and by an e-book/audiobook distributor on the impact of the App Store rules on competition in music streaming and e-books/audiobooks.

Apple’s response:

It’s disappointing the European Commission is advancing baseless complaints from a handful of companies who simply want a free ride, and don’t want to play by the same rules as everyone else… We don’t think that’s right — we want to maintain a level playing field where anyone with determination and a great idea can succeed.

I agree with Manton Reece’s assessment that this might be the most insulting statement from Apple I’ve ever seen.

More interesting links can be found at Michael Tsai’s Blog.

As if to make an example of someone, like a gangster asking for ‘protection money’, Apple today also rejected an update to the new HEY email app and have threatened to kick it out of the store entirely if it doesn’t start uses the Apple/iOS payment system.

HEY is doing exactly what Basecamp is doing, is doing exactly what Netflix is doing. Offering a subscription service that must be purchased on the web, then a client in the App Store to access that.

We don’t use the App Store for our Mac app for this reason. But we have no choice but to use the App Store for iOS. It’s the monopoly store in apple mobile town.

For the few who closely follow my own career, it has been clear my love of Apple and Mac OS X has long been on the decline. However, like a marriage with kids, it’s hard to just pick up and leave. It’s best to make some plans and plot your escape.

Today’s events only strengthen my resolve to escape.

Full Time Spaceship Employees Only

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Tue, 22 Oct 2019 17:22:29 -0400

Recent episodes of Accidental Tech Podcast have brought up Apple’s lack of quality developer documentation. The most recent discussion spawning after the release of a new website, No Overview Available, which serves as “a survey of Apple developer documentation.”

During the multiple discussions it has been suggested that this documentation issue is an easier problem for Apple fix than others since documentation can be produced in parallel, money can buy more writers and Apple has plenty of money.

This is mostly true, but a major factor that is not brought up is Apple’s reluctance to hire remote documentation writers.

I myself was approached for a documentation team job a few years back and the fact I did not want to move out to Cupertino was an immediate strike. It was a shame too since I was probably a prime candidate having both real world development experience as well as teaching experience about the platform.

No matter how well designed the new campus is, I feel like Apple’s reluctance to embrace some kind of remote work culture will be a thread of its inevitable decline. There is a fixed, limited pool of candidates who live or is willing to relocate to the Cupertino area. It gets even more difficult when you consider a technical writer will probably make less (Glassdoor listing) than a developer and yet the cost of living out there is crazy for both professions.

PS: Yes, I know of a few special cases that are allowed to work remotely but they are just that, very special cases.

If Flying, Print Out MacBook Battery Status

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Fri, 23 Aug 2019 21:43:50 -0400

In recent weeks the FAA has put a flight ban on the MacBook Pro laptops with recalled batteries. NPR writes:

The Federal Aviation Administration has banned certain MacBook Pro laptops on flights following an announcement by Apple Inc. that some use batteries that pose a fire or safety risk.

The laptops were sold between September 2015 and February 2017 and can be identified by their product serial number, according to the company’s notice.

The Apple support site is here.

Since the model range is so wide and the laptops all look the same I don’t know what this going to mean for people flying with their laptop.

I recommend printing out the support page with your serial number coming up as clean in case you are red flagged going through security.

Happy flying.

A Month with the 2019 23.7-inch LG UltraFine 4K Display

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Thu, 01 Aug 2019 20:00:00 -0400

Previously on, The Great Monitor Search Continues. After identifying a need to get a new external display for my MacBook Pro, I first paused to see what WWDC might bring. After Apple released a monitor that I could not afford I instead went with the LG 49-inch UltraWide monitor which, while productive and cool in many ways, did not jive with Mac OS X day-to-day. It was returned. Now having my second choice monitor, the 2019 23.7-inch LG UltraFine 4K Display, how is it going?

Jumping from a 49-inch ultra wide to a 23.7-inch monitor at first felt like many steps backwards. Once again I’m forced to perch my MacBook Pro on a stand to be my secondary monitor. While there are many new advances and benefits of the 23.7-inch monitor, it’s hard to ignore that it doesn’t fill the void the previous 2011 27-inch iMac (ran in display mode only) was filling even before I tested out the ultra wide.

That aside, so far the monitor is working out well.

The color and resolution are amazing. With my bedroom lighting the glossy screen avoids the typical reflection issues and so I benefit with richer colors without too much of a compromise. The 500 nits of brightness are amazing and even puts my MacBook Pro display to shame. I like running the monitor at a true retina 2x 1080p of resolution for general tasks but have nudged the monitor to a scaled 1440 while doing some longer programming sessions. With the more detailed resolution and sharper text I’ve even been able to lower my coding font to grab up some extra space.

The real benefit of this monitor however comes from its nearly seamless integration with Mac OS X. All of the expected brightness and volume controls work from the keyboard. There is no power button on the display and once you connect the Thunderbolt cord to the MacBook Pro the monitor wakes up and also starts charging the laptop. Even wake from sleep is fairly reliable. (I think twice I had to do a unplug/replug for the monitor to be found but this could have also been from the fact that the cord needs to be firmly connected and the design of USB-C can leave connections to come out a little too easy sometimes.

For downsides I’ll mention the internal speakers. I like the fact they are included but the quality is pretty bad. I’m not an audiophile so it’s hard for me to describe but in my own day-to-day I’m using the MacBook Pro laptop speakers instead (for now) as I feel like they have more range. (Aside: The old iMac had good, usable speakers, I wish the LG had them.)

I think it’s a shame the monitor only has USB-C connections on the back. I would have appreciated a few USB-A type ports so I can plug my keyboard and mouse in directly without the need for yet another $39 adaptor. I also have a slight concern that this monitor won’t be usable by any of my current or future Windows computers since they prefer Display Port or even HDMI as a backup. I dunno. I have done no testing and in general am living with the fact that this is probably going to be an Apple-only monitor for me.

I would have also appreciated a basic camera for conference calls. I have an external USB camera I can setup (with ANOTHER adaptor) but not having a camera/microphone for this common need seems like an oversight for such a high end monitor.

My final complaint, and this isn’t for the monitor directly, is that using it makes my MacBook Pro (15-inch, 2016) run hot. Check out this graph, the early days are when I was working from home with the monitor attached and then the later days are me on the road at a conference with no monitor. Connecting the monitor seems to double the temperature, just to push the pixels let alone when I’m really pushing the CPU with code compliers or video exports.

I worry about running a laptop with high thermals like this regularly day-to-day. What really stings is that under a better scenario I would be connected to a modern and affordable Mac Pro tower that would have more cooling capacity – but I digress.

In short, I’m generally pretty positive about the monitor. I think it does have a bit high of a price tag and notable compromises but the improved Mac OS X integration makes up for it for me. I wish we had more options on the market. I also wish Apple would just make a monitor for the rest of us.

PS: A few days ago LG refreshed the 5K version of this monitor sold through Apple Stores. The previous 5K was discontinued when I had to make my choice which is a shame since I think the 27-inch might have been a better match for my needs. I think I’ll sit on my hands for a while and watch for the new reviews. Perhaps in time I’ll sell my 23.7-inch 4K and upgrade or maybe I’ll just buy a second 23.7-inch 4K. That is one other benefit of the 2019 refresh is that the 23.7-inch has better support for monitor chaining. But then again, if I’m getting too much heat with one monitor I wonder how hard two would push my laptop.

The Great Monitor Search Continues (again)…

The Great Monitor Search Continues

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Mon, 24 Jun 2019 19:30:40 -0400

TLDR: The LG 49 inch UltraWide monitor is pretty cool, but not very Mac compatible (specifics defects below). Next up for me is the Apple Store approved, 23.7-inch LG UltraFine 4K Display, which will trade screen real estate for retina, better color and native controls.

Backstory

I’ve been anxious to buy a new monitor for my MacBook Pro for a few months. I decided to hold off until Apple announced their Mac Pro + Display plans as I generally like all the conveniences that come from using an Apple monitor with Apple hardware and would love to buy one.

I still use a 27-inch Thunderbolt 1 Apple monitor at my work office – this new monitor would be for home use (for now).

So WWDC has come and gone and while amazing, that new Apple monitor is not for me. Instead I bought what I had been eyeing for a while, the LG 49WL95C-W 49 inch 32:9 UltraWide.

YouTube Reviews: Linus Tech Tips, The Tech Chap, MacRumors

Defects

I got to use the LG 49 inch UltraWide monitor for about two weeks and while I enjoyed the extreme screen real estate, I just ran into too many hardware issues and so it’s getting returned.

First, was random screen blackouts. I actually was prepared for this from reading reviews before purchase, but I also read that recent firmware updates fixed it. In my own experience I had some early blackouts on day one, used the (very non-Mac like) LG software to update the monitor firmware and didn’t see anymore … until today, where I had a few pop up while watching YouTube. (Maybe the monitor has figured out it’s getting returned and it is out to get me?).

The bigger issue however is screen resolution and refresh rate. If you wake up a connected MacBook Pro via a keyboard connected to the monitor you have about a 30% chance it will get the resolution right. When it goes wrong you’ll either end up with an extremely distorted view (as in the OS doesn’t know what monitor is connected and everything is stretched out) or you’ll get the native resolution but the refresh rate will only be 30 Hz. That refresh rate is really iffy too, sometime I see a pull down in System Preferences that lets me switch to 60 Hz, other times I get no pull down and my only recourse is to power down the monitor and attempt a reconnect or a system reboot. It’s pretty annoying and a deal breaker for such a high end piece of equipment.

There are other problems too, like not being able to edit the speaker volume or brightness using the native Mac system controls but since I’ve started my monitor search months ago I sadly came to accept some tradeoffs. Frankly it’s really hard to find a good monitor to pair up a Mac with.

I’ve begun the refund process with Amazon and it seems like I should get a full refund since it’s under 30 days. We’ll see.

Round Two

For my second contender I’ve chosen the more Apple approved, 23.7-inch LG UltraFine 4K Display. While it does not have anywhere near the size or screen real estate of the previous 49-inch monitor it will be a retina display, that comes with better color and more integrated controls.

YouTube Reviews: MacRumors, 9to5Mac

My general thinking is that maybe in the long run I’ll get two of these (it has some nice thunderbolt chaining possibilities) to get back my extra room, but will test drive just one for now.

While I’m sure I will enjoy the Mac integration, there is part of me that also worries that this might not play nice with Windows should I ever need to use the monitor with that OS. Again, lots of compromises to be made when shopping for monitors right now so sadly I’ll deal.

MacPro Reactions

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Tue, 04 Jun 2019 19:41:48 -0400

This year’s WWDC as expected is overflowing with things to talk about. For now, let’s scope this to just the MacPro (and its monitor).

From a purely technical perspective, there isn’t much missing. We got:

Expandable RAM (12 physical DIMM slots)
Expandable SSDs (2 slots; I hear the T2 encryption will work with this even if it’s non-Apple supplied.)
Expandable IO via 8 PCI express slot
A neat modular system that seemingly can also fall back to more generic cards.
The CPU even seems socket-able.

I’m not sure I love the aesthetics but I do enjoy how they use both sides of the motherboard and the whole shell slides up to reveal the internals.

I’m am a little concerned that there is no direct fan on the CPU or video card, though I am relieved that if they need to add fans in future revisions, at least there is plenty of room.

The pricing for the base SKU is $6000. Before WWDC I thought it would be $5000 so $6000 by itself isn’t crazy however it does start to sting when you realize the base model only comes with 256 GB SSD and a pretty old video card. That is plain cheap and greedy on Apple. The base CPU does have a rough street value of $1300 but I’m left wondering where the rest of this money is going? Apple’s margins I assume.

The monitor is technical perfection.

I’ve been shopping for a new monitor and Apple was right that there are about 8 modern features one looks for in a monitor and no one today checks off all boxes. Lots of monitors focus on price or gaming. Some offer retina but then shoddy Thunderbolt 3 support. This new Apple monitor looks amazing, but oh man that price.

$5000 for the monitor, or $6000 if you want the matte option – and then the stand, an extra $1000.

This is what broke me. This is the point in which I question why Apple is showing me this?

I truly believe they should have revealed this MacPro and monitor at a proper video / media conference. Revealing it in front of developers who can’t afford it nor whom the product is marketed at just feel very out of context. We were begging them to built us a tower and display, but they built them for someone else, and it’s kind of depressing.

What I wanted:

I wanted a $5000 tower where I could update the graphics cards a few years in. I don’t need 8 PCI slots, maybe 4 or 2 would work. I wanted to have easy access to RAM to add more in the future (I don’t need 12 slots I’m sure 4-6 would be fine). I want multiple SSD slots on the board (2 is fine). I want to be able to open it up and clean out the dust every few months (this is why an iMac will never work for me).

I wanted a $1000 self-contained version of the 5K iMac display. Maybe an ultrawide version? I like Apple monitors historically. They work great out of the box and have great color. Surely there is room in the market for a sub-$6000 Apple monitor for the “rest of us”?

What’s Next?

Well with this new knowledge I finally pulled the trigger on my new monitor. It’s not an Apple monitor. I’ll go more into that one next time.

As for the MacPro itself – time will tell. I for sure am not buying one day one. I want to see people review this. I want to see iFixIt rip it apart. We need time to see how this thing fairs in the real world. The recent laptops have turned me off to buying untested Mac hardware.

I will also continue to update and prune my dream hackintosh part list (which right now hovers around $2000) as I think that might be a more viable option.

Thoughts on Mac Pros at WWDC

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Tue, 07 May 2019 15:48:04 -0400

Today I reread the transcript of that closed door Mac roundtable event of 2017 where we were promised new Mac Pros.

As I read it one of the things that frustrated me most is how Apple acknowledged and was almost proud of how “pros” have moved on to the portable line and even the iMacs without once considering that this purchasing behavior might be influenced by their own neglect of the Mac Pro line.

Craig Federighi: That is a pretty incredible evolution that we’ve seen over the last decade. The original iMac, you never would’ve thought as remotely touching pro uses. And now you look at today’s 5k iMac, top configs, it’s incredibly powerful, and a huge fraction of what would’ve traditionally required the Mac Pros of old and are being well addressed by iMac.

Later…

Phil Schiller: As part of doing a new Mac Pro — it is, by definition, a modular system — we will be doing a pro display as well. Now you won’t see any of those products this year; we’re in the process of that. We think it’s really important to create something great for our pro customers who want a Mac Pro modular system, and that’ll take longer than this year to do.

That quote was in 2017 and oh how I remember us in the community jumping to conclusions that he must mean we’ll see new Mac Pros in 2018 – but alas they never materialized.

For a meeting who’s goal was to clear things up, they sure did leave us speculating.

Anyways, that event was over two years ago now. It’s time for Apple to show its cards. I’m not saying we need an order form or even a ship date but come June 3rd at WWDC, we need to see what Apple’s plan is. Its time.

Oh, and if the rumors are true, and we end up with some 40-50% margin’d proprietary stack of Mac minis, consider my faith in the Mac Pro completely lost.

If WWDC comes and goes without any news, I’ll live with my assumptions and make my own hardware plans.

Oh and this is funny…

Phil Schiller: Obviously, as you know, we just did a very major update to the MacBook Pro line. That’s going very well. Customers absolutely love it, we’ve had a lot of customers buying them.

Oh, poor 2017 Phil – he doesn’t know yet. In time this line of products, specifically its keyboards will become known as the worst products in Apple history, by even its most devote fans.

A Pivotal Year for the Mac Platform

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Thu, 17 Jan 2019 18:55:05 -0500

This is going to be a pivotal year for the Mac platform and my relationship to it.

First up is the Mac Pro.

While I’ve owned Apple laptops since I switched to Mac OS X full time, I almost always had a tower computer as my main hub. I love towers. I love loading them up with hard drives and upgrading the RAM and graphics card after a few years of use. Even after I would have upgraded to a new tower I’d usually make use of the old tower as a backup or media server of some kind.

Things changed in 2011 when I was ready to buy a new tower but Apple hadn’t updated the current lineup in any significant way. At the time I decided to go with a loaded 27-inch iMac instead. In general it was a nice machine but did have some faults, heat and dust buildup being the most problematic. I had AppleCare so Apple replaced the overheated graphics card, twice, for no extra charge and I’m sure they would de-dust during the install as well. When AppleCare was up, so were my yearly cleanings and in time the iMac would start to run hot again. Seeing as how Apple has added no dust cleaning features to the current iMac design, not even a simple filter on the air vents, I don’t think I can buy an iMac or an iMac Pro again.

My desktop dreams lay with the new Mac Pro design we’ve been told will come this year. 🤞

Next, is Marzipan.

So, Swift is a curious language. My biggest complaint can be summarized to say Swift is schizophrenic. It wants to be everyone’s best friend. It can do object oriented programming, it can do functional programming, it can do “protocol oriented programming”. It lacks strong opinions.

In day-to-day work, using Swift, a strongly typed, functional leaning, complier driven language, to execute UIKit which is built in Objective-C, a dynamic, object oriented language which loves runtime changes feels clunky at best and flat out bizarre if you came into the ecosystem without appreciating the strange tale of how we got here.

My hope has and continues to be that Apple is working on a replacement for UIKit (and AppKit?). A new UI framework that has functional design patterns and is learning from what we see out in the web world right now. When I saw the Marzipan announcement, my hopes started to sink. If the longterm goal is a new framework, why the hell are we adding desktop metaphors to UIKit?!? It just seems like more duck tape and not the clean solution I want and we deserve. I’ll hold off on hard criticism until we see a proper developer preview, most likely coming this summer. Regardless, I really hope the Mac OS starts to see some love. I feel like its been stagnating for many, many years now.

Finally, we have the AX processor, and potential Intel to ARM switch.

Apple’s decision to design its own mobile processors for the iPhone and iPad product lines has turned out to be an extreme success. As has been widely reported, the recent processors we see in the new iPad Pro product line rival desktop class Intel chip performance and rumors of a potential desktop architecture change are very strong.

This has very wide implications, many upsides but some downsides too. I have developer concerns. I have consumer questions. I have industry curiosities. Not to mention, what does this mean for my Mac Pro?

Lots of questions. I look forward to the answers.

Apple’s Use of Donations as Marketing

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Thu, 04 Oct 2018 16:07:40 +0000

The other day Tim Cook (‪@tim_cook‬) tweeted:

Our hearts go out to the people of Sulawesi and all of Indonesia after this weekend’s devastating earthquake and tsunami. Apple is donating $1 million to aid relief efforts as this beautiful country starts to rebuild.

I feel bad for the earthquake victims too, but this kind of marketing makes me a little ill.

Best I can tell Apple reported 53.8 billion dollars in profit over the last year. If you compared the ratio of their donation to say a person making $100,000 a year, the donation would be $1.86.

Now I don’t want to say a million dollars isn’t a big impact to the receivers of the donation, I’m sure it is — but it just feels a little cheap to announce it and have everyone retweet it, the media website repost it, all to build up this fake “good will” sentiment. Hell, you can’t even buy a media ad campaign for that cheap.

Anytime you read this stuff remember, these are the same big corporations dodging taxes that could normally fund proper emergency relief and preparedness along with other infrastructure needs.

Some might say, well Apple needs to answer to their shareholders and this is how every company works. Well I say, everyone has a choice, and yeah it can be easier to fall in line and do the expected but I root for the person who is going to step out of line and Think Different.

At a minimum, donate your $1.86 annomously without looking for a thank you.

Right to Repair

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Wed, 11 Apr 2018 15:00:54 +0000

Via phoneArena:

It has been reported that iOS 11.3 has disabled some iPhone 8 touch displays. The devices affected are those who have had third party displays installed. These displays are typically installed by local repair shops and are not affiliated with Apple.

I’ve been a supporter of the Right to Repair movement and Apple once again disappoints. Perhaps the issue is a anomaly but if the past is pattern and without providing comment, then it feels like spite.

Louis Rossman has a good breakdown video you can watch for more info.

UPDATE: Another relivent story today: FTC: Warranty-voiding language like Nintendo’s and Sony’s is illegal

Rethinking My Music Storage

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Sat, 10 Dec 2016 02:58:07 +0000

I’m not a huge music collector, at least not compared to some other people I know. I do have about 150 GBs of music in my iTunes collection — lots of it being video game soundtracks I enjoy listening to while I program.

A few things I have not liked about my historic setup:

Because the collection was 150 GB I could not store it on my main computer’s SSD (which was 256 GB in size).
iTunes sucks. I don’t want to get into details here but as a music player and organization tool it’s awful.

Some goals for my new setup:

I want to get rid of iTunes.
I’d like to store my music on Dropbox, preferably in a way where I can control which Music (if any) gets synced to my other Dropbox setups.
I have recently become a Spotify member. It’s got a nice collection I feel I can lean on AND it has some tools the player UI to support local files as well as streaming songs which I think will be key.

With all that said, what I’m up to:

First thing, I made a new iTunes library on my desktop and have started re-downloading my old iTunes music purchases. I have lots of music that is still DRM wrapped and these new downloads do not have such DRM.

Next, I’m going to slowly start to put the music into Dropbox. I’ll have a root level Music folder but inside I’m going to split the collection into Rare and Common. Common being for songs that are streamable from Spotify and thus being a folder I can selectively NOT sync on my other computers. The Rare folder will have all of my video game soundtracks and other albums I find to be incomplete or missing on Spotify. As I said, I like how Spotify can bring in local music into playlists and even lets you control the source folders and I’m hopeful this will work nicely.

We’ll see how it goes over the next few weeks. I’d love to hear if anyone else has an exotic setup like this.

Also, next up for a rethink is photos. Again, I’m really not happy with the current Apple solution and am thinking of alternatives. Feedback welcome.

Pre-“Hello Again” Mac Event Thoughts

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Sat, 22 Oct 2016 22:34:21 +0000

Having been a long time Mac user and developer it’s been very disappointing to see Apple ignore the hardware release cycle of the Mac platform over the last few years. I’m really anxious to see what’s going to come of the “Hello Again” event this week and I might even buy a new Mac depending.

Current Mac-state of Mind

So my main personal machine is a 2011 maxed-out iMac. I bought it after waiting and waiting for a proper Mac Pro update in 2011 that was never to come. Overall I’ve been pretty happy with the iMac. I have had to do a USB storage dance with some backups and media drives but overall it’s been a workhorse, with tons of days of Xcode and Warcraft under its belt.

Other Macs in my arsenal include:

A 2011 Mac mini which at times has served as a CI box but as of now is dormant (might be resurrected depending how CI plans turn out for my side project).
A 2012 Macbook Air which I use situationally. Recently for beta testing 10.12 over the summer and the occasional Philly CocoaHeads video capture.
My work provides me a high end Mid 2014 15-inch Macbook Pro. I’m trying to do a better job of keeping that machine in kind of a white room state just for work stuff with mixed success.

I also have a 27-inch Thunderbolt display and a 27-inch Dell display which I use to extend my Macs in various ways at different times.

To Upgrade or Not?

Technically speaking my 2011 iMac is working fine. It does have some issues: occasionally the wifi likes to disconnect, there are some color issues spreading out from the lower left corner of the display, the DVD drive broke (I bought an external one to supplement the occasional need) and the 256 GB SSD is not large enough to hold all my stuff anymore so I have an awkward HD layout with USB storage. The iMac also runs very hot. I suspect part of this is dust build up but have not investigated too much. While annoying, none of these issues are blockers.

The first big upgrade question is laptop or desktop? I’ve always leaned on the desktop experience for pure power but there are many things that push me towards a laptop as my main personal machine right now:

I could setup a very “swap” friendly environment that would allow me to have a home work station letting me plug in my personal or work laptop as needed.
Since I have a Gaming PC now I don’t need the graphic power of the Mac as much making laptop more feasible.
I am traveling more — more conferences, more work trips, single days at IndyHall (instead of a full time desk and me leaving the iMac there). A personal laptop for these days would help me with that home/work separation on the company laptop.

Other welcome improvements:

Retina Display. My iMac does not have a retina display and my hope would be that a new laptop from Apple would support this natively as well as support a future retina external monitor connection.
More SSD storage. Would be nice to consolidate my external drives into one big SSD.
If I go laptop, no need to upgrade two machines every year with a new OS, keeps all the software/licenses in sync.
Complier speed improvements. From a numbers perspective my iMac has a good CPU but I would hope improvements to the bus speeds and other architecture improvements would see some improved Xcode complier times.

I feel like in the process of writing this I’ve talked myself into a upgrade but we’ll see what comes out of Apple on Thursday. Enjoy the show.

Should I Sell My Apple Watch?

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Fri, 07 Oct 2016 21:55:30 +0000

I did not partake in the first release of Apple Watch. I was curious but not curious enough. I bought a Playstation 4 instead.

Last month Apple had its announcements. I wasn’t all that jazzed about the iPhone 7 (even though I am due to upgrade my iPhone 6) so I thought I’d try out the watch instead. I ordered an Apple Watch Series 2, 42mm Stainless Steel w/ Silver Milanese Loop. I also got a Cocoa Sport Band for a little variety.

It’s been about a month with the watch and I’m not sure I should keep it. Few notes:

I suspect a big benefit of the watch is quick glances at notifications — but for me, I’m actively trying to remove notifications from my life. I turn them off completely on the desktop and audit them on iOS significantly.
There is the health tracker / movement component, but for me it’s not a huge draw. I don’t do heavy workouts much. I do like to take the occasional podcast walk, but I feel like I get enough info from my phone’s step counter if I really cared.
I don’t like the pressure that I need to wear the watch all day to fill up my bars. I did not wear a watch before this and it still feels very alien. I like taking it off when I type on my laptop or after I wash my hands (it gets wet and doesn’t dry off right away).
I find myself constantly fiddling with the magnet strap. I like the band to be slightly tight and it feels like it get loose quickly if I move my arms a certain way (putting on my backpack, making my bed, etc.).
The sport band strap is too small for me (even with the larger of the two bands) — it technically fits but is too tight. One more hole would have helped.

Am I missing something? What do you love about your Apple Watch? Let me know. As of now, I’m looking for ways to sell it — I think the money for me would be better put towards a new Mac (should they ever be rev’d again).

24 Hours with My iPad Pro

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Sun, 15 Nov 2015 00:46:33 +0000

I’ve always been a big fan of the iPad. I’ve owned an: iPad 1, iPad 2 (which I sold to upgrade to an iPad 3), an iPad mini (retina), and now an iPad Pro.

I’ve been pretty antsy for an iPad Pro since I saw the original announcement. I can’t say I have any unquie plans for it (outside reading Big Nerd Ranch book drafts in PDF format on a much bigger screen). Mostly I just want to experiment with the all the new features like the pencil and multitasking.

As of right now I have the iPad Pro itself (I went with the high end, 128 GB with cellular) and the keyboard cover. The pencil has been a little harder to come by so until then I’m making due with the 53 Pencil I bought a while ago but never really got into due to the smallness of the iPad mini. So far, it plus the larger screen is working out well. I look forward to comparing this to Apple’s version.

There are lots of great iPad Pro reviews out there so I won’t go into major detail. The things I’m liking a lot: the huge screen, the sound system and the battery life. The things that got me down a bit: the removal of the split keyboard (it’s hard to type holding the iPad Pro in portrait mode), lack of 3D Touch and the lack of the newer thumbprint scanner.

All that said, when it comes down to it, it’s about the software. I think I’ve spent $100 in new software playing around with things. If you know of some must have iPad software let me know cause I want to see how hard I can push this thing. Tomorrow should be a great test as I fly down to Atlanta to visit the home office of Big Nerd Ranch.

WWDC 2015 Wish List

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Sat, 02 May 2015 23:48:58 +0000

While I won’t be at WWDC proper I will be in San Francisco the week of WWDC. I have a ticket to AltConf and otherwise expect to be mingling about.

What do I want to see announced? Here is some of my wish list.

Swift Improvements

Let me use Xcode’s refactor tool to refactor Swift.
Let me use Instruments to measure performance of Swift.
Introduce a tool similar to gofmt
Add standard library tools for processing JSON.
Continue to improve Obj-C Interoperability.
Swift versions of NSDate and NSDecimalNumber
Fix the “I have to make it public or double add the modules” to let tests see code issue.

Xcode

Introduce a cloud service version of Xcode Server.
Improve Xcode Templates (eg: should recommend new test file with new class).
Add code coverage tools.
Improve testing tools. (Maybe add a formal UI testing layer?)
Add a spell checker that is smart about function names and other symbols.
Stability improvements.

Others

Let me slide loads apps outside the App Store.
Improve App Store searching, browsing and discovery.
Formal API to iTunes Connect.
Third Party Siri access.

A Walled Garden of Shit

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Tue, 12 Aug 2014 00:55:27 +0000

From the App Store Review Guidelines:

We have over a million Apps in the App Store. If your App doesn’t do something useful, unique or provide some form of lasting entertainment, it may not be accepted.

I sure wish they would take that guideline to heart and start rejecting some of this shit.

So PBG got an iPad and found some shitty iPad games and I’d like to say these are the exception — but they’re not. There are tons of these crappy apps on the store and while it helps inflate that “total app” number for Apple it really hurts people browsing around trying to discover new apps.

http://www.youtube.com/embed/rm_Y2t51tUE

WEIRD IPAD GAMES!

A Mac Pro Guy Getting By in an iMac World: Storage

mike@mikezornek.com (Mike Zornek) — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 04:39:47 +0000

Recently I decommissioned my much beloved Mac Pro which served as a lowly file server since I moved to my loaded 27-inch iMac last year. The iMac is working out great though I would have still preferred a new Mac Pro for it’s overall expandability, particular to this post — it’s extra hard drive bays.

On the iMac, I use the 256 GB SSD for my boot drive and have the second internal 2 TB (disk-based) drive partitioned into three other drives, one for a nightly SuperDuper! mirror of said SSD, another for a Time Machine backup and then the final one for 700 GB of misc storage. This “misc storage” used to be for my iTunes library and backups of large downloads like Xcode/Mac OS X installs, but that’s changed now as you’ll see below so I might roll this back into the Time Machine partition or rework it to have a Windows Bootcamp drive again (like I had on my Mac Pro).

All in all, the built-in storage I get with the iMac works fine for day-to-day work but I still needed something for my archives: my monthly backup of cloud/server assets, archives of my video/screencast work and my iTunes library (which has ballooned with WWDC videos and slides).

For a while I debated getting a Drobo, particularly one of the newer Thunderbolt versions. From the outside it looks like a great system but at $850 with no hard drives included I just couldn’t justify it. So what did I end up with?

I bought a pair of Western Digital, My Passport, 2TB Portable External Hard Drives ($139 on Amazon). My digital closet sizes up at around 800 GB right now so I expect these should meet my needs for a good while. I got two of them and use one as my main archive drive and then the other to backup the main. They use USB 3.0 for transfer and while the speed isn’t crazy awesome, it totally meets my needs. I love the small form factor and the fact they do not need an additional power supply. I often throw the backup one in my bag for IndyHall if I’d like to have my iTunes library with me (it’s way to big for my MacBook Air’s SSD). I also love that I’m not using some complex RAID format. I can plug these drives into any Mac and get access to my files.

Anyways, I’ve been using these drives for three months now and all is working well. If you are in the market for some extra external storage, I highly recommend. I’m actually considering buying a third to start a rotation of sorts at IndyHall. With that I believe I’d be safe losing all my home gear to a theft or fire and still have all my digital stuff safe.