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Author "don"

wrote in 1086: Apple Demolishes the Street, How Much Do You Use Your iPhone? .

Tim Cook has said time and again that analysts should not look at “supply chain” reports to predict how Apple is doing. Over the past few weeks there were quite a few of those same analysts that didn’t listen, claiming that Apple’s sales were slow, that the iPhone X was not a success, that guidance for the next quarter was based upon supply chain checks.

Ooops, wrong again! Apple stock rebounded from the erroneous reports that had some folks selling their Apple stock and it has rebounded with Apple well on its way to becoming the first trillion dollar company. Apple services business alone, which has tripled over the past 5 years, is now at around $35 billion. I remember well, when we started Small Dog Electronics, an Apple exec boasting that Apple would soon become a $5 billion company.

Think about services revenue for a minute at $35 billion. FaceBook has revenues of about $40 billion, Netflix had revenues of $12 billion and database giant SAP had revenues of $28 billion. These companies have market caps of between $150 and $500 billion so we can assume that if Apple wanted to just spin off their services business (who spins off a double digit growth sector?) it would be about a $200 billion company. Simply amazing.

In the quarter, Apple posted revenue of $61.1 billion and a net profit of $13.8 billion or $2.37 per share. This compares pretty darn well with last year’s $52.9 billion in revenue and $11 billion in profit. All three numbers, revenue, net profit and profit per share, were records for the 2nd quarter for the company.

Apple is re-patriating a lot of its overseas cash and their board of directors cranked up the dividend by $0.10 per share to $0.73 per share. Apple is one of the largest dividend payers in the world. They also announced a new $100 billion share re-purchase program so they can buy their own stock back the next time the analysts try to beat down the stock.

Apple sold 52.2 million iPhones this past quarter, compared to 50.8 million in the same quarter last year. iPad sales were up, too, at 9.1 million units. Mac sales slid a bit from 4.2 to 4.1 million units. Tim Cook said:

“We’re thrilled to report our best March quarter ever, with strong revenue growth in iPhone, Services and Wearables,” said Apple’s CEO. “Customers chose iPhone X more than any other iPhone each week in the March quarter, just as they did following its launch in the December quarter. We also grew revenue in all of our geographic segments, with over 20% growth in greater China and Japan.”

Tim also mentioned that Apple’s wearable business, which includes Apple Watch, AirPods and Beats, was up almost 50 percent and was now the size of a “Fortune 300” company.

Apple remains “the iPhone company” with 62% of its revenue coming from iPhone, but the growth in the services and wearables sectors, as well as continued leadership in the tablet market, should be evidence that Apple is not a one-horse show!

Congratulations to everyone at Apple for an amazingly successful quarter and another chapter in the greatest ongoing American business story ever told.

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wrote in 1085: Speed Up Those Apple Watch Updates, How Does My Apple Watch Know My Heartrate? .

The local power company is holding their annual shade tree giveaway on Saturday. The Keys lost a lot of vegetation and some areas up around Big Pine were so devastated that firefighters were fighting a huge brush fire this past week. Grace and I have done a lot of planting this year but I think we will go get our allocated two baby trees and figure out a place for them.

We are thinking about the trip to Vermont but I keep looking at my cameras at my house on Prickly and keep seeing this white stuff on the ground so I guess I shouldn’t rush!

Thank you for reading this issue of Kibbles & Bytes!

Your Kibbles & Bytes Team,

Don & Mike

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wrote in 1085: Speed Up Those Apple Watch Updates, How Does My Apple Watch Know My Heartrate? .

I run Apple beta software on my Apple Watch so I probably update the software a bit more often than most Apple Watch users. But I know you Apple Watch users will agree with me that the Apple Watch updates are painfully slow. As long as I am complaining, I don’t know why Apple requires a charged Apple Watch to be on the charger in order to complete the update. It probably is because that 12-hour charge on your Apple Watch might not be enough to cover the slow update.

I can’t do much about the charger part but I can help show you how to speed up the updates. Your Apple Watch communicates with your iPhone via both BlueTooth and Wi-Fi. The Apple Watch prioritizes BlueTooth over Wi-Fi to preserve power. BlueTooth uses less power but it also is a lot slower transferring data than Wi-Fi in almost every case.

If you disable BlueTooth at just the right moment you can force the Apple Watch to use Wi-Fi to do your upgrade. Believe me, it is a LOT faster. Unlike most Apple devices your Apple Watch does not download its own upgrades. You have to think about your Apple Watch as an extension of your iPhone, even if you have the cellular version.

Let’s say you get a notice on your Apple Watch of an update, and you also see that notice on the iPhone. When you go to the Apple Watch app on your iPhone you can download the Watch update to your iPhone and it will then update your paired Apple Watch. This is not a tiny file and sending it over BlueTooth to your Apple Watch just takes a really long time. I am sure you have watched that update circle move like maple sap in the dead of winter.

You can speed up this process by utilizing Wi-Fi instead of BlueTooth, but to do this, you will have to turn off BlueTooth at the right moment in the process. Here’s the steps to faster updates for your Apple Watch:

  1. Make sure that your Apple Watch is on its charger and charged to at least 50%. Your iPhone should be close to the Apple Watch. We are assuming from the start that both BlueTooth and Wi-Fi are active on your iPhone and your Apple Watch
  2. Open the Watch app on your iPhone and click on the My Watch tab
  3. Tap on General and then Software Update. If there is an update available you will see the version number, some notes about the new release and a Download and Install button
  4. Pushing on that button may trigger a request for your passcode, go ahead and enter that
  5. As the Watch app prepares to send the update to your Apple Watch you will see a message with “Estimated time remaining” just under the version number
  6. When the rough estimate of time remaining shows (i.e. “about 2 hours remaining”) and not before, it is time to switch to Wi-Fi by temporarily disabling BlueTooth. The timing is important here – don’t disable BlueTooth before you see the estimated time remaining alert.
  7. Open Settings*on your iPhone and choose *BlueTooth from the list
  8. Slide the toggle switch to Off. This shuts off BlueTooth on your iPhone. That means all your BlueTooth devices aren’t going to work while you do this upgrade but it isn’t that long.

  9. Go back to the Software Update screen on the Watch App on your iPhone and you will see a warning to turn BlueTooth back on. Click Cancel to continue. Without BlueTooth your iPhone and Watch will now communicate with the faster Wi-Fi protocol.
  10. Now watch that circle close up! You should see the estimated time decline dramatically. Once, the download has completed – meaning the iPhone has sent it to the Watch you will see the “Estimated Time…” change to “Preparing…”
  11. You will then see it say “Verifying…” and then you will have an active “Install” button. Tap the install button and enter your passcode if requested.
  12. Once the progress wheel appears on your Apple Watch your iPhone is no longer needed. Go back to Settings on your iPhone and slide the BlueTooth toggle back to on.

This work-around is actually pretty easy, the main thing to remember is to turn off BlueTooth on your iPhone at the right time (just after the estimated time appears) and then to remember to turn it back on.

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wrote in 1084: Apple Watch On My Wrist, What Is New In iOS 11.3 .

Hapy and his friend Denise are coming to visit this weekend. That should be some fun since we haven’t seen them since the fall. It is a good time for them to get away from Vermont! I know they will welcome our weather here.

The President came to Key West this week so I had to take some time off to join the peaceful protest with a few hundred others. Our theme was One Human Family which is also the official adopted slogan of Key West. This little visit must have cost a few million for what seemed like a photo op. There were hundreds of motorcycle police from as far away as Miami leading a big motorcade. We all wore black (in the hot sun I might add) and carried signs and rainbow flags. Some local teachers brought their students who arrived to cheers from the crowd. The older students held signs about gun control and made me very proud of them and their teachers!

Thank you for reading this issue of Kibbles & Bytes!

Your Kibbles & Bytes Team,

Don and Emily

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wrote in 1084: Apple Watch On My Wrist, What Is New In iOS 11.3 .

I have been a fan of the Apple Watch since the first one came out. I hadn’t worn a watch since I was 12 but I have had one on my wrist since the Apple Watch was introduced. The Series 3 Apple Watch with cellular has become an essential tool for me.

What do I use it for? Well, here’s a short list:

  • Control my HomeKit gear – open and lock the door, adjust the thermostat, turn on the lights
  • Keep track of my sports scores – “Hey Siri, What’s the Cubs score?”
  • Get text messages and respond
  • Answer and make phone calls without my iPhone
  • Embarrass me by only occasionally meeting my move, stand and exercise goals
  • Check my heart rate
  • Open my hotel room door at Hiltons or Starwood
  • Go swimming
  • Wake me up with alarms while traveling
  • Carry my boarding passes when traveling
  • Pay for stuff with Apple Pay
  • Siri settles trivia disputes
  • Reminds me of meetings and calls
  • Send Apple Pay cash to my granddaughter
  • Get the news
  • Know the weather
  • Summon a Lyft or Uber
  • Give me directions – great for the directionally challenged, like me
  • Scan my email
  • Lock and unlock my car
  • Play music to my Beats X while I am chilling in the hammock
  • Control my Apple TV
  • Track my sleep
  • Keep track of my to-do list

Of course it can do a lot more but these are the kind of things that I use my Apple Watch for each day. It has become an essential part of my digital life.

Apple Watch Series 3 with cellular is packed with features to help you stay connected, be more active, and listen to your favorite music. Cellular is the ultimate expression of Apple Watch, giving you the freedom to go with just your watch. Track your run with built-in GPS and never miss an important call. Hang out at the beach and reply to a message. Or book a ride home. All without needing your phone. With faster performance, a barometric altimeter, and watchOS 4, Apple Watch Series 3 offers you the flexibility to go anywhere.

Cellular really makes the difference. Now, I am free to roam without my iPhone in my pocket. It uses the same cell phone number as my iPhone so the connection is seamless. It uses the built-in cellular capability whenever it is not connected to your iPhone or Wi-Fi. Setting it up is easy and most carriers only add a small monthly fee.

Apple Music customers can stream 40 million songs right to their wrist. You can listen to Beats 1 or any other Apple Music Radio channel with the new Radio app and the Music app has a new UI and automatically syncs curated playlists to Apple Watch. The watch can’t hold too many songs but as long as you are on cellular or Wi-Fi you have access to Apple’s enormous music library

Apple Watch Series 3 is the fastest Apple Watch ever with a dual-core processor delivers up to 70% faster performance, faster app launch times, and an overall smoother user interface. The Apple W2 wireless chip delivers up to 85% faster Wi-Fi and is up to 50% more power efficient

Apple added a barometric altimeter which measures elevation gain for outdoor workouts, such as running, hiking, skiing, and snowboarding. You get more Move and Exercise credit for moving uphill – which might be handy in Vermont. It also tracks how many flights of stairs you climb during the day.

The Apple Watch Series 3 is swim proof (water resistant to 50M), so you can leave it on when you’re in the pool or the ocean and it has this cool little water expulsion system using the speaker to push out any water from the speaker.

watchOS 4 makes the Apple Watch tick. The Siri watch face intelligently updates throughout the day, showing what you need when you need it. Smart activity coaching can help you close your rings every day (if only). The Workout app makes it easier to do multiple workouts in one session, and there’s also a new workout type—High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT). The updated Heart Rate app shows additional insights—while you’re resting, walking, or in the recovery phase after a workout. It also serves sleep monitoring apps that can give you some insight into your sleep patterns.

I highly recommend the Apple Series 3 watch with cellular. We have them in stock at all locations!

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wrote in 1083: Protect Your Privacy On Facbook .

Our friend from Tidbits, Adam Engst, is the ghost writer of some of our content in Kibbles & Bytes. I have worked with Adam for a few decades and he and Tonya are directly responsible for the emergence of Kibbles & Bytes! It was a long time ago, in a galaxy far away, when Tidbits (which is the granddaddy of all Mac newsletters!) had a section called Dealbits. We would put deals there but when Adam decided to change things up a bit we decided to launch Kibbles & Bytes!

He did a great job with this FaceBook article and offers great advice. But whether it is Facebook, Twitter or any of the thousands of social media sites, news groups, bulletin boards or forums, some common sense will help you maintain your privacy. These are all PUBLIC areas on the internet and when you post something thing about whether you want that on the front page of your local paper. I mostly post my political opinions (which I want everyone to know) and pictures of Jezebel but I have seen friends post the most personal information including phone numbers, addresses, etc. and that is just dumb.

In the end, you cannot depend on anyone but yourself to protect your privacy. In this day and age, that is difficult so you have to decide what you want to be private and what you don’t care if the world knows. This is going to become more and more of an issue as technology becomes more intrusive and able to spy on you. Who knows if Amazon is listening with Alexa or Apple with Siri but I don’t really care if they know about me although I have considered installing a Maxwell Smart cone of silence.

Thank you for reading this issue of Kibbles & Bytes!

Your Kibbles & Bytes Team,

Don & Emily

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wrote in 1083: Protect Your Privacy On Facbook .

Facebook has been in the news headlines of late, but not for good reasons. There were the 50 million Facebook profiles gathered for Cambridge Analytica and used in the 2016 presidential election. Perhaps even more shocking, Facebook has long been scraping call and text message data from Android phones. And within the Facebook iOS app, the company pushes the Onavo Protect VPN, an app made by a subsidiary that literally collects all your mobile data traffic for Facebook.

Because of this, many have encouraged Facebook users to delete their accounts. That even includes the billionaire co-founder of the WhatsApp messaging service, which Facebook bought in 2014. If you’re finished with Facebook, you’re welcome to deactivate or even delete your account. Facebook provides instructions for both actions Deactivating your account basically just makes you invisible on Facebook, whereas deleting your account may eventually (up to 3 months) result in most of the data being removed.

The problem is that Facebook is useful. I know that I have re-connected with many friends on FaceBook and it is my link to those friends. It may be the only connection you have with certain friends or family members, and many informal groups use Facebook for meetup logistics. For many of us, losing access to Facebook would hurt our real-world relationships and activities. Plus, lots of companies have Facebook pages, and taking those down might result in a loss of business from customers who would find out about the firm only through Facebook. What to do?

If you’re a business, the most sensible strategy is to keep your Facebook page but avoid relying on it. Remember, Facebook is not your friend. Earlier in 2018, Facebook announced that it would be prioritizing posts from friends and family over public content, which is a nice way of saying that Facebook is deprecating business-related posts. So make sure you have a Web site that you control, and make sure that customers can easily find it and contact you through it. It’s also a good idea to offer customers multiple ways to contact you, including via email. Frankly, I find Facebook pages for business to be less than helpful.

On a personal level, there are two ways to think about privacy on Facebook: limiting the information you share with other people on Facebook, and limiting the information that you’re willing to provide to Facebook at all. If Facebook doesn’t have certain data about you, they can’t sell it to the highest bidder, let it be harvested by hackers, or use it in ways you might find creepy.

To control who on Facebook can see what you share, click the? button on the Facebook Web site on your Mac, or tap the hamburger button in the bottom right corner of the Facebook iOS app and tap Privacy Shortcuts. Then click or tap Privacy Checkup and run through the steps to make sure you’re sharing the right info with the right people. Be sure to lock down or remove any apps that you don’t need since they can leak all sorts of data. If you have a bunch of apps you might want to go to the apps and websites page to delete them faster.

Also, go to Facebook’s Privacy Settings & Tools page. Click the Edit button next to each item and make it as specific as you can. You also might want to review the posts you’re tagged in and remove those that you don’t want on your timeline.

But what if you don’t want to give information to Facebook for it to use? Go to Facebook’s page for Uploading and Managing Your Contacts, and delete them all. You’re just giving away your contacts’ personal information without their permission otherwise!

To ensure that contact uploading doesn’t happen again, in the Facebook iOS app, tap the hamburger button, scroll to the bottom, and then tap Settings & Privacy > Account Settings > General > Upload Contacts and make sure the switch is off. (Some versions of the Facebook app just have Settings, not Settings & Privacy, and show a popover for Account Settings.)

Also, in the iPhone Facebook app, tap the hamburger button again and then Settings & Privacy > Account Settings > Location > Location, and make sure it’s set to Never. And whatever you do, keep Location History off—Facebook doesn’t need to know everywhere you’ve ever been.

If you’re bothered by the way Facebook’s iOS app is trying to capture your contacts and locations, you could delete it from your iOS devices and rely instead on the Facebook Web site, which can’t access nearly as much information about you. To make it easier to open, in Safari, visit facebook.com, tap the Share button, and then tap the Add to Home Screen button in the bottom row of the share sheet.

Let us leave you with one thought. Always assume that anything you post to Facebook or allow Facebook to have access to could end up on the front page of your local newspaper… or the New York Times. Nothing on Facebook is ever completely private—Facebook has shown it isn’t trustworthy or reliable—and the best way to ensure confidential information doesn’t leak inadvertently is to avoid posting it to Facebook in the first place. It is a public social media site that has already been shown it can do anything with your data including selling it to the Russians to swing an election.

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wrote in Uncategorized .

You know that I have a lot of gadgets at my house. So many, that at times Grace gets frustrated with all the home automation stuff. When we have our dog sitter come to stay Grace doesn’t even tell her how to talk to Siri or Alexa. Nevertheless, I have both of those assistants hanging […]

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wrote in 1082: HomePod On My Desk, Farewell Trusty Notebooks .

Spring break lasts a long time down here but we are going to soon be back to a calmer time with fewer tourists. The cruise boats will still come but the thousands of college kids taking a break from their studies will be done for the year.

My gardens here seem to be doing well, everything is growing and with the hotter weather I have to fine tune my irrigation system a bit. It is a shame that it is not HomeKit compatible but I bet it will be soon. I can tell Alexa to water the lawn but not Siri, yet.

Thank you so much for reading this issue of Kibbles & Bytes. We realize that it is you, our loyal customers that ultimately pay our wages. Some time ago, my friend Jen Mayer from Charlotte Street Computers handed me a book entitled “Customer Satisfaction is Nothing, Customer Loyalty is Everything”. The book wasn’t that well written but there is a lot of truth in the title!

Your Kibbles & Bytes Team,

Don & Emily

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wrote in 1082: HomePod On My Desk, Farewell Trusty Notebooks .

You know that I have a lot of gadgets at my house. So many, that at times Grace gets frustrated with all the home automation stuff. When we have our dog sitter come to stay Grace doesn’t even tell her how to talk to Siri or Alexa. Nevertheless, I have both of those assistants hanging out in my house listening to my every word.

I grabbed one of the first HomePods that we received and set it up in my office at my house. I will definitely be bringing it back to Vermont with me. The HomePod is the best yet both in terms of the sound quality and the integration with my home. I had also tried a Google Home unit some time ago but it was so bad that I sold it on eBay.

Let’s talk music first. I have a lot of ways to interact with my music. I have Sonos everywhere including the Alexa-enabled Play One and with their voice interface with Amazon Alexa it is easy to request music from a variety of sources. In terms of content, at this point I think that Amazon/Sonos has the broadest selection. I can get songs from Pandora, Apple Music or Spotify. I can also get content from Audible and Tune-in.

But I have a pretty large music collection after spending hours/days digitizing all my CDs and spending a lot of money buying from the iTunes store. I also subscribe to Apple Music so I literally have access to more music than I could listen to in my life. So, what sounds the best? HomePod! It is clear to me that the HomePod has better sound quality, deeper bass and clearer sound than the Sonos Play One by a hair and it is not even close when comparing the sound to the tinny Amazon Echo. It is reggae Thursday at my office every Thursday and I just say “Hey Siri, play me some reggae” and she says “sure thing, here’s some reggae just for you”. The play list that results is tailored to me by learning what I like. I can say, “Siri, I really like this song” and she says “okay, I got it” and that helps to fine tune the music the HomePod plays for me. You can even add songs to a playlist or create a playlist by interacting with Siri.

I can tell Siri to pause or stop if I can a call and it is instantaneous which is handy because it is not always party time at the office.

So, with all the technology I have, when I am listening to music in my office it is HomePod now. It is not quite up to the Sonos Play 5s in my bedroom but the sound fills my office perfectly as it automatically adjusts to my room to provide me with optimal sound.

For music I give the nod to HomePod based upon sound quality, intelligence and ease of use. I give the nod to Sonos/Amazon for the breadth of content.

HomePod also serves as your HomeKit server. When I activated my HomePod and got it on my network, I literally had to do nothing to make it take over the HomeKit tasks. It was automatic. While I will probably still keep my AppleTV powered up you do not need an AppleTV or iPad to have remote access to your HomeKit devices.

The integration with HomeKit makes it simple to use. I can simply say “ Hey Siri, turn on the office lights” and she does it. I can also ask her to turn the thermostat up, lock the doors or do any of the tasks that are HomeKit compatible. I also have scenes that mostly work. I say mostly because as a security feature Siri will not unlock your doors so my “good morning” scene requires my iPhone but that security feature is appreciated. I can probably figure out a workaround but I like the security. My other most used scene is “good night”. When I say “hey Siri, good night” she turns off all the lights except the one next to my bed, turns down the thermostat and locks all three doors. She then says “on it!”. I have to say that Siri’s responses are friendlier and hipper than Alexa.

Of course, you can do much of this with Amazon Alexa but it would take multiple commands and Alexa just seems a lot finickier with names of devices. Because HomePod is connected to my network, I can also unlock (with iPhone) and lock my house in Vermont remotely.

Getting information from Siri is pretty much the same as using Siri on your other devices. I find her answers to be more complete than Alexa but again there is more breadth to Alexa’s database. I have heard that Apple has made a bunch of new hires for Siri and I fully expect that Apple is working hard to show Alexa that she is just as smart. Artificial intelligence is just in its infancy and it is pretty exciting to see what it can do. A bit scary, too but unless we start making Terminators we should be okay.

Later this year as Apple continues development of the HomePod you will be able to add a second HomePod to create stereo sound or use Airplay 2 to play the same music (or different music) is separate rooms. This will give Sonos a bit of competition.

HomePod has some other tricks, too. You can receive a call on your iPhone and hand it off to the HomePod for a conference call —we might have to use HomePod in our conference room. When you receive a text, Siri can read it to you on HomePod. You can tell Siri to send texts, make shopping lists, add stuff to your calendar and I am sure this is just the start of Siri’s skills.

After a few weeks with HomePod I can give it my full endorsement. If I had to have just one music device I would choose HomePod for its versatility, sound quality and because of how seamlessly it integrates with my other Apple devices.

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