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The Only-Way Edition Monday, February 14, 2022

Goodbye, Touch ID: iOS 15.4 Shows Face ID Is Here To Stay – And I Like It, by José Adorno, 9to5Mac

For me, it shows that the company is indeed improving its facial recognition method as the only way for iPhone users to securely unlock, pay, and store information on their devices.

Apple Fans Need To Try These Valentine’s Day iPhone Tricks — Including Sarcastic Siri And Handwritten iMessages, by Charlotte Edwards, The Sun

From a handwritten iMessage to asking Siri if she has a boyfriend, here's three of the best iPhone Valentine's tricks.

Coming Soon?

Apple Registers Three New Macs In Eurasian Database Ahead Of Rumored March Event, by Benjamin Mayo, 9to5Mac

As spotted by Consomac, Apple has registered three new Macs in the Eurasian regulatory database. The new model numbers are A2615, A2686, and A2681. One of these models is described as a laptop.

Is Apple Making A HomePod With A Video Screen? Siri Seems To Think So..., by Joe Svetlik, What Hi-Fi?

Asked to find some information from Wikipedia, Apple's voice assistant can be heard saying "I found an answer. It's displayed on your HomePod." Which is curious, seeing that the HomePod doesn't have a screen.

Stuff

Portable Monitors: The Amazing Productivity Gadget You Didn’t Know You Needed, by Nicole Nguyen, Wall Street Journal

So if you want to be more effective while working from anywhere, you’re going to want a monitor, and not a heavy desktop one. New lighter-weight portable screens are hitting the market, and there are more ways now to turn old devices into extra displays, too. Here are your main options.

Ulysses 25, by Agen Schmitz, TidBITS

On the Mac, Ulysses 25 can now run Shortcuts actions directly from the Share menu in the app, ensures that adding Ulysses sheets to Quick Notes now also works when using the On My Mac section.

Tools For Typing — Text-Editing Apps For Writing, Note-Taking, And Daily Productivity, by Laura Jean, Medium

If long lists and multiple apps seems like too many commitments and you’re looking for one app to really streamline your productivity across the board, hands down I recommend Notion.

The One Thing Every Apple HomeKit Owner Should Use — And It's Free, by Kate Kozuch, Tom's Guide

HomeKit just received a helping hand from a fairly new third-party app called Home Widget. Home Widget is essentially a dashboard for designing iPhone and iPad HomeKit widgets. So as long as you know how to add a widget to your iPhone's home screen, you could transform your device into an effective HomeKit controller with Home Widget.

Develop

I Tried Doing A 'Brain Dump' Every Day For A Week To Declutter My Mind, Manage Racing Thoughts, And Improve Focus. It's Way Better Than Its Name Suggests., by Sarah Jackson, Insider

Getting these questions down on paper essentially gave my mind the freedom to stop stressing about them, because I knew I was only shelving them temporarily and could come back to them later.

Notes

Apple Threatens To Pull Out Of Sam Mizrahi’s Toronto Condo Project, by Greg McArthur, The Globe and Mail

Mizrahi said it exercised its right to delay the delivery of the space because of events out of its control, such as the pandemic and the plumber’s strike. In December, 2020, it told Apple that it would push out the delivery of the space to Oct. 31, 2021. Apple responded by saying it would exercise its rights to terminate the lease and provided a list of items it thought Mizrahi could not deliver.

Apple’s “position flies in the face of the commercial and practical realities of the construction process for a project,” such as The One, Mizrahi’s court filing said.

The Staggering Ecological Impacts Of Computation And The Cloud, by Steven Gonzalez Monserrate, The MIT Press Reader

While in technical parlance the “Cloud” might refer to the pooling of computing resources over a network, in popular culture, “Cloud” has come to signify and encompass the full gamut of infrastructures that make online activity possible, everything from Instagram to Hulu to Google Drive. Like a puffy cumulus drifting across a clear blue sky, refusing to maintain a solid shape or form, the Cloud of the digital is elusive, its inner workings largely mysterious to the wider public, an example of what MIT cybernetician Norbert Weiner once called a “black box.” But just as the clouds above us, however formless or ethereal they may appear to be, are in fact made of matter, the Cloud of the digital is also relentlessly material.

To get at the matter of the Cloud we must unravel the coils of coaxial cables, fiber optic tubes, cellular towers, air conditioners, power distribution units, transformers, water pipes, computer servers, and more. We must attend to its material flows of electricity, water, air, heat, metals, minerals, and rare earth elements that undergird our digital lives. In this way, the Cloud is not only material, but is also an ecological force. As it continues to expand, its environmental impact increases, even as the engineers, technicians, and executives behind its infrastructures strive to balance profitability with sustainability. Nowhere is this dilemma more visible than in the walls of the infrastructures where the content of the Cloud lives: the factory-libraries where data is stored and computational power is pooled to keep our cloud applications afloat.

Bottom of the Page

Three new Macs, eh?

1) We've waited many many years for the Mac mini to really be mini, but given Apple's u-turn on the number of ports, I don't see this year's Mac mini to be significantly smaller than the last year's model.

Maybe we should hope for a Mac nano instead?

2) I don't see why iMac and iMac Pro cannot both come in two different sizes. And in fun colors for all too!

3) Purple MacBook Air!

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Here's wishing everyone a day filled with love -- and many many love-filled days ahead. Thanks for reading.