The apps that run on your Mac or iPhone/iPad.
Have you recently started to see an alert indicating that one of your applications is not optimized for your Mac? This is a new alert that Apple added in macOS High Sierra version 10.13.4. This alert appears for older applications, what are called 32-bit applications. It’s important to understand that these older applications will continue … Read more
When you reset or change your email account password, you have to enter the new password in two places in your email account configurations in Mail. The first place is in the incoming mail settings. The second place is in the outgoing (SMTP) mail settings. In previous versions of Apple Mail it was tough to locate … Read more
Did you know that you can take pictures of your Apple Watch’s screen? The procedure is simple. Press and hold the side button while simultaneously pressing and releasing the Digital Crown. The screen will flash briefly, when the photo is taken. You can read Apple’s illustrated article on how to take a watch screen snapshot. The side … Read more
Do you have a new iPhone X? Are you unsure about how to access certain features on the iPhone X since Apple removed the Home button from this model? If so, check out Apple’s iPhone X support article to help you learn how to use gestures to navigate around your iPhone X. The Normal Neilsen group … Read more
Would you like to change the initial page displayed when you open Firefox on your Mac? If so, follow these instructions. Fortunately, Google hasn’t changed this very much over the past few years. These instructions will certainly work on Firefox versions 40-57, and maybe newer versions. In some version after 57 but before 63, Firefox … Read more
Did you know that you can easily look up any word’s definition that you’re reading in an email or web page on your Mac, iPhone or iPad? All of your Apple devices have built-in dictionaries which are used to display definitions. Here are instructions for performing a look up on your Mac. Instructions for your … Read more
Would you like to change the initial page displayed when you open Google Chrome on your Mac? If so, follow these instructions. Fortunately, Google hasn’t changed this very much over the past few years. These instructions will certainly work on Chrome versions 49-72, and maybe newer versions. Open Chrome, click on the Chrome menu and … Read more
Would you like to change the initial page displayed when you open Safari on your Mac? If so, follow these instructions. Fortunately, Apple hasn’t changed how this is done in many versions of Safari. These instructions will certainly work on Safari versions 5-11 on Mac OS X version 10.6.x up to macOS High Sierra (aka … Read more
A kernel panic refers to a very specific type of computer freeze. A variety of things can cause kernel panics. Below is a description of how your Mac behaves when it experiences a kernel panic so you can recognize it if this happens to you.
Read moreWould you like to be able to use the blind carbon copy (Bcc) feature in Apple Mail? It is easy to enable this feature, but not necessarily obvious how to do so. By default, when you create a new email message in Mail, it only displays lines named To, CC and Subject. To add a … Read more
Do you want to completely erase a Mac and reinstall its operating system? Perhaps you are about to give away this Mac. Or, perhaps your Mac is acting up and you want to start with a clean slate. Here are instructions on how you can erase the hard drive and reinstall OS X, recently renamed … Read more
iOS 11, released in October, 2017, adds an Emergency SOS feature, which also gives you a way to disable your TouchID feature. Disabling TouchID could be desired in the event of a mugging or an arrest.
Read moreAre you getting messages from your email hosting company that your email account is nearly full? If so, it’s time to move some of your email messages off of your hosting company’s email server and into folders on your Mac. Here are some general instructions for how to do this. These instructions assume you use … Read more
[Update: February 2019 – A few months ago Microsoft released Office 2019 for both Windows and Mac so you should buy Office 2019 now, instead of Office 2016. Microsoft has announced that support for Office 2016 ends on October 13, 2020.] If you use Office 2011, it’s time for you to start planning your upgrade … Read more
Before you install iOS 11 on your iPhone or iPad, please check to see if you rely on older apps which are not compatible with iOS 11. iOS 11 is Apple’s latest major release of software for iPhones and iPads, released at the end of September, 2017. For many years, I’ve recommended holding off on … Read more
When you are away from home, you need to make sure your iPhone connects to wi-fi networks to ensure that it’s getting backed up. This tip assumes that you have automatic backups to iCloud enabled. If you need help turning on this feature or checking to see if it’s on, then please refer to my … Read more
Would you like to make the text on your iPhone or iPad easier to read? I believe the following 3 ways to enlarge text have been available since at least iOS 7 and they continue to be available in the current version of iOS. To turn on any of these options do this: Tap on … Read more
Do you know how to edit text you’ve typed on your iPhone? I am regularly surprised to find people who do not know it’s possible to do this. Let’s imagine that you’ve typed several lines of text in the Notes app, then you notice a typo back on the first line. You don’t need to … Read more
Are you having problems viewing one or two particular web sites in Safari? Were you previously able to view these web sites? If so, a common cause of this problem is corruption in Safari’s cache. Cache is temporary storage. Specifically, it contains recently viewed web pages. Occasionally, these temporarily stored web pages can get damaged. Thus, … Read more
Do you have a cluttered Inbox? Do you value emails from a few people more than all the rest? If so, you should make those few people VIPs. By designating a person as a VIP then emails from that person will appear in the VIP Mailbox which appears, separate from and below your Inbox. Here … Read more