1 month

[dave_the_nerd]

FWIW, most of the people I know just manage their iPads/iPhones as standalone devices, back up to iCloud, and don't worry about syncing with the computer.

If you want to bounce documents back and forth, Dropbox works pretty well, as does Google Drive.

 

[Ichinisan]

I already use spotify for that. I was wondering more how to download podcasts to the ipad without physically connecting the two. It looks like home sharing might do it.

I'm not a podcast person, but Apple makes a free "Podcasts" app you can download on your iOS device from the App Store.

 

[Ichinisan]

I was also exploring system info and it mentions that the macbook has s/pdif optical out of the combined port which seems cool. Further exploring to see if I can hook it to my Onkyo amp via digital.

EDIT: It appears so, but not without a jack converter.

Yeah. I've had an Acer PC laptop a looong time ago that had the all-in-one S/PDIF + optical connector. I finally knew why some of my optical cables had that strange white adapter dangling on the end.

 

[v-600]

FWIW, most of the people I know just manage their iPads/iPhones as standalone devices, back up to iCloud, and don't worry about syncing with the computer.

I have been so far, hence the late arrival to itunes. Basically I'd found the podcast series I wanted to listen to, downloaded it to the laptop and pressed sync. Which just updated the subscription to the ipad's podcast app, rather than transfer the files which I am now downloading again on the ipad (yay unlimited broadband).

 

[v-600]

With iOS, Apple has definitely... umm... "streamlined" your available choices in order to make the "best" decisions for you.

This photo I think exemplifies my differing opinion of osx and ios

It took a bit of research and an apple script but I got the result I wanted. Its almost certainly not an "apple" way of doing things but they don't go out of their way to make it impossible to do so.

 

[CZroe]

This photo I think exemplifies my differing opinion of osx and ios

It took a bit of research and an apple script but I got the result I wanted. Its almost certainly not an "apple" way of doing things but they don't go out of their way to make it impossible to do so.

Ichinisan and I have that album too.

 

[v-600]

It was my success celebration song. That and I've not listened to them in ages. Googles All Access is quite good, but so far I don't think its better than spotify. The ipad app is also just a scaled iphone app.

 

[v-600]

One problem solved. Onto the next. And a new problem discovered. It turns out it buggers the chrome icon. Clicking chrome to open a regular browser window just focuses on the Google Music 'app'. You have to right click the music app and choose open new window. Or make sure you open chrome first and then close all windows before opening the appified music window. Meh, too much hassle to investigate at the mo and easy to work round.

Anyway next problem. I use a bluetooth receiver hooked into my little hifi to stream music. When playing over the macbooks speakers the hardware media keys work. When playing over bluetooth they don't. Any clues?

P.S. this constant niggling tweaking is appealing to my love of Linux. Who knew OSX's unix roots would show through [/sarcasm].

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Which hardware media keys - next track, pause, ffwd? Or the volume keys?

 

[v-600]

Sorry, should have been clearer. The volume keys work, but the play/pause and skip track don't.

 

[Ichinisan]

This photo I think exemplifies my differing opinion of osx and ios

It took a bit of research and an apple script but I got the result I wanted. Its almost certainly not an "apple" way of doing things but they don't go out of their way to make it impossible to do so.

I have that CD. Ripped to iTunes. Available on my computer, iPad, iPhone, and Apple TV (even streaming on the go). If I would rather not stream a track or album, I can download to my device with a single tap.

 

[v-600]

I have that CD. Ripped to iTunes. Available on my computer, iPad, iPhone, and Apple TV (even streaming on the go). If I would rather not stream a track or album, I can download to my device with a single tap.

Ah CD's. How I remember thee.

Also can I get itunes match and icloud for my nexus? 'Cos google music works on linux, windows, osx, ios and android. Likewise for spotify. And my macbook doesn't have a CD drive.

In my view, limiting interoperability with other services to provide seamless integration with a few products isn't a positive direction. But different strokes for different folks. I think apple TV is one I'd like to try next but I can't work out yet how to persuade the IT dept I need one at home.

 

[v-600]

Back in Nepal and just turned on my own laptop for the first time. There's a wonderful sense of familiarity. However I'd got used to the 16:10 screen on the mac and now 16:9 looks far to squashed. The low res TN doesn't really help either.

With both desktop and macbook you get used to a SSD really quickly and now the laptop seems too slow to respond (but I do like its terabyte of storage). Might ditch the optical drive and put a SSD instead (cheaper than buying a new laptop).

 

[Ichinisan]

Back in Nepal and just turned on my own laptop for the first time. There's a wonderful sense of familiarity. However I'd got used to the 16:10 screen on the mac and now 16:9 looks far to squashed. The low res TN doesn't really help either.

With both desktop and macbook you get used to a SSD really quickly and now the laptop seems too slow to respond (but I do like its terabyte of storage). Might ditch the optical drive and put a SSD instead (cheaper than buying a new laptop).

16:9 drives me insane. I have to use dual low-rez 16:9 monitors at work and it hurts my brain.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Also can I get itunes match and icloud for my nexus? 'Cos google music works on linux, windows, osx, ios and android. Likewise for spotify. And my macbook doesn't have a CD drive.

Match is iTunes-only. (MacOS / iOS)

 

[v-600]

Thanks for the sensible reply.

That comment was more of a minor grumble against the locked down nature of the software, as compared to other comparable/competing services, rather than as a major problem to investigate.

 

[Ichinisan]

Thanks for the sensible reply.

That comment was more of a minor grumble against the locked down nature of the software, as compared to other comparable/competing services, rather than as a major problem to investigate.

Yeah. Apple definitely wants to control the user experience. That usually works for Apple.

They want Apple devices, software, and services to be the solution to your music needs wants. Apple would rather not try to integrate with anyone else's ecosystem.

That would definitely be a limitation if you aren't all-in with Apple.

 

[v-600]

I realise the month is over....but....work just issued us new differently formatted email address and now my new gmail account won't play nicely with the mail app at all. IT are also swamped with other problems at the mo so can't put anybody on the case of fixing it (their advice at present is use the gmail website). TBF mail didn't play nice with the old account but I got it working, and since then I guess something updated because as far as I can work out all the settings between old and new gmail accounts are the same.

I've spent a while searching a solution and have decided the best approach may be to sidestep the issue by trying a few other mail clients.

Any advice on the ones you use, like, dislike etc?

 

[weevilone]

What's it doing? It's probably just a server-side setting. I use the mail client with a handful of Gmail accounts, personal and work related (ie gmail domain and otherwise) without issue.

 

[v-600]

Initially it just refused to connect the account at all, then went through a process of crashing out of Mail, now it just says the password is wrong. The calendar and contacts are fine. Just email. I've tried the default settings in both Mail and Google. Also made sure IMAP is enabled, directly input the correct settings to the Mail app, and still nothing. Rarg.

I'm currently trying Thunderbird, purely because I know of it.

 

[CZroe]

Does your password have a hyphen in it? Long ago I couldn't easily type my old password with a Mac keyboard connected to a PC because the hyphen was a different character. I think it had a different key that did work (minus on numpad?).

 

[v-600]

Interesting thought, but no. In a shocking display of bad practice I kept the same password on the two accounts. It worked with one before and doesn't with the other now.

EDIT: Also Thunderbird worked perfectly with no trouble or need to change settings.

 

[Ichinisan]

I realise the month is over....but....work just issued us new differently formatted email address and now my new gmail account won't play nicely with the mail app at all. IT are also swamped with other problems at the mo so can't put anybody on the case of fixing it (their advice at present is use the gmail website). TBF mail didn't play nice with the old account but I got it working, and since then I guess something updated because as far as I can work out all the settings between old and new gmail accounts are the same.

I've spent a while searching a solution and have decided the best approach may be to sidestep the issue by trying a few other mail clients.

Any advice on the ones you use, like, dislike etc?

What account type were you using before? Mail has extra features and requires fewer settings to configure if you choose Google/Gmail as the account type instead of "other" (IMAP/POP+SMTP).

 

[v-600]

I tried 3-4 times with the default add a google account method. With the old email address there were a couple of issues with smtp server settings needing tweaked, but that was all. With the new one I can't get to that stage as it just flat out refuses the password.