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In July 2017, Adobe announced that it would stop distributing and updating Flash Player on December 31st, 2020.

Several years ago, Apple bought a company called Shazam, which made an app that identified songs by listening to the music playing nearby.

You probably know that you can select an image in the Finder and press the Space bar to preview it in a Quick Look window.

Photos in iOS 14 provides four views of your library: Years, Months, Days, and All Photos.

You’ve likely seen our tip on using the Dock on an iPhone or iPad as a temporary holding place that makes rearranging apps easier.

Starting with macOS 10.15.5 Catalina, Apple introduced a battery health management feature that improves your battery’s lifespan by adjusting charging patterns to reduce the rate at which the battery chemically ages.

On the Mac, nearly every file has an extension, a set of characters after a period that indicates what type of file it is and determines which app opens it.

You likely know that you can use Do Not Disturb to prevent random notifications on your iPhone from waking you at night—it’s easy to set a Do Not Disturb schedule for your usual sleeping hours.

Apple unveiled its latest subscription service: Apple Fitness+. It’s a “workout experience” that combines metrics from an Apple Watch Series 3 or later with studio-style workouts that you view on an iPhone, iPad, or Apple TV.

Many of us have been using iPhones for years, and apps we bought or downloaded long ago molder in corners of our Home screens. Even if you haven’t played Flappy Bird in years, its pixelated icon still stares glumly at you every time you peer at its Home screen, and it’s far from alone. To find out how many apps you have, go to Settings > General > About and look next to Applications.

Over the last couple of years we’ve seen increased demand for digital signage with our customers. Ditto is a new product to our portfolio that allows businesses a very cost effective way to use screens for both drop dead simple screen mirroring and for digital signage.

We’re big fans of column view in Finder windows (choose View > as Columns). You never have to worry about missing icons that are outside the window, everything is sorted alphabetically, and selecting a file shows a preview. But the column widths can be too thin, such that they cut off file and folder names, or too wide, forcing you to scroll unnecessarily.

The App Library in iOS 14 ensures that you can find all the apps installed on your iPhone without having to hunt through Home screens.

You’ve long had text messages forwarding from your iPhone to your Mac and iPad, but after you get a new device, it might be a while before you realize that it’s not receiving texts sent to your iPhone.

Ever since Apple introduced the Activity app to watchOS, you’ve been able to adjust your Move goal, which is measured in kilocalories, but your Exercise goal was locked at 30 minutes and the Stand goal at 12 hours. In watchOS 7, you can finally change these last two.

Continuing its pandemic-driven approach of short, focused announcements, Apple once again took to the Internet to stream its “One More Thing” event. On center stage this time was the Mac, or specifically, three Macs, all of which replace the longstanding Intel chip with Apple’s new M1 chip. All three Macs can be ordered now and will be available within a week or so.

If you’re flying, driving, or biking to visit an iPhone-using friend or family member, you can reduce anxiety related to arrival time or pickup plans (and perhaps provide amusement) by sharing your location temporarily so they can watch your progress.

The holiday shopping season is fast approaching! Given the significant stresses placed on society’s fulfillment, distribution, and delivery systems by the pandemic, we recommend you start thinking about your holiday gift-giving sooner rather than later. Even Apple, which generally does an excellent job predicting demand and shipping products quickly, has been suffering from delays this year. But if you order in time, Apple has a wide variety of products that would make great gifts for your Apple-using loved ones.​

For those who work in organizations, regardless of size, you know how much effort is involved with coordinating a group’s technology. It can take quite some time to set up a new Mac, iPad, or iPhone with all the right apps, settings, and logins. And that’s just to get started—on an everyday basis, maintaining solid security practices is essential, and support requests are inevitable.

It’s all too easy to end up with a boatload of Bluetooth devices connected to your Mac. Apple devices will likely have sensible names, like Magic Mouse 2, but what if someone has given you a device with their name in it?

We’ve been hearing reports of an uptick in the scam phone calls that claim to be from Apple.

We wanted to make sure that those of you who work on a Mac laptop with an external display know that you can close your laptop’s screen and keep working.

For the second time in less than a month, Apple has made a splashy announcement. In its “Hi, Speed” event, the company unveiled a new lineup of four iPhone 12 models.

Harvest season is here again, and Apple has deemed iOS 14 (along with iPadOS 14, watchOS 7, and tvOS 14) ready for the picking.

Cranston IT's traditional focus has been on the small business market and businesses of less then 200 users and typically in 10 - 50 user range. Today, we are pleased to announce our expansion of services into the Corporate and Enterprise markets. With our new Apple Corporate Services, we now offer enterprise level integration, deployment and security services for Apple devices. Providing the backbone of this new service offering is our newest team member, Michael Crispin.

Over the last few releases of macOS, Apple has been beefing up the Mac’s privacy controls so they more closely resemble what the company has done in iOS.

On the iPad side of things, Apple’s first announcement was the simplest. The new eighth-generation iPad replaces the previous seventh-generation model and sports only a single change. More interesting is the new fourth-generation iPad Air. The third-generation iPad Air was essentially a stripped-down version of the older 10.5-inch iPad Pro, and the fourth-generation model continues that trend with the current 11-inch iPad Pro.

Almost every business today accepts credit card payments in one form or another. With credit card processing it’s recommended to review your agreement every few years to make sure you are still getting the best rates.

Sure, you know that the Space bar in the iOS virtual keyboard types a space character. But did you realize that if you tap it twice, it inserts a period?

People whose iPhones or iPads have relatively little free space have long struggled with the fact that iOS likes to download updates so they’ll be ready for installation.

On the Mac, scroll bars are essential for both orienting yourself and navigating within a Web page or document window.

About a year ago, Fujitsu informed owners of older models of the company’s ScanSnap scanners that it wouldn’t be updating the necessary ScanSnap Manager app to be 64-bit, effectively preventing those people from using their scanners in macOS 10.15 Catalina. Unexpectedly, Fujitsu has now reversed course.

Apple’s workhorse desktop Mac, the 27-inch iMac with Retina 5K display, hasn’t seen an update since March 2019—nearly a year and a half ago. Happily, the company has finally released a new version of the popular iMac, outfitting it with 10th-generation Intel processors, increasing its RAM and storage capacities, and improving its audio and video capabilities.

Every year at its Worldwide Developer Conference, Apple lays out its roadmap for the next releases of each of its operating systems. The COVID-19 pandemic forced Apple to record its keynote presentation ahead of time rather than having it live, but the company doesn’t seem to have tempered its ambitions for iOS 14 and iPadOS 14.

Keeping company data safe while online has been a growing concern over the past several years. Traditionally, company information was accessed while users were on the company network. Security devices such as firewalls were deployed to protect the network and the computers on the network from internet threats. As the workforce has become more mobile and the sudden rise of Work From Home environments due to Covid19 this year, in many cases, users are accessing company data outside of the company network and thus outside of the firewalls. This leaves users, their computers and the company exposed to internet based threats that would have traditionally been blocked by the company's firewall.

Whenever you view a document that’s longer than will fit onscreen, a scroll bar appears (often only if you’re actively scrolling). That’s true whether you’re using an iPhone, iPad, or Mac. Inside the scroll bar is a control called a scroller that you can drag to scroll more quickly than by swiping or using keyboard keys. But did you know its size and position are useful for orienting yourself within the page?

If you have lots of apps on your iPhone or iPad, rearranging their icons on your Home screens by dragging from page to page is tedious. Although the new App Library promised for iOS 14 later this year will help you find apps, rearranging them will still be a manual process.

Every so often, we hear from a Mac user with a seemingly impossible problem: a document window in some app is opening somewhere outside of the screen so it’s effectively invisible and they can’t work with it in any way.

Whenever you tap a link to open a Web page on your iPhone or iPad, it automatically opens a new tab. Having hundreds of tabs open won’t cause any problems but can make working with tabs clumsy.

In a move that completes the transition of the MacBook line from the troubled butterfly keyboard to the Magic Keyboard, Apple has released a new 13-inch MacBook Pro. The company also doubled the amount of storage in each of the standard configurations while keeping prices the same, and it ramped up the specs in the model with four Thunderbolt 3 ports.

Four years after the release of the original iPhone SE, Apple has introduced a second-generation iPhone SE with aggressive pricing that starts at just $399.

Need help with something? On occasion, we all need tech support. Speaking as the people who are sometimes on the other end of those requests for help, we have some suggestions on how to get the support you need as quickly as possible.

This isn’t about periscopes or mouthwash—when it comes to searching, a scope is the area in which a search takes place.

Group FaceTime has a feature that some find obnoxious: automatic speaking prominence that causes the video tile for the speaker to grow and move around. Happily, Apple finally took the feedback and added options to disable that feature.

If you have access to multiple printers, you probably know that you can choose one from the Printer pop-up menu at the top of the Print dialog. But macOS has a feature that should make it so you don’t have to switch printers manually as often.

Tired of typing your admin account password whenever you try to install software or change security settings on your Mac?

You know the drill—a friend comes to visit and wants to get on your Wi-Fi network. You’ve written the password down somewhere, but where?

Every now and then, we’ve seen iPhones stop being able to access the Internet, either via Wi-Fi or a cellular data connection. Assuming that the Internet connection is working for other devices, there are two easy ways to reset your iPhone’s connection and get it working again.

When you’re in the Finder, choosing File > New Finder Window does, as you’d expect, open a new Finder window.

If you’re plugging your iPhone in regularly but getting low-battery warnings when you shouldn’t, consider the possibility that something is preventing your iPhone from charging successfully while plugged in.

When you’re writing a blog post or email newsletter, you’ll eventually hit the question of how to capitalize words in a title.

In a widely expected update, Apple has introduced a new MacBook Air that replaces the much-maligned butterfly keyboard with the new Magic Keyboard. The MacBook Air also gains faster processors, enhanced graphics, and more storage options, all for $200 less than before.

Apple threw back the curtains on an updated iPad Pro that will be compatible with a new iPad Pro-specific Magic Keyboard that includes a trackpad. The iPad Pro is available now, but the Magic Keyboard won’t ship until May.

Sharing your location works well when you’re out with friends or family and want everyone to be able to see where everyone else is.

The decision is easier than you might think, because Apple® may be phasing out My Photo Stream. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. For those who still have a choice, which way should you go? Let’s look closer.

CranstonIT is pleased to share with its clients a powerful new workflow automation tool that helps small and medium-sized businesses connect data from different cloud services.

Split View on the Mac helps you focus on your work in one app—perhaps a word processor—while providing access to one other app, like a Web browser. Before, you had to click and hold on the green full-screen button in the upper-left corner of any window. That's all changed.

Are you overwhelmed by email? Is your Inbox filled with promotions, special offers, and the like? These messages aren’t spam but that doesn’t mean you want to hear from them repeatedly.

It’s perhaps one of the most under-appreciated tools on your Mac®. It’s Spotlight®, and it hunts down pretty much anything on your hard drive that you can’t find on your own. And now, with macOS® Catalina, Spotlight is just getting started.

If your Mac is anything like ours, it’s suffering from an infestation of menu bar icons. Sure, the Wi-Fi menu is essential, and many others can be helpful. But if you have too many, or they’re in random order, finding one when you need it can be frustrating.

As you undoubtedly know, TYPING IN ALL CAPS is considered shouting on the Internet. Doesn’t it bug you when you accidentally tap the Caps Lock key and start writing in uppercase?

In your list of conversations in Messages, you probably have lots of people who have generic icons next to their names or numbers. A new feature in iOS 13 lets you share your preferred name and avatar picture with other iMessage users.

Power users like keyboard shortcuts because it’s faster to press a couple of keys than to navigate lengthy menus.

Have you ever seen the dreaded “No Service” label at the top of your iPhone’s screen, even when you’re pretty sure there should be cellular reception?

When Apple® released iOS 13 exclusively for iPhone® (and iPod touch®) last September, it offered many new features that didn’t make headlines — but are quite useful nonetheless. One such feature is Markup tools, a hidden powerhouse, and now more capable and intuitive than ever for adding notations to screenshots and photos.

Every time Apple® releases a new iPhone®, or even an iOS update, the added apps and features put more demands on the device’s battery. Consider, too, that rechargeable batteries in today’s mobile technology are consumable components that degrade over time, and become less capable of holding a charge or delivering optimal performance.

The Datto Networking Appliance offers everything your network needs in a single, compact device. Perfect for small and medium-sized companies, this device ensures your business remains connected and productive during Internet outages with fully integrated 4G LTE Internet failover. The Datto Networking Appliance is now a part of CranstonIT’s managed services commitment to deliver the latest in advanced network security.

Historically, picking a new Wi-Fi network has required you to open the Settings app and tap Wi-Fi, forcing you to unlock your iPhone or switch away from what you were doing.

For many of us, voicemail replaced answering machines, so we don't think of voicemail messages as being something we can save or share.

The next time you buy and set up a new Mac, make sure to migrate data and apps from your previous Mac to it right away during the initial setup.

If you’ve resisted requiring a password on your Mac after it wakes up or comes out of the screen saver because it’s too much work to enter repeatedly, an Apple Watch can make authentication much easier.

As company meetings become more virtual — and as businesses continue to explore new ways to cut costs — the challenge becomes finding the right technology partner to make it all happen. That’s why CranstonIT is pleased to announce its new partnership with Zoom, the leader in modern business video communications.

You would be right if you guessed the iPhone® was Apple’s best-selling product of all time. But would you know what comes next?

Most people have no idea how many digital photos they’ve taken or, even more perplexing, where they are located. It’s easy to feel overwhelmed when that search begins.

AirDrop has become a fast and reliable way to transfer data from one iPhone to another that’s nearby.

Did you know that the word for the irrational fear of Friday the 13th is paraskevidekatriaphobia? Neither did we, but what that supposedly unlucky day is good for—whenever it rolls around—is reminding us to test our backup systems.

With the iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Pro, and iPhone 11 Pro Max, Apple changed the way the Camera app’s shutter button works in ways that could cause confusion.

In previous versions of iOS, a scroll bar would appear on the right edge of the screen while you were swiping through a long Web page, email message, or document. Apple has made the scroll bar more helpful, and you’ll want to use it to scroll long pages more quickly than you can with swiping.

If you want to import photos from a device other than an iPhone or iPad and what if you don’t want those images in Photos. Turn to Apple’s Image Capture app.

If you’re experiencing a sporadic problem with your Mac, the sort of thing that happens often enough to be annoying but not so frequently as to be reproducible, allow us to suggest one little-known troubleshooting tip.

The all-new 16-inch MacBook Pro®, Apple’s most powerful and featured-packed notebook ever, has been released.This new MacBook Pro features an immersive 16-inch Retina® display, performance up to 80 percent faster, the latest 8-core processors, the largest battery capacity ever and advanced thermal architecture that enables the system to run at higher power for sustained periods of time.

Once of the fastest ways to communicate an emergency SOS is with your iPhone®. Specifically, it’s by creating a Medical ID using the Health app on your phone.

CranstonIT is pleased to introduce a new partnership that can help transform your WiFi network into a new revenue stream for your company.

For unknown reasons, Apple redesigned the toolbar in the iOS 13 version of Mail.

By default, most iPhones and iPads ship with Apple’s tiny 5-watt power adapters. They work, but not quickly.

A small but welcome new feature of iOS 13 is Driving ETA, which helps you share your estimated time of arrival with a contact whenever you’re navigating with the Maps app.

If your business relies on the power of the Apple® ecosystem, here are two free solutions that help enable next-level turnkey management of all your devices — and save you money in the process.

Are you a fan of Apple’s AirPods, or have you had trouble with them staying in your ears?

Brandon joined CranstonIT in October. He came to us from PureRED, a national marketing communications company with local offices in North Huntingdon.

It won’t surprise anyone that YouTube and Instagram are the most popular apps on the iPhone®. But it might surprise everyone that the iPhone houses the world’s most popular camera.

Apple likes to keep Mac names simple, but that’s not always helpful. For instance, if you want to add RAM to your Mac, it’s not good enough to know that it’s an iMac. Apple likes to keep Mac names simple, but that’s not always helpful. For instance, if you want to add RAM to your Mac, it’s not good enough to know that it’s an iMac.

There are plenty of situations where it makes sense to put a date in a filename, but if you don’t use the right date format, the files may sort in unhelpful ways.

Whenever Apple releases hot new hardware, it’s tempting to order the latest and greatest and then put your old Mac or iPhone® up for sale on a classifieds site like Craigslist. If you do that, be cautious about potential buyers.

Do you use 3D Touch on your iPhone®?

iPadOS 13 debuts with this new generation of iPad Pro®, iPad, iPad mini and iPad Air® devices. iPadOS serves to recognize that iPad continues to grow into its own computing platform. So while iPadOS was built on the same foundation as iOS, it delivers a truly unique and distinct experience for iPad users.

Few people get so little email that they want an iPhone® notification for every message that rolls in. But many of us have just a couple of people—our personal VIPs—whose messages are important enough to warrant an alert.

Apple’s release of macOS® 10.15 Catalina is not simply another OS X® refresh, but instead a robust version packed with new features that continue to push the OS forward.

CranstonIT is pleased to offer its clients a modernized and more intuitive approach to small business physical security. Verkada builds enterprise security cameras that combine cutting-edge technology with intelligent cloud-based software. With its line of indoor and outdoor D-Series cameras, Verkada eliminates the need for local servers, firewall equipment and network video recorders — reducing complexity and lowering operating costs.

If you have a friend whom you refer to only by his nickname, it can be annoying to feel like you should use his proper first name when adding him to Contacts.

macOS 10.15 Catalina update has released, should you update?