MacworldApril 2016的目錄

Let’s hear it for the Mac. This is test from Tereza to try update mobile version of this story. There’s been plenty of ink shed on the meaning and impact of iPhone and iPad sales in Apple’s most recent quarters. In and of itself, that’s no surprise: The iPhone is the company’s biggest product and makes up more than two-thirds of its revenue. The iPad, on the other hand, has been struggling, unlike most of Apple’s other devices. But through it all, the Mac has quietly kept on doing steady business, and I think the sturdy workhorse of Apple’s lineup deserves some accolades. Not only has the Mac entered its fourth decade—impressive for any piece of technology—but it’s seen tremendous success and even growth in an era where all anybody…

MAC GEMS ARE APPS THAT OFFER STANDOUT UTILITY OR UNIQUE FEATURES AT A GREAT PRICE. UNLESS YOU’VE BEEN living under the proverbial rock, there’s a good chance that you have, by now, become aware of how tragically easy it can be for your online credentials to be stolen. From picking weak combinations of characters that can be easily guessed—it’s somewhat sad that, in 2016, password is still the most common passphrase—to reusing the same password across multiple websites, it doesn’t take much to make a mistake that could very well turn out to be fatal.   1PASSWORD 6 FOR MAC PRICE WHEN RATED $50 single-user license COMPANY AgileBits While there is no bulletproof solution to this problem, the easiest way to alleviate it is to engage the services of a…

AIRTABLE IS AN ONLINE platform for creating, using, and sharing small relational databases. It’s not ready for enterprise users yet (that’s coming), but right now, if you want help managing data for personal use or for your small business, if you need to share that data with others, if you’d like users to access it anywhere, and if you’d love to do all this for free (or next to nothing), then Airtable (airtable.com) might be the answer to your prayers. AIRTABLE PRICE WHEN RATED Monthly fee ranges from free to $24 per user COMPANY Airtable On your computer, there is nothing to download. Just launch your browser, go to Airtable.com, and sign up. It’s free to get started. FIRST BASE: HOUSE HUNTING You can pick from a couple dozen starter…

PARTIES AND EVENTS take forever to plan and organize, only to be over in the blink of an eye. Once everyone leaves, photos taken on their smartphones go with them. As host, you’re left with only memories and a mess to clean up should guests forget to share their pictures—and even if they do, it could be days or weeks later. It doesn’t have to be this way: Assuming you own the latest Apple TV and your partygoers have iOS devices, you can not only gather all of the photos being taken as they happen, but make those images part of the actual event itself. Built upon the company’s mobile-only Partysnapper app, Boinx Software touts PhotoWall+ (boinx.com/connect/photowallplus) as “a social photo wall for Apple TV” that could very well become…

Both the Oculus Rift (go.macworld.com/oculuspreorder) and HTC Vive (go.macworld.com/htcvivepreorder) headsets will soon be released to the public, finally delivering on the long-envisioned promise of immersive virtual reality experiences. However, both require a seriously beefed-up PC—not a Mac, either—along with a significant investment, with the Rift priced at $600 and the Vive trumping it at $799. That’s premium VR, obviously. What about the low end? Well, assuming you have an iPhone 5 or newer, you can try out mobile VR using a simple viewer shell, and Google’s Cardboard platform is the easiest way in. Cardboard lets you buy or even build a viewer made of low-cost materials, and then slot your phone in to use as the brains and the screen. And then you’ll hold it up to your face and…

On February 23, the United States District Court of California issued an order (go.macworld.com/fbi appleorder) requiring Apple to assist the FBI in accessing a locked iPhone—and not just any iPhone, but the iPhone 5c used by one of the San Bernardino shooters. The order is very clear: Build new firmware to enable the FBI to perform an unlimited, high-speed brute force attack, and place that firmware on the device. Apple is not only fighting the request (go.macworld.com/oppose courtorder), but posted a public letter (go.macworld.com/tcletter) signed by Tim Cook and linked on Apple’s front page. Make no mistake: This is unprecedented, and the situation was deliberately engineered by the FBI and Department of Justice to force a showdown that could define limits to our civil rights for generations to come. This…

ALTHOUGH FASTER, MORE DURABLE solid-state disk (SSD) storage eliminated spinning platters and therefore reduces the chance of losing precious files due to mechanical failure, there are plenty of other ways drive-related catastrophe can rear its ugly head. Frequent backups are one highly recommended method of protection, but that alone isn’t enough to prevent complete data loss. As the old saying goes, the best offense is a good defense. In the case of your Mac, that strategy involves keeping good data recovery software on hand for when a file or—God forbid—an entire disk partition eventually winds up disappearing without a trace. (And remember, it’s not a question of “if,” but “when.” Unless an afflicted drive craps out entirely—in which case your only hope will be paying for costly recovery services like…

ANKER POWERCORE+ 20100 If you need a high-capacity battery that can fully charge a 12-inch MacBook, the $50 Anker PowerCore+ 20100 (anker.com) is your best bet. It’s far cheaper (especially adjusted for inflation) than what a removable replacement used to cost when Mac laptops offered swappable batteries. Plus, it performed well in our tests, has an attractive shape and material that fits nicely in the hand, and features a perfectly-adequate three ports, including a combined in/out USB-C charging port. —GLENN FLEISHMAN TALENTCELL 10400MAH 38WH PORTABLE CHARGER The $27 Talentcell 10400mAh 38Wh Portable Charger (talentcell.com) is sturdy and well snapped together, and performed extremely well in testing. While it ostensibly has just 10,400 mAh of capacity, in testing it seemed to punch well above its class. It was able…

Your Instagram videos are getting the augmented reality treatment thanks to a new mobile printer. The LifePrint (lifeprintphotos.com) can print instant photos directly from your iPhone, Android phone, or GoPro via Bluetooth. It uses Zink film and its thermal printing technology so it doesn’t require ink or toner. In that way, LifePrint is very much like the Polaroid Zip Instant Mobile Printer (go.macworld.com/polaroidzip). In fact, the two printers are nearly the same price: the LifePrint is $129 and the Polaroid Zip is $129.95. But the LifePrint can print Apple Live Photos, GIFs, Vines, Instagram videos, and GoPro clips. And you can use the LifePrint app to see how these printed images move, loop, and rewind. The LifePrint app for iOS and Android connects to your camera roll and social media…

As a plug-in to Photos (go.macworld.com/photosforosx), Macphun’s apps significantly augment the Apple app’s bare-bones editing tools. Despite their power, Creative Kit apps require a minimal learning curve. Creative Kit does not seek to replace Photos’ organizational utility, though Macphun (macphun.com) does market a separate app called Snapselect for organizing and choosing the best photos from a batch and trashing duplicates. The Mac-only Creative Kit is a six-app bundle that functions both as a standalone app and a plug-in to Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom (go.macworld.com/lightrcc), and Elements (go.macworld.com/elements14). Available via a single installer for one discounted price, Creative Kit lets you access some of Macphun’s most popular image enhancement packages: Noiseless, Focus, Intensify, Tonality, Snapheal, and FX Photo Studio. Each is also available as a standalone app (though in your Applications folder,…

When it comes to gadgets, Apple and Amazon tend to have very different audiences. Consider tablets, for example: Amazon’s entry-level Fire tablet is priced at a stunning $50, while Apple’s cheapest active iPad (2013’s iPad Mini 2) sells for $269. There’s a noticeable gap in quality between the two in many regards, but Amazon’s focus on cheap, usable tech contrasts sharply against Apple’s higher-end polish and performance. The difference is less obvious when it comes to set-top boxes, however. Last fall’s overhauled Apple TV was a big leap for the device, adding apps and games along with the touchpad remote, but Amazon had already mined that territory with the first Fire TV. Right after the Apple TV was released, Amazon refreshed the Fire TV with added processing power, 4K resolution…

CONSIDERING INSTAGRAM’S BAKED-IN LIMITATIONS, it’s a miracle the photo-centric social network has become as wildly popular as it has. After all, third-party apps aren’t permitted to upload images to the service at all, and nearly six years after the debut of the iPad, there’s still no tablet-optimized iOS update to be found. Instagram is also oddly walled off from desktop computers. Sure, you can use a web browser to search or view images, but it feels like something the company grudgingly maintains. Even after Facebook acquired the service in 2012, Instagram remains stubbornly mobile-first, despite the efforts of developers like ThinkTime, who keep trying to expand its reach. GRIDS FOR INSTAGRAM 3.1.1 PRICE WHEN RATED $5 COMPANY ThinkTime Creations INSTAGRAM FAUX MAC Grids for Instagram (go.macworld.com/grids) puts more emphasis on…

With all the unsettling, unblinking zeal of a missionary, I want to try to convince you that something which sounds a bit weird is actually a great idea that will completely change your life. I want you to consider using an iPhone as your primary computer when you’re traveling, especially on business, only carrying one extra thing with you: a Bluetooth keyboard. Let me admit up front that you will look a bit peculiar. As you board a train, as you check into a hotel, as you post up at a coffee shop—if all you’re carrying is a keyboard, you will attract looks. You could, naturally, carry a bag instead and stash the keyboard in it, but while this makes you look less goggle-eyed crazy, it takes away from one…

IF ELGATO’S HOMEKIT (elgato.com/eve) kit products aren’t an homage to the movie Wall-E, I’ll eat my hat. It would be a baseball hat, and my least favorite, but I don’t think I have to worry. Look at the image above. Even if the company claims otherwise. If you don’t know what the heck I’m talking about, Elgato’s environmental and door/window sensors and its remote on/off switch are styled much like EVE, the robotic love interest in the animated Pixar movie; they’re clean and glossy white with just a hint of green. Okay, there’s blue in the movie as well and the green flashes, but…then, of course, there’s the name. It’s all-caps in the movie, but those are about the only things that aren’t note-for-note. I’m dishing out compliments here. They…

It goes without saying, but digital address books are great. You have instant access to all of your contacts, and your brother’s phone number is just a few keystrokes away. But just as you can misplace your real-world address book, you can just as easily lose your digital one if you aren’t careful. Read on, and we’ll show you a few ways to safeguard your precious contacts list. CLOUD SYNCING SERVICES: A PRIMER The easiest, most pain-free way to store your contacts is to use a cloud-based contacts management service. Most of the big-name email services—Google’s Gmail, Microsoft Outlook, Apple iCloud, and Yahoo Mail—offer some sort of contact manager. And since they’re fully integrated with your email, you don’t have to hop from service to service to find the person…

In a brand-new update made available only to Lightroom’s Creative Cloud subscribers, Adobe has launched a feature that is sure to delight panorama fanatics: Boundary Warp (go. macworld.com/boundarywarp). The object is to protect parts of a stitched image that would otherwise be cut off with a typical rectangular crop. Lightroom’s Photo Merge feature simplifies the process of photo stitching, and the new Boundary Warp offers a greater degree of control than in the past. Even if you shot your images in vertical orientation with height in mind, Lightroom’s panorama feature might still cut off outlying edges of your stitched image. As you shoot, it’s sometimes hard to tell exactly what you’ll have to later discard. This oddly named feature restores full edge content to panorama landscapes. Here’s how to use…