Here are the slides from Dennis’ iCloud presentation of Nov 19, 2019, at the monthly MacMAD meeting.
Naturally, the link is to the Keynote slide show in iCloud.
Here are the slides from Dennis’ iCloud presentation of Nov 19, 2019, at the monthly MacMAD meeting.
Naturally, the link is to the Keynote slide show in iCloud.
Here’s some useful information from this month’s meeting on Contacts and Calendars.
The contacts and calendars apps exist on both the Mac (computers) and iOS (iPad & iPhone). The different versions can cooperate and share data via iCloud, but they are not the same. The Mac version can do some things, such as edit contact groups that the iOS version cannot do.
Here is Apple’s Support Article on Contacts for the Mac. It is an overview of Contacts and how to use them.
And, similarly, here is Apple’s Support Article on Calendars on the Mac.
Besides Apple’s pre-defined Holiday calendar and your own calendars, you may find public calendars for various topics and groups on-line which you can subscribe to. For example, here is the MacMAD meeting calendar. If you subscribe to that, you will see our monthly meetings. If any changes are made, you will see the changes automatically.
Our April, 2019 meeting was on email and iCloud. Here are some helpful links from that meeting. Fittingly, the slides are shared through iCloud.
Here are the files from last night’s MacMAD meeting.
How better to share the information about iCloud than through iCloud? So, these links are to the presentation as iCloud documents.
Here are the slides in Keynote.
Here is the spreadsheet in Numbers.
When following these links, iCloud may ask you to enter a name for “collaborating”. You may enter any name you like, and click Join.
There has been a recent spate of phishing emails purporting to come from Apple. Typically they show some sort of a purchase or subscription that you supposedly bought from Apple. As always, DO NOT CLICK LINKS in emails.
If you want to check your account, do so from within iTunes, or by logging in at iCloud.com or Apple.com yourself.
In the email there are some suspicious indicators if you look for them. First of all, the email is not from the domain apple.com.
Second, the mail addresses you as “Valuable Customer”, not by name.
The bad guys expect you to be outraged that you are being charged for something you didn’t order — and that you will rashly click on the link they provided.
I don’t know what happens when you do that. Probably, it is a fake imitation of the Apple sign-in page where your credentials will be stolen. However, it may be some kind of attack that takes place merely by visiting the site.
Be safe out there, folks!
Your Apple ID is your single set of credentials for everything from Apple, including:
This is pretty important stuff, right? You don’t want your credentials to fall into the wrong hands! Until recently, those credentials consisted of only your username and password, which seldom change. If a bad guy got hold of those, he’d have complete access to your Apple identity.
To help prevent that, Apple set up Two-Factor Authentication (2FA). With 2FA, in addition to username and password, you must also give a verification code. Verification codes are sent to your phone or other trusted device. The verification code is different each time you log on.
Two-Factor Authentication is optional for users. However, you may now be forced to use it if you use certain apps — those which access your iCloud account.
Some apps require access to your files in iCloud, and therefore need your iCloud credentials to do so. This is fine, but you don’t want them to have the keys to your entire kingdom, do you? You don’t want a calendar app to order a new Macintosh, or delete your photos.
To control such apps, Apple now requires them to access iCloud using a One-Time password. This allows them to bypass 2FA, but using a special password which is only useable by that app for limited purposes. Once you give a one-time password to an app, and it uses it, it can never be used again for any other purpose.
You do not need to store or remember one-time passwords. If for some reason you need to re-authorize an app, you can simply generate a new one-time password for it. Dennis explains how to do all this in these slides from this month’s meeting:
I set out recently to find a shared iOS shopping list App to replace my family’s paper grocery shopping list. I had some pretty simple requirements:
I spent some time in the App store looking at reviews and didn’t see anything I wanted to buy. Some otherwise useful apps had a bad reputation for crashing. Others were just too complex. Some needed a subscription and a sign-on for sharing to work. It’s just creepy that the vendor would be watching everything on your shopping list.
Eventually I found it. An app that was already on my phone that met all my requirements and didn’t need any additional sign-ups, plus you can use Siri to add items to the list by voice.
The app is: Reminders — the humble Apple Reminders app that comes with iOS.
Here’s an overview from iMore on how to set Reminders up for sharing.
A couple of tips:
Enjoy!
Recently, I have been receiving mysterious spam calendar invitations like the one below. You may have received them also.
I never saw a corresponding email. Even worse, the only options are accept or decline. Either one sends a message back to the spammer, confirming my email address! This junk is coming through your iCloud account. Here are instructions for preventing this type of spam from The Dangling Pointer blog.
Since this is associated with your iCloud calendar, it affects both iOS and Macintosh.
They probably didn’t get your email address from anywhere. It appears they are trying big lists of likely email addresses @icloud.com.
Email is one of the most basic services that people expect on their Mac, iPhone or iPad. It is also one of the things that many beginners have trouble with. If you have a good understanding of your own email accounts you will have an easier time using all on-line services.
An email address is a string of characters that the email system can use to send or receive email. Usually an email address belongs to a single person or to a company.
Here is a typical email address: [email protected]
Email addresses must be in this specific format: The first part is a username then one at sign: @, then a domain name. Email addresses must not contain any spaces.
Email addresses are usually given in all lower case.
However, the part of the email address after the @ is not case sensitive for the purposes of sending email. So, mail sent to any of the following addresses should all reach the same recipient.
The username part of an email address (the part before the @) is often treated as case sensitive by email clients and servers, so always use the same capitalization.
Email addresses are public. They are not secret. They should not be used as passwords.
You should know who your email provider is. It is usually a well known company. Most people have email provided by their Internet Service Provider (ISP). Many people have email accounts with more than one provider.
Sample email addresses for common email providers:
Notice that the email domain is not necessarily identical to the company name.
Customers of Bright House Networks in central Florida have email addresses like:
The rr stands for Road Runner, which is Bright House’s name for their internet service.
It seems obvious, but you need to memorize your email address and password or write them down someplace safe, preferably both. If you can’t access your email, you may lose access to other services as well. Your email account is the key to your on-line kingdom. Pay attention.
After your email address, the other thing you’ll need to access your email account is your password. When you first create your email account you will be asked to create a password. You should do so very carefully, and write it down in a safe place. Passwords should be kept secret.
Unfortunately the exact rules for what is allowed or required in passwords varies depending on the site or email provider you are using. The following rules are a good starting point.
Example passwords:
Randomly generated: Nm4$tL&vWv
Easier to type on iOS: mtvv4$&NLW (don’t need to shift keyboards as often)
Too Easy to Guess: ABC.def.123
Very bad: 7/December/1941 (especially if that’s your birthday)
Watch out for letters and numbers that can be easily confused. Is that a lower-case ell or a one? A zero or an oh? It might be best to avoid using these confusing letters/numbers in your passwords. Be sure to be extremely clear about these distinctions when you write down your password, so you can decipher it when you need to enter it again.
You will want to log on to the Mail app on your Mac or iPhone. Your credentials will be your email address and password.
Most email providers also provide a web mail service where you can connect to their mail system directly without using an app. Usually this is good for situations when you want to read your mail while using someone else’s computer. However some people use email that way all the time — it’s your preference.
For example, if you have an email account through Google’s gmail, you can log on at gmail.com, or mail.google.com. There you should enter the same email address and password you created initially.
Many web sites, maybe most web sites, want you to log on using an email address even if that site has nothing to do with email. Why do they do that? Because it identifies you uniquely — no two people can have the same email address. That makes it easy for the site to keep you separate from all the other people using the site, and to recognize you when you return.
For example, eBay is an auction site. It has nothing to do with email. It invites users to sign in using their “Email or username”.
You may use your email address as your username on some site, and others insist on it. Almost all sites want to you to enter your email address even if they give you a different username. This is so they can use email to help you reset your password if you forget.
Here’s the important thing:
Even though you may logon to a site using your email address, that’s just a coincidence.
Ultimately you should have a different password for each site you use, e.g. one for Facebook, one for Yahoo!, one for eBay, even if you use the same email address to log on to each one. I know it can be difficult to remember these. So, you must have a system for writing them down or remembering them. This is why password manager apps are so popular.
There’s a lot more to say about email, but this is enough for one beginner article.
If you will be buying a new Mac or iOS device soon, it really pays to get your ducks in a row as far as your Apple ID goes. Your Apple ID is more important than ever in the new operating systems, Yosemite for the Mac, and iOS 8 for the iPhone and its ilk.
Apple ID Is Your Single Credential for all Things Apple
If you have, or have ever had an iCloud account, Dot-Mac account, or Me.com account, you have an Apple ID.
Your single Apple ID is used for all these things:
I’m probably forgetting something that should be in this list. It’s also used for developer access, if you are a registered developer with Apple.
Decide Which ID You Want To Use
If you’ve been using the Mac for a while, you may have more than one Apple ID. You probably want to settle on a single ID for your on-line life.
If you have been sharing an Apple ID with a significant other, you should get separate IDs. (It’s not that I don’t love you, but how can I send you a message if you don’t have your own ID?) Apple’s family sharing lets you share iTunes purchases with family members with their own accounts, so there’s no reason to use the same ID any longer.
Email Addresses
Although Apple has changed their mind several times about what domain they want users to use for email, they have done a good job of making it transparent. Email sent to [email protected], or [email protected] can be received at [email protected] John Doe can also use any of those to log on to his one iCloud account.
Apple could phase those older domains out some day, so use @iCloud as much as possible going forward.
It’s good policy for personal email addresses to belong to one and only one person. Some couples share an email address, but it’s a bad idea. One person can miss an email because the other one read it or deleted it. It can be awkward for your friends who are not sure which person they are addressing in an email. It’s certainly awkward if a couple separates for any reason — Who gets the email address? And, when the inevitable happens, and one person passes away, it can be extremely weird for you to send, or your friends to receive, email from the account of a dead person.
Use Really Good Password Practices
The strength of your password is the only thing keeping bad guys from buying a new Mac and charging it to your credit card. Since your Apple ID is so important, you want to make sure you have a good password. Don’t use the same password for your Apple ID as you use for any other service! I’d say that 10-12 characters is long enough for a password these days. Make sure your password or simple modifications to it are not in any dictionary. Mix in some numbers, caps and special characters.
In new installs, your login password on your Mac is your Apple ID password by default. That’s a pretty good idea, because it makes you remember your Apple ID, since you’ll use it every day to login. If you just set up a new Mac, or just installed a new OS from scratch, you’ll likely get to a point where the machine restarts, and you are asked for a login password. If you’re like me, you’ll think “Panic! I don’t know the password because I haven’t created a password for this machine yet.” Well, don’t panic. The login password is your Apple ID password.
For greater protection, you can enable two-factor authentication (aka two-step verification) for your Apple ID. This provides much better security for your Apple account. It eliminates social engineering attacks where the attacker is able to find out the answers to those lame security questions (your mother’s maiden name, etc.), and get Apple to reset your password. With Apple’s two-step verification, your security becomes entirely up to you. Apple cannot help you if you forget. You are responsible for remembering your password. You will also be given a recovery code which you are responsible for keeping in a safe place where you can find it if needed.
Two-factor authentication isn’t for everyone. Read the instructions carefully before enabling it. You will have to use application-specific passwords for certain things. Make sure that doesn’t scare you before you commit to the change.