Category: iOS

How to Upload Images Right-Side-Up

A frequently asked question on the Internet is:

“My photo appears correct on my computer, but when I uploaded it to [website], it is sideways. How can I make my image upload in the correct orientation?”

This problem is surprisingly universal, it affects many different web sites and users of Windows, Macintosh, tablets and smartphones are all affected. It most often affects photos that were taken in portrait orientation.

Local Image Correct Orientation
Uploaded Image Sideways

The problem is caused by the varying interpretations of the image rotation tags in the EXIF data accompanying digital photos. This problem is not likely to go away anytime soon because the meaning of the rotation tags is somewhat ambiguous, and there is disagreement about what the correct way to handle them ought to be. Some software thinks it should apply the tags, other programs or sites think they should ignore the tags or remove the tags.

There is an easy solution for users: Edit the photo in your photo editor of choice (with the possible exception of Windows Picture Viewer). Rotate it to be right-side-up if necessary. Then make some other change that affects the image. Tweak the contrast or the color. Crop the image slightly. Almost any change will work. Then, save it.

The saved image will have its pixels oriented properly and have no Orientation tag, or have the default Horizontal tag. Everybody agrees on how to display an image like that. When you upload it, it will display the same as you saw it on your computer.

If you edit an image, but only rotate it, your editor will probably just change the Orientation tag without changing the image pixels. Unfortunately, not every program or site will interpret the Orientation tag the same way as your image editor.

If you make a change to the actual image, it forces the program to completely re-write the image from scratch, which results in an image with the default orientation.

May Meeting Notes: Contacts and Calendars

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.

The Shortcuts App for iOS

Dennis Crowley presented on Shortcuts for the iPhone and iPad at our February meeting.

Shortcuts is a new scripting tool for iOS. Although it has more potential than anything Apple has released recently, it is widely under appreciated. Many people have never heard of it.

Shortcuts lets you easily create and use your own scripts for commonly performed actions on iOS. You can also use many pre-existing scripts which are freely available.

Although Shortcuts is an Apple app, and is free, it may not be installed on your device by default. You can get it from the App Store.

Here are the slides from that talk. Note that many of the slides contain links to more information. The slides are shared in Apple Keynote format through iCloud.

 

June 2018 WWDC Notes

At this month’s meeting we are reviewing the announcements from Apple’s World Wide Developer’s Conference Keynote. As usual, MacMAD is providing links so that you don’t need to take notes in the meeting.

The announcements fell into three subject areas:

The Apple TV and Apple Watch (PDF)

iOS 12 – New system for the iPhone and iPad (Pages document) or (view as PDF)

MacOS Mojave – New system for the Macintosh (RTF Text Edit document)

 

 

iOS 11.0.3 Fixes Problem with 3rd Party Replacement Screens

Apple released iOS 11.0.3 on Wednesday, October 11, 2017. The description of the release is as follows:

iOS 11.0.3 includes bug fixes for your iPhone or iPad. This update:

  • Fixes an issue where audio and haptic feedback would not work on some iPhone 7 and 7 Plus devices
  • Addresses an issue where touch input was unresponsive on some iPhone 6s displays because they were not serviced with genuine Apple parts

It so happens that I repaired my iPhone 6s screen recently with an apparently reputable, but non-Apple replacement screen.

Old screen, miscellaneous tools and the new screen installed.

Since the repair, I had noticed a few times when the touch screen became completely unresponsive. This was disconcerting at first, because an iPhone that doesn’t respond to any tap, touch, drag, etc. is pretty much a useless brick. However I found that just waiting about 1 minute or so with the screen off would bring it back to life. Since it didn’t happen but a few times, and since I knew a workaround, I didn’t complain to anybody.

Apparently, this was happening to enough people to reach the ears of Apple.

I want to give Apple a big thank you for putting in a software fix to work around a hardware problem that was not their fault. They could have done nothing. Some companies have gone so far as to deliberately disable unauthorized 3rd party hardware. Not Apple. Apple stuck by their customers, and this customer intends to stick by Apple.

Apple customers who used 3rd party replacement screens escaped with only a stern talking-to:

Note: Non-genuine replacement displays may have compromised visual quality and may fail to work correctly. Apple-certified screen repairs are performed by trusted experts who use genuine Apple parts.

While we’re on the subject of screen repair. Although I did successfully repair my own iPhone screen, I can’t really recommend doing it yourself. The process involved a jeweler’s magnifier, a guitar pick, a suction cup and six or eight nearly microscopic screws. I came extremely close to letting the magic smoke out of my iPhone. (Smoke must be what makes it work, because if the smoke ever comes out, it doesn’t work any more!)

I got away for about $50, but the folks who install a genuine Apple screen for, say, $150 are earning their money.