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4 EDITORIAL

STAFF PICKS
What are you going to do

Editorial this year that you’ve never

done before?

ANTHONY
CARUANA

I
’ve loved taking pictures since I was Apple’s most recent earnings call and
a kid. Back when I was about nine, I some subsequent market analysis pointed
Run a marathon.
received my first camera as a gift. It out that, although the iPhone is still a very
used film cartridges that shot 12 images popular and profitable product for Apple,
per roll, used a cube flash that was good Android does enjoy larger market share –
for four shots and the film had to be taken albeit through its strength in the low-cost
to the local chemist to be dropped off for handset market where Apple chooses
development and collected a week later. not to compete. That’s why this month’s MADELEINE
How times have changed. The cost feature by Michael Simon on taking an SWAIN
of photography is almost free once you Android vacation is so interesting. I know
get past the initial equipment layout, if of quite a few people who have jumped Play my own
daughter's
you’re an amateur snapper, and pros ship, either by choice or because of an
grandmother in
now operate in a market where a great employer, to Android. a play.
deal of what was handled via a deep I’ve switched between iOS, Android
understanding of how cameras operate and Windows Phone several times and am
is being replaced by post-production fascinated by the experiences of others. JAMUNA
software. Susie Ochs’ look at the iPad Pro focuses RAJ
Although this offers lots of on a big question – can the iPad Pro
opportunities, my friends making a living replace your Mac? Every since the first iPad Visit Japan at the
as professionals are often confronted came to the market I’ve flirted with using an end of this year.
I'm working with
by clients who don’t understand the iPad as my main travelling computer. And
this goal in mind!
difference high-end equipment and skill I’ve tested a lot of external keyboards and
can make to the quality of an image. other accessories to make it possible, but
In this month’s feature on photography I’ve always gone back to a Mac.
MONIQUE
I take a look at some of those changes Perhaps the iPad Pro will change that, BLAIR
and try to offer some advice for beginners although, despite the great hardware, I
and pros alike. can’t help but wonder if the real reason Moving out of
This month’s collection of reviews is the iPad Pro can potentially work as a home to live with
friends.
a little more eclectic than usual. We’re mobile computer is the emergence of real
including security, sports, networking and enterprise quality apps.
sound products as well as a movie review
– something you don’t see too often in
technology magazines.

APRIL 2016 / ISSUE NO. 216

CONSUMER TECH DIVISION (Macworld Australia & MacTalk):
Publisher Joanne Davies joanne.davies@niche.com.au
Editor Anthony Caruana anthony.caruana@niche.com.au @anthony_caruana
Subeditor Madeleine Swain madeleine.swain@niche.com.au
facebook.com/ausmacworld
National Advertising Manager Lachlan Oakley lachlan.oakley@niche.com.au +61 3 9948 4941 twitter.com/macworldau
MACWORLD AU PRODUCTION: Production Manager Jamuna Raj jamuna.raj@niche.com.au Design and Digital Prepress Monique Blair

NICHE MEDIA:
Chairman Nicholas Dower Managing Director Paul Lidgerwood Commercial Director Joanne Davies Content Director Chris Rennie Financial Controller Sonia Jurista
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CTP/Print Graphic Impressions

ISSN 2200-2375. Macworld Australia is a publication of Niche Media Pty Ltd ABN 13 064 613 529. 1 Queens Road, Melbourne, Victoria 3004 Australia. Macworld Australia is published under licence from International Data Group Inc.
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Material appearing in in Macworld Australia is copyright and reproduction in whole or part without express permission from the publishers will result in litigation. Editorial items appearing in Macworld Australia that were originally published
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 5

ONTENTS

www
APRIL 2016
w.macworld.com.au
macworld com au
Features
16
SNAPPING THE WORLD –
THE CHANGING WORLD
THROUGH A CAMERA LENS
Photography is now more accessible than it’s ever
been. Anthony Caruana looks at what’s new in the world
of photography with some advice for aspiring snappers.

38
WHY THE BEST iPAD YET
WON’T WORK FOR EVERYONE
Susie Ochs takes deep dive look at the iPad Pro to
see if it really is the perfect crossover device that
straddles the divide between the road and the office.
6

ONTENTS

Regulars
07 MAIL
10 MACMAN:
It’s more than just the iCar
12 GUEST COLUMN:
How Apple could fix the Mac App Store
14 HOT STUFF
22 BUSINESS
28 MAC GEMS
30 GADGET GUIDE
32 iOS APP GUIDE Reviews
34 SECRETS 46 LockSmart
36 SPECIAL FEATURE
47 Edifier R20000DB
iPad Buyers’ Guide
43 HELP 48 Garmin Varia Bundle
44 GROUP TEST: 49 Linksys RE6700 Range Extender
Monitors 50 Movie review: Steve Jobs
 MAIL 7

www.macworld.com.au
APRIL 2016
HAVE YOUR SAY

LETTER OF THE MONTH

MISSING PRODUCTS
IN GROUP TEST
I was a little disappointed that there
was no review of Topfield or Beyonwiz
PVRs, which (from what I’ve been
reading on the IceTV forum) are two
of the best on the market. I totally
understand that there is limited space
in your magazine, but I’m sure you
could have squeezed them in.
As someone who ordered a Skippa
in the first batch, but was ‘railroaded’
by IceTV, I’m in the market to replace
my Foxtel service and I really could
have used a review of these two PVRs.
MACKEEPER ANXIETY I’ve pretty much made my decision
I thoroughly enjoy the magazine and read every word, although a lot of it is (Beyonwiz T4), but am still looking for
much too technical for an aged person (my first exposure to a computer was reviews.
in 1967 – Basic and punchcards!). After years of frustration with Windows,
Shannon Pasto
I drew back the blinds, saw the light and, just like Adam, ‘bit the Apple’ in
2010. I upgrade every new version, and was ‘El Capitan’ as soon as it came
out and before you wrote about how to install it. Now to the purpose of this
It is a challenge to fit everything into
letter.
This month I was dismayed to read at line three on page 36 “never be the limited space we have. And often,
tempted to install MacKeeper”. I was aghast! I have had MacKeeper for as much as we’d love to review these
a couple of years now and have never found a problem with it. Should I products, some manufacturers don’t
be expecting trouble soon? I have only used it to do clean-ups and find have review units available in the time
updates. I’ll be on tenterhooks waiting for something bad to happen. Could we need them.
you enlighten me as to the reason for such a statement, and should I be We try our best to get a
worried? Should I uninstall it? representative sample of the
Should I lie awake at night worrying, or should I drink myself into products in a category that we think
oblivion? are most likely to be appealing or
Jack Barry of interest to Macworld Australia
readers. But sometimes, despite our
Well, Jack – to put it bluntly – MacKeeper does not enjoy a great reputation. Many best intentions, we simply can’t get
people have found MacKeeper slows their system down or makes it less stable. I’m the products.
pleased that’s not been your experience, but it’s certainly one that I’ve seen and read
about for some time.
MacKeeper operates at a very low level in OS X and can be difficult to remove. And MEMORIES
it does little for its reputation by using scaremongering in its ads. As a short lament for the anniversary
I’m a fan of not installing any application without a specific purpose. I’m not sure edition of Australian Macworld that
what you mean by ‘clean ups’, but there are plenty of other tools like OnyX and will not now see the light of day, may I
Cocktail that perform similar tasks – although, in my experience, they are rarely share a memory?
needed. In mid 1985, at some considerable
expense, I shipped back to Australia
8 MAIL
HAVE YOUR SAY
a Smith Corona portable electric
typewriter purchased during a year’s
sojourn in the US. I felt I had entered a
new world of ease and sophistication.
A few month’s later, at a New Year’s
Eve party, my friend took me into his
study and introduced me to his new
Apple Macintosh 512K. I spent much
of the evening tucked in there in close
conversation with it, like a schoolgirl
with a new, exotic boyfriend. Soon,
I was plotting how I might extricate
myself from the old relationship.
A few months later with a new
contract signed, I took out a bank
loan to purchase my very own 512KE
– and how important was that ‘E’?
The retail price was about $4000 – by
the time I paid off the bank loan, I
had laid out $6000. I purchased a
piano for my daughter for half that
with the same contract. I have never
had a moment’s regret. But it was
a lonely world for Apple Macintosh
enthusiasts – especially a freelance
historian with tenuous institutional
affiliations. We Apple people had to
be our own technicians – and this is
where Australian Macworld came in as
an indispensable friend and colleague.
Better than that, it proved to be a
valuable early-warning system. Not
long after I began subscribing they
ran a story about the edition being
late because of some glitch that had
destroyed files that had not been
backed up.
Backed up! Oh yes, I knew about
lost text. We all had colleagues who
had suffered some disastrous loss
of the only copy of their thesis, essay
or draft of a book, but somehow that
little box on my desk promised a
new and enticing permanence – and
reproducibility. Multiple copies at the
press of a key! That, I soon realised,
was the key to backing up in those
early days. Printing. Notwithstanding
the cost of ink, I learnt from Macworld’s
experience to print everything that
was important. And, yes, there were
times when the text disappeared – but
I always had a copy. It was a lesson
well-learned and backing up has
become so much easier with time – but
all the devices in the world are useless
without the backup mentality. So thank
you, Macworld – and for all the reading
pleasure and useful information that I
have absorbed since.
As for the jilted Smith Corona – he
found a home eventually, but I am not
sure for how long he was in service. I
have been entirely faithful to Apple ever
since.
Carolyn Rasmussen

REIGNITING YOUR LOVE...
Despite the look of the subject of this,
it has nothing do do with little blue pills,
matchmaking sites or anything else of
that ilk.
I’m talking about the rollercoaster
ride that is part of being an Apple user.
2015 saw the release of iOS 9 and OS
X El Capitan, each of which was not
without its issues and annoyances. I
know for me that iOS 9 has had me
tearing my hair out over problems with
iMessage, autocorrect and Siri, but I
was able to put it all in context again
when I spent some time trying to get
our daughter’s Android tablet locked
down to stop her accidentally buying a
game or an in-app purchase. What a
mission!
There does not appear to be any
way to actually turn off or hide the
Google Play Store and you can only
password protect purchases that
cost money. Free purchases can be
downloaded without a password (note
that the tablet is only running Android
4.1.2 and cannot be upgraded any
further despite only being about two
years old). This made me realise
that the odd issue with a bad word
replacement and Siri’s failings are a
small price to pay for the joy of being
able to update older devices to the
latest version of iOS and that much
better parental control system that is
built in to iOS. Our iPad 2 runs iOS 9
MAIL 9
www.macworld.com.au
APRIL 2016
without any issues; yes, it is getting
a little slow with modern games like Q Letters should be emailed to editor@macworld.com.au
The Room 3 (which I recommend to with a subject header of ‘Letter to the Editor’ or by post to:
everyone, it is a great game!), but it still Macworld Australia Mailbox, Level 8, St Kilda Road Towers,
works – one day it would be really nice 1 Queens Road, Melbourne, Victoria, 3004. Please include
to replace it with an iPad Air 2, but until your full name and address, including state or territory.
the money fairy visits that’s not going Q Comments on stories or Forum posts on
to happen. www.macworld.com.au are also eligible for the prize.
I’d also note that now that El Q We reserve the right to edit letters and probably will.
Capitan is up to version 10.11.2 the
Q Letters of fewer than 200 words are given preference.
speed and stability issues that I had
previously have more or less vanished.
I’d also heartily recommend that
everyone replace the 5400 RPM
hard drives in their MacBooks with
SSDs as the performance gain is
spectacular and they’re not even that
expensive any more.
It’s funny at times how what are
really the most minor of things can
enrage you so much; perhaps that is
why from time to time we need to step
away from the keyboard or screen and
think twice (or maybe three or four
times!) before making posts in public
forums or on Facebook – remember
folks that things typed in anger can be
very much just as hurtful and mean as
words said face to face, or perhaps
even more so.
This issue’s prize to the Macworld Australia
This has been a public service
reader who has submitted what we think is
announcement bought to you by the
the most interesting letter is a Joby GripTight
number 9 and the letter X (and perhaps
a few words that began with letters we
GorillaPod for smaller tablets. The GPod
best not mention!) provides a fun, flexible mounting stand,
allowing you to wrap around your leg or chair,
Jamie Dobbs
position on railing or stand on rubber foot
grips for the best viewing for your small tablet.
It’s fair to say that it’s not all smooth The GPod retails at $49.95.
sailing for Apple users, but it can www.joby.com
take a trip to an alternative to
remind us that despite some of
the missteps Apple has made it’s TERMS AND CONDITIONS. Letter of the month 1. Instructions on how to enter form part of
these conditions of entry. 2. To enter send tips or queries to editor@macworld.com.au with a
not all bad. subject header of “Letter to the Editor”. Entries will be judged by the editorial staff of Macworld
Australia. The judges’ decision in relation to any aspect of the competition is final and binding
And your advice about the SSD on every person who enters. No correspondence will be entered into. Chance plays no part in
determining the winner(s). Each entry will be individually judged based on its degree of interest.
is a sound one. When I replaced 4. Employees, their immediate families and agencies associated with this competition are not
permitted to enter. 5. The Promoter accepts no responsibility for late or misdirected entries.
the drive in an older MacBook a few 6. The best entry/entries as determined by the judges will win the prize(s). 7. The Promoter is
neither responsible nor liable for any change in the value of the prize occurring between the
years ago I was astounded by the publish date and the date the prize(s) is claimed. 8. The prize(s) is not transferable and will
not be exchanged for cash. 9. The winner(s) will be notified by email. 10. All entries become
difference it made. Operations that the property of the Promoter. 11. The collection, use and disclosure of personal information
provided in connection with this competition is governed by the Privacy Notice
took several seconds were suddenly 12. The Promoter is Niche Media Pty Ltd of 1 Queens Road, Melbourne, Victoria 3004
Ph 03 9948 4900, (ABN 13 064 613 529).
almost instantaneous.
10 THE MACMAN... BY GARRY BARKER
It’s more than just the iCar
I
t’s now clear that Apple is going
into the automotive business, and
why not? It’s an area that’s ripe
for innovation – a whole new way of
looking at safe individual transportation,
and who better to do that than the
world’s leading consumer technology
company? It has the money, it has the
smarts, it has the design genius to do
something really outstanding and, like
Tesla, won’t delve into the jungle of
creating a dealer network. It also has
shown that it never rushes to be first,
but has the patience to aim for highest
possible quality. Industry observers say
an Apple car may not appear on sale
until 2019.
Besides, while iPads, iPhones and
Macs will be upgraded with more
processing power, better graphics,
smarter cameras, more storage and
stuff like a shift to USB-C connection,
it’s hard to see anything really
revolutionary in the years ahead –
maybe an iPad one could roll up and
stuff into a backpack or a mini iPhone
to stick behind your ear and dial by
calling Siri.
But cars, that’s a whole new and
fertile field for people who have always
thought outside the square. Of course,
Apple won’t say anything about it
until it is good and ready. Some of the
best guesses say the first production
models will appear in 2019 with
demonstration models by late 2017
or 2018.
The other point on which most of
the experts agree is that Apple will
probably concentrate on design and
software, stuff it really knows about
and on which it has plenty of money to
spend rather than going into the very
expensive business of setting up an
entire car factory, just as it does not
manufacture iPads, iPhone or Macs
(with the exception of the ‘Darth Vader’
powerhouse professional Mac Pro).
Of course, with about US$180 billion
in cash in the bank it could do almost
anything, but it has never been a
spendthrift.
Apple CEO Tim Cook is known
to have recently had talks in Munich
with BMW management. Others think
carmakers in China, India, Europe or
Scandinavia may get the job. Austria’s
Magna Steyr and Finland’s Valmet
Automotive have been mentioned by
The Wall Street Journal, which sounds
convinced an iCar is on the way.
Good batteries will be essential.
Tesla may be tapped for them. It’s
building a giant factory in the US for
the purpose. There are even possible
Australian links. Redflow, a Brisbane
company in which Internode founder
Simon Hackett has an interest,
is regarded as a world leader in
advanced battery technology. And,
several years ago, a team led by
Dr Laurie Sparke, who was head of
Holden’s Advanced Engineering before
GM Detroit shut it down, was working
on a small electric town car for which

an iPad was the dashboard, control
system and security.
We think the Apple car will be
powered by electricity and that it will
be driverless, or certainly have that
capability. That’s where the world
automotive industry sees the future.
Driverlessness (if that’s a word) will
be forced upon us simply because
of the troublesome traffic density
already building in every city. Driverless
vehicles, controlled with micro-second
reaction times by powerful software,
could allow cars to run much closer
and more accurately on freeways
and roads. We are not talking about
following a cable under road. The cars
will be smart enough to know where
everyone is on the roadway around
them, have the destination dialled into
their electronic brains, sense traffic
lights and emergencies before they
impinge and thus run, probably in
designated lanes, much closer to one
another than is possible or safe under
human control (despite the tailgating
you see on our roads).
The other probable point is that
driverless cars are beautifully positioned
for short-term, Uber-style rental. Rather
than owning a car, people will simply
use their smartphone to call up a car,
ride it to their destination, and leave it
to pick up someone else. Uber already
has the software to handle bookings
and credit card charging, and is already
researching in the driverless arena.
So far at least 25 automotive
companies have started work on the
concept. Google was a pioneer and
has been working on driverless cars for
a few years. Their cars have covered
about 4.8 million kilometres and, I
am told, have had two crashes, both
when humans, not the system, were
driving. Since then some of the biggest
names in the industry have dived in –
Mercedes-Benz, Audi and Volkswagen,
Volvo, Ford, BMW (in concert with
Baidu of China), Bosch, Honda, GM,
Renault, Tata (the Indian firm that owns
Jaguar and Land Rover), Tesla, Toyota
and also Uber. Scania is even said to
be looking at driverless trucks running
in platoons to reduce traffic jams
and China is said to be working on a
driverless bus. In China’s appallingly
undisciplined traffic driverless would be
a live-saver.
Overall, it looks like being the
biggest revolution to hit the automotive
industry since Karl Benz first chugged
on to the streets of Mannheim
Germany in 1878. He invented the
THE MACMAN 11
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APRIL 2016
internal combustion engine and is
thus called the father of the modern
car, but he was nowhere near first
in self-propulsion. Indeed, the first
electric car was built by a Frenchman,
Gustave Trouvé, in 1881 and another
Frenchman, Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot,
built a steam-powered three-wheeler
in 1769.
Apple has been hiring automotive
engineers for more than a year – some,
we understand, from Tesla, to join a team
headed by Apple vice president Steve
Zadesky, who once worked at Ford.
And, finally, think of the cachet
Apple products have; people trust
them and will pay to have them. Apple
has been deeply involved with car
infotainment systems for a decade
and more. It already has its own
sales organisation and, like Tesla, will
probably avoid the minefield of an
extensive dealer network.
Finally, will the iCar be like Tesla’s
products: an expensive power car? Or
will it be for consumers and commuters
– beautifully designed, reliable, cheap
to run and, above all, safe. You choose.
Me, I’ll go for a user-friendly town car,
and most likely one you will rent from
an ‘Uber’ rather than own. Think how
much money you could save! C
12 GUEST COLUMN... BY ROB GRIFFITHS
How Apple could fix the
Mac App Store
I
think the current implementation is
flawed and leads to bad experiences
for both developers and customers.
A few simple changes – and one not-
so-simple change – could make the
Mac App Store the place to shop for
Mac software, instead of a place
where you only find apps that meet
Apple’s narrow definition of what an
app should be.
THE SIMPLE CHANGES
The following changes should be easy
for Apple to implement as none involve
altering the store’s operations. They
are mostly policy changes rather than
complex technical changes.
1. Allow demos
There are no technical reasons Apple
couldn’t offer demos. The company
could issue a licence that expires in a
given number of days or after a given
number of uses.
2. Allow refunds
While you can’t get refunds on software
you purchase at retail stores, Mac
developers have long offered refunds
on downloadable software. Panic,
BareBones, Smile and more have
generous refund policies. Why can’t
Apple officially offer refunds, too?
3. Allow paid upgrades
For many independent developers,
reduced-cost (but still paid) major
version upgrades are a key revenue
source. They’re also a benefit for
existing customers, as they save money
compared to the full cost of the new app.
For apps in the App Store,
developers either choose to release
a major new release for free, or set
them up as a new app and list at a
discounted price to simulate upgrade
pricing. But everyone gets the low price
and prior customers aren’t rewarded for
their original purchase.
Apple could easily let developers
designate a release as a paid upgrade
with its own price, available only to
those who already own the app.
4. Treat the Mac App Store like
an equal
If you compare the Mac App Store to
the iTunes Store, the former is clearly
the ignored child. iTunes Store apps
can use videos to demonstrate how
they work. iTunes Store developers can
use Apple’s TestFlight to beta-test their
apps. iTunes Store apps can implement
app analytics to help with marketing and
design decisions.
The Mac App Store gets none of
these tools.
5. Allow interaction between
developers and users
Pick any app on the Mac App Store and
you’ll find a few one-star reviews that
have nothing to do with reviewing the

software. Here’s one example, taken at
random from a selection of many:
“I purchased this app and [am] trying
to burn disk with no success. It keeps
crashing and it won’t load at all any more.
I’ve gone through five discs with no luck.”
This ‘review’ comes, of course, with
a one-star rating. But the user isn’t
reviewing the software, they’re asking
for tech support help. But the app
developers have no way to contact this
user to solve their problem. The best
they can do is leave another ‘review’,
asking the user to get in touch with
them. But it’s not a reply to the review, so
there’s little chance the user will see it.
Apple could easily solve this problem
by letting the registered developer of
the app (you’d have to be logged in
using the account associated with your
app) send a response message to any
posted review. Developers wouldn’t
see the user’s address, of course, as
it’d first be made anonymous by Apple.
Amazon, eBay, Craigslist and many
other sites do something similar when
buyers contact sellers; why can’t Apple?
Regardless of the ‘how’, something
should be done. The current system
is broken for both users trying to find
actual reviews, and for developers trying
to provide support.
6. The harder change
To really make the Mac App Store a
vibrant and lively storefront for Mac
apps, Apple should find a way to allow
non-sandboxed apps, as well as other
currently prohibited apps, into the store.
“Danger!” you scream? Keep in mind
that the Mac App Store was open for
over a year without any sandboxing
requirements, and the world didn’t end.
In fact, there are still non-sandboxed
apps in the App Store today. These
non-sandboxed apps exist because
Apple allowed them to remain (but not
gain new features) in the store if they
were there when the sandbox rule went
into effect in March 2012. For over
three years, then, thousands of people
have been buying and installing non-
sandboxed apps, with no ill effect.
I’m not suggesting that Apple removes
the sandbox. Rather, there should be
some way for shoppers to browse
non-sandboxed apps. Why? Because
by removing the sandbox restriction,
Apple can showcase an entire range
of useful applications that users are
not seeing today. Programs that rely
on inter-application communication,
for example. Programs could do more,
too, if they were allowed to implement
features that weren’t sandbox-able.
Beyond the sandbox, Apple needs
to let more complex apps into the
store. Microsoft Office, virtualisation
apps like VMware Fusion and Parallels
Desktop, Adobe’s entire product suite,
backup apps like Carbon Copy Cloner
and Backblaze, alternative browsers
such as Firefox and Google Chrome,
text expansion utilities like Typinator,
TextExpander and TypeIt4Me. I could
go on, but Dan Counsell of RealMac
Software has put together a great list,
which is just the tip of the iceberg.
By keeping these apps out of the
App Store, Apple is presenting a limited
view of just what the Mac can do. And
as the Mac App Store is installed on
every new Mac, many users probably
GUEST COLUMN 13
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APRIL 2016
don’t know any better and think that
what they see is what they can get.
That’s not good for users, not good for
developers and, in the long run, not
good for Apple.
But what about the danger, you ask?
Every developer in the App Store has
to be registered with Apple. They can
easily include kill-switch functionality
that would disable any rogue apps
that get through the review process.
And, yes, every app in the store would
still have to go through the review
process, and meet Apple’s non-
technical requirements for functionality,
features, appearance etc. But the
sandbox wouldn’t have to apply, and
apps that require extensions or System
Preferences panels to run would be
welcomed, assuming they passed the
rest of the review.
Is this an easy thing for Apple to
do? I don’t think so; the implementation
details are complex (how would users
access these ‘outside the box’ apps?
Do they show up in search results?).
However, for the good of the platform
and the App Store itself, I think it’s
critical that the store offer a much
broader selection of apps. C
14 NEWS
HOT STUFF
WHAT’S THE STORY
WITH ERROR 53?
BY ANTHONY CARUANA
A number of iPhone users have been
hit with a significant issue. It seems that
iPhones that have been exposed to
two conditions are being ‘bricked’ – or
rendered unresponsive and unrecoverable.
The two conditions that can create the
Error 53 issue are running recent versions
of iOS and the Touch ID sensor being
‘tampered’ with in some way.
I use the word ‘tamper’ with some
reservations. In all the cases I’ve read
about, the affected party’s iPhone has
suffered some type of damage and been
repaired by an unauthorised repairer.
When the screen is replaced, the
button on the front face of the iPhone is
disassembled or, in some cases, replaced.
According to Kyle Wiens, from iFixit.com,
independent repairers sometimes replace
the fingerprint sensor or its small cable
when repairing broken screens or home
buttons on iPhones.
Apple says this is a protective measure
to ensure the integrity of the iPhone’s
security is maintained.
A selection of Apple, Mac and iOS news from Macworld.com.au
TWO SIDES TO
THE ARGUMENT
Those who believe Apple is acting poorly
say we ought to have the right to choose
repair services. Although we are spoiled
in Australia with many Apple Stores and
authorised service centres, that’s not the
case everywhere.
Also, Apple’s repair services can be
expensive.
Then there’s the issue of information.
Until this issue hit the news, I’m not sure
there was anyone outside Apple who knew
this could happen when having an iPhone
or iPad with a Touch ID sensor repaired.
Apple’s argument is simple. The Touch
ID sensor is part of a complex security
system. If someone switches out a part, it
could possibly compromise the system.
The issue isn’t likely to be a rogue
repairer installing dodgy sensors. The
bigger risk comes from a tainted supply
chain that pushes thousands of tainted
sensors into the market.
As far as I’ve read, none of the
commentators on this issue have noted
that Apple is now a major player in the
payments business and the Touch ID
sensor, Secure Element chip and the
associated software are a tightly controlled
system.
Compromising any part of that system
would result in a major problem for Apple –
far bigger that today’s anger over Error 53.
APPLE IS AT FAULT –
BUT NOT HOW YOU EXPECT
Apple has made a misstep with the
Error 53 incident through a lack of clear
communication.
If Apple had stated clearly that repairs
that ‘tamper’ with the Touch ID system in
any way could result in the iPhone or iPad
being bricked then, I suspect, there would
have been less outrage. Certainly, people
would be disgruntled, but they would be
able to make informed decisions when
choosing repair services.
THINKING AHEAD
At the moment, Apple seems to be in a
defensive mode with this issue.
I think that’s a mistake.
I spend a lot of time covering
information security for other publications.
And I’ve spoken to a lot of people on both
sides of the security fence – those in the
protection business and those connected
to the other side.
Here’s what I hear. Apple’s systems
are not unbreakable. It’s possible, as we
saw with the recent XcodeGhost hack,
for Apple’s supply chain to be tainted.
Malware was injected into pirated versions
of X-Code and used to create infected
iOS apps.
However, the bad guys see other mobile
platforms, particularly Android, as a better
target as it has massive market penetration
and is far more open.
Apple ought to be standing up on this
issue and using it as an example of how
it is protecting your personal data – in
particular your credit card and payments
information.
APPLE IS SECRETLY
PROTOTYPING VR
HEADSET TO RIVAL
OCULUS RIFT AND
HOLOLENS
BY OSCAR RAYMUNDO
Apple is hoping to replicate the success of
the iPhone by tapping into another reality.
According to reports, Apple is secretly
building a team of experts to develop the
company’s virtual and augmented reality
efforts. Apple has reportedly been testing a
secret VR (virtual reality) headset prototype
for months now.
Apple has poached experts formerly
working on HoloLens to kick-start this
secret initiative, recently bringing on

board a top virtual reality researcher and
former director of Virginia Tech’s Center for
Human-Computer Interaction.
It remains uncertain whether Apple is
developing a VR accessory for iPhones or
a fully-integrated headset like Oculus Rift or
HoloLens. Apple has declined to comment
on its VR efforts.
“In terms of virtual reality, uh, no, I don’t
think it’s a niche,” Apple CEO Tim Cook
said during a recent earnings call. “I think
it can be… it’s really cool, and has some
interesting applications.”
Apple recently acquired Flyby Media, a
start-up that had been working with Google
to let smartphones ‘see’ the world around
them. Cupertino’s virtual and augmented
reality efforts can be traced back to 2008
when Apple first filed a patent for what
looked to be a VR headset exclusively for
iPhones.
This isn’t the first time that Apple has
looked into virtual reality. Apple’s interest in
VR and AR (augmented reality) dates back
to the mid-2000s, but Steve Jobs thought
the technology was ‘immature’.
Apple is reportedly looking to make
more high profile acquisitions in this
area, but it’s altogether possible that the
company will decide not to release the
headset if it can’t get it right.
Last year Cook told The New Yorker that
the company’s greater goal for wearable
technology was to create something that
“isn’t obnoxious” and that doesn’t create
“a barrier between you and me”.
FITBIT SLIMS DOWN
WITH FASHIONABLE
NEW ALTA FITNESS
TRACKER
BY CAITLIN MCGARRY
Fitbit took a bold step at CES when it
unveiled the Blaze, a $329.95 fitness-
forward smartwatch that seemed designed
to compete with Apple Watch. But Wall
Street wasn’t a fan of the announcement,
and Fitbit’s stock plunged. Though the
Blaze hasn’t even been released yet, Fitbit
is back with an activity tracker more in line
with the rest of its fitness bands.
The $199.95 Fitbit Alta is slimmer than
other Fitbits you may have used in the
past, like the Surge and Charge HR, and
is more stylish than the similarly trim Fitbit
Flex. The Alta has all the basic activity-
tracking features that other Fitbit bands do,
but also adds Apple Watch-like reminders
to move – though the Alta urges you to
NEWS 15
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APRIL 2016
walk around instead of just stand so that
you’ll reach a goal of 250 steps per hour.
Like the Blaze, the Alta automatically
recognises exercises such as walking,
running, dancing and soccer, so you don’t
have to launch the Fitbit app to record a
workout.
Fitbit has called the Alta and Blaze its
most fashionable fitness trackers, and
the company is going to sell a variety
of interchangeable bands in different
materials and colours so you can switch up
your look. You’ll be able to snag a classic
band in black, plum, blue and teal, a
leather band in grey or pink, or a stainless
steel band. Fitbit will soon partner with
designer Tory Burch to create even more
stylish band options.
Fitbit is trying to make activity trackers
more versatile and less utilitarian, because
people are more likely to buy fitness bands
that can be worn both during a workout
and out on the town. The company already
makes the most popular activity trackers,
but smartwatches that also track fitness are
nipping at the heels of traditional workout
bands, according to a new survey from
the NPD Group. Fitbit needs to continue to
innovate to stay ahead of the game.
The Alta is currently available to pre-order
online and began shipping in March. C
16 FEATURE
SNAPPING
THE WORLD –
THE WORLD OF DIGITAL
PHOTOGRAPHY
BY ANTHONY CARUANA
I
t’s fair to say the integration of
cameras into mobile phones earlier
this century completely changed the
way we considered photography. My first
camera took film cartridges and used a
flash cube that was good for four photos.
Throw in the cost of the film and having to
run it down to the chemist for development
and then having to wait a few days and
you can see why photos were seen as such
an investment in days gone by.
Today, people think nothing of
snapping hundreds of pictures per day as
the cost of photography has fallen, in one
sense, to almost zero. And modern cameras
have evolved to the point where it’s
possible to take good photos with almost
no real understanding about how cameras
work – something that professional
photographers are sometimes loathe to
admit.
There are lots of upsides to this change
for everyone. For those looking to enter
the world of photography, entry-level
DSLR cameras are now more affordable
than ever. And for those who have no
aspirations of trading in their amateur
status, the cameras in our iPhones
continue to improve with each generation
and the tools we can use to edit those pics
become simpler and more powerful with
each new software release.
So, what’s out there for photographers
new and old? What if you don’t want a
camera?
PHOTOGRAPHY BASICS
When digital photography first hit the
consumer market, helped in no small
way by Apple with the QuickTake
100 – the world’s first mass-market
digital camera – just over 20 years ago,
photography purists said digital would
never surpass the quality of film. Well,
that’s changed.
What digital photography has done is
brought what used to be a very expensive
and highly technical pursuit to more
people. Beyond the megapixel count,
however, there’s a lot more to digital
photography. Knowing some of the basics
is still really handy.
When shooting either with a DSLR (digital
single-lens reflex) camera or using an
app on your iPhone that lets you adjust
the camera’s settings, it’s worth knowing
a few basics so you can hone your skills.
While it’s easy to work in automatic mode,
there’s little point in owning a DSLR if you
only keep the settings on the trusty ‘A’.
There are a few things you’ll need to
identify with your DSLR camera.
First, learn how to adjust the f-stop and
shutter speed. Also, check your camera’s
manual and ensure you know how to
disable autofocus.
The f-stop is a ratio of the focal
length of the lens and the diameter of
the aperture. If you think of a camera as
being similar to your eye, the diameter of
the aperture is analogous to the opening
of your pupil. This determines how much
light reaches the camera’s sensor (in the
case of your eye, it’s how much light
reaches your retina).
The focal length is the distance within
the lens where the image you are shooting
is optimally focused. So, when you zoom

in on an image, you’re changing the focal
point and the amount of light reaching the
camera sensor.
When the camera is in automatic mode,
it automatically adjusts the f-stop, so
that the right amount of light reaches the
sensor when you zoom in and out or use
different lenses. This is done electronically
with the camera’s computer making
determinations about what you want to see
in your photos.
The shutter speed is also important. If
you’re shooting in low-light, increasing
the exposure time will allow more light
to reach the camera sensor. If the camera
is not held steady, however, you’ll end
up with a blurred picture, as all the
movements are captured on the sensor.
This can be used to great effect. For
example, placing a camera on a tripod
facing a busy freeway at night, with a
very long exposure, will produce one of
those spectacular images with headlights
streaking across the roadway. Or you can
point the camera at the night sky and
capture the movement of the stars.
In contrast, if you’re shooting fast moving
events, such as sports or kids playing, then
a short exposure time will capture the
moment with no blurring.
Putting all these things together, you
can see that getting the photo you want
is a balancing act between ensuring
enough light reaches the sensor and the
sensor only picking up what you want.
That means being able to manipulate the
aperture, focus and exposure, so that the
camera captures what you actually want
and not what you think it wants.
Finally, when it comes to focus,
autofocus is great for a quick snap. But
turning autofocus off allows you to
ensure you focus on what you want. Most
autofocus systems make a determination
of what you are trying to shoot. But by
manually focusing you can zoom into
specific objects in your shot.
Some of my favourite shots are ones
where the objects in the foreground –
which is what autofocus typically homes
in on – are out of focus with something
further back captured sharply.
FEATURE 17
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APRIL 2016
MANDATORY EQUIPMENT FOR
THE BUDDING PHOTOGRAPHER
Once you’ve got a camera, you’ll need a
few other accessories. Like any hobby or
occupation, you can accessorise to well
beyond your budget, so it’s important to
prioritise your spending.
The first two essentials are decent bags
that protect your camera and lenses, and
a tripod.
With the bag, don’t just buy a padded
backpack. Investing in a decent bag will
ensure your gear is well-protected and
easily accessible. Camera-specific bags do
cost a little more than regular backpacks,
but the investment is worthwhile.
I’d suggest having at least two bags
to start with. One should be a smaller
one that can easily hold the camera and
possibly a second lens. Making sure it has
small, easy-to-reach pockets is essential
as well, so you can get your hands on
memory cards, cleaning cloths and other
bits and pieces as well.
The larger bag should be able to carry
everything you need for a bigger shoot.
18 FEATURE
As well as your camera or cameras, it
needs to hold all the lenses you need. A
spot, either inside our outside, for your
tripod is handy so you can easily grab and
stow it as needed.
A tripod is essential. There’s little
chance you’ll be able to hold the camera
perfectly still in every situation. Although
a cheap tripod may get you started, a more
solid one with lots of adjustment capacity
for when you’re shooting on even ground
is essential.
While all tripods ship with a head for
connecting the camera to the main body,
buying a tripod with the capacity to add
different heads for different situations is a
good way to futureproof that investment.
As you’d imagine with such a technical
field, there are all sorts of technical
gadgets you can buy.
A couple of essentials are a remote for the
camera and a light meter.
A remote control ensures you can snap
an image while the camera is on the tripod
without disturbing the camera. Remember,
when the exposure time is long, even the
smallest touch can blur the image.
A light meter can help you to adjust
your exposure and f-stop settings
correctly.
Not all lighting conditions are perfect.
There are times when you’ll need to
somehow compensate for poor lighting,
excessive brightness or other trying
conditions. That means investing in filters,
flash units and lens hoods to ensure the
right amount of light hits the sensor.
If you’re planning to spend a full day
out with the camera, a spare battery or two
can be handy as well.
CHOOSING YOUR FIRST DSLR
Choosing your first DSLR camera can
be a daunting experience. And if you
want to start a war, akin to the Mac
versus Windows battle, ask some
professionals which of photography’s
‘big two’ is the best – Nikon or Canon.
There are many other brands – Sony is
probably the main challenger – but take
a look at the gear being used by fashion,
sports, wedding and other pros, and
you’ll see Nikon and Canon cameras
everywhere.
When you’re buying your first DSLR,
you’re taking your first steps into a new
equipment ecosystem.
Most entry-level cameras come in kits
with two main components: the camera
body and a lens kit. This is part of the
beauty of a DSLR. Not only do you have

lots of control over how you capture your
images, but you can also choose different
lenses for different purposes.
If you’re planning to move your
photographic hobby from being an
enjoyable pastime to being a potential
career, then you can invest in lenses and
upgrade the body later.
Like any purchase, you need to balance
between the features you need, the features
you want and your budget.
Make sure you test out a potential
purchase at a store before laying down
your cash or card. Different cameras weigh
differently and have different shapes, so
take some test shots, ensuring your fingers
can reach the various controls easily.
The digital viewfinder on the back of
the camera is important. Less expensive
cameras may skimp. While a centimetre
may not sound like much, it can be
substantial. Although the difference
between a 2.5in screen and a 1.8in one
may not sound like much, it’s easier to
view your shots on a larger screen.
One other feature worth holding
out for is stability control, or anti-shake.
This will automatically compensate for
any slight shudder that occurs when
holding the camera or pressing the shutter
button. This can make a significant
difference, particularly when shooting at
high zoom.
EDITING YOUR IMAGES
Despite many years of education and
practice, there are times when your
images aren’t perfect straight from the
camera. And for those moments there are
thousands of apps for your office and
mobile devices that let you make all sorts
of changes to your images.
The simplest form of image editing is
cropping. This is the art of cutting away
anything around the edges of your photos
you don’t want to keep.
Apple’s Photos apps for iOS and OS X
make this quite simple. Once the image
is in your Photos library, use the edit
functions to access the crop commands.
And while you’re there, you can also
straighten your images just in case the
camera was on a bit of an angle when you
clicked the shutter.
When it comes to more specialised
edits – such as removing blemishes in your
photographs, applying filters, adjusting
colours and shading or applying special
effects – you’ll need to go to a more
complex editing tool.
Without a doubt, the most well-known
application for editing images is Photoshop.
Like Xerox and Hoover, the product name
has become a verb for editing images.
Traditionally, Photoshop has been
outside the budget of many users, although
the introduction of Adobe’s Creative Cloud
FEATURE 19
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APRIL 2016
service ushered in the era of monthly
payments for software. You can access
Photoshop via a subscription to Creative
Cloud for as little as $9.99 per month.
For that you get Photoshop, Lightroom
for managing your images and access to
Adobe’s suite of mobile apps.
I’m a big fan of Pixelmator. At $46.99
from the OS X App Store or $7.99 for
iOS, this tool offers a lot of bang for your
buck. All of the image editing tools you
expect are there and it can open and edit
Photoshop files. It integrates with iCloud,
so you can access and edit your images
from almost any device. I use Pixelmator
to edit most of the images you see on the
Macworld Australia website.
Similarly, Polarr (from the OS X App
Store) offers much, with the ability to edit
RAW files – these are the uncompressed
files that are created from the data
captured by your camera’s sensor. It
can import and export images in a wide
variety of formats and lets you easily add
watermarks when exporting images –
handy for photographers concerned that
their images will be used with attribution
or permission.
In addition to complete editing tools,
there are many small apps, particularly for
iOS devices, that apply a small number of
effects. For example, ColorSplash (US$7.99
from the App Store) takes an image,
20 FEATURE
converts it into black and white and then
lets you selectively re-add colours. For
example, you could take a photo of some
children playing and make all but your
own kids black and white.
Others like Pic Collage (free with in-app
purchases from the App Store) let you
collate a number of different images and
create a collage that you can either print
or share over social media.
SHARING YOUR PICS
One thing about the digital photography
revolution is the ease with which you can
share pictures. Many of us, of a certain
vintage, will remember the family gathering
around a screen and slide projector to sit
through a slideshow of holiday snaps.
Today, we can do the same, albeit
electronically, with Apple’s Photos app
and an Apple TV over AirPlay. Or you can
create a photo slideshow using iMovie
and add a soundtrack such as music or a
commentary.
There are, however, many other ways to
share your pics, whether you’ve shot them
with a DSLR, a compact digital camera or
an iOS device.
If you and your friends all live in
the Apple ecosystem, then iCloud Photo
Sharing is an easy way to share images.
To share photos from your Mac,
launch Photos and open Preferences.
Click on the iCloud icon on the screen
and enable iCloud Photo Sharing. You
can also do the same from your iOS
devices by tapping Settings and scrolling
down to Photos and Camera. Tap and
on the next screen, switch on iCloud
Photo Sharing.
To share photos from your Mac, select
an album or some thumbnails. Click the
share icon in Photos’ toolbar and choose
iCloud Photo Sharing. Click on New
Shared Album, name the album and invite
someone to subscribe to it by entering
their name, email address or mobile
phone number into the To field and add a
description in the Comment field.
The process is similar on your iOS
device, although you can only share single
images and not albums.
As well as being able to pass your
photos around via iCloud Photo Sharing,
the OS X and iOS Share menus are chock
full of sharing options. Twitter, Facebook
and Flickr are easily available on your
Mac. But if you’ve installed services such
as Instagram or Picasa, the iOS share menu
will add those services. C
 FEATURE 21

www.macworld.com.au
APRIL 2016
GOING OLD SCHOOL WITH
FUJIFILM INSTAX MINI 8

While there’s lots of interest in digital photography, some

retro trends are making a comeback.
Fujifilm’s Instax Mini 8 harks back to the days of the
Polaroid instant cameras – which are also still available.
They take a film cartridge that delivers up to 10 images, each
printed instantly on a credit-card sized piece of photo paper.
There’s no zoom, so you’ll need to frame your subject
using the viewfinder. There’s a manual dial around the lens
that adjusts the exposure time depending on whether you’re
indoors or in cloudy or sunny outdoor conditions.
Taking a picture is a snap. Simply turn the camera on, set
the lighting level using the dial, frame the shot and click. A
couple of seconds later a blank piece of photo paper emerges
A QUICK WORD ON PHOTOS from the top of the camera’s body.
Doing this with anyone under the age of 18 is something
Over here at the Macworld Australia office, few changes of a revelation. They can scarcely believe this is how we used
made by Apple have created more angst than the demise of to take pictures in ‘the olden days’ – having to wait to see the
iPhoto in favour of Photos. And the almost simultaneous picture rather than today’s instant gratification culture.
decommissioning of Aperture left many Apple users in states To be honest, the image results are quite mixed. When the
varying from bewilderment to outright anger. light is bright and even, you can get some great shots. But if
After its release 14 years ago, iPhoto evolved into a solid you choose the wrong lighting level, you can end up with an
image manager and basic editor. But a year ago, Apple pulled almost blank piece of paper. My best results came from taking
the rug out from everyone’s feet and introduced Photos for pictures indoors with strong natural light.
the Mac. The camera retails for about $80 at various department
Like its iOS counterpart, Photos for the Mac has a far stores. Film costs about $15 for 10 images if you choose plain
more Spartan interface than iPhoto. Apple, in its quest for paper. There are also decorative papers with different patterns
simplified interfaces, chose to remove many features or for a couple of dollars more.
change how images are managed. In other words, the Fujifilm Instax Mini 8 is great for
Over the last year, Apple has addressed some of the issues occasional use like birthday parties, but it can get pretty
and has opened up the application so that third parties can expensive if you use it as a day-to-day snapper.
create plug-ins to augment Photos’ limited editing capability.
On the upside, Apple did include lots of nifty features in
Photos – it just happens that existing iPhoto users lost out.
For example, while the addition of lots of Automator actions
was a step forward, the loss of the ability to add geographical
information to non-geotagged images was a backwards step.
The old star system for designating favourite photos was
replaced with a heart. So, whereas you used to be able to
designate photos with zero to five stars, now you can simply
‘heart’ an image. Fortunately, the old stars weren’t removed
from your images when you upgraded, so you can still search
for photos based on the stars, but new images can only be
tagged with a heart.
Clearly, Apple is looking to make its Mac and iOS apps
more feature compatible. For rusted-on Mac users this
has been a source of frustration. As well as Photos, other
applications such as Pages and Keynote have seen features
removed from the desktop versions as the programs were
redeveloped to be multiplatform. However, those applications
have seen features added back over time.
Perhaps the same will be the case for Photos – only time
will tell.
22 BUSINESS

to say, ‘Keep your hands in your pockets!’ active you can turn them off, unless, of
– there’s nothing here you want to touch course, you’re working in an active server
unless you know why you’re touching it.) environment.
You turn services on and off by
INSIDE THE SERVER APP selecting one in the sidebar of the server
If you haven’t done so already, open the app and flipping the services switch to the
Server app and let’s take a look around. One on or off position. If you want to take a
of the first things you’ll see is that the app’s quick look at turning on a service that you
sidebar is organised into four sections: should be running, have a look at Save
Server: Used to view and change your bandwidth by using a caching server.
information about your server, manage
Apple AirPort base stations for use with SERVER INFORMATION
your server, view and take action on Server Select your server under the Server section
alerts, view Server logs and graphical in the sidebar of the Server app. When it’s
A PRIMER IN statistics for services you have running. selected you should see four tabs across
Accounts: Used to create and manage the top of the Server app window.
PROFILE MANAGER
user accounts and groups. Overview: Displays information about
Services: For managing the most your server, including your Server’s host
JEFFERY BATTERSBY commonly used services. name, external IP address, current version
Advanced: For managing less frequently of the OS and Server app running on your
In the previous issue of Macworld used services. server, and available network interfaces.
Australia, we completed the process of If you don’t see any information Settings: Allows you to manage your
installing El Capitan and the Server app on displayed underneath any of these server’s remote access options and Apple’s
an external hard drive. Now we’ll look at sections, move your mouse on top of a Push Notification Services, and change
the Server app’s features and we’ll also get section title and you should see the word your service data location.serversettings
started with Server’s remote management Show. Click your mouse button while Storage: For viewing every disk attached
features. you see Show and the services under that to your server and for managing access to
section should appear. the files and folders located on those disks.
APPLE’S SERVER Services are active when you can see a serverstorage
(YUP! IT’S REALLY AN APP) little green dot next to the service name. Access: Lets you define which users will
If you’re used to working with typical At this point in time, you shouldn’t have access to the services you’re hosting
server software, you’re also used to the see any services active. If any services are on your server. serveraccess
notion of a server operating system, such
as Microsoft’s Windows Server 2012.
Apple’s server app is a horse of a different
colour, which is to say, it’s an app running
on Apple’s El Capitan operating system.
Install and set up the app and you have
all the features of a server operating
system. Drag the app to the Trash and
the app will detect that it’s no longer in
the Applications folder and will turn off
all the services. Re-install and open the
Server app and you will once again have
a functioning server. It’s so simple that, if
you’re used to other server environments,
it can initially be a little confusing.
(Note: While it’s outside the scope of
this primer, if you want to see where the
Server app stores its server data, you can
take a peek inside your Server’s /Library/
Server folder at the root of your hard
drive. But, just like my grandmother used

TURN ON REMOTE ACCESS
At the moment, you’re probably managing
your server using a mouse and keyboard
connected to the computer on which that
Server is running. While that’s practical
when you’re only working with one server,
the reality is that you want to be able to
manage servers when you’re not sitting
directly in front of them, either while
they’re in a server room somewhere or
while you’re at a remote location and your
server is in at the office. Apple’s Server
app allows you to do this, but not without
first enabling Remote Access services.
To do this click the Settings tab.
Locate the Remote access section and
put checks in the boxes next to: ‘Screen
Sharing and Apple Remote Desktop app’
and ‘Using Server app on a remote Mac’.
Now it’s time to check and see if remote
management works. To perform this part
of the setup you’re going to need another
Mac with server installed.
Before we begin, double-check to make
sure that both Screen Sharing and Apple
Remote Desktop app and Using Server app
on a remote Mac are checked under the
Settings tab in the server app.
• Click your server’s name in the sidebar
of the Server app
• Click the Settings tab
• Verify that both the screen sharing and
remote access options are selected.
SCREEN SHARING
The first service we’ll verify is screen
sharing, to make sure we can connect
remotely to our server and control its
screen. In order to perform this task, you’ll
need to have another Mac you can use that
is on the same network as your server.
Open a Finder window and locate and
click your server in the sidebar. If you
can’t locate your server in the sidebar,
open the Finder’s Go Menu, click the
Network menu item and locate your server
in the list of servers that appear.
With your server selected, click the
Share Screen button.
Note: Depending on the Finder view
you’ve chosen, it’s possible you won’t see
the Share Screen button. If you don’t, click
the Finder’s Show Items In Columns button.
After clicking the Share Screen button,
you should see an authentication window.
Enter your server’s administrative user ID
and password.
Once you’ve authenticated you should
be able to control your server remotely.
Leave the screen sharing session open
for a few minutes so we can compare
differences between a screen sharing
session and a remote management session.
REMOTE MANAGEMENT
The second sharing feature we enabled
was remote server management, which
allows you to remotely manage services
on your server using the Server app on
another Mac. In order to use this feature,
you have to download the Server app in
the computer you want to use to remotely
manage your server:
• open the App Store app
• click the Purchased tab
• locate the Server app and click the
Download button
• once the app is downloaded, drag it
from the Applications folder to the
Dock, and
• open the Server app.
It’s very important that you select your
server from the list of servers in the Choose a
Mac window that appears when you open the
BUSINESS 23
www.macworld.com.au
APRIL 2016
Server app. If you choose This Mac and click
Continue the Server app will begin setting up
services on your administrative Mac. If you
do not see the Choose a Mac window when
you open the app, select the Server app’s
Manage menu and select ‘Connect to server’.
From the Choose a Mac window, select
your server and click continue.
Enter the name and password for your
administrator and click Connect. After
connecting to your server, you may see a
message stating that your server is using
an untrusted SSL certificate.
Choose the option to trust the
certificate and click continue.
Enter your current computer’s
administrative user ID and password.
Once you’ve completed these steps,
the Server app will open displaying
information about your server. Compare the
server app running remotely with the server
app running in your screen sharing session,
you should see that it looks exactly the
same with one exception: under Server’s
Settings tab your remote app cannot make
changes to the Remote Access setting for
using the Server app on a remote Mac.
Next issue we’ll set up Open Directory,
so we can begin managing devices using
profile manager. C
24 BUSINESS
UPTHERE HANDS-ON:
PROMISING SYNC-FREE
CLOUD STORAGE
FOR MAC, iPHONE
KIRK MCELHEARN
Like it or not, cloud storage is the future,
despite the fact that even major players
with deep pockets haven’t quite nailed it
yet. Now that Dropbox has come down
to Earth on pricing and capacity, it’s
generally considered superior to competing
services from Amazon, Google and
Apple – and don’t even get me started on
Microsoft, which recently reneged on its
promise of unlimited storage for Office 365
subscribers.
Recently, a new player named Upthere
(upthere.com) burst onto the scene,
offering an alternative, sync-free ‘cloud
computer’. Currently available free with
unlimited storage while in beta (the
company has yet to announce pricing),
Upthere does have at least one ace up its
sleeve: founder and former Apple vice-
president Bertrand Serlet, who worked as
the software engineering lieutenant under
Steve Jobs for more than two decades.
I managed to get in on the beta and
spent a couple weeks putting Upthere
through its paces. While not yet as robust
as other cloud storage players, the service
shows plenty of promise – but without
a sync component, it could wind up
hamstrung by data caps and a lack of fast,
ubiquitous internet.
HOME ON THE CLOUD
Upthere is currently accessible from a Mac
or a trio of mobile apps. The OS X client,
Upthere Home, monitors Photos, Aperture,
Photo Booth or iTunes libraries for new
content and uploads it automatically.
There’s also an iPhone version that
does the same for your Camera Roll, a
companion Upthere Camera app for direct
uploading of photos as they’re shot, and a
unified Home and Camera app for Android.
Upthere Home splits uploaded content
into four areas: Flow, an activity monitor
for files that have been added or shared;
Photos and Videos, which displays both
media types in one consolidated view;
Music, sorted strictly by artist name; and
Documents, where you can drag and drop
files such as documents that don’t fit into
other categories. Uploaded files remain
private until shared with friends or family
as Loops, which are displayed underneath
the main categories on the Mac, or in a
separate tab on mobile.
The all-white user interface is quite
straightforward, intuitive and easy to use;
sharing requires only a name or email
address. During the beta period, anyone
you share with can also use Upthere
free of charge. At launch, there’s no
web component, but shared photos can
optionally be set to appear online from
the Details tab, making them viewable to
anyone with the public link.
On a 5Mbps broadband connection, it
took most of the weekend to upload more
than 18,000 photos, around 30 videos
and my nearly 71GB iTunes library from a
MacBook Pro running night and day. The
Mac uploader completely locked up on
several occasions, but I was able to pick
up right where I left off after the software
rescanned the connected application
libraries (15 to 20 minutes in my case).
Although photos displayed perfectly
well, videos wouldn’t play at all unless
downloaded first, which kind of defeats the
purpose of using a cloud service.
YOUR CLOUD CAMERA
On the surface, Upthere isn’t significantly
different from rival services – in fact, it’s
downright underpowered in some ways.
On the Mac, there’s no central folder for
syncing files like iCloud Drive, Dropbox
or OneDrive, and desktop content can’t be
mirrored like SugarSync or Bitcasa either.
This is by design: Upthere was designed as a
central cloud repository for all of your files.

Although the Upthere Home can be
configured to automatically upload Camera
Roll images, new photos can also be taken
with Upthere Camera, which pushes full-
resolution images straight to the cloud.
None of the apps offer built-in image
editing, although users can view metadata
such as time/date and location. There’s
also an option to store new photos in your
Camera Roll, but this has to be turned
on prior to taking pictures or they’ll only
appear in the cloud; in my tests, Upthere
Home was smart enough to skip any
duplicates that exist in both places.
The concept of a cloud camera isn’t
particularly new: StreamNation has offered
an unlimited, free storage in its Shutter
app for several years. What makes Upthere
Camera unique is the ability to take photos
directly into existing Loops. Create a new
shared camera (or swipe to select an existing
one), snap a picture and it’s instantly shared
with everyone in that group.
Other than this neat trick, Upthere
Camera is a no-frills affair – so basic, in
fact, I’m surprised the developers didn’t
roll its functionality into the Upthere
Home app like they did on Android. For
now, Upthere Camera doesn’t shoot video
(although Upthere Home will upload
anything shot with the built-in camera
app), and neither iPhone app works
BUSINESS 25
www.macworld.com.au
natively on iPad at this time; support for APRIL 2016
additional platforms is planned.
CAN IT COMPETE?
As the latest contender to the cloud storage
throne, Upthere is off to a promising start.
Mac uploader bugs aside, the service is quite
polished for a beta, and sharing content
is about as frictionless as it gets. But the
verdict is still out on how much it will cost,
and whether consumers want to entrust their
content to yet another fledgling start-up.
Sharing is a snap from Upthere Home
for Mac, including the option to make
content viewable on the web to anyone
with a link. C
26 BUSINESS
NUMBERS 3.6.1
FOR MAC REVIEW:
THE BEST VERSION OF
APPLE’S SPREADSHEET
APP SO FAR
ROB GRIFFITHS
The last major release of the ‘new’
Numbers came with a slew of changes –
both good and bad – to the interface and
feature set.
Now, two years on, Numbers has
gained 0.6.1 version numbers, as well
as some new features and changes to its
interface. It’s also now a much stronger
collaboration tool, and you can work on
spreadsheets on OS X, iOS and the web.
ISSUES FROM THE
ORIGINAL REVIEW
When I reviewed version 3.0, I noted that
the left-hand sidebar and customisable
toolbar were both gone. While the left-
hand sidebar is still gone, the customisable
toolbar has returned. No longer are you
stuck with the buttons Apple deems most
important. If you’d like some room back
on the toolbar, consider removing the Tips
button; it just pops up a few mostly useless
yellow text boxes.
Numbers once again allows you to
decide which buttons you’d like to see on
the toolbar.
Beyond this one change, however,
Numbers 3.6.1 looks much like Numbers
3.0. There’s still no formatting bar below
the customisable toolbar, so everything
is still controlled by the context-sensitive
right-hand panel. And while this cleans up
the look a lot, it leads to lots of clicking
between tabs in the panel for many
common tasks.
Another annoyance that remains from
version 3.0 is the lack of an editable
formula bar. To edit a formula, you have
to double-click the formula, which pops
up a tiny editing box. This box can be
both resized and moved, but for no
reason I can discern, these changes aren’t
permanent, so you have to resize and
move the formula box every time you
use it (assuming you don’t like its size/
location).
AppleScript, which vanished in 3.0,
has also returned from the dead, to the
relief of scripters everywhere. (It’s even
gained a couple new options for PDF
and Excel export.) Macros, which didn’t
exist before, still don’t exist. I expect
them to continue to not exist in all
future versions, so macro users should
look elsewhere.
This version of Numbers also returns
Help to the app, sort of… Numbers no
longer opens a webpage when you open
Help, but the in-app help viewer still
requires an internet connection. Get
stuck with Numbers on a flight? Oh
well, no Help available. To me, this is
inexcusable: using the internet to update
Help files is fine, but the base version
of Help should be available without a
net connection.
Performance is greatly improved
when opening large worksheets. I have
an 8MB test file that I’ve been using
ever since Numbers first came out.
Opening this file in Numbers 3.0
(and Numbers 2009) took nearly 30
seconds; in Numbers 3.6.1, it opens in
about five, which is only a second or
two slower than it opens in Excel. If you
routinely work with large files, this is a
most welcome improvement.
NEW AND/OR IMPROVED
The list of changes in Numbers, across all
three platforms, is massive.
If you sort your data, Numbers finally
lets you sort only a subset of rows in the
table. In version 3.0, you had to sort all
the rows in a table, which could wreak
havoc on your data. Not only can you sort
on a subset of rows, but you can sort on
multiple columns as well, which makes
sort much more useful.
One nice-to-have-back feature is
the alignment guides for working with
multiple tables on one sheet. These existed
in pre-3.0 Numbers, and have returned
to the 3.x series. As you drag one table
around, alignment guides appear to help
you properly align it relative to other
tables on the sheet.
More specific to the latest Numbers
update, charts have gained some new
powers. You can easily add up to five
reference lines to a graph, making it simple
to display an average, median, mode or
custom value as a visual reference.

Another nice touch in graphs is the ability
to use an image as the style for a chart
(or table or shape). You do this by telling
Numbers which image you’d like to use as
the source for the object. Numbers then
analyses the colours in the image and
applies them to the chosen object.
The end result can be quite compelling;
in my tests, Numbers did a good job of
picking colours that really helped the
objects blend with the photo on the table.
If you’re using Numbers to create complex
reports with a mix of data, text and
objects, this feature can really help pull
them together.
There are a number of other minor
changes in this latest update, including
improved Excel compatibility when reading
and exporting, Voiceover support for
comments and charts, and the ability to view
Photos’ Collections and Moments etc from
the Media Browser. And if you’ve purchased
a new Magic Trackpad 2, you can use Force
Touch on certain items in Numbers.
One final feature that’s migrated from
the iOS world is support for Split View. If
you’re working in Full Screen mode, you
can slide over a second app to ‘multi-task’.
PROUDLY SUPPORTING MAC IN BUSINESS
If you find this feature useful, here’s a tip:
you’re using a Mac. Simply don’t enter
Full Screen mode, and then you can work
on more than two things at once!
Finally, there are a couple of nice
looking new templates for simple
budgeting and expense sharing. Neither of
these will replace Quicken or a bill-sharing
app on your iPhone, but both do a good
job of demonstrating some of the things
you can do with Numbers.
IT’S A SHARING WORLD
Numbers is set up to work with iCloud
Drive, meaning you can edit the same
worksheet on OS X, iOS and the web.
I tested this using a number of devices
on the local network, and it worked
reasonably well. Changes would take up
to a minute to sync, but I had no
problems with changes made to the same
document by several simultaneous users.
Shared worksheets can also now be
previewed on Android and iOS browsers,
so users can see them without having
to edit them.
The collaboration level isn’t quite
up there with Google’s Sheets, but it’s
BUSINESS 27
www.macworld.com.au
APRIL 2016
probably sufficient for most users. Being
able to save and edit anywhere is a definite
strong point with Numbers.
Bottom line. Apple has added back many
of the missing features from the original
Numbers 3.0 transition, and that’s a
good thing. AppleScript support and the
customisable toolbar improve the app’s
usability, and performance with large data
sets is now much better. The interface
is generally pleasant, and many of the
provided templates are genuinely useful
and well-designed. Of course, if you work
across iOS, OS X and the web, Numbers’
sharing features can’t be beaten.
Annoyances remain, of course. It’s
still a bit tricky to edit formulas, Help
still requires an internet connection and
formatting objects requires lots of clicking
around in the right-hand sidebar.
Overall, this version of Numbers is
the best of the 3.x series. If you’re still
hanging on to Numbers 2009, you may
find this version does everything you need
it to do, and provides a number of features
(particularly sharing) that aren’t available
in Numbers 2009. C
28 APPLICATIONS

MAC GEMS NEW SOFTWARE FROM THE MAC APP STORE

ON1 PHOTO 10
PHOTOGRAPHY
On1
US$120
For about a decade, On1’s photo-editing tools were plug-ins for
Adobe Lightroom, Apple Aperture or Adobe Photoshop. A couple
of versions back, On1 began rolling these into a Perfect Photo
Suite that created a dashboard for all the tools. On1 Photo 10 now
stands on its own as an alternative to Lightroom and Photoshop.
NEW NAME, NEW LOOK
At the heart of Photo 10 are three editing modules – Enhance,
Effects and Portrait – and a fourth module for creating and
managing layers.
Photo 10’s Enhance module can read raw files and perform
basic adjustments, corrections and enhancements, such as
exposure, contrast, colour, noise and sharpness, and spot removal.
The Effects module gives you a quick start on your images by
selecting a preset from the drawer on the left. You can edit all the
presets or build your own.
Portrait provides tools for editing the elements of a face. You
can enhance detail in eyes without exacerbating wrinkles, or soften
skin and remove blemishes without making a mask that excludes
eyes and mouth.
Layers goes beyond Lightroom and invites comparison to
Photoshop. Even within a single layer you can get layer-like effects
by stacking filters and by using masks and blending.
Edits made to raw files by Photo 10 are saved in separate
files (JPEG, TIFF or PSD). I have always worked in a variety of
editors, and I don’t really trust any of them (remember Aperture?).
For me, keeping my edited files independent of any one app is a
big plus.
TOP
PICK
fond of On1’s Photo Via feature, which syncs
selected images with my iPhone and iPad via
Dropbox or iCloud.
WHAT’S NOT TO LIKE?
Photo 10 doesn’t do everything. There’s no panorama stitching,
tools for advanced lens corrections, perspectival correction or
support for movie files.
And Photo 10 needs some polishing. In testing, it occasionally
misbehaved in ways that suggested there are still bugs to be
squashed. There are rough edges in the user interface and user
experience; there’s no way to view an image in full-screen and,
when I close a file in the Layers module, I expect to return to
Browse, but I don’t. I’ve been told by the folks at On1 that some of
these foibles will be fixed in coming updates.
Bottom line. No other single app in active development for Mac
OS X provides the range of features found in On1 Photo 10. Even
if you’re a Photoshop virtuoso, you may be interested in Photo 10
for the creative presets in the Effects module. If you are already
happy with another app as your primary photo management and
processing tool (say, Lightroom or Photos), you should check out
Photo 10’s easy implementation of layers. But remember, Photo
10 is now a complete raw workflow app that can stand on its own.
– WILLIAM PORTER

WORKFLOW COMPLETE
Photo 10 eliminates the need to import files. Since it doesn’t store
your edits in a proprietary database, you copy images from your
camera to your computer’s storage any way you like, then click
on a folder of images in Photo 10’s Browse module. The Browse
module renders images quickly and I can quickly rate, keyword,
label and caption a large folder of images.
Photo 10 can export to multiple file formats, resize files, add a
watermark and add effects from editing presets. The new sharing
feature hooks into OS X to upload images to Flickr or Facebook,
send to Photos or Messages, or share via AirDrop. I’m especially
 APPLICATIONS 29

www.macworld.com.au
APRIL 2016
POLARR PHOTO EDITOR FOTOR PHOTO EDITOR
PHOTOGRAPHY PHOTOGRAPHY
Polarr Inc Chengdu Everimaging Science and Technology Co
$14.99 FREE

Sometimes, you don’t need a
complex tool for making edits
to your photos. Polarr Photo
Editor is a compact application
– taking up just 4MB of disk
space – that delivers filters
and myriad other adjustments
for your photos. here are 12 filter categories that make it easy to apply
over 100 different filters. As well as the Mac version, there are OS X,
Windows, Android and Linux options.
Fotor tries to fill the middle ground
between Apple’s Photos and
Photoshop at the perfect price – free.
Fotor’s editing tools give you control
over exposure, brightness, contrast,
white balance, sharpening, blurring
and much more. The app supports most image formats including raw
import and is optimised for Apple’s Retina displays. While pros may be
looking for more sophisticated tools, it’s worth having Fotor in the toolkit
as it’s easy to use and can complement more complex tools.

SWIFT PUBLISHER 4
GRAPHICS DESIGN
BeLight Software
$30.99

Swift Publisher 4 is affordable page-layout software for the Mac it’s not surprising Swift Publisher lacks a few high-end features
that’s best described as a pared-down version of Adobe InDesign. like true CMYK preview and robust type controls, but this won’t
At the heart of the software is a Template Gallery covering nearly be an issue for the target audience. It’s an exceptional value for
400 common scenarios. Fully populated templates provide a parents, home business, educators and just about anyone else
quick way to get started – text and graphic elements can be added, who needs to create paper-based products quickly and easily.
customised or removed in a few clicks of the mouse. There’s also an
Electronic Media section for designing Facebook and Twitter covers – CHRIS BARYLICK
or iOS device screens. Designers can start from scratch, selecting
from thousands of built-in, high-quality clip art elements, Photos/
Aperture/iPhoto libraries and smart shapes. The Insert menu lets
you place other objects including photos, text, tables and calendars.
Elements can be manipulated using the Layout tools with most of
the window reserved for designing and managing documents. The
user interface will make iLife users feel at home.
Version 4.0 brings barcodes into the mix making it easy to
insert retail UPC (universal product code), QR (quick response)
and ISBN (international standard book number) codes into a
document with custom values – something that requires additional
software for many design applications. There are dynamic text
fields, the equivalent of Microsoft Word’s popular Mail Merge
feature, for quickly swapping out names, addresses and more.
Swift Publisher’s image editing capabilities tap into OS X’s
Core Image filters to adjust colour, exposure, gamma and other
enhancements without the need for more software. Given the price,
30 PRODUCTS

GEAR S
GIZMOES
GOODI

GADGETGUIDE
QODE Ultimate Lite Keyboard Case for iPad Air 2
My name is Anthony. I’m the editor of Macworld Australia and I have an addiction.
Ever since the first iPad was released back in 2015, I’ve been looking for ways
to use it as a serious productivity tool and not just a consumption device.
And that’s resulted in my being on an unrelenting quest to find the perfect
keyboard.
Over the years, I’ve tried many – some cheap, some very expensive. Some
were great to type on and others felt like trampolines. But over the last couple of
years, accessory makers have improved their products significantly. So much so
that devices such as Belkin’s QODE Ultimate Lite Keyboard Case for the iPad Air
2 have made it possible for me to seriously consider leaving my MacBook Pro
behind on many business trips.
Last month, I looked at the ClamCase (p63, January 2016) and liked it a lot.
Belkin’s QODE takes a similar approach by completely enclosing the iPad Air
2 in a cocoon of plastic and aluminium that protects the iPad and offers up a nice
keyboard without adding lots of weight or making the iPad unwieldy to handle.
When my iPad Air 2 was securely snapped into the top section of the case, I
could still access all of the ports and buttons easily although the top section does
make it a little harder to reach the volume control buttons and the edge is slightly
thickened in order to protect the iPad.
Unlike many other similar cases that use a hinge, the QODE has a wide band
of flexible material that joins the two halves of the case. With the clever use
of magnets in the keyboard section, you can prop the iPad up on two different
viewing angles easily when using the keyboard.
This approach also makes it easy to lay the iPad flat against the keyboard so it
can be used as a slate rather than as a quasi-laptop.
The keyboard section of the case is made of aluminium and feels quite solid
despite the entire case weighing just 360g. When typing, there’s none of the
sponginess associated with cheaper units. Although the keys are smaller than
those of a full-sized keyboard, it’s still comfortable to type on.
There are a few sacrifices made in order to accommodate the keyboard into
the limited space available. There’s just one pair of Command and Option keys
and all the keys are smaller than a standard keyboard
There are five rows of keys – like a traditional QWERTY keyboard – but there
are no extra function keys. Some iPad keyboards add a row of narrow keys for
quickly launching Safari, email and other commonly used applications. However,
a function key in the bottom left corner acts a modifier for the number keys and
some others for play/pause control of movies and music, volume controls and
task swapping.
Belkin claims the QODE will last about six months between full charges –
which are done via a mini-USB cable that’s provided in the box. Unfortunately,
there’s no way to easily monitor the battery level while the keyboard is in use;
however, after using the QODE for about four weeks, I didn’t see a single
battery warning even though I haven’t connected it to a charger since taking
it out of the box.
There are many options when it comes to adding a keyboard to your iPad.
Belkin’s QODE Ultimate Lite Keyboard Case for the iPad Air 2 is certainly one of
the best I’ve tried and well worth your consideration.
Belkin / $149.95 / www.belkin.com/au
– BY ANTHONY CARUANA
 PRODUCTS 31

TruSwing
Garmin’s TruSwing is a small, lightweight and easy-to-use first golf club
sensor accessory that measures the swing metrics golfers need to improve
their game. It syncs wirelessly to a variety of Garmin’s Approach watches
or handhelds, so golfers can get instant swing feedback on their wrist after
each swing or, with the recently updated Garmin Connect mobile app on their
smartphone or tablet, they can get detailed data like 3D animations, or review
their entire swing session.
Data is transmitted after each swing, so golfers are able to analyse several
elements of their action.
The Ball Flight metric looks at the club path, face angle and shaft angle
to help golfers understand what adjustments they need to make to hit the ball
www.macworld.com.au
APRIL 2016
straighter. Trajectory measures the shaft lean and face angle, which impacts the
trajectory taken by the ball, so golfers can practise taking off or adding loft to
their shots. Distance relates to how fast the club head is travelling and where on
the club face the ball is hit. Golfers can use the swing tempo metric to improve
swing consistency and see how it affects club head speed
TruSwing can produce 3D swing animations through the Garmin Connect
mobile app on a smartphone or tablet so golfers can view side-by-side swing
comparisons to analyse their data in real-time. Data is stored within Garmin
Connect and each session is organised by date, so users can go back to see each
individual swing and how they’ve improved.
Garmin / $229 / www.garmin.com.au

BookArc möd Boom 2 speaker Fitbit Alta

The BookArc möd is a hardwood stand for the
MacBook, MacBook Air or MacBook Pro. The
möd was inspired by the Cherner chair, so you
can think of it as fine furniture for your laptop.
The stand keeps your MacBook upright to free up
space on your desk, and the rubber rings hidden
on the bottom keep your cords securely in place,
even when disconnected from your Mac. The möd
is also the perfect place to keep your MacBook in
‘closed-clamshell’ mode next to your display. It
comes in three wooden finishes: Birch, Espresso
and Walnut.
Twelve South
US$60
twelvesouth.com
If your friends are always fighting over who gets to
play DJ during your get-togethers, the UE Boom
2 wireless speaker may solve a few disputes. The
Boom 2 lasts for up to 15 hours on a charge and a
recent firmware update introduced the new Block
Party feature, so that three smartphones can be
hooked up to it to take turns playing music. Only
one person has to have the app installed and the
other devices can play music from their preferred
streaming service. Pairs of UE Boom speakers can
be linked using the app to double the volume or
designate a left and right speaker to create stereo
sound.
Logitech Ultimate Ears
$189
ultimateears.com
The Fitbit Alta is Fitbit’s latest entrant to the
wearables game – and it has a very strong
fashion focus. It can be personalised to fit
your style with many different bands to choose
from, and adds several new health and fitness
features – such as reminders to be more
active – to make tracking workouts easier and
keep you motivated. Fitbit Alta is designed
with a satin finish and stainless steel body,
and features a line of interchangeable bands
in multiple popular colours and premium
materials.
Fitbit
$200
www.fitbit.com
32 APPLICATIONS
APP GUIDE
VOICE 2.0
PRODUCTIVITY
Adobe
iPHONE AND iPAD FREE (IN-APP PURCHASES)
If you are already using Adobe Voice, you’re not the type who
wants to leave much margin for error. You have something to say
and you want to get that message across quickly and succinctly. A
bit of flair and polish wouldn’t hurt, either.
The newly released universal iOS app guides you through
each step of creating a unique and appealing animated video
presentation, complete with audiovisual elements, images, icons
and, critically, your own voice.
With Voice, Adobe diverges from its target audience of
professional designers, photographers and artists into consumer
territory. The more you know about design, and the pickier you are
about elements like colour, layout or fonts, the less inclined you’ll
be to surrender your visuals to the template-driven, procedural
approach that Voice takes.
Adobe Voice methodically walks you through the building
blocks of your animated video. There are plenty of choices for a
unique look without becoming overwhelming.
Then again, the app’s ease of use and high-end output may
tempt pros that need to quickly knock out a project. It’s easy enough
for a kid to learn and the slick productions never look canned.
Cool software for the iOS & Apple Watch.
TOP
PICK
The latest version has iPhone support.
Anything you create is synced via your Adobe account so you can
access and work on the same project from whichever device you
have on hand.
The main ingredient for a Voice presentation is your voice. You
start by recording the narrative. It’s odd to be repeatedly prompted
to speak, but it encourages you to hone your message.
While the templates will initially make design choices for
you, there’s plenty of flexibility. You can experiment with different
themes, fonts, colours and music. Adobe includes a limited
number of free soundtracks to use as backing music and you can
use non-DRM (digital rights management) songs from your iTunes
collection.
For the most part, Voice 2.0 brings you all the design
goodness most users will need. The credits conveniently ensure
that any Creative Commons drawings or images you use in the
piece are properly credited, plus you can add your own copyright
to your original.
From a design viewpoint, it may seem odd that the app works
only in portrait mode on the iPhone. Though I can appreciate
how that may add to novice ease of use, a
landscape option would allow for even more
customisation.
As I placed icons on top of images, it
became obvious that they could not be
resized or placed anywhere but in the middle.
It would have been nice to be able to resize
the icons, an inherently non-complex task,
especially since images can be adjusted
within the template.
With all the free apps available these
days, the question has become not whether
an app is worth the money, but rather whether
it’s worth your time. Adobe Voice is free on
the App Store with no Creative Cloud strings
attached. You will need an Adobe login ID to
save and share your work from Adobe’s servers.
– JACKIE DOVE
 APPLICATIONS 33

www.macworld.com.au
APRIL 2016
DAY ONE 2 JOURNAL + NOTES OVER
LIFESTYLE OVER
Bloom Built LLC Photo and Video
iPHONE, iPAD AND APPLE WATCH US$4.99 iPHONE AND iPAD FREE (IN-APP PURCHASES)

Writing a journal Over is designed to help you create

can be a very beautiful art by combining your photos
therapeutic activity. with great typography without you
Day One lets you needing to become an expert graphic
easily record what designer. The app includes more than
you’ve been doing 300 fonts and 800 illustrations with
and how you feel new content added regularly. The
through a clean applications are quite broad, ranging
interface that from dressing up social media posts
makes it easy to to creating funky backgrounds for your
capture whatever is iPhone or iPad and presentation slides
going on by typing, shooting a picture or recording your voice. Journals – if it can use a great image, then you
can be protected from prying eyes with their own security code and you can use Over to create that image.
can store up to 10 different journals – so you can keep one for personal There are adjustment tools as well, so
reflections, one for work and others for specific purposes. You can export you can tweak the images you use to
your journal to PDF or plain text for offline saving. get the art you create just right and lots of text effects as well.

SIDEFARI
UTILITIES
Francisco Cantu
iPHONE AND iPAD US$1.49

iOS 9 brought multiple gifts for iPad owners: Slide Over, Picture in Picture and Split
View allow the tablet to multitask in new ways that make the device feel more like
a personal computer. Unfortunately, browsing websites in Safari remains a single-
screen experience. Sidefari provides a second web browser window alongside
Safari’s own, making it possible to browse different sites at the same time. Sidefari
works its magic through Safari View Controller, the stripped-down browser available
inside many third-party apps. That’s not necessarily a bad thing – with the iOS
9.2 update, apps like 1Password can be used with any in-app browser, even if the
developer hasn’t directly added support for them. Sidefari offers its own history of
the 50 most recent sites visited from the app, an option that can be toggled off if
desired. Users can swipe to delete individual entries, or clear the entire history at
once. Sidefari takes advantage of share and action extensions, as well as login details and credit cards stored in iCloud Keychain. There’s
no search option in the address field – it’s strictly for websites. There are a couple of little conveniences like a Paste Clipboard shortcut,
and the ability to autofill passwords or credit cards saved with iCloud Keychain. Users can send open Sidefari web pages to Safari by
tapping the compass in the upper right corner, or share with compatible apps and action extensions. While Sidefari is worth the meagre
asking price, there’s room for improvement. Built-in search would be nice, along with more intelligent handling of text entered without
an extension. One big downside to Sidefari: websites that default to a mobile version can’t be switched to the desktop version. Sidefari
makes side-by-side web browsing a reality for late-model iPads, but lacks most of the niceties of the full Mobile Safari.
34 SECRETS
Create Smart Playlists to find
which of your songs are Apple
Music, in the cloud and more
S
ince the launch of Apple
Music, your iTunes library can
contain several different types
of music files, and they can be stored
in different locations. You may have
files that you’ve ripped from CDs,
which are stored on your Mac. Your
library probably holds some music
that you bought from the iTunes Store,
which may be on your Mac, or may be
in the cloud.
And if you’ve signed up for Apple
Music, you may have added some
music to your iTunes library. It may
be local, or it may be on Apple’s
servers.
All this can be a bit confusing.
While you don’t always need to
know which tracks are on your Mac
or in the cloud, it can be useful. For
example, if you decide to not opt for
an Apple Music subscription after your
three-month trial expires, you’ll want to
check and make sure that none of the
music you’ve added from Apple Music
to your iTunes library remains there.
Or, if you need to make space on your
drive, you may want to find which of
your tracks are Apple music tracks or
purchased tracks stored in the cloud,
and delete the local copies.
You can find out where any tracks
are stored using smart playlists.
APPLE MUSIC TRACKS
To find which tracks in your iTunes
library come from Apple Music, go
to your Music library and then click
Playlists in the navigation bar. Choose
File > New Smart Playlist (or press
Command-Option-N). Create a playlist
with the following conditions:
Media Kind is Music.
iCloud Status is Apple Music.
(Click the + button after the first
condition to add the second.)
Make sure that Live Updating is
checked; this means that each time
you view the contents of this smart
playlist it will show you the latest
tracks you’ve added to your Music
library. Click OK to save the playlist.
You’ll see, when you look at this
playlist that it contains all of your Apple
Music tracks, and that some of its
tracks display cloud icons; this tells you
that the tracks aren’t on your Mac, but
that you can download them if you wish.
If you only want to find which
of your Apple Music tracks are on
your drive, taking up space, you can
alter the smart playlist by adding the
following condition:
Location is on this computer
If you want to delete some of
these tracks from your Mac – but not

from your iTunes library – select one
or more tracks, right-click and then
choose Remove Download.
If you want to delete all your Apple
Music tracks, press Command-A to
select all the tracks in this playlist and
then press Option-Shift-Delete. iTunes
will ask you to confirm that you want to
delete these tracks.
TRACKS IN THE CLOUD
If you’re using iCloud Music Library or
iTunes Match, you can create a smart
playlist to show you which of your
tracks are stored on your Mac, and
which are in the cloud. You may want
to do this to delete some of the local
tracks to free up space on your Mac.
Create a smart playlist with the
following condition:
Location is on this computer.
Press the Option key and click
the + button to add another, nested
condition, then click the + button to
add two more:
iCloud Status is Matched iCloud
Status is Purchased iCloud Status is
Uploaded.
SECRETS 35
www.macworld.com.au
APRIL 2016
Make sure that Match All of the
following rules is selected at the top
of the playlist, and that Any of the
following are true is selected for the
second group of conditions.
As above, you can delete the
local copies of these tracks by
selecting one or more of them, right-
clicking and then choosing Remove
Download.
Smart playlists are quick and
easy to create, and they help you
free up space, or delete Apple Music
tracks. C
36 FEATURE
HOW TO CHOOSE
AN iPAD PRO, iPAD
AIR OR iPAD MINI
BY JASON SNELL
S
o you’re in the market for a
new iPad. Excellent choice – I
couldn’t live without mine. It’s my
companion when I’m catching up on news
and email in the morning over tea, reading
a comic book in the evening to unwind, or
watching a movie while travelling on an
aeroplane.
But these days, picking an iPad can be
tricky. Apple currently sells five different
models of iPad, with prices ranging from
$369 to $1699. There are size, storage,
colour and connectivity options to
consider. All in all, there are 61 different
variations of iPad from which to choose.
So which iPad is right for you? Read on.
IF YOU WANT IT ALL: iPAD PRO
The iPad Pro is the newest and biggest
iPad, with a 12.9in diagonal screen. It’s
a bit like someone ripped the screen off
a 13in laptop and turned it into an iPad.
The iPad Pro is also the fastest iOS device
ever and offers many features that aren’t
available on any other device.
If you’re an artist who has dreamed of
having a larger and more responsive iPad
to draw on, the iPad Pro is a dream come
true. It’s the only iPad that supports the
$165 Apple Pencil, and while there are
other pressure-sensitive iPad styluses on the
market, this is the one that’s made by Apple
– and that means it will probably be the best
in its class, if for no other reason than it
will be deeply integrated into the iPad Pro’s
software. The iPad Pro’s screen can scan for
the location of the Apple Pencil 240 times
per second, twice the rate of other iPads.
If you’re someone who does a lot of
serious work on your iPad, the iPad Pro
is made for you, too – its larger screen
is perfect for running two apps in Split
View. And rather than having to rely on a
Bluetooth connection to attach an external
keyboard, the new Smart Connector
supplies data and power to both Apple’s
$269 Smart Keyboard (which doubles as a
carrying case) as well as other forthcoming
keyboards, including the Logitech Create.
But, despite its name, the iPad Pro isn’t
just a tool for artists and other people
wanting a more powerful and expansive
iPad to get work done. It’s also a fantastic
(albeit pricey) entertainment device, thanks
to its stereo speakers and that gorgeous
2732 by 2048 pixel display.
For all its size, the iPad Pro doesn’t
feel heavy. At 725g, it’s about as heavy
as the original iPad – but its weight is
spread over a much larger area, making it
comfortable to hold.
Colour options: Silver, Gold, Space Grey
Storage options: 32GB ($1249) or
128GB ($1499)
Cellular option: Only the 128GB model is
available with a cellular variant, for $1699
Who it’s for: Artists, people who use
their iPads to get work done, and anyone
who wants a big, bright screen (and good
audio) for watching videos.
THE ALL-PURPOSE
POWERHOUSE: iPAD AIR 2
It was introduced more than a year ago
now, but the iPad Air 2 is still the beating
heart at the centre of the iPad product line.
It was so advanced compared to any other
iOS device that preceded it, that even a
year later it’s the model that most people
should consider when they’re shopping for
a new iPad.
In terms of tech specs, the iPad Air 2 is
impressive: it’s got a three-core Apple A8X
processor and 2GB of RAM. This year’s
iPad mini 4 can’t even match it in terms of
speed, and the extra RAM improves almost
everything when it comes to switching
among a bunch of different apps. While
it’s technically ‘last year’s model’, it’s
probably more accurate to say that the
iPad Air 2 was next year’s model back in
2014, and it’s still in its prime.
The iPad Air 2’s 9.7in display puts it
firmly in the centre of the iPad product
line. It’s got the same screen size as the
original iPad model from five years ago
– but of course, things have advanced
an awful lot since then. This screen is a
Retina display at 2048 by 1536 pixels,
and is laminated to an anti-reflective
glass coating, the result being a relatively
low-glare screen that feels incredibly close
to the surface. It’s also thin and light,
weighing in at less than 454g.
Yes, the displays of the iPad Air 2
and the iPad mini 2 offer the exact same

number of pixels. What sets them apart
is sheer size. On the Air, those pixels are
given room to breathe – and if you’ve got
ageing eyes, you’ll be grateful for that. I’ve
found reading comic books much more
pleasurable on the iPad Air 2 than on the
iPad mini, and it’s entirely down to the
fact that everything on the screen is bigger.
To sum it all up, the iPad Air 2 is a
powerful, thin, light iPad with a beautiful
screen. It’s the mainstream iPad and the
one that most potential iPad buyers should
consider first.
Colour options: Silver, Gold, Space Grey
Storage options: 16GB ($699),
64GB ($8299), or 128GB ($959)
Cellular options: 16GB ($859),
64GB ($989), or 128GB ($1119)
Who it’s for: Just about anyone, but
especially people who are happy to trade
a little weight and size for a larger screen
that’s more comfortable for imperfect eyes
to scan.
SMALL IS BEAUTIFUL:
iPAD MINI 4
Apple pretty much took 2014 off when
it came to the iPad mini, adding a Touch
ID sensor (and very little else) to the iPad
mini 3. But 2015 was a very, very good to
fans of the smallest iPad. The iPad mini
4 is powered by a speedy A8 processor and
has 2GB of RAM, making it almost – but
not quite – the match of its big brother, the
iPad Air 2. The Air 2 is a little bit faster,
but only by a hair. And the iPad mini 4
has access to all the advanced features of
iOS 9 that its predecessors didn’t have,
including Split View multitasking.
The iPad mini 4’s screen is also to
die for. The Retina display is laminated
directly to the glass, reducing reflection
and making you feel like the pixels are
right underneath your fingers. The 2048
by 1536 pixel resolution is the same as the
iPad Air 2 – the only different is that all
3.1 million pixels are packed into a 7.9in
diagonal screen, as opposed to the Air’s
9.7in diagonal.
But making the trade-off that favours
smaller size is what the iPad mini line has
always been about. It’s a pretty great size,
at 20.3cm (8in) tall by 13.4cm (5.3in) wide,
and weighing 300g. My 11-year-old son
has been toting around an iPad mini for
the last couple of years, and he absolutely
loves it. As for me, I always found the
smaller size of the iPad mini preferable
to the iPad Air, but in the last year I’ve
become aware that my ageing eyes feel
a lot less strain when viewing all those
pixels on a bigger screen.
If you want the smallest screen with
the most power, though, the iPad mini 4
delivers.
Colour options: Silver, Gold, Space Grey
Storage options: 16GB ($569),
64GB ($699) or 128GB ($829)
Cellular options: 16GB ($729),
64GB ($859) or 128GB ($989)
Who it’s for: It’s the perfect device for
someone who wants it all, but wants to
keep it small.
BIG SCREEN, LOWER PRICE
TAG: iPAD AIR
The original iPad Air, released in 2013,
is still available for sale. It’s $100 or $150
less than the iPad Air 2, but it’s quite a bit
slower and doesn’t have access to some
new features like Split View multitasking.
The screen, while the same resolution
as the iPad Air 2, isn’t laminated to the
glass, so it’s got more glare and feels a bit
further away when you hold it.
This is not a bad iPad by any means,
but it is older technology, and for the same
price as the 16GB model you can buy the
16GB iPad mini 4, which is faster and has
more RAM. The best buy in the line is the
32GB model, which is $150 less than the
iPad Air 2 – but also has half the storage
capacity. And you can’t get more than
32GB of capacity in this model – if you
want more storage, you’ll need to buy a
different model.
In general, we’re reluctant to
recommend that anyone buy an original
iPad Air unless price is absolutely the
biggest consideration and, even then, the
iPad mini 4 is worth considering. Chances
are good that many future iOS features
will not include this device, so if you care
about speed and a long device life, steer
clear. On the other hand, the iPad Air has
a big 9.4in Retina display and is perfectly
FEATURE 37
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APRIL 2016
suitable for everything but the most taxing
productivity multitasking and the latest
cutting edge games.
Colour options: Silver, Space Grey
Storage options: 16GB ($569),
32GB ($629)
Cellular options: 16GB ($729),
32GB ($789)
Who it’s for: Price-conscious buyers who
want a full-size iPad and don’t mind if it’s
a little slower than the mainstream model.
THE LOW PRICE LEADER:
iPAD MINI 2
Like the iPad Air, the iPad mini 2 was
originally released in 2013. As a result,
it’s slower and has less RAM than modern
models. But it’s the cheapest iPad by far,
starting at $269. For that price, you get a
light, small iPad that’s got the same 2048-
by-1536 resolution as the other iPad mini
and iPad Air models.
Yes, there are some concerns about
buying a new iPad that’s using two-year-
old technology. Certainly if you were
someone who was committed to cutting
edge games and multitasking between lots
of productivity apps, this model may not
be for you. But if there’s someone in your
life who just wants to play games, surf the
web or check Twitter, this is a pretty great
little tablet for a pretty great price.
Until this summer, when I switched to
the iPad Air 2, my everyday iPad was an
iPad mini 2, and I loved it. Yes, it’s not
as good as this year’s models, but it’s still
pretty great.
As with the iPad mini 4, my only
caution is for people who are older and
are dealing with ageing eyes or failing
eyesight. My mother’s first iPad was an
original iPad mini, but she’s much happier
now with a full-sized iPad Air. The mini
screen size is ideal for people with good
vision.
Colour options: Silver, Space Grey
Storage options: 16GB ($369),
32GB ($429)
Cellular options: 16GB ($529),
32GB ($569)
Who it’s for: Kids, casual users, pretty
much anyone who wants a low-cost iPad
and doesn’t mind the smaller screen size. C
38 REVIEWS

iPAD PRO:
WHY THE BEST
iPAD YET WON’T
WORK FOR EVERYONE
BY SUSIE OCHS
W
ell, I tried. I tried the whole
‘use the iPad Pro instead of
my computer for a week’
thing and barely lasted a day. It doesn’t fit
my workflow like my MacBook Air does,
so I stopped trying to force it – and that’s
OK. Apple’s newest largest tablet doesn’t
need to be a laptop replacement to be
good, but for a $550 premium over the
cheapest iPad Air 2, it does need to deliver
more than just a larger screen.
In some ways it does. Thanks to a faster
processor and more RAM, the iPad Pro can
enable a new class of applications that feel
as powerful as desktop apps. Support for
the Apple Pencil is limited to this iPad, so
if your work includes drawing or drafting,
or you’d rather handwrite notes than type
them, your choice is clear: buy this iPad
Pro or wait a year to see if Pencil support
trickles down to more models.
But if you aren’t planning to use the
Pencil, it could be hard for most people to
justify the extra cost over an iPad Air 2
or even an iPad mini 4 – at least, it is for
me. As a work tool, the iPad Pro is a little
like the Mac Pro, or the MacBook Pro, or
even something specialised like a miter
saw. If you really need it to do your job,
you likely know you need it, and you don’t
need me to tell you. If you find yourself
wondering if you really need it… you
probably don’t.
THE PENCIL IS THE iPAD PRO’S
BIG SELLING POINT
Using the Pencil is awesome. It feels
natural, writes naturally and makes a
cheap rubber-tipped capacitive stylus feel
like trying to write your name with a hot
dog. Drawing and even just doodling with
it are wonderful experiences thanks to
the pressure sensitivity and tilt detection
that help it act more or less as you would
expect, with very little lag. I haven’t done
much drawing or painting since college,
REVIEWS 39
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APRIL 2016
but the Pencil just makes me want to use
it, and the fact that I can doodle, colour,
sketch or mind-map while catching up
on a show in Hulu in a Picture-in-Picture
window appeals to me in a unique way.
It’s a strange blend of nostalgia for the
time when paper and pencils were my
daily tools of choice, and that futuristic
tingle of using something that feels so
cutting edge.
I’m not really sure why it’s so round
– I hate putting it down and seeing it roll
away – and I’m fairly afraid of losing the
little cap that covers the Lightning port.
And I don’t actually need the Pencil for
my workflow, since I mostly type text
into boxes and edit JPEGs in Pixelmator.
So while I love using it like I used to use
notebooks and pens, I could buy an iPad
mini and a lot of very fancy notebooks
and pens before I hit the $1414 barrier
to entry of the iPad Pro and Pencil. But
graphic designers will think this setup
40 REVIEWS

plus an app like Astropad is a bargain
compared to a Wacom Cintiq. More uses
for the Pencil could emerge over time as
well – developers and tinkerers are already
experimenting.
HITS AND MISSES
WHEN TRYING TO WORK
Some work apps really do benefit from
a bigger canvas. Drawing apps like the
wonderful Procreate, sure. Editing photos
with Pixelmator, definitely. Apps with a
lot of tools like iMovie are a natural for a
larger screen. And when you’re working
with two apps side by side, it’s great to be
able to give each of them the space of an
entire iPad Air. But the apps I use the most
on my iPad – Byword, Safari, Kindle, Mail
– are just as good on a 9.7in iPad Air (or
even a 7.9in iPad mini) as they are on the
12.9in iPad Pro.
Plus, running two apps side by side
isn’t exactly multi-tasking. I kept running
into limitations that I could work around,
but didn’t want to have to. I liked having
Byword open along with Safari in Split
View on the iPad Pro. But on my Mac,
I typically have more than one Byword
document open at a time – one file with
notes and another with an article in
progress, usually – and the iPad can’t do
that, since you can’t have the same app
open in both sides of Split View. If you
want to see two webpages side by side
rather than just in tabs, you have to open
them in different browsers. And, of course,
not every iPad app supports Split View.
That’s not all. On my Mac, I use a few
utilities that can run in the background,
like RescueTime, which logs every minute
I spend using various Mac apps and
websites, but has no iOS version. Only on
my Mac can I record Skype calls for the
podcast, while plugged into Ethernet for
the occasion. My Mac lets me download
files more easily and organise them
however I like – although the iCloud Drive
app in iOS 9 has made that easier on the
iPad than it’s been in the past.
IT’S STILL THE BEST iPAD EVER
One of the things I like best about the iPad
Pro is that while it isn’t as capable a work
machine as my Mac, it’s a much better
REVIEWS 41
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APRIL 2016
iPad than my Mac. No, really – for all the
iOS creep into the Mac (from iBooks to
Maps to Launchpad to swipe gestures), the
iPad is still better at a slew of tasks that
my brain has firmly categorised as ‘mobile’
since iOS does them so well.
As I set up my iPad Pro, I first took a
look at the Applications folder on my Mac,
so I could grab equivalent iOS App Store
offerings like Slack, Byword, Pixelmator,
Tweetbot and Things. But then I took a
look at my iPhone home screens, so I’d
remember to grab my favourites from the
mobile side, such as Kindle, My Fitness
Pal, Spotify and Pocket Casts. It was cool
to be able to log a snack or take a quick
Instapaper break, and then get back to my
writing and editing work, without having
to switch devices. And I loved listening
to podcasts or music while writing full-
screen, then just swiping up to Control
Center for the playback buttons, always
handy but tucked neatly out of sight.
Still, everything in the paragraph above
is just as possible on the smaller iPads than
the nice, big, roomy iPad Pro. Apps on the
Pro launch faster, which makes Split View
42 REVIEWS
feel more fluid, since you’re switching apps
and flipping back and forth in a blink.
But aside from Pencil support and overall
speed, I’m hard-pressed to name a task I
can do better on the iPad Pro than on the
smaller (and more reasonably priced) iPads
in the line-up.
IT’S LIGHT IN MY BAG,
BUT BIG ON MY LAP
Big as it is, the iPad Pro feels a lot
lighter in my shoulder bag than the 13in
MacBook Air I typically carry. Even with
the Smart Keyboard, which bulks the iPad
Pro up to 1kg, it’s a noticeable change
from my 1.3kg, 13in MacBook Air. When
working at a table, the iPad Pro doesn’t
feel too large, but when I curl up in bed to
watch Netflix or read Kindle books on it,
it starts to feel a little unwieldy – I want
to prop it up on pillows way on the other
side of the bed, or I feel like I’m watching
movies too close to the screen.
The speakers are much improved,
though, which does make a difference
when using the iPad Pro as an
entertainment device. Apple included four
speakers, and the top two are used for
treble while the bottom two are used for
bass – no matter how you hold the tablet.
They sound good, loud enough to fill an
average room with music even if you don’t
have a Bluetooth speaker handy.
Still, compared to using a laptop, the
iPad Pro is just less comfortable all around.
When sitting at a desk with the Smart
Keyboard, I didn’t like how I couldn’t
adjust the angle of the screen, or keep my
hands in one relative position. (Reaching
up to tap the screen feels awkward at first,
but after about a day and a half, I found
myself reaching up to tap the screen of
my MacBook Air, instead of going for the
trackpad).
Battery life is excellent – starting a
workday at 85 percent charged, I didn’t get
the 10 percent warning until almost 4pm. I
do wish the iPad had the Low Power Mode
that I’ve been enjoying so much in iOS 9
for my iPhone, but that mode works by
throttling some performance behind the
scenes (stopping background app refreshes,
slowing down the processor speed)
and Apple may have felt these weren’t
acceptable trade-offs to eke more power
out of the iPad Pro. The tablet ships with a
12-watt USB power adapter for charging –
both the battery life and the tiny universal
charger are big points for the iPad Pro over
a MacBook.
Bottom line. Apple offers multiple sizes
of iPhones, laptops and iPods, so it makes
total sense to expand the iPad line-up from
two sizes to three, and with the Pencil,
Apple’s given the 12.9in iPad a rightful
claim on the name Pro.
For me, it’s just not worth the
considerable premium in price over an
iPad Air 2 (which starts at $699 for 16GB)
or my favourite model, the iPad mini 4
($569). The Pencil is fabulous, but instead
of shelling out $1249 for the entry-level
(32GB, Wi-Fi only) iPad Pro and another
$165 for the Pencil, I could get a maxed
out 128GB iPad mini 4 with cellular for
$989 and have plenty of money left for
all the fancy pens and notebooks my heart
desires. C
APPLE
www.apple.com/au
PROS Excellent battery life; Plenty of speed
and power
CONS Software keyboard bug
$1249 (32GB WI-FI),
$1499 (128GB WI-FI),
$1699 (128GB WI-FI AND CELLULAR)

STM READER TIP
!
From Martyn Cox
I read with interest the article on page 50 of the December
issue ‘How to make a bootable OS X 10.11 El Capitan installer
drive’. I have been using the methods described for the last
three or four OS X releases. While I have had no issues I can
appreciate how having to use the Terminal and the steps involved
may be too daunting for some. I recently found a small app called
Install Disk Creator from MacDaddy that reduces the process to
three clicks of the mouse. Perhaps you might share this great
little app with your readers. You can download the app from
http://macdaddy.io.
Thanks for the tip, Martyn.
Q EACH MONTH, STM gives a prize to the Macworld Australia
reader who submits the best and most useful tip (undocumented
tips preferred). This month’s prize is a comfortable and portable
STM sequel small laptop shoulder bag worth $99.95.
Your daily gear travels in sleek protective style. The sequel is the
perfect, just the essentials bag for your 13in laptop, tablet, a couple
of files, cords and chargers.
Features:
• main flap secured with light but durable brushed aluminium
buckle with easy one-handed click-and-go design
• laptop compartment lined with soft nylex and high-density
foam to protect most 13in screens (will hold most laptops from
12 to 14in)
• front zippered stealth pocket is lined and accessible without
opening main flap – perfect for sunnies or a phone
• dedicated tablet slip pocket with soft nylex lining
• organisational front pocket for biz cards, pens, keys, etc
• slip rear pocket for some reading material with quick drop
phone pocket
• luggage pass through secures the bag to the handle of your
wheeled travel piece
• padded, non-slip shoulder pad for a comfortable carry
• quick cam-adjust shoulder strap for both cross body
and shoulder carries, and
• water resistant 320D brushed poly main
fabric with 640D reinforced bottom fabricc
www.stmbags.com.au
HELP 43
www.macworld.com.au
APRIL 2016
YOU CAN ASK THE MACWORLD AUSTRALIA TEAM
ANY MAC- OR APPLE-RELATED QUESTIONS BY
EMAILING EDITOR@MACWORLD.COM.AU.
ANSWERS THIS MONTH BY GLENN FLEISHMAN.
?
BACKUPS AND CLOUD SYNCING
Recently I had a close scare with almost
losing a lot of photos of my family. That
day I decided to completely change my
backup strategy – which, before the scare, was
essentially ‘Keep important things on both my
iMac and MacBook’.
So I bought a 3TB Time Capsule, which is
now doing its job. However, as we know, a good
backup strategy means one version needs to
be kept off-site. I explored options such as
Carbonite and CrashPlan, but decided that
since I pay for extra iCloud Storage, I would
give that a go.
So I copied roughly 32GB of photos to my
iCloud Drive as ‘Photo Backup’ and I left my
computer on for three days to do the upload.
This brings my total iCloud Drive usage to
around 50GB.
I have found, however, that in the course
of three days my download usage has been
in excess of 150GB and not even looking like
slowing down. Since I have got close to my
500GB cap now, I have deleted the photos off
my iCloud Drive and have also turned off
iCloud Drive on my iMac. It seems to have
stopped the problem.
Now, I could go to Carbonite, CrashPlan or
even Dropbox, but was hoping iCloud Drive
could be the solution. Is there a fix for this yet?
Or am I doing something wrong?
Kyle Bryant
iCloud Drive isn’t really a backup solution – it’s
more about syncing files, so you can share them
across devices. The difference is subtle.
Another option for off-site is to simply use an
external hard drive and take it to a friend’s each
week. Although it’s not real-time, combined with
synching your most important files online (rather
than everything) it’s a pretty good strategy.
Perhaps you could reciprocate with a trusted
friend, so you store their backup and they store
yours? C
44 GROUP TEST
Monitors
By Adam Turner
Dell UltraSharp
U2515H
A versatile monitor delivering a stunning picture, the Dell
U2515H will appeal to those looking for plenty of high-end
features.
This 25in Dell monitor offers 2560 x 1440 resolution with a
16:9 aspect ratio, so it’s sharper than a 1080p Blu-ray movie,
but not quite sharp enough to do Ultra HD content justice.
It’s an IPS (In Plane Switching) LCD panel offering 350 cd/m2
brightness and an 8ms grey-to-grey response time. The result is
a bright screen with vivid colours, wide viewing angles and deep
blacks‚ making it a great choice for multimedia work or watching
action movies. It’s a matte display with an anti-glare coating.
You’ll find two HDMI video ports on the back which
are MHL-compatible (Mobile High-Definition Link). The
monitor also sports DisplayPort and mini-DisplayPort video
connectors, along with a DisplayPort MST (Multi-Stream
Transport) output for running multiple monitors. To round
things off the monitor also features a five-port USB3.0 hub.
This Dell lacks built-in speakers, but there is a 3.5mm line-
out to take the audio through to external speakers. Dell offers an
optional sound bar, which hangs from the bottom of the monitor.
This monitor also comes with an extremely flexible stand.
Along with turning the screen from side to side you can raise it,
tilt it forward/back and even rotate it sideways. The monitor is
also compatible with Dell’s optional MDS14 Dual Monitor Stand.
DELL
www.dell.com.au
PROS DisplayPort MST; USB3.0 hub
CONS No built-in speakers; expensive
$549 (INC DELIVERY)
BenQ BL2420PT
With a fantastic picture and plenty of video connectors,
BenQ’s BL2420PT is designed for serious multimedia work.
This 24in BenQ monitor offers 2560 x 1440 resolution with
a 16:9 aspect ratio, so it’s sharper than 1080p Blu-ray. It relies
on an IPS LCD panel offering 300 cd/m2 brightness and 5ms
grey-to-grey response time. It’s also a matte display to keep
down screen glare.
This BenQ can hold its head high alongside the Dell when
screening movies, although it isn’t quite as bright. The BenQ
is designed with multimedia work in mind, featuring a CAD/
CAM Mode, which shows up fine detail in graphic designs.
The BenQ’s strength is its range of video connectors from
HDMI and DisplayPort to the older DVI-DL and D-Sub.
You’ll also find built-in 1W stereo speakers, which play
audio via HDMI and DisplayPort connections. They’ll suffice
for everyday computing, but aren’t much to get excited about
in terms of listening to music or watching movies. There’s a
3.5mm line-in on the back along with a headphones jack, plus
the monitor features a two-port USB2.0 hub.
Like the Dell, the BenQ comes with a very flexible stand.
You can turn the screen left/right 45 degrees, adjust the
height of the display (about 25mm higher than the Dell), tilt it
forward/back and rotate it sideways to use it in portrait mode.
The BenQ has a surprisingly chunky 16mm bezel, the thickest
of the bunch, which may frustrate you if you’re looking to run
multiple monitors side-by-side.
BENQ
www.benq.com.au
PROS Plenty of video connectors
CONS Mediocre speakers
$399
 OUTSTANDING VERY GOOD
ASUS VX24AH
With a decent picture and reasonable built-in speakers, Asus’
VX24AH is aimed at those looking for an all-rounder for work
and play.
This 24in Asus monitor offers 2560 x 1440 resolution with
a 16:9 aspect ratio, so it’s sharper than 1080p Blu-ray and
offers 77 percent more workspace on the screen. It relies on
an IPS LCD panel offering 300 cd/m2 brightness and 5ms
grey-to-grey response time, with a matte finish.
When it comes to video ports, you’ve only got two MHL-
compatible HDMI ports and D-Sub. You’ll probably need a
mini-DisplayPort to HDMI adapter to connect your Mac, but
shop with care because some adapters only support up to
1920 x 1080. The monitor also lacks USB ports.
On the plus side, you’ve got built-in downward-facing 2W
stereo speakers, playing sound from HDMI devices or the
3.5mm audio line-in. They’re obviously no substitute for decent
desktop speakers, but they may suffice if you’re looking for
your computer workstation to double as an entertainment
centre. There’s also a headphone jack on the back.
Like all the IPS monitors in this bunch, the Asus offers wide
178-degree horizontal and vertical viewing angles, meaning the
colour accuracy isn’t compromised if you’re looking at the screen
on a bit of an angle. As for picture quality, it’s not bad, but fussy
viewers will feel it falls short of the Dell and BenQ (perhaps not
helped by the reliance on a mini-DisplayPort to HDMI adapter).
The screen features an extra-thin 3.94mm bezel, which
is useful if you want to use multiple monitors side-by-side.
However, the stand is rather disappointing. It’s fixed at a
surprisingly low height and your only adjustment option is to
tilt it backwards. Ergonomically it’s best to have the top of the
monitor at eye height, so you may end up sitting this monitor
on telephone books.
ASUS
www.asus.com
PROS Built-in speakers
CONS Limited inputs
$499
GOOD FLAWED UNACCEPTABLE 45
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APRIL 2016
Samsung
LS24E510CS
With a curved screen and low motion blur, Samsung’s
LS24E510CS is aimed at gamers looking to become
immersed in the action.
This 24in Samsung monitor is the odd one out in this
bunch, because it only offers 1920 x 1080 resolution with
a 16:9 aspect ratio. It’s a VA LCD panel, which can’t quite
match the image quality of its IPS LCD rivals. The colours
aren’t as vivid and the screen is also a little dimmer, only
offering 250 cd/m2 brightness, but it still offers very wide
viewing angles and has a matte finish to keep down glare.
The strength of VA LCD is its faster response time than IPS
LCD when switched to gaming mode. This Samsung offers
4ms grey-to-grey response time, which reduces image lag and
motion blur, targeted at gamers playing first-person shooters who
are primarily concerned about split-second timing. That said,
serious gamers tend to prefer TN monitors. Samsung’s choice of
VA LCD is a compromise intended to appease gamers without
sacrificing too much on picture quality for multimedia fans.
This monitor only features HDMI and D-Sub video ports
on the back. There are no built-in speakers, but you’ve got a
headphone jack.
The screen’s curve is subtler than you may expect, only
sticking out about 10mm further than the centre of the screen.
It adds nothing to the viewing experience on a screen this
small. Despite the curved screen, it features 100mm VESA
points for mounting on a wall or monitor arm, like all the
monitors in this bunch.
The Samsung’s fixed-height stand sits about 30mm
higher than the Asus; once again your only option is to tilt it
backwards. C
SAMSUNG
www.samsung.com.au
PROS Low motion blur
CONS No built-in speakers; limited inputs
$469.95
46 REVIEWS
LockSmart Keyless
Bluetooth Padlock
T
he humble padlock, first
invented almost 2000 years
ago, has barely changed.
A key on the bottom, a solid metal
shackle and a strong body have been
the recipe for security for a long time.
But that doesn’t mean this guardian of
our gear isn’t ripe for a technological
facelift.
Dog & Bone has taken this age-
old protector and added a wireless
twist to create the LockSmart Keyless
Bluetooth Padlock.
At first glance, the LockSmart
looks like almost any other padlock,
albeit a slightly more stylish one.
The polished zinc alloy body safely
houses the electronic and mechanical
components within. The shackle is
made of 8mm stainless steel. There’s
a rubber cover over the USB port that’s
used to recharge the LockSmart. That
also covers a small button that can be
used to initiate the pairing process and
indicate the battery status via a small
LED on the LockSmart’s face.
LockSmart’s boast is that its
padlock isn’t just weather resistant –
it’s weatherproof. So rain, hail, snow
and sunshine are not a problem,
with a working temperature rating of
between -20 Celsius and 70 Celsius.
Although, there’s a fair bet your fingers
will get burned if you’re opening it on
a hot summer’s day.
The LockSmart, despite its
technical sophistication, is very easy
to use.
In order to use the LockSmart,
you’ll need to install an app to your
iPhone or Android smartphone and
create a user account. Once that’s
done, you use the LockSmart app to
connect to the lock. The app lets you
control several LockSmart devices.
You can name each one, as well as
include an image to make different
locks easy to identify. For example, if
you have a LockSmart on your shed
and another on the gate, you can
shoot a picture of each and include it
on each lock’s profile.
As well as being able to control
multiple locks from one instance of
the app, the LockSmart can be shared
to multiple users – overcoming the
old ‘who has the keys for the lock’
problem many households face. Each
opening and closing of the LockSmart
is logged, so you know who opened
the lock and when.
As well as letting you unlock the
LockSmart by tapping on the screen,
the app also allows you to use Touch
ID or a passcode to unlock the
LockSmart if you want to add some
extra security. The app also integrates
with the iPhone’s notification system
so you can be alerted when the
battery level is low – although
you won’t see too many of those
notifications as the battery is rated for
up to two years or 3000 opens.
One of the applications I saw for the
LockSmart was being able to remotely
unlock secured locations without
having to fumble around looking for
keys. One of the challenges, however,
is the need to press the power button
under the rubber cover. Although it’s
not a massive inconvenience a lot of
the time – pressing on the cover will
activate it – it is annoying finding the
button in the dark.
Also, the size of the LockSmart
limits its usefulness. The 8mm shackle
is quite large and the 388g weight quite
hefty. So, while it’s great for locking
up a shed, it’s not suitable for smaller
applications such as letterboxes.
Bottom line. As well as the obvious
domestic applications, tradies will find
the LockSmart useful. A site manager
could lock sheds and allocate access
to specific people and tradespeople
can lock their vans and trailers easily.
In short, the LockSmart is a great
example of how technology can
improve an old product. C
– ANTHONY CARUANA
DOG & BONE
www.dogandbonecases.com
PROS Battery life; secure; easy to use
CONS Only one size
$125

R2000DB speakers
O
ne of the most strongly
contested market segments
in consumer electronics is
speakers. And, over the years, the
quality you can get for your money
has leapt forward. So, it takes a lot
for a speaker to stand out. In the
past, Edifier used some very creative
design to create speakers that sound
great and appeal to those looking
for speakers that make a design
statement.
The R2000DB stereo speakers look
like basic black bookcase speakers,
but they pack a lot of bang for your
buck into their 174 × 289 × 252mm
MDF wooden bodies.
The right speaker contains all
the smarts. As well as holding the
power supply for the speakers, the
volume, bass and treble controls
are at the back of the unit. There are
two RCA inputs and an optical input
making these a good choice for many
applications such as home audio,
home theatre and even accompanying
your desktop Mac. The two speakers
are connected by another cable.
Complementing all those wired
options is Bluetooth making the
R2000DB very flexible. And you won’t
need to make a trip to the store for
extra cables as Edifier supplies all
the cables you’ll need, including RCA
to 3.5mm cables to make it easy to
connect almost any playback device.
Music playback is sensational. I tested
Edifier’s R1700BT last month and
thought they had great sound for the
money. But the R2000DB speakers
are even better.
My standard speaker testing
regimen involves listening to many
different musical genres by both
cabled and wireless connections.
When I test some speakers, I run
through a track or two of each genre
to get a feel for the sound. But with
the R2000DBs I didn’t want the testing
to stop. I listened to a lot of music,
including classical, rock and jazz, and
could identify almost every instrument.
I must be a bit of an old fogey, but
I’m not a fan of the modern trend for
speakers and headphones to play up
the bass. The R2000DB speakers deliver
solid, but not overwhelming, bass.
Edifier has chosen newly developed
25mm silk dome ‘Eagle Eye’ tweeters
and 13.3cm full range units to push
the sound out. Even with the volume
pushed up, there was no noticeable
distortion as Edifier uses Digital Signal
Processing (DSP) and Dynamic Range
Control (DRC) to limit distortion.
Depending on your preference,
you can either leave the front of the
speakers exposed or covered by a
fabric grille that can be easily put on
or removed.
Although I wouldn’t use the
R2000DBs for a large room filled with
REVIEWS 47
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APRIL 2016
people at a party, they are a great fit
for a lounge room, bedroom or office
environment. I’d also rate them as
worth considering for gamers.
Although the R2000DBs look
great, they do have one functional
annoyance. All of the controls are on
the back of the right speaker. Assuming
you place the speakers on a shelf, that
makes adjusting the bass, treble and
volume rather annoying. There is a
remote control for changing the volume
and switching between inputs, but
bass and treble remain tricky.
I’d also have liked Play/Pause
and Forward/Back controls on the
remote control.
Bottom line. At this price point,
buyers have a lot of choices when
it comes to speakers. Edifier’s
R2000DBs deliver great sound that will
fulfil the needs of many different users.
They’re a good fit for home theatre,
gaming and music lovers. C
– ANTHONY CARUANA
EDIFIER
www.edifier.com/au
PROS Exceptional sound; connectivity
CONS Position of control knobs
$369.95
48 REVIEWS
Garmin Varia
Rearview Radar Bundle
F
or many cyclists and runners,
Garmin is the go-to brand
when it comes to tracking and
monitoring accessories. I’ve tested
several Garmin accessories in the
past, but this is the first cycling-
specific accessory I’ve looked at. The
Varia Rearview Radar Bundle brings
together two pieces of equipment –
the Varia RDU (Radar Display Unit)
and the RTL-500 radar taillight.
The taillight unit, as well as
improving my visibility to vehicles,
has a radar unit that warns me of
vehicles approaching from behind. As
cars approach, an indicator flashes
on the RDU. This gives me warning
of vehicles as they get closer from a
range of about 140 metres.
This is important. According to
research carried out by Monash
University, looking at national data,
about 20 percent of bicycle incidents
are caused by vehicles travelling in
the same direction as the cyclist. So,
being aware of the vehicles behind
you is important for cyclists.
I installed the two components on my
hybrid bike, which I use on light trails
and on the road. For the purpose of
testing, I used the Varia Radar Bundle
while riding on the road.
Installation of the taillight was
straightforward. Garmin provides a
couple of different mounting options.
I chose the seat post bracket, which
comes with inserts to accommodate
different post diameters. Once the
bracket was in place, the RTL-500 can
be easily removed and put away.
The RDU can be installed to either
the handlebars or gooseneck of your
bike. I installed it to the gooseneck
using the mounting plate that is
attached using rubber rings. Initially, I
was concerned that this wouldn’t be
very secure, but it was very secure.
Like the taillight unit, the RDU can be
easily removed so that I could secure
it when I parked my bike.
The RTL-500 can also integrate
with other Garmin cycling computers.
The rear taillight unit offers several
different options for the array of LEDs.
Pressing the power button toggles
between several different flashing
patterns.
While out riding, the RDU provided
a visual indication of vehicles
approaching me from behind.
Once a car came into range of
the sensor and a dot moved along
the indicator showing its proximity.
When more than one car approached,
several dots appeared. This was
particularly handy on busy roads
when I wasn’t sure of what was behind
me and I needed to move around
parked cars. Although I don’t wear
headphones while riding, it’s not
always easy to hear approaching cars.
Hybrids, especially, are very quiet.
One thing I found a little annoying
when I was riding was that parked
cars were sometimes detected as I
passed them. While riding along a
major thoroughfare with a wide service
road, I stayed in the service road and
the adjacent parked cars sometimes
appeared on the RDU. It wasn’t a
major issue, however.
Interestingly, Garmin is adding to
the Varia range with its new Vision, a
heads-up display that attaches to almost
any pair of sunglasses and can receive
data from the RTL-500 and other sensor
devices such as heart rate monitors,
GPS units and cadence monitors.
Bottom line. For cyclists, safety is
of paramount concern. And knowing
what’s around you is critical. The
Garmin Varia Rearview Radar Bundle
offers riders a tool to assist them
with riding safely and having greater
awareness of road conditions. C
– ANTHONY CARUANA
GARMIN
www.garmin.com.au
PROS Makes riding safer; easy to install and use
CONS Occasional false positives with parked cars
$389

RE6700 AC1200
AMPLIFY Dual-Band
Wi-Fi Range Extender
N
ot every home is a good
candidate for coverage by a
single Wi-Fi-enabled router
or access point. In some cases, your
router, because of where you installed
your inbound internet connection, will
be poorly placed to deliver optimal
coverage. Or the construction of your
home means the wireless signal can’t
pass through some areas easily. In
particular, an extender installed to a
power outlet near the backyard can
extend your wireless network outdoors
without the need for extra wiring.
The Linksys RE6700 AC1200
AMPLIFY Dual-Band Wi-Fi Range
Extender picks up a wireless
signal from an access point and
rebroadcasts it back to the main
router, acting as a relay point for your
wireless LAN.
I installed the RE6700 in my home.
The unit plugs into a regular power
outlet. It’s the size of a large power
supply and has two antennae, one on
each side. The unit is quite bulky and
makes it hard to access the second
outlet on a standard double power
point. However, it has another outlet
on its face so you don’t lose access to
the outlet it’s plugged into.
Setup was very easy. Once the
RE6700 was plugged in, it created a
wireless network for configuration. I
connected my iPhone to that access
point and browsed to http://extender.
linksys.com. From that point, it was
simply a matter of following the
instructions to connect the RE6700 to
my existing network.
Interestingly, Linksys’ advice is to
give the extended network a different
name to the main wireless network.
By default, the configuration process
added ‘_Ext’ as a suffix to my main
network’s name so I can tell whether
I’m connecting to the main network
or the the extended one. There’s no
need to do this unless you need to
know to which access point you’re
connecting.
The setup process not only
configures the RE6700, but also
helps you place it in the best location
so that you get the best possible
performance.
Equipped with 2.4GHz and 5GHz
radios, the RE6700 delivers up to
300Mbps of throughput.
I used the RE6700 with a Mac mini
to stream video, transfer files and
connect to my NAS for Time Machine
backups.
In testing some file transfers across
my network, I used a MacBook Pro and
copied a 500MB file from the MacBook
Pro to my NAS. The initial copy, using
my regular network equipped with a
Telstra-suppled Netgear modem/router,
saw the file arrive in about two minutes
or around 33Mbps. The same copy,
using the RE6700 took closer to three
and a half minutes or 19Mbps. Those
numbers are dependent on both the
REVIEWS 49
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APRIL 2016
network and the NAS – the RE6700
is likely performing well in excess of
those numbers, but the test is being
throttled by the NAS.
That’s quite a significant difference,
but given the choice between a slower
network and no network, I’d take
slower.
For those on ADSL connections,
it’s unlikely you’d notice the difference
when using your internet connection,
as very few ADSL connections operate
in excess of 19Mbps in the real world.
It is likely, however, that large file
transfers within the network would be
impacted by the RE6700.
As a bonus, there’s a headphone
jack on the RE6700, so you can use it
with a set of speakers to AirPlay music
in your home.
The RE6700 AC1200 AMPLIFY
Dual-Band Wi-Fi Range Extender is
easy to set up, less expensive than
adding wired access points to your
home and delivers on its promise of
extending your wireless LAN.
– ANTHONY CARUANA
LINKSYS
www.linksys.com.au
PROS Easy setup, AirPlay support
CONS Performance, bulky
$189.95
50 REVIEWS
Steve Jobs
W
hat, I hear you ask, didn’t we
just see a film about Steve
Jobs a couple of years ago?
Well, yes, we did and even more
confusingly they both were at least a
little inspired by Walter Isaacson’s best
selling biography of the Apple founder.
But the two films are very different,
Jobs was made in 2013, starred Ashton
Kutcher and was a fairly straightforward
TV movie-style.
Steve Jobs has a much more
formidable pedigree. It was written
by Aaron Sorkin, who has form in this
department, having already won an
Oscar for his screenplay about Mark
Zuckerberg and the beginning of
Facebook in The Social Network, but is
also famous for films like A Few Good
Men and The American President, as
well as TV shows like The West Wing.
And what all those titles will tell you
right away is that Sorkin likes to write
dialogue. It’s his forte and he’s certainly
let all of his creative juices flow in this
direction on Steve Jobs.
The film was directed by Danny
Boyle, best known for being the
opposite of Sorkin, in that he seems to
be totally unpredictable in his project
choices. His films range from the
anarchic Trainspotting via the superior
zombie flick 28 Days Later, to the sci
fi Sunshine and the Oscar-winning
Indian feel good hit of 2008, Slumdog
Millionaire.
The cast too is a classier affair,
with Michael Fassbender in typically
intense and focused form as the titular
IT visionary. And Kate Winslet as his
marketing guru Joanna Hoffman. The
supporting cast includes Seth Rogen,
Jeff Daniels and Sarah Snook, the
Australian actor who seemed to be in
just about every local production last
year from Oddball to The Dressmaker
and TV’s The Beautiful Lie, but appears
here in her first American role.
So what’s the result? Did we need
another retelling of the Jobs story?
Don’t we all know by now that the man
lauded and worshipped by millions
for introducing the world to the iPod
and iPhone was also a dreadful bully
who refused to acknowledge his
own daughter for many years and
could terrorise staff he thought were
underperforming, as well as lionise
them if he thought they could cut
the mustard. Driven and dastardly,
or inspiring and insensitive in equal
measure?
The answer is a qualified yes.
And for a start, the performances
are infinitely superior to the first Jobs
biopic. It’s not that Kutcher didn’t give This structure gives the film space
it a red hot go, but you could see how to explore motivation, character and
hard he was working and how much consequences in a way that a linear
study he’d done every moment that he biopic would struggle to do. And this
was on screen. Fassbender, being a is where the film is most successful.
more naturally gifted actor, simply melts Conversely though, it also means
into the role, so that you forget to that the film could work equally as
watch the tics and mannerisms and well as a stage play. Like so much of
concentrate instead on his speeches Sorkin’s work, it’s largely composed of
and actions. conversations, or more likely heated
What’s interesting about Sorkin’s debates and arguments. It’s mostly set
screenplay is that it is both more backstage somewhere and requires
filmic and less so than its immediate very little external photography.
predecessor. I say more because If you don’t know a huge amount
instead of a conventional linear about the man who made the cover
structure, it is a very specific three-act of Time magazine at least eight times
affair, each act comprising the half hour before succumbing to pancreatic cancer
or so before one of Jobs’ major product in October 2011 at the age of 56, this
launches – the Macintosh computer, will certainly leave you a little wiser. C
the NeXTcube computer and the iMac.
In between there are linking sequences – MADELEINE SWAIN
explaining a little of how we have
travelled from one event to the next, but
STEVE JOBS
in the main Sorkin uses these three acts
to examine the man, his relationship WRITER Aaron Sorkin
with Apple and his colleagues and, DIRECTOR Danny Boyle
particularly, his relationship with his
STARS Michael Fassbender, Kate Winslet, Seth Rogen,
daughter Lisa – who goes from a young
Jeff Daniels
ignored child to a college aged young
woman, frequently at loggerheads with M, 122 MINUTES
her father.
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