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I thought it was us Brits who were supposed to see the black cloud around every silver lining!

There is a world-wide malware threat to WiFi routers so the FBI puts out a warning and some easily understood, easily actioned advice to US citizens. Isn't that their job? Isn't that a good thing?

If you follow the Symantec link in the article, you'll find that the FBI's advice is effective; not 100% effective but nonetheless helpful. Part of the issue here is that people never changed their routers' passwords, with that audience the FBI needed to keep it simple. The bigger fix involves firmware updates and basic security hygiene and the FBI notice goes on to describe this; it may be simple to the audience here but not so much to the world at large.

Hopefully they'll go on to fix some more bugs now! When I went to install the update, I noticed that all the info across the top of the home screen (eg time, battery, network etc) had disappeared (and not for the first time). The cameras also struggle in difficult lighting situations that my iPhone Xs took in its stride. Disappointing.

iPhone 15 Pro 256GB

retrogusto said:

A few years ago I wrote to Apple to ask for something similar for laptops. I mostly buy laptops, but 99% of the time I use them at home plugged in, and on occasion I use them elsewhere, but almost never far from an outlet. So I basically always use them plugged in, and like to just leave them plugged in rather than unplugging them every time I turn them off, ... Maybe someday…

This, at least, you can have. As I sit here with my MBP, it's plugged in and its battery is charged to 80% and the battery menu says "Charging on hold (rarely used on battery)" because I have been travelling only with my iPad lately. Perhaps someone did listen.

On Ventura (at least) look for it in System Settings > Battery > Battery Health and the 'I' in a circle.

When comparing audio systems, it is essential to equalise the sound levels of the systems. At all reasonable levels, a louder playback will gain a quality advantage; this is down to the extra detail revealed by boosting the volume of the quieter parts. This is a common problem when trying to compare sound quality, be it of different systems or different versions (eg remastered CD vs original CD - it may not be a coincidence that remasters are usually louder than their predecessors).

While they were playing at a lower level, the HomePods were disadvantaged (I think the story acknowledges that but it's a bit subtle in saying so).

Well this is a turn up for the books! I had given up hope.

I am one of the hold-outs still using the 'old' Pages. There are two big reasons for that and one is the ability to link text boxes so that text flows between them...and it's just been reinstated and, at a quick look, it seems like it works. Well done Apple.

The other reason I'm a hold-out has not, sadly, been addressed. Pages 6.2 continues not to be able to cope with double-page spreads for which, IMHO, two related features are essential. The first is the need for reflected margins on alternate pages, so the binding edge of the page can have a wider margin than the edge you actually turn. The second is the need for a double page (facing page) view, so the designer can understand the two page combination that the reader will see when the 'book' is open. These are arguably only needed for documents that will end up as hard-copy but that remains quite important in many workflows.

Still, I am encouraged by the text box linking and the new shapes are useful too so it remains great news.

I must be missing something:
One is an apple, one is a pear
One has a stalk, one doesn't,
One has a bite out of it, the other doesn't
One has a leaf above it, the other has a leaf beside it

We have a saying in the UK that you can't compare apples and pears (or indeed oranges)...

jdw said:
…"Apple Car"… would have made the company "too diverse."  I think it would have harmed Apple in the end, so good riddance.  No doubt they'll glean money off all the patents they filed in the years to come.  That's enough.

I agree that a car would likely have heavily diluted management focus because there are few synergies with core business once you start looking at all the physical systems.

Probably more seriously, the car market is very difficult. There are many competitors and low margins: Apple could conceivably compete with these but the market is also heavily regulated (it’s the opposite of a green field) and uncertain. The market for EVs (and it’s far too late to enter the internal combustion market) is subject to volatile government regulation (which year do other fuels get banned from sales = it just keeps changing), user doubt (range anxiety) and dumping from China (at least in the UK, the new government still thinks that’s a good thing). However good your product, these things will cause big variations in the sale of very expensive products. 

The whole 'USB-C connector for charging on everything' makes a lot of sense. I can travel with one charger and one cable to charge iPhone, iPad, earPods, MBP, camera (Canon), power bank, Kindle etc.

Change always comes with pain and that's what we're currently (!) seeing.

Could we please stop these irrelevant rambling political pieces from this author. 

There seems to be a technology story in there somewhere, between technology companies and the mayor of London, but dragging in a random selection of 'UK is doomed' political stories is not useful and does not belong here.


And the "ballet box" - are we dragging in the arts too? /s

In 2017 Apple released iPhone X including a Neural Engine. In 2020 Apple released a Mac Mini including a Neural Engine. In both product lines (and iPad Pros), year on year, the Neural Engines have become increasingly powerful and ubiquitous. There's a hint there that substantial processing of AI (ML, LLM or whatever) will be done on device.

There may be a hierarchy here, with recent devices processing substantial AI tasks onboard and older devices off-loading them to Apple servers. There may instead be all on-device processing but with progressively greater limitations on what older devices can support. The second approach would be consistent with other hardware supported features that are only available on new(er) devices, this then motivates users to update their devices.

I know which one I would I would bet on.