Last week, Apple updated all its operating systems with unspecified bug fixes and important security updates. The company also posted record-breaking financials for Q1 2022 despite supply constraints and weak sales in Japan. Adam Engst has solved a mystery for some TidBITS readers, discovering that Yahoo’s POP3 email service occasionally garbles TidBITS articles by deleting periods. Glenn Fleishman draws on his experience writing books about privacy and security to evaluate Apple’s new Personal Safety User Guide website and PDF. Finally, Josh Centers reviews Simply Piano, explaining how it helped his 8-year-old son pick up the instrument. Notable Mac app releases this week include macOS Big Sur 11.6.3 and Security Update 2022-001 Catalina, Safari 15.3, URL Manager Pro 5.9, Zoom 5.9.3, and BusyCal 2022.1.1 and BusyContacts 1.6.4.
Apple has updated all of its operating systems with bug fixes and security updates but no new features apart from Siri on the HomePod learning to recognize two new languages.
Apple had a typical record-breaking quarter, with especially robust growth for the Mac. But iPad and Japanese sales were notably weak, with no satisfactory answers from Apple.
After much sleuthing, Adam Engst uncovers why some TidBITS readers experience a situation where an article in a TidBITS issue would be formatted as a column of text a single character wide. The culprit? An ancient email retrieval protocol as implemented by Yahoo Mail.
Apple has consolidated advice shared across many of its support documents and user manuals into one relatively concise guide. While welcome, it has room to improve.
Simply Piano gamifies the tedious process of learning to play piano, but is it worth the subscription cost?
Watchlist
Patches security vulnerabilities in Big Sur and Catalina. (Free, various sizes, macOS 11 and 10.15)
Patches four WebKit-related security vulnerabilities. (Free, various sizes, macOS 10.15+)
Adds support for drag and drop from the Search Results window. ($29.99 new, free update, 20.5 MB, macOS 10.13+)
Brings new and enhanced features and bug fixes to the video conferencing app. (Free, 25.8 MB, macOS 10.9+)
Brings improvements and bug fixes to the calendar and contacts apps from BusyMac. ($49.99 new for each, free updates, various sizes, macOS 10.12+)