The Coast of Maine: 19th century paintings

Paintings from 1845 by Thomas Cole, Frederic Edwin Church his pupil, Winslow Homer, and other American artists from the 18th century. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Saturday Mac riddles 275

Here are this weekend’s Mac riddles to entertain you through family time, shopping and recreation. 1: Traced in […] | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

A brief history of System Information and Gestalt

Introduced in 1997, Apple System Profiler gave detailed information about a Mac's hardware and software. Later came Gestalt, a dictionary of useful info about a Mac. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Emily Carr’s paintings, 1914-1930

Following her flop in 1913, she painted seldom, but started travelling and painting again in the late 1920s. By 1930 she had established and international reputation. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Which disk format?

APFS or HFS+? Which can Time Machine back up to? What about hard disks? Which format for use on PCs? And which are supported by Disk Utility now? | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

The Real Country: 6 The mill

Turning harvested and threshed grain into food required it to be crushed into flour in mills, powered either by wind or water. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Inside Sequoia’s new Passwords app

Which passwords, passkeys, wi-fi passwords, and so on are supported by Sequoia's new Passwords app? Where has Keychain Access gone, and do you still need it? | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Reading visual art: 161 Death

Deathbed scenes of Dido, Pyramus and Thisbe, King Arthur, Queen Elizabeth I, General Wolfe, Marat, Géricault, Camille Monet, and a posthumous portrait that proved the death of Klimt. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

How XProtect has changed in macOS Sequoia

Does XProtect confuse you in Sequoia? Do you know why it could show as version 0, 5273 or 5274? Here's a guide to what I think is going on. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Apple has just released an update to XProtect for Sequoia

Apple has just released an update to XProtect for Sequoia only, bringing it to version 5275. As usual, […] | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Reading visual art: 160 Birth

Myths of the strange births of Venus, Bacchus, Helen and Adonis, the Nativity, and Ford Madox Brown's son. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Silently updated security data files in Sequoia

Essential details of each of the three types of XProtect data files, how they're updated, how to update them, and more. Covers new XProtect in macOS 15.x. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Changing Paintings: 38 The Calydonian Boar Hunt

More than a dozen heroes are called to hunt a boar as big as an ox that is destroying crops and livestock. Their attempts are farcical until the young woman Atalanta impales the boar with her arrow. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Solutions to Saturday Mac riddles 274

I hope that you enjoyed Saturday’s Mac Riddles, episode 274. Here are my solutions to them. 1: Exam […] | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Firmware updates with macOS 15.0, 14.7 and 13.7

Latest macOS updates bring revised firmware for most models. Here are details of which are no longer being updated, and what's likely in the future. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Which firmware should your Mac be using? (version 9, Sequoia)

Full details of firmware installed by macOS Sequoia on supported Macs, including on remaining Intel model without a T2 chip, T2 and Apple silicon Macs. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Heroines: Introduction, overview and contents

Introduction and background, extensive references including English translations, and a complete illustrated table of contents of this series. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Last Week on my Mac: I told you so

If your Mac is running Sequoia, it could have no XProtect data at all, or being using version 5272 or 5273 but not 5274; if it's running Sonoma or earlier, the version could be 5272 or 5274 but not 5273. Simple. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Heroines 20, 21: Cydippe’s apple of love

How a young man tricked a young woman into making a vow to marry. When attempts to marry her to another failed, they were finally united. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Saturday Mac riddles 274

Here are this weekend’s Mac riddles to entertain you through family time, shopping and recreation. 1: Exam success […] | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

A brief history of QuickDraw and PICTs

At the heart of the first Macs, its support for Regions was unique, and it could replay drawing instructions in a Picture, the basis of its PICT file format. Then came Mac OS X with Quartz. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Emily Carr’s paintings: Haida 1912-1913

In the summer of 1912 she travelled north to paint First Nations peoples, and returned to exhibit 200 of her paintings in Vancouver in 1913. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

What should you do when an update goes wrong?

You've just installed an update or upgrade and your Mac just isn't right. How to tackle everything from a boot loop to a downgrade. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

The Real Country: 5 Threshing and processing grain

Threshing cut cereal using flails, horses towing a roller, oxen trampling the corn, a sledge, a hand-cranked machine, and a large threshing machine. With Monet's grainstacks. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

What to do when your Mac can’t update

There should be an update available, but you can't find it, or it fails to install, or you have problems with a Content Caching Server. How to tackle these. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Apple has just released an update to XProtect

Apple has just released an update to XProtect for all versions of macOS from El Capitan to Sonoma, […] | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Reading visual art: 159 Voyeur, modern

King Candaules killed, Phryné acquitted of impiety, Musidora watched while bathing, a nude on a beach, and Bonnard's partner Marthe. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Build a VM with iCloud access in Sequoia, on Apple silicon

Step by step guide to building and installing a VM running macOS 15.0 Sequoia with Apple Account access to iCloud, and updating XProtect. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

XProtect updates are available again

XProtect updates are available in the normal way for macOS Sonoma and earlier, to version 5272, and for Sequoia to either 5272 or 5273. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Reading visual art: 158 Voyeur, classical

Polyphemus watching the naked Acis, King David watching Bathsheba, two old elders watching Susanna bathing, each of them voyeurs. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Apple has stopped all XProtect updates for macOS Sonoma and earlier

Updating XProtect data has suddenly changed, whichever version of macOS is running. Here are the full details. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Sequoia introduces pinning to iCloud Drive

If you have Optimise Mac Storage enabled for iCloud Drive, this new feature lets you pin the files you want to be stored locally and not evicted. Full details. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Apple has just released an update to XProtect

Apple has just released an update to XProtect for all versions of macOS from El Capitan or so, […] | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Apple has released macOS 15.0 Sequoia and security updates to 14.7 and 13.7

As promised last week, Apple has released the upgrade to macOS 15.0 Sequoia, together with security updates to […] | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Changing Paintings: 37 The fall of Icarus

Daedalus and son Icarus try to escape the island of Crete by flying with artificial wings. Icarus flies too close to the sun, melting the wax holding his wings together, and drowns. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Solutions to Saturday Mac riddles 273

I hope that you enjoyed Saturday’s Mac Riddles, episode 273. Here are my solutions to them. 1: Resign, […] | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Looking ahead to Sequoia’s updates

When should we expect scheduled updates to macOS Sequoia over the coming year? Which are the most likely to fix or create bugs? | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Laundresses in a landscape 2

Later landscapes from 1880, by Boudin, Vincent van Gogh, Gauguin, Renoir, and others, prior to their decline in the early 20th century. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Last Week on my Mac: 15.0 or wait for 15.1?

Although we have another month to wait for AI, Sequoia 15.0 has important new features including iPhone Mirroring, the Passwords app, and changes in XProtect. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Laundresses in a landscape 1

Landscapes featuring women washing linen and clothes from Isabey, Jongkind, Boudin, Berthe Morisot, Sisley and others. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Saturday Mac riddles 273

Here are this weekend’s Mac riddles to entertain you through family time, shopping and recreation. 1: Resign, stop […] | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

A brief history of QuickTime

After the Desktop Publishing revolution of the late 1980s came the Desktop Video revolution in the 1990s, based around QuickTime. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Emily Carr’s paintings: First totems 1892-1911

Born in Victoria, British Columbia, she started painting First Nations totems in 1907, and decided to document them on the NW coast. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

From quarantine to provenance: how xattrs are copied

macOS has an elaborate set of rules determining which types of xattr are preserve during different types of copying, including syncing to iCloud Drive. Here they are in full detail. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

The Real Country: 4 Gleaning

Gleaning has Biblical origins, to let the poor get their own free supply of grain. Was it confined to the poorest, and did it remain a right, later in Europe? | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

From quarantine to provenance: extended attributes

Extended attributes were added to Mac OS X 10.4, and soon supported the quarantine xattr. They have since flourished, and have valuable properties. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

Reading visual art: 157 Hospitality in life

Religious paintings of the parable of the Good Samaritan, and Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well, and charitable saints, before all changed in the 19th century.. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago

macOS Sequoia ships next week; here’s a SilentKnight update for it

SilenKnight 2.11 addresses issues with Sequoia, and is strongly recommended if you're going to update from Monday 16 September onwards. | Continue reading


@eclecticlight.co | 3 months ago