https://www.jpsdesign.com/blog graphic design, packaging design, web design en-us Fri, 19 Apr 2024 15:07:00 -0800 Fri, 5 Jan 2018 00:00:00 -0800 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss jpsdg@jpsdesign.com jpsdg@jpsdesign.com jpsdg@jpsdesign.com no https://www.jpsdesign.com/blog/listing.asp?2018/1/how-to-protect-against-the-meltdown-and-spectre-CPU-security-flaws <p>you’ve probably heard about the metldown and spectre cpu security flaws that are making headlines around the world. so, if you’re looking to protect your device from these issues, you’ve come to the right place.</p> <p>update: apple has now admitted that meltdown and spectre flaws affect its mac and iphone products, so we've updated our advice in the relevant sections.</p> <p> </p> <p>as this is breaking news, and new revelations are still emerging, we’ll keep this guide up to date as any new fixes for meltdown and spectre are found.</p> <p>to get up to speed on the issue, check out our news on the <a href='http://www.techradar.com/news/patch-for-critical-bug-in-intel-cpus-could-potentially-slow-down-your-pc'>critical bug in intel cpus</a>, as well as <a href='http://www.techradar.com/news/intel-shoots-down-inaccurate-reports-of-critical-memory-flaw-in-its-chips'>intel’s response</a>.</p> <h3>what are spectre and meltdown?</h3> <p>spectre and meltdown are the names of the flaws found in a number of processors from intel, arm and amd that could allow hackers to access passwords, encryption keys and other private information from open applications.</p> <p>the flaws, found by a number of people including a member of <a href='https://googleprojectzero.blogspot.co.uk/2018/01/reading-privileged-memory-with-side.html' target='_blank'>google’s project zero</a>, are sending shock waves through the it world. namely, it was revealed that they had been present in chip designs for over 20 years, and that they affect a number of companies’ processors, meaning the flaws could be found on a huge number of devices, from pcs to web servers and even smartphones.</p> <h3>should i be worried about spectre and meltdown?</h3> <p>at the moment, you shouldn’t panic too much, because so far it doesn’t look like the spectre or meltdown flaws have been used in an attack, and device manufacturers are working with intel, arm and amd to fix these flaws.</p> <p>intel <a href='https://newsroom.intel.com/news/intel-responds-to-security-research-findings/' target='_blank'>has claimed</a> that the exploits can't corrupt, modify or delete data. while it’s good to see companies set aside their differences to find a fix for these flaws, <a href='https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/03/business/computer-flaws.html?_r=0' rel='nofollow' target='_blank'>it has emerged </a>that one flaw, spectre, may need a processor redesign to fix.</p> <p>however, this does mean that future processors should be free from the spectre and meltdown security flaws. so, don’t be too alarmed, but keep an eye on any updates your device offers, and follow our advice on how to protect against the meltdown and spectre cpu security flaws.</p> <h3>how to protect against the meltdown and spectre cpu security flaws</h3> <p>below you’ll find ways to fix and protect yourself against the meltdown and spectre cpu security flaws for a range of devices. we’ll keep updating this list as new fixes emerge.</p> <h3>how to fix meltdown and spectre cpu security flaws on android phones</h3> <p>google will <a href='https://support.google.com/faqs/answer/7622138' target='_blank'>release a new security update</a> on january 5 that will help protect your android phone against meltdown and spectre.</p> <p>if you have a google-branded phone, such as the <a href='http://www.techradar.com/reviews/phones/mobile-phones/nexus-5x-1305317/review'>nexus 5x</a> or the <a href='http://www.techradar.com/reviews/google-pixel-2-review'>pixel 2</a> or <a href='http://www.techradar.com/reviews/google-pixel-2-xl-review'>pixel 2 xl</a>, then you should get the update promptly, and on google’s newer devices the update should download and install automatically.</p> <p>android phones from other manufacturers may take longer to get the update –<br /> though, hopefully due to the attention meltdown and spectre are getting, most manufacturers won’t take too long to implement the update.</p> <p>open the settings app on your android smartphone, go to ‘system’ and see if you can find new updates waiting for you. it may also be worth following your phone manufacturer on twitter to keep up with news about the update.</p> <h3>how to fix meltdown and spectre cpu security flaws on iphone</h3> <p>apple has finally broken its silence over meltdown and spectre, revealing that<a href='http://www.techradar.com/news/apple-says-all-macs-and-ios-devices-have-been-hit-by-meltdown-and-spectre'> all iphones are affected by the security flaws</a>.</p> <p>while the delay in admitting the flaws were indeed affecting its products was frustrating, apple did reveal that it had already released ‘mitigations’ for meltdown in ios 11.2, so make sure you keep an eye out for any new updates made available for ios on your iphone or ipad, and go into 'settings' to check what version of ios you are running.</p> <p>it didn't say it had a fix for spectre just yet, but it mentioned that “we continue to develop and test further mitigations for these issues and will release them in upcoming updates of ios, macos, tvos, and watchos.” </p> <h3>how to fix meltdown and spectre cpu security flaws on windows pcs</h3> <p>windows pcs are likely to be hit hardest by meltdown and spectre, regardless if they run on intel or amd processors. the good news is that microsoft seems to be on the case and has said that it has already released a security update on wednesday for <a href='http://www.techradar.com/reviews/pc-mac/software/operating-systems/windows-10-1267364/review'>windows 10</a>, as well as previous versions of windows.</p> <p>windows 10 should download the update automatically, but to be sure, type ‘windows update’ in the search bar of the taskbar, and select ‘check for updates.’ download and install any new updates it finds.</p> <h3>how to fix meltdown and spectre security flaws on macs</h3> <p>macs have also been affected by meltdown and spectre, and while apple was initially keeping tight lipped about the problem, it finally <a href='https://go.redirectingat.com/?id=92x363&xcust=trd_362633569&xs=1&url=https%3a%2f%2fsupport.apple.com%2fen-us%2fht208394&sref=http%3a%2f%2fwww.techradar.com%2fnews%2fapple-says-all-macs-and-ios-devices-have-been-hit-by-meltdown-and-spectre' target='_blank'>released a statement</a> saying that all macs have been affected.</p> <p>while this is worrying news, apple also added that it has already released a series of fixes in macos 10.13.2, so keep an eye out in the mac app store for any updates to os x or macos, and make sure you’re running the latest version of the operating system.</p> <h3>how to fix meltdown and spectre security flaws on chromebooks</h3> <p>if you have a recent chromebook, then you should be automatically protected from meltdown and spectre, as google released chrome os version 63 in december, which has features included to avoid these flaws.</p> <p>if you want to know if your chromebook is updated to version 63, or if an update is coming, check out <a href='https://sites.google.com/a/chromium.org/dev/chrome-os-devices-and-kernel-versions' target='_blank'>google’s list of chrome os devices</a>, and check that it says ‘yes’ in the last column.</p> <p>original article on <a href='http://www.techradar.com/how-to/how-to-protect-against-the-meltdown-and-spectre-cpu-security-flaws' target='_blank'><strong>techradar</strong></a>.</p> OS X Tip Fri, 5 Jan 2018 00:00:00 -0800 https://www.jpsdesign.com/blog/listing.asp?2018/1/how-to-protect-against-the-meltdown-and-spectre-CPU-security-flaws https://www.jpsdesign.com/blog/listing.asp?2017/12/the-most-popular-google-android-and-apple-iOS-apps-of-2017 <p>which mobile app did people download the most in 2017? which android app? which ios app?</p> <p>glad you asked. both <a href='http://fortune.com/fortune500/alphabet/' target='_blank'>google</a> (which makes android) and <a href='http://fortune.com/fortune500/apple/' target='_blank'>apple</a> (which makes ios) have announced the most downloaded mobile apps of 2017. some are surprises. others? not so much.</p> <p>without further ado:</p> <h2>top (new) google android apps of 2017</h2> <p>as measured by play store downloads <a href='https://blog.google/products/google-play/announcing-google-plays-best-2017/' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>during the year</a>.</p> <p>1. <a href='https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=io.faceapp' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>faceapp</a>. this popular app was also controversial, allowing users to transform photos of their face using artificial intelligence. (how so? by changing a frown into a smile, by reversing (or accelerating) the effects of time, or even changing one’s gender. like we said: controversial!)</p> <p>2. <a href='https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.williamking.whattheforecast' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>what the forecast?!!</a>. this weather app takes related data and explains conditions in plain language, with a touch of sass. (“is this fedora weather? nope. it’s never fedora weather.”)</p> <p>3. <a href='https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.boomerang.boomerangapp' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>boomerang</a>. this app, not to be confused with the instagram feature of the same name, is made by <a href='http://fortune.com/fortune500/time-warner/' target='_blank'>time warner</a> and allows users to watch popular looney tunes, hanna-barbera, and mgm cartoon series—<em>tom and jerry</em>, <em>popeye</em>, <em>the jetsons</em>, etc.—owned by warner bros.</p> <p>4. <a href='https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ss.android.article.topbuzzvideo.en' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>topbuzz video</a>. there’s little magic (but a lot of fun) to this app, which uses machine learning to serve up what it believes are the most shared or trending viral videos on the internet.</p> <p>5. <a href='https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.science.yarnapp' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>yarn</a>. this novel app tells you a story through a series of text messages.</p> <p>google didn’t tally the most popular apps (old and new) in the google play store for the year, but there are several that have recurred on the most popular list throughout the year. among them: amazon alexa, google home, facebook messenger, snapchat, instagram, spotify music, fitbit, pandora, netflix, and facebook.</p> <h2>top apple ios apps of 2017</h2> <p>not just the new ones. as measured by app store downloads during the year.</p> <p>1. <a href='https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bitmoji/id868077558?mt=8' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>bitmoji</a>. an app to create an expressive cartoon avatar for yourself.</p> <p>2. <a href='https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/snapchat/id447188370?mt=8' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>snapchat</a>. the popular, occasionally ephemeral social media app.</p> <p>3. <a href='https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/youtube-watch-listen-stream/id544007664?mt=8' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>youtube</a>. the google-owned video channel to end all video channels.</p> <p>4. <a href='https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/messenger/id454638411?mt=8' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>facebook messenger</a>. the social media company’s chat app.</p> <p>5. <a href='https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/instagram/id389801252?mt=8' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>instagram</a>. the facebook-owned, multimedia-first social media service.</p> <p>6. <a href='https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/facebook/id284882215?mt=8' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>facebook</a>. the social media giant’s signature service.</p> <p>7. <a href='https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/google-maps-gps-navigation/id585027354?mt=8' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>google maps</a>. the popular mapping and directions app (and competitor to apple’s own maps.)</p> <p>8. <a href='https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/netflix/id363590051?mt=8' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>netflix</a>. the streaming movie and tv show monolith.</p> <p>9. <a href='https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/spotify-music/id324684580?mt=8' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>spotify</a>. the popular (if unprofitable!) streaming music service.</p> <p>10. <a href='https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/uber/id368677368?mt=8' rel='noopener noreferrer' target='_blank'>uber</a>. the dominant (if controversial) on-demand transportation service.</p> OS X Tip Fri, 29 Dec 2017 00:00:00 -0800 https://www.jpsdesign.com/blog/listing.asp?2017/12/the-most-popular-google-android-and-apple-iOS-apps-of-2017 https://www.jpsdesign.com/blog/listing.asp?2017/8/how-to-speed-up-a-mac-in-11-tips <p>enterprise, creative or home user — everyone with a mac should learn a few simple steps they can take to tweak a little more performance from their apple machine. this short collection provides an essential guide.</p> <h3>1. update the mac</h3> <p>it’s possible you haven’t updated your mac for some time. each os update brings a bunch of useful under-the-hood improvements, some of which may boost performance. to access them, you need to upgrade the system on your mac. open the app store, tap updates and install.</p> <h3>2. activity monitor</h3> <p>take a look at <a href='http://www.computerworld.com/article/2475894/mac-os-x/os-x-mavericks--what-is-activity-monitor-.html'>activity monitor</a> (fastest way to open the app? <em>command-space>type activity monito</em>r, tap <em>return</em>). this illustrates how your mac is running. look at the cpu and memory columns to see if you can recognize an application that seems to be demanding a lot from your system. if there is, just quit that app until next time you need it.</p> <h3>3. start up</h3> <p>do you have any apps that launch themselves when you start up your mac? take a look in system preferences> users&groups > check for your user name. enter your password, and you can look at your login items. select any you don’t need to have start up automatically and tap the minus – button to remove them from the start up items list.</p> <h3>4. limit the visuals</h3> <p>macs are great for visuals. all the same, to tweak a little more performance from your computer, you may want to switch some of those effects off.</p> <p>in <em>system preferences>dock</em> uncheck the following sections:</p> <ul> <li>magnification</li> <li>animate opening applications</li> <li>automatically hide and show the dock</li> <li>and set minimize windows using to scale effect.</li> </ul> <p>you may also want to reduce transparency effects. this you can do in <em>settings> accessibility > display</em>, check <em>reduce transparency</em>.</p> <h3>5. about this mac</h3> <p>macos has some really helpful built-in tools to help you boost mac performance by getting rid of items you no longer need.</p> <p>open <em>about this mac</em> in the <em>menu</em> and tap <em>storage</em> to access these. wait a few moments, and you should see a visual representation that shows what is taking up space on your system.</p> <p>that’s interesting, but to get to the tools tap <em>manage</em>.</p> <p>here you’ll see a selection of different items (mail, itunes, icloud drive, among others). tap these to get more information and to find app-specific recommendations. you’ll also see a <em>recommendations</em> item. tap this, and you’ll find a series of ideas to help you eliminate space wasting items from your mac, likely to include:</p> <ul> <li>store in icloud: stores all your photos images and videos in icloud and lets you reduce the size of the collection kept on your mac.</li> <li>optimize storage: enable this and in the future, itunes movies and tv shows you’ve watched already won’t be kept on your mac. only recent mail attachments will be stored on your mac when storage is low.</li> <li>empty trash automatically: anything in your trash will be deleted after 30-days.</li> <li>reduce clutter: this tool lets you explore and delete large files, downloads and other items from your mac.</li> </ul> <h3>6. itunes collections</h3> <p>itunes likes to collect apps you install on your ios device. you can use the reduce clutter tool to delete apps you no longer use from itunes. however, it makes much more sense to do this within itunes because you can better tell which apps you are deleting. it’s a little time-consuming, but therapeutic — it’s also a bit like an app history lesson as you explore those early efforts you installed way back in 2007.</p> <h3>7. finder tips</h3> <p>do you see all your files in the finder each time you open a new finder window? you may see a very tiny performance boost if you change this. in finder open finder preferences and in new finder windows show choose an appropriate folder, such as desktop, or make an in progress folder into which you save work in progress. in the future, rather than having to figure and display information about all your files, the mac will just open the folder you have defined.</p> <h3>8. web browser tips</h3> <p>web browsers and mail applications can become system hogs. when you have web pages open in safari you can get a sense of this by opening activity monitor and looking at which of your processes are taking up the most cpu performance. you’ll often find these are the pages you have open on your mac, which are running annoying scripts that consumer your processor when it should be doing something else. the best thing you can do is quit your browser when you are not using it, and keep tight control of the number of websites/tabs you have open in the browser at any time. you should also reduce the number of active browser extensions you are using.</p> <h3>9. mail tips</h3> <p>after a while, apple’s mail can become a little unwieldy. that’s not true for everyone, but is certainly true if you get a lot of email and have been using the same accounts for years (like me). when mail hangs it can slow your entire system. three things you can try if you want to tame mail app include:</p> <ul> <li>delete: delete spam, empty your deleted items box, delete any items you don’t need.</li> <li>rebuild: mailbox>rebuild. this operation can take some time to complete.</li> <li>reindex: take a look at this <a href='http://www.computerworld.com/article/2476217/mac-os-x/mac-os-x-how-to-fix-apple-mail-by-rebuilding-and-reindexing-the-mailbox.html'>process in this report</a>.</li> </ul> <p>there are a few other suggestions you might want to try <a href='http://www.applemust.com/how-to-fix-apple-mail-when-it-slows-your-mac/'>here</a>.</p> <h3>10. add more memory</h3> <p>maximizing the amount of ram you have installed in your mac is a surefire way to get better performance from your machine. that’s why it’s deeply sad apple doesn’t make it easier for us to install more ourselves. you can find out what sort of memory your mac requires and how to install it <a href='https://support.apple.com/kb/index?q=how+to+remove+or+install+memory&src=globalnav_support&locale=en_gb&type=organic&page=search'>among these pages on the apple website</a>.</p> <h3>11. reinstall os x</h3> <p>when all else fails, try reinstalling your os — just make sure you’ve backed everything up first (for bootable backups, try <a href='http://www.shirt-pocket.com/superduper/superduperdescription.html'>superduper</a>, <a href='https://macdaddy.io/mac-backup-software/'>macbackup guru</a> or <a href='http://www.bombich.com/'>carbon copy cloner</a>). once you back up your files, follow these instructions to <a href='https://support.apple.com/en-gb/ht204904'>reinstall os x</a>. be sure to take a note of your wi-fi password before you begin.</p> <p>i do hope these quick tips help you tweak a little more performance from your mac.</p> <p>original article on <a href='http://www.computerworld.com/article/3218709/apple-mac/how-to-speed-up-a-mac-in-11-tips.html' target='_blank'><strong>computer world</strong></a>.</p> OS X Tip Thu, 24 Aug 2017 00:00:00 -0800 https://www.jpsdesign.com/blog/listing.asp?2017/8/how-to-speed-up-a-mac-in-11-tips https://www.jpsdesign.com/blog/listing.asp?2017/8/Apple-iPhone-8 <p style='text-align:start'>known leaker ice universe leaked what appear to be some tidbits about the a11 fusion processor that is slated to power <strong>apple</strong>'s iphone models this fall.</p> <p style='text-align:start'>per his post, here are some tidbits about the upcoming chip:</p> <ul> <li>3 ghz cpu operating frequency.</li> <li>heterogeneous multi-processing capability.</li> <li>single-core geekbench 4 score of between 4300 and 4600; multi-core geekbench 4 score of between 7000 and 8500.</li> </ul> <p style='text-align:start'>although this information doesn't seem like a lot, it tells us quite a lot about the innovations that apple plans to bring to the new chip.</p> <h3 style='font-style: normal; text-align: start;'><strong>higher frequencies driving better performance</strong></h3> <p style='text-align:start'>the apple a10 fusion chip runs its "high-performance cores" at a frequency of 2.34ghz. at that speed, the a10 fusion achieves a single-core geekbench 4 score of roughly 3500 -- making it best in class among smartphones today, and even putting it in direct competition with modern notebook and desktop personal computers.</p> <p style='text-align:start'>if the a11 fusion chip runs its high-performance cores at 3ghz, then this would imply a frequency uplift of about 28%. the single-core geekbench 4 score that ice universe claims the a11 fusion can achieve in the best case is 4600, or about 31% better than what the a10 fusion could achieve.</p> <p>such a dramatic increase in frequency likely comes partly from the transition to a new, higher performance manufacturing technology, and partly from circuit-level enhancements.</p> <p style='text-align:start'>in other words, apple's chip team has been working hard.</p> <h3 style='font-style: normal; text-align: start;'><strong>heterogeneous multi-processing? </strong></h3> <p style='text-align:start'>the leaker also claims that the a11 fusion chip will support a feature known as "heterogeneous multi-processing."</p> <p style='text-align:start'>at first, i was inclined to think the leaker was merely referring to apple's "fusion" scheme whereby it uses two "high-performance" cores to run processor-intensive tasks (e.g., games) while using two "high-efficiency" cores to handle less intensive/mundane tasks (e.g., email).</p> <p style='text-align:start'>however, heterogeneous multi-processing is a term that's used to refer to a processor setup whereby both the "high-performance" cores as well as the "high-efficiency" cores can be used in tandem to increase performance (albeit at the cost of additional power consumption).</p> <p style='text-align:start'>if apple is indeed implementing such a scheme, that could help boost the peak multi-core performance of the a11 fusion chip relative to what it'd be able to do under the prior scheme used by the a10 fusion and a10x fusion.</p> <h3 style='font-style: normal; text-align: start;'><strong>the multi-core geekbench 4 score implies...</strong></h3> <p style='text-align:start'>and, finally, while i talked about the single-core geekbench 4 score, the multi-core scores that ice universe posted seems to imply that there will only be two high-performance cores present on the chip.</p> <p style='text-align:start'>apple's a10x fusion, which showed up in the company's recently launched ipad pro 10.5-inch and 12.9-inch tablets, includes three high-performance cores and three high-efficiency cores. however, by the larger device surface area and battery capacity of the ipad pro tablets relative to the upcoming iphone models, the a10x fusion can consume more power and dissipate more heat than the a11 fusion will be allowed to.</p> <p style='text-align:start'>therefore, it only makes sense that apple would stick with two high-performance cores and try to wring more performance out of them for the a11 fusion rather than try to stuff three of each in there, only to have the device overheat or battery life severely shortened.</p> <p><strong>original article:</strong> <a href='https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/08/03/this-apple-inc-iphone-8-leak-looks-ridiculously-im.aspx' target='_blank'>motley fool</a></p> OS X Tip Fri, 4 Aug 2017 00:00:00 -0800 https://www.jpsdesign.com/blog/listing.asp?2017/8/Apple-iPhone-8