HCS Blog

The near-ubiquity of videoconferencing is a lasting effect of the pandemic. The ease of gathering a group virtually usually more than makes up for the downsides. Despite that, many people still appear in video calls with low-resolution, poorly lit video that makes the call less effective.

A better webcam is an easy way to improve your video, and the best readily available webcam may already be in your pocket. That’s because you can use your iPhone and its high-quality cameras as a wired or wireless Mac webcam, thanks to Apple’s Continuity Camera technology.

In a slight nod to the hype surrounding generative AI, Apple added inline text prediction capabilities to the iPhone, iPad, and Mac. They can be helpful, particularly on the iPhone and iPad, where it’s often much easier to tap the Space bar than to finish typing a word or sentence. But that’s less true on the Mac, where a fast typist can be slowed down or derailed by the suggestions, and some people dislike having an AI finish their thoughts. The feature is easily turned off. On the iPhone and iPad running at least iOS/iPadOS 17.2, go to Settings > General > Keyboard and switch off Show Predictions Inline. (Leave Predictive Text on to continue to get suggestions above the keyboard.) On the Mac running macOS 14.2 Sonoma or later, open System Settings > Keyboard, click Edit under the Text Input header, turn off “Show inline predictive text,” and click Done.

(Featured image based on an original by iStock.com/Armastas)

When Apple introduced tvOS 17 last September, an eagerly awaited feature was its support for FaceTime calls, using Continuity Camera on an iPhone or iPad to equip an Apple TV with the necessary camera and microphone. FaceTime on the Apple TV requires a second-generation Apple TV 4K or later and an iPhone running iOS 17 or an iPad running iPadOS 17.

The feature works pretty well. Setting up Continuity Camera is simple—you launch the FaceTime app on the Apple TV, select your user profile, confirm on the iPhone or iPad, and then position the iPhone or iPad in landscape orientation so the rear camera faces you. You can start FaceTime calls from the Apple TV or move a call in progress from an iPhone or iPad to the Apple TV. The video quality is excellent, the audio is surprisingly good even across the room, and Center Stage zooms and pans to keep you in the picture. You can also add reactions like hearts and fireworks with hand gestures. Or not.

Since its inception, Time Machine has backed up on an hourly schedule. It then keeps hourly backups for the previous 24 hours, daily backups for the last month, and weekly backups back to the start of the backup. Once free space on the backup drive gets low, Time Machine deletes older backups to make room for new ones, always maintaining at least one copy of every backed-up file. The traditional hourly backups are usually fine, but starting in macOS 13 Ventura, Apple lets you choose a daily or weekly schedule instead. One of those might be useful for Macs that are turned on infrequently or where very little important data changes. It also might reduce resource usage and how much data Time Machine backs up. Most people shouldn’t need to change the backup frequency, but if you’ve always wanted to, now you can.

(Featured image based on an original by iStock.com/STILLFX)

iOS 17 brings a new mode for the iPhone: StandBy. All you have to do is connect your iPhone to a charger wirelessly or with a cable, position it on its side in landscape orientation, and press the side button to lock the screen. Standby works best with a MagSafe charging stand. Swipe left or right to switch between three screens: widgets, photos, and clocks. Swipe up and down to move between widgets, photo collections, and clock styles. On the widget screen, touch and hold to add and remove widgets, and on the photo screen, to choose which collections and albums to display. You can choose how long the display stays active in Settings > StandBy > Display. By default, it will stay on all the time on iPhone models with an Always-On display; a tap or nudge will wake it on other iPhone models. Finally, StandBy remembers your preferred view in different locations, so it can be a clock in the bedroom, a photo frame in the kitchen, and a clock at the office.

(Featured image by Apple)