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If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

macworld.com

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Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#131

Post by azinman2 »

aunty_helen wrote: post #31
freediver wrote: post #18

Yesterday I prepared a few years old Windows laptop for my daughter to use in school. It took me a few hours just to install updates, remove bloatware (my oh my, the amount is staggering!) and fix privacy settings. And this was for Windows 10 which I hear is a mild version of a mess that Windows 11 is. I was instantly reminded why I appreciate Apple software more.

In reality, you just don't realise how much bloatware osx has. Install a firewall and watch as studentd or 100 other services you never use contacts apple. Edit: List of most recent and trying not to include things that may be useful to me syncdefaultsd, nsurlsessiond, apsd, cloudd, transparencyd, mapspushd, cloudphotod, akd, parsec-fbf, appstoreagent, AddressBookSourceSync, com.apple.iCloudHelper.xpc, familycircled,…

So basically in that list you’re suggesting disabling the ability to download web content, syncing of address books, getting updated security signatures, connecting to iCloud, downloading dynamic assets that many apps use to reduce initial size and provide non-binary updates, Siri keyword suggestions in Safari, Airdrop, Maps integration, push notifications for Messages, etc.

Most Apple users will definitively want those on, and will break your system in subtle ways if you disable them. I wouldn’t make such assumptions about whatever you use the service or not. If you don’t use a service, it typically will have very little traffic if any at all.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#132

Post by kccqzy »

SamuelAdams wrote: post #64
aunty_helen wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In reality, you just don't realise how much bloatware osx has. Install a firewall and watch as studentd or 100 other services you never use contacts apple. Edit: List of most recent and trying not to include things that may be useful to me syncdefaultsd, nsurlsessiond, apsd, cloudd, transparencyd, mapspushd, cloudphotod, akd, parsec-fbf, appstoreagent, AddressBookSourceSync, com.apple.iCloudHelper.xpc, familycircled,…

Hey so I’ll be getting my first MacBook Pro in a couple weeks, so I’m still learning the details about OS X. I’m coming from a windows / Linux background. I thought the OS shipped with its own firewall? Would you recommend using a third party firewall despite having its own?

Apple ships the pf fireball by default. It's a powerful firewall (same as OpenBSD AFAIK) but the way Apple configures it is very permissive. You can use a utility like Murus to configure it to your liking, although the configuration is rather complicated. It's also a network-level firewall, not an application-level firewall.

If you'd like an application-level firewall, you can check out Lulu or Little Snitch. Back when Little Snitch still(?) installed kernel extensions, it was found to be quite insecure—there were talks at DEFCON about it. Lulu is a lesser-known alternative.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#133

Post by lghh »

nickpp wrote: post #84
phoenixdblack wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since Internet Explorer is not supported anymore by most websites Safari has become the new worst browser in regards to having really bad CSS and Web API Support.

Yeah maybe you as a developer want some fancy CSS and bleeding fresh Web API but I as a user don't. The web is too bloated as it is, I feel that Apple is on my side putting a damper on that. Safari is powerful enough as it is. You want voip, notifications, codecs and so on - do the work and learn to write a native app. I'd rather pay for that than paying with my attention to ads in your "free" web app.

> do the work and learn to write a native app

Why? I want it to run on all platforms. That's one of the best things about the web. I'd rather just not support Safari than write and deploy separate MacOS, Windows, and Mobile applications.

My and most user-bases agree.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#134

Post by gumby »

aunty_helen wrote: post #31
freediver wrote: post #18

Yesterday I prepared a few years old Windows laptop for my daughter to use in school. It took me a few hours just to install updates, remove bloatware (my oh my, the amount is staggering!) and fix privacy settings. And this was for Windows 10 which I hear is a mild version of a mess that Windows 11 is. I was instantly reminded why I appreciate Apple software more.

In reality, you just don't realise how much bloatware osx has. Install a firewall and watch as studentd or 100 other services you never use contacts apple. Edit: List of most recent and trying not to include things that may be useful to me syncdefaultsd, nsurlsessiond, apsd, cloudd, transparencyd, mapspushd, cloudphotod, akd, parsec-fbf, appstoreagent, AddressBookSourceSync, com.apple.iCloudHelper.xpc, familycircled,…

Many of those are useful to me even if you don’t care about them…which proves your point: there’s no reasonable (and sometimes none at all) way to pick and choose.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#135

Post by azinman2 »

aunty_helen wrote: post #77
SamuelAdams wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey so I’ll be getting my first MacBook Pro in a couple weeks, so I’m still learning the details about OS X. I’m coming from a windows / Linux background. I thought the OS shipped with its own firewall? Would you recommend using a third party firewall despite having its own?

Get little snitch. This is a firewall that dosen't care what apple thinks is useful. There was some controversy in the previous year because apple tried to deprecate the firewall hooks and allow their junk passed the replacement they offered. I'm leaving apple for linux as we speak for two reasons, privacy and they can't help but mess with shit every time they release an update. The most recent, this week they releas…

s/airport/airplay

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#136

Post by mschuster91 »

azinman2 wrote: post #131
aunty_helen wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In reality, you just don't realise how much bloatware osx has. Install a firewall and watch as studentd or 100 other services you never use contacts apple. Edit: List of most recent and trying not to include things that may be useful to me syncdefaultsd, nsurlsessiond, apsd, cloudd, transparencyd, mapspushd, cloudphotod, akd, parsec-fbf, appstoreagent, AddressBookSourceSync, com.apple.iCloudHelper.xpc, familycircled,…

So basically in that list you’re suggesting disabling the ability to download web content, syncing of address books, getting updated security signatures, connecting to iCloud, downloading dynamic assets that many apps use to reduce initial size and provide non-binary updates, Siri keyword suggestions in Safari, Airdrop, Maps integration, push notifications for Messages, etc. Most Apple users will definitively want th…

> Most Apple users will definitively want those on, and will break your system in subtle ways if you disable them.

What happened to the good old days of "ask for user consent before phoning home"?

I mean, Apple is miles ahead of Windows in that regard, but your average Linux or BSD setup won't phone home outside of repository downloads unless requested.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#137

Post by azinman2 »

smoldesu wrote: post #101
SamuelAdams wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey so I’ll be getting my first MacBook Pro in a couple weeks, so I’m still learning the details about OS X. I’m coming from a windows / Linux background. I thought the OS shipped with its own firewall? Would you recommend using a third party firewall despite having its own?

There are multiple firewall options, but it's worth noting that Apple can circumvent them at a kernel-level if they want to phone home. You should think long and hard about how much you trust Apple before switching everything over.

The pf firewall is unaffected and can stop any calls to Apple.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#138

Post by MeinBlutIstBlau »

aunty_helen wrote: post #77
SamuelAdams wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey so I’ll be getting my first MacBook Pro in a couple weeks, so I’m still learning the details about OS X. I’m coming from a windows / Linux background. I thought the OS shipped with its own firewall? Would you recommend using a third party firewall despite having its own?

Get little snitch. This is a firewall that dosen't care what apple thinks is useful. There was some controversy in the previous year because apple tried to deprecate the firewall hooks and allow their junk passed the replacement they offered. I'm leaving apple for linux as we speak for two reasons, privacy and they can't help but mess with shit every time they release an update. The most recent, this week they releas…

I left Apple for the same reasons. They want complacent morons who pay $2000+ for a glorified email checker. Not legitimate developers. Idgaf how much iOS/MacOS users pay, I'm not learning Swift or objective C. Apple is the farthest thing from a company that wants to encourage development. They just want major players to shell out large amounts 30% transactions.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#139

Post by krono »

SamuelAdams wrote: post #64
aunty_helen wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In reality, you just don't realise how much bloatware osx has. Install a firewall and watch as studentd or 100 other services you never use contacts apple. Edit: List of most recent and trying not to include things that may be useful to me syncdefaultsd, nsurlsessiond, apsd, cloudd, transparencyd, mapspushd, cloudphotod, akd, parsec-fbf, appstoreagent, AddressBookSourceSync, com.apple.iCloudHelper.xpc, familycircled,…

Hey so I’ll be getting my first MacBook Pro in a couple weeks, so I’m still learning the details about OS X. I’m coming from a windows / Linux background. I thought the OS shipped with its own firewall? Would you recommend using a third party firewall despite having its own?

The OS firewall can only block incoming traffic (but not Apple's I believe) and has almost no configuration options.

Some popular third party solutions that are actually useful are Little Snitch [0], LuLu [1], and AdGuard [2].

[0] https://www.obdev.at/products/littlesnitch/index.html

[1] https://objective-see.com/products/lulu.html

[2] https://adguard.com/en/adguard-mac/overview.html

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#140

Post by afandian »

prewett wrote: post #93
afandian wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never found a way of disabling the automatic starting of iTunes when you press the play/pause button on the keyboard. How do I choose my own music player app? And my new Mac has things like (can't remember exactly) 'musiccreationd'. These count as 'startup items' to me.

If you're running a non-iTunes music app (including web pages, on newer versions of macOS), the play/pause button goes to whichever one last grabbed the audio. So if you start VLC (or whatever) first thing (or add it to the auto-start items), then the play/pause button will always go there.

It always worked as a pause/play for already playing media, my complaint was about its use as a launcher. Made muscle memory tricky as its behaviour depended on what was running at the time.
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