Chit Chat Across The Pond Lite

This week, Adam Engst joins us to talk about some work he did to try to measure the accuracy of several different AI models in creating audio transcriptions. He let me help him with some of the transcriptions so I was invested in his findings. We'll learn about ways to measure accuracy, including Word Error Rate aka WER. You can read Adam's article where he describes in detail the process he followed and the rather unsatisfying results at [tidbits.com/...](https://tidbits.com/2025/02/28/comparing-audio-transcription-in-notes-audio-hijack-and-macwhisper/). Read an unedited, auto-generated transcript with chapter marks: CCATP_2025_03_23

You know I’m not a music person, but I’ve invited Steve Mallard onto the show to talk about a topic he’s quite passionate about - the evolution of music tech. He is not an expert in this field, he just finds the history fascinating. Steve will take us back to the first acoustic guitars, and explain why electric guitars needed to be invented. He'll talk a little bit about the early effects that could be added with vacuum tube amps and how the invention of the transistor revolutionized the music industry. Things accelerate after that up to where digital signal processing began allowing new music effects and replication of tone became possible. At the end, we get into a bit of a debate on whether this democratization of music creation has ruined music. Read an unedited, auto-generated transcript with chapter marks:

This week, the delightful Adam Engst of TidBITS joins us to talk about how he learned to write so well, what it's like having an editor, and then moves into how he uses the AI tool Grammarly to improve his writing. It's great fun as always and convinced me to pay for one month of Grammarly to see if it will make me as awesome of a writer as Adam. You can read all the details of his use of Grammarly in his article entitled ["Why Grammarly Beats Apple’s Writing Tools for Serious Writers" on tidbits.com](https://tidbits.com/2025/01/30/why-grammarly-beats-apples-writing-tools-for-serious-writers/) Join the Conversation: [email protected] podfeet.com/slack Support the Show: Patreon Donation Apple Pay or Credit Card one-time donation PayPal one-time donation Podfeet Podcasts Mugs at Zazzle Podfeet 15-Year Anniversary Shirts Referral Links: Parallels Toolbox - 3 months free for you and me Learn through MacSparky Field Guides - 15% off for you and me Backblaze - One free month for me and you Eufy - $40 for

If you’ve been on the Internet before, and you’ve heard of a little fruit company called Apple, then you’ve probably seen Jason Snell's famous Six Colors charts on Apple earnings. In this episode of Chit Chat Across the Pond, we don't talk about earnings, we talk about the magic behind how he creates his famous charts. It's full of nerdy fun like how he decides when to use a serape chart vs. a bar chart, how he calculates a rolling average, how he gets the data for the charts, and how he gets the charts from Apple Numbers into his website. His joy at finding people who want to talk about the nerd side of this is evident in his enthusiasm. * Apple Q1 Earnings charts on Six Colors including video of Jason Snell and Dan Moren discussing what the numbers mean. * How Jason automated creating the blog posts from Numbers: Chart Party at sixcolors.com. * Jason's podcasts: The Incomparable, Upgrade, and other appearances Join the Conversation: [email protected] podfeet.com/slack Support the Show: Patreon Dona

Adam Engst of TidBITS joins us to talk about a bug in macOS Sequoia 15.2 that affected a low-level system tool called Apple System Restore or ASR. This tool is the path for developers of backup tools to create true bootable backups, and the bug makes it now impossible to create bootable backups. We talk about the different viewpoints of the developers of Superduper!, Carbon Copy Cloner, and Chronosyc regarding the future of bootable backups. Then Adam talks about whether we really _need_ bootable backups anymore. We then segue into a survey Adam conducted on backup strategies with TidBITS readers and he discusses the relative merits of the different strategies. Join the Conversation: [email protected] podfeet.com/slack Support the Show: Patreon Donation Apple Pay or Credit Card one-time donation PayPal one-time donation Podfeet Podcasts Mugs at Zazzle Podfeet 15-Year Anniversary Shirts Referral Links: Parallels Toolbox - 3 months free for you and me Learn through MacSparky Field Guides - 15% off for y

Andrea Jones-Rooy is a data scientist, a standup comedian, _and_ a circus performer. Andrea delves into the realms of data science, its significance, and how it is often misunderstood in mainstream narratives. Andrea begins by reflecting on their journey to becoming a data scientist. Andrea was a professor of data science at NYU Center for Data Science and they taught an undergraduate course called "Data Science for Everyone". The cool thing is you can watch Andrea teach the same material for free in a video series of the same name: Data Science for Everyone on YouTube. I watched all 20 episodes, and I have to tell you it was fascinating. I may have gushed just a little bit about how awesome it was. Read an unedited, auto-generated transcript with chapter marks: CCATP_2025_01_10 Join the Conversation: [email protected] podfeet.com/slack Support the Show: Patreon Donation Apple Pay or Credit Card one-time donation PayPal one-time donation Podfeet Podcasts Mugs at Zazzle Podfeet 15-Year Anniversary

In this episode of Chit Chat Across the Pond, Bart talks about his job as a cybersecurity specialist. We get a bit silly in our early part of the chat, the reasons for which will become obvious when you listen to the beginning but he successfully gives a flavor of what "a day in the life" is like for him. Read an unedited, auto-generated transcript with chapter marks: CCATP_2024_12_29 Join the Conversation: [email protected] podfeet.com/slack Support the Show: Patreon Donation Apple Pay or Credit Card one-time donation PayPal one-time donation Podfeet Podcasts Mugs at Zazzle Podfeet 15-Year Anniversary Shirts Referral Links: Parallels Toolbox - 3 months free for you and me Learn through MacSparky Field Guides - 15% off for you and me Backblaze - One free month for me and you Eufy - $40 for me if you spend $200. Sadly nothing in it for you. PIA VPN - One month added to Paid Accounts for both of us CleanShot X - Earns me $25%, sorry nothing in it for you but my gratitude

Certified Apple Consultant Pat Dengler joins me to tell the harrowing story of how her neighbor was seconds away from being scammed out of $30,000. In an elaborate web of lies with multiple people involved, she was connected supposedly to Amazon, the FBI, lawyers, and more, and every single person gave their IDs and return phone numbers. Pat saved her literally in the nick of time. This story aired as part of the NosillaCast on December 1st, 2024 but I made it a standalone episode so folks can point directly to it to help raise awareness. If you need a Certified Apple Consultant, Pat can be contacted at [email protected]. Join the Conversation: [email protected] podfeet.com/slack Support the Show: Patreon Donation Apple Pay or Credit Card one-time donation PayPal one-time donation Podfeet Podcasts Mugs at Zazzle Podfeet 15-Year Anniversary Shirts Referral Links: Parallels Toolbox - 3 months free for you and me Learn through MacSparky Field Guides - 15% off for you and me Backblaze - One fre

Adam Engst of TidBITS back again to talk about an unusual and clever scam experienced by one of his TidBITS readers. It involved fake obituaries triggering iPhone security warnings triggering App Store downloads. You can find Adam's written article on the topic at [tidbits.com/...](https://tidbits.com/2024/12/06/beware-obituary-scam-sites-and-fake-iphone-security-warnings/). Join the Conversation: [email protected] podfeet.com/slack Support the Show: Patreon Donation Apple Pay or Credit Card one-time donation PayPal one-time donation Podfeet Podcasts Mugs at Zazzle Podfeet 15-Year Anniversary Shirts Referral Links: Parallels Toolbox - 3 months free for you and me Learn through MacSparky Field Guides - 15% off for you and me Backblaze - One free month for me and you Setapp - One free month for me and you Eufy - $40 for me if you spend $200. Sadly nothing in it for you. PIA VPN - One month added to Paid Accounts for both of us CleanShot X - Earns me $25%, sorry nothing in it for you but my gratitude

In this episode of Chit Chat Across the Pond, Adam Engst and I discussed his October 24th article entitled [Exposé Reveals Ongoing Smartphone Location Tracking Threats](https://tidbits.com/2024/10/23/expose-reveals-ongoing-smartphone-location-tracking-threats/). He explained how much easier it is now for your precise location to be determined because of your online activity, in spite of the safeguards Apple has instituted in an attempt to anonymize your data. Adam gives chilling examples of what's possible today. Adam doesn't leave us with doom and gloom though, he arms us with some tools to fight this tracking as best we can in his article, [Protect Yourself Against Location Tracking Abuses](https://tidbits.com/2024/10/27/protect-yourself-against-location-tracking-abuses/). [audio mp3="https://media.blubrry.com/nosillacast/traffic.libsyn.com/nosillacast/CCATP_2024_11_12.mp3"] mp3 download Read an unedited, auto-generated transcript with chapter marks: CCATP_2024_11_12

I had the pleasure of interviewing Sam King, chief revenue officer for eSIM provider GigSky. As an unwritten policy, I don’t generally interview people who sell products or services, but since it’s my own guideline, I can color outside the lines when I want to, and this is one of those times. We do a fair bit of international travel, and I have always chosen my eSIM by going to esimDB and choosing the best combination of data and length of time of my stay for the price. On our last two trips, GigSky met our needs the best. But I didn't understand something pretty fundamental about choosing an eSIM provider. Sam explained that most eSIM providers are simply resellers. That matters because if there are any network or installation issues, these companies have no way of fixing the problem and lack any accountability. It turns out there are only a handful of eSIM companies (including GigSky) that are network operators who supply their own US-based eSIMs. He went on to explain that network operators actually c

In this week's episode of Chit Chat Across the Pond, Adam Engst of TidBITS joins us to join in the fun conversation about limiting your iPhone's charging to 80%. He wrote up an article entitled Does Limiting an iPhone’s Battery Charging to 80% Increase Lifespan? in which he references an article by Juli Clover of MacRumors. Juli used her iPhone 15 Pro Max for a solid year with charging set to a max of 80%. Juli freely admits this was not a terribly scientific effort to determine whether it helps because there are far too many variables at play and not enough data points to form any conclusions. That doesn't stop me and Adam from pretending to do science with her results, Adam and my results charging normally, and even more anecdotal data collected by Nick Heer on Pixel Envy. I even threw around a pivot table I made with this "data" which is well known to turn anecdotes into scientifically derived proof. On top of that, I nerdily referenced Battery University that sheds a wee bit of light on the subject.

Adam Engst joins me again, this time to talk about the patently wrong decision by Apple to include repetitive permissions requests for screen recording in the macOS Sequoia beta. As he explains in his article on TidBITS.com entitled Apple Reduces Excessive Sequoia Permission Requests, Shifts to Monthly, changing from weekly permissions requests to monthly is 4 times less wrong, but still 12 times per year wrong. We discuss the types of applications this will affect, from screenshot utilities like CleanShot, to menu bar modifiers like Bartender and Ice, as well as apps like Photoshop that simply use an eye dropper to let you choose colors outside of the app interface. Adam has a no whining policy in his community, so this isn't just a big complaint conversation, he explains some ideas he has the Apple could implement which might give users the desired security protections without causing them permissions fatigue. Even in this rather fist-shaking episode, Adam is a delight and we had a lot of fun chit chatt

This week our guest is the venerable Adam Engst of TidBITS. Adam wrote an article recently about his solar inverters that ended up being a story about troubleshooting. That inspired me last week to tell you our troubleshooting story about our home network. We thought it would be fun to go through Adam's story and pick out ideas for troubleshooting and where our own weaknesses are. Read an unedited, auto-generated transcript with chapter marks: CCATP_2024_08_06

CCATP #793 for July 9, 2024, and I'm your host, Allison Sheridan. In case you missed the announcement, Adam Engst of TidBITS is now a member of the Podfeet Podcasts family as a continuing contributor to Chit Chat Across the Pond. In this week's episode, we talked about why Adam believes we need persistent calendar and reminder notifications. Adam is hyper-focused and when he's writing it's not uncommon for him to easily dismiss a notification of an upcoming event. Articles referenced in the conversation: * A Call to Alarms: Why We Need Persistent Calendar and Reminder Notifications. * In Your Face Provides Persistent Notifications for Events and Tasks * Just Due It: Persistent Notifications for Tasks - TidBITS * CalAlarm app Adam is testing for iOS Read an unedited, auto-generated transcript with chapter marks: CCATP_2024_07_09 Join the Conversation: [email protected] podfeet.com/slack Support the Show: Patreon Donation PayPal one-time donation Podfeet Podcasts Mugs at Zazzle Podfeet 15-Yea

So ... I made a wee mistake this morning when I accidentally told the NosillaCast feed to move to the Chit Chat Across the Pond feed! I thought I fixed it right away, but then Louis Trapani told me that he was seeing all of the NosillaCast content slopped into Chit Chat Across the Pond! Evidently, the fix didn't "stick". Overcast subscribers are fine because the RSS feed is ok, but Apple Podcasts subscribers may not ever get the NosillaCast again unless you resubscribe. I can't believe I did this on the day before my 1000th episode and I'm very sorry and sad! I sure hope you see this and you'll resubscribe and get all that NosillaCast goodness - especially the 1000th episode! Read an unedited, auto-generated transcript with chapter marks: CCATP_2024_07_06

Well hello there, this is Alison Sheridan and I have a very special announcement for July 5th, 2024, to the Chit Chat Across the Pond light audience and the Programming By Stealth audience. If you were subscribed to the Lite feed, you may have noticed that your Chit Chat Across the Pond Lite logo changed into the Chit Chat Across the Pond logo and that you see a whole pile of recent episodes that are all Programming By Stealth. As a Programming By Stealth learner, you won't have noticed a difference yet, but you also care about this. I've decided to make some changes to the podcast, which I'm pretty sure will benefit everyone. There will be a full explanation of all of the changes in the NosillaCast on episode 1000, but let's talk about you first. The first change is that we've stopped publishing Programming by Stealth as part of Chit Chat Across the Pond. If you want the Programming By Stealth content, then you'll need to subscribe to the standalone podcast that we've always had. Since Programming By St

In this episode of Chit Chat Across the Pond Lite, Bart Busschots joins us to talk about weather apps. He's a serious weather nerd by necessity, living in Ireland and being an avid bike rider. As he walks through the apps he'll explain which ones fall down on privacy, which ones have good apps for everything from the watch to iOS to the Mac. He'll even go through how he uses different widgets to help him decide how much rain gear to wear. Read an unedited, auto-generated transcript with chapter marks: CCATP_2024_04_26 Join the Conversation: [email protected] podfeet.com/slack Support the Show: Patreon Donation PayPal one-time donation Podfeet Podcasts Mugs at Zazzle Podfeet 15-Year Anniversary Shirts Referral Links: Parallels Toolbox - 3 months free for you and me Learn through MacSparky Field Guides - 15% off for you and me Backblaze - One free month for me and you Setapp - One free month for me and you Eufy - $40 for me if you spend $200. Sadly nothing in it for you. PIA VPN - One month added

In this episode of Chit Chat Across the Pond Lite, Bart Busschots joins us to talk Dyson vacuums. I know that doesn't sound too technical but you'd be surprised how advanced the tech is in the new devices. I share a few of my Dyson stories too and we both talk about our love for everything Dyson. Hide your pocketbooks before listening because all Dyson products are super expensive!

This week's Chit Chat Across the Pond Lite is a stretch to the word "Lite". I'd call it a crossover episode of Lite and Programming By Stealth. Helma van der Linden joins me to tell the story of how she has successfully started the new version of Bart's fabulous xkpasswd password generation service. xkpasswd.net was written in perl ages ago and depends on very old and outdated libraries. Bart spent many months teaching the Programming By Stealth students the tools we (and he) would need to port the code over to JavaScript. His plan all along was to have students help him make the new version of XKPASSWD a reality. It turns out that Helma is an extraordinary student and has done most of the work to make it a minimal viable product, all without Bart's help. In this conversation, we'll talk about how she did this without getting _too_ nerdy. Some nerdy but not too nerdy. If you'd like to give the very beta version of the new tool a try (without knowing any coding), check it out at bartificer.github.io/xkpassw