Instant translation

You are visiting a foreign website in a language you do not understand. How to translate it without using an app or another website such as Google Translate?

Safari, your favorite browser offers instant and “in situ” translation with just one click! Let’s see how.

Let’s say you visit a German site that gives the latest corona info for your trip, at random https://www.land.nrw/de/wichtige-fragen-und-antworten-zum-corona-virus.

The site is in German and the English version does not contain the information you are looking for.

Fortunately, Safari tells you that the translation is available (for this language).

Choose your language:

And voila!

The good news? it also works on your iPhone!

Traduction instantanée

Vous visitez un site web étranger dans une langue que vous ne maitrisez pas. Comment le traduire sans faire appel à une app ou un autre site web tel que Google Translate?

Safari, votre navigateur préféré offre la traduction instantanée et in situ en un seul click! Voyons comment.

Disons que vous visitez un site allemand qui donne les dernières infos sur le corona pour votre voyage, au hasard https://www.land.nrw/de/wichtige-fragen-und-antworten-zum-corona-virus.

Le site est en allemand et la version française ne contient pas ces infos qui vous intéressent.

Heureusement, Safari vous annonce que la traduction est disponible (pour cette langue).

Choisissez votre langue:

Et le tour est joué!

La bonne nouvelle? ça marche aussi sur votre iPhone!

How to rename your Magic Mouse?

Strangely enough, the System Preference mouse menu does not allow to rename your Magic Mouse, typically called “John Smith’s Magic Mouse”. In order to rename it, go to the Bluetooth menu in System Preference. Right clicking your Magic Mouse in the list of Bluetooth devices, opens a contextual menu where your can select “Rename”.

That’s it. As simple as that.

Comment renommer sa souris Magic Mouse?

Etonnament, le menu de gestion de la souris dans les préférences systèmes ne permet pas de renommer la souris, typiquement appelée “Magic Mouse de Jean Dupont”.

Pour la renommer, passer par les préférences système Bluetooth. Un clic droit sur la souris dans la liste des appareils Bluetooth disponibles, offre la possibilité de renommer la souris.

Et le tour est joué.

iCloud drive not syncing?

Recently, after replacing the hard drive (SSD) of my iMac, and after restoring its content from Time Machine (see my post on the best backup strategy), I realized that my iCloud folders (Documents & Desktop) struggled a bit and didn’t seem to sync with iCloud anymore. Some documents edited on my MacBook Pro were not up to date!

Clicking on the circular progress bar icon of the iCloud folder shows a progress bar but it does not appear to progress at all. I hope that it will be better tomorrow. But nothing helps. The next day, the bar did not move by one inch. It is true that I total 30 GB of files in iCloud and after all, after a restore from Time Machine, with a potentially older version of some files, one could wonder how iCloud can handle this. That restored Excel file from yesterday appears to have been placed on iCloud just now. What about its more recent version on the Macbook?

Let’s take an example, the File.xlsx file was modified on 3/16/2021 at 4:09:23 PM on the Macbook. The Time Machine restore File.xlsx from 3/15/2021 at 9:37:43 PM, but the restore operation took place on 3/16/2021 at 5:00:00 PM. What will iCloud do? The most recent version of the file is the Macbook’s version, dated 03/16/2021 at 16:09:23.

Well in my case iCloud seems a bit lost and doesn’t sync anymore. Is this dilemma the cause of this hesitation? Who knows.

How to fix it?

Apple recommends, when iCloud no longer synchronizes, to close the session and reopen it after restarting the Mac. Closing the session, displays an alert: your files will be deleted from this Mac! You can keep a copy if necessary. In my case, no need for a copy, I still have my Time Machine backup and the cloud version. So I opt out and uncheck the local copy and close the session.

After restarting my computer, and reconnecting to iCloud Drive, surprise: my files are instantaneously restored to Documents and Desktop, but still not synced! Strange. I decide to try and log out of iCloud again, making sure I have unchecked the local copy option. I restart the Mac, but before reconnecting the iCloud session, I check the contents of my folders. Documents and Desktop are empty as expected, but there is a folder at the root of my account on the system drive: iCloud Drive (Archive). That’s my guilty party!

Yet I did not ask for it. So I rename this folder to “My iCloud Drive (Archive)” before I reopen the iCloud session.

This time it’s okay, my Documents and Office folders are both empty…. but they remain empty! I would at least expect to see the structure of these folders appear from iCloud, but no! Let’s pretend to not care and carry on with other things, while keeping an eye on my files. I create a “March 16” folder on the desktop, just to see. I open my MacBook Pro and see that this folder doesn’t seem to appear there … No iCloud cloud icon on the iMac either … No syncing!

And then suddenly, without any warning, my folders fill up again from iCloud. “March 17th” folder appears on the MacBook Pro and all the other documents and folders come down from the cloud to the iMac. Phew! Syncing has resumed. My File.xlsx is dated 03/16/2021 at 4:09:23 PM, i.e. the latest version loaded in iCloud from the MacBook Pro. All OK as expected!

Conclusion

iCloud management seems to be delivering to expectations. However, Apple leaves users in the dark. A dashboard that would show the status of iCloud syncing would not be a luxury, with a button to restart it and even manage possible conflicts. Let’s dream!