Apple has pushed out an update for macOS in the form of a supplemental update last night and I’ve given it test on my iMac – it has addressed the USB disconnection issue that I mentioned in my last blog post. I checked it a few times, put it to sleep then woke it up, put it sleep for longer then woke it up – no warning about how the drive was not removed safely – it appears that Apple have fixed the issue. I might have worried if I had formatted it using HFS+ but I use APFS for my external drive.
How are my finances going? They’re going well thank goodness – I’m in one of those industries that will make money during good times and bad times but I’ve helped out the company by using some of my holidays along with lots of other employees along with working from home so I’m happy that things are pretty stable. In terms of reaching my goal – I’m on track to be debt free by 40 and in fact have some money saved for a trip to go overseas at the end of 2021 where I am tempted to maybe go to China and the United States.
Looking forward to WWDC this year – hopefully since it is all online this year that it’ll be available as soon as possible rather than it sometimes taking up to 24-48 hours after the session has finished before it finally makes its way up on the Apple website. The big question is whether this year we’ll see major changes or whether we’ll see a ‘High Catalina’ where the focus isn’t on new features but refining the existing technologies and dealing with the rough edges – Twitter via the Catalyst framework is working ok but it is unstable at times so I wonder to what extent this is an issue with the Catalyst framework or whether it is a matter of Twitter needing to fix bugs in their code.
Hopefully there is a lot of focus on Device Kit – improving documentation (I’ve read a lot of complaints about the lack of in-depth documentation particularly in the Rea of migrating code from being compiled as a KEXT to utilising Driver Kit) along with making the depth and breadth devices supported to the point that we start seeing Apple move all (or as many as they can) the drivers that reside within the kernel today out to using Device Kit, maybe create a file system user space framework and move file system support out of the kernel to improve stability.
Apple has pushed out an update today for iOS and iPadOS to address FaceTime compatibility issue when trying to create a FaceTime session with someone using a device running older version of iOS or iPadOS. I’ve installed it on my iPhone 11 Max Pro – no problems so far, everything very stable.
There has been a nasty bug (link) found in macOS 10.15.4 but in the comment section it appears that it has existed prior to 10.15.4 all the way back to the release of 10.15.0. It will be interesting to see whether Apple releases an out of band patch or whether the solution is probably complex enough that it requires Apple to push the fix into the 10.15.5 update so that it is tested along side all the other updates to ensure that the fix doesn’t result in a regression in reliability (aka ensuring that a fix doesn’t create a new set of bugs). The one thing I noticed on my iMac is my external hard disk – if I put my device to sleep then wake it up the next day it says that my USB hard disk was not removed safely. It never used to happen with 10.15.3, it has only just happened – I wonder if it is related to it.
Reading through Twitter and it is amazing the number of Bernie supporters who get sucked into the vortex of bullshit by taking the bait laid down by professional shit stirrers such as Neera Tanden. Her whole mission is to put provocative tweets out there so then she can get a response by Bernie supporters which enables her to go on MSNBC or CNN to talk about how she is the victim of the ‘Bernie Bros’. Bernie supporters need to think and act smarter – feeding the troll might give you an endorphin and adrenaline rush of putting someone in their place but long term it’ll make the situation worse because ultimately the results of elections are decided by people who watch such channels, whose minds are still shaped by those on television using their position as an example of being in a position of authority (so therefore what they have to say as carrying more weight than it would otherwise if it were a level playing field of the real world or or a social network like Twitter).
This is the reason why the mainstream media and the pundit class dislike social media because social media levels the playing field – their ability to use a platform like television as a de facto legitimisation of their opinions on the basis that it is worthy of consideration by virtue of it being given an prestigious platform with a wide reach is something that has died with some in generation X, and pretty much with all of Generation Y and Z. The most eye opening part is looking at the break down of demographics that watch cable news – there are YouTube channels that focus on news and opinions that have higher subscription and viewership. The mainstream media is dying – the question is whether there is the ability to resuscitate it or is it doomed to a permanent downward trajectory.
Back to work…working at home and I kind of enjoy it. The ability to get up 30 minutes before starting work; putting on a coffee, have a quick shower, get into something comfortable and log in to start the day. So I log in at 11:30am, start replying to emails and contacting customers (through the AWS service – I had to install Firefox because it is only compatible with Firefox and Chrome but not Safari) then off at 8:00pm. I wish this was my full time job – being able to chill out at home working and not have the constant stress.
I’ve been following the Democratic primaries – it appears that Biden will become the nominee but with that has come a group calling themselves ‘Bernie or bust’, not because they want Trump again but want Biden to move further to the left to address the legitimate concerns which led to the likes of Trump gaining traction in the first place. The material conditions fed into the rise of Donald Trump ( he saw a rising tide of people angry at a system that threw them overboard 40+ years ago and Donald Trump saw it as his opportunity to ride that anger into the White House) if left unaddressed will result an even worse Donald Trump. Unlike the Trump of today the future demagogue will actually have the political skill to get their own way made worse by a subservient Republican Party who will do anything to hold onto power combined with an impotent Democratic Party that prefer being in opposition because of the grift they can have running by scaring donors.
If Biden is serious about winning over the progressive he needs to be willing to bend the knee and that involves not only nominating a strong progressive as a running mate. As Lawrence O’Donnell noted in an interview:
If you want to pull the Democrats to the left you have to show that you’re capable of not voting for them – that is the purpose of the ‘Bernie or bust’ movement – to send a clear message to the establishment (who by the way have been disparaging Bernie supporters the whole primary cycle – insisting that Bernie supporters aren’t needed because Nancy/Chuck have this wonderful plan of pandering to moderate Republicans in the suburbs – that same wonderful plan that….oh, did Hillary become president? No, that plan crashed and burned but I guess they think that giving in a second go will be a charm) that they have to win over the base, not just take them for granted just as the Republicans have to win over the base.
Another day in ‘lock down’ in New Zealand and things appear to be going well. I’m generally avoiding going out where ever possible although when I do I have a clear purpose. Each of the times I have gone out it is for the essentials from the store and when I get home I always make sure I washed my hands and face – it isn’t a full proof plan but regular hand washing and minimising exposure reduces the chances of contracting COVID-19.
Tonight I had tortellini with a creamy tomato sauce which was very tasty. In the past I used to microwave it (in a bowl of water) but what I do these days is get the water boiling in the pot (with a pinch of salt in the water) then pouring the tortellini into the water to boil for 10 minutes. After boiling for 10 minutes I then strain it and while it is straining (to remove as much water so that the sauce isn’t watered down) I heat up the pasta sauce then add the tortellini and mixed in it. All in all, rather than trying to half-ass it like I’ve done in the past I’m taking a few extra minutes to do it properly and the end result is a wonderful meal.
When I wake up tomorrow I’ll do some cleaning around the house – mopping, hoovering, dusting etc. the extra time should men that I’ll be able to get my house clean from top to bottom. Oh well, lots of work to keep myself occupied while on lock down.
With the release of 10.15 Apple announced the deprecation of kernel extensions in favour of user space based drivers. I remember when the announcement was made I wasn’t expecting it to kick in maybe until the following release (macOS 10.17) but it appears that support maybe completely removed in macOS 10.16. With the release of 10.15.4 a message is now displayed to the end user when they’re reliant upon a third party kernel extension (link).
The reason for this? It all comes down to security – anyone who has been following the updates that Apple put out on a regular basis they also include a document where it outlines all the security bugs that have been fixed (link). If you have a look through there are at least 14 instances of kernel vulnerabilities relating to either the kernel itself or an kernel extension. If something goes wrong for any code running in kernel space then it opens up the whole system – even with fuzzing techniques etc. it is difficult to debug because of the process of crashing, rebooting, recompiling, checking code dumps etc. which s time consuming and even with automated tools it can give hints about where there might be an issue but it doesn’t pin point exactly resulting in still many hours of work. The situation is made worse if you’re dependent upon third parties to maintain their code as well then timing it so that you can merge it with your update then testing it then provide feedback up to the third party to then receive an notified binaries back again to then retest.
I don’t think it will ever be possible to have a 100% secure kernel or a system as a whole but what one can do is decrease the surface attack area by taking steps such as Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) but there are limits which s why there is a focus on deprecating kernel extensions support for third parties in favour of moving driver developers over to using the user land DriverKit API so that misbehaving extensions don’t bring down the whole system and more importantly that a security vulnerability in an user land extension doesn’t pose a giant security risk for the rest fo the system.
It appears that Apple is already starting to make it use the framework:
A term known as ‘Dog fooding’ is a process where by developers will make use of their own code in the early stages so that the framework develops to meet real world needs rather than a situation of trying to develop a framework in an abstract way but finding that in the real world it doesn’t meet developers needs. This is an important part of making the framework more robust – moving drivers over to the framework (because that is what a lot of developers will be doing m in terms of moving their existing code base to a new framework – they aren’t going to throw away thousands of man hours of battle hardened code if they can avoid it) and as they see how certain drives behave they can make adjustments to the framework so that by the time it is ready for third party developers it will be ready to be used barring corner cases that’ll need to be addressed on a case by case basis.
Although this is speculation on my part I think that over the long term that part of the move to ARM for Mac will involve pushing the kernel in either a micro-kernel or at least a monolithic kernel but trying to push as much out of kernel space as possible. Although there is a performance hit in terms of context switching on x86, on ARM the cost is a lot lower and if Apple takes advantage of ARM ISA extensions then the performance penalty will be almost nothing. By moving the drivers out of the kernel it’ll also allow them to make radical changes to the kernel without having to be concerned about driver compatibility – there has been much made about inefficiencies within macOS kernel (XNU) with some of them the result of architectural decisions (valuing low latency over throughput for example) and some of them being the result of decisions made based on hardware limitations that are now becoming an impediment (see the slow removal of the giant lock and the emergence of multi-core CPUs becoming mainstream in recent years).
It appears that they’re most likely going to start pushing USB devices into user space first but then eventually work their way into areas such as the graphics subsystem where all but the most essential code sits inside the kernel which is shared amongst all the vendors which will hopefully mean maybe a return of support by nVidia since it would mean support for nVidia GPU’s wouldn’t be dependent on a kernel extension. I could also imagine seeing Apple pull the all the file system drivers out of the kernel thus leaving APFS the only one loaded in the kernel. This would all make sense given that for years they’ve been breaking down their kernel extensions into smaller components. The best example of that would be the video card drivers where they’ve been broken down into a shared common kernel extension, a hardware abstraction library, a services extension etc. where as before it was all dumped into a single file and left it at that.
I guess in June 2020 when there is WWDC we’ll get to see where Apple is going to be taking macOS (and their other operating systems) in the future.
macOS 10.15.4, iOS 13.4 and tvOS 13.4 was released today (Wednesday) – I did a clean install on all my devices (DFU on my iPhone 11 Pro Max) to clear off some cruft that built up as I was doing some stuff for my mum (moving her documents from Microsoft OneDrive to Google Drive) and because Google projectile vomits it’s crap all around the drive it is difficult to completely remove all the files that Google include with their installer.
When it comes to my iMac (iMac 18,3) the Boot ROM has been updated from 180.0.0.0.0 to 181.0.0.0.0 but the SMC Version remained the same where as with my MacBook Pro 15” (MacBook Pro 14,3) the Boot ROM has been updated from 204.0.0.0.0 to 205.0.0.0.0 and the SMC Version was updated from 2.45f1 to 2.45f3. I wouldn’t be surprised if it the it includes the latest round of microcode updates which not only include any recent security updates it also includes optimisations for past microcode pushed out but engineers have optimised the code so that it has less of an impact on performance.
There have been a fair number of bug fixes and new features (link) along with many security features (link) and then there are the big improvements that have come with Safari 13.1 (link) and the security fixes (link) – although the link is to the beta version the final version has all those changes plus maybe a few changes (such as bug fixes) that were fixed but weren’t worth mentioning. All in all it appears that Apple has put out a pretty sizeable update which leaves me wondering what more they have in store for macOS 10.16 and iOS/tvOS 14.0 when they announce it in June.
Well, I was heading home and stopped off at the local Countdown to pick up a box of ice creams and found that the local one had closed at 9pm so I went to the other on my way home (when going home another way), same situation. It really frustrates me that this occurs because idiots go out shopping to hoard food because they get themselves worked up over what might happen based on extenuating circumstances outside of New Zealand. On my way home from work tomorrow I’ll be able to grab a few things since I’ll be finishing at 8pm which will allow me enough time to quickly sneak in before closing time.
iOS 13.4, tvOS 13.4 and macOS 10.15.4 look at getting release next week either on 24 or the 25 March so I’ll be looking forward at the new features, bug fixes and optimisations. The big contribution is the addition of pointer support to iPadOS which is gradually turning the iPad into a powerful device that is quickly becoming the ‘computer for the rest of us’ while Microsoft is once again failing to deliver a stripped down cleaned up version of Windows 10X.
Work is going well but everyone is a bit paranoid about the whole COVID-19 – the best anyone can do is follow the best advise from those who are advising the government and we’ll all get through this. Lets hope that after this whole experience that it services as a warning to any future governments that running the healthcare system on the smell of an oily rag with very little slack sets up the system to collapse when something like COVID-19 as seen by what is happening in the UK’s NHS.
Another weekend has arrived – time to start doing the washing tomorrow and cleaning around the house, watching some television and unwinding after a week of busyness particularly with the big announcement made by by the government regarding COVID-19 and the steps that the government are taking to slow down the spread. There scheduled a press conference next week (week starting 16 March 2020) where there will be an economic stimulus announced – to keep the country moving along and avoid falling into recession.
I’m going to start something new tomorrow – a new meal regiment which has been organised with my last weekly shopping. The major benefit is having a predictable grocery bill every fortnight along with having a meal schedule at work which balances up having satisfying meals while also ensuring that the food eaten don’t result in me feeling even more hungry later on – the protein in the meals (chicken in one meal and fish in the other meal) do their job making my stomach feel full.
Apple has announced that WWDC will be an online only conference but the date hasn’t been announced yet and no word yet on whether there will be a charge for people to have access to the sessions or whether it’ll be free for everyone and if you want to ask engineers questions then you have to pay a entry fee for the conference. I’m looking at having some time off over June so I’m hoping that in the next couple of weeks that there will be more details made available. It’ll be interesting to see the direction that each of the platforms take – if iOS takes on more traditional features such as pointer supporter then it raises question about the direction of macOS in the future because although there are cross over points I think that macOS will chart a course where more power user features will be added – macOS for the power users, iPadOS for everyone else.
Reading an article about the possibility of Apple moving to their own custom ARM based SoC based on another business who are shipping ARM based CPUs delivering performance equal to that of what intel offers with Xeon with the added bonus of using almost half the amount of power (link).What it goes to show is that there isn’t any limitation architecturally so I’m sure Apple could scale up their core CPU design and the utilise AMD for a discrete GPU then combine that with further investments into their Metal technologies I could see it occurring within the next couple of years. The move to ARM isn’t just about standardising for the sake of standardising but about controlling the entire widget so that the development of components line up with the schedule that Apple want their product to be released on rather than their schedule being dictated by a third party aka Intel’s own schedule.
I’ve been following the Democratic primaries in the United States – once again it appears that people are voting against their own self interest as information leaks out about Biden writing up a wish list of people and which positions he would like them in. The DNC (the establishment/centrists) has made it clear (and reiterated by Chuck Schumer) that they don’t need the left wing flank of the party – that for every left winger they lose they’ll gain 4 moderate Republicans in the suburbs – great, then in which case you don’t need vote shame the left wing flank into voting for Biden but low and behold the DNC are doing just that. After 40 years of ‘bending the knee’ for the centrists by the left wing flank the centrists are now indignant about adopting some pretty mainstream social democratic ideas such as single payer healthcare, free tertiary education and the green new deal (an environmentally focused public works project).
The weekend has been relaxing – being able to sleep in and not have to worry. On my days off I prefer just relaxing around at home – getting some chores done in between watching movies, television shows while replying to twitter. Oh, and I finally found out where the leaking petrol was coming from on my scooter – there was a very slight slit in the fuel line so what I had to do was cut it back to where the spit was and then reconnect it – no problems since then. Tomorrow I’ll vacuum clean the home, finishing off my washing for the new week and prepare something nice for dinner – all in all I am a happy chap.
Well, that day went quickly and once again the American public never cease to disappointment me with their half baked decision making when confronted with a candidate who promises nothing in the way of change vs. a candidate who does the most audacious proposal was to bring the United States inline with almost every other country in the OECD in the form of an expanded social safety net, single payer healthcare, investment into decarbonising the economy and so on.
With that being said , the candidate has to take responsibility because ultimately it is the candidate who is the one giving the sales pitch and that involves predicting the dirty tricks campaign that vest interests have in ensuring that the status quo remains. That means first of all addressing the concerns that people have – some of them misplaced such as the conflation of insurance with healthcare, some very much understandable such as concerns about the existing relationships they have with providers are going to be upended ss with the case many found with the ACA where people were told “if you like your doctor you can keep them” and “if you like your plan you can keep it” but quickly people found out that there was a whole lot of small print that people found out later down the track.
What do hope that in the light of what is happening in the United States that in New Zealand that we don’t make the same idiotic mistake by voting in the Pavlovian dog known as Simon Bridges whose response to any question asked is either i) tax cuts ii) cutting regulations iii) build more roads. Unfortunately I’m not optimistic given how easily the voting public is swayed but a big multi lane high way that they can take their oversize SUV along with the 2.5 kids on a holiday up the coast all while claiming that their car centric carbon emitting lifestyle can be off set by recycle a few pieces of plastic each week on recycling day.
Anyway, I need to head to bed and have a good night sleep for work tomorrow – hopefully it won’t be too busy, I might even get some extra work done during the day.
