After one week of using MacOS Big Sur — I have to say, I’m in LOVE.

It’s beautiful, it’s fast, it’s responsive.

But today, I was on a conference call. And my battery just died.

Never in 10+ years using a Macbook Pro has this happened.

I unplugged the charger, unplugged the HDMI, and all other peripherals.

Nothing.

Only after restarting my Mac, it seems to have corrected the issue.

Will continue to monitor — however it’s interesting that this is only starting to occur now I’ve updated to MacOS Big Sur.

After restarting, it was fixed.

Definitely a software problem, not hardware.

Which USB Microphone should I get for streaming? Blue Yeti vs AirPods Pro vs EarPods vs MacBook Pro

Recently I wanted to upgrade my microphone setup, because I found that audio recordings on my AirPods Pro were good, but not great.

I also wanted to upgrade my Remote Working setup, so I was a bit more presentable and could work more comfortably from home.

I absolutely love the AirPods Pro.

Best personal audio device ever.

I now love my Blue Yeti USB Microphone.

For gaming, but also for business.

AirPods Pro

Best purchase I have ever made.

I use these more than any other device, in more flexible settings (home, gym, outdoors, shopping, work, etc) and pairs very nicely with Apple Watch when out-and-about. …

As a Japanese beginner, it can be difficult to grasp the difference between verbs, especially when two are used commonly used to mean 'to do'.

• Both YARU (やる) and SURU (する) mean “to do something”.
• YARU (やる) and SURU (する) are often interchangeable.
• But there’s some key differences when we use them.

SURU (する)

1. Can be used to make nouns into verbs.
   ダンスする — to dance
   勉強します — to study
   洗濯します — to do laundry
2. Can be used with adjectives.
   きれいにします — to make clean
3. To decide, especially when ordering food.
   寿司にします — I’ll have the sushi

When in doubt, use する.

YARU (やる)

Importantly, cannot be used with nouns i.e. …

Japanese characters are composed of strokes and each character is intended to be written in a certain order.

It is very important to learn the correct stroke order as this will help you intuitively know how to write new characters and it has a big effect on how readable it ends up looking.

Get Japanese Hiragana and Katakana for Beginners on the App Store.

Traditionally when Japanese characters were written with calligraphy brushes, this was even more important as the ‘tail’ of the brush glides across the paper and creates a unique shape of the character.

Often small businesses will order lots of stock so they can deliver quickly to customers, but these business often struggle later on trying to sell things customers don’t want to buy, or offering discounts to eliminate unwanted stock.

Many small businesses struggle because they order too much stock, before knowing whether customers will actually want to buy those items.

What is Just In Time inventory management?

Just In Time (JIT) is an ordering system where materials, components or retail products are delivered immediately before they are required in order to minimise storage costs and prevent a surplus of stock that customers simply won’t need.

Essentially, don’t buy the stock until the customer orders it.

However what many small businesses don’t know is that many suppliers maybe able to help you coordinate last minute (“Just-In-Time”) ordering or even better, some wholesalers can arrange Direct-To-Customer on your behalf — also known as Drop Shipping. …

With the age of social media, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, many people still wonder whether a business card is still important and whether it’s worth the money.

I love it when people call me up and tell me about their new business ideas.

It’s so wonderful to see people passionate about creating something.

But the question that always comes up is whether they are pursuing a hobby, or a business. There’s a threshold that you cross which makes your hobby a business — and that’s when you start thinking commercially.

Business cards can help make a hobby a business reality. Everyone who has a hobby has an instagram page or a website, but do they have a business card?

Should I get a business card?

People keep asking me: “I’ve started an online shop and I’m unsure whether I should get a business card, is this just another expense that I can avoid when starting out?” …

In July 2020, Apple announced the transition from iBooks Author to Pages, which means now anyone with a Mac can publish an eBook.

Believed to have been first created by the Project Gutenberg in 1971, eBooks are now becoming an everyday media for information societies and they are changing the way that our world is distributing and consuming knowledge and entertainment compared to traditional publishing mechanisms.

eBooks encourage open source formats and challenge conventional copyright laws.

This also imposes several challenges for distribution networks as consumers struggle to find suitable e-reader devices which support a wide range of both proprietary and open source eBook formats. …

One of the fundamental differences compared to print media, is that people spend less time reading online, and more time scanning.

Focus on the first word

Humans are inherently lazy, so make it easy for them to scan through large lists by making the first word in the list stand out.

In this example, the first word for most of the items is “cat” which makes it more difficult to find the topic of interest.

Typically, people focus on the first 11 characters in the sentence to find key words. If they don’t see what they’re looking for, the eyes skip to the next line.

By rewriting the entire list, we can bring keywords to the front, making it up to 300% easier to read online content, because users take up to a third of the time to find the same piece of information on the page. Why make it hard?

By rewording the content, we make it easier to scan. Focus on the first word.

Originally published at https://internetstack.com.