DECEMBER 2019 MACWORLD 17
- REVERT AFTER
A BAD UPGRADE
Have you ever installed
a software update only
to discover that it has
broken other software
you depend on to do
your job? Catalina adds
a new feature that takes
a snapshot of the system
disk just before applying
an update, and allows
you to restore your Mac
to that state via macOS
Recovery. (Restart your Mac and hold down
Command-R to boot into macOS Recovery.)
This is a clever use of the snapshot
feature of the APFS filesystem, but it takes
up a lot of disk space (since your drive has
to save very bit of your pre- and post-
upgrade Mac). Snapshots are only retained
for a day, and if you don’t have enough
free space available they won’t be
available at all. Still, this is a really great
feature—that ironically is being introduced
in an OS version that intentionally breaks
compatibility with more than a decade of
macOS apps (see page 12). At least you’ll
be able to roll back after the next one.
- QUICK PICTURE IN PICTURE
Apple has expanded ways you can get
video into Picture in Picture, one of my
favorite feature additions of recent years
because I like my video to float above all
the other windows on my Mac. In Safari, if
video is playing, you can click and hold on
the audio icon in the Smart Bar and then
click on Enter Picture in Picture. I used to
have to use a bookmarklet to do this, but
it’s now enabled right within Safari.
Apple has also added support for
Picture in Picture to QuickTime Player.
There’s now a PIP button on the in-window
floating control bar that will get your video
floating above it all with one click.
- MAKE TIME LAPSES AND
ANIMATIONS IN QUICKTIME
PL AY E R
A classic QuickTime feature makes its
return in Catalina with the Open Image
Sequence command, which lets you open a
collection of still images and convert them
4K HDR movies and TV shows are available in the Apple TV app,
but only certain Macs can play them.
