Mac Format - UK (2020-04)

EDITED BY HOWARD OAKLEY

What’s inside

56

PERMISSION

REQUESTS

Avoiding repetitive

consent dialogs

57

iOS SOFTWARE

Swipe away your

touchscreen troubles

58-59

macOS

Sage advice to help

overcome Mac maladies

60-61

MAC SOFTWARE

Resolving restrictions

with your Mac apps

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EXPERT

ADVICE

56 | MACFORMAT

Problems with a Home

folder on an external disk

this off, or to make that external drive an

exception to the rule.

Location-based protections only apply

when apps access files there without using

standard open and save file dialogs, though.

When you double-click a document to open

it, that shouldn’t prompt you for consent, as

your action already expresses your intent to

open that file. This is aimed at apps that open

or scan files to search them, for example,

without you explicitly indicating you want

to open each of those files.

If you use apps that result in many consent

dialogs, or open files in other ways, add them

to System Prefs > Security & Privacy > Privacy

> Full Disk Access, and they should be listed

there and in the Files and Folders list. You may

still see the odd consent dialog even then.

Q

To save cost on internal storage, I

keep most of my Documents on an

external SSD, which works fine after

upgrading to Catalina, but some apps prompt

me for permission to access that drive. How

can I avoid this?

by STEVE VINCENT

A

These are Catalina’s new extended

privacy features at work. In Mojave,

they applied to certain locations

which most apps don’t use; in macOS 10.15,

however, they include commonly-used folders

such as Documents and Downloads, and all

removable storage, including your external

SSD. Unfortunately, there’s no way to turn

If an app needs to access files without using Open and

Save dialogs, add it to the Full Disk Access list in Privacy.