WWDC is tomorrow, where Apple is likely to announce a new version of OS X. Here's what we'd like to see.

1. AV Foundation improvements

There are so many improvements needed for AV Foundation that it merits an article of its own, but a few would be expanded codec support, easier extensibility, LOTS of bug fixes and the ability to stream Airplay video without ugly hacks.

2. Mac App Store improvements

Apple should allow app developers to request exemptions from sandboxing rules. We feel that the strict rules hurt the user experience and even removed one of our apps as a result of this.

Other areas for improvement would be the ability to hide third-party updates and not requiring a password for free updates (this can get tedious if you have multiple accounts).

3. Files in use

OS X frequently marks files in use when they aren't, which can cause issues copying or deleting files and also when emptying the Trash.

I have a theory that this may be caused by QuickLook trying to generate icon previews for these files but it's difficult to pinpoint.

This bug is especially frustrating when using network drives as OS X frequently creates temp files that can only be deleted after unmounting and remounting the drive.

4. Make full screen work on the current display only - don't let it blank out every other monitor

Full screen functionality was improved significantly in Mavericks with the "Displays have separate Spaces" option in the Mission Control section of System Preferences, but many people had to switch it off and revert to the old system due to compatibility issues (mine were with FCP 7).

When switching back to the old way of doing things on a shared Space, OS X blanks out all monitors even if there is nothing displaying on them.

I think the solution to this problem is a blacklist where users can specify apps that should only use the current Space on another monitor without disabling it for compatible apps.

5. Network drive / VPN improvements

It is clear that Apple is assuming most users are saving files to HFS+ formatted SSDs. This is apparent when mounting a drive over a VPN connection because Finder and many other Apple apps experience very poor performance.

In fact, I completely eschew Apple apps over a VPN and use Path Finder as a Finder replacement and AppCode as an Xcode substitute because those apps do not read or write to disk unnecessarily and handle these issues much better.

6. Bug fixes

Apple is announcing a new OS when arguably Mavericks still needs a lot of bug fixes. Some of the issues I am still experiencing in 10.9.3 are:

• Hang when copying certain files to a network volume
• Audio output randomly disappearing (speaker icon becomes greyed out), requiring a restart
• Exposé sometimes fails, meaning it's difficult to exit it and switch back to an application, requiring a restart
• Plugging in a monitor and closing the laptop lid sometimes makes it sleep randomly in the middle of me working. It also sleeps if I disconnect the charger.
• Periodic freezes where the mouse moves but everything else is frozen.
• Occasional apps that cannot be closed, which requires a hard reset because they stop OS X from shutting down
• Other people have also reported issues in OpenCL apps with 10.9.3

With these issues in mind, I would be very happy if Apple institutes a Snow Leopard-style overhaul. Snow Leopard was so stable it took me a long time to upgrade and many of our customers are still using it.

I'm also hoping that Apple recently opening up the beta program to non-developers helps to address this, but if it doesn't I feel that Apple should not commit to a yearly upgrade schedule if they cannot guarantee quality.

With WWDC and iOS 8 around the corner, we thought we'd offer up our wish list for future iOS features and bug fixes.

1. Documents app

The biggest problem with iOS is the limited file system, which can make working on files in different apps difficult.

Currently you can store movies and photos in a central place that is accessible by all apps with permission to access it. While this implementation has its flaws (e.g. apps can't delete files they've created), creating a similar storage area for documents would go some way toward improving the limitations when sharing files.

Much like Photos and Videos, these documents could be accessed and managed in a Documents (or Files) app.

2. Utility apps

Another problem with iOS is that it can be difficult to know what to do when someone emails you an unusual file format.

For example, customers often email me .log files when I'm on the move. These are exactly the same as text files, however iOS refuses to open them because they do not have a .txt extension.

Unlike OS X, you cannot force a file to open in another app, nor can you rename files, so I was stuck scouring the App Store for an app that would open them. The only app I found that would open them was a hex editor app but this was not a perfect solution because it was not designed for formatting and displaying large portions of text.

OS X has a lot of utility apps like TextEdit, Preview, Font Book, etc, but Apple seems to have delegated Mail as the only (limited) general-purpose file viewer. If Apple hopes to one day replace OS X with iOS they will need to address issues like this.

3. Better Copy & Paste

I have a lot of difficulty with copying and pasting. The primary issue I experience is that iOS tries to second-guess what I'm doing and it always gets it wrong.

For example, after you have selected a certain amount of text iOS assumes you want to select the entire paragraph, which may not be exactly what you want, but there's no way to select less.

So I find it easier to select more text than I need, paste it and then delete the parts I don't want.

4. Improved multitasking

While switching between apps is simple, the apps don't always retain their status when you switch back to them.

For example, an app that requires a network connection may have disconnected or you may have to wait for a web browser to reload the page again.

This doesn't happen every time but it occurs when iOS comes under pressure to free up memory. Now that iDevice CPUs are pretty fast I hope Apple can implement an OS X-style memory compression system to reduce occurrences.

I also hope the rumors of split-screen multitasking are true because it will help significantly with this issue.

5. Better Gmail support in Mail

I use the stock Mail app with Gmail because I have not found a third-party mail app that I like (suggestions are appreciated).

However, the Mail app seems to be frequently confused by conversations, with some messages correctly joined together and others shown as distinct messages. This can be annoying if I've deleted a conversation, only for all the deleted messages to reappear in my inbox when someone else replies. In some cases this requires me to re-delete 15 or so messages.

Another issue is that it seems to be impossible to actually delete messages. Deleted messages are archived with a special tag rather than actually being deleted. Additionally, sent messages don't show up in other apps or the Gmail web interface.

It's for reasons like the five listed above that I prefer to delegate particular tasks until I get back to a desktop computer. If the rumors are correct and Apple is creating an iPad Pro, simply adding a bigger screen won't be enough. In my opinion the changes most likely to endear it to professional usage would come from iOS itself.

Earlier this week we released Pro Maintenance Tools 2.0.22, a minor update to our suite of troubleshooting and repair tools for your NLE.

Fix for Compressor 4.1 "Unable to submit to queue" error

Compressor Repair can now fix instances of the common "Unable to submit to queue" error in Compressor 4.1. This is a better solution than Apple's official advice because you do not lose custom settings and destinations.

Fix for QuickTime Player X unresponsive UI

Housekeeper can fix an issue occurring for some users who upgraded from OS X 10.6 to a later version of OS X and can no longer use the playback controls in QuickTime Player X.

Media Salvage UI simplification

We've also simplified the Media Salvage user interface. The Output Format dropdown now only shows codecs and frame size and frame rate settings are now set in the columns to the right.

The full list of changes in Pro Maintenance Tools 2.0.22 is here.

Pro Maintenance Tools is an essential toolkit for maintaining, optimizing and troubleshooting your editing system. To find out more see the feature list, read the user manual, watch the overview video or download the free 15-day trial.

When copying certain files to a network volume on OS X 10.9, Finder (or indeed Path Finder) will copy the first 12 KB and then beachball for minutes before eventually completing the transfer.

Our testing has indicated that this seems to occur when overwriting files from a local disk to the network volume and seems to only occur with .app application bundles. We believe this may be something to do with resource forks because it is rare for files other than applications to have them and network volumes do not support them. It does not occur on file transfers between the same network drive or from one network drive to another.

It's a nasty bug because it not only causes Finder to hang for minutes but can also affect all other applications using files on that volume. It has even a couple of times completely prevented any network or internet access at all for the duration of the file transfer.

We've reported this to Apple and are waiting on a fix. In the meantime, the easiest way is to either delete the destination file and then copy it or compress the .app bundle, copy it and then decompress.

Yesterday we released Pro Media Tools 1.2.1, a minor update to our suite of media management tools.

Video Check flash frame overhaul

We've overhauled flash frame detection in Video Check, which not only offers more reliable detection but also allows you to manually specify the maximum length of a flash frame to search for. Also, when showing a flash frame in the results view, the length of the flash is now specified.

QT Edit batch timecode import

QT Edit can now import timecode from a range of files in a batch. Go to File > New Batch and import a range of files that you want to apply timecode to. Then select the "Create timecode track from QuickTime movie" Quick Task and browse for a folder containing movie files with identical filenames to those in the batch.

This functionality is very useful for situations where you've processed dailies with another application that has stripped the timecode out of the files and need to restore the timecode back again.

There were a few other minor changes in this version which you can read about here.

Pro Media Tools is an invaluable toolkit to help editors and post production professionals enhance their media management workflows. To find out more view the feature list, read the user manual, watch the overview video or download the free 15-day trial.

Upon launching DaVinci Resolve you may see the following error:

"Resolve did not locate a compatible or upgradable database."

Clicking past it shows an empty project view.

There are several possible causes including database corruption but a common one is caused by your PostgreSQL database being too large. This can cause PostgreSQL to request more shared memory than is allowed by OS X or Linux.

To determine the exact error on OS X, you can launch the Start Server app in your /Applications/PostgreSQL folder. If it fails to launch it will show an error message after about a minute or so. On Ubuntu the equivalent command would be sudo service postgresql start.

The error may not have the exact wording shown above but will be labeled "could not created shared memory segment".

There are two ways to fix this problem - either permanently or temporarily until your next reboot. I'd recommend trying the temporary option first because if something goes wrong you can just restart to fix it.

Temporary Fix

1. Enter the following command into the Terminal located in /Applications/Utilities:

sudo sysctl -w kern.sysv.shmmax=41943040

You'll need to enter your admin password after typing this.

2. Launch the Start Server app or type sudo service postgresql start on Ubuntu. If all went well, it should not report an error and Resolve should be able to see the database when you relaunch it.

3. If you still get an error, try the command again with a higher value then repeat Step 2. The memory limit is specified in bytes so multiply the number of megabytes by 1024 twice. PostgreSQL documentation recommends you use 1/4 of the available memory for this, although I was able to get it working with much less.

Permanent Fix

1. Back up the file /etc/sysctl.conf.

2. Use the following command to edit the file:

sudo nano /etc/sysctl.conf

3. Add the following line (or edit it if it already exists):

kern.sysv.shmmax=41943040

4. Press Ctrl + O to save the file, then reboot.

5. Resolve should now be able to see the database. If it can't, try increasing the memory limit further and reboot.

If you get into problems and your system refuses to boot, either boot into safe mode or use target disk mode to copy the backup file and then reboot.

Yesterday we released Kollaborate Server 1.1 which brings all of the changes in Kollaborate 1.1 plus many other server-specific features and fixes.

Annotations

You can now draw over your videos in multiple colors. Annotations must be submitted alongside a comment which helps to give the drawing context.

Comment Colors

Comments can be color-coded for context and colors are respected when exporting to marker lists. Comment colors are a powerful feature because you can filter the comment view by color and even filter colors when you export to a marker list.

Email Notification Preferences

Kollaborate now offers finer control over notification alerts. You can now choose exactly which notifications to receive from the Profile page.

Move Files Between Projects

Files can now be shared from your private storage area and can also be moved between projects.

Admins can view all projects

Superadmins and admins can now access and view all projects on the server regardless of whether or not they are part of the project's Team.

Installer tweaks

We've improved the installer too, allowing you to specify the superadmin email address and password as part of the installation process instead of logging in with the defaults and then changing them. This simplifies installation and also improves security for those who would not have changed the default login information.

Bug fixes

A large number of bugs are fixed in this version, particularly on Windows servers, and file serving performance has been improved, making this a recommended update for all server administrators.

Kollaborate Server is a version of the Kollaborate cloud workflow platform that you can run in-house on your own servers and storage, with improved customization. To find out more about Kollaborate, view the feature list, read the Kollaborate Server documentation or sign up for the free 15-day trial.

Last week we launched our new account portal that provides an easy way of viewing your Digital Rebellion software licenses in one place.

Today we're adding the ability to view transactions and generate invoices. If you don't have an account when you make the purchase, your transactions will be imported when you create one and verify your email address. If your purchases were made under a different email address, you'll need to claim the address from the My Licenses page before transactions will appear.

To generate an invoice, go to the account portal, log in and click Transactions. Decide which purchase you want to print an invoice for, then click Create Invoice next to it on the right.

This applies to all purchases from today onwards. If you need an invoice from a prior purchase, please contact us and we'll send you one.

Note that Kollaborate subscriptions do not show up in this list. To view Kollaborate payments, please visit the Subscription page on Kollaborate.

We've just released Kollaborate 1.1 onto the cloud. This is a major new update to our popular cloud workflow platform.

Annotations

You can now draw over your videos in multiple colors. Annotations must be submitted alongside a comment which helps to give the drawing context.

This is currently only supported in the web interface right now but it will be coming soon to CinePlay for Mac and CinePlay for iOS.

Comment Colors

Comments can be color-coded for context and colors are respected when exporting to marker lists. Comment colors are a powerful feature because you can filter the comment view by color and even filter colors when you export to a marker list.

This works really well with Cut Notes because you can setup preset colored buttons for particular categories such as sound and picture and then filter your marker outputs accordingly.

Comment colors are supported by Cut Notes and CinePlay for Mac and will be coming soon to CinePlay for iOS.

Kollaborate Transfer 1.1 Beta

We've also released a new version of Kollaborate Transfer. This uses AV Foundation for encoding on OS X 10.7 or higher which significantly boosts encoding performance.

It also uploads QuickTime metadata tags to Kollaborate so you can reference them from the player.

Email Notification Preferences

Kollaborate now offers finer control over notification alerts. You can now choose exactly which notifications to receive from the Profile page.

Move Files Between Projects

Files can now be shared from your private storage area and can also be moved between projects.

On top of this, there have been a large number of bug fixes, UI tweaks and performance optimizations to improve the Kollaborate experience. There will also be a corresponding update to Kollaborate Server next week.

Kollaborate is a cloud workflow platform that allows you to share files and collaborate with others while offering full integration with Digital Rebellion products. To find out more visit www.kollaborate.tv.

We've just released Cut Notes 2.2, CinePlay for iOS 1.3 and corresponding versions of Cut Notes: Kollaborate Edition and CinePlay: Kollaborate Edition.

You may not notice much of a difference in the UI but both apps have received a significant architecture overhaul under-the-hood which should result in improved stability, performance and memory usage.

Cut Notes has also received a minor facelift to make it more iOS 7-compatible, alongside an overhauled Kollaborate login dialog which allows you to configure Kollaborate Server directly from the dialog instead of having to exit to go into the iOS Settings app.

CinePlay features a new Downloads window that displays ongoing downloads in a central location while you continue to navigate within the app. We've also improved Kollaborate integration by allowing you to download Kollaborate files for offline viewing and play back earlier revisions of a file.

For more details on the changes please see the Cut Notes changelog and CinePlay changelog.