Avid Hates You - "idk.app" Is Damaged And Can't Be Opened

  Avid hates you, Avid likes to eat your soul, Avid is bloated software, Avid is too old school even for an old fart like me.

What the F*&k is this Avid?

 Not only your software is way too big, gobbling over 8GB of space on my drive, but your stupid installer is installing crap apps, or installing shit so wrong that macOS has to block it.

jdk.app BLOCKED!

 Seriously what the F*&k Avid? Media Composer is the only software that you have to battle every single time you fire it up. No peace ever with MC. After battling it for hours it might work fine for a few days, or a few weeks if you're lucky. But as soon as you change anything on your system, god forbid update anything, you are a target for Avid ire. MC will break, somehow, somewhere.

 I only use Media Composer and Pro Tools from Avid, I have no idea how other Avid software works. Compared to MC, Pro Tools is much more stable, but as you probably know, Avid acquired Pro Tools from Digidesign, and in my mind it has much better bones.

 Why can't Avid make Media Composer more stable and better is a mystery to me. 😑

Which App Is Best To Remove Telecine Pulldown In 2026?

  If you have to deal with pulldown removal in 2026, there is one app that does it best.

 It's not Final Cut Pro, it's not Apple Compressor, it's not Premiere, nor Adobe Media Encoder, it's not Avid Media Composer, it's not After Effects.

 For those of you who do not know what that's about, pulldown is a trick used when transferring film to tape, in the old days of telecine transfers.

 In order to see films that are 24 progressive frames per second on Television which used to be 30 interlaced (or 60 (1/2 frame "fields") per seconds, the telecine process repeated some frames in a predetermined sequence, usually in a 3-2 pattern.

 If you want to know more about telecine, read this great entry Telecine Explained.

 For example the film sequence of 24 frames:

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24

Was transferred as follow in a 60 frames sequence:

1,1,1,2,2,3,3,3,4,4,5,5,5,6,6,7,7,7,8,8,9,9,9,10,10,11,11,11,12,12,13,13,13,14,14,15,15,15,16,16,17,17,17,18,18,19,19,19,20,20,21,21,21,22,22,23,23,23,24,24

 Now since the complete frame consists of 2 interlaced fields, the TV had some frames composed of identical fields / image, and other frames composed of different fields / image.

 In our example, TV frame 1 is composed of film frames 1,1 - identical. But TV frame 2 is composed of film frames 1,2 - different. TV frame 3 is film 2,3 - different, and TV frame 4 is film frames 3, 3 - identical.

 When you want to go from the telecine 30fps interlaced back to the 24fps progressive, you have to perform pulldown removal = removing the duplicated fields, AND reassembling the complete film frames in the proper order.

 The software (or yourself if operating manually) has to recognize the proper sequence, pull and reassemble the proper fields into frames. Which is easily said, but because of the nature of video can be a headache.

 For example you might not have a (3-2) 1,1,1,2,2,3,3,3,4,4 sequence, and instead have a (2-3) 1,1,2,2,2,3,3,4,4,4 one. If the software expects duplicated fields in a 3,2,3,2 sequence and instead gets a 2,3,2,3 sequence it will fail. Or the sequence might start on a random field, and then it's not 3-2 nor 2-3, but some bastardized version thereof.

 In addition, there are other flavors / combinations of pulldown sequences that might or might not be recognized properly.

 After Effects has the most extensive pattern recognition and manual override for removing pull-down, but it is nevertheless prone to failure.

 Back in the days of Final Cut Pro Legacy (Classic Versions 1-7), and Final Cut Studio (R.I.P), we had Cinema Tools! That was the perfect app to remove pulldown. And it did that instantly, writing the resulting file in a matter of seconds. Alas, unless you kept a old Mac running an old OS with the old tools installed, no more Cinema Tools for us post pros.

 In 2026 the one app that does a great job is... DaVinci Resolve! Click "Remove Pulldown" in the clip attributes, drop your 29,97 interlaced clip into a 24 progressive timeline, done. Render clean, error free, un-telecined file.

 These are the settings in DVR 20.3:

 Now this is for a single one go telecine transfer where the sequence won't change. If dealing with a telecine, or multiple telecine files that have been edited into a single movie resulting in the sequences being broken multiple times because the cuts have been made randomly, then I don't know how it would behave. I assume it will fail, but I would have to test that theory for myself. That's for another day.

 If you have a favorite way to deal with removing pulldown, let me know in the comments.

Adobe Creative Cloud App Libraries Not Syncing

 If you have an error message in Adobe Creative Cloud App about libraries not syncing on macOS, you might need to grant CC Full Disk access.

In macOS Tahoe 26.3, Go to System Preferences, Privacy and Security, Full Disk Access.

It's likely that Creative Cloud .app is missing from the list of authorized apps, or the slider is off / not authorized.

Either turn the slider on for CC, or add CC (click the + button at the bottom of the list) and select Creative Cloud.app which is in Boot drive/Applications/Utilities/Adobe Creative/ACC.

CC needs to restart and now that it has Full Disk access your libraries files should sync properly.

Click on the cloud icon within CC to verify the proper syncing.

File Provider For Cloud Storage On macOS 12.1 And Up

  There is a good write-up by Google on File Provider which is used by macOS 12.1 and up explaining how it works with cloud storage services, including Google Drive.

 You can find it here.

 Among other things it stipulates that the streaming location is controlled by macOS and goes into: User/youruser/Library/CloudStorage.

 There is an extensive table comparing the File Provider and Legacy methods of streaming. The differences are sometimes subtle.

 In my observations, Google Drive, iCloudDrive, OneDrive and Internxt Drive are stored in the CloudStorage location.

 Mega Drive, Dropbox Drive, kDrive, Drime, Sync Drive on the other end are stored in a location of my choice, even though they too have extensions in File Provider:

 If you have an explanation as to why that is, I would love to know. Post in the comments. Thanks!

Google Drive Icon Missing, Or Annoyingly Blinking

  There an annoying bug with Google Drive icon on macOS Tahoe, where the Finder icon is missing, and when getting info (Command + I) the top icon is blinking like mad.

 Don't know what's causing this, but it's been a problem for a while, even on Windows as mentioned in this thread.

 This is Google Drive Version 122.0.1.0 on Apple Silicon.

Apple iCloud, What Works, What Doesn't - Part 2

  In Part 1 I explore Apple iCloud and share my findings.

 In Part 2, I dig further into the functionalities, or lack of thereof... Apple has a lackluster cloud storage solution for the advanced user.

 I get it, most people will be happy to simply log-in, pay the fee, and let Apple decide whatever to do with their iCloud, and Apple is all for that! I'm not that person, I want CONTROL and OPTIONS and FEATURES.

 One thing that's exasperating is the fact that there can only be ONE iCloud / Drive - linked to ONE Apple ID.

 If you happen to use 2 Apple ID or more, you're out of luck as far as sharing iCloud Drive(s). No way to connect different Apple IDs to the same iCloud / Drive. Thinking of using Family for your multiple personas? Sure, only they are entirely walled off. Back to square one.

 This means that you must connect all your devices to the same iCloud to enjoy a true shared cloud space. Some people do not want that. They want a space for their phone, and a different space for their personal computer, and a third space for their work computer for example. And they want to be able to selectively sync, share and access these spaces however they see fit.

 Can't do that with iCloud/Drive. There is a single Drive and everything is synced, period. Same with the other apps: Mail, Contacts, Calendar, Photos, Notes, Reminders, Invites, Pages, Numbers, Keynote and Find My. Basically all or nothing, not exactly true, but in essence yes, it is all or nothing.

 The only app for which this rigid and immutable configuration is a benefit for is Find My. That is the only one for which it makes sense, and is not a limitation.

 If you have 3 devices, you have to either share everything under one common iCloud, or buy 3 different iClouds that won't talk to each other.

 There is only ONE Drive in iCloud, there is no second or third or Nth drive that one could use to compartmentalize, or sync separately as they see fit. Fine, only a few cloud storage providers offer that function.

 There is no selective sync. This my friend is HUGE. Being able to select what folders you want to sync to your devices instead of the whole Drive is a power feature. Not with iCloud.

   This is also what Microsoft OneDrive does unfortunately, single drive, all or nothing synced, no selective sync. I dont know who copied who in this case, but they are both fairly basic.

 OK, back to iCloud, how about sharing a folder with x number of people? Yes you can do that, only they have to SIGN-IN (or UP) to THEIR OWN iCloud, and the folder is then ADDED TO THEIR iCloud Drive. No way to access the folder anonymously.

 What? That's forcing other people to use iCloud, I will never do that. That a big NO Apple.

 Compare this failing to OneDrive impeccable anonymous sharing (by default):

 And with OneDrive you can even allow anonymous people to edit:

 How about sharing a single file with iDrive then? That at least must doable without signing in... Yes it is, when selecting share with Anyone with the link, and Can view only:

 

 Finally a direct, anonymous link to download the file.

 Again, you cannot do this with a folder. The recipient must sign-in into their iCloud account.

 Do you think you can batch share files with iCloud? NOPE. If you select more than one file, the share option is greyed out in the menu. You cannot drag files to the permanently featured Shared folder either.

 Again Microsoft beats Apple as OneDrive does have batch sharing:

 Apple why are you so lame?

 I realize this Part 2 only deals with things that do not work. Sorry Apple, that's how it is, my opinion.

Cloud Storage Compared

  Here is a fantastic tool to compare cloud storages offers from the myriad of providers around the world: https://comparisontabl.es/cloud-storage/

 In addition to the very useful information in this online spreadsheet, I encourage you to test for yourself as each provider has unique functions, or lack of thereof, that will only reveal themself through testing. Note that I'm on Apple Mac Silicon, what applies to me doesn't necessarily apply to your situation, so test away! Most if not all providers offer free trials.

 For example did you know that the iCloud Drive web app doesn't have a search function? I didn't either, and it's a big annoyance. It's also linked to your AppleID which is another huge gotcha.

 How about the ability to free storage space on your device by storing files in the cloud only, but still listing the offline files on your devices, visually signaling the difference between offline and online? Some do it (iCloud, Internxt), some don't (Mega.) Some are supposed to do it, only it doesn't work (kDrive.)

 Some allow for multiple workspaces (Drime), some don't. Some have selective sync (kDrive), some don't.

 I have yet to discover which ones have block level sync (Dropbox does), and which do not.

Provider	Web Search	Offline/online	Multi Workspace	Selective Sync	Block Level
iCloud	No	Yes	No	No	?
OneDrive	Yes	Yes	No	No	?
Mega	Yes	No	No	No	?
GoogleDrive	Yes	Yes	No	No	?
Internxt	Yes	Yes	No	No	?
kDrive	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	?
DropBox	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes
Drime	Yes	No	Yes	No	No

 Drime on macOS syncs and display every .DS_Store file (normally invisible), which is a real pain.

 Again, Apple M1 user here, macOS Tahoe 26.3.

 As I discover more uniqueness, I'll report and add to this post.