How to make Siri aware of Google Chrome browser on Mac? I have Google Chrome browser installed on my Mac. It's set as my default browser.

When I tell Siri:

  Siri, open browser

It launches Safari.

I tell Siri:

  Siri, open Chrome browser

It says "It doesn't look like you have an app named Chrome Browser...". But I have it installed. How to teach Siri that I have it and to launch it? I am running macOS Mojave 10.14.4.

Invoke Siri and say any one of the following:

Open Google Chrome app
Open Google Chrome
Open Chrome app
Open Chrome
Launch Google Chrome app
Launch Google Chrome
Launch Chrome app
Launch Chrome

If some of the above doesn't work during the first try, you can alternatively, invoke Siri and say:

Open app

or

Launch app

Siri will respond back by asking what app you wish to launch. You can simply ask to open Google Chrome app, Chrome app or simply Chrome. With subsequent tries, when Siri has become aware of the Google Chrome app, you will be able to launch Google Chrome with the commands mentioned in the beginning.


How to create Table of Contents in Keynote? How can I add a Table of Contents to a Keynote presentation that shows pages and titles in some hierarchy.

Assuming one is using Keynote 6 (OP did not state version used.), one way to create a Table of Contents or Handout is to use the Print dialog.

This can be printed to PDF for handouts.  One way to customize would be to create a duplicate copy of your presentation then edit the copy before printing the outline.

Edit After printing the outline to PDF, one can create a new slide at the beginning of the presentation and insert the PDF outline onto the slide.


Slow login (Active Directory User + Filevault2) - Mountain Lion Two of our users have been getting this weird issue where their login to the computer seem to take "ages".

The issue seems to go away if you turn off FileVault.

However we need to keep FileVault on, but as this only effects a small number of users it seems like this is some specific issue with just their computers.

Info about the computers:

MacBook Pro (Retina) - Early 2013
Mac OS X 10.8.2
FileVault 2

Connected to Active Directory (Network Account Server)

Think I found an answer: https://jamfnation.jamfsoftware.com/discussion.html?id=6025

sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.loginwindow DSBindTimeout -int 8

Changes the bind timeout to 8 seconds. Our bind happens within 3-4 seconds over ethernet, so we figure double it and add an extra second should be enough for an absolutely unscientific unengineering-like guess.


Boot Camp Assistant Install Fails to install Windows 10 1709. "An error occurred while copying the Windows installation files." I'm trying to do a first-time install of Windows 10 1709 with Boot Camp Assistant. During installation, I receive the message: "An error occurred while copying the Windows installation files."

This leaves me with the extra partitions, which are cleaned up upon restarting my computer, starting Boot Camp Assistant, and letting BCA reset the partition.

I've tried booting into System Recovery, running csrutil disable, and retry the installation procedure, but I receive the same error.

Hardware: MBP 2017.
OS: 10.13.3

I created a macOS tool to solve the problem and create a new ISO that works. I also wrote up an explanation. It is related max file size of FAT32 and how Boot Camp Assistant prepares the installation.

https://twocanoes.com/using-larger-windows-10-isos-with-boot-camp-assistant/


How do I launch Finder from terminal or command line I use command line a lot, like most programmers.
I want to be able to launch Finder, Safari or any other application for that matter from command line e.g.

  finder .

where it will start Finder app, and the set the view to the current folder that I am in at the command line.

To open your current directory in Finder from Terminal, type open .

So, if you want Documents: open Documents

Library: open /Library

Downloads: open Downloads

And so on.


Why does "Turn Passcode Off" on iOS take so long? Actually, all of these operations take a lot longer than I expect:

Turn Passcode On
Turn Passcode Off
Change Passcode

I'm not complaining. I'm a developer (not Apple tech) who thinks it takes longer than it ought to basically hash a few bytes and write to an SSD. I assume that's because the work involved in managing an iOS password is either more complicated than I imagine, or it's some kind of anti-cracking countermeasure. The more I wonder about it, the more curious I am about the details. Is it some kind of cool cryptography thing??

Does anyone know anything about this? What actually happens when I disable passcode-to-unlock behavior on an iPhone?

As another answer pointed out, iOS 8 uses FDE with passcode enabled, much the same way FileVault encrypts a hard drive on a Mac. The more data you have, the longer it will take to de-crypt or re-encrypt all this stuff as you toggle it.

The secondary reason for this is by design: Mac OS and iOS have strong UNIX and BSD underpinnings, as most are aware (side note: how cool is it iOS auto-fills 'underpinnings' after I type 'UNIX'?!). UNIX systems implement a computationally expensive hashing algorithm, which is designed to resist brute-force attacks because it takes so damn long. While the effectiveness of this technique has waned as processors become faster and more powerful, it's still noticeable as the little spinny thing on your login screen just before you log in to your Mac, which would make sitting there and typing random passwords very annoying (read up on pam_unix if this interests the developer side of your brain).


Samba Share is mounted and shows indexing enabled, but why doesn't work? I am running macOS High Sierra version 10.13.6 (17G65).

I enabled indexing on samba share by using sudo mdutil -i on command. The result:

$ sudo mdutil -s /Volumes/e\$/
/Volumes/e$:
    Indexing enabled.

I did find the indexing cache location: /var/db/Spotlight-V100/Volumes/smb%3A%2F%2Fadministrator@ip%2Fe$/ and /private/var/db/Spotlight-V100/Volumes/smb%3A%2F%2Fadministrator@ip%2Fe$/.

But after three hours, I still can not find anything from the samba share via Spotlight and tag mdfind commands.

For example:

[/Volumes/e$]$ tag -a test test

# after three hours .........

[/Volumes/e$]$ tag -f test              # nothing returns
[/Volumes/e$]$ mdfind tag:test          # nothing returns

Since nobody answers this question, I posted what I found so far.

(1) Spotlight and command line tools tag, mdfind won't work on samba network drive.

(2) To search filename and tag, Finder app works. Finder --> open the samba network drive folder --> In search bar, type filename or tag:tagname, it works very well.


Any way to adjust Bluetooth radio sensitivity? I've got a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse connected to a MacBook at my desk in my home office. When I'm laptopping outside the office (which is honestly most of the time), away from the keyboard/mouse, they stay connected, thereby chewing through batteries and popping up warnings.

I was hoping there was a way to adjust the radio sensitivity or cutoff or something. For example, I'm outside the office right now and they're about -75 dB RSSi, and I'd like to tell the system "don't connect to devices with signal below -60 dB".

I ended up solving it myself. In short:

get signal strength from system_profiler; if bad, turn off bluetooth
check AC power with pmset; turn on Bluetooth if connected

Needs blueutil to toggle Bluetooth.

I couldn't find a way to tell a device to shut off remotely.


Your partition table seems screwed:

Your first partition on disk1 is a Windows Recovery partition, the second is an EFI partition. Then either Microsoft Reserved (E3C9E316-0B5C-4DB8-817D-F92DF00215AE), Basic data (EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7) or Windows Recovery (DE94BBA4-06D1-4D40-A16A-BFD50179D6AC) partitions.

But the hexdump of block 335874048 (the first block of the 6th partition) looks promising:

...
0000020 4e 58 53 42 00 10 00 00 29 ea 22 01 00 00 00 00
...

4e 58 53 42: magic string of an APFS container
00 10 00 00: APFS block size: 4096
29 ea 22 01 00 00 00 00 APFS container size in APFS blocks: 19065385 (=152523080 512-blocks)

After re-arranging the Bytes 29 ea 22 01 00 00 00 00 > 00 00 00 00 29 ea 22 01 > 00 00 00 00 01 22 ea 29, you can get the decimal value here:

The sixth partition obviously has the wrong type!

The partition type has to be modified with gpt then:

Disable SIP in Recovery Mode (the recovery system version has to be 10.11 or newer)
Boot to your external drive or Internet Recovery Mode.
Open Terminal and get some details:

diskutil list
sudo gpt -r show /dev/disk1

remove the 6th partition:

sudo gpt remove -i 6 /dev/disk1

restore the same partition with the proper type:

sudo gpt add -i 6 -b 335874048 -s 152523080 -t 7C3457EF-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC /dev/disk1

check the APFS container

diskutil verifyVolume disk1s6

Enable SIP in Recovery Mode

The partition layout is still uncommon since macOS usually requires an EFI partition as first partition.

The non-default layout may prevent firmware updates in the future!


MacBook Air 2015 is a bit slow booting up I got my Mac restored completely yesterday by some guy at the Apple Store.
It runs the latest version of El Capitan now, however, when I turn it on, it takes a little longer to load the OS than it did before.

It is not really that big of a deal, since heavier applications like Xcode (involving Simulator), Photoshop and smaller ones like Safari, iTunes or Maps work just like they used to. It turns off and goes to sleep right away, the only issue is when it launches the whole OS, the Apple logo with the loading bar is on for a bit too long.

The guy at the Apple Store said if I am bothered with this ('cause it would bother him, he said), I should take it to a full checkup. This Mac is my workstation and 1,5 weeks in service is not really going to happen anytime soon.

Are there any ways to work around this problem and any tips what might cause this? The reason why it was restored is because I was reinstalling the OS, however, my internet connection broke at some point. El Capitan had been uninstalled, but the new version hasn't been downloaded yet. So I was like I better take it to the store then mess everything up by myself.

Before I used 10.11.0, now it is 10.11.5.

I have to say that each version of El Capitan (including 10.11.0) slowed a little more my MacBook Air.
In Yosemite the boot was easily 3 times faster.

Those days, it's the normal behavior of new system versions...


Allow access to selected web sites only I have a lab of MacBook computers. How can I limit the internet access to only learning sites I choose (like Study Island or Plato)?

This sounds like you need something that will limit the MacBooks to an allowed "white list" of web sites, which you set up.  ("White list" is the opposite of "black list", which is when you set up a list of web sites that are not allowed.)

You might be able to use the built-in OS X Parental Controls system... go to Apple menu > System Preferences > Parental Controls.

Apple has some documentation on Parental Controls here, which includes the picture below: see the "Allow access to only these websites" button.


Fresh install of macOS takes up too much space I recently downloaded the macOS Catalina beta. However, it messed up a lot of my daily apps, so I decided to downgrade back to macOS Mojave. I did the following:

Backed up everything
Shut down Mac
Turn it on while pressing Command + Option + R until a spinning globe appeared
Selected "Reinstall macOS"
Waited until it finished
Opened Disk Utility
Removed past partition (macOS Catalina one)
Checked how much free space I had and found this:

It says that I currently have 104.73 GB available of 499.96 GB! And almost 400GB are being used by the system!

How can I get my space back? Where should I start looking?

When I click on "Manage" (Administrar...) this is what my system shows:

I'm using a 13" 2016 MacBook Pro with Touch Bar with macOS Mojave 10.14.5 (18F132).

I found this answer which says to download OmniDiskSweeper

It seems like my previous Downloads and Applications are still there but not showing under my File System. Somehow they are still on the disk, in a "hidden" place between both partitions.

I will try a new fresh install and I'll edit this answer later.

I managed to remove ~300 GB of the total space used by Previous Content using OmniDiskSweeper, but some items are "protected" against deletion, that's why a second fresh install might help.

After fresh install following these steps:

Shut down Mac
Turn it on again while pressing ⌘ R
Selected Disk Utility
Click on Erase
Closed Disk Utility
Selected Reinstall macOS
Waited for it to install
Success!

The picture below shows that, I've already installed some apps when I took this SS.


Upgrading High Sierra to Catalina on 2016 MBP using local webserver In the past colleagues (and I) believed it was often a bad idea to install newer OSs on older Macs. I get the feeling that has changed, and that putting Catalina on my 2016 MacBook Pro shouldn't be a problem.
What I'm wondering about is whether my local webserver will survive the upgrade. I have Apache/MySQL/PHP set up in the same approximate manner as we were told to do this years ago - sites running in /Library/WebServer/Documents, custom hosts and httpd-vhosts.conf files in /private/etc and so on. In past os upgrades and moves to new machines it's been necessary to re-set-up all that, which isn't a huge problem but also not a lot of fun.
In the past it helped that I was migrating to a new machine, so I had access to my whole old setup and could do things like export MySQL databases from the old and import into the new. This time I'm thinking about upgrading my existing machine so I won't have easy access to a backup while I'm doing this.
I hate the thought of buying a new machine just so I can upgrade the OS. On the other hand this is my work machine and it's 4 years old (and has a dead speaker) so perhaps it's time to bite the bullet.
Any of you experienced migrators have an opinion about which way I should go?

In the past colleagues (and I) believed it was often a bad idea to install newer OSs on older Macs.

It's actually a bad idea not to upgrade to at least more current versions of OSes as you will miss out on important security and feature updates.  There's no evidence that Mac's can't or shouldn't be upgraded.

What I'm wondering about is whether my local web server will survive the upgrade.

It depends.  When Apple releases a new OS, they try to update all of the 3rd party software as well. This means if Apache changed things from one version to the next, you could potentially break something. Without knowing which version you had, which version you're going to, what your config looks like specifically , it's impossible to tell you whether it will break or not.  However, in the interest of playing it safe, assume it will.
The ideal path is to keep your web server up and running, install/upgrade your OS onto a different machine, deploy your web server, test it out and once everything is working switch over.  It's never a good idea to take a running (production) web server and just upgrade the OS in place and hope for the best.  It's not a good idea to do this with individual services for that matter (i.e. Apache, MySQL, PHP, etc.)

Any of you experienced migrators have an opinion about which way I should go?

Use Virtual Machines
Unless you have a special use case, I advice folks to not load up an AMP stack on macOS.  Why?  If your site is being hosted somewhere it's likely a Linux variant or FreeBSD.  You want to keep your test/dev environment as close to your production environment as possible.  When you have a VM, you can easily manage the web server environment independent of the host OS.  You can also clone the VM, perform the upgrade as I described earlier and if it succeeds, simply forward traffic from the firewall to the new VM - you wouldn't have to purchase a single piece of hardware.
In my use case, I standardize on FreeBSD and use only the bare minimum that I will need for my AMP stack.  This keeps the overhead for the VM as low as possible. There's no desktop environment, no client software, nothing but the core OS and the AMP stack with necessary dependencies.  I usually have my DocumentRoot pointed to an iSCSI LUN on a NAS or SAN (locally or in the cloud).  This way, I can very easily move data from VM to VM without much downtime.  My NAS has it's own multi-level backup so I can be certain data is secure.
These are broad stroke suggestions and you'll need to tailor it to your  specific environment.  By using VM's to host your web server, you gain a lot of flexibility especially if you want to migrate from a locally hosted machine to a cloud based instance.  It's very easy to copy a VMDK to an Azure or AWS container and then scale as needed.  Since you're considering a migration/upgrade, now is the time to do this - migrate to a virtualized environment.


don't show contact photos in mail message view How do I disable showing of the contact photos in OSX mail in the message headers in the message view? The faces distract me from the messages. They are pulled from some ldap server based contact list I guess.
I can hide them when I set the headers to "show header detail: None", but I need the headers. Custom header selection seems to be broken. I can remove some or all of them and it has no influence on what is being displayed.

I use classic layout, so I already don't see them in the message list.
OSX Mail Version 6.6 (1510)

I don't really think the images comes from an LDAP based system.
However, they're likely to come from Contact.app that fetch all users' data saved in it. Mine is full of Facebook people and pictures I see comes from their facebook profile.

Your idea to use the header personnalization might not become handy here because it only allow you to show or hide infomations contained in the mail header. And as I said a little higher, theses images doesn't come from here.

So I don't think there really is a solution to your problem here... Unless you're ready to refuse Contact.app from fetching infos on G+, Fb, LDAP etc.
Or you could use another mail application


Why can’t I share my Internet connection with another Mac? I tried to share my Internet connection with another Mac but it failed. I could before I upgraded to Mountain Lion.

I have a 3G USB modem that I use for Internet. I went to System Preferences → Sharing → Internet Sharing → Select my 3G device from Share your connection from → Tick WI-FI → Setup WI-FI Options... and then enable Internet sharing.

However, the other Mac can see my network but cannot join.

How do I fix this?

HW: MacBook Pro Retina 15"
OS: Mountain Lion

You could try disabling your Wi-Fi, changing the sharing settings so that the security is off (just for testing purposes of course) then enabling your Wi-Fi and try again.


Git not working over AFP I've got a git repository on my file server which I'm connecting to via AFP.  Whenever I try to do a git operation on the shared repository, such as staging a file, I get the following error message:

fatal: Unable to write new index file

If I execute the git command on the server it works fine, so there's something about sharing the repository via AFP that's not working.

I'm using Mountain Lion on both the server and the client.

UPDATE

I seem to have write permission for both .git and .git/index:

$ ls -ld .git
drwxr-xr-x  1 david  staff  364 Nov 29 22:38 .git/
$ ls -l .git/index
-rw-r--r--  1 david  staff  2232 Nov 29 21:45 .git/index
$ cp .git/index backup
$ echo change >> .git/index

I tried recursively applying permissions to .git as suggested by an answer below, but that didn't help:

$ chmod -Rv +w .git
$ git add deploy.js
fatal: Unable to write new index file

Hmm, it looks like someone else is using the index file:

$ cp .git/index backup; mv backup .git/index
mv: rename backup to .git/index: Resource busy

But fuser and lsof aren't of any help:

$ fuser -fu .git/index
.git/index:
$ lsof .git/index

Weird workaround:  If I do the following command on the server, it allows me to write a new index file on the client over AFP.

$ cp .git/index backup; mv backup .git/index

I'm totally lost at this point; any new theories?

We've run into the same issue repeatedly, especially as we try to use XCode 6. I'm currently changing over my connect to our server to WebDAV (connecting to our server via Finder > Go (menubar) > Connect to Server... > https://localnetworkIP/userfolder/).

This is working for us (so far).

UPDATE: After a few days, I noticed a new issue using WebDAV: files would disappear from view in the Finder causing XCode/Git to think that the file had been deleted. Looking at the server showed that the files were still there.

I then changed my connection type to SMB. This has worked well for me: Git no longer encounters file permission errors, and Finder (OSX 10.10 Yosemite) doesn't "loose" files.


Check for Existence of File then Move Rename Old File and Move New One Here is what I am attempting to do:

I have a folder which contains a script and a file.  The file is an older copy of a file located in this path: /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Apple80211.framework/Versions/A.

I am attempting to create an AppleScript that will activate Finder, open the aforementioned path, check if the file in question exists, rename that file to .new if it does, then move the older version from the folder containing the script.

Alternatively, if the AppleScript is run when the .new version of the file exists at the aforementioned path, I would like for the script to rename the older version of the file (which was previously copied) to .old and remove the .new from the original file (i.e., essentially reverse what it did previously, but without removing the file which was added).

No matter what I've tried, I've been, thus far, unable to get the script to authenticate properly to rename the file (the folder in question, obviously, requires administrator approval before any modifications may be made).

Getting the script to activate Finder and open the folder is fairly trivial (e.g., tell application "Finder"
    activate
    open ("/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Apple80211.framework/Versions/A" as POSIX file)
end tell works just fine), but getting the script to authenticate after that, check for the existence of the file(s), and then act accordingly has been a rather fruitless task.

Any help will be much appreciated.

do shell script "
d=/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Apple80211.framework/Versions/A
if [[ -e $d/Apple80211 ]]; then
  mv $d/Apple80211 $d/Apple80211.new
  cp ~/path/to/Apple80211 $d/Apple80211
else
  mv $d/Apple80211 $d/Apple80211.old
  mv $d/Apple80211.new $d/Apple80211
fi" with administrator privileges


Share Keyboard Shortcuts I have about over 100 keyboard shortcuts for my mac, and I want to transfer all those shortcuts to my second computer. Is there a way to do this easily?

The best bet is to change some shortcuts while observing the content of your Preferences folder sorted by modification date.

In my system (10.7.5 Lion) the relevant files are com.apple.symbolichotkeys.plist, com.apple.universalaccess.plist and pbs.plist as well as probably somehow related plists like com.apple.systempreferences.plist/com.apple.ServicesMenu.Services.plist.

If both of your Macs have the same system/apps installed simply copy the files you found.


Animated Traveling route in iMovie I like to make a movie from my holidays where I travelled a lot through a country. What I would like to include is an animated traveling route in the Indiana Jones style. That means, you see an old fashioned map with some points for cities on it and then a red line is starting to connect city 1 to your next destination. I would like to do this by a straight line when I travel by plane and an actual path (maybe from a GPS file) when I travel by train. I hope you guys understand what I want!

Is this somehow possible with iMovie? Or are there any suggestions on how to do this? The build in map solution from iMovie is not what I am searching for since I see no way to customize the map as well as the path - only straight lines are possible, no real paths!

I don't think you can do this in iMovie but you could do it as a screen recording in Quicktime Player then import that into iMovie. Open up any paint application, open your map, select a large red paintbrush, start Quicktime Player recording then draw your route in.


Can I create a self-extracting archive for Mac? In Windows I can create self-extracting archives, which end in exe instead of rar, and then you don't need to have an unarchiver available to extract them. How can I create a self-extracting archive for Mac?

I need to distribute for download a large (100 mb when compressed) archive from a server to many mac users. I'd rather use a better compression like RAR or LZMA, but I need to be sure that it can be opened by everyone without needing to install anything.

OSX contains an unarchiver so you don't need the equivalent of a .exe so you can extract on any machine and not be stuck as you are on a Mac when you receive a Windows self-extracting archive

To archive select the files in Finder. Command-click or right-click and choose compress from the menu - you will get Archive.zip. To unzip just double click on the .zip file

The tool that does the unarchiving is Archive Utility.app and understands various compression schemes from Wikipaedia including bzip2 which can be better than zip - but you need to compress using a command line tool bzip2


How do I remove the previous App Store user from my computer? Someone else at the office was attempting to help me setup the laptop before I started, so now my MBP has their credentials for some apps. I can uninstall and reinstall the app, if that's all it takes, but how do I remove this user from the system so it quites prompting me?

The App Store app uses spotlight to find all the apps on your Mac that were downloaded from the store. You need to run a search and delete all those apps from the Mac (your personal data and settings do not get deleted) and re-download the app. Remember, you could have more than one copy of an app, so keep checking until they all are deleted.
Step one of course, it to sign out from the other account if you haven't done that yet. When the App Store App is running, choose the Store -> Sign Out menu item.
The details on how the App Store app actually knows if an app was downloaded is buried inside the application bundle as descrtibed on this quesiton about avoiding updates to apps entirely.

How can I opt out of updates for one app when using the App Store?


Is there a bluetooth phone that can remain paired with iPhone? What I would like to do is find a bluetooth capable phone that I can pair with my iPhone and will remain paired even if my iPhone is paired with a bluetooth headset at the same time.

I had purchased the AT&T phone model TL92278, but, if I forgot to turn off my headset just before I returned home, the phone would no longer be paired with my iPhone. It was easy, but annoying to have to pair it again constantly.

Basically, I am wondering if there is a phone out there that can remain paired with my iPhone while my iPhone is paired with a headset.

I have had good experience with Uniden. They make a range of phones that pair to your iPhone via bluetooth. They are good for incoming but have not yet worked out how to make outgoing calls through them.


Where is the OS X Volume Change Feedback Sound File located? I upgraded Yosemite, and turns out they changed the "pop" sound that plays when you change the volume. I have another Mac, which is on Mavericks, and I would like to get the old sound back.

I saw Where are the Mac OS X alert sound files located?, and it is NOT there in Macintosh HD ▸ System ▸ Library ▸ Sounds

Any help would be appreciated.

The volume up/down feedback audio file is called volume.aiff and is located in:

/System/Library/LoginPlugins/BezelServices.loginPlugin/Contents/Resources/


Mac Notes Keeps Opening Up every 5 seconds Yesterday, I decided to set up iMessage on my Macbook Pro.  And ever since then, Mac Notes keeps opening up every 5 seconds.  I close it, or force quit, and it opens again in 5 seconds.  But even when it's idle Mac Notes is restarting every 5 seconds, and assumes priority on my screen, so I am battling to type and work on my Mac.  It's as though it wants to create a new note each time.

Macbook Pro
Mountain Lion OSX 10.8.3

If you previously had Twonky Media Server installed and removed it, that could be the culprit. I had the same issue, though with Lotus Notes (also conveniently called Notes.app), starting/popping up every 5 seconds.

CleanTwonkyServerData.command (in /Users/Shared) was the culprit, it might be the same for you.


How can I get the iPhone to "forget" certain words? The auto-complete features can be nice, but somewhere along the line my iPhone has learned some questionable language.  How can I get the iPhone to "forget" certain words from its auto-complete settings / dictionary?

It sounds like it used to be possible to manually edit the user dictionary, but unfortunately it isn't anymore.

Just a guess, but perhaps you can have it forget them the same way it learned them — when it suggests the word, try tapping on the small [x] next to the suggestion. If you do this a few times it may "forget" the word.

You can reset the dictionary entirely by going to Settings > General > Reset:


Notification on new app version in IOS app store Is there a way to be notified when a new version of an application is published to the app store?

I don't mean the general notification on the app store when opened. I would like to get an email or equivalent as soon as a new version is published in the app store. I need to track the version available in the app store for several applications at once.

No, there's no way to do this from the App Store.  Developers do not have access to any Apple API to notify users when a new version is available within the App Store.

Developers can notify users within their own app that a new version is available.  For example, I have several apps that send me a popup message about a new version but I must open an older version of that app first, before I can see the notification.


Do larger desktop photos use more resources? Does using a larger sized photo for one's desktop hinder performance? My new desktop photo is 3MBs, does it use more resources than say a 1MB sized photo?

They do, but there is a more theoretical difference between a 3MB photo and a 1MB photo as desktop background. The number of icons may be relevant and an animated background by a third party application may slow down your mac, too.


Apple computers model name identification and getting detailed specs? I'm about to buy a MacBook Pro Customized Model, its model name and number is MD831/LLA.
When I google it, I couldnt find anything from a trusted apple source.
Specifications of the model is as follows;

MacBook Pro 15" Retina, 16 GB Ram, 768 GB SSD, 2.7 Ghz i7

I'm buying it from a local shop which imported the computer from US and itself is not a official Apple distributor or something.

What I'm afraid of is; that what if model turns out to be an older version or something. Because price of the device is considerably low and almost identical to Apple Store.
When I configure a machine as proposed above; price on store.apple.com is ; 3749 $
Local shop sells the same configured computer for 3800 $.

So how can I get detailed information by model name and number proposed by the seller: MD831/LLA

The Apple Specs database isn't always complete -- I think this is the relevant entry, but it doesn't list the model number so it's hard to be sure. I tend to use third-party sources for this sort of thing: I've found EveryMac.com to be reliable, and if you already have a Mac, Mactracker is excellent.

BTW, if you have the computer running with an internet connection, you can get it to look itself up: Pull down the Apple menu, select "About This Mac", then in the info box that opens click "More Info", then in the expanded info window click Support near the top right, then the Specifications link below.


Personal Hotspot won't work (connected through cable) iPhone SE (gen 1). Prior to updating my iOS from 13.x to 14.x I was successfully using Personal Hotspot to connect my laptop to the internet using Lightning-USB cable. Then I updated my iOS to 14.x (can't quite remember the exact version), everything was fine for some time. And then all of a sudden my internet connection just dropped and never came back up again. I still have this blue bar indicating the connection on the top and my laptop indicates the connection, yet no internet connection.
I tried:

Rebooting my device
Resetting my Network Settings
Updating my iOS 14.x to 14.3
Connecting to another USB port
Connecting my iPhone to another laptop

None of the above worked, all the same.
However, using Wi-Fi Hotspot instead of direct USB connection works perfectly fine but it's not an option for me.
I also tried connecting through my second iPhone's Personal Hotspot (iPhone 8, iOS 14.3), same effect, it works over Wi-Fi, doesn't work over direct USB connection.
Any thoughts? I appreciate any help.
UPDATE
As of Dec 25th 2020 this issue is now Linux-specific only.
I was able to connect via USB on Windows laptop after some painful acts of update. Force-(re)updated iOS via latest version of iTunes.

Welcome to Ask Different. Is your Laptop a Mac or a PC?
If it's a Mac, you might want to check if the USB connection has not been made inactive/lower service order in Network Settings within System Preferences on the Mac.
To check, go to System Preferences>Network; on the left you will see a list of connections (e.g. Wifi, Bluetooth, Ethernet, iPhone USB, etc.). If you see a green dot on those connections, it means you are connected to them.
If iPhone USB is showing as not connected, check if "Disable unless needed" has been enabled, and disable it if it is. Furthermore, if you have multiple successful connections, it is possible the service order prioritises the other connections over your USB connection. So at the bottom of that list, click on more options icon and select Set service order, now you should be able to reorder the connections priority to prioritise iPhone USB above wifi, ethernet, etc.

Finally, you mentioned you have reset network settings. Did you do this on your iPhone or on your laptop?
Sometimes the trust relationship between the Laptop and iPhone can be corrupted or need a reset after updating. You can reset this trust relationship in iOS settings, by going to Settings>General>Reset>Reset Location & Privacy. After resetting location and privacy settings, the iPhone will prompt you to trust the device it is connecting to. Trusting the device (laptop) will rewrite the trust relationship between the two devices.
Note, resetting location and privacy settings will prompt you to trust every other device your iPhone connects to. This should only happen on the initial connection to that device after you have reset these settings.
Let me know how you go. Best of luck!


Is it possible to make iTunes write rating on the file itself? I'm on Yosemite (10.10.2) and using iTunes (12.1.0.50).
I read that iTunes saves the rating of the songs on its own database, not the audio files tags themselves. Is there a way to make iTunes to write the ratings on the files? Because if I move the audio file to any other place, the rating won't be recognized.

If anyone else needs something like this I wrote a quick piece of code using Qt 5.4 and taglib 1.14.0 that reads the iTunes database and writes the play count and rating into each mp3 file. You'll have to build it yourself or download the binary; it seems to work for me: https://github.com/carlonluca/ITunesEmbed. Backup your library before using it.


Reloading a MacBook with applications My daughter has a MacBook, 10.6.8 and we have the install discs.
It's gotten to that age, 5-6 years, where it runs sluggishly, and I'm thinking to wipe the drive, maybe replace with an SSD, and reinstall the OS.

I am looking to be sure that the applications that have been activated by serial number continue to work. Is there a simple process to do this? In the very old Mac days, the serial number / keys were stored in a preference folder. Now, I'm not so sure what pieces need to be saved to move software from an old drive to new.

I'd go the CCC (clone) route, but a full image would probably take the sluggishness with it. Trying to clean up the next version of the drive.

Take a single Time Machine backup, just in case.

When you wipe the laptop, use the Time Machine drive to selectively (manually) restore certain items.  Information and files related to application licensing will most often be located in:

~/Library/
~/Library/Application Support
~/Library/Preferences


Why is this folder 4.2mb? It only has a handful of relatively small text files in it! I have a WordPress plugin which was originally 26kb zipped (79kb uncompressed).

I installed it, then made some live changes, then downloaded it and found that the plugin folder is showing 4.2MB in Finder!

Expanding all the folders in one Finder window, I can confirm that there is maybe 50KB in there unzipped.

What is going wrong? Even when I zip it it's 3.8MB. Where is this extra data coming from? Right now I'm blaming the Mac, but maybe this is wrong.

Did you check hidden files? What about https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.DS_Store? :)

Open terminal, go to that directory and type ls -alh. Then compare what you see in terminal and what Finder is showing.


Why is the menu bar showing the VPN "Disconnecting" animation  forever? You know how when you disconnect from a VPN, you get a little scrolling "Disconnecting..." notification in the upper right notification area?

Well, I'm getting that, but it never goes away. It's been "Disconnecting" now for 20 minutes. The VPN is not, actually, connected anymore, but the UI won't let me reconnect now.

The Network preferences panel shows the same problem:

The console shows that the disconnect did, actually, happen:

Somehow the only problem is that the UI is convinced that I'm still disconnecting, which makes it impossible to connect again.

If you're using a PPTP VPN, try manually killing the "pppd" process.

sudo killall pppd

If that doesn't solve it, you may need to add a -9 to forcibly kill the process. You should try without first though.

sudo killall -9 pppd


Does iPhone 5 have a terminal? I'm new to iPhones and Mac, but I pretty ok with Linux. I think I could solve some of my networking issues, if I could just get into a bash shell, but I haven't been able to locate a shell.

Is there a default shell for iPhone 5? if so, where is it?

If not, is there a preferable terminal emulator in the App Store?

iPhone does have a shell, bash to be specific, but you can't access the shell without jailbreaking, and any 'shell' app from the App Store won't have the ability to interact with the device in any reasonable manner necessary for fixing network problems.


Who makes non-white iPhone earbuds similar in function and design to Apple's default earbuds? I like the default iPhone earbuds, but I'd prefer a color other than white, which is the only color Apple makes them. Are there any other good earbuds that have the following characteristics?

Have all the iPhone-specific controls
Are earphones/earbuds, i.e. do not go inside the ear canal (since those are uncomfortable and always pop out of my ear)

I've bought a couple of Belkin Headphones Adapter with Remotes, one because a few of them tore, and two because I bought one for myself and my girlfriend for use in our own cars'.

It's a very simple gadget. Push the middle for play/pause/skip/previous, and it has volume up/down controls on the extremities. Note that you have to plug the adapter into the phone, it cannot be the other way around.

These have worked in an iPhone, iPad, and iPod, and they're chiefly designed for the buttonless iPod shuffle, but work with everything else.

If you don't need the mic, you could get by with this, and any pair of headphones you want.


Restoring <= 10.6.8 lid-open Clamshell Mode in Mountain Lion? In Snow Leopoard and earlier, you could open the lid of your laptop after you had activated clam shell mode and the display would remain inactive until you disconnected the external monitors.

In Mountain Lion (and Lion?), the behavior is to immediately turn the display on.

My question is, is it possible to restore the earlier behavior?

Note that none of the solutions listed here actually restore this behavior. The boot-args option is especially egregious as it disables the internal display completely until you reboot. This is far less than desirable.

If you need more detail about the specifics of the Pre-Lion behavior, leave a comment.

You can get pre-lion behavior with:

sudo nvram boot-args="iog=0x0"

If it screws up your system, just zap the PRAM next boot (cmd+opt+p+r) and you'll be back to the default state.

Or from terminal, this command will get you back to Lion's default state as well:

sudo nvram -d boot-args


esc key doesn't work, only fn + esc So there's probably some app that's responsible for this, but I'm not sure how to find it.

I press Esc  in:

Karabiner-events: it echoes 'escape' as it should
according to OS X keyboard-viewer Esc is never pressed.

But fnEsc  does work (also in OS X keyboard-viewer).

I have no clue where to look for.
I saw this thread but I already disabled Siri and Speech and rebooted.

Where can I find more info how to deal with this?

I'm on the latest update of High Sierra 10.13.4.

Using an app called 'Key Codes', it logged:

pressing Esc : nothing
pressing fnEsc  (first fn, than esc):

Modifier Change
    Keys:
    Key Code:       65535 / 0xffff
    Modifiers:      8388864 / 0x800100 ⓘ

Key Down
    Characters:
    Unicode:        27 / 0x1b
    Keys:           Escape
    Key Code:       53 / 0x35
    Modifiers:      8388864 / 0x800100 ⓘ

Key Up
    Characters:
    Unicode:        27 / 0x1b
    Keys:           Escape
    Key Code:       53 / 0x35
    Modifiers:      8388864 / 0x800100 ⓘ

Modifier Change
    Keys:
    Key Code:       65535 / 0xffff
    Modifiers:      256 / 0x100 ⓘ

In xev, when I press 'esc' nothing is echoed. But when I press fn+esc, I get the following output:

FocusIn event, serial 34, synthetic NO, window 0xa00001,
    mode NotifyNormal, detail NotifyNonlinear

KeymapNotify event, serial 34, synthetic NO, window 0x0,
    keys:  4294967201 0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0
           0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0   0

PropertyNotify event, serial 34, synthetic NO, window 0xa00001,
    atom 0x101 (_NET_WM_STATE), time 979893442, state PropertyNewValue

KeyPress event, serial 34, synthetic NO, window 0xa00001,
    root 0x1a1, subw 0x0, time 979893799, (144,-11), root:(161,702),
    state 0x0, keycode 61 (keysym 0xff1b, Escape), same_screen YES,
    XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (1b) "
mbLookupString gives 1 bytes: (1b) "
FilterEvent returns: False

KeyRelease event, serial 34, synthetic NO, window 0xa00001,
    root 0x1a1, subw 0x0, time 979893895, (144,-11), root:(161,702),
    state 0x0, keycode 61 (keysym 0xff1b, Escape), same_screen YES,
    XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (1b) "
FilterEvent returns: False

For the full output of xmodmap -pk I uploaded it here. The most notable lines (I guess) is:

 61         0xff1b (Escape) 0x0000 (NoSymbol)       0xff1b (Escape)
 79         0xff1b (Escape) 0x0000 (NoSymbol)       0xff1b (Escape)

If you know that your keyboard has got the correct country identification and ISO/Ansi setting, you might try "xev" in Terminal app.
After some moments it will open a small window left on top of your screen.
Just press "esc" once, then any letter, next press "fn" and "esc". Last: Cmd-dot to stop the output.
Depending on what your Terminal window tells you you might get some hint.

Another command in Terminal "xmodmap -pk" delivers a list of your keyboard's Keycodes and Keysym-values.
Maybe there is s.th. unusual shown there. You might post relevant output here.


Turn Virtual Memory Swapping back on in Yosemite I disabled virtual memory swapping using OnyX in Yosemite, but the program can't turn it back on when I click Turn On.

I already tried:

sudo launchctl load -wF /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.dynamic_pager.plist

and it just says "Operation already in progress." OnyX still shows that the swap file is turned off and I have zero swap files. How do I turn it back on?

Figured it out! I had to force the OS to create a swap file using this command in terminal:

memory_pressure -l critical

It will run a test to force your RAM usage to climb. Open Activity Monitor to watch its progress and it will show the swap file being created. Ctrl+C will stop the process in terminal. Now the virtual memory swapping works again.


Connecting two monitors to MacBook Pro 2017 while charging it I am using a 13" MacBook Pro 2017 with a Shinevi Hyperdrive adapter for access to a wider variety of ports, granting my access to a single Thunderbolt 3 port, a USB Type-C port, and a single HDMI port.

While fully charged, I can connect both of my Samsung S22C300 monitors with no problem, one through the HDMI port, and the other through the Thunderbolt 3 port. (Note: The single Thunderbolt 3 port is the only port that allows you to charge the MacBook through the Shinevi hyperdrive). This configuration allows me to use 3 screens in total, including the MacBook Pro screen.

However, when my laptop starts running low on battery, I have to unplug the external monitor connected to the Thunderbolt 3 port in order to charge my laptop, leaving me with only one external monitor.

I'd recently bought an HDMI splitter (I have no idea what model splitter it is) in hopes of connecting both monitors through the splitter, but neither monitor is receiving signal through the splitter. I have also checked to see if the splitter is broken by testing it on other devices, and it works elsewhere.

can I charge and have HDMI out from one thunderbolt port?

One solution for the problem here is to use a Apple USB-C Digital AV Multiport Adapter. It is available on Apple Retail Stores and Apple Online Store for $69.00.

Product Description:

Here's a summary of the product description as obtained from the Apple Online Store web-page:

  The USB-C Digital AV Multiport Adapter lets you connect your USB-C or Thunderbolt 3 (USB-C) enabled Mac to an HDMI display, while also connecting a standard USB device and a USB-C charging cable.


Remap FN key to OPTION key I just got a new keyboard.  How can I remap the FN key on only this external keyboard to option?

So far I've played around with karabiner but haven't had success.

One Excellent third party tool that can make amazing edits to the keyboard mapping is named Karabiner.

To accomplish option and function key changes, create a filter for the external keyboard and adjust the modifier keys.

Prerequisites: external keyboard

Download, install and open Karabiner
Open in the menulet Karabiner -> Preferences
Open the tab Misc & Uninstall
Hit the button Launch EventViewer
Hit the tab Devices
Make a note of the vendor and product ID of the external keyboard:

Hit the tab Main
Enter the (PC-)Ctrl-key, (PC-)Fn-key and the (PC-)Alt-key and make a note of the "event names/miscs":

Close the EventViewer
Hit the button Open private.xml
Open the file private.xml with an appropriate editor
Enter the customized keycode and replace the vendor name, the product name, the vendor and product ID by IDs and names found above as well as the "names/miscs" of the events (= KeyCode).

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>
  <devicevendordef>
    <vendorname>Cougar</vendorname>
    <vendorid>0x05ac</vendorid>
  </devicevendordef>
  <deviceproductdef>
    <productname>ATTACKX3</productname>
    <productid>0x0256</productid>
  </deviceproductdef>
  <item>
    <name>Function to Option for ATTACKX3</name>
    <identifier>private.fn2optExtK</identifier>
    <device_only>DeviceVendor::Cougar, DeviceProduct::ATTACKX3</device_only>
    <autogen>__KeyToKey__ KeyCode::Fn, KeyCode::OPTION_L</autogen>
  </item>
</root>

Depending on your findings in the Event Viewer you may have to remap (PC-)keys to Control_L and Command_L also.
Save the file
Open in the menulet Karabiner -> Preferences the tab Change Key
Hit the ReloadXML button
Enable the remapping. It should be listed at the beginning.


iPhone 11 What are the authorized manufacturer/s for iPhone 11's Screen I have an iPhone 11, and today the screen broke when my mobile fall down.
I want to buy a new screen for my iPhone 11 from Amazon, but I am not sure which are the authorized brand(s) for iPhone 11.
Is there a resource that qualifies aftermarket parts for iPhones?

Apple does not approve any brands for direct to consumer sale of Phone parts. They recommend complete service in an Apple Store or an AASP (Apple Authorized Service Provider Program). Parts alone don’t make the repair successful.

https://locate.apple.com

However, it can be cheaper to replace the screen at home. Keep in mind that you won't get any Apple "free" warranty replacement after your repair. Also, True Tone will be disabled on the phone - even if you use Apple "original" or “equivalent” screens.
I recommend iFixit parts, they come with great tools and the screen is of good quality - I ordered iPhone 11, 8 and XR screen parts without any problems.


Searching for file within Time Capsule Mavericks OSX 10.9.5.
I need to locate a file in the Time Capsule.
I can navigate into the directory I want to search in, and using OSX find, I can "search" for a file that is right there and there are no results.

For example navigate to directory Website containing two or three files including index.php and search for "index.php" yields nothing.

I think that I'm not actually navigating to a directory, but that the OS is displaying a virtual directory based on the Time Capsule database.

How does one search for a file within Time Capsule backups?

Searching a TimeMachine backup is tricky - for one thing Spotlight has not indexed the backup (do not tell Spotlight to do this - you will be in for a world of hurt)

Second, you are sort of correct about about TimeMachine being virtual.  what it really is a hundreds of symlinks that link about in all kinds of crazy ways.

Your best bet, is to mount the volume using TimeMachine and recover the file using the interface Apple has provided.

If you are not going to do that, then hopefully you know where the file should be on the original system, and you should navigate to latest/path/to/file.html  where "latest" is the name of one of the directories in at the root of the TimeMachine archive.  Really it is...  If you know what date you want the file from, you could use that date in place of "latest"


Is it possible to have Preview add text at a place other than the center? Whenever I click the text tool icon, it automatically places a text box in the center of the screen. Is it possible to add text boxes at the location I click my cursor (for example at the left edge of my PDF)?

Any help would be appreciated.

Preview actually adds the text box at the center of the current zoom level and not the absolute center of the image, so you can manipulate the drop position of the text box by zooming on the region where you approximately want the text box to be dropped.

After that, you can quickly reposition the box with your mouse or by holding down Shift and an arrow key.

Changing the drop zone from the center to e.g. an edge, however, is not currently supported.


iPod 3g 4.3.5 Updated Firmware Apps can't run I have installed Firmware update to 4.3.5 for my iPod touch 3g (32gb), and after installation, I have a problem where apps can't run. I tap on an app, it runs (~1 sec) and then skips to main menu of iPod.

What it can be? What I have to do?

I had a similar problem. Try go to AppStore and update or download something free; the point is to authorize with apple store. Once you finish this, everything should be back to normal.


Switch between monitors using camera Is there any software for Mac which watches out head and focus a window that is in a specified monitor based on our head angle? I'm using 3 monitors at the same time and hitting cmd + tab is always the pain.

You may be able to craft your own solution with a combination of scripting software and assistive hardware.

Assistive hardware exists to track head movement. Most assistive hardware can be used to provide an input that can then be scripted via AppleScript or shell script.

A few examples are linked below. I have no experience with these tools but your goal appears possible.

Headmouse

  HeadMouse® Extreme replaces the standard computer mouse for people who cannot use or have limited use of their hands when controlling a computer or alternative and augmentative communication (AAC) device. The HeadMouse translates natural movements of a user's head into directly proportional movements of the computer mouse pointer, so as the user moves their head the mouse pointer on the screen also moves.

SmartNav

  The SmartNav 4 AT is a total hands-free mouse solution. With built-in Dwell Clicking Software and a free On-screen Keyboard created by Lake Software. The AT package is used successfully by people with ALS, spinal cord injuries, muscular dystrophy, and other special needs.

One Switch

One Switch sell a wide range of assistive hardware and link to associated software.

  The following list details a number of different styles of head, mouth and eye operated controllers. Most of these are for PCs and Apple computers, but there are alternatives for games consoles too. Some of these devices are very expensive, so it is always worth trying to track down some way of trying before you buy.


Use `security` to get my login username and password for use in shell scripts / cron I'd like to create a cron job that periodically pings an external resource and retrieves some information on my behalf, using my username and password that I logged in to the computer with.
I could hard-code the username and password into the script, but that is a bad practice.
I could use environment variables, but then I have to hard-code the username and password into a different script, which is still a bad practice.
I could create a keychain pair for use with this process, but then when my network password changes every few months, this process is likely to keep running with the wrong password and lock out my account.
My question is:  What parameters can I give to the security command to retrieve the password that I used to log in to the machine?

I don’t believe that the Security framework keeps a two-way copy of your password. The best you could do is use a keychain pair as you’ve stated and then have your script check if that password is able to be locally authenticated before trying it over the network. That way at least you get an alert every few months to update your Keychain.


Shortcut for search bar in Dictionary.app I was hoping that there was some shortcut for the search bar in Dictionary.app. I tried ⌘+L as one can do in Safari, hoping it would work, to no avail. Does anyone know a shortcut for this?

You don't need a shortcut. You can just start typing and it'll automatically replace whatever's in the search box with what you've just typed.


Kernel panics; Apple hardware test error codes... Bad memory? My MacMini, which I bought new around Thanksgiving 2010 from Amazon, has been having quite a few kernel panics. They aren't consistent in any way, but they have become more frequent and now many apps seem to be crashing more as well and I have also noticed Spotlight and Alfred have become painfully slow.

I was about to reinstall Snow Leopard and start from scratch after making a SuperDuper clone on an external for backup when I read on the Apple CD that you can run an "Apple Hardware Test" by holding "D" during startup.

I figured it was worth checking out. Especially since my memory is non-original. I had put 2x 4GB Corsair sticks in it right away that I also got from Amazon a few months before then which I had used in my previous early-2009 MacMini. The memory seemed to have worked fine in both computers. All 8 GB were being recognized. These kernel panics only started happening a few months ago.

Now the Apple Hardware tests, which I tried in every conceivable configuration; swapping slots, removing one then the other etc., did in fact show errors. I wrote down two of the error codes. I believe there were only two unique codes; I suppose the different stick arrangements I used is cause for the variances, but it's possible there were more, but I know for a fact they all started out with the same characters, 4MEM/9/40000000: .

4MEM/9/40000000: 0xa90c1418 & 4MEM/9/40000000: 0xa95de698

However, the strange thing is the Apple Hardware Test only showed this error when I had BOTH sticks installed; either stick in either slot on it's own showed no error. As I mentioned earlier, I tested all possible configurations because I had read that sometimes it could be a faulty slot.

So, with that information, does anyone have an idea how to fix my Mac. Do I need to replace one or both sticks? Is it something else? Is there an app I can use to help diagnose the issue?

As I'm writing, I realized I can still try using both the original sticks that came with the Mac at the same time, but I need to find them. I may wait until tomorrow to try that.

It sounds like some sort of RAM issue for sure, and there are a few memtest based programs out there to try and run and see if you run into problems.
Rember is a gui based memtest, and applejack is a fairly well known utility script that also contains it.

I dont know why you only got the error with a specific configuration of ram, but with 8GB of addressable space it can take a while to find the bad guy.


How to ask Siri to tell me the news Siri seems to be smart enough to fetch some news for me, but let's say I just want to find out the news in my country.

I asked Tell me the news and the answer was: Here's some news for 'tell me the news'.

I tried Tell me the breaking news and the answer was: Here's some news for 'Breaking'.

So, how to ask Siri about the Breaking news and news in general?

The News app and features for iOS 10 are only limited to the USA, UK and Austraila at the moment. http://www.apple.com/ios/feature-availability/#news

In these countries, if you were to ask Siri for example:

  What's the latest in New York City

Sir would respond with a list of articles from the News app.

However, if you are outside these countries. For example, I am in Toronto, Canada and if I ask Siri a similar question:

  What's the latest in Toronto

Siri first asks for confirmation to use a Twitter account to recommend more personalised results if you don't have one signed in or don't allow Siri access to Twitter. Siri will display a list of Tweets related to the location of Toronto.


How to find Hard Drive capacity in Mavericks? I usually check the Hard Drive capacity in the Activity Monitor. But when I checked it, it literally looked different. I selected each tabs, trying to find the information about my disk but to no avail. How can I find the disk occupied in my hard drive?

You can check it via Finder. Just select the Hard Drive and press CMD + I.

Or

Click on the Apple icon on the menu bar
Select About This Mac, then click on More Info.
Select Storage


Restored iPhone from iTunes backup - where's all the iMessage storage that was previously used? iPhone 7 Plus running iOS 12.4.1.

Device showed the following iMessage statistics under iPhone Storage:

I took encrypted backup using iTunes on Windows, then restored that backup (also to 12.4.1).  Waited 24 hours following the restore for everything to sync, iCloud messages to download if necessary (Messages in iCloud was set to ON), etc.  But same screen shows vastly different numbers now:

Things like this about the iPhone - there you have zero visibility into what is actually happening freak me out.  What would account for the substantially lower storage numbers afterwards?

UPDATE: I am convinced that all of the photos and videos reflected in the "before" screenshot are still present on the device (despite Messages in iCloud being on), yet for some reason the Messages storage page simply isn't reflecting the usage for some reason.  The reason I believe that the media is still present on the device is because when I back up the iPhone via iTunes and then use any number of 3rd party tools to inspect the backup, all of the photos and videos are there.

I updated iOS* and the screens shown in the screenshots above showed the results I expected; that is, they showed storage amounts consistent with those prior to my restore.

I suspect that the upgrade forced the statistics to be updated.

*The upgrade was to iOS 13.1 but my gut feeling is that any upgrade would have "resolved" the problem.


Finder icon size slider broken, how to fix? The slider in the bottom-right corner of Finder windows doesn't change the icon size for me. This is of course with "Icon View" selected. What am I doing wrong? It worked before, up until Lion.

When you are in Thumbnail view, press cmd+ 2 (to get the List view) and then switch back to Thumbnail view with cmd+ 1.
Normally, it should get your slider working!


Restoring `System.keychain` from a Time Machine backup without access to system `/var/db/SystemKey` I have an old backup that (hopefully) holds the encryption keys to some encrypted disks in the System.keychain. To unlock that properly, I seem to need the /var/db/SystemKey that does not seem to be present in the backup.
I've been searcing around and can't seem to find any solutions that don't need the SystemKey file (which makes sense if it is the encryption key), but since that computer has since been wiped and given on, I can't imagine any way of restoring it (though if it can somehow be deterministically created on the specific computer, I could ask the new user to create the key if I knew how)
If I can't recover the SystemKey, what other options are there? Are the keys in my System.keychain gone for good?

Yes, unfortunately for all practical purposes the keys are gone for good.
You need the SystemKey file corresponding to that System.keychain in order to restore anything from it. If you haven't got a backup, you'll have to resort to bruteforcing the contents of the SystemKey file - which is not practically possible.


VirtualBox VERR_NOT_SUPPORTED opening Windows 10 partition/vmdk I'm trying to virtualize my physical Boot Camp partition, so I can do small Windows tasks from Mac without restarting. I followed mostly this tutorial but also read others.

But now when I try to launch the VM it prompts this: VD: error VERR_NOT_SUPPORTED opening image file

Any idea what could I try?

This was (or obviously still is in VirtualBox 5?) a known bug of VirtualBox 3 which should have been fixed in 4.0.0!

The workaround is disabling the use of the new async I/O code... done by ticking "Use host I/O cache" for the SATA (and SCSI) controllers.


How can I disconnect my Internet connection and still be connected to my TimeCapsule? How can I disconnect my Internet connection and still be connected to my TimeCapsule?

The only way I know of to disconnect Internet is to turn off my Wi-Fi, but I then I cannot reach my TimeCapsule, and that's what I still want to do.

Thanks!

Yes, this is possible.

Configure the Time Capsule to "create a wireless network", name the network and set up a password for the network.

When doing this, ignore the error messages about having no Ethernet cable connected to the WAN port on the Time Capsule and/or not having an internet connection.

Of course you'll need to connect your Mac to this WiFi network for backing up.

Hope this helps!

[EDIT]

This edit provides the actual steps for creating a wireless network from the Time Capsule.

In most cases you would usually connect your DSL/Cable modem to your Time Capsule using the ethernet WAN port. However, in your case you won't need to do this since you're not wanting the internet.
Open Airport Utility (usually located in the Utilities folder of macOS). Or, if you happen to be on a Windows machine you would usually go to Start > All Programs > AirPort
Follow the instructions on the screen for creating a new wireless network.

NOTES

I've made the assumption you're still wanting to backup wirelessly - but you do also have the option of connecting the computer directly via ethernet cable. This would involve different steps.
Different versions of Airport Utility provide different options, so if my steps don't make sense please provide the version of OS you're running as well as the version of Airport Utility.
If you have problems, it may be worth returning your Time Capsule to factory settings - use something pointy to press and hold the Reset button for about 5 or so seconds (you'll know when as the status light starts flashing).
If you get stuck, you can also visit Apple's Airport page which will provide additional info, including access to manuals etc.

Let me know how you go.


I get errors when trying to install GTK+3 on my Mac OSX 10.9 system I'm trying to install GTK+3 on my Mac OSX 10.9 system to run a pyGObject project I've been developing in Ubuntu. It runs perfectly on Ubuntu, so I wanted to test cross-platform compatibility. I'm following the directions on wiki.gnome.org.

I finished the part where I run the sh gtk-osx-build-setup.sh command. It loads everything perfectly (as far as I can tell). However, if I do a which jhbuild or try a command, I get an error:

EnvironmentError: MacOSX10.9.sdk not found
jhbuild: could not load config file

Any suggestions on how to fix this and finish installing jhbuild? It seems like the instructions from their webpage are a little incomplete or perhaps I'm not adding to path correctly?

Questions:

Which file do I put the path? Is it .bashrc or .bash_profile (neither have worked so far). Perhaps some other file is my bash profile script?
What is the path to the jhbuild? In the example, it says alias jhbuild="PATH=gtk-prefix/bin:$PATH jhbuild", but I'm not actually sure what I should substitute in for gtk-prefix (not sure where the actual path is, since which jhbuild doesn't work).

Forgive me if this is a silly question but do you have Xcode installed?

The OSX SDK should be installed on your system within the Xcode application bundle. You should be able to find it at /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/MacOSX.platform/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.9.sdk/.

If Xcode isn't installed you can install it for free from here.


Does Mountain Lion support Canon Pixma printers? I've recently re-installed Mountain Lion after I upgraded from Lion on a 2009 iMac.
Before the reinstallation, my printer, a Canon Pixma iP3000, worked perfectly and out of the box — no drivers to install, supported by the OS.

Now, instead, my Mac doesn't have Canon drivers at all, and I can't find any on the internet.

How do I use my printer with my Mac?

Model Name: iMac
Model Identifier:   iMac10,1

CUPS Version:   1.6.2 (cups-327.6)

System Version: OS X 10.8.4 (12E55)
Kernel Version: Darwin 12.4.0

This is what the OS sees of the printer (it's just USB data):

iP3000:

Product ID: 0x1094
Vendor ID:  0x04a9  (Canon Inc.)
Version:     1.10
Serial Number:  A4319B
Speed:  Up to 12 Mb/sec
Manufacturer:   Canon
Location ID:    0x06400000 / 3
Current Available (mA): 500
Current Required (mA):  2
1284 Device ID: MFG:Canon;CMD:BJL,BJRaster3,BSCCe;SOJ:TXT01;MDL:iP3000;
                CLS:PRINTER;DES:Canon iP3000;VER:1.10;STA:20;FSI:03;

Apple has moved the printer drivers out of the OS and made them available on a separate page. Very unfortunately they don't mention the exact printer models, nor that the pacakge is for Snow Leopard on the page so they are hard to find with Google.

  Canon Inkjet Printer Drivers v2.12 for OS X

http://support.apple.com/kb/dl899


Is there an app to control preferences/desktop/dock based on an environment I use my laptop for personal use and work. Is there a way to be able to reconfigure my preferences, desktop icons, and dock apps with a script or app?

I personally would like something like f.lux where the settings can change based on the time, so I can set something like work mode between 9a-5pm.

I'd just create a new user, and just sign on to whichever one depending on where you are.


macOS, launchctl and dnsmasq for localhost domain spoofing I am usually a Linux user, but I would like to test my mojolicious webapp on a macOS system.  thus, I would like *.test *.*.test and *.*.*.test all to resolve to 127.0.0.1, where my webapp is eagerly listening on port 80 .

I understand that this is best done by installing dnsmasq.  For macOS,

# brew install dnsmasq

and then

# echo "address=/test/127.0.0.1" >> /usr/local/dnsmasq.conf
# launchctl start dnsmasq
# launchctl list | grep dns
89254   0   homebrew.mxcl.dnsmasq

so, if I understand this correctly, ping abc.test should now ping localhost.  alas, it does not.  (or, is there a better way to test?)

I also do not understand how to shut down and restart dnsmasq.  launchctl restart dnsmasq, launchctl kill dnsmasq.mxcl.dnsmasq, and launchctl disable 89254 (and many permutations thereof) all seem to elicit scorn but no results.

You've not said which version of MacOS you're on; my reply here is from macOS Sierra Version 10.12.5. (I'm using it in order to run tests against a VMWare installation of ADCS...)

First, the commands to stop and start dnsmasq are:

sudo launchctl stop homebrew.mxcl.dnsmasq
sudo launchctl start homebrew.mxcl.dnsmasq

ETA If launchctl stop doesn't actually stop it, it's likely that the .plistfile (presumably /Library/LaunchDaemons/homebrew.mxcl.dnsmasq.plist contains the lines

<key>KeepAlive</key>
<true/>

If you don't want it to be always on, change that to

<key>KeepAlive</key>
<false/>

instead. Or you can disable it with

sudo launchctl disable homebrew.mxcl.dnsmasq

The next time you want to turn it on, run

sudo launchctl enable homebrew.mxcl.dnsmasq

Second, you should check the other values of your dnsmasq.conf file. Here's mine:

[jenny@temeraire ~] $ grep -v ^# /usr/local/etc/dnsmasq.conf | grep -v ^$
domain-needed
bogus-priv
resolv-file=/usr/local/etc/resolv.conf
server=/ad.dybedahl.se/192.168.226.10
server=/226.168.192.in-addr.arpa/192.168.226.10
listen-address=127.0.0.1
no-negcache

Note the line resolv-file. It tells dnsmasq which nameservers to use for hosts that aren't in the dnsmasq config. In my case, it looks like this:

[jenny@temeraire ~] $ more /usr/local/etc/resolv.conf
nameserver 8.8.8.8
nameserver 8.8.8.4

So all DNS lookups that aren't answered by my virtual AD server will be handled by Google's nameservers, meaning that I can still connect to hosts that aren't in my config.

Third, to debug whether dnsmasq acts properly, don't use ping. Instead, use dig, like so:

dig @127.0.0.1 abc.test

To test whether your system is using dnsmasq as its resolver, again use dig:

dig abc.test

It will tell you what nameserver it's using, among other things.

Dig will give you information about how the lookup is actually done.

Fourth, in order to use dnsmasq as your resolver, you need to also change /etc/resolv.conf to point to 127.0.0.1 instead of whatever it now points at. You should start by copying your current /etc/resolv.conf to /usr/local/etc/resolv.conf, so that dnsmasq will know what nameservers to use. Then change /etc/resolv.conf to read

nameserver 127.0.0.1

On my laptop, I do this in System Preferences -> Network -> DNS. I'm not sure how you do it on a server; perhaps simply editing the file will work.


How to install the OS with a new Hard drive? I've just bought my first Mac, a Macbook pro(with an hdd), and I'm thinking in buying an ssd and replace the hdd. But the computer came with no dvd of the OS. I know that in the hdd there is a restore partition, but if I remove the hdd, how can I install the OS?

You can create your own recovery disk with Recovery Disk Assistant and a blank USB drive that is at least 1 GB. Alternatively, your Mac can boot into OS X Internet Recovery mode in which it downloads an image from Apple's servers, and it can do this with a damaged recovery partition or even a blank hard drive -- it's built into the firmware of the system. To access it, boot up while holding Command + R. You can do this over a wireless network that is either unprotected or WPA-secured, or you can use an Ethernet connection. In both cases, your system will need to download OS X from Apple (the recovery partition does not contain a full OS X.)


iOS/macOS - Determine Emoji name while choosing Emoji are quite popular now on macOS/iOS along with other software platforms. For many people, they are an integral part of day to day conversation over apps like Messages and WhatsApp.

However, many folks end up using them based solely on instinct rather than knowing their exact meaning/name. There comes the question.

Is there any mechanism to determine the name of an Emoji when entering one, while using Emoji keyboard? Long press comes to mind, but that gesture appears to be reserved for selecting skin tone variation. While Emoji can be searched for using the search bar (In WhatsApp for macOS, which uses the same set as Apple), I am  looking for a way to determine the name for a particular Emoji, while choosing to enter it.

In macOS Messages.app, hovering the mouse pointer over an emoji shows its name:


Install macOS, Linux, Windows in the same USB External SSD I have a 960GB External USB SSD and I have MacBook Air.

I would like to know if is it possible to install, macOS Catalina 320GB, Windows 10 320GB, Linux CentOS 7 320GB in the same External HD.

I don’t know how to find a guide to know how to install these sequentially.

You should be possible to install, macOS Catalina 320GB, Windows 10 320GB, Linux CentOS 7 320GB in the same external SSD. You probably will have to use the CLI to install Windows 10 to the external SSD.

Below is a suggested GPT partitioning for the drive.

EFI for macOS Catalina and CentOS 7
Apple_APFS for macOS Catalina
EFI for Windows 10
Microsoft Basic Data for Windows 10
Microsoft Basic Data for  CentOS 7
Linux LVM for CentOS 7

I would suggest creating partitions 1 through 4 before installing any operating systems. Leave free space where partitions 5 and 6 will eventually reside. Next, install macOS followed by Windows 10. Finally, install CentOS. Here, I would let CentOS create its own partitions (5 and 6) in the free space.

I do not know what your experience is with respect to installing operating systems. I can expand on this answer if necessary.


Can you Access the Versions menu while in fullscreen apps? In Lion, a document's version history is normally accessed by clicking the arrow next to a document's name in the title bar. However, the title bar does not appear when an app is put into fullscreen mode. Is it possible to access the Versions interface while in full screen?

Or am I completely missing something...

Oddly, and in my opinion, not a great solution by Apple from the user interface consistency standpoint, the answer is both Yes and No.

There are a limited number of fullscreen-enabled apps available at this time, but with the ones I tried (Pages, Keynote, and Preview), you cannot directly access the standard Versions interface while in fullscreen for the reason you mention: no access to the title bar. When the title bar is available, to get to Versions, you would normally click the arrow next to the document title and choose Browse All Versions.

However, in fullscreen mode, once you have saved a version (File > Save a Version), choosing File > Revert to Saved drops the app out of fullscreen, then invokes the Versions interface. It's the functional equivalent to choosing Browse All Versions from the title bar. Once you click the Done button in the Versions interface, the app returns you into fullscreen mode.


Why am I getting no sound from my Amazon WorkSpace? I'm connecting to Amazon WorkSpaces using the Amazon WorkSpaces Client version 3.0.4.964 but I'm not receiving any audio from the Windows VM. My sound works fine locally (I can play a YouTube video) but when I play the same video in a browser in the WorkSpace, all I hear is silence. I'm using a Bluetooth headset, if that makes a difference. I'm also trying to use a microphone and camera, and those don't seem to be available in the Windows VM either.

How can I troubleshoot sound delivery from my Amazon WorkSpace? Is there something I need to configure in macOS sound settings?

I'm running macOS 10.15.3 (Catalina) on my MacBook Pro.

Amazon WorkSpaces client uses a Teradici Virtual Audio Driver which is initialized with the system Sound settings when the connection is first opened. Whatever Sound device was selected in System Preferences when the connection was established will continue to be the sound device for as long as the session was open.

In my case, I had to disconnect the WorkSpaces client, change the system Sound settings to use my bluetooth headset, then reconnect to WorkSpaces to get my sound working on the bluetooth headset.


Installing SSD to non retina 2012 macbook pro via recovery menu I have a 13" 2012 non-retina MacBook Pro that I intend on upgrading with a Samsung Evo 850 SSD. I have watched some tutorials and for the most part, I think I know what to do on the hardware side of things but I have two questions for the software side after the disk has been successfully installed.

Question 1. Can I use the recovery menu (accessed by hitting command + r on boot) to both format, and install a version of MacOS?

Question 2. If so, do I need to initialize the disk before installing it? Or can I literally unbox the SSD, install it in my MBP, and then format/install MacOS via recovery?

What you do depends on how you want to setup your Mac. More specifically, do you want to just do a totally clean installation of macOS, or do you want to migrate your existing setup (including users/data) across to the SSD?

Regardless, you will need to format the SSD first. Probably the easiest way to proceed is to connect it to your Mac via an external enclosure and then use Disk Utility to format it.

If you haven't got an external enclosure (or another way to connect the SSD), then you could insert the SSD into the MacBook and opt to run macOS Recovery from the Internet. To do this, hold down OptionCommandR (or, if that doesn't work, try ShiftOptionCommandR).

NOTE: If you proceed this way then:

It may be worth you testing to make sure you can boot into macOS Recovery from the internet prior to going to the trouble of physically installing the SSD into your MacBook.
The only way to migrate all your data is if you have a Time Machine backup on an external disk (i.e. if you don't have a TM backup and want to keep your current setup, then you will need to either make a TM backup first, or have a way of connecting the SSD or the internal drive to your Mac for migrating the data across).

Regardless, once booted into macOS Recovery, run Disk Utility to format the SSD.

Once it’s formatted you can install macOS, but how you proceed will depend on how you want to setup your Mac. More specifically, do you want to just do a totally clean installation of macOS and then install software etc as you need, or do you want to migrate your existing setup (including users/data) from a Time Machine backup?

If you're planning to migrate data from a Time Machine backup, then take a look at How to use Time Machine to back up or restore your Mac.


Preview cannot display two different eps files with the same name simultaneously I am running OS X 10.9.5 on a 2010 Macbook Pro.  I have two eps files that I want to use Preview to view (Preview really converts the eps files to pdfs).  One file is ~/Research/images/test.eps and the other file is ~/Desktop/test.eps.  The first file displays sin(x), the second displays cos(x).

If I open the first file, it shows the correct plot (i.e. sin(x)).  Now if I open the second file (keeping the first open), the second plot correctly displays cos(x). However, the first instance of test.pdf automatically changes from sin(x) to cos(x). When I was using OS X 10.6.8, this never happened.

This makes it very difficult to compare plots (with the same name).  Is there a setting I can change or a way around this?

You might want to use and Open two instances of Preview at once.

  Unfortunately, Preview (like most Mac OS X applications) lets you have
  just one instance of a file open at a time. But there’s a way around
  that restriction.

  The open command line program accepts a parameter -n that allows it to
  launch the application again, even if it’s already running. So, if
  you’re currently viewing file.pdf in Preview, enter open -n file.pdf
  in Terminal. (You’ll need to supply the full and complete path to the
  file, of course; the easiest way to do that is to type in open -n,
  then drag the file from the Finder to the Terminal command line.)
  Another instance of Preview will launch, complete with its own Dock
  icon, with the PDF document open.


OS X 10.11.5 hangs occasionally for 30 seconds for multitasking, gestures and the Dock Since a few weeks (maybe since updating from 11.3) my system (MacBook Pro Retina 13" 16 GB RAM) hangs for about 30 seconds every now and then. I am able to use the app where the focus is on, e.g. browser but I can not use the Dock or multitask or use any gestures.

I have already tried to reinstall OS X from Recovery HD. Surprisingly the system downloaded OS X and installed it, but it is not a "clean" install. All my apps and settings are still here ... and the problem as well.

What could be the reason for it and how could I track it down to fix it?

Don't worry, it's not just you. Many Mac users are experiencing this same issue, including me. It is thought to be a bug in 10.11.4 and I suggest you upgrade to 10.11.5 or downgrade (if you have a backup) to 10.11.3.

In my case, I haven't had an issue or a freeze since I upgraded to 10.11.5. It works great.

See: http://www.macrumors.com/2016/05/13/macbook-pro-system-freezes-os-x-10-11-4/


Use a custom version of clang in Xcode I installed the recent version of clang (to /usr/local/). How do I set up Xcode to use this and not the built-in version of clang?

This is a copy of my answer on StackOverflow: How can I force Xcode to use custom compiler?.

  People say it is possible with custom toolchains. I didn't make a research on them because easier solution worked well for me:

    It is also possible to run frontend plugins directly by setting appropriate "build settings" of Xcode. (Several ways to do this, you can set them on the command line for instance: xcodebuild build FOO=bla.) Here are a few build settings that I found useful to inject C flags:

    OTHER_CFLAGS, OTHER_CPLUSPLUSFLAGS or to replace the compiler(s) and linker(s):

    CC, CPLUSPLUS, LD, LDPLUSPLUS, LIBTOOL

    The same approach works to control the "analyze" action: CLANG_ANALYZER_EXEC, CLANG_ANALYZER_OTHER_FLAGS

    Disclaimer: some of those build settings are undocumented (afaik). Use at your own risk.

  (Taken from [cfe-dev] Compile/refactor iOS Xcode projects)

  For me it was enough to define the following User-Defined Settings in Build Settings of Xcode projects:

  CC=my-c-compiler

  CXX=my-cxx-compiler

  LIBTOOL=my-linker-for-static-libraries


Save and restore data with command line I will zip a file with a password. Then, I will write a script and ask:

if (have the password saved) {
   unzip file
} else {
    ask password
    save password
    unzip file
}

I want the user write only one time password in that computer. So what is the best program to save and restore a data. Use a file is too obvious, it will be a little more secure.

My AppleScript-fu isn't up to the task of providing you with the necessary code, but I think you're most likely to find the solution by leveraging the Keychain.


Can the Macbook Pro drive two Ultra HD monitors at 60FPS each? I'm referring to the 2015 Macbook Pro, 15-inch, with the AMD Radeon R9 M370X with 2GB GDDR5 memory. Can this drive two Ultra HD monitors (3840 x 2160) at 60FPS each? If so, would you be able to simultaneously use the built-in display?

To be clear, I'm referring to SST (single-stream transport) monitors, not MST (multi-stream transport).

You'd have to plug each monitor into a Thunderbolt port, since HDMI supports only 30FPS. Are both Thunderbolt ports on different Thunderbolt buses, or the same? In the latter case, there may not be enough bandwidth.

According to this document https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204154 The MacBook Pro (15-inch and 17-inch, Early 2011) and later have Thunderbolt2 and can handle two thunderbolt displays (2560x1440).

According to this document https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202856 The MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Late 2013 and later) can handle one MST 4K display at 60Hz.

You can run one 4K monitor off of the Thunderbolt display at 60z and a second off HDMI at 30Hz. the two thunderbolt ports are connected. Once you try to connect a second 4K monitor to the other port, you will go over the bandwidth and the second monitor will go dark.


Applescript sub-procedure problem I would like to display a comma-delimited list of values in a List.  Unfortunately, I get an error that reads Microsoft Outlook got an error: Can’t continue joinList. when I attempt to use the sub-procedure that performs the join:

tell application "Microsoft Outlook"
  ...
  set addressList to {}
  repeat with theAddress in the theAddresses
    if addressList does not contain (address of theAddress) then
      set addressList to addressList & (address of theAddress)
    end if
  end repeat

  display dialog joinList(addressList, ";") <-- error here
  ...
end tell

on joinList(aList, delimiter)
    set retVal to ""
    set prevDelimiter to AppleScript's text item delimiters
    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to delimiter
    set retVal to aList as string
    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to prevDelimiter
    return retVal
end joinList

What am I doing wrong?

The code should have been:

display dialog my joinList(addressList, ";")


How to send music to one output device, all other sounds to phones? I would like to send music (Spotify app) to the Bluetooth speakers but keep all other sounds (notifications, etc) on the earphones.
Is this possible?
From what I can find online I need a 3rd party app (can't do it from the OS).
Most of the results are about sending all audio to multiple outputs, thus creating the output aggregate device using audio midi setup built-in app.
Version: MacOs Catalina 10.15.5

Unless anyone can come up with a freeware solution, SoundSource is your best bet. It's about $£€ 30, depending on local tax.


Installing Xcode with iOS 4.3 device simulator? I installed Xcode 4.3.1 two days ago. I need to access the iOS 4.3 device simulator, but it is not available in the new Xcode. So I went to Xcode > Preferences > Download (tab) and downloaded the Xcode 4.3.1 developer library and the iOS 5.1 library, hoping I could add the 4.3 simulator.

But, this hasn't worked. So far I haven't got the 4.3 simulator installed on my Xcode. What is the solution for this?

The option to download iOS 4.3 simulator is available from within Xcode. You can find it under Preferences > Downloads. Just click on "Install" and you might have to enter your Apple ID credentials.

If you don't see this option, you could try removing your older versions of Xcode and installing the latest one from the Appstore. My version is 4.3.2.


Login Screen Background 'squeezed' The login screen seems to be 'squeezed' into the lower left corner.  Not sure what event caused this to happen.  Macbook Air, El Capitan 10.11.6

What is the root cause of the problem and how can this be corrected?

It's probably a result of the background image not being the same size as your display. I didn't know why we were supposed to scale the image to match exactly, but that looks like the reason.

Try scaling (and cropping, if necessary) the image to the exact pixel size of your display. (GIMP is a very good tool for this.) If you don't know the exact size of the display, for example if you have a Retina display,  > About This Mac will tell you.


Text messages/website displayed on MAC I'm currently going through a divorce, and I do not want my text messages or browser history showing up on my wife's (used to be our) Mac from my iPhone.  I'm not hiding anything, but since we are no longer together she does not need to know what is going on in my life.  Since I don't have access to the computer, how can I turn off this feature?

It sounds like you want to remotely prevent the Mac (which your wife has in her possession) from receiving additional data.

On your iPhone, go to Settings > Messages > Text Message Forwarding, and turn off forwarding for the Mac.
Source: http://www.macworld.com/article/2997176/software-web/how-to-remove-old-devices-from-text-forwarding-on-an-iphone.html

To stop browser history from syncing across devices, also sign the Mac out of your iCloud account. You can do this by signing into https://www.icloud.com/, visiting Settings, and removing the Mac from My Devices.

You may also want to change your iCloud account's password, which you can access via the iCloud account settings (Apple ID > Manage).


Mac Vanilla Menu Bar App - How can I move the icon around? This is my current menu bar. The little caret at the far left is the Vanilla app hiding some icons. Works great, but I want to move the caret all the way to the right. Is there a way to do that? Using command + drag is not working.

Thanks in advance!

Hold down the command key and move the app around wherever you like!
At least in my case. It may not work for you from your description.


"Buy me a coffee" as in-app purchase? Does Apple tolerate a "buy me a coffee" feature as In-App purchase ?

Yes. This kind of 'donation' IAP is fine and approved by Apple.
This has always been possible, but Apple also clarified this with an update to the App Store Guidelines in February 2021:

3.1.1: Clarified how apps can enable customers to “tip” developers: “Apps may use in-app purchase currencies to enable customers to “tip” the developer or digital content providers in the app.”

For an example of an app which uses this, see Pedometer++ (an app promoted by Apple on numerous occasions) which uses three donation IAPs of different values to allow users more control over the quantity of their donation—also allowed.


NUMBERS Is it possible to select all the cells that share the same background colour on an existing table? I have a large(ish) table, which is 75 rows, and 120 columns. so, 9000 cells. They are all empty of data, but some of them have their background fill set to Colour A, and some have it set to Colour B.

I would like to be able to select all the cells that are currently showing as Colour A cells, and change their background fill in one go, rather than have to sit for hours on end, manually selecting the cells individually.

Is this possible, or do I have a long night ahead?

You should be able to Select All the cells in the sheet, then in the Format Sidebar,  click the Cell tab. Then in the Fill section of the sidebar, click the color well, then select a fill option. It will say Multiple Fills. You should be able to select No Fill and delete all background (fill) colors:


Is it safe to thin out Time Machine backups by deduplicating files? When I move a large file between folders, I notice that Time Machine takes a long time on the next hourly backup. Apparently, it is quite stupid and considers a file move just like a deletion and an addition of a completely new file...

Since my backups are getting quite large, I'd like to shrink them by removing duplicate files across the backup sets. Would it be safe to simply run fdupes or a similar program on the backup sets? If not, would it be reasonable to instead use some custom script that replaces each found dupe with a hardlink to the duped file?

No, you cannot run most deduplicator applications on a time-machine backup.

Time machine makes extensive use of hard-links internally. Any application that is not aware of this will find hundreds or thousands of false duplicates (which are really hard-links to the same file), and proceed to hose your time machine backup. Apple also seems to do some filesystem-specific stuff in the backup too, which is why it needs to be on a HFS+ volume (either a entire drive, or a .sparseimage on a network share).

A lot of the complexity within the time machine mechanism is poorly or undocumented entirely, and if you break something, time machine will simply not work, without any meaningful documentation. If your deduplicator is hard-link aware, it may work, but it has equal chances of hosing something, from which you cannot recover.

Really, there does not seem to be any decent tools for managing time-machine images, unfortunately.


Mac mini server A1347 can't use Wi-Fi during setup My ex-collegue just passed on a Mac mini Server to me and said it needed an OS. So I start it with Command-R, and then it asks me for Wi-Fi connection.

I am on my University network, so I can connect with my staff account or eduroam. However, none of those are in the list of detected networks. They have fine range though and all my other Mac/Unix machines in my office have no problem.

So I tried adding a new network: I type eid and I have a box for password, however, not for username. All the networks here require both username and password.

Is there any way around this?

--update--

I can connect to my iPhone as a hotspot, but I can't possibly share as much data as needed for the setup as my bill would be too high.

So I figure, I'd share my MacBook connection through USB with my iPhone, but it says: Your Internet connection cannot be shared because it is protected by 802.1X.

Maybe this reveals some info about the Wi-Fi connection here and why the setup is not detecting it.

There is no (reasonable) way around this. Basically, what's going on is that the firmware's network stack isn't smart enough to do 802.1X authentication (which is what's used for "enterprise" Wi-Fi authentication with both username and password). It can only do "personal" Wi-Fi authentication (network password, no username) an open networks (no captive portals either -- they require a browser). And ethernet, of course.

As for resharing the network (e.g. from your Mac) there's no technical reason this can't be done, but there's an extremely good practical one: 802.1X authentication implies a relatively high-security network, and particularly one where the network admins want to be able to tell who's connected where and when. Resharing such a network connection would open a hole in the network security, as well as potentially allowing untraceable and probably unauthorized people to connect to the network. From a security policy perspective, this would be very very bad. So macOS doesn't allow it.

Possible solutions: Can you get access to the campus network over ethernet? If so, you could use that (unless it also requires 802.1X authentication, but that's rare). If not, you're going to have to take the Mac Mini somewhere else to get an Internet connection it can use.

Another possible solution is to download the macOS installer app to your MacBook (in the App Store), then use DiskMaker X to make a bootable installer disk (you need an erasable USB flash drive at least 8GB), then boot the Mini from that. This might need a network connection, but as long as the installer is for the latest version of macOS, it should only need to check for & download the latest firmware for the Mini -- your iPhone hotspot should be able to handle that.


Where is the folder with color schemes used by vim? I use vi on mac os x at work and on Ubuntu at home. I like the colorscheme vim uses on the mac and I'd like to copy the corresponding file on ubuntu, but I can't find it, since there's no ~/.vim folder.
Searching on the web I always find the answer "create it", but this is not the point, since I just want to see (and copy) an already installed colorscheme.

I found the answer  here: color scheme's and syntax' files can be found in /usr/share/vim/.


Keyboard shortcuts for "Straighten" in iPhoto? If you've used iPhoto for photo retouching, you probably know the Straighten functionality.

My question is, are there any keyboard shortcuts for rotating the photo, or is mouse & the slider the only way? Any other useful tips regarding this are of course also welcome.

It can be somewhat slow and awkward to do this with mouse/trackpad for each photo (especially if your mouse is not the most accurate one, like my Logitech bluetooth mouse). In iPhoto '09 they made matters worse by removing the small buttons next to the slider that you could click to rotate by one step (0.1 degrees).

You can press the S key to activate the straighten tool. And the return key will save any changes. Unfortunately, I am not sure how to control the slider in order to actually make a change using the keyboard.


Xcode Error: Unable to install app (Error Code: Code: -402620383) I am using my free Apple developer account (Apple ID) for learning to develop iOS apps with Xcode. My iOS version is 13.5 and I am running Xcode 11.5 on Mac Catalina version 10.15.4.

I created a simple app that prints some text on the screen on my iPhone X, and when I tried to run the app, Xcode returned an error:

  "Unable to install app", error code: -402620383.

When I clicked for more details, I got a more detailed description of the error:

  "The maximum number of apps for free development profiles has been reached."

After much search on the Internet, I tried the following fixes and none of these worked:

Creating a new Apple ID and link that to Xcode.
Unpaired my iPhone X/deleted the provisioning profiles in windows/devices in Xcode.
Checked in the windows/devices and simulators and there were no apps installed.

The interesting thing is that I tried running the app on my wife's iPhone X (running iOS 13.5 as well) and it worked. Digging a little deeper, I noticed device management under settings/general is missing in my iPhone but present in my wife's iPhone. The profile of the app I was trying to install in device management. Maybe that is the cause of the problem. I really don't know what to do and would appreciate help on this, thanks!

It is a very hot issue with the new update of Catalina.
To be very precise the issue is with the manually signing of the provisioning profile. If you check Automatically manage signing it works.