How can I disable the HD4000 integrated graphics card on a MacBook Pro? HD 4000 on my MacBook Pro shared 512 MB RAM from my main memory, which is calculated as part of kernel_task.

My question is simple, is there a way to disable it, stopping it from taking up 512 MB of memory and just use the 650M in all situation.

I can of course not use it with the option under Energy Saver, but that doesn't return the precious memory it steals.

Any idea will be appreciated, I am thinking sysctl?

EDIT July, 2013

Things just got worse as I now see HD 4000 taking not 512 MB but 1024 MB out of my main memory. I am not sure if I was wrong the last time around but it is definitely a bigger issue now.

EDIT 2 July, 2013

The 1024 MB report from both System Profiler and About This Mac seems to be flawed. After reminded by Bart Arondson to look at Activity Monitor. It still just takes up about 512 MB. My guess is that the shared memory part is dynamically adjusted, I will try to dig deeper.

Use gfxCardStatus - it lets you choose which graphic card to use.


Upgraded my HDD to SDD. Can boot successfully via USB but will not boot when in MBP I have a late 2011 macbook pro. I decided to upgrade to SSD. Here are the steps I took:

Connected SSD via USB
Formatted using MAC OS Extended Journaled (using disk utility)
Cloned HDD to SSD using Carbon Copy Cloner (during this clone, I was prompted to create a recover partition which I did)

I then rebooted (holding CMD + R) to select my new SSD as the boot up drive. This worked fine. To test this fully I created some files on the desktop and restarted several times switching between SSD and HDD to verify that I was actually booting up into SSD.

I can boot up via SSD with the HDD in the MBP and SSD connected via USB. But when I remove the replace the HDD with my SSD and power it on, all I see is the apple logo and the spinning wheel forever. For some reason, I cannot boot up when it has been fitted inside.

Any ideas why this may be?

Edit:

Further on from this, I can't boot into the recovery partition and I have also cloned the them switched around (SSD internal, HDD on USB). This cloned fine but still presented me with the same problems. Attached is the CMD+V output from booting up with SSD inside.

Thank you for all the responses. I believe I have tried everything and have lost count of how many time I have switched the drives, formatted and reinstalled the Lion.

I figured out the problem, in the end, it turned out to be a problem with the firmware. The firmware on the drive was not compatible with late 2011 MBP and needed to be downgraded. After downgrading the firmware to 0309 it worked like a treat!

Thank you for all the responses, most appreciated. I hope this helps some people out.


Switch to another app's active window only Command+Tab and Command+Shift+Tab - toggles between apps

Command+` and Command+Shift+` - toggles between windows of the currently active app

Is there a way to switch to another app but only to the most recently active window (so that it doesn't dredge up the rest of the app's windows)?

I have multiple windows open for some apps and having this would be very handy especially if I have one has limited screen space.

If not available, is there a way to create such a shortcut through System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts > App Shortcuts for all applications?

Thanks!

There seem to be two proprietary programs that do solve this problem, but there isn't a way to set it up yourself using a keyboard shortcut.

The two apps are Witch (as suggested by Buscar웃) and Contexts, in case someone wanted to check them both out. Witch costs $14, and Contexts costs $9.

I'm trying both to see which one fits my needs most as both offer a free trial.

http://manytricks.com/witch/

https://contexts.co


How do I access my private browsing history? I'm trying to recover some pages that I had open when my macbook (OSX 10.8.5) crashed.

Unfortunately I was using Opera (V30) in private browsing mode.
I've tried looking at my DNS cache - but not exactly sure how to read it. (I can't see the URLs in the text)

I've also looked at my router logs but can only find info like this:

May 9 00:39:27> PPPD Successfully Launched
May 9 00:39:32> pppd 2.4.3 started by root, uid 0

Just to let you know - I'm not trying to snoop on anyone, really just want to recover the pages I had open!

Here is a quote from a Wikipedia:

Privacy mode

  Privacy mode or "private browsing" or "incognito mode" is a privacy feature in some web browsers to disable browsing history and
  the web cache. This allows a person to browse the Web without storing
  local data that could be retrieved at a later date. Privacy mode will
  also disable the storage of data in cookies and Flash cookies. This
  privacy protection is only on the local computing device as it is
  still possible to identify frequented websites by associating the IP
  address at the web server.

You may try to find logs from any routing, filtering or tracking hardware or software inside your network, or from your Internet provider.


After resetting iOS 7, and having my volume disappear, how can I re-enable it? I just did a hard reset on my iPhone 4S by wiping the phone and restoring an iCloud backup. During that process, I used my iPad charger to make sure it stayed charged while it was being wiped and restored.

However, after the restore was complete and my phone was back up and running the volume control was gone. It was simply non-existent in Control Center, grayed out in Music.app, and the volume buttons didn't work. It looked like what happens when the phone is connected to a car stereo, for example. Interestingly, the ringer control in Settings -> Sounds, worked.

I have tried:

Rebooting the device
Playing music, and a video (which work through headphones, but not the speakers)
Tested Siri to confirm that it wasn't a hardware problem in the speakers actually malfunctioning.
Closed all apps, except one.
Tried testing sounds with an alarm app, which didn't play as well.

Any ideas on how I can fix this?

To fix this problem, I got my iPad charger (which was disconnected from any power source such as a wall outlet), and plugged it into my iPhone, and unplugged it twice. This process fixed the iPhone.


Why does iTunes think my SIM card is unsupported? I recently bought an unlocked iPhone 4 from the US. I live in the UAE. I had a normal SIM card and I cut it and installed it into iphone and it started working.

But when I tried to upgrade to the most recent iOS version using iTunes, at the end of the installation it says Your SIM card does not appear to be supported.

When I went to my carrier office they gave me SIM card which works in their iPhone (UAE) but it does not work in my iPhone (US).

I am worried about what happened to it. I bought it just one week back. Now I am not able to even start it; it's not detecting my SIM (which is working in other iPhone).

Any idea what the problem is? What should I do? Shoud I format it?

If the handset was unlocked using UltraSn0w, then you have completely removed it by updating the firmware to the latest version (Ultrasn0w only supports iOS 4.3.3). Worse yet, this has updated your baseband and that cannot be reverted even if you manage to downgrade the OS (unless you used Pwnage Tools or Sn0wbreeze as they can preserve the baseband during update). If this is indeed the case, you have now a locked phone to whatever carrier it was purchased under (AT&T) and you will have to talk to that carrier for a "hard" unlock.

To my knowledge, a "true" unlocked iPhone has no geographic limitations. As long as the network supports GSM phones (read: SIM cards), then there should be no problem.


Downgrade Apple TV to 7.5 I've recently updated my Apple TV (3rd generation), model A1469, to 7.6 (8130). But now it freezes when pausing YouTube videos. Others have the same problem. Here are some reports and discussions:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/251826984
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/251813632
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/251805180
https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/72724736

How can I downgrade to 7.5? Can I download Apple TV software 7.5 from an official Apple server?
The instructions on the first link above point to https://ipsw.me/product/AppleTV, but this is not an official Apple site.

I've downloaded Apple TV software 7.5 from https://ipsw.me/download/AppleTV3,2/12H885 and the Finder info says it was downloaded from http://updates-http.cdn-apple.com/2020/ios/061-27784-20200313-6EA1D1F6-A6E5-40CB-8C61-B9680241903C/, which apparently is an Apple server.


Background processes periodically eat up my CPU time on OS X 10.10.4, Yosemite Periodically the CPU on my iMac Mid-2015 running OS X 10.10.4, gets used almost exclusively by:

launchd: ~70%
fseventsd: 12%
UserEventAgent: ~40%
opendirectoryd: 20%
notifyd: 12%

I have tried quitting programs (e.g. Chrome, Outlook etc.) and no apparent process seems to be the culprit.  It seems to occur once an hour (at least it has done it 3 times in the last 3 hours) and each episode lasts ~10-30minutes.  It does not appear to be reproducible with any action that I take.

If I open Console.app, in system.log, there are many repeated errors, such as:

Aug  6 16:29:11 DREWGEHRYW13 com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.google.keystone.user.agent[60455]): Service setup event to handle failure and will not launch until it fires.`

These errors are not generated the entire time when this behavior is occurring, but it seems that they are written every few minutes (even when Chrome is closed).

In System Log Queries -> All Messages : There aren't any recent messages

Also, possibly related, I have experienced 2 kernel panics in the past week caused by launchd (or processes launched by it), but I will limit this question to solely the CPU issue for now.

What is causing this and how do I fix this?

Today, I checked Chrome and it states that

Version 43.0.2357.65(64-bit)
Update failed (error: 12)

It appears that my version is out of date by about 3 weeks.  So I believe that Chrome was periodically trying to frantically update and would subsequently fail.  I followed the recommendations of Google and attempted removing the appropriate files, but my version of Chrome would still not update.

I ended up uninstalling Chrome by dragging the icon from Applications to the trash and removing ~/Library/Google and /Library/Google (not sure why it is here also...).  I reinstalled Chrome and it appears that I now have the most up to date version of Chrome (44.0.2403.103) and I have yet to experience any of those errors or cooking of my cpu.  I have been at my desktop now for 4 hours, so hopefully this issue has been resolved.  I'll also see if I experience anymore kernel panics, hopefully these issues were related and both are resolved.


Can I use El Capitan on a MacBook that is shipped with Sierra? I just purchased late-2016 15' MacBook Pro, which is shipped with macOS Sierra as of now.

However, Karabiner, a software that I deeply use every day has a serious compatibility problem with macOS Sierra, and thus I couldn't work on the mac productively enough.

So I would like to use El Capitan on the new MacBook Pro if at all possible. At least I was able to restore my TimeMachine backup from El Capitan on the new mac. Is it possible to run El Capitan on a Mac that is shipped with a newer version in default?

Nope, the 2016 15-inch MacBook Pro can not run El Capitan. The oldest it can run is 10.12.1 (16B2659).

If you attempt to boot El Capitan, it will present you with the prohibitory symbol.


Does macOS support Ethernet over USB without a 3rd-party driver? As we all know, the MacBook and MacBook Pro do not have Ethernet ports.

Apple makes a Thunderbolt Ethernet adapter (which requires no driver), but with the change to USB Type-C, this is no longer an option without an additional adapter.

Now Apple sells a USB-C Ethernet adapter made by Belkin, but according to the reviews it appears it requires a 3rd-party driver. I've also looked around on Google about this and other adapters, and I'm getting conflicting information on support for Ethernet over USB without 3rd-party drivers.

Does macOS have the ability to support USB Ethernet adapters without 3rd-party drivers, or is searching for one a wild goose chase?

Yes - the vast majority of ethernet adapters work - especially USB-C since they are generally very new, a little more pricey and use fairly standard types of control chips and usb chips.
The Belkin you listed is both plug and play when the OS is booted, it also works at netboot from the hardware / EFI / firmware so it's truly driverless on the new Mac.

https://www.apple.com/shop/product/HJKF2ZM/A/belkin-usb-c-to-gigabit-ethernet-adapter

I personally am liking the Belkin adapters and all the thunderbolt 3 dock stations from the likes of OWC / Belkin / Elgato as well. Tripp lite and some others are on the market - but I've not had great durability of Tripp in a work setting, so the cost savings there aren't panning out over time over the higher end products for us. Light home use might be perfectly fine with less pricey adapters so YMMV.
Also - a general guideline if Apple is selling the adapters in their stores - they are likely best of the best. If they are selling them online, chances are they are best of the best or at least very good fit and need no drivers either.


Macbook Pro 2017 with 2 thunderbolt ports with triple monitor setup I currently have a macbook pro with 2 thunderbolt 3 ports and integrated graphic card and a belkin dock that I use for work, but can't get work done with just 1 monitor.
I have a triple 1080p monitor setup at home that uses VGA and/or HDMI and was wondering if there is anyway I can use all 3 monitors with my laptop. Please keep in mind that although the dock has 2 thunderbolt ports one is used to connect to the macbook and the other I need to use for my yubikey. So in total I only have 1 more thunderbolt port free (the one from the macbook).
Thank you guys!

Displays: 3 x https://support.hp.com/au-en/document/c05415696

Yubikey: https://www.yubico.com/product/yubikey-5c/

In order to get this setup working, you'll want to get the following:

2 x Thunderbolt 3 to HDMI cable
1 x DisplayPort to HDMI adapter-cable
1 x USB-A to USB-C adapter

You would connect the first monitor directly into the MacBook Pro using the Thunderbolt 3 to HDMI cable.

The second monitor connects to the dock's Thunderbolt 3 connector using the Thunderbolt 3 to HDMI cable.

The third monitor connects to the dock's DisplayPort connector using the DisplayPort to HDMI adapter-cable.

The YubiKey connects to one of the dock's USB ports using the USB-A to USB-C adapter.

Example products:

Thunderbolt 3 to HDMI cable:
https://www.amazon.com/uni-Thunderbolt-Compatible-MacBook-Pixelbook/dp/B075V5JK36

DisplayPort to HDMI adapter-cable:
https://www.amazon.com/AmazonBasics-DisplayPort-HDMI-Cable-Feet/dp/B015OW3M1W

USB-A to USB-C adapter:
https://www.amazon.com/ARKTEK-Adapter-Convert-Samsung-Aluminum/dp/B075R95QM7


Xcode: TAB key for indenting selection I hope that somebody here can suggest me a way to make the TAB key indent a text selection (i.e., could be multi-line and not just one line) in Xcode.

In Xcode preferences, I set TAB as the shortcut for the "Shift right" function but it does not work: instead of indenting, it deletes the text.

Thank you in advance for your help.

You can use BetterTouchTool to rebind TAB ⇥ key to ⌘ CMD+] only for Xcode.app. BetterTouchTool can be downloaded here. This is how this should look like:

 I've tested this and it works for me.


How do I use  instead of  in VIM? I have been searching for a while, but i still can't get it work.

I add :map <C-6> <C-1> or :map <C-1> <C-6> to '.vimrc', but it doesn't work.

If you use vim in iTerm 2, try to map control-1 to 0x1e (C-^).


Why does my MacBook audio output have no sound when connected to a stereo component? I have a problem with my MacBook Pro (10.5.8) - the audio output has no sound when connected to a stereo component, but when connected to small speakers it works fine. Internal speakers are working also. Does anyone have an idea?

You seem to have isolated the issue to the stereo component. If it expects line in signal, you might need a device like the Griffin iMic to provide line level sound.

Also, setting the volume lower might make the input low enough to not trip a protection on the stereo, but usually line level is higher than speaker/headphone level so that might not help at all.


Can’t connect to Time Capsule in recovery mode (Big Sur) I made a big mistake and updated some Python packages with Homebrew on my 2015 MacBook Pro, MacOS 11.0.1. The updates caused many issues with my preferred IDE, PyCharm. Of course, I made a backup on my Time Capsule prior to updating with Homebrew. So, after being frustrated and getting nowhere with PyCharm, I decided to restore from my backup. I entered into recovery mode by holding CMD + R while restarting. When I went to restore from backup, I could not connect to my Time Capsule. The prompt stated, “There was a problem connecting to the server.” Any ideas on how to get the MacBook to connect to the Time Capsule?

After over an hour on the phone with Apple, it was suggested I try to use Migration Assistant to restore from backup. That worked for me.
EDIT: While it did work, there was a major issue: While trying to run Python/Jupyter in PyCharm, I repeatedly get malware warnings that have to be manually suppressed, individually. I mean, every file associated with a Python package in the virtual environment seems to be identified as possible malware. I called Apple about the issue, but no one knew how to globally suppress the malware warnings. There are way too many files to manually suppress them all.
I found an alternative, create a new project in PyCharm, copy in Python/Jupyer files (not packages, but files I created), then add the packages needed to run everything.


How to resolve the ambiguity of sending iMessages to a person with multiple addresses? My friend's iphone keeps forgetting one of its iMessage addresses. Both the phone number and her email address are configured for iMessage but often the phone doesn't receive messages if they are sent to the email address. This often happens if she sends me message from the Messages app on her mac and I reply on my mac. Then she expects a reply on her phone but doesn't get it.  Is there a way I can configure my Messages app to always send to the phone number? I guess I could just delete her email address from her Contacts card but I don't really want to do that and it might not work anyway.

Tell your friend to go to Settings > Messages > Send & Receive.

By turning on the setting to receive from all of the email addresses, it shouldn't matter which address you send to. Your friend can also choose the phone to be their "Caller-ID" so they are sending as a mobile and not an email/AppleID.

You can also be sure to delete any conversations that aren't to the phone number so you reuse a thread to the cell as opposed to the email.


Transferring apps to new iPhone? I just got an iPhone 6, upgrading from the 5.

My main computer is a Mac Pro Running Snow Leo, and iTunes 11.4. I backed up the iPhone 5 and when I went to sync to the 6, I got a warning that it wants a higher level of iTunes. I went to the other Pro running Yosemite and iTunes 12 is there, so I backed up the 5 to that computer. The apps don't show up to add back to 6, nor does the 5 backup show to copy it over.

How do I get the apps to transfer? (If I need to transfer all of iTunes from the Snow Leo Mac to the Yosemite Mac, and just update iTunes in place, that's ok too. I'd just like a hint at the best method to get this new phone up and running)

Since iTunes won't back up the apps, I tried taking the files, e.g. Evernote 7.9.1.ipa, etc, and moving them from the iTunes 11 to iTunes 12.

When at the Yosemite machine running iTunes 12, a double click of the app loaded it to the folder where apps are stored and pulled it into iTunes to sync.

Now, I'll spend a bit of time and look at the old phone to see which apps I use and would like to keep. Just a click to load each one, at least not a search and download off the store.


How to clean install the macOS Catalina? I want to clean install the Catalina but there is Macintosh HD - Data so I'm confused to deal with this extra partition.

macOS Catalina runs on a dedicated, read-only system volume called
  Macintosh HD. This volume is completely separate from all other data
  to help prevent the accidental overwriting of critical operating
  system files. Your files and data are stored in another volume named
  Macintosh HD - Data. In the Finder, both volumes appear as Macintosh
  HD.
  https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210650

Then, these are the procedure.

Click the Macintosh HD - Data (1) then click the minus above the Volume (2)

Click the Macintosh HD (1) then click the Erase (2)

The rest is the same as usual.

Copy right of the images: https://qiita.com/PaSeRi/items/59e9785580dbd518ac93


Use Quicklook to see the Content of .JSON files? Currently, I can use the space bar to preview a number of files such as .txt, .css, .html etc in Quick Look.  I cannot, however, see the actual contents of a .json file.

Is there any possible way to see the contents of .json files through space bar preview in finder?
(I'm Using OSX 10.8.4)

also installable via

brew cask install qlstephen


How to correctly handle two different versions running commands from Terminal? I've download ctags from Homebrew, which was installed in /usr/local/bin/ctags. Currently I have an older version of 'ctags' which is located in /usr/bin/ctags/.

I want the new version to be the default when executing ctags via the Terminal.

How can that be achieved?

The safest way is to make sure /usr/local/bin comes before /usr/bin in your $PATH variable.


Does VSCode have Full Disk Access via Terminal? I can use the terminal in VSCode and the terminal has Full Disk Access, so does VSCode have Full Disk Access?
Can VSCode and extensions run terminal commands?

That is a mix of misconceptions.
You do not run Terminal in VSCode. Vscode calls macOS to request macOS to launch Terminal. So VSCode does not have Full Disk Access that way.
VSCode also can run command line tools directly not via Terminal. These tools might need Full Disk Access which I think can is done by giving VSCode Full Disk Access.
VSCode also might need Full Disk Access to access files in various different places on the disk.
Except for a few special cases for an App to get Full Disk Access requires the user to manually give it. This is via System Preferences->Security & Privacy -> Full Disk Access
Note I don't use VSCode at the moment but this is the setup for my programming editors.


iPhone 7 is not showing notifications for a incoming messages in Messages application I have iPhone 7 running iOS 11.2.5

iMessages (Messages) application is not displaying any notifications for the messages that is coming from bank.

I checked all the settings for notifications and messages app. All of them are enabled.

Some threads on Apple Community forums says that you need to disable bluetooth.

I don't know. Anyone is facing the same issue?

If your iPhone’s date or time is incorrect, that could be the reason why you aren’t getting notifications or alerts promptly.


Homebrew in bash profile I'm having an issue with my bash profile on my mac.  Given the following from my .bash_profile

FOO="$(brew --prefix coreutils)/libexec/gnubin"
BAR="$(brew --prefix ruby)/bin"
BAZ="$(brew --prefix python)/bin"

The first line successfully completes, but the two following lines print the following error when I start terminal

-bash: brew: command not found

When I run brew --prefix ruby or brew --prefix python at the command line after terminal starts, it prints out their respective paths.

Can anybody figure this out?

The brew command is in /usr/local/bin, so you need to ensure that you either use the full path to brew in your commands, i.e. /usr/local/bin/brew or you need to set your PATH environment variable in your profile before using brew, e.g.:

export PATH=/usr/local/bin:$PATH


Where are the pmset settings saved? In which path exactly are the pmset settings saved?  The manpage says it's stored here.  However, I couldn't find any settings there.

The macOS Energy Saver preference file is stored
at:
/Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/com.apple.PowerManagement.plist

/Library/Preferences/com.apple.PowerManagement.plist
I recommend EasyFind to track down system files, as Spotlight won't search them. It doesn't index, so it's slower, but if it's there, it will find it.


Macbook Air: Model of 2013 or 2014? New apple user here,

I found this Macbook Air model:
http://www.ispot.ma/index.php/mac-15/macbook-air/macbook-air-md760.html

When I did a search about the Serial Order (MD760F/A), I couldn't find it!

My Question:
How to identify this model?

Thank you in advance!

What you have here is a model number, not a "Serial Oder".

You can look up Mac model numbers here, for example:
http://www.everymac.com/ultimate-mac-lookup/?search_keywords=MD760F%2FA


Macbook Pro - bottom part of the screen partly mirrors the top Making the computer sleep will remove this symptom for a while.
Tried disabling hardware acceleration (GPU) via setting or gSwitch, resetting SMC and PRAM/NVRAM, and rebooting. Apple diagnostics has not been identifying any issues.

Wow - unless you’re sure it’s software, I would get it to Apple Service for a look. One method to perform a quick check is boot to recovery - hold option and R. If the firmware screen is broken, you know it’s GPU / CPU.
If the firmware screen is perfect, you would want to back up and then perform an erase install. It’s possible hardware failure could happen only when all graphic drivers are fully loaded and optimized / accelerated.


Setup up Kaleidoscope as external diff tool in IntelliJ? I want to change the diff tool to an external one in IntelliJ Idea (basically in Android Studio).

I get this message:

  Can"t Launch Diff Tool
  Cannot run program "/Applications/Kaleidoscope.app": error=12, Permission denied

Permissions of the file:

$ ls -l | grep Kalei*
drwxr-xr-x   3 paschalis  admin  102 Jan 17 07:52 Kaleidoscope.app

What am I doing wrong?
I also removed the "@" / quarantine tag, Kaleidoscope had, but still nothing!

Let Kaleidoscope install it's command-line tool ksdiff (Menu - Kaleidoscope - Integration). Then use /usr/local/bin/ksdiff as "Path to executable" in the Jetbrains IDE. This works for me with PyCharm.


A good (and inexpensive) images manager for Mac? I'm dealing with a huge variety of image files (photos, vectors, icons, cliparts, etc.).

I've organized them in folders and subfolders, in order to find theproper sort of image, but I don't find a good way to quickly get what I need.

I've tried following solutions:

iPhoto
Picasa
Adobe Bridges
ACDSee

All of them have some kind of issue that I will resume here:

Unable to show all sort of iles (e.g.: if ti shows pictures, it doesn't show vector images, like .ai files)
Unable to handle a library (only browsing through the filesystem)
Unable to retrieve metadata (and therefore take advantage of an hypothetical search engine)
Unable to handle separated libraries (iPhoto and Picasa creates a single library, mixed with all images: personal and for work can't be spearated, unless using tags or folders)
Unable to display a single stream images (filtered or not filtered): they only shows the current folder/album files

I know that probably Lightroom and other (expensive) products would solve my problem, but they are meant for more than that. Instead, I just want to find a media library that only makes my life easier when looking for an image.

I've found a couple of questions here in that makes similar questions, but none of them really matches my needs (and anyway, the answer's always iPhoto, Picasa or some adobe products).

By the way, I've tried with Adobe Bridges because I have a free Adobe Elements license (so, no Lightroom).

Well, you could try some sort of "anything bucket" like DevonThink or Yojimbo, as those should be pretty capable of handling the search and metadata parts, but I think those might be tad bit overkill if you only want to use it for images.

I am not sure how powerful the image managing part is, as I mostly use the conversion and editing tools, but GraphicConverter has some image managing parts built into it and might be worth a try:

http://www.lemkesoft.com/content/188/graphicconverter.html

As I said, it mostly is a conversion and light editing tool, but since it is an old-school shareware program, you can try it out for free to see if it suits your taste. In that case, I would recommend trying out both version 6 and 7, as 7 was a complete rewrite and as far as I know has not yet full feature parity with the older version.


GBoard always starts lagging / crashing after ios update I have an iphone XS, and have been using GBoard since I got the phone a year ago with no problem.

Recently I upgraded to ios 13, and I've noticed GBoard having issues ever since.

Frequently when I open an app, gboard does not appear, and instead the default english keyboard appears (I have gboard set as primary). When I click the change keyboard button, I have to cycle through all my keyboards multiple times before gboard actually shows up. The first few cycles, gboard will appear for a split second before crashing and going back to the default english keyboard again.

Previously, I had an iphone 7S, which had the exact same symptom. GBoard was working perfectly until I did an OS upgrade, and then it started crashing the exact same way. It gradually got worse with each OS upgrade until it became completely unusable.

The assumption you're making is that the problems you're having are related to the upgrade to iOS 13.

Now, while this assumption may be correct, it's also the case that around the same time iOS 13 was released, Google also updated Gboard to v 2.3.0 and, not long after, to 2.3.1. In other words, not only did the version of iOS change, but also the version of Gboard.

As a troubleshooting step it would be good to test the latest version of Gboard on an iPhone that's not running iOS 13. I do appreciate, however, that's not necessarily an option for you.

So, what I'd try is totally removing Gboard from your iPhone and then re-installing it from scratch.

Removing Gboard

Open Settings
Go to General > Keyboard > Keyboards
At top right, tap Edit
In the list tap on Remove next to Gboard

Re-installing Gboard

Download Gboard from the App Store
Configure Gboard as per your preferences (keyboard, full access, etc)

Now test to see if that's helped to alleviate the situation.


In Apple Mail, is there a keyboard command to shift focus from a message to the message list In my usual review of email, I have the message preview pane open and use the keyboard to delete, archive, or skip messages with the focus in the message list.  Sometimes I want to click a link in in an email.  When I'm finished with that, I usually switch back to Mail using ⌘-Tab.  In that case it takes a mouse/trackpad gesture to put the focus back in the message list.  Normally, I would expect to be able to use ⌥-Tab to shift focus between the panes, but instead, the focus moves to individual items in the toolbar and skips the message list.  What am I missing?

On macOS Mojave, tab cycles between Mailbox list, message list, message and search bar.


Horipad Ultimate Local Multiplayer on tvOS I have two HORIPAD Ultimate controllers and would like to set them up for local multiplayer games on tvOS.

Both controllers pair to the AppleTV (4k), but they always both join in the same "position". They both have the leftmost LED lit to indicate player position 1. When paired this way, both controllers give input to the same player. None of the games with local multiplayer seem to trigger the event to "see" a second controller for activating a second player.

Is there some trick to get one controller to join in position 2?

Did you try clearing pairing and re-pairing?

"To clear all pairings, hold the Bluetooth button and the MENU button together for at least 5 seconds"

See also all the apple TV requirements here and the troubleshooting section at the end.


Should I be concerned if my charger is earthed (grounded) or not? Depending on when you bought your Macbook and from whom you will either get a 2 prong duckhead connector or a 3 prong grounded connector.

I noticed the three-prong grounded connector is well grounded.  When is this a benefit(besides of obviously be longer).  Also should I be concerned at times when there is no ground?  I believe is actually grounded according to these pictures https://i.stack.imgur.com/UZndk.jpg https://i.stack.imgur.com/9ByBt.jpg

All Power Supplies must meet 4 critieria

1) Safety; for Hipot, leakage to earth and other things.
2) EMI compatibility
3) meet product requirements for  AC-DC or AC-RF mobile charger
4) Low Cost
Will they fail from a 6kV lightning transient?

possibly (especially in Florida) but not 2~3kV according to regional product power standards in an area protected with line lightning arrestors

Are you safe from secondary breakdown and getting zapped
yes if they are compliant and there are no manufacturing defects.
all manufacturers are only required to do 100% Hipot and leakage tests but not EMI tests

What about EMI?

It is well defined in most countries but with the flooded online aftermarket of 3rd party power adapters, it's a gray zone.

The 3rd party or aftermarket chargers like OEM's are self-regulated and are not tested with every target device as OEM's are required to do. So compatibility with load noise and switcher noise may vary if the step load rates happen to interfere under some load condition. So hypothetically it may become a source of EMI if not an OEM supply or may not have the smart communication signals over DC power to identify the match to the target device.

Radio and power line conducted interference requirements are well specified for consumer and commercial equipment.

Susceptibility has long been a corporate standard and then included in CE standards.  The RF standard levels  are shown in a graph below. But there are more tests for Hipot, leakage current to ground wire , ESD damage and sometimes a few more. ( coke spill test, drop test, temp rise test, short circuit test)

Beside converting AC to DC which usually generates a lot fast rise time current pulses, the purpose is to  minimize this "egress" going out and "ingress from power line transients (PLT) and lightning noise.

There are many methods to this AC-DC conversion.  Long ago bricks just pumped high pulse currents just after a bridge rectifier peak voltage that had to be sustained until the next half cycle. These were notorious for causing external mic buzz issues on some 3rd party desk mics for laptops and even towers with ATX 50kHz SMPS converters.  The converters didn't radiate that far but far enough to be picked up by an unbalanced desktop mic plugged into an ungrounded mobile laptop or even a grounded desktop. Usually ok, but some were caused a buzz.

This is due the common mode stray EMI coupling into an unbalanced high impedance mic( or radio or other elctronic device nearby) and the receiving cable converts the CM noise into a differential voltage due to unbalanced impedance on signal vs ground.

The most common solution is a 2 way Pi Filter , sometimes in two stages. The winding balance is critical and the Y caps to earth ground are plastic high quality and rated for lightning transients for breakdown safety.

Now you have notied that many mobiles with low power mobiles e.g. iPhones, iPads do not use 3 pronged plugs.  Instead they higher frequency Ac-DC converters where the CM noise can be absorbed in the lossy ferrite CM choke instead of being shunt from CM choke to earth ground.

Emission levels

An example of some 2 pronged AC-DC noise filters ( PLT protection not shown)

This does not mean ALL 2 pronged mobile chargers are compliant to conducted/radiated ingress/egress but many are such as Apple's.

So don't be worried. Just be aware of the requirements and possible EMI and susceptibility to damage or interference from lightning or power line transients and changes to local standards in your country.

Just beware of of the requirements and 3rd party chargers that have not been certified with your equipment.  It may be OK, so trust  but verify or don't trust.

Your choice.

edit

Content References: all from my experience as an EE since 1975 doing R&D, Test Eng , CMS and EMI testing.

Image references: https://interferencetechnology.com/practical-reasons-for-shifting-to-the-application-of-dielectric-independent-emi-filters-with-integral-surge-protection-in-product-designs/


Cancel A Specific Reminder for App Store Update I have a Mac Mini server. I bought it with Mountain Lion OSX and Server 2.2.2.

I do not use my mac mini as a server anymore, I just use it as a desktop and use a NAS for my local server. I did not want to pay for the upgrade to Server.app version 3.

The app store keeps reminding me there is an update for the Apple server program but when I tried to update it it told me I'm not eligible for it because I don't have Mavericks OS, the most current OS version. The update reminder for the server app has been up there for a couple of weeks and I'd like it to go away.

Is there any way to cancel the update reminder for this one specific update that I am not eligible for? I do not want to turn off the service completely cause I still want to know about updates for all my other programs/apps.

Mavericks is free and doesn't cost anything to update to.  If you are satisfied with staying at Mountain Lion you can ignore any update for server.app version 3 by opening terminal.app and running..

softwareupdate --list

to get the full name of the update and then run..

softwareupdate --ignore <label>

If you due end up running the free upgrade to Mavericks you can clear any updates you ignored by running..

softwareupdate --reset-ignored


iTunes 12: How to cycle through View Options with script/shortcut? I'm trying to writing an applescript that cycles through Songs, Albums, Artists, Composers, Genres, and back to Songs.

There is nothing in applescript Dictionary with regards to this, so I have to resort to UIscripting/Accessibility. This is what I have so far:

tell application "System Events" to tell process "iTunes"

    set frontmost to true -- necessary
    delay 1 -- for last line to take effect, delete if you bind this to keyboard shortcut

    tell window 1 -- tell window "iTunes" only works when in fullscreen

        tell pop up button 2 to perform action "AXPress" -- equivalent of
        --keystroke "j" using {command down}

        tell UI element 1 of row 5 of table 1 of pop over 1 of pop up button 2 to perform action "AXPress"
        -- pressing Genres button, assuming Vies is not in Genres already, of course

    end tell
end tell

You can run this with Script Editor, or preferably for the purpose of the rest of this question, bind it to a keyboard shortcut and invoke it while in iTunes. When you run this, you see the pop up menu flash on your screen, right?

Now, here is the interesting part: Use your cursor to click the pop up button, move down and position the cursor on Artists.

The cursor itself is omitted by OS X Screenshot function, but you can see Artists is in focus. Now press Esc to hide the menu, and invoke the script while the cursor in still in this position.

Bam! You now switched to Artists view. It turns out the 2nd perform action "AXPress" is performed under cursor because the pop up menu is not in focus after clicking the vie option button.

There is a simpler way to verify this problem/bug. 1) Click view option. 2) Press Down key a couple times. You would expect focus would move to Songs, and then Albums, right? Nope, you are just moving through library items in the background, all the while the menu is still in display in the foreground.

So, my question boils down to, how can I move cursor focus to this pop up menu?

UPDATE: Thanks @jackjr300 for the answer. This what my finished script looks like:

tell application "System Events"
    tell process "iTunes"
        set frontmost to true
        delay 1
        tell pop up button 2 of window 1
            click

            if value of attribute "AXDescription" is "Genres" then
                tell (select row 1 of table 1 of pop over 1) to click UI element 1
            end if
            if value of attribute "AXDescription" is "Songs" then
                tell (select row 2 of table 1 of pop over 1) to click UI element 1
            end if
            if value of attribute "AXDescription" is "Albums" then
                tell (select row 3 of table 1 of pop over 1) to click UI element 1
            end if
            if value of attribute "AXDescription" is "Artists" then
                tell (select row 4 of table 1 of pop over 1) to click UI element 1
            end if
            if value of attribute "AXDescription" is "Composers" then
                tell (select row 5 of table 1 of pop over 1) to click UI element 1
            end if

        end tell
    end tell
end tell

Use the select command to select the row.

tell application "System Events"
    tell process "iTunes"
        set frontmost to true
        delay 1
        tell pop up button 2 of window 1
            click
            tell (select row 5 of table 1 of pop over 1) to click UI element 1
        end tell
    end tell
end tell


"Safari" would like to control this computer using accessibility features I recently did a clean install of OS X Yosemite 10.10.2 on my MacBook Air.
I was making a credit card payment on the Barclaycard website and received a dialog window saying ""Safari" would like to control this computer using accessibility features."
I chose "Deny" but I am wondering why I received this dialog in the first place? I am certain I was on the actual, official Barclaycard website. Do I have malware? The only extensions I am using with Safari are AdBlock and 1Password.

Text only version:

"Safari" would like to control this computer using accessibility features.
Grant access to this application in Security & Privacy preferences, located in System Preferences.
Open System Preferences Deny

Based on the way accessibility features work in macOS, it is reasonable to assume that when saving or entering usernames and password using Apple's Keychain, or when using AutoFill to enter data into a page, that it uses some type of virtual keyboard that allows the system to enter text in user land. This would be very similar to how assistive devices function when using an Automator extension such as the "Watch Me Do" function. The reason why this comes up is because it is attempting to either read or write to the screen on behalf of the user.

This is an assumption, but it is based on working technical experience with the underlying software sets involved.


Freeing disk space with El Capitan I have had this Macbook pro since a few months and I am trying to download XCode. I have about 12GB free and apparently that is not enough to install the app. What is weird is that I had about 6GB free and I deleted the old XCode which according to Finder was 12GB, and my new total available space is only 12GB. Is Finder totally rubbish at estimating disk space? When I go into about this Mac it tells me I have about 16GB of Apps and 21GB of "Other"

When I look in my Applications folder I don't see anything close to 16GB:

Same when I look for files that would account into Other, I am nowhere near that. Can anyone help me out finding where this usage is coming from?

EDIT: To be clear I am not trying to find out how much space XCode needs, but where to find these GBs that my computer says are used

Thanks

You may want to manually inspect the .Trash folder in your home directory and remove any files found inside. I've seen some instances where things were not completely removed.

In Terminal:

rm -rf ~/.Trash/*

(Original answer)

Go and grab the free OmniDiskSweeper app and run it.

It will help you see both the visible and hidden files on your system. Only remove those which you know that you do not need. You can easily corrupt the OS if you start moving system files without being certain what you are moving. Your caches may be taking up a lot of room somewhere.

OmniDiskSweeper will help you find and eliminate files. If you have an external drive you could also just move some of the files over using Finder. Your disk seems incredibly small as it stands (50GB?).

There are hidden files elsewhere on your system. Usually under your home directory. If you are familiar with Terminal, you could try to change to the home directory and review the hidden folders.

cd ~
ls .*

If you have an external USB you might want to use the symbolic link method to move the hidden folders and replace them with a symbolic link in that location:

mv /path/to/original/foldername /Volumes/TargetDisk/path/to/moved/foldername
ln -s /Volumes/TargetDisk/path/to/moved/foldername foldername

Where "foldername" is the name of the folder you want to move and make a symbolic link. Only attempt this is you are very comfortable with Terminal. Otherwise just use OmniDiskSweeper.

Good Luck.


How can I combine multiple font files into one family? I have several font families that have different naming styles. The results is that instead of all those fonts showing up as one family, there's a separate family for each font variation (bold, black, thin, italic, etc).

This makes my font list messy. Is there a way to combine multiple font files into one family?

If you're not afraid about command lines, I suggest you ttf2ttc. *.ttc files are TrueType fonts Collection


Can I upgrade my 2008 Mac Pro completely? Hey everyone, I have a 2008 Mac Pro/2.83hzXEON(8)/8800GT512mb.

Is it possible for me to upgrade this machine to newer hardware, since it is Intel based? What would it entail to put a newer processor, ram and video card in this machine? Is it worth it?

Thanks

Certain upgrades are possible, but it’s not that simple.

Accelerate your Mac is a nice source of information, you can find them here.
ANandtech did change the CPU of a Mac Pro.
OWC Mac Sales does have memory upgrades (there are others).
Video card: Unless you want to experiment with modified firmwares, your only choice in that model is the ATI 4870, which is considerably faster than the regular NVidia (it’s very noticeable in x-plane and 3d applications) but still lagging behind the “latest offerings”.

According to Wikipedia: "The Mac Pro, as with other Macintosh platforms, requires Mac OS X firmware. That is to say, a PCIe video card designed exclusively for other operating systems will not work properly under Mac OS X without appropriate drivers and/or firmware”

Sadly, no other video card has that, other than the Apple’s offerings. But If you google around there are some posts about people who managed to make other cards work.

Forget about upgrading your Motherboard, as it’s a custom design.
Hard drives/SuperDrives are generic and can be replaced, as you may have already guessed.
Any other component is probably “custom” designed for a Mac Pro (the power supply for example) and you won’t be able to get away with it…

Is it worth?

I have an early 2008 Mac Pro with 2x4 Intel XEON 2.8 and 10GB RAM. I’ve upgraded the RAM (from the lame 2GB to 10 @ OWC liked above), and I ordered the machine with the NVIDIA card (8800? I don’t remember), which was the only option other than the stock ATI2600 or something lame like that.

A couple of years later, the NVIDIA died (the Apple guy told me it had bugs and used to fail), so I got the new ATI 4780 512MB (it was 100€ less expensive than the out of warranty NVIDIA apple replacement). The difference was really noticeable in 3d apps.

I haven’t thought about upgrading the CPUs because getting faster XEONs (I wouldn’t be able to upgrade to Nehalem or anything new) won’t really make a big difference for me.

I use a SSD and 4 Hard Drives in the bays, if that counts as an upgrade (my original drive was 750gb, up from the stock 500).

I brought it with the Bluetooth/Wifi module (it was optional back then) and tho I haven’t used it a lot, it came in handy in a few occasions.

OS X Doesn’t support SLI/Crossfire for using more than 1 video card in parallel (you can install more than one, but it’s not the same thing), so forget about getting two super video cards for running crysis y super-top-ultra-maximum quality.

Conclusion

Yes, if you upgrade the RAM to something other than the 2GB and yes to the video card if you do 3d intensive stuff. Exposé will work fine on the NVIDIA8800 you have, but X-Plane (among other 3D things) will be noticeably faster with a new video card.


What is daemon user on mac? I installed XAMPP on mac and it uses the user daemon. I have trouble accessing an external site that I have setup for which I am getting "Access Denied" error.
This is likely because daemon user does not have access to this folder. I can't see this user among user users. I have looked everywhere.
Where I can access/change permission to this user?

I came to know about Daemons and Agents on mac. Are they related?
How would I add this user to directory. Because when I click get info a folder, this user (daemon) is not listed.

Ref : XAMPP on Mac OSX: Why running as 'daemon'?

In /Applications/XAMPP/xamppfiles/etc/httpd.conf change

User daemon
Group daemon

to

User YourName
Group YourGroup

Fixed!


How can you pause text to speech so that it restarts from where you left off? I have a 40 page Pages document which is a transcript from a hand written diary.  I wish to use Text to Speech to read passages from my Pages document so that I can check the text against the original version.  This works well except that when highlighting a portion of text in the document and I wish to stop (pause) the Text to Speech it only starts at the beginning of the highlighted text and not restarting from the point of being paused.

If I use the start/stop keyboard shortcut in Text to Speech system preferences the situation is worse.  No matter if you have a highlighted portion of text it will restart from the beginning of the document!!

So the question is How to pause the text to speech process rather than stopping it?

This is a feature people wanted for a long time but it never came. An alternative is to use voice over but it doesn't really allow you to read out loud the highlighted text, it has to be the entire document. To activate it the default shortcut is command F5. You have to enable it in setting, just search for voice over.

There is one other way. You can save the entire document as txt file and open it with any browser of yours, tested on chrome or safari. Select all and right click, then "add to itunes as spoken track." It will take a few minutes and then you will have an audio file you can play. Press pause key on the keyboard to pause or resume while reading.


Trying to use a Canon MP210 printer with OS X running 10.8.2 I am honestly not sure if the problem is with the OS or with the printer. I can use this printer with a windows machine without any trouble. However, when I try to use it with my Mac, is just complains that I don't have any color ink...which is true. I only have black ink in the printer. I just want to be able to print and cannot seem to tell the printer to just use the black ink and ignore the fact that no color ink is available.

Go to System Preferences/Print & Scan and click on Open Print Queue. This will open a window that includes Settings, both under the Printer menu of this app (which in my case is named Epson320) and in the toolbar (customize toolbar, if not.)

Another way to access this window is to go to ~/Library/Printers and double click on the printer icon you will find there, which is actually an app. Or if your printer is in the dock (and this icon can be dragged to the dock, like any application) Settings will be in the dock menu.

In Settings, at least with my printer and I suspect yours as well, under the Driver tab, there is an option "Permit Temporary Black Printing."

See if that doesn't do it.


How to create an IPA file (non-payload folder method) I'm trying to create an iOS IPA file using Xcode. I have archived it (Product → Archive) and it is visible under my archives (Window → Organiser), but Xcode says I can't Export it unless I have an Apple Developer Licence.

Is there any way to create a proper IPA of this (not by placing the .app into a folder named payload, zipping that folder, and then renaming the .zip to .ipa)?

When I try to do what is suggested here, this happens:

$ cd ~/Library/Developer/Xcode/Archives/2019-05-07
$ xcodebuild -exportArchive -exportFormat ipa -archivePath g0blinpreRC3.xcarchive -exportPath ~/Desktop/Jailbreak/iOS\ 10/g0blin_preRC3.ipa

xcodebuild: error: invalid option '-exportFormat'

You can't create an ipa file without an Apple Developer Account.

You can create a free developer account and sign the app with a development certificate.  You won't be allowed to distribute the app to anyone but you can use it on your own devices.

An overview of the different types of memberships are available here.


How to verify which wireless access point my iOS device is using? In my house I have multiple wireless access points, all of which use the same SSID. I'd like to know which wireless AP my iPhone is currently connected to.

On my MacBook I use the WiFi Explorer app to view available wifi networks and verify which wireless AP the MacBook is currently connected to - the app lists the Vendor name (eg Netgear, TP-Link) beside the SSID.

How can I verify which wireless access point my iOS device is connected to?

The standard iOS Wi-Fi menu only lists the SSID name, and since all APs have the same SSID this doesn't help.

The Net Analyzer app shows the BSSID which appears to be the same as the access point’s MAC (at least on my network).
https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/network-analyzer/id562315041


How make Safari download PDF files instead of opening them in-page? Firefox downloads my PDF files straight to "Downloads", Safari opens them "in-page".

I need PDF files to save to a file, not to open.

Is there a setting make Safari download PDF files instead of opening them in-page?

Open up a terminal window: ⌘space and type Terminal. Hit enter when its highlighted. When you get to the terminal prompt, type the following command:

defaults write com.apple.Safari WebKitOmitPDFSupport -bool YES

You won't get a response at the command line, but once you restart Safari it will no longer open them in the browser.

To take it a step further while you're there, you can keep it from opening them once they are downloaded with this one:

defaults write com.apple.Safari AutoOpenSafeDownloads -bool NO

This last command achieves what the other answer suggests.


Stopping iPhone app from using Facebook login info I was playing Hearts Of Vegas on Facebook and once logged into the iPhone app using my Facebook login information.  Recently, the game developer blocked me from the game because I was complaining (long story).

Now, I would just like to play the game on my iPhone app without having anything to do with my Facebook account.  However, the app also blocks me because of the one time of signing in using my Facebook login.  I don’t even get to a screen where I can log out of the Facebook info.  I have tried deleting the app, blocking the app on Facebook, signing out of my Facebook in my safari and deleting the Facebook app, signing out of apple gameroom, and even using a different Apple ID.  Nothing seems to work because when I reinstall the app, it appears that it must still be automatically logging me into the game with my Facebook creditials.  My iPhone must be providing the info to the app automatically once it is launched.

Any advice on how to stop this so I can play the game?  I just don’t know what I’m missing.  Can app developers somehow log identifying information from a specific iPhone?

Thanks in advance for any help!!

9/2/18 update - I spoke with Apple support.  They basically said the only way I can play the app is if I find a way to mask the identifying 2 bits of info the developer has about me through DeviceCheck when I download and reinstall the app.  Does anyone know if this is possible?  Apple support was unsure.

If you want to remove personally identifying data (for example tokens or whatnot) that the developer has stored about you in the Keychain on your device, you'll need to not only delete that specific app - but also delete any other app created by the same developer. I.e. other apps that share Keychain access with the problematic app will retain the data.

The developer also has the possibility of storing 2 bits of information unique for your device - the so called DeviceCheck API. The bits are stored at Apple and won't be deleted when you uninstall the problematic app and all other apps by that developer. The developer might have used one of those 2 bits to mean that the user is blocked from using the app.


Fix the constant shift issue On my Macbook Air A1466 the shift key seems to be constantly pressed, even during boot so it only boots into safe mode because of this.

The issue exists both before and after replacing the keyboard with a brand new one!

This is what I've tried:

Reinstalled MacOS
Replaced the whole keyboard (painful process)
Reset NVRAM (alt + cmd + p + r) during startup
Hooked up an external keyboard (this one works fine, but shift is still held down)
Tried Keyremapper: https://pqrs.org/osx/karabiner/ which helps WITHIN the OS, but not during boot

Any ideas?

PS: This is not a duplicate of Shift key damaged how to disable it at boot?. There it's simply a keyboard hardware issue, which is not the case here since the keyboard has been replaced.

The issue was fixed after replacing the trackpad module.


How can I resize an image created using dd which contains a block-by-block copy of my Mac drive? I created a copy of a working (but getting a few disk errors) 1TB spinning disk drive using dd. I can mount the image (hdiutil attach or just double click in Finder) no problem and see the files on the main HFS+ volume. However, I don't see the other partitions which I know are there (EFI, Recovery HD). I know these are there because if I restore the image directly to a physical drive, they are there.

However, I would like to restore this image to a 480GB SSD (smaller), so I need to shrink the main/large HFS+ partition of the image. There is plenty of free space in the partition (700GB) so this should be feasible.

I have tried converting the image to a read-write image (hdiutil convert -format UDRW) or a sparse bundle (hdiutil convert -format UDSB - results in a 200GB file).

The read-write image won't resize:
hdiutil: resize request is below minimum size allowed.

Running hdiutil compact on the sparse bundle won't shrink it:
Reclaimed 0 bytes out of 796.9 GB possible.

What is the correct way to accomplish resizing the main/large HFS+ partition in the full disk image?

In my opinion this may be possible but it's not effective because to accomplish this you would have to extract and shrink one part of the dd raw image and then reassemble all three parts. Additionally you have to manipulate the gpt partition table inside the reassembled raw dd image by hex-editing it. Then you have to dd back the image.

Instead do the following which is significantly less time consuming and probably less error-prone:

Partition your new disk with 3 partitions: EFI, main system volume and a Recovery HD partition
Since EFI and recovery partition have fixed sizes and defined start blocks you can simply dd the EFI and the Recovery HD in your dd raw image to the respective partitions of your new SSD
To copy the content of the old main volume, mount the dd raw image and rsync the content to the new main volume.

Here I assume you have an external disk with a full OS X (El Capitan) to prepare the SSD. All device names/identifiers or sizes are just examples and may differ from your actual environment/results.

Preparing your new SSD:

Open Disk Utility and erase the new disk (Name: SSD/Format: OS X Extended (Journaled)/Scheme: GUID Partition table)
Open Terminal and enter diskutil list. The result should be (the sizes may slightly differ from yours):

/dev/disk0 (internal, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *480.0 GB   disk0
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk0s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS SSD                     479.6 GB   disk0s2
/dev/disk1...

In Terminal enter sudo gpt -r show disk0. The result should be (the sizes may slightly differ from yours):

      start       size  index  contents
          0          1         PMBR
          1          1         Pri GPT header
          2         32         Pri GPT table
         34          6
         40     409600      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
     409640  936755120      2  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
  937164760     262151
  937426911         32         Sec GPT table
  937426943          1         Sec GPT header

Now unmount disk0 and remove the second partition:

diskutil umountDisk disk0
sudo gpt remove -i 2 disk0

Add the recovery partition. The recovery partition always has the size 1269536 blocks and starts at total size of the disk in blocks - 1269576 blocks (in my example that's: 937426944 - 1269576 = 936157368)

sudo gpt add -i 3 -b 936157368 -s 1269536 -t 426F6F74-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC disk0

Enter sudo gpt -r show disk0 again to show the new partition:

      start       size  index  contents
          0          1         PMBR
          1          1         Pri GPT header
          2         32         Pri GPT table
         34          6
         40     409600      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
     409640  935747728
  936157368    1269536      3  GPT part - 426F6F74-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
  937426904          7
  937426911         32         Sec GPT table
  937426943          1         Sec GPT header

In the empty space between partition i=1 and i=3 add a new partition. The start block and the size are given by the data found above:

sudo gpt add -i 2 -b 409640 -s 935747728 -t 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC disk0

Unmount disk0 and format the new volume:

diskutil umountDisk disk0
sudo newfs_hfs -J -v "SSD" /dev/disk0s2

Restoring your data:

Mount your raw disk image by double-clicking it.
Enter diskutil list. You should see a new entry similar to this one:

/dev/disk0 (internal, physical):
...
/dev/disk3 (disk image):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        +1.0 TB     disk3
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk3s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS Macintosh HD            1.0 TB     disk3s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk3s3

dd the EFI and the Recovery HD from the image to the SSD:

sudo dd if=/dev/disk3s1 of=/dev/disk0s1 bs=4096
diskutil umountDisk disk0
sudo dd if=/dev/disk3s3 of=/dev/disk0s3 bs=4096

mount the main volume of the SSD:

diskutil mount disk0s2

rsync the content of the main volume of the disk image (which should be visible on your desktop in contrary to the EFI/Recovery HD partitions) to the main SSD volume:

sudo rsync -a /Volumes/Volume_name_of_Diskimage/ /Volumes/SSD

This is a very basic rsync command example. You may refine the rsync command (options/exclusions) according to this or this linked scripts.

Please check all device names in the various command containing dd or gptthoroughly or you will delete or overwrite important partitions/data unwantedly.


Using too much of Hotspot hurts the iPad? I have a iPad mini2 (cellular). Recently my modem has been broken and to use the internet via my laptop I use a personal hotspot connection. I mean I connect to my ipad by my laptop for using the internet.

As I've mentioned in the title of my question, I do that too much. For example 10 hours per day. Now I want to know, should I stop doing that? would it hurts my ipad?

You know, I feel the connection has slowed recently, I mean when I turn personal hotspot on in my ipad, it takes 1 min to my laptop find it and connect to it. I think that happened faster already.

Should I stop doing that?

The only reason you may want to stop is to avoid going over your cellular data limit (if any).

  Will it hurt my iPad?

No, this wont "hurt" your iPad, however it's a process that requires the iPad to work a bit harder than normal, meaning you can expect these while you are using the hotspot:

Shorter battery life for the iPad
Slower Performance on the iPad
Slower internet speeds than usual for all devices


Where can I download iOS 8.4 Beta safely, and how do I install it? I've just seen a video on the new Music app in iOS 8.4 Beta. Now if possible I would like to try it, so I simply googled "iOS 8.4 Beta download". I was hoping to find it in some developer section of an Apple website, but only found it on third party websites.
Can I assume that the software is going to be safe, when downloading it from websites like Chip.de (which is usually a trustworthy source).
How would I go about installing the software, as there are normally updates in iTunes or on the iOS device itself?

iOS 8.4 is not an open beta, so you have to be registered Apple developer (99$ a year) to use beta software on your iOS device.

Also note that getting the software-package is not enough. You're devices UID has to be registered with apple so it will activate when you install the beta software.


why does my iMac has two IP addresses registered? I have been doing network ping discovery on a WiFi-LAN and one of my iMac has two IP addresses, and I cannot understand why would that be.

the only connection to the LAN is via Wifi, there is no file sharing, no Ethernet, no Bluetooth or any other network services (apart from screen sharing).

I have 4 IP addresses on some of my Mac's network interfaces since I set them up in network preferences control panel.

You could go there and delete all un-needed IP addresses or at least know it's not something that was intended.


PHP Version 7.3.22 to be removed in future macOS I just attempted to load a new development page without having created the httpdconf entry, & got the PHPinfo page with the following in the header...
PHP Version 7.3.22-(to be removed in future macOS)
Does this mean Apple are intending to remove PHP from a future version of macOS? Or is it simply flagging that this version of PHP will be replaced?

php -v gives the following response:
WARNING: PHP is not recommended
PHP is included in macOS for compatibility with legacy software.
Future versions of macOS will not include PHP.

The release notes for Catalina contain the following remark:
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/macos-release-notes/macos-catalina-10_15-release-notes

Scripting Language Runtimes
Deprecations
Scripting language runtimes such as Python, Ruby, and Perl are included in macOS for
compatibility with legacy software. Future versions of macOS won’t
include scripting language runtimes by default, and might require you
to install additional packages. If your software depends on scripting
languages, it’s recommended that you bundle the runtime within the
app.

In short: macOS continues to include 'legacy' versions of things like Python, Ruby, Perl, and indeed PHP, so that existing code won't break, but Apple is leaving it to the user to install the versions that they want to use.
At the time of writing, 10.16 ('macOS 11') continues to include these languages.


How do I connect a 3rd 4K monitor to my 2013 Mac Pro? I have a Mac Pro 2013. I already have two 4k monitors now connected to

the HDMI port (Bus 0)
a thunderbolt port with a TB->HDMI adapter (Bus 1)
Before I simply buy a third monitor and adapter, is it as easy as that?

Do I just plug another adapter into the last BUS that isn't being used? (I understand to separate the monitors on different buses.)

FYI, I tried a 3rd monitor that wasn't 4k and it didn't fire up/get recognized. I read somewhere on Apple's site that once you have one 4K monitor connected you need all of them to be 4K.

The main article on 4k displays links to the below article on Mac Pro:

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT206587
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202801

The trick for the third display on Mac Pro is to use 2 Thunderbolt and one HDMI cable to connect each directly to the Mac Pro. Basically each bus can handle 2 normal displays or one 4K display each.

  Three 4K displays: two connected via Mini DisplayPort and one connected via HDMI

You are correct about bus 0 conflicting with the HDMI adapter as well.

If you're not on the 2013 Mac Pro - see this thread for options for "unsupported" adapters that might work for lower resolutions or lower refresh rates than the native ones.

How can I run 3 4K monitors on my 2015 MBP


3 locations for SSHd configuration So I want to harden my SSH daemon when Remote Login is enabled.

So far I've found:

/private/etc/ssh/sshd_config
/System/Library/LaunchDaemons/ssh.plist -> protected by SIP
/etc/ssh/sshd_config

Why are there 3 locations, and what is the difference?

If you look at the specific files you'll see that there are actually only two files (/etc/ssh/sshd_config and /private/etc/ssh/sshd_config is the same file unless your setup is non-standard).

/System/Library/LaunchDaemons/ssh.plist is used by the system to start sshd, usually you don't need to change this
/private/etc/ssh/sshd_config is the global configuration file for sshd, and the place where you need to change whatever is required to harden SSH on your Mac.


your iCloud music library session has expired After deciding I dont want Apple managing any of my music through iCloud I decided to log out of iTunes. Now I am constantly getting an annoying message from iTunes that says:

your iCloud music library session has expired

It's very obvious to me that it is expired, as I signed out. How can I get iTunes to stop pestering me with this reminder? I press esc or CANCEL and it comes back 2 or 3 times before it quits for about 15 minutes then asks me again. I Have to keep hitting CANCEL for it to go away.

Running iTunes 12.2.3.35 on OSX 10.9.5

I may have found an answer. Navigate to iTunes and on the top menu items navigate to the STORE tab. From there sign out of iTunes, and then log in again.

I restarted Itunes just to double check and everything looks good. I haven't been prompted by the annoying message!


Keyboard Shortcuts for "Compress" or "New Folder with Selection"? Has anybody found a decent solution to this? Custom keyboard shortcuts (as defined in System Preferences > Keyboard) don't work for any dynamic menus like Compress XX items or (new in Lion) New Folder with Selection (XX items) because they add the number of files selected after them.

Are there undocumented wildcards for keyboard shortcuts?

Unlike Compress, New Folder with Selection (XX items) does have a default keyboard shortcut, but there still doesn't seem to be a way to change it.

For compressing i found simple solution.
I'm using OS X Yosemite 10.10.2 and It's worked for me.

Open system preferences and follow the screenshots:

--> Step1:

--> Step2:

--> Step3:

--> Step4(It's Done):

That's It.

I know it's been long time since you asked the Question but i'm posting the answers for those who are still looking for solution.


How do I give options to Homebrew install Is it possible to give options to a Homebrew installation package from the command line, something like this (which does not seem to work):

brew install tesseract --all-languages

Or do you have to use brew edit tesseract and actually edit your desired options into the file that opens?

(If the latter is the only way, why did they choose to do it like this? It seems very cumbersome.)

EDIT: I did uninstall, then install again with the option added, and now it seems to react. 1. Homebrew should have been able to understand the change without uninstalling first. 2. I can't see the option thing documented or mentioned anywhere.

As of 2 February 2019, Homebrew no longer supports options link.

So you would need to edit the install file.

brew edit tesseract

(Hopefully someone finds an easier way to accomplish this behavior. But, for now, it seems like is gone for the time being.)


Applescript Calculate Run Time of a Command How would you calculate the time it took to run a command? Specifically, I want to know the time it takes to return a value in a Shell command. I wrote this up, would it work? (Psuedocode)

a=currentTime
[command]
b=currentTime
print b-a

If translated into Applescript would this work? Is there a better way to do this when calculating the runtime of a shell command (the command is run via do shell command)?

It’s not AppleScript, but is there a reason why the time command isn't applicable?  It’s used like this:

time <command>
time find /opt
time tar xf bigFile.tar.bz2

It gives output like this:

real    0m0.044s
user    0m0.000s
sys     0m0.008s


What does Time Machine back up? Does Time Machine backup system files, kernel files and other OS-related files?

I have corrupted system drivers and files and I want to do a fresh install of OS X but I also want to back up my applications, files and folders.

I wonder if I should go with Time Machine or manually backing up each file.

I think I can comfort you with the following statement on the website of Apple (Update: The information cited here has been removed, but you can still find it in this archived version)

  Time Machine automatically backs up your entire Mac, including system
  files, applications, accounts, preferences, email messages, music,
  photos, movies, and documents. But what makes Time Machine different
  from other backup applications is that it not only keeps a spare copy
  of every file, it remembers how your system looked on any given day—so
  you can revisit your Mac as it appeared in the past.

On the given page, there are even tutorials on how to restore your Mac from a Time Machine copy.

Please be aware those backups are not bootable. So you still have to manually install a fresh OS (from USB, DVD or other...)


Can I separate Facetime audio from system audio? I have an iPhone 6 and MBP on OSX Yosemite.  The new feature in OSX allowing me to take a call through my MBP is fantastic, but it's less practical than it could be because of how long it takes to switch the audio input/output settings to my headset.  The sequence goes like this:

My normal audio settings have output through Cinema display, input through display (or built-in, whatever)
I'm listening to pandora
Call comes in.  Sweet!  I can use my headset!
Hold down ⌥ and click the speaker icon in the menu bar
Select output to go through my headset.
Repeat #4
Select input to come through my headset
Stop pandora so it doesn't interfere with the phone call
Answer call just in time to hear someone say "call me back" or just hang up
Make phone call on my phone, defeating the entire purpose

Steps 4-9 take way too long.  The Google Hangouts plugin does this right, as does Skype (IIRC).  Those steps:

Normal audio settings
Listening to pandora
Call comes in, I grab headset
I answer call, pandora is squelched somewhat, the headset is piped through to the call automatically

The second set is what's desirable.  Is there a way to make Facetime on OSX do this?

Have you considered trying Sound Siphon or Audio Hijack Pro to control your audio?


Toggle Light Mode/Dark Mode AND Accent Color from one to another I am new to scripting, so excuse my lack of knowledge. I would like to create a toggle that switches from Light Mode and an accent (and highlight) color of blue to Dark Mode and an accent/highlight color of red. So far, I've been able to create the toggle for Light/Dark mode only, as well as switch just the highlight color (but not toggle it). However, with accent color being a new feature to macOS in Mojave, I'm not sure how to proceed as I can't find the attribute for accent color.

Maybe this applescript code will help a bit

tell application "System Preferences"
    reveal anchor "Main" of pane id "com.apple.preference.general"
end tell

tell application "System Events"
    repeat until exists of checkbox "Dark" of window "General" of application process "System Preferences"
        delay 0.1
    end repeat
    -- Appearance
    click checkbox "Dark" of window "General" of application process "System Preferences"
    -- Accent Color
    click checkbox "Red" of window "General" of application process "System Preferences"
    -- Dropdown Menu For Highlight Color
    click pop up button 1 of window "General" of application process "System Preferences"
    -- Highlight Color
    click menu item "Red" of menu 1 of pop up button 1 of window "General" of application process "System Preferences"
end tell

tell application "System Preferences" to quit

UPDATE:

Taking it one step further, save this following AppleScript code as an application.  When this new app is launched, it allows for choosing your different color modes.

property appearanceMode : {"Light", "Dark"}
property accentColors : {"Blue", "Purple", "Pink", "Red", "Orange", "Yellow", "Green", "Graphite"}
property highlightColors : {"Blue", "Purple", "Pink", "Red", "Orange", "Yellow", "Green", "Graphite", "Other"}

activate
set chosenAppearanceMode to (choose from list appearanceMode ¬
    with title "Please Choose Your Appearance Mode" with prompt ¬
    "Please Choose Your Appearance Mode" OK button name ¬
    "OK" cancel button name "CANCEL") as string

if chosenAppearanceMode is "false" then return

activate
set chosenAccentColor to (choose from list accentColors ¬
    with title "Please Choose Your Accent Color" with prompt ¬
    "Please Choose Your Accent Color" OK button name ¬
    "OK" cancel button name "CANCEL") as string

if chosenAccentColor is "false" then return

activate
set chosenHighlightColor to (choose from list highlightColors ¬
    with title "Please Choose Your Highlight Color" with prompt ¬
    "Please Choose Your Highlight Color" OK button name ¬
    "OK" cancel button name "CANCEL") as string

if chosenHighlightColor is "false" then return

try
    if application "System Preferences" is running then do shell script "killall 'System Preferences'"
end try
repeat until application "System Preferences" is not running
    delay 0.1
end repeat

tell application "System Preferences" to reveal anchor "Main" of pane id "com.apple.preference.general"

tell application "System Events"
    repeat until exists of checkbox chosenAppearanceMode of window "General" of application process "System Preferences"
        delay 0.1
    end repeat
    -- Appearance
    click checkbox chosenAppearanceMode of window "General" of application process "System Preferences"
    -- Accent Color
    click checkbox chosenAccentColor of window "General" of application process "System Preferences"
    -- Dropdown Menu For Highlight Color
    click pop up button 1 of window "General" of application process "System Preferences"
    -- Highlight Color
    click menu item chosenHighlightColor of menu 1 of pop up button 1 of window "General" of application process "System Preferences"
end tell

try
    if application "System Preferences" is running then do shell script "killall 'System Preferences'"
end try

SIDENOTE:  My reason for using the the do shell script "killall 'System Preferences'" command rather than tell application "System Preferences" to quit is... Let's say, for what ever reason, System Preferences.app is already activated (with, for example, window Sharing/ Remote Management/ Computer Settings open) but not visible or not front most or whatever.  In Script Editor, you try to run tell application "System Preferences" to reveal anchor "SpeakableItems" of pane id "com.apple.preference.universalaccess" That command completes with no obvious errors but when you switch over to System Preferences, your "revealed anchor" is not revealed. Ok, no big deal, easy fix. I'll just insert a tell application "System Preferences" to quit command prior to the reveal anchorcommand. Running the updated code this time, you get a (userCanceledErr:-128) error. All of this hassle is because that secondary drop down window in System Preferences is open. In my opinion, the do shell script "killall 'System Preferences'" command seems to be the best solution.


How does iOS delete a file technically and can it potentially be undeleted? We have an interesting discussion here about file deletion on iOS devices.
The question was: if I delete a file using NSFileManager, what's happening under the hood?

My understanding is that deletion is performed by removing the corresponding file entry from the file system table.

The counter argument is that a file handle remains in some way and only a flag gets set which marks the file as deleted. If the user had root access to the iOS device, he could potentially reset that flag and recover the file content.

In both cases we agree that the actual file content will not be overwritten and the plain bytes still exist on the flash memory/disk until the block is occupied by another file.

The idea is now: if the second version is true, we could overwrite the file with a one byte content prior to deletion (even if that byte gets written to a new location on the flash drive without actually overwriting the old content). If then the file is recovered, only the overwritten one byte content is available.

Note that we're not talking about forensic analysis of the flash drive which could maybe recover the original file content.

So to recap:

How does deletion of a file on iOS work internally?
Does the overwrite approach prevent undeletion?

I believe in Unix the file system is modified as you suggest (the entry is removed from the file system table). On Windows the file system table is modified, and the file is just flagged as deleted - data recovery tools can undelete the file. Having looked at Windows undelete applications I think the file name is also modified, so when undeleting, you need to supply the correct file name. Modifying the file name would mean if you created a file with the same name as the one you just deleted, the OS wouldn't have to reconcile there being two files with the same name.

MacOSX and Windows have a trash can (recycle bin) which I think is implemented a special folder into which the deleted files are copied. When you empty the trash, this folder is purged - by modifying the system file table. If you use NSFileManager, it circumvents the trash can (which doesn't exist on iOS anyway) so it's a real delete. likewise if you "rm" from a terminal window.

If you create a new file with the same name as the old one, in Unix it's just a new entry in the system file table, but since the old entry had been removed from the table, there wouldn't be an advantage to creating the new entry.

That's my belief, and I'm ready for the onslaught of down votes ;-)


Mini Lyrics Alternative For Mac Have you guys seen the "mini lyrics" app for windows? It downloads the lyrics of the currently playing song and displays it on the screen. The great thing about it is that it highlights the current part of the lyrics. Do you know any alternative of it for mac?

Get Lyrical
I use this. It will display the lyrics and add them to your iTunes library (if you choose to) I would highly recommend it.
There is also LessLyrics. I haven't used it before.


How to get to the help input field on OS X in German? There is this nifty little help input field, which I use often as a new Mac user to find the right menu options. It says Command + Shift + ? is the keyboard shortcut to get there, even in the German Apple help pages.

What happens on my German keyboard with German OSX settings is that I already have to press the shift key to get to the question mark. Thus: When I do that, I get the help (Command + ?), not the help input field.

What's the keyboard shortcut to get to the help input field?

By pure chance I found my answer through this post, which is about remapping shortcuts via the settings menu

How do I remove the 'Quit' action from an application on OSX

You have to use Cmd + Shift + / to get to the input field! (probably similar for the non German speakers out there)

Sandro


(10.15.7) From where can the Quartz image filters be accessed? I stumbled upon the Quartz image filters when I was building a Quick Action in Automator.  From within Automator, I was able to preview the image filters, and some of them are actually pretty cool.  I'm aware that the PDF Quartz filters can be applied via exporting an existing PDF opened in Preview, however this is not true of the image filters.  Oddly enough, they aren't available in ColorSync Utility either, even though the PDF filters are.  A few of them appear in Photo Booth.  Beyond Automator workflows, is there anywhere else that these filters can be accessed?

Firstly, I think you mean Quartz Filters, not XQuartz. Quartz is the graphics subsystem in macOS, XQuartz is an X11 (unix GUI) environment for macOS ('X11 on quartz').
There are two types of Quartz Filters: 'Quartz Filters' and 'Quartz Composition Filters'.
Quartz Filters are normally found in /System/Library/Filters. They should be accessible in ColorSync Utility, under the Filters pane of the toolbar.
The following are the system installed filters in that folder:
Black & White.qfilter
Blue Tone.qfilter
Create Generic PDFX-3 Document.qfilter
Gray Tone.qfilter
Lightness Decrease.qfilter
Lightness Increase.qfilter
Reduce File Size.qfilter
Sepia Tone.qfilter

You may have other filters installed in either /Library/Filters or <user>/Library/Filters.
However, it's likely that you're talking about Quartz Composition Filters, which provide a range of manipulations to images. The Automator action to apply Quartz Composition Filters states:

This
action can use any Quartz Composition of type Image Filter installed
in the Quartz Composer Composition Repository (“/Library/Compositions”
or “~/Library/Compositions”) as long as it does not depend on time.

The system-bundled filters are in /System/Library/Compositions. They include things like Blur, Mask, Mirror, and other effects.
As for where they can be accessed: the answer is 'not many places'. (Yet again Preview fails to be a flagship/showcase for the impressive features of the underlying architecture.)
You can of course create a droplet Application with Automator that will show the Action at runtime, allowing you to select and define the filter each time. (You may want to duplicate the image beforehand.)
These things are called Quartz Composition Filters because they were created in Quartz Composer, a developer tool for processing graphical data. However, this has been deprecated in Catalina, so it will not be developed further and may be removed from the OS at some later point.


Settings for Firewall and AirPort Extreme Router to Open a Port I am trying to make ports on my OS X 10.6.5 MBP accessible to the open internet.

The only thing I could find in the system firewall was allowing (or disallowing) a particular.app file, but nothing about specific ports. From Googling I read that the firewall is supposed to let an allowed.app use any ports it wants and specification is not needed. I added the .app I wanted to add the port for.

The router is an AirPort Extreme v7.5.1.

I've created a DHCP Reservation based on wireless MAC address for the laptop, 10.0.0.5.

Under Advanced: Port Mapping, I added a new entry with the same values for each combination of fields:

Public/Private UDP/TCP Port: 9000
Private IP Address: 10.0.0.5

I want port 9000 on my public IP address to forward to port 9000 on internal IP 10.0.0.5.

When I test my application after this, it doesn't work.

To further test, I've turned off the system firewall on the laptop, and I've also placed the laptop in the 'DMZ' by checking Enable default host at: 10.0.0.5

Even with this configuration set (disabled firewall in the dmz), a full port scan from GRC Shields Up!! reports no ports open whatsoever. Is that normal for OS X? I come from Windows-land, so that would be a surprise.

Is something wrong here?

Something's wrong.  If you've only got the Apple device between yourself and the internet - you've verified your external IP, you've lowered your machine's firewall, and you've DMZ'd your internal IP (which you've verified is correct...) - then the only way a connection can be halted is through another piece of software running on your machine.

If you go through all of those steps, you should be completely open to the internet.


Partition space with the command diskutil partitionDisk Why if I run the commande below, I don't have 8G partition but 7,9?

diskutil partitionDisk disk2 hfs+ 14 8G hfs+ 15 8G hfs+ 13 8G
Started partitioning on disk2
Unmounting disk
Creating the partition map
Waiting for partitions to activate
Formatting disk2s2 as Mac OS Extended with name 14
Initialized /dev/rdisk2s2 as a 7 GB case-insensitive HFS Plus volume
Mounting disk
Formatting disk2s3 as Mac OS Extended with name 15
Initialized /dev/rdisk2s3 as a 7 GB case-insensitive HFS Plus volume
Mounting disk
Formatting disk2s4 as Mac OS Extended with name 13
Initialized /dev/rdisk2s4 as a 13 GB case-insensitive HFS Plus volume
Mounting disk
Finished partitioning on disk2
/dev/disk2 (external, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *30.8 GB    disk2
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk2s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS 14                      7.9 GB     disk2s2
   3:                  Apple_HFS 15                      7.9 GB     disk2s3
   4:                  Apple_HFS 13                      14.4 GB    disk2s4

And how to have 3 partitions of 8G and one with the remaining space?
I have tried this command but it does not work

diskutil partitionDisk disk2 4 GPT hfs+ 14 8G hfs+ 15 8G hfs+ 13 8G hfs+ Combo 100%
The disk is too small for your request

Note: I made the assumption you would want the volumes to be journaled. So I used jhfs+ instead of hfs+.

The command you are looking for is given below.

diskutil partitiondisk disk2 jhfs+ 14 15887144s jhfs+ 15 15887144s jhfs+ 13 R

To have 3 partitions of 8G and one with the remaining space, enter the following command.

diskutil partitiondisk disk2 jhfs+ 14 15887144s jhfs+ 15 15887144s jhfs+ 13 15887144s jhfs+ Combo R

Actually, the command you entered reserved exactly 8 GB of space for the 14 and 15 volumes. However, this includes 134,217,728 bytes of free space between each hfs+ formatted partition. These kinds of obscure requirements generally go away when APFS is used.

Here is how I determined the correct value was 15887144s. The sector size is 512 bytes. So 134,217,728 bytes is 262,144 sectors and 8,000,000,000 bytes is 15,625,000 sectors. Add these two values together and you will get 15,887,144 sectors.

The amount of free space, between each partition, can be determined from the output of the command given below. This is how I came up with the value of 262,144 sectors.

gpt -r show /dev/disk2

The sector size can be found by entering the command given below.

diskutil info disk2 | grep "Block Size"

Also, if the output from the gpt -r show /dev/disk2 command shows a Pri GPT table size of 32 sectors, then the sector size is 512 bytes. Otherwise, you can assume a sector size of 4096 bytes.


Prevent BootCamp partition from automatically mounting I don't want my BootCamp partitions automatically mounted on boot.

For the main windows partition this can be accomplished by putting the UUID into fstab.

# /etc/fstab
# https://gist.github.com/968327
# You can find the volume UUID in Disk Utility. Select the volume on the left
# and then File->Get Info. See "Universal Unique Identifier".
#
# Options used below:
#  ro for readonly (can be omitted)
#  noauto to prevent auto-mount
#  noatime to skip writing last access times (performance thing, optional)
#
# Remember to set the filesystem type (hfs, ntfs, etc) too
##########
# BOOTCAMP
UUID=BCC6AB78-5605-4102-B4CE-D2CF9C3D2BDB     none     ntfs     ro,noauto,noatime
LABEL="SYSTEM RESERVED" none    ntfs    ro,noauto,noatime

But, as you see, I tried to prevent 'System Reserved' from mounting as well.
Unfortunately it doesn't work with a UUID, because it doesn't have one.
The LABEL option doesn't seem to work on OSX either.

Your original solution using /etc/fstab will work, but you must use the volume's UUID (which DOES exist, Disk Utility just doesn't display it for NTFS formatted partitions- thanks Apple...)
To learn the UUID use the following command in terminal:

diskutil info /dev/diskXsY  ##substituting the X & Y for the disk and partition designation of the volume you want NOT to be mounted- which you can learn with: diskutil list

For this command to succeed and show you the UUID you can not have Tuxera NTFS enabled for that partition.  If you are using that or probably any other non-native file system drivers for NTFS, you must disable them (at least for that partition) and reboot.
The partition must also either be mounted or dismounted when you run the command- I can't remember which (and I remember that for me it actually turned out to be the opposite of what I found posted on a forum somewhere... so experiment).

If for some reason you just can't get OS X to show you the UUID you can resort to booting up with an Ubuntu installation disk and using a tool like gparted (there are quite a few ways using either the command line or a GUI app- you won't have trouble finding more information on that).  You don't have to worry, the UUID will be the same between operating systems.

Then add the following line to /etc/fstab

UUID=(you know what to put here- no enclosing brackets or anything) none ro,noauto 0 0

reboot and voila- no unwanted partitions mounted!  This is a system wide setting for all users, but you can still mount the partition using the Disk Utility.

This is the most pervasive and effective solution to this problem- plus it's not broken if you happen to move the disk to another controller or port, or even if you change the volume's label.  However, formatting the partition will assign it a new UUID.


Expand symlinked directory in finder Is there a way to make it so that in list view in Finder a symbolically linked directory can be expanded like a regular directory? I would just switch to column view, but I'm using TextMate 2's file browser, which appears to use Finder's list view.

I have no issue with getting my hands dirty with the console or editing plists if need be - I used Linux for years and fiddled with a Hackintosh for a while before switching to Mac. I'll also understand if The Mighty Apple Hath Spoken. I've just found very little on the topic. (And in my case it's on Macintosh HD so unmounting and remounting is not an option.)

One solution, as detailed here, would be to use a hardlink for the directory. It's very important that you understand the implications listed in Bob's answer as well as only use the hunlink utility (also in Bob's answer) to remove any directories created via the hlink utility.

I certainly would not recommend this solution for anyone who isn't comfortable understanding the details laid out in Bob's answer and/or for a shared system where not every user is aware of which directories are hard links and how to properly handle them.


Can extensive creating, copying and erasing files eventually ruin a HDD? The HDD of my Early 2011 MBP broke, and I'm considering if it's because of the heavy workload I put it through by installing, deleting, downloading, copying and erasing files, over and over.
I thought about it, and logically it would make sense that this would eventually wear down a HDD, but since I'm not an expert, I was wondering if I was right in this assumption, or if I was just unlucky with my HDD?

Also, I'm using my new computer now, and I'm worried the same might happen to it eventually, if I don't take preventative measures early on.

Everything eventually wears out, it's just a matter of time and a fact of life.  Since it's an unknown as to explicitly why your HDD failed it can only be said that normal/excessive usage leads to normal/excessive wear and tear which does contribute to the eventual failure.  The only thing you can do about it is to ensure that you always maintain proper and current backups so in the event it fails you do not loose important files.


Migrating from one computer to another The screen on my daughter's iMac went partially bad and so I just bought her an interim Mac (basically the same model that she had before).  I'm in the process of trying to do the migration from the old one to the new one.  Her old computer was running 10.6.6 and the newer one is running Tiger.  I thought that it would be a good idea to update the new one to Snow Leopard before starting the migration.  When I set up the new computer I accidentally gave it a different short name than the old one has.  Will I be able to migrate the files if the short name is different?  If not, is there any easy way to change it one the new computer There is nothing else on there now.

Run the Migration Assistant utility on the new computer, and it'll walk you through migrating the account to the new computer.  It's actually good that you used a different name on the new computer, since that means it can bring over the entire account (by its original name) and it won't conflict with the account you've already created on the new (/temporary) computer.


Change iPhone language from Chinese to English I bought a second hand iPhone 4, and I cannot create an Apple ID since the language appearing is Chinese. How do I change it to English?

设置（Setting) -> 通用（General) -> 语言与地区 (Language and Region) -> iPhone 语言(iPhone Language)  , Choose English.