If I use LaunchBar can I disable Spotlight? If I use LaunchBar can I disable Spotlight? Does LaunchBar do all of its own indexing and never use the Spotlight database? Or does it rely on the Spotlight database for some of its search awesome-sauce?

Edit: I'm considering disabling Spotlight because mds is currently in the process of re-indexing my just-moved home directory. I'd rather not have that happen during working hours. That got me wondering if I even need Spotlight at all with LaunchBar present.

I've contacted their support and here's their reply:


Does the SIP still protect against other operating systems? System Integrity Protection from Apple protects very important parts of the system and is, in my opinion, the main reason a Mac is so secure.
That's why I ask myself the question whenever I boot Linux or Windows, for example, on a different volume. Can Windows, for example, then change something in the area of e.g. / system or does the system integrity protection also protect there?
The same question also with disk mode. Is the Mac protected by the SIP if it is used as a hard drive by another Mac?

No, System Integrity Protection is not active when you are running other operating systems or when you mount the hard drive in another computer.
There are other protection mechanisms (such as Secure Boot and T2 disk encryption) on modern Macs that protect your system from booting "malicious" (i.e. infected) operating systems, and from the disk being simply mounted on a different computer.


How do I disable the "fn + F8" shortcut? As I need to use the fn + F8 shortcut within my virtual machine, I'd like to disable it in my host.

How do I go about disabling this particular shortcut, so that it can be used within my VM?

Try installing KeyRemap4MacBook. It's a free and powerfull utility for keyboard customization for MacOS X.


Will Mac Mini 2011 run two HD monitors? I'm thinking of getting the basic Mac mini with the Intel HD 3000 graphics. I'm planning to run two 1920x1080 screens - one with a mini DisplayPort to DVI, the other with an HDMI to DVI.

Has anyone tried this and confirmed that it works?

I've seen many threads talking about using two monitors, but the resolution hasn't been specified.

The tech specs page says:

Thunderbolt port with support for up to 2560-by-1600 resolution
HDMI port with support for up to 1920-by-1200 resolution
DVI output using HDMI to DVI Adapter (included)
Support for dual display and video mirroring

I'm not clear whether that means that I can run on monitor from the mini DisplayPort and one from the HDMI, or whether the resolution is capped somehow.

It is able to do so, I'm doing this exact thing right now. I've got two 1080p monitors connected, one via HDMI (to DVI), one via Thunderbolt (also to DVI) - works all fine :-)


Mac does not automatically restart when power is re-applied after `shutdown -hu now` I want to have a Mac Mini automatically boot when power is applied, as I cannot conveniently reach its power button, because it resides inside an art installation, where the power will be shut down during the night. I thought it might be possible to use the "Start up automatically after a power failure" in the energy system settings for this, along with the -u parameter to the shutdown command, in order to safely bring the machine in a state where I don't have to fear data loss. According to the shutdown man page, the -u parameter seems to be what I need:

  -u: The system is halted up until the point of removing system power, but waits before removing power for 5 minutes so that an external UPS (uninterruptible power supply) can forcibly remove power. This simulates a dirty shutdown to permit a later automatic power on. OS X uses this mode automatically with supported UPSs in emergency shutdowns.

But shutdown -hu now does not work. On both Macs I tested it with (Mac Mini with 10.10 and a Mac Pro on 10.11), the machines still power off immediately, they do not wait for five minutes in the halt state, so that I don't have the time to power off the mains. Therefore, the autostart on power failure setting doesn't trigger, and I have to manually push the power button to make them boot again.

The NVRAM setting to power on when power returns has nothing to do with the shutdown command, so I wouldn't worry about the shutdown options and instead focus on the NVRAM settings for what to do when the machine senses a return of power.

If you don't have an actual UPS - I would get an internet enabled power switch like WeMo or other or just train staff to power cycle the hardware.

The setting to power on automatically is quite reliable in my experience, so you should only need that to recover from 95% or more of the power failure events you have. Also, kiosk machines generally just run apps and open files, so you don't have work that needs to be saved to disk. I would just let the power cut from the Mac and make sure the filesystem is journaled so that the restart is quick.

If you have an actual UPS - use the energy saver control panel to tell the OS to shut down N minutes before the power runs out and you will be well protected from data loss.

Here I have a server with storage attached so I'm having the shut down scheduled 10 minutes before the battery expires.  For a kiosk, I would disable all three sliders/check boxes for UPS or get a simple UPS like APS BGE70 that lacks USB port entirely and just gives you some time when people accidentally trip the power or a substation feeder shifts and your outage is a minute or so in length.


Can dock items be added for multiple OS users? Hi can anyone give me a simple step by step procedure for me to be able to use the same dock for two separate users.

I basically have me as two companies and have set up two users to keep everything separate.

But I would like to be able to add icons for  word, photoshop, and illustrator in both user accounts.

You can script dock additions, but it's actually quite a pain to do correctly and in a general manner.

The time it takes you to read one of the links I will add will be longer than it takes to just log in to each user, add the icons to the dock by hand and then logging out.

https://github.com/kcrawford/dockutil

The above link is a command line utility to manipulate a user's dock. It also can operate on multiple users at the same time, so I would start with that tool and look for others if this one doesn't work for your needs / abilities.

dockutil --add /Applications/Word.app --before 'System Preferences' --allhomes


How can I archive articles I'm reading on my iPad? (Evernote, Instapaper, etc) I read a number of magazines and newspapers daily on my iPad, using a number of different apps. I generally start out in Flipboard, then read the New York Times using the dedicated app in Newsstand, then often read bits from The Week UK, again using their Newsstand app. I usually end up in Safari, reading something further on a regular website.

I'd like to archive some of the articles that I read, and ideally I'd like a single mechanism that works in all of these apps. My strategy at the moment is to use the ubiquitous "Email" button in almost any iPad app to send article links to Evernote by means of the Evernote email service.

That causes a link to the article to be archived into my Evernote database, sometimes together with a little blurb about the article.

What I'd most like, though, is for the full text of the article, ideally even with a nice layout, to be archived into Evernote. As a PDF would be a huge bonus.

I'm aware that I can go through various mechanisms of opening up the links on my desktop computer, then printing the articles as PDFs and having them added back to Evernote. I'm also aware that this could be a quick process, if I utilize folder actions or a "PDF to Evernote" service. But ideally, I'd like this whole process to be a single step from my iPad itself. I don't relish the idea of going back to my desktop for constant administration of this system.

I should mention that I'm not a regular Instapaper user, though I know it's a well-loved service. Instapaper seems designed for "time shifting" reading, which isn't something I do. I'm more interested in archiving and referencing. I use Evernote because I like that it is agnostic to the kind of information I put in (I can combine text snippets, images, and whole PDFs), I like that the database is on my computer and not solely in the cloud, and I like its search functions.

So my questions are:

Is there a way to email article links to some service which will convert those links into full PDFs, then email them on to Evernote?
Is there a better way to keep articles and snippets than Evernote, one which I can send things into by email?
Is there a wholly different way of doing this that may be more efficient and avoid the problems of emailing links instead of PDFs?

EDIT:

Thanks to the suggestions I've gotten here, I've tried exploring more options. I'm still stuck, and perhaps someone here can help move me forward.

The critical piece was discovering a website called "If This, Then That,", which acts as a glue between other websites. I've set up an action on IFTTT to monitor my Instapaper RSS feed for a new article, then to automatically add that article to Evernote. Since Instapaper also provides an email address for adding items to the reading list, this should allow me to simply email to Instapaper, and have everything automatically download in Evernote.

Unfortunately the Instapaper RSS feed doesn't seem to pick up updates to my Instapaper reading list. Furthermore, links sent from the New York Times are not translated into the full articles by Instapaper, they're just kept as links. So close and yet so far!

I've been experimenting with Pocket and Readability for the same problem. So far nothing works. But I feel I'm on the right track with IFTTT.

I find the Send to Instapaper button to be perfect for archiving because it's so ubiquitous. The glue that gets your articles from there to Evernote is IFTTT.

Just create a rule that says anything you save to Instapaper gets imported to Evernote and you're set. I believe you can automatically have it add a tag at the same time.


How do I use time machine to restore my entire computer, rather than a file? Is is possible? What is the easiest (most hassle-free) way of accomplishing this?

To recover your entire system:

1) Connect your Time Machine backup disk to your computer.

If you’re restoring your system because of a problem with your startup disk, make sure the disk has been repaired or replaced.

2) Insert your Mac OS X Install disk, and double-click the Install Mac OS X icon.

3) In the Installer, choose Utilities > Restore System from Backup.

4) In the Restore Your System dialog, click Continue.

5) Select your Time Machine backup volume.

6) Select the Time Machine backup you want to restore.

7) Follow the onscreen instructions.


Clean OS X install, keeping Time Machine history? I need to wipe and rebuild my Macbook Pro Retina's hard drive (OS X Yosemite, if it matters) and am planning on using Setup Assistant to restore all my data from my Time Machine backup. Question: once I do this, will my existing Time Machine history be preserved, so that I can, say, go and find a file's version as of two months ago? Or, is there a way of accessing my old Time Machine data through the Time Machine interface (so I don't have to burrow through all the hidden Time Machine files)?

(This question was previously asked as "Clean Lion install, keeping Time Machine history?", but the fundamental question of Time Machine History was never answered.)

Well, I tried it, and indeed the Time Machine history is preserved (at least with OS X Yosemite). I did the following:

Erased the hard drive
Installed Yosemite
Restored from my Time Machine backup drive

After all this was done, and with the backup drive connected, I entered Time Machine on my Documents folder, and there was the history.

Good work, Apple!

Edit: I finally had to buy a new MacBook Pro, and used Setup Assistant again to transfer all my files from my old MacBook's Time Machine archive. It worked well, and when I was done I booted from my new MacBook everything was there.

Interestingly, when I re-enabled Time Machine on my new MacBook, still attached to my old MacBook's Time Machine disk, I got the following dialog (actually with different disk names):

Sure enough, after I chose "Inherit Backup History" my new Mac was using the old Time Machine backup disk, history in all. Way, way cool.


ssh -A doesn't properly enable forwarding of authentication agent connection I love ssh -A, which allows me to use my local ssh key when establishing a connection from a remote server. For example, I ssh -A host1.example.com and then from there I can ssh host2.example.com (or use git) and it uses my ssh key from the original machine, which in this case should be my mac. Although this has always worked for me on Debian/Ubuntu, it doesn't work on my new mac (Lion).

What am I missing here? How do I configure ssh to work correctly with -A? Do I need an ssh that is not the standard MacOS one?

Actually, the very simple answer is that you have to run

ssh-add

and then it all works.

Basically, macOS already has the ssh-agent set up for you, but after each reboot you need to add your keys to it. ssh-add gives ssh-agent access to your keys for the current boot cycle.  You'll have to enter the password for your private key if you have created one.


Black screen when using 4 ram sticks on brand new iMac 5K I bought a 5K iMac 4 months ago, with the stock 8gb of ram. I bought an extra 2x4GB off Amazon (Crucial Ram). But then, it looks like I cannot use all 4 ram slots at the same time. The iMac won't even start, only show a black screen.
The Crucial ram sticks are 100% working, since I tried removing the original ram sticks, using only the new ones, and the mac boots and runs fine
Right now, I am running the iMac with 3 of the 4 sticks, so at the moment I have 12gb of ram.
I tried using the top 3 slots, it works. Bottom 3, it works.
2 slots works too.
But as soon as I insert a 4th ram stick, it stops working
I have resetted the SMC and NVRAM. Still no luck
Also updated Mojave to 10.14.2 (latest version)

Any ideas?
I would like to see if there's anything I can try before setting an appointment with Apple for this, since it's my main working machine, and I need to work on some projects right now.

Thanks a lot!

Here's the Ram kit I have bought:

Crucial 8GB Kit (4GBx2) DDR4 2400 MT/S (PC4-19200) SR x8 SODIMM 260-Pin Memory

I've read multiple comments on Amazon about this kit working fine with 5k iMacs...so I'm not sure what's going on here. Thanks

Not all RAM is created equal. The way motherboards handle things is radically different. For example where an ASUS PC motherboard might take mismatched RAM, the iMac will not. To ensure compatibility use RAM that has the same:

Clock Speed
Voltage Requirement
Latency timings

It's best to buy identical RAM sticks. They should be the same manufacturer and the same model number. Occasionally even RAM with the same model number can have different modules on the chip. (This is very rare )

Can you update your question with details about the Manufacturer, Model number, Clock speed, voltage Requirement, and latency timings of your RAM?

UPDATE:
According to the Apple website, the RAM you bought should be compatible:
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201191

Might be time for the genius bar.


How can I run Mojave on an iMac that won’t run Mojave? Last week a relative gave me his old iMac 27” 2011 [HDD]. I Planned to run it off a bootable external SSD with Mojave 10.14.6 installed — I wasn’t aware of the hardware limitations i.e. the iMac’s hardware only supports MacOS up to High Sierra.

How could I run Mojave on this iMac?

Responders may suggest 1) patch with dosdude's patcher (not compatible with this model iMac) or 2) use High Sierra. My problem with the 2nd suggestion is that I'm already set on Mojave with software licenses (with machine install limits/hardware locks etc.) and all sorts of custom software patching setup for audio production that will be a nightmare to replicate (obviously I can't use a Mojave Time Machine BU to go backwards).

Any ideas welcome.

You could try http://dosdude1.com/mojave/, although I don't know if that would work in your configuration.


How to format selected text in monospace in Apple Notes app? When I select a text and hit Command+Shift M, It format the whole line instead of the selected text.
Example:
This is a code
expected:
This is a code
What I have:
This is a code

I guess you can't change it. MonoSpace falls under Paragraph Style in Notes and it implies for whole sentence or paragraph.


How can I disable this mutli-monitor window-cutoff in Mavericks? If I drag a window in between two screens, half the window disappears. Is there a flag I can set from the command line or pref option somewhere to disable this?

My chrome window below is in the middle of my two monitors with the left half hidden.

have you tried system pref > mission control > and uncheck "displays have separate spaces"


MBP Connected to WiFi but won't connect to Web I'm connected to WiFi but won't connect to the Web. FaceTime works but when I try to load safari the bar starts to fill and then stops. I've checked DNS and tried 8.8.8.8 as well as the defaults. All proxies are unchecked. I've run diagnostics and it says it's working fine. Can anyone help?

I've asked some questions to help debug as a comment, but this is what I would try:

1) Turn off all extensions in Safari (Safari menu -> Preferences -> Extensions)

2) Rule out DNS issues - try to ping a site. Open Terminal (in Applications -> Utilities). Type in:

ping google.com

You should get something like:

⇒  ping google.com PING google.com (173.194.43.39): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 173.194.43.39: icmp_seq=0 ttl=251 time=7.462 ms
64 bytes from 173.194.43.39: icmp_seq=1 ttl=251 time=6.895 ms
64 bytes from 173.194.43.39: icmp_seq=2 ttl=251 time=7.991 ms

So, take the IP (173.194.43.39), might be different for you, and put that into Safari, see if that works.

You can also just try the IP above as well. If Safari works with the IP, then the issue is DNS.

3) Using Terminal again, try curl:

curl www.google.com

If you get a lot of code back, it's fine, and your issue is purely Safari.

4) Try a different WiFi network
5) Try a different device on your WiFi network
6) Try a different browser if you have one


Where to get iPhone app download statistics? I know this is a elementary question, but I figured I'd get a quicker answer here than Apple support. Where can I find out how many times the app has been downloaded and other download stats? I'm a developer and can't find the stats on the iOS Dev Center. I have not renewed the $99 Developer license, so could it be hidden because of that?

If it is the application you developed, you can access it from itunesconnect.apple.com which is called iTunes Connect, and that's how you should have uploaded your app to Apple in the first place.

You can also try a piece of software called AppFigures, which is essentially a portal to iTunes Connect, which I find easier to use and with more features.

Also: after not renewing your iPhone Developer licence, your apps will stay in iTunes Connect for some period of time, probably around a year before being deleted.


Why is Safari asking for local items keychain? Recently, after opening safari on my macbook air, it began asking for the password to my local items keychain. Immediately this raises a red flag, as this never happened before and seems not entirely unlikely to be some form of malware. Is this actually a security risk or is this something benign?

Benign, probably.  This is related to iCloud Keychain.. it will take the 'local' keychain (called "login") and rename it to Local Items.  Then it'll upload the items that it can to iCloud and call that "iCloud".


Mac Book Pro file sharing stops working OS X El Capitan - 10.11.6
MBP Mid 2015

I have file sharing setup to a folder on an external drive.  I use the sharing via VLC on my phone or on a fire stick.

The most recent example was watching a movie for more than an hour, pausing and coming back less than 5 minutes later and not being able to continue watching.  Confirming on the phone the file sharing seemed to be no longer working.  Going back to the laptop and turning sharing off and back on resolved the problem.

The laptop is connected to a power adapter and the power settings in adapter mode prevent the computer from sleeping automatically when display is off and the put hard drives to sleep when possible is not checked.

I had noticed that if the filesharing is working properly and I come back to the laptop and unclick filesharing, osx will come up with a dialog that says users are still connected to the sharing, would you like to end sharing in x minutes.  If I come back and the sharing is not working and unclick the sharing it doesn't give this warning.  Sometimes the problem is the firestick as I can see the sharing working on the phone but sometimes the problem is osx as the sharing has stopped working for both.  I am not too surprised the firestick stuff is a little unstable but the problems with osx and sharing surprise me.

Any thoughts as to what causes this?

The following might be one of the issues but it hasn't fixed the issue for me so I'll continue to look for a solution.  Opening preferences, sharing and enabling and disabling sharing causes the sharing to start working again so possibly I just need a cron job that runs every so often and does whatever the gui is doing in the background.  The other possible hint is that my monitors are typically asleep so I might test around disabling the "turn display off after" or "automatic graphics switching" features.
The OSX powernap feature and SMB don't like each other.  I've quoted and pasted the link below describing the problem.  The answer is also apple recommended so that leads credence to it.

“Enable Power Nap” selected in the Energy Saver settings was forcing the network drives to dismount. I disabled that setting two days ago, and the network backups have properly worked the past two nights; the network drives also remain mounted as I can see when I come into the office in the morning. This behavior is counterintuitive given that the entire point of a Power Nap is to permit the computer to perform network based operations as per Apple’s own words:
“While sleeping, your Mac can back ip using Time Machine and periodically check for new email, calendar, and other iCloud updates”
Yet, this very same feature causes network drives to dismount once the Mac goes to sleep.  As I stated in the original post, this appears to be a longstanding problem that needs to be corrected in macOS, as many Mac users, particularly those in work environments, need to connect to servers, NAS, etc. that are not set up with Mac-centric protocols.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/7842881
I'll update once I've had a chance to test out disabling the other energy features and see that I don't encounter any more issues with the file sharing.


Robust OCR / scanning software recommendations Ideally I would like smart batch capabilities, emphasis on image correction and tweakable OCR. An example use case: I have photos of textbook pages - the most ideal application ever would adjust for shadows and noise, apply filters to clarify text, differentiate between text and pictures and process separately, deskew and warp to compensate for curved pages, crop correctly, provide tools for OCR adjustment, and compile into a PDF. Correct me if I'm wrong, but all of these tasks are not too difficult from a developer's standpoint. If this software doesn't exist yet, whoever does it best will make millions!

Solved, with a great app called Prizmo. A few baffling interface problems (slides occasionally rearrange themselves or change their thumbnails to adjacent pages?!) but I managed to turn a set of low-light camera phone pictures of a textbook into a flat, curvature-corrected readable pdf. OCR didn't work at all but the images were so low quality that I was surprised at the few times it did; if I were more careful with the photography it could easily have read a page taken with an iPhone camera. Really great curvature correction, only a few interface adjustments would make this software perfect and efficient for a higher number of pages, like key shortcuts and some thought put into the curvature adjustment interface, or the ability to copy curvature correction settings over similar pages, or the somewhat obvious ability to pull 2 pages out of a picture/scan of a book. If they fire their current UX lead and replace him/her with a technology user the next update will be absolute gold.


User folder on 2nd partition with link? I have a hackintosh system. Fully working one.

I have a secondary partition called "Storage". I would like to move my user folder from /Users/"Username" to "Storage"/"Username".

Afterward create a link from "Storage"/"Username" to /Users/"Username"

Is this possible? Anyone tried?

Don't wanna brake system before trying.

You can use a symbolic link to do this. I used it on an old mac which required the OS to be within a certain distance from the beginning of the drive, so I had to partition my hard drive to ensure that it would be there. To create a symbolic link, you need to use the command ln -s <source> <destination> in Terminal.

However, it would be better to use the advanced options in the Accounts preference pane to move your home folder's location. You will need to unlock the preferences if required (using the lock icon in the bottom left corner), then right click on your account name and change the location of your home directory. Since you are putting it on a separate partition, the path will start with /Volumes/PartitionName. Copy the folder over to the other partition before changing this setting! Then log out and back in and it should be using the new home folder, and you will be able to delete the old one. You can still create the symbolic link just in case some applications improperly assume that your home folder is in the /Users folder.


How to back up text messages from iPhone 5S? What is the most simple way (for a non-techie) to back up my text messages, including the pictures within iMessages?

I believe that the right way on doing that is with an iTunes Back-up. This way you make sure you can restore them back to your device anytime you want without loosing any of them including the images.

Also there are few apps out there that could help you export the messages, but not sure if they can be imported back to your device. For example using an app for Mac called iExplorer.


FaceTime HD camera stops transmitting live video in Catalina -- how to fix? At some point in Catalina's evolution (10.15.5+ ?) situations started recurring where there’s no video with the Thunderbolt Display attached and the MacBook Pro in closed clamshell mode when attempting a videoconference via FaceTime or other videoconferencing app (Skype, Zoom, etc). What is strange is that the Display FaceTime HD camera is selected and the green LED is illuminated. I also tried disconnecting the Thunderbolt Display to see whether the MacBook Pro’s built-in FaceTime would transmit live video — and it did. But then there was no audio! I was able to reconnect the Thunderbolt Display to regain audio, but of course there was no live video.
The workaround for this problem is to restart the computer.
Has anyone else seen this problem, and is there a fix besides restarting?

I know this is an old question, but just in case it helps someone else who lands on this page: it seems this is related to a bug with MacBook Pros after they wake up from sleep. You can deal with it by simply restarting the camera plugin. Close the videoconference app, open Terminal and type:
sudo killall VDCAssistant

Type in your password at the prompt and that's it. If the issue was related to the wake-up-from-sleep bug, then the Thunderbolt Display camera should be working once you start the videoconference app again.


How to prevent someone accessing my iMac My desktop is in the living room where anyone visiting can access it.  I'd like to make it secure from those in my home since I have a roommate.

You can't make it truly secure; there is a saying that says given enough time, physical access is root access. That being said, there are some steps you can take to get as close as possible.

FileVault

Enable filevalult. This will keep people from accessing your data if they boot from an external drive.
To do this, go to System Preferences -> Security & Privacy -> FileVault, and click Turn On FileVault. This will most likely require an admin password, and will probably take a very long time, depending on how much stuff is on your computer. That being said, it's worth it.

Screen lock

Enable auto-locking of your computer after a set amount of time. This can be done in System Preferences -> Security & Privacy -> General. Check the box that says require password [5 minutes] after sleep or screensaver begins and change it to your desired amount of time.

Firmware lock

To prevent booting into single user mode or from an external disk without a password, enable firmware lock.

WARNING: THIS IS VERY HARD TO RECOVER FROM IF YOU LOSE YOUR PASSWORD. DON'T LOSE IT.

To do this, shut down your computer and turn it on while holding the Command+R keys. This will put you in recovery mode. Click the Utilities menu, and select the Firmware Password Utility. Click Turn On Firmware Password... and set a password. You will need it to boot from anything other than your main partition, so keep it safe! If you have an older Mac (Pre-2011, I think) there is a trick to get around this, but it requires removing the RAM, so it's pretty unlikely.


How to convert Apple Music M4P to MP3? Is there any way to convert Apple Music M4P files to MP3?

iTunes doesn't allow to burn discs with Apple Music files, is there any other method?

M4P files are protected with Apple's Digital Rights Management (DRM) to stop conversion etc. Any unprotected MPEG4 files like .m4a can be converted easily with iTunes or various other applications but the DRM prevents this.

If you've purchased the music yourself, then upgrading to iTunes Match will let you replace the DRM protected files with standard m4a which Apple now uses for iTunes purchases. It's an annual subscription but you might also find it useful for syncing and updating other music in your library.

Also bear in mind that any conversion from m4a to mp3 will be from one lossy format to another, so you might notice a reduction in sound quality.


Switch from sleep to hibernate after set time Is there a way to set a MacBook Pro (10.8.2) to go into normal sleep when I close the case but then switch to hibernation after, say, 15 minutes? It's clearly capable of going from sleep to hibernate when the battery runs low, but I haven't been able to find out if that behavior can be triggered by anything else.

Background: I need to use Filevault encryption, and my understanding is that it doesn't provide much protection if the computer is stolen while in normal sleep mode. To remedy this I've set it to hibernate instead of sleeping and enabled the DestroyFVKeyOnStandby option. But this is very inconvenient when I just want to put it on standby for a few minutes (e.g., put it in my bag, walk to a meeting upstairs, open it back up).

Retina MacBook Pros and newer MacBook Airs actually do that by default under certain conditions. If Power Nap is disabled, the computer is on battery power, not connected to USB devices and not paired with Bluetooth devices, it enters standby mode (hibernation) after about 70 minutes of normal sleep.

If pmset -g | grep standby looks like this, your computer supports standby mode:

 standby              1
 standbydelay         4200

You can change the delay to 15 minutes with sudo pmset -b standbydelay 900.


Add facebook event to MacOS Catalina calendar On older MacOS version I used to have a Facebook account so all the events I participated or was interested into appeared in the Calendar application.

What is the best way to achieve this now that the Facebook account disappeared?

Have you tried this :

Open Facebook.com on your Mac
Go to Events > Calendar
On the right side, click on "Upcoming Events" :

A .ics file will be downloaded, and you just need to open it in the Calendar.app


Active monitoring and scheduled scanning in ClamXav? I want to use an antivirus app on my Mac, and I heard that ClamXav is a good one to use. However, I'm not sure how to use it.

All previous anti-virus scanners that I have used have two main features:

Active monitoring
Scheduled scanning

The first feature constantly monitors your system and when it detects a new virus file being created, it will let you know so that you can remove the virus before it does any damage.

The second feature will periodically (e.g. every week) scan your entire hard-drive to make sure that no viruses have made their way onto your hard-drive.

Is there any way to enable these two features in ClamXav?

From a cursory read of ClamXav's online documentation, it appears that both of those features are available.

For Active monitoring, ClamXav allows you to specify any number of folders to watch (e.g. your Downloads folder) as well as having a way to scan incoming email and inserted disks.
For Scheduling scanning, there is a preference pane which allows you to both schedule virus definition updates and perform periodic scans.

I would recommend reading their online documentation.


Writing a shell script (or something similar) that will execute some commands For my work I use an app called Sublime Text to edit website documents. To open my project in sublime text I drag the folder above the icon and it opens it up in sublime text.

My next step is to run a nodejs script, and after it's run open chrome and navigate to a local url.

My question is - how can I automate that process - meaning I will have a script that I run (command line is fine) that will open the project in sublime text, run the nodejs script (which starts a local web server), open safari to a url.

Is that possible?

Thanks

Yes, this is possible. The two best options for stitching together Mac applications are AppleScript and Automator.

Given your steps, consider exploring the included Automator application: Applications > Automator.app

Apple's Mac Basics: Automator support note is a good starting point.

The following Actions are likely to help:

Display Webpages for opening your default browser and showing a URL
Run Shell Script for interacting with node.js
Open Finder Items for opening documents in Sublime Text


Cannot sync with iTunes: This computer is no longer authorized for apps that are installed on the iPhone I'm not even trying to sync apps. I only want to sync one movie. When I try to sync, I get this error message.

I click the Authorize button, it asks me to enter my iTunes password, and after that, it gives me this error.

I even tried to go to the menu > iTunes Store > Authorize This Computer, but it still gives the error. I also tried to de-authorize the computer, but it gives the same error when I try to authorize. I ran the diagnostics in iTunes and they all passed. (I did not run the CD test.) I checked for updates and it says it is the latest. I have the box checked in preferences to "Automatically Update".

Windows 8.1, iPhone 5, iOS 9.2.1, iTunes 12.1.2.27

Try this :

Open iTunes
From the Store menu, select "View my Account..."
Sign in with your Apple ID and password.
Under "Computer Authorizations" select "Deauthorize All".
Authorize each computer you still have, as you may require.

Then restart iTunes, and try again to autorize your computer with your Apple ID


How can I locate in iPhoto an image selected in the Finder? This is essentially the reverse of this question: given that I have selected an image in the Finder, is there an applescript or similar tool which will open iPhoto and highlight this file in the library so I can delete/modify/tag/inspect it there?

Here is a basic automator service that will allow you to select an image in Finder and then start the service to find it in iPhoto. It worked fine on my Snow Leopard machine.

HTH

EDIT:
Changed the code slightly to make it behave better and make it go into Edit mode. Here is the changed code. Open the Automator Service file, and copy/paste it over it. Save it and it should take effect immediately.

on run {input, parameters}
    set fPath to POSIX path of (input as string)

    tell application "iPhoto"
        activate
        select album "PHOTOS"
        set photoList to every photo whose image path is fPath
        select item 1 of photoList

        # Pressing Enter key goes into Edit mode...
        tell application "System Events"
            keystroke return
        end tell
    end tell
    return input
end run


1st Reboot after fresh Yosemite Install - Chime + Apple logo + status bar...then status bar goes about 1/3 of the way and then it dissappers along with the logo and I get just the white screen.

When I boot into Safe Mode I have no audio and sometime the screen flickers.  I looks like it flickering rolling up the screen.  It's weird.

I've tried two different HD's and created to different USB installeation disks.
I've reset PRAM and NVRAM.

I'm stumped.

Might it be a Macbook Pro from 2010 to 2012 that you performed the installation on? It sounds an awful lot like the motherboard issue that these models suffer from....


How to validate macOS Catalina password dialog? (Has weird icon) Anyone recognize icon on the App Store download dialog in inline pic below?

On macOS Catalina, I am regularly getting a pop-up requesting I enter my Apple ID and password to download from the App Store.  But I'm concerned because the password prompt dialog doesn't have the App Store app icon, and I don't recognize the icon showing in the upper-left corner of dialog.

I can't think of any other app that might legitimately request the password. When I click the dialog title bar, the foremost running app does not change in the title bar. For example, if it was "Finder" was the forefront app, the menu bar still says "Finder" when I click the dialog title bar, and Safari is the forefront app, the menubar still stays Safari.

I tried googling around for images to discover what the Catalina pop-up should look like but I can't find corroborating pics or evidence, and couldn't get a visual conformation. I did notice on older macOS releases that the App Store app icon (the blue icon that looks like an "A") appears in the App Store password prompt dialogs, so not sure why that would change. So this has raised my suspicions.

The icon is for "Paste - Clipboard Manager".

I would open the App Store app separate and check the "Updates" tab and the account tab to see if you have indeed requested the download of that app yourself.


How to use a pipe in a script optionally How can I achieve the conditional usage of a pipe for a command execution in a script.

It looks like this

#!/bin/bash
XCPRETTY=" | xcpretty"
if [ $(which xcpretty | wc -l) == 0 ]; then
    XCPRETTY=""
fi
xcodebuild archive ....... $XCPRETTY || exit 1

Just use cat as a no-op if xcpretty is not installed:

XCPRETTY="xcpretty"
which xcpretty || XCPRETTY="cat"
xcodebuild archive ....... | eval $XCPRETTY || exit 1


Always show service in contextual menu Sometimes when I create a service in Automator, I want it to always appear in the Finder contextual menu, not just when I have a selected a file or folder.
The services are always either pure applescript or pure bash, so if it can be done some other way without using Automator, I'm also satisfied.

I've mentioned before that the commercial utility Unsanity FruitMenu allows customization of Finder contextual menus. You could launch an AppleScript or Automator document from the contextual menu with this utility. But FruitMenu requires Rosetta and therefore won't work in Lion. I don't know if Unsanity is developing a way to implement this in Lion, or not.


~/Pictures Bloated Size I am planning on backing up my pictures

When I got to ~/Pictures it shows 168.57GB Size and then two libraries iPhoto and photos as shown below.

I thought these were just links so total of all my pictures should be just around approx 90GB but not 168.57.

So now if I backup ~/Pictures to an external Drive is it going to consume 168.57GB and have duplicates?

Please suggest if I am thinking incorrectly.

The image files (the jpgs) exist only once but are hard linked into both libraries. As the Finder doesn't have an (easy) way to identify the hard linking, calculating folder size on ~/Pictures counts these files twice.

Hard links work within one disk volume only, so if you copy data to a Cloud drive or to Windows, you will end up having two seperate files (and really use 168 GB in your case).


What is the optimal way of using a Mac with an ultrawide screen? I have an ultrawide screen (similar to this), which is connected to my Mac. I am looking for a way to split this screen into two or three virtual screens when needed, for easy multitasking. OSX does support screen splitting if you hold on the green button at the top of any screen, but it's very inconvenient because it takes a lot of clicks to switch which applications are currently displayed.

Is there a better way to make efficient use of such a big screen?

Been there before...

Currently, there is no way in MacOS to achieve true multi-monitor support on one display. I have a wide LG and the way I get around this is to us
 keyboard shortcuts to define sections of the screen with snap tools such as:

BetterSnapTool
Moom


Cocoa emacs -- open in current space? I usually use several different spaces (desktops?) for various different tasks.

Unfortunately, cocoa emacs 24.1 (9.0), even when using emacsclient (I do a server start in my init.el file) always opens a document or email response in the space emacs was originally started in.

Aquamacs seems better behaved in this respect, but I prefer cocoa emacs.

Is there a way to change this behavior?

Best,

JRV

I've gotten at least a usable approach, tho not perfect.

The best I could do is the following:

1) don't ever use emacsclient and take start server out of init.el

2) in mission control preferences, uncheck the boxes for "when switching to an application..." and "group windows by application"

If I am editing more than one doc, in different desktops I end up with more than one instance of emacs running,  but I can live with this.  Also, the startup seems to be fast enough for me without emacsclient.

It doesn't look like cocoa emacs is impemented as a document based cocoa app.  Is that the case?

Seems like Macvim handles the multiple document without multiple instance case more gracefully.

Best regards.

JRV


generate Keynote presentation from text or Markdown? Is there a way to automatically generate a Keynote presentation from a source file written in text format, Markdown format, or org-mode?

I know that Pandoc and other tools can generate HTML-based slideshows from Markdown. But Keynote allows you to put all your speaker notes to yourself in "Presenter View," which allows you to have a detailed view of your slideshow + notes on your laptop, and project a clean presentation that is not cluttered up with all your speaker notes.

(Whereas with HTML presentations, since there's only one window, you either have to put your speaker notes in the presentation slide itself, or put your speaker notes elsewhere.)

So can I generate a Keynote presentation, or at least a barebones one with slide headlines, from another source?

Example

# A headline

![some image](http://google.com/image.jpg)

Some text here.

# A headline

![some image](http://google.com/image.jpg)

- bullet point
- bullet point

# A headline

![some image](http://google.com/image.jpg)

Some text.

> Speaker notes.

md2key

md2key is exactly what you want. md2key is an open source tool for converting markdown to Keynote presentations.

Install

Install md2key with the command:

gem install md2key

Usage

Create a keynote document
Create a first slide as a cover slide
Create a second slide to choose a slide layout
Then execute md2key markdown.md


unable to ping local network I have a problem whereby Mac A cannot ping the local network. It can ping the router, 192.168.1.1 but none of the machines on that network. Mac B works properly.

I am running yosemite 10.10 on both macs.
I've tried deleting the network settings and starting again (on Mac A)

This is also preventing (which) mac from discovering my SONOS network (which is or isn't different than the local network??).

Ping can be suppressed by a firewall, so I like to take a more overall view.

I would choose one thing that Macs can share like Screen Sharing and File Sharing and turn them on on both Macs.
I would check if the time of day is correct on both (since some deviation past a few hundred seconds can cause visibility errors in some sharing tasks). This also ensures that the network connection to internet time servers is working if you set the time automatically.
Now that you know the network itself is functional for each Mac - open Finder in both and search for the other Mac.

If you have hidden the "shared" sidebar in finder, you might have to un-hide it. Alternatively, you could make a new test user account on both Macs and use it for troubleshooting. The default Finder settings will show shared Macs on the local network.

At that point, you'll know a bit more about the network and possibly want to power off both Macs and power off the router and then start them all up again.


What is single user mode useful for? I don't quite understand on the Internet I couldn't really find anything useful. What is the individual user there for exactly? The terminal that is used in single user mode can also be used in the recovery partition?

Single user mode is there in order to be able to diagnose and fix problems with the system. It is commonly used if there's an error with the system that prevents it from properly booting normally into multiuser mode (i.e. the default mode).
The single user mode allows advanced users to examine the file system, change settings, and otherwise work with the system and installed programs. In theory, you can run any command line program here - so if needed, you could for example copy all your data to an external drive in order to save files from a non-working system.
The command line interface when booted in Recovery mode is similar, but actually not the same. In single user mode you're booting your actual operating system that you would normally start up. In Recovery mode you're booting a separate "known good" system that might or might not be the same as your primary system (i.e. it could be an older or newer version for example). In Recovery mode you also wouldn't have immediate access to programs that you have installed yourself. You can mount the primary drive and access your programs that way, but it is not exactly the same.
Note also that single user mode predates the Recovery partition by quite a lot as it has been there since the original OS X Cheetah release in 2001, whereas the Recovery partition was introduced with OS X Lion in 2011.


How do I do enterprise iPad recovery? Occasionally we have employees supplied with company equipment that leave on less than favorable terms.  Some of those devices the employees have locked to their own Apple accounts somehow, which leaves us unable to reset them the normal way.  Is there a procedure somewhere that we can restore these to factory (I assume that it would require some kind of vetting process with Apple to confirm the iPad not stolen of course).  So, what's the procedure for this type of enterprise iPad equipment recovery (if any, perhaps they're just bricks now)?

I use three avenues to prevent hurt feelings all around.

First the policy for employee use of equipment spells out that it's their responsibility to turn in their company equipment and assets. For iOS devices, that means that they remove iCloud activation lock and return the hardware in working order. The financial consequence of failing to do both is explained when the hardware is issued. HR can then choose to deduct that amount from any final pay check as appropriate should the employee choose not to return company property.
Apple is very helpful in unlocking equipment that was bought through their channel or that you have a purchase receipt with serial numbers included proving original ownership. Any genius bar or web/phone Apple epmployee can get you started with unlocking one or several devices should you have them but not control of them.
MDM solutions such as JAMF casper suite or Configuration profiles to enable remote wipe and/or iOS policies that prevent iCloud usage in the first place if desired and/or allow wiping them to a known original configuration.


Why do PDF forms/annotations filled in using Preview.app appear blank to Windows/Adobe users? If I fill out a PDF form using Preview.app on Mac OS X, and email it to a Windows user, it appears to be blank when they open it in Acrobat. The same applies to some (most?) annotations.

How can I stop this happening?!

I keep encountering this, both in my own work and friends/family filling in PDF forms using Preview.app. It can be a bit embarrassing in professional circumstances, getting a response of "No, please send the filled out form, not the blank one!".

NB this seems to be fixed in the most recent versions of OS X, so workaround perhaps no longer required...

Workaround

Probably the simplest / safest option is to 'flatten' the PDF before sending it, by printing it to a new PDF.

After completing your form in Preview, go to the Print menu (cmd+P) and use the PDF drop-down in the bottom-left, selecting to Save as PDF... to generate a new, 'flattened' PDF.

Flattened simply means that all annotations (including data in the form) become indistinguishable from the actual content of the PDF, as if they were part of it all along. This means you can't edit them anymore (in the new, printed PDF), which can be desirable, but also means they'll show up properly in Adobe.

The Problem

The actual cause of the problem is detailed here from Adobe, and that blog post also includes a script for Acrobat users to recover the data from a form filled in using Preview.app (it turns out Preview puts the data in the form, but doesn't specify how it should 'appear', so Acrobat shows it as blank/invisible).

I'll leave it up to the reader to decide whether this is a bug in Adobe's software (for not showing form data without a specified "appearance") or a bug in Apple's software (for not including the "appearance" information).

If you've been affected by this bug, please consider notifying one/both of these companies of the issue:

Apple's bug report or feedback sites.
Adobe's feature request/bug report or bug base sites.


iPhoto does not import photos from iPhone after switching the library to external storage On a Mac running Yosemite, I moved my iPhoto library to an external hard disk, just by cut and pasting it. After running iPhoto, it could not find the local library anymore and asked me for the library location, I easily selected the external storage location, and it worked.

But now it does not import new photos from iPhone, just remains in "Preparing to import...". I tried to rebuild iPhoto library database, removing the related files Cache and Preferences of ~/Library folder, neither worked.

I even tried making an empty library in local hard disk and still the problem did not solve. This is while I can easily import photos from another user account on the same machine. It seems something is wrong with my user account.

Is there an idea?

After trying many different ways I could not fix iPhoto. However I succeeded to import photos to iPhoto. The trick was to run Image Capture, import photos using it and selecting the destination to iPhoto. It worked like a charm!


Disappearing dock and menu bar only on other desktops The dock and menu bar auto hide only on desktops other than DT 1. The preference button has no effect. OSX 10.11.1

I'm having the same problem, my dock and menu bar hides, which started a couple of days ago.


Cannot seem to install VMware vCSA 6.7 cert on macOS 10.13.6 High Sierra Trying to install the web certificate for my vCenter Server Appliance (vCSA 6.7) on my Mac Mini (running macOS High Sierra 10.13.6). I download the cert.0 file, change the extension to .crt and double-click the file, Keychain Access opens...but then nothing. The cert does not get installed. This is exactly how I've always installed the cert on machines before. Where could be going wrong here?

Resolved. I followed the instructions here (which was already getting done by the OS), but had to just manually "trust" the CA.


how to enable continuous scrolling in iBooks 1.0 for OSX Mavericks? According to press reports, Apple promised that the new iBooks app for OSX Mavericks would include an option to read books in continuous scrolling mode. Did this come to pass, and if so, how does one enable this?

Continuous scrolling is available for iBooks on iOS but not the Mac. The Mac version of iBooks only allows pagination.


Can I upload my Garmin Forerunner running track data from my iPad 2? I use a Garmin Forerunner 405CX GPS watch to track my running.

At the moment I have to use an ANT+ USB dongle to get the data (GPX) from my watch on to my computer/laptop.

I upload the data to the Endomondo and Runkeeper websites either by way of a Firefox/ActiveX plugin or by manually uploading the GPX file.

I want to remove the laptop from this process so is there a dongle (or similar) that will allow me to perform the same process(es) directly on the iPad?

There are a few devices I found that have been recently added to the market

Garmin Ant+ adaptor for iPhone
Wahoo Key for iPhone

Both allow you to connect and record in real time exercise data in association with their and other third party apps (Garmin Fit and Wahoo have a list here)

What I have not been able to confirm is whether it will provide upload facility from devices after being out of range as you want.

My assumption is yes it can, since you can get swim watch data entry.

All the products were originally designed for iPhone and I don't see any issue with running them on an ipad


Is Mac hardware with the T2 chip vulnerable to the latest Intel CSME exploit? Based on this exploit, are recent Macs with the T2 chip affected, I ask as I wonder how much Apple relies on its own silicon vs Intel CSME.

This is a disaster, how is Intel surviving this stuff.

I read that the T2 chip has its own Secure Enclave and immutable BootROM, and it verifies the Intel UEFI ROM before it is allowed to load, and then the CPU reads this from the T2 over SPI.

So it would seem that this boot process is not weakened by a compromise of the Intel key, as only Apple can sign UEFI updates to be loaded onto the T2 chip?

Yes.

I was curious about this also, so I tweeted at the security researcher who discovered the flaw, this was his response:

  My understanding is that on Macs with T1/T2 chips, hard disk encryption isn't affected. I don't know whether they use IPT, but DRM is certainly affected. And of course CSME arbitrary code execution is possible even if T1/T2 present (can intercept usb traffic for example)


iPhone4 can't access iCloud after upgrade to iOS 7.0.2 Software upgrade seems to have worked fine but settings->icloud is disabled.  It used to work fine.

Also FaceTime icon produces  message "Account restriction - this iphone is restricted from creating FaceTime accounts".

Any ideas please? Thanks in advance.

Settings > Restrictions > Allow Changes > Accounts

If disallowed FaceTime appears as you said.
I had the same problem and in looking for the solution managed to figure it out.


Mass remove blank spaces from file names and folder names How can I remove blank spaces from files and folders names, but just at the beginning and at the end of the files and folders names?

Thanks.

There are apps that do this but I am not endorsing anything. In my experience, these apps save me hours, if not days, of work as often I need to rename or clean up thousands of images being imported from a camera.

Try searching for something like: Finder, Better, Rename.

Other than that -- you may have to write an AppleScript. There may be an AppleScript already out there. Search for AppleScripts, too.


Which version of Windows runs best on an early 2011 MacBook Pro (and how do I obtain it)? I'd like to install Windows on my early 2011 MBP via Bootcamp so I can run a highly critical piece of software (Guild Wars 2).

The system reqs. are XP or better.

Which version of Windows?

On searching Amazon, I found that there are several versions of Windows for sale.

There's Windows 7 Home Premium. That sounds about right I guess. But does the "Premium" tag mean there's also a cheaper "non-premium" version available? If so, should I get that instead?

I understand that the current version is Windows 8. But my sense is that with Windows, one doesn't always want to run the current version.

Which release version (XP, Vista, 7, or 8) and feature version (Home, Premium, whatever) is least likely to make me miserable?
Should I install the 32 or 64-bit version? (64-bit, I guess, right?)

Looking at the Bootcamp 5 FAQ - you want a 64 bit version of Windows 7 or 8.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5639

Furthermore, you'll want to get your specific model of MacBook Pro and check this table for the exact version you want before shopping:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5634

As for major version, I know many businesses that stuck with Windows 7 so unless you need Windows 8 - I'd vote with my wallet on the cheapest non-XP version you can get. From your question, the home version is perfect for gaming and you won't really need advanced pro/premium features based on the requirements (actually lack thereof) that you listed. A benefit of going to Windows 8 now is that presumably you'll have longer to run with it before needing to upgrade to a future OS. Mark also makes a good point that Windows 8 is marketed primarily to consumers as an upgrade version, so be sure you understand your return options when buying and check into a Windows 8 system builder / OEM version if you decide to go with 8.


Where is the dns server configuration file located in OS X Server App on OS X El Capitan? What is the dns server bundled with OS X Server app on OS X El Capitan and where is the configuration file located?

For some reason Server App crashes and the only service I tried to configure is DNS.

What is the dns server bundled with OS X Server app on OS X El Capitan and where is the configuration file located?

The dns server is a domain name server used for resolving hostnames to IP adresses. The software used are bind. The configuration files for the Server.app are located at /Library/Server/ and the DNS configuration are in a subfolder called "named".

To restore your Server.app functionality, since you haven't configured anything else I would recommend removing the Server.app from your local computer, then remove the /Library/Server folder, and reinstalling the Server.app from the App Store once again.


Best HandBrake-Settings to rip DVD (multi-language) for iTunes / Apple TV / Mac / iPhone etc I want to digitalize my DVD-Collection (>300 DVD) and store it in iTunes or somewhere else for playback on Mac, iPhone, iPad and mainly Apple TV 4K.

What are the best settings in HandBrake? I want a good quality but a reasonable file-size. And at least the Original Language (f.e. English) and the Secondary Language (f.e. German) and the optional subtitles too.

First of all "What are the best settings in HandBrake?" is really up to you...

But you can find a lot of good tips on the web, as an exemple from Handbrake: Complete Step-by-step Guide:

  The recommended settings for an x264 video encoding (which is the
  default on Handbrake) is RF (Rate Factor) 18 to 22 for Standard
  Definition. For higher definitions, you can play with the Quality bar,
  19 to 23 for High Definition, RF 20 to 24 for Full High Definition and
  22 to 28 for Ultra High Definition.

For a good quality, but a reasonable size, I'd say you have to have a size file to be at least 1280x720p

Remember to get the Encoder Preset to the slowest mode in order to have the better result in size/quality !

You can set a favorite language (english & german) for audio and subtitles in both tabs.

After finding the best settings that suite you, you can save the preset and let it be the one by default !


Basic 'print' & 'puts' Mac OS terminal commands not found I followed this article to install & update ruby with a package manager but I clearly messed up somewhere.

https://stackify.com/install-ruby-on-your-mac-everything-you-need-to-get-going/

If I try to 'puts' or 'print' anything I get -bash: print: command not found / -bash: puts: command not found returned.

'ls' & 'cd' commands still work for example, but echo $path returns nothing.

As you have probably guessed, I am completely new to code & stupidly copy pasted lines into the shell that I don't understand.

Is this a path issue?

print is not a standard bash command. I think so because  man print returns no manual entry.
puts  is a Standard C Library function and should be used inside a file and used as:

#include <stdio.h>
puts(const char *s);

  The function puts() writes the string s, and a terminating newline character, to the stream stdout.

An example:

/* puts example : hello world! */
#include <stdio.h>

int main ()
{
  char string [] = "Hello world!";
  puts (string);
}

http://www.cplusplus.com/reference/cstdio/puts/

echo $path returns an empty line. It is case-sensitive. Use echo $PATH.
You need to save the ruby script in a file with appropriate file extension: .rb. Open Terminal, go the directory where the file is located using cd path/to/directory and run ruby filename.rb to see the results.


How can I run an unsigned script in Automator I can run the well-respected perl script exiftool from the command line in Terminal and achieve the desired result, but when I incorporate it in Automator as a Service I get a generic error message and the perl script is not executed. When I look in the system.log I find: "The operation couldn’t be completed. (OSStatus error -67062.)" i.e., Code object is not signed.

Correct, exiftool is not signed, and there is nothing I can do about that.  I had to bypass Gatekeeper to install it in Yosemite (10.10.5). But the script is well know in photography circles and has been used by many to edit the EXIF information in image files.

I tried to add the script or my Automator workflow to System Preferences > Security & Privacy > Privacy > Accessibility but the panel won't accept either.

Is there some way to tell Automator to accept this unsigned script or a command or switch I can put in my bash script to have it accepted?

Here is my current shell script:

for f in “$@”
do
exiftool -overwrite_original -AllDates-=1 "$f"
done

Thanks for any help.

The exiftool installs into /usr/bin. Under SIP this is not permitted.  I assume the developer will change this at some stage.

If you install in /usr/local/bin it should work, and you won't have to override anything.

EDIT
I believe the latest has been changed to install in /usr/local/bin I have never bothered to install it myself, I just run from a local directory.


Replaced CPU with i7, now 1 LED blinking I replaced the Core i5 2.7 GHz CPU in my iMac 27-inch (mid 2011) my with an i7 2600.

On boot I got a blinking single LED on LED1. Reading up that normally means insufficient power. The main fan would spin cycle up and down.

I put the i5 back in and it boots fine. Things I'm not sure about:

I'm assuming the CPU is good, but can't be 100% sure
I didn't put the RAM back in when I tested the i7, but normally you'd get a long tone.

Anything else I can try? I'll have another go when I've got more time and double check I've seated all the cable correctly etc.

Big shame if it doesn't work - I was looking forward to the upgrade!

Ok - so I took it all apart again. Reseated the i7 CPU and it all booted fine.

Runs like a champ! Awesome upgrade :-)


Keyboard shortcut CAPSLOCK-SHIFT-TAB not working in Chrome on external keyboard after CAPSLOCK modified to CONTROL On my Macbook Pro with High Sierra 10.13.3, I have an Apple external keyboard. I used System Preferences > Keyboard > Modifier Keys... to make CAPSLOCK into another CONTROL key:

With this configuration, I can move one Chrome tab to the right with CAPSLOCK-TAB, very convenient.

However, moving one tab to the left with CAPSLOCK-SHIFT-TAB doesn't work on the external keyboard.

It does work on the laptop's built-in keyboard, oddly.

This is not Chrome's fault, because I see the same behavior in the Sublime Text app.

you can use Apple's wireless keyboard, that will solve your problem.


Moving my iTunes library file to a new machine I have machine x (running Windows) that has my iTunes library file on it in the My Music folder.  All the media files in the library are on an external hdd.  I use machine x to sync my iPod on a regular basis, and have built up quite a history of songs played, recent songs, etc.

I now want to replace machine x with machine y (also running Windows).  Is it a simple case of 1) Installing iTunes on machine y; 2) moving the iTunes library file to the My Music folder on machine y and 3) then connecting the HDD to machine y (ensuring it has the same drive letter)?  Then launch iTunes.  Will machine y now know about all the song history (like play and skip counts, ratings...) as it was on machine x?  The thing I'm most afraid of is sync'ing my iPod on machine y only to have something go nasty wrong and I lose my history?

Any pointers?

Apple has a support document, iTunes for Windows: Moving your iTunes Media folder.

The answer to your questions is "yes".


How does macOS detect keyboard? How to manually add a new keyboard? I have new keyboard, Logitech MX Keys, 920-009416 = US ISO.

The keyboard works well, out of box, on Windows 10 and Linux, Manjaro. On macOS there is issue with it.
After plugin on macOS, app Keyboard Setup Assistant opens and try detect my keyboard. The main problem is with keys: tilde~ on the left side of 1 and backslash \ near to z. According to the documentation:

If you are a Windows, Linux and Android user, the special characters will be on the right side of the key:

If you are a macOS or iOS user, the special characters and keys will be on the left side of the keys:

but I want to use tilde to the left of key 1, so I want to use windows/linux layout.
After many attempts with the Assistant, I wasn't able to generate the correct configuration:
$ defaults read /Library/Preferences/com.apple.keyboardtype
{
    keyboardtype =     {
        "10203-5824-0" = 41;
        "45915-1133-0" = 41;
    };
}

I had to help myself Karabiner-Elements and map the keys:
grave_accent_and_tilde(`) with non_us_backslash.
I tried to find out what the code in /Library/Preferences/com.apple.keyboardtype.plist means, but I failed. At first Karabiner could see the keyboard but it was grayed out and I couldn't map keys for it.
The second problem is with adding a new keyboard, new dongle. After this, when I use Keyboard Setup Assistant, the file /Library/Preferences/com.apple.keyboardtype.plist is changing and I have the problem again. I don't know why.
Is it possible to use the same layout as under Windows/Linux? How to manually add a keyboard?
What does the keys layout depend on, §|` and `|\ ?
On Linux, xev returns for left-upper tilde:
KeyPress event, serial 34, synthetic NO, window 0x4000001,
    root 0x139, subw 0x0, time 356984, (-111,112), root:(600,476),
    state 0x0, keycode 49 (keysym 0x60, grave), same_screen YES,
    XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (60) "`"
    XmbLookupString gives 1 bytes: (60) "`"
    XFilterEvent returns: False

and
KeyPress event, serial 37, synthetic NO, window 0x4000001,
    root 0x139, subw 0x0, time 360368, (-107,104), root:(604,468),
    state 0x0, keycode 94 (keysym 0x3c, less), same_screen YES,
    XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (3c) "<"
    XmbLookupString gives 1 bytes: (3c) "<"
    XFilterEvent returns: False

for "backslash" but I don't use this key.

Have you tried Logitech Options?
 It's their custom software and in the specifics tells that it's good also for MX keyboards.


Does the AFP Service ACL still exist in 10.9 Server.app? All I'm really trying to do is set up my wife's laptop to use my Mac Pro as a network Time Machine server. We both recently upgraded to Mavericks and I just installed Server.app.

Problem is all connection attempts from her account fail, and I can't work out why (after lots of time and effort diagnosing the problem).

One ars forum post describes a similar problem, and one of the suggestions is that the connection is being blocked by a SACL. This theory is validated by the fact that I can connect with my own (admin) account.

More searching, and it seems that the suggestion is to edit the SACL using the Server Admin app. I guess this has now been rolled into Server.app?

Can someone please enlighten me, where are Service ACLs configured?

You can enable individual access to services for users and groups inside of Server.app 3.0. Select the Users or Groups section from the sidebar, and then click on the user or group that you'd like to configure access for. Click on the action (gear) icon below the list of users or groups, and choose "Edit Access to Services...":

You'll be presented with a list of services that allow access to be enabled and disabled for this user/group. If the list is disabled, you may need to choose to "Manage Service Access":

The software may prompt you to confirm your choice to enable management of Service Access:

Some information on how to configure these checkboxes using dseditgroup is available. It should also be noted that users from external directories are denied access to services by default.

If you're just trying to confirm that the user is inside of the group that's allowed to access the AFP service, you can perform this command:

dscl localhost read /Local/Default/Groups/com.apple.access_afp GroupMembership

If the command reports that the record is not found (-14136), you probably don't have an ACL applied to the AFP service.


Why does my cellular iPad not have the cellular capabilities? I’ve recently purchased an iPad Air advertised as ‘Wifi Only’ but it has the sim card tray & antenna. I’ve got the exact same model A1475 in a different storage capacity variant side-by-side with it, the model numbers match. Both are indeed Wifi + Cellular models.

Using Apple's site https://checkcoverage.apple.com and entering the serial number to check the service and support coverage of the devices, both are shown to be 'iPad Air WiFi, Cellular'

The serial numbers on the back of the devices match the serial number in ‘Settings->General->About’ for each device respectively.

The one lacking cellular capability also lacks the following fields in the ‘About’ section: Network, Carrier, Cellular Data Number, IMEI, ICCID, MEID, Modem Firmware. It does not have ‘Cellular Data’ or ‘Carrier’ in the first category of settings either as the older iPad does either, usually 'Airplane Mode, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Cellular Data, Carrier'.

I've tried 2 different sim cards, both which work in my phone and other cellular iPad but there's absolutely no indication that it's been inserted or lack thereof.

Other suggestion around the web and on the Apple forums indicate to restore the iPad, users have reported only WiFi firmware is compatible and resetting network settings (I've reset the entire device), all to no avail for other users either.

Browsing other forums I’ve learnt that:

The software setting up the antenna may have failed during a software update therefore no longer has the cellular capability. (iPhones are not prone to this however)
The board within the device or certain components could have been removed in order to remove an iCloud lock that existed on the device.

I picked up both second-hand for dirt-cheap prices and the newer iPad was originally advertised as ‘WiFi only’ anyway so there’s no issue with that, I would just like to find a way to resolve the issue is possible. I’d be grateful for any suggestions.

Edit 01/06/2017
I opened up the iPad and found that a cable from the sim card tray to the motherboard where the screen ICs are connected was unplugged. When turning the iPad on, it attempts to look for a signal (shows the 5 empty circles) but then changes to the text 'iPad' but without the pop-up that reads 'No sim card inserted'.
I may have damaged the cable when inserting it, it was a mission to get in, that's probably why the last person who repaired it didn't put it into place.

My wife had an iPhone 4 for a long time and at one stage the iPhone fell in some water.  We did all the usual tricks, turn it off, put it in rice, etc.   After a few days the phone was fine and worked as normal except the wifi never worked again.

I would suspect something similar happened to this iPad.  The cellular module is probably damaged, for some reason or another, and doesn't work.  The seller most likely advertised it as Wifi Only so you couldn't complain back to them later.


Can’t get "play/pause" of window 1. Access not allowed. - trying to unpause movie through Applescript I'm trying to pause/unpause QuickTime Player with a little dictation command:

on run
    activate application "QuickTime Player"
    tell application "System Events"
        click "play/pause" of window 1
    end tell
end run

When I test this, I get the error message Can’t get "play/pause" of window 1. Access not allowed. Is there any way around this?

Thanks

I guess the answer to my question is to use the scripting dictionary for QTP instead of the using the UI. The website I got my code from is here and the code I'm using is below:

set movieFile to (path to me) & name of front window of application "QuickTime Player"

tell application "QuickTime Player"
    try
        set isPlaying to get playing of document 1
    on error
        open movieFile
    end try
    if isPlaying is true then
    else
        set the looping of document 1 to true
        play document 1
    end if
end tell


Use shell wildcard OR with diskutil I have the following terminal command, which matches volumes called A001R45R, A123R45R, etc.

diskutil eraseVolume HFS+ FreshMag /Volumes/*R45R

But I also want it to match volumes called B001R4G5, B150R4G5, etc.  How can I use the OR expression in the wildcard?  I tried the following, but it doesn't work:

$ diskutil eraseVolume HFS+ FreshMag /Volumes/{*R45R,*R4G5}
The third parameter does not appear to be "bootable" or "nonbootable"
$ diskutil eraseVolume HFS+ FreshMag /Volumes/"{*R45R,*R4G5}"
Unable to find disk for /Volumes/{*R45R,*R4G5}

I'm using bash.

I figured out the answer myself.  Apparently the bash version in OS X supports square brackets, but not curly brackets.  Weird.  It's bash 3.2.53.  This command works:

diskutil eraseVolume HFS+ FreshMag /Volumes/*[R45R,R4G5]

However, in this particular case, it's actually better to use a more specific command like this:

diskutil eraseVolume HFS+ FreshMag /Volumes/[A-Z][0-9][0-9][0-9][R,L]???

It should be noted that if more than one volume matches this wildcard, the command will fail, because the wildcard expands to both filenames.


Automator Combine PDF Application I have created almost an exact automator application as those who have posted before me and it goes as follows;

1) Get Selected Finder Items

2) Combine PDF pages

3) Move Finder Items (+show this action when the workflow runs)

yet when I drop in pdf files into the application icon I get double the pages I initially input. Is there anyone else running into this problem and is there a way around this?

And a related question concerning the naming of output file; what function do I need to add in order to custom name each pdf binder output? As I have read sequential naming doesn't work without a shell script, are there any other solutions which do not involve external scripts other than provided by the automator?

Thank you.

If you want to custom name the combined PDF files, then add a Rename Finder Items action between the Combine PDF Pages action and the Move Finder Items action, with the Options set to checking the Show this action when the workflow runs check box. Set the Rename Finder Items action to Name Single Item and Name: Basename only to: [], where [] is and empty text box.

Note: When first added, the Rename Finder Items action shows as Rename Finder Items however, once you select Name Single Item in the first pop-up list box it changes the name of the action to Name Single Item.

The reason I suggest setting Name: Basename only to: [] is the .pdf extension is added automatically when the document is saved, so there is no need to type it.

That said, I was able to reproduce the issue of double pages when using the above workflow as an application See mu Update: note below for the explanation. Another way to do it, without running as a workflow from within Automator, is to create it as an Automator Service workflow as show below:

This is then available in Finder from the Finder > Services menu or the Services context menu when selecting PDF files and right-click or control-click the selected files.

Update: The cause of the double pages when used as an application with your original actions is because of Application receives files and folders as input, which already receives the selected files and by adding a
Get Selected Finder Items action it is passing the selected files again and hence double the number of pages. If you want to use it as an application just remove the Get Selected Finder Items action from your original workflow.


Is it possible to scroll the tabs in Safari if there are too many like Firefox? When I open a lot of tabs in safari it shows the first ones normally and all those, which do not fit a grouped into one tab. This is very annoying when switching between tabs that are at the end.

Is it possible to make them scrollable as it is done in Firefox?

If you are running the latest version of Safari, you can pinch in on a trackpad to reveal all of your tabs. You can swipe through this list using two fingers or by clicking on the dots below the previews.


Why is steps count different in Health and Activity App in my iPhone? As apparent, the steps count appear out of sync in Health and Activity app when viewed at the same time. Both are first party apps.

What is the reason for discrepancy?

You only have a difference of 95 steps over a total of 19000 steps; it looks like a rounding error.

Or maybe the Apple Watch has not yet uploaded the latest steps to the iPhone (it does this every few minutes, in order to save battery).


Will Microsoft Office for Mac 2011 be affected by an upgrade from Yosemite to Sierra? I would like to know if it is safe to upgrade from Yosemite to Sierra, with Microsoft Office for Mac 2011 (version 14.7.1) installed. Will I have to reinstall it again, or is it safe and there are no worries?

What I can tell you is that Microsoft Office for Mac 2011 does indeed work in macOS Sierra.

I've also just done a check on its Roaring Apps page and up to version 14.6.8 was confirmed as working in macOS Sierra. While this is not the version you quote (14.7.1), Microsoft typically provides updates to improve compatibility with the OS, so your more recent version will work fine.

As to whether you will have any issues because you're upgrading directly from Yosemite to Sierra, no-one can give you a 100% guarantee as every system has its own quirks (depending on configuration, installed software, connected hardware, etc). However, your current installation of MS Office should still work fine after the upgrade.


Remove non-existent AFP server from Finder sidebar? For a while, I had a Linux-based AFP server in my network. Due to issues not related to this question, I've decided to switch it off. Problem is - the server still appears in the Finder sidebar. The original server name was hostname-afp, and for a few weeks, the entry of that name was still visible in the sidebar. About a week ago, the name changed to hostname-2-afp, now it is hostname-3-afp. Where does Finder store the reference to that server, and how do I remove it?

Unchecking the servers in the Finder preferences does not remove the server from the sidebar. Unchecking the Bonjour Computers does remove it, but I'd like to keep the Bonjour feature enabled, and re-checking Bonjour Computers makes the ghost entry reappear as well. Cmd-/Ctrl-/Whatever-Dragging the entry does nothing.

(El Capitan / 10.11.6)

You probably configured Avahi (a free zero-configuration networking implementation for Linux including multicast DNS/DNS-SD service discovery AKA Bonjour) manually to propagate the AFP-service running on your Linux server in the .local network.

Even after disabling the AFP service on the Linux server, the Linux server's Bonjour name will still be registered then and thus shown in the Mac's sidebar.

You can check this by entering dns-sd -B _afpovertcp._tcp in Terminal.app on the Mac.

So remove the manually created config file (here: /etc/avahi/services/afpd.service) and restart the avahi service (probably sudo service avahi-daemon restart) to get rid of the non-existing AFP server name in the Mac's sidebar.


Reply/to address for replies to emails that received no reply Steps:

I send an email.
I wait some days, and I receive no response (the recipient never replies). I now wish to send a follow-up email.
I locate the first email I sent (either by searching or scrolling, in either my "sent" folder or "all mail", doesn't matter,
same outcome).
I click the reply button or hit cmdr (doesn't matter, same outcome).
I compose a second message.
I click send.

Expectation:

My second email should go to my recipient.

Unexpected outcome:

My second email is sent to myself instead.

I'm new to Apple macOS Mail app. I'm more familiar with Gmail, but I recently switched to free my email from my web browser. However, I don't understand why anyone would want this behavior, and I'm hoping there's a way to fix it that I've not found.

UPDATE:

In troubleshooting after the comments below, it seems this problem occurs only for ignored emails sent before I switched from Gmail web app to Apple Mail app. I guess that's good news (in that eventually the problem should become irrelevant the longer I use Mail app), but why should this even occur?

Software:

Mail app version 12.4
macOS version 10.14.4 (Mojave)

You should check the recipient/ To email address if that mention your name then it will come on to your email address.


How can I make Arabic fonts in GIMP work? If I select an Arabic font like Kufi (كوفي) and enter text into GIMP 2.8.14 on OS X 10.11, this is the result:

As you can see, the letters are incorrectly disjointed.

If I right-click on the text and select "From right to left", it makes no difference. In the text tool's options, I can change the language from English to Arabic, but it makes no difference. I can also change the justification to centered or to left-aligned, but it makes no difference.

Some fonts I select do render with the letters connected, but it looks like it's simply using a fallback font.

You better ask Gimp!
Gimp FAQ :  http://www.gimp.org/docs/userfaq.html
Or ask Gimp Support.


Is there a DAC (Digital to Analog Converter) in the iPhone Lightning Dock? I'm wondering if there's a DAC in the dock because the first sound loudness level is noticeable higher than the first level from iPhone 6+ when the iPhone is mount on the dock.

I suppose if there's a DAC that it has a lower resolution, i.e. less steps between silent and max loudness making each step wider on the dock.

Yes, because the Lightning port is digital-only. The Apple Lightning to 30-Pin Adapter also contains a DAC, according to MacRumors.

I don't know about the quality, but there is much more space for a good DAC in the dock then there is in the phone, so I wouldn't say it has to be worse.


What is the maximum WiFi speed of iPhone 6s? I have a new broadband plan of 1000 Mbps been effective for a few days. With a new ac router claiming a max to 1300 Mbps, I have conducted a brief test with my SE. It was at 267 Mbps, far lower than I expect. I am going to test it with an iPhone 6s which may benefit with MIMO. What is the top WiFi speed that iPhone 6s supported?

All iPhone 6s models support 802.11a/b/g/n and ac Wi‑Fi with multiple input multiple output (MIMO).

The iPhone SE also supports 802.11a/b/g/n and ac Wi‑Fi (but without MIMO).

While you should get better speeds with the iPhone 6s, the reality is that there are many factors that can impact speed at any given point of time.

However, if my reading of your question is correct, I think it's based on a misunderstanding of what the ac router claiming a max speed of 1300 Mbps actually means. This 1.3Gbps (1300Mbps) figure can be highly misleading because it is a theoretical maximum. It translates to 166 megabytes per second (MBps) or about 1331 megabits per second (Mbps), which of course sounds fantastic, but these figures are never realised in real world scenarios.

Most 802.11ac routers will perform closer to a range of 250-300Mbit.

In terms of your devices, you'll find that the speed obtained by 802.11ac capable devices will differ considerably depending on how many antennas they can physically fit in. While the maximum supported by the 802.11ac standard is 8 antennas, most smartphones only have 1 antenna, most tablets will have between 2-4 antennas, and so on. Even 802.11ac routers will differ in terms of how many antennas they will incorporate.


How can I disable ALL notifications in OSX Lion? I need to disable all notifications: iCal, Skype, and especially application updates. Everything.

I can find info on how to do this in Yosemite, but not Lion.

Would anyone know how to go about this?

First of all, let's make sure that we are talking about Mac OS X "Lion" which is version 10.7 and not "Mountain Lion" which is version 10.8. Is this correct? This is important since Notification Center debuted in 10.8.

If you are on 10.7 then I may suggest two workarounds.

1. You may want to install Growl app and set all notifications off. Please, read Help and Blog sections before purchasing the app.

2. You may want to upgrade to "Mountain Lion" and then turn off all notifications by entering this commands in terminal:

launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.notificationcenterui.plist
killall NotificationCenter

If you'll ever change your mind, you can then return it back by:

launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.notificationcenterui.plist

Hope this helps.


Can I have two Time Machine partitions on one hard disk drive? I know that someone can use a partition on a hard disk drive for Time Machine, but is it possible to specify more than one partition on a single drive for this purpose?

The scenario: My partner and I want to share one physical HDD to back up our Macs, but we want completely separate encryption passwords for our backups.

And if it is possible, is there a downside?

It is definitely possible to partition a single drive into two partitions and have separate encrypted Time Machine backups on each partition for your two individual Macs.

The only downside is a single point of failure since there's a single physical drive used for two machines. If anything goes wrong with that disk, both the Macs would be left without usable backups. You could still go ahead with this approach, but it would be better if you have disk clones also done regularly on (additional) separate physical drives and/or use some online backup service for important data.

For more information on Time Machine and encrypted backups, see:
Time Machine FAQ - How do I set up and use encrypted backups?


How to remove my Photo Stream from my phone without losing any photos I need to make space on my phone to upgrade iOS, and an 800 MB Photo Stream looks like a pretty good candidate for removal.  The only problem is that it's very unclear to me what happens if I remove the Photo Stream: are the photos deleted from other devices?  (I'm not talking about deleting individual photos from the photo stream, but rather turning off Photo Stream on that device.  Apple doesn't make the consequences of that action 100% clear, and things I've read (which I hope are wrong) suggest that any removal on one device is carried over to other devices.

What happens to my photos if I turn off My Photo Stream?
If you sign out of iCloud or turn off My Photo Stream on an iOS device, all the images in My Photo Stream are removed from that device. The images in My Photo Stream on your other devices are not affected. Images added to My Photo Stream are saved on the iCloud server for 30 days from the date you added them to My Photo Stream. If you sign in to iCloud with the same Apple ID and turn on My Photo Stream on another device, those photos will automatically download to this device. Before turning off My Photo Stream, it's a good idea to save any photos that you'd like to keep to your Camera Roll. Learn more about saving your photos to your Camera Roll.

source


How do I go into a message conversation My friends iPhone 4 will not provide notification when I send a message from my iPhone 5.  All other messages from all other contacts will notify him when they text him.  I was researching the issue and found the "just go into the go into the conversation -> details -> and toggle the do not disturb switch."  How does he do that.  We can find no "details" or "do not disturb" toggle.

Whilst viewing a list of messages (conversation view), tap the blue i in a circle at the top-right of the screen. This is the conversation details view, where one can change conversation settings.


As a general rule, can you install publically released versions of iOS after installing a beta release? As a general rule, can you install publically released versions of iOS (earlier versions than the beta) after installing a beta release?

I just asked a question regarding this and managed to figure out that it is possible. If you enter recovery mode you can force restore the device and iTunes will update it to the most recent public release for that device. See my question here: Can I undo the upgrade to iOS 7 by restoring to iOS 6.1.3?

So in conclusion, yes, I'd say as a general rule it is currently confirmed possible under current circumstances and software releases possible to downgrade back to the publicly approved version of iOS.


Legally run IE for testing via Parallels on Mac, _without_ buying Windows? Web designers and developers using Macs (and others) need to run (Windows) Internet Explorer for testing, and a popular option here is Parallels, which virtualises Windows in the background and lets you run Interent Explorer from the dock as if it was a regular Mac app.

The problem is, you need a Windows DVD or image file, which you then install into the Parallels virtual machine.

Buying a Windows licence purely for the purpose of this is one option - but the idea of financially rewarding Microsoft for IE doesn't sit well with anyone who's spent hours fighting with IE's many bugs.

Piracy isn't/shouldn't be an option for tools for professional work.

So, I'm looking for another way to get a working, legal copy of Windows into Parallels.

For another Windows virtualisation product - Virtualbox - it's possible to acquire a free, legal Windows image published by Microsoft for the purposes of testing, that comes with IE and essentially nothing else. However, the source I know for this (https://github.com/xdissent/ievms, also advocated on this site in this question) seems to be specific to Virtualbox.

Is there an equivalent legal, free source of Windows for Mac IE testing virtualisation purposes that works with Parallels?

Got it working. Microsoft currently publish free, official Windows virtual machines for things like Parallels and others, for exactly this sort of testing - currently distributed on http://modern.ie

Go to the visualization page downloads section and choose 'Mac' then 'Parallels'.
For me (on Lion, July 2013) the "IE9 – Win7" VM didn't work at all, but the "IE10 – Win7" worked first time. Download it and extract the pvm file using the terminal commands provided. It's a big download, about 3.5gbs.
Run the newly extracted pvm file (after installing parallels) which should open in Parallels and boot up. If it asks if the VM was 'Moved' or 'Copied', chose "Copied".

A few tips for working with Windows through Parallels in this way:

Downloads within IE go to the regular Mac download folder by default
It seems to work first time with whatever input methods you have on the Mac. Copy and paste between applications "just works", and (unlike Virtualbox), if you usually use a non-standard input device like a graphics tablet, it works in the visualized Windows windows just as well as everywhere else
...that said, it still interprets the numpad default differently as by default numpad numbers are arrow keys until you hit the 'Clear' button (while your Windows VM is focused) then it acts just like when the NumLock key is on for PC keyboards, i.e. you get numbers.
If you have trouble entering credentials for any web pages, it seems like it adds a domain of its own (e.g. "IE10win7") rather than using the default for your network. If you have trouble logging in, try adding your network domain with a Windows-style backslash (e.g. enter domain\username as your username instead of username)
To switch so that instead of ae Windows window with desktop, start button, etc, it treats each Windows application like a Mac application with its own separate window and doc icon, switch to 'Coherence mode' (View > Enter coherence)
In 'Coherence mode', where Windows apps are treated and docked just like Mac apps, if you need to get to the windows desktop view for any reason, use the red parallels icon in the tray at the top right and 'Exit coherence'.

And just in case anyone is in the exact same position as me, needing IE for testing and for doing stuff in Sharepoint, you can install Sharepoint Designer in the VM but it has to be the 32 bit version.


Macintosh HD is not visible on boot but is can be detected using Recovery on an installation USB I've transplanted the SSD drive between two identical MacBook Air's - both are 13" Early 2015 models - as one of them had died. Upon moving the SSD from the dead MacBook to the other one, booting the computer presents me with the folder and the question mark icon.

Holding down ⌥ Option on boot only gives me the option for network recovery. I created an installation USB using the same OS that is on the SSD (High Sierra) and booted into it. Here I can see the disk in disk utility and everything appears normal. I ran first aid on the disk and no major errors were found, only a few permission errors were fixed.

When selecting the Startup Disk option, I have the option to choose the SSD however upon reboot it cannot be seen again, only the installation USB is detected. (See below pictures)

How can I get the "new" MacBook Air to boot from the "old" SSD?

If there is anything I missed, please let me know!

So as it turns out, there was nothing wrong with the SSD or any boot parameters.

The SSD that used to be in the MacBook was running Yosemite, however the one that I was putting into it was running High Sierra.

I solved the issue by putting the original SSD back in, upgrading that to High Sierra then putting the other SSD back in, which was detected immediately and booted instantly.

My best guess is that there may be some form of OS protection built into the system that detects when an older/newer OS is present and acts accordingly. It would be nice to know exactly what's going on there, but for now this has solved my problem.


How to charge MacBook Pro quickly from an iMac? I am charging a MacBook Pro using a Thunderbolt 3 cable plugged into an iMac. This charging speed is exceptionally slow. The image shows 5+ hours to charge the laptop.

I am using:

2018 MacBook Pro 13" with Touch Bar
2017 Retino 4K 21.5-inch iMac
Apple Thunderbolt 3 (USB-C) Cable (0.8m)

This cable costs $39 retail. At this price I am expecting better performance for charging than what I'm getting here. How could I diagnose this issue?

This cable costs $39 retail. At this price I am expecting better
  performance for charging than what I'm getting here. How could I
  diagnose this issue?

There's nothing to diagnose because everything is operating as it should.

The problem is not the cable (it's irrelevant, actually) nor the iMac as it's only capable of delivering up to 15W of power via the Thunderbolt 3 ports. From Apple's Support Document.

  Your iMac also has two Thunderbolt 3 (USB-C) ports....Thunderbolt 3 also supports USB 3.1 Gen 2 connectivity at up to 10Gbps, and can supply 15W of power per port to external devices.

Emphasis mine

Your MacBook Pro requires a 61W charger so, in essence, you're using a charger that can only supply a quarter (25%) of what you're MacBook Pro requires.  Therefore, the long charging time is accurate and to be expected.

Bottom line - use the charger that came with your MacBook Pro.


How to split data between two iCloud accounts? My daughter and I have been sharing one iCloud account for our iPhone.  She has her own Apple ID to purchase music. I need her to have her own iCloud account as mine is running out of storage. She is afraid if I delete her phone from my iCloud in my settings she will lose all of her contacts etc. Then is there a way to move items from one iCloud account to a newly created one?

When your daughter disconnects her phone from the shared iCloud account (by deleting it in Settings) she will be given the option to keep her contacts, calendar entries etc. on the phone. Afterwards just create a new iCloud account directly from the phone.