Rebooting a Mac with a frozen application I have just realized I do not know how OS X manages applications.

Today Google Chrome froze on my OS X Yosemite 10.10.2. After it froze, I simply quit it using "Force quit". I have even sent a report to Apple.

The Dock kept showing it as 'running', but clicking on "Force quit" did not have any effect. I restarted both the Finder and the Dock, but Chrome kept showing as 'running'. However, no process reminding me of 'Chrome' was listed in Activity Monitor or in ps aux in a Terminal.

So I decided to restart my machine and it was embarrassing:

So I was rebooting because Chrome was not responding, but my machine refused to reboot because I had to quit Google Chrome first, which was not among the running processes. Luckily, Apple has not yet removed the power button from their laptops.

When does this happen? Which "lock" file do I need to remove for telling OS X that a 'running' application is in reality not running?

PS. Isn't this a MS Windows 95-like behaviour? What a pity...

In the very rare occasion this has happened to me in the past, I started fiddling around with dtrace scripts to know what's going on. One ready to use script is opensnoop.

So, the next time you hit this issue, toy around with it as follows:

$ sudo opensnoop -ve

or limiting the output to what you'd expect:

$ sudo opensnoop -ve | grep -i chrome

Short-lived processes might not show up in your ps output, so another option is to us the function boundary tracing framework available to dtrace. Most probably, your OSX version will have simple entry points defined for the VFS layer (call it dump_vfs.d):

#!/usr/sbin/dtrace -s

#pragma D option quiet
#pragma D option switchrate=10hz

dtrace:::BEGIN {
    printf("%-12s %6s %6s %-12.12s %-12s %s\n", "TIME(ms)", "UID",
        "PID", "PROCESS", "CALL", "DIR/FILE");
}

fbt::VNOP_CREATE:entry,
fbt::VNOP_REMOVE:entry {
    this->path = ((struct vnode *)arg0)->v_name;
    this->name = ((struct componentname *)arg2)->cn_nameptr;
    printf("%-12d %6d %6d %-12.12s %-12s %s/%s\n",
        timestamp / 1000000, uid, pid, execname, probefunc,
        this->path != NULL ? stringof(this->path) : "<null>",
        stringof(this->name));
}

Calling it is similar to above:

$ sudo dtrace -s dump_vfs.d

A functionally close feat can be achieved by the fs_usage command, especially if you suspect said process to be hanging in an event loop, though still accessing the fs layer using system calls.

This might be a bit of an overkill, since the most pragmatic choice is probably hitting the power button. Since you mentioned that you sent a report to Apple, you might want to check it out again under the following locations:

~/Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/
/Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/

This should give you additional pointers as to why said application crashed in such a way.

Your curiosity with regard to the OS handling such situations can probably be partially quenched by looking into the XNU kernel sources at bsd/kern/kern_shutdown.c. At some point, the shutdown process initiated via Finder will run into a timeout, which then logs the attempts of failed SIGTERM (extract from my local version 2782.1.97 copy of the Darwin kernel sources):

    [...]
    for (p = allproc.lh_first; p; p = p->p_list.le_next) {
        if (p->p_shutdownstate == 1) {
            printf("%s[%d]: didn't act on SIGTERM\n", p->p_comm, p->p_pid);
            sd_log(ctx, "%s[%d]: didn't act on SIGTERM\n", p->p_comm, p->p_pid);
        }
    }
    [...]

This indicates that the Console application might show you the relevant log entries. Depending on a potential live lock situation regarding a file held on a network mounted partition which just lost its layer 1 signal, the kernel will enter a wait loop of 100 to 200 seconds, depending on some VFS mount timeout settings.

As a sidenote: I had very little joy stability-wise with Chrome on my MBP, mainly because I believe recent updates to the nvidia core driver inside OSX >= 10.9 together with elevated power management functionalities and now appnap, combined with recent advances in the shockwave plugin management of said browser, repeatedly caused havoc. On top of that, Chrome in 2014 for me was the most power hungry of all browsers.

There are probably half a dozen more scenarios as to why you were greeted with this unmotivated feedback GUI. None of which come even remotely close to the issues you briefly referred to by mentioning Win95 :).

Just hit the power button, already!


Folder disappears after dragging it into "All My Files" in Finder I had a folder, we'll call it Folder1, open in a Finder window, and I was going to move files to it. So, I opened up another file window, but accidentally dragged the Folder1 icon into the Images section in All My Files in the new Finder window.

Now I can't find the folder anywhere. I even did

sudo /usr/libexec/locate.updatedb && locate Folder1

to no avail. It seems to be nowhere.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I've just tried to repeat what you did, the folder ended up in the Documents folder. Instead of using locate it might be easier to use the search functionality included in the Finder directly (or Spotlight) to look for it.


Why won't Apple allow users to access iCloud online via an iPhone? Try this on your iPhone.

Go to www.iCloud.com . You can try it on Safari or Chrome.

Apple won't let you access the online version of iCloud.

On Chrome for iPhone, there's something called "Request Desktop Version." If you try that, Apple will redirect the site to www.Apple.com

Reason I want to access iCloud online: I don't have the iWork apps installed on my iPhone. So, I wanted to try out the web apps on iCloud (via my iPhone) and test them.

Why won't Apple let anyone do this. Anyone have any clue?

Because iCloud.com has not been optimised for a mobile screen size and for touchscreen controls.
Because they want to promote 'the correct way'

Adding the iCloud account to Settings for access to Mail, etc.
Using the App Store apps for iWork


iPhone sending texts to Apple Message, not phones My wife has an iPhone. I have an Android phone. I also have a MacBook running Mojave. We've texted with no problem for years. Suddenly, however, we're encountering these periods where my wife will text my phone number and the message will go to my MacBook's Messages app instead of my phone.

I tried disabling my account in Messages but then I didn't receive texts in either place.

What could be causing this? Is it a setting on her phone or my laptop?

I've run into this problem before, and it's usually that the phone number has some how become dissociated with iCloud but the email has not.

If, in iOS, you go to Settings / FaceTime, you'll see a "You can be reached by Facetime at" and this will often show if your phone number is even associated or activated.

Likewise, go to Settings / Messages / Send & Receive / > and see if appears there.

See https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201349 for details about adding numbers.


iPhone 5 flashlight strength After having had my bag stolen, I am putting together a new EDC kit, and am wanting to include a flashlight. I want it to be at least as powerful as that featured on the iPhone 5. Does anyone know how powerful the one on the iPhone 5 is, measured in Lumen?

My apologies for not being able to give you a 100% answer. But I did find a informative post about the LED strength of an iPhone 4 (should be the same for the 5 - not the 5S).

Using a combination of direct and reflection lux meter readings, and comparing the same readings to lights of known lumen output, I'd roughly estimate the iPhone 4 LED is about 5 to 10 lumens in normal continuous use.
It briefly gets significantly brighter when used as a camera flash, but it's too brief to measure with my lux meter. I'd estimate it's about 4x brighter, which is around 40 lumens, but only for about 1/4 second.

Source
I hope this helps!


Read-only HFS+ on Windows 10 with boot camp driver question I've been searching around on the internet for a while trying to answer this question, but I can't get a clear answer for it.

Background info:
I'm running El Capitan with a Windows 10 partition on my MBP that I created through Boot Camp. When I ran the boot camp assistant, I made sure the "Download latest support software from apple" box was checked. After that my computer rebooted and I installed Windows onto the newly created partition from a USB drive. I then booted into Windows, where an Installer for the Boot Camp Windows Software popped up. I installed it.

I've read on the internet that the Boot Camp Support Software allows read-only access to the Macintosh HFS+ partition, BUT windows does not recognize the partition, I can't even read from it. Why is this? Is what I read wrong? Or is there a different thing I need to install that's not the software apple put on my Windows Install USB? Or is this feature simply not supported in Windows 10?

I can't figure out why this drive is not accessible to me even though a bunch of places on the internet say that support is included in the Boot Camp Support Software, which I'm fairly sure I installed

EDIT: I realize that there are other third party options to get both read and write support for HFS+, but I am specifically looking for an option built in by Apple.

I finally solved it!

This literally took hours out of my day, but I now know what the problem was. It turned out that the drivers actually were installed. by verified this checking for the presence of the following files:

C:\Windows\System32\Drivers\AppleHFS.sys
C:\Windows\System32\Drivers\AppleMNT.sys

The reason that the drive was unreadable is because they were encrypted with FileVault. I disabled FileVault in OS X, and when I booted into Windows again, the partition was mounted.

There might be a way to use FileVault and Boot Camp together, I'm not sure. I read in a few places, however, that if you enable FileVault after installing Windows with Boot Camp, you can have your drive encrypted and accessible from windows. (This is just a hunch however, I'll have to look into it more)


Hide the dock in Mission Control and Launchpad? I am really fed up with the Mac OS Dock showing in Mission Control and especially Launchpad.

Is there any way at all (even if I have to program it myself) to hide it in Mission Control and Launchpad because it gets in the way.

I still want it to show on the desktop and when I have applications open.

Can the dock be hidden only for Mission Control and Launchpad in macOS ?

You could make it very small by pulling on the divider that is located to the right, usually just before the trash (a line) and it will turn in to double arrow when you click on it.


How to update a command-line program using Homebrew? curl is a command line tool for transferring data with URLs. It is installed on my system as version 7.51.0. According to the tool's homepage, its current version number is 7.54.0. I'd like to update my copy of this tool to the latest version.

According to the Releases and Downloads page of curl's website, the latest version can be installed on Mac OS X using Homebrew.

How can I use Homebrew to update my copy of curl to the latest version? Is updating the same as installing? If so, then the answer to my question is:

> brew install curl

But is there a different way to update an already existing program?

Simply no. Only Apple can update programs in /usr/bin etc.

However you can make your scripts find the program from Homebrew first. You do this by making your $PATH have /usr/local/bin (which is where Homebrew puts links to the executables) earlier in the $PATH than OS supplied programs.


Multiple display setup mac, ignore separation between displays I am currently setting up my workstation, and I want to use the set up pictured here:

As you can see, the display on the top is turned sideways, and that is the way I want it.

The question is this: how can I make the cursor jump between the left and right monitors and the top monitor smoothly (rather, at all), as if the top display was just as wide as the bottom center display? Right now, the cursor can't cross directly over the separation between the top and the side displays.

The desired behavior is that which would result if the top display was just as wide as the bottom, so there wouldn't be any disconnect between the displays. However, I want to keep the top display oriented at its current orientation.

I am using a retina macbook pro, early 2013, on OS X 10.10.1.

That's not really what you wanted, but have you tried this arrangement?


How do you clear Mac install program files? I installed a 30-day "test drive" of QuarkXpress, but got pulled in to other projects and didn't have time to test it. I now need to test it, but the 30 days are up. So I want to install the "test drive" again, but it won't let me. So far, I uninstalled the old copy, signed up under a different account, and downloaded a new version. I know there has to be application data somewhere, but I am a PC person and don't know where to look in the Mac OS. HELP! Thanks.

Oh, and if necessary, I am using Mac OS X (Snow Leopard) Version 10.6.8 on a Mac Pro.

In the old days, changing the date, deleting the preferences, or installing the trial software in a different path did the trick, but, nowadays, it seems rather unlikely that there's such an easy way.

Trial software may call home to check the database for a combination of your MAC address and your email, your IP, both, create an invisible file with a who-knows-which-name or a million different things. I mean, if there was an easy way to do so, you wont need the full version, right?

Someone might find a way, of course. But it will probably be for a specific program, not a generic way for all trial software.

EDIT: Just noticed that I'm not answering your question. Indeed, installed and used applications will leave other files, such as Preferences, stored either in your user's preferences folder (~/Library/Preferences) or in the System-Wide preferences folder  (/Library/Preferences/), or Application Support Files (which will be, again, in your user's library folder or in the root one). There could be a lot more, of course.

If you want to get rid of them, making a search, with Spotlight or Finder, should show them all.


Why does the cloud have my photos when I haven't saved them there? I am 100% sure than I haven't enabled the "Photos" option in my iCloud since I got the phone and created the account.

However my iCloud is almost full!?

The size of the photos saved in the cloud matches the size of the photos in "Photos & Camera".

You are confusing your iCloud Backup with iCloud Photo Library.

iCloud Backup by default makes a copy of your whole iOS device, in case you have a problem with it (you erase something by mistake, it gets stolen, lost, damaged) to be able to restore it to the last available backup.

You can selectively remove different data from the backup, that —of course— won't be available to restore later on.

iCloud Photo Library is a different service: it will allow you to upload all your full size pictures to iCloud, save a smaller sized copy on your device to save space (if you set it that way) and sync them between different devices.

So "the cloud" has a copy of your whole phone for backup purposes because you activated iCloud backup. You can deactivate it and erase it, —I would advice to make a local backup regularly with iTunes in that case— or leave out only your pictures from the iCloud Backup, by deselecting the "Photo Library" item on the "Manage Storage" settings under iCloud Backup (shown in your screen capture).


Pipe Terminal Output To Notification, If Output Contains Specific Phrase? I have a long series of commands that I run on a semi-regular basis. Sometimes, completion of the commands requires user input via password prompt or other responses and sometimes information is output in the course of these commands that I need to copy to a log elsewhere. Mostly, though, the script can run unattended as it processes its lengthy series of tasks.

I've come across dozens of scripts and tools that will tell you when your command has finished running. But that's not what I need. And I've come across tools that should be able to convert varied output into a notification, but there's no accompanying documentation explaining how to do this.

So, if I wanted to be sent a banner notification through Notification Center every time the phrase "space cats" was output during the running of my command, how would I trigger that notification to be sent?

If I understand you correctly, you can access the output of your scripts. Then you can do something like this:

#!/bin/bash

# Replace the echo with your script
echo "space cats" | grep "space cats"

if [[ "$?" -eq "0" ]]; then
    osascript -e 'display notification "Attention!" with title "Notification" subtitle "I found space cats" sound name "Submarine"'
fi


OS X security version? I am trying to find out the most recent security patch that has been installed on a system (e.g. 2015-006). In this case, it is the latest Yosemite (10.10.5). Neither the version nor the build number are helpful here, as security patches do not seem to update them.

All security updates are recorded in receipts folder located here:

ls -ltr /var/db/receipts

If you list the receipts folder, you can see the most recent updates installed.


How do I see disk usage within a Fusion Drive (CoreStorage Logical Volume)? I just created a "Fusion Drive" on my MacBook Pro by following "How to make a Custom CoreStorage Drive in OS X".

It was created with a 256GB SSD and 320GB HD, with the SSD set as the "primary" disk in the logical volume. However, I'm not seeing much of a speed increase, and I'm not sure my data is being stored to the SSD.

How do I confirm that most of my data is stored on the SSD within a Logical Volume?

I was hoping I could simply see disk usage for each disk within the logical volume, but it looks like diskutil cs list doesn't report that.

iostat command check out the complete article from JollyJinx blog.

http://jollyjinx.tumblr.com/post/34638496292/fusion-drive-on-older-macs-yes-since-apple-has


Convert case-sensitive HDD to journaled insensitive? Like everyone, I've search everywhere in the web about getting my brother's HDD converted to case-sensitive journaled.

I have a back up HDD that I can transfer to, I have no idea why iPartition is not working with the xnfers. I'm not sure if the HDD is broken. He has all of his information from the HDD like family videos. He does not want to lose it. Hope someone can help with the recovery.

Most utilities don't want to deal with the hassle of making sure all the file names work when going from a case sensitive filesystem to a case-insensitive one. For that reason, you'll want to back up, wipe and then restore the files.

You'll want to have a plan for handling a collision when:

FilEa.DOC
filea.doc

Happen in the same folder since they can coexist in a case sensitive world but not the other.


Print Diff of two text files I'd like to compare two text files on a paper. Which app should I use to print a diff of two files?

I know several apps to show diff on a screen and usually use MacVim. However, MacVim seems not have a feature to print diff side by side.

I thought perhaps BBEdit might have what you want. Under the Search menu, there is a Find Differences command, wherein the text files can be selected.

However, the result shows the file contents side-by-side, on screen. When printed, the output is merely a list of which lines did not match.

As a workaround, might I suggest the following:

Perform the comparison using whatever software works for you.
Get a screen capture (i.e., bitmap) of each page of side-by-side text.
Print the bitmaps.

It will be somewhat rough, but you'll (probably) have the printed sheets of line comparisons that you need.


Why does setting CLICOLOR=1 not turn on colors for "ls"? If I do ls -G, I do get the colors. From what I understood from the man pages, if I go into ~/.bash_profile and add export CLICOLOR=1 I would then get colors by doing just ls, as "This option is equivalent to defining CLICOLOR in the environment."

Am I understanding this wrong? Because it's not working for me on Yosemite 10.10.5 in bash with homebrew coreutils(not sure how much of that is relevant). I tried adding this in ~./bashrc but same thing. I could always just alias my ls to ls -G, but I want to do this the "right" way. I also tried adding export LSCOLORS=... but it didn't help either. Like I said I do get colors with -G, but I'd like to get them by default by just typing ls and not having to set an alias for it, unless my understanding of how this works is wrong.

A few issues.

Homebrew coreutils ls is not the OSX/freebsd ls. Coreutils is GNU, and that ls uses --colors instead of -G. -G in gnu ls means do not show groups. It does not use CLICOLOR either. There is no environmental variable to set colors for gnu ls.

OSX's ls uses -G as a command line option, in the same way that exporting CLICOLOR would as an environmental variable.

So you are using the wrong variable for the wrong command.


iTerm as a slide-out terminal from the top of the screen I have installed iTerm2 and was hoping I'd have something like guake (Yes I just switched from Ubuntu). I mapped the hotkey to a button of my choice and it works fine, but I miss the slide-down-from-top animation like I had in Ubuntu.

You can use iTerm2's system-wide hotkey with the Hotkey Window profile to do this.
In iTerm2 preferences, click on the "Keys" tab and choose "Hotkey". Click "Create a Dedicated Hotkey Window…" and assign the hotkey you'd like to use.
Check the "Hotkey toggles a dedicated window with profile:" option and choose "Hotkey Window" in the popup menu below (should be selected by default).
With default settings, the Hotkey Profile window will stretch across the top of the screen, and the hotkey will drop the window down from the top, complete with animation.

You can customize the settings for the "Hotkey Window" profile under the "Profiles" tab. To make it look like a Quake drop-down terminal, you can use similar "Window" preferences:


How do I pair my Apple Keyboard with Apple Watch? Can I pair my keyboard to the watch? If so, how?

You can't with any shipping keyboard in 2015 and Watch OS 1.0 or 2.0.

Apple Watch only pairs with iPhone, BT headphones, and BT heart rate monitors.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204218


What is the maximum amount of file arguments I can pass to a command? If I do this in OS X, what is the maximum amount of files I can test?

Or is there a maximum length for this string?

do shell script "md5 -q 'path/to/file1.txt' 'path/to/file2.txt'"

getconf ARG_MAX, or currently 262144 bytes.

If you get an argument list too long eror, try using find:

find . -type f -exec md5 -q {} \+

-exec md5 {} \+ and -print0 | xargs -0 md5 pass multiple arguments to md5, so they are usually faster than -exec md5 {} \;.


How can I use different magic mouses at home and at work? I have two magic mouses, one at home and one at work. Both work just fine over bluetooth with my Macbook Pro (10.9.2), which I use at both places.

Suppose I'm using my home mouse, and then unplug my laptop. If I use my laptop at home next, the mouse with automatically connect. But if instead I bring it to work, the mouse won't automatically connect and I'll have to connect it manually. At which point, I'll have the same problem again: it'll automatically connect to my work mouse, but I'll have to connect my home mouse manually.

This is getting really frustrating. Is there any way I can make both mouses connect automatically?

Afaik what happens to you is not default OS X behavior. It should always connect to any input-device that is nearby automatically.

You could try the following:

Remove all bluetooth devices from the bluetooth preferences
Delete com.Apple.Bluetooth.plist from /Library/Preferences and/or ~/Library/Preferences (once I had it in both... not sure why)
Reboot
Pair devices again
Reset your PRAM by holding ⌘ Command+⌥ Option+P+R after pressing the power button when turned off. Hold it until the startup-chime is heard for the 2nd time.


How to navigate between screens on the Mac Cmd+tab is like the task switcher in Windows, except it only pulls the menu bar up for the application, and not the application itself.

Q: How do I switch between applications such that the application is visible?

If you're asking what I think you're asking, cmd+` will usually cycle between application windows within a single application.

It's also possible you have no application windows open, and you're just getting a menu bar.

Also, this should probably be in the superuser stackexchange.


When saving a document or editing a file name, with the focus on the string itself, why does CMD+Delete move the file or folder to the trash? To be more specific, I am saving a file from my markdown editor. Within the save dialog box, I navigate to the folder I wish to save the file. I then decide to change the name of the file. I put my cursor at the end of the text string and hit CMD + Delete. The expected behavior is to delete the entire string. Instead, this deletes the previously selected folder I highlighted in the dialog box.

Typically, I expect CMD + Delete to remove an entire line of text. I also tested this with renaming a file. If my focus is on the string name of the file, why would CMD+delete remove the file, when Option+Delete removes individual words as expected.

I can do screen shots or short movie if this is confusing. I don't recall this happening previously but I'm not often creating files outside of Python.

13" rMBP using 10.10.1

If the file name is highlighted then just use Delete, not the CMD+Delete.

The CMD+Delete will also delete the file on my MBA with 10.9.5 Finder.


macOS Sierra doesn't appear in my Purchased list within the Mac App Store Typically, when users download and/or upgrade to a new version or macOS (previously Mac OS X), via the Mac App Store, that version of the installer appears in the Purchased tab of the App Store app.

Below is an example of how this appears (I've added arrows to highlight the macOS installations):

However, users are reporting that they do not see the macOS Sierra installer in their list of purchased items. Signing out and back into the App Store does not resolve this issue.

Questions

How do users get their previously downloaded macOS Sierra installation to appear in the list?
How can users ensure that macOS Sierra (or later versions of macOS) are available to them when newer versions of macOS are released?

The download of macOS Sierra is not linked to an Apple ID. In fact, users can download it without having to sign into the Mac App Store.

Another recent change made by Apple is the inclusion of an additional macOS Recovery option. Instead of two, we now have three options:

commandR to reinstall the latest macOS that was installed on your Mac, without upgrading to a later version
optioncommandR to upgrade to the latest macOS that is compatible with your Mac
shiftoptioncommandR to reinstall the macOS that came with your Mac, or the version closest to it that is still available1

1 That third option is a new option only available since 27 March 2017 and requires macOS Sierra 10.12.4.

The result of these changes is that in future, if you need to install a compatible version of macOS that is earlier than the one that is still available, you will need to have a copy of the installer.

In summary, if you wish to have a version of macOS available for possible future installation, it is recommended that you download and store the relevant installer so that it is available to you. You don’t need to install it to do this, you can download it via the Mac App Store and then quit the installer when it launches. You can then make a copy of it for future use.

[Update as at 3 October 2017]

This edit provides an update on how users can access a macOS Sierra installer for Macs that already have macOS High Sierra installed.

As I previously recommended, if you wish to have a version of macOS Sierra available for possible future installation, users needed to download and store the relevant installer so that it was available to them.

After discussion with Apple today (3 October 2017), the following is how things will work if you happen to want to install macOS Sierra on a Mac that already has macOS High Sierra installed (assuming the Mac in question supports a macOS Sierra installation):

If your Mac originally shipped with macOS Sierra, then the easiest option is to use the shiftoptioncommandR recovery option to reinstall macOS Sierra
If your Mac did not originally ship with macOS Sierra, then the only official options are:

use a copy of the macOS Sierra installer that you've previously downloaded and saved (if you have one), or
take it into an Apple Store where they can install macOS Sierra for you (but how long this would be an option was questionable).

IMPORTANT - If your Mac originally shipped with El Capitan or earlier and also supports a macOS Sierra installation, you cannot use the shiftoptioncommandR recovery option to reinstall the original macOS in the hope you can then upgrade to macOS Sierra. Instead, doing this will only result in the Mac App Store offering macOS High Sierra as the next upgrade option.

In relation to option 1 above, if you can obtain a copy of the macOS Sierra installer through other means (such as from a friend), then this will also work. Obviously, downloading the macOS Sierra installer from dubious sources is not recommended and is at your own risk.

[Update as at 18 October 2017]

Please refer to bmike's answer. Apple has just published a new help article that provides a way for users to install macOS Sierra.


Keyboard shortcut to open Mac menu Is there a keyboard shortcut I can use to open the Apple menu? The closest thing I can find in the Apple documentationis pressing Command + Shift + ? which opens the help menu (if one exists).

I'm open to suggestions that incorporate the use of third party apps like BetterTouchTool.

By default, Ctrl-F2 will move focus to the menu bar, placing it initially on the Apple Menu (but not opening it—you'll then have to press Space or down arrow to do that).

You can find/change this shortcut in the Keyboard System Preferences > Shortcuts tab > Keyboard section.


Where is the preferences file for the Adobe Application Manager Update Notifier menubar app? On my OSX 10.6 MacBook, the Adobe Application Manager menubar app always launches at login. It's supposed to have a settings button but this button does not appear since the app only shows "The update server is not responding".

I want to disable this menubar app from launching automatically at login, but since it won't let me do this in it's own settings, I was wondering if I could find the preferences file and change it manually.

If Adobe behaved itself it'd have an option in the Login Items under Apple > System Preferences > Accounts. But it's worth keeping that in mind for other apps you may want to prevent from logging in.

As for disabling Adobe Application Manager, you actually need to create a com.adobe.AdobeUpdater.Admin.plist file in your user's Library Preferences folder. The easiest way to do this is using the Terminal.

Follow these steps:

Launch Terminal app (usually found in your Utilities folder within the Applications folder)
Once it opens, copy and paste the following command:

defaults write com.adobe.AdobeUpdater.Admin Disable.Update -bool yes
Press return

Now the plist file should be created and Adobe Update Manager should no longer launch when you login.


How to get full screen button in other applications on OS X? I want the full screen button in image 2 to appear in the app shown in image 1 (Photoshop). In Chrome there's an option to go full screen, but in Photoshop and Office this does not exist. Is there any way to get it?

Full screen support requires the developer to integrate it in to the app. You can't just 'add' the button to an app.


Unable to access external drives over the network - original item can't be found From my new macbook pro I can connect to my iMac over the local network and access files on the iMac's internal disk. I can share the screen on the iMac and view all of the connected external storage devices. From the iMac's system preferences, I have explicitly made these eternal devices available for sharing. However, although these external devices appear in the finder on my laptop, when I attempt to access these external drives directly from the finder on my laptop I get the following error: "The operation can't be completed because the original item for "mydrivename" can't be found".

I have tried relaunching the finder on the laptop with no effect.

This is how the remote computer and it's external drives show on the laptop finder.

And this is the result of clicking on any one of the external drives.

Can anyone help please.

I managed to solve this problem using the advice found at:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250716547

Basically, on the file sharing computer switch file sharing off and then back on. On the remote macbook relaunch the finder. Now not only do the external drives appear in the finder but I can access their contents remotely.


Can I convert .ifo files with Final Cut? I need to convert .ifo files to upload to YouTube. I don't know how to determine what they are and how to convert / open them with Final Cut.

Is this common knowledge to someone or how might I figure this out?

VLC is able to open .ifo files, it also can save files in other formats:

Open VLC
Select File->Convert/Stream (or press Shift-Cmd-S)
Drag&drop your .ifo file into the window
Select conversion profile suitable for YouTube
Select target file and click on Go!


How hard is the glass on Retina MacBook Pro I haven't got a screen protector for my MacBook Pro, and I am wondering just how easy it is to get a scratch on it? Is it using the Gorilla Glass like the iPad? If so, I might consider not getting a screen protector at all.

Anyone with some experience?

Update:

After a year of testing, albeit I've replaced the upper component including display and the casing, I will say it is reasonably strong. Mine is the first-generation one, but I would imagine all future model is just as good.

As you can read on: http://www.anandtech.com/show/5998/macbook-pro-retina-display-analysis
the glass is not the same as on the usual MBP but instead created using two layers of glass.

But the thing is the new Retina MBP does not have the cover glass. That does mean that if you scratch it in a way you are scratching the real LCD and not just a cover glass which would be the case if you scrach the display on a MBP.

Hope you can decide from that whether or not you should use a screen protector.


Change highlight color in Mavericks preview? In Preview on OS X 10.9 Mavericks, is it possible to change the color to something other than yellow, green, blue, pink, purple?  I know it is possible to highlight in other colors because I did it while using Preview for the first time after upgrading to Mavericks, but now that I've changed I can't seem to change back.

I'm afraid this is not possbile anymore as Apple removed the workaround via the Fonts-Menu.

Discussed in the Apple Support Forum here :
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4145911?start=15&tstart=0
(same problem with underline colors)
and on MacRumors here :
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1658053
where they discussed what has changed since ML.


How to make my iPhone 7 faster (at least decent) I have iPhone 7, with the latest iOS. It was slower and I thought it was because of many apps. I formatted it and use essential apps but it has not made it faster. Last year I had its battery changed as it was draining the battery too fast.
The claim that Apple is purposely doing the phone slow, seems to be true? What is the way around to make my phone faster as not even the search would show up if I want to find an app.

The claim you refer about Apple purposely making the phone slow is one of these things that can seem both true and false depending on your point of view.
The short version of that story is that the battery in your phone is a wearpart - and as it wears down it will loose capacity and perform worser. At a certain point the battery is weakened so much that you risk the phone just spontaneously turning off as the battery cannot supply the necessary power. At that point Apple applies "performance management", which essentially means making the CPU a bit slower in order to consume less power and prevent the phone from turning off unexpectedly.
You can disable this behavior from Settings > Battery > Battery Health. It will display the following text if performance management is applied:

"This iPhone has experienced an unexpected shutdown because the
battery was unable to deliver the necessary peak power. Performance
management has been applied to help prevent this from happening again.
Disable…"

You can disable performance management to ensure the CPU is run at full speed again. However, it will automatically be turned on again, if the phone is unexpectedly powered off due to battery problems.
Essentially if your current battery is worn down, you want to replace the battery to fix this problem.
However, if your previous battey was worn down and performance management applied - and you replaced the battery without disabling performance management again, then you can simply disable it to regain performance. If you used an official, authorized repair shop, they should have done this for you as part of the battery replacement though.
All in all the "truthiness" of the claim now depends on whether you think an slightly throttled iPhone is faster than a non-throttled iPhone that might turn off at the most unfortunate time.


Interactive Ssh blocked with Catalina Since migrating to Catalina, I am not able to run an interactive shell through SSH to one of my linux servers. Using a Windows machine (I do not have a pre-Catalina machine available), I have no problem connecting.

Non-interactive ssh works correctly (I use an authorized key, so no password prompt) :

~> echo 'uname -a' | ssh user@server
Pseudo-terminal will not be allocated because stdin is not a terminal.
Linux ????? 4.9.78-xxxx-std-ipv6-64 #2 SMP Wed Jan 24 10:27:15 CET 2018 x86_64 GNU/Linux

Interactive ssh hangs, until the server's sshd kick me out :

~> ssh user@server
[Long wait]
packet_write_wait: Connection to ????: Broken pipe

When use verbose (-v), I can see that the authentication works:

~> ssh -v user@server
[...]
debug1: Authentication succeeded (publickey)
[...]
debug1: client_input_global_request: rtype hostkeys-00@openssh.com want_reply 0
debug1: Sending environment.
debug1: Sending env LC_CTYPE = UTF-8
[long Wait]
packet_write_wait: Connection to ????: Broken pipe

Not using a authorized key results in a password prompt, and then the same Broken pipe

Versions:

~> sw_vers
ProductName:    Mac OS X
ProductVersion: 10.15.1
BuildVersion:   19B88

~> ssh -V
OpenSSH_7.9p1, LibreSSL 2.7.3

Any idea ?

After looking some more I found a workaround here and on superUser

Adding -o IPQoS=throughput to the ssh command line fixed my issue :

ssh -o IPQoS=throughput user@server

It's ugly to have to add this option, even if it could probably be added in ~/.ssh/config. It also probably hides some other issues. Any ideas?


iPhone constantly outputting audio via universal connector My iPhone 3GS has just developed an unusual problem. Audio will not come out of the loudspeaker, but the ear piece works, the headphones work and plugging into iPhone speakers via universal connector works. Oddly, the loudspeaker works when on a call and setting to loudspeaker.

I think the audio is constantly being routed through the universal connector, for the following reasons:

It tells me that the device is is plugged into is not compatible with iPhone, despite not being plugged into anything at all.
It connects to my speakers instantly, normally there is a slight delay is it needs to redirect the audio.

Also, I tried plugging it in and out of the speakers with audio running, without and it various other variations. One time I did get sound out through the speakers, but it only lasted 2 seconds before it returned to no audio.

Volume control has no effect unless headphones plugged in.

I have tried reboot and muting/unmuting several time.

Take a look at this Apple Support article. Not exactly your problem, but similar.

Basically, it says that it there's nothing clogging the audio-related components. If there is, it suggests cleaning them and tells you how:

  If the speaker, microphone mesh, or
  top microphone (iPhone 4 only) appear
  clogged, please use a clean, small,
  dry, soft-bristled brush to clean
  them. To do this follow these
  instructions: Use the brush to
  carefully and gently brush the speaker
  and microphone mesh. Brush away from
  the 30-pin dock connector to avoid
  getting any debris into the dock
  connector.

And, if that doesn't work, Apple suggests that you get it serviced.


Elderly Father Wishes to have YouTUBE GUI from AppleTV 2 This is a follow up to Workaround for YouTube to appear in Apple TV

I got my father AppleTV 3rd generation and he HATES the YouTUBE User Interface.

He says if YouTUBE API for old Apple TV (we purchased in 2012) is 100, the new YouTUBE UI is 5.

He is even willing to pay $20/month to use the old UI if Apple is offering it.

He is so frustrated and angry at this. He's not computer literate at all, and YouTUBE from old AppleTV was the best he could do.

I was thinking of Google Chrome, but I'd like to see a demo of it before purchasing it.

Any ideas?

If he's willing to spend that amount of money then he might as well consider getting the Chromecast. The Chromecast doesn't necessarily work on it's own in the sense that it could work off nothing but a remote but it has an amazingly solid playlist queue that anyone in the house can just sort of throw videos into.

If it's just a YouTube experience alone, I can say from experience that the Chromecast to this day is the best YouTube has to offer in terms of user experience.


Terminal.app magically changing color values Terminal.app does some very odd color shifting that makes it impossible to match colors consistently, and I'm wondering if there is any way to disable it or better control it. The "magic" is what shows purple instead of blue, for example, even when the ansi color for the theme is set to plain blue.

This behavior appears to be tied to setting the background color... setting any background color (with terminfo setab capability) disables the "magic" color shift, while an attribute reset (sgr0) re-enables it.

This is my test (sets the foreground, prints some unicode filled blocks, explicitly sets the background to black, prints again):

b=$'\xE2\x96\x88' && bs=$b$b$b$b$b$b$b$b &&
  tput setaf 4 && echo -n "$bs" &&
  tput setab 0 && echo "$bs"

With the default theme, it prints purple (magic) then blue (ansi). So, my first attempt was to sample the purple color, and update the preferences to use that purple instead of blue... everything should be consistent now, right?

On the next run, I get a slightly brighter purple and then the purple I entered. At first I thought I just put the color in wrong, but as I kept brightening the color setting to match what Terminal.app was showing without the background set explicitly, the Terminal.app just kept getting brighter too -- all the way up until it was white!

From this, it seems to me that Terminal.app is automatically scaling the the colors displayed on the default background color by some factor, but it leaves colors on any explicitly set background alone; making it impossible for the two colors ever to match (except white and black).

FWIW, the window background is set to fully-opaque black.

Is there any way to get rid of this behavior? I'm thinking that this is maybe bug-report-worthy, but I'm curious if there is just something I'm missing.

In order to get the right color scheme the background needs to be explicitly declared inside LSCOLOR (gnu) or LS_COLOR (linux) and match the non-ANSI one set in your Terminal.app (i.e. Window > Background > Color and Effects).

So, something like LSCOLORS=eadafafacafafacacaeaea would work while something like LSCOLORS=exdxfxfxcxfxfxcxcxexex wouldn't.


Is it normal for a 2011 MBP to display "Not Charging" while using Skype? Whenever I use Skype, my MBP displays "Not Charging" about 95% of the time. When it is charging, it is extremely slow, gaining 1% over maybe an hour or so. Additionally, if I start using Skype on battery power, with my Mac charged at 100%, the battery drains to nothing over just an hour and a half, on average. I'm literally running Skype and Safari (Facebook) and that is it.

When I use battery power, the screen brightness is at 50%.

I use Growl, iCloud, and an app called UnPlugged (a preference pane) that alerts me whenever my Mac is plugged in or unplugged.

The Mac was purchase 5 months ago, and is well maintained.

2.3 GHz i7
4 GB 1333 Mhz DDR3 Ram
750 GB HD
OS 10.7.2
Build 11C74

When you have Skype running, and you see either slow charging or fast battery draining (depending on whether or not it's plugged in), launch an application called Activity Monitor. You can launch it from Spotlight, or from the Finder when you go to the /Applications/Utilities folder, or from Launchpad if you go into the Utilities folder.

With Activity Monitor open, click on the column header that says "% CPU", and click it again if needed to make the little triangle point down. This will show your running applications, with the ones using the most CPU at the top. Also, you can select "CPU" from the tab bar near the bottom of the window. There you'll see a graph of the load (or demand) on the CPU.

This will give you indications of whether the CPU is working excessively, and which applications are causing the issue. It's a fair assumption that Skype is using a lot of CPU for some reason. Do some observations, then go to the Skype support webpage (for US English, go here: https://support.skype.com/en-us/).

If you find that some other process or application is causing the high CPU usage, leave a comment here or update your original question with your findings.


How do I give a user sudo permissions? On my computer I have two accounts: geoff and admin. I want to do gacutil.... Doing it in account geoff (where I need it to be done) I get the message:

gac directories could not be created, possibly permission issues.

When I login as admin this seems to work fine.

So I go back to the geoff account and try sudo gacutil... and putting the password for geoff but it tells me that geoff is not in the sudoers file.

So it seems that I either have to get geoff in as a sudoer (how?) or else get my admin account to do the gacutil on geoff's behalf (is this possible?).

Rather than give geoff sudo privileges, consider adding the account to the admin group so that it inherits the admin group sudoer privileges. This would be the more correct way to do things.

To add geoff to the admin group you'll need to run the following as the admin account:

sudo dseditgroup -o edit -a geoff -t user admin

You may also want to consider putting geoff in the wheel group too:

sudo dseditgroup -o edit -a geoff -t user wheel

The wheel group is a BSD-ism, where OS X has its roots. In traditional BSD systems the wheel group was used to keep a collection of users who were allowed to become superusers using the su command. It's not strictly necessary to be in both admin and wheel but anyone setup as as "Administrator" on the machine through the UI for adding a user is in both so it can't hurt to replicate that setup.


How can I use Windows via Parallels or Fusion with MINIMAL HARD DISK space? I would like to use VMWare Fusion or Parallels (or another option for running Windows within OSX; not Wine), but I am concerned about the hard disk space requirements.  How can I reduce the hard disk usage when creating a new Windows WM?

Both Fusion and Parallels give you the option of creating dynamically sized virtual hard drives. They allow you to specify the maximum size of the virtual hard drive, but do not actually consume (or reserve) that much disk space on the real hard drive. So to answer your question, just be sure to create a dynamically sized virtual hard drive. (I believe this is the default in both Fusion and Parallels.)


No notification of receiving call whilst on a call While on a call, any other calls do not come in. After the end of the first call, I do not get any notification that I have missed a call. I have turned off call waiting but this has not helped.

This is something your carrier must support. Contact your carrier.


question about MacBook Pro and external monitor configuration I have a 15" MacBook Pro with a Thunderbolt port.

Lately I've been working a lot at my desk, so I'm thinking about getting an external monitor, keyboard and mouse for it.

I'm thinking about this set up:

LG IPS277L 27" monitor with HDMI in.
monoprice Mini Display Port -to- HDMI cable
Apple wireless keyboard, wireless magic trackpad

My questons are ...

IMAGE QUALITY:

Will the video from the MacBook to the monitor be as "computer perfect" through the HDMI in as it would though VGA or DVI inputs?  Or will it be some kind of different reformatted "home theatre" image?

USAGE:

When it's all set up, will I just be able to sit at the desk, turn on the laptop, plug in mini Display Port cable to the Thunderbolt output, close the lid on the laptop and start typing away?  Or will I have to do some manual setup of each component (monitor, keyboard, trackpad) before it will work?  Or even worse, will I have to keep the laptop lid open?

AUDIO:

I'm not sure if the monitor has built-in speakers, but if it does, will the computer's audio come out of the monitor's speakers through the Thunderbolt-to-HDMI cable?

Any help or suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Will the video from the MacBook to the monitor be as "computer perfect" through the HDMI in as it would though VGA or DVI inputs? Or will it be some kind of different reformatted "home theatre" image?

This question, as it's worded, is difficult to answer.

Quantitatively speaking, that monitor you're looking at has a native resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels. Your MacBook can handle that and you will see a 1920 x 1080 pixel desktop on that monitor. Whether that's "computer perfect", given the term isn't something in the common lexicon, is up to you. My personal opinion is that 1920 x 1080 at the working distance most people sit at when they're at their desks, on a 27" screen, is going to look at little pixelated. Especially coming from a 1440 x 900 native resolution screen that's only 15" across that you have on a 15" MacBook Pro.

  When it's all set up, will I just be able to sit at the desk, turn on the laptop, plug in mini Display Port cable to the Thunderbolt output, close the lid on the laptop and start typing away?

Yes. There's a small delay as the keyboard and mouse pair with the BlueTooth on the MacBook pro but it's usually less than 30 seconds.

  Or even worse, will I have to keep the laptop lid open?

Keeping the lid open is not required but bear in mind that the MacBook Pro venting doesn't function well when the lid is closed. The cooling vents operate best when the lid is open. If you're running CPU-intensive applications you may find you need to operate with the lid open just to cool the computer adequately.

  I'm not sure if the monitor has built-in speakers, but if it does, will the computer's audio come out of the monitor's speakers through the Thunderbolt-to-HDMI cable?

That cable passes audio, so yes.


Need JDK6, but JDK7 won't go away! I'm running Lion (10.7), and need to use JDK 6 for development, but previously I had installed JDK 7 and I can't seem to get it uninstalled.

I ran the JDK 6 installer and seems to be installed in /System/Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/1.6.0.jdk, and JDK 7 seems to be installed in /System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Versions/A

Somewhere along the lines my Java Preferences seems to have been deleted (not by me).

I tried to delete everything (as described here) in /System/Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/ and /System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/ and then do a fresh install of JDK 6, but both JDK 6 and 7 came back!

Worse /usr/bin/{java,javac} point to JDK 7.

Does anyone know how I can delete JDK 7? (And maybe get back my Java Preferences?)

Whatever development environment you're using, you can probably explicitly set it to use JDK 6, by setting $JAVA_HOME or changing preferences in an IDE like tor commented. But if that doesn't work for you, here's how to get JDK 6 back as the system default.

The Apple JDK 6 is installed on your machine; it's just being masked by the newer JDK 7. OS X's Java indirection layer will prefer newer versions. You can verify that it's there by doing /usr/libexec/java_home -v 1.6.

The Oracle JDKs live in /Library/Frameworks. You can remove them by just deleting them.

sudo rm -rf /Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/*.jdk
sudo rm -rf /Library/Internet\ Plug-Ins/JavaAppletPlugin.plugin
sudo rm -rf /Library/PreferencePanes/JavaControlPanel.prefpane

You're out of luck on the Java Preferences. Apple removed it in an update. But when you eventually install a newer Oracle JDK again, you'll get a Java control panel with similar functionality.


How can I save Google Maps in iOS for offline use? Is there a way to retain a map with as much detail as possible (street view, maps, directions, zoom levels) offline?

This question refers to the Apple maps program that shipped with iOS versions 1 to 5 that relied on google map tiles. Please open a new question for iOS 6 maps and the google map app that is also available on the App Store since 2012.

Without jailbreaking, the iPhone DOES cache the last few map tiles on the view, at all the view zoom levels. I'm not sure how extensive this is, and because it's only a temporary cache the data is always a second away from deletion.

Without jailbreaking, you can download an application, there are lots of them, but my favorite is called MotionX GPS, which is on the App Store. It allows you to cache and save certain types of map tiles from a variety of map modes, including Terrain, roads, and more. I'm not sure if they're specifically Google Maps, but you can get some types of maps for sure.

After jailbreaking, which is both legal and easy, you can find a couple of 3rd party utilities to help you download map tiles to the device, but most of them require you to view the tiles in the app itself, not in the Maps application.


iTerm2: How to change the color used to highlight search results? It seems that iTerm2 is hardcoded to highlight search results using a yellow background color. I tried both the latest release and the nightlies but could not find a way to change that color.

Did I miss something? It seems implausible to me, that a terminal emulator with such a degree of customizability would really hardcode a single color while at the same time making virtually everything else user-configurable.

For clarification, here's a screenshot:

As you can see, I searched the screen contents for the word "stack" and all its occurrences are highlighted in yellow (except for the selected one).

For iTerm2 Text color changes:

From the menus choose Profiles → Open Profiles.
Click the Edit Profiles button, then the Colors tabs.

You can change the colors by clicking on the color wells.

You can find iTerm color schemes at iterm2colorschemes.com.


Can I share iCloud Drive folder with other iCloud user? I would like to share a folder like Dropbox does, but under Share I can not find such an option.

Before macOS High Sierra and iOS 10 release the answer was "No - iCloud drive and its folder structure is strictly for sharing with one account." You can now share files but not entire folders easily.

Now with iOS 10 and High Sierra and newer, you can share from the share control on macOS and choose a file. You can share with the generic "add people" icon files but not folders currently. You can share from the web interface and iOS as well.

For some iWork documents and photos, you can share them individually or by adding someone to a shared photo album, but that's based on the app design and not a more general folder based file sharing idiom.

You can also avail yourself of all the share sheets when an app like Things or OneNote or Acorn can accept a shared file from iCloud.

Also -  Apple's MailDrop feature to email each file to the recipient(s) that need to share the file, but it wouldn't be anything that's hosted and really shared in the sense that a change to the file by one user would then be reflected on the cloud. When that works it's great since you don't have to plan to share out the files - it just happens.

Clearly, iCloud isn't competing directly with Box.com and DropBox but it has picked up tons of useful features and the live on line collaboration for iWork documents and notes is really fantastic in 2018 now that we have some real sharing features in iCloud.


Macbook Pro Application Switcher automatically moves to far right? Apologies if this has been asked somewhere. I tried searching for a solution to this for a while to no avail.

When I press CMD + TAB on my Macbook Pro (Yosemite 10.10.3) to open the application switcher, normal behavior allows you to release the TAB key and hold CMD to keep the switcher window open, then tap TAB as necessary to reach the desired application. Instead, my machine continues cycling to whatever application is on the far right, as if I were also holding down the TAB key.

I haven't noticed any odd behavior anywhere else. I tried repairing my disk (which did need to be repaired), but now everything says OK and the behavior still persists.

Let me know if any other information would be applicable. Thanks.

I'm having this same issue. I use Command+Tab very frequently, and I would say about 50% of the time lately, when I switch applications, the selector doesn't stop. It just flows all the way to the right. I am running the 10.10.4 beta preview which might have something to do with it. To the original poster, are you running a beta or a normal public release?


How can I map keyboard keys to other keyboard keys in an app specific manner? I would like to have some way to specify that when I am focused on Spotify.app and I press the j key that it will translate into a ↓ key and be sent to the app. I would like this because I like vim style navigation but Spotify  does not support remapping keyboard shortcuts.

@iGameRam's suggestion of KeyRemap4MacBook ended up working for me. I selected KeyRemap4MacBook because I am already using it to remap keys for me system wide. To do this I had to read the reference manual.

From the reference manual I found that there is a private.xml file that enables me to add more remapping values to KeyRemap4MacBook. By going to the KeyRemap4MacBook pref pane, going to the "Misc & Uninstall" tab and selecting "Open private.xml" I was able to open the file.

I had to add two elements to my private.xml. The first was:

<appdef>
  <appname>SPOTIFY</appname>
  <equal>com.spotify.client</equal>
</appdef>

This is because KeyRemap4MacBook does not ship with an app definition for Spotify. It does ship with many others. I need the app definition so my keyboard keybindings only apply for Spotify and are not system wide.

The second element I added was:

<item>
  <name>Spotify Vim Style Nav</name>
  <appendix>J and K works in Spotify</appendix>
  <identifier>private.spotify.vim_style_nav</identifier>
  <only>SPOTIFY</only>
  <autogen>--KeyToKey-- KeyCode::J, KeyCode::CURSOR_DOWN</autogen>
  <autogen>--KeyToKey-- KeyCode::K, KeyCode::CURSOR_UP</autogen>
</item>

This is the actual definition of the key bindings. The <identifier> tag is supposed to be unique for every key mapping. The manual suggests prefixing the identifier with private.. The <only> tag has to match an appname defined in the private.xml or shipped with KeyRemap4MacBook.

The <autogen> tags are supposed to contain the mappings. The manual has many examples on what kind of mappings that can be created. The two I have map the J and K keys to the Down and Up keys respectively.

Once the file has been saved, I just needed to press the "ReloadXML" button and then my mapping appeared as an option in the menu.

After selecting it everything worked as I wanted.


How to access iPhone Google Chrome history over 90 days ago? How can we access all  browsing history from Chrome on iPhone?

Does Google Chrome on iPhone have a SQLite database I can access?

You can use google chrome sync option to sync your chrome history on other devices. I believe this URL will helps you https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/2591582?hl=en


Keychain: how to set expiration time to `Internet password`? I see column Expires but how can I edit it? Attributes window does not have such field. I want that aws tool for git automatically refresh saved password that generates every 15 minutes. Or maybe I can disable caching of passwords? Or maybe in some way I can persist always deny for reading some passwords from Keychain? Or maybe exists some correct way to disable of using Keychain for Git? This official article from AWS says: 'Install a version of Git that does not use the keychain by default or configure the Keychain Access utility to not provide credentials for AWS CodeCommit repositories.' How to do any of that?

Expires is a field that Keychain uses on items which have an intrinsic expiry, such as certificates. You're not able to set passwords with an expiry.


Time Capsule user account password change I installed a Time Capsule at my office to handle backups of all Macbooks (8).

To ensure a minimum of privacy, via Airport Utility-->Disks I created One account per each user (Changed Secured Shared Disks-->With accounts).

I used a default password so each user would then sign in via Finder and then change it to something else.

I've been trying to figure out how a regular user with no access to the Time Capsule main password would go in and update his own password.

When I connect from finder to the Time Capsule a modal comes in to sign in and there's a button to change password.

Clicking on change password triggers a new modal to input old password, new password and verify.
After I click Change Password I always get an error like this:

If I sign in with my assigned password, I can access to my Shared disk account without problems so it cannot be an invalid IP or server name because I can access, I just can't change the password.

How do you change a user password on a user account within Time Capsule without using Airport Utility when you know your current user account user & password but you don't know the device password of the Time Capsule.

Thanks!

This seems to be a recurring problem with TC devices. I have managed to setup users on a TC in the past, but never had others attempted to change the password. That may be a limitation to the user who created the accounts/setup the TC. Are they able to create their own accounts from their machines? If so, that may help you with the issue.

In closing, I know most people get the TC with the hope of being able to backup and use it as a NAS, but there are a lot of limitations with it. Right now, there are a lot of other solutions that can accomplish Time Machine backups, and act as a full-fledged NAS. I am currently running such setup on a Netgear Nighthawk, and I love being able to backup my Mac AND Windows machines.

Further efforts: Start by digging Through this post. My second suggestion is to post directly in the Time Capsule Apple forums. You may want to follow this thread as well (unless it was posted by you :P)


Backing up a large sparsebundle using Time Machine I use a large (presently 16GB) sparsebundle as a container for all of my professional work.  This is convenient for me because it is an isolated, secure, "portable" entity where all of my work can be stored in one place.  It has persisted over three laptops and several hard drive changes (basically copy it from one to another as needed).  It has worked great.  In the past, I've used ChronoSync as my backup utility of choice: separate documents to backup drive excluding sparsebundle, then a second document to backup the mounted bundle as a filesystem -- thus, entire bundle is not copied every time, just changed files.  But, I have recently started using Time Machine given the wonderful integration it provides.  However, I'm not convinced it is handling this large sparsebundle properly:

I can't seem to access it via the Time Machine itself.  The only option presented is "restore".  I don't want to "try" that out.  I created a test bundled (100MB) with the same security.  I put a few files in... manual backup via TM... added a few more... manual backup... deleted a few... manual backup.  However, when I restore those via the TM interface, the changes don't seem to track.  There is indeed a backup instance for each manual backup, but the instances don't correspond to the changes made.  Perhaps I am going faster than the system is actually writing to disk? (probably 1 minute between changes).
Directly accessing the filesystem (Backups.backupdb) shows the large 16GB sparse bundle present in most (all?... haven't checked) backup instances (e.g., 2013-02-28-042451).  The filesystem reports it as 16GB, prompts for the password if I attempt to mount it, but then fails with "no mountable file system".  I guess this is to be expected as I don't think Time Machine backups up the ENTIRE bundle each time... but I can't even mount the ORIGINAL bundle from the first backup, which I would presume is a true copy.

The questions are: does Time Machine definitely handle large sparsebundles properly?  Should I be concerned about my testing with the small bundle?  Is there any way to access individual files within a Time Machine backup of a large sparsebundle, or does the whole bundle need to be restored?

The only time I've seen the error you report was when I stored a sparse disk bunds inside another sparse disk bundle and both were remotely mounted on a fairly slow network storage device such as a Time Capsule.

In those cases, I've often excluded the original image directory from the Time Machine backups, since it works in theory (and most of the time in practice), you can't get any benefits of browsing those files on a Time Machine backup.

I usually set up rsync or another incremental backup tool to copy those files on a schedule I like (perhaps automating it all with Lingon 3).

By restoring the file to a local drive, you'll know if the failure to mount is due to an actual corruption or just network indirection and time out.

Once it's copied to an attached or internal disk, you might also be able to use Disk Utility to patch up filesystem errors although with encrypted sparse disk bundles, that is often not successful.


"Installing" MySQL JDBC .jar file for MATLAB Goal: "install" JDBC drivers for MATLAB to use

This article indicated that one can put the JDBC driver .jar file in:

/Library/Java/Extensions/

.bashrc and .bashrc_profile were configured with CLASSPATH

export CLASSPATH="/Library/Java/Extensions/"

Command Line tests:

Users-MacBook-Air:~ user$ ls -l $CLASSPATH
total 3936
-rw-r--r--@ 1 user  wheel  1004840 Feb 26 13:28 mysql-connector-java-5.1.46-bin.jar
-rw-r--r--@ 1 user  wheel  1004838 Feb 26 13:28 mysql-connector-java-5.1.46.jar
Users-MacBook-Air:~ user$ echo $CLASSPATH
/Library/Java/Extensions/

Questions

Is there any other steps I need to perform to install the JDBC driver?
How can I test from the command line that JAVA can 'see' the JDBC driver?
Is it enough to have the .jar files on MATLAB's javaclasspath?

SYMPTOM

MATLAB is unable to open up a database connection to MySQL because no suitable driver found.  Ideally, there would be a test to confirm that the issue is in MATLAB and that the JDBC component is properly installed.

UPDATE

Added JDBC driver path to MATLAB's javaclasspath:

>> javaclasspath('-static')
        STATIC JAVA PATH
    /Library/Java/Extensions/
>> ls -l /Library/Java/Extensions/
total 3936
-rw-r--r--@ 1 user  wheel  1004840 Feb 26 13:28 mysql-connector-java-5.1.46-bin.jar
-rw-r--r--@ 1 user  wheel  1004838 Feb 26 13:28 mysql-connector-java-5.1.46.jar

MATLAB requires the directory and filename be added to the javaclasspath.  Litmus test:

>> javaclasspath('-static')
        STATIC JAVA PATH
/Library/Java/Extensions/mysql-connector-java-5.1.46-bin.jar
/Library/Java/Extensions/mysql-connector-java-5.1.46.jar

Instructions for adding the .jar files to the class path:

Run the prefdir command in the Command Window. The output of this command is a file path to the MATLAB® preferences folder on your computer.
Close MATLAB.
Navigate to the folder from step 1, and create a file named javaclasspath.txt in the folder.
Open javaclasspath.txt. Add the full path to the database driver JAR file in javaclasspath.txt. The full path includes the path to the folder where you downloaded the JAR file from the database provider followed by the JAR file name. The following is an example of the path:

/home/user/DB_Drivers/mysql-connector-java-5.1.17-bin.jar.

Save and close javaclasspath.txt.
Restart MATLAB.


Mount command can not contain Chinese characters I encounter a problem,

I want to mount a shared remote directory, but the url has Chinese characters.

mount_smbfs //user:password@192.168.1.168/图片 /Volumes/picture

图片 are Chinese characters, which mean picture in English.

When I execute this command, I get below error:

  mount_smbfs: URL parsing failed, please correct the URL and try again: Invalid argument
  16384

I can confirm it is caused by the Chinese character, because I can execute below command:

mount_smbfs //user:password@192.168.1.168/hehe /Volumes/picture

Both hehe and 图片 are remote shared directories.

Try escaping the unicode

图片 translates as  %E5%9B%BE%E7%89%87 using an escape function I found online at http://www.url-encode-decode.com

The app UnicodeChecker installs a service which can convert any unicode character string into percent escapes.

See https://stackoverflow.com/questions/912811/what-is-the-proper-way-to-url-encode-unicode-characters for a reference.


Can I change the default size of a new table in macOS Pages? In Pages, I frequently have to make documents (for school) with a two by five table.  Each time I click the table button, I then have to resize the table.  Can I change the default table size, so each new table is automatically two by five?

You have a number of options available to you, such as creating a template, using AppleScript or Automator to create applications, scripts, or services, and so on.

Below is a sample script I've created based on the details in your question:

tell application "Pages"
set myDoc to make new document
tell page 1 of myDoc to set myTable to make new table with properties {column count:5, row count:2}
tell cell range of myTable
    set width of columns to 80
    set text wrap to true
    set alignment to left

end tell
end tell

Assuming you're not familiar with how to use this, below is one way you could use the above script:

Create a service using Automator

Launch Automator (usually found within your Applications folder)
Go to File > New
Select Service and click the Choose button (Note: If the 'Service' option is not available, select Quick Action instead)
In the top right hand of the window that appears, ensure that "No input" is selected from the Service receives drop-down list
Ensure the In drop-down list is showing "Any application"
In the second column containing the long list, find "Run AppleScript" and double-click on it
This will add the Run AppleScript window on the right
Now, replace the (* Your script goes here *) with the the sample script above
Save the service using a meaningful name (e.g. Create Pages Table).

Now you should be able to run the service from any application by going to the Services list within any Application menu (e.g. Pages > Services, Finder > Services, etc) and select the service you just created.

NOTES:

The set width, set text wrap and set alignment lines within the script are not required. I have included these so you know how to customise these table characteristics if you need to.
I have assumed from your question that your two by five table referred to five columns by two rows. However, you can safely change the column count and row count values in the script to suit your requirements.


Restore existing iPhone from iCloud I am looking to restore my current iPhone from iCloud because I've accidentally deleted WhatsApp and want to recover the conversations.

I am nervous to do a reset in case I lose more than I bargained for. Does everything come back to your phone if you reset and restore from icloud. I have a back up as of yesterday and have now turned it off so that it doesn't back up again before I can restore. I have googled this and everything is to do with new set up. I saw  your post re this but wanted to double check before I click "reset" thanks

Yes, you can. Just reset and restore. The backup is from yesterday, so only that information will be lost which you added today. Everything will come back. But it will take time if you have a large camera roll or lots of apps.


Force Airport Express to join 5GHz network I have an Airport Express 2nd Generation (Version 7.6.8) that I'm using as an access point for my desktop PC.

My house has a Technicolor DPC3848VE modem and WiFi router with dual-band network.

I set the Airport express to connect to the 5GHz network (the networks have the same name + 2.4 or 5.0 for differentiating them).

All the connection is done without problems, but when I check the Network Icon in the Task Bar, the tooltip says I’m connected to the 2.4GHz network.

Just to be sure I did a factory reset and connected the router again and it still connects me to the 2.4GHz network.

How can I fix this/force the airport to only use the 5GHz network?

Your computer will use the wifi best suited under current reception characteristics. If you want to force your windows computer to only use the 5GHz wifi, you'll have to remove the 2.4 GHz from the known networks as for example detailed here for Windows 10 (which you appear to be using judging by your screenshot): http://www.ilovefreesoftware.com/24/windows-10/remove-saved-wi-fi-networks-windows-10.html

What you could do is configure both wifi's with the same name and let your computer switch automatically (works way better when they have the same name), that way your laptop would choose the 5 GHz one when close enough to the Airport and choose the 2.4 GHz one when further away


Does a Big Sur 11.x Update kill genuine Apple SSDs in MacBook Pro 13" Early 2015? I've heard quite a few stories of Big Sur bricking older MacBooks, but I'm not quite sure in which way precisely they get bricked (motherboard or just SSD), so question is whether the following story fits into those reports:
I have the 13" MBPR (Early 2015, 2.9 GHz i5) of my 78 year old father here, which is kind of dead after he – if he recalls correctly – performed an update from Big Sur 11.x to Big Sur 11.y (he grabs every update he gets offered, so unfortunately he doesn't pay much attention to the details). Let’s call this MacBook A.
It has a 512 GB SSUBX Apple Samsung OEM SSD (Model MZ-JPV5120/0A4). Let’s call this SSD A.
After the update the MacBook doesn’t boot up properly anymore: Apple logo and progress bar appear, everything looks normal at first, but at 50% the progress bars stalls ... and that’s it. I waited as much as 10 hours, but it doesn't move a single pixel.
For cross reference/examination I have another 13" MBPR (Early 2015, 2.7 GHz i5) with 512 GB SSD running Catalina perfectly fine. Let’s call this MacBook B and SSD B.
Here’s what I've tried and observed so far:

NVRAM and SMC reset multiple times
Disconnect/reconnect battery
Reseat SSD
Attempted to boot into Safe Mode with Shift key pressed (= same behavior: stalled progress bar)
Swapping SSDs between the two MacBooks swaps the problem from MacBook A to B (in other words: the faulty MacBook A boots fine with the SSD B running Catalina from MacBook B, but MacBook B has the exact same boot problem with SSD A).
Apple Hardware Test on MacBook A with SSD B = Runs flawlessly resulting in no problems.
Apple Hardware Test on MacBook A with misbehaving SSD A = Screen stays forever black, and ends in Globe with exclamation sign and error -2003D (which is a OS recovery http connection issue, nothing which matters in the context).

Conclusion up to this point: The MacBook A still is perfectly fine, it’s the SSD A which is f#ck3d up (thanks to the Big Sur update).
Next ...

Booting with alt key pressed: SSD A is listed as valid startup volume. However...
Booting into Internet Recovery or
Booting from Big Sur USB stick drive or
Booting from Catalina USB stick drive show the exact same behaviour:SSD A does not show up in Disk Utility (View All Devices) and does not show up when trying to installing a fresh Mac OS.diskutil list shows multiple volumes of the 32 GB USB boot stick, but not the SSD A (remember: SSD A gets listed when starting with alt key pressed and boots halfway ... so it is there somehow)
Booting from a Windows 10 Installer USB Stick does show the SSD (however despite being able to format it somehow, I wasn't able to install Windows, which would have been an attempt to at least gain access again to the SSD A)

I have 30+ years of Mac background, I've seen SSDs biting the dust, but this is nothing I've ever seen before.
Ideas?

No. We have that update on several Macs identical to yours. You may have a hardware failure, but it’s not the OS that’s causing it. The OS is hobbled by it no other than needing the next write to succeed, there’s no code in the OS that intentionally breaks storage.
As it has been for two decades of Mac OS support, coincidence is more likely than cause, here. It stinks when we get a failure, so no amount of experience lessens that disappointment. Worse, it shakes our confidence when we confront how little we can do in the face of hardware failure.

When you run an upgrade, you change the boot process substantially. This is precisely when you discover hardware isn’t up to snuff and pre-existing storage failures become critical. (This is also the time when minor  storage corruptions turn into data loss.)

Separating causality from correlation is super tricky outside a repair shop where you have access to known good parts, can reconnect cables, run advanced diagnostics and see trends due to hundreds of repairs a week.
Your next step is to contact Apple for a service estimate. They may just offer a service program and underwrite the cost of the repair. Worst case, you have a second look at your triage and know one cost for repair.
In the mean time, you can try erasing it from several OS, but be sure you keep good backups if you “revive” this Mac.
p.s. this sort of error is precisely how many of our SSD bite the dust. We gladly pay for repairs on 2015 and newer gear as they run great with new SSD or logic boards, even on Big Sur.


Yosemite OSX iMac reboot progress bar stuck at 50% My son went out of town and, upon returning, turned on his iMac. It rebooted and went into the progress bar typically showing during updates. It goes to the 50% mark, fairly quickly but then stayed there for 10 minutes. He rebooted and tried again but, this time let it sit overnight, at least six hours, but still stuck at 50%.

He tells me he installed Yosemite but not any time in the last few days before he left. From Googling around we tried resetting PRAM and also verifying the hard disk form disk utilities. The hard disk gave a green check mark(?) and said the volume was OK. I asked him to verify permissions but that was now grayed out.

Unfortunately, I am not a Mac user and I'm trying to help him over the phone. I'm very technically inclined but don't know what to do about this issue.

EDIT: So now things are getting worse as he tries rebooting and, after the start up sound, the computer powers down.

EDIT2: I just learned that the computer was not turned off while he was away which leads me to believe the system tried to update itself and something went wrong causing some system files to not be found or, perhaps, the few things we tried to do to the system helped that along.

So we found out Apple will check out his system even though it's not under warranty and, if it can be fixed in the software, they'll also fix it for free. What a great company!

EDIT3: Apple decided the hard drive had gone bad and replaced it. My son has a friend in the data recovery business who will attempt to extract the data.

From your describe("progress bar typically showing during updates"). sound like the system is updating and doing something. Click "⌘L" will show you installation log, you can check what's going on


With two external displays in Mountain Lion how do I specify where the content of the Desktop is shown? I have connected two external displays to a Macbook and have deselected 'Mirror Displays'. The lid of the Macbook is closed, therefore I am using just the larger screens. The contents of my desktop are currently only shown on screen 2.

However, I would like to tell the OS to not show the contents of the Desktop on screen 2, but on screen 1. How can I achieve that?

Sorry, if this is a duplicate, I couldn't find any question about the desktop contents.

In my experience for Mountain Lion, determining which display is the primary display is usually achieved by dragging the white Menu Bar (circled in screenshot below) onto the graphic of another display, thus setting the other display as the primary monitor.


How do I make my own terminal command with flags? So suppose I want to make a terminal command and I also want to add specific flags how do I accomplish this? What is the syntax for this and how do accomplish this?

Though the question is probably off-topic I want to provide an answer: to start with simple bash scripting get in touch with getopts.

#!/bin/bash

while getopts ":a:" opt; do
  case $opt in
    a)
      echo "I'm the $OPTARG coder in the world." >&2
      ;;
    \?)
      echo "Invalid option: -$OPTARG" >&2
      exit 1
      ;;
    :)
      echo "Option -$OPTARG requires an argument." >&2
      exit 1
      ;;
  esac
done

Save this bash script as coder in a directory in the PATH and make it executable with chmod +x coder. If you choose another name don't replace an already existing file with the same name! Choose a unique name! The bash script checks for the flag/option -a and takes the argument after the flag to echo a sentence. The script doesn't check if the result is grammatically correct!

Examples:

coder -a best will result in I'm the best coder in the world.
coder -a "most yellow" will result in I'm the most yellow coder in the world.

but:

coder -a most yellow will result in I'm the most coder in the world.

or

coder -b "most yellow" > Invalid option: -b.


Difference Between macOS Locking and a Kernel Panic Why is it that macOS Sierra, when something goes awry, sometimes has a kernel panic, but other times just freezes completely (can't move mouse, use keyboard, etc.)?

Is one worse than the other?

Given that in 10.6 the kernel panic message was before the reboot, and in 10.9 it was after, the system seems to know when it is going to have a kernel panic. Likewise, there used to be an option in 10.8 to restart the Mac if it froze, so presumably the system also knows when it is going to lock up.

Why does one happen vs the other?

Panic is a guaranteed, deterministic dead end. The code literally cannot continue so the conditions that led up to it are documented (as well as they can on a system that is already broken) and aborts.

Hangs can be all manner of thing so the generalization is less possible or convenient to make.

One library of buggy program can cause both - so that’s a clue you might be able leverage in your investigation.

What is a Kernel Panic and what does it mean?
How can I troubleshoot Kernel Panics on my iMac
How serious are occasional kernel panics?

Since the panics have more diagnostic information and are more certain, I’d start with debugging and cornering those. For the hangs, you’ll need to trigger sysdiagnose and look over log files and collect the data and timing manually.


Why is a application called "java" always open on my OS X 10.9.2 even when I force quit it? Whenever I turn my computer on I have this application open called "java." No matter what I do I can't exit it. When I try force quitting it, it's called "bin." Images below show what I'm talking about:

Go to Apple< System preferences< Users and groups< there is two tabs here Password & login items< select login items and remove the app from the list>

all the apps & folder added to this section will auto-open when you start up your computer.


Dictionary styling (background color) [OS 10.10.5]

I want the content background of the Dictionary app to be black. I know this can be done by editing the DefaultStyle.css file of each dictionary, but the background color is still bright white when there is no input in the Search box. How can I make the background color of Dictionary always black? Thanks.

(I know Mojave has Dark Mode, but I have no intention to upgrade my OS to Mojave for now.)

Here's the content of DefaultStyle.css file which I put in Contents subdirectory for each dictionary I have at ~/Library/Dictionaries and at /System/Library/Assets/com_apple_MobileAsset_DictionaryServices_dictionaryOSX/:

@charset "UTF-8";
@namespace d url(http://www.apple.com/DTDs/DictionaryService-1.0.rng);

@media (prefers-dark-interface)
{

    html {
        -apple-color-filter: apple-invert-lightness();
    }
    a {
        -apple-color-filter: none;
        color: -webkit-link;
    }
    img {
        filter: invert(100%);
    }
}

It fixed the problem of background color for me, which appeared in Apple Dictionary somewhat after I migrated to Mojave.

I think you can edit background-color in this CSS as you want to achieve the result.


Using an external boot drive and the app store I'm trying to setup my MacBook Pro so that I have an internal drive with one OS X installation (Lion) as well as an external installation that boots via an esata card.  Everything is working great except that when I go to install software via the app store on the external installation it finds apps that are installed on the internal hard drive and won't let me re-install them on the external drive.  I'm trying to keep things completely separated, any way to do this?

Boot from the external drive and then eject the internal drive (use Disk Utility or right-click and eject the drive via Finder).

The Mac App Store will no longer see the internal drive when evaluating what apps have been purchased and are installed on the external drive.


Splitting an iTunes Library Possible Duplicate:
  iTunes videos on a different harddrive?

I have read several articles online about the most efficient means of splitting an iTunes library across multiple drives, unfortunately none seems efficient and some that I have tried do not work as advertised.  So I thought I would throw this out to this community to see if anyone has a more workable solution... I am running the very latest version of iTunes 10.5.2 on the very latest version of OSX 10.7.2 on a Mac mini that has two 750GB drives.  I need to split Movies from Music/Audiobooks due to the size of my library.  I copied all movies to the second internal drive manually, and deleted them from my library then I unchecked the preference options to keep the folder organized and to copy items when adding to the library but each time I try to drag the Movies back into iTunes it seems to be copying them onto  the primary drive as if I hadn't unchecked the options.  What the .... ?  Anyway can someone tell me what the secret incantation is to do this split?  This is RIDICULOUS and I know this is not the first time someone has run into a disk size limitation for an iTunes library. Apple really needs to address this in some straightforward manner!

I have all my movies on an external hard-drive as well. There's an easy fix:

Delete all movies from the library, but keep the option for automatic organization checked, so iTunes manages your music etc.

Now drag all your movies from the second drive to the iTunes sidebar over the Movies folder. Press and hold the 'alt'-key and release the mouse. This created links to all your movies. You need to organize the Movies-folder by hand, but that's not that bad.

See also this question: iTunes videos on a different harddrive?


iTerm2 how to get autocomplete through tab key In my terminal I can press tab key to autocomplete dir names etc but I can't do this in iTerm2. Is there any way to do that in iterm2? I'm using bash.

I know cmd ; shows autocomplete but I'd like to use tab key to get the behavior from the built in terminal.

This has been answered here.

Note, the answer you're after is not the accepted one. It's one below it.


macOS - Determine the count of open windows for running app After switching to an app with Cmd + Tab, which has multiple windows open, if the frontmost window in not the desired one, additionally Cmd + ` needs to be done to reach the desired window. But at times, the latter shortcut may not effect a switch when the target app has only single window open.

Is it feasible to determine the total count of open windows for the target app? (E.g. by having the count of open windows shown under the app icon in app switcher UI or in the Dock)

No - there's not a general solution for this. You might need to add a follow on question explaining why you need this information and what you'll want to do once you have that information. Some apps are well behaved and you can use automation to request a count of active windows or use Mission Control or script things in python with an objective C bridge to count all windows based on your definition of “open” whether it excludes hidden / minimized / on another virtual space or screen or just the windows visible.

Keep in mind if you’re scripting things, with App Nap / Sudden Termination / Power Nap and all the advanced power scheduling technology that's been added to macOS - you can't really even define if some apps are even running. You will have an app running and show up in the dock and app switcher when each and every thread of that app is killed and nothing is running on the kernel. Similarly - you can have threads running on the kernel - doing active work when the app is technically not running and you won't see it in the dock or the app switcher.

Quite simply, the OS and applications deeply integrate to start and stop things and the illusion that an app is running is no longer something you want to manage. You should expect that when you switch to an app or launch an app, that it responds quickly and lets you get back to work regardless of the status of it running or not before you asked it to do work.


Does Apple Remote Desktop connect to computers over the internet? Does Apple Remote Desktop connect to computers over the internet?

Does the client computer need a real internet ip address?
The main question is if i can use it to connect to employees laptops no matter where they are, as long as they have an internet connection (similar to Teamviewer)

Yes it can use iCloud back to my Mac to locate remote Macs behind a NAT router. Also, if your network allows inbound network connections then that also would work over the Internet.

And no, ARD is not a service where a client runs on each Mac to tunnel out of more arbitrary network connections as Team Viewer, Citrix/GoToMeeting and other solutions that are designed to have the computer that is "to be controlled" initiate contact with the administrator.

For example, setting up the clients over Bonjour will not work if you then try to access the clients over the Internet.

Select the scanner.

Select the Network Address scanner type, and enter the public/BTMM IP address of the computer.

Yes, the client computer will need a "real Internet IP address" for this method to work, or the Back to my Mac address if enabled.

To find the Back to my Mac address, make sure that iCloud and Back to my Mac is enabled, then run the following command:

dns-sd -E

The final line shows the account number.

Use the following syntax for determining the address:

computername.number.members.btmm.icloud.com

You can find the computer name in System Preferences → Sharing.


Looking for Encryption application I want to encrypt a file then email it. The recipient needs to decrypt it.  Needs to be free.

I'm looking for an encryption application that runs on Windows 10 and macOS 10.10 at a minimum.  Would be nice if the app run on android, ios, macOS and Windows.  All I want is to have the application: Ask one question, provide file, then encrypt file.

Actually, it doesn't have to be the same app, but multiple apps that encrypt and decrypt in the same format.

Does Windows have encryption?  Could I find an app that mimics the windows encryption?

What I don't want is for the app to ask a lot of questions like what type of encryption I want,how to save the output file, save a bunch of files on my drive, no command line stuff, easy to hack file, etc.

Encrypto by MacPaw is a free file encryption app available for macOS and Windows. The app uses AES-256 with no configuration; provide a password for encryption and optional password hint.


How to hunt down which tab or webpage (on Google Chrome) used a lot of memory? I already know Google Chrome was using a lot of memory for a badly behaving webpage. The issue was I don't know which webpage was doing that.

Sometimes after a day or two, possibly some webpage on Google Chrome might be using a lot of memory.

Some webpage might not be intentionally broken or harmful but it could be the analytics or the ad system having a lot of memory leaks in their code
Eventually, the Macbook swaps memory to disk and if unchecked, complaints of hard disk space running low arrive.

Using trail-and-error, if I close all tab and wait 2 - 3 minutes or quit entirely, then the hard drive all of a sudden gains back 2GB.

Is there a way to hunt down which webpage is eating up so much memory, other than by trail-and-error?

Chrome has a task manager that will be handy in case you have too many tabs to simply close them manually and note when memory reclaims.

https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/1385029

  On your computer, open Chrome.
  At the top right, click the vertical "dot dot dot" icon.
  Select More Tools and then Task Manager.
  Click “Memory” to sort tasks by memory usage. - Tip: Look for any items labeled "Background page."
  Select the task you want to close.
  Click End Process. - Note: Any unsaved work in your task will be lost.

I would also run vm_stat 1 and watch the OS memory allocations and freeing so you can watch the effects as you close tabs and see tasks free in the app.