iPhone 5c can't install Netflix because iOS 11 is required I have an iPhone 5c and want to download Netflix. Every time I try though, it tells me that I need iOS 11 which my phone can't do. It doesnt give me an option to download the last compatible version. Is there a way to do this?

Unless you've bought/downloaded Netflix before (at a time there still was a Netflix app compatible with your current iOS version) you can't access old versions in the store.
Netflix might have pulled old versions from the store because theAPI between the app and the netflix servers changed and old versions can't talk to the backend any longer


Sync 6th generation iPod nano with iCloud Music Library I have a 6th generation iPod nano wit 8GB memory and I've recently subscribed to Apple Music.
Whenever I sync my iPod with iTunes I get this error message:

But in the iPod settings I can't find any "iCloud Music Library" to turn on. Also all the songs I would like to synchronize have already been downloaded locally on my PC.

I don't understand what's wrong.

Songs from Apple Music (as in your iCloud Music Library) can only be used with iOS devices, Android phones and computers running macOS or Windows.

From apple.com, emphasis mine:

  Before you can download music to listen to offline, you need to add the songs, albums, or playlists to your Library. Then, in the Music app on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch; in iTunes on your Mac or PC; or in the Apple Music app on your Android phone, find the song, album, or playlist that you want to download, and follow these steps: (...)


How can I force pinch-to-zoom on some websites? As someone with vision issues I typically need to zoom on every single page I load on my iPhone.

The "three finger tap" to zoom kinda sucks, so pinch to zoom works great. However since upgrading to iPhone 4S I've noticed a lot of sites don't allow it.

I know there's a meta tag you can use to disable that feature, but is there an override that you can set to be able to zoom on every page?  I can't zoom in on google results, so I can't really see them. NFL.com doesn't allow pinch to zoom either.

Ugh, this is so annoying -- it is the height of designer/developer arrogance (in my opinion -- and I'm a developer myself). The other answer's code did not work for me, but after much experimenting I got this to work (iPad 3/iOS 5):

javascript:document.querySelector('meta[name=viewport]').setAttribute('content','width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=10.0,user-scalable=1');

Use the same method as the other answer says to add it (create a bookmark for any page, then edit the bookmark and replace its URL with the above code).


Showing two mouse cursors? Whats up with this?:

When I have a mouse cursor size that is bigger than the actual mouse, this shows up. Please help! It is really annoying and it makes my computer lag. It does not survive a reboot, but right when someone else logs into my computer or I log out and then log back in, it starts again.

One issue could possibly be with the Shake mouse pointer to locate.

To turn it off:

Go into System Preferences -> Accessibility -> Display.

Uncheck the option: Shake mouse pointer to locate.

This might fix it but I'm not sure.


How do I automatically connect to a VPN when using Wi-Fi in OS X? The FBI issued a warning regarding hotel Wi-Fi access points, and any other public access point.
I'd like to make sure my apple device always uses a VPN when using Wi-Fi. That way even if an attacker were to see my data, they would only see an encrypted jumble of bits. Note that this hack can also be applied to HTTPS connections.
How do I ensure that OSX automatically uses a VPN when using Wi-Fi?

I created a script and launch agent that will automatically connect to a VPN connection when it cannot ping a specific address. It could probably be modified in a way that looks at wifi network whitelist and connects to the VPN if the current wifi is not in that list. As it is right now the vpn will always try to connect if it cannot hit an address that is on the vpn network.

The agent calls a shell script every 30 seconds and tries to ping an IP address that is static on the vpn network. If it cannot ping that IP it enables your vpn connection.

If you did this through an Apple Script App, the app icon will always be in your dock. I prefer to have this running automatically in the background.

Clone the project below and follow the directions in the readme. The end result is an installer package that will place a launch agent plist file in /Library/LaunchAgents/ and a shell script in /Library/Application Support/melonsmasher/.

Be sure to edit the shell script(auto-vpn) with your VPN connection name and an IP address that is on the VPN network. You can change the run interval in the plist file(com.melonsmasher.autovpn.plist).

https://github.com/MelonSmasher/OSX-AutoVPN


How can Charles Proxy change settings without admin rights after first time? Charles Proxy has a feature that it can automatically configure your system proxy settings when it starts.

Every programmatic way I've found of changing these settings (e.g. networksetup) requires raised privileges to use, however this app somehow manages to do this with standard user permissions. The only time it requires raised privileges is on the very first time it runs.

Where can its permissions be managed for making changes in future for e.g., making it ask for privileges again?

Privileged Helper

If Charles Proxy is following Apple's recommendations, the permissions gained during the initial set-up will be encoded as a Privileged Helper.

On macOS the folder /Library/PrivilegedHelperTools contains tools that have previously authenticated and authorised with the user.

The folder /Library/LaunchDaemons contains the launchd files that launch and determine access to the tools.

There are other approaches, such as:

  Running with Elevated Privileges

  If you do need to run code with elevated privileges, there are several approaches you can take:

  You can run a daemon with elevated privileges that you call on when you need to perform a privileged task. The preferred method of launching a daemon is to use the launchd daemon (see launchd). It is easier to use launchd to launch a daemon and easier to communicate with a daemon than it is to fork your own privileged process.
  You can use the authopen command to read, create, or update a file (see authopen).
  You can use a BSD system call to change privilege level (see Calls to Change Privilege Level). These commands have confusing semantics. You must be careful to use them correctly, and it’s very important to check the return values of these calls to make sure they succeeded.


What is the process EscrowSecurityAlert in Activity Monitor? I'm a little worried about a process I see in Activity Monitor called 'EscrowSecurityAlert'
Descriptions provided other forums ranges from it being a sign of malware:

The threat to your Mac is CleanMyMac. Delete it.

through to it being harmless:

This should be perfectly fine as something

and descriptions I don't understand (I can't think of anything I use that requires 'data escrow'):

Escrow is a data security measure in which acryptographic key is entrusted to a third party (i.e., kept in escrow). Under normal circumstances, the key is not released to someone other than the sender or receiver without proper authorization. Key escrow systems can be considered a security risk at the user puts access to information into the hands of the escrow agent holding the cryptographic key; however, key escrow systems are used to ensure that there is a backup of the cryptographic key in case the parties with access to key lose the data through a disaster or malicious intent.

Question
Regarding the 'EscrowSecurityAlert' process - is this something that ships with macOS or have I installed it myself somehow?

Yes, it's part of macOS & has been since perhaps Mavericks.
Wikipedia lists it in List of macOS components but provides no description -
The iPhone Wiki gives a brief description

This application works with the iCloud Keychain servers. It manages the password uploads and anything that keychain tools does.

By definition an escrow service is one who acts as a middle-man in a complex or expensive process. It is often used when buying/selling a house. The escrow company holds both the deeds and the money until all parties have completed the legal requirements to transfer the property, preventing either one from 'running off with the money'.
In computing terms it is an arbitrator between two not-necessarily-yet-trusted 'clients'. It prevents any data from one leaking to the other until full trust is established. In effect, it doesn't let anything 'run off with the money'.
This is, in effect, a less mind-numbing version of your last link & quote.


Using launchd to clear bash history? Clarification: Am not looking to destroy history, am looking for means
to periodically purge it via launchd for security purposes

Have been using cat /dev/null > ~/.bash_history to clear bash history as have seen in many *nix conversations as the most effective way to do so.
So I put it into a shell script that runs in launchd, yet after some time I've come to realize though it runs it's not clearing history.
Is it possible to clear bash history this way via bash script or can it only be done manually as a user? Perhaps I need to run the command directly in the .plist and not via a bash script?
Note: I have other scripts running correctly via launchd so question is strictly about being able to clear history via an agent
Thank you

Update: Found this cool site that helps generate launchd scripts if
this helps anyone. Cannot vouch for it but it's much easier than
hacking XML.
It seems to use sh -c for all commands though, so not sure why that is.
launchd plist generator
http://launched.zerowidth.com/

It seems you've come up with a very convoluted solution to the problem of not wanting a bash_history.
I would advise that instead of periodically clearing the history from launchd, you should simply disable history recording:
echo 'set +o history' >> ~/.bashrc

Close the terminal tab and open a new one - and your history will no longer be recorded.


Is there a shortcut key to bring up the Launch Pad on an older apple keyboard? It's a white iMac, I think perhaps 2007 model. Here is the keyboard currently:

There is one that works for Mission Control, but not for Launch Pad.

Do you think there is a way to configure one to work?

You could simply configure a shortcut of your liking for it in:

System Preferences > Keyboard > Keyboard Shortcuts > Launchpad & Dock


How many RAM can i add and who are the manufacturer? I have two RAM chips in my Mac. How can i get to know, how many of them can i upgrade? I mean, it could happen, that one (or even two) of them are soldered on…?

And, how is it possible to get out who is the manufacturer of RAM? - three are only cryptical codes, like 0xAD00000000000000… I wouldn't like to buy RAM from manufacturer, who doesn't match with the RAM already installed.

It goes about the following hardware:

MacBook Pro
15 Zoll, 2,4 2,2 GHz
Prozessor  2,2 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT 128 MB
Serial Number: W874214LX91

RAM:

BANK 0/DIMM0:
Size:   2 GB
Typ:    DDR2 SDRAM
Tact Frequency: 667 MHz
Status: OK
Manufacturer:   0xAD00000000000000
Part Number:    0x48594D503132355336344350382D59352020
Serial Number:  0x00006170

BANK 1/DIMM1:
Size:   1 GB
Typ:    DDR2 SDRAM
Tact Frequency: 667 MHz
Status: OK
Manufacturer:   0x7F7F7F7F7F7FC100
Part Number:    0x4232594A55533733464E3120202020202020
Serial Number:  0x00000058

Apple did not solder RAM in those days, so you should be good to go. As far as the manufacturer is concerned, it really doesn't matter. As long as the modules are from a good (and ideally the same) manufacturer (crucial has been good in my experience), match the required specs which you can find at sites such as http://www.appleserialnumberinfo.com by entering your serial number, you'll be good to go.

I would also advise that you use the same sizes of memory modules in both banks. You currently have an imbalance, which can negatively impact performance.


Mini Mouse Stop it from pairing with another computer? I work in a office with a bunch of macs and we all have mini mouse except for one person, who has a tablet pad. I had to use my mini mouse on that guys computer one day, and now everytime I turn my computer off my mouse connects to his computer.

How can I stop it from connecting to his computer at all?

On his computer, go to System Preferences → Bluetooth and delete the mouse from the list:


Files moved partially and the rest gone! I moved about 100GB folders of pictures from one external hard to another one.

In the beginning of the process the finder breaks down and didn't respond. None of the relaunch solutions worked!

So I restart my mac but now, the moved part exist on destination hard drive but the other part doesn't exist on origin hard drive!

The destination hard shows folder in gray color but expect one the others have zero byte capacity.

Is there any way I can access the lost part?

Before you transfer any more files or make any changes to either hard drive, run Disk Utility and repair the two disks.

Hopefully, that will recover your lost files. If not you could try a commercial product like DiskWarrior, Drive Genius, or Data Rescue.

Unless you do a destructive delete, files are never actually deleted and as long as you don't save anything else to the disks the files are still there and have not been overwritten. As a last resort a data recovery service could possibly resurrect your files.


iOS app Distribution outside of App Store We have an iOS application that we are looking to possibly distribute to a client through Apple Developer Enterprise Program.

This app is not public, so releasing it on App Store will not work.

Ultimately, we are looking to send an invitation to users through an email, or direct the users to a iOS hosting platform where they can download the app.

If possible, we are not willing to manage device ids. The client will have users outside the organization (contractors) to which they will need to distribute the app.

How can we do this?

Your question seems quite unclear as you seem to have given the answer together with the question.

The way to do this is to apply to the Apple Developer Enterprise Program. Using that account you can create an In-House Distribution Certificate that you can use to sign your app with in Xcode.

After you have signed your app, you'll need to create a manifest plist file. Host the app (.ipa) and the manifest (.plist) in a folder on a web server, and send the user's an invitation via email.

The user will then be able to download the app, trust the enterprise profile and eventually run the app.


How to bind a key to press two separate keys In other words, if I press "x", it registers as me pressing "a" and "b" sequentially.

I run Mac OSX Yosemite 10.10.5. A Karabiner solution eludes me, thus I am researching more.

To make this work you have to use a third party tool: Karabiner.

Download, install and open Karabiner
Open in the menulet Karabiner -> Preferences
Open the tab Misc & Uninstall
Hit the button Open private.xml
Open the file private.xml with an appropriate editor
Enter the customized keycode

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>
    <item>
        <name>X to A and B</name>
        <appendix>When you type X, A and B are written</appendix>
        <identifier>x2ab</identifier>
        <autogen>__KeyToKey__ KeyCode::X, KeyCode::A, KeyCode::B</autogen>
    </item>
</root>

Save the file
Open in the menulet Karabiner -> Preferences the tab Change Key
Hit the ReloadXML button
Enable the remapping. It should be listed at the beginning.

You can restrict the keybinding to particular apps if needed by adding additional tags. Leave a comment if you want to know how or specify your question.


How to set gcc 4.8 as default gcc compiler I recently installed gcc 4.8 using brew on OSX 10.7.5 (Lion). I can now compile using gcc 4.8 by using

g++-4.8 some_file.c

or using the default gcc 4.2 by using

g++ some_file.c

I want to use gcc 4.8 as the default compiler for Xcode and if I type gcc at the terminal. I suppose I must alter gcc-related links within dirname $(which gcc).

When I do

ls -al $(dirname $(which gcc)) | grep 'gcc\|g++\|c++'

I get the following:

lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel         7 Jul 31 12:17 c++ -> clang++
-rwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel    909360 Nov 18  2011 c++filt
lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel         5 Jul 31 12:17 clang++ -> clang
lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel        12 Jul 31 12:17 g++ -> llvm-g++-4.2
lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel        12 Jul 31 12:17 gcc -> llvm-gcc-4.2
lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel        28 Jul 31 12:17 gcov-4.2 -> ../llvm-gcc-4.2/bin/gcov-4.2
lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel        52 Jul 31 12:17 i686-apple-darwin11-llvm-g++-4.2 -> ../llvm-gcc-4.2/bin/i686-apple-darwin11-llvm-g++-4.2
lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel        52 Jul 31 12:17 i686-apple-darwin11-llvm-gcc-4.2 -> ../llvm-gcc-4.2/bin/i686-apple-darwin11-llvm-gcc-4.2
lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel        32 Jul 31 12:17 llvm-cpp-4.2 -> ../llvm-gcc-4.2/bin/llvm-cpp-4.2
lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel        32 Jul 31 12:17 llvm-g++ -> ../llvm-gcc-4.2/bin/llvm-g++-4.2
lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel        32 Jul 31 12:17 llvm-g++-4.2 -> ../llvm-gcc-4.2/bin/llvm-g++-4.2
lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel        32 Jul 31 12:17 llvm-gcc -> ../llvm-gcc-4.2/bin/llvm-gcc-4.2
lrwxr-xr-x     1 root   wheel        32 Jul 31 12:17 llvm-gcc-4.2 -> ../llvm-gcc-4.2/bin/llvm-gcc-4.2

When I run: which gcc-4.8 I get /usr/local/bin/gcc-4.8.

Steps to get this done would be very helpful.

Please and thank you.

Assuming you're using bash (it's the default), then you can add /usr/local/bin as your top priority in PATH like this:

echo "PATH=\"/usr/local/bin:$PATH\"" >> ~/.bash_profile

This will ensure that /usr/local/bin is checked before all other areas of your path. Then just start a new terminal session to load the new variable.

Another way to do this:

  cd /usr/bin
  rm cc gcc c++ g++
  ln -s /usr/local/bin/gcc-4.8 cc
  ln -s /usr/local/bin/gcc-4.8 gcc
  ln -s /usr/local/bin/c++-4.8 c++
  ln -s /usr/local/bin/g++-4.8 g++


How to make iOS open separate keychain files from macOS I have separate keychain files on my Mac, but they are obviously not synced via iCloud. Are there any way to open them on iOS? Conversion to another format is viable, but free (both in beer and speech) solutions are preferred.

Example ..

Steps to create .p12 file:

Run the Keychain Access Application on your Mac.
Select the login keychain from the top-left panel
Select key's
Right click and select Export Items...
Save your key in the Personal Information Exchange (.p12) file format, and name the file “something.p12”
You will be prompted to create a password that is used when you attempt to import this key on another computer
Enter a password and save


Turn off autosave drafts in mail on OS X El Capitan and Sierra I am having a bit of an issue here with the default mail application in mac OS El Capitan. I am using my gmail account on the mail client and it is autosaving drafts when I compose messages ... I have done some searching and found various answers saying that I can turn it off by going to Mail --> Preferences --> Accounts and after selecting the account in "Mailbox Behaviours" box just uncheck the "Store draft messages on the server" check box ... as explained in this tutorial that I have found How to Configure Apple Mail to Avoid Duplicate Drafts with Gmail ... But there is a issue ... I don't have that option in my preferences .. please see this screenshot of my preferences screen.

I am really confused on this ... Oh forgot to tell this is my first Mac experience. Looking forward to your answers. Thanks :)

UPDATE: I have upgraded to macOS Sierra ... but the issue still persists ...

After no one replied so I did some research on this again ... though I could not find how to turn off the autosave draft feature on my apple mail application ... I did figure out a way to deal with this annoying drafts problem ... All I did is that in "Mailbox Behaviors" tab I changed the location of the Drafts folder ... now instead of saving the drafts in Gmail/Drafts folder the mail application is saving them in a Local Drafts folder on my mac ... Life is much easier now ... now I don't have to see all those drafts when I open my mailbox on my smartphone.


Macbook Air blocking websites I am not tech savvy and know almost nothing about computers. Macs are even harder, so I don't know where to start.

I did the suggested update yesterday and now it is blocking me on a bunch of stuff but not all.

For instance, I can't go to facebook or my school division website, but can google, read news pages, go to yahoo mail......that is about all I do on here.

Anyhow it has also blocked my access to my portal that I had installed for work....no idea what happened, but an assuming it was the update.
any info would help.

If you could make your advice simple enough that a monkey could follow it then I might have a chance to fix it :)  Thanks

Monkey sees monkey does :)

Assuming you are the Administrator (open system preferences- users and groups check under your profile name that says Admin.
Now this is bit surgical, but just follow the steps (you will remove any web sites blocking)

Open Terminal app located in your utility folder (it looks like funny screen with only text in it.

To get started, Copy and paste the following code in Terminal:

sudo /bin/cp /etc/hosts /etc/hosts-original

Terminal will ask for your password. (same password that you use to log in to computer)

Now we can start editing the hosts file.

Copy and paste this code in Terminal (all one line):

sudo /Applications/TextEdit.app/Contents/MacOS/TextEdit /etc/hosts

The hosts file will open in new window called TextEdit.

Notice the following lines and do not delete them under any circumstances:

127.0.0.1 localhost

255.255.255.255 broadcasthost

::1 localhost

fe80::1%lo0 localhost

You should not have any further lines after those.

If you do! just delete them. (those are the ones preventing you from accessing other websites)

When you’re done, quit TextEdit and save the hosts file when prompted.

Restart your computer.


opening an app in a shell script with sudo I'm trying to open an app that listens to port 25 within a shell script.  In order to listen to port 25, I need to run the app with sudo.  So I tried the following:

sudo open appThatNeedsPort25

It asks me for my password and opens the app.  Problem is the app is NOT being run as root, so it is unable to listen to port 25...

What do I do to open an app from a shell script so that it can listen to port 25?

Just try sudo appthatneedsport25, no need to use open when dealing with bash or shell scripts. If it is an interpreted script (python ruby etc) and it isnt set to executable, you can always do sudo python scriptname.


Can I apply my iPhone 3GS backup to my iPhone 4S? As mentioned is a previous question, I made a backup of my old AT&T iPhone 3GS, then exchanged it for a new iPhone 4S at Sprint.

They transfered over my contacts. However, there's a lot of other stuff in that backup that I'd like to have on the phone. All my applications and their various configurations. For example, my GPS app has two years worth of saved locations.

On top of that, it looks like not all my contacts got transfered over for some reason.

So my question is, can I restore the AT&T 3GS backup onto my Sprint 4S phone without messing up it's Sprint-specific configuration? Will doing so cause the phone to think it's connected to AT&T?

Also, how exactly do you restore a backup onto an iPhone?

To restore from backup

connect the iPhone to your computer
wait for it to appear in iTunes
right-click on the iPhone listed under Devices and select "Restore from backup..."
select the backup you want to restore (there may be several)

Restoring will only touch user-specific content and configurations.


Safari not warning on SSL certificate hostname mismatch For some reason (e.g., bad preferences setting, maybe?) Safari 6.0.5, on OS X 10.8.4, is failing to give me an SSL Certificate Warning when I visit a site whose hostname doesn't match the hostname bound to the site's certificate.
Reproduced below is the certificate information that Safari gave me, but only when I clicked on the "https" icon located between the favicon and the hostname (with domain name redacted). It plainly indicates that the certificate isn't valid for the hostname.

I believe that this information about the hostname mismatch should have appeared in a warning notifier containing the message:

Safari can't verify the identity of the website "sbxstg.redacted.com"

But I wasn't given any such notifier; just an address bar whose contents make it appear that everything went well and without error, and that I have a secure connection to the proper holder of the certificate. (!!)
Can someone please tell me where I should be looking to turn the warning feature back on, if I've somehow inadvertantly turned it off?
On the other hand, is it possible that I've found a corner-case/bug in Safari? Note that the domain to which Safari claims the certificate is bound is simply redacted.com, and not *.redacted.com. Could that possibly be confusing the algorithm that Safari uses to decide whether to pop up the warning?
For what it's worth, Firefox 21.0 running on the same Mac does give me the expected "This Connection is Untrusted" message, stating in the Technical Details section that:

sbxstg.redacted.com uses an invalid security certificate.
The certificate is only valid for the following names:
redacted.com , www.redacted.com."

Update: I've been able to reproduce this behavior on Safari 6.2.3, but only after getting an initial notifier warning me that there was a problem with the certificate ("Safari can't verify the identity of the website sbxstg.redacted.com. The certificate for this website is invalid...").
Once I'd clicked "Continue", though, subsequent attempts to load https://sbxstg.redacted.com appeared to work as described in my original post (i.e., no obvious, modal warning -- just the one that is hidden until displaying the certificate information).
So it looks like you get one chance. And if you decide "damn the torpedoes," then it's on you forever after to remember that there's something hinky about the site/cert, because you have effectively "turned off" the in-your-face warning for that particular site. (I theorize that when I originally posted this question, I must have already hit "Continue" at some earlier point, and didn't remember that I'd done so.)
So the question remains: How do I turn the warning feature back on?

So, as noted in the update, Safari does actually warn you -- once.

If you decide to proceed anyway, then for the remainder of that browser session, you need to remember that you're talking to a potentially compromised server, because you will see no evidence of that except by examining the certificate (by clicking on the https/padlock icon).

However, exiting Safari and restarting it restores the warning. A visit to the compromised site in the new instance of the browser once again presents the warning.


How can I monitor the amount of data sent/received to/from a specific host? I've found som tools to monitor tx/rx and show the overall data usage and live graphs etc.
But what I need is a tool to monitor how much data has been transferred
between my machine and a specific host.
Is there any tool where I can specify an IP/hostname for yosemite?

And just to clarify the needs:
required is

Dumping/graphing the incoming/outgoing network data
Limiting the output to a specific host
Easily readable output (regarding the units - Mb/GB etc.)
"Counter" can be reset

Does anything like this exist?

IStat menu gives you this data.
The only thing missing is counter I think it only gives you total since boot for a network interface.


How can I use 2 USB Headsets on one Macbook? I homeschool my daughter and she takes several complex online classes.  The teachers want me to be able to listen in and also be able to talk from time to time.  I tried going without a mic, but there is way too much background noise for the listener.  Recently, I purchased two Turtle Beach Ear Force PLa Gaming Headsets.

While they each work great individually we can't use them at the same time because, the Macbook makes you select a specific USB port. Is there some sort of USB splitter out there that would allow us to both plug into one USB port?  When we just had to worry about headphones and not a microphone, we used a Belkin F8V234AMOB 6-Inch Audio Y Cable. My hope is to find something similar for USB ports, but I'm open to other suggestions.

Thanks in advance for any and all advice!

You don't need special hardware for this. Plug in both headphones, then open Audio Midi setup from /Applications/Utilities. Click the plus in the lower left corner and choose "Create Multi-Output Device." Check the checkboxes beside both headphones in the new panel on the right. If you want to rename it, you can double click the new entry in the list on the left and give it a name like "Both headphones."

Now you can choose the Multi-Output Device as the audio output in System Preferences → Sound. (You can also easily change the output by holding the Option key and clicking the volume menu.)


"Eject" USB device (non-HDD) from OSX? I have a Cyberpower UPS connected to my system using USB (for power management).  Sometimes I want to have this device accessible from within Windows 7, which is virtualized in VirtualBox.  VirtualBox correctly detects that the USB device is currently is use by the host OS, so it won't connect.  My workaround is to create a device filter in VirtualBox, then unplug and reconnect the USB cable while VirtualBox is running.  I would like to know how to make OS X stop the device without physically unplugging the cable.

I'm running OS 10.9 Mavericks.

From VirtualBox usb status bar icon open "USB Settings" and then add your device permanently to VirtualBox.

Then reconnect your device... and that's it.


It is the 2020 Macbook Air good for Adobe suite? I want to buy a 2020 Macbook Air but I don't know if it is convenient. I want to use the computer to edit videos and images with the Adobe suite.
13-inch MacBook Air

Retina display with True Tone
1.1GHz quad-core 10th-generation Intel Core i5 processor
Turbo Boost up to 3.5GHz
Intel Iris Plus Graphics
8GB 3733MHz LPDDR4X memory
512GB SSD storage
Magic Keyboard
Touch ID
Force Touch trackpad
Two Thunderbolt 3 ports

I'm not trying to be flippant, but you're wanting to use the model computer that is literally one step above the least powerful they make with some of the most resource hungry applications on the market.  Normally, this type of question would be closed because it's opinionated, but in this instance, I think a preponderance of people would resoundingly say "no, that model Mac is not appropriate for that type of work."
So, instead of providing you an opinionated answer on what I think would be best, instead, I'm going to provide you with the salient points you need to consider when selecting a computer to fit your work - in this case video editing.

This workflow is hard on a computer; it's resource hungry.  The less resources you give it, the less efficient you'll be and the more frustrated you'll become.  Editing video requires lots of CPU, lots of GPU, tons of memory and storage (scratch space as well as archival).
CPU
More is better.  However, there's only so much CPU you can dump into a laptop form factor before you hit the wall in terms of diminishing returns.  What do I mean by that?  Faster CPU = more heat.  Heat is detrimental to a CPU so cooling is paramount and laptops are horrible at it. So, macOS with throttle your CPU to keep it cool but that ends up being CPU power you paid for that you can't use.  It's like buying a V8 but it throttles down to the power of a 4 cylinder to keep it cool.  So, more is good, too much (in a laptop) is a waste.
Memory
In video editing you can't have enough memory.  Get as much as you can.  32GB should be your minimum.  Nobody has ever uttered the words, "Gee, I wish I had less memory."  You might find that 64GB or even 96GB or 128GB of RAM is what you need, depending on the videos you're creating.
GPU
All MacBook Air models comes with integrated graphics meaning it doesn't actually have a GPU.  This is needing a pickup truck to haul products but you go out and buy a Prius because the cost was good and gas mileage was even better.  Can you haul product in that Prius?  Sure, but you won't get nearly the same amount of work done if you would have bought the truck.
Storage
It's important but not as critical as you'd think.  You need enough storage for what you're working on currently.  Everything else can be put on offline storage (external drives).  You may only need 256GB or 512GB.  This is where a little planning can save you money because Apple storage isn't cheap.
Convenience Items
Everything else is ancillary.  Touchbar, Magic Keyboard/Mouse TouchID, etc. are all conveniences.  Get what you think will make your computing experience easier.  None of it will have an impact on your video editing workflow - positive or negative.
Bottom Line
What all this means you shouldn't be looking at anything that doesn't have the word "Pro" in it.  This means it's going to be expensive.  As for some financial advice, I would look at the secondary (used) market before dropping a credit card on a shiny new Mac.  If what you purchase isn't the right fit, you can sell it on that same market (eBay, Craigslist, etc.) and try something else.  You might find that the desktop models (iMac or Mac Pro) are a better fit.  You may even find that you need a "good" (but not the best) laptop and a desktop.
My advice here is to start small (financially) and find out what works for you before committing to a product that simply doesn't fit.


Is Late 2016 MacBook Pro 13" Capable of 3440 x 1440 @ 100 Hz? I have a Late 2016 MacBook Pro 13" laptop and I am considering buying the Samsung CF791 34" monitor, capable of 3440 x 1440 @ 100 Hz resolution. I realize I may need to buy an adapter, such as the USB-C to DisplayPort Adapter Cable from StarTech, but I'm concerned I won't be able to get 100 Hz from this cable and/or the built-in video card won't support that resolution and refresh rate.

If I buy this monitor and cable, will I be able to use the Mac at 3440 x 1440 @ 100 Hz resolution?

The Startech adapter didn't work for me with the Samsung CF791 (the monitor was not getting any signal and I had to return the cable). I did however get 3440x1440 @ 100 Hz using the Anker USB-C to HDMI adapter. You can see it here:


Mac Postfix - Force from address, prevent from using Mac Username After making the switch from Windows using WAMP and sendmail, to Mac using MAMP Pro and hopefully Postfix I am having issues getting the emails configured correctly. I have fully configured the Postfix Smart Host to use a live email account to send the emails.

When I check the mail.log

Jul 22 11:29:28 John-MacBook postfix/smtp[544]: C5B2926C91C: to=<info@mysite.co.uk>, relay=mail.mysite.com[212.110.123.123]:25, delay=603, delays=602/0.07/0.13/0.03, dsn=5.7.1, status=bounced (host mail.mysite.com[212.110.123.123] said: 553 5.7.1 <john@mysite.co.uk>: Sender address rejected: not owned by user mail@mysite.co.uk (in reply to RCPT TO command))
Jul 22 11:29:28 John-MacBook postfix/cleanup[550]: 4607426CA90: message-id=<20120722102928.4607426CA90@mailer.mysite.co.uk>
Jul 22 11:29:28 John-MacBook postfix/qmgr[502]: 4607426CA90: from=<>, size=2447, nrcpt=1 (queue active)
Jul 22 11:29:28 John-MacBook postfix/bounce[548]: C5B2926C91C: sender non-delivery notification: 4607426CA90
Jul 22 11:29:28 John-MacBook postfix/qmgr[502]: C5B2926C91C: removed
Jul 22 11:29:28 John-MacBook postfix/smtp[543]: 4607426CA90: to=<john@mysite.co.uk>, relay=mail.mysite.com[212.110.123.123]:25, delay=0.19, delays=0.01/0/0.08/0.09, dsn=2.0.0, status=sent (250 2.0.0 Ok: queued as 5E2E8D807E)
Jul 22 11:29:28 John-MacBook postfix/qmgr[502]: 4607426CA90: removed

  status=bounced : Sender address rejected: not owned by user
  mail@mysite.co.uk (in reply to RCPT TO command))

I notice here that "john@mysite.co.uk" doesn't exist, actually "john" is my Mac username. How can I force Postfix to always send email using mail@mysite.com? This is the email address it should be using to send the email which I enter into the MAMP PRO control panel.

The issue was caused because Postfix was sending email using my username from the logged in user.

I was able to get around this problem following this guide:
Sending Email With Postfix And MAMP Pro


MacBook Air (bought in August 2014) With the recent Yosemite software update (I updated on 23rd February 2015) the cool 'bubble' sound that the volume keys made when pressed is now gone and replaced with a different sound. How do I get the old one back?

While it is always difficult to describe the sound (I can only guess which one you mean), I am offering you to find it first.

/System/Library/Sounds/

Once found:

Copy the file to desktop and rename it in to Volume.aiff

Now go here /System/Library/LoginPlugins/BezelServices.loginPlugin/Contents/Resources/ find and rename the Volume.aiff in to oldvolume.aiff

Last step, move the file from desktop in to this folder.


When is a message charged? I opened my contacts, clicked my friend's name and using his email, sent him a message. My friend's email is associated with an apple account. Yet when the message was delivered, it turned green. Does it mean that I was charged for the message? Is it necessary that the sender is charged whenever the message turns green? I don't have an SMS package or any other prepaid options. I have a simple AT&T plan with limited talk time and 300 MB of data.

My friend lives in a different country and uses an iPod through his home wifi.

P.S.: I have asked this question on the official Apple forum (link). I think SE is a better place for such questions.

When the text bubble is green instead of blue, you're sending a SMS instead of using iMessage, being, therefore, charged for that.

Messages are sent as SMS when iMessage is unavailable, unless you disable this under Settings / Messages / Send as SMS.

So, as I understand it, you either sent it to an non Apple ID email address, or the text couldn't reach the receiver through iMessage, changing to SMS mode.


prevent inbuilt apache running using server app Using OS X 10.11.3 (15D21), with macports, apache 2.4/php 7.0.2 with OS X Server installed (for TimeCapsule sharing)

I can't seem to prevent the inbuild apache from starting on reboot.

if i use:

sudo launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.apache.httpd.plist

then reboot and use the command

imac:scripts pete$ ps -Al | grep httpd
    0   245     1        4   0  31  0  2623184  21960 -      Ss                 0 ??         0:00.36 /opt/local/apache2/bin/httpd -k start
   70   280   245      104   0  31  0  2623184   1020 -      S                   0 ??         0:00.00 /opt/local/apache2/bin/httpd -k start
   70   281   245      104   0  31  0  2623184   1052 -      S                   0 ??         0:00.00 /opt/local/apache2/bin/httpd -k start
   70   282   245      104   0  31  0  2623184   1044 -      S                   0 ??         0:00.00 /opt/local/apache2/bin/httpd -k start
   70   283   245      104   0  31  0  2623184   1100 -      S                   0 ??         0:00.00 /opt/local/apache2/bin/httpd -k start
   70   284   245      104   0  31  0  2623184   1088 -      S                   0 ??         0:00.00 /opt/local/apache2/bin/httpd -k start
    0   510     1     4004   0  31  0  2496992   9540 -      Ss                  0 ??         0:00.12 /usr/sbin/httpd -D FOREGROUND -f /Library/Server/Web/Config/apache2/services/ACSServer.conf -E /var/log/apache2/services/ACSServer_error_log
   70   522   510      104   0  31  0  2494944   1184 -      S                   0 ??         0:00.00 /usr/sbin/httpd -D FOREGROUND -f /Library/Server/Web/Config/apache2/services/ACSServer.conf -E /var/log/apache2/services/ACSServer_error_log

the server app websites is turned off, and if I uninstall the server app, the problem resolves - it is just I want the server app to use TimeCapsule backups.

I had the same problem!

You have to edit:

/Library/Server/Web/Config/Proxy/apache_serviceproxy.conf

and

/Library/Server/Web/Config/apache2/services/ACSServer.conf

Change "Listen ..." to "# Listen ..." (Change to comment).
This prevents the httpd from starting.

You have to restart after this!


Mail not responding when syncing with Google Apps Gmail account in OS X Yosemite 10.10.1 Mail.app goes unresponsive whenever a specific Gmail account is added.

If I quit the process and go to System Preferences > Internet Accounts and disable the account, I can start Mail normally.

I can then use my other accounts (Exchange and Gmail) normally. If I then go to Preferences and enable the offending Gmail account, new emails are downloaded and then mail goes unresponsive.

I have tried removing and recreating the internet account, the mailbox, etc. I can verify that Mail downloads 1.5GB of data (approximately the size of the Gmail account) whenever I recreate the account. It remains unresponsive whenever the account is active.

I have tried the solution laid out here. It worked the first time this happened and now did not resolve the issue.

Can anyone think of any other steps to take to reset mail and get this issue fixed? Does anyone know the source of the bug?

I turned off all "Show in IMAP" label settings in the Gmail web console.

I then added back only "All Mail."  I restarted Mail.app and reenabled the account.
Mail started normally and my email was available.

I still would like to know the source of the issue, but for now the problem is resolved.


Transfering all photos from old iPad I have an iPad 3rd gen (running iOS 9.3.6) and the new iPad 7th gen. I am trying to get all the pictures from the old iPad to the new. When I turn on iCloud for photos I get the following error: “

  Photos and Videos Synced from iTunes will be Removed

The problem is that I no longer have the PC which I used to sync. The only copy of all these photos is on the iPad and I am having a difficult time transferring them off the iPad.

To summarize, I want to get all the pictures from an old iPad. On the old iPad I have photos from the following sources:

Import from iTunes.
Import from a digital camera using the converter.
Pictures taken with the iPad.

I do not have easy access to a Mac or PC.

If you can get access to a Mac or a PC, you should try the iMazing application.

It allows you to selectively copy data from your iPad. You should be able to get all photos from the Photos app. I believe iMazing can also copy individual apps and their data from one device to another.

The iMazing application can also create backups and lets you browse those backups. Make a backup. Save it to a USB pen drive. Whatever method you use to transfer photos from your old iPad to the new iPad, that USB stick will be your safety net. Keep it around until you are sure the new iPad has all the photos.


After add a page to my "read later" list, and go off-line, where's the page for me to read? I can't find how to access the pages I added to "read later" with Safari in iOS5, any hint?

Start Safari
Access bookmarks (the Book icon on the toolbar)
Pick 'Reading List' (Top entry in the table with the glasses icon)

Unlike InstaPaper, the Reading List just collects links (not content) so you need to be online to access the articles.


When someone sends email message to both me and husband, the message goes to his mailbox and not mine My husband and I share one log-in account, with our own Mac pop mail account. When someone sends an email to both our email addresses, it goes to his mailbox, but not mine, even though my address is also in the "To" space.

When using POP usually the client deletes the email on the server after retrieving it. So the first client (yours or your husband's) will fetch it and delete it from the remote inbox.

You can tell the email client to keep the message in the inbox (Using a POP account with more than one device):

In Mail select Mail > Preferences.
Click the Accounts tab.
Select the account for which you wish to change the settings.
Click the Advanced tab.
Select the "Remove copy from server after retrieving a message" option.
Select a time frame from the pop-up menu.


How to uninstall deprecated Unsubscribe plugin from Mail.app? I used the Unsubscribe plugin for Mail.app, but it is now a part of TrustedID (http://www.unsubscribe.com/), so now I can't use it anymore and want to remove it.

When I want to uninstall the plugin from inside the Mail.app preferences, nothing happens when I hit the button Remove Unsubscribe Plugin. There's nothing in /Users/MyUserName/Library/Mail/Bundles that looks like the Unsubscribe plugin.

How to uninstall deprecated Unsubscribe plugin from Mail.app?

UnsubMailPluginMail App for OS X is a leftover from a free program which later switched to become a user pay software. The program vanished but the plugin stayed to pop up and annoy you.

To remove it:

Open your Finder window.
Proceed to the Go menu.
Then down to Go to Folder....
Then in the window delete existing wording and type in
/Library/Mail/.

When the folder opens, locate the plugin and move it to Trash.


How do I find my hostname for my google account? Can you help me figure out what my hostname for my google account would be? I'm setting up Fetch (FTP) and I need my hostname for my gmail.

If you are using some FTP client you need to connect to their IP Address AFAIK, so with this you can try accessing GMAIL's IP (74.*.235.) and enter your username and password as other FTP Client is doing.

HTH


Manage iPhoto event from Lightroom I have a dream!

I wish I could import my photos in Lightroom, process them and add them to several different collections/published collections that would then show up as events in iPhoto. Think "Italy 2009", "Wedding", "The Children" and so on.

I can get part of the way today but some very important steps remain to solve.

I import my photos into Lightroom
I organize and edit them into published collections
I publish the collection to disk
I import it into iPhoto and I have very nice event that I can sync with my iOS devices

Here is what I can't do after this step

Edit an image and re-publish and have iPhoto replace it's version with the new one (if possible really replace it so that metadata like faces and locations remains)
Delete an image from the collection and have it removed from iPhoto, including all original/master copies. I have my original i Lightroom so unless it's a part of a currently published collection it shouldn't be in iPhoto. At all.
Have the (temporary) directory removed. I don't need to store this image in more places, Lightroom and iPhoto is enough.

So I guess the question is: can anyone solve any of my 3 problems or improve on the overall workflow?

While it is far from an ideal solution, when I want to put the Lightroom-created JPEGs in iPhoto, I've been using the following to solve #1:

Publish to a Hard Drive folder from Lightroom, each folder named according to the events I want them to have in iPhoto
Uncheck the "Copy Items to the iPhoto Library" box in iPhoto's Preferences>Advanced menu
Import the folders to iPhoto

This will import these pictures by reference only; all the photos stay in their existing folder. (I usually re-check the box afterwards, so later pictures from sources other than Lightroom are actually copied). But you can set all the usually iPhoto metadata, reorganize into different events, browse thumbnails, etc.

If you modify anything in Lightroom, and republish the changes, those changes will be visible immediately when you open the picture in iPhoto. Note however, that unfortunately iPhoto does not update the thumbnail. And iPhoto uses the thumbnail for the zooming-in animation. So not only when you view it in the event display, but for a moment in the zoom-in animation, you will see the original version. But on the plus side, any metadata changes that you make will be preserved, because iPhoto stores these in the database. Only the image is external.

Also, since I don't like having another folder outside of the iPhoto database, I actually have Lightroom publish to a folder that is within the iPhoto database package. iPhoto doesn't delete anything in there that it didn't originally create, as far as I can tell. I have tried to use the "repair library" option to see if it can pull in the files (it claims to be able to recover orphans), but no luck there.

Unfortunately, iPhoto does not check when the files are removed. So it doesn't solve #2. It sort of solves #3, in that there is no additional copy.

Anyways, like I said, it's a very imperfect solution, but I've found it to work reasonably well for myself, and it's the best that I've come up with. There is a plugin that purports to be a Lightroom Publish Service for iPhoto, but it doesn't work at all (it's basically an export; it doesn't update photos).

Best of luck!


Replace TextEdit as the default text editor in MacOS Big Sur I just never want TextEdit to be opened, and instead set sublime as the default editor for all plain-text files. So not only files with *.txt extension.
For older versions than Big Sur the following command always has worked for me:
defaults write com.apple.LaunchServices/com.apple.launchservices.secure \
    LSHandlers -array-add \
    '{LSHandlerContentType=public.plain-text;LSHandlerRoleAll=com.sublimetext.3;}'

From this answer: https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/123834/405588
But on Big Sur this doesn't work anymore. Even after restarting MacOS text files still open with TextEdit.
edit: apparently after running the command above double clicking dot files like ~/.bashrc do open in Sublime. But when running open ~/.bashrc from Terminal it still opens the file in TextEdit...

Have you tried SwiftDefaultApps? It's a modern replacement for the old RCDefaults System Preferences pane.
https://github.com/Lord-Kamina/SwiftDefaultApps
Here are two screen shots of SwiftDefaultApps, the first showing Uniform Type Identifiers tab for public.plain.text with Sublime Text 2 set as the Editor, and the second showing the Applications tab and Sublime Text 2 with public.plain.text checked. (This works the same with Sublime Text 3 too.)
With these settings, any plain text file, with or without a .txt extension, will open in Sublime Text when double-clicked in Finder.

 Historical Reference: RCDefaultApp @ web.archive.org: https://web.archive.org/web/20200312011847/http://www.rubicode.com/Software/RCDefaultApp/


Playlist questions for new iTunes update I recently upgraded to the new 7.0 iPhone/iTunes update and am aggravated because my purchased music is included in playlists when I do not choose them. I have a lot of music that I have purchased just to complete a collection. I want only to play what I choose. How do you get them off the playlist and keep them from playing?

Don't be aggravated, take a trip into settings where you can quickly and easily turn this off.

Settings > Music > Show All Music: ON / OFF

This settings toggles between:

  All music that has been downloaded or that is stored in iCloud will be shown

and

  Only music that has been downloaded to this device will be shown.

Now you're sorted, go for a run and wind down ;)


Clean Remove Partial Binary of Homebrew in OSX Mojave I interrupted Homebrew installation from the Terminal by pressing ^ Control C because I realized I have little space left in the hard disk.

Now I want to clean the data that was incompletely written to my hard disk. What should I do?

I ran following commands in the Terminal to install:

ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"

This was interrupted. Now I keep getting message of low disc space.

Homebrew conveniently has a few ways to uninstall it"

Issue the command

/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/uninstall.sh)"

They also conveniently provide an Uninstall script
you can download that should remove the files from the aborted installation.

Either of these methods should get Homebrew uninstalled.


Is it possible to use the character map as a standalone app? I always loved the opportunity to create a standalone version of the Color picker instead of having to look for it between the apps menus.

Is it possible to use the character map as a standalone app?

Thank you

In this http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20051022020253863 Article, you find the AppleScripts to do what you want. However, the paths seem to have changed at least under Lion. So, to show the Character Palette under 10.7 (possibly older as well), use this AppleScript:

tell application "Finder"
    open item "System:Library:Input Methods:CharacterPalette.app" of the
    startup disk
end tell

As a bonus, the Keyboard Viewer is displayed with this script:

tell application "Finder"
    open item "System:Library:Input Methods:KeyboardViewer.app" of the
    startup disk
end tell

To create a "Standalone Application" from them, just paste them into the AppleScript Editor, choose File->Save As... and select Application as the type.


Blurry font when connecting MBP Mid-2012, Retina to an HPes 27" display My MBP (Mid 2012, Retina) running El Capitan is now connected to an external HP Display via an HDMI cable.
It all works fine, but the fonts on the HP are not as smooth as the MBP. Now, I get that Retina is quite superior so I may immediately catch abnormalities in an external display - but I assure you, that's not the case.

The HP font is significantly rough on the edges, contributing to a blurry font (and a string of headaches).
I called HP, and they tried to get me to buy their $67 paid support to give me the "drivers" for the monitor that I know they don't have.

Either I need to get an easy fix here, or I call Apple, OR you folks can be kind enough to refer me to any other affordable and sleek looking external display at BestBuy or Amazon.ca

I still have a return policy on hand with this bestbuy, so I may be able to exchange it for a display that doesn't have these silly issues.

Thanks!

How are you connecting to the display?

I've used screens in the past (a particular model dell springs to mind) which applied sharpening to the HDMI input by default, resulting in "crunchy-looking" type. That could be worth checking.

It's also fair to say that the MacOS doesn't always handle transitioning windows from retina to non-retina screens -- I've seen plenty of instances where the windows fonts in FCPX become extra-jagged until some magic combination of moving the window from screen to screen and/or rebooting the mac solves the issue. That's with a mix of screens, including the thunderbolt display.


I can't set a HTTP-Proxy on my wifi anymore Anyone have an idea how to fix this?

I press save but still it isn't saved.. or being used?

You should try to :

Click on "Forget this network", search for this wifi, enter the password and try to set your proxy again
Go to Settings > General > Reset > Reset Network settings and try again


Weird bar in the bottom-left. What is that? Sometimes, when I hit a combination of keys (I have not figured out which one) a weird bar in the bottom-left of a screen appears. I cannot get rid of it in any way. The screencast: https://youtu.be/CdXVgth_sTk

The only way I have figured out of removing it is via: killall Dock.

What is the bar in question? How do you trigger it, how do you get rid of it, how to use it?

Use QuickTime to record your screen with the MacOS onscreen keyboard visible and you'll be able to figure out what key combo causes this to appear. Then you can track it down to a particular package.


Terminal script to create folders and copy files based on part of filename I have a folder with thousands of files in this format

filenameA - 1.ext
filenameA - 2.ext
filenameB - 1.ext

and sometimes

filenameB - 02.ext

I need a script that will read the files and create a single folder with each distinct filename before the " - #.ext" and then add all files with that same name into the folder.

From the example above I would have two folders 1) filenameA 2) filenameB -
 each with two files in them. The actual data has thousands of files and each group can have 1 to 50ish files, with sequential numbers added to the end.

If all your files follow the convention of dirname - the_rest_and_ext (have the - in the middle) you can use something like:

for f in *; do
   dir_name=`echo "$f" | sed 's/ -.*//'`
   mkdir -p "$dir_name"
   mv "$f" "$dir_name"
done

If all the files have the same extension, you can change the for to something like:

for f in *.ext; do

NOTE: make sure you know what you are doing.


Apple Configurator 2 version and blueprints If I upgrade from version 2.3 of the Apple configurator 2 to the newest version will my be blueprints disappear?

No they won't. However, if you are concerned about losing them, you can follow the instructions in the linked document to backup and restore blueprints:

Preserve or migrate data for Apple Configurator 2


How do I turn iMessages off in OS X? How do I turn iMessages off on my MacBook? I have tried to go to settings but those were in the old version! I don't know how to turn it off in the new version.

As mentioned in one of the comments already, within Messages go to Preferences > Accounts and highlight the iMessage account.  There either untick the box for Enable this account or sign out of iMessage, which will effectively disable the account.


Spotlight overrides first character What's wrong: I hit CMD+SPACE to open up spotlight, typically type in the name of the application I want to start, hit enter and either the wrong app or no app at all will start, because the app name is missing the first character. "Learn to type" I hear you say but wait: as I enter the first character in the search bar, the cursor jumps to the beginning of the line and my second character input overrides the first one. So entering for example "ever", in order to start Evernote, will result in "ver". "php" to start PHPStorm will result in "hp" and start my damn HP printer app and so on.

This cursor jump to the beginning of the line will not happen in any other application and even if I accept the fact that my cursor jumps from time to time, I don't get why the second character overrides the first one. I'm not even sure if you can configure your Mac to always override the character at current position, but I surely haven't.

So this keeps on happening quite regularly and I cannot reproduce it. It just happens and when I try it again (close Spotlight, CMD+SHIFT again), it won't happen again, even if I give it like 5 tries or so.

It won't kill me but I am a software developer myself and this kind of bugs just leave me frustrated plus I can not imagine that this is the desired behavior. I have seen some talk about this issue on the internet but I did not come across a solution..

I have 3 MacBooks, different ages, all with German keyboard layouts and German set as system language and they all do this. Just mentioning this, because after that fact, I can barely imagine this isn't affecting at least a lot, if not all, MacBook (Pro?) users.

13" Pro 2010 or so
15" Pro Retina 2013
13" Pro Retina 2015

They all run El Capitan but I already encountered this before. I don't know the OS X version I had installed when I first stumbled across it.

here is a solution which have worked for me https://www.reddit.com/r/OSXElCapitan/comments/3wczrk/spotlight_eating_the_first_letter/?

iamtaybo sugested to UNCHECK "Allow Spotlight Suggestions in Spotlight" in System Preferences->Spotlight


Airport Extreme Name Resolution I have a little issue with my airport extreme. I'm using the device in my corporate network which has two DNS server for resolving intern and external names.

When I do an nslookup "public adresse" (such as www.google.com), everything works fine.

...But, when I try to resolve an internal name, for exemple bardo1, I get:

;;SERVFAIL reply from XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX trying next server
;;connection timed out; no servers could be reached

When I try nslookup internalservername my.internal.dns.server everything works thing.

Where is the problem ??? I don't get it.

Is it because apple uses a different way to resolve names then microsoft ?

How can I fix that on the router ? Not on client side...

My PC Config IP: 10.0.1.3/32 Gateway: 10.0.1.1 DNS: 10.0.1.1

Airport Extreme IP WAN: 172.16.1.117 DNS1: x.x.x.13 DNS2: x.x.x.45 domain: mydomain.local

Apple's DNS resolution expects a tiered solution, so you will want to simply point the router and clients to the internal DNS.

That DNS will answer all queries for it's internal responses and refer/forward requests outside it's authority to the outside DNS of your choosing.

In short, you will either need to change your internal DNS or set up a third DNS to know what requests to handle internally and which externally as the AirPort wasn't designed to do that choosing for you.

Here's how you would set up OS X server DNS to do forwarding - it's a simple pane where you place the external addresses.


Disabling app updates I have iOS 8.2 running on my iPod Touch (7); and since I downloaded iOS 8, all of my apps update automatically. I personally don't like that at all, I want to see what updates are available and what apps want to update before they do, not after.

Is there any way that I can disable this feature?

Settings > iTunes & App Store > Automatic Downloads


Find which process receives a given keyboard command I'm trying to figure out why a certain keyboard combination is no longer working.

As an example, Sublime Text 2 ships with a keyboard shortcut for opening the Find/Replace panel:

Command + Option + F

This combo worked fine until I did a clean install of OSX 10.8.5, after which it mysteriously stopped working in Sublime Text.

I know keyboard sequences can be captured by processes other than the frontmost (like by the OS) so I was wondering if there is a way of checking by which process a particular keyboard command was "consumed"?

ShortcutDetective solves your problem. It's free, simple, and to the point.


Big Sur: PDF Service shell script cannot call python I recently upgraded from Mohave to Big Sur, and the shell script I use as a PDF Service has stopped working. The script calls a Python script to process the PDF, and this gives the error "operation not permitted". Thinking that this has to do with the new security restrictions, I tried dragging everything that seemed relevant to Full Disk Access in the Privacy pane of the Security & Privacy settings, but that didn't help. Here is the script with some debugging lines inserted:
#!/bin/sh

export PATH=/Library/TeX/texbin:/usr/local/bin:$PATH

########################################
# Log stdout and stderr (from https://stackoverflow.com/a/20564208).
LOG_FILE=/tmp/pdfbooklog.txt
# Close STDOUT file descriptor
exec 1<&-
# Close STDERR FD
exec 2<&-
# Open STDOUT as $LOG_FILE file for read and write.
exec 1<>$LOG_FILE
# Redirect STDERR to STDOUT
exec 2>&1

########################################
# Get name of file printed and print options (unused).

# name or title of file printed, e.g., document.odt
TITLE="${1:-}"
# space separated options from the print dialog: k1=v1 k2='v2' …
PRINT_OPTIONS="$2"
# Make first (usually only) filename $1.
shift
shift

# Some programs called write files to the current directory, so make sure
# we're somewhere where that will work.
cd /tmp

########################################
# Apparently it's possible to be called with multiple filenames.
# Use a loop to make sure we handle all files listed on the command line.

for f in "$@"
do
    echo "Processing '$f'"
    echo "PATH: $PATH"
    /usr/local/bin/python3 -c 'print("Python works")'
    pdfbook2 --inner-margin=80 "$f"
    open "${f%.pdf}-book.pdf"
done

When I invoke it from the print dialog, this is what is written to the log file:
Processing '/var/folders/2j/w5jh3df55p7f4n05nh_m45jr0000gn/T/printing.11142.10/test.odt.pdf'
PATH: /Library/TeX/texbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin
/Users/me/Library/PDF Services/Make PDF booklet.sh: line 40: /usr/local/bin/python3: Operation not permitted
/Users/me/Library/PDF Services/Make PDF booklet.sh: /Library/TeX/texbin/pdfbook2: /usr/bin/env: bad interpreter: Operation not permitted
The file /var/folders/2j/w5jh3df55p7f4n05nh_m45jr0000gn/T/printing.11142.10/test.odt-book.pdf does not exist.
test.odt-book.pdf does not exist.
Done

pdfbook2 is included with MacTeX: it is a Python script that invokes python3 with /usr/bin/env. python3 is in /usr/local/bin (installed with Homebrew), and as the test line shows, I cannot even invoke it directly. What do I have to do to permit Big Sur to run this script?
Update:

In case it wasn't clear, the script works when invoked from the Terminal. It only fails when it is invoked from the print dialog.
Since Big Sur still has /usr/bin/python3, the script above can be modified to use it. When the PDF Service is invoked from the print dialog, /usr/bin/python3 -c 'print("Python works")' will print "Python works". /usr/bin/python3 /Library/TeX/texbin/pdfbook2 --inner-margin=80 "$f" will begin executing, but pdfbook2 will then throw a PermissionError of "Operation not permitted" when it tries to run pdfcrop, which is also in /Library/TeX/texbin.
The first line of pdfbook2 is #!/usr/bin/env python3. The first line of pdfcrop is #!/usr/bin/env perl, which should find /usr/bin/perl, since there is no Perl in my /usr/local/bin.
So apparently SIP is preventing PDF Services from execing anything that is not in a protected directory, and from using /usr/bin/env as an interpreter (which could circumvent that restriction). Is there any way to give a script permission to do this? Giving the script Full Disk Access doesn't work.

I have discovered that Big Sur will graciously allow a script to execute in a PDF Service, if the script is put inside an Automator workflow saved as an APPLICATION. Saving as a Print plug-in, workflow, or other type will not work.
Use the 'Run Shell Script' Automator action, and place the script in there.
Whether the script can call another script with the necessary permissions, I have not tried.


Transferring money on n Apple account from one iPhone to another I have some money on my Apple account. If I buy a new iphone, can I still use this money to buy things on my new phone, or will I lose the money? Presumably it will still be the same log in details and account, so I assume that I will be able to use the money when I buy a new phone, or am I being overly optimistic? Thanks

There was a comment below your question but I wanted to make sure it was clear. If you sign into your new iPhone with the same apple ID you will be able to use whatever money you have loaded into your account. You will also be able to access any previous purchases made with that same apple ID. Purchases including but not limited to, music, movies, tv shows and apps.


Securely erase all user data on an old iBook I have an old iBook (Model A1007) that I would like to donate, but first I need to delete all of the last user's data so that it is not recoverable. With Windows machines, I usually do this by running a live Linux USB or CD and then using the "shred" tool to overwrite the hard drive some number of times with random data.

Unfortunately, I have been having trouble running live Linux on this Mac, as per this post: booting an iBook from a live linux usb drive. Booting from a CD instead hasn't seemed to have given me more useful results.

It seems that if I were to purchase the Mac OS 10.4 installer disk, it might be able to do what I need, though since I am doing this just to get rid of the computer, it seems like a bit of an excessive investment for what I am trying to do.

My problem is similar to this one: Securely wipe all user data from iBook G4 / OSX 10.4?. That user had three proposed solutions

Connect the computer to another Mac. I'd rather not, as I don't have another Mac.
Clone the entire computer to an external disk and then run it off that. This seems like it is going to likely be a big project involving lots of debugging (and somehow finding a blank external hard drive, which I would prefer to avoid as well).

So my questions are:

Is there some free way to either run Linux on this old iBook and use that to wipe the data?
If not, is there some other free way to securely delete the data from the iBook?
If neither 1 nor 2, is there a way that will minimize hassle and expense to clean this computer so that I can get rid of it?

I'm not above breaking this thing open and physically destroying the hard drive, if I must. I'd just rather use software means if its possible (and not too expensive).

You can use the Disk Utility program supplied by Apple - and you can tell it how many overwrites you wish it to do, the last time I read that info it said one pass was not very reliable, 7 should be fine and 35 was overkill - bear in mind how long it takes to do one complete pass....

A similar question is here : Selling a Macbook Pro - removing personal information from it

Edit: You need to boot from a different media as it cannot work on itself so, either the original install disc or a newer install disk for a later version - as older ones don’t usually work forwards... Other bootable media may also work - but that I have not tried...


Cannot Download or View Canadian Immigration Form I would like to download and view Canadian Immigration Form 1294E, the application to be filed by a non-Canadian person living overseas who wishes to come to Canada for study. I live in the US. The Canadian Immigration URL to download this form is here. When I go to that URL, I'm confronted with a dialog that says:

  Please wait...

  If this message is not eventually replaced by the proper contents of the document, your PDF viewer may not be able to display this type of document.
  You can upgrade to the latest version of Adobe Reader for Windows®, Mac, or Linux® by visiting http://www.adobe.com/go/reader_download.

  For more assistance with Adobe Reader visit http://www.adobe.com/go/acrreader.

I waited minutes, but no file was downloaded. I then navigated to Adobe to update my computer's Reader, selected download, waited for the installation to complete (replacing an earlier version of Reader), then restarted the computer. Then again navigating to the Canadian Immigration URL, the same dialog appears and no .pdf is downloaded.

Another Canadian Immigration page has a drop-down that allows the user to select a specific form. Using that page again results in no download and the same dialog.

My iMac runs macOS 10.15.5, Safari 13.1.1, and the computer has Acrobat Reader DC version 20.009.20063, dated May 3, 2020. This sure seems like it'd be the "latest version." I also tried with Chrome v.83.0.4103.97 (the latest macOS version), and the same dialog was displayed.

The Wayback Machine retrieves only the same error dialog.

What might I try to retrieve this document?

I was finally able to download the Canadian immigration .pdf document.

The solution was to use Firefox, and to reset FF's preferences regarding .pdf files from "Open in browser" to "save file." I have been unable to find a similar setting in Safari.


iTunes hangs at "Step 6 of 7. Importing photos" Everytime I connect my iPhone (4 or 5) to iTunes (v. 12.0.1.26), it begins syncing but hangs on step 6 of 7, "Importing photos".

Quit iTunes
Delete ~/Pictures/iPod Photo Cache (may or may not exist)
Go to `~/Pictures/iPhoto Library
CTRL+click > Show Package Contents
Delete iPod Photo Cache inside the library
Try syncing again.

Worked for me.


would like to create memoirs by talking into computer and having software convert the speech into text into a document like MS Word My 82 year old father would like to create his memoirs by talking into his computer and having software convert the speech into text into a document like MS Word.  Originally I was thinking that I would purchase software for his PC so that he talk into his PC's microphone and the software would take care of converting it into speech.  In thinking through this further I realized that maybe using an iPhone or iPad he could do something similar.  He currently has a PC desktop, a ChromeBook as his laptop and a flip phone as his cell phone.  Would it make more sense for him to use either an iPhone or IPad to do this speech to text conversion and what additional software (if any) would be necessary?

My Grandfather had a similar need, he hand wrote his memoirs on paper and then wanted to turn them into a self published book.

The best way to do this is to get someone who has good English skills and is fast at typing to do it.

Speech recognition software is not use-friendly for those who are not tech savvy, I wouldn't suggest it is an easy way for him to use a computer. They are also incredibly inaccurate.

I would argue at this point Google Voice and Apple's Dictation features have better recognition than the leading product on the market as they learn from their users over time where as most standalone products have limited data to work from.

However it's worth a try, for OS X you'll need Nuance's Dragon Dictate for Mac it works I've tried two versions but it's not great however. It is pretty pricey, and you'll need to get the headset, it won't work very well with a poor quality microphone or just a ambient mic on your Mac.

They also have an app on iTunes that is free, again it works okay, but not great.

The main issue with dictation is that you have to say all the punctuation and often words are misheard and that can in turn confuse it with the next few words, it's also very difficult to think of what you want to say in written language quickly enough.

In conclusion, I honestly wouldn't recommend voice recognition, especially if you are hoping to make it easier for him. I would suggest he uses an iPad and types it, or you sit with him and he dictates it. My Granddad had my Mum do this in the end, 3-4 months of weekly meet-ups he was very happy and they had a great excuse to spend time together.


A calendar embedded in OS X desktop that allows me to cross off days I workout - does something like this exist? I'm getting into an exercise routine and in the past I've found it helpful to cross off the days tha I do exercise on a calendar. It occurred to me that I spend far more time looking at my macbook desktop than at my bedroom wall and would like to know if anyone is aware of an application that will allow me to have a calendar with at least one full month showing at a time embedded on my desktop, and allow me to cross off the days that I work out?

Use the build in calendar (came with osx), open it, click on the (+) sign to add new event for today, type worked, then you have lots of options to use if you want to, but that is the simplest way to do it.
You can even make a new calendar specific to your activity.
You can email the event to yourself, etc...


Mounting a Network share on login (There was a problem connecting to this server) I have a new piece of software that I've installed that relies on a mounted network share in order to operate. The network share is a hosted MacMini Server, connecting over SMB.

I've added the share to the user's login items, but whenever the computer boots and is logged in, I see the (There was a problem connecting to the server "MacMini") and it doesn't mount.

However, if I simply acknowledge that message, then do Command+K and mount it manually, it will mount without issue.

I've already saved the credentials to KeyChain, I'm just not sure why it wont mount at login.

If anyone has any ideas. Much appreciated.

I've been struggling with it for a couple of days myself, and finally found a solution.

In Automator, I made a simple three step Application that waits for a few seconds (using "Pause") before trying to connect to the network share. I believe the problem is related to the (in my case wireless) network connection not being completely established when the login items run immediately after login.

The Application consists of three steps:

Pause for 5 seconds
Get specified Servers "smb://HOSTNAME/SHARENAME"
Connect to Servers

HOSTNAME and SHARENAME should be replaced with your own parameters. The choice of 5 seconds is arbitrary (and probably is likely dependent on one's own specific conditions) but it works on my own Mac Mini 2011.

Please note that running this script only works when the network share is not already connected, you need to unmount before running the application for testing purposes.

Update: Now that I've had a few days of experience with this script I've found that it works sometimes and sometimes not, my guess is still that the wireless network isn't ready to connect and that it fails because of that. The reasons why are unclear to say the least, increasing the Pause timer duration definitely helps though.


Unable to use gpt to restore efi partition I accidentally deleted my efi partition, which I now know is bad news bears. I found a guide here to restore it without losing data, but even though I'm booting from usb and have unmounted all partitions, I'm still getting the error gpt remove: unable to open device "disk0": resource busy.

Everything I'm reading says to boot from an OSX usb installer disk, and use diskutil unmountdisk disk0 and then gpt will work.  I've definitely done both of these things but it's still telling me the disk is mounted...

Could someone recommend anything else to try? Much thanks

I figured it out, my hd was getting mounted under Volumes and had to be removed with diskutil unmount /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD

Don't know why unmountdisk wasn't fixing this but whatever


Magic Mouse 2 - Do I need to raise my finger? When I use the right click, I need to raise my left finger or it works like a left click. Is this a normal behavior? Can I change it?

Try going into mouse preferences and enabling Secondary Click:


MacBook Retina strange system/battery behaviour I am quite used to the fact, that MacOS X does a lot abracadabra internally to provide the best user experience ever, but I also used to understand all that happens. With my pristine MBPr (3 battery loadcycles) I got lost. There are at least two things that I do not understand.

First of all my pmset -g configuration is as follows (note hibernatemode is off):

Currently in use:
 standbydelay         4200
 standby              1
 womp                 1
 halfdim              1
 hibernatefile        /var/vm/sleepimage
 gpuswitch            2
 darkwakes            1
 networkoversleep     0
 disksleep            10
 sleep                10
 hibernatemode        0
 ttyskeepawake        1
 displaysleep         10
 acwake               0
 lidwake              1

When I was using my notebook at the very beginning it was running on batteries until almost drained. At about 1% I rebooted it, but instead of rebooting it presented me a nice empty battery pictogram (just one you may know from iOS devices). I pushed power-on button several times just to see the very nice pictogram again. I left the notebook then and started looking for a charger. Accidentaly after a few seconds MBPr powered itself (!) on. Still on battery! I pressed Option and waited on boot screen until it turned off again - but this lasted for long minutes.
Having it recharged to 100% I used it on battery again. This time I didn't notice that it went down to 0% while I stil had my system booted and many applications open. I glanced a "running on reserve battery power" warning and screen went blank. Pushing power-on button - no action. I simply put a charger in and went to sleep. In the morning another suprise: I open the lid and see that the system didn't actually shut off. It is up and all my applications are still running. So at 0% battery it simply went to some "sleep" mode.

My guessing is that either battery is somehow uncalibrated and provides more power than the system expects from it, or MBPr with ML is keeping some additional non-reported reserve of power below displayed 0%. Or am I wrong? It's a pity that the nice sleep indicator was removed from the chasis - without you never actually know what your system is doing right now.

macbooks generally hibernate (save your ram's state to your hdd) when the battery is too low.
to do that efficiently (without losing data) there's an internal threshold that keeps some energy for the system to save state.

in general, you don't shut down (as in "windows is shutting down") your mac. you either let it go to sleep after some time or just close the lid (and trigger hibernation). you can even trigger hibernation from the apple menu.


How to hide Dock on non-fullscreen desktop I want to hide Dock on non-full desktops. It takes a lot of space so some applications are hard to use in such small amount of space, but on the other hand I don't want to keep each single application on its own desktop, because of logical grouping.

So is there any way to hide dock and make program take extra space used by Dock. like on the full-screen desktop but keeping multiple applications.

I would be grateful for any help.
Thx.

You can hide/show the Dock by pressing optioncommandD which checks/un-checks the Automatically hide and show the Dock checkbox under System Preferences > Dock, and then application windows can occupy the space normally used by the Dock.

When hidden, you can have the Dock temporarily reappear by moving the mouse to the bottom of the screen (that's assuming you have it in its default location).


How to mapping "Eject" key on Non-Mac keyboard? I've gotten a new USB keyboard for my Mac. It is a Windows keyboard, but after remapping the Alt and Windows keys, it works just like a Mac keyboard. It is missing one particular feature and that is the "Eject" key. I'm not sure how to remap that command to another key. Where can I find that command?
Also if I can assign volume up and volume down to control the sound from the keyboard.

If anybody knows of a way to resolve this issue, I would greatly appreciate it.

One way you can eject a disk without remapping keys is to use the Eject Menu Extra item.
Just navigate to the /System/Library/CoreServices/Menu Extras/ folder and double-click on the Eject.menu file. It will put the 'eject' icon in the menu bar:

For me, this has worked for both internal and external drives. One click and the drive opens like magic!


System-wide SOCKS Proxy Settings? If I have a SOCKS proxy running on a specific port, is there a way to configure all network traffic to leave through it?

If I configure the SOCKS proxy in the Network system preference, it seems to work properly for all browsers without additional configuration. (As reported by a quick Google for 'what is my IP' in both Chrome and Safari.)

However, a traceroute does not seem to be using this proxy, nor do downloads using curl. I also have no way of knowing whether other apps like Mail (SMTP) or an SSH connection are using the proxy.

I found the app MacProxy, but it's only a 30-day trial. It seems like there is surely a way to configure this via the command line for free?

There could be a couple of things happening here. OS X support SOCKS v5 but your SOCKS server might still be on v4. The difference is that v5 also routes UDP through the proxy but v4 doesn't

Try traceroute -I destination which will make traceroute use ICMP echo instead of UDP and see if you get a different route.

curl should be using the proxy if you specify it. Try curl --proxy socks5://proxyhost.examplecom:portnumber


How can I lock Mail/Contact/Calendars in an iPad? All members of my family use the iPad primarily for browsing the Web or playing games.  It is basically a living room computer. But I use it also for my e-mail.

I know The iPad can be locked with a passcode as a whole (which I don't really need, because anyone who makes it to my living room is welcome to use it), but I would like to lock only the Mail app.  Is there any way to do that?

Without jailbreaking, I believe your options are the use of apps that provide this kind of lock functionality built-in, unless Apple decide to implement some kind of multiple user support in future iOS versions for devices like the iPad.

I've previously come across Secure Gmail or Secure Webmail (there may well be others) which provide passcode protection schemes when starting and, judging by the screenshots, appear to be frontends to the relevant webmail pages (as opposed to a native application like the Apple Mail app). I've not used either, but they may be of use to you.


Can I use MacBook UDID registration for testing of iPhone application? I am not having any iPhone ,I have MacBook and have my developer account.

For archiving the app developed for iPhone I need to have provisioning profile, can it be done by using registering MacBook with it's UDID or not?

if not then what is the solution for the same?

One more question how many Apple devices can be registered in a developer account?

You cannot use a MacBook as the hardware device for getting an iPhone UDID, no. As there's no need for you to actual own the device you're adding the UDID for, you can get an UDID from a friend's phone or similar.

Note that you can create a distribution provisioning profile in the developer portal without having any physical devices registered. So there's not need for an iPhone UDID in order to for example archiving an app for TestFlight.

You can register up to 100 devices of each type in the developer account. You have the chance to reset the list once per year to remove irrelevant devices. You can find the specification from Apple at this page:

https://developer.apple.com/support/account/

Look under the heading "Resetting Your Device List Annually".


Apple Watch and MyFitnessPal not talking to one another For a long time I’ve been using MyFitnessPal on my iPhone as a diet/calorie tracker. I recently bought an Apple Watch Series 3 to track my exercise, steps and so on, and I’m trying to get it to work properly with MyFitnessPal, but something has gone astray.

In MyFitnessPal I’ve chosen my Apple Watch as the device to track steps. And, in the Health app I’ve given permission for MyFitnessPal to read Apple Watch data for Steps, Walking + Running Distance, and Workouts.

The problem is, whenever I look at my Diary in MyFitnessPal it never seems to capture the exercise I’m doing, and this is throwing out all my Calories remaining for the day. It does show an indication of my steps, but I’m not being allocated any calories for this or other exercise.

I called Apple Support and they checked all my settings for the Health app and Apple Watch and everything is good. I contacted MyFitnessPal and as far as they can tell, I’ve set everything right within their app as well.

So why isn’t this working? Has anyone else come across this? Is there a fix? I’m desperate to get this working!

Thanks in advance for any and all help! :)

This may sound silly, but since everything is okay according to Apple and MyFitnessPal, are you actually doing any exercise? Let me explain…

If you’re not telling the Apple Watch that something you’re doing is to be counted as exercise, then the data is probably not being recorded in the way MyFitnessPal wants in order to see it as exercise.

So, to solve this, try using the Workout app on your Apple Watch the next time you’re doing exercise (even if it’s just a walk) and see if that is recognised as exercise in MyFitnessPal. If so, you should then get credited the calories for the exercise you’ve done.

As for the normal everyday steps you’re doing from walking around etc, while MyFitnessPal is showing you an indication of these, it’s probably not going to count any calories associated with these steps as it's already factored that into its calculations for how many calories you should be doing on each day.

What I mean by this is that when you set MyFitnessPal up you would have entered your Activity Level from one of four choices: Not Very Active; Lightly Active; Active; and Very Active. So the app has already factored that into its calculations. On the other hand, when you actually do some exercise, this will be seen as over and above what it’s already calculated.

In a nutshell, using the Workout app on your Apple Watch should track the data that MyFitnessPal will except as ‘exercise’.


Is the /Developer directory still needed for Xcode in OS X Mavericks? The new Xcode is .app and all the package contents are with it, inside the applications folder. Can I just delete /Developer?

You can delete this folder. The new /Developer is located in /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer, so /Developer can be deleted.


What Is Graphic Switching & Are There Reasons to Turn It Off? I was tinkering about in the System Preferences of my Macbook Pro yesterday, when I came across "Automatic Graphic Switching" within the Energy Saver pane as exemplied below:

What exactly is Graphic Switching, and are there any reasons or instances when it shouldn't be automatically enabled & switched off ?

Graphics switching is where the integrated graphics is switched for the discrete graphics when more performance is required (and where performance is more important than battery life & heat output).

You can see the current graphics card that is enabled, and forcefully switch between the two, with gfxCardStatus.

Integrated graphics should be used when you need battery life over performance (the Integrated Only option in gfxCardStatus can be used to force integrated graphics in circumstances where OS X believes that the discrete graphics is required).
Discrete graphics should be used when you need performance over battery life (this is usually not required to be set manually with the Discrete Only option since OS X is happy to switch automatically).
Dynamic Switching uses the default OS X graphics switching.

When 'Automatic graphics switching' is disabled in the Energy Saver system preference pane, only the discrete graphics is used.


Is there TRIM support in OS X 10.6.9 for PowerPC? A friend of mine has a PowerBook running 10.6.9. To give it another lease of life, he'd like to install an SSD. Question is: does OS X on PPC have TRIM support?

A few searches tell me that there isn't good SSD support for power pc macs.

This seems to be mostly a SATA III compatibility issue. TRIM support seems to have been introduced in 10.6.8 but only for Apple-supplied drives. Since Apple was producing Intel-based systems by that point, that is where they focused the support.

There are blog posts where people have talked about specific drives working in G5 and G4 macs but this is notably without TRIM.

OWC has some posts about TRIM and how it isn't for everyone.

The important question is, why do you need TRIM?


Data detector for Safari similar to Mail.app? Does Safari have a similar data detector system like Mail.app? I don't think it has this because I am trying to add an event based on date and it doesn't occur. Is the data detector system limited on Safari compared to the Mail app?

Safari only supports the telephone data detector.

It's currently not possible to enable the other data detectors in Safari. (Is there a Safari Extension for adding Mail-style Data Detectors to Web Pages?)


How can I switch spaces instantly? I can't overstate the significance of "instantly"! I'm trialling a working process that makes very heavy use of spaces. Heavy enough that any delay when switching spaces is making it essentially unworkable.

I made a change — turned "Reduce Motion" on — which I think sped things up, but nowhere near enough. I need the delay to be as little as it is when, for example, switching windows within the same app+space i.e. instant.

To demonstrate the issue, open a few applications across a couple of spaces, then try to cmd-tab between a) apps on different spaces b) apps on the same space. Note that, even with "reduce motion" enabled, switching is much faster within a space.

Is there any setting I can change, or third-party app, that will totally eliminate the delay? Failing that, can anyone familiar with macos programming weigh in on whether this is even possible or not, or whether its something imposed by the OS which there is no chance of changing at all (without hacking the os binary!)

I'm running a MacBook Pro Retina Mid-2014, macOS 10.13.3, with 10 workspaces configured.

My preference would be for the animation to be totally eliminated for every switch-spacing mechanism. However, my main method is going to be using Ctrl+[1-0] to switch between 10 workspaces.

I recommend the option System Preferences > Accessibility > Display > Reduce motion.

This causes the transition to become a simple fade, which is also much quicker than the screen pan especially when using ctrl+1, 2 etc shortcuts.

I also use this option on iOS for similar reasons.

There's also TotalSpaces2 which apparently allows complete removal of the transition. I've not used it myself though.


Changing Terminal colors when ssh-ing into remote machine and back Looking for a way automatically change terminal colors when ssh-ing into remote machine and revert back to the default colors, when exiting the ssh session. Simply, want have another colors when i'm working on the remote machine.

Any idea?

ps: don't want use iTerm2, but standard Terminal.app

I'm using the following.

Have a shell command, called myssh, with content:

PROFILE="$1";shift;
DEF="Basic" #the default profile name
echo "tell app \"Terminal\" to set current settings of first window to settings set \"${PROFILE}\""|osascript
ssh $@
echo "tell app \"Terminal\" to set current settings of first window to settings set \"${DEF}\""|osascript

and use bash aliases for the connect, like:

alias ssweb='myssh Homebrew user@web.example.com'
alias ssmail='myssh Ocean me@mail.example.com'

When I want to ssh into the web server, I simply write ssweb in the Terminal and I got the "Homebrew" profile. When the ssh session ends, the AppleScript sets back to the "Basic".

The aliases should go into your $HOME/.profile or similar bash-startup file.

The "Homebrew", "Ocean" etc. are the setting profiles from the Terminal.app preferences. You can also set up different fonts, encodings, etc.

Of course, you can use it directly (without aliases) like:

myssh Pro user@another.machine.example.com
       ^        ^
       |        ssh command arguments
       terminal profile name


Download the USB installer on macOS X Catalina I'm trying to download the USB installer of macOS X Catalina but I'm getting an error:

Update not found The requested version of macOS is not available.

I'm already on mac os Catalina 10.15, I'm not trying to update, I want to download the USB installer.

Below the error I'm receving, a screenshot and a gif.

softwareupdate --fetch-full-installer --full-installer-version 10.15

See also How can I download an older version of OS X/macOS?


How do I rename files sequentially in automator based on a variable? I'd like to rename some image files. Is there a way to have the service ask what number to start at?

Everything here is set up as I'd like it to be. Though, when I run the script, I would like the service to ask me for a variable and then input it into the "start numbers at" box.

Is there a way to do this? Thanks.

Checked "Show this action when the workflow runs".

This allows me to choose what number to start at.


Grab list of Stats, Application Data, and Serials off OSX 10.6 to prepare for reformat and fresh install? I need to reformat my 2007 OSX as it is now returning kernal errors. I want to install everything fresh but I have a lot of software and don't want to sit here making a list of everything installed as it is all unorganized.

For windows I usually accomplish this with Belarc Advisor: http://download.cnet.com/Belarc-Advisor/3000-2094_4-10007277.html?tag=mncol;1

Is there something similar, whether a method or an app that will allow me to do this on a mac?

Most of what you need (i.e. hardware, network information, software etc. thats similar to what Belarc Advisor returns) can be obtained using the built-in System Profiler application (/Applications/Utilities/System Profiler.app).

You can then export the information to a file using File ➔ Save As.., then select either "Plain Text" or "Rich Text Format" from the "File Format" dropdown.

The above can get quite verbose, so if you just want a quick snapshot of installed apps (including those installed by default, of course), you could start the Terminal (/Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app) then type

ls /Applications

or

ls /Applications > ~/Documents/apps.txt to send the output to the file apps.txt in your Documents folder.


How to remove folder/account from list of messages (OS X 10.1 Mail) I just upgraded to Yosemite and I noticed in Mail that the folder/account are listed in the Inbox section right after the subject. I don't remember seeing this before. Is there a way (terminal flag, perhaps) to turn this off so the Subject of the message isn't truncated?

This is an important feature because it creates a quick visual tool to let you know what Inbox it's located in without actually opening the message or right clicking on your To: address. When using universal inbox like this, it's important, however the subject line isn't truncated because of this, the subject line gets truncated based of the width of your Sort Column or 'Messages' Column. In fact, even the inbox account name gets truncated when the column width is less than stellar. Simply enlarge the column width to an appropriate size that makes you happy. Otherwise, the only option you could do is turn off the contact photos which will give you an extra 100 pixels or so of space. You can find that setting in Preferences > Viewing > Show contact Photos in the message list

To answer the question specifically though, it's truncated because of the column width, alter the size and it will no longer be truncated.