Open list of URLs in your clipboard as new tabs in Safari I want to open a list of tabs in Safari I have currently open in Chrome.
In Chrome there i use the Copy all URLs extension, which allows me to copy all open tabs URLs into the clipboard. The same extension allows me also to open a new tab for a list of URLs in the clipboard.
I found Tabs to Links, which allows me to copy all open Safari tabs as URLs. But nothing to open tabs for a given list of URLs.
Do I miss something? Has anybody a suggestion how to solve this?
Thanks in advance.

In what format is the Copy all URLs extensions in Google Chrome placing the URLs on the clipboard?
If it is just lines of text with one URL on each line, then the following example AppleScript code will open a new window in Safari and open each URL in a new tab:
set theURLs to paragraphs of (the clipboard)

tell application "Safari"
    make new document with properties {URL:first item of theURLs}
    activate
    tell front window
        repeat with i from 2 to the length of theURLs
            set current tab to (make new tab with properties {URL:item i of theURLs})
        end repeat
        set current tab to first tab
    end tell
end tell

If you want to not have the target Safari window remain frontmost while opening each URL in a new tab, then here is a way to have that happen:
Example AppleScript code:
set theURLs to paragraphs of (the clipboard)

set windowName to random number from 1000000 to 9999999
set tmpFileName to "/private/tmp/" & windowName & ".html"
set tmpFileContent to "<title>" & windowName & "</title>"

if not my writeToFile(tmpFileContent, tmpFileName, true) then return

tell application "Safari"

    make new document with properties {URL:"file://" & tmpFileName}
    set i to 0
    repeat while not (exists (windows whose name is windowName))
        delay 0.1
        set i to i + 1
        if i = 30 then return
    end repeat
    set winID to (id of windows whose name is windowName) as number

    make new tab at end of tabs of window id winID with properties {URL:item 1 of myURLs}
    delete first tab of window id winID
    repeat with i from 2 to (length of myURLs)
        make new tab at end of tabs of window id winID with properties {URL:item i of myURLs}
        delay 1
    end repeat

end tell

tell application "System Events" to delete file tmpFileName

--  # Handler #

on writeToFile(theData, theFile, overwriteExistingContent)
    try
        set theFile to theFile as string
        if theFile contains "/" then
            set theOpenedFile to open for access theFile with write permission
        else
            set theOpenedFile to open for access file theFile with write permission
        end if
        if overwriteExistingContent is true then set eof of theOpenedFile to 0
        write theData to theOpenedFile starting at eof
        close access theOpenedFile
        return true
    on error
        try
            close access file theFile
        end try
        return false
    end try
end writeToFile

The example AppleScript code can be used in an Automator Service/Quick Action with a Run AppleScript action using the example AppleScript code in place of the default code.
Open: Automator -- File > New     ⌘N
Choose a type for your document: Quick Action
Set Workflow receives [no input] in [Safari]
Add a Run AppleScript action from: Actions > Library > Utilities
Replace the default code with the example AppleScript code.
Save the Automator Service/Quick Action.
Assign the new Service/Quick Action a keyboard shortcut in: System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts > Services.
It is then available from the Services menu in Safari and as a keyboard shortcut.
The example AppleScript code can also be used in any third-party application that has the ability to trigger AppleScript code and or assign it a keyboard shortcut. I personally use FastScripts and I am not associated with its developer, just a satisfied user of the product.

Notes:

This second example AppleScript code includes some error handling, in that if the tmp file (value of the tmpFileName variable) is not created the script aborts without any message. This can be changed by converting the if not my writeToFile ... statement to a full if block and include an appropriate display alert, display dialog or display notification command, as wanted, followed by the return command.

The repeat loop as coded is written to wait up to 3 seconds for the HTML file to load and should be more than enough time. Adjust if necessary.

As coded, it assumes the clipboard contains just lines of text with one URL on each line.

Note: The example AppleScript code is just that and sans any included error handling does not contain any additional error handling as may be appropriate. The onus is upon the user to add any error handling as may be appropriate, needed or wanted. Have a look at the try statement and error statement in the AppleScript Language Guide. See also, Working with Errors. Additionally, the use of the delay command may be necessary between events where appropriate, e.g. delay 0.5, with the value of the delay set appropriately.


How to execute a Folder Action or another Automator script when I make changes to a folder? How to execute a Folder Action or another Automator script when I make changes to a folder?
And by changes I mean not just deleting or inserting new file, the most important for me is when the content of a file is changed the action will be triggered.

Using launchd, you could save a property list like this in ~/Library/LaunchAgents/ and load it with something like launchctl load ~/Library/LaunchAgents/automator_test.plist or by logging out and back in.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC -//Apple Computer//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN
http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd>
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
    <key>Label</key>
    <string>automator_test</string>
    <key>ProgramArguments</key>
    <array>
        <string>automator</string>
        <string>/Users/username/Desktop/Test.workflow</string>
    </array>
    <key>WatchPaths</key>
    <array>
        <string>/Users/username/Desktop/</string>
    </array>
    <key>StartInterval</key>
    <integer>0</integer> <!-- run at most every 0 seconds, by default 10 -->
</dict>
</plist>

Launchd only detects changes to files when they are saved atomically (or deleted and recreated every time they are saved). Most OS X apps perform atomic saves, but for example TextMate and vim don't.


What rules does OS X use for naming mounted volumes? When I use VeraCrypt (a successor of TrueCrypt) to mount volumes on my filesystem, and I don't specify where it should mount them, the results are:

/Volumes/NO NAME
/Volumes/NO NAME 1
/Volumes/NO NAME 2

...and similar. I suspect these default paths don't come from VeraCrypt, but rather are set somewhere in OS X itself.

I ask because I'm trying to predict what other people's OS X installations will do, and I'm worried theirs are configured differently than mine. I'd like to be able to predict the mounted paths on other comps, and I'm getting reports of paths like:

/Volumes/Untitled

But I can't reproduce this.

Questions

Can anyone verify this is standard OS X behavior?
By what rules does OS X decide where volumes are mounted on the filesystem, especially what are the defaults and how are they set?
Is this question related to the unix or BSD ancestry of OS X?

EDIT

I'm really trying to understand why and when different volume labels are used (the "NO NAME" or "Untitled" part).

Yes, this is standard OSX behavior. If you have two identically named volumes, OSX will suffix 2-N with a digit in the filesystem (however, I don't believe they appear differently named on the desktop)
OSX mounts everything under /Volumes/. You can see what the interface is by running the mount command. Physical volumes are mounted in /dev/diskXsY, where X and Y are interface ID's.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ - you asked it in the Apple area.


Pros & Cons of still running Mac OS X Snow Leopard? I am still running Snow Leopard on my late 2010 Macbook Pro. Are there potentially any benefits of still using this version of the Mac OS, or am I more disadvantaged by not being on the latest version - Mountain Lion.

Some people have informed me that Mountain Lion is very iOS-eque in nature, and they feel that this really should be kept to iOS devices such as the iPhone & iPad, and not brought into the "computing environment", such is the case that if they were able to downgrade to Snow Leopard they would - however they inform me that their brand new iMacs are of an "architecture" that does not permit this.

Another person informed me that security updates for Snow Leopard ended some months ago, and it is now officially an unsupported OS (although I dont believe this to be the case), thus Lion is now the oldest supported OS.

Any clarification on the above is very welcomed........

Pros:

1) Speed. 10.6.x runs faster on older hardware, particularly if you only have a regular hard drive. I see the beachball much more often in Mountain Lion than I did in Snow Leopard because my MBPro only has a 5400-RPM drive and ML seems to access the hard disk a lot more. SSD is preferred for Lion and Mountain Lion.

2) Colored icons in the Finder sidebar. Apple made them grayscale in 10.7 and 10.8, a huge step back for usability. There is a hack that will re-enable color, but it can cause Finder instability.

3) Rosetta. If you upgrade to 10.7/10.8, you'll lose the ability to run apps based on PPC code.

Cons:

1) No iCloud. There are workarounds but I've never been able to get them to work properly or reliably.

2) Security updates. However, you can "stay safe" just by keeping Flash up-to-date (or uninstall it and only use Chrome for Flash), disabling Java in your web browsers, avoiding pirated software, running Little Snitch, and periodically running AV software.

These are the ones that stand out to me. I'm sure others can add to this list.


Fast or automatic way to organize iphone/ipod apps Is there a tool or application that can help me quickly organize my iphone applications?  The standard way of dragging and dropping 1 application at a time in folder is too frustrating for me.  I gave up after 1 hour of trying... I found it to be such a waste of time ...

I am looking for an application to automatically organize my apps in the standard folder categories at least (Productivity, Navigation, Photography, etc).  I was not able to find one in the iTunes store.

Any suggestions?

Connect your phone to iTunes, go to your phone in the sidebar, and select the Apps tab. There you should find some slightly less tedious app management where you can rearrange icons and/or screens. Perform a sync when you're finished reorganizing.

There's also a Jailbreak app called MultiIconMover, but the Jailbreak apps for messing with icons is a whole other kettle of fish...


extract to a new folder with spl name working on OS X 10.8.3, have part of what I want working, hoping for help with the rest

#!/bin/bash
# script accepts a path to base dir - base path to extract
# also accepts second param - archive /xys/there/usefulLib-version-3.2.1.zip
# 1. cd to base
# 2. get name path of file, 'useful-lib-version-3.2.1.zip'
# 3. strip away extn and -._ spaces so its 'usefulLibversion321' if possible make init char capital of each token (from second) before removing the separator like 'usefulLibVersion321'
# 4. if this folder exists in base then add 1 or 2 or 3 till we get a new folder name, create that. cd to that new folder
# 5. give extract command to original file here (like jar xp -file- or other)

cd $1
file1=$2

file1fullname=$(basename $file1)
file1name=${file1fullname%.*}

echo ${file1fullname}

echo ${file1name}
file1sname=${file1name//./}

file1sname=${file1sname//-/}

file1sname=${file1sname//_/}
file1sname=${file1sname// /}
echo ${file1sname}

mkdir ${file1sname}
cd ${file1sname}
#could use other extract command, i know this one of java
jar xf $2

I need help with point 4.

Motivation : quickly expand the many jars and other archives that I download. some times get many .jar files with spring and other frameworks and utilities.

How about the date naming below and an attempt to ensure no more than one collision of names happens. You could also add seconds to the mix, but this seems more than robust enough for most cases.

DATE=$(date +"%Y%m%d%H%M")
final=${file1sname}_${DATE}
if [-a $final]
  then final=${file1sname}_${DATE}_1
  sleep 60
  #we will prevent another run of this tool in the current minute
fi


iPhone unable to backup on Mac due to insufficient space I am trying to backup my iPhone 11 (64GB, capacity only around 60GB) on my Macbook. My iPhone has about 20GB free space, so about 40GB is used. My Macbook has 60GB free space, but when I backup through iTunes it keeps saying that my mac doesn't have enough space. Does the size of the backup correspond to the amount of space my iPhone 11 has used?

The amount of space you use on your iphone is proportional to the size of the backup. But often the receiving device will need more space than the actual backup to backup a device. Do you have Google Drive or Dropbox?  If so you can move some of your files off your MacBook and store then on one of those services. This will free up some space on your MacBook.


How do I drop outgoing packets to specific host/port? I want to test something locally. For that, I'd like to be able to drop outgoing packets sent to a specific host/port. I tried messing around with pf rules using Murus (the non-free version), but have been unsuccessful.

I am comfortable in the terminal, but am unsure where to make any changes and how to apply them. I am familiar with iptables on linux.

Can I get some direction on how to achieve this?

You could use the PF firewall:

Add this line to /etc/pf.conf to drop all packets to the given ip:port

block drop out quick proto tcp  to 192.168.1.103 port 80

After changing pf.conf you should reload it with

sudo pfctl -f /etc/pf.conf

Eventually you will have to enable it with

sudo pfctl -e


How do I sync two folders in OS X Lion? I have some files and folders on a USB drive connected to my iMac...I would like to sync them with a folder on my iMac...how do I do that?

Is there built-in functionality in Lion that allows me to do that, or do I have to use a 3rd party solution?

arRsync is a free OS X GUI to the rsync command line utility. It will get you started on the path to rsync enlightenment. You can save common sync operations to recall them at a later time for easy rsync. And it supports the common rsync use case scenarios: push A to B but leave stuff that's in B but not A in place, push A to B and delete stuff that's in B but not in A, make A and B look the same (with a conflict report).


Why can't I insert a DVD into my Mac Mini? I'm trying, without success, to insert a DVD inside my Mac mini DVD drive. Let me say that actually the computer is without the upper case and the HD drive has been taken from a Windows laptop (it is NTFS formatted and there's Windows XP installed on it).

I'm tryng to insert Install DVD to format and reinstall a proper version of Mac OS X upon new hard drive, but I can't.

Sounds like your optical drive is faulty, immediate ejection of a disk is typical of an optical drive failure.

In the current state your Mac mini is trying to boot to a Macintosh volume.  So, after pressing the power button press and hold the Option key until a mouse cursor appears and your Windows XP partition should appear.  Using either arrow keys and the Enter key, or the mouse, you can select the Windows XP partition and boot to that.

In terms of getting your optical drive fixed, I'd recommend buying an external USB optical drive, it'd be much cheaper than repairing your optical drive through the Apple channels.


Issues compiling GnuPG: ./configure: command not found I wanted to install GnuPG by compiling the binaries but I'm stuck on the second dependancy, libgpg-error. I'll check the obvious tomorrow and shasum the tarball, re-download it (etc) but I'm hoping I can find a little insight into what's going on here. I'm on macOS Catalina.

Here's what I'm trying to do in Terminal (as is documented in the README). Briefly, configure, make, install:

sudo ./configure
sudo make
sudo make install
sudo make clean

However, the first command sudo ./configure produces an error:

sudo: ./configure: command not found

So,

I'm wondering if anybody has experienced the same issue and why? Is this common?
Should I expect more issues compiling GnuPG from the binaries?
Any suggestions on alternative PGP command line tools?

I am not interested in the GPGTools/PGP Suite for macOS. I don't want all the bels and whistles. I'm just looking for a command line PGP utility.

Edit: Revised question with Terminal input and output.

The issue command not found occurs because the script ./configure is not executable. I fixed it by setting the executable bit for the user with chmod.

While in the root directory, type the command in Terminal:

chmod u+x configure


How do I find the model number on iPhone X or iPhone 8? Since Apple removed the regulatory information from iPhone X and iPhone 8 that included the model number how I do I find the model number when a device won't power on?

Since Apple removed the regulatory marks from the iPhone 8 and X the model number is now in the sim tray slot.


Prefer iPhone when synchronizing playlists between iTunes and iPhone When synchronizing Playlists between iTunes and an iPhone, by default, the playlists of iTunes are preferred - even if the iPhone's change is more current. I prefer to change my playlists on the go on my iPhone, so I want to change this behaviour. Is that possible?

I'm unaware of any settings that this will work with iTunes/iPhone out of the box. But you could give iGadget X a try:

  ** iPad, iPod touch and iPhone Support **

  iGadget (Windows and Mac) now supports
  the iPad, iPod touch and iPhone.
  However, due to the limitation of the
  Notes feature on these devices, only
  the Music Transfer, Playlist Transfer
  and Music Listing functions are
  available when used with the iPad,
  iPod touch or iPhone.

PS: It's shareware ($19.99)


macbook pro out of warranty, two keys not working in built in keyboard. Options? I have a 2007 macbook pro and two keys are not working on the built in keyboard.

I tried cleaning the keys by removing the keys and the plastic under it but that didn't help.

After removing the keys, tried to depress the plastic blob underneath to make it work but that didn't work either.

What options do I have? Am planning to take it to the local apple store to see what can be done if all else fails

Your two options are roughly;

You can still take it into the Apple Store, and they can repair it. Obviously, for a cost. Your question notes that you appear to need a whole new keyboard tray, as it's not just a key dead at the surface-level. I don't know how much this would cost, you could perhaps call ahead to save you a trip and essentially just get an expected quote.
Fix it yourself. I love iFixIt for this purpose, start at their MacBook Pro parts page, pick your MacBook Pro's size/model, and check the price for the "upper case" part. I can't imagine that specific key death could be anything other than the keyboard tray and particular circuit boards attached to it.


Get current path of Automator app I am trying to create an Automator application which I will be distributing to other users on the network. The automator app will be accompanied by a ZIP file and a PKG installer file.

I need to run the PKG installer file the automator app. For this I'm trying to use the Run Shell Script using the following command:

open gdata.pkg

The problem I'm having is that Automator cannot find this file. I think it doesn't pick up the current path. I tried changing it to following ways:

Experiment #1:

cd $@; open gdata.pkg

Experiment #2:

open ./gdata.pkg

Both didn't work for me. Automator keeps giving error that it couldn't run the script. How do I accomplish this here?

My next step after this would be to decompress the accompanied ZIP file onto a new folder on user's desktop.

Use a Run AppleScript action with the following to get the path:

POSIX path of (path to me)

When run in the workflow, this provides the path to Automator.app, but when run by launching the saved application, this provides the path to the application.


Mac Excel won't recognize Spanish/Portuguese accents (UTF8 or ANSI) I'm working with Excel to open a delimited (tabbed) txt file that contains Portuguese and Spanish accents. As you can see below, in the third row there is a title "Último Año" that is correct.

However when I import the file into Excel the text is misinterpreted as "Ãšltimo AÃ±o".

The correct codepage would be Unicode UTF-8 or ANSI. I tried several options, like using the import file options from Excel to select UTF-8 (and other formats) but the result is always weird.

Does anybody know how to interpret/display the correct latin accents on Mac Excel?

After several bumps in the wall I figure out this Terminal command (Shell Script) that will convert properly the files from UTF-8 for Latin 1:

iconv -f UTF-8 -t LATIN1 </path/sourceFile.txt >/path/destinationFile.txt

Oddly enough, the Finder preview won't display the correct characters and TextEdit won't even open the file. But Excel recognize everything, which is fine for me.


Touch ID doesn't work after several tries So I've tried with most of my fingers, and both my thumbs. It doesn't work for me. (hopefully yet)

Most video tutorials/demo online just repeatedly tap the home button, and the red fills up the fingerprint onscreen. They tap when the phone vibrates while my doesn't vibrate and simply tells me to lift and then place again.

I don't see what I'm doing wrong, here's a video of my action, if someone can spot what I did wrong, please post it as an answer.

It's quite frustrating really.

Link to video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3VM4RcQu1A

Put your finger in different positions on the sensor.
This video seems to explain it very well.

Also take a look at Apple's documentation.


setting up new me.com to activate iCloud when I already have one There is no where for me to enter the fact I already have a me.com address that I wish to keep and continue using.  At the moment none of my devices are syncing because it insists I set up a new me.com account - help!!!!

You need to clarify your questions a little, but it sounds like you are trying to set up a new iCloud account directly on your iOS devices, and wanting to use your own Mobile Me account as the template (as it were).

The best way to do this, is to go to a computer and log into me.com using your Mobile Me account to verify it's still active. From there, you can move your MobileMe account to iCloud by visiting me.com/move.

You also will want to read over two articles that discuss FAQ about the transition...

Creating an iCloud account: Frequently Asked Questions
Apple IDs and iCloud

Once complete, you will then be able to include your iCloud details during the account setup on your iOS device, and it should just work as the existing me.com address will already be converted to an iCloud one.


Exchange 2010 Sync for iPad 4.3.2 I can enter all my Exchange 2010 data and it looks like everything is fine, but my contacts, calendar, and mail are never loaded from the exchange server, and mail gives me errors ("The connection to the mail server failed") when trying to connect. Do I need to update iOS or change Exchange 2010 settings?

The iOS 4.3.3 update changed the location cacheing dynamics, so Exchange wouldn't benefit in the least.

Deleting the Exchange account and re-entering the information is a good first step, before considering a restore. Does it actually confirm a connection to your exchange server when you've entered the information? If it doesn't, then we're at good odds the iPad isn't the problem at all.

If the server settings are good, and you're setting up the Exchange server in the proper area of the Mail accounts area, then I would consider following with @luca590 and restore.


Create a zip file using an Automator Service I am trying to create a service in Automator in Mac OS X Mountain Lion. The command that I want to use is as follows:

zip zip-file.zip "$@"

And here is a screen capture of what I did:

It works. But two problems:

zip-file.zip is placed in my home directory ~\. I want to place the zip file in where the original files are.
zip-file.zip contains the folder structure of the specified files beginning from the root. I want to only include files, or just from the closest parent directory.

What should I do?

Why not just use the Create Archive action rather than shell scripting?

I created a quick one that has four steps.

selects a folder (Ask for Finder Items - Folders only)
selects the files (Get Folder Contents)
filters the items to not selects any subfolders (Filter Finder Items)
pass the files to the Create Archive action


Airport - List of Network is not displayed on startup I am having a weird problem. When I save network setting is not available the list of other available network used to get displayed on startup. However from past two days I could not find it on startup. I have also verified Network preferences. "Ask to join new network is checked". More over when I try to connect to my preferred network its showing "connected to unknown" in network airport preferences.

Any help will be highly appreciated.

Thanks!

If the network you speak of is your Home network, then either the SSID is no longer being broadcast or the network name has changed somehow (one of the kids, power brownout?)

You may have to connect by ethernet and get into the router to fix your problem.

If it is a work network, your IT department will help.


Safari 10.1: unable to install extension from Apple's official Gallery On Safari Extension Gallery page the "Install Now" button does not appear after updated to Sierra 10.12.4. It seems that Apple's official webpage didn't recognize that I'm using Safari 10.1 (12603.1.30.0.34).

I searched the community and found lots of discussions of similar issue, but it seems there is no magic cure for everyone. Here is what I've done so far:

I can still install and activate 3rd party Extensions directly from .safariextz file. So the "Verisign Certificate" thing is not the cause of this problem. And that "Trust" button works as expected with normal mouse click (no need to enable Keyboard navigation or something).
Antivirus / CleanMyMac / MacKeeper / other 3rd. party in system proxy or firewall: NOT INSTALLED in the first place.
Log in with Guest account: NOT WORKING. Safari Extension Gallery still won't recognize me.
Reboot into Safe mode: NOT WORKING.
Fix permission with Onyx: NOT WORKING. It doesn't seem link to any files under user home directory anyway, since the Guest account also suffer from the same problem.
Delete "Safari Extension List" in Keychain Access: NOT WORKING.
Remove the whole "~/Library/Safari", "~/Library/Caches" and other Safari/Web*** related .plist file in SyncedPreferences and other places: NOT WORKING.
EtreCheck: Diagnostic result is pasted here: https://pastebin.com/zmUcLs2R

--
Thanks for Any Help!

Richard Liu

Problem solved. It's TripMode. Unload kernel module with:

launchctl unload /Library/LaunchDaemons/ch.tripmode.TripModeNKE.plist


How can I get iCal to sync with iCloud while running Snow Leopard? I have been looking for a few weeks for a workaround to get iCal on Snow leopard to sync with iOS 5 devices with iCloud.

Is there a work around that will allow syncing as I cannot upgrade to OSX Lion?

I have found a suitable work around that I have been testing for a couple of days.

While using iCal on a Mac running Snow Leopard, I needed to add an account to iCal. This account would point to iCloud and sync with it.

So, open Preferences and select accounts, enter the add account window by hitting +.

this takes you to:

You need to choose CalDav and enter your Apple ID email address (not your .me.com email address)

enter in your password and the server name which in most cases is p06-caldav.icloud.com

Once this has been added you will need to uncheck some of the calendars in the 'on my mac' menu.


Other resolution (no scaling) in MacBook Pro retina What do the other resolutions look like? I know in OS X you can't go down (for now) to really (non retina) at 1440x900 and also in Windows (for no new bootcamp driver) you can't; but I see how in the gaming sessions you can choose the 1440x900, how does it look compared to a standard MacBook Pro display with a 1440x900 native resolution?

Because, in theory, it would look identical, without the problem about scaling to non-native resolutions (what happens, for example, when you go to 1280x800 in a display with 1440x900 native resolution), due to the fact who each 4px of retina display becomes exatly 1px at that resolution. There is any one who can try and check this?

Images and icons look about the same because of integral scaling. But text in non-Retina apps looks clearly worse. The difference is that on a non-Retina display, text uses sub-pixel rendering. But with Retina, old apps use full-pixel anti-aliasing instead. (Those full pixels are then multiplied perfectly with integral scaling.) Not quite sure what Retina text on a Retina display uses, it's hard to eyeball.

Separately, other resolutions look pretty good. The highest is 1920x1200. The trick is they are also rendered in double-resolution (3840x2400) and then scaled down for the display (2880x1800). Because there are so many tiny pixels, the result is acceptable, but the optimal setting is definitely sharper.

So Retina apps at 1920 look pretty good, and non-Retina text at 1920 has smaller and slightly fuzzier full-pixel anti-aliasing.


Terminal Passwords in AppleScript I am running into an issue trying to update keychain password with Applescript and Terminal.

I am currently using this :

set response to (display dialog "Do you know your previous password?" buttons {"No", "Yes"} default button "Yes" with icon caution) if button returned of response is "Yes" then
try
    tell application "Keychain Access" to activate
    tell application "System Events"
        tell process "Keychain Access"
            select row 1 of outline 1 of scroll area 1 of splitter group 1 of splitter group 1 of window "Keychain Access"
            delay 1
            click menu item "Change Password for Keychain “Login”…" of menu "Edit" of menu bar 1
            tell application "Keychain Access" to quit
        end tell
    end tell
end try

and want to use:

do shell script "security set-keychain-password" with admin privileges

But then it does ask for Old password, New password, and New passowrd again.

Is there anyway to get this to work, I am using this for work and for other users seeing a bunch of screen pop up is kind of nerve racking so I figure doing most of my script through Terminal will be better route.

Thanks,

This authenticates the user and unlocks if necessary the old keychain. It's by design, and ensures security practices are followed.  If you really do want to alleviate the users' concerns you can educate them, update the keychains for them, or a whole host of other options.  Bypassing OS X's security in the way you're asking though, I don't believe is possible and also isn't a good idea IMO.


Highlight Active Button in Yosemite I usually work without using the mouse too much.
In Mavericks the active button (the one that's pressed using the spacebar) had a nice blue outline. Any way to get that back?

In the screenshot below "Don't Save" is actually active and pressing space presses it. also Tab-Space presses the cancel button.

Old UI:

This used to work in every application for me until I installed Yosemite. Now, It only works for certain applications. The way around this is to use the 'command + (first letter of the button text)'  For example, if you want to choose "Don't Save" then 'command+d'.


Set default shell to MacPorts bash in Mac OS X 10.6.8? As a follow up to my previous question, I reinstalled my MacPorts and want to try its newer version of bash again.

I installed the newest bash via MacPorts on my Mac OS X 10.6.8 system, but when I start a Terminal.app session, the "sh --version" command showed I was still using the old bash 3.2.48. This is even when "which bash" points to the newer 4.2.37 installed by MacPorts.

I tried to change Terminal.app preferences to use the new bash as default, changed /etc/shells, and used the chsh command to specify MacPorts bash as the default. However, none of these methods were successful. What am I missing? Thank you very much.

sh --version is probably the same as /bin/sh --version. If the current shell is bash, you can see its version with echo $BASH_VERSION. If you change the default login shell with chsh, you can keep Terminal's default shell as the login shell.

sudo port install bash
Add /opt/local/bin/bash to /etc/shells
chsh -s /opt/local/bin/bash
Open a new tab and check echo $BASH_VERSION


Grey screen on startup of OS X when using Boot Camp 5 I'm afraid I've corrupted my OS X install. When choosing to boot up with the system I get a grey screen (there's a short load sequence before this, after klicking the system icon in the bootup menu). I can hover my mouse around but there is no content. Earlier today I tried installing Windows 8 as a second system using Mountain Lion and Boot Camp 5.

I did the following:

Created a volume for Windows and installed Win7 + windows drivers
Began installing Win8, only to realize that I needed more disk space (apparently using the online upgrade requires a LOT of disk in between the switch). Chose to quit the installer.
Tried returning to OS X to delete the Windows volume but ended up with a grey screen.

Worth noting is that I see my OS X Recovery volume presented along OS X and Windows. My guess is it should be there but it could also be an indication that there is something wrong.

Problem solved (for now). Started up OS X successfully in Safe Mode and was able to remove the Windows partition via Boot Camp Assistant. Restarted and everything seems to be back to normal.


Command+TAB (⌘⇥) to switch to most recent window (even on different space) The default behaviour of ⌘⇥ is roughly the following:

Switch to the most recently used app.
Bring all windows of that application (in the current space) to the foreground.
Give the most recent window focus.
Is there no window of that app on the current space? Switch to most recent used space with that app.

Say I have two windows of the same application open. One is running full screen in a separate Space, while the other is on the Desktop Space with other application windows. Take for example the following spaces:

Desktop: Safari + Mail Window  1
Full Screen: Mail Window 2

So now I'm working in Mail Window 2 (Space 2), ⌘⇥ brings me to Safari (Space 1). However ⌘⇥ again and I'm taken to Mail Window 1 (Space 1), whereas I would've wanted to go back to Mail Window 2 (Space 2). In order to go back to Mail Window 2 by keyboard, I have to go through all spaces using ⌃→ or ⌃1..⌃9, which is cumbersome when working with more than 2 spaces.

Is there a keyboard shortcut I'm missing, or a way to change how ⌘⇥ could work for my use case?

There is the default shortcut ⌘` (that's a backtick [or ⌘` for QWERTZ keyboard layouts] to toggle focus between application windows.

I don't think it's possible to adjust the behaviour of ⌘⇥ so it meets your criteria.


Is the iPhone 6 model A1549 (CDMA) compatible with T-Mobile? According to this site, there are three models of iPhone 6: A1549(GSM), A1549(CDMA), and A1586. It says the A1549(CDMA) model "supports all the same spectrum" as its GSM counterpart, but also supports additional spectrum making it a "world phone". Does this mean the unlocked T-Mobile iPhone 6 is essentially the Verizon model with its CDMA capabilities disabled? Could one go to an Apple Store, pay for a Verizon iPhone 6 in full, and pop in a T-Mobile SIM with no side effects?

The GSM side of Verizon phones are unlocked and will work on domestic
  carriers but there is no guarantee all features will work. It is not
  the same for Sprint, the GSM side of that phone is unlocked and
  unlocking it will only allow it to work with non-domestic GSM
  carriers.

A1549 (CDMA):

  This is considered as the world phone version. It supports all the
  same spectrum frequencies as the A1549 (GSM) and also includes CDMA
  EV-DO Rev. A and Rev. B (with 800, 1700/2100, 1900 and 2100 MHz
  bands). Besides, it works on UMTS/HSPA+/DC-HSDPA (850, 900, 1700/2100,
  1900, 2100 MHz), GSM/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz) and 4G LTE bands
  include bands 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 13, 17, 18, 19, 20, 25, 26, 28, 29.
  The model is compatible with Verizon and Cricket in the US. However,
  if you buy an unlocked Verizon phone, you will be able to use it on
  any other GSM networks like T-Mobile and AT&T as well.

Best is to double check with T-Mobile.


Is there a known reason why the filesystem in iOS is case-sensitive? Developing an iOS apps, there was a thing that drove me mad: executing the same app that created the same files at the same path, the iPhone simulator worked the correct way, while a real iPhone didn't. I eventually discovered that i mistyped a character (uppercase instead of lowercase) and consequently the iPhone created a folder starting with an uppercase character, while putting the file in a path with that folder starting with the lowercase version of that character. The simulator however, didn't care of that difference. I suppose that was because the simulator, running on a case-insensitive system (OS X/mac OS), inherits its "case-insensitivity", while the iPhone (seems to me) is natively case-sensitive.

Is there any known explanation/documentation by Apple (or other trusted sources) on why the iOS filesystem is case-sensitive, given that is an OS based on a case-insensitive one (OS X)?

HFS+ originally ran on System 8 and System 9 and is case-insensitive. Apple developed the HFSX case sensitive file system around 2002-2003 as a replacement for UFS which was used by NextSTEP and could also be used by OS X.

In the transition from System 9 to OS X, Apple offered Carbon API's so that vendors could easily port their products without completely re-writing their applications. Carbon does not offer case sensitivity. For many years major vendors used Carbon code in their products, so HFS+ was left as the default file system.

iOS has transitioned to APFS but TimeMachine uses HFSX.


Does time capsule backup 3rd party app preferences When I use migration assistant to restore a backup from my time capsule onto my new iMac, will the backups include settings of 3rd party apps like 1Password, Dropbox etc, or does it only save core mac preferences only.

Yes, settings of 3rd party apps are included.


Is there a way to close all ports using iOS Is the a way I can block the use of all apple devices in my network either thru router or my fing box specifically iphone and apple watch

There should be a "Parental control" option in your router, from where you can set up rules for access.

You don't mention any specific router brand, so I can't give you a specific how-to.


Cannot install rabbitmq management tool I need to install the rabbitmq management tool, but enabling results in the error (please see below).  I am on OS X Maverick.  I tried "rabbitmq-plugins disable Mochiweb"  but Mochiweb could not be found

rabbitmq-plugins enable rabbitmq_management

********************************************************************************
Warning: Mochiweb enabled and Erlang version 17 detected.
Enabling plugins that depend on Mochiweb is not supported on this Erlang
version. At least R13B01 is required.

RabbitMQ will not start successfully in this configuration. You *must*
disable the Mochiweb plugin, or upgrade Erlang.

I just ran into this exact same error message when I enabled the rabbitmq_tracing plugin on Fedora21. Short story: you should be fine. RabbitMQ started right up for me with this plugin enabled (and all its dependent plugins including rabbitmq_management and Mochiweb)

I think there may be a problem with how RabbitMQ is detecting Erlang versions? From looking at http://www.erlang.org/documentation/ it appears that:

Release R13B01 maps to version 5.7.2
Release 17 maps to versions 6.x

So by running Erlang release 17 we appear to be running a sufficiently recent version to work with the Mochiweb plugin.


Changing OS X behaviour after crash recovery OS X tends to try and help out and reopen everything to just the way it was before it crashed. I mean this in two ways:

If an app running within OS X crashes, OS X will remember the last working state of the app and resume at that point next time you launch the app.
Example: Safari crashes because I've shamelessly opened way too many tabs and windows again. The next time I launch Safari I tax the system severely and fight to be able close windows or even force quit again.

If OS X itself crashes, the computer automatically restarts and loads OS X again, at which point every application, web page, and document that was open at time are simultaneously reloaded.

How can I prevent or alter the way such situations are handled?

To your first question:

Open System Preference -General settings, and select following:

To your second question: (actually we do not like to have more than one question, but since they are related...) that is a Safari settings.


iOS 7 upgrade - how much space will I get back? I've got an iPhone 5 running iOS6 and I'm considering upgrading to 7.0.6.  I see I need 3.9 GB to run the update and I'm pretty sure I'm going to get some of that back, but don't know how much.

How much space does an iOS 6.1.4 to iOS 7.0.6 take?

You'll get back all but about 60 MB of space. (Which is about the same space as all four movements of Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5 take up when copied to my iPhone.)

On my 32 GB iPhone 5, I now have 27.94 GB free space under iOS 7.0.6 instead of 28.00 GB that I had on iOS 6.


Removing a device from Find iPhone I used to have both my phone and somebody else's registered on my Find iPhone in my iTunes account. That person and I have since parted ways on bad terms. I changed my passwords to make sure that person cannot temper with my account. That person's phone, however, has stayed in Find iPhone for me to see. I tried to remove it (only possible when it is turned off), but it reappeared.

The only option I seem have is to remotely erase the iPhone. Will the other person have any means to see that I remotely deleted it? Or will it just be erased? Follow-up: If they restore from backup, will they appear in Find iPhone again? I need a way to get rid of that phone from my account.

Disclaimer: I do not, under any circumstances, want to talk to that person.

Remotely wiping a device, as long as you don't set a lock screen message, will look just like a regular wipe of the phone. However, the person with the phone will have to enter your Apple ID password to use it again.

The reason the phone keeps showing up on Find My iPhone is that your Apple ID is still on the phone, to remove it, all you need to do is wipe it then select remove from account. The person with the phone will not need to enter your password to use it again.


What is a good Time Capsule substitute? I am looking for something similar to Time Capsule, but I am really not interested in the wireless router capabilities.

Can you suggest hardware which has the same good qualities (size, silent operation, reliability), interoperability with my Macs, and possibly aesthetics?

I've looked at various offerings but I've overall unconvinced by any.

Any Drobo product will do, but it’s possibly more expensive than a single Time Capsule. The advantages are a lot tho. :)

You can compare the different models. I have used a Drobo (not pro, not fs, not anything) and it had problems with certain reliability, but I’ve heard nice things about Drobo FS and even Drobo Pro.

There are other NAS out there, so find one that you can afford, seek for reviews and go ahead :).

The nice thing about (Drobo in this case) is that you put “normal” drives in there, if one fails, you just replace it. BOom. That simple. It works in practice too. I’ve had two drive failures while using the Drobo.


Safari web inspector breaks media queries Using Safari Version 11.1, whenever I open the web inspector on a web page, all media queries in the CSS stop working. If I close the inspector, the problem goes away. This happens on any site.

Are other people experiencing this? Is there a setting that I've toggled?

Any help would be much appreciated! Thanks.

I also have experienced this problem. After doing some research I finally manage to solve the problem.

Backup and remove ~/Library/WebKit/com.apple.Safari folder.

A problem should disappear after that operation. Enjoy :D


System alerts and Mail in Mojave are no longer playing any alert or notification sounds I'm running Mail 12.4 on a macOS 10.14.6 system. For some reason I no longer hear any new mail notifications when a new message arrives. As near as I can tell I have Mail configured correctly to play a notification for every new message:

So far, I've tried creating a rule that matched every message and would play a sound, but that didn't help. I've also confirmed that Mail is set to play sounds for its notifications in the Notifications system preferences.
I later discovered that, in fact, no alert sounds are playing on this system either, and that the issue is not just limited to Mail. As near as I can tell, the Sound Effects section of the Sound system preferences is configured correctly.
How do I fix this?

Open System Preferences > Sound.
Click the Sound Effects tab.
Check if Play sound effects through has the right speakers.
Make sure Alert Volume is not mute.
Make sure Play user interface sound effects is enabled.


Get OS X Notification Center State From the Command Line On OS X 10.8, users can disable Notification Center for a single day. Is there a way to check if it is enabled from the command line?.

You actually can find out if the Do Not Disturb is currently enabled or disabled.  Notification Center drops a plist in the following location that you can read the value of.
Run the following to find the plist file:

ls ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.notificationcenterui.*.plist

Now, you can read the value from the plist you just found by using:

defaults read ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.notificationcenterui.8D3EA20D-8D7F-52E2-9F99-BC17A13A3F0E.plist

NOTE: your actual filename may be different than what I have listed above.

You will see a key called "doNotDisturb" and it will either have a value of 1 or 0 (enabled or disabled)

You can also change it's status by doing:

defaults write ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.notificationcenterui.8D3EA20D-8D7F-52E2-9F99-BC17A13A3F0E.plist doNotDisturb 1

or:

defaults write ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.notificationcenterui.8D3EA20D-8D7F-52E2-9F99-BC17A13A3F0E.plist doNotDisturb 0

To make the change take effect, you'll need to restart Notification Center by typing:

killall NotificationCenter

I've actually written a very simple Automator script so now I can enable/disable the Do Not Disturb for Notification Center with a keyboard shortcut.  Very handy. :)


External monitor displaying only noise after Yosemite upgrade After upgrading to Yosemite, I see just noise on the external monitor,
using a MDP to HDMI converter and an HDMI to DVI cable. It worked very well on Mavericks. I have no display now after updating, it just shows grey noise. Tried resetting SMC & PRAM. Additionally, I have tested each of the cables individually and they are okay, so it has to be a software problem.

Display screenshot:

It shows flickers in red color sometimes.

Macbook gives display on another setup, but flickers a lot. (my friend's)
its a MDP to VGA adapter plugged to VGA monitor.

Mine gives no display, I'm disappointed. Need help please.

UPDATE

I almost forgot I had this issue, recently I changed cables. I am now using MDP to HDMI without adapters. Before I am using DVI to DVI Cable + DVI to MDP Adapter.

I think you need to avoid 2 conversions and use only 1 cable.

OLD ANSWER

It is also happening to me, and I can't find the solutions either. But I figured out how to avoid it.

When booting up mac

turn off monitor first and then power on the mac.
turn on the monitor after the mac finished boot or in the login screen

Settings

Open system Preferences > Energy Saver
Click Power Adapter tab(assuming your mac is plugged in) and slide the 'Turn display off after' to at least 1 hr.

It also occurs when mac goes to sleep and to avoid it, the steps above should be followed. Only do the settings step if you don't mind the power consumption.

Please let me know if you have better suggestions but this works for me as of now.


Remote control Pandora iPhone app from Mac I'm trying to replace my Sonos system with old iphones. I can stream Pandora with the iphone app but also want to be able to control the music remotely from my Mac.
Is there a way of doing that?

You can get a VNC app that will allow you to remote control your mac. Something like "Screens" https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/screens-vnc-client-for-ios/id400012962?mt=8

That will allow you to control your mac entirely from your iDevice.


How does noise-cancellation work in Mac laptops? How does noise-cancellation work in Mac laptops?.

I understand how it works in Headphones or even in iPhone.  But if the mics in a MacBook Air 2018, for example, are located in the same spot, what is being cancelled there? How can a plane motor or fan buzz be cancelled this way during a FaceTime call or similar?

This is set up in System Preferences > Audio "Use Ambient Noise Reduction"

Any resource explaining this?

Any help much welcome.

The microphones are not placed in the same spot exactly!

The 2018 MacBook Air actually has 3 microphones in a sort of triangle configuration. There are two microphones aligned on the right-hand side of the laptop under the speaker grille besides the Delete and | buttons (given a US keyboard). The third microphone is underneath the Delete button itself.

In addition to their placements, the three microphones also have different orientations. If you look from the top-down, the second microphone is rotated 180 degrees when compared to the first. The third microphone is rotated 90 degrees when compared to the first.

These different placements and orientations allows signal processing algorithms to seperate ambient noise from the desired signal (to a degree).


Finder seems to be broken, Desktop files missing I have an old imac mid 2010 with upgraded ram and ssd that works really well. I mostly use it for coding and I did not updated / installed any new apps lately.

Since 24hours ago:

finder seems to be broken (cannot launch it)
cannot access the cmd+space finder
all files in desktop disappeared

Everything else seems to be working. The computer seems to be fine except that. I have access to chrome, spotify, terminal etc through the shortcuts clicking on the bottom menu bar.

Following some instructions, I have tried to locate ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.finder.plist and there is nothing.

I would like to understand what is happening and fix it. I have run:

sudo sysdiagnose -f ~/Desktop

Here is the result https://pastebin.com/ehp52jBR

Massive thanks to @Tetsujin. It worked.

Just a small tip if you experience the same issue, the re-install seemed to be stuck at '1 minute remaining'. I dug a little bit and the system was copying everything from a temp folder to the final destination.

You can activate the logs by pressing Cmd/L or just wait until it finishes (it can take several hours/days).


Icloud problem on my ipad I have an ipad 2 and its just 2nd hand. My ipad 2 had been reset and then when I open it up it says that I need to connect/sign in to an Icloud account while I dont have one. What should I do?

It sounds like the previous owner left the Activation Lock turned on. You will need to turn the device off and then the pre-owner can turn it off via iCloud.com

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201365


How can I get photos from my DSLR (with a CF card) to my iPad wirelessly? I can shot tethered to my MBP (using LR3) but then how do I get them to the iPad wirelessly or better yet bypass the MBP altogether?  I know they have a wifi card for SD cameras but my dslr only uses CF cards.

You have a variety of choices!

Without using the MBP:

A iPad card reader such as http://photojojo.com/store/awesomeness/ipad-cf-sd-reader/ (not supported by Apple) for CF cards.
If your DSLR has a USB port, get the Apple Camera Connection Kit and plug in your camera via USB.

This may not work, depending on your camera. It needs to support either Mass Storage Device or Picture Transfer Protocol. The older your camera, the less likely it is to support these transfer options. I recommend trying a connection kit belonging to a friend or a friendly shop first.
Get an SD-CF adaptor for your camera, a SD card, and the Camera Connection Kit.
Get an SD-CF adaptor for your camera, a Eye-Fi brand WiFi SD card, and their free iPad app.

Using the MBP:

Get an SD-CF adaptor for your camera, a WiFi SD card, the latest iPhoto and sync via iCloud.
Tether your camera to your MBP, and use the latest iPhoto to sync via iCloud.


Automator -> send file to email (from filename) Im trying to create an Automator folder action that sends an email with an attached file.

In my folder the files will be generated with the email as name:
Example: name@company.com.jpg, othername@othercompany.com.jpg and so on.

What I need is an action that copies the filename, remove the extension (.jpg), create an email and put the filename/email into the "To" and then sends the email.

I all ready have a working version where the file is attached to the e-mail and the content of the e-mail is filled out. But I can't find a solution to copy the file name and specify it to the "To" address.

Hope that someone out there can help me :-)

I've tried with Automator without succeeding looping through dropped files.

Here's a folder action script that does what you want, and how to attach it to a folder :

1. Open AppleScript Editor

2. Paste the following script into a new document

property mail_subject : "An image for you"
property mail_plain_content : "Attached you will the image you required." & return & return & "Best Regards" & return & "Automator"
property mail_html_content : "Attached you will the image you required.

Best Regards
Automator"

on adding folder items to this_folder after receiving these_items
    processItems(these_items)
end adding folder items to

on processItems(these_items)
    repeat with i from 1 to (count of these_items)
        set this_item to item i of these_items
        if isFolder(this_item) then
            processItems(getFolderItems(this_item))
        else
            processFile(this_item)
        end if
    end repeat
end processItems

on processFile(this_file)
    set mail_address to RemoveExtension(getFileName(this_file))
    tell application "Microsoft Outlook"
        set newMessage to make new outgoing message with properties {subject:mail_subject, plain text content:mail_plain_content, content:mail_html_content}
        tell newMessage
            make new recipient with properties {email address:{address:mail_address}}
            make new attachment with properties {file:this_file as alias}
            send
        end tell
        activate
    end tell
end processFile

on isFolder(this_item)
    tell application "System Events" to return (exists folder (this_item as string))
end isFolder

on RemoveExtension(this_name)
    -- This function comes from :
    -- http://www.macosxautomation.com/applescript/sbrt/index.html
    if this_name contains "." then
        set this_name to (the reverse of every character of this_name) as string
        set dot_offset to the offset of "." in this_name
        set this_name to (text (dot_offset + 1) thru -1 of this_name)
        set this_name to (the reverse of every character of this_name) as string
    end if
    return this_name
end RemoveExtension

on getExtension(this_name)
    if this_name contains "." then
        set this_name to (the reverse of every character of this_name) as string
        set dot_offset to the offset of "." in this_name
        set this_name to (text 1 thru (dot_offset - 1) of this_name)
        set this_name to (the reverse of every character of this_name) as string
        return this_name
    else
        return ""
    end if
end getExtension

on getFileName(this_file)
    tell application "Finder" to return name of this_file
end getFileName

on getFolderItems(this_folder)
    tell application "Finder" to return items of this_folder
end getFolderItems

3. Save it in your ~/Library/Scripts/Folder Action Scripts Folder

Menu File > Save

Go to the right folder : press cmd+G and paste:
~/Library/Scripts/Folder Action Scripts
and click Go

Save as : Image - Email using name as address.scpt (for example)
Format : Script

4. Create a new folder that will be watched for added items

5. Associate the script to the folder

In the Finder, right click on your folder, then select Services > Folder Actions Setup
Select the new created Image - Email using name as address.scpt script

You're done, drop a file whose name is an address, mail will be sent.


Are Mac OS X services name sensitive? Are Mac OS X services name sensitive?  I have the following Applescript code and can install it as a service (using Automator) with the name "Move_Mail_L5", but can't install it as a service with the name "Move_Mail_LV".

on run {input, parameters}
    delay 1
    tell application "System Events"
        tell process "Mail"
            click menu item "Landscaping V" of menu 1 of menu item "Move to" of menu 1 of menu bar item "Message" of menu bar 1
        end tell
    end tell
    return input
end run

My four files in ~/Library/Services are

Move_Mail_L5.workflow
Copy_Mail_LV.workflow
Copy_Mail_BC.workflow
Move_Mail_BC.workflow

There is no naming problem with "Copy_Mail_LV.workflow".  Its code is the same as that of "Move_Mail_L5.workflow", except that it has "Copy" in place of "Move".

My Mac Book Air 2012 is running Sierra version 10.12.6

Added later: I can install it with the name "Mov_Mail_LV".

The suggestion to do a NVRAM reset seems to have fixed the naming problem that I had described.  After doing a NVRAM reset I could name the service as "Move_Mail_LV"--as desired.


Where are all these ipfw rules coming from? Any attempt to connect to a server over port 143 is blocked by the OS. I've verified it's not my connection; other computers on the network can see the port just fine. I've replicated the problem on a different network, as well as both the Ethernet and Wifi interfaces.

On my Macbook, I get this:

$ telnet mail.xxxx.com 143
Trying xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx...
telnet: connect to address xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx: Permission denied
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host

$ telnet mail.xxxx.com 110
Trying xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx...
Connected to mail.xxxx.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
+OK Welcome to MailEnable POP3 Server

On another computer on the same network:

$ telnet mail.xxxx.com 143
Trying xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx...
Connected to mail.xxxx.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
* OK IMAP4rev1 server ready at 07/28/11 19:53:15

The problem is due to a lot of extraneous ipfw rules:

$ sudo ipfw show
00010   1166    210912 allow ip from any to any via lo*
00100      0         0 deny ip from 127.0.0.0/8 to any in
00110      0         0 deny ip from any to 127.0.0.0/8 in
00120      0         0 deny ip from 224.0.0.0/3 to any in
00130      0         0 deny tcp from any to 224.0.0.0/3 in
10010      0         0 check-state
10020    163     12011 deny ip from any to any established in
10030      0         0 deny ip from any to any frag in
20000     14       784 skipto 50000 icmp from any to any out keep-state
20010 227761 225019565 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 80,8080 out setup keep-state
20011   7994   1700223 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 443,8443 out setup keep-state
20020      0         0 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 53 out setup keep-state
20020   1359    125457 skipto 50000 udp from any to any dst-port 53 out keep-state
20030    150     17801 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 110,993 out setup keep-state
20031      0         0 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 25,465,587 out setup keep-state
20040    501     54357 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 22 out setup keep-state
20050      0         0 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 21 out setup keep-state
20060      0         0 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 123 out setup keep-state
20060     12       912 skipto 50000 udp from any to any dst-port 123 out keep-state
20070      0         0 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 113 out setup keep-state
20070      0         0 skipto 50000 udp from any to any dst-port 113 out keep-state
20080      0         0 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 194 out setup keep-state
20080      0         0 skipto 50000 udp from any to any dst-port 194 out keep-state
20090      0         0 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 137-139,445 out setup keep-state
20090    214     28854 skipto 50000 udp from any to any dst-port 137-139,445 out keep-state
20100      0         0 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 1194 out setup keep-state
20100      0         0 skipto 50000 udp from any to any dst-port 1194 out keep-state
20110      0         0 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 111,2049 out setup keep-state
20110      0         0 skipto 50000 udp from any to any dst-port 111,2049 out keep-state
20120      0         0 skipto 50000 tcp from any to any dst-port 6881-6999 out setup keep-state
30000      0         0 allow tcp from any to me dst-port 22 in setup keep-state
30010      0         0 allow udp from any to me dst-port 67,68 in keep-state
30020      0         0 allow icmp from 192.168.0.2 to any in keep-state
40000   1284    289790 deny ip from any to any
50000 238005 226947953 allow ip from any to any
65535     25      7914 allow ip from any to any

I cannot find where these settings are coming from, disabling the firewall has no effect.

I cleared them out with:

$ sudo ipfw -f flush

But this is only a temporary fix, and I have no idea where these rules are coming from.

I've discovered that disabling the ruleset they belong to lasts longer:

$ sudo ipfw set disable 0

But they still get re-enabled after a reboot.


Sierra has changed IPv6 link-local addressing. Why/how? The permanent ipv6 address of my machines changed with the advent of macOS Sierra.

Note that we're not talking about the privacy enhanced temporary addresses. What I'm talking about happens even with "sysctl -w net.inet6.ip6.use_tempaddr=0" in effect.

The difference is that ifconfig shows a "secured" flag on the end of both the link-local and prefix-assigned addresses on Ethernet and WiFi interfaces. The host portion of the address differs from what the EUI-64 expansion of the host MAC address ostensibly would be. Additionally, the 0x2 bit of the top byte of the host portion is zero, which indicates that it's a "non-unique" address, though the addresses do seem to remain consistent across reboots.

My guess is that Apple is constructing the host portion of the link-local address by running the EUI-64 through a cryptographic hash function or something like that.

Is this new addition to sierra documented anywhere? Can it be turned on or off?

There hasn't been any documentation made available for this feature (so no information on how the addresses are generated), which is indeed new in Sierra, nor can it be disabled. Apple announced this feature at WWDC 2016.

Essentially Apple is generating IPv6 addresses that are unrelated to the MAC address in order to prevent tracking of users based on MAC addresses assigned to Apple. The link-local address is generated once and does not change (since there's less privacy concern in local-only communication), whereas the non-temporary address will change when connecting to a new network.


Same user multiple times - Sharing & Permissions My account at work (rtonneyck), is a Windows domain account. That's what I use to login too. I noticed the permissions for my Shared windows drive has my user name listed multiple times. Why is this?? Is this a bug with Mavericks?

Screenshot:

MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X Mavericks (10.9.4), Using Windows domain

Sounds like there are multiple entries with your user account in the access control list of the share.

Unless you're experiencing performance/functionality issues, I recommend contacting the person who administers that share, letting them know about what you found, then ignore it. :)

If you're experiencing performance/functionality issues, find out if anyone else who uses the share experiences the same symptoms, compile your findings, then submit them to the share administrator.


How to change/customize mail signature in Mountain Lion? To add an custom mail-signature in Lion you had to add an signature via preferences, and then replace the contents of the webarchive with your own.

In Mountain Lion, Apple replaced the webarchive format for signatures with an new format: .mailsignature. When I open such an file, I just see HTML (!). But when I change it, it doesn't take effect..

Does someone have an solution to perform this?

Quit Mail, edit the .mailsignature file with a text editor changing the HTML to whatever you like then right click the file in Finder and select "Get Info" then tick the "Locked" checkbox.  This prevents Mail from resetting the file to the original version and it uses your version.


How to enable missing tag search in Spotlight? OS X Mavericks adds better support for tags. You can search tagged files using Spotlight with the query tag:tagname.

However, this stopped working for me a few days after upgrading form OS X Mountain Lion. Whatever I search for, no results. My tagged files are still tagged and I can use them via OS X’s “smart folders“ and third-party tools. It even works in Finder windows when entering only tagname and choosing the proposed tag. I use OS X 10.9 (13A603).

Is there any switch to enable it in the Spotlight dialogue again or could it just be a bug or even a known issue? I haven’t found anything so far.

Thank you for your help.

I don't know the definitive answer, but we could usually solve these issues by rebuilding the spotlight index. Takes a couple of hours, but most issues are fixed that way:

sudo mdutil -E / #deletes the spotlight index
sudo mdutil -i on / # starts the reindexing process

Additionally, you can use the commands here for an even more lowlevel approach


What commands can be issued to Excel for Mac from the terminal? I know I can tell Excel to open a file with:

open MAC\ Addresses.xlsx -a "Microsoft Excel.app/"

But I cannot figure out how to do anything with Excel from the terminal.

Where can I find a list of the commands that can be sent to Excel from the terminal?

Excel is primarily a GUI application, there isn't much more you can do from the Terminal than using open to have it opening a file.

Excel has a little AppleScript interface you can use via osascript, but it only supports a minimal set of commands.


Is there an alternative to Application Switcher with search? On Windows, I've been using Switcher and the one feature that I really like is being able to switch to applications by typing in portions of their title. Is there an application for Mac OS X (10.7) that provides similar functionality?

Alfred (free)

find any application or file
this app will learn and prioritize your searches
system commands and extended features (google search, bitly...)
you can get more powerful features when purchasing the powerpack

Quicksilver (free)

find any application or file
this app will learn and prioritize your searches
lots of free plugins with extend the functionalities

move files
execute bash commands
...

Spotlight (built-in)

...which is part of the OS and be triggered using ⌘+space (default shortcut).


Debug iPhone Mobile Safari without Web Inspector I'm using Pythonista, a mobile Python environment to code on my iPhone while I'm on the train with no laptop around. I've started working on a small web application using bottle and d3.js. However, finding javascript errors in Safari is impossible. There is simply no way to find out what error stopped the application.

Is there a workaround for this?

I found a way to do this. It's a little dirty but it works and it helps a lot with scripting for the browser.

Simply put a try...catch block around the code you're want to debug and use alert() to output the information to you. Like this:

try {
  // some code that might go wrong
catch (e) {
  alert(e);
  alert(e.stack);
}


iCloud back up on iPhone 5c If I back all my data on to iCloud will this free my memory on my phone as I only have 8GB and would like more pics songs etc , hope people can help!

Backing up to iCloud is only a backup, it will not free up space on your iOS device.. you'll need to free up space manually.

You can find more information on iCloud storage and backup overview here:
http://support.apple.com/kb/PH12519?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US


Installing and Upgrading Ram on a mid 2011 iMac (different size RAM) Apologies for my ignorance here, as the title suggests I am looking for advice on  upgrading the Ram on my mid 2011 iMac. I have bought 2x4GB and the iMac already has 2x2GB. I found the question was already asked by Mike Kwan here:
How should different sized RAM be added to iMac?

However as I do not have 50 rep, I can not comment and when I went to put an answer in I am told not to ask questions or look for help in the answer.

(So again sorry about the duplication question)

According to Josh " as long as your top two slots are filled using the original factory RAM and you installed the new RAM into the bottom slots" the configuration is good.
So I looked at the image that Mike provided and compared it to the info from my iMac (after I had installed the extra RAM). As the 1st image of my configuration shows Bank 0 and 1/DIMM0 on my iMac contain the 4GB sticks which is in contrast to Mike's picture. I followed the install guide that Josh suggested regarding the "Top and Bottom" slots here: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1423

Have I missed something or have I done this correct?

My understanding is that you want to pair your memory sticks in order to avail of dual-channelling, and are uncertain if this configuration is compliant.

It is. Firstly, apple recommends keeping the factory memory in the same position as it always has been. Failing that, it's only important to keep the same-sized memory in the same DIMM slot.

As you have above, both 4GB sticks are in the zeroth position, and both 2GB sticks are in the first position. This (or the opposite 2GB in zeroth, and 4GB in first) is the optimal configuration.


How to delete storage in 'Other Volumes in Container'? As you can tell from the picture I have the majority of my disk storage being taken up by 'Other Volumes in Container' leaving me with less than 20GB to actually use. Running Mojave 10.14.2 on a 2015 Macbook Pro

Here are the fixes I have attempted:

Contacted Apple support, it has been 2 weeks and they have been unable to fix it
Wiped disk and reinstalled OS. Note: the 97GB of 'Other volumes in Container' still remains after the disk wipe and before the reinstall of OS
Turned network caching on and off
Used Omnidisksweeper
Searched in activity monitor for any suspicious activities as well as running an antivirus scan
reindexing spotlight
ran diskutil list in terminal and it shows Preboot, Recovery and VM only taking up approximately 2GB

I had this same problem too, I solved by this step

diskutil list

    /dev/disk0 (internal, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *121.3 GB   disk0
   1:                        EFI EFI                     314.6 MB   disk0s1
   2:                 Apple_APFS Container disk1         121.0 GB   disk0s2

   /dev/disk1 (synthesized):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      APFS Container Scheme -                      +121.0 GB   disk1
                                 Physical Store disk0s2
   1:                APFS Volume 未命名 - 数据           93.1 GB    disk1s1
   2:                APFS Volume Preboot                 82.4 MB    disk1s2
   3:                APFS Volume Recovery                528.3 MB   disk1s3
   4:                APFS Volume VM                      1.1 GB     disk1s4
   5:                APFS Volume mac - Data              13.7 GB    disk1s5
   6:                APFS Volume mac                     11.3 GB    disk1s6
   7:                APFS Volume Untitled                487.4 KB   disk1s7

   /dev/disk2 (disk image):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:                            Fonedog-PowerMyma-1... +162.5 MB   disk2

   /dev/disk3 (disk image):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:                            OmniDiskSweeper        +25.2 MB    disk3

then delete the 93.1 GB    disk1s1

diskutil eraseVolume APFS Blank /dev/disk1s1

all done


iPhone and iPad apps have gone missing since update When I updated to the most recent iPhone software last year, my phone had trouble getting the update and after resetting it and trying to restore it, I still have a number of apps that I can't find. These apps:

don't show in my "purchase" list in the iStore
do show as downloaded if I try to repurchase (even the free ones)
are not hidden
show as an unchecked app on the list of apps on the left if I open the iPhone in iTunes, but when I check it, it does not allow it to be synched because it says it can't be found

I have an iPhone 3GS and iPad 2 with a MacBook Pro as the mothership. Any way to redownload apps that the store clearly knows I already own (wouldn't label them 'downloaded' if it didn't).

I have checked under my two diff identities (a me.com account and another one that I owned from way back) and have same issue in both.

Apps that have been removed from the App Store can no longer be downloaded, regardless of having been purchased or free. If you can confirm that you cannot find them in the App Store, then, sadly, this is the case.


How to change the password for my Apple ID from my iPad? I want to change the password of my iPad, I mean the one that I need to type when installing software.

How do I do it? I looked everywhere in the Settings app for a "Change password" entry, but couldn't find an option for that.

Go to App Store or iTunes Store and scroll to the bottom, then pick your Apple ID. Select View Apple ID and log in with your current password. Pick Apple ID at the top and change your password, then press Done.


OS X license on used Mac? I just got off a very long and very frustrating phone call with Apple support.

I purchased a used Apple computer which came installed with Mountain Lion. Meaning that the computer was shipped by Apple with Mountain Lion installed, and received by me with that same installation.

As a precaution, I tried to reinstall Mountain Lion via Recovery mode. This failed because my Apple ID hasn't purchased Mountain Lion.

Apple insisted that because I didn't purchase the computer new, I don't have a license for OS X. I don't believe this is correct, or even legal. This means that anyone using a used computer is doing so illegally, unless they've purchased a separate OS license.

Am I way off-base here? I'm pretty sure I now "own" a copy of Mountain Lion, and Apple is in the wrong. If this is correct, what are my options?

The agent should get low feedback. The license to Mountain Lion transfers with the computer when it is sold.

The agent should have told you that no Apple ID is needed to download another copy of the installer since the system prompts you to send the serial number for verification.

Now, you don't get a license to the Mountan Lion upgrade to install on other computers. That is software you purchase separately from a computer and that is tied to one Apple ID and is not transferable. (like everything else sold from the App Store)

The one case where you don't get Mountain Lion is if the machine shipped from the factory with Lion but was sold with a "free upgrade" to Mountain Lion. This could happen in the window between when they announce the new OS to when it's released or on Mac that are imaged in the factory before Mountain Lion was released, but sold after the release.

In that case, Apple have a free redemption of the upgrade to the first Apple ID to redeem it. The only license that would transfer would be Lion and not Mountain Lion.


original iPad not charging Ok, I just bought a brand new original iPad. Sounds impossible, right? Well, we just opened the box, and it is not even charging. There is no indication that this iPad even works even though it is technically "new." Is this something that Apple will need to fix or do I just need to let it sit on the charger overnight and hope it wakes up from a 2 year sleep in its box?

To sum up:

When the battery of an iOS device is fully depleted, it needs a few minutes of charging before it turns on.
You need to use original cable and adapter
If charging an iPad, use the wall outlet instead of laptop's USB port when possible.


Why does Finder search not find my .c files? My goal is, that the finder search finds .c files that have the search keywords in it.  It seems to work for others but not for me:

but searching for main doesn't yield any results:

What do I need to change/fix to get it to work?

See attached image:

When I search with the parameters Kind:C source code and for the term Bootstrap, I am able to locate all of my C files that contain that string.

Is this the functionality that you are wanting that you don't have?


Can I "hot copy" an entire running Macbook to a new one without using Target mode? Is it possible to copy a running Macbook's state (running Sierra) over to a new Macbook?

I can't use target disk mode for two reasons: one, I don't have a Firewire cable and am not sure where to get one on my tiny island;  two, the old Macbook is broken: when restarted, it usually won't boot, and I fear it won't boot even into target disk mode. (At the moment, I'm keeping it running until the replacement arrives. Day five so far.)

There is a Time Machine backup, but I'm excluding a lot of non-essential files from it. If I added all those files just to transfer everything over, it'd enlarge the overall backup size forever, which I'd like to avoid.

You can't clone a fully booted Mac to another completely booted Mac

Not completely accurate.

A fully booted mac can be copied, in it's entirely, to somewhere else. Use Carbon Copy Cloner (easy) or rsync (Unix guru).

The only place "somewhere else" cannot be is a booted volume. The hardware hosting the destination can be booted to the desktop, you just need a second partition on the drive and send the clone there.

You can also clone to an external drive or a disk image. In your case I would clone the old machine to the external drive that has Time Machine on it (NOT as a disk image), boot the new machine from the external, and clone again. Use Carbon Copy and it will not bother copying files that are already there.

You can do the clone-to-external part right now.


Does the Mac mini (2018) deliver power over Thunderbolt ports? Thunderbolt ports can optionally provide power, up to 100 watts.

Does the Mac mini (2018) provide any power over any of its four Thunderbolt ports? If so, how many watts? On which of the 4 ports?

The Apple specifications page does not provide this important detail.

The Thunderbolt 3 standard distinguish between two types of supplying power over the connection - either for "charging" or for "bus-powered devices".

The standard supports up to 100 watts for charging, which is it what you refer to. This is usually only supported by dedicated chargers or docking stations meant to charge laptops.

The minimum requirement of the Thunderbolt 3 standard however is that the computer must be able to provide 15 watts of power to "bus-powered devices". As far as I know, this is exactly what is supported by the Mac Mini.

If you're interested in a specific device connected to your Mac Mini, you can open up System Report where it is reported exactly how much power (in mA) that is provided to the device, and how much is available for that device.


Issue when syncing iPhone to iTunes when adding movies I'm having some trouble with my wife's iPhone (4 running ios5.1.1).

First what works

If I plug it into iTunes (10.6.3) it will sync happily, backup happily and appear to work.
I can also change without issue the photos and apps that are sync'd.

Then what doesn't

If I try and change the movies (or music) that are sync'd (currently none are) then when I click apply the following message is shown.
"The iPhone “XXX’s iPhone” is synced with another iTunes library. Do you want to erase this iPhone and sync with this iTunes library?"

With options of Cancel or Erase and sync

I've tried following the instructions here:
https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3141

But that doesn't appear to have resolved the issue.
I would like to be able to add movies or music without losing the existing content (state of apps etc.)

OK so after talking to Apple support last night:
The messages only apply to the "tab" that they show in. So in this case clicking erase and sync wasn't an issue.

Ben


iPod 2nd Gen Replacement digitizer not working So I just ordered a new digitizer and middle frame for my 2nd Gen iPod Touch, wired everything up, and the digitizer is not recognizing any finger swipes.

I have not snapped the frame into place yet as I want to make sure I don't have to tear this thing apart again.  The video's I've watched show that the digitizer "should" work when not snapped in.

Is there anything I should be looking for before marking this new digitizer as defective?


Java DICOM viewer fails on MacOS Catalania (10.15.3) I have a CD containing the images of the MRT I had recently. I tried to start the DICOM viewer which is on the CD as well. However the viewer fails with the error:

WARNING: An illegal reflective access operation has occurred
WARNING: Illegal reflective access by org.eclipse.osgi.internal.baseadaptor.BaseStorage (file:/Users/manuel/2016-11-18 - CT Josephskrankenhaus/PLUGINS/OSGI.JAR) to method java.net.URLClassLoader.addURL(java.net.URL)
WARNING: Please consider reporting this to the maintainers of org.eclipse.osgi.internal.baseadaptor.BaseStorage
WARNING: Use --illegal-access=warn to enable warnings of further illegal reflective access operations
WARNING: All illegal access operations will be denied in a future release

Return value is 13. How can I troubleshoot this problem?

These warnings are caused by Oracle tightening security in the JVM (which is unfortunately badly needed) but currently does not cause the process to crash.

Hence my guess is that something else has broken.  Without anything further to go on, I would guess (based on the exit code 13) that the Java DICOM viewer is 1) rather old and 2) links in native code, notably Java 6 (perhaps even 5) and native 32-bit library.

Unfortunately for you, modern Java versions are 64-bit only, and cannot use 32-bit libraries, so if I'm right the Java you have now will not run this program.  You might, however, have luck in getting the old Java 6 from Apple and use that instead, but only if you have not upgraded to Catalina.

I would look around for a newer version of the DICOM viewer on the net.  You might be lucky.


Why is my (automatic) clock running 8 minutes behind? I just realized my macbook's clock is 8 minutes behind. And yet the setting is on "automatically set to date and time". See screenshot. How can I fix this?

On the left: asking for "time" in google. 14:32
On the right: 14:24 and the "automatic" box is ticked

This might help.

How can I tell if my Mac is keeping the clock updated properly?
And, this
ntpd: consistently incorrect time on mid-2013 MacBook Air

TL;DR:  open a command prompt, aka Shell, aka "Terminal".

What's the output of 'ntpq -p'?
What is in /var/db/ntp.drift ?

A list of servers is available at http://support.ntp.org/servers; you have to try to select the servers that are close to you, especially not just geographically, but network-wise.


Mac NetInstall does not send booter on specific devices Using Mac Server on 10.9, with only NetInstall working (we use InfoBlox for DHCP) I can successfully NetBoot to our only image from a iMac Pro (Core2Duo), but not from a MacBook Pro (Intel i7, ~2012).

I captured the NBI on the newer MacBook Pro (Deploystudio Netboot Set)
Both devices list the boot image in the boot options menu at startup.
Both devices allow me to SELECT the image.
Both devices send a BSDP ACK[SELECT] to the server.
Server sends both devices at least an ACK pktsize 300 to the correct IP.

The MacBook Pro decides, after all this, that it will just boot to the regular local disk, which is not what should happen. Whereas the main iMac boots to the network disk (Apple Logo with mini spinning globe).

Does anyone have any ideas why the MacBook Pro does not boot, considering it is communicating with the server?

I had the same problem. Although using only NetInstall. My problem was cause by the fact that the Netboot image (folder)and files inside of it had incorrect permissions (for instace the booter files had no access to the everyone group.
After I fixed the entire folder permission manually Netboot worked.
I hope this helps you.


macOS grayscale except some apps Is there anyway by which one can have grayscale system wide except some selected (by user) apps, on macOS?

Yes, this is possible, though my solution is a bit hacky. Note that this method uses some undocumented Objective C APIs, and doesn't go through ordinary accessibility settings, so be careful.

First you need to have developer tools installed so that you can compile Objective C code. Then compile two commands enable-grayscale and disable-grayscale from source (based on this StackOverflow answer which provides some additional ways of doing this).

$  cat enable-grayscale.c
// https://stackoverflow.com/questions/14163788/how-does-on-screen-color-inversion-work-in-os-x
#include <stdio.h>
#include <ApplicationServices/ApplicationServices.h>

CG_EXTERN bool CGDisplayUsesForceToGray(void);
CG_EXTERN void CGDisplayForceToGray(bool forceToGray);

int
main(int argc, char** argv)
{
    bool isGrayscale = CGDisplayUsesForceToGray();
        if (!isGrayscale) {
                CGDisplayForceToGray(TRUE);
        }

    return 0;
}

$ cat disable-grayscale.c
// https://stackoverflow.com/questions/14163788/how-does-on-screen-color-inversion-work-in-os-x
#include <stdio.h>
#include <ApplicationServices/ApplicationServices.h>

CG_EXTERN bool CGDisplayUsesForceToGray(void);
CG_EXTERN void CGDisplayForceToGray(bool forceToGray);

int
main(int argc, char** argv)
{
    bool isGrayscale = CGDisplayUsesForceToGray();
        if (isGrayscale) {
        CGDisplayForceToGray(0);
        }

    return 0;
}

Then compile them into commands:

clang -g -O2 -std=c11 -Wall -framework ApplicationServices enable-grayscale.c -o enable-grayscale
clang -g -O2 -std=c11 -Wall -framework ApplicationServices disable-grayscale.c -o disable-grayscale

Put the resulting files somewhere you want to run them, e.g. your home directory.

Now install Hammerspoon. You'll need to give it accessibility access in System Preferences. Within Hammerspoon, select "Open Config", and modify the Lua code to do what you want. My configuration is below, based on this example from their docs:

function applicationWatcher(appName, eventType, appObject)
    if (eventType == hs.application.watcher.activated) then
        if (appName == "Firefox") then
            os.execute('/path/to/scripts/enable-grayscale')
        end
    end
    if (eventType == hs.application.watcher.deactivated) then
        if (appName == "Firefox") then
            os.execute('/path/to/scripts/disable-grayscale')
        end
    end
end
appWatcher = hs.application.watcher.new(applicationWatcher)
appWatcher:start()

That's the configuration I chose (turn on grayscale for Firefox, but leave it off for all other applications). Whenever Firefox is focused, the whole screen becomes grayscale. When other applications are focused, it's color. It sounds like you'd want the opposite: grayscale turned on in System Preferences, with it being disabled when you focus an app from the list you're interested in. Once you've configured it as you want, click "Reload Config" to activate the changes.


Remote Desktop that doesn't go through the cloud What is a simple and cheap solution that let's me see and control my OSX desktop from iOS that solely works over LAN and does not connect to the internet at any time?

There are a variety of VNC clients in the App Store. If you put "VNC" in the search field, you should be able to easily see what's available in your geographic region and sort the wheat from the chaff.


Why does shared WiFi connection from iPhone to laptop (personal hotspot) not go through phone VPN? I'm trying to share the WiFi connection from my iPhone to my laptop = personal hotspot. The iPhone connects to a VPN and a quick check on phone browser (whatismyip) shows that this works ok. However, when my laptop connects to the iPhone hotspot through WiFi, the connection does not seem to use the VPN. Instead, the IP range belongs to my internet provider, just as if the VPN was turned off.
Is this the normal behavior?

This is not possible on iOS as it ships from the factory.
When you create the hotspot, you turn your iPhone into a router with NAT clients on one side (usually WiFi) and your public IP on the other (Cellular).  As such, whatever config you had before (WiFi Internet with VPN) gets disabled.
If you want to use VPN while on your hotspot, the best approach is to use the VPN client on the end devices themselves (i.e. the Windows or macOS laptops connecting to your phone).
However, if you're willing to Jailbreak, an app called TetherMe that supposedly allows it.  I haven't tested so YMMV.  Personally, I would go with a VPN on the end devices instead.


Multi threaded file copy? Windows os has tools to spin off multiple threads for copying files: RichCopy, Robocopy or vXCopy.

I was wondering if there exists a method or tool to copy a lot (thousands) of small files/directories using multiple threads on macOS?


New "Local Items" Keychain in macOS 10.9+: What's it all about? macOS (10.9 Mavericks) created a new keychain "Local Items" for me that can't be deleted. What's the idea here and why is there a second keychain in addition to my login keychain?

If you mean the keychain that is called Local Items in the U.S. English locale, I think it is used for keychain items that are eligible to be synced with iCloud Keychain.

From http://arstechnica.com/apple/2013/10/os-x-10-9/5/:

  If the iCloud Keychain is subsequently disabled, the iCloud keychain highlighted in the screenshot above is replaced with a "Local Items" keychain that has the same contents as the iCloud keychain. Any items added to the Local Items keychain will be pushed out to other devices when iCloud Keychain is re-enabled.

I have never enabled iCloud Keychain, but I also have a Local Items keychain. It contains about half of the keychain items from my login keychain, or mostly web form passwords. The Local Items keychain does not seem to correspond to any file and it cannot be deleted.


Recovering files from an unbootable partition in OSX I have a MacBook previously bootcamped to Windows 10. The internal hard drive had 3 partitions:

200MB Partition 0
249GB Partition 1 (OSX)
250GB Partition 2 (Windows 10)

The model is a MacBook Pro mid-2012, and Partition 1 has OSX 10.15 Catalina.
I've made a fatal mistake of accidentally deleting the 200 MB partition via the Windows 10 install disk. I wanted to reinstall Windows 10 to fix some audio errors. Now I'm trying to recover all the files I have in the OSX partition. Before I made this mistake, I've backed up all Windows files on the OSX partition.
If I go to disk utility via Internet Recovery on my Mac, the list of disks and volumes has a "disk0s1" volume that I can't verify nor repair but can only be partitioned away. If I ever re-partition or reformat that hard drive, all data will be lost. I need to recover the files before I do anything.
diskutil list prints out:
/dev/disk0
#:                   TYPE NAME SIZE      IDENTIFIER
0: FDisk_partition_scheme      *500.1 GB disk0
1:                   0xFF      249.0 GB  disk0s1

gpt -r show /dev/disk0 prints out:
    start      size index contents
        0         1       MBR
        1         1       Pri GPT header
        2        32       Pri GPT table
       34         6
       40    409600     1 GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
   409640 486328128     1 MBR part 255
486737768       152
486737920 490035200     3 GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7
976773120        15
976773135        32       Sec GPT Table
976773167         1       Sec GPT header

The tools I currently have for this situation:

Windows 10 installation USB
A Seagate External portable 1TB hard drive

I will post this as an answer although there are some uncertainties since some info is missing.

A 200mb Partition usually is the EFI partition (more detail what this is) which allows your Mac to boot into Windows.

Deleting this does not at a all delete your actual Mac/Windows partition. Therefore, I doubt you have actual done too much harm.
It is not clear if you have tried and failed, but you should be able to boot into macOS. After startup go into the finder and show all drives (finder hit cmd, select sidebar and tick everything that says disk).
You should then be able to see the remaining two partitions, Macintosh HD and some other name (e.g. Windows). Usually, you can simply open either and then do whatever you want, e.g. clone one disk, save the data,...


How to set missing serial number on MacBook Pro 2014 My MacBook pro model 2014 mid 15 inches, has lost serial number during upgrading the OS.
I am having Catalina Os installed on the machine and have tried with a guide that tells about the Blank board serializer I write it to USB drive and when boot up the machine, Clicked EFI BOOT start normally nothing effect.
All I want any other way of setting back my serial number.
I am struggling for the last one month to fix the issue please help me out.

If your MacBook is not properly serialized it should be done by an Apple Authorised Service Provider. It is to be assumed that perhaps it was forgotten (or not properly done) after a repair.


Why won't iTunes let me manually sync PDFs to iBooks? I have my iPad set to manually manage content (i.e. drag and drop, not sync). I'm trying to add some PDFs to iBooks, but it refuses to let me copy them to my iPad. I can do this with epub books just fine. Is this a known limitation in iTunes, or a bug?

Is there any workaround (to clarify: still using iTunes) that doesn't involve having to use the sync option (which forces me to sync videos as well, which is not workable)?

You can get the PDF's on your iPad via some other method (e.g. Email, DropBox, etc.) and then choose to open the PDF inside iBooks.


Which keyboard layout is this? Which keyboard layout is this? Its AZERTY so I tried French (all french keyboards but the keys up are not well mapped) it's really weird.

Tony Tran's answer is almost correct — it is in fact the Italian set of keycaps, but the keycaps have been moved around to a custom AZERTY layout!

The combination of characters present in the five keys just to the left of the ↩ key (and indeed, even any one of those keys) is not found in any other Mac keyboard layout.


Mac won't boot of an external drive, starts internet recovery instead I wanted to clean a MacBook Pro 15,2 with Touchbar.
However I noticed that it wasn't running smoothly, so I backed it up using the Target Disk mode and erased the disk, because the Recovery partition was corrupted and didn't boot (a major red flag, that i sadly ignored).

Next I created a Mojave install media, conected it and booted up with Alt pressed.
However when I selected the icon the Macbook pro went to start internet recovery, so I waited for it to finish.

The bar filled up, mac rebooted and after the apple logo and bar showed up there was high fan spin and then another reboot.
Of course it didn't boot into recovery it just showed the "missing files" sign, which is not suprising. (I repeated the process several times, but nothing changed.)

Then I tried everything. Atempting to boot from anything external fails (and it doesn't see TimeMachine backups) and loads internet recovery. I flashed the "BaseSystem.dmg" from the installer to the internal drive, it shows up in the bootmanager, but no luck.

Only idea I have to put all the files from the backup back in, but who knows.

I'll be glad for any advice. Thank you.

Presumably your data on the backup is fine, it just doesn't have the correct boot sectors or they are corrupted. Why not go thru with the internet recovery, get your Macbook to a base state, then you can use Migration Assistant to move files from your backup to the now refreshed Macbook.


iMac ram memory installing 16GB vs 20GB I have a mid-2011 27" iMac with i7 processor.  It came with 4 gigs of ram (2x2GB).  I just bought 2x8GB of matched memory.  I am wondering two things
1.  is it good/bad/neutral to leave in the existing memory and add the 2x8 into the remaining two slots?
2. If you say it doesn't matter if it shows up as 20GB installed, but will only use 16GB of it, then should I put those 2x8 in the upper slots (the ones the factory 2x2 are presently occupying) and either leave out the 2x2 or put them in the bottom 2 slots. IOW does it use the upper two slots first during processing?
Where can I find a speed test to see what difference it all makes?

So many questions, but I'll try to break them down:

Leaving in the current 2x2GB that it has is good, it's better than
2x0GB.
All 20GB will be recognized, the only reason you'd want to replace the current 2x2GB chips with 2x8GB is purely for the additional RAM.
I recommend you pair the sticks up into the dual channel configuration for your iMac (as can be found online), so that one 8GB module and one 4GB module is on each of the two channels, enabling the use of dual channel memory speeds.