How to set permissions on network interfaces? At each reboot, the permissions on the network devices /dev/bpf* are changed.

As a developer, I want write acccess on these files.
This can easily be fixed with a chmod.

What is the most elegant solution to fix this issue permanently?

Wireshark ships a StartupItem that does just that; however, the StartupItems API is deprecated:

 The SystemStarter utility is deprecated.  System services should instead
 be described by a launchd.plist(5).  See launchd(8) for more details.
 The launchd utility is available on Mac OS X 10.4 and later.

 In earlier versions of Mac OS X, the SystemStarter utility is used to
 start, stop, and restart the system services which are described in the
 /Library/StartupItems/ and /System/Library/StartupItems/ paths.

So, since you're asking for "the most elegant solution", that would be a launch daemon.

I haven't tried the following code, but it should be roughly correct.

Create a file /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.stackexchange.apple.bpf-helper.plist:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
    <key>Label</key>
    <string>com.stackexchange.apple.bpf-helper</string>
    <key>ProgramArguments</key>
    <array>
        <string>/Library/PrivilegedHelperTools/com.stackexchange.apple.bpf-helper.sh</string>
    </array>
</dict>
</plist>

And a file /Library/PrivilegedHelperTools/com.stackexchange.apple.bpf-helper.sh:

#!/bin/sh
chgrp admin /dev/bpf*
chmod g+rw /dev/bpf*

Both should be owned by root:wheel. The first should be 644; the second 755 (600 and 700, respectively, will probably do as well).

You can use launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.stackexchange.apple.bpf-helper.plist to try it without a reboot.


Unpacking .bundle files via terminal There's a known method for unpacking .bundle by going to Show Package Contents, but what if that option is unavailable?

There is a solution that works for .pkg files by using the pkgutil --expand command. Is there any solution for .bundle?

I was under the impression that .bundle files are actually folders - in your terminal application, try typing the following:
cd archive_name.bundle
ls

For example, on my end:
cd IMDB.bundle/
ls
$Contents   README.md


Destroy old Apple IDs from my iPhone I created three Apple IDs on my iPhone. I have signed out of all three IDs one by one. However now I am not able to create a new Apple ID on my iPhone.

You cannot 'destroy' Apple IDs, they last forever.
You only need one ID. You can change the associated email address if needed.
The ID used to set up the phone or to download any software is the only one that can ever update or restore it.
Giving someone else your ID & password details is a security nightmare & foolish in the extreme - open to abuse at any time in the future.


How can I make sure texts from friends with iPhones don't go to iMessage instead of my Android phone? I have always used an Android phone, but text messages from certain friends get hijacked by iMessage. How do I prevent iPhones and MacOS Messages from sending me iMessages? I need all messages to be SMS or MMS.
Some friends with iPhones will text me, but I don't receive the message. Today I noticed the Message app on my Mac had notifications. I never open this app since I don't use iMessage, but I looked today, and found multiple "lost" messages from several weeks ago.
Please note that this is NOT the same question as Removing phone number from iMessage. My Android phone is not, and has never been, registered with iMessage, and I have already followed those instructions. Another poster (cpcallen) had the same question as me--How can I ensure that friends with iPhones send me SMS/text instead of iMessages?--but it was closed, being deemed as the same as the Removing phone number question. It's actually fairly different.
I have tried:

Leaving my Messages app closed on my Mac. But somehow messages from these people get hijacked.
Deregistering my mobile number using Apple's online Deregister iMessage tool. When I attempted this, I got the message "Your phone number is not registered with iMessage."
Finding a setting on my Android phone that addresses this. The
problem is apparently (and logically seems to be) on the Apple end.

Things cpcallen says he tried:

Closing Messages.app. I still get macOS notifications of messages.
In Messages > Preferences… > Accounts > [my email address], untick "Enable this account". Then my friends messages disappear and I never
see them at all, at least until I reenable in Messages.app.
Looking in System Preferences and on icloud.com and appleid.apple.com    to see if there is some setting I can disable—but
I've not found    anything relevant.
Using Apple's Deregister iMessage tool to unregister my mobile    number. When I attempted this it gave me the message "Your phone
number is not registered with iMessage."

You can not control how the sending phone addresses messaging much from your phone. As you mentioned, you have already deregistered your cell phone from Apple serves so that leads to the conclusion that your contacts are sending to your AppleID, by their choice.
Your only lever on the receive side is to change your AppleID to something no one knows. Then, you won’t have incoming iMessage transmissions by email or by mobile.

It’s likely not practical to get everyone to change their address book to clear their contact database to suit your preference, each time they make a mistake sending to your AppleID.
It’s also equally impractical to just block them entirely on Apple devices and hope they change the way they communicate.

But it never hurts to ask nicely, maybe people would change up their conversations instead of reusing the old conversation that is easy rather than checking the “to” closely.


How do I format a usb drive on a PC or Mac? I have a USB drive that was formatted for a Mac and now I want to use it for a PC. How can I do to make it?

It’s quite simple. Note that reformatting the thumb drive will erase all it’s contents.

Open Disk Utility. It’s located in the /Applications/Utilities folder. Or just type in “Disk Utility" in Spotlight.
Select the drive (not the volume), and click the “Partition” tab.
Select “1 partition” from the drop down. Then click Options… > select “Master Boot Record” as the partition scheme
Format: exFat
Give it a name.
Click apply, and you are done.

Notes:

If you want the USB drive to be universally compatible, format it as exFAT/FAT32. The standard nowadays is exFAT. It supports files of up to 16 exabytes in size. FAT32 only supports 4 GB files. Additionally, in a windows environment, the FAT32 filesystem is subject to more fragmentation.
If you want to use it exclusively on your PC, reformat it as NTFS in Windows on your PC (you can reformat as exFAT and FAT32 in Windows as well). An NTFS filesystem is read only in an OS X environment. OS X’s Disk Utility does not offer this as an option.
Others may suggest just to click the erase tab. This does not properly reformat the disk since the partition table isn’t modified.


What image file formats are commonly imported into Keynote and PowerPoint for Mac? I am a Windows user, but my superior colleague is a Mac user (he has a MacBook).  He has asked me to send him some images that I used in a PDF report.  He would like to include these (original high-resolution) images in a presentation that he will make (almost certainly using either Keynote or PowerPoint for Mac).  Since I'm very unfamiliar with Mac (embarrassingly, I have not owned a Mac computer since 1997!), what file format(s) do you think that I should send these images in?

In Windows, here are some common formats:

JPEG for photographs
GIF or PNG for graphics (e.g., graphical schematics, graphs, charts).  Specifically, I actually originally imported PNG images into my PDF report.
EPS (Encapsulated PostScript) for graphics (e.g., graphical schematics, graphs, charts)

Are these image formats easily compatible with Mac and easily importable into Keynote/PowerPoint?  Or does Mac have something better that I should convert them to for use in Keynote/PowerPoint?  I'm particularly interested in an image format that will easily and nicely store graphs and charts.

Yes, these are standard image formats that OS X, Keynote, and PowerPoint for Mac all support.

There are not any special Mac graphics formats that would be better for you to use.


Unlock with Apple Watch on Sierra not working I have it enabled on my 2013 Retina MacBook Pro, my Apple Watch is on the same wifi network, and bluetooth is enabled as well. When I wake up my Mac, it says “Unlocking with Apple Watch” for several seconds, then it times out and prompts me to enter my password. I don't receive any notification on my watch either. I tried disabling and re-enabling the feature, but that doesn’t have any effect. Any ideas?

Uncheck "Unlock with Watch" box in System Preferences.

Then hold down both buttons on your watch until the Apple logo shows, then release. This will reset your device (no data or app loss).

Let your watch re-start.

Unlock the watch.

Then, back on your Mac, re-check "Unlock with Watch."


My MacBook Pro 13'' works only with 85w charger I have a MacBook Pro 13'' mid 2014. My 60w charger stopped working yesterday (no green light, no AC charger detected in system information). However, when I tested the charger with another MacBook Pro 13'' everything looked ok.

Then I connected my MacBook Pro 13'' to a 85w charger from a 15'' and that one worked perfectly.

What could be the reason?

Either:

The two Macbook 13 draw different power due to normal conditions and your adapter won't work at all when a normal but high draw is needed. (i.e. replace your adapter)
The 60 W adapter is failing and it' bad luck that you got a few heads in a row and a few tails in a row - if you do enough tests 50% failure rate will happen with any MacBook. (i.e. replace your adapter)
Your MacBook is drawing / requesting more power than it should and needs a soft reset / SMC reset or repair. (i.e. service your Mac)


How to sync non-system photo library to iPhone The default photo library is system library. Any new library created is non-system photo library. How to sync the photos in these library into iPhone? In iTunes it seems that you can only sync the system library. Is there any app useful?

Yosemite 10.10.3
Photos 1.0
iTunes 12.1.2.27
iOS 8.3

In Photos go to Preferences and you'll see an option to "Use as System Photo Library". It will then see whatever library you chose in iTunes.


Control characters in Terminal and an international keyboard I have a Linux server with services running inside systemd containers. To access the shell inside a container, I can use the command machinectl login <container>. That command will give me the container's login prompt and this message:

Connected to container <name>. Press ^] three times within 1s to exit session.

After I'm done and type exit or logout, I'm returned to the container's login prompt. In order to get back to the host's shell, I need to send the control character ^] (three times within one second).

I'm using an international (Finnish) keyboard and instead of having its own dedicated key, the ] character is ⌥+9. But when I press ctrl+⌥+9, it's not recognized as the control character ^] and I'm stuck at the login prompt.

How can I send a proper ^] control character with an international keyboard?

There might be a more direct solution, but here's the one I found.

If you go to
Terminal → Preferences... → Profiles → the profile you're using → Keyboard
you'll get a list of mappings between function keys and special keystrokes.

We want to add the ^] to this list, so click on +, and choose the key, and optionally modifier, you would like use. (I went with ctrl+F12, and since F12 is also the key for volume up, what I actually need to press is fn+ctrl+F12.)

In the text field, we need to enter the correct control character, but the thing is, ctrl+⌥+9 is not recognized here either. The solution is to directly paste in the correct octal code, which happens to be \035 (you can copy&paste it from here).

Now pressing fn+ctrl+F12 sends the proper ^] control character, and I can get back to the host's shell.


How do I type the Escape key on an iPad keyboard? I just got a Zagg keyboard and it is great for typing long sections of text on the iPad.  But a big drawback is that it does not have an Escape ⎋ key.  All the top row keys are mapped to iPad-specific features. This is bad when using vim or remoting into a Windows machine.  Does anyone know how to get the Escape ⎋ key to work?  Or is there a better iPad keyboard out there that has the Escape ⎋ key?

Give Ctrl and [ a try that should send the same as Esc (ASCII 27).


Why is iPhone battery percentage fluctuating at lower levels? My iPhone 4 (going on 19 months of love) has recently started having a bit of an issue knowing the percentage of its battery it has remaining.  I will be using it and it will jump from 31% to 19% and pop up that annoying "Low Battery" notification.  A few moments after I dismiss it, the percentage jumps back up to 27%. This happens at least ten times, reliably, before it starts hitting 11% and then I know it was "real" and it needs charging soon. This feels like a NiCad issue… I know we've advanced past those days.

So my question is: how can I force a calibration of the percentage counter on iPhone 4?  Alternatively, and I don't know that I would like this even if it is possible (I doubt it is), can I disable the "Low Battery" notification?  It is excessively annoying when it pops up ten times over the course of thirty minutes.

To recalibrate your iPhones battery, you should:

Use the iPhone until it shuts off due to low battery.
Charge it, without interruptions, to full charge (100%).
Reset the iPhone by Holding Home and the Power buttons at the same time. Ignore the Slide to Power off,  and let the iPhone restart itself.

And for the notifications, as far as I know, no such thing can be achieved without jailbreaking. Cydia's app LowPowerBanner, for instance, should do the trick, though.


Is iCloud is not backing up my iPhone completely? My iCloud is not backing up my device (iPhone 4 with iOS 5.0.0) completely.

When I try to backup my Contact List or Mails via iCloud; It only backups the newest added contacts or recent mails. (Beginning from last restore) For example. I have 220 contacts, I added 10 more after updating to iOS 5 (fresh restore) When I run iCloud. It only backups the 10 contacts.

Is this how it is supposed to work?

Here a link to a Macworld article that contains a terrific explanation of how iCloud backups work. The answer to your question is that iCloud performs incremental backups--only what has changed since the last backup will be sent to iCloud on the following backup.

This means that, for example, if the initial iCloud backup contained 2.0 GB of data and then only 0.1 GB of data changed (say, Address Book contacts), then only those 0.1 GB will be sent to iCloud. This saves battery and avoids transferring data that iCloud already knows about. This is the same principle behind Time Machine on the Mac.

(There are other nice things that iCloud does for the sake of efficiency. For instance, your iTunes purchases are not sent to the iCloud backup, only their references, since Apple already has the songs themselves in iTunes)

In general, I would say that if you backup regularly, then each subsequent backup should stay relatively small and should complete in a short time. The exception is, naturally, when you have recently added large amounts of media like photographs or video taken from the Camera app.

I recommend giving that article a read. It is very comprehensive. Hope this helps.


Mount APFS Volume to /Users with the Disk Utility during the installation I’m trying during the installation from MacOS High Sierra to separate the system and user data. I splitted the SSD with Disk Utility, but I can’t mount the second APFS Volume to /Users with the Disk Utility. Is that possible at this stage?

Not with Disk Utility (can't specify custom mount points with Disk Utility) but the macOS installer environment has Terminal. With Terminal, you can run:

mount_apfs /dev/disk1s3 /Users

Replace disk1s3 with the identifier of the volume to mount there.

This should answer your question about mounting during installation, but after a reboot your disk will be unmounted and /Users unavailable. To permanently set a mount point, you'll have to mess with fstab.


How can I write files to iPod's internal disk on Windows? when trying it I get the "can't do that" icon

  How can I copy new photos to the iPod?

Got it

I used iPhoneBrowser and I could easily add photos to iPod Touch Library :)

But there is a problem, with this, I don't get the photos/videos on the PhotosApp on the iPod Touch :(


I can't send messages to anyone in my contacts except to myself I cant send messages to anyone in my contacts except to myself and I can't add people to whom I can message and receive messages from. Anyone who can help?

Use the Messages app to send and receive messages.

Send a message

Open Messages.
Tap the Compose button  to start a new message. Or go to an existing conversation.
Type your message.
Tap the Send button .

Use Messages on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch

Pressing Compose lets you type a phone number or email address to send a message to.
The list of email addresses and phone numbers in your screenshot of Settings are what other people type in their compose box to send you messages. You don't add other people's contact information there.
If you get an error message when trying to send a message, Apple has debugging steps:

If you can't send or receive messages on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch


Copy home directory from one Mac to another both running macOS Catalina I have a new 16" and an older 15" MacBook Pros both running macOS Catalina. I want to transfer all my the content in my home directory to the new MacBook Pro while retaining the same username.
How do I do this?
Different problems have occurred since I have a huge amount of data about 1.3TB of it to transfer.

With scp -rp: Over my local Wi-Fi network, it is slow and mainly, files with a too long full path are not copied.

With rsync -aZv: Slow here too and there are the same issue than with scp with the long full path of filenames to copy.

By linking the 2 MacBook Pros with a Thunderbolt cable : With Shared directory, too slow and I have had at each time errors that stops the copy, which is very frustrating.

So, how can I copy all this data (even with a long full path for files) on to the new MacBook Pro ?
i.e how to to be able to copy all the content of my /Users/name/ directory into another directory of my new macbook pro 16", i.e into /Users/name/home_from_old_macbook_15_inch/ ?

Migration Assistant was designed by Apple to do just that.  A direct copy may have problems because some of the things in ~/Library depend on MAC address, and some may change due to differences in hardware or O.S. version.
With 1.3 TB, speed cannot be expected.
You’ll have to have nothing else running (not even Time Machine or Spotlight indexing) to avoid error -42.  According to http://www.macwizard.com/errors.html, that means “too many files open.”  If no other apps are running, then report to Apple that Migration Assistant has a bug.  Actually two of them—it should not open too many files, and if it does get that error, it should close some and keep going instead of quitting.


Is it Safe to enter Google Password in 3rd party apps? I would like to get a RSS reader application for my iPad.  It will need to be able to sync with Google Reader because I use Google Reader on my phone and at work.  However, I am concerned about providing my Google password to a 3rd party application.  If I enter my Google password in a 3rd party app, I am assuming that the app could easily send my password back to a home server, store it, and then do anything they want with it.  Is that not the case?  Do Apple or Google provide some kind of password hiding scheme so that 3rd party apps can use passwords without actually being able to see them?

If you're worried about it, my suggestion would be to use Google's 2-step verification on your account. Basically, when you're signing in to your Google account from an untrusted computer (one you haven't successfully signed in with before) then in addition to your password you will also need to provide a 6-digit code that can be generated by an iPhone app or texted to your phone. That way, even if your password is compromised, no one can log into your account without your phone.

For apps like RSS readers, Google also lets you set up randomly-generated one time use passwords to sign into those apps that you can revoke at any time.


What HDMI to DVI adapters are high quality? When I bought my Mac mini Server (Mid 2011) it came with a HDMI to DVI adapter/dongle. Now I want to buy a similar, high quality, dongle for my retina Macbook Pro. I prefer a HDMI dongle because it keeps my Thunderbolt ports available. How can I determine quality so I'm not just shopping based on price?

from: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3235

And if not, what is a good alternative? I know about the Belkin HDMI to DVI, but I dislike the long cable.

One of these adapters is available from eBay in the US at this link: HDMI to DVI Adapter. Many more are available from other sellers.


Do keyboard docks specified for the iPad2 work with the iPad? I was looking on the Apple store for a keyboard for my iPad (specifically this product) and it doesn't say if it is compatible only with the iPad2 or if it also works with the original iPad.

Would it generally be the case that docked hardware like this would work with both iPads, or has something changed in the iPad2 that might break compatibility with the original iPad?

If it says it is compatible with iPad, it is compatible with the iPad 1, iPad 2, theoretically the iPhone 4/S. I have it.


Mail 7.2 issues with drafts When I type a reply email multiple copies of this email get saved in drafts.

I've read over the posts tagged mail.app and I thought I hit the jackpot with this answer by @Kyle, but when I navigate to Accounts>Mailbox Behaviours there is no option for disabling saving drafts on the server,
or am I missing something?

I am running Mail 7.2 on an MBP with OS X Mavericks 10.9.2

When I type a reply email multiple copies of this email get saved in drafts, then these drafts all appear when I have View>Organize by Conversation ticked. Our company uses gmail as our mail service. This does not happen when I use my own gmail account.

This is really annoying as when I am writing a long email, there can be an additional 20 "emails" in the email trail.

I get the same behaviour whether I am running IMAP or POP.

Is there a way to stop this?

The reason for this issue was the fact that I had set up the account as a POP account in apple mail.

When IMAP is selected the following screen appears:

and as can be seen the first item is the one I was looking for.

Drafts : Store draft messages on the server.

When the option above is not ticked the issue stops.


iPod Shuffle supporting software I have an iPod Shuffle. Unfortunately, I formatted it using Windows Explorer and copied some songs to it, but it's not working now. What happened to it? Did the supporting programs get formatted? How can I recover it?

When you formatted it, you may have deleted its internal software. Never format iPods from Windows Explorer, Disk Utility, or anything that's not iTunes.

To fix this, launch iTunes, plug in the iPod, and restore its software from there. As this will format the disk, you should back up anything you have put on the iPod in the meantime.

Also remember that you have to use iTunes to put music on the iPod - you can't just drag files onto it.


Passing a password to an Automator application I have written an Automator application with the following shell script to open an FTP connection on my system:

sudo -s launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/ftp.plist
osascript -e 'tell app "Finder" to display alert "SFTP Opened"'

This works exactly as expected except that the sudo command needs a password. When the same command is run on Terminal, it prompts me for a password but when run as an Automator app, doesn't prompt me for any input. Is there anyway to programmatically pass the password to this sudo within the Automator script? I know this is not a safe practice but I still want to do it as my system is reasonably secure and untouched by anyone other than me.

A "do shell script...with administrator privileges" method is giving the following error:

AppleScript should let you do this by using with administrator privileges:

osascript -e 'do shell script "sudo -s launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/ftp.plist" with administrator privileges'

This doesn't pass the password, but prompts for it with a standard OS X prompt:

You can use this in your Automator workflow in one of the two following ways:


How do I compile vim with the --enable-gui=yes flag on OS X 10.8.2 I'm trying to compile the latest version of vim (7.3.785 as on date) with the --enable-gui option set to yes:

./configure --enable-gui=yes
make

but make fails with several errors (full output). I can't quite make sense of the errors, as I don't see anything specific that I can fix. I must add that compiling it works fine without the GUI option, so it might be something directly related to X or the OS X Cocoa frame work. I'm running OS X 10.8.2 on a retina MBP.

What should I change/add/install to get this to work?

  Note: This question is explicitly about compiling vim from source with the GUI option. I'm aware of macvim and this is what I use for almost everything. However, in order to embed vim inside Eclipse using eclim, I need gvim (works out of the box on Windows and Linux). Unfortunately, macvim does not support embedding inside Eclipse, hence my attempts to make it work on OS X.

You can fix the error about missing header files by exporting CFLAGS like this before running make:

export CFLAGS="-I/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/MacOSX.platform/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.7.sdk/Developer/Headers/FlatCarbon/"

Unfortunately, a new attempt to compile vim fails with loads of errors:

/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/MacOSX.platform/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.8.sdk/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/CarbonCore.framework/Versions/A/Headers/MacTypes.h:17:24: error: #include nested too deeply
(...)
/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreFoundation.framework/Headers/CFBase.h:156: error: conflicting types for ‘Boolean’
/usr/X11/include/X11/Intrinsic.h:155: error: previous declaration of ‘Boolean’ was here
(...)
/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/MacOSX.platform/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.8.sdk/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/CarbonCore.framework/Versions/A/Headers/MacTypes.h:11:20: error: missing binary operator before token "("
(...)

and README_mac.txt doesn't offer much help:

(...)
Sorry, this text still needs to be written!

After some more failed attempts with other compile options, and after skimming through the errors, one quickly gets the impression that GUI support is not yet implemented for OS X, at least for Quartz.

A look to the other options for getting vim, HomeBrew and MacPorts, pretty much confirms the suspicion: The former doesn't offer GUI support at all (see here) and the latter only using X11 (see here).

So to compile vim with GUI support you will have to revert to the good ol' X11 (I tested the Athena widgets, other options are motif and, if you use GTK, gtk1 and gtk2):

$ make distclean
$ ./configure --enable-gui=yes --enable-gui=athena --disable-darwin

After launching XQuartz I could start vim in GUI mode:

$ export DISPLAY=:0
$ ./src/vim -g

However, I have the impression that this is not the GUI support you need to embed vim inside Eclipse.


Duplicate songs in Apple Music after syncing Yesterday I switched from a PC to a MBP. I've been using Apple Music since it came out. I synced my phone and today I noticed many songs are duplicated, or extra songs I have deleted before are back on my phone, but all of those songs are grayed out and unplayable. The only option I get when I tap on it is to add it to a playlist or delete the song.

I can still play all my original songs, but the broken songs take up a lot of screen space. How can I get rid of these songs without manually deleting them all?

You can make iTunes detect duplicate songs by going to View -> Show Duplicate items and delete your duplicate songs from here.

If some of the songs you have haven't been downloaded for offline play, you can also click in View -> Only Music Available Offline to show only the songs that you've downloaded on your system.


Does erasing Macintosh HD then restoring from Time Machine result in the HDD being reformatted? I recently had a problem with the Macintosh HD that could not be repaired using the disk utility so I erased the disk (using disk utility) then restored from time machine (most recent backup)

Does this result in the HDD being reformatted or could any potentially bad disk areas be reused inadvertently?

Klanomath's procedures are 100% correct if it's a hard drive.

I use a tool named Scannerz to evaluate drives and it's extremely conservative. If you find bad blocks their procedures are pretty much exactly what Klanomath described, except it will be quite evident how extensive the damage is during testing. SMART technology only finds bad sectors if a write attempt to them has been made and fails. If there's a lot of damage on the drive and it's never been used because it's in free space, SMART will never know about it but Scannerz will pick it up. Zeroing the drive as described will force sector reallocation, and if the supply of spares is exhausted, the operation will fail.

If it's a manufacturing oddity that yielded a few bad blocks, the drive can be recovered by reformatting as Klanomath described. If it's extensive, you could probably partition the bad areas out but that's a risk I wouldn't take. I know some people have done it with success, but you end up with a drive with multiple volumes where one likely existed before.

As far as SSDs go, ideally their drive management software is supposed to pull bad blocks when they're encountered during a write operation. Unfortunately, an SSD, like an HD can develop an odd block here or there that just fails while it's holding data. The problem here is a dilemma, because the people responsible for writing that code must ask themselves whether or not they should just yank a block right out of the middle of an existing file and replace it with a blank, or should they leave it in place, and let the user try to recover what they can from it. This problem is rare, but it can happen.

In any case, typically there are trim and garbage collection routines that an SSD uses that will (hopefully) automatically pull the bad blocks and correct them after a failed write operation. On some SSDs, these may occur while the system is in use, on others they may occur when there's a quiet time of a few minutes.

Steer clear of any tool that tells you it's going to take a bad sector and "repair" it. There's no such thing. That's a dishonest marketing trick that has it's roots back in the 1980's when drives were using MFM and developers could actually gain access to the drive directly, and even then, it was at best only sort of possible to do it. Those days disappeared with IDE when the controller was put right on the HD.  Scannerz, for example, has an option to re-map sectors, but a warning will flash up telling you not to do it and that any information in the bad block is already basically dead, and the manual has a warning about a page and a half long, once again, basically telling you not to kid yourself.


How can I tell when Safari on iPad is using HTTPS Safari hides the protocol part of the URL (HTTP or HTTPS) in the address bar.

When I'm purchasing something on the Internet, I like to check that I'm using HTTPS when entering credit card details or entering a username and password.

I don't seem to be able to do this when using Safari on my iPad.

There should be a padlock before the page title at the top of the screen when you're on an https page.


How to Remote into my Mac Mini Server from Outside my Network? I'm doing mobile development and program on a Windows development machine.  However, I need to reach the Xamarin Build Host on my Mac Mini OS X Yosemite server.  Is it possible to remote into this Mac from outside my network?  I have a fixed IP for the network, but need to know how to assign ports to the various machines on the network.

Port forwarding examples:

When you set port-forwarding on your router, you pick a port number (or range of ports) and a single local IP address, ie. port 5900 and Ip address 192.168.0.2. So any internet traffic coming in on port 5900 gets sent directly to the computer on the IP address 192.168.0.2.

Answered above, you've specified one of the IP addresses in the port forwarding. It will be the IP address you specified in the DHCP address reservations.
It's only as secure as your password. I'm sure that the password is encrypted before transmission back to your Macs.

You need to set up port forwarding in your Router.

Depending on your Router's make/model, the setup may vary, but the basics are the same regardless.

I would choose a port way north of 1 or 2.

Both computers will be listening on port 5900, so you'd set something up like:

85.85.85.85:15000 --> 192.168.0.99:5900

and

85.85.85.85:16000 --> 192.168.0.100:5900


Restoring data from Time Machine backup created on second Mac I have a desktop Mac and MacBook Air.

The MacBook Air has decided to die, so I want to restore the back up files in my Time Machine to my Mac desktop.

How do I do that?

It must be simple, but I can only get into the data for my Mac desktop.

⌥ alt/option-click the Time Machine icon in the menu bar and keep the key held whilst selecting Browse Other Backup Disks….

From there, you can select the other Mac and copy files.


In Mail, Cmd-Opt-Ctrl-F does something unexpected I would like to assign Cmd-Opt-Ctrl-F to flag an email item, but that combination in mail is already assigned somewhere, and I cannot find where that is.

It is not in System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts.
It does not seem to be on any of the Mail menus.

The action that it causes seems to be "position to a specific mail item in one of the folders".

So I deleted that mail item. Then Cmd-Opt-Ctrl-F did not do anything, so I thought. So I went into System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts and set it up.

Now when I press that combination, instead of flagging the item as desired, it positions to a different mail item in the same folder. And always that exact item.

Any ideas where Cmd-Opt-Ctrl-F is being assigned, and why it has such a weird action?

In Mavericks Mail:

The shortcut for Flag is shift- cmd - L to assign the Urgent Flag.

There is no Cmd-Opt-Ctrl-F in my Mail app.

However, if you try to add that shortcut in keyboard shortcut it will alert you if that short cut is used by someone else and show you by whom.


How can I cut off/block all traffic when I lock the screen (and resume when unlocking) in MacOS? Looking to block all network traffic anytime I am away from the computer. I tried putting the iMac to sleep every time I step away and changed the sleep mode to hibernation as well changed energy saving settings to disable network traffic and Wake on LAN, and Powernap is disabled, but my router reports that my iMac still is doing network communication after I put it to sleep.

I am looking to prevent this.

Any script I can run when I lock the computer?

[EDIT]

It seems I can run this command as a script:

/usr/libexec/ApplicationFirewall/socketfilterfw --setblockall on

The problem is it won't work unless I sudo it, and I don't want to have to put in a password every time I lock the screen so this script runs.

Is there any way around this short of removing the need to provide a password to sudo?

This is almost as fast as having a lock script. Basically, just turn your ethernet interface(s) off/on.

in a terminal run 'sudo -s'
before locking run 'ifconfig en1 down'
after unlocking run  'ifconfig en1 up'
leave the terminal open but just minimize it for later use

if you don't know which is your active interface, run ifconfig and look for the entry with an IP Address. In the example above, my WiFi interface is en1.
** if you have multiple interfaces just concatenate the command:
'ifconfig en1 down && ifconfig en2 down' …&etc as needed.


iOS: How to fix “Software Update Failed”? I am trying to update my iPhone to iOS 11.4.1. However, when attempting to check for software update, I am receiving the following error message:

How do I overcome this issue and install the software update?

This error can occur due to a variety of temporary issues. Make sure you have an active Internet connection. To install the software update, try the following approaches one by one:

Approach I: Wait for some time and try again

Software update download could fail due to Internet connectivity issues or an issue at the Apple's software update server end. Such issues are often temporary and get resolved automatically in a short while. Tap on Close button in the alert shown and try again after some time. You may also toggle Wi-Fi off and on before re-trying.

Approach II: Update via iTunes

If you have a Mac or a PC handy with iTunes installed and an active Internet connection, you can download the software update on the computer and install in on device. Connect your iPhone to the USB port via the Lightning cable and launch iTunes.

If this is the first time you are connecting the iPhone to this computer, the computer will ask for your permission to access the iPhone. You'll need to unlock the iPhone and will see and alert asking you to trust the computer. Trust the computer to process.

Select the device in iTunes, click on Summary and click on Check for Update button. iTunes will check with the software update server, download the update and install it onto the iPhone.

Approach III: Install the update manually with iTunes

If the above two approach fail to download the software update file, you can manually download the IPSW (iPhone Software) file and use it to install the software update.

Do note that this approach erases the device contents and sets it up as a brand new device. Only proceed with it after creating proper backups.

Head to ipsw.me website, choose your device, and download the signed IPSW. You should get a file with .ipsw extension. Once the file is handy, with the device connected, go to iTunes, select the device and click summary. Now press and hold the Option (Alt) key on the keyboard and click on Restore iPhone... button (shown in previous illustration). A file open window is shown. Browse to the location where .ipsw file was downloaded. Select the file and you are good to go. iTunes will start installing the firmware on the device.

Caution: Use this method only as a last resort, when the first two approaches fail and you absolutely need to update the software. Even after downloading the .ipsw file, you'll need an active Internet connection as iTunes will need to verify the .ipsw file signature with Apple servers.

Also, please note that this approach erases the contents of device. You may wish to backup your device prior to installing software via this approach and restore the backup later.


Facebook calendar exists, but won't display events in iOS 11.1 The Facebook calendar is checked (picture below), and while the events do appear on my laptop, they won't appear on my iPhone calendar.  I uninstalled Facebook and Messenger, then logged out of my gmail account to remove all calendars.  It was odd that when I did this, the Facebook calendar option stayed yet the rest left (second picture), but after reinstalling everything the events still won't show up.

On your desktop, Look in the right-hand pane on the Event page in Facebook. Find this section...

The last two links are webcal links which will let you subscribe via iCalendar on your Mac. Then, it will sync to your device if you have iCloud calendar sharing on. Roundabout, yes.


Wifi connection has password issue with my Macbook Pro I have a 2010 Macbook Pro (running Snow Leopard) and I connect to my home internet thru Wifi (via Thompson router).
The problem is, after I choose my Wifi from a list of Wifis and enter the password, majority of the times it fails to connect saying "Incorrect password", even though its correct. All I have to do is keep pressing the return key until a connection is established.
Very few times I get connected automatically without a need to enter the password and sometimes I get the connection on the first attempt, but usually it takes around 5-10 tries.
It doesn't happen to my Windows (vaio) laptop though.
Anyone seen something likely and got it fixed?

You could try 'Forget this network' in the Airport settings through System Preferences -> Network, then reconnect fresh again


After updating the emoji font in an older macOS, is there a way to visually find and insert newer emoji that the system emoji picker doesn't support? I just updated the emoji font on my macOS 10.14.6 system using the method detailed in this answer.
This seems to have worked great in that I can now view newer emojis that people send me, or that appear on web pages. However, the emoji picker in Mojave doesn't support these emoji, leaving me with no good way to type them, other than finding them in an existing document somewhere and using copy/paste.
Is there a way to update the emoji picker to include these new emoji? Or perhaps use an alternative emoji picker?
(I'm aware I could use text replacements in System Preferences / Keyboard / Text to type the emoji, but I strongly prefer to be able to find emoji visually, hence the specific wording in my question.)

All Emoji should show up when you use the expanded version of the Character Viewer. If you don't see Emoji on the list at the left, click on the gear wheel and then Customize to add it. You may also need to add the Unicode category and go to the range where the new Emoji are located (probably 1f300-1f900).


ScreenWakeUp for iPad 1 (iOs 5) Is there a software like ScreenWakeUp for an old iPad 1? Couldn't find on appstore

[EDIT] Jailbreak is an option.

You won't find anything like this on the App Store, since…

It's a service that restarts on boot (Android permission RECEIVE_BOOT_COMPLETED), which isn't possible on iOS without a jailbreak or without exceptions, and is disallowed on the App Store.

  2.8 Apps that install or launch other executable code will be rejected

It'd run in the background all the time, which can't happen due to iOS restrictions, and is disallowed on the App Store.

  2.16 Multitasking Apps may only use background services for their intended purposes: VoIP, audio playback, location, task completion, local notifications, etc.

It uses the Android permission DISABLE_KEYGUARD which doesn't exist on iOS since apps can't bypass or interact with the system in that way.

  2.6 Apps that read or write data outside its designated container area will be rejected

App Store Guidelines available at https://developer.apple.com/appstore/resources/approval/guidelines.html


How do I change my apple id country without a credit card? Man, what do i do?

This happened I don't have money in the account but my relative gave me some money but it's in USD and I am in India.

When I change my apple id country it says "give billing option".

It looks like your question is 2 fold:

  Can I accept an iTunes gift card from another country?
  Can I change my apple id country without providing a credit card?

Looks like in both cases it's a No.

1. Can I accept an iTunes gift card from another country?

From the Apple Forums

  You can't redeem it outside of the USA. You also can't change the
  iTunes Store country while any of its balance remains.

2. Can I change my apple id country without providing a credit card?

For this you can enter a credit card, but it's not charged unless you purchase an item from iTunes or the App Store.

There appear to be a bunch of different hacks around this, but nothing definite from my estimation.


Delete Flickr album from iOS app Is there any way I can delete an album from the official iOS Flickr app?

I found the solution. You have to remove all the photos from the album you want to delete.


Why won't iPhoto open after upgrading to Lion? So, I just downloaded and installed Lion on my iMac. However, I did so on a separate clean partition, and saved Snow Leopard on the other. So, in Lion, I tried to open iPhoto on my Snow Leopard partition, and it crashed. Here's the error message:

com.apple.iPhoto: dyld: Library not loaded:      /Library/Frameworks/iLifeFaceRecognition.framework/Versions/A/iLifeFaceRecognition

Any help would be appreciated!

I had the same problem and I fixed it. It's really a iPhoto 9.1.5, Time Machine backup/restore and Lion upgrade issue.

To fix my problem I:

Delete my iPhoto Library on my HD
Restore the latest iPhoto Library from Time Machine
Delete iPhoto software
Reinstall iPhoto with my iLife 11 DVD
Start iPhoto, but it asked me to upgrade from Internet. I did.
With iPhoto 9.1, I started it and bingo, the issue is fixed.
After a few tests, I did another software update to have the latest iPhoto version, 9.1.5

I tried many things the past two days, but only the steps described here worked.

Hope it will help you.

Serge


Are there any way I can have a Dashboard Widget visible all the time on the desktop? A thing that I like with Windows 7 is that I can have the gadgets (widgets) open and visible all the time, e.g. a small RSS reader in the corner of the desktop.

I would like to be able to have a small RSS reader in the corner of my Mac OS X desktop too. I already use a RSS reader as Dashboard widget, but I have to press F12 every time I want to chek it. Are there any way I can show the widgets all the time while I'm working in other applications? I haven't used the Dashboard that much before.

You can drag a widget outside the "screen" it appears in, if you enable the debugging mode for the Dashboard.

Open a Terminal window, and execute the following command: defaults write com.apple.dashboard devmode YES
log out, and log in back
press the key-combination that in your Mac shows the Dashboard
grab the widget you want to take off from the Dashboard, and drag it
press the key-combination that you used to make the Dashboard appear
drop the widget when you want to place it

Alternatively, there are some utilities that enable it for you; I cannot report you which ones are, though.


Script to check Software Version Hi i'm tryin to write a script to check software version.  I want to pass my own variables, which are name of the Application and Version.

Here's a copy.  It's not working for me currently... i'm a noob and i'm pretty sure it has to do with syntax.

Any input is appreciated.

Thanks,
Paul

#/bin/sh

#Enter the Name of the Application here
ApplicationName=/Applications/FakeApp.app
ApplicationVersionNumber=1.0
echo $ApplicationName

#Check if Directory Exist
if [ ! -d $ApplicationName ]; then
            echo $ApplicationName "is not installed"
            exit 123456
fi
echo $ApplicationName " is installed"

# Check Version
VersionCheck=`cat $ApplicationName/version.plist | grep $ApplicationVersionNumber`
echo $VersionCheck
if [ ${#VersionCheck} != 0 ]; then
echo $VersionCheck
echo $ApplicationName $ApplicationVersion Number "is Installed"
exit 0
fi
echo $ApplicationName $ApplicationVersion Number "is NOT Installed"

exit 1

There is really only one syntax mistake that you made. You put a space before Number in $ApplicationVersionNumber. Most apps don't have a version.plist file, but they always have the version in their Info.plist.

Here is a fixed version of the script with a few improvements:

#!/bin/sh

ApplicationName=/Applications/FakeApp.app
ApplicationVersionNumber=1.0
echo $ApplicationName

#Check if Directory Exist
if [ ! -d $ApplicationName ]; then
    echo "$ApplicationName is not installed"
    exit 123456
fi
echo "$ApplicationName is installed"

# Check Version
VersionCheck=`plutil -p "${ApplicationName}/Contents/Info.plist" | grep "CFBundleShortVersionString.*$ApplicationVersionNumber"`
echo $VersionCheck
if [ ${#VersionCheck} != 0 ]; then
    echo "$ApplicationName $ApplicationVersionNumber is Installed"
    exit 0
fi
echo "$ApplicationName $ApplicationVersionNumber is NOT Installed"
exit 1

It uses plutil -p instead of cat, since plutil can print out a nice, readable version of the plist even if it isn't in XML form.
It greps for the key (CFBundleShortVersionString), .*, and then the value. This is better because you don't want it to trigger on things like LSMinimumSystemVersion.
I also added more quotes because I like quotes and things are (usually) less likely to break that way.

I would have written it like this:

#!/bin/bash
app_path="$1"
desired_version="$2"

#Get the line, regardless of whether it is correct
version_line=$(plutil -p "${app_path}/Contents/Info.plist" | grep "CFBundleShortVersionString")
if [[ $? -ne 0 ]]; then
    version_line=$(plutil -p "${app_path}/Contents/Info.plist" | grep "CFBundleVersion")
    if [[ $? -ne 0 ]]; then #if it failed again, the app is not installed at that path
        echo "$app_path not installed at all"
        exit 123456
    fi
fi
#Some text editing to get the real version number
real_version=$(echo $version_line | grep -o '"[[:digit:].]*"' | sed 's/"//g')
if [ "$real_version" = "$desired_version" ]; then
    echo "$app_path $desired_version is installed"
    exit 0
fi
echo "${app_path}'s version is $real_version, not $desired_version"
exit 1

The advantage of this is it checks the actual version string, so if you put 1.3 and it's 1.3.1, it reports that it is a different version. $1 and $2 are the command-line arguments that are passed like ./script.sh '/Applications/FakeApp.app' '1.3'

Also, the other would count as correct on 1.1 for 121 because grep counts the . as a wildcard.


Photos app (iPhoto) hangs when trying to open Ive got a mac mini running OSX 10.10.5. I use the built in "Photos" app (formally iPhoto) to manage photos i take on my iPhone, which are synced back to the Photos app via iCloud.

Recently when i open the Photos app it just hangs on this screen (see attached screenshot). Ive force quit the app and re opened it a few times and the same thing happens.

What can be done to get it to work ?

The first thing I would try before doing anything else is giving the Photos Library Repair Tool a go.

The Photos Library Repair Tool can resolve a number of issues as it analyses the entire database and, where possible, makes repairs.

Follow these steps:

Hold down the Option + Command keys as you open the Photos app
The following message will appear:

Click the blue Repair button to repair your Photos Library.


Why do Downloaded Google Maps expire after 29 days? I am assuming when the map expires, that I am SOL if I try to use it.

Within the Google Maps app, one can download maps for offline use: great when traveling abroad, especially when there is no connectivity.  What is the reason for having the maps expire after such a short time span?  Is there a way to increase the number?  It's odd in the sense expiration is 29 days and not a round number.

There hasn't been any info from Google as to why the maps expire in 30 days.

A theory postulated in this Android SE site states

  ...I'd say it's highly likely that this time limit is related to contractual limitations at least in some areas. Kindof like how iTunes rentals expire, or Spotify Premium offline playlists expire: if there was no expiry date at all, then there's no difference between 'accessing' and effectively 'permanently buying for free/cheap'.

I also guess that Google wants to refresh the business list in the downloaded map data.  They charge businesses to advertise (not appear) in Maps and so they have an interest in keeping the downloaded data 'fresh'. <-- my $0.02


How can I move files by USB between a version 6.1 iPod Touch and a Linux machine? I've recently dug out my old 5th Gen (A1421) model iPod Touch and put it back to factory settings. It's currently running version 6.1 (10B141) of its OS. I don't want to find that a software update has broken it one day, so my goal is to keep it offline as much as possible (specifically, Airplane Mode) and have it only talk to my PC, a Xubuntu 20.04 Linux machine. In line with this goal, I've never linked it up with any sort of iTunes software or Apple account.
It was my hope that with the iPod set up as above, I would be able to connect it by USB to my PC and transfer files as I pleased. My goal is to use it to play mp3s. After all, Linux typically ignores whatever file system visibility restrictions that the connected device is trying to enforce. Now that I've tried that, my PC is only reporting that two devices exist: "iPod", contained only an empty DCIM folder, and "Documentes on iPod touch", containing nothing. When I try to move files to either of these, I either get an error message saying that a file doesn't exist or an error message saying that a directory doesn't exist. Unlocking the iPod does not change this, and the iPod does not seem to respond at all to anything that I'm doing on the PC, other than trying to charge its battery from my machine.
So, given my goals, what can I do to be able to move files between the two devices? Could anything that I've done, such as putting the iPod in Airplane Mode, be to blame for my difficulties? I have managed to use ifuse to get new files on to the iPod, but the iPod itself shows no signs of recognizing them.

TL;DR — Try GtkPod. If no luck, install the latest version of libimobiledevice and try Rhythmbox. You may need to bootstrap the process using iTunes. You may be completely out of luck with a 5th-generation iPod Touch.
iPods and iOS devices use a proprietary database-style design, with seemingly arbitrarily named files scattered around the filesystem; not a simple artist/album/track hierarchy of audio files like you probably have on your computer. You will not be able to achieve what you want just by using a file explorer. What you're looking for is a drop-in replacement for iTunes, software which understands how the iPod handles music files. Back in the the day, YamiPod was a very good option (I personally used it on Windows Me, since iTunes only supported XP onwards), and GtkPod is still a popular choice for Linux users of older devices, but both now appear to be unmaintained.
Most music library managers and players for Linux, such as Rhythmbox, have implemented iPod syncing (music only), so I'd try using that, but YMMV. For a larger list of such software, see Comparison of iPod file managers on Wikipedia (though do note that some of the info there about what supports what seems to be outdated).
Under the hood, most apps that support interacting with iPods and iOS devices, including Rhythmbox, use libimobiledevice, which is an impressively feature-rich API. Unfortunately, there is a clear lack of user-friendly software that takes full advantage of it (beyond music syncing). The library is probably available in your distro's repos, but they may not have the latest version; ensure you have the latest version installed if syncing in Rhythmbox doesn't appear to be working. It doesn't have support for the latest devices/iOS versions (indeed, their FAQ emphasises the lack of full support, but doesn't go into detail about what specifically is and isn't supported), but I believe there is good support at least up to iOS 6.1.2, so it's worth a shot.
If none of that works, or if you want to explore additional functionality, take a look at the Debian article on the subject.


Working with two screens Sometimes I connect my MacBook to my TV to watch a movie. I don't use screen mirroring, but have the TV arranged above the Display of the MacBook. Dragging a window with the touchpad to the TV screen is easy enough, but I don't like the user experience. Is there a way to manage my windows with key combinations? Thus, is there a key combination to move a window from one screen to another?
If I could arrange windows between screens with Mission Control that would also be great; but as far as I can tell Mission Control is limited to the current screen. Thus, I found no way of moving a window from one screen to another using Mission Control.
Also I would like the Dock to always stay on my MacBook Display. Usually it does, but often enough it vanishes only to appear on my TV screen. Is there a way to control this on macOS Mojave 10.14.6?

The dock will stay on the primary display if you disable 'Displays have separate Spaces' in Mission Control prefs. This will also enable all the settings below to work seamlessly, rather than fighting with what Spaces you have frontmost on each display.
If you use VLC for playback - which I'd highly recommend as being a) free, b) really easy to use but c) with lots of really complex options if you really need them -  you can set it to open in its own fullscreen method, which ignores the macOS native fullscreen, which otherwise will automatically black out the other screen. You can also dictate which display to open the playlist & the playback video on.
This means you can use the laptop screen for your playlist & the TV for the movie.
There's a lot you can do if you juggle these options. It's worth a few minutes messing with them to see what suits you. [You usually need to re-launch it for these to kick in.]

Set as above will hide the playlist as you start playback. Disabling the first option will allow you to keep them separate if you want. Disabling native fullscreen stops the OS from blacking one display [unless you specifically enable it on the right] & making a new Space [both of which I find infuriating… yet another reason I never use Apple's fullscreen.]
If you're using this setup for movie playback, I think this will remove any need to be dragging windows from screen to screen at all.
Set & forget.
The only downside I've ever found with VLC is that it forgets your current playlist if you quit/relaunch/reboot. It will remember current playback position inside any one file, once you reload your playlist, but not which was playing. It's not like most Mac apps in that respect.  For everything else, it pretty much 'just works'.


How to use (home) brew install python 3.6.5_1 I am trying to install python 3.6.5_1 using Homebrew by running the following:

$ brew install https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core/f2a764ef944b1080be64bd88dca9a1d80130c558/Formula/python.rb

I am getting the following error:

Error: python contains a recursive dependency on itself: python depends on sphinx-doc sphinx-doc depends on python

How do I deal with it?

You can use --ignore-dependencies:

brew install --ignore-dependencies https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core/f2a764ef944b1080be64bd88dca9a1d80130c558/Formula/python.rb


Determining OS X version from Time Machine backup I have Time Machine backups from my iMac Early 2008 (20"). Can I determine from those backups what OS X version was running on the machine at the time of latest backup?

Just open the file

/Volumes/BackupVolumeName/BackupName.ext/ComputerName/latest/VolumeName/System/Library/CoreServices/SystemVersion.plist

to determine the product version ("latest" is a sym-link).

BackupName.ext, BackupVolumeName, ComputerName and VolumeName are all variable and depend on the type of backup or the names configured/given to your backup volume, Mac and main system volume. BackupName.ext is often Backups.backupdb though.

Here is my SystemVersion.plist (it's the original file and not a file in a  backup) opened in PlistEdit Pro. You may also open it with an arbitrary text editor or Xcode:


Does iOS simulator in Xcode allow AppleID sign in? I am interested in using iCloud for Windows for syncing bookmarks between Windows browsers (as a replacement for Xmarks, which is shutting down). I installed iCloud for Windows and used my AppleID to log in, but it said I needed to first use an iOS device. I do not have an iPhone or iPad, nor intend to have, so maybe the iOS simulator in Xcode could be enough for this purpose of mine. So my question is: does Xcode's iOS simulator allow me to sign in my AppleID account? Or does it work "offline", account-free?

Yes, it is possible to sign-in to iCloud via iOS Simulator. Simply launch the Settings app and click on Sign in to your iPhone to log into iCloud.


What is the difference between an "iOS App Development" certificate and an "In-House and Ad Hoc" one? I am a member of my employer's corporate Apple account, and I am building a test app. To get it deployed, I created an "iOS App Development" certificate, after registering my device's UDID as required, and that all works fine.

Now, searching Stack Overflow and other places, I find information like to install to a second device I can just plug the new device in and copy across from XCode, without using up another of my 100 device registrations. Furthermore, an "In-House and Ad Hoc" certificate will allow me to share the app throughout the enterprise.

However, there are still a number of questions outstanding:

Does the iOS App Development certificate give me any extra rights on my registered device?
Does the iOS App Development certificate give me any extra rights on unregistered devices?
Do I actually need an iOS App Development certificate, or will an In-House and Ad Hoc one do everything I need?
Does an In-House and Ad Hoc certificate have no technical install limitations, just the legal force of the user agreement?

Source of everything I'm about to say: iOS developership.
First of all...
You can not deploy a development app on a second device without using another one of your 100 devices. You just can't.
Now, the list of questions.

Yes, you can run development apps that haven't been signed with a distribution certificate.
No. The development cert may only be installed on registered devices.
Yes, if you are serious about development. You could get by with only an ad-hoc cert, but it would be cumbersome, and you wouldn't be able to use hugely helpful Xcode debugging features like Breakpoints and logging.
I don't know, but I would assume so.


Unable to resize last partition on external drive I have a 2 TB external USB drive partitioned into 3 "drives." Two are ~500 MB, the third ~1 GB. I have lots of spare space in the middle partition, so wanted to make it smaller and give that space to the third partition.

I was able to resize the middle partition smaller using Yosemite's Disk Utility. However, when I tried to enlarge the partition that was "last", i.e., the bottom of the partition diagram, to give it the now unallocated space, the sizing handle was at the bottom of the diagram and couldn't move down and I couldn't drag the start of the partition up in the diagram.

Can you only make a partition "longer" and not move the start or "head" of a partition? That's all I could think, but was unable to find any documentation on this. There is a box where you can enter a size value for the partition, but I was too chicken to try it without asking here first.

Thanks.

In Disk Utility a 2 TB disk with three partitions (2x500 GB & 1x1 TB) looks like this:

In Terminal and using gpt you will get the following output:

sudo gpt -r show disk3
       start        size  index  contents
           0           1         PMBR
           1           1         Pri GPT header
           2          32         Pri GPT table
          34           6
          40      409600      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
      409640   976562504      2  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
   976972144      262144
   977234288   976562504      3  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
  1953796792      262144
  1954058936  1952044320      4  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
  3906103256      262151
  3906365407          32         Sec GPT table
  3906365439           1         Sec GPT header

The partition with the index number 2 is Volume1, index number 3 is Volume2 and finally index number 4 is Volume3. The 262144-block areas of unallocated disk space are standard Apple partitioning policy.

After resizing the second partition to 250 GB Disk Utility shows the following:

and gpt ...

sudo gpt -r show disk3
       start        size  index  contents
           0           1         PMBR
           1           1         Pri GPT header
           2          32         Pri GPT table
          34           6
          40      409600      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
      409640   976562504      2  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
   976972144      262144
   977234288   488281248      3  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
  1465515536   488543400
  1954058936  1952044320      4  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
  3906103256      262151
  3906365407          32         Sec GPT table
  3906365439           1         Sec GPT header

Expanding the fourth partition (Volume3) would require to move its first block (1954058936) to lower block numbers e.g. block 1465777680.

This can't be done with on-board tools like Disk Utility or command line tools like diskutil. 3rd party tools like iPartition or Stellar Partition Manager are capable of doing this though.


How do i get the quotation mark on ipad pro with logitech keyboard? When i want to type ", i get «» instead. And it shoes the quotation mark on the keyboard being on number 2, but it´s the double arrow instead. How do i fix this? Nordic layout btw.

Go to Settings/General/Keyboard and turn Smart Punctuation OFF.


How do I get Finder windows to reopen on start up? I just got my new computer with system 10.7.2 and this is really bugging me. I like having a few Finder windows always open. When I shut down and then start up my computer the next day, all the windows I had opened in the Finder are closed save one. It always just has a single Finder window open. If I have 5 windows open when I shut down, I want all 5 of them open the next day. How do I make this happen? I can't stress this enough. The windows won't stay opened on restart.

In the general preferences I have the "Restore windows when quitting..." button checked. When I shut down, the "Reopen windows when logging back in" button always remains checked. I can find no other mention anywhere regarding windows maintenance and it's driving me nuts! This should be a no-brainer but I can't find any way of correcting this situation. It seems everywhere I look on-line, people are having the exact opposite problem.

There might be several answers to that.

Your restore for finder could be corrupted somehow. Delete the ~/Library/Saved Application State/com.apple.finder.savedState and give it a try
Your finder app may be configured NOT to restore the windows. Try this: defaults write com.apple.finder NSQuitAlwaysKeepsWindows -bool true

Does your other apps have the same behaviour? Have you tried with another username to see how it goes?

Sources:

http://osxdaily.com/2011/07/17/delete-specific-application-saved-states-from-mac-os-x-10-7-lion-resume/
http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20110722125937252


What should I look for when buying a used Macbook Pro? I had been a Windows guy for a decade and I am planning to buy a used Macbook Pro (2009 model).  What should I look for and check when buying a used Macbook Pro?

Beyond visual inspection, you should be able to run Apple Hardware Test in order to check the system hardware's working condition.


How can I login iChat with my Apple ID? I have 2 apple ID. All of them are not mac.com or me.com account. I didn't know about them hone making the accounts. However, now I can't login with my apple ID on iChat. I have been used Google Talk account, but it has too many features not supported. I want full featured iChat experience (support all iChat features including file transfer, group chat, video chat...). What should I do?

If both people are using iChat, all the features will work over Jabber, but you are out of luck if both people are not using iChat.

The MobileMe/.Mac sign in, when I used it anyway, used AOL’s OSCAR protocol used for AIM and ICQ (you should still be able to sign in with an ICQ account by treating it as an AIM account) due to an old and separate deal between Apple and AOL, so MobileMe users can talk to AIM and ICQ users without a gateway and vice versa. Still, even talking to them, the feature ratio between AIM clients and iChat is not 1:1, so some things would probably still break, iChat Theater if nothing else anyway, unless the other party was also using iChat.

So for a full featured iChat experience, send free Macs to all of your friends. Instant Messaging clients have shaky interoperability at best beyond basic text messages, which is unfortunate. As an alternative, I can recommend Skype which works on multiple platforms, and I find it also has better audio quality than iChat (both are quite crashy for me with audio chats and screen sharing though). There is also FaceTime which IIRC does use your Apple ID, but will only work for people using Macs, iPhones and iPads.


What is the equivalent of netsh wlan hostednetwork on MacOSX? With Windows is is possible to setup a netsh wlan hostednetwork even if the computer is already using a wlan connection for itself. However, a Mac's inbuilt Internet Sharing functionalities only support generating a wlan from a wired connection. What application/settings can I use to construct a wlan hostednetwork the same way it is done on Windows?

I think this is not possible. What do you try to archive? If you have the login credentials for the network your first mac uses, you could use those on any other device to connect to the wlan. The only thing I could think of is using a mac as a repeater. Questions regarding this were answered at: MacBook as WiFi extender and Macbook Pro as a wireless bridge? (Private hotspot from external wifi connection)

tl;dr: It is not possible. one solution is to use another external wifi card via usb.


How can I fix NXDOMAIN error? I have recently moved my blog to another hosting company.
The problem is that I cannot access my blog from my macbook pro although at the same time I can see it from my sony vaio.
Going at the terminal and running : nslookup blog.myblogname.org I get the following results:

Server: xx.xx.x.xxx
Address: xx.xx.x.xxx#53

** server can't find blog.myblogname.org: NXDOMAIN

(Server is my isp's domain name server)

Any ideas how to fix that error so that I am able to access my blog from my macbook pro?
Thank you!

PS : My operating system is MAC OS 10.7.4

Try using dscacheutil -flushcache in the terminal on the Mac.


Manually add location to a photo in iPhone, without Mac I have taken some pictures with my iPhone 6 when the localization functionality was deactivated. Now, I'd like to manually add the location to these pictures, to let them appear in the map of the Photo app.
But I don't know how to do it. I read many posts regarding the Photo application on Mac, but unfortunately I don't own a computer running Mac OS.

Location data is stored in EXIF data structures embedded in pictures, EXIF editors are available in the App Store, just search for „EXIF“. Exif Editor & Viewer seems to be a likely candidate.


Getting the file path of a currently playing iTunes track with Applescript I've got an Applescript program that works really well for getting most of the info of a currently playing track into a series of named variables:

tell application "System Events"
    if application process "iTunes" exists then
        tell application "iTunes"
            set state to player state
            if state = playing
                tell current track
                    set theArtist to artist
                    set theTitle to name
                    set theAlbum to album
                    set theTime to time
                    set theGrouping to grouping
                    set theGenre to genre
                    set theKind to kind
                    set theYear to year
                    set theComments to comment
                    set playCount to played count
                    set theTrack to track number
                    set numTracks to track count
                    set theDisc to disc number
                    set numDiscs to disc count
                    set bitRate to bit rate
                end tell
            else
                set state to "none"
            end if
        end tell
    else
        set state to "none"
    end if
end tell

But I'm completely baffled on how to get actual file path of the current track. The Applescript library for iTunes has a "file track" entry that has a "location" item, but I haven't been able to figure out how to use it in this context. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

You don't need System Events, iTunes can tell if it's running or not.

Also, set the properties of current track to a variable and then get the info from the variable. The reason for this is you make only one lower level call (properties of current track) and then the assigning of the other variables gets the info from a variable containing all the info, and not making 15 separate lower level calls to get the info,  This should be faster and more efficient code.

tell application "iTunes"
    if running then
        set state to player state
        if state = playing then
            set trackProperties to (properties of current track)
            set theArtist to artist in trackProperties
            set theTitle to name in trackProperties
            set theAlbum to album in trackProperties
            set theTime to time of trackProperties
            set theGrouping to grouping in trackProperties
            set theGenre to genre in trackProperties
            set theKind to kind in trackProperties
            set theYear to year of trackProperties
            set theComments to comment in trackProperties
            set playCount to played count in trackProperties
            set theTrack to track number in trackProperties
            set numTracks to track count in trackProperties
            set theDisc to disc number in trackProperties
            set numDiscs to disc count in trackProperties
            set bitRate to bit rate in trackProperties
            try
                set thePath to POSIX path of (get location of current track)
            on error
                set thePath to "Not playing from local library."
            end try
        else
            set state to "none"
        end if
    else
        set state to "none"
    end if
end tell


What's a way to run an automator/bash/applescript command right when a laptop starts charging and right when it stops being charged? I'm trying to automate running a background application only when my laptop is charging to save battery.

So it will launch when I plug the laptop in, and quit when I take it out.

You can do that very easily using ControlPlane, a free (open-source) application:

  ControlPlane, a fork of MarcoPolo, brings context and location sensitive awareness to OS X. With ControlPlane you can intelligently reconfigure your Mac or perform any number of actions based on input from a wide variety of evidence sources [...]

from: https://github.com/dustinrue/ControlPlane

You can very easily add a "power source rule" which then launches or quits an application or script. As you can see in the attached screenshots, it's very easy to set-up.


Is there any podcast App that allows to listen to episodes chronologically, starting at episode 1? I can not figure out what's the correct settings to be able to listen to podcast episodes from day 1, in the chronologically order, automatically.

Let's say that I've just discovered an interesting podcast. So nice that I want to listen to every episodes from day 1. What I want is to always have for instance 2 or 5 unread podcast episodes on my phone. I want to have 6,7,8 when I have already listen to 1,2,3,4,5. But not the freshly released 150th.

Can anyone help me with it? It's seems to be really basic, but I have not yet succeeded to set any podcast prefs right until now, and I've to add episodes manually...

EDIT : If there is no way to do it, is there an alternative App that does it ?

EDIT 2 : Since it's an old question that I'm still want an answer to : is there any new app that permit a chronological listening of the episodes?

In settings for the podcast .
Choose to sort and play the podcasts from oldest to newest

Do not limit episodes. You will end up with all episodes

If syncing from iTunes you should be able to choose the x oldest podcasts in iTunes settings but the syncing is unreliable


Setting the default calendar in iOS? In the calendar app (iCal?) in iOS, is it possible to set a default calendar?  Every time I go to add a scheduled event when I am at work, it picks the wrong calendar to add it to, and if I could just set a default I could save alot of time on that.

Settings -> Mail Contacts Calendars - > Calender -> Defaultcalendar


Can I use an iPad effectively without a computer to dock it to? I'm interested in buying an iPad, but I'm trying to understand what the implications are of not synchronise/docking it with a computer. I only have Linux (Ubuntu) machines these days; I have nothing running Windows or MacOS. As far as I understand, there is no official support for Linux (I am aware of libimobiledevice, but would like not to rely on it).

I'm used to my HTC Desire, which is able to synchronise most things I care about (IMAP, Google Mail, Google Calendar being three key ones) over the air, and I'd like to work this way with the iPad. When folks speak about the iPad, there seems to be a lot of talk of docking it with the computer, but I'm not clear why this would be needed/desirable. Can iPad apps typically sync over the air? I've seen reference to MobileMe, but that implies that this facility is not built in and may cost extra.

What do I lose by not docking/syncing the iPad to a computer? Can I do that - buy it and use it indefinitely without docking it? Will I lose any major functionality?

Thanks.

If you get a 3G iPad, I think the 3G data plan has to be activated through iTunes.  If you get Wi-Fi-only iPad, this isn't an issue.

Note that you can probably get by if you have a friend with a Mac or PC who will let you sync once in a while for these rare needs.

Syncing is also useful for these needs:

Backup
Transferring photos (although you can e-mail them instead)
Syncing calendar and contacts
Getting music, videos, and books from iTunes Music Store (you can d/l songs over the air, but I think the other media types have to be done through desktop)

But if you don't need those areas of functionality (and many people won't), then you won't miss syncing.  Basically, if you don't expect to use Apple's built-in apps, you won't need sync.

MobileMe is really only useful if you have a Mac or PC.  It makes it easy to sync calendar and contacts across multiple machines over the air.  A few third-party apps use it as well, but not many.

Third-party apps typically sync over the air, because Apple's sync is not very open to third-party developers.

FWIW, since getting my iPad, the only time I turn on my MacBook is when I want to backup/sync purchases or charge my iPad.  I'm not saying that the iPad is a complete substitute for a laptop, but it is definitely a useful device all by itself.


Existing mail viewer window doesn't open when I click on Mail App dock icon I have minimised a mail viewer window to the dock. When I click the Mail icon (to the left of the dividing line) it does not bring the viewer window up. I have to click on the actual viewer window (to the right of the line) to see the window and mail messages. This is new, reverts to normal if I close mail and restart, but soon reverts. Any suggestions please?

I had this problem but it went away when I removed mail from the dock and then docked it again.

Right click icon, select options, uncheck "Keep in Dock"

Right click icon, select quit

Then start mail from Finder>Applications and recheck "Keep in Dock" from the icon that reappears in the dock


Is it possible to connect two iMacs via Thunderbolt 3 cable? Is it possible to connect two iMacs via Thunderbolt 3 cable and what capabilities does that provide if so?

I've three things in mind:

Very fast file transfers between the systems
Very fast screensharing/remote control of either system (not to be confused with using one iMac as a second display)
Access other web services running on the second iMac from the first

Is this possible?  I know all of those are possible via 1Gbps ethernet, but Thunderbolt 3 is much faster.  I don't yet have a second iMac to evaluate whether or not Thunderbolt 3 can be used in this way.

I just found information about how to network via Thunderbolt for two Macbooks.  I've yet to verify that it works for iMacs, but it seems reasonable to assume it will, and will perform significantly faster than ethernet networking.
See: https://9to5mac.com/2016/11/22/macbook-pro-thunderbolt-3-bridge-network-video/


Start from external disk only if connected to iMac I have Windows installed in external SSD; I can choose to start Windows 10 if I press option key and selected that external SSD.

Some days ago I was able to start Windows without having to select the drive, just by having the drive connected before switching on the iMac. If not connected macOS was started. This was very convenient.

Somehow the setting disappeared and I do not know how to bring it back.

Holding down the option key will involve the Startup Manager. If you hold down the control key before making your selection, then your selection will become the default. This works for both internally and externally installed operating systems.

If Windows on the external drive is the default and the external drive is not connected, then the firmware will search for another operating system to boot. The preference is to boot macOS on an internal drive.


Rename mail account? I hope this is not too obvious, but I would like to know if this is possible.  I made an email account without renaming it.  So it has the boring name Exchange.  How can I rename this email account on my iPad without deleting and re adding it?  I would rather not type all that info in again.

Go to Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars > Tap your Exchange account (for you, it will likely say Exchange) > Tap on your exchange email address (i.e. daniel@example.com) > scroll down to Description (past Username and Password), then enter the new name in there.


How to create a shortcut on the desktop to a selected folder In windows when right clicking a folder there is an option: send to -> desktop (create shortcut).

How can I do this on a Mac?

Start automator
Make new service
Set it to receive files and folders in finder
add the 'new aliases' command
it's set to desktop by default
save the service as 'send alias to desktop' and voila!

Now you have an extra option under the right click menu, and a service in the finder menu!


How to stop Windows firewall from blocking Bonjour hostname resolution I have Bonjour installed on my Windows 7 PC, and the installer appears to have poked all the necessary holes in the Windows firewall. However, I can't ping windows-pc.local from my Mac. If I completely disable the Windows firewall, I can. How do I configure Windows firewall to allow Bonjour hostname resolution?

Create a new Inbound Rule that allows traffic over UDP port 5353 in the needed security zones.

Step-by-step:

Open Windows Firewall Advanced Settings

Create a new rule in Inbound Rules

Under Protocols and Rules, choose Protocol Type > UDP and Specific Ports > 5353

Choose the appropriate security zones for your network. For more information on security zones, read the Microsoft documentation: How Windows Firewall with Advanced Security Works


How do I remove the WD Quick view icon in menu bar? I install some app from WD external Hard and it add some incon in my menu bar but I don't know how can I remove it, I try to drag it out of the system bar while holding the "command" key (but it didn't work for this type of icon) I also try to uninstall this app via CleanApp but I can't find it!

sorry because of my low reputation I can't post the image here. :(

For this particular app, WD provide an uninstaller. It should be in your Applications folder (look for "WD Quick View Uninstaller.app").

You will need to reboot before it is fully removed but it is disabled as soon as you run the installer (I was monitoring its network activity before and after).

It appears to be totally fine to remove it since it only provides information to the user rather than affecting any actual functionality of the drive. If your model of WD drive comes with a management console then all the information is apparently in there (this would be accessed via a browser. For a My Book Live it would be http://mybooklive.local/UI/ ).


MacBook Unidentified Sound My MacBook started making a weird sound a few weeks ago. It happens about every 10 minutes, and I don't know what is causing it. It's not the hardware. I know because if my computer is on mute, then I can't hear it. Here is a link to a video that plays the sound: https://youtu.be/nCEbk7zI3cs

I'm on a 2017 MacBook Pro running High Sierra.

How can I get this sound to go away?

I updated my OS version to Mojave, and it went away. I still have no idea what it was, but at least it's gone.


Image Capture doesn't recognize iPhone 4S Image Capture doesn't recognize iPhone 4S. I'm using OS X Mavericks and iPhone 4S 64 GB with latest iOS 7.1.2

iTunes detects the phone and can perform a backup. iPhoto and Image Capture do not see the phone at all.

I'm using an original Apple cable and the phone is not modded in any way.

If you have a lock screen password/code etc. then you first have to connect your iPhone to the iTunes on your computer. The two will then perform a handshake where you will unlock you phone and say Yes to a notification on your phone asking you whether or not to trust this computer.

As far as I'm aware, the issue that you were having is that Image Capture does not perform this required handshake, so the phone doesn't know to trust this computer until you connect it through iTunes. PS. You should only need to do this once, after that it should work without iTunes, but don't quote me on that.

As to why iExplore worked, I'm just guessing, but they've been known for finding really cool loop holes in iOS for years, so I wouldn't be surprised if this is just another sweet trick they found. Or most likely they just do the an iTunes-like handshake. ;)


What domain name is appended to a default Apple ID when created in OS X? Upon booting a MacBook Air for the first time (OS X, Version 10.8), I was prompted to create an AppleID. I selected a username and a default domain name was added automatically to this username.

I cannot recall what the domain name was. Does anybody know the default domain name?

The default domain name for new Apple ID's (or iCloud accounts) is @icloud.com. You can also use @me.com.


iPad Air - How to type exclamation point from the exclamation/comma key This has been bugging me for a while. While I see the exclamation point in the exclamation/comma key, there is no way to make that key type the exclamation point. What I am able to do with the key is to type comma and single quote with the key.

What am I missing? How can I make exclamation/comma key to type exclamation point.

Press ⇧,

Press the ⇧ shift key, then press the , comma key, which will insert a !.

This also works for the question mark above the .


iBooks - The file X couldn't be saved in the folder Y A few days ago, iTunes up and dumped every one of my ~300 books (PDFs, added manually from a source) — not any kind of warning or explanation, no upgrade I accepted, the sidebar item just vanished — and iBooks is refusing to recognize a single one of them. It managed to add a whole two, and in the process copied them to another location without my consent. I then created an alias to force iBooks to read from the appropriate location on an external drive. Such was the intent, in any case.

iTunes doesn't like it when ~/User/Music/iTunes/ is an alias. Automatic sorting of music goes one directory too high because of reasons. A stupid bug that was never fixed, and likely never will be. I can deal with that, but now I find that iBooks is completely broken in an identical scenario. Why should it care whether a directory is on the boot partition or a larger external drive?

The error in the title took a good five minutes to appear. I used Force Quit so as not to be required to manually close ~300 individual alerts, since "do this for all" is apparently outside the app design at this point.

So my question is this: How am I supposed to store my mountain of not-books on a portable HDD if the most obvious solution doesn't cut it?

Edit: Aliases and symbolic links are, for all intents and purposes, the same thing when used in this manner. iTunes cannot function properly with this configuration because reasons, and iBooks is even worse. Also because reasons. What else is there to do?

2 ideas...

1) Try using a symlink rather than an alias - http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/10433/symboliclinker is a freeware contextual menu plugin that saves you having to learn how to do it in Terminal.

2) Disable iTunes Prefs > Advanced > Keep iTunes Media folder organised.


How to update or downgrade my iPad 3 that has a jailbreak? I have iPad 3 (model A1416 Wi-Fi only). It was using iOS 5.1.1 and I have then jailbroken it.
Unfortunately I allowed the device to update automatically, and didn't save the SSH blobs or any other files to enable be to revert the OS back again.
After trying some restores, I now get the black screen that tells you to plug your USB cable and connect with iTunes.
iTunes says that I have the last update and no update button is available, only restore
I have download some IPSW files for iOS 5.1.1 and iPad 7.0.4, and if I try to restore with shift in windows and browse for IPSW files and extract it, I get an error that I need to check host files etc
I have downloaded many tools like iFaith and take SSH keys from Cydia for iOS 5.1.1 and trying to make an IPSW from that give me this message:

The provided apticket looks valid!
Although the apticket is valid, the set of blobs you selected are not supported in this build of iFaith.

So, I am unable to put either 5.1.1 or the latest iOS on my iPad - how can I fix this?

you can not use SHSH on this device. only ipad 1 or ipad 2, nothing newer. if you need to restore you'll be forced to the latest IPSW apple is signing for that device. at the moment this is 7.0.4 if it's an ipad 3.


iMac's built-in microphone doesn't work on Windows 8 I'm running an up-to-date copy of Windows 8 on my iMac via Boot Camp and apparently it doesn't like the built-in microphone. I tested it with Audacity and Teamspeak, both of them just record absolute silence.

My Mac is a late 2012 27" iMac and I have the latest version of Apple's Boot Camp drivers installed. Is there anything else I can do to make my microphone work with Windows?

Turns out I'm dumb. For some reason the upper slider was set to 0, effectively silencing the microphone. Setting it to 100 solved my problem.


Open With - Change All reverts back to original application CS5/CC I have just set up a Mac (10.8.4) with CS5 and CC.

By default all my Indesign files now want to open in Indesign Creative Cloud. If I Get Info of the file and choose Indesign CS5 and then select Change All, the selected app reverts back to Indesign CC.

If I don't choose Change All and just modify the one Indesign document the setting sticks. However I need to change all my Indesign/Photoshop files to open in the CS5 app.

I have tried rebuilding the launch services. But the default application still reverts to CC whenever I hit Change All.

Any ideas?

It's expected behaviour.

There is only one creator type shared by both versions, so the system will always choose the newest version.
You can probably see it better if you try to change it using RCDefaultApp. It will only offer the newest installed version of valid apps in the drop-menu for any file type.


Tried to do a complete fresh install of Sierra. "Permission Denied" when I go to Install So I wiped my computer at work using the disk utility. I went to install the OS again and when I select the drive and hit "install" I get "The operation couldn't be completed. Permission Denied"

When I search for this problem it looks like most people aren't reinstalling the OS and just installing a program so their issue seems to be they are not using an Admin account or what not.

With my issue I'm not exactly logged in to any account and don't know how to give myself permission.

Does anyone have any ideas to fix this issue?

Heres a link to a reddit thread I made where some one tried to help me out so you can see what I've tried. Theres also some more screen shots in that thread.

Edit: I should add that I tried restarting and holding CommandOptionRto do an Internet recovery but when do it takes me back to macOS Utility. I assume as soon as I and it goes to that progress bar which makes me unable to hold Command to choose a boot location. I do have macOS installer on a USB drive but again, when I restart and hold Option it does the progress bar. I do have another Mac and a Thunderbolt cable but I'm not quite sure of the process to use another computer to install the OS. I'll be searching that now.

This one should help it

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/7860429

Needed to erase and rename the Drive to Macintosh HD


How do I remount USB Flash Drive or SD card? I noticed that I could remount my USB hard drive through terminal after I eject it by typing diskutil list to find the drive and diskutil mountDisk /dev/disk"X"...

So I tried to do the same with my SD card and my USB flash drive but...after I eject them, I cannot find them anymore through diskutil list.

I suspect this is because they are not "drive" until the system determines them as drives...which happens automatically when you plug them in - and the system remove those drives from the USB interfaces/SD card interfaces after I eject them.

So, the question is, how do I manually determine these USB interfaces/SD interfaces as "drives" so I can remount them. Thanks.

There's a difference between unmounting and ejecting.
I'm not familiar with the CLI of diskutil, so I'll explain it using Disk Utility.app

When you have a mounted SD card you can unmount it by clicking the Unmount button in the Toolbar:

The SD card stays in the list, but it is faded out.
Then if you want to remount it again, just select the SD card and click Mount:


The Function (fn) key keeps bringing up Mission Control. How do I disable it? (fn) Function Key keeps bringing up Mission Control. How do I disable it? I have looked all around and have found no answers? any ideas?

I was able to replicate the problem. Here's what worked on my machine to fix it:

Go to System Preferences » Mission Control
Under Keyboard and Mouse Shortcuts, go to Mission Control.

If it's set to fn, set it to some other value (or the - at the bottom of the list to disable a keyboard shortcut for Mission Control).
If it's not set for fn, but fn keeps triggering it (which happened to me), change it to anything else, then change it back to the value you want it to have.

On my machine, that made fn stop triggering Mission Control.


Tags not associated in OS X I have tags assigned to my user created text file and it wouldn't show on finder.

I have assigned, Green icon / tag (renamed to environments) to associate a text file. Tag gets assigned good. Atleast thats what i see.

But when i click on the Green tag on the sidebar of the finder, to get all files associated with green, it does not work.

I did try restarting my Mac for the settings to take effect to no avail.

Image attached.

This is in relation to this question posted here.

Unknown tag in finder

Issued sudo mdutil -i on "/Volumes/External-SSD” and got back "Indexing and searching disabled.” for external HDD.
Defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -boolean true ; killall Finder (shows all file)
Go to hdd where indexing is not working. externalssd in my case. find locate .metadata_never_index & delete it.
sudo mdutil -i on "/Volumes/External-SSD” started spotlight indexing and indexes are created.
Tags working now.

This concludes that Tag functionality is dependant on spotlight and needs to be enabled.


Need Mac Numbers & Pages for Mojave I have a 2010 MacPro running Mojave. I've been trying to buy, copy, or steal copies of Pages and Numbers for hours just so I can work on a client's Pages file.
Why is this so hard?

Running on Mojave, a quick test of deleting Pages reveals that I cannot download the latest version from the App Store's main pages, but if I go to the list of "Purchased" apps in my Account, I can download a compatible version.

If you haven't already purchased (for the sum of 0) the iWork apps, then you likely can't download them on older OSes. It's well worth downloading them now, for the future!


My MacBook's external monitor is magnified When I initially got my MacBook, I connected my external monitor and it worked fine. Last night I disconnected it and when I connected them back together, the resolution on the external monitor was changed. The overall display is now magnified (for example as I'm writing this I have to scroll down to see this).

I tried to change the resolution settings in Preferences but this didn't help to change it back. So how can I set the resolution of the external monitor back to a sane state?

Maybe you accidentally magnified your screen using Universal Access's screen Zoom, it can survive display detects with out zooming back out. And it can be accidentially triggered via holding down the ⌘ key or some customizable key and then scrolling up or down with your mouse or track pad.

Look in System Preferences under the "Univeral Access" section.
Once there click on the "Seeing" tab. Is "Zoom:" on? If yes then continue.
Press ⌘ + ⌥ + - to zoom out.