How Does El Capitan Improve Application Load Times? One of the claims for El Capitan is that it improves load times for applications up to 40%, but has anyone identified what this actually means?

Are only specific applications affected? For example, have Apple only reduced the load times of their own apps by up to 40%? Or is there some new feature at work that allows applications to get into memory faster, or load shared libraries faster or what?

So, does anyone know how the claimed improvement is achieved? Should all apps be expected to load a bit faster (even if it's not the full 40%)?

I've been unable to find any technical details about what has been done in terms of performance, except that Metal now exists, but that shouldn't impact load times really.

Barring magic the only solution of load time should be to load an app in the background (completely or in part), so that it can load faster when called up by the user.  Obviously application developers can work on their app to make it load faster (like Libreoffice did) but this seems to be a completely different story. Preloading apps obviously has the disadvantage of taking up resources and it might only work with the apps bundled with the OS because these are the only apps that the OS developers can actually directly control.  In any case, an excellent question, and I am sorry I cannot provide more info.


how to delay the login items to start I use a program to deal with the contents in sd card on startup. But the problem is that the program always starts before I can see the sd card in the finder.  As a result, the program can't find the contents and can't run correctly. I think whether I can delay the startup time of a specified program in login items preference.

Make a simple bash script, that starts on startup instead:

#!/bin/bash
#Wait for however long you want:
sleep <num of seconds>
#Use the following if the program is a .app:
open -a /path/to/app/myApp.app
#Use the following if the program is an executable (not a .app):
/path/to/exec/theExec

Now, save the file to your documents folder as startupScript.bash.

Note: If you use textedit to create the file, hold down  shift  +  command  +  T  before saving it.

Open up "Terminal". Type:

chmod +x ~/Documents/startupScript.bash

Then open up System Preferences, and add the script to the login items tab.


Keynote Error Dialogue When Opening .pptx I opened keynote 7.3.1 on my Mac (10.12.6) and navigated to the Desktop to open a .pptx document.
This resulted in an error dialogue stating that it could not recognize that file format (.pptx).
What would cause this error and how could it be resolved?

Try to locate the .pptx file in Finder (instead of the Desktop), right click on it, then move the cursor onto Open with… and select Keynote to open the Powerpoint.

If that doesn't work let us know.


Delete a specific key value using the defaults delete command line tool Having the following .plist file:
/usr/bin/sudo /usr/bin/defaults read /Library/Preferences/com.apple.systempreferences.plist

{
    DisabledPreferencePanes =     (
        "com.apple.preference.general",
        "com.apple.preference.mouse"
    );
}

Using the defaults command line tool, if I want to delete for example only the com.apple.preference.mouse line from the plist how do I do that?

The output of the defaults command, in your OP, shows a single key, DisabledPreferencePanes, as an array with two elements. Unfortunately defaults cannot explicitly delete a single element in an array containing multiple elements, in this case com.apple.preference.mouse.
Since the target com.apple.systempreferences.plist file in /Library/Preferences only has the single key as an array, the entire file and thus the array can be overwritten without the target element in the array, e.g.:
    NOTE: This form of the command overwrites the entire target file.
sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.systempreferences.plist '{ DisabledPreferencePanes = ("com.apple.preference.general"); }'

If the target .plist file had other keys, you could overwrite just the target key, e.g:
    NOTE: This form of the command overwrites just the target array.
sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.systempreferences.plist DisabledPreferencePanes -array com.apple.preference.general

That said, I prefer to use PlistBuddy because a single element of the array can be deleted, e.g.:
sudo /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c "Delete :DisabledPreferencePanes:1" /Library/Preferences/com.apple.systempreferences.plist

In PlistBuddy, array items are specified by a zero-based integer index.

PlistBuddy can also be easier to use in a shell script where one could code it to find a target element of an array and delete it. This could not be done with defaults as it can only write (or overwrite) an array without the target element in it.

Notes:

System Preferences should be closed when modifying its releated .plist files.

Immediately after modifying the target file, in this use case, you need to terminate all occurrences of cfprefsd.

As one is owned by root you'll need to use sudo in Terminal, e.g.:
sudo killall cfprefsd

If you do not do this, the edited file may/will be overwriten by its original copy in memory, thus making the changes null and void.

cfprefsd will reload on its own afterwards.


OS X Mountain Lion: keyboard shortcut to move current window to another space In OS X Mountain Lion, is there a way I can assign a keyboard shortcut to move the active window to a specified space (or even the adjacent space if an arbitrary space can't be specified).

Ideally, the space to which the window is moved to, won't itself get activated in the process. That is, the window will simply disappear from the current space, while the current space won't itself change.

I am open to all options: AppleScript, objective C, tweaking with preferences etc.

Lack of this feature really gets in the way of the window management workflow!

You could use sizeUp.

sizeUp allows you to send the window to the next/previous space but also it has keyboard shortcuts for mounting a screen to the left or the right of a screen and sending it to the next/previous monitor.


Can you preview a song in iTunes Match before upgrading your local copy? I'm a bit pedantic over my library, in many ways. Clean album art, quality standards, tagging standards, etc. iTunes Match is a boon in many ways, but one problem concerns me.

I'm not entirely sold on the concept of acoustical audio matching, and I know my file tags occasionally differ enough that some parsers can't match based off song information alone.

That said, I've followed Jason Snell's instructions for a Match upgradable Smart Playlist, and I'm at the step where I'm about to delete all the files from my machine locally.

But I'm terribly concerned that I may lose a file due to incorrect identification, tagging, or some other issue that I haven't even considered yet.

Is it possible to preview the iTunes Match supplied version before I delete my local copy?

If you move all your songs that you are about to delete to a different directory, iTunes should no longer be able to find them, and you should be able to hear the matched version and inspect its encoding. If you regret it, it should just be to move the songs back to where they were.

Haven't tried it myself to test it with one or two songs first!


How can I make ctrl+right/left arrow stop changing Desktops in Lion? ⌃ Control+→ and ⌃ Control+← switches desktops.

I actually had this enabled in Spaces on Snow Leopard, but I'd like to turn this off because I use those key combinations when editing in Eclipse. How do I turn this off?

Go to System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts > Mission Control and change the settings for "Move left a space" and "Move right a space" or disable them completely.


Can iOS8 QuickType show suggestions in more than one language? With iOS8's new QuickType feature (predicting words you're likely to type, based on message context, learning frequently used words), is there a way to show predictions in the language of the message?

I'm frequently writing emails in English or German, depending on who I correspond with, and it would be nice if there was a way to have QuickType show suggestions based on the language I'm using in the email or message.

Yes, this is possible, although not automatically. There's currently no way for iOS to detect the language of the message, but you can use multiple keyboards to show predictions in a different language of your choice.

To do this, go to Settings > General > Keyboard > Keyboards. This screen shows a list of keyboards set up on the device. You can use the Add New Keyboard... link at the bottom of the screen to add additional keyboards. The keyboards are ordered by language and locale (e.g. English (Australia)) - and there's also the Emoji keyboard there, for adding smileys and other funny icons to your messages.

Depending on the keyboard, there might be multiple layouts (QWERTZ, QWERTY, AZERTY), which can be switched from the list of selected keyboards by opening the keyboard's details.

Once you have selected an additional keyboard, you will see a new globe icon at the bottom left of the keyboard. Pressing the globe icon will switch to the next keyboard, holding the icon for a moment will show all available keyboards, and will also allow to enable/disable the predictions.

Switching to the English keyboard will show predictions in English language, while switching to German will show predictions in German language. The Emoji keyboard doesn't show any preditions :-)


Is there a way to show the full path of a Samba share on a Finder window title? I mostly have the same folder name on different shares. These can get confusing after a while. So, is there a way to show the shared folder name and not the mount name on a Finder window title?

EDIT: I'm explaining on the below screenshot.

An easier way in the GUI is to right/ctl click the top (dark grey) area of the finder window, select "Customise Toolbar" and drag in the "Path" icon.

Clicking this with the desired folder highlighted will give the path.

You could then drag the folder / share into the list on the left to save as a bookmark and right/ctl click it to rename to something more meaningful to you. Thus not having to worry about the path in the future.

Another quick way to find the path is to drag the folder into a terminal window which will populate it with the mounted path.


Problem of installation xcode4 and then xcode3 I install Xcode4 first in the default path /Developer then I install Xcode3 in /XCode3 It seems that the installation was not completed because I can't see Xcode.app in /XCode3/Application. What should I do?

Update!
I noticed that while I'm installing Xcode3 in the window "Install Xcode and iOS SDK" in path of Custom Install the check box of Xcode Toolset under Essentials is disable with unchecked status. What should I do?

I think the way to have Xcode 3 and 3 is to install Xcode 3 first - it will be in /Developer. Then Xcode 4 install will move Xcode 3 to /Developer-old  and install Xcode 4 in /Developer. So in your case delete /Developer and start again.


Get specific version macports dependencies Some ports have several versions installed, for example:

sqlite3 @3.7.17_0
sqlite3 @3.8.0_0 (active)

How do I get dependencies per each of them?

$ port deps sqlite3@3.7.17_0
Full Name: sqlite3 @3.8.0.2_0
Library Dependencies: libedit
$ port echo depof:sqlite3 and version:3.7.17_0
$ port echo depof:sqlite3 and version:@3.7.17_0
$

No success at the moment.

P.S.: wanted the dependencies tag for this question.

That looks like either a bug or a limitation with the deps command to me. A quick look in the MacPorts Guide, and port help deps doesn't specify any such limitation, though that's not very conclusive.

I'm not sure if you should be able to see dependencies for different versions, though I can definitely see different dependencies for different variants.

I have two versions of boost installed (note the different python variants, but same version):

% port installed boost
The following ports are currently installed:
  boost @1.54.0_0+no_single+no_static+python27 (active)
  boost @1.54.0_0+no_single+no_static+python33

And I can check their dependencies independently by referencing them as portname@version+variants (version & variants being optional):

% port deps boost @1.54.0_0+no_single+no_static+python27
Full Name: boost @1.54.0_0+no_single+no_static+python27
Library Dependencies: zlib, expat, bzip2, libiconv, icu, python27

% port deps boost @1.54.0_0+no_single+no_static+python33
Full Name: boost @1.54.0_0+no_single+no_static+python33
Library Dependencies: zlib, expat, bzip2, libiconv, icu, python33

But I also have two versions of glib2 and pango installed at present:

% port installed glib2 pango
The following ports are currently installed:
  glib2 @2.36.4_0
  glib2 @2.38.0_0 (active)
  pango @1.34.1_1+x11
  pango @1.36.0_0+x11 (active)

Yet, likewise, cannot see the deps of the inactive versions:

% port deps glib2 @2.36.4_0
Full Name: glib2 @2.38.0_1
Extract Dependencies: xz
Build Dependencies:   libxml2
Library Dependencies: gettext, libiconv, zlib, libffi, perl5

% port deps pango @1.34.1_1+x11
Full Name: pango @1.36.0_0+x11
Extract Dependencies: xz
Build Dependencies:   pkgconfig
Library Dependencies: glib2, cairo, gobject-introspection, harfbuzz, Xft2

Both show the newer (active) version rather than the older one, even with the --index argument to deps.


Problem with permissions on my Lion Server I have noticed that the permissions for certain folders seem to be screwed up.

When I look at the Get Info for the folder I see strange things in the permissions section. There are many users with grey symbols with a question mark next to them. It says unknown next to them. When I unlock the permissions I try to delete them, but pressing the - button has no effect.

The problem is on the second hard drive, which I use for data. I also tried to repair the permissions from the recovery partition but it will only let me repair the permissions on the system hard drive.

How can I reset the permissions to a standard value? Or can I repair permissions on the secondary hard drive as well?

Thanks

First, as an FYI, you only need to boot into the recovery partition to repair permissions when you are trying to repair permissions on your computer's boot drive. To do it for any other drive, simple select it in Disk Utility and click the Repair Disk Permissions button. This may solve your problem, so try that first.

After that, the simplest solution is to turn on "Ignore Ownership" on the drive. Navigate to the drive in Finder and use Get Info... to see the permissions, as you have been doing. Underneath the permissions, you'll see a box that says "Ignore Ownership on this volume." Check that box. This will ignore all permissions on the volume and allow any user or program to do anything on the drive. Follow this link for more information on the benefits and perils of doing this: https://larryjordan.com/articles/mac-os-set-hard-drive-permissions/

Alternatively:

You can reset the permissions using the Terminal App. Open the app in Applications > Utilities > Terminal.

Navigate to the folder you're having trouble with using the "cd" command, then use the command

sudo chmod -R 644 .

This will change the directory and every file within that directory to the default OS X permissions. For more information on how to use Terminal and chmod, take a look at this tutorial:

http://computers.tutsplus.com/tutorials/navigating-the-terminal-a-gentle-introduction--mac-3855


Moving notes to iCloud I just upgraded to mountain lion and noticed that I can only see notes in iCloud in the "Notes" application.

I have several notes related to a mail account that I would like to see on the Mac or move to iCloud.

Now:

notes are no more visible in Mail.app (as expected)
the notes in the mail account are visible on my iPhone and iPad but I cannot move them (there is no such functionality)
the Notes application shows the mail account on the left pane with a sub entry "Notes" but is empty
in the "Mail, Contacts & Calendars" preferences the checkbox "Use With: Notes" is checked

Any way to move the notes to iCloud on iOS or better getting Notes to synchronize everything on the Mac?

Notes in Mail will be removed in iOS 6, and iCloud only syncs notes between the notes apps.

So, Mountain Lion is just a few month ahead of iOS 6 so there is a bit of a missing link between the systems.

  You can create for every "mail.app-note" one entry in the notes app
  from iOS and they will be synced to all your devices.

So copy and paste every entry from the Mail-Notes to a new entry in the notes app on iOS, and they appear in Mountain Lion and on your other iOS-Devices.

  Works between iOS 5, 6 and Mountain Lion.


Data not backed up, System not booting, Getting Error: -69845 after trying to fix bad Partition Type A few months ago someone installed Linux on my computer using rEFInd for a project. I am using a 2015 13" Macbook Pro with 256GB SSD. The partition for linux was made to be 60GB. After the project I somehow deleted rEFInd and completely forgot about the rest.

A few days ago I noticed that I had only 190GB of fully usable space and remembered that Linux was probably still there. After trying to use diskutil I thought deleting the Linux partition and resizing the Apple AFS partition everything would work. But sadly after deleting it,the partition with my data on had type FFFFFFFF-FFFF-FFFF-FFFF-FFFFFFFFFFFF on my main bootable drive. Now after restarting my computer I get a black screen followed by GRUB Minimal Bash screen.

After following instructions on Data Not Backed Up, Partition Type: FFFFFFFF-FFFF-FFFF-FFFF-FFFFFFFFFFFF I tried the commands to change my partition type to a normal OS-X partition. After doing that verifyDisk didn't give me any problems but verifying that volume returned

Error: -69845: File system verify or repair failed.
Underlying error: 8: POSIX reports: Exec format error

These are the photos of $ diskutil list and $ gpt -r show disk0.

I'm not the most knowledgeable when it comes to commands like this so any help is appreciated. I have important data on the disk that I hope is not erased and won't be erased that is not backed up anywhere else.

After looking through more threads I found my own problem. The type for my partition was supposed to be APFS so by using the previous solution with the correct type as in

diskutil umountDisk disk0
gpt remove -i 2 disk0
gpt add -i 2 -b 409640 -s 372637568 -t 7C3457EF-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC disk0

Now I did come across a problem at first because diskutil verifyVolume disk0s2 gave me Unrecognized file system (-69846)
I did not mind it and tried to reboot after NVRAM reset and I was able to boot back to my Macbook as I did before with no loss in data. After that I used the command :

diskutil apfs resizeContainer disk0s2 0

in order to be able to use the memory from erasing my linux partition. Hope this helps someone.


Is it possible to enable OSX keyboard text substitution in more apps? OSX has built into text substitution that is configured in System Preferences > Keyboard > Text. This works great in certain apps, such as Evernote and Textedit, but seems to be disabled in other apps/content areas. Is it possible to enable it in other apps, such as Google Chrome?

I would like to use text substitution to drop in signatures when composing emails at gmail.com while using Google Chrome.

The application needs to implement Auto Text Expansion and it hasn't been implemented in Chrome yet. You could try this Chrome plugin Auto Text Expander. You'll have to again add the text-expansions though.

Mac's Text expansion should work in Safari though. If not already enabled, you can enable by typing the following in terminal.

defaults write -g WebAutomaticTextReplacementEnabled -bool true


Can I update an Mac App purchased by a different Apple ID? At work we have one Mac laptop that everyone uses to compile and test our iOS app.  The employee who originally installed XCode used his personal Apple ID, and has since left the company.

When I log in to the App Store on this PC, I can download new apps (including the Mavericks update) but when I try to update an existing app, especially XCode, it always brings up the login prompt, with the user id field disabled and prefilled with his Apple ID.

Can I update XCode without his Apple ID password?

I recently ran into this issue in a different context.  I changed my developer appleID and had xCode registered under the defunct one.  When I upgraded to Mavericks, Xcode wouldn't update, since I'd downloaded it from the Apple store under defunct AppleID.

I removed the association with the defunct appleID by removing the receipt from Xcode:

Control-click Xcode app and "show package contents".
Move the _MASReceipt directory to the trash in order to dis-associate Xcode with the old AppleID (you'll need your Mac's admin password).
Restart Apple store and "install" (rather than upgrade).

The net effect:  Xcode will "install" (upgrade) but under your preferred AppleID.

You do NOT need your ex-employee's personal AppleID account for this, but you do need admin rights on the machine.


iPod Touch Passcode doesn't work after restore from backup My son entered too many incorrect passcodes on my iPod Touch and apparently forced it to wipe my iPod clean.  Sadly, this has happened before.  I connected to iTunes and restored from my latest backup and then sync'd.  When I went to unlock my iPod, instead of being presented with the usual numeric keypad, I was given the full qwerty keyboard.  This was alarming, but I switched to number mode and entered my numeric passcode.  I was told "Wrong Passcode, try again".

What has happened?  Why won't my passcode work, and where did this qwerty keyboard come from?  And most importantly, how do I fix this?

The solution to my problem was rather simple, though I still don't understand it:

Reboot.

My battery drained completely, and when it came back on after plugging it in it presented the expected numeric keypad and accepted my passcode.  It seems rebooting was all I needed to get back to normal.

It doesn't make sense to my why it happened that way.  If you have an explanation, I'll happily accept your answer.


Macbook Pro doesn't accept any incoming connections - Firewall disabled! My MacBook Pro running macOS Big Sur 11.3.1 doesn't respond to Ping, SSH, and Remote Access.
What I tried so far:

Made sure "stealth mode" was disabled on Firewall
Disabled the Firewall entierly
Resetted all network configurations (removing plist files on /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/)
Removed the Wi-Fi adapter and re-added it
Removed any VPN apps (wireguard)
Updated to the latest macOS version

It can access all devices on my local network, but no devices can access it.
I have no idea what else I can try.
Here's my files under /Library/LaunchDeamons/, if it helps:
com.adobe.ARMDC.Communicator.plist
com.adobe.ARMDC.SMJobBlessHelper.plist
com.adobe.acc.installer.v2.plist
com.adobe.agsservice.plist
com.aescripts.ZXP-Installer.helper.plist
com.ambrosiasw.ambrosiaaudiosupporthelper.daemon.plist
com.daisydiskapp.DaisyDiskAdminHelper.plist
com.daisydiskapp.DaisyDiskStandAlone.AdminHelper.plist
com.diebold.warsaw.plist
com.docker.vmnetd.plist
com.ea.origin.ESHelper.plist
com.google.keystone.daemon.plist
com.hanynet.icefloor.plist
com.intel.haxm.plist
com.macpaw.CleanMyMac-setapp.Agent.plist
com.microsoft.autoupdate.helper.plist
com.microsoft.office.licensingV2.helper.plist
com.nomachine.server.plist
com.nomachine.uninstall.plist
com.oracle.java.Helper-Tool.plist -> /Library/Internet Plug-Ins/JavaAppletPlugin.plugin/Contents/Resources/com.oracle.java.Helper-Tool.plist
com.paragon-software.extfs.loader.plist
com.paragon-software.extfsd.plist
com.paragon-software.installer.plist
com.paragon-software.ntfs.loader.plist
com.paragon-software.ntfsd.plist
com.soma-zone.LaunchControl.Helper.plist
com.stclairsoft.AppTamerAgent.plist
org.virtualbox.startup.plist -> ../Application Support/VirtualBox/LaunchDaemons/org.virtualbox.startup.plist

The solution to your issue may be a simple one. Have you gone into System Preferences/Sharing and configure & enabled the Remote Management, Remote Apple Events, Remote Login etc. Services?


Using a US-bought WiFi iPad in the UK with the AppStore? I'm looking to give a WiFi-only iPad to a family member as a gift this Christmas. However, I'm concerned that since I am located in the UK, and the device I purchase will be 'US' configured for the store, etc, I will be unable to configure it to work correctly as a UK iPad, with the correct iTunes store, etc.

Is the iTunes store (app, music, video) related to the device software, the network it's accessing from, or the locale of the iTunes account associated with that device?

The iTunes store is related to the locale of the iTunes account (which is determined by the credit card associated with the account). Several friends of mine have bought iPads in other countries (US and UK) and are happily using them in Sweden with the Swedish iTunes store.


Is Mac Informer safe? I am considering an application called Mac Informer.

Is this application safe?

Applications bought through the Mac App Store are handled by Apple's mechanism. Most non-App Store Mac applications include their own built-in software updating mechanisms.

I would approach this as a question of what value does Mac Informer offer over the risk of opening up your Mac to an unknown company.

At some stage, the application will need your administrator privileges to install software updates. This will expose your Mac to any actions, positive or negative, the application wishes to take.

The lack of identifiable individuals, lack of physical address, and lack of registered company details on the about page does concern me.


How to clone an audio CD (including pauses between tracks) under Mac OS X Mountain Lion? I need to clone an audio CD, including the defined pauses between tracks. Under Linux, cdrdao would do the trick for me, but I cannot get the version from MacPorts to work — it will not read from my SuperDrive.

Could someone please tell me how to clone a CD with a MacBook Pro under Mountain Lion?

First, what does not work:

Some people suggest Burn, but it is no longer updated and does not
work on modern versions of OS X.
Some people suggest LiquidCD, but it is no longer updated and does not work on modern versions of OS X.
Some people suggest Disk Utility, which is great for DATA CDs but does not work for AUDIO CDs because Audio CDs do not have a file system. Disk Utility (and hdiutil behind the scenes) cannot image raw Audio CDs because they have to write into a file system-based .dmg file. When you see an Audio CD mounted in Finder it is using the cddafs convenience file system driver to present Audio CD tracks as playable .aiff files - this is not the raw Audio CD data and so when you image this view from Disk Utility's Disk Image from Folder option you will often have messed up audio gaps. When you mount these .dmg files Finder windows will show you the .aiff audio files again, but iTunes will not recognize the mounted .dmg as an Audio CD and so will not give you the opportunity to rip it as if it were a normal Audio CD.

What does work? cdrdao still works and is freely available through Macports (port install cdrdao) and Homebrew (brew install cdrdao).

I'm not a huge fan of cdrdao but it is suitable for this particular task. It's too complex for the average user because (a) it requires use of the command line (which I'm comfortable with, but most people aren't); (b) it requires knowledge of two different sets of device names and (c) it requires that iTunes is not running because it locks Audio CDs in a way that prevents exclusive access.

NOTE: This whole process is a lot easier if you go to System Preferences > CDs & DVDs and set all options there to Ignore. This should stop Finder, iTunes and other software from breaking things at the wrong times for you.

First up you need to know the /dev/disk(?) name of your optical device, since you're going to have to umount it so that cdrdao can get exclusive access to it, e.g.:

$ diskutil list

/dev/disk0
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *1.0 TB     disk0
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk0s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS Macintosh HD            999.3 GB   disk0s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk0s3
/dev/disk3
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:        CD_partition_scheme Cool Music Disc...     *834.4 MB   disk3
   1:                      CD_DA                         75.3 KB    disk3s0
   2:                      CD_DA                         30.3 MB    disk3s1
...

In this case, /dev/disk3 is our USB-based optical device with an Audio CD inserted.

You also need to know what cdrdao thinks this device is called:

$ cdrdao scanbus

Cdrdao version 1.2.3 - (C) Andreas Mueller <andreas@daneb.de>
IOService:/AppleACPIPlatformExpert/PCI0@0/AppleACPIPCI/XHC1@14/AppleUSBXHCI/MT1887@14113000/6238--Storage@0/IOUSBMassStorageClass/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceNub/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceType05/IODVDServices : TSSTcorp, CDDVDW SE-208DB, MF00
IOService:/AppleACPIPlatformExpert/PCI0@0/AppleACPIPCI/XHC1@14/AppleUSBXHCI/SDRW-08D1S-U@14112000/IOUSBInterface@0/IOUSBMassStorageClass/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceNub/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceType05/IODVDServices : ASUS, SDRW-08D1S-U, 1.02

Those massive strings, up to the " : " anyway, are the device names that cdrdao requires. I have two listed because I have two USB-based optical drives plugged in - a Samsung and an ASUS.

To image an Audio CD you issue the commands:

$ diskutil umount /dev/disk3

Volume Cool Music Disc... on disk3 unmounted

$ cdrdao read-cd --device "IOService:/AppleACPIPlatformExpert/PCI0@0/AppleACPIPCI/XHC1@14/AppleUSBXHCI/SDRW-08D1S-U@14112000/IOUSBInterface@0/IOUSBMassStorageClass/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceNub/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceType05/IODVDServices" --with-cddb --datafile test.dat test.toc

Cdrdao version 1.2.3 - (C) Andreas Mueller <andreas@daneb.de>
IOService:/AppleACPIPlatformExpert/PCI0@0/AppleACPIPCI/XHC1@14/AppleUSBXHCI/SDRW-08D1S-U@14112000/IOUSBInterface@0/IOUSBMassStorageClass/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceNub/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceType05/IODVDServices: ASUS SDRW-08D1S-U    Rev: 1.02
Using driver: Generic SCSI-3/MMC - Version 2.0 (options 0x0000)

Reading toc and track data...
...

Eventually you'll have two files on disc:

test.dat is a binary file containing the data of the Audio CD
test.toc is a text file containing the track metadata of the Audio CD (including track name/artist information if you used the --with-cddb switch)

Finally, to write the data on to a new disc, pop in a blank CD+/-R and use the command:

$ cdrdao write --device "IOService:/AppleACPIPlatformExpert/PCI0@0/AppleACPIPCI/XHC1@14/AppleUSBXHCI/SDRW-08D1S-U@14112000/IOUSBInterface@0/IOUSBMassStorageClass/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceNub/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceType05/IODVDServices" test.toc

Cdrdao version 1.2.3 - (C) Andreas Mueller <andreas@daneb.de>
IOService:/AppleACPIPlatformExpert/PCI0@0/AppleACPIPCI/XHC1@14/AppleUSBXHCI/SDRW-08D1S-U@14112000/IOUSBInterface@0/IOUSBMassStorageClass/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceNub/IOSCSIPeripheralDeviceType05/IODVDServices: ASUS SDRW-08D1S-U    Rev: 1.02
Using driver: Generic SCSI-3/MMC - Version 2.0 (options 0x0000)

Starting write at speed 10...
Pausing 10 seconds - hit CTRL-C to abort.
Process can be aborted with QUIT signal (usually CTRL-\).
WARNING: No super user permission to setup real time scheduling.
Turning BURN-Proof on
Executing power calibration...
Power calibration successful.
Writing track 01 (mode AUDIO/AUDIO )...
...
Writing track 13 (mode AUDIO/AUDIO )....
Wrote 795 of 795 MB (Buffers 100%  98%).
Wrote 354742 blocks. Buffer fill min 93%/max 100%.
Flushing cache...
Writing finished successfully.

When this finishes you'll have an exact duplicate of your original Audio CD. When you pop this in a drive iTunes will recognise it as an Audio CD and it will give you the option to rip its contents.

Hope this helps.


How can I use Automator to generate a kerberos ticket using KINIT? I need to be able to generate a kerberos ticket for my MacBook Pro each time the machine restarts. I can manually run KINIT with my credentials to generate a ticket. What is the best way to automate that process?

You can easily package shell commands inside an Automator application (or service) using the “Run Shell Script” action. However, this will run the commands in a non-interactive shell  (for an explanation of the difference between interactive and non-interactive shells, see the pertinent section of the Advanced Bash Scripting Guide – simply put, you will not have access to the terminal for the password prompt, and if kinit is not aware of this, your script will hang). There are two ways around that:

script Terminal.app to execute your command instead of executing it directly. In that case, you will need a “Run AppleScript” action instead, containing the following command:

tell application "Terminal" to do script "kinit <options>"

which will open a new Terminal tab running the given command.
use kinit’s --password-file option and pass it the password inside your workflow, i.e.

echo <password> | kinit --passwordfile=STDIN <options>

To avoid storing your password in plain text inside the workflow, you can securely store it in the OS X Keychain and retrieve it from there. Although possible via a shell script (the TextMate blog has details on how to achieve that – be sure to read the comments), there are so many gotchas to that I’d recommend  using a bit of AppleScript and Daniel Jalkut’s excellent Usable Keychain Scripting app. Once installed, the following bit of AppleScript will retrieve your password (assuming the account name is “kinit”):

tell application "Usable Keychain Scripting" to get password of first generic item of current keychain whose account is "kinit"

Either wrap it in an osascript shell command, i.e.

passphrase=$(osascript -e '<command above>')

or, as you are using Automator, add an AppleScript action, retrieve the passphrase inside it and pass it to the shell script.


I want to make VLC my default player on Mac OS X 10.10.3 I have seen people say to click get info then do something with the 'open with' but when I go to get info there is NO open with option, no options to change at all. I cannot drag the files into VLC like I could before the upgrade either. Please help me out! I am not real tech savvy, but I can do basics and follow instructions. Thanks.

Right click on any movie file you have.

Get Info

At the bottom of that window you will see the current app used to open it.

Change to VLC and use the "Change all"

You need to repeat that for all movie files that have different extension.

Normally you would have .fvl, the .mov, and maybe some other formats.


Keynote movie playback ignores start/stop times, only in presentation mode I'm putting together a presentation in Keynote '09.  I've embedded a movie (created by exporting a keynote slide, so that I can continuously loop the animations).  I'd like to skip the beginning and end of the movie, since there are undesirable acceleration/decelerations in the animation.  I've gone into the Quicktime tab of the Inspector window, and set the start and stop points appropriately

|----------1-------------------2-----------|
           ^                   ^
    desired start       desired stop

When I hit 'Play' in the inspector, it works great.  When I double-click the slide in edit mode, it works great.  When I go into presentation mode, it doesn't work.

|----------1-------------------2-----------|
           ^                               ^
    loop 1 start                    loop 1 end

^                                          ^
loop 2 start                        loop 2 end

What's going on here?  Is there a way to avoid this behavior?

Since you have set start and end on the clip, Keynote can permanently clip it after reducing file size to save space and improve performance.  The result is that the undesired parts of the clips are no longer even available to Keynote so they shouldn't play when looping.

Set your start and end points
Go to File > Advanced > Reduce File Size

Keynote will trim the excess footage from your video file.  You will note the change if you deselect the video then select again and view the Edit Movie in the inspector.  (Be sure you keep the original somewhere else as a backup.)

Before:

After:


Can I install macOS 10.6.8 on a mid-2011 MacBook Air? Can I install macOS 10.6.8, Snow Leopard, to a mid-2011 MacBook Air that came preloaded with macOS 10.7.0, Lion, like the MacBook Pros can?

Or even a mid-2012 MacBook Air that came with 10.7.4 to capitalize on the 8 GB RAM upgrade?

I’m looking at purchasing an early model MacBook Air, preferably the 2012 model where they bumped up the capable RAM to 8 GB. In 2011 the early MacBook Pros came with macOS 10.6.6, Snow Leopard, the late 2011 models came with Lion 10.7.2 but from what I’m told these late model MacBook Pros are capable of having Snow Leopard installed even when Lion was pre-installed.

I know that you can’t back install macOS platforms on MacBooks like you can with iMacs but 2011 seems to be a particular case between late models having the ability to accept early model macOS 10.6, Snow Leopard.

This really ends up build you asking yourself "What installer do you have to install 10.6.8?"

You can know the exact build and version of the potential installers and go through the documentation to see which models "support" that installer.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201686

Furthermore, even if you don't have Apple official support, then you can see if you want to consider modifying the OS to hack it to try the install anyhow and see how badly it breaks. Lastly, some people use an installer to install from a supported machine to an external drive and then take that drive to the Mac that's not supported and see how badly things break when you boot. On iMacs, typical failure modes are WiFi not working and AirDrop / bonjour not working. Some of those items you can get around with USB adapters, other items you can't get around since the kernel and low level drivers are just not present to start up unsupported machines.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201260
https://web.archive.org/web/20150225022618/http://support.apple.com:80/en-us/HT201260 (use archive.org to look at older versions of support articles)
https://web.archive.org/web/20150223074747/http://support.apple.com:80/en-us/ht1159

That last link shows all 2012 MacBook Air shipped originally with 10.7 so you would not expect 10.6 to have the drivers needed for full compatibility.


Transfer accounts from Mac or iPhone to new iPad? I have 8 different email accounts configured on my iPhone. It's a pain to move them one-by-one to the iPad. If I wipe the iPad I can move them all over at the same time. Is there any way to do this without wiping the iPad? I just got a new email account and don't want to manually configure each device.

Not exactly sure what you mean: if you use the same Apple ID on both devices and you have enabled iCloud storage for keychain, mail, whatever else on the iPhone - assuming that it’s holding all the data you want on the iPad - you’re done.


Where can I buy a replacement MagSafe female chip for my MacBook Pro? I am trying to find a replacement charging chip for my MacBook pro 5.5 (mid 2009).  I have looked on eBay and can't find them.  Does anyone know of a site that sells parts like this?

Thank you.

Check http://www.ifixit.com/MacBook-Parts/MacBook-Pro-13-Inch-Unibody-MagSafe-DC-In-Board/IF163-011, it looks to be what you're looking for.


List hung processes in Terminal? Is there any way to list only those processes which are hung, i.e., "not responding", in Terminal?

The only way I know to do this is look in Activity Monitor for the ones in red.

You can use the following command:

ps aux | grep -w Z

From ps man page:

The state is given by a sequence of characters, for example, ``RWNA''.
The first character indicates the run state of the process:

I       Marks a process that is idle (sleeping for longer than about 20 seconds).
R       Marks a runnable process.
S       Marks a process that is sleeping for less than about 20 seconds.
T       Marks a stopped process.
U       Marks a process in uninterruptible wait.
Z       Marks a dead process (a ``zombie'').


Open Browser on Login How would I configure mac's to open a browser to a certain website on login for all users? I work in a lab we need to distribute a survey.

I'm looking for a possible terminal command to configure this.

To configure an action like Open Browser on Login follow these steps:

Go to System Preferences->Accounts and select your user account in the left column
Then Select the Login Items tab on the right. There you see a list of applications and files that you can direct your Mac to open at login)
Just drag your .webloc file(s) into the Login Items list

And the next time you log in, Your Mac will open automatically the web location (.webloc) you put in Login Items tab (with your default browser)

Here more detailed explanation about how add .webloc files on login startup:  https://www.macworld.com/article/1156341/open_websites_login_startup.html


PHP version shown in command line differs from phpinfo(); in localhost:8000 I started my OS X PHP test server by typing

php -S localhost:8000

I updated my PHP on OS X to 5.6 and when I check the version through the command line by typing:

php -v

It tells me that I have "PHP 5.6.5"

When I start my PHP test server and look at the index.php file that has the phpinfo(); function, it tells me that I still have version 5.5.14 that comes with OS X.

What can I do to get my PHP version on localhost:8000 to reflect that change?

The new version of PHP needs to be in your $PATH and the path to the new version of php needs to be listed before /usr/bin. If the new version of php (the executable) is installed in /usr/local/bin/ you should be in good shape, otherwise you need to either  link the new php executable there (ln -s /path/to/newphp /usr/local/bin/php) or add it's location to your $PATH (export PATH=/path/to/newphp:"${PATH}") (<- add this to your ~/.bash_profile).

One other possibility to check... is the new version of php named php? It's possible that it will be named something like php5 or some such thing. If so you'll need to create a a link or use that name on the command line.


"A descriptive string set at run-time. Don't localize."? When I open Safari, in my Bookmarks tab it shows me a pop-up:

What does this mean?

It appears to be an internal testing message for localization. Are you using a beta version of Safari? or have you in the past? It may be a case of resetting safari content if so.


Mountain Lion way to QuickLook folders The freeware Folder.qlgenerator was already broken by Lion.

defaults write QLEnableXRayFolders -bool true

does not appear to work in ML. Does anyone have a replacement solution? I’m looking at a large file tree, and I’d like some convenient way to remind myself of what is where. Expanding everything in List View would send most of the information off the bottom of the screen.

You are right with "Once upon the Time", that feature does not work on Lion. There is currently no known work around.


Option / Preference to toggle folder summary at base of finder window in OSX 10.10 When i did i clean install from osx 10.8 to 10.10 a year or so ago i lost the option to have a summary of the folder i was in at the bottom of the finder window. Recently i seem to have pressed a short cut that has brought back the summary, but i have no idea how i did it.. any ideas ?

I have included a image of the summary bar below :

This is not really a "folder summary bar" but the "Status Bar". It shows the number of items in the opened folder and the available free space on the volume containing the folder. To toggle visibility of the Status Bar use either the key combination cmd ⌘/ (en_US keyboard layout) or the Finder menu View > Hide/Show Status Bar.


How to seamlessly sync contacts and calendars across devices? I currently have all my contacts and calendars on my Mac, but would like to sync them over the air with my other devices (iPod, iPad and Android phone). I also want it to be multidirectional: being able to add, edit or delete from all devices.

As far as I understood from reading other threads, the best bet is to keep all calendars and contacts on Google and sync them with the other devices. This means not using iCloud to sync calendars or contacts.

Is this correct? Do I really have to move all my contacts and calendars to Google Contacts and Google Calendar in order to have them synced across all devices? Will I be able to add contacts or edit calendars from any device and have them in sync as well?

Yes, the best way to sync cross platform is via google.

By far the easiest most care free way to sync all contacts, calendars, email etc is to have all Apple devices, this is how Apple meant for this service to be used.

Google has done a good job of making this service available to people working on multiple platforms.


Do battery strips prevent an iPhone's power from cutting out? I have an iPhone SE. I wanted to get a new battery. I made the mistake of taking it to a non-Apple vendor. They broke my iPhone and I wonder what role the battery strips (missing from my iPhone) play.

The phone starts and I can log in. Everything is fine until the phone suddenly cuts out and goes dead. This happens both when charging and not charging. It doesn't shut down, just cuts out.

The shop staff told me it's a software issue. I just don't believe them as I don't see any process happening when it cuts and the state of the phone when it's back up is different from when it gets cut out.

The shop staff also lied to me about what was and wasn't in my phone when they returned it. Apple told me the battery strips were missing and the device should be replaced (I took it to Apple after the other vendor broke the phone).

So now I'm wondering what the significance and purpose of battery strips is? And, whether or not getting new strips might fix my phone?

Edit:
I forgot to mention that I requested my original battery be put back in. So this cutting out problem happened with the replacement battery as well as with the original battery after their tampering.

Battery strips are adhesive, stretchy "tape" strips. The purpose of them is to keep the battery in place, as well as slightly insulate the battery from the casing. The insulation means that sudden applications of heat or cold to the outside case (such as for example taking the phone out in intense sun light, or placing it on a very cold surface) doesn't immediately transfer the heat/cold to the battery via the aluminium casing.

If you're not exposing the phone to these changes in heat/cold when the cutout happens, it just sounds like you've received a non-Apple battery replacement of low quality.

Usually these cuts outs happen when the phone hardware uses more power than the battery can provide. As the power draw increases, the current (i.e. volts) are lowered slightly. With a bad battery, a normal power usage can lower the current so significantly that it is below the requirements of the CPU. This means that the system just shuts off immediately.

It is obviously not healthy for a phone.

I see it as very unlikely that new battery strips will solve your problem, unless you specifically see the problem when shaking the phone, or exposing it to heat/cold. Your problem could potentially be solved by replacing the battery - but then you'll also want battery strips installed ofcourse.


How to fine tune force touch trackpad sensitivity? The force touch trackpad seems great but I would like to reduce it's sensitivity.

It seems the UI allow selection of 3 modes:
Click: Light - Medium - Firm
which both set sensitivity and the haptic feedback level.

Would it be possible to set the sensitivity in a more fine way ? Maybe by command line ?

Well, BetterTouchTool seems to be able to modify the trackpad sensibility for 2 fingers and more clicks. It can as well change the haptic feedback strength and feeling (you can have your trackpad vibrate when you force click with two fingers). However, it's not able to change the force click with one finger but it proves that we can have a low driver access to the new macbook force touch trackpad. If somebody got any documentation on how to access these drivers, I could try to play around with that and maybe develop a little app to change the sensitivity of the pad.


Application installer add extention to my browser. Is mavericks following the path of Windows? I have use OS X 10.6.8 for years and just recently did a fresh installation of Mavericks. One of the nicest aspects of OS X was the fact that after three years of use and installing tons of application, none of them, ever added any toolbar or extension to my firefox. As appose to windows that after couple of weeks, the browser looks like a circus.

Today during installing uTorrent on Mavericks, I noticed that my firefox was reset and upon opening my home page changed to yahoo as well as my default search engine. Later I noticed that it has also added an extension to my browser.

Is this a flaw in the Apple new OS? Was it always there and I was just lucky in three years of using Snow Leopard? Is there some kind of security mechanism that I have to enable?

During installation many installers, not just uTorrent. (Also Daemon Tools for example on Windows) try to install a lot of stuff on your computer.

If you accept one of the offers (which looks like an agreement), you end up with stupid plugins in your browser and other default search tools - this is exactly what you're facing right now.

I would strongly recommend you to open the installer again and notice the 3rd party installers which are hidden inside the uTorrent installation program so you can spot them in future installations.

For now, to fix this problem: Remove the toolbars / plugins manually and set back Google (or whatever your default search provider was) as default search engine.

To make this answer complete, the same could happen to you on Snow Leopard. This is just the way the installer (ab)uses the way you grant access in installing an application as Administrator.


Cookies in Safari private browsing with iframes Update: Since doing some more investigation, I'm updating this question.

We're seeing some strange behaviour on our site for Safari users who are in private browsing mode. Our site is in an iframe which is on a different domain to the main window.

It seems like our cookies are being blocked by Safari when in private mode.

Interestingly, if the cookies already exist (ie. if we login through the main window, and then go to this page) then it allows the cookies and you can see them in the web inspector. But if you try to log in through this iframe when in private mode, the login fails, and it appears to be because Safari is blocking the cookies.

Is this a private browsing setting which can be changed perhaps? The information I've found about how private browsing affects the way Safari treats cookies has been inconsistent.

Any information or ideas that anyone has would be much appreciated.

I know this was asked over a month ago now, however I'll answer incase you haven't found the answer and for future users.

It is to do with safaris cookie policy that is set by default. As by default safari will only allow cookies from sites that you have visited.

It does not use, therefore, any cookies set by the webpage that is within an iframe. This is because the location of the top frame (the page that has the iframe) is a different domain to the iframe, and if the user has never been to the domain of the site contained within the iframe, safari will not use the cookies set by the iframe.
Therefore, if a user were to go to the "main window" or the domain within the iframe, safari knows that you have visited this site, and will allow cookies set by this site/domain to be used.

You can check the policy safari is using when in safari, if you click Safari (top left) then Preferences a dialog box should appear. Along the top you should see a privacy tab. In the privacy tab, the first settings you should see are the cookies and website data. By default this will be set to Allow from websites I visit however this needs changing to Always allow for the cookies in an iframe to work without a coded solution. Alternately, you could look into a coded solution, such as this or this


Automating Creation of Hundreds of Symlinks in Finder What's going to be the most painless way to automate the creation of hundreds of symlinks?

My iTunes Movies folder contains each .mp4 film in an individual folder. These folders are named for the movie they contain and most include artwork as well as the movie file in at least one alternate format.

Because of Plex's limitations, my Plex library is a separate folder that contains only the mp4 files of the movies, which are copies of those in my iTunes Library folder. There are 520 mp4s in there right now and this is obviously a huge waste of space.

So, what I wanna do is somehow scan through all the folders in my iTunes Movie Library, select all the .mp4 files and create symlinks to them in a new Plex Movie Library folder. What's going to be the easiest way to do this?

Finder doesn't know about symlinks but Terminal does. So

ln -s ~/iTunes/*/Movies/*/*.mp4 /path/to/plex/folder/

should do the trick (paths need to adapted to your local paths).


How to identify explicitly saved versions when reverting a document? I suspect I know the answer to this, but...

In 10.7, versions of a document are saved automatically. You can also explicitly save a version by selecting "Save a Version".

When I wish to revert to a previous version, in the Time Machine-like display that appears, there seems to be no way to identify which versions it's showing me were saved automatically by the system, and which were (what I consider to be) the "milestone" versions that I saved explicitly.

Am I missing something? I know you're given the opportunity to revert to the last-saved version when you select File->Revert, but what if I just want to look at that version first, or revert to the last-but-one saved version?

You can't.

Keep doing the manual versioning series that you should always have been doing. At each milestone save a new copy with a new file title that describes what it is.

All that's new with a Lion Autosave/Versions app is that you'll have to suffer horrifically each time you do so.

Start with your working document, save it as "MyReport - workingcopy".
When you want to save your manual milestone version, first press CMD-S to "Save a Version" (or you may get a dialogue about reverting to a previous version).
Then select File / Duplicate , which will pop up a second window of your open document (not prompt you to save a copy to disk).
The new window will be titled "MyReport - workingcopy copy". This is very confusingly a tentative filename only that doesn't actually exist as a (user accessible) file on your drive yet.
Now press CMD-S to save that open duplicated document window. This will give you the normal file save dialogue where you can rename it "MyReport - Milestone 1".
Now CLOSE THAT NEW DOCUMENT "MyReport - Milestone 1" and go back to working on the previous document "MyReport - workingcopy" -- leaving your new milestone file safe (for now) in its saved state.

If you've cleverly thought of going to System Preferences / Keyboards to create a CMD-D keyboard shortcut for that Duplicate command, TextEdit at least will completely ignore it.

The shortcut will not appear in the File menu next to the Duplicate menu item. Pressing it will do nothing.


Should I create APFS encrypted disk image on hard disk drives? I'm about to create an encrypted sparse disk image on my HFS+ formatted hard drive, but then I wondered if APFS's drawbacks on HDDs will mean anything in this case, since the hardware is anyway on HFS+. Since the disk image is in software, I think APFS should do faster logical copying and decrypting because it's newer but I don't really know how this works.

It's more like the benefits/features of APFS won't mean anything. A lot of it takes advantage of the fact that random (arbitrary) locations can be read from a SSD with no "seek time" penalties you might get in an HDD

Creating a small disk image on a HDD might help disguise how much APFS slows down on a HDD if it's kept in one continuous piece, and the drive has a big cache, but 200GB image on a 1TB drive is only ever going to perform as well as the drive it's on minus overhead.


How can I 'un update' my ipad I have an iPad Air 2 8.1.3 and I would like to make it 8.1.2 again.

Is this possible?

Downgrading to iOS 8.1.2

Since iOS 8.1.3 is the latest version of iOS, you can’t simply open up iTunes and “update” to an older version. You have to add on a couple more steps, but luckily it’s fairly easy.

Before you do anything, make sure to back up your iOS device because this method will wipe your iPhone or iPad clean. Luckily, we have a handy guide on how to do just that.

First off, visit this website and download the iOS 8.1.2 IPSW for your specific iOS device. These files range between 1.5 GB and 2GB for iPhones and iPads, so be aware that it may take a bit of time to download it.

Once you have the file downloaded, plug your iOS device into your computer and open up iTunes. Go to your device’s summary page and hold down the Option/Alt key on your keyboard or Shift if you’re on Windows. Keep holding down the key as you click on Restore in iTunes.

Next, browse to find the IPSW file that you downloaded and open it. iTunes will begin restoring your iPhone and will install iOS 8.1.2.

After the process is complete, your iOS device should now be running iOS 8.1.2. From there, you’ll want to restore your backup by going to the device summary page in iTunes and clicking on Restore Backup. Give it time to restore all of your apps and settings, and eventually you’ll be back to running iOS 8.1.2 just like you were before updating to iOS 8.1.3.

Word for word from: http://www.gottabemobile.com/2015/01/27/how-to-install-ios-8-1-3-update/


App store thinks I have a bunch of apps installed after I reinstalled my mac I did a clean install of mountain lion using a bootable disk. Went into disk utility and erased the lion partition before the re-install.

Now when I go into the app store it thinks that all the apps that I have installed through the app store are already installed on the computer. It seems that the app store is consulting apples servers rather than my local machine so I can't install any of the apps because the buttons say the app is already installed.

How can I tell the app store that it's wrong that apps are not installed locally.

The App Store app only consults spotlight for your Mac to determine if an app is installed, so we can rule out any account problem (and you can sign out of the account from the store and reboot to confirm this on your system.)

So, since you have a few apps, you can focus on one app app and check spotlight to see if there are copies of it elsewhere than in /Applications.

Some helpful hints:

be sure to eject all disks except for the one drive you are booted from
consider rebuilding your spotlight index after checking for apps on other volumes by ejecting the volumes


Is there a keyboard shortcut for the therefore sign "∴" on mac? Or is there a way to create a keyboard shortcut for it? The therefore sign "∴" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therefore_sign) is something I may need to use a lot. How can I get a keyboard shortcut for it?

I found several answers for you here: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/3685146/how-do-you-do-the-therefore-%E2%88%B4-symbol-on-a-mac-or-in-textmate

a google search is all it took.

In the character viewer under math symbols. ∴


Check enable box whitout a mouse on an imac I have no mouse
I have the keyboard full size

how do I check the enable box in mouse keys

Thank you!!

Depending on which keyboard you have, the answer is different.

Standard Keyboard:

This assumes you have the standard, smaller keyboard shown here:

If this applies to you, then to click using Mouse Keys simply press I.

Extended Keyboard:

This assumes you have the extended, larger keyboard shown here:

If this applies to you, the to click using Mouse Keys simply press the 5 key on the keypad on the right.

Hope this helps!


Reinstall Office for Mac 2011 I downloaded Office 2011 to my old computer that crashed and no way to retrieve HD contents. I lost everything. Now I have a new computer MacBook Pro and I have the key number that I had printed out before.  Maybe this sounds dumb but can I download the program again on this new computer since I have the key number? How do I do it?

To re-download Office for Mac 2011 go to Microsoft's Office for Mac 2011 Download Site and after choosing a language version, entering your serial number, and completing the CAPTCHA you should get a link.

In the common browsers like Safari, Firefox and Google Chrome the site looks like scam but it seems to be legit.


What type of power cable does the HomePod mini use? Apple has released a new, smaller version of their speaker: HomePod mini.

One of my complaints with the original HomePod was its use of a proprietary power cable connector, which made it difficult to replace or shorten the cable. Most other Apple devices use industry-standard C7 "figure 8" power cables for mains wall power, or a USB-C or Lightning cable plus a power adapter.
What type of power cord does the HomePod mini use?

The Apple sales page does not contain a single photo of the power cord. It's as if they want you to think it doesn't have one...
I used that page's "AR" feature on my iPhone to view a virtual version of the HomePod mini on my table. I had to walk around to the other side of the table, then took a screenshot.
The AR HomePod mini appears to use the same round, proprietary, non-removable power cable as the original HomePod.


How to draw a mathematical graph on mac I want to draw two plots

at x=1, y=3, at x=2, y=9
change the above plot so that y=exp(y), x is unchanged.

I know this might seem silly to ask, but I do not have any experience to draw a mathematical plot. Is there any built-in app to do so? I'd be very appreciated for your help.

Note:   Plotting just 2 points will give you a straight line only. To see any curvature in a date set, you must plot more than 2 points and the x values must span the proper region.

I think Excel, Numbers or Google Sheets would be your best bet. You can define an x range of values in one column and then calculate the y values. Both Excel and Numbers have charting/plotting capabilities. Be sure to select "scatter plot" as your choice for chart type. You can then plot the x and y data you generated. You can choose bar chart if that is what you want. Below is an image of your result using Google Sheets. If you change the x, y or y2 values the chart will update to reflect the new values. The image won't update though.

There are other plotting apps for the Mac. The Mac comes with Grapher which is good for charting functions. There is also Magic Plot, and Veusz.  These are probably overkill for what you want which is why I recommended a spreadsheet package.


not all the sounds got played on iPhone I have a iPhone 3G with iOS 4.2.1 which hit the ground too many times. The thing is that it doesn't ring when someone calls me but it play the sounds on some games or when I try to change the ringtones in Settings->Sounds menu. All the ringtones are the default ones.

Is your ringer switch stuck on mute? If not this could be a simple software issue, you would have to save all your data through iTunes, save all of your pictures separately, and restore the iPhone to factory settings. Once restored you must choose to set the iPhone up as new, otherwise restoring from a corrupted backup will bring the issue back. You can make sure to save contacts & calendar events on 4.2.1 by going into the info tab while the iPhone is plugged into iTunes, and selecting sync contacts, & sync calendars, notes, bookmarks, ect.

If you did drop it too many times & break the ringer switch, it's about time for a new phone


How to have character accent menu _and_ key repeat So it seems you have an either/or choice for the character accent menu or normal press-and-hold for key repeat behaviour.

Surely it's possible to have press and hold bring up the Character Picker accent menu, then - after a set delay - start repeating? Is there any way to enable this behaviour?

OK I think I finally understood what you want, and that is not possible.

Holding a key will bring up that character accents.

But you do not want to pick one you only want to have the pressed key repeat.

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

So to do that you need following command in Terminal to enable it.

defaults write -g ApplePressAndHoldEnabled -bool false

Since the keyboard is initialized during the boot cycle, you need to restart for it to take effect.

To set it back just use True at the end instead of false.

Unfortunately that will disable the "Accents" pop up since those 2 functions are conflicting.

Writing a Script that switches the function for the press and hold is useless since you would need to restart anyway.


Is there a hand tool for xcode's storyboard (scrolling without scrollbars, PDF style)? I guess the title says it all. I was looking for a way to e.g. hold down a modifier key and "grab" the storyboard so that I can stop trying to aim for the scrollbars every time I want to scroll freely with a mouse.

I found this key chart http://cocoasamurai.blogspot.se/2011/03/xcode-4-keyboard-shortcuts-now.html but it didn't help.

It depends on what type of mouse you're using, but on my magic mouse, I can scroll the storyboard in any direction by dragging one finger over the mouse.

You can also move it around with the command key and arrow keys:

⌘ →   Scroll right

⌘ ←   Scroll left

⌘ ↓   Scroll down

⌘ ↑   Scroll up

Note that you'd have to give the storyboard focus first, by clicking in a blank area.


iPhone: Disable syncing for mail account, but keep existing e-mails I have a university e-mail account (Exchange, if that makes a difference) which for reasons that aren’t relevant to this question does not work at the moment. The underlying user account has been disabled on the university’s servers, and I cannot log in.

This means my iPhone is constantly asking for a password – it obviously can’t connect since the account is frozen – and telling me it cannot fetch e-mail for this account. That is exceedingly frustrating. (It’s also terrible UI/UX to repeatedly block the entire interface from the user every time the app is opened, but that’s a different matter.)

In order to get rid of this infuriating, incessant pestering for a password that I can’t give, I would like to temporarily disable syncing from this account, but only syncing. Old e-mails which have been fetched should still appear in the inbox and subfolders and be searchable; it just shouldn’t try to actually connect to the server to fetch or send new e-mail.

This question asks about more or less the same thing, except it’s for OS X Mail, which works quite differently from iOS Mail, and it is about a permanently defunct mail address, whereas this question is about an account which will hopefully be online again at some point in the not too distant future.

Googling this, I found hundreds of tutorials on how to set up and remove e-mail accounts (I know how to do both; neither is what I’m looking for), but nothing useful.

The closest I got was a site telling me to uncheck the “Mail” option in the account settings. While this does indeed stop Mail from trying to connect to the server, it also completely wipes the account from the Mail app, deleting every trace of the account’s inbox and folders, which rather defeats the purpose. (In another case of shockingly bad UX, it does this without any kind of warning, meaning I’ve now already irreversibly lost all e-mails in this account on one phone – thankfully the one I don’t use much.)

Is there no way to tell Mail to stop trying in vain to sync this account, but not change anything else?

MS Exchange is a system not too different from the way IMAP works: most of the mail is kept on the server and generally only recent mail and/or headers are kept on the local PC.

You can keep your mail but it is a bit of a work-around. Essentially you need to create a bunch of new mailboxes that mirror your folders on your Exchange account. You would go to

Mailbox > New Mailbox... > Location > On my Mac

Give the folder a name and repeat for any other folders you want to save, making sure that when you create the new folder it is "On my Mac"

Once that is done, open the Folders of the Exchange mailboxes one at a time, select all the emails (Command A) and drag them to the correspondingly named folder you just created. repeat for all folders.

Remember that Exchange may not have downloaded the whole email and you may just be dragging the email headers from one mailbox to another. Without a connection to the Exchange server that is the best you can do.

Now you could delete that account without fear of losing your email.

It is possible to get an archive of your email account, assuming the Exchange server admin is willing to or allowed to do so. On an Exchange server you can export a mailbox or whole email account to a PST file. Once you have the PST file you can use Outlook for the Mac (or a free conversion utility) to open the PST file and view your old emails.


add the division symbol on OpenOffice Writer (Word) on Mac OS X How can I add the division symbol on OpenOffice Writer (Word) on Mac OS X?

I cannot seem to find a way to add this symbol.

The division symbol ÷ can be written in any editor (OpenOffice, Word, Safari text fields, Pages, TextEdit etc) with the key combo Option-/


Had no free disk space on my iPhone 5... but now I do? I realized yesterday that I had no disk space left on my iPhone 5 after I got spammed with iOS notifications that my apps could not be updated (due to lack of disk space). This morning I woke up to about 350 MB of free space - and I didn't do anything.

I don't know what the exact numbers were for usage (Settings --> General --> Storage & iCloud Usage --> Manage Storage), so I don't know what happened. As well as gaining free space, about 10 apps were updated.

My best guess is that there is some internal routine to compress images, since at full resolution they take up a fair amount of space, but even minimal lossy compression can save megabytes per photo without a noticeable loss in quality.

Is there such a documented process, or did something else happen? In any case, I wish I would have screenshotted the storage usage before this happened...

You can try to do the most obvious and smart things that free up space on your iPhone. Which are

Upgrade to iOS 10.3: Apple’s new file system, Apple File System (APFS) included in iOS 10.3 is optimized for flash and solid-state drive storage. According to [Apple Insider][1], there has been a gain of space of almost 8GB in a 256GB model. But don’t expect a gain of 6-8GB in your 16GB or 32GB. As Apple Insider explains, the more memory you have, the more free space iOS 10.3 will reclaim.
Backup Photos using Google Photos: Google Photos is basically a cloud storage for your photos. It works great with iOS too. Google Photos offers unlimited photos and videos for free, up to 16 megapixels and 1080p HD. Photos that are safely backed up can be removed from your device’s storage in just a tap.
Remove “Other” Data on your phone: When you connect your iPhone to a computer and open iTunes, you would encounter the “Other” section in little iTunes usage bar graph. Check out this tip by OSXdaily on how to manage this issue. http://osxdaily.com/2013/07/24/remove-other-data-storage-iphone-ipad/
Use Progressive Web Apps (PWA): Although PWA offers to free up app space, iOS doesn’t fully support it at this point. Some features
such as Add to Home Screen and Push Notifications, are available in
some form in Safari but are not implemented in standard ways. To
give you a comparison of the Space utilization for an App VS PWA,
the Twitter app has a size of 196 MB in the app store. But the PWA
app for twitter is just 1-2MB!
Stream your music instead of downloading them
Remove offline reading list data in Safari: This can be done by navigating to Settings and then General > Usage > Manage Storage > Safari. Then, go to Offline Reading List and tap Delete.
Clear the Safari browser cache: To clean up the cache, simply go to Settings > Safari > Clear History and Website Data.
Remove items from iBooks
Disable using My Photo Stream: Go to Settings > iCloud > Photos, then turn off My Photo Stream
Delete Burst Mode photos
Don’t keep both photos when you enable HDR mode. Go to Settings > Photos & Camera, then deselect Keep Normal Photo

If you have tried most of the above-mentioned tips and still find yourself with less storage space then follow this trick to gain more space.  This trick forces iOS to clear it OS cache. There has been an ongoing argument that since this is a system level cache it would have been freed anyway when you actually needed the space. But this does not seem to work if you are in the middle of taking a video and run our of space.
http://techathlon.com/free-gbs-space-iphone-deleting-photos-apps-files/.


Can I make the caps-lock setting stick, for external USB keyboard in Mountain Lion? I have a Macbook Pro running Mountain Lion, and I frequently use an (external) Apple USB keyboard with it.  In the Keyboard sys prefs, I set the "caps lock" key to be "^ Control", for both "Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad" and "Apple Keyboard" (i.e., external).

When I unplug the external keyboard, and plug it in again, though, the "caps lock" key once again is a caps lock key.  I can set it back in the sys prefs, but it only lasts until I unplug it next.

I have a different Mac running 10.7, with the same caps lock setting, and when I unplug the external USB keyboard, the caps lock setting stays set.

Is this by design?  Is it a bug?  Is there a workaround?  Can I make Mountain Lion remember my caps lock setting somehow?

It should stick even on Mountain Lion.

Two suggestions.

First, you might use Onyx to validate your preferences.

Second, try deleting ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.systempreferences.plist and logging out and logging in again.

In either case, the pref file might be messed up and that could prevent it from being saved.


iPhone 5s not registering steps data in iOS 8 Health app I am using the new iOS8 Health app and I'm confused. The steps and walking & running graphs are showing but without data. I've restarted, updated, and tried again and again but it is not functioning.

See Edit note at bottom.  My answer does need work, but I don't know the correct answer yet.

You need additional accessories to collect that data.

From the IOS8 for iPhone manual Page 122:

  Data sources: Enter your own data, Collect data from a device, Collect data from an app.

Also on Apple's "Health" marketing page note it says:

  The Health app in iOS 8 lets you see the data that your health and fitness apps collect in one place. You can also store your important health data in Medical ID for easy retrieval in an emergency.

Nowhere in any of the documentation does it indicate that Apple has figured out a way to collect this data with the phones sensors regardless of where the user is keeping/carrying the phone (i.e. shirt pocket, pants pocket, in an arm band carrier...etc).

Apple also sells the accessories in the apple store.

EDIT to add:  Now I'm confused too!! today My iPhone 6 has data collected, and I don't know how from the research I've done for this answer. The interface seems incredibly buggy, I am seeing both NO DATA and graphs populated with data and I can't see apparent methods to make either happen intentionally.  Drilling down to the "All Data" display and waiting a long time does seem to return data points that the phone has collected.

Additional Info Edit: NO DATA seems to appear while data is being sorted, that's my feeling anyway, I can't seem to figure out what makes sorting short or long however.

I've googled and searched apple additionally and can find no apparent documentation other than what I've already linked and quoted.


USB Power Adapter gets really hot? Is it okay if your power adapter gets hot, because mine gets really really hot, it's kinda burning to the touch and I'm really worried, especially because my Iphone is brand new and i don't live in US, but that is where i got it from, and there aren't any apple stores in my country so i can go and ask for help. If anyone knows any solution, i would be really grateful. Thank you.

Mmm I think it all depends on how much you use it and for how long you've been having it.

Though if you use it for several hours straight it may start getting a little bit hot (or even worse sometimes), it's common.

But if you think it's way out the normal, you may want to consider about purchasing a new one maybe?

You can either purchase the official one from the Apple Online Store.

Or on Amazon (thus today only 12/07/2016 is the Prime Day!) take a look!


Recording audio (book) and creating useable chapters to send via email using Garageband. Help! My son has learning disabilities, he is in college, and there was no audiobook available for one of his textbooks.  I have spent hours recording the book for him, creating chapters as I went along.  I imported the file into i-Tunes, and have run into two problems.

The chapters I marked in GarageBand do not show up in iTunes, so I cannot simply go to Chapter 3, for instance - I have to listen/scroll along to find where a specific chapter begins.  Is there a way to fix this, so that he can go directly to a certain chapter?
The file is too large to send via email, so I need to figure out one of two options:    Can the file be broken into chapters and sent individually? This could resolve the problem above... Or, secondly, is there a way for me to share it using iTunes store (or would that be violating copyright to share it on iTunes?)   Or, can anyone come up with another way to accomplish this?

He is far from home and we will not see him before the end of his year, so we need to be able to do this via email or web... I can send him the file in hard copy - either a thumb drive or disc - but will chapters be visible there?  I suspect not, given that we'd be copying from iTunes, where they are not visible...

I was planning to send this to him today, so I'm hoping someone will have some ideas that can help me...

Yes, you should break it up so that you can solve both problems.

The easiest way to do this is to create another track and mute it.

Then you can use the ⌘ + T "Split" function at each chapter (if need)

Finally drag all the audio but the current chapter you are exporting into the muted track. (Use select all and then shift-click the chapter you want to leave behind to unselect just that one.)

Forgot to mention:

You will do one export for each chapter.

In my experience when you export this it won't have a lot of silence after the end of the chapter, but if it does there is a UI element (I don't know the name) but it is a purple triangle in the time line that you can drag to the end of the audio you want to export.

It will take a bit, but you can do it.

One last note: since it is spoken word, you can export it at a pretty low bit rate. I use the "Mono Podcast" all the time and it is fine.


Split Keynote Builds Into Separate Slides I need a method that takes a Keynote presentation with multiple build animations (appear, disappear, etc.) as input and splits each slide into several new slides, one new slide for each build animation. Essentially, I need the PowerPoint plugin PPspliT equivalent for Keynote.

To illustrate the problem with an example, suppose I have this Keynote as input:

Notice that there is one slide with three build animations.

I desire this Keynote as output:

Notice that there are now four slides, with none of the slides having build animations. Both input.key and output.key produce the same slideshow.

This may be a little late, but I know how to do this.
Under the File Menu in Keynote, select "Export to", then choose "Images".
In the following window, check the box that says "create an image for each stage of builds". Go to the folder where you saved those images, then drag them all back into a new keynote doc.


Two-factor authentication: why was I asked for my iPhone passcode after I entered the verification code? I signed into iCloud in my Mac and I was sent a verification code to my iPhone, which I entered in the Mac.  But then I was surprised to be asked for the iPhone passcode.

I then got this dialog box, what protected data would be unavailable?

This situation actually never happened again, but I keep asking myself: in what situation are you required to enter the iPhone passcode?

Apple does not hold encryption keys to certain types of protected data held in iCloud such as passwords, health and home. You need to enter your passcode to allow this new device to decrypt your data.


Unable to take off 27” iMac stand I got a 2018 27" iMac which I want to mount. I got an Apple VESA toolkit and trying to unlock the hinge to take off the stand but failing.

I watched videos and everyone in the house tried. Isn’t there any Apple video to take the stand off?

No - Apple iMac internals have very delicate connectors and expecially the hinges have tight tolerances, screw torque requirements, strong springs that can get lost if you don’t perform the maintenance properly.

Those training videos are pretty hard to find since most people that pay to become a tech won’t leak them.

You can search on YouTube to learn all the failures when people try to DIY their stand and mounts. Even the vesa mounts are easier than they were in the past, but I would reach out to sales support for help if you’re struggling with it.

It should go easy and if not, you could break things if you force it. Here are techs around the globe - the cost to do a VESA should be very low since it’s quick and easy for someone that’s done a dozen or so.

https://locate.apple.com


2560x1440 resolution in linux vm with virtualbox or vmware I've got a macbook air (10.8.2) and want to use an external monitor with 2560x1440 resolution with a Linux (Debian) virtual machine. I want to use the vm in fullscreen mode, with 2560x1440 resolution. Will that work in virtualbox or vmware?

Yes; I confirm Debian runs Full Screen under VMWare on Lion at 2560x1440.


What are the advantages and disadvantages of iBooks and Kindle books for my iPad? Even though I have had an iPad for a while, I haven't taken the plunge to buy any ebooks yet. I'd like to make a decision on whether to prefer buying iBooks or Kindle before I buy any so that I can keep my collection in one place.

iBooks or Kindle: What are the reasons to choose one or the other?

I also have an iPhone for some reading, and don't imagine I'll ever buy the  Kindle hardware (as nice as they are at present).

The iBooks app is better. But Amazon Kindle Store is cheaper and has a superior selection.

The books

Publishers are responsible for creating and making available the books in each store. Sometimes a book is exclusive to one store. In that case, you have no option of where you purchase it.

When a book is available in both stores, you must compare the price and quality on a book-by-book basis. This is easy to do because both stores offer free sample chapters. Books tend to be better formatted in the iBooks Store than in Kindle's Store. This can be critical for some genres, such as technical/programming books with graphics, code samples, and tables.

The ecosystem

iBookstore purchases can only be read on iPhone/iPod touch/iPad/Mac. Kindle purchases can also be read on Amazon's dedicated Kindle devices, Microsoft Windows, iOS, BlackBerry, Mac OS X, Android, webOS, Windows Phone, as well as in a web browser.

The apps

iBooks app:

better interface (you even can turn off the skeuomorphic design features, if you prefer)
it has less features, but the features it does have are better: dictionary, highlighting, type/fonts, footnotes, navigation, look and feel
better PDF support
iBookstore built-into-the-app for convenient browsing and purchasing

Kindle app:

Sharing feature where you can publicly publish snippets from your book to kindle.amazon.com for linking-to in Twitter/Facebook. Example.
Amazon creates an email address for you to send documents to your Kindle via email. E.g. yourname@kindle.com
Con: You have to jump out to the web browser to browse and purchase content.

On an iPad, I prefer reading in iBooks because Apple executes the fundamentals better. Amazon's Kindle app has some nice differentiating features, though. All that said, at the end of the day, nothing's better than reading a basic novel on a standalone e-ink Kindle device.


kernel_task writes huge amounts of data to disk (> 1TB) - how to diagnose? My MacBook (2016 with TouchBar) running macOS 10.13 has a 512GB SSD. Looking at the activity monitor after a couple of weeks of uptime (most of it spent in standby), kernel_task shows 1.43TB (!) of bytes written to disk right now:

What is wrong here - how can I diagnose why kernel_task is writing so much data to the disk? (This happens all the time after each reboot).

Memory pressure is still "green" most of the time. Running out of space is also not an issue so most of the data seems to be "temporary".

However, I am a bit worried about my SSD - writing 25 TB per year (in addition to the "regular" workload) does not seem to be a good idea...

Any ideas?

I had the same issue on my 2010 MacBook Pro.
The fix for me was to clean out the dust from inside my laptop. I removed the fan (just requires unscrewing it with a special screwdriver, like the type for installing a hard drive) and there was a giant amount of dust blocking the airflow.
Kernel_text helps regulate the computer temperature. It was trying, but the fan couldn't do its job. After this fix, I went from 500 GB of kernel_text disk usage within a few hours of computer use, to less than 2 GB.
Interestingly, this also seemed to fix the issue of disnoted and sharedfilelistd processes using too much CPU.
However, my computer didn't have massive disk usage from the CrashPlanService process, so you might have a different issue.


How do I extend the lifespan of my MacBook's battery (2015 Retina Model) I have just received my 2015 Retina MacBook. I would really like the battery to last long.

Is there anything I can do to extend the battery life because my retina MacBook Pro's battery got progressively worse over time.

I am not familiar with the battery technology in the 2015 Retina MacBook but on the website its says:

Built-in 39.7-watt-hour lithium-polymer battery

As Allendar's comment said, read the documentation and help.  I suspect it will say something along the lines that you should connect the charger whenever power is available, and avoid a deep discharge.  These days I suspect the software will protect you as well.

By deep discharge I mean to keep running the computer from battery power beyond the limit recommended for best battery life.

Get the computer to show the battery status in the menu bar, keep an eye on it, and act accordingly.  Especially if it says the battery needs to be serviced - when this happens, get the computer looked at as soon as you can.

I have a 2009 MacBook I am still using, and the biggest problem I ever had with it was when its first battery started to fail.  The computer warned me about it (via the status in the menu bar) but I, wanting to save money, ignored the warnings.  Eventually the battery truly failed, swelling up and causing hardware trouble.


Applications assume Home folder to be /home/{user} All my apps have started identifying Home folder as /home/{user} rather than  /Users/{user}. This is causing them not to be able to launch as they can't be launched due to inability to write/read from /home/{user}

e.g
When launched Chrome says following popup and doesn't launch:

Google Chrome cannot read or write to it's data directory :
/home/{user}/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome

When launched Skype says following popup and doesn't launch:

Can't create Skype folder at "/home/{user}/Library/Application Support/Skype/"
Make sure you have enough privileges to create that folder and then launch skype again.

Relaunching finder gives me this message :

The home or Users folder may have been moved or deleted. If the home folder is located on the network, the server may be temporarily unavailable. If you continue to have problems, see your system administrator.

Any solutions ?

Log in to a different user account, then open System Preferences → Users & Groups.
Unlock the pane and right-click your user account in the list, then click Advanced Options.
Make sure the Home Directory listed is correct and change it if necessary, then reboot.


What is the relationship between Lion's Resume feature and Safe Sleep? I have disabled the "Restore windows when quitting and re-opening apps" checkbox in the General preferences pane in Lion, but after a recent sudden power loss (no battery) my iMac restarted in exactly the same state as I had left it the night before. What feature of Lion is making this (miracle) possible, and how do I ensure that it remans enabled?

I read for example that I can "disable Resume", because it "duplicates" something called "Safe Sleep", but I'm not sure what any of these features are, how they are related, or how I can control them. For example, does the behavior I saw in my recent power loss mean that my machine had gone to sleep between my last use and the power failure, or is some kind of snapshotting taking place continuously in the background? I also understand that there are different "kinds" of sleep. If sleep is indeed necessary, do different triggers (keyboard, script, idle, etc.) for sleep result in different "kinds" of sleep.

Resume, counterintuitively, does not actually save anything itself. It simply relaunches all the applications that were running when you shut your computer down. It's the job of those Lion-compatible applications to restore their windows.

Safe sleep, on the other hand, saves a snapshot of your RAM to your HDD when you put your computer to sleep. In case of power failure, the machine boots from this file on startup.

Safe sleep is the only time (that I know of) that OS X saves its RAM.

You can use the pmset command line utility (specifically the sudo pmset -a hibernatemode x command where x is the sleep mode) to change the sleep mode, although there is no significant benefit in doing this.

The three main different kinds of sleep are as follows (from the pmset man page):

  hibernatemode = 0 (binary 0000) by default on supported desktops. The
  system will not back memory up to persistent storage. The
       system must wake from the contents of memory; the system will lose context on power loss. This is, historically, plain old sleep.

  hibernatemode = 3 (binary 0011) by default on supported portables. The system will store a copy of memory to persistent
  storage
       (the disk), and will power memory during sleep. The system will wake from memory, unless a power loss forces it to restore from
       disk image.

  hibernatemode = 25 (binary 0001 1001) is only settable via pmset. The system will store a copy of memory to persistent storage
       (the disk), and will remove power to memory. The system will restore from disk image. If you want "hibernation" - slower sleeps,
       slower wakes, and better battery life, you should use this setting.

As I stated before, configuring the sleep mode is not recommended (again from the pmset man page):

  We do not recommend modifying hibernation settings. Any changes you
  make are not supported. If you choose to do so anyway, we recommend
  using one of these three settings. For your sake and mine, please
  don't use anything other 0, 3, or 25.

I don't know about the script vs. user issue, although I highly doubt there is a difference.


How to prevent iPhone from auto-connecting to unknown Wi-Fi? One thing I never do is to connect to foreign Wi-Fis. But my iPhone decides to automatically connect to those.

Translated:

  Welcome to the Telekom HotSpot (german network provider). You are connected to the internet via your SIM over Wi-Fi and are using your HotSpot flatrate. There will be no additional cost.

Unfortunately I've seen the message half an hour later so I assume I already sent data via a foreign Wi-Fi in the background. How do I stop the phone from connecting to new, for me unknown wifis, without turning Wi-Fi off completly? Is this a general 'feature' or only in branded iPhones?

iPhone will only auto-join networks that are set to be joined automatically — it won't connect to any random network. SSIDs can be set to auto-join by being manually connected to in Settings → Wi-Fi in the past (the default is auto-join and you can tap the ⓘ to disable auto-join) or because of a profile installed on the device potentially by your carrier or workplace (accessed through Settings → General → Profiles).

You also might need to clean out the check mark to remember networks if you sync settings over iCloud. When one device remembers a network - it will sync to all devices and computers.


Boot from usb take forever Recently I made the stupid mistake of erasing MacBook Pro (2012) HDD without immediately installing OS X. And now it can't even boot or get to recovery utilities.

So I decided to make a bootable OS X El Capitan usb installer. I could select it as boot drive and it go to screen with Apple logo and a progress bar. However the progress bar takes very long to build up (more than an hour) and you could hear the HDD spinning really hard. Finally the progress bar is filled but nothing happen for an hour now. Please let me know how to fix this problem.

Thanks!

OP here, it was actually pretty simple to fix. I just hard reset it and try again. Had to hard reset twice before the setup succeed.

I don't know why but my guess is that El Capitan is quite newer than my laptop so it takes a few tries to iron out all the conflicts.


How do I change the default font-family for all slides in keynote I am using  keynote 2009 and I want all my slides to have the font-family "Courier". I tried playing with master slides but when I create a new slide it defaults to "Gill Sans".

Any help is appreciated.

You can change the Master Slide to get the fonts you want, and if you’d like this to be the default, then you can save this out as a Theme.

(Caveat: I only have iWork ’11 in front of me, but I believe it's the same, for iWork ’09).

(i) Adjust font for a single presentation

Open the complete set of Master Slides. View > Show/Edit Master Slides.
Find the Master Slide(s) that corresponds to slides that you’ve used in your presentation. Open the Fonts panel (Format > Font > Show Fonts, or the Fonts item in the toolbar).
Select everything in the slide (Edit > Select All, or ⌘A), and then, in the fonts panel, select Courier instead of Gill Sans.
Repeat for every Master Slide you need.
Create a text box and format it with the font/style you want. Then select it and choose Format > Advanced > Define Text for All Masters.

(ii) Adjust font of a theme for all future presentations based on this theme

Create a blank slide show with the chosen Theme, make these edits on every Master Slide. (Every slide should now have Courier instead of Gill Sans as the default font).

Then save this out as a new Theme (File > Save theme…) to avoid overwriting the default. Call it something descriptive, like Courier Black, and just save it.

Now, next time the Theme chooser pops up, you’ll be able to choose your Courier Black variant, which will have Courier as the default.