Making Safari’s View Controller always go back in history when swiping back I spend more time in Safari View Controller (SVC, the in-app browser of apps) than Safari itself, mostly through Reeder.

Often I navigate away from the original page, starting to build a history. To go back in said history, I need to click the < in the bottom left. However, muscle memory often compels me to swipe back instead, which takes me out of SVC and to the app again, making me lose all my navigated history.

Yet sometimes it does take me back in history. I figure it must be something in the way I swipe, but so far I haven’t been able to figure out how to reliably swipe to go back in history.

Ideally for me, swipe back would always go back in history, returning to the app only when you were at the firs page; or via pressing Done.

Is there really a difference in swipes? Or better yet, a setting to change to accomplish what I want?

Whether performing a horizontal left to right edge swipe would navigate to the previous webpage in the in-app browser's navigation history or the previous view controller in the app is something which could be customized by the developer of the app.

So it's likely that you will find one or the other mode implemented among different apps. There's no set standard. Although it's possible for the app developer to provide an in-app setting to switch between the two.

You are right that this has the potential of muscle memory failing on the user by increasing the likelihood of performing the unintended gesture in an app.

Turns out, the way Reeder app is implemented, performing an edge swipe always navigates back to the previous view controller (i.e. out of the browser). As per the current implementation, the behaviour isn't configurable. If you wish to navigate back in browsing history, be careful with the gesture.

You may try contacting the developer and share your feedback regarding the same.


What sense it has to set copyright info when creating app in iTunes Connect? It is not straightforward that the owner of the product is who uploads the binary?

Why do I have to set the year at copyright field? Next year I have to update it?

In which case I can use copyright info? If somebody steels the my computer, my binary, than I can sue him? Can copyright info use against me?

Apple does not assume who owns the copyright. The copyright field is provided for you to explicitly state who claims copyright for the uploaded product.

Apple's iTunes Connect documentation states:

  Copyright (required) The name of the person or entity that owns the exclusive rights to the app, preceded by the year the rights were obtained (for example, 2014 Example, Inc.). The copyright symbol is added automatically.

Copyright is a large and complex issue. If you are unsure or have legal questions, you are best contacting a legal expert for the jurisdictions you intend to operate within.

You may also find this question helpful, Understanding copyright field in the iTunes Connect app submission.


TouchBar appears on the screen when clicked When I try to adjust the volume, the TouchBar appears on my screen. I tried to refresh the TouchBar agent by killing it, it doesn't work. And another problem about this issue is I cannot smoothly adjust the volume, I have to keep my finger on a certain point, because a circle shows up and it needs to be full before recognizing a press. It looks like a debug mode, I have no idea how this happened.

My setup is: 2017 MacBook Pro with macOS Sierra version 10.12.6

Screenshot: https://www.dropbox.com/s/zzkg9l50bn5wlvl/Screen%20Shot%202017-10-30%20at%2010.21.47%20AM.png?dl=0

Apparently this is the zoom feature of TouchBar. It was already disabled, I have enabled and then disabled again before. To fix the problem,

Open System Preferences -> Accessibility -> Zoom
Click Enable Touch Bar zoom checkbox twice to reset its status, final version should be unclicked.


Ping Issues using Thunderbolt to CAT Is anyone having a higher than usual ping when using a thunderbolt to Ethernet adapter? Or maybe the thunderbolt adaptor has a known issue?

Found this thread, Ping on Mavericks on late 2013 MacBook Pro slow and variable compared to Windows

but it doesn't look to cover hardwire connections.

So I did the test using the ping command in terminal

For Google.com

Ping Google.com

The result for 2.5 GHz WiFi was:

  20 packets transmitted, 19 packets received, 5.0% packet loss
  round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 16.295/18.872/30.858/2.935 ms

with transmit rate of 130.

And for my 5 GHz WiFi:

15 packets transmitted, 15 packets received, 0.0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 17.451/19.066/21.444/1.157 ms

with transmit rate of 216.


Cleaning up temp and bash + periodics Every night, I run the following commands in Terminal before shutting down my Mac, but I wonder if I should just enter them in the same directory that my Terminal appears in (/Users/myUserName) or should I cd to a particular directory?

rm -rf ~/.bash_history
rm -rf .TemporaryItems
rm -rf .Trash
sudo periodic daily
sudo periodic weekly
sudo periodic monthly
history -c

Ignoring for a moment that the daily, weekly, monthly jobs are running automatically anyway, you need to make sure that you are either in the correct directory or using absolute paths when running rm:

rm -rf /PATH/TO/.TemporaryItems
rm -rf ~/.Trash


iPhone 4 is locked after using Find My iPhone My iPhone 4 won't turn on or do anything after using the Find My iPhone app to find it.
I already tried to fully charge the iPhone and pushing the power button, but nothing works.

Any suggestions?

From HT1430:

  Press and hold the Sleep/Wake button and the Home button together for at least ten seconds, until the Apple logo appears.


How do you install Adobe AIR on an ipad Adobe AIR does not appear in the App Store - this is Australia, on an iPad 2.

Are there geographic restrictions - surely it isn't sideloaded?

You don't.

There aren't geographic restrictions: there are universal restrictions. As is the case with Flash—or pretty much anything that can interpret arbitrary code—Apple is not going to allow Air onto iOS.


How to fix missing Dock icon when Safari is active and minimized? After recently upgrading to Mountain Lion, I had no problems with my settings or personalization of my environment.  However, all of a sudden (yesterday) and for no reason I've been able to discern, Safari (and Safari alone) is now minimizing to the dock in a very different way.

When the application is visible, there is no dock icon. And when it minimizes, it minimizes to the trash-side of the dock with a preview, instead of simply minimizing to a dock icon like everything else.

What might have caused this?
And, more importantly, how can I set it back to behave like other applications?

Minimising into the right hand side of the tray is pretty much the norm for so called "document based applications", whereby an open application may well have 1 or more windows (or "documents") open.  This allows each individual window to have it's own minimised icon, with a preview based icon to allow you to distinguish between them.

Applications which are not multiple window based, things like say Disk Utility etc, usually minimise to the application icon instead, and even if (like Safari) they do have multiple windows, then clicking the dock app icon should take you to the most recent window if it's not merely the only one.

Either way, your running applications icon for Safari should remain in the dock, although I have to admit that mine also went missing recently, although I can't recall if this was pre or post ML.

A reboot should fix it, as it seem to me to be a transient fault, but if you are familiar with Terminal.app you can type the following in to restart the Dock process, which should clear out any such gremlins:

  killall Dock

You can also force document based applications to only minimise to the dock icon and not produce per-window icons on the right hand side of the dock in System Preferences:


How to auto switch input method by app My mac has several input methods (English, Chinese)

When I open terminal / iterm2 , I want the input method to switch to English  automatically.

When I open skype or chat messenger , I want the input method to switch to Chinese automatically.

I have the same problem and solve it by the following approach.

  choose System Preferences
  select the Keyboard option
  Select the Input Sources tab, and then check the box next to Automatically switch to a document’s input source option

Source: https://www.tech-recipes.com/rx/53194/os-x-switch-language-input-sources-automatically/


How do you get Mac OS Finder to group folders together when sorting? I have Mac OS 10.7.4 and I'd like Finder to use "Is Folder?" as its first sort criteria, or in other words, group folders before files regardless of the sorting method.

Windows and Linux both do this by default.

Finder > Preferences > Advanced > Keep folders on top when sorting by name

Before macOS 10.12 Sierra, this wasn't an option.
Before 10.12, Finder just didn't have a "group the folders" at the top/bottom. There are legions of Mac users that put all sorts of characters in their folder names so that they sort above or below when sorted by name.
There are all sorts of hacky ways to manipulate the "kind" strings internally, but then everything is arranged by kind first, and secondarily alphabetically.
If this is a deal breaker - check out the many apps that run in place of the Finder. Here is a query to get you started:
https://apple.stackexchange.com/search?q=finder+replacement


How to upgrade Mid-2009 MacBook from Mountain Lion to El Capitan? I have been having quite the struggle trying to update my Mid-2009 MBP to the "latest" MacOS.

Initially I wanted to install Sierra. I booted (CMD-R), wiped the main partition, then attempted to upgrade. The only available option was Mountain Lion, which was already installed. Even this install was not possible as when I entered my Apple ID, I kept receiving the "This Action Could not be completed, please try again".

Finally I gave up, and restored from backup.

Since then I realized that it's not possible to update to Sierra as this Mac is too old. So I would like to install El Capitan. However it's not available in the app store.

I have a developer account, so I downloaded the combo update, but of course it can't be installed on top of mountain lion.

I've tried creating USB installers, however none of them have worked, they just show the "prohibited" symbol (/).

Can anyone help me get El Capitan installed? Thanks so much.

As per the support documentation you should be able to download El Capitan from the App Store.

If you've previously downloaded El Capitan with your Apple ID (e.g. onto another device), you should find it on the "Purchased" tab.


How do I avoid "message could not be moved to the mailbox Trash" on iOS 10? Since upgrading to iOS 10, in certain e-mail accounts (notably an msn.com account) I cannot delete certain messages in Apple Mail. If I swipe left or open the message, and click the Trash icon, I get an error message

Unable to Move Message
The message could not be moved to the mailbox Trash.

This appears to happen only for messages that have already been deleted via a different client (e.g., Apple Mail on macOS) but that still appear in iOS. No matter how long I wait, these messages do not correctly sync with the iOS client on their own, and manually deleting them produces the error above.
All the instructions I've found online for addressing this (apparently common) issue either do not apply to iOS 10 or simply have no effect (repeating the same error). The only way to delete a message once this error occurs for it is to disable and then re-enable the offending account, or delete and re-add the account entirely. The account then correct syncs with the server and shows the already deleted messages as gone. But that only works until the error happens again.
How do I avoid "message could not be moved to the mailbox Trash" on iOS 10?

Here's what I did to fix things...

(EDITED, BECAUSE PREVIOUS WAY DIDN'T WORK... EVERYTHING REAPPEARED)

Go in to settings > Mail > Accounts > (Account Name) > shut off "mail"

Force quit the mail app; force quit settings app.

Re-open mail app. It should not show any mail from that account. Force quit mail app again.

Then reopen settings, re-enable mail. Everything is re-synced. Re-open mail app.


How to reorder the inbox list in the Mail app I check 3 email accounts on the iPhone.  So under 'All Inboxes' in the email app, there are 3 entries.  How do I reorder the 3 inboxes?  I'd like to put the inbox that's currently 3rd in the list to be 1st in the list.

Delete the accounts and re-enter them in the order you want them to appear.


Can I list all the Bonjour-enabled services that are running? I would be interested in knowing which programs advertise themselves using Bonjour on my machine. Is there a way to do that?

The dns-sd command-line tool can be helpful for this, but learning to use it is a bit tricky.

Running dns-sd -B _services._dns-sd._udp will return a list of all available service types that currently being advertised. (The list is per interface, so there will be some redundancy.) If this is done on a Mac with no active network connection, the list will of course only contain services running on that machine.

Using that list, you can request information about the individual services types by running things like dns-sd -B _home-sharing._tcp (which lists iTunes Home Sharing instances), and then, given an instance name, you can run dns-sd -L "Wes Campaigne’s Library" _home-sharing._tcp to lookup information for a particular instance.

To be honest, though, this whole process is rather tedious, and it's exactly what Discovery (formerly Bonjour Browser) was built to do, so I highly recommend using that. Whichever way you do it, though, it may not always be clear what program is responsible for a given service entry.

You can use the strategy given in binarybob's answer to try to map service entries to running processes based on port number, but this may not always work. Another strategy is to run something like dns-sd -B _home-sharing._tcp which remains open and reports when instances are added or removed, then, one by one, quit various apps and (assuming it's not a system service) see which one's quitting triggers the removal message.


RESTclient for Safari Is there a POSTMAN for Chrome equivalent (or alternative to) for Safari in Mac OS X Mavericks? I hate switching between browsers just to be able to test my APIs.

I used an App Store utility called Rested. It's not in Safari, but it's good, and tiny, and does not require running another browser.


Can I upgrade the memory on late 2013 Retina MacBook Pro? The below is my macOS version with basic capabilities :

While developing my apps, my Mac often shows great memory usage and swaps. These makes my Mac running and building apps slowly.

I would like to find out the ways to increase my SSD capacities and RAM . Would you please tell me how can I upgrade my RAM and SSD?

The RAM is soldered on so it is not upgradeable.

The SSD CAN be upgraded, with a standard PCIe M.2 drive if you buy an internal adapter ($2-3 on ebay) since Apple added compatibility for the new M2 Drives with High Sierra. They are much cheaper and have faster read/write speeds than the originals. OR there are some standard SSDs like this one you can buy if you don’t want to use an adapter: https://www.ifixit.com/Store/Mac/MacBook-Pro-13-Inch-and-15-Inch-Retina-Late-2013-Mid-2014-SSD/IF123-026-5

Just search for „MacBook Pro Late 2013 SSD“ on Google/eBay/Amazon and you will get some more results.


Is it possible to join the Apple Developer Program with a Visa Prepaid card? I have just ordered a Visa reLoad card where you simply put money on your card before you buy something. Will this work with an Apple Developers subscription?

Visa Pre-Paid is a credit card. It will honored providing they can charge those $99 successfully to it. They don't really care if it's pre-paid, secured or non-secured. If they can charge it, they'll gladly accept it, like any other business would. The money is real either way.


iOS 9 upgrade question Quick question, if you are still in iOS8 in your iPhone and it shows software upgrade in the settings, which version will it upgrade to 9.0 or to the latest 9.2?

The latest, currently 9.2
It ought to drop the older version & download the new, as it's released.

If that failed for any reason, then it would fetch the latest immediately [or soon] after you upgrade.

The simplest & safest method is always to do it via iTunes, assuming you already have iTunes linked to the phone.

Connect the phone
Download the update but don't install it.
Sync the phone with iTunes.
Switch to the Apps tab & get all pending updates.
Sync again.
Backup.
Disconnect & reconnect, then when it asks, run the update.


Dvorak-QWERTY keyboard does not properly switch between keyboards when I press Command button on Safari Original question: What is the new shortcut to get to select the address line on Safari?

I always used to use the Command+L to select/highlight the URL and go to another website. This changed in macOS Sierra. Now when I press those buttons, it will create a new window.

Is there a new shortcut to select the address?

–––

Edit:

Ok, I think I found the issue: the standard keyboard I work on is Dvorak - QWERTY.
It means the keys are in the Dvorak layout when I type normally, and they become QWERTY when I press the command button. I use this because many shortcuts are in favour of the QWERTY Layout.

I confirmed on another keyboard that selecting the address bar is still indeed Command+L. The reason Safari would open a new window instead is because the "L" button in QWERTY is "N" in Dvorak layout. Command+N is open a new window! It would mean that in macOS Sierra, pressing the command button does not always turn the layout in QWERTY, and sometimes it inputs the key value in Dvorak even if I press down the command button... How do I fix this issue?

Check Safari menu that you have the same picture as below.
If anything is different then you need to check System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts to see if you have any other keys assigned to these menu items.


Bad stdio forwarding specification '%h:%p I am on macOS Sierra, and my SSH version is :
OpenSSH_7.5p1, OpenSSL 1.0.2l  25 May 2017

I have this content in my .ssh/config :

Host db
  User user
  HostName 192.168.1.111
  ProxyCommand ssh user@db -W %h:%p

Host website
  User user
  HostName 192.168.1.100
  ProxyCommand ssh user@Website -W %h:%p

I also have a server with a public IP, that has direct connection with these two servers, I want to forward my SSH connection through this public server to my private servers (db and website).

When I use this command:

ssh user@db -W %h:%p

I get this error:

Bad stdio forwarding specification '%h:%p'

Now, what should I do to solve this problem and connect my macOS host to my private servers?

Your config file as well as the command are wrong.

The ProxyCommand line should contain the JumpHost's user/hostname but not the final destination.

Config file:

Host db
  User dbuser
  HostName 192.168.1.111 #db host name/IP
  ProxyCommand ssh user_public_server@public_server -W %h:%p

Host website
  User websiteuser
  HostName 192.168.1.100 #website host name/IP
  ProxyCommand ssh user_public_server@public_server -W %h:%p

The command is then simply ssh db or ssh website because the user friendly Host's name (e.g. db) as defined in the config file is expanded to the HostName/IP (e.g. 192.168.1.111).


Should I blow air canister over MacBook motherboard? I'm going to replace my Superdrive with a SSD. While the bottom casing is detached, should I gently blow an air canister over the exposed motherboard? Any area I should particularly target?

Is there any other cleaning / maintenance I should do while it is opened?

My MacBook never leaves my desk and the screen is always kept open. I use bluetooth keyboard and trackpad. Dust accumulates on the bezeling (and keys / trackpad to lesser degree).  I've had this MacBook for 3 years.

I use a commercial can of compressed air (versus air from your shop compressor, for example) and gently blow any and all dust from the exposed interior. I would do this before proceeding to replace the drive, especially if there is visible dust in the interior.

I pay particular attention to any cooling fans (not knowing your exact model) to blow all of the dust off the fan blades and from the ductwork. A pair of tweezers or a toothpick can be helpful to remove major dust bunnies, if any.

Try not to blow dust up into the fan spindle/seat directly, nor into your hard drive or Superdrive (which is simply saying, be careful to blow dust OUT of things, not into them). There may be an exposed pressure port on your hard drive case (non SSD), and the mechanism and optics in the optical drive, which are not friendly to dust or too much air pressure.


Unable to delete a file/folder I've got a pretty scary problem.
Yesterday I wanted to empty the trash but somewhere in the process it just hung up.
I rebooted a few times and tried it again and again but with no result.

I then used the terminal to delete the files out of the .Trash folder manually and I could narrow down the problem to one particular file/folder that I can't delete. If I try rm -rfv <file/foldername> it just hangs up. Even if I try to get more infos about the file/folder with ls -l it will hang up.

I also tried to repair the volume using disk utility with no success.

Tricky indeed, things to try

steps recommended by Apple (HT1526) but it seems you did most of them already
remove and recreate the whole trash folder: cd ~; rm -rf .Trash; mkdir .Trash; chmod 700 .Trash
delete by inode: cd .Trash; ls -i should give you the inode number; find . -inum INODE -exec rm {} \; deletes by inode number
hack rmi.c to compile under Mac OSX and use this to remove by inode directly (I haven't tested this)
boot into Recovery Mode (on Lion) or from DVD (Snow Leopard and earlier) and run fsck/volume repair
boot into single user mode (HT1492) and run fsck/volume repair


Windows appear in odd places in Yosemite Since upgrading to Yosemite when it came out, windows in different apps randomly appear in odd places - eg, not connected to their parents window. Here's the Chrome search bar:

Sometimes it's worse, sometimes it's better, but it's never 100% OK. This happens in multiple apps. Restarting the OS or the app does not help. How can I made windows appear in normal places again on Yosemite?

Might be worth trying to login as another user, either creating a new user, or using the guest account to see if it happens there also, if it does not. It would suggest the issue is with the preferences in your user account, especially if it only happens in some apps, you can look to clear their caches and preferences. However if it continues, I would suggest backup and reinstall the operating system.


Battery efficient GPS/Sat Nav app I'm looking for a battery efficient satellite navigation app for use on my bike. The problem is that GPS apps are a huge drain on the battery. My iPhone 6S lasts just under 3 hours when running Google Maps.

Years ago, I remember some app that had the feature of dimming the screen in between navigation instructions. I've checked Apple Maps, Google Maps and Waze and these do not appear to have the feature I describe.

Does anyone know of a good GPS/Sat Nav app that is gentle on the battery?

The solution I took in the end involves turning off the screen when riding on my bike. The audio navigation instructions still come through on my Bluetooth earpiece, and the instructions are accurate even if my phone is in my pocket.

Now I get to ride without anything cluttering up my handlebars, and my phone lasts long enough for the journeys I make.


My search engine is Yahoo, how can I change it to Google? I already follow some tips like, trying to find the extensions, but when I open it there's nothing in it. Also my search also already Google, so I'm confused right now.

You set this in Safari* Preferences - you don't need an extension to do this.

In Safari, go to the Search tab in Safari → Preferences (or press ⌘ Command,)

Select the Search Tab, and pick your Search engine.  I personally use Bing (by the way, Yahoo uses Bing to power it's search engine since 2009), but you can choose the engine you prefer.

* Safari 11.1.2 was used at the time of submitting this answer


What are the short-cuts to click buttons on a MacOS message box? On Windows you can use the TAB key to switch between which button has focus then press space to click the focused button.

However, on MacOS, when presented with the dialog in this screenshot, I cannot seem to use tab to switch between the buttons I want to click. I can only hit RETURN to click the Save button, or ESC to click Cancel. But I have no idea how I can click the "Don't Save" button using just the keyboard.

How can I navigate/click buttons in a MacOS message box using just the keyboard (not the TouchBar, Mouse or TrackPad)?

Actually, you can achieve the same behaviour in macOS!

First, you need to do as follows:

Go to Apple > System Preferences > Keyboard
Select the Shortcuts tab
Tick the All Controls radio button (see below)

Now exit System Preferences

Once you've done this, you can use the Tab key to navigate the various options (incl. buttons) in Dialog boxes. In the screenshot below I've selected the Don't Save button.

Once selected, just press the space bar as you would in Windows!


GMail and Outlook Attachment Not Showing in Mail after Upgrading to Mountain Lion I used to see Word and PDF attachements with my GMail account in Mail.  Recently I added my new Outlook account to Mail and found that attachments are missing.  So I asked my friends to send attachments to my GMail account and they are also not showing up.  All I see in attachment is a winmail.dat file (no matter my friend sends a Word or PDF file over).  This happens only after I upgraded to Mountain Lion.  Just wonder if there's some setting I need to tweak, hopefully this is not a 10.8 problem.  Thanks for any help.

There is a free online winmail.dat reader at Winmail.dat. The usual warnings about uploading documents to an unknown website apply, so don't use this for confidential stuff.


What's the Numbers equivalent to Excel's "A1:A10-B1" I'm switching from Microsoft Excel to Number.app, in Excel you can do

=SUMPRODUCT((A1:A5-A1)^2,B1:B5)

the a1:a10-b1 bit will return a cell range equivalent to a1:a10 but with all the cells decremented by b1. What's the proper syntax in Numbers for that?

If I try to import an Excel workbook using that syntax into Numbers, that formula will be imported verbatim and Numbers will complain.

In numbers, SUMPRODUCT (range, range…) takes the following arguments:

range:   A range of cells. range is a reference to a single range of
cells containing values of any type. If string or Boolean values are
included in range, they are ignored.
range…:   Optionally include one
or more additional ranges of cells. The ranges must all have the same
dimensions.

So you'll need to set up a range to perform the initial calculation (and squaring) and then sumproduct two simple ranges.


Is the installation of Xcode from App Store enough for having the developer tools? today I tried to install the new version of Xcode.
Before that I removed the developer tools with the following command:

sudo /Library/Developer/Shared/uninstall-devtools --mode=all

I also had other folder in /Library/Developer such as 4.2 4.2.1 ...

After that I installed the new Xcode and I noticed that the folder /Library/Developer contains only the Shared folder, which doesn't contain the command uninstall-devtools.

Did I install the developer tools or do I have to do something more?

Another related problem is that when I try to install Flann through Homebrew it reports the following error:

  xcode-select: Error: No Xcode folder is set. Run xcode-select -switch <xcode_folder_path> to set the path to the Xcode folder.

How can I fix it?

Installing Xcode 4.3 does install the developer tools, but not for command line access. With this version, everything has been moved into the application bundle, which means there is no need for a uninstaller, since you can just delete the application. If you want to install the command line tools, open Xcode and go to Xcode > Preferences > Downloads, select the Components tab, and click the button next to Command Line Tools. (This might add an uninstaller somewhere, but I'm not sure.)

As for Homebrew, you might have to wait for an update before it supports Xcode 4.3, since everything was moved. I would suggest trying /Applications/Xcode.app as the <xcode_folder_path>, since most of the hierarchy appears to be the same.

The homebrew developers are tracking these changes in their bug database so, you may want to monitor this thread for workarounds and notification of when the homebrew system will effortlessly work with the new changes for Xcode 4.3.


Syncing applications from iPhone to iTunes with multiple iTunes Store accounts I purchased applications from multiple iTunes store accounts, and when I sync with iTunes they are removed from the device. What do I do in this situation?

Likely this means you are not signed in and authorized with the secondary account you purchased the applications with, generally iTunes will report something on the lines of "You are not authorized to playback this content" blah blah I am going to erase all the stuff you are not authorized to play.

The fix is to go to the Store menu in iTunes and choose authorize computer, and enter in the secondary credentials, then you should be able to sync purchased apps from multiple account holders using the transfer purchases option, if nothing else.

Apple has some decent articles on the process:
About iTunes Store authorization and deauthorization
iTunes Store: Transferring purchases from your iPhone, iPad, or iPod to a computer


Did 25k on the bike, iPhone says 7.8 k I just got back from a ride where other people had odometers on their bike. They read 26 km. My iPhone's HealthKit said 7.8 km of walking and running.

Is HealthKit just not useful for biking, or is there some way to get it to recognize biking?

Cycling doesn't trigger the 'step' recognition the way actual steps do.

The subsystem responsible for the step sensor in fact does a great deal of work to filter out anything that isn't an actual step.

So the fact that some cycle moves make it through could actually be considered a flaw.

What actual cycling apps do instead is:

use the location service (e.g. GPS) of the phone,
merge this with optional data from other sensors (like wheel speed or cadence),
optionally feed the resulting cycle metrics into the Health app.

This is why you can possibly find cycling data in someone's Health database – apps can use it to store their own sensor data or metrics. But so far (early 2016) iPhones don't directly feature built-in cycling sensors.


How to download macOS High Sierra from the Mojave App Store? I use the beta of macOS Mojave and I want to download High Sierra for another install.

I don't find it in the new App Store, maybe because the update of the OS is now in the System Preferences.

I try the link from the online version: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/macos-high-sierra/id1246284741?mt=12 but the Download button is disabled.

Any idea to download it?

In previous versions of the beta this was not possible.  But in the latest release (as of 9/15/18) it is possible to use direct links to open the download page.

This links can be found on Apple's How To Download pages.

Here are the direct links for a some of them:

High Sierra
Sierra
El Capitan
Yosemite

All other OS can be purchased from Apple directly and are not in the App Store.


New Photo app - upload speed to iCloud photos really so slow? I installed the new Photos app and imported my Aperture library (about 50.000 photos altogether. As I had a bad experience when my hdd with my pictures was stolen, I want to upload all of them to iCloud. (I am not a professional photographer)

So far so good: but in the last three days, only about 5000 photos were uploaded. In other words: 30 days to go...

Is this to be expected?

Does anybody has any experiences with uploading that many photos?

I am obviously uploading via ethernet (1000 baseT) and the internet connection is not nearly saturated.

Just realized, it is on my side and my upload is saturated since I installed Photos - so it is not Apple's fault:

If I am not mistaken, it should be done in about 12-15 days.


Sharing iPhone WiFi connection Is there any way to share an iPhone's Wifi connection via Bluetooth or USB?
I know Windows PC's and MAC's can do this, but what about iPhones?

Note: Please use text descriptions instead of images.

There are Three Methods to Share internet from iPhone to other devices as per my knowledge.

Method 1 : Via Hotspot

On your iPhone tap the Settings app. This may be located in a folder labeled "Utilities."
Tap the Cellular option.
Toggle Cellular Data ON if it isn't. This will need to be enabled in order to turn on the wireless hotspot.
Tap Set Up Personal Hotspot

  This button only appears if you've never used the personal hotspot before.

  After setting up your personal hotspot for the first time, the Personal Hotspot option will appear in the main Settings list.

Click the Networks button in Windows. You'll see this in the System Tray in the lower-right corner of the screen.
Turn on Wi-fi and Connect to the network displayed with the password shown on iPhone.

Method 2 : Via USB Tethering

Install iTunes on your computer.

  If you're tethering your iPhone to a Windows computer, the computer will need to have iTunes installed in order to connect.

Tap the Settings app on your iPhone. You can find this on one of your Home screens, or in the Utilities folder.
Tap the Cellular option.
Toggle Cellular Data on. You'll need this enabled in order to share your iPhone's internet with your computer.
Tap Set Up Personal Hotspot option.
Plug your iPhone into your computer's USB port.

  you will see a prompt how to share the internet ( over USB only or wifi and bluetooth as well )

Click the Network button on your computer. In Windows, you'll find this in the System Tray.
You can now setup iPhone as a new network.

  Click your iPhone to select it as your computer's network. Your computer will now use your iPhone's internet connection as you browse the internet.

Method 3 : Via Bluetooth

Follow same steps till turning on Hotspot
go back to settings menu
Toggle Bluetooth
on Windows: Click the Bluetooth button in your System Tray. If you don't have a Bluetooth icon, your Windows computer may not have a Bluetooth adapter installed.
Click "Join a Personal Area Network."
Click the "Add a device" button. This can be found at the top of the window.
Click your iPhone.

  Don't Close this Window.

Tap Pair on your iPhone. You may be prompted to enter a code that is displayed on the other device.
Return to the Devices and Printers window.
Right-click on your iPhone.
Highlight "Connect using" and then click "Access point." Your Windows PC will now use your iPhone's internet connection over Bluetooth.


Can 2013 MacBook Air output to 2560x1080? I recently purchased a 21:9 LG monitor (model 29UM57) and I'm having difficulty getting my 2013 MBA to output to 2560x1080, which is the monitor's resolution. My max resolution is 1080p.

I purchased this MDP-HDMI adapter, Cable Matters® Gold Plated Mini DisplayPort (Thunderbolt™ Port Compatible) to HDMI Male to Female Adapter - 4K Resolution Ready, hoping that it would help my situation, but my max resolution has not changed.

I'm wondering whether ordering this HDMI cable, AmazonBasics High-Speed HDMI Cable - 6.5 Feet (2 Meters) Supports Ethernet, 3D, 4K and Audio Return, will fix my problem. I don't know what version or whatever my current HDMI cable is.

Please advise.

I believe the problem is your HDMI cable - it's not capable of displaying a resolution of 2560x1080.  In other words, it's pre-HDMI 1.4 specification.  (Also, the link provided to the cable in the original question is out of date; it's no longer available).

Per Apple Support, the 2013 MacBook Air (11" and 13" model) has a Thunderbolt port which also supports mini Display Port.

Since the HDMI cable referenced in the original question is 4K capable (HDMI v1.4 specification), the cable is not the issue.  What wasn't mentioned was the HDMI adapter. I believe this component to be the "weak link" in this chain because if the mDP to HDMI adapter isn't 4K capable, nothing else will matter.

I recommend getting an active mDP to HDMI adapter (rather than passive) and then connecting your HDMI (v1.4 or above) cable from the adapter to the TV.

That said, I would only recommend this solution for this particular setup, because the LG monitor 29UM57-P only supports HDMI connections.

Ideally, you would want to use mDP to either mDP or DP connections rather than convert to HDMI, DVI, etc., to get the most reliable connection(s).  Less conversions means less points of potential failure.


How to create a file with a specific Created at time? Possible Duplicate:
  How do I set the creation time of a file?

How can you create a files on a Mac that have a specific creation date (different from the current one)?

What I have found so far, touch can only alter the modified at time...

SetFile can also be used to set the creation date before the modification date or in the future.

-d date    Sets the creation date, where date is a string of the
           form: "mm/dd/[yy]yy [hh:mm:[:ss] [AM | PM]]" Notes:
           Enclose the string in quotation marks if it contains spa-
           ces. The date must be in the Unix epoch, that is, between
           1/1/1970 and 1/18/2038. If the year is provided as a two-
           digit year, it is assumed to be in the 21st century and
           must be from 00 (2000) through 38 (2038).

This would set the creation date to the modification date:

SetFile -d "$(GetFileInfo -m test.txt)" test.txt

SetFile and GetFileInfo are part of the command line tools package, which can be downloaded from developer.apple.com/downloads or from Xcode's preferences after installing it from the App Store.


How to toggle between normal, vibrate and silent modes like in Android On Android it is easy to toggle between normal (ring + vibrate), vibrate (vibrate only) and silent (no ring or vibrate) modes. How can I get all 3 modes and easily change between them on iPhone?

iOS is different than android in this aspect.

Vibrate is implemented as two software binary switches in iOS.  Vibrate can be on or off in silent and independently on or off in non-silent.

Volume is a software slider that can optionally be controlled by the external buttons.  When the silent switch is orange / down / silent most sounds are muted.

There are plenty of apps that control volume but not vibrate status outside the settings app. Take Five is my favorite.

Unless there is a jailbreak app that someone has created to emulate android, there is no program that does precisely what you ask.

When I want zero chance of any sound or vibration, I power down my device.


Is there a way to set application-specific 'hot corners' in OS X? OS X's 'hot corners' feature is great, but I'd like to use it in just one specific application - or, set a specific hot corner action for one app, and a different action (for the same corner) in another app.

Is there a tool that can do this?

The tool CornerClick seems to have a lot of custom features over OS X's own one, but from a brief look it doesn't seem it offers a way to actually isolate/customize hot corners to specific apps per se.

CornerClick and AppleScript

Try creating an AppleScript that is triggered by CornerClick. Your AppleScript could check which application is front most and act accordingly.

Enhancement Request

Also, consider opening an enhancement request with CornerClick. The project is open source and your interest may help motivate the author, or other developers, to improve the product.


How to find files by the filename length in OS X 10.9.1? Need to find files/folders with names longer than n characters (OS X 10.9.1).

Could you please help?

You can use the find command with the -regex (regular expression) option. This is probably less efficient than globbing, because -regex matches against the entire path.

find -E . \( -type f -or -type d \) -and -regex '.*/[^/]{11,}'

Precisely, this command does the following:

recursively searches for files in the current folder and in the subdirectories (you can limit the depth with an additional -maxdepth n clause);
uses the extended syntax (-E) for regexes.
searches for files and folders (-type f -or -type d)
regex match: the string which follows the last slash in the file path must be 11 characters or longer.


During Install: unexpected Arabic text in Elevated Permissions Dialog … why? Can anybody explain this, and more importantly how to solve it? It only appears to be the dialog that comes up asking for elevated permissions when installing an application, and everything works as expected, even though the text coming up is wrong.

I'm running OSX 10.8.4 on an iMac, language settings wise I now have only British English installed, everything else has been removed.

Running sudo defaults read -g AppleLanguages produces:

The domain/default pair of (kCFPreferencesAnyApplication, AppleLanguages) does not exist

Also it doesn't seem to be all installers. I've just installed a new Canon printer, and the dialog requesting elevated permissions came up as normal.

Mixed localizations like this have been reported fairly frequently in Mountain Lion, Arabic being the most common.  Normally it can be fixed by just going to system preferences/language & text/language and using the Edit button to remove Arabic.

Having only British English on that list may be risky, because the OS has no British English localization, so something else has to be used.  Try adding back at least English and perhaps some other languages and then restarting.  Or even adding back English and Arabic and then restarting and then remove Arabic and restart.


Is it possible to wirelessly connect macbook pro to LG monitor Is it possible to wirelessly connect macbook pro 2015 to LG ULTRAWIDE monitor? Through airplay or whatever else channel, or even through 3rd-party adapter.

An AppleTV will let you Airplay to the monitor or any other device with an HDMI input. owlswipe's suggestion of a wireless HDMI transmitter is another option if you don't mind adding additional hardware to the Macbook


iPad mini offers update to iOS 6.0.2 that won't install An update to iOS 6.0.2 did not seem so important at the time and so it was never installed. Now that iOS 6.1 is out I'd expect that Software Update skips the update to iOS 6.0.2 and directly provides me with the ability to update from iOS 6.0.1 to iOS 6.1 instead.

And yet, Software Update is stuck with the intention to update to iOS 6.0.2. In the hope that after iOS 6.0.2 was successfully installed Software Update  may offer to install iOS 6.1 next I accepted the update to iOS 6.0.2.

However, the next thing is that Software Update claims that the installation of iOS 6.0.2 cannot be started because there is no connection to the Internet. I positively verified that the connection is possible; so the most likely explanation is that Software Update is not able to find the update to iOS 6.0.2 any longer and concludes that this is caused by a lack of connectivity.

How can I make Software Update ignore the pending update to iOS 6.0.2 and head for iOS 6.1 instead?

Since things aren't working as expected, make a backup - perhaps two, one to iTunes and another to iCloud.

Connect the device to iTunes and let iTunes download the entire 6.1 update rather than monkeying with a pair of delta patches that iOS downloads to save space on the device and save bandwidth and time to update.


Can Garageband Loops be removed after removing Garageband? I have just removed Garageband Loops via System Information > Manage; these remained after I'd uninstalled Garageband using AppCleaner.
Can I remove them manually or will this impact other functionality in the system?

You can safely remove the GarageBand loops. Note: These loops can also be used by Logic.
Remember - should you want to use GarageBand in the future, the loops can be re-downloaded any time.
Edit in light of benwiggy's comment.


iPhone/iPad back up to different hard drive? Is there a way to have iTunes store your iPhone/iPad/iPod back up to a different hard drive on a Mac?

Sure, if you are on a PC, create a junction.

Locate your current iTunes backup folder. If you are using Windows 8, 7, or Vista, to locate the iTunes backup folder use the Windows Start Menu and enter the following in the Search box: %APPDATA%\Apple Computer\MobileSync
Move the current iTunes iOS backup folder to the new desired destination via a simple drag and drop
At the original folder location, press the SHIFT key, right-click and select “Open command window here”
In the command prompt window, manually type in the following command where E:\ is the new drive location (drive letter may vary) and “Backup” is the name of the iOS backup folder you just moved: mklink /J “%APPDATA%\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup” “E:\Backup”
You will now see the command prompt window return a success in creating a junction
A new folder shortcut called “Backup” will appear in the original location
Double click on the “Backup” folder shortcut and while it may seem you are still within the MobileSync folder on the C: drive, what you actually see is the contents of the “Backup” folder you previously moved to the new location. You can think of it as a virtual tunnel created through your computer directory space


Late 2008 MacBook Pro no longer wakes up on its own Plain and simple here: about one week ago, my MacBook Pro stopped adhering to its wake schedule. I have had it set to wake every weekday at 6 a.m. for as long as I can remember. It has done so with 100% reliability as long as a power source is plugged in and the lid is open. Then it stopped. I finally went and checked the power savings pref pane this morning, and all is right with the world. I tweak my computer all the time, but have not done anything with this setting, nor have I installed anything that was advertised to affect power management. That being said, should I reset the SMC? This doesn't really seem to fall under what apple would normally recommend this for.

Cheers

This could be related to the SMC or the PRAM. The System Management Controller controls everything related to power on your Mac. I would reset this first, and then reset the PRAM right after. Let us know if that works. You may have to reset the sleep schedule after resetting the PRAM.


Connecting second screen via Thunderbolt and HDMI So my problem is the following:

At home I am connecting my MacBook Pro (macOS Sierra installed) to a second screen using the HDMI port. If I do that, and already have my mac running, on that second screen I have a new "Desktop" (i.e. in Mission Control) and all previously opened windows stay on the first desktop of my mac. This is the behaviour I like.

Now at work I am connecting with Thunderbolt. There, my "Desktop 1" gets transferred to the second screen, together with all my open windows, and I have a new empty Desktop on my mac.

So what I would like:

Get a consistent behaviour, no matter how I connect to a second screen.
Preferably, have the behaviour I get now when connecting with HDMI as default (i.e. the main desktop should always stay on my mac).

Anyone having experience with this?

There is a product that should be able to fix this issue for you:  Stay

From their website:

  Stay can store a set of windows for every combination of displays that
  you use with your computer. Stay can also be configured to
  automatically restore windows as displays are connected and
  disconnected.


No bootable device found ( Install windows on Mac ) I'm owning a macbook pro 13 inch mid 2009 and a USB thumb drive Kingston DataTraveler 100G3 16 GB.

I successfully installed Windows 7 on my Mac using Bootcamp ( with a little trick to enable "Creat a bootable flash drive" feature which was hidden in my bootcamp version ).

The problem is, after about 1 month, I followed exactly the same procedure, with the same USB and ISO installation file on my friend's computer ( Macbook Early 2008 model ), it just didn't work. When I tried to boot into USB, it said : "No bootable device - insert boot disk and press any key ". Similar to this video : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgWBY6IezQA

And to be even more frustrating, I tested it on my computer again to check whether there was something wrong with my friend's computer, my computer couldn't even boot into the USB again

I'm really desperate now. I feel like there is some mysterious thing going around here. My USB's working perfectly otherwise.

The problem is that your MacBook doesn't have BIOS, it uses EFI instead. I won't go into the differences between the two, but the Boot record you've created on your USB is for BIOS not EFI.

There are two fix this, one requires a PC with Windows, the other doesn't.

Windows method:
Go to this link: http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/15458-uefi-bootable-usb-flash-drive-create-windows.html

It'll explain the steps you need to follow to have your MBP boot from the USB.

Other method:
Go to http://gparted.org
Download and run GPARTED
Convert your MBR volume to GPT

Now you're EFI will recognise your USB as a bootable device :)


My login keychain cannot be found. I have Keychain access but no Keychain repair option. OS X El Capitan My login keychain cannot be found.
I have Keychain access but no Keychain repair option in the drop down menu. I am unclear if I have erased something in error, or if this is a common issue?

The login keychain lives in ~/Library/Keychains/

First thing I'd do is see if Time Machine has a backup.

There is no Repair Keychain function in El Capitan. According to Apple KB: About the security content of OS X El Capitan 10.11.2

  Impact: A malicious application may be able to masquerade as the
  Keychain Server. Description: An issue existed in how Keychain Access
  interacted with Keychain Agent. This issue was resolved by removing
  legacy functionality.

According to rumour, it never worked since 10.11 anyway.


How can I setup two iCloud Keychains? I want to replicate my Keychain setup for OS X in iCloud Keychain, to have passwords sync between iOS and OS X devices.

The way I set it up was following this article. The idea is having the default login Keychain for all Wi-Fi and system passwords that remains unlocked after login, and a separate Keychain for website passwords that is kept locked and requires a password in order to access the passwords when needed.

I would like to access these website passwords from my iOS devices in this same way, only when I set up iCloud Keychain, the login Keychain automatically became the iCloud Keychain.

Is there anyway to have to separate iCloud Keychains syncing between my devices?

Alternatively, is there any other way to make the passwords in my secondary Keychain available in iOS?

There's no way to have more than a single iCloud Keychain I'm afraid. Other Keychains you create locally on your Mac are only for use on that Mac.

Until Apple allows Keychain Management on iOS from Settings you're out of luck. If you're interested to know how iCloud Keychain works, see here: https://support.apple.com/en-au/HT204085


Can you change the storage location of Conversation History for Mac Lync? I know the history is stored in /Users/<username>/Documents/Microsoft User Data/Microsoft Lync History.

Does anyone know if it's possible to change where it's stored? I'd like to save conversations to a cloud storage directory.

How about moving that directory to Drop Box, or a similar cloud-synced space, and then symlinked that path to your cloud directory?

You can create the link with the Finder 'Make Alias' command under File, or use Terminal to create a link with 'ln'.

The original directory goes in your cloud directory, and the alias goes back in /Users//Documents/Microsoft User Data/

This process is standard for DropBox, I assume it would work with other services too.


This worked well for me on Windows: https://www.copytrans.net/support/how-to-convert-iphone-sms-to-plain-text/

But because I use a Mac from day to day I use this, however it does require you to backup the device before you can extract the texts: https://www.imactools.com/tutorial/extract-sms-messages-from-iphone-backup


How does one change Terminal.app profile for all open tabs using a keyboard shortcut? Would love to know if there is a way to switch all my current Terminal.app tabs to a different profile on the fly.

The use-case being to change Terminal profile from a dark to a light theme, and vice versa, depending on a user's current mood/preference. This can be achieved manually by right clicking on a Tab header and choosing "Inspect tab", and then changing the theme for each tab.

The other option is to close down all the open tabs and reopen them with a new theme, again suboptimal IMHO.

Hope someone has a better way :)

Create an AppleScript like this one, and call it something like TerminalNightMode:

tell application "Terminal"
    set current settings of tabs of windows to settings set "Pro"
end tell

You can replace the "Pro" setting with the setting name of your choice. When you run this AppleScript, it will change the settings for all the tabs in all windows. I recommend putting this script on the dock for easy access. Likewise, you can make another script for day mode.


Forgot administrator username and password MacBook Pro I got a MacBook Pro and I forgot my administrator username and password and I can't log in into my account. If I use my guest account I can't log in into my iCloud because it is asking me for my administrator credentials.

How can I reset my computer or reset my administrator information?

I have tried to open a new Apple ID but I still need my administrator permission to log in.

Password assistant (FileVault must be on)
One way to reset your password is using set Password assistant (FileVault must be on).
If FileVault is on, follow these steps to reset your password:

Wait up to a minute at the login screen, until you see a message saying that you can use the power button on your Mac to shut down and
start up again in Recovery OS. If you don't see this message,
FileVault isn't on.

Press and hold the power button until your Mac turns off.

Press the power button again to turn on your Mac.

When the Reset Password window appears, follow the onscreen instructions to create a new password. If you need to connect to
Wi-Fi, move your pointer to the top of the screen and use the Wi-Fi
menu to connect. To exit without resetting your password, choose Apple
menu > Restart.

When done, click Restart.

If you were able to reset your password with the Reset Password assistant, log in to your account using your new password.

Determine whether to create a new login keychain.

(Source)
Reset using your Recovery Key (FileVault must be on)
If FileVault is on and you have a recovery key you can use that to reset your password:

At the login screen, keep entering a password until you see a message saying that you can reset your password using your Recovery
Key. If you don't see the message after three attempts, FileVault
isn't on.

Click the arrow next to the message. The password field changes to a Recovery Key field.

Enter your Recovery Key. Use uppercase characters, and include the hyphens.  Follow the onscreen instructions to create a new password,
then click Reset Password when done.

Determine whether to create a new login keychain.

Reset using Recover Mode
You can reset your password from the terminal using Recovery Mode:

Turn off your Mac (choose Apple > Shut Down).

Press the power button while holding down Command + R. The Mac will boot into Recovery.

When you see the load bar appear you can let go of the keys. It may take a few minutes to load.

Select Disk Utility and press Continue.

Choose Utilities > Terminal.

Enter resetpassword (all one word, lower-case letters) and press Return.

Select the volume containing the account (normally this will be your main hard drive).

Choose the account to change with Select the User Account.

Enter a new password and re-enter it into the password fields.

Enter a new password hint related to the password.

Click Save.

A warning will appear that the password has changed, but not the Keychain Password. Click OK.

Click Apple > Shut Down.

(Source)


What SSD interface/form factor is compatible with my 13" MBP (Mid 2012)? I have an old MacBook Pro (13", Mid 2012; 5,400 RPM HDD) that I want to bring back to life with an SSD.

The options I've been exploring are the 2.5" SATA SSDs—am I looking for the right component? I just realized there's mSATA, not sure if that's what I should be looking for.

Thanks!

Yes! A 2.5 inch SATA SSD like this one from Samsung or this one from Crucial or this one from Western Digital will work.
(Note that those three are just examples.)


iCloud in iOS and mac os require my phone password to log into icloud on my mac? Since when? I recently noticed that when trying to log into my icloud on either my iphone 7 running ios 12.3.1, or my mac running high sierra, i am required to enter my iphone screen unlock password on ios (for icloud login), and my mac screen unlock login for icloud login on mac os. Since when does apple require you to enter your real passwords for hardware devices just to log into icloud? Seems like a security issue.

This is likely due to iCloud's end-to-end encryption. According to Apple's iCloud security overview:

End-to-end encryption provides the highest level of data security.
Your data is protected with a key derived from information unique to
your device, combined with your device passcode, which only you know.
To access your data on a new device, you might have to enter the
passcode for an existing or former device.


Why won't Netflix play videos on my iPad? Go to watch any video instantly.  Click on play video.  It'll say that it's preparing to load.  Then it switches to the video screen for half a second, then back to the preparing to load screen, then dumps me back to the browsing for instant videos screen.  So the video never played at all.

Any idea on how to fix this?

I managed to resolve this by changing my DNS server to Google's 8.8.8.8.  Not ideal, but it worked.  Still, any ideas why this is happening?


How do you position your hand to use the control + w key? What fingers do you use? I would like to improve my typing. Currently, I start web dev with vim. I use one of the feature called split, which create new window for me. then we need to hit Control+ W to move around cursors. I find myself vary awkward hit press the control key and w key at the same time, pinky for control key and ring for w key.

I understand there is one correct answer to this question. I would like to know how you guys do it. I definitely will find useful tips to improve the typing overall. Thank you so much in advance.

edit:
Ok, I need to specific, I am using MacbookPro 2016, which only have left control key. (I wish we could modify the right option key to act as a control key, but the left option key stays the same)

On the Apple Magic keyboard, I use my left thumb for the command key, and my left ring finger for any bottom row keys to the left of that. For command W, I use my thumb and middle finger. For control W I use my ring and middle finger - all on the left hand.


Simulate iPhone from the backup I am currently having some problems with my iPhone making it impossible to connect to it. I did perform a full backup before it died.

My question is, is it possible to simulate my iPhone using the backup? And if so, how?

It isn't possible to simulate the iPhone contents from the backup. The possible resort is to restore the backup on the device after resolving the issue or get another iPhone to restore onto.


Where did music scan go on my iOS 4.2 iPod Touch 2nd Gen? A week ago, I had a slider when playing music that let me scan through music really quickly. Now it's gone. Here's a screenshot:

Did I change a setting or something? I can't find anything about it. The slider used to be near the top. I only have the standard fast-forward/rewind buttons now.

Have you tried tapping the album art while the music or podcast is playing? That should bring the "scrub-bar" to the screen where you can quickly scan through the media currently playing (seek-bar at the top of the picture).


Printer Deploy with and custom preset profiles to Mac OS X workstations How would I go about deploying a network printer (Sharp MX-2600N) to Mac OS X machines that would include a custom printer preset profile (Embedded Printer User Authentication Code)?

Ideal Method of deployment that might be plausible is ssh command session. I am a newbie with unix commands.

Environment

Printer- Sharp MX-2600N

This printer is controlled by 'User Authentication' code that we have to configure on the printer presets.

Mac OS X Machines - Are joined to 2003/2008r2 mixed active directory environment.

Mac OS Versions - 10.7/10.8

You will need to install the drivers before you are able to setup the Mac systems to use that printer's Authentication method.  You'll need to download the drivers from Sharp Website for MX-2600N Mac Drivers.

Once you have downloaded that DMG, you'll need to open it, deploy, and install the PKG file inside correlating to the Mac OS version you are running on the destination system.  So for a client machine with Mountain Lion (10.8) you'll need to deploy that package to the machine either via SSH, email, Apple Remote Desktop, or some other method.  You mentioned through SSH so if you have a session open you would SCP it from your machine to that machine.

To install, you would run this command sudo installer -pkg /path/to/package.pkg -target /

Once the drivers are installed, you can then add the printer to the machine and have the user select the Secure Print feature in the Printing Preferences.


Syncing photos Android -> Mac I would like to accomplish the following, which, in today's technological ecosystem, seems like it should just happen anyway:

I take a photo on my Android phone

The phone uploads it somewhere automatically (presumably Google Photos)

My Mac downloads it automatically into a folder

In other words, I want the photos on my android device to seamlessly appear in a folder on my Mac, without me needing to do anything besides take the photo.
I have Google Drive installed, but my photos don't seem to be there. I tried installing "Google Backup and Sync", but it crashed immediately and I can't get it to work. (I'm on OS X 10.11, so maybe that's why. I don't intend to upgrade until I get a new machine.) I've head that Google Backup and Sync is quite complex and fiddly to use anyway.
Is there any other way that automatic photo sync between Android and Mac can be accomplished? If possible, I'd prefer not to use Dropbox, because mine is nearly full and I already pay for additional space on Google Drive, so I don't want to upgrade Dropbox as well.

One way to accomplish this is with Microsoft OneDrive. The main barriers to this method are:

You need a paid Office365 account to get the 1 TB storage
You need to be on Mac OS 10.12 or newer

It has the same functionality as Google Photos where you can have all your photos automatically upload from you phone. Then you can sync them to your computer using OneDrive for Mac.
Sounds like you weren't planning to upgrade Mac OS, but if you already have an Office365 subscription and the upgrade would make the difference, this could be an option.


kernel_task on Macbook hogging CPU even after OS upgrades/downgrades; possible Flash malware? On a Macbook Air (13-inch, Early 2015) my girlfriend got one of those "upgrade Flash" pop-ups and hit (Continue/Okay/etc?). This may or may not have anything to do with the current problem but ever since, the kernel_task has been hogging the CPU to the point at which the computer is so slow as to be unusable. In Activity Monitor, the % CPU of kernel_task is is a constant 220-450. The CPU load is a constant 75%-90%, although the computer is not getting hot.

Here is what I have done so far. I've reset the SMC and NVRAM/PRAM multiple times. I upgraded to the newest OS, Catalina. I downgraded to the original OS for this laptop, El Capitan. I upgraded and downgraded more than once and each time, the issue remains. The installation of the OSes took forever, as well; been working on this problem for 4 or 5 days now. Oh, and booting in safe mode doesn't help, either. Anyway, two questions:

1) Is it possible for a Flash malware thing to install/configure something in the kernel that remains after re-installing the OS?

2) Any ideas on how to fix this?

When a system is infected with malware, the best course of action is format the drive and restore known-good backup from before the malware infection.

If you just reinstall the operating system on top of your infected system, while keeping all your own files on your drive, you're in high risk of keeping the malware - and/or simply reinfecting the system quickly after the upgrade.

In theory malware could change the firmware of the SMC or something like that, to persist even when the drive is formatted - but in practice Flash malware is very unlikely to do so.

However, I'm not entirely convinced that your problem with kernel_task is related to the malware. I would suggest rebooting your computer into "Recovery mode" by holding the Command and R buttons during boot. When in "Recovery Mode", open the Terminal and run the command:

top -ocpu

This should show a live updating overview of the currently running processes, sorted with the most CPU using process at the top.

If you still have kernel_task at the top spot with a large percentage, the problem is most likely unrelated to the malware, and could instead indicate a hardware problem regarding cooling. This could be a problem with a fan not operating properly, cooling paste, or even a sensor issue.


Launching a specific web page from iOS home screen I want to create an app icon on my iOS home screen that launches a particular web page in a browser when it is tapped. In other words, it should look visually like an app, but I don't want to have to code an app. I don't want to have to launch a browser and open a bookmark each time I want to visit that web page.

Is there a way to do this?

Safari, the default browser available in iOS has a feature that lets you add a website bookmark to your Home Screen.

The bookmark visually looks like an app icon and when tapped, opens the webpage in Safari. The website favicon is used to represent the app icon. However, unlike Safari bookmarks which syncs across all your Apple devices, this one appears only on the iOS device that you add it on.

To add a webpage bookmark on your iOS Home screen:

Open the webpage in Safari.

Tap on the Share button. In the bottom row, tap on Add to Home Screen

If needed, edit the name of shown below the bookmark icon. Webpage title is used by default.

Tap Add and you are done. The webpage bookmark is now added to the iOS Home screen. If need be, it can be easily removed by following the same procedure to uninstall app (tap and hold until the icon wiggles, tap on ⓧ button at top left of the icon).


Display & Keyboard Sync Is there a way to synchronize display brightness with keyboard backlight levels? So, when ambient light sensor detects a change automatically adjust both levels.

The latter half of your question, adjusting keyboard backlight from ambient light, can be achieved in System Preferences → Keyboard → Adjust keyboard brightness in low light.

This won't adjust the backlight if you manually adjust the screen brightness. If you don't use the ambient light sensor for the display, you can use some hook on the increase/decrease brightness keys to also press the backlight brightness keys at the same time, using an app such as Keyboard Maestro. Otherwise, you can use Keyboard Maestro with some loop to get the display brightness on regular intervals and set the backlight brightness appropriately.


Why aren't Find My Friends location indicators working? My boyfriend and I share location thru Messages and Find My Friends.

I used to be able to see either a purple or gray arrow in settings whenever my location was checked...but not anymore. I just tested it again and had my sister locate me...the arrow appeared in the status bar, but the only purple arrow in settings was under system settings. And, sometimes when I don't allow location access in Messages and Find My Friends, people can still locate me.

Basically, I want to be able to see indicators when someone has checked my location, and I want to be able to disable it altogether when I don't want my location shared.

What do I need to do to make it work this way?

For seeing the icon indicator when someone checks your location, you need to go to Settings > Privacy > Location services > System services (all the way to the bottom). Then go to the bottom again and check “show status bar icon”.

Please note that this will make the indicator show whenever any of the system location services use your location, not necessarily when someone checks your location on Find my friends. You will probably see the icon very often and it might rarely be caused by Find my friends.

The purple and gray arrows can be seen on the same page, by the name “location sharing”. You can also disable it there so people won’t see you, but it’s better to enable or disable it directly on the Friends app.

For temporarily disabling your location on the service, open the Friends app and tap your name. Then enable or disable “share my location”.

If your location indicator on the map is red, you can’t be seen by your friends. If it’s blue, then the friends you are sharing your location with can check your location.

The message your friends get when you disable sharing is the same as they would if you didn’t have an internet connection: “location unavailable”.


I have bought a ipad 2 32gb wifi and 3g it came with ios 4.3.5. how would i jailbreak it? i have seen many people among my friends who have jailbroken their ipad 1. I have just bought an ipad 2 yesterday and wish to do the same . how would i jailbreak it i have also tried downloading an ios 4.3.3 firmware

thanks in advance

If you are running iOS 5.0.1 (or if you update to iOS 5.0.1 through iTunes), you can use Absinthe to JailBreak your iPad 2. Go to http://greenpois0n.com/ and look for the "JailBreak iOS 5.0.1" table on the right of the page. Choose your download, and enjoy! It's really easy and intuitive to JailBreak with Absinthe. For further reference, you can always check out http://www.jailbrea.kr/ for the latest updates and info. Note that Absinthe is only for the iPhone 4S and iPad 2 running iOS 5.0.1.


How can I merge two similar-but-not identical folders? I have a folder (which is filled with many many sub-folders and files) which is on a FireWire drive [source] which I am trying to move to a USB drive [destination].

I am trying to move all of the files from the Source to the Destination.

I started doing this via Finder, but it gave me a permissions error about 1/8th of the way through the process and then stopped.

When moving files between drives, I believe the Finder first does a 'copy' and then removes the 'source' only when the copy command has completed successfully.

That means that some files were copied successfully, but I have no idea which ones or how many. So I started copying sub-folders from Source to Destination (smaller sets) and removed them from Source when they successfully copied.

I ended up not being able to complete that process in one sitting, and I lost my "place"

So now I'm left with two incomplete data sets. The Source probably has some files/folders which are already on the Destination, but not everything has been copied.

Some of the folders may have been partially copied but not all of their subfolders, etc.

I'm trying to figure out the best way to move the rest of Source to Destination while minimizing duplication. We're talking about a lot of data here (Source is 420.72 GB in 398,127 items, and Destination is 298.84 GB and 390,149 items) so I'm obviously going to have to try to automate this somehow. I'm just not sure how.

I've thought about gcp [GNU cp] with --update --archive or ditto or rsync or ChronoSync but I'm just not sure what the best option is and what settings I should use for whichever program would be recommended (do I want --archive with gcp? What flags would I use with ditto or rsync?)

You can open Terminal and use one of the following (rsync would probably be the one for you if you want something that won't be completely lost if you halt the process):

The standard UNIX way

cp -R -v source/. destination

The geeky UNIX way (restartable)

rsync -vaEW source/ destination

The OSX "easy" way

ditto -V source destination

Source


Why does this I in a black rectangle with a line through appear on my iPad Pro screen, and how to get rid of it permanently? This black sign appears on my iPad Pro screen many times, sometimes in one top corner of the screen, sometimes on different other places on the screen, but I guess always on the Safari tabs, as I’ve never seen it on the screen when using other apps! The size is less than one square centimeter.

Why does it appear on my screen? And how can I get rid of it forever?

Since this is happening in Safari several additions could inject content that doesn’t directly come from the websites you listed:

VPN or network injection (very unlikely as it would break most secure sites that use TLs)
Content blockers (very suspect, try disabling them all, then enabling then half at a time)
CSS modifications (less common, but very likely if you use them)
Developer tools and experimental features (Settings app > Safari > Advanced)

The developer tools and attaching your iPad to desktop safari and opening web inspector is the tool I use to dissect an odd website behavior. I can not reproduce your issue despite trying, but if someone can show how to reproduce it, I would love to help solve it.


Why won’t my iPad backup? I always get notifications that my iPad “hasn’t been backed up in X weeks. Backups occur when the iPad is locked, connected to WiFi and charging.” I feel that this must occur all the time, but the iPad still does not back up. Is there a certain amount of time the iPad must be in that state before a backup is completed, or something?

Make sure that iCloud backup is turned on.
(Settings -> tap on your name at top -> tap on iCloud -> tap on iCloud backup -> turn on.

iPad will now automatically back up daily when the screen is locked, wifi is on, and iPad plugged into power.

You can also backup manually from this screen by tapping backup now to iCloud.

If you don't have enough storage available on iCloud you will get an error message.

You can also backup to a computer by connecting through usb, then "trusting" the iPad (find the iPad in Finder) then the option to backup to computer will become available. Or use iTunes.


External drive mounts but doesn't appear in Finder anymore I have an external hard drive (Drobo 2nd gen) connected to my Mac via Firewire. It used to appear on my desktop and in my Finder sidebar, but now it won't show up in either place (I do have "Hard disks" and "External disks" turned on in the Finder sidebar options).

The drive does seem to be mounting fine: the drive and partition are visible in Disk Utility and I can browse to it in Finder if I use the Finder's "Go to Folder..." command and type /Volumes/Drobo/. I can read/write to it fine once I've navigated to it.

I have the latest version of Drobo's Dashboard utility installed, and my firmware is up to date. Any ideas? Is this a sign that my external drive is starting to die?

EDIT: I've resolved this problem with the help of Drobo's tech support. See my own accepted answer below. I've revised this answer to make it less Drobo-specific, since it ended up being a filesystem thing.

With the help of Drobo's technical support who pointed me to this MacRumors thread, I've resolved the issue. It turned out that somehow my drive got set to "invisible", which is a filesystem attribute. I don't think this setting is settable via the Finder, so I'm not sure how it got set like that.

To confirm the issue, I had to install Xcode and then install the command line tools, then run this Terminal command:

GetFileInfo /Volumes/Drobo/

where /Volumes/Drobo/ is the path to the volume in question. This command returns all the attributes set for that volume. If the list of attributes includes a V (capital V), it means that the volume is invisible.

To fix it:

SetFile -a v /Volumes/Drobo/

with a lowercase v, to remove the invisible attribute.

After a reboot, everything was back to normal.

Note: depending on the drive and your permissions, it's possible you will need to run these commands with sudo, although I didn't.


How to change Font size for PDF in iPad running iOS 9? I have iPad mini 2 running iOS 9. I'm transferring my PDFs to the iPad via iTunes.

I swear that I didn't find any option to increase font size in iBooks, not even in iBooks settings.

I don't think it's possible. I can't find any way to adjust font size on PDFs using iBooks for iOS, nor can I find anything about it online. Apparently, one can only adjust the font size with books in iBooks and not PDFs.


How to get the shortest file size on aliases? I realize a bit of why they are so big. Actually, they used to be small enough (around 2kb) and still magical about keeping the file link.

I can also see a few ways to "shorten" it, including one I've been using for a long time already, which is a simple service to create symlinks instead. There's an issue there:

Symlinks are not aliases

They break way too easily. An alias can keep linked to the origin most of the times.
Some software will treat symlinks differently from Aliases. Here, each one have their use, and eventually I'll use one or another.
Not as easy to create as aliases -> use CMD + ALT while dragging n' dropping files!

So, forget symlinks for this question, please!

As for the actual way to shorten it (described on the already linked apple forums) they are way unpractical. First you need to install Shrink Alias with Shortcuts (because the first is unsupported in newer OS X's and the second is a hack to make it available as a Service) and Delete Data Fork workflow. Then manually apply both to each alias. Eventhough you can do it by selecting all files in Finder, again, you still have to do it for each time you create aliases and it's many hacks to keep updated on the next OS'es.

Isn't there a simple Service Workflow, Automator or AppleScript which could do  all that automatically whenever I create a new alias, maybe by hooking up on the Alias Manager?

I doubt there is a secret to help with any of this...

How about some other new idea about all this?

In High Sierra, the following works: just select the alias and run Finder command "Show Original" (command-R).  This trims the alias size down to a minimum.  This brought an alias that was previously 24 Mb down to 8 Kb.


Searching for files on SMB share shows all files as question marks "?" on macOS High Sierra Searching on SMB share in Finder on macOS High Sierra (10.13.3) shows all files names as "?". The correct kind and size is identified, it is just the name that is messed up.

Browsing works fine and all files show up correctly.

It worked fine on Sierra before upgrading to High Sierra.

Also the "kind" suddenly contains Japanese(?) letters. Doesn't usually show. The system language is English.

Any suggestions on how to fix this?

I did a clean install of High Sierra and it's working now. I guess some system files had been corrupted during the upgrade.

Not really a fix, so if someone has a better answer I'll hapily give them the points. I consider it closed for now.


Can't install bundler using gem I'm trying to install Bundler on my Mac which is running OS X El Capitan Public Beta 6 (15A278b).

I try sudo gem install bundler but I get the following error back

  ERROR: While executing gem ... (Errno:EPERM)
      Operation not permitted - /usr/bin/bundle

For future reference, use a newer version of bundler - disabling a core security feature of the operating system is a Bad Idea and will leave your machine vulnerable.


Where is the mount point and format of the iOS memory when it is plugged in a mac? I would like to do manual changes to my iOS iPhone, and I would like to know if it is possible to plug the iOS into a mac, find the mount point and /dev/disk<number> and then cd to it and do changes. What is the format of the iOS memory and mount point?

Is it possible to mount the phone if it is not mounted yet? How does iTunes make changes to the phone?

the iPhone does not present itself to any computer as a block device, so you won't be able to mount it and access the file system. This is among other things a security feature. Depending on what you are trying to change, you might be able to use iTunes for manually uploading music, playlists and I think possibly videos as well. Additionally you can use iTunes to upload files to any apps that allow it.

If you jailbreak your phone, you get full file system access at which point you can install an ssh daemon and ssh into your phone.


Is removing network access to a shared Time Machine drive mid-backup similar to unplugging a physical drive? I'm considering using FreeNAS to provide Time Machine network shares for Time Machine backups of 5-10 Macbooks.  One thing I like about this approach is that users simply have to join the network (e.g. open my Macbook), and the Time Machine backup will commence.  This is advantageous as there is no drive that the user must remember to plug in.

The disadvantage is that users will surely simply close their laptops and leave the network, effectively "unplugging" the Time Machine network share.

Given that Time Capsule supports this exact use case (wireless Time Machine backups), I'm inclined to think that suddenly leaving the network mid-backup won't be an issue.  It would be nice to have confirmation from the community, though.

Will this cause problems?  What should I do to make this use case less error-prone?

The nature of backups is that you have an hourly window of time to start one, so the majority of the time, the majority of the computers are not mounting the network share. The algorithm itself is solid in my experience.

If you are starting the first backup, that can take quite a while to save, but if you corrupt the disk image then, you can nuke it and start over with no loss of data (there weren't any backups to lose).

The OS enables journaling so that the worst that happens in practice is the one interval that was in the middle of being changed gets cancelled and cleaned up. I've had very few OS X server backups have issues with network backups, so as long as the software you run on the NAS is equivalent to OS X implementation you should be just fine with your plan. You can also hedge your bets with periodic backups to hard drives. OS X supports multiple time machine destinations as well as ad-hoc adding and removing them to make more point in time ones that you can archive easier than trolling for changes on the NAS.

Some data points - roughly 100 Mac are backing up to about a dozen Mac Mini over the last 3 years, and the number of trouble tickets to assist with things users can't solve has been 2. One user was able to be guided to mount the backup destination and use Finder to remove the partial backup interval. The other made requested we copy their image to a hard drive from the server so they could get the files they needed. That user used a local HD to do backups in the interim and now backs up to that drive and had us wipe the server side image and is backing up to both destinations with no issues.

We don't manage anything or train users to do anything special. Power off, disconnect from network, they just expect Time Machine to run and we train them to check on it two times: a) before making a large change to a document that losing work would mean losing more than 4 hours of work. b) once a month, run a backup manually from the Menu Bar to ensure it completes.

On the server side, we have visibility into when backup images are not updating for more than 3 weeks by a script, so you can implement a check on your NAS if you desire to recreate that Server.app functionality. For $20 I'm a big fan of using server.app to handle things, but lots of people like DIY too.


Why is OS X indexing *again*? For some reason, OS X thinks it's a good idea to reindex my entire hard drive (which takes it a few hours) about twice a week. This is really getting annoying, especially since it does this on battery, and drains it quickly.

There's nothing suspicious in the Console, when I grep for mdworker it only gives:

6/12/12 6:04:40.870 PM com.apple.launchd.peruser.501: (com.apple.mdworker.pool.0) Throttling respawn: Will start in 2 seconds
6/12/12 6:11:19.769 PM mdworker: CFPropertyListCreateFromXMLData(): Old-style plist parser: missing semicolon in dictionary.
6/12/12 8:26:59.774 PM mdworker: CFPropertyListCreateFromXMLData(): Old-style plist parser: missing semicolon in dictionary.

There's also a huge number of these errors (about one every 5 seconds):

6/12/12 8:29:25.000 PM kernel: SMC::smcReadKeyAction ERROR F1Mn kSMCBadArgumentError(0x89) fKeyHashTable=0x0xffffff800a715000

(I posted a different question about that here)

Why is it indexing and how can I stop this annoying behavior? Why would it ever need to reindex the entire drive? Every sane indexing program only indexes new files. I don't see why would it need to reindex the whole drive, and I certainly don't see why it would need to do this twice a week.

I found my disk was indexing a lot a few months ago, probably more than twice a week. Finally tracked it down to Backblaze - it turned out that backblaze creates a lot of temporary files as it backs up, especially if you're working with lots of small files (which I do, being a programmer). Spotlight would see those changes and initiate a re-index causing my fan to kick in and the laptop to get hot and burn through battery-life very quickly. Adding the /Library/Backblaze directory to blacklist in Spotlight's settings fixed the problem.

I've also heard people can have the same problem if they have a very active Dropbox account.

If you're doing any video editing this can also be a cause; adding the working directories to Spotlight's blacklist should help. Or, basically, any app that creates a lot of files outside of the OS's temp directories.


How can I migrate Google Fit activity data to Apple Health? Is there a first-party way of doing this?  I exported all my data from Google using the Google Takeout interface, but this produced a zip file, which iOS cannot open.  I also cannot install Google Fit on my iPhone to be able to import the data at the application level (it is not available in the Appstore).

How do I get the data into Apple Health?


Safari not working with notification center I have a new macbook pro with mountain lion. I want to use the notification center for my Facebook/gmail, but when I'm logged into both facebook and gmail, I never get alerts.I have safari available in my notification center, but it won't work. What do I do?

When you go to Gmail in Safari 6, you should see this at the top:

That should enable alerts in Notification Center. You could also set up your Gmail in Mail.app.

On Apple's website for Mountain Lion, it says:

  Facebook integration coming this fall.

So it may be a few weeks still before you can use Facebook with Notification Center.


How to ensure that all networking goes through my ssh proxy? I have a network location set up to ssh tunnel to my server.  For now, just ssh -D type stuff.  This works fine.  I set up the tunnel from within my .screenrc.  In other words, "screen" is the trigger to connect to my proxy.  Before I type that I should not be able to go online.  However, lynx and ping go through without problems. tunnel or not.  This is disquieting.

How can I ensure all network traffic uses my Network settings, and not it's own?  The only way packets should be leaving is via my DynamicForward port.

EDIT:  The apple specificity comes with the Network settings, either accessed via System Preferences, or via networksetup.

OS X has both ipfw, and the application level firewall.

The appfirewall does not seem to stop things from going out.  It stops connections to the system.

Ipfw does take precedence over the application firewall, apparently.

My SOCKS5 proxy is set up on a port, and I then give  that  port to in a network Location as the SOCKS5 proxy.  This works fine.  As I see it, programs should not get a choice about using the proxy, and indeed, if I turn it off, browsers can not access the web.

Linux and *BSD's do not have the various ( quite nifty ) things that OSX has in this regard. For them, it would be ipchains and ipfw, respectively.

I think I'm missing something.  It should just work.

Assuming that ssh is running on localhost (or another machine on the local subnet), the easiest thing to do is to shut down your routes so that nothing can get outside.  netstat -nr will show you your current routes.  Mine looks like this:

Internet:
Destination        Gateway            Flags    Refs      Use  Netif Expire
default            192.168.0.69       UGSc       93     4438    en1

192.168.0.69 is my default route.  If I take that route out:  route delete default 192.168.0.69 then I cannot get to any machine not wired to my network.  Once screen sets up your proxy, you should have access back.


Contacts from Google not downloading to MBP Never had a problem before. Enabled my Google account on a new MBP yesterday, and asked to sync contacts. A day later, none of them have populated. Am I overlooking something? Any way to force a manual download (other than export/import, since that would defeat the purpose)?

EDIT: I went and disabled/re-enabled the account a few more times and it worked.

Disable and Re-enable the account can work in Contacts app preferences.


I-Beam insertion curson goes missing occasionally I bought this new Macbook Air, and am completely new to Mac OSX.
I have Mac Sierra installed, and lately have noticed that the The I-Beam insertion cursor for the keyboard goes invisible occasionally. Maybe there's a shortcut or a trackpad problem, I'm not sure. Thought I could ask here.

Thanks for any help!

This is standard macOS behaviour.

The I-Beam cursor ought to go invisible as you start to type & only reappear if you stop typing & move the cursor.


Preview application is not showing search results when I do Cmd + F to search a string Actually this error occurred after I updated my os to Mojave. Earlier it was working fine. I'm using a MacBook Pro 2015 model.

Caveats -:

I am searching in pdf files containing texts.

I've tried the solutions provided over internet, like closing and opening it again.

Searching works fine when I open the same file in Adobe Reader.

there are multiple type of pdf encodings, some of which disable text selection and thus searching strings, which under the hood selects text and highlights text, is disabled.

check by double clicking on any word.

1.) if the whole page becomes blue, that means you can't do searching on that page.

2.) if the word is selected, and still you're unable to search, do comment with details,

I'll be happy to help!


Why doesn't Spotlight show invisible files that I know exist? I am running Mac OS X 10.8 (Mountain Lion) and had to edit an invisible file as part of an Android project. While I eventually found it, Spotlight was of no help, since it could not find an invisible file when searching for the exact name (.classpath) and with the 'File Visibility' option set to 'Visible or Invisible'.

Why didn't Spotlight work in this instance?

Though, it won't update the results in spotlight I use the below script to toggle hidden files on and off every time it's run:

To make:

Open TextEdit
Make sure it is in Plain Text Mode (Format > Make Plain Text from the menu)
paste in the below text:

    #Load current state into I
    I=$(defaults read com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles)
    if [ "$I" == "false" ]
      then
        # Flip
        I=true
        echo -e "\t>> Showing Hidden Files"
      else
        # Flop
        I=false
        echo -e "\t<< Hiding Hidden Files"
    fi
    # Write I to com.apple.Finder.plist
    defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles $I
    # Restart Finder
    killall Finder
    exit

Save the above file to your desktop as togglehidden.command (be sure not to append .txt to the end of the file)
Open /Applications/Utilities/Terminal
Enter the command chmod u+x ~/Desktop/togglehidden.command to make your new file executable.
Double Click togglehidden.command on your desktop to show or hide hidden files.


How to install Mac OS X upon NTFS partition with Win XP on it? My original Mac Mini hard drive is waste, so, i've replaced it with an old hard drive with XP installed on it. Actually, computer starts correctly, and Windows XP is loaded. Now I want to format this hard drive using Mac FileSystem and install Mac OS X on it.

Actually I have Mac Tiger DVD in front of me (DVD was sale to me with computer) but when I insert the disc in optical drive under Windows XP it tries to read than spit it off (i've tried with MS Office CD and it works).

The question is simple: what can I do to install Mac OS X if disk is NTFS partition and Win XP is installed?

Best regards

It's ok, welcome to the dark side.  In answer to the issue...

You can also start by inserting the Install DVD and restarting your computer while holding down the C key

Windows cannot read the disk format but the Mac can.

These instructions are for Leopard but they haven't changed

Apple Support Installing Leopard from DVD

edit: forgot to add, Choose 'Erase and Install'


Does anyone know of a todo-list app that can sync via USB between iOS and Mac? I've been looking for a todo-list app that can sync directly (via local/tethered USB) between my MacBook Pro (currently running Mavericks, upgrading soon to Yosemite) and iPod Touch 5 (running iOS 8).

Apple's Reminders and Notes can only be synced via iCloud.

Any suggestions? Thanks!

I've been looking for something similar, and it has proven quite difficult to find options. Everything's moving to the cloud.

Appigo's Todo app seems to allow local sync, but that may be limited to Wifi sync (with both devices on the same network). Still, even something like that (which at least does not involve a 3rd party server) is hard to find.

Omnifocus has a similar option that allows sync without a 3rd party server, but it requires you to run a webdav server on your mac (e.g. via server.app).

I'd love to hear of other options!


OS X terminal "open" command and keeping focus on the command line I appreciate the "open" terminal command to launch OS X apps. When invoking the open command for any purpose, it is overwhelmingly likely that I will have at least one other command I would like to type into the terminal before tending to the application I have just summoned.

How do I keep focus on the terminal when using the open command?

Use the -g flag.

From the man page:

  -g  Do not bring the application to the foreground.

Example: To open the folder at your current path, behind the current Terminal window:

open . -g

As a side note, it is often better to manually peruse the documentation for new commands, as the verbiage may be different from what you expect:

  i.e. "Do not bring the application to the foreground." vs. "Maintain terminal window focus."


Photo Sharing from iTunes In iTunes, from the Advanced menu, I selected Photos to Share.  I then picked a folder and the hard drive cranked at full speed for good 5-10 minutes.

I do not see any of the photos on the iPad.  So, who did I actually share the Photos with?

Mathias is correct about the proper way to sync photos to your iPad. Sharing photos from iTunes approves them for Home Sharing, a system designed to share iTunes Store purchases and media amongst family members.

Apple Knowledgebase: iTunes: Setting up Home Sharing on your computer

Home Sharing can also be used to allow access to photos from an AppleTV.

Apple Knowledgebase: Setting up Home Sharing for Apple TV (2nd generation)


How do I uninstall Java? I have several Java installations on my machine:

$ /usr/libexec/java_home -V
Matching Java Virtual Machines (6):
    1.6.0_24-b07-334, x86_64: "Java SE 6"   /Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/1.6.0_24-b07-334.jdk/Contents/Home
    1.6.0_24-b07-334, i386:   "Java SE 6"   /Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/1.6.0_24-b07-334.jdk/Contents/Home
    1.6.0_24-b07-334, x86_64: "Java SE 6"   /System/Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/1.6.0.jdk/Contents/Home
    1.6.0_24-b07-334, i386:   "Java SE 6"   /System/Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/1.6.0.jdk/Contents/Home
    1.6.0_22-b04-307, x86_64: "Java SE 6"   /Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/1.6.0_22-b04-307.jdk/Contents/Home
    1.6.0_22-b04-307, i386:   "Java SE 6"   /Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/1.6.0_22-b04-307.jdk/Contents/Home

I don't need them all. For example I don't need update 22 version. How can I uninstall it cleanly?

I would also like to get rid of those 'duplicate' JVMs, but I need to have sources around, since I do lot of Java developement, so that may not be possible. Why are there so many of them anyway?

After some reading:

JVM in /System is system-wide installation of Java, which is always installed on Snow Leopard, and is updated through standard Software Update mechanism.  I don't think it would be good idea to remove this JVM, but haven't tried it ... maybe nothing bad will happen (if you don't use Java).

My JVMs in /Library are from Java Developer Package, which also contain sources and documentation. It seems that it is OK to simply remove them. After I have removed them, java_tool is no longer showing them.

(After this, I've updated my Java to latest one available from Apple, and also installed latest Java Developer Package, which added new JVM into /Library again. Since I use Java sources and documentation in my IDE, I will let it live).