Does macOS have /usr/bin/env? I'm just wondering if macOS has /usr/bin/env. I am a software developer trying to support macOS without having a box at my disposal.

Yes, /usr/bin/env exists on OS X/macOS.

$ ls -l /usr/bin/env
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  23504 May 29 18:32 /usr/bin/env
$

From man env:

ENV(1)                    BSD General Commands Manual                   ENV(1)

NAME
     env -- set environment and execute command, or print environment

SYNOPSIS
     env [-iv] [-P altpath] [-S string] [-u name] [name=value ...]
         [utility [argument ...]]

DESCRIPTION
     The env utility executes another utility after modifying the environment
     as specified on the command line.  Each name=value option specifies the
     setting of an environment variable, name, with a value of value.  All
     such environment variables are set before the utility is executed.

     The options are as follows:

     -i      Execute the utility with only those environment variables speci-
             fied by name=value options.  The environment inherited by env is
             ignored completely.

     -P altpath
             Search the set of directories as specified by altpath to locate
             the specified utility program, instead of using the value of the
             PATH environment variable.

     -S string
             Split apart the given string into multiple strings, and process
             each of the resulting strings as separate arguments to the env
             utility.  The -S option recognizes some special character escape
             sequences and also supports environment-variable substitution, as
             described below.

     -u name
             If the environment variable name is in the environment, then
             remove it before processing the remaining options.  This is simi-
             lar to the unset command in sh(1).  The value for name must not
             include the `=' character.

     -v      Print verbose information for each step of processing done by the
             env utility.  Additional information will be printed if -v is
             specified multiple times.

     The above options are only recognized when they are specified before any
     name=value options.

     If no utility is specified, env prints out the names and values of the
     variables in the environment, with one name/value pair per line.

   Details of -S (split-string) processing
     The processing of the -S option will split the given string into separate
     arguments based on any space or <tab> characters found in the string.
     Each of those new arguments will then be treated as if it had been speci-
     fied as a separate argument on the original env command.

     Spaces and tabs may be embedded in one of those new arguments by using
     single (``''') or double (`"') quotes, or backslashes (`\').  Single
     quotes will escape all non-single quote characters, up to the matching
     single quote.  Double quotes will escape all non-double quote characters,
     up to the matching double quote.  It is an error if the end of the string
     is reached before the matching quote character.

     If -S would create a new argument that starts with the `#' character,
     then that argument and the remainder of the string will be ignored.  The
     `\#' sequence can be used when you want a new argument to start with a
     `#' character, without causing the remainder of the string to be skipped.

     While processing the string value, -S processing will treat certain char-
     acter combinations as escape sequences which represent some action to
     take.  The character escape sequences are in backslash notation.  The
     characters and their meanings are as follows:

           \c      Ignore the remaining characters in the string.  This must
                   not appear inside a double-quoted string.
           \f      Replace with a <form-feed> character.
           \n      Replace with a <new-line> character.
           \r      Replace with a <carriage return> character.
           \t      Replace with a <tab> character.
           \v      Replace with a <vertical tab> character.
           \#      Replace with a `#' character.  This would be useful when
                   you need a `#' as the first character in one of the argu-
                   ments created by splitting apart the given string.
           \$      Replace with a `$' character.
           \_      If this is found inside of a double-quoted string, then
                   replace it with a single blank.  If this is found outside
                   of a quoted string, then treat this as the separator char-
                   acter between new arguments in the original string.
           \"      Replace with a <double quote> character.
           \'      Replace with a <single quote> character.
           \\      Replace with a backslash character.

     The sequences for <single-quote> and backslash are the only sequences
     which are recognized inside of a single-quoted string.  The other
     sequences have no special meaning inside a single-quoted string.  All
     escape sequences are recognized inside of a double-quoted string.  It is
     an error if a single `\' character is followed by a character other than
     the ones listed above.

     The processing of -S also supports substitution of values from environ-
     ment variables.  To do this, the name of the environment variable must be
     inside of `${}', such as: ${SOMEVAR}.  The common shell syntax of
     $SOMEVAR is not supported.  All values substituted will be the values of
     the environment variables as they were when the env utility was origi-
     nally invoked.  Those values will not be checked for any of the escape
     sequences as described above.  And any settings of name=value will not
     effect the values used for substitution in -S processing.

     Also, -S processing can not reference the value of the special parameters
     which are defined by most shells.  For instance, -S can not recognize
     special parameters such as: `$*', `$@', `$#', `$?' or `$$' if they appear
     inside the given string.

   Use in shell-scripts
     The env utility is often used as the interpreter on the first line of
     interpreted scripts, as described in execve(2).

     Note that the way the kernel parses the `#!' (first line) of an inter-
     preted script has changed as of FreeBSD 6.0.  Prior to that, the FreeBSD
     kernel would split that first line into separate arguments based on any
     whitespace (space or <tab> characters) found in the line.  So, if a
     script named /usr/local/bin/someport had a first line of:

           #!/usr/local/bin/php -n -q -dsafe_mode=0

     then the /usr/local/bin/php program would have been started with the
     arguments of:

           arg[0] = '/usr/local/bin/php'
           arg[1] = '-n'
           arg[2] = '-q'
           arg[3] = '-dsafe_mode=0'
           arg[4] = '/usr/local/bin/someport'

     plus any arguments the user specified when executing someport.  However,
     this processing of multiple options on the `#!' line is not the way any
     other operating system parses the first line of an interpreted script.
     So after a change which was made for FreeBSD 6.0 release, that script
     will result in /usr/local/bin/php being started with the arguments of:

           arg[0] = '/usr/local/bin/php'
           arg[1] = '-n -q -dsafe_mode=0'
           arg[2] = '/usr/local/bin/someport'

     plus any arguments the user specified.  This caused a significant change
     in the behavior of a few scripts.  In the case of above script, to have
     it behave the same way under FreeBSD 6.0 as it did under earlier
     releases, the first line should be changed to:

           #!/usr/bin/env -S /usr/local/bin/php -n -q -dsafe_mode=0

     The env utility will be started with the entire line as a single argu-
     ment:

           arg[1] = '-S /usr/local/bin/php -n -q -dsafe_mode=0'

     and then -S processing will split that line into separate arguments
     before executing /usr/local/bin/php.

ENVIRONMENT
     The env utility uses the PATH environment variable to locate the
     requested utility if the name contains no `/' characters, unless the -P
     option has been specified.

EXIT STATUS
     The env utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.  An exit
     status of 126 indicates that utility was found, but could not be exe-
     cuted.  An exit status of 127 indicates that utility could not be found.

EXAMPLES
     Since the env utility is often used as part of the first line of an
     interpreted script, the following examples show a number of ways that the
     env utility can be useful in scripts.

     The kernel processing of an interpreted script does not allow a script to
     directly reference some other script as its own interpreter.  As a way
     around this, the main difference between

           #!/usr/local/bin/foo
     and
           #!/usr/bin/env /usr/local/bin/foo

     is that the latter works even if /usr/local/bin/foo is itself an inter-
     preted script.

     Probably the most common use of env is to find the correct interpreter
     for a script, when the interpreter may be in different directories on
     different systems.  The following example will find the `perl' inter-
     preter by searching through the directories specified by PATH.

           #!/usr/bin/env perl

     One limitation of that example is that it assumes the user's value for
     PATH is set to a value which will find the interpreter you want to exe-
     cute.  The -P option can be used to make sure a specific list of directo-
     ries is used in the search for utility.  Note that the -S option is also
     required for this example to work correctly.

           #!/usr/bin/env -S -P/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin perl

     The above finds `perl' only if it is in /usr/local/bin or /usr/bin.  That
     could be combined with the present value of PATH, to provide more flexi-
     bility.  Note that spaces are not required between the -S and -P options:

           #!/usr/bin/env -S-P/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:${PATH} perl

COMPATIBILITY
     The env utility accepts the - option as a synonym for -i.

SEE ALSO
     printenv(1), sh(1), execvp(3), environ(7)

STANDARDS
     The env utility conforms to IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 (``POSIX.1'').  The -P,
     -S, -u and -v options are non-standard extensions supported by FreeBSD,
     but which may not be available on other operating systems.

HISTORY
     The env command appeared in 4.4BSD.  The -P, -S and -v options were added
     in FreeBSD 6.0.

BUGS
     The env utility does not handle values of utility which have an equals
     sign (`=') in their name, for obvious reasons.

     The env utility does not take multibyte characters into account when pro-
     cessing the -S option, which may lead to incorrect results in some
     locales.

BSD                             April 17, 2008                             BSD


How can I erase the history of passcodes on the iPhone4? I have an iPhone4 running version iOS 4.3.  It is not jailbroken.  I want to re-use a previous passcode (the 4 number code to unlock the screen).  How can I get the iPhone to forget all the passcodes I've used in the past?

Many times password policies like this are enforced by looking at the most recent N passwords. For example, if a company requires changing your password every month, they may look at the last 12 passwords. I can't say for sure how it is implemented with the iPhone.

A simple trick to get around this is to change your password N times so that the password you want gets knocked off the list and you can use it again. If you don't know what the rule is and how many recent passwords are stored, it may take some trial and error.


Lion resolving DNS names when querying server directly, but not when used in a command or app I've recently (as in minutes ago) added a hostname and reverse (A and PTR) records for a hostname on my internal network, using a Bind DNS server. For some reason, i can both dig and nslookup this new name successfully, but ping and my GUI applications can not resolve the name.

I have attempted flushing the DNS cache on my local machine with dscacheutil -flushcache to no effect.

Here's an example of my session (names, IPs changed for security):

$ nslookup newbox.internal
server     10.0.0.2
address    10.0.0.2#53

Name:    newbox.internal
Address: 10.1.1.1

$ ping newbox.internal
ping: cannot resolve newbox.internal: Unknown host

WTF? Okay, I'm sure my DNS is set up correctly though:

$ dig newbox.internal

; <<>> DiG 9.8.3-P1 <<>> newbox.internal
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 33812
;; flags: qr aa rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 4, ADDITIONAL: 4

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;newbox.internal.   IN  A

;; ANSWER SECTION:
newbox.internal. 21600 IN   A   10.1.1.1

;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
internal.       10800   IN  NS  dns001.internal.
internal.       10800   IN  NS  dss001.internal.
internal.       10800   IN  NS  dhdns001.internal.
internal.       10800   IN  NS  dhdns002.internal.

;; ADDITIONAL SECTION:
dns001.internal. 10800 IN   A   10.0.0.2
dns002.internal. 10800 IN   A   10.0.0.3
dhdns001.internal. 10800 IN A   10.0.0.20
dhdns002.internal. 10800 IN A   10.0.0.21

;; Query time: 1 msec
;; SERVER: 10.0.0.2#53(10.0.0.2)
;; WHEN: Mon Jul  1 14:43:35 2013
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 245

Why does my system demonstrate this odd DNS resolver behavior?

As a side note, DNS works fine otherwise on my system. At this moment, this new hostname is the only one I'm having trouble resolving. My system is configured to use the 10.0.0.2 DNS server as it's primary.

EDIT

Killing mDNSResponder fixed this issue.. but why?

Killing mDNSResponder fixed this issue.. but why?

Because you flushed the local DNS cache!

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht5343

A direct lookup command will query the DNS server directly, however the resolution mechanism for just about anything else is that mDNSResponder process you killed.

dscacheutil -flushcache is deprecated as per the KB.


Hardware pause button doesn't work for Chrome media Similar to (but opposite of) Pause button started working for Chrome / Youtube, messing with audio player controls, I can't get the touch bar Play/Pause button to play or pause Youtube videos in Chrome.
I checked that chrome://flags/#hardware-media-key-handling was enabled.
When I manually play or pause the video in the browser it changes the touch bar icon between playing and paused, but tapping the icon doesn't do anything.
How can I get the media key to control Chrome?

I found the solution here: https://support.google.com/chrome/thread/2477469?hl=en&msgid=23986136
If you have the Google Play Music extension installed, uninstall it. The touch bar play pause button works correctly after that.


The Mac won't let me import photos from my iphone I am trying to import my photos from my iphone to my mac and even though i already put trust this computer, the mac insists that i haven't done it yet. i have done it many times and its still not working. Any idea of how to solve this?

On your iphone, go to Settings > General > Reset > Reset Location & Privacy.

Plug in your iPhone via the USB to your mac.

On your iPhone when prompted press "Trust".

You should now be able to import.


I want to sign into a different App Store account but keep the same Account in FaceTime If I Sign out of the Apple App Store, will it sign out of my Facetime too?

The account signed in to iTunes & App Store is independent to FaceTime and iMessage. You can freely log out of one without affecting the other.


M1 mac mini: Python reports `mach-o, but wrong architecture` We've rented a M1 Mac Mini at a Cloud provider and installed python3 via homebrew.
However, when installing packages, we see many errors reporting wrong architecture mismatches.
pip3 install <something>

/private/var/folders/s9/94x83w5x5gv1tkw6pgcvy55r0000gn/T/pip-install-6zb2vf39/rchitect_2226cf31d84b4fbeb14084a47e566d22/.eggs/cffi-1.14.5-py3.9-macosx-11.4-arm64.egg/_cffi_backend.cpython-39-darwin.so: mach-o, but wrong architecture

Other CLI libraries work just fine with their (native) brew installations. Rosetta is not even installed.
I am not heavily into Python and searching the web did not help, hence I suspect something non-standard might be going on here.
brew info python3
python@3.9: stable 3.9.5 (bottled)
Interpreted, interactive, object-oriented programming language
https://www.python.org/
/opt/homebrew/Cellar/python@3.9/3.9.5 (3,108 files, 55.5MB) *
  Poured from bottle on 2021-05-27 at 20:07:29
From: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core/blob/HEAD/Formula/python@3.9.rb
License: Python-2.0

which python3
/opt/homebrew/bin/python3

Does anyone have a clue what might be going on?
Edit: Here are the architectures of the files
file /opt/homebrew/bin/python3
/opt/homebrew/bin/python3: Mach-O 64-bit executable arm64

file /private/var/folders/s9/94x83w5x5gv1tkw6pgcvy55r0000gn/T/pip-install-nq_w_w15/rchitect_e1cd9cd747dc44e2a7f69885db619a02/.eggs/cffi-1.14.5-py3.9-macosx-11-arm64.egg/_cffi_backend.cpython-39-darwin.so: Mach-O 64-bit bundle x86_64

The downloaded egg of cffi is the wrong architecture. Why is this happening and who might be the bad player here?

Pypi does not provide an ARM package for this software for macOS.  Only X86_64.
How do I know?
I actually went and looked.
https://pypi.org/project/cffi/#files


double password entry to access account I have the Require password 4 hours after sleep ... option in Security and Privacy System Preferences set and am running a script with launchd to suspend my session at a certain time of day (see this question for details). The result is (when the time span and specific time of day overlap) is that my account is doubly-locked, one for each action, requiring password entry twice.

Is there a way to check (for example in a shellscript or Applescript)  whether or not my account is already locked before calling /System/Library/CoreServices/Menu Extras/User.menu/Contents/Resources/CGSession -suspend command?

The following script should do what you are needing.

TESTED ON:

10.6.x
10.7.4

Prevent suspend command if Screensaver's forced login time has already been reached.

NOTE: Change the USER_PATH variable to match that of the user you wanting to manage.

#!/bin/bash

USER_PATH="/Users/YOUR_USER"

ELAPSED_TIME=$(ps -eo etime,command | grep "ScreenSaverEngine.app" | grep -v "grep" | sed 's/:.*//' | awk '{print $1}')
CHOSEN_TIME=$(/usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c "Print:askForPasswordDelay" ${USER_PATH}/Library/Preferences/com.apple.screensaver.plist | sed 's/\..*//')

if [[ ${CHOSEN_TIME} != 0 ]]; then
    if [[ ${CHOSEN_TIME} -ge 60 ]]; then
        CONVERT_TIME=$(expr ${CHOSEN_TIME} / 60)
    elif [[ ${CHOSEN_TIME} -lt 60 ]]; then
        CONVERT_TIME="${CHOSEN_TIME}"
    fi
fi

if [[ ${ELAPSED_TIME} -lt ${CONVERT_TIME} ]]; then
    /System/Library/CoreServices/Menu\ Extras/User.menu/Contents/Resources/CGSession -suspend
fi


Can I install apps on Lion without using app store? Is it true that I can only install app from app store in OS X Lion?

Can I not install app from any other source?

Not true - mean sure can install apps from dmg.

The Lion remain a full-blown OS, with all common functions, like Terminal.app, root access, Developer system, and so on. When here is no way block installing applications if you will have a root access, so Apple sure will NOT TRY do this.

The following is only my opinion:

On the other side - most of developers will sell their apps via AppStore (because it is easy), so here will be less "demo downloads" (what was possible activated by simple serial#). IMHO, over the time will be here more and more application in AppStore in two versions, like for example:

SudokuLite.app (like current demo versions) - free,
Sudoku.app (full paid version)


How to uninstall SaltyBeer Skype call recorder? I wanted to test SaltyBeer Skype Call recorder. So I downloaded saltybeer-mac-installer.pkg and installed it on my OS X 10.11.6. Now when I open Skype, it opens SaltyBeer automatically.

Now I want to uninstall it, but no icon is added to /Applications/. There is no instruction to uninstall in the product website. I tried AppCleaner, but there was no luck. Also, there is no process named saltybeer in the running processes:

$ ps -ef | grep saltybeer
$

How can I uninstall SaltyBeer?

According to this answer:

I found package ID with pkgutil:

$ pkgutil --packages | grep saltybeer
com.saltybeer.pkg.saltybeer

To find out paths of installed payload:

$ pkgutil --files com.saltybeer.pkg.saltybeer
Contents
Contents/Info.plist
Contents/MacOS
Contents/MacOS/saltybeer
plugins
plugins/saltybeer.bundle
plugins/saltybeer.bundle/Contents
plugins/saltybeer.bundle/Contents/Info.plist
plugins/saltybeer.bundle/Contents/MacOS
plugins/saltybeer.bundle/Contents/MacOS/cocoa_ui
plugins/saltybeer.bundle/Contents/Resources
plugins/saltybeer.bundle/Contents/Resources/._Info.plist
plugins/saltybeer.bundle/Contents/Resources/Assets.car
plugins/saltybeer.bundle/Contents/Resources/Info.plist
plugins/saltybeer.bundle/Contents/Resources/MainMenu.nib
plugins/saltybeer.bundle/Contents/_CodeSignature
plugins/saltybeer.bundle/Contents/_CodeSignature/CodeResources

Then to find out the location of installation:

$ pkgutil --pkg-info com.saltybeer.pkg.saltybeer
package-id: com.saltybeer.pkg.saltybeer
version: 2.0
volume: /
location: Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/HAL/saltybeer.plugin
install-time: 1477419357

I changed the current working directory:

$ cd /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/HAL/saltybeer.plugin

And deleted installed files:

$ pkgutil --only-files --files com.saltybeer.pkg.saltybeer | tr '\n' '\0' | xargs -n 1 -0 sudo rm -if

And directories:

$ pkgutil --only-dirs --files com.saltybeer.pkg.saltybeer | tail -r | tr '\n' '\0' | xargs -n 1 -0 sudo rmdir

Then I removed package receipt:

$ sudo pkgutil --forget com.saltybeer.pkg.saltybeer
Forgot package 'com.saltybeer.pkg.saltybeer' on '/'.

and finally to remove plugin directory:

$ cd /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/HAL
$ sudo rm -rf saltybeer.plugin

Done!


Getting prompted for verification code but where do I put it in? I am using an old iPad -- it's an iPad 2 model MC990LL/A
-- running iOS 9.3.5
I noticed when I go to settings --> iCloud and tap the top part where my name and ID is, I get this:

Account Details Unavailable
If you are signing in to iCloud on another device or at iCloud.com, you can get a verification code while offline.

I tap "Get verification code" and it sends one -- but where do I put it in? I saw the answers that said to tack it onto the end of your password but there's no password prompt!
I wanted to add my iPad to my list of trusted devices (my phone and computer are there) but there does not seem to be a way to do it.
Any help appreciated.
ETA: The help offere by bmike was great; as it happened turning it off and on again a couple of times did the trick after I reset the settings. (Not a full restore). But dang, the back compatibility is starting to go...

Tack the numbers on the end of the password if you don’t get a pop up to enter the code.

That’s what happens on older os in general.

Changing the Apple ID on a 1st generation iPad
No input field for Apple ID Verification Code

To be clear, if your password were thirteen-odd-variations and your second factor (iMessage) were 330000, then enter thirteen-odd-variations330000 as your password instead of what you usually enter.

If you don’t see a password prompt at all, you’ll want to make sure you have a backup of your device and then sign out of iCloud / App Store / wherever you wish to sign in so that you get the account / password dialog.

I’ve seen this happen when the certificate has expired and you need to sign out to release the old pairing from the keychain and then request a new session from iCloud

If you can’t ever get that dialog, you will want to restore the device from a computer or reset all content and settings - this erases everything, so be sure you have a backup or can afford to learn that the device has failed before doing the erase.


Why I cannot play M4A audio on iTunes, but I can play it on QuickTime? I have some M4A audio files, that I can't play on iTunes (e.g. double click the file, and then iTunes fired up, the audio added to the library, but the play doesn't start. Tried double clicking on the audio on the library, still doesn't start the player).

But when I open them in QuickTime, QuickTime can play it. Why that happens? And what can I do about it so I can import those files to iTunes? Thanks.

Changing the extension to .mp4 from .m4a worked for me but as a solution sucks since I now have to change it for each file individually. With a large music collection failing the same way this solution with take significant time to implement.


Is it safe to buy 3rd party plug adapters for the MacBook Pro? Apple doesn't sell just the removable plug end of the charger. I know buying 3rd party chargers are unsafe. However, is just the modular plug end safe?

Here is an example of what I am talking about

Yes it is Safe.

That adapter does noting to Mac, it just redirects the socket power in different way.

No changes are made to the Power.


How can I delete a paused application download on my iPhone? I started installing an application from the App Store but forgot to check its size. When I check now, it is 50 MB. Now I don't want to download that application any more because I'm on 3G plan which is costly. I paused it but don't know how to delete it. Can anyone help me on how to delete a paused app download?

If you can't delete the paused download (which, I'm thinking, suggests you aren't on the most recent release of iOS), then the simplest option that doesn't require a restore is going to be to find a WiFi hotspot and let the app finish downloading. Personally, I'd go that route (especially if out-and-about or on vacation, etc.) before wiping my data and having to restore again.

Alternatively, leave it on paused until you get home to your primary network. Your phone doesn't care two cents about your paused app downloads, so it shouldn't get in the way of anything.


Need to Back Up a MacBook that Won't Turn On I have a Retina MacBook Pro running El Capitan. Recently, the machine refuses to let me log in. After booting and entering my password, the Mac starts loading, but freezes once the loading bar is full.

With Apple Support, I tried booting in several different modes, restarting things, etc. I was unable to login or see anything other than loading screens. So, they had me book an appointment for the Genius Bar.

I am wondering if there is anyway to back up a Mac in this state. I have Googled and searched this forum, but all the methods require some functionality on the device that needs to be backed up. If I can't back it up, so be it, I just wanted to check as it has some very important files.

Can you restart into Recovery HD? If you can, then you should be able to copy the HD onto an external HD using Disk Utility.

If you can't do that, but have another Mac available, you can restart into Target Disk Mode, and connect the two Macs together using a Thunderbolt cable. On the other Mac, your HD will show up as an external HD, and you'll be able to back it up.


iPhone 5 show iOS old iOS (9.3.5) as available update not the latest iOS (10.0) My iPhone 5S shows iOS 10.0 in available update but for iPhone 5 it shows different. It shows iOS 9.3.5.

What's is the problem ?

The iPhone already downloaded the 9.3.5 update and can't download / install iOS 10 until that is dealt with. Either remove this download from the iPhone, or install the update and later update to iOS 10.

To delete the update:

Go to Settings > General > Usage > Manage Storage.
Tap Delete Update, and tap Delete Update again to confirm.


“Copy URL to Clipboard.app is not available as a HTTP browser” in El Capitan I came across “Copy URL to Clipboard.app” (or “CUTC” for short) in How to access a clicked URL in a URL handler application created in Automator and have been using it for some time now. However, it seems to have stopped working in OS X 10.11, and I have no idea what to do to make it work.

What I've tried

I downloaded the pre-compiled app and moved it to /Applications/ and then launched it manually to clear the quarantine message (“Are you sure you want to open this file downloaded from the Internet?”)
I went to System Preferences » General and clicked the dropdown for “Default Web Browser" but CUTC does not appear as one of the available browsers.
I rebooted my Mac just to make sure. It still did not appear.
I tried https://github.com/kerma/defaultbrowser to set my default browser from Terminal:

% defaultbrowser -set Copy\ URL\ to\ Clipboard

Copy URL to Clipboard is not available as a HTTP browser

(It also listed all available HTTP browsers, which made it clear that OS X did not consider CUTC to be able to receive http/https links, as opposed to some sort of simple syntax error trying to use the defaultbrowser command.)
I re-compiled the app from source in Xcode, and tried using that instead, but had the same results as with the pre-compiled version.

I have no idea where to go from here. I am not a programmer and have no idea what needs to be done for an app to register itself as able to receive http/https links.

The Problem I Am Trying to Solve

I have used CUTC as my default browser in the past so that I could process URLs using shell scripts before handing them to another browser.

If there is another app out there which is capable of receiving http/https links clicked on from other apps (mail, Tweetbot, etc), I would be equally happy to try that.

The CFBundleURLTypes tag in the Info.plist file just needed a wee bit of a change and now it works on OSX v10.11 El Capitan.

This following worked okay in previous versions but isn't recognised in El Capitan.

<key>CFBundleURLTypes</key>
<array>
    <string>http</string>
    <string>https</string>
</array>

However if you change it to the following El Capitan recognises it and offers the "Copy URL to Clipboard" application in the "Default web browser" drop-down menu in System Preferences.

<key>CFBundleURLTypes</key>
<array>
    <dict>
        <key>CFBundleURLName</key>
        <string>Web site URL</string>
        <key>CFBundleURLSchemes</key>
        <array>
            <string>http</string>
            <string>https</string>
        </array>
    </dict>
</array>

I've submitted a pull request to houbysoft but in the meantime you can download an updated binary here.


How do I copy files between OS X and Android 6 over USB cable? I want to copy files from OS X (El Capitan) to my Nexus phone (which uses Android 6) and vice versa. And I just mean copying locally, i.e. over USB cable, I want to avoid overcomplicating things with upload and download through intermediary servers.

In the past I used Android File Transfer for this. But that was with a previous OS X version, and my old phone with Android 5. I tried again, but it doesn't work anymore, it keeps saying:

  Can't access device storage.

  If your device's screen is locked, disconnect its USB cable, unlock your screen, and then reconnect the USB cable.

The screen is most definitely not locked, and dis+reconnecting the USB cable (either end) doesn't help.

Pull down notification menu.
Tap "USB for charging / Touch for more options"
Tap "Transfer files (MTP)"


Shortcut for opening applications stack on dock bar Is there any keyboard shortcut to open applications stack on dock bar?

The idea is I want to be able to open any app without using mouse.

ctrl+fn+F3

..selects an item of the dock. You can navigate using the arrow keys. The selected item is the one that will be selected first the next time you use this shortcut.

Once you've selected the Applications folder, the shortcut becomes for the next time:

ctrl+fn+F3+↩

BTW:
You can also use ctrl+fn+F2 to access menubar items.


How can I tell what group(s) a contact is already in? If I'm looking at a contact record, is there a field or icon that can appear to let me know the record is in one or multiple different groups?

There is no such field in the card, but you can create Smart Group to include contacts that are (or are not) members of certain groups.

To see all contacts that are not in any group, just select Card is not member of any group.

These options are available only if you have more than one group in your contacts.

Alternatively, you can do the following:

Open the Mac OS X Address Book.
Highlight the desired contact, either under All or in a specific group.
Press Alt / Option on keyboard.

Any groups of which the contact is a member will be highlighted in the Group column.


Can I use 2 different Apple IDs with a single install of iTunes? I just got an iPhone 5 at work, and have discovered the only way to get a different ringtone on the device is via iTunes.  However, work will not allow iTunes to be downloaded to Corporate PCs.

I have iTunes at home, and wanted to know if I logged off iTunes with my personal Apple ID and logged in with my work Apple ID, could I add a ringtone to iTunes and then sync it to my work phone.

I have no interest in using any personal music or apps on the work phone, so I don't need/want to authorize media on another device.  I just want to get a darn non-standard ringtone on my iPhone.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Yes, you can log in with multiple iTunes accounts. Log out of one, log in with the other.


pkg installer installs to inconsistent locations When I install my Xamarin-generated package with the terminal command from Installing .pkg with terminal ?

sudo installer -pkg /path/to/package.pkg -target /

the place it actually gets installed is inconsistent, even from the same package.

Sometimes it goes to Applications. Sometimes it goes to

myProject/bin/debug

Sometimes it goes to

myProject/bin/Distribution/

What gives?

Installer -target doesn't take an absolute path as an argument it takes a volume.

The installation path is determined when you build the package. Not via the -target flag


iOS "Add to Home Screen" - Delete Data I believe this is the best forum to ask this question.

This issue is with iOS Safari's "Add to Home Screen", and is particularly specific to Google Keep.

I added "Google Keep" to Home Screen through Safari, and after logging in with an email ID (user A), I figured that I needed to login with some other user (user B). Now, Google Keep doesn't have a logout link within the Google Keep interface. Clicking on the signed in user's email address, the "Home Screen app" opens up the Safari browser for further working on that link. In short, there is no way of logging out!

What I have already tried:

Tried deleting the "Home Screen app" and adding it back, fresh! Yet, it holds on to the previous cookie/session, and auto logs in with user A.
Tried clearing Safari cache and cookie data from iOS settings!
Tried combinations of the above two.
Even tried using ?v=2 at the end of the Google Keep URL (https://keep.google.com/?v=2) and adding that to the "Home Screen", but ... the same!!

Is there any way of doing this? Or do I have to manually dig down into the iOS file system and delete the relevant plist or whatever way it's holding this data in?! And if I have to do the latter, can anyone point out which FS file do I exactly need to tackle?

It's for the first time that I am frustrated with iOS, but blame also somewhat falls on Google for not giving a simple logout link in Google Keep (or not having a full-fledged app yet)!!

Please help!

1) Log in to accounts.google.com

2) Login

3) in the Google Dashboard, stop and clear that user

OR

3a) revoke  ALL safari sessions and or Safari enabled Devices presented.

4) reboot iDevice and freshly sign in to Gkeep


MS Word 2011 forces wrong keyboard change For some strange reason, and since a very long time, every time I open word, the keyboard is automatically changed to Japanese Hiragana. Obviously, being Italian, I do not at all want such an auto change. Is there any way to reverse this? Is this a Word problem or something related to the OS, or perhaps something to do with both?

Update

Following comments, I tried unchecking the box in Word > Preferences > Edit for "Match font with keyboard". No change, but I found out that the change takes place during the opening of Word, stays there while the Project Gallery is open, and is reversed as soon as the new document gets opened, so once the new document appears, the keyboard changes back to the correct US Extended keyboard.

Update copied from the forum

Neither the Normal.dotm, nor the Match font with keyboard box in Preferences>Edit, nor Tools>Language and selecting Italian, none of this did anything. This issue is mysterious...

Another copied update

The Language and Text thing (System preferences > L&T > put Italian at the top of the language list) did not work at all. Plus, I want my Mac to speak English, and this change makes System Preferences speak Italian, which I decidedly do not like. Which is why I reversed it.

Tom in the comments here was getting to it. Too bad John Korchok was quicker in replying over at the forum. He suggested this:

  That means there is one last thing you can try. Please open Applications>Microsoft Office 2011>Additional Tools>Microsoft Language Register and open Microsoft Language Register. Check that the dropdown is set to English, then OK out and test Word once more.

And I commented on it with this:

  Yep, that was it. Changed Japanese to English, and the keyboard change vanished. But the Phonetic Guide option also vanished… is there any way to have both no keyboard change and the Phonetic Guide? Because if I ever find myself typing Japanese, I might need that phonetic guide… Of course, if that ever happens, I can just reopen the register, but if there was a way of keeping the option even with the register saying English it would be great.

That was 2 secs ago so he hasn't had time to reply to the "would be great" part just yet :).


Create a live USB for Linux Derivation I want to create a live USB to run a Linux derivation and followed these guides:

Make and create Live USB Linux for Mac? How?

Making a Bootable USB Stick on an Apple Mac OS X from an ISO

Everything just went fine following the tutorial, but when I restart my MacBook Pro I cannot choose the USB drive, it just doesn't show up.

I looked at the second guide and the actual process is much simpler than the method suggested there.

Do the following, it works.

Go to Disk Utility, click on your USB drive on the left pane and click on the Info button at the top. Make a note of the Disk Identifier (Disk0, Disk1 etc.). Then, unmount any mounted partitions on your USB drive, but don't eject the drive itself.

In Terminal type the following, without pressing Enter afterwards...

sudo dd bs=1m if=

Then, drag your .ISO file to the Terminal window so its path is entered quickly and easily.

Add the following line onto the end of the command line, altering the number  at the end if your USB stick's Disk Identifier is other than Disk1

of=/dev/rdisk1

You should end up with a command like this...

sudo dd bs=1m if=/Users/s.darkly/Desktop/Linux/crunchbang-11-20130506-amd64.iso of=/dev/rdisk1

Hit enter, put your password in and wait for the magic to happen. It will take a few minutes and there won't be a progress bar so be patient.


Animated gif as user picture in OS X? How can I set an animated gif as user picture in OS X? Is it possible?

It isn't possible. When you specify an account picture, macOS will automatically convert the image file to .tiff file format and save it in the cache. Unlike .gif, .tiff is a single-image file format, so once your .gif file is converted, the animation will be lost.


2014 MacBook does not boot; 2 chimes My MacBook experiences boot up problem.

A normal MacBook could startup properly after pressing the power button and a chime sound would be heard.

But my MacBook (2014 Mid MacBook Pro with Nvidia graphic card) is a different story. After I pressed the power button, I would hear 2 chime sound and the screen is not turning on. I have to force shut down and reboot again. Then everything seems OK again.

This is really frustrating, it happens every time I shut down or sleep my device.

System report from MacBook

panic(cpu 0 caller 0xffffff7f842be679): GPU Panic: mux-regs 2 3 5f 1d 0 8 severity 3 WS-ready 1 switch-state 0 IG FBs 1 EG FBs 0:0 power-state 4 3D idle HDA idle : NVRM[0/1:0:0]: Read Error 0x00137310: CFG 0x0fc910de 0x00100000 0x00000000, BAR0 0xc0000000 0xffffff9214f8f000 0x0e7290a2, D3, P0/4

Reset NVRAM or PRAM on your Mac

Settings that can be stored in NVRAM include sound volume, display resolution, startup disk selection, time zone, and recent kernel panic information. The settings stored in NVRAM depend on your Mac and the devices that you're using with your Mac.

Shut down your Mac, then turn it on and immediately press and hold these four keys together: Option, Command, P, and R. You can release the keys after about 20 seconds, during which your Mac might appear to restart.

I also would suggest you try SMC Reset if the above solution doesn't help.

Reset the SMC on Mac

First, shut down your Mac and Press Shift-Control-Option on the left side of the built-in keyboard, then press the power button at the same time. Hold these keys and the power button for 10 seconds. Release all keys. And, Press the power button again to turn on your Mac.

What the SMC does

The SMC is responsible for these and other low-level functions on Intel-based Mac computers:

Responding to presses of the power button
Responding to the display lid opening and closing on Mac notebooks

For more reason, you can check https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201295


Screen sharing - can you prevent the attached screen from turning on? I have a machine at work that I sometimes like to connect to using screen sharing, but I don't want anyone else in the office to be able to see what I'm doing.  I also don't want to give them access to the computer - I password-lock my screen with a screen saver when I'm not at the machine, but when I log on with screen sharing, I have to disable this lock.

So, is there any way to prevent the original screens from becoming active while using screen sharing?

in Lion this is possible, but don't remember seeing this anywhere in previous versions. When you start a screen sharing session it will ask you how you want to view the remote session.


Tips or Tricks: Identifying if there are Opened Documents New Mac user here, trying to figure out how to adapt my workflow and the like from Windows/Linux to Mac.

I think the answer might be "it's not possible" but here goes anyway.

I'm used to leaving documents open as a reminder to complete them later. This means I'm used to quickly glancing at the taskbar (dock) to determine which documents I have open and what I need to do. Since the red x doesn't actually close a lot of apps - terminal for instance - it makes it a little tedious to determine if I have an open document.

The only solutions I can think of are either remembering to manually ⌘Q-ing each window (oof), or to right click each open app to determine if there are opened documents and then remembering the answer. Neither of those are great so I'm wondering if anyone has any good methods around this.

I realize this might encourage discussion/opinions, but I'd like to emphasize that I am looking for concrete answers EG: "there isn't a way" or "This setting will make the number of opened documents be displayed on the dock". One of the biggest issues I'm having with moving to Mac is determining the best way to solve a problem, and I'm guessing that what I think is a solution here might not actually work.

Just by looking the taskbar I think you can't. But you can set an easy shortcut and if you click on the application you want to view and the press the shortcut you can see all the windows opened (active and minimised) for that application.

In System Preference > Mission Control, you can set a shortcut for Application windows. Just try it once and with time it will become smooth for you.


Add a Google account to macOS 10.14.6 running Safari 13.0? Starting on September 20, 2019, my macOS 10.14.6-equipped iMac began asking me to enter the password for two Google accounts I've long had connected to the machine.

I clicked the notification bubble and it took me to the Internet Accounts area of System Preferences. Upon clicking one of the two Google accounts a dialog was presented by System Preferences that informed me I had to complete password entry for the Google account in Safari. Clicking OK opened Safari but no authorization page is every loaded.

I deleted the accounts and attempted to re-add them to the Internet Accounts settings but the problem remains. I'm stuck in a loop.

Prior to this occuring, I updated Safari on the iMac. No changes were made to either Google account by me prior to this occuring (though Google could have made changes quietly without my knowledge).

You can view the problem occuring in this screen capture video I took: https://youtu.be/wIJaBCyp_5I

Both of these Google accounts have long used 2FA if that is of any help helping me solve this problem. I would use an app-specific password here, but that doesn't appear to be an option when adding a Google account in the Internet Accounts pane of System Preferences.

How can I fix this and get these accounts re-added to macOS?

Safari 13.0.1 fixes this issue.

From the release notes:

Fixes an issue that prevents signing into Google in Internet Accounts in System Preferences

To install Safari 13.0.1:

Go to System Preferences > Software Update to install the 13.0.1 update. You'll need to restart your Mac after the installation for the Google authentication problem to go away.

If pressing the "Open Safari" button in the Internet Accounts pane of System Preferences fails to open Safari, open Safari yourself and the problem shoudl rectify itself. Safari does not need to be made the default browser for the system.

As of the time this was posted, September 20 2019, there was no known solution to the problem. Safari 13.0 broke the authentication workflow from System Preferences with Google account authentication if you use 2FA on your Google account.

The problem has been reported to Google and Apple via their official bug feedback channels.

Partial workaround

A partial workaround to the problem can be had for Mail.app and Notes.app if you add your Google account as a generic "Mail Account". For this to work you'll need to generate an application-specific password in your Google account and use this app-specific password with your Google email address to link the account to Mail.app and macOS.

To generate an application specific password for your Google account (from Google's official documentation):

Go to your Google Account.
On the left navigation panel, choose Security.
On the "Signing in to Google" panel, choose App Passwords. If you don’t see this option:

2-Step Verification is not set up for your account.
2-Step Verification is set up for security keys only.
Your account is through work, school, or other organization.
You’ve turned on Advanced Protection for your account.

At the bottom, choose Select app and choose the app you’re using.
Choose Select device and choose the device you’re using.
Choose Generate.
Follow the instructions to enter the App Password. The App Password is the 16-character code in the yellow bar on your device.
Choose Done.

To use this password with macOS:

Navigate to System Preferences > Internet Accounts and click the Add Other Account... at the bottom of the list
Select Mail account from the list
Fill out the fields:

Name:
Email Address:
Password:

Click the Sign In button to complete the process. You'll be able to connect to Mail and Notes with this approach.

Unfortunately this approach won't work to make a Calendar connection from Calendar.app to your Google calendar.


Using a company iPad privately My boss has given each employee an iPad 2 with the express permission to use it privately as well as professionaly (take it home, install apps, ...).

All iPads are used with the same company-wide Apple ID, so that all devices are automatically synchronised. However, I also have a private Apple ID and I'm wondering how I could get content I purchased with my private ID on my new iPad. While we are allowed to buy non-free apps with the company's apple ID if we pay for them with iTunes store cards, I would rather buy content with my own Apple ID so that I can keep it.

Is it possible to abandon the principle that all company iPads are used with the same ID and still get automatical synchronisation?
Is it possible to use content purchased with my Apple ID while logged in with another ID?
Are there any other things which are good to know in my situation?

The iPad will allow you to run any app installed on it, no matter what Apple ID it is associated with. You will need to switch to your account when you first download the app, and then switch back. The app will continue to run normally, and if there are any updates you can download them without switching accounts (the App Store will ask for your account's password). I am not sure which account will be used if you try to make an in-app purchase, though, so be careful.


How to customise rEFInd theme on High Sierra? Installed rEFInd using the install binary. All working but the originally theme was a little uninspiring. So I followed following steps from this link.

  From OSX, do the following

  Start by mounting your EFI partition.

  sudo mount -t msdos /dev/disk0s1 /Volumes

  Then cd to the rEFInd directory on that partition cd
  /Volumes/EFI/rEFInd

  Download the theme with Git

  git clone https://github.com/EvanPurkhiser/rEFInd-minimal

  Now add the theme info to refind.conf

  echo "include rEFInd-minimal/theme.conf" >> refind.conf

  Reboot with sudo reboot

everything seemed to execute successfuly and the line include rEFInd-minimal/theme.conf has been added to the refind.conf file but when I reboot the theme remains the same (original). Can it be customised?

Sorry, I'm pretty newbie when it comes to this stuff so go easy on me!

I could be wrong, but isn't

echo "include rEFInd-minimal/theme.conf" >> refind.conf

suppose to be the following.

echo "include themes/rEFInd-minimal/theme.conf" >> refind.conf

You omitted the themes folder, but there are many references to a themes folder in the theme.conf file.

I would suggest the following.

  From OSX, do the following

  Start by mounting your EFI partition.

  sudo mount -t msdos /dev/disk0s1 /Volumes

  Then cd to the rEFInd directory on that partition cd
  /Volumes/EFI/rEFInd

  mkdir themes

  cd themes

  Download the theme with Git

  git clone https://github.com/EvanPurkhiser/rEFInd-minimal

  Now add the theme info to refind.conf

  cd ..
  echo "include themes/rEFInd-minimal/theme.conf" >> refind.conf

  Reboot with sudo reboot


How do I troubleshoot iTunes failing to add songs to my iCloud Music Library? I want to add a couple songs to an iCloud Music Library playlist (in iTunes 12.6.1.25 on OS X 10.10.5), but the songs aren't in my iCloud Music Library:

If I right-click on the songs and select "Add to iCloud Music Library", the "spinner" appears in the upper-right corner of the iTunes window and shortly afterwards disappears. The songs continue to have the cloud icon with the slash through it:

I guess it's failing without displaying an error message. I get the same message (as above) when I again try to add the songs to the playlist.

I tried forcing an update as described in https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/197896/94, and I also tried signing out and back in and (again) forcing an update.

How can I get more information on why these songs are failing to sync to my iCloud Music Library?

The icon you're getting (i.e. a single Cloud with a diagonal slash from top left to bottom right) means your song isn’t eligible to be uploaded to your iCloud library.

For example, this can happen if the song file is larger than 200 MB, or if it's encoded at 96 Kbps or less.

For more information you can refer to:

iTunes for Mac: Symbols used in iTunes
About iCloud Music Library icons and status

To quote Apple from the second link above:

  This icon appears next items that can't be added to iCloud Music Library. A song might be ineligible if it wasn't purchased from the iTunes Store or was purchased using a different Apple ID, or if the song file is larger than 200 MB, is longer than two hours, or was encoded at 96 Kbps or less.


Can I convert an IPA file to support a higher version of iOS? I bought my iPad 2 in 2012 which currently runs iOS 7. I have this amazing app through which I am able to download any video I find online. I was able to retrieve the IPA file through my iPad, but each time I try to transfer it to my iPhone 8 Plus running the latest iOS, on iTunes it says that the app I want to copy is not compatible with the higher iOS version on my iPhone.

When I try to use my iCloud back up from the iPad, it simply does not even show up in my apps. This app is not even in my purchases on the App Store with my Apple ID. I have tried using Cydia Impactor, CopyTrans Manager and iMazing, none of it has worked so far. Is there any way I can change this IPA file to support a higher version of iOS? I do not have a MacBook, I do not know if Xcode would even work with this but I am unable to use it if there is any solution on Windows I would love to try it.

Is there any way I can change this IPA file to support a higher version of iOS?

No, it is not possible to modify an IPA to run on a higher version of iOS. Also, it is not possible to reverse engineer an IPA using Xcode as it contains compiled code.


How can I get the name of connected devices on an Apple AirPort Extreme Base Station? I can see who is connected to my base station by going to Advanced>Logs and Statistics. http://cl.ly/2l0p0w223q1E3T1H0B0w

What I'd like to know is who/what device is connected by device name without having to lookup a table of MAC addresses in a compiled list, etc.

I know that I can filter via MAC address (AirPort>Access Control) and in doing so, run a stricter network. I am more interested at a quick glance to see if Bob's iPhone, Suzy's iPad or HP Printer X is connected.

The AirPort (4th Gen, dual-band, release just prior to the newest one) is running in bridge mode. I'm not sure if this causes any issues with pulling device name or if this is just something that the AirPort does not do by default. I know that when it is not handling DHCP that you cannot create a guest network.

Any third party utilities that I can augment the AirPort with or other suggestions welcomed.

Thanks.

With Airport Utility 6 you find IP, Mac, and network name for WiFi (not ethernet) devices by holding option key, then double click on the AirPort device (e.g. base station) providing DHCP services. You will see a new 'Summary' tab, click outline icon in wireless client list to see details.


TextEdit hangs when trying to reopen documents. Can I recover all documents except the one causing problems? I was using TextEdit with a number of unsaved documents open. I then attempted to paste an unreasonably large RTF table into a new document. After watching TextEdit beachball for about 5 minutes, I used force quit and reopened it. This caused it to hang and not open any documents, presumably because it was trying to reopen the partially-pasted enormous document that caused it to hang in the first place.

After about 10 minutes I force quit again and tried to reopen it again. It put up a dialog asking: The last time you opened TextEdit, it was force quit while reopening windows. Do you want to try to reopen its windows again?

If I choose reopen, it hangs again. When I right-click on its icon in the dock, I can actually see the titles of all the documents I had open, but I can't switch to any of them.

If I choose "don't reopen," will my unsaved documents and changes be lost? Is there any way to recover them outside of TextEdit, or to tell TextEdit to stop trying to reopen that one fatal document?

I am not using iCloud, and I was not connected to my Time Machine drive when the problem occurred.

Eventually I gave in and told TextEdit not to reopen windows. It immediately opened, and the documents that had never been saved were still there. Only the named / saved documents had been closed. The document that was causing the problems was also open and usable, though I'm not sure if the paste operation had completed or whether it just had as much of the text as it had been able to cram in before the initial crash.

The overall answer is that choosing "don't reopen" was safe. TextEdit behaved reasonably and didn't, as far as I can tell, lose any data.


Change directory for screenshots on IPad for using Dropbox I would like to change the directory for the screenshots in a way that dropbox uploads it automatially. There are a lot of tutorials on MAC OS but I cannot find it for IPad. Does someone knows how to save screenshots in directory that dropbox can uploads?

You can't change the location of screenshots in iOS, they always get stored into your Photo Library. To get the into Dropbox you have to open the Dropbox ap, pick the photos you want to publish and store them into one of your Dropbox folders.


Built in FTP client (cmd + k) - can't upload files (Mavericks) I have just found out that I can enter a built-in FTP client on my Mac by simply pressing ^ Ctrl + K. Great thing!

But after I have successfully connected to my server and a 'folder' with files located there appeared, it occurred that I can't upload files by simply drag & drop'ing them. When I checked the 'Get info' I saw that it is marked as 'You can only read', yet the ftp account itself is okay, because I could upload files there from dreamweaver (unfortunately I have only Windows licence for this app).

Why is it marked as 'You can only read' and how do I fix that?

Please help!

P.S. Could you explain it in an easy way? Because I'm new to Mac (just bought one few days ago).

The built-in ftp is read only since forever unfortunately. From Mavericks help:

  Servers and shared computers that you can connect to

  You can connect your Mac to the types of servers and other computers
  listed here.

  ...

  FTP servers

  With read-only access, you can copy files from the server, but to copy
  files to the server you may need another FTP app. Choose Apple menu >
  App Store to find FTP apps available for OS X.

Maybe try the free Cyberduck or (not free) Transmit.


What is the best backup strategy for macbook pro laptop? I have a lot of data on my macbook pro retina laptop and i am looking for the best backup strategy.  I have previously had a windows desktop with an external harddrive connected all of the time and a backup program that copied to the external harddrive incrementally.  I am trying to figure out the best backup strategy given its a laptop that i move around with and travel with alot (so can't really have a external hard drive always connected)

What is the recommended backup solution for map laptops?

The Basics: Time Machine

Time Machine is Apple's backup solution, included in OS X. An external drive is required. It backs up changed files every hour, and stores as many "snapshots" as it can hold. After the initial full backup, it only stores changes to files, which makes things more efficient, and allows for more granular snapshots. In addition to being able to do a full system restore, you can selectively restore older versions of specific files, which is handy in case you delete or make changes you didn't mean to.

Using Time Machine on OS X 10.7 and later also enables "local snapshots", which keeps snapshots of changed files on your main drive when you don't have your backup drive attached, provided there's sufficient space. Obviously this doesn't help if you have a drive failure, but in the case of accidental deletions, etc. it can be helpful.

For more information, Apple's Mac 101: Time Machine article is a good starting point.

Online Backup

If you're on the go a lot, you may want to consider an online backup service. BackBlaze is a popular one, but there's also CrashPlan, Mozy and several others.

The advantages are not needing an external drive, and having an off-site backup to recover from in the event of something nasty happening to your house. The downside is the monthly cost (I believe BackBlaze is a flat fee, others have differing schemes based on how much data you back up), as well as the time required to back up over the internet. These services only back up data that has changed, so after the initial full backup, things will get faster, but depending on your connection, it could be a bit problematic (particularly if you're travelling — most hotel Wi-Fi I've used isn't exactly speedy).

SuperDuper

SuperDuper is a longstanding Mac favourite. It will make a complete clone of your drive to an external drive, which is then bootable and usable exactly like your internal drive. It also has a "smart update" feature, where after the initial clone, it only updates the backup with changed data, to minimize how long backups take. SuperDuper is the best way to get up and running again after a hard drive crash — you can boot off your backup drive right away and you'll your full system.

Dropbox

I'm listing this separately from the other online backup systems because it's not really a full backup, but it's definitely worth using. It's simply a folder that syncs to the Dropbox servers and wherever else you install your Dropbox client. Some limited storage of old versions of files is also included. 2GB is provided free, you can pay if you need more. The best use of Dropbox would be for your current working files. It won't store everything, but if you use it for the files you most often need, or those that you're using lately, you'll have up to date backups from whenever you have an internet connection.

Wrap Up

You'll have to do think about what exact setup suits your needs best. Ideally, a robust backup system would include at least two or three of these options in combination, so that you have multiple fallbacks. For example, you could do a daily or weekly SuperDuper backup, and then use Dropbox or Time Machine to restore the files you've been working on since your most recent backup. Adding in an online backup service for off-site redundancy will give you some added protection in the event your local backups are lost or destroyed.


Yosemite divided dock? I've seen this divided dock twice in Yosemite, but I can't find any documentation on it, and don't understand what it's supposed to represent, nor which conditions cause it to occur.  When I click on the leftmost item, it takes me to that application, the division disappears, and I cannot reproduce the conditions which made it appear in the first place.  Can anyone explain this behavior please?  And what does the mini monitor icon represent in the upper right hand corner of the (in this case) safari icon represent?

This is the Handoﬀ feature on iOS 8 and OSX 10.10. It appears when you are doing something on one device and lets you finish your task on your computer.

You can read more on Handoﬀ and Continuity here.


Backing up External drive to Time Machine - what if it's not connected? I have 2 x 1 TB drive that I use interchangeably. 1 holds Video and the other Photos. I only have 1 connected when I'm working (using Premiere or Lightroom). I have a 2 TB NAS for making redundant copy of the other 2 drives.So far I've been doing the copying manually.

I'm considering of using Time Machine to make proper backup sets (though I'm always only interested in the latest set). I know that I can set Time Machine to backup to NAS over the network and include any external drives connected to the mac at the time.

QUestion now is:

Will Time Machine "craps out" if it can't find the external drive?
Does Time Machine handle backing up the external drives - one at a time - only when it's connected - without thinking the files/volume had been deleted?

I also have my external HDD connected from time to time. To answer to Afmrak, Time Machine only prepares (stashes) backups once it finds out you connected your Time Machine HDD. So if you haven't connected your HDD for some time, it will take a while for Time Machine to prepare and make backup.
I have never been backing up external volumes.


/etc/resolver: TLD itself not resolved by custom resolver I'm using the /etc/resolver technique for a dev domain as explained in some blog posts around the web (like this one).

I used this technique previously on 10.9, but on my new Yosemite there seems to be one small problem: the TLD itself, i.e dev, does not seem to be resolved by the custom DNS. In other words on 10.9 both dev and *.dev would be passed to dnsmasq and resolved correctly, but on Yosemite this only happens for *.dev. dev is resolved by something else to an address other than the one configured in dnsmasq.

I know dnsmasq works properly:

# host dev localhost
Using domain server:
Name: localhost
Address: 127.0.0.1#53
Aliases:

dev has address 127.0.0.1

however:

# ping -c 1 dev
PING dev (127.0.53.53): 56 data bytes
^C
--- dev ping statistics ---
1 packets transmitted, 0 packets received, 100.0% packet loss
# ping -c 1 a.dev
PING a.dev (127.0.0.1): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=64 time=0.035 ms

--- a.dev ping statistics ---
1 packets transmitted, 1 packets received, 0.0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 0.035/0.035/0.035/0.000 ms

My /etc/resolver/dev is:

nameserver 127.0.0.1

I know I can just add dev itself to /etc/hosts, since it's the only one that doesn't work it not a big deal. However I'd like to know if I did something wrong and if I can achieve the same behaviour I had previously on 10.9.

127.0.53.53 is a special address, indicating a possible name collision. What's happened is Google has registered .dev as a new TLD, and dnsmasq is trying to inform you that your use of .dev could collide with the new official use of .dev.

Though it's strange you can get *.dev to resolve correctly, I can't, I just made Apache listen on 127.0.53.53 because I'm lazy like that.

Here's ICANN's explanation of 127.0.53.53


Apple TV ungroups songs in an album I'm seeing this issue all too frequently with some albums on my Apple TV. When I try to search for an album, the tracks are not grouped within one album. Instead, the Apple TV creates duplicate list items (different tracks though) resulting in not being able to play the album all at once.

The weird thing is that they group fine into one album within iTunes itself. One of the albums displayed in my screenshots below was even bought on iTunes.

Any help on how to get it neatly grouped into one album?

P.S.: Already restarted the Apple TV and logged in and out. Using iTunes Match

Same here. I found a easy 2 step approach to solve the problem.

1.) Make sure you have ticked the compilation box in iTunes and delete the album artists completely.

2.) After your Apple TV updated the music library the compilation will be together as one (with "Verschiedene Interpreten" in German, wich is "Various Artists" in English). After that you can re-enter any Album Artist you want, the ATV will not split up the Album again.


10.7.3 - Screensaver turns on while I'm in the middle of typing/mouse activity Has anyone seen this?  Let's say I set my screen saver to activate after 5 minutes.  Well I can be typing and using the mouse almost continuously for a period of time (5 minutes?  I'm not exactly sure) and all of the sudden the screen saver turns on.  If I'm in the middle of typing the screen saver then goes away almost instantly but I lose a few key strokes.

Is there an option I need to set to say don't turn on the screen saver until 5 minutes of inactivity?  Or is this a bug?

According to Apple Support:

  If you use a screen saver, it starts automatically after your computer
  is inactive for a time. You can also choose a shortcut so your
  screen saver starts when you move the pointer to a corner of the
  screen.

  Choose Apple menu > System Preferences, click Desktop & Screen Saver, and then click Screen Saver.
  Open the Screen Saver pane of Desktop & Screen Saver preferences
  Click Hot Corners. Choose Start Screen Saver or Disable Screen Saver from the pop-up menu for a corner you want to use; and
  then click OK. To use the Command (⌘), Control
  (^), Option (⌥), or Shift (⇧) key
  together with a hot corner, press the key while the pop-up menu is
  open. For example, if you press the Shift key, the Start Screen Saver
  command changes to ⇧-Start Screen Saver.

  To deactivate the screen saver and return to the desktop, press any
  key or move the mouse.

Additional screensaver configuration options for Lion are listed in this Apple Support KB.

This issue could definitely be a bug, but you could also check your screensaver configuration to determine whether you've turned on hot corners - it's possible that your mouse pointer may have triggered the screensaver. You can also choose to disable screensavers completely to avoid this issue.


How to create a Mac bootable gparted or Parted Magic thumb drive? Is it possible to create a Mac-bootable thumb drive containing gparted or Parted Magic without installing a full Linux distribution?

I tried several methods like

unetbootin (some blogs suggest this though the unetbootin site explicitly mentions that it isn't possible)
sudo dd if=/.../.iso of=/dev/rdiskx

which both failed.

The following steps have been tested on macOS Mojave 10.14.6 and I confirm I was able to boot GParted on a 2019 MacBook Air (with secure boot disabled). That being said, the keyboard and trackpad didn’t work as drivers are not yet available on live distros. Also, the new T2 chip currently prevents live distros from accessing the SSD (another driver issue).

Step 1: Open Disk Utility.

Step 2: Click on View (upper left) and select Show All Devices.

Step 3: Select your thumb drive and click Erase.

Step 4: Select MS-DOS (FAT) as Format and GUID Partition Map as Scheme.

Step 5: Click Erase.

Step 6: Download the latest gparted-live-1.0.0-3-amd64.zip.

Step 7: Double-click on gparted-live-1.0.0-3-amd64.zip to unzip folder.

Step 8: Copy all files from gparted-live-1.0.0-3-amd64 to your thumb drive.

You now have a bootable version of GParted that should work on your Mac!


How should I update Xcode when I installed it from the app store but it hasn't updated to most recent version? I have OS X version 11.0.1 (Big Sur), and checked to see if my Xcode were up to date. I originally installed Xcode from the app store because I'd read that if you do it that way, it updates automatically. When I checked, the Xcode version was 11.3.1, and when I looked at this link in the Xcode 11.x - 12.x (since SwiftUI framework) table, it seems like the Xcode version should have automatically updated to 12.1.1.
What I Want To Know:
I read that if you download Xcode from the app store, it updates automatically, whereas if you download it from developer.apple.com/download, it doesn't. Given that it doesn't seem to have updated itself after downloading from the app store, should I download version 12.1.1 from developer.apple.com/download? If so, will it continue to not update itself, and I should plan to update it manually from now on? Or do you have any other advice on how I should handle this?

Xcode is not automatically updated as a consequence of updating to Big Sur.
Just installing Xcode from the App Store itself won't automatically ensure it is updated. This only happens if you have enabled automatic updates in the Mac App Store settings.
In any case, there can be a lag from the time the new version is released and until the automatic update feature on your Mac notices it and upgrades.
You can always just open the App Store, go to the page for Xcode and hit the "Update" button there.
If you download and install Xcode manually from a link, then no, it will not automatically update from that point on.


Opening an attached pdf file on wiki page outside of browser I have set up a personal wiki on a localhost using drupal. I have attached pdf's that open in the browser window which is generally ok but I'd rather be able to open them in Preview so I get all the usability benefits of that app (without downloading them and thus creating a 2nd version outside the wiki directory). Anyone have a suggestion?

I don't think you can open them in Preview without downloading them.  Also - by merely opening or viewing the document at all, you are actually downloading it.  It's stored in a temp directory somewhere, and likely trashed when you close your browser.


OSX utility for copy/pasting a text file in a FIFO queue fashion There are a few similar questions regarding "clipboard managers" but nothing that quite suits my needs.

I often end up with an unformatted list of text that needs entering into various form fields. I'm looking for a utility that makes the clipboard act like a FIFO queue using a pre-defined text file of this nature.

Say I have a text file with 30 names

Adam
Alice
...
Will
Zara

I'd like to be able to paste this list into the clipboard manager. I'd then switch to the form, click the first box, press a hotkey and the first item would be "popped" from the list and pasted into the box. I'd then click the second box, press the hotkey again and the next name would be popped and pasted.

As a bonus, it would also be cool if I could do the reverse: click an item, press a hotkey and it's appended to a text file (or a list that can be easily exported as an unformatted text file). I've seen that lots of these other tools can build a list within the app itself, but I really need the output to be in a text file to use for other purposes.

The closest I have seen to these requirements is Flycut (free on the App Store)

It's extremely simple to use, though it won't automatically pop an item off the stack then move to the next one.

However, when you invoke Flycut (assuming you are starting at the top of the stack), you can just press the down arrow key ↓ to go to the next item.  When you release, it pastes what is in queue.

So, your sequence of keystrokes would be:

First:  ⇧ Shift ⌘ Command V

Second: ⇧ Shift ⌘ Command V then ↓

and so on...


How to search by image from the iPad? Google only allows image search from the camera directly (and not the gallery), but doesn't allow iPad users to search by uploading an existing image or typing a specific URL.

How can I search by image from an iPad?

When you're on the Google Images page scroll all the way to the bottom. There is a choice there to use either Google Tablet or Classic (defaults to tablet on the iPad). Click on classic and you should get the same options as on your mac/pc.


How can I record a verbal or sound to use as a ringtone for specific numbers I have an iPhone 4S with iOS 5.

How do I record speech or sound to use as a ringtone dedicated to certain phone numbers, especially numbers that aren't in my address book?

I think this is two questions. How do I record ringtones? and How do I get a ringtone for non-contacts? I will address the second.

You cannot explicitly set a ringtone for numbers not in you address book. But, you can get this effect. Simply make sure all your contacts have a "custom" ringtone set. Then, set your default ringtone to something else. You can do this with only two ringtones, one for contacts and one for the non-contacts. Or, you could customize your contacts as much as you want. Just make sure that every time you add a contact you give them a rintone other than the default.


When I download a free app in appstore it says “amd action:authenticate:sm” When I download a free app in appstore it says "amd action:authenticate:sm". My device is iPhone 5c. How can I solve this problem???

You can try adjusting your iPhone clock to your current location.
Go to Settings > General > Date & Time on iOS and set your time appropriately -either manually or automatically by switching the "Set Automatically" slider to on.


Which iOS devices can *not* update to iOS 4.3? What is the complete list of iOS devices (iPod Touch, iPhone, iPad) that are unable to update to iOS 4.3 or higher?

According to Apple, (scroll to the bottom of the page) only the two most recent generations of each device can upgrade. So both iPads, the iPhone 4 and 3GS and the 3rd & 4th generation iPod touch. One exception: The CDMA (Verizon in the US) iPhone 4 is staying on 4.2.6 for a while. It has some, but not all, features of iOS 4.3.

That leaves the first two generations of iPod touch and the original iPhone and iPhone 3G unable to use it.

The 3G and second-generation iPod touch got stripped-down versions of 4.0-4.2.1. (No multitasking, homescreen wallpapers, or printing.) The other two devices left out (1st-gen iPod touch & iPhone) didn't even get 4.0.


Xcode installation seems corrupt? I've been try to download Xcode for work, but for some reason the Mac App Store is giving me a bit of trouble. Activity monitor shows some network usage, but in Launchpad it seems the download isn't moving.

When I go to the purchases panel of the Mac App Store, I see this.

No status, no pause button, in fact - the button has no text on it! I've tried restarting the App Store, restarting my computer, even removing the com.apple.appstore folder in /var/folders but alas, no luck.

Can anyone diagnose the issue? When I removed com.apple.appstore, Xcode still showed up on Launchpad, and clicking on it did nothing - it was frozen in time. So can I kill off this partial download and start new?

As near as I can tell, this might be a Hidden Purchase. Choose Store > View My Account, where you can see hidden purchases. You may be able to cancel or unhide the download from there.


Favicons not showing in Safari 5.1.1 on OSX Lion? Since upgrading to Safari 5.1.1 none of the websites I am visiting is displaying Favicons. I had a look in ~/Library/Safari/Icons to try and reset these but noticed that the file/folder doesn't exist, so the problem is not related to the caching.

This was working fine in a clean install of Lion before upgrading to 10.7.2. Even installing Glims and setting the icons to display in the tab headers did not fix the problem.

Is anyone aware of a fix for this, or whether this is a known bug?

After doing some research it turns out I am not the only one with this problem, and Safari has changed the location for it's favicon database.

From this Apple Forum discussion:

  Quit Safari.
  Go to ~/Library/Safari.
  Move the WebpageIcons.db file from the Safari folder to the Trash.
  Relaunch Safari.


Can I upgrade to Mountain Lion from Snow Leopard? I'm currently running Snow Leopard (10.6.8) and I never upgraded to Lion.

However, the features in Mountain Lion have me intrigued and I'd like to upgrade.

Am I allowed to upgrade straight to Mountain Lion from Snow Leopard, or do I need to somehow upgrade to Lion first?

Yes. As long as you're running the most up-to-date Snow Leopard version (10.6.8), you can directly upgrade to Mountain Lion, as detailed on Apple's 10.8 Upgrade Page. Just download from the App Store and you should be good to go.


Difference between Export PDF and Print to PDF in Safari What is the difference between to File > Export as PDF and File > Print > Save As PDF?

"Save as PDF" is essentially a digital copy of what you get if you were to print a specific page from Safari. This includes extra headers/footers that include the date, webpage, number of pages, web address, etc.

"Export as PDF" is a simple snapshot of the page as is and does not include all of those extra details.

From the few pages I've compared the differences with these two options, Export as PDF tends to retain more of the formatting details whereas the Save as PDF option can cause the page to look slightly different.


Assign a key combination for each input language I know I can "cycle through languages" and "toggle between last used two languages" with key combinations. These options are not so convenient when you have three or more input languages installed.

Is there any way to assign a key combination for each language, not cycling or toggling? For the sake of example, if I can press Command + 1 then the input mode is changed to English, if Command + 2 then Japanese, if Command + 3 then Korean. Something like that.

First enable all necessary layouts in System Preferences -> Keyboard -> Input Sources

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

Example:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>

  <vkchangeinputsourcedef>
    <name>KeyCode::VK_CHANGE_INPUTSOURCE_US</name>
    <inputsourceid_equal>com.apple.keylayout.US</inputsourceid_equal>
  </vkchangeinputsourcedef>

  <item>
    <name>Change input source to US by right shift key + U</name>
    <identifier>private.change_input_source_to_us</identifier>
    <autogen>
      __KeyToKey__
      KeyCode::U, ModifierFlag::SHIFT_R,
      KeyCode::VK_CHANGE_INPUTSOURCE_US
    </autogen>
  </item>

  <vkchangeinputsourcedef>
    <name>KeyCode::VK_CHANGE_INPUTSOURCE_GERMAN</name>
    <languagecode>de</languagecode>
  </vkchangeinputsourcedef>

  <item>
    <name>Change input source to German by right shift key + D</name>
    <identifier>private.change_input_source_to_german</identifier>
    <autogen>
      __KeyToKey__
      KeyCode::D, ModifierFlag::SHIFT_R,
      KeyCode::VK_CHANGE_INPUTSOURCE_GERMAN
    </autogen>
  </item>

  <vkchangeinputsourcedef>
    <name>KeyCode::VK_CHANGE_INPUTSOURCE_UNICODEHEXINPUT</name>
    <inputsourceid_equal>com.apple.keylayout.UnicodeHexInput</inputsourceid_equal>
  </vkchangeinputsourcedef>

    <item>
    <name>Change input source to HEX by right shift key + H</name>
    <identifier>private.change_input_source_to_hex</identifier>
    <autogen>
      __KeyToKey__
      KeyCode::H, ModifierFlag::SHIFT_R,
      KeyCode::VK_CHANGE_INPUTSOURCE_UNICODEHEXINPUT
    </autogen>
    </item>

</root>

In the example hitting right shiftu will enable the US layout, right shiftg the german layout and right shifth the hex layout.

A comprehensive list of vkchangeinputsourcedefs is available here.
Save the file
Open in the menulet Karabiner -> Preferences the tab Change Key
Hit the ReloadXML button
Enable all "shortcuts". They are listed at the beginning.


Upgrade system frameworks without upgrading OS I am currently running macOS 10.10.2, but would like to be able to run the latest Ableton Live 10 which is built on macOS 10.11.  When I directly run the executable I get errors referencing symbols not found in:

/System/Library/Frameworks/AudioToolbox.framework/Versions/A/AudioToolbox.

Of course this issue would be resolved by upgrading to 10.11, but that is something that I really do not want to do for a number of reasons, so I am wondering if I can:

Extract the relevant Framework files from a El Capitan InstallESD.dmg, and
Overwrite the existing framework files with the new ones.

How much am I missing, or would this work?

Thanks

Edit:  I want to know if this is possibile, not if it is a good idea.

Ableton Live 10 isn't even released yet.

https://www.ableton.com/en/blog/live-10-coming-february-6

You should also check the system requirements.

https://help.ableton.com/hc/en-us/articles/115001663530-Live-10-Minimum-System-Requirements

  OS X 10.11.6 or later

So I think the answer to your question is don't modify system frameworks (sounds like a recipe for dependency hell) and either upgrade to macOS 10.11 or stick to using Ableton Live 9.


Icons in Safari's pinned tabs Pinned tabs are very useful feature in Safari and I'm using it all the time.
But, I'm having some experience problem with it.
When I pin several tabs from the same domain but different subdomains, I'm getting the first letter as the icon of this pinned tab to be exactly the same. Then it takes me a while to find the tab I was looking for by switching through them one by one.

Is it possible to manually change the icon for these tabs or at least make it to use the first letter of the subdomain instead of the domain name, so it will be much faster accessible?

There is another workaround: Add the webpage of your pinned tab to your bookmarks. The pinned tab will then show the first letter of your bookmark title. So this way you can at least make sure that all your pinned tabs have different letters, which might already be sufficient :D


Why does email from an iPhone have the wrong time zone in the Date field? Whenever my daughter sends me email from her iPhone, the email arrives with the wrong timezone in the headers. However, the timezone seems to be set correctly on her phone.

Her correct timezone is Eastern Daylight Time (EDT). However, look at the headers on the email I received (sanitized to remove identifying information):

Received: from my.example.com (localhost [127.0.0.1])
        by my.example.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id 70DDBF60347
        for <myname@localhost>; Thu, 14 Jul 2016 11:19:59 -0400 (EDT)
Envelope-to: myname@example.com
Delivery-date: Thu, 14 Jul 2016 11:15:44 -0400
Received: from another.example.com [11.22.33.44]
        by my.example.com with IMAP (fetchmail-6.3.26)
        for <myname@localhost> (single-drop); Thu, 14 Jul 2016 11:19:59 -0400 (EDT)
Received: from njbrspamp10.vtext.com ([69.78.129.155]:23060)
        by another.example.com with esmtps (TLSv1:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:256)
        (Exim 4.87)
        (envelope-from <6175551212@vzwpix.com>)
        id 1bNiMZ-0008Nw-LM
        for myname@example.com; Thu, 14 Jul 2016 11:15:44 -0400
Received: from 5.sub-69-78-32.myvzw.com (HELO m04.vzwpix.com) ([69.78.32.5])
  by njbrspamp10.vtext.com with SMTP; 14 Jul 2016 15:15:42 +0000
From: 6175551212@vzwpix.com
To: myname@example.com
Subject:
Date: Thu, 14 Jul 2016 15:15:42 +0000

As you can see, the final "Received" line has a timezone offset of +0000 (GMT), whereas all the others have offsets of -0400 (EDT). As a result, the "Date" line in the email (used by my email client) has a +0000 timezone offset instead of -0400, which is confusing because both sender and recipient are in the Eastern USA (-0400).

Is this a problem at Verizon (myvzw.com), on my daughter's phone, or somewhere else, and how can it be fixed?

Thank you very much.

The problem, I think, is with your mail client. The times in the headers are consistent, that is, the chronological sequence is correct. The issue is that your mail client is not translating the time given in the header into local time for display. This means that an email to you from, say, New Zealand would be shown in your mail client with a time that hasn't happened yet for you locally.

Verizon's cellphone equipment (e.g., ENodeB) is almost certainly set for UTC (alias GMT). That greatly simplifies their data aggregation issues.


How can you do compound boolean statements in AppleScript? For example

    on run {input, parameters}

    set Variable1 to "5"

    if (Variable1 is not "5") & (Variable1 is not "6") then

        display dialog "Variable1 is not 5 or 6"

    else

        display dialog "Variable1 is 5"

    end if

    return input
end run

When running this program, I get the error:

  Can’t make {false, true} into type boolean.

The following should handle the test:

set Variable1 to "5"

if (Variable1 is not "5") and (Variable1 is not "6") then
    display dialog "Variable1 is not 5 or 6"
else
    display dialog "Variable1 is " & Variable1
end if


Can you permanently disable rootless on OS X? When booting to recover and running csrutil disable it just writes it into the NVRAM, unfortunately I reset the NVRAM very often so it's annoying to have to do that all the time. It's also annoying right now when I need to use something which requires me to turn off SIP when I can't reboot, (I am copying a bunch of files).

The following should be possible.

Download and install rEFInd to your EFI partition.
Use the Mac Startup Manager to make rEFInd the default system to
boot to.
Configure rEFInd know of OS X and to not search for any other
operating systems. (This decreases boot time.)
Configure rEFInd to operate silently and to boot OS X.
Configure rEFInd to disable all or part of SIP before booting OS X.

Normally when you start the Mac, OS X should startup (after first silently booting rEFInd). SIP will be in whatever state you configured rEFInd to set it to.

If you reset NVRAM, then you may have to hold down the option key and instruct the Startup Manager to make rEFInd the default to boot to. I say may because I am not sure if resetting the NVRAM changes the default operating system to boot to.


Requirements for iPhone 6 battery replacement I'm having a friend take my iPhone 6 to the local Apple Store to replace my failing battery. What steps must I take to have my phone ready for the Apple Store technician? I read somewhere you may need to disable 'Find My Phone'. Is this true?  What other steps should I take? Will the fingerprint reader require my presence?

From the Apple site
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201557
Before you bring in your device
Follow these steps before you take your device to an Apple Store, Apple Authorized Service Provider, or carrier. If your device won't turn on or respond, finish as many steps as possible:

Back up your iOS device.

Have your Apple ID password ready. For some
repairs, you'll need your Apple ID password to erase your device and
turn off Find My iPhone.*

Bring your sales receipt (if possible), in
case your service requires proof of purchase.

Bring your device and any accessories that you need help with.

Bring a form of personal identification, like a driver’s license, passport, or other government-issued ID.

If you haven't already, call to check whether you need an appointment before you go to a service location. For example, schedule a Genius Bar reservation before you go to an Apple Store.

Before you send your device
Follow these steps before you send your device in for repair or replacement. If it won't turn on or respond, finish as many steps as possible:

If you need to send in an iPhone that's paired with an Apple Watch, unpair your devices. When you unpair, your iPhone will create a new backup of your Apple Watch. You can use the backup to restore your Apple Watch when your iPhone returns from service.
Back up your iOS device.
Go to Settings > Messages and turn off iMessage.
Erase your device. Go to Settings > General > Reset > Erase All Content and Settings. If asked, enter your passcode and Apple ID password. If you can't erase your device because it won't power on or isn't responding, you can erase it from iCloud.com. Learn how.
Make sure that Activation Lock is disabled.
Remove any SIM card, case, or screen protector from your device and keep your cable and charger.
Now your device is ready to send. If you arranged a repair request, you should have received instructions for how to mail in your device. If you didn't get instructions or you haven't set up a repair request, contact Apple Support.

You can find additional answers here: https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/battery-power


How can I send an SMS message from my Mac? I want to know how I can send a SMS message (not an iMessage) from my Mac. I don't have great Wi-Fi right now, so I need to send a text message in order for it to go through. I know to send one on an iPhone, one needs to hold down the message bubble, but I don't know how to send one on OS X.

This is called Text Message Forwarding and requires iOS 8.1 or above. Make sure both the OS X Messages App and your iPhone have the same Apple ID enabled. Then, do the following:

On your iPhone, tap Settings > Messages.
Tap Text Message Forwarding.
Enable your Mac in the list of devices.
On your Mac, open Messages.
A six-digit activation code appears.
Enter this code on your iPhone, then tap Allow.

That should just about do it.


View number of items in a folder in Icon view In Downloads folder I see that the number of items present in a folder is displayed under the folder name in Icon view.

But I am unable to view such detail in Desktop, Documents, etc folders. How can I get that info to be always displayed in the Icon view?

I checked Folder actions but I do not find any difference (Finder folder icon showing items count when empty)

This option is called "Show item Info" and is toggled from the View menu rather from Preferences.

Select the finder window you want to apply this view to, even the desktop. And set it to icon view.
Go to the View menu and select "Show view options."
A window opens up (like below) check the Show Item Info checkbox.

Now folder icons will show the number of files in them for that window.


Do users incur any charges for receiving push notifications on iPhones, even if indirectly? I was always under the impression there is no charge associated with using push notifications but this suggests otherwise:

http://mashable.com/2013/07/03/mobile-data-travel/

If a user receives a push notification, especially when in a roaming situation, is there a charge associated with that, even if indirectly as a consequence of the push bumping up the amount of data they have used and thus potentially incurring data overage charges?

Push notifications will mean charges are incurred if you ever pay for data. Clearly, most push notifications are very small transmissions, but they almost always use data connection instead of WiFi so if you had thousands of pushes, it might be the bit of data that exceeds your quota and racks up more cost. Also when roaming, all data might be metered a la carte, so you would in essence pay for each notification you received while roaming.

As outlined in the comment by Matthieu.

Push notifications are data.  If you are "roaming" (ie. outside the country where you have your service contract with your mobile service provider) you will incur charges.

Having said that there are plans which allow for free data roaming globally.  Such as the T-Mobile plans available in the US. This has something to do with the fact that T-Mobile is Deutsche Telecom.  On such a plan there will be no charges.


If I were to use Windows 7 or 8 either via Boot Camp or Virtualisation Software on my Mac would my Magic Trackpad still function? If I were to install Windows 7 or 8 either via Boot Camp or Virtualisation Software on my Mac would my Magic Trackpad still function in the Windows environment or is the ability to use gesture control inherent to Mac OS X ?

There is a table showing the features of the Magic Trackpad supported for Windows 7, Windows Vista and Windows XP on the About Apple Magic Trackpad (and 27-inch LED Cinema Display) Update for Windows on the Apple Support site.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht4273

Windows 8 is not currently supported by BOOTCAMP. Boot Camp 4.0, OS X Lion and Mountain Lion: Frequently asked questions refers:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4818#3.1


Retina Macbook Pro 15'' overheating? I got this RMBP mid 2012. I am now noticing overheating problems when I browse the internet + about 15 tabs of youtube open, mainly music.

I also notice that my battery quickly depletes during this overheating problem, and it's only at 200 cycles. I removed Deep Sleep Mode and Hibernation Mode, not sure if these are related.

I never had such a problem before, but now I can't even keep it on my lap for so long. What is causing this and how can I fix it ?

Specs :

2.6 Ghz Intel Core i7
16GB 1600 MHz DDR3
500GB storage
OSX 10.8.5
GForce 650M

EDIT

I am not just browsing in Safari with 8 tabs only, VLC in the BG but nothing running, iTunes open but nothing playing. I can already feel the heat on my lap. My temps :

Activity Monitor :

In my experience, if you're on a dual-GPU MacBook Pro and running 15 Flash sites, quick battery drainage is almost expected. Even if you installed something like ClickToPlugin, which replaces YouTube's Flash app with QuickTime and is more efficient, the computer should still be fairly warm or borderline hot.

You should use something like gfxCardStatus to verify whether any of the open apps are forcing a switching to the Nvidia GPU. If there is one issue that is often associated with high temperatures and fast battery drainage, this would be it. Try closing the affected app and see if things improve, and then try figuring out a way to avoid the GPU switch (which may entail replacing the app by another one which is better behaved with respect to GPU switching).


How do a create an iPhoto Smart Album of ANY of the names X, Y or Z but only for the year 2013 I'm trying to create a smart album that has "face is" with each member of my family the date range is a given year. In other words I'm trying to create a "yearly" smart album of just my immediate family members. I have used:

Face is Me
Face is Daughter
Face is Wife

with the ANY option selected.

But then when I add the date range line of 1/1/2013 to 12/31/2013 I get all pictures in 2013 and I just want the ones with faces.

Any ideas? In math I'm looking for (x or yor z) AND (date = this year) and I'm getting x or y or z OR date = this year.

It's not possible with iPhoto smart albums because you can't combine a conjunction with a disjunction in the same smart folder.  This would work, in a convoluted way, if iPhoto let you use a smart folder as an input, but unfortunately it doesn't (i.e., Album is MY_SMART_XYZ_ALBUM AND date is 2013).  iTunes can do this, but apparently not iPhoto.  Theoretically, it's possible to create "dumb" albums with smart contents in Automator, though.  It should also be possible to filter a conjunctive set of elements with a subsequent disjunctive criterion.  But I'm not sure how fast this would perform.


Month 13 is out of bounds? Recently my Mac is showing up some weird messages such as "Month 13 is out of bounds".

How do I fix this error I can't go to ant apple authorized repair centre because it is very far away from an Apple centre

This error is logged on iOS 11 and on macOS 10.13 for sure and I'm not seeing it cause any specific function or problem on any platform.

I'll link to the main question here about "does macOS log too much" since that's an opinion and impression that is worthy of discussion. Some people might feel better if there were no messages unless a really serious condition needs action. Others want even more detail so they can know what's happening / learn / measure. So, it's going to be a tradeoff how these are issues / categorized / used.

Fresh macOS install: Console.app displays errors/faults. Is that to be expected?

One interesting developer that has some tools is Howard Oakley who blogs at https://eclecticlight.co/

His downloads page has two apps of interest (use the left downloads link as the product versions below are beta and may not be current in a day or week):

Consolation - an alternative console browser
Woodpile - a tool to count / bin / analyze patterns of logging