I can't import photos in GarageBand Every website or video tutorial about adding artwork to my projects shows that the media browser has tabs/buttons for Audio, Photos, Movies.  My GarageBand has only Audio and Movies.

If I try to drag a photo in, it is just ignored.  I can drag movies or audio files in with no problem, but not photos.

How do I get a photo into my project?

If your media browser in Garage Band is only showing tabs for Audio and Movies, this means the first time you tried to use the Media Browser you didn't give GarageBand permission to access your Photos.

In other words, you would have had a prompt such as:

As you can see from the image above, you can still provide access after initially denying access by:

Going to Apple > System Preferences > Security & Privacy
Select the Privacy tab
Select the Photos app from the list of apps on the left
You should now see something similar to:

Now tick the checkbox next to GarageBand
If GarageBand is running, you'll see a prompt asking you if you want to Quit GarageBand now or later - select Quit Now.

Once you launch GarageBand again you'll see that Photos are now available within your Media Browser.


How to install apps on iPad 4 which require IOS version 11 or higher? Just borrowed an old ipad 4 from a friend and found out that i can't download most of the apps on it because the IOS updates are no longer available for this device. For almost all of the apps, i get an error: The application requires IOS 11.0 or higher during install.

I can't find any iOS updates in the software update and latest version on this device is iOS 10.3.4.

Is there any way to download these apps on my ipad?

Answer is No, you can't do it. However, there are few workarounds and one I did a bit long time was:

You need to have a newer iOS device (if you do not have one, you can borrow one from a friend).
Make sure that you’re signed in to iCloud with the same Apple ID on both devices (if you are borrowing a device from a friend, your friend needs to log out first, your friend may want to make copies of the information that he stored in iCloud).
On your new device, launch the App Store and find the app and download and install it.
Now get the old device that you want to install the app. On your old device, go to App Store and then Purchased. You will see the app there because you just purchased it. İf you do not see it yet, just wait.

And then tap the iCloud icon to download the app.
And the download will start.

Note that these methods may not work for all apps. This only works if the developer of the app had not deleted it from Apple’s App servers. Furthermore, since you are downloading an older version of the app, it is highly likely that not all features of the app may be available.


Recommended power bank capacity for iPhone 4S I would like to know the recommended capacity in a power bank to charge my iPhone 4S on the go.

I've seen power banks with over 4000 mAh of capacity. Wouldn't that damage my iPhone, since I read that the iPhone 4S has a battery of 1430 mAh and the charger is 1000 mAh.

Wouldn't the recommended capacity be around those values?

And one more question, how do we calculate how the iPhone would charge? For example:

I have a friend that has 2 power banks, one of 4400 mAh and other of 2600 mAh. She says that she can charge her iPhone twice to 100% with the 4400 mAh power bank and she can only charge to 80% with the 2600 mAh.

The power bank capacity is just that, capacity. So the bigger the capacity, the more often you can recharge your iPhone before you need to recharge your power bank. Give or take a few mAh getting lost on the way, the number of recharges possible is basically Capacity of power bank divided by Capacity of iPhone.

This also means that there is no recommended capacity per se. Questions you may want to ask yourself before buying one include

do I need to recharge several time a day or is one recharge usually enough?
do I plan to take multi-day cross-country hikes without power outlets on the way
is low weight important for me (more capacity usually means more weight)
do I just want to recharge one device or is the goal to charge e.g. an iPad as well


Use cron to screencapture on Mountain Lion I want to set cron to capture the current desktop every hour:

screencapture -Cd -tjpg ~/Desktop/screen-`date +"%Y%m%d-%H%M"`.jpg

I tired this method but it seems doesn't work on Mountain Lion. I also tried Lingo but with no luck. Any ideas?

cron behaves a bit differently than a standard prompt, which is why it's not doing what you're expecting. There are two issues with the command as is:

Because it doesn't parse the PATH environment variable the same was as the shell, cron doesn't know where screencapture is. You need to specify the full path, /usr/sbin/screencapture.
As noted in the crontab(5) man page, cron treats % as a newline character:

  Percent-signs (%) in the command, unless escaped with backslash (\), will be changed into newline characters, and all data after the first % will be sent to the command as standard input.

So you need to escape each % with a \ to get your desired result.

This crontab entry will give you a screen capture every hour, on the hour:

0 * * * * /usr/sbin/screencapture -Cd -tjpg ~/Desktop/screen-`date +"\%Y\%m\%d-\%H\%M"`.jpg

Cron Error Logging

As an aside, if you're having issues with cron, check your system mail by running the mail command in Terminal. It's not very obvious, but by default cron sends error messages there that can provide a starting point to figuring out what's going wrong.


How do I correct wrong iTunes play counts? The play count in my iTunes library has somehow become incorrect. It shows some songs as never been played while I know that I have played them many times before. These songs do still have a "last played" date though.

Also, some songs are being listed as only played once, while I know they have been played multiple times.

I have an iPhone 4S, with iOS 6.0.1, iTunes 11. My PC is a VAIO running on Windows 7. I have a backup of my iTunes account. I think the problem started after I updated my iTunes account to version 11.

What I need is to get my original play count data back. Can anyone help me with this?

For minor play count screwups, I use a little AppleScript to set the count:

tell application "iTunes"
  activate
  set played count of track named "Vaseline Machine Gun" to 16
  return
end tell

Obviously this can be elaborated to handle more complicated situations involving multiple tracks and playlists.


Setting PHP upload_max_filesize in Mountain Lion I have edited /etc/php.ini and have inserted the following line of code to set the subject variable:

 upload_max_filesize = 20M

However, within a Joomla website on this host, the PHP Information screen says that this variable is set to only 2M.  I have restarted Apache, then I restarted the machine, etc.  Nothing seems to allow me to change this var.  Installing some Joomla extensions requires this limit to be higher.  Any ideas out there?

Have you modified the post_max_size too ?

post_max_size = 20M
upload_max_filesize = 20M

Check "PHP post_max_size overrides upload_max_filesize" here :
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/7754133/php-post-max-size-overrides-upload-max-filesize


How can I change some of the system default preferences used for the guest and new user accounts? I have an shared OSX machine (now running Yosemite) that is used by a large group of people, most of which are not normally Mac users. A couple of the most regulars such as myself that need persistent storage have accounts of our own with things costomized the way we like them. Anybody else sitting down at the machine uses the guest account and everything is nuked when they logout.

This arrangement works pretty well, but the system default settings used for the guest account are less than ideal. For one thing the mouse is absurdly slow and needs speeding up just to stay on the table trying to get across the screen. There are also some language and keyboard settings that frequently get set even for temporary use.

How can I set values in System Preferences in such a way that they will be the base system default and get used for guest logins?
Additionally is it possible to coustomize the default dock contents to make it easier on users unfamiliar with OSX to find the apps they need access to on this system?

First of all you may need to unhide the hiden files so open terminal and run those commands :

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE

killall Finder

To switch back, do the same but substitute FALSE for TRUE.

Now
Login to your guest account, there set chrome as your default browser (or even Firefox)
Then do not logout ! This would erase your session, so use the  on the top right corner use the swich user drop down menue,
Now that you are back again in your Admin account,
Find the new temporary guest home folder, under

 Users/Guest

Select all the folders inside of it,
And copy them in :

 /System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/

English or whatever your languish is if you are using your computer in french this should be :

  /System/Library/User Template/French.lproj/

as you can see in this folder there was the defaults folders for the guest account
By modifying them you have just modified default appearance of the guest user account
You may want to save this folder in a safe place before, in case you want to undo your work.

For reference ,
You just have to follow the steps as shown in this video :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JU-W2-_c5bA

Or if you prefer text version :

http://www.michaelsmac.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=394


Running one more display when MacBook is in clamshell mode I was wondering if anyone has tried running one more screen off their MacBooks by closing the lid of the MacBook. This is a common practice of many Windows laptops that support only 2 screens but have multiple video outputs. Since this is a hardware limitation of the number of video out ports and the number of screens that the video card in the laptop supports I would assume that any these combinations should work, if not in OS X but in Windows under Boot Camp at least.

Retina MacBook Pro: Supports two screens through any combination of HDMI and Thunderbolt/DisplayPort; lid closed: three screens though the same any combination of the video out ports.

MacBook/MacBook Pro 13"/MacBook Air/MacBook Pro 2012 (non-retina): Supports only one external screen with the internal one on, but when lid closed should be able to connect one more Thunderbolt display.

MacBook Pro (Before 2012 edition with Thunderbolt and AMD graphics): Two Thunderbolt screens connected with the lid open; lid closed, three Thunderbolt screens. This possibly may not work because of bandwidth limitation of Thunderbolt, not that the video card can't handle it.

Clarification: The configurations I list are what should happen if my hypothesis is true. I am asking for people to confirm this by using thir own MacBooks since I do not own this hardware to test.

Here is some documentation.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5219?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US#dispnum

Specifically this, noting the footnotes. I've done some editing for readability:

How many Apple Thunderbolt Displays can I use with my Mac in OS X?

The table below indicates how many Thunderbolt displays can be connected to Thunderbolt-capable Mac computers in OS X.

Computer    Maximum number of connected displays
Thunderbolt-capable Macs with only Intel HD Graphics 3000 integrated graphics can support one connected Apple Thunderbolt Display (27-inch):

  MacBook Air (Mid 2011),
  MacBook Pro (13-inch, Early 2011) and (13-inch, Late 2011),
  Mac mini (Mid 2011), 2.3 GHz,
  Mac mini with Lion Server (Mid 2011)

Thunderbolt-capable Macs that can support up to two connected Apple Thunderbolt Displays.

  MacBook Pro (Retina, Mid 2012),
  MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2012),
  MacBook Pro (15-inch and 17-inch, Early 2011) and later,
  MacBook Air (Mid 2012),
  iMac (Mid 2011),
  Mac mini (Mid 2011), 2.5 GHz,

Note: The F8 key does not work when using Windows with a USB keyboard connected to an Apple Thunderbolt Display (27-inch).

1 You can connect a second Apple Thunderbolt Display (27-inch) to a MacBook Pro (13-inch, Early 2011) and (13-inch, Late 2011), but the built-in display on the MacBook Pro will go dark. This is expected behavior.

2 iMac (27-inch, Mid 2011) with two Thunderbolt ports supports a total of two Thunderbolt displays regardless of which Thunderbolt port each display is connected to.

3 Mac mini with AMD graphics can support an HDMI compatible device on its HDMI port when using two Thunderbolt displays.

4 MacBook Pro (Retina, Mid 2012) can support an HDMI-compatible device on its HDMI port while also using two Thunderbolt displays.

And here's an OWC article with an image showing a MacBook Pro with Retina that has three attached displays plus the built-in.

http://blog.macsales.com/14241-macbook-pro-15-with-retina-display-can-run-3-external-displays


Why do I get "A program tried to load new system extension(s) signed by 'Benjamin Fleischer'"? When I try to mount a disk using sshfs on my Mac High Sierra v10.13 I get the pop-up message:

System Extension Blocked
A program tried to load new system extension(s) signed by “Benjamin Fleischer”.  If you want to enable these extensions, open Security & Privacy System Preferences.

Why do I have to enable an extension? Is this new in High Sierra?

This seems to be a known issue with FUSE for OS X (and I guess sshfs uses that). Take a look here: https://github.com/osxfuse/osxfuse/issues/437

It is not a security issue per se, but just the system informing you that an app tried to load a system extension and that this extension was blocked (due to your system's settings). The question rather should be: Do you trust the people who wrote sshfs and FUSE enough (Benjamin Fleischer) to let their extension run on your system? If the answer is yes, then you can open open System Preferences -> Security & Privacy -> General and allow Benjamin Fleischer


How do I merge System partition with another HFS+ partition without data loss? My hard drive is split in three visible partitions: System, Data and Backup.
I'd like to merge System (OS X Lion) and Data into one partition without data loss.
Disk Utility won't let me resize the system partition:

That's my complete setup:

Apparently, I can't use mergePartitions because diskutil man says:

mergePartitions [force] format name fromDevice toDevice
Merge two or more partitions on a disk.
All data on merged partitions other than the first will be lost.

I can imagine decreasing Data size, creating a New partition, moving all files from Data to New and proceeding with mergePartitions, thus merging System and Data into System+Data. Then I probably can move stuff from New to the merged System+Data partition and merge them all.
However I'm unsure what will happen to Recovery HD that stands between System and Data. Will it get erased? If so, how can I restore it?

There is absolutely no way that you should even think about doing any of this without a complete backup on a separate disk. Verify the backup before beginning.

1) If you have a complete backup, the easiest way to do this would be to wipe everything, make the partitions you want, and then copy the information back from your backup. If your Recovery HD is deleted, there is no way to re-create it without reinstalling the OS. (At least none that I could find when I was searching recently.)

2) Assuming you have a backup OTHER than that Backup partition, if you want to attempt to merge these, I would try it in this order:

a. Delete the 'Backup' partition.

b. Merge 'Data' partition and former 'Backup' partition.

c. Merge System partition and other partition.

d. Re-create the 'Backup' partition and restore it from whatever backup you have.

I have done several live-system partition resizings with no problems. However, the one time that there was a problem, I had to reformat the entire drive and start over.


Can I install Windows (and if so, which one) on my Power Mac G5 tower Can I install Windows (and if so, which one) on my Power Mac G5 tower? I know the maximum Mac OSX that can be installed is Leopard as I think, so it would be better to run some windows on it. Do you know which one can I install, and what is the maximum version of Windows for it? Thanks guys!

Virtual PC was a software emulator for creating & running Windows virtual machines on Mac systems using the PPC architecture. If you can find it, it'll do what you want albeit at a glacial level of response.


What is this menu bar icon with three right chevrons? Recently a piece of software started showing up in my menubar.  I don't remember installing it, I have no idea what it is. The icon is three chevrons and the menu contains three items named: "Software Portal", "Vulnerability Scan" and "Inventory Scan".

Any ideas what the >>> menubar icon is for?

If it is opened on login, check login items, {~,}/Library/Launch{Daemons,Agents}/, or /var/db/launchd.db/com.apple.launchd.peruser.501/overrides.plist.

You could also try running sudo opensnoop and clicking one of the menu items.

Or search for the names of the menu items:

grep -r 'Inventory Scan' -onlyin /Applications/
mdfind '"Inventory Scan"' -onlyin /Applications/


Aborted localhost http requests -- how to troubleshoot? I've got a webserver running on localhost (not the one built into OSX -- a different, proprietary webserver).  I do most of my web app dev there, refreshing the browser to reload, etc.  This has worked flawlessly for years.  Lately though I've been having a bizarre problem.

Some of the resources (different ones each time) simply aren't loading -- they show status Aborted in Firebug.

When I enable the deepest level of debugs on the webserver, I can verify that the webserver never sees the requests at all.  The webserver does not see these requests, as if they never happened.

The only way I've found to resolve this is to restart my macbook.  Other things I've tried unsuccessfully:

changing IP and Port - doesn't help
restarting loopback interface (sudo ifconfig lo0 down; sudo ifconfig lo0 up) - doesn't help
Have disabled all plugins/extensions in FF & Chrome - doesn't help

How can I get to the bottom of this?  What kinds of issues may be at the root of it?

Here is some more info that may help:

OSX 10.7.5
Webserver is Webcluster 5.2 (a java based HTTP server my company developed -- you haven't heard of it ;)
The webserver is restarted often through the day -- meaning the IP+port is dropped and then reattached frequently
Happens both when wifi and when cabled
Happens both on our VPN and off it
Seeing this in Firefox 20.0, Chrome 26.0.1410.65, and Safari 6.0.4.

This application was frequently (20+ times a day) un binding and binding the ip+port.  Once I refactored this to stop doing that, it no longer has had problems.


Unable to access Mac OS X Lion server on web I have the Mac OS X Lion server and am able to view on my iMac, however when I go on a different computer i am unable to see it.
website: wiki.piezosystems.org

If you only want to be able to access the website on your internal network, you can add the IP address of your server to the list of DNS servers:


Why does iTunes fail to sync my iPhone? For the past month or so, I've been unable to backup my iPhone using iTunes.
Every time I try, I'm told that the phone is "disconnected":

What could be causing this?
I've tried different USB cables and different USB ports, but the result is always the same.

I'm using OS X 10.10.3, iTunes 12.1.2.27, and iOS 8.3.
The procedure I'm using is the obvious one: launch iTunes; connect the iPhone; choose the iPhone in iTunes; press "Sync".

If you've tried all physical options, removing hubs, changing cables, ports etc, then the remaining likelihood is that the existing backup is corrupt.

Simplest method would be to find your backups folder & rename/delete the corrupt one, then test again…

Disconnect phone, quit iTunes
Switch to Finder
 Cmd ⌘   N  for new window
 Cmd ⌘   Shift ⇧   G  for Go To…
Copy/paste ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/ & hit  Enter ⌅  or  Return⏎
Change the name of the folder with the long, complex number - just add .bak or something to the end of it. (If there are multiple folders, see the note at the end)
In iTunes, try a new Backup, then Sync.
If successful, you can delete the old .bak folder

If you have multiple backup folders…

If you only ever backup one iDevice to iTunes, rename all the folders the same way, add .bak etc
If you backup multiple iDevices, you can find which is the correct folder by matching the device identifier with the backup folder name by clicking on the Serial Number field in iTunes (which will switch it to your device identifier.)


bootcamp with windows 7 64bit? I have the new (2011) 27" iMac and need to run visual studio and some other .NET software development related software. What version of Windows 7 (home premium OEM - because it is the cheapest?) should I buy? 64bit or 32bit?

Check these:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1846
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4410
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1461


Mount network share (AFP/SMB) for multiple users (fast user switching) i'm having the following problem with my network shares from my NAS (Synology 415+ if it matters) in Yosemite.

At home, we have an iMac with two different users. I moved all of our media (music & photos) to the NAS, so that both users could use the data with the according apps.
I thought, that it would be easy to mount the network shares for both users, but actually it isn't - or i'm doing something wrong.

I'm using a simple Applescript in the following form

tell application "Finder"
    activate
    mount volume "smb://ipaddress/sharename/"
end tell

that is started automatically when my user logs into the system.

That works fine for me. But when my partner switches to her user account, the mounts aren't accessible for her. Moreover, when she starts the same script as i do, the paths are getting messed up:

If two users mount the network shares, two different folders exist on the system: /Volumes/music for the first user and /Volumes/music-1 for the second user, which messes up all file paths (especially in iTunes, but also in Lightroom or other apps).

Is there ANY way to mount a network share for both users? I really don't care if i use AFP or SMB, i just want a network share which is usable for multiple users. Seems like a common scenario for me.

Setup your NAS to export a NFS-share. Refer to the Synology knowledgebase how to do this or use the following how-to to set it up, fine tune and secure your set-up.

You may do it manually in the command line also:
Let's assume your media folder is /Shares/Media. Create or edit a file named exports in /etc. The example below restricts the access to computers with an IP address in the range 192.168.0.1 - 192.168.0.254. You may have to restart your NAS or at least nfsd (nfs-daemon).

Linux/NAS file /etc/exports:

/Shares/Media 192.168.0.0/255.255.255.0(rw)

if you use a Mac Server use this line:

/Shares/Media -network 192.168.0.0 -mask 255.255.255.0

Edit /etc/auto_master on your Mac and add the line:

/-                                  auto_media

file /etc/auto_master:

#
# Automounter master map
#
+auto_master                        # Use directory service
/-                                  auto_media
/net                                -hosts      -nobrowse,hidefromfinder,nosuid
/home                               auto_home   -nobrowse,hidefromfinder
/Network/Servers                    -fstab
/-                                  -static

and create a new file auto_media in /etc on your Mac

file /etc/auto_media:

/Media         IP-NAS:/Shares/Media

Please don't forget: all files mentioned above need a trailing empty line
enter sudo automount -vc in Terminal on your Mac with the output:

$ sudo automount -vc
automount: /Media updated
automount: /net updated
automount: /home updated
automount: no unmounts

/Media will now always be visible in the root folder of your Mac and accessible for both of you as long as the NAS is up & running. No Apple Script to mount it nor a Connect to Server needed.

(Set up and tested on a Server 10.7 (no Synology NAS, because i don't own one, but it shouldn't make a difference) and Client 10.9)


If I have AT&T, will the iPhone 4S work in areas of CDMA coverage only? The new iPhone 4S has 2 antennas: both GSM and CDMA. Is there a chance that if I, who am an AT&T customer, buy one of these, that I would be able to use it in areas that are CDMA only? AT&T is GSM only. I have two locations out of town that I frequently visit that have ZERO GSM / AT&T coverage, but get full coverage to Verizon and US Cellular, both CDMA networks.

No. CDMA will only work of you buy and activate your 4S device onto a CDMA carrier.

The FAQ shows that when you activate the phone it will choose one technology for coverage in country. GSM Registered phones will roam on GSM as will CDMA phones. Sprint should work in 35 unnamed countries and Verizon in 40 at launch.


Have two Macbook Pros, can't update iMovie on either I have an old MacBook Pro running iMovie 9.0, and a newer Macbook Pro with version 10.1.1. I am trying to get them to match.

When I try to update the old one to use it for my movies by going to the App Store, there is no update listed in current updates.  When I select iMovie as if I'm going to buy it it says "update" in the box, but the asterisk-like wheel just circles forever. I have tried trashing the application, signing out and back in as suggested, but nothing changes.

Mac Apps have limitations as to which operating systems they can be installed on. You mentioned a newer MacBook Pro on 10.1.1 (did you mean 10.11? If not, keep reading). You need to first update your operating system, and then update iMovie. If you are unable to update the computer because it is too old and the new OS doesn't support it, you can get your copy of iMovie from Purchases in the Mac App Store, but it might not be updated. Note that downloading from Purchases is not an update, but rather a replacement to the existing copy that shipped with your computer.

This question has been asked here, so read there too: Why can't I update iMovie?


Is there any way to set Gmail app as the default mail client in iPhone and iPad? I want to be able to one-click email links from apps such as Twitter, Safari and Instapaper. Is this possible if I'm using Gmail and not Apple's Mail app?

Do I have to set Gmail as the default mail client? Is this possible?

To give a very short answer: No, this is not possible.


Mac Mini Display Size I have a new Mac Mini connected to my HDTV with an HDMI cable and the desktop is larger than my screen so I can't see the menu bar at the top.  How do I adjust this?

Go into System Preferences - Display - adjust the Underscan scale.


How can I manually delete old backups to free space for Time Machine? I use a Time Capsule for backup and now I want the drive to back up data from an extra Mac. But the drive is filled up with old backups from Mac 1. There simply is not enough space available for the backup for Mac 2.

I get this error message when running Time Machine backup:

  Time Machine could not complete the backup.
  This backup is too large for the backup disk. The backup requires
  28.68 GB but only 626.2 MB are available.

  Time Machine needs work space on the backup disk, in addition to the
  space required to store backups. Open Time Machine preferences to
  select a larger backup disk or make the backup smaller by excluding
  files.

I know Time Machine itself is able to remove old backups when it needs more space. But in this case it does not remove any Mac 1 backups to make space for Mac 2.

Question is, how do I do it manually?

Be careful with sudo and making sure you pick the correct Mac's files since there is no undo or confirmation of the following command:

sudo tmutil delete /Volumes/drive_name/Backups.backupdb/old_mac_name

The sudo command needs your password (and it won't echo to the screen, so just type it and pause to be sure you're dating the correct files before pressing enter). If you want to be safer, you can pick one snapshot to delete first to be sure the command works as intended. This is nice since it could take hours to clean up some larger backup sets and you want to leave the Mac confident it's deleting the correct information store.

You can use the tmutil tool to delete backups one by one.

sudo tmutil delete /Volumes/drive_name/Backups.backupdb/mac_name/YYYY-MM-DD-hhmmss

Since tmutil was introduced with Lion, this will not work on earlier OS versions.

If you want to get the current directory of backups (there can be multiple destinations defined and only one will be "current")

sudo tmutil machinedirectory


iPod 5th gen not showing in iTunes after error-check I have a mate's 5th generation iPod 30gb from 2005. It kept popping up saying "check for errors" on my Windows 7 so I finally ran the check. I then loaded it up in iTunes, but it froze and I shut it down. Now it's not showing up in iTunes at all! It shows up in Windows but not iTunes, any ideas? I've got all the most up to date software. Did all the error checks, service checks, emptied temp folder etc and still no luck.

I found the following answer and it has worked!

  http://forums.ilounge.com/windows-ipod-discussion-problems/160623-ipod-not-being-detected-itunes-updater.html#post920916

In brief, the solution is to:

Disconnect the iPod.
Uninstall iTunes and iPod Updater and reboot.
Hold down the Center and Menu buttons until the Apple logo appears on the screen (i.e., force a reboot).
Connect the iPod.
When the iPod appears in Disk Management (My Computer > Manage > Disk Management in Windows XP), format it as FAT32. Do not use Quick Format.
Install iPod Updater (not iTunes) and restore the iPod.
Reinstall iTunes and refresh iPod contents as desired.


Need to replace iPhone screen. Are aftermarket parts OK? I have an iPhone 4 or 4s (not sure which) with a cracked screen that a friend of mine asked me to replace.  I see online that you can pick that part up for $20-$30, but they are all "aftermarket" (i.e. non-Apple) parts.

I've never replaced the screen on an iPhone before, but non-Apple parts in other areas (like laptop power adapters) have always given me cause for concern.

Are aftermarket knock-off parts OK?  Do they work as well as Apple OEM parts?  What is the quality like?

Be willing to spend about $40 for the more expensive ones, because in the end, they'll be worth it. The parts work well, but the ribbon cables are ridiculously easy to rip and tear, so be extremely careful.

The cheaper ones usually have thinner glass, thus cracking easily. Also, make sure you specify either CDMA or GSM when searching for parts as the CDMA parts are different from the GSM ones, and they're not inter-compatible.


Is there any way to disable OR password protect my iPhone to prevent someone from turning it off? If my phone is stolen, I would think the first thing a thief would do is turn it off.  Is there any way to disable or password protect this via settings (which I doubt) OR a cydia tweak?

If you've jailbroken your phone, try either iGotYa or iCaughtYou Pro. They offer the best protection against theft without using a commercial MDM system, in my opinion.

PowerGuard will provide the power feature you want, but it won't protect the phone from being placed in DFU mode. Still, a combination of both PowerGuard and one of the above apps is better than nothing.

This won't prevent powering it off, but, if you've upgraded to iOS7:

  With Find My iPhone turned on in iOS 7, your Apple ID and password will be always be required before anyone can:

  Turn off Find My iPhone on your device.
  Erase your device.
  Reactivate and use your device.

  There is nothing you need to do except to keep Find My iPhone turned on and remember
  your Apple ID and password.

From a device security perspective, I think this would accomplish the same thing by rendering your device useless to anyone who steals or finds it.


Mac Password dialog box font missing / corrupt Since changing my Mac's font from the default on Yosemite to San Francisco (the font on the Apple Watch for those who don't know) my Mac's password dialog box has always appeared like this. It still works once I type my password in, but it's slightly annoying.

Would anyone have any suggestion on how to fix this? Cheers!

Mac OS 10.10.3.

I have the same issue. Did some Google searching and tried to clean the cache in the font database through terminal: "sudo atsutil databases -remove; atsutil server -shutdown"

This did not work, so the other option would be to remove San Francisco for now from your user folder. Haven't tried that yet.


21.5" iMac Mid 2010 Won't Boot from USB to Install High Sierra I tried clean installing High Sierra in by making bootable USB. I did the following:

PRAM Reset
Pressed Option Key at the Startup
Choose USB with Install High Sierra from the Drives
The Apple logo screen appears and stays endlessly

I thought the USB might be corrupt so used different USB with light indicator and made bootable version of the High Sierra but same thing happens and after selecting install High Sierra the screen with Apple logo appears endlessly. The USB only lits up during the drive selection time and momentarily after Apple logo appears and then the light of the USB stays off indicating the iMac is not reading the USB.

Is this related to bad motherboard?

Log info as suggested by @At0mic & @Allan

Is this related to bad motherboard?

Basically, yes.

You’ve got some good diagnostic information from attempting to boot from a USB installer.  If both your internal drive and the new USB installer have the exact same symptoms, the problem is with your computer itself.

Now, this particular vintage iMac had a removable GPU “card” and chances are (based on my professional experience), this is likely the case; these would often fail.  To get further confirmation, having a look at the boot messages (Verbose Mode - hold Command V while booting) will help determine this.  Also, booting to the diagnostic disk that came with your Mac would allow you to run the graphics tests.

Can you replace it?

Absolutely.  Unlike 2012 and newer iMac computers that have the display assembly glued in place, the 2009-2011 models used magnets and Torx screws to hold it in place.  User servicing is definitely doable here.  IFixit.com has excellent repair instructions.

However, these are quite “expensive” and very rare as the 27” iMac was much more popular.  A cursory search on eBay found only one at over $100USD at the time of this writing. Is it worth fixing?  IMO, no.  It’s obsolete and no matter how much effort you put into it, it will only become more difficult to maintain.  However, if you’re into “retro computing,” this may be something you don’t want to give up on just yet.

Now, it could still be your logic board, but I think it’s unlikely (the probability isn’t zero).  The nice thing with eBay now, is that you get 30 days to return even on used products.  So, your risk is very low if it turns out not to be the GPU.


Make pixel size numbers in Preview show larger when editing photos? I occasionally have trouble seeing the small pixel-size values that Preview.app displays while editing photos. For images that are close to 640 pixels, I like to keep them just under 640 so they display full size in Stack Exchange, like the image below does in this question.

Is there any way I can ask Preview to just make those numbers a bit larger? Permanently is fine, or a hot key. I'd like to avoid solutions that just zoom the whole screen.

It's not possible to customize the size of the said on-screen numbers shown by Preview.app.

As a workaround and a more generalized solution for other such cases, you can leverage the Screen Zoom feature available in macOS. Although it's an accessibility feature, it is generally employed by UI designers to create pixel perfect UI.

To enable and configure Screen zoom, go to System Preferences app → Accessibility → Zoom, and enable the checkmark for Use scroll gesture with modifier keys to zoom. Now assign a convenient key to be used as modifier key (I use Control).

Once configured, you can press and hold the modifier key and scroll to quickly zoom in and out of your screen.


Accessing fine-grained volume control using external keyboard volume wheel In macOS, the Volume keys change the volume in full steps, but it is possible make fine-grained changes using Option-Shift-Volume{Up,Down}.
I have an external keyboard connected which provides a volume wheel. Moving this wheel modifies the volume very quickly, in full steps. Pressing Option-Shift while moving the wheel is the perfect precision for me.
Is it possible to configure macOS (or the external keyboard) so the internal keyboard behavior isn't affected but the VolumeUp/VolumeDown keys from the external keyboard act in small steps, without pressing Option-Shift?
Otherwise, is it possible to modify the entire behavior so volume control always acts in small steps? (regardless of whether it's the internal or external keyboard)

You should be able to use Karabiner-Elements to do this. It allows you to customize keyboard actions on a per-device basis. You could set it up to replace Volume Up / Volume Down with Option + Volume Up / Option + Volume Down.


macOS Catalina blueoothd high CPU IOBluetoothBroadcomSchedulerWorkaround issue I've already spent many hours with this and I wasn't able to come up with a solution. Since 10.14.x (I don't remember exactly, currently on 10.15.2) I am have been having this issue (and console flooded with the following message and bluetoothd causes CPU usage of 40-120 %, too) :

bluetoothd     EVENT:  ModeChange
bluetoothd  == IOBluetoothBroadcomSchedulerWorkaround start
bluetoothd  USBProductID 0x7B   USBVendorID 0x5AC
bluetoothd  schedularWorkaroundActive? 0
bluetoothd  active? 0
bluetoothd  == IOBluetoothBroadcomSchedulerWorkaround end
bluetoothd     EVENT:  ModeChange
bluetoothd  Apple HID device count: 0
bluetoothd  updateAppleHIDConnectionIntervals - connectedAppleDevices 0
bluetoothd  updateAppleHIDConnectionIntervals - twoSniffAttemptDeviceCount 0
bluetoothd  updateAppleHIDConnectionIntervals - connectedSCODeviceCount 0
bluetoothd  Dont enable MSS for this device Microsoft Sculpt Comfort Mouse
bluetoothd  == IOBluetoothBroadcomSchedulerWorkaround end

Happens with a Microsoft Sculpt Comfort Mouse and two different (Logitech) mouses, too. Any ideas what I could try? I've already tried deleting plists, NVRAM, reseting SMC, booting into Safe Mode, reseting BT setting in macOS… Thanks!

More details: Machine specs are: MBP 13" 2018 (2.3/16/512).
Apart from this, bluetooth connection drops randomly and the issue occurs both with Wi-Fi on and off and the USB-C dock connnected and disconnected.

I've found a workaround: I've figured out MSS probably means Master-Slave-Switch. That didn't suffice to fix the issue. But disabling sniff mode resolves the issue. It seems that some energy management code doesn't work properly.
The cause of the issue traced down: Apple has a bug within BT3.0 Stack. This issue is not happening with anything BT4.0+.


How do I jailbreak my iPhone 4? I'm looking to go rogue. Where do I jailbreak my iPhone 4.

Open up Safari on your iPhone 4 and go to jailbreakme.com.
Sit tight for couple minutes and your iPhone is jailbroken. You'll see that Cydia app is installed.

It uses PDF security flaw on mobile Safari. It will be patched soon, so jailbreak now while it's available. It's by far the easiest way to jailbreak your iPhone.

It jailbreaks iOS 4.0.1 which is the latest at the moment.

Edit (8/11/2010): Apple has just releases iOS 4.0.2 to fix the PDF exploit that jailbreakme.com uses. Jailbreakme.com should still work for iOS 4.0.1 and below.

Edit (8/13/2010): PDF Patch is available for download in Cydia. Search for "PDF Patch." You can jailbreak 4.0.1 and then just patch PDF bug instead of upgrading to 4.0.2 and wait for jailbreak to be available.


Delete My Gmail Account In My iPad I wanna give away my old iPad to my kid, and would like to delete my Gmail account from the old iPad.

Questions:

1) Will my Gmail account be totally erased when I delete my Gmail account on my iPad?

2) I have thousands and thousand of contacts in my iPad which is linked to Gmail, I'm afraid if I delete the Gmail account, all contact details will be gone forever.

Thanks and looking forward to your favorable reply.

Just remove the Gmail account from the iPad by going to Settings -> Mail, Contacts, Calendars -> Select your Gmail account -> Tap the Delete Account button.

The account will no longer be available on that iPad, but no contacts or email will be deleted from the account at Google, just from the iPad. DO NOT delete the emails and contacts themselves manually, they will be removed from the iPad when you remove the account from it.

Depending on the age of your kid and how much you want to keep him/her from getting access to your emails and contacts, it might also be enough to just disable Mail, Contacts, Calendars and/or Notes from the Gmail account screen instead of removing the entire account. If you do this, just enabling them again will put the email and contacts back on the device.


Why can't I restore apps to iPhone 5 from 4s? I recently upgraded from an iPhone 4s to iPhone 5. How do I transfer all my apps to the new iPhone 5? I have tried two times without success:

First attempt:

From iTunes, make "a full backup" of the 4s on "this computer."
From iTunes, restore the backup to the iPhone 5

This transferred all my contacts, call history, messages, and photos but all my 3rd party apps were missing. (Also messages I had received on the iPhone 5 before restoring were over-written... any way to prevent this?) The size of the resulting backup files was only 10GB; about the amount of photos and videos on my 4s. Note: I can view the list of my purchased 3rd party apps from the app store and download/install them one at a time. When I re-install the apps, they retain all their old data and even old icon locations.

Second attempt:

From iTunes, click 'Automatically sync new apps'
Again, make "a full backup" of the 4s on "this computer," (this time using the "Encrypt iPhone backup" in hopes my passwords would also be retained.)
Again, restore the backup to the iPhone 5

This time, the backup size was about 20GB. However, still no 3rd party apps were transferred except a few apps I had re-installed since the last restore.

When I view my apps on the 4s from iTunes (version 11.0.1.12) I see one significant difference from most on-line instructions. Although 99 apps are visible on the right, I am unable to select any of them because they are not listed on the left:

If it makes any differnce, my iPhones 4s still has iOS version 5.1.1 while the iPhone 5 has iOS version 6.

Also, at the end of the restore, the iPhone 5 seems to reboot automatically. However, after waiting for a long time, nothing happened so I restarted the phone manually.

So how do I make a truly full backup of my iPhone 4s and fully restore it on my iPhone 5?

I had the same issue (I use iTunes on Windows 7). I Bought a new iPhone 5 and used the Backup / Restore method to move my stuff from the old iPhone 4S to the new one. The process only restored all the Apple apps, plus Contacts, Phone Calls, and Messages. When I tried to backup again - hoping it would restore the rest - it went through a restore process in iTunes (for about 5 minutes) and then I got the message that my iPhone will restart but never did (I had to restart it manually).

What I also noticed was that, when I retried, the Backup seemed to be very quick.

I called Apple Support who said that there is a problem with the Backup process. I would be able to restore my Apps via the Purchased Apps process but I would lose all my user data (such as games progress). I was extremely frustrated because I use my iPhone and iPad as tools, not game devices.

I went to the App Store on the iPhone and started downloading some of the Purchased apps from the what seemed to be the iCloud. To my surprise, all app data was there (eg. WhatsApp chats, and The Vault data). I am not sure how this works because I never deliberatelly setup app backup on the cloud, but I suspect that the "Documents and Data" == "On" setting on Settings --> iCloud does exactly that, and in return does not include this information on the PC backup.

All seems fine now (at least for the apps for which I care and tried). The issue I still have is this uncertainty on what exactly is my iPhone doing and where is my stuff at any point in time.


Preview: Opening more than 12 pdf files in new windows I've noticed that whenever I have 12 or more pdf files open at one time (each in a separate window) and attempt to open an additional pdf, this additional pdf opens in the same window as the pdf on top. In other words, it's as if the "Open each file in its own window" is disabled once I reach 12 open pdfs.

I can then transfer the newly-opened pdf to a new window by right-clicking on the pdf's thumbnail and selecting "Open in New Window" but I don't want to have to do that every time I want to open an additional file. Does anyone know how I can make this happen?

Again, I already have the "Open each file in its own window" option enabled (and it works when I have less 12 pdfs already opened).

Lastly, assuming this is deliberate on Apple's part (i.e. not some sort of bug), is there a reason why I should be wary of opening up more than 12 pdfs in separate windows? And what other options are there for opening up pdfs in OS X other than via Preview? (I'm sure there are plenty of third-party apps available but I'm particularly interested in built-in alternatives).

Thanks.

[Note: A similar issue was mentioned here:
Difficulties opening PDFs in Preview but the solution offered doesn't apply.]

OS X - Macbook Pro;
Version 10.9.3

[EDIT: This behavior has occurred periodically for a while now (months)--it seems to occur after I've opened files in Preview that have been saved as PDFs via the "Save as PDF" option from the "Print" window.]

You can use the mastodont Adobe Reader.

In fact, this app from Adobe, formerly named Acrobat, was the app provided in Macs, before Preview existed.


banner - horizontal text On my Linux box, if I do banner message I get a horizontal banner saying "banner".

However, on my Mac I get a vertical banner. How do you revert this to horizontal?

The default banner on macOS does not have any option to change orientation.

However, figlet is available in Homebrew:

  brew install figlet


How do I add multiple pictures from Photos to iCloud Drive? In Photos on iOS 10.3.3, when I select one picture and open the share sheet, there’s an option to “Add to iCloud Drive”. But when I select multiple pictures, the share sheet doesn’t offer that option. Adding multiple pictures to iCloud Drive one by one gets rather tedious. Is there some way I can add multiple pictures at once? Perhaps by using another app?

At present there is no easy way to do this, namely because Apple sees iCloud Photo Library and, depending on what you're trying to achieve, iCloud Photo Sharing as its iCloud solution regarding photos.

However, it is highly likely that with iOS 11 and the change to the new Files app, that you'll be able to do what you want, as Files will work more like traditional (if that's the right word) cloud storage. More details will be revealed at Apple press event on 12 September 2017, so you haven't got long to wait.

Workaround

There is a bit of a messy workaround if you can't wait for iOS 11 or if your device isn't going to be compatible with iOS 11. This involves installing Apple's Workflow app and using it to Zip (i.e. 'make archive') of multiple photos and then move the zipped file into iCloud Drive.


Metadata to ensure audio CD has tracks in the correct order when burned from iTunes I have a public domain audiobook from librivox.org which I want to put on CD for a blind friend.  I want to add a table of contents to the beginning of each CD.  The total length will take six CDs without a lot to spare, so I am planning on seven after I add the TOC files.

The files already have track numbers matching the 27 chapter numbers, i.e., 1 0f 27, 2 of 27, …, 27 of 27.  Since I only have ten blank CDs, and they are CD-R (write only once), I am reluctant to answer this by experimenting.

Do I need to renumber all the files, including my additions, so that each CD starts with track 1 of N?  Or can I make my additions track 0 of 27, disk X of 7 and still have the addition be the first track on its CD?

Or to put it another way, if the metadata for disk two is 0/27, 5/27, 6/27, etc. will the CD be in that order?  Or scrambled, or even just create an error message?

When I imported an unrelated two-disc album, the CDDB made it two separate albums, so I can't judge by that.

Would it work better to take them out of iTunes and burn the CDs some other way?

The track numbers in iTunes are mainly for human consumption. The computer will burn them in ascending order and once they're on the CD they'll be numbered starting from 1.

So, basically, I think you can proceed and everything will work as you want it to.

Thoughts:

you might be able to burn to a virtual CD to test?
look into .cue files
use Tag Editor or A Better Finder Renamer to work with audio file metadata


iMac (mid 2010, 27") minimum ram slots required to fill Can I use only two 8 GB RAM modules with my mid 2010 27" iMac (2.8 GHz Core I5)? In other words, do you have to fill all 4 memory slots or are 2 filled slots sufficient?

Short answer to your question is YES.

But why would you limit the memory given the price of modules today?

According to Everymac.com, your "official" max is 16GB, however you can go all the way up to 32GB.  I personally used Crucial memory modules in my iMac and MacBook Pro with no problems

I would go with 2 16GB kits (a "kit" being 2 8GB modules) for a total of 32 GB RAM (a total of 4 8GB RAM modules).


Looking to ease workflow between RSS reader and Google Plus on iPad I'm a Google user, have been for years.  I've got a well established set of feeds in my Google Reader account.  I am also a Google Plus user.

I would like to have an easy workflow to go from reading things in Google Reader on the iPad to sharing them on Google Plus.  I don't see that happening with the Google Mobile interfaces presented on the iPad, so I come to you, the apple community, to ask if you've got a workflow figured out.

I am willing to entertain an alternate RSS reader than Google Reader.

I would like to view my RSS feeds on the iPad, and when I see something interesting, share it to Google Plus circles.  Any thoughts?

Thanks!

I suggest you try out a native app (such as Reeder) with support for sharing through various services and which will eventually get support for Google+. Until then, perhaps a bookmarklet for Safari will do? See here.


Remote login option not saving after reboot I have two Mac minis which both lose the remote login option after a reboot, and I don't know why. After I check that box, it saves, at least during that session. But after a reboot, I always find the box unchecked:

macOS versions:

macOS 10.12.3
OS X 10.10.5

I have found a workaround that can force Remote Login to be turned on, when the computer is powered up. This can be a good choice for someone who is working in a workgroup with several machines.

I have installed LaunchControl, and went in Global Daemons, then created a new plist named as com.remotelogin.true (you can choose the name you want) there with:

NOTE:

After you choose Save and Load, it will give you an error, but if you go to terminal with,

sudo systemsetup -getremotelogin

you will see that remote login is now on.


How do I uninstall iCloud extras on a Windows machine? I recently bought a Mac for some iOS development, which of course requires an Apple ID and gives you iCloud. I wanted to move some files from my Windows machine to iCloud and saw that there is a Windows iCloud app so I installed.

Unlike Google Drive, DropBox, Box, or OneDrive, iCloud installed a bunch of other applications that duplicate functionality I already have, namely Calendar, Contacts, Find My iPhone, iCloudPhotos, Keynote, Mail, Notes, Numbers, Pages, and Reminders.

All I wanted was the cloud drive! How do I remove all this unwanted bloat?

iCloud doesn't install other applications, it just provides the ability to set up sync services with your existing applications and those iCloud services. In iCloud Control Panel, turn off those services using the checkboxes to not use those services in applications.


Is T-mobile iPhone 6 unlocked I bought an iPhone 6 T-mobile from Apple store. I tried my SIM from Sweden and it worked. However tried with another SIM from Ghana but it didn't work, showing "no service".

Does that mean the phone is locked or something else is wrong?

The "no service" can have other reasons than the SIM card and iPhone lock.

Since it worked in Sweden (with non T-Mobile SIM) then the iPhone is unlocked.

Try another provider or better try a prepay SIM to see if that works in Ghana.


Stop multiple alerts for incoming message etc. on iPhone My iPhone with iOS 10 keeps beeping every several minutes to remind me of an incoming message (and other events) until I unlock the device with passcode or fingerprint.

Is there some way to stop the repeated alerts? I want only one alert per event.

Settings → Notifications → Messages → Repeat Alerts and set it to Never.

For what it's worth, the default setting of repeat once means that an unread message notification will alert twice unless a subsequent message arrives or you read the message, the latter of which can be from the lock screen. This only applies to messages, not other alerts/events, and only once more than the normal notification, not continuously.

An important distinction from what you said about unlocking — you don't need to unlock, you just need to interact, so any of these will disable the second alert:

being the one to turn the phone on with the sleep/wake button
sleeping the phone after a notification with the sleep/wake button rather than letting the device time out
3D Touch on a notification
dismiss the notification


Cannot boot into Recovery What I've done

Disable T2 Security Boot
In Catalina
Add a APFS Volume mac2
Install Mojave on Volume mac2 from an external drive
(Install security update, copy files and etc.)
Remove Macintosh HD and its Data volume in Mojave

Then when I tried to boot into Recovery, it turns into Internet Recovery (and failed with code -1008F).

Is there a known way to make Recovery work (or reinstall only Recovery), before I try to install Mojave again in-place?

Some info:

~ $ diskutil mount Recovery
Volume Recovery on Recovery mounted

~ $ ls /Volumes/Recovery/
C755CEE7-<rest of the UUID>

where C755CEE7... is the volume UUID of Volume mac2.

Ran into the same issue, but when I bought the mac at the apple seems it was hardcoded to stay with Catalina and not downgrade to Mojave.


How to change the image of external background when connected to projector? OS X El capitan
version 10.11.6
Macbook pro 13-inch

Whenever I connect to projector, the projected screen has a old picture of me and it is quite embarrassing when I am presenting in front of professional crowd. I already removed that picture from the Desktop pictures folder but every time I connect projector, it still shows the same.
This is not happening when I connect to external display (monitor) though.How can i change this?

I suggest you plug into a projector and then use the Desktop & Screen Saver Control Panel to change the background of the desktop being projected to something else. The new background should then stay the same anytime you plug a monitor/projector in.


How to open multiple Kindle books at the same time? How can I open several instances of the kindle reader at the same time, so that I can have a different book open in each one?

I found this:

Multiple Kindle Windows on PC, Mac

Which suggests using multiple cloud readers, but I want to use the desktop version.

I haven't tested this specifically with Kindle, but it works for most apps that don't normally open a second instance...

In Terminal
open -n
(note the space after -n)
then drop the Kindle app onto the Terminal window to auto-fill the path to it & hit  Return⏎

back in Terminal,  Opt ⌥   ↑  then  Return⏎  will repeat that command & should open a second instance.


Terminal Command to Check Available USB Ports I recently took a trip and was utilizing a USB GPS Device push coordinates to a file.  In the middle of the day the device decided to stop working.  We were never able to get it back working again with my machine.  1 of the possible scenarios (aside from hardware failure on the GPS) we have all but ruled out because of an LED indicator.  This leaves me a bit confused.   My question is 2 fold.

1) Is it possible for a device on a MAC to not release a USB port?
2) Is there a way to tell if a USB port is being used at a global system level by any resource?  Can this be done in terminal?

By running

/usr/sbin/system_profiler SPUSBDataType

I get...

USB:

    USB Bus:

      Host Controller Driver: AppleUSBUHCIPCI
      PCI Device ID: 0x2688
      PCI Revision ID: 0x0009
      PCI Vendor ID: 0x8086

        Generic USB Hub:

          Product ID: 0x0008
          Vendor ID: 0x04fe  (PFU Limited)
          Version: 1.02
          Speed: Up to 12 Mb/sec
          Manufacturer: Chicony
          Location ID: 0x1d100000 / 1
          Current Available (mA): 1000
          Current Required (mA): 64
          Extra Operating Current (mA): 0

            PFU-65 USB Keyboard:

              Product ID: 0x0006
              Vendor ID: 0x04fe  (PFU Limited)
              Version: 1.02
              Speed: Up to 12 Mb/sec
              Manufacturer: Chicony
              Location ID: 0x1d110000 / 2
              Current Available (mA): 1000
              Current Required (mA): 36
              Extra Operating Current (mA): 0

    USB Bus:

      Host Controller Driver: AppleUSBUHCIPCI
      PCI Device ID: 0x268b
      PCI Revision ID: 0x0009
      PCI Vendor ID: 0x8086

    USB Bus:

      Host Controller Driver: AppleUSBUHCIPCI
      PCI Device ID: 0x2689
      PCI Revision ID: 0x0009
      PCI Vendor ID: 0x8086

        USB2.0-Serial:

          Product ID: 0x7523
          Vendor ID: 0x1a86
          Version: 2.54
          Speed: Up to 12 Mb/sec
          Location ID: 0x3d100000 / 1
          Current Available (mA): 1000
          Current Required (mA): 96
          Extra Operating Current (mA): 0

    USB Bus:

      Host Controller Driver: AppleUSBUHCIPCI
      PCI Device ID: 0x268a
      PCI Revision ID: 0x0009
      PCI Vendor ID: 0x8086

        Bluetooth HCI:

          Product ID: 0x8206
          Vendor ID: 0x05ac  (Apple Inc.)
          Version: 19.65
          Speed: Up to 12 Mb/sec
          Location ID: 0x5d200000 / 2
          Current Available (mA): 1000
          Current Required (mA): 0
          Extra Operating Current (mA): 0
          Built-In: Yes

    USB 2.0 Bus:

      Host Controller Driver: AppleUSBEHCIPCI
      PCI Device ID: 0x268c
      PCI Revision ID: 0x0009
      PCI Vendor ID: 0x8086

sed n' grep it to your heart's desire.


How to lock a Mac lock screen without using keystrokes in the script? I'd like to go to the Mac lock screen with a command line script. Many of the existing answers suggest something like osascript -e 'tell application "Finder" to sleep', but my computer does not allow me to change the settings to show the lock screen on sleep.
The AppleScript includes a command to open KeyboardCleaner which disables access to the keyboard and I'd like to run this while KeyboardCleaner is active. So any script/command that doesn't depend on keystrokes is required.
I'll run my AppleScript (which opens KeyboardCleaner and also locks the computer ) by running
python3 -c 'from file import *; script();'

This is what I've tried

osascript -e 'tell application "Finder" to sleep' - my computer does not show the lock screen on sleep.
alias afk="osascript -e 'tell application \"System Events\" to keystroke \"q\" using {command down,control down}'" - this requires using the keyboard which is not possible for my use case
pmset displaysleepnow - same problem as 1
tell application "System Events" to key code 12 using {control down, command down} - same problem as 2

I’d like to go to the lock screen on my computer without using the keyboard. Any command line script will do.

I’m not sure what you mean by “Without using the keyboard” if you are willing to accept a script… which would have to be triggered using the keyboard.
If there is something specific / unusual / unique about your setup, it would be good to explain what that is.
In the meantime, if you are willing to accept a shell script, try this:
"/System/Library/CoreServices/Menu Extras/User.menu/Contents/Resources/CGSession" -suspend

All one line


How to disable SIP when Big Sur is installed in a VMware Fusion Player virtual machine I have Big Sur installed in a VMware Fusion Player virtual machine. I desire to disable SIP. With an actual physical Mac, the usual method would involve first booting to internal macOS Recovery, then entering the command given below in a Terminal window.
csrutil disable

However, booting to internal macOS Recovery does not seem possible. The holding down the ⌘+R key combination at startup does not work. The Mac Startup Manager does not appear to exist. I can restart to firmware, but the Recovery volume does not have a boot.efi which can be chosen to boot from.
I realize the SIP setting is stored in the 4 byte NVRAM variable given below.
7C436110-AB2A-4BBB-A880-FE41995C9F82:csr-active-config

The firmware does allow booting to a built‑in EFI 1.0 shell. However, this shell does not appear to have any commands which can modify this variable. In fact, the variable does not even currently exist in the virtual machine NVRAM. I tried entering the command below in a macOS Terminal window.
 sudo nvram csr-active-config=%7f%00%00%00

The result was the error message given below.
nvram: Error setting variable - 'csr-active-config': (iokit/common) not permitted

What procedures can be used used to disable SIP?
I am using the current free version of VMware Fusion Player (Version 12.1.0).

Host Stats
Guest Stats

iMac (21.5-inch, Late 2013)
Mac

macOS Catalina version 10.15.7
macOS Big Sur version 11.2

Memory: 16 GB
Memory: 4 GB

Quad-Core Intel Core i5
2 processor cores

2.9 GHz
2.76 GHz

USB 3 (5 Gb/s) Samsung T7 SSD
SATA HDD

Below are a links to sites with procedures that either I could not get to work or only work with previous versions of macOS.
Can I initiate a MacOS restart to Recovery mode solely from the command line?
how to disable SIP (system integrity protection) in vmware fusion 12 for macOS big sur?

Follow the steps below to disable System Integrity Protection (SIP).

Start by booting to macOS Big Sur and opening a Terminal application window. Next, enter the command given below. This will create a NVRAM variable with the desired value, but misspelled variable name. This misspelling will be corrected in a later step.
sudo nvram Asr-active-config=%7f%00%00%00

Shutdown macOS. In the Setting window for the virtual machine, select
Startup Disk. Hold down the option key and select the Restart to Firmware… button, as shown below.

Select the EFI Internal Shell, as shown below.

If desired, enter the command below to get full use of the window.
mode 128 40

Set the current filesystem to the EFI volume. This should be the mapped fs0 filesystem, so you would enter the following
fs0:

Next, verify the label is EFI by entering the command below.
vol

If wrong, then try fs1:, fs2:, fs3:, ....

Enter the command below to save the Asr-active-config variable to the file csr.bin.
dmpstore Asr-active-config -s csr.bin

Note: For more information on this command enter help -b dmpstore.

Next, enter the command below to edit the csr.bin file. You will need to correct the spelling by replacing the letter A with the letter c. The can be done by typing a 63 over the 41 on the first line.
hexedit csr.bin

The corrected file will appear as shown below. When finished save the changes and exit.

Note: The value of the variable is stored in the last 4 bytes of this file.

Enter the command below to create the csr-active-config variable in NVRAM.
dmpstore -l csr.bin

SIP will now be disabled on the next boot of Big Sur. If desired, enter the command below to remove the Asr-active-config variable from NVRAM.
dmpstore -d Asr-active-config

Enter the command below to leave the command shell.
exit

From the Boot Manager, select Mac OS X to boot Big Sur.

Format of the csv.bin File

Offset in Hex
Size in Decimal
Description

00-03
4
Length of variable name

04-27
36
Variable name stored as null terminated UTF-16LE string

28-37
16
GUID of the variable

38-3B
4
Attributes stored as 4 byte integer (See below)

3C-3F
4
Length of the data

40-43
4
The 4 byte integer that comprises the data

Attribute
Value
Description

NV
1
Non-volatile

BS
2
Boot service Access

RT
4
Runtime Access

HR
8
Hardware Error Record


Homebrew services - how to stream its log? If I run command line service like mongod , my terminal window will continue to show its log output. If i run it as a homebrew service, which is what mongodb itself recommends for mac, brew services start mongodb-community, I won't get any log output.

How do i continually stream the log? For mongod, or other homebrew services?

The mongodb-community service logs to the following places:

$HOMEBREW_PREFIX/var/log/mongodb/mongo.log
$HOMEBREW_PREFIX/var/log/mongodb/output.log

Usually this means that they're located in:

/usr/local/var/log/mongodb/

You can continually stream the logs using a command like this in the Terminal:

tail -f /usr/local/var/log/mongodb/*.log


Can I use TouchID for a password in my browser? I would like to use my touch ID to fill in my password at any website. Is there a plug-in for that or is it still inpossible.

Example: Facebook asks me for a log-in on facebook.com and I want that when I lay down my finger on the touch id that it automatically fills in my password.

Do I need to dream on or is there a possibility to reach this?

Thanks in forward.

You can save your usernames/passwords in Safari and have them be filled in automatically when accessing the site. On Mojave, this filling-in can be controlled with Touch ID via the Touch ID System Settings.


Show attachments as icon by default in Mail OS X El Capitan I would like not to show attachments previews in the app "Mail" in OS X El Capitan, but just show icons.
Following the guides, I have tried this command in the Terminal:

defaults write com.apple.mail DisableInlineAttachmentViewing -bool yes

but is seems that, for El Capitan, this doesn't work properly, since in the Inbox folder, attachments aren't shown as icons.

Any suggestions?

I just pasted the following into terminal and it works correctly for me. All attachments appear immediately as icons in El Capitan Mail:

defaults write com.apple.mail DisableInlineAttachmentViewing -bool yes

It appears to be exactly the same as you entered it above. Before entering the command, I closed Mail and relaunched it after the command had been accepted in terminal. Don't know what to say other than it worked for me. Hope this helps someone!


How do I save iCloud photos to external hard drive? Photos on my iPad are backed up on iCloud, but as my iCloud storage is full I want to back up my iCloud photos to an external hard drive. How do I do this on my Windows desktop PC? I do not have a Mac.

Sign in to https://www.icloud.com and download/ export your photos from the web app.


Dead Macbook Pro 13 2018 w/ Touch Bar I have a Macbook Pro 2018 13 with Touchbar. I had bootcamp + mojave installed, but accidentaly removed the macos, mac recovery and bootcamp recovery partitions ... Im left with a non working bootcamp and stuck.

what i’ve tried:

resetting nvram
reinstalling windows by bootable usb*
reinstalling macOS by bootable usb*
cmd+r for recovery*
cmd+option+r for recovery*
cmd+shift+option for recovery*
use of internet recovery*
tried booting gparted by bootable usb*
cloning an existing mojave drive (another mac that works) to an external drive and tried booting*

all of these where tried holding the option key during startup, but no matter what I boot to, I always get to internet recovery. Once in internet recovery (after trying with multiple wifi networks and the router being at 10cm of distance), The globe just starts spinning, with no progress bar. I left it for more than 14 hours and nothing. I have 50mbps internet.

How can a “new” mac become unrepairable?

sigh

For anyone facing this situation, the fix is this:

Note: This has been tried with a 13 MacBook Pro 2018 and 15 MacBook Pro 2018. This should work on any bricked T2 device.

Requirements:

Another working macOS computer (PC-1)
USB-A to USB-C cable or Thunderbolt 2/3 to USB-C
Bricked macOS computer (PC-2) that wont boot external drives and Internet Recovery is not working.
Apple Configurator 2

Step 1: Download “Apple Configurator 2” to PC-1 from App Store

Step 2: Connect PC-1 to PC-2, if your PC-2 is a MacBook Pro 2018+ (4 Thunderbolt ports), you need to connect the Power Supply to the LEFT TOP port of the PC-2 and the USB-C to USB-A to the LEFT BOTTOM port of the PC-2.

Step 3: Open “Apple Configurator 2” in PC-1

Step 4: While connected (step 2) power off PC-2 pressing the power button for around 5 seconds

Step 5: While off, press COMMAND+OPTION+RIGHT SHIFT+POWER until PC-2 appears in PC-1 as “DFU”.

Step 6: Once “DFU” appears in PC-1, select it and go to “Actions > Advanced > Remove Data & Settings”.

The drive will be wiped and an error will appear in PC-1 when trying to re-install macOS (THIS IS OK) and PC-2 will just restart.

Step 7: Disconnect PC-2 from PC-1

Step 8: Power off (if it’s on) PC-2

Step 9: Boot PC-2 with COMMAND+R, internet recovery should appear.

Step 10: If on wifi: enter credentials

Step 11: Internet Recovery will show a progress bar and a timer, follow the instructions and restore your macOS.

Internet Recovery failing happens because PC-2 detects more than 1 partitions in the hard drive, that’s why we wipe them out with Apple Configurator 2 and then try again to restore from internet.


Unable to pair two iPhone's via Bluetooth I have an iPhone 4S and I would like to connect it via Bluetooth with an iPhone 5 but it won't connect.

How can I connect them?

iOS uses Bluetooth in a very particular way. Depending on what you want to achieve, you can use an App or an iOS feature:

For transfering files: iOS allows you to transfer stuff via AirDrop
For internet sharing, use the built in iOS hotspot feature

Typically, iOS pairs only with accessories such as bluetooth headphones or heart rate sensors.

There are other bluetooth features that are managed by iOS and work without user intervention such as continuity or bluetooth beacon detection.


Output format of the standard Mac OS Color Picker dialog (choose color) It is possible to create an AppleScript that calls for the standard Mac OS Color Picker dialog (choose color) and gets the output value after user picks some color:

set the rez to choose color
set the rezStr to rez2string(rez)
set the clipboard to rezStr

on rez2string({r, g, b})
    return "(" & r & ", " & g & ", " & b & ")" as string
end rez2string

So, selected color value will be copied to the clipboard.

My question is: can I control the output of this Color Picker dialog in AppleScript? By default it returns the color value in this format: (59432, 59441, 59428), which is a 16-bit high color, I believe.

Can I specify somehow that I want to get a "standard" RGB (with 255 as a maximum value) instead? Or any other? Or 16-bit high color is the only supported output format for choose color? That would be a pity, because as far as I know there is no way to get proper RGB/Hex values from 16-bit high color as it would involve rounding and approximation.

I mean, the very same standard Color Picker dialog that is called by choose color has RGB values (along with the Hex one) on its second tab (Color Sliders), so it is capable of returning values in those formats. But are those available to get in AppleScript?

Update 1.

I wrote a blog-post with more details about the problem.

Update 2.

As Jon pointed out in his answer, the problem originates in the eye-dropper, so scripts are actually able to convert from 16-bit high color into "normal" 255-RGB and then HEX, but due to the fact that eye-dropper outputs incorrect value (from different color space, apparently), all further calculations are doomed.

First, this is the script I use:

set format to (button returned of (display dialog "Select the format of the chosen color for the clipboard." buttons {"Cancel", "HEX", "RGB"} default button 3 with icon 1 with title "Color Picker"))
set {r, g, b} to choose color
set {r, g, b} to {_16_to_8(r), _16_to_8(g), _16_to_8(b)}
if (format = "RGB") then
    set the clipboard to ("rgb(" & r & ", " & g & ", " & b & ")")
else
    set the clipboard to ("#" & {dec_to_hex(r), dec_to_hex(g), dec_to_hex(b)})
end if

on _16_to_8(n)
    return ((n / 65535) * 255) as integer
end _16_to_8

property hex_chars : "0123456789ABCDEF"'s characters
on dec_to_hex(n)
    if (n = 0) then return "00"
    return (hex_chars's item (((n div 16) mod 16) + 1)) & (hex_chars's item ((n mod 16) + 1))
end dec_to_hex

The issue you are seeing is specific to the color you chose ({236, 236, 236} / ECECEC) using the eye-dropper tool. The picker showed it as {236, 236, 236} but when returned via AppleScript, it was {59438, 59436, 59437} or something close where the RGB values are not the same (i.e., not a true gray). If you open the color picker and manually enter 236 for each of the RGB values (do not use the eye-dropper tool) and then return the color, it will return the RGB result as 3 equal values ({60652, 60652, 60652}) that will then be coerced properly by the script above.

I believe there is a rounding issue with the color picker and the eye-dropper tool as it shows, by default, 8-bit (0-255) integers instead of floating point (0.0-1.0). When you pickup the color from your example image using the eye-dropper tool and switch to the grayscale slider, it will show as 91%. This is incorrect. The value should be 92.5% but the picker doesn't show floats, only integers in the grayscale slider (you can change to floats in the RGB slider section from the action button to the right of the slider type popup button). If you are in the grayscale slider section, manually enter 92.5 and then hit the tab key to have the value accepted by the picker then hit the OK button and again, you should see the proper results back in AppleScript.

So, if the result from AppleScript is not what you are seeing in the picker, just copy the HEX value from the picker's HEX field and cancel the picker by hitting esc or the Cancel button. If you want the RGB colors, run the script again but instead of using the eye-dropper tool, paste the HEX value in the Hex field and press tab to commit the entry then hit return or OK and the proper RGB values should be on the clipboard. A pain, no doubt, but if precision is important to you, perhaps the way to go.

Off topic but using the code above, you can also convert ASCII to HEX:

string_to_hex("Convert to hexadecimal!")

property hex_chars : "0123456789ABCDEF"'s characters
on dec_to_hex(n)
    if (n = 0) then return "00"
    return (hex_chars's item (((n div 16) mod 16) + 1)) & (hex_chars's item ((n mod 16) + 1))
end dec_to_hex

on string_to_hex(s)
    set r to {}
    repeat with c in s's characters
        set end of r to dec_to_hex(ASCII number c)
    end repeat
    return r as string
end string_to_hex

UPDATE

Here's a revised script that will look to see if the user canceled the color picker with the HEX code copied to the clipboard. If both of those conditions are true, then the script will use the copied HEX code to add the RGB or HEX code to the clipboard. An extra few awkward steps (select and copy the HEX string, then cancel the color picker) but perhaps feasible for your needs.

try
    set format to (button returned of (display dialog "Select the format of the chosen color for the clipboard." buttons {"Cancel", "HEX", "RGB"} default button 3 with icon 1 with title "Color Picker"))
    set {r, g, b} to choose color
    set {r, g, b} to {_16_to_8(r), _16_to_8(g), _16_to_8(b)}
on error e number n
    if (n = -128) then --user canceled
        set clipboard_string to (get the clipboard)
        if ((clipboard_string count) = 6) then
            set {r, g, b} to hex_string_to_dec(clipboard_string)
        else
            return
        end if
    else
        log {n:n, e:e}
        return
    end if
end try
if (format = "RGB") then
    set the clipboard to ("rgb(" & r & ", " & g & ", " & b & ")")
else
    set the clipboard to ("#" & {dec_to_hex(r), dec_to_hex(g), dec_to_hex(b)})
end if

on _16_to_8(n)
    return ((n / 65535) * 255) as integer
end _16_to_8

property hex_chars : "0123456789ABCDEF"'s characters
on dec_to_hex(n)
    if (n = 0) then return "00"
    return (hex_chars's item (((n div 16) mod 16) + 1)) & (hex_chars's item ((n mod 16) + 1))
end dec_to_hex

property hex_to_dec_chars : "0.1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.9AaBbCcDdEeFf"
on hex_to_dec(s)
    set s to s's items's reverse
    set {d, p} to {0, 0}
    repeat with c in s
        set d to d + (((offset of c in hex_to_dec_chars) div 2) * (16 ^ p))
        set p to p + 1
    end repeat
    return d as integer
end hex_to_dec

on hex_string_to_dec(s)
    if character 1 of s = "#" then set s to s's text 2 thru -1
    set r to {}
    repeat with x from 1 to length of s by 2
        set end of r to hex_to_dec(s's text x thru (x + 1))
    end repeat
    return r
end hex_string_to_dec


El Capitan /private/var/folders cache files consuming 30–40 GB I've upgraded my MacBook Pro to El Capitan recently, and one of the first unpleasant changes, other than XtraFinder & TotalTerminal no longer being compatible, is that the system deems it appropriate to make /private/var/folders to consume up to and beyond 30–40 GB of space, causing my Mac to slow down tremendously. I understand that the files within this folder are all cache files. My only question is why this is happening, and what makes this happen? Is there any way to make it only cache apps that are actually open, or do I have to refresh my NVRAM/PRAM? It's exceedingly annoying to have my computer act like its trying to buffer 20 gigabytes all at once.

The answer is that yes, you are allowed to delete files from /private/var/folders/. The command

sudo rm -r -P /private/var/folders/tr/*

was able to work and no crashes came of it. Some errors were issued by the command, but no errors came from the system as a whole. I might issue a new post later on when I know more about this to understand what Apple did with El Capitan to make it act this way.

Here's a thread from the Apple website about this; it agrees that deleting tr should be safe. According to the thread, /var/folders is the new location of caches, which you can safely delete if you've closed all running apps.

  UPDATE: Another reason for this behavior can be due to Spotlight indexing, especially on older models of MacBook / MacBook Pro. I recently noticed the problem happening again, and even though I had done everything I could to prevent it from continuing to happen, I was forced to watch my Mac slowly consume more than 100 gigabytes of space to some phantom process occurring in the background.

  Even so, be sure to go into Settings -> Spotlight & uncheck the box for Folders indexing, and if you're like me and have a lot of music (such as over 50 gigabytes), turn off Music indexing, too. Turn off any others you may not want, as well, but Folder indexing seems to be the biggest culprit in both disk space loss and performance slowdown on older MacBook models.

  Upon turning this off, I have not seen any issues. Additionally, the remaining disk space displayed in Finder now provides accurate results.

  This may also apply to iOS devices, since OS X & iOS are currently being developed to match each other's functionality and features. A large portion of the Other data stored on the device may  just be Spotlight indexing not giving a toot about how much disk space it consumes. It won't hurt to try turning some features / options off if you notice issues.


Clean restart from terminal? In the last several weeks, my OS X 10.8.4 laptop has gotten completely stuck in states where it's impossible to interact with directly. Several times VMWare Fusion's USB shim has broken keyboard input. One time, the system had an apparent race condition between locking the system and drawing the unlock prompt, leaving the GUI completely wedged. These are terrible problems, but there's nothing I can do to fix them.

All I can do is figure out how I can get a clean restart when this happens. I can ssh in to the computer and run any commands, without problem. I don't really trust the system state to be recoverable in either of those states, so I just want a clean reboot.

But shutdown -h now is not a clean reboot. It doesn't do the same things for cleanly shutting down GUI apps that selecting "Restart..." or "Shutdown..." from the apple menu does. It results in data loss because GUI apps weren't shut down cleanly. I could try finding everything I have running in ps, and sending them all SIGTERM. It seems to work, but it's a hugely manual process. I'd love to just tell OS X to do whatever it does when you pick those menu items.

So - is there a utility that does this right? Am I stuck doing it in a manual and error-prone way?

Yeah, ok.  I can solve this with Applescript.  Thanks to patrix for getting me to look in the right direction.

tell application "Finder"
    restart
end tell

Saved as restart.scpt, run with osascript restart.scpt. I've tested running it remotely with the screen locked, and it restarted cleanly perfectly. I need to remember that Applescript exists whenever I want to automate Finder interactions..


How to retrieve deleted text messages from iPhone 5s? I need to be able to retrieve some deleted text messages from my Daughters phone which were deleted approx. 1 week ago.

I have had limited success by using an online service called TeenSafe which has pulled some of the messages back, but these appear to be mostly my daughters side of the conversation with only sporadic responses from the other party.

What I would like to know is how TeenSafe is managing to retrieve some of these deleted messages, and if it can retrieve some, is there a way that I can use a similar method to get the rest of them back?

Assistance is greatly appreciated.

If the iPhone was backed up to a computer through iTunes, you can explore the contents of the backup with a tool like this: http://supercrazyawesome.com if there's no backup then it becomes a lot more difficult as they're removed from the message database.


15" MacBook Pro Thunderbolt Display Flickering - Firmware Updates? I've had my 15" 2011 MacBook Pro for about 6 months now, and I picked up a VGA adapter for it a few weeks ago. (Thunderbolt -> VGA)

I have the laptop in clamshell mode running an Acer monitor, and will occassionally (every 5 minutes or so) experience a weird flickering, as seen in the first few seconds of this video:

YouTube Link (Not my video)

I see the weird flickering/distortion, but it doesn't last nearly as long as shown in the video, it's maybe 0.25 seconds of "shaking", then back to normal for another 5 minutes.

I experience this issue with multiple different VGA adapters, so I'm convinced it's a GPU/port issue.

I've installed all the EFI/SMC/Thunderbolt updates available in Software Update, but I've heard that there was a separate firmware update being passed around the Apple Discussion forums, but not released publicly.

My question, is whether I should take this in to an Apple Store to have it checked out, or whether there's a firmware update I can install to test? I've seen firmware updates for cinema displays, EFI updates, etc. but they haven't fixed my problem, so I'm wondering if there are any last efforts I should try before scheduling an appointment.

Edit: I'm not using an Apple adapter, but a Monoprice version. I have used a friend's Apple adapter however, and the problem continued to occur. Also, I'm running Lion 10.7.2

Since your MBP is a 2011 (and we're still in 2011), I'll assume it's still under AppleCare 1st year warranty. If so, consider getting it checked at the nearest Apple Store. Do mention you tried applying the firmware update. The list of Apple firmware and SMC updates is here.

If you don't live near an Apple Store, and if you're curious, you could try to diagnose if there's a hardware problem using Apple Hardware Test (AHT) which is a software in one of the DVD that came with your MBP.

Insert the DVD
shut down the MBP, then
hold down the D (for diagnostic) while you power on your MBP
Follow the on-screen menu and note down (or take a photo of the
screen) any errors reported before you call Apple Phone Support.


Why does `df` use "Bi" as abbreviation for bytes? Apparently df is putting "i" after capital letters for each size. This makes sense for Kilobytes/Kibibytes, Gigabytes/Gibibytes, and Mebibytes (if that's what "Mi" stands for).  But why would it use "Bi" for bytes?

For example, part of my result of df -h is:

map auto_home           0Bi    0Bi    0Bi   100%       0          0  100%   /home

It's the difference between the decimal value and the binary prefix.
In this case, it's saying you are using 0 binary bytes.

What's the difference?

Using "Giga" as our example, it means 10003 of something (i.e. Gigahertz).

In computers it poses an interesting problem:

A Gigabyte is 10003 bytes.  However a byte is 8 (binary) bits.  Which means it's technically 10243 bytes.   To account for this, we use different notation:

Giga is decimal (base 10)
Gibi is binary (base 2)

The output is telling you that it's using binary units.

If you want to get the output in "human readable decimal notation", use a capital "H":

$ df -H
/dev/disk2      1.1T   413G   706G    37% 100935848 172431606   37%
map auto_home     0B     0B     0B   100%         0         0  100%   /home

Finally, it's actually not an Apple convention, but one from BSD (it's a BSD command). You can find more info on the man page (man df).


How to open files from unknown developers without a warning in OSX? I believe I have too much security on my mac. Whenever I try changing a file name or install a program I have to enter my laptop's password. Moreover, I cannot quickly access downloaded programs because they are from unidentified developers, and I must right-click > open in order for me to run them. That is really frustrating.
Do I need to my laptop to be THAT secure (due to recent malware attacks on Macbooks ? ) Can I chance the settings to have it a bit more flexible ?

Platform : Mountaion Lion Retina Macbook Pro

You can disable Gatekeeper in System Preferences:

This removes the warnings about opening files downloaded from the internet:

defaults write com.apple.LaunchServices LSQuarantine -bool false

It doesn't affect the dialogs about opening applications for the first time though.

You can run Finder as root with osascript -e 'quit app "Finder"' && sudo /System/Library/CoreServices/Finder.app/Contents/MacOS/Finder, but it's not really meant to be done permanently.


How to save a black & white photo as a color photo with Preview App I open a black & white photo (.jpg) with Preview App (Version 10.1):

Then i copy and paste a colored icon:

But after saving the picture and open it again the color is missing:

I cannot find an easy way how to save this photo (originally saved as b&w) as a color photo with the Preview App.

Instead of saving, go File > Export... and save as a new JPEG.


VLC keeps freezing on Mac OS X El Capitan I have the latest versions for both El Capitan and VLC, however, ever since I've upgraded to El Capitan, VLC keeps freezing during playback. Generally to solve this: I have to pause, exit fullscreen, play and wait for it to start playing again. Every time it plays again, there is a grey overlap that comes over the video (which eventually goes away).

I was thinking that it may be a temporary thing but this has been happening to me quite often now. Is anyone else facing this? Are there any solutions out there?

It shouldn't be anything hardware related. I have a pretty decent configuration for a MacBook Pro NR.

VLC Version: 2.2.1 64-bit
Mac OS X Version: 10.11.3
RAM: 16GB DDR3 1600 MHz
Processor: Intel i5 @ 2.5 GHz

You do not have the latest version of VLC for OS X, at the present time, the latest version of VLC for OS X is 2.2.2, so you might want to try it and see if the issue persists.

In clicking VLC > Check for Update..., note as shown in the image below it says:

  More than 100 fixes for issues reported for 2.2.1.
  Full support of Mac OS X 10.11 El Capitan.

Note: If Check for Update... doesn't work then click the link above to download the vlc-2.2.2.dmg file and manually install it after deleting the existing application bundle.


Can iOS apps be distributed in a closed app store without requiring a jailbreak on each device? I have an application available to all comers on the App Store and I would like to restrict access to the application. The app is free and because of this, some people download it then find they can't use it and leave bad feedback. Although the description clearly says you need to be an existing customer obviously not everyone is reading it and the bad comments put off our actual clients.

I've looked into the Enterprise account but from what I understand you can only distribute to in-house staff. These are our clients so do not fall under this category.

Can Apple's code signing requirements used to allow select customers to see certain apps?

Solving this problem could go down three routes (and I'll initially answer it generally to be of most use to everyone reading this):

Using a development license and signing apps for a limited pool if iOS devices (currently, you get only 100 test slots as any iOS developer). This avoids the App Store entirely
Setting up an enterprise account with Apple so that that entity could sign apps for effectively an unlimited amount of devices. You would then let the company that has the enterprise account sign the apps for the devices it wants to run them and pull or modify the app from the public App Store.
Have the developer and the clients sign up for the Volume Purchase Program from Apple. This puts the app on the App Store, but the developer can control whether all VPP buyers can see the app or only white list certain clients to purchase.

From an experience standpoint, option 3 is far superior for most situations. Abusing the developer program to distribute apps commercially is against the terms of service, and there are technical issues and undue hassle with implementing that potential around the code signing barrier.

Removing the app and only selling to clients might work for your case - using option 2. Only the clients need to sign up, but you get total control about issuing fixes, builds and there is no delay (or benefit) to submitting the app to Apple for review. It doesn't mean you couldn't still submit the same build and price it high enough that people don't buy it, but then refund those customers when they are done evaluating your app, want to get a direct build they can sign.

The last option means you, the developer, need to list your app under VPP (which hides that app from most users of the App Store) and your clients also need to enroll in VPP, but this is Apple's solution to the dilemma you find yourself in.

The client gets access to special pricing, special access and still has Apple reviewing apps and providing the store front, code signing, etc...
The seller gets access to special pricing, explicit permission from Apple to sign related contracts directly with the clients to stipulate anything you wish (minimum purchase, pricing, availability, custom design) - but they only review the apps - Apple doesn't arbitrate, facilitate or handle agreements or disputes between the seller and the buyer.
The seller can price the app differently for each client or use the same pricing for all.

Both parties need to have a company and jump through some filing paperwork to enter VPP, but it's really the optimal solution for most cases where you don't want to price your app for free on the public store.


MacBook Pro won't go to sleep when lid is closed I have a Late 2011 MacBook Pro and I just got it back from the repair shop (mainboard was swapped). I immediately installed OS X El Capitan (before it was Yosemite) and found that when I closed the lid, the Mac would not go to sleep anymore. Even testing in other user's accounts and after restarting, resetting NVRAM and SMC and even booting from a different hard disk (with OS X Lion installed), it won't go to sleep and also the little LED on the right will not light up, neither while booting nor when I close the lid. Running pmset -g assertions in Terminal gave this output:

Assertion status system-wide:

   BackgroundTask                 1

   ApplePushServiceTask           0

   UserIsActive                   1

   PreventUserIdleDisplaySleep    0

   PreventSystemSleep             1

   ExternalMedia                  0

   PreventUserIdleSystemSleep     0

   NetworkClientActive            0

Listed by owning process:

   pid 54(configd): [0x00000054000701d1] 00:02:13 DenySystemSleep named: "InternetSharingPreferencePlugin"
   pid 102(hidd): [0x0000001e000901ba]
00:03:07 UserIsActive named: "com.apple.iohideventsystem.queue.tickle"
    Timeout will fire in 894 secs
Action=TimeoutActionRelease
   pid 44(UserEventAgent): [0x00000030000b01cd]
00:02:48 BackgroundTask named: "com.apple.mds.0"
    Created for PID: 64.
   pid 44(UserEventAgent): [0x00000006000b0137]
 00:03:30 BackgroundTask named: "com.apple.metadata.mds.power"
    Created for PID: 64.
Kernel Assertions: 0x100=MAGICWAKE
   id=501  level=255 0x100=MAGICWAKE mod=01.01.70,
07:30 description=en0 owner=en0
Idle sleep preventers: IODisplayWrangler

I have prevented bluetooth devices from waking the Mac, but otherwise I am not sure what to do. Could it be a hardware issue caused by the replacement of the motherboard?

This is looking like a hardware problem. It's possible that the repair shop may have hooked it up incorrectly (even professionals make mistakes) such that the lid closing doesn't register, or the connection may have been knocked out of place.


Adding gedit to my PATH I finally made the jump and got a MacBook, and I'm trying to move in. I have the OSX port of gedit installed, but I'm having trouble adding it to my PATH. My current PATH looks like this:

export PATH=/opt/local/bin:/Applications/gedit.app/Contents/MacOS/gedit:/opt/local/sbin:$PATH

as per a comment here.

Note: On OS X, you don't need /Application apps to be in the PATH to launch them.

open -a gedit

Check man open


Import RSS into iCal I have an online calendar in an RSS-format. Is is possible to import it into iCal and will it be kept synced automatically?
An example of such a calendar is: RSS-Calendar

Generally speaking Calendar supports CalDAV and Exchange calendars. I am not certain what an "rss-calendar" is but if it can be converted to or supports CalDAV or Exchange calendar formats you are golden.

I have not had to import a or subscribe to a calendar in quite a while so Calendar in the last couple of versions of Mac O/S may have some new supported formats. You may want to try just pointing Calendar to the URL of your "rss-calendar" and see what happens.

The other possibility is if you can export an ICAL compatible file that can then be imported into Calendar. It's not automatic syncing but it may be better than nothing.


Address for "Home" is incorrect in Maps and I can't seem to find a way to updated it? When I originally got my iPhone 5s I asked Siri to set my home address. At that time, it recognized a wrong address and I can't seem to find a way to correct it.  It is listed with a little house icon as my home address within my recent listing of addresses but not sure how to correct it.  My iPhone (which I recently updated to an iPhone 6) does recognize "me" as my correct contact information within contacts.  My contact information does have my correct home address and when I ask Siri what my home address it is does list my contact information but when I say "take me home" it goes to the historic wrong address.

I've read prior posts and one suggested it might be pulling from my AppleID but that isn't the case.  It's listed right there.

I can't seem to find where this information is editable?  The only place where I can find where it seems to be stored is within the iPhone/Apple "Maps" application.

I've cleared the history in the application and it clears everything but the home so can't seem to find a way to get rid of it or change it (swipe to left or right doesn't seem to work easily).

As stated, I now have an iPhone 6.  It's running iOS8 but has the same problem on my 5s when it was running iOS7.

Please help, I find this frustrating and haven't seem to find any posts that help.

Don't know if you've figured this out yet, but I finally did today. I've had the same problem for years and multiple phones. Today I opened my contact info and as always, my home address was correct. I clicked on edit and down at the bottom, under my home address was an "other" address, the one maps always tried to take me to. I was able to delete that address and it fixed my problem!

Also - be sure to check if you have many sources to contacts. Facebook, work or exchange contact lists, google contact lists, etc.. can all link and pull an address that's somehow indicated as "home".

The steps to clear up contacts when contacts only exist locally or only in one cloud database is:

How do I tell iOS 7 which address is my “home” address?