Intel management engine - is macOS vulnerable? Based on, for example, the Wired reporting, this is major bad news. Intel® Management Engine Critical Firmware Update (Intel SA-00086) - www.intel.com
https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/articles/000025619/software.html

Is Apple hardware/macOS vulnerable?

First: it's not macOS itself which is vulnerable in the first place but the firmware and related hardware is affected. In a second step your system may be attacked though.

Only some of the impacted processors are installed in Macs:

6th and 7th generation Intel® Core™ Processor Family

I checked some random firmware files with the tool MEAnalyzer and found at least some containing Intel Management Engine code:

This is the MacBook Pro Retina Mid 2017:

File:     MBP143_0167_B00.fd (3/3)

Family:   CSE ME
Version:  11.6.14.1241
Release:  Production
Type:     Region, Extracted
SKU:      Slim H
Rev:      D0
SVN:      1
VCN:      173
LBG:      No
PV:       Yes
Date:     2017-03-08
FIT Ver:  11.6.14.1241
FIT SKU:  PCH-H No Emulation SKL
Size:     0x124000
Platform: SPT/KBP
Latest:   Yes

An ME entry in Family denotes Management Engine code.

In an EFIFirmware2015Update.pkg 2 of 21 firmware files contain Intel Management Engine code which may be affected by CVE-2017-5705|5708|5711|5712.

In the macOS 10.13.1 update.pkg 21 of 46 firmware files contain Intel Management Engine code which may be affected by CVE-2017-5705|5708|5711|5712.

One source and a linked source therein state that "Intel ME is baked in every CPU but according to The Register (0) the AMT part is not running on Apple hardware." AMT is also related to an older vulnerability and the Register link refers to this. Then the firmware may not be affected by CVE-2017-5711|5712 because AMT isn't present on Macs.

But some of the recent vulnerabilities don't require AMT.

In my opinion it's unclear whether Macs are affected by the Intel Q3’17 ME 11.x vulnerability - probably only Apple can tell. At least Macs are not affected by the SPS 4.0 and the TXE 3.0 bugs!


Can I use multiple Twitter accounts on Safari? I'd like to know if I can switch between multiple Twitter accounts using Safari? (Like on iOS.)

On Safari, or any other browser that supports private/incognito mode, you could start a new private/incognito window by pressing ⌘+Shift+N File | New Private/Incognito Window and enter different credentials.

Every new window will store account information isolated, and will be deleted once you close the window.


OSX Lion Spaces & desktop files When I switch between spaces, after the transition effect the files on the previous desktop fade back in, so that the same files are on every desktop.

Is it possible to keep separate files on separate Spaces desktops?

It's not; there is only one "Desktop" folder in your home directory, and the contents of that folder determine what appears on all of your desktops.

One problem with allowing varying sets of files for various desktops wouldn't that it's not clear what should happen if you delete a secondary desktop. Where would the files on that desktop go? Lion has made it relatively painless to add and remove desktops, so it's a user experience question that would have to be addressed.

That said, in theory someone could probably write an app that would let you do this. I believe the system sends out notifications when the active desktop changes, so you could probably write an app that watched for those changes and then swapped out the contents of the ~/Desktop/ folder for you. But as far as I'm aware, nobody has written that app yet.


What can I use to enable-disable a ssh tunnel with port forwarding? I already found a product that does this, named Meerkat, but I'm looking for a free solution.

I need to do several port remapping with ease.

Aliases and a bash script? Or the following:

SSH Tunnel Manager (free, open source)
Cocoa-SSHTunnel (GPL)
SSH Keychain (GPL)


Mac does not recognize iPhone when it is connected by USB My iPhone fails to connect to my mac via USB charger. The USB port and the cable are working. System Information shows that "unknown device (...not been configured)". I don't know why this happens?

Lots of reasons this could happen.

Rather than us guessing, here's the recipe for isolating the cause:

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203979 - If you don't see your connected device in iTunes for Mac


Black Screen With Cursor on Logout in Yosemite This is specifically occurring on Yosemite Macs that have been NetRestored. Initial login works fine. However, when restarting the Mac or logging out of the user, a black screen appears with only the mouse cursor there. (Please note this is on logout, not login. I'm quite familiar with the login issue.)

I cannot even get out of it by sending a Restart (Lose Changes) command through ARD. Only a manual force shut down solves the issue.

In the past, I've removed the /Library/Preferences/com.apple.loginwindow.plist file and it's solved the issue. However, it's still occurring now. Any suggestions?

Just returned here, although old question, to leave the solution I have found  after long suffering this problem in High Sierra after trying to upgrade from version 10.13.5 to 10.13.6. I deleted these files through terminal, then rebooted.

You may need to enter your admin password when asked:

sudo rm -f /Library/Preferences/com.apple.loginwindow.plist
sudo rm -f /private/var/db/.AppleUpgrade
sudo rm -f /private/var/db/.SoftwareUpdateAtLogout
sudo reboot


Yosemite upgrade frozen, what should I do? I'm trying to upgrade a Macbook Pro to Yosemite. It downloaded everything just fine, restarted the machine into the installer process. That went just fine until it just stopped.

It's on the "Installing on 'Macintosh HD'" screen with a progressbar sitting at around 60% and says "About 29 minutes remaining". It's been sitting in that same spot for over two hours now.

Does anyone have any advice on what to do at this point?

UPDATE: I ended up holding down the power button to halt the machine, turned it on again, and hoped that it would start okay. It did. :)  It just appeared to restart the install process, and everything was fine. It got to the last minute or so and took quite awhile, but it did finish.

Apparently having Homebrew installed, or something else which stores a bunch of files in /usr/local, will cause this last-minute slowdown of the installer. You can either move those files before you install or you can just wait it out during the last minute.

I'm really not sure what caused the installer to halt at the 29 minute mark. But just turning it off/on did not hurt anything.

As recommended by 0942v8653, Command+L will show you the log and give you a better idea what is going on. In my case, the delay was due to copying of TexLive that had an enormous number of files.


Which SSDs are compatible with my old Macbook Pro? I have a MacBook Pro A1260 from 2008 and I want to upgrade to the fastest SSD I can get, as long as the rest of the system isn't the I/O bottleneck.

Where can I find information on compatible SSDs, and how many MB/s my system can handle?

Everymac.com is as close to a comprehensive source of system information as you'll find. In the case of your Mac, you can see it has a 1.5Gb/s SATA interface. So you won't be able to get the full potential sequential transfer speeds of a recent SSD, but keep in mind that the most noticeable benefit of an SSD comes from the random access speeds, which are less likely to be bottlenecked by the SATA interface.

It's also worth considering that SSD prices have come down a lot lately, so you're less likely to save much by getting an older model. I'd recommend looking at the Samsung 830 series or the Crucial m4. Both have excellent performance and good reliability.


Restore Time Machine Backup of 2016 MBP to 2011 MBP? My 2016 Macbook Pro needs service and I'm planning to use my old 2011 Macbook Pro until I have it back. Will I be able to restore a Time Machine backup of my 2016 Macbook Pro onto my 2011 Macbook Pro without any issues?
The 2016 is still running High Sierra, which should be compatible with the 2011.
I can't simply give this a try because I would first have to buy a larger disk for the old machine.

You could install the macOS you want on the old machine first to be sure it runs. Get all the work done before you upgrade the component. Even if the specs are OK, I like to know everything is in working order.  The OS only needs 15 GB or so to install.
As long as you can run the same or newer OS than was backed up, you’ll be able to restore apps and data.


How to stream my .wmv movies to Apple TV using VLC with MacOS Lion? I want to stream videos (several formats) but I don't want to convert it before to Apple format (H264).

Is there any free option that supports subtitle files? How to stream using VLC?

Beamer seems to work, take a look here : http://beamer-app.com/


Apple's typical device refresh optimal for new college students? Long-story-short: When does apple typically update their hardware?

As a prospective college student, I'd want to get new devices before college begins, but I'd also prefer to have the most up-to-date once I actually begin college.

Colleges that I've looked into typically start in Fall, so I was wondering whether Apple typically updates devices in late-Summer. Or, do they inconveniently update it after most colleges start?

There's a comprehensive Buyers' Guide at MacRumors, which provides the average product cycle lengths (and date of latest product update).


How do I (re)mount missing Firewire drives? Why do they vanish? I have several Firewire drives that occasionally "go missing" even though they are connected to my Mac and powered on (the power light is illuminated). These drives do not appear in Disk Utility or when I run mount so there's no evidence of there existence that would allow me to use mount or diskutil to remount them. The only way I have found to re-mount them is to reboot my machine, or cycle the power the drive connected directly to my Mac (a very inconvenient process).

This issue has persisted over the course of several physical configurations (a change of Macs, rearrangement of the cabling, both FW 400 and FW 800, etc.) and is intermittent (it occurs most frequently during long periods of Mac sleep).

Why would my Firewire external drives "vanish" in this way? Is there a way to programmatically re-mount them in this case, or to prevent them from vanishing in the first place?

OS X 10.9 (issue present since 10.7, on several machine); G-Technology drives (various models); "put disks to sleep" setting is disabled; pmset reports:

Currently in use:
 standbydelay         10800
 standby              1
 womp                 1
 halfdim              1
 hibernatefile        /var/vm/sleepimage
 darkwakes            1
 networkoversleep     0
 disksleep            0
 sleep                1
 autopoweroffdelay    14400
 hibernatemode        3
 autopoweroff         1
 ttyskeepawake        1
 displaysleep         5
 acwake               0
 lidwake              1

Note also that this is not a question about preventing spin-down. I've found ways to prevent this where possible, but when it's not (e.g., when the mac itself is asleep and the drives spin down because they ignore system settings to prevent spin-down), my drives frequently also unmount, thus vanishing completely from the system. The question is about how to prevent or recover from that.

I can't see a way to change the OS directly, but here's how you would mitigate it:

set up a script to parse diskutil list and possible diskutil cs list and have it mount any volumes that are connected and unmounted
use a tool like Launch Control or Lingon to wrap that script in a launchd trigger mechanism to call it periodically.


Can a casual user of my iPad set it up to have remote access If someone has access for a few minutes to one's iPad, with permission, including the login password, is there anything they could do that compromises ones's security? Should one change the login password afterwards to be sure?

It's not really meaningful to provide a blanket "yes" or "no" answer. Instead, let's look at some scenarios.

Unsophisticated attacker -- probably no.

If there is a recent high-risk security problem and you have not yet installed the latest OS update, mmmmaybe.

Limited physical access -- probably no.

If you let the attacker out of your sight even briefly, be a little bit concerned. If they disappeared behind a corner and you catch them connecting your device to a laptop, be very concerned.

Sophisticated attacker -- now it's getting interesting.

Are you a high-profile target? If so, get professional security advice instead of googling random security-related questions. Chances are there's a team of security researchers who is eager to take you on as a research topic if you have reasons to believe you are under attack from a nation-state security agency or similar.
Could you be a "useful idiot" for someone trying to reach a high-profile target? Like, are you personal friends with Lois Lane and Clark Kent? Or are many of your friends the president of Lugunda, or guerrillas from the People's Liberation Front of Elbonia?

There are indications that cybersecurity ops from several countries are equipped to break into systems using "zero-day exploits". This means that there is a security problem which has not yet been communicated to the vendor, let alone fixed with a security update.  We can't rule out the possibility that there is an attacker right here right now who has access to your system using secret back doors. But they are unlikely to risk spending such valuable assets on a low-priority target -- every exposure increases the risk that they could get caught.

Of course, if any of this sounds even remotely plausible, you would not loan your device to strangers in the first place, let alone reveal your password to them.

Though really, there should never ever be a scenario where you reveal your password to anyone. If you did, by all means, yes, change it.


What can cause a MacBook Pro mid 2015 sound output to fade rapidly to silence? Today when i am using my mbp 2015 retina , sound went off suddenly.
Internal speaker or headphones are silent. I can only get sound from hdmi output.

Sound settings seem ok to me.

Some unspecified Diagnostic shows no problems.

No red lights in headphone jack.
I have reset the nvram and smc. With headphones, 8 hear sound just for a second but that fades out very quickly. I am running OS X mojave and don’t know how to fix this.

The amplifier to make sound is the likely cause of failure. Since that’s on the logic board, a free warranty swap or a flat rate repair for $300 or so are the likely costs to fix this properly.

Have you tested installing a new OS on an external drive or wiping and reinstalling in case it’s software? That’s worth doing so you have a backup or confidence you need a repair as well.


Shortcut to open the Goto window in file open/save dialogues WITH the equivalent to path added When you have a file open/save prompt box open, you can hit the / key to open a GoTo dialouge to navigate via the file path.

Is there a shortcut that does this action but automatically adds the ./

ie. hitting the shortcut would open a box looking like this:

(where normally the period at the beginning is missing)

You just have to delete the automatically added / in the beginning. The Go To box works from the current directory in the background.

For example if I open my home folder and press /, the Go To box opens with a / already there. If I want to work from the current directory (./), i.e., home, I just have to delete that /.

Now, if I type ./Desktop and press enter, or just Desktop and press enter, the result would be the same.


Are the per process memory and other statistics defined the same as the system wide stats? There's been a lot of posts about memory in OSX.  None have really documented what the screen below speaks to.  Especially the difference between private memory, and virtual private memory.  Also does port represent just network ports, or does it include open file handles on that screen? The link right here What's the difference between Real, Virtual, Shared, and Private Memory? is not the same question.  They're speaking of a different screen in OSX, which makes different measurements.  The screen I'm referring to in the image below is per process, not per system.  I would greatly appreciate if any one can provide information to what memory statistics in the image below represent, and what ports details.

Yes - the per process memory statistics and mach call counters mean the same thing as the system wide statistics.

Activity Monitor helps you break down which specific processes are making up the conglomerated statistics if you use the screens shown above. You may also find the sysdoagnose command useful in probing how the various numbers all add up if you prefer a textual output as opposed to a combined graphical and textual one.


How can I set a keyboard shortcut that includes the backspace key? My question is in the title: does OS X allow to set a shortcut with backspace, like  Ctrl+Option ⌥+Command ⌘+backspace (in my case to an Automator service)?

Edit:
You might think "Try it yourself"; well, I did it. In System Preferences → Keyboard → Shortcuts, I tried to add this shortcut to my service and it doesn't work. The problem seems to be with backspace. Ctrl+Option ⌥+Command ⌘+m works well.

Does anybody know a workaround that allows me to use the backspace key in a keyboard shortcut?

To change the shortcut of a service, run plutil -convert xml1 ~/Library/Preferences/pbs.plist, open the plist, and change for example

<key>(null) - Some Service - runWorkflowAsService</key>
<dict>
    <key>key_equivalent</key>
    <string>@~a</string>
</dict>

to

<key>(null) - Some Service - runWorkflowAsService</key>
<dict>
    <key>key_equivalent</key>
    <string>@~&#x8;</string>
</dict>

Then restart to apply the changes.

@ is command, ~ is option, and &#x8; is delete (Windows backspace). Forward delete (Windows delete) would be &#x7f;. The shortcut strings use the same format as in DefaultKeyBinding.dict.

To change a global shortcut set in the App Shortcuts section, run plutil -convert xml1 ~/Library/Preferences/.GlobalPreferences.plist, open the plist, and change for example

<key>Some Menu Name</key>
<string>~@a</string>

to

<key>Some Menu Name</key>
<string>~@&#x8;</string>

Then quit and reopen applications to apply the changes.

Application-specific shortcuts are stored in ~/Library/Preferences/*.plist and ~/Library/Containers/*/Data/Library/Preferences/*.plist.


iPhone 5 not starting I have to solve following problem.

  iPhone 5 of which the OS has not been updated recently because of too less free space.

  Under Usage, it said that there was 0MB of free space. Suddenly, it shut down automatically. After pressing the on/off button, it will show the black screen with white Apple logo and stay there.

  Letting the battery become empty, recharging it and pressing the on/off button again (or on/off button and button below screen simultaneously) does not help.
  Nor connecting to a computer with iPhoto to remove data in order to add free memory: the iPhone does not show up in iPhoto.
  It is possible to connect to iTunes in recovery mode, but it makes no sense to install the latest OS in factory settings, since the iPhone was not updated using iTunes recently and might have insufficient space to install the most recent OS.

Is there anything I can try other than contacting an Apple store?

Seems something has corrupted on the iOS and that is why it cannot boot properly.

I recently had an individual I know face the same issue with an iPhone 7. They were able to take the phone to an Apple store and was able to fix the issue without wiping the phone, saving all data on it. Apple then performed a diagnostic to ensure the hardware was working correctly because it was still under warranty.

If you cannot go to an Apple store, an iTunes recovery with your computer is necessary. Good thing you said you can put it in recovery mode because that's what you'll need to do, then use a computer to recover it.

This is the only option you have without going to apple support. If Apple cannot manage to fix the issue with the method they used for the individual I know, they will end up doing a wipe and reinstall first to ensure this isn't hardware at fault, then proceed with a hardware diagnostic to confirm that.

Keeping a devices memory so full that it cannot update is risky. Try not to do that if you can. Use iCloud storage or other services such as Dropbox, Google Drive, One drive, or MEGA to hold/backup your files.

I highly also recommend always keeping your phone/computer updated at all costs. Security issues are happening all the time now.


"More info" button missing in "About this Mac" I have a macbook pro running Yosemite 10.10.5.  When I click on the apple and select "About this Mac", I'm allegedly supposed to see a button "More info", but it's not there.  Is it just me?  How else can I access detailed system information?

There's a System Report... button in the Overview tab.


AppleScript POSIX path to smb path I want to create an automator service that copies the full smb:// path of a folder or file (like you would get from ⌃ + ⌥ + ⌘ + C)
The reason the shortcut isn't enough is for all those "older people" (no offense intended) that can't remember shortcuts or don't want to use them at all (the typical rightclick -> copy instead of ⌘ + C users).
So far I got the POSIX path but how do I transform it to my correct smb:// path?
on run
    tell application "Finder"
         set theItem to selection as string
    end tell
    set posixForm to POSIX path of theItem
    set the clipboard to posixForm
end run

So this path /Volumes/someFolder/someSubFolder/ would become this smb://Server/someFolder/someSubFolder/

You may need to URL Encode some characters and spaces, however, here is some example AppleScript code  that you may find helpful, although it only encodes spaces:
tell application "Finder" to ¬
    set theItem to the first item of ¬
        the (selection as alias list)

set posixForm to POSIX path of theItem

set {TID, AppleScript's text item delimiters} to ¬
    {AppleScript's text item delimiters, " "}
set foo to text items of posixForm
set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "%20"
set foo to foo as string
set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "/"
set foo to text items 3 thru -1 of foo
set foo to foo as string
set smbForm to "smb://server/" & foo as string
set AppleScript's text item delimiters to TID

set the clipboard to smbForm

Notes:
Have a look at Encoding and Decoding Text in the Mac Automation Scripting Guide.

Note: The example AppleScript code is just that and sans any included error handling does not contain any additional error handling as may be appropriate. The onus is upon the user to add any error handling as may be appropriate, needed or wanted. Have a look at the try statement and error statement in the AppleScript Language Guide. See also, Working with Errors. Additionally, the use of the delay command may be necessary between events where appropriate, e.g. delay 0.5, with the value of the delay set appropriately.


3G downloading a retina-only game? If I try to download a game from the AppStore from an iPhone 3G, and the game says in the requirements that it only supports 3GS+, will the AppStore immediately disallow me the download or will it let me download nonetheless?

No, it will complete the purchase request regardless. It just won't run on your device.

If you did make a purchase that doesn't run on your current device, you will have to contact the iTunes team and request a refund.


How do I get my HP PHotosmart 7520 setup to scan to mac? I have my HP Photosmart wireless printer setup successfully to print from my MacBook, but cannot get the scan to PC function to work.  Help!

Try opening Preview and choosing File -> Import from Scanner


OS X Lion Migration - Problem with spaces configuration Have any of you faced some problems with the new Lion Mission Control after migrating from Snow Leopard.

I have the following two problems.

The Finder window is generally hidden. When it is hidden, I have to context-click the Finder dock icon and select option -> This desktop.
Using quicksilver to switch apps, generally the apps will be hidden behind another app. For instance, switching from an alternate application to Firefox I will be shown Finder (with Firefox completely hidden behind it).

NOTE: The issue of Item 2 is when using full screen mode, a new feature in Lion, and could be the source of the issues.

As a last resort, I will be performing a new clean install.  Does anyone have suggestion as to how I may fix these issues without having to perform a clean install?

As far as my understanding of your question goes,

  The Finder window, is almost always is hidden. I have to context-click the Finder dock icon and select option -> This desktop.

Well, why would you expect it to always be visible?

When I click Finder in the Dock, it either shows an existing window or creates a new one on the last space I've used it on and switches me to that space. Here, Finder is no different from any other application.

One thing you may want to do is to set the setting you mentioned to All Desktops so the window is displayed on each space. By doing so, you'll be able to skip the screen-switching hustle when you're working on several desktops and need a Finder window here.

Choosing This Desktop setting binds new windows to open on the specified desktop so I fail to see how it helps you.

  Most of the time, the apps will be hidden behind another app. For instance if I am switching to Firefox. I will be shown Finder (with firefox completely hidden behind it).

I am not sure what you're talking about because I'm not a Quicksilver user but let me give you a couple of suggestions.

Firstly, if any app is in Lion fullscreen mode, there is no way to put something “below” it—in fact, it contradicts the very idea of fullscreen mode.

Secondly, why don't you just use Dock and Mission Control together to switch between apps?

Swipe four (or three, depends on you Trackpad settings) fingers up to get a view of current screen, then just swipe left and right with three fingers to switch between desktops and fullscreen apps.

Last, I doubt this has anything to do with a clean install—rather, you seem to have some misunderstanding about how Dock and/or Mission Control work, and probably the program you're using (Quicksilver) may have issues with Lion (which I can't confirm or disconfirm). If you still have issues, please indicate your exact steps, expected and actual outcome so we can understand the problem.


Cannot input password when selecting network SSID to perform internet recovery So after hitting command + R I am brought to a screen that prompts me to select my wifi network. Once I select my network SSID I get a field where I can input the password to my network however I am unable to select the field to enter my password. There is a lock icon to the left of the password entry field and a spinning indicator on the right.

As a result I am unable to perform an internet recovery as I cannot connect to internet.

Are you connecting to a WPA2 Enterprise network (like the ones found at a school or job)? These networks require an additional certificate to be installed which is unsupported in the simplified Recovery Mode.

Also won't connect to Wi-Fi if you need to click Accept (like the ones in coffee shops and hotels).

Can you use the network normally from a different device? If yes then the network is not compatible with Recovery Mode.


Can the Cellular Applewatch operate without an iPhone? My 80 y.o. mother will not use a smartphone, however, I would like to give her a cellular (T-mobile service) Apple Watch, because it sports the fall sensor, that automatically calls EMS / designated contact.

Although could configure the Apple Watch with an un-simmed iPhone:  Is it possible to provision an A-Watch so that it has its own phone number and not share it with an iPhone?  She has a flip-phone (Tracphone) that she is comfortable with and I am certain she will switch to any smartphone.

My suggestion: Buy a cheap refurbished iPhone, bond the watch to it, then put the phone in a drawer. The LTE Apple Watch doesn’t need the iPhone to be on or nearby if it’s a Series 4 or later. It is NOT possible to set up an Apple Watch on a number that s completely separate from its iPhone bond mate.

BTW, she can make calls from the Apple Watch without the iPhone involved, but it has to be bonded to an iPhone.

I’m betting you know somebody who has an iPhone 6/7 with a shattered screen or bad battery.


How to transform an Apple Mac Mini intro a reliable Ubuntu Server? This question is about what steps are needed for transforming an Apple Mac Mini into an Ubuntu server.

Here are some areas:

installing Ubuntu and making it to be bootable from EFI by default
enabing CPU and fan control (by default it does not work)
be sure that it will power on after power failure
SSD configuring (assuming that the primary disk is a SSD and that you may have a HD as the second disk, nobody needs the DVD drive).

First install rEFInd, and boot Ubuntu installer after.

Enable "Boot after power failure" by adding next line to /etc/rc.local:

 setpci -s 0:1f.0 0xa4.b=0
 setpci -s 00:03.0 0x7b.b=0x19

Install mac fan control:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:mactel-support/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y macfanctld applesmc-dkms

For SSD tunning (you have to adapt to your config) here is my /etc/fstab file:

UUID=<...> /        ext4   noatime,nodiratime,errors=remount-ro 0       1
UUID=<...> /boot    vfat   defaults,noatime,discard    0   1

What is important to remember here:

/boot is the rEFInd partition, as you can keep all in the same place.
I added noatime,nodiratime to the / partition as this will lower the tear-down of the SSD.

Do noy add discard or ext4discard to the list of options because instant TRIM will slow down your SSD too much.

The optimal solution is to run TRIM in a daily crob job, by running something like:

 fstrim -v /

Other resources:

http://www.frozenindustries.com/2012/11/04/ubuntu-12-04-lts-on-an-apple-mac-mini-late-2012/


Why is the filesize of downloaded disk image different? I have a disk image which I uploaded to a web server and then downloaded with Safari 5.1 in OS X 10.7.

Finder reports the original as 34,911,334 bytes, and the downloaded file as 34,909,684. Both appear to contain identical contents when mounted.

What's going on here?

Edit: See output of ls -l@ and md5 as suggested:

$ ls -l@
total 136376
-rw-r--r--@ 1 rich  staff  34909684 15 Aug 16:37 Downloaded.dmg
    com.apple.diskimages.fsck         20
    com.apple.diskimages.recentcksum          80
    com.apple.metadata:kMDItemDownloadedDate          53
    com.apple.metadata:kMDItemWhereFroms         144
    com.apple.quarantine          74
-rw-r--r--@ 1 rich  admin  34909684 15 Aug 12:42 Original.dmg
    com.apple.FinderInfo          32
    com.apple.ResourceFork      1650
    com.apple.diskimages.recentcksum          80

$ md5 Original.dmg
MD5 (Original.dmg) = 4c1ed7a85de6ae51479a136ea23ac69e

$ md5 Downloaded.dmg
MD5 (Downloaded.dmg) = 4c1ed7a85de6ae51479a136ea23ac69e

The difference of 1650 bytes is probably the result of the resource fork being stripped from the uploaded disk image.

To test, I created a disk image from a folder in Disk Utility. I then used

ls -l@

in the folder that contained the disk image, and it showed the image had a resource fork that was 1650 bytes.


Why won't iPad connect to my mail server? I have just got an iPad and tried to set up my mail server.

I have a server that has SMTP on port 25 and IMAP configured on the default port 143, nothing special.

In addition, I have port 144 for secure IMAP and 26 for secure SMTP. SSL is a self signed certificate for a custom root that is installed in all devices that allow it.

I use SSL exclusively here and every laptop, desktop and other device works fine with it.

I first tried to set the iPad up with this, but when it did not work, I deleted the account and tried the non secure standard 25/143.

After main attempts (and failures) I did discover that I can send messages fine on both standard and the secure SMTP (indicating no problems with the SSL certificate).

I turned on logging on my mail server and found the message

TCPConnection - SSL handshake with client failed. Error code: 2, Message: End of file,

I get this when trying both SSL on and off.

I tested it on an iPod touch that was here and it works fine on both Imap Secure and standard.

Thanks in advance!

edit---

I found the enterprise tool, and managed to pull a log. I have cleared the log, then go in to mail and the following occurs:

Thu Nov 11 15:33:50 unknown MobileMail[47] <Warning>: Error: Tried to get message at 0, but we only have 0 messages.
Thu Nov 11 15:33:50 unknown MobileMail[47] <Warning>: Error: Tried to get message at 0, but we only have 0 messages.
Thu Nov 11 15:33:50 unknown MobileMail[47] <Warning>: Error: Tried to get message at 0, but we only have 0 messages.
Thu Nov 11 15:33:50 unknown MobileMail[47] <Warning>: Error: Tried to get message at 0, but we only have 0 messages.
Thu Nov 11 15:33:50 unknown MobileMail[47] <Warning>: Error: Tried to get message at 0, but we only have 0 messages.
Thu Nov 11 15:33:50 unknown MobileMail[47] <Warning>: Error: Tried to get message at 0, but we only have 0 messages.
Thu Nov 11 15:33:50 unknown configd[24] <Debug>: CaptiveNetworkSupport:UIAllowedNotifyCallback:63 uiallowed: true
Thu Nov 11 15:35:14 unknown MobileMail[47] <Warning>: Error: Tried to get message at 0, but we only have 0 messages.
Thu Nov 11 15:35:14 unknown MobileMail[47] <Warning>: Error: Tried to get message at 0, but we only have 0 messages.
Thu Nov 11 15:35:14 unknown MobileMail[47] <Warning>: Error: Tried to get message at 0, but we only have 0 messages.
Thu Nov 11 15:35:14 unknown MobileMail[47] <Warning>: ERROR: MFMessageErrorDomain/Socket Read - The connection to the server "ezpcltd.com" failed.

Straight after the last line, the device flashes the "Cannot Get Mail" message.

I did originally fix this problem, but it has resurfaced.

I have written a great deal about this problem at my blog... (would paste directly, but pictures will not show up).

http://blog.williamhilsum.com/2010/11/ipad-update-and-more-problems-with-mail.html

The blog will show how I fixed the original problem, therefore is an answer, however, it also shows the new (related) problem.

If anyone has a good fix that will solve everything once and for all, please write another answer!


Automator: how to clear 'got' items? I've created an Automator workflow which (should) create a copy of a particular file in the currently selected folder. (i.e. select a folder, run the Quick Action, get a copy of the file in the folder.

However, when I run the Quick Action, I get the file and TWO copies of the folder itself, within itself. They are not links (I think), but I get a couple of iterations.

Here's the workflow:

I'm thinking that the variable "Path" is copying itself, for some reason. Possibly because it's been "Got". Is there a way to clear the "get"?

Even if I remove the "Get Selected Finder Items" action, I still get one copy of the folder.

In the options for each Action, there is a checkbox "Ignore this action's input", which means that nothing from the previous actions goes through.
Doing this on the "Get Specifed Items in Finder" action means that the folder path itself does not 'trickle down' to the Copy action.

The "Get Selected Finder Items" action is unnecessary, as the workflow already receives folders as an argument.


How can I get VMWare Fusion 4.0 to work on Mountain Lion? After upgrading to Mountain Lion, I find that when I attempt to launch VMWare Fusion 4.0 I receive the error:

You can't use this version of the application "VMWare Fusion" with this version of OS X

Has anyone found any workarounds for this? Should I migrate to Parallels?

Upgrade to the latest version of VMWare Fusion, in your situation you will need manually download it as indicated below for the situation you describe in your question:

I upgraded to Mountain Lion and now VMware Fusion 4 won’t start. What happened?
Mountain Lion appears to detect some older versions of VMware Fusion 4 and prevent them from launching. To resolve this issue, login to http://my.vmware.com/ (free product registration required) and download VMware Fusion 4.1.3. It can be found under “Products & Downloads > All Downloads > VMware Fusion”

According to VMware Fusion and OS X Mountain Lion FAQ


Manage iOS automatic connection to public Wi-Fi I use Skype to make some international calls. This works well if I am at home/office and connected to Wi-Fi.

However if I am on move, I prefer to turn off Wi-Fi to prevent connection to public Wi-Fi networks so that it won't affect my ongoing calls.

Sometimes after calls I forget to turn on Wi-Fi and start using some other app which can consume substantial amount of data.

Is there is any way to disconnect Wi-Fi for just a few minutes (the estimated duration of the call)? Or to force app calling features to use cellular only?

Rather than manually managing when you are connected to untrusted WiFi access points, you should consider setting up a VPN connection that is automatically enabled when you connect to WiFi.  That will protect your data - even when on a public WiFi network.  At that point, you don't need to worry as much about whether WiFi is on or off.


Logging MacBook firewall is empty I have enabled the built-in firewall on my MacBook (Sierra v10.12.1), but unfortunately the log files located in /var/log (appfirewall.log and alf.log) stay empty. I contacted Apple Support but they don't know the reason or a solution to this problem. I saw someone with a similar problem and concerns at: Firewall logging enabled, but not recording which isn't resolved.

Any ideas how to handle this one?

To get some logging from the Firewall you have to define some rules.

Open System Preferences > Security & Privacy > Firewall, unlock it, and select
Firewall Options and add some rules about application you want to block any access from the outside.

Ex. :

Once done, lock back the Security & Privacy preference menu.

Try any prohibited or allowed access and you will see it appear in /var/log/appfirewall.log.


OS X slow after switching users I have a 2010 MacBook Pro running OS X Yosemite with 4GB of RAM and 200+ GB of disk space. After switching users, the user who has just logged in is slow. Waiting several minutes or dropping to Terminal and running sudo killall -u $other_user -KILL seems to immediately show an improvement in performance.

The only consistent symptom I can find is that the other user has a number of processes, nearly all Chrome, using CPU cycles. I have not tracked this observation consistently enough to say if it is always true or not. When OS X switches users does it treat the other user as if the system were asleep or does it allow that users processes to run?

Killing another users running processes is poor manners. Is there a better way to solve this problem? What can I examine to determine why the system is slow after switching users?

The problem was resolved by swapping in an SSD.

The root cause may still be memory swapping. I am not sure if I was truly I/O bound or if the SSD just swaps fast enough to not be a problem.


In Numbers, how can I get a cell value from another sheet with a formula? My need is to compare content cells from two different sheets in the same file and get the cell value from another column of the first one.

This is the tested formula to find the right position:

ADDRESS(MATCH(B;Sheet1::Table 1::$I);7;4;1;)

it gives, for example, G12 in a relative cell in the second sheet, but I need the value of "G12" cell from the first sheet.

How can I do this?

ADDRESS has an optional parameter specifying the table name for the reference which can span across sheets by specifying the sheet name before the table name.

ADDRESS(row, column, addr-type, addr-style, table)
table: An optional value specifying the name of the table. table is a string value. If the table is on another sheet, you must also include the name of the sheet. If omitted, table is assumed to be the current table on the current sheet (that is, the table where the ADDRESS function resides).
=ADDRESS(3, 3,,,"Sheet 2::Table 1") creates the address Sheet 2::Table 1::$C$3.

ADDRESS returns a cell address string which can be used to look up the value located in the referenced cell using INDIRECT(addr-string, addr-style).


Are these Canon websites safe to download printer software? I'd like some drivers for printer. Is Canon site safe to download them as self-installed trojans are Mac's worst nightmare and I have no real time scanner to detect if something comes in.

Google gives me both sites, but is there any difference?

https://www.usa.canon.com

http://www.canon-europe.com

I just find it weird one is canon.com while other canon-europe.com - if it is same company, shouldn't it be europe.canon.com...

Not sure what to trust or to trust either at all.
And connecting printer to Mac will not offer download so I need this...

You can check the signature/authenticity of a downloaded package installer (*.pkg) quickly yourself - independent of the shabby look of a website:

Open Terminal and enter pkgutil --check-signature. Then open the downloaded dmg image and drop the pkg onto the Terminal window and hit the enter key:

pkgutil --check-signature  /Volumes/PrinterDriver_MG8100\ series/PrinterDriver_MG8100\ series_161000.pkg
Package "PrinterDriver_MG8100 series_161000.pkg":
   Status: signed by a certificate trusted by Mac OS X
   Certificate Chain:
    1. Developer ID Installer: Canon Inc.
       SHA1 fingerprint: 5B B8 FC D3 38 4C CA 03 CD B6 14 EE 1B 01 34 A7 75 A2 82 58
       -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
    2. Developer ID Certification Authority
       SHA1 fingerprint: 3B 16 6C 3B 7D C4 B7 51 C9 FE 2A FA B9 13 56 41 E3 88 E1 86
       -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
    3. Apple Root CA
       SHA1 fingerprint: 61 1E 5B 66 2C 59 3A 08 FF 58 D1 4A E2 24 52 D1 98 DF 6C 60

You get a more OS X GUI like approach by simply clicking the lock in the upper left after opening the pkg with Installer.app:

Valid SHA1 fingerprints for Apple updates are

SHA1 FA 02 79 0F CE 9D 93 00 89 C8 C2 51 0B BC 50 B4 85 8E 6F BF
SHA1 9C 86 47 71 48 B3 D7 04 24 7A 3C 3F 56 EA 2D E5 94 4B 01 C2

for third party software signed by an Apple Certification Authority and some Apple updates also:

SHA1 3B 16 6C 3B 7D C4 B7 51 C9 FE 2A FA B9 13 56 41 E3 88 E1 86


Cannot disable gate keeper I received my M1 Mac Mini a couple weeks ago and restored my time machine backup from an Intel Mac with Catalina.
Today I execute this command: sudo spctl --master-disable and the following occurred.
objc[865]: Class SPExecutionPolicy is implemented in both /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SystemPolicy.framework/Versions/A/SystemPolicy and /usr/sbin/spctl. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.
objc[865]: Class AppWrapper is implemented in both /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SystemPolicy.framework/Versions/A/SystemPolicy and /usr/sbin/spctl. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.
objc[865]: Class AppWrapperPolicyResult is implemented in both /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SystemPolicy.framework/Versions/A/SystemPolicy and /usr/sbin/spctl. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.
objc[865]: Class AppWrapperPolicy is implemented in both /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SystemPolicy.framework/Versions/A/SystemPolicy and /usr/sbin/spctl. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.
objc[865]: Class SPLog is implemented in both /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SystemPolicy.framework/Versions/A/SystemPolicy and /usr/sbin/spctl. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.
objc[865]: Class MIS is implemented in both /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SystemPolicy.framework/Versions/A/SystemPolicy and /usr/sbin/spctl. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.
objc[865]: Class SPExecutionHistoryItem is implemented in both /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SystemPolicy.framework/Versions/A/SystemPolicy and /usr/sbin/spctl. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.
objc[865]: Class SPExecutionPolicyItem is implemented in both /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SystemPolicy.framework/Versions/A/SystemPolicy and /usr/sbin/spctl. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.
objc[865]: Class SPDeveloperPolicy is implemented in both /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SystemPolicy.framework/Versions/A/SystemPolicy and /usr/sbin/spctl. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.
objc[865]: Class GKScanResult is implemented in both /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SystemPolicy.framework/Versions/A/SystemPolicy and /usr/sbin/spctl. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.

I've never seen such messages in previous versions of Mac OS. Can anyone shed some light?

U need to see if the spctl is actually disabled though.
I noticed same wordy warnings when I tried same command. In my case it was disabled and the same warnings keep showing up no matter what spctl command is run for me.
To check results:
sudo spctl --master-disable
sudo spctl --status

Last line after the warnings should be:
assessments disabled

So, the command worked for me to disable and enable spctl.
Regarding those warnings stack overflow user bbum claims to wrote the error reporting code, but so far there is no explanation why the warnings are reporting on this command.
Good luck to u.


Quicksilver Lion Problems I have been using Quicksilver ß60 for a while, and I recently updated to Lion. However, there is a problem. Quicksilver quit unexpectedly, and now when I launch it launches and quits immediately. I have reinstalled QS, deleted the .plist file restarted my Mac, and cleared the QS Cache files in Library/Caches and Library/Application Support/QS. I also moved the iTunes plugin away and deleted it's entry in the Plugins.plist file. This still did not fix the problem. Are there any other plugins that have not been playing nice with Lion/ß60? Have any other users experienced this problem. The messages from Console.app are as follows (the same 2 happen every launch, in this order):

    8/14/11 9:09:07.841 AM [0x0-0x49049].com.blacktree.Quicksilver:
    Error:    WirelessAttach: -2013261844

    8/14/11 9:09:07.863 AM com.apple.launchd.peruser.501: ([0x0-
    0x49049].com.blacktree.Quicksilver[22241]) Exited with code: 255

Update: I found the trouble plug-in. It was Airport Module, of all things. Perhaps WirelessAttach was a clue. If any of you are having the same problems, I recommend removing the plugin (~/Library/Application Support/Quicksilver/PlugIns/

This thread on Google Groups may help.

You may also want to consider adding your feedback to that thread, too.


Sort songs within an Apple Music Playlist - by Artist, Song Name, etc There was a post on reddit about tracks sorting within an playlist in Apple Music app for iOS but it seems this method doesn't work anymore (at least for me).

When I delete or add songs to playlists using iTunes, yes, it automatically syncs with my iPhone (Apple Music app) but sorting seems to be ignored, whichever sorting/order I set in iTunes it doesn't reflect in Apple Music app.

How can I solve this problem?

I just want to sort my track by release date

I found the way (but still you need iTunes to set order on your iOS device).

Open iTunes
Right click on a playlist
Select Copy to Play Order to set the default order for this playlist when copied to a device


Office 2016 on OS 10.11.6 - any known conflicts in 2017? MacBook Pro Quad i7 late 2011, 16GB Ram, SSD
OS 10.11.6 (latest El Capitan)
Running Office for Mac 2011 (registered)
Use: graphic / web design / video commercial

I have opportunity to install MS Office 2016 FOC through my employment scheme and they are keen for me to do this to match Win team.

Q. Any known issues or incompatibilities with my specific OS please?

I don't need help with install and I am aware of issue on first release of 10.11 which is now fixed with Apple update. Looking for someone running same set-up to confirm solid.

Checked web and forums but 95% swamped with early issues that are not relevant in 2017.

In my experience, Microsoft is investing substantial engineering, funding, resources, man and woman-power in to the Office 365 - Mac Office 2016 suite.

The updates are very rapid, easy access to pre-release and insider builds, well documented issues / workarounds.

https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/office_for_mac_support_team_blog/
https://products.office.com/en-us/mac/latest-office-for-mac
https://products.office.com/en-US/mac/microsoft-office-for-mac

There's even a "back channel" admin and version tracking system that helps point power users to what changes when with respect to Office for Mac.

Are there known issues - absolutely. Even better, Microsoft documents them so people don't waste time troubleshooting things. Will one or more affect you? That's harder to tell, but we have thousands of daily users in our company using these apps heavily. The number of things we need to escalate to MS are few and far between and the time to fix things is superb. I personally prefer iWork suite, but Office and Microsoft have a huge lead from what I can see for most people's needs in the office space - Mac or iOS.


AppleScript to spit out Incremented Number with Leading Zeros So I am trying to create a simple script that will use a file to store an integer. When the script is called (in my case as part of a keyboard macro) it will drop in (where I'm typing) the current integer, with the requisite number of leading zeros. Then it will increment the integer (without the leading zeros) and write it back into the file.

The leading zeros part works, but for the life of me I can not figure out how to store the value of the 'counter' variable in a file so that, later, when I call the script again, it will pick up where it left off.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Here is the error message I get:

    error "Can’t make \"z:Users:zachphillips:Dev:AppleScripts:counter\"
    into type file." number -1700 from
    "z:Users:zachphillips:Dev:AppleScripts:counter" to file

And here is the code:

    set theFile to "z:Users:zachphillips:Dev:AppleScripts:counter"
        open for access theFile
        set fileContents to read theFile
        close access theFile

        set counter to fileContents as integer

        on add_leading_zeros(counter, max_leading_zeros)
        set the threshold_number to (10 ^ max_leading_zeros) as integer
        if counter is less than the threshold_number then
            set the leading_zeros to ""
            set the digit_count to the length of ((counter div 1) as string)
            set the character_count to (max_leading_zeros + 1) - digit_count
            repeat character_count times
                set the leading_zeros to (the leading_zeros & "0") as string
            end repeat
            return (leading_zeros & (counter as text)) as string
        else
            return counter as text
        end if
    end add_leading_zeros

    add_leading_zeros(counter, 2)

    open for access newFile with write permission
    set eof of newFile to 0
    write counter + 1 to newFile
    close access newFile

Add a .txt extension to the file you're saving to. If counter is the folder, do this:

set theFile to "z:Users:zachphillips:Dev:AppleScripts:counter:save.txt"

Assuming that you have a valid path, this should fix the problem. Otherwise, you're trying to save to a folder.


Can I sort Spotlight results by most-recently-used? Like everyone else, I use spotlight to open up OSX apps.  But I also like to use it to open up a particular log file, or a specific remote desktop connection.

When I search for the osx app, it is usually sorted to the top of the list so I can just type the return key to run it.  However, for the log file and the remote connection, they are WAY down the list, so I have to use the mouse to click them.  (I know, I am lazy)...

I used to use Launchy when I was on windows, and it would sort my most recently used items or most frequently used items to be at the top, so it was nice and convenient.  Is there any way to duplicate this functionality?

I do that in Finder Search window with custom settings.

It looks like this

I save that search in the finder side bar, so now just click it and it shows me the results.


Cannot change login wallpaper in 11.x Big Sur? Similar to the question here, is there a way to change the login background wallpaper in Big Sur? During the beta, I was able to do it via a combination of the procedures in Catalina and the bless command described at https://eclecticlight.co/2020/06/25/big-surs-signed-system-volume-added-security-protection/
This doesn't seem to work with 11.0.1 (20B29). It keeps reverting to the com.apple.os.update-779B* snapshot. Note that I am using FileVault.
Thanks

FileVault has to be OFF, to use a non-system sealed shapshot to boot Big Sur


MacBook losing charge while shut down I have a Macbook Pro 13 2019 and a Macbook Pro 13 2020.
2019 one runs 10.14.6 Mojave. 2020 one runs latest 10.15 Catalina
When I turn off the Macbook Pro 2020 with "shut down" on 100% and I turn it back on 4-5 days later it's 97%. That's fine-ish.
When I turn off the Macbook Pro 2019 with "shut down" on 100% it loses every day around 8-10% of charge while turned off. 5 days later it was 49%, 2 days later it's 83%, etc.
In system settings wake for wifi and power nap is off.
Any ideas what could be draining the battery while the computer is shut down (not slept) and how to make it not happen?

Even if your Macbook isn't drawing power from a battery, the battery itself is chemical in nature and, like all batteries, subject to "self-discharge". The only time this is an issue is when it's "elevated self-discharge."  So your Macbook needn't be powered-on therefore to suffer some degree of battery drain.
So battery drain in a powered-down state isn't the problem- it happens to all chemical batteries.  Your issue is that it's at an elevated level, which might indicate the battery requires replacement as the 2nd link talks about. Apparently 5% loss within 24 hours and 1-2% per day thereafter is expected for Lithium batteries. Yours is definitely draining at a much higher rate.
If you go to the "Power" section of "System Report" you can check the status of your battery to see if it's misbehaving as mine apparently is in my 2018 Macbook!:

So assuming you're 100% sure that the affected Macbook isn't in a sleep state, but fully powered down, this looks a lot like a hardware issue regarding the battery. Here's some guidance from Apple on troubleshooting Battery issues
Another thing you can look at for the sake of completeness when reviewing your power issue is resetting the Service Management Controller (SMC), if only to exclude this as not being causal before you trundle down to Apple with your Macbook-


Is there a hook for triggering scripts when a particular notification is displayed? I'm trying to set up some system behaviors to occur when particular iCal or GCal events begin and end. Is there a way to hook into the notifications system (e.g., via a LaunchAgent) to make the Mac run a script when a particular notification fires?

Note that I'm not asking about triggering a notification from a script, but rather the other way around.

In calendar.app you’re able to set a file to run instead of an alert. Try creating an Automator file, and select the calendar type


What can I do to speed up a Mac that is running slow? My mac seems like it is running slower and slower. While I am thinking abut installing Lion from scratch, I figure there has to be stuff I can do now to help. I have reset PR RAM recently, I have run the verify disk utility, and fixed permissions. I have seen mixed references to running a disk defragmenter. Could that help? I am on an iMac that is about 2 years old now.

I regularly run Windows XP in Parallels, Chrome, Mail.app, and iTunes.

Update: I have about 90 GB of free space. I run Onyx every month.

First, check that your processor is running full speed. Go to Preferences, Energy Saver, Options and look at the drop box down near the bottom called Processor Performance. If it is not set to "Highest", set it to that right away. This maximizes performance, but for notebooks, it may run down the battery faster. Note that not all Macs have this setting - laptops do, and my certainly my PowerMac G5 tower does, but not all Macs do.

Next, download OnyX and run the complete set of clean up and maintenance scripts and then evaluate again. Get OnyX at:

http://www.titanium.free.fr/pgs/english.html

Next, you may wish to check that you have enough free space on your hard drive. Highlight the Macintosh HD icon on your desktop, CTL-click it and select Get Info from the resulting menu. Make sure you have a reasonable amount of space left. If not, a little spring cleaning may be in order.

There are two excellent apps for showing where all of your hard disk space has gone, Disk Inventory X and WhatSize. Get them at:

Disk Inventory X: http://www.derlien.com

WhatSize: http://www.id-design.com/software/whatsize

Both do a great job at letting you zero in on your largest disk space consumers, so that you can hunt down any rogue files (and both are freeware, which is good).

Finally, it is possible you may have some processes running that are consuming a lot of idle CPU, thus slowing down your machine overall. I had a bad widget that did this once. Open Activity Monitor and look at your "resting" CPU occupancy when you are not doing anything in particular with the machine. It should be pretty much zero (maybe 1% to 2% at most). If it not, identify the process or processes that are taking the time. What are they? Do you recognize them? Are they needed?

If you find one that is not needed, kill it and see how your machine starts to behave. If this is the cure, you will need to identify the startup item that launches it and delete it.

So, in summary then, take the following steps in order:
1/ Start with ensuring that your processor speed setting is full (applies to many Macs but not all)
2/ Then do Onyx based full maintenance
3/ Then check that you have sufficient available disk space
4/ Finally, search for processes that are consuming an unexpected amount of CPU

Source: http://www.mac-forums.com/forums/os-x-operating-system/80467-how-do-i-get-my-mac-run-faster.html

Another place you may find helpful:

http://lowendmac.com/eubanks/07/0312.html


MacBook shows it is charging when MagSafe is green My MacBook currently shows this  even though the MagSafe charger has a green light.

Does anyone know why this is?

If it helps I am on a MacBook Air late 2010 with 819 cycle counts, 4,995mAh (currently), max capacity is 4,995mAh and the original capacity is 6,700mAh. I am also running make in terminal which has set my fans on and is making my computer lag a bit since it has a lot to install.

Could the issue be the process it using a lot of power?

Edit

Just clicked on my battery in the toolbar while pressing alt and found out it says service battery could this be a reason as well? (the message keeps appearing and disappearing)

reset SMC
 look up how to reset SMC on macbook's without removable battery


Should I upgrade Mavericks to Yosemite? I have MacBook Pro 5,5 Mid 2009 Core 2 Duo with 4GB of RAM running Mavericks
 and I am wondering if should I upgrade my system to Yosemite.

Does Yosemite make my system run faster what about performance and heat?

Does Yosemite make my system run faster what about performance and
  heat?

Faster?  Not that you are going to be significantly notice.  If your apps were slow to begin with, they are going to be just as slow with an OS upgrade.

Performance?  Heat?  (I assume you are talking about efficiency here.)  You will probably notice increase stability in your apps. Any performance gains (speed) will be negligible. Again, if your app is slow on Mavericks, it will continue to be slow on Yosemite.

Heat is a topic that seems to get way more attention than it deserves.  The temperature of your CPU/GPU is dependent on how much work it's doing. If you have no processes running that consume CPU cycles, it won't generate any heat.  Conversely, if you have lots, it will generate lots of heat.  If the CPU gets too hot, it will shut itself down.  In large data centers we concern ourselves with heat, but not to the degree (pun intended, maybe) here.  Worrying about very minute temperature changes of a CPU is academic at best.

Should you upgrade?

Yes.  Beyond any perceived performance enhancements, you need to get security and bug fixes.  Holding on to an old version of an OS can potentially lock you out of important fixes.  That said, I have personally held off on Sierra because all the perceived benefits it brought are outweighed by the myriad of issues it has (El Cap is still current, so it's not a problem).

However, I wouldn't go to Yosemite;  I would go to El Capitan and be done with it (it's the highest OS supported by your MacBook Pro).  Personally, I have found El Cap to be extremely stable even on older MacBook Pros such as yours.

Although Apple has traditionally killed off the ability to download older versions of macOS unless you "purchased" it previously, they have made the El Captain installer available for users with Macs unsupported by Sierra.

On a side note, I suggest "purchasing" (aka downloading) every macOS version that comes out even if you have no plans on using it immediately.  This will link it to your AppleID and you will have access to it long after it's no longer supported.  You can delete it once the download is complete, but the "purchase" record will be there.

Upgrade your hardware.

If you want to see higher performance (and less heat), you should upgrade your RAM to the max of 8GB.1  This will ensure that more of your apps reside in RAM rather than on you hard drive (in swap).  You will also want to upgrade to an SSD which runs significantly cooler and faster than a traditional hard drive.

This, more than anything will give you a performance boost.  Basically, upgrade your OS to stay current.  Upgrade your hardware for performance.

1 Everymac.com Maximum RAM:  8GB.  RAM Type:  PC3-8500


Where in the iPhone file system is iPhone's "Photo Library" found? In the file system on the iPhone, Photos are located under /User/Media/DCIM/*

But where should I found Images of "Photo Library" ?

In case you are still wondering where it is located inside your iPhone, as I just answered elsewhere, this is the place: /private/var/mobile/Media/Photos/ all files inside that folder are relevant. The actual photo data are stored on the Thumbs encoded as ithmb. You'll need some software to decode them.

/var/mobile/Media/PhotoData/Sync/ is the correct path to "Photo Library"


Visualize Syslog on OSX I'm looking for a GUI (or terminal if there is no GUI) application that provides the following:

Visualization of syslog logs.
Filtering: For example, I can filter a particular type of logs, a particular PID, etc..

Basically, I have an application that logs to syslog. I want to read these logs comfortably. Console.app only does show the syslog file, which is, not quite different than opening the file in a note pad.

Any ideas?

The new console.app will let you set filters and lets you set options to display certain info. Console.app comes with your mac and is in the Utilities folder which is in the Applications folder. Or more clearly its path is /Applications/Utilities

The console.app is shown below.


How do I use iMessages without a sim card? I recently received an iPhone 3G from a friend. She took out her SIM card, so I don't have a SIM on my iPhone. I heard that you can now text on iMessage using your email instead of a phone number. I went to Settings > Messages, and I put in my email address, but my friend's number is on top. I'm tying to delete it, but I can't. I also have no SIM.

This is the same set of steps you would use if you had a sim card, it's more about clearing the account that device has registered with the iMessage service.

Try to turn off iMessage completely, totally log out of the system in Settings > Messages.  When you re-enable it, ensure you log in with your own Apple ID.  At this point, you should be able to message to your registered email address.

If that doesn't work, you may need to back everything up and restore the device. This is somewhat problematic without a SIM card, since you may get stuck at activation if you don't at least have an inactive SIM from the proper carrier.


How can I automount a network share on macOS Catalina? I want to connect to a network share and I want the connection to remain active after logout. I tried:
$ echo "/-      auto_smb        -nosuid,noowners,nofail
        /-      auto_afp        -nobrowse,nosuid" >> /etc/auto_master
$ echo "/System/Volumes/Data/mount/Test2 -fstype=smbfs,soft,noowners,nosuid,rw ://$username:$password@server/share" >> /etc/auto_smb
$ automount -cv

My username and password have special characters so I tried escaping them and replacing them with URL encoding, but it did not work. What am I doing wrong?

This is the article that i used
https://useyourloaf.com/blog/using-the-mac-os-x-automounter/
and my code:
networkPath
persistent="true"
username
password

function debugEcho () {
  if (true) then
   echo -e $1
  fi
}

shareName=${networkPath##*/}
debugEcho "$shareName"
userPersistent=$username
userPersistent=$(echo "$username" | tr "\\" ";")
if [[ $username == *"@"* ]]; then
  OIFS=$IFS
  IFS=@
  set -- $username
  user=$1
  domain=$2
  debugEcho "$user $domain"
  userPersistent="$domain;$user"
  IFS=$OIFS
  debugEcho "$userPersistent"
fi

username=${username//@/"%40"}
debugEcho $username
shareName="TEST7"

if [[ "$persistent" == "true" ]]; then
  mkdir -p /System/Volumes/Data/mnt
  LINE="/System/Volumes/Data/mnt/Resources auto_resources"
  FILE='/etc/auto_master'
  grep -qF -- "$LINE" "$FILE" || echo "$LINE" >> "$FILE"
  touch /etc/auto_resources
  LINE="$shareName -fstype=smbfs ://$userPersistent:$password@$networkPath"
  FILE='/etc/auto_resources'
  grep -qF -- "$LINE" "$FILE" || echo "$LINE" >> "$FILE"
  automount -cv
  open "/System/Volumes/Data/mnt/Resources/"
  path1="/System/Volumes/Data/mnt/Resources/"
  path2="~/Desktop/"
  debugEcho "$path1"
  ln -s $path1 $path2

else
  open "smb://$username:$password@$networkPath"

fi


Why is my iOS Development Certificate Team ID different from my real Team ID? When I create an iOS Development Certificate using Xcode or the manual CSR process, the Team ID is something like (for e.g.) EK1H65HGFB, whereas my Team ID according to the Apple website is actually ECTE57HE5G. Creating a Distribution Certificate in Xcode works just fine and produces a certificate with a correct Team ID.

This discrepancy causes provisioning profiles to break because they expect a Development Certificate with my real Team ID.

Why does this happen and how can I fix this? Is this a problem with my Xcode configuration? (I have removed all it's settings and reinstalled it though.)

I've since had communication with the Apple Developer Program Support and they've sent me an email clarifying the team IDs.
This is what they wrote:

  Please note that I can confirm that the ID assigned to the IOS Development Certificate is a random one and is not the Team ID, therefore it is expected behavior. The ID assigned to the IOS Distribution Certificate would match the TID.

It seems the TeamID of the Development Certificate is in fact random. I wasn't able to do purchases in my app because of a bug and not this error.


How to Uninstall Lightspeed From Mac Just checked my Activity Monitor on my Mac, and I saw something like the image below running. How can I uninstall/remove that:

Updated

As far as I remember, I downloaded a software named Lightspeed POS for Mac. After the trial version, I deleted the application from the Application Folder, and also deleted the Lightspeed Preference entry. (Apple Icon > Preference).

The simple answer is that you have installed server users and databases on your Mac so you might want to restore from a backup if you have lots of other apps you don't want to reinstall over a clean OS Install.

The clean install is also viable - be sure to only restore your files and settings - not other users or applications from your backup since the Postgres database could be installed in many locations.

The most surgical option would be to find the specific uninstaller script for the specific version / flavor / edition of the software. Lightspeed POS has Lightspeed Retail / Lightspeed Restaurant / Lightspeed Onsite /Lightspeed eCom - each of which has a couple of variants, each of which has dozens of versions.

The vendor made a script to make all the changes to your system, so with a product like this, the chances they have a specific uninstaller for your specific situation is highly likely.


How to turn off "Your SIM played a tone" message on iPhone 4? Each time when I get the message "Your SIM played a tone" if I don't respond instantly and close the option it gets stuck and my entire iOS 9.3.2
doesn't respond. I have had this issue some ten times. How do I disable this?

To disable the feature do the following:

Open Settings > Phone > SIM Applications then turn off the CallerXChange Service or anything similiar to that.


How to set HTML-files icon to default? I have a problem with icons in files. Particularly it's only HTML files. I uninstalled Coda 2 app (deleting all relevant info, also clear my cash) and continue to use Sublime Text 3. But I have this (see the screenshot below) and this icons are not updated as my .css or .js files do. How can I fix it?

Already try this from here:

/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/LaunchServices.framework/Versions/A/Support/lsregister -kill -r -domain local -domain system -domain user

Nothing changes. Maybe because it's especially for OS X Mavericks and I have Yosemite...

You could also try to run

rm -r /var/folders/*/*/*/com.apple.iconservices
rm -r /var/folders/*/*/*/com.apple.dock.iconcache
rm -r ~/Library/Caches/com.apple.finder
qlmanage -r
sudo rm -r /Library/Caches/com.apple.iconservices.store

and restart.


Automator & AppleScript: How do I import the texts of Notes and Reminders as PDFs and RTFs? I would like to export and save the Notes and Reminders documents or texts as PDFs and RTFs, keeping or preserving the formatting and the background of Notes or Reminders, but the Notes doesn't have the option.

I would like to know if it's possible to use Automator and AppleScript to export the Notes and Reminders as PDFs and RTFs.

Another way to export notes is to move them to an email account first. For example:

Move notes to a Gmail account in Notes.app
Move the notes to some other folder in Gmail's web interface
Select the notes in Mail.app and save them as rich text or plain text

Here is another AppleScript for exporting notes as RTF:

set i to 1
tell application "Notes"
    repeat with n in notes
        do shell script "printf %s " & quoted form of (get body of n) & " | textutil -inputencoding UTF-8 -format html -convert rtf -stdin -output /tmp/" & i & ".rtf"
    set i to i + 1
    end repeat
end tell

It doesn't keep images, and it doesn't work with notes that are longer than getconf ARG_MAX. -inputencoding UTF-8 is required for preserving U+100 and characters above it.


Can't disable "Press the Option key five times to turn Mouse Keys on and off" Apple lets users who occasionally want the use of Mouse Keys to enable/disable it by pressing Option (⌥) five times. I use Maya, so I'm constantly using the Option key to manipulate the camera, and this usage often triggers Mouse Keys. Unfortunately, this disables the rest of my keyboard (see this Apple KB page) and I can't use other helpful shortcuts. I can of course disable it again, but it's annoying when I have to do it again and again.

I went to the appropriate place in System Preferences to disable this (Universal Access > Mouse & Trackpad), but it's greyed out. I've done extensive searching and haven't found anyone with a similar problem.

Why is this happening, and how can I stop it?

Change the value of useMouseKeysShortcutKeys to NO in 'com.apple.universalaccess.plist'. I believe you will find the files in ~/Library/Preferences/. When you're done, don't forget to reboot ;)

Also, you can do this via Terminal by typing defaults write com.apple.universalaccess useMouseKeysShortcutKeys NO and pressing enter. You may need admin rights to do this.


Log for the root directory of an external HDD I really doubt that this would be possible, but is there any chance that OS X 10.7.5 logs the root directory contents of an external HDD that was plugged in through a USB drive a week ago?

My external HDD died and I would like to retrieve the info of what folders it contained just to know if it worth 800 USD to get it fixed.

Nope, there is no log of such.

The data, such a spotlight DB, is stored on the drive itself.


How to make a copy of Xcode.app which is installed from App Store? I have installed Xcode 12.2 from the App Store. (I am using Big Sur 11.0.1).
I would like to use the XVim2 plugin for Xcode. In order to use the the XVim2 plugin, the Xcode app must be re-signed with a self-signed certificate. Since, re-signing the app will replace the original signature, I would like to keep 2 copies of the Xcode app- the original one signed by Apple and a copy which has been re-signed by me.
I tried to copy the Xcode app by performing the following steps-

Open Finder and go to /Applications
Copy Xcode.app
Go to ~/Desktop and paste the app
Rename the Xcode.app file in Desktop to XcodeVim.app
Move the XcodeVim.app file to /Applications

After these steps, if I try to open the Xcode.app or the XcodeVim.app, the apps do not respond. The activity monitor shows that a process called XProtectService uses a lot of CPU when I try to open the apps.
Is there any way to copy the Xcode app which is installed from the App Store?
P.S.-
I do not face this issue if I use the .xip file downloaded from https://developer.apple.com . I can make copies of the Xcode app and use them concurrently. However, I cannot use the .xip file from Apple Developer website as it does not support delta updates while App Store supports delta updates.

It's possible that modifying Xcode in this way is triggering macOS's built-in security features.
However, there are two easy ways to make a copy of the original app.

Compress the Xcode.app into a zip file.

A copy of the original Xcode will be saved as part of your backup, which you are already maintaining for reasons that include restoring modified apps.


Moving photos from one Photos library into another We have two Photo libraries (one for my wife and one for me, different user accounts on one Mac, El Capitan). Now I would like to move most photos and videos from her Photos library into my Photos library.

How can I do this easily?

I think the easiest way to do this is to export the photos from her library and then copy them to /Users/[username]/Public/Drop Box. You can access these public folder from every other account on your computer and import the photos into the new library.


How does HealthKit resolve recording of the same activity by multiple sources? What happens when more than one "source" registered with HealthKit tracks the same activity?

For example, if I have Human tracking my activity in general, and then use Cyclemeter (which supports HealthKit in version 10.3) to track particular bike ride, both will (I assume) submit the same activity to HealthKit. Presumably it should be possible for HealthKit to recognize that these activities are likely duplicates and at least ask me how to resolve the "duplication" (much as sync conflicts are resolved). In fact, the activities contain enough data that such recognition should generally be possible to perform automatically.

Does HealthKit do this? Does it resolve duplicate recordings of the same activity (either automatically or semi-automatically)?

HealthKit is pretty smart with your data. For every source in the Health app, you can set the priority of difference apps. Tap one of the metrics in the Health app tap Share data > Edit to drag sources in the right order.

If other apps request data, HealthKit will automatically merge the datasets, probably based on timestamps. It picks the high priority app first, and fills the gaps in data with the number 2 app, etc.

This WWDC would be a great start to get a complete overview.


iCloud sign out not possible on High Sierra I recently changed my Apple ID mail address. I was getting messages that I have to enter my password for my old iCloud address. Therefore I attempted to sign out on the system preferences. However every time I try this it gets stuck at some loading process. I have every iCloud service disabled. The internet-accounts panel says that this is not my primary iCloud account. I tried deleting the keychains folder and signed out and on again.

I was able to fix the issues by deleting the files in ~/Library/Accounts/ and ~/Library/Preferences/MobileMeAccounts.plist then logging out and in again before opening the panels again. Warning: This also removes every other account you have listed in the accounts folder.


Can I mirror my iPad's display using the VGA adapter for use in a presentation? I would love to be able to mirror the display of my iPad on a projector for use in a presentation. Is there any software available to do this - on the AppStore or if necessary for use with a jailbroken iPad?

There's no official way to achieve this.

You have to jailbreak your iPad and use a software like DisplayOut (works on all iDevices) to do this.


Connecting iMac 2012 to an Yamaha Amplifier I just bought a 2012 iMac and I want to connect it to my Yamaha Amplifier.

On my previous PC setup I had an external audio card which connected to the Amplifier via an optical cable. However, I don't want to use an external card anymore.

What are my options? Does the iMac have an optical out? Is it via the Headphone/Audio Line-Out Port?

If so, do I connect it directly to the optical port of the Amplifier or do I have to also buy a DAC?

Regards,

Valentin Ivanov

Yes the iMac have optical out, most Macs do.

You need one of these Toslink adapter that plugs into standard 3.5mm audio plug for iMac to output optical from that.

Those are pretty cheap, and most are bundled with the cable itself or some audio accessories. Some shops might give away one for free, I got mine that way.

Anyway, Good luck!


What are some good sources for Pages and Keynote templates? It doesn't matter whether they are for free or for purchase as long as they are compatible.

The best commercial packages of themes for the iWork apps, in my experience, are those from Jumsoft.(under Design) They produce themes for both Pages and Keynote, as well as animation and art packs.

For free templates, iWorkCommunity has a ton of Pages templates, and some decent Numbers templates as well for basic use. KeynoteUser also produces commercial themes, in addition to having some freebies, and an excellent blog and collection of links for other sources of high quality stuff.


"Battery is not charging"? When I connect the charger cable to my Macbook pro, sometimes the battery is not charged and I can read near the clock: "Battery is not charging".

If I unplug and reconnect the cable, it usually starts to charge again.

Even if the battery is not charging, the mac is not in "battery mode" (the charger works): it is just a battery issue.

thanks

That's actually not a bug, but a feature: as the battery ages by charge cycles, your computer won't charge if it's almost full in order to extend the battery's life. By unplugging and replugging the power supply, you force a battery recharge until it's full.


problems with computer itself due to improper disconnection of disk? I know if a disk is not ejected properly, that can cause corruption or data loss on that disk. But can it cause problems with the Mac as well, such as with the file directory? And if it did cause problems with the computer, would those be limited to how it relates to the disk in question?

If you were transferring content to your computer from the disk, the write could be left incomplete. The main purpose of ejecting is to make sure everything actually transferred properly, but if nothing is transferring, issues are unlikely on the computer and the disk. Although improper ejection can damage the disk, it does not damage the computer.


How do I stop getting password notifications from iCloud? I have been having this weird issue where my phone keeps asking for my iCloud password.  I enter the password but then it says the password is locked.

Is there a way I can fix this or get rid of all the nonfictions it keeps giving me?

My iPhone has been doing this way more often since the iOS 10.0.2 update.

From Apple KB : If your Apple ID is locked

If your Apple ID is locked
If you or someone else enters your password, security questions, or
other account information incorrectly too many times, your Apple ID
automatically locks to protect your security and you can't sign in to
any Apple services. You can unlock your Apple ID after you verify your
identity.
If your Apple ID is locked for security reasons, you might see one of
these alerts:

“This Apple ID has been disabled for security reasons”
"You can't sign in because your account was disabled for security reasons"
"This Apple ID has been locked for security reasons"

When you see one of these alerts, you can go to iforgot.apple.com
to unlock your account with your existing password or to reset your
password. After multiple unsuccessful attempts to unlock your
account, your Apple ID will remain locked and you can try again the
next day.
If you use two-step verification, you need to use your recovery
key and a trusted device. And if you use two-factor
authentication, you need a trusted device or trusted phone number
to unlock your Apple ID.
If you see a message that is different from the alerts above and you
can't reset your password, contact Apple for help.


Folder won't delete from Trash for "Can't delete "_ImageItems" because its pathname is too long" I'm trying to empty my trash on my iMac.  When I do, I can detete everything but 1 folder.  The one folder seems to reference itself infinitely.  Each time I click on the expander chevron, I get another folder of the same name with the same date.  When I created _ImageItems, there was only one level.
I've attached some screen clips.

You can use the command line in the terminal.
rm -rvf ~/.Trash/*

For completeness sake the options here from the rm man page:
-f  Attempt to remove the files without prompting for confirmation,
     regardless of the file's permissions.  If the file does not exist,
     do not display a diagnostic message or modify the exit status to
     reflect an error.  The -f option overrides any previous -i
     options.

-R[-r]  Attempt to remove the file hierarchy rooted in each file argument.
         The -R option implies the -d option.  If the -i option is speci-
         fied, the user is prompted for confirmation before each direc-
         tory's contents are processed (as well as before the attempt is
         made to remove the directory).  If the user does not respond
         affirmatively, the file hierarchy rooted in that directory is
         skipped.

 -v   Be verbose when deleting files, showing them as they are removed.


Why am unable to download free app? I am unable to download free app from App Store. All app showing same thing. I don't know what they want. Each app showing this **it. Plzz help me out soon

Tap Continue and verify your payment information. There is no way around it. If you do not have a credit card or debit card to add to your account, you won't be able to download any more apps.


Authorize a computer on a iPad with broken touch screen We have an iPad where the touch screen is not working. The rest of the device works fine, so we are using it for development purpose on our build server (we are using some third-party libraries which have not been built for the iPad simulator architecture so we must have a physical device connected to be able to build). The trouble is that we have bought a new build server and since our iPad is running iOS 7 we get the authorization dialogue: "Trust the currently connected computer? Trusting this computer will allow it to have full access to your device and all of its data." Since we cannot tap the "Trust" button the new machine is not able to use the iPad for development.

So my question is if it is possible to authorize the computer without having a working touch screen.

No.

If you could simply override the setting from the computer, that would defeat the purpose of iOS not exposing internal data until it has been approved through the touch interface.


Remote management on OSX platform over the internet (dynamic ip) I've installed a Mac into my parents' house. They're not tech people and I'll need to take care of all the system update/ software update, and possibly some remote assistance to them (screen sharing). I live in another country so this needs to be carried on over the internet.
I'm wondering what's the best option I have considering the following requirements:

I'm on Mac as well, so it doesn't need to be cross platform
Both me and them have dynamic IPs, I need to be able to connect to them without knowing their IP address
Ideally they'll use a non admin account with limited rights, but I'd like to remote login as administrator to perform administrative tasks.
It might be a paid service but it shouldn't be too expensive (10 euro/month)

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

If you and your parents both have an Apple ID, you can use screen sharing via iMessage (Messages app).
Open a conversation w/ your parents, click on the "Details" link in the top-right corner of the Messages app window, then on the two screens icon, then on "Ask to Share Screen". Your parents have to confirm the request dialog with the option allowing to control their computer selected. This will open the Screen Sharing app and will allow you to control the remote Mac. You can even copy files to their machine via drag-and-drop from your local machine into the remote screen window.

Administrative tasks in the Finder can be performed in non-admin accounts by just entering admin credentials into the respective prompts (for instance, login/password dialog after clicking a lock icon in Preferences.app or when installing an app via Installer.app). Just add an admin account for you and a non-admin account for your parents.
Administrative tasks in the command line can be performed via sudo.
Additionally, for remote administration/access, you can try
• TeamViewer (free for private use) https://www.teamviewer.com/en/download/mac-os/
or
• Screens (ca. 35 € one-time license) https://edovia.com/en/screens-mac/
Both have methods/software components to work with dynamic IPs/behind a NAT.


Issue downgrading MacOS Catalina to Mojave using bootable install on 16 inch MacBook Pro I've just got my 2019 MacBook Pro 16 in which came preinstalled with Catalina. To use 32 bit programs, I'm trying to use a bootable install in order to downgrade to Mojave, which I've done before.
I followed the instructions provided on this site: https://www.imore.com/how-make-bootable-installer-drive-downgrade. I also went into recovery mode to access Startup Security Utility to enable bootable installs.
In the final step of holding down Option while restarting, the prohibited symbol appears on the screen (circle with line through) and my system restarts normally.
Important thing to not: I couldn't download Mojave from the App Store on my new computer, as a warning would stop me saying:
    Update not found
    The requested version of macOS is not available

So I had to download Mojave on my older computer to create the bootable install. I checked articles like https://macreports.com/update-not-found-the-requested-version-of-macos-is-not-available-fix/. But nothing seems to work so far.
Does anyone know how I might be able to either download Mojave on my new computer, allow my computer to downgrade through bootable install, or perhaps otherwise downgrade my computer?

Downgrading MacBook Pro 16” to Mojave

The 16 inch MacBook Pro will not install Mojave. For those that are new versions of older gear like Mac Mini and iMacs, the drivers are likely good enough in Mojave so you can try using safari to download. There’s some good discussions on that below:

How to download Mojave now that Catalina is available?
How can I download an older version of OS X/macOS?
Mac OS X downloads do not begin, other app store downloads normal


How to reflect the names from one subnet to other I want to reflect the names from the WiFi network to which my Mac is connected on to the vmware virtual subnet on which my virtual machines connected.

If you are familiar with avahi-daemon's enable-reflector parameter; this is exactly what I am looking for in bonjour.

It appears you will need to create a Bonjour proxy to bridge the subnets. See Using Bonjour Across Subnets:

  The Bonjour proxy functionality that is built-in to the dns-sd command line program is the simplest solution to set up initially, but it can be difficult to maintain. Important to note is that although the man page for dns-sd says it first appeared on Mac OS 10.3 this is not true. It will run on 10.3, but it did not ship with the OS until Mac OS 10.4.

A summary of three approaches is available:

  The three ways to provide Bonjour service discovery across subnets or on a wide area network (WAN) are multicast routing, unicast DNS, or a Bonjour proxy for each service on every subnet. Each of these methods has advantages and disadvantages. In most situations, deciding factors will be the upfront effort required to setup the solution and the ongoing maintenance required to support the configuration.


Is there a way to add Services to the Trash Can's context menu? I am wondering if there is a way to add custom Services to the Trash Can's context menu (specifically the context menu that appears when right clicking the Trash Can from the dock rather than in a Finder window.). The reasoning is that I've built a series of simple programs to replicate the functionality of the now-deprecated "Securely Empty Trash" option in Finder, but I don't want to put it up for download until it has a proper OS-integrated feel.

In Yosemite and before, maybe (though exactly how is off-topic for this site), but specifically with El Capitan and forward, it's no longer possible to inject code into running processes, which is about the only way I can think of that you'd be able to override a system menu like that.


How do I disable text antialias (font smoothing) in Terminal and globally for all apps? I'd like to disable every kind of text anti-aliasing and font smoothing globally in OS X.

With OS X 10.8 on a mid-2013 MacBook Air 13", I've tried quite a few options:  the Turn off text smoothing for font sizes … and smaller, which corresponds to AppleAntiAliasingThreshold in NSGlobalDomain, doesn't seem to cause any effect — I've tried setting it to 12 through the interface, and to 24 through defaults, to no effect.

defaults read | fgrep Smooth returns nothing, but manually setting AppleFontSmoothing -int 0 or AppleSmoothFixedFontsSizeThreshold -int 24, for NSGlobalDomain, as per https://stackoverflow.com/questions/11660895/disable-anti-aliasing-fonts-in-xcode-4-4-in-mountain-lion, doesn't seem to cause any effect, either.

For example, with Terminal, if I go to preferences, in Settings, Text, Text, there's an option Antialias text, and it's ticked, and there's no way to untick it, because the whole option is greyed out.

How do I completely disable antialias in Terminal and globally for all apps?

defaults write -g AppleFontSmoothing -int 0 should just disable subpixel rendering, like unchecking  "Use LCD font smoothing when available" from the General preference pane. It only has effect after you quit and reopen applications.

Terminal does allow disabling antialiasing for some fonts like Monaco, but not for others like Menlo:

iTerm 2 allows disabling anti-aliasing for all fonts.

The "Turn off text smoothing for font sizes ... and smaller" setting has always affected only a small part of all UI elements. On my 10.8 VM, it affects text views in TextEdit, web views in Safari, and the names of files in Finder. The setting was removed from System Preferences in 10.9. defaults write -g AppleSmoothFixedFontsSizeThreshold -int still works in 10.9, but it affects an even smaller subset of all UI elements.

If you think text looks too blurry or bold by default, you can change to a lighter text rendering style by running defaults write -g AppleFontSmoothing -int 1 and quitting and reopening applications. It doesn't disable antialiasing or subpixel rendering though.


Slow/laggy rMBP (mid 2014) - nVidia card not being used? I have a mid 2014 MBPr & it is very sluggish (2-3 second response times moving between applications/slow chrome rendering) to the point that i did a full re-install of OS (High Sierra) at the weekend to see if this would speed up the laptop. There has been no significant speed increase with a fresh install

I downloaded XRG to benchmark the system to see if there is anything obvious & it shows that the  nVidia graphics card (GPU 2) wass not being used at all. Is this normal - i tried using chrome with graphic intense operations (maps, JS rendering etc) on the expectation it would kick in but has not.

is there anything obvious that could be causing this issue? Is there a way to 'switch on' the nVidia card to be used?

The spec of the machine is;

--Edit -- Memory footprint

You could try installing the NVIDIA Web Driver for your GPU. That's what I did to try and improve GPU performance on my old MBP with GeForce 320M. It also adds a preference pane where you can always switch back to using Apple's default GPU driver.

Since the NVIDIA driver archive is a pain to navigate I recommend using the NVIDIA Web Driver Auto Installer from here to automatically find and install the correct driver for your GPU.


Can iMac 5k be set up to change screen resolution at log in depending on user I have 2 users on iMac 5k and need each user to login at a different screen resolution (Default for one,  Looks like 2048 x 1152 for the other). Is this possible / can a script be set to run on login to set the resolution?

Yes, the display resolution can be different for each user. This is specified in System Preferences > Displays and the computer should remember these settings at login.


How to get two symbols “\ $“ in Swedish Apid Pro Keyboard? I have tried all compositions such as “shift+option”`+ any other letters but there is no symbol as “\ $“. How could get it?

If you have the Swedish Pro keyboard layout active in the input menu at the top right of the screen, $ is at option 4 and \ is at opton shift 7.


What happens if you create another folder alongside the Contents folder in an application bundle? I know the icons representing programs that end in .app are really a specially treated folder, and not a single file. And inside that folder, there is a folder called Contents, and in that folder lies all the guts of an application.

If one wanted to store information about an application (say, notes to oneself about crashes, workflows, or projects involving that application), just how bad of an idea would it be to create another folder inside the application bundle alongside the Contents folder? Would it break code signing? Make the folder stop behaving like an application bundle? Have no adverse side effects at all? Will folders inside the app bundle but outside Contents get clobbered in an app upgrade?

For instance, I bought Byword from the app store.
I have /Applications/Byword.app on my computer. /Applications/Byword.app/Contents/* contains the application itself. Could I create /Applications/Byword.app/My notes/* and store my own comments about the application there?

It wouldn't be that bad except for the whole completely using app packaging completely incorrectly. Anything inside that app won't get indexed by spotlight, if you delete that app then all notes and references are also gone.

I can't think of a sensible use case where this would be a good idea. Unless of course you are an app developer and you are wanting to store things during app execution.

I would not recommend doing this even though it should technically work.


Spoofing MAC address in a persistent fashion So I like to set a new, randomly-generated MAC address after every restart using

ruby -e 'print ("%02x"%((rand 64)*4|2))+(0..4).inject(""){|s,x|s+":%02x"%(rand 256)} + "\n"'

and then copy/pasting the output after the command

sudo ifconfig en0 ether

so that I get a new IP address from my ISP each day. I would like to further automate this process so that on startup my computer automatically runs these two commands, but I don't know enough about CLI syntax to make it work. How can I combine these two commands so that ifconfig takes the generated output of the ruby command in a single step? And then, how can I get that to automatically run at startup?

Thank you.

Run EDITOR=nano sudo crontab -e and add a line like this:

@reboot ifconfig en0 ether $(printf \%02x $(($RANDOM\%128*2)))$(head -c4 /dev/random|hexdump -v -e '/1 ":\%02x"')

Commands scheduled by @reboot are run after you restart or turn the computer on but not after you log out and back in. % has to be escaped as \% in crontab.

From a comment at http://osxdaily.com/2010/11/10/random-mac-address-generator/:

  You need to be careful that this does not generate multicast mac addresses, as these are technically illegal as source macs. The strict definition of a multicast mac address is one where the least significant bit of the first byte is set to 1. So if the first octet’s LSB is 1 (01, 03,05, a1, etc) you technically have a multicast mac source. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MAC_address.

  Using multicast src macs might not cause immediate connectivity problems, but certainly has implications for switches learning the mac address preventing unicast flooding, and routers allowing arp to resolve.

  Cisco, for example, will not allow mac learning if the source is non-unicast, and Cisco routers will not install arp entries for multicast macs to unicast ip addresses.