The macOS Mojave installer is not responding on my mid-2013 MacBook Air I don't  know why this is happening but 4 days ago due to some storage issue I completely cleaned my MacOS Mojave installed MacBook Air Mid 2013 and after clean up it came up with MacOS Mountain Lion:

My Specs:

Now I want to upgrade it to MacOS Mojave again, so I downloaded the Install macOS Mojave Installer:

But in the end it does not work as it's meant to. When I try to launch it it shows Not Responding all the time:

Has anyone else in this beautiful world faced this issue? Can someone suggest a solution?

It's not clear what "I completely cleaned my MacOS Mojave installed Macbook Air Mid 2013" means, but reading between the lines I'm assuming you have no user data on your internal drive.

If that's the case and all you want is to have macOS Mojave installed before adding back your user data, I'd start the process again as follows:

Fully shut down your Mac
Power up your Mac again but immediately press and hold the option⌘R keys1
Keep the keys down until you see either an Apple logo or spinning globe appear on screen (Note: If you have a firmware password set on your system, then let go of the keys when the password prompt appears)
Once the Utilities window appears you'll be in macOS Recovery Mode

Now choose to reinstall macOS and follow the prompts.

1. This choice of macOS Recovery keyboard shortcut allows the user to install the latest version of macOS that is compatible with your Mac. Since that's currently macOS Mojave, this should result in that being installed. You could also try using the ⌘R shortcut instead which allows you to install the latest macOS that was installed on your Mac, but without knowing what you've previously done this may not work as expected.


If my iPhone is running iOS 10 and my home button breaks, do I lose the ability to make an emergency call? I understand I can't get make regular calls if it breaks (if I have enabled a passcode). This seems like a safety issue if even the emergency call feature is impossible to access if the button is broken.

Am I missing a different way to access the emergency call feature?

You will need to turn on AssistiveTouch prior to needing to call Emergency.

Go to Settings -> General -> Accessibility -> AssistiveTouch and turn it On.  This will show a screen overlay of several options, including the home button.  (You can also just tell Siri to turn on AssistiveTouch)

Whenever you need to call Emergency, wake the iPhone the usual way and then tap the AssistiveTouch screen overlay and swipe to bring-up the ability to call Emergency.


Mission control and Dock are buggy Both my Mission Control and Dock are not working properly.

My Dock does not seem to recognize my mouse moving horizontally along the Dock, ie. magnification does not move and when magnification is turned off, the tooltip does not move.

Mission control opens with a gesture, but hovering over the names of desktops/fullscreen windows does not expand the top bar to show previews like normal, and clicking them does nothing but escape Mission Control.

I have tried restarting and even wiping preferences for dock/mission control using defaults delete com.apple.dock; killall Dock. This did not fix my issue.

If it matters, this issue along with general unresponsiveness had been happening and I reset PRAM and SMC. This fixed the general unresponsiveness and my menu bar, which was also not working, but did not fix this issue.

My issue has been fixed. Today, my clicking with my trackpad would not work. After some googling, I found that an my disconnecting my external mouse fixed that issue and my original one! No idea why, but I will be probably be replacing my mouse.


How to make a terminal window always float on top? I see tons of people who have asked this question in the past, and the answer is always the same.. "Use Afloat".  But since Afloat hasn't been updated in ages, and has only support for certain applications (and questionable support at that), I'm afraid that it is not an acceptable solution.

I want to be able to make an arbitrary window - in this case a terminal window - float on top of all other windows.  Please note that this is NOT the same as keeping it on "all desktops" (I'm already doing that), as the window will still pop behind other windows on the other desktops.

How can I, Using OSX Lion circa December of 2012, keep a specific Terminal window on top of all other windows, of all other applications?

TotalTerminal might be a better option. TotalTerminal has a visor mode that allows it to stay on top of all the other windows. You can choose to place it anywhere on the desktop, of course, and choose to have it slide out from one of those positions when you use CTRL-~ key combo or anything else you’ve set up. Plus it’s free.


Using mdfind to evaluate the text content of a specified file? I would like write an applescript to evaluate whether a particular file contains a specified string (perhaps as part of an if... then statement). I want to invoke a shell command using mdfind to do this and I am aware of how to restrict mdfind to find files containing a specified string only in specified directories:

mdfind -onlyin /Users/viktor/Desktop/ nintendo

This command will find all files containing the string "nintendo". Is it possible to somehow query a file rather than a directory? And return true / false or the file itself to indicate that the string is in the text content of the file? Putting a file name after "-onlyin" does not work of course...

Try:

set fileText to read POSIX file "/Users/John/Desktop/test.txt" as «class utf8»
fileText contains "nintendo"


Selecting which apps are allowed to cancel shutdown I find it hard to accept that any app can cancel an otherwise smooth shutdown of my mac.

Is there a setting somewhere that I would be able to approve certain apps, but not others, to the prevent shutdown?

OSX 10.10

An app will always cancel shutdown if it has an open unsaved document which needs your decision as to whether to save or not.

Also, if an app goes unresponsive, the shutdown will time out.

I'm not sure that behaviour can be changed, but I'm open to ideas.


"Go" button on the Finder window I am trying to remove the plug-in for Unsubscribe to avoid the message appearing every time I open my Mac.  To do so, I am supposed to click on the "Go" button in the Finder window.  Unfortunately, I can't see where is the "Go" button on the Finder window on an iMac OS X Version 10.7.5.

It is likely directing you to the Go menu in Finder. It looks like this.

(source: macosxtips.co.uk)


Can I copy by highlighting and paste by middle click on Mac OS X? I was using Linux for the last couple of years and I find it extremely useful to copy text by highlighting it as well as to paste by clicking a middle mouse button.

I'm using a Mac now and I wonder if I can achieve such behaviour on Mac OS X.

I wrote a free little C program that does something similar to Gilligan's answer. Whenever you drag-highlight or double-click text, it copies to the clipboard buffer. Then you can middle-mouse-click in any window to paste it. It is called "macpaste" and on Github (https://github.com/lodestone/macpaste). It works globally for every program I use that has textual data.

In iTerm2, disable their middle-click in Preferences, otherwise you'll get double pastes.


What file is responsible for saving window position? Since upgrading to Mojave in 2018, I've had some apps that simply will not remember their window positions properly. They remember the correct Space but not the correct display.
I use dual 27" screens [standard 1440p, not 'retina'], across multiple Spaces, set so both are the same Space [Mission Control prefs]. Left screen is the Primary. Both monitors are permanently connected.
Some apps - all Apple apps, not 3rd party - notably TextEdit, Messages & just recently Apple Remote Desktop has joined this list, after an SSD boot drive change done via Carbon Copy Cloner.
Messages is initially positioned on the right screen, & is set to re-open after Restart. Without fail, it will re-open at the correct height [top of screen] but not on the 2nd display, instead it's tight against the right-hand edge of the left display.
Recently ARD has started displaying similar behaviour. The app itself will open correctly on the right screen, but every other window launched from it will open hard against the right edge of the left screen.
Trashing the Saved Application State has no effect. A search of the drive for 'remotedesktop' brings a bewildering array of files. I've peeked inside a few of the plists but can't see anything like a position reference.
Does anyone have any idea where, generically, window positions are stored? If this is a similar location for many apps, then I can start to dig into which I could trash to try reset this behaviour.
I've reached the point where I'm quite willing to trash an overall Finder prefs list & reset everything from scratch for Spaces/positions if it will help… I just have no clue which one.
I'm not interested in any 3rd party window manager - the OS should be perfectly capable of doing this by itself [& did for many years].
Mac Pro 5,1 Mojave 10.14.6 [correct Metal2 Mac-flashed AMD GPU for Mojave] 64GB RAM, 1TB SSD, half full, 12TB other storage.
Late edit
I 'fixed' Apple Remote Desktop by setting it to 'None' in the Dock right click > Options. I can repeatedly repro the initial issue by toggling to & from 'This Desktop'.
This hasn't worked for Messages, which still stubbornly opens on the left screen.
Additional note I put a high bounty on this with no result. if someone can nail it, I will retrospectively award a 1000* point bounty [as it seems wasteful to just throw it away again]
*ah… Apparently, bounty is capped at 500, so it will have to be that instead.

Assuming the app uses NSWindow, then the position of document windows is usually described in the application's preference file like this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
    <key>NSWindow Frame TextWindow</key>
    <string>1324 504 544 481 0 0 2560 1417 </string>
</dict>
</plist>

.
For an Apple app, the .plist will be in something like ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.TextEdit/Data/Library/Preferences
A windows.plist file in Containers ... Saved Application State may also hold relevant data.


Opening any of the iWork suite brings up over 80 dialogs in a row Upon opening Pages, Keynote or Numbers I'm informed that it "needs to download the font X" with a skip or a download button via a dialog (great choice, something that remains in the centre of the screen regardless of which app is focused). It's just one font, it's perhaps 10 or 15 that reappear in a loop. I need to go beyond 80 clicks to clear them, even if I quit the app. Choosing download or skip makes no difference, the fonts are never installed, I don't know if they're even downloaded.

I've tried opening Font Book to download them there but when I click the download button I see a download meter appear and disappear in a flash. The font is never installed. They are all in the list of Mojave downloadable fonts.

I use a standard user account most of the time, so I logged in to my admin account and lo and behold, those 3 apps are marked for update. I ran the update, all 3 downloaded, not one updated.

I'd like to be able to get some work done instead of wondering how to track down and berate the developer that doesn't know not to test installs with elevated privileges, let alone for not making them work, so if you're feeling charitable (to me or that dev), any help will be much appreciated.

MacOS v10.14.6

iWork apps are:

Pages v8.2.1
Numbers v6.2.1
Keynote v9.2.1

I got those version numbers from the GetInfo mechanism, there's no way I'm opening the apps up again.

I managed to fix this, I hope this helps anyone else facing a similar problem.

1. Installing the fonts.

Font Book v9.0

Greyed out fonts that need to be installed have a "Download" button but if you look at the information there's a download link in there. I found that by copying and pasting it somewhere else the URL had a double slash "//" which was probably interfering with the ability to download it. It's actually a link to fonts in the /System directory.

I found most of the fonts I needed here:

/System/Library/Frameworks/ApplicationServices.framework/Frameworks/ATS.framework/Support/FontSubsets

By right clicking the font name and using the "Add Fonts…" dialog I could browse to the font and install them.

2. Permissions

The apps still didn't work. One of the Numbers crash reports said that /Applications/Numbers.app/Contents/SharedSupport/DocumentResources/Metadata.plist couldn't be accessed. When I checked all the permissions were screwed up - some folders were owned by root, others had permissions that locked out anyone but the owner. So:

sudo chmod -R g+rwx "/Applications/Pages.app/Contents/"
sudo chmod -R g+rwx "/Applications/Numbers.app/Contents/"
sudo chmod -R g+rwx "/Applications/Keynote.app/Contents/"

and chown commands across the right dirs seems to have fixed that.

Can't say I'm impressed with this turn of events, the standards at Apple really have been slipping badly of late.


The screen on my iPhone 5s no longer turns off automatically while I am talking on a call How to turn the screen off of my iPhone while on a call? Screen remaining on is causing unintended things like putting people on hold and unintended button presses. This is really annoying.

The most likely explanation for this behavior is that the Proximity sensor in your iPhone is not working as expected. It is a sensor located near the earpiece of your iPhone.

Proximity sensor is responsible for detecting if your iPhone is placed near your face, and in case it is, turn-off the screen automatically. This helps in preventing unintended taps on the screen as well as preserving battery life while on a call.

To resolve, you can try the following steps one by one:

Make sure nothing is obstructing the proximity sensor. A screen guard, dust accumulation, case etc.
Restart your iPhone. This can sometime help in re-setting any software bug/glitch which may be interfering with the working of Proximity sensor.
Update to the latest version of iOS software available for your iPhone. This can help by doing away with any software bug which may be interfering with the working of Proximity sensor.
If everything above fails, you can try by factory resetting your iPhone and see if that fixes the issue.
Your last resort would be to get your iPhone inspected by an Apple authorized service provider or technician and get the Proximity sensor replaced.

Image source: https://drfone.wondershare.com/iphone-problems/fix-your-iphone-proximity-sensor-by-yourself.html


Batch command to change each file's creation date to match the information in the file name I have a folder with several hundred video files. All files names are in this format:

2011-08-27 11.18.00

Unfortunately the 'Date Created' for each file is the date on which it were converted (a date in 2014), not the date it was originally taken (specified in the file name).

I've found that the touch -t operator can be used to change the creation date of a single file.

Below: file on which I've successfully changed the Date Created (with above command) and file for which Date Created is still incorrect.

Can anyone help with terminal code that would extract YYYYMMDDhhmm info from each file name and use it for the for the touch -t operation for that file, in a batch operation?

I'd like the creation date / time to be correct so that when I import into my library each file will be in the right place in the timeline.

Mac OS: El Capitan 10.11.5

Terminal Version: 2.6.1

Thanks all.

open Terminal
type cd (including the trailing space) and drag the folder containing the files to be renamed into the Terminal window (the folder is probably Desktop/PRIMARYVIDEOS, so the command should look like cd /Users/Andrew/Desktop/PRIMARYVIDEOS)
press Enter
type (or copy/paste)

for f in *; do t=$(echo $f | sed -E 's/[-. mov]//g'); echo touch -t $t "$f"; done

press Enter
if (and only if) this results in a list of touch commands which look ok, type (or copy/paste)

for f in *; do t=$(echo $f | sed -E 's/[-. mov]//g'); touch -t $t "$f"; done

press Enter


time machine recover from specific sparsbundle My time machine has three sparsebundles. Obviously something wen wrong long time ago.

I am also missing files for a while and most probably they are in the oldest sparsebundle.

How do I access a specific sparsebundle and explore files in them?

Might be easier to do it manually than try to persuade the Time Machine GUI to use a specific one (if that's even possible). Double-click the sparsebundle and it'll mount like any other disk image. You'll find the individually-dated backups under the /Backups.backupdb/(computer-name) folder.


Administrator Password pop up screen does not open I have Macpro4.1 running Yosemite. Suddenly I can't do anything that requires Administrator's password. The pop up screen to type in password does not come up.
If I go to Users & Groups and click on the lock, It will say authenticating but just spins and password screen does not open. If I try to access passwords in Keychain the app will lock up and I have to force quit.
Any ideas on how to fix this problem?

I would suggest you to:

Reset NVRAM or PRAM on your Mac

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

Test after this.
Note: When your Mac finishes starting up, you might want to open System Preferences and adjust any settings that were reset, such as sound volume, display resolution, startup disk selection, or time zone.

If this doesn't help then at last try to:
Reset the SMC on Mac

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

This two reset should help.


git doesn't work anymore after moving user home to external drive I've moved my users home directory from /Users/romeovs to /Volumes/DATA/home and ever since I get a git error.

Whenever I use git clone or git init it replies:

 fatal: Failed to expand user dir in: '~git/init'

has anyone had this problem?
I tried reinstalling git from hombrew but that didn't fix it (I am using the homebrew installed git from /usr/local/Cellar)

The problem was indeed a faulty configuration directive:

[init]
     templatedir=~git/init

which I accidently copied from another machine, without copying the template directory as well.


Best tips in regard to calibrating a macbook pro screen My eyes hurt a lot since I have a macbook (current is antiglare 15 inch, last one was 13 inch).

What's the best way to calibrate the screen (hardware calibrator, software, internal calibration)?

Other best practices in regard to the topic?

In my experience, with the exception of my first-gen fluorescent backlit plastic MacBook, which has never looked quite right, Apple displays ship with excellent default calibration.

Unlike TVs which are optimized to maximize their brightness in already bright fluorescent-lit showrooms, Apple tends to ship their displays calibrated for rooms with normal levels of incandescent light.

That said, if you'd like to get into color calibration, try calibrating by eye first. Turn on the advanced settings for a load of controls. Just follow the instructions carefully.

  System Preferences > Displays > Color > Calibrate

If you have a good eye, aren't doing color sensitive work, and just want to get your display to "look good", this might be all you need. During the calibration, make sure the ambient (room) lighting matches what it will be while you're using the display normally.

Also, while doing the test, you might want to get some distance from the screen and squint a bit, especially for the tests that have you judging brightness levels.

If you need something more high end, you might want to look into something hardware based like these products: Pantone Huey, Colormunki, Datacolor Spyder.

Depending on which of these you get, you'll be able to not only calibrate your display so that it displays color accurately, but also generate color profiles for proofing so you can simulate what your work will look like when printed on a specific printer, paper, inks etc.


How to select which iOS device receives push notifications (for Facebook) I've got an iPad 2 and an iPhone 3GS, both of which have the official Facebook app. Since I set up Facebook on my iPad, only my iPad has been receiving notifications from Facebook. (I think this might also be the case with other apps.)

Ideally I'd like to receive notifications on both devices. Is this possible?

If not, how do I select which device receives notifications? Is it a simple matter of turning off notifications for a given app on one device, and leaving them on for the other?

Just of note that Facebook is notorious for being extremely flakey when delivering notifications of any kind (whether they be system wide through the home screen icon, or even in-app). If you have Push enabled on both devices, the problems could lie within Facebook.

Also note that it may (read: should) be the case that when you check your account on one device, the notifications should disappear on the other, as they will be marked as read.

Additionally, it could be that Facebook's servers deliver a notification only once to any waiting device capable of handling them (remember they have millions of users to contend with). You'll have to contact Facebook to make certain of this however.

You can use mail to test it. If you send yourself an email, do you receive notifications on both devices? If you read the mail, do they disappear (get marked as read) on both devices?


Disable Waiting for Activation Popup After my phone reboots a popup appears "Waiting for Activation This may take some time." How can I disable this? I'm using a deactivated SIM card. I would like the card to remain deactivated. This is on an iPhone 5S and iPhone6.

I faced this problem before. You can try to use this trick:

Go to Settings ~> Message and Turn Off iMessage + Facetime.
Turn on the Airplane Mode.
Turn on Wi-Fi.
Turn on iMessage like the first step. The system will ask you for your Apple ID If it is not added yet.
Turn Off the Air Plane Mode.
iMessage should work properly now.

Source.


How do I get music labeled under "various artists" to appear under the artist themselves? I'm uploading some of my albums and I have a few things (such as soundtracks) that have multiple artists on the album. I want the individual songs to show up under the artist instead of the "various artist" label. I've tried unclicking the "part of compilation" button, but it isn't quite working. Any suggestions?

Besides the Compilation checkbox, look under the Sorting tab.  The songs are probably configured with sort artist as "various artist".  Clear that field for all of the tracks and they will default back to the appropriate artist value.


Any ideas why Mavericks is slowing down due to BetterSnapTool? I use BetterSnapTool to resize my windows with keyboard shortcuts. Since upgrading to Mavericks, after I've used my computer for 6-12ish hours, scrolling and moving things around the screen using the trackpad becomes sluggish and stutters. When I close BetterSnapTool, it fixes the issue, and it stays fixed until I relaunch.

Any ideas what is causing the issue? Is there an easy, low overhead way to automatically quit and relaunch BetterSnapTool every 4 hours or so?

(This answers the second question about how to automate restarting BetterSnapTool. Since I haven't experienced the issue described and have no second-hand explanations, I can't answer the question of why this is happening.)

Here is a quick and simple AppleScript I whipped up that works for restarting BetterSnapTools:

tell application "BetterSnapTool"
quit
end tell

delay 2 -- Wait for BetterSnapTool to close

tell application "BetterSnapTool" to activate

If you want to set this to automatically run every, say, 6 hours I think your best bet is to create a Launch Daemon using launchd. A quick presentation of this approach can be found here. For more information, check the entry on creating Launch Daemons in the apple developer's library.

You said "low overhead", which I took to mean using only methods native to OS X. If you're fine with third-party software, though, this GUI application for cron (the precursor to launchd) scheduling seems promising (but I haven't tried it so can't be certain).


MacBook Pro will not wake from sleep after installing third party application I installed an application called Air Parrot that uses air play with an Apple tv to mirror or extend the desktop.  I noticed that after I installed it, I am no longer able to wake my Mac from sleep.  I have to do a hard reset every time.  I have also noticed the activity light on the front stays bright and does not dim like it should in sleep mode.  I've reset the PRAM and done an EFI Firmware update to no avail.

I have uninstalled the application and ran CC cleaner as well as CleanMyMac.  I suspect this app because it is listed in an error log that generates every time I restart my Mac.

Any help would be very appreciated.

I have the same problem, and I'm in the process of updating my Air Parrot to 1.1.3 (the newest version), which I think will help.


How do I make Safari, Chrome, Mail, and other applications all use different SOCKS proxies How do I make different applications like Safari, Chrome, and Mail all use different SOCKS proxies.

FireFox has it's own proxy settings, but Safari, Chrome, and presumably Mail all use the system proxy  settings.  I need them to all use different SOCKS proxies, all running simultaneously under the same user and login.

I have all the SOCKS proxies set up on different ports already, each is proxies into a different company in a different country using ssh -D.

You need a program like Proxycap. You can configure it like this.


Error in opening Microsoft Word through Terminal I haven't been able to open Microsoft Word through Terminal.
I tried:

open -a Microsoft\Word

But I get this in return:

Unable to find application named 'MicrosoftWord'

How can I open Microsoft Word (I see it in Applications so I know it's installed)?

You are missing a space, it should be:

open -a Microsoft\ Word

Or:

open -a "Microsoft Word"

Program names that contain spaces need to be escaped with a \ backslash or use " quotes around the name, but not both.


Running flash on MacBook Air V1 I run applications that use Adobe Flash.

This causes my MacBook Air (1st generation) to heat up and end up becoming unusable.

Someone suggested running flash after creating a new Windows Partition, because Mac OS-X does not support Flash very well.

Will it help to run Flash that way?

I have found that Parallels and VMWare are painfully slow on a 1st gen MBA. You could use Chrome when you need Flash as it runs a browser-specific instance of Flash rather than calling the system Flash instance. Flash is very CPU-intensive so it may very well heat up the machine more than normal — I seem to recall mine always being pretty hot on the bottom.

John Gruber has a great article on removing Flash from OS X and then just using Chrome when you need it here - http://daringfireball.net/2010/11/flash_free_and_cheating_with_google_chrome


Nano Memory card does not show up in Finder nor Disk Utility I have a Nano Memory card working fine. I know it's fine because it contains a bootable ubuntu OS that is being used in a Raspberry Pi.

When I plug it to my Macbook Pro (Mojave 10.14.5) it does not show up in Finder nor even in Disk Utility.

Working as designed.  macOS doesn't support the linux filesystems that linux uses to boot.  The one I use for booting is ext4.

check what filesystem you formatted flash driver with.

For ext4, you can install one of these drivers.

http://osxdaily.com/2014/03/20/mount-ext-linux-file-system-mac/

https://www.paragon-software.com/us/home/extfs-mac/#


Setup wifi access on iPhone when out of range I want to setup a wifi connection on an iPhone 6S.

I have the SSID name and WPA password.  But the wifi access point is out of range.  It is not my phone.  I want to set up the wifi name and password so that when the access point is within range in the future, it autoconnects.

When I try to add the connection it complains that it cannot connect, so it is wrong, so it won't save it.

Is there a way?  So far the only way I found is to setup a local wifi hotspot with the same name and password and connect to that.  I am not sure it works.

Perhaps you can set up a temporary access point at your present location with the same SSID and password, then connect to that?  I do not know if the iPhone is going to save some other router-specific identifying information which would prevent connection at the other location, but if you have two routers available to you where you are it would be pretty easy to test.


Multiple keychain-db files on Sierra I tried resetting my login keychain on Sierra because I was seeing lots of duplicate codesigning identities when running security find-identity -v -p codesigning. It renamed my login keychain to login_renamed_1 and created a new login keychain for me.

But when I run security list-keychains there are 12 items called /<my_user>/Library/Keychains/login_renamed_1.keychain-db shown. So I tried deleting the login_renamed_1 keychain using Keychain Access, but still these keychain-db files remain.

I also tried rebooting.

How do I get rid of them?

So I discovered that you can fix it by editing the associated plist and remove the offending duplicates.

i.e. sudo vi ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.security.plist


Useless swipe in App Exposé in Sierra If I invoke Exposé and use the gesture to swipe between fullscreen apps, open windows from other applications will show (similar to ⌘+⇥). However, I cannot click on them to bring them to the front, so it is practically useless.

I noticed this behavior since Sierra and wonder if this is intended behavior or just a bug.

Bonus question (Since I don't have access to macOS 10.11 or lower): Has this behavior existed before?

i think i know what you're talking about. expose used to have this really annoying "feature" where it required a mouse move before it would register a click. so if i used expose and the window i wanted was right under my mouse cursor, i couldn't just click it. i had to move my mouse a little, then i could click it

but, i just tried reproducing this in macos sierra and the problem is gone!


WeChat: "Voice call may be compromised and incur charges on current network" In a WeChat video call, I periodically see the following message: "Voice call may be compromised and incur charges on current network.", even after I press OK. What does this mean? How can I stop this message from re-appearing?

Best guess - it means you are not on wifi, so are [potentially] paying regular data charge over your standard carrier network.

If you have a huge data allowance you can probably ignore this, but 2GB a month or pay-as-you-go & you'll be eating that allowance rapidly on a video call.


How can I see a list of apps that have the ability to record my keyboard history? How can I see a list of programs/services that have the ability to record my keyboard history? My goal is to prevent programs from recording my keyboard history without root privilege. I cannot seem to find any Apple's documentation on its security policies. References are also appreciated.

Apps which are in the foreground are granted access to the keyboard automatically.
Apps which are run by your user account but are not in the foreground require accessibility access to access the keyboard. The list of applications granted access to this is available in System Preferences → Security & Privacy → Accessibility. Here you can add and remove applications to grant and deny access, however some applications may lose functionality.
Apps which run as root are not restricted in this way. You will have been required to authorise this before this is permitted. You can check the current list of running root processes in Activity Monitor.

Keep in mind there's no keyboard history maintained — the apps must be recording it live.


Dragging files onto desktop causes Finder window to unwantedly open Every time I drag a file onto my desktop, my finder folder opens. This is new to OS X 10.9 Mavericks. How do I disable this behavior?

I found a similar question that said it's a problem with Google Chrome.

Using the latest version of Chrome seems to solve the problem.


Keyboard shortcut for current window position I am looking for the keyboard shortcut to place the current window in half of the screen, either to the left or right. This functionality is performed in windows by typing the windows button plus left or right.

How is this done on Mac OSX?

Slate is an extremely customizable keyboard window management tool. It can take a while to get setup (although there are some example configs) but it's totally worth it.

Edit:

Slate has seemly abandoned at this point. I have switched to Phoenix which is very similar and more actively developed.


VirtualBox - Sharing a folder I'm a Windows 10 user, running macOS High Sierra 10.13 via VirtualBox 5.1.28.
I didn't fully understand how to share a folder.
The part that I did understand and did, is:

Devices → Insert Guest Additions CD image...

But then, in macOS, I type in the terminal:

sudo mount -t vboxsf release_builds ~/Downloads/SteamCMD-GUI

And I get the error:

mount: exec /Library/Filesystems/vboxsf.fs/Contents/Resources/mount_vboxsf for /Users/avi12/Downloads/SteamCMD-GUI: No such file or directory

Later, I checked the directory /Library/Filesystems, and found that:

Which means that, there's actually no directory vboxsf.fs, so there would obviously be an error.

The question is then, what part am I missing?

There are no guest additions for macOS in VirtualBox. The shared folder feature of VirtualBox won't work here.

You have to configure a share on the host system and access it from inside the guest with one of the common methods:

Finder > Go > Connect to server... cmdK
Terminal: mount -t smbfs //username:password@server/share .../mountpoint
Finder window > sidebar > Shared > choose share >

Some network connection between host and guest is required (e.g NAT or bridged adapter). Using the latter requires to set up an IP-address in macOS in the same network as the host's adapter.

To set up a bridged adapter for a guest (which has to be shut down) do the following:

Choose the VM > Settings > Network > Adapter 1 > Check Enable Network Adapter > Attached to > Bridged Adapter > choose a network interface of the host (usually either Ethernet or Wi-Fi)
Check the IP config of this interface in the host (e.g. IP= 192.168.0.2 Netmask= 255.255.255.0 Gateway=192.168.0.1 DNS=8.8.8.8)
Use the same config in the guest but choose a different IP (e.g. 192.168.0.111)
Connect from the guest to the host with cmdK > enter smb://192.168.0.2/Share_name > enter the credentials


How to fix a completely unresponsive MacBook Pro 2018 keyboard? I have a 2018 Macbook Pro 13” with Touch Bar running MacOS Catalina. Today my keyboard suddenly stopped working after sleep. It simply would not output ANYTHING. I foolishly restarted my computer before even trying to look into some settings. After that I was unable to login, connect a bluetooth keyboard, nothing. I could not even hold the option key to boot into bootcamp. I’m simply in shock right now, as my MacBook really cost a ton and is extremely vital to my studies and hobbies.
Thank you so much for any help!

It's worth taking it to the Apple Store. There have been hardware/manufacturing problems with recent MacBook keyboards, and if it is such a problem, then Apple should fix it free.

Apple currently has a "Keyboard Service Program" for a range of laptops, including yours.


What is the best way to make backups on my MacBook Pro? What is the best way to make automatic backups on my MacBook Pro? It's more preferable that synchronization will perform via Wi-Fi.

I heard that Apple's Time Capsule has short-living time, so I thought that there exists alternate way.

I would be glad to see any recommendations and success stories.

Thanks.

I have an external hard disk connected to an AirPort Extreme. Time Machine wirelessly backs up my MacBook Pro to it. In this regard, it works the same as TimeCapsule but as the hard disk is external (and you get to choose it), it doesn't suffer from the same reliability problems.

I've found the AirPort Extreme to be a very good Wireless Access Point, too (and not just for Apple devices).


Subversion - Homebrew vs. Xcode command line tools I have to update Subversion on my system because I'm working with a server which is running the version 1.7 and this stops me to make commits.

This is the error it returns:

$ svn commit
svn: The path '...' appears to be part of a Subversion 1.7 or greater working copy.
Please upgrade your Subversion client to use this working copy.

Currently I'm running the version 1.6.18

$ svn --version
svn, version 1.6.18 (r1303927)
   compiled Aug  4 2012, 19:46:53

Copyright (C) 2000-2009 CollabNet.
Subversion is open source software, see http://subversion.apache.org/
This product includes software developed by CollabNet (http://www.Collab.Net/).

I read this question in which the user asked how is it possible to install the version 1.7. They said that this is possible through MacPorts. However I'm using Homebrew as package manager. It provides Subversion 1.7.7

$ brew info subversion
subversion: stable 1.7.7
http://subversion.apache.org/
Depends on: pkg-config, neon, sqlite, serf
Not installed

However I suppose that having two SVN version installed could bring to some conflicts. Is that true? How can I manage it without removing the Xcode command line tools?

No, there shouldn't be a problem having 2 different versions of Subversion installed at the same time. MacPorts and Homebrew will install their executable binaries to a different path.

The version which actually gets executed when executing svn in the shell depends on your $PATH environment variable, which contains a list of directories to search through, in order.

If your $PATH variable lists the directory where Homebrew installs binaries first (I believe this is the default configuration), svn will use the more recent version.


How do I use karabiner to define two Shift+L to enter a key? My current definition lets me input "<" when I tap SHIFT_L:

__KeyOverlaidModifier__
KeyCode::SHIFT_L,
KeyCode::SHIFT_L, KeyCode::BACKQUOTE

But I want to change it so I have to press SHIFT_L twice. I've tried this, but it doesn't work:

__KeyOverlaidModifier__
KeyCode::SHIFT_L,
KeyCode::SHIFT_L,
KeyCode::SHIFT_L, KeyCode::BACKQUOTE

Ok, I figured it out, I just had to use a different command:

__DoublePressModifier__
KeyCode::SHIFT_L,
KeyCode::SHIFT_L,
KeyCode::SHIFT_L, KeyCode::BACKQUOTE


Remove rogue keyboard shortcut in OSX I recently followed this blog to add a keyboard shortcut to lock the screen:

http://hpmalte.blogspot.ca/2012/01/keyboard-shortcut-to-lock-screen-in-os.html

I assigned the commandL keyboard shortcut to this script. I recently discovered the built-in ctrlshifteject, which is better.

Now I'm trying to remove the commandL shortcut, but it has disappeared from my keyboard shortcuts preferences! The keybinding still works, but it's not listed in keyboard shortcuts, and I do not know how to remove it now.

Does anyone know how? Thanks!

The Service should have been saved in ~/Library/Services (~ means your home directory), so have a look for the file there. Deleting it should remove the functionality (although it should be showing up in the Services section of Keyboard Shortcuts — check to make sure it's not in a collapsed section).


Can't delete Logical Volume Group on Fusion drive I have a 2014 iMac Retina running OS X Yosemite and a 3TB Fusion drive. I am attempting to restore it from a Time Machine backup, but when I try to do so, I get the error message, "The disk can't be erased." referring to the Macintosh HD Fusion drive. Trying to use disk utility to delete the drive also doesn't work.

I had previously had this problem when I had to restore my computer, and managed to use the solution found here using Terminal to manually delete the Logical Volume Group. However, now when I use the command:

diskutil cs deleteLVG UUID

The process begins and says "Destroying Logical Volume Group" but it only gets to 20% and then nothing happens. Even after letting it sit for hours it shows no further progress.

I also found this solution here, which recommends using the command

diskutil cs deleteVolume UUID

to delete the Logical Volume first, prior to deleting the Logical Volume Group, but when I do so I get the following message:

  Error: -69779: Unable to delete the CoreStorage Logical Volume

So at this point I'm stuck. If anyone has any other suggestions for how I can delete the Fusion drive and restore from my Time Machine backup, I would appreciate any help. Thanks.

If all other means fail to remove a CoreStorage Volume Group you can always use gpt to remove the CS partition (or the CS partitions if it is a Fusion Drive).

Preparation:

Detach your backup drive
Restart to Internet Recovery Mode by pressing alt cmd R at startup.

The prerequisites are the latest firmware update installed, either ethernet or WLAN (WPA/WPA2) and a router with DHCP activated.
On a 50 Mbps-line it takes about 4 min (presenting a small animated globe) to boot into a recovery netboot image which usually is loaded from an Apple/Akamai server.

I recommend ethernet because it's more reliable. If you are restricted to WIFI and the boot process fails, just restart your Mac until you succeed booting.

Alternatively you may start from a bootable installer thumb drive (preferably Yosemite or El Capitan) or a thumb drive containing a full system (preferably Yosemite or El Capitan). If you boot to a full system and login as admin you have to prepend sudo to execute some commands like gpt ... or newfs_hfs ...!

Modify the GUID partition table and replace your current LVG

Enter diskutil list and gpt -r show /dev/diskX (with diskX: the disk identifiers of your internal disks (probably disk0 SSD/disk1 HDD) to get an overview. In the commands below I assume the disk identifiers are disk0/disk1.
To delete a partition use:

diskutil umountDisk /dev/disk2 #unmount the Logical Volume(s)
diskutil umountDisk /dev/disk0
diskutil umountDisk /dev/disk1
gpt remove -i index_number /dev/disk0
gpt remove -i index_number /dev/disk1

Usually the Physical Volumes of a Fusion Drive have the index number 2:

gpt remove -i 2 /dev/disk0
gpt remove -i 2 /dev/disk1

Re-add the partitions with the same start block and sizes as they had previously

gpt add -b StartBlock -i 2 -s size -t 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC /dev/disk0
gpt add -b StartBlock -i 2 -s size -t 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC /dev/disk1

Format the new partition:

newfs_hfs -v "SSD" -J /dev/disk0s2
newfs_hfs -v "HDD" -J /dev/disk1s2

Create a new Logical Volume Group (or "Fusion Drive"):

diskutil cs create name disk0s2 disk1s2 #name: name of the future LVG (e.g. FusinDrive)

Create a new Logical Volume:

diskutil cs list
diskutil cs createVolume lvgUUID jhfs+ name 100% #lvgUUID: the UUID of the Logical Volume Group, name: name of the future LV (e.g. MacintoshHD)

or

diskutil cs createVolume lvgUUID jhfs+ name size #size in t, g, m (e.g. 3100g)

To quit Terminal enter:

exit

and quit Terminal
Open Disk Utility to verify the new LVG/LV
Attach the backup drive
Open Time Machine and restore your backup


Replacing sync services Apple is dropping in iCloud I have a two Macs at home and one at work that I have kept nicely synced with a combination of MobileMe and Jungle Disk. Apple's replacement for MobileMe, iCloud, looks interesting, but I am not going to switch until I have an adequate replacement for three syncing services Apple is dropping.

Mail Rule Syncing
Preference Syncing
Keychain Syncing

What are my options at present for replacing these services?

You can sync your keychain with Keychain2go


iPhone plays/pauses/skips songs and activates siri only when connected to earphones I have had my iphone 5s (still have version 7.1.1) for three years now and never have encountered such a problem until recently.

When I plug my earphones, it works well depending on whether i want to facetime or play music but lately, it frequently stops, skips, pauses songs or activate Siri on its own accord. It even ends my facetime calls while i'm talking, so i have to call back every time (I can call back for more than 7-10 times).

Can someone help me???

PS: it never does this when its not connected to my headphones

You need a new headset.

The symptoms you are describing is because the "controller" assembly of your headset (the part that has the buttons and the microphone) is failing; most likely due to moisture (or some other contaminant) getting in and interfering with the circuitry.

I have had this happen to me on several occasions and not just limited to Apple headsets.    Get a good quality headset that is also water resistant like the Bose SoundSport and you shouldn't have this problem again.  (Going on 4 years with my Bose where I wouldn't last a year with the regular ones).


How do I add Wikipedia as a search provider for the Safari search bar? In Safari, when I click on the magnifying glass in the search bar I get a menu, the bottom of which lists Google, Yahoo!, and Bing. I'd like to see Wikipedia here too, and get results returned from the Wikipedia website.

FYI, I'm using Safari 5.1 on Snow Leopard.

There's a plugin for Safari called Glims that lets you add different search engines (including Wikipedia) to the search bar among other tweaks. You can read about and download it here.

Here's a post on someone's blog that details how to install it and set your search engines to what you want.

Hope that helps!


How does the Keychain identify executables? I am wondering how the Keychain identifies applications. I suspect that this based on code signing, but the experiments are not really consistent with this:

It works for executables that are not signed at all:

codesign -dv  /Library/Frameworks/R.framework/Resources/bin/exec/R
# /Library/Frameworks/R.framework/Resources/bin/exec/R: code object is not signed at all

But the R process is added to the ACL of this secret, and it can query it happily...

There is also nothing in the extended attributes of the executable:

xattr -l  /usr/bin/security
#

If I change the file itself, it still works:

cp /usr/bin/security foobar
echo "\nharmless" >> foobar
./foobar find-generic-password -a 'gaborcsardi' -s foobar -g
# keychain: "/Users/gaborcsardi/Library/Keychains/login.keychain"
# class: "genp"
# attributes:
#     0x00000007 <blob>="foobar"
#     0x00000008 <blob>=<NULL>
#     "acct"<blob>="gaborcsardi"
# ...
# password: "secret"

But then how does it work? More specifically, how does the keychain know that the password query is coming from the security app, that I specifically allowed access to this entry?

The Keychain doesn't identify applications, the applications call the Keychain API

  The Keychain Services API provides a solution to this problem. By
  making a single call to this API, an app can store small bits of
  secret information on a keychain, from which the app can later
  retrieve the information—also with a single call. The keychain secures
  data by encrypting it before storing it in the file system, relieving
  you of the need to implement complicated encryption algorithms. The
  system also carefully controls access to stored items. The entire
  keychain can be locked, meaning no one can decrypt its protected
  contents until it is unlocked with a master password. Even with an
  unlocked keychain, the system’s Keychain Access policy ensures that
  only authorized apps gain access to a given item in the keychain. In
  the simplest case, the app that created an item is the only one that
  can access it later. However, Keychain Services also provides ways to
  share secrets among apps.


Disable 'allow permission to send push notification' in Safari 11.1 Even though the option of "Allow websites to ask permission to send push notifications" is unchecked, I get alert in websites asking for permissions. How do disable this completely?

Also to confirm, I'm getting the native alerts asking for permission. Like this:

This seems to be a bug in Safari, you should report in Apple, as did I


How can I configure Lion to use PHP mail() locally? I'm doing web development with PHP on my mac and need to be able to use the mail command locally (on localhost). What do I have to configure to get the PHP mail() command working?

PS: On Windows I used hmail for this.

I mean how to connect PHP with mail server on my mac, i noticed when i type mail on terminal, it seems mac already come with Mail Server.

This works for me at OS X Snow Leopard:

When an email is sent using PHP's mail() function, the email is piped through to the smtp_catcher.php script.
The smtp_catcher.php script saves the email into a local folder as a .emlx file.
The email is opened through Apple Mail and displayed on the screen (woo!).


Why does Enterprise Connect exit immediately? Attempts to restart Enterprise Connect do not result in showing its icon or menu.

Using the command line in the Terminal app and running the application from there with an option attempting to show a list of options I was able to mount the share.  It persisted after pressing Ctrl+C.

$ /Applications/Enterprise\ Connect.app/Contents/MacOS/Enterprise\ Connect --help
2019-02-17 12:14:34.871 Enterprise Connect[38321:1060864] mounting shares is done


Can‘t update any iOS Apps: “If you have an Apple ID, sign in with it here“ Edit: I did a factory reset and it worked. Very annoying bug...
I haven‘t been able to update apps in months. Whenever I click on update, the App Store prompts me with:

“If you have an Apple ID, sign in with it here.“

Not only am I already logged into my account (yes, it is the same account that I used to download the app), there is literally no way I can log in with this prompt, since it asks for only a password and not an email + password. Whatever I type in, I get “Your Apple Id or Password is incorrect.“
Here‘s what I‘ve tried:

Updating iOS

Restarting iPhone several times

Logging in and out of different Apple Accounts

Does anyone have any ideas on what I should do? Anything I’m missing?
I haven‘t really cared much but now WhatsApp is forcing me to update and refuses to support my version so I literally cannot use it. I also don‘t want to delete and reinstall it because I would lose my chat and document histories.

To anyone having the same problem, the only thing that worked for me was doing a full reset.


App to lock the phone “right now” I configure my devices to only turn off the screen after a couple of minutes, and only lock themselves several minutes after (so I can quickly turn on the screen without needing to unlock them all the time), for example when outside walking for geocaching.
On Android, I have an application on my home screen which forces locking the phone (i.e. turns off the screen and makes it so that it requires the PIN when turned on again), which makes this scenario useful/secure. I would call this app when I want to turn off the device without needing to turn it on soon.
Which app do I need to install on iOS to achieve the same effect? (iPhone SE, iOS 13)

[Apple] - Use Emergency SOS on your iPhone:

Press and hold the side button and one of the Volume buttons until the Emergency SOS slider appears.

This locks the screen and requires a pin:

If you use the Emergency SOS shortcut, you need to enter your passcode to re-enable Touch ID, even if you don't complete a call to emergency services.

If that doesn't work (iPhone 7 and earlier):

Rapidly press the side (or top) button five times.

Note that you may want to turn off "Auto Call", to avoid accidentally calling emergency services. This can be done in the "Emergency SOS" settings.


Photoshop CC not responding when opening a 2MB PDF file There's a Mac on my job that recently got installed Adobe CC. I, myself, haven't used CC before, always CS6 so I don't know about the common errors, bugs, crashes or fixes. Moreover, I'm not a designer, I'm just the IT guy (I have only used CS6 for really basic stuff).

I've gone through the basic check, which included updating from Mavericks to Yosemite, and check adobe updates but the issue still persists.

The problem seems to happen by doing the following:

Open Finder and navigate to a folder with 2MB PDF files.
Drag one of those 2MB PDF files and drop it on the Photoshop icon located in the Dock
It may stop responding here, or when opening the Crop To dropdown box.

Any ideas?

I'm using PhotoShop CC 2014 under Yosemite on a 2012 MacBook Pro. I'm not seeing an issue, even testing with a 5MB PDF.

One thing to consider is that the PDF file is corrupt. To check this, try loading some alternative PDFs into PhotoShop.

Instead of drag-dropping the PDF onto the Dock icon, you can also try either of the following:

Right-click the PDF, then choose Open with >> PhotoShop.
With PhotoShop open, drag-drop the PDF from the Finder window to the PhotoShop window.


How do I remove iTunes downloads without deleting from my library? iTunes has an option that I've used often in the past, I believe it was named Remove Download, to "undo" the download of a song or album (I've used it to free up space and to re-download music into different folders). However, I no longer see the option to do this, and I can't figure out why.
I'm using macOS Mojave 10.14.6 on an old MacBook Air. I'm not subscribed to Apple Music or iTunes Match (subscribing to either one is not an option right now). My account is set up with Family Sharing.
Thank you!
(Image: a screenshot of the menu that appears when I right-click a song.)

On my computer running 10.14.6 and iTunes 12.9.5.5, clicking the "Delete from library" brings up an option to either just remove the download or remove it from from the library entirely.


MobileBackups is using too much space I am running short of space on my OS partition for some large files I want to install.

I note that du shows 15G /.MobileBackups
I have 2 Time Machine drives. One attached to my MacBook Pro (at least when it is not being used as a portable), and a second, which is attached once a week. This was last updated yesterday.

What is using the 15G and why? What would happen if deleted it?

A second issue. du shows 103G    / but Disk Utility says Used 112G. Is this the sum of file sizes vs disk space used?

Mobile backups are a part of Time Machine called "snapshots" basically it lets you restore to one of the most recent backups without the need for you time machine disk.

I believe OSX will automatically free up this space when it is need, but it can be turned off manually as well.

See https://support.apple.com/en-au/HT204015
And http://osxdaily.com/2011/09/28/disable-time-machine-local-backups-in-mac-os-x-lion/


Is Safari's "Close Tabs to the Right" a new feature released in macOS 10.15.4? After updating to macOS Catalina 10.15.4, I've noticed a new Close Tabs to the Right option when right clicking a Safari tab:

I'm not 100% sure if this came with the 10.15.4 update thought, since the release notes don't actually say anything about this. When did this feature first appear?

It's new in Safari 13.1, even on Mojave.
Safari 13.1 will run on macOS High Sierra, Mojave, and Catalina (specifically versions 10.13.6, 10.14.6, and 10.15.4), It's the Safari version that's key, not the OS version itself.
Here's the changelog which show this: Safari 13.1 Beta Release Notes

Added Close Tabs to the Right.

Added Duplicate Tab.


El Capitan folder permissions to make admin accounts read-only I have a folder with about eight sub folders which contain about seventy folders containing about 10,000 files. I want to give students read access to the files, but want to prevent them from accidentally or maliciously deleting the files. Although my admin account is listed as the "owner" of the top level folder and all of its sub-folders and contents, a student with an admin account of their own can drag one of these files to the trash and delete it by using their admin privileges. Is there any way to prevent this? Can permissions be set at a root level that would prevent deletion without running a terminal command?

No. Admin accounts can modify any ACL or permission you make to keep them out.

Admin = root on OS X

I would consider placing the files on a file server and control access over file sharing (where your account is the only admin) or remove admin permissions from the accounts that cannot be trusted to not be malicious or careless.


Can I sync changes made on MacOS Photos app with Photos in iOS? I am not using the iCloud Sync feature right now. I manually imported all the pictures on the Photos app on MacOS and made some changes (deleted some, updated some etc.).

I would prefer to not use iCloud syncing as I would rather not pay for storage and the service to sync more than 5 GB of free data.

Is there a way that I can sync the same changes to the Photos app on my iPhone?

Yes - if you opt in to iCloud Photo Library on your Mac - the changes you make to any photo in the Photos library (the main system one - not any extra libraries you create past the first one) sync up to iCloud.

Then on iOS - opt in to the same iCloud Photo Library and those changes will merge up and sync.

Worst case, you'll have some duplicates, so be sure to make a backup of both the iOS device and the Mac library - before you turn this on in case everything gets duplicated.

I have been using this on two to three Mac and 3 to 5 iOS devices without any snags or errors or issues for about 4 years and am quite happy with having my main Photos library stored in the cloud and syncing up / down to all my devices.


Accessing Java Applets on website in iPhone 4S Is there any way, without jailbreaking, to open java applets  on websites on an iPhone?

I want to open a java based online ssh service (applet) : http://www.cryptzone.com/products/agmindterm/

I will be using it from Usermin (Webmin).

Is there a free solution?


Starting Google Chrome leads to altered display colours – why? When I start Google Chrome (seen from 38.0.2125.111 to 42.0.2311.135 (64-bit)) on my 15" Mid-2010 MBP (NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M) on OS X Yosemite (10.10 to 10.10.3) the display often (not just the displayed browser) changes to a much cooler colour, as if I had set a different colour profile. (The colour profile in the settings remained the same) When I shut down Chrome, everything looks as expected again. What's the reason and how can I prevent this behaviour?

Update: GFX shows that when starting Chrome the graphics switch to the discrete graphic card. When I disable this, nothing changes anymore. Turning off the discrete graphics might circumvent the problem, but it is no solution.

Have you tried resetting the SMC?

Shutdown your Mac
Connect the power cable
Press and hold the
LEFT Alt + Ctrl + Shift keys
While still holding the keys above, press the power button

Besides that, could you check what color profiles you have installed and report back? Removing faulty profiles and rebooting might help solve your issue as well.

Open Finder
Press Cmd + Shift + G
Type /Library/ColorSync/Profiles/Displays and press Go

Update: installing a tool that prevents graphic card switching could likely help you as well, though I'd keep that as a fallback option. GFX does a great job at that.


Changing movie genre in AppleTV (4th Generation)? Apple TV (4th Gen)
MBP (15" w/ TB)

I have a few hundred movies purchased through iTunes, some have mismatched genres, some I'd like to create my own.

Examples:

Rush Hour 1 & 3 are marked as Comedy
Rush Hour 2 is marked as Action & Adventure
Grouping all James Bond movies under a genre of the same name

I found this article from 2009 that explains how to do this with AppleTV out at the time.

On my MBP:iTunes, I can CMD+Select multiple movies > Get Info > Change Genre. This is reflected in iTunes on my MBP, the article then states

  Now re-sync your Apple TV (in the Devices section of iTunes, select the Apple TV and click Sync) and you’re done.

On my MBP:iTunes, there is nothing listed under Devices.

Do I need to turn on Home Sharing to have the genres updated on the Apple TV or does the device no longer "sync" local genre changes vs. iTunes defaults?

Follow up question: If this can be done, is there a way to specify sort preferences per genre (e.g. list Bond genre movies by year)?

Edit the genres in iTunes.  On the ATV, access the movies through Home Sharing, NOT through the Movies app.  Using the Movies app will show you movies you've purchased, but with all of the original data from Apple.  Using Home Sharing (the "Computers" app), you'll see the movies and genres stored on your local computer.

There hasn't been sync'ing since ATV1, I think...


How to change iCloud ID? Hello I need to change email address on my iCloud on my iPad but I don’t know how My e-mail box has been hacked and I had to change it I managed to change my Apple ID and when I checked my “iCloud account information” on iPad it’s showing my new email address yet on iCloud icon and next to my name there’s still my old email? How can I change it? Is my old email address still connected to my iCloud account? How can I get rid of it?

YES, you can change the email address associated with the Apple ID. The Apple ID is literally the email address (don't pay attention to the previous answer...)! It sounds like you created an ADDITIONAL Apple ID instead of updating the email address on your current Apple ID.

Navigate to appleid.apple.com and login with your 'old' Apple ID email address, from here you will be able to update to your new email. However, you would also need to follow this process to login to appleid.apple.com with the NEW address and assign this a "dummy" email address so that you can assign the "new" email to your current Apple ID so that you retain all purchases and content associated with your iCloud account.


Damaged Anti-reflective Layer on MacBook Pro My MacBook Pro's display has the anti-reflective coating damaged. What can I do about it?

Apple has recently renewed replacing screens for the following MacBooks:
MacBook Pro (13“, early 2013)
MacBook Pro (15“, early 2013)
MacBook Pro (13“, late 2013)
MacBook Pro (15“, late 2013)
MacBook Pro (13“, mid 2014)
MacBook Pro (15“, mid 2014)
MacBook Pro (13“, early 2015)
MacBook Pro (15“, mid 2015)
MacBook Pro (13“, 2016)
MacBook Pro (15“, 2016)
MacBook Pro (13“, 2017)
MacBook Pro (15“, 2017)
MacBook (12“, early 2015)
MacBook (12“, early 2016)
MacBook (12“, early 2017)
even after warranty has ended for free! Just head on over to the nearest Apple Store or a certified Apple Service Provider and get a new screen.


How to add watermark to all video files in a folder? (Mac, mencoder, terminal) Is there a way to add watermark to all (mp4) video files in a folder.

I have like 1000 videos in one folder and It'll take a long time to change one by one manually - so, maybe, there is some kind of a tool / software?

Maybe, it's possible to do somehow with mencoder that I can run in terminal?

You should be able to do it from the terminal with ffmpeg's overlay filter ... download prebuilt binaries or install with Homebrew if you don't have it already and the command would look something like this:

ffmpeg -i video.mp4 -i watermark.png -filter_complex 'overlay=10:10' outputname.mp4

That'll place watermark.png 10px in and 10px down from the top right corner ...


How do I close a password-protected numbers spreadsheet on iPad to preserve security? How do I close a password-protected numbers spreadsheet on iPad to preserve security? In apple discussions there is a suggestion to put spreadsheet in trash (supposedly at bottom). There is no trash at bottom. Deleting the spreadsheet doesn't close it, it deletes it.

In short - if going back to the linen background doesn't ask for the password again, you may have to force the issue in the same manner as killing a program that is crashing and needs a clean start.

Using multitasking, you can try to force the Numbers app to quit on iOS and see if that requires entering the password before viewing that spreadsheet.

Close out any spreadsheets you have open so you are at the main screen in Numbers with the linen background.
Double tap the home button to bring up the multitasking bar
Swipe left or right (if needed) until you see the numbers icon
Tap and hold the numbers icon until they all shake and have a small red circle icon with a minus sign in the left corner of the icons
Tap the minus icon on numbers to cause iOS to terminate numbers and force it to launch from a clean start the next time (rather than resuming the prior state)

This shows how iOS behavior of normally resuming exactly where you left off can have unintended consequences if the app should also have a check against a password and a time out period.


Can't create a new desktop workspace? When I bring up the spaces option (by either pressing the F3 button or 4 finger swipe up on trackpad), the + button in the top right corner is no longer there and I can't create a new desktop space.

I am running mavericks 10.9.4 on a 2012 13" MacBook Pro.

Any suggestions/ideas?

The + button only appears if you move your mouse close to the location of the button, or hold down ⌥. Also note that you can have a maximum of 17 desktops, or 16 desktops and Dashboard, then the + button is no longer available.


What file contains user typed words (user dictionary)? iOS tracks everything you type and uses those words to suggest spelling corrections. This list of words used to be a clear text list buried in /private or /System (I don't remember where, which is my problem). I think Apple migrated it to a db/encrypted file for security/speed reasons.

My issue is that I have mistyped a number of words which now have the incorrect spelling in my user dictionary. So, now when I mistype the word the incorrect spelling is accepted as "correct". It is really frustrating.

I would like to review the list of words and remove those that I don't want. Where is the file that holds this data?

Direct Answer
Based on this link, I think the file you are looking for is:
    /private/var/mobile/Library/Keyboard/dynamic-text.dat

Look at the link above to see full instructions.

Original Post
Slow Way
To reject the suggested word, finish typing the word as you want it, then tap the x to dismiss the suggestion before typing anything else. Each time you reject a suggestion for the same word, the iPhone becomes more likely to accept your word.
Fast Way
Reset the keyboard dictionary: Choose Settings > General > Reset and tap Reset Keyboard Dictionary. Resetting the keyboard dictionary erases all words you’ve added, and you can start over with a clean slate.
Second Option (Apps)
Looking at this post, it seems that there are two apps that could allow you to do this.
AutoCorrector ($0.99) allows you to add custom words to your iPhone’s dictionary so they are recognized and suggested by the autocorrect. You can also add list of short-hand words you use in text messages. The app doesn’t recognize all words – certain swear words are off-limits, however it’s an easy way to train your iPhone to behave.
ManualCorrect Pro ($0.99) is available through the Cydia store and works on jailbroken iPhones. The app switches some of the autocorrect features, so that you have to tap on the autocorrect bubble for it to be activated. The app also contains the ability to turn on autocorrect features for correct punctuation, and correct capitalization. Like AutoCorrector, you can create your own list of custom shortcuts.
Links/References
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2430621?start=0&tstart=0
http://www.zeropaid.com/news/101147/6-ways-to-improve-your-iphones-autocorrect/


How to open the sshd service? On Mac, how to start/enable the sshd service?

I use network general tool to scan the ports, do not find the 22 port.

Seems Apple disables it by default.

I tried to open the sshd service:

aircraftdeMacBook-Pro:.ssh ldl$ sudo /usr/sbin/sshd
Password:
Could not load host key: /etc/ssh/ssh_host_rsa_key
Could not load host key: /etc/ssh/ssh_host_dsa_key
Could not load host key: /etc/ssh/ssh_host_ecdsa_key
Could not load host key: /etc/ssh/ssh_host_ed25519_key
sshd: no hostkeys available -- exiting.

But failed.

How to open sshd service on Mac?

EDIT

I also tried use ssh-keygen to generate secretkey, but still not work.

ssh-keygen -t dsa -f /etc/ssh/ssh_host_dsa_key
ssh-keygen -t rsa -f /etc/ssh/ssh_host_rsa_key
/usr/sbin/sshd

Turn on Remote Login under System Preferences >> Sharing

It will enable the sshd service and allow you to connect.


Why Gigabit Ethernet Direct Connect is not default at Macs? Trying to connect two Macintoshs with a Ethernet cable (capable of Gigabit speed, of course) will not automatically set a gigabit connection. Instead of this, a 100MB connection is established. Does anybody knows why? After a thousand searchs at google, and trying with a bunch of machines, I still on limbo.  Both ports are capable and set to Gigabit speed, imho. Thanks for any advice, answering or any way I should/could improve this question.

Both Macs tested are:
Both iMac (late 2011+), iMac + MacPro (Late 2009+)
All machines running Yosemite full updated.

Gigabit Ethernet is new technology in wired networking so if you're using a crossover cable, it will only work up to 100Mbps. Use a straight cable instead.

In Wikipedia:

  An Ethernet crossover cable is a type of Ethernet cable used to
  connect computing devices together directly. It is most often used to
  connect two devices of the same type: e.g. two computers (via network
  interface controller) or two switches to each other. By contrast,
  patch cables or straight through cables are used to connect devices of
  different types, such as a computer to a network switch or hub.

  Many devices today support Auto MDI-X capability, wherein a patch
  cable can be used in place of a crossover cable, or vice versa, and
  the receive and transmit signals are reconfigured automatically to
  yield the expected result.

To make things easier to understand, network interface cards (NICs) back then were "dumb" so they still need separate lines for receive and transmit signals. Now, NICs can identify both in one line.


List all playlists that include a particular song I would like to replace a songs that I have in my iTunes library with a higher quality version (and different filename).

These songs are listed in various playlists in my iTunes library, what would be the best way to update them on the playlists as well without manually going through each playlist to find find and replace?

Okay so I have found that if I delete the track via Finder (and empty trash), then finding the track in my Library in iTunes as expected it will say the file is not found. This will then give you prompt to locate the file, after selecting the new file all instances of the track will be replaced with the new location automatically by iTunes


How do I insert a function along with a word in numbers I am using numbers and I have a column function at the footer row. I'd like it to produce a Countif() along with a word.

I tried: =Countif(Checkboxes,True) "Checkboxes"
so that it would express for example 5 Checkboxes

That did not work as expected.

You can do this in the custom cell format rather than the function.

Go to the cell click format>manage custom cell formats
From the Type pop-up menu, choose Number & Text
Drag the (blue) Entered Text element from the Date & Time Elements box into the
empty format field above the box.
Place the insertion point after the element, and then type your text 'checkboxes'
Click Ok to save.


NFS mounts without automounter, which seems to grab everything We have some NFS mounts we place in the fstab, via "vifs" which we want to manage separate of the autofs subsystem.    The mounts were created in a separate location (/mnt) which should not be managed by the automounting system.   But it appears that no matter where you place a mount, somehow the autofs/automount subsystem grabs ahold of it and tries to remount it when you unmount it.

This is a big problem and I'm trying very hard to figure out why and how to fix it.   I wonder if there is a flag in the /etc/auto* files that might have to do with this?   Something else?

Does someone know how to get around this annoying behavior.

Thanks!

I'm not sure if this will help you. If all your looking to do is save the connection information, finder will solve that problem. http://support.apple.com/kb/TA22243
Just add it your list of favorite servers and it's point and click. The information appears to be outdated, but I'm sure the process is still similar.

I just checked and there is another way to mount NFS shares:

$cd /net/"ip or computer name"

and browse the shares.

You can easily write a script to do this for you. I can confirm that the above method does work, because I tested it in Lion, and I read about this technique in a book I think is based on Tiger/Leopard.

EDIT: Here is an output of my /etc/auto_master file

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

I'm guessing you would delete the last two lines according to the manual.  [Disclaimer: I have never tried this].  Here is a link the auto_master documentation.

https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/Darwin/Reference/Manpages/man5/auto_master.5.html

  EDIT: http://lowendmac.com/ed/winston/09kw/intro-to-autofs.html Here
  it describes the last two entries

  The last two lines in auto_master handle NFS mounts defined in the
  /etc/fstab file, the common file system mount table in Linux and other
  Unix flavors. The /etc/fstab file is deprecated in OS X and not
  recommended.
  I would try commenting them out one at a time and see if that helps


Where can I find raw data for Apple photo's face recognition I've been using Mac's photos to recognize faces in my pictures. I'm interested in seeing some basic stats such as the occurrences and co-occurrences of people and how they change over time. Is there a place where the raw data are stored so that I can write codes to perform analysis?

In Mojave and earlier: Photos library (right click) > Show package contents > Resources > Media > Face. The sub-folders within the Face folder contains thumbnails of all faces. Additional data about them can be found in Database > photos.db but you'll need DB Browser for sqlite or similar program. Face related data is in a table named RKFace, several other tables named RKFace..., and elsewhere.
In Catalina and later, use the same approach as above but the folder names are different. You'll be querying Database > photos.sqlite, and looking at tables such as ZDETECTEDFACE, ZFACECROP, and basically any other with "face" in it.
Be very careful not to modify, delete or move anything when you open Photos library.photoslibrary.


trouble deleting files from an external drive When I try to delete folders/files from my External drive I get the below error after being asked to enter my admin password:

The operation can’t be completed because you don’t have permission to access some of the items.

This volume is Mac OS X Extended (Journaled) and I am running 10.7.2

Permissions seem correct read/write and everything else is working fine.

Open Terminal
Drag folder you want to delete onto the Terminal icon in the dock
Type cd .. in the new Terminal window in order to move to the parent directory.
Type ls to find out the exact name of the files/folders in the directory.
Type sudo rm -r filename to delete the file/folder 'filename'. Be careful to type the correct name.

Dragging files onto the terminal icon does not work. You will need to drag the parent directory onto the icon.


Best version of DOSBox for macOS (Homebrew version seems abandoned) I've been using DOSBox through Homebrew for years, and now it won't update because of a SHA256 mismatch error. I tried all possible updates and cleanups in Homebrew to no avail. According to Homebrew, this means the brew is abandoned. DOSBox was last updated in 2010.

What is the best version of DOSBox for macOS, preferably available through Homebrew?

DOSBox-X is your best bet, it's the only one that is currently being updated. I'm not sure what makes you think it's Japanese, it's managed by a guy in Seattle, WA, USA.

I have no issues with it and keyboard typing. I am using British-PC layout and a wired Apple aluminium keyboard with numeric pad.


Android Studio 2.1 very slow build, macbook blows very loud I am using new version of Android Studio since one week (v2.1) and it completely freezes my macbook. Each gradle build takes forever, and my computer blows air like if it is going to die.

Anyone experiencing issues of this kind ?

OS X El Capitan 10.11.2 core i7, 16 ram GBB

Android 2.1.1 is available, I have updated studio from 2.1.0 to 2.1.1 and works.
On studio 2.1.0 I was facing same problem.


How to split CSV file by Column values into multiple files on a Mac? awk? HELP!!!
Trying to split a csv file admin_bids_view.csv into multiple files. The CSV has 2000 rows and 7 columns. I would like a new file per ID number in column 1.

Example data below:

Have tried    awk -F\| '{print>$1}' admin_bids_view.csv

But the below is being returned.

awk: can't open file admin_bids_view.csv
 source line number 1

Please can someone point me in the right direction?

Thank you.

Your approach would mostly work, although you'd end up with column A in the output file, which may not be what you want.  Here's another approach that doesn't put column A in the output file:

awk -F, '{outfile=($1 ".csv") ; print substr($0,index($0,$2)) >>outfile ; close(outfile)}' <name_of_input_file

You said "CSV", so use a comma as the field separator.


iPad USB flash drive file transfer Can I use a 30 pin to USB adapter to connect a USB flash drive to an iPad and transfer arbitrary files back and forth?

please address specifically:

Can ANY file be transferred? Not just Image or Music files?
This can be done WITHOUT any modification (jail-breaking)

Please provide references to adapter device specifications and references from reliable sources addressing the above specific points.

No, you can't do this without jailbreaking.

http://www.pocketables.com/2013/02/accessory-review-apple-lightning-to-usb-camera-adapter-for-ipad.html

No, you cannot transfer any arbitrary files.  you cannot transfer documents, txt, source, etc; you can only transfer images and videos.


Mojave (10.14) setting environment variables There are other questions and topics just like this but I can not find anything that is specific to 10.14 Mojave.  I have tried the ~/Library/LaunchAgents/environment.plist method and I have tried to move the same file to /Library/LaunchDaemons (and restarted) but it does not affect Emacs when it is launched from the dock, Spotlight, or the Applications window.

In that file, I did launchctl setenv PATH $PATH:/usr/local/bin  Curiously, when Terminal (bash) is launched and echo $PATH > /tmp/bash.debug is the first line in ~/.bash_profile, the output is /usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin so... something has prepended /usr/local/bin while I was attempting to append it.

I have not tried things like /etc/launchd.conf or ~/.MacOSX/environment.plist because the pages I find say that both of those stopped working a while back.

In particular, I want to add /usr/local/bin to PATH.  Currently, my work around is to do it in my Emacs start up files.

There was one person who mentioned that setting system wide environment variables in MacOS is a bad idea and I'm tempted to go along with that.  The Emacs specific solution I have works and doesn't have any side effects.  But, I'd like to know how to do it ... if it is possible.  Once I get curious about something its hard for me to let it go.

As always, thank you very much for your time.

The answer to this one in Mojave is to create a named file in /etc/paths.d, for instance

vi /etc/paths.d/local_bin

Put

/usr/local/bin

in the file, save and quit. Start another terminal window and it will be on your path.

I have one for MacPorts

$ cat MacPorts
/opt/local/bin


Can I speed up iCloud photo sync between iPhone and Macbook? I have an iPhone 5 running iOS 9.1 and a Macbook Pro running Yosemite.

Both devices are set up to sync photos to and from iCloud.

When I take a photo on the iPhone (for further processing on the Macbook), it takes an inordinate amount of time until the photo shows up in the Macbook's photos library - sometimes up to 10-20 minutes. Sometimes it seems to work faster if I quit the Photos app on both devices, and start it again.

I often end up sending myself photos through E-Mail because it's quicker. That seems ridiculous!

Is there a way to force a sync on the iPhone, or to speed up the process some other way?

When you take a photo from your iPhone, switch to the Photos app. At the very bottom of the Photos tab, you should immediately see the indicator Uploading…

If your MacBook is plugged in to a power source and/or has the Photos app open, it will download photos as soon as they are in iCloud.

Both your devices need to be connected to Wi-Fi for the aforementioned to occur.

The key is for you to open the Photos app on your iPhone. It used to upload as soon as you connected to Wi-Fi (possibly only if you had sufficient battery), but as of iOS 9 that no longer appears to be the case. I’m guessing this was done to keep from eating up your bandwidth while you may be doing something else.

If you don’t open the Photos app, your iPhone will upload new photos if it is connected to a power source and locked, and it has sufficient battery.

Update: Starting with iOS 10, I am once again seeing immediate uploads of photos from my iPhone when connected to Wi-Fi, whether I’m using the phone or not, and whether connected to a power source or not (might still need to be above 50% battery). Low power mode should be turned off too.


My iPhone won't pair to my August EP650R headphones I have had my headphones paired to my iPhone but needed to disconnect recently which wouldn't work so I had to 'forget the device'. Now my iPhone won't pair with my headphones at all. Is there a way to get them paired again?

Go to settings -> Bluetooth and make sure the switch is turned on:

Then make sure the headphones are in a range of up to 10 metres and in a state to be paired to the phone.

If this doesn’t work try:

Turning Bluetooth on and off on both the phone and the device
Resetting the device and restarting the phone
Contacting the device manufacturer


Compute distance to an object in ios Is there an ios App that lets you compute the distance to an object using the built-in camera?

SureveyorPro lets you do exactly that. It uses the iPhone gyro to calibrate itself. Note that it only lets you measure distances on the surface and support for measuring heights is partial. Also, don't expect any support if you run into problems as it was last updated 2 years ago.

PS: If  you're looking for something accurate, don't expect it out of an iPhone.


Desktop Mac OSX b10.9, MAIL PROGRAM When I attach a document to my email, it can come out as an icon, or sometimes as a printed document. Can I control this?

If you are attaching something in a new email:

RIGHT Click on the attachment and select View as Icon or View in Place.


iPhoto opens automatically by creating files on Desktop My problem:

iPhoto opens automatically, when I:

Copy and paste any kind of file to my Desktop
Save any file type to my Desktop
Create a screenshot (which is automatically saved to Desktop)

iPhoto doesn't open when I:

Move any file type to my Desktop
Copy and paste a file anywhere in documents (not Desktop)

According to this I think the problem is with creating a file on the Desktop.

When the problem first appeared:

I tried to create a shortcurt to an application and looked through several blogs. I ended up in creating a test-service, which launches iPhoto.
I wanted to map that service to a shortcut, but it  didn't work out...

What I've tried so far:

I've deleted the service I've created.
I went to System Preferences > Keyboard and "Restored all Defaults" in each category for all the shortcuts.
I've unchecked every Service in the System Preferences.
I went through the Preferences of iPhoto.
I searched Google for like 3 days.

Does anyone has any clue how I can fix this behavior?

Edit:

Sorry the confusion: the behaviour hadn't anything to do with the service I've created. It was a Folder Action assigned to my Desktop.

Maybe the service is saved somewhere else? As far as I know, they go into ~/Library/Services/ (you can go there by switching to Finder and press Shift+Control+G or select "go to folder" in the Go-To-Menü).

Maybe you saved your Automator script as "Folder Action"? Have you checked them, too? I think they are visible as a submenu when Control-Clicking on the Desktop.


Why does placing a Moto X on my Macbook turn off the screen? Whenever I place my Moto X down, face-up, so the center of it is just below and to the left of the fn key on a Macbook Pro Retina 15", the screen goes blank black. When I pick it up, I get the lock screen. I think it may be magnetic, since there are certain locations in that area in which my phone will rotate left or right by itself. Or perhaps it has to do with NFC, because it doesn't happen when I place the phone face-down, and the NFC is located in the back?

I've had similar experiences when stacking two MacBooks just the right way. I think it's the magnets being triggered, and the computer thinking it's been closed.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203315


Firewall window pops up then vanishes For about the last month, I've had the Firewall Accept/Deny incoming connection window pop up at semi-regular intervals. I have not, however, been able to identify the cause. Taking a look at the System Console report shows nothing enlightening. Taking a look at /var/etc/appfirewall.log shows lots of these, though I'm not yet sure if they correlate to the Firewall request message:

<Info>: Stealth Mode connection attempt to UDP 192.168.1.139:61264 from 192.168.1.1:53

Other answers on the site don't seem to be relevant to me: one identifies Facebook Video Calling as the problem, but I don't have Facebook Video Calling installed. (Nor would I!)

I've just tried disabling Stealth Mode in the hopes that it may resolve the issue. In the meantime, however, a few questions:

Is it possible that the Stealth Mode issue is what I'm seeing?
If not, is there anything I can do to capture the screen at relatively low resolution continuously for a while so I can just pick up exactly what the application is?
Why in the world would the firewall dialog go away? Is this what happens if the requesting application stops requesting access, or is something else going on?

Update

The number and frequency of the popups seems to have diminished significantly after disabling Stealth Mode, and I'm no longer seeing that particular set of messages (none today at all, in fact). Now, however, I'm seeing another message (that was appearing before as well, but with much less frequency):

<Info>: java is listening from :::0 proto=6

Some answers to similar questions have suggested simply allowing Java through the firewall. This is, in my mind, more than a little bit crazy; I have Java on my system because I have to, but it is a major security hole these days and I have no interest in letting it have unrestricted access to the internet. Is there a better way of handling this than just opening it up wide open?

See also:

Dialog pops up every day for less than a second
Pop up windows that disappear mysteriously
Mountain Lion firewall is randomly delaying DNS requests

I don't recommend Stealth Mode for this reason, constant pop-ups.

Mac Help says:

  If you don’t either allow or deny access, the message remains
  displayed, and any attempts to connect to the app are denied.

But in  my experience, they dismiss instantly.

Unless you want to manage the firewall with one of the third-party apps--which are certainly available—Apple in their wisdom hath now given us an application firewall, and that's what we've got.


On iOS, is there any way to see what the “Documents & Sync” system service is using cellular data for? I’m using iOS 13.2 on an iPhone X, and would like to drastically reduce the amount of cellular data my phone is using. In less than a month, my phone has used 10.7 GB of cellular data. 8.5 GB of that is from “System Services,” with 7.9 GB coming from “Documents & Sync.”

Is there any way to see what is using all of that data, or to control what happens over cellular vs waiting for Wi-Fi? My battery also dies quickly, and assume that is related to how much cellular data is being used in background.

What I tried:

I turned off iCloud Drive syncing over cellular network yesterday morning and then reset cellular data usage statistics. Since then, Documents & Sync has used used 1.0 GB of cellular data .
I’ve had “Low Data Mode” turned on under Cellular Data Options for the entire month, which doesn’t seem to be helping at all.
I tried erasing all content and settings and restoring from backup. This may have helped slightly, but it still seems to be using large amounts of cellular data

Take a look at "Wi-Fi Assist", which is found at Settings --> Cellular --> right near the bottom of the list.  This setting uses your cellular data when Wi-Fi connectivity is poor.

This may account for cell usage even when you have iCloud Drive turned off.


Is there any iPhone SE out there with 3D Touch? I have an iPhone SE so does my cousin. A few days ago we went to the movies and I noticed she was 3D Touching her way around the screen.

This surprised me because I don't think my iPhone SE has ever had 3D Touch capability, so when I got home I looked in the settings app but there was no 3D Touch option anywhere. I checked the specs online and found that the

  iPhone SE has a 4" (diagonal) widescreen multi-touch IPS LED-backlit
  1136x640 native resolution (326 ppi) "retina display" without 3D Touch
  support

But I know what I saw and my cousin was definitely using 3D Touch.

Is her model a newer series of iPhone SE that has 3D Touch?

What am I missing here?

You are correct, the iPhone SE does not have 3D Touch. What you most likely witnessed is that your cousin was running the iOS 13 Beta and as a result of this, Haptic Touch is now available on some older iPhones that never had 3D Touch.

In terms of what you can do about it, you’re in luck because iOS 13 is now available to the public. All you need to do is upgrade iOS and you’ll have the Haptic Touch support that iOS 13 offers (one that is almost identical to 3D Touch).

That is, in iOS 13 Haptic Touch is now available in most of the ways that 3D Touch was available to 3D Touch devices (previously, in iOS 12 Haptic Touch was limited). However, the way to utilise it is by pressing on the screen continuously for a second or so, as opposed to applying more pressure in the way 3D Touch worked. Because this works on the basis of how long you're pressing, there's no need for special hardware, hence the reason why the iPhone SE can take advantage of this feature.

For more information, see the iOS 13 info on Apple's website.

To upgrade, simply go to Settings > General > Software Update.


Can't empty trash of removable HD I can't empty the trash of my removable drive. At first it appears to empty it correctly (no error message, the sound is played), but the folder in question stays there.

I tried:

jan@MacBook-Pro /Volumes/JD 2 $ sudo rm -rf .Trashes/

which gives errors like the following:

rm: .Trashes//501: Directory not empty
rm: .Trashes/: Directory not empty

Anyways, I narrowed it down to a .svn file that can't be deleted:

root@MacBook-Pro /Volumes/JD 2/.Trashes/501/CD_10.2009/devel/funghos $ ls -altr .svn
-rwxrwxrwx  1 _unknown  _unknown  690 Oct 21  2009 .svn
root@MacBook-Pro /Volumes/JD 2/.Trashes/501/CD_10.2009/devel/funghos $ rm -f .svn
root@MacBook-Pro /Volumes/JD 2/.Trashes/501/CD_10.2009/devel/funghos $ ls -altr .svn
-rwxrwxrwx  1 _unknown  _unknown  690 Oct 21  2009 .svn

As you can see, no error appears, but the file doesn't get deleted. Huh?

This is due to the MNT_IGNORE_OWNERSHIP flag being set for the drive when mounted. The unknown user and group are exactly what show up when root views files on a drive for which permissions are ignored.  When a user views the permissions, the files will show up as their own.  I'm surprised you can't delete the .svn file from your own account (not root)

Please see this Ask Different Answer for more direction.  Basically, you'll need to uncheck the "Ignore ownership on this volume" checkbox from an inspector on the drive info.

If you can't delete it from your user account, try setting yourself as the file owner with the ignore flag unset.


Does moving photos to multiple USB drives make the photos decrease in quality? Does moving photos over and over again make the photos decrease in quality? In either device?

No, just copying the file can't degrade the quality. You can copy ad infinitum, and you should always end up with an identical digital replica.


Mac book air Admin account slower than fresh brand new user account — I have tried a lot to fix I have a Mac book air 2017 running Catalina. I have noticed my admin account being a little slow. Safari launching slower and some other apps slower
I did a test and made a new admin user. I logged out of my account and logged in as that user. Everything is faster. Safari launches and renders pages faster and just feels snappier
I am not saying my computer is un-usable just not as fast as it could be
In order to try to fix problem I have tried the following

remove all launch agents in my user library folder
only Startup necessary software and remove any login items not neceassy
Deleted preferences folder in user library folder
reset safari cache and disable extensions
boot into recovery mode and repair disk
Boot into safe mode and test
Cleaning up hard drive and removing apps and files. I have 150gb free storage out of 500gb

Do you have any other ideas or is it reformat and rebuild time? I haven’t done a fresh install in 10 years and really want to avoid this

"Do you have any other ideas or is it reformat and rebuild time? I haven’t done a fresh install in 10 years and really want to avoid
this."

If the problem does not appear in a brand new user account, then there is absolutely no need to erase the disk and reinstall the OS. The OS works fine: only the user account is affected.
Some may suggest packing up and moving to a new user account. The trouble is that if you keep doing this every time you come up with a user-account problem, you'll have a succession of different user accounts, which may cause problems with backups, file ownership attributions, etc. And you'll be none the wiser.
The cause is something in the user's Library folder. It could be third-party software that's set to launch at startup, so test by disabling ALL of that. Don't leave any 'necessary' stuff.
You've deleted the entire user Preference folder, which is overkill. I would test whether things improve after you remove the folder, and then restore it if they don't. Move on to the next folder.


Getting spam on my Apple email from just one company I have an email address that I only use for official communication with the Apple Corporation. I have no phone and have only used this address when registering my iPad and the payment mechanism for buying things in the AppStore.

This email address which I have had for over 10 years is now receiving spam from a single company: "Goodman Capital" which is advertising some kind of investment services. I receive absolutely no other communications on this address except for official Apple correspondence, like password resets and things like that.

Is Apple providing customer emails to third parties or have they been hacked?

The only comparable problem I have had is that the email address I use to communicate with Adobe receives occasional spam, but this is because of a known hack where somebody got access to Adobe's customer records and began selling them on the dark web.

No - Apple doesn't sell out emails and the simple explanation is that this resource just tried all mail addresses possible at Apple and now knows your mail is valid (or doesn't know it's not valid) and will keep spamming it forever since they don't actually have permission or a lead - they're just being nasty like someone that robo calls all the phone numbers possible whether they're in the phone book or not.


Triangle on my pictures I have taken pictures on my iPhone 8 Plus but when I try to look at them on my MacBook running Sierra 10.12, they all have a triangle on them with an exclamation point.

I am not able to edit the photos. What can I do to fix this?

I’m guessing your MacBook isn’t on High Sierra and you’re viewing the new photo formats.

Have you looked at the settings app, camera, formats and checked JPEG instead of high efficiency? If you want to maintain high efficiency formats, upgrading now or eventually would be the plan.