In Safari, can a set of bookmarks in a folder be opened programmatically (e.g. using AppleScript)? I have a set of bookmarks in a folder. Usually, I open them by selecting the folder  and then "Open in New Tabs". Is it possible to do this using a script? I imagine AppleScript would be the right tool here, but anything that is included with the system would work as an answer.

If you are just wanting to script the clicking go the Open in New Tabs menu item of the target folder under Bookmarks, then the following example AppleScript code will do that:

set bookmarksFolder to "Saved Tabs"

tell application "Safari" to activate

delay 1

tell application "System Events" to ¬
    click menu item "Open in New Tabs" of ¬
        menu 1 of ¬
        menu item bookmarksFolder of ¬
        menu 1 of ¬
        menu bar item "Bookmarks" of ¬
        menu bar 1 of ¬
        application process "Safari"

Just change "Saved Tabs" in the first line of code to the actual name of the target folder on the Bookmarks menu.

Here is something a bit more robust…

I have different sets of URLs that I group into different windows by themselves, and have made an AppleScript application from the code. You can use the example AppleScript code below to do the same:

set myURLs to {¬
    "https://somedomain.com", ¬
    "https://somedomain.com", ¬
    "https://somedomain.com", ¬
    "https://somedomain.com", ¬
    "https://somedomain.com", ¬
    "https://somedomain.com", ¬
    "https://somedomain.com", ¬
    "https://somedomain.com"}

tell application "Safari"
    make new document with properties {URL:first item of myURLs}
    activate
    tell window 1
        set bounds to {0, 22, 1136, 844}
        delay 1
        repeat with i from 2 to count myURLs
            set current tab to (make new tab with properties {URL:item i of myURLs})
            delay 2
        end repeat
        set current tab to fourth tab
    end tell
end tell

Obviously "https://somedomain.com" is just a place holder for the real URL. The set bounds … and set current tab … commands can be adjusted to your liking or omitted.

I called the AppleScript application My Regular Sites, gave it a nice icon through the Get Info window method, and put it in the Dock.

This make it real easy to open Safari with a window containing my regular sites.

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


Keynote and presenter note fonts Is there a way to tell Keynote to change the font for all the presenter notes in this file to a specific font? I find that sometimes it screws up the fonts for the notes (not the body) of a bunch of the slides, and it is tedious to change them one-by-one.

Seems you can edit the XML if you're really stuck:
  https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2626026?start=0&tstart=0


Magic mouse does not switch ON I have been using the magic mouse for two years. I always slide off the switch under the mouse after the mac shuts down as I have seen it to save battery life to some extent.

Since a week the mouse does not switch ON consistently, it does not show the green light at all.

When I took it to a nearby Apple service center, it turned ON surprisingly.
But, back home it stopped working again. It somehow worked after many attempts. Today it stopped working again.

I have cleaned the terminals, and all looks fine. But I have some doubt on the slide switch.

The mouse has been used carefully and has never been dropped.

Has anyone experienced this, any input?

Thanks to all.
I was able to solve this puzzle:)

Observation/solution:

When we shutdown the Mac, the mouse and the keyboard go to sleep mode(this is instructed by the mac to the mouse/keyboard controllers) to conserve battery. I usually switch them off at this moment.

For the mouse and the keyboard to work with the mac there is a bluetooth setup done by the mac. Likewise, the mouse and the keyboard will have some controller working in sync with the mac. As I had this habit of turning the devices off, right when their controllers were instructing them to sleep, some configuration in the magic mouse could have gone wrong making it stay in sleep mode even when you switch ON and go out of sync with the mac.

So, what I did this time when it turned ON somehow is shutdown the mac, leaving the devices to sleep as designed and turned ON the mac back again.
The mouse and keyboard powered back with green lights. Later, while the mac was running, I tried all combinations of turning the mouse ON and OFF through batteries and the button, but the mouse responded well.

I now understand that to avoid this rare problem, which could happen at some point when you turn off the mouse while it goes to sleep through an instruction from mac which is shutting down, is to wait. Wait till the mouse sleeps completely, i.e, the green light goes off plus 2-5 seconds more for its controller to sleep and then turn the slide button off. Same with the keyboard.


How to activate and run JavaScript in AppleScript? I'm trying to run simple script in AppleScript Editor on OS X 10.9.5, but using JavaScript, e.g.:

var SE = new Application("System Events");
SE.processes.windows.name()

However my dropdown only shows AppleScript.

How do I activate JavaScript if it isn't appearing on the list? It is also not in Preferences/General.

You cannot. JavaScript for Automation was only introduced in OS X 10.10 Yosemite.

AppleScript Editor.app was also renamed to Script Editor.app due to it now not only being for AppleScript.


How can I make my Mac accept a user password of 8 characters? I just unboxed my new MacBook Pro, running Yosemite 10.10.5. When I went through the setup procedure, it didn't ask me what password to use for my account, and just set it to that of my AppleID. (I only discovered that by trial and error.)

I now want to set my password to the same one that I use on the old Mac; but the password (eight characters, includes some digits, which BTW is also exactly true of my AppleID password) is rejected.

When I simply run passwd while logged in as myself, it fails saying:

  passwd: general failure

And when I run it as sudo passwd mike, it is more precise:

  passwd: Password change failed because password is too short.  Password change failed because password is too short.

(Yes, it says it twice.)

It also does this when I use 13-character password. It doesn't say how long a password it requires and I am not minded to determine this by trial and error.

How can I force my Mac to accept the password of my choice?

Try to change it by going to System Preferences -> Users & Groups -> your account, and click on Change Password...


2 Thunderbolt Displays to a MacBook Air Can I connect a second TB Display to my MacBook Air?  I currently have just one TB and would like to add a second

Without knowing your hardware, this search might help you understand if your hardware supports it.

https://support.apple.com/kb/index?page=search&q=multiple%20displays%20air&product=&doctype=&currentPage=1&includeArchived=false&locale=en_US&src=globalnav_support&type=organic

Feel free to take away any of the & items if your Air is old enough the support KB is archived.
The current Air should be capable of most dual display setups: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211190


Adding TextWrangler to the path environment I would like to add TextWrangler to the path environment. I have tried with this command on the terminal:

alias textwrangler=/Applications/TextWrangler.app

and then tried to call it just typing textwrangler, but as you can imagine, it's not working.

I did it in this way, because I had done the same thing for mysql, and it had worked.

I know there are other possibilities to add an application to the path environment, but I would like to know what is the secure way to do it. Can you describe it?

By the way, what I did, as I understood, is not exactly adding TextWrangler to the path environment...

Your alias which you have configured will change the working directory in shells which support changing directory without 'cd' to the application bundle of TextWrangler.

To have an alias which opens an app, you will need to run the binary in the app bundle, usually located in Contents/MacOS. For example…

alias textwrangler=/Applications/TextWrangler.app/Contents/MacOS/TextWrangler

The binary in TextWrangler also understands arguments for passing files, which will mean that you can now edit files using the following. This won't work with every app though.

textwrangler /path/to/file

I'm not sure I understand what you're trying to add to your path, but if you want to add the binary to your path, you can add the containing folder:

export PATH=$PATH:/Applications/TextWrangler.app/Contents/MacOS

To add the alias to every interactive shell session, add the alias line to one of the profile files for your shell.


Going in for an apple repair, do I need to remove my second hard drive for the superdrive? The right fan on my mac stopped working, I have scheduled an appointment at the mac store genius bar (its still in warranty).

I have installed a second hard drive in place of the super drive, and also upgraded the hard drive (to SSD) and the ram (to 16GB).

Do I need to restore everything before taking it into the mac store for repair? (ie put back in the superdrive and hdd)?

Did you install the second hard drive yourself?  If so then your best bet is to swap your SuperDrive back in before taking it in for service.

I cover this scenario in more depth with this answer:

  Apple's warranty (AppleCare) is specific about what components are
  user replaceable/serviceable. The hard drive on an older MacBook for
  instance is user replaceable, AppleCare used to have the option to
  send you a replacement hard drive along with a disposable ESD
  wriststrap for you to install it yourself.

  The difference though is the hard drive in the MacBook was almost as
  easy to access as the RAM in the Mac mini. The Mac mini's hard drive
  is a different story. In order to access it you have to expose the
  logic board which increases the chance of damage from ESD if proper
  precautions aren't taken. Because of this the only user replaceable
  part in the new minis is the RAM, since the logic board is still
  pretty well protected when only removing the RAM.

  The Magnusson Moss act essentially says they can't deny warranty
  unless they can prove damage. It wouldn't be hard for Apple to say
  "The upgrade situation you described to us implies that there was a high risk for ESD damage, which has likely caused such and such
  issue".

  The flip side though is that if an Apple Authorized Service Provider
  (AASP) installs a third party hard drive your AppleCare will remain
  intact because the AASP has proved to Apple that its technicians
  follow all safety rules and procedures when working on Macs,
  essentially the same reason Apple allows them to perform warranty
  work. Apple would then not be involved in the hard drive's warranty
  (though most HDDs have 3-5 year warranties of their own) but the
  remaining components would still be recognized as "in warranty" by
  Apple. The most you would need to do is provide a receipt for the
  service you had done at an AASP.

  source: I was "that guy" at the Genius Bar for several years who had
  to turn people away from warranty coverage for unauthorized upgrades &
  repairs.  As soon as your Mac goes out of warranty I definitely
  encourage a DIY attitude, however I would try to heed the above advice
  while it's under AppleCare.

Basically if it was a user replaceable part (it's not) you wouldn't run much risk of them blaming a failure on your upgrade.  The problem though is that with the optical drive not being considered a user replaceable component, and the replacement being a somewhat major (in their eyes) modification, they have every right to deny coverage since they have no way of knowing if proper ESD precautions and whatnot were followed.

If I were you I'd play it safe.  The Superdrive installation isn't terribly difficult and could save you a lot of arguing if you don't get a Genius who just looks the other way.


Safari extension for timed automagical tab switching. Does it exist? Can I create one? I can't find any extension that allows me to switch between open tabs every x seconds.....
Before I 'dive' into extension development I have to ask....:

Is there a limitation in Safari's extensions system which would block the development of an auto tab switcher?

This should be possible. The extension API gives you access to the SafariBrowserTab class, which allows you to activate a specific tab in a specific window. So adding an extension toolbar button that started/stopped the looped switching should be pretty straightforward.


How can I use a single monitor when connecting to a multi monitor machine using Screen Sharing, VNC or RDP? I have a mac desktop and laptop at work, and I keep the desktop up to date with tools, code, etc, so it's my main machine.

When I'm working from home, I like to connect to my desktop since it's all setup - but it has 3 monitors, and when I connect using a single monitor, some of the apps I was running are on other monitors and can't be seen.

Even when I try and CMD+TAB to apps that are on other monitors, they dont show up.

How can I manage this better?

A simple solution that works for me is to

turn on "Display Mirroring" as soon as I connect
view my remote connection on a single monitor.

You can do this:

manually by going to "System Preferences | Displays", and toggling it
or you can use this free opensource command line app to toggle it super easy from the command line.


How can I work in other applications while using PowerPoint presenter view on mac? In Windows it is possible to switch between and work with open applications when PowerPoint is open in presenter view. In this mode, the audience sees only the PowerPoint presentation, while you use the other applications.

So the presenter is viewing the presentation via the MacBook and the audience sees it on a projector.

This does not seem possible on the Mac. Does anyone know how this can be achieved?

I am assuming multiple display setup in extended mode (not mirrored).  I had this problem as well.

I found that in PowerPoint Mac 2011:

go to "Slide Show" tab in the ribbon.
Click "Set Up Show" button.
Change radio button for "Show type" to "Browsed by an individual (window)".

This will put the presentation into a window, which you can maximize on the presenting screen (for me the 2nd display hooked up).  Yes you get the title bar, but otherwise it's effectively full screen.  On the primary display (which is still my laptop screen), I can move to different applications without affecting the windowed presentation screen.


Is there an iPhone app that lets you post to Twitter and Facebook Pages as yourself? I am looking for an iOS app that lets you spot status updates (tweets) to both Twitter and a Facebook Page (not my personal Facebook profile, but one of the Pages that I administer). In particular the app needs to let me post as myself.
The closest I have found to this is Hootsuite which lets you post to FB Pages and not just profiles but unfortunately every update I make appears with the name of the actual Facebook page rather than with my personal name. This does not work for me.
Any suggestions?

I let Twitter do it automatically but I'm not sure it will carry your name but rather post as the page. You'll have to try it and see. It may be that it's functionality not included in Facebook itself.

Here is the instructions from Twitter gel pages:

To connect your Twitter account and your Facebook profile:
Log in to the Twitter account you want to associate with your Facebook profile.
Go to your Settings menu's Apps tab.
Click Connect to Facebook.
If you are not already logged in to Facebook, then you will be prompted to enter your Facebook login credentials. Enter your credentials and click Log in to sign in to Facebook.
You will then receive a prompt explaining that Twitter will receive certain information from your Facebook account. In order to continue, you must select “Okay.”
You will then be prompted to select the privacy settings for who will see your Tweets and Retweets posted to your Facebook wall. It is set to friends by default.
Click “Okay” to complete the process.
Your Tweets and Retweets will now post to your profile Facebook wall and your username will be displayed there as well. @Replies will not be posted.

Note: To link your Facebook updates to Twitter, use this application on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/twitter.

To connect your Twitter account to a Facebook page:
If you have a Facebook Fan Page, or are the admin of one, you can post Tweets and Retweets from your Twitter account to your Facebook Page.

Follow the steps above to connect to your Facebook profile.
If you have not already done so, visit your Apps settings and grant Twitter the “manage pages” permission for your Facebook profile.
In your Apps settings, Select the page you'd like to connect to.
When prompted, click to allow permission to post to the selected Facebook page.


Terminal $PATH error I was adding a $PATH to .bash_profile:

PATH="/Applications/MAMP/bin/php/php5.3.6/bin:$PATH"

So I could install PEAR on MAMP. That all worked, but now I have an this error each time I start up:

-bash: export: `/usr/local/bin': not a valid identifier

I tried a lot of solutions from people with similar problems, such as:

I messed up my bash configuration on mac

These are the files possibly containing the problem:

/etc/profile

# System-wide .profile for sh(1) if [ -x /usr/libexec/path_helper ]; then eval /usr/libexec/path_helper -s` fi if [ "${BASH-no}" != "no" ]; then [ -r /etc/bashrc ] && . /etc/bashrc fi`

/etc/paths

/usr/bin
/bin
/usr/sbin
/sbin
/usr/local/bin

~/.profile

export PATH="/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:$PATH"

~/.bash_profile

#export PATH="/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:$PATH"

launchctl export

    PATH="/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin"; export PATH;
    TMPDIR="/var/folders/9l/7n7rrkrj0d51ydll3hb3l8780000gn/T/"; export TMPDIR;
    SHELL="/bin/bash"; export SHELL;
    HOME="/Users/XXXXXX"; export HOME;
    USER="XXXXXX"; export USER;
    LOGNAME="XXXXXX"; export LOGNAME;
    SSH_AUTH_SOCK="/tmp/launch-d3uaRv/Listeners"; export SSH_AUTH_SOCK;
    Apple_Ubiquity_Message="/tmp/launch-YdytLh/Apple_Ubiquity_Message"; export Apple_Ubiquity_Message;
    Apple_PubSub_Socket_Render="/tmp/launch-8QgJZ0/Render"; export Apple_PubSub_Socket_Render;
    DISPLAY="/tmp/launch-c6nAQC/org.macosforge.xquartz:0"; export DISPLAY;

printenv

TERM_PROGRAM=Apple_Terminal
TERM=xterm-256color
SHELL=/bin/bash
TMPDIR=/var/folders/9l/7n7rrkrj0d51ydll3hb3l8780000gn/T/
Apple_PubSub_Socket_Render=/tmp/launch-8QgJZ0/Render
TERM_PROGRAM_VERSION=309
TERM_SESSION_ID=8336481B-7483-4050-919F-1268887775DE
USER=XXXXXX
COMMAND_MODE=unix2003
SSH_AUTH_SOCK=/tmp/launch-d3uaRv/Listeners
__CF_USER_TEXT_ENCODING=0x1F5:0:0
Apple_Ubiquity_Message=/tmp/launch-YdytLh/Apple_Ubiquity_Message
PATH=/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/opt/X11/bin:
PWD=/Users/XXXXXX
SHLVL=1
HOME=/Users/XXXXXX
LOGNAME=XXXXXX
LC_CTYPE=UTF-8
DISPLAY=/tmp/launch-c6nAQC/org.macosforge.xquartz:0
_=/usr/bin/printenv
OLDPWD=/Users/XXXXXX

Files in '/etc/paths.d/':

40-XQuartz

/opt/X11/bin

I dont have a  bashrc directory at location /etc/bashrc.

I also don't have ~/.bashrc.

Maybe it is also useful that before I installed PEAR I added a symlink to /usr/bin maybe that is part of the problem?

The error message you listed is the result of using one of

 export $VARIABLE
 export /a/path/to/something
 export *more or less anything which is not a syntactically correct variable name*

instead of

 export VARIABLE

in one of your initialization files. To find the offending line you need to look into all the .profile, .bash_profile and anything sourced/called from there and grep for 'export ' to find it.

As it seams to be related to the installation of either PEAR or MAMP I would start looking at any additions done by these installations.


Dell monitor does not run on native resolution of 1600x900 pixel when connected to early macbook pro retina 2015 via thunderbolt just a few hours ago I got 2 dell E2015HV monitors, they are VGA monitors with a native resolution of 1600x900 pixel and since the macbook pro retina does not have any VGA ports I'm using two VGA to thunderbolt converters to connect the two displays to the computer to make them an extended display, but for some reason none of the displays want to run on their native resolution, and when I option + click on the scaled display setting from display preferences I see a list of custom resolutions but not one of them are the monitor's native resolution of 1600x900 pixel, as a matter of fact none of the resolutions listed in the list box even begin with the number 1600. So, the question now is that is there anything I can do to make them run on their native resolution? Thanks!

There is nothing wrong with your monitors, neither your Mac. That's a compatibility issue with your adapter. There are many comments on Amazon complaining about the same issue on similar converters. That seems, unfortunately, a hardware fault.

Example: http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/cr/B00NH13I08/ref=mw_dp_cr


iPhone untrusted certificate warning My iPhone 7 iOS 10.3.1 randomly started receiving untrusted certificate pop-ups from onboard.info (but I’ve seen it on devices going back to iPhone 5):

This was at home last night and I had just unlocked my phone. I tried to get a screenshot of the rest of the certificate details but it was registered as just a home button press and there is no way to switch back into the certificate warning dialogue by changing apps.

I can’t apply any logic to the root cause of this or recreate it. I’ve never clicked Trust for obvious reasons.

Can anyone explain?

21/04/17 - Just happened again.  The irony of the backdrop in this picture is not lost on me.  Is this some sort of MITM attack?

Yes, it seems to be a MITM attack. The pcr.apple.com has a certificate issued by Symantec for Apple - but you're getting an entirely different, self-signed certificate.

Note that MITM doesn't mean that it must be a "malicious" attack as such.

You do not mention the internet source you're connected to when the problem occurs. Some connections, particular public WiFi such as in restaurants, on trains and busses, etc. will use seemingly MITM for presenting sign-on pages for their WiFi, or for the purpose of injecting ads into web pages.

The certificate you're getting is from an Icomera system. They supply systems for passenger WiFi on trains and busses. If you're using such WiFi, this is the source of your problems.

And yes, it is a terrible practice for Icomera and others to be building their systems like this.


How to Import photo from screensaver Mac I have transferred a photo from camera to the Mac and it is  stored in screen saver. I couldn't find any photo in iPhoto or in the library.

If you can please help me how to import photos from screen saver.

Open the screen saver preference pane and see what folder has the files. If you can locate that, open photos and import from that location.


Mid 2009 MacBook won't recognize [any] hard drive My MacBook had been acting fine. I applied the latest update to Mountain Lion and closed the lid. When I opened the lid, it wouldn't wake from sleep (dark screen with whirring fan for ~5mins). I held the power button and it rebooted to a dark grey screen. I reset the pram using Cmd+Option+P and it booted to the grey screen with flashing question mark. So I rebooted with the install disk for lion (I didn't make one for 10.8). Disk Utility doesn't see my root partition, it does however see the Mac OSX Base System 1.4 GB partition (I'm not sure if this is actually on my HDD or if it is a virtual file system created by the install disk). In any case, I swapped out to my OEM hard disk and rebooted. Disk utility still only sees the Mac OSX Base System. diskutil list reports the same. I can't reboot to recovery via Cmd+R or via holding the Option key. I also don't hear the hard drive spin up. At this point I'm thinking that I have a bad motherboard.

Is there any way to confirm that the motherboard is indeed bad?

It was the logic board. I'm using the hard drive now as an external drive with out problem.


Screen sharing stopped working after 10.10.2 update Screen sharing between my iMac and my Mac Mini stopped working after I applied the 10.10.2 update.  I'm trying to access the Mac Mini from the iMac.  I get the standard error message advising that I should check the Mac Mini is on the network etc. etc.

File sharing works well.  I can copy files between the two Macs and can move and delete files on the Mac Mini.  I always access Screen Sharing using the same user credentials as for File Sharing.

Things I have tried:

Turned Screen Sharing off then on again on the Mac Mini.
Checked the IP address many times.
Invoked Screen Sharing using the application (in CoreServices), the Connect to Server dialog (command-k) and the Network dialog (command-shift-k).
Reinstalled 10.10.2 using the combo updater.
Adding port 5900 to the vac command (i.e. vnc://nnn.nnn.n.nnn:5900).
Deleted the screen sharing prefs files (on the iMac).
Deleted relevant entries in my KeyChain (in the hope SS would pop a login dialog - but it didn’t).
Made sure the Mac Mini is awake.
Checked logs but can find nothing at all on Screen Sharing.
Installed the ARD update on both machines.
Checked Firewall settings - Screen sharing is specifically allowed (and there are no other sharing functions blocked).

My Mac Mini does appear under “Sharing” in the sidebar of the iMac's windows suggesting (with the working file sharing) that this is not a networking issue.

The iMac is connected to the router by cable; the Mac Mini is connected by wifi.

Screen sharing worked under 10.10 and 10.10.1.  Now it doesn't.  I haven't played with settings except as stated above.

Does anyone have any ideas ?  This has me totally stumped.

Many thanks.

Garry

After working with Apple, I have an answer. It looks like the 10.10.2 update changed your firewall settings. Try this:

System Preferences>Security and Privacy>Firewall Options

Scroll down the list till you find "screensharingd". If it's marked as block in coming connections, change it to allow incoming connections.

Be sure to reboot your computer and you should be good to go!


How to join audio tracks into a single audiobook? I am looking for a solution to join entire CD to a single audio file, preferably with chapterizing functionality.

Usually, Join Toghether should do the job but this solution doesn't work anymore with Lion and I am looking for a solution that works with Lion.

I mention that most of my files are in AAC Lossless format and I don't want to convert them to something worse. I tried Audiobook Builder but it seams to not be able to build lossless files.

Rogue Amoeba's Fission will do what you want. It costs US $39 but it has a limited trial demo you can download. It is a lightweight lossless audio editor. The publisher reports no compatibility problems with Lion.


iPhone field test instructions "Access the iPhone’s Field Test mode by typing 3001#12345# in the phone’s keypad and press dial. This will bring up the Field Test menu."

Doesn't work for me.

The correct code is

*3001#12345#*

(note the asterisks at the beginning and end).


Applescript to find application path from partial app name? How do I get the path to a running application using part of the app name. (eg. 'Acrobat' in 'Adobe Acrobat Reader DC') This is what I tried but it's incorrect. (Note: Not sure if it changes if multiple instances are running, but I only want a single POSIX path returned)
tell application "System Events",
  if (get name of every application process) contains "Acrobat" then
    return POSIX path of (path to ((get name of every application process) contains "Acrobat"))
  end if
end tell

The following example AppleScript code assumes you only have one application running that contains "Acrobat" in its name, otherwise you'll need to process the list returned from System Events in a repeat loop.
tell application "System Events" to ¬
    set appAcrobatList to the ¬
        name of every application process ¬
        whose background only is false ¬
        and name contains "Acrobat"

if appAcrobatList is not {} then ¬
    return POSIX path of ¬
        (path to application ¬
            (first item of appAcrobatList))


Can't open my iPad mini I shutdown my iPad and left it for a while.  Now I want to start it again and I can't open it.  I've used the sleep/awake button, also use that with the home button but I can't open it at all. It sits there with the Apple icon on the screen and sometimes it has a spinning little icon in the middle.  I sure would appreciate some help.

First of all, I assume that you have enough battery power on the iPadWhen you see the apple icon on your ipad, hold the power- and home button for several seconds. The ipad will turn off and back on again. After this you can release the buttons when the apple logo is visible.

When the ipad is still stuck on the loading screen, you could preform a DFU (device firmware reset)-reset. Do not forget: by preforming a dfu-reset, all data will be deleted from the iPad.

A tutorial on how to enter dfu-mode can be found here
Make sure that the ad is turned on before you start following the tutorial.

To check if you successfully entered dfu- mode:

there should be an iTunes logo with a lightning/30-pins cable on the screen of the ipad
when the device is connected to iTunes, you should get a popup that the device is in restore mode and it has to be restoren before it can be used.


How do I schedule a root command to run at intervals? I need to run a script in intervals that requires a root user to execute. I created a plist that will call a script in ~/bin/test.sh.

user@MBP:~$ ls -lah ~/bin/
-rw-r--r--   1 root       staff   566B Feb  6 23:44 test.plist
-rwxr-xr-x   1 root       staff    51B Feb  6 23:38 test.sh

Here are the contents:

user@MBP:~$ cat ~/bin/test.plist
<?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>Label</key>
    <string>com.test.script</string>
    <key>ProgramArguments</key>
    <array>
        <string>sh</string>
        <string>/Users/user/bin/test.sh</string>
    </array>
    <key>StartInterval</key>
    <integer>30</integer>
</dict>
</plist>

user@MBP:~$ cat ~/bin/test.sh
#!/bin/sh
cp /Users/user/bin/dummy.txt /etc

Then I symlinked the plist in /Library/LaunchAgents.

user@MBP:~$ ls -lah /Library/LaunchAgents/
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel    31B Feb  5 06:28 com.test.script.plist -> /Users/user/bin/test.plist

But all of this doesn't work. When I look at /var/logs/system.log it just say:

Feb  7 14:42:12 MBP com.apple.launchd.peruser.501[242] (com.test.script`[925]): Exited with code: 1

The man page for launchd.plist describes a UserName key that is required when running the job as root. Presumably, the value should be "root."

I'm no guru, but this seems to be the only thing you're missing — unless launch agents can't be symlinked.


How can I see if an e-mail is signed in "Mail" (using an Exchange account)? Usually, a signed message shows a checkmark icon. Clicking on this icon displays the certificate that was used to sign the message:

Not so when a message lies in an exchange mailbox, and is displayed with "Mail" on MacOS (tested up to 10.10):

The iPad, on the other hand, handles the exact same message just fine. It is also connected via Exchange protocol to the server:

So: How can I enable this also on "Mail" on OS X? Or is this a bug, or even a permanent restriction?

It was most likely a bug. I had the same behaviour and after the latest update (10.10.2) Mail is showing the information again.

Edit

As commented by user2216335 the Security information is not always shown.

Apple Mail was able to recognise the signature from my example:

Content-Type: application/pkcs7-signature; name=smime.p7s;
smime-type=signed-data Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="smime.p7s"
Content-Description: S/MIME Cryptographic Signature

but not from a message sent by Apple Mail

Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="smime.p7s"
Content-Type: application/pkcs7-signature; name="smime.p7s"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64


How can I view (not download) iPhone pictures on a Mac screen? I have an iPhone 5 with various photos.
I have a Mac desktop running OS X Yosemite.

Is there a way to view a fullscreen slideshow of the photos on the Mac display?  I don't want to download the photos, just flip through them for display on the big screen.

Apple's mandated solution would be to wait for the photos to upload to your Photo Stream or iCloud Photo Library, then start a slideshow in iPhoto or Aperture.

Alternatively, you could make your Mac into an AirPlay receiver using a 3rd party app such as AirSquirrel's Reflector. This one is paid, but I'm not aware of any free equivalent.


How is a large, spread out company supposed to work with the iOS Developer Program? I work for a company which has several offices in various parts of the country (USA).

The division I'm part of wants to get an Apple iOS Developer Program license.

Another division (in another office/state) already has a license.

When we go to that division they said it would be better/easier to just apply for our own license, which made sense.

When we apply to get the license we have to use our legal company name.

Apple shot us down - because the other division already has the license under the legal company name. Which also makes sense.

Apple is being Apple in that it's basically impossible to get someone on the phone to discuss what we're supposed to do here. So my guess is that what we're going to have to do is piggy-back off of the license the other division is using.

Besides sounding like a big huge hassle (coordinating with coworkers in another office/state whom you've never met) I'm not really sure what the logistics are. Are we supposed to be able to use this one license on every Mac we own across the company? (which luckily there's not that many of) Or is there a seat limit? The end goal is the App Store, but should we have gotten an Enterprise license? If so, is there any way to "upgrade" to that if the other division just got the standard one? Is someone from the other division supposed to be the "admin" of the license? Or can we all be added as users to their license?

For a large, spread out company with divisions in many different offices and states, how are you supposed to work with the iOS Developer Program?

(I asked this on SO as well, and someone recommended I ask it here, too. Let me know if this is unacceptable)

A $99 "company" developer membership allows the administrator of the account to set up many "developer" accounts. You should get the administrator of that account (whoever set it up originally, most likely) to create accounts for each of your developers.

You might need to share the admin account for things like provisioning and app submission, but for most of your daily work, you can have your own login that shares the developer membership.


Connect MacBook Pro 2015 to iMac 2015 with HDMI? I forgot to bring my "Thunderbolt to Thunderbolt" cable to connect my MacBook Pro to my iMac screen. I do not wish to spend again all that money to go buy one now.

The only thing I have here is a "HDMI to HDMI" cable and there is a possibility for me to go buy an "HDMI to Mini DisplayPort" which are cheap.

I would like to know if connecting the HDMI from my MacBook and using the adapter to connect to the Thunderbolt of my iMac will work.

Target Display Mode needs DisplayPort or Thunderbolt. It cannot use passive HDMI adapters or ones that don’t support active HDMI to DisplayPort.

https://www.amazon.com/DisplayPort-Adapter-FOINNEX-Converter-Compatible/dp/B07G796JF8/
https://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-HDMI2DP-DisplayPort-Active-Converter/dp/B004I6IYSM/

Warning, that the apple link only lists DisplayPort in for some models of Mac. Be sure you can return anything you buy if you’re not sure it will work or have the seller or manufacturer confirm your specific Mac and use.

Source : Apple KB - Use your iMac as a display with Target Display Mode


Lost space after removing bootcamp So I removed bootcamp and now there is a partition called "free space" that I can't remove.

Here is my output from diskutil list:

Here is the screenshot from disk utility showing the partitions:

And here is the error I get when I try to remove "free space":

Heres the output when I run

sudo diskutil apfs resizeContainer disk0s2 0

This is a very common question. Once again, the answer is given below.

sudo diskutil apfs resizeContainer disk0s2 0


Keyboard Fn Function key switchUsing language Using Macbook Air M1. The keyboard Fn (Function) key has a globe icon to switch between languages. It works but a bit quirky. When it's not working, it tries to switch language but couldn't, and when I switch screen, the language switching dialog keeps popping up.
To make the keyboard Fn key work again in switching language, I have to restart my computer. See video attached - the Fn key is not even pressed.

Using Fn to switch keyboards is new with Big Sur.  Buggy behavior has been reported by many users in the Apple discussion forums.  Until Apple fixes it, probably best to use the traditional shortcuts found in System Preferences/Keyboard/Shortcuts.
I understand MacOS 11.2 should fix this problem when released.


iPhone 7 Plus Won't Turn On? So I recently got a new iPhone 7 Plus a week ago. Tonight, I got onto this website which kept on putting up pop-ups on the page. I went to the lock screen, and it instantly froze. I couldn't even unlock the phone. Then, it went into a black screen with the loading icon. I tried to shut it off several times, but no use. I tried to connect it to iTunes via my MacBook Pro, but since the phone has a password, iTunes sent a verification text to my phone. Of course, I can't access anything in my phone now. There's literally nothing I can do with the phone. (The battery was at 70%, if that helps.)

Sorry for the long post, but what do I do? I'm very worried that it might've gotten hacked or something. Please help!

If a device seems like it's not responding to any input, often a hard reset, which is Sleep + Volume Down (for iPhone 7 and above; for iPhone 6s and below, use Sleep + Home) held until the Apple logo appears, is needed.

Powering off an iOS device isn't like powering off a computer. It doesn't reset everything, flush RAM, etc as a computer does when powered down. It's more akin to hibernation mode on a computer, as it's designed to come back on quickly. The hard reset is more like turning the computer off and back on - it dumps RAM and does any housekeeping that might be preventing the device from responding. It does NOT reset any data, preferences, apps, content, or so on.


Screensaver after morning wake I would like the screen saver (which shows family photos) to launch each morning when the computer wakes in the morning.  I used the Energy Saver option to sleep the computer each night and to wake it each morning.  But instead, each morning I find a blank screen and am forced to login to start the screen saver.
I am wondering if someone can recommend a way for the screensaver to start automatically each morning, without needing to login.  This is for a computer at my (elderly) parents house where they love to watch the photos, but don't quite understand why they would need to log in to see them each morning.
The only solution I have is to completely turn off energy save mode and leave the computer/screensaver on in perpetuity.
Ideas?
System = iMac 27/2013 with OSX 10.9.1 (also 10.8)

It looks like running the following command in Terminal, or supposedly through a script, will start the screen saver:

/System/Library/Frameworks/ScreenSaver.framework/Resources/ScreenSaverEngine.app/Contents/MacOS/ScreenSaverEngine

You could then schedule the screen saver to run a couple of minutes after the time the computer is scheduled to turn on. See this SuperUser question for some alternatives for task scheduling in Mac OS X.


Creating a virtual serial port I'm trying to create a pair of virtual serial ports on my mac. This is fairly easy to do with many shareware programs on a PC. I figured there would be some uber-powerful shell command to do this in one line, but I can't find it.

I want to send NMEA data into one port, and have Google earth read the data out of the other.

Any tips?

EDIT

MrDaniel's /dev/ptypx comment seemed to be interesting - I can pull it out of /dev/ttypx just fine in terminal.
But Google earth seems to be reading cu.deviceName instead of the /ttypx deveices..

specifically (Old Pro):

When trying to import the current location using a GPS (or NMEA stream piped through our virtual serial port), we go: Tools > GPS > Realtime to get to the import screen.
After selecting the NMEA option, and enabling realtime tracking, it looks for connected devices, and seems to look at:

usb:
/dev/cu.Bluetooth-PDA-Sync
/dev/cu.Bluetooth-Modem
/dev/cu.iPhone-WirelessAP

Even with our ttypx serial port operating ok, it doesn't look for it.
I would like to get the data from that device into Google Earth.

Google has an extremely useful tool for Arduino developers and it simulates serial ports very well on OS X for testing purposes. It only works until 10.6

https://github.com/clokey/PublicCode/tree/master/MacOSXVirtualSerialPort

(previously available from http://code.google.com/p/macosxvirtualserialport/ )

Might this help you?


Bash script not found El Capitan I have created a Bash script that simply does ls -l.

In Mavericks and older versions of OSX I simply made a symlink to the script and put it in the /usr/bin folder (ln -s ll.sh /usr/bin/ll) and I could then execute the script using ll from any folder.

Since upgrading to El Capitan I am unable to load this script. I have disabled SIP so that I am able to create the symlink and the script is definitely executable. The location (/usr/bin) is definitely in the $PATH and I have even tried adding a path to the script into the $PATH too.

Nothing seems to work, all I am getting is -bash: ll: command not found.

I have restarted the terminal after each update to the $PATH and I have tried source ~/.bash_profile but neither are making any difference.

Edit: I also tried adding the current directory of the scripts to the $PATH and that was also giving the same error. In the end I have aliased all my scripts so that they will run.

Just read the comments and see that you're looking for a general solution, rather than that specific example. I'll leave my previous answer in case it helps someone, but here's a more general solution.

My first piece of advice: leave /usr/bin alone. There's no reason to mess with it and there are many reasons not to mess with it. Instead, add a directory somewhere else, put you scripts there, and add it to you $PATH variable. If you want this just for your user, you could create a scripts or bin directory in your home directory, or if you want it globally available you could put it under /usr/local, e.g. /usr/local/scripts or /usr/local/bin. Then, in the .bashrc file in your home directory, add the following:

export PATH=$PATH:~/scripts:/usr/local/scripts

If you would rather have your commands override a system command (should they have the same name) then you could do the following, instead:

export PATH=~/scripts:/usr/local/scripts:$PATH

If you want this set for all users, then there is a global /etc/bashrc file that you can add the above to.

In order to edit the global bashrc or modify /usr/local you need root/admin privileges.


How can I have iOS Safari remember credentials for websites with HTTP(S) Basic Authentication? I have a HTTPS website which is protected by basic authentication. When I use Safari on macOS to access this website, it will store my credentials (in the Keychain). However, Safari on iOS (11.2.6) refuses to do so. I can click on the key icon on the top right of the keyboard, but it will show only credentials from  form-based websites (the same list as in macOS Safari -> Preferences -> Passwords). Is there any way I can force Safari on iOS to remember these basic authentication credentials?

Safari does not support saving the credentials for basic authentication. That's why you're not asked to store it.

There are basically three work-arounds you can use:

The first is simply to create a bookmark that contains your credentials. Note that this should only be done if the credentials aren't "important" - like for example if this is one of those commercial web sites that allow anyone in that knows that this year's password is "2019" or something like that. Then you can create a bookmark for the URL like this:

http://user:pass@website.com/

When you open that bookmark, you'll not be asked for credentials, but will be logged in automatically.

If you require an ordinary amount of security regarding the saved credentials, you can instead use a different work around. On your device, access Settings and then Passwords & Accounts and then App & Website Passwords. At the top is a + icon that you can click to add your web site and the username and password.

Contrary to form based password authentication, the information you enter there will not be automatically filled out. However when you get the username/password popup, you have the option of clicking the little "key" icon to select the stored credentials.

The third possible work-around is to use a Mac logged in to the same iCloud account with Keychain enabled. Access the web site using Safari on the Mac, and you'll be able to store the credentials.

On the iOS device the credentials will not be automatically filled out, but you will be able to press the "lock" icon in the popup to allow choosing the credentials you've stored on the Mac.


I have a problem resetting my AppleID password I tried to reset my AppleID password but I do not remember the Email account or the security questions I used to create the AppleID. Is there anyway to change or find the email I used for my AppleID?

If the Apple ID is still logged in the iPad, you can view the email address used by the iCloud account in Settings > iCloud. (Email address appears under the name on the iCloud account)

From there, you can retrieve the email address used to register the iCloud account and attempt to recover your password.


Is there a way to snooze the reminder for a calendar event on iPhone? Is it possible to snooze a reminder for a calendar event when the reminder shows up? I have my calendar set up through an exchange server and would like a snooze feature so I can be reminded of the event 2 or 4 hours after the original notification. If this is not possible is there a good app for recurring events with push notification?

This is not supported by the default calendar app at the moment. An app called Calendar Alarm from the App Store might be what you're looking for. Its listed features include:

  Works seamlessly together with all
  iPhone supported calendars (Google
  Calendar, CalDAV, Outlook, Exchange,
  iCal).
  Snooze function with intervals of your choice.


Why does Messages app take up so much space? I was recently inspecting the Usage tab in my iPhone's settings. The Messages app is #2 on the list with almost 700 MB. Anecdotal reports have it that the app can take up multiple GB of space. So what is in there?

Is every photo and video sent being stored in the app's data? If so, does that mean if I take a photo or video and send it out, it is being stored on my phone twice? And can I remove the photos and videos without deleting the entire message thread?

Yes, videos and photos are stored in messages and they take up too much space. Try deleting any large discussion thread you do not need if you would like to free some space. Or, if you would like to weed out individual photos or videos, you can tap and hold on any message bubble for the context menu. It will appear with two options: "Copy" | "More". Tap "More" for a list of checkboxes to appear on the left side of the screen. This allows you to easily delete one or more (large) individual messages.

Up to iOS 6 messages just weren't in the usage tab, and consequently one couldn't easily see how much space it consumed.

Also note, that you are just deleting those messages off of that device. If they are iMessages, and you have other devices (a Mac or OSX device) with those accounts synced there, the messages will stay there.


Alias use from Terminal - What's the magic recipe? I wanted to make a shortcut at my root, entry Terminal directory

Goal

an Alias for /someLongPath/someProject/ at ~/someProject

Problem

I create the Alias and locate it at ~/. For me this is ~/MultiTimer here. But for the Alias, the Terminal use of cd does not work!

Question

How do you use cd from the Terminal for an Alias? Can this be setup?

Aliases are special files for OS X and currently only supported by GUI apps.
They contain information about the target object wich allows the finder to find the original location even if the target has been moved across filesystems.

There is some C source to build a tool that gets the target name out of an alias file (Link to source code), but I think to use it in the way you would like (cd) this is not that practical. Ex:

cd `./getTrueName Multitimer`

As mentioned in the first answer, ln is the right tool to use if you don't need the advanced Alias features:

ln -s <sourcepath> <targetpath> does not allow for target movement.

ln <sourcepath> <targetpath> allows for target movement, but only on the same file system.


2 external monitors with Macbook Pro Can I connect two external monitors to my Macbook Pro's (non-retina, mid-2012) mini displayport ? I got one mini displayport to dvi converter and dvi-male to 2*dvi female splitter but this setup didn't work. My question is, can I use one display port to connect to two different monitors (both the monitors should be independent and not mirror)

According to MacBook Pro (15-inch, Mid 2012) - Technical Specifications, this is what's supported under Graphics and Video Support and Thunderbolt digital video output:

  Graphics and Video Support

  Intel HD Graphics 4000
  NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M with 512MB of GDDR5 memory (15-inch 2.3GHz configuration) or NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M with 1GB of GDDR5 memory
  (15-inch 2.6GHz configuration) and automatic graphics switching
  Dual display and video mirroring: Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display and up to   2560 by 1600
  pixels on an external display, both at millions of colors

  Thunderbolt digital video output

  Native Mini DisplayPort output
  DVI output using Mini DisplayPort to DVI Adapter (sold separately)
  VGA output using Mini DisplayPort to VGA Adapter (sold separately)
  Dual-link DVI output using Mini DisplayPort to Dual-Link DVI Adapter (sold separately)
  HDMI audio and video output using third-party Mini DisplayPort to HDMI Adapter (sold separately)


rEFInd boot manager not showing EFI shell After succesfully installing the rEFInd tool from https://www.rodsbooks.com/refind/ on a macbook with macos 10.15, restarting the laptop does bring me into the rEFInd boot manager. But the only option available is to launch macOS. I downloaded this tool to use the EFI shell and there seems to be no option to launch the shell.

Is this some sort of package I need to install to the EFI mount?

You need a compatible EFI Shell program (called shell.efi) in your EFI partition.

As mentioned in the rEFInd config file documentation, in the showtools parameter section:

  Note that the shell, memtest, gdisk, apple_recovery, mok_tool, and fwupdate options all require the presence of programs not included with rEFInd.

The rEFInd CD version does include an EFI shell (there is also a link for it on the Installing Additional Components section of the documentation) but this doesn't work on my macs (all 2015 or older) as the Apple EFI firmware is too old.

You can download an older EDK version 1 binary which should work on any version :

Download Shell_Full.efi from tianocore/edk2
Rename it to shell.efi
Mount your ESP with mkdir /Volumes/ESP followed by sudo mount -t msdos /dev/disk0s1 /Volumes/ESP
Copy shell.efi to directory /Volumes/ESP/EFI/tools where rEFInd will look by default (make directory if it doesn't exist).
rEFInd will display shell as a small icon underneath the OS icons if it finds the executable.


Why my iPhone switches from wi-fi to 3g each time screen blocks and does it take any data during? (or how to check it) I am using iPhone 3gs 16gb with OS 4.0.1 and each time screen blocks it is switching from wi-fi to 3g. It comes back automatically to wi-fi each time I unblock the screen.

Can I prevent it somehow? I want it to stay connected to wi-fi all the time.

How can I check how much datas it is downloading during?

That is a feature to preserve battery life. If your iPhone is jailbroken, you can install Insomnia from Cydia to keep WiFi active while the screen locks.

If you want to check your data usage, you can go to Settings >> General >> Usage. There, you can check under "Cellular Network Data" for how much data you have used. You can reset that, then lock your screen for some time, come back and check what has changed.

Hope this helps!


Could not update to iOS 11 because ‘an error occurred installing’ Been trying this for more than 10 times already. Both from iTunes from my laptop and my phone. What should I do? Been doing the usual restart but still that still shows up.

iPhone 5s

This happened when there is not enough space.

Before trying to reinstall you need to delete the old update.

To do this go to Settings -> General -> Storage & iCloud Storage -> Manage Storage.

Then look for the update and delete it:

Then try to install the update using iTunes:

Open iTunes and select your device
from the left panel

Click on Summary, then click Check for
Update

Click Download and Update

When asked, enter your passcode


What is portProxy.bin and why is it sucking/eating/using up my CPU? Through today, portProxy.bin has been eating up my CPU, constantly using about 60% and making the fans in my computer whizz up.

I'm guessing it might be connected to my VPN use, but now I haven't been running any VPNs for some hours and portProxy has still been staying at around 60% CPU usage.

I use Cisco AnyConnect to access my schools private network and Disconnect to block trackers and hide my location. Sometimes I forget to disable Disconnect before trying to connect through Cisco AnyConnect, but then AnyConnect can establish a connection and I'm reminded I have Disconnect running. Could this have something to do with it?

Thank you.

I haven't figured out what portProxy.bin is or why it was hogging my CPU, so if you know this, please edit and replace this text with an explanation.

I did a restart and that corrected the problem.


How to convert Keynote to PowerPoint online Is there a way to convert a downloaded Keynote (from slideshare) file to a PowerPoint file (or an open format like Open/LibreOffice) online?

Here is how you can do this...

Sign in / up for iCloud at www.icloud.com
Open the online "Keynote" app
Drag your Keynote file onto the browser window
Keynote browser app will open your presentation
Make any changes etc.
Click the wrench icon on top right, and select "Download a copy"

7. Keynote will prompt you with option to download a PPT / PDF / Keynote file

8. Select PPT and ye shall receive a Powerpoint version :-)


Macbook startup disk full; GP shows 164GB of 'Miscellaneous used space' I can't work on my macbook anymore as it constantly pops up 'startup disk full' I went through every article I could find, cleaning up as much as I could.

I deleted unnecessary backups, do not have any other user accounts, cleared trash, etc etc.

I currently have about 70GB of files I actually need, and now Grand Perspective is showing me I have 164GB of 'Miscellaneous used space'.

What is this space and can I get rid of it?

I found the this link on MacRumors that sounds like the same problem you are having. The gist of it seems to be clearing the system cache using this command sudo rm -r /System/Library/Caches could help ( assuming that is where the issue lies). You should also be able to hopefully figure out what is using up all the space with this command sudo du -chxd 1 / to see what is taking up all the space.


Why Does My Dock Background Sometimes Exclude the Leftmost Icon? Very silly question, won't really affect my productivity or anything, but I'm curious...

Every now and then I realize my Dock suddenly looks like this:

That is, the background excludes the left-most, Finder icon. If I restart the Dock porcess with, say:

$ sudo killall Dock

(also useful to clear MRU list on cmd-click app icon)

...it goes back to normal:

What is causing it in the first place?

My Setup

MacBook Pro with an external monitor attached, running macOS 10.12.6 ("Sierra").
System Preferences/Mission Control/"Displays have separate Spaces" is unchecked (i.e., the Dock always stays on main monitor).

EDIT: I tried rearranging the icons to see if anything on the far left will trigger this or it is just finder. Curiously, as of Sierra at least, the leftmost Finder icon seems to be fixed and impossible to drag/rearrange.

It turns out the Continuity feature Handoff is to blame: If I open mobile Safari on my nearby iPhone, this happens:

When I close the mobile app, the left-most segment disappears and Finder is "kicked out" of the Dock, like in the question.

Perhaps I sould file a bug report with Apple, but can not check if this has been fixed in the upcoming High Sierra or not...


Can't run python script from Automator on Catalina "Operation not permitted" I have a service in Automator that I pass a folder and it runs on every file in the folder. It uses a python script to read the album field from an mp3's id3 tags and write it to the Finder comment field:

This worked fine in Mojave, with each file's album being written to its comment. Now with Catalina when I run the service, every comment gets set to the following:
/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/Resources/Python.app/Contents/MacOS/Python: can't open file '/Users/thompcha/Documents/Scripts/album.py': [Errno 1] Operation not permitted

The script works fine if I run it manually from the terminal
I granted Automator, Terminal, and Python full disk access in System Preferences
I installed python via Homebrew as suggested in responses to similar questions
I made the script chmod 777 and changed the owner to myself

The answer found here does not work for me because I need to pass the output of the python script to the rest of the shell script for further execution.
What can I do to make automator successfully execute my python script?

I ended up in-lining my python script. The finished product looked like this:

for f in "$1"/*.mp3;
do

    updated=$(python -c "import eyed3; import sys; eyed3.log.setLevel(\"ERROR\"); filename = '$f'; from eyed3 import mp3; f = mp3.Mp3AudioFile(filename); album = f.tag.album; f.tag.comments.set(album); f.tag.save(); print(album); exit(album);")

    comment=$(mdls -r -nullMarker "" -n kMDItemFinderComment "$f")

    printf "%s ( comment ): %s\n" "${1##*/}" "$comment"

    /usr/bin/osascript -e "set filepath to POSIX file \"$f\"" \
    -e "set the_File to filepath as alias" \
    -e "tell application \"Finder\" to set the comment of the_File to \"$updated\""

done


Unable to install R-2.11.1.pkg and up to R-3.0.2 in Mac OSX 10.8.5 I have an iMac 2013 with a Fusion Drive and OSX 10.8.5. No plans to migrate to Mavericks yet.

I have had issues also with x11 that I've solved with a "direct" install:

installer -pkg ~/Desktop/XQuartz.pkg -target / -allowUntrusted -store

But, when I try to install R-2.11.1 and above (I'm using R-2.10.1, and works well ;) ) I get the following message from the installer:

R 3.0.2 for Mac OS X 10.6 or higher (Snow Leopard build) can't be installed on this disk.
This build of R requires MAC OS X 10.6 or higher.

If I try from the Terminal

sudo installer -pkg ~/Desktop/R-3.0.2.pkg -target / -allowUntrusted -store

I receive this output from terminal:

installer: Note: running installer as an admin user (instead of root) gives better Mac App Store fidelity
installer: Warning: R-3.0.2.pkg was signed with a certificate that is not valid for store submission.
installer: Installation Check: Passed
installer: Volume Check: Fatal: Failure

And it fails.

What can I do? Delete some plist? Regenerate something? Reinstall Mountain Lion? I really prefer to not to have to rebuild from source.

I have had no issues installing R on my notebook with Lion.

Why are you using the -store option? You realise that if you have that then -allowUntrusted is ignored. To quote the man page In this mode, no other options are supported. That option is there to check that a package is ready to be submitted to Apple for the App Store.

Take that out.

I also discovered that failed attempts seem to leave orphan installer processes running that seem to cause trouble in later attempts - even a kill -9 leaves them on the process stack.

Reboot your computer and then run Terminal. First go sudo -s so you get an actual root shell. Now installer -verbose -pkg ~/Desktop/R-3.0.2.pkg -target / in the root shell. Thats what worked for me under 10.9


No option to restore system I recently setup my Time Machine so I can easily restore my system if I break it.

Problem is that when I start the installer from my USB-drive the option "Restore from a Time Machine Backup" is not present.

The USB-drive I'm booting from have the Yosemite installer on it. I've also tried to hold in CMD+R during boot but it doesn't seem to work, I just get to the normal login screen.

Here's a bad image of what it looks like in the "Utilities"-menu.

Anyone know what's up?

If this is what I believe you are asking:

At the top of you OS, you will see a clock with an arrow going round clockwise. Click that, then choose the third option down - 'Enter Time Machine'. Find your backup needed, then press restore.

Nick


Does Apple allow buying a new phone through its website the day it's released? I am new to Apple and I am not sure how it does things with new phones, but I wanted to know if and when the next iPhone is released will it be made available on its website the day it's released?

I tried finding some info regarding this online but it's hard to get good information of when they updated their website and if it was made available on the same day.

If it is, I don't quite understand why people would line up and wait hours to get it or am I missing something?

The only thing you're missing is the need to be part of the party.
People like queuing up to be first.

If you pre-order it online* you can answer the door in your pyjamas & get your phone the same day, without the queue. I've known them arrive at 8am on release day.

*Note: If you wait too long to pre-order, you won't get it on the first day, but some time later, depending on how popular the release is.

Announcements are usually made in the first week or so of September, with the release being about a week later. The online stores will go live for pre-orders at about the time the announcement/conference ends. They will be closed for the day up to that point.
No date has yet been set for even the announcement, so at present everything is still speculation.


I updated my iPad Air to iOS 8 and keychain not working correctly After updating my iPad Air to iOS 8, keychain is not working correctly.  It will occasionally ask to save new login data but never offers to fill in that info when I go to that website.  All the logins from iOS 7 are in the password file but it never uses any of the old data nor ask to save those websites again.  The password file has the four digit password which I did not have on iOS 7.  I have checked the settings several times and tried different settings and nothing works.  The settings appear to be correctly.

Since iOS is a sandbox I do not know of any tools to help reset the keychain and download it again with out resetting all settings. Do you have the iCloud Keychain running, is it backed up via iCloud? If so then trying to reinstall your iCloud data back may fix the issue. Start by going to Setting> General>Reset reset all settings. If this does not work try  erase all content and settings and restore from and iCloud backup. If you are still acing issues the try a  full erase of the iOS and your data. Then restore from an iCloud backup.


Installation error rpm in mac 10.9.3 I using sudo port install rpm to install the rpm in my mac(version 10.9.3), but when i use rpm, for example rpm -qa, it always gives me the error like:

Segmentation fault: 11

Could somebody explain why and how to install correctly?

The rpm port is rather old (it depends on python 2.5 and perl 5.08 ) and is outdated as per macports mail list in July 2012 (i.e. it was outdated 2 years ago)

  Note that the rpm port contains the very old version 4.4.9 of the rpm program. Other ports exist that provide newer versions of rpm which you may want to use instead. None of the newer rpm ports have this particular bug.

Looking for new rpm ports by port search rpm shoes the highest port as rpm54 so try sudo port install rpm54

I would note that that latest is the same latest as two years ago I do not know if there is a higher rpm version elsewhere


What does "sudo nvram boot-args="debug=0x10"" do to my Mac? Because Parallels Desktop 10 and Fusion 7 both run slow on Yosemite, there are KB articles which make the users execute

sudo nvram boot-args="debug=0x10"

For instance here: http://kb.parallels.com/122767

I have figured out that 0x10 will "make ddb the default debugger". But I have no idea what this means, yet it sounds scary.

What will this command do to Yosemite/the Mac? Can it have any other side effects?

sudo nvram boot-args="debug=0x144"

This is a combination of kernel debugging features that will show you extra information about the kernel's processes, which can be exceptionally useful if a system is experiencing kernel panics. Another option is to use debug=0x14e, which will display even more logging options. The primary use for this is that it enables old-style kernel panics that show scrolled text on the screen about why the system panicked, instead of displaying the gray backdrop and the message to merely restart your system. Alternative debug options are the following, though these will likely only be useful to kernel programmers:

0x01 - Stop at boot time and wait for the debugger to attach
0x02 - Send kernel debugging output to the console
0x04 - Drop into debugger on a nonmaskable interrupt
0x08 - Send kernel debugging information to a serial port
0x10 - Make ddb the default debugger
0x20 - Output diagnostics information to the system log
0x40 - Allow the debugger to ARP and route
0x80 - Support old versions of gdb on newer systems
0x100 - Disable the graphical panic dialog screen

Source: Boot argument options in OS X
ddb is just a debugger. It's absolutely safe to enable those kinds of modes to collect information once you experienced system issues.


osx trackpad gesture to switch between chrome tabs Is there a trackpad gesture to switch between Chrome browser tabs? I understand there may be one for Safari.

You can use Better Touch Tool to assign custom gestures to any application. Here's an example how You this would look like in BTT (tip tap gestures to switch tabs):


Multiple Windows on Startup Items - How to Remove I currently have 2 SSDs on my Macbook Pro 2010 13", on which I have successfully installed MacOS & Ubuntu on 1 SSD, and Windows on the other. All is working fine and successfully installed. The issue now only, after I installed Ubuntu, I have multiple Windows drives showing up which created double options. One of these drives are totally useless. How do I remove this so it's back to the original 3 options as it should be? (The first Windows icon from the left is the useless one).
Thanks in advance for anyone that willing to help or advise.

Below my diskutil list

/dev/disk0 (internal, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:     FDisk_partition_scheme                        *250.1 GB   disk0
   1:               Windows_NTFS BOOTCAMP                250.1 GB   disk0s1

/dev/disk1 (internal, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *240.1 GB   disk1
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk1s1
   2:                 Apple_APFS Container disk2         151.8 GB   disk1s2
   3:       Microsoft Basic Data                         7.9 GB     disk1s3
   4:       Microsoft Basic Data                         79.9 GB    disk1s4

/dev/disk2 (synthesized):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      APFS Container Scheme -                      +151.8 GB   disk2
                                 Physical Store disk1s2
   1:                APFS Volume dn1122                  13.9 GB    disk2s1
   2:                APFS Volume Preboot                 24.5 MB    disk2s2
   3:                APFS Volume Recovery                512.1 MB   disk2s3
   4:                APFS Volume VM                      4.3 GB     disk2s4

***sudo fdisk /dev/disk1
Disk: /dev/disk1    geometry: 29185/255/63 [468862128 sectors]
Signature: 0xAA55
         Starting       Ending
 #: id  cyl  hd sec -  cyl  hd sec [     start -       size]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
 1: EE    0   0   1 - 1023 254  63 [         1 -     409639] <Unknown ID>
*2: DA 1023 254  63 - 1023 254  63 [    409640 -  296551216] <Unknown ID>
 3: 82 1023 254  63 - 1023 254  63 [ 296962048 -   15362048] Linux swap
 4: 83 1023 254  63 - 1023 254  63 [ 312586240 -  156012544] Linux files*

Remove Windows from Startup Manager

You at least need to remove the hybrid partitioning on disk1. I assuming this drive would be /dev/sda under Ubuntu. If not, then make the appropriate substitution. The command below can be entered in a Ubuntu terminal window to list the drives and partitions.

sudo lsblk -e7

You can use gdisk included with Ubuntu to remove the hybrid partitioning. This is a interactive command. The command and user input is given below.

sudo gdisk /dev/sda
x
n
w
y

How to change EFI Boot to Ubuntu (Optional)

I noticed you have a icon for Ubuntu, but are still using the default label.

Enter the following commands in a macOS Terminal application window.

sudo diskutil mount disk1s1
sudo bless --folder /Volumes/EFI/EFI/Boot --label Ubuntu
diskutil unmount disk1s1

How to Restore Hybrid Partitioning to the Windows Drive.

I assuming this drive would be /dev/disk0 under macOS. If not, then make the appropriate substitution. The command below can be entered in a Terminal application window to list the drives and partitions.

diskutil list

You can use gdisk installed in macOS to partially convert disk0 from a GPT to MBR partition table. This is a interactive command. The command and user input is given below.

sudo gdisk /dev/disk0
r
h
1
n
07
y
n
w
y

Next, use the following commands to finish the conversion.

sudo fdisk -e /dev/disk0
s 2
0
q
y
diskutil unmountdisk disk0
gpt destroy /dev/disk0


El Capitan installed but App Store says there was an error I just updated to El Capitan. The installation seems to have gone through with no problems, and the operating system works well. However, under the App Store tab "purchases", El Capitan is shown as "An error occurred" in red, and the clickable icon offer the option "Download". Should I download it again and re-install?

It might not have actually installed. From the Apple menu, choose About This Mac and verify that you are running El Capitan. If you still have the installer in your applications folder then this too might suggest that it did not install. If it didn't then I would delete the installer from Applications and download El Capitan from App Store again and preferably perform a clean install although not required.


Clock icon next to some apps on macOS Mojave Notice the clock or piece-of-pie icons next to 3 of the apps in this screenshot of the Finder. The icon has been there for two days. All three apps work; I have used each of them.

➥ What does that icon mean?

➥ Is it a problem? What can I do to fix it?

Using macOS Mojave 10.14.5 on a Mac mini (2018).

Bug

Apparently, the icons where caused by an innocuous bug.

After restarting the Mac mini, the icons were gone.


Left shift key unresponsive and stuck? Okay, so I have a mid-2010 MacBook Pro (unibody design) and I have the typical problem with the keyboard. My shift key function is "stuck" so everything WILL COME UP LIKE THIS> (hence the > instead of the period). I booted into a flash drive to update to Lion and the keyboard still typed like the shift key was pressed. Well, we went to Apple to see what they could do. They said that the top case has to be replaced. The problem is, that runs a whopping $250+ and that's out of my budget right now. I have been searching around and haven't seemed to find much of a solution anywhere. I have seen that (at least on here) that the keyboard itself can be replaced without having to replace the entire top case. Nothing has been spilled onto the keyboard and it is not dirty as I have taken a few keys off and checked underneath. So if I replaced the keyboard only, would that fix the problem? Anyone have any experience with this?

Try

tell application "System Events"
        key up {shift}
end tell

via osascript.


How do I back up the entire system state online? As far as I can see, the major cloud-based backup services that exist for Macs - for example iCloud, Backblaze, or iDrive - back up only your work files.

That's great, but it doesn't achieve the comfort of Time Machine which backs up the entire system state, allowing you to restore your backup to a different Mac and continuing with your work without having to first set up your work environment, like with those services that only save your files.

Is there a product that does this, either as a cloud-based service or a tool that allows you to upload state to your own online space (Web, Amazon S3...) via FTP or similar?

Alternatively, is there a sane way to do this using Time Machine, say by hosting a TM volume on a virtual private server?

Dolly Drive comes to mind. My understanding is they offer exactly what you want, although you'll have to double check if they do it in a manner that suits you. They do offer a fee trial, but this is limited to 100GB - so it probably won't allow you to test it properly for your purposes.

Since you mentioned using a virtual private server, you could do this without the need of purchasing any extra software. You will, however, need access to a VPN you can use (usually at a monthly or yearly cost). This option also requires that you understand how to use SSH (to run commands, and to edit files). If this is something you're comfortable with, you can check out Configuring Time Machine to back up to your own server over the internet

Another possible option is to just use rsync to regularly copy your data to a cloud service. Rsync is a Unix tool to synchronise data between disks or servers, and it supports incremental updates. This option, of course, requires you to be willing/comfortable to use Terminal. As a starting point you can launch Terminal and enter the man rsync command for details.

I'm sure others here will have suggestions for you.

My personal view

You can choose to ignore this little blurb, otherwise read on. :)

My preference is not to use the cloud for this type of backup. The cloud is great for low volume data storage and file services (e.g. Dropbox, iCloud, Google Drive, MS OneDrive, etc), but for this type of backup it's not (at least not yet). And, in terms of the OS you can always restore macOS directly via Apple online.

My recommendation to users is to always alternate two TM backup drives and store one of them offsite. By way of example, I'll explain how I do this for one of my Macs (but I follow a similar process for all my machines!)

This iMac has a 500GB HDD
I have purchased two portable USB 2TB external hard drives
I have labelled these hard drives as iMac TM Backup HD 1 and iMac TM Backup HD 2
I set both of these external drives to be TM backup drives
As both drives are set up with TM they are alternated whenever both drives are available
Once the initial backups are done, I physically remove one of the external drives and take it 'offsite'
On the same day each week, I then swap them over
The net result is that both hard drives will have backups in the order of one week on, one week off (but between them I have a full set of backups).

Now, in terms of keeping one of them offsite, you have a number of options. Over the years I have used as my offsite location any of the following:

My workplace
A shed in the back yard
My car (but this may depend on your climate and where you 'garage' your car)
A family member's/friend's place (assuming you trust them!)

Basically, the idea is that your offsite drive is somewhere that protects your data in the event your house burns down or you get robbed. My strong suggestion would be in a locked drawer at your workplace (unless you work at home). Most people's workplaces are air-conditioned, secure, and convenient.

Regardless of the 'offsite' location you choose to keep your hard drive, there are some key factors to keep in mind:

Always keep the drive safe from large magnetic fields!
Ensure the location has a temperature range between 10 degrees celsius (50 degrees fahrenheit) and 43 degrees celsius (110 degrees fahrenheit). So, keeping it in a car would usually not be a good idea.


Connect two USB-C displays to MacBook Pro 15" 2018 is it even possible to connect two USB-C displays to one MacBook Pro 15" 2018?

Seems like MacOS intentionally shuts down one of them. I'm a bit puzzled why..

You should absolutely be able to do this. From Apple's web site

  Video Support

  Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display at millions of colors and:

  Up to two displays with 5120-by-2880 resolution at 60Hz at over a billion colors
     Up to four displays with 4096-by-2304 resolution at 60Hz at over a billion colors

  Thunderbolt 3 digital video output

  Native DisplayPort output over USB‑C
     VGA, HDMI, DVI, and Thunderbolt 2 output supported using adapters (sold separately)

However USB-C/Thunderbolt can be a bit finicky/picky about cables and monitors. Perhaps if you shared your exact configuration (cables/lengths, monitors, etc.) we might be able to help. Just add that info to your original question.


How do you set file permissions in Lion? I just loaded Lion on my Mac and now cannot access certain files. How can I change the permissions of a certain file?

I've tried to find the HD in Finder but it doesn't show up.

The easiest way of setting permission to a file is:

Select the file you want to change permissions to.
Hit Commandi.
In the last part of the information panel, just authenticate and change the permissions as you want them.

This can be achieved, too, through terminal with the chmod command.

Lion does not show the HD by default. In the General tab of the Finder's preferences just check Show this items on Desktop: Hard Drive, and it will be shown. You can also type ShiftCommandC to open a Finder window for the whole drive directly.


Changing volume at command line using script/function I found this nifty command which sets volume to 50% (or any level desired):

osascript -e 'set volume output volume 50'

I'd love to have a script or function that lets me type v 50 or v 30, etc. to easily change the volume levels.

I tried making this bash function:

v() {
# adjust volume function
osascript -e 'set volume output volume $1'
}

However this gives:

25:26: syntax error: Expected expression but found unknown token. (-2741)

How can I make this work?

Single quotes ('') suppress parameter expansion so you have to use double quotes:

v() {
    osascript -e "set volume output $1"
}


Get scancodes of Italian layout keyboard I'm lookin' for Italian keyboard scan codes.

I've searched the net but nothing that deals with Mac except for:

/System/Library/Frameworks/Carbon.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/HIToolbox.framework/Versions/A/Headers/Events.h

But this does not contain Layout Related scan codes.

My questions:

Is there any official documentation about this?
Is there any software like 'dumpkeys' running on macOS?

If possible I'd prefer the triple (byte 1: Modifier, byte 2: Reserved, byte 3: Keycode 1) as defined in http://www.usb.org/developers/hidpage/

The nicest tool for examining keyboard events including the scan codes is Karabiner-EventViewer which is part of Karabiner-Elements.

It will show you the scan codes as they occur.


Photo in icloud are corrupted I have scanned a few photos back in Dec 2013. They were scanned by 'Image Capture' app and they were imported into icloud via Photo at least two years ago.

Today when I browsed my photo on osx, I realised they are corrupted:

When I checked my iphone they are corrupted in the same way.

I want to know how can I find out the extent of damages to my photo collection. I have imported my entire family album and there are over 40000 photo and 2500 video. It is impossible to access them one by one by myself.

You need to contact Apple Support right away. Your iCloud account could be having functionality issues. They can put in a petition to the iCloud team so they can investigate your account.


How long does it take for Apple's AA battery charger to recharge? I'm talking about the charger that comes with their new Bluetooth trackpad and keyboard.

If I put 2 empty batteries in it now, how long till they're full?

Apple has said that it may take up to five hours to charge the batteries.


Is it possible to stream an RTSP feed to an iPhone? A co-worker of mine wants to stream an RTSP streaming video feed to his iphone so he can tap into his child's daycare center here and there. Any ideas on how to do this?

IP Vision is an expensive app. There are several free apps that will stream RTSP on iPhone. I use Aceplayer, but it doesn't seem to be very stable. It may not be the app - I haven't had time to thoroughly test it yet.

There are at least dozen more, so search the app store for RTSP and try out what works for you.


How to stop an app from launching on Login? I have created an app, that sets itself to launch at Login using SMLoginItemSetEnabled. Here is the code it uses. My question is, how can I manually remove this app from launching at login?

The app does not show under "Login Items", or /Library/LaunchAgents, or /Library/LaunchDaemons or in the /Users/username/Library/LaunchAgents, or /Users/username/Library/LaunchDaemons folders. I looked around in /Library/Preferences and PreferecePanes, but I found nothing. The app does load on login.

You can stop the item from launching with launchctl disable gui/$UID/bundle-id.

If you don't know the bundle ID, you can find it by typing launchctl list. That will list all processes running under your user, with their PIDs in the first column. So, if you saw this:

$ launchctl list
-   0   com.apple.SafariHistoryServiceAgent
277 0   com.apple.Finder
-   0   com.apple.quicklook
-   0   com.apple.parentalcontrols.check
[…]
189 0   com.example.ExampleDaemon
-   0   com.apple.java.InstallOnDemand

…you could use Activity Monitor to confirm that the unwanted app's PID is 189, which makes its bundle ID com.example.ExampleDaemon. Then:

launchctl disable gui/$UID/com.example.ExampleDaemon

That's it. There is still a record of the login item on disk, just disabled. If you want to purge it, or just want to learn more, read on.

Counterintuitively (but amusingly?), the list is saved here:

/var/db/com.apple.xpc.launchd/disabled.$UID.plist

That file will look something 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>com.example.ExampleDaemon</key>
    <false/>
</dict>
</plist>

Yes, the false means that an app with that bundle id should be launched at startup. After running launchctl disable, the false will change to a true. (As far as I can tell, launchd doesn't write these files right away, so you may not see this until you reboot.) You can see the disabled items with this command:

launchctl print-disabled gui/$UID

There's also some extra info about each login item stored here, but removing it won't stop the item from launching:

/var/db/com.apple.xpc.launchd/loginitems.$UID.plist

Any changes you make while the system is running will be overwritten when you shut down/restart. So, as far as I can tell, the only way to completely remove an item from disabled.$UID.plist is to reboot in single user mode and make the edits there. Even without having run launchctl disable, removing a key/false pair from this file stops the app from launching at login. I'm not going to include instructions for editing these files in single user mode in this answer.


iMac and RAM upgrade for a new iMac? I wanted to buy this iMac. Does anyone know if I could upgrade the RAM to 16?

This particular model that you're looking at is referring to the Late 2013 model of the iMac, 27" display version (model number ME089LLAUZ from the linked store page and verifiable through Apple's own KB article).

Apple sells this on their store still, and you can order a custom configuration with up to 32 GB of RAM as specified on its product page. This would probably be the better option after a glance at the numbers when you add 16 GB of RAM to the order.

However, for the model on the website you referred to, you can also purchase supported RAM yourself and install it in the two empty slots at the bottom of the machine (Apple has their own guide for that here). Note that the RAM you purchase must meet the following criteria (may seem like a lot, but compatible parts are easily found on Amazon and other suppliers):

PC3-12800
Unbuffered
Nonparity
204-pin
1600 MHz
DDR3 SDRAM


to change the date based on exif data since export from Mac Photos shows date of export using exiftool I used the following to change the Date Created to the actual date the photo was taken because exporting from Photos showed the date of export.
"for file in *; do SetFile -d "$(exiftool -p '$CreateDate' -d '%m/%d/%Y %H:%M:%S' "$file")" "$file"; done"
I got the following warning:
"Warning: [minor] Adjusted MakerNotes base by 46 - IMG_1369.JPG" -- what does this mean?
I found the above suggestion at this thread:
Export from Mac Photos app while keeping date created data?
Also what is the cmd to change "Date Modifed" using exiftool?
Thanks.

As a test, I exported six photos as JPG files from Photos, on macOS High Sierra, into a new folder.
Then in Terminal I change directory to the new folder containing the exported photos and ran the following command to change both the create and modify date/time from the EXIF info:
for f in *; do SetFile -d "$(exiftool -p '$CreateDate' -d '%m/%d/%Y %T' "${f}")" -m "$(exiftool -p '$ModifyDate' -d '%m/%d/%Y %T' "${f}")" "${f}"; done

The prompt returned without error, and the exported files now have the original create and modify date/time.


Xcode does not detect new Apple Distribution Certificate in my keychain I generated a new Apple Distribution Certificate for my React Native project because I got an email saying my old one was going to expire. It appears to be in my keychain:

but when I try to upload my app to the app store, it shows this error:

and when I click Manage Certificates it shows this:

What I Want To Know: How do I make sure that my new certificate is in my keychain such that Xcode detects it and doesn't show this error?

You need to obtain the private key for the certificate before you can use it for signing with Xcode.
When using Keychain, the private key is generated on the computer that was initially used for creating the certificate signing request (CSR) that is sent to Apple in order to obtain the certificate.
You need to copy the private key from that computer to your current computer in order to be able to use the certificate with Xcode.


MacBook Pro speakers dust The holes of the speakers in the MacBook Pro (the recent model) are closed by dust.
Is there a good way to clean them?

if you have a small vacuum cleaner, like the portable ones for cars or furniture I would suggest you try that. Or even a regular vac if your careful.


How to prevent notifications of old Messages when I log into my Mac? I use Messages on my Mac as well as my iPhone.

Whenever I log into my Mac, notifications pop up for each Message I've received since the last time I logged in, even though I've already checked them on my iPhone.

How can I prevent this?

I like having new message notifications appear, but it's annoying to see the whole day's message history every time I log in..!

Power Nap, a feature of MacBooks that enables them to do more when they are asleep (like back up to iCloud/Time Capsule, check emails, and check iMessage) will allow your Mac to stop showing messages you've already read when you open your computer.  Here is Apple's support guide on turning on Power Nap.


Default signature per email address not email account In Apple Mail, there is functionality to add additional email addresses per email account. In G-Suite (and I would assume Office 365) you can set up email aliases and the additional email addresses in Apple mail associate with those aliases.

My issue is the need for a different email signature to be set by default for each email address, not account.

As you can see here I have multiple email addresses for this one account.

And here you can see that this account has two email signatures, but I can only set one of them for both addresses.

What options do I have to fix this?

Based on several hours of research and digging around in .plist and other files, I feel confident that there is NOT a way to do what you (and I) are looking for in the Apple Mail macOS app. Sorry.

Here's another answer that helps confirm this.

This would be a handy feature that couldn't possibly be very hard for Apple to implement based on how they have already designed a very flexible UI for assigning signatures to accounts, and the structure of the underlying .plist files seems conducive to the concept, too, if the aliases just had account-like IDs. Too bad.


How do I activate an iPhone 3Gs without iTunes or WiFi? Is it possible to activate and use my iPhone 3Gs (A1303) without using iTunes?

I think it is important, not to connect it to a WiFi cause I don't want to update it in any way.

When I connect to a working WiFi and continue the activation process, it says:

  Your iPhone could not be activated because the activation server is temporarily unavailable. Try connecting your iPhone to iTunes to activate it, or try again in a couple of minutes.

  If this problem persists, contact Apple Support at apple.com/support

No matter, where and when I try that, it is the same message since months :)

When I connect it via iTunes, iTunes complains that there ought to be no SIM card in it.

So maybe it is better to find out to How do I jailbreak an iphone 3gs without activating it?

The only way you can activate your iPhone is using a sim-card. You don't have to connect to iTunes or WiFi.

It will show you alerts whether you want to upgrade or not, you can simply decline these.


High CPU and energy usage in Safari Energy impact of Safari is extremely high on my Macbook Air Mid 2013 El Captian 10.11.2. It lead to high usage of CPU (Temperature ~65.0°C) and the CPU fan is running in full speed (6500.0 RPM) constantly.

I have tried so far:

Clear all Safari cached
Restart laptop
Remove/disable all extensions
Uninstall all the software that might possibly affecting e.g. Anti-Virus

The issue is only happening in Safari. Chrome and Firefox are both OK.

Thanks for helping in advance!

CPU:

Energy Impact 1:

Energy Impact 2:

CPU Temperature and Fan Speed:

Network Activity:

I know this is probably a little late but I hope it helps someone else.

I found the reason Safari was using so much CPU was due to faulty permissions. It was stuck in a loop trying to access a file it couldn't.

To see if this might be an issue for you run:

sudo /usr/libexec/repair_packages --verify --standard-pkgs /

And see if there are any files wile damaged permissions.
For me it was:

Permissions differ on "Library/Java", should be drwxr-xr-x , they are drwxrwxr-x .
User differs on "private/var/db/displaypolicyd", should be 0, user is 244.
Group differs on "private/var/db/displaypolicyd", should be 0, group is 244.

So it is a good chance Java permissions are the culprit. To fix run:

sudo /usr/libexec/repair_packages --repair --standard-pkgs --volume /

And then restart Safari. For me this immediately dropped CPU use from 150% to 14%.

One should note if you have 100s of faulty permissions, it could be an early sign of disk failure. As always, keep backups.

I hope this helps someone else out there.


Mail activity window Often I am lost with what is Apple Mail doing or does it do anything.

So I have to open the Activity window to see what is going on.

In this example I was exporting a large mail box, but there was no indication on what is happening unless I open the Activity window.

I have the activity summary window open already, but it does not show details.

The question is, is there a way to have the Activity window pup up automagicaly when it is doing something. I can then close it knowing it is busy.

You can show Mail Activity in the sidebar so that it's visible without you needing to open a separate window.

Click the Show Mail Activity button at the bottom of the Mail sidebar to open the drawer. The drawer will remain open in the corner and any activity will show in this area.


How to resume iCloud restore? I formatted my iPhone and after setting up iCloud, my apps and pictures were downloading.

In middle due to net disconnection, it stopped and it's in stop state till now.

Apps icons are dim and lots of pictures have empty frame.

How do I start downloading/resume them again?

Go to

Settings
Reset
Reset All Settings

and the process will start over. You're not losing content this way, because that's the 2nd option on that page.


Using Lightroom as external editor for iPhoto, how to save image back to iPhoto I setup iPhoto to use Lightroom 5 as the external editor. Now when I open an image in iPhoto and click edit, it opens in Lightroom and asks me to import the image. Once I click import and make my edits, there is no option to save. I must export the image to some folder and drag/drop it back into iPhoto (which means I now have a duplicate).

Is there an easy way to make quick edits in Lightroom and just save over the original file so the original is updated automatically in iPhoto?

Unfortunately, I found several posts that explain why using LR as an external editor cannot be seamless (here's an example: http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1463251). This explanation makes sense to me for now. If I find something better I will update this reply.

I don't shoot RAW all the time, so when I do here's my workflow:

Copy RAW files from card to desktop folder
Import (Add) to LR and edit
Export from LR to 'temp' desktop folder as JPEG files
Import JPEG files to iPhoto

** If I want to keep the original RAW files, I move the folder of originals, still on my desktop, to an external storage drive. If I don't need the originals, I can delete this folder.


Moving the selection to the beginning of the line Although I'm a Mac user for several years now, this noob-question is stuck in my head since the beginning:

I'm selecting a text by holding down Shift and moving around with the cursors.

Imagine I start at one line, press Down and then want to move my selection end to the beginning of the line (just like pressing Left all the way): how do I do that on Mac?

Pressing Home or Cmd+Left always moves the beginning of the selection to the beginning of its line (which is also kinda cool, but doesn't help me here).

I've even made a gif about this to demonstrate:

Once you grasp the pattern, it's quite easy...

To move to the next/last letter -  →  or  ←
To move to the next/last word -  Opt ⌥   →  or  Opt ⌥   ←
To move to the beginning/end of a line -  Cmd ⌘   ←  or  Cmd ⌘   →

Hold  Shift ⇧  whilst doing any of these & it will add to your current selection if you are moving away from your original insertion point, otherwise it will remove...
...with the exception of  Cmd ⌘ , which will always add.

As you've discovered, all these functions use your original cursor point, not the beginning/end of your current selection. That would perhaps require a little mind-reading, to know which end you wanted to work from ;-)

For your specific situation, if you start with  Shift ⇧  held, then  Cmd ⌘   → , then just  →  - 'to end of line plus one character'
Alternatively, holding  Shift ⇧ , then  ↓  followed by a number of  Opt ⌥   ←  would be quicker than just  ←  - 'to middle of line below minus several words, one at a time'


How do I use Messages with Google Hangouts on MacOS Mojave? After upgrading to MacOS Mojave, Messages no longer allows me to sign in to Jabber / Google Talk.  Previously, if the Jabber account was offline, it offered a dropdown to sign back in.

Now, that dropdown appears to be gone.

You can't. Apple removed the option to log in to Jabber with 10.14, Messages is iMessage-only now.