iPad Mini 2: iOS 9.1 iMessage doesn't work after restart. I have recently updated my iPad mini 2 to iOS 9.1 and every time I turn it off, or do a hard restart, it prompts me to put in my Apple ID password. After I type it in, it refuses to verify.

Thanks in advance,

It sounds like this is a bug. You should probably report this to Apple Support.

Try to sign out of you Apple ID, then force restart by holding down the Sleep and Home buttons until the screen goes dark, and release. Afterwards sign back in to your Apple ID.

If this fails, try making a backup in iTunes (download) then restore to the latest firmware. This does two things:

It "reuploads" all the settings on the iPad Mini 2 such that any weird setting bugs should be fixed.
It updates the iPad Mini 2 to the latest iOS firmware possible. Take note that usually there are multiple bug fixes in every new itieration of iOS firmware released.

I do not guarantee this bug will go away, but you should give this a shot.


How can I restore photos and videos from an iPhone back up? How can I get my photos and videos that were backed up from my iPhone 5 onto my iPhone 6?

Use your iCloud ID or send via Bluetooth coppy your file ent back up and go to settings choose erase all content restart your phone login your ICloud ID restore it .


RAM - Can this configuration support dual channel? I'd like to upgrade my 27" late 2013 iMac. The current 8GB is a bit too little for me, and upgrading all the way to 32GB is a bit too expensive for me at the moment. For the time being, I'd like to upgrade with just one 16GB (2x8GB) kit, with the opportunity to upgrade with another kit later on.

Current configuration:

Channel 0:

empty
4GB

Channel 1:

empty
4GB

8GB total, Each channel has 4GB, therefore dual channel mode is supported.

Desired configuration:

Channel 0:

8GB
4GB

Channel 1:

8GB
4GB

24GB total, each channel has 12GB, but not all chips are the same. Will this configuration support dual channel mode?

Since Mac-tel with 4 slots support dual channel there is no reason this should not work.

You only have to be careful to have 2 pairs where in each pair the memory modules are the same.


How create an identical timestamp format as used in ppp.log file in a shell script? In the need to add custom logging messages to ppp.log, I see that the date and time are missing when outputting the command to >> /var/log/ppp.log. Other pppd related messages in ppp.log are prepended with a timestamp format that is similar to: "Sat Apr  9 17:18:02 2016 : ". My goal is to output this exact date time format in a Mavericks shell script
I know that other log files have different date/time timestamps. I want to re-create the format as used in ppp.log.
Regression
This Mac OS X 10.9 environment is configured with a dutch language locale. Therefore $ echo $(date '+%a') returns "za" instead of the desired "Sat". That is the part that can be fixed by export LC_TIME="C" or export LC_TIME="POSIX". I have tried to read the date and pppd man page. However then there is still the abbreviated alphabetic timezone name CEST (the %Z part in $ date +%Z) in the output "Sat Apr  9 18:12:12 CEST 2016".
I know I can create the format using all the different $ date format codes, like %a %b %e etcetera. Though I guess there is  a shorter way, isn't there?

After a lot of searching, a search for "date format without alphabetic time zone abbreviation" returned Info on ISO 8601, the date and time representation standard. That information helped me to find out that the timestamp format that is being used in Mavericks its /private/var/log/ppp.log file, is actually the ANSI C's asctime() format.
C asctime
To create C style asctime in a shell, a non English system might need to override the environment variable for time messages:
export LC_TIME="C"

And then there is the $ date formatting option %c that now displays local date time in the desired format:
$ date +%c
Sat Apr  9 21:10:20 2016

A tip when using echo date, do put the date between apostrophes echo "$(date +%c)", otherwise the filler space in single digit dates might be stripped from the output:
$ echo $(date +%c)
Sat Apr 9 21:13:57 2016
$ echo "$(date +%c)"
Sat Apr  9 21:14:30 2016


How to improve the iPhone battery? Hi all I was looking for a solution to prolong my battery life potential.

Is there a replacement battery for iPhone that is more powerful than the one in-built when we bought it?

Or is there an "external battery" that I can plug into my phone to increase the battery life potential?

Yes, you can get external iPhone batteries.

Amazon will have very many products.


What should I do if my iPod keeps saying "Connect to power"? I have an iPod Nano (6th generation). I bought it 10 months ago. I fully charged it and it started to work. Since then, I left it 10 months without using nor charging. Now, when I connect it to PC, it charges, but after detaching from PC, it says 'Connect to power'. What is the problem? Is its battery damaged? What should I do?

The battery in your iPod has died. I suggest making an appointment at your local Apple Store Genius Bar and they may be able to replace it for you.


applescript to find contacts that are not in any group I have been using a script that does not work anymore in mountain lion even though I have changed the words "address book" to "contacts".

If you select all the contacts, and then use the script, it will find all those contacts that are not in a group for you.  The short script is available at MacOSX hints:

http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20051126084705352

Can anybody modify this to work again? Thanks in advance.

Try this, I have a huge contact list so testing it fully on mine would take a billion years. But the initial tests work

These sort of script are really only handy on small lists as the overhead with all the repeating is exponential the larger they get.

property orphan : "Orphans"

tell application "Contacts"
    if not (exists group orphan) then

        (*Create the new group*)
        make new group at the end of groups with properties {name:orphan}
    end if

    --set thePeople to first person whose first name is "TEST"
    (*get all entries*)
    set thePeople to every person

    (*iterate through the entries*)
    repeat with i from 1 to number of items in thePeople

        (*get the entry*)
        set this_person to item i of thePeople

        (*get the entries group list *)
        set inGroup to name of group of this_person

        if inGroup is {} then
            (* entry is not in any group*)
            add this_person to group orphan
            save

        else if inGroup contains "Orphans" and inGroup is not equal to {"Orphans"} then
            (*if entry is already in a group/s then check it is not also in¬
             Orphans or only in orphans*)

            (* entry is in orphans and another group so remove it from orphans*)
            remove this_person from group orphan
            save
        end if
    end repeat
    save
end tell


how reduce the size of all photos in my iPhoto library? My iPhoto libary is 58 Gigs.  They are all snapshots, nothing professional.  Most of the photos were taken at 12megapixels because that's the default setting on the camera.

I'm sure they will all look fine if they were reduced to 5megapixels.

Is there a way in iPhoto to reduce the size of all photos in the Library to smaller?

Before you take this (drastic) step, consider a couple of things.

Make sure the trash in iPhoto has been emptied -- not everyone realises this needs to be done, and it can take gigs of space.
iPhoto creates a duplicate image when it rotates an image, and the original is not required. I'm not sure if there's an easy manual way to remove these, but I use CleanMyMac (http://macpaw.com/cleanmymac). It has a free trial and it will save a large amount of space.
If you're worried about performance due to the size of the library, consider splitting it up helped me. I got to about 60gb, and it was very slow, so I used iPhoto Library Manager (http://www.fatcatsoftware.com/iplm/) to split it (I split into 1 library per year)


"This item is temporarily unavailable" When Installing Yosemite I have erased my HD and tried to install OS Yosemite on MacBook Pro mid 2009. But keep getting this message "This item is temporarily unavailable." I've tried many proposed solutions but none seem to work. Any one experienced a similar problem?

Let me preface this: it's possible that this solution doesn't work entirely, and that you'll need a version of the installer that has a full copy of OS X (instead of downloading it from the internet on the fly.)

With that said, here's the issue. Your Apple ID (and therefore purchases) are not associated with the computer you're trying to install to since it's a clean install. Therefore, it doesn't know you've "purchased" Yosemite previously, and since it's no longer on the app store, isn't giving you access. What you need to do is reassociate your Apple ID with that computer. The recommended solution is to log into icloud.com.

Alternatively (or if that doesn't work), you can download it from another computer with a working version of OS X and then execute the installer from there (or create a bootable installer from there.)

Small side question: why not install El Cap?


Rubber band not working on Gmail using Safari Is it just me or the rubber band scrolling is not working on Gmail (I'm on Safari)? It works on any other site.

They use a wrapper-div with overflow: scroll and height: 100%, which doesn't use the rubber-band-effect by default.


What is the definition of "recently added" in my iTunes playlists? What is the definition of "recently added" in my iTunes playlists?  Are these songs that I have purposely added or could they be those songs added by iTunes because of my Genius playlist. I need to know if these songs could have been added by someone other than me.

The "Recently Added" playlist is a smart playlist that is automatically generated based on the rules that define it. I have removed it from my machine, but if you right click it and select Edit Smart Playlist, you can see its rules. The playlist contains songs you've added yourself "recently" (you'll have to check yourself to see what "recently" means)


"Playlist can't be added to your iCloud Music Library". Why? I am migrating from Spotify and I want iTunes to accommodate the way I used to add songs to a "favorites" playlist, just like the Starred Songs works on Spotify.

Initially I created a Smart Playlist to self-update with all my hearted/loved tracks (let's call this Playlist 1). That didn't work because apparently the heart rating doesn't persist between devices, and most of the point of this is so I can have this self-updating playlist available offline on mobile.

My second solution was to create a non-smart playlist and manually update that one with any new music the smart playlist catches. (Let's call that Playlist 2.) That works (I can set this manual playlist to be kept accessible offline on my phone), but it's cumbersome to manually copy-paste songs every time I heart new tracks.

My third solution was to create another smart playlist especially made to mirror the first. (Let's call this Playlist 3.) The first playlist is set to auto-add any hearted tracks, but since this parameter doesn't carry to mobile, I made this second smart playlist that simply adds whatever music is added to the first. Essentially a mirror playlist, but with a different parameter.

This kinda works, but I get a strange error:

The playlist was created, and it works as I intended (successfully mirroring the first one at all times), but apparently I can't access it from other devices for some reason.

Why does this happen? The Playlist 3 contains exactly the same tracks as Playlist 1, so the given reason that Playlist 3 "includes other media kinds or songs that are not eligible" doesn't make any sense.

Anyone knows why is this happening and/or how could I solve my initial problem?

Thanks!

"Playlists that reference other Playlists can not be uploaded"

It took me awhile to figure out the solution to this problem, but I eventually did. You can no longer just drag and drop songs from Apple Playlists to new ones that you create yourself, but you are still able to do it a different way. You also used to be able to just right-click on a song, a menu would pop up, and you could then "add to selected playlist" - this no longer works either.

Solution: if you go into any one of your Apple Music playlists, hover over any one of the songs, you will notice a little icon with 3 dots show up - if you LEFT-click on this, a menu will pop up (different than the old menu), and then add the song to your desired new self-made playlist. This seems to work.

The problem is that iTunes still has both the old method and the new method active, but only the new method actually works.


Karabiner F1 to Launch Safari? What is the coding to program my F1 key to launch the Safari application using Karabiner?

Modify private.xml and add:

<item>
   <name>F1 Safari</name>
   <identifier>f1_safari</identifier>
   <autogen>__KeyToKey__ KeyCode::F1, KeyCode::VK_OPEN_URL_APP_Safari</autogen>
</item>

Then enable it in Change Key. Depending on your settings (Consumer Keys or F1-F12 for the F-keys) in System Preferences -> Keyboard -> Keyboard -> F-key behavior you may have to hit the fn-key also.


Iphone 4G Wifi Password Issues I recently replaced my wireless router from Verizon.  I kept all the settings identical, and all the other wireless devices in my home connect with no problem (a pc, mac, ipad, etc).  However, my iphone is unable to connect.  It correctly identifies the wifi network, and I'm prompted to enter my password.  But even though I've entered the password correctly multiple times, it always returns "password incorrect".

You could try this:

Go to Settings -> common -> reset (at the bottom). On the next screen you can choose which settings you wish to reset. Choose "Network settings".

I assume the stored settings are deleted now, and after a re-connect the connection should work.


Can I plug my Iomega hard drive into my new BT Home Hub and access the tunes stored in it from my MacBook Pro wirelessly? We have just acquired a BT home Hub router which has a USB socket. I have my music stored in an Iomega hard drive and normally plug this into the MacBook, which is a bit clumsy. ( I have told iTunes where to find my music when I am logged in. My partner uses the Mac to store her music.)

I was hoping to be able to plug the Iomega into the Home Hub which would send the music to the Mac (or indeed iPad) wherever it is in the house.

Does anyone know if this is possible and where I'd start; or should I just ring BT?

You can connect a USB hard disk to the home hub, and access it as an SMB network drive. There are instructions on the BT website.

You would be able to open your iTunes library from the network drive, but the home hub doesn't have an iTunes server built in (or at least the v2 I have doesn't, and I can't see any mention of it in the v3 features) so it won't appear as a shared library in iTunes.

Make sure the drive is formatted to Fat32 and it's basically plug and play.


How do I view the lifetime total from the Health app? Is it possible to see the lifetime totals (steps, distance, etc) from all data in the Health app? Perhaps with a third party app?

disclaimer: I recently released a new app that displays your (lifetime) Apple Health and workouts data.
The app is called “Health Stats”. Health Stats is a free app (with a one-time premium in-app purchase) that allows you to easily view your health, activity and workout data from the Apple Health app. You can view this data for different date ranges such as: lifetime, this week, this month or set a custom date range yourself.
You can download the app here: https://apps.apple.com/app/health-stats/id1543220823
Health Stats currently supports the following health and workout data sets:
General data sets:

Total exercise time
Total step count
Total walking and running distance
Total flights of stairs climbed
Total stand time
Total stand hours (hours in which you've stood and moved for at least 1 minute)
Total wheelchair pushes
Total wheelchair distance
Active energy burned
Resting energy burned
Total energy burned

Workout data sets:

Total workout time
Total workout distance
Total workouts
Running workouts (time, distance, energy burned and count)
Walking workouts (time, distance, energy burned and count)
Cycling workouts (time, distance, energy burned and count)
Swimming workouts (time, distance, energy burned, swimming strokes and count)
Elliptical workouts (time, energy burned and count)
HIIT workouts (time, energy burned and count)
Strength workouts (time, energy burned and count)
Skiing workouts (time, distance, energy burned and count)
Snowboarding workouts (time, distance, energy burned and count)
Hiking workouts (time, distance, energy burned and count)

Note: all data is directly received from the Apple Health app and none of it will ever leave the iPhone or is stored elsewhere.


QuickLook does not preview .txt files I have the problem that QuickLook does not allow me to preview .txt files, despite being plain text. For instance here

you see—no preview. Pressing Space does not help

However, Spotlight does show me the preview

How can this be? I am quite sure that originally, text file previews worked.
Could this have to do with MacVim being the default application for this file type? I am on 10.10.4 and have the following QL plugins installed:

BetterZipQL
iBooksAuthor
iWork
QLColorCode
qlImageSize
QLMarkdown
QLStephen
QuickLookJSON
Suspicious Package
Video
WebP

You're using the QuickLook Plugin with whatever app you've set as default to open text file. You can probably find that in Your_Application.app/Contents/Library/QuickLook.

As @Julien said:

  Generators embedded in applications are always preferred to plug-ins in ~/Library/QuickLook (which are preferred to the ones in /Library/QuickLook, which are preferred to the ones in /System/Library/QuickLook).

And there is no way to change that preference order. If you want to make sure it's the custom generator you can see the file with the default QL plugin with the following command in Terminal:

qlmanage -g /System/Library/QuickLook/Text.qlgenerator -c public.plain-text -p <path_to_text_file>

You can try to delete the app's QL plug-in, that could work but GateKeeper may stop you from opening the app, since it won't match it code signature.


How to transfer preferences from one machine to another? Is there a way to transfer my various preferences configured on Machine A to a new Machine B?

For example, I would like to transfer many of the preferences configured within System Preferences and native applications, such as Finder.

The easiest way to do this would be to use Migration Assistant.  If you transfer your settings  when you first setup your Mac, you can run the Migration Assistant to transfer the settings for you.

Directly from Apple:  OS X Mavericks: Transfer your info from a computer or disk

I went with Mavericks because it is fairly recent and the procedure is the same in Yosemite.


Will a Microsoft Office Add-In developed in Visual Studio work for both a Windows and Mac ( osx ) versions of Ms Office? I want to develop a Microsoft Office Word Add-In for Mac Users. I would like to know if we create it using Visual Studios in windows will it be compatible with the Mac version of office or is there a whole another way to develop for Mac?

Please provide links so that I could follow some guidelines. The http://msdn.microsoft.com/ site doesn't exactly speak of the platform compatibility of the Add-In.

Thank You very Much in Advance.

Office:Mac 2011 only supports add-ins that were developed in VBA.  Office:Mac 2008 does not support add-ins at all.  A new version of Office:Mac is slated for release in 2015, there have been no announcements as of this writing (December 2014) whether Microsoft will support additional methods of developing add-ins in the new version of Office:Mac.

For further information, check out Getting Started with VBA in Office for Mac 2011 from the Office:Mac 2011 help files.  You might find more assistance in developing Office:Mac add-ins in the Office:Mac help forums hosted by Microsoft.


Why I can't remove iTunes and how to remove it? Whenever I run sudo rm -rf /Applications/iTunes.app, it is deleted, but after some time it's automatically restored. How can I get rid of iTunes forever without any chance of it coming back?

If you just want to prevent it from launching, running

sudo chmod 000 /Applications/iTunes.app

should do the trick. Needs to be repeated after every OS X/iTunes update, but this also applies for any solutions involving removal of standard applications.

PS: Just to put things into perspective as far as disk space is concerned:

root@Mithos:/Applications$ du -sm iTunes.app Chess.app Game\ Center.app Stickies.app Photo\ Booth.app Photos.app
191 iTunes.app
5   Chess.app
3   Game Center.app
5   Stickies.app
5   Photo Booth.app
31  Photos.app

Even on a system with just a 128 GB SSD, squeezing out 200 MB doesn't give you much.


Time machine out of space / Merging time machine backup I have a 15 inch Mac Book Pro that is my main machine. At some point, in the
second half of 2011 I purchased a 750GB external hard drive to configure Time
Machine on my laptop. This is my main method for backup, and I always keep
it up to date. A few weeks ago it started complaining that it did not have
enough space and that it needed to delete the oldest backup to create this new
one. I allowed this to happen at first, but realized that I was losing possible
important historical snapshots of my data.

I want to purchase a new, larger external hard drive to keep my time machine
backups. Before spending a couple hundred dollars in this project I  have a
couple of questions regarding best practices:

Will TM allow me to integrate my older backups into the new hard drive?
While it seems convenient to have my whole history in one hard drive, would it
be smart to do so? Or should I not integrate them? I understand that this would
constitute a single point of failure that is highly undesirable.
What other advanced practices do people have with TM to not have a single point
of failure?

TM will not move your old snapshots to a new drive, although I'm pretty sure that if you first used Disk Utility's Restore tab to clone your old backup drive to the new one (after reformatting it properly), it would see the old snapshots properly.

But there's a bigger problem. You are trying to use TM as an archiving tool, but that's really not what it's designed for. TM will expire old snapshots as it sees fit, so if you want reliable retention of old files it's not the right tool for the job. Unfortunately, I don't have a good suggestion for a better tool, but I would strongly recommend looking for something more appropriate.

That said, switching TM to a new drive (and removing the old one from its backup target list) would be a semi-reasonable way to retain all of the old snapshots (and having multiple redundant backups is a good idea). Doing that and switching to a new archiving tool would also be reasonable (since you probably won't be able to migrate the old TM snapshots to any net tool you select).


Apple Music charges card or available balance? I am subscribed to Apple Music, and I also have a store credit from gift cards.

Will my monthly subscription subtract from my store credit or charge my credit card?

In my personal experience, store credit will be used until it is gone, and then the credit card on file will be charged.


Print from launchd task I have a script that needs to be running in the background periodically (I've put it there with Lingon X).
That script (PHP based) is
1. polling a server,
2. retrieving a PDF file from the server
3. Saving it to disk
4. Printing it using exec("lpr myFile.pdf");
5. Playing a sound using exec("afplay ding.mp3");

When I run the script manually (php myscript.php), everything works perfectly.

However, when the script is running in the background, it does 1, 2, 3 and 5 normally, but does not print at all.

I've tried using lp instead of lpr, I've also compiled and run PDF-Printer (https://github.com/robwithhair/PDF-Printer) and still no paper is getting out of my printer. I've also tried another printer (you know...just in case). Still no luck.

I've tried to get the output from the lpr command to see if it was returning any kind of an error message, yet, nothing. There's also nothing in the printer queue.

I've also tried to run this script as root and as a regular user and still nothing makes the printer...print.

Anyone has any idea of how to accomplish this?

Here's the output of lpc status:

Brother_HL_2240_series:
printer is on device 'usb' speed -1
queuing is enabled
printing is enabled
no entries
daemon present

Try to redirect the stderr so you can see what is happening.

exec("lpr myFile.pdf 2> /tmp/lpr_error");


What is the CAS latency of the memory in a Mac Mini 2018? I'm researching a memory upgrade for a 2018 Mac Mini (in advance of purchase). I thinking to buy it configured with the base 8GB and upgrade it to 32GB with aftermarket memory modules, at a savings of about 50% ($300) from the $600 extra of ordering it with 32GB.

The spec as far as DDR4 2666 MHz 260-pin SODIMM seems quite clear, but I haven't been able to find a CAS latency value for the RAM I'll find installed in the Mac mini. I wanted to get memory with a matching latency or perhaps something below. I'm not looking for extra performance; I just want to make sure it's as compatible as possible and not slow it down.

Here's the conundrum:

The Kingston and Crucial memory selectors both lead to CL=19 modules for Mac Mini 2018.
An offhand mention in an Amazon review stated that CAS latency for memory on iMac 2017 was CL=17.
Kingston offers HyperX modules (targeted toward PC gaming) that have CL=14 at a comparable price to the CL=19 modules.

So I was hoping to find an authoritative source for what the original-equipment CAS latency was for the Mac Mini. If it's CL=19 I'll go with the Kingston-recommended modules, but if it were CL=17 I'd probably go for the HyperX modules. Unfortunately, an hour of Googling around has met with no joy on that count.

Is there some place I can find that spec online or does someone just happen to know and could share that?

Based on iFixit teardown which says these RAM pcs are Hynix model "HMA851S6CJR6N-VK" I'm assuming that they're the same as the ones you can find by browsing this model name (i.e. here) - and they're described as CL 19.

However, there's a video of this guy that switches his Mac Mini's RAM to CORSAIR "CMSX32GX4M2A2666C18" that has CL 18 and it seems to work fine.


Buy AppleCare for MacBook Pro in different country than I bought MacBook I bought a MacBook Pro 13" in june 2010 in Poland. I want to buy AppleCare Protection, I'm going to Hong Kong where it is 50% cheaper than in Poland. So can I buy it there? Or are there any law/guarantee restrictions?

Mateusz

I know of quite a few people based in the UK who have bought their Apple Care from eBay in the states.


Is it mandatory to fill security questions and answers in order to download apps? I was trying to download and install a new app, when a badge appeared on the screen. Apparently I have to choose three security question (and the corresponding answers) to improve the security of my Apple-ID. I clicked on "Not now" but in this way I can't install the app.

It is mandatory to write questions and answers? Is there any way to skip the procedure and download the apps?

Whenever there is a change in account status, it blocks all subsequent Apple ID authentication from completing successfully until you resolve the issue. I've seen this happen with:

Security Questions / Answers when this rolled out a few months back.
Credit Card / Billing issues.
Purchases from a device previously unused by your account.

Only after resolving the particular issue will you be allowed to continue.


How do I stop a freezing Chrome? I tried Esc+Opt+Cmd, then selected Chrome and Force stop.
The name of the application dissapeared from that menu, but it was still freezed.
After 10 minutes I tried to reboot, but the computer were waiting for the application to close. In the end I pressed the power button for a couple of seconds to force the shutdown. Can I kill a lazy app without force-shutting down the mac?

In the terminal type :

killall -9 Google\ Chrome

Since Google Chrome uses multiple process it will kill all the process of the app with that command.


Time Machine backing up way more space than hard drive contains I have a new MacBook Air running 10.14.5 (Mojave, non-beta). The drive is 500GB and formatted APFS.

The initial Time Machine backup has been running for about 24 hours and still isn't finished.

But it has backed up more data than could ever possibly exist on the drive:

Note that it says it's backing up 683 GB (and increasing) of a 500 GB drive, when not even 200 GB of the drive has been used.

I checked the sizes of my local snapshots, and there are only 4 of them, with the following sizes:

502.2 MB
217.5 MB
5.4 MB
7.4 MB

So that doesn't come anywhere near explaining the difference.

The Time Machine drive was cleanly formatted as HFS+ right before the Time Machine backup was initiated.

So… why is it using so much space? How is it using so much space?

Not exactly sure since I haven’t used TM with Mojave yet however, I may help point you in the right direction or stimulate a more accurate answer.  TM can backup all files including temp files, deleted files, cache files and even USB drives attached. If you were making a lot of changes during the initial backup, the initial file size will compensate for that. Also Mojave utilizes APFS which contains nested volumes and containers. There are additional formatting files outside of the readable HD within the volumes and containers that could be getting backed up to make sure you will be able to install from backup correctly.  It could also be backing up your recovery HD. If you run diskUtil list in terminal you can see the size of any hidden volumes and containers.

I wonder since APFS uses the new file reference system to save space while keeping track of duplicated and edited files, maybe that could be play a role as well. TM HD might be saving both or be adding additional reference files for the locals snapshots? In the long run, TM will be writing over the older saved backup files with newer content. So I don’t think you should pry too much to get that additional space back.

I have had issues in the past trying to restore from a TM HD that was the same size as my primary HD and wouldn’t recommend it. Using a drive at least 2/3 times larger is the right way to go.


How to export a date range in Calendar I would like to export some of the events in one of my calendars. The export function will create a .ics file with the entire calendar, but I only want to export events within a specified date range. How can I do that?

A workaround would be:

Create a temporary calendar from File>New Calendar.
Mark the calendars you want to export:

Depending on the time range you want to export select week or month view:

Go to the week or month you want to export, press ⌘A to select all events and ⌘C to copy them.
Select the temporary calendar:

and press ⌘V to paste all previously copied events.
Export the temporary calendar as an ics file:

Delete the temporary calendar with Edit>Delete.


High Sierra reboot loop after data migration I've installed a new SSD on my Mac Mini 2014. So I have a new SSD connected via PCIe and the old OEM HDD via SATA.

I've installed a fresh copy of High Sierra on the new SSD and seems to work well. But after using Migration Assistant (to copy data from HDD OS X installation to the new SSD) the system begins rebooting loop on Apple logo screen.

I've reinstalled it a few times, but the same thing happens after Migration Assistant. Any help?

Try to install High Sierra again but change the format on you SSD drive to a HFS+ and run the Migration Assistant again.

I have the same issue when I boot. I think this is because we have a Mac from early 2015. I think the Mac will not boot a drive with APFS format yet. (Maybe a firmware update will fix this).


Show streaming video to a LG Smart TV I'd like to broadcast videos seen on common web sites (like CNN and such) to my LG Smart TV.

I know I could use dlna or protocols like that to stream a local video file on the TV, but haven't yet found any way to play streaming videos.

Any idea?

There are multiple ways you can do this.

Some TVs have a built in casting functionally. Since your TV is a Smart TV, there is a chance that you TV could support this.

You could buy a Chromecast. It costs $35 for non-4k, and $69 for 4k. You can use Google Chrome to cast webpages, but some webpages or apps support it natively. This works on both mobile and computer.

You could also buy an Apple TV. The latest one costs $150 for 32 GB and $200 for 64 GB. You can cast from both iOS and macOS. You can use AirParrot($20) to airplay from Windows and older macs.

Lastly, you can use the Amazon Fire TV Stick($40) or the Amazon Fire TV($90). This would be my last choice, because it doesn't support casting. Instead, you would use apps. The bonus is that you can use the Alexa remote, sort of like the Siri remote.

I would choose the Chromecast, because it isn't very pricey, but it enables you to cast anything to your TV.


IOS 10.2.1 Backup and restore backup Sync Ipads with Itunes on Computer : it backs up then when I look at Summary it tells me this ipad has never been backed up to this computer? I have done this forever.
So I then decided to go to Files : Devices : Restore Backup, which I do regularly and iPad backups up automatically when syncing anyway, and Backup device is highlighted and Restore Backup is greyed out so I cant do this either? W
hat is happening.  My last 2 weeks have been a nightmare upgrading to IOS 10 and now again IOS 10.2.1.  I am working with a bank of 25 iPads so to loads seperately onto each iPad - my last resort which I have just started is really the end.

Sync Ipads with Itunes on Computer : it backs up then when I look at Summary it tells me this ipad has never been backed up to this computer?

iTunes does not automatically back up every time you sync, so maybe it didn't do a backup just then? If you press the button to make a backup, does it backup successfully and change the last backup date?

An article I wrote awhile ago about syncing vs backing up, for reference:
https://deciphertools.com/blog/2015_01_27_itunes_sync_vs_backup_ensure_data/


Are "generic" Optical Bay Hard Drive Enclosures for Macbook Pros just as good as Optibay/OWC I'm looking at replacing my DVD drive in my Macbook Pro with an SSD.  The Optibay and OWC solutions seem awfully expensive compared to "knockoffs" found on Amazon and eBay.

Do these knockoff products work just as good?  Does anybody have hands-on experience with these alternatives?

Do you really need a caddy when installing an SSD?

Yes, you need something in order to install a drive in the area where your optical drive is.  You won't really be able to do it without one.

You can obviously buy a knock off optibay at a lower price, I did when I bought my first one, and for the most part it does the job it says that it will do.  It was a cheap plastic little skeleton of a mount and did the job it said it would do.

Later on I purchased a newer computer not too long ago, I decided to buy the actual official optibay.

Now, I am someone who likes build quality, and the official optibay was superior to the knockoff one that I purchased before that.  It is light and wasn't just a plastic skeleton that held the drive like the knock off.  It was a full thin metal chassis that seems like it would hold it more solidly and not jitter around.  It was made of thin sturdy metal and felt more rigid, like it was going to last.  Also, when I purchased mine, it came with a free DVD drive enclosure, which works great and it didn't require me to go and acquire one somewhere else. I was able to keep the DVD drive and it even works on my other macs.  Pretty convenient but not entirely necessary. The enclosure was very bare bones and was plastic but it was a nice gesture and it works.  The Optibay is now only 50 dollars, when I bought it, it was about 100 with shipping and handling but came with the enclosure for free.  The enclosure is now a 30 dollar add on.

The bottom line is that though there is a difference between knockoffs and the official one, whether or not you will really care about those difference is entirely up to you.  The experience that I received with the official was great and it is backed by a company that actually cares about their customers and they test all the new laptops to make sure that everything will continue to work. If you end up buying a knock, just make sure that it will work with your exact make and model and year of your macbook pro.  Don't usually expect support, when I bought my first one, it was off of ebay and really cheap and I can't even remember the company it came from. Also, be sure to check the size limitations, the official optibay supports drives that are 9.5 mm thick, others may give you slightly more space or be slightly different since their are multiple knock offs out there.

Just read reviews and research, you'll find the one that you like. Also, make sure that you also research about SSD in your computer and things that you can do to optimize things, it never hurts to learn as much as you possibly can.

Good luck.


Why browsers ignores /etc/hosts behind a SOCKS proxy? My MacBook in office does not have internet access. So I set up an instant SOCKS Proxy over SSH to surf the web.

However, when I try to add an entry to /etc/hosts, the browser does not go to the site I expected ...

My MacBook's WIFI is off and is connected to the company LAN:

 IP address:  192.168.8.250
 Subnet mask: 255.255.255.0
 Router:      192.168.8.1
 DNS server:  8.8.8.8

Be default, there is not internet access.

There a Linux development box (192.168.12.128) which has access to the internet, so I set up an instant SOCKS proxy to gain internet access for my MacBook:

 ssh -fND localhost:30000 ohho@192.168.12.128

Then in my MacBook's System Preferences > Network > Proxies

 (Enable) SOCKS Proxy
 SOCKS Proxy sever: 127.0.0.1:30000
 Bypass proxy settings for these Hosts & Domains:
   *.local, 169.254/16, 127.0.0.1

Now I can surf the web, so far so good.

For development, I set up a few entries in /etc/hosts for virtual hosts purpose:

 127.0.0.1 air.company.com

In bash:

 $ ping air.company.com
 PING air.ohho.es (127.0.0.1): 56 data bytes
 64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=64 time=0.046 ms

 $ curl air.company.com
 OK

It looks good and curl returns the content of the index.html nicely.

However, if I try to open the site:http://air.company.com in the browsers (Safari/Chrome/Firefox), none of them returns the result like curl did. Chrome give an error:

  This webpage is not available The webpage at http://air.company.com/
  might be temporarily down or it may have moved permanently to a new
  web address. Error 120 (net::ERR_SOCKS_CONNECTION_FAILED): Unknown
  error.

If I add another entry in /etc/hosts:

 127.0.0.1 www.microsoft.com

In bash:

 $ ping www.microsoft.com
 PING www.microsoft.com (127.0.0.1): 56 data bytes
 64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=64 time=0.047 ms
 64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=0.128 ms
 ^C
 --- www.microsoft.com ping statistics ---
 2 packets transmitted, 2 packets received, 0.0% packet loss
 round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 0.047/0.087/0.128/0.041 ms

 $ curl www.microsoft.com
 OK

However, the browsers returns the content from the web server of the real Microsoft site, instead of the content from my MacBook (127.0.01). Why?

p.s.

If I disable the SOCKS proxy, the browser returns the content from 127.0.0.1 correctly.

If I disconnect the LAN cable, the browser returns the content from 127.0.0.1 correctly.

Your browser is asking the SOCKS proxy for the sites, it is not connecting directly. Therefore putting the IP address in the exceptions list doesn't work, as your computer is not performing the look up of air.company.com to 127.0.0.1. The SOCKS proxy is.

To avoid this, place the full domain name of what you are accessing locally in the exceptions list in System Preferences > Network > Proxies.

So for air.company.com you'd see an exception list (from your example above) of:

  *.local, 169.254/16, 127.0.0.1, air.company.com

Your computer will now connect to air.company.com directly, and therefore make use of /etc/hosts.


iCloud app cannot be installed on Windows 10 Recently I reinstalled my OS on my Laptop and tried to install iCloud for Windows 10 and unfortunately I am unable to do so because at the end of it I got this error:

There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program required for this install to complete could not be run. Contact your support personnel or package vendor.

I have tried uninstalling all the Apple apps through the Control Panel (successfully) and then start with installing the iCloud for Windows again. Also I've tried uninstalling all of them (successfully) with MicrosoftProgram_Install_and_Uninstall and still nothing. Tried installing iCloud via Apple Software Update and the installation goes through but I can't open/start the program.
Went through everything as stated here and still I can't fix the issue.
Installing iTunes is okay I've tried both ways, via Microsoft Store and standalone installer.

On the linked article:

  If you downloaded iTunes from the Microsoft Store on Windows 10 or aren't seeing this error message, don't use the steps in this article. Instead, learn how to remove and reinstall iTunes and related software components for Windows 7 and later. Errors like this are related to components of Windows that iTunes from the Microsoft Store on Windows 10 doesn't use.

Follow the steps found here. Make sure you uninstall everything in the right order.

  In some rare instances, you might need to remove iTunes and related software components before you reinstall iTunes or install iTunes from the Microsoft Store. If you're directed to reinstall iTunes by AppleCare, an article, or an alert dialog, you can do so by following the steps below.

Afterwards, install the software from the Microsoft Software.


How to set default fonts in Mac? Yesterday, I just installed Open Sans fonts family because I need it for developing apps in Xcode and to create some design in design software. Today, I see that almost all the text that should be using default fonts now using Open Sans Condensed instead, including some websites and some apps like Whatsapp chat bubbles. Open Sans Condensed is really bad for reading. How can I change the default font back to whatever the default system font was, but not turning off or deleting Open Sans font family because I need them?

For example, the font displayed on Whatsapp chat bubbles should be like the "Type a message" font.

The default font on website is also affected.

Open Terminal and run these commands: (Restart after)

rm -rf ~/Library/Caches/*
 rm -rf ~/Library/Saved\ Application\ State/*
 sudo rm -rf /Library/Caches/*
 sudo rm -rf /System/Library/Caches/*
 sudo rm -rf /var/folders/*
 atsutil databases -removeUser
 sudo atsutil databases -remove
 sudo atsutil server -shutdown
 sudo atsutil server -ping

Restart

Reset Standard fonts in Font Book

Open Font Book. File -> Restore Standard fonts. Restart.


How can I de-folderize the contents of a folder? Is it possible - without any command line or programming being involved - to remove all folders within a folder, and just leave the files?

For example, if I processed this photo folder:

Then I would end up having all the photos in just one folder to go through them faster rather than having to go inside each folder (some of which are sometimes empty, since the camera creates the folder based on the date but doesn't delete the folder if you delete the photos from that day).

I know that one can change the camera's settings to make the camera save all the photos in just one folder, but this isn't what I'm asking, since knowing how to do this type of de-folderizing action would be useful in many other situations, not just with this particular example.

Simplest solutions are more welcome than ones involving programming.

Currently I'm sitting at an older Mac (running 10.6.8), but if I use the folder view where I see the sidebar and search field I can:

Type anything into the search field to activate it
Constrain the search to the enclosing folder
Click the little circle with the plus to get more search options
Choose "Kind" is "Document"
Delete the text you typed in to activate the search field

What I get is a list of all documents in all the folders inside the enclosing folder, recursively. You could then select all of the files and copy or move them to a new location.

Or -- since we are talking about Photographs -- if your have Adobe Bridge you can set that to show the contents of sub-folders when looking at a folder, then use Bridge's move or copy commands.


iPhone 4 cracked and will not slide over for password. I cracked my iPhone 4 and now it's messed up. The phone turns completely on where i can see my lock screen picture, but if trying to sliding over to unlocked it..it won't slide. The only place I can get it to slide over from it the very top, but I'm unable to type the password because nothing works beyond the top part. Is this fixable? I just want my messages and photos back.

Man...that's rough.

If you have been backing up to iTunes or iCloud, your stuff should be there.  You are backing up, right?

There are a couple more options you can try before you take your iphone in for repair to get at your data:

Bluetooth Keyboard - just connect and enter your pin
Voice Over - triple tap the home button and "say" your pin

Both of those must have been previously set up.  If you didn't set them up, they aren't going to work.

One more you may want to try...

If either of those two methods are unavailable, try PhoneView which will allow you to get access to everything on your phone via your Mac.  It costs about $30, but that may be cheap considering how valuable your data is.

Finally, if all else fails, you will have to have the digitizer replaced.  Maybe a local repair shop can hook up a digitizer temporarily so you can back up your data, but that would be a long shot.


Why does SystemUIServer try to talk to my router via UDP port 192? I captured the request but it didn't tell me anything. There were 4 bytes of data transmitted and the value was 08010310.

UDP port 192 is used for Apple’s AirPort base station discovery and configuration.
SystemUIServer is responsible for the menu bar icons, including the AirPort Wi-Fi icon and its information about the wireless connection.

According to http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20110105044728511, this menu bar item requests information about wireless connections to display that information in the menu bar item, and that disabling this icon stops the connections on port 192 while not actively inspecting network configuration otherwise.


How does Facetime compare to normal video calling? So, Apple is billing Facetime as though it is a revolutionary technology. I'm not going to ask you whether you think it is, as that is clearly a subjective question. What I will ask instead is how does it compare to normal video calling. Is there anything new that hasn't been done before?

Entirely new? No - not really, but the quality is quite acceptable (I'd say it's better than most Skype video calls I've had) and it's extremely painless to use. It's also at the present time far more limited in audience (only iPhone 4's, iPad 2's and Macs) than normal video calling.

You can think of it as video calling built right into the OS with software that doesn't require hoops (no log in required) to jump through to use it.


Change Volume using External keyboard with Macbook? I have an external mac keyboard on my mac, and would like to be able to use the keyboard to control the volume like I do with my MacBook pro's FN+F10-12 keys, but there's no FN key on my external keyboard.

How can I do this? I'm willing to change to using just Function keys if required.

You could try using a private.xml like this with KeyRemap4MacBook:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>
  <item>
    <name>test</name>
    <identifier>test</identifier>
    <autogen>__KeyToKey__ KeyCode::F1, VK_CONTROL, KeyCode::BRIGHTNESS_DOWN</autogen>
    <autogen>__KeyToKey__ KeyCode::F2, VK_CONTROL, KeyCode::BRIGHTNESS_UP</autogen>
    <autogen>__KeyToKey__ KeyCode::F3, VK_CONTROL, KeyCode::EXPOSE_ALL</autogen>
    <autogen>__KeyToKey__ KeyCode::F4, VK_CONTROL, KeyCode::LAUNCHPAD</autogen>
    <autogen>__ConsumerToKey__ KeyCode::F5, VK_CONTROL, ConsumerKeyCode::KEYBOARDLIGHT_LOW</autogen>
    <autogen>__ConsumerToKey__ KeyCode::F6, VK_CONTROL, ConsumerKeyCode::KEYBOARDLIGHT_HIGH</autogen>
    <autogen>__ConsumerToKey__ KeyCode::F7, VK_CONTROL, ConsumerKeyCode::MUSIC_PREV</autogen>
    <autogen>__ConsumerToKey__ KeyCode::F8, VK_CONTROL, ConsumerKeyCode::MUSIC_PLAY</autogen>
    <autogen>__ConsumerToKey__ KeyCode::F9, VK_CONTROL, ConsumerKeyCode::MUSIC_NEXT</autogen>
    <autogen>__ConsumerToKey__ KeyCode::F10, VK_CONTROL, ConsumerKeyCode::VOLUME_MUTE</autogen>
    <autogen>__ConsumerToKey__ KeyCode::F11, VK_CONTROL, ConsumerKeyCode::VOLUME_DOWN, ModifierFlag::OPTION_L | ModifierFlag::SHIFT_L</autogen>
    <autogen>__ConsumerToKey__ KeyCode::F12, VK_CONTROL, ConsumerKeyCode::VOLUME_UP, ModifierFlag::OPTION_L | ModifierFlag::SHIFT_L</autogen>
  </item>
</root>

I don't know if it works with all keyboards, but it does work with my Kinesis Advantage.

See http://lri.me/keyremap4macbook.html for more information about using KeyRemap4MacBook.


Bootcamp: My Mac Only Boots into macOS No Matter What Partition I Choose I have a 2017 Macbook Pro 15 inch running 10.13.5 and a bootcamp partition of Windows 10. I cannot boot into windows unless I select the windows partition from system preferences and restart from there.

If I try and hold down the option key on restart, Startup Manager opens but no matter which partition I click, it boots into macOS. It will not let me boot into windows this way.

Is there any way to fix Startup Manager/boot into windows?

Edit: Video on what is happening

AFAIK High Sierra already "introduced" APFS. The Bootcamp partition is formatted NTFS, I thought. If you set the startup disk to macOS in Settings (while in macOS), then, when you startup holding the Alt key, the boot window should let you choose between the two partitions. I cannot check now since I am a long way from base.
I am not sure when Startup disk is set to the Bootcamp partition, everything will work correctly as expected.


Are the internal drives on a MacPro3,1 hot swappable? I believe SATA drives were designed to be hot swappable, but I imagine there might still be some hardware restrictions.

So if you were to unmount a drive, can you swap out a drive in one of the internal drive sleds while the machine is on?

In 12 years of owning Mac Pros, I've never tried this.

MacRumors, however, says a resounding "No". Don't do it.

Apparently the protocol supports it but the hardware must too. XServes supported it, Pros don't.

Relevant threads…
Can you Insert Drive While Running Mac Pro ??
How to rescan SATA ports without restarting?

I also found on ArsTechnica - Did I fry my Mac Pro?


Is my HDD throughput normal? I am a musician, and was finding my 2011 iMac was getting sluggish with more complex tracks. It was topping out the CPU so I bought a second hand 2015 iMac with a much more powerful CPU. I am finding that the new machine is actually considerably worse in performance than the older one. Activity monitor reveals that there is plenty of CPU time and physical memory available. The problem seems to occur whenever I try to do more than one thing at a time which requires any amount of disk access. As I type this, my Dropbox has just started syncing, and the performance of the machine has degraded to the extent that I am typing, and the letters are appearing slowly one at a time on the page. If I try to open a piece of software while another one is doing anything, the whole system grinds to a halt, I get a persistent beachball, and software will start to freeze and/or crash entirely. Despite this, Activity Monitor continues to assert that there is no problem CPU or memory-wise. So I did a disk benchmark and was surprised at how low the results were:

Dragging and dropping that image into Safari from my Desktop, by the way, required me to wait for Exposé to redraw (and it stuttered rather than swishing smoothly), click and drag the file, un-Exposé and wait again, drag the file into Safari, then wait for the beachball to stop before letting go. From experience, if I drag and drop without waiting for the beachball to stop, the Mac ignores the drag and drop and I have to do it again.

Opening my Applications directory can take several minutes. Opening music project files? I go and make tea while it thinks about it. It is so bad that I have actually put the older 2011 iMac back into the studio as this new one is completely unusable. It has been like this since I got it. When I bought it I erased the HDD and installed Mojave from scratch. It has always been this slow—it has not degraded over time.

This is clearly not the expected performance for this machine, so if the CPU and memory aren't causing the problem, could it be that the hard drive is either so slow as to bottleneck the performance, or is failing?

Hardware Overview:

  Model Name:   iMac
  Model Identifier: iMac16,2
  Processor Name:   Intel Core i5
  Processor Speed:  2.8 GHz
  Number of Processors: 1
  Total Number of Cores:    4
  L2 Cache (per Core):  256 KB
  L3 Cache: 4 MB
  Memory:   8 GB
  Boot ROM Version: 229.0.0.0.0
  SMC Version (system): 2.32f20
  Serial Number (system):   C02SF1JTGG77
  Hardware UUID:    C3F0A7B9-1498-5EA2-94D2-B1CBE28C6E50

APPLE HDD HTS541010A9E662:

  Capacity: 1 TB (1,000,204,886,016 bytes)
  Model:    APPLE HDD HTS541010A9E662
  Revision: JA0AB5D0
  Serial Number:    JD8002D81S8JRD
  Native Command Queuing:   Yes
  Queue Depth:  32
  Removable Media:  No
  Detachable Drive: No
  BSD Name: disk0
  Rotational Rate:  5400
  Medium Type:  Rotational
  Partition Map Type:   GPT (GUID Partition Table)
  SMART status: Verified
  Volumes:
EFI:
  Capacity: 209.7 MB (209,715,200 bytes)
  File System:  MS-DOS FAT32
  BSD Name: disk0s1
  Content:  EFI
  Volume UUID:  0E239BC6-F960-3107-89CF-1C97F78BB46B
disk0s2:
  Capacity: 1 TB (999,995,129,856 bytes)
  BSD Name: disk0s2
  Content:  Apple_APFS

I am experiencing something similar "upgrading" from a 2011 MacBook Air with SSD to a 2017 iMac 4K with 1TB 5400 disk (same disk as yours).

The read and write speeds looks what you could expect from such drive.

You could try reboot into safe mode to see if there is any difference.

Another solution is to buy an external SSD to hook up via USB/Thunderbolt for your project files.


How can I remember the SSH key password on a remote system that SSH's into a second remote system? I have three systems:

New MBP (Catalina)
Old MBP (El Capitan)
Raspberry Pi (Raspbian Buster)

I want to SSH from the New MBP to the Old MBP, and then SSH from the Old MBP to the Raspberry Pi.
My final goal is to set-up an rsync backup scheme between the Raspberry Pi and the Old MBP.
✅ I can SSH from the New MBP to the Old MBP without a problem.
✅ When I open screen sharing on the New MBP, connect to Old MBP and SSH from the Old MBP to the Raspberry Pi it works without a problem.
❌ When I SSH from the New MBP to the Old MBP, I can SSH from the Old MBP to the Raspberry Pi, but everytime it asks for a passphrase of the SSH key.
I followed these steps and found I had to set-up some different things as well on the Old MBP before they worked. So the complete things I did are:

SSH from New MBP to Old MBP
Start an SSH agent on the Old MBP: eval "$(ssh-agent -s)"
Add the key: ssh-add -K ~/.ssh/id_rsa and ssh-add -A
Now I can SSH to the Raspberry Pi without a password prompt: ssh user@raspi

As long as I don't logout of the Old MBP session (from step 1) everything is fine.
However, if I:

close the New-Old SSH connection
re-connect from the New MBP to the Old MBP
Try to SSH to the Raspberry Pi

I get prompted for a passphrase again!
How can I get the ssh-agent on the Old MBP remember the passphrase across different SSH sessions?

This answer provided me with a solution.
By using ssh -A user@new-mbp and then ssh user@raspi I re-use the ssh-agent of the New MBP (if I understand it correctly) on the Old MBP and can login on the Raspberry Pi using an SSH key without being prompted for a password.


How to get rid of Python Launcher icon every time a script runs? Using Sublime Text 2 or Atom (maybe other editors too), when running a simple plotting script in Python, the Python Launcher icon (the rocket) pops up every time I run the code. The icons add up in the Dock , and I have to close them individually. Is there any configuration to avoid this behavior?

With Sublime Text, for instance, Command + B is the default shortcut I use to run a script. I have not found this issue addressed in Atom's or Sublime Text's documentation (neither in Stack Exchange).

The script that I use is a basic fit to some data:

import csv
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from scipy.interpolate import *

with open('data.csv', 'rU') as mycsv:
    data = csv.reader(mycsv)
    x = []
    y = []
    for row in data:
        x.append(float(row[0]))
        y.append(float(row[1]))

p = polyfit(x, y, 2)
xp = linspace(-5, 1, 1000)

plt.scatter(x, y)
plt.plot(xp,polyval(p,xp),'r-', label='p1')
plt.show()

I'm not familiar with pyplot, but from the documentation, it looks like the show() method 'holds onto' ("blocks") the script until it is closed by some user interaction.

  In non-interactive mode, display all figures and block until the
  figures have been closed;
  A single experimental keyword argument,
  block, may be set to True or False to override the blocking behavior
  described above.

Other methods like ginput() and waitforbuttonpress() describe the blocking process.

You could test this by commenting out the last line and see if the icons persist.


How can I transfer a Large (450Mb) file between two Mountain Lion Macbook Pros? I have two identical Macbook Pro Retina laptops.  How can I transfer files between them?

I have looked at the AirPort utility, but don't see a way to "create a new network" let alone make it discoverable by the other mac.

I tried enabling File Sharing, but I don't know how to tell the other mac to connect to that share (they are both on the same Wifi, where should I look for it?)

Also I tried the Bluetooth file transfer wizard but don't see the other device.

I've also tried AirDrop, but I can only send small files this way.  I have a folder with many files that adds up to 450Mb and that just times out.

What other ways should I try connecting the hosts together?

After enabling File Sharing on one machine, it will give you the name of the machine as used to connect to it. Next, go to the other computer, and open Finder.  You should see the name of the other computer in the sidebar.  If you don't, then press Go -> Connect to Server, and connect to the other machine by the name that was given in the Sharing window.

When you connect, you should see the public folder of your user account, and the Drop Box folder in there.  Copy the file to the Drop Box folder by dragging it onto the Drop Box folder.  On the target computer, open Finder, your user folder, the "Public" folder, and the "Drop Box" folder, and you will see the file that you copied.


iPhone 4 restarts every 3 min My iPhone 4 restarts itself exactly every 3 min, whether I use it or not (screen off). More precisely, it's respringing its springboard; I don't need to unlock my SIM card after each respring. Seems like a software issue as it restarts at such precise intervals, but a firmware restore has not helped.

Worth mentioning is that it's running iOS 4.2.1 jailbroken, and the problem started after a color swap I did myself. Everything else (all the hardware parts including cameras, antennas, Wi-Fi, etc.) works just fine—which makes it hard to believe that this problem would occur only because of opening the iPhone up. Because of all this, I can't rely on my warranty, so returning the phone is not an alternative.

Did your iPhone was jailbroken before the color swap?

If so, I'm afraid you broke something inside the phone. Something the OS is trying to access and since it's broken, respring the springboard (maybe that's a bug, but since you're not supposed to fiddle with the inside of the phone, it's not something you could use to replace it).

As a last resort, you could try to reopen it and see if there's anything that looks broken.


Hide creation date of a file I've failed to produce a document in time - if I send it, the receiver will be able to see the creation and last modification dates.

This is what happens whenever I download files from the web or an usb stick/hard disk: I'm always able to see these metadata.

So, where are these data stored? In the file? What then if I create a text only file: why am I still able to see the creation date?

How can I hide this information NOT from the Finder but from the document itself?

Thanks!

I would suggest that just hiding the date is not going to convince anyone, since it is normal to find the dates where they supposed to be.

If there is no date one will be very suspicious.

What you have to do is to modify the date so that it looks the way you want it.

First learn where the information is stored.

Lets say you are using MS word documents.

Under File click on properties > statistics (you will see the dates).

This part is fun, but do not screw it up.

Go to your system preferences and change the date that will become your

  original save date

.

Open the document and save it. (that will become your creation date)

Now change the system date to the date you should have submitted it or day before.

Again open the document and make some kind of small modification then save it again.

That will become your modification date.

Here is a sample I just made (notice the dates are not from today but from what I choose them to be).

You are done.

Do not open and modify the documents after your have changed your system date to today.


Daisy chain Thunderbolt display to regular, fullsize DisplayPort monitor? I have a 27" Korean IPS with a full size DisplayPort input (not Thunderbolt). Is it possible to drive this monitor daisy chained off a 27" Apple Thunderbolt monitor, using a mini DisplayPort output to fullsize DisplayPort cable? The Apple monitor would be driven by my late 2011 MacBook Pro.

Couldn't find a clear answer on this, as I think people are confusing DisplayPort and Thunderbolt quite a bit. My guess is you can't do this, because perhaps you can only daisy chain a thunderbolt monitor to another thunderbolt monitor?

From Apple's Thunderbolt Ports and Displays FAQ:

Can I connect a Mini DisplayPort display to my Apple Thunderbolt Display for computers that support using more than one display?
Mini DisplayPort displays will not function if connected to the Thunderbolt port of an Apple Thunderbolt Display. Displays connected via Mini DisplayPort video adapter or cable to the Thunderbolt port of an Apple Thunderbolt Display will not work.

So as you guessed, you can't daisychain a non-Thunderbolt display to a Thunderbolt display. You can only do it with two Thunderbolt displays (or of course, two displays on different ports directly connected to your Mac).


How do I find how much disk space a program is occupying? How do I find out how much disk space a program such as Skype occupies?

My SSD is getting full, and I want to see what can be deleted.

Daisy Disk

It's a killer app for analyzing disk use on a Mac. It'll scan all your drives and shows you disk use broken down by customizable buckets: file types, programs, tags, etc. It can show you all the disk space used by a program like Skype if you like and more.

Edit: it's also on sale right now for $10.


Mac mini stops blinking in standby I'm on Macmini6,2 with current firmware and 10.8.4. When I send it to sleep it starts its on and off fading status LED thing to indicate it is now asleep.

When I come back a few hours later, it is dark, but the computer is still asleep and enters wake mode when I touch any key.

What's wrong there? Isn't the indicator LED supposed to blink all the time?

I am not sure if it is only with the most recent model, but apparently by default it is set to go into deep sleep after a few hours, and this turns the power light off entirely.

This thread on AVForums provides a command that should disable deep sleep, if that is what you want.

pmset -g
sudo pmset -a autopoweroff 0

After entering this it will prompt you for your password.


Bash shell script to locate and remove substring within a filename I am trying to write a bash shell script (which is called by an Automator Action) to rename TV show DVD rips that I have named badly over the years. I want to remove part of the text in the filenames. I want to remove the text that appears after a specific series of characters that I know will always appear in the filename. But I do not know how many characters will appear before or after the known series of characters. I also don't know if the before or after text will contain multiple periods or dashes. An example would probably help:

The.Big.Bang.Theory.S01E01.xxxxxxxx.mp4

I know that each file will always contain a string in the format of SxxExx where the x's are always numbers. But I do not know what the numbers will be. I want to get the filename up to and including the SxxExx string and the file extension but strip out everything else. So for the above example I would end-up with:

The.Big.Bang.Theory.S01E01.mp4

I have tried using bash's built-in string replacement commands. I thought the expr index command would give me the integer start point of the SxxExx string and then I could use ${filename:offset:length} to extract only the required part of the filename (i already know the extension so that can be re-added). But it seems the OS X version of expr doesn't include the index functionality. I have only scripted in Basic and LotusScript before. In those environments this would have been fairly easy using commands such as 'Like' and 'Instr' or 'Mid'. But in bash I just can't figure it out. I have spent hours googling trying to understand how to use regular expressions to locate the 'SxxExx' substring in the filename but I just can't figure it out. I hope some clever UNIX scripters will be able to help me!

With bash only:

for filename in *; do
    if [[ "$filename" =~ (.*S[0-9][0-9]E[0-9][0-9]).*(\....)$ ]]; then
        echo mv "$filename" "${BASH_REMATCH[1]}${BASH_REMATCH[2]}"
    fi
done

Remove the "echo" when you're satisfied it's working.


How to make the tags appear the old way on Mavericks? Is there a way to make the folders tagged in any color (red, blue, purple, etc.) appear in a more visible way than the OSX 10.9 way?

For instance, on OSX 10.8, the whole title of the item was colored.

A long time ago (System 7), even the color of the folder was changed.

There is no officially supported way to do this (and no unofficially supported hack that re-enables it either).  The behaviour of Tags in Mavericks as compared to Labels in every previous version of OS X is very different, and you cannot pick and choose elements to work in one way and have the rest to work in another, it's all or nothing I'm afraid, so if you are on Mavericks the best you can do is hope for a feature as part of a future OS update that adds extended options to tags.  I'm sure further tag options will be forthcoming, as it's essentially a V1 feature at present, and maybe this will be one of them.


Could I take a Core i7 form a 2012 MBP and put it into a 2018 MBP? I know very little about computer hardware so I thought I might as well ask.

I have an Intel Core i7 in my MacBook Pro Late 2012. I am considering getting a 2018 MacBook Pro. I was wondering if it is possible to purchase an Intel Core i5 2018 model and then just take the 2012 Core i7 and put it in the 2018.

I am wondering if this is realistically possible and also if its technically possible (like could the 2018 hardware accept a 2012 core i7 or would there be other hardware compatibility issues).

I am also wondering how a 2012 Core i7 processor compares to a 2018 Core i5 (would it be worth it).

I don't know what exact CPU model numbers are involved here, but a simple check of the sockets for the ranges shows that the 2011 or 2012 i7 will not fit on a motherboard designed for a 2017 or 2018 i5 (of course Apple may have used a 2010 i7 or a 2016 i5 in their computers, but the same thing would apply).

The later i5 also uses a different I/O bus, but that might be backwards compatible (haven't checked as it's irrelevant since you won't be able to fit the CPU in the first place).

Depending on the exact models involved, the old i7 also would require quite a lot more power than the new i5, meaning higher power draw and heat generation, both problems the new computer case and power supply might not be able to handle.


SSD and Superdrive on Nvidia MCP79 SATA controller Right now I have a Hitachi 320GB 5400rpm and a MATSHITADVD-R UJ-868 superdrive connected to the Nvidia MCP79 SATA controller in my MacBook Pro 5,3. The link speed of the hard disk drive is negotiated to 1.5 Gbps as, according to this answer the device is a SATA I (1.5Gbps) device.
This is what my system profiler says about the SATA controller:
Vendor:                 NVidia
Product:                MCP79 AHCI
Link Speed:             3 Gigabit
Negotiated Link Speed:  1.5 Gigabit
Description:            AHCI Version 1.20 Supported

Now I'm wondering the following:
If I would replace the Hitachi HDD with an SSD of any brand will the negotiated link speed be 3Gbps? The SSD being a SATA II or III device. Or will this be capped because it has to divide the 3Gbps over the HDD/SSD and the Superdrive?

There are two independent SATA channels available. Each channel will negotiate highest possible speed based on client capabilities. It will not divide 3Gbps between two clients.

And as a side answer to your question: in case you don't use Superdrive look for SATA to SATA 9.5mm optical bay caddy. This way you'll be able to put SSD in place of Superdrive and have plenty of storage on platters.

Your Macbook even accept 12.5mm thick HDDs in HDD chamber.


how to fill a 64 gb SDXC card with random files I need to create 64GB worth of files with a size between 30 and 50 MB to evaluate copying a large number of files from an SDXC card to an external HDD. So I need a few files to try with.

I figure I could create an arbitrary number of files (can be random bytes) with a file size between x MB and y MB who in total do not cap a size of z GB on OSX?

Is this easy to do in terminal for a non-programmer?

64 GB of files, 30 to 50 MB each

First, there are a couple of ways to create large files. This command creates a 30 MB file of zeros very quickly.

dd if=/dev/zero of=file.dat count=30 bs=1048576

This command creates a 50 MB file of random bytes. It's not as fast as a file of zeros.

dd if=/dev/urandom of=file.dat count=50 bs=1048576

Here are some other useful commands for this project.

jot -r 1 30 50             # makes a random number between 30 and 50
du -sm . | awk {'print $1'} # finds the size in MB for the current folder

Shell script

Choosing files of zeros (it's faster), and putting everything together in a shell script:

#!/bin/sh
min=1          # minimum file size
max=1          # maximum file size
limit=1        # limit of total files size
filetype="dat" # filetype
folder="."     # folder to put files in
zeros=1        # fill with zeros or random bytes?

while getopts ":h:n:m:l:f:t:z:" opt; do
  case $opt in
    h) echo "-n {min. file size in MB} -m {max. file size in MB} -l {limit of total size of all files in GB} -t {string filetype without dot ex.: 'jpg'}-z {1 = fill with zeros | 0 = fill with random bytes (slower) }"
    ;;
    n) min="$OPTARG"
    ;;
    m) max="$OPTARG"
    ;;
    l) limit="$OPTARG"
    ;;
    f) folder="$OPTARG"
    ;;
    t) filetype="$OPTARG"
    ;;
    z) zeros="$OPTARG"
    ;;
    \?) echo "Invalid option -$OPTARG" >&2
    ;;
  esac
done

if [ $zeros -eq 1 ]
then
  source=/dev/zero
else
  source=/dev/urandom
fi

n=1                                      # count files
lm=$((($limit*1000)-($max-1)))           # real total file size limit
sz=`du -sm "$folder" | awk {'print $1'}` # size of folder in MB

while [ $sz -lt $lm ];
do
   cnt=`jot -rn 1 $min $max`;
   dd if=$source of=$folder/file$n.$filetype count=$cnt bs=1048576 2> /dev/null;
   status=$?;
   if [ $status -eq 0 ]; then
      echo file$n.$filetype $cnt MB;
   else
      echo write file$n.$filetype failed;
      exit $status;
   fi
   let n=n+1;
   sz=`du -sm "$folder" | awk {'print $1'}`;
done
exit;

n counts files so that each file has a different name
cnt is a random number from $min to $max that the dd command uses to make a file between $min MB and $max MB

Copy the script and paste into a new TextEdit window. Select Format->Make Plain Text from the menu bar. Save the file on the Desktop and name it random_data_files.sh.

Creating the files

Open a Terminal window and run these commands:

cd ~/Desktop
chmod a+x random_data_files.sh

Make a folder or mount an SDXC card. cd to the folder or card. Run the the shell script.

~/Desktop/random_data_files.sh -n 30 -m 50 -l 64 -t jpg -f {your_folder}

The script will create approximately 1,600 files (sometimes more, sometimes fewer) for 64 GB of 30-to-50 MB files. Open another Terminal window in the same folder or the card, and use:

du -h

to watch the progress of the script. Please comment if something's not clear or if you have a problem.


Did the most recent Mac OSX security update version 2016-001 (10.11.6) break java jnotify? I installed the security update 20016-001 for Mac OSx 10.11.6 this morning and now my use of sbt (0.13.8) with scala (2.11.8) and playframework (2.3.9) is giving the traceback below.  I'm guessing that the update includes new shared object files that are not working with the java versions I have installed.  I tried jdk 1.7.0_80 and 1.8.0_92.

java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError: no jnotify in java.library.path
        at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadLibrary(ClassLoader.java:1886)
        at java.lang.Runtime.loadLibrary0(Runtime.java:849)
        at java.lang.System.loadLibrary(System.java:1088)
        at net.contentobjects.jnotify.macosx.JNotify_macosx.<clinit>(Unknown Source)
        at net.contentobjects.jnotify.macosx.JNotifyAdapterMacOSX.<init>(Unknown Source)
        at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance0(Native Method)
        at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.java:57)
        at sun.reflect.DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.java:45)
        at java.lang.reflect.Constructor.newInstance(Constructor.java:526)
        at java.lang.Class.newInstance(Class.java:383)
        at net.contentobjects.jnotify.JNotify.<clinit>(Unknown Source)
        at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
        at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:57)
        at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:43)
        at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:606)
        at play.runsupport.JNotifyPlayWatchService$JNotifyDelegate.ensureLoaded(PlayWatchService.scala:168)
        at play.runsupport.JNotifyPlayWatchService$$anonfun$5.apply(PlayWatchService.scala:223)
        at play.runsupport.JNotifyPlayWatchService$$anonfun$5.apply(PlayWatchService.scala:179)

Update:

I ended up doing a massive clean/uninstall/reinstall of my java and scala tools as well as clearing my ~/.ivy2 cache. Something in there fixed it, but I didn't have the time to track down what it was.

Delete ~/.ivy (it will be recreated) and run 'activator clean'.


How to copy file/folder beginning with dot from Mac to PC without hidden attribute? I have Mac (OSX Lion) and PC (Windows 7) with a shared folder. To mount Windows shared folder I use "Connect to Server" in Finder. All files and folders are copied ok except for the files that begin with dot (e.g .htaccess). In Windows these files are created with hidden attribute.

How to copy file/folder beginning with dot without hidden attribute?

Let's assume for this example that your ".htaccess" file is located in the root directory of your mounted Windows share. Let's also say the Windows volume is called "WindowsShare". Finally, let's say you want to copy this file to your Desktop.

Open Terminal. Type in cd /Volumes/WindowsShare. Then type in cp .htaccess ~/Desktop. You can modify this as needed based on your file locations and file names.


What causes incorrect PDFkit or blurry PDF display in macOS Sierra and how to fix or remedy that situation? Problem: Some applications like Preview or Skim do not display anything in certain PDFs, primarily in text PDFs, while images work fine. Skim even displays tables of contents but both start beachballing heavily after quite a while.
The PDFs display fine in Adobe Reader and I do not see anything meaningful in log or Console.
Logs for "Devices" in Console are filled up with messages like these:

Preview   the behavior of the UICollectionViewFlowLayout is not defined because:
Preview   the item width must be less than the width of the UICollectionView minus the section insets left and right values.
Preview   Please check the values return by the delegate.

Interestingly this situation looks infectious.
Certain small PDFs open OK at first and keep this state while scrolling. But after opening a larger PDF, which does not display anything, the first PDF degrades its display quality, especially after scrolling.
To illustrate this, left is Preview.app, right is QuickLook preview for /Library/Documentation/License.lpdf:

It seems quite weird that this looks more like a collection of bugs in Sierra's Preview.
One bug is that the intermediate scrolling representation in Preview sometimes doesn't get updated properly once scrolling stops. This effect is visible with almost all PDFs but remedies itself rather quickly most of the time.
The worst bug seems to be triggered when using big and complex PDFs especially when they were produced with LaTeX.
One example seems to be this UserGuide.
Preview seems to be affected the worst. Closing Preview windows pseudo auto-quits the program but doesn't eliminate it from the list of running processes. Once a document like this is opened Preview.app or Skim descend into an abyss of weird behaviour like in the screenshot above.
On other Sierra systems that were less manipulated than mine the same behaviour was observed, but not always.
Currently I do not see which systems will be commonly affected nor a pattern for which PDFs will trigger these symptoms.

The answer to this question involves a bunch of things.

Preview/PDFKit in Sierra is just buggy (10.12.5 +.6 Preview Version 9.0 (909.18)). It is less robust in this regard as Preview in either Yosemite or High Sierra. And coupled with apparent auto-termination this is the only 'background process' that really matters in this regard.
Once the bug gets triggered (enough) it is much earlier in Sierra Preview compared to other versions and propagates through the application: that vanishes from the Dock  or from the Cmd+Tab  application switcher but remains active in the background as Activity Monitor will show.
That tempted to reach the conclusion that almost all PDFs were affected at first. But once a killall Preview cleared that process up for good, only bug-triggering PDFs (that might justifiably called substandard) really triggered that behaviour.
But one such concrete bug trigger I could positively identify is related to Multiple PDFs with page group included in a single page warning.
It is somehow dependent on the number of these incorrect inclusion attributes but I couldn't determine the exact amount.
Since many of my own PDFs, files I downloaded and had to work with and also the given example in the Question above demonstrate: this is a widespread weakness leading to very unwanted behaviour on Sierra, not only but (for me) mostly from LaTeX generated content or many includes for an assembled PDF.

Unless this bug in Preview is fixed, or the PDFs are reflown there is no solution but to avoid Preview on Sierra for these kind of files.

A workaround is to use other applications like Acrobat Reader from the start for all PDFs to display if they contain text.

Once this bug is triggered with Preview, it is necessary to kill all PDFkit related processes since quitting the application Preview via cmd+q or the equivalent menu item is not enough sufficient.


New "EFI boot" drive appearing after reverting OS X drive to HFS+ Months ago I performed a clean install of Yosemite, and as you can read elsewhere, drive was formatted as Core Storage. Later on I partitioned and put on Windows 8.1 through Bootcamp.

Worked well for months (still working actually). I was booting holding the option key and I was able to choose between the OS X and Windows partitions.

However, Bootcamp does not provide drivers to read Core Storage disks. So, in order to get read access to the OS X drive from Windows, I followed the most common suggestion I could find: diskutil coreStorage revert <UUID>. It is well (though unofficially) documented and worked with me also - OS X drive is HFS+ again and I can read it when booted into Windows.

So?

The only issue I could find is that now, when booting holding option, I am presented a third option called EFI boot. I am not brave enough to click on it, but would like to know what is it, why it's there and eventually how I can get rid of it. It is not shown in Disk Utility of course.

Here is an image pretty similar to my case:

Before doing diskutil coreStorage revert I had just Yosemite and Windows options; now there's this new guy. However this happens only in the boot screen; there's no EFI boot in Disk Utility nor in the Startup Disk view.

diskutil list

/dev/disk0
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *750.2 GB   disk0
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk0s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS Macintosh HD            609.3 GB   disk0s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk0s3
   4:       Microsoft Basic Data Windows HD              140.0 GB   disk0s4
/dev/disk1
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:        CD_partition_scheme                        *116.8 MB   disk1
   1:     Apple_partition_scheme                         101.7 MB   disk1s0
   2:        Apple_partition_map                         17.9 KB    disk1s0s1
   3:                  Apple_HFS Vodafone Mobile Broa... 31.9 MB    disk1s0s2

//last one should be my internet key actually plugged in.

To rename the Recovery Partition, falsely named "EFI Boot", I first mounted the Recovery HD, by showing all partitions in Disk Utility.
To show all partitions:
1.) quit Disk Utility
2.) In Terminal write or paste: defaults write com.apple.DiskUtility DUShowEveryPartition 1 and hit 'enter'.
Launch Disk Utility and mount the hidden, but now showing "Recovery HD" by selecting it in the sidebar and clicking the "mount" menu.  Here it did mount with its proper name "Recovery HD".

Then rename it by using Terminal and this command:
sudo bless --folder /Volumes/Recovery\ HD --label "Recovery HD",
or change the label "Recovery HD" to something that's preferred.

To revert Disk Utility's 'show all partitions' just use the same command with '0' instead of '1':
defaults write com.apple.DiskUtility DUShowEveryPartition 0

Edit: changes in macOS Sierra lead to a different approach:

Find the disk identifier by running the following command in Terminal:

  diskutil list

This will identify the Recovery HD with diskXsX (e.g. disk0s3)

Mount the Recovery HD with the help of its found identifier, e.g.:

  diskutil mount disk0s3

as in the example mentioned above in step 1, replacing "disk0s3" with your own found identifier.

Then use the following command for the disk label to change:

  sudo bless --folder /Volumes/Recovery\ HD/System/Library/CoreServices --label "Recovery HD"

Again, replacing "Recovery HD" for your own preferred disk label.


Why doesn't Mac OS X source ~/.bashrc? I found a lot of people figuring out why instruction similar to this :

Put X to your ~/.bashrc and you can do Y

don't work.

It always turns out that Mac OS X's bash's startup files (or Mac's Bash itself) doesn't source ~/.bashrc file, either in the login shell, or in a shell spawned from window system - like Terminal app in Mac OS X)

Why is this, when all other Unix-like systems with Bash I've worked with before have done this?

PS:

I found what Bash itself says about startup files (which could be helpful) :

  When Bash is invoked as an interactive login shell, or as a
  non-interactive shell with the --login option, it first reads and
  executes commands from the file /etc/profile, if that file exists.
  After reading that file, it looks for ~/.bash_profile, ~/.bash_login,
  and ~/.profile, in that order, and reads and executes commands from
  the first one that exists and is readable. The --noprofile option may
  be used when the shell is started to inhibit this behavior.

Source : http://www.gnu.org/software/bash/manual/bashref.html#Bash-Startup-Files

In OSX the terminal  by default starts a login session so reads .bash_profile etc. (The GUI login process that asks for your name and password does not use shell scripts and starts no shell it is all done from launchd and the workspace)
On other Unices xterm runs a non login shell by default so they read .bashrc as the scripts that present you with your password etc at login call the login session and all terminals are sub process of this and inherit the shell environment.
From the GNU document you referred to

Invoked as an interactive non-login shell
When an interactive shell that is not a login shell is started, Bash
reads and executes commands from ~/.bashrc, if that file exists. This
may be inhibited by using the --norc option. The --rcfile file option
will force Bash to read and execute commands from file instead of
~/.bashrc.
So, typically, your ~/.bash_profile contains the line
if [ -f ~/.bashrc ]; then . ~/.bashrc; fi

after (or before) any
login-specific initializations.


MacBook Pro new battery not charging. Defective? Model: MacBook Pro 13" Retina early 2015

My MacBook Pro had a battery in the condition "Replace now" so I bought a new battery on ebay and got it replaced. The problem is the MacBook identifies the battery but it is in the condition of "Replace now" and does not go above 0%. It was with 0% when I installed it since when I connected the power adapter the computer turned on.

I reset SMC and PRAM.
I'm almost sure my power adapter is fine and I can use the computer with the power adapter.

I'm thinking I purchased a dead battery and that is the problem?
What else could be the problem?

If you could give me your opinion on the battery stats on the image attached would help a lot.

That certainly looks like a dead battery.  iFixit sells a replacement kit starting at $99 (USD).


I there a way to set a separate password for a file (other than root)? I struggle with procrastination on sites like reddit, youtube, and netflix so I want to block them. I know I can do this by modifying /etc/hosts to redirect to 127.0.0.1, but I still can and do change the hosts file back. Is there some way I can set a password for /etc/hosts so that I can not sudo edit it? Alternatively can someone recommend a better solution to block these sites? I use High Sierra and Chrome.

Thanks for your help.

What you wish to achieve sounds like a duplicate of this question. There are complications such as SIP to consider these days. More trouble than it's worth.

It would be more effective to 'firewall' those sites in some way that does not rely on a password that you may forget, or be tempted to revert when you should be concentrating your attentions elsewhere. Fortunately, as the other question stated, there's an app (or many) to do that.

I personally used Self Control some years ago when trying to get coursework done. It's free. There are other similar apps out there, some paid-for for the sake of extra features, though I feel those extra features are just another avenue of procrastination.


MacBook Pro is not turning on monitor When I turn on my MacBook Pro it starts with a sound of checking CD inside and the case light detector turns on as usual, and ventilators starts to run, but monitor is still switched off.

At the beginning right after it happened, I just switched off/on the computer once and it started again with all it's processes and a typical beginning sound, but without a screen. Moreover, I was able even to login (in blind mode) and really check if the machine is running, because my Internet sharing has been started as soon as Mac OS starts. So my network has been accessible in other computers and I was sure that the problem has been just in my monitor.

Than I tried to turn the computer on/off manually by holding power button many, many times. And it almost always did the same process, starting with a typical Mac sound at the beginning. But later on, it stopped to make this sound, however turned on with a sound of checking the CD, running ventilators. But I am not able to login anymore and seems login view is not loaded anymore. Monitor is still not turning on at all. Perhaps, this could happen, because I was pushing on/off button too many times or so?!

But right now, I am having it turning on, just with ventilators, case light and a sound of checking the CD, and that's it. Computer is opened and located here on my table ready for any checks...

I already has been in Apple center and they made a 3 days diagnostic, saying my motherboard is broken, but I don't believe them at all. Services are made very bad here in Austria. I was trying to explain that I was able even to login, but the conclusion has been final - motherboard and -$50.

So, I don't trust in their checking at all and wish to hear your opinions, if this is motherboard or some other stuff could be broken?!

It could very well be a broken logic board.  But try to do the following and see if it fixes it :

Reset System Management Controller as per these instructions

Reset PVRAM as per these instructions

Doing these two resets generally fixes most hardware based issues on Macs.  You can also eliminate that its your monitor by trying to see if you can replicate this problem on other screens.

But I would trust the advice you've been given by Apple on this one.


Macbook Pro Retina Early 2015 bootcamp My bootcamp doesn't have the 'selected tasks'
Please help! I really need windows on my mac.
Thank you :)

In your window, click the "Go Back" button until you get to the selection screen.

Note: Also, don't get illegal copies of OSes. If you want a free copy of Windows 10, sign up for the Windows Insider Program. You can get a free ISO file from there.


Will changing my MAC address void my warranty or affect any existing programs? Noobie here
Pretty much what the title says.

I have 2016 Macbook Pro (macOS 10.12.3), so, will changing the MAC Address by terminal or by using some program like SpoofMAC void my warranty or AppleCare Protection?

Will it hinder my iMessage or Facetime or any other existing programs?

Thanks!

It shouldn't. I'm currently doing it on hotel wifi and everything seems to work fine. Restoring your default MAC address is as simple as rebooting the machine, so no way for Apple to really know anyway!


Is there simple note-taking tool available for Mac? I am looking for a simple note taking tool for, with only requirement for backing data, and code highlight support

The PearNote app is one I can recommend with no caveats. It is simple, beautiful and powerful.

You don't have to use all of its features, but they are there if you ever wish to add audio or video.


How do I start a new blank image page in Preview? I want to be able to paste an image in a new blank page in Preview.app but do not see this option in the program.

This is a workaround I use that suffices since I rarely use Preview, so there may be better options than this.

Typically, when creating a new image in image editing software you'll be prompted for things such as resolution, background, etc. So I've created a bunch of default images I keep stored in a folder with descriptive filenames such as:

500x500 transparent image
500x500 white image
500x1000 transparent image
and so on

On the rare occasion I have to start from scratch using Preview, I just open the image I need and do a Save As... (hold down the option as you click on the File menu, our just use the optionshiftcommandS keyboard shortcut) and I'm good to go.


How do I stop iCal from always asking for a password? I have several (webcal) subscription calendars on my iCal.  Two of them require passwords stored in my keychain.  At regular intervals, iCal will ask for my keychain password.  Is there a way to set up iCal so that it behaves the way Mail.app does, that is, one types the password once when the app is fired and from then on it just uses it?

My keychain is set to unlock when I log in; the webcal items in the keychain are set to allow any application to access the item.

Have you seen the following menu in Keychain Access app?

Open Keychain Access app (use spotlight!), select your login Keychain and in the Edit menu:

select 'Change Settings for Keychain “login”…’

This brings you the following screen:

If you have either of those, iCal will find the Keychain locked when it tries to sync.


Chrome Extentions Autoupdate So I am wondering if it's possible that Google chrome extensions can be updated even if the computer/device turned off?

Assuming I understand your question correctly, there is no way for software to autoupdate without a device being switched on. Autoupdates require an internet connection to function properly.

More specifically, an internet connection is needed to compare the currently installed version with the latest version available and, when a new version is available, to download the new version. In some cases, an internet connection is also required to perform the actual installation.

Since an internet connection is required, the device must be powered up for the process to work. In other words a device that is switched off can not autoupdate any of its software, nor can a device that is switched on but not connected to the internet (often referred to as standalone devices).


Developer setup install script, with Homebrew & Dropbox? Installing development tools is not too hard these days, with the likes of Homebrew - http://brew.sh ... So I thought I would try to write a script with the homebrew installation and various tools, which I could use whenever I set up a new Mac.

Some people have already done something like this, see some examples here: http://www.justinball.com/2011/12/03/script-your-development-environment-setup-on-your-new-mac/

But before I do this, I had another thought. Could I simply install, via Homebrew to a folder within my Dropbox... and then when I start using a new Mac, just install Dropbox on it and point my .zshrc  script to the folder .. to get the exact same developer environment?

Why not simply use git (and github or bitbucket)? I think that should work better for synchronizing/saving the dotfiles. See google and various blogposts for detailed instructions, or search github directly (1), (2).


Creating folders from the Open File dialog I need to know how to create client file folders and reference or matter subfolders to be saved within each client folder from within the Open File dialog.

For example, "Smith Manufacturing Corp." would be the master client folder. Within that folder, I would like to create subfolders for each matter the lawyer is addressing for that client, for example: "Agreement with Jones Demolition Co." or "Purchase of Main Street Property" and so on.  I was able to do that quite easily with Microsoft Word on my PC.

Folder structure diagram:

- Smith Manufacturing Corp
  + Agreement with Jones Demolition Co.
  + Purchase of Main Street Property

This cannot be done from the Open dialog on the Mac. It, however, can be done from the "Save" dialog.

Enter the "Save" dialog (in Word, it's usually shown as a sheet). If you don't see the file tree, click the down-arrow next to the filename box (it's circled in the below image).

In the expanded window, navigate to the folder where you have your client information. To make a new folder, click the "New Folder" button in the lower-left of the sheet (again, circled in the below image).

(Screenshot examples from Word 2011.)


Running an app off an external hard drive Can I download DaVinci Resolve to an external hard drive and work from/off it?

My computer has a limited storage space, so I can not download it straight to my computer. Ideally, i'd like to download it to my external hard drive and work off it. Can this be done?

Running is not a problem, but the program might (and, like many others, will) put several folders to ~/Library (hidden) folder - Logs, Cache, Container/Group Container. The size might be significant.


iPhone as Samba Server? My aim here is to make my iPhone 4S (running iOS 5.0) serve its music library over SMB/Samba (Windows File Sharing protocol) so any computer on the LAN can access it.

Are there any iPhone apps available (for a non-jailbroken phone) that can act as a Samba file server for the iPhone's filesystem (or at least music library)?

Out of the box it's definitively not possible. To share music you need an Airplay capable counterpart (speakers etc.).
Also you can share music with iTunes.


MAMP not detecting git cloned folders Inside htdocs if I create a folder, I can see it using mkdir test. However, if I use git clone {address} MAMP does not detect it. The permissions are the same (I even tried chmod 777 the files) but it still does not show up.

Unlike it not existing (NOT FOUND), it shows up as FORBIDDEN.

Okay this seemed to be because I had a link called index.html inside, which was linking to a non-existent file.

This folder contained a create-react-app.