Joomla not working on Localhost:8000 I was migrating a Joomla site to a new server. Before uploading to the new server, I wished to test it on my localhost php server. I have done this with Wordpress sites and other PHP/MySQL things with no problems but for some reason Joomla is giving me issues.

I CD to the websites folder in the terminal and start php using my homebrew install of php 5.6.7:

/usr/local/Cellar/php56/5.6.7/bin/php -S localhost:8000

When trying to access the Joomla site locally, the page gives the error message:

This webpage is not available.

In terminal, this is the output I receive:

[Wed Apr  8 11:40:34 2015] PHP Deprecated:  iconv_set_encoding(): Use of iconv.internal_encoding is deprecated in /Users/AdvancedNetworks/Documents/Websites/carzmetix/new-site/libraries/joomla/string/string.php on line 27
[Wed Apr  8 11:40:34 2015] PHP Deprecated:  iconv_set_encoding(): Use of iconv.input_encoding is deprecated in /Users/AdvancedNetworks/Documents/Websites/carzmetix/new-site/libraries/joomla/string/string.php on line 28
[Wed Apr  8 11:40:34 2015] PHP Deprecated:  iconv_set_encoding(): Use of iconv.output_encoding is deprecated in /Users/AdvancedNetworks/Documents/Websites/carzmetix/new-site/libraries/joomla/string/string.php on line 29
[Wed Apr  8 11:40:37 2015] PHP Notice:  Undefined variable: extension in /Users/AdvancedNetworks/Documents/Websites/carzmetix/new-site/templates/forte/layouts/default/layout.php on line 80

(Note: I have MySQL and Phpmyadmin installed locally so I imported the database onto my localhost.)

I double checked that I did not input the DB credentials incorrectly by changing the configuration.php file. When the info was incorrect, I would see an error that told me that there was an error connecting to the MySQL database.

Also: Accessing the administration page gives the same errors.

Do I need to install additional php extensions for Joomla to work? If so, I can get that via Homebrew.

Note: I uploaded the same files onto Hostgator and imported the same SQL file and it worked there so I must have done something incorrectly on the localhost machine.

What can I do? Thank you!

After further research, I saw that Joomla 3.x does not work with php version 5.6 (which is what I was using)

If you are having this issue, I recommend using Homebrew to get php 5.4 or 5.3.

I did the following:

brew install php54

In one terminal tab, I have php5.6 running with the following command:

/usr/local/Cellar/php56/5.6.7/bin/php -S localhost:8000

In another terminal tab, I have stable php 5.4 running with the following command:

/usr/local/Cellar/php54/5.4.39/bin/php -S localhost:8001

(Both have the same document root (website folder) so both can access MySQL just fine.)

So going to http://localhost:8000/ will go to my php 5.6 server while http://localhost:8001/ will go to my php 5.4 server.

Joomla is working like a charm on my php 5.4 test server.

I suppose it should have been common sense to use a more stable version of php rather than the newest one but hopeful this helps someone!


How to "un-maximize" or "restore" an Excel window In Excel, I have a window that uses all of the display real estate, apart from the dock area. Is there any way to make it use only part of the display, apart from resizing the window by dragging the bottom right corner of the window, or installing a third-party application?

I tried pressing the green button in the top left hand corner, and also all sensible combinations of keyboard keys plus the green button. I also examined whether the "Window" menu had anything to help do this.

"Un-maximimize" or "restore" may or may not be the correct terminology. In both Microsoft Windows, and most flavours of Linux GUIs I've encountered, you can "maximize" a window to make it use most of the display real estate, and then "restore" a window to make it shrink back to the previous size. I don't know the OS X terminology, as unlike Microsoft Windows and Linux GUIs, there isn't a menu about resizing windows. I understand that the green button in OS X isn't exactly equivalent to "maximize".

The Escape key un-maximizes Excel. Another way is to push the mouse cursor to the top edge of the screen. The menu bar would appear. A blue unmaximize button will appear in the top right corner. Finally, you can use Control Command F. That should work with all programs, not just Excel.

If you have an additional monitor and set up access to it in the "top" direction, it will not be possible to "hit" the top of the screen to get the menu bar. In this case hit the top corner of the monitor.


If on Wifi only, how does Mail work when not connected? If I have an iPod touch, which will only connect to the internet via Wifi, how will it work with email?  If I write an email on the bus, will it send when I get home?  If I check an email with an attachment, will it download the attachment when it's connected, so that I can read it offline?

Yes. Email works well when not connected to internet.

You will get warnings that it cannot connect to your email accounts. One warning pops up for every email account that you have set up on your device (and possibly one for all the outgoing servers as well). After canceling all of these, you are home free.

If you send an email and are not connected to the internet, it will sit in the outbox, and should send automatically as soon as you reach wifi connectivity. (It may alert you that it failed to send.)

Like you thought, there is an icon that appears for any attachments that aren't downloaded. If you aren't connected to the internet, you won't be able to engage the download of the attachment.


Switch back to HFS+ from APFS Recently I heard about new apple file system.
Of course I wanted to try it.
So I moved all files to one external hard drive for safety... And accidentaly switched it to APFS...
How to revert changes?

$ diskutil apfs createContainer /dev/disk1s2
Started APFS operation on disk1s2 Data
Creating a new empty APFS Container
Unmounting Volumes
Switching disk1s2 to APFS
Creating APFS Container
Created new APFS Container disk1s2
Finished APFS operation on disk1s2 Data

$ diskutil list
/dev/disk0 (internal, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *240.1 GB   disk0
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk0s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS Macintosh SSD           239.2 GB   disk0s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk0s3

/dev/disk1 (external, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *1.0 TB     disk1
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk1s1
   2:                 Apple_APFS                         999.9 GB   disk1s2

/dev/disk2 (external, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *500.1 GB   disk2
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk2s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS Untitled                499.8 GB   disk2s2

/dev/disk3 (disk image):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:     Apple_partition_scheme                        +25.2 MB    disk3
   1:        Apple_partition_map                         32.3 KB    disk3s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS Data Rescue             25.1 MB    disk3s2

I'm afraid there's no non-destructive way to revert back to HFS once converted. You may use diskutil apfs deleteContainer /dev/disk(x)s(x) (where x is your correct APFS container).
This will revert the APFS container back to HFS but will destroy all data. Best find another pool of storage to copy all data from that drive to, then revert, then copy back.


Black screen, perhaps from login/lock system, after 'closing the clam' I make use of the rather clumsy 'closed clam' mode of operation. I close up my macbook pro, bring it to work, and plug in a USB keyboard and a monitor.

80% of the time, all is well.

The other 20% of the time, things proceed as follows:

Unlock box appears on external monitor
Enter password
System unlocks
30 second later ...
Go to black screen with mouse cursor

It looks just like the 'unlock' environment, only, of course, missing the unlock dialog box.

I've also seen the system momentarily display the unlock dialog box. If the system was idle long enough to power-save the display, but not to go into lock, wiggling the mouse will sometimes result in my desktop reappearing with the unlock password box appearing, as well, and then disappearing.

Any ideas?

I'll take a stab at how to collect the data needed to come up with an answer as to what and why the system isn't waking up properly. The new unibody MacBook Pro have much more sophisticated modes of clamshell mode so I'll assume you have one of those for now.

The best place to see what is happening after the event happens is the console application (or logging into the mac remotely with ssh to tail the logs as you are debugging this issue).

Sleep / wake events get a lot of log messages and you will want to look over a normal sleep wake to get familiar with all the messages that happen in which specific order and what normal times to begin and end the wake from sleep take.

A lot happens when the machine wakes as it needs to detect what is connected, if the display is shut, which graphics mode to wake up - what the display options and layout are. Then it transmits that info to all the running apps and has to put it's stuff together.

One thing to simplify things would be to disable all sorts of screen savers, display time outs and such. I've seen my mac get confused and wake from sleep just to engage a screen saver which went missing because I didn't change it and don't normally use it.

There have been several firmware updates in the last two years to tighten up this process as there were (and potentially are still) situations when the system doesn't respond in time or at all correctly.

Lastly - a poor display cable contact or impending hardware failure could be a cause of this. Not likely, but worth checking if you really want to nail this down.


OSX: How to compare and merge two folders and their subfolders and differing files of the same origin I'm among those unlucky few (I'm hoping there are more than one) that are stuck with truly utterly messy backups from multiple machines, in multiple folders.

I've now managed to figure out that I've got one folder with 18gb and 44000+ files and one folder with 17gb and 34000+ files. They are the same folder, but one is on backup2/ and the other is in backup3/. I've used MacPaw's Gemini to remove duplicates from folder1 - and sometimes used Gemini to remove duplicates from folder2. They could be described as being totally out of sync with eachother - they are from separate times and now with mismatching files - i.e., there are duplicates there, but not really enough to use Gemini easily.

I'd like to compare and merge them, but safely. Without losing folders. One might have a subfolder inside a subfolder with 35 files, the other with 12 files - yet the 12 files wouldn't be in the 35 files, so I'd have to be able to merge subfolders so that I don't lose any files. Also, there are, as you would expect, duplicates there too, files with the same name, but with differing file content. I'd have to make copies of those to compare them, remove lines (in case of a textfile) from txt1 and add them to txt2, etc.

What should I do, and which app should I use to visually be able to combine these folders and their subfolders and their contents, merging the files and only keeping the ones that are absolutely differently sized (maybe I've touched a few of the files, maybe not, it's a total shambles).

How should I proceed? I'm running diff on the folders, but that's really quite complicated work.

I realize this is quite the complex question.

The rsync command line tool is able to merge two folders.
You'll need to open a terminal window. Take a look at the manual pages

man rsync

There may be a one liner but the following steps are non-destructive since you won't change your source folders.

Create a new folder (dest)
Sync source1_path to dest
Sync source2_path to dest

Here the script - check the manual pages for additional options

rsync -rv source1_path/ dest
rsync -rv source2_path/ dest

The following commands also create copies for non-identical files which exist in both source directories (with a difference in size or timestamp for example)

rsync -rv --backup --suffix=_source1 source1_path/ dest
rsync -rv --backup --suffix=_source2 source2_path/ dest


PBS not working on Apple TV. Other channels are fine I have I believe is a second generation AppleTV. A few weeks ago, I could no longer stream PBS content. I can get all other channels without any issues.

I can get into the PBS app itself. I can see the content. I can go into settings. If I select something to watch, I sometimes even see the commercial supported by content that plays at the beginning of some of the streams. However, I then see the little spinner, and the screen goes blank. If I press the Apple TV Remote, I can see the frame which shows where I am in the show, and it even shows me the length of the show, but nothing plays.

I've rebooted the Apple TV by unplugging it and plugging it back in. I've switched PBS affiliates. I haven't tried completely resetting my Apple TV because that means reentering and enabling every other channel. I'm hoping to do that as a last resort.

I've seen hints on other forums that the most recent Apple TV update of PBS broke the service, but nothing solid, and nothing about what can be done to fix the issue.

Anyone else have or had these issues? Was anyone else able to work around them?

I have similar issues.  All works fine on the Apple TV with the exception of streaming the PBS shows.  PBS works fine on my PC.  I'm using an Apple TV2 and have a Passport subscription to PBS. We just finished watching Victoria and other Masterpiece series a while back but now, after the commercials play, I get 'Error loading Content' or Content not available now, try again later'.

You and I will need to work with PBS support to fix out accounts in all likelihood.


Export iMessages in human readable form for archival I have a long (several months' worth) iMessage conversation with a contact.  He lost these messages when he re-installed his OS, but I still have the archive.  There is some important information there that we'd like to keep.

Is there a simple way to export this conversation for archival in a human readable form, and also keep any images?

I can select parts of the conversation, copy it to the clipboard and paste it into a rich text document, but this discards all images.  I'm looking for a way that keeps the images.

Note: I use iMessage on OS X only, not iOS.

(Ideally I'd also like to export all non-image file attachments, but I'm not expecting that this will be possible.)

If you know the iMessage account of your contact here is a bash script of mine to retrieve text + images.

#Parameter is a iMessage account (email or phone number i.e. +33616.... )
if [ $# -lt 1 ]; then
    echo "Enter a iMessage account (email of phone number i.e +33616.....) "
fi
login=$1

#Retrieve the text messages

sqlite3 ~/Library/Messages/chat.db "
select is_from_me,text from message where handle_id=(
select handle_id from chat_handle_join where chat_id=(
select ROWID from chat where guid='iMessage;-;$1')
)" | sed 's/1\|/me: /g;s/0\|/budy: /g' > MessageBackup.txt

#Retrieve the attached stored in the local cache

sqlite3 ~/Library/Messages/chat.db "
select filename from attachment where rowid in (
select attachment_id from message_attachment_join where message_id in (
select rowid from message where cache_has_attachments=1 and handle_id=(
select handle_id from chat_handle_join where chat_id=(
select ROWID from chat where guid='iMessage;-;$1')
)))" | cut -c 2- | awk -v home=$HOME '{print home $0}' | tr '\n' '\0' | xargs -0 -t -I fname cp fname .


How to see total memory usage per app? Is there a way to see memory usage per app in macOS?
That is, I want to see the total memory consumed by each app, including  its child processes.

The Activity Monitor shows memory usage by process which makes it hard to determine, for example, how much memory the Chrome app is using, since it spawns multiple processes.

Activity Monitor > View > All Processes, Hierarchically ought to do it, with a bit of scrolling...


Is there an iPhone drop-in charging cradle? Is there a third-party accessory that plugs into the iPhone's dock connector and lets you literally drop it into a (supplied by the same manufacturer) cradle to charge by way of electrical contact?

This question is NOT asking about a SYNCING cradle.  ONLY charging is sufficient.

This question is NOT about "charging pads" that work without electrical contact by way of RF or magnetic flux.

Some models of blackberry have small electrical contacts on the bottom of the device that allow it to be "dropped" into a charging dock.  Is there an iPhone accessory that enables the same kind of behavior?

You'd want something like this charger called Elevation Dock


iOS 7 automatically downloaded to phone after downgrading to iOS 6 I have downgraded my iPhone 4 from iOS 7 to iOS 6.1.3, but when it went back to iOS 6, the Software Update section of Settings is showing that iOS 7 is automatically downloading again. I tried to downgrade my phone again and again but it's not working.

Your iPhone software update is trying to be smart by downloading the update in the background for iOS 7. What it is trying to do is make sure that the update is already on your device, and all you need to do is press the update button, without waiting for a download to finish.

You aren't in danger of loosing your downgrade - your phone will always ask your permission before installing any update. You probably won't be able to keep it from downloading the update, though.


Is there a way to force iTunes to reset volume levels for audio tracks? I have around 17000 tracks and I think quite a few of them are leveled improperly, is there a way to have iTunes do it again?

I have iTunes Match, is this going to cause problems?

Select all your Tracks in your Library cmd+A.
Right click on a random track and select Get Info in the menu. You should get a popup with a warning you are about to edit multiple track info. Click "YES".
In the popup under Options you should see the volume slider. Adjust to your liking.

I don't see how this could interfere with iTunes Match so you should be fine.


Add PDFs to iBooks, without making a copy to com.apple.BKAgentService folder TL;DR: How do I get rid of duplicate PDF files between the com.apple.BKAgentService iBooks folder and their original location?

My SSD is running out of space, so I'm doing some cleanup. A point that has come to my attention is a lot of duplication of PDF files added to my iBooks library (which I'm forced to use for viewing these files in my iPhone and iPad -- if Apple didn't force iBooks down my throat, I would steer as clear as possible from this abomination.)

As I recall, at some point in time, iBooks wouldn't copy your PDFs to the com.apple.BKAgentService folder -- I believe it was used for your purchased iBooks from Apple, or for PDFs/ePubs you downloaded in iOS Safari and then clicked on "Open in iBooks".

It looks like this is different now. When adding a PDF to iBooks, a copy is automatically made to the com.apple.BKAgentService folder, which is woefully inefficient.

Of course I could delete the other copy (not in com.apple.BKAgentService) of my PDF, but I like to keep them organized by folders, kinda like iTunes does with //.mp3. If this is were possible inside the com.apple.BKAgentService folder, this would be an acceptable solution to me.

I've also thought of individually symlinking each file in the com.apple.BKAgentService folder to their original location. Although this would be a lot of work, it would also be an acceptable solution to me, but I have no idea if this is going to wreak havoc with iBooks.

Any other solutions to the problem are welcome.

I eventually solved the problem by hard-linking the files between my folder and the com.apple.BKAgentService folder, with the aid of some shell scripts to automate the process. Everything still seems to be working fine.


Time machine restore failed to fix boot After connecting MacBook Pro running 10.8 to video project, the system crashed and after restart it booted into recovery (OS X Utilities).

I tried to fix the problem with checking disks and disk permission, everything was fine. Selecting Macintosh Hard disk as the "Startup Disk" did not alter anything. Zapping PRAM did not fix. The system even could not restart to Safe Mode.

I finally used the 7-days-ago Time Machine backup to restore the whole Macintosh hard disk. It finished successfully, but after selecting the language it boot again to recovery, and now "Startup Disk" application shows no disk to be selected.

I am sure about the backup that was created in healthy condition. This situation is very rare on this Mac and I face this condition for the first time.

Does anybody have any suggestions?

It sounds like the file system is damaged. Have you tried running Disk Utility, and selecting 'Repair Disk'?
Restoring from Time Machine will not repair the file system.


FTDI High speed serial on MacOS I have a FTDI serial cable (C232HD-DDHSP-0) which also supports high speeds (I need 3500000). I want to use this on MacOS with eg picocom (and later on a library). Picocom is build with support for higher baud rates.

$ picocom --help
picocom v3.1

Compiled-in options:
TTY_Q_SZ is 0
HIGH_BAUD is enabled
USE_FLOCK is enabled
LINENOISE is enabled
HISTFILE is: .picocom_history
USE_CUSTOM_BAUD is enabled

I've installed the FTDI drivers, and using kextstat I can also see the ftdi driver is being used (I need to unload the AppleUSBFTDI driver).
But somehow higher speeds are not accepted. Using stty to set the speed results in an error (for both drivers).

$ stty -f /dev/cu.usbserial-FT1UD0JP 3500000
stty: tcsetattr: Invalid argument

I've also found an old blog post and technical note detailing how to add aliasses for the baud rate. But with recent versions of MacOS, unsigned drivers are not allowed. Since updating the Info.plist changes the driver, it is not trusted anymore.

The cable (and device is needs to be connected to) do work fine when using a Linux setup. So the problem is somewhere on the MacOS side of things.

How can I get support for the higher baud rates on MacOS?
And to try things, how can I load unsigned/untrusted kernel drivers?

To answer my own question, currently the only way is to use the baud rate aliasing as described in the technical note.

Since that results in a changed driver, it either needs resigning, or disabling of SIP.


How to determine if a USB-C power bank can charge my macbook? I am starting to realize that I may need my MacBook battery to last longer while I am outside without having any power socket available.
My MacBook has a USB-C port used both for charging and for data.
There are many USB-C power banks available online, although it seems they are mainly used for phones, but some sellers claim that some of them can be used to charge laptops as well, including a MacBook.
How can I determine if a USB-C power bank will actually charge my MacBook, before buying it and testing it, based on the MacBook specs and the power bank specs?
And what is a "reasonable" capacity for a power bank used on a Mac (or laptop in general)? For example, is 20000MAh reasonable enough for an "average" use for an extra couple of hours, or is it definitely not enough and I need a higher capacity?
My MacBook: MacBook 10,1 (Retina, 12-inch, 2017)
Some examples of power banks online

Link1 ("Compatible with MacBook Pro")
Link2 (According to two different reviews it charges laptops as well)
Link3 (It says "for iPhone laptop samsung")
Link4 ("Output for MacBook Nintendo Switch iPhone ...")
Link5 (One of the pictures explicitly shows it can charge laptops, and description says it can charge Macbook Air)
Link6 (Specific for MacBook Pro and quite efficient apparently)
Link7 (Another charger for laptops)
Link8 (It says it is also for MacBook)
Link9 (Same as above)

If you look at the spec sheet of your MacBook it says that the charger provides up to 29 Watts, which is roughly the maximum power draw the MacBook needs. Now regarding a power bank you would want to have a look at the maximum power [W] output is provided.
Have a look at this article or this quora post where you will find out that the maximum power over a standard (non PD port) is usually with the 7.5W with for USB 3.0. However power banks may offer a USB-C (USB-A usually doesn't offer this) Power Delivery (PD) port, which theoretically can be certified up to 100W, which for mobile power banks usually is out of reach.
From the links you posted, I think options 1, 6, 7 and 9 would work fine.

To say how long a certain capacity will help you heavily depends on what you are doing while connected to the power bank. These power banks theoretically have a much higher capacity than the MacBook, yet this charging system has inherent efficiencies. Also, when you charge the MacBook with this power bank the MacBook will think its connected to a wall plug and then apply the according power settings (so make sure to set them appropriately to extend battery life).
However, I would think you could gain up to a complete charge on a 20000mah power bank. Turning off the MacBook and charging it that way is the most efficient way.

Some ideas on how to estimate the power bank endurance.

Install coconutBattery
Check the power draw at your usual workload

That will give you an idea how fast/if at all your MacBook can be charged (e.g. the newest MBP 16" charger can provide up to 100W and at peak power consumption the MBP can nearly reach that).
Coconut battery also tells you what cycle count your battery is in and how much capacity is left in it. If you then open settings and go to battery (assuming macOS 11.x) you can try to roughly estimate the increased battery life when using a power bank.


Migration over wifi requires specific network configuration? I bought a new Macbook running Lion, trying to migrate from an old Macbook running Snow Leopard. At my temporary housing, the two machines were able to find each other over migration assistant, but since the network is so unreliable (it took 30 minutes just to connect each machine), I can't use it for migration. At work, we have an excellent wifi, but the two machines can't find each other in the migration assistant (despite being able to ping each other). Any guesses as to why?

My first guess is that your work's network configuration could be blocking Bonjour broadcasts. But in my experience doing a migration over WiFi can be a bit flaky anyway. Try it several times and maybe it will eventually work.

Instead of using WiFi, I would recommend using a wired connection if possible. It will go many times faster. If both computers have an ethernet port you can just connect them directly to each other with an ethernet cable. Or you can connect them via FireWire or Thunderbolt if you have one of those cables.

If only one computer has ethernet, try plugging that computer in via ethernet and connecting to WiFi with the other. That will help the speed and reliability.


Can I use an iMac as an external monitor if not booting up the OS? My 2012 iMac was in a room with room temperature of about 39 C, and now the hard drive seems to be not working well, taking 5 minutes to launch an app.  If I boot up Win 7 using bootcamp, Win 7 reports that the hard drive might have problems.

I wonder how high the cost of repairing it, and I might get a new iMac, so a plan is, to use the old iMac as an external display for my Macbook Air.

But is it true that I must turn on the iMac and boot up Mac OS X or Win 7 in order for it to act as an external monitor?  It will just be boot up the OS and I won't use it since it is not functioning, so I would like to find a way to somehow just use it as an external display but without having the processor and RAM all be consuming power.

(a partial solution might be to turn on the iMac while pressing the Option key, so that it will let me choose the OS to boot up to, and the display might be able to be used, without any OS running.  But the processor and the RAM probably will still be consuming power).

Based on the Apple Support Doc http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3924 it doesn't look like it. But if it is the hard disk, it might be cheaper to replace the hard disk, then to buy a monitor.


Editing com.apple.atrun.plist on El Capitan I am running El Capitan on several computers and would like to be able to use at to run scheduled jobs in the background.  Enabling at requires editing /System/Library/LaunchDaemon/com.apple.atrun.plist.  Any way I have tried to do this, I have run into a permissions problem: using sudo, logging in as root or trying to change the permissions from the file information panel all result on a permissions error of some sort.

I have tried:

sudo vi /System/Library/LaunchDaemon/com.apple.atrun.plist and not been able to save the edited file.
Copying to file, editing it and copying back - I am not allowed to copy back using sudo.
Using Xcode to edited the fiel through a GUI, cannot save.
using Property List Editor, cannot save, even logged in as root.
Changing owner, group is not allowed, even using sudo or logged in a root.
Changing permissions of all the subdirectories in the tree above (System, System/Library, etc.) used sudo, also tried changed disk permissions.
Run disk utility.

There must be some way of doing this, please advise.

The file com.apple.atrun.plist is protected by System Integrity Protection.

So boot to the Recovery HD partition (hold down Command + R while restarting), disable SIP and modify the item:

In the menubar open Utilities->Terminal
Enter csrutil disable
Reboot to your main volume and edit the file
Reboot into the Recovery Partition again
Enable SIP again csrutil enable
Reboot to your main volume


Keyboard Shortcuts in Tooltips in macOS Calculator Is there something that can be done so that the tooltip text indicates the keyboard shortcut associated with each button in the macOS calculator? It's frustrating to have to look it up online every time.

Currently, the tooltip text contains only a description of the button, not its shortcut.

I'm on Calculator Version 10.14 (123) on Catalina 10.15.1.

Tooltip text (presented on hovering the mouse cursor over the Calculator app buttons) does show the keyboard shortcut. The following is a screenshot from Calculator app version Version 10.14 (123), running in macOS Catalina 10.5.1.


My 3 years old 13'' MacBook Pro Retina doesn't sit flat There are 4 rubber feet on the bottom of MacBook Pro. They worked well before. But recently 2 of them (near the touch pad) cannot touch the flat.

I phoned Apple support and she said that this is most likely because the battery is bloated. And she suggested me send my MacBook to the Genius Bar for repair.

But I use several battery status checker apps, such as coconutBattery, battery monitor and the built-in one, they all say my battery is good.

So what happened?

I had a similar experience with my 2013 MacBook Pro. The battery was bloated causing the MacBook to wobble even on perfectly flat glass.

Battery checker apps like CoconutBattery were reporting it to be normal. Even macOS wasn’t showing any battery warnings (I have consumed only a reasonable number of charge cycles).

While the cause of bloating still remains unknown to me, Apple service recommended me to replace the battery as the continuous bloating may end up causing damage to the board, bottom case, trackpad and the keyboard.

It is advisable to get the battery replaced as soon as possible.

Note: After getting the battery replacement, I sought advise on do's and don't from the technician. I was told that this wasn't an expected behaviour and happens in rare circumstances. Thus, the cause for bloating remains unknown to me.


LaunchAgents runs Python script in version 2 Maybe someone can explain this. I'm having LaunchAgents run a Python script on startup. The relevant part of the plist looks like:
<key>ProgramArguments</key>
<array>
    <string>python</string>
    <string>/Volumes/path to script

This launches the script in python2, despite the fact that "python" points to python3:
/usr/local/bin/python -> /Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.8/bin/python3.8

…which errors because launchd is running a python3 script in python2. To fix it I had to specify python3:
<key>ProgramArguments</key>
<array>
    <string>python3</string>
    <string>/Volumes/

Am I doing this right? Is python2 coded into launchd somewhere? Is there a reason I still need to specify python3?

As mentioned in the comments, you can use full paths in the XML, e.g.:
<string>/usr/local/bin/python</string>

launchd isn't aware of environmental variables, like $PATH, unless explicitly set in the XML, so python would default to /usr/bin/python.
https://serverfault.com/questions/111391/use-an-environment-variable-in-a-launchd-script


Why can't Safari open RSS feeds? I'm using Safari 5.1.3 on Lion.

Each time I click the RSS icon in the address bar (or directly visit the feed), Safari will report can't open page, saying operation not permitted with the NSPOSIXErrorDomain: 1 error. For other web sites, Safari works fine.

I have no 3rd party firewall installed on my system. I also tried to disable the firewall in system settings but still getting the same error.

As I use Google Reader, I've once installed the "Add To Google Reader" extension from Apple's site, but it didn't work for me.

Based on the error message, I tried the following command and solved the problem:

chown -R username: ~/Library/Safari

So I guess there are some files or directories which does not belong to me. It's weird how could this happen because I never touched that directory manually before.


Use caps-lock to lock fn key or other way to lock fn key? What I want to achieve is simple:

caps lock on = fn locked (use function keys).
caps lock off = fn unlock (use media keys).

I found a couple of topics around this problem, but their solutions didn't help me:

Checking / unchecking the option "Use fn keys as standard" in the keyboard preference panel is what I want to achieve when pressing /unpressing the caps lock key.
Others solutions, like the Functionflip program or remapping keyboard tools like Karabiner don't seem to be proposals to resolve my problem.

Do you know programs or solutions that can achieve this?

If not:

Can I assign a program to the caps lock key? How?
Can I toggle the option in the Keyboard preference pane with a script?

To address the last point in your post, "Can I toggle the option in the Keyboard preference pane with a script?", here is the AppleScript code that will toggle the state of the "Use all F1, F2, etc. keys as standard function keys" checkbox on the Keyboard tab of the Keyboard System Preferences.

tell application "System Preferences"
    activate
    set the current pane to pane id "com.apple.preference.keyboard"
    reveal anchor "keyboardTab" of pane id "com.apple.preference.keyboard"
end tell

tell application "System Events" to tell process "System Preferences"
    click checkbox 1 of tab group 1 of window 1
end tell

quit application "System Preferences"

Note:  This code was tested under OS X 10.8.5. It may need to be adjusted for later versions of OS X.

You could use this code in an AppleScript application that could be placed in the Dock or in an Automator Service Workflow that could be assigned a Keyboard Shortcut, etc. If you need help with that, just ask.


Why do I see "Cannot Use Thunderbolt Accessory"? I purchased a brand new MBP and a cable was included in the box, it has USB-C type connectors on each end and works for charging the computer.

When, instead of charging with the brick, I plug it into my new iMac, I get this error message:

Why do I see this? How do I fix the problem?

This message implies that I have connected the "accessory" (iMac) using a non-Thunderbolt port on the MacBook Pro. However, the marketing materials on apple.com tell me that all the ports are Thunderbolt ports:

To slow charge your Mac Book Pro from your iMac, you can connect the USB-C Cable. Unfortunately It seems with recent updates is shows this error on both the MBP and iMac screen. However despite this happening, charging is still occurring.


Entering custom date for event in iOS Calendar app I want to add a historical date in the iOS Calendar app. To do this I currently have to flick through the date picker control like forever, until I roll back to where I want.

This is appalling slow and frustrating. Is there a way of just entering the date I want?

For older dates it‘s easier to navigate to the date first, and enter the event there:

Switch to year view (tap the Month and Year label at top left)
Scroll back in time to the year you want to add the event
Tap on the day you want to add the event on
Tap ＋ as usual


Is there a Windows 7/8/8.1 like automatic window sizer? so I got a Macbook Pro a few months ago to use for coding and as a DAW. Really the only thing I miss about Windows 8.1 is the ability to drag a window to the upper left or upper right corner and have it automatically resized to take up the half the screen. Is there an option in Yosemite like this, or a tool I can download? Found it to be a real time saver as opposed to fiddling with height and width.

BetterTouchTool has one of the features u are looking for.

You can find it in Window Snapping Settings:


Verify a CD/DVD from ISO Is there a tool (preferably free) in OS X that will allow me to verify that an ISO was written to a CD or DVD correctly? I want a tool that can do that without going through the burn first.

If there's a tool that can be used from the command line, that's fine too.

You have two choices that I can see if you don't want to re-burn and re-verify.

Mount the ISO and the DVD and do a recursive diff of the two file systems. For example, if the DVD is /Volumes/DVD and the ISO is /Volumes/ISO then:

diff --recursive /Volumes/DVD /Volumes/ISO
Compare the MD5 sums of all the data on the two images. So:

md5 original.iso

dd if=/dev/disk1 bs=2048 count=169383 | md5

I'd take option #2 over #1 personally, though both are less than great ways to do a comparison.

You could also try exploiting rsync to do the comparison instead of using diff. If you ran rsync with the --checksum, --recursive and --dry-run options what you'd get back is a list of transfers that rsync thinks it needs to make to make the two file trees look the same.


iOS available space doesn't add up Am I going mental, or does the number in the following image make no sense at all? my top 10 apps seem to account for barely ~15GB, so why is my used space so high?

So, I'm calling this a bug. The "other" section of my phone is taking up 40GB of space. I figured I'd just take a backup and restore my phone but due to there being no available space, I couldn't take a backup through iTunes. So I deleted my Spotify music, and the 40GB "other" grew almost instantly to take up the remainder of the space. I tried putting my phone into airplane more, but the button didn't put it into airplane mode - I had to restart and do it (I also temporarily lost use of my lock button and home button). I used a 3rd party tool to take a backup and deleted all my photos, and the storage has stopped growing at 42GB. Here's my iTunes screenshot for giggles:

I tried updating my iOS, nothing. I checked using iMazing at my phones directory structure (it allows you to view folder sizes) and none of my folders had 40GB, the total amounted to what my phone was reporting (~15GB).

I have no idea why it's doing it, so I'm going to go for a full restore from my newly created backup.

Is this device older than 2 years and has never been reset?

I can't tell you exactly what to do but this article quotes some possible solutions:

Do you happen to send and receive a lot of messages with multimedia? that could be clogging up some of your storage especially if you set the settings to delete messages to never.
How much space do you seen take by the Other category? Other may include:

  If you've ever connected your iPhone to iTunes, you're well aware of the "other" stuff taking up space on your device. This data contains things like Safari's browser cache, your email, Siri's cache, reminders, notes, stocks, weather data, emails (including attachments), text messages, iMessages (including images and videos), app data, etc.

Check voicemails?
Try to reset Safari Cache and data.

EDIT: OP indicated that the issue is indeed with the "Other" category, this article has some tips on how to try and locate and free up space taken by various elements that make up this category.Also check this Apple forums thread. Download any mentioned software there after doing your own DD.

Here's what "Other" includes, in full:

  Browser cache

  Mail cache

  Mail messages

  Mail attachments

  Safari's Reading List

  iTunes Backups

  Crud resulting from jailbreaking your iDevice

  Game data

  Saved data files

  Call history

  Notes

  Media

  Voice memos


I don't have Siri enabled but get Siri suggestions in iOS 12 I've disabled Siri years ago, before updating to iOS 11 and now iOS 12 on my iPhone 6S. So I don't have Siri & Search in my Settings, but I do get Siri suggestions on my lock screen after a missed call (after updating to iOS 12).

How can I get rid of the Siri suggestions on my lock screen and why do they appear if Siri is disabled?

You can disable theses suggestions by going into Settings > Siri & Search and switching "On lockscreen" off.
As to why this isn't normally disabled if you disable Siri, I don't know.


After restoring FTP server in High Sierra, how to log in to localhost? I followed the instructions here https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/312273/72004 to get an FTP server running on High Sierra. But when I log in to localhost, it doesn't recognize me as a user.

% ftp localhost
Trying ::1...
Connected to localhost.
220 ::1 FTP server (tnftpd 20100324) ready.
Name (localhost:[my username]): [my username]
530 Login incorrect.
ftp: Login failed

What gives? How can I restore myself as an FTP user? Thanks!

I finally solved my problem.

#set file ownership so we can update WP
#https://www.fetchdesigns.com/blog/failed-to-connect-to-ftp-server-localhost21-wordpress-on-mac/
sudo dseditgroup -o edit -a <your username> -t user _www
sudo chown -R _www:_www <path_to_wordpress>
sudo chmod -R g+w <path_to_wordpress>

sudo chmod 777 .htaccess
sudo chmod 755 <path_to_wordpress>/wp-content/uploads

Hope this helps someone else.


Why do two Chrome windows launch when I click an external link? I've got the most recent version of Mountain Lion installed, as well as the most recent version of Chrome.

When I've got Chrome set as the default browser, and if I close out all the tabs before I quit Chrome itself, if I click on an external link (e.g., from within an e-mail, Tweetbot, etc.), two Chrome windows launch—one with Google (my set homepage) and one with the target of the link.

Not closing out all the tabs before I quit Chrome does the trick, but what specifically could be causing this?

You've set the homepage to open on startup. Go to settings cmd+, check the On startup option there. You can disable it from there too.


How to turn off data roaming in iOS 7? I find the new iOS 7 toggles to be a bit ambiguous.  If I want to turn off data roaming do I leave it so that the button is to the left (only white) or do it push it to the right (where the color green appears on the left of the button).

In case you're wondering why I find it confusing: I can interpret it as "yes, I want to turn data roaming off" -- in which case I would slide the button to the right. Or I could just read it as "Data Roaming" and deactivate it by sliding it to the left.

You enable Data Roaming when showing the green part to the left.

On iOS 6 and older you had the text ON or OFF on the button. OFF disabled Data Roaming, and ON enabled Data Roaming and the button was showing a blue background behind the ON. So on iOS 7 you have the same behavior - just without the ON/OFF text, and with a green background - you can however turn on an 1 as ON and a 0 as OFF under Settings=>General=>Accessibility=>On/Off Labels)


Transplanting MacBook Air 11" logic board to a 13" one I've got an 11" MacBook Air with a broken screen (big gaping hole due to mishandling). I've also have another 13" MacBook Air with a broken logic board (won't boot and the beeps seem to say "memory error"). What would be the challenges of transplanting the 11" logic board to the 13" one?

I suppose it the 11" logic board would be somewhat smaller, hence should fit to a 13" casing with some duct tapes. What else I need to know and how can I adapt those parts?

I'm not going to say it'd be absolutely 100% impossible, but unless you had time (and money) to burn on a side project, it really wouldn't be a practical exercise. By this I mean I can't see a way for you to then be able to use it in the usual manner one uses a laptop.

For example, your USB and headphone/microphone ports won't line up properly, so how easy will it be to connect devices to them? Sure, you may be able to connect extension leads from the logic board connectors to the exterior of the casing, but this isn't practical on a stationery desk let alone a portable laptop.

The other issue is the display module itself. You don't specify the exact models of your MacBook Airs, but the display module needs to be able to connect to the logic board. In order to do so the cabling needs to be in the right location (or long enough) in order to reach the logic board. And, this assumes the connection is the same. Trust me, the cabling inside these devices are no longer than they need to be - everything is a very tight fit!

Some observations

Here are some additional comments:

If you did want to do this as a side project, you'd have to be willing to largely accept the device having to either sit stationery on a desk in order to use it, or be willing to do a bit of soldering and custom cabling in order to try and get it to work as a portable laptop.
Assuming you are willing to do the above, before proceeding you would have to check the cabling (type, location and length) of the 13" MacBook Air display module and confirm you can connect it to the 11" logic board. If so, then that's probably the hardest obstacle overcome (as I can't see a way for you to connect the display module otherwise).
If you have home contents insurance, you may find that your 11" MacBook Air is actually covered by the insurance policy. It would be easier to determine this and just make an insurance claim. You'll likely find that they deem it uneconomical to repair and will replace it for you.
If you don't have home contents insurance (or your 11" model isn't covered by it), since doing what you propose almost certainly restricts it to being a desktop Mac, have you considered just purchasing a used display from a garage sale (or similar) and using it with that?
As for the 13" MacBook Air, I sense you may be approaching this in the classical XY problem manner. That is, you have a problem (X) and decide the solution is Y, so you've come here asking a question about Y rather than the actual problem X. To clarify what I mean, your 13" MBA doesn't boot and beeps at you, so you assume it's a faulty logic board. However, I suggest you ask a separate and specific question about that.


In Xcode, how can I utilize new UI APIs for Yosemite, but then revert to older ones for older OS'? I have been looking all over the place and can't seem to find an answer. (I'm probably not using the correct terminology)

I'm building a simple AppleScript ObjC program and I want to use the new UI API for Yosemite (NSVisualEffectView) but, as expected, it crashes when I open it on Mavericks. How could I get it to use old APIs instead without having to create a completely different app?

You'll need to figure out at runtime if method/class is available. Here's Apple guide about "SDK Based Development".

In Your case It'll look like this:

if ([NSVisualEffectView class])
{
    // OS X 10.10 code here.
}
else
{
    // OS X < 10.10 code here.
}


Dot-files and other meta data on non-Mac network shares Is there a way to tell Finder to not use (or worry about) the ._* files and other meta-data files it normally tries to use when it's on a network share?

Currently when I'm in Finder and I try to copy a file to a network share it results in an error:

  The Finder can’t complete the
  operation because some data in “file_name” can’t be read or written.
  (Error code -36)

But I can copy the file from the terminal command line to the network share and use it from Finder afterward just fine.  It seems that the meta-data isn't really needed on the network share.  Is there a way to tell Finder this?

For reference, I'm using Snow Leopard and the share is a Samba share on a Linux server.

Is the file you're trying to copy using a resource fork?

If you're dealing with .DS_Store file issues run the following command in Terminal:

defaults write com.apple.desktopservices DSDontWriteNetworkStores true

If you're having issues with resource forks on Snow Leopard you may need to change your settings for the streams setting in smb.conf on the Linux machine or nsmb.conf on your local Mac. (._FILENAME files are the resource forks of the file). Check out Super User for more details on this.


How to open link in a new tab via shortcut in Chrome on Mac? On Windows, I would just hold control, and click the 30 links on the page I wanted to open. How do I do this in Mac?

It will still take 30 clicks, one for each link, but…
Remember that  Cmd ⌘  on Mac is usually equivalent to  Ctrl ⌃  on Windows.
 Cmd ⌘  Click will open a link in a new a tab behind the current one, if you click a link.
 Cmd ⌘   Shift ⇧  Click will open the new tab & bring it to the front.
These are the default settings [iirc] but they can be changed in Prefs…

Edit:
Sorry, I only just realised you said Chrome.
It does follow the same behaviour, though I can't find anywhere to actually change it.


Harddrive is full of Audio and Photos, how can I find them? I have bought a new Macbook and when I go to About This Mac -> Storage I see: 1.11 GB Audio and 750 MB of Photos.. But I have not copied any Audio or Photos to this laptop.

How can I find where these files are? For example in Windows there was this app: WinDirStat https://windirstat.info/ Anything like this for Mac?

How about Daisy Disk? It's a fantastically fluid and feature filled application for the cause.

However, I think the majority of the space taken up by photos are operating system/application assets


Can't open dmg for combo update to 10.14: corrupt image I've downloaded macOSUpdCombo10.14.6.dmg from the official apple site twice now in order to update my 10.10 to 10.14, both times when I try to open the dmg I am told that it can't be opened as the image is corrupt.

I'm at a loss, this isn't happening with other dmg files I have, I've run the disk utility function verify on my drive and it reports no errors.
 Is it the file? Am I doing something wrong?  Any insights would be appreciated.

Get macOS Mojave directly from the App Store and install it. This will give you the most recent version of 10.14.6, you won't need to run the combo updater afterwards.


Just bought MBPr and cannot connect to appstore Whenever I try to connect to app store I got this error:

I tried everything I could find in internet, but always the same problem.

OSX: Yosemite
Model: MBPr 15 mid-2014

Any help?

Check the date and time / timezone. If it's incorrect you won't be able to connect to the App Store (or much else for that matter.)


Discoveryd Alternative to Replace mDNSResponder Argument? This is a direct follow-on to this question. Before Yosemite, I'd add the "-AlwaysAppendSearchDomains" argument to the mDNSResponder plist file so that all local resolver lookups added the search domains, regardless of whether there was a period in the label to be looked up. For example, whether I try to ssh to hostname foo.bar or foo, the search domain of baz.com should be tried, not only for the latter case, as was (and is) the default behavior.

Now, it looks like the mDNSResponder is gone, replaced with discoveryd. I cannot find a similar option to get it to always appending the search domain. Suggestions? I'd rather not go the route of using a non-default local resolver, but I'd consider it as an option. For now, I'll just type in the long FQDNs, but I'd really rather not.

Thanks,
Pete

Since 10.10.1, the simplest way to fix this is to add --AlwaysAppendSearchDomains to ProgramArguments in plist file /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.discoveryd.plist

Then restart com.apple.discoveryd.plist with:

sudo launchctl unload /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.discoveryd.plist
sudo launchctl load /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.discoveryd.plist

All this according to the help printed by:

/usr/libexec/discoveryd --help

That will do the same as it did for mDNSResponder as far as I can tell.


iPhone with external hard drive I see there have recently been several products released that offer to give an iOS device access to local mass storage on the order of terabytes via WiFi.  It appears that most if not all of these devices only allow access to the drive through a special (and very limited) iOS app for THAT product.

Via jailbreaking or otherwise, is there a way to use ANY iOS app (for example, photo, audio, and video editing apps) with local Wifi-connected storage?

No, it is not possible in iOS and I'll bet it won't be implemented in near future. To be this feature possible, you need at least very fast wifi everywhere.


Creating a Windows 10 Install USB when FAT32 has 4GB max file size So I am attempting to create a Windows 10 install USB on my MBP running macOS 10.14 Mojave. To create a bootable USB it needs to be formatted into FAT32, not exFAT. The issue is that when copying the .iso to the USB it fails because the file sources/install.wim is 4.4GB. I can't format as exFAT because I cannot boot from that format and I cannot use FAT32 because of the 4.4GB file. I used the command cp -rpv /Volumes/CCCOMA_X64FRE_EN-US_DV9/* /Volumes/WINDOWS10/ after Boot Camp Assistant failed to create the  USB with a "Drive too small" error, even though it was a 16GB drive. When I wasn't paying attention, the cp completed and the installer booted, but failed with a missing: sources/install.wim error because the file can't be copied.

Is there any solution to this problem, or should I just burn a DVD with the installer on it?

EDIT: I forgot to specify that I was creating a USB for a PC, not a Mac. The Mac was just being used to create an install USB.

Heres the file:

The only way I was able to successfully overcome this problem was following this person's guide:

  The final problem is that the install.wim file is too big to copy across to the FAT32-formatted USB stick (you can try, but will be met with an error). On Windows, Microsoft's official solution is to split the file using a special tool designed for these .wim files. Fortunately, there's also a free alternative called wimlib which works on Mac (and Linux).

With wimlib installed, available via Homebrew (brew install wimlib), you can easily perform the file splitting of install.wim that the Windows 10 ISO will automatically pickup and understand with no extra fuss.

wimlib-imagex split /Volumes/CCCOMA_X64FRE_EN-US_DV9/sources/install.wim /Volumes/WINDOWS10/sources/install.swm 4000


File works manually; does not work with cron; setting PATH makes it worse So I've got these three scrips: one moves pictures to a file (photosscript2.sh), one deletes pictures over 7 days old from that file (photosremove.sh), and one calls both files to keep the folder updated (every-minute.sh).  I'm trying to set every-minute.sh up with CRON.  Everything works if I type in the file name, ./every-minute.sh manually.  But I want it to run in the background with CRON and it does not work.  So I added a PATH to CRON.  No go.  So I had CRON cd to / first, which is where everything is located.  Still no go.  WTF is wrong.  WHY won't it run?  Note: CRON works 100% without a PATH on my mom's computer.

#!/bin/bash
#photoscript2.sh
find /Users/username/Pictures/Photos\ Library.photoslibrary/Masters/2019/* -mtime -7 -exec cp {} /Users/username/Documents/Recently\ Added/ \;

#!/bin/bash
#photosremove.sh
#PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/Users/user
#export DISPLAY=:0.0
#someone on here said to add this.  did nothing.
find /Users/username/Documents/Recently\ Added/ -mtime +7 -exec rm {} \+

#!/bin/bash
#every-minute.sh
#this runs the other two scripts.  I'm trying to get this file to be activated by CRON.
/User/username/photosscript2.sh
/User/username/photosremove.sh

#CRONTAB -e
SHELL=/bin/sh
PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/Users/user
*/5 * * * * cd / && /User/username/every-minute.sh

Error messages:
Before adding PATH:

find: /Users/username/Pictures/Photos Library.photoslibrary/Masters/2019/*: No such file or directory
find: /Users/username/Documents/Recently Added/*: No such file or directory

After adding PATH:

/bin/sh: /User/username/every-minute.sh: No such file or directory

You do not need the glob (*). Try the following for the photoscript2.sh script.

#! /bin/sh
find /Users/username/Pictures/Photos\ Library.photoslibrary/Masters/2019 \
    ! \( -name '.*' -o -name 2019 \) \
    -mtime -7 -exec cp {} /Users/username/Documents/Recently\ Added/ \;


Automatically marking junk mail as read Is there any way to automatically mark junk mail as 'read' in OS X (10.6.5) Mail? A free or shareware utility would be nice.

My mail provider supports junk filters that automatically moves selected messages to the junk folder, but does not mark them as read. OS X Mail picks them up (IMAP) and displays the headers in the Junk folder as unread.

I would like to continue to use my mail provider's filters instead of just the 'Rules' in OS X Mail because otherwise I show tons of messages in my iPhone inbox, since it does not support filtering.

Go To Mail -> Preferences -> Junk

When junk mail arrives, say:
Perform Custom actions

Click on the Advanced button at the bottom, which just turned up to be active.

Then say "Mark as read" in one of your actions:


iTunes MiniPlayer replacement I finally was forced to upgrade to iTunes 11 in order to upgrade my iPhone's operating system. I think I can get a reasonable replacement to iTunes DJ with smart playlists, but the one thing that is killing me is the new MiniPlayer.

The two issues I have with it are that it doesn't show the time remaining in my track, and that it doesn't scroll long track names (except once at the beginning of the track).

Now, if it is indeed possible to do this, I'd love to hear how, but I am not very hopeful.

Are there any good MiniPlayer replacements out there? The only ones I found were for Windows.  I'd just like some kind of small persistant window that shows me what is playing in iTunes.

Cover Sutra has a nice player bezel, which, while larger than the iTunes MiniPlayer, has more info (such as a progress bar). If it was smaller, and offered the ability to change the color (it's black), I'd want to keep it visible all the time.


iPhone - how to disable Shake for undoing read/unread email? Can anyone help me understand if there have been changes to the "shake-to-undo" feature specific to Mail using it to undo marking messages read/unread? My mom gets a pop-up just about every time she opens Mail, asking "Undo read message?"
We both have shake-to-undo enabled globally, but mine does not do this (nor do I want it to). Shake-to-undo typing is working equally for both of us.
In further troublehsooting, I notice that I'm still in iOS 12.3.1, and she's on 13.x (not at her phone rn).
Does anybody recall this behavior being specifically added in iOS 13? By any chance has it been changed since then? I've done a lot of searching on this, and there are countless posts from others who are frustrated by it.
We had to turn off the global setting to get her phone to stop doing this, which is unfortunately b/c it is otherwise an important and useful feature.

Open the settings app
Swipe down slightly
Enter undo in the search field
Tap “Swipe to undo”
Make your choice

The setting is global and not app specific.
Since you didn’t list actual troubleshooting steps, once you conclude you can suppress this by disabling it globally and that it returns.
Look for other differences for your experience. Different accelerometer sensitivities, different actual accelerations or pursue software resets.

power cycle it normally
force reset the device
Leave the undo off for a day globally
restore the device
swap or repair the hardware

Being organized is the only way to troubleshoot a frustrating situation like you mention.


How exactly is PATH calculated? I've read a dozen different answers and talked to a bunch of people and am having difficulty understanding how PATH is calculated in different scenarios. Specifically I'm thinking of

How exactly is PATH calculated for bash?
How exactly is it calculated for other shells? (I assume its shell dependent, but what is the commonality between all shells?)
How exactly is it calculated for GUI apps?
Am I missing another way of launching stuff? Do daemons do something different? (I don't think so? But maybe...)

Additionally I'm on High Sierra now but I'm seeing some people mentioned that this changed at some point?

I've seen this answer and this one but both seem to be focused explicitly on what happens inside of bash.

I'm going to lump together 1 & 2 because all shells read files at startup.

PATH is inherited from its parent process. This is a key concept that you need to understand.

The PATH is first hard coded into the kernel:

sysctl user.cs_path
user.cs_path: /usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin

launchd which acts as init can be configured to change this PATH. Generally it is not changed.

The loginwindow.app will setup an environment when you log into your computer. PATH will  be checked that it has been set or it will be set to the hard coded path in the kernel or a modified path set by launchd. It is like the loginwindow.app is calling login -pf <username>.

At this point, a user LaunchAgent or LaunchDaemon may modify the PATH.

This will be the PATH available to GUI applications from the Finder. (Early versions of OS X could use ~/.MacOSX/environment.plist to change the PATH for GUI applications). Now if this seems complicated, it's not and more that likely,like me, the PATH available is /usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin

When you start the Terminal.app, it first calls login (login -pf ) which triggers your shell to be treated as a login shell. The appropriate files in /etc and your HOME folder are read. Now, PATH should be different than set by the loginwindow.app. Remember we talked about inheritance? If you start a GUI app from within your terminal session then the PATH available to GUI application will be same as set by the shell.

As far as daemons, they are usually started by their absolute path.


Where did the command-backtick keyboard shortcut go in 10.7 Lion? With every Mac OS X I've ever used, hitting command-backtick (`) cycled to the next window.  I just installed Mac OS X 10.7 (on top of a perfectly fresh 10.6), and command-backtick does nothing at all.

Did this feature go away?

This feature is still present (I'm using 10.7.3 and it works for me).

Go to System Preferences > Keyboard and check the keyboard shortcuts. In the list of 'Keyboard & Text Input' shortcuts you should see 'Move focus to next window'
⌘+`.

Make sure it is checked, and it should work.


Using an old Windows keyboard on a Macbook I recently found my old mechanical keyboard and I want to use it on my Macbook Pro. It still uses an old PS2 connector so I went out and bought a PS2 to USB adapter.

When I plug it in, the lock lights on the side simply light up once and then I can't use it. The keys do not work and the keyboard identifier utility from System Preferences does not recognize it.

I'm guessing I need some sort of driver but where can I find it? It's an old A4Tech KeyWorks Office keyboard.

I have heard that all USB/PS2 adapters are not created equal. Some work some don't. But you would probably cost yourself more time and effort getting a working adapter than just buying a cheap PC USB keyboard.

I use PC USB keyboards on Macs all the time and they work a treat. I can get a used (Dell) USB keyboard locally for about twelve bucks. As cheap as they are you could spend that on two adapters easily, not to mention time spent futzing with it...


Mac Notes App Sync Containers Having Mac Applications I saw same two applications under "open with" menu and searching for the other instance took me to ~/Library/Group Containers/group.com.apple.notes/Media folder.

After backing up notes, I deleted the Macvim.app from the notes media folder but the moment I open the notes app it reappeared. I'm not sure how to clean up and there are other apps also inside the folder such as Dashboard.app and Firefox.app.

Please advise if anyone has encountered this issue or has resolved it.

Thanks

Somehow icloud had backup data of old notes plus apps. So after backing my current notes, I deleted the backed up data from icloud. After resyncing the notes, the problem was fixed.


iTunes won't sync podcasts in folder I have some podcasts that I've put in a playlist, the playlist is supposed to sync with my iPhone - however when I try to sync with my iPhone, the podcasts doesn't sync.

I suppose this has something to do with my Podcast syncing options, options that are working well for me, so I don't want to change them.

Is there a way to tell iTunes that a podcast is no longer a podcast, but merely an audio file? I've tried to change the genre to no luck.

Any ideas? :)

I went into the podcasts tab at the top and had to select 'sync podcasts automatically' before mine would start working. Hope this works for others too!


First Aid found corruption for repair but First Aid from Recovery did not solve the issue I am trying to solve this problem on my Macbook Pro 2012, running Sierra 10.12.1. I've run First Aid from Recovery and did not find any corruption, everything was fine. I've run it again from my OS and I still get the problem as follow:

Verifying storage system
Checking volume
disk0s2: Scan for Volume Headers
disk0s2: Scan for Disk Labels
Logical Volume Group 04B93861-2D39-432E-A393-50AD1CE83BFE on 1 device
disk0s2: Scan for Metadata Volume
Logical Volume Group has a 24 MB Metadata Volume with double redundancy
Start scanning metadata for a valid checkpoint
Load and verify Segment Headers
Load and verify Checkpoint Payload
Load and verify Transaction Segment
Incorporate 0 newer non-checkpoint transactions
Load and verify Virtual Address Table
Load and verify Segment Usage Table
Load and verify Metadata Superblock
Load and verify Logical Volumes B-Trees
Logical Volume Group contains 1 Logical Volume
Load and verify 55E94947-EFBC-473A-A314-5EBEFF0A949A
Load and verify F9FAD274-A819-4CDC-9F05-F519DA8DBED2
Load and verify Freespace Summary
Load and verify Block Accounting
Load and verify Live Virtual Addresses
Newest transaction commit checkpoint is valid
Load and verify Segment Cleaning
The volume 04B93861-2D39-432E-A393-50AD1CE83BFE appears to be OK
Storage system check exit code is 0.
Verifying file system.
Using live mode.
Performing live verification.
Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume.
Checking extents overflow file.
Checking catalog file.
**Incorrect block count for file processing-3.2.3-macosx.zip.f0fd203b-064b-4fd7-bce4-89d8c693971e**
**(It should be 6452 instead of 28451)
Incorrect block count for file USB_LUCA.zip.40b230dc-a016-4312-afcd-c1a087fcd8a2
(It should be 4630 instead of 530384)**
Checking multi-linked files.
**Incorrect number of file hard links**
Checking catalog hierarchy.
Checking extended attributes file.
Checking volume bitmap.
**Volume bitmap needs minor repair for orphaned blocks**
Checking volume information.
**Invalid volume free block count**
**(It should be 19383016 instead of 9221304)**
*The volume Macintosh HD was found corrupt and needs to be repaired.*
File system check exit code is 8.
Operation successful.

Anyone had the same issue?

When repeated attempts to repair the filesystem fail, your next step is to back up all the files that you need and erase the partition.

Set up a new filesystem and then re-test the repair in recovery. If that fails - your hardware needs repair. If that succeeds with a clean check - you can set up a new account and/or restore from backup.

Live repair is not to be trusted, but live errors are of concern. I would try a verify in live mode to be sure you have issues before going to the erase / re-partition step as that can take some time so you'd rather be sure before starting down that path.


Backup Mac OS partition to NTFS: are there any drawbacks? I need to backup Mac data into our NTFS storage partition. Are there any issues/drawbacks I should consider?

If connected directly to your Mac, you may need to install something like MacFuse and NTFS-3G or Tuxera NTFS to be able to write to NTFS partitions. Per Apple Support:

  Mac OS X can read and write FAT volumes, but can only read NTFS volumes.

If the drive is connected over the network, then your main issues will probably be network speed/latency, authentication, and the size of the backup data compared to the size of the drive.


AppleScript call function in IF statement I don't usually use function, but why can't I call a function inside an IF statement?
for example this obviously work just fine
notification()
on notification()
    display notification "just a quick demo"
end notification

but this doesn't :
set myOption to {"demo one", "demo two"}
set selectedoption to choose from list myOption with title "demo" with prompt "What's the story?" default items "Start Prism"

if selectedoption is equal to "demo one" then
    notification()
end if

on notification()
    display notification "just a quick demo"
end notification

Your If statement isn't checking out.
Change "is equal to" to "contains", it should catch it.
if selectedoption contains "demo one" then
    notification()
end if


What can I do when "Find My iPhone" won't turn off? I've been trying to restore my iPhone SE (running iOS 10.3.1) from a local iTunes backup, but iTunes on the Mac says that it cannot preform a restore until I turn off the "Find My iPhone" feature. I've been repeatedly trying to do this, but to no avail. I also tried restarting the iPhone or doing a hard reset between attempts.

When I try to turn the Find My iPhone feature off via Settings > Apple ID > iCloud > Find My iPhone, the screen shows one of three things:

The slider moves to the Off position, but when I return to the
iCloud page, the Find My iPhone line indicates that the feature is
still On. (If I return to the Find My iPhone page, it indeed shows the slider
as On.)
A prompt appears, asking for my Apple ID password. Entering it doesn't do anything (obvious).
Like # 2, I get an Apple ID prompt. Entering it just leads to an error message: "Verification Failed: There was an error connecting to the Apple ID server." However, when I check Apple's System Status web page, all of their services (including Apple ID and iCloud) are in the green.

Has anyone else resolved an issue like this? What else can I try? Any idea why it is happening?

Enter the Settings menu of your device.
Tap the name that you see at the top of the menu.
You should see your available devices and the ability to change personal settings. Tap iCloud.
Scroll down until you see “Find My iPhone” or the green radar icon and tap it.
You can toggle the feature on and off here using the button labeled “Find My iPhone”.

https://www.ubreakifix.com/blog/turn-off-find-iphone


Google Calendar Refuse Login Password Out of no where the iCal 7 refused to sync with Google by prompting me to input password upon launched.

I tried both Google account password and application-specific password but no availability.

The error log I gotten from the Console are below:

  9/9/14 5:35:52.541 PM CalendarAgent[373]:
  [com.apple.calendar.store.log.caldav.queue] [Account refresh failed
  with error: Error Domain=CoreDAVHTTPStatusErrorDomain Code=401 "The
  operation couldn’t be completed. (CoreDAVHTTPStatusErrorDomain error
  401.)" UserInfo=0x7fe79c00f3b0 {AccountName=myemail@gmail.com, CalDAVErrFromRefresh=YES, CoreDAVHTTPHeaders={type = immutable dict, count = 12,
  entries =>    0 : Content-Type = {contents = "application/vnd.google.gdata.error+xml;
  charset=UTF-8"}   4 : alternate-protocol = {contents = "443:quic"}  5 : Content-Encoding = gzip
    6 : Server = GSE    7 : x-xss-protection = {contents = "1; mode=block"}     8 : Expires = {contents = "Tue, 09 Sep 2014 09:35:49
  GMT"}     12 : Cache-Control = {contents = "private, max-age=0"}    13 : Date =
  {contents = "Tue, 09 Sep
  2014 09:35:49 GMT"}   15 : Content-Length = 210   19 :
  x-content-type-options = nosniff  21 : x-frame-options = {contents = "SAMEORIGIN"}     22 :
  Www-Authenticate = {contents
  = "GoogleLogin realm="https://accounts.google.com/ClientLogin", service="cl""} } }]

I have no issue accessing other Google services on the Mavericks and via browser.

Anybody can help? Thanks

Go to System Preferences > Internet Accounts, remove your Google account and add it back again.

WARNING: This operation will eliminate all the data related to your account stored in your computer and will download a fresh copy (email, contacts, messages, etc.)


Two Time Capsules with same disk name - Time Machine settings "mix up" targets? I added a second Time Capsule to my network. At first I configured the MacBook Air to use it and everything went well. Then I configured a MacMini Server to use it and Time Machine Settings seem to be confused:

The first (...nw3) has 3TB, so that's ok. The second (TC) has 2TB, so something is not right here.

I know, that I added the first, was confused by both showing 2TB and then removed the 3TB one. Interestingly the 3TB remained, but the 2TB was gone. So I added the 2TB time capsule and noticed, that all show as 3TB. (The ExtHD04 is a USB drive, so the icon is obviously wrong for that.) It looks like as if in the settings the destinations are picked by disk name and with two of the same name, it picks just which "comes first".

EDIT: A few backups later I notice this: The display is sometimes correct on my MacBook Air; the display is always wrong on my two MacMini's. This applies to El Capitan 10.11.1 and 10.11.2. I'll file a bug report and see what Apple says. /EDIT

Q1: Are problems to be expected, when two time capsules with the same disk name are in use?

Q2: Is it recommended to rename the disks?

Q3: Can I fix it in another way and if yes, how?

(Never renamed a time capsule disk - I assume one can do it when erasing the disk in the time capsule settings via Air Port Utility.)

I searched for such issues, but all results gave no hint for problems and I got the impression, that this should just work. However, it makes me a bit nervous, as I would expect the backup system not to show such behaviour.

(All running El Capitan, 2TB Time Capsule is Gen4, 3TB Time Capsule is Gen5; MacBook Air backs up over WiFi, MacMini Server over ethernet cable.)

A1: I do believe TM uses UUIDs to identify backup servers. There shouldn't be any issues with duplicate names.

A2: Renaming the disks would probably help you identify it, but it is unlikely that it would solve this problem. As mentioned in A1, TM uses UUIDs to identify disks.

A3: I would try removing the disk through the "Select Disk" button below the disk list (this does not delete your existing backups) and reselecting it.

I would believe that this was likely caused by a graphical glitch.

Good luck.


Can I safely delete the Classic System folder when running Lion? I still have a folder called "System Folder" that belongs to the Classic environment. It takes up almost 400MB on my disk. Since I'm running Lion, can I safely delete the entire folder?

Considering the Classic environment was phased out versions ago, I think it would be completely safe to delete a folder belonging to the classic environment.


Notification that ‘someone might be watching what you browse’ I got a notification on my iPhone. The notification reads

  Someone might be watching what you browse. Follow 3 steps to encrypt your web traffic and change your IP address.

What does this mean?

It's worse than Spam, it's a Scam - an attempt to trick you into paying them something, and maybe installing their own malicious software on your computer.  (For example, software that does encrypt your information, and you can only ever see it again by paying them more.)

You said it was a "notification" - was it really a system-wide notification, or just a picture in the web browser?
The important thing is to note that such messages usually comes from the anonymous creator of the website - Not from Apple or your Phone/Computer's OS.  Sometimes will display what looks like an alert in your web browser - but remember it's just an image in your browser, not a real popup alert.

The site you visited is either hacked, or is a malicious website.  You may want to avoid visiting that sort of website lets you fall prey to another trick.


iPhone AppStore always asks for password when redeeming Basically what the title says; when I'm redeeming a code in the AppStore, there's no option for me to authenticate via TouchID, it always asks me for my Apple ID password. Am I missing something?

It's not really a HUGE deal, just a little annoying. Also curious that Apple lets you use TouchID for PAYMENTS but not when redeeming codes.

This is by design. The prompt to enter your password shows you the Apple ID that you are using and for people that use more than one ID - it's quite helpful to prevent inadvertent redemption of money. I agree for some people it would be easier to just use the fingerprint, but I've seen cases where $100 gift cards went to the wrong account and it was a hassle to correct it.


How do I add an iframe whitelist to OS X Server 3.1.1 I can't seem to be able to find how to add a whitelist to the Wiki Server on OS X Server 3.1.1 the collabd service.

The information is missing from the documentation at

http://help.apple.com/wikiuser/mac/4.0/

neither at:

https://help.apple.com/advancedserveradmin/mac/3.1/

There is a fix to this problem --
Instead of changing the white list file in /Library/Server/Wiki/Config you have to change the whitelist.plist.default fine in the Server.app bundle (/Applications/Server.app/Contents/ServerRoot/private/etc/collabd/whitelist.plist.default). I did and all works well, even after restart.

Hope that helps!

-Matt

From over on https://discussions.apple.com/message/25866041#25866041#25866041


Port forwarding on all ports except ssh on macOS Sierra (redsocks) I am trying to forward all ports except port 22 on OSX Sierra using pfctl but it doesn't seem to work.

file: /pf.conf

ext_if = "inet"
rdr pass $ext_if proto tcp from any to any -> 127.0.0.1 port 12345
rdr pass $ext_if proto udp from any to any -> 127.0.0.1 port 10053
pass out proto tcp from any to any port ssh

I enabled it with

sudo sysctl -w net.inet.ip.forwarding=1
sudo pfctl -f pf.conf
sudo pfctl -e

The traffic seems to be redirecting fine to port 12345, but I can't get port 22 to passthrough.

The ssh line should be above the ‘rdr’ lines, so that the ssh line is matched first.


If I delete Clash of Clans on one iPad, and download it on another using the same Apple ID, will it save my progress? I just bought a new iPad and I’m wondering if I can move Clash of Clans from the old to the new and save the progress. I spent a fair bit of money into it and I don't want to lose it.

Extracted from the Clash of Clans FAQ:

  Can I continue my game on a new device?

  Yes you can, but it requires the use of GameCenter. The only way to transfer your account to a new device is to have the original village linked to a Game Center account. Login to that Game Center account on your new device and you will prompted to load your previous village.

This post which requires a login, has some helpful instructions on setting up your game on a new device.


Download iOS app on PC and unzip I have an URL as: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/the-calculator-free/id398129933

Is it possible to download that app in my PC and then unzip or see what's inside?

I haven't Apple Computer nor iPad nor iPhone.

Download the app in iTunes on your PC.
Find the app in your library and reveal its location in Explorer.
Copy the .ipa to somewhere else and rename the extension to .zip.
Extract the zip archive.


How to restore Spotlight user interface after killing it with Cocktail? I installed an App called cocktail and disabled spotlight. But now the Application does not start and it gives an error of some sort. I deleted the App and I do not have Spotlight anymore.

Can I enable it from some other place? How?

pastebin.com/Yw8czsFU

try

  sudo chmod 755 /System/Library/CoreServices/Search.bundle/Contents/MacOS/Search

then

  killall SystemUIServer


How to dock multiple screens in a single screen? I am using Macbook Pro and I am trying to dock terminal in the bottom and my webstorm on the top left and safari in top right. I followed the suggestion but I can't get the dividie by holding shift but can't seem to get the divider the solution suggests. How do we get the divider or is this solution is

The dock has two sides. One side of the dock is for running and not-running Apps. The other side holds the trash can and all folders, documents and minimized application windows.

I've uploaded some retina sized images with an obscenely large hello arrow to show the dividing line.

When your dock is on the bottom, look for this dark thin line.

When your dock is on a side, look for a light set of bars.


Is Ethernet traffic slowing OS X? Running OS X 11 or 12 on late 2012 iMac connected to company LAN via 1000BaseT.  Even when not running browser, email client, …, that would use the network, Mac is quite slow. RAM pressure is light (8 GB of 32 used), negligible disc or other I/O, CPU 80% idle. Worst during peak work hours, better nights and weekends.  Disconnect the Ethernet, and performance improves to level to which I'm accustomed.

Firewall is on with strict settings.

Does the network interface require bus or CPU to handle traffic not addressed to me?  Broadcast flood?

I tried sniffing with WireShark, but it was like trying to drink from a firehose.

Ideas?

If you're connected to a switch then it should be filtering the traffic for you, other than broadcast data as you mentioned. If you're using a dumb hub then all traffic would be sent to all ports. In fact, pretty sure WiFi is like a dumb hub- it sends all traffic and all clients are listening.


Best way to split large media files for sharing I have a large .mkv file that I am looking to share with a friend. My Dropbox limit is 2GB so I am looking for a simple way to split the file in to chunks of say 1gb, send them individually and the have him recompile it on his end.

Rather than going to the effort of splitting it then re-combining at the other end...

There are dozens of file-sending sites - I mean direct user-to-user not 'dodgy stuff off the interwebz'. I've used https://www.wetransfer.com before now, but Google has a whole lot more options under 'send large files free'


Play HVDVD_TS EVO with DVD Player? How can we play a DVD with an HVDVD_TS folder and EVO files inside using DVD Player?

DVD Player says, "There was a problem opening the media. The media type is not supported."

The DVD plays with DVD Player on a Mac Pro 2008 with Mac OS X Snow Lepoard to OS X ML, but does not play on a Retina MacBook Pro with Lion or Mountain Lion.

The Mac Pro had Final Cut Studio 2, FCS 3, FCPX, iLife '09, iDVD 11. The MacBook did not have FCS 2.

Are we missing a codec? Did Leopard have codecs for HVDVD_TS?

We can play EVO files using VLC, but VLC plays the video with a loud buzz in the left audio channel.

Try it with VLC player. The newest version supports the retina display


How do I set my computer to restart in the last operating system I swear when I first installed windows on a partition of my Mac HD my computer would restart in the last operating system used. By that I mean that if I hit restart whilst in Windows, my computer would restart and boot up Windows and likewise for OS X. Ever since I was messing around with my system preferences and selected a startup disc, I now have to pick weather I want it to always restart in OS X or always in Windows. How do I get it back to the way it was (or was it never that way)? Thanks.

The answer is it was never worked that way. If you want it to work that way, you have to install a boot manager.  The most common free one is call rEFInd. Most people install this software in the OS X partition, but this can lead to problems when you install updates. I installed rEFInd in its own partition to avoid such problems.

I would go with @ryebread's answer and just use either "Startup Disk" on OS X System Preferences or "Boot Camp" menu on Windows Control Panel. An example of this is shown below. Here, Windows is set as startup.

If I want to switch to OS X, then I need to click on the OS X icon to highlight it. This is shown below.

I am now set to boot to OS X. There is no need to do a Restart. I can just close the window.

(Actually in practice, you will probably end up selecting the Restart button.)

Update 1:

If you want to boot from OS X to Windows while leaving OS X as the default, then you would need to enter the bless command from a Terminal application window. Or, you can create a script launched as a Service via the Automator application. An example script is given here.

Update 2:

After some testing, I found if no system is highlighted in the Startup Disk window, then the computer always boots to OS X. I am not sure what your computer was doing originally. I think what you want is for the computer to always boot to the last operating system  that ran. If this is true, then rEFInd is probably the best way to go. On my computer, rEFInd only occupies 6 MB of space. If you need help installing, let me know.

BTW, I removed the highlighting by blessing a flash drive.


What is "routined" and why is it eating my CPU? After my fans started blazing, I checked top and found that a process named routined was using 60-70% cpu. Surprisingly, I found no information about this process via Google, other than a mention of it in relation to a keychain issue which doesn't apply to me.

Anybody know what this process is doing?

The process was owned by my user, but after killing it, it came back running as root. After a minute or so, the cpu usage droped to 0.

macOS Catalina 10.15.2 on a MacBook Pro

I wondered the same thing! It does have a small but somewhat helpful man page, which you can get via man routined in Terminal.

NAME
     routined -- A daemon that learns the historical location patterns of a user.

DESCRIPTION
     routined is a per-user daemon that learns historical location patterns of a user and predicts
     future visits to locations.

     There are no configurations to routined, and users should not run routined manually.

As to what it's doing? One way to find this out for (nearly) any process is to take a sample using Activity Monitor:

That will then produce a fairly verbose report that you can send to Apple using Feedback Assistant: https://developer.apple.com/bug-reporting/

In my sample, it appears to be training a machine learning model:

 +               1440 __44-[RTLearnedLocationEngine trainWithHandler:]_block_invoke  (in libcoreroutine.dylib) + 475  [0x7fff6ff29e85]
    +                 1440 -[RTLearnedLocationEngine _trainWithHandler:]  (in libcoreroutine.dylib) + 1041  [0x7fff6ff29612]
    +                   1440 -[RTLearnedLocationEngine _trainWithFromDate:ToDate:forLastLearnedVisit:handler:]  (in libcoreroutine.dylib) + 765  [0x7fff6ff2996a]
    +                     1440 -[RTLearnedLocationEngine _trainLocationsOfInterestModelWithError:]  (in libcoreroutine.dylib) + 121  [0x7fff6ff2a1f7]
    +                       1440 -[RTLearnedLocationEngine _relabelWithError:]  (in libcoreroutine.dylib) + 303  [0x7fff6ff2e58e]
    +                         1440 -[RTLearnedLocationEngine _relabelWithRelabeler:relabelerPersister:error:]  (in libcoreroutine.dylib) + 1619  [0x7fff6ff2ec22]
    +                           1440 -[RTLearnedLocationStore enumerateStoredLocationsOfInterestWithOptions:enumerationBlock:]  (in libcoreroutine.dylib)

I would expect such activity to eventually complete and stop chewing CPU, but you never know!


"Too many files open" error when syncing an iPhone For the last month or so, every time I try to sync my iPhone XR to iTunes (on a Mac) I get an error:

This started happening when I tried turning on Wi-Fi sync between my phone and my Mac. I have since turned it off, but the error persists. I have rebooted my Mac and my iPhone multiple times since then to no avail.

Other devices (an iPod Touch, two different iPads) synchronize just fine to the same computer, and my photos are able to transfer from this iPhone to Photos as well.

Any idea what's going on and how I can fix it?

There are several threads about this on the Apple discussion forum, but all of them have gone unanswered for many years.

This appears to be a bug with current versions of iTunes, and may be fixed in the future.

In the meantime, a workaround which sometimes works:

Disable "automatically sync this phone when connected"
Turn off music synchronization, and click "remove" when it asks you if you really want to stop synchronizing to this library
Sync the phone manually
Turn music synchronization back on, and then click "remove and sync" when it asks you what to do.
Sync the phone manually

After this point the library seems to be repaired and it starts to sync again, at least for a little while.

UPDATE: This technique stopped working for me (or rather, it failed to work; thanks, confirmation bias). However, doing a backup of my phone, and then restoring it from that backup, usually works. Eventually.


Homebrew: SHA1 Mismatch Even After Update Mac OS X 10.7.4 (Lion)
Homebrew 0.9.2

Fresh install of Homebrew. No program will install on its own—the expected hash signature never matches the actual one, for whatever reason.

The only answer I have found online is to do brew update beforehand. I did this, and deleted the previously-downloaded package, but it doesn’t seem to have any effect:

 $ brew update
 Already up-to-date.
 $ brew install sshfs
 ==> Installing sshfs dependency: autoconf
 ==> Downloading http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/autoconf/autoconf-2.69.tar.gz
 ######################################################################## 100.0%
 Error: SHA1 mismatch
 Expected: 562471cbcb0dd0fa42a76665acf0dbb68479b78a
 Actual: 304f244353d8b7694914ff42fa87f31608728aed
 Archive: /Library/Caches/Homebrew/autoconf-2.69.tar.gz
 (To retry an incomplete download, remove the file above.)

What’s going on?

Edit: If I download a package manually, and put it into /Library/Caches/Homebrew/ with the same filename that Homebrew expects, and then try to install, it works fine. But if I let Homebrew try to fetch the file itself, the download ends prematurely after only a few kilobytes which corrupts the file and causes the hashes not to match.

If you're certain the downloaded tarball for sshfs is good can try to force Homebrew to install it with:

brew install -f sshfs

More than likely though, if it still complains, is you've got a corrupt tarball download. You can remove /usr/local/Cellar/sshfs/2.4.0/sshfs_2_4_0, which is the cached tarball that Homebrew downloaded, and have Homebrew try downloading the package anew.

If it still complains about the hash value mismatch, you can edit the recipe and update the MD5 checksum for the file in the recipe and then install. The file to edit is /usr/local/Library/Formula/sshfs.rb. Looking at:

/Users/ian/code/tmp/brew [ian@Ian-Chesals-MacBook-Pro] [13:13]
> cat /usr/local/Library/Formula/sshfs.rb
require 'formula'

class Sshfs < Formula
  homepage 'http://fuse.sourceforge.net/sshfs.html'
  url 'https://github.com/fuse4x/sshfs/tarball/sshfs_2_4_0'
  md5 'c9ea547b9684ec4d85437393a2731322'
  version '2.4.0'

  depends_on :automake
  depends_on :libtool

  depends_on 'pkg-config' => :build
  depends_on 'fuse4x'
  depends_on 'glib'

  def install
    system "autoreconf", "--force", "--install"
    system "./configure", "--disable-debug", "--disable-dependency-tracking",
                          "--prefix=#{prefix}"
    system "make install"
  end

  def caveats; <<-EOS.undent
    Make sure to follow the directions given by `brew info fuse4x-kext`
    before trying to use a FUSE-based filesystem.
    EOS
  end
end

You can see that you need to download https://github.com/fuse4x/sshfs/tarball/sshfs_2_4_0 and recalculate the MD5 checksum for the file and then update the recipe. So:

/Users/ian/code/tmp/brew [ian@Ian-Cs-MacBook-Pro] [13:13]
> wget https://github.com/fuse4x/sshfs/tarball/sshfs_2_4_0
--2012-07-23 13:13:53--  https://github.com/fuse4x/sshfs/tarball/sshfs_2_4_0
Resolving github.com... 207.97.227.239
Connecting to github.com|207.97.227.239|:443... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 302 Found
Location: https://nodeload.github.com/fuse4x/sshfs/tarball/sshfs_2_4_0 [following]
--2012-07-23 13:13:53--  https://nodeload.github.com/fuse4x/sshfs/tarball/sshfs_2_4_0
Resolving nodeload.github.com... 207.97.227.252
Connecting to nodeload.github.com|207.97.227.252|:443... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 52812 (52K) [application/octet-stream]
Saving to: `sshfs_2_4_0'

100%[===========================================================================================>] 52,812       288K/s   in 0.2s

2012-07-23 13:13:54 (288 KB/s) - `sshfs_2_4_0' saved [52812/52812]

/Users/ian/code/tmp/brew [ian@Ian-Cs-MacBook-Pro] [13:13]
> md5 sshfs_2_4_0
MD5 (sshfs_2_4_0) = c9ea547b9684ec4d85437393a2731322

In my case the computed value for the download matches the value in the recipe. If it's different for your case it's likely your download is corrupt. You can go ahead and update the recipe if you think your download is not corrupt.

Note: I did a brew update before running the above so I can attest to the fact that I do have the latest recipe for sshfs and that the MD5 checksum for the tarball in the recipe is correct and matches what gets downloaded from github.

Caveat Utilitor if you do this.


How do I stop Launchpad from changing app/folder order? Possible Duplicate:
  Is there a way to keep your app icons sorted by name in LaunchPad?

How do I stop Launchpad from changing the app/folder order that I set?

I have quite a few applications, so I organize most of them into folders, then I arrange the folders alphabetically to make them easier for me to access.  Then, inside the folders I usually arrange the applications alphabetically for the same reason.

Trouble is, I'll come back later and things have been rearranged on me!  Not necessarily every time, but often enough to be annoying.  (After all, the computer is supposed to do what I tell it, not the other way around!)

Is there some other step I should be taking?

You're not the first one to have this problem, and I'm afraid the answer is that it's a bug that has been reported to Apple.


Can I use Shift, Alt and Control Modifier Keys Together With the Function Keys on the Touch Bar? I've configured my touch bar to always show function keys in one program where I use those frequently (IntelliJ IDEA, code editor). Many hotkeys in IDEA are triggered using a function key together with shift, alt or control, e.g. for renaming a variable, I use Shift+F6.

With the emulated function keys, this does not work, the program acts as if I had just hit F6 without holding down the alt key.

It was no problem with the hardware function keys on my old MacBook.

Is this a known bug, or a limitation one has to live with? Or is there some way to work around it? Perhaps I'm just to stupid and missing something obvious?

This is a major pain for me as a software developer…

As @Patrick mentions in his answer, one cause of this problem is Karabiner-Elements not enabling the Touch Bar "keyboard" by default. The solution is to enable that keyboard in Karabiner-Elements Preferences (Vendor ID 1452, Product ID 34304) as shown in following screenshot:

I filed Touch Bar keyboard should be enabled by default · Issue #1700 · tekezo/Karabiner-Elements to request it be enabled by default in Karabiner-Elements.

More information in the following comments:

https://github.com/tekezo/Karabiner-Elements/issues/535#issuecomment-350522019
https://github.com/tekezo/Karabiner-Elements/issues/535#issuecomment-350597725


Adding custom input not working I created a .inputplugin file per Apple's guide to use with a custom font I have. When I try to install it, it does nothing and doesn't appear in my input menu. Any ideas? Thanks in advance!

I was using UTF-8 instead of UTF-16 and didn't space between entries (I should have double-spaced). Changing those fixed my issue.


How do I set video recording rate to 60 fps or 120 fps and change between the two? How do I set video recording rate to 60 fps or 120 fps and change between the two? I'm looking to be able to use different FPS rates when recording video with the iPhone 5s.

the only option using the iphone's camera is by switching between Slow-Mo and Video modes. You can then speed up a Slow-Mo video to normal speed in the photos app pretty easily. You can't convert normal videos to Slow-Mo.

There are probably a ton of apps that offer a bit more manual configuration than that. But I don't know of them.


Fresh Install of Mountain Lion on MacBook Pro Retina that upgraded via a voucher I want to do a fresh install of Mountain Lion. I bought my MackBook Pro before Mountain Lion was out. Later I got my free download voucher and used it to upgrade. Now I want to do a fresh install, but I'm unsure how to download Mountain Lion again without paying for it.

I tried redeeming the code again in the App store, but I get an error saying this code has already been used.

Any ideas?

It turns out Mountain Lion will be available under your Purchases list. Go to Store -> Purchases and you'll see it there with an option to download.