How to measure GPu temperature MBP 13 mid-2010? My question is very simple. I have some troubles with my MBP 13' mid-2010 (kernels panics, crashs and reboots). I think the problem is coming from the GPU (Nividia 320m). One solution could be to change the thermal paste on the GPU but before doing this I want to know the temperature of the GPU.

I use iStat Pro but it doesn't propose to measure this temperature. Do you know if it's possible? And if yes how can I do this?

I used to have an MBP 15" mid-2010 and I was able to measure a lot of temperatures (including, I'm fairly sure, the GPU temperature) using iStat Menus. They have a 14-day trial version so it costs nothing to try.

Edit: here's a crop from a screenshot on my older MBP 15" mid-2010 showing the latest version of iStat Menus. Notice the plethora of GPU sensors.


Folder tree in Finder sidebar (or stuck to Finder) Is there a Finder plugin (maybe SIMBL plugin) which allows one to see the directory structure in the Finder's sidebar (instead of Favorites, Shared, Devices) or in an attached window?

Something like this:

There is Cover Flow, but it's not what I need.

Also I don't need any Finder replacement; I just want to fix this missing feature in Finder.

I doubt there's a SIMBL plugin to do that. What you're asking for would be a fairly extensive rewrite even if you had the source code for the Finder.

Your best bets are what @jtbandes and @Richard's comments on your question state: get a Finder replacement that does that or use list view in the Finder.


Three-finger lookup order wrong? When I use three-finger lookup, this is what I got.

The order of the results is wrong (i.e., different from my settings shown below), and many dictionaries are missing!

However, I open the dictionary app and look the same word up inside, the order of the results is correct, the same as my settings.

How do I correct the result order of three-finger lookups?

You can try disabling any dictionaries you don't specifically need. three-finger/force-click lookups only show a few results, not all of them. You can open the dictionary and search the word there as an alternative. This seems to be a bug on Apple's side, so there isn't much else you can do. If its any consolation, I have this problem as well, so you aren't alone.


Is running an app all night harmful to the iPhone? I use some apps that listen to my sleep, such as SnoreLab, to give me details on my sleep quality. These apps need to run all night, the iPhone being unlocked (but the screen is black because it faces the table). The iPhone is also charging all night.

I was wondering if using this kind of apps, running all night, is harmful in any way to the iPhone.

It could possibly be harmful if the phone overheats, though I spent several months with an older iPhone between my pillow and the bed, plugged in and charging, and never had any problems.

Other than that, no.


OS X Lion not able to login with regular open directory domain users I've configured a Lion client machine to connect to my OS X server and use it for network logins. The diradmin works okay, but I tried to use a regular user, and it doesn't allow any other users to log on.

Where can I start to troubleshoot this?

I'm guessing from your tags this is a 10.5 Server with 10.7 clients?

In your Open Directory user configuration/preferences are you using portable home folders? (With the user in question selected in Workgroup Manager, choose the Preferences button and check the "Mobility" section)

If so (and even if not!), check that your users have a Home path set in Workgroup Manager -> Accounts -> testuser -> Home tab. Usually the diradmin default home is set to /var but for other users I've seen it default to (None) which causes the login window to just shake and reject the user when trying to log in on a client system, probably because the system doesn't know where to create their home folder.

Try a test where you set testuser's Home location to /Users/testuser by clicking the + in the Home tab of WGM and entering /Users/testuser under the Full Path: field (I'm basing this wording off a 10.6 server but I recall 10.4 to 10.6 being all quite similar.)

Good luck!!


How can I buy apps in the App Store without a credit card? While I'm waiting for my credit card to arrive, I still want to be able to buy some apps for my iPad!

Are there alternative ways to pay for apps, without resorting to someone else's credit card?

I don't know if this is applicable to your country, but in Germany, Apple sells iTunes apps cards especially for buying apps in the app store.


Is launchd still being actively developed? Launchd is an interesting piece of software. It seems like it is working ok, but one would think the brand new way of replacing init would have a few more iterations.

Is launchd still under active development? The last svn checkin was 2009, the mailing list is not that vibrant, unless i'm looking at the wrong one... and all the tutorials online are from 2006 or so.

What am I missing?

If the last time Apple publicly posted sources to launchd was when Snow Leopard shipped, it may be that there were no critical bugs in launchd that were worth fixing in Snow Leopard software updates, so none of the post-Snow-Leopard updates to the Darwin sources would contain any launchd changes.

When Lion ships, you can expect to see a huge new drop of Darwin sources based on Lion.  You may find that a lot has been going on behind the scenes over the last 2 years. Or not. But given that Apple has said Lion will ship sometime this month, your question might be 2 weeks premature.


Troubleshooting an iPhone 4 connected to wifi, but can't connect to the internet I recently got an iPhone 4. At home, it connected to our wifi and worked perfectly. Now I am at school. My iPhone is now connected to the wifi here, it says that it is connected and has strong wifi signal. However apps that require internet like email, Facebook app, and online games (like words with friends, etc) load and stall showing "updating". All apps are unable to actually update. It shows it is loading for forever.

What can I do to fix this?

Go to Settings, then Network. Select your network. Click the accessory button to see the network settings.

If you don't have an IP address, scroll down and tap "Renew Lease".

If you have an IP address that is a 168... number, it means you are not getting an IP address from the school's server. You'll need to contact their sysadmins.

Hope this helps.


Screen Share stuck zoomed in I have a Mac Mini hooked up to my television. On occasion I have to use my MacBook to screen share onto the Mini. Something happened where when screen sharing, the screen is zoomed in. It is NOT zoomed in when switching the TV input to use it as the monitor. It only happens when screen sharing.

How can I get this back to normal?

Thanks!

Turn Scaling Off from the View menu of Screen Sharing.


OS X Mavericks doesn't recognize my Nexus 5 when plugged in via USB When I plug in my Nexus 5 into my Mid 2013 MacBook Air 11" nothing happens. It doesn't show up in the finder / on the desktop and when I enable USB tethering, it doesn't show up in my network preferences.

But when I connect the USB cable with Nexus 5 while parallels with Windows 8.1 is running and choose to use the connected device in Windows 8.1 - everything works as expected.

So the problem isn't anywhere in the hardware, nor in my Nexus 5, but somewhere in the OS X.

Any ideas how to find more info, fix it?

Update:

In the System Report generated by About This Mac, I can see my device connected via USB.

Not sure if you ever solved this as its 30 days old, but in OS X you need The Android File Transfer App running in the background in order to mount your Android shares. Hope this helps.


How to set up Document Root as "Sites" folder in Apache on macOS Sierra? I have an index.html in my /Users/igor/Sites/MySite folder (igor is my username on Mac). Links (for example: Page) all go to localhost/page instead of http://localhost/~igor/MySite/page. http://localhost reports It works!, in http://localhost/~igor/ I see all my files and folders.

My /private/etc/apache2/users/igor.conf file:

<Directory "/Users/igor/Sites/">
AllowOverride All
Options Indexes MultiViews FollowSymLinks
Require all granted
</Directory>

My /private/etc/apache2/extra/httpd-userdir.conf file (without comments):

UserDir Sites
Include /private/etc/apache2/users/*.conf
<IfModule bonjour_module>
       RegisterUserSite customized-users
</IfModule>

Also I uncommented lines in httpd.conf as described here.

Some lines from my httpd.conf:

User _www
Group _www

 <Directory />
    AllowOverride none
    Require all denied
</Directory>

<Directory "/Library/WebServer/Documents">
    Options FollowSymLinks Multiviews
    MultiviewsMatch Any

    AllowOverride None

    Require all granted
</Directory>

httpd -V output:

Server version: Apache/2.4.23 (Unix)
Server built:   Aug  8 2016 16:31:34
Server's Module Magic Number: 20120211:61
Server loaded:  APR 1.5.2, APR-UTIL 1.5.4
Compiled using: APR 1.5.2, APR-UTIL 1.5.4
Architecture:   64-bit
Server MPM:     prefork
  threaded:     no
    forked:     yes (variable process count)
Server compiled with....
 -D APR_HAS_SENDFILE
 -D APR_HAS_MMAP
 -D APR_HAVE_IPV6 (IPv4-mapped addresses enabled)
 -D APR_USE_FLOCK_SERIALIZE
 -D APR_USE_PTHREAD_SERIALIZE
 -D SINGLE_LISTEN_UNSERIALIZED_ACCEPT
 -D APR_HAS_OTHER_CHILD
 -D AP_HAVE_RELIABLE_PIPED_LOGS
 -D DYNAMIC_MODULE_LIMIT=256
 -D HTTPD_ROOT="/usr"
 -D SUEXEC_BIN="/usr/bin/suexec"
 -D DEFAULT_PIDLOG="/private/var/run/httpd.pid"
 -D DEFAULT_SCOREBOARD="logs/apache_runtime_status"
 -D DEFAULT_ERRORLOG="logs/error_log"
 -D AP_TYPES_CONFIG_FILE="/private/etc/apache2/mime.types"
 -D SERVER_CONFIG_FILE="/private/etc/apache2/httpd.conf"

How to fix links so they correspond to Sites/MySite/MyLink and not localhost/MyLink? Thanks.

Update: httpd -t -D DUMP_RUN_CFG returns:

[Thu Oct 13 16:55:24.277291 2016] [so:warn] [pid 46810] AH01574: module php5_module is already loaded, skipping
AH00112: Warning: DocumentRoot [/usr/docs/dummy-host.example.com] does not exist
AH00112: Warning: DocumentRoot [/usr/docs/dummy-host2.example.com] does not exist
ServerRoot: "/usr"
Main DocumentRoot: "/Library/WebServer/Documents"
Main ErrorLog: "/private/var/log/apache2/error_log"
Mutex default: dir="/private/var/run/" mechanism=default
Mutex mpm-accept: using_defaults
PidFile: "/private/var/run/httpd.pid"
Define: DUMP_RUN_CFG
User: name="_www" id=70 not_used
Group: name="_www" id=70 not_used

You have to set the DocumentRoot directive in your httpd.conf.  First, using your favorite editor, search for the DocumentRoot directive and add the following:

 DocumentRoot "/Users/igor/Sites/MySite/MyLink"

Restart Apache so that it reads the updated directive from httpd.conf


Change the default system highlight color Is it possible to change the default highlight color in Chrome and other Mac OS X Applications system wide?

How do I customize the default setting in apps like TextEdit or Mail?

Go to System Preferences > General. Click on Highlight Color.
You can even choose a custom color using Other...

If you are bored of the default Blue, you can change it to one of your taste.


Reminders won't sync to iPhone Running iOS 8.1 on an iPad mini, Yosemite on an Air, and 8.1 on a 5C.

For whatever reason, the 5C has stopped syncing reminders to/from iCloud. Works fine between the iPad and Air.

So far I've tried disabling reminder sync on the iPhone (not entire iCloud), and rebooted. When I open Reminders now everything is gone (expected) but none of the lists sync down. Reminders is stuck in a state where the only visible button is the "New List +" section, which does not react to taps.

If I turn off sync and open the app, I'm presented with "New List +" and a default empty "Reminders" sheet.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Potentially related: iOS reminders app not syncing with Yosemite

Kind Regards,

What worked for me:

Disable reminders in iCloud settings
Open reminders
On the default reminders list create a random task, e.g. "Test"
Re-enable reminders in iCloud settings
"Merge" reminders
Open reminders and wait for the sync to finish


How can I restore the Time Machine exclusion list from a Time Machine backup? I reinstalled Yosemite clean, reformatting the disk before. I want to recover the Time Machine settings, specially the exclusion list, from the time machine backup of Maverics.

Any idea how to do it?

I copied com.apple.TimeMachine.plist located in /Library/Preferences/ but it didn't work.

any other idea?

thanks

Open that plist from your previous install and look for "SkipPaths". Under that key you should find the exclusion paths you had set on your previous install.

For example from my own it looks like this:

<key>SkipPaths</key>
<array>
    <string>~alistair/Documents/Virtual Machines</string>
    <string>~alistair/Downloads</string>
</array>

That would at least tell you which paths you had excluded before so you could re-add them through the Time Machine preferences pane in System Preferences.


Would accessory charging via USB hurt a MacBook Pro? Is it bad for my macbook pro 2013's battery if I often charge my bluetooth devices via its USB port.

Not really.

The rating of your MacBook Pro battery is 1000 full charge cycles and you probably get 500 charges of your Bluetooth per one discharge of the Apple battery, so you’re taking 1 / 500000 or the equivalent of diluting alcohol in water at two parts per million.

If you do the milliamp hours calculation for your situation, that’s more accurate than my estimate, but if you factor convenience and the eventual cost of a new Apple battery, I can’t imagine anyone not charging some devices unless your Mac battery already has issues unrelated to charging Bluetooth devices.


Can you passlock specific Apps on an iPhone? I know the easiest way to secure your iPhone is by using a 4-digit-passcode to lock the entire phone. However, I was wondering if there is a way to securely passcode-protect only the Photo and Mail apps, i.e. a passcode is required every time the apps are opened?

My iPhone is not jailbroken and I'm not planning on doing so.

Individual apps from the App Store can't be passcode protected in this way without jailbreaking which you mentioned you don't want to do. You may be able to use restrictions, but you will need to go to Settings each time to enable/disable access, and restrictions are only available for certain pre-installed apps and features.


How to keep MacBook Pro from stopping Time Machine when sleeping? I don't want to leave my monitor on all the time on my MacBook but would like Time Machine to run when the MacBook screen is off.  My first backup is 500 GB and the computer keeps going to sleep and Time Machine pauses.

Any way to keep Time Machine working but have screen go off only?

If your MacBook supports Power Nap and is connected to power, go to System Preferences → Energy Saver → Power Adapter → Enable Power Nap while plugged into a power adapter. This will allow Time Machine to wake the computer for a backup.


XQuartz does not work correctly I have got a problem with XQuartz. We are running a server on which we installed an application which runs via Wine. If I start the application via Linux it works perfect.

But with my Macbook (OS X Sierra 10.12.5) it does not start.
I connect to the server with ssh -X serverID, after this I try to start the application with ./"appname" and it happens just nothing.
In the background XQuartz has already started while I was connecting to the server, but then it does not do anything. No error messages, nothing. Just a little freeze.
If I try to open xeyes, this app starts but without the animation of the Iris. Someone who can help me?

Please try by providing /full_path/appname on the Terminal, Where full_path is the path which the particular appname is located.


Internet connectivity on 3g iPad when on a non-internet-connected wifi Imagine the following scenario, which I am proposing to a client for their service technicians' trucks.

I have a very small wireless LAN that exists only for the purpose of providing print services for iOS devices (using a Lantronix xPrintServer, a portable WiFi router, and a mobile printer, all wired into the truck's electrical system).

I have an iPad that is connected to the WiFi in the truck, and also has 3G service.

On that iPad, I go to check my email. What happens? Does it try to connect to the mail server over WiFi and fail? Or does it know it can't route that way and use the 3G instead?

When connected to both Wi-Fi and 3G, you have two IP addresses. One handed out by DHCP on your portable Wi-Fi network and one from AT&T (or Verizon, as may be the case).

To my knowledge and from my experience, your iPad will use the IP address obtained by Wi-Fi first, and then 3G. So if you're connected to a Wi-Fi network that doesn't have internet connectivity, the email address you're trying to check has nowhere to go since you don't have internet service connected to your portable Wi-Fi network.

Unfortunately, this means that in order to check your email, you'll have to disconnect from the portable Wi-Fi network, allowing the 3G IP address to become active.


Powerline Theme in OSX terminal have a strange color I configure the powerline theme on OSX like zsh vim and emacs

But it has a strange colour in the ">" character

How can I make the the ">" character colour match with the powerline bar

There's not much you can do about it (except trying a different font).

I had the same "issue" but I don't consider this as something bad.
Get use to it but first try a font that will match as much as possible and will reduce the difference between "rectangle" section and "triangle" section.

Check my OMZ shell script where I use bullet-train theme.

  Bullet Train theme for OMZ requires Powerline Compatible Fonts

Take a look especially at:

mkdir $TEMP_FONT_DEST
cd $TEMP_FONT_DEST
git clone https://github.com/powerline/fonts.git .
./install.sh
rm -rf $TEMP_FONT_DEST

I will upvote your question because you're new here and to wake up your creativity. Good luck with customising your shell.


Fusion drive: replace SSD and HDD vice-versa I've just made a Fusion Drive on my MBP 2012 and restored data from the Time Machine. Unfortunately, right now I read information that the best place for SSD is the main bay of HDD not the optical bay. So I want to replace SSD to the main bay and HDD to the optical bay.

My question is: it's possible without reinstalling the system?

I'm asking because I not fully understand how Fusion Drive works. When I make coreStorage and I put the names of disks (For instance, /dev/disk0 and /dev/disk1) how it determines where is the SSD and where is the HDD? By manufacture information? So it means that I can replace SSD and HDD vice-versa and it's gonna be fine or coreStorage stores information about each drive how it was determine: first - SSD - /dev/disk0, second - HDD - /dev/disk1?

I did the trick by Trent Fitzpatrick's recommendation. Everything works. Speed doesn't changed. Probably it's because I've just made a Fusion Drive and there need some time, probably it doesn't affect at all. But Write 120mb/s and Read 380 mb/s really slow for Fusion Drive I guess.

I'll wait some time and if speed doesn't will change I guess I'll replace SSD and HDD again because HDD tray has some shock protection.


Is an external drive connected to Time Capsule also backed up? If I connect an external hard drive to a Time Capulse, it that drive also backed up to the Time Capsule?

No, that won't work. Simply connecting the external drive to the Time Capsule wouldn't start a backup by itself, because, counter-intuitive as it may seen, a Time Capsule doesn't know anything about backups: the Time Capsule is, in effect, just a network attached drive -- it doesn't back up anything by itself, but rather just makes storage space available to a Mac to be used, among other things, for backups; such backups must be entirely managed by that Mac, running the Time Machine software provided by OS X, which is what actually performs the backup process. No Mac, no automatic backup.

What Time Machine can do is back up an external hard drive physically connected to your Mac (via Thunderbolt or USB), so long as it is formatted using HFS -- if it's in FAT32 or NTFS format, Time Machine won't back it up. That's not your case, since you've plugged the drive to the Time Capsule and not the Mac -- the only way you can access that drive from your Mac (which, as explained above, is what actually performs the backup) is via the network. Quoting from Pondini's excellent Time Machine web site:

  Time Machine can easily back up multiple internal and/or directly-connected external drives and partitions simultaneously (but Time Machine cannot back up data that's on a network).

So if you really want to back that drive up, you'll have to connect it directly to a Mac, make sure it is in HFS format, and follow the instructions on the link above.


Export PATH directly from command line in Yosemite--where is my PATH? I want to use the latest version of git which I installed via Homebrew, so I needed to change my PATH variable to ensure OS X uses the Homebrew version instead of the outdated version that ships with OS X and Command Line Tools. This tutorial recommends simply running:

$ export PATH=/usr/local/bin:$PATH

That's what I did and it worked great.

My question is: where did this command modify my PATH variable? I don't have ~/.bashrc, ~/.bash_profile, or ~/.profile files in my home directory at all, but when I $ echo $PATH then the PATH appears correct and when running which git and git --version everything appears to point to the right place. I do see the correct paths listed in /etc/paths but if I add a test path using export from the command line then the test path does not appear in that file.

Another question: is this a good way to modify my PATH variable?

Final question: what are the advantages and disadvantages of this method?

Edit: I do see the correct paths listed in /etc/paths but if I add a test path using $ export PATH=/test:$PATH then the test path does not appear in /etc/paths/, but it appears first when I run $ echo $PATH, however it is lost after rebooting.

On June 3 you posted the following comment

@DavidAnderson So if I understand correctly, running export PATH... from an interactive shell session only affects $PATH for that session and the newly added path is not saved anywhere (and therefore there is no file where the newly added path can be edited). E.g., if I run export PATH=/test:$PATH but I meant to export the /testing_123 dir instead, then my best option is to simply start a new session rather than attempt to locate and edit a file containing the erroneous /test dir (because there is no such file). Correct?

My response to your comment

From the manual page for bash, I have extracted the following.

A parameter is an entity that stores values.  It can be a name, a
number, or one of the special characters listed below under Special
Parameters.  A variable is a parameter denoted by a name.  A variable
has a value and zero or more attributes.

PATH is the name of a variable. Normally, this variable has only the export attribute turned on. The export attribute marks a variable for export to subsequent  commands via the environment. The export command turns on the export attribute, but in the case of the PATH variable, the export attribute is already turned on. Therefore, for the PATH variable, the next four commands are equivalent.

PATH=/test:$PATH
export PATH=/test:$PATH
declare PATH=/test:$PATH
typeset PATH=/test:$PATH

As for your comment, you are correct. There is no such file.

In the case of a mistake of the type you mentioned, I do not think starting a new session would be the best option. I would enter the command

declare -p PATH

and then highlight the output. You can then cut and paste the text as your next command. Before hitting the return key, use the other keys to correct your mistake.

For more information on this subject, see the manual page for bash. Either enter the command

man bash

or visit the site: bash - GNU Bourne-Again SHell.

In response to your Edit:

Yes, you are suppose to lose /test in your PATH variable when you reboot. This is why you need to put an export command in your ~./profile file.

Original answer:

You seem confused when the ~/.bashrc, ~/.bash_profile, and ~/.profile files execute. Maybe this will help.

Here is how I set up my computer. I have three files: ~/.profile, ~/.bashrc and ~/.bashcm. If you are missing any of these, you can create them.

When I start the Terminal application or select "New Window" from "Shell" on the menu bar, an interactive bash login shell is invoked. This shell executes the ~/.profile script at startup. You can substitute ~/.bash_profile or ~/.bash_login for ~./profile if you wish. If an interactive bash shell that is not a login shell  is  started,  the shell reads  and executes commands from ~/.bashrc. The purpose of ~/.bashcm is to provide a common script to be executed by both ~/.profile and ~/.bashrc.

Here is an example of a .profile file

echo in .profile
source ~/.bashcm
export PATH=$PATH:~/bin
echo exit .profile

The purpose of the echo commands are to illustrate when the scripts are executed. Once you are comfortable, you can either comment out or delete them.  The .profile file executes .bashcm script, then modifies the PATH variable and exits. An example .bashcm file is shown below.

echo in bashcm
PS1='\h:\W \u\$ '
alias home='cd ~'
echo exit .bashcm

Other than the echo commands, .bashcm only sets the prompt and an alias. The example .bashrc file shown below simply executes the .bashcm script. Again the echo commands are just for illustration purposes.

echo in .bashrc
source ~/.bashcm
echo exit .bashrc

If I start the Terminal application and enter the commands

echo $PATH
alias
bash
echo $PATH
alias

in the window, I get the following.

Last login: Wed May 27 14:48:19 on ttys000
in .profile
in bashcm
exit .bashcm
exit .profile
Steelhead:~ davidanderson$ echo $PATH
/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/Users/davidanderson/bin
Steelhead:~ davidanderson$ alias
alias home='cd ~'
Steelhead:~ davidanderson$ bash
in .bashrc
in bashcm
exit .bashcm
exit .bashrc
Steelhead:~ davidanderson$ echo $PATH
/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/Users/davidanderson/bin
Steelhead:~ davidanderson$ alias
alias home='cd ~'
Steelhead:~ davidanderson$


iOS and Gmail Notes Syncing Issue I have a iPad and iPhone, both of which are having severe Gmail Notes syncing issues.

My setup was working fine for the last several years, but recently (starting about a month and a half ago), my Notes randomly stop syncing between the devices and Google.

The notes will be locally updated on the particular iDevice I used last, but never sync up to Gmail (verified by looking in my account on a web browser), and therefore never sync to my other iDevice. This causes out-of-sync Notes, and is a pain to get working again. When I do get it working again, it only works for a handful of days (2-5 days), and then suddenly stops syncing again for no obvious reason.

I only use Gmail for Notes - I have all other Gmail syncing turned off in the iOS settings (as has been for at least the last year and a half without issue). I use Office 365 for Mail, Contacts, and Calendars. My Gmail Notes integration was legacy, but I preferred how it worked over the Office 365's OneNote setup.

Things I've tried:

Turned off Note syncing (which deletes the notes from the Device), and then turning it back on. This does not seem to have any effect, and the Gmail notes section under the Notes app never shows back up. It's like it's still not enabled.
Deleting the Gmail account off the iDevice entirely, and then re-adding the Gmail account and turning everything off except Notes syncing. This works for a few days, and then suddenly stops again.
Tried doing a Network Settings Reset on both iDevices. This has no effect.
Tried updating my iDevices from 10.3.1 -> 10.3.2 hoping there was some issue/bug in the Notes app from Apple... but this had no effect, even after repeating the above things.

Oddly enough, when I go into Settings and enable Gmail Email syncing, the notes seem to start to sync again. The problem here is I forward all email to my Office 365 account, so I don't want to sync my Gmail Mail to the iDevices. My password for Gmail has not changed recently, and deleting/re-adding the account to iOS would confirm if I've entered the wrong password anyway.

My Devices:

iPhone 6 on iOS 10.3.2
iPad 4 on iOS 10.3.2

How can I make my iDevices cooperate with Gmail Notes like they used to?

My iPad updates right away if I add or edit a note in gmail.  iPhone does not.  Only way I can get the iPhone to sync is to do a hard reset of the phone (waiting for the white Apple) and then restarting the notes app.


Re-using an ejected flash drive I tried to properly eject a flash drive by moving it into Trash. It went up in that little puff of smoke. Now when I try to reuse the drive by plugging it back into the computer, it does not show up in my Finder. What gives? (I am running Yosemite.)

It sounds like you might have dragged it out of the Sidebar on your Finder Window. Try this: plug the drive back in, and then hit  Cmd ⌘   Shift ⇧   C   to go to your Computer view. You should see all your connected drives there; just drag the drive you want back to the Sidebar.


In iOS 9, where is the "Usage" function in Settings? In iOS8's Settings page, I used to be able to go to "General" then "Usage" and it would tell me how much free space is available on the device, and how much space each app uses.

Where is this now in iOS9?

It has moved to a little different location. To access the same screen, go to: Settings > General > Storage & iCloud Usage > Manage Storage

Moreover, iOS9 now has a search function inside "Settings". A user can search for a term, such as "Usage" in the search bar to access the corresponding settings.


Desktop icon spacing - bigger gap on the left of desktop Why do the desktop icons on the left of the screen have a bigger gap than the icons on the right? I have set my desktop icons "snap to grid".

Is there any way I can make it even?

Resetting Finder and changing grid spacing doesn't help.

I'm using Mojave on MacBook Pro.

The zero point (0|0) of the grid coordinate system is the upper right corner of the desktop (either with or without menubar - depends on your settings in System Preferences > General > Automatically hide and show menubar).

With a fixed grid size progressing to the left and the bottom of the desktop you usually will get gaps (=incomplete grid boxes) at the left and at the bottom.

Example with your screenshot:

Each box has a fixed size (pixel x pixel) depending on the grid spacing setting. The leftmost column is incomplete and the bottom row is overlapped by the dock. Both usually won't be used to place items in there.

AFAIR Windows uses a relative grid size and a natural number (=positive integer) of tiles (in the x- and y-direction).

Assuming the grid spacing is in pixel (or better some natural multiple), you can set it to a whole integer divisor of your monitor size. I think 60 will fit a lot of common sizes:

/usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c "Set :DesktopViewSettings:IconViewSettings:gridSpacing 60" ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.finder.plist

Check the settings with:

/usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c "Print :DesktopViewSettings:IconViewSettings:gridSpacing" ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.finder.plist


Attachments missing from messages in "inbox" folder in apple mail, when using google apps When using mail.app with google mail (google premier apps) over imap, i have a problem where e-mails come through without showing attachments sometimes.

The odd thing is, if i look at the "All Mail" sub-folder under the "Gmail" folder(shows up further down the left side column of mail.app), the e-mail is in there and shows the attachment. Why is it then that when the e-mail is in the apple mail "inbox" view, it doesn't show the attachment?

I do have the setting in Preferences -> Accounts -> Advanced -> "Keep copies of messages for offline viewing" set to "All messages and their attachments" too. So it should be working.

Any ideas?

I had a similar problem in Mail on Mountain Lion, where attachments did not show up for a message. When looking at the raw source (⌘⎇U) of the message, I also found that headers of the message were missing.

I managed to fix the issue by selecting the mailbox containing the broken email, and then using the "Rebuild" command from the "Mailbox" menu. After a short time, my emails reappeared, complete with attachments.


Apple Hardware Test gives no issues, but MacBook 8,1 fails to load after login This MacBook fails to finish logging in after boot ... diagnosis was a "bad harddrive cable", but after replacing that, no change. For reference, an independent, Apple-certified repair center did a "long" diagnostic after the "Genius" (term used only due to branding) bar said the hard drive was bad.

The laptop boots to a login prompt. After successful login, a progress bar that looks like a firmware update or system check takes a long time to complete (>15 min), and then the computer shuts off. I'd like to reclaim the current OS install, and avoid reformatting/reinstalling.

How can I diagnose what is wrong, without being able to login? AHT "long" test shows no problems.

Bonus points: how can I run the same diagnostics the Apple-Certified repair center did, so I can see the error codes, etc...

Update:
Disk Utility in repair mode failed to verify or repair the disk.
Problems were found with the partition map which might prevent booting
Problems were encountered during repair of the partition map

Run Disk Utitiy from Recovery Mode. On Reboot, press Command (⌘) R. Open Disk Utility. Your partition map might be corrupt. Hit repair a couple of times.
Reset NVRAM/PRAM.  http://support.apple.com/kb/PH18761
Also run EtreCheck and post the report here. Free Download:
http://etresoft.com/etrecheck.


How can I re-build Mail.app's search index? Since upgrading to Lion, my search in Mail has gotten drastically less helpful. Since I have read many reviews about what an improvement Mail 5.0's search is, I can only assume that my search index was not built correctly. Is there a file I can delete or a terminal command I can run to tell Mail to re-index my messages?

Here's what I've used in the past to rebuild the search index:

sudo mdutil -E /

The -E option "will cause each local store for the volumes indicated to be erased. The stores will be rebuilt if appropriate."

While I don't use Mail.app, I noticed similar behavior with Outlook 2011 -- which also uses Spotlight for search.


Change Font Style when writing Code, Math, .. in Pages Is it possible to quickly switch between font styles when writing different types of text. For example when I write code or mathematical text I'd like to use a different font, eventually a background.

So far I only know how to add paragraph styles which change the whole paragraph obviously, not just a few characters.

It'd be great if you could help me out.

What you’re looking for is called Character Styles. It works similarly to Paragraph Styles, except that it only affect the character you’ve selected. To create a paragraph style:

Select characters you want to define the style for (eg. math formula, code)  and change the background, font type, or font color according to your preferences.
Open up Text Inspector Pane (it’s under the same panel in Pages 5.x), or you might need to dig around for Pages 4.x. You should be able to see some default character styles such as ALL CAPS, Emphasis, and Underline. See screenshots.
From the list of styles, choose the + sign at the top right and name your newly created style. Apply this for all your future selected characters.

Here’s the screenshot for the list of Character Styles.


How do I remove a disk image that I created myself? I went to disk utility and created a new image with 1.5 GB of my hard disk.

Now I want to remove it and have all the space back for my Macintosh HD. Nothing seems to work. If I eject it, it's not completely gone because I can still go to File -> Open Disk Image and I can still see that image.

How should I completely remove it and restore everything to what it was before?

The disk image itself is basically treated as a file by Finder. So, after ejecting the disk image (assuming you had it mounted), all you need to do is delete the disk image like like you would any other file.

For example, right-click on the disk image and select the Move to Trash option and then empty the trash. Likewise, you can just select it in Finder and use the commanddelete keyboard shortcut to move it to trash and then empty it.


Shortcuts in Keynote I've recently moved from Powerpoint to Keynote. While I am overall satisfied with the transition, I feel that there is too much clicking to do simple things. For instance:

If I want to align objects after selecting them, I need to press the Arrange tab > Align dropdown > Left. In powerpoint I just click Align left on the Quick access toolbar.
If I want to change the fill color or outline color of a shape, I need to press Style tab > Fill. In powerpoint I simply have to click the Fill color in the Quick access toolbar.

While this doesn't seem much, it is tedious to have to click on every single tab just to do something that would otherwise be done with a single click. This becomes worse if I am working with an animation and then need to work with a shape, adding 1 more click at the top to select Format

So my question is: is there such a thing as a "shortcut toolbar" or "quick access toolbar" in Keynote in the same way as there is in Powerpoint?

Simple answer: no. Apple removed the PPT-like quick format bar when iWork '09 was replaced by the current versions.

Anyway, here are my workarunds/best practices:

Question 1

a) You can keep the "Arrange" tools palette open for quick access to – well – the Arrange tools.

View menu -> Show Arrange Tools

b) Most Arrange menu items /Align, Distribute) don't have keyboard shortcuts by default. But you can set custom menu shortcuts for virtually any menu item function in a Mac application. Please refer to this guide from Apple for more info:

https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/create-keyboard-shortcuts-for-apps-mchlp2271/mac

Question 2

Again, you can enable the Arrange Tools palette and have the Format bar switched to the Style tab so you have both toolsets available at the same time.

Personally I try to work as much as possible with custom-defined Shape Styles (I usually delete all the default styles and then create my own)


Reset "New Terminal at Folder" placement in context menu Before when I enabled the option to open a new Terminal window from a certain folder, my context menu looked like this:

Now it looks like this:

How can I go back to having just the one option in the context menu?  I have tried disabling and reenabling the functionality in System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts > Services to no avail.  This appears to have happened after installing SourceTree and I looked around for some options in SourceTree preferences but found nothing so far.  What can I do?

This is the Services Menu. I assume if you only have a single Service OS X displays this directly.

I find it hard to imagine a computer with only a single Service.

The only option would be to go to the Services Menu in Finder and disable the other services. Of course if you install any software you may get more Services added.


Retrieve the Apple ID used to download a given app (in iphone) I have an iphone, which has some apps installed. The Apple ID used to sign in (to iTunes store and App strore) is, say, ID1.
When updating apps, in some cases it asks for the password of another ID, say, ID2.

Is there any way to know what Apple ID is associated with each app?

I know that I can remove an app and purchase it under a different ID (which may have cost), and I know that there exists Family sharing, but that does not answer the question.

This is a related question.

On your phone you can use the Setting app to set the default ID for App Store under "iTunes and App Store"

Set ID1.

Open App Store -> Updates. At the top you can click Purchased to see all apps purchased with that account.

Then, go back to settings, sign in to ID2, and go back to the App Store and check to see ID2s list.


Why are my songs on my iPhone, but they aren't downloaded? I'm trying to download some songs onto my iPhone (5S, iOS 7), but they are just grey with this little broken circle next to them. Can anyone explain what's going on? I have space on my phone, and when I don't, my computer tells me, but here the songs are just kind of there.

The circle means the song exists on the device but does not exist in your current iTunes library. You need to either import them again from CD into your library or transfer them from your device.


What is the reason of sound from the attached file? From time to time I hear this sound without any visible notification: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwUf1IftWc6YUk1BWDFoQ1A2SW8/view

What is the reason of it?

Usually I have the following apps opened: Chrome, Skype, Telegram, Sublime Text, IntelliJ, iTerm, Commander One, Postman.
macOS 10.12.3

James P, Thanks for the hint! It was Skype indeed.

To turn off this sound I went to Skype -> Preferences -> Notifications -> Overview and unchecked "Play sounds related to contact availability"


Why does Time Machine hang/freeze on "Backing up..."? Lately, whenever I try to back up Time Machine to one particular external drive, it gets past the "Preparing..." stage (most troubleshooting documents talk about fixing problems with hangs in this stage). The status says "Backing up..." and the subtitle will say "Copying X GB of Y GB..." but it will make no progress even if I leave it overnight.

What's wrong?

I couldn't find any information on this issue, so I called Apple. After some digging, they told me that this could result from corruption in the OS X install. They asked me to reinstall OS X, which made me a little nervous, but when it was finished, I did a clean Time Machine backup and all went well.


All content inside iBooks disappeared Title is self-explenatory. I really didn't do anything special, all epubs, PDFs etc are gone. I restarted the computer, same result. I have only used it from my MacBook, no iPhone, iPad or anything else.

I checked time machine at username>library>contents>com.apple.BKAgentService>data>documents>ibooks>books and weirdly I could only find books starting from many months ago and not sooner. For at least the last 3-4 backups this folder was empty, which is insane as I use iBooks every day and that definitely wasn't the case until now.

I restored these books, copy and pasted them at the present time username>library>contents>com.apple.BKAgentService>data>documents>ibooks>books folder but to no avail.

This is so weird as we're talking about hundreds of books!

Is there a standard dumb thing I may have unknowingly done for this to occur? What else can I try to resolve this?

My first instinct would be to try logging out of the iBooks Store and then logging back in. You can do this as follows:

Launch iBooks
Go to Store > Sign Out
Wait about 30 seconds and then go to Store > Sign In...
Enter your Apple ID and Password
Click on Sign In
Click on Get Started
iBooks should now populate with all your books, PDFs etc.


Automator PDF text to Spoken Audio file: What's wrong with this script? I have pages of PDF notes which I want converted to spoken audio to aid revision.

There are several suggested workflows online, but I'm still not getting the results I want.

I used this model from Macworld hints (see comment from chrischram).

An RFT file in TextEdit gets converted happily, but when I try and add a PDF, I get errors.

If I select the text myself, the workflow functions perfectly… What have I missed?

Current workflow (translated from German):

Get finder items
Extract PDF text (as RTF, save to folder)
Get TextEdit document contents
Convert Text to Audio, Save
Import data to iTunes
Add imported data to Playlist

For any help, I'd be grateful!

There might be nothing wrong with the script, but rather with the way the PDF is constructed. Text extraction from PDF is much trickier than simply reading in an RTF file. How has the PDF been created?

Due to lack of a better solution, I’d simply open the PDF in Preview.app, ⌘+A, open a new text document in your text editor of choice, ⌘+V, save the file, then use that as the text source instead of the PDF file.


How to clean keyboard with a liquid with sugar spilled on it Well, I just spilled some sweet liquid in my aluminium wired keyboard and few keys are hard to press now. What is the best way to clean the keyboard out of the sugar? I guess I could just clean it with water and let it dry few days but I am worried about the membrane.

I don’t know what’s inside an Apple Aluminium Keyboard as I don’t have one. But washing it with water and letting it dry in the shade for a few days should not cause a problem. If any, you should be worried about rusting any metal and not about the membrane, which is made up of rubber or plastic.

EDIT: Don’t forget to remove the batteries!!!


How can I replace the right-most 30 pixels of my movie with black? I'm using Mac OS 10.13.3.  I have Quicktime 10.4 installed if that will help here.  I recorded an application on my computer, however I recorded a little too much screen real estate.  I would like to remove, or barring that, black out, the right-most 30 pixels from my movie.  How can I do that on Mac using freeware tools?

There is a free video conversion tool available on Mac, Windows and Linux called Handbrake. Handbrake does a lot of things, one of which is crop a video.

If you open a video and go to the picture tab you will get something that looks like this.

At top right you have Cropping. Select custom and then adjust the number of pixels on each edge you want removed.


How to install Windows ISO on a single partition of external HD on Mojave? What it says on the tin.
BalenaEtcher straight up doesn't offer the option to select individual partitions and UnetBootin... well, straight up will not open. I click, it'll ask if I'm sure I want to open it, and then the icon will pop in and right out of the dock.
Also, what I'm doing this for is to attempt installing Windows 7 on a partition of the boot drive and then upgrade it to 10 from inside the install itself so I can 1. Work with a sub-4GB ISO file which apparently makes software happier and 2. Upgrade from pirated to legit Windows. There very possibly may be flaws with this plan (especially since the Boot Camp drivers in another partition of the drive in question are made for Windows 10) so if there are feel free to let me know.

Your model Mac is suppose to be Windows 7 compatible. Windows 7 should include SP1 or later. The Boot Camp Assistant included with macOS can be used to install Windows. There is a chance Mojave will not allow the installation of Windows 7. In this case, the easiest solution would be to install High Sierra to a new volume in the same APFS container as Mojave. You can then use the Boot Camp Assistant from High Sierra to install Widows 7. After Windows 7 SP1 is installed, you can remove the High Sierra volume. The Boot Camp Assistant will probably inform you that you will have to manually copy the Windows Support Software to the flash drive. There will be a link to the website with further instructions. After installing Windows 7, you can upgrade to Windows 10. After you successfully active Windows 10, you can elect to use the Boot Camp Assistant to remove Windows and reinstall a clean version of Windows 10. This version should automatically activate. Also, the clean install of Windows 10 should UEFI boot.


From Windows, you can open a Command Prompt window as an Administrator. Next, you could enter the commands given below to change disk0s2 to an APFS type.

diskpart
select disk 0
select partition 2
set id=7C3457EF-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC override
gpt attributes=0x0000000000000000
exit

Update

The output from dd if=/dev/disk0s2 count=1 bs=512 | vis -c contains the character sequence NXSB which gives evidence that disk0s2 is a APFS container. The sequence that follows NXSB is \0\^P\0\0?\M^B?\^B\0\0\0\0\. This sequence indicates the size value of 49283834 in the GPT is wrong for the 2nd entry (disk0s2). This incorrect value would cause the APFS volume to remain unmounted. Unfortunately, because the sequence contains question mark (?) characters, the correct value for the size can not be precisely determined.

Based on this new information, I can only guess at a solution. Below is my best guess.

Enter the following commands while booted to macOS Internet Recovery.

diskutil unmountdisk /dev/disk0
gpt remove -i 2 /dev/disk0
diskutil unmountdisk /dev/disk0
gpt remove -i 3 /dev/disk0
diskutil unmountdisk /dev/disk0
gpt add -i 2 -b 76806 -s 49316602 -t 7C3457EF-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC /dev/disk0

How to determine the exact size for disk0s2.

While booted to macOS Internet Recovery, copy the first 512 bytes of disk0s2 to a flash drive. Below is an example, where the flash drive volume label is MYFLASHDRV. You will need a flash drive that is MS-DOS (FAT) or ExFAT formatted.

dd if=/dev/disk0s2 count=1 bs=512 of=/Volumes/MYFLASHDRV/hexdump.bin

Print out a hex dump of the saved file. Post the output to your question.

Upload the hexdump.bin file to the website File to hexadecimal converter.

  Note: Before uploading the file, make sure the box labeled "Use 0x and comma as separator (C-like)" is unchecked and the box labeled "Insert newlines after each 16B" is checked off.

Or, find another Mac and run the command shown below.

hexdump -Cv /Volumes/MYFLASHDRV/hexdump.bin

Or, boot to Windows, then download and run the command shown below. Here, I assume the flash drive is assigned the drive letter D:.

writehex < D:\hexdump.bin

  Note: You will need to download the readgpt1.1.0x64.zip file from the readgpt website. You can extract the writehex.exe application from this zip file. This is a website that I created.

Determine the size in 4096 bytes sectors of the APFS container partition (disk0s2). I can do this for you and update my answer. Or, you can read the accepted answer to the question: Tried to fix filesystem type: FFFFFFFF-FFFF-FFFF-FFFF-FFFFFFFFFFFF and probably made it worse.

Alternative method to determine the exact size for disk0s2.

While booted to macOS Internet Recovery, enter the commands given below.

export LC_CTYPE="ASCII"
dd if=/dev/disk0s2 bs=1 count=16 skip=32 2>/dev/null | vis -wc; echo

If value of 49316602 posted in my above guess is correct, then you should get the following output.

NXSB\0\^P\0\0\M-z\M^B\M-p\^B\0\0\0\0

If your results are different, then you can post your results and wait for me to update my answer. OR, you can proceed to step 2.
Find another Mac and enter the command shown below. Here you need to replace the string with your results.

  Note: It is important that the string be enclosed by single quotes ('). Do not use double quotes (").

echo -n 'NXSB\0\^P\0\0\M-z\M^B\M-p\^B\0\0\0\0' | unvis | hexdump -Cv

The above command would produce the following output.

00000000  4e 58 53 42 00 10 00 00  fa 82 f0 02 00 00 00 00  |NXSB............|
00000010

Determine the size in 4096 bytes sectors of the APFS container partition (disk0s2). The procedure for doing this is posted in the accepted answer to the question: Tried to fix filesystem type: FFFFFFFF-FFFF-FFFF-FFFF-FFFFFFFFFFFF and probably made it worse.


How to get the basic linux ps functionality in mac? In linux the basic ps command only shows very basic information about the processes running in the same terminal.

For example:

[root@localhost ~]# sleep 100 &
[1] 4071
[root@localhost ~]# ps
  PID TTY          TIME CMD
 4025 pts/2    00:00:00 bash
 4071 pts/2    00:00:00 sleep
 4078 pts/2    00:00:00 ps
[root@localhost ~]#

What is the way to achieve the same simple output in mac?

The ps without any options in mac, prints a lot more information than processes running in the same terminal.

Apparently there is no ps port from linux to mac for a good reason

About the ps that I have :
Running El Capitan 10.11.6

$ which -a ps
/bin/ps

$ ps --version
ps: illegal option -- -
usage: ps [-AaCcEefhjlMmrSTvwXx] [-O fmt | -o fmt] [-G gid[,gid...]]
          [-g grp[,grp...]] [-u [uid,uid...]]
          [-p pid[,pid...]] [-t tty[,tty...]] [-U user[,user...]]
       ps [-L]

Some example output

$ /bin/ps | wc -l
          69

$ ps | grep iTerm
 2462 ttys000    0:00.20 /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --server /usr/bin/login -fpl hbaba /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --launch_shell
 4157 ttys001    0:00.19 /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --server /usr/bin/login -fpl hbaba /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --launch_shell
 4241 ttys002    0:00.20 /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --server /usr/bin/login -fpl hbaba /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --launch_shell
 4296 ttys003    0:00.20 /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --server /usr/bin/login -fpl hbaba /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --launch_shell
 4380 ttys004    0:00.20 /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --server /usr/bin/login -fpl hbaba /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --launch_shell
 4456 ttys005    0:00.21 /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --server /usr/bin/login -fpl hbaba /Applications/iTerm.app/Contents/MacOS/iTerm2 --launch_shell

I gather the concern is that the MacOS version of ps follows BSD conventions and displays all your processes associated with any controlling terminal. Linux ps follows System V/POSIX conventions and shows your processes on the current controlling terminal.

To replicate the POSIX behavior, just run ps -T.


I deleted my Downloads folder, why can't I remove the items pinned to my sidebar? I moved my download folder on to an external hard drive and then deleted the folder on my Mac.

I clearly had folders I had pinned to the side bar with a root folder in the download folder I deleted.

As a result, when I click on one of those items in the sidebar, it does not respond.

All I am able to do is ctrl click which gives me the option to open sidebar preferences.

How can I unpin these from my sidebar?

Hold command and click and drag the alias out if the side to remove, I believe.


Mac Book Pro Retina Failed to Connect External Monitor via HDMI port with Intel Iris I want to connect my MBP 2015 to my external monitor http://www.asus.com/Monitors/VS239H/ through HDMI port. I found out that by using AMD Radeon, my MBP's battery is draining fast and the fan is noisy. So, I try to use gfxCardStatus to use Intel Iris Only.

But, it just doesn't connect at all. The external monitor doesn't detect my MBP (it says HDMI No Signal). My MBP also doesn't detect my external monitor.

Why does it happen? And how can I do it?

Are you using any kind of adapters to connect the monitor or is it straight HDMI to HDMI connection? I had troubles with non-apple adapters – the simply dind't worked for me...

You can make 2 things to diagnose the issue I can think of:

boot into linux (make a usb from ubuntu with unetbootin)and check if it works in linux – if it does it's a software issue (i guess), meaning some kind of hack is necessary
check your system.log by opening the Console.app or by tailing it in terminal with tail -f /var/log/system.log, also take a look if sudo dmesg got anything useful to say.

When you got the console or terminal open – just connect/disconnect the monitor and check if you get any kind of log activity from it, that should at least give you some idea if the hardware reacts on the display when Intel HDxxxx is used for graphics.

I would first check the syslog and then check the setup in Ubuntu 15.10, grab the latest Ubuntu iso file from here: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/daily-live/current/wily-desktop-amd64.iso


How to repair bootcamp after partitioning for triple boot I already had El Capitan and Windows running smoothly. I needed to add a partition so I could triple boot into Ubuntu. OS X and Ubuntu both work perfectly now but my Boot Camp side seems to have gotten screwed up.

I now get the following error when I try and go onto my windows partition: "Recovery. Your PC needs to be repaired. Error code: 0x000000e"

The thing is, on my Mac side, I can still see Boot Camp under devices and I can access my files. Any ideas how to resolve this problem?

Thanks in advance for any help!

Last time when I tries to partition my Mac, Bootcamp got messed up, what I did is boot into the Windows 10 installer (CD or USB). You can download an ISO here, then burn it to an DVD disc or USB drive. Then pass through the language selection screen, when you get to a screen that says Install Now, there should be a button on the bottom left corner saying Repair This Computer (or something like that, I don't have the CD right now). You should get to a screen similar to this, click Advanced options:

Now click on Startup Repair:

Then follow the instruction to fix startup, then you should be able to boot back into Windows 10.

Hope this help.

P.S. This seems like a problem with the MBR when you partition the drive.

If that can't fix Windows 10 startup, you may be having some problems with the Windows partition.


Backup Time capsule content for later restore I am selling my Time Capsule. I would like to back up its contents so that when I get a new one later, I can restore its contents back. There is a documented way to backup and restore to a new time capsule if you have both the old and new devices available.

How can I backup the contents to a hard drive so that I can restore it later to a new Time Capsule? Can I just copy the contents?

Install the replacement back up device first.
Let the replacement drive finish at least one complete back up.
Secure shred the data on the old one.


Programmer new to Apple - How to efficiently switch between files in XCode? I'm a programmer that's pretty much brand new to Apple software, and everthing is all weird and different and scary :P, so I'm trying to figure out some workflow stuff:

I'm used to having a Visual Studio / Notepad++ style "tab bar" that has all the open documents so that I can have a group of files open to quickly switch between. The XCode navigator works for switching, but it lists all files, which in large projects makes it difficult to quickly work on a set of related files.

I can tell that Apple eschews the "single containing window" thing, so I'm not looking for the same thing in XCode, but asking what's the Apple way of doing document switching?

I can double click to open several windows, but I can't seem to find a way to "list" all open windows, and even though I was able to discover Command-Tab (or WindowsKey-Tab on my keyboard :) it only seems to switch between applications and not files.

Xcode does support tabs. You can add a new one by pressing Command ⌘+T, or go to View > Show Tab Bar to keep the bar open always so you can press the + button there. With multiple tabs, you can use Command ⌘+{ and Command ⌘+} to cycle through them.

As mentioned by bassplayer7 in the comments, you can also use multiple windows and cycle through them with Command ⌘+`(backtick) or Command ⌘+~(tilde).

Additionally, you can have multiple documents open in one window using Assistant editors. Either use Navigate > Open in Assistant Editor, or click the icon which looks like a shirt and bow tie in your toolbar to bring the editor up. Then, you can use the little + in the upper-right corner of the editor to add more.

The Navigate menu has several other useful options too, such as going through an editor's history, various counterparts to a file (headers, implementations, interfaces, ...), and switching focus between various portions of the window.

As for the navigator, use groups to combine related files for easier access. Use File > New > Group or File > New > Group From Selection to add a group and rearrange things however you want. You can completely remove the original groups created in the original project if you want, since they are just for navigation and have no affect on the actual project.


iChat with Yahoo Messenger keeps prompting about the same buddy requests I have iChat set up with the Yahoo Messenger protocol. Every time I log in, or suspend/resume my machine, it prompts me to respond to the same 3 Yahoo Messenger buddy requests. I always hit "decline", dismissing the dialogs, but it doesn't seem to stick. Is there a way to fix this?

This is iChat v6.0.1, with Lion

Sadly, the problem lays in the chat protocol between the Mac and Yahoo.

The only solution I've found is to log on with a Window's machine using the latest Y!M client and doing the decline/ignore there.

I was up to 15 messages requests between my two acts every time I woke my Mac from sleep. Going to the Yahoo client on Windows cleared this up entirely.


Unable to show hidden files on Mac I just received a new MacBook, running OS X El Capitan 10.11.5, from my new employer and I am unable to force hidden files to show in Finder.  This is my fourth MacBook, and in the past I have always used defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles YES to show hidden files; however, on my new Mac, this is not showing the hidden files. I also tried defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE but still cannot see hidden files in Terminal or in Finder.  I restarted my computer, but that didn't solve my issue either.  Any ideas on how to show my Mac's hidden files?

Try this:

defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles -bool true; killall Finder

This sets AppleShowAllFiles to true which tells Finder to show all file. Note the -bool part, that tells will make sure you are setting a Boolean to it instead of string, integer etc. Finally it restarts Finder.


Change default screenshot format for iPhone 6 Plus running iOS 8? I would like to change the format of a screenshot from .png to .tiff. Is this possible? Moreover, is it possible to write a script or some equivalent that can automate screenshots on any apple mobile device i.e. iPhone and/or iPad?

It is currently not possible to change the format of screenshots from PNG, however there are many ways to change image using a PC.

As for your second question, this is only possible by jailbreaking your iOS device and installing SSCapture.


iPhone - Where is the brightness/backlight level setting in the file system? I have an iPhone that was dropped in water. Once the backlight level goes below a certain point, the screen is completely black/useless. I need to go in iFile or some other file system browsing software to set the brightness level to 80% or something high. I've looked around and found the backlight level for SB Settings but I'm not sure if that will work. Anybody know where that setting is?

User > Library > Preferences. The property is called "SBBacklightLevel2" in the com.apple.springboard.plist file.
Thanks @Andrew Larsson for the confirmation of this.


How can I reliably move photos from an iPhone and iPad to a Mac without losses or duplicates? I have a MacBook, an iPhone, and an iPad all using the same iCloud account to sync photos, among other things. There are photos on the iPhone in its Camera Roll, Photo Stream, the iPhoto app, and Camera+. On the iPad, there are a bunch of photos in iPhoto that I've processed and modified.

As a result, the two devices have already eaten the 5 GB of free space provided for iCloud backups. What is a safe and methodical workflow to get the photos off of the devices and into the Mac's iPhoto library without losing edits made on the iPad, and without duplicating a lot of photos?

As an alternative to PhotoStream, I use PhotoSync to reliably move photos to my Mac without losses.  This is via wifi from PhotoSync on the iPad to the PhotoSync Companion on the Mac.  You will then need to import those photos into iPhoto on the Mac.

Without duplicates is bit harder.  PhotoSync will synchronise your photos without considering what you may have transferred using other methods (e.g. PhotoStream and iCloud).  So you will need to find duplicates yourself - either don't transfer those you already have in Mac iPhoto, or transfer the lot and sort out later on your Mac.

Regarding a precise workflow, I suggest you play around with PhotoSync and then you will quickly develop a workflow which suits you.


Chrome can't load certain sites but Safari can - how can I diagnose the problem? Please note: this question is from 2013, but it's received some recent answers (2017). I personally haven't experienced this problem for several years. It's possible that others still have the same issue and that answers to this question might help them -- but it seems more likely that my problem was fixed long ago and that more recent issues are actually a different problem.

When accessing the internet from my home connection, Google Chrome has trouble accessing certain sites that use https. These include Google search, Facebook and discussions.apple.com, but for some reason Gmail is ok. This is on a Retina Macbook Pro with 10.8.3 Mountain Lion.

Given the symptoms described below, it the issue seems likely to be some misconfiguration of the router, which unfortunately I'm not in a position to change. However, since it works in Safari but not Chrome, the two browsers must be doing something differently. What I would really like to know is how I can diagnose what this difference is.

What happens when I try to access the site varies depending on the site. Google search works intermittently, and when it doesn't work it times out as if the server was down. Facebook.com consistently renders the first two wall posts but then stops loading. The Apple forums just sit there forever with a white screen.

I can access these sites just fine in Safari, and they also work fine when I'm browsing via the WiFi at work. It's only when I'm (a) using the ethernet cable at home, and (b) using Google Chrome that the problem occurs. Unfortunately I have no access to the router at home, because the internet is part of my rental agreement and I just have an ethernet socket in my room.

I have tried the following things (and possibly more) to no avail:

Clearing all brower data in Chrome (cache, cookies etc.)
Disabling all extensions and restarting Chrome
Switching to Google public DNS
Checking my proxy settings in OS X. (No proxies are configured. Both Safari and Chrome use the system settings.)
Checking that my IP address is the same when browsing via https from Chrome and Safari (it is.)
Looking for any suspicious messages in Console. (There are several about things relating to Spotlight, but nothing relating to Chrome, and nothing comes up when I try to load these sites.)
Disabling "Predict network actions to improve page load performance" in Chrome preferences. This changes the symptoms slightly (Facebook times out instead of displaying the first two wall posts; other sites behave the same as before) but does not resolve the issue.
Rebooting into safe mode
Deleting my Chrome profile
Deleting all the other files in ~/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome
Setting ipv6 to "Link-local only" in system preferences
Turning off ipv6 completely by running networksetup -setv6off Ethernet in Terminal
Accessing the web via TOR. The problem does not occur, but the connection is too slow for regular use.

My question is, what else can I do to try and work out what the problem is? Chrome is obviously doing something different from what Safari does when trying to access these sites, and I'd like to know what that is, with a view to either solving the problem for myself, or at least being able to submit a bug report to whichever party is responsible.

You did eventing right except for one step.

Making new account.

Quit Google Chrome completely.

Go to the Go menu > Go to Folder.

Enter the following directories in the text field, then press Go.
    ~/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome/

Locate the folder called "Default" in the directory window that opens and rename it as "Backup default."

Try opening Google Chrome again. A new "Default" folder is automatically created as you start using the browser.

Alternatively you can "teach" your browser.

That is done by adding the :80 to the web address.

Example www.myseite.com:80

Also run the netstat -a -p tcp  to see if https (443) are open)

Last not least, turn off the experimental "Built-in Asynchronous DNS" is Disabled in chrome://flags/


Create bookmark folders on iPhone or iPad? Is it possible to create a new bookmark folder using iOS? I share my bookmarks between four devices (using MobileMe) and it would be useful to be able to structure them in a useful way.

Here's how you do it in iOS 4.1:

In Safari, hit the bookmarks icon
Press the "Edit" button in the lower left
In the lower right, a "New Folder" button appears. Press it.
Type in the name of the folder and hit "Done" on the keyboard.


Adding a photo directly to iPhone disk I tried to add a picture in the folder /User/Media/DCIM/100APPLE/ (the same as /private/var/mobile/DCIM/100APPLE/), but it doesn't show up in the Camera Roll.

How can we make it appear?
It's an iPhone 3G running iOS 4.3.1.

Following the advice in this forum thread, I've deleted the files (after backing up to the computer):

/User/Media/PhotoData/com.apple.photos.caches_metadata.plist
/User/Media/PhotoData/Photos.sqlite
/User/Media/PhotoData/PhotosAux.sqlite

After opening the Photos app again, it rebuilds the Library:

It's important to use the pattern IMG_0000.ext for the pictures file names:

0000 being numeric ID of our choosing
.ext is a JPG or PNG extension
we can add letters after the numeric ID to prevent conflicts with the device ID counter, ie, IMG_0041b.png, IMG_0041c.png, IMG_0041d.png.


How to make iPhone charge over USB cable when locked? iPhone 6s, running iOS 12.0.1

Plugging the phone into a computer to charge produces an "Unlock iPhone to use accessories" message and the phone refuses to charge.

How do I fix this nonsensical behavior? I know Apple added a privacy feature where the phone disables the data connection on lock to thwart hacktools that plug into the phone and brute-force the access code, but there's no reason to disable charging-only while it's locked. In this particular case, I only need to charge the phone over a computer; it doesn't need data access.

I'd like to avoid having to buy additional hardware such as a separate power-only limited USB cable.

Fixed.

Go into the security settings (Settings -> Touch ID and Passcode), and enable the "USB Accessories" switch (it should be green with the virtual switch-button to the right). This enables charging off any connection while locked.

Unfortunately this also disables the privacy/security feature that thwarts hacktools with physical access, so if you enable the USB Accessories option you will want to take extra precautions to prevent unauthorized physical device access and refrain from plugging into dodgy machines.


Macbook air wifi problem when is on my legs I've a strange problem with my macbook air. When I use it on my legs, wifi doesn't work or disconnects. I need to raise up the mac in order to get the signal. I'm in a small flat and the signal is very strong.
Anyone has got a similar issue?

thanks

UPDATE 1

It seems the position won't cause the problem, but using a ping command through automator will help to not disconnect.

I have solved removing all ssid stored and then creating a new location in network preferences. However the issue seems to be caused by the energy saver system. In fact, using automator pinging the router ip address every 0.2 sec works too.


drag folder shortcut to the left side of the dock Hi I wanted to drag my folder shortcut to the left side of my dock where all the applications are. the folder I have is just a folder with other apps in it from the same manufacturer because I dont want my dock to be very long I did it that way but is there a way to drag a folder to the left side of the dock or maybe an app that does the same thing.

Folder shortcuts, & document shortcuts, are stuck at the right hand end of the dock. Apple doesn't offer any preference for that aspect of the Dock, & I would suspect any UI hack to do it of being dangerous.


Can I use a different carrier with my iPhone 4s received from provider? I've got an iPhone 4s from a provider, but they gave it to me without a sim card. It worked but I am wondering if I could buy a sim card, put it in the slot and use the phone with a different carrier, like a prepaid one?

If you got your iPhone from a carrier, it is almost certainly locked to that carrier, so you can only use it with a SIM from that carrier. The carriers subsidize the cost of the phones, for the opportunity to make money selling you the data/phone plan.  This is why purchasing an iPhone from a carrier typically costs $0-$200 while an unlocked phone costs $600-$1000.

It can be possible to unlock iPhones.  An unlocked phone can be used with a SIM from any mobile carrier, including carriers from other countries.

Unlocking is completely independent of jail-breaking, which relates to modifying the software to accept non-Apple-approved apps.


setting up iphone 5s I set up my child's phone with my Apple ID.  Now all of the text messages come over with my name instead of her name.  Can I change this on the iphone without setting up an apple id for her?

No. You have to set up an AppleID for her. If you want to share apps and music purchases, then you can use Family Sharing, and you can even specify if your child is able to purchase music/apps, or require you to approve the purchase first. This way, she is not able to rack up a huge bill, and you can both have separate messaging accounts.


How to leverage a desktop iMacPro with a Macbook Pro? Trapped at home with COVID (not diagnosed, but sheltering in place).  My company will not allow me to install VPN software on my desktop (an iMac Pro).  However, I have my Macbook Pro 16 with me that does have VPN.

My hope was to be able to mirror the screen via Thunderbolt so I could take advantage of the larger monitor.  I was also hoping to reuse the wireless keyboard and mouse from my iMac Pro.

Is there an easy way to in effect turn the iMac Pro in to a display while (easily) switching the mouse and keyboard between desktop and laptop?  I am fine twice a day reconnecting Bluetooth between them if necessary but hoping there is a more lightweight solution.

Stay healthy and safe all!

I would use NoMachine for macOS for this.

Basically, install NoMachine on both computers, and setup the MacBook Pro as a NoMachine server (and note the IP address).  Connect to it from the iMac, and you'll be able to quickly switch control between the two computers with a keystroke and mouse-click.  You can control the MacBook Pro almost as though you sitting at the console: either in full screen or a separate window.  NoMachine is very configurable: it forwards audio, connects to local devices, etc.


iPhone and MacBook Pro with a single wireless headset Is it possible to have a single wireless headset that works simultaneously with both an iPhone and a MacBook Pro?

Imagine this scenario: I am watching video on my screen, listening via my wireless headset. My phone rings. To answer it now, I have to remove my headset and put on the second headset paired with my phone.

In scenario two I am having a Skype call on my computer when my phone rings.

In the first scenario I need only need to receive at my headset from one device and send and receive from the second. In the second scenario I need to send and receive with both devices.

Is this possible with a single headset?

I know there are some Bluetooth headphones (such as these ones that I can talk about from personal experience) that come with an optional audio cable, enabling them to be used as a standard pair of wired headphones in case the pairing malfunctions or something. It has the really awesome side effect of enabling the headphones to play two streams of audio at once: Pair them with one device wirelessly and plug them into another.

I know, it's not a perfect solution, but it's the best one I've seen so far.


icloud said it will not let me in for security purposes icloud said it will not let me in for security purposes.  Suggested change of password.  Told me my birthday was wrong.  Then said it sent me email to change password and no show.  This is ongoing.

Only Apple can help. If https://iforgot.apple.com is no help, you'll have to ring them


Rsync to macOS Sierra fails I have a directory in my Ubuntu computer with the following sub directories:

emacs.d/el-get/python-mode/
├── extensions
├── EXTENSIONS
├── INSTALL
├── INSTALL-INFO-FILES
├── ...
└── website

When I rsync to macOS, I get an error:

recv_files: "emacs.d/el-get/python-mode/EXTENSIONS" is a directory

Apparently, macOS creates extensions and then can not create EXTENSIONS. It seems macOS is case insensitive? Is there any way to solve this problem? Can I tell macOS to be case sensitive for the File System?

As Mark mentioned in his comment, "You can make the drive case sensitive but then some apps will not work" and Matteo showing you a list from Disk Utility, let me offer you an alternative to changing the format of the existing physical volume.

I use a sparse bundle (.sparsebundle) formatted as Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, Journaled) to maintain a case sensitive volume that's accessible on my Mac. It could also be a sparse or regular disk image file (.sparseimage/.dmg) vs. the sparse bundle, whichever suits your needs better.

In macOS Sierra's Disk Utility, click File > New Image > Blank Image... then in the settings sheet you can define the properties of the image file.

You can have it mount automatically when you login by adding it to your Login Items (System Preferences > User & Groups > $USER > Login Items).

Note that I use the sparse bundle because I find its easier to compact using hdiutil compact filename.sparsebundle to regain disk space as needed because it uses 8 MiB bands vs. a single file, which works better when the physical disk is getting to full.


Cannot change login wallpaper in 10.15 Catalina? Note: This question is about the background image for the login screen (what you see before you log in), not the desktop wallpaper, which can still be changed by going to: System Preferences » Desktop & Screen Saver » Desktop.
In previous versions of macOS, I believe it was possible to change the background image of the login screen by replacing the default in /Library/Desktop Pictures/.
However, it appears that the default background image for Catalina’s login screen is /System/Library/Desktop Pictures/Catalina.heic
Since /System/Library/Desktop Pictures/ is part of the read-only system partition, there appears to be no way to change the image which appears as the background before you log in.
If anyone knows of a way around that, please let us know.
Tested version “Catalina Public Beta 7”:
ProductName:    Mac OS X
ProductVersion: 10.15
BuildVersion:   19A546d

Update 2019-10-05:
Unfortunately there's no permalink for this (it's currently at https://www.koingosw.com/products/macpilot/ under "Version History" but that will change as soon as the next version is released) but the MacPilot folks also agree that there is no way to do this in Catalina:

The current version of Catalina is the "GM" before the official release.
Note:
Personally I don’t consider “Disable SIP” to be a viable solution for something as trivial as a background image.
However, it appears that there is no other way to do this than to, at least temporarily, disable SIP.

Here's a simplified version of what you need to do (thanks to user3439894):

Put an image you want to use as login background somewhere in your file system (I used my Downloads folder in this example).
Reboot your Mac holding Cmd+R to boot into Recovery OS.
Open Terminal from the Utilities menu on the menu bar.
Backup/Rename Catalina.heic to e.g. Catalina.original.heic in  /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/System/Library/Desktop\ Pictures/, e.g.:

cd  /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/System/Library/Desktop\ Pictures
mv Catalina.heic Catalina.original.heic

Copy your desired image: cp /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD\ -\ Data/Users/[short_user_name]/Downloads/[image_from_step_1].jpg /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/System/Library/Desktop\ Pictures/Catalina.heic

Note you can replace the destination path in the above command with just ./Catalina.heic as you should already be in the target directory if you performed the previous step to backup the original file.

Reboot into normal mode.
Change any option in System Preferences > Users & Groups > Login Options to change the cached image.


Old external HDD drive not recognized properly in new enclosure I've tried searching Google, the Apple Forums, and here for solutions to this and none of them seem to address the issue.

Have been using a Seagate 3TB external HDD for years as a Mac formatted external library and also a partition for TimeMachine, a STBV3000100.  The main problem seems to be that the Micro-B connection on the control board in the enclosure is not very sturdy and I have had to keep the cable at angle to maintain connection.  This is very far below optimal and worried it could lead to damaging the drive.

Bought USB SATA dock (powered externally and can handle 3TB, already checked that, and have used it for other drives since then and it reads the others fine as they were in their other enclosures) and received a "the disk you inserted was not readable by this computer" dialog box with the option to initialize, ignore and eject.  I figured maybe it was a problem with the dock so I bought a full enclosure.

Installed in new enclosure (non-Seagate, but rated for 3TB and beyond and external power) and having the same issue.  If I get the controller from the original Seagate enclosure that I bought the drive in and manage to get the Micro-B to work at JUST the right angle to read the drive then it registers as the normal drive and sees everything, including the TimeMachine partition, properly.

What can I do to resolve this?  And what about the control board from that enclosure (or whatever is causing the issue) is causing my Mac to recognize it when it's connected to that but nothing else?

The screenshots below are from when I've plugged it in with the new enclosure, but the same errors appear when I used the dock.

A few notes:
- It doesn't even give me the option to 'Verify Disk' or 'Repair Disk' which similar (but not the same) issues seem to be resolved by
- I don't have another way to access this data (external and TimeMachine) so simply formattting without transfering it first isn't an option, I neeed some way to access it to copy it to a new drive at least first if that's the only way.
- Running OS X 10.8.5 and this is the only computer I've used this drive on.

Answer from bwDraco on SuperUser
This version posted as Community Wiki

  The enclosure exposes the drive to the computer as an Advanced Format 4Kn device, allowing the use of MBR for compatibility with

  Windows XP systems. When the drive is removed from the enclosure, the
  change in logical sector format results in an invalid partition table.

  External hard drives larger than 2 TiB in capacity often expose 4K sectors directly to the operating system. The 2 TiB limit commonly
  associated with MBR is tied to the traditional 512-byte sector size;
  4K sectors are eight times as large and therefore extend the MBR limit
  to 16 TiB. This allows the use of MBR on disks larger than 2 TiB in
  capacity, enabling use on Windows XP and other systems which do not
  support GPT.
  The underlying hard drive uses 512-byte sector emulation for compatibility with legacy systems. This means that while the disk
  physically has 4K sectors, the immediate host device (in this case,
  the enclosure) sees 512-byte sectors. However, to perform the
  aforementioned MBR expansion and enable Windows XP compatibility, the
  enclosure makes the drive appear to the computer as having 4K native
  sectors.
  When the drive is removed from the enclosure, the 512-byte logical sectors of the underlying 512e disk are exposed. This results in an
  invalid partition table that cannot be correctly interpreted. The
  746.52 GiB value you gave for the last "partition" when the drive is connected directly is precisely the amount of space that lies beyond
  the 2 TiB limit for MBR drives with 512-byte sectors.

  More details about the implications of this conversion are available
  in this blog post.


Does the new Macbook Air (2017) work with Apple Cinema Display? I'm interested in buying a MBA (2017 model), which has Thunderbolt 2 ports.

Does it work without problems with an 27" LED Apple Cinema Display (with Mini DisplayPort)? Will the display have full functionality, e.g. wake up by mouse/keyboard, even when the Macbook is closed?

Yes, your Air will work with any Cinema Display, although if its one of the plastic case  models, you will need both an ADC to DVI & DVI to Mini Display Port adapter to connect it.
If the display is a newer one with the aluminum case, you'll need only the DVI to Mini Display Port adapter to connect to your Air.


`/var/lock` equivalent on OSX /var/lock doesn't exist in OSX, so where do the lock files / PID files go?

/private/var/run is the place for system/root level pid files to live on OSX (Darwin)

Locking is more complicated (or simple depending on your POV) with the system/API arbitrating device locks rather than writing them to the filesystem.

Do consider the implications of fast user switching and the documentation on Multiple User Environments or simply calling NSTemporaryDirectory if your locking happens in user space or the application can be fired up more than one at a time.


Auto or manual refreshing of mounted volumes I use Transmit to mount a Linux server disk on my Mac.

The issue is that when I do something on the remote server with ssh, the change is not reflected in the mounted volume in my mac.

How can I manually/automatically update the changes?

You can refresh using the refresh command in the Transmit Disk menu bar item.

  Transmit 4.1.1

  Released on 9/14/10

  Transmit Disk has been improved dramatically!

  …
  Added a new 'Finder Refresh' command Transmit Disk menu to reload Finder file listings


iMac headphone's external mic not work I have 5 iMac in my office. We use skype for conversation. I have used almost 5 different brand's headphone but headphone's external mic not work at all.

I have checked sound settings. In the sound settings under "Input" section, when I select "Line in" for my headphone the mic does not work. But when I select "internal microphone" it works.

The same headphones are working perfectly on windows system.

Does iMac require any special headphones?

iMac line-in for Microphone is not powered!

Means you can not use a standard microphone.

It has to be one with power-source build in to the microphone.

In your case there are 3 choices.

Buy a line-in microphone with preamp.

Get a USB type Microphone (headset)

Cost reducing alternative:
If you have a Bluetooth headset for your phone (which you should if you making phone calls in the car), you can use it it 2.


Should i upgrade my 2009 macbookpro components on general way? I've a MacBook Pro (mid 2009), and it has low performance. If I can should I upgrade the memory` and/or a new hard drive or SSD? I don't want to buy another one if my Mac is in perfect condition.

My budget for a upgrade is between 300€ and 400€, depending on components suggested.

The most important upgrade is making the system drive a Solid State Drive (SSD). This alone may double the effective speed of your computer. Extra RAM is a nice second.

Since SSDs are usually more expensive than traditional hard drives per GB, you could explore a 'hybrid' drive, though I'd recommend the fastest SSD that your Mac's PCI bus throughput can handle.

When I upgraded my old MacBook Pro (I think it was also a 2009 model), large SSDs were still expensive, so I bought a 128MB SSD for the main system drive and moved the existing HDD into the spot where the Optical Drive was (with a special mounting bracket), and put the Optical Drive in a cheap external USB case.

I found all the parts on eBay for under $250USD and was honestly shocked at how much faster that MacBook performed.


Japanese kana layout on iPad screen keyboard How can I get ordinary kana layout instead of the sorted あいうえお? It's almost as annoying to use as writing English with the keys ordered like ABC. I need this instead:

To get a different layout you have to find one in the App Store or use a hardware keyboard.


Is it true that iOS devices use a hard coded time.apple.com dns for an ntp server? I read that the only way to point an IOS device at your own NTP server is to change your dns sever’s record for time.apple.com to point at your NTP server so that when the iOS device requests the time from the hard-coded time.apple.com it returns that NTP server’s is instead of the one apple returns.

Is that true for all versions of iOS and does it work on iPod Touches?  Additionally, does it request on port 123 like most NTP clients?

Yes it's true and yes it is very hard coded.  Yes it uses standard port 123 UDP.

Jamf is the Apple Business Manager for iOS devices and there is no setting in there either.  See https://www.jamf.com/jamf-nation/discussions/11772/ntp-server-for-ipads

Like the article says create an A record for time.apple.com and set the IP to your NTP server and that's it.


Apache running on Yosemite not working as expected I plan to use both /Library/Webserver/Documents and ~username/Sites/. I have phpmyadmin folder in /Sites directory. If I go to

http://localhost/~username/phpmyadmin

it works, but if I go to

http://localhost/phpmyadmin

I get "The requested URL /phpmyadmin/ was not found on this server.". I've reviewed the relevant files to make sure I enabled the relevant lines and such. Am I missing something obvious?

You've essentially set up two different sites here:

For http://localhost your files are stored in /Library/Webserver/Documents.

For http://localhost/~username the files are stored in ~username/Sites

Therefore, anything you put in ~username/Sites will only be available when you go to http://localhost/~username.  If you want to keep the two things separate, you'll need to put the "phpmyadmin" under /Library/Webserver/Documents instead of http://localhost/~username.


Disable Spotlight indexing, save battery life I am using my laptop with very limited battery availability. I need to save as much battery as possible.

I would like to disable Spotlight indexing, how do I do that?
What else should I disable, even temporarily, to truly maximise savings? Services? Unix daemons? Is there a list?

Thanks.

PS I have already:

dimmed keyboard backlight (on a MacBook Pro)
switched off WiFi (apart from this post)
dimmed screen backlight
disabled discrete graphics
closed non-vital apps

Well, the immediate way is:

sudo mdutil -i off /

from the command line (you will have to enter your admin password) to stop indexing immediately.

You might also want to add the following step:

sudo vim /etc/hostconfig

(you might want to use a different editor than vim, YMMV)

Then, navigate to the entry

SPOTLIGHT=-YES-

and change it to

SPOTLIGHT=-NO-

SAVE the changes the exit the file.  BTW, have a look at iFixit on how to change the battery, it seems you could have much better use of the laptop that way.


How can I determine if a certain .app file is signed Get Info on an .app does not produce the signature information. On Windows for example, right-click > properties will expose who signed the file.

How do I obtain that info for a given .app on OS X?

You can check a file by issuing the following command in Terminal:

 codesign -dv /Applications/Whatever.app

There is a free tool that implements the functions of the codesign command and extends it with a nice GUI. It's called RB App Checker (on the App Store) as well as a site describing the program http://brockerhoff.net/RB/AppCheckerLite/

I've not needed anything but these two tools for checking code signing on OS X so hopefully they fit your needs. Do check out the AppChecker if your Mac doesn't have codesign (some older ones needed Xcode to get that tool before gatekeeper shipped).

As to how you would know, the OS will show untrusted apps as dim and with a generic icon until the gatekeeper process approves a bundle to run - but that code could still be signed so you can't rely on a visual clue to necessarily tell if some code has or has not been signed - especially considering that gatekeeper could be disabled on a given Mac.


Can the M1 MBP drive a 4K display at 60Hz when not in clamshell mode? I have an M1 MBP. I connect it to my external display (DELL S2721QS) using a HyperDrive Viper hub.
When my MBP is in clamshell mode, the external display works at 4K 60Hz resolution. When the MBP is open, the external display only works at 4K 30Hz.
My hub and HDMI cable are both capable of 60Hz, as shown by the fact that it works when in clamshell mode. Does anyone know if the M1 MBP is capable of driving a 4K display at 60Hz when the laptop is open?

Yes, this is officially possible. Your MBP supports full native resolution on the internal display in addition to a single display up to 6K at 60 Hz.
To quote Apple's technical specifications:

Video Support
Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the
built-in display in millions of colours and one external display with
up to 6K resolution at 60Hz

M1 MacBook Pro 13" - Technical Specifications
Italics added for emphasis
As you can see, the specs specifically say: "Simultaneously supports".


Recording audio clips on a timer? I'm working on a project that requires me to record a large number of 20-second audio clips (the file format is unimportant, as far as I'm aware). I would like to be able to do this without pressing a button to stop each recording—that is, I'm hoping there's a way that I can use a timer to stop recording automatically each time 20 seconds is up. Can I manage this in QuickTime? If not, I'm open to any suggestions the community may have. Thanks in advance.

This is a sample script to try and fit the needs/wants you expressed.  As coded it's going to make 3 five second recordings on your Desktop named "Recording_n.m4a" when 'n' in the name will be incremented automatically 1 to 3, e.g. "Recording_1.m4a", "Recording_2.m4a" etc. to whatever howMany is set to.

Open Script Editor and copy and paste the code below and press the "Compile" button.

set howMany to 3 -- The number of recordings to make.

set recordingNumber to 1 -- 'recordingNumber' is used to increment the recording number in the filename when exporting.

tell application "QuickTime Player"
    activate
    close (every document whose name contains "Untitled") saving no -- I set this just to have no other Untitled windows open when starting the recordings, especially if having broken out of the repeat loop.
    repeat howMany times
        set savePath to (the path to the desktop folder as text) & "Recording_" & recordingNumber & ".m4a"
        set recording to new audio recording
        start recording
        delay 6 -- Add an additional second to the wanted value, e.g. for 20 second recording set delay to 21.
        stop recording
        export document "Untitled" in file savePath using settings preset "Audio Only"
        delay 2 -- Set appropraite delay to allow export to complete.
        close (every document whose name contains "Untitled") saving no
        set recordingNumber to recordingNumber + 1 -- Increments recording number by one.
        -- Close "Export Progress" window.
        tell application "System Events" to click menu item "Hide Export Progress" of menu "Window" of menu bar 1 of process "QuickTime Player"
        display dialog "Click OK or press Enter to start next recording."
    end repeat
end tell

Run the script as is a time or two so you can see what it's doing and then you can change the value of howMany to the number of recordings you want/need to make, change the value of the first delay from '6' to '21' for a 20 second recording and the value of the second delay from '2' to e.g. '5'.  The value of the second delay you'll need to determine ahead of time by setting the value of howMany to 1 or 2 and the value of the first delay from '6' to '21' so you have a 20 second recording to see how many seconds it takes to export.  This value (of the second delay) can be higher then actually needed, say if you want a little break between recordings to catch your breath and collect your thoughts for the next recording, although there is another control in the form of a dialog message box between each recording.

Note the line display dialog "Click OK or press Enter to start next recording.", it's there as a control mechanism to start the next recording or to break out of the repeat loop. There are many different of ways to code and accomplish a task like this and this is just meant to give you a starting framework to build upon if you want to use AppleScript to accomplish an automated task such as you've mentioned.

There is no error checking written into this script as is, meaning if the script is run a second time it will overwrite e.g. "Recording_1.m4a", "Recording_2.m4a" etc. So if you need to break out of the repeat loop by clicking "Cancel" in the dialog message box or "Stop" in the Script Editor, make sure you set recordingNumber to the appropriate number, which would be the number used of the last exported file + 1.  Also, the first close (every document whose name contains "Untitled") saving no line will close any file opened in QuickTime Player whose name contains "Untitled" without saving it or prompting to be saved. It can be commented out by placing -- in front of it if you wish although if you broke out of the repeat loop you'll have to manually cleanup before restarting so you may want to leave it as is.  Just when using this script only use QuickTime Player for the task at hand if you don't understand why I coded it this way.