Multiple or duplicate cursors I'm seeing a problem where I have multiple mouse cursors on certain parts of my screen or screen configurations. I've searched bug reports and haven't seen any mention of something similar, so I'm wondering if anyone has seen this problem before.

I've tried:

Restating the computer
Updating the OS

I'm hesitant to wipe and re-install everything... but that's my next step unless I can solve this annoying bug.

When I take a screenshot, the second cursor disappears, so please excuse the phone photos.

Pointer and I-bar on text input:

Pointer and drag hand when editing the previous photo:

Second cursor on a monitor that is rotated 90° CC (vertical):

Computer Information:

I got a tip from a co-worker to reset my SMC (which I hadn't tried yet), and that solved the problem.

To reset the SMC, hold Shift, Control, and Option while the computer is plugged in. It restarted my machine and the problem is now resolved.


Way to Setup More than single "Last Import" Is there a way to have more than just a single "Last Import," like a second from last-type import. Its automatic event creation won't work as some imports (especially from our iPhones) span a larger amounts of time than the dSLR or point and shoots.

Any ideas on other ways to get several "imports?"

OK, I had a "duh" moment. As long as after each subsequent import, I select all within "Last Import" I can make a new album with that import's photos to organize at a later date.


Disabling all non-essential system resources I am running a lab experiment on my Macbook Pro and I'm calculating the results of a program (physics simulation) so I need all of the available CPU I can get. Since the program that I have to run requires full access to the GPU I cannot boot in safe mode because it seems to reduce the graphics quite a bit. Things that I am doing now:

Quitting all application (of course), quitting Finder, disabling all sharing services (in system preferences), plugging laptop into AC adapter, reducing screen brightness (not sure if it will help), turning off wifi/bluetooth, disabling time machine, disabling all notifications and disabling sounds.

This is probably sufficient but is there something else I could do?

You can disable user defined non-essential system resources by:

Opening the Activity Monitor
Selecting the My Processes view:.
Sort by Most Memory and look at all memory-consuming processes.
Or Sort by CPU usage.

See the sample picture below:


ICloud Photos: Disable and Delete on Ipad My photo’s have been taking up 4.7 GB out of the 5 GB that i have, i decided to do the “disable and delete” option in ICloud. I was wondering if it delete’s all the photo’s from my photo’s or just the old pictures that aren’t in my photo’s that are saved in ICloud? Turning on the disable and delete option fixed the problem but i stressed myself out about it and i’m just stressed at the moment cuz i dont want to lose all my photo’s (i use an Ipad)

Welcome to AskDifferent!

"Disable & Delete" deletes only the photos and videos on iCloud. However, you would lose the originals of your photos and videos if "Optimize iPad Storage" were selected instead of "Download and Keep Originals" in your iPad's “Settings > [Your Name] > iCloud > Photos” settings prior to your selecting "Disable & Delete".

In addition, if your iPad has had little free storage left recently and "Optimize iPad Storage" were selected instead of "Download and Keep Originals", then you might also have lost some of the photos and videos you have been accessing the least in addition to originals of all your photos and videos. The number of photos and videos you might have lost in such a scenario (in addition to all of the originals of all photos and videos) would depend on how little free storage your iPad has had (if that were the case) recently.

In summary, if “Download and Keep Originals” were selected in your iPad's “Settings > [Your Name] > iCloud > Photos” settings prior to your selecting “Disable & Delete” (and you have had no trouble with the storage space on your iPad recently), you should not have lost anything at all. However, if “Optimize iPad Storage” were selected prior to “Disable & Delete”, it depends. This relatively recent article explains “What Happens When You Disable and Delete Photos from iCloud” in more detail.


Should I upgrade Mac OS 10.6.8 to El Capitan on Macbook Air 2010? I have the Macbook Air 11' late 2010 with Core 2 Duo and 2 GB RAM. I decided to install XCode 7, but it requires Mac OS 10.11 El Capitan. So, should I upgrade OSX on my 5-yearold macbook air? I worry about work speed.

I'm posting this answer from a late 2010 11" MacBook Air running El Capitan, and I have no performance issues. It runs very well. But this machine has 4GB of RAM, not 2GB, and that might make a difference.

Remember that 10.6.8 has not received security updates for years now, and will be full of unpatched vulnerabilities. It is a risk to keep running it.


iOS10 intermittent black screen issue Recently upgraded my iPhone 6 Plus to iOS 10.  Soon after upgrading I started to notice a intermittent issue where the phone would randomly jump to a black screen with a white loading spinner in the middle (similar to what you see when shutting the phone down) and then after about 5 seconds it will take me back to the lock screen.  I'm still able to unlock the phone using the fingerprint reader (so the phone hasn't actually rebooted) and the phone appears to function as per normal.

It is extremely annoying as it can happen in the middle of any phone function (including taking and making calls) and on some days can happen more than half a dozen times.

So far I have noticed it happening when using the following Apps:

Google Chrome
Microsoft Outlook App
Facebook App
Apple Music App (completely stopped a playing track at the time)

Not sure if it's just random or being triggered by particular apps.  When it happens whilst Google Chrome is open the next time I open Chrome it reports that Chrome crashed and "would I like to restore my pages?".

I haven't done a fresh iOS 10 install but I'm reluctant to do this as it takes time and risks my data and setup on the phone now (even though I do have a iCloud backup).

I have also since upgraded to iOS 10.0.2 (14A456) but the problem still remains.

Is there a way to view diagnostic, error or event logs on the OS to see what might be happening immediately before the black screen occurs?

Anyone else experiencing the issue?

My recommendation is to do a restore to factory settings and then dont restore the backup and see if the issue persists. I read the comments and saw that you had the device replaced and that the issue persisted once you restored the backup. Apparently there is some app data that is corrupt in your backup that is causing the issue. I urge to just set up the iPhone as new, and then dont restore the backup. If you need those apps back, all you have to do is login to both iCloud and iTunes & App Stores in settings (iOS 11 click on your name above). Next go into the App Store app and then look for updates, and then click on your profile icon (iOS 11) and then look for purchased apps (or purchased). In both lists are your recently purchased/downloaded apps. If you used another account then those apps may be on that other account.


How can I loop through the results of an AppleScript to find the variables that have a boolean value of 1? I'm using Applescript with Pashua: Native macOS dialogs for scripting languages. I'm using checkboxes in the dialog box, and I can get the output of those as a result in the script editor, i.e., when cat and cat 2 are checked, I get:

{cat:"1", cat4:"0", cat2:"1", cat3:"0"}

But what I need to do is loop through the checkboxes to find only those that have been toggled to 1, and I don't know where to start.

How can I loop through all categories - cat, cat2, cat3, cat4, etc. - in the result, find only those that are boolean 1, and then output those in one variable, separated by a comma.

I.e. using this script result

{cat:"1", cat4:"0", cat2:"1", cat3:"0"}

how can I loop through and get a variable that has a value of:

cat1, cat2

This is the script that generates the dialog box and the checkboxes:

tell application "Finder" to set thisFolder to (container of (path to me)) as text -- get the folder path
try
    set thePath to alias (thisFolder & "Pashua.scpt")
    set pashuaBinding to load script thePath

    tell pashuaBinding
        try
            set dialogConfiguration to my getDialogConfiguration() -- configure the dialog
            set dialogResult to showDialog(dialogConfiguration, "") -- show the dialog

        end try
    end tell
end try

on getDialogConfiguration() -- return the configuration string
    return "

# Add category checkboxes
txtcats.type = text
txtcats.default = Categories
cat.rely = -18
cat.type = checkbox
cat.label = Category 1
cat2.type = checkbox
cat2.label = Category 2
cat3.type = checkbox
cat3.label = Category 3
cat4.type = checkbox
cat4.label = Category 4

"
end getDialogConfiguration

AppleScript records are a poorly implemented construct, appearing to emulate what is referred to in some languages as an associative array, but doing a half-arsed job of it.

What are referred to as properties in a record, i.e. cat, cat4, etc. in your case, aren't things that can be referenced indirectly, therefore it isn't possible to read them as values and store them in a variable through which you could access the record item associated with that property.

In other words, one cannot do any of these:

set R to {cat:"1", cat4:"0", cat2:"1", cat3:"0"}

set item_name to cat  # Error: the variable cat is not defined
return item_name of R

set item_name to "cat"
return item_name of R # Error: can't get item_name of {cat:"1", ...}

set item_name to a reference to cat
return item_name of R # [ As above ]

You can, of course, do this:

set item_value to cat of R

but that requires you already hold an awareness of the property name "cat".

The simplest way to get around this problem is to cast the AppleScript record into a different data type of another language that gives you full access to the associative relationship between the paired entries.

Your two options are Objective-C , and JavaScript:

AppleScript-ObjC

AppleScript records bridge to what Objective-C and many other languages refer to as dictionaries, which are—for all intents and purposes to us—the same as associative arrays (they differ under the hood in how data is stored and accessed, but this makes little difference to us).

We need to transform the AppleScript record into an Objective-C NSDictionary class object, then we can search through its keys (what was referred to above as properties) and values indiscriminately:

use framework "Foundation"

property this : a reference to the current application
property NSDictionary : a reference to NSDictionary of this

set R to {cat:"1", cat4:"0", cat2:"1", cat3:"0"} # Swap in the return value of your script

set D to NSDictionary's dictionaryWithDictionary:R
return (D's allKeysForObject:"1") as list
    --> {"cat", "cat2"}

If you want to stick this in a function to use to search for some arbitrary value in some arbitrary record, then:

on keys from R as record given data:V : missing value
    local R, V

    script
        use framework "Foundation"
        property this : a reference to current application
        property nil : a reference to missing value
        property dict : a reference to NSDictionary of this

        property object : R
        property value : V

        on fn()
            tell (dict's dictionaryWithDictionary:object)
                if value = nil then return ¬
                    allKeys() as list
                allKeysForObject_(value) as list
            end tell
        end fn
    end script

    result's fn()
end keys

Then:

return the keys from {cat:"1", cat4:"0", cat2:"1", cat3:"0"}

will return {"cat", "cat4", "cat2", "cat3" }, i.e. all the keys, and

return the keys from {cat:"1", cat4:"0", cat2:"1", cat3:"0"} given data:"0"

will return only the ones who are associated with the value "0".


Numbers: Count unique items in a column I'd like to count the occurrence of unique items found in one column of about 120 items. I  can't find a way to do this in Numbers.app

If it doesn't have to be updated dynamically, you might also copy the cells and run something like pbpaste | sort | uniq | wc -l.


Installing Homebrew on Lion I am trying to install Homebrew on Lion but keep getting an error.

$ /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.github.com/gist/323731)"

I run the above code, which results in:

==> This script will install:
/usr/local/bin/brew
/usr/local/Library/Formula/...
/usr/local/Library/Homebrew/...

Press enter to continue
==> /usr/bin/sudo /bin/chmod o+w /usr/local
==> Downloading and Installing Homebrew...
bin/brew: Can't create 'bin/brew'
tar: Error exit delayed from previous errors.
Failed during: /bin/bash -o pipefail -c '/usr/bin/curl -sSfL https://github.com/mxcl/homebrew/tarball/master | /usr/bin/tar xz -m --strip 1'
==> /usr/bin/sudo /bin/chmod o-w /usr/local

I have seen a couple of 'answers' to this problem which basically suggest running the initial command as root. This fails with the following error:

$ sudo /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.github.com/gist/323731)"
Don't run this as root!

Any suggestions would be appreciated!

As per this question I ran the following command:

sudo chown -R `whoami` /usr/local

And then re-ran the homebrew command:

$ /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.github.com/gist/323731)"
==> This script will install:
/usr/local/bin/brew
/usr/local/Library/Formula/...
/usr/local/Library/Homebrew/...

Press enter to continue
==> /usr/bin/sudo /bin/chmod o+w /usr/local
==> Downloading and Installing Homebrew...
==> /usr/bin/sudo /bin/chmod o-w /usr/local
==> Installation successful!
Now type: brew help

I hope this helps someone in future!


How do I get my 2019 MacBook Pro to support higher refresh rates than 60 Hz? If I switch my the external monitor to 85 Hz, it goes really weird.
What does it need to support an lg uhd with 85 Hz?
MacBook Pro 2019 i7 16 GB & lg gk950-b

The max refresh rate remains 60Hz.
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210742
Available refresh rates
You can switch between these refresh rates on your Retina display:

60 Hertz
59.94 Hertz
50 Hertz
48 Hertz
47.95 Hertz

MEH!


Apple TV 3G can't connect to Windows iTunes home sharing library I'm trying to connect my 3rd generation Apple TV to iTunes on Windows 7 via iTunes home sharing, but when I "click" the Computers icon on the Apple TV, it shows an error message stating that it can't connect to my iTunes library. Connecting to the iTunes library on my Mac works. The only thing that doesn't work is using home sharing to get data from my PC iTunes to the Apple TV directly:

Here's what works:

Streaming data from my Mac to the Apple TV via home sharing
Streaming data from my PC to any device except the Apple TV (Mac iTunes, iPad Music and Videos apps)
Streaming data from any device to the Apple TV via AirPlay
Remote controlling my PC iTunes via the iPad remote app. I can even tell it to stream the data from my PC to the Apple TV via AirPlay.
When remote controlling the Apple TV via the remote app, it shows my PC's

What I've tried:

rebooting the Apple TV
rebooting the Windows PC, reinstalling iTunes there and checking
disabling the firewall on the PC (even with the firewall enabled, all other devices connect to the PC flawlessly)

Any suggestions?

Might be a long shot, but have you tried disabling IPv6 on your Win 7 pc?


With Yosemite pop-over doesn't work when holding keys down anymore I always used the accented character pop-over menu often, by holding a key for a second or two.  Now, with Yosemite suddenly all I get is something like:

  Resumeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

When I want the chance to type:

  Resumé

I feel like I'm missing something obvious.

Resume

Maybe it is disabled for some reason ?

defaults write -g ApplePressAndHoldEnabled -bool false

to enable copy paste following in your Terminal app located in the utility folder.

defaults write -g ApplePressAndHoldEnabled -bool true


Changing the name attached to my MacBook Pro I bought a MacBook Pro Retina, and it's my first OS X computer. During setup, I had a brain lapse and entered my mom's email address instead of my own. I don't remember what it was I was setting up, but I believe it had something to do with Apple ID. My mom has a MacBook herself.

I'm not talking about the computer name. The computer is named correctly. Also, iTunes and the App Store are linked to my own Apple ID.

Later, when I opened up Xcode, I found that new Objective-C files have my mom's name in the comments section at the top.

I just installed Parallels and also found that during registration my mom's name and email address appear pre-filled for me.

I have no idea what to do to change this. Any idea how I can retake "ownership"?

You need to change your personal contact card in Address Book, soon to be Contacts in Mountain Lion.

In order to do this, launch Address Book and create a card with your information in it.

Then, while your card is selected, go to the Card menu and select "Make This My Card".

Note:  I'm not sure if Xcode has a stores this info elsewhere or not, but anything new that you install will definitely get this updated info.


What does it look like when an Instagram user using an iPhone X comes across an iPhone X size image in Stories? I am curious to know if someone with an iPhone X could share when an iPhone X style photo comes up in stories.

Instagram limits the sizes of the photos that can appear in their stories. Even though you upload for example a high resolution screenshot from an iPhone X, it will be scaled to a lower resolution and even cropped to fit their choice of aspect ratio.

Instagram currently allows for square images (up to 1080x1080 px), vertical images (up to 1080x1350 px) and horizontal images (up to 1080x566px).

It doesn't matter if you're uploading/viewing this on an iPhone X, the same restrictions apply.


ssh terminal window closes immediately when opened I am seeing some odd behavior when using the Terminal app to open an ssh window to a remote machine. I normally connect to many different Linux servers from my MacBook Pro running Mac OS X 10.7.3, with Terminal 2.2.2 (303).

I have a list of the servers' IP addresses in the New Remote Connection window's ssh group. When I select one of the servers (10.x.y.120, for instance), enter a username, and click Connect, an ssh window opens and I can enter my password and get to work.

However, starting yesterday, for a couple of the machines (10.x.y.182 and 10.x.y.194), when I follow this procedure an ssh window opens and then immediately disappears. For other servers, the window opens as usual.

Here's the kicker: If I open a terminal window on my MacBook Pro itself, then run ssh on the command line to the machine that I can't reach through the New Remote Connection window, the connection works perfectly. It only fails when I do it through Terminal.

I have tried deleting the entry in New Remote Connection, and creating it again, but that didn't help. This is happening on a machine that was just restarted. One thing that did change was that I applied the latest Mac OS updates over the weekend. I don't remember which versions they were.

Things used to work last week, so something broke recently. Are there any logs I could look at for more information? Are there any configuration or data files that might have become corrupt? Thanks in advance for your help.

Here's what happened. On the machines I was trying to reach (10.x.y.182 and 10.x.y.194), in the time when I was not using them they had their hard disks replaced and the OS reinstalled. This gave them new SSH keys, invalidating the ones I had in my ~/.ssh/known_hosts file. Unfortunately, Terminal.app did not surface this problem to me.

By deleting the entries for those machines in ~/.ssh/known_hosts, I forced the system to pull down the new keys and ask me if I wanted to use them. With this done, connections worked perfectly as usual. Oddly, however, even before I changed ~/.ssh/known_hosts, connections using the DNS name of the machine (svr10 and svr20) worked. Weird.

Thanks, everyone, who looked at this problem.


Can't delete email from Junk/Trash folders Late last week I started noticing that I can't delete emails from either Junk or Trash folders in my Mail program. In addition the Mail program seems to run very slowly when sending emails and I cannot quit it and have to force quit.

When deleting emails, I highlight as many as I want, select delete and they disappear from sight.  But when I return back to that folder they reappear.

In the console I am seeing messages like:

5/31/16 6:43:42.849 AM Mail[1305]: Skipping STATUS for INBOX.Deleted Messages because CHECK failed with error: (null)
5/31/16 6:43:42.851 AM Mail[1305]: Skipping STATUS for INBOX because CHECK failed with error: (null)
5/31/16 6:43:42.853 AM Mail[1305]: Skipping STATUS for INBOX.Deleted Messages because CHECK failed with error: (null)
5/31/16 6:43:42.854 AM Mail[1305]: Skipping STATUS for INBOX because CHECK failed with error: (null)
5/31/16 6:44:01.659 AM Mail[1305]: Skipping STATUS for INBOX because CHECK failed with error: (null)
5/31/16 6:44:01.840 AM Mail[1305]: Skipping STATUS for Trash because CHECK failed with error: (null)
5/31/16 7:04:53.590 AM Mail[1305]: Failed to open emlx and partial.emlx files (/Users/jdmobile/Library/Mail/V3/IMAP-[Redacted]/INBOX.mbox/Junk.mbox/CF2FBDC0-75B0-42CD-8443-70E3612FF687/Data/4/4/Messages/44436.partial.emlx)

In addition at times I have seen the Mail program using up to 10% of CPU and currently my Mail program racked up 46 minutes of CPU time and is consuming 26 threads.

Can anyone suggest what to start looking for?

Edit

Based on user6492's answer I really should add that:

I can receive email perfectly fine on my problem El Capitan Mac.
The email configuration for the IMAP account looks non-corrupted.
Using another Mac that has Mail configured for the same IMAP account, I can send/receive/delete email without any issue.  So the server side of the email equation has not changed.

Edit 2

Now it really gets weird for me.  It appears that I can delete emails if I do it one at a time or even a few at a time - not sure at what point it starts to fail to delete

Edit 3
I managed to delete lots of emails from both the Junk and Trash folders, however I am stuck with 16 messages that I can't delete from my Trash folder and 1 that I can't delete from my Spam folder. All of the messages are marked as being Spam, and when I right click on any of them and say they are not junk mail, they remain tagged as junk mail.

I suspect that something down inside the Mail system is corrupt and not allowing these files to be deleted.

Edit 4

After a force quit I managed to manually delete all but one email.  But this is a strange one and I think the source of all of my problems as it shows in both the Trash and Junk mail folders at the same time.

You seems to have an IMAP account, so Mail order server to delete those emails, but something goes wrong and the task is not completed. When Mail sincronizes with server again, those emails will show up again because were never actually deleted from server. You have to review the configurations of this account with your mail provider - probably request for a support. I'm afraid this is the first step. Chances are your configurations changed somehow (even some corrupted file) or the server were updated and your configurations are outdated.


Cant SSH from my mac computer: ssh_exchange_identification I try to ssh to my local raspberry pi and I get:

eran-mac:~ eran$ ssh 192.168.178.24
ssh_exchange_identification: Connection closed by remote host
eran-mac:~ eran$

I tried with -v and then:

eran-mac:~ eran$ ssh -v 192.168.178.24
OpenSSH_5.9p1, OpenSSL 0.9.8x 10 May 2012
debug1: Reading configuration data /Users/eran/.ssh/config
debug1: /Users/eran/.ssh/config line 1: Applying options for *
debug1: Reading configuration data /etc/ssh_config
debug1: /etc/ssh_config line 20: Applying options for *
debug1: /etc/ssh_config line 53: Applying options for *
debug1: Connecting to 192.168.178.24 [192.168.178.24] port 22.
debug1: Connection established.
debug1: identity file /Users/eran/.ssh/id_rsa type -1
debug1: identity file /Users/eran/.ssh/id_rsa-cert type -1
debug1: identity file /Users/eran/.ssh/id_dsa type -1
debug1: identity file /Users/eran/.ssh/id_dsa-cert type -1
ssh_exchange_identification: Connection closed by remote host
eran-mac:~ eran$

Most of the time it is a server side problem, so check your Raspberry Pi.

Majority of GNU/Linux distributions have /var/log/secure, you can find more data about why connection is closed.

Also check /etc/hosts.deny and /etc/hosts.allow if they are maybe blocking the access. Quick fix can be running this command in shell:

echo 'SSHD: ALL' >> /etc/hosts.allow

Some additional solutions that you can check can be found here http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-software-2/ssh_exchange_identification-connection-closed-by-remote-host-103423/


Battery warning "Service Battery" goes away by itself I got the "service battery" message when clicking on the power indicator of my MBP the other day, only my battery appears to be fine. Then today, it's gone away by itself, I haven't taken it in for a service but now it shows battery condition normal...?

Anybody else experience this or have any idea why this would happen.

I believe this is fairly common behaviour. You may want to calibrate your MacBook Pro's battery to help Mac OS X better gauge its health.

I have a MacBook with an older battery. The battery is suffering and frequently shows the "Service Battery" message in the battery status menu. It too will alternate between asking for a service to being in good health.

  Apple Portables: Calibrating your computer's battery for best performance

  Plug in the power adapter and fully charge your PowerBook's battery until the light ring or LED on the power adapter plug changes to green and the onscreen meter in the menu bar indicates that the battery is fully charged.
  Allow the battery to rest in the fully charged state for at least two hours. You may use your computer during this time as long as the adapter is plugged in.
  Disconnect the power adapter while the computer still on and start running the computer off battery power. You may use your computer during this time. When your battery gets low, the low battery warning dialog appears on the screen.
  At this point, save your work.  Continue to use your computer; when the battery gets very low, the computer will automatically go to sleep.
  Turn off the computer or allow it to sleep for five hours or more.
  Connect the power adapter and leave it connected until the battery is fully charged again.


Can I put an app bought with an old ID on my iPad with its new ID? I bought the app for my old iPod Touch and used the second of two IDs I have...now I use another ID.  They're both mine.  I bought some apps with this alternative ID, can I put those apps on my new iPad?

Yes you can.

Open Settings.app
Scroll down and tap on "iTunes & App Stores"
Tap on "Apple ID: [yourappleid@example.com]
Tap Sign out
After signing out of your "new" Apple ID sign in with your old one and download the app.


How do I create a custom keyboard layout like "Dvorak - Qwerty Cmd" On macOS there is a special keyboard layout("Dvorak - Qwerty Cmd") which allows you to type in Dvorak while still using the more familiar Qwerty keyboard shortcuts.

Is there way with Ukulele or another keyboard creator to create a layout that works in a similar way?

This is actually much easier then I would have guessed open Ukulele and simply press the command key and move the keys around essentially in any order.


How to upgrade an older Mac Mini to newest OS and newest firmware? I am having trouble to download the latest OS Update.
When I try to install the update using native mac features I get an error like

update couldn't be verified. While loading it was probably damaged...

So I tried command line.

softwareupdate -i -a

Result:

    Software Update Tool
Copyright 2002-2010 Apple

2018-05-26 20:12:49.918 softwareupdate[4498:4207] PackageKit: Missing bundle path, skipping: <bundle id="com.apple.XsanAdmin"></bundle>
2018-05-26 20:12:49.963 softwareupdate[4498:4207] PackageKit: Missing bundle path, skipping: <bundle id="com.apple.airport.airportutility"></bundle>

Downloading Mac OS X Update
Package failed: The operation couldn’t be completed. (SUSessionErrorDomain error 4.)

My Mac Mini has the following specs:
2 GB DDR 2 Memory
enough HDD Space
1,83 GHZ x2

Here all specs in german:

  Modellname:   Mac mini
  Modell-Identifizierung:   Macmini2,1
  Prozessortyp: Intel Core 2 Duo
  Prozessorgeschwindigkeit: 1,83 GHz
  Anzahl der Prozessoren:   1
  Gesamtanzahl der Kerne:   2
  L2-Cache: 2 MB
  Speicher: 2 GB
  Busgeschwindigkeit:   667 MHz
  Boot-ROM-Version: MM21.009A.B00
  SMC-Version (System): 1.19f0
  Seriennummer (System):    YM7350C8YL1
  Hardware-UUID:    00000000-0000-1000-8000-0016CBABF5B5

I am currently running on Version 10.7.4

What are my options?
Thank you in advance

Unfortunately, this Mac Mini can only be upgraded to macOS version 10.7.5.

Source: MacTracker.app on both iOS and macOS.

This Apple Community post also verifies this.


How do I get Wi-Fi info from within Terminal? Is there a way to get BSSID and the list of available Wi-Fi networks from within Terminal?

I.e. I'm looking for something similar to ifconfig run0 scan on OpenBSD, which lists all access points, BSSID, signal strength etc.

There's an airport utility buried that you'll want to use. Create a symbolic link in /usr/local/bin to the utility for quick access with this command:

sudo ln -s /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Apple80211.framework/Versions/Current/Resources/airport /usr/local/bin/airport

Now, you should be able to run airport -s and get a list of available networks with BSSIDs.

If you hold the option key while opening the WiFi networks in the Menu Bar, you can also see the BSSIDs one at a time, although it seems like you wanted the CLI-like version from OpenBSD.

UPDATE:

"rootless" AKA System Integrity Protection (SIP) has been added to OSX since I wrote this answer originally, which makes /usr/bin and /usr/sbin read-only. It is proper to use /usr/local/bin, so I have updated the answer so that the symbolic link is created there.


How do I secure the Firewire cable on my MacBook Pro? Firewire connections can be a little touchy. Since I use my MacBook to record audio - sometimes on location, hooked into an interface or Firewire mixing board - I'm often concerned that the cable will get jostled and disconnect in the middle of a critical operation.

Does anyone know of any method or device that will secure the cable to the Macbook's Firewire port more effectively?

Low-tech solutions would be welcome. (For example, I use a thick rubber band to do the trick on my portable hard drive, running the cable back through the rubber band and holding it against the top of the drive.) However, I wouldn't be averse to purchasing a small gadget or connector of some sort.

It is very low tech, but some tape is both cheap and effective at holding a cable securely when you start the tape around the cable and then have an inch or two of tape holding the cable securely along the bottom surface of the mac.

Choose one with adhesive that cleans with alcohol and most cables and bottom cases are safe for cleaning any adhesive residue that may remain after your session.

I have also seen people use velcro cable wraps with the hook portion affixed to the cable and a loop pad semi-permanently affixed to the bottom of their MacBook Pro. The loop isn't that disruptive in daily use and you only have the hook portion of the velcro on the cable so it can be tucked away when not in use. This is far superior to tape or rubber bands for a more heavy duty connection under repeated use cycles.


What advantage does clicking a menu separator have? If you click a separator in a menu, such as the right click menu in Finder, it closes again. Why? In all other environments it does nothing, why has Apple decided to close the menu? Is it to avoid accidental clicks?

EDIT:

Also, clicking at the very top or bottom of a contextual menu does nothing! Talk about consistency. Why are these different to the separators?

EDIT 2:

As of macOS Sierra, clicking the separator does nothing :D

History.

In the original Macintosh's System Software in 1984, Apple decided that releasing the mouse button over a menu separator should dismiss the menu. This was probably because they viewed holding down the mouse button as a form of concentration; letting go of the button meant it should go away. Where the mouse was didn't matter. You could even be outside the menus entirely, but not pointing at anything particular on the screen.

Later, when Apple made menus click instead of hold, the behaviour was copied over. That was years ago, the the behaviour is still the same.

(It actually probably predates 1984; the Lisa probably did the same.)

I think this was absolutely the right behaviour for click-and-hold menus, but click-and-hold requires more coordination than click.


MacBook battery drains SIGNIFICANTLY after shut down experts! I really hope to solve this problem as it has been drilling me for weeks now. I have a MacBook Pro 13" (2018 with Touch Bar), the A1989 model.

When I shut down my Mac, the Mac shut down correctly and I closed the lid. Left it in my desk until morning. In the morning, I felt that the Mac was warm to the touch and when I turn on, it boots up with Apple logo (like a normal startup, so it wasn’t sleeping) and it asks for my password before I could use Touch ID (so it wasn’t sleeping). BUT the battery had drained from 100% (when I shut it down) to 5%, if not completely 0 mAh left in the battery (literally 0% and won’t boot unless plugged in) when I turn it on.

I find this behaviour rather frustrating and it definitely consumes my charge cycle. When I shut it down and left it for some good 2-3 hours, it also drains around 20-30%.

Yes, I have once removed the Logic Board for cleaning (after some minor liquid damage around the iBridge Bus, which caused camera, Touch Bar, and ambient sensor to no longer work). But I made sure everything was dry and cleaned all the corrosion with 95% ethanol before putting everything back together. Couldn’t be I missed something that causes this weird problem right?

Things I have tried:

Resetting the SMC and NVRAM (and even T2 chip) multiple times.
Reinstalling macOS (I used 10.15.2 and tried downgrading + fresh install 10.14.6 to no avail).
Shutting the Mac down and not even touching the lid. So, left the Mac open after shut down for hours, and yet it drained too.
Turning off Wi-Fi before shutting the Mac down.

all to no avail.

Weirdly enough, if I just sleep the Mac, the drain was normal (just 1% drain overnight). Shut down, which was not supposed to drain any battery, was actually draining A LOT (even if need power for startup or shut down, those maybe drain around 1-5%, not 20%).

Please advise me on what to do. Thank you so much :))

I had this same problem and the only thing that worked for me was turning off bluetooth completely from the menu bar by clicking "Turn Bluetooth Off" on the bluetooth logo.    This has completely stopped my Mac from draining over night.

Previously I had tried all of those same things that you did and nothing worked.


How to create certain two-character items with the Unicode Hex keyboard? With Unicode Hex Input, I can put glyphs with Unicode values of more than two bytes into my documents by entering four bytes with leading zeroes.

Flag emoji (and other things) are defined as the proper rendering of two adjacent five-nibble codes.  When I type them into TextEdit, they do not combine.  Other two-character items will render the first item when it is complete, but change it when the second is complete.

These particular items just show two unknown boxes when their codes are typed.  But if I copy/paste the same flag from elsewhere, it is rendered correctly.  When the source was a web page, "show source" gives an actual flag and not a numeric entity.

In my TextEdit in 10.13, I can get the French flag, which is 1f1eb 1f1f7, by typing the utf-16 for each of these separately with the option key held down, and they do combine:

D83CDDEB D83CDDF7

(To find out character components of glyphs that display as a unit you can use the app UnicodeChecker)


In Lion, how can I configure to not automatically re-open recent files that weren't closed? For example: I opened some files in Excel, then I close Excel, without close each file (ex.: command + Q). In the next time that I will open Excel, it is going to open my recent files that weren't closed.

Is there someway that I can change this behaviour?

P.S.: This occurs with other apps too, for example "Preview".

System Preferences > General

Uncheck the Restore windows when quitting and re-opening apps.

You can also toggle this behavior by holding the option key when quitting an application.

Added - October 19, 2012

In Mountain Lion, this option has been changed to read, "Close windows when quitting an application" with fine print to explain that open documents will not be restored.


Cannot Connect to App Store (Or iTunes) I'm struggling to login to App store or iTunes. I found several posts on this issue already:

Cannot Connect to the App Store

macOS: Cannot connect to app store

Cannot connect App Store after upgrading to Mavericks

When I open my Mac and select apple menu > app store I see a blank grey square:

When I try to log in by clicking store menu > sign in I receive an error message "connection failed".

Then, when I try to open iTunes "The certificate for this server is invalid":

I followed the steps advised in several blog posts on this e.g. this one.

These steps include:

Verifying I have internet connection via network settings window
Set Macs DNS server to Googles with 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4. Mine was set to this already. Restarted Mac. Problem persists.
In finder, navigated to /var/db/crls/ and moved both cricache.db and ocspcache.db to the trash and then emptied the trash. Restarted Mac, problem persists.
Looked for problem certificates in Keychain access under /Applications/Utilities/. "In the left pane, click on Certificates under Category. In the search field at the top right corner of the KeyChain Access window, type Class and press Return. Among the search results, locate and double-click on a certificate that has an icon with a blue outline. This will open a window with information pertaining to the certificate.". None of my certificates have a blue outline, everything appears in order here.

Other information:
I don't know which version of Macos I have because when I navigate to the Apple menu > about this Mac all it says is Macbook OSX 10.9.5 (Mavericks?):

I have an ssd drive. I don't know if that's relevant or important.

Exhaisted all Google searches, blogs and posts. I would like to install any available updates, login to iTunes and generally just use my Apple ID with my Mac.

Does anyone have a solution to this or hypothesis about what I can try next?

EDIT:

Some new information. From a comment I visited https://init.itunes.apple.com in Safari and then selected show certificates which resulted in this screen shot:

Your user profile on your Mac might be compromised.

To test, create new user and try to access iTunes or App Store.

If it works lets try repair your user profile with permissions repair.

Restoring the OSX from backup will not fix that, it will keep your user profile as is.

Just as safety and unexpected problems, create second Administrator (full access) account.

Launch Disk Utility, located at /Applications/Utilities/.
Select the 'First Aid' tab.
In the left-hand pane, select a volume you wish to run Repair Permissions on. ...
Click the 'Repair Disk Permissions' button.

Also see this article to restore/reset permissions

But your problem might be even deeper. The certificates reside in KeyChain.

Repairing keychain it might be tricky so follow the instructions carefully (like FIRST make BACKUP).


How can I de-compress a source file on my basic MacBookAir (macOS Sierra Version 10.12.2) I've downloaded the source file from

https://arxiv.org/format/1610.01410v2

How can I decompress it to obtain the plain text
(say, in a TextEdit file)?

The file I downloaded is designated

1610.01410

that is it does not have a .gz or .tar extension

Can I issue certain commands in Terminal? Do I need more apps installed?

You can find out the type of find using the file command in Terminal. In this case we get:

# file 1610.01410v2
1610.01410v2: POSIX tar archive (GNU)

So, you can open it up using tar, from the terminal:

tar xvf 1610.01410v2
x defectfcn.eps
x sepvol2ment.tex

Or, just rename it to 1610.01410v2.tar and let the Finder handle it.


Xcode 10 runs really slow and slows my entire computer down I'm currently using Xcode 10.1 and it's driving me crazy, it slows my computer down to a point that it is unusable. Before I upgraded to Xcode 10 I was running the same project on Xcode 9 and High Sierra without any problems and with only half of the memory it currently has (8GB of Ram). I now have upgraded the memory to 16GB but it didn't make a difference.
FYI - I don't think the slow down has to do with Mojave 10.14.2 since I was experiencing the same issue with High Sierra and Xcode 10, which is the reason I upgraded to Mojave thinking that Xcode 10 would run smoother in the newest operating system.
Here are the specs of my computer:
Computer has a fusion drive.

Here is what I see in Activity Monitor for CPU and Memory usage:

Disk Activity

Any idea what could be wrong?
EDIT:
The Simulator may be the possible cause.
In the comments below I stated that the issue was resolved by uninstalling and reinstalling Xcode but I later found out that it wasn't true. The issue seems to be caused by the Simulator, what I noticed is that if I reboot my computer and don't use the Simulator, Xcode runs fine. But as soon as I use the Simulator, Xcode starts running slow even after closing the Simulator. I need to reboot and use Xcode without using the Simulator to temporarily fix the issue. I have been using hardware-devices for testing and Xcode seem to be running fine. Any thoughts?
Thanks

I do have the same issue - unlike many other posts on the Web, I only have one view controller with a couple of slides and views, so simplifying is not a solution for me -

I suspect the simulator seems to slow things down - there is a SimStreamProcessorService which seems to take a lot of CPU time (look at Activity Monitor under %CPU) -

I restarted XCode and didn't use the simulator and it seems to be running fine.  I have a MacBookPro late 2011 with 16GB RAM running Sierra -


How to turn on email notifications when Find My iPhone is used? I actually liked getting email notifications when Find My iPhone was used and all of the sudden they stopped. I can't find any options to turn them back on. Anyone know why they stopped or how to get them back?

You can't turn off email notifications, so they are being sent, but not being delivered. Check that the email address is correct and the emails are not being delivered to your spam folder.


9,93 GB of 5 GB iCloud storage taken up by Docs - how to find an delete them? How is that possible?
How can I locate these files and remove them?

I cannot locate them neither through the iOS Settings nor at https://www.icloud.com/.

All I am using iCloud for is creating a backup with only a small number of applications included and it is usually smaller than 2 GB.

I was unable to solve the problem myself, so I contacted Apple Support. During a phone call, I was explained that the space was taken by temporary, hidden files like incomplete backups.

I couldn't delete these myself and the technician did that for me.


Merge old exchange contacts to iCloud (with iPhone) I'm trying to export my contact from my old exchange account to my iCloud account. The problem is that I do not have access to my exchange account anymore. All I have, is my contacts saved on my iphone. I tried syncing my iCloud contacts and merge everything, but I get a message saying that exchange contacts can't be merge. Since I don't have access to my exchange account anymore I also can't export them from outlook to a csv file.

So basically, is there an app or a trick to get old exchange contacts saved in the iPhone to iCloud?

Thanks!

I would try using iExplorer to extract the contacts from the iPhone.  It works on Mac or PC, and it has a free trial version that should allow you to do everything you need.


Lost one AirPod Pro — but “find my“ thinks it is together with the other one! I lost one AirPod pro in my house. However, even though the other AirPod is in its charging case, when I ping them on “find my”, only the one I have makes a sound. See screenshot.
When I click on “right” , see screenshot, (not sure it is even clickable) — nothing happens. Unlikely that the battery is dead since this just happened recently.
Any suggestions would be appreciated! I could “forget” the earbuds and then reconnect them in Bluetooth and try again, but not sure if that’sa good idea...

If your AirPods or AirPods Pro are separated from each other, you see
only one location at a time on the map. Find the AirPod or AirPod Pro
that you see on the map and put it in its case. Then refresh the map
and find the other one.

If your AirPods, AirPods Pro, or AirPods Max are out of range or need
to charge, you might see their last known location, "No location
found," or "Offline." You also won't see the location for your AirPods
or AirPods Pro if they're inside their Charging Case.

If you see "No location found" or "Offline" under your AirPods,
AirPods Pro, or AirPods Max, you can't play a sound to find them but
you might be able to get directions to the location where they were
last connected. If they do come back online, you'll get a notification
on the iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch you use them with.

(from Apple Support)


Where to configure the default user group for file/directory creation? I would like to configure the default group for any file or directory which is created by my user. I am not sure where to start. Could somebody point me the right direction? My user lives in Active Directory and by default I get the default AD group. I am wondering if I could override this behavior on my computer.

[myuser::~]touch test_file

[myuser::~]ls -alrth test_file

-rw-r--r--  1 myuser  AD\Domain Users     0B Mar 19 10:40 test_file

I don't see a way to do this. Since network accounts have their groups managed by the network account server, it doesn't look like this can be overridden locally. And since the user is part of the network account server they are technically not part of a local user group.

As a test, I used Advanced Options to modify my network user to group 80 (local admins group). Upon reboot my user belonged to the AD group again.

If you want to change group ownership, you will probably need to use the chown user:group functionality in the Terminal on each file or folder you want to modify ownership permissions over.

Another option, of course, is to work off of a local user account and use your network credentials when accessing network resources. You will lose awesome things like single-sign-on though.


How to fix Mac “file system or verified failed”? Mac gets stuck when trying to update and I get the error “macOS could not be installed on your computer, file system verify or repair failed”.

I tried using disk utility and running first aid. I get the following error:
the volume Macintosh hd could not be verified completely.
File system check exit code is 8.
File system or repair failed.
Operation failed.

What do I need to do here to get my computer running again. I have transferred all files I need onto another computer.

Thanks

So it sounds like you have a disk error of some sort that Disk utility can't fix. This does happen from time to time and is the reason things like Diskwarrior exist.

Assuming you don't have access to a third-party disk repair tool (Diskwarrior, etc.) and you do not have High Sierra (disk repair tools don't work on APFS disks yet) then you can reformat your MacHD volume and reinstall from scratch.

If at all possible it could be a bit faster to create a macOS install thumb drive so you don't have to wait on Recovery Mode to download the OS as it installs.

If you do it that way, boot from the thumb drive and once you get to the install screen you should have a menu option to launch Disk Utility. Do so, select the MacHD volume (or whatever it is called) and format it. Once that is done you can proceed with installing macOS and restoring your files and Apps.

If you are doing it from recovery Mode. Launch Disk utility first and (as above) format the MacHD volume before proceeding with the OS install.

Formatting a volume (assuming it is not a hard (or physical) error) will usually wipe out most common volume corruption/damage errors, making it OK to reinstall whatever was on it to begin with.

If it turns out it is a physical error of some sort then after formatting the volume you will either get an error that it could not be formatted or running disk repair on it will still return errors. In that case it is likely that the spinning disk or SSD needs to be replaced.


Why does Mail.app translate the :-) smiley into a computer icon? I noticed that if someone writes me a message and includes :-) in it, Mail.app translates it a computer, mailbox and telephone icon:

If I copy paste these three icons to another program (TextEdit for example) it pastes as :-).
Other smileys, like ;-), are not converted by Mail and show up as intended.
My MacBook Pro is running OSX 10.8.4, Mail 6.5 and the default (and only) language in System Preferences -> Language & Text is British English.

How can I force Mail to show :-) instead of the three icons?

Update:
Just checked the same message on the Gmail website, and it also showed the three symbols instead of the :-) smiley. So it seems to be caused by the sender. Double checking I sent an e-mail to myself with the :-) from the Gmail website and all was fine. The smiley showed as a smiley.

E-mail header:
This is the e-mail header with stripped addresses and dates. The ;-) smiley of the content shows alright, but the :-) gets transformed into the icon.

Delivered-To: receiver
DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed;
        d=gmail.com; s=20120113;
        h=mime-version:date:message-id:subject:from:to:content-type;
        bh=3H2PCCC335OLe+Lvqj/dMcRCFvHrPBVZaMi1o/kzjsU=;
        b=Sxr7L8398byVePjxFrQCZghNWCYpBLd7dCV62QJ+xTTfBSf+EsrbmNs4SSZnEVFvhh
         lQXADjThKhTGjxRyxt119KX0PqVlxEjiRR6Cx95tPbTtN4K1b8UKMc2nnw6t1d9hPyoK
         S9VnKU3X+NI0JsOrkzutz7CsmPE5Z/BlZvNK7ZkbMZlKggn1li5j72v1QiGCDyG4kcLk
         M2Ijj1g0TRISRmIeyaAKDxq1vLYFVvFOHt2Lkl0Nc7gAryqhBSmLoNgzgjnTfWjEUf4g
         cGYYVRbkmn1CG78RIDprIbMOXXWBuqIC/KPs9fuH7FLOr97r/CYoRWIumZis2uu1Sfm5
         +7Ow==
MIME-Version: 1.0
Message-ID: <CAB6M5AkUFH3Vy=3FBiWqG5YJMk0V_HhQOdrvCqjmxVbt5dnBog@mail.gmail.com>
Subject: subject
From: sender
To: receiver
Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary=047d7b5d574ed1d37b04e1d6a95e

--047d7b5d574ed1d37b04e1d6a95e
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

... als ik ;-).
... even druk :-)

--047d7b5d574ed1d37b04e1d6a95e
Content-Type: text/html; charset=windows-1252
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

... als ik ;-).

...even druk </spa=
n>:-)<=
/span>.

--047d7b5d574ed1d37b04e1d6a95e--

For whatever reason, the people sending you emails are sending the smileys in Wingdings.  With the normal Microsoft encoding of Wingdings, the letters and punctuation map to the symbols.

Presumably, you have MS Office for Mac installed, because that installs a version of the font which includes these symbols in the normal character slots.  That's why you get the funny symbols.

By default, Mac OS X ships with a version of the font that does NOT have those symbols assigned to letters and punctuation.  In that case, apps will display normal letters.

The best solution would be to stop the sender from setting weird wingdings font on :-), but that may not be possible.

Another option is to remove the Microsoft version of the font and leave the OS X version. But that would mean that if you try to use Wingdings characters by typing letters, it wouldn't work. You'd need to add them from the character panel.


How do I disable Swipe Between Pages on Safari I am trying to find how to enable and disable the Swipe between pages gesture via the defaults command either system wide or just for Safari. I can't do it manually as we will need to do this on machines on mass.

Setting in the UI is located at "Apple>System Preferences>Trackpad>More Gestures". I have looked all over the net and found plenty of enteries for Chrome but none for Safari.

I have tried adding AppleEnableSwipeNavigateWithScrolls to com.apple.Safari with defaults but doesn't seem to work at all.

There is a free program called Better Touch Tool (http://www.boastr.de/) which allows you to disable gestures, or set specific gestures, on a per-app basis.


Deleting a file on the NAS says "delete immediately" but it is still on the NAS's recycle bin? I have a WD NAS, and sometimes I right click a file and choose "Move to Trash", a box pops up saying the file will be deleted immediately (and cannot be undone).  So I thought I released the space.

But later on, I found that the NAS actually has a folder called "Recycle Bin," and the deleted files are still there.  So, it looks like the space  is actually not released, and I have to find the Recycle Bin on different volumes and then delete the files.

That is kind of manual and low level and is hard to manage.  Is there a way to do it in the Dashboard or configure it so that it really is "delete immediately"?

P.S. I just found, what's more, if I move some files between Shares in the same NAS -- note that it is "moving", then the NAS actually decrease in storage, and I found the file in the Recycle Bin... so it is like a copy and delete. This makes it even harder to manage.

P.S. I found out Recycle Bin seems to be on a "per share" level, meaning each share can be configured to have a recycle bin or not.  If there is no recycle bin, then the file is immediately deleted and space released.

This is not new and many NAS boxes have this feature.  It's just a method to provide for recovery, in addition to backup.

  I have to find the Recycle Bin on different volumes and then delete the files? That is kind of manual and low level and is hard to manage. Is there a way to do it in the Dashboard or configure it so that it really is "delete immediately"?

From your Apple (SMB) client?  No.  This is no more different that connecting to a friends MacBook via a shared folder and deleting a file.  You would have no access to empty their trash.

Why?  Because the inherent property of a NAS is sharing and usually by more than one person.  For instance, if we both deleted files from a NAS and you realized you needed it back, you wouldn't appreciate me emptying the trash of your things.

However, emptying of the Trash doesn't have to be a manual process.  FreeNAS, and my Synology NAS both have a feature for both manually emptying the trash as well as setting up a schedule to do so.  Here's a screen grab from my personal Synology:

Check your NAS documentation to see if you can set a schedule for when the trash gets emptied.

  What's more, if I move some files between Shares in the same NAS -- note that it is "moving", then the NAS actually decrease in storage, and I found the file in the Recycle Bin... so it is like a copy and delete. This makes it even harder to manage.

Yes, especially so if you're doing it from an SMB client like your MacBook.  A move is, in fact, a copy and delete.  This is not a fault of of the OS - macOS on your client and Linux (likely) on the NAS.  It's just a reality of SAMBA.

While I absolutely love my NAS for the convenience it brings, I try not to do any massive file operations from my client device.  Instead I will log in either via the web interface or via SSH so that a move (mv is actually a move and not a copy/delete).  In effect, I bypass SAMBA for these operations.


Apple Mail won't delete messages Lately I have problems deleting messages in Apple Mail (Mac OS 10.11).
I select one or multiple messages, hit delete key and get an error saying that these messages have already been "deleted" (moved to the trash folder in Mail): that's not true, the trash folder is empty and I'm stuck with the problem.

What should I do? I tried also to rebuilt Mail's mailbox with Onyx utility, but the problem persist.

Any idea? Thanks

I had the same problem. Tried rebuilding Mail mailboxes, re setting preferences and so on to no avail. Then rebuilt and repaired whole hard drive with DiskWarrior 5. So far no further problems. Perhaps a coincidence, perhaps a solution but I pass it on for what it is worth.


Reservations on buying a mini DisplayPort to VGA adapter I'm planning on buying a mini DisplayPort to VGA adapter to make use of my unused Samsung 20" monitor. I'm planning to use it so that I can extend my desktop in my MacBook Pro.

I have some reservations if it would work fine. I've heard others complaining that it doesn't work when they attach their VGA cords to the device. Do you think the cause of it is just their monitors or MacBooks not capable of supporting a the highest resolution?  The maximum resolution of my 13" MBP is 1280x800. I'm quite sure that my 20" monitor can handle this.

Am I right with my hunch?
What's the issue why other monitors tend to not work at all when attached to the device?

I have several aftermarket mini DisplayPort to VGA adapters (el-cheapo like Monoprice.com) to work perfectly with several Macs and various monitors and projectors.

Moreover, I am ever pleased and surprised at how well VGA works considering the old tech.

It should "just work" for a 20" VGA display. The Displays control panel will let you select resolutions up to the max supported by the display and extend the desktop from your MacBook. Performance should be excellent.

I use a cheap mini DisplayPort adapter ($9) with 2008 and 2010 15" MacBook Pros and various VGA displays and projectors and it has always worked with no fuss, even over way-too-long VGA cables (50') connected to a high-def projector.

VGA is component video so signal integrity means a lot for image clarity. For a desktop 20" LCD display on a normal cable, it will appear fine.


JBL Soundfly Air with multi-router AirPort Express WiFi I got my hands on a JBL Soundfly, but it shows some trouble when I connect it to my home WiFi, which consists of 2 first generation AirPort Express linked by a cable to create a shared network.

The AirPorts are set to 802.11n only (2.4 GHz).

When I stream music from my iPhone via Airplay the connection gets disrupted a lot (noticeable audio gaps).

When I attach another WiFi-Router to the network, and connect the Soundfly to that AP, it plays without problem.

Does anyone have the Soundfly running in a similar AirPort Express network and does not experience any problem?

Turns out the JBL Soundfly officially only supports 802.11b/g according to this document (page 3).

This leaves me wondering why it apparently worked with the 802.11n network, or whether that was a problem with my test. But now it has been working for a few minutes without any problems.


Time Machine is recording *diminishing* amounts of bytes Many issues are concerned with insufficient storage for Time Machine's disk. Mine is the opposite, it would seem that available storage is ignored.

MacBook Pro: 15-inch 2018
Memory: 16GB 2400MHz DDR4
MacOS Big Sur Version 11.1
Time Machine disk: Seagate Backup Plus Drive, 8TB
Time Machine works correctly. I can explore material back to 2016.
Encryption: I started it this week. It's at 18%. I recognize that
it's a slow process.
Automatic backup is turned off in order not to delay encryption.

Yes; backup not an archive -- but I like sometimes to be able to explore ancient material.
Using info last night I saw 940,570,304,512 bytes used; call it 940,570 MB. I did a (manual) backup. The amount used diminished to 939,733 MB. A succession of further checks showed 939,800 ... 939,816 ... 939,818 ... so increasing ... 939,906 ... 939,908 MB. I shut the machine down. This morning, upon start-up, that figure is reduced; it's now 939,760.
It's as if a limit of 1TB is somehow set -- yet I have an 8TB drive.

Has such a limit been set somewhere?
If so, where?
How can I see it?
How can I reset it?

Time Machine compresses backups based on a regular schedule. Ultimately you will end up with weekly backups. This occurs regardless of your free storage space.
When you run out of space, it will start deleting whatever backups you have, oldest first, until you have enough space to complete a new one.


BootCamp "boot to OSX" boots to recovery instead of macOS I have a Mac Pro from 2010. I've set it up with BootCamp and Windows 7 back in 2010.

When in macOS, I can change the boot disk to BOOTCAMP and it will boot Windows 7 on restart.
When in Windows7, there is the BootCamp tray icon I can click and choose "Boot to OS X", but on reboot it will not load macOS but will boot from the "OS X Base System" instead.

Is there a way I can fix BootCamp in Windows, so it will choose the right macOS disk instead of this recovery disk?

The reason I'd need to do this is that I wanted to upgrade to a PC graphics card. The card works great in macOS and in Windows 7, but it doesn't show the boot menu (ALT at startup), so the only way I could get back to macOS from Windows is to choose "Boot to OS X".

I updated to macOS Sierra 10.12.1 and also installed a new BootCamp version in Windows (BootCamp 5.1) but the problem is still there.
My guess is, that back when I installed BootCamp in 2010, OS X didn't have that recovery disk yet. So probably BootCamp now thinks "Recovery HD" is my regular OS X installation for some reason.

Update

I'll add info about my disks. diskutil list gives this output:

/dev/disk0 (internal, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *500.1 GB   disk0
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk0s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS master                  498.6 GB   disk0s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             1.3 GB     disk0s3

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

/dev/disk2 (internal, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *3.0 TB     disk2
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk2s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS data_disk               3.0 TB     disk2s2

/dev/disk3 (internal, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *1.0 TB     disk3
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk3s1
   2:       Microsoft Basic Data BOOTCAMP                427.3 GB   disk3s2

master is my OS X partition where 10.12.1 Sierra is installed on.

When selecting "Boot to OS X" in Windows, it should boot from master. But it always boots from Recovery HD instead.

Update 2

I couldn't find a solution for why BootCamp's "Boot to OS X" functionality doesn't work. But I found a workaround today:

I set my master (macOS) as startup disk.
I installed BootChamp in macOS. It allows me to click "Restart into Windows". This doesn't change the startup disk but boots into Windows just one time.
When in Windows, I can simply reboot and it will start macOS again.

This way I can boot both operating systems without seeing the EFI boot menu.

A possible solution would be to install rEFInd in your EFI partition. I would first test by installing rEFInd on a USB flash drive. If MacOS and Windows boot from rEFInd, then you could copy rEFInd to you EFI partition.


"t" key always pressed on mac For some reason, my Mac keyboard always thinks that the "t" key is always being pressed. However as you can see I can still type in the letter t, but it comes out delayed compared to the other keys. I think it is a software bug as the key still works fine, but on some pages the t key just gets spammed. Oddly enough, shift+t won't give me an uppercase t, but all the other letters work fine (and my caps lock has been converted to a backspace, so I can't test that (by choice)). this has happened before, but typically goes away after a restart, but this one time a restart didn't help.

Edit: Currently on Macbook Air (1 generation ago)

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but most likely your "T" key has a crumb of food or some dust stuck underneath it.

Canned air sometimes works, but sometimes will jam it in there for good.

If it's still under AppleCare, bring it in to an Apple store and look distressed...sometimes it helps to cry a little bit and/or beg. Personally, I just grab a Genius' pant leg and refuse to let go while sobbing loudly.

Generally they can replace the key and/or keyboard, but you may need to go without your laptop for a week.


How would I access my 2012 MacBook Air's Hard drive? I recently spilled liquid on my 2012 13' macbook air (4,2) and now I would like to access the data that is (hopefully) still stored on my harddrive. What would I buy to read the data externally, as my laptop is currently not working. Is there a special wire or case that I have to get?

Thanks in advance for any help.

This site claims that the drive is not officially user replaceable, but it’s simply a case of the connector being different.

But you say it’s the Mid 2012 model 4,2? That is the model number for the Mid 2011 model as per the specifications listed here. iFixit has a good rundown on how to get to that one. And Other World Computing sells and external enclosure called the Envoy that can take that internal SSD and make it an external USB 3.0 drive. Instructions on how to install a drive in that Envoy enclosure are here as well.


Is there an alternative App to Mail on iPad? I'm looking for another app than Mail on my iPad. I have searched the appStore without success.

Is there not other emailers on iPad ?

A solution would be to use Gmail web app and add it to the dashboard.

The iPad web interface is pretty nice, I believe it works offline, too. One of the main problem is that there's no new mail notification.


Can I globally change the cmd-Q shortcut to require holding for two seconds, like the option in Chrome? Many, many times, I accidentally press ⌘+Q when I meant to close a tab or window, or switch applications. When I saw the option in Google Chrome to require the shortcut to be held, I was overjoyed. Problem is, I use Safari.

So, in short: How can I make the "hold command-Q" shortcut universal across all of my applications (or at least Safari)?

Here's a partial solution for starters:

Preventing accidental quitting in Safari (or any specific application)

Simply set up an unusual keyboard shortcut for the "Quit Safari" menu item in Keyboard preferences.

This will disable the standard ⌘Q shortcut, so accidentally hitting it doesn't make a difference — and you have to think before you quit!

(Unfortunately, I haven't found an easy way to do this for every application, without entering each one manually.)


How to access internet on an Apple iBook G3 without Airport Card? I got an old Apple iBook (second generation G3 if I'm not mistaken) without an Airport Card.

Are there any other options to access the internet on it besides the ethernet port?
Could I share the WiFi from a smartphone with the iBook or something like that?

That is going to be tricky because any new usb wifi adapters are probably not going to have the driver support with the OS you are going to be using.
(If you are right about the model the maximum OS is 10.4.11.)

Amazon has original airport cards for sale and it looks like they aren't too expensive compared to newer adapters (~$20). That's the solution I'd use to get that computer online.


keybinding for macOS Sierra As it needs 3 keys on a German keyboard (alt shift 7) to get a backslash, I would like to use the keys on the numerical keyboard to get this character (and others difficult to obtain as é).  I tried two different versions of ~/Library/Keybindings/DefaultKeyBinding.dict
available at
http://alexanderstoffel.selfip.org/KeyBindings/DefaultKeyBinding1.dict
and
http://alexanderstoffel.selfip.org/KeyBindings/DefaultKeyBinding2.dict
After rebooting, the first version has the effect that hitting the corresponding keys does neither insert the former nor the desired character but the acoustic system alert is audible. The second version does not have any effect. How can I get the desired effect?  I am using a MacBook Air with macOS Sierra (10.12.1) and with an additional Apple Keyboard (Product-ID: 0x0250).

I haven't had much luck the keybinding dict route, seems very spotty what works and what doesn't. Far easier to use an app like Ukulele to make a tweaked keyboard layout exactly how you want it - no issues whatsoever. Much recommended.


Will reinstalling macOS delete my data and installed apps? My os (macOS High Sierra) got corrupted and login screen doesn't appear.. if I reinstall macOS from recovery menu will my previously installed software and data be deleted?

And if so how can I back them up on a hard drive, the data and the software are very important to me.

Reinstalling macOS from the recovery menu does not erase your data. However, if there is a corruption issue, your data may be corrupted as well, its really hard to tell.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204904

I will take this time to remind you that the time for backup is BEFORE you have an issue, so hopefully you have a Time Machine backup or Carbon Copy Cloner disk around.

To gain access to the disk depends on what model Mac you have. An older Macbook or Macbook Pro likely has a hard drive that is removable, allowing you to connect it externally using an enclosure or cable. Newer Macbook/Macbook Pros and iMacs make it much more difficult, as their SSDs are not removable or very difficult to remove. I recommend you review the step by step guides at ifixit.com to see if you are brave enough.

Otherwise, find a friend's Mac, and follow these Apple instructions to set your Mac in 'target disk mode' and allow the other Mac to access your files to copy them off. Again, the corruption might make this impossible.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201462

Oh, and backup your computer!


How can I get boot details when booting from Snow Leopard DVD? I'm running into a situation where I need to repair my main partition but I can not get my machine to boot off the Snow Leopard DVD. It will boot up, let me choose my language, then go to the "Preparing Installation" (I think that's what it says) screen just before you get to the install wizard and utilities. After that the screen goes gray and then the machine cuts off, black screen, no lights, no power.

Also I seem unable to boot into an Ubuntu install cd (which seems to hang up) or into Safe Mode via holding Shift at startup (which gives me folder with a question mark in it).

Does you guys know any way I can get details about what's going on to see what the problem is? The disc I'm using is the 10.6 Snow Leopard DVD when it first came out (no idea if newer burns have updated versions).

Specs:

2008 unibody MacBook Pro 15" 4 gb
1067 DDR3
2.53 Core 2 320 gb HD
10.6.4 OS X (upgarded install from the original 10.5)

I'm tempted to just try installing 10.5 fresh and see if I can do the upgrade, or find out how to get a detailed boot from the Ubuntu install disc.

EDIT: Just as a note, I can boot fine off my 10.5 install disc that came with my laptop originally. I'm just not sure if any changes between then and 10.6 would make using those disk utilities a bad idea. I know the versions are different. Also the memtest utility was successful off the Ubuntu disc, but it just sort of hangs up during the boot process.

There should be a point—after you choose the language, but before it starts trying to install the OS—where you see a Utilities option in the menu bar.

Do you get to this point? If so, what happens when you choose Disk Utility?

There's more information about this at Using Disk Utility to Repair a Disk (University of Wisconsin).

OK, now it's a different question, so here's my different answer:

If repairing your main partition is what you want to accomplish, why not just run Disk Utility off the 10.5 system disk?


macOS Mojave disable all 4 rounded window corners either with defaults, or software, or programatically Is there a system API, or utility (open source), or default I can set to disable all 4 rounded window corners on macOS?

I've checked the two other prominent questions relating to this:

Can I change 10.8.2 Mountain Lion window corners from rounded to squared?
How can I disable rounded window corners in OS X

And the links are either dead, or the offered solution does not work.

I figured it out, I used ThemeEngine to edit the appropriate theme in SystemAppearance.bundle.
I made a repo with the changes here: https://github.com/tsujp/custom-macos-gui
I know StackExchange hate linking answers so here is a summary for my case:

Using ThemeEngine edit the files in DarkAquaAppearance.car
The files you need to edit are WindowFrame_WindowShapeEdges
Change the masks to squares.
Change the base to completely transparent.
Reboot or otherwise restart the Dock, Finder, SystemUIServer, etc.


How do I enable Java Web Start for ASDM Launcher (Cisco ASA management) in Mountain Lion? I've been trying to get my Cisco ASA management software working and on Snow Leopard, it ran fine. However, even after installing Java manually on Mountain Lion (on my new Macbook Pro), I continue to receive this message:

I've searched as best as I can and my google-fu is really failing me here. How do I resolve this? There's nothing in the Java Preferences pane that even references Web Start applications. Help?

Edit: Clicking on the "More Info..." button sends me to http://www.java.com/en/download/mac_download.jsp which is where I downloaded and installed Java from the first time I got this error.

If this is indeed a bug with your application and Java 7 as Mark mentioned, you can re-enable the previously-Apple-provided Java 6 and Web-Start functionality by following the steps from HT5559. The steps are below, along with commands to undo these changes, if they do not help.

Open Terminal in an administrator account (Terminal is in /Applications/Utilities) and run this command: sudo mkdir -p /Library/Internet\ Plug-Ins/disabled to create a directory for "disabled" plugins that you don't want to run.

Run sudo mv /Library/Internet\ Plug-Ins/JavaAppletPlugin.plugin /Library/Internet\ Plug-Ins/disabled to move your current Java plugin to the new "disabled" folder.

Run

  sudo ln -sf
  /System/Library/Java/Support/Deploy.bundle/Contents/Resources/JavaPlugin2_NPAPI.plugin
  /Library/Internet\ Plug-Ins/JavaAppletPlugin.plugin

to link Apple's Java plugin to make it your current JavaAppletPlugin.

Run

 sudo ln -sf
 /System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Commands/javaws
 /usr/bin/javaws

to re-enable Java Web-Start.

To disable the above, follow the directions below:

Open Terminal in an administrator account and run:

 sudo ln -sf
 /System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Versions/Current/Commands/javaws
 /usr/bin/javaws

to disable Java 6 Web-Start and replace it with the newest Web-Start functionality.

and Re-install the newest Java Runtime Environment 7 from Oracle.


How to execute terminal command on energy efficient cores on M1 chip? I want to run nodejs process on E cores, but when I run it I see that it uses P cores even if there is a 0.3 second task.

What you want to do is technically known as setting a "CPU affinity", i.e. letting the operating system scheduler know, which CPU core a process should be allowed to run on.
As far as I know, macOS does not come with a GUI or command line program for setting CPU affinity. This is unlike some other operating systems, such as for example Linux that features a simple taskset command for that purpose.
However, the absence of a nice tool does not mean that it is impossible to do. Far from it. Apple does provide an API for programmers that allow them to set CPU affinity.
As you indicate that you want to set the CPU affinity for various nodejs processes, it seems likely that you're developing software or running open-source software where you can modify the source code. In that case you can set the CPU affinity by way of the thread_policy_set() function.
For example if you have a Mach thread named thread that you want to schedule only on core #7, you can do it like this:
thread_affinity_policy_data_t policy = { 7 };
thread_policy_set(thread, THREAD_AFFINITY_POLICY, (thread_policy_t)&policy, 1);


iOS Stacks or equivalent functionality Fairly simple question, is there a way, either through existing functionality or by jail breaking that you can add Stacks to the iOS dock.

EDIT:
There are three different formats in the way that Stacks work on OSX, Grid (iOS Folder View), Fan and List.

Is there any implementation of Fan or List views?

Long press any app icon to enter "wiggle mode".
Drag the desired folder to the Dock.
Press the Home button to exit "wiggle mode".

Done!


Safari SSH Tunneling Troubleshooting Diagnostics What diagnostics / troubleshooting can be performed to meet the goal?

Goal: tunnel through a remote router, with port 22 enabled for SSH access via SSH.  Asus RT68U Router outfitted with Merlin Firmware

Background:

ssh tunnel setup from terminal: ssh -D 3000 -N user@mydomain.fqdn.com
proxy setup:

Note: username / pw is accepted by router on the WAN side.

Observations:

Tunnel failure indicated: Safari does not return any webpages when proxy is engaged.
Terminal indicates:

channel 2: open failed: administratively prohibited:
channel 3: open failed: administratively prohibited:
channel 4: open failed: administratively prohibited:
channel 5: open failed: administratively prohibited:

The litmus test is www.whatismyip.com should return the FQDN's WAN IP address.

What diagnostic tests can be performed to determine corrective action?  Any diagnostic questions to advance the effort is appreciated: thank you.

Is it possible that having identical subnets 192.168.1.X at both ends is problematic?

SSH Implementations?

ipkg list_installed | grep ssh

openssh-sftp-server - 5.9p1-1 - sftp-server only from a FREE version of the SSH protocol suite of network connectivity tools.

  ls /etc/dropbear/

returns:

  dropbear_dss_host_key    dropbear_ecdsa_host_key
  dropbear_rsa_host_key

Attempt to find sshd_config:

  cd /; find . | grep sshd_config

does not return anything

Attempted to install 'full' OpenSSH server:

ipkg install openssh-server

returned errors:

  Configuring portmap /opt/sbin/portmap: can't resolve symbol
  '__register_frame_info' postinst script returned status 1 ERROR:
  portmap.postinst returned 1 Nothing to be done An error ocurred,
  return value: 4. Collected errors: Cannot find package openssh-server.
  Check the spelling or perhaps run 'ipkg update'

The reason your attempt fails is because the remote host (i.e. the router at mydomain.fqdn.com) doesn't allow you to forward the traffic through the SOCKS proxy. This is the meaning of the "open failed: administratively prohibited" message.

In order to fix this, you'll need to change the SSH configuration on the remote router at mydomain.fqdn.com. In case that system uses OpenSSH, you need to check that your sshd_config adheres to the following:

AllowTCPForwarding must not be set to "no" (i.e. don't set it or set it to "yes")
PermitOpen must either not be set, set to "any" or set to allow the IP address of the "www.whatismyip.com" web site you're testing with.

If you're using SSH keys to authenticate, check that your authorized_keys file on the router does not have a "no-port-forwarding" limitation on your key, or that you have "permitopen" limitations that doesn't explicitly allow the IP address of the "www.whatismyip.com" web site.

If the remote router uses something else than OpenSSH to offer its SSH service, it might not support the TCP forwarding / SOCKS proxy feature at all. You'll want to check the documentation for the device to see if it does support the feature, and if so, how to enable it.

UPDATE: You have updated your question to include information that indicates that you're using a "homespun" router using a variant of OpenWrt. In addition you specify that you have just the openssh-sftp-server package installed.

The solution is then to install the full OpenSSH, namely from the openssh-server package. You can do that with the following command on the router command line:

ipkg install openssh-server


Why did I get a notification on my phone that says "Your Apple ID is now being used for iMessage on a new iPod Touch"? I was very confused when I saw this notification. I've been asking my mom to get me an Apple Watch and I'm not sure if she is trying to surprise me.

If your mom got an iPod and knows your Apple ID, that might explain it. Does she know your Apple ID?

This can also happen with existing devices already on your account if it needs to re-sign-in to iMessage.

Go to Settings > iCloud > tap your account name/photo on top and sign in > Devices. That will show you all of your devices. Tap the new iPod and answer your account security questions to see details about it and locate it on a map ("Show in Find My iPhone...") provided that it is powered on and set up for Find My iPhone.

Or you can open the Find iPhone app on your phone if you don't remember your security questions and want to locate it. If you see it's on and in your house, you can make it ring to locate it, but that will get rid of the surprise I guess. Or if it looks like someone else somewhere else is using the device with your Apple ID, you can wipe the device and remove it from your account.


Under Lion, unable to log in with DisplayLink drivers installed I have a mid-2009 MBP 15", and I recently upgraded to lion.

I also have DisplayLink hardware which worked fine under SnowLeopard.

With Lion, as per http://www.displaylink.org/forum/showthread.php?t=1059, I am unable to log in, ever, once I install the DisplayLink drivers -- even if I have none of the DL hardware plugged in. I had to reinstall Lion to recover.

The forum thread suggests turning off 'automatic graphics switching' as a workaround.

I could flip that setting and then install the drivers and reboot again. If it doesn't work, however, it's another Lion install, which is quite time-consuming. Is there some mechanism I am missing that would allow me to recover my system more rapidly if the workaround is unhelpful?

I have this problem as well.  However, I discovered that I WAS able to log in - the issue is the login prompt (and later some window content) was not displaying.

Once I plugged in the displayLink display, I was able to uninstall the driver.  However, the displayLink forum says this is due to a Lion issue with video drivers covered in this thread:  http://www.displaylink.org/forum/showthread.php?t=1059

So this needs to be address; I am out a display until this is fixed.


How in the world do you remove an action in iAd producer? I am using iAd producer this afternoon to make iAds for some of my apps. I have googled around but I still cannot figure out how to remove an action that I have added to an action list. I have tried dragging the action out of the list, control clicking, alt clicking, command clicking, but I can't figure it out.

How do I delete the action?


Apple Mail not showing mails in Smart Mailbox after upgrading to 10.15.2 There were around 500 mails in my Smart Mailbox. I upgraded from Catalina 10.15.0 to 10.15.2. Now it is showing only 3 mails.

Inbox folder shows all the mails. They just don't appear in "Smart Mailbox".

Smart Mailbox settings

Discrepancy in mails

Inbox shows 503 while Smart mailbox shows only 3.

Steps to solve it:

Goto to "Inbox" in mailboxes
Press "Cmd + A" to select all messages
Click Message > "Move to Google Again"

This rebuilds all the "Smart Mailboxes".


Stuck in soft dfu mode My iPod(4g iOS 6.1.6) is stuck in soft DFU mode because I quit out of redsn0w to early. Then I also used an app to exit recovery mode and now it's in soft DFU mode. I had to use the DFU IPSW in order to put my device in DFU mode in the first place.

When I attempt to restore it in iTunes, after the "extracting software" step, it says "preparing ipod for restore". After the 1-2 minutes pass the boot logo does not show up it says "The iPod (iPod) could not be restored. An unknown error occurred (1601).

I'm just going to try and let my iPod die and then reboot it. Any alternate suggestions to regain control of the device?

Use ReiBoot app to push the phone out of recovery mode cycle. I had the same problem and only one that app solved it. I tried going into DFU mode and  without DFU mode, using .ipsw files to restore old and new iOS version, and none worked. I installed ReiBoot and in 5 minutes I solved the problem. Just install the app for mac (I do not know if it works for windows) and plug the iPhone in the computer. Open the ReiBoot and push the phone out of recovery mode cycle. VOILA! This was the only thing that worked for me. Nothing else worked. I tried different USB ports, different USB cables, nothing else worked, literally.


How to share .bash_profile between different users in the same group? I have searched by google but cannot find a right solution.The scenario is like this: in my mac, there are two users, lets say user1, user2. these two users are in the same group, which is staff actually.

Now in user2, there is a .bash_profile for user2's terminal, can i share this profile with the user1? I know i can copy one from user2 to user1. but if i copy one, when there is something changed in user2, i have to copy it again. I wonder whether there is a way to share it with user1?

i work it out by using command ln -s /Users/user2/.bash_profile /Users/user1/.bash_profile.
But by only this command, i can only change the .bash_profile in user2. in user1, you can only use the file in the read-only mode. Then i check the .bash_profile privilege in user2. its rw-r--r--. So i do chmod 664 /Users/user2/.bash_profile. Finally i can share the .bash_profile in different users.


Create a text encoding conversion service in Automator I was trying to make a Finder service to easily convert text encoding of some files. Because the default charset for Simplified Chinese in Windows is the Chinese national standard GB18030 (not the UTF-8 used on Mac).

With some help from the answers at services - Automator Get Filename of Selected File - Ask Different, I set up Service receives selected: Files or folders in:Finder

Then, I made this Shell script in Automator:

for f in "$@"
do
    iconv -f gb18030 -t utf-8 f > f.new
done

However, when I run the service when selecting f, I don't see the newly created f.new in Finder. I guess I have set the output path wrong. But I don't know what is the right way to fix it.

Change:

for f in "$@"
do
    iconv -f gb18030 -t utf-8 f > f.new
done

To:

for f in "$@"; do
    if [[ ! $(basename "$f") =~ .*\..* ]]; then
        iconv -f gb18030 -t utf-8 < "$f" > "${f}-new"
    else
        iconv -f gb18030 -t utf-8 < "$f" > "${f%.*}-new.${f##*.}"
    fi
done

And set Pass input: to as arguments on the Run Shell Script action.

To address the comment made by Gordon Davisson to handle a filename with no extension, I've modified the code in my answer above.

The code tests the filename portion of the fully qualified pathname passed to the Run Sell Script action using a regex to see if it has an extension, or more literally a . as part of the filename, and if there is no . in the filename it process the if branch, otherwise it processes the else branch.

Also note that using a glob instead of a regex, e.g.:

if [[ ! $(base name "$f") == *.* ]]; then

Would also work to test for an extension. Either way the new fully qualified pathname will appropriately follow one of these two examples:

/path/to/filename becomes: /path/to/filename-new
/path/to/filename.ext becomes: /path/to/filename-new.ext

Note: This answer assumes fully qualified pathnames do not contain null characters and or carriage returns and or linefeeds. IMO Proper pathnames do not contains such characters and I will not test for them.


macOS briefly falls back to console after login A few days ago, my 2018 MacBook Air entered console mode after logging in:

and then switches back to graphical mode (full video here).
I didn't install any system updates. I didn't see anything in the system logs. Console output shows nothing relevant (AFAIK).
Also, after this issue appeared, macOS asks me to allow incoming network connections for emlog.pl.
Any idea how to debug this issue? I've already tried to reset NVRAM, PRAM and SMC.

It seems like you have filevault enabled. You also have verbose mode enabled.
Because of this macOS needs to finish booting into the decrypted drive and it shows verbose output.  To avoid this disable filevault or verbose mode. That should fix the problem.
To disable filevault go to system preferences->security->FileVault and disable it there. If you want to disable verbose mode then I think you need to change back boot-args by running sudo nvram -d boot-args.


As a developer, what will I miss on a Macbook Air? [MBA vs MBP] I am an indie game developer. I am in love with the Mackbook Air [13 inch], and want to buy it. I was wondering:

Will I miss the DVD drive, and upgradability if I am choosing a Macbook Air over Macbook Pro or a Thinkpad Machine?
Is the form factor and battery backup time worth the choice?
Is it good for iPhone/Android Development?
Will I be able to run my favorite open-source tools from Ubuntu, like GIMP/Blender etc.? If not, will I be able to dual boot Ubuntu? (I know I can do Windows)

[PS: Please don't suggest me the new Macbook Pro Retina, as it is quite an investment to afford. And, I am very new to the Mac world. :-) ]

You'll do just fine with a MacBook Air, at least, that's what I'd go for (and I'm in love with the Air as well :))

  I will miss the DVD drive, and upgrade ability if I am choosing a
  Macbook Air over Macbook Pro or a Thinkpad Machine?

Who uses a drive more then 2 times a year these days? I don't and I think most of the Mac users don't. And if you really need one, you can try Apple's USB Superdrive or if you don't want to pay, you can try the DVD and CD sharing within Mac OS X.

  Is the form factor and backup time, worth the choice?

It's the smallest notebook of the two (MacBook Air vs. MacBook Pro), so form factor will do just fine. About the back-up time, I'm not sure what you mean, but as it's all Flash storage inside, reading and writing to the hard drive will go extremely fast.

  Is it good for iPhone/Android Development?

Yep. It's full size keyboard and gorgeous screen will allow you to do everything you can on a MacBook Pro, but you'll have a lighter and smaller notebook.

  Will I be able to run my favorite Open Source tools from Ubuntu, like
  GIMP/Blender etc.,? If not will I be able to dual boot Ubuntu? (I know
  I can do Windows)

You'll be able to dual boot Ubuntu without any hassle. Here is a good tutorial how to install it using a Flash drive


Monitor not waking up after switching KVM input I'm using a 2-port KVM switch between my Mac Mini and a Ubuntu desktop computer. I have no problems with the Ubuntu machine waking up when I switch to the inputs. However, when I switch over to the Mac Mini, the monitor stays dark.

This problem only started after upgrading the Mac Mini to OSX 10.11 El Capitan.

FWIW: When I VNC in from another computer, the monitor fires up just fine and I can do stuff just fine. Then I can use the keyboard and mouse hooked up through the KVM switch on the Mac Mini.

Also, I am switching using the physical buttons on the KVM switch; not a hotkey sequence on the keyboard.

Any ideas?

While I do not have an answer to your problem, I can add a "me too" with having issues with KVM's and El Capitan. I have an ATEN CS1944 kvm that works just fine with everything up to and including Yosemite. When I convert machines to El Capitan the the KVM and the machines freak out when the kvm shifts focus away from the El Capitan machine and then ultimately requires a reboot of the affected machine to get things going again.

Tried numerous work arounds and tweaks with no success. Between this kvm issue and the other issues that arose with the converted machines not playing well as XSAN clients (kept randomly failing to auto-mount the xsan volumes) upon machine startup, I had to bite the bullet and fall back to Yosemite on the 2 converted machines that were attached to the KVM.

I guess it will be a wait for KVM firmware updates and or OS X patches / fixes to try again after the product matures a little more. Keeping the fingers crossed and continuing research for a fix.

Good luck with resolution to your issue as well.


How to enable Chrome's "continue where you left off" for OS X El Capitan? I need Chrome to restore last session tabs after closing its whole window.
Simple "continue where you left off" does not work when I close Chrome's window.

I was looking for the resolution but all I got is useless answers provided by apple fanboys "that is the proper way - closing window does not mean closing a program". Sincerly, I don't accept it.

How to achieve proper behaviour of "continue where you left off"?

First, you want to make sure the setting is enabled in Chrome.    In the upper left corner of the screen, you'll want to click on Chrome -> Preferences and make sure the "continue where you left off" button is checked.

Next, please do understand there is a difference between closing a window and closing a program.   Command - Q is used to exit a program completely.    In OS X, if you close a window using the "red x" in the upper left corner, you are closing out a window, and not the program.

To see this work correctly...  try opening 3-4 tabs.   Then press  Command - Q.    Then relaunch Chrome.   You should see all your tabs there.


Do you know a simple sound booster app for Mac? Some videos on websites have the sound volume so low that even with all sound settings at maximum levels it's hard to listen.

I'm looking for an app that would allow me to boost the Mac's volume. Something similar to VLC volume controls.

I already looked at Audio Hijack, but it has way too much features for what I'm looking for.
Anything free of charge would be a plus. :)

You can boost the volume of videos playing in Chrome using free extensions. I found the Ears chrome plugin works quite well. Steps:

install the plugin
click the Ears extension icon in chrome
drag the baseline from 0 up to +5
click EQ this tab


Opening a subset of bookmarks in a Bookmark Folder I imported my bookmark folders from Chrome, which I now hate.  How can I open a subset of bookmarks in a folder, but NOT ALL bookmarks in the folder, each in a NEW tab.  I am using Safari 7.1.5 and OS X 10.9.5

Which ever way you look through the Bookmarks in Safari, it will offer you the option a sub menu to "open In Tabs"

Example: From the Bookmarks menu bar.


MacBook Pro running Tiger 10.4 erase start up disk I do not have the original disks but the computer has been upgraded to Snow Leopard.  I have the Snow Leopard 10.6.3 disks but the computer will not allow the disks access to my startup disk.  I need to erase all and restore the computer to its original state so I can sell it. I have talked to Apple and they say the machine is too old and they do not have the original disks available.

If the disks you have are not full retail disks [grey background rather than white, quite often], then they may not work on all machines, but only those they were designed for at the time.

Apple still sell the Snow Leopard DVD - http://store.apple.com/us/product/MC573Z/A/mac-os-x-106-snow-leopard - though whether it's really worth $19 these days is debatable.

If you know anyone with an Apple Developer account, Snow Leopard is available as a disk image, directly downloadable from Download Mac OS X 10.6 10a432 DVD image (direct link from Apple), for burning to DVD.


Make non-Apple mouse scroll smoothly I've begun using a Logitech G600 and customizing it with Folivora, and the power of the combination is incredible. It's speeding up my workflow and making it more intuitive.

However... I miss the smooth scrolling of my Magic Mouse/Trackpad something awful. The jerky, clicking, jumpy scrolling really grates on me.

Is there a way to somehow make my non-Apple mouse scroll smoothly?

After a bit more digging I found a free tool that takes care of this.