Messages using email instead of phone number Messages shows the email of the person I am sending to instead of their phone number on some contacts. Why is it picking the email up for some contacts and the number for others

A single contact entry in your iPhone may have one or more email address, phone number or both listed.

People using iPhone are logged in with their Apple ID which requires an email address to create. The phone number of the iPhone gets linked to the Apple ID. However, Apple ID can be used to login into Mac or an iPad as well. It's also possible that a person is using a Mac or iPad and not having an iPhone, in which case the phone number doesn't get linked with Apple ID.

Messages app on iPhone gives priority to iMessage over SMS (if the recipient's email/phone number is registered with Messages). The Messages app displays the email address of the recipient if it's an Apple ID. The message can be sent as an iMessage.

In your case, its possible that the contact has only email address available and it's an Apple ID registered with Messages. If the contact also has a phone number saved, it will be listed and SMS can be sent to it.


Bootcamp partitioning stuck on 'Status: Idle' I've been trying to install Windows 10 onto a Mac mini (late 2012, Catalina) using a 16GB USB. The bar for partitioning fills up and then I put in my password and the bar is stuck on idle.

So far I've tried to:

restart the Mac from the Windows disk, but it froze the computer.
restart in Single User mode (⌘ Command  S).

Resizing the container where Catalina is installed can take an extremely long time. In fact, if you issue a diskutil apfs resizeContainer command, you can get a message stating this. Also, the message will state resizing can execute faster if you boot to macOS Recovery. The Boot Camp Assistant must use the same software to resize and make space for Windows, but no warning is issued with respect to time. So, I can see where a user would conclude something is wrong, when in fact it really does take that long to resize.

Restarting the Mac, during resizing of the container where Catalina is install, probably would cause the container to be corrupted. You could try boot to macOS Recovery over the internet and then use the Disk Utility to run Fist Aid on the container.


How can I change the default bash look? My bash is white and black and I would like it to look much more colorful, how do I do that?

Terminal -> Preferences -> Settings

Select a color scheme and click Default


How do I change the location of the Music folder on macOS? How can I change the location of the Music folder from /Users/Me/Music to an external drive, so that iTunes saves its stuff there?

This is so that I can access the XML file that you can create from iTunes for Windows programs to use. And yes, I know that the file paths are not the same, but it will still be helpful.

You can set the folder iTunes uses directly in iTunes -> Preferences:


Is there a convenient way for me to use my other macs audio output? I have two macs, one of them is plugged into speakers. Can I use the mac that isn't plugged in to use my other mac for audio output in some convenient fashion?

Sure. Since you can AirPlay system audio there are tons of solutions for this nowadays, any program that can act as an AirPlay receiver.
Many of these are commercial (like AirFoil and AirServer), not exactly made for your use case (media centers like Kodi) or  terminaly/somewhat fiddly (shairport-sync).
There should definitely be streamlined enough freeware/open source implementations out there that aren't outdated and abandoned, but I don't know of any. There's a list on the open-airplay github that might be worth a look.

Last time I needed to do this I used the old school method of soundflower plus a client+server to pass audio - Soundfly is free and still works fine. Can act up occasionally but more robust/set it and forget it than AirPlay in my experience.


Sleep second display I have an iMac with a Thunderbolt display attached.

I know I can force both displays to sleep by pressing ctrl-shift-eject.

How can I force only one display, the Thunderbolt one, to sleep?

I do not use both displays all the time and sometimes I just don't want to waste the electricity.

There is no direct control of this for an individual screen in Mac OS as you also can't go the other way round and turn off the laptop-display to only use the external one without closing the lid and keeping it closed.

I guess you have to not plug in your external monitor if you don't want to use it.


Gboard Keyboard Not Showing Up in Various Google Apps on iPhone Xr iPhone Xr
iOS 12.4
Gboard 2.2.0.247258495
Gmail 6.0.190602
Docs 1.2019.28202
Chat 0.156.259040960

Issue:
I various apps developed by Google, such as Gmail, Docs, Chrome, Chat, the Gboard keyboard is not appearing. Nor is the "globe" icon that should allow one to switch between keyboards. Instead, I'm left with only the basic keyboard.

Screenshots:

Things I've tried/reviewed:

Reinstalling the apps where I'm seeing the issue
Reinstalling Gboard
Restart of iPhone
Tapping where the "globe" should be
Within Settings, rearranging the Gboard keyboard to not be the default
Within Settings, confirmed that the Gboard keyboard has Full Access
Ensured all individual apps, as well as iOS itself, are up to date

Has anyone experienced this issue or have any suggestions of what else to try to resolve this?

I'm having the same issue and like you I've tried everything from reinstalling to trying different custom keyboards. Only the default keyboard and emoji keyboards work in the google apps like gmail, hangout, meet etc. I can't find a lot of people complaining about the issue online so I figured it might be because this is a company device and some permission is blocking it? The custom keyboards work in all other apps so gboard not working with google apps is just baffling.


iCloud Photo Library not uploading anymore I have iCloud photo library enabled on my iPhone (6, iOS 8.3).
Since the weekend it does not upload the photos anymore.
When I go to the Photos settings, it gives me the following messages in a loop:

  2324 Objects waiting for upload
  Uploading 2324 objects

The progressbar shows up, fills up to around 30%, then disapears again.
I translated the messages from German, they might be different when iOS is set to English.
A restart of the phone does not help.

When I go to iCloud.com the photos are not there and also in Photos on my Mac I cannot see them. However when I create a shared album, I get the photos on Photos on my Mac.

Any suggestions?

I tried Photo Library briefly and had a similar problem. The progress bar would go to about 40% then disappear. The problem for me was a lack of storage space, and so it would just fail at a certain point. Go to General > iCloud > Storage to check the amount of space available on your iCloud account, then check the amount your photos take up (I believe this can only be done in iTunes). If the photos don't fit in the available space either buy more space or just turn off the feature as it wastes battery if it is not actually being useful.


Anyone know what libChineseTokenizer.dylib is? I found it in:

/usr/lib/libChineseTokenizer.dylib

It looks like it was installed as part of an update, but want to be sure it's legit.

It's a standard part of macOS. It's supposed to be there.


Will the 4G LTE used in an iPad bought in England also work in Sweden? If I buy a new iPad with 4G LTE in the United Kingdom, will the 4G LTE work in Sweden (with a SIM from a carrier offering 4G LTE obviously)?

I am asking not least because of statements in this article that 4G LTE uses different bands in different countries.

No.
The LTE standard uses different frequencies in the US and Europe. However, the model sold in Europe is the US model. This has been officially confirmed by Apple [1, german].
LTE in the iPad
The iPad supports only the frequencies 700 and 2100 MHz [2] for LTE use. These frequencies are not used for LTE in the EU.
If you take a look at the footnotes, Apple states on their website (US and foreign) that:

4G LTE (is only) supported on AT&T and Verizon networks in the U.S.; Bell, Rogers, and Telus networks in Canada.

LTE worldwide [3]
The following frequencies aren't really such even numbers. They are frequency bands that spread out over a whole spectrum of which little fragments are divided among carriers.

USA: 700, 1800, 2100 MHz
Canada and Mexico: 1800, 2100 MHz
European Union:  800, 1800, 2600 MHz * (bands in use differ widely)
Asia in general: 1800, 2600 MHz
Australia: 1800 MHz

There also exists this table [4] which lists very detailed information on frequencies bands used world wide. You can see here that the the 2100 MHz band is used for UMTS and IMT (= 3G standards) in Europe. The 700 MHz band does not seem to be used by carries in Europe.


Updating iPad- Error message: "Could not start session with iPad" When I try to update my iPad from my Win 7 desktop, I get this error message which says Could not start session with iPad and then the iPad disconnects.

Even during normal syncing I have noticed that my iPad disconnects a few seconds after doing the backup. It's for this reason that I have never been able to do a full sync of my iPad.

Note that the same usb cable/port works just fine for syncing/updating my iPhone 4.

I even tried reinstalling my Apple USB drivers as mentioned here but to no avail.

Several things to try:

Soft reset your iPad by holding the power button and home button at the same time for a few seconds. The iPad will reboot. You won't lose your files so don't worry. When it completely boots up, try the sync again.
If the problem persists, then you may try to use iTunes to restore the OS. Be cautious when using this method because you may lose data. Maybe you should try syncing on another PC/Mac computer before you do this restore:

Connect your iPad to your Windows 7 (cancel sync if you know it won't go through), then click your iPad in the "device" list; Press the restore button and follow the prompts.


Cyberduck Google Drive connection error I've downloaded Cyberduck for Mac. I'm using Mojave 10.14.6 and Cyberduck 7.2.2

I have a google drive 2T account (Google One now) and my Google Backup and Sync is working fine.

I open cyberduck and click on New Connection->Google Drive and I click on Connect

A Chorme page opens where I select my account, and I get the following message:

Sign in with google temporarily disabled for this app
This app has not been verified yet by Google in order to use Google Sign In

Any ideas of what is going on and how to solve?

Unverified app user cap
  To protect users and Google systems from abuse, apps that use OAuth and Cloud Identity have certain quota restrictions based on the risk level of the OAuth scopes an app uses.

  [Sign in with Google temporarily disabled window]

  To remove these screens from your app, or to prevent your app from being marked as risky, you need to go through the verification process.

and

  When your app is successfully verified, the unverified app screen is removed from your client.

... talk to developers and expect them to take action.

  If you were using an app and you were redirected here from an error page, wait one day before you try to use the app again. This should allow the app total new user cap to refresh. If you continue to get an error, the owner of the app might need to take action before you and other new users can access it.

https://support.google.com/cloud/answer/7454865


Use Home as Desktop directory in Yosemite How can I use my Home as the Desktop directory in Yosemite? Deleting the Desktop directory doesn't work after a restart. I would like to do this because I don't like to switch to Desktop dir everytime I take to Terminal and would like to see all my dirs on the "Desktop" screen.

Also please address the permissions aspect of any solution. Since I notice that some of the OSX created directories in my Home have this permission: "drwx------+" I worry that fixing my issue will have ramifications for permissions.

Can I have what I want with the permissions Apple has set?

I'm trying to refrain from starting with "Why would you want to do that?"

You cannot delete the Desktop Folder, the OS should tell you it is a required folder & not allow it. I suppose you could sudo it, but my guess is it would either replace it after a relog, or just cause problems.

Even if you did manage to force it to remove the Desktop Folder, what would the OS then use as your Desktop? It certainly wouldn't default to your Home folder, that's not its job.

I'm sure it would be far simpler all round, if you do want your Home Folders contents directly displayed on your desktop, to make Aliases of those folders & put them inside the Desktop Folder.


Why can't the account password be same as the iCloud password? When you install macOS (10.12 Sierra), enter your iCloud credentials and then get prompted to create a local account on the computer, if you try to enter a password that matches that of the iCloud account you will get an error stating the the local account password cannot be the same as the iCloud account password. Why does macOS install not allow you to set matching passwords?

(It is however possible to enter a different password at first and later change it to match the iCloud account, so it appears there is no technical obstacle to using matching passwords.)

Please note: I'm not interested in comments about using the same password being a good practice or not. I'm interested in knowing why the macOS installer enforces different passwords in this specific case.

Absent any explicit statement from Apple, it's as good as it gets: The reason it enforces different passwords is because it's a good security practice.

The fact you are able to change it later shows that they haven't implemented cross-checking in the later stage but it also shows there are no technical reasons why it has to be the way it is.


Backups not available in Time Machine, but visible in disk's backupdb folder I'm running 10.15.4. I've got Time Machine enabled and backing up to a 2Tb external drive with over 1Tb free (Mac OS Extended (Journaled)). It's been running for months.

But when I "Enter Time Machine" via the menu bar I can only view my backups from today and yesterday. Before that my "latest" backups is 5 months ago. I actually suspect that the visible backups from today/yesterday are local snapshots and not actually on my disk at all (as I can see these while the disk is disconnected).

When I open the actual disk I can see my Backup.backupdb which contains visible hourly snapshots.

If I remove the disk from TM and try to re-add it, it now says there's no "latest" or "first" backup on the disk.

How can repair this?

My oh my. I started playing around with tmutil and it looks like somehow, my entire home directory was added to the exclusion list. I have no idea how it happened but glad to have noticed it now rather than later.


Check Macbook Pro Fan operation speed? I am having Macbook Retina(13 inches). How can I check whether laptop's fan is working or not?

There are a few apps that are available to use as Fan Utilities - they will show you current speed, as well as allow you to enable the fans to full blast.

Here's one I have used previously:

https://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/23049/smcfancontrol

--
Ed


Customizing Wallpaper for Apple Watch Infograph Watch Face? I wanted to create a watch face that has

a customizable wallpaper, and
8 complications like the Infograph watch face.

According to this page, the only customizable feature of Infograph watch face is color, so if I chose this watch face I wouldn't be able to use my own wallpaper.
Clearly, my goal cannot be reached without using any third-party softwares. I tried to search on GitHub but so far I haven't found a perfect solution yet. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Wallpaper can't be changed for the Infograph Watch face.
Even watchOS 7, currently in beta testing, doesn't allow this.
I suggest you provide feedback directly to Apple and indicate you want this ability: https://www.apple.com/feedback/watch.html


can't create user account after reinstall After erasing my hd and reinstalling Mac OS X Mavericks I am not able to create a user account. It just seems to loop. I also tried to create a second account, for that worked last time, but now it even loops with the second one.

So my question: Any ideas what I could try next? I need my Macbook usable until Wednesday, because I have to write and print my CV and don't own any other computer...

By not logging in with my Apple-ID I have been able to create a new user account.


How do i quickly silence all notifications except for ringer on an iPhone 6? Sometimes I'm on call for work overnight and would like to know a quick way that I can silence all notifications except for the call ringer.  The closest thing I see is allowing calls from everyone on do not disturb but that will allow messages to ring as well.

Actually, Do Not Disturb is indeed your solution as it blocks ALL notifications EXCEPT the calls which you specifically allow. It will block message notifications.

After you have configured the settings in Settings -> Do Not Disturb, all you need to do to enable it is swipe up from the bottom of the screen and tap the moon icon.

You can configure it to only allow certain contact groups, favorites, all callers, and/or repeated calls.


Beta Command Line Tools offered as update—why? Today the App Store is offering me the Command Line Tools for Xcode 10.0 beta 1.

I do not recall ever signing up as a beta tester for any Apple software. Why do I get this update and how can I prevent such beta software from being accidentally installed on my system?
I have macOS 10.13.5 and Xcode 9.4. I also have MacPorts with clang 6.0 (newer than the one in Xcode, but it shouldn't interfere).

Update 2019-06-04: It is happening again, this time it is offering "Command Line Tools beta 1 for Xcode 11.0". This seems to be a mistake on Apple's part again (see the accepted answer).
Update 2020-09-15: Again with "Command Line Tools beta 5 for Xcode 12.0".

Apple has also now fixed the same issue which occurred with macOS 10.14 Mojave offering CLTools for macOS 10.15 Catalina. For a short time, the 10.14 catalog included 10.15's tools, but this has since been removed from this catalog and only included in the beta catalog.

https://swscan.apple.com/content/catalogs/others/index-10.14-10.13-10.12-10.11-10.10-10.9-mountainlion-lion-snowleopard-leopard.merged-1.sucatalog.gz

A removal package has not been provided for removing the 10.15 tools specifically this year. You can try removing the tools using the removal package for 10.14 or removing them completely, then reinstall them:

http://swcdn.apple.com/content/downloads/11/13/041-71563/s1da971g95kch5ljsghwjufij12crr2o5b/CLTools_macOS_DevSDK_Remove_1014.pkg
How do I uninstall the command line tools for Xcode?

Apple fixed the issue for macOS 10.13 High Sierra. Refresh the updates with ⌘R and the update should disappear.

This was a bug on Apple's part. Apple has incorrectly released this update to everyone, not just those on a beta upgrade path.

If the update is still shown, you can hide it by right-clicking and choosing Hide Update.

If you've installed the update and realised your tools are broken, you can remove these tools using CLTools_macOS_SDK_Remove_1014.pkg from Apple:

http://swcdn.apple.com/content/downloads/01/53/091-65367/h0b7b20hoylsqj7pih1htv5b9oa9y4z4gq/CLTools_macOS_SDK_Remove_1014.pkg

The update was incorrectly provided in the default software update catalog on High Sierra: https://swscan.apple.com/content/catalogs/others/index-10.13-10.12-10.11-10.10-10.9-mountainlion-lion-snowleopard-leopard.merged-1.sucatalog.gz.

The update is provided for beta and developers in their associated catalogs:

https://swscan.apple.com/content/catalogs/others/index-10.13beta-10.13-10.12-10.11-10.10-10.9-mountainlion-lion-snowleopard-leopard.merged-1.sucatalog.gz
https://swscan.apple.com/content/catalogs/others/index-10.13seed-10.13-10.12-10.11-10.10-10.9-mountainlion-lion-snowleopard-leopard.merged-1.sucatalog.gz

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Stop Mail Activity window being always on top in El Capitan? I like to have Mail's Activity window open in the background, but since upgrading to El Capitan it floats on top of all other Mail windows.

I have another Mac that's still on Yosemite and it doesn't exhibit this behaviour.

Is this a change that was introduced in El Capitan? Is there a way to disable it?

I had a conversation with Apple Tech Support yesterday regarding this issue, which I also find frustrating.

The answers I got simply deepened and widened my frustration. This behavior was a conscious decision on the part of the programmers. The logic went something like this.  The Activity window is a diagnostic therefore if someone wants to view it, they will want to view it in front of other windows anyway. They kindly left us with a Command+0 option to toggle its display on and off.

I let them know that there are various functions that I use as diagnostics and I like to keep them where I can see them at a glance but where they do not interfere with my work. I let them know that I have always had the option to toggle the display on and off and that I also have always had the option to see the window in front of all others, all I had to do is click in it and it immediately came forward.  What they did is to make a decision on my behalf that reduced my options and that is a way of thinking that I don't appreciate.  If they want to give me more options, that is fine but a decision to reduce options is usually a poorly thought out decision.

I am still looking for a solution through the terminal that might allow me to regain my previous functionality.  They were not forthcoming in this area.  They simply said that at this point, we cannot do it. Not a very good answer, certainly not the one I wanted to hear but I suppose having the answer, like it or not, is helpful in a way.  Now I can dismiss the thought that it was an accident and decide how much time I want to invest in working around their poor thinking.


removing write up protection from micro sd card My micro sd card suddenly got locked and i don't know how to remove the write up protection using my macbook air nor the disk utility. How do I remove the digital write up protection from my card using my mac?

Golden Rule #1

As soon as an SD card [or USB stick] starts to play up - bin it.
They're not worth the effort once they error.

I go through literally hundreds of them for work. Low write count, high read count.

If they error once, they will error again. Quality control on them is, let's say… variable.

Some of them have a controller chip that will permanently lock them to read only if they detect a write error, as a preservation measure. There is no way to unlock them once this happens.

Golden Rule #2

Don't use them to store anything valuable.

Edit:
If the data on an SD card was truly valuable, it is theoretically possible to replace the controller chip, or even directly access the memory itself. This service can be performed by data recovery specialists, but they charge a lot for their efforts & still can make no guarantees.

Rules 1 & 2 are still 'best practise'

Verbatim from my answer at https://superuser.com/a/854645/347380


What happens if you restore your keychain from a TM backup? Does anyone know what happens or what I should expect if I restore all contents of ~/Library/Keychains from a Time Machine backup? I'm trying to assess the risks of doing this.

The reason I am asking is my iCloud keychain, which contains about 8 years of pretty important "Secure Notes", disappeared a few days ago. I believe the reason for it disappearing is that its local copy became corrupt (there is now a files at ~/Library/Keychains/[redacted_guid]/keychain-2.db-
keychain-2.db-corrupt and it was created around the time I noticed problems). I have tried restoring just the ~/Library/Keychains/[redacted_guid]/ folder, but that didn't fix the problem.

A reasonable next step is to restore the entire folder, which I hope has a working db and valid links to it. But I am afraid this will make things worse. Currently, my system is working fine. Using my user password, I can unlock my computer from a sleep and I can unlock the secure parts of System Preferences. I can see things going bad fast if I screw up my primary login keychain.

Answering my own question -- because I simply ran out of time: my need for my secure notes outweighed the risks.

I restored an earlier copy of my entire ~/Library/Keychains folder from a pre-corruption Time Machine backup. This did not restore the "iCloud" option in my Keychain Access "Keychains" panel, but the secure notes all reappeared under "Local Items". After restoring the items, I was able to lock and unlock things in System Preferences, and I was able to log-out and log-in to my computer (after making copies of all the secure notes, and so far I can't say I see any obvious problems.

So in my case, the answer to my question is: it didn't do anything bad, though it will (of course) reset any passwords you may have changed since the backup.


How can I delete photos from camera roll and leave in an album? I created a named album on my iPhone and placed photos from my camera roll in there. I would then like to delete these photos from the camera roll. However, when I try to do so an error messages warns that the photos (which currently reside in the the camera roll and named album) will also be deleted from the album.

Is there a way to delete the photos from the camera roll and leave them in the specific album?

You can't. iOS uses a simple photo database, very similar to iPhoto. Primary storage for all photo image data and metadata (time, place, exposure, etc) is the camera roll. This system lets you create the illusion of multiple albums, and storing photos in the albums.

But from a database perspective, your album is just a table with the image ID of every photo you place in it, creating a link back to the image data in the camera roll.

You can delete photos from albums, thereby removing them from the table.

When you delete a photo from the camera roll, you delete the photo from the system.


Can I disable Safari's pinch-to-zoom tab switcher? When looking at a PDF document I often want to zoom-out to scroll quickly to its contents and get an overview.

However, when I zoom-out past a certain threshold (it seems to differ per PDF) Safari thinks I want to see the tab overview:

I have never found a use for this function, so it only causes annoyance.

Can I turn this tab overview off somehow? A solution that uncouples the pinch-to-zoom gesture from the functionality would also work.

I'm on Mountain Lion 10.8.5 with Safari 6.1.3.

This is currently not possible. Apple does not provide a way to turn this off.

Note that if your swiping is begun whilst still zoomed slightly, the tab switcher is not invoked. See this animation:

This is a pretty large GIF — it'll take a while to load and be smooth.


How to show Cmd+ to the **tab** title? I was watching a video and this guy managed to add Cmd+number to the tabs title - instead of the window title that only shows the current selected tab - how?

In term2, the default is to show the command and number. See image below.


iTunes intermittent freeze/crash: how can I diagnose the problem? I have an ongoing but intermittent problem with iTunes. Sometimes after starting iTunes or after plugging in an iPhone, iTunes will cause my Mac to become unresponsive. I'm having trouble reproducing this problem, and it doesn't seem to leave any traces in the system log. How can I figure out what's causing this problem?

Here are the symptoms: When I start iTunes, it loads and appears to be functioning normally for a few seconds, but then my Mac becomes unresponsive. The trackpad still moves the on-screen pointer, but input, as far as I can tell, is completely ignored.

Doesn't work:

Attempting to quit or force-quit. Nothing happens: keyboard input ignored.
Clicking on anything: clicks are ignored.
Removing the iPhone, when the freeze happens after plugging in the iPhone - the system does not react to the removal of the device, and it still appears in the iTunes sidebar.

Interesting features:

Mouse/cursor still moves, but clicks just "vanish" - nothing happens on click.
If music or other media are still playing, they continue to play - sometimes to the end of the current track, sometimes for less (long tracks).
If an external monitor is in use when the freeze happens, and is unplugged after the freeze, the Mac doesn't do the fade-to-blue-and-redraw thing. It doesn't react to the monitor going away.

What I've tried:

Removing iTunes library and rebuilding from the XML file does not fix the issue.
Making sure that I'm the owner of all of the relevant iTunes files (single-user computer) - no change.
Restarting computer: the problem never appears on the first launch of iTunes after a restart.

What puzzles me:

Sometimes it happens with just iTunes, sometimes it happens with the iTunes + plugged-in iPhone combination.
Why is mouse movement still visible even though the rest of the system has gone utterly brain-dead?
Why is there nothing in the system logs that I've been able to see?

Setup details:

Early 2011 Macbook Pro, Snow Leopard 10.6.8.
iTunes 10.6.3
iPhone 4, iOS 5.1.1
Music folder on an external hard drive (a few hundred gigs of music in the library, and the onboard hard drive is an 128GB SSD, so this is non-negotiable)

Currently, when I run into this problem, I have to reboot by holding down the power button until the Mac powers down, then start it again. This is deeply sub-optimal. Is this a known problem in disguise with a known fix? If not, how can I narrow down the problem, how I can I get more information about what's actually happening during the crash? The nature of the problem means that no crash report is generated, so that's a difficulty. I've tried watching top, ps, and lsof whilst trying to reproduce the problem, but since I don't know what I'm looking for, I can't really get any help from the information they provide.

I would simply say that your Library is corrupt for some reason. As your library is a virtual reference lookup to your actual music files, if it has a problem it is possible that it will either give you issues at program startup or perhaps when you add something to your library as it will read the reference file and encounter issues when trying to add to it.

I first of all tried all the obvious, Disk Utility repair, permissions, deleted and reloaded iTunes, etc. However all of that will still use the original Library file so it won't solve the issues so many are having with iTunes.

The simplest yet time related route is to rebuild your library. What this means is that you need to create a new one, and import all your content again. It may take you 30 minutes and for your computer 10 hours.

As it's your library that's corrupt and not the actual files/file structure that is the problem you will be able to import all of your music again together. About 95% of your albums will be kept together although in some occasions with downloaded albums their reference name will not match that of the official release so it may be separated and in need of the artwork but neither is a big take to sort out. It's the same deal with your movies.

Quit iTunes
Hold Alt and click iTunes again
Select new Library (don't worry your old one is still there and will not be deleted)
Then you can start to rebuild. You can always go back to your old Library by closing iTunes, holding Alt and clicking on iTunes.

To select which library to open - you will see that in your Music/Itunes folder there are now two libraries and the xml library file is in the sub folder for each for you to select if you cant find it. Give yours a simple name when you create it such as 'ITunes Library 2' that way you can search for it too if you can't find it.

The only issue with this method is having to backup your iPhone/iPad or other device in your old Library as it can only be sync'd with one library. However, once you are happy with your new library you can Erase your device and sync it with your new Library.

When you erase your iPhone for example, it will only wipe/erase the content (Music, Movies, etc.) it will not delete Apps, Messages, Bookmarks, Photos, etc.

I hope this helps, as it not only sorted my iTunes issues for good but also made my iMac a lot faster in general as iTunes is not struggling and does not crash any more.


Is it possible to enter emojis directly using a keyboard shortcut? I would like to enter emojis directly from the keyboard. E.g. that I type ‘:D’ and it gets converted to ‘’. Is that possible?

I know about the control + command + space shortcut to open the emoji palette, but I am looking for a faster way.

Go to System Preferences → Keyboard → Text and set as many replacements as you wish.

Set the ‘Replace’ to the standard characters and the ‘With’ to the emoji you would like the ‘Replace’ to be replaced with.

These synchronise over iCloud, so will be available on your iOS devices too.


Macbook Pro 2013 no longer boots My MacBook Pro 2013 no longer boots. I've tried different modes like safe boot, utility menu, boot from other device,... but I instantly get a white screen. Wiping the NVRAM, removing the battery or the SSD does not work.

Has anyone an idea what I can do or how I can reflash the firmware maybe this will solve my problem?

the only thing left no removed  - try removing RAM modules one at a time ( try each sodimm individually in either slot - do not forget to power unit off ( fans not spinning) as you meddle inside the unit ;) ...
also - did you disconnect the dvd drive and did you inspect the logic board for possible water damage?

by the look - the unit does not pass POST  either due to dGPU or RAM/northbridge


Family Sharing iPhone - Unique Question about purchases I want to know if someone in my family share group still has an app downloaded on their phone. Is there a way to tell if they have deleted the app from their device?  I know all about hiding apps and how they cannot be deleted and all that. I get all that.

For example, I know about an app I told my kid he cannot use.  Well, its always going to show up on his downloaded list - but is there a way to see if he has put it back on his phone or not via family sharing.   (kid has adult privileges in family sharing, he is a teenager and I don't use any of the other parental controls nor do I want to)

Yes. Sign up for a free MDM solution and enroll your child's iOS device under management.

add the app(s) in question to management

You then get telemetry and reporting if that app is installed.

I prefer JAMF now, but there are several options. I’d start with this and then research others once this one has some specific drawbacks for you.

https://support.jamfnow.com/

You won’t need DEP or VPP to run family devices under management.


MacBook Pro late 2011 had GPU problems I have a MacBook Pro late 2011 and yesterday my external screen suddenly showed glitches on the screen; much like the screenshots you see from other 2011 MacBook Pro's that have a failing GPU.

As I work with the lid closed, I opened the lid and closed it again and the problem would disappear for a few minutes. I then disconnected my external screen and tried my MacBook pro's build in screen. After working with that for an hour it also started to show glitches. These did not go away after opening and closing the lid.

Becoming more and more annoyed I decided to reset the PRAM, and low and behold, it didn't work. So I went on with resetting the SMC. This is when the real problems started. My MacBook pro now booted up into a grey screen after loading for a bit.

Using Single-User mode I tried repairing the SSD with fsck -fy, this didn't help. Slowly I had to come to the conclusion that it most likely was a dedicated GPU hardware failure.

Then, suddenly my MacBook pro decided that it would want to boot up in Safe Mode, however, after a few minutes vertical and horizontal lines showed up again.

So, I decided to turn off the dedicated GPU by moving the kernel extensions into another folder. This worked but made everything very slow. After putting everything back, I decided to follow the following instructions:

http://www.asyncro.com/2014/03/24/macbook-pro-discreate-graphics-card-issue-fix-updated/

Having followed every instruction, including letting my MacBook overheat, my notebook was still slow.

Now, here is the thing, after putting all kernel extensions back into place and restoring everything back to normal, the notebook suddenly started normally at full speed using the dedicated graphics card.

Until now I have not experienced any problems (few hours later). At first I thought that it might be because of the gfxCardStatus software, so I deleted that in order to replicate the problem. However, my MacBook is still running fine now and I seem not to be able to replicate the problem.

My Question

Can it be that all my problems were caused by a badly behaving SMC and that there is nothing wrong with the dedicated GPU?

No, you most likely have the very same common GPU issue. Seeing the glitches multiple times is a sure tell sign.

Beneath all that drama caused by resetting and tweaking things, temperature variations on the GPU contacts were what caused the glitches and the inconsistent behaviors. Your laptop is probably in the initial phase of GPU(soldering) failure. Sooner or later the problem worsens and more severe graphic glitches will appear or the computer simply becomes unbootable.

You can try the simple steps below to stress-test the GPU, but by doing so you could be accelerating the problem and end up in an unusable state sooner. You can decide if it's in your interest to forcefully trigger the problem. Regardless, these steps are not beyond any normal operating parameters, so if your laptop is immune from the GPU problem you are not doing anything harmful by performing these steps, warranty-wise especially.

Get a temperature & fan speed monitoring app like iStat Menus that can show you fan speeds, CPU and GPU temperatures in real time.
Run a GPU benchmark app to stress the GPU. Valley or Heaven should work, for free. Keep running/looping so the GPU temperature stays around 70'C or higher, for as long as possible (hours).
You should pause the benchmark app periodically for the temperature to drop down (back to 45~50'C range). Or just turn it off at nights. Repeat the heating/cooling process until the symptoms appear.

This test might end up proving nothing, and yet it doesn't mean the GPU is trouble-free. It takes time and many temperature cycles for the solder joint problem to become apparent.


Trying to get LaTeX work with Anki I'm trying to get LaTeX working on Anki.  I am the only admin on my system but when I try and run the terminal command "tlmgr update --self && tlmgr install dvipng" I get an error saying I need to run the program as an admin. I am the admin! How do I run this program?

Note:  Due to lack of reputation, I am unable to vote or bump any existing material, so I am asking a new question.  The comment to the top answer is identical to my query, hence the identical text.

How can I get LaTeX working on Anki?

http://ankisrs.net/docs/manual.html#installing-and-assumed-knowledge

  Anki’s LaTeX support is not turn-key: it is assumed that you know how to use LaTeX already, and that you have it installed. If you have
  no experience with LaTeX, please consult one of the many guides
  available on the internet. If you are having trouble with markup,
  please ask on a LaTeX forum.

  To install LaTeX, on Windows use MiKTeX; on OSX use MacTex, and on
  Linux use your distro’s package manager. Dvipng must also be
  installed.

  Note On Windows, go to Settings in MikTek’s maintenance window, and
  make sure "Install missing packages on the fly" is set to "No", not to
  "Ask me first". If you continue to have difficulties, one user
  reported that running Anki as an administrator until all the packages
  were fetched helped.

    Note On OSX, LaTeX has only been tested with MacTex and BasicTex. If
    you use BasicTex, you need to install dvipng separately, with the
    following command:

      sudo tlmgr update --self; sudo tlmgr install dvipng

    The command may not be on the path, so you may need to provide the
    full path, eg /usr/local/texlive/2014basic/bin/x86_64-darwin/tlmgr.

  Note If you are not using the above LaTeX packages, you will need to
  use the "edit LaTeX" add-on to specify the full path to latex and
  dvipng.

Superuser access needed, not just admin.

P.S. It would be great if someone with sufficient rep link this answer to the Apple Stack Exchange question!  Even though we would be quite a few years late to answering user21373 's query :P


iOS - Bluetooth not auto connecting to previously paired device My iOS devices do not auto-connect (auto-pair) to a Bluetooth audio receiver device. However this works as expected on Android and OS X Yosemite. Thus I do not think it is the Bluetooth receiver that needs to be reset. What am I doing wrong? How do I correct this?

I have a little-known bluetooth stereo system receiver: BeeWi bbr100.
http://www.bee-wi.com/bluetooth-stereo-music-receiver-bbr100-beewi,us,4,BBR100-A 1.cfm

Steps on all devices tested are:

Turn on Bluetooth
Select and pair beewi bbr100 device (never paired until now)
Works fine, plays music.
Turn off Bluetooth
Turn on Bluetooth
iOS Does not automatically pair it, says 'not connected'. On Android and MacBook Air, it connects automatically.

Summary of my testing:

iPad Mini iOS 8.1.2 - No
iPhone 4S iOS 7.0.5 - No
Nexus 5 Android Lollipop - Yes
MacBook Air OS X Yosemite - Yes

I have gone through the Apple troubleshooting guide and already performed the following steps:

Reset network settings.
Log out of iCloud.
Performed a hard reboot.
Reset the Bluetooth device.

Is there something I'm doing wrong, something I don't understand, or something broken?

Apparently a lot of headset devices can maintain a list of several devices. So did my Skull Candy Ink'd Wireless.

The trick to reset this list, was to power up the device and hold - and + for a few (5?) seconds till you hear a strange beep. Then I paired again and the auto-connect worked again.

My guess is that it didn't like to be connected to multiple iPhones and got confused somehow.


Disable ⌘Q for a specific application I know someone or the other has asked about disabling ⌘Q, but I like the shortcut, and I use it often. However, I use an email client called Airmail that unfortunately does not keep a service (for notifications) running in the background when it is quitted. However, if I press the close button a service runs in the background, allowing me to receive notifications.

But since I have a habit of pressing ⌘Q all the time to close apps, I was looking into a way I could disable it for only Airmail.

Anyone know of a what to do this?

You can add a Key Command to any app [or all apps] from
System Prefs > Keyboard > Shortcuts > App Shortcuts
I don't have Airmail, but using Safari as an example

Hit the + button, select which app, type the menu name & your chosen key combo
For an app you don't want the original key combo to work for, replace it with something difficult to hit, or something you would never use, like
 Cmd ⌘  /  Opt ⌥   /  Ctrl ⌃  /  Shift ⇧  /  F15   etc

Alternatively, if you want to replace Quit with Close Window, you add  Cmd ⌘   Q   to Close Window instead, [so long as that command appears in the menu somewhere] which will automatically remove  Cmd ⌘   Q  from the Quit item


Silence calls from everyone but a defined set of numbers? If I'm on-call, I only want to be woken by important calls or text messages.  How can I set up an iPhone to ring during certain hours only for calls or texts from a certain set of numbers?

If it can't be done using vanilla iPhone apps, is there a 3rd party app that could do it?

You could make a silent ringtone your default, and then assign other custom ringtones to each of that certain set of numbers.

See Apple's Purchasing and creating ringtones FAQ for a start.


iPad 4 cannot connect to internet using iMac wireless Have latest iPad 4 and latest iMac with OS Lion and have a wireless connection. iMac system preferences checked for internet sharing ethernet to wireless device. BUT iPad Safari cannot open page as unable to connect to internet. The iMac ethernet connection is via Cable and internet connection ok. Any advice as to how to connect the iPad correctly. I've tried re-start after checking all settings are correct.

If you haven't already follow the instructions at http://support.apple.com/kb/PH3853

And this thread discusses a variety of configuration problems that some people have had http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1192376


Mac Pro 2013 Blank Displays And Can't Hard Reset I have a Mac Pro, Late 2013 (Trashcan) with Dual D700 Graphics and I recently installed Windows 10 using Bootcamp.
In Windows I went into the AMD FirePro Control Panel and clicked "Enable 10-bit Colour".
Windows restarted and now I just get a blank screen. I tried connecting to different displays using either the HDMI or Thunderbolt but always blank. I've rebooted several times. I've tried Command + R on startup but no such luch.
What have I done? Can I fix this?

I think this may be one of the few times that recommending reset of the SMC &  NVRAM might be in order.
NVRAM stores display config, amongst other things - see The Eclectic Light Company - What is stored in NVRAM? (generally a knowledgeable resource)
SMC stores external video source in some Macs. I'm less certain this is going to be the useful step, but the same resource, The Eclectic Light Company mentions that treating them as a pair can be useful. SMC first, then NVRAM.
Persistence: EFI, SMC and NVRAM


Correct battery voltage for new MacBook Pro battery I have a 17" Macbook Pro (5,2 mid 2009,  MC226LL/A) that has a battery that is in need of being replaced.

I'm looking for the correct battery for it and have found various batteries that say they are compatible. The odd thing is that some of the batteries that are said to be compatible have a voltage that is higher than the original.

My battery is model A1309 with a voltage of 7.3V and 95Wh. But batteries that I've seen listed as compatible with model MC226LL/A have a voltage of 10.95V and 95Wh. Does this difference in voltage matter?

Batteries are the one thing in a laptop you shouldn't mess with -- I'm fairly sure they're the only component in your computer that is in a constantly controlled risk of overheating, catching fire or quite literally exploding. When they are not made to the utmost standards of quality, you could be, again quite literally, putting your life at risk. I'm not saying this is the case with you, and fortunately not with me, but if I were unable to afford a new manufacturer-supplied battery to replace a dying one in my laptop, I would rather sell it and buy a cheaper laptop whose battery I could afford.

I agree Apple's markup on batteries -- and quite generally most of the accessories they sell -- is excessive, but batteries and chargers (due to the risk of electric shock) are two things I would never buy from anyone but Apple. If you search around you will find teardowns of original Apple chargers and cheap Chinese knockoffs, and even if you have zero knowledge of electronics, you can tell the Apple chargers are much higher quality than the Chinese knockoffs. This is quite hard to tell with batteries, but do you believe for a moment the lowest bidder won't cut costs exactly as they do with chargers?

And just to stay on topic, yes the battery is quite important. 7.3 V sounds like a two cell Li-ion configuration while 10.95 V would be a three cell Li-ion battery. Using a two-cell battery in place of a three-cell battery or vice-versa is a sure-fire recipe for disaster -- even if the electronics could take the different voltage, over-charging a two cell battery with enough voltage for a three cell battery would immediately damage it. In case of a high quality battery, only the protection circuit would be damaged, but in case of a low-quality knockoff with no protection circuits, the battery would be immediately and irreversibly damaged, with a symptom of either swelling, fire or an explosion.


Quotes problem in Mavericks (or TextEdit) TextEdit in Mavericks changes the standard double quotes "Hello" to using curly, non-ascii quotation marks “Hello”.  It does this even when you edit plain text documents.  Is there a way to prevent this new behavior in Mavericks?

This is not just TextEdit, it's Mavericks.

Under System Preferences > Keyboard, you can change the quotation marks.

Go to the 'Text' sub-menu.  On the right-hand side of the box, uncheck the "Use smart quotes and dashes" checkbox.


How to package Quicklook plugins for AppStore I developed a bunch of specialized Quicklook plugins and would like to share them through the App store. Is there a way of packaging them and distributing them through the App Store?

Put them inside MyApp.app/Contents/Library/QuickLook/

More info on Apple developer site.

  When Quick Look searches for a generator to use, it first looks for it in the bundle of the associated application and then in the standard file-system locations (...)

If You do not have any app and only the plugins, I think you can make a single view application describing the plugins or something like this. However I can't find the reference for this.


Ways to unlock iPhone 5 with iOS 10 to reduce Home button presses I have an iPhone 5 and since I installed iOS 10 I have to press home button twice to unlock the screen. I hate having to do this. I feel that there is 200%  probability more than before that my home button breaks. Is there any other way to unlock the screen? Is it possible to go back to the 'Slide to unlock'? I would also hate to put the Assistive Touch button on the screen.

You can't use Slide to Unlock without jailbreaking. Since your device does not have Touch ID, you can't use Rest to Unlock either, and your device does not support Raise to Wake either.

One way to reduce the wear on your home button is to use the power button to wake the device, then press the home button when you actually wish to unlock the device.


What version of Bluetooth does Magic Mouse need? Just wondering what minimum Bluetooth version does the Magic Mouse need?

According to this article, Magic Mouse uses Bluetooth 2.1.


What is ZoomWindow, and why is it hanging? I updated to MacOS Sierra, and since then I have been getting a message (via CleanMyMac which tells me this sort of thing) that ZoomWindow is not responding.

I get the impression that ZoomWindow is part of the system, but anything I find on the Internet is either uninformative or useless.

What is ZoomWindow, and should it be unresponsive like this?

ZoomWindow is a process that runs under "Accessibility" options (System Preferences). I had this turned on because of poor eyesight, and occasionally I would want to use a keyboard shortcut to zoom in on a specific area of the screen (think of the Magnifying Glass in Windows). I never stopped to think that it would be a constantly-running process that was using RAM and (very little) CPU, but when you're running a system as old as mine, you need every tiny resource you can free up. I turned off the "Accessibility" option in my Taskbar, but all that did was prevent the little "Accessibility" icon from showing up; ZoomWindow (or some derivative) would always be in Activity Monitor.

Just messing around with it, I discovered you can turn this process off by going into System Preferences, Accessibility, then selecting Zoom, and UN-checking the box that read "Use keyboard shortcuts to zoom"; also, you want to check "More Options" (from the Accessibility window), and make sure "Enable temporary zoom" is also UN-checked.

I had tried to Force-Quit the process countless times in Activity Monitor, and each time, it would close, then immediately come right back; by using the steps described above, I opened Activity Monitor and discovered that the ZoomWindow process was no longer running. I didn't even have to Force-Quit.

Hope this helps!


Change MAC address in Yosemite To change the MAC address I use the common

sudo /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Apple80211.framework/Resources/airport -z
sudo ifconfig en0 ether xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
networksetup -detectnewhardware

It shows the changed MAC address when I run

ifconfig en0 |grep ether

Is this sufficient or should the changed address also appear in System Preferences -> Network and in the extended Wi-Fi details sub menu (alt+click on Wi-Fi symbol)? In both places the original MAC address is still shown although Terminal gives a different address.

This should be sufficient. After changing the MAC address this way you could use e.g. Wireshark to capture the network traffic. The new MAC address should be shown there. At least this works on my macbook.


How to install Windows XP on mid-2012 MacBook Air Mountain Lion? I have to install Windows XP on my mid-2012 Mountain Lion MacBook Air (base config: 4GB RAM, 128GB SDD, 1.8 GHz) but the BootCamp doesn't support anything except 7.

I can't afford to set aside sth like 15-25 GB for Win 7.

How can I do it? Can I downgrade BootCamp in Mountain Lion to a previous version which supported XP and then install XP?

Or if I can create an empty FAT partition and later simply reboot and insert Windows XP insert USB drive(non disc drive) and go on with XP installation?

Update: I have to use that XP partition for gaming purposes so virtual machines are not an option. They eat up too much resource for let me game on my 4GB MBA. I've tried. My problem with 7 and 8 is that they will probably gobble ~30% of my disk space for just the OS.

Looks like there's really no way. Besides, I've got those games on Steam for Linux/Mac now. So, I don't even want to go near a Windows machine anymore. Thanks for answering. I think I shall close this question from further posts if possible.

As far as I know there is no way to dual-boot any Mac with Bootcamp and Windows XP. It is simply not supported. Bootcamp under Lion and Mountain Lion should be able to support Windows 7 or Windows 8; can't you use one of them to run your Windows software instead of Windows XP?

If you cannot use Bootcamp, then you should evaluate the commercial virtualization products VMware Fusion for Mac and Parallels Desktop. Either of those can run Windows XP. Perhaps they can give you enough system speed for your gaming needs.


"Unable to load the Parallels driver" after upgrade to Lion I have Parallels Desktop 6 (6.0.11994) installed and after an upgrade to Lion, whenever I start Parallels, I get these two messages:

Then Parallels Virtual Machines window appears but neither of them can be started.
How do I fix this?

You don't have the Lion compatible version of Parallels installed! The current version is 6.0.12094.

You can download the latest version from Parallel's download page or use Check for Updates... in Parallels Desktop menu.


How do I get the American Flag back on my menu bar? I'm new to Macs and got a 2011 MacBook Pro a few weeks ago and when I first set it up there was an American Flag on my menu bar.  Somehow it has disappeared and I can't figure out how to get it back.

in the Language and Text, under Input source, you need to select one or more input sources; you also need to select Keyboard and Character Viewer on the top of the input source list.
As far as I know, the flag is displayed only when you select more than one input source; differently, the icon you see is a generic one.

This is the icon you see when just an input source is selected.

This is the icon you see when you selected two or more input sources; in this case, the selected input source is "Italian Pro."


ATV3 Youtube Quality I have a 3rd generation   Apple TV that I'm trying to watch some YouTube tutorials on but the streaming quality is really low.
How do I select a higher definition? I can't seem to find an option or setting for it.
The clip I'm watching right now actually started at around 720p~1080p for the first ten seconds or so before reverting back to a blurry mess. It's obviously auto adjusting to the available bandwidth, just like it does in an ordinary browser, on an ordinary computer.
I don't mind if I have to wait for videos to load. I don't mind if it's not a Full HD cinematic experience. I just need it to be watchable. Surely there's something I have overlooked.

You should change the default TV resolution of your Apple TV.

Settings --> Audio&Video --> TV Resolution and choose the resolution you want.


How to move Photos Library and associated iPhotos Library to another drive without breaking links? I wish to move my Photos Library to a secondary drive, both formatted with APFS. I still have the iPhotos Library from where the pictures were imported.

I'm concerned that when moving the Photos and the iPhotos libraries to a new drive the shared masters will be duplicated and increase storage usage.

Is there a way I can move both libraries and preserve the link between them?

So, no definitive answer.

I had copied my iPhotos, Aperture and Photos libraries to the new drive using Finder, but I was worried I was using unnecessary space. I did a new copy using rsync as follows:

rsync -azH --progress Aperture\ Library.migratedaplibrary iPhoto\ Library.migratedphotolibrary Photos\ Library\ \(Aperture\).photoslibrary Photos\ Library\ \(iPhoto\).photoslibrary /Volumes/Secondary\ SSHD/Users/me/Pictures

Now I'm sure I'm using too much space. :-)

This command should preserve hard links from the source in the destination, but as @Tetsujin commented on the question APFS doesn't support hard links and I don't think it would use copy on write with files in different media (what would happen if I ejected the media?).


Typing on my iPhone: how to change input method when typing from an external Bluetooth keyboard I need to type in two languages on my iPhone but can only do so easily when typing from Apple's "Magic Keyboard". I am looking for potential ways to make typing on an iPhone easier for other Bluetooth keyboards that were not made by nor for Apple devices.

I should be running the latest iOS software.

The Trouble: For now, after I paired the iPhone with an Always-On Bluetooth keyboard at home, I am forever bound to such keyboard: it won't quit, as the keyboard is powered by a set of AA batteries and there is no switch on it to turn it off, and it won't let me change input method!

What the "Magic Keyboard" does when paired with iPhone

Thanks to the integration of Apple products, there are two ways:

At the far right corner of the Magic Keyboard, there is a key that can show/hide the on-screen keyboard. One can use this interface to switch input method.
Moreover, the default "Mac-OS" keyboard shortcut still works: holding opt + space shall get me to loop through the input methods

Yet, I only have bought one pair of Magic Keyboard and have kept it at work. Over the years, I should have a good number of generic Bluetooth keyboards, 2 among which are fancy mechanical switch ones. Unfortunately, they are "generic Bluetooth keyboards" ==>

What generic Bluetooth keyboards do? And, can we avoid buying

Well, when typing, I did not find a way to summon the on-screen keyboard at all. This bans all graphical interface tweaks: there is simply no button to click on.

Question 1: Can I devise finger swipes to change input methods? I have only two in total.

Then, Alt + space does not register on iPhone. This may have to do with how these generic Bluetooth keyboards are dealing with issuing keystrokes, and I wonder if there is a walk-around? Say:

Question 2: Is it possible to define keyboard shortcuts for iPhone to loop through input methods?
Question 3: Or, can I spare a F1 key if key-combination is not allowed, solely for iOS to change input method.

The standard way to switch layouts in iOS is always Control plus Space (not Alt/Opt). It should work on arbitrary keyboards with these two keys.

There’s no way to change this shortcut in iOS as far as I know.


Do I still need my iTunes directory? After upgrading to Catalina and the Music App I have two directories:
iTunes and Music

When I launch the app I noticed all my Music has the cloud icon (as I use iTunes Match) so its not downloaded locally. If I download a song it appears under Music/Media and not iTunes/iTunes Media.

I'm in the process of downloading all the songs in my library. Once I do this can I delete the iTunes folder and everything in it (including the iTunes Library file, iTunes Media, etc.)?

You are correct - both folders are not needed.

Once the new folder is set, you can consolidate all the media there, make one last backup of the old structure and delete it.

I’ve not seen them split often, so make sure you have a backup in case you find any old files didn’t migrate. Also, keep backing up - some people have felt that Apple Music was so good they stopped backing up only to learn months or years later that some tracks they wanted were substituted for ones close like non-explicit versions, etc.. The cloud isn’t your backup plan, it just makes it easier to sync. A cloud database also can get deleted or corrupted so test your backups from time to time.


Prevent iOS 11 from closing background apps? Since upgrading to iOS 11, I've noticed that apps running in the background are closed much more aggressively.

Two specific cases that are especially frustrating:

Google Maps, which was in the middle of routing me, was closed and I almost missed my exit because it didn't give me a notification.
WhatsApp is frequently closed, which stops notifications from showing up on the desktop app.

Is there anything I can do to prevent iOS from closing these apps?

(and for completeness: "background app refresh" is enabled for these apps, and this is on an iPhone 6)

This is a known bug in iOS 11 and should be fixed with iOS 11.1
Most of the Apps are using the BackgroundFetch functionality, which is totally broken in iOS 11

Currently there is iOS 11.1 beta 4 released. It seems that Apple will release the final version within the delivery of the iPhone X.

If you want to have more technical details you can have a look at the technical topics in StackOverflow: iOS11 swift silent push (background fetch, didReceiveRemoteNotification) is not working anymore

UPDATE 2017-10-31

Just FYI: Apple released today iOS11.1 -> the issue should be now resolved from a operating system point of view.


Can I use Google Sync (Exchange, Push) through Mail.app in Mountain Lion? I love using gmail through Google Sync on my iPhone because it supports PUSH through the Exchange protocol.
See: https://www.google.com/mobile/sync

Essentially, they provide an Exchange compatible server through m.google.com.

I would like to setup Mail on OSX To use exchange as well, but have not been able to set it up properly.

No, you can't use Google Sync through Mail.app in Mountain Lion.

Google's exchange server m.google.com is not a fully implemented exchange server. It just implements the ActiveSync protocol which seems to be a subset of the exchange protocol for mobile devices. See also this information on Google Sync: http://support.google.com/a/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=135937


Internet Sharing handing out wrong DNS server address I'm using a MacBook Pro with OS X Mavericks 10.9.2. It connects to the internet via a USB 3G dongle, and I want to share that internet connection via wifi. However, on devices that connect to the created wifi access point, DNS lookup will not work (though I can ping 8.8.8.8 just fine). If I statically configure the devices to use 8.8.8.8, everything works, but not every device supports that (or only if you're also willing to configure a static IP and gateway).

The problem seems to be that OS X configures bootp (the DHCP server) to hand out a DNS server address of the MacBook itself:

$ cat /etc/bootp.list
...
            <key>dhcp_domain_name_server</key>
            <array>
                <string>192.168.2.1</string>
            </array>
...

This is indeed the IP address of the machine itself:

$ ifconfig
...
bridge100: flags=8863<UP,BROADCAST,SMART,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> mtu 1500
    options=3<RXCSUM,TXCSUM>
    ether 02:26:bb:66:19:64
    inet 192.168.2.1 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.168.2.255
...

And it's what clients are receiving in the DHCP response:

$ sudo tcpdump -vv
15:26:07.265635 IP (tos 0x0, ttl 255, id 9846, offset 0, flags [none], proto UDP (17), length 328)
    192.168.2.1.bootps > 192.168.2.2.bootpc: [udp sum ok] BOOTP/DHCP, Reply, length 300, xid 0x4e0988af, Flags [none] (0x0000)
      Your-IP 192.168.2.2
      Server-IP 192.168.2.1
      Client-Ethernet-Address 10:bf:48:cc:49:7d (oui Unknown)
      sname "ip-77-24-232-37.web.vodafone.de"
      Vendor-rfc1048 Extensions
        Magic Cookie 0x63825363
        DHCP-Message Option 53, length 1: ACK
        Server-ID Option 54, length 4: 192.168.2.1
        Lease-Time Option 51, length 4: 85536
        Subnet-Mask Option 1, length 4: 255.255.255.0
        Default-Gateway Option 3, length 4: 192.168.2.1
        Domain-Name-Server Option 6, length 4: 192.168.2.1

Now, that would be fine if it actually worked as written here, i.e. OS X runs a bind (named) server itself, that just forwards DNS requests and responses to the ISP's servers.

However... using tcpdump I can see that the client is getting an error response from its DNS lookups:

$ sudo tcpdump
15:23:33.181447 IP 192.168.2.2.57291 > 192.168.2.1.domain: 32713+ A? google.com. (28)
15:23:33.181528 IP 192.168.2.1 > 192.168.2.2: ICMP 192.168.2.1 udp port domain unreachable, length 36

Indeed, no named server is running, and it doesn't even seem to be installed:

$ ps aux | grep named
thomas           2175   0.0  0.0  2423368    188 s000  R+    3:14pm   0:00.00 grep named
$ which named
$

Nothing else is listening on UDP port 53 either, though there is a thing called mDNSResponder on 5353:

$ sudo lsof -i -P | grep 53
mDNSRespo   47 _mdnsresponder    8u  IPv4 0x4dcb7c0f075daa1d      0t0    UDP *:5353
mDNSRespo   47 _mdnsresponder    9u  IPv6 0x4dcb7c0f075da835      0t0    UDP *:5353
natpmpd   1664           root    4u  IPv4 0x4dcb7c0f064b6f15      0t0    UDP 192.168.2.1:5351

Now I can think of two ways to fix this, neither very practical:

Run some DNS server on UDP port 53. Unfortunately, none is installed.
Tell DHCP to hand out a DNS server address that actually works, like 8.8.8.8. Unfortunately, the InternetSharing application overwrites /etc/bootp.plist each time internet sharing is turned on, so even if I added an IP address there and even if it would work, it wouldn't work forever.

But something tells me that this should (and usually does) work correctly out of the box... what am I missing?

The article you reference  was indeed correct for when it was published and that's how it works prior to Mavericks. Under Mountain Lion 'named' get's launched when Internet Sharing is active with /etc/com.apple.named.proxy.conf as the config file. This is all observable under Mountain Lion - I verified it.

However, domain name resolution isn't just based on DNS under OS X like it is in other OSen, but instead it's based on Directory Services -- which permits DNS lookups from flat-files, NIS, NetInfo, LDAP, ZeroConfig/Bonjour ... and DNS -- and it's mDNSResponder that's used for resolution of these name turns. (As per its man page mDNSResponder is also the system-wide Unicast DNS Resolver. It's what is (or should) doing the DNS resolution for your Internet Shared clients under Mavericks. (It was odd that they fired up named under Mt Lion rather than using mDNSResponder back then.)

When Internet Sharing is activated either named (pre-Mavericks) or mDNSResponder (Mavericks) is the "DNS server" that should perform name resolution for Internet Sharing, and that correctly makes 192.168.2.1 the DNS server for the NAPT'ed clients of Internet Sharing. So the straight and simple answer to your questions is that it's not handing out the "wrong DNS server address".

This demonstrable worked for me setting up Internet Sharing to share out my WiFi connection via Ethernet. Clients served by Internet Sharing sent DNS requests to 192.168.2.1 were observed to receive there queries correctly from a browser and when issuing dig @192.168.2.1 apple.com; I observed this in action with tcpdump to verify. Everything "just works" as you'd expect.

I note that in this configuration from the hosting Mac I'm also able to telnet 192.168.2.1 53 and connect to mDNSResponder. I also note that I have the Service Order for the configured networks set with WiFi having precedence over the Ethernet.

However when running this in reverse, sharing the Ethernet connection via WiFi I initially experienced the same issue you were seeing. Namely I saw the UDP DNS request sent over but no response back, just like you observed. Ping passed through to 8.8.8.8 and resolving against 8.8.8.8 using dig worked fine too. I was all prepared to write this up as a bug but I later had the opportunity to restart my MacBook Pro and tried this again, also assuring this time I had Ethernet having precedence over WiFi in the Network preference pane Service Order. This time it "just worked" and I wasn't able to recreate the issue. Problem solved by reboot and checking service order.

Additionally I verified that I could:

Issue a dig @192.168.2.1 apple.com from a client (assigned 192.168.2.3) of Internet Sharing and receive a successful response. I also observed the UDP query and response using tcpdump:

01:01:05.620240 IP 192.168.2.3.58817 > 192.168.2.1.domain: 34923+ A? apple.com. (27)
01:01:06.051566 IP 192.168.2.1.domain > 192.168.2.3.58817: 34923 3/0/0 A 17.149.160.49, A 17.172.224.47, A 17.178.96.59 (75)

From the hosting Mac was able to telnet 192.168.2.1 53 and receive a connection.

Internet Sharing has always been a bit fragile. I've often seen weird behavior and have found it's best to restart before attempting to run Internet Sharing or at least to "Make [the] Service Inactive" in Network Preferences for the interfaces in question and then set them active again. (Be sure also to "Apply" when making such changes".) Additionally the Service Order (which controls the default gateways) can also have an impact (as would be expected.) You may also wish to make sure you're using the Apple supplied Location "Automatic" (or a reasonable facsimile). Remember when debuging also that each network interface can have it's own gateway and prefered DNS server to use since after around Leopard or so.

So I'd suggest three things: (1) a reboot and confirm your network service order precedence and/or (2) a clean install of Mavericks to see if this resolves your issues, as well as (3) verify you can get Internet Sharing working where Ethernet is shared out over WiFi and vise versa. If you can't make (3) work then you need to look at something specifically configured wrong on your Mac and again that suggests a clean install.

If you can get it working for Ethernet -> WiFi and WiFi -> Ethernet, this suggests something with the USB Dongle -- and perhaps adjusting the Service Order so it's a higher precedence may be required.

Make sure also you don't have any Firewall rules or are running Little Snitch or anything that may interfere.

Internet Sharing appears also to have some debugging options if you issue

$ /usr/libexec/InternetSharing --help

These, and it's log file, along with the log file for mDNSResponder, might also be useful if you're still having issues.

But as the answer to the question: It's not handing out the wrong DNS server address in DHCP as 192.168.2.1 is the "right" DNS server for Internet Sharing to be handing out based on how it's designed to operate. And mDNSResponder is what should be handling DNS on the host running Internet Sharing under Mavericks. No `named is needed.


Archive emails on Google Mail using Apple Mail Is it possible to archive emails using apple mail? Or do I have to log in to the web UI to archive old mail? I am using 10.6.7.

Two options work for this.

Move the message to the [Gmail]/All Mail folder. Mail.app will show two copies of the message in there, but it will appear properly in other clients (definitely the web interface and on iPhones, should be respected elsewhere).
Goto the Mailbox Behaviours section in the Accounts tab of the Mail.app preferences and deselect "Move deleted messages to the Trash mailbox" and "Store deleted messages on the server". This way deleting messages out of your Inbox removes them instantly, but there's still the archived copy in [Gmail]/All Mail. Solves the duplicates problem, but if you really want to delete something, you've got to move it to the [Gmail]/Trash folder.

Hope that helps. Google has published some other guidelines for using Gmail in Mail.app that may be helpful.


Is it possible to program an OS X screen lock? I want the ability to lock my Macbook at my command. I don't want a screensaver or sleep lock. Don't you get tired of repeatedly typing in your password in all day? I don't want to wait for my computer to lock itself in 10 minutes or 1 minute when the screensaver or sleep begins. I don't want to save and close all my apps and documents and logout.

So just let me lock my computer, simple request. Hit a hotkey? Close the lid?

I walk out my door, I lock my door. I get out of my car, I lock my car. Why can't I just lock my computer?

I've been told you can't reconfigure this type of setting in OS X, is this true?

On a Macbook, pressing ctrl+shift+Eject will lock the screen instantly.  These keyboard shortcuts are configurable from System Preferences.


What is the ellipsis badge on minimized terminal app in the dock mean? I have another terminal window minimized next to it in the dock and it doesn't have the ellipsis. Also it doesn't have any running processes. What does it mean?

See the question Terminal doesn't show badge - how to enable?. In the accepted answer it says:

  There is also an "unread text" indicator displayed in tabs, in the
  form of ellipsis ("…"):

  This is displayed when anything is written to a background terminal, and, like the bell indicator, cleared when you activate that
  terminal window/tab. An "unread text" ellipsis is also displayed on
  minimized terminal windows in the Dock.


Mac Mini 2011 - monitor wakes up messed up I have an Mac Mini from 2011. Sometimes (I would say 80% of the time) when I wake up the monitors, after they've been sleeping, my main monitor (a Benq G2220HD 22″, connected via DVI → Mini Displayport) wakes up with just noise. Its like a grey background with black, white, red, green and blue dots all over. To solve this I have to power off the monitor, and power it on again.

I also have a second monitor plugged in, through the included DVI-HDMI adapter (doesnt make a difference if I hook up my Benq using this method.) The second monitor works fine (I can see/use it while my other one is messed up), but it will also get the same issue if it is the only monitor hooked up.

I'm running OS X 10.8.5 (this was also on Lion and all other versions I've tried), I've done a SMC reset, and I've updated the EFI to MM51.0077.B10, which is said to fix an HDCP authentication thing, but it doesnt fix my problem.

My current solution is to just never sleep the monitor, instead have a screensaver running, but I want it to sleep because it gets really hot otherwise.

This doesn't happen in Boot Camp (Windows 7). It works fine there, so it has to be something with OS X I'm thinking.

UPDATE 26-10-2013 : This still happens in 10.9 Mavericks.

I've experienced the same issue on a friends mac.
If he switches spaces (swipe with 2 fingers on magic mouse - but i suppose opening mission control via a shortcut does the same) it's back to normal (until the next sleep)


Automate printing with options? I am trying to print a file (a pdf), without intervention. Not Automator specific, I can deal with applescript or terminal or whatever. The specifics of what I want are:

Print to specific Printer
Print to specific Page Size (Non-Standard)
Auto-Rotated (Optional)
Scale to Fit, Print Entire Page (Ends up being 109 to 112%. 110% works)

I can do this manually through Preview's print menu, only the page size is non-default, but I want to automate it, drag and drop, somehow.
Things I tried:

If I print from Finder, it uses Preview, but it's blown out of size, and wrong Page size.
If I drag it onto the printer in ~/Library/Printers/printername, it's like using LP, but without the options.
Applescript's printing options are poorly documented.
Automator's "Print Finder Items" it's like #1.
Automator's "Print Images" is like Preview but "Scale to Fit" does not work like Preview does, I can't choose the page size, and "Auto-Rotate" doesn't work at all.
If I print from terminal via LP or LPR, I can set page size and orientation/fit-to-page, but I can't scale it to 110%. This is the closest thing to what I want.

How can I do this? It shouldn't be so hard, I want to do what the GUI can, not like I want extra features.
Worst case, how can I emulate mouse or keyboard control of Preview's print menu? All that would be needed is to 1. open file, 2. Bring up print menu, 3. switch to a preset or page size, as all the other options including scaling are default., 4. press print/enter.

Let's split the problem into two parts: scaling and printing.

Scaling

You can scale a PDF on the command line. Consider creating a temporary, scaled, PDF to print.

See scaling PDF content and page dimensions from command line for suggested approaches to this. The highest voted answer suggests using cpdf with a command like:

cpdf -scale-page "1.1 1.1" in.pdf -o out.pdf

An alternative tool is sips. This tool is included with OS X and is surprisingly capable.

Printing

As you have discovered, OS X's printing system is the Common Unix Printing System (CUPS). CUPS includes the command line tool lpr which can accept all the settings and options you need.

For printing the PDF via the command line see:

Print PDF from Command Line – cups-pdf, lpr -P PDF
CUPS printing of pdf files

To list the available printers, use:

lpstat -p -d

To print a PDF file to the default printer, use:

lpr file.pdf


External DVD Drive won't mount anymore after burning two disks Here's a short story: I was burning a OS 9 install disk on my Mac Mini because don't judge me.

When it was done, the disk seemed fine, but it said the drive was "disconnected" after it finished burning.

I looked at the disk (mounted on the desktop, even though I told it to eject) and it seemed fine.

Just to be sure, I burned it again to another CD-R, same error, disk not mounted, drive not ejected.

The drive was in a hub, so I put it into one of the main 4 ports to see if it would mount. Nope.

There isn't a optical drive in Disk Utility or a disk1 in /dev, like previously.

Any ideas?

The USB port it was in was for the keyboard and mouse.


How can I improve/replace View Source in Safari? As a new convert to Safari, I am astonished by how unbearably ugly default page source view is.
The font is miserably small and unaliased, leave alone color highlighting.

Is there a way to enhance Safari's View Source feature or seamlessly replace it?

I'm looking for:

reasonable default font, customizable is better;
basic HTML/JS syntax highlighting;
working on Lion.

Please refrain from suggesting viewing source with Web Inspector: it is nice but isn't convenient for quick source browsing.

BetterSource

It's similar to the view source in Chrome in a lot of ways:

It has syntax highlighting and line numbers
It's opened in a tab instead of a window
Uses the default monospace font specified in preferences instead of Monaco 12

Limitations:

Line numbers are included in selections
The source view cannot be opened with a shortcut
Takes slightly longer to appear than the normal source window

Setting a default zoom level in a custom style sheet

The custom style sheet you can specify in the Advanced tab of the preferences also affects the view source window. I don't know how to target it specifically, but this would apply a default zoom level to both it and website content:

body { zoom: 125%; }

view source in TextMate.scpt

tell application "Safari" to tell document 1
    repeat 100 times
        if (do JavaScript "document.readyState") is "complete" then exit repeat
        delay 0.05
    end repeat
    set src to source
    set u to URL
end tell

try
    tell application "TextMate"
        open POSIX file u
        activate
    end tell
on error
    set f to do shell script "f=`echo " & quoted form of u & " |
    sed 's|.*://||;s|/$||;s|:|-|g;s|/|-|g'`; echo \"/tmp/view-source-$f.html\""
    do shell script "/bin/echo " & quoted form of src & " > " & quoted form of f
    set f to POSIX file f
    tell application "TextMate"
        activate
        open f
    end tell
end try


How to delete the list of songs on iTunes I have a little problem with my iTunes on my pc. I have to delete all the songs that are inside it but to do this job I have to delete one song at time because I don't know how I can do it in a short way. I search also on the Internet a possible solution but with no results. Is there anyone that can help me?

Methode A:

Open iTunes
Go to Music
Go to the "songs" area where each song is listed on one row.
Select a song, then click Control - A (which will select all the songs in your library)
Go to 'Edit' menu
Select 'Delete'

Methode B:

Close iTunes
Find the iTunes folder (C:\Users\username\My Music\iTunes)
Go to the Music folder
Delete all of it's content
Start iTunes again, all music should be gone

I'm not using windows so I can't double check


How can I make the Facebook app forget everything? If I delete the Facebook app, it asks me whether I want to delete only the app or also its data. Even if I confirm that I want to delete both but, if I re-download the app, it remembers all my previous accounts. This happens regardless of me providing any identifiable information to the App: at second download the app already recognize my device at startup
So some data obviously didn't get deleted. How can I remove all traces the Facebook app leaves so that it starts afresh after a reinstall?

The reason this happens is that deleting app and data deletes only the actual app and the data files it left in its sandbox. This leaves out the information the app has stored in the iOS Keychain. This information is not deleted when an app is deleted.
There could be many reasons why Apple chose to do it this way. For example a large company could have several different apps in a group relying on the same Keychain data - for example Facebook also makes apps like Creator Studio, Portal and Facebook Gaming. If deleting one app deleted the Keychain data as well, the other apps might stop working contrary to what a user might expect.
In an earlier beta release of iOS, Apple did actually experiment with deleting the Keychain data when deleting an app - trying to preserve Keychain data only when other apps in the same group were installed. This lead to confusion for some users as to when the Keychain data was actually deleted - as well as frustration for some users that were used to deleting apps to "save space temporarily" and relied on reinstalling them also making them automatically login again. The change was reverted and never went into the actual iOS release.
As a user there's unfortunately no general way to delete the Keychain data of a specific app. You can only wipe the whole device to delete everything by opening Settings, tap General, then Reset and then Erase All Content and Settings. Beware that this will delete everything on the devices - not just Facebook or the Keychain.
Remember to take care if you're syncing your Keychain across multiple devices using iCloud.


iPad "Not Charging" with 3m USB-dock-connector cable iPad "Not Charging" with 3m USB-dock-connector cable

I just bough two 3-meter (10ft) USB-dock-connector cables on eBay. When I connect the USB connector to an Apple 12W USB Power Adapter and plug the dock connector into my iPad 3, I get the "Not Charging" message next to the battery icon. The cable works fine with iPods and iPhones. The normal Apple 3m cable works fine. I know the message is caused by not supplying enough current from the charger, and that charging still takes place, just slowly, but how is this possible? It seems that the iPad 3 requires around 2 amps (10W/5V) of current to satisfy its power hunger. 12W would theoretically supple even more current (12W/5V=2.4A). So what could be causing this apparent "current deficit"? Certainly a 10m wire could not have enough resistance to cause such a large current drop. This is DC so there can be no impedance issues. I doubt the soldering is so sloppy that the joints would have a high resistance but you never know… I have two such cables and both display the same behavior. I can't measure anything in the dock connector with a VOM because the opening and the pins are too small. What are some other possibilities that would reduce the current so much?

Additional information:

I was able to ring out the +5V (pin 1) and GND (pin 4) pins of the USB connector of both 3m cables and I found that the GND pin is NOT connected to the outer grounding shell of the connector like it is on the official Apple cable so that definitely is a problem. It means the USB +5V is floating and USB GND is not tied in with other GND pins. Geeze…

USB pinouts:

http://pinouts.ru/visual/USB.jpg

Apple dock connector pinouts:

http://www.allpinouts.org/index.php/Apple_iPod,_iPad_and_iPhone_dock

I know Apple's answer - 'our cable works, there is no problem'.

IN SUMMARY - you either need to use Apple's own cables or the decent quality PC World versions or Asda or something, that are not really cheap but are two thirds the price of Apple, or half or something.

Really cheap clone cables will NOT work.  Can't explain it, but know it is fact.  My guess, they are not soldered properly inside the lightning end, and ipad depends on quality of connection being really good, maybe?  Any money, not all the connector bits on the lightning are connected physically to the other end.  ie it gets complicated.

Explanation follows:

I have found that Apples' own cable supplied (lightning) tends to kink near the ipad end, and horribly shorts out resulting in two main issues: a - ipad reboots or similar alarming thing b - it doesn't charge c- the charger that is on the plug gets very hot indeed, but the give-away is that unlike when charging the ipad properly, the back of the ipad where the battery/charging components are, remains completely cool to the touch.

So, it's the difference with your 3m cable to Apple's one.  I have bought several 'clone' cables AND NONE OF THEM WORK.  Short or long, makes no difference.  I keep them in a bag marked 'cheap useless aftermarket cables'. If you go to PC World or somewhere similar that sells cables for over a tenner apiece, they'll probably work.

If the cable costs 2.50 gbp ir probably WON't work, that's my experience.

You don't reveal where you bought the non-apple cable?  ASDA and places like PC World, their cables will work even non-apple ones.  Others might not.

Last, the earthing (ground) thing.  Generally, for signal-level power, only one end of the ground cable is earthed.  I know the house-wiring norm is for all of them to be tied together - so I guess it depends which way Apple leaned on this one.  Lightning adaptor of course, reconfigures uses of each contact, so which one is ground may not even stay the same?


Where does mysql register to start itself at boot time? I've got a Macbook Air that is starting mysql on boot.  I've looked in LaunchAgents, LaunchDaemons, .bash_profile and .profile and login items.  It's also not in /etc/rc.local.

Where else can I look?


Downloaded apps do not start, error -10658 When I downloaded an application (e.g. RubyMine) and transfered it to the Applications folder, the application wont start (nothing happens). It is not limited to the Applications folder, it appears for every directory I unpack the downloaded app (out of the .dmg).

When I type open RubyMine.app in the Terminal, I get:

LSOpenURLsWithRole() failed with error -10658 for the file /Applications/RubyMine.app.

And it happens with more apps then only RubyMine.

What can I do about this? At the beginning i was asked to allow the startup of the downloaded app, but now this appears every time.

This seems to be a problem with permissions in the bundle itself. Usually the execution flag doesn't get carried over from the DMG image.

Try, for the sake of curiosity to set the execution flag like this:

chmod +x /Applications/RubyMine.app/Contents/MacOS/<name of the app>

Note: replace <name of the app> with the name of the app (it will probably be "rubymine", but I don't have that app to confirm the exact name of the binary.

If you're in doubt, right click on RubyMine.app, do a "Show Package Contents" and navigate to Contents/MacOS/ folder and see what's in there. Perform the above command (chmod +x) on that file and try again.

I think it should be:

chmod +x /Applications/RubyMine.app/Contents/MacOS/rubymine

update: I've downloaded RubyMine and the above command will work, however, for what is worth, I've got to say that mine had the execution flag so I didn't have any problem with it. Have you checked?


revoke ipad access to my wireless network My elderly neighbor needed help with iPad.  So as I was helping her with it, I gave her access to my wireless network to ensure it was working properly.  Now, she "accidentally" prints to my printer often because she does not choose her own printer.  I know I could "forget device" from ipad but I am not physically with her right now.  Is there anyway that I can remove her ipad access, by removing it from my Mac?  Where do I find the list of those devices that have access to my wireless network?
Thanks!

The simplest solution would be to change the network password.  This can be done from the Airport Utility application found in your Applications > Utilities folder.

This will disconnect all devices, so it would require entering the new password in your devices including your connected printer.

Airport Utility also will show you devices connected to your network.  See also Apple Support for Airport.


XeLaTeX doesn't have complete fonts I've just moved to OS X form Ubuntu. I'm using OS X 10.8.2 unfortunately I'm not able to say what TeX distribution is installed on the computer since it wasn't me who installed it, I guess it was installation form tug.org.

I have problem with my .tex files. While LaTeX documents are compiled correctly, XeLateX generate a warning:

  Missing character: There is no ẖ in font [lmroman10-regular]:mapping=tex-text
  !

All other diacritics signes are found (\d{h}, \b{d} etc).

I was compiling file in TeXworks and TeXshop and I guess it's not a problem of editor since in both editors I get the same warning.

If LaTeX is using special fonts installed in it's directory, XeLaTeX is supposed to use the fonts available in general in the system.

Thanks

Here is the output of the content of /Applications/TeX directory:

MacBook-Pro-Marek:TeX user$ ls
BibDesk.app             LaTeXiT.app             TeXShop.app
Eps-Tiff-Conversion.pdf LuaTeX-and-XeTeX        TeXworks.app
Excalibur-4.0.7         READ ME FIRST.pdf       What Is Installed.pdf
FixMacTeX2012.pkg       TeX Live Utility.app

The problem was that in the fonts I was trying to use this particular diacritic sing doesn't exist. Solution given to me on tex.stackexchange is to add this character in the preamble of .tex document. The code for simple XeLaTeX document containing ẖ is:

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{fontspec}
\usepackage{newunicodechar}

\UndeclareUTFcomposite[\UTFencname]{x1E96}{\b}{h}
\makeatletter
\DeclareRobustCommand{\b}[1]
{\hmode@bgroup\o@lign{\relax#1\crcr\hidewidth\ltx@sh@ft{-3ex}%
\vbox to.2ex{\hbox{\char"AF}\vss}\hidewidth}\egroup}
\makeatother

\newunicodechar{ẖ}{\b{h}}

\begin{document}

\b{h}ur\=u\v g

\end{document}

Other possibility is to install fonts, like Linux Libertine, which do have this character.

To see all question and original reply and comments, see here.


How to get iTunes to stop encrypting iPhone backups without the password? Is there a way to disable the checkbox near Encrypt iPhone backup without knowing the password. I don't need the data that is encrypted but I would like new backups to stop being encrypted as I forgot the password so I would like to disable old backups and keep new backups in place without password.

I know one of the options is to wipe iPhone clean and start over but that doesn't seem good to me. So i'm searching for a more pleasant way to drop old backups with password and be able to make new ones :-)

I use Windows 7.

Things you can try (that I haven't tried myself), other than hoping it's not an Apple bug:

If you have a 4 digit lockcode on the iPhone, the encryption on iTunes might share the same password. Try the same pin. Also try older pins, if you change it. It could be an old one.
Get iPhone Explorer, delete /var/Keychains/Keychains-2.db (may need to jailbreak the phone to be able to see it) on it and restart. Be aware this will clear all your passwords. Now delete your iTunes encrypted backups and re-sync.
Enter DFU mode, wipe your phone, and sync back - this is an easy way to remove the lock code, not sure about the encrypt iphone check tho. Probably.
Use some mysterious magic tool, enter in recovery mode to begin with a lot more of hacking. I won't get into much detail here because this isn't a simple procedure. You're on your own. Just wanted to cite it's possible and that maybe even today the "encryption" is quite fake.
Restore from an old unencrypted backup. Yes, this is the closest step to "wipe".
As you already suggested, wipe your phone (just for the sake of completeness).

Good luck!


How do I remove my birthday from Skype for iPad? A while ago I was fiddling with my birth date on Skype for iPad (version 8.68), and I accidentally pressed save.
However, I do not want it to be visible. I’ve tried changing my birth date to (day, month, year), but there aren’t any (day, month, year) buttons.
What are my options?
——EDIT——
(On Safari) I was able to see the option to change my birth date, however, it said it was a required field and I wasn’t able to change it.
Any suggestions?
Just making the year invisible would be great!

If Skype saved that data to their servers, you would need to contact them or delete that account.
If it only saved to the Skype app, you might be able to delete the app and hope it clears on reinstall.
More specific guidance will be challenging to provide since we don’t know versions of the OS or App or even which country your account is managed. Most big companies handle accounts differently based on legal requirements and whether you disclose you are a minor or adult, etc...


Downloaded music in google music app get "unplayable file" in my 2017 crosstrek Oddly specific question but I just got an iPhone 6S and with the memory upgrade I decided to download all my music from the google music app into the phone so I don't have to stream and save a little data. However if the phone is plugged into the car via usb I get the "unplayable file" error message in my car. Playing through bluetooth works just fine though.

I removed the apple music app and my car will then just say "no audio file" even though the phone will show that it's playing music through the google music app.

I had a similar issue with my old iPhone 6 where even if I was streaming it would take a few tries to get the music to play because it would say "unplayable file" but after that it would work but if I tried manually changing a song in a playlist it would go back to "unplayable file" After months this finally stopped being an issue.

Dunno exactly why, but I offloaded the subaru starlink app and it's streaming just fine again.


The system preference panes will not load When I open System Preferences and click on an item it says 'Loading Users & Groups' at the top of the window, but will not load the pane.

I've tried deleting the property list file:

 /library/preferences/com.apple.systempreference.plist

I also tried clearing the PRAM and booting in Safe Mode.

Sometimes it's just enough to quit the System Preferences app. Check if the process was ended well, i.e. use Activity Monitor (also to quit "System Preferences" app). In my recent case it was not necessary to force quit, just select the process and quit was enough.
Alternatively Force Quit if System Preferences is open and in the Doc, just do a secondary click on the System Preferences icon, hit [alt] key "Quit" will change got "Force Quit" and click that.
After restarting the app the preference pane (in my case time machine pane) could be loaded as expected.
Lately it happened, that the described method didn't work, after force quit I still couldn't open the preference pane. I found that waiting a little (few minutes) before reopening helped, because when I was not able to reopen the pane I searched for a different solution, coming back to System Preferences – without doing anything else – was able to open the desired pane.