Macbook Pro 2015 Lid seemingly overnight stopped from closing properly When I plugged my Macbook Pro (Early 2015) yesterday, the lid was closing perfectly. This morning I woke up early and left without checking on the laptop. 8 hours later, I came back and realized the lid wasn't closing properly by a huge margin (look at picture).
It's like something is preventing it from closing all the way... I'm currently in vacation in a hot country and few months ago I received some warnings about changing the battery. Could it be that the battery is getting swollen and is deforming the case preventing the lid from closing properly?
If so is it dangerous? Will it stop getting swollen if I stop using the Macbook? I kind of want to repair it myself but I don't want to wait a month to replace the battery if it's dangerous...
Thank you for your help

Here the information on the system information panel:

EDIT: I Just checked on a flat surface and the bottom case is definitely deformed:

The most obvious diagnosis at this time would be a swollen battery.
A swollen battery can cause different symptoms from a misaligned track pad to a malformed keyboard.  In your case, it appears it's mis-aligning the case causing the lid to not close properly.

Why is my Early 2014 MacBook Air's Trackpad Uneven?
Stiff trackpad on Macbook air
Macbook Pro mid-2015 15" swollen battery

A battery swells because the off gasses that are normally vented are trapped (see the first link for more info); the battery swells like a balloon.  Suffice to say, this is more than an inconvenience, this can cause something called "thermal runaway" where it could cause a fire.
I strongly suggest that you get this addressed as quickly as possible.  It's impossible to predict if/when this could occur, but it is very dangerous.  You cannot put out a thermal runaway fire as the chemical reaction will continue.  This is why firefighters simply allow hybrid and electric cars to burn out; they will try to contain the fire, but they cannot extinguish it.
At a minimum, from a non-safety point of view, the battery is warping the aluminum structure - it could be permanently be bent, or unlike it's counterpart steel, will tear once it reaches a certain point.


Chrome toolbar icons acting weirdly It recently started happening that the icons in Google Chrome started freaking out, and randomly look weird:

And they don't always look the same, either:

The appearance of them tends to change if I hover over them, do any tab-related actions, disconnect or connect my external monitor, etc.

The download circle progress bar and icon also exhibit this behavior.

I assume you are using the dev version of Chrome (19.0.1077.3). If so, this is a bug that was introduced a few days ago. Expect it to be fixed with the new update. Here's the bug report on the official Google blog: Dev Channel Update.

Edit: I just checked for updates manually, and indeed the update was available, solving the rendering issue. To get the update now, got to Chrome settings (chrome://chrome/settings/), and click on the Help tab. The app will check for updates automatically, and ask you to relaunch the browser.


Display the app location of every cask I know how to use brew cask list to display every installed cask. However, this only provides me with the name of each cask:

1password
1password-cli
font-fira-code
font-ubuntu
geekbench
visual-studio-code

However, I would like to know where each cask's main artifact is located without running brew cask info on each one. Is it possible to get a list of casks while also showing their main artifact's path? For example:

1password             ~/Applications/1Password 7.app
1password-cli         /usr/local/bin/op
font-fira-code        ~/Library/Fonts/FiraCode-Regular.otf
font-ubuntu           ~/Library/Fonts/Ubuntu-R.ttf
geekbench             ~/Applications/Geekbench 4.app
visual-studio-code    ~/Applications/Visual Studio Code.app

$ for f in `brew cask list`; do brew cask info $f | grep -e [^B]\)$ | sed -e s/^/"$f":/g; done
emacs:Emacs.app (App)
emacs:/Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/MacOS/Emacs -> emacs (Binary)
emacs:/Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/MacOS/bin/ebrowse (Binary)
emacs:/Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/MacOS/bin/emacsclient (Binary)
emacs:/Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/MacOS/bin/etags (Binary)
macvim:macvim: 8.1.950,155 (auto_updates)
macvim:MacVim.app (App)
macvim:/Applications/MacVim.app/Contents/bin/mvim -> gview (Binary)
macvim:/Applications/MacVim.app/Contents/bin/mvim -> gvim (Binary)
macvim:/Applications/MacVim.app/Contents/bin/mvim -> gvimdiff (Binary)
macvim:/Applications/MacVim.app/Contents/bin/mvim -> mview (Binary)
macvim:/Applications/MacVim.app/Contents/bin/mvim -> mvimdiff (Binary)
macvim:/Applications/MacVim.app/Contents/bin/mvim -> view (Binary)
macvim:/Applications/MacVim.app/Contents/bin/mvim -> vim (Binary)
macvim:/Applications/MacVim.app/Contents/bin/mvim -> vimdiff (Binary)
macvim:/Applications/MacVim.app/Contents/bin/mvim -> mvim (Binary)
minikube:minikube-darwin-amd64 -> minikube (Binary)
osxfuse:osxfuse: 3.8.3 (auto_updates)
osxfuse:Extras/FUSE for macOS 3.8.3.pkg (Pkg)
virtualbox:VirtualBox.pkg (Pkg)
wireshark:Wireshark 3.0.1 Intel 64.pkg (Pkg)
xmind:XMind.app (App)


Safari 9 Key Command. Go back to previous page I would like to program my Wacom tablet, thus what is the correct Safari key command to go back to the previous page?

I am using Safari 9.1.1 on Yosemite.

The menu command to go back a page is "History" > "Back".

The command key equivalent is ⌘[


Turn on bluetooth via terminal/command line How can I turn on bluetooth via the terminal / the command line?

There is an answer over at Superuser. The last post there is what I found to work best, in a slightly different form. The 'checkbox "On"' did not work for me, but the following code did:

# This is only necessary, if AppleScripts are not yet allowed to change checkboxes
tell application "System Events" to set UI elements enabled to true
# Now change the bluetooth status
tell application "System Preferences"
    set current pane to pane id "com.apple.preferences.bluetooth"
    tell application "System Events"
        tell process "System Preferences"
            # Enabled is checkbox number 2
            if value of checkbox 2 of window "Bluetooth" is 0 then
                click checkbox 2 of window "Bluetooth"
            end if
        end tell
    end tell
    quit
end tell

You can execute this script using osascript.

Update: I now changed the script to just enable Bluetooth. No toggling anymore.


XQuartz right away quits itself macOS Catalina Version 10.15.5
I have downloaded XQuartz from following page (https://www.xquartz.org/). The application installed and shown on the Utilities folder. When I open it, it is shown a second on the docker and always gone away (quits itself). It does not show up on the running applications, so I crashes due to some reason.

I don't know how can I fix this issue, since I am not able to open the application. Is there any way can I fix this issue?

I was able to solve it by running from the Terminal.
run_Xquartz() {
  [ $(ps aux | grep -E '[X]quartz' | wc -l) -gt 0 ] && echo 'Xquartz is already running' \
  || nohup /Applications/Utilities/XQuartz.app/Contents/MacOS/X11.bin > /dev/null 2>&1 &
}

$ run_Xquartz

If Xquartz is already running on the background it prints Xquartz is already running.
If Xquartz is not running on the background it runs it on the background using nohup.

=> When Xquartz starts running on the dock you will see it.


codesign still tries to access other keychains when adding --keychain parameter we have a automated codesigning setup on our CI/CD infrastructure which is using the codesing command to resign a iOS application with a certificate located in a specific keychain. The codesign script works in general but I detected an unexpected behavior. Even though I tell the codesign command with '--keychain' the keychain it should use, it still tries to access the keychains from the keychain search list. If I add all keychains to the searchlist it will lock the execution on a certain call because it tries to access a password protected keychain which is in the search list. If I remove all keychains from the search list (except the login and the system keychain), codesign won't find the proper signing identity even when pointing to the proper keychain with the --keychain argument.

the codesign command is called as follows:

codesign --sign <signidentity> ---keychain <path/to/my.keychain> --force

This one happens on macOS 10.14.4 and 10.13.6. I also tried different xcode versions like 9.2.1, 9.4.x and 10.1.

I'm a little bit at the end of my ideas of how to solve this issue. It feels that the --keychain argument is bugged or doesn't do what I think it should do.

We have the same problem. For now, we have to add the keychain we want to the search list as the only keychain. Then restore all keychains after codesign.


Is it possible to connect an external CD/DVD drive to an iOS device? What happens to those people who have completely switched to an iOS device and don't have a CD drive? Then, when they want to rip a CD/DVD to their iOS device, they can't. Is it possible to connect an external CD/DVD drive to an iOS device?

No. There is no way to interface a CD drive with an iOS device. The best way to do this is to have your iOS device registered to a copy of iTunes running on a Mac or PC, and to connect the iOS device to the Mac or PC via WiFi or a USB cable. This would presuppose that you have a suitable CD drive connected to the Mac or PC for ripping audio.

However, it occurs to me that you could probably rip music to AAC or MP3 format on a Mac or PC and then email those files to yourself, check the email on your iOS device, and then open the email attachments on the iOS device. That would get the music files in there.


Resolving "There is a problem with your mailboxes." in El Capitan I'm running into an identical problem with Mail on two separate systems, both starting immediately after upgrading from a long-working Yosemite to the new El Capitan and persisting through the latest 10.11.2 version.  The systems have at least 16GB of memory and well over 200GB of free disk space, no other apps are running, nor does Mail have any extensions installed.

The problem manifests with Apple's Mail, even while unattended, at some point spontaneously popping up with this error in a dialog box:

  There is a problem with your mailboxes.

  Try clicking Quit and then opening Mail again. If this message
  reappears, click Quit and Rebuild Index. The next time you open Mail,
  it will import your messages.

The only options are Quit and Quit and Rebuild Index. Neither resolves the problem for future invocations.

Connection Doctor shows all connections (SMTP and IMAP) as green, in fact the Show Details panel continues to show what looks like active and good communication even after the model error box appears, this includes "OK Still here" idle responses.

Activity monitor usually continues, but sometimes halts while Download Messages. Mail will often peg at 99-100% CPU.

Console will issue these messages, but nothing more descriptive:

Mail: Error accessing account, (null)
kernel: process Mail[###] thread ##### caught buring CPU!; EXC_RESOURCE suppressed due to audio playback
com.apple.xpc.launchd: (com.apple.xpc.launchd.oneshot.0x10000005.Mail[###]) Service exited with abnormal code: 1

Note there is no sound being played, so I don't know what the audio playback would be.

I have tried:

Rebooting
Safe Rebooting (holding down Shift at boot)
Using Disk Utility to verify the disk
Repairing Permissions in El Capitan
Launching Mail in safe mode (holding down shift when starting Mail)
Using nearly every aggressive feature in Onyx
Taken all accounts offline and online, incrementally from the Mailbox menu
Disabling and re-enabling the email account(s) from Mail Preferences...
Deleting and re-adding the email account(s)
Discovered it happens with even just one account, regardless of which
Resyncing the accounts, from the Mailbox Menu
Rebuilding the accounts within Mail
Reindexing the accounts by deleting the Envelope Index files and letting it download all content again
Removing Mail's saved state
Remove and Rebuild mail's container
Vacuuming Mail's index, though used V3 instead of V2

Can anyone suggest something else to look at or try?

An interesting possible clue:

In Mail's Connection Doctor it is possible to check Log Connection Activity, and then Show Logs.  In the YYYY-MM-DD_Library.log file, I'm seeing something that smells highly suspicious.

Mail[###] <Debug>: SQLite error 7 (out of memory): Error preparing statement for query SELECT ROWID, remote_id, flags FROM messages WHERE remote_mailbox = (SELECT ROWID from mailboxes WHERE url = ?) AND remote_id IN ( ...a huge list of integers, at well over a hundred thousand, appear here ... ) ORDER BY remote_id

It is true that the server this connects to has multiple years of messages, though they are spread across about three dozen mail folders.

Open to ideas to try.

I too am having this issue since upgrading to El Capitan in October. It is quite frustrating as any email being composed is lost once the error dialog box hits.

The only partial work around I have found is deleting the log files found at:
\library\containers\com.apple.mail\Data\library\logs\Mail*.log

Mail seems to keep writing to these log files, using more and more ram in the process, until mail becomes unresponsive and the error dialog appears.


Spotlight in upper right screen corner in Mountain Lion In the System Preferences panel for Spotlight in OS X 10.8, it claims "Spotlight is located at the top right corner of the screen". On my system, this no longer appears to be true; the Notification Center menubar icon has claimed that particular piece of prime real estate. There is precisely one pixel that is "at" the top right corner. Spotlight is still near the top right corner, but the top right pixel no longer triggers Spotlight.

Has anyone discovered a way to make the Spotlight icon appear where it used to (preferably without disabling Notification Center, which is indeed useful but doesn't need that particular spot)?

It used to be the realm of the first menu-bar item to start the got the prized first (last?) slot in the menu bar.  But since Spotlight, it's always had the prime location to itself.  Now it's been usurped.  That's not to say that some command line hack won't turn up that can change things, but as things stand there is no officially supported/provided way of doing this via a preference pane.

But I wouldn't actually go looking - the whole point of the spotlight button is to allow you to type in some search criteria.  As such, why click the icon, then move to the keyboard - just use the provided keyboard shortcut instead - command+space is not only the easiest to remember (for me) it's also the easiest to pull off even if you are terrible at remembering shortcuts.  I use it as my command launcher these days, just command+space+"sa"+return starts Safari up faster than mousework for me.


I am typing into my terminal and the stdin is changing and adding characters on its own I am using curl on my Macos Catalina terminal app, and the text I enter in stdin gets altered on me pressing enter Enter. For a simple example:
curl -d " 印度是最好的 The weather is good" -X POST http://localhost:8000/questions/21/
curl: (1) Protocol "hhttp" not supported or disabled in libcurl

is actually entered as :
 curl -d " 印度是最好的 The weather is good" -X POST hhttp://localhost:8000/questions/21/

, which I can see from previous command on terminal Control + P.
P.S - I've entered the command and thus, it shows libcurl error.
For an english sentence - you can see the error below:
terminal error
I have no idea why this is happening, I'm using zsh shell and ohmyzsh along with it - and this is happening the first time to me.
Adding an image here too, for further investigation.
terminal typing problems

I don't have any problem with trying to paste that line into zsh running in Terminal.app.  Some testing...
zsh: processed normally
dash: processed normally
oksh: processed normally
pdksh: processed normally
tcsh: processed normally
bash: processed normally
fish: processed normally
ksh: takes the Chinese as editor commands and weirds out

I'll report that as a ksh bug, I suppose.
But your problem would seem to be OhMyZsh, not Terminal.app.  I can replicate the ksh behavior in iTerm as well.
Edit: ksh has a bug with multibyte characters and the KEYBD trap.  See https://github.com/ksh93/ksh/issues/307 and https://github.com/att/ast/issues/197


How do I record a weightlifting exercise on an Apple Watch? On an Apple Watch Series 2 with WatchOS 4.2.3, how can I record a weightlifting session on the Workout App?

I’m currently recording my sessions as “Other”, but I’d like to categorize them as something more specific in my activity history.

As far as I can tell, your best bet is to go through this process:

On your Apple Watch open the Workout app
Use the crown to navigate to the Other option
Tap on this to begin your weightlifting exercise workout
After completing the workout, swipe right and tap on the red END cross
When the summary appears you'll see a grey Name Workout button - tap on that
Now you'll see a list of categories, initially grouped by Popular categories and then listed in alphabetical order
Use the crown to scroll through the choices and tap the one that best fits (I see that Strength Training is listed as a popular choice - perhaps that's a suitable option)
Now the label will appear on the Summary screen
Use the crown to scroll to the bottom of the summary screen and tap on the Done button

Now you'll find that whatever category you selected will be available in your list of main Workout options when you launch the Workout app. It also means this option can be used by the Activity app on your iPhone so that your workout history is more informative/applicable to what you're doing.


How to enter special characters so that Bash/Terminal understands them? Let's say a folder has a file called Näyttökuva.png (for those who are interested, it is ”screenshot” in Finnish). This is what happens:

$ ls
Näyttökuva.png

$ ls N*
Näyttökuva.png

$ ls Nä*
ls: Nä*: No such file or directory

This also affects the tab-auto-completion. If I start typing ls N and press tab it is correctly expanded to ls Näyttökuva.png. But if I start typing ls Nä tabbing does nothing.

How can I either:

configure bash/terminal so it understands special characters
type the special characters so bash/terminal understands them?

In Terminal's encoding is set to UTF-8 in the Settings–tab and the Encoding–tab is in its default state, ie. UTF-8, Mac OS Roman, ISO Latin 1, ISO Latin 9, Windows Latin 1, ASCII, NextStep + some Asian codings are enabled.

Even stranger (though probably not essential for the question):

If I type ls N, press tab, delete characters from the end until it reads ls Nä and press tab again, the command expands to ls Nättökuva.png [sic].

If I try deleting the letters second time back to ls Nä and press tab it expands to ls Nätökuva.png. Third run expands to ls Näökuva.png.

For some reason, the 4th run gives ls Nä̈kuva.png (notice the umlauts over umlauts). Tabbing the ls Nä̈ gives ls Nä̈kuva.png every time. Nevertheless, it works:

$ ls Nä̈kuva.png
Näyttökuva.png

$ history 2
518  ls Näyttökuva.png
519  history 2

I think bash is tripping over some anomalies in how accented characters are handled.  You might want to grab some popcorn, because this is going to get technical for a little bit...

Unicode allows some accented characters to be represented in several different ways: as a "code point" representing the accented character, or as a series of code points representing the unaccented version of the character, followed by the accent(s).  For example, "ä" could be represented either precomposed as U+00E4 (UTF-8 0xc3a4, Latin small letter 1 with diaeresis) or decomposed as U+0061 U+0308 (UTF-8 0x61cc88, Latin small letter a + combining diaeresis).

OS X's HFS+ filesystem requires that all filenames be stored in the UTF-8 representation of their fully decomposed form.  In an HFS+ filename, "ä" MUST be encoded as 0x61cc88, and "ö" MUST be encoded as 0x6fcc88.

I'm pretty sure what's happening here is that when you type "Näyttökuva.png" at the command line, it's "typing" the characters in precomposed form.  When the file is created, the filesystem decomposes the characters for storage.  Everything is fine so far.  But when you try to use tab-completion starting with "Nä", I think bash is  failing to decompose the "ä" before searching for matches, and of course it doesn't find any.

To illustrate the difference, here's an example of what encoding is used when I just type "Näyttökuva.png" at the command line, vs. what's used when I store it as a filename and use tab completion to fill it in:

$ printf Näyttökuva.png | xxd    # This time I pasted the it in from this web page
0000000: 4ec3 a479 7474 c3b6 6b75 7661 2e70 6e67  N..ytt..kuva.png
$ touch Näyttökuva.png           # Also pasted from the web
$ printf Näyttökuva.png | xxd    # This time I tab-completed it after N
0000000: 4e61 cc88 7974 746f cc88 6b75 7661 2e70  Na..ytto..kuva.p
0000010: 6e67                                     ng

Now, as for the matter of characters getting lost when deleting and re-tab-completing, I suspect that's closely related.  Specifically, I think bash is "deleting" one code point per press of the delete key, but erasing one character from the Terminal window per press.  Because one of the deleted characters ("ö" this time) consisted of two code points, but only one character, the Terminal display gets out of sync.  Try tab-completing the whole filename, deleting it back to "Näytt", then re-tab-completing: bash seems to think that only the combining diaeresis was deleted, not the entire "ö", so it re-adds the combining diaeresis, but it this time it attaches to the "t":

$ echo Näytẗkuva.png
Näyttökuva.png

Note that when I press return, bash actually has the entire filename there; it's just the Terminal display that was confused.

TL;DR bash has some bugs handling decomposable accented characters.

EDIT: after some mulling, I think the only full solution is to fix bash (/wait for its developers to fix it).  There might also be a way to input characters in decomposed form, but I have no idea what that would be.  But I did find some partial workarounds:

Drag-and-droping a file from the Finder pastes in its correct form.  Since the Finder gets the filename from the filesystem, it's already decomposed, so it just works.
You can actually tab-complete the accented character itself.  For example, if you type "Na" and then tab, it'll match "Näyttökuva.png" because the canonical decomposition of "ä" starts with "a".  But if you have a file named "Narwal.gif" in the same directory, that won't be very helpful...
I haven't tested this, but if you bind tab to menu-complete instead of complete, it should let you tab through possible matches so you can select the one you want even if you can't type the next letter.  (Or you could bind it to a different keystroke, so you can use it only when you need to.)
For fixing the problem with the Terminal display getting out of sync, you could bind something to redraw-current-line -- it won't prevent the problem from happening, but it'll give you a way to resynchronize the display.


Install as non-admin user when the installer requires admin permissions I need to run an app that uses Adobe Air, but the installer for Adobe Air requires admin permissions. On general security principles, I limit what gets installed as admin user, and Adobe has a bad history when it comes to security, so it doesn't get exempted from my policy. I found that Mac OS X has a feature similar to Linux's LD_PRELOAD, called DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES, which changes the search path for libraries. So I'm wondering if this can be used to fake out installers that unnecessarily require admin permissions so the installer will install to the current user's directory instead of the system level directory. Or is there a better way to accomplish this?

Drag-drop installs can go to an Applications folder at the root of the user's home folder and function without issue, but Adobe has been known for needing hooks in various parts of the OS. For example, a cursory overview of that package shows it wants to install certificates, the flashplayer plugin if not already present, etc.
Conceivably, if you could 'snapshot'(using fsevents/dtrace/packaging tools like packagemaker or Composer, etc.) the installation in a VM and track down all the files it sprays on disk, and relocate those wherever applicable to the user folder on your system, AND the Air runtime and App in question could run without failing due to expecting to see resources in hardcoded directories....

In other words, magic 8-ball says 'highly unlikely'.


Insert key in mac book pro 2011 with windows 10 with bootcamp I have a MacBook Pro 2011 running windows 10 with bootcamp.

How to use "Insert key" (Ins) or equivalent on Mac keyboard, in MS word 2016 ?

There isnt key insert, and fn + return doesn not work, and also bringing the windows onboard keybord does not send inset command ?

Thank you.

For me to get insert to work on iMac with Linux and a Mac keyboard I had to use FnCommandReturn


macOS "Verifying Microsoft [Excel/Word/Powerpoint].app" over and over again Here's the problem I'm having with Microsoft Office apps:

I see this dialog several times a month when I launch Microsoft Word/Excel/Powerpoint.
Very frequently, the verification process hangs, and I need to force-quit.
Even when it succeeds, it often takes several minutes or more.
Worse yet, even after it succeeds, it's often only a matter of a few days or weeks before macOS seems to need to reverify the app again. (I.e., if the Mac is "whitelisting" the app once it successfully verifies it - that whitelist only lasts for a few days or weeks).
Needless to say, this is extremely annoying.
I appreciate that MacOs is trying to keep my computer safe from malicious viruses and programs. However, is there a way to ensure that, once whitelisted, a program can remain whitelisted?
In case it's relevant, I'm running macOS Big Sur (v. 11.2.3), and v. 16.49 of the Microsoft Office for Mac apps.

Press Command + Space and type terminal and press enter .
Then type these commands :
sudo chmod -R 755 /path/to/app

To find path of your app just simply drag the app to terminal .
Press enter and run this command too .
sudo xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /path/to/app

Press enter .


Cannot see/accept/decline invitations from Exchange My wife and I send each other calendar invitations from time to time. She is on an Exchange account, while I am not. I have a variety of email accounts, including iCloud, Gmail, and non-iCloud, non-Gmail accounts.

When my wife sends me an invitation, regardless of which of my accounts she sends it to, it doesn't appear in the Calendar app on either my phone or my Macbook. Instead, it simply shows up in the Mail app as an email with a .ics attachment. I can't see anything about the invitation without opening the attachment. This is especially bad with updates and cancellations, as I can't see what has changed, and cancelled items never seem to get deleted from my calendar.

When I send her invitations, she has the same problems; invitations come through as attachments.

What could be causing this?

Note: we were both on the same Exchange server in the past, when we both worked at the same place, and had no problems sending, viewing, and accepting invitations on our phones and PCs. But we have had the problems above ever since I left that employer.

This is not a great answer, but it's a workaround for now. I set up an account on Outlook.com. Invitations to or from that address work seamlessly, so both my wife and I can open each other's invitations, accept, decline, etc.

The downside is that this only works for events on my Outlook.com calendar. There's still no way to accept an invitation from her and put it on my iCloud calendar, and she still gets an attachment if I send an invitation from iCloud or some other account. So, I very much consider this a workaround, not a solution, and would appreciate any actual answers.


Thunderbolt cable that only works as USB 3.1 I have an LG 5k Ultrafine screen which does not work when connected to my Macbook Pro 2018. Before thinking that the screen may not be working, it could be that the cable which isn't working.
In order for it to work, it must be a Thunderbolt 3 cable, which I know it is (I bought it and it used to work with the screen). I plugged the cable Macbook <> Different USB-C device and it did work, however it Apple -> About this Mac -> System Report, the device only gets shown in the USB 3.1 bus instead of the Thunderbolt section.
Are there ways to test if the cable that I have is a working Thunderbolt 3 cable?

I'll step through some obvious reasons this might not work, so don't feel offended if this sounds "basic" and you've done this already.  The setup you describe should work so it comes down to a bad setup or bad hardware.
The first thing is to see if the cables are in fact Thunderbolt cables.  They should have USB-C connectors on each end and the Thunderbolt icon on one or both connectors.  If you don't know what the icons look like for the different connectors/ports then take a look at Apple's support page on this: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201736
The second thing to check is that the devices needing the most bandwidth are connected closest to the computer.  Connect the Thunderbolt cable to the Thunderbolt ports on the Mac and the display.  Any USB-C devices connected in this chain should be connected to the ports on the back of the display.  It's best to connect any USB-C devices directly to the Mac if you can since they can "steal" needed bandwidth from the display.
A Thunderbolt cable is "dumb", as in these cables don't often have any electronics in them to identify them as a Thunderbolt cable when connected to a Mac.  A Thunderbolt cable when used to connect a USB 3.x device will look like a USB cable to the computer, it doesn't know the difference.
If walking through the wiring and checking that it's like I describe then perhaps something is broken.  Do what you can to verify all cables are working, as well as the display and devices.


iCloud mail sync with outlook 2016 on MAC I have all the latest software - El Capitan, Outlook 2016 fully patched, and an iCloud account that I can log into (from Safari) using either thisIsMe@icloud.com or thisIsMe@gmail.com with thisIsMyPassword.

I setup Mac Outlook 2016 as per web instructions...

E-mail address: thisIsMe@icloud.com
User Name: thisIsMe
Password:  thisIsMyPassword
Incoming Server: imap.mail.me.com:993 (SSL checked)
Outgoing Server: smtp.mail.me.com:587 (SSL checked)

I have tried everything... sadly no combination of anything makes it all 'just work'. :(

What am I doing wrong?

Solved. The issue was the 2-factor authentication. The solution, go to Manage your Apple ID, Edit by security, create an APP-SPECIFIC PASSWORD..

The rest is self-explanatory. Thank you for your consideration.


How to get early feedback prior to the official submission to Apple In a couple of weeks I plan to submit my App to Apple.

I have seen the new guidelines that came out a few days ago and I'm not entirely sure that I am compliant.

How can I get early feedback from Apple leaving at the same time the official submission untarnished?

Can I publish my App as BETA to TestFlight for this purpose? Will Apple use the same examination criteria or is it more shallow?

Beta submission ready via AppCenter..

Yes, submitting your app via TestFlight for public beta testing serves that purpose. The app will undergo a review, albeit a smaller review than the ordinary App Store review. You do not need to actually release your app for beta testing to any third party (except Apple) - you can choose to get it approved and then do nothing.

Similarly you can submit your app for the App Store to get the full review done. There's no need for you to actually make the app public on the App Store right away - you can keep it out of the App Store for as long as you like - and publish only when you're ready. It is also possible to update the app before publishing - although the update will then have to undergo review as well.

You do not have to worry about your official submission being "tarnished". If Apple rejects the app, you have plenty of options for changing the app and resubmitting for a new review.

In the interest of saving time, it is however a good idea to make sure that the app follows the new guidelines before submitting them it to review.


Does the new iPhone 5 Lightning connector still provide serial output (or does it when the dock connector adapter?)? I'm working on an iPhone DIY dock kit, that exposes the serial connection for controlling the music playback controls through the serial port (Apple Accessory Protocol).

Does anyone know if the AAP serial commands still work with the new Lightning connector, or even better, with the dock adapter (since I'm not going to be shelling out for Apple's hardware developer program just yet)? I've had a hard time googling it successfully, other than that the adapter works with some other hardware and things like the MintyBoost DIY charger.

I dont't know if this is what your're looking for but anyways.
Momentarily it is a work in progress. I hope we'll get some info soon.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4f8aUUHrHKc

P.S. I am not affiliated with this, I was just looking for it.


Regain data from iphone 6s(not sure if plus) factory reset? Sorry if this is not the right place to ask this, but I'm not sure of anywhere else I can post this.

Some time ago I changed my iPhone(iPhone 6s or 6s plus, not sure which, should be latest ios, 12 at the least.) password, but now I forgot and I have tried until I reached the 'iPhone is disabled, connect to itunes' page. I have went to the apple service providers with Proof of Purchase and they said my only option is to restore my iPhone, which will wipe out all my data. I was also told the same by a data recovery specialist I was recommended to try by said provider. Is there any alternative? Can I factory reset my phone and try to find the original files using some other third party data recoverer or is factory reset the same as restore and will also overwrite the data?

I know the files will be likely to be encrypted and take a long time to decrypt, if not forever. That is fine, as long as I can extract the files, encrypted or not I am ok with their status.

If you have not done a backup either to iTunes or to iCloud, then there aren't any ways to do retrieve that information. It is an Apple security mechanism. Hypothetically, let's say someone stole your phone, tried to guess your password over and over, it would disable it. There are programs to access a lower level of the phone, but they require it to be unlocked. The only thing I can think of is using major data recovery, like through DriveSavers or Kroll Ontrack recovery services. They're quite expensive though. It'd recommend attempting to restore from your most recent iCloud backup. It won't hurt.

Unfortunately, if that doesn't work, you will have to restore your phone, and there won't be a way to get that information back.


MacOS Catalina Time Machine restoration to Mojave failed; MacOS Recovery failed (-1008F) I was in the process of restoring my Mac Mini 2018 running macOS Catalina 10.15.1 to an earlier Time Machine backup encapsulating the latest version of macOS Mojave via macOS Recovery, when the process failed. I got the message:

  An error occurred while restoring from the backup. Try restoring from a different backup or reinstall macOS and then transfer your information from a Time Machine backup using Migration assistant.

I then restarted the Mac, and tried to enter macOS Recovery (⌘+R on boot). I saw the "spinning globe" icon for about 4 minutes, but then it gave the error:

  apple.com/support
  -1008F

I have since reset the NVRAM (⌥+⌘+P+R) but I continually get the "-1008F" error when trying to access macOS Recovery. However, in this Reddit thread regarding this nominal issue for the macOS Catalina Beta, they suggest to try another Recovery key combination (⌘+⌥+R on boot), and this indeed gets me into some sort of Recovery mode where I'm first asked to enter my Apple ID, and I can afterwards see the usual Recovery options like Disk Utility, Reinstall MacOS, Restore from Time Machine backup, etc.

However, I am unsure on how to proceed from this point. As mentioned, my previous Time Machine restoration failed from macOS Recovery (the backup is located on a Synology NAS on my network; I have an additional concurrent backup on another Synology NAS which I haven't tried yet).

Furthermore, according to some sources I found on the net when searching for the "-1008F" error, it can be indicative of hardware failure and some people seem to have had hardware parts replaced. I did notice that when I entered macOS Recovery the first time, it was lingering a very long time on the state: "Examining available disks...".

When checking Disk Utility, I have two Mac HD Partitions apparently since installing macOS Catalina: Macintosh HD for the OS partition and Macintosh HD - Data for user data. Since macOS Mojave doesn't use this setup, do I need to "merge" these partitions to successfully restore from the Time Machine backup or reinstall macOS Mojave from scratch? I wonder this because when I navigate to the Time Machine backup process, it asks me which partition to restore into – and I can select both the Macintosh HD and Macintosh HD - Data partitions. This doesn't feel right, as macOS Mojave uses one partition for both OS and user data.

If I indeed need to "merge" the two partitions (e.g. by reformatting them into one "Macintosh HD" partition), how do I do that? A user in this Reddit thread regarding the MacOS Catalina beta suggests to "Erase the APFS container and format it again as APFS", but I don't understand what the user means by the "AFPS container". I don't see a single container encapsulating both partitions, rather they appear like two separate things seen in the images below:

To make a long story short: how do I best resolve this problem and restore my Time Machine backup to my macOS Mojave system from the now broken macOS Catalina system?

Do I need to reformat the drive first, and can I then restore from my Time Machine backup – or should I install a fresh copy of macOS Mojave and then attempt restoration via the Migration Assistant?

I was in contact with Apple's support for this issue, and it was ultimately resolved although a bit tortuous.
There are several modes of MacOS Recovery, accessible by holding different key combinations as described here.
Trying to access MacOS Recovery failed and gave the "-1008F" error every time I tried the MacOS Recovery modes "Reinstall the latest macOS that was installed on your Mac (recommended)" (⌘+R) and "Upgrade to the latest macOS that is compatible with your Mac." (⌥+⌘+R).
However, the mode "Reinstall the macOS that came with your Mac, or the closest version still available." (⇧+⌥+⌘+R) did work for me. From this mode, I was instructed by Apple Support to wipe/format the disk entirely clean using MacOS Recovery mode's Disk Utility and create a new volume (I'm not sure if this step is absolutely necessary). From there on, I could successfully install MacOS Mojave (the OS that originally shipped with the Mac).
Next arose the issue of restoring my system. My intention was to stay on MacOS Mojave instead of MacOS Catalina, but unfortunately it appears that when I installed MacOS Catalina the first time (before all this happened and I decided to go back to MacOS Mojave) – MacOS Catalina actually converted format of my Time Machine backups stored on my NAS from the traditional .sparsebundle format to the newly introduced .backupbundle format. I think this was disingenuous by Apple, because I had not been asked for this conversion to occur, nor did any Time Machine backup process once MacOS Catalina was installed ever move past the backup preparation stage since I had manually disabled Time Machine backup. In other words, MacOS Catalina converts your Time Machine backups to a new format without asking you!
The problem is of course that the new .backupbundle format of Time Machine backups cannot be identified by MacOS Mojave. According to Apple Support, Apple does for the time being provide a "secret" method to convert .backupbundle files back to .sparsebundle, but this is not something that they are announcing publicly because apparently they want all users to shift to MacOS Catalina. Rather than hassle with this however, I opted to upgrade to MacOS Catalina and try to restore my Time Machine backups from there instead.
Once MacOS had been upgraded to a clean install of Catalina, a had a new problem because the Time Machine backups were now identifiable but not restorable by Migration Assistant.app, the recommended Time Machine restoration application in MacOS.  I believe the error message said something like "Could not open backup, file in use..." (paraphrasing). It turns out that there was an issue with MacOS/Migration Assistant not being able to open Time Machine backups stored on my Synology NAS devices over the network, even when trying different modes of SMB/AFP. The solution was to copy the .backupbundle files from the NAS onto an external USB/Thunderbolt drive, then mount the .backupbundle file by double-clicking it in Finder, and finally running Migration Assistant again. From thereon, I could successfully restore my files and system configuration onto MacOS Catalina.
The first lesson here is not to keep Time Machine backups only on NAS devices, because they are unsupported Time Machine destinations in Apple's view. Apple primarily supports Time Machine backups on external USB/Thunderbolt drives, and were not inclined to help me resolve the problem of reading the Time Machine backup on the NAS. I had to buy an entire new external drive in order to relocate the .backupbundle file and restore it, and I now intend to back up both to the external drive and NAS continually. The second lesson is to make copies of your Time Machine backups before upgrading to a new OS – I did not foresee that MacOS Catalina would convert or otherwise do things to my backup files upon OS upgrade without my permission!
Hope this is of use to anyone else running into this chain of issues after upgrading to MacOS Catalina.


What iPhone apps can't you live without? What are your "must-have" iPhone or iPod touch apps—the ones you can't live without? (Figuratively speaking, I hope.) Please omit apps that come pre-installed.

Rules

One app per answer.
Use this format for the first two lines of your answer:
## [app name](link to website)
[App Store](link to appstore)
Include short description.
Check for duplicates before adding new answers.
If you find a duplicate, vote it down and encourage its poster to upvote the original entry instead (and remove the dupe).

Please exclude iPad-only apps from here; there's Great iPad Apps for those.

Disclaimer: I know this type of question is controversial. However, great many people do find that properly implemented and curated CW polls can be useful. (If you are one of those who do not, could you simply consider ignoring this?)

Dropbox

App Store

Conveniently access files in your Dropbox on the go.


iPod touch resetting My ex husband bought our daughter an iPod touch and put everything under his email account so when she try's to text and stuff it goes to him. Is there a way to reset just the email to hers so she can talk with her friends in private. I would reset the whole thing but she has already bought a lot of music and we don't have iTunes or Internet on home computer.

Easy enough...

go into Settings -> iCloud and sign out of his account there. You may also have to do the same in the Message -> iMessage settings.

Once that is done you can use her email for the icloud and iMessage account.

If you do that and are still getting his messages use the Apple Support page for de-registering your account on that phone:

https://selfsolve.apple.com/deregister-imessage


Have 2 iCloud accounts in my mac and don't know how I have 2 iCloud accounts and don't know how, I tried to delete the deactivated one (the bottom one in the image) but when i deleted it, my mac deleted the other (which was active).

When the 2 accounts was deleted I created again my iCloud account but still have 2 iCloud accounts.

How I resolve this issue?

Any help will be appreciated.

I have two iCloud accounts on my Mac (and in fact, most of my selected iOS devices) because of the way Apple IDs work.

One of them iCloud accounts is used for iCloud syncing, etc and the email address attached to it is not of an Apple-owned domain (e.g. @icloud.com, @me.com).

The second iCloud account is most likely your iCloud email account.


i think my harddrive died? did an internet recovery, whats the status of my computer? can't restore from backup until i get home so for some reason my 2011 MBP died on my way to work this morning? when i got in and booted it up, it froze. i restarted it and got a flashing folder with a question mark on it.

what does this mean exactly? how could this happen? i was literally just using it last night before i went to sleep, and then it was doing this when i woke up.

so i read some stuff online and did an internet recovery, which i've never done before. now it's at a disk utility page asking me to choose a method to restore. i want to restore from an old Time Machine backup I have, but that's back at my apartment. is it safe to put it to sleep on this screen until i get home?

sorry for this, i'm very confused and frustrated as to why this just happened. and my backup is old and i don't know if i backed up any system settings so i don't know if that will even work.

Anyway...

What could have caused this? What does that error even mean?
What is the current status of my computer? Is everything wiped from my HDD?
Is is safe to leave it sleeping on the Disc Utility until I get home?
Can I restore from Time Machine if I didn't backup system settings?

i'm really anxious at work right now, and any insights would be really helpful right now.

thanks

UPDATE:

if anyone comes across this in the future, here's an update.

my harddrive was fine, the cable between the logic board and the HDD was dead. i took it to the apple store, and they were very nice and understanding and replaced it right there for $18.

What could have caused this? What does that error even mean?

You may have a hard drive that is going bad. The flashing folder means that the Mac can not find or read the needed system files to boot up.

What is the current status of my computer? Is everything wiped from my HDD?

Hard to say, but probably not. You could remove your harddrive, put it in an external HD dock, and try to recover you personal files.  Or, you could restart it while holding down the "T" key to put it in target disk mode and then connect it to another running Mac computer via a Firewire or Thunderbolt cable. Your hard drive will show up as another disk on that computer and the can get to your files.

Either way, I would consider replacing the hard drive.  To check for errors, in the Terminal (/Applications/Utilities), type

grep -i "i/o error" /var/log/system.log

If you see any results, your hard drive may be dying.

3. Is is safe to leave it sleeping on the Disc Utility until I get home?

Yes

4.  Can I restore from Time Machine if I didn't backup system settings?

Yes


Apple Battery Charger Not Charging Sanyo Batteries I've had the Apple Battery Charger for a good long while now. After I bought it, I also bought a couple 8-packs of Sanyo Eneloop HR-3UTGA batteries, known to be the same model of battery included with Apple's charger. They worked great until a couple days ago. Now, with the Apple-branded batteries in the charger, it works fine. But when I put the Sanyos in the charger, nothing happens. No status light comes on. Nothing. Zilch.

I've tried swapping out different sets of batteries, and it seems that my charger has suddenly taken an intense dislike for the Sanyos, completely without warning. But when I put the Apple batteries in, no problem.

Can anyone suggest a course of action? Is it a bum charger now, or is something weird going on?

Stating the obvious up front, the charger is only designed and tested to work with the Apple Batteries. It could be that the mAh of the Sanyo batteries is too different (out of range) for the Apple Battery Charger to properly recognize and charge to full capacity. The Apple batteries have a mAh of 1900.

If the Sanyo are 2400 or even 1600 the gap may just be too much so that the charger doesn't do its thing. As long as the charger is still able to charge the Apple batteries, the charger should not be bum.


Shortcut to insert row in Excel I see a reference showing the shortcut to be Ctl-Shift-I : but it is not working on Excel for Mac 2015

https://exceljet.net/keyboard-shortcuts/insert-rows

Is there any working shortcut for this?

Just tested command shift + and control shift + on excel 2016 on a mac - both add a row as long as the row is selected.

If the row is not selected then it will shift the cells down in that row.

For Excel 2011, then control i works to add a row if the row is selected, if only a cell is selected then it brings up the insert cell dialogue.
In excel 2011 command i does italic.

For command-shift-i this does italic on the selected row - the version using control does not work (excel 2106).

That website has information that appears out of date.


Restoring 10.6.7 wallpapers This may sound a bit silly and I hope it's not off-topic, but... I'm looking for a specific wallpaper that was present in OS X 10.6.7 (an Ansel Adams-style black-and-white landscape with the sun hidden behind some very remarkable clouds). It is no longer present in OS X Lion.

Strangely, it is also not a part of the OS X 10.6 wallpapers pack.

Is there a comprehensive resource from which old OS X wallpapers can be accessed?

If its the mountains in black and white with the sun behind clouds.. It's in this pack: http://www.redmondpie.com/download-os-x-snow-leopard-wallpapers/


iOS App Store: Can't scroll to see more results When searching with a keyword in the App Store app on my iPhone, I unable to scroll to see more results. What could be causing the issue? I am running iOS 12.

To resolve, try the following one by one:

Relaunch the App Store app. Invoke the multitasking UI by double pressing Home button, and swipe up to quit the app. Now relaunch the app and try again.

Make sure you have an active Internet connection and the App Store is able to access it. You can browse around in the app to ensure you have an active connection.
Try connecting to a different Wi-Fi/mobile data network (basically to a different ISP). Sometimes App Store may not be able to fetch data over some network. Switching to a different network may help resolve the issue.
You can also try by restarting your iPhone.
One last resort would be reset your Network Settings. Go to Settings app → General → Reset and tap Reset Network Settings. Do note to use it with caution as this will reset all network configuration on your device and you'll have to re-add the saved Wi-Fi access points.


macOS unattended install I know how to create a bootable USB drive from which I can install macOS.

However, the usual macOS installer is interactive, I can't just plug in the installation media and let it do its work. The setup assistant will ask for things like country, computer name, user name, password, wifi settings, etc.

Can I somehow preconfigure the installation media so that it would complete the entire process without any user interaction?

The Apple macOS installer doesn't read settings so people that require a scripted setup add post install scripts or a full fledged MDM to push configuration profiles. You can pick apart the vendor install and roll a combined package - createOSXinstallPkg - but 10.12.4 changes may limit the options there going forward.

In the end, your solution for this varies according to your scale and the cost to afford user interaction.

5 installs typically you make an image or use ssh / Apple Remote Desktop to script and push out customizations
50 installs you might use a tool like createOSXinstallPkg or server.app and profile manager
500 to 5000 installs set up an MDM like munki or jamf pro.

Organizations are successfully deploying "zero touch" solutions but that means IT doesn't have to touch the os - end users still need to initiate and handle some subset of the default graphical / interactive steps. Many like iCloud, diagnostic settings, location and Siri can be preconfigured or automated but not everything.


Why is my MacBook Pro already using swap memory? I have a late 2013 MacBook Pro 13" with 8 GB of memory. Lately my MacBook Pro uses swap memory, when it has enough free memory. Is this normal and can I do something about it? Also when I only have safari and let's say Xcode open it uses 99% of the RAM. Is this normal behavior?

This is normal behavior. You are not experiencing any memory issues in your screenshot above. What I suspect is happening is that OS X is creating some placeholder of sorts to enable swap memory, rather than actually using swap memory here. I have never seen a zero in the swap memory section, unless I have just restarted and open the Activity Monitor window fresh, and even then, I rarely see zero.

With Mavericks and Yosemite, the way the OS uses memory changed a bit. Essentially, the OS takes all the memory, and then manages it out as needed. So, our traditional way of looking at the memory report in Activity Monitor is not really valid. Due to this, Mavericks added the 'Memory Pressure' gauge, to give you an idea of when you have a limitation caused by memory. In your screenshot, you have a green memory pressure. For more see this answer.

Ars Technica has a nice description of this 'memory compression' in their Mavericks review:

http://arstechnica.com/apple/2013/10/os-x-10-9/17/


How to clear ALL items from Safari's reading list? How to clear ALL items from Safari's reading list?
I have 100's of items in the list so do not want do do them individually.

I tried removing Bookmarks.plist in ~/Library/Safari/ which deletes the reading list on the mac locally but iCloud just adds them back, when syncing.

In more recent Safari versions where the button has gone away, just right-click or Control-click an item in the list. The context menu will show a Clear all… choice there.


"Unknown error" when unlocking AppleID account I had to change my Apple ID password because my account was locked. When I try to do this on Apple's website I get an "unknown error":

which doesn't allow me to proceed.

How can I resolve this?

This looks like a problem only Apple can solve. You can contact Apple Support through https://getsupport.apple.com/, it may need some patience to navigate through the structure there til you get to a phone/email contact.


Displaying 'note keys/labels' on Garageband for iOS (specifically iPad) I'm wondering if there is a way to display all the 'note letters' on the keys in the Keyboard on GarageBand for iOS.

At the moment it only displays the 'C notes' - for example C2, C3 and C4.

I have no 'music-based technical knowledge' or expertise and would appreciate any help in being able to see all the notes displayed.

Thanks for your help!

I'm pretty certain that there is no setting to overlay the note names on each key of the GarageBand-IOS keyboard. It's a reasonable question, and I found it repeated a couple of other times on discussion forums.

I submitted this to Apple as a feature request. I encourage you (and others) to do the same using this link.


In Lion can I get the four fingere swipe to do COMMAND+Tab? I recently switched to Lion from Snow Leopard (Yah I know, I am late), it is great, the only one thing that I miss is the four fingere swipe that did COMMAND+TAB

Is there anyway I can enable that?

BetterTouchTool
can surely do this and a lot more! Enjoy:
http://www.boastr.de/


Is it safe to use the mac's cable for an airport express? When you pull the power plug off the airport express, a connector appears, similar to the connector on the mac's power brick. These connect perfectly, but I want to be sure: is it safe to use a mac's cable to power an airport express?

I often use the smaller Airport cable to power the Mac power adapter without having a ground and you can safely do the opposite as long as you get a firm connection and support the AirPort hardware if the plug extends lower than the bottom of the device.


Concerns in testing a potentially water damaged Macbook battery So, I acquired a water damaged Macbook (Late-2008 Unibody / 5.1) to cannibalize for parts for my existing macbook of the same model.  I've taken everything I need off it, so I'm looking to part out the rest of the components to recover a few dollars from what I paid for it.  The logic board is pretty obviously fried - absolutely no life in it if I attempt to power it on.

However, the PMC seems to be intact.  When I connect a charger it lights up green, then orange like it's charging the battery.  The charge indicator lights on the side also come on and indicate a discharged battery (one blinking green light).

So, given that the battery may have been water damaged, but shows no symptoms of it, how should I go about testing it, and what should my concerns be?  If it seems to be holding a charge in the damaged macbook, could it still damage my fully-functioning macbook if I plugged it in to test it/check the capacity?

If you have the Apple Service Toolkit, that is the easiest way, if you don't... there aren't may programs out there really suited for this type of work.

If you are showing that the battery may be holding or attempting to obtain a charge, the battery probably will be OK to be used. I am sure that enough time has passed in where the battery has been completely dry.  In many cases you could submerge the battery, dry it off and it will work. The batteries are pretty much air tight to begin with.

If a battery had a crack in it, or something of the sort you'd know.

The best thing to do is to attempt to get a charge out of it, if the battery holds one you are fine, if not then you may be able to go down to an Apple Store and ask if there is a way to view how much life is left in the battery.

Of course, this is assuming the battery hasn't been saturated in salt water either, if it has, you may just want to throw it away.  Otherwise I think you will be safe to use it as long as it holds a charge that is.


how to change "§" (section symbol) key to write "`" (back quote) I'm using back quote many times but never use the '§' symbol.

I'd like to change the key to always write back quote instead. does anyone know how can I change it programtically?

An easier way with Karabiner is to just add a new Simple Modification (the first tab in Karabiner):

From key: non_us_backslash
To key: grave_accent_and_tilde (`)

Here's a screenshot of that:

Why is that called non_us_backslash and not §?
The "non us backslash" is probably any key directly below the esc key (or the touchbar) (source: this issue).
On the English International, UK English, Dutch, Polish etc. keyboards, that's the key that produces the section symbol §.


iCloud photo question I have iCloud Photo Library turned on for all my devices (iPhone, iPad, IPod).

My question: Is there any way to have iCloud turned on but have photos save to just one device with out having them saved to all devices?

If I try to delete the picture or video it deletes from all 3 devices, is there a way to have iCloud Photo Library turned on but still be able to just have pictures on one device?

Thanks for any help!

Yes. You can do this by heading to Settings > iCloud then turn off the Photos option. This will disable photo sharing between devices, allowing you to delete your photos off of one device but keep them on the others, or vice versa. Hope this helps!


Download Mountain Lion on unsupported Mac? Can I buy and download OS X 10.8, Mountain Lion, via the Mac App Store on an unsupported Mac?

My home internet is dial-up, so whenever I need to download stuff I go to the library with my Snow Leopard (Mac OS X 10.6) MacBook.

For Mountain Lion (OS X 10.8), it doesn't work, because my MacBook isn't supported by Mountain Lion, even though I actually want to install 10.8 on my iMac at home, so the app store won't let me buy it.

Is there a way to work around this?

You should be able to use file linked here to download mavericks, just use "Disk Utility" to restore the ".dmg" to a usb thumb drive then boot your mac off it, then select your hard drive and then let it finish booting.

I used this to download Mavericks on a late 2006 model Mac mini with 2GB of RAM. Mavericks won't install or run on it, but I was able to use the downloaded app along with tools from the "tonymacx86.com" website to make a USB installer to install on a PC to make a customac (aka a hackintosh)

I wish they still had Mountain Lion available to download, If they still did I think this method would have also worked to download it too.


How to stop CorruptPowerlog eating up my disk space? I am running 10.14.6 (18G3020) on a 2018 MacBook Air.

Every 15 seconds or so a triplet of files is created in /private/var/db/powerlog/Library/BatteryLife/Quarantine. For example

30144 -rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel    15M Apr  1 17:02 CorruptPowerlog_1585785775.350699.PLSQL
   64 -rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel    32K Apr  1 17:02 CorruptPowerlog_1585785775.350699.PLSQL-shm
    0 -rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel     0B Apr  1 17:02 CorruptPowerlog_1585785775.350699.PLSQL-wal

This means that my disk space is shrinking by 60MB per minute.

I can delete these files as root, but they keep coming back.

What program creates these files? How can I stop this?

PowerLog is malware
that displays pop-ups and unwanted advertisements that do not come from the websites you are browsing. These PowerLog ads are displayed as boxes with coupons, underlined keywords (in-text ads), pop-up ads, or advertising banners. Virustotal
PowerLog is usually bundled with other free software that you download from the Internet. Unfortunately, some free downloads do not adequately advertise that other software is being installed, and you may find that you installed PowerLog without your knowledge.
The PowerLog ads may have different text in the popup: "Powered by PowerLog", "Advertisements by PowerLog", "Brought to you by PowerLog", "Ads by PowerLog", or "Ads powered by PowerLog". These ads are designed to encourage the installation of additional questionable content, including web browser toolbars, optimization utilities, and other products, so that the PowerLog publisher can generate pay-per-click revenue.
Note: Once installed, PowerLog installs another app of this type called MacPerformance. This app forces browsers to open websites that offer updates for software with fake tools. You can see the PowerLog process in the Activity Monitor: It is displayed as "PowerLift".
When your device is infected with the PowerLog adware, the following symptoms are common:

Ads appear in places where they shouldn't be.

Your web browser's home page has mysteriously changed without your permission.

Web pages you normally visit do not display properly.

Website links direct you to websites other than those you expected.

Browser pop-ups will appear recommending fake updates or other software.

Other unwanted programs may be installed without your knowledge.

How to remove PowerLog adware
Go to the system settings.
Click Profiles.
The list contains the entry "AdminPrefs". Select this option and click the "-" button in the lower left corner.
Note: If there is no profile icon, no profiles are installed. This is normal.
Open "Finder" an click on "Applications". Find and remove the PowerLog app. Also look for MPlayerX, NicePlayer, or any other suspicious application and drag it to the Trash. After removing the potentially unwanted applications that are causing online ads, scan your Mac for any remaining unwanted components
Avoid launchd trying to start this program again. Delete the associated files from the following paths
/Library/LaunchAgents

~/Library/LaunchAgents

/Library/LaunchDaemons

Look for recently added suspicious files in the LaunchAgents folder and move them to the Trash. Examples of files generated by adware - "installmac.AppRemoval.plist", "myppes.download.plist", "mykotlerino.ltvbit.plist", "kuklorest.update.plist", etc. Adware typically installs multiple files with the same string.
Look for recently added suspicious files in the LaunchDaemons folder. For example "com.aoudad.net-Settings.plist", "com.myppes.net-Settings.plist", "com.kuklorest.net-Settings.plist", "com.avickUpd.plist" and delete it.
Check for adware-generated files in the (~)/Library/Application\ Support folder. Also, look for recently added suspicious folders in the Application Support folder. For example "MplayerX" or "NicePlayer" and move these folders to the trash.
Last uninstall the PowerLog extension from Safari, Chrome, or Firefox.
But you can also use Malwarebytes or Combo Cleaner. They can also remove it.


Force xcodebuild use a specific SDK only I am trying to fix a homebrew formula which uses xcodebuild to build a dependency. Unfortunately, this dependency relies on an older SDK, MacOSX10.12.sdk. I cannot make this project use a newer SDK as it would require vast refactoring to the codebase. Moreover, this library is from Apple and they chose to drop support for it on purpose in the newest Xcode SDK.

Fortunately, I have managed to find the SDK which I need from this repository on  Github. Yet now I do not know how to force xcodebuild to use the SDK which I need. No matter what options or variables I set, xcodebuild always uses the default SDK from Xcode.

The version of the system I'm using for this is 10.12.6. Yes, even though the version of the system itself is 10.12, Xcode refuses to use an SDK which matches said version.

So how can I force xcodebuild to use my older SDK in my own custom directory?

You run xcodebuild like this:

xcodebuild -sdk "/path/to/sdk/" -project myproj.xcodeproj


How to Fix Disk Utility Getting Stuck on "Verifying storage system" Okay, had a brief power outage today that shut down my computer and external drives, so I figured I should run a quick disk check just to be safe.

However, when I run try to verify with Disk Utility, one of the volumes (an encrypted Fusion Drive) is getting stuck on the "Verifying storage system" step. I've tried leaving it, but even after more than eight hours it wasn't showing any progress of any kind.

I've tried using both the Disk Utility app as well as the diskutil verifyVolume command line utility, but nothing happens.

I've also tried doing this with the volume not being used as the system volume, but it makes no difference; not sure if it's relevant, but even though the volume isn't the system volume, Disk Utility isn't unmounting it to verify it. It only just occurred to me now, so I'll try and remember tomorrow to keep the volume unmounted and run a check in that state to see if it makes any difference.

I'm not even sure if I remember seeing the "verifying storage system" step before, or if it does come up it must scroll away quickly normally, certainly never had it stick before.

So I tried running disk verification with the volume unmounted and verification occurred without getting stuck as before.

You can unmount a volume from Disk Utility (don't eject it), but if it's your system volume then you'll need to boot into the recovery partition (hold Command + R during start-up) as the volume won't unmount otherwise.

I still can't determine why verification is getting stuck for the volume while it's mounted, or why Disk Utility isn't unmounting the volume automatically, but all tests are returning success so at least the file-system appears to be okay.


Command Line - Enable Remote Login and Remote Management For my job, before I deploy a new Mac laptop, I need to enable these two settings:

System Preferences - Sharing - Remote Login.  Once enabled I also need to add the admin account that previously I have created by selecting the little + symbol under Only these users:
System Preferences - Sharing - Remote Management - (the little pop up windows comes out) and I select all the features

How do I achieve the above two process via command line?

Modifying remote login and remote management settings is done with two different commands - both executed as root:

systemsetup
kickstart

To enable remote login for members of the admin group enter:

sudo systemsetup -setremotelogin on

To restrict access use dseditgroup. First check if it exists and add it if necessary:

dseditgroup com.apple.access_ssh
dseditgroup -o create -q com.apple.access_ssh

and add a user group:

sudo dseditgroup -o edit -a admin -t group com.apple.access_ssh

To enable remote management for admin users enter:

sudo /System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/Resources/kickstart -activate -configure -access -on -users admin -privs -all -restart -agent -menu

To check other options enter:

sudo /System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/Resources/kickstart --help


Deactivate automatic mark as read in Apple Mail 7.3 I just changed from Windows to OS X Mavericks with Apple Mail App 7.3. The first thing I'm wondering about is that I cannot disable the automation to mark an email as read by default when I just clicked on it. Is there any way to do so?

I found TruePreview. But the tool does not support Mail 7.3 any more. Another solution would be to use a different mail client like Thunderbird. But there I miss the integration of the address book and the synchronisation with my iPhone and iPad.

I've been using Mail Act-On. It's overkill (does a lot more than just keep messages unread) and kind of pricey at $30 (with free trial), but since it's a paid app, they keep it up to date. Even when TruePreview was being maintained, it'd sometimes be weeks or months before it was updated to work with the latest version of OS X.


Persistent location-based reminder I want to set a permanent reminder in iOS that will fire every time I leave the house to remind me to check that I've locked the door.  I can set a location-based reminder that triggers when I leave, but it seems to be a one-shot deal (and I don't want to have to set a reminder to remind me to set another reminder!)

It does seem that there's an ability to set a scheduled reminder that fires every day at a given time and is also location-based, but I don't think this is what I'm looking for due to requiring to have to set a time too.  I don't think this is going to fire off if I'm already outside before the reminder's time comes.

Is it possible to set up an event that fires off every time you leave a location and not just once?  If so, how?

You can set up repeating reminders based on location using several different methods. Workflow and Shortcuts are native iOS apps that have functions for reminders based on location. I do not recall if they can be triggered automatically or have to be manually triggered.

You could also use a third party app/service such as IFTTT which supports repeating triggers. Use the location service connected to a notification service to create your reminder.


When will Endnote X4 for Mac be compatible with Word for Mac 2011? In the meantime, how can one manage?

According to their website:

  EndNote X4 is not compatible with Word 2011. The compatibility of Word 2011 with EndNote X4 will be addressed in a free update. Please register your software to be informed when EndNote X4 is compatible with Word 2011.

On their message board, this message says:

  The schedule has changed since then so I cannot provide a firm ETA, other than we're now targeting the first quarter of 2011.

From the later comments in that thread (and other threads in their forum), there appear to be a lot of unhappy customers.

Your other options appear to be:

Use X4 with MS Word 2008 (and thankfully, you can run 2008 and 2011 apps at the same time)
Use X4 with Pages '09
Use X3 with MS Word 2011
Apply to beta test the Word 2011 version of X4
Don't use Endnote; instead just use Word 2011's built-in tools


Changing configurations for Jrnl Greetings to the apple community.
I'm a newbie to mac and the terminal and I have no previous exposure to Linux.
I have only casually used computers. However I've been wanting to step up my game and understand a few basics.
I've installed this package http://maebert.github.io/jrnl/ which is basically to write entries on the terminal.
I've done so, and I've been following the tutorial.
However, I'm facing difficulty to edit my entries.
The documentation says that I need to change the ~/.jrnl_config file.
However, when I try to access it I get permission denied.

Harguns-MacBook-Pro-3:~ hargun3045$ ~/.jrnl_config
-bash: /Users/hargun3045/.jrnl_config: Permission denied

I have a very vague idea of user read/write permissions and about Root access, however I'm not very clear how I can go to the particular file and change settings.

Can a experienced user guide me?

Thanks!

It looks like you're attempting to execute the .jrnl_config file. You don't want to execute it, you want to edit it. i.e. nano ~/.jrnl_config or open ~/.jrnl_config.

In the error message, Bash is telling you that you don't have permission to execute the file. This is because execute permission isn't given to your user (or any user, most likely) for that file. This makes sense because the file isn't meant to be executed--it's a configuration file.


Difficulty deleting music from music library on my iPhone I'm having difficulty managing music in my iTunes library on my phone. I have old songs that I do not want anymore that are still showing up with the iCloud symbol (ready to download) in my library. Even going to settings to hide certain downloaded music, the songs I do not want still appear (just without the iCloud symbol) and cannot be deleted. I want to completely get rid of some songs. Help.

I was having the same problem. I went into Settings on my iPhone and to Music. Towards the bottom it says Show All Music. I just disabled that and it solved my problem.


If my App gets approved, can I set a specific "Release Date"? I'm developing my first App for the App Store, and I'll soon be submitting it. However I need to release it on a specific day for promotional reasons. Since I've never been through the process before, can you tell me if it is possible to set a "release after X" date when submitting the app?

In other words, will my app be automatically "released" as soon as it is approved?

I've found this question dealing with updates, hoping for an answer specific to a whole new app.

You can set the release date through iTunes Connect.
The App Distribution Guide in the iOS Developer Documentation has a page titled Managing Your App in iTunes Connect, where the section Changing the Availability Date of Your App states:

Use iTunes Connect to set a date when the app is available on the store. For example, you can choose a date that immediately releases the app to the store after it’s approved, or you can set a later date. Using a later availability date allows you to arrange other marketing activities around the launch of your app.

Sign in to iTunes Connect.

Select Manage Your Apps.

Select your app in the Recent Activity section.

Click Rights and Pricing.

Choose a date from the Availability Date pop-up menus.

Optionally, edit the other fields in this form.

Click Save.

Changes you make to Rights and Pricing go live immediately (expect 24 hours for a full refresh of the changes on the store).

Read the App Distribution Guide for more information on managing your app on the App Store.


iTunes Home Sharing never updates Play Counts or Ratings from iPhone Ever since iTunes introduced Home Sharing, the Preferences dialog has had a checkbox titled "Home Sharing computers and devices update play counts".  But this option has never had any effect whatsoever that I can discern.

You can rate the songs on your iPhone and the rating will appear to stick on the iPhone, but when you disconnect from the Home Sharing, the ratings you've just made are discarded.  And the Play Counts in your iTunes library will never update.

Can this be fixed or is this just a huge bug since the beginning of Home Sharing?

This has always worked for me and here is a test I just performed on iOS 5.0.1 (9A405) and iTunes 10.5 (141).

make a smart playlist of songs rated higher than three stars and browse it on your iOS device
the only bug I see is sometimes when you go to settings, the current stars don't show, but when I change the rating it is reflected in the iTunes listing almost instantly (the change pushes over WiFi back to the iTunes and causes the display to refresh after each change).
play counts get updated at the end of the song, last played is updated correctly.

If this doesn't work for you, you may have to isolate the error in your setup. I would start with a new user account and moving 5 songs to a clean iTunes library. Be sure you quit iTunes on the "main" account if you use fast user switching - home sharing might not handle two copies of iTunes running on the same computer well. Another quick check might be to disable any firewall software on your mac. Something is off on your setup and without more testing, it's hard to guess exactly what.


How can I ensure that laptop batteries I buy are genuine? I need new batteries for my for MBP 2012 8.1 13". I ran across a site selling what seems to be actual new Apple batteries. Is this a scam? I would like to buy a real Apple product, so how can I be sure of this?

Some sellers offer batteries for MacBooks cheaper than Apple. If it is a well-known manufacturer or seller, I would have less to think about. However, I would order from a trusted shop.


Checking apps for a "GateKeeper" Developer ID? Is there any way for a Mac user currently running Snow Leopard or Lion to check, maybe from the Terminal command-line, whether some application downloaded from the net was digitally signed with an Apple issued Developer ID?

If so, what might be the benefits for a Mac user to do such checking now?

Apple has been encouraging Mac developers to digitally sign their Mac applications with an Apple issued Developer ID, which Apple announced will be used by the Mac OS at some point in the future.

If you have the developer tools installed, you can view the signing information for a binary using this command:

codesign -dvvv <path to app.app>

The output looks like this:

Executable=/Volumes/Big Disk/F376/Projects/<My App>
Identifier=<My Bundle ID>
Format=bundle with Mach-O thin (x86_64)
CodeDirectory v=20100 size=3958 flags=0x0(none) hashes=189+5 location=embedded
Hash type=sha1 size=20
CDHash=761b0d1XXXXXXXXXX0dc8dd42e38eb445fb5341f
Signature size=8504
Authority=Developer ID Application: XXXXXX
Authority=Developer ID Certification Authority
Authority=Apple Root CA
Timestamp=May 7, 2013 3:07:59 PM
Info.plist entries=30
Sealed Resources rules=4 files=128
Internal requirements count=1 size=224


Can I see which iPad apps I use most frequently? I have many games on my iPad which my kids play.  I'd like to remove the games and apps that aren't used but I don't know how to find this information.

Is there a way to see the most used apps on your iOS device?  Or possibly a list of apps with a "last used" data field?

In a pinch, you could look through the multitasking bar that appears when you double-click the home button. The apps are arranged in order of most recently used. It is not a measure of how frequently an app is used, but it could at least tell you if it was used recently, or if other apps have been of more interest lately.


I need to examine an 82.7 GB (!) text file. What can open it? We recently had a meltdown of a Tomcat server, that produced an 82.7 GB "catalina.out" log file, which I saved for forensic analysis.

What macOS editors can open monster text files without consuming 80 GB of RAM or causing 15 minute freezes?

less filename

From the command line, it lets you view files straightaway without loading the full file into memory.


What happened to the rename song iTunes keyboard shortcut? The keyboard shortcut that used to enter rename mode for the currently selected song no longer works in iTunes. Has it changed, or disappeared?

Pressing ⌤ enter / fn + ↩ return always works for me…

In addition, ⌘ cmd + ↩ return also works most of the time.


How can I force my right-hand monitor to always be my primary monitor on my MBP? I have a new MBP with 2x 4k monitors.  Due to the layout of my desk, I want my right-side monitor to be my primary display.  I know how to set this up within the display settings, however, I have to do make these changes every time I connect my monitors-- they do not persist.

Specifically, I have a new 2017 MBP with the 4x USB-C ports. Every day, I consistently connect monitor #1 (the one on my right) then monitor #2, which should be my secondary display.  It never fails, monitor #2 becomes my primary display, and the display "seam" isn't between the two monitors but is instead along the outer edges of my display..  In other words, I can't drag my mouse from the left side display, to the right side display, moving left-to-right. Instead, I have to move my mouse to the left-side of my left monitor, and then it will transition to the right-side of my right monitor, as if the orientation of the two display is suppose to be flip=flopped on my desk.

Every morning when I plug in my laptop, I have to change the orientation of my displays from within the Display settings screen.  I'd like to be able to set this up once, and then macOS will come to expect that when two monitors are attached, the "first" monitor is on the right, and is the primary display.  Can I configure macOS to persist this behavior?

Swap the plugs over.

If it absolutely always does it the same way whichever way you put the plugs in, then swap the monitors over.


Console Utility iMac When I open the console utility on my iMac, I see that messages are occurring at a rate so fast that they can't be read.  I don't recall messages occurring so fast.  Is this normal behavior? I only have 2 apps open in background.

Yes, this is completely normal behavior. Here is an example of how to break down the messages in the console app.

This is my what appears when I open my console app.

Look how many messages came in within a second at 14:03:04! That's a lot of data to process! But you don't have to process this data.

Let's say you're looking for an error message, click on the box in the top left labelled Errors and Faults. This is what mine looks like.

Less than an error per second. Much easier to process. But my guess is that even this is not what you were looking for. Check out the sidebar here:

These are the various files and folders that contain various logs for both built-in and third party apps. If you click on one of these files or navigate through the folders to the log file you are looking for you can view the log file in app. My guess is the what you are looking for is the system.log which records information for built-in system functions.

This is an example of what an open system.log file looks like.


Item: "Documents", Kind "Unknown" in Login Items In my Login Items on Mac OS 10.11.3 I see an item called "Documents". The Kind is specified as "unknown" and there is a yellow warning sign at the end of the line.

No further information is shown when I hover or click the warning sign or the item. I checked the loginwindow.plist, but couldn't see anything relating to the item in question.

I don't want to merely clear it out.

Does anyone know what this item is supposed to do and how I could further inquire what is wrong with it?

Somehow or another it sounds like your Documents folder was added to your startup items. I think this used to be a way to have the Finder open a specific folder on login, but it hasn't worked that way for some time.

It is not serving any purpose now, and there's no reason to keep it.


Downgrade without SHSH2 Blobs I recently upgraded to iOS 12.0 from 11.2 and I didn't save my SHSH2 blobs. In the process, I stupidly lost my jailbreak and realized there are no iOS 12 jailbreaks that are public yet. How do you downgrade to iOS 11.2 without SHSH2 blobs? I am aware that downgrading results in a factory reset and restoring your data with iCloud will bring it up to that iOS version, unless there is a way to do it that I am not aware of...

You don't - without SHSH2 blobs you won't be able to.


How can my son access my iTunes account from his windows 8 'sign on' on my computer? I want my son to be able to access my full iTunes library without signing in to my Microsoft account on my Windows 8 pc.  He has his own Microsoft account/sign in. I have tried Home Sharing, but this seams only to work if he has a different computer (and we only have this one). I do not want to create a separate iTunes account for him.  When he opens iTunes and looks at the songs list, he can see some, but not all of the songs in my library. Can anyone help?

Apple provides an answer to this question.

In short:

Quit iTunes
Go to \Users*username*\Music\iTunes (where username is your
Move the iTunes Media (might be iTunes Music) folder to a public folder, e.g. \Users\Public\Public Music
Now, on each Windows account:

Launch iTunes
In the Edit menu, select Preferences
Click the Advanced icon**
Click the Change button
Navigate to \Users\Public\Public Music (or whatever public folder you moved your music to)
Click OK

You should be all set. If you’re not, that might be because iTunes for Windows apparently doesn’t automatically move your music to its iTunes Media folder. In the account which holds the music:

Launch iTunes
In the File menu, select Library > Organize > Consolidate Library. Your music will be copied into the iTunes Media folder. You may want to do a bit of cleanup to avoid data duplication.


How to determine iOS app usage frequency for iPhone or iPad I have over 200 apps on my iPhone 4 (32GB).  No one needs that many apps, right?  I want to organize my installed apps based on how frequently I use them, and/or how recently I last used them.  I could probably take a qualitative, subjective stab at this myself, but I'd like to have some data, just so I don't toss an app that I may have used, but don't remember using.  Yeah, I know that deleting isn't forever with apps-- but having geeky data makes me feel good.

So far, I have not found a way to do this.  I've seen apps mentioned here on AskDifferent that purport to do such a thing, but have not tried any of them.  For some reason, I seem to recall Googling this several months ago, and running across an article describing a way to glean usage information from the backup file(s) that iTunes creates.  I can no longer find that article-- not sure if it's gone or if I'm just not using the same search terms as before.

Note that my iPhone is not jailbroken, nor do I wish to jail-break it.  I'm not necessarily even interested in an iOS app that gets me this information; I'm simply interested in it any way that it can be had.  If that is via Terminal on the desktop, that's fine.

Knowing this kind of usage information would also be objectively useful if I'm trying to implement some kind of app/folder organizational strategy.  Otherwise, I'm left to my own intuition about how often I use things, which can be false, or in the least, inefficient.

I think I may have found an astoundingly low-tech solution to this problem, and it was right under my nose.

Ever since iOS became "multi-tasking" capable (I say that tongue-in-cheek, as we all know that most apps that get backgrounded aren't still running, they've just had their state saved until used again), the Task Switcher, accessible via a double-press of the Home Button, shows you a more-or-less "use-ordered" list of your apps.  Unless you deliberately open the Task Switcher and kill the apps, they linger in there... I guess forever, or until you reboot the device.

So, if I clear all those out, and then just go about my business using my device for a while, and occasionally look at what apps are in my first 3 or 4 "pages" in the Task Switcher, that gives me a decent idea of which apps I use the most-- or at least can tell me the ones that I've used "most recently".  Those apps that are on the far right "page" of Task Switcher are the least used (or at least the ones that were used "least recently").

EDIT: As of iOS9, the order of applications displayed in the Task Switcher is reversed.  The most recently foregrounded app is on the far right.

I suppose a person could extend this into a true exercise in statistical geekery by noting the order of the apps on a schedule... say every morning or every evening (or more or less often)... over a period of time; a week, a month, whatever.  Then you could compile that into useful info for yourself.


Reviving white macbook (Early 2009) I'm trying to revive my old college laptop which is a white macbook from early 2009.  I pasted the hardware a software specs below.  The last thing that I did with it was update it to Mountain Lion, which turned out to be somewhat of a mistake because it is now painfully slow (which is why I haven't touched it in a while).  I'm looking for suggestions for how to bring it back up to speed.

Here's what I have in mind:

Update the RAM.  4Gb at least and 6Gb if possible
General cleaning.  I'm considering CleanMyMac 2, but I'm not sure if the gains I    get from it will be worth the $40.
Lastly, I'm considering upgrading to an SSD.

Thanks in advance,

Hardware:

Model Name:    MacBook
 Model Identifier:  MacBook5,2
  Processor Name:   Intel Core 2 Duo
  Processor Speed:  2 GHz
  Number of Processors: 1
  Total Number of Cores:    2
  L2 Cache: 3 MB
  Memory:   2 GB
  Bus Speed:    1.07 GHz
  Boot ROM Version: MB52.0088.B05
  SMC Version (system): 1.38f5
  Serial Number (system):   W89064CJ4R1
  Hardware UUID:    F898BAE6-8231-55EE-9CE8-604194507E5A
  Sudden Motion Sensor:
  State:    Enabled

Software:
 System Version:    Mac OS X 10.7.5 (11G63b)
  Kernel Version:   Darwin 11.4.2

If you really want to make your old mac happy I would say the best thing is the SSD. It will make it feel faster than it was out of the box and that is because it is. A RAM upgrade isn't really necessary and I would suggest investing that money over into a new battery. If the unit hasn't been used in a good long while chances are your battery will be dead or inches away from death.

A new battery (directly from Apple) will be guarantied for a year and will give you a notebook to take with you (using an SSD instead of a HDD also gives you a few extra minutes in battery life.

CleanMyMac is not recommended! Instead install a new OS on the SSD and then using an external enclosure transfer the data via Migration Assistant. But always make sure you have a backup of your files.

Honestly I am more of a fan of keeping things fresh and installing 3PP programs fresh too and manually dragging over your documents, pictures, music, etc.


How to do Ctrl+Alt+Del via Logitech iPad keyboard This is and old question, but all the answers I managed to find in the Internet didn't solved my issue.

I am using a Logitech wireless keyboard on my iPad --- "Logitech Ultrathin Keyboard Cover" to be more precise.

I use Parallels on my iPad to access my Windows 7 computer.

When I go into it, I am asked to press Ctrl+Alt+Del to start a session. I am not allowed to disable that option on my Windows computer.

I have tried all the keyboard combinations, but nothing seems to work. How can I press Ctrl+Alt+Del on my wireless keyboard???

If it's Parallels Mobile, you need to use the on-screen keyboard for complex keyboard commands such as this one. According to the documentation, once you bring up the on-screen keyboard, there are arrow keys on the top of the keyboard to switch to a "function" keyboard; from there, you can press "delete" with both the Ctrl and Alt modifiers active.

The Mobile Guide (link) produced by Parallels for this application can help guide you further. (the Page 19 area references the items I mention above)


How can I navigate to individual windows? I have many many apps running in the background some are infact two or three windows of same program, i.e. Firefox 3-4 windows and Xcode 3-4 windows etc...

I know that I can switch using ⌘+⇥ but that only switches on programs and I want to go to each individual window.

I've tried spotlight and it's not what im looking for. Also, I do not prefer to install any paid software and would like to use build in features if possible.

To switch between windows of the same application, use ⌘ + ~.

If you need a shortcut like the Windows' Alt+Tab that switches between all open windows, you can set one in your System Preferences -> Keyboard Shortcuts as shown below.

As you can see above, the default is Ctrl+F4, which actually means you need to press Ctrl+Fn+F4 because of the special meaning of the function keys. You could change it to any unused key combination, e.g. Alt+Tab itself.


Time Machine says "Waiting to Backup" after ML upgrade I just upgraded to ML and my Time Machine says "Waiting to Backup".

Is the cause of this got to do anything with Spotlight indexing?

It's possible. You should be able to click the Time Machine icon, then Open Time Machine Preferences... and then it will tell you a more detailed reason such as the following:


Is Mac Right For Win Programmer? I'm considering a Mac purchase but I don't know if it is right for me.

I use laptops and PCs mostly for programming, most of my time I develop in C# on Windows and Mono Linux (I'm considering to develop on Linux and test if they run on Win), other than that I use Java, Python, C, and Ruby (this is my hobby and freelance projects)

I would also from time to time play some games.

So my current focus is to do my work on Linux (I'm having a hard time to switch) and do fun like games on Windows. But the Linux learning curve compared to Win is rather high.

So is Mac right for me?
What's the learning curve compared to Linux switch from Win?

Now I know that most if not all software dev platforms are for Mac, but can I use a VM to test Win capability? And are there any cost relating the dev tools for Mac that integrate tightly with the OS?

Can I play games on this (e.g Civ 5, Hitman & others)?

I'm considering a MacBook Pro with i5 (i7s are way too expensive on the mac).

This is subjective but my opinion is:

If you are programming in C#, you should use Windows as Mono does not give all that is in Microsoft's version, especially if your users are on Windows.

There are several VMs: Fusion, Parallels and Virtual Box that can run Windows.

OS X is Unix so is like Linux, so the learning curve will be similar to Linux although most Apple users think the GUI is better and easier to use.

Mono will run as well as on Linux.

For games, OS X has more than Linux but much less than Windows and running games in a VM will be slow.

Thus why do you want to leave Windows?


How can I make my headphone jack work on my Macbook Pro 15" Retina Display, it quit working randomly So I have been using different headphones here and there, but also running a synthesizer program out of my headphone jack into the mixer for live audio performance.

Everything always works fine, except for yesterday, it started that no headphones/speakers will work anymore for anything coming out of the 1/8" headphone jack.  Yes, I have them plugged in all the way, yes i have tried different headphones/speakers etc...  Yes I have gone into settings/audio and selected the proper output and made sure that nothing is muted, all sound is balanced and that it is turned up.  The headphones just put out the most faint level of audio that isn't easily detected unless you really press the headphones onto your ears.  All this while the regular Macbook speakers work if you unplug the headphones.

I need my headphones to plug in so I can mix audio that has to be done this week, yet I can't get any sound through them.  I have tried all things online to reset certain functions of the computer, and the closest Apple store is over 2.5 hours away.  What makes this situation worse is that I have Apple support by phone but I am unable to speak due to strained vocal cords, so I am kind of in Limbo, is there anywhere to chat online?

Your speakers not working after you unplug your headphone jack is a dead giveaway that your headphone jack is full of dust or some other kind of foreign substance. Get a can of compressed air (you must be 18 to purchase compressed air, also it costs about $5 per can) from Wal-Mart or Best Buy or another retailer and use it to blow the headphone jack clean and you should find that it works again.


Does 64-bit compatibility matter with files/documents? macOS Catalina runs only on 64-bit, so when I reload my existing Microsoft Office files, will they be "read only"?

The 32-bit/64-bit description refers to executable code, rather than data. Applications and other executable code will contain instructions that are either 32 or 64 bits wide.

However, file formats are largely unaffected by this. Almost all applications will open the same file data regardless of the application's bit-depth. So, MS Office documents can be opened by both 32 and 64-bit versions.

It's possible that new software may introduce new data structures than are unreadable by older software, but that's a different issue.


Where are receipts for App Store purchases on OS X I recently upgraded to Lion, which has been good so far. My employer likes receipts for the things I purchase though. Is there some place where you can see what you bought through the OS X App Store and how much you paid for it?

You should get a receipt by Email a couple of hours up to days after you bought something on the App Store. There is no way to tell how long it will take though.