Partition on External Hard Drive not showing in Finder My external hard drive is partitioned into three parts - but somehow I made one of the parts go away/stop showing up in the Finder. I ran a set of recommended commands in terminal, and this is what I came up with:

"Rachel Reboot Backup" is the one that I'm trying to get to show up again in Finder/be restored. Any advice? Disk Utility says it is mounted, and it doesn't appear to be marked hidden. I'm not sure what I did to it.

Onyx offers the option of hiding and revealing files, folders and volumes. You'll want to select the Utilities section and then Visibility. This may help with your visibility issue. If you can regain visibility you should be able to select the mounted volume and bring up its info (command + i), then tick the "Ignore ownership on this volume" box.

You could also try logging in as Root and see if that gives you visibility of your missing partition.

Really important bit first, as Root user you have the power to delete files that are hidden/protected under normal circumstances - be careful before deleting or moving anything as you could render your system unusable.

With that out of the way, you enable Root account access by using Directory Utility. This can be found in System/Library/CoreServices or System/Library/CoreServices/Applications, depending on your OS.

First you need to "Click the lock to make changes". Then, from the Edit menu, select "Enable Root User". You will be prompted to create a password for the Root account. Once that's done you can log out of your own account.

Now, log in with the username Root and the password you've just created.

Remember, as Root user you now have the ability to break everything if you're careless - so take your time, do what you need to do and then log out as soon as you're done

You should be able to see straight away whether you have visibility of your errant partition. Hopefully you do. If so, see if you get the option on the info page (command + i) to "Ignore ownership on this volume". If it does, tick it. If not, you could then try hvtuananh's suggestion of changing ownership with the command sudo chown RachelNicholsIII:staff /Volumes/RachelReboot Backup.

If any of that helps then logout and back into your usual account, then disable the Root account using the option in Directory Utility as previously outlined.

Once more, be careful what you do when logged in as Root!


How do I download embedded media such as Flash video in Safari 6? Possible Duplicate:
  How to mimic Safari 5 Activity window with Mountain Lion, to save FLV video files?

It used to be in Safari 5 and such I could open the Activity Viewer with ⌘⌥A, but no longer in Safari 6. How then do I download embedded files such as Flash Video from a website for offline viewing in Safari 6? Is there a Safari Extension (my Google-fu hasn't turned up anything useful on that front)?

Ok, I figured this out last night. Due to a weird flaw in the Inspector, I didn't notice this before.

If you intend to download anything loaded via a plugin you must have the inspector open before you have the plugin load the resource. This is easiest when the site does not autoload/play a video or music file. ClickToPlugin is particularly helpful in this regard.

Enable the debug menu if you haven't. (Preferences > Advanced)
Go to the web page of the resource you want. (e.g. http://www.example.com/kittenvideo.html)
Pull up the inspector. ⌘⌥A now pulls up the Inspector.
Now load the resource you want to download.
Back to the inspector, look at the list of files. Look for audio, video, etc under the Other folder.
Select the resource you want, then look to the right of the window under location and copy the full URL.
Open the Download window (⌘⌥L)
Paste the URL in the Downloads window to download.

So now there are just a few extra steps, but the paste to the downloads still works as before.


VoIP App for iPhone (universal, for standard SIP protocol) Is there a VoIP app for iPhone which doesn't need to be open to receive calls and is continuously on? I'm after something similar to the Skype app. I've tried Zoiper and Bria but neither have this feature.

The app should support the standard SIP protocol and allow connecting to any VoIP/SIP provider.

I know that there is an app that behaves similar to your mention. The case is, that the app I'm talking about is well known in DACH and is only working with routers of a specific company 'avm'. The app is called 'Fritz!App Fon' and empowers you to receive and make calls. Even when not opened, the app receives incoming calls. Unfortunately you need those routers 'Fritz!Box' to take advantage of that feature. VOIP providers can then be set in the router's settings and be bound to your device - very simple and not complicated at all.

Edit: Via VPN you are able to make those calls from any place on the world - internet connectivity required :)


iMessages being delivered to both me and my daughter I'm having some trouble with iTunes  We have 4 different devices connected to my iTunes account. I have one daughter's iPod, another daughters iPod, one iPad and I just got one of the girls their first phone last night and set up that phone under this same iTunes account.

All of the texts I get to my iPad are also going to her phone.  Should I have given her a totally different iTunes account?  Is there a way to give her one iMessage number and a different iMessage number on the iPad, so we don't get each other's iMessages?

Also, when I connected the new phone to this iTunes account last night, it switched the iMessage number on the iPad to the same number as the phone?
Any suggestions?

Yes, you'd need to get her a different Apple ID for iMessages to be sent separately. You can do this by one of two ways:

Method 1: Create an Apple ID using Gmail, Outlook, etc:

If you want to create an Apple ID, but don't want to have to restore the phone to do it, visit the Apple ID management page. Note: your daughter will need an existing email address to do this. Follow the onscreen instructions to create the new ID using the existing email.

Method 2: Create an Apple ID by restoring the phone:

If you want an email address ending in @icloud.com, then you have to reset the phone by navigating to General > Reset > Reset all Content and Settings and confirming the prompts onscreen. Then, when your phone resets, you will be able to create an Apple ID during the setup process.

Otherwise...

Otherwise iMessage will view as both of you as the same person.

The reason iTunes assigned the phone number to the iPad because, again, it thinks you're the same person because both devices are linked to the same Apple ID.


Free software that monitor CPU temperature under El Capitan? Is there some free software that can show CPU temperature in real time for OS X El Capitan?

Any way to have CPU temperature in the menu bar? doesn't provide such an option.

Since nobody suggested it yet, you can try Macs Fan Control.
I'm using it for MBP on El Capitan 10.11.5, and it shows real temperature.
http://www.crystalidea.com/macs-fan-control


Mac OS X Yosemite broke my iMac I recently tried to update my iMac OS to Yosemite as most people had already done it a while ago.
it downloaded the package when rebooted to install it. It was stuck with error message.

It looks as if there was an issue with hard drive preventing installation.
I was also unfortunate to revert the installation, hence end up loosing all my files as I decided to erase the disk and create new partition.
Even after formatting the disk and using 'Reinstall OS X' from recovery mode; I am unable to complete.

The screen doesn't seem to do anything stuck at 'Downloading additional components, it will automatically restart' I tried leaving it for few hours but no result.

Would someone please share your experience?

Try using Internet Recovery Mode instead of the regular Recovery Mode, and make sure that you formatted the right hard drive (in other words if you have an external hard drive plugged in, make sure that you formatted your actual hard drive, not your external one).

Here is some more info about different recovery modes from Apple's support site.


iPad2 - Will not boot nor cold/hard reset I have an iPad2 with me and I can't turn it on. Here are the behavior;

Not shown in iTunes/Device Manager (I have Windows XP SP3)
The sleep button will not show the slider to close the iPad.
I see a light apple on the screen but not a solid one as when it boots up. When I
press the sleep button and the home one, after 6 seconds, the light
apple goes off but as soon as I released the home button, it came
back. Nothing popping up on my PC screen tho...

The iPad is being charged for at least a full hours but still nothing. What can I do short of taking it in for repair?

According to HT1430 there isn't much more that you can do:

Restarting your device

Press and hold the Sleep/Wake button for a few seconds until the red "slide to power off" slider appears, and then slide the slider.
Press and hold the Sleep/Wake button until the Apple logo appears.

Follow these steps to reset your device

Note: Reset your device only if it is no longer responding and the steps above do not work.

Press and hold the Sleep/Wake button and the Home button together for at least ten seconds, until the Apple logo appears.

Got an Apple Retail Store nearby for a visit to the Genius Bar?


Automator-generated apps - Backwards compatibility In my experience apps created with automator on Mountain Lion don't work on a Snow Leopard machine. The opposite isn't true though: apps created with automator on Snow Leopard do work on a Mountain Lion machine.

I'm creating a very simple wrapper around a command line executable and using cocoa seems overkill. I want the app to work on as many versions of OSX as possible though, so backwards compatibility is a concern.

Any thoughts on that matter? How can I ensure that my Mountain Lion Automator app is backwards-compatible?

I don't know how backward-compatible they are, but you can also save scripts as applications from AppleScript Editor.

Another option might be to use Platypus.

  Platypus is a developer tool for the Mac OS X operating system. It creates native Mac OS X applications from interpreted scripts such as shell scripts or Perl, Ruby and Python programs. This is done by wrapping the script in an application bundle along with a native executable binary that runs the script.


Is the iTunes Match Limit for ALL Songs or just Matched Songs? On the iTunes Match page, I see this text:

  iTunes determines which songs in your collection are available in the iTunes Store. Any music with a match is automatically added to iCloud for you to listen to anytime, on any device. Since there are more than 20 million songs in the iTunes Store, chances are your music is already in iCloud. And for the few songs that aren’t, iTunes uploads what it can’t match (which is much faster than uploading your entire music library).

and:

  You can store up to 25,000 songs in iCloud (more if songs are purchased from the iTunes Store), but only what you want to play is stored on your device. So you have immediate access to a huge music library without taking up storage space.

I was under the impression that this means (my interpretation):

  iTunes will scan your whole library.  Anything found that matches something in the iTunes store will now be cloud-available for you from the iTunes store.  Anything that doesn't match will be uploaded to also be cloud-available, up to 25,000 songs.

But it looks like my interpretation is in error.  I have a library of approximately 32,000 songs, and I would estimate that a lot of it is "available" on iTunes (even though that's not where I originally obtained it... most of it is ripped from CDs).  And when I try to enable iTunes Match, it immediately tells me that I can't use it because I have over 25,000 songs.

So, it doesn't actually "scan" and "match" songs, it just blindly uploads whatever I have to cloud storage?  Or am I doing something wrong?

I think the difference is in the second paragraph that you posted. In your situation, if you have bought less then 7,000 songs from iTunes, then the rest counts against the storage.

In other words, it looks to me that only the songs that you bought from the iTunes store will not count against your 25,000 song limit. All other songs will (whether bought from somewhere such as Amazon, or ripped from a cd) likely count against that limit.

Keep in mind that you can have more than one Apple ID with purchased music in a library and according to the FAQ - only the Apple ID paying for iTunes Match/Apple Music is exempted from the 25k song limit.

It's not clear whether Family Sharing is all considered "one Apple ID" so you might want to be sure you re-download all family songs under your Apple ID if you are running up against a limit.


Can I uninstall Xcode but keep Simulator? I do not want Xcode, I only want Simulator. Are they different apps? Can I uninstall Xcode but keep Simulator?

No, but you can use the storage management tool in System Information app to delete portions of Xcode like simulators, SDK versions, cached data and more.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT206996

Choose Apple menu  > About This Mac, then click Storage
Click the Manage button to open the Storage Management window


Unlock delay for iPhone 6 So I waste too much time on my phone. Checking Facebook and Twitter, browsing to read unproductive things, etc. I should just stop, but I'm curious if there is a technological deterrent to my habit.

I suspect that an unlock delay would be perfect. If I knew that my phone would take 30 or 60 seconds to unlock, then I would be significantly less likely to pick up my phone at all, when I don't need anything. I need to have my phone near me and on for work, but I would like it if the time-wasting aspects of my phone were less convenient.

Is there any sort of setting or app that could help with this?

There's no setting to delay the unlock, but what you could do is go to Settings > Touch ID & Passcode, switch off Use Touch ID for iPhone Unlock, and then switch off Simple Passcode.

Switching off Use Touch ID for iPhone Unlock will disable your fingerprint's ability to unlock your phone, and switching off Simple Passcode will make you write a passcode that can be any length you want, with any characters you want. You can make the only way into your phone long/inconvenient enough to not be worth the hassle of typing on such a regular basis.


Windows external hard drive not detected in Startup Disk List I am trying to set up an external hard drive with a copy of Windows 10 that I can boot from my MacBook Pro (Early 2015). I used the procedure posted by Alex Lambert in the following thread:

Is it possible to use Boot Camp with Windows 10 from an external HDD?

Following his procedure, I never received any error messages, but when I reboot my MacBook and hold down the option key, the only bootable hard drive listed is my "Macintosh HD". If I open System preferences-->Startup Disk, it finds my external hard drive as a Windows disk, but if I try to select it, then I get the error: "You can't change the startup disk to the selected disk. The bless tool was unable to set the current boot disk."

How can I check what is missing on the hard drive that keeps it from showing up in the startup disk selection?

This procedure will not work for your 2015 Mac. Step 6.2.5 states: "Run: clean". The next step (6.2.6) states: "Run: create partition primary". This indicates the external drive is using the Master Boot Record (MBR) partition scheme. The 2015 and later Macs can no longer boot operating systems using this scheme. The question you refer to involved a 2014 Mac.

This procedure you reference requires you to download the "Windows 7 Automated Installation Kit" in step 3. Later, step 6.2.4 uses the imagex command from this kit. This command has been deprecated and should not be used with Windows 10. The replacement command is dism.exe, which is included in the Windows 10 installation iso. So steps 3 and 5.3 are unnecessary.

This procedure may be adapted for your model Mac. One change would be that the external drive needs to be using the GUID Partition Table (GPT) scheme.  This is probably not the only change needed. The accepted answer to the question "Unable to boot Windows 10 from Bootcamp external HDD" documents another possible change that may be needed.


How can I set up a system-wide key combination to toggle a specific System Preferences setting ("Tap to Click")? I want to be able to toggle the "Tap to Click" setting under "Trackpad" > "Point & Click" in the System Settings app with a key combination from within any application.

I looked at "Keyboard" > "Shortcuts", but the options here look pretty limited. "App Shortcuts" seem to be the closest thing -- it appears you can bind a key to an option in pull-down menus on the top menu bar, but if there's a way to bind a key to a toggle in the System Settings app pane, it's not clear to me.

Perhaps this is something that's better done by AppleScript (or system-hooked JavaScript)? Or triggering a command-line option?

Since you didn't say what version of macOS you are running, here is the AppleScript code I'd use to toggle the target checkbox under macOS High Sierra. It may need to be modified for macOS Mojave and later.

Also note that when assigning a global keyboard shortcut, it can not be one already assigned to any app that has focus when the keyboard shortcut is pressed.

You can use this code in a Run AppleScript action in an Automator Service.1

1 In macOS Mojave, and later, an Automator Service is called a Quick Action. There are also other minor nomenclature differences but they should be more obvious when comparing them to pre-macOS Mojave Automator workflows.

The keyboard shortcut can be assigned in: System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts > Services

Example AppleScript code:

if running of application "System Preferences" then
    try
        tell application "System Preferences" to quit
    on error
        do shell script "killall 'System Preferences'"
    end try
end if

repeat while running of application "System Preferences" is true
    delay 0.1
end repeat

tell application "System Preferences" to ¬
    reveal pane id "com.apple.preference.trackpad"

tell application "System Events" to tell application process "System Preferences"
    repeat while not (exists window "Trackpad")
        delay 0.1
    end repeat
    tell tab group 1 of window "Trackpad"
        click radio button "Point & Click"
        repeat while value of radio button "Point & Click" is equal to 0
            delay 0.01
        end repeat
        click checkbox 3
    end tell
end tell

quit application "System Preferences"

Note: The example AppleScript code is just that and does not contain any additional error handling as may be appropriate. The onus is upon the user to add any error handling as may be appropriate, needed or wanted. Have a look at the try statement and error statement in the AppleScript Language Guide. See also, Working with Errors.


iPhone wipe- "Verification Failed. There was a problem connecting to the server." I wiped my iPhone 5s, but in the process of re-setting it up, it says "verification failed, there was a problem connecting to the server" after I tried submitting the two-factor identification code- even though the wifi is working.
I tried to call apple support, but I have to have some "IBN"(?) number that I can only get to by going to settings, which I can't do because my iPhone isn't functioning yet. This number supposedly also comes with the packaging which I don't have anymore because I got the phone almost a year ago.

So, right now I'm stuck with a phone that won't log in, and I can't reach customer support about it. I've tried doing a hard reset with the lock and home button and retrying, but it won't work. What do I do?

Connect the phone to iTunes and set it up. That will remove any need to enter any data on the device or from the device. Once you do that one time, you can then set up the phone as you wish.


My iphone 6 plus is bent and not powering on, need to retrieve data not backup to cloud First, thanks in advance for any help. I got the new iPhone 6 plus four months ago from AT&T. The phone has been working great the whole time until i sat on it when getting into my car last Friday evening and my phone bent and went dead. I made appointment in the Apple store to set up repair service and they told me they could not retrieve any photos or data that was not backed up to the cloud. I took a family trip to Hawaii to see my son in the military the day after the last back up due to the cloud being full. I cannot lose these photos. I am willing to send in the hard drive somewhere to retrieve this data but cant find where to do this or get the phone repaired enough to power on to retrieve the data. Any thoughts on how to best get this accomplished?

There are companies out there, although I can't recommend any that claim to be able to recover data off broken iPhones, I've not tried them, the iPhone doesn't have a hard drive, the whole device is on a single computer circuit board, it's going to destroy the phone trying to get it repaired.

Data recovery is expensive, and once your phone has been modified by a third party the price for getting Apple to repair/replace your phone will escalate as they won't do an out of warranty service on a phone that has been modified by a 3rd party unauthorised centre.

In other words you'll have to buy a new phone, and fork out a load of money on data recovery.


Using PhotoStream on the Mac for pics transfer I want to transfer pics from my iPhone to my Mac. I've had Photo Stream on for over a year, and I had it turned on my Mac as well. I don't use iPhoto. I have a Smart Folder setup so that I can access my pics that way. When I delete a picture from my Photo Stream on my iPhone, is it supposed to delete from the Smart Folder? I experimented with it this morning and the image remains in that Mac folder. This makes me think that the images, once synced to the Mac, are permanently there until I manually delete from the Mac (even if it's no longer in my iPhone Photo Stream album).

Additionally, there are over 1000+ images, plus images older than 30 days in this current Mac folder. I've tried reading up on Photo Stream, but everything I've read makes me think that the images should be deleted from the Smart folder.

Does this mean that I can safely delete images from my iPhone since I have a permanent copy of these images on my Mac - or should I copy the images from the Smart Folder to a regular folder? I don't want to make unnecessary duplicates of the images, but I don't want to lose them either!

Once Photostream images are exported to the Mac, they can safely be removed from your iPhone camera roll or from the Photostream itself. The images on the computer are local copies and are no longer directly tied to the Photostream. The photos will remain on your computer until you delete them.

  Since your Mac and PC have more storage than your iOS devices, you can choose to have all of your My Photo Stream photos automatically downloaded. In iPhoto or Aperture preferences on your Mac, be sure to select Photo Stream > My Photo Stream > Automatic Import. All of your photo stream photos will be imported into your Events, Projects, Photos, Faces, and Places folders in iPhoto or Aperture. On your PC with Photo Stream enabled in the Control Panel, all of your photos will be imported into C:\Users\\Pictures\Photo Stream\My Photo Stream.

ᔥ Apple Knowledgebase: iCloud: Photo Stream FAQ


iPhone just keeps offloading SoundCloud app even though it is used heavilly My question is related to peculiar behavior of my iPhone, as suggested in the title.

Offloading means deleting the app from the phone, however data remains, so after user installs it back from appstore, it just works in continuity from before the deletion of the app. Operating System on iOS allows automatic offloading of apps, which were not used much, to save memory/space.

Yes my iPhone is full, and I allowed offloading of unused apps. (and I really need this). ... it makes sense that iOS wants to offload some app, but why SounCloud? Many other apps are still present, untouched.

The strange thing is, that SoundCloud is probably the most used app on my phone, and it would be just too much, if it was offloaded/deleted even ones. Even that would not make sense. However, it just keeps be deleted over and over on regular basis. I have to reinstall the app in quite unexpected situations if I want listen to music again. Often in situations without strong data signal.

I didn't notice that there would be any other apps, which would be offloaded/deleted prematurely like this. It seems to me, that otherwise only apps which I did not use for a long time are targeted by the system and offloaded.

In the case of Soundcloud - I use it kind of at least for few hours a day. Often I can let it run from the morning to the night nonstop. Everyday! Still - after being in subway for an hour (not data signal - not using anything, or after watching YouTube for few hours - and bang! Souncloud is gone! Again! All that the system apparently needs to decide, that my SoundCloud is unused to delete it is few hours of me doing something else and it targets SounCloud preferentially and deletes it!

My question is actually double:

1) First, I just really want to stop offloading this particular application (while keeping the system decide what other app was not used lately and let it automatically offload that) .. if there exist any more specific setting allowing me to make an exception for an app, that I wish the particular app to not be offloaded, I would love to use it.

2) Second, I am just amused and curious, why that particular app might be targeted in the first place? Does not make sense at all! It even feels as if iOS is picking on SoundCloud or something. Any reasons?

I have iPhone SE and always with the latest OS (and behavior is the same regardless on the version of iOS). I have 32 GB of memory space and it is always close to be full. ... And I keep listening something on earphones non-stop, either music on SoundCloud, or some podcast or YouTube.

(I would suggest tags I cannot add: SoundCloud and Offloading)

I am actually using this 'Offload' feature for a long time and I took care of my apps about whether they are still ready to use...
But..
I have never seen the situation that you've faced. It's interesting for iPhone to execute Offload App command such an app which is in being used constantly.

My advice you to delete the app without offload and backup, directly erase the app, then install again and start from zero to use. I hope it DOES work in time!


How to disable coalescing of log messages in OS X? I've been using Console to debug some things on my Mac, and I keep seeing --- last message repeated one time --- in the log.  Apparently it's not really essential, and you can turn it off on the command line with the -dup_delay switch on syslogd (see here).  But how do I do that so it turns it off in the Console app?  I don't want to start syslogd again, I just want to change a setting on the currently running process.

The Console application is simply reading the log files.  I suspect running syslogd with that flag will cure your problem, as syslogd will then write the log files differently..


egrep: empty (sub)expression : Unexpected behaviour for bash Loop on Mac I have the filling simplified script on Mac OS X 10.12 :

#!/usr/bin/env bash

echo "=> BASH_VERSION = $BASH_VERSION"
function testForLoopMac {
local file
for file
do
    echo File=$file
done | egrep "$file"
}

function testForLoopMacBis {
local file
for file
do
    echo File=$file
done | egrep "$file|OK"
}

testForLoopMac $@

testForLoopMacBis $@

But the result when I run is :

$ testForLoopMac.sh example.pdf
=> BASH_VERSION = 3.2.57(1)-release
File=example.pdf
egrep: empty (sub)expression

On Debian/Ubuntu Linux, the result is :

$ testForLoopMac.sh example.md
=> BASH_VERSION = 4.3.30(1)-release
File=example.md
File=example.md

Edit : With bash4 on Mac OSX 10.12 :

I changed the shebang to #!/usr/bin/env bash4 and the result is the same :

$ testForLoopMac.sh example.md
=> BASH_VERSION = 4.4.12(1)-release
File=example.md
egrep: empty (sub)expression

Edit: Thanks to you guys I understand the behavior difference on Linux or BSD egrep is because that at the time of the egrep execution the variable can be empty.

I'm going the use therefore, the following regExp :

egrep "File=|OK"

Thanks again :)

The shell expands the subexpression $file on the right hand side of the pipe before the variable has any value. So in both functions egrep is actually called with the empty string in place of $file. The first function doesn't throw an error because an empty pattern is a valid parameter for egrep both on macOS and on Linux. In the second fucntion the difference comes into play because the empty subexpression causes BSD egrep (the one used on macOS) to throw an error.

Example:

echo foo | egrep "|foo"
egrep: empty (sub)expression

as another example with $file having no value

echo foo | egrep "$file|foo"
egrep: empty (sub)expression

So, as a workaround in your function use:

egrep -e "$file" -e 'OK'

I have no idea why you are using egrep when you are looking for fixed strings.


One-sided iCloud photo upload I have a lot of pictures on my iPhone SE. I have them synced with my iCloud. However, every picture I add gets added to both my device and my iCloud. I don't want this. I don't have much storage so I want to delete all pictures I currently have from my iPhone and put them all on iCloud, so that I can start making pictures again! How can I do this?

You can't, is the short answer. iCloud Photo Library is a two-way street - if you want to be able to upload to it, it has to be turned on, which means photos will also be synced to the device.

You can enable Optimize Device Storage under Settings > Photos, but that will still use some storage on the device. There is no way to bring that to zero without disabling iCloud Photo Library on the device entirely.


Unable to deploy Mobile Config for Active Sync on iOS 13.4.1 I'm trying to deploy a mobile configuration for a number of iPhones. The mobile configuration only includes PKCS12 for the client certificate authentication and the configuration of the MS Exchange Active Sync Server.

I have an older ".mobileconfig", we've previously used and I have one with the same data, but generated by the current "Apple Configurator 2" from the App Store.

The old.mobileconfig crashes without any further info, on the last step, after the user password for the Active Sync has been entered on iOS 13.4.1 but works perfectly fine on iOS 13.2.2 (both iPhone SE).

With the new.mobileconfig, the setup finishes just fine and the profile is set up on the client, but it fails to connect to the sync server with the client certificate, both on iOS 13.4.1 and iOS 13.2.2.

Upload for "Additional Text" keeps failing for me on here, so I'll attach a redacted version of both configuration files like so:

old.mobileconfig: https://pastebin.com/X8Q0U90M

new.mobileconfig: https://pastebin.com/bLs2wBcS

My patience grows thin with this setup, so I am asking for help here.

What is the issue with my mobileconfigs, how can I correctly generate/adjust the mobileconfig to have our iPhones connect to our Active Sync server with client certificate authentication?

As I have identified, the issue was that the current iOS versions (13.4.1, iOS 13.4.5BETA) have a bug, where iOS can not use client certificate authentication.

It seems like this was finally fixed in the iOS BETA 13.5 (17F5065a).

With the client certificate authentication working again, the setup worked on the newer iOS version.


How can I increase spotify lock screen controls duration after pause? While playing Spotify on my iPod Touch I have got some controls over the player on my lock-screen.

I have to pause the player a lot and wish I could play the songs instantly after some time again. But the controls are vanishing too quickly (after couple of minutes) and I have to type login again (pressing home button twice and typing my pass-code), which is very annoying as I have to do it very often…

(*How) can I increase the time to let spotify show the controls over a longer period of time?

I do not know of a way of increasing the time that the controls remain on the screen for. However, there is a quicker way to be able to resume playing, You can swipe up from the bottom of the lock screen, and get access to the play / pause controller. You do not need to authenticate to do this.

Hope this helps.


What is the correct way to install python on OS X? Im learning python programming, what is the correct way to install python on Mavericks 10.9?. Is it correct just to download the installer or use homebrew instead to install python?.

OS X Mavericks actually ships with Python in /usr/bin/python:

|ruby-2.1.1| mymachine in ~
○ → /usr/bin/python --version
Python 2.7.5

You don't need to install Python at all to get started developing with Python on OS X. That version is sufficiently high enough to be useful for Python 2.x development work and not totally suck (i.e. it's not Python 2.4).

My personal preference to is to use Homebrew for installing command line tools. You get a nice, neat, compartmentalized installation that's fairly straightforward to wipe away if it bothers you. So, I would use Homebrew to install a newer version of Python if I wanted it.

To install Python with Homebrew first install Homebrew:

ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"

And then install Python 2.7.8 with:

brew install python

As you can see, this is the 2.7.8 version of Python:

|ruby-2.1.1| mymachine in ~
○ → brew info python
python: stable 2.7.8 (bottled), HEAD
http://www.python.org
/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.6_1 (4976 files, 81M) *
  Poured from bottle
From: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew/blob/master/Library/Formula/python.rb

If you'd also like Python 3.4.1 you can use:

brew install python3

Which you can see gives you:

|ruby-2.1.1| mymachine in ~
○ → brew info python3
python3: stable 3.4.1 (bottled), HEAD
https://www.python.org/
Not installed
From: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew/blob/master/Library/Formula/python3.rb

Homebrew will install any dependencies you need to run Python in either case.


Accent popup in Terminal.app? I was wondering if anyone has figured out a way to enable the press-and-hold accent popup in Terminal.app, where it does not work out of the box? Does not have to be press-and-hold, but some way to bring up the popup.

I'm used to the unix-style Compose key, but the accent popup seems like a good substitute, especially given that it should also be possible to configure it to support Greek alphabet (for maths), following the instructions in another question: How to add characters to the press and hold character picker in OS X Lion? . But if it won't work in Terminal.app as well, then I'll have to set up a Compose key as explained here: http://lolengine.net/blog/2012/06/17/compose-key-on-os-x .

This can be done with a bit of hacking. ;)

Before proceeding, you should backup your Terminal’s preferences file:

cp "Library/Preferences/com.apple.Terminal.plist" "Library/Preferences/com.apple.Terminal_OLD.plist"

Check to see if the file was copied successfully:

ls "Library/Preferences/com.apple.Terminal_OLD.plist"

If it prints Library/Preferences/com.apple.Terminal_OLD.plist then you're good to go. Otherwise make sure you typed the first command correctly.

Now for the fun part, you can modify the internal settings of the Terminal by typing:

defaults write com.apple.Terminal "ApplePressAndHoldEnabled" -bool true

Close the Terminal completely by first closing all open Terminal windows and then right clicking the Dock icon and choosing Quit.

Open the Terminal again and smile :)

Let me know if this doesn't work on your system.


What is my MacBook's public IP address? I am trying to find out my public IP address for my MacBook Air  It is on Comcast/Xfinity Wifi (my parents had some tech dudes set it up). When I check http://ipecho.net or any other I get 73.170.168.215, but this is the same as on my iPhone 8.

On the contrary, the two devices have different local ip addresses with all the numbers the same except the last one 192.168.40.XXX. Is the public IP address the same thing as the router?

The IP you're seeing (73.170.168.215) is the address your router is exposing to the outside world.  The router is masking you're real address to keep you safe.

Any device that uses that router to connect to the outside world will be 'seen' as having that same IP.  This is why your Mac and your iPhone appear to have the identical IP's when viewed from outside your network.  The public IP  is the address of that router (I'm trying to keep this simple because networking can get really complicated fast).

Your router is responsible for taking the individual device traffic and routing them to the correct device within your "private" network.

To use BlockheadsServer correctly with your Mac, it's best if you contact their support to determine the best way to configure it.  You don't want to misconfigure a router because you might accidentally open-up your network to malicious activity.


iCloud share group of calendars? I've been using icalx.com to sync all my many calendars as a single group. When I turned on iCloud, all my calendar group structure completely disappeared and I see no way to re-add it. Is there any way (including workarounds using icalx or Google Calendar as an intermediary) to continue sharing all my calendars as a single group? It's a huge pain for people to set up 10+ subscriptions just to see my events, not to mention having to check and uncheck all 10 each time they want to see what I'm doing.

When MobileMe upgraded calendars - it removed the group option. iCloud does not have a folder/group data structure.

BusyCal does let you create groups to manage your local view of iCloud (and other) calendars, but doesn't change iCloud's limitation to not have those groups appear on the server end of things.

Their blog is an excellent source to get clear and well prepared discussion on the changes MobileMe has made as well as how iCloud is different.


What's the refresh rate/sampling rate for the sudden motion sensor? I like using my macbook pro's sudden motion sensors as an accelerometer for small at-home experiments. There are applications such as Seismac that already let you do this.

I'm now writing one myself for my own purposes, but I couldn't find the sampling rate/refresh rate for the motion sensors. This information is critical if you need to reconstruct the 3D path accurately. Does anyone know where I can find this information?

The refresh rate of the sudden motion sensor is variable.

The supported bandwith depends on the hardware used; so you have to do some more research on the specific motion sensor used in your model. I've searched ifixit without much success.

According to SeisMac the motion sensor used in the first Macbook Pro is the KXM-52. The specifications state the bandwidth depends on the axis:

  x, y axis: 0 to 3000 Hz
  z axis: 0 to 1500 Hz

[source: KXM-52 tech specs]

SeisMac itself only allows to set refresh rates between 10-500 Hz in its preferences.


How to reassign default editor for different file types from the command line? I am looking for a way to reassign default editor on OS X. For example I want to reassign all file types opened by TextEditor with TextWrangler.

Probably it has something to do with the defaults command but I do not know how to list current assignments and change them.

There is a command line utility called Duti which can do this.

http://duti.sourceforge.net/

There is no easy way to do this using built-in commands.


Converting RAW into JPEG in Photos Is there a way, in Apple Photos, to convert a lot of RAW pictures into JPEGs and delete the RAW version, to save space? I'm looking for an automatic way of converting all RAW pictures into JPEG as I have several thousands.

Yes, you can select the RAW photos, then select "Export..." from the File menu.

There you can select JPEG as the file format, then also select any options for size and quality you desire.


How do I view RSS feed data? I have an RSS source link: https://www.zhihu.com/rss
and I want to have a look at its data, so I type the link in the browser (Safari), but I get the error below:

  No RSS reader is installed.

  Safari can't open "feed:https://www.zhihu.com/rss" because Safari can't display RSS feeds. You can search the Mac App Store for an RSS app.

How can I have a look at its feed data? I know the data is in an XML-like format, but I don't know how to take a look at it.

Open Terminal
cd Documents (or any other suitable directory)
curl -o feed.xml https://www.zhihu.com/rss
Use the text editor of your choice to open feed.xml


How can I connect my iPhone 6s Plus to my stereo? I understand that Apple's iPhone Lightning Dock has a headphone socket that I can use:

  Connect the dock to powered speakers or a stereo using a 3.5mm cable (sold separately) to play music and podcasts from your iPhone

I actually have a similar (3rd-party) dock that I used with an iPhone 4s. However, (a) that obviously has an old-style 20-pin connector, and (b) the sound quality was poor.

Clearly Apple's new dock would have the right connector, and hopefully the sound quality would be better, but I worry about the negative reviews of that dock, which imply that the stress on the connector can cause the phone's lightning socket to deteriorate and eventually fail.

I don't care about having a "stand" for the phone, and I don't really care that much about charging... is there a cable-based solution I could use? (In other words, something where I just plug in a cable rather than putting the phone in a wobbly stand).

Or, is a wireless more appropriate? I see that there are Bluetooth receivers out there that seem to be designed to do this, but again there are a lot of negative reviews, mostly about the reliability of the Bluetooth connection. The only device I found that got a lot of positive reviews was the Arcam rMini Blink, and that's quite expensive.

Don't Apple offer something in this space? (Not that it'd be less expensive!).

I've done it 4 different ways (from lowest to highest cost). Sound quality is mostly dependent on the quality of the audio file on the iPhone and the quality of the stereo. The quality degradation due to any of these 4 connection mechanisms seems relatively low - unless you're an audiophile or Neill Young. ;-)

Connect iPhone headphone output to stereo auxiliary input with an appropriate adapter cable (mini-stereo jack ==> what ever your stereo accepts e.g. RCA). Important: Run iPhone output volume only around 50% to avoid input distortion at stereo.
Get bluetooth receiving device (I've had good luck with one from Philips bad luck with some generic chinese stuff), which connects to the stereo input. Then connect with bluetooth to that device. In my experience bluetooth worked rather well when the iPhone was stationary reasonably close to the bluetooth device. Moving around with iPhone in pocket while on Bluetooth connection could cause audio dropout grief in some cases.
Use an Airport Express as wifi or wired network participant (e.g. as a wifi extender) on your regular home wifi, and connect the audio output from that to the stereo input. Then use Airplay to send the iPhone audio to the Airport Express. Moving around with iPhone in pocket seems to be more tolerant than bluetooth based connection.
Use an Apple TV as wired or wifi participant on your home network. However to the best of my knowledge the Apple TV only outputs digital audio (HDMI or optical SPDIF on 2nd or 3rd gen Apple TV), so either the stereo has to have inputs for HDMI or optical SPDIF or one needs an additional converter box.  And then use Airplay to send the iPhone audio to the Apple TV. Moving around with iPhone in pocket is equally tolerant as with Airport Express, since both use iPhone wifi.


Can I make my bootcamp partition bigger without formatting it? Is it possible to increase the size of my Windows partition without having to wipe the entire thing?

Not with the built in tools. Moving the start of a partition is no trivial task. Resizing your main Mac partition only grows/shrinks it, but because your bootcamp partition resides further on your disk, it needs to be moved up before it can be grown. This is not a trivial operation and is not supported out of the box in either OS X or Windows.

You will need a specialised 3rd party tool like iPartition, but use with care and triple check compatibility.


What's the deal with Xcode's price? So... prior to Xcode 4, Xcode was always free. Then 4.0 cost $5 for non-developers. Now 4.1 is free. I'm just a little confused with this situation.

4.1 is Lion only (no SL support). Is 4.1 free and 4.0 is still $5? Are the price tags removed for both versions? I just need someone to clear up the situation a little for me.

Here's what we know:

When Xcode 4.0 hit the store - it was $4.99 and ran on Snow Leopard
Xcode 4.1 hit the store July 20 (Lion launch day) for free but requires Lion. It replaces the prior version so that's effectively not for sale any longer.

Unless you feel someone that has a hand in pricing decisions from Apple will answer here, the rest is speculation.


Restoring Preferences after downgrade from El Capitan to Yosemite I had to revert from 10.11.5 to 10.10.5 because of some devices not working on the newest OS. I had prepared a USB flash drive a while ago and in order for it to work I had to erase the partition the OS was on. I had been doing Time Machine backups regularly and before erasing the hard drive I copied the Users, Library and Applications folders to an external hard drive. Now I have a clean copy of 10.10.5 installed and transferring some of the files wouldn't work out because of the different operating systems. My question is if there is a way to keep my 'old' system preferences(at least) without having to set everything up manually.

OS X stores application preferences in a few locations

Restore the files and folders from these locations in your backup:
    /Users/username/Library/Preferences
    /Users/username/Library/Application Support
    /Users/username/Library/Containers

To the corresponding locations for your new user account.
No guarantee though that the plist files from the newer OS X system version will work in the older one though. Try it.


Is there a utility to display outlines of other resolutions on the screen? I have a 17" MacBook Pro and occasionally need to design software that's optimized for smaller resolutions. Some of them I can work with by setting my display's resolution to the target system's, but there are a few resolutions (1400x900, for example) that aren't supported on my machine.

Is there a utility that will display a rectangle on the screen that will show me what the resolution would be for smaller displays?

BTW, I'm using Mac OS X 10.8.4 (Mountain Lion).

Thanks,

Chuck

have a look at xscope.
Its not expensive and it has "Screens" and "Frames" function which both should to be doing what you need.


Can OS X automate creating a reminders from a page in a web browser? I enjoy the feature of creating reminders from a web page with one click. similar to how Omnifocus does this.

Can Apple's Reminders do the same by apple scripting or other addition/short cut?

If you want to add a selected text as a reminder

Open Automator
Create a new service
Service receives selected text in any application
Add a Run ApplScript Action
Add the following script
Save it

the script :

on run {input, parameters}

    tell application "Reminders"
        set theReminder to (make new reminder with properties {name:input})
        activate
    end tell

    return input
end run

Now when selecting text, you can with a right clic add it as a reminder. If you want that only in Safari. Replace the any application with Safari at the top of the Automator window.

And if you don't want to show the Application Reminders when adding a new one, just remove the line  activate in the script.


Why do all of the .dmg files I download end up on my desktop? When I download a .dmg file it somehow ends up on my desktop automatically. Even after I install the .dmg, it is still on my desktop.

How do I stop these from appearing on my desktop? Should they be there?

If you mean volumes that are shown after you mount dmg files, you can uncheck this checkbox:

You can eject volumes from Finder's sidebar or by selecting their icons and pressing ⌘E.


Older versions of Xcode Command Line Tools on macOS Catalina I have a project that requires the Command Line Tools from macOS
High Sierra. The specific installer I’m running is Command Line Tools (macOS High Sierra version 10.13).pkg.

When I run it, I get:

  “This package is incompatible with this version of macOS. The package is trying to install content to the system volume. Contact the software manufacturer for assistance.”

I haven’t contacted Apple about this yet. My queries are:

Should I just install this on a different drive?
Is there a way to get this to install to my main internal SSD?
Once installed, what's the easiest way to switch between the old Command Line Tools and new Command Line Tools when I need to?

The command-line tool installer installs lots of stuff (libraries, frameworks, etc.) in multiple OS system directories.  So you probably need to find or create a volume (external drive or partition) with OS X High Sierra on it for the install to complete.

I usually partition my SSDs so that I can keep multiple bootable macOS versions on it for running such older tooling and apps.


Why does iCloud take up 30+ gigs of storage on my Mac? For some reason iCloud is taking up over 30 gigabytes of storage on my MacBook Air. How do I get rid of this? I though the whole point of iCloud was to save space not eat it up! I'm on macOS Sierra 10.2

Your iCloud Drive contents are cached. After looking over the new storage management features in Sierra, doesn't look like the "Optimize Storage" feature will clear that.

If you go to About this Mac > Storage > Manage > iCloud Drive are there options there to remove files locally? I don't use it personally so mine's empty.  :)


How to get a list of all songs in iTunes? Is there an easy way to get a list of all my songs in iTunes into a text file?

This is actually insanely simple:

Open iTunes and go into your music library. Click on a song to ensure focus is inside the song list, press ⌘a to select all your songs, then press ⌘c to copy them.

Open the text editor of your choice, anything should do, then ⌘v paste your songs!

Ét Voíla, all your songs listed in plain text.


Resetting a bought used iPad 2 I'm buying a used iPad 2 through Craigslist.  He has lost his iCloud account info for that iPad 2. If he does a factory reset on the iPad 2 and I bought it after reset, would it be possible during set up.

Can I use my own iCloud info to go forward and pass through, on the set up of the iPad 2 once I bought it from that person?

It depends on if he signed out of his iCloud account and turned off Find my iPad first. iOS has a built-in feature so that a thief cannot wipe a device and login with his own credentials. If he did log out, then you will be fine. If he didn't, he should go to iCloud.com and reset his password if he does not know his credentials.  From there, he can turn off Find my iPad remotely so you can login. If you cannot set up the iPad, and he does not perform these steps, you will not be able to use the iPad.


Entering in recovery system trouble When I'm trying to enter in recovery system through pressing cmd+R I'm getting OS X Internet Recovery instead of Utilites window. How to avoid it?

The machine will automatically use Internet Recovery on holding  Cmd ⌘   R  if it can find no suitable Recovery Partition.

Extrapolation of that is that your hard drive may have had a failure & cannot currently be read by the machine - or simply that there is a bootable drive, but no additional Recovery Partition.

Once Internet Recovery has booted, you may be able to investigate further.


Downloading videos and saving to camera roll? I need a tweak like "Download Manager pro", which allows you to download any video you play.
The thing is, it saves to its own private storage (and not camera roll) so I can't share them with anyone.

Does anyone knows a tweak that does this job?

There are a few tweaks for jailbroken iOS that can import videos into the Videos app:

Music2iPod (free). I haven't tested this one though.
Bridge ($2).
The paid version of iFile ($4), using the Gremlin library.
YourTube ($4) also uses the Gremlin library and lets you import videos directly from the YouTube app.


Backing up HDD to restore it on another SSD I want to switch out my current HDD for a SSD in my Mac. However I don't want to reinstall the OS and all my software.

How can I backup (image) the entire HDD to restore it later as image with Disk Utility on another SSD? Accordingly, if I have 50GB partition for my current system, will that partition size somehow sustain through the image to the new SSD and make the other space that would be available on a larger harddrive then unusable? If so, how can I avoid this behavior?

Three ideas. First addresses your idea about Disk Utility. The next on the method I have used. The third is an idea to just do a switch of the disks & use an external enclosure.

You can use Disk Utility, but I’ve actually had better luck not
using it or any official Apple tools. With Disk Utility you would
simply make an image of your boot disk to another drive then boot up
your machine from some other device—a CD, DVD, USB, etc…—or even the
recovery partition. Once booted you go to Disk Utility & restore.
But like I said, I have had better luck with other methods.
I have done clones & migrations over the years using tools such as
SuperDuper!
or Carbon Copy Cloner. Just hook up an
external drive with an empty partition as big—or bigger—than the
source, clone the disk as a bootable copy to the new disk. Install
the new drive in your machine, but then boot up from the copy you
just made & clone it in reverse from the external drive to the
internal. Maybe Time Machine can do this, but I don’t use that for backups.
But I have a third solution I think would work well. Get an external
enclosure for the drive you are going to remove, place the drive in
that enclosure, place the new drive in your machine, boot from the
external drive & then clone it in reverse from the external drive to
the internal.

The last one has a slight risk since if you have no backup & you remove your internal drive & somehow damage it in the process, well… You have nothing. I recommend method 2 since it’s a tried & true way of imaging a machine. Works great!


CPU usage is too high with Catalina when macbook-pro connected to an external monitor The same problem was occurring on the High Sierra. I was hoping it will be fixed on Catalina but unfortunately, I didn't.

I use Catalina 10.15.1 on my MacBook Pro and work with an external monitor that is connected with HDMI.

The issue is that, according to Activity Monitor, the kernel_task process consumes more than 600% of CPU even when no tasks are running. The computer becomes totally unusable. I cannot switch between screens and everything freezes.

As a solution, I disconnect the external monitor.

Why didn't Apple fix this issue in the latest Catalina update?

=> Is there an alternative solution for this?

I have followed for the rMBP kernel_task spikes when connecting more than one external monitor [duplicate]

I managed to disable system file protection using csrutil disable, but on Catalina now I am having the following error:

mv: rename X86PlatformShim.kext to X86PlatformShim.kext.disabled: Read-only file system

From your observations it sounds like you have a temperature problem with your MacBook Pro. The system makes the CPU sleep when it detects a temperature problem - this what makes it appear as if kernel_task consumes all the CPU time (it actually doesn't). Usually this is due to either: (a) fan problems, (b) blocked vents or (c) lack of cooling paste.

I would check these to make sure that fans are working properly, the machine is not full of dust, the vents are free and cooling paste has been applied properly to the CPU.


Google Calendars disappeared in iCal Suddenly, since today (not having installed todays OSX Update to 10.6.8, so still running 10.6.7), my Google Calendars ('delegates') have disappeared from iCal.

Strangely, I found them in the Window menu, where they are all listed. When I clen one of them there, iCal opens a new Window with only that calendar showing.

I want the combines view back, as it always was - where all calendars are shown at the right and can be selected for being displayed in the main pane.

Any ideas?

I found a solution: in the iCal preferences ⌘ + ,

From the accounts Tab:

Select the caldav server
go to the "Delegation" Tab.

There, all delegate Calendars are listed. Select the check marked for all calendars to be shown.

I have no idea how this setting got disabled, though.


Does an app downloaded on one device automatically show up another device using the same Apple ID? If two people are sharing an Apple ID and one decides to download an app on their device will it show up downloaded on the other persons device? This may sound like a crazy question but I am pretty certain it can't happen but I was wanting to double check.

If two devices have the same AppleID (typically what would happen if you have an iPhone and an iPad), then if an app is download on one device, it will change the icon in the App Store to show a cloud with an arrow rather then the "Get" or price button.

Additionally, depending on the iTunes & App Store settings in the Settings app, the apps may automatically download to the other device.


MacBook Pro Recovery (-1005F) I needed to reinstall macOS, so I deleted my partition and opened the Mac recovery and started downloading Sierra. Unbelievable 6 hours later, the installation was stuck and I turned my MacBook off.

Pressing the power button + Commandcommand R gives me this message:

I tried everything, changing my WiFi authentication type from WEP to WPA/WPA2, all boot shortcuts, resetting SMC/NVRAM.

Pressing power + CommandOption shows me the following:

Clicking the "..." button lets me manually input the WiFi SSID and password, but it hangs forever in the loading indicator.

I don't have another Mac to make a bootable USB stick and reinstall the OS, only Windows.

I had to reinstall macOS using a USB stick. Probably the recovery partition data was corrupted and my WiFi network wasn't compatible at all for some reason.


Emptying the trash after deleting Time Machine Backups I went to my Time Machine External HD and deleted one of the backups by dragging it to the trash. Now when I try to empty the trash I keep getting messages that certain folders can't be deleted because they are in use. How do I empty the trash completely? I tried opening the trash and right-clicking on the folder and choosing "Delete Immediately" but it still gives me the message that folder can't be deleted.  I'm running High Sierra 10.13.5 on an iMac.

Of course the problem only shows when I want to empty my trash and my related Time Machine volume is mounted. When I want to delete my trash, I temporarily unmount the TM Volume. And from now on I will not try to make extra room on my other TM back-up volumes by deleting folders from my Time Machine back-up. I will either let Time Machine automatically delete what is needed when the volume is full, or manually delete data using a method built into the Time Machine software.


Conflict with my Mac user won't let me connect to my site's FTP I realize this may be a weird thing to ask and that it doesn't make much sense, so I will clarify the issue here. It is a very bizarre issue that I do not understand why is happening and I do not know how to fix.

Here's the scenario: My Mac's user name is andyibanez. I am also the owner of https://www.andyibanez.com. I want to configure my website to use a different subdomain for FTP, SSH, and all those goodies, called ftp, so my ftp host will be ftp.andyibanez.com. So I created the DNS settings and tried to use them.

Here's the weird thing, though: When I open the Terminal app and type ssh andyibanez@ftp.andyibanez.com, the operation fails immediately, it doesn't even try to connect to the internet. I know it doesn't because it fails as soon as I send the command by pressing the Enter key.

ssh: Could not resolve hostname ftp.andyibanez.com: nodename nor servname provided, or not known

All apps I have tried to use SSH and FTP have failed immediately. That includes Cyberduck and Transmit.

Trying to ping ftp.andyibanez.com doesn't work, either.

ping: cannot resolve ftp.andyibanez.com: Unknown host

At this point you may be thinking that I have misconfigured my DNS settings. Nope, I am 100% I didn't, for the following reasons:

All operations in regarding that host fail immediately.
I have actually tried a different computer (that doesn't have andyibanez as a user) and it worked fine. I was also able to connect fine using the Transmit iOS app.
I set up another domain as ftp.myotherdomain.com with the same things as ftp.andyibanez.com and it works fine. I can connect to it with no problems.

Of course, I have the easy workaround that I can connect with this computer by setting a different subdomain or even using the naked domain. So I can connect to SSH. I am asking this because I am really curious as to why this happens.

What does dig ssh.andyibanez.com return to you? DNS is not immediate action and there is some TTL. If you did the DNS change and started trying immediately, you or your DNS provider has the records cached.

The easiest way is to way few hours and it will start work (I can resolve these hostnames from my place and initiate ssh connection).

Other way around is to flush your local DNS cache, probably with something like this:

sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder


How can iMessage send from my old phone number that doesn't have service anymore? So my little brother used iMessage through my mom's iPad. He was just being funny and sending pics and cute little memes.

However, in the process, he sent my mom a few messages from the iPad. However, they popped up from my phone number on her iPhone. What I mean is that it appeared as if I had sent her the message.

I looked into and the internet said that it was because my iCloud account was synced to the iPad. However, I have never even used her iPad and it has also a different account.

The weird thing is that my phone hasn't had service in a month. And now I am freaking out and thinking my little brother is a computer whiz or a secret hacker.

Please help because I am so confused. Thank you to those who answer and provide clarity on this situation.

I think there is only a solution for this and is the one that you have found on internet.

More precisely, no matter if you are not using you iPhone or even your number configurate to iMessage in your phone, if you mom's phone marks the message from iPad under your name this mean only one thing and the thing is that the iMessage account on your iPad is configure with the same iCloud account (email) that you have on the iMessage of your iPhone.

You can always change this settings. The interesting thing's for you is to figure out who did this ;-)


Setting an alarm using Siri on Apple Watch does not set an alarm on iPhone When I set an alarm on my Apple Watch only the watch goes off when the alarm time comes around. I'd like my phone to also participate in the alarm.

I've even tried saying: "Hey Siri, set an alarm on my phone..." and that went off on my watch only.

Is this just the way it is, or is there a setting I'm not seeing that pushes the alarm to the iPhone?

Unfortunately, this is just how the Apple Watch handles alarms and timers. You can set an alarm or timer on your iPhone and get it on both your Apple Watch and iPhone, but an alarm or timer on the Apple Watch only goes off on the watch.

If this is something you are interested in having added in future iOS releases, perhaps send some feedback to Apple via this form. No guarantees on effectiveness of these feedback forms, but it's certainly better than nothing.


what is the style of command line editing used by the terminal emulator? in bash in gnome terminal in Ubuntu, the command line editing commands are by default emacs-style, and can be changed to vim-style.

In bash in the terminal emulator of Mac, the emacs-style commands don't work. Are the commands just those of a regular text editor?

OS X ships with bash and you will want to set -o vi to get vi-style commands. A very popular choice is zsh and the many customization packages like oh-my-zsh. Neither she'll is fully in either style by default.

For emacs style, it's similar - see this great post for more details:

  You switch between the two modes in bash, zsh or ksh with set -o vi or set -o emacs, and with bindkey -e or bindkey -v in tcsh or zsh.


edit a .jpg file in preview I have typed the name of a bird on a .jpg photo. I made a spelling mistake and tried to edit it. I can create a new text box but not edit the original. Is there a way to edit a text box once you have saved the file

No, there is no way to edit the text after saving the image.

You may be able to revert to a previous version of the image, before the misspelt text was written:

Open the image in Preview.app
Select the menu item: File > Revert To > Browse All Versions


Annotation/Highlight doesn't work in Apple Preview I have a screenshot. I want to highlight some parts of it. The highlight icon is disabled; the Tools > Annotate > Highlight Text is greyed out.

Why? And how can I highlight easily on my screenshot png file?

You can't highlight text because the format of your screen capture is a bitmap (a set of pixels and not text).

Nonetheless, if the text you wanted to highlight is horizontal enough and not too distorted, you can achieve a nice highlighting effect with Tools > Annotate > Rectangle. Then choose a color which isn't frequent inside your image, let's say Lemon and decrease the opacity to less than 25 % to be able to see the text through as in this example:

If your need is important in volume of text to highlight, you will have to use an OCR software to transfom your image into text.


How to open a .zip file which is embedded in .xlsx file? I have a .zip file which has been embedded in a .xlsx file (excel ). But everytime I double click on the file it keeps giving this message:

Cannot start source application for this object. There may not be enough space in memory.

How can I open the .zip file? I have downloaded the unarchiver and also OpenXMLConvertor.But I dont know how to use them to extract the file.

I have Microsoft Excel 2011 (Version 14.0.0) and MAC OS X mountain lion, 64 bit , macbook air (2013). Kindly help

The thing is - all Microsoft Office documents are ZIP files containing XML files. I would try this:

copy the XLSX to another location
Rename the copy by addin ".zip" to it (ignore the warnings)
unzip the copy with your favourite tool (Unarchiver or terminal "unzip ")
look through the folder structure and find your zip file.


Is filevault compatible with LDAP configurations? I turned on FileVault (on my Enterprise attached Mac) and it's no longer prompting me for my LDAP credentials.  After the filevault login, it just tosses me straight into local administrator.  LDAP still shows as on and "working", but does not appear to be.

My old Mac (with an old OS) used to ask me for the admin filevault password, followed by my LDAP password, and then continue on by logging into the appropriate LDAP user account.

Have I missed some configuration step on the new Mac, or has there been a change in how the newest OS X handle filevault+LDAP?

I was never able to get FileVault to work in an Enterprise configuration of OS X.  So, I'll answer this as "not currently possible".  Perhaps some later update of OS X...


Configuring a Mac to use Oxford spelling I cannot figure out now to make my Mac (OS X 10.8) use Oxford spelling in its spell checker (note I am being absolutely precise in the use of that term)! For example, I want to be able to write "organize colours" without my Mac from underlining one of those words as a spelling error (whilst also recognising that the way I just spelled recognize was an error, as old habits die hard).

Neither the British nor American spelling options in the system preferences can do this, and it is just ever so slightly infuriating that a Mac that uses the Oxford Dictionary as its spelling dictionary will not use said dictionary's preferred spelling!

LibreOffice's British English dictionary has support for Oxford English. You can download the .dic and .aff files from https://github.com/ropensci/hunspell/tree/master/inst/dict and place the files in ~/Library/Spelling – either manually, or using the terminal:

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ropensci/hunspell/master/inst/dict/en_GB.aff -O ~/Library/Spelling/en_GB.aff
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ropensci/hunspell/master/inst/dict/en_GB.dic -O ~/Library/Spelling/en_GB.dic

Then log out and log in again, or restart your machine.

You should now be able to go to your keyboard preferences (Apple menu → System Preferences…), choose the Text tab and enable the new dictionary under Spelling. It should be called “British English (Library)”:

Here's a screenshot of a Safari text field spell checked with this dictionary:

P.S: If you choose to enable auto-detection of the language used for spell checking, it doesn't seem to use these “Library” dictionaries, so you might need to right click in text fields, open Spelling and grammar and explicitly set the language to British English (Library) to get it to work.


iOS 6 activation error on iPhone 3GS without SIM card I recently got an iPhone 3GS without a SIM card. I upgraded it to iOS 6 from 5.1.1.
However, the phone is stuck on "Activation error" after successfully connecting to my WiFi. The screen says:

  Activation request could not be completed. If the problem persists,
  please contact customer care.

If connected to iTunes 11, iTunes says:

  We're sorry, we are unable to continue with your activation at this
  time.

Resetting the phone doesn't work. Anybody has any ideas, besides contacting customer care?

Edit: The problem was solved by inserting a valid SIM card.

I had a similar error once, and if I remember correctly, it was that the time on the iPhone was wrong (months or years, I think). Setting the time correctly allowed it to go through.


Automator's "Extract to PDF" does not remember output folder I'm trying to create a simple Folder Action with Automator (on macOS Sierra 10.12.2) that watches a folder for PDF files and convert these to TXT files and save it to a subfolder. The problem is that the selected subfolder is not being stored. When I hit save and open the action again, the subfolder is set to its default Desktop.

This is how it looks like when I hit save. When I close Automator, open it again and select this recent action, Save Output to is set to Desktop.

Seems to be a known bug that hasn't been resolved since 2012:

How to extract the text of a PDF document with Automator, and save it in a directory


Do the Airpods Pro change how your internal voice sounds? This is just a question for owners of Airpods Pro. I've noticed that with regular earbuds that seal with a foam or soft plastic tip, the seal makes your internal voice sound weird. This is very jarring and makes speaking normally very difficult. This makes earbuds very uncomfortable to use for meetings/phone calls.
Apple's regular wired earbuds don't have a perfect seal, and talking with them in doesn't change the way my voice sounds to myself. This is good, but the earbuds also don't fit well in my ears and keep falling out.
I can't find anyone talking about this online, possibly because I don't know what terms to search for. I'm wondering if anyone with Airpods Pro can let me know:

Are you familiar with this problem? It's possible that not everyone experiences this.
Do the Airpods Pro have this problem, where your voice sounds different to yourself? Does this change if you use Transparency mode?

No they do not - not due to plugging your ears and not due to loopback.
Both AirPods and AirPods Pro don’t loop back audio, so you don’t get any negative effects whatsoever. You have to go out of your way to loop the audio back with a tool like LoopBack to get any hint of your own vocalizations in the mix.

https://www.rogueamoeba.com/loopback/

AirPods Pro can be even better in transparency mode if you don’t like to have any attenuation. The Pro on full isolation mode are less effective than Etymotic ER-6 and more effective than foam noise protectors in my experience in terms of external noise and less impactful to making you think your voice is different.


How do i navigate to httpd_vhosts.conf in xammp from the terminal? How do I navigate to httpd_vhosts.conf in Xammp from the terminal?

This was all I could find on the subject.

I guess you need 3 directories to configure Xammp on OSX.

/Applications/XAMPP/xamppfiles/etc/httpd.conf
/Applications/XAMPP/xamppfiles/etc/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf
/etc/hosts

you can open file from within the terminal for editing using e.g. nano

nano /Applications/XAMPP/xamppfiles/etc/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf

you can then edit it and save changes using Ctrl+O.


Force a change to a program's key bindings Is it possible to force a change to a program's keybindings?  E.g., instead of an menu action being invoked by Cmd-J it's Cmd-K?

The reason I ask is that Cmd-Q in Firefox drives me nuts.  I occasionally hit it instead of Cmd-W (to close a tab) & I have to wait for my entire instance of Firefox to stop & then restart.  I'd love to bind "Quit" to something ridiculous (or remove it all together).

My hope is this is in a resource file that's easily hacked?

No resource file hacking necessary; it's all built in to the GUI. And not only that, but Apple's even documented it:

Using global keyboard shortcuts
Creating keyboard shortcuts for applications

(the above assumes you're on OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, but everyone with a supported system should be by now.)


How do I get my GPS working on iPhone 3GS after upgrading to iOS 5? I've upgraded my iPhone 3GS to iOS 5 and hence changed my baseband to 5.16.05. Now it is not possible for me to unlock the phone. Is there any way I could get both GPS and phone working?. I've done jailbreak with redsnow. I don't need iOS 5 and is willing to downgrade without breaking anything. Is it possible to do it?

No. You are out of luck.

Even if you had saved the SHSH blobs for iOS 4.X (which are what you'll require to rollback), you can't revert the baseband, which is required for the unlock. So even if you did manage to install iOS 4.X, you'd still be running baseband 5.16.05.


External HDD can be seen in Disk Utility but not in Finder I've been using my external HDD a lot of times before on my Macbook Pro 13" OS X version 10.9.5, but it doesn't seem to appear in my Finder anymore. It can be seen in Disk Utility, though. Can anyone help?

I've already checked the Finder > Preferences > ... And, I've already run Repair Disk and clicked on Mount, to no avail. I don't want to reformat the disk because it has years of files and pictures.

This is the info on my external HDD:

Name :  HW Drive
Type :  Partition

Disk Identifier :   disk1s1
Mount Point :   Not mounted
File System :   Windows NT Filesystem (Tuxera NTFS)
Connection Bus :    USB
Device Tree :   IODeviceTree:/PCI0@0/EHC2@1A,7
Writable :  Yes
Capacity :  320.07 GB (320,071,884,800 Bytes)
Owners Enabled :    No
Can Turn Owners Off :   No
Can Be Formatted :  Yes
Bootable :  No
Supports Journaling :   No
Journaled :     No
Disk Number :   1
Partition Number :  1

This fixed mine:

In Finder:
 Finder>Preferences>Sidebar>DEVICES>
Then I unchecked and re-checked (deselected and then reselected) "Hard Disks" and they came back. (even though they were external) Basically try unchecking and checking them all.

I'm also now running disk checks.


iMessage different on iPad then phone Just recently my iPad iMessage is not the same as my phone, I have no clue why it changed, if someone can help me get them to be the same, I would truly appreciate it.  I notice that from my iPad, it uses my Apple ID, and I do not want that. I went to settings and clicked on send and receive but it only shows 3 different email addresses no phone number. If I sign out, I am inable to send messages without signing in to Apple ID. Extremely frustrated thanks in advance for any help Bob

iPads can send and receive iMessages through your phone number because your iPhone associates its number to your iCloud account. According to Apple's troubleshooting steps and support forums, the first thing to try is to repeat the association process in case that's somehow come undone:

Toggle iMessage off (Settings -> Messages) on both your iPad and iPhone.
Wait a few minutes. Some guides say restart your iPhone, which can't hurt.
On your iPhone, toggle iMessage on. If you see blue text below the toggle that says "Use your Apple ID for iMessage", tap it to sign in.
Once your iPhone has activated iMessage and lists both your phone number and email addresses in (Settings -> Messages -> Send & Receive), toggle iMessage on in your iPad's Settings. Your phone number should now be one of the "Send & Receive" options on your iPad.

Note that receiving and sending non-iMessage SMS texts on your iPad is set up separately.


Make Mac eject external drives when going to slumber or sleep/wake I have an external drive, a "Western Digital My Passport for Mac". I usually leave it connected and walk away from my MacBook Pro. The Mac often went to slumber and many times the "not properly ejected" message pops up. Being used to Windows I just clicked it away. Windows often gives errors that have no consequences. Until at one time the disc stopped mounting. I can't help but think that that is connected to the error and lack of ejecting properly.

Is there a way to have the Mac eject USB drives safely when it goes to sleep? Either of it's own accord or even when I have it go to slumber or close the lid?

It's just very cumbersome to have to eject the drive every time I walk away. Having a very chaotic nature doesn't help with that sort of thing.

BTW, just yesterday I got the drive to mount read-only through the macOS Disc Uility app. So I salvaged my files. Would still rather not have that again, because the drive contained some photo's that weren't yet backed up. BTW, the error it displays is with the volume selected (disk passes the first test):

Schijf-EHBO uitvoeren op 'My Passport for Mac' (disk2s2)

Bestandssysteem herstellen.
Het volume is al gedeactiveerd.
fsck_hfs -fy -x /dev/rdisk2s2 uitvoeren
Eindcode bestandssysteem is 8.
De oorspronkelijke status wordt teruggezet naar gedeactiveerd.
Controle of herstel van bestandssysteem mislukt.

Bewerking mislukt…

A Google Translate, in English, of the message above:

Perform disk first aid on 'My Passport for Mac' (disk2s2)

Restore file system.
The volume has already been deactivated.
Run fsck_hfs -fy -x / dev / rdisk2s2
File code final code is 8.
The original status is reset to deactivated.
File system check or restore failed.

Operation failed ...

There's a 3rd party app available for exactly this purpose. Jettison app automatically ejects your external drives when you put your MacBook to sleep.

It is a paid app with 15 days of free trial available.


Automatic Window Switcher I'm looking for a Mac app that will accomplish the following:

Switch between two full-screen mac apps - Tweetdeck and iCal, automatically on a timed interval. Back and forth without stopping.

We have a Mac setup as an office information kiosk. Staff can see quick Twitter updates, then take a look at our shared Exchange calendar in iCal.

Currently I am running an Apple Script using the keyboard shortcuts in Lion to scroll left and right between the two full screen apps. This is great, but from time-to-time the script crashes, or scrolls too far to one side. Looking for something robust and simple.

If the applications are in different windows, I think you can simply activate them. Save this as a stay open application:

property counter : 0

on idle
    set counter to counter + 1
    if counter mod 2 = 0 then
        activate application "Twitter"
    else
        activate application "Firefox"
    end if

    return 3 -- in seconds
end idle


MBA wifi busted - can I just install a USB Wifi dongle? The Wifi on my 2012 MBA is busted, and a lab wants $400 to repair the logic board. Could I just buy a USB Wifi dongle, disable the builtin Wifi and set it up via the dongle?

If yes, any recommended brands that are known to work with OS X? This product seems to have good reviews and boasts OS X compatibility - can it work for me?

I don't think it is that easy: isn't a working Wifi Airport Card a prerequisite for connecting/authenticating with the App Store?

On my MB Air 2,1 (mid 2009) the wifi is broken. Connecting with the internet is possible via an Apple USB-Ethernet-adapter but when trying to install an App/update OSx El Capitan the message in App Store is:

  Your device or computer could not be verified.

I've googled a bit and as far as I can tell the options for this 5 year old machine are either to have the wifi repaired (€125) or buy a USB wifi dongle (€22) and accept that OSx will not be able to update.

E.g. this post:

  A NIC (network interface card) is needed for authentication purposes to make sure the computer is what it claims to be.

on forums.macrumors.com reads like a sound argument.

On Hackintosh this seems to be fixed with various work arounds - but that's too much tinkering for me.


iPhone 4 wifi stuck on off On my iphone 4 the wifi will sometimes be stuck on off. The button is grayed out and can't be slid back to on. This seems to happen at random. I've heard about this issue happening permanently, but on my phone, it's only occasionally. I'll open the phone up later and it will work again. Any suggestions on a fix?

There is nothing that can fix this other than hardware service, it's greyed out because the Wi-Fi module is not functioning correctly, it is intermittent now but will eventually fail entirely.

Your best course of action if you are under warranty is to take it to Apple, however this model is unlikely to be under the 1 year warranty, or 2 year AppleCare warranty.

In this case, if all of these apply to you:

Bought the phone in the EU.
Are the original purchaser of the unit.
Bought for consumer use, not business
Bought from Apple Online or an Apple Store

Then you can make a claim under EU Consumer Law which states a device should last a reasonable amount of time, however you are typically required to demonstrate this within the first 6 months. However this issue was a common failure mode for this product so I would suggest that it's a known issue to Apple and they should replace it under EU Consumer Law on the basis it is a known issue.

If one or more of the above don't apply or Apple refuses, then there is no option but a handset replacement, I wouldn't personally attempt a logic board replacement using parts online, it's a particularly complex repair.

Source: 6+ years working at Apple Retail


Some process is slowly taking over disk space...how do I find out what this is and how do I deal with it? I have a Mac Book Pro, first generation.  It is running 10.6.4.  I usually keep it running.  I put it into hibernation mode (i.e. it writes the state to disk and powers down) when I need to put it to sleep.

I have a ~100GB hard drive.  Now I only have about 3.5 GB free.  I've noticed that recently i get the low disk warning quite a bit and when I check sometimes it dwindles down to a few MB.  I figured that it might have been my browsers (Chrome, Safari) caching stuff. I clear the cache and it frees up some space.  But I never get back to 3.5GB.

So, I decide to shutdown and restart.  Every time I do that I see that indeed I get back to about 3.5GB free.

My question is how do I figure out what is slowly eating up my disk space?  Have people out there experienced these symptoms?  What was the cause and how did you deal with it?

It’s a combination of the page file (virtual memory) and the hibernation file that gets written when you put your computer to sleep. Of course, other processes may also leave temp files that get deleted when you restart. There isn’t really much you can do to improve that without affecting your computer’s performance.

You can get a utility like WhatSize, Daisy Disk or similar to visually inspect the contents of your hard drive and see where is the “abnormal” file or directory.

You can also use Monolingual to reduce the size of your executables and remove unwanted languages and files.

Update:

The virtual memory file is located in

/private/var/vm

and the hibernation/sleeping file in

/var/vm/sleepimage

Please not that you can’t (and shouldn’t) delete the vm file while OS X is running.


How to stop the brightness of MacBook Air Display from fluctuating? The brightness of display of my MacBook Air is fluctuating. It is getting black and bright continuously. I don't know what to do or how to resolve the issue.

The first thing I would try is to disable auto brightness: System Preferences → Displays → uncheck Automatically adjust brightness.
If that doesn't work (or if it does and you still want auto brightness), try resetting the SMC (System Management Controller) — the SMC controls many hardware features of the Mac and resetting it can fix such problems.

Lights

The display backlight doesn't respond correctly to ambient light changes on Mac computers that have this feature.

Source: https://support.apple.com/kb/HT201295

Shut down the computer and connect the power adapter.

Press ⇧⌃⌥ and the power button, then release them all at the same time.
The Mac shouldn't boot and will remain off. The LED on the MagSafe connector may change colour and/or flash briefly.

With the charger still connected, press the power button to turn your Mac back on.


Are special characters allowed for an iPhone’s name? I know how to rename my iPhone.

I'm curious if there is any problem with adding a character to the iPhone's name.

Specifically, can I rename it to "TMH's iP7+" with the plus sign at the end?

I have looked online and cannot find any mention if this is an issue.

Symbols are fine, including a plus sign or even emoji.


MacBook Pro won't boot with new hard drive, but a different MacBook Pro will So here are the details. My friend and I both have 13-inch Mid 2010 MacBook Pro's. Same processor and specs since they were purchased at the same time, but originally had 250 GB hard drives. His hard drive failed and needed a new one. Put a 500 GB Seagate Momentus 5400.6 in his computer, and tried using a flash drive with "Install OS X Mavericks" on it to install Mavericks on his new hard drive. No matter what, it wouldn't install. I finally was able to install OS X 10.9.4 on it by connecting the new hard drive to my computer with a USB hard drive enclosure. I put the hard drive back inside his computer and it wouldn't boot (stuck on the gray screen with apple logo and a spinning wheel). I then attached to the hard drive to his computer externally with the USB enclosure, and then it booted and worked perfectly.

So, it seemed like the problem was with something inside his computer, but then I switched our drives, and that doesn't seem to be the case anymore. I put my original hard drive into his computer, and his new hard drive into my computer, and they both booted and worked perfectly, so I have no idea why his computer will not boot with the new hard drive internally.

To summarize, his computer boots with: 1) new hard drive connected externally (won't work if it's internal), and 2) my hard drive internally
but my computer boots with: 1) new hard drive connected externally AND internally, and 2) my hard drive internally.
Both hard drives have OS X 10.9.4 installed

If anyone has any idea what's causing this and how to make his computer work with the new hard drive internally that would be greatly appreciated.

Edit: Update
I was able to test the computers with some other hard drives. I have his original hard drive (which apparently needed to be replaced), which I was able to read with my computer and install Mavericks on. I also installed Mavericks on a 1 TB Toshiba hard drive. Here's the results with all 4 hard drives installed internally on either computer:

His computer:
1) Works perfectly with the original hard drive from my computer (recall they are the same model MacBook Pro)
2) Stuck on gray screen with apple logo and spinning wheel when booting with 500 GB Seagate and 1 TB Toshiba hard drives
3) Folder with question mark when booting with his original hard drive (which is why he said/was told it needed to be replaced originally)

My Computer:
1) Works with all 4 hard drives, including the one that causes his computer to show a folder with a question mark.

Could you swap hdd cable and see If that help ? Also take a look here, where the general consensus seems to be that the issue is the hard drive cable: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2648100?tstart=0


Mac App store download failures and fake complete notification I just upgraded to Mavericks on my new Macbook Air and I am facing issues downloading apps from the Mac app store.

When I click on the install button on any app, it does the usual animation of jumping into the Application folder and then the button immediately says installed. If you go to the dashboard you can see the new app icon with the progress bar inside it which has moved all the way to the end and the cancel button on the upper left corner. It remains this way forever.

No it doesn't matter if the app is big or small; it always behaves this way although I have had random apps succeeding.

The problem is not just the fake complete notification, the app never gets installed and sometimes it gives an error saying that the download failed and asks me to retry again from the purchases menu in the App store.

I have even done a complete re-installation of Mavericks but it did not help.

PS: The first time I upgraded to Mavericks, I was able to download Pages and iPhoto without any issues. The problem started sometime after that.

I spent a long time with customer support on this; several weeks actually.

One of the things you can try is to remove the folder that is listed in the console log when the issue happens. To do this, open console and leave it running. Next attempt the download and when you get the failure message, go back to console and you will see entries which say that system was unable to access a folder. Using finder, open the folder just above the folder that is named with a random sequence of strings.

For eg:
file:///var/folders/nc/qmbww7hd0cl24ylyqnldqxv80000gn/C/com.apple.appstore/409183694/mzps155989934935175015.pkg#Keynote6.pkg

In the above case, delete the folder nc. Make sure the appstore is closed when you do it. Restart the computer after this.

But what really fixed the problem for me was a very simple change.

Click on the wifi symbol on the menu bar and click open network preferences. Click on the location drop down and click edit locations. Remove all the locations in the resulting window and create a new one with a completely new name.

Restart the PC and connect to your network and attempt the download again. This fix is what worked for me. In case you have the same issue, try it out and let me know if it worked.


Can I charge a 4th gen iPod touch with the Galaxy tab's charger? Can I charge a fourth generation iPod touch with Samsung Galaxy Tab's charger?

You can plug a standard Apple 30pin USB Charging cable into the Galaxy Tab charger and it will work fine.  Both the Apple and Samsung chargers deliver 5v output (although the Samsung one delivers a higher current).  It is perfectly safe to use.


Stuck in a Bad iCloud Session I dropped my new iPhone into the Puget Sound, so I'm trying to use my old iPhone for now. I have a new SIM card installed, but I seem to be stuck in an iCloud loop.

In order to do pretty much anything on my phone, I have to be signed into iCloud. When I try to sign in, I get this error: Verification Failed: There was an error connecting to the Apple ID server.

According to this post, the solution seems to be to sign out and sign back in again. However, I can't sign out without turning off "Find My iPhone", which asks for a password and gives me an error.

I also tried resetting my phone, both through the settings menu and through iTunes, but I have the same issue.

I figured it out! The network settings needed to be reset, which I did by going to Settings > General > Reset and clicking on Reset Network Settings.


Is it possible to control dimensions of cropping an image? I'm looking for a tool that can help reshape images to specific dimensions, but I'm not sure if there's a term easy to search for tools that support that.

Preview can resize images to specific dimensions, but at the cost of losing dimension ratio. However you can create a square here in preview to specify how to crop, then to zoom in our out of image to get the crop you want, however you cannot specify that crop dimensions, only the image dimensions.

Is there a software or a key term for feature that can help you specify crop dimension? (not image dimension)

Example: Here I have to carefully drag the border to make it a square, but is there a way to create a crop area with predefined dimensions?]

Depending on your needs you might resize all images first, then specify the crop and potentially resize again after if needed. It's really up to your workflow which operation needs to happen in which order.

Photos manually (which also has a very nice square crop tool and can export and re-sample the image if needed). The next step would be to have  automator or AppleScript control Photos (or your editor of choice) to make entering specific dimensions easier. If you don't mind shell scripting, the tool I've used to script this for many images is https://www.imagemagick.org/

You can get it with https://brew.sh and install quite easily. You should spend 10 minutes installing brew and the command line tools (free) from Apple and skip installing Xcode unless you feel you want the whole developer toolset. That might take 30 minutes or more to install.

There are dozens of tutorials on how to do this - here are three:

https://www.macworld.com/article/1153762/resize_images_automator.html
https://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/how_to_batch_convert_and_resize_images_with_automator
https://9to5mac.com/2016/04/27/how-to-quickly-resize-images-mac-using-automator-service/


Where are Mail.app display prefs? I restarted my Mac (OS X 10.11.6) this morning and upon opening Mail.app (9.3), most (all?) of my display preferences had been reset. Very annoying! I have a Time Machine backup - what file(s) do I need to restore to get Mail back to where I like it? Thanks much!

~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.mail.plist would be the first one to try.


Copy a movie between iPhones Seems like an idiot question, but I completely failed to copy a movie from one iPhone to another.

We tried coupling with bluetooth, failed to send files.
Enabling internet sharing (which worked) but failed to send files through Airdrop.

I understand that if we were connected to a WIFI network Airdrop would probably have worked. But we were on a trip travelling in a car, so there was no WIFI availability.

Remembering sharing photos over BT with friends ages ago using old push-button cell phones is seems crazy that we could not find out how to do it.

Can this be done? (iOS 9.3, iPhone 6 + SE)

On the Home screen (or on any screen with something you want to share), swipe up from the bottom.  You should see a bunch of icons. Toward the bottom 1/3rd of the sheet you'll see the AirDrop icon.  Tap the AirDrop icon and 3 choices will slide-up from the bottom:

Everyone
Contacts Only
Off

These choices allow you to limit the people with whom you can share. You both should have the same setting to ensure you can see each other.


Apple ID password vs iCloud password - better to be the same or different? I have too many passwords to track on too many devices. With my apple devices & services, it would be easier for me if both my iCloud and Apple ID passwords were the same.

Should this be ok or is it bad security practice? Is there a recommendation? What do most people do?

First, you usually don't need a different Apple ID for iCloud:

  We recommend that you use the same Apple ID for Store purchases and iCloud. Using multiple Apple IDs might be confusing and might cause issues with accessing purchased content or using some services.

If you do have two Apple ID's, Apple has this to say about reusing passwords:

  Avoid using your Apple ID password with other online accounts.

Password reuse is problematic because all your security depends on the "weakest link", the less secure –or more exposed– service. Once that service is compromised, all your services are.

XKCD has this to say about the subject:

On the matter of remembering passwords, XKCD –sorry, again– has some iconic graphical input, analyzed and validated here by the people at InfoSec SE.

In a nutshell, passwords must be difficult to guess and easy to remember, and he proposes the use of passphrases instead of short, complicated passwords.

Yet others think that

  The Only Secure Password Is the One You Can’t Remember

which is my philosophy by the way.
In order to achieve this apparent nonsense, you use a Password manager, (iCloud Keychain, Keepass, 1Password, LastPass), and generate different random secure passwords for every service. You only have to remember one master password –where you could apply XKCD's idea.

People have different opinions on how secure password managers are; if you are a bit paranoid or have very sensitive data you may want to have an eidetic memory instead, although one known cryptographer and security expert advocates the use of at least one –not cloud synced, though.