Why can't I change my macbook's backlight? So apparently I cannot modify my Macbook's backlight using the keyboard shortcut:

I'm pretty sure it will work again if I restart it. But I wonder what may cause this: is it perhaps an issue with my hardware, or just some OS glitch caused by something insignificant?

Macbook Pro Retina, 15" mid 2014. El Capitan 10.11.

You set it with the F5 and F6 keys, and it should not change after that, except for the setting SystemPreferences->Keyboard->Keyboard  "adjust keyboard brightness in low light".


Archive to Gmail Fails, but only when using the Archive Button on the Toolbar If I try to archive an email using the toolbar 'archive' button I get this error message:

"The IMAP command “UID COPY” (to Archive) failed for the mailbox “INBOX” with server error: No folder Archive (Failure)."

However, if I manually drag the email to all mail, it archives just fine.  Any ideas?

Go to Mail.app / Preferences / Accounts / MailBoxes and under Trash, uncheck Store deleted messages on the server.

Usually this does the trick.


Installed provision profiles not seen on iOS8? I have installed a few profiles from third-parties, now I'd like to remove them from General - Settings - Profiles, which is the way I did before prior to iOS 8. However, I don't see them there on my iPhone/iPad(iOS 8.0.2) any more.

Is this something new from iOS 8? Any clue how to remove my installed profiles?

ps. I know I can remove profiles from Xcode - Devices. But that's only for the ones installed with my associated development account. I need a general way to remove all of them.

I know this is an old thread. I have been experiencing the sam issue with students downloading apps through 3rd party. The provisioning profiles are still on the device, despite them being removed through settings etc..

Once the update 10.2.1 was complete they no longer exist on the device as seen through the our MDM, Xcode or the device itself..

So updating to new OS worked for me.. Hope this helps anyone


Apple Dual-Link DVI adapter doesn't work after upgrade to 10.9.2 I have a late 2011 MacBook Pro. I've been running 10.8.x.  I'm using the Apple branded dual-link DVI adapter to connect an external WQHD monitor (1440p).  It was working great with 10.8.

I just installed the 10.9.2 update from the AppStore.  During the upgrade, the machine wouldn't even boot with the DVI adapter connected.  After figuring that out, the upgrade installed.

Now, when I connect the adapter, the laptop LCD screen goes black (but backlit, so it's not off) and the external monitor doesn't detect a signal.  When I remove the thunderbolt cord to the adapter, the display remains black (it doesn't switch back).

If I boot the machine with the adapter connected, the dock never appears and CMD+TAB doesn't show anything. When I remove the adapter at that point, the dock appears.

System Information shows the adapter as detected, but the resolution is shown as "1x1".

EDIT: Here's some info from the system log:

Mar 24 09:29:51 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: Received display connect changed for display 0x4272dc2
Mar 24 09:29:51 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: Found 45 modes for display 0x04272dc2 [33, 12]
Mar 24 09:29:51 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: Received display connect changed for display 0x3f003f
Mar 24 09:29:51 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: build_mode_list_if_needed: No always available modes from IOGraphics [1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0]
Mar 24 09:29:51 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]:         mode id 0x00003000, nominal [1 x 1], flags 0x00000000
Mar 24 09:29:51 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: Found 3 modes for display 0x003f003f [0, 0]
Mar 24 09:29:51 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: Display 0x003f003f changed state to online
Mar 24 09:29:51 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: MPSelectMode: Mode number 1 always unavailable for display 0x003f003f
Mar 24 09:29:51 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: complete_connect_change: Error selecting mode 1 for display 0x003f003f
Mar 24 09:29:51 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: Received display connect changed for display 0x3f0040
Mar 24 09:29:51 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: Found 1 modes for display 0x003f0040 [1, 0]
Mar 24 09:30:00 LM125892-CYTHOM com.apple.launchd.peruser.735236149[306] (com.qbix.CalendarStart[768]): Exited with code: 1
Mar 24 09:30:00 LM125892-CYTHOM com.apple.launchd.peruser.735236149[306] (com.qbix.CalendarStart): Throttling respawn: Will start in 10 seconds
Mar 24 09:30:10 LM125892-CYTHOM com.apple.launchd.peruser.735236149[306] (com.qbix.CalendarStart[824]): Exited with code: 1
Mar 24 09:30:12 LM125892-CYTHOM com.apple.launchd[1] (com.teamviewer.service): assertion failed: 13C64: launchd + 40562 [425516B6-9F3E-342F-87B3-EC461EBA6A1A]: 0x10000003
Mar 24 09:30:12 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: CGXGetConnectionProperty: Invalid connection 61699
Mar 24 09:30:12 --- last message repeated 19 times ---
Mar 24 09:30:12 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: CGXOrderWindowList: Invalid window 56 (index 0/1)
Mar 24 09:30:12 LM125892-CYTHOM WindowServer[106]: CGXGetConnectionProperty: Invalid connection 61699

I would probably install the old OS onto an external USB drive to be sure it's not a failure unrelated to the OS.

It's rare that the OS breaks an adapter that was working - even if the change happened at the same time as an OS update. Also, you can usually rule out software by updating to 10.9.3 (in your case) or to the next point update in case there was an error that was caught in the drivers or settings.


How to delete cache of Microsoft Teams on macOS? I want to delete the cache of the Microsoft Teams on my Macbook Air.
Please let me know how to do it.

There are multiple locations with Teams cache files:

as noted by @JMY1000, the regular cache folder ~/Library/Caches
see @grg's answer here or this answer by a Microsoft employee: ~/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/Teams

If you remove just those, you don't need to login again, so the following Terminal commands would work:
rm -rf ~/Library/Caches/com.microsoft.teams
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Microsoft/Teams/Application\ Cache/Cache
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Microsoft/Teams/blob_storage
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Microsoft/Teams/Cache
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Microsoft/Teams/databases
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Microsoft/Teams/GPUCache
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Microsoft/Teams/IndexedDB
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Microsoft/Teams/Local\ Storage
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Microsoft/Teams/tmp

For those who prefer a solution outside Terminal:

open Finder
open the 'Go' menu, choose 'Go to Folder...'

(or alternatively, use the keyboard shortcut Shift+Cmd+G)

enter ~/Library/Caches and press Enter
delete the com.microsoft.teams folder

Similarly, go to the ~/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/Teams folder and delete these folders:

Application Cache/Cache
blob_storage
Cache
databases
GPUCache
IndexedDB
Local Storage
tmp


When do I formally "Own" an app from App Store? I'm new to this community. I have some simple question but I can't understand why nobody else ever asked them with below scenario.

My Scenario

As all we know, sometimes developers make their paid apps, free for a limited time.
I unfortunately  have a Limited internet in home.

* What I do in this situation is that I "Get" this temporary free apps, and after about 1% of downloading I pause them in order to resume downloading later. *

Notice that all below questions are related to each other like a chain and It's not sensible to ask in three separate question.

My Questions:

When I formally "own" an app (if it's free or paid)? right after pushing the "Get" button in App Store OR when downloading has completed ?
(According to above story) Can I resume this downloads (also when apps get back to paid mode) ?
If this temporary free apps become paid again, Will I still get new updates for ever since I own them ?

PS: when somebody "purchase" a paid app, he is "owner" of that app. In this question I used word "own" in the meaning of "possession".

Once you tap Get, then confirm it by tapping again, then entering your Apple ID or using Touch ID, and the download starts, then you own it.

The download starting is important—if there's not enough space on the device, or the network disconnects first, or anything else prevents the circular progress bar from starting, you don't own the app.

Once download has started, you can tap the Stop button to stop the download. The icon changes to an iCloud download icon and you now own the app.
You can download apps you own from the Purchases list found at the top of the Updates tab on iOS.
Once the app has been added to your Apple ID, the app will remain on the list regardless of whether the app developer changes the price tier of the app. It won't be removed if the price increases and you can't be charged in the future.

This also applies with part 2, as if you purchase the app, then delete it, you can download it again without being charged even if the price tier increases.


Where can I find the official documentation of macOS Kernel Debugging? I want to study kernel debugging on macOS, and hence have tried to find official documentation for macOS Kernel Debugging.

Currently, I'm only able to find up-to-date or complete information on third-party blogs, but I'd rather read the original source.

Windows provide such information freely available as part on its site - doesn't Apple do the same?

Yes, Apple does the same...

You can read the documentation here:

https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/Darwin/Conceptual/KernelProgramming/build/build.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP30000905-CH221-CIHBJCGC


iPhone Apple ID reset Can I reset or use a new Apple ID in my existing iPhone? Will it affect the existing apps installed?

Sorry I’m kinda new in the Apple environment and my sister just gave me her old iPhone.

Here is the playbook for wiping the iPhone before you put any information on it.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201351

If you don’t detach the previous owner accounts, your data will commingle and you’ll eventually need their password or potentially be locked out of your phone. Search more on this site for all the woe people experience trying to bypass activation lock and untangle commingled address books, calendars, App Store purchase, etc...

Unless that device has made dozens of previous AppleID, you will be able to make a ne Apple ID once it’s erased. Just follow the “make an AppleID” prompts when you set up the device after the wipe (which wipes everything on that device but nothing stored in the cloud)


Can I get 2560x1440 resolution on external monitor? I have a mid-2015 MacBook Pro running High Sierra. I normally use it as a desktop computer in clamshell mode with an external monitor.

I just replaced my 24-inch external monitor with a 32-inch monitor. The new monitor is an Acer EB321HQU-B, which is supposed to support up to 2560x1440 resolution.

According to the technical specifications my Mac is supposed to support

  full native resolution on the built-in display and up to 3840 by 2160 pixels on up to two external displays, both at millions of colors.

and

  Support for 3840-by-2160 resolution at 30Hz

I have the new monitor connected via a Mini DisplayPort to HDMI adapter.

But the best I can get is 1920x1080, which is the same as my old monitor. In Display preferences, the only options I see in Scaled are 1600x900, 1080p, 1080i, and 720p, whether I select 60Hz or 30Hz. So I can't show any more on the screen, it's just all scaled up 33%.

Is there some way I can take advantage of the new monitor?

The problem is the cable you’re using to connect the monitor to the computer.

The easiest way to ensure that you have the full resolution is to use a standard mini-DisplayPort to DisplayPort cable and you should be able to use the full resolution without problems.

You can also use a mini-DisplayPort to DVI cable, but these are usually harder to come by in a standard home electronics store.

Last but not least, it might be possible to get the full resolution by using a better HDMI cable. You'll need one that supports HDMI 1.3 or 1.4 to support the 2560x1440 resolution.


brew couldn't upgrade after upgrade xcode 7.3.1 to 8.1 I upgraded xcode from 7.3.1 to 8.1 and also I update homebrew using [brew update]. after that I could use [brew upgrade]. It shown the following warning message

Warning: You are using a pre-release version of Xcode.
   You may encounter build failures or other breakages.
   Please create pull-requests instead of filing issues.

I used [brew config] and it shown the following info

  HOMEBREW_VERSION: 1.0.8-54-g8019afb
  ORIGIN: https://github.com/Homebrew/brew.git
  HEAD: 8019afb60ad321b0f14f60b00c23d7fb098d35c2
  Last commit: 6 days ago
  Core tap ORIGIN: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core
  Core tap HEAD: 83f73d73fac8229ac523bf839b8a5913de05bf08
  Core tap last commit: 3 hours ago
  HOMEBREW_PREFIX: /usr/local
  HOMEBREW_REPOSITORY: /usr/local/Homebrew
  HOMEBREW_CELLAR: /usr/local/Cellar
  HOMEBREW_BOTTLE_DOMAIN: https://homebrew.bintray.com
  CPU: quad-core 64-bit haswell
  Homebrew Ruby: 2.0.0-p648
  Clang: 8.0 build 800
  Git: 2.9.3 => /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/usr/bin/git
  Perl: /usr/bin/perl
  Python: /usr/bin/python
  Ruby: /usr/local/bin/ruby => /usr/local/Cellar/ruby/2.3.1_2/bin/ruby
  Java: 1.8.0_25
  macOS: 10.11.6-x86_64
  Xcode: 8.1
  CLT: 7.3.1.0.1.1461711523

I think the last line of above info [CLT] means command line tools and its version is 7.3.1..., I think it should be 8.1 because Xcode is 8.1. How can I upgrade CLT from 7.3.1 to 8.1?

I had similar issue:

brew is not up-to-date even though running brew update returns:

Already up-to-date

Running brew upgrade returns:

Warning: You are using a pre-release version of Xcode.
You may encounter build failures or other breakages.
Please create pull-requests instead of filing issues.

I solved running the following command:
cd "$(brew --repo)" && git fetch && git reset --hard origin/master && brew update --force


macOS 10.12.4 keeps losing Wi-Fi connection I have a mid-2014 MBP Pro which I have updated to macOS 10.12.4.

After running this update, the laptop refuses to connect to any Wi-Fi network.

Needless to say, every device on the network has been reset and they are all able to connect to the house Wi-Fi, with the exception of the MBP. The MBP can see all the wireless networks, but can't connect to any of them. It can also see the hotspot from my phone, but can't connect to it.

Does anyone know of a fix?

Update: This is a bug in 10.12.4

I have reformatted the laptop, installed a fresh installation of 10.12.4. The bug is basically this, if the laptop goes to sleep, your ability to connect to a Wifi network is gone forever.

I would totally remove your Wi-Fi service, restart, and add your Wi-Fi service back.

To do this:

Go to Apple > System Preferences > Network
Select the Wi-Fi service on the left-hand side
Click on the cog icon at bottom-left and select Make Service Inactive
Now delete the service by clicking on the minus sign (i.e. the - button) at left of the cog
Click on the Apply button
Exit Network preferences
Restart your MBP
Go to Apple > System Preferences > Network
Click on the plus sign (i.e. the + button) at left of the cog
In the pop-up window, ensure that Wi-Fi is selected from the drop-down menu
Click on the Create button
Make sure Wi-Fi is on and connected (it should remember your previous settings, but if not just re-add your Wi-Fi network again)

Let me know if this resolves the issue.

Boot into Safe Mode

Since removing the Wi-Fi service etc didn't work, let's try booting your Mac into Safe Mode:

Fully shut down your Mac
Restart your Mac
Immediately press the Shift key and keep it down
Let go of the Shift key when you see the login window (NOTE: If you
have FileVault enabled you may need to log in twice).
Test to see what happens
Exit Safe Mode by restarting your Mac as normal
Test again to see what happens

Note, booting into Safe Mode will take longer than usual.

Run Apple Diagnostics

Okay, time to test your hardware. Follow these steps to run Apple Diagnostics:

Fully shut down your Mac
Restart your Mac
Immediately press the D key and keep it down until you see the Diagnostics screen appear
Wait for Diagnostics to finish (this typically only takes a few minutes)
Once complete, one of two things will appear on the screen:

a No issues found message
a brief description of any errors found plus further instructions

If the diagnostics test does find errors, take a note of what they are

Note: If pressing and holding the D key at Step 3 doesn't work, start again at Step 1 and, at Step 3 press and hold both the OptionD keys instead. This will try and run diagnostics from the internet instead, so you will need to allow more time for it to complete.

Regardless, let me know how you went.


how do i make iphone sync all contacts from Google Contacts into IPhone? http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google%20Mobile/thread?tid=1b27fcd343e0544a&hl=en (rephrased):

  if you want to sync google contacts with iphone over the air using
  google sync, you can... sync all contacts... this way you can leave
  your already existing contacts on iphone and sync all google contacts
  (remember that every email which contact you except spam is put into
  all contacts... this means veeeery lot of contacts and some people
  find this very frustrating)

Ok it basically claims that we can sync All Contacts (all people we have ever contacted) to our IPhone over the air.

But right now my IPhone is syncing only My Contacts group and is not syncing anything outside that group. How do I make it sync All Contacts ?

I don't know how to get the phone to sync with a different group than My Contacts, or to sync all the contacts, but as long as you aren't using My Contacts for filing now, then you can have every contact in two groups - "My Contacts" for syncing and your chosen group for filing and organization.

You can do this without destroying the rest of your sorting scheme by selecting all contacts in each group in Google Contacts, opening the Groups menu, clicking the checkbox next to My Contacts until it shows up as a solid check mark (not a slash), and then clicking "apply" in the same menu. By selecting the checkbox instead of the name and using Apply, you are telling the UI to add them to My Contacts without moving them; this is a standard bit of Google UI style.


Safari OCSP/CRL Checking Causing Connectivity Failure I'm currently implementing an 802.1X network authentication system using Cisco ISE for one of our customers.

Our solution requires users (with personal devices) to connect to an open SSID network, get HTTP redirected to our (https, internally signed) login portal, and get provisioned with a wireless profile.

This is working fine in general, but we have a specific case with OS X machines (so far it's only been seen on Mavericks) where browsing to a website and getting redirected is not working. It is only happening in Safari, in Firefox it is working fine.

We have allowed traffic to the OCSP and CRL servers specified in our HTTPS server certificate, however, in a packet capture from the Mac, I can see it sending AAAA DNS requests for the OCSP and CRL servers names (which are failing, because IPv6 is not configured/supported on this network), but the machine does not appear to fallback to IPv4 (A) requests.

Other DNS lookups (safari looking up google.com.au) send simultaneous AAAA and A lookups.

Is this a known bug? Is there anything on the network side we can do to resolve this issue?

I am interested to hear if there is a config change on the Mac we can make to fix this, but it is not a solution, as we need to make as minimal a change to the users personal devices as possible.

Thank you.

So... There was another thing causing my portal to not load (redirect ACL). The DNS was a red herring, and the only reason we saw AAAA and not A requests was because the machine had already cached the answer for the A record.

Finding that out was humbling... what a silly mistake!

Anyway, no issue with the Mac here, but if you see similar behaviour, flush your DNS cache and try again!


iMovie doesn't support Graphite appearance? I downloaded iMovie and to my surprise I realized that it didn't support the Graphite appearance option. iMovie's window buttons are colourful. This leads me to believe that iMovie has badly written code. I was wondering if there's something I can do to get that Graphite appearance?

I believe "that graphite look" you refer to is merely the color scheme that Apple uses for its "Pro" applications to distinguish them from its consumer level applications.

iMovie is a perfectly good (if limited in what it can do) application that can be used quite successfully to edit and finish up home or amateur video projects. If you need some features that iMovie does not offer you can switch to Final Cut Pro or Adobe Premier


How can I control my Apple TV from my Mac? I have two third gen Apple TVs and a Macbook Pro running 10.8. I use the remote app on my iPhone and iPad all the time, but it seems silly that I have to reach for them when my Macbook is right on my lap.

I'm not looking for a remote iTunes solution or home sharing, I want to actually be able to navigate the Apple TV menus from my Mac and do things like launch Hulu+ and Netflix.

I've searched around a little and can't find anything that claims to do this. Is it possible?

I managed to control Apple TV from Mac with 1Keyboard application (http://www.eyalw.com/1keyboard) that turns Mac OS X into a bluetooth keyboard. Another app that does this is Type2Phone, probably there are even more of them.


Hotkeys being captured in save menu in GIMP? I just installed GIMP (from the dmg on the GIMP website) on my new MacBook Pro running Mavericks. Unfortunately, when I went to go export/save an image, the keys that are hotkeys in GIMP (e.g. 1 is 100% zoom) are captured as hotkeys while typing in the name to save the file. Captured in that they both are not typed in the save name input and it messes with what is being done in the GIMP project.

Anyone know what the cause might be or how I might fix it?

The problem was fixed in GIMP 2.8.10, so if you're running into this problem please download a newer version.


How to find an older version of Microsoft Office 365 for MacBook 10.11.6 The harddisk of the MacBook crashed. Now I want te re-install Office 365, but the latest version needs 10.12.0. My MacBook (medio 2009) has El Capitan 10.11.6. more is not possible. Who knows a solution?

You can find previous installers at

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/officeupdates/update-history-office-for-mac

If you go to that page, look for the installer for "16.15 (18070902)" and use that.

In case the page changes or doesn't exist in the future, here are the current links:

Release Notes:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/officeupdates/release-notes-office-for-mac#july-2018-release

Installer Package

https://officecdn.microsoft.com/pr/C1297A47-86C4-4C1F-97FA-950631F94777/OfficeMac/Microsoft_Office_2016_16.15.18070902_Installer.pkg

Verification Information

Size:

1797089465 bytes (1.79 GB)

md5 -r Microsoft_Office_2016_16.15.18070902_Installer.pkg

e580d202dca712c268c288b36576a89a Microsoft_Office_2016_16.15.18070902_Installer.pkg

shasum -a 256 -p Microsoft_Office_2016_16.15.18070902_Installer.pkg

2caa050dcc2a95f90f57449f9ab5b173437fa2580f282f4c1513a83918e49ffa ?Microsoft_Office_2016_16.15.18070902_Installer.pkg


Calendar view in iPad Mini running iOS 9 I can't seem to adjust my calendar view to see 5 days under the week view with my iPad Mini running iOS 9.  How do I change the setup?  I don't see an option in settings.

The few things you can change in the native calendar app are under settings at the bottom of Mail, Contacts, Calendars:

You would need to download a custom calendar app to change the week view of your calendar data. The best I can manage is changing the week start date, which changes things everywhere.


How to remove bluetooth device by clicking "x" when there is no "x"? I'm following instructions on what to before you sell, give away, or trade in your Mac and when attempting step 6 (Unpair bluetooth devices), I attempt to 'move the pointer over device that you want to remove, then click the remove (x) button next to the device name'. But there is no remove (x) button (nor anything similar):

I have tried

left clicking, right clicking, and double clicking in all areas of the Bluetooth settings (on the grey areas, white areas, and the blue area), but no extra options/menus emerge.
clicked 'Advanced', but that only gives three unrelated options
read that it could be a bug, and attempted to click the bluetooth icon in the menu bar with option held down, but no 'remove' option is available

I am therefore not sure what to attempt next?
Note: running Catalina 10.15.6 (up to date)

The answer (for me at least) was very simple: bluetooth needs to be on in order for the "x" to appear when the bluetooth device is hovered over. It's that simple: turn bluetooth on.


HP PSC 1350 Scanner OS X Lion I just upgraded to OS X Lion. My HP PSC 1350 printer will print but it won't scan. HP's website says to remove, readd, etc, which I tried. It said I could get the generic driver from Apple software update, but nada. How can I scan in Lion with my HP PSC 1350?

I'm so happy! I found it and it works great!

http://support.apple.com/kb/DL907

These are the up-to-date HP Printer drivers appearently. If anyone else is having issues with their printer I'd suggest looking on Apple's website.


Reverting back to Mavericks from El Capitan Ever since I downloaded El Capitan I have lost the ability to Drag & Drop photos into Pages documents I am creating.  Also in Pages, Certificate templates, for example, are not able to be edited.  I can open the template but can not do anything with it, cannot edit any changes.  Also cannot edit my own created files.  I also don't like how in Photos my photo labels are not visible underneath the photo like they used to be.  I don't know what other unpleasantness might still  be in store for me so I want to revert back to Mavericks.  How do I do this?

There is no real way to easily downgrade any version of Mac OS. You have two choices here.

If you made a backup image of your HD before you upgraded, back up the files that have changed since then, boot from that image and restore it to your boot drive.
Back up your current HD, Wipe it and reinstall the previous OS. Then reinstall your apps and restore your data from the backup.

Honestly sounds more like an issue with Pages than with the OS, but since I don't use Pages I have nothing useful to suggest other than removing and reinstalling the app. Perhaps if you edited your question asking for help with Pages on El Cap....


Does SMS Forward to Mac work if iPhone is turned off? I have a MacBook and an iPhone. The iPhone is setup to forward SMS to my MacBook. If the iPhone is turned off can I still send/receive SMS in Messages on my MacBook?

No, iPhone has to be turned on in order for SMS messages to be received by it and then forwarded to your computer, or for you to send messages, which are sent back to the phone and then out to your carrier from there.


Screenshots from PDF without creating a new file I have a document given as a PDF and would like to copy parts from it into Powerpoint. For example, an equation.

I use Preview's "Take a screenshot" function but this always generates a new Preview file with the selection. On this new file, I do a Command + A, Command + C then Command + V, and I have the image on my slide. I then have to delete the screenshot file.

What is an efficient way to select a certain portion of my PDF and copy it without generating a new file?

If you’re happy with a screenshot, there’s a screenshot-to-clipboard function built into macOS.

Use the keyboard shortcut Control + Shift + Command 4. (Try doing that with one hand! :-) )


Terminal. SSH with Proxy Socks 4 Gday all,

So i'm trying to use the terminal to SSH into a server using a SOCKS4 proxy.

In putty on windows you can tell it the IP and Port of the server. and then set the proxy in the proxy tab (IP and port)

is there anyway i can do this with the terminal on OSX?
Or is there another program i can use?

Pretty much so i don't have to VM windows and use putty

Cheers

You can use ProxyCommand option to ssh, which does exactly what you want in ssh_config:

Host target # or all
  ProxyCommand /usr/bin/nc -x IP:port %h %p

Or directly on command line:

ssh -o ProxyCommand='nc -x IP:port %h %p' user@host

The OSX netcat might have a bit different switches, but conceptually it works this way.

Credits: SuperUser question


Is there a way to connect to office VPN using parallels (windows) but surf on host Mac OS X? My office VPN called Juniper does not gets installed on Mac OS X. I am using Parallels to run guest Windows on my macbook pro with OS X Yosemite. I don't know what I am asking, and if it is even logical or not, but here is my question:

Is there a way that I can share my guest operating system's VPN connection with host operating system? What I mean is, that I connect to my office VPN using my guest Parallels Windows OS and that can be shared with my host macbook Mac OS X?

By doing this what I want to achieve is, that I want to just open Windows using Parallels and then connect to my VPN and then minimize it and come back to OS X and then surf all my internet websites on Safari or Chrome (on Mac and not W indows).

Is this possible? Could anybody guide me on how to do this if its possible?

You may be able to share the connection from Windows to Mac, depending upon how it is implemented in Windows. Follow these steps, from this site:

Add a Host-Only network adapter to the guest (Windows).
Launch the Guest (Windows).
Go to a command prompt and type:

ipconfig /all

Note the IP Address of the Host Only adapter. Likely something like 10.37.129.2.
Assuming the VPN shows as a connection in Windows Network Connections, setup Internet Connection Sharing on this adapter. When setting up ICS, choose the Host Only adapter as the Private Network Adapter.
Once that’s done, connect to the VPN.
On the host, add a route to your VPN, specifying the IP address of the Host Only Adapter as the gateway. In this example, the subnet trying to be reached on the VPN is 192.168.40.0/24, and the IP address of the Host Only Adapter is 10.37.129.2, so in a Terminal window you would type the following:

sudo route -n add 192.168.40.0/24 10.37.129.3


Finder sidebar icons showing as circles for disks My Finder looks like this - the icons for local and external volumes are shown correctly in column view, on Get Info and on the desktop but in sidebar Locations all (except for boot volume) are all just plain circles:

I checked this question Changing the Finder icon for an external disk formatted as ExFat? and none of the volumes have a .VolumeIcon.icns file and I have renamed the volumes with no effect.

This question Change Mac OS X Finder sidebar icons suggested looking at ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.sidebarlists.plist but this doesn't seem to exist in Mojave.

This question How to reset default sidebar favourites icons in Finder? suggested deleting ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.finder.plist and restarting Finder.  Sure enough this works and the sidebar icons are corrected but after a reboot they are back to being circles.

I am running Mojave 10.14.6 on a mid 2014 MBP.

Do you have WhatsYourSign (program that checks if an app is signed) installed by any chance? I removed that and the icons are back to normal


Macbook air stutters during streaming video I am streaming video from an ASUS router to a macbook air (2013) and having horrible stuttering problems. No big deal, you may say - I just don't have the bandwidth for it. The only thing is, if I copy the video over the network to my laptop, it only takes 10 minutes for a 90 minute movie, telling me that I have 9X the bandwidth required for streaming. This suggests that buffering may be the problem, but I've used both Movist and VLC and get the same problems.

Has anyone experienced something similar - where more than enough bandwidth is available, but video streaming still stutters horribly? And more importantly, did you find a solution?

According to a post on VLC's own forum, there is a "known issue" with streaming directly from a NAS.

Here's what they have to say on the streaming from NAS issue.

  "Known issue, but I agree it's really annoying.
  I also met the lagging issue when playing directly from NAS, but through UPnP, playback is really smooth.

  If your NAS has UPnP server, consider using it."

So, the user "nkoriyama" suggests enabling uPnP as the solution, if it's available as an option for you.

Note: This answer is taken from the comment stream under the op's question


How to share internet connection via thunderbolt? I have a recent iMac and will buy a new MacBook Air.
And I'm finding fastest way to connect internet to the Air. Wi-Fi is still too slow and USB-Ethernet converter offers only 100-Mbit speed. But both of them have Thunderbolt port, so I expected internet sharing via the port. It could be fantastic.

But I couldn't fine any way to do that. In configuration panel, it shows only old options like Firewire. Is sharing internet connection via Thunderbolt possible? If it is, how can I do this?

I don't think you can do this. Thunderbolt doesn't really have a "native" protocol like Firewire or Ethernet, it's just fancy PCIe transport. It might be possible in the future, but it would require Apple to add the functionality.

However it's worth noting that it's unlikely Thunderbolt would speed up your connection at all. Unless you have a seriously heavy duty internet connection (think corporate/university fiber), the limiting factor in your internet speeds won't be the connection between local machines, it's the cable/dsl your ISP provides. It's possible wifi could be limiting if you have a bad connection with a lot of interference, but most wifi should be able to keep up with your internet connection.


iterm - what's the key-combo to switch panes? I've learned how to split my terminal windows with apple-d and apple-shift-d.  Its very useful.
How do I then switch between the two panes (see below) using the keyboard?
I know I can use the mouse but would like to know if there's a key combo to do it.

⌘+⌥+←/↑/→/↓ will let you navigate split panes in the direction of the arrow, i.e. when using ⌘+D to split panes vertically, ⌘+⌥+← and ⌘+⌥+→ will let you switch between the panes.

Note: ⌥ is the [alt] key


Can I prevent "Photos" app from loading? I really dislike using "photos" app it is simply an un needed app for me because I have minimal HD space and do not need a back-up and do not want a cloud back-up either. I would love it if I could prevent the app from loading altogether.

When you say loading you mean Photos will open once you connect a device to your mac?

Use the Image Capture app to configure what app is loaded for that device. You can turn off loading of Photos, too. This setting is on the bottom left, you might hat to click the arrow-up sign to see the app selection box.


Fusion drive benefits for Boot Camp? I've got a late-2015 Retina iMac with Fusion drive. From what I understand, but want to confirm, is that there is no real benefit for Boot Camp as the partition is completely on the HDD side, so the speed in Boot Camp is considerably slower than if it had SSD access.

How can I confirm this or even see the two 'sides' of my Fusion Drive?

Boot Camp Assistant partitions the HDD so that Windows can be installed. Windows does not support Core Storage, hence the partition is solely on the HDD.

  Do Macs that have a Fusion Drive support Boot Camp?
  Yes. Boot Camp Assistant creates the Windows partition on the disk drive instead of the flash drive (SSD).

Source: https://support.apple.com/kb/HT201456

Speaking of Core Storage, this is what is used to make your two disks appear as one logical volume. You can't see the individual drives' content separately. For more information, see Core Storage Wikipedia or search "Core Storage".


Mac with 2 monitors, how do i switch virtual desktops on one monitor only? I have 2 monitors for mac, one extended the other.

How do i switch virtual desktops on one monitor only?

For example, When I do 4 fingers swipe left/right on screen1,  I expect the switching happens on screen1 only.

BUT both monitors will switch virtual desktops at the same time, how do i avoid that?

I am not on a My Mac at the moment, but in the Mission Control Preferences there is a setting to have the spaces work independently. Go to Preferences -> Mission Control -> Displays have separate Spaces.


retry 'message send failure' with editing Here is the situation I get confronted with once in a while. I send an iMessage to more than one person. After a while, I get 'Message send failure'. I search for the reason and I figure I have input a home phone number of the person instead of his iPhone or email address. I go to 'Edit' message but the OS does not allow me to delete that phone number. Is there any other way to remove that number from the 'To' field so that I can resend the iMessage? I don't want to recompose the message (including cut, copy, pasting into a new iMessage)

I am on iOS 6.

The following is only a little less work than simply copying and pasting the original into a new message, but I believe it meets your requirements:

Tap Edit in the upper-right corner of the message list
Tap your message to mark it
Tap the Forward button at the bottom of the list

This will bring up a sheet that allows you to enter new recipients, with the previously-composed message already in place.


'Show scroll bars' stuck on Always At one point, I connected a USB mouse to my MacBook Pro, which caused the scroll bars to always be shown in every app. This was despite my settings in Appearance.prefpane where ‘Show scroll bars’ was set to ‘Whilst scrolling’.

Since then, I have been unable to remove the scroll bars. Setting the option in the General preference pane to ‘When scrolling’ has no effect, and upon quitting and re-opening System Preferences the option is reverted to Always.

I have tried using defaults write -g AppleShowScrollBars -string WhenScrolling but this has no effect either. How can I set the scroll bar visibility to ‘When scrolling’?

I fixed this by editing the AppleShowScrollBars string in the ByHost .GlobalPreferences plist.

Even though ~/Library/Preferences/.GlobalPreferences.plist showed the correct value of ‘WhenScrolling’, the ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/.GlobalPreferences.udid.plist had the value of "Always". By changing the string using Xcode and logging out, it was resolved.


how to remove the shortcut on Finder top bar (see picture) I don't know how I got these shortcuts on Finder's bar (look on the right). These shortcuts are on every Finder windows.
How to remove them ? What's those shortcut called ?

This picture is worth more than any description.

Press the command key ⌘ .
Drag the item away from the toolbar.

This behavior is generic for other OS X Apps. (Finder, Safari, Pages,...)


install windows 7 32-bit using boot-camp on snow-leopard I have Snow-Leopard running on my MacBook. I want to install Windows 7 32-bit Professional. I have already purchased copy of Windows from Amazon. I never'ed install Windows on my MacBook till date, so I don't know what to do, and how to install it.

Please share your experiences of installing Windows using Boot-Camp.
I need screen-shots or video that can help me with installation.

Thousands of tutorials can be found using Google or YouTube, for example:

http://www.simplehelp.net/2009/01/15/using-boot-camp-to-install-windows-7-on-your-mac-the-complete-walkthrough/

http://gizmodo.com/5387353/how-to-survive-boot-camp-and-run-win-7-on-a-mac

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OM2495dmO0I


FileVault security hole when used on SSDs I just woke up to the fact that it looks like user data can be leaked when using FileVault and Migration Assistant on an SSD on a new Mac when following the default prompts.

When I set up a new Mac, it encourages me to "Transfer Information to This Mac" early in the process, before I'm allowed to enable FileVault.  This is OK on an HDD because even though I'm copying my data to the new Mac in the clear, FileVault will eventually overwrite all of it with encryption.

On an SSD, however, it's impossible to overwrite data securely:

  ... the Mac's "Secure Erase Trash" function leaves 2/3rds of a file recoverable.

— Mac fail: SSD security

  ... it is almost impossible to securely delete an individual file on an SSD, because the way that SSDs write and delete files is scattered, and a user has no control over what an SSD is doing where. If that's the kind of security you're looking for, your best bet is encryption ...

— Ask Ars: How can I securely erase the data from my SSD drive?

So by the time I'm allowed to enable FileVault, it's too late.  Even worse, I can't securely wipe the drive before selling the computer later:

  With OS X Lion and an SSD drive, Secure Erase and Erasing Free Space are not available in Disk Utility. These options are not needed for an SSD drive because a standard erase makes it difficult to recover data from an SSD. For more security, consider turning on FileVault 2 encryption when you start using the SSD drive.

— Mac OS X: About Disk Utility's erase free space feature (support.apple.com/kb/HT3680)

So it looks like the solution is:

Skip the Migration Assistant when prompted.
Create a new user account.
Run Software Update to completion to generate more entropy before enabling FileVault in order to mitigate this "worst-case scenario, in which
the PRNG has only been seeded with the least amount
of entropy" — Inﬁltrate the Vault: Security Analysis and Decryption of Lion Full Disk
Encryption (eprint.iacr.org/2012/374.pdf), page 9.
Enable FileVault.
Run the Migration Assistant.

I'm assuming that even though FileVault is still encrypting the disk before I run Migration Assistant (my computer tells me it has 36 minutes of encryption time remaining) that all new writes made by Migration Assistant will be encrypted and thus my data will never touch the NANDs in the clear.

Do you agree with the problem and my solution?

Your making a test user account with a short name different than the eventual user to be migrated is sound.

In practice, you will in time over write more and more of the data, but if you have the time to first establish a file vault key and have the drive completely encrypted before copying any sensitive data, you have a more secure system and can know that the data can be sanitized cryptographically as opposed to being over-written or actually erased.

You'll want to look for these lines in the diskutil cs list output to know it's ready for the start of data migration:

|       Conversion Status:       Complete
|       High Level Queries:      Fully Secure
|       |                        Passphrase Required


Can't see Apple_HFS partition after using Minitool Partition Wizard I tried to reduce my partition size using Minitool Partition Wizard on my BOOTCAMP partition (I didn't touch Apple_HFS partition) now I can't see my Apple_HFS partition in Disk Utility.

However this partition works under bootcamp.

I think boot manager is broken. But I am not sure how can I repair while I can't see the partition.

Edit: as requested I've executed the following commands

readmbr  -t
readgpt  -t

results are

Selected \\.\PhysicalDrive0 to read from.
Disk ID is 028A47A7.
Sector size is 512 bytes.
Drive contains 240,057,409,536 bytes (240 GB).

Disk: /dev/disk0    geometry: 29185/255/63 [468862128 sectors]
Signature: 0xAA55
         Starting       Ending
 #: id  cyl  hd sec -  cyl  hd sec [     start -       size]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
 1: EE 1023 254  63 - 1023 254  63 [         1 -  468862127] <Unknown ID>
 2: 00    0   0   0 -    0   0   0 [         0 -          0] unused
 3: 00    0   0   0 -    0   0   0 [         0 -          0] unused
 4: 00    0   0   0 -    0   0   0 [         0 -          0] unused

and

Selected \\.\PhysicalDrive0 to read from.
Sector size is 512 bytes.
Drive contains 468,862,128 sectors.
Drive contains 240,057,409,536 bytes (240 GB).

       start        size  index  contents
           0           1         MBR
           1           1         Pri GPT header
           2          32         Pri GPT table
          34           6
          40      409600      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
      409640   211070944      2  GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7
   211480584      262144
   211742728   153600000      3  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
   365342728        2040
   365344768   100409344      4  GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7
   465754112         752
   465754864     1269536      5  GPT part - 426F6F74-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
   467024400     1837688      6  GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7
   468862088           7
   468862095          32         Sec GPT table
   468862127           1         Sec GPT header

The results you posted from the readgpt command leads me the following conclusions about your drive's partitions. The six partitions are listed in the order found on the drive.

~200 MB EFI partition (Usually hidden from the user)
~100 GB Windows partition
~75 GB OS X partition
~50 GB Windows partition
~650 MB OS X recovery partition (This is exactly the correct size)
~900 MB Windows partition

This is anything like what one would expect to see.

How to Fix Your Problem

From our posts and comments, it would appear the GUIDs for partitions 2 and 3 have been reversed. (The GUIDs identify the partition types. See this site for specific types.) The third party tool that I use to fix these types of problems is gdisk. You can download the zip file gdisk-windows-1.0.1.zip from this site.

Below are a the entries to gdisk32.exe that I made on a simulation of your disk. You should copy these entries.

C:\Users\david\Desktop>gdisk32 \\.\PhysicalDrive0
GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 1.0.1

Partition table scan:
  MBR: protective
  BSD: not present
  APM: not present
  GPT: present

Found valid GPT with protective MBR; using GPT.

Command (? for help): t
Partition number (1-6): 2
Current type is 'Microsoft basic data'
Hex code or GUID (L to show codes, Enter = 700): af00
Changed type of partition to 'Apple HFS/HFS+'

Command (? for help): t
Partition number (1-6): 3
Current type is 'Apple HFS/HFS+'
Hex code or GUID (L to show codes, Enter = 700): 0700
Changed type of partition to 'Microsoft basic data'

Command (? for help): w

Final checks complete. About to write GPT data. THIS WILL OVERWRITE EXISTING
PARTITIONS!!

Do you want to proceed? (Y/N): y
OK; writing new GUID partition table (GPT) to \\.\PhysicalDrive0.
Disk synchronization succeeded! The computer should now use the new
partition table.
The operation has completed successfully.

C:\Users\david\Desktop>

Your Apple_HFS partition should now appear in the Disk Utility.

  Note: For other readers, the commands used to dump the partition tables came from this site. The commands have to be executed in an "Administrator: Command Prompt" window.

To open the Command Prompt window as an Administrator using Windows 10, right click on the Start Menu icon and select "Command Prompt (Admin)". See the image below.


What version of GDB version is included in your Xcode? Not sure if this is suitable for Stack Overflow or here.

I'm having some problems with GDB in Xcode and I wonder if it isn't a problem with what version I'm on. I have Snow Leopard and Xcode 3.2.6. The GDB version that I believe is being used by Xcode is:

GNU gdb 6.3.50-20050815 (Apple version gdb-1515) (Sat Jan 15 08:33:48 UTC 2011)

My version in Fink, for example, is:

GNU gdb (GDB) 7.4.1

I believe I can't go any higher than Xcode 3.2.6 without at least upgrading to Lion.

Can anyone tell me what version of GDB they have with their corresponding Xcode? I want to know if its worth it for me to switch to Lion or Mountain Lion just for this.

The version on my system (Mountain Lion, XCode 4.5 is:

GNU gdb 6.3.50-20050815 (Apple version gdb-1822) (Sun Aug  5 03:00:42 UTC 2012)

Basically, 6.3 is the last version covered by the GPLv2 license, everything past that is subject to GPLv3. Apple does not distribute any GPLv3 software, presumably as it would seriously hinder their patent lawsuits. (this is also why OSX or XCode no longer ship with Samba or GCC newer than 4.2)

By the way, the last version of XCode for Snow Leopard is 4.2, but as far as I know this is only available in the downloads section to iOS or Mac developer program subscribers.


Do AppleTVs show up in AirPlay by proximity? So it is weird, I cannot find any details online, but we just set up multiple AppleTVs in our office for meeting rooms today. They are hard wired to our network which is connected with our WiFi network. All access points and hardwired devices connect to the same network switch/router.

It seems that somehow devices know which AppleTV they are near, as only the nearby ones (within about 40-50 feet) show up as options in AirPlay. Does anyone know if this is a feature, or is it a problem that we need to troubleshoot? (Don't want to have a big client meeting and then scramble to get a something working to show work.)

Thank you.

The 6.1 update added airplay discoverability via bluetooth to the Apple TV, and it sounds as though this is what you are seeing, especially since the distances you mention are not dissimilar to bluetooth ranges.

From Macrumors:

  This change allows Apple TV to search for connectable devices over
  Bluetooth, bypassing Bonjour and making it easier for education and
  business administrators to set up iOS device and Apple TV pairings.
  Previously, Apple TVs could have a difficult time discovering devices
  on networks that might block Bonjour.

At the time, it required an iOS 7.1 device and did not work with a mac, but apparently this feature was added in Yosemite:

  Unfortunately, this Bluetooth Discovery feature has not been available
  for Macs, which is why your iPhone/iPad can see the Apple TV and your
  Mac cannot. Fortunately, with the latest beta release of Apple's
  Yosemite OS, this appears to be working now (Hooray!)

iOS 8 added a peer-to-peer airplay system for third generation Apple TVs, however since your Apple TVs are on the same network as your other devices it seems less likely to be what you are seeing (though it could be useful if you have guest presenters).


Hide Drafts "Unread" count Apple Mail App (Mac)? (Not badge) I'm using Google Inbox to create template emails, which are stored as "drafts" in IMAP.

I want to eliminate that number (in grey, same as unread count in other folders) from Mail.

Gmail Settings: "labels tab" - deselect folders ('drafts' in my case) from showing in IMAP
"Synchronize" mail account in Mail app ("Mailbox" menu bar)


How is iOS updating all my apps without permission? iPad is at iOS 12.3, iPad is WiFi only. iPhone is at iOS 12.4.

Both have got automatic download and updates turned OFF in settings → iTunes and AppStore. Yet in the last weeks both devices, without intervention or permission have updated every single App. This has resulted in ADS (apple disorientation services), where I have to login to apps again with passwords I haven’t used for years, and everything’s looking different and working differently. How has this happened?

I do iOS updates for security, but if my App ain’t broke I don’t wanna fix it. How do I stop this app auto-update feature on my iOS devices?

FWIW, this just happened to me. Had auto updates turned off, kinda freaked me out. Turned out, in my case, I had enabled “offload unused apps” to free up space - got a feeling this might be why all my apps needed re-downloading. Not sure if “re-downloading” == “upgrade”.


How to change all Folder Icons to Show the content/Preview Image? The default folder icons are not helpful to me.  I'd prefer to see a preview image of the contents or first image.

I dont want to manually do this for every folder either, just set a global default.  How can this be done?

This cannot be done automatically across the computer, but there is a way to do this quickly to a group of directories:

Select the files/folders you want to change the icon of
Open the Inspector (Right Click -> Get Info) or Command + I
Drag a new icon

Using inspector will be best because you can select multiple files to change the icons of at once.

Also, as stated in this link, Apple will display file previews for some items by default.

Dynamic Previews Documentation: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201067

How to change file icons, as described above: https://support.apple.com/kb/PH13922?locale=en_US


Best way to turn off cupsd? I have a macOS 10.13 machine that is being used only for remote work, and has no need for printers. Printer Sharing is definitely turned off in System Preferences, and yet, cupsd is listening to a port:

# lsof -i :631
COMMAND PID USER   FD   TYPE             DEVICE SIZE/OFF NODE NAME
cupsd   427 root    5u  IPv6 0xbb661a1308e1d70b      0t0  TCP localhost:ipp (LISTEN)
cupsd   427 root    6u  IPv4 0xbb661a130bee2d13      0t0  TCP localhost:ipp (LISTEN)

What is the appropriate way to turn off cupsd?

In the terminal...

sudo launchctl unload /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.cups.cupsd.plist

...will unload cups.  This stops the service.

After that,

sudo launchctl remove /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.cups.cupsd.plist

...will ensure that cups does not come back after a reboot.

I don't know how OS X will react if you try to leave cups unloaded in the long term.  Also, I am nearly certain that major (and likely some minor) OS updates will "correct the issue" and reload cups for you.   So helpful.

Last, you can check to see what services are currently running by using sudo launchctl list


Is there a way to access and stream one's iTunes music collection from a web browser? Does the possibility exist to access one's iTunes music collection from any web browser? e.g. to browse the library and stream the songs.

One possibility :

Moving your iTunes library to your ~/Sites/ directory and enable files sharing.

With this your the content of your library will be accessible from your browser with your ip ( http://myip/~MyUsername/ )


What do I need to do to sell my iPhone 3GS? I've upgraded my iPhone 3GS to iPhone 4 (and my wife's as well). The new phones came with their own US/AT&T microSIM cards and have been activated. So we still have our old phones with the old SIM cards in them. I've deleted the data off of the old phones, and I would like to sell them.

What do I need to do to sell the old phones? Do I remove the SIM from the phone and expect the buyer to put their own SIM in there? How do they go about getting a legit SIM from AT&T to put in the phone? Or do they use the SIM that is in there? How can I be assured the old phones cannot be linked to my current account in any way?

One easy option, if you can use the store credit, is to sell them to Radio Shack for $200 [1].

If you prefer cold hard cash, or think you can do better than $200, there's a market for them on eBay, and it's easy to search for the going rate.  The phones will be easier to sell for more if you can jailbreak and/or unlock them in advance.  (How to do that is best left for another question.)

As for how a conscientious buyer activates your old phone through the proper channels, it's my understanding that once you've upgraded your line, your old phone can simply be brought into any AT&T store and associated with a new account.  I.e., you can & should sell the phone without a SIM.

Once it's been wiped and no longer has your SIM, the phone is no longer linked to you.

[1] http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-19512_7-20008186-233.html


2015 Macbook pro 13" with Dell U2518D blurry font I recently bought a Dell U2518D monitor to use as my primary display paired with my 2015 Macbook pro 13". This is a 2560x1440 1440p monitor. I used the included display port to mini display port cable and the first thing I notice is the blurry fonts on full 1440p resolution.

I tried many things; using the EDID patch ruby script, using switchresx to create a custom resolution with double the 1440p resolution and setting this resolution as a hiDpi resolution, resetting NVRAM etc. Nothing seems to work. I even tried switching to an HDMI cable but it did not make any difference.

I have attached some images I took with my phone on what I mean by pixelated. Am I really supposed to see it this way? Am I imagining things and expecting too much after using the retina display for more than 3 years?

https://imgur.com/LfUjTiN

https://imgur.com/swwWd40

Edit: I am on El Capitan 10.11.6

Edit2: The monitor is display as a TV in System preferences. Screenshot below.

I also stumbled on the same issue on my MacBook Pro.

MacBook Pro Retina 15.4" 2014 Model
OS: 10.11.2
Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M 2048 MB

Default monitor comes with HDMI input source, so if you plug in an HDMI to thunderbolt the max you will get is 2048 x 1080.

All works well i.e. full 2560 x 1440 resolution if you use Displayport to Thunderbolt cable (which also comes along with the monitor), and also change the source using the monitor menu. I was quite amazed why Dell Support had no idea about this.

Resolutions can be confirmed using the below command.

$ system_profiler SPDisplaysDataType
Graphics/Displays:

    Intel Iris Pro:

      Chipset Model: Intel Iris Pro
      Type: GPU
      Bus: Built-In
      VRAM (Dynamic, Max): 1536 MB
      Vendor: Intel (0x8086)
      Device ID: 0x0d26
      Revision ID: 0x0008
      gMux Version: 4.0.8 [3.2.8]

    NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M:

      Chipset Model: NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M
      Type: GPU
      Bus: PCIe
      PCIe Lane Width: x8
      VRAM (Total): 2048 MB
      Vendor: NVIDIA (0x10de)
      Device ID: 0x0fe9
      Revision ID: 0x00a2
      ROM Revision: 3776
      gMux Version: 4.0.8 [3.2.8]
      Displays:
        Color LCD:
          Display Type: Retina LCD
          Resolution: 2880 x 1800 Retina
          Retina: Yes
          Pixel Depth: 32-Bit Color (ARGB8888)
          Main Display: Yes
          Mirror: Off
          Online: Yes
          Built-In: Yes
        DELL U2518D:
          Resolution: 2560 x 1440 @ 59 Hz
          Pixel Depth: 32-Bit Color (ARGB8888)
          Display Serial Number: XXXXXXXX
          Mirror: Off
          Online: Yes
          Rotation: Supported
          Adapter Type: DisplayPort
          Television: Yes
$


Set "Always on Top" for a window How do I set a window to be "Always on Top" like in Linux (ie, even if you switch to another application the current window will not go to the background, but it will stay "on top")? I can't seem to find it anywhere.

Youre probably looking for the free Afloat application. It is really very cool. ;)


mount afp drive via terminal like staff profile user I was reading this question but the answer is for root or sudo mode profile.

You can see, using finder, something like:

sh-3.2# ls -al /Volumes/
total 40
drwxr-xr-x@  4 root        wheel    136 Oct 19 02:55 .
drwxr-xr-x  28 root        wheel   1020 Oct 15 23:51 ..
drwx------   1 pepito      staff  16384 Oct 19 02:56 HD710A
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root        wheel      1 Oct 19 02:42 HDD -> /
sh-3.2#

unmounting the Drive...

sh-3.2# ls -al /Volumes/
total 8
drwxr-xr-x@  3 root  wheel   102 Oct 19 03:08 .
drwxr-xr-x  28 root  wheel  1020 Oct 15 23:51 ..
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel     1 Oct 19 02:42 HDD -> /
sh-3.2# exit
exit

Now from like normal user (non privileged mode).

$ mkdir /Volumes/HD710A
mkdir: /Volumes/HD710A: Permission denied
$

I'm forced to use sudo mode

$ sudo mkdir /Volumes/HD710A
Password:
$ ls -al /Volumes/
total 8
drwxr-xr-x@  4 root  wheel   136 Oct 19 03:16 .
drwxr-xr-x  28 root  wheel  1020 Oct 15 23:51 ..
drwxr-xr-x+  2 root  wheel    68 Oct 19 03:16 HD710A
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel     1 Oct 19 02:42 HDD -> /
$

Let's go to mount the drive

$ mount -t afp afp://pepito:thepassword@MacBook-Air.local/HD710A /Volumes/HD710A
mount_afp: AFPMountURL returned error 1, errno is 1
$

Again forced to use sudo mode

$ sudo mount -t afp afp://pepito:thepassword@MacBook-Air.local/HD710A /Volumes/HD710A
$ ls -al /Volumes/
total 8
drwxr-xr-x@  4 root  wheel   136 Oct 19 03:16 .
drwxr-xr-x  28 root  wheel  1020 Oct 15 23:51 ..
drwx------   1 root  wheel  1316 Oct 19 02:56 HD710A
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel     1 Oct 19 02:42 HDD -> /
$ umount /Volumes/HD710A
umount: unmount(/Volumes/HD710A): Operation not permitted
$ sudo umount /Volumes/HD710A
$

The problem when the drive is mounted like root or sudo mode the write/read using copy & paste operation are limited from Finder.

How to mount like staff mode similar to made for/from Finder?

There's some basic misunderstandings of how things are working, so let's clear them up.

sudo isn't a "mode" or a "profile", it's a command that allows you to execute a command as another user (See the man page:  man sudo)

The command su allows you to switch or substitute a user's identity (man su).  So, think of sudo as su- get another identity and then do something.

Without specifying a user, it defaults to root:

sudo foo = sudo -u root foo.

This is not limited to the root user either.  User1 can issue a command as User2:

$ sudo -u User2 foo

Now, Finder doesn't mount anything, Finder will call a function that mounts your device (technically, there's a "listener" function - automount - that waits for a device to be inserted to automatically mount it).  Finder just "displays" it.

This automounter is running with root level privileges which is required to mount anything in the /Volumes folder which is where automount will put the folder to the newly mounted device.  Users aren't allowed to modify this folder which is why you need root privileges; thus sudo

If you want to mount something without using sudo, mount it anywhere you have full ownership, like in your home directory (/Users/username/foo/bar).  Since you have full ownership in that directory, you won't need root privileges to mount it.


Deleting photos that have been backed up iCloud If I delete a photo from my camera roll after backing up on iCloud, will the backup (In this case, the photo I deleted) be affected?

Yes, it could be gone over a period of time as more backups are made and you're forced to delete older backups (or if you remove Camera Roll from the backup selection). The next time the iCloud backup happens, it will create a backup without this photo. The older iCloud backup with the photo will continue to remain for as long as you have space available on iCloud and you don't delete old backups.

To view the available iCloud backups for your device, go to Settings > iCloud > Storage & Backup > Manage Storage.

Note that iCloud backup happens  automatically over Wi-Fi every day (only once every 24 hours) while it’s turned on, locked, and connected to a power source. You can also trigger it manually from Settings > iCloud > Storage & Backup > Back Up Now.


Corporate iPhone but on personal wifi. What can my employer see? Can they see my browser history and website? If an employee has a corporate iPhone but is on personal wifi. Can the employee view their browsing websites etc?

Your company probably use an MDM (Mobile device management) on your phone.
From Apple website :

Not all settings and account information are exposed. You can manage corporate
accounts, settings, and information provisioned via MDM, but the user’s
personal accounts cannot be accessed.

Here are some examples of what an MDM can/cannot see :

Keep in mind that if a VPN is turned on, your company can see what you are doing on your phone.
Edit : I didn't see your comment. Google Device Policy can see the exact same things. Here is a detailed list.


How to get out a stuck cd out of my mac mini (not the actual model the one from 2010? (slot-in drive) I tried everything on this page: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=mac/10.4/en/mh1750.html except Open Firmware (Intel macs doesn't support this).

Then I tried using the terminal but this didn't work either.

Every time I bootup my mac the drive tries to eject it but it can't. I ran the Apple Hardware Test (hold d on startup) and it sayed that all is fine. (it also tested the slot in drive).

And I put my mac upside down and booted it up (hoped that the cd could come out) but it didn't work. (same problem)

How can I get that out of my slot in drive? Mayby with a tweezer?

Any ideas?

PS: in finder there's no visible cd and in the diskutility there's nothing too

Recent Apple portable optical drives (i.e. anything < 5 yrs old and not a Mac Pro) no longer have the "paper clip" levers so your best bet is to take it to a technician that is able to open the mac and safely retrieve the stuck media. If you are curious, iFixit does publish fairly good mac repair guides so you decide to pay someone or DIY. You'll have better luck trying to trigger the eject lever deeper in the right hand side with something thinner than a ruler.

The mechanism is obviously stuck or obstructed if you hear it trying to eject when the software commands an eject.

Forcing things more often causes additional damage rather than somehow inducing the internal eject mechanism to work again. If you are gentle and can tickle the eject lever or gently guide the CD out, your chances of success are that much higher. The cases where a light touch won't work is a signal that permanent damage to the device or the media is imminent.

It's almost always cheaper to buy a USB external if the internal breaks, so factor that into your calculation if you just want to yank out the stuck drive no matter the long term health of your optical drive.


Keyboard keeps reverting to U.S For a few weeks, I've noticed that my keyboard layout keeps reverting to U.S. each time I reboot. To be precise: each time I reboot, my System Preferences -> Keyboard -> Input Sources window looks like this:

I keep changing it to this (but it doesn't stick around for long):

NB: MathUnicode is a .keylayout file of my own making, which I've used for several years now, without any problems.

I'm running OS X Yosemite (10.10.1) on a MacBook Pro (13-inch, Early 2011).

Does anybody know how I can stop it reverting to the U.S. keyboard layout?

Select Keyboard you want.
Shut down your Mac.
Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command (⌘), Option, P, and R. You will need to hold these keys down simultaneously
Turn on the computer.
Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys before the gray screen appears.
Hold the keys down until the computer restarts and you hear the startup sound for the second time.
Release the keys.

After resetting NVRAM or PRAM, you may need to reconfigure your settings for speaker volume, screen resolution, startup disk selection, and time zone information.


iTunes unable to see latest backup Hi I have a problem with restoring a backup on my phone right now. This is my situation:

I recently upgraded my iPhone to iOS 10. After a while I didn't like the interface so I wanted to downgrade it to the previous OS which is 9.3.5.

Before I did that I backed up my files with iTunes and proceed to revert my iPhone back to iOS 9.3.5. After reverting, i tried to restore my backup but iTunes couldn't see my backup file that I did before reverting.

On my iTunes, it shows that I have two backups: one on iCloud in April and the other was before I reverted to iOS 9. I can find both backups in the backup folder but iTunes can only see the one in April.

Please help me with the problem. I have tried various solution but it did not work.

The backup from April is visible because it was made with iOS v9.x. The backup from before you downgraded was made with v10.x.

You cannot downgrade and then restore a backup from before you downgraded. It is not compatible with the version of iOS that you are running.


How do I fix "could not activate cellular data network" problem when returning to US after traveling and using a different SIM card? After traveling overseas (Vietnam & Japan) and using a SIM card for each country, I restored my AT&T SIM card into my iPhone and got:

I tried the suggestions in https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201415 and all of the suggestions in https://appletoolbox.com/2013/04/iphone-could-not-activate-cellular-data-network-fix/ except backing up and restoring, but nothing worked.

I called AT&T and was asked to see if there is a profile at the bottom of Settings->General. There was, and deleting it fixed the problem. Apparently profiles are often installed when using overseas SIM cards.


hostname returns another device's name I realized that the hostname had changed while I was doing some work using terminal in OS X Yosemite. I thought there might be an IP address conflict so I reset it. However I still get another device's name (someone else's iPhone, to be exact) when I use the hostname command:

Last login: Fri May  1 15:52:42 on ttys000
SomeonesiPhone:~ irem$

SomeonesiPhone:~ irem$ hostname
SomeonesiPhone.wireless.duke.local

What's going on and how can I fix this?

It appears the IP address has not changed. But the address that I get by doing ipconfig getifaddr en0 is different from my public IP address.  I looked up my public IP address using Google, like this:

By default, your Mac will take the host name from the router when it received a DHCP reservation reply.

You can change this by not using DHCP or fixing the router or as a last resort over-writing the host name once you notice it's gone amok:

sudo scutil --set ComputerName whatever
sudo scutil --set LocalHostName whatever


Does find my iPhone store history I know the location of my iPhone. However, I want to know the history of where the iPhone has been.

My iPhone is stolen. I turned off the sim card. Which was a big mistake. Now I can no longer track the phone.

I wish I knew where the phone had been?

The only time the phone will show that it's lost is if it connects to internet. The thing is there is no free wifi in Indonesia and the simcard there is disabled. So the only time it'll connect to internet is when some possibly not so innocent buyer connect it.

No, if you did not enable lost mode, the device's location history is not recorded.


Upgrade to Mavericks wipes out Python site-packages directory? As the subject suggests, I recently upgraded to OSX Mavericks, and...

$ ls /Library/Python/*/site-packages/
/Library/Python/2.3/site-packages/:
Extras.pth README

/Library/Python/2.5/site-packages/:
README

/Library/Python/2.6/site-packages/:
README

/Library/Python/2.7/site-packages/:
README

I had a bunch of modules installed there, mostly Django stuff and dependencies thereof under 2.7, and now it seems to all be... just gone. And no, the READMEs don't say anything helpful.

So, questions:

Has anyone else seen this? I can't find any other mentions of it online, so... maybe there's something else going on?
Any suggestions for things I should do or investigate before I just start re-installing it all while cursing quietly to myself?

Apple tends to wipe out supporting files for scripting languages such as python, perl, and ruby with each major upgrade.

To avoid this in the future, look for a package manager that maintains and works with a local copy of python outside of the Apple managed folders of /Library and /System. A good starting point is homebrew:

Install homebrew with:

ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.github.com/Homebrew/homebrew/go/install)"

Then install a local copy of python with:

brew install python

For perl, the perlbrew project is ideal and explicitly calls out Apple for his behaviour.


Incorrect icon of Time Capsule in Finder Have a little perfectionistic problem: quite often in Finder Time Capsule's icon not displayed correctly, when I click on it - becomes normal, what's the problem?

That's one of the bugs which Mavericks 10.9.4 has. So you can't do anything beside waiting and hoping, that apple will fix this issue in a future update.


Can't log into my MacPro user account I have an older Mac Pro in 10.11. After a minor update, I can no longer log into my main user account (which is a standard account) with all my files; the rotator goes indefinitely. I can log into any of the other accounts, including the Admin. I have tried safe boot, reset NVRAM, repairing with disk utility, repaired with DiskWarrior, then with Drive Genius 3, then with DiskWarrior again. I have a clone that was made before the minor update, and yet it behaves the same as the main HD. The HDs are fairly full, but there should be room enough. I was regularly logging into my user account right up to the time I did the update, and the clone shouldn't have that update.

This isn't a permanent solution, BUT it will let you recover your files.

Login to your Admin account
Open Terminal
Type chmod -R 777 /Users/username/
Go to the directory that your user folders are stored in (/Users/)
Retrieve any files needed just using Finder.
Delete user account.

Or

Login to your Admin Account
Open System Preferences
Click Users & Groups
Click reset password on the user.
Change password.


Mail App bug? Dark Background + Dark Text on random messages (illegible), inconsistent Stats: 10.15.1

2014 MacBook pro

Issue is in Mail application only.

Recently the mac mail app defaults to dark text and a dark background as shown in the photo (Hopefully you get the point with what is visible, there's a "Hi All" underneath the From/To). It makes text very diffciult to see.

Sometimes if I click to load another email, it reverts to white background black text, sometimes to white text, black background.

It seems to only be in this app - some kind of dark mode bug maybe. Could be related to individuals using some kind of formatting on their emails, except the issue is not persistent - when I select another email and then switch back, sometimes the issue resolves.

Is this a bug? Is this a settings issue?

Do you have have macOS 10.13.x High Sierra on your Mac? There is a bug in the video chip or driver for some models in that version of macOS (also possibly in Mojave) that renders messages black in Mail in some scenarios. I have only seen it once, and then it affected all messages in threads, meaning it only manifested with the Mail View menu -> Organise by Conversation turned on, and then only for messages where there were actually two or more messages in the thread.

The solution, if this is the bug that bites you, is to open the System preferences, go to the Displays pane -> Colour tab, and try another one of the Display profiles in the list (uncheck "Show profiles for this display only"). Some will display the bug, some won't, so try to find one that don't show the bug and is pleasing to the eye. Alternatively you can calibrate the display to make a custom profile, and see if that one is bug free.


What's the BSD equivalent of the linux date command for adding subtracting days/weeks/months from a given date? I have a given date, such as 2013-10-31 and I need to accurately determine the next day (taking into account DST, leap years, leap minutes, timezones, etc).  I have no way of knowing whether the date is at the end of a month/year/etc, and I sincerely hope not having to care about that.

In Linux, I simply type:

date1="2013-10-31"
day_after=`date -ud"$date1 1 days" +%Y-%m-%d`

echo "$day_after" => 2013-11-01

However, when I try the same in Darwin/BSD:

date1="2013-10-31"
day_after=`date -v1d -ujf"%Y-%m-%d" $date1 +%Y-%m-%d`

echo "$day_after" => 2013-10-01

How can I get BSD to do proper date calculations?

You must specify + in your date adjustment or BSD assumes that you are giving it an actual day of the month to use.

date1="2013-10-31"
day_after=`date -v+1d -ujf"%Y-%m-%d" $date1 +%Y-%m-%d`

echo "$day_after" => 2013-11-01


Reading user Plist files from /var/db/dslocal/nodes/Default/users Identifying user accounts in macOS (Catalina) can be achieved using the following command
 dscl . -list /Users | grep -vE '_|root|nobody|daemon|Guest'

Which gives me the below output.Note: hiddenswasti is a hidden account (not visible in the login/welcome screen) while swastibhushandeb is a normal account.

Referring to a post here ,it is inferred that the user specific plist files residing in var/db/dslocal/nodes/Default/users can be read using defaults read or plutil -p and contains valuable information to ascertain if an account is hidden or otherwise.

Issue I am facing is to develop a one liner code (using bash )is utilizing the output of the dscl command detailed above and use generated output as input to plutil -p to read the contents of hiddenswasti.plist and swastibhushandeb.plist. Would appreciate help.Thanks in advance.

You can try this to loop through the users.
USER_PLIST="/var/db/dslocal/nodes/Default/users"

for user in $(dscl . -list /Users | grep -vE '_|root|nobody|daemon|Guest'); do
  sudo defaults read ${USER_PLIST}/${user}.plist
done

This sets up a for loop with your dscl output and feeds those usernames to defaults. You can easily substitute plutil, if you prefer. You can make this a one-liner by using the semicolon between carriage returns. I left that out to make it easily readable.
HTH.


Late 2013 MacBook Pro Retina + 2 Thunderbolt displays + Apple Cinema Display @2560x1440? I saw this answer by griewei here:
https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/124479/81640

Unfortunately I don't have enough rep to comment.

What I would like to do is something similar e.g.
 - one latest greatest Mac Book Pro Retina
 - 2x Thunderbolt Displays
 - 1 Apple Cinema Display via HDMI adapter etc.

@griewei said he was doing this and it was working; does anyone know if the Apple Cinema display is scaled at 2560 x 1440 in this configuration?

I know it was not possible in Mountain Lion but I heard it was possible in Mavericks

Thanks!

This is my current setup with a late 2013 MacBook Pro


How to use a custom text editor (like Emacs.app or MacVim) in Xcode 4? In Xcode 3 we could change file type settings, like indicated below:

  Using External Text Editors with Xcode

  There are lots of text editors available on Mac OS X. If you shelled
  out good money for a text editor, you want to use it to edit your
  source code instead of Xcode's editor. How do you tell Xcode to use
  your desired text editor to edit your source code files?

  Choose Xcode > Preferences to open Xcode's preferences window. There
  is a toolbar at the top of the window with many buttons. Click the
  File Types button. From here you can assign the editor to use for lots
  of file types.

  Initially there will be two items: file and folder. Click the
  disclosure triangle next to file. Click the disclosure triangle next
  to text because you're interested in text editing. The two most
  interesting subcategories are sourcecode and scripts.

  When you come across a file type you want to edit with your text
  editor, select the Preferred Editor column for that file type. A menu
  will pop up. Choose External Editor. If your text editor does not
  appear in the submenu, choose Other. Navigate to the location of your
  text editor, and click the OK button. Repeat these steps for every
  file type you want to edit with your text editor.

  Now when you double-click a source code file in Xcode's project
  window, it will open in your text editor.

But there are no settings for using external editor with Xcode 4.

Is there any way to use custom text editors with Xcode (such as Emacs.app or MacVim)?

There is not really a setting with in Xcode 4 to configure external editors as there use to be in Xcode 3.

The workaround is to set up your preferred text editor to open the file types that you want.  And then right click on a source file in Xcodes Project Navigator and select "Open with External Editor..."

This suggestion of using "Open with External Editor..." at first will probably just open in Xcode a standalone window, since by default Xcode will probably be set to the default application for opening programming source files.

Set up your preferred application/s to open source files with.

For example for each kind of source files such as .c .h .m you want to edit in your preferred editor. Open a Finder Window/s that contains each type of file you want to set your preferred editor for.

Right click on a source file
Select "Get Info"
Expand the "Open With:" section and select your preferred text editor to something other than Xcode.
Press the Change All... button.

Now when you select "Open with External Editor..." in Xcode it should open the source file in your preferred external editor.


Smart mailbox for senders who are not members of a group I want to set up a smart mailbox in Mail that contains messages from any sender who is not a member of a particular group in my address book.

There's an option in the smart mailbox rules for "sender is member of group," but I don't see a way to negate it. Is this possible?

This is maybe a bit counter intuitive but you can do it via the Contacts app.

You can make an intelligent group in your Contacts app with the criteria:

is not member in group

and use this group for your smart mailbox.


How to find which process has opened the port on macOS? using netstat we can find LISTENing or open port etc.
I want to know how can we find out which process has opened which port we see in the result of

netstat -vanp tcp

As @klanomath mentioned in a comment, the output from netstat -vanp tcp contains the process ID of the process that has the port open (it's the next-to-last field), so you can look it up by that:

$ netstat -vanp tcp
Active Internet connections (including servers)
Proto Recv-Q Send-Q  Local Address          Foreign Address        (state)     rhiwat shiwat    pid   epid
...
tcp4       0      0  127.0.0.1.631          *.*                    LISTEN      131072 131072  14636      0
                                                                                ^^^^^
$ ps 14636
  PID   TT  STAT      TIME COMMAND
14636   ??  Ss     3:55.43 /usr/sbin/cupsd -l

So in this example, it's cupsd (the Common UNIX Printing System Daemon) listening on port 631 (for IPP, the Internet Printing Protocol).

You can also use lsof -i, with many options to narrow down the search; see man lsof for details. But note that you need to run it as root (i.e. with sudo) to see processes you don't own:

$ sudo lsof -i :631
Password: [admin password doesn't echo]
COMMAND   PID USER   FD   TYPE             DEVICE SIZE/OFF NODE NAME
cupsd   14636 root    5u  IPv6 0xc9c73d98b1fafae5      0t0  TCP localhost:ipp (LISTEN)
cupsd   14636 root    6u  IPv4 0xc9c73d98b3b2548d      0t0  TCP localhost:ipp (LISTEN)


What do you call a home page on an app? Could it be called landing, or profile, or main ? I am not sure what these are called on an app.

According to Apple's Human Interface Guidelines, the screen after the Launch screen is called the first screen.  Not very exciting, huh.  I've also heard/seen it as home screen.

  A launch screen appears the moment your app starts, giving the impression that your app is fast and responsive, while allowing initial content to load. This screen is quickly replaced by the first screen of your app...


Safari search google directly on right click highlighted link text I am using Safari 11 on macOS 10.13.

Just wondering why right clicking the link text would make "Search with Google" moved to "Services"?

Thanks.

Normal Search with Google:

More steps for a Google search:

It's all about the definition of service, by the way also in the 'normal search' you can find 'Search with google' also under the services, is repeated


MacBook Pro won't boot, or boots slowly I have a MacBookPro OS X 10.7.5 from 2011. When trying to boot it has a slow startup or login, with numerious spinning wheels. Sometimes after a long time I can sign into the computer and sometimes it just fails to startup or login.

It became more serious recently as I think I might have let my battery run out. Once it did boot and I also tried to download the operating system to reinstall it but it allways stops around 1.4 GB out of 1.7 then the wheel spinning started again.

Now it wont boot at all, so I tried to boot in in safe mode. After the shift key it took about a half hour until the time bar at the bottom filled up, and when it did the screen went black. When it hit the start button it went back to the safe startup screen with the gray apple, spinning wheel and bar filling up at the bottom.

The "invalid node structure" and "disk I/O" errors you see in verbose mode are both indicative of a failing hard drive.

The invalid node structure points to a problem with the data cataloging mechanism of the operating system, basically that system that keeps track of where all the data is stored.  One off reports of this aren't so bad but coupled with the issues you're seeing and the other error message I imagine it's a result of a failing drive.

The Disk I/O error pops up when the hard drive is inaccessible, either for a split second or several minutes.  This can usually be attributed to any of the following:

SATA port on the logic board going bad (not very likely)
Hard drive cable going bad (somewhat likely)
The hard drive itself failing or starting to fail (much more likely)

Because the disk is temporarily unavailable you often see system corruption (such as the invalid node structure error above) occur as a result.

So, what to do from here...

Definitely don't try to install a new operating system.  The process of doing so is one of the most taxing procedures a hard drive is likely to go through in normal use, on a failing drive it can stress it to the point of complete failure.
Backup your data if you haven't already.  If your Mac does manage to boot again I would strongly encourage you to copy whatever important data you might have (pictures, documents, etc) to a thumb drive or external hard drive.  If you're unable to do this then I would recommend checking with local AASPs (see two paragraphs down) to see about data recovery options.
Repair.  Depending on your comfort level working with computers you might attempt to repair your Mac yourself.  As I mentioned, the hard drive is the most likely culprit, iFixit has a guide that walks you through the process - MacBook Pro hard drive replacement. Almost any 2.5" SATA hard drive will work as a replacement.
If you prefer to have someone else repair it you can find Apple Authorized Service Providers (AASPs) and Apple retail stores using Apple's locate tool.  If your Mac is under warranty (you can check with this tool) then the repair would likely be covered by both Apple and/or an AASP so long as it wasn't a result of accidental damage.  If it's not covered then I would get a quote from each shop.

Hopefully that helps or at the very least gets you started.


Can I have Apple replace my wireless card with a newer model I have a 15" MBP mid 2010. I also have a 3rd gen iPad 64GB wifi which I have recently discovered (following update to IOS 8.xxlatest) is unable to work with AIR DROP. I thought about upgrading to the iPad Air 2. Fortunately, I didn't as I now discover that my MBP might not work with Air Drop either.

I find NO reference on my MBP to "handoff". My wireless card is the BCM43xx 1.0. According to another community supplied "Continuity Tool", it says I need a new Wireless card.
 Since this is not a 17" (never seen one), there are NO additional ports to add in a newer wireless card. My wireless in-house network seems to function just fine.

When I click on Air Drop on the side panel, I see my wife's MBP show up. However, I click on it and nothing happens. What am I missing?

QUESTION: Do I need a newer wireless card for AIR DROP to work. I am running Yosemite.

Air Drop should work with my two MBPs. Question is, will they?

OK, never mind. I just discovered all the old info regarding "handoff" is no longer pertinent. All I do is drop a file on the air drop id I see and they get a question pop up asking to save & open, deny or save. Puts it in the download folder.

However, the iPad 3rd gen still does NOT support air drop. Boo hoo. At least, if I get an iPad air 2, it should work with air drop.


Do you have to keep Bluetooth on to scan for Bluetooth Low Energy devices? When using advertise-only non-connectable Bluetooth 4.0 Low Energy / Smart devices like heart rate monitors, do you have to keep / turn Bluetooth switch on in your iPhone / iPad?

I believe the energy drain is negligible, but the need to and explicitly turn on BT may be really frustrating for some applications.

Thanks.

You will need to activate Bluetooth on any iOS device in order for it to interact with other Bluetooth devices, including LE ones.

iOS7 will add a lot of nice compatibility to BT LE devices but it looks as though even with that you will still have to turn on Bluetooth.

Source: http://9to5mac.com/2013/06/13/apple-unlocks-full-notification-center-access-much-more-for-bluetooth-le-devices-in-ios-7/


Does FileVault encryption slow read/write access on an SSD? Never fancied enabling FileVault on previous Macs but now I'm running OS X on an SSD. Is there a noticeable decrease in speed?

Every time you make the computer do something extra, in this case encrypting/decrypting all file access, it will take longer and the machine will slow down a bit.

FileVault 1 did slow things down noticeably, but with FileVault version 2 (Introduced in OS X 10.7 (Lion)) running on an SSD there is no noticeable decrease in reading or writing files. I have this enabled on a 15" MacBook Pro Retina and a 2012 11" MacBook Air. The only time it is noticeable is when you reboot, as it requires a password before starting the boot process.

You may notice that the system is slow when you first enable FileVault 2, since it has to encrypt the whole drive. Once that is done you will probably forget that it is on.

If you decide that you don't agree with me, turning FileVault off is easy enough. You will, once again, have the slow initial period as the whole drive is decrypted.


Is it safe to provide your raw system profile to software vendors for tech support? I have a very expensive piece of software that began crashing after a recent system update, which presumably broke something. Unfortunately, the system logs the app throws aren't detailed enough for me to debug it myself.

The software vendor has asked for my complete system profile: is that a safe thing to do? Is there any sensitive information contained in the system profile that should make me think twice about providing it?

I know my LAN hostname would appear, which I don't consider a problem, as well as my username (which would show up in paths).

The biggest question is, how much do you trust the vendor? If you have a decent relationship with them and they are honest, there isn't too much to be worried about - however I would definitely not send the serial number or UUID. If someone were to get a hold of it, they could request bogus things for it like a warranty repair, get a replacement, never send in an original, and use a bogus credit card number as collateral (Like a gift card with $5 on it). Then when it comes time, you might need something fixed, and Apple will say no because of that shady stuff in the past.

However if you are uncomfortable with any of this and you do have a good relationship, just ask them what they want specifically so nothing additional gets sent.


Minimal Apple TV Setup For an exhibition I need a minimal Apple TV setup that enables me to connect an iPad to an Apple TV via Air Play.

→ Ideally I don't want to bring an extra router or computer. Is it possible to connect the iPad to the Apple TV directly without having both joined to a wifi network?

If this is not the case, what would be an easy to setup solution for this? (Is it e.g. a separate Airport Express to create the network?)

I just called Apple to make sure. The answer is unfortunately as expected:

No, Apple TV and iPad cannot connect directly without being part of the same network.
And yes, the best way to create this kind of network would be an Airport Express.

Well.


Are these harmful files that were scanned on my Mac safe to delete? The scan says the threat is blocked but for more safety I'm considering removing them. Is it safe to do so since some files seem to be system files.

Yes, you should remove these files.
VSearch is adware for OS X. You can find more information about VSearch here:

Removing VSearch or OSX/Vsearch threat from your Mac — support.norton.com

Whilst these files are in system locations such as /System, they are not part of OS X. The adware simply places files in those locations to obfuscate the actions of the adware.


Network homes / synchronized mobile homes with OS X and Active Directory I work in a company which manages IT for several customers (mainly for Apple OS X deployments). Some of them have more users than computers, so they need some form of "movable" home directory (so the user's bookmarks, settings and so on stay while he changes computers).

I remember that this worked relatively well in OS X 10.6.X and wasn't so hard to set up. I now tried (in different configurations) to get it working in OS X 10.10.X and OS X 10.11.X but never really got it working in a stable way. Here are the different ways I tried it (for both: OS X 10.10 and 10.11):

Open Directory server on OS X Server and userhome-location on the OS X Server

Issue: The keychain-items do not get synchronized. Other files get synchronized (but the keychain-not-syncing is a showstopper)

Active Directory, userhome-location on the OS X Server or on a synology file server (AFP or SMB) or on the windows server:

same issue as with "pure OD": Keychain does not get synced. Additionally, many other files do not get saved correctly or with incorrect permissions.

general Issue: Some applications do not work well with network homes (for example the mac built-in unzipper)

Because of those problems, I decided to try to get it working with synchronized mobile homes. Here, the user home is copied locally and upon the user logging out, the changes are written to the server. The general observation is:

it is incredibly slow (2 Minutes for 3MB are nothing special, and this on a Gigabit-LAN!)
There are many synchronization errors or wrong file permissions

Here are the combinations I tried for synchronized mobile homes:

OS X Open Directory Server, Storage location on the OS X Server
OS X Open Directory Server, Storage location on the Synology Server (AFP and SMB)
Active Directory Server, Storage location on the Synology Server (AFP and SMB)
Active Directory Server, Storage location on the OS X Server (AFP and
SMB)
Active Directory Server, Storage location on the Active Directoryy Server (SMB)

I ask myself if it is even possible to get it working. I tried 3 times, always with those (or comparable) results. Also I let colleagues check my DNS, NTP and networking settings - no problems there.
I'd be realy happy if someone who's experienced with that topic could answer and even if it's a "no it's not possible anymore".

Regards
Christian

Use SMB and set it back to V1 on a windows file server


How to remove all cell formatting How can all formatting be removed from a sheet in Numbers so each cell only contains the text, with links no longer clickable?

If you just want to remove hyperlinks, this post (the first result of this Google search) should help. Summarized below:

Select all cells using ⌘+A (or Edit -> Select All)
Copy cells using ⌘+C ( or Edit -> Copy)
Paste and Match Style using ⌘+⌥+ ⇧ +V (or Edit -> Paste and Match Style)

This will remove all hyperlinks, however it will keep formatting like Bold, Italics, etc. If you want all formatting to be gone, use the suggestion from Steve Chambers to export to CSV and import from CSV, as the CSV Format is just plain text and doesn't save any formatting.

File -> Export to -> CSV...
Select the CSV you just exported in Finder and right click -> Open With -> Numbers

This will completely open a new Numbers document without formatting, unless you have Numbers set to automatically detect hyperlinks. If you do not want hyperlinks to be detected:

Open Numbers preferences using ⌘+, (or Numbers -> Preferences...)
Go to the Auto-Correction tab and uncheck "Automatically detect links" under the Formatting section


Using Command Line how to make the user an Administrator As soon I bind a Mac to the AD Domain, I usually log into the Mac with the user account.

Of course, under System Preference, User & Groups, the user account is marked as: Managed, Mobile

My second step, is to make the user an Administrator account because I want to allow him/her to install/remove stuff from her/his Mac.

So, with the GUI, System Preferences > Users & Groups > I select the user name and I check mark the option: enable Allow user to administer this computer and I restart the machine and everything works fine.  The user now is an Admin for that machine.

Question, how do I perform the above process with the command line in Terminal?  Not the bind process, but to make the user Admin for that specific machine.

sudo dscl . -merge /Groups/admin GroupMembership username

where ‘username’ is the username of the user you would like to make an admin.

sudo since making changes like this requires elevated privileges.
dscl is the Directory Service command line utility.
. is the local machine.
-merge allows you to add a new key to a record path.
/Groups/admin is the record path for the key.
GroupMembership is the key you would like to assign a value.
username is the value for the key.


How to reset my step length? I have had a new iPhone SE for a few weeks. It works fine, but in the "Health" app, my step length is approximately 0.6 m (1000 steps give a distance of 600 meters), which seems wrong (I used to have around 0.8 m with my previous phone). I also checked with the distance on my companion's iPhone : my iPhone correctly measures steps, but not distances.

Is there any way to reset this ?

BTW : yes, I have allowed the "Motion Calibration & Distance" option in the "Privacy" setting.

Unfortunately Apple does not provide this option in the health app.

There is an app that does though called Fitbit which tracks your steps and you can input your step length. This feature does not require a tracker.

Link to app in AppStore:
Fitbit by Fitbit, Inc. https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/fitbit/id462638897?mt=8