What does "@" signify in unix file permissions? I have a file with the following permissions on my MacBook Pro:

-rwxr-xr-x@  1 root  wheel   101K Feb 29 17:09 apachectl

What does the @ stand for?  I can't execute the file and this is the only thing that's standing out to me.  How can I get rid of it?

Just as some background, I copied this from a Time Machine backup.

If the file or directory has extended attributes, you'll see an @ in the permissions field. For extended security information (ACLs), you'll see a +.

From man ls on OS X:

-@      Display extended attribute keys and sizes in long (-l) output.

The xattr program can be used to display and manipulate extended attributes. Take a look at what's there before deciding to go while deleting those attributes, though. Definitely take a quick look at the man page for xattr too.

A quick example from some example PHP compromise code I keep around for reference:

$ ls -@l php-compromise.php
-rw-r--r--@ 1 user  group  502620 Jul  5  2011 php-compromise.php
    com.apple.FinderInfo        32
    com.apple.TextEncoding      15


How can my mid-2012 MacBook Pro Retina 15 run a 4K panel at 30Hz over HDMI? I have the first gen MacBook Pro Retina 15" (mid 2012) laptop. I'm on the latest MacOS X (10.9.4).

I just ordered the Seiki SE50UY04 which is a 50" 4K @ 30Hz display.

How can I run that display off my laptop, preferably right off the HDMI port on the laptop?

Ok, so I got the display and it works just fine - power it up and connect the HDMI cable and it's set to 4K @ 30Hz (the panel's limit).

Sometimes when coming out of sleep, the HDMI panel keeps cycling through a black screen, displays "snow" or digital white noise. Sometimes it goes for 5 or more minutes! It's a weird bug and I know that opening the macbook pro lid helps it get quickly out of this weird mode. I think this might be a Mac OS X bug.

On a side note, at the native 4K resolution, everything looks the right size on the screen at 3' away but the panel is a bit too big. I have to move my head quite a bit - like when talking to 2-3 people at a party and you have to move your head to make eye contact ... maybe should have ordered the 39" display...

UPDATE

So I also bought a VIZIO 50" 4K display ("P502ui-B1E") and a new Macbook Pro 15" Retina Mid 2014 (GeForce 750M)

The VIZIO has an HDMI 2.0 port so can do 4K @ 60Hz but I noticed that Mac OS X (10.10.2) can still only do 4K@30Hz over it's in-built HDMI port while the same machine, when booted into Windows 8.1 (Bootcamp) can do 4K@60Hz very easily.


Save Bash shell history also when closing Terminal tab When a macOS High Sierra Terminal shell is ended using the exit command the Bash shell history is saved and can be recalled in subsequent shell sessions. However, if the shell is ended by closing the Terminal tab or window, the shell history will not be saved. How can the shell history also be saved when closing a Terminal tab?

Presumably the problem relates to the fact that the trap set in /etc/bashrc_Apple_Terminal (trap shell_session_update EXIT) is not triggered when closing a tab.  Is there a signal that could be trapped when closing a Terminal tab?

This drove me crazy for months until I read through /etc/bashrc_Apple_Terminal. trap shell_session_update HUP fixed it for me. Terminal appears to send SIGHUP to the shell whenever a tab is closed or the entire Terminal app is closed via Cmd-Q.


How do I set the home page for Safari on the iPad2? This is driving me crazy .

I'm trying to set the Home page on the iPad.

The instructions I've seen indicate there should be a bar at the bottom of the browser with an arrow. There isn't. There also isn't a Home Page button.

I just updated the latest OS release few weeks ago.

Any ideas?

There is no concept of HomePage in Safari for iPad. Sorry

You can go to your favorite website, use the "arrow" icon and press the "On home screen" button, that will create an icon on your homescreen which will launch that webpage in safari when you press it.


Is there any limit to create Apple ids through iTunes on a computer? I need to know that is there any Apple account/id creation limit through iTunes from a computer?

There is no limit of Apple ID creating attempts through iTunes on the MAC computer. I personally helped more than 80 people to create a new Apple ID without credit card. No problem!
There is a limit of 3 attempts for Apple ID activation on any Apple gadget (iPhone, iPad, iPod or MAC). Activation process occur when you enter new Apple ID account info into Settings > iCloud for the first time.
This limit can not be reset... Even if you ask Apple support team, they will refuse to do that.


Any way to change the location of Time Machine local backups (./MobileBackups) to another drive? I am running an SSD boot drive and a HDD drive on my Macbook Pro 5,5 and I obviously cannot have Time Machine filling up my SSD. I was wondering if there was anyway to have time machine create local backups of the users on my SSD, but store it on my HDD and be able to use the typical features of time machine local backups, because otherwise it would be unnecessary. If this question has been asked, I would appreciate a link, because I searched and could not find anything. Otherwise, thank you very much any help you can offer.

I couldn't find any way of modifying the path /.MobileBackups, but you can create a folder on your HDD and then symlink it to /.MobileBackups:

Open Applications>Utilities>Terminal.

Now you will have to type several commands. Press return after every command for it to execute. When asked, type your password.
The snapshots folder has complex permissions. The simplest way to preserve them is to copy the existing folder to the new location on your HDD:

sudo rsync -ahvHE /.MobileBackups /Volumes/HDD/

(replace /Volumes/HDD with the path to your HDD.)

rsync options are:

-a: archive mode (recursive; copy symlinks as symlinks; preserve permissions, times, owner, group, device files, sockets and fifos)
-h: output result in human-readable format
-v: verbose, that is, show what the command is doing
-H: preserve hardlinks
-E: copy extended attributes like resource forks and ACLs

Disable local snapshots (this will delete /.MobileBackups and its contents):

sudo tmutil disablelocal
Create symlink:

sudo ln -s /Volumes/HDD/.MobileBackups /.MobileBackups

(replace /Volumes/HDD with the path to your HDD.)
Enable local snapshots:

sudo tmutil enablelocal
Create a local snapshot:

sudo tmutil snapshot
If you see a new snapshot dated "now":

ls -l /Volumes/HDD/.MobileBackups/Computer/
(...)
drwxr-xr-x@ 3 root  wheel  102 Jan 28 09:05 2013-01-28-090534

you're done!

If something went wrong or is not working as expected, revert to the original configuration:

Disable local snapshots:

sudo tmutil disablelocal

This will delete the symlink /.MobileBackups. Should that not be the case, delete it with:

sudo rm /.MobileBackups
Enable local snapshots:

sudo tmutil enablelocal
Delete alternative snapshot folder on your HDD:

sudo rm -rf /Volumes/HDD/.MobileBackups

(rm -rf is a dangerous command that won't ask for confirmation before deleting the folder. Make sure the path is correct!)


How to turn off all animations on OS X Is it possible to turn off all animations on OS X?

I have only enabled the first four of these, but here are all hidden preferences for disabling animations I have found.

# opening and closing windows and popovers
defaults write -g NSAutomaticWindowAnimationsEnabled -bool false

# smooth scrolling
defaults write -g NSScrollAnimationEnabled -bool false

# showing and hiding sheets, resizing preference windows, zooming windows
# float 0 doesn't work
defaults write -g NSWindowResizeTime -float 0.001

# opening and closing Quick Look windows
defaults write -g QLPanelAnimationDuration -float 0

# rubberband scrolling (doesn't affect web views)
defaults write -g NSScrollViewRubberbanding -bool false

# resizing windows before and after showing the version browser
# also disabled by NSWindowResizeTime -float 0.001
defaults write -g NSDocumentRevisionsWindowTransformAnimation -bool false

# showing a toolbar or menu bar in full screen
defaults write -g NSToolbarFullScreenAnimationDuration -float 0

# scrolling column views
defaults write -g NSBrowserColumnAnimationSpeedMultiplier -float 0

# showing the Dock
defaults write com.apple.dock autohide-time-modifier -float 0
defaults write com.apple.dock autohide-delay -float 0

# showing and hiding Mission Control, command+numbers
defaults write com.apple.dock expose-animation-duration -float 0

# showing and hiding Launchpad
defaults write com.apple.dock springboard-show-duration -float 0
defaults write com.apple.dock springboard-hide-duration -float 0

# changing pages in Launchpad
defaults write com.apple.dock springboard-page-duration -float 0

# at least AnimateInfoPanes
defaults write com.apple.finder DisableAllAnimations -bool true

# sending messages and opening windows for replies
defaults write com.apple.Mail DisableSendAnimations -bool true
defaults write com.apple.Mail DisableReplyAnimations -bool true


How create an apple ID? I gave my daughter my old iPhone but I forgot all the information about the apple ID. I want to create a new one and disable the other one, or just delete the entire ID. Any ideas?

You have a couple of options:

1) Call Apple Customer service and they will be able to help you. That's the hard way.

2) You can also delete your iCloud account if you don't have any purchases of content attached to it. I highly doubt that you don't need the account and that's why I would tell your daughter to go to the iPhone Settings>>iCloud>>Sign Out. She can then sign in with her own iCloud/Apple ID. If she doesn't have one, she can set up a new Apple ID and new iCloud account by following these steps. While at it, she'll make things a lot easier if her icloud account is the same as her apple ID account. Access to all of your content will be much more simple. This is a mistake a lot of people make. I highly recommend you have only one account/pass for both.

In case you still want to delete your iCloud account and deactivate it, here is how to:
How to delete your iCloud account

I hope all this helps :)


Match the Creation Date of 2 sets of files with same name I've just converted hundreds of AIF recordings from a few days ago to WAV, but I need the newly created files to keep the original Creation Date of the recordings. Filenames are identical apart from the extension, stored in two separate folders.

Is there a way to batch modify each WAV's Creation Date to match its respective AIF?

Thanks!

Assuming a folder structure like

./
+--AIFFolder/
+--WAVFolder/

and also assuming that the WAV files end in .wav you can use

cd AIFFolder
for f in *; do
    date=$(stat -f %SB -t %Y%m%d%H%M "$f")
    base=${f%.*}
    touch -t $date ../WAVFolder/"$base".wav
done

This can be simplified (thanks for the hint, @fd0) to

cd AIFFolder
for f in *; do
    touch -r "$f" ../WAVFolder/"${f%.*}.wav"
done


Spotlight Doesn't Properly Show Preference Panes I'm having an issue where Spotlight isn't properly showing results for System Preference panels. When I search for a preference panel by name (e.g. Sharing or Network), I don't get any System Preferences results. If I search for "pref", I get a list of preference panes, like this:

Even typing the name as it appears there (e.g. SharingPref.prefPane or a subset thereof) doesn't get a result.

The only exception is that third party preference panes do appear correctly (albeit still with the .prefPane extension.

I've tried forcing a re-index, both by Apple's method, and sudo mdutil -E /, and neither has fixed this behaviour. I don't recall when it started exactly, but I think it may have been ever since getting my new iMac (running 10.8), which was set up via Migration Assistant from my old MBP running 10.7.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to fix this?

I have disabled everything except Applications, Systems Preferences, Contacts, Events & To Dos and Developer. Usually I search for files and documents via Finder. Now it properly shows preferences panes while searching.

Also you can drag categories in Spotlight preferences to change result priority.


Installing Windows 7 on an iPad Pro I have an older version model of an iPad Pro. I need to download an application that requires Windows.

Can I install Windows 7 on my iPad Pro?

No, it is not possible to install Windows 7 on an iPad Pro. You'll need a desktop/laptop computer to run Windows.

Unlike generally available consumer computers, where you can choose to install supported operating system of your choice, it is not possible to change the operating system on your iPad (or iOS devices in general).

To install Windows, you'll need access to a PC computer. If you do not have access to a PC, Apple's desktop/laptop computers branded as Mac are capable of running Windows both natively or in a virtual machine.


Drag to convert Automator Action into Applescript In Automator, there is a way to quickly convert an Action into its equivalent Applescript in Automator, I think by dragging it in some tricky way.   I saw this some time ago but have now forgotten. I've tried searching and can't find it.

In case anyone has this question, I found it, but it only works for recorded actions.

After you Record some clicks or other actions in Automator, they appear in a "Watch Me Do" action. You can then click on and drag an individual action out of that Action and release when the + sign appears. Automator will add a "Run AppleScript" action with the AppleScript that sends the same clicks and key presses to System Events.

You can also simply Copy the action you want, switch over to AppleScript Editor, and paste to get the same code.

Example: "Click Skype in the Dock" Event converts to the following AppleScript:

on run {input, parameters}
    -- Click “Skype” in the Dock.
    delay 7.872251
    set timeoutSeconds to 2.000000
    set uiScript to "click UI Element \"Skype\" of list 1 of application process \"Dock\""
    my doWithTimeout( uiScript, timeoutSeconds )
    return input
end run

on doWithTimeout(uiScript, timeoutSeconds)
    set endDate to (current date) + timeoutSeconds
    repeat
        try
            run script "tell application \"System Events\"
" & uiScript & "
end tell"
            exit repeat
        on error errorMessage
            if ((current date) > endDate) then
                error "Can not " & uiScript
            end if
        end try
    end repeat
end doWithTimeout

How to convert recorded events in Automator:


Spotlight Search by Full Path? When performing a Spotlight search, either through the Finder or via terminal commands, is it possible to filter results against the full-path of a file, or at least the name of it's parent folder?

The reason I need to be able to filter by the full path is that although I'm searching for actual files, I only want to return files that are found within folders matching a particular pattern.

For example, consider I have a bunch of files structured like so:

Jobs
    Foo Poster
        Preview.jpg
        Final.psd
    Bar Poster
        Preview.png
        Final.psd
    Foo Banner
        Preview.jpg
        Final.psd

This is a bit of a contrived example for simplicity, but consider now that I want to find all the preview images found only within folders with "Poster" in the name.

I could do this with find using something like:

 find /path/to/Jobs -ipath *poster/preview*

However, what I'd really like is a way to do this using Spotlight, not only for speed but also for the additional search options available (labels, image sizes etc.).

Is it possible to do this? I know I can restrict searches to a single folder, but this is no use as what I really need is to find folders matching a pattern, and then search within those for the actual files.

I found the Document Container option in the Finder's search GUI, but this doesn't appear to work as I would expect; it sounds like it should let me match against a parent folder of a document, but this doesn't appear to be the case.

Assuming this isn't possible with the Finder's GUI directly (i.e- requires a Spotlight terminal command), I would ideally like to be able to create a smart folder if possible.

This is not possible with Spotlight alone. Spotlight does not index the file path as a property of the file. Thus it is not possible to use the path as search criterion.

You can use mdfind at the command line to search the Spotlight index. With the -onlyin parameter you can point it at the top of your folder hierarchy. You can the filter the returned results using grep.

mdfind -onlyin ~/Downloads/ 'kMDItemContentTypeTree == "public.image"cd' | grep '.*/test.*/.*'

If you need help building the query for mdfind, have a look at HoudahSpot. There you can set up your search criteria. Then go to Window > Raw Query to find the Spotlight query string you can use with mdfind.

While in HoudahSpot you can also use its ability to filter search results. Above the search results you will find a search field that allows for filter/exclude by name/path. Here you can use the asterisk as a wildcard.

Full disclosure: I am the developer of HoudahSpot.


Why does my iPhone alarm go off one hour late? I live in Italy and since the summer time change; I cannot set up the alarm to ring at the appropriate time.
I need the alarm to ring at 6:30 am, but if i set the alarm to 6:30 it rings at 7:30 instead.
It's very annoying. I tried to delete every alarm i had set before and create new ones, but i doesn't change anything. How can i fix it?

I believe you’re a victim of the iPhone time bug. You don’t specify your iPhone model nor iOS version, but I’m sure you have the above mentioned problem:

  Reports from around the world have exposed a daylights savings flaw in the iOS software, which is causing alarms to go off either an hour late or early, depending on where you live.

Google for more love in the subject.


My Itunes has an unauthorized name on it The name "Deepali Goal" has appeared on my Itunes. It is in a tab shaped like a house. When I click on this I have an option for My Library or Deepali Goal's Library. What does this mean??

Your Apple account may be compromised and some (not so smart) idiot logged into it and enabled Home Sharing, that causes his media library to appear on your side and most likely yours also appears on his side.

Change your Apple account's password and consider enabling two-factor authentication on it, but most importantly try to understand how he got the password; was it a really bad password and he got lucky via brute force, or something more serious like a compromise of your computer or e-mail account ?


Using night shift/f.lux on external monitors Mac OS 10.15 I’m having an issue using Night Shift, f.lux, or any blue light filter application on 2 of the 3 external monitors I have hooked up to my MacBook Pro via a Dell docking station. This is my hardware:

MacBook Pro 2019
Dell D6000 dock
Dell 24 in monitor
Dell 24 in monitor
LG 34 in monitor

I’ve tried reseating cables, reinstalling display link drivers, and downloading other blue light filter applications like f.lux.

I have a Dell D6000 docking station and had the same issue.
Got it working after I did the following:

Quit the Displaylink Manager application and set it so that it does not start on startup.
Unplug the Dock connection to your Macbook.
Replug the Dock connection to your Macbook.

The monitors should work AND with Night Shift without needing to have the DisplayLink manager running in the background.


Why is Chrome aggressively consuming CPU cycles? I literally have 0 tabs open, and yet Chrome is consuming a very significant amount of CPU resources, and quickly draining my battery...

Why?

Why - because it's got a bug or loop and can't tell you it's stuck in human terms.

So, you'll need to look at the guts of the program or get someone to help get to why in your case the software wants to eat all your battery.

In activity monitor, first select chrome and run System Diagnostics.... Then go make a cup of tea. When you get back, click Sample Process while you highlighted the selected chrome item and look over the sample results.

Based on where it spends time, you’ll need to triage things. I recommend people start by filtering the sample as Percent of Thread so you can see where the busy parts of the code are and hide the fames the drop from a high percentage of time to a low percentage of time.

The alternative, is just triage and remove things chrome could do. Pitch all extensions - add them back half by half until you identify the culprit(s).

Catalina: After some hours various things start to crash and/or stop working

Also, keep track of your time spent baby sitting that browser to protect your battery charge. At some point, you’ll know to delete it and import your bookmarks into another browser.

From your detail already in the question, I have high confidence you’ll determine one bad plug in or just remove and reinstall it will quiet it down. That amount of CPU use is egregious and should be easy to chase down. Worst case you have the sysdiagnose that captures more data to analyze.


How can I force an index of all the Apple notes? Copied all my local notes to Apple's iCloud notes.  It's been a few days and they haven't indexed yet.  I found if I edit a notes file then it gets indexed.  I don't want to edit all my notes apps as they maintain the date of last usage.  How can I force an index of all the Apple notes?

For what it's worth, I copied all my notes from iCloud to "on my Mac" by selecting all the iCloud notes, holding down the option key and dragging them all to "On my Mac".  Immediately they were all indexed and searchable.  hmm.  Oh my, so are the iCloud notes now searchable too.  So that copy function must have triggered an indexing command.

Cheers,

Ron


QuickLook set app to display preview Is it possible to set the app that displays the QuickLook preview in OS X?

I'm developing iOS apps and I have Xcode installed, but when I open the QuickLook preview of a Source-Code file, the preview uses the iA Writer, which I have also installed but the "Open with" button un the top right corner shows Xcode.

Info: I'm using a MacBook Air, Late 2010, OS X 10.9.2

If I uninstall iA Writer it looks like this

Question:

How do I tell the Quick Look NOT to use the iA Writer (without having to uninstall it)?

qlmanage

Use the command line tool qlmanage to investigate your QuickLook set up, including the default generator for each file format.

  qlmanage -- Quick Look Server debug and management tool

Apple's QuickLook developer documentation provides a good overview of how QuickLook works and how to test specific plugins.

Editing the iA Writer QuickLook Plugin

You may want to edit the iA Writer QuickLook plugin to disassociate it from your .h and .m files. See QuickLook file associations for more information about achieving this.


Writing Windows .bat files in Mac Can anyone suggest any decent software for writing .bat scripts in Mac that transfer over to Windows properly? I've tried using BBEdit and Sublime Text to write my .bat scripts but when I bring them over they don't work properly.

Sublime Text doesn't carry do newlines properly (even though it's set for Windows) so the scripts don't run.

BBEdit doesn't do certain things properly (like echo) even though I set the newline for Windows and the encoding to Western Latin 1.

I do use BBEdit successfully for my .bat files. As you say, you need to keep in mind that the newlines are set correctly. The concepts of line feed (LF) and carriage return (CR) are closely associated but used differently on Windows and *nix.

For the visitors, TextWrangler is the free (stripped down) version of BBEdit. Both are text editors for OS X, and they do not suck.

The screenshot below is the bottom of my .bat file created in BBEdit. I have build this file from scratch and it works just as you would expect. Make sure you have:

Text-encoding set to 'Unicode (UTF-8)'
Line breaks to 'Windows(CRLF)'

That should be enough.

If you keep having problems with these akward settings, copy a working .bat from windows to your mac and save it as a template for your new scripts. BBEdit will recognise the current settings in a .bat/text file.


Mac stuck in "El Capitan" installer loop: "no packages were eligible for install" My problem is that my Mac starts up to the "El Capitan" installer. After restarting several times, OS X is still on screen telling me that "no packages were eligible for install".
Can someone help please, and can you bear in mind that I’m not technically minded so keep instruction in simple terms.

As explained here, OS X 10.11 "El Capitan" fails to install because it is too old (the technical reason being that the signing certificate is no longer valid).
But you can trick the OS X installer into thinking that it is 2017 and it will happily run without any errors.
How to trick the OS X installer

When the OS X installer complains that "No packages were eligible for install" and displays this window:

don't restart your Mac.

Turn Wi-Fi off or unplug the Ethernet cord, depending on your configuration, to prevent your Mac from connecting to the Internet:

Select Utilities>Terminal:

Click the window that appears:

and type date 0115124517 (this will reset the date to Jan 1st 12:45 2017). After typing the command, press Enter:

Terminal will confirm that the date has been changed with a line of output that displays the new date.

Quit Terminal:

In the OS X installer window, press Restart:

When your Mac comes back up, disable Wi-Fi and leave the Ethernet cord unplugged, as explained in step 2, and press Continue:

Read the software license agreement, press Agree to accept it and press Continue:

Select the disk on which you want to install "El Capitan" and press Continue (note that the icon and name of the disk will be different in your case) (there is usually only one option. If you have several options because the Time Machine drive is plugged in to your computer, make sure you select the correct drive and not the Time Machine drive):

The installation should now proceed without any errors:


How can I take a picture with my iSight camera? I have a MacBook Air which has a built in camera. Is there any simple application (preferably one that comes with Mac OS X) which simply takes a picture and saves it as PNG or JPG?

Yes, the application is called "Photo Booth," and lives, I'm pretty sure, in /Applications/Photo Booth.app

After you've taken a photo, you can drag an image to the desktop or to a folder in the Finder to save as a jpg image.


Password not working (it said the password I typed in was wrong) Alright, so I just got my iMac back from the store and I login to it knowing my password was correct, later I was trying to download a JDK but a window pop up asking me for the password of the admin account. I proceeded to entered my password but it won't accept it, all it does is say that it's wrong although I typed the exact same password. I tried contacting many people that I know but it still isn't working. Is there anyone who can identify this problem for me? If so then please do tell me how to fix it.

It has been a while since I have tried this so I assume it still works

Turn off your Mac (choose Apple > Shut Down).
Press the power button  while holding down Command-R. The Mac will boot into Recovery mode.
Select Disk Utility and press Continue.
Choose Utilities > Terminal.
Enter resetpassword (all one word, lowercase letters) and press Return.
Select the volume containing the account (normally this will be your Main hard drive).
Choose the account to change with Select the User Account.
Enter a new password and re-enter it into the password fields.
Enter a new password hint related to the password & click Save.
A warning will appear that the password has changed, but not the Keychain Password. Click OK.
Click Apple > Shut Down.
Now start up the Mac. You can login using the new password.

Or you could google "reset mac password" and follow the instructions I found and pasted in above.


Can I delete images from Pictures folder? Are they redundant? I have several gigabyte of images/photos in my Pictures folder on my Mac.
I also have the Photos Library and iPhotos Library bundles. I believe all my images/photos would have been imported into the these two libraries.

Does that mean that I can delete all my images/photos from the Pictures folder?

Normally the photos have to be imported to one or the other via drag and drop or the import button. To be on the safe side import some of the photos into the photo application. If they are duplicates you will receive a popup stating that the files are the same


How do iPhones acquire date and time? Do iPhones and iPads with cellular network support NITZ or do they only rely on NTP?

From the Carrier.plist file - iOS does support NITZ. Here' the refference on theiphonewiki.com.

Network time sync
<key>SupportsNITZ</key>
<true/>

Enables time updates through the NITZ protocol.


Why do Notes not sync? iCloud Notes not syncing says the solution is to update to El Capitan or log out of iCloud.  But I am now on 10.13 and have had to log in to iCloud many times due to updates and new devices.  All (Macbook Pro 2012 and iPad Pro) are on the latest updates.  (Which is why the other one saying to "upgrade to El Capitan" is not helpful.)

My iPad prefs said that four IMAP accounts, one Exchange account, and the iCloud should be syncing Notes.  The Macbook Pro prefs say the same.  But Notes I create on the iPad never appear on the Macbook Pro.  (And vice versa.)

Wondering whether having them on more than one account might be a problem, I tried to turn Notes off on the IMAP accounts.  Two accounts did it silently, but the third warned me that it would DELETE Notes from the device.  Since they aren't apparently anywhere else, I declined.

How can I get Notes to show up in the Notes app on both devices?  Preferably the most efficient way in terms of storage and bandwidth.

Open Notes on your MacBook and in the top menu, select:

Notes -> Preferences

You will see a drop-down selector labelled "Default Account:".

Make sure to select the iCloud account.

Then, while still on your MacBook, look at the left bar of your "Notes" app. You should see your IMAP and iCloud accounts there. If you do not see a left bar, then click the "sidebar" icon in the Notes toolbar.

Click on each of those sections and drag the notes into the iCloud -> Notes section.

Now, all of your notes should be on your iCloud account.

Then, on your iPad, go to Settings -> Notes -> Default Account, and set "iCloud" as your default account.

If this fails, please post a comment with details, and I will try to assist further.


launchd hitting every modified file every 30 seconds I am on MacOs 10.12.5. I am trying to do high volume I/O but some task managed by launchd hits every modified disk block every 30 seconds. When this happens my high volume I/O has to compete causing a severe slow down. How do I identify the problem task?

I believe it is something to do with launchd because fs_usage -w -f diskio tells me it is. Every 30 seconds it outputs a list like this for every changed disk block in the system (apologies you have to scroll to see launchd):

14:34:33.887889    WrData[AT3]     D=0x0068c05a  B=0x1000   /dev/disk2  /Users/simon/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome/Default/Session Storage/000430.log                                                             0.000145 W launchd.9793620
14:34:33.887893    WrData[AT3]     D=0x00549a2b  B=0x1000   /dev/disk2  /Users/simon/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome/Default/Session Storage/LOG                                                                    0.000107 W launchd.9793620
14:34:33.887895    WrData[AT3]     D=0x00570119  B=0x1000   /dev/disk2  /Users/simon/Library/Saved Application State/com.apple.Terminal.savedState/window_2.data                                                              0.000070 W launchd.9793620
14:34:33.887897    WrData[AT3]     D=0x0056fab5  B=0x1000   /dev/disk2  /Users/simon/Library/Saved Application State/com.apple.Terminal.savedState/window_3.data                                                              0.000064 W launchd.9793620
14:34:33.887912    WrData[ANT3]    D=0x0056ffd0  B=0x1000   /dev/disk2  /Users/simon/Library/Saved Application State/com.apple.Terminal.savedState/windows.plist                                                              0.000072 W launchd.9793620

I thought it might be my McAfee anti-virus software, so I excluded the files I was writing from real-time scanning, and then tried turning it off.

I then thought it might be Spotlight search, but again excluding the volume my data files are on did not prevent this launchd task from re-accessing the files.

Running launchctl list shows a list of 327 tasks. I would love to be able to narrow this down to just one.

Whilst I am sure the task runs every 30 seconds having watched it many times, I cannot find any mention of an appropriate "30" in the configuration files. I have:

No mention of "30" in /System/Library/LaunchAgents
One mention of "30" in /System/Library/LaunchDaemons

com.apple.powerd.swd.plist sets ThrottleInterval to 30

No mention of "30" in /Library/LaunchAgents
One mention of "30" in /Library/LaunchDaemons

com.mcafee.virusscan.fmpd.plist sets ExitTimeout to 30

No mention of "30" in ~/Library/LaunchAgents

Although McAfee does mention "30", disabling it and excluding the files made no difference.

Any help in identifying the task which is accessing changed disk blocks would be appreciated.

I had the same problem a while back but IIRC, it turned out to be the Spotlight indexing services (mds, mdworker, etc) which are spawned by launchd.

Open Spotlight in System Preferences, switch to the Privacy tab, then drag your home folder into the window.  This will cause Spotlight to ignore your home folder and all subfolders.

If you don't want to exclude all your files, create a folder specifically for this high I/O application and configure Spotlight to ignore just this folder.

For a geekier method, here are some shell commands to run that will exclude the entire drive from Spotlight indexing.  I use these commands on all external USB/flash drives as soon as I can.

Touch these files at the root of the drive to exclude, so
cd / for the main internal drive or cd /Volumes/USB_FLASH_DRIVE_NAME for an external USB/FLASH drive, then

sudo /usr/bin/touch .metadata_never_index
sudo /usr/bin/chflags hidden .metadata_never_index

and to stop prompting if you want to use the disk for TimeMachine backups

sudo /usr/bin/touch .com.apple.timemachine.donotpresent
sudo /usr/bin/chflags hidden .com.apple.timemachine.donotpresent


How do you specify which zip version to compress with? I am trying to create a .imscc file, a common cartridge file used for interoperability between different Course Management Systems. It is essentially just a bunch of folders and XML files zipped up and labeled .imscc. However simply unzipping and rezipping with the standard archiving utility is somehow breaking the file and Canvas, the system I'm trying to import to, does not accept the file. Using zipinfo I discovered that the files generated by Canvas were zipped with version 5.2 while the standard zip utility uses version 2.1 and I'm hoping this is the source of the issue. It's definitely something with the zipping since the file sizes are different once I've unzipped and rezipped. (No hidden resource fork files I could find, for the record) I've tried the Canvas forums to no avail so I'm hoping someone here might know a way to zip a folder with a specific zip version.

Any ideas?

Years later, but in case someone else comes across this, Canvas has written a very useful guide to .imscc files. It discusses why they're problematic on OS X:

  It won't work on a Mac, because the Mac adds junk hidden files to the zip file that cause the cartridge to not be recognized.  There might be a work-around for getting zip files without extra junk on the Mac, but I don't know it, so we just used Windows instead.


MacOS Bluetooth Appears "Permanently" Not Available? (MacOS 10.15 Catalina) For some reason after a MacOS "upgrade" to 10.15 Catalina the Bluetooth Appears "Permanently" Not Available?  How can I diagnose which “a device” to connect to get Bluetooth to work ?

Upgraded to 10.15.2 but no better.

Any suggestions?  Does this have anything to do with Bluetooth pan internet sharing?

macOS Catalina Version 10.15.6 (19G73) seems to have "fixed" some of the problem but not all of it...
The MacOS "Console" System Log still has some error messages however the bluetooth connection does show up in networking.
bluetoothhd : deny(1) mach-lookup com.apple.server.bluetooth
Here is what the screen shot of the system log files look like if you search for "bluetooth"

the suspicion is that this is a hardware to OS "bridge bug" that is specific to MacBook Pro's?  For example... my system with...
Hardware Overview:

  Model Name:   MacBook Pro
  Model Identifier: MacBookPro11,3
  Processor Name:   Quad-Core Intel Core i7
  Processor Speed:  2.8 GHz
  Number of Processors: 1
  Total Number of Cores:    4
  L2 Cache (per Core):  256 KB
  L3 Cache: 6 MB
  Hyper-Threading Technology:   Enabled
  Memory:   16 GB
  Boot ROM Version: 162.0.0.0.0
  SMC Version (system): 2.19f12


iPhone 5s reset password—wrong date of birth I was having problems with my daughter’s iPhone 5s touch screen. I was advised to do a factory reset, as this could rectify the problem. After I did this I encountered Activation Lock.

You’ve guessed it, she can’t remember her Apple ID password. We tried to reset it, since she can’t remember her email password either, we can’t login to her email. We then opted for the security questions, but it’s rejecting her date of birth.

What options do we have?

Head on over to https://iforgot.apple.com/ and see if you can get your situation sorted out—although I’m not sure you’ll get any more options than what you already went through.

If that fails, you’ll need to contact Apple directly and be prepared to prove that the iPhone is indeed yours/your daughter’s.


Can I export my id_rsa cert from Keychain Access? I'm migrating to a new Macbook. On my old one, I generated an ssh key pair many years ago, and I have configured that key on several sites, some of which I don't have direct control over. After I set up my keypair, I used ssh-add to import the cert into my keychain so I wouldn't have to type the passphrase every time. This worked fine.

Now that I am migrating to a new Mac, I am trying to import my id_rsa key on my new mac, but it's asking me for a passphrase that I apparently do not remember.  I feel like that passphrase must be stored in the keychain of my old mac (which I still have), but I haven't figured out which of the entries in my old keychain is my id_rsa cert (we use S/MIME encrypted e-mail at work and the cert expire frequently, so I have quite a few certs in there).

So -- is there a way for me to either view the passphrase of my id_rsa cert in Keychain Access (after I unlock it with my system password), or to export my keypair from Keychain access in such a way that I can import it on my new Mac without having the original passphrase?

Thanks!

There was a similar question on SuperUser here on SE.

If you have still have access to your old Mac and you can successfully login into whatever services require your id_rsa cert with your passphrase saved in Keychain, you should be able to get the passphrase with no problem.

Basically, you should be able to see the passwords by selecting Show Password in Keychain.

Have a look at this answer for details


iOS Disregards Airplane Mode Setting on Reboot I’m using an iPhone 11 Pro on iOS 14, but I have also observed this behavior on iOS 13 as well as on an iPad running iOS 14.
Sometimes, when I go to reboot my phone I will close all apps (just to cleanup the app drawer, I’m not trying to manage what’s running myself) and then put the phone into airplane mode so that it will be in airplane mode when it eventually reboots.
What I’ve noticed is that about half the time, after closing all apps and putting the phone into airplane mode, when the phone reboots, LTE is active, wifi is not connected, and the last few apps that I closed are in the app switcher. If I do it again, it works as expected. I also notice that if I wait for 30-60 seconds after closing everything, and then reboot, I almost never see this behavior.
This is more of a curiosity than anything but I wanted to see if there was a reason for this? Does iOS not immediately store the open apps and airplane mode status when set?
Thanks!

This is by design.
I've tested this on several iOS devices of various iOS versions (iOS 9, 13, 14 and iPadOS 14) and all do the same thing.
I haven't found anything that specifically says so, but it makes sense so that if it's ever lost/stolen while in Airplane mode (WiFi/Bluetooth/Cellular off) when it comes back on after a period of time, it will automatically turn things on to be able to be found.
If you turn off WiFi individually, you get a message that it's "disconnecting from WiFi for 24 hours," not permanently. This is obviously to get you connected again in case you forget or the phone is lost or stolen.
It falls into a design philosophy of "fail secure" meaning if everything fails, it will fall back to a config that will allows you to find it and/or wipe it.


Apple wants to make changes I get a persistent pop-up window that states:
Apple wants to make changes. (See pic below)

Before I mindlessly press OK, I'd like to know what the action is about.

Can anyone suggest how I might find out more about what is involved?

No application appears to be involved by name.
The icon shows a "console" window inset over the locked padlock.
I was running Safari 11.1.2 build 12605.3.8.1 on macOS Sierra 10.12.6
It remained onscreen after I quit Safari.
It requires three cancels to cancel.
has recurred maybe half-a-dozen times in the last week.

Note: I have removed the user name which appears correctly for my account.

UPDATE (Edit)

As per a suggestion in the comments, I ran Activity Monitor. It runs okay; but, I don't know what to look for so I tried all the variations I could think of without any Eureka moment.

Not very much later, I got this pop-up window asking for password permission to make changes. My User Name was right (erased from the screen-grab). Although the window identified the Activity Monitor as the application, there was no ? in the lower left corner for any more detail.

I decided to click OK without password and it hated that. After a few tries, the window tried giving me my original password hint from the OS set-up. It took three "Cancel" clicks to go away. It hasn't recurred.

Meanwhile, the first anonymous "Apple wants… " pop-up window appears, from time to time, during Safari use. Occasionally, Safari becomes unstable and the main window closes.

UPDATE (Edit) Problem Resolved.

Today was a slow news day so I called Apple support who encouraged me to download and install Malwarebytes (Tip of the hat to them) which identified the location of suspicious files as similar to ones I found according to Apple Support discussion thread found in the answer given by Ashley.

The plist was a simple run-on-load and the other file was an executable and my unix is a bit… non-existent.

The Files found were:
~/Library/Application Support/com.SearchProvided
~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.SearchProvided.plist

There's a mention of "Apple wants to make changes" in this Apple discussions thread.  Someone there ran Malwarebytes, which found "Adware.OperatorMac", and mentions the following files:

~/Library/Application Support/com.SearchSystem
~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.SearchSystem.plist

So, if you have those files, that would seem a good place to find out more.

I don't have 10.12.6 installed at the moment, but I do have machines running 10.11.6 and 10.13.6.  I don't have those files on either machine, so they aren't part of a standard install.

If you do have these files, perhaps you could post their contents as an update?


When I unplug my headphones, my speakers (and headphones) stop working Happens intermittently:
When I unplug my Sony headphones, I am unable to get my 17" MBP (2.8ghz intel core 2 duo, running Lion), to make any sound. I've tried a handful of different hardware, and nothing will make a peep.

Restarting "fixes" it.

Its a bug Lion has.

This thread should provide you with more info of users suffering the same bug.

This app claims to fix it (I found it on that same thread).

I haven't had the bug for a while, but I did have it quite a bit before. I really hope Apple fixes it, by 10.7.2 perhaps.

Hope it helps!

Edit: Probably the most relevant information in the thread is that it seems to be a bug on Core Audio. $ sudo killall coreaudiod quits the process and the system automatically restarts it, effectively providing a quick fix to the bug. The rest are people posting about their personal experiences and thanking the developer of the app that automatically applies this fix.


How to set no tabs in TextMate I do not want tabs as symbols in Textmate.
I would like to them be for instance 4 spaces.

How can you make each 'tab' be 4 spaces?

Put this in your ~/.tm_properties:

tabSize         = 4
softTabs        = true


Tips and tricks to use Google Apps on Mac OS X I'm trying to collect advice and utilities to make better use of the Google Apps on OS X, in particular Gmail, Google Calendar and Google Docs.

Gmail

I tried Mailplane but I find the ratio price/features a bit too high so I decided not to buy it.

Now I use a Fluid's app for Gmail and I installed Google Notifier to have growl like notifications.

Google Calendar

Idem, Fluid app, and Google notifier.

I'm syncing my google calendars with iCal but it is only one-way.

Edit

As @Rene Larsen said, it is possible to use CalDAV to sync with Google Calendar.

I have my own calendar, I shared calendar that I created and I calendar that I  can only view. They appear like that:

Is it normal that each calendar appear in its own list ?

What do you use ? How is it possible to improve that ?

This tip describes how to avoid delegates in iCal:

  STEP 1: disable your delegate calendars from iCal

  Open iCal, then select ‘Preferences’ from the iCal dropdown menu
  Select your Google CalDAV account and open the ‘Delegation’ tab at the top of the window
  Uncheck each checkbox corresponding to each delegate calendar; they will disappear from the main calendar view where they were currently shown as delegates

  STEP 2: create the necessary account(s) for each delegate calendar

  A typical Google Account URL has the following form: https://www.google.com/calendar/dav/USERNAME@gmail.com/user

  This should be already present on your existing CalDAV account (the one you expunged the delegates from). Replace ‘USERNAME’ with your Google Account username, then copy and paste the line above into a temporary text document for now.

  Open your browser and log in into your Google Account, then follow the Calendar link
  Select ‘Settings’ on the ‘My calendars’ box on the left column of the page
  Select the delegate calendar you want to keep in sync from the main page’s frame
  At the bottom of the next page (the with the selected calendar’s details), copy the Calendar ID value (shown as clear text) which can be found in the ‘Calendar Address’ section; the Calendar ID has the following sample structure: qwertyuiopasdfghjkl1234567@group.calendar.google.com
  Go back to the previous temporary text document where you saved your Google Account URL, paste the Calendar ID value you copied in the previous step and replace the ‘USERNAME@gmail.com’ part as follows (replace the Calendar ID with your correct value):https://www.google.com/calendar/dav/qwertyuiopasdfghjkl1234567@group.calendar.google.com/user
  Then copy the whole resulting string
  Go to iCal, select Preferences once again and add a new CalDAV account: please make sure you expand the ‘Server Option’ dropdown and paste the aforementioned string into the ‘Account URL’ field.

  You will need to create a brand new iCal account for each delegate you have set up on Google Calendar. When done, your iCal software will display each delegate(s) as separate calendars, and each one of them will be shown into iTunes and will be available for synchronization in the Device’s Info tab.


cannot boot. volume disappeared from boot option after Disk Utility (GUI) repair I have a 13-inch MBP with the latest OS X version.

Problem

Yesterday, I went to the Recovery Mode and performed Repair on my boot volume. I was not having a problem, but I just wanted to verify and repair as a regular maintenance. The Disk Utility said some kind of error (I cannot remember, but something about EFI?), and I cannot start my computer since then (question mark folder icon when I try to boot).

I have tried the following

I tried to recover the drive by going into the Recovery Mode, but when I press Option key for boot options, I just have an empty grey screen have no option(not even the recovery volume). I have also tried to enter into the Single User Mode, but it goes straight back to the question mark folder icon. Just in case, I performed PRAM and SMC reset, but still no dice.

Next, I tried to boot with Command+R pressed, and the computer went into Internet Recovery Mode, which works fine. Then, I went to the Disk Utility, and my SSD is on the list with the volume that has OS X(only volume on the entire disk except recovery volume, etc). I use FileVault2, and I can unlock the volume and mount it without any problem. When I do Verify Disk, it says that the volume appears to be OK. Also, performed fsck using Recovery Mode's Terminal, and it still says that "The volume Macintosh HD appears to be OK," the exact same message that I got from GUI disk utility. I also tried to unlock and set the volume as a start-up disk, but I still get the question mark folder icon.

If you need further details, please let me know!
Please save me!

You managed somehow to kill your EFI. (EFI is the boot loader)

EFI is in a Hidden partition on your hard drive.

Obviously you found it and kill it?

Just to say, in reading your activity, you do mess around to much.

Macs do not need regular maintenance specially not using Recovery mode.

You can get help from here to get a copy of the EFI.


How to change email settings on iPad so as not to show images by default My friend has an iPad.  I have never used an iPad, but am trying to help her set things up better -- so it's clearly a case of the blind leading the blind.

In my own email (a gmail account, which I read in thunderbird), if I open a message with images, the images are not shown as images -- there's a placeholder where each image would be.

I would like to set things up that way on my friend's iPad.

How do I do that?  She reads both yahoo mail and Exchange on her iPad.

Please make your instructions detailed, clear and idiot-proof -- thank you!!

Go into Settings.app and then go to Mail, Contacts, Calendars.

Scroll down the to Mail section...

I hope this helps!


Is there something similar to the Greasemonkey script system for a browser in iOS? Greasemonkey is explained in this Wikipedia entry.

I would like to add my own stylesheet to a particularly non-mobile-friendly website. Is there any way to accomplish this? Are there any browser apps that can do it?

At the moment there is the GreasePocket project in the works.

Have a look at their website, but it's far from a finished product, it will also probably need to be run on a JailBroken device.


Multiple instances of installed applications and updates displayed in updates history Today I was updating my Mavericks installation and during the process it seems that App Store somehow "hung up" on installation and some downloads didn’t download properly.

Because of that, now I see multiple instances of "OSX Update 10.9.1" in updates history, and not just that, but every other part from that chunk of updates such as iTunes update.

When the download finally "finished" and when I activated it, it said that it was corrupted and it should be downloaded again. I did that, activated it and everything went OK, update is now here.

I’m interested if these types of situations are common and are not something to worry about. From my previous experiences, App Store is kind of wonky so this behavior is not unexpected, but I see this first time and I’m little concerned.

If you get it working just by redownloading, it's nothing to worry about.

As both a user and developer I can tell that these types of errors aren't uncommon (Often times caused by an unstable internet connection or if the Mac has been on standby for a longer period whereafter the download is continued). But it's decided by multiple factors including your router, signal strength, geographical location and so on.

The problem is that it can be hard to perfectly download every little piece of a large file. Sometimes it's read wrong or written wrong to the disk and this causes corruption and possibly confuses the part of App Store that displays progress and download items.

To Apple's credit, though, they seem to be able to "chunk" download effectively most of the time, where other apps (like Chrome for instance) just kills the download and makes you manually start over.
Personally, I rarely have these types of errors anymore (they were much more common in the "early days" of the App Store).


What port does Skype for iPhone use? I want to set up Skype to have priority on my router whem I'm skyping from my iPhone, but I can't figure out which port the app uses.

Any ideas?

It seems that it's port 80 and port 443.  See this article on blocking of Skype 3G traffic

www.bluecoat.com/doc/486


How Apple.com set Apple Touch Icon? Apple Touch Icon is a icon used in Safari 8 favourite new page on OS X,or web clip in Home screen on iOS.
https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/AppleApplications/Reference/SafariWebContent/ConfiguringWebApplications/ConfiguringWebApplications.html
there is two way to set it,one is using rel="shortcut icon",another is using rel="apple-touch-icon" like http://apple.stackexchange.com do.So I can find icon URL http://cdn.sstatic.net/apple/img/apple-touch-icon.png?v=2a2c3caaec7f
However apple.com doesn't use those two method.How can I find apple.com's apple touch icon URL?

Is it not just http://www.apple.com/apple-touch-icon.png?

From the iOS Developer Library article you pointed to above...

  To specify an icon for the entire website (every page on the website), place an icon file in PNG format in the root document folder called apple-touch-icon.png


Does IOS "Find My" App work when the app is not open? If so, why? The following is all pertaining to IOS (14): (and assume locations services are turned on)
If you go to settings -> privacy -> location services -> Find My there are three options:

Never
Ask next time
While using the App.

There is no "Always" option (some apps, such as google maps, have an "Always" option).
Doesn't this mean that the "Find My" app can't share my real-time location with people when the app is closed (say, if I am checking my email)? Or does the app have a way around this?
Perhaps sharing my location with someone give the app location access while I am sharing my location, even if the app is closed? If so, shouldn't that be noted somewhere?

Sharing your location with other people and locating a lost device always works, even when the app is not open, providing other toggles are enabled.

The ‘Find My’ app location services access is separate to the system service that shares your location to other people in the background.
The toggle for the background sharing of your location to friends you have shared your location with is near the top of Location Services settings, called ‘Share My Location’.
The toggle for the background sharing of your location when looking for your own lost device is at the bottom of Location Services, under System Services, labelled ‘Find My iPhone’.


Yosemite does not have ftp sharing option in file sharing preferences? I have just obtained a Macbook Pro with Yosemite installed and am trying to connect to it from another host on the local network via ftp. The connection is refused. So I get into the preferences in the Yosemite system and look of ftp option in the file sharing preferences. There isn't one. There is options for afp, smb sharing but not ftp. On my other Macs there is an option for ftp sharing.

Also, when I set the ethernet interface to manual address with sub net mask, the settings are not installed as reflected in terminal app command ifconfig. I can use ifconfig to set it but the settings are dropped when the machine is rebooted. I have to set them every time the machine boots.

I could write a shell script to configure the interfaces but I don't know where to put this script so it will be run on startup.

does anyone have suggestions, useful info on this issue?

For the manual addressing, have you tried using the networksetup command? These settings can be set using the following command:

networksetup -setmanual <networkservice> <ip> <subnet> <router>


Searching for items in list I'm trying to search within a list of items (specifically, a list of files from a folder) for certain files. However, I don't know the names of these files; all I know is that they all begin with the same word (for example, "Work 1", "Work 2" and "Work 3"). I tried this script:

tell application "Finder"

    set filelist to name of every item in folder (path to desktop)

    set endlist to {}

    repeat with i from 1 to count filelist
    if {filelist's item i}'s name begins with "Work" then set endlist's end to filelist's item i

    end repeat
end tell

which at first glance would seem about right, but whenevr I run it I get error number -1728 from name. (error "Can’t get name of {\"file1\"}." number -1728 from name of {"file1.txt"}) (this "File1" happens to be the first item in the "filelist" list)

I know that applescript can recognize if an item in the list starts with "work", since this:

 if ((some item whose name begins with "Work") exists) then...

works fine, so I'm not sure what to do next...

P.S. just in case, I've tried many iterations of the "If" statemente in the script, including

  if name of {filelist's item i} begins with "Work" then...

and none have worked...

It a simple problem to solve.

You are first asking for the names of every item.

set filelist to name of every item in folder (path to desktop)

Which returns a list of the names. As text items.

Then you want to  do your search. But in your code you are asking for the name of the text item.

Thats why you are getting the error. The text item does not have a name.

Change the line:

if {filelist's item i}'s name begins with "Work" then set endlist's end to filelist's item i

to

if filelist's item i begins with "Work" then set endlist's end to filelist's item i

UPDATE:
In response to your comment.

You can create a list of the names of the items found on the desktop whose name  begins with for example "Work"

Doing it this way may be better.

Here you ask for a list containing the names  of any item found whose name (returned as a text item text) begins with ..

tell application "Finder"

    set filelist to name of every item in folder (path to desktop) whose name begins with "Work"
end tell


How to unblock an application with socketfilterfw? I am compiling a software from scratch and running its tests. I do this often. The tests open ports and expect connections.

Whenever I run the tests, I get the

  Do you want the application “run-tests” to accept incoming network connections?
  Clicking Deny may limit the application’s behavior. This setting can be changed in the Firewall pane of Security & Privacy preferences.

dialog box. I click on Allow every time. To avoid this I am trying to unblock the application with socketfilterfw. So, I am trying the following commands in a script file

SFW="/usr/libexec/ApplicationFirewall/socketfilterfw"
TESTS_DEBUG="/Users/thefourtheye/git/libuv/out/Debug/run-tests"
${SFW} --remove "$TESTS_DEBUG"
${SFW} --add "$TESTS_DEBUG"
${SFW} --unblock "$TESTS_DEBUG"

Whenever I execute the script file, it always gives the following

The application is not part of the firewall
Application at path ( /Users/thefourtheye/git/libuv/out/Debug/run-tests ) added to firewall
The application is not part of the firewall

If I run my tests after this, it still shows the dialog box.

The TESTS_DEBUG file is not a link, it is an executable binary file.

➜  libuv git:(v1.x) ✗ file /Users/thefourtheye/git/libuv/out/Debug/run-tests
/Users/thefourtheye/git/libuv/out/Debug/run-tests: Mach-O 64-bit executable x86_64
➜  libuv git:(v1.x) ✗ ls -ltrh /Users/thefourtheye/git/libuv/out/Debug/run-tests
-rwxr-xr-x  1 thefoutheye  110095815   1.1M Nov 29 17:32 /Users/thefourtheye/git/libuv/out/Debug/run-tests

My operating system details

➜  libuv git:(v1.x) ✗ sw_vers
ProductName:    Mac OS X
ProductVersion: 10.12.6
BuildVersion:   16G1618

My questions are

Why does the ${SFW} --add says the application is added and ${SFW} --unblock says application is not part of the firewall?
How can I fix this?

I've taken a look at this and I think that the reason for the popups are still being produced is that there is another run-tests in test/.libs/run-tests.

Using this script I could get this working locally. Could you give it a try and see if this works for you?


How do you change the Export DPI of Microsoft PowerPoint? Office 2016 has on option in the Windows version to alter the export-DPI of PowerPoint by editing a registry key,

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\16.0\PowerPoint\Options

Where would I find this registry key or the equivalent on the OSX version?

Assuming I understand your question correctly, you can change the DPI by altering the width and height upon export.

For example, if you want to export your slides in PNG format, you would:

Go to File > Export...
In the Export window that appears, select the PNG option from the File Format drop-down list (at bottom centre of window)
Now you will see options for Width and Height (see image below):

Now change the value of either option (this will automatically change the other value to ensure you keep the same ratio)

By changing the dimensions, you also change the DPI. For example, a 720x405 image exported from PowerPoint will only be about 54dpi, while doubling this upon export to 1,440x810 will also double the dpi to 108dpi.


Time Capsule external connections I recently purchased a new 2TB Time Capsule. Can I connect my old Time Capsule to it to serve as an external drive?

Yes. You can use the New as main router and create a WiFi network. Then have the Old join in (as an Access Point in jargon). It's the same is accessing a shared disk on another Mac laptop/desktop.

Or you can link them with Ethernet cable.


Make a slideshow in iPhoto 9.6.1 showing photos in random order I want to make a slideshow that shows photos in random order, but I don't see the option to do it. I only have an option to sort images by name or date or things that do not apply.

There is no preset for random order – but you can switch to random order ("shuffle order") while the slideshow is actually playing:

  "While a slideshow is playing, move the pointer to make the slideshow controls appear, and then click the Settings button"

The settings button is the little cog wheel icon next to the close [X] button:

Clicking the settings button in play mode will open an extended preferences panel, featuring an additional option "Shuffle slide order" in the lower third of the panel:

Checking/unchecking that option will toggle the Shuffle mode.

You can find a detailled description on this page "Change slideshow settings"at support.apple.com – it's for iPhoto 9.5 but should also apply for iPhoto 9.6.


Yosemite not displaying external HDMI monitor at full resolution I have an HP Pavilion 22xi, which is 1920 x 1080, but my external display settings only go up to 1080p, even with the option click trick on the scaled button.

1080p = 1920x1080 so you are already getting the highest resolution available on your monitor.

Are you missing the menu bar at the top of the screen and the dock at the bottom? If so, moving the underscan slider beneath the resolution section in the Displays preference pane should resolve your problem.

If you are still having trouble, try a PRAM reset (instructions below). Display resolution settings are stored there.

1.Turn off your computer.

2. Locate Command+Option+P+R keys and be ready to press them simultaneously.

3. Press the power button then immediately press and hold the keys until you hear the startup chime a second time.


Emulate older iOS versions on Mavericks I downloaded latest XCode version for Mavericks. I'm looking forward to emulate older versions of iOS for wev development testing.

I followed instructions at this posts where an answer recommends checking XCode's Preferences -> Downloads sections.

By going there is seems that I'm only able to download SDK's for iOS 6.1 and iOS 6.0.

Is there a supported way to get older emulators? I'm trying to avoid downloading other versions of Xcode due to very slow internet connection.

iOS Simulator 5.0 and 5.1 do not work on Mavericks. See this, granted you have a developer account with Apple.

  The iOS simulator does not duplicate some of the low-level parts of iOS. For example, it uses the host OS X's kernel instead of trying to virtualize the iOS kernel. The iOS simulator requires that these subsystems look sufficiently similar between the simulated iOS and the host OS X. When a new host OS X changes too much it can break old simulators. At that point somebody makes an engineering and cost decision to either update the old simulator or drop support for it.


Getting a new iPhone 5 and handing down my old 4S My wife is getting an iPhone 5 next week and I have the iPhone 4S. I will use the new phone and she is going to use my old 4S.

I'm new to the iPhone world, so this may be a dumb question but how do I keep my photos, contacts, etc. without it all popping up again when she syncs her iPhone? Will I have a new iCloud and she have mine? Or will that all change also? Will the apps come back or do they delete?

I don't want any old contacts texing her or old photos popping up when its her phone!

Back up the 4S (either to your computer or iCloud), then when you set up the 5, select to restore from the old 4S backup. That will restore your iCloud account, and all apps and content.

Once the 5 has been successfully set up with your content, wipe the 4s (Settings → Reset → Erase All Content and Settings) and set it up from scratch, with a new iCloud account for your wife (unless she has an existing one).

It's important to note that your phone account is tied to the SIM card in the phone, so calls and SMSes sent to your existing number will still go to the iPhone 4S, and the iPhone 5 will be linked to your wife's account. To change this, you need to swap the SIM cards, which is easy to do, except the iPhone 4S uses a micro-SIM, whereas the 5 uses a nano-SIM. You're likely going to need to talk with your phone provider to reprogram the SIMs, or get new ones of the proper sizes.


Pinning Apps to dock VIA terminal or installation arguments OS Sierra I am using meraki MDM systems manager to deploy applications for are teachers. It would save me a-lot of heart ache to be able to include a terminal command or some type of software to help with automatically pinning things to the dock, so i don't have to touch each device individually thanks in advanced!!

You can use the following command (replace PATH_TO_YOUR_APP):

defaults write com.apple.dock persistent-apps -array-add "<dict><key>tile-data</key><dict><key>file-data</key><dict><key>_CFURLString</key><string>PATH_TO_YOUR_APP</string><key>_CFURLStringType</key><integer>0</integer></dict></dict></dict>"

This adds the application to the dock. For the change to take effect, follow this up with killall cfprefsd and killall Dock.


Can we get "Enqueue" or something similar in iTunes [10.7] iTunes 10.7 is pretty awesome compared to nearly all media players/browsers I have experienced. But, just a quick question if I could have some option to get "Now Playing" list with "Enqueue" option to my audios, similar to what we have in Winamp? It would be of great help.

The current (and previous) version of iTunes only supports this for the iTunes DJ playlist. This playlist selects music from your library to play automatically and shows some upcoming songs. You can choose a song to be next by right-clicking (control-clicking) on it and choosing "Play Next in iTunes DJ". You can also choose "Add to iTunes DJ" to put it at the end of the list already in iTunes DJ.

The next version of iTunes will support this from any playlist, through the "Up Next" feature. After playing the song you choose, it will return to the playlist you were in, even if that song wasn't in the playlist.


List of Times and Dates a Specific App was Accessed on my Mac I would like to know if it is possible to use the terminal in order to get info regarding when a specific app was accessed/closed (history of the app usage). I'm pretty sure that my mac stores this type of info (it uses it for screen time... but screen time only gives you the total time, not the detail regarding when the app was accessed...) but I'm not sure how to access it. Thanks!!

Go to Console in the Utilities folder and start it. When the window appears, on the left there is a list of reports. Click on Mac Analytics Data. After clicking this the info will appear in the console window.  Go to the search bar on the top of the console window and enter the name of the program of interest.  See the image below. It shows the window when I performed a session with the app Atom.


How do I recover a password from a custom disk? I made a folder with some content into a disk image and assigned it a password. I unfortunately have forgotten the password and cant access it. Any work around solution to the problem?

Short answer, No - that's what encryption is for, to prevent anyone getting in who doesn't know the password.


MacBook Air - random start/wake up times I have a 3yo MacBook Air running Lion. When I open it to start using it again it seems to sometimes have trouble 'waking up'. Sometimes this is instantaneous, sometimes I get a blank screen for 30 seconds, sometimes the screen is ok but all the programs are frozen and sometimes I can move the mouse around the screen but cant click anything.

All these states seem to sort themselves out after about 2 minutes which isnt too bad - just slightly annoying.

I've also noticed that it doesnt seem to matter how long the laptop has been on standby for or what programs are running in the back ground - It just seems random.

Is this natural? Would anyone know why this is occurring?

Like I said, not a big issue at all - just curious.

Turns out it was my hard drive being very close to full.


Looking for a word processor with the power of Markdown Basically, I am looking for a word editor (like Word or Pages) that is compatible with Markdown. I want to be able to write in Markdown but with the concept of pages. Their are a lot of Markdown editor but none that handles the concept of pages (I know that Markdown is primary for the web, so I understand why), but I will use Markdown for document that I will need to print, so I need to know, in advance, the number of pages.

Here is what I need:

compatible with Markdown
header : same for every page
footer : same for every page
number of pages and page numbers
automatically numbering headings (you can do it with CSS)
editable stylesheet
live preview
easy to use

Mou can do must of this (items 1, 5, 6, 7, 8). The problems are for header, footer and number of pages and page numbers

Do you know a software that can do what I need ?

Texts is a strange hybrid between a text editor and what you are looking for.

Markdown visual editor

  Write using Markdown - without having to remember the markup. With
  Texts you can apply styles to words or paragraphs and immediately see
  the results. Your images and tables are displayed directly within
  Texts.

Well-structured content

  Use Texts to create structured documents. You set your titles and
  headings, and they will stay in place if you export your document to
  another format.

Blogging on GitHub Pages

  Content written in Texts can be easily published as a blog on GitHub
  Pages, with math, tables, footnotes etc.

Perfect for academics

  Developed to cover all your needs: formulas and footnotes,
  bibliography and citations, tables and links.

Single source publishing

  Writing your documents in Texts gives you a lot of flexibility. You
  can easily convert your words into clean HTML5, professional PDFs,
  ePub or Word format, or even a presentation.

Professional typesetting

  Texts produces immaculate PDFs. Everything you create — from
  paragraphs of text to mathematical formulae — is perfectly typeset.
  See some sample documents.

Cross-platform application

  Mac OS X or Windows? Doesn't matter, use Texts on both. The app has
  native look and feel on each platform, and the document format is
  common across platforms.

Custom themes

  Change the appearance of your text editor with themes.

Export templates

  Adjust style of any published documents with export templates.

http://www.texts.io/


How to Disable Left Command key My wife spilled beer on my Macbook Pro (El Capitan) and now everything seems kind of ok, except I can't use the keyboard because the Mac thinks that the left Cmd key is always pressed. I've taken off the key to try and unpress it and nothing is helping.

Is there a way to disable it in software?  I'd be happy remapping my Caps Caps Lock to be a Command key if need be, but I want to make the Mac ignore the fact that the left Command key is always pressed.

One thing is remapping a key.  It's another thing altogether to ignore a key that's a modifier key.  This is not the biggest issue, however.

Short answer:  You need to take it in for repairs and at the very minimum have it cleaned with an ultrasonic cleaner or some sort of solvent for electronics.

The problem is not the alcohol in the beer, but the sugars and other ingredients that can short out components.  You are already seeing that because you have shorted out the electrical contacts for the Command key making it appear it's pressed.

This is not a "software fix" per se because the issue is a physical one - you have physically shorted the connections so no matter what happens, the system is going to see that key pressed because, it is.

You will most likely have to get the keyboard replaced.


Can I retrieve the configuration data of the standard iPhone weather app? Can I retrieve the configuration data of the standard iPhone weather app?

There is a town selected that I don't remember having ever selected and I would like to find out when it has been selected, to figure out who did it…

The configuration information is stored in

/var/mobile/Library/Preferences/com.apple.weather.plist

This single property list contains all the preferences, including a 'Cities' array which holds info about each of the defined cities.

Whilst each city does have an 'UpdateTime' it doesn't contain when each city was selected and since all the cities are saved in the same file you can't use the date modified to tell when a city was selected.


How to delete Google apps from my launchpad? After I have downloaded Google Chrome because my Safari wasn't finding servers, multiple google apps appeared on my launchpad that I can't delete. I uploaded a picture so you understand what I'm talking about: http://i.imgur.com/KWy1yFV.png

When I click on them, they open and instantly close.

MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Mid 2014)

Type following in Chrome address bar

chrome://apps/

Now when you right click you will have the option to remove the app.


Where are iTunes smart playlists stored on disk? I want to create a Best albums smart playlist containing a somewhat reasonable number of songs :

the rule Album rating is greater than ★★★ result in a 221 songs playlist.
wheareas the rule Album rating is greater than ★★ result in a 4000+ songs playlist.

I understand why those numbers, but still I would prefer that the resulting playlist contains ~1000 songs : hence my need to have access to the smart playlist file definition so I can overwrite the ratings representation inside.

Other approach tried : activate half star ratings (to create a 'greater than 3.5 stars' rule), but if half star is activated for song rating in the main window, it is not the case for the smart playlist dialog.

In the smart playlist edit panel, just specify a max limit for the number of songs (eg: max 1,000 songs or max 4GB), and also choose that it should choose the highest rated songs to reach that limit.


Son changed password on iPad, need to recover Pages document My son changed the password on his iPad and promptly forgot the new one... He was working on a lengthy document in Pages on it and was hoping to recover the work since his last save to iDisk.  Will he lose this work if we reset the iPad in iTunes?  Any way to transfer the file from iPad to iTunes (it doesn't appear in the list of documents that we can transfer over)?

Since necessity is the mother of invention, I've found my own solution...

Sync'd iPad with iTunes as usual, restored iPad to factory settings, then restored iPad from backup.

I feel like a fool for not seeing this off the bat, but if you knew this boy, you'd know what was at stake with him losing his work.  I have a feeling that he won't set anymore passcodes on his iPad nor will he forget to backup to iDisk.


Code Signing: Where is the "encrypted hash" of a signed blob? Reading the developer docu about Code Signing, it says in section Digital Signatures and Signed Code:

  To create a digital signature, the signing software computes a special
  type of checksum called a hash (or digest) based on a piece of data or
  code and encrypts that hash with the signer’s private key. This
  encrypted hash is called a signature.

  To verify that signature, the verifying software computes a hash of
  the data or code. It then uses the signer’s public key to decrypt the
  signature, thus obtaining the original hash as computed by the signer.
  If the two hashes match, the data has not been modified since it was
  signed by someone in possession of the signer’s private key.

  Signed code contains several digital signatures:

  If the code is universal, the object code for each slice
  (architecture) is signed separately. This signature is stored within
  the binary file itself.
  Various components of the application bundle
  (such as the Info.plist file, if there is one) are also signed. These
  signatures are stored in a file called _CodeSignature/CodeResources
  within the bundle.

After some fiddling, I know the following:

Inside the binary, I got the CodeDirectory (0xfade0c02) containing all SHA-1 hashes or checksums of the Bundle, e.g. Info.plist etc.
Inside the bundle, I got the _CodeSignature directory with the CodeResources file, which - as the cited paragraph above mentions - should contain all signatures. However, the CodeResources only contains base64 encoded SHA-1 hashes of several files.
Inside the binary, I've got some certificates, which I can extract using codesign -d --extract-certificates <binary> - generating codesign0, codesign1 etc. These certificates actually are CMS Signatures (0xfade0b01) that do contain certificate signatures. Looking up CMS I get Cryptographic Message Syntax, which is used to sign data.

Now the paragraph tells me that some hash has to be stored as a signature (encrypted hash) in the binary or in the CodeResources file.

I suspect that codesign uses one of the certificates/CMS Signatures to extract the public key, then decrypts a signature (encrypted hash) and compares the output to the original hash of a given file, e.g. Info.plist.

So my question is: Where is this signature (encrypted hash)? Is it the signature inside a certificate/CMS Signature? Or is it somewhere else?

Here is the basic test I made.

I have OS X 10.10 installed on a external disk under volume name "Steelhead3". I entered the following commands.

cd "/Volumes/Steelhead3/Applications/Utilities"
sudo codesign -fs - "Boot Camp Assistant.app"

I then made a copy of the folder "Boot Camp Assistant.app". Next, I edited the "/Volumes/Steelhead3/Applications/Utilities/Boot Camp Assistant.app/Contents/Info.plist" and made a small change regarding the model Macs that can make the Windows USB installer.

At this point I reran the following commands.

cd "/Volumes/Steelhead3/Applications/Utilities"
sudo codesign -fs - "Boot Camp Assistant.app"

From here I booted to Windows and used the Windiff.exe application to compare the files. I expected to see the change made to the "Info.plist" files, which I did. Also, the "/Volumes/Steelhead3/Applications/Utilities/Boot Camp Assistant.app/Contents/MacOs/Boot Camp Assistant" files appeared to have changed. Since this is a binary file, I first converted the before and after versions to hex characters, then Windiff.exe was used to find the differences. Below is the only differences.

It appears the only difference is a 20 byte change in the the executable binary file. I assume this is where the hash is stored. All other files were unchanged.


How do I "say . . . using" in Javascript for Automation? In Applescript, I can specify the voice the system uses to speak text as follows:

say "Hello" using "Alex"

In Javascript, I can do something similar:

var ScriptEditor = Application("Script Editor");
ScriptEditor.includeStandardAdditions = true;

ScriptEditor.say("Hello!")

But I don't know how to specify the specific voice; I always have to use the system. Is there a way to specify the using parameter, or another version of say that allows the code to specify the voice?

Apple's documentation describes how to call commands which have both direct parameters (the text) and named parameters (the using). In this case, you would do this:

var ScriptEditor = Application("Script Editor");
ScriptEditor.includeStandardAdditions = true;

ScriptEditor.say("Hello", {using: "Alex"})


How to have clipboard holding many entries available simultaneously...? I am looking for:
There are many hot words which I often need to type while using my Apple MacBook Pro/Snow Leopard like say my desktop machine name, some other host names etc. Now, right now, I copy this and paste it wherever I need, but I would like these hot words to be all the time copied and be available like if I use a shortcut key + d, this should paste desktop machine name etc..

I don't know, if such a thing exists, but looks like a commonly needed requirement and nice to have thing.

Any ideas? Can I install any 3rd party clipboard software etc?

You have two main options for a situation like this.

There are clipboard managers that would help you. They generally don't allow multiple things in the clipboard at the same time, but they do allow you to easily paste anything that has been copied recently. So, you could copy everything you need (individually) and then select what you want and paste it.

ClipMenu is a typical clipboard manager.

The other option is a text expansion utility, which I think would suit your needs better. These are tools that let you type something short and automatically change it to something longer. For example, you could type dd and it would change it to the desktop machine name.

My favorite text expansion utility is TextExpander.


How to delete fonts that are erroneously »in use«? There is this issue on OSX that often when you put a font file into the trash, it can't be emptied as the system thinks the font is still in use:

However, I've uninstalled it using Font Book, I've quit any application that might still be holding on to the font, including the Finder, but it's still reported as being in use. The only thing that helps is completely logging out and back in again, but that's not right. There has to be a better way. Has anyone figured this out?

(I know this isn't exactly a serious problem but it's nagging me.)

You could force remove it using Terminal, if it really bothers you.

Example:
rm /Users/akiekintveld/.Trash/font.ttf
Would remove a file named "font.ttf" from your trash.


How to manage Skim Notes within DevonThink? I see that there are a lot of posts about automated ways to get annotations and notes from Skim PDFs into DevonThink. However, it seems like there's no easy way to automate that, which is fine. I usually read and highlight a PDF all in one shot, so I don't mind just doing "Export Notes to Text" in Skim when I'm done going through a PDF.

Once I do that, what's the best way to manage Skim Notes?

What's the best way to manually import Skim Notes into DevonThink? Do I need to "Export Notes as Text" first?
Is there a way to connect the Skim Notes text file with the corresponding PDF that I also have in my DevonThink database?
I'd like to use the auto See Also/Classify thing with the Skim Notes only, as a way for DevonThink to tell me what PDFs are related, but I want DevonThink to do that using ONLY my highlights (i.e. the parts of the PDF I deemed to be most important). What's the best way to do this?

In Skim preferences, select "Automatically save Skim notes backups." This will ensure that a .skim file is saved next to the PDF. Now, index the PDF & its .skim companion in DevonThink. Select the .skim file and DevonThink will show its contents, i.e. the annotations alone without the PDF.

Use the "see also" feature in DevonThink on this .skim file.


External monitor resolution setting is lost after MacBook "wakes up" from sleep I have recently purchased an external monitor that I am connecting to my MacBook Pro (Late 2009) using the MiniDisplay-to-VGA adapter. I have both the external monitor and the MacBook's monitor set to "Best Available" resolution in OS X Lion. Whenever the computer "wakes up" from its sleeping state, the resolution setting for the external monitor is "forgotten". Every time the computer "wakes up", the resolution of the external monitor is set to match the MacBook's monitor.

The only reason I am using the VGA cable rather than a DVI cable, is because I do not have the MiniDisplay-to-DVI adapter. Will switching to DVI solve the problem? Is there any known way to solve this issue other than getting a utility to reset the resolution manually every time?

Thanks.

I recommend you reset your NVRAM. This chip stores information on screen resolution and can often become corrupted. You can reset it by starting your Mac while holding down cmd + opt + P + R . You should hear the Mac chime, restart and chime a second time. Then you can release the keys you are holding. More info here.


What does 9:41 mean? As you may have noticed, the time in iPhone/iPad advertisements has always been 9:42 am, and it's recently (?) switched to 9:41.

Why the original 9:42, and also, why the switch?

I've heard it was used because that was the approximate time at which the iPad was revealed originally, and given the Apple attention to detail, the clock had to match up. It was used in everything else because a lot of the same materials were used in the presentations as in the ads.


How do I change Software Update server to official one on OS X Lion (or later)? I recently bought a new macbook pro with Lion, had some problems and had it checked by Apple people. It was returned to me but the software update server seems to have been changed and will not update. How can I change to the official one? I would like to avoid the 2 hour drive.
Thanks!!

It depends on exactly how they changed the update server setting.  If they did the obvious thing, this should delete the setting (so it'll go back to normal):

sudo defaults delete /Library/Preferences/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate CatalogURL

If that doesn't work, it's possible it's configured as a per-user (rather than system-wide) setting, in which case this should do it:

defaults delete com.apple.SoftwareUpdate CatalogURL


Safari URL bar discoloration In Safari (12.0.3 and probably earlier) the URL bar can have an element of discoloration. I think is partially driven by the content/colors of the page being displayed as the amount of discoloration changes from page to page and appears to be stronger for pages that have darker colors below the section that is discolored.

Unfortunately this discoloration can mimic the symptoms of macula degeneration if you are glancing at this spot on the screen.  As such I want to get rid of it.

How can I turn this discoloration off?

System Prefs > Accessibility > Display > Reduce Transparency.

You can search it with 'reduce'.


WindowServer and kerneltask using a lot of CPU in Big Sur I have seen these two questions
WindowServer high CPU usage, spikes when moving cursor on M1 MacBook Big Sur
MacBook Pro - High CPU Under Low Workload
and I have the same problem with WindowServer on both a Macbook Pro 16" and an Macbook Air 2020, but I also have problems with kernel_task.
According to the script here https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/393207/31395 my Air's total awake time since last restart is 1 day, 22:07:19.374478 (uptime returns 9 days, 13:59, 5 users, load averages: 5,04 5,11 4,79).
Looking in Activity Monitor, WindowServer has used 42h05m since last restart (since the awake time is 46 hours, that is over 90 % on average) while kernel_task 14h19m ≈ 31 % (I will update this question with corresponding number for my MBP later on).
I mostly use this machine for web browsing and office tasks. These numbers are completely unreasonable! The computer is updated and reasonably "clean". Since I have the same problem on my other machine I don't think it is anything specific to this setup.
The only slightly odd usage is that I use Firefox - a well known resource hog - and it is hard to test if Firefox is the culprit since I need to use it 80-90 % of the time. A different browser isn't really an option.
Any ideas what might be going on here?

I will copy my answer from WindowServer high CPU usage, spikes when moving cursor on M1 MacBook Big Sur, as the problem and probable cause appear to be the same:
Big Sur has many known issues related to UI performance. It’s almost certain that you’re experiencing one of these bugs, and so you’re unlikely to be able to do much about it yourself. We can try to confirm or refute this hypothesis if you’d like.
Does this occur if you’re running in Safe Mode? (Shift during boot) If so, do the following in Safe Mode. Otherwise, do it when the problem occurs.

Run the following command to enable kernel symbolication: sudo nvram boot-args="keepsyms=1" (this may require you to disable SIP first).
Reboot your machine and don’t open any apps except for Terminal.
Do the minimum required in order to reproduce the problem.
In Terminal, run the following, making sure you’re only running it during the window of time that you experience the system slowdown. (In particular, do NOT have Activity Monitor running when you do this.): sudo spindump -reveal -noProcessingWhileSampling
After waiting for 10 seconds to collect a sample and another minute or two to symbolicate and format, you’ll get a file in /tmp/spindump.txt that contains a stackshot of every process.
Upload the file to PasteBin or some equivalent place and we can take a look to see what’s causing the CPU usage spikes.


How to disable the Macbook internal display and only use the external display on Snow Leopard? Preferably without having to reboot etc, use magnets, or open/close the lid + waking it via USB peripherals I would like to have my MacBook display in "projector only" mode. Ideally, I'd like to be able to move already-on MacBook from the lounge to my desk, plug in the external display, and have it work with minimal fuss while still using the MacBook keyboard and track-pad.

Windows 7 really nailed this feature. Winkey + P is all you need to swap between modes.

Is it possible to disable the Macbook display and use only the external display, a la Windows 7's projector only mode?

You might want to disable it by turning down the brightness to zero and put it in clone display mode. I think it would be equivalent. It is a trivial answer but it should work.


Wrong Application Name when Asking for Privacy Permissions? This seems like an odd one. I installed iTerm2 shortly after doing a fresh install of Big Sur on my laptop. A bit after that, I installed VMware Fusion and went on with my life. Tonight, I wanted to check something in my Downloads directly in iTerm2, so I did a simple ls ~/Downloads and the privacy permissions popup appeared, saying

"VMware Fusion" would like to access file in your Downloads folder.

Since I wasn't actively using VMware Fusion -- the VM was paused and hadn't been used since I last rebooted a few hours earlier -- I said "Don't Allow" and went back to iTerm2, which promptly denied my viewing of my ~/Downloads directory. Odd.
I stopped both apps, then went into the Privacy tab and deleted all "Files and Folders" permissions for both VMware Fusion and iTerm2, then restarted iTerm2. Went into ~/Downloads again and got the same pop-up asking for permission for VMware Fusion to access the Downloads folder. Started VMware Fusion up and it asked for permission to view files in ~/Documents.
I'm kind of stuck on this one and not sure how to go about debugging it. I'm guessing that VMware may have stomped on some identifier that iTerm2 uses in the Privacy settings, but I'm not sure how to go about untangling this. I'm inclined try uninstalling VMware Fusion, then try it, but I'm wondering if there's something else I can do first, before taking that step.

For what it's worth, removing VMware Fusion, then reinstalling it seems to have fixed the issue.


How to get Time Machine to include files in /var/log in a backup I have Apache2 web access logs that are created in /var/log/apache2/ that I want to preserve forever so that a web statistics analyser can process them and show me how page hits are changing over a period of months.  I use Time Machine as a backup, and hoped that it would backup these log files too, but have now discovered that they are not included (tmutil confirms that the individual files are excluded).  There are thousands of log files (one per day, for each of 10 virtual hosts) and at least 10 are generated each new day, so manually including a rule for each is not possible.  Is there a way to tell Time Machine to include the whole of /var/log/apache2 and its sub-directories (the TM Preference Pane makes it easy to exclude folders, but I don't see  a way of telling it to include folders)?

I'm running Mac OS X 10.10 on a recent Mac Mini and using the MacPorts version of Apache, but I doubt that my question is specific to this hardware/software.

Time Machine is designed around ease of use, rather than utility. It does not backup everything on the hard drive, typically not including files that are not necessary to recover from a failure. Log files seem to fit this category.

The first option is to see if you can remove the exclusion using tmutil, which is the commandline version of Time Machine.

  tmutil removeexclusion "/var/log/apache2"

Typically, this command is used for exclusions the user has created, but its worth a try.

The other option is to use something like chron and bash (or Automator) to simply compress the log files into an archive (zip file) and place the archive in your documents folder. I would suggest that you perhaps name your archive file with the date, so Time Machine does not assume they are duplicate or simply newer versions of the same file.


Wake on demand no more working I was using Wake on Demand (not WOL) to access my mac remotely.
I was able to turn in on from LAN or internet through SSH, VNC or HTTP.
The problems came when I upgraded to Mountain Lion.
Initially It was working for a small amount of time after the computer was set to sleep: after about half an hour it wouldn't turn on.
Then, a few weeks later, as soon as it went to sleep there was no way to wake it up. I recently upgraded to Mavericks with the hope that it would have solved the problem but nothing has changed.

I tried all the possible solutions in this article but nothing helped me. In the last updates there are some workarounds but those are not what I want: they are simply keeping the mac on with the screen off, not sleeping.
Is there anyone who managed to use the real wake on demand after Mountain Lion?

Thank you.

Update:
Today, after the update 10.9.2, wake on demand suddenly started working again.

Today, after the update 10.9.2, wake on demand suddenly started working again.

It appears this problem has been solved for the questioner by upgrading to OS X 10.9.2.

This appears to be a widely reported problem but no obvious cause or answers are documented.


Time Machine Server - one MBP can back up, another can't. Why? So I have Server 5.2 running on a Mac mini, running OS X 10.11.6.

I have two MacBook Pros trying to use it as a Time Machine server; the backup disk is offered to both MBPs when setting up Time Machine. I select Encrypted backups on both MBPs, and use the same credentials to connect to the disk on both, then enter encryption passwords for both.

Time Machine is set up successfully on both MBPs. They also both have SMB and AFP enabled under File Sharing.

One MBP backs up using Time Machine just fine, the other says that the backup fails because the network username and password are wrong. It suggests re-adding the backup disk. I've done this countless times, and triple-checked the credentials used on the second MBP, but I can't get the backup to work.

Any suggestions to advice? Thank you!

So, the problem was that the second MBP needed the Time Machine server credentials User in all lower case. The Mac mini has a local user, let's say Arthur. I configured the second MBP to use the credentials Arthur/(a password) and the connection wouldn't work. Configuring it as arthur/(a password) worked just fine.

Thanks to Allan I found this by mounting two volumes from the Mac mini, one using SMB and one using AFP, and noticed that the AFP mount showed the user as 'arthur', and the SMB showed the user as 'Arthur', even though I'd logged in as Arthur for both mounts.


How do I sync Finder Tags across Macs Between an iMac and MacBook Air, I use Finder Tags extensively. Normally, they sync without effort on my part. The Finder Tags are no longer syncing automatically. How can I 'force' synchronization and control that the MacBook Air updates the iMac and not the other way around?

Here is a manually solution: open Finder -> preferences -> Tags. Look at the 'Favorite Tags' part, then you can drag/delete/add tags to your current right click menu (in your current mac)