Download iPhoto for Yosemite? How can I download the last iPhoto version for Yosemite?

Looks like any links are invalid now that Photos is out.

And upgrading a pre-Yosemite version does not work. There is an update button but it does not do anything but disable itself when clicked.

Have you purchased the iPhoto? If yes, you should see it in App Store > Purchases tab.

EDIT: The problem was: Clicking on "Update" button didn't update application.

Solution: Delete and redownload application.


How to forward iPhone messages to Macbook or iPod? I'm currently studying abroad in England. I have an iPod touch, iPhone 5, and Macbook Air. I recently took the SIM card out of my iPhone and received a UK Sim card so I can use data and texting here in London. However, I obviously got a new phone number  with that. I was fine with having a new phone number and simply using iMessage on my laptop or iPod touch seeing as all my friends from home have that. However, my US messages are not working now that my iPhone is associated with a new number. Anyone have a solution?

Your icloud should still work - meaning FaceTime should still be operational - for the rest you have to rely on your MacBook and iPod - iPhone with a new number is useless - or just use your US sim knowing that you will be charged long distance roaming etc.  I'm an expat a long time - we have our limits in communicating back home - stay with your MacBook. Safe and not sorry


Backup of "untitled" file recoverable? The answer might be different for different apps.  (For example, TextEdit works with the O.S. to re-open files not "saved" even after a reboot, while LibreOffice does things much differently.)

If one has been working on a new document, and inadvertently closes the window without saving, how (if possible) would one find the partially complete file in a Time Machine backup?  Or in a temporary local backup?

It depends on the application, but a program like TextEdit, that you mention, names unsaved documents as "Untitled xx" where xx is a number. You can then search for that name to recover the document from backups.

For example on many systems the untitled document would be saved in:

~/Library/Mobile Documents/com~apple~TextEdit/Documents/Untitled xx.rtf

If you have a Mac where the system has been shut down, and open windows have been auto saved, and you're looking at the disk from a different Mac for recovery, you'll find the auto saved window information in:

~/Library/Containers/com.apple.TextEdit/Data/Library/Saved Application State/com.apple.TextEdit.savedState

However, those files are not immediately readable as RTF files. The easiest way to restore them is to place them there on another Mac, and then start up TextEdit to restore them.


Keyboard shortcuts for resizing windows on mac I'm looking for the Mac keyboard shortcut equivalent of "windows key + left/right/top arrow" to resize windows (not split view)

There is possibility to move window left or to right but I am not aware of quadrant.
If one hovers over resize button (green circle in upper left corner of window) there are different possibilities displayed depending on position and size of window. By default there should be keyboard shortcuts assigned at least to two of them:

Tile Window to Left of Screen ⌃⌘←
Tile Window to Right of Screen ⌃⌘→

These are for split view. However, there are other options, among them are:

Move Window to Left Side of Screen
Move Window to Right Side of Screen

For those one needs to assign keyboard shortcuts. System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts > App Shortucts, click on +, keep 'All applications', enter exact text as above into 'Menu Title' and assign shortcut in 'Keyboard Shortcut'. I personally have followed the path of built-in which start with ⌃⌘. For left it's ⌃⌘L and for right it's ⌃⌘R.
There is also built-in keyboard shortcut to toggle full screen: ⌃⌘F. Combined with moving window to left and right side it's covers basic needs.
There are also options Zoom and Revert to which one can assign keyboard shortcuts in similar fashion.
After assigning shortcuts and while hovering over resize button my machine displays following (interesting to note that full screen toggle shortcut is not displayed)

For more elaborate window arrangements I use paid app Magnet.


Using a Creative Live Chat Cam with Skype I am trying to set up a Creative Live Chat Cam on a Mac mini to use with Skype. How do I get this combination to work?

Your Camera is a UVC -Universal Video Camera type.

In English that means you should just plug it in and it will work.

Following steps should do it:

Plug the camera in..

Open Skype

If Skype does not auto-identify the camera (asking you if you want to use it)

Go to the Skype Preferences

Go to the Audio Video

There you should be able to select the camera + Microphone + Speakers

You will see your self if all worked.


How to make 'grep' work like in Ubuntu? I tried to use grep to match one pattern on the terminal, but n
o any result comes out.

$ grep -R 'networks'
grep: warning: recursive search of stdin

I knew grep on macOS is based on BSD while grep on Ubuntu is based on GNU.

How to make 'grep' work on macOS like in Ubuntu?

When the -R option is used, MacOS grep requires you to explicitly give it a directory to search; for example, specify . to recursively search the current directory:

grep -R 'networks' .


Can emails be recovered on Iphone 5s? Is it possible to recover emails from an iPhone 5s that completely disappeared the other day? It is through Outlook Express, have AT&T and it is IOS 7.0.1 version. They were not deleted. I was on my phone back and forth from facebook to email to safari and the "manage your storage" message kept popping up. A couple hours earlier, I had deleted some photos from photo roll and text messages to make more room and I was also deleting unwanted emails thinking that would help (which upon further investigation it does not) because I knew my storage was low. I had deleted like almost 2000 emails from Hotmail earlier and I think later when I went into Hotmail it picked up other emails that must have been "hanging" out there and when there was room they started updating or downloading but it was when I went into outlook later that 850 emails just disappeared. They are not in trash. I looked into all those iPhone recovery downloads but it doesn't look like they can get emails back. Would iTunes backup work somehow?! Thanks

Try to find your archive folder, the emails should be in there and once you find them they can be moved to your inbox.


How can I add another Directory Admin on OpenDirectory Right now, I am planning to have another account on my OpenDirectory on our Mac Server. How can I add another Directory Admin on OpenDirectory?

I already added a user but I thinks it's not it. I already read some articles about adding users but I can't find one about Adding Another Directory Admin on OpenDirectory.

You can add a second Directory Admin by either using the Server.app GUI or via command line to your OD server.

GUI:

Open Server.app and enable View > Show System Accounts
In the sidebar choose Accounts > Users
Click the + button at the bottom to add a new user:

Choose Local Network Directory for Directory, enter all details and save the user.
Right-click the new user > Advanced Options... and add or modify further details:

Right-click the new user > Edit User... and remove all group memberships except Administrators, Open Directory Users and Open Directory Administrators

More or less without GUI:

Use a predefined/precreated ldif file and import it:

0x0A 0x5C 0x3A 0x2C dsRecTypeStandard:Users 11 dsAttrTypeStandard:Expire dsAttrTypeStandard:Change dsAttrTypeStandard:FirstName dsAttrTypeStandard:UserShell dsAttrTypeStandard:GeneratedUID dsAttrTypeStandard:PrimaryGroupID dsAttrTypeStandard:RecordName dsAttrTypeStandard:UniqueID dsAttrTypeStandard:LastName dsAttrTypeStandard:RealName dsAttrTypeStandard:NFSHomeDirectory
0:0:Directory:/bin/tcsh:24DCA574-8E9D-4F1A-84B5-79A18882F5CF:20:diradmin3:1002:Administrator3:Directory Administrator3:/private/var/root

The UUID (24DCA574-8E9D...) has been generated with uuidgen. Also change UID, all names and other details.
Import the file with:

dsimport /Users/user/Desktop/file.ldif /LDAPv3/127.0.0.1 O -u diradmin -p <diradmin_password>

add/modify password and group memberships of the new diradmin3 with tools like dscl or the GUI.


How to determine if there are public transit apps for your region? In iOS 6, the built-in Maps application no longer provides public transportation information.  Instead, it kicks you to 3rd party apps that provide that functionality.  I'm currently running iOS 5, and won't update until I know there's a way to easily look up bus routes under iOS 6.  How can I determine if there are 3rd party transit apps that cover my region?

I'm being deliberately vague on the region I'm living in, as I want a generic answer that will be useful to public transit users in all regions.

This question is outdated as Apple Maps (iOS 10) now supports transit but an alternative to Apple Maps is Google Maps which in my experience is the best way to find transit to get from A to B but I encourage you to compare both based on where you live.


Display message box only if "filter finder items" finds an item (Automator) Currently, I have a workflow going like this:

When files and folders added to downloads
Filter finder items where kind = music
Open finder items with ID3 tag editor
Ask for confirmation "Click OK when tags edited"
Filter finder items where kind = music (for safety)
Move finder items to "Itunes Autoadd" folder

However, even when I download a file that is not music (".dmg" file) the messagebox will still display.

How do I make it so the messagebox only displays when a music file is found?

Thanks!

It is doing the right thing.

There is no decision making being done so the dialog box will appear every time. To fix it, you will need to add an AppleScript action as discussed here

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/509298?start=0&tstart=0

So, if the filter returns an empty list {} then it quits.

Here is what it looks like...


Mount a previously internal and encrypted HDD as an external drive I upgraded the hard drive on my late 2015 iMac from the fusion drive that came with it to a 1TB Samsung SSD. My SSD has a fresh install of macOS and I planned on using my fusion drive as an external drive with a SATA to USB case, so I didn’t copy any of my files from the fusion drive expecting to be able to just plug it into the iMac later.

But it doesn’t get recognized at all, not even in disk utility. I’m assuming it’s due to the fusion drive being encrypted with the macOS that was installed on the fusion drive itself. Is there any way I can mount that drive to access my data? Or would I have to open up the iMac again and reinstall the fusion drive, copy my files properly, then reinstall the SSD?

You seem to be under the impression that the hard drive is the Fusion Drive - that is not the case. The Fusion Drive is a "virtual drive" consisting of both the hard drive as well as the internal SSD that was factory installed in your iMac.

You cannot remove just the hard drive from the iMac and expect to be able to mount it externally on other computers and copy files off it. You will need the data from the internal SSD to be able to do that. The easiest way to do this is to mount it in the same iMac that it came from.

If you during reinstallation of macOS cleared the internal SSD of the iMac, you have effectively wiped your data - and you won't be able to mount the external hard drive. You will need to do data recovery on the drive to be able to get anything out.

If you haven't cleared the internal SSD, it should be possible to mount the Fusion Drive again. It is however usually very cumbersome to do so if you have altered the disk configuration by adding another internal SSD. If you use any of the standard tools for fusing the Fusion Drive (like "diskutil resetFusion" on Mojave), you'll not only loose your data - but it will probably just error out stating that you have a non-standard disk configuration.

I would advise simply removing the new SSD from the iMac, putting back the hard drive. Cross your fingers and hope everything boots up - and then copy off any data you want to save. Then you install the new SSD again.


Macbook Pro Late 2016 Monitor Flicking when using Viber video I have the latest Macbook Pro 2016 with the touchbar.

My setup is:

AMD Radeon Pro 450
2,6 GHz Intel Core i7
16 GB 2133 MHz LPDDR3

When I make a viber video call if I move any window around the screen the monitor is flicking. Strangely, it is not the Viber window or the video flicking but the whole screen. The colours are trembling and the windows seem to be broken/have a delay while moving them around the screen.

I already returned a Macbook Pro 2016 to Apple because of that and also because it had some other issues with the graphic card. The new one that they gave me has exactly the same behavior as the one that I returned.

Way to reproduce it:

Install the latest Viber
Open Viber and do a video call (cameras ON from both sides)
During the Video call move around the screen some Finder or other applications windows.

Is it a general problem of the Hardware? Can one application (Viber) have such big impact to the graphics output and besides its own window affect the output of the whole screen?

With Skype video everything works fine.

This sounds a lot like GPU driver issues or application issues where the developers of the fiber app can fix things. Tons of libraries make hardware assumptions and might need to be updated for the new Apple hardware and GPU.

if this is something you can easily reproduce on new hardware, the chances of Apple or vibes fixing it are high. Unless you don't need the latest GPU and can exchange for the non touchbar Mac - I'd work with software side to get the bugs addressed even though that can be slow and frustrating and sometimes opaque as companies typically shield engineering staff from users with bugs to report.


Where is the SafariStand menu/preferences? Inspired by this answer I installed SafariStand (after installing SIMBAL) (following instrtuctions in the read me file

  How To Install
  - Install SIMBL 0.9.5 or later http://culater.net/software/SIMBL/SIMBL.php
  - Quit Safari.
  - move "SafariStand.bundle" into your SIMBL plugin folder.
  - Result path is "/Library/Application Support/SIMBL/Plugins/SafariStand.bundle".

and also in this website)

Now that the installation is done, I am unable to see the menu/icon of SafariStand There is not much documentation anywhere.

Where/how do I see the SafariStand settings window?

Look for the "Stand" menu to appear between the "Window" and "Help" menus in your top menu bar.


Mavericks 10.9.5 / MBP 17 2011 - system intermittently hangs when a USB mouse is plugged in This has happened to me a number of times (6-10).  I am not sure of the specific circumstances because it is not easily replicated.

I usually only use the trackpad, because I am just typing.  But sometimes I will plug in a USB mouse for a while.

This is what happens.

The system continues working but does not respond in any way to the mouse, trackpad or keyboard.  So it is essentially frozen, except for whatever was started when it happened.

The only way I have found to get out of it is to hold down the power button to reboot.  This is asking for trouble, not least because I am usually running a Postgres server on my machine - worries about database corruption though it has never happened yet.

So right now, I was watching a YouTube video, plugging the mouse in and it happened again.  YouTube happily continued playing the video, so its not like the computer is frozen, but its peripherals are locked out.

It's hard to tell from looking at the Console app, because there is a lot of stuff going there and you get all the diagnostics from the booting up sequence.  But I usually spot a USB related messages like this one.

2015-08-15 2:48:43.000 PM   kernel[0]   USBF:    264266.931    AppleUSBHubPort: Port 3 of Hub at 0xfa100000 about to terminate a busy device (USB Device) after waiting 10 seconds

(btw how do I run the console app from the command line?  sudo dmesg? doesn't seem to print out the same things at all).

What could be causing this?  The same mouse will work on the same port after reboot.  I am not sure if it's one particular mouse, I don't think so.  This has happened over a number of Mavericks maintenance releases, so it seems to be a persistent "feature" of my machine, not tied to a glitchy Mavericks update.

A clean install of Mavericks might help or even better, update to Yosemite for more bug fixes.


Transfer Company Apple Developer membership to Individual on iTunes App Store without repaying Basically doing the complete reverse as this.

I'm looking to dissolve my company and transfer my company's Apple Developer to myself i.e. individual (or to another newly incorporated entity). Is that even possible?

Has anyone managed such a transfer of Apple Developer membership?

p.s. I've just renewed the Developer membership a few weeks ago and now my co-founder and I have come to the conclusion we should dissolve our incorporation and in that case I will take ownership of the app. So the best case scenario is that I can somehow transfer the company Apple Developer membership to myself (Individual) without repaying.

Contrary to the transformation of an individual account to an organization account, there's no tool for initiating such a transformation on Apple's web site.

The only way to know if Apple will allow your to change your account type is to contact their support for clarification.

Note that it is always possible to transfer the app from the organization to a personal account for you by simply opening a new personal account (and thus paying again), and then using the ordinary tools for transferring apps between accounts.


USB-C cable for MacBook Pro 2019 16" - fully supported charging cables? I can see this question has been broached before but I want to clarify if anything has changed with the MBP 16", which is a 96w device.

Does this have any special additional standards / features that are required in the usb-c to usb-c cable?

I wanted to get a second backup cable. I am a big fan of Anker so I was thinking I would get theirs over the official cable. However, both Anker and Apple seem to be coy about fully supporting the MBP 2019 16".

For example, on the official Anker website the product listing doesn't mention the MBP 16" outright, and seems like it doesn't fully support it:

And even the official Apple store listing stops short of declaring support:

It's about six months since the MBP 16" came out.

Is everyone just behind updating their listings, or is it some special tech in there that is going to need a faster rated cable of some kind?

Update - Apple's Recommendation

It seems that Apple has a page which says you do in fact need the correct usb-c cable to get the 100w charging:

  For the best charging experience, you should use the USB-C charge cable that comes with your Mac notebook. If you use a higher wattage USB-C cable, your Mac will still charge normally. USB-C cables rated for 29W or 30W will work with any USB-C power adapter, but won't provide enough power when connected to a power adapter that is more than 61W, such as the 96W USB-C Power Adapter.

Update 2 - Thunderbolt 3

It also seems that USB-C is only a physical form and if you start looking at active thunderbolt 3 cables then they speak of being able to make use of the full 100w charging.

Anker have a product which says:

  High-Speed Charging: Supports rapid charging currents of up to 100W, with a compatible charger.

And the offical app store sells a 2m Belkin branded one which says:

  Take advantage of up to 100W power delivery

But as yet I have not found anybody discussing this, and if there is a real improvement, for charging, between a usb-c 3.1 cable vs an active thunderbolt 3 cable.

The price is certainly much higher, but is that just because it supports 40gb/s transfer instead of 10gb/s, and the high speed 100w charge is the same as a usb-c cable or is it really an improvement?

A USB-C cable is a USB-C cable.  Period.  Full stop.

It’s not going to be different for each different device.  The marketing  material that you’re seeing is for SEO or search engine optimization.  There’s no compatibility differences.

The USB-C port on your MacBook Pro 16” isn’t any different from the USB-C ports on any of those Mac laptops in the “specification page.”   Any cable with the the USB-C logo on it must support 10Gb/s transfer rate and support up to 100 watts of power.  Since the highest capacity charger Apple makes is 96W, any USB-C cable will work.

This is why you buy from reputable brands like Anker.  In order to put the USB logo on their products, they must pay the licensing fee and have the product tested that it meets the standards.  Yes, they cost more, but you can be assured they meet all the specifications.

Are there USB-C charge only cables or cables that don’t support alternate mode video or some other USB standard?  Yes, there are.  None will be USB “certified.”


CMD + Tab from fullscreen app switches to wrong application Sometimes I have a fullscreen app open , say safari. Then I want to switch to Terminal app thats open on the desktop( along with other apps like preview etc).
When I cmd tab from safari to terminal , the PREVIEW app comes to focus , and its window comes on top.

I am using macOS sierra 12.1

Any tips on how to fix this ?

Force quit Preview, since it has a bad habit of running in the background, like text edit and others. Only Terminal, Finder and Safari should only be seen with cmd+tab pressed in full screen view....good luck


Why isn't iPhone syncing Calendar items with Outlook? I am trying to set up a new (Verizon) iPhone to sync Contacts and Calender entries with Outlook 2007 on a Windows Vista Ultimate PC. The Contacts sync both ways, and calendar entries created in Outlook sync to the phone, but calendar entries created on the phone don't sync back to Outlook. I only have one calendar in Outlook. How can I get the calendar items created on the iPhone to sync back to Outlook?

The best troubleshooting I have found for this problem is iPhone, iPad, iPod touch: Troubleshooting contact and calendar syncing via USB on Windows(Apple), mainly due to the fact that it explains how to reset sync history in iTunes, a process that reevaluates the contents of both devices and tries to resync them.

Another good little trick is to try a "Replace data on this iPhone" near the bottom of the info tab, that will wipe the specific data set off the iPhone and replace it with the computers, often a good way to get them talking to each other again.


How to sync music videos when iCloud Music Library is enabled? I've just notice that after I subscribe to Apple Music (and enabled iCloud Music Library that comes with it), music videos in my iTunes Library are no longer syncing. That is whenever I added a new music video (manually by adding the file to iTunes and setting the type to Music Video), it no longer shows up in my iOS device – even after I plug it in.

I know that the music videos are not eligible to sync via iCloud. However, that said, plugging-in the device via USB should sync those that are not eligible for cloud syncing, right?

The question is, how can I add those non-iCloud music videos in my iTunes library to my iOS device?

I just got off the phone with Apple I have the same problem. according to the guy i spoke with Apple Music will only recognize music bought from iTunes. it part of their Digital Music Rights or some BS of that nature. im taking all of my music videos and i changed their setting to Tv Show. and re-sync with computer and everything is back


How to: Create a playlist with full albums for which one (or more) of its contained tracks has a 5 star rating? I am looking for a tool/script/javascript to run within windows against my iTunes database that will produce a playlist of "all albums for which I have given five stars to any one song."

I can easily get a play list of my 5 star songs (been there, done that) but now I want one that pulls in the remainder of each album that has a 5 star song.  Odds are, if I liked one song, I should listen to the rest of the album again and may find others I like as well.

I saw something like this a few months ago, but can't find the site.

http://ottodestruct.com/blog/2005/itunes-javascripts/ provides some useful scripts, but not quite what I'm looking for.

Any help out there?

Thanks!

Don't know of a precise solution to what you're asking, but here's a possible workaround.

Create a playlist of all the songs rated 5 stars. Change the viewable columns for the playlist to show the Album Rating. Set the rating of all of the albums to 5 stars (I believe, unfortunately, that this has to be done on Windows on an album-by-album basis). Now create a new playlist for all the albums with 5 stars.


Does a slow Time Machine disk affect general Mac performance? Say a Mac Pro tower has OS X + Apps installed on a blazing fast PCIe SSD. It also has Time Machine enabled on a slow 5400rpm mechanical drive. The TM drive is internal and connected at all times.

Will the relative slowness of the TM drive affect general performance when the Mac and its filesystem are being used strenuously? Are internally connected TM drives being being read/written to constantly?

I don't see why one would have anything to do with the other. Drives are not being constantly read from and written to unless something needs to do that. You can play a video game and once it's in RAM it'll stop reading the hard drive in many cases. A large movie on the other hand will constantly read from the hard drive. But even still, Time Machine and your external drive are separate from the other stuff your computer does. While yes, it'll take longer to backup and restore from it, that's the extent of the slowness you'll have from it.


Unable to redeem app codes with Configurator Configurator 1.4.2 (370). OS X 10.9

I have 20 iPads that I'm managing with Configurator.  I have purchased 20 licenses each for two apps through the Volume Purchase Program.  I have Prepared tablets with no trouble.  On the Supervise panel I assign the paid app to the devices and apply.  19/20 ipads complete successfully.

One iPad completes with an error for both apps: Unable to redeem code for "App Name". There are no codes left to redeem.

Looking at the licenses for each app it clearly says there is one remaining code available.

Do not import the initial VPP spreadsheet into Configurator!

After receiving the initial spreadsheet from VPP, you must redeem one of the codes from the spreadsheet in the iTunes App Store to 'purchase' the app you are distributing. Once you download the app and import it into Configurator, go back to the VPP site and re-download the spreadsheet. This spreadsheet will now have the word Redeemed in the cell where the download link used to be. Import only the second spreadsheet into Configurator.

Lastly, VPP Support is sometimes very forgiving with minor glitches like this and can get you back a license code, especially if the price of the app was substantial.


Unread Messages Badge Wrong in Dock I have a Macbook Pro 13" running El Capitan, purchased in February 2016. For the iMessage app, which I have saved in the Dock, the unread messages badge says there is one unread message and there's not. If I click and hold on the iMessage icon, it tells me which message is unread. And I have viewed all of the messages from that person. I tried quitting and reopening the app - that didn't fix it. I restarted my computer, and that does fix it, but the same issue arises again within a few days.

How can I fix this so the badge count is accurate?

I'm not great at using the Terminal. If you have a suggestion using the Terminal, please be very specific so I can replicate your suggestion easily.

EDIT: I just discovered that the badge count is wrong on the Messages app on my Mac if I have a text message (not an iMessage) unread on my iPhone.

That has happened to me. Try opening the app and clicking on the person who sent the last message (or simply click on all of your contacts). That should prove you have read all the messages and take away the badge. Hope this helps.


Shutdown keyboard shortcut on MacBook Pro with Touchbar So on previous Apple computers, one could shutdown using the keyboard shortcut Ctrl + Option + Cmd + Eject/Power. However, the new MacBook Pro w/ Touchbar has neither an eject nor a power key. Does this mean that the shortcut no longer exists for this computer?

Unfortunately it's not an option. There is an option for a sleep command, but there is nothing for Shut Down or Restart. Modifier/command keys on the sleep button don't work either.


Automatically scan/cycle through safari tabs? I have a mac mini setup on a tv to monitor our network.  I'd like to setup the monitoring pages we'd like to view in a set of tabs and have safari automatically cycle through them.  Something like how gas stations use to change video feeds; some sort of auto-switcher.

I looked at glims but it doesn't appear to have the functionality.  Is there a way to do this with base safari or does anyone know of a plugin that will do this behavior in Safari?

You can use this block of AppleScript to loop through your tabs on a window:

tell application "Safari"
    repeat
        repeat with i from (count of tabs of window 1) to 1 by -1
            set thisTab to tab i of window 1
            set current tab of window 1 to thisTab
            delay 1
        end repeat
    end repeat
end tell

This will go through all your tabs and switch every 1 second.  Just change the delay to change the time before each tab switches.


How to delete or change the words "My card" under my own name at the top of "Contacts"? (iOS 13.5.1) When I open "Contacts" on my iPhone XR running iOS 13.5.1, the person listed at the top is me. The index entry consists of three parts: my name in bold; an image I've chosen; and, under my name in smaller type, the words "My Card".
How can I delete or change the words "My Card"? (Note: this is all I want to change. I do not want to delete myself as a contact, or my name, or the image.)

You can’t change those words. They are hard coded into the application and it shows them to identify which contact in the app identifies you.
If you don’t want that contact to be identified as you, go into the preferences for the contacts app and choose a different card under “My Info”. If that doesn’t work, you can delete the card and re-add it, but without choosing the card as your contact details.


How do I create a blank desktop (on OS 10.7.5) I realize that this isn't a new feature but I've never needed to use different workspaces on my computer until now and I'm having a bit of trouble.

I'm able to add a new desktop by entering Mission Control and hovering over the translucent + that appears and clicking on it. My problem is that when I go to that newly-created space, it's a copy of the existing cluttered original desktop. How do I create a blank desktop?

The point of spaces is that they allow for different collections and configurations of application windows, and they do not allow for having different desktops; the desktop is not a window.

The desktop icons shown are simply file and folder items at a file system level that are displayed without requiring to be viewed through an application window. There is only a single desktop folder per user.

Taking both of these into account, what you want can't work for a number of reasons


Can I upgrade a previously purchased iPhone under the iPhone Upgrade Program? I bought an iPhone 6s Plus from Apple a couple of years ago. Can I enroll in the iPhone Upgrade Program and upgrade it to an iPhone 8/X?

Apple offers trade in for any phone you own outright. You have to pay monthly as part of an upgrade plan to get started, so unless you are paying Apple or the financing arranged through apple, you aren't part of the upgrade program which lets you get a new phone after 12 monthly payments.

You can easily check though - https://www.apple.com/shop/iphone/iphone-upgrade-program

I suppose it depends on what you mean by "upgrade" and what exact transaction you started a couple of years ago.


Macbook Pro Always print in grey scale Whenever I print something from my MacBook, the printout is always in color.

On my Windows machine, I could go to my printer preferences and set it to always print in grayscale. Then, no matter what application is printing, they always printed in black & white.

I have searched and I have not found a setting on my Mac which allows me to say "color prints are expensive so dont use color when printing".  In other words, "always use grayscale or black and white" when printing.  Where can I change my printing preferences to always use grayscale?

Current answer is wrong because Apple does not allow you to override the default. Still the answer is good for saving another preset.

Once you saved and selected that preset jus tbe sure that you keep Option/Alt key while pressint the print button, this will make MacOS remember your preset for the next usage --- mainly switcing the default to your current profile.


Typing in 2 different applications at the same time I am typing code on Google Docs through Chrome. What I want is for an app to enter whatever I type in the Google Docs into an open XCode editor. This way while I am done typing code I can check for errors. The hard way is to finish coding and select everything and then copy and paste.
In short: I am looking for an app that helps you type in 2 different applications at the same time.

As far as I know no, mostly due to the way the OS X window manager is setup you need to have the text area to have focus to receive key input (but not all key events).

However, this is not to say it's not possible, but I can't think of a way to do it 'live', as in sending the text char by char. If I was looking at doing it basically what I'd be trying to to basically keylog myself (list of keyloggers), and hack a script to switch to Chrome, dump the text and switch back to Xcode, but that's about as gracefully as I can think of and even that's a pretty ugly way to do it.

There's probably a nicer way to do it, but I'd start with the keylogger and build from there.


Apache on localhost doesn't recognize a website unless I include the full path to index.html Using MacOS 11.1 Big Sur, I'm developing static websites (ie just a standalone index.html, plus JavaScript and CSS files) on my localhost, with the files accessible under /Library/Web Server/Documents.
Unless I include the full path to the website, including the index.html section, the website fails to load:

I can even reproduce this with the standard "it works" file:

How can I get Apache to check for the presence of the index.html file?

As it appears you do not have any idea about what you broke earlier, you might run into other interesting problems later even if you figure out how to fix this.
I would strongly suggest you reinstall Apache to get back to its original configuration.  As this appears to be a part of the Big Sur installation (and not XCode) you probably need to boot to recovery mode and reinstall Big Sur from there to get the system back in a known state.
You may also be able to just restore the Apache folder from your time machine backup.
In the future I suggest you develop against something more controllable.  These days a good suggestion is using Docker with a suitable Apache container.  You are also strongly suggested to learn and use version control of your code, so you don't lose anything if you suffer from hardware failure.


Simulating a non-retina display Sometimes I need to test my designs (SVGs) in a regular, non-retina display, so I can feel how it looks for users behind such displays. What I normally do is using an old Windows notebook, but it'd be handy if I could do that quickly in my retina MacBook.

As suggested here, I tested the "Open in Low Resolution" option in Get Info:

However, it seems to me that the whole window (in this case, Safari) was blurred, just like as a massive anti-aliasing was applied. It doesn't seem that only the PPI was reduced.

My question is: is there a better way for simulating a non-retina display in my retina MacBook, or is this the best I can get?

Since you're a JavaScript programmer and you need to see your SVGs in a browser there are two potential solutions. First, you can use the chrome dev tools to simulate a non HiDPI (Retina Display) screen in the browser. Or you can use the EasyRes app to quickly switch the resolution of your entire display.

Solution 1

Steps to view websites as different devices on Google Chrome:

Open up desired page in Google Chrome and enable Developer Tools for the page ⌥+⌘+I
Click the device toolbar located in the upper left of the dev tools window ⌘+⇧+M
Click the type of device at the top toolbar and click on edit to add a new device to emulate
Now in your case you want to be able to emulate a non-retina display so would you add "Laptop with MDPI screen" to your list of emulated devices. If you wanted to emulate any other device add it from this list. Or for instance if you wanted to emulate a retina display you would choose "Laptop with HiDPI screen." Note: If you want to switch quickly between both resolutions to compare add "Laptop with HiDPI screen" as well.
Close the emulated devices window and click on the current device chrome is emulating (on the left side of the toolbar above the webpage) and switch it to "Laptop with MDPI screen"
To get a better view of the webpage, undock the dev tools window into a separate window by clicking the menu options (the three vertical dots on the right side of the dev tools window) and the selecting the leftmost option for the "Dock side." Or use this shortcut ⌘+⇧+D. This will pop out the dev tools into a separate window so you can view the whole page as if you were browsing normally
Then your browser should look like this. You can also change the zoom options of the emulated webpage in the toolbar to better suit your needs.

Solution 2

http://easyresapp.com/

Link to download EasyRes from Mac App Store.

Also, here is a link to a video demo of EasyRes


Applescript: Waiting till AFTER QuickTime Movie Recording Window is Active I'm trying to resize a Quicktime Movie Recording Window--only after it's active.
Is this possible?
The below script does work––if I hardcode the delay time.
Any help is appreciated.
Thanks

do shell script "open " & quoted form of "/Applications/QuickTime Player.app"

tell application "QuickTime Player"
        activate

        -- Start iPhone Screen cast of Game
        set newMovieRecording to new movie recording

        tell application "System Events"

            -- Wait for Movie Recording Window to Launch
            repeat until (exists window "Movie Recording" of application process "QuickTime Player")
                delay 2
            end repeat

            -- Resize Quicktime Window now that Window is active
            set position of first window of application process "QuickTime Player" to {1087, 497}
            set size of first window of application process "QuickTime Player" to {350, 621}
        end tell
    end tell

I'm trying to resize a Quicktime Movie Recording Window--only after it's active. Is this possible? The below script does work––if I hardcode the delay time.

Preamble/disclaimer:

▸ "active" is a vague term that has more than one meaning: I interpreted first to mean "focussed", then to mean "frontmost", and then to mean "exists"; but running your script up to the point where it creates a new movie recording, it turns out that the window created is immediately focussed, immediately frontmost, and, of course, it necessarily exists.

▸ It's not clear why you point out that you "hardcode" the delay time: was this because you would prefer to set the delay at run time, which implies being able to predict its value ahead of time; or was it because you don't want to use a delay at all, which would be a shame because that's exactly the way to do it (illustrated below).

The perceived problem

Looking through your script and testing it on my Macbook, it appears what you're wanting to set the size and position of the window that is created for the new movie recording, but finding that AppleScript will set these properties before the window is fully initialised (into a state where it is ready to record), during which time QuickTime resizes the window to accommodate the input source, thus "undoing" your adjustments.

Your script, as it is, doesn't in fact work, as it tests for the window's existence before advancing the script, and, as mentioned above in my preamble, the window exists immediately, which is to say that it gets created before it gets fully initialised (which is actually a really stupid thing for Apple to have done).  Therefore, when I ran it on my system, the issue described above is annoyingly persistent.

So, to me, the problem seems to how to workaround this jarring behaviour of seeing a window created one size, then grow, then shrink, and then grow again.
 Ideally, if it were me, I would like the window to just appear, set at the size and position of my choosing.

Assuming this describes your objective too, then...

Suggested solution

NB. If you just need to know the time, and not especially how the clock works, skip to the end where there's a script.  But, if you encounter any problems, do read the instruction manual before picking up the phone.

Firstly, we're not going to use System Events to adjust the frame of a window in an application that is scriptable, because scriptable applications provide a means to do this already, using the bounds property of a window object.  It is a four-item list of integers that equate to the coordinates of the window's top-left and its bottom-right corners.  Thus, if you wish to set the size of some window to {w, h} and position its top-left corner at coordinates {x, y}, you would do this:

set the bounds of some window to {x, y, x + w, y + h}

Secondly, there's no point hinging our script's delay time on a window's existence, because it will already exist on most systems.  If, on your system, you do find that an error is thrown when you reference the window of the new movie recording that tells you it can't find that particular window, i.e. error "QuickTime Player got an error: Can’t get window \"Movie Recording\"." number -1728 from window "Movie Recording", then you indeed do need to test for its existence.  Remember, however, this only that its properties are now gettable and settable, but not that this is the appropriate time to get and/or set them.

Therefore, thirdly, we need a new condition to test for that reliable tells us that we can adjust the window's properties and be confident QuickTime is done re-adjusting them itself, i.e. how can we tell that the window is done initialising ?

The answer to that is discovered like so:

Retrieve all the properties of the window and its document immediately after creating a new movie recording;
Instigate a delay of any length, but one that's definitely long enough to give the window time to initialise fully, like delay 5 or delay 10 (depending on your patience);
Retrieve all the properties of the window and its document a second time;
Compare.

Only two properties change between the times before and after the window's initialisation: the bounds property of the window (obviously, since this is what's annoying us); and the natural dimensions property of its document.

We can't reliably use the bounds property of the window because we won't know its initial or final values (either one alone would have been suitable for a viable test).  Thankfully, natural dimensions happens to sounds like a property that is probably size-related.  As it turns out, it's an extremely helpful size-related property: it doesn't tell us what the size of the window is at any point, but it does tell us the pixel resolution of the document's video input source.

If you wonder what QuickTime is doing that takes it so long to initialise a window...  It's looking for, and then loading, the feed from the video input source.  Therefore, when it first creates the window, the value of the document's natural dimensions is set at {0, 0}, i.e. there is no input source at present.  After everything is done and the movie is ready to record, it sets the natural dimensions to its final value.

This is when you know it's a good time to adjust the bounds of the window.

However...  This only eliminates one of the two jarring window resizes.  The solution to get rid of something you don't want on your screen is to hide it from view, or better still, make sure it doesn't appear on your screen in the first place.

There are three ways to open an application with AppleScript, and none of them involve a call to do shell script "open ...":

activate: This is the command everyone knows, because it's the one everyone uses, and so it's pervasive, and common, but this rarely means something is the best.  It opens an application if it isn't already open, makes it the frontmost application, bringing it into focus.  With some applications, it also triggers either a new window to be created if one doesn't exist already (some browsers, for example), or an "Open..." dialog to let you pick a document on your computer to open, if one isn't already (TextEdit, Preview, etc.).
launch: This command is underused because many people aren't aware that an application doesn't need to be at the front in order to accept AppleScript commands.  It opens an application, and places it and its windows on the desktop, but not at the front, and it doesn't steal focus.  This means that, whatever application one is currently working in will not get disturbed.
run: This is a command that, in fairness, isn't suitable for all applications, and for those that it is, is often called implicitly without the scripter realising.  That's because its purpose is to open an application without physical cues; in fact, if your dock doesn't have the indicator marking running applications, there would be zero visual trace of the application at all.  It opens, but in the background.  It's not frontmost, it's not focussed, it's not visible, which means its windows are hidden.  But most Apple applications don't need to be visible to be scripted.  However, if the application is already running and this command is called explicitly, it makes the application visible (but not frontmost).

Therefore, assuming that you are opening QuickTime where it wasn't previously running, this script implements all of the above:

property position : {1087, 497}
property size : {350, 621}

tell application "QuickTime Player"
    # if it is running then quit

    set doc to new movie recording
    repeat until doc's natural dimensions ≠ {0, 0}
        delay 0.5
    end repeat

    set win to the first window where its document = doc
    set {{x, y}, {w, h}} to {position, my size}
    set win's bounds to {x, y, x + w, y + h}

    activate
end tell

YES, there is a use of the delay command.  It's needed but it's not random: it's set to a minimal value purely to slow the rate at which AppleScript re-checks the natural dimensions property, which is a far cry from simply "guesstimating" a fixed delay that many people like to do in their scripts.

You will also notice it doesn't seem to use the run command I mentioned.  But hopefully, you recall that it can also get invoked implicitly, and this is one of those times: if QuickTime isn't already running, then simply starting the script with new movie recording will have stuff initialising in the background.  It becomes visible by sending the activate command (but don't forget, this isn't necessary, even for the actual recording and saving processes, so it's entirely possible to do a full screen recording, save it to a file, and close QuickTime without ever having to see that it was even open).

The line commented out is an optional extra to cater for instances where QuickTime is already open.  In that situation, even if it wasn't visible previously, the implicit run call will make the program visible.  However, quitting the application first, then running it will keep it incognito, providing there are no open documents that first need saving.

I really hope that's what you were after, because that was a long answer for me to write, and a long one for you to read (sorry about that).


internal SSD crash. macbook retina early 2016. Mac OS X el capitan My macbook crashed after an ongoing update.
I get the "?" file when rebooting it.
After several test i decided to reformat my SSD as it was impossible to install a new version of mac OS X on it.
At this point, the SSD is crashing the reformat or erase process from diskutil. when i launched them. The system is starting to unmount the drive. Then freezing after 30 seconds approximately.

Here are the details of the hard drive and the errors

the problem is disk0

the gpt show command is showing this

when i try to repair the volume

when i try to repair the disk

Thanks a lot for the support
Paul

If you’re not sure you are doing the full erase correctly, you can follow this guide. It will repartition the drive erasing everything on it and let you attempt a clean os installation.

https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/354246/5472

If you’re not ready for that, consider installing on to an external drive to back up any files and make sure it’s not something other than the SSD failing or needing to erase everything first.


How to tell if a bookmark already exists in Safari (v6.0.5) I find I often wrestle with the implementation of bookmarks in Safari.  Since I care to have my bookmarks simply and cleanly synchronized by iCloud, I continue to use the (inadequate) bookmark features of Safari.  My specific question is: Is there a way to tell if a site is already bookmarked?  I have 1000s of bookmarks, organized by folders.  It seems pretty straightforward for Safari to know when I hit CMD-D to initiate a bookmark that it already exists in my collection.  Am I missing this feature that is already implemented?

Safari has a bookmark search function in the top right corner of the bookmark menu window,

Just paste the new bookmark (or type first 3 letters) in to it and it will tell you if it already exist.

It is also useful in finding bookmarks in a very large library.


How to sync photos from iOS to MacBook just as songs sync from MacBook to iOS If I am at a camp site with no internet access, but with a wifi router, a macbook, and an iPhone, I can sync songs on iTunes from the macbook to the iPhone seamlessly. No need for cables, no need to go through Apple's servers.

How can I do the same with photos, but in the other direction? You're traveling, for instance, and you'd like to backup the photos on your phone to your macbook, wirelessly (wifi/bluetooth), automatically (just as with iTunes), and without going through iCloud. What is the recipe?

Okay, so both solutions are great and I am also shock why isnt your photos syncing across device if they are both connected with the same WiFi and logged in with the same iCloud account

However, these are my two suggestions:

Update both your iPhone and Mac device to the latest software version. Check this site: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204264 on how to do that and how to turn on iCloud for photos
Read a little about AirDrop. AirDrop is powerful. I use it daily and it is my style of transferring things between my Apple products. Please check this site: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204144 on how to use it. It is easy and VERY fast to use. It is probably the most fastest way to solve your problem

I hope this will solve your problem. Have a nice day !


Documents show have 4GB but there is no file in it As you can see below this image, the Documents shows that it have 4.11GB but on the right side, it have nothing. What should I do now? Is it the file gone or the file went to somewhere else?

The amount of data being shown is the total amount of storage the documents take up on your local disk. You are not seeing any files since it is only displaying large files, as seen by the tab bar below the "Documents" header where "Large Files" is selected. This means there are no large documents on your Mac, but there may be many small files that are taking up the 4.11 GB.

To see all the files that may be taking up storage on your Mac, click "File Browser" in the tab bar under the "Documents" header. This will show all the files in the root directory of your Mac, so you can clear them out. However, I would not recommend removing files from the "Library" folder unless you know what you are doing. This folder can contain system files that are essential to running certain apps.


Replacing MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2012) logic board As in the title, I have quite an old MacBook Pro. I bought it in 2013, and recently on some apps or webpages, at random times, my screen is glitching on the top side. I tried checking to see whether it's a screen issue or not, but when I tried to connect it to an external display, the glitch still appeared.

So I made an assumption its a graphics issue meaning a logic board issue.

My questions are:

What will happen when I change to a new logic board? I mean I am a custom PC user before, but I never tried to change a motherboard / logicboard on a laptop before. Will it have an issue with the software?
Can I replace my logic board with higher version of my current logic board?

ie.

My processor right now:  2.5 GHz Intel Core i5
I want to get: 3.1GHz dual-core Intel Core i7 processor (I'm not sure this type is compatible with mine since it's the latest core for "old" MacBook Pro in the site, but I hope you get what I mean)

The only logic boards guaranteed as compatible with the Mid 2012 13" Unibody MacBook Pros are either the 2.5Ghz (core i5) as you have now or the 2.9Ghz (core i7) unit also used for this model.

The cost of replacing these depends on where you're based, where you purchase from, and whether you buy a new, used or refurbished logic board.

Before considering such a replacement you should also consider whether you feel comfortable doing this yourself or not? You can review the MacBook Pro 13" Unibody Mid 2012 Logic Board Replacement page which details the tools required and steps involved. If you feel comfortable doing this, then you can decide whether or not purchasing a replacement logic board is an economical exercise or not.

Without knowing your location, I can't really recommend a retailer to purchase one from. However, most users who undertake this themselves will purchase replacement parts online from places such as eBay and Amazon, or from some specialised online retailers such as iFixit or We Love Macs.


Should I change my password if I see an iOS popup that someone tried to login from an unrecognized city? An iOS a popup just occurred that says someone tried to login from a city I do not recognize. In the past, I have changed my password when this has happened - but despite using a unique, multi-character password - these popups have occurred at least half-a-dozen times.

Posts from Apple such as referenced on this SE question mention that you should refuse requests you do not recognize. They also say you should change your password frequently - but what they don’t mention is whether it is very important to change your password every time.

Do these two-factor pop-ups only occur when someone has guessed your password? If you simply refuse the two-factor approval - does the “bot” or whatever hack you still know your password? And does that mean you should change your password every time this happpens because someone was able to figure it out? Or is there another interpretation and the account is actually safe by just declining their login?

There are a number of valid reasons why this could happen:

You're using a VPN service that is causing you to show up in a different city
You're being incorrectly geolocated to another city broadly within your region of the world.

Aside from that though (and assuming it's not a phishing message you see), it seems that someone is getting your password, and not only should you be changing it, but also trying to figure out whether you've got a keylogger, are getting phished, etc.


How can I get the Navionics App for iphone to utilise a third party gps When I am outside of wifi and cell coverage, or even by choice, how can you use a third party GPS?

From the frequently asked questions page, it appears Navionics has not tested third party GPS devices:

  Q. If I attach an external GPS to my iPod Touch 2nd Generation, will I locate my position on the Navionics app?

  A. Navionics has not tested this thoroughly enough to guarantee a good performance.

The answer suggests third party GPS devices should just work, but may not be reliable.


Delete time zone entry in Calendar's list How can I delete an item from the Time Zone list on Calendar app?
I'm on Yosemite.

Thanks.

Terminal:

defaults delete com.apple.iCal 'RecentlyUsedTimeZones'

removes all recently used time zones.
(Close Calendar app beforehand.)

I'm pretty sure (but please, someone prove me wrong) the defaults command can not delete single values within keys.

If you have Xcode installed, you can open the Calendar/iCal preferences file located under ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.iCal.plist

You then search for the RecentlyUsedTimeZones key and manually delete the unwanted items within the key by clicking the (-) icon next to the item number.


How do I show an application only in the dock assigned to a desktop? You can assign the application in the dock to a desktop. But can you hide the application in the dock in the desktop where it is not assigned? That is, the dock in each desktop should show only the app icons that are assigned to that desktop. Possible? Within OS X or via an app?


Bandwidth throttling / simulation for selected host I can control the network for the whole device with Network Link Conditioner but is there a way to do it just for selected hosts? I know that with /etc/hosts I can totally block connection to a host, but it's not what I need here. As a minimum solution, if I were able to make a host never respond, but just keeps loading forever, it would work, too.

I make a VM when I need this and only install the conditioner on the VM. It’s usually no hassle for me to have the entire computer slow or lossy when I’m testing and then I return it to full performance when I’m done.
I suppose it depends on why you are wanting to have differential speeds out of the same network interface.  It’s really a lot of complexity to poke holes in the filter when it’s implemented on a per interface basis. I’m curious what your use case is for not just doing the testing and returning your network interface to full speed.


How to disable results opening in new tab for Yahoo search I switched to from Google to Yahoo as my default search engine for Safari.

The search itself works fine, but then when I click an item on the search results page, it will open it in a new tab by default, rather than in the same tab that the results were in. I really prefer the latter behavior, because otherwise my browser window quickly fills up with search results tabs that I have no use for. I also don't see myself getting used to manually closing every single search result tab I open during the day.

Hence, I was wondering if anyone else has experienced this and if there's perhaps a way to disable this "feature".

This not an Apple issue becuase it's a Yahoo preference setting

What you need to do is set your search preferences so that search results open in the current tab.

Once you set this, it will be active across all browsers in all platforms.


Restoring backup from a stolen iPhone I am trying to restore my backup but it is asking to turn off "Find my iPhone" on the old device, which was stolen. How can I restore my backup?

Well I guess this might help you : iCloud: Remove your device from Find My iPhone
See :
Remove an iOS device you no longer have
If you no longer have the iOS device because you gave it away or sold it, you need to remotely erase it before you can remove it.

Sign in to icloud.com/#find with your Apple ID (the one you use with iCloud). If you’re using another iCloud app, click the app’s name at the top of the iCloud.com window, then click Find My iPhone.

Click All Devices, then select the device.

Click Erase device, then enter your Apple ID password. Because the device isn’t lost, don’t enter a phone number or message.
If the device is offline, the remote erase begins the next time it’s online. You’ll receive an email when the device is erased.

When the device is erased, click Remove from Account.
All your content is erased and someone else can now activate the device.


gmail account emails only appear in iCloud Inbox This has apparently been going on for some time but I didn't notice it until today.

I use Apple Mail (Sierra) as my mail client.  Any emails I receive to either of my two Gmail accounts, are only visible under the iCloud Inbox folder.  They are labeled as existing in that folder when I do a search, and I can see them as long as that's what I'm viewing (or have rules based on that Inbox).  But if I go to the actual Gmail account inboxes, none of the messages are there.

Why is this happening and how can I stop it?  I tried removing a Gmail account and re-adding it from scratch in System Prefs, but nothing changed.

To add some clarity, here is a picture showing my Inboxes - 1 for iCloud, and 2 for Gmail.  All emails sent to or from the Gmail addresses (via the mail.app client) appear under the iCloud Inbox (or sent mail) and do NOT appear under the appropriate Gmail Inboxes.

If I scroll down further, I see the second image, which clearly shows that the Gmail Inboxes don't even have all the usual Gmail folders below them, only Important and Chats, but nothing else.  So what gives here?

you might have an rule set-up to automatically forward mail in the client.


Macbook Pro strange display issues Last week my Macbook Pro from 2012 suddenly had a display issue. I was working on something using my external monitor (through thunderbolt -> displayPort) when the screen showed some banding and the computer suddenly turned itself off..

Here is a description of what it is currently doing when I turn it back on:

shows the normal apple start screen with progress bar
progress bar slowly moves across and then I get some strange banding in the top (see screenshot)
eventually the progress bar gets stuck about 75-80% of the way and the screen goes to just gray
and then it switches to being black

Now the screen stays lit up but I don't have a cursor or any way to control it.

I have tried to connect it to various monitors in this state (display port, DVI, etc) all through the thunderbolt display but nothing registers...

Here is a list of what I have tried so far:

resetting PRAM - keyboard combo works, PRAM resets as it boots again
but no change
resetting SMC - keyboard combo works, computer resets
but no change
target disk mode - this works, i have it in target disk
mode now and am backing up files onto my macbook air. I also read a
post about deleting the com.apple.loginWindow.plist preferences which
I did but no change

Oddly I found that a lot of 'normal' startup key combinations are not working anymore, even though this used to when i had other issues on this.

Does not work:

holding down SHIFT to go into safe mode: does not work / no
difference in startup
holding down D for diagnostics or V for verbose: does not work
holding down Control-R for recovery mode: does
not work

I am making an appointment to at the apple store today after I finish the backup but I am wondering if anybody has any advice. Isn't it odd that these startup options don't work? Also the display lights up and displays the thunderbolt icon fine when it is in target disk mode so that seems like the display is working...

Thank you!
- J

I suspect a video card issue (that band of "static" on the top pic usually means it's the video subsystem) though it could be cabling or the display itself.

You are on the right track though. A Genius Bar appointment will diagnose the issue.


Creating System-Wide Keyboard Shortcut To Launch Applications I recently switched from Ubuntu, and I was feeling very comfortable with using Ctrl + Alt + T to launch terminal. Can I assign Shift + Cmd + T to do the same thing in Yosemite? Specifically, I want a new terminal window to be opened.

Most system events can be directly handled and manipulated with Automator. Automator is highly resourceful, yet not taken advantage of. I'll walk you through the steps to creating a system wide keyboard shortcut for opening any application, but in your case, Terminal.

Step 1 : Open Automator [located in Applications > Automator]

Step 2 : Create a New Service for your 'Document Type'

Step 3 : Before moving forward with anything else, ensure you change the input methods in the top right sidebar to where it is now capable of running without any input in a specific application. Emulate the following picture:

Step 4 : Click on the Library tab 'Utilities' > Drag and Drop the 'Launch Application' into your workflow. Select your Application, in your case, you will have to manually find it by selecting 'other'. Your screen should now resemble mine:

Step 5 : Save your Service to whatever name you want, for this instance, I went ahead and saved mine as Launch Terminal, you'll see why this is important in a minute.

Step 6 : Navigate to your System Preferences > Keyboard > 'Shortcuts' tab.

Step 7 : Click on the 'Services' tab in the left side bar and all your services will populate. Navigate to the 'General' section, and since it's a newly created service, it will automatically be turned on by default. Here is where you can set your keyboard shortcut. [THERE WILL NOT BE ONE BY DEFAULT]

Step 8 : Close your System Preferences after you set the shortcut and test it out! Voila! Magnifico!

There are some things to consider when selecting your shortcut:

SHIFT+CMD+T is a widely used variable. The shortcut you set shouldn't be a keyboard shortcut used elsewhere. Since we didn't specify an input or specific application, this shortcut can be used system wide. However if an app already is hard coded to use this keyboard shortcut, yours will be overrided. Safari has the same short cut, so the Application will override your service keyboard shortcut. So use a pattern of keys not used elsewhere.  For safety I used : SHIFT+CONTROL+OPTION+CMD+T as no other applications really use that. You can use whatever you want, I just wanted to clear that up before people commented.
Why is saving the name appropriately important? Services populate according to the types of files you select in finder in the right click contextual menu. So for example: you select a finder menu item that is a picture and you have a service set to resize those photos, the contextual menu will populate that service in there :    As you can see the service populates in your contextual menu, that doesn't matter now since you didn't specify input or an application when creating the workflow in Yosemite, but you don't know how this will effect future OS releases.


How can I have Calendar use an audible alarm for alerts? Today I missed an event alert because I stepped away from my desk for a few minutes. What settings would affect whether Calendar Alerts have an audible alarm?  Is there a way to force an audible alarm sound for specific items?

If you go to Settings -> Notifications, then under In Notification Center, select Calendar and scroll down to Calendar Alerts and choose it.

This will give you the screen to select an alert tone for your calendar alerts. You could select a ringtone for it even. To my knowledge there is no option to select a different tone for specific calendar items.


Computer crashes on login, greeted with flashing folder icon So here's what happened
I was happily using my Macbook as usual, and I closed the lid like I always do when I put it away.
When I came back and wanted to use it again two hours later, I open it up and type in my password. Strangely I'm greeted with the infamous spinning beach ball of death, and after a minute or two of the computer not responding I close the lid again.
I then hear the boot sound, and thinking the computer simply crashed and rebooted I open the lid, only to see the flashing question mark folder.
Doing some research I find that it means the computer can't find the boot drive, so I reboot into Internet recovery mode, and try to select the boot drive... Nothing's there. I then go to Disk Utility to try and see if I can repair the drive. All I find is the base system, to which I don't have write permissions, and as such am not allowed to repair or format.
What do I do? I don't want to lose all the precious work I have on it, and I don't have a time machine for backups.
It's a late 2011 13 inch Macbook pro with 8 gb ram and a 2 tb hard drive
New Information:
The computer boots fine from the hard drive if I connect it via USB, so I suspect it might have something to do with the cable, but I'm not sure.

It may be as simple as the cable has become loose.  If that is the case, it is a fairly easy fix.  Sorry to see you don’t have a backup.  If the drive has gone bad, that would have been your recourse.

For future reference, a simple external drive connected via USB will work fine as a Time Machine backup disk.  Even if you are not as regular in connecting it as you should, you would at least have a backup in case of catastrophic failure.  There are other online backup solutions too that are subscription based.

If you are comfortable with taking the MacBook apart, you can check the cables first.


Monitor Console.app for a string and notify when found Is it possible to monitor all messages in Console.app for a string and then notify the user when this string occurs?

I have the problem that I'm getting disk I/O errors and I suspect that it's not a HDD failure, but somehow is caused by a piece of software. The only way I know that I have disk I/O errors is that I sometimes look through all the messages in the Console.app out of curiosity. Of course this does not give me real time information.
Therefore I want to receive a notification when the following message occurs in the Console:

07/01/2013 20:59:06 kernel  disk0s1: I/O error.

Is this somehow possible? It's OK if this means that Console has to be on all the time.

I'm on Snow Leopard 10.6.8.

I would not use Console.app.  Instead use Terminal.app with the following command:

tail -f /var/log/system.log | grep "string you are looking for"

then leave that window open and you will see all matching entries in that window as you work.

Also know that when the system.log file is rotated (due to size/time) tail will stop.  you will need to restart the command.


In macOS Photos, How can I sort images in "All Photos" album? I had to recently completely wipe my computer and reinstall everything.  I just imported my photos from an external hard drive and that worked fine but the only issue is when i go into Photos, all of my pics are out of order.

Surprisingly can't find any way to sort by date of image (versus date imported which would be the same for all images). Am I missing something?

How can there not be a "sort by date" option for images in an album?

The Photos Timeline view is sorted by the date embedded in the photo, not by date added. All other views are also sorted by the date of the photo except the All Photos album, which is date added. You can't change the sort view of any of the application created albums.

The last import view shows only the last import, and does not include photos from PhotoStream.

Work around: you can create a smart album and it gives a variety of ways to sort the photos in the new smart album (date range, title, keyword, etc)


How does memory management work in Mac OS X? I am a university student who has been trying to write a compare and contrast paper between how Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X manage memory.  For instance, with Windows, it's physical memory (RAM) and virtual memory (paging file).  How does a Mac do this?

So far, the only information I've found on the topic has been people screaming about one of the releases for Mac OS X and how it had memory leaks.  Please keep in mind, I am not a Mac user, so I'm not looking for instructions on how to check memory being used, etc.  A link to an article or document that explains how it works would be most appreciated.

I found this: http://www.macosxautomation.com/applescript/apps/memory.html, but it deals more with garbage collection in Objective-C than the OS's internal memory management.

Apple documents the lowest levels of the Mach Kernel and the virtual memory subsystem fairly well on the web as part of it's developer documentation.

Kernel Programming Guide: Memory and Virtual Memory

Since that kernel was developed by Carnegie Mellon University, you can find dozens of papers describing it quite easily.

If that is too low level for your paper, we have easily 10 or more good questions covering more of a non-programmer's view of OS X memory management. You'll probably have to do the synthesis of how OS X compares to the other two OS as I haven't seen that answered here to date.

Focus on the virtual-memory and os-x tags for the best results in your searching:

What does it mean if I have lots of "Inactive" memory at the end of a work day?
Can I force my Mac to make better use of the inactive memory?
Why is my memory still inactive after purging?
Trouble Understanding Inactive Memory in MacOSX
Isn't Inactive memory a waste of resources?

By the sheer number of "inactive memory" questions, you can focus on the part of OS X's memory management that is most puzzling to people and hence gathers the most questions here looking for explanations.


How to DNS resolve also subdomains to same host as the domain itself using wildcards? We have a local DNS server running for development purposes. But it seems not to resolve subdomains to the same destination ip as the domain itself. As I figured out so far, we need to configure each subdomain itself or using a wildcard, so that the following mapping would be possible:

vhost1.example.com => example.com => 192.168.0.22
vhost2.example.com => example.com => 192.168.0.22
something.example.com => example.com => 192.168.0.22

Normally, in the internet, if you bought a domain this works just fine with subdomain (vhost) wildcard on the domain. Until now, there was no need for me to configure it on my owned domains. But locally on a Mac Server we have to configure it?!

After searching hours on the internet I found no solution that works for me. This post here does also not work for me.

We are using Mac OS X El Captian 10.11.6 on the server.

Edit: And yes, I cleared the cache after editing the DNS config by using the command dscacheutil -flushcache;killall -HUP mDNSResponder;say flushed as root user (sudo su)

This is how i usually do:

Add primary domain example.com
Add Machine Record example.com (inside domain example.com) with ip : 192.168.0.22
Add alias vhost1.example.com -> example.com
Add alias vhost2.example.com -> example.com

... etc
you can add other records as usual


Compress a folder via a command line while persisting its icon I have a folder with a custom icon (via NSWorkspace's setIcon:forFile:options).

I would like to zip the folder so the custom icon is preserved after unzipping.

Currently, I call

zip -r9 Folder.zip Folder

When I uncompress it via Finder, the uncompressed folder does not have any custom icon and the folder contains an item named Icon?.

How to fix it / how to compress the folder properly?

The command-line zip command doesn't seem to be able to hand certain aspects of macOS, including icons, but the more traditional unix tar utility can. You can make use of this by replacing your command with the following (this will also compress the folder using gzip):

tar -czf Folder.tar.gz Folder


What rtmp streaming software solutions exist? I've been doing some live streaming lately, and learned that Adobe's Flash Media Live Encoder is cross-platform. Unfortunately, it's been ludicrously unstable crashing occasionally during use, and always crashing when told to quit.

After searching for alternatives, the closest I came was Telestream's Wirecast product, which despite it's "affordable" claim, is $450 I don't have, and about $400 worth of features I don't need.

What I need in a rtmp/flash streaming client is:

Stability and a good native feeling client. Adobe's dark-grey drab interface is neither of these things.
A reasonable price. I'm willing to pay money, but triple-digits is pushing it. Free is always nice :).
Support for XML profile import. I'm unsure of any other specific term for this, but Nico Nico has a link in their streaming interface to download an XML file containing stream quality parameters, default device selection, and of course the URL of the streaming server. It's wonderful to simply tell FMLE to open this file, and then just click 'Start'.

I have no specific requirements of 'effects' or generally ways to change the stream. I use CamTwist as a front-end device to set the video however I want.

Has anyone used any other software fulfilling this purpose?

Try influxis.com, it's web based but you could get your cam streaming pretty quickly. There are free options also like Red5, it's open source and it doesn't use FMS.


How can I install Debian on a PowerBook G3 with Mac OS 9.2? Today I started installing Debian Linux on an old Macintosh PowerBook G3 with Mac OS 9.2. After a long time of backing up old documents I erased the whole disk. At the end I just want Debian installed, so I did that. Than I've burned a Debian CD (DVD won't work) and inserted it into the PowerBook. I wanted to boot from this CD with pressing C at boot, but I always just get a big question mark on the screen.
Please help me, because I already tried more than a hour with booting the disk and it never worked.

According to this how to article:

You'll need a working OS X partition and you'll need to reboot with Option + Command + O + F. It is a bit complicated so follow the link for more info.

I personally would go with Ubuntu on your Powerbook. Follow this guide for info on how to install. Although the guide is for a Power Mac G4, it should work with your Powerbook.


ssh: Identity not Loaded from Keychain at Startup I have configured a host in my ~/.ssh/config like this

Host pptest
IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_rsa_test_2048_pp
UseKeychain yes
AddKeysToAgent yes

This key has a passphrase on it. As was my understanding, UseKeychain and AddKeysToAgent should automatically load the keys passphrase on reboot, however I have not found this to be the case. To get for instance a git-fetch (or any remote action involving ssh) working, I still need to run an

ssh-add

beforehand.

Why is this happening?

My system is 10.15.5 (19F96)

Have you done a ssh-copy-id of your public key to your host? If not the

UseKeychain yes
AddKeysToAgent yes

is meaningless, since the host has no way of verifying who you are, and will ask for the password or passphrase.
Take a look at Taming the terminal part 30/37 for an explanation.
Also man ssh-copy-id should give you more info.


Does clamshell mode reduce lifespan due to heat? I been playing some games on my rMBP in clamshell mode as having 2 screens causes framerate to drop and I don't want the CPU/GPU to render a screen on laptop side that I don't use.

My main concern to this approach is the heat generated, does clamshell mode trap more heat? will the heat damage the laptop screen if used for long periods of the time?

I doubt that the heat will damage the screen, but considering how MB and MBP feed the fan, I'd be concerned more of airflow cutoff as lots of the air comes through the keyboard itself. You could look into placing a small magnet over the reed switch area and leave the lid open, it's near the Battery Indicator Light. Be careful though, don't swipe a magnet over your HDD.


What are locked files (already inside Trash)? I was cleaning my desktop and I put a lot of unnecessary files into my Trash. In one particular folder I was asked to provide administrator's password, so I did. Everything went to Trash very smoothly. Below prompt appeared when I decided to empty Trash.

What are locked files?
What locked them?
Why those files have been locked?

After clicking on Remove All Items the trash was successfully cleaned however I would like to get answers for those questions.

A locked file can be a lock placed on a file by a process to ensure that the file is available while the process is running. In a second form a lock file has a user defined lock in the file's inode metadata.


Multiple Desktops, how to have them be different? When I create a new desktop it has all the same crud on it that my original desktop has on it.

How do I create a new desktop that's empty, and use that as a new work area... like a new desktop?

The source of my confusion is that they're named "DESKTOPS", and given unique numbers, yet they completely fail to follow the ideas of their own metaphor:

Desktop 1 is exactly the same as Desktop 2, only it's got the possibility of having different app windows in it. That's not a new desktop. It's the same desktop.

@Confused I too had the same issue. I wanted different desktops for different projects. So, I made an Python/Applescript app which allows you to have multiple desktops in the "true sense" that you refer to:

http://www.shirt-ediss.me/clarity/

It should serve your purpose, but please see the "Tips" sections for caveats with my approach. It works simply by moving files and folders from the Desktop to a storage folder, and recording their icon positions. This means that this desktop can be restored to exactly the same state later. There is still only one Desktop/ folder on the Mac, and Mission Control works just as it did before.

I now have about 20 different desktops and switch between them all of the time - great for productivity.


Launchd unloading LaunchDaemon I have a script scheduled to run as LaunchDaemon. Script runs fine when launched manually through terminal.

I have two commands

sudo launchctl unload -F /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.test.plist
sudo launchctl load -F /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.test.plist

plist below

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com
 /DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
 <plist version="1.0">
 <dict>
  <key>Label</key>
  <string>com.test.plist</string>
 <key>Program</key>
 <string>/usr/local/bin/test.sh</string>
 <key>StandardErrorPath</key>
 <string>/tmp/com.test.plist.err</string>
<key>StandardOutPath</key>
<string>/tmp/com.test.plist.out</string>
<key>StartCalendarInterval</key>
<dict>
    <key>Hour</key>
    <integer>18</integer>
    <key>Minute</key>
    <integer>4</integer>
</dict>

when run separately they do work. But once scheduled in launchd it runs for split second them goes to unloaded. I am guessing once it unloads the script it stops running. I change the values of the intervals set in the plist with another script which is why I need to unload and load. Is there another way to do this?

Is the problem perhaps that your unload command hasn't finished before the load command starts?

How about trying kickstart instead? "-k" instructs launchctl to "kill the running instance before restarting the service."

  sudo launchctl kickstart -k /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.test.plist

Note that load and unload are now under "Legacy commands" in the Yosemite launchctl man page.


Is Mac OS X's two finger scrolling damaging to your hand? I've noticed an unusual feeling associated with Mac OS X's two fingering scrolling.  Any chance this might indicate a repetitive stress injury in the making?  I've been trying to rotate the fingers I use for scrolling somewhat, but not terribly successfully.  Anyone else found solutions to this potential issue?  (related)

Out of all the Mac users I've ever heard of/seen, none of them have ever said anything like this. I swift touch of a trackpad of mouse certainly doesn't seem to be any sort of damaging movements. If you end up having problems with it more you could ask a more 'medical' associated person. I've personally never heard anything like it, but muscle pains can be worsened from certain movements causing stress. Good luck!


What version of Dovecot comes bundled with Lion Server? I'm currently running a Snow Leopard Server, and trying to get anything useful working with the v1.1 version of Dovecot bundled with it is as pleasant as banging my head against a brick wall.

Dovecot's extremely sparse documentation has a lot of mentions of horribly-crippling bugs (specifically with public mailboxes and permissions) in 1.1 that were only fixed in 1.2. Which is not helpful for me since Apple has their own frustratingly-special blend of dovecot build (1.1.20apple0.5) for Snow Leopard Servers.

So, does the new Lion Server have enough Dovecot functionality to make it worth using?

Dovecot 239 is how it's listed by Apple as open source that was shipped with Lion 10.7 Build 11A511.

You can see lots of nice version and source code information at http://www.opensource.apple.com/release/mac-os-x-107/ in case the 239 doesn't match the real version of the package.

If you want to compare the current with past versions, many versions of OS X are listed at http://www.opensource.apple.com/


Script that Automatically Does Something Every Day I'm looking for a way to automatically run a shell script or command every time interval. I'm running a server and I want to backup some folders every day. I don't want to use time machine because the backups need to be just the raw data.

How do I write a daemon/application/script that will do this? The commands I need to run are pretty simple, and theres more than one I need, so it'd be great if there was a semi-generalized way to do this.

On Macs running 10.5 or earlier, I'll use crontab.

On Macs running 10.6 and newer, I'll use launchd. More details here
https://developer.apple.com/legacy/library/documentation/Darwin/Reference/ManPages/man5/launchd.plist.5.html


iPad AirPlay to Apple TV - 802.11n problems I have been attempting to resolve an issue with AirPlay from an iPad to AppleTV.  Here are the details:

Playing media (audio or video) originating on the iPad sent to
AppleTV via AirPlay does not work.

With audio-only media, the result is mostly silence with
occasional very short bursts (less than 100ms) of sound.
With video, the video does not play at all. The TV display can be
one of

black screen with a rotating spinner in the center
black screen with the blue time bar at the bottom and a
rotating spinner at the bottom left
white screen with the blue time bar at the bottom and a
rotating spinner at the bottom left

The failure mode is extremely specific, and requires:

The media being played resides physically on the iPad. Media of
any type being streamed from the Internet via the iPad does not
have this problem.
The problem occurs only when both the iPad and AppleTV are on the
same 5GHz network. Any other combination with either the iPad or
AppleTV or both on the 2.4GHz network operates correctly.

Hardware:

iPad       mdl:MC979LL    iOS:5.1.1
AppleTV    mdl:MD199LL/A  OS:5.1.1(5433)
Router     Netgear WNDR3400V2 with firmware V1.0.0.34_1.0.52

The router is running in access-point mode where it does not do any
routing, just provides wireless access.

During testing I tried the following:

Changing WiFi channels
Upgrading the router firmware to the latest version
Rebooting and power-cycling all equipment multiple times,
including hard-resetting the iPad
Testing with iTunes on the PC not running, in case it is somehow
saturating the connection to the AppleTV
"Reset Network Settings" on the iPad.

So far no luck.

BTW, I wanted to tag this post 802.11n but that tag does not exist and I can't create it with less than 300 rep.  Would somebody please create that tag, add it here and delete this paragraph? Thx.

I was poking around in the router's admin interface and examined the wireless
settings.  On this particular router, for each frequency band (2.4GHz
and 5GHz) there is a "Wireless Mode" setting that enables high-speed
operation. It has three settings for the 5GHz network:

Up to 54Mbps
Up to 145Mbps
Up to 300Mbps

The factory default is Up to 300Mbps.  I tested all three settings,
and the only one that works is the slowest Up to 54Mbps.

It appears that AppleTV's 802.11n implementation does not support
speeds above 54Mbps.


Iphone 3G is very slow when launch apps that use GPS I have a iPhone 3G is very slow when launching apps that use GPS, like Google Maps or similar. The phone becomes unusable until I restart the OS.

One trick that seems to work occasionally is to deactivate the push notifications and then I can use the Google Maps without problems. Other days it also doesn't work and simply freezes.

How can I fix this?

My iPhone 3G is a 16GB article, running iOS 4.2.1, it is not jailbroken.

Well I used to have an iPhone 3G and when I upgraded it to iOS 3 it was painfully slow. So what I did was this:

1) Switch off spotlight search (Or some elements of it) - Settings -> General -> Spotlight Search.

2) Reduce the amount of mail accounts being fetched to only the ones I needed to be fetched.

3) Try and keep minimal tabs open in Safari i.e. Don't leave all 8 open, keep closing them once you're finished.

4) Reset network settings at least once a month - i've found this also helps when you have no service, it just comes back instantly for me sometimes.

5) Try to use applications that are less resource intensive. This means stay clear of things like Infinity Blade.

6) Try to minimize how many calendars, contacts etc you have syncing.

7) Upgrade to iPhone 3GS/4/4S - they are all faster, the iPhone 3G has a slow processor.

I hope this helps. This really helped me speed my iPhone 3G and make certain applications usable a few years ago.


Yosemite keeps restarting or going into grey screen I have an iMac from 2011 and I have installed Yosemite as soon as it was released, without any issues before this one.

Here is what happened: it has suddenly shut itself off, after turning it on, it goes into the loading screen, loads to about half of the loading bar and restarts itself, this happens in a loop.
I have tried internet recovery. After choosing the network, connecting, and going through the loading screen, the screen becomes grey. Same thing when I try recovery mode or when I boot from external usb device. I am able to enter the verbose mode and I was able to do system check, which did not find any issues.

Not sure what to do and whether this is a hardware or a software problem.

These symptoms imply an issue with your GPU. There is actually an ongoing class-action lawsuit against Apple regarding the AMD GPUs in the 2011 Macs (primarily MacBook Pros). I have seen the issue before in person; my sister's MacBook Pro just encountered it. The symptoms were just as you described: boot chime, Apple logo, spinning loader, grey screen, nothing else. Apple had recently started using lead-free solder for internal components in order to adhere to EU environmental regulations, but the solder is more prone to stress and cracking from rapid heat fluctuation, which can cause the GPU to slowly separate from the logic board. If this is in fact the case, you have 3 options:

Allow Apple to repair it: This will run you $310 if your machine is not under warranty (unlikely, since your machine is 3-4 years old). Apple will replace your entire logic board, which includes the GPU. The only problem with this is that they will be swapping in a logic board with the exact same lead-free solder, which one can consider to be a manufacturing defect. The new board will still likely fail in the future...which is why this issue is big enough to elicit a lawsuit.
Reball: Some 3rd-party computer repair establishments can remove the GPU from the logic board, replace the lead-free solder with lead-based solder, and fix the GPU back onto the logic board. This process is known as "reballing." It is often cheaper than the Apple repair, and more reliable (as long as the repair place is reputable, of course). This would void your warranty, but if you've read this far, yours probably expired already anyway.
Reflow: If you're willing to get your hands dirty, you can use a heat gun to melt the solder back down into place. This is called "reflowing," and is the same process used to fix the "yellow light of death" issue on PS3 consoles.

You can read more about the lawsuit here: http://time.com/3545723/apple-macbook-lawsuit/


Playing music from the iPhone wirelessly to a stereo that doesn't support Bluetooth I'm looking for a way to stream music from my iPhone to a stereo which doesn't support Bluetooth, but does support connecting a standard audio cable to it. For example, I can take a standard audio cable and connect my iPhone directly to this stereo. However, I'm looking for a solution that will free me of wires on the iPhone side.

If there was some kind of Bluetooth device which has a standard audio cable as its output and as its input it uses a Bluetooth profile that the iPhone supports for wireless audio listening, I guess that would work.

Is this even possible?

The Sony Ericsson MBR-100 is a bluetooth adapter that should work.


Why are some PDFs scrambled when opened with Preview on Mac? Consider this PDF file for example. The text in this file appears scrambled when opened with Safari or Preview. However, the PDF is formatted fine when opened with Adobe Acrobat Reader DC or most 3rd party web browsers including but not limited to Gecko-based Firefox and Chromium-based Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge and Opera.
I wondered if it is because of some of the embedded fonts in the PDF file which perhaps I needed to install on my mac. So, I searched for these fonts and installed them on my system but to no avail. Perhaps it is a bug?
How would you deal with such PDF files when you want to primarily use Preview?

EDIT:
I am using macOS Catalina 10.15.6 and Preview 11.0. In the attached screenshot, the left rendering is by Preview and the right one is by Adobe Acrobat Reader DC.

The PDF does seem to display incorrectly on Catalina, but not on other versions of macOS.
Preflighting the PDF in Acrobat flags several instances of fonts that are not embedded. Acrobat and other versions of macOS seem to be able to substitute the system Arial and Times New Roman, but Catalina does not. I'd suggest that is the bug.
Exporting from Acrobat as PostScript and re-distilling will produce a PDF that works in Catalina.
Exporting from Preview in another version of macOS will also produce a version that works in Catalina. (Exporting, not just Save As..)
Ghostscript produces a single blank page when trying to process the PDF.
The file was originally created using Acrobat 3, in 2001 on some Windows OS. While such systems should have been creating perfectly decent PDFs, something seems to have gone wrong here.


Dial another phone, access SMS of another phone using IPOD Touch 4 I have an IPOD Touch 4 and i was hoping to convert it to a phone. However in india we don't have VOIP support, but my phone "HTC TOUCH" supports Remote Sim. I am looking for an app which can allow my ipod to control my phone and also enable me to make calls thru my ipod by dialing on my phone. is it possible?

Not possibly currently I'm afraid. Certainly, you'd have to have a jailbroken Touch as a starting point. No way you'd be able to do this on a stock iPod Touch. Even then, I'm not aware of anything out there that will do this.


How to remove group membership from user using the Lion Terminal? How to remove a self created daemon user named '_denyhosts' from group 1025(workgroup), 403(com.apple.sharepoint.group.2), 404(com.apple.sharepoint.group.3) and 405(com.apple.sharepoint.group.4) using Lion Terminal?

Background

To create a reduced privileged daemon user account, to run denyhosts.py using launchd, the example on http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Tutorials/Create_a_Mac_OS_X_startup_daemon has been helpful.

However the created Lion daemon user account "_denyhosts" seems to have to many groups assigned:

$ id _denyhosts
uid=300(_denyhosts) gid=300(_denyhosts) groups=300(_denyhosts),1025(workgroup),12(everyone),61(localaccounts),403(com.apple.sharepoint.group.2),404(com.apple.sharepoint.group.3),405(com.apple.sharepoint.group.4)

In my opinion the groups membership of:

1025(workgroup)
403(com.apple.sharepoint.group.2)
404(com.apple.sharepoint.group.3)
405(com.apple.sharepoint.group.4)

can be removed.

I have been trying to accomplish to remove the user its groups memberships using:

$ dscl . -delete /Groups/workgroup GroupMembership _denyhosts
delete: Invalid Path
<dscl_cmd> DS Error: -14009 (eDSUnknownNodeName)

$ dscl . -delete /groups/workgroup GroupMembership _denyhosts
delete: Invalid Path
<dscl_cmd> DS Error: -14009 (eDSUnknownNodeName)

$ sudo dscl . delete /Groups/workgroup GroupMembership _denyhosts
delete: Invalid Path
<dscl_cmd> DS Error: -14009 (eDSUnknownNodeName)

$ sudo dseditgroup -o edit -d _denyhosts -t user workgroup
Username and password must be provided.

I guess that these commands fail because group "workgroup" is not located in a local directory but an LDAP directory:

$ dseditgroup -o -read workgroup | grep AppleMetaNode -A 1
dsAttrTypeStandard:AppleMetaNodeLocation -
        /LDAPv3/127.0.0.1

But that is not all, because com.apple.sharepoint.group groups are /Local/Default, there $ sudo dseditgroup -o edit -d _denyhosts -t user com.apple.sharepoint.group.2 doesn't output an error, but also doesn't remove the _denyhosts user from the group:

$ id _denyhosts
uid=300(_denyhosts) gid=300(_denyhosts) groups=300(_denyhosts),1025(workgroup),12(everyone),61(localaccounts),403(com.apple.sharepoint.group.2),404(com.apple.sharepoint.group.3),405(com.apple.sharepoint.group.4)

https://superuser.com/questions/279891/list-all-members-of-a-group-mac-os-x helped to know that group membership can also be assigned by inheritance. Guess is that such inherited membership is what happens here.

$ dscl . -read /Groups/com.apple.sharepoint.group.2 | grep NestedGroupsNestedGroups
NestedGroupsNestedGroups: ABCDEFAB-CDEF-ABCD-EFAB-CDEF00000050 ABCDEFAB-CDEF-ABCD-EFAB-CDEF0000000C

Try this command to remove the user from a particular group

dseditgroup -o edit -d $Username -t user $GroupName

dseditgroup -o edit -d _denyhosts -t user workgroup