MacBook as WiFi extender With AirDrop it seems that my MacBook Pro can have multiple Wifi Connections, so can I connect my iPhone to my Macbook at the same time as the macbook is connected to a Time Capsule's Wifi network.

I have both 5GHz and 2.4GHz Wifi in my house, and the 2.4GHz only just reaches my room, whereas the 5GHz signal is much better. Sometimes my iPhone cant connect to the 2.4GHz network without moving closer to the base station.

Is it possible to use my MacBook as an extender, so that my phone can connect to the Macbook and then use it's 5GHz connection, and it won't drop out and become unconnectable?

According to Dori's answer in this Apple.SE thread, what you're looking for is not possible:

  In order for a Mac to create a local Wi-Fi network, it needs to have a
  wired Internet source.

More information can be found in this Apple Support KB:

  Choose Apple menu > System Preferences and click Sharing.
  Select Internet Sharing and click the checkbox if it isn’t checked.
  Choose the Internet connection you want to share from the “Share your connection from” pop-up menu. For example, if you’re connected to
  the Internet over Ethernet, choose Ethernet.
  Select how you want to share your Internet connection in the “To computers using” list. For example, if you want to share your Internet
  connection over AirPort, select AirPort. If you share your Internet
  connection using AirPort, click AirPort Options and give your network
  a name and password.

You'd need to hook your MacBook up to a wired connection before you can share Wi-Fi via Internet Sharing.


How can I clear the kernel extension caches while using FileVault 2? I have the same problem as this user, Air + Lion : plug in USB, keyboard/pad stop working , where the built-in keyboard and trackpad on my MacBook Pro stop working (and drop out of the USB devices listed) periodically when I plug in a USB hard drive.

The solution provided was to boot into safe-mode and clear the kernel extension caches, however I use FileVault 2 full-disk encryption which seems to disable booting into safe-mode.

Is there any way to clear the kernel extension caches in OS X 10.9 Mavericks without disabling FileVault 2 to get to safe-mode? I really don't want to de-encrypt and later re-encrypt the entire 750GB drive.

Alternatively, can kextcache be safely run on a system that isn't booted into safe-mode?

Holding down cmdS at boot time, for a boot drive that's FileVault 2 encrypted, presents the password dialog, then continues into Safe Mode.


iPhone backup takes too much space I have my iCloud backups stripped down to only CONTACTS and NOTES and about 150MB of apps, yet the backup is 5.22 GB.

How do I make my iPhone backup smaller?!

I created an account just to answer this question.  I ran into this issue myself months ago and was unable to find an answer.  The short of it is, Apple is backing up things even if you have them disabled.  In my case, Messages was completely disabled from iCloud backup.  In fact, almost everything was but my initial backups kept saying 4.4GB or so.  I looked at my storage and noticed the closest to that were my Messages.  So as a test I deleted a top conversation that was over 1GB and when I recalculated my iCloud backups, sure enough it dropped by a gig.

So great job to Apple backing up something I explicitly disabled.  Thankfully I resolved this issue on my own doing testing.  I hope this helps others.


Mac OS X Mountain Lion - DNS resolving uses wrong order on VPN via dial-up connection I am using a MacBook with Mac OS X 10.8.2 and connect to my company's network via VPN. Everything works great when establishing the VPN connection via LAN or WLAN. However, when I use a dial-up connection (Huawei HSDPA USB Stick) host names are not correctly resolved in applications (e.g. Web-Browser). Command line tools like host name will correctly resolve the IP address, ping name will not resolve.

Using scutil --dns I dumped the DNS configuration when connecting via WLAN vs. dial-up. There is a notable difference in the lookup order:

connecting using WLAN:

resolver #1
  nameserver[0] : 192.168.80.10
  nameserver[1] : 192.168.80.24
  if_index : 6 (ppp0)
  reach    : Reachable,Transient Connection
  order    : 100000

resolver #2
  nameserver[0] : 192.168.80.10
  nameserver[1] : 192.168.80.24
  if_index : 6 (ppp0)
  reach    : Reachable,Transient Connection
  order    : 200000

resolver #3
  domain   : local
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 300000

resolver #4
  domain   : 254.169.in-addr.arpa
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 300200

resolver #5
  domain   : 8.e.f.ip6.arpa
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 300400

resolver #6
  domain   : 9.e.f.ip6.arpa
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 300600

resolver #7
  domain   : a.e.f.ip6.arpa
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 300800

resolver #8
  domain   : b.e.f.ip6.arpa
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 301000

DNS configuration (for scoped queries)

resolver #1
  nameserver[0] : 192.168.1.1
  if_index : 4 (en0)
  flags    : Scoped
  reach    : Reachable,Directly Reachable Address

resolver #2
  nameserver[0] : 192.168.80.10
  nameserver[1] : 192.168.80.24
  if_index : 6 (ppp0)
  flags    : Scoped
  reach    : Reachable,Transient Connection

The ppp0 connection is the VPN connection. As you can see, two servers are connected and they answer correctly on the command line and in applications.

Connecting via UMTS:

resolver #1
  nameserver[0] : 139.7.30.126
  nameserver[1] : 139.7.30.125
  if_index : 6 (ppp0)
  reach    : Reachable,Transient Connection
  order    : 100000

resolver #2
  nameserver[0] : 192.168.80.10
  nameserver[1] : 192.168.80.24
  if_index : 7 (ppp1)
  reach    : Reachable,Transient Connection
  order    : 100000

resolver #3
  nameserver[0] : 192.168.80.10
  nameserver[1] : 192.168.80.24
  if_index : 7 (ppp1)
  reach    : Reachable,Transient Connection
  order    : 200000

resolver #4
  domain   : local
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 300000

resolver #5
  domain   : 254.169.in-addr.arpa
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 300200

resolver #6
  domain   : 8.e.f.ip6.arpa
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 300400

resolver #7
  domain   : 9.e.f.ip6.arpa
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 300600

resolver #8
  domain   : a.e.f.ip6.arpa
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 300800

resolver #9
  domain   : b.e.f.ip6.arpa
  options  : mdns
  timeout  : 5
  order    : 301000

DNS configuration (for scoped queries)

resolver #1
  nameserver[0] : 192.168.80.10
  nameserver[1] : 192.168.80.24
  if_index : 7 (ppp1)
  flags    : Scoped
  reach    : Reachable,Transient Connection

resolver #2
  nameserver[0] : 139.7.30.126
  nameserver[1] : 139.7.30.125
  if_index : 6 (ppp0)
  flags    : Scoped
  reach    : Reachable,Transient Connection

This time, ppp1 is the VPN connection and ppp0 is the UMTS connection. From the response times of the commands (using the non-existing hostname foo.bar.local) I infer that ping uses the first resolver chain, where as host uses the scoped query configuration. ping takes 5 seconds to return "Unkown host", hostgets back immediately. I assume ping runs into the 5 second timeout of the mdns resolver.

In order to fix my problem with the broken DNS lookups when dialing in via VPN over modem I need to change the order of the resolvers. So far I have not found a way of doing this.

Any ideas welcome.

I had the same problem on my Mac, and after fixing it I have figured out that it was caused by FortiClient (VPN client). Even when FortiClient was disconnected - it's DNS still appeared in the scutil.

The solution for me was:

scutil
> list ".*DNS"

This will show you a list of all DNS configs, that will look something like:

subKey [0] = State:/Network/Global/DNS

subKey [1] = State:/Network/MulticastDNS

subKey [2] = State:/Network/OpenVPN/DNS

subKey [3] = State:/Network/OpenVPN/OldDNS

subKey [4] = State:/Network/PrivateDNS

subKey [5] = State:/Network/Service/forticlientsslvpn/DNS

To check each of them run: (until you find the problematic one)

> get key_name
> d.show

…and to fix it run:

> get key_name
> d.remove ServerAddresses
> set key_name

This is how it looked on my machine:

> get State:/Network/Service/forticlientsslvpn/DNS
> d.show
<dictionary> {
  ServerAddresses : <array> {
    0 : 192.168.30.6
    1 : 192.168.30.15
  }
  SupplementalMatchDomains : <array> {
    0 :
  }
  SupplementalMatchOrders : <array> {
    0 : 100000
  }
}
> d.remove ServerAddresses
> d.show
<dictionary> {
  SupplementalMatchDomains : <array> {
    0 :
  }
  SupplementalMatchOrders : <array> {
    0 : 100000
  }
}
> set State:/Network/Service/forticlientsslvpn/DNS
> exit


Can I use an old iPhone as a wifi-only device? I have an AT&T (GSM) iPhone 4. If I were to upgrade to an iPhone 5, could I simply pop the SIM out of my iPhone 4 and continue using it on wifi only?

Would I also need to get the SIM deactivated since an iPhone 5 would come with its own SIM?

Yes, you can use the device as if it were an iPod Touch without cellular service.  No need to remove the SIM. It will automatically be deactivated when your new phone is activated.

You can also purchase a prepaid SIM from a service using provider network to which the phone is attached if you'd like to use it as an emergency or burner phone. For example, h2o pre-paid SIMS work in locked AT&T phones.


MacOS Catalina Verifying app at bootstrap I updated to Catalina yesterday and now I have the following message:

every time I turn on my macbook. Until it finishes, I can't open any app.
I've already tried:
sudo xattr -d com.apple.quarantine /Applications/Docker.app

and the output is:
xattr: /Applications/Docker.app: No such xattr: com.apple.quarantine

I have the same problems with other apps like Xcode, Spotify, iOS runtime 11.0 and so on.
I've never encountered this error before.
Should I just wait an hotfix by Apple or do we have a workaround for it?
Update:
I contacted the Apple Support and they suggested me to perform a first aid on the HD and re-install the OS. Both didn't work.
Temporary workaround
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250735975?answerId=251529672022#251529672022
(This reduces the security of macOS so it's just temporary)

I also met the similar problem. I contacted Apple technical support and got the reply that I should try Reset NVRAM or PRAM or RESET SMC. But It does not work at all.

Finally I erased the disk, reinstalled macOS Catalina and then recovered important data from Time Machine and other backups. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204904


Use same slide number on several slides in keynote? As you might know, you can add some notes for every slide in Keynote. Since I want to talk quite a lot about one specific slide, there are a lot of notes I want to add to this slide. In the moderator view, I can view this notes, but since they are so long, I would have to scroll if I place them all on one slide.

So my idea was to copy the slide lets say five times and put a portion of my notes on every of the copies. Then, I can "click through my notes" while the slide looks similar all the time. The only problem is, that if I do so, the slide has five different slide numbers.

Is there a way to set the number of  a slide or any other way to solve this? Thank you!

Maybe the answer is to resize the notes display in the Presenter View. If you can get your notes to fit comfortably in Presenter View, then there is little need for duplicating the slides.

Try the following:

In Keynote, select "Play -> Customize Presenter Display". You'll be presented with a flexible layout and and an Inspector
In the inspector, assure that "Notes" is checked.
Try resizing the "Notes" display so that it is large enough to view all (or most) of your notes. (You can have only the notes displayed if you like.)

Everything on the Presenter display is moveable, so try editing all the elements to suit your needs.


Mac internal/boot HD - "the disk you inserted is not readable by this computer" My iMac has been playing up and I thought it was the system, but then it froze completely and I had to force quit. When I restarted it booted in to an external drive that has its own system, but my main HD won't mount with the message "the disk you inserted is not readable by this computer". Ouch.

Considering it will still spin (I've removed it and put it on a SATA USB connector) what software options are recommended for recovery and what should I expect? There are a lot of options out there but any recommended that aren't too expensive? Do they just recover fragments or a mess of files? Its a Seagate SATA drive 3TB I installed in 2016.

I've used Data Rescue before: https://www.prosofteng.com

You'll get a big load of files, without hierarchy or filenames.

Note for the future: you can buy a backup disk for less than most data recovery software costs.


How to change fonts picked by Terminal.app to display languages other than English? This is definitely and advanced topic and possibly needs a hack that I am willing to do.

I edit Arabic files quite a lot. Arabic characters displayed by Terminal.app are not playing nice at all. To top that, some custom fonts that I use are getting picked up as alternatives for certain glyphs in my vim sessions.

The default font for displaying English works fine and I have no complains about it.

However, I want to change the font picked by Terminal.app when displaying other languages, in my case it is Arabic.

To answer this question, one must know if it is even possible. Are the fonts hardwired into the binary? Is there a hack to bypass that?

UPDATE:

It turns out the only hack to solve this problem wasn't a hack. It is the best of what the OS offers for eligible Fixed Arabic Font and that is Courier New. The font can be read very clearly except for "ARABIC LETER HEH INITIAL FORM" Unicode FEEB. Hopefully someday someone will fix that letter for better reading in the terminal. Or just copy those glyphs over to Menlo.

You can set the font for terminal in the terminal preferences. (Terminal -> Preferences... then select the "Settings" tab and "Text" sub-tab. Fonts are choses based on profiles so you could set up a profile with an Arabic font.

You must have monospaced Arabic font installed. You'll need to to search the internet for one.

Most important, for using using Vim read this:

http://vim.dindinx.net/orig/html/arabic.txt.php

The default version of Vim on the Mac is compiled with "-arabic" so it will never give you what you want, you'll need to recompile you own version (try homebrew) also MacVim may work (GUI version of Vim so no terminal necessary).


Cant open my new iPhone I used to have an iPhone 5c and i used iTunes to back up it on my windows laptop.

Now I've got an iPhone 7 and I am trying to set it up but I can't.  First, I entered my iCloud and tried to "restore from iCloud backup".  It works until it is 99% and then it gives me a message that it can't be done.

I tried to get the backup from iTunes "restore from iTunes backup".  The laptop didn't recognize the phone and told me that it needs the last version.  I tried to download it but it didn't work either.

Now if I choose to "set up as new phone" will all my data be lost, especially my contacts, notes, whatapp history, photos, etc?

What do I need to do to get it working?

Thanks

iOS backups are tied to the version of iOS on your device. You can't restore a backup on a device running and older version of iOS than was used to make the backup.

I had the same problem last week with my new iPad. It shipped with some version of iOS 9. Here's what I did to fix it:

Don't worry about setting it up as a new iPhone. You will be able to restore from your backup later.
Set it up as a new iPhone. You will probably have to put your iTunes account information.
If it asks you about making backups, skip that part.
Once you are through to the home screen, run the Settings app and update to the latest version of iOS.
Once the latest version of iOS is installed reset all settings on your phone. When the phone reboots you should be back at the setup screens.
Now you should be able to restore from either iCloud or iTunes backups.

You can also use iTunes on your Mac to download and install the iOS update.


How do I erase an encrypted TimeMachine drive on Mountain Lion if I've forgotten the password? My question is similar to this question. I have a USB drive that contains an old encrypted backup. I don't remember the password and don't care about loosing the backup - I just want to be able to use the drive. When I select the volume on the left, I only see two tabs: "First Aid" and "Partition". I don't see an "Erase" tab.

Just found the answer here. Basically, from the terminal, type:

sudo diskutil cs list

You'll get a list of your drives and a bunch of related info. Look for the one you want to format and grab its Logical Volume Group's UUID. It should look something like this:

Logical Volume Group XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX

Then erase the drive by executing the command:

sudo diskutil cs delete XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX

Now you should be able to see the drive and format it using Disk Utility.


How to remove synced iPhone data in iTunes 11? I didn't have a free outlet to plug my iPhone charger into, so I plugged it into the USB port of my work computer (Macbook Pro) to charge.  Anyway, iTunes 11 and iPhoto opened up!  I forgot that iPhones automatically sync with iTunes (as I never sync with anything -- I don't back anything up -- my contacts and calendar are synced to Google, and that's all I really care about on my phone).  I was able to disable iPhoto from opening, but I can't do that with iTunes.  I did click on the Preference to "Prevent iPods, iPhones, and iPads from syncing automatically" but this was after I think some syncing took place.  How can remove whatever data was synced?  I think it was just the apps that got synced, but how can I be sure?  Is there some folder hidden somewhere in the system that I can check?  And if it is only the apps, how do I remove that information?

This is my work computer, and I don't want any information from my personal phone to end up on it.

I learned my lesson -- don't plug anything personal into a work computer.

There isn't an easy way to have iTunes show you the last sync data.

You could use Time Machine to compare the files in ~/Music/iTunes after the sync with before it. (Or just restore that entire folder or the entire Mac from a backup before the sync.)

The automatic sync that happens with a new computer is not any actual transfer of files as you would have to go into iTunes and set up the rules or accept the automatic sync of content so unless you already had synced that device to that iTunes library before no data would transfer.


what is the correct ownership for files in /Applications It has been a while since last using Fritzing, and I was trying to open one of the files I saved almost 2 years ago.

The iMac was purchased early 2018, and everything copied from my MacBook

I have updated my iMac to the latest Mojave release, and got strange errors.

I looked at /Applications/Fritzing.app to see what I could change and found it was owned by my daughter (who has a login on my computer)

I used chown to change this, but a few other apps were also owned by her.

I seem to have a collection of root, ian (me) and bec (even one owned by my wife).
Neither of these would have installed any apps on my computer, so I don't know why.

My question is what is the correct ownership for files in /Applications

The correct owner of an application bundle within /Applications for preinstalled Apple apps is: root

The correct owner of an application bundle within /Applications for packaged installers user installed apps is: root

The correct owner of an application bundle within /Applications for drag and drop user installed apps is: $USER

Where $USER is typically the short name of the person who installed the app. Otherwise, use the short name of the USER who is to own the file.

Here are the results of the ls -leO@d command run from Terminal on the Fritzing application bundle:

$ ls -leO@d /Applications/Fritzing.app
drwxr-xr-x@ 3 me  admin  - 102 Jun  6  2016 /Applications/Fritzing.app
    com.apple.quarantine     57
$

Same command run on the directory mentioned in the error message shown in the OP:

$ ls -leO@d /Applications/Fritzing.app/Contents/MacOS/fritzing-parts
drwxr-xr-x@ 15 me  admin  - 510 Jun  6  2016 /Applications/Fritzing.app/Contents/MacOS/fritzing-parts
    com.apple.quarantine     57
$

To change owner of a user installed app, e.g. for Fritzing, use the following command in Terminal:

sudo chown -R $USER /Applications/Fritzing.app

Note you can leave $USER as is written if you are the logged in USER and you are taking ownership.

Also consider checking the permissions and adjust as needed. As in this case for Fritzing:

sudo chmod -R 0755 /Applications/Fritzing.app

As I have Fritzing installed and working, and its permission are as previously shown, I believe the error message is somewhat erroneous and is being caused by you not being the owner. Changing ownership as previously shown should resolve your issue.


Character viewer missing Unicode blocks I just switched from OS 10.9 to OS 10.14, and the character viewer (aka "Show Emoji & Symbols") looks like this:

Where have all the other Unicode blocks (e.g. Greek and Coptic, Cyrillic, Georgian, Phonetic Symbols) gone? How do I get them back?
(Also, what do I tag this as? keyboard and character are the only two suggestions, they don't seem appropriate, but I'm out of ideas…)

Click the gear button, scroll down to the ones you want, select them.


Wirelessly play audio from an iPad to a Mac Is it possible to send audio from an iPad to a Mac to make use of speakers connected to Mac? Either Bluetooth or WiFi will work, it doesn't matter to me.

The problem is, it's much easier to play something on the iPad because of its excellent music apps infrastructure (for example, TuneIn). However the iPad speaker quality is poor, and I am searching for another way to listen to music from it.

The AirServer application may offer the functionality that you're looking for. According to this 2011 review, the app can:

  AirPlay is what lets you throw content from an iPad or iPhone
  wirelessly to speakers or your TV. To do this, you need to have an
  AirPort Express next to your speakers, or an Apple TV hooked up to
  your TV. Bluetooth speakers show up in the list, too. What you can’t
  do is beam movies from your iOS device direct to your big-screen iMac.

  AirServer is a $3 app that adds in this last piece of the puzzle. With
  it running on your Mac, a new entry will show up in the AirPlay
  popover of any iOS device on the same network, as you’d expect.

  Music just appears magically from your Mac’s speakers, or whatever
  speakers are hooked up to it. Movies open after a second in the
  Quicktime player, and it’s on-screen controls let you play, pause,
  scrub and change volume on the Mac itself.

According to the link on the AirServer website, the price for the current version (AirServer 4.0) is $14.99.

Another application with similar functionality is Banana TV. However, it doesn't support iOS 5, as this note on the app homepage states:

  Banana TV has moved to free. We will not be supporting iOS5, although
  the latest build DOES support Lion. You need an iPhone or iPad running
  greater than or equal to iOS 4.2 and less than iOS 5.0. We apologize,
  but keeping up with Apple's continual change of the undocumented,
  private AirPlay interfaces just isn't something we can continue!

Both applications allow for media to be played from an iOS device to a networked Mac.

EDIT: Add current price of AirServer application.


What characterizes a Mobile Account? When joining a domain one of the AD I can set following options:

If mobile account is selected, where does my account get stored? Also, does a mobile account have special properties that a normal local account doesn't have?

Mobile Account home directory trees are stored locally (normally under /Users) but are synced with a home directory tree on the server.

Other than local files for the user home (which is good if you are using programs that depend on local disk for performance or other reasons), I can't remember any special properties other than the fact that you have two copies of the user's files (which doesn't really count as a backup). Both types of accounts can be managed.


How can I get Itunes on Mac to see all of my music? I setup itunes on a new mac and downloaded all of my purchases songs.  I now copied all of my music from an external hard drive onto the directory:

 Music/Itunes Media/Music

I then restart Itunes but it doesn't recognize any of the new music that I just copied over.

What is the best way for itunes to detect all of this new music?

iTunes uses an internal database for your song list. Move the songs you added manually from Finder to the Desktop (for example).

Check in iTunes settings that it's set to let iTunes manage the Music Library.

Open iTunes and drag and drop the song folder on iTunes (either the window or the icon in the Dock).

iTunes will then copy them and add them to its library.

You can now delete the songs you have on your Desktop.


Apple Force Touch - How do I make it feel like the old tap-to-click? I just purchased a new Macbook Pro with Force Touch.

I’m used to the old tap-to-click feature. Force Touch does not feel the same – it requires a much harder press even with “Click” sensitivity set to “light.”

Tap-to-click, is also not working on my Magic Trackpad.

How do I make Apple Force Touch feel like the old tap-to-click?

How do I make tap-to-click work on a Magic Trackpad connected to a Macbook Pro 2015 with Force Touch?

Go to system preferences and navigate to accessibility.

Disable "Spring-loading delay."


Configuring AirPort Extreme with Existing Router I'm setting up an office network consisting of:
- ATT ADSL2 Modem -> CISCO Router (198.x.x.x) -> Airport Extreme

I'm having an issue getting the Airport Extreme (6th Gen) to connect to the network. I want to use the AE to serve its own 5Ghz and 2.5Ghz network. The issue isn't configuring the wireless details - it is how to get the airport to connect to the router correctly.

Upon connecting the AE as a fresh factory default device, it reports:

What is the correct method to setting up the Airport Extreme in this instance?
I've tried the roaming setup on Apple with no success.

The airport extreme should be connected as just a device with the cisco router handling DHCP and NAT.  in the airport configuration go to the Network Tab and click the double headed arrow under Router Mode set it to "Off(Bridged Mode)

You can then go to Wireless and set that how ever you want all traffic will go to the cisco router and either be forwarded to the Internet or go to the voip, printer, etc.


What unit does the activity monitor use in the energy tab? The activity monitor of OS X show in the energy tab the energy impact. What unit does this value use? Is it Watts? If so, 327 seems a bit high for my taste. I am running this on the low end 21" late 2013 iMac. Of course, Handbrake will use lots of energy, but I would not think that the iMac can pull as much as 320 Watts.

It's a proprietary unit calculated from other available data about a process, including but not limited to CPU utilisation, both short-term and long-term averages (think load averages).


Macbook to iPhone tether, hotspot or wifi If I am connected to wifi on my iPhone, and I turn on my personal hotspot, and then tether to my MacBook will my MacBook use the wifi that my iPhone is connected to or will it use my data via personal hotspot? MacBook is not connected to wifi, only the usb tether to the iPhone, which is connected to wifi.

When using you iPhone as a hotspot, it will use your data plan. In the screenshots you see my iPhone connected to WiFi, and when a device is connected to it's hotspot, my iPhone will be disconnected from the WiFi.

iPhone connected to WiFi:

iPhone not connected to WiFi, but network still available


OSX Yosemite My Calendar Icon Stopped Updating Since upgrading to Yosemite, the calendar icon in my dock has been stuck on October 17. I have had no luck getting it to display the correct date.

Has anyone else run into/found a solution for this issue? Its driving me insane.

This is a little old, but for those still looking for a quick fix:

Open up the terminal and enter the following command:
'killall Dock'

This should reload your dock, including all of the icons thus updating the date displayed in the calendar icon.


Sharing Mac files with windows 10 I have followed instructions found here but I am unable to see the Mac book as a computer in windows 10 network places. Nor can I map it.

Below is what the Mac screen looks like. Even the IP address is not the regular format (numbers). I'm not sure what needs to be done to make this work.

All help is appreciated.

Update
The computer name/workgroup in MAC and PC are the same

Windows PC name

Now, you might see a difference between the computer name in the above. I tried both. Naming the computer in MAC under NETBIOS the same as that in Windows and naming it differently (as shown in the pictures). None worked

The IP address in MAC was the same as that when I logged into the windows. Both the windows and MAC OS are on the same PC so not sure if that makes any difference. Started with a  192.

In windows, when I ping the IP address is worked fine, but probably because the IP address in both MAC and PC are obviously the same. When I tried pinging the computer name (when different in MAC from Windows) it didn't work. I got the following error

Not sure what more I need to do. Elsewhere, I was told that with the latest version of Windows 10, file sharing isn't possible.

Step 1:

On the Mac, go to  System Preferences > Network.  Then on the active network (WLAN or Ethernet, whatever you use) click Advanced > WINS.

Give the computer a name and the same Workgroup as the Windows computer:
To find the Workgroup on Windows, start Explorer, right-Click "My Computer", "Properties".  This will show the workgroup the Windows-PC is on.  Use the same workgroup on the Mac.

Also make sure that IP-V4 and IP-V6 is enabled on Mac OS (also System Preferences > Network).

You can now try to shortcut to Step 6 and see if it works.  If not, proceed with Step 2.

Step 2:
On Mac OS open a Terminal and type ifconfig.  You should get an output like this.  Find the ip-address (something different than 127.0.0.1):

Step 3:
On the Windows computer, open a command prompt.  Type ipconfig ... this should give you output with an IPv4-Address that starts with the same numbers as the one from the Mac (e.g. also 192.168.1.xxx).

Type ping 192.168.1.149 (but with your Mac's IP address from step 2).   If that works, type ping computername (but with the name you gave your Mac from step1).  Both should result in the same output, like this:

Step 4:

In windows explorer, in the address bar, type \\192.168.1.149  (but again with your IP address).  You should now see your shared folders (thse from your own screenshot).

Step 5:

\\computername  (but with the name from the mac network config).

This should also show your data folders.

Step 6:

If all that works, you should also see the Mac in Windows > Explorer > Network (on the left bar in Explorer).


Change order of iMessage Apps? I'm using iOS 10. Is there a way to rearrange the order of iMessage apps as they appear when you tap the App Store icon in Messages? Thanks in advance!

Rearranging the apps in the grid doesn't affect the order that they show up when you're swiping side to side between iMessage apps. My guess is that Apple expected people to largely use the app draw to select the iMessage apps they want to use, with the horizontal scrolling view functioning more like the app switcher for the phone, with the most recently used app appearing first.

So the horizontal order is based in the order in which you've opened the iMessage apps from the app draw - with the most recent at the left and oldest at the right. To get the order you want in the horizontal scrolling view, first open the app draw. Select the one you want at the right hand side. Then reopen the app draw and select the one you want to the left of that, and repeat, ending with the app you want at the left hand side of the iMessage apps.

So to get the below order mapped over to the horizontal view I'd open the app draw and select '#images.' Then reopen the app draw and select 'grammarsnob,' reopen and select 'giphy,' reopen and select 'Alto's Adventure.'

It's not very intuitive, but I guess they're going for Snapchat levels of UI confusion.


just upgraded iMac late 2015 ram from 12 GB to 28 GB and it became too slow to use I had added an 8GB RAM along with existing 4GB when I purchased this iMac in 2016. For all this long it was running fine when lately I thought to add more RAM. So yesterday I added 2 more 8GB RAM modules and as I turned the system on it starts running to slow.

Apps which were running smooth earlier are now running too slow.
On Civilization VI i can practically see every frame moving every second, which earlier was running very fine.

Old config RAM

Slot 1 from bottom 4GB - system default RAM
Slot 3 from bottom 8GB - Hyper Kingston 1867 DDR3 RAM SODIMM

Now added RAM

Slot 2 from bottom 8GB - Hyper Kingston 1867 DDR3 RAM SODIMM
Slot 4 from bottom 8GB - Hyper Kingston 1867 DDR3 RAM SODIMM

You should have matching DIMMS in order to maximize performance / dual channel functionality.  Also note that RAM is going to operate at the lowest speed of all the DIMMS, which is another reason why they should all match.

That being said, it shouldn't be operating that slowly.  I would start with removing the original 4 GB stick, possibly doing a PRAM reset, and maybe shuffling around which slots they're installed in, since the problem only starting showing when you used the two vacant slots with the new RAM, if I'm reading correctly. Also confirm that the system is recognizing all the memory you installed.

Finally, it's possible you got bad/defective memory.  You can also try running diagnostics to rule out logic board issues etc.


How to get rid of a persistent iOS app? Last year in Spain, I got a free app to manage my cell phone service.  I no longer have an iPhone, and the app is useless unless I have that account in that country.

So I deleted the app from my iPad, but it keeps reappearing as an available update.  I keep deleting it to save update bandwidth, but it is there repeatedly.

I know the workaround is to skip its update, but due to circumstances, I have to go some time between updates, and it is quite convenient to "update all" instead of tapping one or two dozen choices.

So how do I completely get rid of this thing?

If the update was pending when it was deleted or something similar, then the various lists of what is installed or needs to be undated may have gotten out of wack.

Perhaps reinstalling it, updating it, and when there are no updates pending, then deleting it, might be effective.


Disabling SIP on a mid 2012 Mac Running Sierra 10.12.16 I tried booting my mid 2012 mac (which is running Sierra 10.12.6) in recovery mode and opening the terminal; I would like to disable SIP. As per usual, I typed "csrutil disable", and 'command not found' was returned. I looked at klanomath's answer here (csrutil: command not found) though I didn't quite understand what he/she meant by 'booting to your main volume'. I am not sure if that is relevant here, but I am inquiring if there is any further way to disable SIP. Is high-sierra needed or helpful here?

(Also, if possible, an answer comprehensible by someone with very little background in computing or working with the terminal would be highly appreciated)

Thanks in advance.

Instead of just writing "csrutil", replace that with:

/Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/usr/bin/csrutil

so the whole thing becomes:

/Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/usr/bin/csrutil disable

Note that "Macintosh HD" should be replaced with the name of your startup disk. If you do not know the name, then run the following command:

ls /Volumes

It will list the available volumes for you.

If the above gives the error message: "Operation not supported" it means that your recovery system is a version so old that it hasn't got support for the functionality necessary to run csrutil.

In that case try starting up in Internet Recovery mode by holding down Cmd-Opt-R while booting the Mac, which means that the files for the recovery system are downloaded adhoc from Apple's servers. This should give you a version new enough to run csrutil.

In case that is not possible then you could instead upgrade your own recovery partition to a newer version or alternatively create a recovery partition on a USB pen-drive and boot on that. How to do both is described here:

https://superuser.com/questions/1024493/updating-recovery-partition-in-os-x-el-capitan


Is it possible to enable 1.5x scaling using HiDPI on OS X? I use a Mac Mini on a 46" 1080p TV and using native resolution the UI is too small, and using HiDPI the UI is too big.

Is there a way to hack the OS X to enable 150% scaling instead of 100% and 200% ??

No, this is not possible as it would result in a significantly distorted image with loss of image data. There is no way to accurately display one dot over 1.5 x 1.5 pixels.


can I restore my SMS messages without iCloud? I sold my iPhone 7, I don't have iCloud backups nor set it to save messages to iCloud.  I wonder if I can have them restored to a new iPhone or Android phone, are they saved by the carrier?  (carrier is Three). All I have is the my SIM card.
Any help much welcome.

No, if you don't have any backups in iCloud or your local Mac or PC, you can't restore them.  You don't have any place to restore them from.
The SIM card does not store a copy of messages sent using iMessage or Messages.


How to recover icloud account? I have just bought a Macbook pro. When I install it, I click login to icloud but I forgot question that I use and I don't use email to backup.

I can't speak english good.
Please help me recover icloud question for that case

Yeah, iforgot.apple.com. It's also available in your language. As this probably leaves you with nothing seeing as you forgot both email and security questions, your second best shot is Apple Support, which is also available for your country. Try to get on the phone with one of their advisors.


macOS partition not showing up after High Sierra update I updated my MacBook Pro mid 2015 to High Sierra from Sierra. Update was successful and everything worked perfectly for nearly 6 hours.
Then MBP hung and I had to hard power off since it wasn't responding for quite a while.

Now, that partition doesn't even exist. I had Boot Camp installed. Hence it automatically boots into Windows. No other drive shows up for boot options. Not even macOS recovery partition.

I made a bootable USB stick with macOS High Sierra from internet recovery, Disk Utility cannot fix it.

fsck_apfs says it is not a APFS container.
Windows lists it as HFS/HFS+.
diskutil lists - APFS container.

I need all the data on it since I had been working while the update happened which has no backup.
How do I recover that partition or at least all the data in it?

Note: Drive was not encrypted with FileVault.

Try System Preferences -> Startup Disk -> macOS. I updated Sierra on my MBP (late 2016) and was unable to boot into Boot Camp. Fixed over the phone with Apple, but then I was unable to boot into macOS. They fixed that at the Apple store today using the above commands.

If you want to boot into Windows directly, just hold down the "option" key while you press power on button. This saves you from having to log in to macOS and then restarting while holding down the option key.


Is Mac Mini enough to publish my game on iTunes or do I need iPod or iPhone to publish the game on iTunes? I have a simple trivia game where you basically click on one of the 4 buttons the whole time, nothing else, maybe except the main game menu.

My question is, if I need to own anything else except my Mac Mini to publish this game on iTunes or I need some mobile device like, iPod Touch 4 etc.

If it's not possible to go without iPhone/iPod (iPod Touch with iOS 4.1), which device is then the minimum? As I said, it's a simple game, no motion graphics, few simple effects after the answer etc.

My primary phone device is Samsung Galaxy and this would be my first iOS port of my trivia game for Android, so I am not sure if Mac Mini is enough or I need for this type of game/quiz something better?

As a user I would hope that you have run the app on the IOS device that Iuse. Thus iff you say it runs on an iPad you have run it on an iPad, if I have an IPhone you have run it on an iPhone etc.

If I have a problem I expect you to be able to reproduce it on the hardware I have or be able to say that you see no problem on the hardware.

No simulator is perfect there will be differences between it and real running - especially as they use different types of processor etc. One example of this as pointed out by 0x7fffffff is that the file system in the simulator is case insensitive but on a IOS device it is case sensitive

So I would expect professional support to have run the app on at least an iPad and an iPhone and preferably on various models e.g. iPad and iPad mini, iPhone 4s and 5.


Code Highlighting is not working on Chrome, Big Sur I was reading the rust book, however the code was not highlighted.
(It is using highlight js to highlight the code)
OS: MacOS Big Sur public beta
Browser: Chrome(Maybe Chromium) (Not on Safari)
Screenshot:

(println! keyword is computed to orange in lower right)
As you can see, the code highlighting isn't working.
However, the computed color is different from black.
This is really stressing me out. How can I fix this problem?

This issue had also been stressing me out for months and with every Chrome or macOS update I was hoping it would get fixed… Today I stumbled upon this comment which finally helped me solve the problem!
Turns out I just had to reinstall Source Code Pro (in my case by running brew reinstall font-source-code-pro).


How can I access iCloud documents/files from an iOS device? I completed a Numbers document on my Mac, saved to iCloud and now tried to open/read it on my iPhone 4S.

I can see it listed in Settings → Manage Storage, but how do I retrieve it?

You can do so from the Numbers app on iOS. You don’t open it from manage storage. You open the app in which the document was created, on the iPhone.


How to point an Apple TV to an iTunes Library on a NAS? I have my Apple TV linked to my iTunes library stored on a network storage device by linking to my laptop. I would like to point my Apple TV directly to the iTunes library on the storage device without linking through the laptop. Is there an easy way to do this?

(Assuming you have an Apple TV 2…) You can't do it without jailbreaking.

Once you do that, you just need to run Plex or XBMC. I only have experience with the former, but we're very happy with the results.


Integrating user acounts I bought a new iMac and migrated stuff over from my old mac. I now have 3 user accounts, 2 with different variations on my name! None of them access the same applications and information. I have no idea how I accomplished this: computers are not my strong suit. How do I blend them all together? Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Each time do you a migration, it will make a new account on the new machine.

I can only assume to get 3 separate accounts you started with a brand new user on the new Mac, then did two separate, possibly partial, migrations.

It is possible to manually merge them, [I also learned the hard way how to do this] but in all honesty, & especially as you claim to not be a power-user, it will be simpler to wipe the Mac & start over. It may not actually take any longer than trying to merge what you have currently & is likely to be less 'hazardous'.
Do a full single migration as part of the initial setup. When the machine first asks you who you are, there is a point at which you migrate instead of making a new user.

Apple have a step by step procedure to "sell" your Mac & set up fresh for the "new owner". I would follow that. What to do before you sell, give away, or trade in your Mac As it reboots once more as a "new Mac" then follow the Migration guide - How to move your content to a new Mac which should then Migrate to one single new account, matching the one you had on your previous machine.


Firefox Developer Edition [and others] not opening in macOS Catalina Ok... tell me it's not just me, when I launch Firefox Developer Edition [68.0b13] in macOS Catalina [beta 2] I get the error message that it can't open because it's from an unidentified developer.

So, I try to go to the file in Application and right-click open and confirm that I want to open.  The base program opens but there is an updater sequence that Firefox tries to open that hits the same wall as before.

I've even gone to Security and Privacy and told it to open anyway.  Still nothing.

Does anyone know how to overcome this and get FDE to launch or am I just screwed until Apple and Mozilla figure their stuff out?

Ok... I figured it out.

Disable the block

sudo spctl --master-disable

Launch Firefox and allow the update to complete then re-enable the block.  I bet this will also resolve other software not opening as well.

sudo spctl --master-enable

Thanks to @Mark for the reminder about the Beta forums.


MBP 2013 keyboard & trackpad freeze after USB disconnect while sleeping MacBook Pro 2013 retina. Sometimes I plug my phone into one of the USB ports to charge it. Sometimes I close the MBP and let the phone keep charging. Sometimes I then unplug the phone without waking up the MBP. Sometimes (not always -- just intermittently) when I do open the MBP again after this sequence, the keyboard and trackpad no longer work. An external mouse still works fine. But no combination of switching plugs, re-attaching the phone, sleep/wake, will get me the use of the keyboard again. I'm stuck at the screen saver login page with nothing but an external mouse (can't type password, no option to shut down cleanly). I have to force shutdown by holding down the power button, which is not ideal.

Does anybody know a way to un-wedge at this point or re-enable the trackpad + keyboard? I'd love to be able to just get back to work again, or at the very least do a clean logout and shutdown without a force reset.

Workaround

When you find yourself in this situation, you should be able to just briefly press the power button. Just a quick half-second press. In doing so you'll be prompted to restart, shutdown, etc.

Potential fix

It may be worth you resetting the System Management Controller (SMC) to see whether this resolves the issue in the longer term.

To do this on your model of MBP, follow these steps:

Shut down your MBP
Keep the MagSafe adapter (power cable) plugged in.
Press at the same time shiftoptioncontrol (on the left side of the built-in keyboard) and the power button
Let go
Turn your computer back on with the power button.

Some tests

Have you tested to see whether this behaviour is replicated on all USB ports?

Another test would be to boot into Safe Mode and see if it is replicated, either during Safe Mode or again afterwards. I understand it's an intermittent issue, so these sorts of tests will require determination/patience.

To boot into Safe Mode:

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


Wiped drive, now can’t reinstall El Capitan from Recovery because the "item is temporarily unavailable" I wanted to clear room on my computer, so I restarted the computer with cmd+r keys and opened OS X Utilities. I erased my drive and wanted to reinstall OS X El Capitan. After I agreed to the terms then selected my drive I signed into the Apple store. I put the confirmation code in from my phone and it said “This item is temporarily unavailable Try again later”. I tried restarting it and trying then shutting it down and trying but it still won’t work.

I ran into this issue myself.  NoahL's comment is spot on: try Internet Recovery (Command+Option+R).

I was trying to reinstall macOS on a laptop.  The on-disk recovery kept giving me this error message after I gave it my AppleID in the reinstall wizard:

This item is temporarily unavailable.
Try again later.

I retried two weeks later, and still got the same error.
I found this thread and tried out Internet Recovery and I was able to reinstall macOS.

Note: I had to erase the disk with Disk Utility before Internet Recovery would let me reinstall macOS, because the version on disk was newer than the version that will be installed.

(I don't know why Internet Recovery doesn't just offer the latest macOS...)


Mountain Lion - scale down the window shadows it is just me or did apple increased the size of the window shadows in mountain lion way to much?
This is annoying when you've 2 windows side by side - is there any way to turn them off / to scale them down?

The program I use to do this on OS X 10.8.4 is ShadowSweeper.

http://download.cnet.com/ShadowSweeper/3000-2072_4-75966596.html

This one looks like it might also work but I haven't tried it myself.

https://github.com/puffnfresh/toggle-osx-shadows

Others have suggested the programs ShadowKiller and Nocturne. Neither worked for me.


Is there a GUI for OS X LaunchAgents? I'm a web developer by day and a lot of the software I install on my computer (namely databases and web servers) come with an optional LaunchAgent to automate starting/stopping processes on boot. I'm wondering if there's a GUI for these types of services so I can use the LaunchAgent, then kill the services gracefully. Another great feature would be if I could turn off boot on launch and just use the LaunchAgent to start/stop a service as needed.

This seems to be exactly what you are looking for: LaunchControl


Macbook 13 inch - Screen Noise on attached display I have a 13 Inch Macbook (2014) running Yosemite -  the computer has been attached to an external dell monitor via the HDMI port. The screen works fine but on waking the computer from sleep, I see noise (see image below) on the external monitor. I have to plug out the monitor and plug it in again to make it work.

It looks like timing issue between monitor and your Macbook.

You might try different cable or just turning monitor off and on with a button (much better than wearing off HDMI socket btw)


Does this Mini DisplayPort to HDMI connector output audio? I'm trying to find a relatively cheap Mini DisplayPort to HDMI cable that also supports sending audio to an HDTV. Cables from Monoprice are out of the question, since they don't ship to Romania and I'd rather not spend $40 for a cable sold by an Apple authorized reseller.

I've found several cables on eBay1 that say they support "DTS/DTS-HD, Dolby Digital / Dolby TrueHD, and Linear PCM (LPCM)". All those acronyms leave me completely clueless; they all have something to do with audio, but none of them clearly state "yes, we have audio support". Would such a cable allow me to output both video and audio to a mid-2010 MacBook Pro? Has anyone actually purchased such a cable and had any problems with it?

1. I haven't linked to any of the cables I've found on eBay since I'm not here to drive traffic to their products. Also, I'm trying not to spam this site.

The Original Apple-Adapter supports Audio for MacBook Pro and iMac Mid2010

From the Apple-Website:

  Note: *Audio support is only available for MacBook Pro 13/15/17-in.
  mid-2010 release; iMac 21.5/27-in. early-2010 release

Apple-Store Link

I've bought a cheap one from Belkin for my MacBook Air - but there is no Audio-Output!


Less RAM and an SSD vs. more RAM and an HDD? This isn't a question about which part of my computer to upgrade. It's a question about what I should buy in my eventual new computer.

I have an early 2011 13" MBP with a 500GB hard drive and an upgrade to 10GB of RAM. Now I'm starting to look at buying a 13" rMBP with a 512GB SSD, and I'm torn between paying more for the 16GB model or sticking with 8GB, keeping everything else constant (i.e. that's the only part I'm indecisive about). I remembered that a while ago, something I read said that having less RAM but an SSD is comparable to having more RAM and an HDD. Is this true?

Specifically, if I've grown used to working on 10GB of RAM, could I get the 8GB rMBP and not experience any serious performance drops because the storage that the RAM is drawing everything from is still so much faster than what I'm used to?

It all depends on what type of usage your rMBP will be subjected to. It does help with the SSD and just cutting it off at 8gb(I had a similar setup but with the earlier 15" rMBPs) if you're trying to save some money but make sure you have enough storage on the SSD(you'll run out fast). Not to mention 2011 RAM speeds are significantly slower than today's.


Macbook air keeps disconnecting audio source I have a new Macbook Air (2019 version) with macOS Catalina. My issue is that it keeps disconnecting the audio output I'm using. This has been occurring ever since I bought the mac 3 weeks ago, rendering it useless to play music.

If I plug in my headset with minijack, I'll get to play music for about 1-5 minutes, before the Mac goes into some form of epilepsy mode, where I can observe in the audio settings that the audio output (in this case external headset) is removed and added very rapidly, sometimes naming the source "unknown", like every half second for about 2-3 minutes, before resuming to play music.

If I physically take out the mini jack during this epilepsy mode, the Mac will play music from the internal speakers, which is now named "unknown". During this time I'm not able to change the volume, having to quit iTunes/Spotify to make the music stop.

This occurs suddenly and without any obvious triggers. Its been happening 2 times while writing this post. It seems to happens regardless of external monitors, what programs are running, and happens on 2 different headsets with minijack and even with my bluetooth connected Airpods.

Any ideas?

This is happening to me, you need to unplug the jack and put it back in.


How do I read developer responses to my app reviews? Is there a way to view all of your developer responses in the App Store?

I was wondering this too, check your junk mail I found the response in there :)


The C key stopped working, any workaround to emulate 'Command + C'? On a macbook, the C key isn't working anymore, so i was wondering if there was a way to trigger the command + c shortcut other than pressing the command and C keys

Thanks a lot

Yes, you can use the Edit menu and select copy


How to dual boot an iMac 2020, 27", T2 from (Catalina & Mojave) I need to add a Mojave partition to my native Catalina iMac 2020, 27", T2.
To date all attempts to boot from a Mojave external install drive have failed. "Secure Boot" is set to "No Security" and "External Boot" is set to "Allowed". Catalina just shows a "No Entry" sign after selecting the Mojave Installer drive. I know this machine will support Mojave. I am able to boot exclusively from a Catalina external install drive. If I wipe the computers internal hard drive from a Catalina external install drive will I be able to access the machine and install Mojave? If so how do I proceed? Any other possible scenarios. What about target disk mode?
Thanks again.

Your iMac shipped with Catalina.  Generally, Apple does not support using an OS older than what the device originally shipped with.  Yes, there are the occasional exceptions.  Unfortunately, your model is not one of them.
If you really need to run Mojave on your system, then you should probably consider running it within a virtual machine.


How do I make applications open on the primary display and not the active display? I love the improvements that Apple made to multiple displays in Mavericks, but there is one thing that really gets on my nerves.  If I'm using an application on my secondary display, and I use spotlight to open a new application, I want it to open on my primary display, not the display that was just active.  Unfortunately, the only way that I know of to fix this is to disable separate spaces for each display, which I use very frequently.  Is there any way that I can force all of my applications to open on the primary display (the one with the menu bar in the Displays preference pane)?

I don't fully understand your question but here's my answer on what i think you want to achieve. Make sure you have your display connected when doing the following.

Open the application you want to assign.
Control+Click(Right click) on the dock icon
You should see that a menu pops up and hover over Options
You'll see something that says Assign To and then some options
Select the display you want
You should be done :)


What's the meaning of "These photos will also be deleted from Photo Stream on all your devices"? I have iCloud Photos, and for a period had iCloud enabled on my iPhone (6, 12.1.2). Then I had disabled iCloud on the phone to free space. Some photos still stayed on the phone and I didn't delete them for a while. Now after some time again my storage is full on the phone and I wanted to delete these photos, which all perfectly synced to Photos on my other Macs, and which I'd assumed are only local copies.

BUT when I tried deleting them I got this message: "These photos will also be deleted from Photo Stream on all your devices". I've checked and Photo Stream is disabled on the phone. It's not clear to me how things work and why I'm getting this message.

Can I safely delete these photos without deleting them from Photos across all devices?

I suggest that you have a separate folder on an external drive for all photos as a backup.

I do this and even if I make a mistake between any device and iCloud I still have the originals.

When it warns you that the photos will be removed across all devices then it is best to believe it and make sure.


Is it possible to rebuild the ~/Library folder completely? Most of the time the first step to troubleshoot an OSX application problem is to login to the Guest account and see if a problem persist. The reason for this - I presume - is that the ~/Library folder of the guest account does not contain any, possibly corrupt preference files.

Over the years of using my Mac my ~/Library folder has become cluttered with preference files and folders of applications. Some of these applications are no longer installed.
Is there a way to "start over"? Some way to delete all existing preferences, and then let the applications currently present populate it again when the application is started?
Especially the Application Support and Preferences folder is full of old, irrelevant files.

I know I could do a fresh install, but then if I restore the user from Time Machine obviously the ~/Library is restored as well.

If you log into the Guest account and everything is running as you suspect, simply create a new user (make sure they are an administrator). Log into the new account and then take ownership of the previous user's Documents, Photo's, Music, etc. folders and move them into the new profile. Depending on how many files you have to move this way it is a quick and easy way to "start over." :D


Not able to install Netbeans IDE (PHP bundle) on OS X El Capitan I am trying to install Netbeans IDE (PHP bundle) on OS X El Capitan.

I am getting following error

  NetBeans IDE cannot be installed. This software can be installed with
  Java 7 update 10 or newer. Please download and install the latest
  update of Java 7 from
  http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/index.html and
  restart NetBeans installation.

Following is error screenshot

PHP and some other bundles (HTML, C/C++) don't need separate java as they include JRE as mentioned on Netbeans downloads page - https://netbeans.org/downloads/

  HTML/JS, PHP and C/C++ NetBeans bundles include Java Runtime
  Environment and do not require a separate Java installation.

am I missing out something here?

Make sure that you have downloaded and are using the correct installer. Like your note says, it evidently should not require a separate Java installation.

Otherwise, just install the JDK separately.


Is my Apple Id under attack, and how do I fix it? So I got an e-mail from Apple which says:

  You recently requested a password reset for your Apple ID. To complete
  the process, click the link below. Reset now > If you didn’t make this
  change or if you believe an unauthorized person has accessed your
  account, go to iforgot.apple.com to reset your password immediately.
  Then sign into your Apple ID account page at https://appleid.apple.com
  to review and update your security settings. Apple Support

I didn't request any such password, and I already know my password, but when I try to log into my account to check my security settings it wants me to answer two security questions, neither of which I recognize.  So I go to try to change my security questions at the "iforgot" domain, and it says:

  Choose a method to reset your security questions.

  Use credit card information Enter the details for the card on file
  with Apple. Your card will not be charged.
  Answer your current security questions Answer the question(s) you chose when you created your Apple ID.

The problem is, I obviously can't use the second method because since I don't recognize the questions, I can't know the answers.  But I also don't know what credit card Apple is asking for here.  I may have used more than one card with Apple in stores, but I don't recall if I have ever used one online, and in fact I may have used a "throw-away" number.

So I'm not sure what to do here.  Is my account under attack?  How can I get control of my account back?

I would absolutely follow the “if you did not request this” instructions to the letter. Since you may have difficulty with security questions or past purchases, I would open a support case with Apple and take good notes what you trying anything seems odd.

Just be sure you don’t click the links in the mail - it’s getting hard to tell the scam mails from the real ones if you just look at font and spelling and not the address that links open.

Navigate to apple support site from https://apple.com

The main problem is if you don’t keep good records of all your security information when you signed up, you might need to be patient and dig up app purchases, review old credit cards systematically and work with support.

A typo in a year is something a computer won't validate and you know the year you were born, just that might not be what the keyboard typed. Worse, if you made up answers or answered the correct question in the wrong field (answer in the field above the question instead of below the question), you could easily lock yourself out.

That ends the thing you control, here are things you don't control:

There’s no way you can prevent someone else from trying to lock your account initially or even take it over. Until you validate to Apple support that you are the owner of the account, the account could be "flagged" for extra security. Hopefully it is just someone that is confused and not someone maliciously trying to make your life miserable.


Add command to sudo in OS X - or how to fix a major security inconsistency in OS X OS X provides Keychain Access, which is a great way to save passwords of varying apps and websites. When you want to view a password via the Keychain Access GUI, you are asked the admin password. However, OS X also provides a command to export all Keychain Access passwords to a text file, unencrypted:

security dump-keychain -d login.keychain > keychain.txt

This command does not require sudo privileges.

So I have two questions:

How can I add the sudo privilege requirement to the security command.
Is this behaviour intended or is it a major inconsistency with regards to security concerns at Apple ?

The security command is working as expected, and is following the same keychain access policies that any other program would follow.

Accessing a user's keychain is not an admin function -- the user's keychain belongs to them, so admin access is irrelevant. On the other hand, the System keychain (/Library/Keychains//System.keychain) is "owned by" the system, so admin access might be needed for it and/or its items.
To gain access to the user's keychain, it must first be unlocked. login.keychain is normally encrypted with the user's login password, and is automatically unlocked when they log in. If it weren't already unlocked, security would trigger a prompt for the password to unlock it.
Each item in the keychain has its own access policy. You can see these in the Keychain Access utility by double-clicking the keychain item, then selecting the Access Control tab. security obeys these access controls: if it's set to "Allow all applications to access this item", security will dump the item without prompting for anything; if it's set to "Confirm before allowing access" (and security isn't in the "Always allow..." list), security will trigger a prompt for access to the item (and if "Ask for keychain password" is selected as well, the prompt will require the keychain password).

It might be possible to require admin rights to run security, but I wouldn't recommend it. Firstly, it might break any parts of the OS that depend on running security (though I don't know of any), and secondly it wouldn't prevent any other program from dumping out the keychain, since other programs are subject to the same access policies.


Preference Panes no longer open after Big Sur update. Library/PreferencePanes is now completely empty After upgrading to Big Sur, none of the System Preferences panes open. A little hunting around online steered me to the folder, Library/PreferencePanes, which is now completely empty. So I guess there's just nothing to open. On the advice of Apple Support, I've tried reinstalling Big Sur in the hope that it would restore everything, but still nothing. The folder remains empty. I've tried multiple restarts and clearing NVRAM. Weirdly, when I open Timemachine and search for old copies of Library/PreferencePanes to restore, the folder is empty even before the upgrade, back in the good old days when the panes still opened. I'm stuck. Any ideas would be great. Thanks!

Make sure you look at the right preference panes folder. There are three of them:

/System/Library/PreferencePanes This folder includes all the panes which are shipped with macOS. It definitely should not be empty.
/Library/PreferencePanes Here you can install third-party panes which should be available for all users of your Mac.
/Users/yourusername/Library/PreferencePanes Here you can install third-party panes which should be available just for "your" user.

Use Finder and select "Go to" – "Go to folder..." and enter one of the path names. Finder will then show you wether it is empty. The last two can be empty, but the first one not.
If the first one isn't empty, try to add another admin user using the steps in this answer and see if this user can open the preference panes.
If it is empty, you should try to install the system again, checking the disk first by booting into recovery mode. Press Command-R during startup to do this.


My SD card slot doesn't work My SD card slot on the latest MacBook (Mid 2012) won't mount my SD card. The SD card doesn't appear in Finder, Disk Utility, Image Capture or anywhere. I know it's not a software problem, because nothing changed before and after. How do I fix it?

I blew hard in the SD card hub. Now it is working fine.


Which Macs support HDMI with ethernet? Which Macs support HDMI with ethernet, either natively such as the 15" retina Macbook Pro, or via a Mini Displayport adapter?

My Samsung TV can connect to the internet, but has no Wi-Fi access. However, it should be possible to share my internet access via a HDMI connection and update the TV's software, right?

Please explain: are you attempting to update your TV's firmware? If so, check the TV's manual - I'm pretty sure it's done by loading from your Macbook to a USB drive. HDMI over ethernet is a system built to provide  a digital television signal over two cat5 cables. It requires extra hardware on each end, and is quite likely not what you are looking for.
If all you need is that internet connection, go to the "Sharing" preferences and turn on internet sharing by sharing your WIFI connection and checking the Ethernet box. Now connect the laptop and TV's ethernet ports.


Bash executes only ~/.profile but neither of ~/.bash_profile and ~/.bashrc I have a strange problem with bash:

I switch my default shell to /bin/sh from zsh and it doesn't execute ~/.bash_profile or ~/.bashrc when I open a new terminal, it only executes ~/.profile.

What could be the problem?

I could probably source ~/.bashrc from ~/.profile but that does't seem like a good idea, e.g. it would break if I changed to another shell again.

I suggest that you read the bash manual under the heading INVOCATION which states:

   If bash is invoked with the name sh, it tries to mimic the startup behavior of historical versions of sh as  closely
   as  possible, while conforming to the POSIX standard as well.  When invoked as an interactive login shell, or a non-
   interactive shell with the --login option, it first attempts to read and  execute  commands  from  /etc/profile  and
   ~/.profile,  in that order.  The --noprofile option may be used to inhibit this behavior.  When invoked as an inter-
   active shell with the name sh, bash looks for the variable ENV, expands its value if it is  defined,  and  uses  the
   expanded  value as the name of a file to read and execute.  Since a shell invoked as sh does not attempt to read and
   execute commands from any other startup files, the --rcfile option has no effect.  A non-interactive  shell  invoked
   with the name sh does not attempt to read any other startup files.  When invoked as sh, bash enters posix mode after
   the startup files are read.

A new terminal session in OS X/macOS always starts as a login shell.


sparsebundle reverting to read-only I have a wireless drive [WD My Passport Pro] and of course I want to encrypt it, but of course there's no way to encrypt the actual drive with FDE and still have it recognized by the Passport's firmware, so I've created a sparsebundle within in encrypted with AES-256 with the drive physically attached to my Mac. I've been able to write to it, but as soon as I've accessed the sparsebundle from the underlying drive mounted as a network share, it became read-only, even though the underlying drive is r/w and I am the owner of the sparsebundle file. Re-attaching the drive locally and opening the sparsebundle still results in a read-only FS. I've created a sparseimage and I've been able to write to it ever since, even after several ummounts and remounts, but it seems to be much slower, which is expected. How can I make the sparsebundle writable once again?

I'm on the latest 10.13.

Similar to this.

Thank you

As far as I have understood, macOS allows read-only mounting sparsebundles in almost all situations.

However, when you want to read/write mount a sparsebundle, the underlying filesystem (in this case the network protocol you're using for mounting the wireless drive - for example AFP or SMB) must support F_FULLFSYNC. If your system does not support that the risk of data loss is substantial.

Therefore check if you can use a different protocol, or you can change the settings, mount options or FUSE-driver (if such is used) to allow F_FULLFSYNC.


How to use GUI pinentry program for GPG I would always like to use the GUI version of entering my GPG passphrase. Currently my pinentry program is set the same on my laptop as my desktop. But the desktop always asks for my passphrase on the command line, and my laptop always asks using the GUI.

What do I need to set to force the use of the GUI on the desktop?

Current ~/.gnupg/gpg-agent.conf

pinentry-program /usr/local/MacGPG2/libexec/pinentry-mac.app/Contents/MacOS/pinentry-mac
default-cache-ttl 600
max-cache-ttl 7200

Current ~/.gnupg/gpg.conf

default-key 26A32A76
require-cross-certification
keyserver-options auto-key-retrieve
keyserver hkps://hkps.pool.sks-keyservers.net
auto-key-locate hkps://hkps.pool.sks-keyservers.net
keyserver-options no-honor-keyserver-url
comment GPG
cert-digest-algo SHA512
default-preference-list SHA512 SHA384 SHA256 SHA224 AES256 AES192 AES CAST5 ZLIB BZIP2 ZIP Uncompressed
personal-digest-preferences SHA512 SHA384 SHA256 SHA224
no-emit-version
use-agent

Try to uncheck Store passphrases in OS X Keychain by default and press Delete stored passphrases button in GPGPreferences if you installed GPG Suite.
Also try to comment this line from your ~/.gnupg/gpg.conf:

use-agent


Can You Make the Podcasts App Show Only Downloaded Episodes? I've never met anyone who loves Apple's podcasts app.  But I could make peace with it if not for one infuriating design choice that I can't figure out how to correct.

I have set up iTunes to sync all unplayed podcast episodes to my iPhone.  The Podcasts app is set to not download anything itself and keep only unplayed episodes.  So, I sync an episode, listen to it on the Podcasts app, and then the file is removed from the iPhone on next sync.  But it still shows up in the list, with a little cloud icon (#521):

Is there any way to prevent non-downloaded podcasts from showing up in this app?

I have found a solution, albeit an unsatisfactory one.  The way to get the behavior I want is to uninstall the podcasts app from the mobile device, and then reinstall it during the next sync.  This resets everything to how it should be in the first place.


MacOS Automator: Save new text file in current folder I am trying to write a simple Automator service to merge selected text files. I’ve nearly got it, but I am running into one problem.

I want to create a new text file from the combined output of the selected files. When I add the New Text File action, I can only set the Where location to a particular folder.

If I want to create a new folder, I have the option of Same Folder as Input. This does not appear for new text files.

How can I save a new text file to the same folder as the selected files?

Since you did not include your workflow, what type of workflow it is, or which version of OS X/macOS you're using, I can only offer an example of how you can set a variable to use for the Where: in a New Text File action in an Automator workflow.

I have a Temp folder, which I created, in the root the Macintosh HD, and in this folder I created two plain text files, named Filename1.txt and Filename2.txt, each of which contain a single line of text, "The name of this file is Filename1.txt" and "The name of this file is Filename2.txt", respectively.

The following Automator workflow works with selected Finder items in Finder's frontmost window, or the Desktop as appropriate if no other individual Finder windows are frontmost with a selection, and using a Run AppleScript action sets a variable to the parent folder of the first item selected to be used as the Where: in a New Text File action. and creates a file named Combined.txt.

Note in the image below, there is a break in the link between the Set Value of Variable action and what is the second Get Selected Finders Item action.  This disconnect is created by selecting Ignore this action's input under Options in the second Get Selected Finders Item action.

The variable inputParentFolder was dragged and dropped from the Variable section at the bottom of the workflow pane into the Where: in the New Text File action.

As you can see in the image below, the workflow completed successfully combining the content of the two selected files in Finder into a new file named Combined.txt in the same folder as the selected files.


Bluetooth can't find any device After maintenance, my Macbook Pro Retina can't find any bluetooth device (Magic Mouse / Keyboard / Soundbar / Phone)

I read many instructions, reseted SMC and NVRAM, but nothing changes

Solved: service master didn't connected all three wires, that come to antenn.


How does iTunes Match match the songs in your library? There seems to be a lot of information about iTunes Match, but I couldn't find any that describes exactly how the algorithm works. Is it something as simple as comparing song names/artists, or is some kind of checksum done?

I'm asking since I've got some music which isn't even properly tagged (titles/artists mismatched) and since iTunes Match is not yet available in Poland I can't really test how it would be behave with such files. So is it something really complicated and nicely done which involves music analysis or something as trivial as checking song names? Does anyone have detailed information on it?

I already answered a related question. I may not know the most definite answer, But I read that iTunes Match uses Gracenote's MusicID program. It seems MusicID uses the following techniques to identify songs.

MusicID-featured Identification Technologies:

CD Identification: Using the CD’s unique Table of Content (TOC), MusicID can identify CDs released around the world. Even with multiple pressings and release dates, patented fuzzy matching enables accurate recognition.

Stream Identification: Using an audio waveform fingerprint technology, MusicID can identify music with short audio samples anywhere in the song.

Digital File Identification: MusicID can identify individual songs or albums in a user’s collection regardless of source, format, or tag information. Utilizing a multi-step process which combines stream identification with textual information analysis from the file’s embedded tags, file name, directory path, and other related files in the user’s collection, individual or groups of songs can be matched to albums.

More here.

To answer your question, they perform some fuzzy text matching algorithm to map meta data and also perform audio waveform analysis.


Can't delete attachments in mac mail On the mac mail I used to be able to select a mail, then press “Command” button and “M” to delete an attachment (without deleting the whole e-mail, just delete the attachment). But right now, when I try to delete attachments in some e-mails by pressing those two buttons, it just make a “ding” sound and wouldn’t delete anything. Can you please tell me how to solve this problem?

Since this problem only happening with certain e-mails with attachments, I thought it’s probably something wrong with the attachment. So, I forward that same e-mail back to me (including the attachment and everything), I can delete that attachment by pressing those two buttons. So, I am guessing there is nothing wrong with the files that has been attached.

Macbook Pro OS X 10.6.8
Mail Version 4.5 (1084)

I do not know for the OS X 10.6.8 but on 10.9.5 it works like this

Create new Smart Mailbox

Once it is done finding all emails with attachments

Select all or specific one

Under the Messages tab select "Remove Attachment".

Or

Create a keyboard shortcut for it

System preferences Keyboard - Shortcuts tab

Select App shortcut

Click on (+) sign)

Select Mail in the Application window

Write "Remove Attachments"

Now choose your favorite keyboard combination for it.


Can I make the Keyboard Viewer more readable I am using the Keyboard Viewer in recorded video screenshots to demonstrate the action of keystrokes on an app.
The keyboard window is small, the produced video is compressed, and as a result it is very hard for many people in the audience to perceive what keys are pressed during the presentation (pressed keys are outlined in dark brown/purple on a black background).
The previous UX for the Keyboard Viewer was a lot more accessible and legible.
I am not expressing an opinion - tools like WebAIM give this color combination a Contrast Ratio Fail rating across all three categories, with a very low 2.02:1 contrast rating against the surrounding background color.
Current Keyboard Viewer on Catalina:

Can you tell which keys are pressed? I didn't think so
Previous Keyboard Viewer on High Sierra:

Can you tell which keys are pressed? Yes you can! Yes you can!
Is there a way to use the more accessible, gray Keyboard Viewer on Catalina?
Given that Apple has always had very inclusive Accessibility Guidelines, I am hoping that I am missing a setting somewhere and that this poor UX decision can be reversed.

In Catalina Keyboard Viewer, click the Gear icon in the upper right corner of the window. This opens a pop-up window where you can select the Appearance setting of the Keyboard View window to either Dark or Light, independent of the System Appearance setting:

When you choose Dark Mode, a pressed key is outlined in red.
When you choose Light Mode, a pressed key is outlined in red in addition to having a grey overlay, which is what you are looking for.


installing old version of c++ compiler I use OSX 10.10.5 need to compile some c++ code with an old version of gcc, namely 4.3.4. I don't think XCode provide that kind of tools. I suppose there is a way to do that by hand. How can I do that ?

I have compiled older gcc in the past as a last resort.

Get Xcode - it gives you clang and lots of header files. If you can't stomach it, get the command line tools.
Get http://brew.sh
brew install gcc

From there you can see if an older gcc is available or worst case, pull that source and compile it from the version of gcc you have running from above. It looks like you'll be able to use homebrew to get at the version 4.3 from the versioned source already in the tool:

mac:~ me$ brew search gcc
gcc
homebrew/dupes/apple-gcc42       homebrew/versions/gcc44          homebrew/versions/gcc47          homebrew/versions/gcc5
homebrew/head-only/gccxml        homebrew/versions/gcc45          homebrew/versions/gcc48          homebrew/versions/llvm-gcc28
homebrew/versions/gcc43          homebrew/versions/gcc46          homebrew/versions/gcc49


Is it necessary to open each app at least once after restoring from an iCloud Backup before Push Notifications will be generated? Last week, I upgraded from iOS 12 to iOS 13 on my iPhone XS - all was fine. Due to upgrading to an 11 Pro, I then made an iCloud Backup on my XS, and then restored to the just-created backup on my new 11 Pro - again, all fine.

Since that time, however, I've noticed that I'm not receiving push notifications for the majority of apps that I have installed on my new 11 Pro - the only apps that appear to be sending me notifications are the ones that I've deliberately opened manually from my home screen - apps that I haven't yet opened since restoring from my iCloud Backup arn't producing anything - it's worth noting that they were working as expected after upgrading from iOS 12 to 13 on my XS before erasing it. So - things that I've tried so far:

Rebooting the phone

Checking the "Notifications" screen from within Settings.app - all notification settings are as they should be, and are enabled for apps that arn't currently producing them

Things that I deliberately haven't done yet:

Removed the apps that arn't currently producing notifications; I have a lot of these, and don't want to spend time re-organising my Home screen folders if I can avoid it!

Opening each app at least once to see if this begins to generate notifications (see my reasoning below for this)

So - my question. Upon restoring from an iCloud Backup, is it necessary to first open each app individually to force notifications to come through as they were doing before I restored? I have a lot of apps, but would prefer doing this than reinstalling them all individually. I don't remember having to do this when upgrading from my old iPhone 7 to the XS last year; I don't completely understand how APNS works, so can't figure out if my tokens will still be valid from my old iPhone or whether there's a simple solution to this that I just haven't tried yet. I'm not sure if the opening each app approach will work; I opened the Stack Exchange app upon restoring from iCloud to enter my login info, but as of yet haven't received any notifications - I know for a fact that I would have; I have new items in my Inbox that haven't come through as a notification on my new 11 Pro.

So - to answer my own question. It appears that after restoring from an iCloud Backup (I haven't been able to test with iTunes), that you have to open each app that you were previously receiving notifications for before restoring at least once - not performing this step means that they simply arn't generated, even though they're listed as being allowed to send notifications when checking from within Settings.app. I'm not sure why technically this happens - maybe somebody else has further insight which would be useful.


Export photos with timestamp in filename I'm trying to export photos from iPhone using mac os Photos app.

The problem is that there is no way of structuring them in a format that will allow to easily access them by date.

Ideally I'd like to have filenames in with timestamp of a photo, something like: 2017-10-03-12-05 but it is not possible with the Photos app.

I would also tolerate some folders structure with date information, but I haven't found any suitable way.

The only way I found so far is by using subfolder format with Moment Name which creates subfolders with name of the location and date

Here is the example of folder name generated in this way:

Schloßpark Nymphenburg - Munich, Bavaria, October 19, 2017

However such name is almost unusable because there is almost no way to filter all photos let's say from October 2017.
I would really appreciate name like this:

2017-10-19 - Schloßpark Nymphenburg - Munich, Bavaria

which would allow easily sorting and structuring my photos.

Q: Does someone know any way of exporting photos in more usable names? I'd appreciate any way that will at least improve the way I'm exporting now.

Whilst this isn't the solution you were asking for, an equivalent outcome could be achieved if you were willing to employ a bit of AppleScript.  AppleScript could be used to automate the exporting process from Photos and then rename the files that are created in Finder.  But, honestly, I would suggest the exporting be done just as you're doing it now—from within the application—and then use AppleScript to collectively rename/move them afterwards.

    tell application "System Events"
        set ExportPath to POSIX file "/path/to/exported/photos" as alias
        set ExportedPhotos to every file in ExportPath
    end tell

    repeat with PhotoFile in ExportedPhotos
        tell application "System Events" to set Filename to name of PhotoFile
            --> e.g. "Schloßpark Nymphenburg - Munich, Bavaria, October 19, 2017.jpg"

        set [file_extension, theYear, theDay, theMonth] to reverse of words of Filename
            --> {"jpg", "2017", "19", "October", "Bavaria", "Munich", "Nymphenburg", "Schloßpark"}

        set AppleScript's text item delimiters to " "
        set PhotoDate to date ({theDay, theMonth, theYear, "12:00:00 AM"} as text)
            --> date "Thursday, 19 October 2017 at 12:00:00"

        set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "-"
        set {theYear, theMonth, theDay} to {year of PhotoDate as text, ¬
            text -2 thru -1 of ("0" & (month of PhotoDate) * 1), ¬
            text -2 thru -1 of ("0" & day of PhotoDate)}
            --> {"2017", "10", "19"}

        set isoDate to result as text
            --> "2017-10-19"

        set AppleScript's text item delimiters to ", " & month of PhotoDate
        first text item of Filename
            --> "Schloßpark Nymphenburg - Munich, Bavaria"

        set Filename to [isoDate, " - ", result, ".", file_extension] as text
            --> "2017-10-19 - Schloßpark Nymphenburg - Munich, Bavaria.jpg"

        tell application "System Events" to set the name of PhotoFile to Filename
    end repeat

You could also choose to format the date portion of the filename using the bash function date called from AppleScript with a do shell script command, which does reduce the number of lines of code overall.

    do shell script "date -j -f '%B %d, %Y' 'October 19, 2017' '+%F'"
        --> "2017-10-19"

I've pasted this shorter version of the script below for completeness.

It's worth saying that this code only works if the exported filenames are of a consistent pattern in line with the example you provided.  Specifically, the exported filename needs to end in a date that occupies the last three words of the filename; and any text before it needs to have a comma and a space separating it from the date portion.  Of course, the code can be adjusted accordingly if a different naming pattern is chosen, but it's best to choose one and stick with it.

If you need to create a directory hierarchy based on dates, this extra portion of script will create nested folders %Year/%Month/%Day/ and move the photo into the appropriate directory:

    -- Continuing the script above from the following line
    -- (the "[to]" is now omitted to create a "tell" block)
    tell application "System Events" [to]
        set the name of PhotoFile to Filename

        set NestedFolders to [ExportPath, theYear, theMonth, theDay]

        repeat until number of NestedFolders is 1
            set [This, NestedFolders] to [item 1, rest] of NestedFolders
            set Child to first item of NestedFolders

            if not (exists folder Child of This) then
                set first item of NestedFolders to ¬
                    (make new folder at folder (POSIX path of This) with properties {name:Child})
            else
                set first item of NestedFolders to folder Child of This
            end if
        end repeat

        move (alias Filename in ExportPath) to POSIX path of (first item of NestedFolders)
    end tell

Now all of your exported photos will be renamed as per your guideline above, and organised in date-based directory hierarchies.  Again, this extra portion of code could have been achieved using some do shell script commands (bash actually has a ready-made function for creating nested folders easily).

As a final thought, if you wanted to automate the whole process, you could adapt this script to a folder action, and attach it to the folder into which your photos are exported.  This means that, whenever Finder detects new photos added to the folder, it will automatically run the folder action script for you.  Therefore, as soon as the photos are exported, they will immediately get renamed and moved accordingly.

Here's the first part of the script again, this time using a shell command to reformat the date portion of the filename:

    tell application "Finder"
        set PhotoFile to file "Schloßpark Nymphenburg - Munich, Bavaria, October 19, 2017.png" in desktop as alias
        set Filename to name of PhotoFile
            --> e.g. "Schloßpark Nymphenburg - Munich, Bavaria, October 19, 2017.jpg"
        set Extension to name extension of PhotoFile
    end tell

    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to {", ", "." & Extension}
    text items -3 thru -2 of Filename as text
        --> "October 19, 2017"

    do shell script "date -j -f '%B %d, %Y' " & quoted form of result & " '+%F'"
    set isoDate to result
        --> "2017-10-19"

    text items 1 thru -4 of Filename as text
        --> "Schloßpark Nymphenburg - Munich, Bavaria"

    set Filename to [isoDate, " - ", result, ".", Extension] as text
        --> "2017-10-19 - Schloßpark Nymphenburg - Munich, Bavaria.jpg"

    tell application "Finder" to set the name of PhotoFile to Filename

As you can see, it's quite a bit shorter in terms of the number of lines of code, though I couldn't honestly tell you which will be faster or more robust.


Enable Quick Look for text files without the .txt extension Doing Quick Look on .txt files is very convenient (select in Finder and press space).

Is there a way to enable Quick Look for other text files which don't have the .txt extension (e.g., .strings files)?

QLStephen is a more general solution that works for all kinds of text files.


After iPad restore (from iCloud) apps still appear as 'waiting' I just got the new iPad, and since I backed up my old iPad using iCloud, I restored from the iCloud backup. After restore, it restarted and began downloading all the apps.

Now, I have all these apps on my Mac, so I plugged in the iPad at this point and clicked "Sync". The sync has not finished yet (it's still copying music), but iTunes has restored all of the apps first.
However, on the iPad all of the apps still appear as 'waiting' even though iTunes seems to have installed them.

Will this magically fix itself after sync, do I need to reboot, or is it more complicated?

EDIT

I gave up, and did a backup and restore via iTunes.

Here is a quick and short how-to guide.

They say:

  A final step involves re-downloading all your apps from the App Store,
  a process that the iPhone/iPad handled automatically.

So my guess, your iPad and iTunes are clever enough to handle it by itself. When they notice an App is already installed, they wil leave it alone. If they find an uninstalled app, it will be installed.


Can I disable Wi-fi on a Time Capsule? Is it possible to disable Wi-fi on a Time Capsule device and use it only wired ?

With Airport Utility, select the time capsule; Airport tab; Wireless tab.  In the Wireless Mode dropdown, choose 'Off'.


Can I attach two external displays to new MacBook Air? Would it be possible to connect a thunderbolt display and a DVI display to the new thunderbolt MacBook Air? The Apple website has images of a Pro with multiple external monitors, but an Air with only one. Is it possible to do this? Or is the MacBook Air not powerful enough?

I know this is technically possible, by connecting the Air to the thunderbolt display and then connecting the DVI display to the thunderbolt display (with an adaptor), but will the MacBook Air be powerful enough?

[The DVI monitor is a standard 22" Dell monitor]

Not using the built-in hardware. Only MacBooks with a discrete graphics card can drive a second external display (and even then, only one of the new Thunderbolt displays).

The MacBook Air doesn't have a discrete graphics card, only the Intel HD 3000 one that comes with the CPU. The same applies to the MacBook Pro 13 inch and the 15 inch ones that don't have one of the AMD Radeon graphics cards.

You can drive an external display using a USB connected graphics card. For example I have one of the DisplayLink adapters, which works very well for everything except 3D graphics and full screen video). I use one of these for my second external display on my MacBook Pro 13.


iOS13 Beta / iOS13 requirements TLS Certificate this post is about this link iOS 13 requirements TLS Server Certificate and two questions that bother me currently.

First of, can anyone tell me, if a SHA2 signature is required only for my server certificate and it's issuing CA cert or does every certificate in the chain of trust need to be signed with SHA2?

My Situation: Trusted Root CA cert (SHA1) -> Intermediate CA cert (SHA256) -> my.domain.com cert (SHA256)

And my second question is, if anyone has already installed the iOS 13 Beta and could tell me, if there were changes in the trusted root certificates until now?
 I especially want to know, if the GlobalSign Root CA R1-SHA1 was removed. I don't think so, becaus it'll be valid until somwhere around 2028 but I don't want to build something up on my believes, if I can have facts.

If you have any insight on that, I'd really appreciate your input here.

Thanks in advance guys

I cannot confirm but the article you a referring to states very clearly its only for Server and Issuing Certificates.
In other words SHA-1 Root certificates are not impacted.


Is it possible to use Remote Desktop or a similar tool to manage iOS devices ? I find it really useful to use Remote Desktop to manage OSX devices, Is it possible to use Remote Desktop or a similar tool to manage iOS devices ?

Sounds like you want Apple Configurator.
Description from the Mac App Store:

Apple Configurator 2 makes it easy to deploy iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, and Apple TV devices in your school or business.
Use Apple Configurator 2 to quickly configure large numbers of devices connected to your Mac via USB with the settings, apps, and data you specify for your students, employees, or customers.


How to set system keyboard shortcuts via command line? I'm used to have some keyboard shortcut remapping for menu items via Apple's system preferences -> keyboard pane. Some globals, most of them application specific.
What was working in the past (High Sierra if I'm not mistaken) was something like this:
defaults write com.googlecode.iterm2 NSUserKeyEquivalents -dict-add "Advanced Paste…" -string "@~^v"

Running
defaults read com.googlecode.iterm2 NSUserKeyEquivalents

shows that it has been set, but neither System Preferences (after restart) shows it nor the menu item in iTerm2.
If I enter it manually in System Preferences, the read command reveals the same (after deleting it before) and the new shortcut is visible in the menu.
This seems to be the case on Catalina for every application and shortcut I previously added via a setup script, e.g. for apps like Safari, Google Chrome, etc.
I also tried
defaults write -app iTerm ...

but it has the exact same effect.
Did anything change on (at least) Catalina? What's the correct way nowadays to do it?

Figured it out. You have to add the application you want to modify keys for to com.apple.universalaccess.
defaults write com.apple.universalaccess com.apple.custommenu.apps -array-add "com.googlecode.iterm2"

or if all keyboard equivalents are set via one file, you can also write the full list at once
defaults write com.apple.universalaccess com.apple.custommenu.apps -array "com.googlecode.iterm2" "com.apple.Safari" "com.google.Chrome"

The other thing that was tricky was, that my iterm2 prefs file is symlinked and therefore doesn't appear in the list of domains nor is read with the defaults tool. The keyboard however works, since it's listed in the prefs file already.