Possible to charge iPhone through other means? I am too cheap to purchase a USB charging connector for my iPhone, so I was wondering if there's a way to create a USB cable at home or use some other USB cable and get the job done safely.

For example will other USBs, assuming the connectors fit, charge, or no? I figure they would since they are just USB 2.0 based and iPhone can't tell the difference from its hardware perspective.

A better way to look at this: any other way to charge an iPhone without an iPhone-specific charger? I heard it's possible to use a wind turbine or dynamometer, but those are not inexpensive. Could those be replicated at home with typical at home tools? For example could I make a crank device that delivers powered-charge through the USB to the iPhone's battery?

Yes it is possible, but consider the consumption and Costs.

How much electricity does it take to power your iPhone for a year?

The answer: 1 kWh.

This is the amount of electricity you’d need to power ten 100-watt incandescent light-bulbs for an hour.

Far from anything worth being sheepish over, 1 kwh costs about 12 cents.

To be specific, your iPhone battery holds a charge of 1,440 mAh, or about 5.45 watt hours. If you fully drained and recharged your phone everyday, then over the course of a year you would have to feed it about 2,000 watt hours, or 2kWh = 25 Cents per Year.

As for your iPad, keeping it fed costs just $1.36 a year, according to the Electric Power Research Institute.

Your average laptop, with its far bigger screen, uses about 72 kWh, costing some $8 a year.

There is your challenge:

Make a power station that has a ROI such to recover the cost using the 25 cents per Year returns.

Answer: if it cost you $20 to make the power station- it will take about 40 Years before you see benefit.


In the iOS Mail app, how do I share an email, or save to Files, etc.? In the iOS Mail app, there's no "Share" button (box with an arrow) that presents the standard share sheet with options to send via Messages/Airdrop, save to Files, open in other apps, etc. Is there any way to share the contents of an email other than forwarding, replying, or printing?

As far as I can tell, this is the best solution:

Tap the button to Print the email
Pinch-zoom the print page preview to fill the screen
Now you should see what's effectively a PDF of the email, including headers and all pages, and there will be a Share button in the top bar
Tap the Share button to get all the standard options to share a PDF of the email

If the email has any attachments that can't be displayed inline, then it looks like the PDF that's shared will just include an icon representing the file. So these attachments would have to be opened and shared separately.


cd to directory with name of `-` I'm trying to make a folder called -. I know it's a silly name, it's named so to mirror something else.

mkdir -
ls
> -
cd -

This makes it go up a folder or exit the symlink context depending on where I am. I found that cd - means go to previous location, but can't escape it. cd \- does not work.

Any way around this?

You can use either relative or absolute paths to prevent the - from standing alone and confusing bash's build in command cd:

mkdir ./-
cd ./-


What happens to a MacBook's battery once it reaches the maximum cycle count? I have a MacBook Pro and according to Apple, its cycle count limit is 1000. What happens when it surpasses 1000 cycles? Will the battery continue working or not? Will the MacBook still be able to receive power from the battery or not? Should it be replaced?

Thanks.

As it says on the page you've linked to (emphasis mine):

Batteries have a limited amount of charge cycles before they're considered to be consumed. Once consumed, a replacement battery is recommended. You can use your battery after it reaches its maximum cycle count, but you might notice a reduction in your battery life.
Knowing how many charge cycles your battery has and how many are left can help you determine when a battery replacement is required. For best performance, replace your battery when you reach its maximum cycle count.


Convert HTML hyperlink code to Markdown (MD) in pure AppleScript? I have a text file or some text to process via the clipboard. It contains a few lines of HTML code, and I'd like to convert it to pure Markdown.
E.g. from:
This is a link: link
to:
This is a link: [link](https://duck.com)
Is there pure AppleScript code (using regex substitution) that can do this?
Alternatively, I am happy with AppleScript calling any CLI tool to process the text via do shell script if it's an in-built text which doesn't require homebrew or a third party tool to be installed.

Here is one example:
set htmlString to "This is a link: link"

set mdString to do shell script "/usr/bin/sed -E -e 's|link|)|g' <<< " & htmlString's quoted form

Result:
"This is a link: [link](https://duck.com)"

This can also be down without the use of the do shell script command, as in this example:
set htmlString to "This is a link: link"

set htmlString to findAndReplaceInText(htmlString, "link", ")")

on findAndReplaceInText(theText, theSearchString, theReplacementString)
    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to theSearchString
    set theTextItems to every text item of theText
    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to theReplacementString
    set theText to theTextItems as string
    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to ""
    return theText
end findAndReplaceInText

Result:
"This is a link: [link](https://duck.com)"

If This is a link: link is in a file or on the clipboard, the escaping is done automatically when assigning it to a variable.  You then only need to escape the " in the sed command as shown in the example above.

Other examples:
If This is a link: link in in a file:
set htmlFile to "/path/to/filename/ext"
set htmlString to read htmlFile
set mdString to do shell script "/usr/bin/sed -E -e 's|link|)|g' <<< " & htmlString's quoted form

Or, processing the file directly:
set htmlFile to "/path/to/filename.ext"
set mdString to do shell script "/usr/bin/sed -E -e 's|link|)|g'" & space & htmlFile's quoted form

If This is a link: link is on the clipboard:
set htmlString to (the clipboard as text)
set mdString to do shell script "/usr/bin/sed -E -e 's|link|)|g' <<< " & htmlString's quoted form

Note: The use of the findAndReplaceInText() handler can also be used in place of the do shell script command in these other examples.

See also, Manipulating Text in the Mac Automation Scripting Guide.


Strange Keychain Popups in Safari I just upgraded my Mac from El Capitan to Sierra, and now I'm getting some weird keychain popups in Safari.

When I browse Safari, if I visit a site for which I have credentials stored, a dialog pops up asking me whether or not to allow Safari to use the keychain info for an entirely different URL than the one I'm currently visiting (the url is a development server of mine). Here's a screenshot of it happening on Stack Overflow:

Translation by @owlswipe: Safari wants to access confidential information stored in [website] in your keychain with buttons for Always Allow, Allow, and Deny.

Then it gets weirder: when I click "allow", a second prompt appears, requesting an administrator's password and mentioning SteerMouse, a system settings extension for advanced mouse settings that I've installed.

Translation by @owlswipe: For security reasons, please enter an administrator's password to confirm the action. You can add "SteerMouse Manager" to the list of input helpers in System Preferences to stop displaying this password dialog. with a username and password field and buttons for Cancel and OK.

I don't have any reason to think that SteerMouse is trying to do anything nefarious here, as it's a widely recommended, popular product. But all this seems a little weird.

I know I can probably make it shut up by doing what the dialog says, but before I do so, can anyone explain what is going on here?

Open Keychain Access.app in your Applications > Utilities folder.
Highlight the login keychain on the left sidebar.
Select one of the sites you see the popup from the list of credentials and double-click to get the info panel.
On that panel select "Access Control".
Below "Always allow access by these applications" click on +, and navigate to Safari in your Applications folder. Save changes.
Close Keychain Access and restart Safari.

(adapted from this answer. You may need to do steps 3-5 for each site for which that problem is occurring; I'm not certain.)


How do I block power from going to usb without stopping data transfer? I need an iPad connected to my iMac for a long time, but I don't want power going to it because leaving an iPad charged to 100% all the time ruins the life of the battery(link). I still want to allow data transfer, but with no charge(or extremely little like when it says "Not Charging") going to my device.

There is no easy way to do this. You could try to rewire a USB cable with the power wire removed. There's a chance this would work, but I wouldn't bet on it, it would depend on how the iPad handles USB connections.

You won't ruin your battery by having it plugged in at 100%. This might be an issue if you're leaving it 24 hours a day, but Apple is smart enough not to let their batteries die from being plugged in.


How to get the domain name on the command line I know this is a simple question, but I can't recall a method of doing it.  I wrote a service using automator to copy the public URL of a file in my Sites folder.  I wrote this script:

sed -e 's/:/\//g' -e 's/\ /%20/g' -e "s/^\/Users\/$USER\/Sites/http:\/\/$HOST\/~$USER/g" | pbcopy

But $HOST only has my computer's name, not including the domain.  I figured out that I can do this:

host $HOST
myname.mydomain.com has address 111.111.111.111

I know I can use this to pull the domain name out:

set FULLHOST=`host $HOST | perl -pne 's/ has address .*//;$_=lc'`
sed -e 's/:/\//g' -e 's/\ /%20/g' -e "s/^\/Users\/$USER\/Sites/http:\/\/$FULLHOST\/~$USER/g" | pbcopy

but I'm curious, is there a cleaner command that will just give me back either the domain (mydomain.com) or the full address (myname.mydomain.com)?

There’s /bin/hostname which prints the name of the machine, either including the domain (which is the default mode of operation) or without it. (I couldn’t verify that it really does that because I have no idea where to configure the domain name of my machine. :)


Force Mac Installer to Continue Download I had a working Mac and suddenly it could not boot. Digging deeper I found the "Corpses" famous cryptic error being the cause. Reading through I found a way to fix it, that is reinstalling in Recovery Mode. So I went and did just that and after about two hours it was saying 1minute remaining and ka-boom! My wi-fi connection was lost and it hanged there forever. Even after restoring a working Wi-Fi it is still saying the same: one minute remaining.

I have checked the log and it seems like it retried two times and it failed (I noticed connection issue after less than 30min I guess). I cannot waste more of bandwidth, having faced same issue multiple times and I cannot see Apple providing a retry button, only cancel.

Since my download was almost done, is there a way to force installer to pick up where it failed when downloading?

Update:

Am using Re-Install Option from Recovery boot (Power On then hold Command+R).

No - the installer for the reinstall uses apple's Content Delivery Network (CDN) to download the install image file in parts. There are usually about 500 chunks that get downloaded and then fused into the installer.

(I suppose someone could reverse engineer this process, but it's not documented and signed cryptographically to prevent man in the middle tampering with the downloads - so that might be costly).

What you can do is run a local caching server (on High Sierra - turn on content caching on the Sharing preference pane and on Sierra and lower - install server.app and turn on content caching).

That way whenever any device on your local network downloads these 500 items - they get cached locally and your next download only needs to get pieces that are not already cached. The first time you do recovery for the image needed - you of course download all bits from outside your local network, but until the image changes - you are set.

If you can't afford another download or set up caching server - you can go to the Mac App Store on another Mac and download the OS installer and then create a bootable USB installer - now you have no download and something bootable for the Mac you hoped to use Internet Recovery on.


Thunderbolt speed via bootcamp? Thunderbolt is very fast on OS X, but do we get the same speed when accessing Thunderbolt devices through boot camp? Meaning, if I wanted to install Steam games from my Boot Camp partition onto a Thunderbolt drive instead of on the partition itself, would I see any deterioration in quality?

Since the Thunderbolt drives can run 10 up to 20 Gbps that is much faster than the internal drive in many cases.

I do not see a problem, but can not speak for the boot camp it self.

Here are some numbers:

SSDs itself will have the same speed of reading and writing no matter the cable. The TYPE of cable/connection decides if it can sustain that speed, and this is equally true with USB 3.0, eSATA (v2/3) and TB1/2 - all of them have wide enough bandwidth to support high-speed transfer rates that SSDs are capable of.

USB 3.0 up to 5 Gbits/s (525 MB/s)

eSATA 2 up to 3 Gbits/s (300 MB/s)

eSATA 3 up to 6 Gbits/s (600 MB/s)

TB1 up to 10 Gbits/s per channel (1050 MB/s)

TB2 up to 20 Gbits/s aggregated channels (2100 MB/s)

In summary, those numbers would say the Boot camp would run as fast or faster via Thunderbolt cable to SSD drive.


Time Machine won't backup with Mountain Lion Server I have a Mac Mini with OS X Mountain Lion Server installed.  I've turned on Time Machine in the server app and selected an internal disk to backup clients to.  On my iMac, I have turned on Time Machine and selected the backup share listed on the server.  But, I recieve the following error dialog box:

Time Machine couldn’t complete the backup to “server”.  Back disk is not available.  I'm clearly able to connect to the server and the Shared Items > Backup folder, which the server created.  I'm also made sure file permissions look right.

Any ideas?

I kept getting Backup not available so before doing a tmutil setdest I unmounted the drive and manually mounted using mount_afp, that did the trick for me.


How to enable "tap to click" using keyboard only? My trackpad started to work incorrectly: when I double-clicked and draged, I couldn't select text anymore. Even though when I just double-clicked a word, it was being selected as usual.

I tried to troubleshoot this issue and went into Trackpad preferences. I tapped "Tap to click" option, and now I cannot click anything at all! And I cannot turn the option back ON. Also, I don't have a mouse to connect...

Question

How to turn "tap to click" back ON using only keyboard?

Versions

Mac OS X 10.14.6 Build 18G3020
MBP 13" 2017

You can do it via Terminal.app with those commands:

defaults write com.apple.driver.AppleBluetoothMultitouch.trackpad Clicking -bool true
defaults write com.apple.AppleMultitouchTrackpad Clicking -bool true

You may need to restart the System after that.


Problem with updating apps in iPad 3 with iOS 7.1 I have an iPad 3 with iOS 7.1. From April, 2014 I am having this strange problem. My iPad Apps won't update both manually and automatically. Every time I have to "Reset all settings" in the iPad and then only the apps would update. So please suggest how to solve this problem.

Did you Jailbreak your phone?

If no, try go to Settings->iTunes & AppStore and turn on automatic updates. And make sure you have update you iOS version and check if you have enough storage space to download update.


iTunes Wi-Fi Sync, copy photos from iPad to PC? I want to copy photos from iPad to PC (iTunes). On iTunes, I click the iPad icon, and then click "Photos" from the left panel. It shows "Sync Photos" on the right. But the problem is that when I click the Sync button, the pictures on the iPhone are not copied to the PC. Only the reverse was true (PC -> iPad).

Doesn't Apple support copying photos from iPad to PC? Or did I do something wrong? How can I copy photos from iPad to a PC on the same home network wirelessly?

If possible, I do not want to use the USB cable, because it is cumbersome than Wi-Fi Sync. I do not want to use iCloud as a middle man (iPad -> iCloud -> my PC) either, because I know a lot of people's pictures were leaked through iCloud.

iTunes can't download pictures from iOS devices to your computer, not even when connected via USB. The sync option allows you to upload pictures from a selected folder from your computer to the device.

On Windows, you can use the system camera import option –some methods on how to enable it if it's not working are described here–, Windows Live Photo Gallery, Photos app on windows 8 and 10, and a long list of apps; all of them require you to plug your device to your computer.

There appear to exist pure wireless alternatives, one called "Wifi Photo Transfer" - link to CNET review; and "Wifi Transfer App" - link to the App Store; look at the "Customers Also Bought" section as there appear to be a lot of apps that do what you want. I haven't tried any of them.

If you'd rather never worry about manually syncing, and don't want to use iCloud Photo Library marvelous service, that even takes care of reducing the space used by your pictures, I suggest you try Dropbox that does what you want –via internet though, and if you either have bad passwords, reuse them, or, god forbid, Dropbox passwords are leaked or stolen and you don't react quickly you may be in trouble. Google has another alternative, closer to iCloud Photo Library in functionality, but you'll have to install Google Drive on your PC and activate the Photos folder inside Drive in order to have a hard copy on your computer. Also, depending on your settings and how many pictures you have, you may have to pay with Google or Dropbox (and iCloud as well).

Lastly, you may enable My Photo Stream, which in my opinion is very complicated but it automatically copies your pictures (via iCloud) to your computer; if iCloud Photo library is off there is no way to view your pictures online thus your fear of your pictures leaking is at least minimized because a third person looking to steal your pictures will have to set up a device with your iCloud credentials in order to retrieve said pictures, and it will alert you of that event on all signed in machines.

You can also add Two-factor or two-step authentication to your device if you are worried about your privacy.


Fans kick in very late after ssd upgrade Recently I replaced my MBP Mid-2010 HDD with a Zotac 480G Premium SSD. Things are really faster now, but one thing I noticed is that the CPU rises to peaks quite unprecedented with my original HDD. In video conversion, the CPU temperature soars to 95 degrees Celsius but the fans seem sluggish to kick in before the CPU temperature is 85 or so. The GPU temperature is also quite high. Of course, after they start spinning up they both work around 6000, but they cannot lower the CPU temperature below 92 degrees Celsius. I have stared to think of putting the HDD back. In idle mode while I am not working with my mac, the CPU temp is around 49, but on startup and when working with apps like pages the temperature is around 66 degrees.

What do think? When do your fans usually kick in while you are having a cpu-intensive process running in your mac?

Update: Here are two images related to CPU usage and temperature. I hope it helps.

Regards

It is not a problem that your CPU is at 95 degrees celcicus for a short period of time.

The mid-2010 MacBook Pro with Core i5 processor is specified to withstand up to 105 degrees.

So unless you have some kind of practical problem (for example the underside of the laptop being too hot to handle), there's really nothing to worry about.


How to view logs in Airport Utility v6, or install 5.6 in Mountain Lion? So I just upgraded to Mountain Lion, and I'm watching some Netflix over my Apple TV, when it stops streaming and tells me it's not connected to the network any more.  Sure enough, my Air has also lost it's network connectivity and the Airport Extreme is solid Amber on the status light.

I wait a while, it starts to flash green, then it goes green, and slowly my SSIDs start to appear, and everything is normal again.

I presume the AE just rebooted, so I fire up Airport extreme to look at the logs, and remember that in Airport Utility 6.0, all the nice advanced features (and some not so advanced ones) are not available.  Amongst them is viewing the logs.  So I download 5.6, which is the most recent non-6.0 version that uses the old ways and lets you view logs etc - and it won't install because it's not compatible with Mountain Lion.

A bit of googling about also reveals that apparently V6.0 will only manage Wireless-N networks.  Seems anyone with older Airport kit, or a need to do anything slightly advanced in ML is screwed.

Anyone know how I can either view logs in 6, or install 5.6 on 10.8?

If you do not want (or can't) get the app out of a backup you can extract it from the installer.

Download the Airport Utility 5.6 for Lion and move the file AirPortUtility56.pkg contained within the dmg to your ~/Downloads folder. Then in a Terminal window do :

$ cd ~/Downloads
$ pkgutil --expand ./AirPortUtility56.pkg ~/Downloads/AirPortUtility56
$ gunzip -c < ./AirPortUtility56/AirPortUtility56Lion.pkg/Payload | sudo tar -C / -xvf - "./Applications/Utilities/AirPort Utility 5.6.app"

The app works without issue on Mountain Lion in my limited testing so far.

If you wanted to mod the package to skip the check, if you want to easily install the package on multiple macs for instance, here's what you need :

A tool called "Flat Package Editor" to modify the file called Distribution in AirPortUtility56.pkg. To get that tool download the "Auxiliary tools for Xcode" from the Apple Dev site. It's hidden in PackageMaker.app/Contents/resources/Flat Package Editor.app. With it you can open the pkg directly :

Just drag out the Distribution file and remove these lines :

// Less than 10.8
if(-1 != system.compareVersions(my.target.systemVersion.ProductVersion, '10.8')) {
  my.result.type = 'Fatal';
  my.result.message = system.localizedString('ERR_OSHIGH');
  return (false);
}

Drag the new version back in, delete the old Distribution and save.


How can I create a backup of my iMac when it won't start and recovery mode fails At this point I'm just trying to get a copy of my hard drive before I wipe it.

I have an iMac running El Capitan and I am unable to login to my user account (spinning wheel of death).

I've tried to start up in Recovery Mode and backup files using Disk Utility.
After waiting several hours I got the error message "The operation couldn't be completed. (com.apple.diskutililty error 3.)"

This was the process I followed.

When I try to re-install a new copy of El Capitan I get the error "Unable to install because this disk has S.M.A.R.T errors"

What else can I try?

How can I create a backup of my hard drive?

Have you tried starting your iMac in Target Disk Mode?

To do this, switch off your iMac and then boot it up again making sure to hold the T key down until you see an icon appear on the screen.

If that works, then you may be able to use this mode to access your Hard Drive from another Mac (or even a Windows PC). However, if using a Windows computer it has to have the right connections and also be able to read a Mac's drive, usually by having extra drivers such as MacDrive, TransMac, MacDisk, or HFSExplorer installed.

Speaking of connections, you didn't specify what model of iMac you have. Typically you would use an appropriate cable connecting the two computers via your FireWire or Thunderbolt port. USB is not supported.

Summary

In a nutshell, if you can get your iMac to start in Target Disk Mode, you can connect it to another computer (almost always another Mac) and your iMac's hard drive will then appear as an external drive on the other computer. If so, copy whatever files you can from it to another drive.

I should warn you though that it sounds as if your hard drive has failed, and doing this may not work. Also, even if it does, I wouldn't try reformatting it to continue using it. You really should replace the drive or use an external drive as your bootable drive.

Also, if you can boot from an external drive, another option is to just do that and try copying across your data that way (i.e. From the internal drive onto another drive). This avoids the need to try using Target Disk Mode.


Stuck on finishing import (from external hard drive to computer hard drive) I started the process of importing my iPhoto library from an external hard drive to my Mac with a newly replaced hard drive.  I have roughly 180,000 photos and it looked like it was uploading all day.  Now it seems to be stuck on "finishing import".  Do I just wait?  Is this a lengthily process, too, or is it really just stuck?

If you are not sure if the process is actually doing something or just stuck, you can get an idea from the following

Activity Monitor
/Applications/Utilities/Activity Monitor.app

See if the process is frozen. In that case activity monitor should
show the process/App (iPhoto in your case) in red color. If it is
red, there is a high probability that the app is "hung".
See if the process is actually doing something on the CPU or Hard Drive.

If you see something going on there, it is highly possible that it is still doing something.

If you don't see anything, you may want to check Console:

Console.app
/Applications/Utilities/Console.app
Console shows error messages that the app may have generated to give some idea on what is happening.

Note that both these are indicative and may not be 100% accurate. In the worst case you may have to import again (I would search Google for any issues with importing large iPhoto libraries before trying again)

This is a snapshot of my activity monitor, I have selected QuickSilver and it shows 59.0 MB Bytes Read and 27.6 MB under Bytes Written. This data is dynamically refreshed so you can get a fair idea of the disk usage of an app. The same for CPU. Memory may not be a very good indicator though, even if an app has frozen it may still use memory.


Can I download 3rd party songs on the iPad and add them to iTunes Match? I wonder if i can buy and download songs e.g. via Bandcamp in Safari, and then add them to my iTunes match right on my iPad?

I know how to do that with iTunes on the Mac, but it would be neat to have this also on the iPad.

Nope. You won't be able to add the in iTunes and thus you won't be able to add them to iTunes match.


How do I fix the SSL warning I get when visiting github.com? I see the following warning when visiting http://www.github.com/ after July 26, 2014. I get this warning in both Chrome and Safari on my OS X Mavericks-equipped iMac.

Should I worry about this? How do I fix it?

Should I worry about this?

You should always distrust SSL connections that are using expired certificates. This could indicate a simple oversight on the part of the website operator or it could indicate a malicious attempt to intercept encrypted communications between the website and your browser. Heed your browser's warnings and don't load the page when these warnings occur.

  How do I fix it?

OS X users can delete the expired certification from their keychains. This certificate was issued by DigiCert and they have a blog post that details what happened and how to fix it. Paraphrased from the post:

Start the Keychain Access application (you may be asked for your password when you do this)
In Keychain Access go to View -> Show Expired Certs and search for DigiCert High to find the DigiCert High Assurance EV Root CA that expired on July 26, 2014. It's important you only delete the expired certificate here.
Delete this certificate and close Keychain Access.

You may also need to restart Chrome and Safari for the warning to disappear. Also, make sure you check all Keychains and verify your Category filters - certificates or All Items should be selected.


How to make clean installation of iMac (macOS Sierra)? I need to make fresh installation on my iMac 2012 of macOS Sierra. I already upgraded to that one, but I want to make a fresh install. I found several articles, but I am not sure if they right, because I think they have an additional drive to make an installation on (they talk about non-bootable USB).

As far I do the following:

USB flash drive formatted to HFS+ Journaled + GUID
Install on it Sierra files using: sudo /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/Untitled --applicationpath /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Sierra.app --nointeraction
Reboot + using Command + R key to show menu.

I need to delete my HDD from Disk Manager, but I am not sure that my USB is boot-able and I can start installation from USB drive. Also I am not sure that I will not delete some important part from my HDD!

Can someone advise me how to do that?

Remark: I have only this Apple computer at my disposal.

Step 3 is "wrong" in this case, if you reboot holding cmd+R you will reboot into the recovery partition.

What you should do is to reboot with the USB plugged in while holding the alt/option key to get to the EFI boot manager.

Then you select the USB media and press enter to boot from it.
You will be presented with the installation wizard, at this point go to the top menu and select disk utility to erase the internal drive (choose GUID partition and HFS+ Journaled as file system).

Now you can close disk utility and proceed with the installation.


How-to change apple ID email address correctly I have old email address address1@domain.com as an apple id. How to change email address to address2@domain.com correctly? I have only 1 iOS device. Should i log out from all services and change it through appleid page or i can change it directly from iOS devise without logging out from services (iMessage, iTunes etc.)? Thanks.

I would suggest that you first sign out of any service or device that uses your Apple ID, except for your primary iOS device, if you want to use it to change your email. From there, you can change your Apple ID email address from the iCloud preferences.

Check out this article for information on how to change your Apple ID: Change your Apple ID


How can I tell what version of SMB is negotiated when I connect to a share from macOS? I have quite a few file servers at work that serve up files over SMB/CIFS.

How can I tell what version is negotiated when someone says that I need to be sure I'm connecting over SMB version 3 to get best performance?

The smbutil command can dump the attributes for all shares or you can target one particular share and parse out the version string:

smbutil statshares -a

In the case of the listing below:

site-test-mbp01:~ me$ df
Filesystem                                           512-blocks       Used  Available Capacity  iused               ifree %iused  Mounted on
/dev/disk1s1                                          975210568  368841648  602865928    38%  1808606 9223372036852967201    0%   /
devfs                                                       706        706          0   100%     1222                   0  100%   /dev
/dev/disk1s4                                          975210568    2097200  602865928     1%        2 9223372036854775805    0%   /private/var/vm
map -hosts                                                    0          0          0   100%        0                   0  100%   /net
map auto_home                                                 0          0          0   100%        0                   0  100%   /home
/dev/disk3s1                                         7813365344 1387760392 6424657392    18%    28307 9223372036854747500    0%   /Volumes/apfs
com.apple.TimeMachine.2018-03-29-120539@/dev/disk1s1  975210568  367917520  602865928    38%  1809465 9223372036852966342    0%   /Volumes/com.apple.TimeMachine.localsnapshots/Backups.backupdb/site-test-mbp01/2018-03-29-120539/Macintosh HD
com.apple.TimeMachine.2018-03-23-083810@/dev/disk1s1  975210568  348612592  602865928    37%  1755978 9223372036853019829    0%   /Volumes/com.apple.TimeMachine.localsnapshots/Backups.backupdb/site-test-mbp01/2018-03-23-083810/Macintosh HD
//me@file-nasuni/abc                              2147409920     227552 2147182368     1%   113774          1073591184    0%   /Volumes/abc

To target the Nasuni share "abc"

smbutil statshares -m /Volumes/abc/|grep VERSION|awk '{print $2}

The command shows I'm negotiated a SMB_3.02 connection to that storage appliance share.


I need to take 500 screenshots at 325x200 over and over. How can I do this on a Mac quickly? I could just do Cmd-Shift-4 and draw them out, but that would take forever and kill my hand doing that 500 times.

Is there a screenshot app/utility out there for Mac that would allow me to set a specific size of a fixed box and just allow me to quickly take screenshots over and over just moving the box around on the screen?

If you know javascript you could use something like phantom.js feed it a list of urls to get screen captures

http://phantomjs.org/screen-capture.html


Recommendation for an iOS & Mac app suite with iCloud support for editing RTF files? I'm looking for an app suite of iOS and Mac apps for editing RTF files (originally created with TextEdit) and which allow sharing the files through iCloud.

I considered getting the WriteToGo suite of apps. This seems to do pretty much what I want. But I noticed in iTunes that these apps were released in 2013 and haven't been updated since. I'm hesitant to pour money into what seems like old apps with little developer support. So I was wondering whether someone can recommend this(*), or recommend another app suite?

There's a related question on finding an “editor for both iOS and Mac OS X designed for writers” but, as far as I can tell, the options mentioned there don't use RTF as their native file format (being able to convert from/to RTF and the app suite's native file format is not what I'm looking for).

(*) If anyone is using the WriteToGo suite, I was also wondering what the difference is between the two different Mac apps “WriteToGo knapsack” and “WriteToGo pro”?

I'm the developer of an app called RTF Write which does exactly what you're looking for -- it also supports iCloud Drive and iCloud HandOff.  It's free for iOS, the OS X version is $2.99.

http://machsoftwaredesign.com/rtfwrite.html


How to fix broken text to speech rate on Big Sur I'm on macOS 11.2 using a 16 inch 2019 MacBook Pro. I noticed when I use the text to speech functionality (system preferences > Accessibility > spoken content), the Siri voice doesn't adjust it's speech rate when using the slider (or the button on the popup controller). One thing I've noticed is that any other non-siri voice works. Furthermore, the voice was working till I reimaged my computer. Lastly, I have an older mid-2015 mac and it works just fine (even after I completely wiped it).
I tried to copy over some plist files from my old mac to see if I could get that to work, but that failed.
Any suggestions on how to fix the broken functionality?

Well, it looks like it is a regression from macOS 10 to macOS 11. I confirm your saying, it worked and now Siri's voice speed can't be controlled anymore in Preferences Pane > Accessibility > Spoken Content
Apple does not notify anything about it in macOS 11's doc
The feature seems to be broken and bugs about Spoken Content are not new on MacOS. Look at this for instance.
Unfortunately, I think your only option is to open a bug ticket on Apple's website and wait until enough people are complaining about it to get it fixed.


Is there a display screen with a Thunderbolt interface that is not made by Apple? Any suggestion for a non-Apple monitor to connect to MBA (mid-2011)? The display has to reach the same resolution without flickering. Does a non-Apple Thunderbolt display exist?

It's not advertised all that well, but Apple still sells the non-Thunderbolt 27" LED Display (Apple Store US Link).

As CajunLuke points out, there are other good 27" displays out there, notably by Dell and HP, just be careful that you're getting one that isn't low resolution (1920x1080 on a 27" won't look great - the good ones are 2560x1440), and has a native Displayport input - as you may be aware, the miniDisplayport to dual-link DVI adapters have some issues.


Want to update from OSX 10.6.8 to OSX 10.9 When I go into my apple software updates on my OSX 10.6.8 computer to update to an OSX 10.9, the computer tells me that I do not have any new updates. How can I update to OSX 10.9 if it does not give me that option?

Mac OS X Lion - 10.7 was (is) a paid upgrade. From there, you can then ride the free major upgrade train as far as your hardware allows.

Upgrade Macbook Pro from 10.6.8 to 10.8

I’ve heard of people jumping to ElCapitan, but never experienced it since I have lion digitally as well as on a USB key so I just rolled that path in the past.

Upgrade iMac12,2 from Mac OS X 10.6.8

You may run into issues, so feel free to ask a specific question if you run into a specific block knowing you can’t just upgrade in one step.


Syncing Contacts and iCal between multiple Macs and iOS? I have a two Macs, an iPod Touch and an iPad, so 4 devices in total.

I wonder if there is a way to sync contacts and ical calendars between these devices automatically (or in case of the iPod/iPad when they are connected to a mac).

So far, I'm seeing these options:

MobileMe - seems really expensive for what it offers and stores data in the cloud
Mac OS X Server - requires a dedicated machine and is also not cheap
Syncing with Google Contacts and Calendars - requires the data to go to the cloud, but is free

Is there anything that simply allows me to sync from Mac to Mac to iOS through my local network?

I've been extremely happy with iCloud syncing between MacBook Pro, iPhone, and iPad. Once set up it works flawlessly and reliably unlike MobileMe which I had for years and was useful but never totally trustworthy. iCloud really is a great solution for syncing address book and calendar and reminders. I'm also enjoying it's syncing of bookmarks and other safari browser data.

My only caveat about it is that some MobileMe users have had some issues in doing the move. None of these issues to my knowledge have been unsolveable but there have been some bumps. For users with an Apple ID and no legacy of MobileMe use it's extremely smooth to set up.

All iOS devices need to be running iOS 5, Macs need latest version of Lion.

http://www.apple.com/icloud/setup/


How to disable Documents folder protection? I'm working on a C++ program in Xcode, which opens some files in the project folder, which is in ~/Documents/Xcode Projects. Because it's in my Documents folder, every time I run the program, it asks for permissions to access my documents folder, and I have to click yes every time. I tried explicitly giving the program permission in the settings, and that works for a little bit, but after about 3 runs of the program it asks for permissions again. Can I just disable the document folder protection? How?

The easy way is to turn off sandboxing for the app, in Xcode project settings under "capabilities". You might not want that though.

Otherwise you probably need a security-scoped bookmark to the directory. When you get access, create a bookmark from the directory URL using bookmarkData(options:includingResourceValuesForKeys:relativeTo:). Make sure to use .withSecurityScope in the options argument. Save that to user defaults. Then when you want to use the directory,

Read the bookmark from user defaults
Initialize the URL using init(resolvingBookmarkData:options:relativeTo:bookmarkDataIsStale:) with options of [.withSecurityScope, .withoutUI].
Call .startAccessingSecurityScopedResource() before trying to use the URL.
Call .stopAccessingSecurityScopedResource() when you're done with the URL.


Applescript to reboot router by clicking on buttons I am attempting to write an applescript to reboot a router using Safari during the night when no one is using the network.  I can successfully log into the router but am having trouble in selecting the button.  It appears that the button is in a frame and I don't know how to select the button in the frame.  After logging in, the HTML code appears as:

<frame name="topFrame" marginWidth="0" marginHeight="0" src="./frame/top.htm" noResize scrolling="no" frameSpacing="0" frameBorder="0">
    <frameset cols="182,55%,*">
        <frame id="frame1" name="bottomLeftFrame" marginWidth="0" marginHeight="0" src="./MenuRpm.htm" noResize frameBorder="1" scrolling="auto" style="overflow-x:hidden">
        <frame id="frame2" name="mainFrame" marginWidth="0" marginHeight="0" src="./mainFrame.htm" frameBorder="1">
        <frame name="helpFrame" marginWidth="0" marginHeight="0" src="./help/StatusHelpRpm.htm" frameBorder="1">
    </frameset>
</frameset>

Inside the code for the "bottomLeftFrame," I want to click on the button below:

System Tools

- Time Settings

- Diagnostic

- Factory Defaults

- Reboot

- Password

- System Log

- Statistics

Can someone please show me how I can select the menu item with the id of "menu_tools"? Thanks!

There's no way for me to know if this following code will help you, without being able to see the website and test the script.  The action for clicking a button in Safari (by identifying the button by its ID), requires the use of JavaScript within your AppleScript code…

As long as this button is not within a drop-down menu or pop-up window or something else, this script should work for you

tell application "Safari"
    do JavaScript "document.getElementById('menu_tools').click();" in document 1
end tell


Why sh -c 'echo -n 1' is different from bash -c 'echo -n 1' I am on a Mac Book Air, OSX 10.8.

I am trying to understand why these two snippets do not print the same output.
sh -c 'echo -n 1' outputs -n 1 whereas
bash -c 'echo -n 1' outputs 1 as expected.

Could you help me explaining why and how to make them output the same (if at all possible)?

Because apparently Mac OS is one of the systems which responds to the xpg_echo option when run in POSIX mode. Running bash as /bin/sh is equivalent to running with either --posix or setting POSIXLY_CORRECT.

The solution is to stop using echo except in cases where there can be no ambiguity. printf is the portable replacement. Never use option flags to echo, (and use printf if you do).

There are multiple incompatible historical implementations of echo which break its specification in a way that can't be fixed, and the option flags are therefore non-portable. I'm not aware of anything that currently implements POSIX echo correctly.

shopt -u xpg_echo should modify this behavior. Also as you've already discovered, not running in POSIX mode.

Also you might want to upgrade... bash 3 is getting a little crusty. Many bugs have been fixed since.


How to tell which files are entirely or partly within a band of a sparse bundle disk image? I have an image with an error in one of its bands:

/Volumes/twoz/macbookpro08-centrim.sparsebundle/bands/3252

The file system personality of the image is Case-sensitive Journaled HFS+.

Question

At the HFS Plus level:

how can I tell which files are entirely or partly within that band?

Names and paths of files will be ideal.

Background

The error is detected by ZFS and is permanent (I chose no redundancy for the pool). File system twoz is mounted by ZEVO.

At the root of the bundle there's probably nothing to help us:

sh-3.2$ sudo ls -ahl /Volumes/twoz/macbookpro08-centrim.sparsebundle
total 8952
drwx------@ 3 root  wheel    10B  3 Mar 19:38 .
drwxr-xr-x  7 root  wheel     7B  9 Dec 17:16 ..
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   499B 30 Dec 12:20 Info.bckup
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   499B 30 Dec 12:20 Info.plist
drwx------  2 root  wheel    26K  3 Mar 08:16 bands
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   445B  3 Mar 06:48 com.apple.TimeMachine.MachineID.bckup
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   445B  3 Mar 06:48 com.apple.TimeMachine.MachineID.plist
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   1.4K  3 Mar 08:20 com.apple.TimeMachine.Results.plist
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel    11K  3 Mar 08:20 com.apple.TimeMachine.SnapshotHistory.plist
-rwx------  1 root  wheel     0B  9 Dec 17:16 token
sh-3.2$ sudo defaults read /Volumes/twoz/macbookpro08-centrim.sparsebundle/Info
{
    CFBundleInfoDictionaryVersion = "6.0";
    "band-size" = 8388608;
    "bundle-backingstore-version" = 1;
    "diskimage-bundle-type" = "com.apple.diskimage.sparsebundle";
    size = 821820674048;
}

I expect the bands directory to contain nothing except bands.

An experiment with cat

sudo cat /Volumes/twoz/macbookpro08-centrim.sparsebundle/bands/3252

The result is mostly binary data and unsurprisingly, an I/O error seems to prevent completion of the command – so I aborted.

Interspersed with binary data, some content is human readable. Some of that readable content is almost certainly within one file (xulrunner) that suffered an I/O error when I attempted to restore data from the disk image.

I'd prefer a more direct approach – one that does not involve attempting to read all data from the volume.

Wonder whether an authoritative answer to this question will involve knowledge of the disk image driver or a private framework. In OS X 10.8.2 for example:

sh-3.2$ hdiutil info
framework       : 344
driver          : 10.7v344

/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/DiskImages.framework

Assuming you can attach the sparsebundle, you should be able to do this using fileXray, which is $79 for a personal use license and found at http://filexray.com

fileXray is able to "reverse map volume storage" meaning it can "determine which file a given block or byte offset on a volume belongs to." The relevant option is --who_owns_byte, explained on page 172 of the documentation, which can be found at http:// filexray.com / fileXray.pdf  (link broken because it won't let me post more than two links).

Now according to page 54 of the documentation, "It is important to note that a device dump must be 'raw'—that is, it must not require any additional transformations such as decompression or decryption. In other words, for a disk image file to be used directly by fileXray, the image must not be compressed, encrypted, or sparse. fileXray will reject such an image." However, it goes on to say, "If you do have such an image that is compressed, encrypted, or sparse, either convert it using the Mac OS X hdiutil command-line program, or simply attach it (optionally without mounting it) using hdiutil and use fileXray on the resultant block device instead of the image file."

So once you have the sparsebundle attached or mounted, the question is what byte offset to provide to the --who_owns_byte option.

Apple provides "routines to manipulate a sparse bundle" at http://www.opensource.apple.com/source/hfs/hfs-191/CopyHFSMeta/SparseBundle.c

Based on that code, we can see in the routine doSparseRead that the bandName of the first band for a given offset is the bandNum as a hexadecimal number. In particular, asprintf(&bandName, "%s/bands/%x", ctx->pathname, bandNum).

The bandNum is the offset / blockSize, since off_t bandNum = (offset + nread) / blockSize and nread starts at 0, which will truncate the result of the division, so the offset should be bandNum * blockSize or bandNum * blockSize + blockSize. Note that the blockSize is the bandSize, since off_t blockSize = ctx->bandSize;

Looking at doSparseWrite seems to give the same answer, since off_t bandNum = (offset + written) / blockSize; with written initialized at 0 and asprintf(&bandName, "%s/bands/%x", ctx->pathname, bandNum);

It would be great if someone with access to fileXray could try this.


Can I delete part of an iMessage from OS X? I would like to delete part of a message history, not all of it. I know how to do this on my iPhone and iPad, but can't find a way to do so on my computer itself.

Right click or ctrl+click on a message and hit "delete".


Why does my Macbook Pro try to shut down when I leave it unattended? When I close the lid of my Macbook Pro (Lion), it goes to sleep, which is good: it powers down without closing my applications.

But if I just leave the computer unattended for a while without closing the lid, it attempts to shut down instead. It usually fails at this, because there's often a program such as Photoshop (which doesn't use Lion's autosave feature) blocking shutdown with a "Save as" dialog. But it does always succeed, annoyingly, in closing my browser etc. It does this even when the computer is plugged in and fully charged.

When I leave my computer unattended for 15 minutes, I want it to behave exactly as if I had closed the lid: it should go to sleep, not shut down.

How can I do this?

Try going to System Preferences and choosing Security & Privacy.  When that application window opens, choose "General" tab and then look to the lower right corner and click on "Advanced".  Uncheck "Log out after _ _ minutes of inactivity.

Not sure but this might be the cause.

Good luck


Copy entire chat in Messages in macOS Mojave I'm trying to copy and paste a chat from Messages.app into an email (macOS Mojave 10.14.5, Messages 12.0 (5500)).  When I go into Messages and select all using command+A, the entire conversation is highlighted as if it's all selected.  However, when I then copy and paste, only the very first selected message gets pasted.  I tried selecting manually with the mouse, using Edit > Select All, and doing all of the above with the message opened in a separate window, but none of those changed the result.

I came up with one kludgey solution of making a PDF to share by selecting File > Print… and then PDF > Save as PDF.  That creates a PDF that can be shared but copying and pasting from it remains a mess.

If I'm not mistaken, this was possible in earlier versions of macOS (I seem to even remember the formatting pasting quite nicely).

So how do you copy the entire chat in Messages?

Scroll up before copying.

I just observed it. Copy-pasted in textedit and used a service to count words which increased every time I scrolled up. Also scrolling up can be sluggish at times due to media, previews etc., so it might be rendering it from another format the source of which I presume is /Users/me/Library/Messages/Archive/01-03-2019/My Friend on 01-03-2019 at 01.11.05.ichat


Can't run Intel Driver Update Utility on OS X I cannot run the Intel Driver Update Utility on OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.5). All Java options are enabled (have tested in Safari, Firefox and Chrome) and latest Java version installed. It keeps saying "Loading…" until a message pops up saying…

  The Intel Driver Update Utility failed. Possible web browser compatibility, firewall or installation issue detected. Select OK to troubleshoot the issue.

Any ideas?

PS: I don't use any other firewall software other than the OS included one.

Unfortunately the Intel Drivers Utility does not work with Mac OS.
It is only windows based application.

From http://www.intel.com/p/en_US/support/iduufaq:

  The Intel Driver Update Utility supports the following operating systems:

Windows 8*
Windows 7*
Windows Vista*
Windows XP*
Windows Server 2008*
Windows Server 2003*

  Operating systems not supported: Apple*, Linux*, and operating system emulators


Two-way CalDAV and CardDAV sync on iOS? (1) So I understand that iOS 4 support CalDAV in for syncing the Calendar app on the iPhone. However, during my initial tests with a test CalDAV URL, I can see the events my iPhone pulled off the server, but I don't see a way of adding/editing events on my iPhone and pushing them onto the server.
Am I doing something wrong? Or is the iOS limited to subscribing to CalDAV, but not real two-way syncing?
If anyone can give specific instructions on how to setup two-way CalDAV syncing that would be great, too...
(2) Is two-way syncing via CardDAV supported? If so, how?
Thanks.

CalDAV and CardDAV should definitely be two-way on iOS 4. I'm doing CalDAV right now through Google and I can confirm it works fine. I haven't tried CardDAV, but I haven't heard of any other issues. It's possible that your CalDAV server isn't set up properly, or you "Subscribed" to the CalDAV server instead of adding an account. Hard to say without knowing the particulars of your setup.

To add a CalDAV account:

Open Settings on your iPhone, and tap Mail, Contacts, Calendars
Tap Add Account...
Tap Other
Under Calendars, tap Add CalDAV Account. Make sure you get that, not Add Subscribed Calendar

Fill in the server and account details, hit Next and Save.
Repeat with CardDAV instead of CalDav

You should be all set. If it doesn't work, check out things server-side.


How to minimise the terminal automatically when it is running a shell script? I have a shell script which runs a Python Program. I created the shell script so that the users of my program may simply double click it to run my program.

When the shell script is executed; the terminal loads in front of the GUI of the Python Program and that is bothersome. Is there anyway to ensure that the Terminal is minimised by default when the shell script runs?

Ok. So I found out a solution.

Turns you can simply use Automator and save the shell script as an App.

Just open Automator; select "Applications" and then "Run a Shell Script"


Monitor ALL network traffic by app so far I used nettop and/or the activity monitor to observe the traffic used by each app but I noticed just now, that there is a huge difference between the sum of the per app traffic and the traffic which actually came through the network interface.

In this example the sum of the received traffic by app seems to be less than 5MB though the opened network interface monitor (right part of the screenshot) tells me, that actually 27.3MB came in. And this is the correct number as my mobile phone gives me the same figure for today's traffic.

So why is the sum of the traffic per app so much lower?

Regards
Simon

In the screen shot you are showing the Network usage numbers are excatly the same 27.3 MB.

The individual network usage per application (coulomb) are current (active) numbers, which are much smaller and are not meant to be added manually to find out the total usage. OS X does that for you in the table at the bottom.

The Table at the bottom is showing the total usage for all applications and it is cumulative (for 7 days) or between restarts which ever comes first.

I did the test:

Data Usage before restart.

and Data usage AFTER restart:


Which one drain battery slower, airplay or hdmi? Two ways of showing video on TV are airplay through Apple TV and hdmi cable.
Which one drain the battery of ipad/ iPhone / ... Slower?

Depending how scientific you want to go, the direct cable would normaly consume less power then wireless transfer.

That is true when using the correct cable (high quality) since the cables also have some resistance (power consumption) specially if they are very long.

To find actual power consumption differences you need one of those power monitoring apps. (many options on the web).

Is it worth knowing? probably not, since you have to monitor it for like 2 hours, without other applications running to get meaningful numbers.


Where are all of the command line tools installed? I was playing around to set up a prober working/development environment.

I installed command line tools such as:

NodeJS
NPM
Grunt
Bower

Where can I find those tools and how can I delete them? Is there any routine?

The whereis command only looks in the standard executable paths. Try which bower instead. Here's an example from my machine. I used "git" because I don't have "bower" installed.

~ 506 whereis git
/usr/bin/git
~ 507 which git
/opt/local/bin/git

whereis returned the path of the system-installed version of "git". which returned the path of the version that actually runs when I type "git" at the command line.


Having trouble configuring homebrew to run pure-ftpd as a service I am trying to run pure-ftpd 1.0.46 as a service and have configured my plist file as below:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
  <dict>
    <key>KeepAlive</key>
    <true/>
    <key>Label</key>
    <string>homebrew.mxcl.pure-ftpd</string>
    <key>ProgramArguments</key>
    <array>
      <string>/usr/local/opt/pure-ftpd/sbin/pure-ftpd</string>
      <string>-A</string>
      <string>-E</string>
      <string>-j</string>
      <string>-z</string>
      <string>-l</string>
      <string>puredb:/usr/local/etc/pureftpd.pdb</string>
      <string>-I</string>
      <string>1</string>
      <string>-c</string>
      <string>1000</string>
    </array>
    <key>RunAtLoad</key>
    <true/>
    <key>WorkingDirectory</key>
    <string>/usr/local/var</string>
    <key>StandardErrorPath</key>
    <string>/usr/local/var/log/pure-ftpd.log</string>
    <key>StandardOutPath</key>
    <string>/usr/local/var/log/pure-ftpd.log</string>
  </dict>
</plist>

However, I find that whenever I try running as a service it logs the following errors.

pure-ftpd: invalid option --
pure-ftpd: unrecognized option `--j -z'
Unable to start a standalone server: Permission denied

Can anyone identify an error I've made in my plist file?

I tried to confirm it matched the example in SirPavlovas answer provided here : Getting launchd to read program arguments correctly

For anyone having this trouble or similar, use the command line plutil to get feedback on what the plist file problems are (e.g. line numbers). In my case the copy from the Confluence page I used to document the install guide inserted broken whitespace characters, invisible to the naked eye but affecting launchd.


Upgrading to Lion - Questions about disks, RAID and backups I've gone Lion on my MBP and now, having backed up four year's worth of files am ready to upgrade...

A bit of background:

I have a 2007 MacPro and have filled all four drive bays with:

2 x Western Digital 250GB (nearly identical serial numbers)
1 x Hitachi 300GB
1 x Western Digital 1TB (nice fast drive)

Since 2007 I've had the 250GB and the 300GB drives set up as a RAID0 under OS X i.e. software RAID. I had to touch wood before typing this, but so far (touches wood again) its run like a dream and I've enjoyed faster performance than I would have had with apps and software running off a single drive (I ran extensive tests on drive configurations with one and all of the above as single and two/three/four drive RAID and this one was the best all-rounder).

I'm loath to buy more drives - I use a couple of fast external eSata drives for media files and backups (incl. Timemachine ones) so I'd like to devote the onboard drives to performance of OS and apps. A bit of spare space to use as working area for movie editing (this was the primary driver for setting up RAID) would be good too.

Can anyone suggest an optimum configuration with the above gear?

Well you already have a pretty optimal setup. Having the two disks in RAID-0 as your boot drive gives you the greatest possible performance. Just be sure to keep a good backup, since if either disk fails you lose the whole array. Superduper! is great since it makes a bootable backup for you, unlike Time Machine. I highly recommend it.

Otherwise you're good to go. The only suggestions I have are to buy an SSD for even more performance, and to upgrade your graphics card, you can get a PC 5770 or something for really cheap and it works great.


Random dummy spinning beachball As the title describes, I keep getting a random spinning wheel, but there is no crash/hanging of the system of any sort. I've been getting these for the last two or so years, but only recently it has started occuring much more frequently, prompting me to ask it here.
I have a 4GB early 2015 MacBook Air on MacOS Sierra. The wheel appears randomly and is not application specific. I can still move the wheel using my trackpad, so the system is definitely not hanging. However, once I click the trackpad, it disappears, with no other effect. I probably must mention that when the wheel appears, it appears "on top" of all applications, in the sense, that once I click the trackpad to make it disappear, I'll have to click once again on the application window I was previously working with to interact with it.
I am just curious about this strange behaviour as I haven't found any similar issue discussed anywhere else.

The spinning beachball doesn't indicate a truly 'hung' app, it indicates a pending transaction that the app is still waiting for time to process. It ought to only occur when the cursor is hovering directly over the app responsible. If you click anywhere except inside your currently-frontmost app, it will bring another to the front & then you will have to switch back.
Having said all that, my prime suspect on a 4GB RAM Mac would be it is paging to virtual memory & having to wait for the swap to finish. Clicking another app will make it have to swap out & then back again, doubling the time it takes.
This may explain a beach ball that doesn't appear directly related to one given app, but the overall machine is struggling to keep up.
You could test this by keeping Activity Monitor visible on-screen, set to the Memory tab, & see what apps seem to be using the most [browsers get complicated because each tab has its own memory, not just the browser itself] & see what colour the Memory Pressure graph at the bottom of the window shows. Green is fine, orange is starting to become an issue & red will surely start to show problems.
The value for Swap Used may also be indicative of the issue.


No route to host, unless someone is logged in When trying to ssh into a remote OS X machine, I get:

ssh: connect to host … port 22: No route to host

ping or traceroute do not reach the machine either.

The interesting detail is that if someone is logged onto the machine as a guest, then the machine is reachable and it can be pinged.

Is it possible to have the machine always be reachable through the network? I have looked for information on the web, but while many pages describe how to enable remote access, I did not find any one that addresses the problem above.

(If needed, I can have someone log directly on the Mac onto my (Administrator) account. Maybe ssh works too when the guest is logged in, I was not able to try yet, as I only have a remote connection.)

Probably FileVault2 is enabled on the remote Mac.

After a clean reboot and before entering the FileVault/user password the disk won't be available and subsequently the common network won't be enabled.
After unlocking the disk locally you should be able to discover your Mac and ssh to it.
If the Guest account is enabled in the FileVault mode your Mac might be pinged depending on the network setup (DHCP), but since it is a special 'Safari window only mode' you shouldn't be able to ssh to it.

To reboot a FileVault-enabled Mac remotely enter sudo fdesetup authrestart. This allows you to restart a FileVault-enabled system without requiring an unlock during the next startup. Check this Apple support page for more information.

If FileVault2 isn't enabled i would expect that the sleep and Wake-on-LAN settings aren't properly set.


Weird Browser Pictures on Mac Mavericks Can someone please tell me what's happening here : http://awesomescreenshot.com/02c2otqbf9 This can be fixed by clearing my cache. Pictures are broken.

My OS is MAC Mavericks, happens on all browsers including Windows browser ( Virtual Box )

But this happens a alot on all the websites I'm doing it's frustrating.

Update:

Also happens on desktop pictures :

Thanks!

I can not help you further then explained in my answer below.

You have installed a add-on with some "other" software from a 3d party.

That one is causing all your problems.

You can try to talk to the developer, or do a clean uninstall of the application and all its by products on your computer.

Well, it is a bit a spam if you want to call it that way.

When you open that web site and click on it, you will get a browser add on.

When you hover over the "Firefox version" (in my case), you will see following in the bottom left corner:

To get rid of it, open your browsers preferences and remove that add on.

PS:

in my case it shows the Firefox version (add on), since i used it to get the page.

I used the standard os x screen capture for the images in here.

EDIT:

I recommend you get rid off that add-on asap since it installs stuff you do not want!

Also remove all web screen shots taken by that POS! including in your desk top collection.


Will an iPhone work and still have regular warranty if it's bought outside your country? I did my research and some sources are saying there wouldn't be warranty if your iPhone is bought outside your home country. But I don't know if that rule still applies now.

I want to buy online on the US apple store 'cause its waaay cheaper than where I reside now.

If your country has an official Apple store, then yes (warranty covers) but it will not be valid if your country has only the official Apple Reseller store.

You must have a proper purchase bill and verify that you own that hardware, then Apple Store will take care of it. In my case, I had purchased my iPhone in Finland and I was able to get a warranty here in Spain too.

Offical statement from Apple:

No Apple reseller, agent, or employee is authorized to make any modification, extension, or addition to this Warranty. If any term is held to be illegal or unenforceable, the legality or enforceability of the remaining terms shall not be affected or impaired. This Warranty is governed by and construed under the laws of the country in which the Apple Product purchase took place. Apple or its successor in title is the warrantor under this Warranty.

Detail on it: https://www.apple.com/legal/warranty/products/ios-warranty-document-us.html


MacBook Pro updating to SSD I have a 15-inch, Late 2011 macbook pro, i mainly use for programming, and occasionally watch a movie or two.

Its getting a bit sluggish, and i reckon its time to update the HD to a SSD one. So my question here is what SSD should i choose, and is there any things i should have a "heads up" with.

I have the stock 500GB HD installed atm. and after all these years i still have 400GB free, so i guess i could manage with a 200-250GB one.

Recommending specific brands and models can be tricky (and this list will probably be out of date in weeks), but at the moment some of the SSD models that get positive comments from Mac users include:

Samsung 840 Pro series
Samsung 840 Evo series
Crucial M500
Sandisk Ultra Plus

As long as the drive doesn't require any additional software to be installed, you can be almost certain that the drive will work fine with OS X. That said, once you've narrowed down one or two models I'd recommend doing a brief search online to see if there are any drawbacks or known problems, just to be on the safe side.

TRIM won't be supported with a third-party SSD, but you can use TRIM Enabler to work around that.

Personally, I have several Samsung 830 and 840 drives and a Crucial M500 and can recommend them all highly (top of the pile would be the 840 Pro).


Help going from two Apple IDs to one I have two Apple IDs. One is with a gmail.com address and the other is with an icloud.com address. I have been using all of Apple's online/cloud/store services since they were released and have no idea how I ended up with two over time, but there is a clear distinction:

The icloud.com one has my iCloud - I sync iMessages in iCloud, have an iCloud drive, sync contacts, and use find my devices all on this account. I do not use iCloud backups or any sort of cloud photo features. I do not actually use my iCloud/.Mac email address.

The gmail.com one is logged into all the stores (music back in the day when I bought tracks individually, app stores, iBooks, etc).

I have a Mac, iPhone, iPad, and watch. I want to once and for all just have one login for everything Apple.

My thought is that since applications and other purchases cannot be transferred, I just need to transfer all my iCloud-synced information to the gmail.com Apple ID, then I can close or stop using the icloud.com Apple ID. I don't think I can go the other way since app purchases cannot be moved between accounts. Is this correct?

How do I go about doing this? Is it as simple as signing out of my iCloud account on one device, signing in on another, and repeating on each device, or will that potentially result in data loss or problems? What annoyances will I have to work around?

Thanks for your help.

As no-one has picked up on this yet, I'm gonna say "It's a toughie!"

I had my first .mac account in the 90's, a private email address for iTunes since 2001 [which I consider my primary account, as it's still my 'real' email address] & me.com [now also icloud.com] since the iPhone & the App Store started.
I have never found any way to successfully merge these identities.
me.com has all my 'cloud sync' stuff, iTunes has all my apps. I have them both set to the same password so I don't have to think too hard about it… & let it go at that.


Can I get power from my Belkin Express Dock HD (Thunderbolt 2) for my MacBook Pro Retina? I plug my MacBook Pro to my Belkin Express Dock HD via Thunderbolt, but I see that my battery is getting down. I was hopping to get power from the Dock. Is there any solution to this problem?

A Thunderbolt port can provide up to 10W. That's enough to charge a phone or a tablet but definitely not a notebook.

A Macbook (Air/Pro) needs  between 45 and 90W.


Is there a way to change the naming scheme for screenshots? Possible Duplicate:
  Save screenshot with my own name

Is there any way, short of a third-party application (I'm quite fond of the baked-in functionality of the screenshot system in Mac OS), to change the filename that screenshots get named with when they're created?

Failing that, are there any notable screenshot apps that give you better granular control over your screenshots, without nuking the process too much?

If you can use the Terminal, screencapture lets you specify the name of the file (and much more).


How can I tell OS X to flag a name as being misspelled? I have a co-worked whose name is Jennett. In Pages, I added her to my local dictionary (located at ~/Library/Spelling/LocalDictionary) by right-clicking on her name and choosing Learn Spelling.

However, OS X is not flagging Jennet with one "t" as being misspelled.

How can I make Jennet with one "t" be flagged as being misspelled?

I assume this problem stems from the fact that jennet—a female donkey—is found in the OS X dictionary. However, given that I don't write much about donkeys, let alone female donkeys, I'd prefer to be notified when I'm misspelling a co-workers name.

Removing words from the built-in dictionary is apparently more difficult than I thought it would be. Since your question is about how to prevent a particular misspelling of your co-worker's name, I have an alternate solution.

You can add "Jennet" to Mac OS X's text substitution list in System Preferences -> Language & Text -> Text

It will automatically correct the spelling for you each time you misspell it. You could add other variant misspellings for completeness, like "Jenet" or even make it auto-capitalize "jennett", but since most other misspelling variants don't have obscure English homonyms these will show up as misspellings.


AppleScript gives no permission error trying to open file, but the file can be opened manually I am getting the following error when attempting to access several files in an AppleScript. However, I can open these files manually without issue.

  The document [filename] could not be opened. You don't have permission.

I have attempted the following:

Manually modified permission via File → Get Info
Used Disk Utility to "Verify" and "Repair Permissions"
Rebooted in recovery mode to reset home directory permissions and acls

I continue to have the problem.

To add further frustration, the files do not consistently report the error. Sometimes I will get the error on a file when I run the script, but not the next time!

Why might I be receiving this permissions error, and how else might I address it?

AppleScript below, if it helps:

-- prompt for source directory
set srcDirectory to (choose folder)

-- get list of all files in source directory
set allFiles to (list folder srcDirectory without invisibles)

tell application "OmniGraffle"
    -- create a new document
    set newDocument to (make new document with properties {template:"Single Pixel Grid"})

    -- added for debug purposes
    delay 5

    -- get a reference to the first layer
    set destinationLayer to first layer in first canvas of newDocument

    -- step through each of the file
    repeat with currentFile in allFiles
        -- get a reference to the next file
        set srcFileString to (srcDirectory as string) & currentFile
        set srcFileRef to (open srcFileString)

        -- get a reference to the icon
        set srcGraphic to first graphic in first layer in first canvas of srcFileRef

        -- flip the icon (they're all upside down)
        flip srcGraphic over vertically

        -- copy the updated source to destination canvas
        duplicate srcGraphic to destinationLayer

        -- close the source file
        close srcFileRef saving no

        -- added for debug purposes
        delay 5
    end repeat

end tell

This problem is caused by Apple's sandboxing of applications (in this case, OmniGraffle). Preview does not receive an entitlement to access the PDF if you just pass it a string to open. From Apple's release notes:

  Compatibility Notes

  When sending commands to a sandboxed application, such as TextEdit in OS X Mountain Lion, parameters that refer to files must be of an explicit file-like type and not a bare string, or the target application will not be able to access the file. For example, file "Macintosh HD:Users:me:sample.txt", POSIX file "/Users/me/sample.txt", or the result of choose file would all be acceptable, but the string "/Users/me/sample.txt" would not.

Why does this sometimes work? When you open a file manually, the application retains the entitlement to open it (in Recents, for instance). Therefore, if you try any file you've opened already, odds are it will work, but it won't work on new files.

To fix, change your code to read:

...
    set srcFileRef to (open POSIX file srcFileString)
...


Will older versions of iLife (like 06 or 08 or 09) run on Lion I'm looking and don't see any official word yet from Apple - I wondered if any web sites have reported whether these older versions work a little or at all (or perfectly well with only some little errors).

The Roaring Apps table lists only iLife 11 versions and my attempts at the top 20 results for several google searches shows a lot of content farms gaming the results.

iLife '08 is running fine on my OSX 10.7 computer.

Most non-PowerPC apps will run fine in Lion, so I expect all the versions you mention will be fine.


AppleScript: How to search files in folder for string and show results in Finder? I am trying to create an Automator-based Service that searches my computer for the selected text. (When I say "my computer," I specifically mean Macintosh HD, not This Mac, because This Mac includes external hard drives.)

I would like the search results to appear in a new Finder window.

Is it possible to accomplish this programmatically in Applescript or a shell script? This doesn't seem possible, but it would be ideal.

If this can't truly be done programmatically, then I would be okay with accomplishing this "manually." Here is an example of how that route might manifest:

tell application "Finder"
    activate
    open (POSIX file "/")
end tell

tell application "System Events"
    keystroke "f" using command down
    keystroke input
end tell

However, I do not know how to change the search directory. (I'm trying to avert scripting mouse clicks.) By default, when a user initiates a search in Finder (e.g., when the user presses ⌘ command + F), the search directory is "This Mac," regardless of the directory of the Finder window that the search function was called in.

If you don't mind changing a particular Finder preference, i.e. When performing a search:, then the following will work.

First, in Finder > Preferences... > Advanced, set When performing a search: to: Search the Current Folder

Next, create an Automator Service workflow with its default settings (Service receives selected text in any application) and add a Run AppleScript action, replacing the default code with the code below:

on run {input, parameters}
    tell application "Finder"
        activate
        open (POSIX file "/")
    end tell
    delay 0.5 -- # Adjust as necessary or comment out/remove if not needed.
    tell application "System Events"
        keystroke "f" using command down
        keystroke input as text
        keystroke return
    end tell
end run

Save the Automator Service workflow, e.g. Search Selected Text in Finder

If you want to add a programatic test and preference change for When performing a search: being set to Search the Current Folder, then add the following code directly after on run {input, parameters} and before the tell application "Finder" block.

if (do shell script "defaults read com.apple.finder FXDefaultSearchScope") is not "SCcf" then
    do shell script "defaults write com.apple.finder FXDefaultSearchScope SCcf; killall Finder"
    delay 1 -- # Adjust as necessary or comment out/remove if not needed.
end if

An alternative, is to leave the default Finder preference for When performing a search: to Searching This Mac and do the following:

Open a new Finder window to the Macintosh HD.
Press: ⌘F
On the Search bar, click the “Macintosh HD” button.
On the Search bar, click the Save button.

Follow through to save the search. In this instance, e.g.:

Save As: Searching “Macintosh HD”
Where: Saved Searches
[] Add To Sidebar (unchecked)

In the Run AppleScript action of the Automator Service workflow, replace open (POSIX file "/") with the following example code, adjusted for your system and how/where you saved the Search:

open POSIX file "/Users/me/Library/Saved Searches/Searching “Macintosh HD”.savedSearch"

The example AppleScript code would then be:

on run {input, parameters}
    tell application "Finder"
        activate
        open POSIX file "/Users/me/Library/Saved Searches/Searching “Macintosh HD”.savedSearch"
    end tell
    delay 0.5 -- # Adjust as necessary or comment out/remove if not needed.
    tell application "System Events"
        keystroke "f" using command down
        keystroke input as text
        keystroke return
    end tell
end run

This latter method leaves the default setting in Finder alone and achieves the goal without using mouse clicks or clicking buttons from the Automator Service workflow.

Note: The example AppleScript code is just that and may require additional delay commands where appropriate/needed, e.g. between the keystroke commands as/if necessary.


Is there a slowing of app download speed when an iPad is locked? I've noticed that downloading apps continue to download in the background as well as when the iPad is locked. Is there a speed decrease in either of these situations (assuming the foreground app isn't using network)?

"Background" is a confusing term, I don't think Apple refer to it at all, but prefer to use "Multitasking" and "Fast App Switching".  As introduced in iOS4, there are a limited number of functions that can maintain running when it is not the foremost app:

audio / VoIP / GPS & location / push notifications / local notifications / task completion / fast app switching

When you download stuff, say a podcast etc, you are really using the "task completion" service, where the program is allowed to continue running while a download completes, or even an upload etc.  This is limited to (I think) 10 minutes, and really is a request for more time.  Some apps game the system, particularly twitter style apps, by staying running and requesting 10 minutes of task completion time even through they don't have a specific task in hand, and just want to still be there when you flip back (hopefully in less than 10 minutes)...

As such, and of these 7 services are afford the same system priority as any other foreground task, so the only thing that should impact on a "background" download, is either a) the 10 minute slot running out, or b) the foreground app sharing the connection to do it's own thing.

As when you flip back, it will (if it supports the Fast App Switching feature) continue to download anyway, even if the 10 minutes have passed, it may well still have got 10 minutes of extra download, but with more to go.  This can make it look as though it has been downloading slowly in the background, when in reality it's been going full speed for 10 minutes, and then stopped until you switched back.


Can iTunes be made to play Apple ProRes files? My videos encoded as Apple ProRes are playable in Quicktime but not in iTunes.  Is there anything I can do to make iTunes play them?

Apple's support page suggests to me that iTunes can play any .MOV file:

  QuickTime and MPEG-4 movie files that end in ".mov", ".m4v", or ".mp4"
  and are playable in QuickTime Player.

but this does not seem to be the case in my testing, instead I find that I am unable to add the files to the iTunes library. There is no error dialog.

On 24 of July I tried for some hours to get iTunes 12.x (actual version at this time) to play other 3rd Party Codecs. In short: I was not successful. iTunes has changed a lot, so none of the older hacks work anymore.

I'm very interested in a solution for this problem, because I have a lot of FLAC-Files I would love to manage in iTunes. If I find a solution I will update this answer and provide a "Tutorial".


Folder Actions missing in High Sierra? I've been using folder actions for years.  Ever since upgrading to High Sierra, my folder actions still work but the ability to add new ones is missing.  When right clicking on a folder, there used to be options such as "Configure Folder Actions" and "Attach A Folder Action."  Now, at least on my Mac, those options are gone.

Where has this gone and how do I get it back?

I'm the only one who uses this Mac and I'm logged in as an Administrator.

Gio Valerio led me to the answer in his comment above.  Somehow, Folder Actions had been deselected in the Services preferences, thus they weren't showing up as an option.  By selecting it there, in Services Preferences, the option for folder actions shows up again in the menu when I right-click on a folder.  Problem solved.  Thanks Gio!


Is there a software that can visually highlight focused windows more? I do web development on my Mac and I tend to have lots of windows open. Even per application, I tend to have multiple windows opened (ie a Terminal window for tail -f error logs, one for ssh, and one for local commands).

When I switch applications with ⌘tab, the visual effect on focused window is subtle and I often get confused and perform commands on the wrong window. For example, I switch to Terminal and do ⌘w to close a tab on the tail -f command, but I accidentally closed the ssh tab!

Is there a Mac program that will highlight or do some more effects on a focused window when I switch applications?

This is Mavericks specific, but Honer will draw a border around the active window. You might also want to combine it with this app that removes window shadows.


Do MacBooks have scissor-switch keyboards yet (Feb 2020)? I can't get a clear answer about this topic. According to the live chat support on the Apple Store website, the mid-2019 MacBook Air models do have the scissor-switch keyboard. However, every other source I check says they still have the butterfly keyboards until mid-2020.

Can I get a definitive answer about whether a new MacBook purchase in the US would have the previous butterfly style keyboard or the newly planned scissor-switch keyboard?

The 2019 MacBook Air uses the third-generation Butterfly keyboard.

This is also clearly stated on Apple's marketing page for the 2019 MacBook Air:

  "The latest-generation MacBook Air keyboard features our butterfly mechanism [...]"

The new scissor-switch style keyboard debuted on the 16" MacBook Pro, which was released in November of 2019. The 2019 MacBook Air is from July of 2019.

It doesn't matter which country you buy your MacBook Air in. Different countries obviously have different keyboard in terms of number of keys and the letters on them - but they're all made in the same way. I.e. a Mid 2019 MacBook Air is going to have the same style of keyboard in every country.

There's no such thing as a "Mid 2020 MacBook Air" (yet). You can only speculate whether it will have a scissor-switch key, or the butterfly keyboard. The public does not know.


How to remove mails from mail app and maintain google calendar synchronized with Apple Reminders? I've got a gmail account and I use the browser to read, write and manage my gmail account.

I wrongly opened Apple mail and it started synchronizing with gmail.

I would like to maintain google calendar synchronized with Apple Reminders, but I would like to free the space on HD used by Apple mail.

Is it possible?

Try system preferences -> Internet accounts -> uncheck mail from google account


MacBook Pro high CPU with external monitors I recently ordered two 4K monitors (LG 27UD88). I connected them using Mini DisplayPort to DisplayPort Adapter cable to my MacBook Pro.

When I have the monitors connected, the CPU load is very high with fans  running at 5500-6000 RPM and a processor temperature of 54°C. This does not seem healthy to me. It's kernel_task which is using absurd amounts of CPU (sometimes spikes up to 600%)

Things I've tried so far

Before I used to have a high CPU load as well (with the additional monitors connected), but that got resolved after following the instructions in this article, CPU usage is too high with Yosemite and an external monitor, kernel_task spikes to 600%+.
Disabling X86PlatformShim.kext
Resetting the SMC.

This all seems very odd to be. I have a maxed out MacBook Pro which can't handle two monitors?

Here is the system configuration:

MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Mid 2015)
Processor: 2,8 GHz Intel Core i7
Memory: 16 GB 1600 MHz DDR3
Graphics: AMD Radeon R9 M370X 2 GB
          Intel Iris Pro 1536 MB
Storage: 500GB Flash Storage

Information from sensors:

UPDATE #1:

Here is the information on the GPU load. It seems that the GPU load is high, but that the processor of the AMD Radeon is not used. I'm currently looking into this, if you have any suggestions on how to make more use of the AMD Radeon GPU please do.

I do have Automatic graphics switching turned off (this should increase high-performance graphics).

Also the system preferences tell that the AMD Radeon is being used for the external display. Though the iStat data suggests otherwise.

Update #2:

I've installed gfxCardStatus and put it to discrete only. Looks like the AMD Radeon GPU is actively being used. This does not make a difference.

Update #3:

I've ran iStat for a while now. Looks like the CPU has many spikes, even up to 90 degrees. This would obviously trigger the fans to start blowing (also the MacBook itself feels hot near the processor). Looks like the average temp at the moment is 70 degrees.

Here is the CPU frequency:

Folks this is an image of my fans before I had them cleaned.

I faced the very same issue that you guys are facing and based on input from another forum decided to get my 2016 MPB fans cleaned out. This made an immediate impact where when I connected my external display to the MBP.pre-cleaning, it would overheat causing the fans to spin at 6000 rpm or thereabout and the kernel_task would eat up 500%-900% of the CPU rending the system unusable. This simple cleanup of the fans has allowed me to connect the monitor with no kernel panic anymore and even though the fans run around 5000 rpm now the CPU and GPU are running around 10 degrees cooler now.


How do I add a flag to an alias? Is it possible to add a flag to a bash alias you create yourself? e.g.

con -a = 'ssh username@server1.domain.com'
con -b = 'ssh username@server2.domain.com'

Or, use a function instead of an alias:

con() {
  local OPTIND svr
  while getopts ":ab" option; do
    case $option in
      a) svr=server1 ;;
      b) svr=server2 ;;
      ?) echo "invalid option: $OPTARG"; return 1 ;;
    esac
  done
  ssh username@${svr}.domain.com
}

con -a


Macbook7.1 (Macbook mid-2010 ) White unibody bottom rubber falling off The bottom cover on my Macbook7.1 (mid-2010) White Unibody is beginning to fall of. I tried using some glue that a guy from a repair shop I could use for rubber-on-aluminium. I tried it and all I got is an awful smell of the glue which sticked right off, and couldn't hold it for long.I can clean the glue off, and I can try a second time to stick it back. Anyone any suggestions on a glue? Or a cheap new bottom rubber cover for my Macbook? Thanks guys!

There is a replacement program for this issue that still seems to be active. My wife's Macbook was also affected, and Apple mailed us out a free replacement replacement kit (comprising replacement part, screws and screwdriver) a couple of years ago.


iCloud Backup Restore 6.0 to 7.0 but not 7.0 to 7.1 Just for my knowledge and curiosity, not using iTunes backup but just over Wi-Fi:

Why is possible to do an iCloud backup and restore from 6.0 to 7.0 and is not possible to do an iCloud backup restore from 7.0 to 7.1 (they must be 7.0 to 7.0 or 7.1 to 7.1)

It is a software requirement? It is a hardware requirement?

It is possible to restore an iCloud backup from iOS 7.0.x on iOS 7.1. Since iOS 7.1 is later than iOS 7, you can restore the backup fine.


Internet sharing via WiFi won't work (BSS stopping) I'm trying to start internet sharing on my mac mini (share ethernet to wifi).
Until a few days ago, it worked fine, and suddenly stopped working.

I'm pretty sure my "graphical" config is fine (with the System settings app). But there's something strange in the /var/log/wifi.log.

Whenever I start the sharing, it actually works very briefly, before stopping again (MAC addresses and stuff replaced with <snip>)

2014-05-05 11:47:37.974783 AM [wifid] <en1> Start BSS on <snip>
2014-05-05 11:47:37.974984 AM [wifid] <en1> Start Network
2014-05-05 11:47:38.058925 AM [wifid] <en1> Apple SWAP IE
Raw IE:
<snip>
Signature Length: 4
Use for Beacon
Use for Probe Response

Host model identifier: Macmini6,2
Internet Connection Sharing Enabled

2014-05-05 11:47:38.107761 AM [wifid] <en1> Stop BSS on <snip>
2014-05-05 11:47:38.117333 AM [wifid] Change Interface Role on en1 with MAC <snip> to sta
2014-05-05 11:47:38.117608 AM [wifid] <en1> Maximum PHY Rate <450>

Any idea what's wrong?

Had the same problem, reseting the NVRAM and PRAM worked for me.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1379


Can I transfer all Mail accounts to a new Mac? I have many email accounts in my Mail app, lets say 15. Entering the necessary values and passwords etc. for each of these is a huge pain. Is it possible to somehow "save" all of those accounts and transfer them to a new Mac, so I don't need to do it manually? This would include icloud mail, gmail, exchange, etc. accounts and passwords.

Note that in this case I am using macOS Sierra. Also note that I am referring to transferring the accounts login information and email server info to receive and send emails, and not referring to transferring actual emails.

You can transfer all accounts and passwords that are saved by transferring your Keychain from your old mac to your new mac.

Manually (long)

On your old mac

Go into your users Library folder which is /Library. By default, this folder is hidden. Open your finder and press, COMMAND+SHIFT+L. This should jump you to that location.

Finder the folder named, Keychain, and copy it to a USB drive or into iCloud.

If you use a USB drive, remove it from the mac now and go to your new mac.

On your new mac

Insert USB drive if thats what your using. Otherwise, go into your iCloud. Select the Keychain directory you saved there and copy it.

Go to your users Library by using the same method as before and paste the Keychain directory. If asked, merge the folders and authenticate. You may also replace the Keychain directory on the new mac with your old Keychain documents. This will replace any information such as logins you may have already saved on your new mac.

Easiest Method

Enable iCloud Keychain on your Apple ID.

Use the same Apple ID on both macs.

All login info will sync together like magic.


Does "reset this pc" work on a Bootcamp Windows 10? I want to Reset my Windows 10 back to its factory state. I installed Windows 10 thru bootcamp partition. Does the "Reset this PC" option work on it? If not how should I reset my windows partition?

You can try the Reset this PC option and if it doesn't work, simply copy and files to iCloud, OneDrive, etc or a hard drive and then remove the Bootcamp partition from macOS and reinstall Windows 10.


How do you shut calendar alerts off There are occasions where I set an event to occur everyday for a week and I don't want an alert connected to it.  I select "none" for alerts and after I have set the appointment, it automatically defaults to a 30 minute notification.

I can go in a couple of days later and again set it to none and it will later default to 30 minute alert notice.

How can I stop this?

Maybe you have set a "time to leave" notification, if you have put an exact location for the event. It tells you at which time you should leave, to get at your appointment on time.

To disable it: Preferences > Alerts > Uncheck Time to Leave.


Remove auto login to a dead server OS X I'm trying to remove an auto login to a dead share but it won't let me do it, any suggestions? There is an exclamation warning after the name of the server in my Users & Groups > Login Items in my preferences:

If it's greyed out then it means it's defined by the administrator (either MCX or profiles). Look in System Information under either Managed Client or Profiles to see where it's coming from.


How to uninstall zsh I'm new to Mac. A friend installed all kinds of additional software including zsh which I would like to uninstall. So how can I uninstall zsh?

If your friend changed the command that shells are opened with, you can change it back to the default login shell from Terminal's preferences:

If the default login shell was changed, you can change it back to /bin/bash by running chsh -s /bin/bash.

zsh is included with OS X (in /bin/zsh), but even if your friend installed a newer version of zsh, you don't necessarily need to uninstall or remove it.


Need to restore from encrypted iPhone backup, but can’t due to missing password I did not set a password for the restore encrypted thing. I have tried 1234 and anything else I could come up with. I have to get back in. I accidentally deleted text messages that I need for personal reasons. I called Apple, and they basically admitted that this could happen somehow, but they had no remedy. Is this true?

I would try your iTunes password and any others you can think of.  Passwords don't magically set themselves.  You or someone else must have enabled the Encrypt iTunes Backups feature, which requires setting a password.
You might be in luck, because deleting text messages (at least in iOS 4.x) doesn't actually erase the data, it still exists in your sms.db file hidden on the phone.  You could seek an experienced iPhone expert to help you jailbreak and access your sms.db, or use a tool like DiskAid or PhoneView to attempt to access the Messages sms.db directly.  Then you (they) would use an SQLite database browser to search and view the text messages.


Is it possible to route traffic from the outside to a virtualbox VM on the inside of a macOS Mojave? I have a Mac (hermione, IP 192.168.2.86) that runs a Virtualbox VM with address 192.168.97.1. netstat -rn on that machine says:

192.168.97         link#23            UC              2        0 vboxnet      !
192.168.97.1       a:0:27:0:0:2       UHLWI           0        4     lo0
192.168.97.100     8:0:27:f0:e0:3e    UHLWIi          1        2 vboxnet    961

When I'm on that Mac, everything is fine, I can ping 192.168.97.1 (VirtuaBbox itself) and 192.168.1.100 (the VM).

Now, I want to be able to reach these from the outside. So on another Mac (luna) I've tried setting up routes to do that, e.g.

sudo route -v -t add -net 192.168.97 192.168.2.86

or

sudo route -v add -host 192.168.97.1 192.168.2.86

Telling luna to route traffic for 192.168.97.1 to 192.168.2.86 (the IP address of hermione).

But traffic won't get through. Is macOS capable of this at all and if so, what am I doing wrong?

You have to set up NAT port forwarding rules then access your services by using the IP address of your Mac much like you would if it were a host behind a traditional firewall/router.

You can do this via the VirtualBox GUI in the Port Forwarding rules setup in the Network Settings preference pane for the individual VM.  In the example below, I show how you can set port forwarding for SSH on port 2222 of your host to port 22 of your guest (using the IPs from your question).

Alternatively, you can do this via the CLI using VBoxManage modifyvm.  So using the same example as above:

$ VBoxManage modifyvm "VM NAME" --natpf1 "SSH,tcp,192.168.2.86,2222,192.168.97.1,22"


Can I develop iPhone apps under Windows using an image of OS X? I want learn iOS development, but I don't have enough money to purchase a Mac.

Is there any way that I could learn iOS development on Windows, perhaps using an image of OS X?

Have you seen http://www.coronalabs.com/

They have a cross-platform sdk that lets you build for iPHone and Android - it's targeted to game developers.

http://www.buzztouch.com/ is also supposed to be a decent cross-platform development tool


Will it Work?.. Download querry for ipod I have an ipod and have two accounts with Apple. I was wondering if I started to download an app with one of my accounts and then  logged out of that account and used the other one, would the download still continue?

Yes, once you have authenticated with Apple the download will continue just fine even if you log out while it is running.