With cask, upgrading all of your installed applications (that installed with cask) is done with a single command:

brew cask update

This is an unofficial (community based) way to upgrade applications and only has free softwares on its repository (there is no way to purchase). Advantages of this mechanism are:

It's scriptable
It separates system applications from user applications (your installed applications are placed in ~/Applications/ instead of /Applications/) so it's per user.
Installation of packaged installers is in the background so it doesn't need user interactions.
Uninstallation of applications is programmed by its community so there is no worry about remaining files after uninstallation.
It's possible to have multiple versions of applications systematically because the mechanism uses symbolic links for the latest or selected version of applications.
The source of applications is kept in the cache so you can install and uninstall them without additional downloads.

Disadvantages of this mechanism are:

There is no differential upgrade. It downloads the whole application image (.dmg) or package (.pkg) and stores in the cache.
Installation of applications is relied on symbolic links that may be not ideal (There are two copies of an application and may be repeated in "Open with" list)

There is also official App Store mechanism (the default) for upgrading applications that are installed with itself and it supports differential upgrade and can upgrade all of it's installed application with a single click; but unlike Cask it's not scriptable to run upgrade, installation, etc and does not keep the sources.
Another mechanism is in-app upgrade check that occurs when application starts. It is different from App Store upgrade and also supports differential upgrade.

I think it's up to you to choose which mechanism to use for which kind of applications, this comparison may help you.

I use the Cask for applications that is not provided in the App Store (like VLC, OS X FUSE, OwnCloud, Weka, etc.) and App Store for non-free applications i purchased. In-app upgrades are not suitable for me because it does not keep the source of downloaded data.


Should I use time machine to migrate from one mac to another?

The best way to do this is with Apple's Migration Assistant. Plug the Macs into each other with an ethernet cable and launch Migration Assistant on both. Follow the instructions on screen.

I've migrated to new machines seven times and it's a pretty flawless system. Based on other answers I'm pretty sure that Eclipse won't really know the difference after migration as long as your short name on both Macs is the same.


Best version of DOSBox for macOS (Homebrew version seems abandoned)

DOSBox-X is your best bet, it's the only one that is currently being updated. I'm not sure what makes you think it's Japanese, it's managed by a guy in Seattle, WA, USA.

I have no issues with it and keyboard typing. I am using British-PC layout and a wired Apple aluminium keyboard with numeric pad.


I just found a nice app for these functions! It's called cinch and it is aviable in the appstore for 7$ (but you can also use the demo)


All additional entries to the HOSTS file must be above the:

fe80::1%lo0

Make sure there is at least one line break after the last entry. Like so:

127.0.0.1 LLL.localhost
127.0.0.1 LLL.localhost
#

Although you probably can't tell, there is another line following the # symbol. One more thing to mention, using Space instead of Tab between 127.0.0.1 and localhost might help too.


30" monitor has black border around desktop

I ended up "fixing" it by re-installing OS X on the system disk.  Brute force due to lack of success with other methods, but all good now.

In some cases a faulty cable can do this as well:

External monitor randomly lowers resolution adds black borders


How can I stop my computer time to reset to my local time-zone time?

You can try blocking outgoing connections to UDP port 123 (NTP) with a PF firewall rule such as:

block drop out quick proto udp from any to any port 123

I'm no PF expert, YMMV.

See here for details on how to apply the rule: https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/230556/134740


ZSH paste from the clipboard a command takes a few second to be write in the terminal

The final problem is related to zsh.

oh-my-zsh is executing bracketed-paste-magic, so I ended up removing it.
Because oh-my-szh doesn't have a plugin manager for this. You have to override the file: $ZSH/lib/misc.zsh

The overrides will be in this folder $ZSH_CUSTOM.

Because I don't have any override I had to create the folder first:
mkdir $ZSH_CUSTOM/lib/

And create a copy of the original
cp $ZSH/lib/misc.zsh $ZSH_CUSTOM/lib/.

and edit the file (use your favorite editor):

vi $ZSH_CUSTOM/lib/misc.zsh

I commented the following lines, but you can remove it or change the if condition.

#if [[ $ZSH_VERSION != 5.1.1 ]]; then
#  for d in $fpath; do
#       if [[ -e "$d/url-quote-magic" ]]; then
#               if is-at-least 5.1; then
#                       autoload -Uz bracketed-paste-magic
#                       zle -N bracketed-paste bracketed-paste-magic
#               fi
#               autoload -Uz url-quote-magic
#               zle -N self-insert url-quote-magic
#      break
#       fi
#  done
#fi

Thanks and sorry for the question description, without the knowledge that I was using zsh this made the task to help me impossible to accomplish.

More info:

https://github.com/robbyrussell/oh-my-zsh/issues/5569
https://github.com/robbyrussell/oh-my-zsh/issues/6338


How can I figure out what program is starting and quitting?

Well the obvious solution is to temporarily disable SIP and run execsnoop as you’ve yourself identified.
There is a cruder and less reliable way which doesn’t require SIP disabled. The next time you see this happen, quickly go into Terminal and run
$ log show —-last 1m —-info —-debug —-predicate='sender contains "launchservicesd"'

That will show you the last 1 minute of breadcrumbs from Launch Services, through which it is likely that your mystery process is being invoked. If it’s not, you won’t see it there. Look for (and/or grep) lines containing CHECKIN and DEATH.


Re-download purchased film on iPad without iTunes

I've got to the bottom of this now and there is the potential that some of the information may be useful to others so thought I'd submit the entire thing as an answer.

The reason why the "cloud" icon is greyed-out (and the root of the entire problem) is that the movie in question is No Longer Available from iTunes. I find this bizarre in itself, the movie is 800Mb but for some reason they need to remove that from their servers to save space...?!?

When the movie was first deleted and we tried to re-download it, it definitely still showed as being available in the store. I guess the metadata was still there but the movie itself was deleted.

This movie cost £10 around a year ago, you can buy it on DVD for less then £5. The lesson here is to have your OWN backups of material from iTunes because they take no responsibility for allowing you to re-download it later. I thought we OWNED this movie and Apple would guarantee our ability to download it onto any device at any time, but apparently I misunderstood that I was paying more money for a product substantially inferior to a DVD.

I found this out by phoning Applecare using the number from Jules' link below.

When going through the "Select an option" stuff, if I selected "iPad", they still wanted £25 to talk to me. By selecting "iTunes", I spoke to them for free. I spoke to a very knowledgeable person who was able to explain the problem and offer - if not a solution, then, at least, a form of compensation.

The offered me 2 movie-rentals by way of compensation, pretty useless for us but better than having nothing for our lost £10.


After sleep, Messages doesn't consult Keychain for passwords

Try:

Disk Utility to verify volumes and repair permissions on the startup volume, then Keychain Access to verify or repair the keychains
run Messages
sleep then wake the computer
if the problem persists, remove relevant items from keychains then allow Messages to replace the items.


Is it possible to block access to Safari's extensions?

Instead of blocking Safari Preferences you can turn on Parental Controls to restrict precisely time slots or what site content should be blocked.

Open System Preferences
Choose Parental Control
Create a new user account with the restrictions you want for your son


Turn on Location Services for an app via command line (macOS)

You should Click The Lock to Make Changes..enter your root passcode. Then you will see all the features (including apps) unlock & ready to accept changes. Klick to the app you’re interested to.


quicktime resets playback speed after pausing

Here is an AppleScript code that will make QuickTime Player remember the playback speed of a video after pausing it. Go to Script Editor and paste the following code into a new document, replacing # with the desired playback speed.
tell application "QuickTime Player"
    set theWindows to windows
    set win1 to item 1 of theWindows
    tell win1
        set visible to false
        set visible to true
        set index to 1
    end tell
    tell document 1
        repeat while miniaturized of win1 is false
            if playing and rate is 1 then
                set the rate to 1.5 as real
            end if
            delay 1.0E-3
        end repeat
    end tell
end tell

The playback speed ("#") can be any real decimal number (i.e., 1.5). Values larger than 1 will speed the video up, and values between 0 and 1 will slow the video down. A negative value will cause the video to play backwards.
Note: The audio will drop out at speeds less than/equal to -2 or greater than/equal to 2.
Press Command+S (or File > Save) to save the script in a location where you can easily access it, and then open the script and run it (press the Play button at the top) whenever you need it. You can pause and play the video as many times as you want, and it will play at the selected speed each time, as long as you do not minimize the QuickTime Player window. You can resize and move the window, and also open other applications in the foreground, though. When you are done, click the Stop button (to left of Play button) and you can close the script.
It can be a little buggy at times, but this is the only method I have found to remedy this issue.


Why won't my iPad sync photos ("not enough memory") when it's half empty?

I have had iTunes go off the deep end thinking there were far too many photos.

I have had luck with several tacks so I presume there are a few bugs - one of which you may have run into:

Take the device to another computer (or another iTunes library on a shell account) and let it sync and erase all photos on iOS. Taking it back to the main iTunes library which has the correct photos sometimes works. I presume the error was an accounting one on the iPad when this works.
Change photo sync to a simple folder with a jpeg or two, sync it, and then change back to the settings I prefer. (rarely works)
Rebuild the affected library in Aperture or iPhoto - this seems to force new data into the media browser so iTunes is forced to take a better look at the sizes for your albums and photos as organized.

Sorry I don't have a sure fire answer - but maybe you haven't tried all of these or it sparks an idea of something else you can try.


Disk storage graphic and usage amount inconsistent?

Blame Spotlight. About this Mac relys on Spotlight's data, and it's clearly screwed up here. You can fix this by forcing Spotlight to reindex your hard drive. Goto System Preferences > Spotlight > Privacy tab. Then add Macintosh HD into the list, then remove it. Spotlight should start reindexing your hard drive. (You can test this by pressing CMD Space and entering an equation. It should say indexing).

(Oh, and this is a duplicate of this Finder and About this mac shows different free space sizes?)


How do I stop my AirPort Express from showing up under AirPlay?

Uncheck AirPlay
Goto the the AirPlay tab in AirPort Utility and uncheck 'Enable AirPlay'.
Reboot all AirPlay playback devices
To ensure that you will be able to wake output AirPlay devices through the Airport router reboot connected output AirPlay devices.
Also, the connected AirPlay device might have to be connected through ethernet for it to be able to wake from sleep when video/audio is sent to it.


If you are in High Sierra and using the Apple "Hebrew" or "Hebrew qwerty" input source, you should get ₪ via Shift-7.  For & you have to do caps lock shift 7.

If you are using the "Hebrew PC" layout, ₪ will be Option 4 (and Shift 7 will give you &).


Is there a picture in picture using spaces under OS X?

If you want to see the contents of one space in another space, there is no such feature in Lion, and I'm not aware of any applications that may enable it.

All in all, such “feature”, if it existed, would have given me a bizarre feeling, akin to remoting into my own computer. Why would I ever want to do that? It would be impossible to control another space with a mouse (scaling issues) so watching a film would be a pain.

You want to code and watch a movie at the same time? (Sure it's a good idea?)
Great, that's precisely what windows are for.

(Sublime Text 2 running with MPlayerX on top of it.)

Some media players (amongst them is MPlayerX, the most polished OS X player) always stay on top when playing so you won't have issues with window disappearing as soon as you switch the focus.

Finally, if you want a window to stay visible regardless of chosen space, right-click its Dock icon and assign it to All Desktops as advised by Andrew in the comment to your question.


How can I write-protect (make read-only) a USB drive in OS X?

Option 1: Mount drive read-only

You can mount the USB drive read-only by using Diskutil.

First, insert/mount the drive once, run diskutil list from Terminal.app and take note of the device representing the drive (should be something like /dev/diskN with N being any number).
Eject the disk by running diskutil unmountDisk /dev/diskN replacing N by the number noted in the first step
Mount the disk read-only by running diskutil mountDisk readOnly /dev/diskN

This of course requires that you actively run these commands every time you want to use the archive stick. For an automated solution, have a look at MarcoPolo or write a launchd command (see e.g. here for inspiration).

Option 2: Use access control on the drive

Does the drive really need to be formatted in FAT32 or do you only access it from a Mac OSX system anyway? In the later case, you can save the drive content on another drive, reformat it as a Mac OSX drive, move/copy the content back and take away any write rights from anybody.


About the only luck I've had, other than writing scripts myself, is using SignatureProfiler.  Note that it's not free ($12).

It's mostly overkill for what I need, which is just the random signatures, so I've implemented a few little scripts to get this working on my own machine - Random Signatures for OSX

Note, however, that something seems to have changed in 10.10 that is now preventing Mail from updating the signature when the signature file itself is updated (until I manually trigger it, or restart mail).  They must have some kind of caching in mail now for the sig files so that it's not read in every time.


Your Apple ID or password was entered incorrectly - Eror while login

Click the "forgot you password?" link and request a new password.


How can I reset the answers of the security questions of my Apple ID?

The reset procedure for security questions is here: https://support.apple.com/kb/HT201485

https://iforgot.apple.com/

It's one of the things you are recommended to do if you think your AppleID is compromised.

Below are more details and screen shots from a while back, but the links above have current information as well as discussion on how to get support in person and newer developments like Two Factor Authentication and
using another trusted device.

If you know your password to your Apple ID and have set up a second email address, you can reset your security questions by logging into the web site https://appleid.apple.com even if you can't answer the security questions that normally are required to make changes to the existing security questions.

Once you have logged in, click 'Password and Security'.  Then click/tap the link in the lower right that says Forgot your answers? Send reset security info email to m * * * *@monsters.edu

You will get an email with a link to reset not only the security questions and answers, but correct your birth date which can be used to verity your identity when you are calling Apple or trying to reset a password.

I have an Apple ID with a recovery email, so perhaps if you have not entered that second email, you might not be able to send the reset email and might need to contact Apple directly for help with your Apple ID. I know of people that have gotten things reset over the phone even after the Mat Honan incident where his account was compromised over the phone with Apple's assistance.


Time Machine keeps validating backup, how to identify reason?

I was suspecting a broken file system on the Time Capsule, but needed proof.   After yet another mysteriously cancelling verification step, I found https://superuser.com/q/1126990/7401 which ended up in
log show --last 3d --style syslog  --predicate 'senderImagePath contains[cd] "TimeMachine"' --info|less

which in turn let me find this log line:
2021-04-05 00:48:38.359222+0200  localhost backupd[276]: (TimeMachine) [com.apple.TimeMachine:General] fsck returned an unknown termination status: 8

So, the file system check program reported an error message but Time Machine didn't let me know.  Apparently 8 indicates unrepairable error, which is a rather bad sign.  I then mounted the "Data" drive holding the backupbundle file on Time Capsule manually, and as Disk Utility did not want to mount the backupbundle, I found https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/39842/3157 resulting in
sudo hdiutil attach -nomount -readwrite /Volumes/Data/XXX.backupbundle

giving
/dev/disk2              GUID_partition_scheme
/dev/disk2s1            EFI
/dev/disk2s2            Apple_HFS

Now the Time Machine backup shows in Disk Utility, and I could run First Aid on the drive which slowly but successfully repaired the filesystem.


How to always use macbook microphone with Bose QuietComfort 35?

I still really like @aaplmath's suggestion (and that may be the best one going forward), but I also just stumbled on this solution that requires no coding (AppleScript/Swift/ObjC/Other) in High Sierra, and it's super easy to configure.
Please note that the answer was in the comment section of the article and it seems to work on High Sierra (I'm on 10.13.6), but I don't know if this works on Mojave and beyond.

Open the standard "Audio MIDI Setup.app" utility, and click the + at the bottom to create an Aggregate Device. Then select the Internal Microphone as the only component in this aggregate device and select it as the default input. For some reason this prevents Mac OS X from selecting the Bluetooth Microphone from now on and it will stay on the internal one when you reconnect.
After creating that aggregate input, go to your usual System Preferences -> Sound -> Input (tab)

Source: http://ssrubin.com/posts/fixing-macos-bluetooth-headphone-audio-quality-issues-with-hammerspoon.html#comment-4018174387


Try re-installing Java using this update.  It is the Java Update for Snow Leopard.  Hopefully that will fix the problems your seeing here.

Let us know if that works, if not we can do some more troubleshooting and help you out.


Copy video files as is from iPhone 5 to Mac

Image Capture works with movies as well, so no need for iPhoto BUT this only works with videos that YOU shot on the device. If someone sends you a video and you save it to your albums, then Image Capture ignores it.


Is there a way to detect what program is stealing focus on my Mac?

You can find the app that steals focus by saving the following code in a find_focus_stealer.py file and running it via python find_focus_stealer.py in a terminal.

Start running the script – it will print out the name of the active app every 3 seconds. Keep working as usual, wait for the problem to occur, and after a few seconds see the output in the terminal. You’ll have your culprit.

In my case it was a Symantec Antivirus background app (SymUIAgent.app).

#!/usr/bin/python

from AppKit import NSWorkspace
import time
t = range(1,100)
for i in t:
    time.sleep(3)
    activeAppName = NSWorkspace.sharedWorkspace().activeApplication()['NSApplicationName']
    print activeAppName

Credits to iMichael_ in this Apple Discussions thread.


Problem with installing Java: java: command not found

Looks like Java is not in the path.  I do something like this in my ~/.bash_profile

# Get Java Home for the specific version
JAVA_HOME=`/usr/libexec/java_home -v1.8 2>/dev/null`
# Add Java to the path
export PATH=$JAVA_HOME/bin:$PATH

Quit terminal once you create or edit ~/.bash_profile.  FYI if you are creating ~/.bash_profile make sure you give it executable privileges.


Getting music off an ipad into the computer

PhoneView (for Mac), PhoneDisk (Windows or Mac), iExplorer (Windows and Mac, free, but you have to find where the music is)


Since most items seem to have transferred, it sounds like the games weren't included in the backup of your old iPad. It is also possible these games required you to sign in with the same Game Center account to associate the new device with your progress.


Change my shell to a different bash version at /usr/local/bin/bash?

I don't know if this will populate in the terminal / advanced user account locations, but "The Way This Has Worked For Years"™ in Linux-land is that you must update /etc/shells with the path to the shell location, and then use chsh -s /usr/local/bin/bash username to use it.

Simply running chsh without modification to /etc/shells should cause an error indicating you've chosen an invalid shell, in case you're curious.

/etc/shells is a root-owned file, so you must use sudo in tandem with an editor in order to modify it. I hope you're comfortable doing that, else I would highly advise against trying out a non-default shell :).

Summary (steps):

brew install bash, then
sudo vi /etc/shells and add /usr/local/bin/bash to the list, then
chsh -s /usr/local/bin/bash [your_username] and restart your terminal in order for your changes to take place


What happens if I use unencrypted time machine backup from a mac that has FileVault turned on?

In your current setup your backups are not encrypted whatsoever. That means if someone steals your external disk your data is fully accessible to an attacker. That challenges the idea of using full disk encryption / Filevault2 in the first place.

I would recommend to either

Create an encrypted sparse bundle image on your external disk and use that as your backup drive. The process is somewhat tricky as it requires tinkering with the sparsebundle image. The process is explained here and here.
Encrypt the external disk entirely. The disadvantage is that you will need the password to open that disk on other Macs. The advantage is that the entire content will be encrypted. To do this simply right-click the disk and select Encrypt...

Either way make sure you note the encryption passwords for Filevault and the backup disk somewhere else than on your computer or the backup disk, as you risk locking yourself out of all your data and backups.

As mentioned in the comment there is the downside that encryption slows down disk performance. That is also true for Filevault2 disk in your Mac. But Intel CPUs are pretty optimized for encryption operations these days and performance degradation should be low.


Actually, you can share a reminders list, as long as the person you want to share with has their own iCloud account. You can share one of your reminders lists either from iCloud.com or from the Reminders app in Mountain Lion.

Either way, the process is the same: Hover over the name of a list for a second, and a small icon will appear. Click on it, then type in the name or e-mail address of the person you want to share the list with.


Is it possible to connect external video to an iMac?

Yes, the latest 27" iMac can act as a monitor via Mini DisplayPort. From Apple:

  Mini DisplayPort output with support for DVI, VGA, and dual-link DVI (adapters sold separately); 27-inch models also support input from external DisplayPort sources (adapters sold separately)

You'll need an adapter to convert your laptop output to Mini DisplayPort. Be careful, as some adapters, such as those provided by Apple, are designed to output DVI/VGA/etc, and aren't capable of being reversed to accept it as input.

further reading: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3924


Connecting a 2007 Mac mini to a Samsung Tv

I solved it.  After setting up a remote connection, I went through the video settings and it turns out the only resolution supported was 720p.  It was, by default, using something else that didn't work.


Sharing my VPN connection on macOS Sierra via WiFi

As a test, I'd try setting things up totally from the macOS GUI rather than using Terminal. You may already know how to do this, but broadly the steps would be:

Connect your Mac to the internet via your Pulse Secure
Set up your VPN connection in System Preferences > Network
Click on the Advanced... button
Ensure you tick the Send all traffic over VPN connection checkbox
Click OK
Ensure you also tick the checkbox for Show VPN status in menu bar
Now go to System Preferences > Sharing
Highlight (but do not tick) the Internet Sharing service in the lefthand pane
On the righthand side, select the VPN connection you created at Step 2 from the Share your connection from drop-down menu
Now select the Nano USB Wi-Fi port (i.e. tick the checkbox)
Click on the Wi-Fi Options... button
Give your new Wi-Fi network a name, password etc
Click OK
Now tick the Internet Sharing service in the lefthand pane

Now test this to confirm that whenever your Mac is connected to the VPN, it will share the connection via the Nano USB Wi-Fi. This means you should be able to connect your mobile device to the new Wi-Fi network you created at Step 12. To do this, follow the steps below.

Using the VPN connection

To make this work with your mobile device:

On the Mac, click on the new VPN Status icon in the menu bar
Select the Connect option pertaining to the VPN connection created previously
Once the connection is established, your Mac should start sharing the VPN via the Nano USB Wi-Fi
Now go to your mobile device and connect it to this Wi-Fi network


How can stop or reduce music duplication in Itunes?

Open iTunes preferences and click advanced.

Uncheck the Copy line item...

You still have to clean up the old dupes, but any new imports will be left on the filesystem where you stored them and not copied or moved to where iTunes would like them to be stored.


Installed Apps not showing in Cellular Allow Data for section

Those apps appears in that section when i turn the data on and use some apps from the data. Each app when takes the data connection and use it start appearing in the section. Once it appears in that section i was able to remove it from there.


Quoted Spaces
A couple of lines need quoting to deal with spaces:
pkill Microsoft Teams

Should read:
pkill "Microsoft Teams"

and Local Storage needs a slash to become Local\ Storage.
Absolute Paths
If you continue to encounter problems, try expanding the ~ and use absolute/full paths. This can solve many problems and allows scripts to be run from within other tools like cron or launchd.
ShellCheck
A useful tool to know about is ShellCheck. This online or offline tool can help point out common shell script problems.


iMac 27 3.2 GHz core i5 [late 2013] memory upgrade

Yes, you can mix and match memory modules with different capacities with no problems. My own late 2009 iMac is currently running with two of the 2GB modules it came with and two 8GB modules, for a total of 20GB. However, for the best performance you should "pair" the modules, and make sure you have two identical modules in adjacent slots.
There's no such thing as memory designed for an i7 or i5. What you need are 204-pin PC3-12800 (1600 MHz) DDR3 SO-DIMM modules, which can be used with either an i5 or i7 CPU.


External 4K display with 2012 MacBook Pro 15"

By installing SwitchResX I was able to choose 2560 x 1440 (60 Hz) which now gives me the screen real estate I need.

A really neat choice that doesn't give me as much screen real estate, but makes the screen into a retina 1080p monitor is the 1080p30 option. Everything now looks super crisp and I have the same screen real estate as on a full HD monitor.

A bit annoying that I need a $16,- third party application to fix this problem, but it's better than no solution at all.


Safari 5.1.8 in Snow Leopard 10.6.8 will not display HTML pages correctly

I have solved my own problem.

Enough snooping around for .plist files got the job done. I identified all the .plist files with "Safari" and "com.apple.Safari" in the name in ~/Library/ and /Library/, and moved them to the Trash. Then I found a couple of invisible files in /Library/ with "Safari" in them and likewise moved them to the Trash. Then I rebooted. Safari now works correctly.

I wish I had thought of that first. I have wasted hours on this problem.


Caps lock key to behave like non-toggle modifier

The easy method of using Apple system preferences only allows mapping the caps lock key to modifier keys and escape key.

Can't swap Caps Lock and Esc keys using Seil

Use caps-lock to lock fn key or other way to lock fn key?


How to add space between cells' borders in Mac Pages (without removing the borders)? See image attached

There is no simple way to do what you want. You could make each cell a new 1x1 table and space then apart. But this takes a while and is difficult to work with. I was able to make tables that looks like the images below. Not what you wanted but similar I think. The spacing can be increased on these tables.


Delete iTunes U downloads without removing their reference

Delete the videos. Then right-click on the course title and select Show all available items. This will restore the complete list of available episodes.

You can also do this by option-clicking on the disclosure arrow of the course. The arrow needs to be closed before option-clicking in order for this to work.


Error trying to install any macOS version in macbook 2010 mid

You have a 2010 MacBook, I have a 2010 iMac and Catalina nor Mojave will run on my machine. I think your machine is too old to install Catalina. You should check the system requirements for Catalina. It doesn't list a 2010 MacBook as being compatible.


Complete documentation of the iOS Settings app's URL scheme

As of iOS 13.1, these URLs are back, and have been exhaustively documented on the MacStories website by Federico Viticci. Please note that the linked page is being actively updated, and contains other useful background and tips such as how to link to the settings for third party apps, so probably a good idea to follow the linke through to that site for the full info:

Settings URLs
iCloud

iCloud: prefs:root=CASTLE
iCloud Backup: prefs:root=CASTLE&path=BACKUP

Wireless Radios

Wi-Fi: prefs:root=WIFI
Bluetooth: prefs:root=Bluetooth
Cellular: prefs:root=MOBILE_DATA_SETTINGS_ID

Personal Hotspot

Personal Hotspot: prefs:root=INTERNET_TETHERING
Personal Hotspot ⇾ Family Sharing: prefs:root=INTERNET_TETHERING&path=Family%20Sharing
Personal Hotspot ⇾ Wi-Fi Password: prefs:root=INTERNET_TETHERING&path=Wi-Fi%20Password

VPN

VPN: prefs:root=General&path=VPN

Notifications

Notifications: prefs:root=NOTIFICATIONS_ID
Notifications ⇾ Siri Suggestions: prefs:root=NOTIFICATIONS_ID&path=Siri%20Suggestions

Sounds

Sounds: prefs:root=Sounds
Ringtone: prefs:root=Sounds&path=Ringtone

Do Not Disturb

Do Not Disturb: prefs:root=DO_NOT_DISTURB
Do Not Disturb ⇾ Allow Calls From: prefs:root=DO_NOT_DISTURB&path=Allow%20Calls%20From

Screen Time

Screen Time: prefs:root=SCREEN_TIME
Screen Time ⇾ Downtime: prefs:root=SCREEN_TIME&path=DOWNTIME
Screen Time ⇾ App Limits: prefs:root=SCREEN_TIME&path=APP_LIMITS
Screen Time ⇾ Always Allowed: prefs:root=SCREEN_TIME&path=ALWAYS_ALLOWED

General

General: prefs:root=General
General ⇾ About: prefs:root=General&path=About
General ⇾ Software Update: prefs:root=General&path=SOFTWARE_UPDATE_LINK
General ⇾ CarPlay: prefs:root=General&path=CARPLAY
General ⇾ Background App Refresh: prefs:root=General&path=AUTO_CONTENT_DOWNLOAD
General ⇾ Multitasking (iPad-only): prefs:root=General&path=MULTITASKING
General ⇾ Date & Time: prefs:root=General&path=DATE_AND_TIME
General ⇾ Keyboard: prefs:root=General&path=Keyboard
General ⇾ Keyboard ⇾ Keyboards: prefs:root=General&path=Keyboard/KEYBOARDS
General ⇾ Language & Region: prefs:root=General&path=INTERNATIONAL
General ⇾ Dictionary: prefs:root=General&path=DICTIONARY
General ⇾ Profiles: prefs:root=General&path=ManagedConfigurationList
General ⇾ Reset: prefs:root=General&path=Reset

Control Center

Control Center: prefs:root=ControlCenter
Control Center ⇾ Customize Controls: prefs:root=ControlCenter&path=CUSTOMIZE_CONTROLS

Display

Display: prefs:root=DISPLAY
Display ⇾ Auto Lock: prefs:root=DISPLAY&path=AUTOLOCK
Display ⇾ Text Size: prefs:root=DISPLAY&path=TEXT_SIZE

Accessibility

Accessibility: prefs:root=ACCESSIBILITY

Wallpaper

Wallpaper: prefs:root=Wallpaper

Siri

Siri: prefs:root=SIRI

Apple Pencil

Apple Pencil (iPad-only): prefs:root=Pencil

Face ID

Face ID: prefs:root=PASSCODE

Emergency SOS

Emergency SOS: prefs:root=EMERGENCY_SOS

Battery

Battery: prefs:root=BATTERY_USAGE
Battery ⇾ Battery Health (iPhone-only): prefs:root=BATTERY_USAGE&path=BATTERY_HEALTH

Privacy

Privacy: prefs:root=Privacy
Privacy ⇾ Location Services: prefs:root=Privacy&path=LOCATION
Privacy ⇾ Contacts: prefs:root=Privacy&path=CONTACTS
Privacy ⇾ Calendars: prefs:root=Privacy&path=CALENDARS
Privacy ⇾ Reminders: prefs:root=Privacy&path=REMINDERS
Privacy ⇾ Photos: prefs:root=Privacy&path=PHOTOS
Privacy ⇾ Microphone: prefs:root=Privacy&path=MICROPHONE
Privacy ⇾ Speech Recognition: prefs:root=Privacy&path=SPEECH_RECOGNITION
Privacy ⇾ Camera: prefs:root=Privacy&path=CAMERA
Privacy ⇾ Motion: prefs:root=Privacy&path=MOTION\

App Store

App Store: prefs:root=STORE
App Store ⇾ App Downloads: prefs:root=STORE&path=App%20Downloads
App Store ⇾ Video Autoplay: prefs:root=STORE&path=Video%20Autoplay

Wallet

Wallet: prefs:root=PASSBOOK

Passwords & Accounts

Passwords & Accounts: prefs:root=ACCOUNTS_AND_PASSWORDS
Passwords & Accounts ⇾ Fetch New Data: prefs:root=ACCOUNTS_AND_PASSWORDS&path=FETCH_NEW_DATA
Passwords & Accounts ⇾ Add Account: prefs:root=ACCOUNTS_AND_PASSWORDS&path=ADD_ACCOUNT

Mail

Mail: prefs:root=MAIL
Mail ⇾ Preview: prefs:root=MAIL&path=Preview
Mail ⇾ Swipe Options: prefs:root=MAIL&path=Swipe%20Options
Mail ⇾ Notifications: prefs:root=MAIL&path=NOTIFICATIONS
Mail ⇾ Blocked: prefs:root=MAIL&path=Blocked
Mail ⇾ Muted Thread Action: prefs:root=MAIL&path=Muted%20Thread%20Action
Mail ⇾ Blocked Sender Options: prefs:root=MAIL&path=Blocked%20Sender%20Options
Mail ⇾ Mark Addresses: prefs:root=MAIL&path=Mark%20Addresses
Mail ⇾ Increase Quote Level: prefs:root=MAIL&path=Increase%20Quote%20Level
Mail ⇾ Include Attachments with Replies: prefs:root=MAIL&path=Include%20Attachments%20with%20Replies
Mail ⇾ Signature: prefs:root=MAIL&path=Signature
Mail ⇾ Default Account: prefs:root=MAIL&path=Default%20Account

Contacts

Contacts: prefs:root=CONTACTS

Calendar

Calendar: prefs:root=CALENDAR
Calendar ⇾ Alternate Calendars: prefs:root=CALENDAR&path=Alternate%20Calendars
Calendar ⇾ Sync: prefs:root=CALENDAR&path=Sync
Calendar ⇾ Default Alert Times: prefs:root=CALENDAR&path=Default%20Alert%20Times
Calendar ⇾ Default Calendar: prefs:root=CALENDAR&path=Default%20Calendar

Notes

Notes: prefs:root=NOTES
Notes ⇾ Default Account: prefs:root=NOTES&path=Default%20Account
Notes ⇾ Password: prefs:root=NOTES&path=Password
Notes ⇾ Sort Notes By: prefs:root=NOTES&path=Sort%20Notes%20By
Notes ⇾ New Notes Start With: prefs:root=NOTES&path=New%20Notes%20Start%20With
Notes ⇾ Sort Checked Items: prefs:root=NOTES&path=Sort%20Checked%20Items
Notes ⇾ Lines & Grids: prefs:root=NOTES&path=Lines%20%26%20Grids
Notes ⇾ Access Notes from Lock Screen: prefs:root=NOTES&path=Access%20Notes%20from%20Lock%20Screen

Reminders

Reminders: prefs:root=REMINDERS
Reminders ⇾ Default List: prefs:root=REMINDERS&path=DEFAULT_LIST

Voice Memos

Voice Memos: prefs:root=VOICE_MEMOS

Phone

Phone: prefs:root=Phone

Messages

Messages: prefs:root=MESSAGES

FaceTime

FaceTime: prefs:root=FACETIME

Maps

Maps: prefs:root=MAPS
Maps ⇾ Driving & Navigation: prefs:root=MAPS&path=Driving%20%26%20Navigation
Maps ⇾ Transit: prefs:root=MAPS&path=Transit

Compass

Compass: prefs:root=COMPASS

Measure

Measure: prefs:root=MEASURE

Safari

Safari: prefs:root=SAFARI
Safari ⇾ Content Blockers: prefs:root=SAFARI&path=Content%20Blockers
Safari ⇾ Downloads: prefs:root=SAFARI&path=DOWNLOADS
Safari ⇾ Close Tabs: prefs:root=SAFARI&path=Close%20Tabs
Safari ⇾ Page Zoom: prefs:root=SAFARI&path=Page%20Zoom
Safari ⇾ Request Desktop Website: prefs:root=SAFARI&path=Request%20Desktop%20Website
Safari ⇾ Reader: prefs:root=SAFARI&path=Reader
Safari ⇾ Camera: prefs:root=SAFARI&path=Camera
Safari ⇾ Microphone: prefs:root=SAFARI&path=Microphone
Safari ⇾ Location: prefs:root=SAFARI&path=Location

News

News: prefs:root=NEWS

Health

Health: prefs:root=HEALTH

Shortcuts

Shortcuts: prefs:root=SHORTCUTS

Music

Music: prefs:root=MUSIC
Music ⇾ Cellular Data: prefs:root=MUSIC&path=com.apple.Music:CellularData
Music ⇾ Optimize Storage: prefs:root=MUSIC&path=com.apple.Music:OptimizeStorage
Music ⇾ EQ: prefs:root=MUSIC&path=com.apple.Music:EQ
Music ⇾ Volume Limit: prefs:root=MUSIC&path=com.apple.Music:VolumeLimit

Photos

Photos: prefs:root=Photos

Camera

Camera: prefs:root=CAMERA
Camera ⇾ Record Video: prefs:root=CAMERA&path=Record%20Video
Camera ⇾ Record Slo-mo: prefs:root=CAMERA&path=Record%20Slo-mo

Books

Books: prefs:root=IBOOKS

Game Center

Game Center: prefs:root=GAMECENTER


Does upgrading to catalina or big sur take up my storage?

Normally, one OS update replaces the file contents of the previous one. While there might be some small variation in size between OS versions, I would not expect an additional 10 GB to get used up.
However, some space will be needed to download the new OS installer before it is launched.
I would install the OS, and then check how much space you have. There are disk utilities like OmniDiskSweeper that sort your whole drive by size, showing you exactly what is taking up the space and letting you delete it, if that is advisable.
You may also want to check if you have any backups of iPhones or iPads saved to your Mac, as these can take up large amounts of space.


Right-click the untitled volumen in Disk Utility.
See if it offers "mount".
If it is NTFS formatted (which it appears it is), Mac OS should be able to read it (i.e. copy/recover data from it).

Another option:

Boot from a Windows 7 CD.
Then choose "Repair".
See if it finds any Windows to repair (e.g. offering c:\WINDOWS).
If so, try a startup repair from the given options.
(If it is not showing a Windows that it can try to repair, do nothing).


Apache in macOS Server runs as the _www user. Try granting this user write access to the directory with an ACL entry.

chmod +a "_www allow list,search,add_file,add_subdirectory,delete_child,write,append,file_inherit,directory_inherit" "/Users/<user>/Sites"


While looking for similar I found this link on here - info about how to reverse 'enable' in Terminal might help?

Allow applications downloaded from anywhere in macOS Sierra

Specifically this section:

Granted this is a little overkill, but it does the job reliably. It
can be re-enabled immediately after launching the application with

sudo spctl --master-enable


How can you change the mouse cursor in OS X?

Sorry, Apple doesn't allow people to change the mouse cursor anymore.


How to add an existing smart folder to the sidebar

In Finder, select your Smart Folder (typically saved in ~/Library/Saved Searches, it's a .savedSearch file).

Then from the menu in Finder, select: File > Add to Sidebar    ^⌘T

Or after selecting the Smart Folder file, just press ^⌘T on the keyboard.

Note that in OS X 10.8 and earlier the keyboard short cut was: ⌘T


Oh, I found Karabiner Elements works for Sierra, and I am very satisfied now.

Previously, Karabiner is out of order in Sierra.
Indeed, Sierra starts to offer custom remaps among those of ⇪Caps Lock, ^Control, ⌥Option, and ⌘Command, with System Preferences > Keyboard > Keyboard > Modifier keys.
Still, I cannot use any of them to switch input source with System Preferences > Keyboard > Keyboard > Shortcuts > Input Sources.

There has been several months, and today I visited Karabiner's homepage again.
They say they produced a Karabiner Elements for Sierra, but I cannot compile myself, though had not closely studied the error message.
Besides, fortunately there is a latest compiled image.
The link is not anywhere obvious on their homepage, but I found it in another forum discussion, so I hope more people seeing this (my post) can find this image.

Karabiner Elements works fine, as far as I see, for simple assignment of keys — i.e. to force the physical key X's signal to be interpreted as key Y's function.
This is my setting.
Physical ⇪Caps Lock now performs the function of Esc,
and Esc that of `,
and ` that of ↹Tab ,
and ↹ Tab that of F4 (or something else),
and F4 that of ⇪Caps Lock.
Then I set F4 to switch to the previously-used input source.
I am proud of my setting. Vim users for non-Latin family language will save considerable effort with this!


If a buy a mac from another retailer, do I get the same warranty that I would get from Apple?

You'll get the same warranty from an authorized Apple retailer as you would from Apple directly. I don't know how prevalent it is today, but for a while you could buy refurbished Macs from non-authorized retailers and you ended up with little or no warranty. (Note that Apple sometimes sells refurbished machines that do have full warranties; the warranty's existence is dependent upon the authorization status of the retailer.)

Apple provides a way to determine which retailers are authorized on the Solution Professionals portion of their website. Be sure to check that list before making a purchase.


When you charge your MacBook, does it matter which thing you plug in first?

Apple recommends to plug the adapter into the wall before connecting it to the computer.
For more information, refer to the Apple Support article, Using and maintaining your Apple MagSafe Adapter.

Connecting the MagSafe Power Adapter to power
Make sure that the AC plug or AC power cord is fully inserted into the power adapter before plugging the adapter into a power outlet. And be sure to plug your adapter into the wall before connecting it to your computer.


I don't think you can do this in iMovie but you could do it as a screen recording in Quicktime Player then import that into iMovie. Open up any paint application, open your map, select a large red paintbrush, start Quicktime Player recording then draw your route in.


Does opening Apple News for the first time re-enable location-based ads?

Yes.

When you first launch Apple News, there is some small text by the continue button that says:

  Your location is sent to Apple to provide you with geopgrahically relevant ads in Apple News and Stocks. You can change this in System Preferences.

If you previously had location based Apple ads unticked it will become ticked.


Linking between tables in different spreadsheets in Numbers

You can reference every table on every sheet by name/title, as long as they are within the same document.
(In the screenshot below, there is a table "Material Cost" in the sheet "Material Cost" with some values in column B that add up to 15.)


Can i decline iphone call when the screen was locked AND power button Does not work?

on your iPhone, go to: settings > general > accessibility > assistive touch
turn it on, it will then put a touchable dot overlay on your screen (even at the lock screen) which will open a popup, allowing you to select "lock screen".


MacBook Pro camera and microphone used by malware?

I'm fairly certain the green light is hard-wired to the camera, there's no way to activate the camera without activating the light, precisely for privacy reasons. If you're really concerned about it, you can always just use a piece of electrical tape to cover the camera (or fold a piece of cardboard over the top of the lid for a non-sticky solution).

Frankly I wouldn't worry too much about the risk of malware. That particular piece of malware (MacDefender) was contained fairly quickly by Apple, it's very unlikely that you could be infected by it now, unless you maintain an unpatched system. There have been a few OS X security issues lately (such as Flashback), and they get a lot of press, but the actual amount of harmful software out there for a Mac is extremely low.

My advice is to keep your system up to date and avoid downloading files from questionable sources. But other than that, don't worry too much, unless you have a highly sensitive job (in which case there should be other people whose job it is to worry about it).


OS X randomly asking for NAS login after using mount_afp on Terminal

Might want to check /etc/auto_afp for your mount point and remove if present.
Sounds like your Mac is constantly trying (and retrying) to automatically mount that share unsuccessfully.

Try moving to using autofs so you don't need to manually deal with mounting your share and it should be seamlessly unmounting that share when you change networks: http://blog.grapii.com/2015/06/keep-network-drives-mounted-on-mac-os-x-using-autofs/

As for Photos requesting you mount your AFP share despite the Photos Library being stored locally I also don't have a clue there.
Maybe changing how its mounted as suggested may resolve your issue? I'll try and recreate your environment here and let you know if I have the same problem (with a possible solution).


Notes iCloud sync fail Yosemite and IOS8

It's a bit difficult to diagnose this with the info you've given but from experience I've found that you are able to reliably "force an sync" with any sort of iCloud data by going to System Preferences and signing out + signing back in (it'll warn you about removing iCloud data from the device, etc.)

As said in the previous answer, make sure you are syncing your notes with iCloud and not with a) another provider (Google, Exchange) or b) not syncing at all (i.e., storing locally). Verify this on the iPhone in Settings > Notes > Accounts or on the Mac with System Preferences > Internet Accounts.

The best way to see what is actually being stored in iCloud is at its web app like you've been doing.


mavericks 10.9.5 downloaded but not installing

@OP: If you have the update... Download it but DONT install it... Go to /Library/Updates and in there is where the update pkg file lives... Copy (don't delete it or cut it) out of there and install manually. Watch the logs.. i.e. note before and after times!

If it asks you to reboot.. Don't... So ti'll probably try and install.. But get the package anyway...

Install that manually...

In steps:

Download and install the update
After installation, don't restart
Drop to terminal or use finder and goto (cmd+shift+g) /Library/Updates
Copy the OS X update to somewhere else i.e. on your desktop
Restart and see if the update worked
If it worked... Stop here :D
If not... Fire up "Console" in Utilities under your applications....
Note the time of the logs under "All Messages"
Install the update by double clicking on it and install it as you would any other pkg file
After the install, reboot.
Go back to console.. Note the end time!!!!
If it worked! Stop here :D
If it didn't work, can you go through the logs and see if anything fails or complains and come back with that?


Any way to have Outlook 2011 sync imap mail without actually being opened?

No, there isn't a way to do this in Outlook, Apple Mail, or any other mail client that I'm aware of.  The closest that you could come would be to launch Outlook and close its window, which should keep Outlook syncing.


So, HFS+ is a closed, proprietary format. For linux to work with this format, it needs hfsprogs, which is a module that supports HFS+.

Most NAS servers use linux-native formats, so if you want HFS+-based filesystems, there are a few ways.

a) Most NAS servers are built with Linux, and most of them have command line. You can load hfsprogs module and write a script to have the system mount your HFS+ formatted drives. In another word, customize the system.

b) Roll your own server, a good Synology enclosure costs about the same price as an Mac mini, you can get an external hard drive and have it running as an server.


How do I get multiple cursors throughout OSX?

Multiple cursors isn't a feature supported by Mac OS X by default. Some apps have it and if you want it in the rest of the system you will need too find an third part plugin.

I think it would be hard to make that work even with a plugin. But if you haven't already I would recommend giving Google a try in finding one.

Here is a link to an similar discussion on Super User: Link


Safari Security wants to use confidential

All your credentials are encrypted and stored using Keychain (e.g. ~/Library/Keychains/). It provides secure storage of your passwords, keys, certificates and other private data.

To prevent unauthorized access to your credentials by 3rd party application, each time when keychain file is accessed, it asks for user permission to access his sensitive data.

If it wouldn't ask you each time, then any application (e.g. Safari plugin) or hacker could access your keychain file and steal all your passwords without your knowledge by a single command.

Read more: Examining Mac OS X User & System Keychains


I, too, was a loyal user of iRAPP. CodeRebel is still in bankruptcy as of today. There's a new company, https://www.nuords.com/, that the CTO of CodeRebel has co-founded to sell comparable technology. I have not tested this product; I don't know whether the IP issues have been resolved.

xrdp works on Sierra (I'm using it right now). The compilation instructions can be found on these two pages:

https://github.com/neutrinolabs/xrdp/wiki/Building-on-OSX-(not-official)
https://github.com/neutrinolabs/xorgxrdp/issues/78

The instructions work with macports as well as homebrew; on macports, the final package you need is pkgconfig rather than pkg-config, and you don't have to work around the absence of OpenSSL. It took me about 15 minutes from start to finish to get it running.


Moving photos to a new Mac from an old one - issues with permissions and iCloud

I suggest that you use the export function of photos.

from the photos app

.. be sure you click on the photos tab

.. command+a to highlight all photos

.. click on file

.. click on export

.. export ...  [ you can pick either of the first two.  I don't know what you might want. If you have made photo edits in photos, you want the first one. ]

if you did't export the photos to an external drive, copy the photos to an external drive.
use the import function on the other machine.

My view, in short, is that placing you photos in iCloud is a method for loosing them. I recommend you get your photos out of the Apple ecosystem and store them as one photo per file on multiple external storage devices. For long term storage, don't rely on usb memory sticks nor external ssd drives.  LoC does not have data on the reliability of usb memory sticks.  Apple seems to be saying do not store photos on external ssd drives.  One device should be off site.  Using a cloud service is fine.  Remember a lot of cloud services are sync services.  That is should the file be deleted on the local device, the photo will be deleted in the cloud.  For this reason,  I never install the cloud service software on my computer.  I use only file upload.  For those who complain, my assessment is that the apple Eco-system doesn't match Library of Congress's requirements for digital archiving.

informative video:
http://www.digitalpreservation.gov/multimedia/videos/personalarchiving-photos.html

printed version
http://www.digitalpreservation.gov/personalarchiving/photos.html

General information on digital preservation:
http://www.digitalpreservation.gov/personalarchiving/


On new Mac, upgrade old Snow Leopard install or start with clean install?

You're five major system updates back from  El Capitan, and Apple has made a lot of changes to code, file arrangements, database structures, network connectivity etc. in the meantime.
Apple usually does a pretty good job of clearing away the old to make way for the new, but things do slip through. I recently killed a few prefs files from 2007 that Migration Assistant kindly transferred to my 2014 mini. Invisible files and such often gets copied too. iTunes data structures have changed significantly, with loss of artwork or metadata upon upgrade being fairly common.

Apple is pretty good, but they're not infallible. With a jump of that many years, I'd go for the clean install, followed by thoughtful installation of needed Apps, and manual transfer of docs, pics, music etc. That way you'll end up with a thoroughly modern System rather than a System that also contains a hodgepodge of used or unused pieces dating from an earlier decade.


How to connect an external display to a MacBook Pro Late 2016?

As I suspected, there is no such thing as a mDP to USB-C converter from Apple. You are using the Thunderbolt 2 to Thunderbolt 3 adapter. It does not convert DisplayPort signals, only Thunderbolt.


You can use the NSDataDetector (a cocoa method) for parsing date from a string.

Here's the script (tested on macOS Sierra):

Warning: on a string which contains "digit/digit/year", the script does not work with a string in the  "day/month/year" format, the string must be in the  "month/day/year" format

use framework "Foundation"
use scripting additions

(* this script works on these formats:
"Sunday 10th September 2017", "Sunday 10 September 2017", "Sunday 10 September 17", "September 10th, 2017", "September 10th 2017", "September 10 2017"
 "10th September 2017", "10 September 2017", "10 Sep 17"
 also work with the abbreviation ( e.g. Sep instead of September and Sun instead of Sunday)
 also work with the localized name of (the month and the day)

"09/10/2017", "09.10.2017", "09-10-2017" : month_day_year only,  or "2016/05/22", "2016-05-22", "2016.05.22" : year_month_day only
( month and days could be one or two digits)
*)

set myString to "Nov 5th, 2005"
set dateString to my stringToDate(myString) --> "05/11/2005"

on stringToDate(thisString) --
    tell current application
        -- **  finds all the matches for a date, the result is a NSArray **
        set m to its ((NSDataDetector's dataDetectorWithTypes:(its NSTextCheckingTypeDate) |error|:(missing value))'s matchesInString:thisString options:0 range:{0, length of thisString})
        if (count m) > 0 then
            set d to (item 1 of m)'s |date|() -- get the NSDate of the first item
            set df to its NSDateFormatter's new() -- create a NSDateFormatter
            df's setDateFormat:"dd/MM/yyyy" -- a specified output format: "day/month/year" (day and month = two digits, year = 4 digits)
            return (df's stringFromDate:d) as text
        end if
    end tell
    return "" -- no match in this string
end stringToDate


I use ntfsclone from system rescue CD. It has allowed me to resize my partitions many times. Then I use the installer CD to run fixboot to rebuild the BCD. Works very well across many hard drives


How do I download my photostream photosto my laptop

Credit: Apple KB Artice

If you are on a Mac:

From the Apple menu, choose System Preferences.
Click iCloud. Then select Photos.
Click the Options button and make sure that My Photo Stream is turned on.
This should store them in the PhotoLibrary that is in your ~/Users/[User]/Pictures folder

On a PC:

Download and install iCloud for Windows.
Open iCloud for Windows.
Next to Photos, click Options.
Select My Photo Stream.
Click Done, then click Apply.
This should store them in your C:\Users[User]\Pictures\ folder


Yes, I am able to reproduce this bug in all of the UITableViews with reordering. Whilst I'm not convinced it's a bug, it is indeed reproducible in all views I've encountered.


For me at least, since I previously "purchased" Mavericks from the App Store, it showed up in my previous purchases list so I was able to download it. If you never actually installed Mavericks from the app store directly (i.e. upgraded an older Mac using the App Store) then it probably won't be there. This is a strange oversight on Apple's part - some apps out there still don't properly support Yosemite, and my workplace also has had problems with Yosemite working with their directory infrastructure, so we still use Mavericks as a matter of course.

If you didn't "buy" (read: download for free) Mavericks officially from the App store, your only option is to find a friend who did and ask them to create you a USB installation media. Instructions for doing this are easily found on the Internet.


In the iOS Mail app, how do I share an email, or save to Files, etc.?

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.


Where does iTunes store my iPhone and iPad backups?

Mobile applications (.ipa files) are stored in the following folder and can take up a lot of space:

~/Music/iTunes/iTunes Media/Mobile Applications


Try connecting to iTunes, it automatically syncs to the current date.


Can you use a single partition for two different time machine backups?

Yes, the Time Machine system handles this automatically.

There's one major drawback in that you cannot decide on a storage quota for each backup. This means that if you have 1 TB of backup storage, you cannot decide that 500 GB is reserved for computer A and 500 GB for computer B.

So if the backup of one computer is too large, that could make it impossible to take a full backup of the other computer.

You can limit the size of a Time Machine backup though by executing on each Mac:

sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine MaxSize -integer size

with size in MB. Example:

sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine MaxSize -integer 500000


Can macOS be prevented from pausing an app when the system runs out of application memory?

You most probably do not want to avoid macOS from suspending apps when the system runs out of RAM when you know that the only alternative is to kill the program. I.e. stop the program from running now and here without saving its data or anything like that.

However, you do not have to restart the programs that are paused as in "close the program and start it over". Instead you can actually unpause the program when you have sufficient free memory on the system. You can do this from the terminal by running:

kill -CONT <pid>

where  should be replaced with the process ID of the process, you want to unpause.

You can find process ID using Activity Monitor or the "ps" command in the Terminal (in this case, look for processes with status T as these are the paused/stopped ones).

An easy way of unpausing and finding the ID in one go is:

kill -CONT `pgrep myprogram`

where myprogram is the name of the program you want to unpause.

The second part of your question where you describe the ideal scenario is very hard to accomplish with a standard program. In general programs can request memory from the operating system, but the operating system cannot request it back afterwards. It is possible, but it requires very specialized programs which is generally not the case.

This means that once macOS have granted your program for example 1 GB of RAM, the operating system cannot just take it back when other programs want more memory. If you take away memory from programs that are not specially crafted to allow that, they will effectively crash as soon as they attempt to use the lost memory.


Will a Keynote with a video in it export to PowerPoint properly?

I just tried it with a QuickTime movie and was able to run the exported .ppt in PowerPoint as well. But this is probably no guarantee that it will work in all cases given the multitude of video formats, codecs, drivers etc. So in your case you probably get the best results if you

start with a specific video format/codec on the Mac side (QuickTime and either MPEG4 or H.264 would be my first choice)
do a test run yourself, maybe involving various target PCs (if this is a scenario you have to be able to work with)
stick to the setup once you have proven it to work


How can I complement a suggested address in Maps?

This answer has evolved slightly since comments changed the OP's intent. It now generally covers Apple Maps & how it stores & searches locations. Sherlock Holmes is less relevant, but it's still a valid start point for the rest.
This is also pertinent to macOS as well as iOS, they both share the same structure.

House numbers come first in the UK.

Sherlock's Address is 221B Baker Street. As it's such an iconic [if actually completely fictitious] address, simply typing 221b will find it.

Again, because it's a well-known landmark, Maps does have a specific Point of Interest for it.
Note that the house with the number 221B painted on the glass above the door & the Sherlock Holmes blue plaque is actually 239 Baker Street, it's all just bluff for the tourists ;)

Generally for the UK, Maps will use the Postcode for the location not the actual number/street, so in this instance NW1 6XE is actually as accurate as it can resolve. [This can be extremely irritating if the Postcode area is large, such as in the countryside, but generally is close enough in a city.]

In short - learn the postcode & search that.

Let's take a much broader example.

I live on Church Street.
Can you imagine just how many Church Streets there are in the UK? - there are 2 within a mile of here so even locally that's a difficult distinction.
If I start typing an address on Church Street [not mine, it knows where I live, of course] but any other number along the road, then it's not even going to hone it to less than a screenful of alternatives until I start the postcode section, which will rapidly hone it to town, then district & finally the correct location.
Amusingly [well, vaguely amusingly] my barber shop has the same address as I do; distinguishable only by the postcode.

I can't really add any generalisation for outside the UK, as that's the only system I know - but you can test it for your own local 'postcode' structure, see below.
A Postcode in the UK is a "potential set of numbers in a given distance on a road [or roads - this changes depending on the population density]." Those numbers fall inside that postcode whether or not they even exist, in case the buildings change over the years. Important & large organisations can have their own 'personal' Postcode - famously, BBC Radio 1 is W1N 4DJ although W1N is actually a valid postcode for where the office is - they couldn't have picked R4D 101 etc, it had to come from the pre-determined pool.

The postcode is the only real stored reference for an Apple Map POI & especially once saved as a contact or favourite [other maps do it differently, but Apple Maps does it this way, even if you enter data in actual international mapping designations initially.] This is the limit of its resolution once saved. As a simple Dropped Pin it retains accuracy, but as soon as it's saved it loses that & drops back to 'postcode' as its finest granularity.

You can test this storage method & whether it also applies to your own country's 'postal code' system by the simple but tedious expedient of saving a location which is inside a geographically large single postcode, saving it as a Contact or Favourite then recalling it - it moves to the centre of the postcode, wherever you had set the POI initially.

This is actually what I have always considered a major failing in Apple Maps & I've reported it many times, from both a user & beta tester perspective.


Emacs crashes on Mac OS X with "Dispatch Thread Hard Limit Reached"

I posted this to another question you asked because it is indeed caused by Emacs 24.3 and related to distnoted acting up. As a solution you can either use a nightly from http://emacsformacosx.com/ or use the patch below to build 24.3 without leaks.

https://gist.github.com/anonymous/8553178


How do I make command+delete delete a word backwards instead of to beginning of the line?

This works for me on an iMac:

"@\U007f" = ( deleteWordBackward:);

my reference http://osxnotes.net/keybindings.html


Is this possible to print a Pages document on Windows?

Try this...

Save the file locally on your windows computer.
Right click on the file and select rename.
Remove .pages extension and enter .zip as the extension and press enter.
Open the zip file and it should allow you open the file and its contents.


Is there a Notification Center widget to show more calendar information for tomorrow?

Just click on edit on the bottom of the Notification Center and add the "Calendar"-widget.

It shows me full day events and six hours from now on in day view...

EDIT: Just realized you are not using Sierra... let me check on that.

2nd EDIT: Checked it on my MacPro running El Capitan OS X 10.11.6, the widget exists in the same spot (and as a bigmouth that I am, until Sierra the OSes were called OS X, and from now on macOS... not that I could've read the number you gave us :D)

3rd Edit: Oh and you did it even right when you asked originally, it was edited by a proactive moderator. Sorry for the wrong accusations. Now try it and mark it hopefully as resolved... :)


IOS 12.1.4 - Apps bugged, can't delete or reinstall

Managed to fix it with 'Apple configurator 2' (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/apple-configurator-2/id1037126344?mt=12). Connect iphone to macbook, launch Apple configurator 2, select device, click 'add -> apps', login with apple id, find spotify, click 'install', choose 'overwrite existing'.

Now on iPhone go back to the app-store and you can redownload it.


Programmatic access to connect to a wifi network

This should do it, although it may need some modification. Every time a user switches, a system log entry is created. Knowing this, you can monitor for user switches quite effortlessly:

global wifi_device
on run
    set wifi_device to do shell script "networksetup -listallhardwareports|grep -A1 'Wi-Fi'|grep Device|sed 's;Device: ;;'"
end run
on idle
    set user_name to do shell script "tail -n0 -f /var/log/system.log|grep -om1 'context values set for .*'|sed -e 's;context values set for ;;'"
    if user_name is equal to "presaccount" then
        do shell script "networksetup -setairportnetwork " & wifi_device & " presaccount_network password"
    else if user_name is equal to "other_account" then
        do shell script "networksetup -setairportnetwork " & wifi_device & " other_account_network password"
    end if
    return 1
end idle

Just change the network names, passwords, and account names to whatever you need them to be.

Basically, we're checking for the log entry containing "context values set for", which occurs on every switch, and contains the username switched to. We use this username to determine which network to join, and that's it! I'd recommend only allowing admins to change the wifi network in system preferences. This actually uses nearly no resources, because the script cannot continue past the first line, until a user switches. Keep in mind that this was done on 10.11. I can't verify if the log entry is present on 10.10, so YMMV. You'll have to save this as a stay-open app in Script Editor.


Share / view files betweek Mac OS X and Linux (Ubuntu) using sshfs and GUI

Looking at your command to mount your Linux drive on Mac,
sshfs user@192.168.0.2:/ localMountDir

it looks like you are specifying that you want to mount the root of the Linux filesystem (that’s the :/ part). In general, most operating systems assign ownership of root-level directories to a privileged user (i.e., not you). In the case of Linux, root is the name of the superuser and wheel is the name of the group to which root belongs. So what you are seeing is, in fact, 100% correct. And it’s also no surprise that permissions become more restrictive as you descend into certain directories (e.g., if you are trying to cd into your own home directory then it’s expected that it is not world-readable [750], whereas the root of the filesystem should be world-readable [755].)
What I suspect you’re wanting to do is to sshfs directly into your own home directory on the Linux box. So you’d want to specify that on your command line:
sshfs user@192.168.0.2:/home/YOURUSERNAME localMountDir


How to produce constant output in a Terminal window?

Pulling ideas from this unix.stackexchange.com Q&A about generating "hollywood" style terminal output.

The Slow Type

This script produces that delayed typing like effect you see in movies. Where the computer prints things in the terminal at some really awful and slow rate.

Save the following to a file named hollywood:

#!/bin/bash

while IFS= read -r line; do
    length="${#line}"
    bol=1
    for (( offset = 0 ; offset < length ; offset++ )); do
        char="${line:offset:1}"
        printf '%s' "$char"
        if (( bol )) && [[ "$char" == " " ]]; then
            continue
        fi
        bol=0
        sleep 0.05
    done

    if (( length == 0 )); then
        sleep 0.$(( RANDOM % 3 + 2 ))
    else
        sleep 0.$(( RANDOM % 7 + 3 ))
    fi

    printf '\n'
done

Set execute permissions on the file hollywood:

chmod +x hollywood

And then pipe it the output from dmesg to give it a large chunk of snazzy looking text to slowly print on the screen:

dmesg | hollywood

The Hex Dump

This dumps hex data to the screen. Looks impressive but is largely unintelligible to the masses.

hexdump -C /dev/urandom | GREP_COLOR='1;32' grep --color=auto 'ca fe'

The Matrix

Numbers. Numbers everywhere.

LC_CTYPE=C tr -c "[:digit:]" " " < /dev/urandom | dd cbs=$COLUMNS conv=unblock | GREP_COLOR="1;32" grep --color "[^ ]"

Unfortunately, with that one there isn't a good way to control the speed.

There's a better version of this available view Homebrew called cmatrix. You can install and run it with:

brew install cmatrix
cmatrix


How do I import only new photos with Image Capture.

I don't think it's entirely possible although there is an Image Capture plugin for Automator that will let you do a number of automatic procedures. I can't say if this is possible but my guess is it will be difficult. Check out the end of this article to see if this is a path you want to take. The Many Miracles of Image Capture

That kind of smart import was built into Photos (iPhoto) as a part of the OS free suite of apps. I generally use that one for easy importing and sorting but some don't because of it's odd organization and storage of the photos.


Avoid double keystrokes for a given set of keys on OS X

I found Unshaky on GitHub (https://github.com/aahung/Unshaky)

I've been testing it for about day and so far it has been working fabulously! During a full workday I experienced a double-keystroke only once.

Please note that you have to set it up:

I put 40ms delay for each key:

I also made an exception for the Tab and Delete keys which I regularly hit repeatedly:

I am not affiliated with Unshaky in any way.


Yosemite magic Mouse and a bluetooth disconnection party

Update!  - Delete "Bluetooth PAN" from network settings and wifi and bluetooth will  instantly work better.  Credit: http://ihealthgeek.com/2015/02/yosemite-10-10-2-wifi-and-bluetooth-finally-solved-no-really/

Otherwise, you can try my previous approach that works better, but is still a nuisance.

Turn off bluetooth on macbook
turn off keyboard/mouse
turn on bluetooth on macbook
Hold power-on key on keyboard WHILE
Choose the Bluetooth>Device>Connect from the macbook
Connection should succeed immediately
Release power button on device

This has worked for me repeatedly after trying the PRAM and other no-fix fixes.   It's a pain to do, but works everytime for me, and stays connected until I leave the room.


Able to open downloaded programs, but once closed need to download again

You might be running them from their DMG file, usually located in the folder where you set your downloads to go to.

Apps you want in your /Applications folder, you have to copy them there. That's why most DMGs provide Applications' alias in the DMG.

Use spotlight or  apps like Easyfind to find the relevant installer.


From OS X 10.9.1: /usr/bin/codesign

Alternatively, grab it from your Recovery HD:

diskutil mount Recovery\ HD
hdiutil mount /Volumes/Recovery\ HD/com.apple.recovery.boot/BaseSystem.dmg
sudo cp /Volumes/OS\ X\ Base\ System/usr/bin/codesign /usr/bin/codesign

I recommend you do a permissions repair after copying.


Using VPN configuration which require 'tap' kernel extension on Mac OS Big Sur?

Viscosity supports TAP on Big Sur.
It costs money though (but it's not that expensive). Hopefully Tunnelblick will go ahead and add it one of these days since Viscosity proved it can be done.


Sleepwatcher only accepts a single executable/script, so you have to put the command you want to run in its own file.

Create a file mute.applescript:

#!/usr/bin/osascript
set volume with output muted

Set it as executable:

chmod +x mute.applescript

Then do:

/usr/local/sbin/sleepwatcher --verbose --sleep /path/to/mute.applescript


How to completely disable the sound effect at all for an invalid action?

You can set alerts to a different output, i.e. Internal Speakers, and/or turn the Alert volume: down completely.

System Preferences > Sound > Sound Effects


Temporary dyld_shared_cache taking a lot of space

Same problem here

It was fixed after opening Xcode and going to Window/Devices and Simulators.
There select your iPhone and wait for the process of "Copying cache files from device" to finish

Then they can go back to their normal flutter workflow.


iCloud removes my third-party ePubs and PDFs from my iPad without permission — how do I stop this?

It sounds like you have "Automatically Manage Storage" turned on in the preferences. If the device is almost filled up, then iOS could be deleting iBooks that are available from your iCloud account from the device.

You can re-download them from iCloud when needed. Bookmarks, placemarks, etc. are also saved into iCloud.


How do I refresh Application metadata - URL handlers, Web browsers - after installing my own AppleScript?

If you saved your AppleScript as application and declared that it can handle the http and https URL scheme in its Info.plist file, you simply need to update its modification date e.g. by running touch "My Program.app" in Terminal, or moving it to a different folder and back again in Finder.

Launch Services will then pick up the change automatically. You will need to restart Safari to update the browser list.


Open second PDF file with hyperlink in first PDF file

One approach is to use Acrobat to add the links. When manually adding links, you specify the view to which the link points. With that, you can set the exact place where the linked to document opens.

If you have suitable software to create your "second" document, you can use Named Destinations, which can be used as target for the link.


Will the Apple Store replace Macbook Pro keys or other parts if serious wearing occurs?

Rather than ask us, you might ask your local store since they are the ones that will make the call.

My guess is if you have a functional problem where you loved the Mac to death and used it so much the keys are worn, they would replace it under AppleCare or the standard Warranty. I wouldn't expect warranty service for normal wear and tear and this will likely be up to them to make the call whether your specific instance is one or the other.

Also - do go in if you are frustrated with your purchase. Go now and not later, since the sooner you show them wearing, the sooner they can document it and it's more likely they'll want to replace something that is wearing out prematurely. Think like tires, if yours wear out in under 5000 miles (or km) it's clearly something the warranty should cover. Several years of wear isn't a defect in the manufacturing and just plain old you wore it out.


How can I change the font used in Preview PDF notes?

Sadly, it is not possible to change the font used by Preview for Notes - this is denoted by Apple an 'UnEditable'.

This thread on the Apple forums (which I can't take credit for) provides a couple of work arounds such as using Annotations instead of notes (as these are editable) or post-editing comments in Adobe Acrobat Reader XI, but not an actual solution to this problem.


If I export a Word document (authored as a versioned document using Pages 4.1 on Lion),...

The short answer is simply: yes, it will.


Is there any way (software) to defrag NTFS on Mac?

In short, no, I don't know of a way to do this other than booting into Windows.

That being said, a few things:

Why do you feel that the drive needs to be defragmented? Modern NTFS does a fairly decent job of preventing itself from getting too fragmented, at least when running under Windows 7+.
If you're sharing these disks with Windows machines, any reason you can't defrag when connected to those platforms?
The NTFS implementation on OSX has never really been extremely robust. While I'm not sure if the reason is solely due to how to handle ACLs (file permissions), it is worth pointing out that NTFS write capability isn't enabled by default.
If your primary machine is OSX, then you're probably best served using HFS+ as your file system. NTFS should be "SneakerNet" with the implication that it probably spends a significant amount of its time on a Windows machine anyway.

Probably #3 is the strongest point here, but at least this list is worth some thought?


2012 iMac boots to prohibited sign after it attempted over night self update? HDD now cannot be mounted?

There are two possibilities. There have been reports of Catalina causing some corruption to the EFI firmware partition. However, if the iMac was running auto-updates, then it should have already updated to Catalina? In which case that's probably not the case.

The other possibility is that the 7-year-old internal hard drive has failed. The computer itself seems to be working as you've booted to an external.

Drive failure often happens to old drives after an OS upgrade ("The new OS broke my drive!") because writing several GB of files to the drive is the 'final straw that breaks the camel's back'.

It's possible that the drive may mount and be read once you've booted to a Catalina OS. You might need to run third-party disk recovery software like Data Rescue.

However, if the drive will not mount at all, then data recovery becomes much more difficult. And by difficult, I mean expensive.
This is where I ask you if you have a backup.


lsof lists more than just file handles. Most notably, it includes program text mapped into all processes (e.g, the executable and all libraries it's using). There are a lot of these mappings in most GUI processes -- I count over 270 for the Finder, for instance -- and they don't consume file handles.

If you believe you are hitting the system's open file limit, go ahead and change kern.maxfile. However, it's more likely that you're hitting the per-process open file limit, which defaults to a lower number (7168 on my system) and can be changed using ulimit.


I'm not aware of any app that does exactly this. The closest I've seen is System Status, which is an Activity Monitor-style app that has a big battery status display, as well as lots of other info on free memory, device space, running processes, etc.

Something that does exactly what you're looking for is unlikely, as there are no public APIs for getting the device signal strength. Any such app wouldn't be allowed in the App Store. It is conceivable you could make something for a jailbroken device.

Perhaps just position the phone closer on your desk, as all that information is readily available in the standard iOS status bar.


iTunes 12 fails to sync on my iPhone 6 (iOS 8.2) and also other apps

Changing USB port fixed my problem. At first I was using an USB 2.0 port on my case, then I moved my iPhone to the USB 3.0 port of my motherboard and it worked.


How can I add an email signature in my iPhone Gmail app?

Open Mobile Safari and visit m.gmail.com
Sign in and navigate up to the list of folders.
There's a gear wheel in the top right, tap it.
In here you can set your 'mobile' signature and opt to use it instead of your desktop signature.

This will now also apply to mail sent via the Gmail app.

EDIT

Theres an update to the gmail app that allows you to do the same thing but from within the app.  Show the menu by clicking the icon in the upper left of the screen and you'll see a gear wheel.  Tap that and you can set your mobile signature in there.


There doesn't seem to be much of solid chance of achieving this. I found this method on Lifehacker, and I haven't tested it, so try it at your own risk.

  The first step is (again, always) to back up your device. Next go get the build of iOS 6 that your phone runs. If you've got an iPhone 5, that means grabbing iOS 6.1.4, the CDMA flavor if you are on Verizon or Sprint, and the GSM flavor if you are on AT&T or T-Mobile. If you've got something else (iPhone 4S and below, iPads 2-4, iPod Touch 4 or 5, or iPad Mini) you'll want 6.1.3. The same CDMA/GSM logic applies.

  Did you back up your device yet? Back up your device.

  Now put your phone into Device Firmware Update (DFU) mode by plugging it into the computer and holding the home button and the power button for 10 seconds. Then let go of the power button and only the power button, and keep the home button pressed down for another 10 seconds or so. The screen will stay black, but iTunes will detect a phone in recovery mode. It's worth noting that this isn't strictly necessary, but it does make matters a little simpler.

  Ignore any restore prompt iTunes throws at you. Specifically this one.

  Open the panel for your iPhone and option-click/shift-click (OSX/Windows) on Restore iPhone.

  This will give you a dialog box popup; use it to go find that ipsw file you downloaded after you backed up your device. And bam, you should be good to go. If things aren't working, try booting up your phone, disabling Find My iPhone, and do it all again.

  There you go, back to skeumorphic goodness. Now just avoid installing iOS 7 for as long as you can bear it. And while you're doing that, try to make peace with the fact that iOS 7 is coming for you eventually, and there's pretty much nothing you can do to stop it.

Source


How To Trick WeChat Into to Thinking My iPhone Is An iPad?

The WeChat app can ask iOS whether it is running on an iPad or iPhone. It is not something you can set in Settings, or "fake" through the Messages settings as indicated elsewhere.

The only way to overcome this is with a jailbroken iPhone, where you can intercept the relevant method calls. In practice it is not possible to do so for an "ordinary user" without strong technical skills.

Try contacting WeChat support to see if they have a work-around, or they might consider lifting the restriction in coming versions.


How do I mount an Windows SMB server as a writeable volume on Lion?

I'm going to assume its windows server as you're mounting a wwwroot. Ensure your user david.hall has file permission access to the correct hierarchy not just share permissions. This is usually why stuff mounts as read-only from the win side.

OS X just mounts the share as normal unless you specify otherwise.


Smart Playlist that includes all song that are/were in another playlist

iTunes' Smart Playlist feature does not have any memory. You can only refer to songs where/how they are in this very moment.

You can, however, add songs to the new smart playlist that have been played in the last X hours/days.

If you can 'explain' to iTunes how to find the songs that you want to have included/excluded, you can create a smart playlist for it.

Does this answer your question?


Where is `defaults -currentHost write domain key value` written to?

If you use -currentHost with defaults it acts on .plist files in:

$HOME/Library/Preferences/ByHost/

As an example, I did not have a com.apple.finder plist file at that location and when I executed the following command, one was created at that location.

defaults -currentHost write com.apple.finder GoToField "/foobar"

$ defaults -currentHost read com.apple.finder GoToField
/foobar
$

Note the full file name contains a UUID however you do not need to include it when -currentHost is used, the normal naming is all that's needed as shown in the command line above.

Example: $HOME/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.finder.6966D045-28DC-544A-97C2-98CDB668DC8B.plist


How to mount remote shares that have the same name, and easily differentiate them in the Finder?

Although tags cannot be edited directly from the finder for volumes, comments can.

Therefore, I went into Side bar → Devices → Machine Name (which is where I can see all the volumes. In fact, it shows the /Volumes folder), and did the following:

I added the name of the particular server as a comment to each of the volumes.
In the finder view options, I added the comment column so that it shows when the folder is in list view, and checked the "always open in list view" option.

Therefore, now, whenever I open the volumes list I can see the comment and know exactly which share I want to open.

Previous to discovering this, I discovered that although volume tags cannot be edited from the finder, they can be changed through command line.

Create a dummy folder or use some existing folder in your own home folder. Change its tag to whatever you want the volume to have.
Get info on the volume you want to change, to see its current name. That is, if the share name is your username userX, and you have more than one such share mounted, one will be named userX, the next userX-1, userX-2 and so on. You can find out the name by getting info on the volume and looking at the "Name and extension" box.
Run the following commands from terminal to copy the tags from you dummy folder:

xattr -wx com.apple.metadata:_kMDItemUserTags "$(xattr -px com.apple.metadata:_kMDItemUserTags /Users/userX/dummyFolder )" /Volumes/userX-N
xattr -wx com.apple.FinderInfo "$(xattr -px com.apple.FinderInfo /Users/userX/dummyFolder )" /Volumes/userX-N

Replace /Users/userX/dummyFolder with the full path of your dummy folder (you can drag it to the terminal window for that), and /Volumes/userX-N with the name of the volume that you verified above.

I learned this method from this answer.

Nevertheless I prefer the first method I mentioned, now that I discovered it, because:

It displays actual textual information rather than a color I have to remember the meaning of (though of course I could go for a text tag rather than a color tag).
It requires no command-line access, only simple finder operations.
It doesn't change anything in the volume that isn't supposed to be changed.

Note: Both solutions require that you do not remove the .DS_store file on the server.


Will it do any harm to cannibalise an old hard drive as an SSD enclosure?

The SSD draws a lot less juice from your power supply and doesn't produce as much heat as a spinning hard drive.  You could say your enclosure is quite over-engineered for your SSD.

I would be concerned if you'd try the opposite (putting a spinning harddrive into a SSD enclosure).

That being said it would be better if you'd put the SSD directly into your iMac.  Or swap the drives.  It's not that difficult and you'll probably gain quite some speed.


iPhone accidentally engages FaceTime during call

This is a known issue. Apple addressed it in IOS 4.1 beta 2. Until it gets released, the simplest thing to do is talk using your headset and lock the screen (note that for some reason Apple removed the screen lock functionality without the headset).


Reformat URLs using Applescript or Automator

Assuming I'm understanding your question correctly, a simple program in any scripting language will do this in just a few lines of code.  Perl, Python, and Ruby are preinstalled on OS X; I'll give an example in Perl.  Just run this at the command prompt in a Terminal window.

Given that the filenames you want to process are listed, one filename per line, in a textfile called infile.txt:

perl -pe 's/(.*)/$1<\/img>/;' < infile.txt > outfile.html

Explanation: Calling the perl executable with the -e flag means "run the code in quotes following"; the -p flag means "for every line on standard input, run the program (meaning the code in quotes in this case) on that line and then print the line"; and the actual program in single quotes merely adds the  tags at the beginning and end of whatever text is in that line of the file.  The < and > operators indicate input and output to the given filenames.


What is Format Painter shortcut in Excel 2011 for Mac?

There is (now) a predefined shortcut for this

To copy the format: CMD+SHFT+C
To paste the copied format: CMD+SHFT+V


JetDrive installation with missing Recovery partition: Clone internal SSD to external SSD

Carbon Copy Cloner - which can also create Recovery partitions - though it does need to get it from somewhere.

You can clone your boot drive whilst booted from it, with no issues.
Then just swap drives.

If you first clone without the Recovery partition option, you then have 2 identical drives to attempt the Internet Recovery on, with a full safety copy.

Recreate the Recovery Partition on either & CCC can then clone it to the other.

As far as I'm aware, the Internet Recovery should not mess up any settings - but this way is belt & braces.


Why does macOS 10.13 suddenly asks for a PIN instead of password for login?

You have your Yubi key in the USB port at some point, put the Yubi key in and enter your Yubi Pin this will unlock your screen


Can an iPhone 4S take microphone through audio jack?

It does work for the standard earphones which are included when you bought an iPhone 4S so it's safe to assume that it works for other headsets as well, at least if their use of the audio jack is the same (which it should be, actually).

PS: See this product listing on apple.com for an example.


How can I remove Skype 8's icon from the menu bar?

Since Skype 8 is an Electron app you can modify its source code. Run this command in Terminal:

LC_ALL=C sed -i '' -e "s/this._tray =/\\/\\/is._tray =/" -e "s/this._trayBaseToolTip =/return;\\/\\/yBaseToolTip =/" /Applications/Skype.app/Contents/Resources/app.asar

It will prevent the menu bar icon from being created.


RTSP feed with ffmpeg and the Mac camera

I successfully implemented something close to this (not true RTSP, but instead RTP streaming over UDP) with the following hardware and software:

2012 Macbook Pro, macOS Mojave 10.14.6
ffmpeg version 3.4.8
ffplay version 4.3.2 (my executable was named ffplay4)

List the audio and video input devices with ffmpeg -f avfoundation -list_devices true -i ""
On the 2012 MBP, the first video device (index 0) is FaceTime HD Camera (Built-in) and the first audio device (index 0) is Built-in Microphone.
The video capture/sending and the video receipt/playback can be done on the same machine, or ffmpeg can send to a remote IP.  In this example, it is sending an MPEG transport stream over UDP to the loopback address 127.0.0.1:9988 but that could just as easily be the IP address and port of another Mac:
ffmpeg \
  -f avfoundation \
  -pix_fmt yuyv422 \
  -video_size 320x240 \
  -framerate 15 \
  -i "0:0" -ac 2 \
  -vf format=yuyv422 \
  -vcodec libx264 -maxrate 2000k \
  -bufsize 2000k -acodec aac -ar 44100 -b:a 128k \
  -f rtp_mpegts udp://127.0.0.1:9988

To receive and play the video:
ffplay4 -i udp://@0.0.0.0:9988

It may take a few seconds to start up and there will be a few errors at first, but the video should begin playing in ffplay4 within a couple seconds.
Bonus: this stream is also viewable with VLC (version 3.0.12).  File->Open Network->URL rtp://@127.0.0.1:9988.  Again, it will take a few seconds (5-10) to begin displaying the video.
Happy streaming.


Yes it will. I use an American AppleTV in a Latin American country and it works just fine as long as your TV have the required HDMI input.

However the content your AppleTV will show varies from country to country, as the iTunes catalog of Movies and TV Series is region specific. You can check what movies and series you will be able to buy or rent using Tunes on your computer. The same content will be available on your AppleTV.

You also might want to try Netflix if its available there.


Follow these steps:

Get into on your icon file (open it for example with Preview).
Select the icon with Command + A.
Copy the selected icon with Command + C.
Paste it over onto the webloc file (as you're doing) with Command + V.

Basically, don't paste the file onto the icon, copy the icon of the icon.


To boot the computer, you need an already-formatted disk, which could be a DVD, a USB drive, or another hard drive.

If you do not already have one of these (and do not have another Mac that you can use) then your options are fairly limited:

Buy Snow Leopard on DVD. You can get it from Apple for $30, free shipping, but it won't ship for 3-5 days.
Buy DiskWarrior [$100] which is probably your best bet if you want to try to save the current hard drive.
Buy Lion on a USB drive $70 from Apple. Note that this is a terrible solution, IMO, because you will not be able to download Lion from the Mac App Store nor will you be able to use Lion's "Recovery Partition" (which, if you had it on your Mac, would most likely have solved your problem).

The rest of this answer is strictly opinion.

Personally I think your best option is #2 and #1.

DiskWarrior is an essential tool for trying to recover from hard drive errors. If your drive is having problems, I would not trust it for very long. Copy an essential files to another drive and then run DiskWarrior. Even if DiskWarrior is able to correct its errors, I would be sure to start making regular backups using either SuperDuper or CarbonCopyCloner.

The problem is that if DiskWarrior finds problems that cannot be fixed, then you are going to need to replace the hard drive and reinstall Mac OS X… which means that you are going to have to buy Snow Leopard on DVD (assuming that you don't have a friend who can make or loan you a copy).

The $70 USB stick from Apple is a terrible deal. If you want to move to Lion, buy your own USB drive, find a friend with a Mac, ask them if you can use it to buy Lion from the Mac App Store, and make your own Lion USB drive using one of the many how-tos posted online, such as this one from TUAW.com.


on iOS, will reinstalling Skype delete my chat history?

It will not delete your chat history.

I reinstalled Skype on a different iPhone and the chat history was restored.


Create one large hard drive partition from multiple smaller ones

What you want to do can be done without using any third party tools. Basically you need move the last two partition to a position after the first partition. The fact that the source and destinations overlap complicates the procedure. This means you may need to move a partition twice. First to the bottom of the drive, then to a position after the first partition. For example, below is sparse bundle from which I can use to expose the necessary steps.

First, I created a new partition at the end of the drive.

Next, I restored the second partition source "MAX DL OLD TBC" to the forth partition destination "SL yosemite 2".

Next, I removed the second partition "MAX DL OLD TBC".

Next, I created a new partition about the same size as the original "MAX DL OLD TBC". The default volume label was "4 TB HD 2 1".

Next, I restored the forth partition source "MAX DL OLD TBC" to the second partition destination "4 TB HD 2 1".

Since there is enough free space, I created new partition after the second partition. This partition is about the same size as the "SL yosemite" partition.

Next, I restored the forth partition source "SL yosemite" to the third partition destination "MAX DL OLD TBC 2 1".

Finally, I removed the last two partitions.

  Note: Occasionally, the Disk Utility application would become confused and not correctly display the results after executing a particular step. Therefore, I needed to quit the and relaunch the Disk Utility application between certain steps. Also, a few times I need to unmount and remount the disk image.

El Capitan users would probably be better off using the command line to create and remove the partitions. This can be done by using the command diskutil. Also, the gpt command can be useful. The Disk Utility application can still be used to copy the partitions.


brew install gdb seems to successfully install gdb.  Did you get a error message when running brew install gdb?


Allowing cookies from a specific site in Safari

Go to Safari's settings and from there you can allow certain sites to leave cookies.  There are several other settings worth investigating here too.

To get to settings, from the Menu click Safari > Preferences... and go to the Privacy tab.


Automator > modifying an URL before downloading it?

Using shell scripting, you could do something like this:

wget $(curl $(<urls.txt) | grep -o 'http[^"]*_small.jpg' | sed 's/_small/_large/')


iPhone, is Reset Network settings necessary after a Carrier profile install?

No, you don't have to reset the network settings. Your phone carrier is just being thorough, as updating the profile can result in some unexpected behaviour for some users and resetting network settings usually resolves this.

I've personally only ever had to reset network settings once on an iPhone after a profile update, so you can just install the new profile and reset network settings afterwards if you start noticing some weird behaviour.