My new Mac Pro has 6 "USB" busses, 12Mb/s, and two "USB High Speed" busses. 480 Mb/s.  One of the "USB" busses shows Bluetooth on it, but none of the others seem to be in use.  The external connectors belong to the two "High Speed" busses.  Buss 0xfd has one of the front and two of the back connectors.  Buss 0xfa has one of the front and one of the back connectors.


Try to connect the TM Backup drive to your mac and hold the alt/opt key when booting. You should be able to see your time machine drive and boot from it. Once booted you can restore the time machine backup to your new SSD.


How to remove wireless network utility icon from the menu bar?

The menubar icon is related to StatusBarApp.app

Possible paths:

/System/Library/CoreServices/StatusBarApp.app

# for version 5.0 (2016) on Mojave
/Library/Application\ Support/WLAN/StatusBarApp.app/

You can close the app by killing the process via the Activity Monitor mac app or entering:

killall StatusBarApp

Note: The app will still open next time you restart the Mac

The app is loaded by launchd while booting. The related plist should be located at /Library/LaunchAgents/ and the file name is Wlan.Software.plist.

To unload the launch agent enter

sudo launchctl unload Wlan.Software

To permanently remove the launch agent enter

sudo launchctl remove Wlan.Software

Alternatively you can remove the file /Library/LaunchAgents/Wlan.Software.plist.

After a reboot the icon should be gone.

I have tested this with the installer TL-WN725N_V2_150901. Since you didn't specify any adapter (or driver) in your question the name of your app/plist may differ. Please check this with launchctl list or launchctl list | grep -i wlan.


First, make sure your external drive is plugged into wall-power, not bus power.

Second, check your system.log for I/O errors.  If you find any, then one of your drives may be failing.  See my article Recover Failing Hard Drives

Third, verify both your boot drive and backup drive in Disk Utility.  Do not attempt this until you have confirmed that there are no I/O errors!  Verifying the backup drive may take a long time (twenty minutes or more) as there are a lot of hard-links to check.  Repair if needed.

If that checks out, try locating a folder named "freds mac"... unless that's the name of your boot volume.  If its not the name of your boot volume, then rename it and try the backup again.  For more Time Machine tips see my article Recommendations for System Backups: Time Machine Tips


This is symptomatic of a hardware failure in most cases. You'll want to isolate the various components:

disconnect all other USB devices
try a new cable
try a different port on the Mac
try that drive on another Mac (or another drive on your Mac)
try another power source for that drive

It's likely the voltage supply to the controller chip in the drive (or the chip itself is faulty or getting power spikes from the drive motor) so I'd consider backing up that data and contacting WD to see if they have newer firmware or if more power is needed to run that drive.


Can I oblige Mail.app to (ask to) send via BCC when sending to a large group?

Mail is notoriously difficult to script effectively - particularly when it comes to outgoing messages not created by the running script.

tell application "Mail"
  set _title to name of front window
  set mList to messages of drafts mailbox whose subject is _title
  if length of mList = 1 then
    set _msg to item 1 of mList
    if length of (get _msg's to recipients) > 5 then
      beep
      error "Too many To-Recipients!  Do you want to send BCC?"
    else
      return "Send_Normal"
    end if
  end if
end tell

Something like this can be used in conjunction with Keyboard Maestro or a similar macro utility to have the utility select the send-menu-item.

While you can use System Events to do this I find that it sometimes takes 3 or more seconds to launch on my machine if it's not already running, and you start wondering why your macro isn't working when it finally takes off.

Other caveats to this approach are that the message must have been saved at least once to be detected.

So what you want to do is possible but very hackish.

-ccs


Are you talking about an actual ePub ebook that you create from a Pages Word Processing document, or just a PDF you create from a Pages document?

If you make the image floating or in the background, you can move it around without being hindered by the margins or other text. To make your object floating or in the background, open the Inspector window (with the blue "i" icon in the toolbar), then click on "Wrap inspector" (third button from the left), and choose your Object placement.

However, converting to ePub removes floating objects, so if you want that, you should edit your eBook (using sigil for example) to add the first page back in. This is not too hard if you know some HTML.


SSD on OSX Mountain Lion says it's almost full but isn't

TRIM isn't enabled on non-Apple OEM SSDs in OSX.  Perhaps garbage collection is not happening.  You can find a lot of sites that explain how to enable TRIM in OSX.  I haven't provided a link as they are plentiful and you may wish to use a site you're more comfortable with.  Use keywords: "enable trim support OSX terminal"

This link explains it but you should not need the freeware tool that the article mentions.  You can enable it from terminal with a few commands.


How to disable middle click paste Mavericks Terminal?

You can use Karabiner (formerly known as KeyRemap4MacBook) with the following setting in private.xml:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>
    <appdef>
        <appname>Terminal</appname>
        <equal>com.apple.Terminal</equal>
    </appdef>
    <item>
        <name>Disable middle-click</name>
        <identifier>private.disablemiddleclick</identifier>
        <only>Terminal</only>
        <autogen>
            __PointingButtonToKey__ PointingButton::MIDDLE, KeyCode::VK_NONE
        </autogen>
    </item>
</root>


Why a downloaded app can read/write to ~/Downloads/ without requiring the privacy allow permission in Big Sur?

I’m not sure I fully follow all the PS, but when you download the tool in the first place and execute or move the file, you are granting entitlements for the download folder and clearing the quarantine flags on the app signaling that the app can run.
Apple designed this to warn people when they didn’t intentionally run an app so the friction is for unintentional downloads is how I interpret why Apple designed it thusly.
You may need a session with someone to pick apart every step and evaluate each program closely to get a specific answer, but generally downloaded apps behave differently than ones the App Store installs with respect to sandbox and entitlement warnings.


iPhone connects to public Wi-Fi but Mac doesn't - why?

This could be related to the frequency/band the Wi-Fi is using, maybee this posts can help you:

How can I tell which band (2.4GHz or 5GHz) my iPhone's WiFi connection is on?

Can Macbook Pro handle 2.4GHz and 5GHz frequencies on the same wifi network without getting dropouts?


Two easy options:

Move your changes from .bashrc to .bash_profile (and delete .bashrc)
Add a line source ~/.bashrc to ~/.bash_profile to make sure .bashrc is read during shell startup


How to download entire iCloud photo library to external drive attached to my MacBook

Sure. Once your library is safely moved to the external, change the setting in Photos to download all images.

Can i store and access iphotos library on external hard drive (and still have it backup to my cloud network)?
https://support.apple.com/guide/photos/download-photos-to-your-mac-from-icloud-phtfa50fd1ec/mac
Verify you’re backing up your Mac and the external drive
Wait a week and then delete the old photos library from internal storage so you can free up that space and not have two libraries and metadata hanging around

Apple documents step 1 as well - https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201517


You can use Bartender.app to manage your menu bar items.  It's a paid app with a free test period.
https://www.macbartender.com/


Mac Apps Store wont download any apps on computer

Try signing out of your iTunes account then signing back in.


Does software exist to rename songs in iTunes based on audio matching like shazam?

Equinux's Song Genie can do this, though it's not perfect.


Would Like To Use my Time Capsule as my Main Router Instead of my NVG589

I'm going to take it that you're reading something along the lines of these instructions from dslreports.com. If so, to answer your questions:

1) What you're looking for is if the public (WAN) side of the network is using their own DHCP-allocated address pool for the network branch your area is provisioned with. This would be IP addresses that start with 10.x, 192.x or 172.x. These are the same IP ranges typically used for LAN addresses issued by DHCP servers on internal networks. The instruction is to use one of those address ranges that does not match that of the WAN side of the AT&T modem. So let's say that your modem has a 192.x.x.x WAN address: set your Time Capsule to use the 10.x.x.x address range in its DHCP settings. This will prevent matching and conflicting IP addresses as packets are transferred through the modem, as the modem is performing a basic NAT function in relaying the packets.

2) Yes, you need to disable any of the port forwarding done on the NVG589 since all the packets will now need to be handled by the Time Capsule. @colomb's answer shows the configuration section of the Airport Utility where you would need to set up the new port forwarding rules, as well as what mode to operate the Time Capsule in. The "Network Options" button at the bottom of his screenshot is where you will set the DHCP address range for the Time Capsule as well as enabling the NAT Port Mapping Protocol.

The end result of all of this is that the NVG589 will now effectively be just a modem for the AT&T service and your Time Capsule will be your router and DHCP server with your port forwarding configuration.


I think your copy of Python 3 is not using the executable name "python". Try "python3 -m markdown" and see if that works. If it does, you can symlink python to python3, or just execute python3 when tutorials ask you to run python.


Tracing PHP process killed on Mac does not work

The behavior you're seeing is not a problem with the hardware, the operating system, or lack or resources.

Instead it is simply the way that Laravel queueing works. If the worker takes too long to process a job, there's a timeout and the worker is killed with signal 9. Similar if the memory usage exceeds a set amount, the worker is killed.

You can set these limits with for example the --memory option.


Search finder for all photos in a given folder?

Type in "kind:Image" and hit enter. I got results for .png, .jpg, .svg, .NEF, .CR2 etc.


How can I export Aperture projects to folders that are named according to library project names?

Found the solution: just go into the Photos sidebar item and export from there. All the projects will be put in their appropriate folders.


OS X Mavericks screensaver changes pictures too quickly: How do I slow it down?

Previous answer still works, and also for Yosemite/El Capitan/Sierra with the caveat that System Integrity Protection (SIP) now needs to be disabled first.

Verify current slide duration:

sudo /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c "print ':JustASlide:mainDuration'" /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Slideshows.framework/Versions/A/Resources/Content/EffectDescriptions.plist

The system default is 3.
Reboot and hold Cmd+R to go into recovery. In the menu select Utilities > Terminal and disable SIP with the following command:

csrutil disable

Reboot again and set slide duration to the desired value in seconds:

sudo /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c "set ':JustASlide:mainDuration' 10" /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Slideshows.framework/Versions/A/Resources/Content/EffectDescriptions.plist

Reboot one more time into recovery (Cmd+R) and reenable SIP for good measure

csrutil enable


Where is the manpage of otools gcc etc. on macOS?

This answer from stackoverflow says that gcc is not installed by default on mac. Instead it installs clang and calls it gcc.

usxxplayegm1:~ grady$ which gcc
/usr/bin/gcc

usxxplayegm1:~ grady$ /usr/bin/gcc --version

Configured with: --prefix=/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/usr --with-gxx-include-dir=/usr/include/c++/4.2.1
Apple LLVM version 5.1 (clang-503.0.38) (based on LLVM 3.4svn)
Target: x86_64-apple-darwin13.0.2
Thread model: posix

you need man clang. Alternatively, if you want help regarding gcc, you can use gcc --help


What is Steam?

According to them, they are  The Ultimate Online Game Platform. What this actually means is that they are a portal for you to buy, play and update games. With certain benefits. But “steam” is just that. They sell games (more on this later), they offer you a community where you can have Friends, Chat with them, unlock achievements, etc. If you’re a user of an iPhone/Pod/Pad that has GameCenter in it, think of Steam as a pseudo GameCenter.

Why Steam and not normal retailer?

The advantages of Steam are a few, and I couldn’t list them all because some things may not be better for everybody, but let’s just say that the strength of the platform and what makes it different from buying a boxed game could be summarized in a few bullets (in no particular order):

Very easy to buy a game (and discover new ones)
Instant buy, start downloading, no delivery costs.
Automatic updates without having to worry
If you buy a game on your Macintosh and one day decide to play it on your Windows computer, provided that the game is supported in that Platform, you can continue your game there, as if nothing has happened. You re-download the game in your Windows machine and voilá.
Friends, Achivements, Progress… Steam as a platform sports game achievements that you unlock by playing.
Discounts, sometimes you will get “cheaper” versions of the games or promos that you can take advantage of.
More, I’m sure there are other advantages but think of an AppStore for games with a plus.

Can games be played independently?

Yes and no. I don’t believe you can copy that game over another machine (tho you could probably install steam on that machine and copy the game… I haven’t tried this). But you can play offline if you don’t have Internet.

Bonus: Is it worth?

If you have a Mac and like gaming, it’s definitely a big plus, as a lot of games get ported and put into the Steam network. If you’re in Windows, I believe the ease of use and “point and click” nature of the service make it worth. And also the fact that you don’t have to pay to use it. Did I mention it’s a free service? ;)

But Does it have Cons?

Some invaluable readers pointed out a few cons, which I will update (and I encourage everybody to contribute):

When you start it, it automatically updates, giving you the sensation that the client is hang. Also if your network speed is not optimal, this process can demand a lot of time.
If your network connection is not good, downloading three gigabytes of game might not be the best idea, given that you usually can’t start playing until almost most (if not all) the content is downloaded.
In order to play offline, you have to log in, and tell steam “I’m going offline”, which kind of voids the possibility of an unexpected loss of connectivity or forgetting to do it before disconnecting for example.
I didn’t mention this, but it’s important to note that not all the Windows games are available on Steam and not all work on OS X. Although decent amount (and growing) catalog is available, not every title is there.

UPDATE: There’s a dedicating gaming community in Stack Exchange for that. Don’t hesitate asking gaming questions there too, those guys may seem like gamers, but they aren’t playing at all ;)


How to troubleshoot 2013 Mac Pro without working display? (Recent MacBooks + iPads available if helpful; Catalina/Big Sur)

Did you have Back To My Mac or Screen Sharing (VNC), Remote Login (ssh), or File Sharing (AFP/SMB) enabled on the Mac Pro beforehand? If so, try to connect to it over the network from another device. That’s the only way I know of to use a second device for I/O.
Does the Caps Lock key light up when you press it? If so, this is a good indicator that the Mac is responding to events in either the OS or at least in firmware.
Can you try to log in to the Mac by “muscle memory” (i.e. use your keyboard to enter your credentials like you used to) and use the Volume Up / Down keys (possibly with the Shift key) to listen for the UI feedback sound. This also would show a good OS.
Try going into Boot Picker (hold Option during boot) to test video out from firmware, in case this is an OS-specific issue.

Unfortunately you’ll probably end up having to buy something in order to isolate the failure: Maybe it’s the display, maybe it’s the cable, or maybe it’s the Mac. (My money would be on the former two more likely flaking out than the latter.) Might be a good excuse to invest in a USB-C adapter for your newer devices.


You can sort of do this.

You can't make a new account for your daughter and then move existing purchases to be owned by your her new account.  You can use those purchases on her iPod though.

If she already has her own computer account and itunes install just move over to a new iTunes account and make new purchases there.  Change your password and move on.   She will no longer be able to buy with your account. You may need to log in every so often so she can get updates of the apps that were purchased by your account but otherwise things will work fine.

If you have to split her a new iTunes account out of your existing account it's a bit more complex.  There are a number of ways you can pull this off; here's how I would pull this off.

Make a computer account for your daughter.
Make a new Apple account for your daughter.
Change your password.
Authorize this new iTunes with your ID.  It's under Store->Authorize This Computer...  This lets her use content you've purchased with out logging in as you.
Use Home Sharing to move your old purchases to the new iTunes.
Sync her iPhone over to this new iCloud account.

At this point you can remove the purchases for her from your account.  They are in her account and will install and play on her iPhone.  She doesn't have for password and those apps you've already purchased for her are still owned by you.  They won't update without your password.   You'll have to log in for her every so often so that things can update. It'll prompt both on the phone and on the computer when it needs it.


Why am I unable to use Game Center on a jail broken phone?

iPhone 4 GSM Black:

I had the same issue when I updated to 6.1.2 from my previous version 5.1.1 when the evasi0n jailbreak came out. I solved the problem by restoring to the factory default. Then I went through the beginning steps of the iphone introduction, when i open and logged in to gamecenter everything came through pretty smooth... I jailbreaked it after I restored  and gamecenter still worked smoothly. Then I restored to my last back-up and opened gamecenter after it all loaded up and everything is still working fine.
Hopefully this simple troubleshooting helped out. It did for me.


curl command can't be found, OSX utilities have been replaced by GNU coreutils... how to start from scratch?

Something seems to have changed your curl binary. To fix it, run

sudo rm -f /usr/bin/curl-wrapper
sudo mv /usr/bin/curl.bin /usr/bin/curl


Can sound be off every time I power off?

You can set the audio value on boot using this:

sudo nvram SystemAudioVolume=%00

00 will set to 0% volume (i.e. mute)

You can reset this by resetting the NVRAM by booting with ⌘⌥PR, or running

sudo nvram -d SystemAudioVolume


Some apps don't open even if deleted and reinstalled!

Install a tweak called iWipe cache, it will respring your Spring board and will do the deal.


When swiping between spaces, sometimes the background moves and sometimes it doesnt

I have this exact same problem. It usually resolves itself after a reboot or removing the affected space but is slight annoying as it does consistently happen after a few hours of uptime.


Fix Terminal error message "-bash: /etc/profile.d/rvm.sh: No such file or directory"

You should also look at /etc/profile file, as it may have references to /etc/profile.d/rvm.sh.

It's also worth it to read the manual for bash, as it lists all files bash will look at for configuration. This will be towards the end of the man page. To read it, in Terminal.app type man bash.

Finally, you can run, again in Terminal.app, the following command:

grep -R 'rvm.sh' /etc

This will look for all files inside /etc, recursively, that contain rvm.sh text in them.


setting up ipad as new ipad or back up from another device

Your content that is stored on the cloud (apps, music from iTunes Store, etc.) can all be retrieved from the cloud as long as you use the same Apple ID to connect to the Store.

Other content from other services (e.g. Kindle books in the Kindle app) can similarly be downloaded from their providers.

Only content that was copied manually (e.g. synced from iTunes on your computer) would need replacing the same way you copied them to the iPhone previously.


Hide the brightness and volume bezels in Catalina?

I think the answer here is still valid for a single user. The multiple users answer doesn't work on Mojave anymore as far as I can tell.


unixODBC

  Driver's SQLAllocHandle on SQL_HANDLE_ENV failed

Cause

  The new security features introduced in DB2® Universal Database™ (DB2 UDB) Version 8.2 prevent users from using the database unless they belong to the Windows® groups DB2ADMNS or DB2USERS.

Solution

  Add the userid (the one used to execute the application) to either the DB2ADMNS or DB2USERS group. Please refer to the link under "Related Information" (below) for instructions on how to accomplish this.

Related:

SQLSTATE IM004, SQLAllocHandle on SQL_HANDLE_ENV failed at IBM
Driver's SQLAllocHandle on SQL_HANDLE_HENV failed at Stack Overflow
How do I install RODBC on Mac with unixodbc and freetds?

ODBC Driver for SQL Server

Reinstall the packages using the recent version:

brew tap microsoft/msodbcsql https://github.com/Microsoft/homebrew-mssql-release
ACCEPT_EULA=y brew reinstall --no-sandbox msodbcsql mssql-tools

Note: If you hit multiple tap conflict, run: brew untap microsoft/mssql-preview && brew untap microsoft/msodbcsql.

Then test your SQL setup by: sqlcmd -S localhost or isql -v -k <connection-string>.

Related: SQL Server : Can't open lib 'ODBC Driver 13 for SQL Server'.

See: Installing the Microsoft ODBC Driver for SQL Server on Linux and macOS.


Short Answer: It's probably not possible to downgrade your iPad 2

Long Answer: It is technically possible, but not without having SHSH blobs for both iOS 4 and iOS 5, which means having been jailbroken in the past on both of those versions, and having saved the .shsh files.


Which command to only output the IPv6 routing table?

To output only IPv6 info, use the -f address_family option.

Example: netstat -nr -f inet6

From the netstat man page:

  −f address_family

  Limit statistics or address control block reports to those of the
  specified address family. The following address families are
  recognized: inet, for AF_INET, inet6, for AF_INET6 and unix, for
  AF_UNIX.


iPad: upload photos to web storage (Flickr or Picasa)

Have you thought about using Everpix? I've fairly recently started using it to keep a full back up of all my pictures, even the ones I don't want to share through sites like Flickr.

There is an online service, along with iOS apps, take a look at https://www.everpix.com


How can I programmatically get the Terminal scrollback text?

Assuming there is only one instance of the file:///.../index.html URL in the contents of the entire scrolling buffer of the tab, then the following example AppleScript code can do that:
tell application "Terminal" to ¬
    set tabHistory to ¬
        history of tab of ¬
        front window as text

set fileURL to ¬
    do shell script ¬
        "grep -o 'file:///.*\\.html' <<< " & ¬
        tabHistory's quoted form & "; exit 0"

if fileURL is not "" then ¬
    do shell script ¬
        "open " & fileURL's quoted form

Notes:
The example AppleScript code above acts on the selected tab of the front window in Terminal.
If there is a file:///.../index.html URL in the contents of the entire scrolling buffer it will be opened by the open command.
If there is more than one instance of the file:///.../index.html URL in the contents of the entire scrolling buffer of the tab, then make the following change in the example AppleScript code above to open the last instance of the file:///.../index.html URL:
Change:
set fileURL to ¬
    do shell script ¬
        "grep -o 'file:///.*\\.html' <<< " & ¬
        tabHistory's quoted form & "; exit 0"

To:
set fileURL to ¬
    last paragraph of ¬
    (do shell script ¬
        "grep -o 'file:///.*\\.html' <<< " & ¬
        tabHistory's quoted form & "; exit 0")

If you want to use Safari to open the URL and have it frontmost, then:
Change:
if fileURL is not "" then ¬
    do shell script ¬
        "open " & fileURL's quoted form

To:
if fileURL is not "" then ¬
    tell application "Safari"
        make new document with properties {URL:fileURL}
        activate
    end tell

The example AppleScript code can be saved as a shell script with a #!/usr/bin/osascript shebang, made executable and run from Terminal.

Note: The example AppleScript code is just that and sans any included error handling does not contain any additional error handling as may be appropriate. The onus is upon the user to add any error handling as may be appropriate, needed or wanted. Have a look at the try statement and error statement in the AppleScript Language Guide. See also, Working with Errors. Additionally, the use of the delay command may be necessary between events where appropriate, e.g. delay 0.5, with the value of the delay set appropriately.


Time control for specific applications on OS X

The only program I could find with this capability is Watcher, but it has very poor reviews from users.

http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/9037/watcher


Time machine backup on another mac in my network

You can set up your iMac as a fully functioning time machine server by purchasing the OSX Lion Server from the Mac App Store.

This provides you with an official method free from hacks to allow you to backup individual machines such as macbooks etc to a single target machine.  I backup my Macbook Air to my iMac in this way.  For extra safety, I occassionally clone off this backup volume in the iMac to an external disk and store it out of the house.


Is it possible to export configuration from Apple's macOS Stocks app?

To be perfectly candid, the Stocks App and related iOS widgets are, quite frankly, not up to par.
There are many, better apps available, especially if you want to share your watch lists with others.

Your brokerage's trading app will usually allow the sharing or exporting of watch lists. Think or Swim actually has the ability to publish (Tweet) your watch list out.  You can export to CSV as well.

Excel supports "pulling in" of live stock price data. Nothing beats an actual spreadsheet for importing/exporting data.

Free/Paid apps on the App Store have much more functionality. For instance StockSpy has all these features including sync between multiple devices and a richer experience.

Financial Websites like Marketwatch have the ability to import/export their financial data.


I’ve heard only good things about Transmit.


OS X no longer sees my DVD drive. How to debug this?

I rebooted a second time, and now it works.  Crazy.


You can do what you are trying to do using the killall command and referring directly to the application's name.

repeat
 delay 84600
 set app_name to "APPLICATION NAME"
 do shell script "killall " & app_name
 delay 30
 tell application app_name to activate
end repeat


Create new (.url) file with url address as variable input

I wrote this thinking that you were looking to create the the Mac Version of a .URL file, which would be a .webloc file...  But after reading your code, it seems my assumption was wrong.  I put too much effort into my solution to just scrap it, so in the event that you need to automate the creation of .webloc files, in the future... Here you go

This AppleScript code works for me using the latest version of macOS Mojave.

set theURL to text returned of (display dialog "Enter Desired URL" default answer ¬
    "https://stackexchange.com" buttons {"Cancel", "OK"} ¬
    default button "OK" cancel button "Cancel" with title "Enter Desired URL")

try
    tell application "Finder" to tell its window 1
        set theFolder to POSIX path of (target as alias)
    end tell
on error errMsg number errNum
    set theFolder to POSIX path of (choose folder)
end try

tell application "Finder"
    activate
    set theName to text returned of (display dialog "Enter Desired Name" default answer ¬
        "File Name" buttons {"Cancel", "OK"} ¬
        default button "OK" cancel button "Cancel" with title "Enter Desired Webloc File Name")
    set fileExists to exists of alias ((theFolder & theName) as POSIX file as text)
    repeat while fileExists is true
        activate
        set theName to text returned of (display dialog "A File With That Name Already Exixts. Please Choose A Different Name" default answer ¬
            "File Name" buttons {"Cancel", "OK"} ¬
            default button "OK" cancel button "Cancel" with title "Enter Desired Webloc File Name")
        set fileExists to exists of alias ((theFolder & theName) as POSIX file as text)
    end repeat
end tell

tell application "Finder" to make new internet location file at POSIX file theFolder to theURL with properties {name:theName}


How do Apple engineers reset EFI password on new MacBooks?

It's not the sort of thing a hacker can easily "figure out" -- as I understand it, the procedure involves calling Apple's Service Provider Support, proving you're an authorized service provider, reading them a code from the computer and typing in the countercode they give you...

Mind you, that doesn't mean you're out of luck.  If you have admin access, and a 10.6.x install DVD or USB key for your Mac, this MacEnterprise posting has instructions to use setregproptool to enable/disable the firmware password.  If you have Lion, it's probably on the recovery partition somewhere, but I haven't investigated.


I don't have administrator account on my mac

You can create a new administrator account by restarting the Setup Assistant:

Boot into Single User Mode: Start/restart your Mac. As soon as you hear the startup tone, press and hold ⌘ + S until you see a black screen with white lettering. (If you end up back on the login screen after a flash of the black screen with white lettering, enter your password and it will return to the black screen.)
Check and repair the drive by typing /sbin/fsck -fy then ↩ enter - as directed by the on-screen text.
Mount the drive as read-write by typing /sbin/mount -uw / then ↩ enter.
Remove the Apple Setup Done file by typing
rm /var/db/.AppleSetupDone then ↩ enter.
Reboot by typing reboot then ↩ enter.
Complete the setup process, creating a new admin account.

Note that this may result in the new account being logging in automatically when the system is restarted, replacing whatever account may have been set to automatically log in previously. If you need to retain access to the original account without knowing its password, this may mess that up.


External microphone input volume too quiet

The command to set your microphone levels all the way up is this:
sudo osascript -e "set volume input volume 100"

Also check your microphones for dust in the mic hole and if there is a power source on the device you may need to plug it in. It may need the built in mic amp.
If that doesn't help possibly a 3rd party free app like Soundsource that gives you sliders to toggle Speaker/Microphone levels from the menu bar. I've never used it but found it referenced in the apple forums.


How use function keys in iPad with Apple keyboard?

When using the Apple Wireless Keyboard with an iPad device, not all function keys work. From Apple's Support Article:  Apple Wireless Keyboard and Magic Keyboard compatibility with iOS devices:

Since the Fn keys don't work per Apple, it's a safe bet that you won't be able to remap them.  You have to recognize them in order to reassign their function.

This is most likely the reason that you will need to utilize the softkeys provided for by the App.

What you can try is using the Escape sequence: Esc #  combination where # is the number of the Fn key you are trying to press (i.e. Esc2 for F2)


How is Internet Recovery able to connect to my Wi-Fi access point even after I changed the hard drive?

Passwords for the previously connected Wi-Fi access point are also stored in your Mac's NVRAM (along with the keychain which is managed by macOS and is stored in your hard drive).

From the Apple Support article, Reset NVRAM or PRAM on your Mac:

  NVRAM (nonvolatile random-access memory) is a small amount of memory that your Mac uses to store certain settings and access them quickly.

  Settings that can be stored in NVRAM include sound volume, display resolution, startup-disk selection, time zone, and recent kernel panic information. The settings stored in NVRAM depend on your Mac and the devices that you're using with your Mac.

That explains why your Mac is able to retrieve and connect to previously known Wi-Fi access point, even after swapping the hard drive.

The data stored in NVRAM is for use by your Mac and is not directly user accessible.


Cydia - Add sources through command line

Flame is the tweak you looking for.

Batch Add: Add multiple sources at once by having them in your clipboard


How can I keep apps on my iPad after I removed all apps in iTunes?

I finally find the answer. Before syncing, select the File menu and choose "Transfer Purchases from ...". After this all apps on the iPad is copied into iTunes' app folder and you can safely sync now.


Does closing the lid put a MacBook Pro to sleep? Would it hurt the computer if I carry it around without shutting it down?

MacBooks are designed for close and go operation and you're not doing the system or hardware any harm by following the practice. That being said, there have been past issues with MacBooks not going to sleep properly when the lid is closed—the indicator being that the Mac is hot to the touch and the battery level is lower than you would expect when you remove it from your bag. There are some reports of wake from sleep issues, generally caused by a "stuck" process.

Assuming you have adequate RAM, the slowdown in your startup process is most likely caused by applications and processes being loaded at startup. The startup on my own MacBook Pro (Mid 2007 model) is measured in minutes as various mission critical utilities—QuickSilver, TextExpander, Growl, etc.—load and populate the menubar If you login to an alternate (preferably clean, stock) user account is the startup process faster?

To get a better idea about what you're loading at startup, navigate to System Preferences and open the Users and Groups pane. (Note: Users and Groups is titled Accounts on some systems.) Select your user account from the panel on the left, then open the Login Items tab.

This screen grab is from a MacBook Air that runs only a subset of the login items of my personal MacBook Pro.

If Applications that you don't need are running, you can remove them. Do this with caution, because sometimes there are login items necessary for other software to run as expected.

Beyond that, you might want use Activity Monitor to discover what's running on your Mac. Run it right after a system startup. If you amend your question to include a screenshot of your login items and/or the running processes, we may be able to help you further.


Set an external display as main and always display the app switcher UI on it

The primary display is configured correctly. The app switcher should be shown on the external display, only if the Dock is not set to Automatically hide and show, and is always visible on screen.

Make sure you have not enabled Automatically hide and show the Dock under System Preferences → Dock. If enable, toggle the setting by unchecking and re-checking it.

If you wish to keep the Dock hidden and shown only when the mouse pointer touches the edge which houses the Dock, the app switcher will be shown on the screen that has last displayed the Dock. Thus, to show the app on your main display (external, on visible right), move the mouse pointer to the edge of the Dock, momentarily display it and then use the app switcher with the keyboard shortcut Command + Tab.


Double clicking the trackpad is suddenly hard

Restarting the computer solved the problem. I can now click as easily as I could earlier. Please comment if you know why this is happening or add an answer if you know of any other way to solve this.


You must run this:

defaults write com.apple.dock hide-mirror -bool true; killall Dock

This enables a more transparent dock but also removes the annoying shadow.

Note: this fix is specifically for OS X Mavericks


Open the video you wish to save.
Tap the Share  button
Select Save Video in the actions list (bottom scroll view, may have to scroll to the right).


Macports issues after Mountain Lion upgrade

Here is how I fix it (after Mountain Lion update):

install the latest MacPorts DMG dedicated to Mountain Lion over the old one;
install the latest Xcode version from the AppStore (it doesn't update by itself!);
launch Xcode and agree to the licence;
in Xcode's Preferences, at the Download's tab, in the Components section, install Command Line Tools (as since Xcode 4.3);
don't forget that you must read and accept licence for it, this is possible after running the following command in the terminal: sudo xcodebuild -license.

Without this step, if you try to use sudo port install [something] or others, you'll have the following return: Error: org.macports.build for port libunwind-headers returned: command execution failed

in terminal:

sudo port selfupdate
sudo port upgrade outdated

After that, everything works except MongoDB, After some research, I found this article (How to upgrade MacPorts to OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion) by Phil Freo.

Thanks to this article, which reassured me in my approach, I also found the solution to my last issue:

  Everything finished and worked properly except MongoDB. Currently there is an incompatibility between boost 1.50 and MongoDB which can be resolved with these two commands, assuming boost 1.49 was previously installed on your machine:

sudo port activate boost @1.49.0_0
sudo port -n install mongodb


Most but not all of my Contacts are synching between my iPad, iPhone, and Macbook

Make sure that the contacts that are on the MacBook Pro are also in iCloud (www.icloud.com/#contacts) by acknowledging the amount of contacts listed. Including the ones that are missing from your iPad and iPhone. If so, then all you need to do is to turn iCloud Contacts off and back on for the iPad and iPhone.

If they aren't there then these contacts are saved to the MacBook's hard drive. To migrate them, you'll 1st need to make sure that you are on a supported MacOS version. I believe MacOS Lion 10.7.2 or newer is required:

  If you have already enabled contact syncing:

  Open contacts, then go to users and groups and choose only your On My Mac Contacts to display.

  Ensure that nothing is typed in the search field. You might want to backup all of your contacts before you begin. Click to select the first contact and shift-click the last to select them all (or Cmd + A to select all. Then go to File and then Export to vcard and then save it to your desktop (Do another Export and save it to Documents for backup). Delete all the contacts from Address Book (using your delete key). Make sure your iCloud account is your default account (contacts -> preferences > general). Select All iCloud contacts from users and groups. Drag the file you previously dragged to your desktop back onto Address Book.

  That should merge those Mac contacts with your iCloud contacts.


Odd (potentially DNS) network problems on my Macbook Pro (VPN / Network Connect related)

So, I fixed this issue by changing my internal network to use a different IP address range. From 192.168.* to 10.0.*.

I'm assuming there was a conflict somewhere.

Anyway, hopefully this info helps somebody else.


How to disable Adobe Core Sync app on OS X from being launched automatically?

You can disable this Finder Sync extension from the System Preferences → Extensions pane (grey puzzle piece icon) – just untick Finder under the app name in question.
Then log out and back in (or restart if you have more than one user logged in to your Mac)

In OS X, the Finder Sync extension point lets you cleanly and safely modify the Finder’s user interface to express file synchronization status and control. Unlike most extension points, Finder Sync does not add features to a host app. Instead, it lets you modify the behavior of the Finder itself.

Extensions are parts of an app that are able to integrate with certain core components of the OS. Finder Sync extensions in particular enable tighter integration with Finder by way of sync status badges, and allowing buttons to be added to the toolbar, sidebar, and right click menus.
OS X keeps a database of all known apps on your computer, and this also includes any extensions (.appex bundles). When Finder launches, it queries this database for Finder Sync extensions and launches them. For security reasons, each extension lives in its own process.


The .nbi is the NetBoot set, it's the disk you are booting the Mac you want to image from that contains DeployStudio Runtime. From there you will run a workflow, that can incorporate an image if you want. The workflow is created in DeployStudio Admin.

To create images, I like to use AutoDMG: https://github.com/MagerValp/AutoDMG

Once you get your image, you'll want to make sure it's named with a .hfs.dmg (AutoDMG will take care of this for you).

You copy the image on to your DeployStudio repo, by mounting the file share and copying the file into a folder called Masters and a subfolder inside that called HFS (I'm doing this from memory so that name may be slightly off).

Once your Master is in place, you should be able to select it from the Imaging step in a new workflow you create in DeployStudio admin.

Make sure the fileshare and its contents are accessible by the user you setup for DeployStudio... that may be the issue.


Unresponsive Keyboard and Trackpad in Macbook Pro High Sierra 10.13.5

I'm not sure what model MacBook you have, but Apple just recently issued a "Keyboard Service Program for MacBook and MacBook Pro." Check out this link (https://www.apple.com/support/keyboard-service-program-for-macbook-and-macbook-pro) to see if your model is eligible. Hope this helps :)


How can I disable inline attachment previews (i.e. view as icon by default) in Mac Mail in macOS Mojave?

Applications (including Terminal) do not get "full disk access" (e.g. your user files) any more in Mojave.

Try to grant Terminal access in...System Preferences > Security & Privacy > Privacy > Full Disk Access

Unlock the system preference panel, by clicking the lock at the bottom left and filling in your password.  Then either drag and drop Terminal.app onto the window, or navigate to it by clicking the plus sign (+).

Then launch Terminal and try your command again.

defaults write com.apple.mail DisableInlineAttachmentViewing -bool yes

PS. Alternatively you could disable SIP (System Integrity Protection) from Recovery, run your command, check that it worked and subsequently enable SIP again.  Less elegant, usually not advised (in case you forget to re-enable it again), a lot of booting in and out, but just as effective.


Automator finish one task before moving on?

Unfortunately empty trash is a message sent to Finder, and, from Automator's point of view, the task finishes when the message is sent.

In this conversation there's a possible solution. You have to modify your Applescript task with a check on the size of the trash:

tell application "Finder"
    set first_size to ""
    set second_size to " "
    set trash_folder to (path to trash folder)

    empty trash

    repeat until first_size is equal to second_size
        set first_size to size of (info for trash_folder) as integer
        delay 2
        set second_size to size of (info for trash_folder) as integer
    end repeat
end tell

This way the task will not end until the size of the trash stops decreasing.

If you use tmutil for time machine backup terminal command, there is a -b option for startbackup command that tells the script to wait until the backup is finished before exiting.


Eclipse Fails To Launch Complaining of Incompatible Java VM

From your comments you have  the Java 8 JRE which is only a web plugin you need to install the Java 8 JDK

Changing things in ~/.bashrc does not effect the environment of apps launched in the GUI


How to add a location to photos in the new photos app?

In OS X 10.10's Photos application, location information is read-only.

Photos reads GPS coordinates from image files during import and displays the location in the Info window. It can also show photos belonging to a collection or moment on a map. The "Photos Help" puts it this way: "If your camera has GPS capability (as iPhone does), or you’ve added GPS information to your photos, Photos can automatically display your photos on a map."

Unfortunately location information is also read-only by the way of Apple Script. I develop the photo geocoding software HoudahGeo. When used with iPhoto or Aperture, this allows for a very elegant workflow:

Import photos into iPhoto or Aperture
Geocode the photos using HoudahGeo or other free software.
Write geotags to the original image files
Have HoudahGeo notify iPhoto or Aperture of the newly added geotags

The last step of the workflow uses Apple Script to update the library to reflect the location information added to the files. This is not currently possible with the new Photos application.

Until Apple adds the option to change location information via Apple Script, we have to resort to a less elegant workflow.

Import photos using the Image Capture application
Geocode the photos using third party software like HoudahGeo or other free software.
Write EXIF/XMP geotags to the image files
Import the tagged files into your Photos library

This workflow does have its advantages. The process of updating the iPhoto or Aperture library for thousands of photos can be rather slow. Adding the GPS information before import is faster.

The above workflow also ensures that GPS information is stored as EXIF/XMP tags within the image files. Just the same as if you had used a GPS camera. The location information will thus always stay with the images.

Update for macOS Sierra:

With Apple Photos 2.0 and HoudahGeo 5.1 running on Sierra it again possible to notify Photos of changes made to location information. I.e. HoudahGeo will geotag orginal image files with EXIF/XMP tags and then pass on location information to the Photos app.


Time Machine backup on per app basis with application preferences?

The short answer to your question is 'it depends on the app'. This thread in the Apple Discussions Forums implies that, at least for basic apps that do not have complex connections with the system, it is possible to restore via Time Machine.

If I am not mistaken, Time Machine works the same way in all folders (including Library and Applications) as long as they are not listed as an exception in System Preferences. What this means is that if you open a new Finder window showing the user's Library folder and then call Time Machine, that should bring back the preferences subfolder for your app when you "go back in time" to when you had it installed. Naturally, you would have to know in advance the name and location of the app's preferences folder within your user's Library folder.

After that is done, then opening Time Machine in a Finder window showing the Applications folder should bring back your app if you "go back in time" to when you had it installed. It's a two step process, but I don't see why it would not work at least for simple apps.


Do I need to keep apps on my Mac with iCloud

As Adam has said, you should disable syncing applications and yes it is safe.

However if an app gets pulled from the App Store by Apple, which you have purchased but do not have currently install on your iOS device, you will not be able to get it back from iCloud. Whereas if you have it saved on your computer in iTunes you can get the app back by syncing.

iCloud doesn't actually back up the apps on your iPhone, it only stores your data for that app, if your restore from iCloud then it will download the apps clean from the App Store and then insert your data from iCloud, so that it appears that the entire app has been backed up.

If they backed up the entire app, for every user of an app there would be that many copies of that app on iCloud which is hugely wasteful.

So don't delete apps that are no longer on the app store else you won't be able to get them back. And if you have an app that looks like it will get pulled shortly (e.g. the app has tethering hidden inside of it) keep it on your computer. But most apps you are fine deleting and just relying on iCloud.


How can I rename an ordered list of files with an ordered list of file names?

For example save this file as filenames.txt:

apple
banana
orange

Then run:

a=($(<filenames.txt));for d in *;do i=0;for f in $d/*;do echo mv $f $d/${a[i++]}.jpg;done;done

Remove echo if the output looks right.

If the file names contain spaces, add IFS=$'\n'; to the start and add double quotes around the variables.


What is this History menu option in the menu bar and how do I clear it?

I presume you are referring to Safari. The option appears when Safari is the front application.

You can clear Safari's history by going to History → Clear History….

To clear a certain section of history rather than the entire history, press ⌥⌘2, select the rows you wish to delete and press ⌫.


You need to open XQuartz, go to X11 → Preferences → Security, there are two check boxes: disable the first, enable the second. Restart XQuartz and try again. You will also need to define the $DISPLAY variable like this:

export DISPLAY=clienthost:0.0


Unable to update third-party apps on macOS Sierra -- temp dir not writeable

This indicates that the permissions on that folder have become corrupted, or were changed by some other process.  My suggestion would be to follow the directions in the link below, and reinstall Sierra from the Recovery Partition.  Doing so, should reset the permissions on that folder, which should then allow you to successfully run the installer.  Just make sure to pay attention to the part where they say, "Skip Step 2 because you will not be erasing your disk.".

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/7715561?start=0&tstart=0


2015 MacBook Air (13" - 256 SSD, 8GB RAM) Boot problems

If your installer/boot media works fine on a different Mac but fails on your MacBook Air, the issue is likely hardware (logic board).
You don't need a drive to load the installer.  If you boot from USB or boot from the network (Internet), it is caching the installer in memory.  If you're to run diskutil list command while the installer is running, you'll find many "disks" from 0 to 20-something.  These are the RAM disks and this is normal.
What you've done by booting both Internet Recovery and USB installer is bypass a potential failure point - the internal storage device.  The fact that the problem still exists  using both of those methods indicates you have logic board issue (possibly CPU or memory).  By booting from Internet, you remove both the USB bus and the internal storage from the equation.  Process of elimination says there's nothing more to bypass - the problem is with your main board.
Apple (service) isn't going to do anything that you've already done.  Apple won't repair this - they will quote you for a logic board replacement.  This normally runs about $5-700 USD.  At that price point, I'd go for a new machine.
Also Sell that one as salvage and recoup some money.  The screen is good, the battery, case, keyboard, trackpad, etc. can all be used for repair parts by a shop.  Even the logic board can be salvaged for individual components (the SMC chip is in high demand).


How do I increase the heap size for Netbeans and any app run via Netbeans?

As Ian C. says, the heap size is Application specific, therefore, here's how you increase it for Netbeans:

Right click on the NetBeans.app and select Show content of package.
Inside the package go to /Contents/Resources/NetBeans/etc/ and open the netbeans.conf file.
In the netbeans_default_options setting, change or add the following options: -J-Xmx... (e.g. -J-Xmx1600M) or -J-XX:MaxPermSize=... (e.g. -J-XX:MaxPermSize=500M).
Save the file and restart the IDE.

If you want to increase the Project's heap size you must go to your project's Properties / Run / VM Options, and in the text box add the arguments.


How can I make Apple's keyboard shortcuts work in Chrome?

Chrome doesn't call Apple's spell checking code and instead wrote their own keyboard handling routines. Since this is how the program was made, there's not much of a workaround except to do your typing in a program that calls Apple's text input libraries and paste the results into Chrome. (Similar to how Dictionary lookup using Control-Command-D didn't work for several years on Chrome either until the code was updated to call Apple's SDK for that function).

You can see this Chromium bug might apply and also, that Chrome is in the process of removing it's own spell checker / autocorrect mechanism and shifting to rely on Apple's implementation: https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/list?q=label:Cr-UI-Browser-Spellcheck


How can I create a default dock for all users (Mavericks)?

Your Question should be answered here :

OSX 10.8 - How to keep a custom dock for all users that login

Basically, you create your dock in your account, copy the .plist from ~/Library to the System Template Lib and your're done.


As of iOS 13, what filetypes does Safari's Download Manager support?

There’s no definitive list of file types which download automatically, since it’s not based on file type but rather the server providing the content. Safari supports every file type if the server is set up to provide a download.

You can force a download of a link to a resource rather than opening the link by holding down on the link and choosing Download Linked File.


"This is not a supported method of installing the operating system” when reinstalling OS X

Update:

Tried Internet Recovery and still couldn't get Internet work in Terminal ( can't setup DNS, /etc/hosts file is on a readonly filesystem).

I went back to to try every boot key options I can find online, and Cmd-opt-PR to reset NVRAM fixed it.


How to select text with touchpad without pressing the "hard" key?

The settings location where the three finger "drag" is enabled has changed over time.
From OS X 10.11 "El Capitan" to macOS 10.14 "Mojave":

Go to System Preferences > Accessibility
Choose Mouse & Trackpad from the left options list
Click Trackpad Options
Tick "Enable dragging" and select “three finger drag” from the drop-down menu next to it

For macOS 10.15 "Catalina" and later:

Go to System Preferences > Accessibility
Choose Pointer Control
On the Mouse & Trackpad tab, click Trackpad Options
Tick "Enable dragging" and select “three finger drag” from the drop-down menu next to it


Where can I find the stock audio files (notifications, ringtones, etc) from iOS 6?

If your device is jailbroken, you can grab them from /System/Library/Audio/UISounds


Badges don't show for mail in sub folders

Found the answer!

Mail Preferences -> General -> New Message Notifications. The default is inbox only. Use the dropdown menu to change it to all mailboxes.


Font changes on Preview 2017 for text on photo

If you are using the Markup feature to add annotations to the image, you need to have the Markup Toolbar enabled:

Text options are then available:


Is it normal to have a pair of slight bumps on the left edge of an iPad Mini screen?

The case linked to in the OP’s question has a built in screen protector.  There is dust or debris trapped between the screen and the protector membrane.

Removing the case and protector then cleaning the screen according to the installation instructions then reinstalling the case should fix the problem.

From the SUPCASE product description:

  Front cover with Built-in screen protector prevents Scratches without compromising sensitivity


How do I stop DVD player from autoplaying?

You might have more success using RCDefaultApp (freeware, old but still functional) if only because it shows a few more choices of precisely what to ignore.


MAC High Sierra password stopped working

So, here is what worked!

I went to Directory Utility.
Directory Editor
Compared the Authentication Authority for working user and locked user.
Noticed this new entry on the top: ;LocalCachedUser;/Active Directory/xxxx:5D79515xxxx3B24B.
Removed the entry and rebooted.

Voila, everything is working fine!


Extracting Voice Memos from iPhone to iTunes

If you sync your iPhone with iTunes and have the voice memo syncing enabled, then the voice memos will be transferred to your computer when syncing. The voice memos will show in the Voice Memos playlist.


Can I edit the Info.plist of an App so that is always starts hidden?

Open the info.plist in textedit and check if the key "LSUIElement" exist.  If not, then add the following piece of code.

<key>LSUIElement</key>
<true/>

If it does, then just change the key from <true/> to <false/>.


How to prevent the keyboard layout from changing?

update: I just noticed it happens with other programs too (for example mac OS' own Notes app) :(

I consider this is a weird quirk of Microsoft Outlook. See here for more details: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msoffice/forum/msoffice_word-mso_mac/disable-automatically-switch-keyboard-to-match/717be469-2267-483b-9d66-7f9e77fac01e

I guess I'll use the Outlook Webapp from now on sigh


Finder displays wrong volume names, drive status (High Sierra)

I was able to go to the apple menu, choose 'force quit' and choose finder.  The button changed to relaunch and then it picked up my volumes correctly.

This still seems like a bug, but this will fix it without rebooting. :)


How can my wife use my iPod touch with her Facebook account?

Depending on the iOS levels, you might have to do the following:

Sign out of Facebook / remove the account from the settings app
Sign out of the Facebook app

At that point, your wife's account would be free to sign in to either the Facebook app or the system wide Facebook account slot for general sharing.


Create the file /etc/apache2/users/niccolomineo.conf and copy the following into the file...

<Directory "/Users/niccolomineo/Creative Cloud Files/dev/">
    Options Indexes MultiViews
    AllowOverride None
    Order allow,deny
    Allow from all
</Directory>

Then restart apache sudo apachectl restart and you should find your pages at http://localhost/~niccolomineo.


Preview won't remember the last viewed page of PDF

Upgrade from Yosemite to El Captain could mess up the preference files.
Delete the folder /Users/{user name}/Library/Containers/com.apple.Preview to reset settings.


How can i compare achievements with Game Center in iOS7

Game Center > Games > select a game > Achievements

or what did you mean by "compare my achievements"?


Trying to recover from very old macOS backups, but not sure I can recall the login/passwords I was using then

My old beagle (old but smart !) has a answer : Use a second Apple computer . Start the locked computer in target mode and use it as a external HD. Connect a Apple computer with the locked one (with a FW/USB/TB cable https://support.apple.com/en-ca/guide/mac-help/mchlp1443/mac) . The locked Apple will show-up on the desktop as external HD . Enjoy ! (Could not work if the MacOS are from different OS generations)


How to Command-X files on OS X El Capitan?

Just copy the file as normal with command+c and then when you past use
command+option+v and it will paste the file, and also cut it from its original location


Ask for password input when mounting a volume via Automator

I don't think the "Ask for Text" action provides that feature so you'll have to run an AppleScript command instead to display the dialog:

on run {input, parameters}
    return {text returned of (display dialog "Password:" ¬
        default answer "" with icon note buttons {"Cancel", "Enter"} ¬
        default button "Enter" with hidden answer)}
end run

which produces the following dialog:

Now, I don't know about hdiutil but this is how you might be able to use it:


Permission denied error when opening Terminal

solved by repairing permissions, thanks to jakebird451 and Mark in the comments above

i'm not sure is sudo is necessary, however this worked to fix it

sudo chmod 0644 /etc/paths

thanks!


The engraving on the back of the watch will tell you. The original Apple Watch just has ‘Watch’ engraved and is sometimes called “Series 0” since it is one generation earlier than “Series 1”. All subsequent watch models have ‘Watch • Series x’ where x is the series of the watch.

Click to enlarge.
Left: Apple Support How to find the serial number or IMEI for your Apple Watch
Right: 9to5Mac Top new Apple Watch Series 1 and Series 2 features

You can also look up the model number on the Identify your Apple Watch Apple Support page. You can find the model number in the iPhone Watch app under My Watch → General → About.


How to use OS X HTML Mail signature on iOS Mail

There is a fairly easy work-around to this.  It requires that you setup your email signature in your Gmail account online.  You can include an image, which means it gets uploaded to your Google account, with a permanent reference to it.  Once you've setup your signature in Gmail, just send yourself an email from the online account.  Open this email up on your phone.  Now select the content of the email, your signature, and press copy.  Now go to Settings > Mail and add your signature by pasting it into the signature box.  Your image will be included. If you used different font sizes, they will all be the same now, but Bold, Italics, etc. will be kept.  Even links have the URL intact.  When you send a new mail from the phone, you might not see the image in the mail you are composing, but as the URL is present in the underlying HTML code, the receiving party will see your image in your signature.  This method seems to work with iOS 10.2 PB 3.


Can two 500 GB external hard drives be used like a single 1 TB hard drive to use for Time Machine?

Depending on your system there are several methods to "concatenate" two or more external drives.

RAID0: diskutil createRAID stripe TMRAID JHFS+ disk1 disk2
JBOD: diskutil createRAID concat TMRAID JHFS+ disk1 disk2
CoreStorage: diskutil cs create disk1s2 disk2s2. A CoreStorage Logical Volume has to be created addtionally.
ZFS: This requires the additional installation of software. Link to Time Machine setup.
MHDDFS: This requires the additional installation of software. ~Setup link (I didn't test this solution as a Time Machine destination).

At the time of writing the new APFS (available in Sierra) apparently doesn't support Time Machine backups.

None of these solutions is recommended as Time Machine destination volume.

The survival probability of the 500 GB drives (I assume they are at least 3 years old) is low compared to a new single drive.
Since both drives are attached externally (via USB, FW etc.) the mechanical handling is error prone. If you detach any of the two drives accidentally while in use, you may loose the whole content because the volume usually is not recoverable afterwards.

I recommend to get a new single external drive (2 TB - 4 TB) which also provides some additional space to "breathe".


Could you help me to identify this font?

According to WhatFontIs, seems to be In And Out Black:

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/fenotype/in-and-out/black/


Show exposé/"All Application Windows" from the dock

Found a way to (sort of) do it: https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/76103/38367

The following command will enable the mouse scroll-up on an app icon to open exposé:

defaults write com.apple.Dock scroll-to-open -bool true
killall Dock

More info on: http://osxdaily.com/2011/11/30/enable-hidden-stack-gestures-mac-os-x-lion/


Single User mode (10.13.6) write locked with SIP disabled

I can say that the problem was indeed with SIP.

  status: disabled (Apple Internal)
  should apparently have been status: disabled without (Apple Internal).

Unfortunately, I only got so far by retrying several times and mixing up the order of some steps up to step 7, and can not with certainty say what has fixed it.

Now moving on to Part 2.


CTRL+a moves to the beginning of the line, CTRL+e to the end of the line.


How can I reenable admin privileges without an administrative user?

You can try whether sudo -s still works (which would allow you to add yourself to the admin group again), but probably it won't.

Do the following

Reboot into Single User mode by keeping Cmd-S pressed during reboot
/sbin/mount -uw /
rm /var/db/.AppleSetupDone
reboot

This will trick your Mac into behaving like a new installation (but with your data still intact). Follow the setup without migrating any data etc., near the end you will have the option to create a new user with admin privileges. Make sure to pick a new username here to avoid any conflicts.


How long before Standby/Deep sleep mode is activated?

You can list some power management settings with pmset -g (get). The default standbydelay was 4200 seconds (70 minutes) on my MacBook Air.

$ pmset -g
Active Profiles:
Battery Power       -1
AC Power        -1*
Currently in use:
 standbydelay         4200
 standby              1
 womp                 1
 halfdim              1
 hibernatefile        /var/vm/sleepimage
 darkwakes            1
 networkoversleep     0
 disksleep            10
 sleep                15
 hibernatemode        0
 ttyskeepawake        1
 displaysleep         15
 acwake               0
 lidwake              1

According to Apple Portables: About standby mode, "the standby mode activates after just over an hour of "regular" sleep".


How many backups does iCloud save for iPhones?

Per device, iCloud keeps the most recent backup, then 1–2 prior backups, regardless of age.


sharingd wants to use the "Local Items keychain

What is sharingd?
sharingd is sharing daemon that enables AirDrop, Handoff, Instant Hotspot, Shared Computers, and Remote Disc in the Finder.

How to solve asking for password problem?
I think the login password and the keychain are not the same. That's why you get those messages. You want your default keychain to be unlocked automatically when you log in. Synchronise your Keychain Access and account login passwords by doing this:

Open Keychain Access (you can get to it by choosing Utilities from the Go menu in the Finder).
From the Edit menu, choose Change Password for Keychain "login."
Type the former password of the account that you are currently logged in to, then click OK.
If you entered the correct password, a new window appears; enter the original password again in the Current Password field.
In the New Password field, type the password that matches your current account password.
Re-enter the newer password in the Verify field, then click OK.


The first thing you want to do is reference the drive specs to see what it is rated in terms of data transfer speed.

According to C/Net, it has an external data transfer rate of 300MBs (it's a SATA drive, so this is expected)

So, if you are getting a drive speed rating of 50MB/s, things are definitely slow.  5400 RPM is also quite slow to begin with.

Your best option is to upgrade your drive to an SSD.  I have written a post that addresses this very topic.  Have a look here: My Mac is getting really slow, what should I do?


Yosemite maximization shortcut and Java applications

http://spectacleapp.com is a free app which will allow you to do all sorts of window manipulation on the Mac, including “Fullscreen” which really means “maximize”:

You can set your own keyboard shortcuts, of course.


Mac Audio output remove high pitch / high frequency sounds

I recommend Rouge Amoebas Audio Hijack.
What you are looking for is actually a low pass filter. Low frequencies should pass it, high frequencies should be attenuated.
Audio Hijack is a high-quality macOS audio tool, which offers not only audio manipulation via an equalizer, but also a dedicated low pass filter.

Start Audio Hijack, add a New Session and select the preset Sweeten. This is a pre-build audio enhancement workflow for all sounds that are played by your selected output device. Then select the category Build-in effects and drag the Low Pass Filter block into the audio processing chain. It should look like the screenshot i attached. You can easily customize the cutoff frequency with a slider.
As soon as you press the start button on the bottom left, the audio effects will be applied.
In case a plain old equalizer is sufficient for you, you can try the free eqMac App.


Opensnoop: dtrace: error on enabled probe ID 5 (ID 163: syscall::open:return): invalid user access in action #11 at DIF offset 12

Usually the errors you've posted are preceded by this information:

dtrace: system integrity protection is on, some features will not be available

You will have to disable SIP (System Integrity Protection) for dtrace.  To do so, boot into "Recovery" by pressing cmdR at startup, then launch "Terminal" from the "Utilities" menu there and type:

csrutil enable --without dtrace

Then press enter
(It will warn you that this unsupported configuration might break in the future.)

Now you should be able to restart and boot back into your OS and run dtrace without those errors.

However, once you're finished using dtrace, you are usually advised to return SIP to its original state, again by booting into Recovery and fully enabling it again:

csrutil enable

...or somewhat faster, by typing

sudo csrutil clear

...in your usual OS environment (i.e. not Recovery) followed by a reboot.


Speed up Mission Control Preview Animation

Not sure why you're using ctrl-shift to do this. This exits Mission Control, but selects the desktop you clicked on. The reason the animation is so slow is that you're held shift (which slows down many OS X animations). Holding ctrl does nothing.

I think what you want to do is switch the preview area of Mission Control to show the contents of another desktop.
This is accomplished by option clicking on the Desktop you want to preview.


Unable to write to any external USB, even after formatting it

There is two possibilities here:

Your drive is mounted as read-only
You do not have permission writing to the filesystem

(The system can definitely write to the drive because you can format the drive)
To address the first one, please enter the following command in Terminal:
mount

You should get something like this:
/dev/disk1s1 on / (apfs, local, journaled)
devfs on /dev (devfs, local, nobrowse)
/dev/disk1s4 on /private/var/vm (apfs, local, noexec, journaled, noatime, nobrowse)
map -hosts on /net (autofs, nosuid, automounted, nobrowse)
map auto_home on /home (autofs, automounted, nobrowse)
/dev/disk#s# on /volumes/<drive name> (ExFAT, local, (...))

Look at the line that say ... on /volumes/NONAME, and see if there is a "read-only" in the bracket, like this one:
com.apple.TimeMachine.2020-08-15-213432@/dev/disk1s1 on /volumes/BK/Snapshots/2020-08-15-213432 (apfs, local, noexec, read-only, journaled, nobrowse)

If there is, try:
mount -uw /volumes/NONAME

and see if you can write to the disk. There is probably a record in your /etc/fstab that causes the mount to be readonly.
If your drive is readonly for whatever reason, you should get this error:
root@Joys-MacBook-Pro /p/v/root# hdiutil attach -readonly test.dmg
/dev/disk2              GUID_partition_scheme
/dev/disk2s1            Microsoft Basic Data            /Volumes/1 1
root@Joys-MacBook-Pro /p/v/root# mount | grep /volumes/1\ 1
/dev/disk2s1 on /volumes/1 1 (exfat, local, nodev, nosuid, read-only, noowners)
root@Joys-MacBook-Pro /p/v/root# mount -uw /volumes/1\ 1/
mount: unknown special file or file system /volumes/1 1/.

You should not get any other errors. If you do, edit your question to include a complete log of commands you type and the result. (Or put it in the comments).
If that is not the case, then it's likely a permission issue. In your terminal, enter:
sudo -i

and enter your password. The password will NOT show on your screen. When you are done, hit enter. Then, enter the following:
touch /volumes/NONAME/1

and see if there is any error. If not, then it's a permission issue. Execute the following command:
chown -R <your account name here> /volumes/NONAME
chmod -R 755 /volumes/NONAME
exit

See if you can write to the folder. If not, then there is something wrong with your system. You can consider reinstalling it (this won't remove your application, settings, or data).


Configured Airport as Bridge and use OS X Server for DHCP and DNS, no Internet

You're trying to accomplish more in one step than you can handle. Break down your problem into subproblems, and solve each one.

The first you want to get working is to have an internet connection on your Mac Mini when the Airport is set in bridge mode. Do this without setting up DNS-servers and changing DNS settings to use your Mac Mini as the DNS server.

When you have working, you can add on the DNS.

Basically at this point you want to ensure:

a) That the Mac Mini's network port is setup with the correct IP, subnet mask and default gateway. This is the static IP and network settings, you have been supplied by your ISP.

b) That your Mac Mini can "ping" addresses on the internet. Open Network Utility and try to an address on the Internet. Try first with an IP (such as 23.78.125.15) and then with a DNS-name (such as www.apple.com).

Remember that in this (simple) scenario, you can only use an IP-address once. I.e. if you assign a static IP to the AirPort Extreme, you cannot assign the same static IP to your Mac Mini.

If you have got only one static IP, you cannot use that IP on both the Airport Extreme and on your Mac Mini.


How do I ensure that the macOS root account bug is fully fixed on my machine?

You can't at this point. The security patch only runs once and Apple hasn't released a new full point installer that guarantees you're patched.

What you can do is set a secure root password and watch for log in attempts and successes and disable sharing until Apple releases a full OS point release with no need for a Security patch to be put on top of one or more unpatched full point releases.

My answer here stands:

https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/307244/5472

If you can’t install the official patch or don't want to trust that it worked, then

You don't want to disable root user on High Sierra only.

To secure your Mac, enable root with a long secure password.

We are not changing this at work until the next full point release is out for macOS which would likely be 10.13.2

I reason that since this was a race condition and Apple pushed the patch so quickly - we're pretty sure it's solid, but what if you got the patch before you upgraded to 10.13.1 and now it needs that patch a second time or what if the installer didn't really do it's job. Low chance either happened, but only you know how bad a breach would be on your computer with someone having total control.


Yes, it is Bluetooth 4.0. I've been using it for the past one year. Although Beats or Apple website do not provide this information this Engadget article explicitly mentions it.

  The Powerbeats² keep the (albeit modified) hook-over-the-ear design, but liberate heads from handsets via Bluetooth 4.0


You can set which default account it should use to store your contacts. Go System Preferences -> Mail, Contacts, Calendar -> scroll down to the contacts sections and set the Default Account


Open up "Settings" then tap on "General" and scroll down to the last option "Reset". Tap the third option "Reset Network Settings". This will take a few seconds and then your phone will restart.

BE ADVISED Doing this will deleted your saved wireless network passwords and wireless network history so you will have to reenter these passwords to reconnect to wireless networks. This option does not delete any of your personal data off your phone.


You can check out OWC. On the page itself, they have information on the RAM that's suitable for various Mac. They also have a bunch of video tutorial on the installation of RAM for different Mac model.


How do I get iTunes to actually PLAY songs at random once shuffle is turned on?

When iTunes shuffles through a playlist, library, or other list, it only will shuffle among items for which the "checkbox" column is checked. By default, this would include all the items in your library; only if you uncheck the box for a song would that remove it from the list of songs to shuffle.

It sounds as though your library is set up with all the songs unchecked. If no songs are checked to be included in shuffle, one gets the behavior you describe. The solution is to go to your library and make sure all your items are checked, not unchecked.


How do I fix a corrupted USB drive on OS X?

Step 1
Open Disk Utility (it is in Applications/Utilities) and click New Image with the device you want to fix selected

Step 2
It doesn't matter what you name it but put it on your desktop so you can find it easily. Make sure it is a read/write.

Step 3
Find the disk on your desktop and open it. It should be empty.

Step 4
Open Terminal (in the same place as Disk Utility) and type in diskutil list and locate your drive. It should have something similar to the name that shows up in disk utility indented under it (in my example it doesn't)

Step 5
We are going to use a Terminal utility called DD to copy the contents bit by bit of the disk image we created to the drive. Make sure you do this right because you can seriously damage your hard drive if you don't. Feel free to ask questions.
This is the layout of dd: dd if=<source> of=<target> bs=1m
So type dd if= and then drag the drive (the one I named "Something") into the terminal window. After that copy the /dev/disk# from the diskutil command of your disk. Make sure it is the right one or you will overwrite your hard drive or other connected drive. Adding onto the dd command type of= and paste the /dev/disk#. Now add bs=1m to that.
Now in the dd command you should have something that looks like:
dd if=/Volumes/Something of=/dev/disk1 bs=1m
This is what it would look like for my example.
If everything looks ok then press enter.
This can take a long time and will not tell you what is happening until it is done. It will just be a blank line in the terminal. When you press enter just let it go until it is done. You will know when it is done because it will tell you something like copied something bytes....
Final step
Now that you have done that you should be able to go back into disk utility and repartition your dive under the partition tab. If you don't know how to partition it, just click the plus button near the bottom left, name your partition, and make it Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and click apply.
Remember if you are unsure, something is different in the steps, or something doesn't work, ask questions!


Sparse bundle on NAS - can't open "Resource temporarily unavailable"

Disable "Time Machine service" for the share the disk image is stored on.


Safari keeps warning "malicious javascript detected on this domain"

JavaScript of Baidu Ad and Statistics are redirected to GitHub urls https://github.com/greatfire/ and https://github.com/cn-nytimes/ It is in fact DDoS due to large population.
GitHub returns an alert page in order to stop the recursive JS running for each user.
This is possibly done by GFW (Great Fire Wall) as the two URLs are not welcomed by them and only people outside mainland China faced this issue today. (GitHub cannot function well in China).
A detailed analysis can be found on WooYun (in Simplified Chinese)
http://drops.wooyun.org/papers/5398


Simplest way to record voice on Macbook Air

Scenario 1: You're both in the same room

Open up QuickTime Player. Select File -> New Audio Recording.... Make sure the source is set to Built-in Microphone (see screen shot below). Hit the big red Record button. Talk away.

Scenario 2: You're using Skype or something like it to converse

This is a little trickier but not impossible. You'll need the SoundFlower app from Cycling '74. If you're using Skype you'll set it's audio output to be the SoundFlower input. Then in QuickTime you'll set the audio input to be SoundFlower's 2-channel output. This routes the audio from Skype in to QuickTime. Record as above.


iTunes asks me to subscribe to iTunes Match again when I try to turn iTunes Match back on

So it turned out that I had just been logged out of iTunes Store. After I logged back in, I was able to turn iTunes Match back on.


From the main screen (Health Data), tap on Activity, then the item you want to add a data point for (Steps, Walking + Running Distance, etc.)

From there, tap on the + in the upper-right hand corner and you can enter a new data point.


Pretty much no matter how loud you play it, the profanity will be audible to some extent. Plus, it's hard to predict when it's coming (which is why networks need to use 10-second delays when broadcasting live stuff). It's best to edit this in iMovie by detatching the audio and using the Split command before the offending word, then trimming the audio clip until the swear is out of your video. Then, drag your censor sound effect to the end of the first of your separated audio clips and trim that bleep to the start of the rest of your audio.

With this in mind, if the exact thing you requested in your question is what you want, you'll need to make a Service in Automator. First, open Automator, then create a Service in the next dialog. Find the Run Shell Script command and drag it into the drag-and-drop area. Copy-paste the text below into the text input area, replacing completePathOfFile with the path of your file:

Afplay completePathOfFile

Save this file and pick a memorable name.

Now go to System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts > Services > Scroll to General. After finding the service you saved earlier, click the Add Shortcut button and type the F12 key. Hope this helps.


Play sound from iPhone thru Macbook to external output

Get an inexpensive bluetooth HD receiver and cut out all the middle men and making macos delay the audio is my suggestion. Rogue Amoeba is the only company I know that meets your quality requirements.

Esinkin Bluetooth Receiver Wireless, NFC-Enabled Audio Adapter 4.0 for HD Home Stereo Music Streaming Sound System for 3.5mm (AUX and RCA) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07TK8ZKQT/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_xzFIEbX8B4NBV
AirFly Pro is awesome - https://www.twelvesouth.com/products/airfly?variant=30720749109305

There are dozens of great options for less than $25 Cost so all your devices, Mac and iOS can play to your audio system.

If you must go bluetooth to Mac, try AirFoil - you’re right you don’t need loopback or the full suite and processing.

https://www.rogueamoeba.com/airfoil/mac/

There are other Wi-Fi / Airplay options for macOS , but AirFoil is what I recommend.


Mac App Store shows OS X Lion installed after interrupted connection

If you select any tab in the App Store except for purchase and hold the option key down when you select purchased, you can re-download the Lion installer.

Using spotlight may also reveal that you have the installer somewhere on the mac - even an external drive and might avoid the delay and bandwidth use to download the installer again.


macOS: App icon remaining in Dock even after closing app

macOS Mojave introduced a feature to show recently launched app's icons in the Dock, even after quitting the app. To a new user of macOS, even if they have been using earlier releases of macOS for a while, this may give an impression that either the app is still running, or the icon got persistently added to the Dock. To disable Dock from displaying recently launched app icons in the Dock, go to System Preferences app → Dock and uncheck Show recent applications in Dock. This setting is enabled by default in macOS Mojave.

While this was not the reason in this particular case, some other reasons this may happen are discussed below:

A macOS app is generally (well in majority of cases) programmed to show it's icon in the Dock when it's launched. (There's an exception to this general rule, an app can be programmed to run and show their icon only in the Menu bar).

Unlike other desktop operating systems, a macOS app generally doesn't quit when you click on the close button (shown in red below):

Clicking the close button generally close the app window and doesn't necessarily quit the app. The app keeps running. (I said generally, because some app are programmed to quit when the close button is clicked).

The way to quit an app completely is either to use Menu bar command App Name → Quit App Name, or to use the universal keyboard shortcut Command + Q. This will always quit the app and remove it's icon from the Dock (if the icon wasn't present in the Dock before app was launched, and you haven't enabled Keep in Dock from the app's Dock icon's context menu).

If an app icon is not present in the Dock before it is launched, it doesn't automatically gets added to the Dock when the app is run.

Another possible scenario where the app icon remains in the Dock happens when you have manually rearrange it in the Dock. Once an app icon is moved to a new location in Dock, the Keep in Dock option in the Dock icon's context menu gets checked. This is by design.

As far as automatic launch of iTunes is concerned when an iPhone (or any other iOS device) is connected to your Mac, you can turn this off. Launch iTunes and open iTunes preferences by using Menu bar command iTunes → Preferences... or using keyboard shortcut Command + ,, go to Devices tab and check Prevent iPods, iPhones and iPads from syncing automatically.


That is the incorrect key combination. You are pressing Command instead of Control.

To reset the SMC on portables with a builtin battery, press (left side):

ShiftControlOption + Power Button

Subsequently, release them at the same time. Then power on your computer.


How to make path prompt easier to read by color-coding each `/` (forward slash)?

If I understand the question correctly, you want to have your prompt display the entire path of your current directory in blue but with each of the forward slashes ("/") in pink.

Unfortunately, you can't do this in your prompt.

Use the builtin precmd () function.

ZSH gives us a precmd function which is similar to Bash's PROMPT_COMMAND.  These allow a command to be issued before the prompt is displayed.

I also wouldn't recommend a long prompt anyway as it makes usability very difficult when entering commands. Putting the full directory above your prompt is much better from a UI standpoint.  The following code accomplishes that.

Simply put the following in your ~/.zprofile.

precmd ()  { printf "\n"; pwd | awk -F "/" ' {for (i=1; i<=NF; i++) printf "\033[01;34m"$i"\033[38;5;206m/"; printf"\n" }' }

And here are the results:

The above screenshot is my iTerm window showing that I have traversed deep into my /Applications/Firefox.app directory with the current directory formatted in blue separated by pink forward slashes.

How it Works...

I've expanded the one line premcmd function above so that it's multi-line and added in some variables so we can better see what's going on.

precmd() {
printf "\n";
pwd | awk -F "/" '{ blue="\033[01;34m"; \
                    pink="\033[38;5;206m"; \
                    for (i=1; i<=NF; i++) \
                      printf blue $i pink "/"; \
                      printf "\n"
                   }'
}

Here's what it all means:

printf "\n" prints out a new line char.  This is for aesthetics.
pwd returns the working directory name (man pwd) which is then piped ("|") to the next command, awk (man awk).
-F "/" defines the field separator to the forward slash; awk's default is a space.  I kept my prompt to it's short and succinct setup.

Within the awk "program," delimited by the braces ("{" and "}") we have the following:

variables blue and pink are set to their ANSI escape codes \033[01;34m and \033[38;5;206m respectively.
We then have a for/do loop that iterates through each of the fields that awk has processed.  NF is the total number of fields.
printf blue $i and printf pink "/" prints out the directory name in blue and the forward slash in pink


1.) Go to SETTINGS next to your networks name there's a blue arrow click on that.

2.) Now turn ON auto-join

3.) Turn OFF auto-log in

4.) It Works!


User /System Permissions none.(Set to 000)

Boot into single user mode (hold ⌘S on boot), then enter:

mount -uw /
chown root /
chmod 1775 /
exit

This will reset the permissions for the entire drive and all its contents allowing full read and write, and may take a long time — don't interrupt it. Once you are booted back in, go to Disk Utility and do a permissions repair to set the permissions correctly per OS X.


Silencing "Your disk is almost full" notification

The solution to disabling the "almost full" and "full" notification is to disable the daemon responsible for it:

launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.diskspaced.plist

or

launchctl stop com.apple.diskspaced

Alternatively, if you only want to prevent the "almost full" from appearing so often then you can lower the GB threshold via:

minFreeSpace (int) - minimal free size in GB. Default: 20

The default 20GB is too high for small SSDs and a possible bug causes the alert to be shown every day rather than just once, so as a workaround you can lower the free space before the alert appears, e.g. to 10GB:

defaults write com.apple.diskspaced minFreeSpace 10

The daemon only reads its prefs on startup so you need to restart it if you have system integrity turned off:

launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.diskspaced.plist
launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.diskspaced.plist

Otherwise kill it:

killall diskspaced

In case you are interested in the other preferences for these disk alerts you can view some of them using the help param:

/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/StorageManagement.framework/Versions/A/Resources/diskspaced help
---
  Domain: com.apple.diskspaced
  Supported keys:
  debugLog (BOOL) - log additional debug information. Default: NO
  checkAllVolumes (BOOL) - check all volumes. Default: NO
  minDiskSize (int) - minimal disk size in GB. Default: 128
  minFreeSpace (int) - minimal free size in GB. Default: 20
  minPurgeableSpace (int) - minimal purgeabe space size in GB. Default: 20
---
  Commands: removeAllNotifications - Removes all scheduled and delivered user notificiations.

And here are a couple of hidden ones:

warningInterval (integer default 0)
lastWarningDate (string e.g. 2017-05-05 16:48:29 +0000)

I didn't look too closely at but it is possible setting the last warning date to a date in the future would also prevent the alert displaying.


http://brew.sh/

Install brew. The website lists the requirements, and the step by steps command line instructions. In short, it's:

ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL --insecure https://raw.github.com/mxcl/homebrew/go)"

Then:

brew install gnuplot

You're on 10.5.8 so installation requires '--insecure' as the older version of curl didn't have the CA secure certs packaged in.

Brew is also very handy for installing software in general. It's a unix package manager in the style of apt.


How to disable individual USB ports by script?

Have you seen this thread and the code here? Maybe shell could be used to "manually" rename the device ID or port to something odd that won't work, upon a specified event, then renames it to what it's supposed to be later.


External SSHD has Mac OS X installed by another mac. Can I use that SSHD on my Mac?

There is no serial number (like a Windows 7/8/10 product key) tied to the OS X installation. If you didn't configure iCloud/iTunes accounts while setting up the system it's almost plain vanilla.

But installing OS X in Internet Recovery Mode will install the system the Mac originally was shipped with. Moving the disk with this system to a newer Mac - which usually relies on a newer OS X version - will probably fail to boot.

Usually newer Mac contain newer or additional hardware. The older system usually doesn't ship with the newer or additional drivers needed.

Example:

The iMac Late 2011 (Mac12,1) was shipped with OS X 10.7.2. The iMac Late 2013 (Mac14,2) was shipped with OS X 10.8.4. Attaching the external disk to the iMac Late 2011 and using IRM's Restore OS X will install 10.7.x on it. The same disk attached to the iMac Late 2013 will probably fail to boot because the system is too old.


"Compress item" inside Time Machine backup

Why does this happen?

Because the Time Machine backup is read-only.

This behavior isn't specific to Time Machine; the same thing will happen if you try to compress an item that's in a read-only area of your hard disk (like /System), or an item on a read-only disk or network volume.


Add custom options to Apache Vhost config

Yes. In Lion, you do this by:

Creating a .conf file that contains your custom Apache configuration directives
Creating a .plist file in /etc/apache2/webapps that references your configuration file — see the manage for webapp.plist
Running webappctl to load your configuration file into one or more of your websites (virtual hosts) — see the manage for webappctl

A bit more about this can be seen at http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4813


Get Size of Folder Containing Hardlinks (like Time Machine Backups)

The answer, partially assisted by the comment above, is to use du

Specifically,
du -hs /path/to/folder/i/want/to/get/size/of

This counts hardlinked files only once. This is the parent folder of my hard-linked backups. So Finder tells me ~322 MB but du tells me ~171 MB. I don't think the 1000 vs 1024 issue is taken into account, but it's certainly close enough for my needs!


Possibility to recover data from restored iPhone?

Unless you had a backup, no. Do you have a copy of your contacts anywhere? iCloud for example? Visit www.icloud.com and login with your AppleID, see in the contacts tab if you still can find your contacts.

If this isn't the case, I don't think you can do anything but learn out of it and make backups regulary.

iTunes is offering you this option. See the support document on iOS: How to back up and restore your content for a complete description.


Assigning a key to light up CM Storm Devastator keyboard problem

First, check under: System Preferences > Keyboard and see if your "Use all F1, F2, etc. keys as standard function keys" option is checked.

If the box is not checked, you will need to hold down Fn as well - this means that it your keyboard combination should be Fn+Cmd+F14.

If the box is checked (which means pressing F1/F2 doesn't affect brightness, F11/F12 doesn't affect volume etc) then you may want to check your configurations and go over the steps in the tutorial again.

I hope this helps.


Unable to set up iCloud email on mail.app after accidentally deleting the ~/Library/Mail/ folder

Instead of selecting "iCloud" when adding the account, try "Add Other Mail Account..." and follow the configuration steps. Repost from comment for thread closure.


mid-2009 macbook pro - erased. Now "Mac OS X cannot start up from this disk". (and cannot install to this disk!)

Start from the original disk, open disk utility and reformat the disk. Then reinstall.


What SSL VPN client do you recommend for the mac?

At our company we use TunnelBlick, free, customisable and very stable.
It support SSL VPN without any problem.


Make sure you've opened Xcode and installed the components. To install the command line tools, run xcode-select --install.


MacBook Pro not detecting external monitor

Turns out there seems to be something wrong with the cable.

I tried using the cable that I use to the monitor that was being detected and it works now... Is this a faulty cable or is the cable simply just not compatible or something?


Possible to create a blockquote in Apple Notes?

I have never seen such an option. In macOS, the built-in help (Help > Notes Help) makes no mention of a block quote feature in the "Write and format notes" section, and a search within Notes help for "quote" did not return any results.
I think your best option is to increase the indentation of the text using Format > Indentation > Increase (⌘]).
On iOS and iPadOS, there is an option to increase indent under the format (Aa) menu.


Emails are stored in sub-directories located in ~/Library/Mail/V2 in .emlx format. This allows you to do a global plaintext search within a specific time machine backup folder.

I wrote a shell script to search for text within all .emlx files in a specific time machine backup.

Alternatively you can do a drive search in terminal (what my script automates). Replace Search Query with what you want to search for:

find "/Volumes/Time Machine" -name "*.emlx" -exec grep -l "Search Query" {} \;

Or also replace /Volumes/Time Machine with a more specific directory to speed things up e.g /Volumes/Time Machine/Backups.backupdb/stan/2014-09-16-084603/


Apple computers model name identification and getting detailed specs?

The Apple Specs database isn't always complete -- I think this is the relevant entry, but it doesn't list the model number so it's hard to be sure. I tend to use third-party sources for this sort of thing: I've found EveryMac.com to be reliable, and if you already have a Mac, Mactracker is excellent.

BTW, if you have the computer running with an internet connection, you can get it to look itself up: Pull down the Apple menu, select "About This Mac", then in the info box that opens click "More Info", then in the expanded info window click Support near the top right, then the Specifications link below.