I'm assuming your Mac is running macOS Sierra or later and your Mac has Night Shift enabled (by default Night Shift will change the appearance of your screen at night).

To access Night Shift settings go to Apple > System Preferences > Displays and select the Night Shift tab (see screenshot below):

Depending on your version of macOS your Displays preference pane may look slightly different to the image above.

Now you have two options:

Totally disable Night Shift by selecting "Off" from the Schedule drop-down menu
Experiment with the Color Temperature slider (at night with Pages open) to see if you can get it so that your font choices are easier to read.

NOTE: You shouldn't have to reboot for the changes to take effect, but if they don't when you're expecting them to (e.g. you set a schedule from 7pm and nothing changes even though it's already after 7pm), you may need to reboot for the change to take effect.


How can I store 15 years of older MacOS Mail on an external drive?

There are a number of existing questions/answers that address this very topic:

Archiving mail from Mail.app
Archiving Apple Mail to an External Drive
Move mail boxes data to external drive on Mac Mail on Mavericks
Moving individual Mailbox to external drive

These posts should get you on the right track to migrating your mail over to the external disk.

Basically, what you need to do is either copy/move the mbox file to the external drive or use the Export function in the Mail app to export mail to a mailbox located on the external drive.


I’m sorry; I don’t know any free apps, but I can suggest two paid apps, if that’s any use.

There’s an app called Audiobook Wizard that I used a year or so ago, under Snow Leopard, that seemed reasonably fast and easy to use.

However, it’s a paid app ($4.99) offered through the Mac App Store: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/audiobook-wizard/id460967298?mt=12. This is apparently Lion compatible and a decent audiobook editor. I haven’t tested this version though.

The developer also offers a free version, which can be downloaded from his site: http://www.audiobookwizard.com/. This only supports Snow Leopard and below, because it has PowerPC components, but you might like to download it to get a feel for the app.

There’s also Audiobook Builder. Again, this is a paid app ($5.99) in the Mac App Store: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/audiobook-builder/id406226796?mt=12. I haven’t used this before, and I’m not sure if it’s Lion compatible. A cursory search of the forums on the developer’s website doesn’t find any problems, so it might be ok. Might be worth trying; not sure.

You’re right about .m4a and .m4b files. This isn’t so much a problem with iTunes, as the file types. .m4b files have the capacity to “bookmark” parts of the file that .m4a doesn’t. From the Wikipedia page on MPEG-4 Part 14:

  Audio book and podcast files, which also contain metadata including chapter markers, images, and hyperlinks, can use the extension .m4a, but more commonly use the .m4b extension. An .m4a audio file cannot "bookmark" (remember the last listening spot), whereas .m4b extension files can.


How can I connect a bluetooth mouse without using the cursor (chicken and egg problem)

You can open the Mouse System Preferences by using Spotlight search.

Press ⌘-Space to open Spotlight. Type "mouse" to find the Mouse System Preferences and press Enter.
When the Mouse Preferences are opened, make sure the mouse is on and wait for it to be discovered. The "Connect" button should be blue, so you can press Enter to connect to it, and you're done.


MacBook Pro 13" Mid 2010 is not seeing internal SATA HDD

You may want to take a look at this answer to a very similar problem affecting 2012 13" MBPs. It's highly unlikely it's your SATA controller - if your MacBook can read DVDs or CDs then it's definitely not your controller as it's the same one that the HDD/SSD will be connected to (Intel Series 7 Platform Controller Hub).

As for why these cables fail I've yet to get to the bottom of the issue, but the ones I've replaced have no visible mechanical damage whatsoever, and replacing them has restored full SATA functionality.

The question/answer I linked to has some information that may make your cable change slightly easier.


I Mac wireless keyboard return key not working


Why is my terminal displaying my IP address beside my name?

The bash interactive shell prompt - if not tweeked further - is determined by the PS1-line in the file /etc/bashrc.

The 6th line PS1='\h:\W \u\$ ' decodes to

\h the hostname up to the first `.' - in your case 192-168-1-7
: delimiter
\W the basename of the current working directory, with $HOME abbreviated with a tilde - in your case ~ which is equivalent to the directory /Users/name/
 delimiter/space
\u short user name of the current user - in your case name
$ UserID-identifier (it turns to a # if the effective UID is 0 (~root) - else $)
 delimiter/space

A longer list of possible customizations of the prompt (e.g. time, date, bell) will be shown after opening Terminal.app, entering man bash and going down to PROMPTING.

The Terminal window title shows your working directory, the name of your shell  (bash - GNU Bourne-Again SHell) and its size: 80 characters x 24 lines.

Your fully qualified host name is probably 192-168-1-7.SLD.TLD (e.g. 192-168-1-7.dlink.home) and is assigned by a DHCP server in your network. Considering all that your Terminal window name and the embedded shell prompt is completely regular.


Is it possible to increase size of an APFS volume?

You can first increase the size of the disk image and in a second step the size of the container:

Get the disk image limits:

hdiutil resize -limits /path/to/disk_image

Eject the disk image items:

diskutil list
diskutil eject diskXsY #eject all volumes/items of the image

Depending on the limits increase the size of the image:

hdiutil resize -size <size> /path/to/disk_image #<size> in b|k|m|g|t (e.g. 50g)

This works for normal as well as sparse images. I didn't test sparse bundle images.
Mount the disk image:

hdiutil attach /path/to/disk_image

Get the details:

diskutil list

Increase the size of the APFS container:

diskutil apfs resizeContainer <disk_identifier_apfs_container> 0

Don't mix the disk identifiers of SSD and disk image APFS container here! The embedded APFS volume should be expanded automatically if required.

Using certain APFS formatted disk images (sparse images) may result in data loss in the image on APFS formatted physical disks with low free space.

Instead of using an APFS disk image simply create a new APFS cache volume (with quota?) in the APFS container (internal SSD) or an image/a second partition on an external HDD.


I eventually found a workaround.  I believe that the problem is that each new song reverts to whatever is the default equalizer setting.

The workaround is to set an equalizer preset individually for each song.  You can do this for several songs at once--all of them, if you want--by highlighting the songs, choosing Get Info, going to the Options tab, selecting an equalizer preset from a dropdown towards the bottom of the window, and then saving.  That is what I am doing now.  Catalina Music is a lot less annoying now (but still annoying in some ways!).


Is it possible to connect two iMacs via Thunderbolt 3 cable?

I just found information about how to network via Thunderbolt for two Macbooks.  I've yet to verify that it works for iMacs, but it seems reasonable to assume it will, and will perform significantly faster than ethernet networking.
See: https://9to5mac.com/2016/11/22/macbook-pro-thunderbolt-3-bridge-network-video/


how to view raw images on iMac or iphone

When you import photos into the Photos library on macOS, the images are stored in ~/Pictures/Photos Library.photoslibrary/Masters/ (~ = user directory)

To access the photos library, navigate to the Pictures folder using Finder and right-click (control + click) the photo library and select Show Package Contents. After that, open the Masters folder, and you will see your photos organized in folders by dates.

As far as I know, iPhones support shooting in RAW but not natively through the camera app. Please correct me if I'm wrong in the comments. Always delete photos from the Photos app to avoid corrupting your local photo library.

Source: OSXDaily


Any way to log off or close apps when time limits run out

You can log out an account after so many minutes via the Security and Privacy preference:

Apple Icon > System Preferences > Security & Privacy > Advanced button and then set the Log out after minutes of inactivity to a low number. This closes all the Apps on my Mac and logs me off completely for more security.


I don't think that's a problem with your iOS as much as it is Apple's map data, unless of course this issue doesn't happen with other iDevices. The best way to correct an issue with Apple's map data however, is to click on the information button in the maps app, then click on "Report an Issue" and you can explain the issue there so Apple can fix it in future iOS releases.


Why is my simple Automator script broken in latest Yosemite update (used to work)?

I used the exact same settings that you did but used Command+Options+Control+L as the shortcut and it worked. The only things I can imagine is that that the key combination is already in use.


I have dual core i5 macbook pro with 4GB memory. I am working on an iOS game in my free time. I am happy with build times and debugging performance.

On my system (running OSX Lion) I have around 200MB free memory while debugging on the simulator, around 300MB while not debugging. Debugging on the device consumes less memory than the simulator. I have iTunes and safari open which consumes a lot of memory too. So 2GB memory may be somewhat insufficient. You should have 4GB to be safe.

As for the native code question, Apple will almost definitely allow native code apps. They don't allow Flash. They don't allow Java. They don't allow just-in-time compiling of .NET/mono. They actively develop, advertise and enforce their SDK. They allow freely mixing C/C++/Objective-C in your code. They also allow script based games for example, Corona SDK uses Lua as scripting language, and there are many games developed with Corona SDK. You should have a look at such SDKs since they allow developing both in MS Windows and OSX. Also such SDKs allow you to develop cross platform apps, which means you can develop for iOS and android at the same time. However, you must have a mac and iOS developer account (99$/yr) to debug and publish for iOS (no such restrictions for android).


How do I remove the restriction passcode on my iPad?

The restrictions password can be reset by adding a PIN to the Springboard preferences file in iOS 6.  Easier said than done!

The instructions below worked for my iPad - and no jailbreak required.

They are, with a few minor changes, from Apple Support Community starting from about the 8th page:

Download iBackupBot
Connect iPhone/iPod/iPad via USB
Backup device to iTunes
Close iTunes (leave your device plugged in to your computer)
Open iBackupBot - this will open all device backups that it can find
Select your backup from the left column
Sort right hand pane by Path and locate "Library/Preferences/com.apple.springboard.plist" (there may be two files named this; try them both) and double-click to open
Extracted it (and only it) to the desktop.  Do this by Checkmark the file, then select the Extract Icon (or File - Export menu), then select the checkbox that says only that file and the other checkbox that says something about Info about the file.  Two files will appear on your desktop - one ending in plist and the other ending in .info.
Edit com.apple.springboard.plist with you favourite plist editor (e.g. Xcode)
Look for and change the string for "SBParentalControlsFailedAttempts" to 0
Add in

<key>SBParentalControlsPIN</key>
<string>1234</string>

after

<dict>
    <key>countryCode</key>
    <string>us</string>
</dict>

Save your changes, and return to iBackupBot
Import the modified plist.  It is now in the backup!
Exit iBackupBot
Open iTunes and use Restore Backup to your device
After restore is done and phone restarts the password should be 1234.

Amazing!  But use at your own risk.

And, just to repeat, I got all this from an Apple Support Community
discussion.  Nothing is original.


What are the benefits of distributing applications via DMG?

DMG is a disk image file format.

In the 'old days' software was distributed on physical media (eg. CD-ROMs) which were read-only and ensured the software remained as intended by the software developer. Today, because of broadband internet, software is more easily downloaded, but software developers still need to ensure their software remains as they intended. Otherwise corruption (intended or otherwise) could occur during the file transfer.

Because DMG files are disk images they help reduce the risk of corruption by offering a way to package data in a fairly secure manner. These files behave like a physical disk. In so doing, the operating system interprets them in the same way as if you had just inserted a CD-ROM into the computer. That's why you need to eject them as you would a CD-ROM or external drive. The difference is that the DMG file itself remains on your computer, unlike a CD-ROM that is removed when ejected.

In addition to behaving like a physical disk, DMG files offer the benefits of verifying the integrity of their contents when they're opened. Not only does this offer the ability to compress any data contained within them, but  also provides read-only options so they can serve only one purpose - the purpose of distributing software.

So, in a nutshell, DMG is a disk image format while ZIP is an archive format. They may seem to both do the same thing, but in reality they don't.


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


You could run a script every minute to update the status to available.

To do this, save the following AppleScript, I called messages-available.scpt, but your can rename if you want.

tell application "System Events"
    tell process "Messages"
        tell menu bar 1
            tell menu bar item "Messages"
                tell menu "Messages"
                    tell menu item "My Status"
                        tell menu "My Status"
                                click menu item "Available"
                            end if
                        end tell
                    end tell
                end tell
             end tell
        end tell
    end tell
end tell

Give permissions: chmod 775 messages-available.scpt.

The script do click on Available menu item in Messages.

Go to folder /Users/your-username/Library/LaunchAgents and save there the following plist file. I named it com.username.messages-available.plist, but again, feel free to change it.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
  <key>Label</key>
  <string>com.your-username.messages-available</string>

  <key>ProgramArguments</key>
  <array>
    <string>/usr/bin/osascript</string>
    <string>/Users/your-username/bin/messages-available.scpt</string>
  </array>

  <key>Nice</key>
  <integer>1</integer>

  <key>StartInterval</key>
  <integer>60</integer>

  <key>RunAtLoad</key>
  <true/>

  <key>StandardErrorPath</key>
  <string>/tmp/com.your-username.messages-available.err</string>

  <key>StandardOutPath</key>
  <string>/tmp/com.your-username.messages-available.out</string>
</dict>
</plist>

The file is pretty self-explanatory. We will launch the command /usr/bin/osascript /Users/your-username/bin/messages-available.scpt every 60 seconds, will be launched at load, will save errors on /tmp/com.username.messages-available.err and logs on /tmp/com.username.messages-available.out.

Replace your-username appropriately.

Last step, tell the Mac launchd daemon to load it.

launchctl load com.your-username.messages-available.plist

To stop the script, just replace the word load with unload in the above sentence. When your restart your computer the script will be load again. To prevent it, move it to another folder.


Enabling both trackpad Drag Lock and 3 Finger Drag at once?

On OS X El Capitan 10.11.1, the following terminal commands seem to solve it for me on the Magic Trackpad (on the built in trackpad I can operate only one dragging mechanic at a time) :

# Enable "tap-and-a-half" to drag.
defaults write com.apple.driver.AppleBluetoothMultitouch.trackpad Dragging -int 1
defaults write com.apple.AppleMultitouchTrackpad Dragging -int 1

# Enable 3-finger drag. (Moving with 3 fingers in any window "chrome" moves the window.)
defaults write com.apple.driver.AppleBluetoothMultitouch.trackpad TrackpadThreeFingerDrag -bool true
defaults write com.apple.AppleMultitouchTrackpad TrackpadThreeFingerDrag -bool true

source: https://github.com/boochtek/mac_config/blob/master/trackpad.sh

Update: dug up a bit more and found the "tap behavior" mouse defaults entry, which requires the "2" preset in order to get "tap to drag" on the built in trackpad

defaults -currentHost write NSGlobalDomain com.apple.mouse.tapBehavior -int 2
defaults write NSGlobalDomain com.apple.mouse.tapBehavior -int 2


"Use F1, F2 as standard function keys" no longer there: how can I control my volume through keyboard?

This seems to be the only answer (other than buy a mac keyboard): https://superuser.com/questions/61001/how-do-i-press-the-fn-key-using-a-pc-keyboard-on-a-mac


How can I get photos from my DSLR (with a CF card) to my iPad wirelessly?

You have a variety of choices!

Without using the MBP:

A iPad card reader such as http://photojojo.com/store/awesomeness/ipad-cf-sd-reader/ (not supported by Apple) for CF cards.
If your DSLR has a USB port, get the Apple Camera Connection Kit and plug in your camera via USB.

This may not work, depending on your camera. It needs to support either Mass Storage Device or Picture Transfer Protocol. The older your camera, the less likely it is to support these transfer options. I recommend trying a connection kit belonging to a friend or a friendly shop first.
Get an SD-CF adaptor for your camera, a SD card, and the Camera Connection Kit.
Get an SD-CF adaptor for your camera, a Eye-Fi brand WiFi SD card, and their free iPad app.

Using the MBP:

Get an SD-CF adaptor for your camera, a WiFi SD card, the latest iPhoto and sync via iCloud.
Tether your camera to your MBP, and use the latest iPhoto to sync via iCloud.


How can I set the Mac OS X terminal history to act like linux when using up/down arrows?

Mark who commented on my questions above was correct. This is a bash setting. If you add the following to your ~/.bash_profile script, you will get this behavior.

HISTCONTROL=ignoredups

You can also ignore any lines that start with a space:

HISTCONTROL=ignorespace

Or do both, by using:

HISTCONTROL=ignoreboth


Insecure connection and stored passwords disappear

Ok, so it seem like that by going into "Disk Utility" and doing the sequence "Verify Disk Permissions"->"Repair Disk Permission" did the trick.


Automator Calendar and Events Dissapears after OS X Update

My solution to this was to abandon the Automaton Calendar in macOS and instead opt for using launchd.  My other option was cron but that has since been deprecated in OS X

  Darwin note: Although cron(8) and crontab(5) are officially supported
  under Darwin, their functionality has been absorbed into launchd(8),
  which provides a more flexible way of automatically executing
  commands. See launchctl(1) for more information.”

I have created and backed up all of the .plists that I need running on my machine and created a bash script that installs all of them in case I need to do a clean install of macOS in the future.

Full documentation on lauchd can be found on Apple's Developer Website


It's currently not possible to set a custom date format on iOS, unlike macOS. On iOS you can only change the date format by changing the region as you discovered.


Automator - automatically copy files/folders when tagged a specific custom label

Check out Taggy Tagger.

It is a macOS menu bar app which automatically tags files and copies/moves files to a specified folder. Right now, it supports Dropbox, Box, GDrive and OneDrive as destinations (actually you can select any destination folder).

How does it work?

Select the folder that contains your files.
Enable copy/move action (Dropbox, Box, OneDrive or GDrive)
Select path to destination folder

From now on, everytime you add a file to the folder that you selected in step 1, it will add a tag and copy/move the file to the destination folder (step 3). Alternatively, perform the action for all files already sitting in the folder by pressing a button.

There is video how it works on the website as well.

[Disclaimer: I am the developer of Taggy Tagger.]


Looks like that feature has been taken off.
While not exactly the answer, CMD-I shows information about the selected song or disk. A workaround could be sort by Artist or Genre


How can I make ctrl+right/left arrow jump words in Visual Studio Code

I ended up finding the solution via Microsoft vscode github issues:
https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/issues/64972

Add these keybindings in ~/Library/Application Support/Code/User/keybindings.json

{
    "key": "ctrl+left",
    "command": "workbench.action.terminal.sendSequence",
    "args": { "text": "\u001bb" }
},
{
    "key": "ctrl+right",
    "command": "workbench.action.terminal.sendSequence",
    "args": { "text": "\u001bf" }
}

Tested in GNU bash version 4.4.23, (installed via homebrew brew install bash)


Ipad keyboard menu bottom of screen while typing

Source: Let's Talk Tech.

By default, the iPadOS keyboard has a predictive text & shortcut
bar above the main QWERTY keyboard, offering things like formatting
options and copy/paste buttons. When you hook up your hardware
Bluetooth keyboard, however, this row of predictive text options and
keyboard shortcuts sits at the bottom of your iPad display while you
type.

On your iPad, open the Settings app.
Tap on General > Keyboard
Disable the following two options from that menu: "Predictive" & "Shortcuts"

That’s all. Once you disable those two options the on-screen predictive text bar will disappear and you can win back those extra pixels.


Disable semitransparent hidden file icons

You can use chflags to remove hidden flag from files you need:

chflags nohidden YourFile

Use this command with YourFile replaced with your file to change the file flag to no hidden.
Files and folders with . prefix will remain hidden.


How to block unwanted sites from opening?

You can add an entry to your /etc/hosts file. For each site you want to block, add a line at the bottom, in the form:

127.0.0.1 site-to-block.com


Only half of my contacts from iPhone 4 sync to iCloud

Contacts app have groups of contacts, ie. Google contacts, Hotmail contacts, Facebook contacts and then iCloud contacts. To see the different groups, go to Contacts, at the very top you will see Groups, just tick iCloud and untick the rest. Now scroll down to the bottom and see if you have 500 contacts or 203.

If you have 203, it means that all your contacts are there. If you still see 500, make a manual backup:

Put your phone on charge.
Make sure you are connected to the internet via WiFi.
Go to Settings -> iCloud. Turn on Contacts.
Now go to Backup -> iCloud Backup: ON
If your iCloud Backup is switched on, you get a Back Up Now button.
Tap the Back Up Now button to manually back up to iCloud.

  Automatically back up data such as your photo library, accounts,
  documents, Health data, Home configuration, and settings when this
  iPhone is plugged in, locked, and connected to WiFi.


Can I delete the /Developer-3.2.6 or /Developer-3.2.5 folders?

Nuke it (you've got a backup, right?)

If you run sudo /Developer-3.2.6/Library/uninstall-devtools it should clean up things like terminal add ons, but they take little space.

Since you only use gcc and such for homebrew - you'll not need all the SDK and such from this old alternate install of Xcode. One compiler set is plenty unless you're really into maintaining some old code that breaks when the newer compiler sees it.

It's probably from an old install where you could pick an alternate destination - not something Xcode 4 moved around.


How can I tell mac to stop trying to connect "idisk" server?

My own experience is with PCs, but I'll give this a shot.

From what I've been able to discern, iDrive is an online backup program. You don't say, but I'm assuming you have an iDrive account, and it keeps trying to connect. I've seen similar behavior with GoogleSync, when it checks files and brings my own system to a standstill until it's finished.

I checked, and Macs have an equivalent to Task Manager, the Force Quit Applications Manager. Command+ Option+ Escape will bring this dialog up. Search for the iDrive application in the list of apps. There should be an option to click on the list of apps (process name), and it should sort -- I'm basing this on PC experience. Scroll through the list for the iDisk app. Click on it to select, and the QUIT button is on the upper left corner. This should terminate the application. This should free up your machine to do other things.

Once you are done, however, this is a temporary solution. The next time you boot up, you will have the same problem. You need to address WHY the app is having problems. I have not used iDrive, but assume it's subscription. Is your account active? If not, you should uninstall the app. If you are a current and active subscriber, you might then need to call the company to find out why you aren't able to log in. I am assuming it worked before without issues and without bringing your system to a standstill. Assuming you are subscribed and want to keep the app, there may be an option to repair the application; not all software has that option, but the better ones do. Otherwise, barring a call to the company, you might need to uninstall and re-install. Macs are pretty stable machines, but sometimes an application does get corrupted.

The steps above should help you get control of your Mac. Again, then you need to deal with the iDrive program and why it's misbehaving. Good luck!


After some trial and error, I discovered a few ways to do this. The easiest solution requiring no Windows client and no external programs is option 1. The absolute easiest method is option 2, use µTorrent for Windows.

Share between computers running µTorrent without a tracker

This assumes that your µTorrent machines can open their own ports in your firewall using uPNP or NAT-PMP. While this may work with other torrent clients, I've had the best luck when using µTorrent. Also, it seems to be one of the few that will allow us to manually add peers, the crucial step.

For simplicity, we'll call the machine with the file(s) to share, "server", even though bittorrent has no concept of a server.

On the server machine, select New Torrent from the File menu.
Settings:

Select the file or parent directory you want to share
Make sure the tracker list is empty
Select Start Seeding
Select Private torrent

Now, Create and Save As... and give your torrent file a name.
At this point, you need to figure out your server's internet IP address. If you don't know how, try http://whatismyip.com.
With the IP in hand, you need to figure out what port µTorrent has opened in your firewall. You can find this in the preferences or by clicking on the right-most icon in the status bar at the bottom of the main µTorrent window.
Send the torrent file along with the IP and Port (e-mail, instant message, etc.) to your colleague(s).

Each of them should open that torrent file with µTorrent, select the torrent in the list, and select the Peers list. They may have to show the Details Pane from the View menu if not already visible.
Right-click in the Peers list and choose Add Peer....
Enter the server's IP and Port like this:  IP:Port.

The client should now connect to the server and start/resume the transfer.

Note: If the server cannot open a port in the firewall, you could add the client peers to the server's peer list, too.
Use a Windows machine with µTorrent as a tracker

In the Preferences, under Advanced, set bt.enable_tracker to true. Now, create a new torrent as described above, but put http://IP:PORT/announce in the tracker list using the same IP and Port described above. Once this is done, your clients will not need the Add Peer... step. They can simply open the torrent file with µTorrent.

Note: The Windows machine running the µTorrent tracker doesn't have to be the server or the clients. If you have any Windows machine available, you could run µTorrent on it and have it serve as your tracker. (I didn't actually test this, but in theory, it should work.)
Install a simple php web-server tracker

If you already have access to a webserver, the easiest tracker I found to install is BitStorm, a single-file php tracker. Simply place the php file on your server somewhere and then put http://server/path/to/bitstorm.php in your tracker list when creating a new torrent. The clients should only need the torrent file.

Note: If I were going to leave this running for the sharing of private files, I would put it on an HTTPS server with a username and password pair to protect it. Then change the tracker url to https://user:pass@server/path/to/bitstorm.php.
Install an actual compiled tracker program

I found several of these that will compile and run on OSX, but none of them seem to work properly in my testing. My tests may have been complicated by the fact that my tracker and clients all had the same IP address (my external IP). Regardless, I don't think this is the right solution because you shouldn't need to require developer tools to be installed.

Warning: I tried using Vuze, an OSX torrent client with a built-in tracker, but I couldn't get it to work. However, it seems that it installed several plugins into every single browser on my system and changed all of my default search engines. Be careful.


Question about external USB disk for mac air

Sorry, no.
With the exception of RAID, which allows you to create one big disk from several smaller ones you can't combine an external USB drive with an internal drive.
So in order to do what you want you would have to have a USB drive with about 100GB of available room on it. Which is eminently practical and do-able. Just more expensive than your 32GB flash drive.


Merge missing disk partition on a Macbook

Linux filesystem partitions may not not appear in the Disk Utility application. I would not recommend using the Disk Utility or diskutil command to remove Linux filesystem or swap partitions. Usually, attempting leads to an unbootable macOS.
I would recommend the following two ways to remove linux partitions.

If your Linux installer flash drive has a bootable live version, then boot to this live version. Most Linux versions include the gdisk command. Use this command to remove the linux partitions.

Boot to macOS Recovery. Basically restart the Mac and hold down the command(⌘)-R key combination. Once booted, open a Terminal application window and use the
 gpt -f remove -i N disk0

command to remove each Linux partition. You need to replace N with the correct partition index. You can use the
 gpt -rf show disk0

command to list the partitions. The Linux partitions have the following partition GUID type values.
 Linux Filesystem          0FC63DAF-8483-4772-8E79-3D69D8477DE4
 Linux LVM                 E6D6D379-F507-44C2-A23C-238F2A3DF928
 Linux Swap                0657FD6D-A4AB-43C4-84E5-0933C84B4F4F


How do you prevent an iPod Classic (and other iPods) from losing ratings on sync

Im not sure this is default behavior. I use stars and smart playlists to actually help manage things (smart playlist to delete songs, and then rate things with 5 stars that need to be 'processed'). I sync usually once a week, and it always syncs these changes back and forth.

Its supposed to sync all the songs in recently played to update their metadata (like playcounts) as well. Maybe if you don't sync for months, that playlist doesn't show everything, and therefore looses some of your ratings?


Calibrating battery on a Macbook: am I supposed to keep the computer running all the time?

It doesn't matter how the battery runs down; there's no difference whatsoever in the battery (or the computer) when your battery is depleted when the computer is running or when it's asleep.  The battery's charge level will fall below the voltage necessary to power on your laptop - one way is just faster than the other.  So, bottom line is that either way is fine - which ever you are comfortable with.


iPod Touch thinks it's full when it isn't

Uummmm....I figured it out....
under the Books tab, the "Sync Audiobooks" option was checked....but it was below the visible portion of the screen so I didn't realize it was checked until my network drive with my audio books got disconnected and on an attempted sync it said it couldn't find the files.

OOPS!!!  I feel sheepish.


In Finder's List view, is there a keyboard shortcut to go to top/bottom of list?

Yep!  You can use opt-↑ to jump to the top of the list and opt-↓ to jump to the bottom.


Can I recover deleted viber messages after my phone is erased?

No.  Unless you have friends at NSA AND Apple.


Touchbar Sending Virtual Keypresses to Amazon Workspaces

I recently faced this problem and found a workaround. In the Keyboard settings, set the "Touch bar shows" to "F1, F2, etc. Keys". After this setting, my function keys are being recognized in Amazon WorkSpaces. Although it does not recognize F11 as it still shows desktop on Mac. You also lose firect access to App Controls.


Erasing partition doesn't give me free diskspace

You will not be able to reclaim this space to your OS X partition unfortunately. That is because the Recovery HD partition is in between your OS X and (formerly) Ubuntu partitions. You have two options:

In the partitions tab, click the "+" and add a new partition. OS X will see this new partition as a separate drive, but it should be fully useable. However, it certainly complicates things vs. having a nice big single drive to work with.
Backup your Macintosh HD and wipe the entire hard drive (booting from another volume, such as Internet Recovery or Gparted on a disc). Then reinstall OS X, allowing it to properly recreate your partitions. This is more cumbersome but recommended.

When I partitioned my Mac for Ubuntu (using rEFIt) a while back, I ended up doing the second option to make my Mac "normal" again.


How can I change the aqua theme in Yosemite?

If you're still looking for a method to darken your UI in Yosemite, download Flavours 2 and choose the "Smooth Criminal" flavour.

Flavours 2 is still in Beta, but most things look great with this skin.


You do not need to disable System Integrity Protection (SIP).

To delete the FaceTime app, do the following:

Backup FaceTime.app via Time Machine or making a Zip archive.

For the Zip archive, right-click it and select: Compress "FaceTime"

Shutdown your Mac.
Boot to Recovery Mode. Press ⌘R when starting your Mac.
Open Terminal from the Utilities menu.
Run the following compound command adjusting Macintosh HD as necessary if you've modified the default name of the primary startup volume:

rm -r "/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Applications/FaceTime.app"; reboot

After rebooting from Recovery Mode, if you still have the FaceTime icon on the Dock, right-click it and select: Options > Remove from Dock

Note that while this does remove the FaceTime.app, it may/will reappear when macOS is updated/upgraded and will need to be deleted again.

If after having done this and you want to restore the FaceTime app, then restore it using Time Machine, if you backed it up in that manner, or if you created the Zip archive, it would have been created in the /Applications folder, if you moved it elsewhere, move it back and then do the following:

Shutdown your Mac.
Boot to Recovery Mode. Press ⌘R when starting your Mac.
Open Terminal from the Utilities menu.
Run the following compound command adjusting Macintosh HD as necessary if you've modified the default name of the primary startup volume:

cd "/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Applications"; ../usr/bin/unzip FaceTime.zip; reboot


iWork Numbers How To Calculate - In Once Cell Function - The Elapsed Time In Hours Between Two Date/Times?

Assuming I have understood what you wish to accomplish correctly, here is one way of doing it in the same cell if you are willing to enter the dates and the times separately:

And here is the text version of the formula shown above

=(DATEDIF(DATE(2020,5,29),DATE(2020,5,30),"D")+TIMEVALUE("02:30")−TIMEVALUE("20:30"))×24

Unfortunately, this can not be done by entering the date & time together for each point in time (or without entering them more than once). It appears that there is no date & time function in Numbers that calculates the difference between two date & time values in hours directly or one that fully converts a date & time value in text or otherwise to a proper date & time value that Numbers can process.


How can I remove a paused app for my iphone 4?

If reboot doesn't work then try troubleshooting, I would do this:

Quit app store
Start app store and go to app and try canceling or re-downloading.
Toggle Airplane Mode and try again
Then reboot


Does iPhone Xs Max have a SIM card slot?

Yes. Dual SIM iPhone Xs Max does have a regular nano SIM card slot and additionally an eSIM.

There's no such thing as an eSIM only iPhone.

From the iPhone Xs Max Tech Specs web-page:

Quoting the footnotes from the Tech Specs page:

  eSIM will be available later this year through a software update. Use of eSIM requires a wireless service plan (which may include restrictions on switching service providers and roaming, even after contract expiration). Not all carriers support eSIM. Use of eSIM in iPhone may be disabled when purchased from some carriers. See your carrier for details. To learn more, visit https://support.apple.com/kb/HT209044.

From the linked support article, Learn about Dual SIM with your iPhone Xs or iPhone Xs Max:

  You can use two cellular plans with your iPhone Xs or iPhone Xs Max, a nano-SIM, and an eSIM. An eSIM is a digital SIM that allows you to activate a cellular plan from your carrier without having to use a physical nano-SIM. Here's how to set up and use a cellular plan using an eSIM

Additionally, exclusively for Chinese Market, Apple has introduced a dual SIM iPhone with support for two nano SIM cards without an eSIM.

Quoting from the support article, Learn about Dual SIM with iPhone Xs Max in China, Hong Kong, and Macau

  In China, Hong Kong, and Macau, you can use Dual SIM with your iPhone Xs Max and two nano-SIM cards. This gives you two phone numbers to make and receive calls and text messages.


How to resolve dropping wifi issue since Yosemite upgrade?

Apple released the 10.10.1 update today, which is supposed to fix many wifi issues.


What's a reliable method to create a stand alone recovery disk for Lion?

This might help

http://support.apple.com/kb/dl1433

"The Lion Recovery Disk Assistant lets you create Lion Recovery on an external drive that has all of the same capabilities as the built-in Lion Recovery: reinstall Lion, repair the disk using Disk Utility, restore from a Time Machine backup, or browse the web with Safari."


How to get MP3 file into iPad Music app without iTunes?

Sorry but all the Programs i know out there which are really able to add Files to the coorrect place (iTunes Folder on your iPod) will ask you to first install iTunes to use its sync Function in the Background.


How do I download to an external hard drive?

You didn't specify which browser you are using, so I assume Safari. Two options come to mind:

Right-click on the file you want to download and download directly to a destination you select
Open Safari Preferences (in the Safari menu) and select a different download destination in the General tab


Lion’s LaunchPad acts much like iOS’ Springboard (the iDevice home screen launcher), which means that

you can create folders by dragging one Launchpad app icon onto another – add more items by dragging them onto the newly created folder. Folders can be renamed by clicking their title when opened. They cannot be nested.
you can only sort items by dragging them around.
hiding apps is not a feature (there is a closing cross on App Store installed apps when you press Option, but this uninstalls the app – it does not hide it from Launchpad). Use Launchpad-Control (freeware) to achieve that.


How do I enable Personal Hotspot in the OS X WiFi menu?

The Mac and iPhone need to have the same iCloud account set up.

If they do, and it's still not visible remove the account from and re-configure it on the device that's behaving unexpectedly.


No. You have to set up an AppleID for her. If you want to share apps and music purchases, then you can use Family Sharing, and you can even specify if your child is able to purchase music/apps, or require you to approve the purchase first. This way, she is not able to rack up a huge bill, and you can both have separate messaging accounts.


How to compile mod_wsgi, mod_fastcgi, etc on Mountain Lion (Mavericks) by fixing `apxs:Error: Command failed with rc=65536`?

I solved this problem while writting question:

For some reason /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/OSX10.8.xctoolchain/ folder (containing Xcode Command Line Tools) is here: /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/XcodeDefault.xctoolchain

To fix the problem:

$ sudo ln -s /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/XcodeDefault.xctoolchain/ /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/OSX10.8.xctoolchain

Greg Bair suggestion for Mavericks:

$ sudo ln -s /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/XcodeDefault.xctoolchain/ /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/OSX10.9.xctoolchain

This creates symlink to the right folder.


Why does App Store redownload already downloaded parts when resuming a paused download?

The PAUSED download is not the same as STOPPED.

You stopped the download (disconnected) so the temporary download file was deleted.

The resume function does not work for that.


Can I change the default music player app on my iPhone? If so, how?

Uninstall the default music app in iOS 11.
Restart. voila.

My headphone control now works with wynk music app.
control center also shows wynk music.


How to completely stop "Disk Not Ejected Properly" message?

Eject the device properly to avoid any chance of errors.

I have seen several devices trashed by just disconnecting... Reformatting made them useable again.


Why do the same characters show up with a ‘text presentation’ in some situations and an ‘emoji presentation’ in others?

There is both a ‘text style’ and ‘emoji style’ for U+25B6 BLACK RIGHT-POINTING TRIANGLE (▶). Whichever style you get depends on whatever style the font you’re currently using has. For example, the font Apple Color Emoji has an ‘emoji style’ glyph for U+25B6 BLACK RIGHT-POINTING TRIANGLE while the font Lucida Grande has a ‘text style’ glyph for U+25B6 BLACK RIGHT-POINTING TRIANGLE. This is fine in a text editor, where you have control over whatever font you’re using for each character, but not in contexts where you don’t.

How can I specify whether or not I want the ‘text presentation’ or ‘emoji presentation’ for a codepoint in contexts where I have no control over the font?

The Unicode Consortium actually provided a solution for this issue in Unicode 6.1, detailed in this Unicode Technical Report.

Essentially, they’ve designated two codepoints as emoji variation selectors: U+FE0E VARIATION SELECTOR-15 (for a text presentation) and U+FE0F VARIATION SELECTOR-16 (for an emoji presentation).

Let me explain how they work. Whenever you enter one of those two variation selectors in a text field (whether through copy-pasting or other means), the text rendering system of your operating system—one conforming to the Unicode Standard, v6.1+—will change the glyph (through font substitution, if necessary) for the character immediately preceding the variation selector you just entered to one matching either ‘text style’ or ‘emoji style’ (depending on which variation selector you entered after the emoji).

Here’s a demonstration:

▶ (U+25B6 U+FE0E)

▶ (U+25B6 U+FE0F)

For people viewing this page on older operating systems, I’ve included some images below demonstrating the behaviour in a normal text box on OS X v10.11 El Capitan.

The system font on OS X v10.11 (which is San Francisco), has no glyph for U+25B6 BLACK RIGHT-POINTING TRIANGLE, so OS X’s text rendering system automatically performs font substitution and ends up using the Lucida Grande UI font instead, which happens to have a 'text style' glyph for U+25B6:

Using U+FE0E VARIATION SELECTOR-15 immediately after it forces it to be ‘text style’, so the result is the same:

Using U+FE0F VARIATION SELECTOR-16 immediately after it instead results in OS X’s text rendering system using a font with an ‘emoji style’ glyph for U+25B6 BLACK RIGHT-POINTING TRIANGLE instead, which happens to be the Apple Color Emoji font:

(For the curious, the screenshots are showing the indispensable Split Up utility in UnicodeChecker).


You should be able to use Media Kind is not Podcast to deselect podcasts:

Some podcasts also have their Genre set to Podcast.


The Permission denied, please try again. is because your password for username was not correct.

If it were a file permissions issue, the error would tell you the path it was having trouble with.

$ scp user@host:/var/root/ /tmp/
scp: /var/root: Permission denied

$ scp user@host:Desktop/*.xls /var/root/
/var/root//test.xls: Permission denied


Cannot Connect to Site with Wi-Fi But Can on 3G

Turns out the issue was indeed not with my system but with my hosting company. I'm not completely clear on how it happened, but my IP address found it's way on a blacklist, the result of a failed SSH login attempt. Though, to the best of my knowledge, I had not tried any sort of SSH login.


Best macbook batteries strategies to watch a movie stored on an external USB hard drive

Number 2 would definitely conserve battery as the device wouldn't need to be constantly powered


iOS 7 automatically downloaded to phone after downgrading to iOS 6

Your iPhone software update is trying to be smart by downloading the update in the background for iOS 7. What it is trying to do is make sure that the update is already on your device, and all you need to do is press the update button, without waiting for a download to finish.

You aren't in danger of loosing your downgrade - your phone will always ask your permission before installing any update. You probably won't be able to keep it from downloading the update, though.


Why does ls -a not show files that finder does show?

It's there, but you're not seeing it because it's not where you're expecting it to be because the sorting in Finder is different than the sorting in Bash/Zsh.  Basically Finder does a case insensitive search whereas Bash is case sensitive.  For example, "a" follows "Z"
If you're looking for a specific file and you know the case, you can use a little ls magic to find it...
$ ls -Ad R*

Where...

-A = List all files, except . and ..
-d = Treat directories as files and do not search them recursively
R* = All files that begin with the letter "R"


OK, just found it!
I closed Safari, restored the file ~/Library/Safari/LastSession.plist from my TimeMachine backup. I then restarted Safari and hit the "Restore from Last Session"

What a bliss to see my 71 tabs back to life!


AFAIK Xcode can support web languages with some plugins, but all the informations I have are pretty old. http://web.archive.org/web/20110811093439/http://developer.apple.com/internet/scripting/phpappledevtools.html

And there are some projects to support autocomplete for PHP that I never really tried.
https://github.com/tonyjohnston/PHP-Xcode-Autocomplete

I'm very happy about PHPStorm, btw and I don't feel the need for a native IDE after moving to it from Eclipse/Aptana.


Can I Add/Remove users from web interface (Profile Manager) on Lion Server?

Not yet. You can only do this through Server.app or Workgroup Manager, or System Preferences if you're not running Open Directory.

You can create Device Groups through the web interface however.

I highly expect Apple to add this to the web UI in future updates to Lion or 10.8.


iMac randomly logging out (High Sierra and Mojave)

TLDR: In my case, SwitchResX seems to be the culprit. Didn't look for a workaround yet.

I just experienced the same logout, with similar logs:

Jun  2 15:21:55 Trema syslogd[48]: ASL Sender Statistics
Jun  2 15:24:07 Trema com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.apple.quicklook[8406]): Endpoint has been activated through legacy launch(3) APIs. Please switch to XPC or bootstrap_check_in(): com.apple.quicklook
Jun  2 15:24:35 Trema com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.apple.WindowServer[205]): Service exited due to SIGABRT
Jun  2 15:24:35 Trema VDCAssistant[203]: BUG in libdispatch client: mach_recv, monitored resource vanished before the source cancel handler was invoked { 0x7fb4e8c0b840[source], ident: 6191 / 0x182f, handler: 0x107f6fa6c }
Jun  2 15:24:35 Trema com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.apple.ViewBridgeAuxiliary[8527]): Service exited with abnormal code: 2
Jun  2 15:24:35 Trema com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.apple.ViewBridgeAuxiliary): Service only ran for 0 seconds. Pushing respawn out by 10 seconds.
Jun  2 15:24:35 Trema sessionlogoutd[8526]: DEAD_PROCESS: 102 console
Jun  2 15:24:35 Trema com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.apple.UserEventAgent-Aqua[606]): Service exited due to SIGKILL | sent by UserEventAgent[606]
Jun  2 15:24:35 Trema com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.apple.WebKit.WebContent.BE261D11-9005-48E6-9B64-31D068C12BB4[4827]): Service exited with abnormal code: 1
Jun  2 15:24:35 Trema com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.apple.WebKit.WebContent.5B14717F-EC42-44AC-BE76-917F52D439A9[4829]): Service exited with abnormal code: 1
Jun  2 15:24:35 Trema com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.adobe.GC.AGM[1366]): Service exited with abnormal code: 15
Jun  2 15:24:35 Trema com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.apple.Dock.agent[662]): Service exited with abnormal code: 1

As suggested by @Ruskes, I ran the command sudo log show --start "2020-06-02 15:24:00" --info --debug --signpost and saw these interesting lines:

2020-06-02 15:24:34.477103+0200 0x4a3      Default     0x0                  0      0    kernel: (AppleIntelFramebufferAzul) Unsupported Extended capabilities type: 0x100
2020-06-02 15:24:34.477135+0200 0x4a3      Default     0x0                  0      0    kernel: (AppleIntelFramebufferAzul) Currently unsupported feature requested
2020-06-02 15:24:34.477171+0200 0x4a3      Default     0x0                  0      0    kernel: (AppleIntelFramebufferAzul) Currently unsupported feature requested
2020-06-02 15:24:34.477203+0200 0x4a3      Default     0x0                  0      0    kernel: (AppleIntelFramebufferAzul) Currently unsupported feature requested
2020-06-02 15:24:34.477238+0200 0x4a3      Default     0x0                  0      0    kernel: (AppleIntelFramebufferAzul) Currently unsupported feature requested
2020-06-02 15:24:34.477272+0200 0x4a3      Default     0x0                  0      0    kernel: (AppleIntelFramebufferAzul) Currently unsupported feature requested
2020-06-02 15:24:34.477300+0200 0x4a3      Default     0x0                  0      0    kernel: (AppleIntelFramebufferAzul) Currently unsupported feature requested
2020-06-02 15:24:34.480826+0200 0x4a3      Error       0x0                  205    7    WindowServer: (CoreDisplay) [com.apple.CoreDisplay:default] [ERROR] - Driver bug - rowBytes too small. Display 0x1c81a9e2, ioModeID 0x80005000, ioModeDepth 0x0, bytePerRow = 32, width = 1, bitsPerPixel = 32, minRowBytes = 7680 stored width = 1920. Forcing minRowBytes (possibly still wrong).
2020-06-02 15:24:34.480844+0200 0x4a3      Error       0x0                  205    7    WindowServer: (CoreDisplay) [com.apple.CoreDisplay:default] [ERROR] - Driver bug - rowBytes too small. Display 0x1c81a9e2, ioModeID 0x80005001, ioModeDepth 0x0, bytePerRow = 32, width = 1, bitsPerPixel = 32, minRowBytes = 4096 stored width = 1024. Forcing minRowBytes (possibly still wrong).
2020-06-02 15:24:34.480858+0200 0x4a3      Error       0x0                  205    7    WindowServer: (CoreDisplay) [com.apple.CoreDisplay:default] [ERROR] - Driver bug - rowBytes too small. Display 0x1c81a9e2, ioModeID 0x80005002, ioModeDepth 0x0, bytePerRow = 32, width = 1, bitsPerPixel = 32, minRowBytes = 4096 stored width = 1024. Forcing minRowBytes (possibly still wrong).
2020-06-02 15:24:34.480872+0200 0x4a3      Error       0x0                  205    7    WindowServer: (CoreDisplay) [com.apple.CoreDisplay:default] [ERROR] - Driver bug - rowBytes too small. Display 0x1c81a9e2, ioModeID 0x80005003, ioModeDepth 0x0, bytePerRow = 32, width = 1, bitsPerPixel = 32, minRowBytes = 3200 stored width = 800. Forcing minRowBytes (possibly still wrong).
2020-06-02 15:24:34.480886+0200 0x4a3      Error       0x0                  205    7    WindowServer: (CoreDisplay) [com.apple.CoreDisplay:default] [ERROR] - Driver bug - rowBytes too small. Display 0x1c81a9e2, ioModeID 0x80005004, ioModeDepth 0x0, bytePerRow = 32, width = 1, bitsPerPixel = 32, minRowBytes = 3200 stored width = 800. Forcing minRowBytes (possibly still wrong).
2020-06-02 15:24:34.480900+0200 0x4a3      Error       0x0                  205    7    WindowServer: (CoreDisplay) [com.apple.CoreDisplay:default] [ERROR] - Driver bug - rowBytes too small. Display 0x1c81a9e2, ioModeID 0x80005005, ioModeDepth 0x0, bytePerRow = 32, width = 1, bitsPerPixel = 32, minRowBytes = 2560 stored width = 640. Forcing minRowBytes (possibly still wrong).
2020-06-02 15:24:34.480913+0200 0x4a3      Error       0x0                  205    7    WindowServer: (CoreDisplay) [com.apple.CoreDisplay:default] [ERROR] - Driver bug - rowBytes too small. Display 0x1c81a9e2, ioModeID 0x80005006, ioModeDepth 0x0, bytePerRow = 32, width = 1, bitsPerPixel = 32, minRowBytes = 2560 stored width = 640. Forcing minRowBytes (possibly still wrong).

[...]

2020-06-02 15:24:35.254853+0200 0x4a3      Default     0x0                  205    7    WindowServer: (CoreDisplay) [com.apple.CoreDisplay:default] [WARN] - description_for_mode_number: Illegal mode number -1 for display 003f003f
2020-06-02 15:24:35.255600+0200 0x269      Default     0x0                  102    5    loginwindow: [com.apple.loginwindow.logging:Standard] -[LoginApp windowServerExited] | enter
2020-06-02 15:24:35.255630+0200 0x4c6      Default     0x0                  0      0    kernel: (AppleIntelFramebufferAzul) Transitioning wsaa from 1->0
2020-06-02 15:24:35.255684+0200 0x269      Default     0x0                  102    5    loginwindow: [com.apple.loginwindow.logging:LWError] -[LoginApp windowServerExited] | ERROR | Window Server exited, closing down the session immediately
2020-06-02 15:24:35.255886+0200 0xd90d     Default     0x0                  664    0    SystemUIServer: (HIToolbox) HIToolbox: received notification of WindowServer event port death.
2020-06-02 15:24:35.255930+0200 0xd90d     Default     0x0                  664    0    SystemUIServer: (HIToolbox) port matched the WindowServer port created in BindCGSToRunLoop
2020-06-02 15:24:35.256039+0200 0x269      Default     0x0                  102    5    loginwindow: [com.apple.loginwindow.logging:Standard] -[SessionLogoutManager startDirectLogout:reason:] | Enter, logoutType: Logout,  directLogoutReason:WindowServerExited
2020-06-02 15:24:35.256041+0200 0x269      Default     0x0                  102    5    loginwindow: [com.apple.loginwindow.logging:Standard] -[SessionLogoutManager startDirectLogout:reason:] | Window server exit, calling doDirectLogoutFinalItemsBeforeSessionLogoutd
2020-06-02 15:24:35.256050+0200 0xd906     Default     0x0                  661    0    talagent: (HIToolbox) HIToolbox: received notification of WindowServer event port death.
2020-06-02 15:24:35.256096+0200 0xd906     Default     0x0                  661    0    talagent: (HIToolbox) port matched the WindowServer port created in BindCGSToRunLoop
2020-06-02 15:24:35.256113+0200 0xd7fe     Default     0x0                  624    0    Google Chrome: (HIToolbox) HIToolbox: received notification of WindowServer event port death.
2020-06-02 15:24:35.256124+0200 0x269      Default     0x0                  102    5    loginwindow: [com.apple.loginwindow.logging:Standard] -[SessionLogoutManager doDirectLogoutFinalItemsBeforeSessionLogoutd] | enter
2020-06-02 15:24:35.256154+0200 0xd7fe     Default     0x0                  624    0    Google Chrome: (HIToolbox) port matched the WindowServer port created in BindCGSToRunLoop
2020-06-02 15:24:35.256200+0200 0x65e31    Default     0x0                  8184   0    ProtonMail Bridge: (HIToolbox) HIToolbox: received notification of WindowServer event port death.
2020-06-02 15:24:35.256214+0200 0x269      Default     0x0                  102    5    loginwindow: [com.apple.loginwindow.logging:Standard] -[SessionLogoutManager doCommonFinalItems] | enter
2020-06-02 15:24:35.256216+0200 0x269      Signpost    0x0                  102    0    [spid excl, process, event] loginwindow: [com.apple.loginwindow.logging:performance_instrumentation] Dock_Dies

I have two external displays, and use SwitchResX to adjust one screen's display to force a retina-like 1440p density over 1080p (connected by HDMI), and another screen (through VGA-MiniDisplay adapter) is simply at 1080p.

The first errors in the detailed logs seems related to SwitchResX's custom resolutions (note the 1920, 1024, 800…), as it registers potentially unsupported resolutions.

For now, I deduce that this triggers WindowServer failure, then logouts, but didn't find a workaround yet.

Any input appreciated!


Prevent StandBy closing MacBook lid during no power connection but Display connected

NoSleep prevents sleep when lid is closed.


MacBook Pro keep on "unplugging" battery and need SMC/PRAM reset

Check if your charger might be dying.

I recently had to change the charger of an old MacBook, after experiencing very similar issues and eliminating all sorts of other possible problems. I even bought a new battery (yes, it was that old). I was about to give up on the device, thinking the motherboard was dead or something.

As a last resort I went to a local store and asked to try charging it with a new MagSafe charger. The device has been happily working again ever since.

Try doing the same; it's basically free to try if they have a relevant charger in stock.


How to enable slow genie effect in macOS 10.13 High Sierra?

Thanks to @etaionshrd on Reddit we have this Terminal command:

defaults write com.apple.dock slow-motion-allowed -bool true && killall Dock

If it doesn't work, try copy-pasting it. There is no auto-correct in Terminal and spelling counts. Works for me macOS 10.13.2 High Sierra.

https://www.reddit.com/r/apple/comments/6jeefp/in_the_latest_high_sierra_beta_a_small_relic_from/#t1_dmpcle3


Is it safe to drill a hole in an Apple TV (3rd gen) remote?

Have a look around the web for disassembly. From a quick look, it appears there is room to drill a hole below the battery for the silver remote.

The newer generation black remote is much more contained, but there is room in the bottom corners of the remote below the battery.

I'd recommend disassembling and removing adjacent parts before drilling.

Update: Very late reply but for the TV2 remote it should be an all-aluminum body below the battery. I drilled a 1/8" hole through the bottom left.


What is the easiest way to run SW that requires Classis Mac OS 9?

I agree with @TomShen - SheepSaver is a good option.

Just keep in mind that it only works with Mac OS 9 up to 9.0.4 (so don't fall into the trap of trying to use Mac OS 9.2 - the most popular version of that release).

Also, if you're wanting to find a secondhand Mac that can run Mac OS 9, you also have the option of Macs that could run what was called the Classic Environment. This was a compatibility layer for running older Mac applications and was included with PowerPC versions of Mac OS X up to and including Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. In other words, if you want a dedicated Mac you're not necessarily limited to much older ones that could run Mac OS 9, but also have the option using the last models of the following series:

Power Mac G5
Mac mini G4
iMac G5
eMac
iBook
PowerBook G4

NOTE: These systems cannot run MacOS 9/Classic applications if running MacOS X Leopard or above!


What are the dimensions of the Mac Book Air 13" screen?

To calculate the screen dimension given the diagonal measurement and the resolution:

The 13.3" MacBook has a 1400 x 900 resolution. Assuming square pixel this gives us

which we can solve for x

The resulting value of x needs to be multiplied with 1400 and 900 to give the screen dimensions, in this case 11.2" x 7.2".


How do I unhide purchases from the App Store?

Go to your account in iTunes on your computer by selecting your Apple ID on the top right in the iTunes Store.
Select view hidden purchases.
Find the app and unhide.


Does having Bluetooth enabled draw extra power when no devices are connected?

Yes.  When the Bluetooth radio is active it not only turns on the receiver (which consumes power) but also periodically transmits to see if any known devices are in range.

When paired devices are on and within range, they do communicate occasionally even if not being used, and thus consume some power.

Turning off Discoverable will save some energy as it transmits less frequently than when it's not discoverable.

However, Bluetooth is such a lower power communications standard that it's hardly worth worrying about - active Bluetooth use (headsets in particular) do use a noticeable amount of power, but almost any other use, or just leaving it on, is negligible.

Further, for iOS devices the Bluetooth is often part of the RF chipset, and turning it off doesn't have much impact because it shares resources with the other RF functionality of the device, and without turning the other radios off (Wifi, GPS, cellular, nike+, etc) very little actually turns off when you disable Bluetooth.


Change the default Quicktime screen recording cache in OSX Mojave to be on an external flash drive instead?

For all I know, there might be a macOS setting to change where QT saves screen recordings, but I have not found that.

Without changing the path to the directory where QT writes screen recording files, you can change the directory to a symbolic link to a folder on your external drive.  The symlink acts as if it is a directory, but instead of holding files and using disk space to save files, it links to any directory you can get to through the file system.

I cannot confirm that you have identified the correct directory where Quicktime saves screen recordings in Mojave.  In Catalina, new screen recordings initially are saved on the desktop.  This is new in Catalina. If for some reason QT is not saving files to the directory you expect, obviously you will have to find the right directory and convert it to a symlink.

I am assuming you can find your way to the command line via the terminal app. I would guess there is a way to avoid using the command line for setting this up, I am going out on a limb and recommending the command line.

To convert a directory at

~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/Library/Autosave\ Information/

to a symlink connected to your external drive, you can try these steps:

Setup a folder on your external drive where you want to save screen recordings.  For this write-up, I am calling it

/Volumes/ext_drive_name/QT_screen_recs

The command for that is

$ mkdir /Volumes/ext_drive_name/QT_screen_recs

If there are files you want to keep from

~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/Library/Autosave\ Information/,

they need to be copied or moved into the new directory at /Volumes/ext_drive_name/QT_screen_recs. The command for that is:

for copy:  $ cp ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/Library/Autosave\ Information/* /Volumes/ext_drive_name/QT_screen_recs

for move:  $ mv ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/Library/Autosave\ Information/* /Volumes/ext_drive_name/QT_screen_recs

Obviously, you could create the new folder by copying the old one to the new location. The commands are similar to those shown for copy and move, you just skip the mkdir in step 1, and drop the /* at the end of the source element in the commands, something like this:

for copy and create new folder in the process:  $ cp ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/Library/Autosave\ Information /Volumes/ext_drive_name/QT_screen_recs

for move and create new folder in the process:  $ mv ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/Library/Autosave\ Information /Volumes/ext_drive_name/QT_screen_recs

Before you can make the symlink, you have to either rename or delete the folder QT has been using. In Catalina, you have to use sudo for these commands. I am not sure if this is needed in Mojave. sudo is used to execute a command with super user privileges.  If you do not use sudo when super user privileges are required, the error message is not always indicative of insufficient permissions.  The error messages can be misleading.  Assuming your account is of type "administrator," to use sudo, you just precede the command with sudo followed by a space.  You will be prompted for your password. You can avoid that by logging in as the root user, but then you run the risk of the directories being owned by the root user instead the account used when recording with QT, causing errors for lack of permissions to write to the directory on the external drive.

With all that as introduction, you can use these commands for renaming or deleting the default QT directory (I renamed mine, temporarily, then deleted it after every thing with the new setup was working for awhile.

rename: sudo mv ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/Library/Autosave\ Information ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/Library/Autosave\ Information.backup

delete sudo rm -rf ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/Library/Autosave\ Information

Make the symlink.  The symlink is going to have the exact same path as the original folder you are moving.  This is absolutely critical,  because QT is going to try writing files where it always has, at that path.  If there is no directory or symlink at that path, QT is going to choke.  The command to make the symlink is:

ln -s /Volumes/ext_drive_name/QT_screen_recs ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/Library/Autosave\ Information

That command will put the symlink exactly where the directory was that you will have moved to the external drive.

To verify it is setup, you can list the directory from the commandline:

$ cd ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/
$ ls -alF

The symlink will look like this:

Autosave Information-> /Volumes/ext_drive_name/QT_screen_recs

Another way you can see the symlink is through Finder.  Navigate to

~/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/

You will see a folder named Autosave Information with a tiny arrow in the lower left corner, indicating it is a link.

Finally, when you make screen recording, if you have converted the correct directory, and have the permissions set correctly, you will find the screen recording files on the external drive.

This symlink thing is a good trick.  I used it to move most of folders in my home directory, including Downloads, Desktop, Music, and Movies to an external drive, conserve space on the relatively small SSD running as my system drive.


Is there a keyboard shortcut for the AC button on Yosemite calculator?

On my MacBook Pro, AC/All Clear can be achieved by fn + esc.


Specfic epubs downloaded outside the iBooks store not syncing on a particular mac

Go to system preferences-> icloud -> icloud drive options...

Then look for ibook entry, check it. Done


Downgrading from Safari 12 (beta) to Safari 11

This applies to Safari 12 final as well.

Overview of options

Restore your machine from backup.
Depending on methods this might take a while. You also have to make sure to turn off Auto-Update in System Preferences > App Store or your joy with good ole Safari 11 will be short lasting. You may want to this either before or while you restore. It might be a nice idea to disconnect form any network to make sure that auto-updates really do not come through. (Disconnect from ethernet or turn off Wi-Fi.)
Re-install your OS.
That is up to the latest update but excluding  the very latest one that contains Safari 12. Which one depends on the OS you are using. This usually takes even longer and you also have to make sure to not re-install Safari 12. That means take control away from auto-update as soon as possible in the process, but be sure to manually install all other updates.
Keyhole surgery to replace really only files that are strictly necessary. This is much faster than both options above, but a bit more complicated. System Integrity Protection needs to be disabled temporarily. Procedure is outlined below.

All three cases require you to turn off auto-updating.
All three cases require you to manually install all future updates that Apple offers to you via the AppStore application, including security updates.

Keyhole surgery

for reverting the files associated to Safari 12 back to Safari 11

Simply deleting the application or replacing the application with a previous version will not work. The (beta) version 12 is not self-contained but distributed as an installer that writes a lot of files into locations different from /Applications.

To do this downgrade you may need to have a recent backup of the system or an installer package of for example Safari 11.1.2 for Sierra (link might change quickly or disappear altogether. Also, try to use the latest applicable version) ready and an application like Pacifist. (High Sierra users might have to revert to download http://updates-http.cdn-apple.com/2018/macos/091-94327-20180709-5409BA12-7C10-11E8-84CF-4F47544C24EB/macOSUpdCombo10.13.6.dmg and extract the files from there. Still quicker than restoring from TimeMachine or a full downgrading re-sinstall.)

This is necessary because simply re-running the Safari 11.1.2 over the version 12 (beta) installation will not work either. The Safari (beta) installer writes many more files than the installer for the regular version 11.1.2 –– and these do not play nice with the installation of 11.1.2.

Therefore you need to disable SIP, open the Safari 11.1.2 package with Pacifist and find the following locations upgraded by that update.

/Applications/Safari.app
/System/Library/Accounts/Notifications/CloudBookmarks/AccountsNotifier.bundle
/System/Library/CoreServices/SafariSupport.bundle
/System/Library/Frameworks/SafariServices.framework
/System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.Safari*.plist
/System/Library/Preferences/Logging/Subsystems/com.apple.Safari*.plist
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/WebDriver.framework
/System/Library/StagedFrameworks/Safari

(Optional: Compare that with the installation package for the beta version.)
Delete exactly these files and folders with their contents, nothing more, nothing less.

Then restore these Safari files from backup or in this case better yet: simply re-run the 11.1.2 package installation.

Generally, the "restore from backup" version is preferred, as Apple often forgets to really include everything needed for a self-contained installation (like the occasional info.plist file) making the re-run 11.1.2 installer method alone potentially a bit dubious.

Now that Safari 12 is out of beta and forced out onto everyone's Mac with SoftwareUpdate you of course need to uncheck "install updates automatically" in System Preferences > App Store pane.
Otherwise the above procedure will be undone in a short amount of time.

Profit and surf on Safari 11 for as long as you can get away with not updating. Again: make sure to manually apply security and other updates if you previously relied on that procedure being done for you in the background.

The above seems to work fine for system up to macOS Sierra and High Sierra. Therefor comments regarding these procedures on Mojave are mmore than welcome.


VoIP App for iPhone (universal, for standard SIP protocol)

I know that there is an app that behaves similar to your mention. The case is, that the app I'm talking about is well known in DACH and is only working with routers of a specific company 'avm'. The app is called 'Fritz!App Fon' and empowers you to receive and make calls. Even when not opened, the app receives incoming calls. Unfortunately you need those routers 'Fritz!Box' to take advantage of that feature. VOIP providers can then be set in the router's settings and be bound to your device - very simple and not complicated at all.

Edit: Via VPN you are able to make those calls from any place on the world - internet connectivity required :)


How do I create an explicit app ID using Xcode?

You must create an explicit App ID in the Developer Member Center. There is no other option of where to create this.


Change opt+backspace binding to ctrl+backspace

Replace ~\U0008 with ^\U0008

~ = Option

^ = Control

\U0008 = Backspace

Reference


Can I use an iMac in target display mode with an Apple TV?

Displayport is the protocol for video over thunderbolt.

https://www.apple.com/thunderbolt/

http://www.cablestogo.com/product/54179/hdmi-to-displayport-adapter-converter

Get the above converter and then connect the cables with whatever cheap adapters and cables are required to fit all the physical connections. All told, less than $200 of cables and adapters are needed to do what you ask.

Basically, you have a video capture station/tiny computer resampling the HDMI signal and re-encoding it into the DisplayPort format.


Deleting the Photo Cache may do the trick.

To do so, just:

From the Finder, choose Home from the Go menu.
Once there, open the Pictures folder and locate the iPhoto Library
file. (For Aperture, this is called Aperture Library.)  If you have
moved your iPhoto Library or Aperture Library to a different
location, go to that location in Finder first.
Control-click the iPhoto Library or Aperture Library file and choose
Show Package Contents from the shortcut menu.
In the next window, locate the iPod Photo Cache folder and drag it
to the Trash. Important: Do not remove or modify any other file
within the library package. Removing or modifying other files may
cause data loss. Close the Finder window.

Extracted from iTunes: Understanding the iPod Photo Cache folder.


Maybe using a different approach will accomplish what you were looking for?

set someDate to "09/ 09 / 2019"
set theDate to date someDate
set currentDate to (current date)

set secondsBetweenDates to (theDate - currentDate)
set timeInDays to (secondsBetweenDates div days)
set timeInWeeks to (secondsBetweenDates div weeks)
set extraDays to (timeInDays mod timeInWeeks)

display dialog ((timeInWeeks as text) & " Weeks & " & extraDays & " Days Remaining Until " & someDate) ¬
    buttons {"Cancel", "OK"} default button "OK"

Obviously change the value of someDate to whatever you need


.smbdelete files accumulating on server share

Spotted an answer on the Apple support forums: https://discussions.apple.com/message/30046649#message30046649

  Apple introduced this behavior in OS X 10.10 you can find it in the
  source code here:

  http://www.opensource.apple.com/source/smb/smb-759.40.1/kernel/smbfs/smbfs_smb.c

  The comment above the code that does it is:

* We have an open file that they want to delete. Use the NFS silly rename
* trick, but try to do better than NFS. The picking of the name came from the
* NFS code. So we first open the file for deletion. Now come up with a new
* name and rename the file. Make the file hidden if we can. Now lets mark
* it for deletion and close the file. If the rename fails then the whole call
* should fail. If the mark for deletion call fails just set a flag on the
* vnode and delete it when we close.

Other googling implies that these are held while 'someone' has an open file handler and are cleaned up automatically later.


See resolutions and supported refresh rate of connected screen

Yes.

For your main display you would:

Click on the Apple menu
Select System Preferences
Select Displays
Click on Display
Select Scaled to select your resolution

Notes:

If you have more than one display, you can select from additional resolution options by also pressing the Option key at Step 5.
You'll also see the refresh rate option after Step 4.

If I've misunderstood your question please let me know.


Recovering files from SSD of MacBook Pro that won’t boot due to water damage

The easy operation is to Use target disk mode to present your Mac as a pure storage device and connect it to another computer. Many broken Macs still work to this extent and since you didn't mention how it was broken, it's quick and easy if power and the storage controller work minimally.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201462

From there, you can copy / image / perform repairs using Disk Utility or other third party data recovery / disk repair / disk imaging.

The article above shows what connectors are supported and you'll be using some flavor of ThunderBolt on a MacBook Pro. For target access - you can use any of the TB3 to TB2 adapters as they work bidirectionally. Same with USB-C to USB-A - the adapters generally work as long as you can make a physical connection.

Liquid damage is tricky and can break all sorts of things:

Need advice: should I open the back of a 2013 Retina MacBook Pro as a means to recover data?

If you are intent on opening the case, the best I can offer is go to iFixit.com or a shop that sells mounting adapters / SSD upgrades for Macs. Without your exact model, we're shooting in the dark to know what tools and adapters would be needed and what bus you want to expose the storage to.


Chrome still allows this, Safari doesn't. It is a per-browser configuration. To my knowledge, Safari does not currently have an option to re-enable this.


Do you have "Force local home directory on startup disk" checked?


Transfer of Songs/Playlists from PC to iPod

The easiest way is to just dump everything into iTunes and sync the iPod with it. Is there a particular reason you can't do that?


Where exactly is the Google Chrome sync passphrase?

I have an entry called GoogleContactSyncService which is an application password, then I have a Google Chrome Sync Passphrase which is stored as a secure note, but I may have added that. Try the former.

If this isn't it, then it is likely an application specific password. Go to your Google Account, revoke the prior Authorization and then generate a new password. If the one I said above isn't it then I have a feeling that what happens is that when you enter the passphrase it generates a much larger authorization token from it which is stored in keychain. The app password doesn't get stored.

Update

I think that you needed to record it, which is likely why I have a secure note in my keychain where I stored the passphrase when I set it up. If you didn't do something similar, or write it down when you set up, then you won't have it.

What is on your computer is the encryption key that is generated by a key derivation function (password hash). Basically you enter the passphrase and the function creates a large, pseudorandom private key with the passphrase as the seed for the random function, though Chrome's algorithm is likely more complex than that. Enter the same passphrase into the function and the resulting key will return the same key. However you shouldn't be able to go in reverse and use the key to generate the passphrase.

There is a possibility that if you didn't choose to use a different passphrase that it will be your Google account login password. If you have change your Google account password, try the older passwords to see if that was the one used as the passphrase. If you generated an app specific password and you didn't record it then the synced data is locked. You will have to reset and start from scratch.


How to paste multiple email addresss into iPhone mail To: field?

In order for mail to distinguish them as separate addresses, they must be formatted as follows before pasting:

<a@b.com>, <b@c.com>, <c@d.com>


Sandbox browser for safely viewing malicious websites

I recommend a VM with the OS and the browsers of your choice. Using the snapshot/clone features you may always revert to the original vanilla state.

Three of the advantages:

Use an arbitrary OS/browser combination (a lot of malicious websites often attack special combinations e.g. Windows XP/7/IE or OS/Flash)
You may detect any impact on the file system safely by comparing the mounted vanilla and infected volume (in read only mode).
You may run fseventer or dtrace (Mac OS X) or other tools (Win/Linux) without interference of your real OS.

Another possibility is outlined here in an article from 2010. Don't know if it still works:

OS X has a built-in sandbox feature for applications, which can restrict their access to certain parts of the system. There isn't a lot of documentation available on the sandboxing system, but I've successfully been able to sandbox Firefox. It has some limitations, but my plug-ins and add-ons work though yours may not.

If you have issues, you'll have to search for the directories where your plug-ins are housed, and give read or read/write access permissions in the firefox-sandbox file. There is only write permission to the ~/Downloads directory, so if you want to save files in a different location, you will have to change the firefox-sandbox file or move them after the download has finished. First, create the following file and save it somewhere as firefox-sandbox:

;; http://codereview.chromium.org/379019/diff/1/2
(version 1)
(deny default)

(allow file-write* file-read-data file-read-metadata
  (regex "^/Users/user_name/Downloads")
  (regex "^/Users/user_name/Library/Application Support/Mozilla")
  (regex "^/Users/user_name/Library/Application Support/Firefox")
  (regex "^/Users/user_name/Library/Preferences")
  (regex "^/Users/user_name/Library/PreferencePanes")
  (regex "^/Users/user_name/Library/Caches/Firefox")
  (regex "^/Users/user_name/Library/Caches/TemporaryItems")
  (regex "^/Applications/Firefox.app")
  (regex "^(/private)?/tmp/"))

(allow file-read-data file-read-metadata
  (regex "^/dev/autofs.*")
  (regex "^/Library/Preferences")
  (regex "^/Library/Internet Plug-Ins")
  (regex "^/Library/PreferencePanes")
  (regex "^/usr/share/icu")
  (regex "^/usr/share/locale")
  (regex "^/System/Library")
  (regex "^/Applications/Firefox.app")
  (regex "^/usr/lib")
  (regex "^/var")
  (regex #"Frameworks/SDL.framework")
; Our Module Directory Services cache
  (regex "^/private/var/tmp/mds/")
  (regex "^/private/var/tmp/mds/[0-9]+(/|$)")
  (regex "^/Users/user_name"))

(allow mach* sysctl-read)

(import "/usr/share/sandbox/bsd.sb")
(deny file-write-data
   (regex #"^(/private)?/etc/localtime$"
     #"^/usr/share/nls/"
     #"^/usr/share/zoneinfo/"))

(allow process-exec
  (regex "^/Applications/Firefox.app"))

(allow network*)

Replace the /Applications/Firefox.app.... parts with the path to Firefox on your system. Also replace user_name with your username. Next, open up a Terminal and execute this command:

sandbox-exec -f firefox-sandbox /Applications/Firefox.app/Contents/MacOS/firefox-bin

Make sure the firefox-sandbox file is in the directory where you run the above command, and Firefox should launch in a protected sandbox.


Internal keyboard + touchpad stopped working, on Macbook air 'early 2014', Yosemite 10.10.2

Apple doesn't package the drivers or installers, so the best you could do is try these installs.

Download the latest "Combo" updater for 10.x.x and install that package.
Download the entire Yosemite Installer and then re-install the OS.

The only downside to option #2 is you need to download more data. It is the sure fire way to ensure everything is up to date. The only downside to #1 is that it might not work. Not everything is packaged in the combo updater - just the things that were updated. So if you choose that, you might waste the time downloading the small package and trying to install it.

Before you do anything, try rebooting in safe mode. That would disable any third party kernel extensions and let you know if the core OS is the problem. If the keyboard works there - you might just need to uninstall your VM and other modifications.


Suspending VMWare Fusion instance that uses Boot Camp partition?

I know that Parallels 6 can 'pause' the boot camp partition. It suspends the virtual machine and frees up system resources without actually suspending the machine i.e. hibernation, however I don't know of any hack/workaround for VMWare Fusion.

Also Parallels can suspend the machine very quickly (around 5 seconds) so you can quit the app freeing up resources. I use it quite a lot as my computing class requires Windows.

  Pausing a Virtual Machine
  Pausing a virtual machine releases the resources, such as RAM and CPU, currently used by this virtual machine. The released resources can then be used by the host computer and its applications or by other virtual machines running on the host computer.

Hope this helps.


Old MacPro (2,1) with Windows 7 runs extremely slow?

I understand you have a 32 bit EFI. I do not think this has anything to do with the BIOS. Since you have already installed 64 bit Windows 7, I am guessing it does not.

In your comments, you say you modified the CD. So I can assume you have a working DVD drive. When you say you modified, I assume this involved oscdimg.

Apple does not officially support 64 bit Windows on your model Mac. Well, I have a 2007 iMac, which Apple does not officially support 64 bit Windows, yet I have run 64 bit Windows 7 and I am currently running 64 bit Windows 10.

I assume the Windows 7 installation DVD has Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1) or later included. This is a requirement according to the Apple website Install Windows 7 on your Mac using Boot Camp.

You have to installed Windows for a BIOS boot. It not a question of whether you can install to use a EFI boot, but rather the restriction is in the drivers. The Boot Camp Support Software for your Mac assumes you are using a BIOS boot method. This software includes the drivers for your Mac.

You can download the Boot Camp Support Software for your Mac from the website Boot Camp Support Software 4.0.4033. Since you have a 64 bit install, you might have trouble installing this download. If so, refer to the website Using Boot Camp Support Software 4.0.4033 to install 64 bit Windows 7 or 8.

Finally, you might not be blessed. If not, then your Mac would be slow to boot. Click on this link for instructions on how to bless your Windows 7 install. The instruction assume you have already installed the Boot Camp Support Software.

  Note: Many people have assumed the latest release the the Boot Camp Support Software should always be used. This is completely wrong. You have to use the Boot Camp Support Software released for your model Mac. Windows is designed to accept older drivers and even 32 bit drivers when the current driver is not available. So, if you decide to install 64 bit Windows 10 on your Mac, you would still use the same Boot Camp Support Software as for a 32 bit Windows 7 install.


The solution is reported on this discussion on the Apple Support Communities.

They report several ways to do that.
The easiest way seems to be:

  Insert your Tiger/Leopard/Snow Leopard DVD into your drive. Once the
  DVD loads, open the "Optional Installs" folder and then the .mpkg of
  the same name. This will launch an Installer. Click through until you
  get the option of choosing what you'd like to install. (this is after
  the Licence Agreement part)

  Open the "Applications" by using the tick box and triangle for the
  drop down menu in the panel of software to install, simply choose
  iChat (only) and let the installer do the work.


How to install SSD on late 2007 MacBook Pro (15 inch)

Since Yosemite needs drivers for those and it has to be signed(here is discussion of possible problems with that kind of SSD on Apple discussions) you much better off installing SSD inside the MBP in place of HDD.

Here is instruction from iFixit how to do it.


Connecting iPhone 4 to MacBook Pro via Bluetooth

Check out this post by @DanielSchlaug on the same subject: It certainly helped me (and a few other people).

Here's the content of Daniel's the answer:

  This fixes what i presume to be a corrupt internet sharing preference file. It will also remove all other network settings such as wifi access-points and their passwords so keep that in mind. Other data such as pictures and contacts will be completely safe.

  On your iPhone, go to Settings -> General -> Reset and choose Reset Network Settings.
  The iPhone will ask you to confirm and then restart.
  In Settings -> Internet Sharing reenable it and choose to turn on bluetooth if a dialog asking to do so appears.
  Reconnect to your wifi-network if applicable.
  You're probably done, try connecting. If it doesn't work go on.
  In Settings -> General -> Bluetooth tap the blue arrow beside your computer and choose to forget the device.
  On your computer go to System Preferences -> Bluetooth and remove your iPhone from the list.
  Go to System Preferences -> Network. In the Location drop down choose Edit Locations.... Add a new location and press done.
  Make sure the new location is selected and press Apply.
  Go back to System Preferences -> Bluetooth and re-pair your phone to the computer.
  Connect to your iPhone's bluetooth network.
  Back in System Preferences -> Network if you do not have a Bluetooth PAN interface add it by pressing the + button in the lower left.
  Press Apply and cross your fingers.


Differences between the three Ask to Join Networks settings in iOS 13?

What I commented above was almost correct.

the popover was very annoying to see when Wi-Fi is on and I am away from known networks. So maybe a notification comes when there's none. So that I can finish what I was doing and then try to connect to something.

The excerpt from an article:

Off ( This requires you t manually select a network if no known
networks are available)
Notify ( Known networks are joined
automatically. If no known networks are available you will see a
notification for available networks)
Ask ( Known networks are joined
automatically. if no known networks are available you will be ‘asked’
before joining a new network.

From https://appletoolbox.com/wi-fi-issues-after-updating-to-ios-13-or-ipados-check-these-10-tips/
The difference seems to be in the direct popup with list of networks vs the notification about available networks which won't interrupt your work.


Is there an iPad app that lets me share my iPad screen with someone at another computer at another location?

There's a Mac app called AirServer that enables you to mirror your iPad 2 onto your Mac. Maybe from there you can get this to another location...


Why is my ipad being charged at low speed and sometimes discharged even when plugged in?

If you charge from a standard USB port (on a PC) or an ordinary USB charger, it is quite normal to charge with up to 500 mA. This is the maximum you can get.

If you want to go beyond that, you'll need a USB 3.0 port or high speed chargers. For example Apple supplies special 10W, 12W, 18W etc. chargers for various iPads.

It is also normal that an iPad is capable of consuming more power than a 500 mA charger supplies. Therefore you can experience that the iPad is discharging the battery even when it is connected to a charger.

To avoid that, close power hungry apps (i.e. don't be playing an intensive 3D game while looking at your battery stats for example), and/or use a higher capacity charger.


What is involved in converting a PC video card to have boot screen on the Mac?

From what I understand, it's not the Mac Pro, it's the graphics card that needs to be flashed so that it's "Apple approved"

For example, on MacUpgrades, they list an Saphire Radeon RX 580
with 8GB RAM

  It has been flashed to work on the Mac Pro 2008 (MacPro 3,1) - Mac Pro
  2012 (MacPro5,1) models.

I ran across a video of the flashing procedure for a newer (but same family) of video cards - though the procedure does require the use of Windows (meaning Bootcamp).

You will need:

GPU-Z to back up your cards firmware
ATIWinFlash to flash the firmware
The EXACT firmware for your Mac and video card

I currently don't have the required components to test/verify this procedure so proceed with caution.  If this is something you are not used to doing, definitely seek out someone who can assist you with this as you run the risk of bricking your GPU.


How to fix a mechanical problem with a single key on a MBP keyboard?

Yes, it's possible to replace individual keys without replacing the keyboard.

I recently replaces right SHIFT, right OPTION and several f1 - f12 keys on my 2011 13' MBP. SHIFT key was chipped on the bottom edge, which made it unaesthetic. OPTION fell off. I customized my fn keys with Karabiner, so the symbols on them no longer apply.

Mechanically, the replaceable bits come in two parts, the cap, which is black and covers all you can see, and the clip, which is white and lays underneath. The part where the cap holds onto the clip is most fragile. There are instructions about how you pop the cap. I say you should be prepared to replace a key if you decide to pop it, since, especially for first timers, removing the cap might damage the key irrevocably.

I decided to replace my own keys because 1) my machine is outside of warranty, 2) a professional would only replace the keyboard as a whole and that costs way more than buying a keyboard myself, 3) replacing a keyboard myself is a big project that requires gutting the entire machine.

I used a Chinese ecommerce site. The parts cost less than a dollar each. I'm sure you can use ebay. One big caveat is that you should send the seller a picture of the cap and clip you are trying to replace. Even in machines with same spec, the keyboard can be different. A fraction of a millimeter difference could mean whether a cap and clip can fit onto the existing keyboard.


Historically, how soon does Apple implement new wireless standards in their routers?

The two wikipedia articles below have an easily searchable summary of both the Airport and 802.11 timelines in the past:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AirPort
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_802.11

Looking specifically at 802.11n - Apple shipped product in November 2006 supporting the draft in MacBook Pro cards. The AirPort hardware followed in January 2007 and the standard didn't get published until October 2009.

Apple clearly isn't allergic to getting way ahead of a standard, and often builds the flexibility to roll out new standards in shipping product and will never mention it (and sometimes the people disassembling the hardware when it's released are in the dark as to these undocumented abilities).

Historically, if a protocol were ready for robust service this summer, you would be safe to presume Apple has considered and built for that more than 18 months ago.

The real problem with these sort of "crystal ball" extrapolations is that Apple only backs things it knows will be a long term success. Take for example Blue Ray and HD DVD. Those standards are clearly far superior to DVD, yet Apple skipped those and has never spent time or money putting those faster, better, and more data dense formats into production. Clearly fast networking is more core to computing and a desirable competitive edge for marketing hardware than an optical media format choice, but you'll want to carefully examine how any "advancement" fits into the big picture for consumers and/or businesses.

I personally don't see large percentages of the consumer population needing faster Wireless network access than 802.11n since fiber to the door and the rest of the network infrastructure in the US is lagging what current AirPort hardware can deliver. I would look instead for smarter devices that proxy app store downloads and undercut various cloud storage services with an Apple solution in the coming months rather than a spec bump.

Apple clearly has the money and expertise to skate to where the puck is going to be in terms of Wi-Fi improvements, but we as consumers often don't have the perspective Apple's engineers have of what's really in the queue for technology so our guessing is more of a parlor game than something I'd plan a purchase or investment around.


Ran Repair Disk on Boot Camp partition and Windows won't boot

A bit late, but maybe others still look at this.

First Aid may have messed up the partitions information. There are two separate places where the partitions are registered:

In the first sector, the MBR - this one need to identify the Windows partition plus the GUID partition range.
In the GUID table, which usually starts at sector 1, up to 63.

It is possible that First Aid reset the MBR to only list the GUID partition range (i.e. the entire disk). In that case you need to re-add the Windows partition (even if both overlap).

I've written some procedures for this here: http://blog.tempel.org/search/label/BootCamp and here: http://www.tempel.org/WindowsWithoutBootCampAssistant

You could also try to see if Boot Runner (https://twocanoes.com/products/mac/boot-runner/) helps fixing your partition and Windows boot records.


Run boot camp on your Mac and download the updated Windows Support files. Once downloaded, install them on your Windows PC as you normally would.


How to add custom extension for QuickLook?

You could try adding it via the .plist file.

This guide will explain how to do it.

To summarize the steps:

Go to the applications folder
Locate TextEdit.app
Show Package Contents
Edit the Info.plist file