iPad 3 as recording device - How to Connect Firewire 400 from a PreSonus device

You don't. Firewire isn't compatible with a full fledged USB controller and the 30 pin connector isn't even a full USB connection to connect peripherals.

Sell the Firewire device and buy a device that will work with the iPad is sadly the best advice I have for you.


How to make macOS and iOS connect to the stronger WiFi

If the one in the living room is connected to the main router via ethernet, just change it to access point only mode. Stop assigning addresses from this router. Set it to the same SSID as the other (stronger) router, and your devices should hand off to whichever signal is stronger at the moment. I have one router at home, plus two more in different areas, set up this way, and there are no issues. When I'm upstairs, devices connect to the access point; when downstairs, they connect directly to the main router, transparently.


How do I instantly lock my computer when screen saver delay is on?

If you set your screen saver to require a password when exiting and then set one of the screen corners to turn the screen saver on, there you go instant turn my screen saver on gesture.

Unfortunately MacOS does not have a universal keystroke to lock the computer like Windows does.

If you have Mojave you can, the shortcut is there in the Apple menu:  ⌃ ⌘ Q


This isn't directly answering your question since I don't know of a way to disable the file cache mechanism in OSX. That being said, I can't think of a good reason WHY you would want to do so in the first place? What makes you so sure it is because of the file cache?

The file cache is a dynamic thing in that it gets larger as you do more I/O with your disk, but gets purged and shrinks as soon as an application needs RAM to get something done. What lives in the file cache is copies of recently used files with the idea that if you need them again shortly thereafter, the I/O will be much faster since it is already in RAM. While this is similar to the RAM cache function of the older MacOS, the big difference here is that it is completely dynamic and grows to make use of unused RAM in your system and will shrink as soon as ANYTHING needs RAM. In other words, it isn't locking up your memory and shouldn't be the cause of any slowdowns on your Mac.

That all being said, there is somewhat of a balance between how OSX manages your RAM. I have seen that there are small delays as things go in/out of the "compressed" state and in general the idea is that once something is compressed, it will stay there until there is a real need otherwise. The bigger cause for a delay would be if you were using swap since that is the slowest form of memory, but your screenshot even indicates 0 bytes dedicated to swap. Compression and swapping aside, I wouldn't be surprised if there is some overhead and delay as a result of shuffling all this around when all of your RAM is being utilized. However, the question might be more around what applications are freezing up when you're in this situation. Perhaps even your disk is near capacity and you're rather experiencing the fact that HFS+ is much slower when the disk is near full?

In general, you might have some short term benefit from purging or disabling the file cache, but I would hazard a guess that it would actually degrade your performance since you wouldn't get the benefit of a filesystem cache.


How do I make my USB pen drive writable?

Some usb's have write protect switch ! (a real switch, not software)

Sometimes it is a simple as flipping the switch.


Delay mounting Backup Plus drive after being improperly ejected

There's probably a duplicate question here, but the system will run a filesystem check when the device attached is possibly a foreign file system or a native Mac filesystem where the journaling feature is disabled or the journal indicates possible failures of the disk allocation catalog or directory structures.

You can usually open Activity Monitor and see some activity start when you connect the drive while the OS is checking if the drive is correct before showing it in finder. Depending on size of the volume, this could take 5 to 25 minutes or more if the drive itself has hardware malfunction.

To diagnose this, you would need a tool to disable the disk arbitration framework and then time / examine the mount process for each disk that's out of the ordinary.

How to Disable USB Auto-mount
https://superuser.com/questions/531673/disable-auto-mounting-of-all-unknown-drives-on-os-x


Well if you have a plastic box put the mac & rice in that, shut the lid and put it somewhere "gently" warm. 24 hours minimum - give it a chance as it sounds like water got deep in...

But if you can get it to someone who can take the cover off to clean and dry it out that would be better...

Be thankful it was not beer or (white) wine - they leave residues that make it very unlikely that they start again (guess how I know :), done 3 water, wine & beer - only one that survived was the one with water...), but water there is a chance...

Best of luck with it.


Unfortunately, the disks that come with a Mac are Mac-specfic. They have special drivers for the machine they came with, and usually don't include drivers for other machines. The serial number he's providing you with should still work with no issues, but the disks themselves will probably not work. I would suggest getting the Snow Leopard Server disks from another source and using the serial number you're buying.

As for installing Server on top of the existing OS, this shouldn't be an issue. I would still recommend having a backup, but it shouldn't erase any data.

Good luck!


Automatically cc myself when sending from 1 particular email account - OSX mail

Currently this isn't possible with the built-in  Mail rule set in Yosemite. As mentioned by user3439894, you have to rely on a third-party utility. Here’s a screenshot from Mail Act-on site.

You can build your own rule using the additional third-party rule set e.g. Add CC Recipient. So people we see that you have added them to Cc list.


The New iPad currently being sold on the Apple Store doesn't come with headphones of any kind, according to their site:

So it seems unlikely that they'll start shipping them with EarPods, especially since the EarPods are already on sale.

That said, there's no way to answer this question aside from pure conjecture. Perhaps a future model of the iPad will ship with the EarPods.


Syncing my music on my new MBP, clarification needed

If you have Music Match it should all get transferred once you authorize the new computer. If you don't, then you will only be able to download the music you have purchased in iTunes. You need to make sure your computer is authorized - you can have up to five devices associated with the same account.


Is it OK to use an HFS+ start disk with High Sierra?

Yes - High Sierra fully supports running / booting from HFS+ since it doesn’t even change any system over to APFS except for Apple SSD based systems. Fusion drives and spinning HDD hard drives all remain on HFS+ as do all external drives connected to your High Sierra system.


Why won't my secondhand iPad let me activate an Apple ID?

Any device (whether iOS or OS X) has a lifetime limit of THREE (3) new iCloud accounts can be activated using it.

Once the third iCloud accounts has been activated from that device, that device cannot be used any longer to create/activate new iCloud accounts.

Apple allows the primary and the secondary account, after third they do this to you:

There is no way around that restriction.

Apple does this to prevent people from having free unlimited storage.

So unless you can use one of the exiting accounts you are out of luck.

Here is some more reading material for the one complaining that I did not provide sufficient link/references:

Can we have two iCloud accounts on our iPad?

iCloud on Mountain Lion: one account per Mac or one per user?

https://discussions.apple.com/message/20755523

Primary and Secondary account

http://support.apple.com/kb/ts4020


Automatically hide and show the dock is greyed out, how to reactivate the option?

I have run into a solution, thanks to idownloadblog
just put the code below into terminal
defaults write com.apple.dock autohide -bool true

It overrides the setting in preference


How much space do "Shared Streams" take up on an iOS device?

When others share with me, are the photos copied to my hard drive? Or do they purely reside in the cloud?

Photos shared with you (or photos you share) get copied to your (or others') devices through iCloud. They reside on iCloud for just 30 days to give adequate time for all devices to sync them from the cloud. See iCloud: My Photo Stream FAQ

  If I add the same photo to two different streams, will it duplicate the amount of space used on my phone? Or does Apple intelligently make a reference link instead of a copy?

It won't add another copy on your phone across your photo streams, but there will be a photo stream specific copy that's separate from the camera roll (and any other albums the photo may be part of).

The quality of the photos shared will also vary across devices. See iCloud Photo Stream and Image Quality

There are three groups you see under Settings > General > Usage > Photos & Camera:

Camera Roll - this is for photos you have taken on the device as well as photos you have saved to the Camera Roll from (others') photo streams you have subscribed to. If you have Photo Stream enabled, any photo you take with your camera will be added to the Camera Roll and Photo Stream (with Photo Stream being restricted to the recent 1000 photos on iOS devices; there are no restrictions on photo streams on computers).
Photo Library - this is for photos that have been synced from iTunes (the source of those usually being iPhoto or Aperture on OS X).
Photo Stream - this is for photos from your and others' photo streams. If you delete a photo from your photo stream, it will get deleted from all other devices that sync to the same iCloud account.


Cannot upgrade iPad Air 2 from iOS 9 to iOS 13

I'm not sure why iTunes recommends iPadOS (iOS 13 equivalent for iPad), but it won't update as the iPad 2 is not compatible with iPad OS, and the highest software it can go to is iOS 9.3.5.

Here is a list of compatible devices on the Apple website:

  12.9-inch iPad Pro.

  11-inch iPad Pro.
  10.5-inch iPad Pro.
  9.7-inch iPad Pro.
  iPad (7th generation)
  iPad (6th generation)
  iPad (5th generation)
  iPad mini (5th generation)
  iPad mini 4
  iPad Air (3rd generation)
  iPad Air 2

You should be able to update to iOS 9.3.5 using the standard Software Update page (accessed by going to Settings -> General) over the internet without a computer.

The only thing you'll get from updating from iOS 9.3.1 is some security fixes, so leaving your device at that isn't a major issue.

Solution for OP

The solution was to restart iTunes on the Mac.


Should I be worried about my iPhone overheating?

Yes and no.

The newer iOS devices have internal temperature sensors and will let you know when the internal temperatures are so high that damage is of concern. You basically get locked out of the device until it's cool enough to run again.

As long as the sensor is working, it is safe to use the device up until it shuts itself off. This protection should cover you from charging or operating the device and causing harm to the components in the short term as well as drastic long term damage to the battery.

If you are concerned about the long term health of the battery - then yes, do worry about temperature. At 0°C - you can expect to lose between 2 and 6% of the capacity per year depending on the average charge in the battery (the lower is at 40% average charge - the higher is 100% average charge). If the temperature is 25°C - these losses jump to 4% to 20% capacity loss. If you store/use the phone for one year at 40°C which most people would consider very hot to hold - the losses in capacity are 15% to 40% annually. Charging the battery this hot or hotter is even worse for the health of the battery.

So, a few times of limited use under 40°C shouldn't be of concern, but leaving it in a very hot car (> 50°C) can be very damaging if it's charging or there for hours or days.

Whenever you can keep it cooler, and not fully charged for long periods of time, your battery will degrade less over time. You can weigh the need to use the battery when warm with the eventual replacement cost of $79 if you should ever just need a battery swapped out by Apple.


How do I set a location for an event in iOS Calendar?

I think this is how to do it.

First thing to do is enable time zone support within Calendar. Open Settings, select "Mail, Contacts and Calendars". Find "Time Zone Support" under Calendars and turn it on. It should automatically set the timezone to your current location, that's fine.

Then create your event in Calendar. The only important fields for scheduling the event correctly are the time and the timezone. Location for example doesn't affect it. Just enter the correct time (13:00 - 16:00) and set the timezone to a nearby city iOS will recognise like Las Vegas. Once you click Done you should see the event in your calendar with the time automatically converted to the time in your current time zone.

Then once you are in the US you need to remember to manually set the Calendar timezone under "Mail, Contacts and Calendars" to Las Vegas or another city in the Pacific Standard Time timezone.

Then your events should appear with the correct time.


I couldn't find any solution for a similar shortcut, and I ended using:

"Capture screen" any white and small space from the screen.
Open the "Captured picture" with the Preview app.
Add your signature to the "Captured picture".
Add the "Captured picture" with your signature to the page document.

Here is a video about the short trick:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSEQeQ-8kNI


lots of errors after sudo bash in terminal

For cases like this with a more detailed dot file, to get a root shell, I would use

sudo -s

If that works, you might add one line to your .bashrc if you like a more detailed prompt: https://superuser.com/questions/866269/use-sudo-s-but-show-current-folder-name

I don’t and want the root prompt to be very different so I know I’m root and not my normal user as that saves pain for me if I forget to get out of root as soon as possible.

If you want an excellent tutorial on root shell for macOS - see https://scriptingosx.com/2018/04/demystifying-root-on-macos-part-2-the-sudo-command/


Is there a way to exclude certain sites from search results in Safari?

If you put -site:pinterest.* after an image search, it doesn't show any pinterest results in a Google search.

E.g. image -site:pinterest.*


Why Firefox takes so long to open in Mac OS X?

If you have installed many fonts (font packages), you should disable the ones that you don't use. Also try running Firefox in safe mode (without addons). FF4 should start for about 2-3 seconds.


Settings > iTunes & App Store > Automatic Downloads


Connecting iPhone Xr to a PC that doesn't have iTunes on it

I ended up finding an answer in a YouTube video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuJgHIipTvM

I will summarize in the event of link rot:

Connect the iPhone to the PC with a USB cable
Click the Start button in the lower left corner, and open the
Devices and Printers window
At the bottom of the window you will see a section labeled
"Unspecified"
Right click on Apple Mobile Device USB Driver and choose
"Properties"
Click the "Hardware" tab, and then the "Properties" button
Click the "Change Settings" button
Click the "Driver" tab and then the "Update Driver" button.
Click the "Browse my computer" option, and then the "Let me pick
from a list" option
Change to the MTP USB Device driver

It worked for me, after I did that I was able to see the iPhone attached to my PC.  I had to open and close the Windows Explorer window a couple times before it would actually let me see the DCIM folder on the iPhone, so don't get frustrated if it doesn't work right away.

Hope that helps anyone who might stop by and see this answer!


Using My Mac as a webserver for my VMware VM

Have you tried 'machinename.local?' (eg mymac.local)

I have a similar setup (and many many variations thereof) and usually the Windows VM can see the Mac via the address 'millie.local', where millie is the machine name.

If you go and look at the 'Sharing' tab of the System Preferences program, you should see what '.local' name your machine will appear as.

This doesn't work so well with Server 2003 (and presumably Server 2008) as .local has a different meaning with Windows AD networks, but it ought to be fine with XP.


Yes it’s possible, no it’s not likely.

You should do one of three things:

get malware anti bytes for Mac and scan for malware
make your user non administrator if you might be browsing places you don’t trust
reinstall the os if you feel you are very compromised and possibly get help from someone on cleaning

Chances are, a reboot is all you need to do unless beeping and high cpu persist.


I'm not familiar with the Belkin S52, but assuming it's a sound device the first thing I would try is using the Audio MIDI Setup app to remove it.

Follow these steps:

Launch the Audio MIDI Setup (by default, this app is located in Applications > Utilities > Audio MIDI Setup)
Once open you'll see a list of devices on the left-hand side
Select the Belkin S52
Now click on the minus - button to remove it
Follow any prompts you may get

If the minus - button isn't available, or the Belkin S52 isn't listed, you may need to clarify your question to include details on what the Belkin S52 is and how you installed it originally.


Is it possible to use Time Machine with Airport Express + USB External Drive?

No - airport express doesn't share drives, just printers.


Prioritize exact matched words in Mac dictionary app?

Seems this is a compatibility error between the dictionary app and other dictionaries like wikipedia.

I only found a partial workaround, that is do not use wikipedia in dictionary app, as most troublesome words are from there. Then the result list is must cleaner. I would like to have wikipedia directly in dictionary though.


This isn't an answer but it does add some information.  The value associated with the com.apple.LSSharedFileList.TemplateSystemSelector key, 1935819875, is a decimal representation of the file type.  In hex, it is 0x73624463, which are the ascii letters 'sbDc'.  This file type is described in /System/Library/CoreServices/CoreTypes.bundle/Contents/Info.plist.  This is a binary plist that you can convert to xml using plutil -convert xml1 -o Info.plist.xml Info.plist.  Looking in the Info.plist.xml file, you can see a dictionary at the top level.  Inside this there is a key "CFBundleDocumentTypes" and an array of dictionaries as its value.  In this array is a dictionary that contains the following:

<dict>
    <key>CFBundleTypeIconFile</key>
    <string>SidebarDocumentsFolder.icns</string>
    <key>CFBundleTypeName</key>
    <string>Sidebar Documents Folder Icon</string>
    <key>CFBundleTypeOSTypes</key>
    <array>
        <string>sbDc</string>
    </array>
    <key>CFBundleTypeRole</key>
    <string>None</string>
    <key>LSTypeIsPackage</key>
    <false/>
    <key>NSPersistentStoreTypeKey</key>
    <string>Binary</string>
</dict>

An interesting key/value pair in this dictionary is CFBundleTypeIconFile: SidebarDocumentsFolder.icns.  This file can be found at /System/Library/CoreServices/CoreTypes.bundle/Contents/Resources/SidebarDocumentsFolder.icns and it contains the icons used for document folders.

I would think that changing the com.apple.LSSharedFileList.TemplateSystemSelector value to a different value, or updating the dictionary for 'sbDc' to refer to a different icns file would get you on your way to having custom icons.


Can I modify a terminal command to do additional stuff?

I'd tend to make a new command for this. I think it would even be logical to combine them into a single one.

go() {
    if [ -d "$1" ]; then
        cd "$1" && ls
    else
        mkdir -p "$1" && echo "Created directory $1" && cd "$1"
    fi
}


Power Nap will receive user level data for any users that are logged in. If you have fast user switching enabled and both accounts are logged in when the Mac goes to sleep, both should get updates.

If there is a bug, it could be reported, but in the light testing I've done, everything seems to work well for users that have logged in.

If the user is not logged in, updates currently do not occur (OS X v10.8.2).


Change color of the Cmd+Tab app switcher on Yosemite?

You can darken the the background of menu bars in Yosemite using "Dark mode".  To enable this go to System Preferences-->General, and check the box next to "Use dark menu bar and Dock".


Trigger the Creation of a Specific Preference List?

In case you're still trying to do this, I just figured out how to generate the file on my Mac running Mac OS X 10.13.6 (17G65).

It's remarkably simple. The file seems to be generated once you select “About This Mac” from the  menu, as shown here:

Before that, "$HOME/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SystemProfiler.plist" did not exist.

After that, I could run

defaults read "$HOME/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SystemProfiler.plist" 'CPU Names'

and get the result I was looking for.


Why does Disk Utility show "Macintosh HD" on both Logical Volume Group and the volume underneath?

Why Disk Utility does it this way is a good question, but when both the drive and volume show like this, its a CoreStorage volume.

These terminal commands should put it back to the old way if it isn't encrypted:

diskutil cs list - find the "Logical Volume" (not Group) and copy the long "number" at the end of the line (it looks like this: BE1E16CA-64E2-494B-8EDC-3E843EF5C9A9)

diskutil cs revert BE1E… - paste in that long string in place of BE1E…

As always, ensure you have a backup in case things don't work out.


Ran codesign -fs - /Applications/Utilities/Boot\ Camp\ Assistant.app how do I reverse it?

There is no undo; permanent changes are made. The only way to resolve this situation would be to replace Boot Camp Assistant with a known-good copy. A simple way to do that is to reinstall OS X using Recovery Mode.


iOS 7:

  Tap Settings
  Tap on WiFi
  Tap on your connected WiFi name
  Tap the static tab and enter your addresses
  Close out of the Settings and launch Safari or another network app to confirm connectivity


100 GB Missing after failing to install Windows 10

The Terminal application commands to remove OSXRESERVED and return the free space to the APFS partition are given below.

sudo  diskutil  erasevolume   free  n  disk0s3
sudo  disktuil  apfs  resizecontainer  disk0s2  0


How can I sync PDF files (and more) with my Mac and iPad?

The PDF files you add to the bookshelf are copied back to iTunes on your Mac and the can be accessed there and opened in Preview. Unfortunately, I don't believe your location data is synchronized.

Archiving of web pages can be done using the Reading List function in Safari or using a service like Instapaper.


Because you want to be able to access the domain only from your local network (which includes the VPN) then you didn't need to get the static IP or domain name. Those are only needed if you want to allow a user to connect from outside the network. For your purpose you just need to set up a domain on your intranet and I found a tutorial at http://www.edugeek.net/forums/internet-related-filtering-firewall/111965-domain-name-intranet-use.html that should work. If it doesn't work then you will be stuck with using the IP Address and out however much you spent on the domain and static IP. However on the bright side you are smart enough not to open up port 80 to the rest of the internet. Good luck!


Dock randomly switches between screens. Any way to stop?

Dock position could be changed when You place Your mouse on the bottom edge of the secondary screen and then move it down again.


With Mac Pro, is software RAID 0 worth it?

Yes, RAID 0 is faster than using the drives independently of each other. Whether or not its noticeably faster depends on what kind of application you're looking at. Some setups benefit hugely from a RAID 0 setup, while for others, its pretty marginal.

There's also the convenience of everything being treated like one big drive.

I will however say that spreading your data like this has one huge disadvantage. You've multiplied the number of potential points of failure by increasing the number of drives in your array, and the data isn't being protected by any sort of mirroring or large scale redundancy. When a RAID 0 array fails, it fails hard, and you'd be well served by having a very robust backup scheme.

For the record, my Mac Pro's drive are not in a RAID configuration.


When you plug in the iPod touch, Alt- or Option ⌥-click the device's "Restore" button in iTunes. This will allow you to choose the appropriate ipsw file to load on the device.

Have someone download the appropriate firmware for your device. Below are links to Apple's downloads of the 4.2.1 firmware.

iPod touch 2G firmware 4.2.1
iPod touch 3G firmware 4.2.1
iPod touch 4G firmware 4.2.1


MacBook screen turns off when setting brightness one notch below maximum

Restarting the computer resolved this. ¯_(ツ)_/¯


How can I independently adjust the horizontal and vertical mouse tracking speed on a Mac?

If you use your Razer Orochi along with the Synapse software from Razer, it will give you the option to change the vertical sensitivity.


Some ways are:

From the lock screen - Go to Settings -> Wallet & Apple Pay and enable Double-Click Home Button. Now when you double-click on the lock screen your cards will appear. Then select your card and use Touch ID or hold it next to the reader. One of the quickest and easiest ways.

Siri - You can access Apple Pay by saying "Apple Pay" to Siri.

Wallet App - Go to the wallet.app, click on your card at the top. Then when you rest your finger on the home button, it will authenticate it and search for a nearby reader.

Holding it near the reader - When you hold your iPhone near a card reader it will automatically bring up your list of cards.

You might also want to check out Apple Pay.


How do I view or verify signed .mobileconfig files using Terminal?

Apple's .mobileconfig files are signed using PKCS7. The signing certificate data can be shown using the following command:

openssl pkcs7 -inform DER -print_certs -in ~/Settings.mobileconfig

You can copy/paste ASCII certificate data from the output into a plain text file (with a .cer filename extension) to create copies of the certificates:

-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
MIIElTCCA32gAwIBAgIBAjALBgkqhkiG9w0BAQswga4xQDA+BgNVBAMMN0tlbGxl
eSBDb21wdXRpbmcgT3BlbiBEaXJlY3RvcnkgQ2VydGlmaWNhdGlvbiBBdXRob3Jp
dHkxGTAXBgNVBAoMEEtlbGxleSBDb21wdXRpbmcxJTAjBgNVBAsMHE1BQ09TWCBP
...
q19fbG33zNwRhVHceYMpcbWG1MSqLxnPu4wo75OZFIJCaByZykfpKAzRZl9aa7rD
5bAuzZAziXBW7WWKce2a4hGN804W9RHco5HIGLsQAdg4pLZvENXF1+JNHtBVXjjL
WJrCDKjnCyS1DqmJqijk9KIDM8gP6iLLeQ==
-----END CERTIFICATE-----

OpenSSL can be used to verify the code-signing certificate as well. Assuming that we've copied the signing CA's certificate text/data into ~/CA.crt, and copied the code signing certificate into ~/CodeSigner.crt.:

openssl verify -CAfile ~/CA.crt ~/CodeSigner.crt

Removing the signature from a file can be accomplished using this command:

openssl smime -inform DER -verify -in ~/Settings.mobileconfig -noverify -out ~/Unsigned.mobileconfig


Is there a way to sync Google Calendar with iCal without CalDAV or EAS?

I just thought I would add to this question, given that it was posted in March, with no further activity. Google originally posted this to the Google Blog:

  CalDAV API will become available for whitelisted developers, and will be shut down for other developers on September 16, 2013. Most developers’ use cases are handled well by Google Calendar API, which we recommend using instead. If you’re a developer and the Calendar API won’t work for you, please fill out this form to tell us about your use case and request access to whitelisted-only CalDAV API.

Shortly thereafter, they added this:

  We worked with the developers who provide 98 percent of our current CalDAV traffic to assure access to the CalDAV API, which means many popular products will not be impacted. We remain committed to supporting open protocols like CalDAV.

As I've heard nothing to lead me to believe otherwise, I presume the current state of things at Google is to continue to support CalDAV. Of course, as with anything else, this could change.


To recover your lost files, you could try TestDisk, or PhotoRec, the dedicated picture recovery version.
There's also Disk Drill, which offers a freemium product (that seems fairly easy to use). I haven't tried it.

Keep in mind that to recover files the recommended procedure is to stop using the affected disk immediately, and ideally mounting it as an external drive on another system to do the recovery from there, as space marked as free on your hard drive gets overwritten randomly.

About files appearing on "Recent" menus: it is not an indicator that the file is still on your hard drive. It is usually a link to where the file was when you opened it.


Can I remotely control an IPad 9.7 running ios 11.2 with Teamviewer on a MacBook Pro?

No.

  Access remote computers on the go with the TeamViewer: Remote Control apps for Android, iOS, Windows 10 Mobile, Windows 10, and BlackBerry. Use your mobile device to provide spontaneous support or to remotely access an unattended computer

There's simply no APIs available to do this AFAIK. Even Apple's own Apple Remote Desktop can't control iOS devices.


Printer Setup Utility gone in Mavericks, how to set default printer in Applescript now?

You can use AppleScript to execute shell scripts, so you can use:

do shell script ("lpoptions -d printername")

Replace printername with the actual printer name. It may not be exactly as it shows in System Preferences (I think ALL non-alphanumeric characters are replaced with underscores, but I'm not certain) so you can view your list of printers with:

lpstat -p


Opening a subset of bookmarks in a Bookmark Folder

Which ever way you look through the Bookmarks in Safari, it will offer you the option a sub menu to "open In Tabs"

Example: From the Bookmarks menu bar.


In Chrome, tap to look up in dictionary: Placement not working properly

The word needs to be in about 1 inch from top or bottom of the screen for pop up to work.

It wont work on all type of web pages.

Here is a example of the pop up relative to the position of the word on the sceen.

The word "Bittersweet" is Up most position for the pop up to work

Mid screen

Low, in this case you actually can see the word in the sentence and the pop up is above it.


Tell Safari to Download Certain File Types?

I don't know about permanently, but you can hold down the option key when clicking on a link, and that will always download it instead of opening it.  Similarly, if you put a URL into the address bar and type option-return, that will download it as well.


AppleScript used to download subtitle files

Use the following example to click the "Save Subtitle" button:

tell application "System Events" to click UI element "Save Subtitle" of group 1 of window 1 of application process "FlixTools"


Mysterious apps with strange names and no Icons showing up on my iPhone

In my case they were webpages that I had added to home screen from Safari

Reference: Apple Discussions


Faster and more efficient alternative for Tunnelblick

I recently switched from Tunnelblick to Viscosity. Awesome, never gives me that laggy trouble, but it requires a license.

A pretty good free option is OpenVPN but I have had login issues with it sometimes. Once you're logged in it's solid though.


how to force quit LookupViewService Processes?

Try running killall LookupViewService in the terminal


Battery status in menu bar was red having charged my laptop for one hour

Sometimes the menubar took some seconds to refresh after the computer was sleeping especially after the computer runs out of charge.
If you have doubts about the health of your battery you could use this amazing app to check it https://www.coconut-flavour.com/coconutbattery/


How to gift an app on the App Store for iOS?

Gift option is available under Share sheet for an app, in the App Store app in iOS. Also note that you cannot gift free items.

Instructions to gift an app, from the Apple Support document, Send App Store & iTunes Gifts via email - From your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch

  Gift an app or another item

  Open the App Store app, iTunes Store app, or Books app. If you're not signed in, sign in with your Apple ID.
  Find the item that you want to gift. (You can't gift a free item.)
  Find and tap the Gift button:

  In the App Store, tap the More button  in the upper-right corner of the app's product page, then tap Gift App .
  In the iTunes Store, tap the Share button , then tap Gift .
  In the Books app, tap Gift .

However, it appears that the gift option is currently not shown. I have observed this in various devices running iOS 12.3.1. It's likely due to an error or an implementation change from Apple's end.

To resolve this, your best bet is to get in touch with their support team.

Apple Support (@AppleSupport) | Twitter

You can also submit feedback to Apple:

Feedback Assistant


How can I track the progress of dd after I've already started it?

Yes, from a separate terminal you can issue this command:

kill -INFO 1234

where you need to replace 1234 with the pid of your dd process. You can look it up with the ps command.

Another simplification at a second terminal:

sudo kill -s siginfo $(pgrep ^dd)   # get dd info

Another simpler way is to request the progress information from the same terminal as dd by pressing Ctrl-T.


I am using a 13-inch mid 2014 MacBook Pro with Retina Display. It is
  about 3 weeks old and already has clocked 13 charge cycles. Is this
  too high?

A charge cycle is just the process of using and then recharging the full capacity of the battery one time. From Apple:

  A charge cycle means using all of the battery’s power, but that
  doesn’t necessarily mean a single charge. For instance, you could use
  your notebook for an hour or more one day, using half its charge, and
  then recharge it fully. If you did the same thing the next day, it
  would count as one charge cycle, not two, so it may take several days
  to complete a cycle.

You can't really have "too many" charge cycles unless there's something wrong with the battery and it's unable to hold a charge. That seems unlikely since your computer is brand new (and OS X will notify you if your battery condition is abnormal).

Furthermore, your particular model is rated for 1,000 charge cycles before it's considered "consumed" (meaning it'll no longer hold a reasonable charge and will likely need to be replaced). If your current rate of 13 charge cycles per three weeks holds, that means you're good for 4.5 years – in other words, nothing to worry about!

  Also, I follow the practice of fully charging it and then using till
  about 40% before recharging without ever leaving it plugged in. Is
  this the best practice to follow or should I leave it plugged in while
  charging ?

Even if you leave your laptop plugged in at 100%, the system will actually silently discharge the battery to ~95% and back up to keep things moving. Apple used to recommend unplugging your laptop at least once a month, but their current guidelines make no mention of that, so I wouldn't worry about it.


This may be possible by opening the "Game Center" app on your youngest son's device and logging him into a third Apple account, or possibly just logging him out of Game Center. Depending on the game, if you are playing over wifi at the same time he may not need to be logged into the Game Center account for the others to see his activity.


How can one open a specific tab in preferences via Terminal?

You can use AppleScript from Terminal using osascript:

osascript -e "tell application \"System Preferences\"" -e "set the current pane to pane id \"com.apple.preference.keyboard\"" -e "reveal anchor \"shortcutsTab\" of pane id \"com.apple.preference.keyboard\"" -e "activate"  -e "end tell"

Replace ‘shortcutsTab’ with one of ‘keyboardTab’, ‘InputSources’, ‘shortcutsTab’, ‘Text’, ‘Dictation’ or ‘keyboardTab_ModifierKeys’ to change the tab it opens.

To find the list of available tabs in other preference panes, use
osascript -e "tell application \"System Preferences\"" -e "set the current pane to pane id \"com.apple.preference.name\"" -e "get the name of every anchor of pane id \"com.apple.preference.name\"" -e "end tell" where ‘name’ is the name of the preference pane.

To select a specific category of shortcut, you can use System Events to select a row from the left table.

osascript -e "tell application \"System Preferences\"" \
          -e   "set the current pane to pane id \"com.apple.preference.keyboard\"" \
          -e   "reveal anchor \"shortcutsTab\" of pane id \"com.apple.preference.keyboard\"" \
          -e "end tell" \
          -e "tell application \"System Events\"" \
          -e   "tell application process \"System Preferences\"" \
          -e     "repeat while not (window 1 exists)" \
          -e     "end repeat" \
          -e     "tell window 1" \
          -e       "repeat while not (row 1 of table 1 of scroll area 1 of splitter group 1 of tab group 1 exists)" \
          -e       "end repeat" \
          -e       "select row i of table 1 of scroll area 1 of splitter group 1 of tab group 1" \
          -e     "end tell" \
          -e   "end tell" \
          -e "end tell" \
          -e "tell application \"System Preferences\"" \
          -e   "activate" \
          -e "end tell"

‘i’ is the index (counting from 1) of the row in the left column of the preference pane tab. The new lines (using ‘\’ on the previous line) and white space outside of speech marks are just for formatting and can be omitted.

Be careful of the use of ‘repeat while not’ which waits for System Preferences to open to the necessary page, however this freezes the code until that point, and if System Preferences is preoccupied with something else such as logging in to iCloud which can't be interrupted, this will freeze until you manually quit.


How to upgrade Individual Developer Account to a Company Account?

The best manner to accomplish this is to contact Apple Developer Program Support directly.

You can find their phone number and initiate a support ticket from this web page:

https://developer.apple.com/contact/

I have found them to be expert at getting you the information you need to effect a smooth and orderly transition and help you from registering incorrectly or having any assets trapped in limbo if you make the transition incorrectly.


Which SATA cable do I need for a SSD installation in an iMac mid-2011?

By SATA 6, I assume you mean SATA 6Gb/s. This is now known as SATA 3. (In fact SATA 3Gb/s, is now known as SATA 2.)  SATA 3 has been around since 2009, and is backwards compatible with SATA 2, so a SATA 3 cable is fine. Also SSDs need both a power AND a data cable to function.

Apparently it is possible to add a second hard drive to this model of Mac (behind the CD drive). You do not state in the question if you merely wish to replace the hard drive you already have or add a second one. This Ifixit guide shows how to add a second drive. From the guide it is clear that this is a MAJOR undertaking.

If you simply wish to replace the drive you already have, as seen here, then you should have an easier time. However, according to the Ifixit guide (step 7)

  The WD Caviar Blue drive is a non-standard SATA drive. The power connector features 7 pins, rather than the standard 4. The drive also has non-standard firmware. This means you can only use Apple's own hard drives and not any standard after-market SATA drive.

Thus you need to choose a compatible new drive. In this case you can just reuse the cables from the old drive.


Installing two different versions of Windows via BootCamp?

I tried and found that you can’t install two different operating systems. When I tried, I came to the installation screen and nothing responds.


Screen Time - Share Across Devices changes code

I can confirm this behavior. All of my devices (Mac OS and iPad OS) are getting an older screen time passcode, other than the one that I have configured on my iPhone for iOS 13.

I spent a good chunk of my day with an Apple support engineer on Friday. In a screen sharing session I showed him the behavior on my mac and iPad. I set my screen time passcode on my iPhone to "1234", and enabled "share across devices". Then, on my mac, I enabled "share across devices" and it got a different passcode than 1234. It is a bug and the only work-around for now is to reset the screen time passcode on each device and NOT enable "share across devices".

I sent them logs and have a follow up with them on Wednesday.

It is possible to reset the screen time code for Mac OS by signing out of iCloud in System Preferences, manually enabling screen time while NOT signed in to iCloud (this is important to prevent "share across devices" from getting auto-enabled), and then signing back in to iCloud. At this point, DO NOT CHECK "share across devices" in screen time settings as it will restore the old, unknown passcode.

For iOS 13, you can reset the screen time pass code by connecting your device to a Mac, making a local backup, and then clicking "Restore iPhone..." using said backup. Backups in iOS 13 do not contain the screen time passcode, and performing a "Restore iPhone..." operation completely wipes the device of all user settings and OS settings.

For iPad OS, I believe a similar approach will work but I have not tried it.


How can I access the remote clipboard when Screen Sharing into a Linux system

There's a program called vncconfig that makes clipboard integration work. Just run it in your sever like:

vncconfig &

And now it works. Kind of a miserably named program though. Another tip is to add vncconfig & to your ~/.vnc/xstartup script so you always have it.


Using AppleScript to delete select files in a folder?

The reason you're getting Expected “,” or “}” but found identifier. is because you have a malformed list for the path. You cannot define the path like {macintosh hd / users / mike / documents / OneDrive / Pictures}.

Use the following instead:

tell application "Finder"
    delete (every item of folder "Macintosh HD:Users:mike:Documents:OneDrive:Pictures" whose name contains "(1)")
end tell

Depending on how may files there are to delete, Finder can have trouble running this AppleScript script, from taking far too much time and or the process stalling without recovery, to then require a Force Quit.

Personally, I would not use AppleScript and instead just use Terminal, and change directory to the one containing all the files and use rm *\(1\)* to delete all files containing (1). However use the rm command with great care because all deleted files are final!


How can I connect multiple wireless headphones to the same iPhone at the same time?

There is another "workaround" that DOESN'T involve Bluetooth. I often train multiple students students for 5K's, 10K's, etc. Since I train multiple students at a time and often use 1-hr long DJ mixes to set paces for everyone, I connect my iPhone to an FM broadcast device (usually limited from a 30-100 feet range). I additionally, I encourage trainees to use wireless devices such as nano shuffles, etc. that can pick up radio FM frequencies. There's no pesky Bluetooth "pairing" compatibility issues and anybody can join in by simply tuning in to my FM frequency; even those with nothing more than a simple portable radio/MP3 player. Although these devices were originally intended for tuning into your car radio, I've found they work just as well as for other mobile devices that can receive radio FM frequencies. They're not that expensive, either.

Link


My iPhone / apple account might be hacked/ infected, looking for clarification and advice

Tons of mails in a draft state is how things worked before IMAP and mail sync on iOS got better at handling this. Especially with gmail, this was a routine thing - dozens of drafts saved (littered) along the way.

I think you are fine if you know you have a secure password, aren’t seeing actual mails sent and can delete the mails. Extra bonus on the multi factor / alert, but older iOS devices might be grandfathered in as trusted, so perhaps change that in iCloud if you want a little extra resistance from this device without wiping it or signing out.

If you’re paranoid, erase all content and settings on the device, but just the presence of 40 to 100 drafts seems harmless in my experience. Without some other indicator you lost control of the device or the account credentials, I’d just keep it in mind and watch things.


You can get the machine name with scutil --get ComputerName and the name of the boot volume with

basename "`find -x /Volumes/ -type l`"

Note that both of these may well return a string containing spaces. So you want to do this

COMPUTER="`scutil --get ComputerName`"
VOLUME="`basename \"\`find -x /Volumes/ -type l\`\""

then

TIMEPATH="/Volumes/Time Machine/Backups.backupdb/$COMPUTER/$VOLUME/Users"


Bart Reardon is trying to convert a broken MBA into a "computer in a keyboard". The project looks a bit stuck right now, but from one photo you can see he has removed (some? all?) components from the Mobo. Perhaps you could ask him if the thing still works if everything is removed. I’d be interested to know!


Go to System Preferences/Universal Access, select the Mouse & Trackpad tab and set the mouse cursor as big as you want.


How to host Etherpad (node.js) AND create a closed Wifi network from the same Mac?

Ah, it seems that the problem is that while "Internet Sharing" is ON, OSX does not instantiate the child connection (in your case, the WiFi network) until you actually get an internet connection on the parent connection.

You can potentially fool it with a loopback adapter on your ethernet connection (and perhaps static addressing and setting the router as itself), but I have not tried it.


Options to deal with 43" monitor with MBP

I understand your goal is to be able to see as much as possible, even if that makes it smaller. In contrast, some people buy larger monitors so that everything appears larger, perhaps to compensate for poor eyesight.

Luckily macOS can accomodate for both preferences. In the System Preferences, under Displays, you can enable Scaled mode and choose More Space so that everything appears smaller, and you can see more things on screen at once.


When can I tell Siri to 'Remind me about this'?

As far as I can tell there is no way to tell if you are using a single device. However if you have more than one device that is Handoff enabled then you can be reasonably certain that if a screen within an app makes Handoff visible to another device then you can tell Siri to "Remind me about this" and a reminder will be created.


One thing to try is add a few more stocks and then the chart should be off screen. Also, when you tap on a specific index - it should take over with the appropriate chart.

If all the indexes are wrong, you might need to remove them and re-add what you need to see if the settings for the app are messed up somehow.

You can delete this app entirely and re-install it as well, so that's kind of a last resort item to try.


Depends on how you created the image.

If you're using the installer as your source then there's a pane for adding directory servers.

If you're using an installed system as the source then you may have to use something like the dsconfigad command in a script to bind.


What's is new in Mail app in Lion compared to Mail app in Leopard Snow?

The Apple Web site on Mail in Lion summarizes the most important new features. If it's "really any better" or not, depends entirely on your personal taste: I do like Mail.app's new list view where the list appears as a side bar, with chunks of message text in addition to the subject/sender information. You can further unclutter the interface by hiding the Mailboxes tree when you don't need it.

The search feature has also got better: things that used to require "Smart Mailboxes" (multi-condition filters) you can now do with a quick search in the search bar. Apple also seems to have stolen some good ideas from Google Mail – like Thread view, which is activated in Mail for Lion by default, and groups together messages that belong to the same thread. A thread shows up only once in the message list, showing the number of messages. It's very convenient to move/delete a whole thread in this way.
Also a neat feature copied from Google: the quoted text of original emails in replies is hidden by default, but you can unfold it by clicking "show more" (with a nice visual effect of unfolding paper).

However, if you love Thunderbird's special features, Mail.app is probably not for you. It's missing the Thunderbird's superb Tabs feature, i.e. you can only view one email folder / search result at a time (this might actually bring me to consider switching to Thunderbird again).

Personally, I like Mail.app because it's much better integrated with the other OS X apps I use, such as Address Book, iCal and iChat. Example: I get an email from a colleague, and if she's currently online in GoogleTalk/Jabber or Bonjour (local network chat), a green dot appears next to her name directly in Mail. Can't have that with Thunderbird... Other example: dates, times, addresses and phone numbers are recognized automatically in email text and can be added in one click as iCal event or to complete an Address Book entry. Also, I'm not sure whether Thunderbird's email database is indexed and searchable with Spotlight. Wouldn't want to miss this feature: searching for an email by subject or even message text without opening Mail in the first place.


Printer setup information is stored in /etc/cups, so simply copying that directory from the old machine to the new, and re-installing any needed print drivers successfully populates the printer list on the new machine.


How do I access icloud photo gallery to transfer photos?

This is a guess, but if you turn off iCloud back up on the iPhone, you may be able to access them using iTunes from your PC.

To turn off backing up photos to iCloud on an iPhone, go to Settings, then iCloud, then Photos, then turn off iCloud Photo Library. Note: My Photo Stream does not use any of your iCloud storage, so you can leave this on if you want.

Then, go back to Settings, iCloud, then Storage, then Manage Storage, then select your phone. Let it load, then turn off Photo Library under "Next Backup Size".

If you want to delete the photos on iCloud you can do it from Settings in your iPhone. Go into Settings, then iCloud, then Storage, then Manage Storage, then iCloud Photo Library. Use the delete button there.


OWC Aura SSD Firmware Update from Mac Recovery Terminal

I'm responding to this post late, and my contribution is a workaround for Aura SSD install/upgrade to High Sierra on a Power Mac, late 2013.

Install High Sierra on your OEM SSD.
Shut down, remove power cable.
Move the OEM SSD to the Envoy enclosure.
Install the Aura SSD into your computer.
Connect your OEM SSD (in the Envoy enclosure) to the USB port of your Mac.
Power up, zapping the p-ram (hold down Option,Command,P,R)
The computer should boot from the OEM SSD (in the Envoy enclosure). If not, restart and hold down the Option Key. The computer will show startup disk options. Choose the OEM SSD.
Once you have booted from the OEM SSD, start Disk Utility.
From the menu, choose "Restore". Select the OEM SSD as the source drive and the Aura SSD as the target drive. This will clone your OEM SSD to the Aura SSD.
Power off the machine, disconnect power cable, and disconnect the USB from the OEM SSD.
Power on, and the machine will boot from the new internal Aura SSD. If not, zap the p-ram again. Also, if you're on a Mac Pro, do not use wireless Bluetooth keyboard/mouse throughout the process, use wired ones.
This worked for me, hope it'll work for you.


How to change the vibrate pattern for Messenger and GroupMe?

Apps specify their own vibration patterns, and unless they offer a way to customize it in-app, that's what you are stuck with. Sadly, most apps do not.

The same goes for notification sounds, with most apps only offering an on/off switch while the app is open (iOS controls the on/off switch for global notification sounds while the app is closed).


This is not possible with Spotlight alone. Spotlight does not index the file path as a property of the file. Thus it is not possible to use the path as search criterion.

You can use mdfind at the command line to search the Spotlight index. With the -onlyin parameter you can point it at the top of your folder hierarchy. You can the filter the returned results using grep.

mdfind -onlyin ~/Downloads/ 'kMDItemContentTypeTree == "public.image"cd' | grep '.*/test.*/.*'

If you need help building the query for mdfind, have a look at HoudahSpot. There you can set up your search criteria. Then go to Window > Raw Query to find the Spotlight query string you can use with mdfind.

While in HoudahSpot you can also use its ability to filter search results. Above the search results you will find a search field that allows for filter/exclude by name/path. Here you can use the asterisk as a wildcard.

Full disclosure: I am the developer of HoudahSpot.


Is it safe to install Windows Updates on a Boot Camp'ed OS?

For practical purposes, when you boot into your Boot Camp partition you are on a regular PC: All updates pushed thru Windows Update should work as expected. I have used Boot Camp since the beta period all the way to Snow Leopard and I have never experienced a situation like the one you describe.

I believe that Windows Update will only push updates that are critical (like security updates) and everything else (like driver updates) is listed as optional. I recommend enabling the option that makes Windows Update prompt you whether or not it should install updates when available. That way if you are in doubt, you can always review and make sure any driver updates are not pushed into your system, and things like security updates are.

It might be a good idea to stick to the drivers provided by Apple.

I am unsure why you had to manually install the drivers on a USB drive, since they are usually installed automatically from the Mac OS X DVD right after Windows completes its setup. I wonder if there is a particular situation with your system and that the fact you had to install the drivers separately is related to what is causing your hardware to be unreponsive now.


The issue is you're modifying two different global settings: AppleFontSmoothing and CGFontRenderingFontSmoothingDisabled.

AppleFontSmoothing is an integer, represented from 0-4, whereas CGFontRenderingFontSmoothingDisabled is boolean. I'd recommend starting by deleting both, both as your user and globally (sudo) defaults delete -g AppleFontSmoothing; same with CGFontRenderingFontSmoothingDisabled.

The Menu Bar's process is called SystemUIServer. So you can restart the Menu Bar (see what your tweaks do) with killall SystemUIServer.


How do I configure the Emacs-like keyboard shortcuts in OS X?

Here are some good resources on how to add and configure these keyboard shortcuts:

A detailed exploration of these shortcuts by Llew Mason, unfortunately only available now through the Wayback Machine.
A similar article by an anonymous author (I think) that includes some caveats about specific methods.
A GitHub repository by Brett Terpstra that shows examples of some relatively complex key bindings.
A deep dive into the Cocoa Text System by Jacob Rus. It’s a decade old now but I’m guessing that a lot of the information is still applicable to today’s macOS.


What is the best way to generate a Yosemite or Mavericks Install USB flash drive?

Edit: this also should work for El Capitan with a 6.33GB+ partition

Currently the best way seems to be through createinstallmedia, which is also Apple's recommended method.

First create a Mac OS Extended (Journaled) partition on the USB key with 5GB or more:

then in the terminal use the createinstallmedia command. It can be found in the Maverick install apk. By default the path is /Applications/Install OS X Mavericks.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia.

Replace /Volumes/MavericksInstall with your own partition name:

sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MavericksInstall --applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app --nointeraction

The output should be along these lines:

Copying installer files to disk...
Copy complete.
Making disk bootable...
Copying boot files...
Copy complete.
Done.

The setup should take few to few dozens minutes depending on your USB drive.

To create a USB installer for multiple OS X versions you can to go through the following procedure:

Start disk utility
Create multiple partitions formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Give them names like:

OS X Lion : LionInstall
OS X Mountain Lion : MountainLionInstall
OS X Mavericks : MavericksInstall

Generate multiple install partitions using the createinstallmedia tool of each OX 10.9+ version and add the other install partitions using disktool :

restore the InstallESD.dmg from /Applications/Install Mac OS X Lion/Contents/SharedSupport  to /Volumes/LionInstall
restore the InstallESD.dmg from /Applications/Install OS X Mountain Lion/Contents/SharedSupport  to /Volumes/MountainLionInstall
sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MavericksInstall --applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app --nointeraction

From experience here is the data usage for each OS X version :

OSX 10.6 Snow Leopard: 7.19GB
OSX 10.7 Lion: 4.78GB (requires 6.13 GB)
OSX 10.8 Mountain Lion: 4.48GB
OSX 10.9 Mavericks: 5.4GB
OSX 10.10 Yosemite: 5.25GB
OSX 10.11 El Capitan: 6.33GB
macOS Sierra: 4.84GB


This may or may not help you, but I actually had the same problem.  Which lead me to this page because I did a Google search.

I had an artist with 11 albums in iTunes.  But on my iPod it only showed 10 albums.  However, when I searched for specific tracks on the "missing" album they would show up and play fine.

I messed around with iTunes a little and followed the other answer's suggestion.  I selected the album in artists view, right clicked on the album art (this will open up the properties for the entire album, not for a specific song.  You can also make changes and apply them to the entire album rather than having to go song by song).

At the bottom of the window there is a box "Album is a compilation of songs by various artists."  Somehow, that was checked.  Which is odd because way back when I started ripping my CDs to iTunes I would let iTunes download the information for the CDs from their database.  Anyway, I unchecked that, synced the iPod again, and the 11th album showed up under the artist.


Setting a clipboard kind without setting "styled Clipboard text"

After some investigation I found that you can manipulate the Pasteboard from Python, without having it introduce the styled Clipboard text entry. I reimplemented the ruby/applescript module in Python, so now I can copy syntax highlighted text from Emacs and paste it either into dumb applications like the terminal window or applications that can handle formatted text, like Pages.


It looks like this is somewhat of a missing feature from all the various music players I can find.  It has been discussed in several other threads over the years (and through many versions of iOS) and no one seems to have a solution:

https://discussions.apple.com/message/23287490#23287490
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4385600?start=0&tstart=0

:(


How can I get TextMate's QuickLook plugin to render HAML and YML files?

Dynamic UTIs are assigned to unknown file types so they have a UTI other than "data".

I suggest you define UTIs for file extensions .haml and .yml and use them in your custom QLGenerator. See this post on SU. The linked topic also contains another answer that suggests to use a QuickLook plugin for the public.data UTI every file falls back on.


How does USB-C on the MacBook connect to multiple devices?

Although Apple named it USB-C, it's officially called USB Type-C.

USB Type-C does not allow daisy chaining like Thunderbolt or FireWire.
That being said, you will need a USB Type-C hub.

USB Type-C Hub

A USB Type-C hub will likely have:

One USB Type-C DFP (Downstream Facing Port) connecting to the host.
Multiple USB Type-C UFP (Upstream Facing Ports) connecting to devices or another hub.

or

Multiple USB Type-A UFP (Upstream Facing Ports) connecting to devices or another hub (USB Type-A are the old USB ports).

USB Type-C hubs will need to comply with the USB 3.1 specifications. USB 3.1 provides backwards compatibility to older USB standards, therefore you would be able to add older USB devices with the use of an adapter or if the hub provides older UBS Type-A ports.

Example: USB Type-C hub

With a USB Type-C hub, you could add multiple USB Type-C devices, for example 2 USB Type-C monitors, as long as the host can drive/support them. In that sense, USB Type-C hubs work just like 'normal' USB hubs.

Example: USB Type-C devices

LaCie announced a USB Type-C external hard drive. If you add this to a laptop with only 1 USB Type-C port (and this laptop also charges via that same USB Type-C port, like the MacBook 12" mid-2015), then you cannot use the hard drive and charge the laptop simultaneously, unless you add a USB Type-C hub (that allows for charging) between the laptop and the hard drive.

Example: USB Type-A devices

You could add a USB Type-C to USB Type-A hub or adapter. For example an Apple USB-C to USB, USB-C to HDMI or USB-C to VGA adapter. Thereby making old USB devices, like a keyboard or a scanner, available to your host.

Note that using a USB-C to HDMI or USB-C to VGA adapter you can simultaneously:

Charge your MacBook
Use HDMI/VGA
Use an old USB Type-A device (this can also be a USB Type-A hub with multiple devices).

USB 3.1 specifications

Please read the USB specifications, including USB Type-C, for more details: http://www.usb.org/developers/docs/


Nothing at all. Any caches that are required will be recreated at next reboot. I clean my caches once in a while as an OCD thing, but it's not needed. A cache is just a temporary file. If you delete it, the apps will recreate them when needed.

Caches were needed back in the HDD days to speed up loading in applications. On SSD's they're not as important, but they're legacy and probably won't go away anytime soon. You can keep deleting them, but they'll always come back. Don't worry about anything going wrong. A properly written app is smart enough to not actually save any settings in a cache so you won't have to worry about losing information.

Delete them all if you want. The ones your apps need will just be recreated. If you're on a HDD you'll notice slowdown for a while as apps recreate the cache. But on an SSD you won't notice a thing.


How to have "say" wait when used in a series of pipes?

Turns out all I had to do was consume all of stdin at the start of my script... I don't want it to process stdin as it's received, but when the entire previous command in the pipe chain completes.
So my stage_complete.sh script is simply this, which works for my use case!
stage_complete.sh
#!/usr/bin/env bash

OUT=$(cat -)

MSG="$*"
say "$MSG"

echo "$OUT"

Note: I figured this out by asking the question in another stack exchange (unix), over here


iCloud Drive keeps re-downloading a 40GB file

There's nothing that appears to be 'fixed', based on the description in your question.
The purpose of iCloud is give you access to your data from any device logged-in with the same Apple ID. Using iCloud, you can access photos, files, contacts, Safari tabs, etc, just like they were part of your file system.  For example, if you create a doc using Pages on your Mac you can access and edit that same file from your iPad using the Pages app.
It looks like iCloud is simply syncing data between your devices at a regular interval.  This is normal, expected behavior.  You can control what's synced by going into your Apple ID via Settings on any logged-in device.
If you only want a backup solution, you can look into other services such as Dropbox and OneDrive.


Cannot find where php5-fpm is stored in MacPorts

FPM support is still in the works at this writing; see Trac ticket #26039.


I had the same problem. The only work around I found was to duplicate the Screen Sharing application. Connect to your work computer with the first application, once connected launch the second (duplicated) application and it will give you a second window. You can then allocate one screen to each application window.


Is there an app that lets me send email only?

Command line will do the trick (with some configuration). You will need to set it up to use your Google account authentication (I noted you tagged the question with "gmail" so I am assuming that's your provider).

This site has the details on how to set it up. If you use two-step authentication with your account just create an application password for command line and use that token when adding in SASL password.

This setup works well but won't handle attachments. If you need to send a file, you'll probably have an easier time using the Mail GUI.

However, your problem is that you don't want to open a program to send a message, correct? Because this requires you to have Terminal open, or to open Terminal when you need to send. But it would be fairly easy to knock together an Applescript that will prompt you for destination address, subject, and text of email, then bounce that directly to the shell and exit. Throw this into your user scripts folder and make sure your Mac is configured to show Scripts in the menu bar for quick access.

Second Edit: Updated the applescript to work a little more efficiently; uses the code from here to write the message body to a temp file in your home directory, then simply uses cat to read the file contents into an email message, and finally deletes the temp file. I tested it and it works well even with characters that were mishandled by the original script.

try
    display dialog "Send email to:" default answer "email@domain.com"
    set theEmail to (text returned of result)
    if theEmail is "email@domain.com" then error "No recipient specified!"

    display dialog "Email subject:" default answer "Subject"
    set theSubject to (text returned of result)
    if theEmail is "Subject" then error "No subject specified!"

    display dialog "Message:" default answer ¬
        "Enter message text" & return & return & return & return
    set theBody to (text returned of result)

    set this_file to (((path to home folder) as text) & "message.tmp")
    my write_to_file(theBody, this_file, true)

    do shell script "cd ~/; cat message.tmp | mail -s \"" & theSubject & "\" " & theEmail & "; rm message.tmp"

on error theError
    display dialog theError buttons {"Quit"} default button 1
end try

-- this subroutine saves input as a text file
on write_to_file(this_data, target_file, append_data) -- (string, file path as string, boolean)
    try
        set the target_file to the target_file as text
        set the open_target_file to ¬
            open for access file target_file with write permission
        if append_data is false then ¬
            set eof of the open_target_file to 0
        write this_data to the open_target_file starting at eof
        close access the open_target_file
        return true
on error
        try
            close access file target_file
        end try
        return false
    end try
end write_to_file


Why did Screen Sharing suddenly stop working (10.6.8)?

The last edit was the primary clue ... it was not a VNC-only issue, but a intermittent network issue.

We had a small 5-port hub in the room to support three machines off of the one network drop. Once we removed the hub and plugged the machine directly into the drop all was good. The hub had been there, trouble-free, for more than 3 years.

Once again I am reminded to ask myself more questions. An obvious question would have been: Does the target Mini have good connection to the network, outside of VNC/SSH? Is it dropping packets to reliable servers?


Is it possible to upgrade from Java 5 to Java 7 on OS X 10.5.8 - Leopard?

It seems that Java 7 will not be provided for Leopard (or even Snow Leopard), and I haven't seen any work-arounds....

Here are the official requirements and Apple's update page which matches what you got in Software Update.


Unable to backup my iPhone using iTunes. Error: Insufficient space on my Mac

According to your information provided

You have 17 GB free space on the Disk.

You also have 128 GB of which 111 GB can be purged (freed).

To purge go to About this Mac > Storage > Manage

Decide what to do by following the instructions.


How to downgrade to macOS Sierra without Time Machine

I got it from this link.
IMPORTANT:
DO NOT downgrade using macOS Sierra (10.12 Installer) disk utility to Erase your disk, you HAVE TO use the Online Recovery tool (or High Sierra (10.13) Disk Utility) to Erase your disk from APFS back to HFS+ , then restart and use your macOS Sierra installer from USB.
If you use Sierra to Erase disk, you'll get stuck in a Reboot Loop which is what happened to me.


How to connect an iPad Air to a Panasonic TV?

Although the OP's question is a bit light on detail, (what model of Panasonic TV?) this is general information on how to stream video from an iOS device, including the iPad Air, to a television equipped with an HDMI input.
Required is a Wireless Network that one has access to.  Also, the TV must have an Airplay capable device attached via HDMI that is capable of receiving streaming video from the iOS device.  For example a second generation Apple TV or newer.
Connect to the Apple TV using AirPlay.
According to Apple:

AirPlay is compatible with the second-generation Apple TV or later. AirPlay Mirroring is available with iPhone 4s or later, iPad Pro, iPad Air or later, iPad 2 or later, iPad mini or later, and iPod touch (5th generation or later).

Use AirPlay to wirelessly stream content from your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch
With AirPlay, you can stream music, photos, and videos to your Apple TV, or stream music to your AirPort Express or AirPlay-enabled speakers. And with AirPlay Mirroring, you can display your iOS screen on your Apple TV.
Get started
To use AirPlay, you need one of these devices:

iPhone 4 or later. iPhone 4s or later for AirPlay Mirroring.
iPad, iPad mini. iPad 2 or later for AirPlay Mirroring.
iPod touch (4th generation or later). iPod touch (5th generation or later) for AirPlay Mirroring.

You can stream content to these devices:

For photos and videos: Apple TV (2nd generation or later).
For music: Apple TV, AirPort Express, or AirPlay-enabled speakers.

If you want to stream iTunes Store content, you also need an Internet connection.
Use AirPlay

Connect your iOS device and your AirPlay device to the same Wi-Fi network.
On your iOS device, swipe up from the bottom of your screen to open Control Center.
Tap AirPlay.
Tap the name of the device you want to stream content to. You'll see a picture of a TV screen or speaker next to each device, so you know what type of content you can stream. On iPad, you might need to scroll to see all of the available devices.

When you choose an AirPlay device, audio or video from your iOS device will play on your AirPlay-enabled speakers or on the TV that's connected to your Apple TV.
If you turn on Mirroring, you'll see your entire iOS screen on the TV that's connected to your Apple TV. Your TV will use the orientation and aspect ratio of your device. If you want the image from your device to fill your TV screen, you might need to to adjust your TV's aspect ratio or zoom settings.


Is a quad-core i5 or i7 27" iMac a viable upgrade from a 2008 2.8ghz octacore Mac Pro 3,1?

It would be a lateral move in terms of processing performance. The following are scores taken from Geekbench (how fortuitous that they were right next to each other?):

As you can see, it's a slight downgrade in processing power, and I stress slight, if that is indeed your current model (3.2 GHz). The other variants (3.0 GHz for example, which can be seen if you scroll down the list) clock in at slightly lower numbers (~9000). While you would gain the use of an additional Thunderbolt port, the 6 Gbps controller, and a faster FSB, they may not offset the cost of buying a new machine.

It really doesn't look like it would be a significant upgrade from your current Mac.


Solution:

I had to remove all DNS and empty my DNS cache.

sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder

resolved my problem


Can a file be copied to one hard drive in a RAID 1 mirror set (software RAID), and later have the 2 drives sync up?

You're thinking of RAID-1 in the wrong way. RAID-1 is not an architecture intended to happily use a single surviving drive within a raid-1 group, and work out mirroring content later. Ultimately it will do that, but that is considered a recovery operation from a failed state, and it will destructively overwrite the mirror drive after replacement. In RAID-1, the two drives are expected to be both online and available all the time, as transactions will be committed to both. A loss of one drive will not stop the system from operating, but that is considered a failure mode, and as you've seen it will operate in a degraded state.

The expected user operation at that point is to replace the failed drive, at which point the RAID software will make a block-for-block copy from the surviving drive onto the new drive, a process sometimes referred to as resilvering. It doesn't look at files within the filesystem. This can be a resource intensive process, and as you note, can take hours. This is expected behavior.

If you want something that will enforce eventual consistency in drive contents, use something like Rsync. There's an app to help set it up. http://arrsync.sourceforge.net


Why isn't the mute key working for an external output device?

My guess is that the driver for your sound device may or may not implement all the expected sound controls on the keyboard. That is to say that they are implemented correctly by the system drivers (speakers, headphone socket) but these are not in the core sound processes - hence you need your driver to support them.

I have a Fiio USB headphone amplifier that I run from my MBP, and neither the mute nor the volume controls work on the keyboard. I suspect volume is applied by analogue circuits, not digital ones - so this would make sense. But I'm a touch surprised my mute doesn't work; maybe that is expected to be implemented by the same thing that controls the volume. (Edit: my device didn't come with a driver, but was recognised as a USB sound device automatically).

Long story short - I would guess that if there is a specific driver for your device, that installing that - or finding the control panel - might help. If you don't have a driver file, try googling for one (and obviously, only download from sources you trust).


Long iPhone voice memos won't import to my Mac

Yesterday I just created a 2h recording using the standard Apple's Voice Memo and "imported" seamlessly to my Mac, no issues at all. It went to my music library in an album "Voice Memos".

I can only say there's nothing special that should cause such an issue and I confirmed it. What I would do in your case is checking the Console hoping for some informative warning and trying to record another file and see how that goes.

But there's a good chance you've got it and is just not finding it, like other dudes. Worst case scenario, get iPhone Explorer and grab them manually. There are some steps you might want to follow and see if it helps in you case. The first one is: Restart you mac.


When you open your Pictures app, select the picture you would like to send, and then select send in an email, it doesn't know that it "should" be part of the previous thread. It is a new email. If it was added to the thread, then technically, any email that you send to him should part of the same thread. Unfortunately, even if you type the same Subject in as the thread, it will still not show in that thread.


As @fsb commented, you should get an options pane where you select where you want to store the export.zip file created by the Health App.  You can save it to one of many options including Airdrop, 'Files', Dropbox, Notes, or other options. If you didn't get the pane to select where to store your data, then maybe it wasn't finished preparing your data. On my iPhone 6 running iOS 12.4.1, the selection pane appears automatically after preparing your data.


Xcode organizer shows crash reports of unsupported device

iPhone-only apps can be downloaded from the App Store to an iPad regardless of whether or not you support using it the iPad.  This is different than iPad-only apps because those can't be installed on an iPhone (non-jailbreak).

A user simply has to select to download the iPhone version to their iPad and they can download it.  The app will display on their iPad in 'compatibility mode', that's as a smaller (screen size) app or magnified to fit the iPad screen.

Just because people are using iPads doesn't mean you have to provide them support.  You can always refuse support to someone if they've used your app on an 'unsupported device'.  Just be sure to clearly call out that it's not designed to run on iPads in your app description.

In iTunesConnect, you're only seeing users who have approved to share analytics and logs with both Apple and the app's developer.  That audience might only contain people with iPhones that agreed to share the logs so you're only going to see iPhones in the logs (this is why I use a 3rd-party analytics tool in addition to the regular ones from Apple).


How to auto-lock MacBook when inactive (without enabling screensaver)

You could try doing this:

Turn screensaver off → System Preferences > Desktop & Screen Saver (Screen Saver tab) > Start after: never (bottom left).
Make sure the mac will go to sleep automatically → System Preferences > Energy Saver → Turn display off after.... Both computer sleep and dispay sleep will lock it.

  For the mac to auto lock you of course need System Preferences > Security & Privacy > General (1st tab) > Require password ____ after sleep or screen saver begins (checkbox) to be checked.

I didn't do very extensive testing, but after putting the mac to sleep or just the display and then unlocking the mac, it seems to let me write in the Chrome textarea... just with a little delay, but like you said screensaver doesn't. I don't know if the delay could be due to some of my third party applications, because oddly enough I can start writing immediately and it takes in a few letters, but then stops and after like a second I can start writing again. So I'm thinking it could be an app stealing the focus for a second there...

I use Unlox and I noticed that when it locks my mac even with the screensaver locking, I can start writing just like with sleep. Unlox can lock the computer with or without the screensaver. The main point of unlox is that you can walk away from your computer with your iphone in your pocket and it gets locked when you get far enough (adjustable) and unlocks when you get close enough (adjustable).

I guess I could also add that before I used unlox, I used to use Alfred to lock my computer manually, which has the system commands to put displays to sleep: sleepdisplays, or to put the whole computer to sleep: sleep and also screensaver, or to just lock the scren: lock. I think you can use these commands with the free version of Alfred.


Couple things to try:

Start in verbose mode (Command + V)

You'll see a narration of the start up processes.

Open Console and look at your logs.

There's lots of things that can lead to slow startups, but I'd be on the look out for permission and network timeout errors.


Install modern Linux as only OS on 2006-era 32-bit EFI Intel iMac with no CD Drive, no Admin Password, no Mac Install Disk

Standard pc linux install media will not work because it assumes bios. You need EFI install media (probably 32 bit even on 64 bit computers) and finding 32 bit EFI install media is difficult.

I think your machine may be a candidate for netbooting. The way to check is to hold down "n" during startup. If you get a globe (solid, blinking, or spinning) this will work. If not you will have to take it apart, remove the hard drive, put the hard drive in another computer, install linux, and put it back, but blessing the image becomes even more difficult.


Time Machine does back them up.

They are kept in
~/Library/Containers/com.apple.TextEdit/Data/Library/Autosave Information/
File named Unsaved TextEdit Document

so, for Time Machine, it would be
/Volumes/[TMvolume]/Backups.backupdb/[computer]/Latest/[drive name]/Users/[user]/Library/Autosave Information
or use the first path & Enter Time Machine, which would probably be simpler.


How do I split a Bootcamp Partition on a second drive?

Open Disk Utility and format second HDD with Partition Map Scheme to be Master Boot Record.
Then start up from Windows Install Disk by pressing Alt or C and create partitions from there.

You should probably use Bootcamp Assistant before (or after) just to save Windows drivers and Bootcamp taskbar utility to the flash disk or elsewhere.


Is there anyway to use GNOME terminal on macOS?

If you install MacPorts, you can install the GNOME Terminal from the macOS Terminal.app:

sudo port install gnome-terminal

You can also install many other GNOME apps.

$ port search gnome
[...]
gnome-calculator @3.26.0_1 (gnome)
    Calculator with financial and scientific modes.

gnome-calendar @3.24.3_3 (gnome)
    Calendar is a calendar application for GNOME.
[...]
gnome-terminal @3.26.2 (gnome)
    Terminal component for the GNOME 3 Desktop

[...]
Found 158 ports.

MacPorts has a collection of over 20,000 open-source software for Mac. You can see all of the available ports here.


Change mouse speed in terminal without restarting

I couldn't find a way to do it with terminal alone so I had to create an Apple Script.

I found a script here:
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1680775/setting-the-mouse-tracking-speed-via-applescript

However, this did not work for me in Mojave so I had change it a littler. I also changed it so that it accepts a parameter which it will then forward to the tracking speed slider.

on run (trackingValue)
--Open and activate System Preferences
tell application "System Preferences" to activate

--Attempt to change settings using System Events
tell application "System Events"
    tell process "System Preferences"
        try
            delay 1
            --Open the "Mouse" pane
            click menu item "Mouse" of menu "View" of menu bar 1
            delay 0.5
            tell window "Mouse"
                tell slider "Tracking speed" of tab group 1
                    set value to round of trackingValue rounding down
                end tell
            end tell
        on error theError
            --An error occured
            display dialog ("Sorry, an error occured while altering Mouse settings:" & return & theError) buttons "OK" default button "OK"
        end try
    end tell
end tell

tell application "System Preferences" to quit
end run

You can then run this via terminal by calling:

osascript /<SCRIPT_LOCATION>/<NAME_OF_SCRIPT>.scpt <TRACKING_SPEED_VALUE>

You will need to give your Terminal accessibility access for this to work.


How to remove annoying iCloud nagging in Catalina?

There are solutions posted here that I'm still a bit unsure about:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/i-dont-want-to-use-icloud-but-system-preferences-nags-me-to-start-using-it.2187969/

defaults delete com.apple.systempreferences AttentionPrefBundleIDs will remove the "1" notif, but there's still annoying imperatives left:

The red "1" was my biggest problem though, I'm not going to spend more effort right now - there are suggestions that involve booting into recovery and stuff like that which I just can't do right now. All ears for anything better!


How do I exit private browsing mode in iOS but retain all of my private tabs?

As of iOS 12 beta 2 and below, this is not currently possible with Safari.

As said by @Snowbody,

  [You can copy & paste] all the URLs from the URL bar into an email or other document[.] Of
  course that doesn't preserve history, form fills, etc.

Your best option is to either find a different browser with that feature (maybe create a new question) or to submit a feature request to Apple.


How to disable the Guest account on OS X El Capitan

After some extensive testing (and multiple Time Machine restores--to verify that this fix works), I have found a solution. And it's pretty easy too, just don't do it on the go, or you'll wipe out your battery.

Visit Apple's dedicated website to download the OS X 10.11.4 Combo Update
Disable Find My Mac
Ensure that you have disabled the guest user

Install the combo update

Poof! Guest is gone.

Re-enable Find My Mac, if you'd like.
Disable guest user again, immediately after re-enabling Find My Mac

And that's it! It works nicely with FileVault 2, Bootcamp, and Time Machine, so no worries there.


What's the purpose of ~/Library/Containers?

~/Library/Containers contain the home directories of sandboxed apps.

Sandboxed apps are for example the apps you download from the Mac App Store. Sandboxing means that they are "isolated" from the rest of the system, so that a single app is not able to do unjust harm to other parts of the system.

Therefore sandboxed apps are normally not allowed to just write to any file system path they want. In order to support writing to standard paths without having to rewrite the apps, the system will create a Container folder that the sandboxed app can write into. The sandboxed app thinks it is writing into a system folder for preferences for example - but the system rewrites the path so that it ends up in the Container folder instead.

For example many apps wrote their data to ~/Library/Application Support/. A sandboxed app cannot do that - and the data is instead written beneath the ~/Library/Containers/ path for that app.


Yes and no.

Flash storage is storage that uses electronically programmable and erasable memory modules with no moving parts. It refers to a very specific implementation of data storage. It can come in different packages though: wrapped in a hard, plastic envelope you slide in to your camera; mounted to a PCB stick with exposed connectors and docked inside your MacPro; or mounted inside a drive enclosure that's slid in to an existing drive bay.

SSD, or Solid State Drive, refers to an enclosed storage device that's meant to act as a disk for a computer, but is lean on details about what's inside the enclosure and being used to store the data.

Technically, "solid state" just refers to "electronics with no moving parts". So a "solid state drive" that used ferromagnetic fluids to store data is still an SSD.

And indeed, SSDs have been around for a long time with a variety of different solid state storage mediums inside of them to keep those 1's and 0's persistent. However, in this day and age, at the time I'm writing this, SSDs are generally filled with (you guessed it): flash-type memory modules. Though flash-based SSDs generally carry the property that their enclosure is built to mirror that of a typical 2.5" spinning drive disk enclosure with an SATA interface so that it can act as a drop-in replacement for a mechanical disk.


Deleting Spotlight's index of your files and reinitializing it should allow it to find your apps in the Applications folder.

1. Turn off spotlight:

sudo mdutil -a -i off

2. Unload its metadata plist:

sudo launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.metadata.mds.plist

3. Load its metadata plist:

sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.metadata.mds.plist

4. Turn on Spotlight again:

sudo mdutil -a -i on


How to use keynote magic move with Connection Lines?

Turns out, according to several sources you can't do it. You would need to separate the lines (i.e. not use connection lines).