iPhone not registering bluetooth keyboard keystrokes

Given that your iPhone and keyboard connect and work just fine when the iPhone is connected to non-public WiFi networks, most likely the public WiFi networks are using frequencies that interfere with the Bluetooth in the keyboard. I would guess that by powering cycling your iPhone, it renegotiates the Bluetooth frequencies with the keyboard which do not interfere. Other factors at work may be microwave ovens, wireless speakers, Dish satellite systems, power sources, badly shielded cables & wires, and a host of other causes. Apple has a great rundown of things that can cause interference.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT20154

We live in a world saturated with radio and microwave radiation. If the poor public Wi-Fi locations are in locations where there are other people with phones, Bluetooth devices, etc, I’m not surprised that things don’t work well sometimes.


My iPhone X was stolen. Will my iCloud be logged out if the person resets the iPhone using my phone's password?

Did you have two factor enabled? Does the thief have access to your recovery email?

Regardless there are things to do right away regardless so don't hesitate!

Refer to the Apple Support article:

If your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch is lost or stolen

  If Find My iPhone isn't enabled on your missing device

  If you didn't turn on Find My iPhone before your device was lost or stolen, you can't use it to locate your device. But you can use these steps to help protect your data:

  Change your Apple ID password. By changing your Apple ID password, you can prevent anyone from accessing your iCloud data or using other services (such as iMessage or iTunes) from your missing device.
  Change the passwords for other internet accounts on your device. This can include email accounts, Facebook, or Twitter.
  Report your lost or stolen device to local law enforcement. Law enforcement might request the serial number of your device. Find your device serial number.
  Report your lost or stolen device to your wireless carrier. Your carrier can disable the account, preventing phone calls, texts, and data use.

  Find My iPhone is the only way that you can track or locate a lost or missing device. If Find My iPhone isn't enabled on your device before it goes missing, there's no other Apple service that can find, track, or flag your device for you.


Go to the Certificates category instead of All Items
Sort on Expiry Date
The top one is probably the newest and you could delete the other certificates you want to delete.


Can I use an Apple remote to control a keynote presentation?

Yes - although most people are using the iOS based Keynote Remote these days, the old infrared (which is very thin / physically touchable and very reliable in dark rooms and easily hidden in a hand) works just fine.

The Keynote '09 help shows what functions the various buttons will perform when you are in the various modes: Keynote window itself, presentation mode and slide switcher mode.


Can I set my Mac to auto-accept Bluetooth file-transfers from my phone?

Open up System Preferences > Sharing > Bluetooth

You should see the options you can set there; use the drop selection to what you prefer:


Pinning the Dock to a Corner in Yosemite/El Capitan

I filed bug #18701500 on this problem with http://bugreporter.apple.com/

My bug was closed by Apple Engineering as a duplicate of bug #16814560, which is still marked as open.

Although Apple does not permit public viewing of the bug database—I cannot see the details on the bug that they have closed it in favor of—and thus you cannot verify my statements, this is proof to me that there is currently no solution to this problem.


Why TimeMachine defaults to case sensitive?

Case-sensitive and -insensitive filesystems under OS X are a mess (to say the least), primarily because some well-known and big software companies require their software to be installed on an case-insensitive filesystem. Otherwise these applications wouldn't really work because accessing IMPORTANT-RESOURCE.jpg would never work with a file named important-resource.jpg on disk.

OTOH for TM backups this is not really important because you will never run an application directly from your TimeMachine drive. Using a case-sensitive filesystem in that case covers both possible options without negative impact.


Home - Switch appears on my Login screen

What you have there is called the Home Panel.

To disable it you can:

Go to Apple menu () > System Preferences
Click the Accessibility pane
Select Switch Control from the list of accessibility options (it's usually at the bottom)
Click the General tab
Untick the Enable Switch Control checkbox

For more information on this feature, refer to Use Switch Control to interact with your Mac on Apple's website.


How to save contacts on iPhone with broken screen?

If you're not already syncing your contacts via iCloud, then you can sync them to your computer in iTunes in the Info screen. Then you can sync the computer's contacts to iCloud and so get them onto your new phone that way.

Alternatively, you could try backing up your current phone (Summary screen) and then restoring the backup to your new phone.

Good luck.


Can I force Mac OS X not to complain when a volume is removed without first unmounting it?

If you don't mind losing notification center, you can disable it.

To disable NC, thus stopping the removal message, type in:

sudo defaults write /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.notificationcenterui KeepAlive -bool false

Then, type in

killall NotificationCenter

To re-enable it, type in:

sudo defaults write /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.notificationcenterui KeepAlive -bool true

Keep in mind, besides disabling this message, it will disable ALL messages.


How much power does Apple TV use on standby?

According to the review on FlatpanelsHD.com, it will use 0.8 watts when in standby (not sleep), and 1.9 watts when in use. To use their description, this is "ridiculously low."

Since all the device needs to do is wait for Bonjour, AirPlay, or IR signals — and the upper number matches up with Apple's own report — I'd say this is believable.

Fun perspective fact from the Apple report: It takes 30 Apple TVs, all streaming HD video, to use the same amount of power as a common 60W light bulb.

You can quickly put the Apple TV to sleep by holding the play/pause button on the home screen. The cursor should be over one of the apps, not a content preview, and last I tested, this didn't work with the play/pause button of the Remote app.


How can I copy files from a RDC PC to my Mac

You could map a folder on the local Mac to the PC and then just move files using the PC copy interface. That's probably the simplest and works across many versions of windows and OS X as well as regardless of the network configuration.

You could set up a proper network share on the PC or Mac as well, but that's more work for little payoff.


Why are the network connections in the Network System Preference panel mislabeled?

We had this problem when we provisioned an image taken from another device. It won't hurt anything, but if it bothers you, you can rename it from the UI.

Click the gear drop-down at the bottom of the list, then select "Rename Service"


I just changed my single user home directory to "/", can I return back?

Unless you have very specific technical reasons for doing so, then modifying MacOS's installation is unnecessary and may cause problems. There's no need to make separate partitions for users, or to move the default location of User accounts.

As you have found out, the root level is read only in Catalina, and any non-OS files and folders will be moved to /Users/Shared when the OS is installed.

If I were you, I would backup your data, boot to Recovery, remove any partitions, reinstall the OS, create a new user account, and then restore your data and apps to the correct intended locations.


Can I have two 4K and one 5K LG displays on a MacBook Pro 15 2016?

Short answer

Yes, this should be fine.

Long answer

It's not just about whether they're 4K or 5K displays, it's also about the resolution you run them at and possibly if you connect multiple displays on the same physical side since this KB mentions for two 5K displays, they must be connected on opposite sides of the hardware.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207448 - LG UltraFine 5K Display
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207447 - LG UltraFine 4K Display

Officially, your model MBP supports up to two displays at 5120x2880 pixels at 60 Hz or up to four displays at 4096x2304 pixels at 60 Hz, one on the left Thunderbolt 3 bus, one on the right Thunderbolt 3 bus.

Your model MBP comes with an integrated Intel HD Graphics 530 GPU and either an AMD Radeon Pro 450, 455, or 460. The integrated Intel HD Graphics 530 GPU will use up to 1.5 GB of your main RAM, while both the Radeon Pro 450 and 455 have 2 GB of dedicated GDDR5 memory and the Radeon Pro 460 has 4 GB of dedicated GDDR5 memory.

At the risk of oversimplifying things, assuming you intend to run the 5K display at 5120x2880 pixels and both 4K displays at 4096x2304 pixels, this equates to a total of 33,619,968 pixels. This is actually less than the 37,748,736 pixels you'd need to power if you were using four 4K displays at 4096x2304. This assumes you intend to use your MBP in clamshell mode, as opposed to also powering the internal display and the external display simultaneously.

Obviously, if you have the Radeon Pro 460 your MBP will manage this configuration better than it would with one of the other GPUs. However, all GPUs should be fine - it's just that if you have the Radeon Pro 460 there will be less heat produced and therefore your fans won't need to spin as fast. Finally, if you have the Radeon Pro 460 then you'll be able to simultaneously manage more graphics intensive tasks on all displays more smoothly than you would with one of the others.


Apps "cannot be opened because of a problem"

Apple let a vital App Store certificate apply, unfortunately. Update your OS and that should fix the issue.

While this does not speak well for Apple, many OS manufacturers have had critical (or if you will stupid) flaws in their OS. Which makes it a good idea to keep up to date on released updates in the App store.


Why is russian beta testing software on my Mac?

It looks like Feedback Assistant.app. Maybe it's missing the en translations. You can check if that really is the correct app in Terminal with:

ls /System/Library/CoreServices/Applications

The output will reveal the real (not translated) applications names.

The Ассистент обратной связи string could be found using:

plutil -p Feedback\ Assistant.app/Contents/Resources/ru.lproj/InfoPlist.strings

The output:

  {
    "CFBundleDisplayName" => "Ассистент обратной связи"
    "CFBundleName" => "Ассистент обратной связи"
  }

To make sure, the app is really from Apple you can run

codesign -d -vvv Feedback\ Assistant.app

and look for Authority=Apple Code Signing Certification Authority.


Sending Network Stream from Playlist (.m3u8) to AirPlay?

Well as you said with AirParrot (which btw is also great for Windows users) you can extend your display to a "Specific App…" thus QuickTime/VLC/MplayerX. To avoid choppy video you should use Ethernet cable…
I don't know what can be done and how Mavericks reacts with the second display feature while changing desktop… But I believe you have the same kind of lags.

Air Video HD allows from local device to AppleTV streams : http://www.inmethod.com/airvideohd/index.html
It should not be to complicated to route your favorite remote server on a local IP address /etc/hosts or something like that …

The alternative that would work for AppleTV v2 and v3 (that last one not being jail braked) is to emulate the "Trailers" service to be able to stream from "PlexConnect" :
— http://gigaom.com/2013/06/04/plex-apple-tv-plexconnect/
— http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1s09hRaWm4


CPU usage is too high with Catalina when macbook-pro connected to an external monitor

From your observations it sounds like you have a temperature problem with your MacBook Pro. The system makes the CPU sleep when it detects a temperature problem - this what makes it appear as if kernel_task consumes all the CPU time (it actually doesn't). Usually this is due to either: (a) fan problems, (b) blocked vents or (c) lack of cooling paste.

I would check these to make sure that fans are working properly, the machine is not full of dust, the vents are free and cooling paste has been applied properly to the CPU.


Firefox: How to disable "delete-key goes back"?

Now that I realized it was "go back" instead of "close tab" - the answer can be found here:

  You can set this pref to 2 on the about:config page to disable the
  backspace_action. browser.backspace_action = 2


If you don't already have the Develop menu enabled, enable it from Safari Preferences → Advanced.
Press shift-cmd-C and click on the link to the site.
Copy the href attribute of the link element.

Examining the href works for all types of links. As you already established, you can copy the link from the location for links to pages, but not for downloads. However, you can still copy the link for downloads: from the Downloads list (click the Downloads button in the Safari toolbar), you can right-click on a download and choose Copy Address.


On your Mac, create a Smart Group with the filter:
Photo | is | unable to upload to iCloud Photo Library

This should hopefully display the problematic photo, which you can try to delete and re-add.
https://daringfireball.net/linked/2018/01/26/apple-photos-unable-to-upload


screen saver and lock not in the same time

The setting you want is in preferences -> security and privacy -> general -> require password (some time) after screen sleep or screen saver.

Note that the lock is will happen (some time) after either the screen saver starts or the screen sleeping.


iPhone 4 (iPhone3,1) reboots while exploiting limera1n

You have a catch 22.

You need to jailbreak to downgrade.
A downgrade is needed to jailbreak.


Click to open the App Store,  sliding to the bottom of the page, you can see your AU account, click on it, select log out.Then you can log in the US account.


Mail on OS X: Choose which X.509 certificate to use for signing mails

You can exactly specify the certificate to be used for sining outgoing emails by following these steps:

Open your keychain. Then right click on the list of certificates and pick the first item on the context menu (In English it is labeled New Identity Preference):

Then type in your email address and select the certificate from the drop down box to use for that address:

The next email you send from the email address typed in above will be signed with the selected certificate.


Is eBay app update bypassing Apple's app store screening?

Current version of the eBay app is 4.0 - requires iOS 7.0 or higher.

Unless your iPad is Jailbroken, all apps come from the iTunes app store.

If iTunes isn't offering the update, maybe either your iTunes or iOS is out of date?


Installing & running OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion from an external hard drive onto my Snow Leopard Macbook Pro?

It should be as simple as:

Step Zero: Make sure you have a verified, complete, bootable backup of your Snow Leopard setup, "just in case". (And make sure that drive isn't attached when you are installing Mountain Lion, so you don't accidentally choose it.)

Attach external drive to MacBook Pro. Format as "Mac OS Extended (journaled)". Give it a clear and distinct name such as "EXTERNAL DRIVE FOR LION"
Launch App Store.app. Purchase Mountain Lion.
Wait wile the installer downloads. It's ~4gb, so you'll be waiting awhile.
When the installer finishes downloading, it will automatically launch and prompt you to start the upgrade process. DON'T PANIC. Nothing will be done until you tell it to proceed.
(OPTIONAL BUT HIGHLY RECOMMENDED STEP) Before you start the installation process, quit the installer. Then, go to Finder and open the /Applications/ folder and look for an app called something like "Install OS X Mountain Lion.app". Drag it from /Applications/ to somewhere else, like your Desktop. (You may be prompted to enter your password to do this. That's OK.) Why do this? Because if you leave the installer in /Applications/, it will be automatically deleted when the installation completes. I recommend keeping it around because it is useful if you want to make a USB installer or something like that. Once you have moved it, launch the "Install OS X Mountain Lion.app" again.
Very early on in the process you should be able to choose which drive you want to install Mountain Lion to. (You may have to click on a 'Customize' button in the installer.)
Choose the "EXTERNAL DRIVE FOR LION" drive and follow the rest of the prompts in the OS X installer.
After the installation starts, it will reboot your computer from the external drive and continue the installation. Make sure this is not interrupted.
When it is done, you can choose the default Startup Disk in System Preferences, or hold down the Option/Alt key when the Mac is booting up.

Bonus Tip: QuickBoot is a free app which will let you reboot your Mac using a different drive than the default startup disk without changing the default startup disk.

Just go slow, watch what you are doing, and it should be very straight-forward.

(Nevertheless, don't forget Step Zero. Have you booted from your backup drive lately to make sure it really boots?)


This drove me bananas. Should be straightforward, but it isn't.
Googling returned lots of results for disabling the microphone on an application-specific basis in Big Sur, but absolutely oogatz on a global toggle to kill the microphone on a GLOBAL basis to both stop Speech Recognition from chewing up my CPU as well as shut down an open mic.
I next visited "System Preferences" > "Sound" which seemed a logical place to tweak such a toggle. Nope.
It's actually buried in "System Preferences" > "Accessibility". No, I'm not joking; that's where it lives. Untick "Enable Voice Control" and if you go back to Activity Monitor, you'll see you get your CPU back and the microphone should be down.

Another thing that really irks me is that Apple is supposed to telling you when something is accessing the microphone or camera, but you don't get a warning when Apple itself is triggering the microphone. ANYTHING that accesses the microphone or camera SHOULD trigger a warning light IMHO.


Separate Time Machine backups for different partitions

When you set a TM backup you specify which drive and partition to backup to. If you have an empty drive you can give it 3 partitions (or more) using disk utilities. Then when you back up your 3 partitions you can back each one up to a separate partition on the other drive. The real problem is that having three time-machine backups means your machine will almost always be backing up something. Since it backs up hourly I'd kick them off 15 minutes apart.
There are also extensions and apps that let you change the hourly backups to daily, or weekly. You could then back-up 10.5 on Wednesdays, 10.6 on Thursday, and 10.7 on fridays. Or back them all up once a day 7 days a week and separated the backups by 8 hours.


How can I set output to internal speakers after I've set the 3.5mm jack as input on 13" MacBook Pro?

Have a look at the free
LineIn
Inside The Lines
LineIn is a simple application for OS X to enable the soft playthru of audio from input devices. In simpler terms, you can use LineIn to play sound coming in through a microphone or any other device plugged in to your Sound In port, just as was once available with OS 9's "Play input through output device" option.


Access an iPad's Photos via the Web or a Linux Computer?

iCloud.com doesn't have an interface to access your Photo Stream. However there are other ways to access the photos if you don't have access to iTunes for syncing.

Dropbox

The iOS Dropbox app has recently been updated with a feature that can automatically upload all the new photos from your Camera Roll to Dropbox when you open the app. I believe you can even get bonus Dropbox storage for using the feature.

Once the photos are in your Dropbox account, you can access them through the web interface on Dropbox.com or the Linux client.

AirSharing

The AirSharing app ($9.99 on the App Store) is essentially a general purpose file transfer client. It supports FTP, SFTP, WebDAV, Google Docs, Dropbox and more. You can use it to transfer photos from your iPad's Camera Roll (or other albums) to your Debian machine via (S)FTP or a WebDAV folder running on your iPad. If you prefer to avoid a cloud solution like Dropbox, this is probably the way to go.

These are just a couple options, there are certainly others out there (the Google Drive app would probably work similarly to Dropbox, and there are other apps similar to AirSharing).


How to change default cell formats in Excel 2011?

For existing (or the one you get from others) Excel documents where you have a lots of data in it, try using the down arrow (under the format window).

It will open new window where you can choose a new format there.

Next right click on the cells you want to modify, or just create new cells.

Another way for existing documents you get from others do following:
Open and than click on the "Import Cell styles" than select your format file (both files have to be open at same time).

For new documents use your saved template.

PS. One day you will succeed giving your template to your coworkers and teaching them to use it, so you do not have to reformat theirs.

Here is my screen capture showing the original and SAMPLE after modifying.
Hope this helped, and you can impress your boss with your excel skills.


No, enabling the hidden Developer settings by connecting to Xcode doesn't change anything on your device.  The default for all of the settings is "off," in which case your device will behave identically as one where the settings are still hidden.


Download entire iTunes purchase history as CSV file (MacOS High Sierra)

The following works on currently latest macOS I'm using (High Sierra 10.13.5 Beta) and latest iTunes (12.7.4.76).

I've written an AppleScript that is using UI Scripting and compiles a list of purchased songs on iTunes. The script will open a new TextEdit document and fill in the songs in a comma delimited format and will contain the sequential number, song name, artist, album and song duration. The output will be similar to this:

"Nr","Song Name","Artist","Album","Duration"
"1","Badinerie","Lucero Tena","Lección de castañuelas","1:03"
"2","El colibrí","Lucero Tena","Lección de castañuelas","1:07"
"3","El relicario","Lucero Tena","Lección de castañuelas","1:36"

Here is the script:

tell application "iTunes" to activate
tell application "TextEdit"
    activate
    make new document at the front with properties {name:"iTunes purchased.txt"}
    delay 1
    tell application "System Events" to click menu item "Make Plain Text" of menu 1 of menu bar item "Format" of menu bar 1 of application process "TextEdit"
end tell
tell application "iTunes" to activate
tell application "System Events"
    keystroke "1" using {command down}
    set w to window "iTunes" of application process "iTunes"
    click radio button "Store" of radio group 1 of w
    delay 2
    set webarea to UI element 1 of scroll area 1 of group 1 of group 1 of splitter group 1 of w
    click static text 1 of UI element 1 of group 6 of list 2 of webarea
    delay 2
    click radio button "All" of tab group 1 of group 2 of webarea
    delay 3
    click radio button "Songs" of tab group 1 of group 5 of webarea
    delay 5
    set allRows to UI elements of table 1 of webarea
    set entireContent to quote & "Nr" & quote & "," & quote & "Song Name" & quote & "," & quote & "Artist" & quote & "," & quote & "Album" & quote & "," & quote & "Duration" & quote & return
    tell application "TextEdit" to activate
    repeat with aRow in allRows
        if class of aRow is row then
            set gr to UI element 1 of group 1 of UI element 2 of aRow
            if class of gr is group then
                set songNum to value of static text 1 of group 1 of UI element 1 of aRow
                set songName to value of static text 1 of group 2 of UI element 2 of aRow
                set songArtist to value of static text 1 of group 1 of UI element 1 of UI element 3 of aRow
                set album to UI element 1 of UI element 4 of aRow
                set songAlbum to ""
                if (count of UI elements of album) is greater than 0 then
                    set songAlbum to value of static text 1 of group 1 of album
                end if
                set songDuration to ""
                set dur to UI element 5 of aRow
                if (count of UI elements of dur) is greater than 0 then
                    set songDuration to value of static text 1 of group 1 of dur
                end if
                set aLine to quote & songNum & quote & "," & quote & songName & quote & "," & quote & songArtist & quote & "," & quote & songAlbum & quote & "," & quote & songDuration & quote
                set entireContent to entireContent & aLine & return
                tell application "TextEdit" to set text of front document to entireContent
            end if
        end if
    end repeat
end tell

The process is not fast, on my computer it takes about 1 second per song so be prepared to wait a while. Also, if you start getting some "out of index" errors try, while the script is running, scrolling the iTunes song list in the background to make sure the entire list content is loaded before being accessed by AppleScript.


If you've tried all physical options, removing hubs, changing cables, ports etc, then the remaining likelihood is that the existing backup is corrupt.

Simplest method would be to find your backups folder & rename/delete the corrupt one, then test again…

Disconnect phone, quit iTunes
Switch to Finder
 Cmd ⌘   N  for new window
 Cmd ⌘   Shift ⇧   G  for Go To…
Copy/paste ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/ & hit  Enter ⌅  or  Return⏎
Change the name of the folder with the long, complex number - just add .bak or something to the end of it. (If there are multiple folders, see the note at the end)
In iTunes, try a new Backup, then Sync.
If successful, you can delete the old .bak folder

If you have multiple backup folders…

If you only ever backup one iDevice to iTunes, rename all the folders the same way, add .bak etc
If you backup multiple iDevices, you can find which is the correct folder by matching the device identifier with the backup folder name by clicking on the Serial Number field in iTunes (which will switch it to your device identifier.)


Does Secure Keyboard Entry Prevent All Forms of Keyloggers?

Almost correct but:

Using the Secure keyboard Entry (on screen key board) will not keep some supper hacker from using the screen capture to see what you entering.

That is assuming you have a serious bug on your system.


How to verify which wireless access point my iOS device is using?

The Net Analyzer app shows the BSSID which appears to be the same as the access point’s MAC (at least on my network).
https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/network-analyzer/id562315041


What's a good iPhone app that will let me view files on my network?

I think NetPortal by Stratospherix may do what you want. I use their FileBrowser for iPad, but I haven’t tried NetPortal, which is their iPhone version. They also have a free NetPortalLite version.

(Sorry, I don’t have the rep to include more than one hyperlink.)


CDA files are not song files, it's just a shortcut.
It doesn't contain any song information, so you can't convert it to other formats.
You need to import cd into a usable format using iTunes on the computer that owns the disc drive.

=======

Note that macOS sees them as "exec" files just because it does not recognize the file type and does not know what else to do with it.


How to fully disable auto-fill-mode in Aquamacs 3.3?

Add this to  ~/Library/Preferences/Aquamacs Emacs/Preferences.el:

(remove-hook 'text-mode-hook 'auto-detect-wrap)


An Error Has Occurred: Downloading and installing Keynote

Here's what worked for me, sign out of App store, quit it.  In the Terminal run:

  defaults write com.apple.appstore ShowDebugMenu -bool true

Start App Store, in the Debug menu, choose Reset App, sign in again, then choose Start Scan for Updates.  Tried Keynote again and it worked.


Why the difference in audio volume via bluetooth?

Every output device has a maximum volume level in its settings. This is different than the current listening volume of the main volume.

For instance,  I have internal speakers, external speakers, alerts, midi Dj'ing equipment and bluetooth PA system speakers.

If I go to the sound preferences, there are different default volumes for each device. No matter the main volume those will override current main volume on plug in , activation or connection of a different device.

Individually they all have their own settings and ultimately they can be found in the sound preferences.

Then as some mentioned, the device you are connecting to, can also have its own defaults that override your connecting device.


OS X Yosemite desktop icon positioning problems

I pressed command-j, changed the font from 12 to 11, changed "sort by" from "snap to grid" to "none", moved my icons where I wanted them, put "snap to grid" back on, then control-click and selected "clean up" to move all the icons back into the alignment of the grid. Since doing this, I have not experienced this problem.


How can I reset my user account password on OS X?

A plausible way of resetting the password of your login on your OS X is to:

Go to Single-user mode (CMD  + S on boot)
Type: /sbin/mount -uw / and press Enter
Type rm /var/db/.applesetupdone and press Enter
Type reboot and press Enter.

On boot, you will be prompted to setup like if your mac was new. Don't panic, as your data is not lost (I would backup just in case though). Skip all unnecessary options, and later you will be prompted to create a new admin account.

Once your setup finishes, from the new account, go to System Preferences > Users and Groups, click on your previous username and click Reset Password. Now type in the new password and login as your old account.


Your notes can synchronize with Gmail or iCloud, not both as far as I can tell.

To sync a note with Gmail do the following

Set up your account and check the notes box in the Mail, Contacts & Calendars preference pane.
Go to notes in Mountain Lion
Go to View -> Show Folders List -- or -- click the folders list icon in the bottom left side of the Notes window
From here you should be able to select your Gmail account instead of iCloud and create a new note
Within Gmail you should have a folder called "Notes" and your newly created note should be inside


Flipboard-like iOS app for "reading" the whole web

You could make a Fluid app of Feedly and subscribe to completely random feeds so you're surprised by what turns up and/or even subscribe to the Pocket, Readability, etc. feeds of completely random people and/or the front page of Reddit. If you set Fluid to use Safari you can "flip" through the pages using the regular OS gestures. And Feedly allows you to choose from a variety of presentation modes. You could, also, do this with any desktop feed reader like Reeder 2, NetNewsWire, etc., but as far as I know creating a Feedly app with Fluid with Safari set as the browser may be the only way to "flip through pages" of completely random content.


Apps that are “beta”, “demo”, “trial”, or “test” versions will be rejected

  Apps that unlock or enable additional features or functionality with mechanisms other than the App Store will be rejected, except in cases where the application hosts plug-ins or extensions

  Apps containing “rental” content or services that expire after a limited time will be rejected

Doesn't seem like it's allowed.

Source: App Store Review Guidelines for iOS apps (login required)


Retrieving an Application from TimeMachine

The application you can download from the App Store again. Once you bought it, you can download it for free again.

The data/settings from that application you should find in the 'Application Support' folder. If you didn't clean this folder yourself there is a great change it is still there. If it is gone, follow these steps:

Finder > Menu 'Go' > 'Go to Folder...'
Type in: ~/Library/Application Support/
Activate Time Machine
Find the 'Simplibudget' folder


In Windows a UNC (network path) looks like this:

\\SERVER\share\path\more_path\file.ext

The same network path would look like this on the Mac:

smb://SERVER/share/path/more_path/file.ext


Less intrusive alternative to Appsfire Deals?

There is for example AppShopper. To use the notification feature (called "wishlist") you have to create a free AppShopper account.

I'm using it for a while and don't get any spam.


Is it possible to export a specific mail folder from Mail?

In Mail click the button Show which is in the top left of the application window:

After step one you can see all your inboxes and folders. You can export any inbox or folder via the right-click menu dialog.


At the bottom of the iPhone photos app, in photos tab, see if the photos has been synced. Also in iCloud.com, Please check and confirm if the photos has been uploaded.

Maybe other uploads are jamming the networks. As mentioned in the comments, Quicktime files are doing so


Cannot watch iTunes purchased media with old Apple ID

If you remember the old id and still have access to the email account associated with it, you can definitely reset the password and then authorize your macbook to play these files.

iForgot will prompt you for information, but it should allow a password reset via email, not just questions. If you still cannot remember/access the info, I recommend sending apple an email via their iTunes store support and see if they can identify you via other means.

http://www.apple.com/support/itunes/contact.html


How can Windows be installed to a Mac via Boot Camp in BIOS Boot mode?

Assuming you are using the Boot Camp Assistant to install a version of Windows officially supported on your Mac, then Windows will be installed to BIOS or UEFI boot automatically without user interaction.

During the Boot Camp installation process, Windows determines the boot method based on how the Boot Camp Assistant partitions the installation drive. If Boot Camp Assistant choose to keep a GUID partition table (GPT) with a fully protected Master Boot Record (MBR) partition table, then Windows will install for a UEFI boot. The alternative is to change to a GPT and a partially protected MBR partition with entries for the macOS (OS X) and Windows partitions. This is referred to as hybrid partitioning. In this case, Windows will install to BIOS boot. The older Macs only support hybrid partitioning for Windows installations, because there is a BIOS, but not a new enough EFI version in the firmware. Newer Macs support both methods of partitioning for Windows installations, because there is both a BIOS and new enough EFI version in the firmware. However, the newest Macs only support a GPT with a full protected MBR for Windows installations, because there is no BIOS support and enough EFI support in the firmware.


How to update some application to latest version with homebrew-cask?

Try this command:

brew cask install dropbox --force

Please consider logging a bug over at homebrew-cask about your concerns with updating this kind of cask.


How to prevent reopening of all programs after power outage

For others looking for an answer to this, specifically to prevent applications restarting after a power failure, see this other AskDifferent post:

Avoiding all apps reopening when OS X crashes

The important part is to prevent the OS from writing to the ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.loginwindow* file(s) which are used to record which applications are open at any given time, and informs the OS of which applications to restore in the case of a power failure.

If you need to ensure that your system's start-up sequence is the same regardless of a manual or timed power-on, as well as a restart in the case of a power failure, then the details provided at the linked answer above, are the solution you need. This is particularly useful in cases where the system is being used to power a kiosk or a similar setup.

I recommend following the "GUI method" outlined in the linked answer, which first involves emptying the file of any references to currently open applications, then locking the file, using the Get Info window's Lock option. This prevents the file being written to going forwards, and ensures the file remains empty of references to currently running applications. As such the system will restart from a power failure, in the same way as it would under normal start-up conditions.


What is the Headset icon on apps in dock on iPad?

I was just wondering the same. According to 3 Reddit threads this is a Siri App Suggestion based on having used the suggested app with headphones.
These are the threads:
https://old.reddit.com/r/iphone/comments/bbjz1d/what_does_the_headphones_symbol_mean/
https://old.reddit.com/r/ipad/comments/78j9k6/headphone_icon_in_docks_recent_apps/
https://old.reddit.com/r/ios/comments/74b74u/weird_dock_bug_when_using_headphone_jack_in_ios_11/


How do change focus from the address bar back to the document after CMD+L?

You can ⇥ back, or alternatively ⇧⇥ which is usually faster.

It takes me two presses of ⇧⇥ to get back from the address bar to the page: one to move to the Add to Reading List button and one to get back to the page. This may be higher if you have the back/forward buttons on the toolbar, and lower if you have Full Keyboard Access disabled in System Preferences.

You can use Keyboard Maestro to create a macro which lets you get back to the page with a single keyboard shortcut.


Macbook Pro Mid 2010 not powering up after smc update

I Had the same and managed to fix it using this reference:
https://discussions.apple.com/message/22024754#22024754

In summary, this is the fix:

  Disconnect power
  Open MBP and disconnect/remove the battery - close the back cover again
  While power is still disconnected, press and hold the power button for about 5 seconds and then while pressing and holding the power button, connect the power cable to the MBP.
  If you are lucky, your MBP will now power up with the fans blazing at 100% and keyboard backlight will be off.  This seems to be a recovery emergency mode or something.  If you MBP did not power up, try again. If your MBP does not power up then you have a different problem and don’t need to continue the following steps.
  Boot you OSX and go onto the Internet and Download the right SMC firmware version for your MBP from: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1237
  Mount/Open the .dmg file and copy out the “Firmware” .pkg file.
  Use Pacifist or the command line to extract the content of the .pkg file.
  In my case the Apple SMC update had three models firmware in  the .pkg file and the correct one for the Mid-2010 15” model was in the folder SMC18 or something.
  Find your correct model firmware for your MBP and copy out the following two files:  SmcFlasher.efi and 2010MBP15.smc  (the 2010MBP15.smc will be different for other MBP models)
  Copy those two files onto the OSX disk drive to a location that you can remember like /User/username/Dowloads/smc  or where ever.
  Google and search for rEFIt .  This is a boot loader app the will take over the boot process when you start up your MBP to enable you to go into a shell utility.  Read up on how to install and how to activate the refit utility.  When installed and enabled, the next time you reboot your MBP you will see the utility start up before your OSX boots.
  If you see the rEFIt utility start after you rebooted the MBP, use the arrow on your keyboard and select shell and press enter.  The shell.efi utility will start to boot in a “DOS” like window and after you see something where it wants to configure or setup something, just press ESC to cancel that.
  After the util booted, you need to first change to your internel disk with the command fs1:  that is F S ONE Colon then Enter, standing for filesystem 1
  Now you can change to the folder to where you copied the two firmware files like:

  cd Users
  cd username
  cd Downloads
  cd smc

  There are different ways of going to the folder or find the place where you put the files.
  After finding the folder with the two files you can start the update process.
  First need to get the SMC into the right state
  SmcFlasher.efi -reset 1
  Your MBP fans should now quiet down.
  Lets Flash :-)
  SmcFlasher.efi -force -LoadApp 2010MBP15.smc -norestart

  Your SMC should now be flashing with the right version.  Once done, power down the MBP. Power the MBP back on and do a SMC reset and all should be fine now.  You can now connect the battery again and start using your MBP.


i have not an apple id and password.i have iphone 5S.how unlock it without id or password

You can signup a Apple Id for free here:
Create a Apple Id

And if you have the invoice of the iPhone 5S, You can go to the Apple Store offline to get help.


Parallels Desktop 12 - Disable Time Sync

In the VM configuration, go to Options → More Options and set Time to Do not sync.


Unable to Adjust Size for pdf in Preview

I did not find out how to do this in preview or skim: so a "real" answer would still be awarded.

However there is a workaround when printing: the print dialog for my HP laserjet has a "Scale" that can be applied. This took care of my immediate need.


iOS 7: delete a location from the weather application

It's a common interaction on iOS : Swipe to the left.

Swipe the location to the left, the delete button will appear.

But this does not work on the one that is at the top of the screen if your letting it use your current location

Swipe the location to the left IN LIST MODE. Then a red square delete button appears on the right edge. Tap it and the location is gone.


Little Snitch reports outgoing connections from Mach Kernel -- am I infected?

I have asked the Little Snitch development team at obdev about this issue. Here is the response:

  In fact local traffic over AFP or SMB protocol is routed by the mach_kernel process on newer OS X systems.

  It is defined as /mach_kernel on 10.10.x.
  I'm on OS X 10.11.4 here, where the process path is now /System/Library/Kernels/kernel

  Unfortunately it can not be treated the same way as other processes, but usually your local network rules should cover all relevant connections for it.

  But I have to admit that I also remember a case where external connections are associated with the mach_kernel by mistake and it seems to happen when the tables in the Little Snitch Network Monitor cache got mixed somehow.
  Do you perhaps experience such external connections associated with the mach_kernel process?
  Possibly thats an issue of memory - happening when your system (including the Little Snitch Network Monitor) is up running for quite some time… I already talked to our developers about that and we will keep an eye on that issue.

  ...

  Simon

"the tables in Little Snitch Network Monitor cache got mixed somehow"? Seriously?

It does indeed seem to happen after my machine has been running for days or weeks without reboot. And a reboot will fix it temporarily. It is possible that this is simply a bug in Little Snitch.

However, I find it dubious that traffic routed over mach_kernel "cannot be treated the same way as other processes". I am not informed about how Little Snitch is architected. It may not be able to run in kernel space (ring 0), but I find it terribly convenient in today's climate of mass government spying that the OSX kernel can simply take over and get around Little Snitch. I believe IPTables would have no such trouble in blocking traffic, but it is most certainly of a different architecture and user model altogether.

See here for additional reference: https://security.stackexchange.com/questions/58815/do-firewalls-always-run-in-userspace

Switching to FOSS/Linux is looking more and more like the path to be on.


Can't export HEVC videos from Photos app

As an alternative, you may take the original video out of the library by right click on Photos Library.photoslibrary > show package contents and search by filename or extension.
Be careful to not modify anything that can mess up the library. Best to just do copy-paste.


Is it possible to have 2 iCloud email accounts in IOS 5?

It sounds like you've already discovered that you can migrate each MobileMe Family Member sub-account individually to iCloud. Having done that, you can now add the second account to your iPad as a secondary iCloud account by going to Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars > Add Account… > iCloud.

You can also add secondary iCloud accounts in OS X by going to System Preferences > Mail, Contacts & Calendars > Add Account… > iCloud. This way you don't have to switch users in OS X to access the second iCloud account's mail.

You can migrate remaining MobileMe Family Members by going to me.com/move, instead of having to create a new user in OS X to do the migration.

Primary iCloud accounts can use a few features that secondary accounts can't:

iOS 5: Photo Stream, Documents & Data, and Backup
OS X Lion: Bookmarks, Photo Stream, Find My Mac, and iCloud Storage


Is there a way to access a USB-serial port by the device id, not by the tty.* port?

Actually, you should be able to find the mapping from device ID/serial number to serial port name using ioreg. Try this command:

ioreg -r -c IOUSBHostDevice -l

It will print all the USB host devices, and it will print out all properties from the subtree of each device. You should be able to find your device on the top level based on its ID or serial number. Once you've found it, you should be able to scan through its subtree, and eventually find an object of class IOSerialBSDClient. This will contain the property IODialinDevice which is what you want.

If you then want to do this programmatically, you could add the -a option to the ioreg command, which will output a plist version of the above output. You could then parse this with a library such as plistlib.

You might find it helpful to use the IORegistryExplorer app to help visualise this, as the full ioreg output is slightly difficult to read! This is available in XCode's "Hardware IO Tools" package which you can find by searching the downloads on the Apple developer site. Here's what it looks like on my device:


Does the iPod Classic respond to the clicker buttons on the iPhone earbuds?

Yep. Check out this link on Apple's site. I'm actually surprised to learn so many devices support it now.

iPhone 4
iPhone 3GS
iPod touch (2nd generation)
iPod classic (120GB 160GB - 2009)
iPod nano (5th generation - video camera)
iPod nano (4th generation - video)
iPod shuffle (3rd generation)
iPad


How is iCloud Photo Library service in China?

iCloud and Apple services are not blocked in China, the iPhone will be able to access iCloud Photo Library and www.icloud.com

Keep in mind that maybe the user will be prompted to enter additional information in order to login if Two-step Verification is enabled. This can include verification code sent to the device or SMS messages to the number associated with the Apple ID.

As alternative to iCloud Photo Library, OneDrive from Microsoft can be used for the same purpose that offers 15GB of space (I don't know if the Upload Camera bonus for additional 15GB is still active). The service has a dedicated app for iPhone (link).

UPDATE: On November 2015 Microsoft announced that will reduce the free space of OneDrive to 5GB and the Upload Camera bonus will also be removed.

SECOND UPDATE: On 11 December 2015 Microsoft announced that the users can keep their 15GB storage plus the 15GB Camera bonus if they confirm using this page: https://preview.onedrive.com/bonus/

Dropbox is blocked in China and can't be used to backup your mobile phone photos.


There's finally an app for this! Call Recorder for FaceTime is a Mac app that was just released today:

https://www.ecamm.com/mac/callrecorderft/

This product is a plug-in that adds recording controls to the FaceTime app. Recording can be started manually, or it can be configured to record automatically. It creates internet-ready QuickTime movies.
Another great use is recording phone calls that come through the Mac via Yosemite's new Handoff feature.

(full disclosure: I work on this product!)


Why is it that I cannot open file in terminal when in root?

I believe you're using su or similar to login to the root account while in your normal account. While you are using Terminal, any action taken in the Terminal.app will have the same root user level access.

However, once you leave the Terminal.app, such as when you use the open command, that opened app does not inherit the special permissions from root. It sends you back to normal land where your user account is limited.

To workaround this, you can use a text editor available in root. A short list includes vi, vim, nano, emacs, pico. I'm a fan of nano as it shows most of its commands in the window. You can use the following command in your normal user to edit a file like so:

sudo nano /some/file.txt

The command to save (write out) is control+x (^O), and quit (exit) is control+x (^X). Good luck!


You could purchase a Huion tablet from Amazon, I don't know if they are available in your region. They're quite cheap, I haven't personally tried them but based on the good reviews it looks like they do their job.

Here are two of them:

https://www.amazon.es/dp/B00DTPYWBG/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_0b9aCb8TDP9VH

https://www.amazon.es/dp/B00DM24HNE/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_di9aCb85MMQRV

There are also the Wacom tablets, I've used them before and I can say that they worked very well.

They can be expensive but there are a few cheaper ones like the Intuos S, I believe it was. It's specifically a drawing tablet but you could use it for writing.

Here it is:

https://www.wacom.com/en-us/products/pen-tablets/wacom-intuos

And for the software, you could use Krita (a free painting app) or Photoshop CC. You could also find other apps in the Mac Store as well.

EDIT: There is a video I found:

https://youtu.be/T0uBv5od8xU

He's using Windows but there's a version of OneNote available for Mac. It converts the hand written equations into text. It's awesome!


What command(s) are ran when you right click on a text and click "open man page" in Terminal?

Looks like

open x-man-page://$1

where you replace the $1 with whatever you would pass to man.
This I learned from here - although I can't find any decent documentation for this.


How to enable USB android tethering on OS X Mountain Lion without using Easy-Tether (Lite)

I'm guessing this isn't your preference, but the paid version of Easy Tether comes with the appropriate Mac OS X kernel extensions - so you could just pay the one time fee (currently $10) to have this feature programmed by someone who has done the work.

I'm fine with you not selecting this answer, but wanted it here for others that might need a solution that gets around the restrictions in the Lite version of the tethering software.


Mouse tracking speed setting has no effect

Ah I just figured it out! I was using a KVM with a "fast switching mode" where you can hit the side of the screen with your mouse twice to switch inputs. Somehow this got turned on. (It also explains why it was randomly switching inputs without me asking!)
As soon as you turn it off (Scroll lock, Scroll lock, F12 for the one I'm using), the mouse works perfectly again. My guess is that in order to know when you hit the side of the screen, the KVM has to be in charge of the position of the cursor on the screen, so it must set the mouse to absolute mode, and then the OS sensitivity has no effect.
Would be nice if something in the UI said the mouse is operating in absolute mode (I didn't even know that was possible, though I guess graphics tablets use it).


Does the iPad 2 or iPhone 4S play HD videos on Youtube?

In the Youtube app video quality is selected automatically based on connection speed, so you will only get HD video if it's available AND you're on WiFi. It doesn't tell you the quality you are getting. On the Youtube HTML5 mobile site m.youtube.com you can select HD manually through a toggle button when it's available and you can do it on 3G but again no indication of the quality other than "HD."


MacBook Pro Retina lag when switching workspaces

Try disabling automatic graphics switching (http://serato.com/video-sl/support/5613/how-to-adjust-graphics-performance-for-the-macbook-pro) and see if that helps. It may be trying to use the slower integrated graphics over the dedicated GPU.

Also, you may experience lag when using a scaled resolution. This is most likely a hardware issue but future software revisions may help.


How to recover from "chown -R $USER /usr/"?

If you can't restore /usr/ from a backup, you could first start up in single user mode (by holding command-S on startup) and run chown -R root /usr/.

On my installation, all files under /usr/local/ were owned by either root or me, a few files under /usr/ were owned by _uucp, and all other files under /usr/ were owned by root:

$ sudo find /usr/local ! -user root ! -user $USER
$ sudo find /usr/!(local) ! -user root -print0|xargs -0 stat -f '%Su %N'
_uucp /usr/bin/cu
_uucp /usr/bin/uucp
_uucp /usr/bin/uuname
_uucp /usr/bin/uustat
_uucp /usr/bin/uux
_uucp /usr/sbin/uucico
_uucp /usr/sbin/uuxqt
_uucp /usr/share/uucp

This would change the owner of the uucp files:

sudo chown _uucp /usr/bin/{cu,uucp,uuname,uustat,uux} /usr/sbin/{uucico,uuxqt} /usr/share/uucp

/usr/local/ does not exist on a fresh installation of OS X. If you only used /usr/local/ with Homebrew, you might delete /usr/local/ and then reinstall Homebrew.

Alternatively, you could use Pacifist to copy the default /usr/ from an OS X installer downloaded from App Store. Doing an upgrade install of OS X from the recovery partition or upgrading to 10.9 might also restore the owners of some files.


update ipad2 3G jailbreaked to ios 7 and it got stuck on error 14

Just connect your iPad to your PC and click on "Restore to factory". iTunes will download the latest version of iOS supported and install it, which in this case will install iOS 7 on your iPad.


Multiple iTunes libraries - podcasts merged after 11.1 upgrade?

I found the new option that controls this.

Preferences/Store/Sync Podcast Subscriptions and Settings

Or maybe this option already existed but its setting was changed as a result of the upgrade.  Disabling this restores previous behavior.

There are also threads at Apple Support, such as this one about problems with podcasts after the 11.1 upgrade.


Can I use Back To My Mac's mDNS address and for ssh and other routing of traffic?

Update

There's a very simple way to simply SSH to a BTMM/iCloud computer:

In Terminal, in the Shell menu select New Remote Connection... (cmd+shift+K). From here you can browse by ssh/sftp/ftp/telnet hosts on the local or BTMM network.

This is obviously much easier for the individual apps that support iCloud/BTMM lookup (e.g. you'll also see file shares in the side-bar of Finder, and remote Airport devices in Airport Utility), but I'll leave the full instructions below for the more arbitrary use-cases.

For command line tools, Apple have replaced the old
<computer-name>.<mobileme-name>.members.mac.com, with <computer-name>.<numeric-id>.members.btmm.icloud.com (where the <numeric_id> field is a number automatically generated for your Apple ID).

Step 1: Find out your iCloud BTMM domain

First, look up your domain using the DNS Service Discovery tool:

# dns-sd -E

The output is formatted slightly awkwardly, but what you're after is the numeric ID, which should be on the last line. You're after the full domain, something like 12345678.members.btmm.icloud.com, however dns-sd will display it (kind of) in reverse order, on separate lines:

23:41:33.309  Added                          icloud.com
                                             - > btmm
                                             - - > members
                                             - - - > 12345678

You'll also need to press ctrl+C after it displays the information you're after (it is designed to continue listening and updating). This applies to each use of dns-sd, here and below.

Step 2: List Computers

You can use these tools to browse that domain for services, e.g. for ssh servers:

# dns-sd -B _ssh 12345678.members.btmm.icloud.com

Or if you already know the hostname just access it directly as computer-name.12345678.members.btmm.icloud.com. (Any spaces in your computer name will be hyphens in this domain).

You can only access this from a computer that is also set up for BTMM on the same Apple ID account, because this hostname will resolve to an IPv6 address that is really the end of an encrypted network tunnel between your Apple ID's BTMM computers.

If you want to see the IPv6 address for a specific host, you can type

# dns-sd -G v6 computer-name.12345678.members.btmm.icloud.com

And it'll display something like:

17:37:47.504  Add     2  0 computer-name.12345678.members.btmm.icloud.com. FD11:993E:64AE:4DEA:011F:FBD1:F444:11A1%<0>  152

Step 3: Connect

# ssh username@computer-name.12345678.members.btmm.icloud.com

Note

I'm not sure if that number will ever change, so you may or may not need to repeat Step 1 at some point later on... mine's been static for quite a few years now.


Keyboard shortcut to switch focus between monitors (from #1 to #2) in Yosemite

You can switch Applications by using ⌘ command+tab. Tabbing through the list of applications can be done by holding the ⌘ command key and continually hitting tab. This will automatically shift focus to the selected app no matter which screen or monitor on which it resides.

Therefore, swapping between IDE and browser is easily done without mapping new shortcuts.

The keyboard command for refreshing the browser is generally ⌘ command+R.

You can switch Windows of the same app by using ⌘ command+~.


How do I collect all of my notes and highlights from iBooks?

iBooks doesn't have AppleScript support.  The annotations are stored in a SQLite file: ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.iBooksX/Data/Documents/AEAnnotation/.

You could try to parse that. This answer gives a link to Digested, which reads that database and then allows you to export your annotations to Evernote, but I don't know what formatting they'll have or if you want to mess with Evernote.

One (possibly) simple solution would be to open the book in iBooks for iOS. You could then email the annotations in bulk to yourself.

Open the book
Press the "list button" to bring up the Table of Contents
Switch to the Notes tab
Press the Share button
Select Edit Notes
Select All
Share via email.

Edit:

Actually, after reading a comment on reddit, there seems to be a way to export them all from iBooks on OS X as well:

  You can export your notes in an email from Notes -> Select All -> Share (you need to hold ctrl while you right click to retain your selection). Your highlighted portions will be copied into the email with your notes and formatted nicely.
  Strangely, on the Mac the application doesn't care about whether the book is copy protected—it will always copy the highlighted portion. The iOS application indeed discriminates though. If your book is copy protected, then only the chapter name will be shared.
  That seems to be the only way to do it unfortunately. :/

Using my laptop's trackpad, I had to hold down ctrl + shift while tapping on the trackpad in order to bring up the contextual menu while retaining the selection.


Where does Apple's predictive keyboard get its "contextual" content from?

If you read the Apple patents there is a explanation how it works.

US patents

Patent No. 8,232,973 for a "Method, device, and graphical user interface providing word recommendations for text input"

and

Apple’s U.S Patent No. 8,074,172 for a "method, system, and graphical user interface for providing word recommendations" or predictive text.

  …..However, the size of these portable communication devices also
  restricts the size of the text input device, such as a physical or
  virtual keyboard, in the portable device. With a size-restricted
  keyboard, designers are often forced to make the keys smaller or
  overload the keys. Both may lead to typing mistakes and thus more
  backtracking to correct the mistakes. This makes the process of
  communication by text on the devices inefficient and reduces user
  satisfaction with such portable communication devices.

  .....The set of strings are compared against a dictionary. Words in the
  dictionary that have any of the set of strings as a prefix are
  identified (206). As used herein, "prefix" means that the string is a
  prefix of a word in the dictionary or is itself a word in the
  dictionary. A dictionary, as used herein, refers to a list of words.
  The dictionary may be pre-made and stored in the memory. The
  dictionary may also include usage frequency rankings for each word in
  the dictionary. A usage frequency ranking for a word indicates (or
  more generally, corresponds to) the statistical usage frequency for
  that word in a language. In some embodiments, the dictionary may
  include different usage frequency rankings for different variants of a
  language. For example, a dictionary of words in the English language
  may have different usage frequency rankings with respect to American
  English and British English.

  In some embodiments, the dictionary may be customizable. That is,
  additional words may be added to the dictionary by the user.
  Furthermore, in some embodiments, different applications may have
  different dictionaries with different words and usage frequency
  rankings. For example, an email application and an SMS application may
  have different dictionaries, with different words and perhaps
  different usage frequency rankings within the same language.

  The identified words are the candidate words that may be presented to
  the user as recommended replacements for the input sequence. The
  candidate words are scored (208). Each candidate word is scored based
  on a character-to-character comparison with the input sequence and
  optionally other factors. Further details regarding the scoring of
  candidate words are described below, in relation to FIGS. 3 and 7A-7C.
  A subset of the candidate words are selected based on predefined
  criteria (210) and the selected subset is presented to the user (212).
  In some embodiments, the selected candidate words are presented to the
  user as a horizontal listing of words.

Graphical view:

I did not intend to provide a complete explanation on how it works, but provide a guide to it.

So what about

Notice my dictionary does not have it so it is red underlined and it is recommending to look it up.

The choices are:

1- look it up and correct

2- add to dictionary as typed

3- ignore it

The predictive keyboard logic will take in account all 3 inputs. Even the ignored version, and it will assume it is what I wanted. So in your case, you probably did not add it to your dictionary, but used that word more than once, so it became marked as the most probable (predictive).


How to bind ⌘← and ⌘→ to previous and next tab in Safari 10?

You can use Keyboard Maestro to overwrite that ambiguous behavior in Safari and map ⌘←/⌘→ to switch between tabs regardless of any context (text field, history availability), to make it work just like it does in Chrome.
It's a pretty straightforward macro like "When ⌘← hotkey is pressed, execute “Previous Safari Tab” action" in a macro folder limited to Safari. However, Keyboard Maestro is not free.

Maybe you could also create a free Applescript service to run Window⟶Show Next Tab command (since this command ignores context, unlike the respective keyboard shortcut) and change system shortcut ⌘←/⌘→ to run that service instead (would like need to add Safari to Accessibility to allow a script manipulating menu items).


Shift-Option- is adding accented characters

In order to avoid accented characters you need to create and use a custom keylayout file.  I followed the steps outlined here:

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/11876485/how-to-disable-typing-special-characters-when-pressing-option-key-in-mac-os-x/24100077#24100077


What is the reference number needed for the Tax Info in iTunes Connect?

The instructions state if you're a foreign individual who is the single owner of a disregarded entity that is not claiming treaty benefits as a hybrid entity, with respect to a payment, and the account to which a payment is made or credited is in the name of the disregarded entity, you should write the name and account number of the disregarded entity on line 7 "Reference number" in order to inform the withholding agent of this fact.


From an email with Slack support:

  The MacOS flash screen setting is based on the system default "alert"
  sound. If an application uses the system default "alert" sound, the
  screen will flash. Since Slack never plays the system default sound,
  we'll never flash the screen.

  For now, I'm afraid this means there is no way to flash the screen
  when Slack receives a notification. That said, I've let the team know
  that this is something you'd like to see in the future.

This was written on the 16th May 2019. Slack v3.3.8


How do I cycle through windows without bringing each to the fore?

To continually switch between two windows use Command` and, to go back to the previous window, ShiftCommand`. I tested it with XQuartz and worked as expected.

Otherwise: Can't you select the window you wish to bring to the front from XQuartz's Window menu?

Other possibility is to use Hot Corners (introduced in OS X 10.3 "Panther") to show all application windows, then choose the one you need. There are plenty of guides out there, for instance http://heresthethingblog.com/2012/02/06/mac-tip-control-desktop-hot-corners/.

Basically (in 10.7 "Lion" and later), you have to open System Preferences, select Mission Control and press the button Hot Corners... in the bottom. Then you can select a corner for action Application Windows.


Should I use Dropbox or Aperture to back up iPhone photos?

If you have your Photostream set up in Aperture and on your iPhone, the photos will also get automatically downloaded to your computer. Dropbox has a similar feature, so if you wanted automatic backups, you could set up both Photostream and Dropbox sync and then back up your Aperture library (from Photostream) to your external HD. That way you have three copies, one of which you cannot modify from your phone.


Why not try CUMeeting video conferencing software which allows multiple people in the same conference.


What is this text message, and how worried should I be?

Note: The previous answer is wrong. Correct answer is the message is from the service provider. Thanks to @duci9y for the correction.


Can I copy the mac OS directly from my macbook pro to a card in the SD slot?

You can use Disk Utility to make bootable copies of the OS. It's always preferable to use an OS that's not booted (i.e. you're not copying yourself), but in practice, OS X generally behaves well. Worst thing - you waste time with a non-bootable copy.

You could also look into something like SuperDuper or CarbonCopy Cloner. They will serve you for more than the initial need of making a backup copy of the OS.

Worst case, you end up with a broken system and have to pick up a secondhand disk from craig's list or similar. Apple also sells replacement media, but used media is usually less expensive.


Jailbroken iPhone 5S stuck on Recovery screen

You need to restore your phone to the latest iOS version being signed, currently iOS 10.2.1.

You should never click Reset All Content and Settings on a jailbroken phone, because it will throw you into an irreversible boot loop and you'll be forced to restore.


Mojave: How to grant apps permission in Security & Privacy -> Privacy -> Accessibility on the command line

tccutil. But not the official one from Apple.

brew has it.

Regards


Function keys since upgrading to Yosemite

It turns out the problem came from the external keyboard, a Logitech K750. I had to use the Logitech Control Center to get the correct behavior. Why this wasn't a problem in Mavericks, I'm not sure.


look up a word in Dictionary.app in Terminal

You can use...

open dict://my_word

...which will open the Dictionary application and lookup the string my_word. If you want to use multiple words use something like open dict://"Big Bang Theory".

There's no output in the Terminal though.


Why is iBooks.app taking 650 MB memory on macOS 10.14.5?

I note that Books is using a similarly small amount of memory on my Mac, too, despite not being launched. So, I'd categorise this as 'normal'.

My general approach to memory issues is "Is this an actual problem?"

If memory pressure is low; and you're not seeing high levels of swap and associated  performance issues: then I'd be tempted to let MacOS do the system management.

You could try launching the app, and letting it 'work' for a bit, then quit it, and see if that improves things. There do seem to be a couple of other reports on ASC about Books running wild with memory - the DiskSpaceEfficiency plugin seems to be the culprit. But no solutions given. FWIW, I don't see the behaviour in Catalina. It's likely to be a bug.


How to manage a huge folder collection in two places

Create your 2012 movie folder.  Hold down the command key and left mouse click to select each movie folder that has a movie made in 2012.  Once you have them all selected (with the command key down) hold down the alt key, and "move" the aliases that are created for all of the movie folders you selected into the 2012 folder.  What this does is create a pointer to the original file/folder, it doesn't actually copy the folder and contents.  It's just a representation and "points" to the location of the original folder.  This way you won't waste space (it's like 1kb per alias).

Do this for each of the year folders, and each of the alphabet folders.  Seems like an easy way not to waste space.


I know my battery should be replaced, but is that all of the problem? (Update)

You can leave your battery unchanged as long as you want, even it is not recommended by the operating system (i.e. Apple).

From my own experience (2011 MacBook Air with 1178 load cycles), the battery performance will just degrade more.

It may be be months away, but at one point the battery will be so weak that an unplugged Mac will not go to sleep when the battery is empty, but just shut down. Trust me, you will notice.

An Apple Store employee told me that battery replacements can often be done while you wait, or within a few hours if you make a Genius Bar appointment rather early in the morning.

Good luck!


can I purchase a SIM unlocked watch and expect it to work with any of the carriers?

No, you cannot expect it to work with just any carrier.

Apple Watch comes in different regional models that supports different frequency bands (this goes for both the Apple Watch 3 and Apple Watch 4). These models are for the Americas, China and Europa/Asia/Pacific.

Therefore you cannot expect the model used in North America to work in Europe.

In addition to that, you cannot expect it to work with any carrier even within the region. The carrier has to specifically support eSIM for Apple Watch. In the Netherlands none of the providers support eSIM, so you cannot buy a subscription for an Apple Watch there.

Combined with the fact that the Watch subscriptions generally do not support roaming in other countries - you cannot get an Apple Watch working with cell support in the Netherlands today.

  As I understand it, the eSIM inside the watch is not removable and copies the SIM info from the iPhone.

It is not removable in the sense that it is not a physical thing. It is just information stored in digital format.

It does not copy the SIM card inside the iPhone if that is what you mean, no. The eSIM is a separate SIM from the one in the iPhone. The process of setting it up however means that the information for the eSIM is retrieved from your provider on your iPhone and sent to the Apple Watch. It is not stored on the iPhone.


Apple mdls (MetaData List) command on Networked Drive

Just an FYI, exiftool (which has to be installed) can pull all metadata from the file over the network without the need to have the network volume indexed.

That said, the most likely reason you're only getting some of the metadata is because indexing is most likely turned off on the network volume.

I tested this with an SMB Share to a Linux System and copied over some photos that I know contain GPS Info.

On first query I got the same results you did, a subset of the metadata, however upon turning indexing on using mdutil and letting the volume be indexed, then mdls returned all metadata including the GPS Info.

In Terminal use the following syntax, mdutil -i on mount_point, e.g.:

mdutil -i on /Volumes/Data

Also, you might want to read the manual page for: mdutil


Setting Outlook.com contacts and calendar on OSX

For desktop usage, Outlook.com uses IMAP for mail.  However, it doesn't provide CardDAV or CalDAV access for contacts and calendars.  For mobile usage, Outlook.com uses Exchange Active Sync.  I'm not aware of any Mac desktop apps that support Exchange Active Sync.

You should tell Microsoft that this is important to you.  When you login to Outlook.com, click the settings icon and then click on Feedback.  Tell them what you want, why it matters, and what you will do in lieu of having this available to you.  For example, I said this in my feedback to them about this topic (feel free to borrow this, although I'd recommend changing it to whatever is important to you):

  I want to be able to sync my calendar and contacts across all devices
  that I use.  I can get my calendar and contacts on my phone, but not
  on my Mac.  Please make it possible for me to see my calendar and
  contacts on Mac desktop clients.  Gmail can sync my calendar and
  contacts to my Mac desktop applications, which makes it very difficult
  for me to use Outlook.com instead of Gmail.


How to set default homepage in safari 6?

Two options come to mind:

Reset Safari (in Safari menu), restart the application and try again
Quit Safari, rename ~/Library/Safari to ~/Library/Safari.old and try again

If the second options work, quit Safari again and copy Bookmarks.plist from Safari.old to the newly created Safari folder.


How to add Screen Recording permission to Google Chrome in Catalina?

It looks like as long as an app does not try to capture or record the screen, the app cannot be manually added to the "Screen Recording" list. For other permission types such as Full Disk Access, I have successfully dragged and dropped an application to add to the list.

In that case, you can open Google Chrome, visit this site and click the "Get Started" button. I have tried it on MacOS Catalina 10.15.4 with Google Chrome 83.0.4103.61 (Official Build) (64-bit), and it worked. After pressing the "Get Started" button, Chrome requested permission to record screen, and then afterwards, I could go to settings->Security & Privacy and then grant permission for Screen Recording.

During my test, I already had the Security & Privacy window open, and already clicked the Lock icon to make changes and entered my password.

Afterwards, I have tested with Google meetings and confirmed that I can share my screen. I have also confirmed that when I deselect Chrome from the Screen Recording list, I can't share the screen.

Hope that works for you, too.


Can an iPad somehow connect the iPad Camera Connector AND be plugged into power simultaneously?

Not with Apple's own kit, but you can find various adapters on places like ebay which do what you want. My friend has one similar to this which appears to work fine (on iOS 5.1.1 at least).


Problem with external monitor and MacBook Air

Are you connecting using 100Hz for example on a 60 Hz monitor? The monitor will turn black then and appears to be disconnected.
There should be an option to cast it as a different Hz to your monitor.


Literally right after typing this question up, my coworker found the solution.

Apparently, the "JAVA_HOME" variable changes based on the context of where you ran your jar. If you run the application directly, the variable leads to

/Library/Internet Plug-Ins/JavaAppletPlugin.plugin/Contents/Home

Whereas running it from bash/terminal/eclipse causes it to be located elsewhere

What this means in the context of this problem, is that we were not adding our certificates in all of the places necessary. Should you come across this, please verify that you are adding your certs in the correct locations.


Is there a problem with Thunderbolt to HDMI in Lion?

The best chance of success (and Lion doesn't seem to affect this either way) is to have the cord connected when the TV is turned on. This lets the mac and the TV negotiate the formats that the TV supports. Sometimes hot plugging it, even though it's supposed to work causes interference (snow) or worse on the TV until you make the connection again.


Can these 10 steps for creating a podcast episode be automated?

For a good summary about how other people do it see How we do our home work which documents how the Home Work podcast gets recorded and post-processed:

QuickTime for audio recording
GarageBand for audio editing
Levelator
Sound Studio to adjust the sample rate, mix down to mono and add metadata

Depending on your setup and your quality requirements you can at least combine #1 and #2 by recording directly in GarageBand and also add intro/outro parts.


Beeping usually indicates a problem with RAM, though I think it can indicate other hardware problems too.   According to Mac computers: About startup tones:

"3 successive tones, a 5 second pause (repeating): This indicates RAM does not pass a data integrity check."

Google Drive is probably installing a driver of some sort that is currently incapatible and causing problems.  Confirm that you're running the latest version of Google Drive's software and update your OS if any updates are available.

Google addresses this problem here with a link to an update which sounds exactly like the problem you're having.


What is the Mac keyboard key with a symbol ⌅ of an up arrow pointing into a horizontal line?

It is called Projective, with Unicode U+2305, and it represents Enter which is different to Carriage Return, represented with a ↩.

Although most of the time they work in the same way, there is a difference between Enter and Carriage Return. While Enter, in most cases, will make a GUI object operate at its default function, the Carriage Return is meant to reset the user's position to the beginning of the line of a text.

Just doing fn+Return should trigger it.

On the short keyboards you'll either find the name or the icon.


Which text editors for iPhone support tabs and editing files in Dropbox in-place?

GoCoEdit

GoCoEdit is a Code and Text Editor optimized for fast opening and editing local (on iOS device) and remote (on server) files with your iOS Device.

It supports extended syntax highlighting on many coding languages and has a themable interface with many dark and light themes.

Features:

  Universal App (use it on your iPad, iPhone & iPod Touch)
  Connect to your servers via SFTP, FTP, Google Drive, Dropbox or OneDrive
  Multiple Tabs
  Very fast reconnect and recover of open files after restart
  Upload and Download files/folders or edit files directly on your server/dropbox/drive without download
  Supporting iOS9 features like textselection by cursor, Splitview and Slide-Over
  Supporting 3D Touch
  External/Bluetooth keyboard support, with lots of shortcuts


Can iTunes reveal which songs are currently on a device?

As I understand your desired functionality, iTunes does not adjust the main library view based on a connected device. You have to select the specific device and see what it contains.

The closest you can get is to plug-in your iPhone into your computer so it appears under Devices in iTunes. If you click on the little arrow in front of your iPhone's name, you can browse its content easily.

In addition you can also see which playlists, artists, genres and albums get synced in the  Music section of the syncing window.


There are few things to check before you can make sure numbers are automatically blocking on your device.

Go to Settings  > Phone > Call Blocking and Identification and
check if you find the same number which you think is blocked?
Also at the top you'll see apps that have access to call blocking.
See if there is any app that is automatically blocking numbers?

If your answer is NO to both questions then you should check with your phone carrier and see if there is any problem in your phone network.


Partition table error in external ARECA RAID

The TestDisk results for macOS formatted disks are/were often misleading or even wrong because the algorithm misinterprets special hidden volume content. AFAIK it tries to detect special empty blocks (2) followed by the occurrences of the strings H+ and/or HFSJ in the third block - which marks the beginning of a HFSJ volume. A similar sequence is used to detect the last blocks of a volume. Such 1536 Byte "blocks" are more frequent than TestDisk can handle.

I prefer a manual approach.

Preconditions:

GPT (GUID Partition Table)
some "standard" partitioning with Disk Utility previously (the disk may contain several volumes though)
the disk mustn't be initialized after the incident
the disk or volume mustn't be repaired (with Disk Utility, Disk Warrior or similar tools)

Methodology:

determine the device block size
determine the volume type of the vanished/missing volume
read-out the volume header (and sometimes the second volume header) to determine block size and number

Basics:

First get all available disks and the partition table of the broken disk (here disk5):

diskutil list
diskutil umountDisk disk5
sudo gpt -r show disk5

Device Block Size:

To determine the block size of the disk enter:

diskutil info disk5 | grep "Device Block Size"

Depending on the Device Block Size (either 512 B or 4096 B) and the total size of the disk they either contain a 200 MiB or 300 MiB EFI partition as first partition after the partition table, then the main volume and finally some free space or a second partition and some free space. The last few blocks are occupied by the second ("backup") partition table.

The standard Apple GUID partition scheme of a 512 B disk looks like this:

                0           1         PMBR
                1           1         Pri GPT header
                2          32         Pri GPT table
               34           6
               40      409600      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
           409640  part2-size      2  GPT part - partition type
         - depending on the formatting of the disk a 3rd partition and/or free space -
    total_size-33          32         Sec GPT table
     total_size-1           1         Sec GPT header

The standard Apple GUID partition scheme of a 4096 B disk looks like this:

               0           1         PMBR
               1           1         Pri GPT header
               2           4         Pri GPT table
               6       76800      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
           76806  part2-size      2  GPT part - partition type
         - depending on the formatting of the disk a 3rd partition and/or free space -
    total_size-5           4         Sec GPT table
    total_size-1           1         Sec GPT header

512 B disks may also have a 614400 blocks(512) EFI partition (partition 1) or 4096 B disks may have a 51200 blocks(4096) EFI partition - both can be found much less often than the other way round though. The size of the main partition is reduced or enlarged respectively.

An external RAID with a RAID-controller may contain a bunch of 4096 B disks but will still present the RAID-volume as 512 B device!

Volume Type:

To determine the volume type you have to hexdump the first blocks after the EFI partition.

This is done by piping data stream input in dd to hexdump:

sudo dd if=/dev/diskX | hexdump

To hexdump a 512 B disk (with a 200 MiB EFI) use the following command:

sudo dd if=/dev/disk5 skip=409640 bs=512 count=3 | hexdump

To hexdump a 4096 B disk (with a 300 MiB EFI) use the following command:

sudo dd if=/dev/disk5 skip=76806 bs=4096 count=1 | hexdump

In both cases a normal HFS+ volume is indicated by its signature 0x482b (="H+") at 0x0000400 and/or by its lastMountedVersion 0x4846534a (="HFSJ") starting at 0x0000408

0000000 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
*
0000400→48 2b←00 04 80 00 20 00→48 46 53 4a←00 00 2b ab
...

In both cases an APFS volume is indicated by 0x4e585342 (= APFS magic string) starting at 0x0000020:

0000000 0f d5 99 82 f1 8b e4 67 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
0000010 14 33 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 80 00 00 00 00
0000020→4e 58 53 42←00 10 00 00 f6 37 b9 03 00 00 00 00
...

Volume Header:

Both dumps also contain the Allocation Block Size and the Number of Allocation Blocks of the (first) volume or the APFS container. Both values determine the size of the (lost) volume/container. The allocation block size mustn't be confused with the device block size!

The allocation block size of an HFS+ volume can be found in the volume header. In the dump above the volume header starts at 0x0000400 and ends at 00005FF.

The allocation block size is an UInt32 starting at 0x0000428

0000400 48 2b 00 04 80 00 20 00 48 46 53 4a 00 00 2b ab
0000410 d2 c3 e0 e6 d8 cd 44 73 00 00 00 00 d2 c3 d2 d6
0000420 00 01 c9 aa 00 00 08 8d→00 00 20 00←2b a9 28 fa
0000430 02 56 52 7a 2b 74 ff f4 00 01 00 00 00 01 00 00

The allocation block number is an UInt32 starting at 0x000042C

0000400 48 2b 00 04 80 00 20 00 48 46 53 4a 00 00 2b ab
0000410 d2 c3 e0 e6 d8 cd 44 73 00 00 00 00 d2 c3 d2 d6
0000420 00 01 c9 aa 00 00 08 8d 00 00 20 00→2b a9 28 fa←
0000430 02 56 52 7a 2b 74 ff f4 00 01 00 00 00 01 00 00

To convert hex to decimal use echo "obase=10; ibase=16; (uppercase hex!)" | bc

So the allocation block size of the above example is

echo "obase=10; ibase=16; 00002000" | bc (=8192 byte)

and the number of allocation blocks is

echo "obase=10; ibase=16; 2BA928FA" | bc (=732506362)

The total size of the example volume is 732506362 x 8192 Byte (= 6000692117504 Byte or 11720101792 blocks(512) or 1465012724 blocks(4096)).

The block size and the block number of an APFS container can be found in the container superblock which starts at 0x0000020.

The block size is an UInt32 (reversed) starting at 0x0000024

0000000 0f d5 99 82 f1 8b e4 67 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
0000010 14 33 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 80 00 00 00 00
0000020 4e 58 53 42→00 10 00 00←f6 37 b9 03 00 00 00 00
0000030 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
...

The block number is an UInt64 (reversed) starting at 0x0000028

0000000 0f d5 99 82 f1 8b e4 67 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
0000010 14 33 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 80 00 00 00 00
0000020 4e 58 53 42 00 10 00 00→f6 37 b9 03 00 00 00 00←
0000030 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
...

To convert hex to decimal with echo... command you have to reverse the byte order:

(00 10)⬄(00 00) > 00⬄00 00⬄10 > 00 00 10 00
and
(f6 37 b9 03)⬄(00 00 00 00) > (00 00)⬄(00 00) (f6 37)⬄(b9 03) > 00⬄00 00⬄00 b9⬄03 f6⬄37 > 00 00 00 00 03 b9 37 f6

So the block size of the above example is

echo "obase=10; ibase=16; 00001000" | bc (=4096 byte)

and the number of blocks is

echo "obase=10; ibase=16; 0000000003B937F6" | bc (=62470134)

The total size of the example volume is 62470134 x 4096 Byte (= 255877668864 Byte or 499761072 blocks(512) or 62470134 blocks(4096)).

Recreating the lost volume:

Depending on your findings in the previous steps (512|4096)/(HFS+/AFPS)/(block size & block number) add the missing EFI and the main volume to the partition table.

Examples with the above example disks (and both missing EFI and main partition):

512 B disk, 200 MiB EFI & APFS container (499761072 blocks(512))

sudo gpt add -i 1 -b 40 -s 409600 -t C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B /dev/disk5
sudo gpt add -i 2 -b 409640 -s 499761072 -t 7C3457EF-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC /dev/disk5

4096 B disk, 300 MiB EFI & HFS+ volume (1465012724 blocks(4096))

sudo gpt add -i 1 -b 6 -s 76800 -t C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B /dev/disk5
sudo gpt add -i 2 -b 76806 -s 1465012724 -t 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC /dev/disk5

Verify the final volumes with diskutil verifyVolume diskXsY.

If you're faced with a 512 B disk and a 300 MiB EFI (or a 4096 B disk and a 200 MiB EFI) which will result in hexdump gibberish, you have to slightly apply the dd ... | hexdump command.


Why isn't my iPod touch's calendar showing up in iCloud?

I had a similar problem with an iPad Calendar that wouldn't sync with [e.g., appear on] my other devices.

I found this link helpful:

http://forums.macrumors.com/showpost.php?p=13675190&postcount=9

In my case, I turned off iCloud Calendar syncing on the iPad [in iCloud settings].  I then chose to keep the Calendar data on the iPad rather than delete it.

Next, I turned iCloud Calendar syncing back on in iCloud settings, chose Merge, and bingo, everything appeared everywhere.

Hope this helps.


Home folder has 'everyone' Read-Only permissions

If you wish new folders at the top level of your home folder to by default be non-readable by anyone but you, add the following two ACLs to your home folder. DO NOT PROPAGATE PERMISSIONS. The first ACL makes all new folders unreadable, unwritable, and unsearchable by everyone. The second ACL makes an exception for you. Be sure to enter them in this order, so the second entry can push itself to the front.

chown +a "group:everyone deny list,add_file,search,add_subdirectory,delete_child,directory_inherit,limit_inherit,only_inherit" ~
chown +a# 0 "user:$USER allow list,add_file,search,add_subdirectory,delete_child,directory_inherit,limit_inherit,only_inherit" ~

But truth be told, it's easier to just fix up the permissions on any subfolders you create directly under your home folder. I mean, it's not like you're going to do that often, right?

And besides, who's to say you want these new folders readable only by you? What if you want a folder that is group-readable for some group but not world readable? These inherited ACLs are just going to get in your way then.

Creating a top-of-home-folder folder should be a rare event. Ad hoc solutions are best for rare events.


Windows RDP client that allows key mapping and easy use of Function Keys

The easiest way might be to disable the Fn key. Since you say that using Fn+F10 works, you could go into System Preferences > Keyboard > Keyboard, and enable Use all F1, F2, etc. keys as standard function keys. This way you no longer need to press Fn to send F10.

The second solution is on the PC side. You could install a utility such as AutoHotkey on your PC and remap the keys there. That way the keybindings will only work on the PC. Lifehacker has nice looking tutorial about this. In AutoHotkey, you can decide which applications the shortcut applies to, but in your case it seems like a global hotkey would work since it is running on the PC side.

Another solution might be to try one of the ways to create keyboard shortcuts menitoned in this Lifehacker article. This article's goal is to help you do similar things that AutoHotkey let's you do on the Mac.


How to make a scatter plot using Apple Numbers?

Yes, it is possible to create a scatter chart in Numbers as you described.

However, sometimes creating a chart in Numbers turns out to be cumbersome for some reason in my experience as well, but, in this case, I could not replicate the problem you are describing. So I am unable to tell you what possibly the problem is in your case.

In addition, I tried a few slightly different procedures, including the one described in this Apple support page, to create a scatter chart using the numbers you have given as an example and all turned out to be successful. I am attaching below the outcome of one of these trials.


We can monitor folders in at least three ways:

Using AppleScript Folder Actions, which can monitor when files are added or removed form a folder, or when the folder window is opened, closed, or moved int he Finder. see Folder Actions Reference.
Using a launchd launch agent, which can launch a unix script or script application when the file system changes at a particular path. See Launch Daemons and Agents.
Create an AppleScript application that uses AppleScriptObjC to receive notifications for file system changes. I can add an example of that if you think it's necessary, though I'd recommend using one of the others for most cases.

I suppose something could be done using syslog, but it seems like a lot more work than the approaches I mentioned.


The flash modules and controller of the SSD are blades (think naked SSD). They are not up to 3rd party configuration (at this time), but according to bmike, they are not soldered onto the main board and are actually discrete components.

However, there is no information as to what kind of proprietary (if any) configuration the blades come in, or whether they require an additional proprietary onboard controller (this may be likely given Apple's tendency to create speciality hardware for their line-up). So it most likely isn't the case that one could just crack open an existing SSD and use the blades within. A manufacturer would have to specifically design a unit for the new notebook. This isn't unlikely, but price will be the determining factor as it will be a speciality component.

It is also not clear at this time if Apple will make the components upgradeable, which is also a distinct possibility given how quickly SSDs are saturating the market place.

At best, it's a tentative "maybe."

You can read more about the new machine here: http://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/design/


Can you higlight a region (*not* text) in Preview?

I could not find a way to do this using Preview.  I tried to cheat by using the line drawing tool, and setting the color to a transparent yellow.  Unfortunately, Preview doesn't seem to allow transparency with its shape tools. (To see what I mean, draw a line, then bring up the color picker window and move the Opacity slider around -- it's either all or nothing.)

As an alternative, I suggest Adobe Reader (I receive no commission).  Its text highlighter has the same limitation as Preview's, but its line drawing tool supports transparency. Open up the Comment pane on the right, then the Drawing Markups section. Right click on the line tool and select Tool Default Properties to change the lines' color, opacity, and thickness. You also might want to enable Keep Tool Selected so you can quickly highlight multiple areas.

Instead of the line tool, you might prefer the rectangle tool.  Follow the same steps as before, but additionally set the Fill Color to be the same as the Color (and make sure the Transparent checkbox is NOT selected for the Fill Color).


Is it possible to boot backtrack from usb on a macbook pro?

Apparently your USB stick, to be bootable, must be setup for EFI/GPT.


Do it as root, and use forward slashes:

$ ln -s /Users /home
$ ls -ld /Users /home
drwxr-xr-x  6 root  admin  204 Apr  8  2014 /Users
lrwxrwxr-x  1 root  wheel    6 Sep 17 15:49 /home -> /Users


The trackpad in the 2008 white plastic MacBook isn't capable of supporting multitouch gestures. As it's a hardware limitation -- meaning the trackpad hardware can't sense input from 3-4 separate fingers at once -- there aren't any hacks to get around the limitation.

One way to get full multitouch support would be to get a Magic Trackpad. They'll work with any bluetooth-enabled Mac running Mac OS X Snow Leopard v10.6.4 or later.


How to Permanently Delete Photos from iPhone

Presuming you're not looking to securely delete these photos, just recover space that they're consuming, as suggested by your original question, let's just start simply...

Aside from the suggestions by superriku11, including using iPhoto to transfer them off with the delete option and Image Capture, you do realize that you can, in Photos in your Camera Roll select Edit and then proceed to select a series of photos and then Delete them. This is time consuming for lots of photos, but does allow you directly on the iPhone to get rid of images you may no longer want to keep. This is the obvious solution to getting rid of multiple images at once but some people forget about it. Realize that if you delete a photo in the Camera Roll that's in an Album it goes away there too. You can delete albums using the Edit button, but this keeps images in the Camera Roll.

If you want to get rid of all the photos in your Camera Roll all at once, go into Settings > General > Usage under Storage click Photos & Camera and the right swipe Camera Roll to bring up a Delete button. Give it some time and it will delete all your photos in the Camera Roll. Likewise you could delete all the photos in your Photo Library and/or Photo Stream the same way.


A way to open a new Finder window when double-clicking anywhere on the Desktop?

I was able to do this with Better Touch Tool, as Anonymous mentioned. As a test, I set "Single Finger Tap Top Right" of the Trackpad to the pre-defined action "Open Finder." Presto, new Finder window.


Installing OS X Server with existing OSX

Due to its UNIX nature, there isn't much difference between running a Mac without or with Server services enabled. Even on an out-of-box OS X installation there are already a lot of background services running if needed, the difference between client and server is a bit academical in a way.

Buying (and running)! Server.app is the intended way of using OS X Server, so there isn't any disadvantage. Basically the application itself primarily is used to administer and install all the server services and configurations (some of them you could also configure already manually by editing the corresponding config file).

At the end, these services (if activated) will need some additional CPU cycles, but this shouldn't be a problem with the hardware you are using (aka the hardware able to run 10.11), at least not if you only have a handful of clients accessing the server.


iPhone stuck in Recovery mode. Trouble restoring iPhone - what could I do?

A program called the firmware umbrella can be used to "kick a device out of recovery mode".