Unmount fails with: "failed to clean up smb mountpoint(s)"

My guess is some program is still using files on the share.

You could see what programming is using files on your share by running the folling line from the command line:

lsof | grep "/Volumes/yourshare/"


You might want to check out this question: What window management options exist for OS X?

My recommendation, if you want it to be fully automatic, is to use Slate.

Slate is no longer in active development, but it still works and is highly customizable. Put this code in a .slate.js file in your home directory:

var rightHalf = slate.operation("move", {
   "x" : "screenSizeX/2+screenOriginX",
   "y" : "screenOriginY",
   "width" : "screenSizeX/2",
   "height" : "screenSizeY"
});
slate.on("windowOpened", function(event, win) {
    if (win.app().name() === "Preview") {
        win.doOperation(rightHalf);
    }
});


Why does Time Machine's backup size not equal the size of my hard drive?

Not all files are backed up by Time Machine, but most files are backed up by Time Machine. There's a user-level exclusion list and a built-in exclusion list. The built-in exclusion list excludes things that are non-essential for restoring a system like log files and what not.

Apps can also exclude their own data from Time Machine by marking files with meta-data tags to exclude them from backups. For example: a web browser may chose to mark its cache directories as excluded from the Time Machine backups because cached surfing data isn't essential to a restore.

There's already a great Q&A on Ask Different that deals with how you see the exclusions list in Time Machine to see what's in the back and what isn't. It was asked and written for Lion, but it applies to anything Lion and post-Lion so far, including Mavericks. That includes details on how to see the built-in list as well as which apps have excluded data from the backups.

In short: don't panic if your first backup isn't the same size as all used space on your hard drive. It wasn't meant to be.


On my machine, the following works:

Go to System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts > Application Shortcuts. Press the [+] button. Select All Applications, type Cut, press your shortcut, and press Add.

Note that on systems still running OS X 10.8 and earlier, it's: System Preferences > Keyboard > Keyboard Shortcuts > Application Shortcuts


Can't get 1680x1050 resolution with Macbook Pro ~2009 and Snow Leopard

The issue is probably the VGA adapter (not faulty; just not capable of that high a resolution).  I think you need a DVI adapter to get the higher resolutions.


Can I use Bluetooth and headphone jack simultaneously

This can't be done on any of the current iPhones running any standard version of iOS.  Maybe if you edit your question and add what you're trying to accomplish by doing this, someone might be able to provide an alternative.


From Apple's site:

Can I play my rental on more than one device?

If you download a rented movie on your computer: You can transfer it to a device such as your Apple TV (1st generation), iPhone, iPad, or iPod if it’s a standard-definition film (movies in HD can only be watched on your computer, iPad, iPhone 4 or later, iPod touch (4th generation or later), or Apple TV). Once you move the movie from your computer to a device, the movie will disappear from your computer's iTunes library. You can move the movie between devices as many times as you wish during the rental period, but the movie can only exist on one device at a time.

If you download a rented movie on your iPhone 4 or later, iPad, iPod touch (4th generation or later), or Apple TV: It is not transferable to any other device or computer.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1657


iOS music replacement apps for iTunes match and dock connector for car radio

You could email/tweet to the makers of Track 8 and tell them to use the MPNowPlayingInfoCenter API, which is what Pandora and all music apps use to report track metadata.


How to use AppleScript to un-hide a file's extension?

Never mind! I found the answer here:

Super User: Show/hide extension of a file through OS X command line

I will delete this question now!

EDIT -

Since some are upvoting this question, I will echo the top answer in the linked question (supplied by @slhck).

A straightforward solution exists, because AppleScript specifically offers a set extension hidden command designed to do exactly what I'm looking for.

tell application "Finder"
    set some_file to (choose file)
    set extension hidden of some_file to false
end tell

And that will make the file extension visible!


Can I change the LTE bands supported by my iPhone 5s

No. The missing "bands" are physically missing hardware (antennas).


Supplemental update stuck on installation screen - how to break free?

In general, Apple software updates will try again and if you’re stuck, you’ll eventually need to power off the machine and risk leaving the disk in a bad state.

I would power down and try restarting and see how it goes. Worst case, use Internet Recovery when you can to install whatever version of OS you want. As long as you don’t install an older version, your data should all be intact. Command R is the usual command to initiate internet recovery when you hear the power on chime or see the Mac start to power up.

Sometimes booting in Safe Mode (hold shift) can get past an install that’s staged, so that’s a long shot if you don’t want to seek hardware service or have a bootable OS brought to the mac so you can triage further.


Difference between old and new LG UltraFine 5K(4K) Displays

27" Models

27MD5KL

current (as of 2020) revision updated in 2019
added: usb-c compatibility
changed: contrast - 1100:1
changed: charging - 94w
changed: thunderbolt controller: Titan Ridge (EDID id: 5b74)

27MD5KB

previous
contrast - 1200:1
charging - 85w
thunderbolt controller: Alpine Ridge (EDID id: 5b11)

27MD5KA

original version
WARNING: this model caused interference issues
sold for a short time only at Apple stores before being removed from shelves


Safari and Firefox displaying different colors than Chrome

The difference in color rendering is because of color profiles. Some browsers support color profiles, others don't. Embedding color profiles in your images will make their file sizes a bit larger, but will cause truer colors across browsers.

Please see:

https://css-tricks.com/color-rendering-difference-firefox-vs-safari/
http://cameratico.com/guides/web-browser-color-management-guide/
https://fstoppers.com/education/how-your-web-browser-affects-way-colors-are-rendered-77241


MIgration Assistant from HFS+ (case sensitive) to APFS (case sensitive)

I was able to restore from a time machine backup.  Just had to manually do a up-to-date backup on the old laptop.

Still don't know why I was unable to do a system-to-system (both with case-sensitive volumes) migration.


Can my files be deleted if I used a beta OS X version?

YES

With beta software there is always the risk of bugs which may be more severe than those in a version available to the general public. So the advice to "always make backups" is valid even stronger if you use beta software (may this be an OS, may this be just any application).


How to update iOS with limited hard drive space?

A conventional spinning hard drive on a computer needs to have at least 15% free space for optimal operation. If a spinning hard drive has less than 15% free space, the entire computer system will run slower than it should, due to a phenomenon called disk fragmentation.

Your friend will do herself a favor if she buys a larger hard drive and pays a technician to install it and clone the contents of her older, smaller hard drive to her newer, larger hard drive. Then she will not only have a faster computer system, she will also have plenty of room for iTunes and the iOS upgrade.

Large hard drives are ridiculously cheap.

That being said, there are many things that can be done to clean out un-needed files from the existing hard drive to free up more space. Start by running the free CCleaner program.

Then free up space on the disk by deleting all but the last Windows System Restore Point. Do a Google search for instructions on that.


How to type a capital letter from the extended Latin alphabet in OS X

Hold the shift key then the number corresponding.  It works just fine.  I think you are forgetting to let go of the shift before hitting the number.  Hence the unexpected output.

Hold shift+U then, after popup let go of the shift key and hit the corresponding number.
Ü ← result


Is it possible to disable audio through speakers, only play through headphones via headphone jack

When you switch audio outputs, the volume level reverts to whatever level it was at when you last used that output. That means that muting the internal speaker before plugging in headphones should be enough to stop audio from playing through the speaker if you disconnect your headphones.

If you want to keep the speaker disabled even if you hit any volume controls, you can use Soundflower. It's an extension designed to let your Mac record its own audio output, which it does by creating virtual input and output options that feed directly into each other. That means that you can hold down Option, click on the volume icon in the menu bar, and select one of the Soundflower options as your audio output before plugging in your headphones and selecting them as the output device. If your headphones get disconnected, your audio output will default to Soundflower, which doesn't send anything through the speaker. To re-enable the speaker, just Option-click on the volume icon in the menu bar and choose the built-in speaker for output.


Using an Android phone with a Mac's messaging App

I have a Macbook but also love my Nexus 6P. I was looking for the same thing and I found iMessage for Android which does exactly what you are looking for.


You could try just using Quick Look, built into the OS.

Select any of the images, tap the Space Bar.
Navigate the way you normally would inside the folder, up/down/left/right arrows.
Tap Space again to close.

This works for more than just pictures, it can handle music, text files, movies etc. & is extendable with new plugins. There's a list here [I don't know how comprehensive] - http://www.quicklookplugins.com


Could an app keep a trail of selected iPhone actions in a journal type style?

iOS applications run inside an individual sandbox, which prevents applications from accessing data etc. from another application. This also prevents a general "Activity Log" type application from working, unless Apple would provide an API for things like this.

Things may look different in the jailbreak world but even there the applications to be monitored would need to "publish" their actions somewhere.


Shortcut to disable keyboard/mouse in OSX

This is a common problem for mac users, press the option key 5 times, and it will be fixed.

Source:
     http://www.mackungfu.org/cat-proofing-a-macbook-keyboard


How do I make more space on a Macbook air?

I suggest using a tool like Space Gremlin to identify files eating up your disk space.
https://itunes.apple.com/de/app/space-gremlin/id414515628?mt=12
http://www.spacegremlinapp.com/


How can I scale a 4K external monitor to have a comfortable amount of space

Using Retina mode on a 4k display is a performance demanding task - especially for that 13" MacBook Pro. When you choose "odd" resolutions like that, the operating system will have to render in really high resolutions and down-sample to get an output suitable for your monitor.

What you could do instead was to install SwitchResX, Display Menu or similar apps that allows you to configure the monitor to your liking. I would recommend trying to disable Retina mode and simply use a high resolution with the monitor (not 3840x2160, but something smaller).

If you disable Retina mode, the performance demands are considerably less.


For what it's worth, I've been looking at an audio issue today and noticed I had 6 different instances of com.apple.audio.SandboxHelper running. Checking showed that the system thinks it has 6 different audio devices attached, so it seems each audio device get a SandboxHelper to look after it.

Oddly, no other piece of hardware, or associated drivers, has a SandboxHelper associated with it, so either the audio devices are the only ones that need help operating in a Sandbox, or only the audio driver team used that name and other tasks running in Sandboxes have their helpers called something else.


Locking has to do with the device itself, not your SIM card or cellular account. So you would need to have the new device unlocked as well. Assuming, though, that you qualified to have the initial device unlocked (per whatever terms and conditions your carrier specifies), you would presumably be able to have the new one unlocked without any problem.


How can I run two instances of WhatsApp on a Mac?

Simply open terminal and run this command:

/Applications/WhatsApp.app/Contents/MacOS/WhatsApp /secondary

Two remarks:

The app seems to crash if you subsequently close the terminal (even if you use &) so keep your terminal open. Sudo may solve this (as seen here) but I didn't really try.
If anyone knows how to make it launch from Spotlight, please share your ideas. I would love to improve on this method and make it easier to use.


I'd recommend checking if fsck is holding your disk hostage upon connection. This was it for me.

Running ps aux | grep fsck revealed:

root              2587   7.3  0.1  4363584  21780   ??  U    10:56PM   2:22.54 /System/Library/Filesystems/exfat.fs/Contents/Resources/./fsck_exfat -y /dev/rdisk2s1

So the solution was a sudo kill -9 2587 (insert your PID instead of 2587) (or sudo pkill -f fsck).
As soon as that ran, my Volume immediately mounted.

Oh the irony of fsck being the problem...

Addendum (surfacing from comments):
Ideally, you're better off letting fsck run its course. Otherwise, you'll run into this the next time too.


How to auto-mount a secondary Encrypted HDD on boot?

I don't know of a good way to make it automount at startup, but you can make it automount for any user by transferring the saved password from your user login keychain to the System keychain.

Open Keychain Access.app (it's in /Applications/Utilities)
Find the saved volume password. You can use the search field in the top right of the window to find it.
If the keychains list isn't visible (in the left-side sidebar, near the top), choose View menu > Show Keychains.
Drag the saved volume password into the System keychain in the sidebar. It'll ask you to authenticate twice (once as an admin, to modify the System keychain, then as your user, to get access to the user keychain item).

There's probably a way to  trigger the automount at startup, rather than at first login, but it sounds like first login should be good enough for your needs.


Can I get a male Thunderbolt to female USB 3.0 adapter?

The Thunderbolt port on your MacBook Pro is already faster than USB 3 so the fastest possible connection of an external storage device would be to attach a Thunderbolt drive via the Thunderbolt port.

Note that Thunderbolt is a faster interface than a hard disk can accept or push data so for top speed you will either need a RAID configured for speed or an SSD drive.


Display on an HP 23fi monitor with a MacBook Pro

I just bought one and had the same problem - blurry fonts on 2014 RMBP & had to adjust the underscan to fit the image on the screen.

Fixed by

turning off Overscan in the monitor menu Image Control > Custom Scaling > Overscan > Off and
turning off Underscan in the System Preferences > Display menu.


How can I extend Mac + keyboard + mouse to a PC through WiFi local network?

If I were trying to do what I think you're trying to do I would use Microsoft's Remote Desktop. It's available for macos from the App Store via this link. It's also free (as in zero cost), so you've only a bit of time to lose for trying it.

I've used it for years, and found it works quite well for my purposes. I've tried other methods, but for connecting to a Windows host, they always feel "clunky" in comparison.


How can I show the Cover Art window in iTunes 11?

To get the second window back, all you have to do is click the album artwork thumbnail in the Now Playing area, either in the full version:

Or in the Mini Player

Both will pop up the larger album art view you are looking for.

In iTunes 11.0, there currently isn't the sidebar album art view that used to be there.


Where can I find public domain images of the latest Apple products for commercial use?

Generally, you should be able to find Apple product images on the official website along with applicable license and applicable usage guidelines/restrictions. However, they are all copyrighted and trademark protected, so you want a lawyer to advise you and not people on the internet, no matter how reasonable we seem.

Most comprehensive information is on Apple’s legal page covering Apple Intellectual Property: https://www.apple.com/legal/intellectual-property/

Once you are set on trademark, copyright and permitted uses, other places to look are:

Apple Newsroom Archive: Search for the product announcement news item for the product you are looking for (e.g. here's the link to the news item for the recently announced 16" MacBook Pro), and you'd find the images made available by Apple.
App Store Marketing Resources and Identity Guidelines Webpage: You can find the product image templates here, with blank screens. The images can be used as per the terms of license for marketing your own software.

The contact information for Apple PR personnel is also generally made available with the Newsroom item. You can also find the relevant contact information on the Apple Contact Us webpage.


Destroyed user account on OS X with dscl; how to restore?

I hope you took a backup of your machine before the sudo command that deleted your account was run. If you have a (Time Machine) backup, you should be able to restore your deleted account & files to a point in time before the deletion occurred. Otherwise, you're probably out of luck.


Mirroring from my iPhone 7+ to aucary projector wirelessly to wall

Two options you have to connect your iPhone to a projector.
Option 1) Get an Apple TV and connect that to the projector using a simple HDMI cable on either end. Then use airplay to stream the content of your iPhone to the Apple TV. I personally like this option as then you have a smart projector with plenty of options for playing content without your phone or computer.
Option 2) Get an Apple Lightning Digital AV Adapter, which then plugs into your iPhone's lightning port and gives you an HDMI port. From there you can take a simple HDMI cable from the adapter into the projector.
Cost is cheaper on the lightning digital av adapter ($49 USD vs $149-179 USD) however long term you might find having an Apple TV more useful than the adapter.


Ethernet adapters conversion from MacBook Air (Mid 2012, 13") to MacBook Pro (Late 2019, 16")

The Belkin USB-C to gigabit adapter that Apple sells online is the best bet for you.

Belkin USB-C to Gigabit Ethernet Adapter

Much better than chaining Apple gear in performance, reliability, price and power usage. The Apple thunderbolt 2 model works fine with the Apple adapter - just you have overkill and two joints to manage.


Currently, the answer is no. It is fairly widely known that the A5 is a fairly difficult nut to crack.

References:

The Dev Team Pwnage tool info

  The 4.3.1 untether works on all devices that actually support 4.3.1
  except for the iPad2:

  iPhone3GS
  iPhone4 (GSM)
  iPod touch 3G
  iPod touch 4G
  iPad1
  AppleTV 2G (PwnageTool only for now)

Cult of Mac Post On iOS 5 Jailbreaks

  As for the iPhone 4S and iPad 2, both devices run Apple’s new A5
  processor, which is proving to be an absolute bitch to jailbreak. Only
  the iPad 2 can be jailbroken under iOS 4.3.3 using the userland
  JailBreakMe v3 exploit. If the iPad 2 is any example to go by, don’t
  expect the iPhone 4S to be jailbroken any time soon.


Safari on Lion exhibits similar behaviour to on IOS, in that it can decide to arbitrarily drop a loaded page in order to save memory, regardless of the fact that you likely have many many more times more Ram than on your iPhone...

When you switch back to a tab that has been dropped, it will then proceed to redownload it to get it back to how it was.  This is irritating, pointless, and potentially disruptive depending on exactly how the page was formed.

Sadly, before you ask your next question, no, there's no way to stop this:


Do the three iPad personal hotspot tethering options differ in terms of speed?

USB is probably the fastest, with a theoretical peak transfer rate of 480 Mbit/s, and will also charge the device (or, at least, prevent it from discharging as quickly). The downside is that only one device can be connected via this method.

Bluetooth is probably the slowest (Bluetooth v3.0 + HS is rated for 24 Mbit/s), but I'd expect it to use less power than WiFi tethering. Bluetooth is also limited to connecting to one device at a time.

WiFi tethering will support more than one device (usually three or five or more) and can be faster than Bluetooth, but uses more power. 802.11g is rated for 54 Mbit/s and 802.11n is supposed to reach 150 Mbit/s, but this is usually shared between all connected devices.

Despite the single-device limit, USB and Bluetooth connections can, if made with a PC or Mac, "forward" the connection over WiFi (as an ad-hoc hotspot), FireWire, Ethernet, or any other connection protocol the machine supports, allowing a theoretically infinite number of devices to use the cellular connection. Of course, you can also use the USB cable to charge the device while using wireless tethering, and you can use multiple (or all three) tethering modes at the same time.

In any case, the limiting factor for speed is likely to be your cellular connection, particularly if you are limited to 3G. Remember, the cell connection is a single pipe that all your connected devices go through, including the iPad itself.


copy maverick installable from first mac to second

Yes.

Once you have downloaded the installer, you won't be asked for an Apple ID on installation. The Apple ID is only requested when the installer is downloaded, either from the Mac App Store or from the Recovery HD.


Is there in AppleScript any way to use "X of every" to get multiple properties of each object to create a record?

It is not possible to get a record with a single object specifier, but you can get a list:

tell application "Safari"
    {URL, name} of tabs of windows
end tell
-- {{{"http://url1", "title 1"}, {"http://url2", "title 2"}}}

For a record, you can use a repeat loop:

set r to {}
tell application "Safari"
    repeat with t in tabs of windows
        set end of r to {|url|:URL of t, |name|:name of t}
    end repeat
end tell
r
-- {{|url|:"http://url1", |name|:"title 1"}, {|url|:"http://url2", |name|:"title 2"}}


Mac mission control add new space + icon is on left - not the right

Having the dock on the right hand side causes this (unwanted) change. Hoping to find a terminal command to fix this be still unsure why Apple feels this is necessary.


Set Preview to open PDFs in Thumbnail View by default on El Capitan

Have you tried setting Preview to always open with the sidebar? You can do this in Preview menu > Preferences > PDF tab and selecting the checkbox for "Always show sidebar".


2008/9 Mac Pro wont turn on, front pannel LED is constant white

Sadly, the most likely cause is that you zapped your system board. If you used a household vacuum cleaner to remove the dust, this is highly likely.


Same here on an iPad, plus iCloud Drive app was saying I need to enable iCloud Drive, but it's already enabled.

I managed to fix the iCloud Drive app problem.

Switch off Settings->AppleId Account->iCloud->iCloud Drive
Reboot
Switch on Settings->AppleId Account->iCloud->iCloud Drive

Nor ibooks nor notes got fixed.

Any hints with ibooks and notes crashes are welcome.


I don't know a lot about GarageBand - but I move most of ~/Library directories (where most of the User stuff is being kept) by simply linking them to a different place with:

ln -s /your/source/directory /your/target/directory in terminal.

for example, assuming that GarageBand is saving music to ~/Library/GarageBand/Music please move the directory first with

mv ~/Library/Music/GarageBand ~/Library/Music/GarageBand.bak/

and then try to link a directory in the place of ~/Library/Music/GarageBand (the ~ resolves to your /Users/username or $HOME and is simply a shortcut to your home directory)

ln -s /Volumes/YourDevice/YourDirectory/GarageBandMusic ~/Library/GarageBand/Music

assuming it is the place where your data is being stored. You could try to create a hard-link without the -s flag, but this is not possible for cross-device targets (i.e another hard-drive)

I'm sure you can do this, there are more ways to force macOS to use linked directories.

I don't know about GarageBand - but I keep my Mails, iTunes, Photos, Dropbox etc. on a different drive simply by either using symbolic links or, if necessary by hard-linking them to another directory.

For hard links workaround in macOS use https://github.com/selkhateeb/hardlink it does work very well.

Keep in mind that if you rm -rf a symbolic link directory you delete link only.

When you do the same with hard-link on the filesystem then rm -rf follows your link and deletes the things linked to it!

Let me know if this helps you.


How to access apple support forum on "This username ... is already taken, please choose another. Another has been provided" message?

Go to Apple ID support web page at http://www.apple.com/support/appleid/ and use the contact support button.

Your account is in a state where the tool can't let you continue and you may need a human on the other end to know what exactly to do. A search of the public knowledge base shows nothing that you should do in this case.


my App Store is broken for Mac High Sierra 10.13.5

You can solve this problem by omitting the AppStore and installing all system updates through the terminal.

Open Terminal and type:

List all available updates:

sudo softwareupdate -l

Install all available updates:

sudo softwareupdate -i -a

This update fixes the app and returns proper function.


Adding contact on iPhone adds it to Exchange but not iCloud

Yes, it is possible.

Set the default account for Contacts to iCloud. That will add new contacts to iCloud.

To do this

Tap Settings -> Mail, Contacts, Calendars
Scroll to Contacts, about 2/3rds down the page.
Tap Default Account and then choose iCloud.


How do I use Handoff in the middle of a call?

As of iOS 9.2, you can't do this in the middle of a call.

To talk using a different device, you must end the call and recall using the second device.


Upgrade from 10.4.11 to 10.9 on a Mac Pro

There is only one available 2.66 GHZ Quad-Core Intel Xeon Mac Pro, which actually is powered by two 2.66 GHz dual core Intel Xeon 5150 processors: MacPro1,1

The maximum OS is Mac OS X 10.7.5, if the RAM was upgraded to at least 2 GB.


Change background based on location/wifi?

Anything involving location-aware contexts can be done with Marco Polo.


Change the plist to

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN"
 "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
    <key>Label</key>
    <string>G-key-pusher</string>
    <key>Program</key>
    <string>/usr/bin/osascript</string>
    <key>Program</key>
    <string>/bin/sh</string>
    <key>ProgramArguments</key>
    <array>
        <string>sh</string>
        <string>-c</string>
        <string>while sleep 5; do /usr/bin/osascript -e 'tell application "System Events" to keystroke "g"'; done</string>
    </array>
    <key>ServiceDescription</key>
    <string>Auto Keypress</string>
    <key>KeepAlive</key>
    <true/>
</dict>
</plist>

What it does, is to run a shell script that does the 5 second timer and calls osascript. The launchd plist just ensures the script is restarted if it were to die for some reason. Please note that I still haven't tested this, but I don't see any reason why it shouldn't work. Though I have had problems in the past when changing launchd items, which I fixed by changing the label. Which reminds me, you had omitted the value for the Label key in your plist.

(Edit: Explain a little, and provide a complete file instead of explaining what parts need to be changed.)


It seems that Apple doesn't supply OSX on a retail DVD anymore, since all modern Macs have a recovery partition, which contains the installer and is updateable. However, there are ways to create an installer USB drive, and here is Apple's own solution.

Before you're able to create a bootable OS X installer, you'll need to do the following first:

Download the OS X Installer app from the Mac App Store.

Mount the volume you want to convert into a bootable installer. This could be removable media such as a USB flash drive, or a secondary internal partition.

You can then use the createinstallmedia tool to convert the volume from step two into a bootable installer based off the installer app from step one. To learn how to use createinstallmedia, use the following command in Terminal:

OS X Yosemite
/Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Yosemite.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia
OS X Mavericks
/Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia
Examples
For example, assuming you have a volume mounted at /Volumes/MyVolume and the OS X installer app is at /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app you could erase /Volumes/MyVolume and convert it into a bootable installer with this command:
OS X Yosemite
sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Yosemite.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MyVolume --applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Yosemite.app
OS X Mavericks
sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MyVolume --applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app
Notes
You may need to adjust the path to the OS X installer app and/or your removable media device's name in the command. createinstallmedia is an advanced option for system administrators and as such, requires some knowledge of the command line in order to be used properly. It is only intended to be used with the version of the OS X Installer app it came with.


First of all, let me just put this out there: any tweak that tweaks the appearance like this is going to require that you jailbreak ;)

While not exactly what you're looking, A3Tweaks has achieved a somewhat similar alternative to what you're describing! It's called "Apex 2 (iOS 7)". It is a paid app, but at $2.99 it's not entirely unreasonable. However, it is slightly different that being just a folder with one icon. Rather than wasting your or my time writing out exactly what it does, what it looks like, or how it functions, you can check out an excellent write-up at iDownloadBlog.

Hope this helps!


How do I change my MacBook FaceTime cell phone number?

You can change the phone number associated with your appleid on http://appleid.apple.com

I know that when you update mail addresses there they also update your facetime account, I suppose it should be the same for telephone numbers.


Does an MDM solution require special apple devices

does the usage of an MDM solution (like Apple Business Manager/Apple School Manager) require special Apple devices that are only intended for this kind of purpose?

No. There is no such restriction in place.

You can enroll your personally owned devices in a MDM solution of your choice.

You are possibly confusing it with Apple's Device Enrollment Program where businesses can procure devices from Apple or approved resellers, get them shipped to the users and have them automatically enrolled in their MDM solution.

But even such devices are same as the regular devices. Only different being that during device activation process, the device communicates with Apple servers and see if it's unique serial number is already enrolled in a MDM solution and configures itself accordingly.


Can I use iMac G5 PowerPC for iOS app development?

Depends how you want to develop, if you want to use the official tools and SDK, then you are out of luck:

What are the requirements for developing with the iOS SDK and Xcode?

To develop with the iOS SDK and Xcode, you must have an Intel-based Mac running Mac OS X Snow Leopard or later and you must be registered as an Apple Developer.

Source


how to set mac desktop background as working terminal

You might to want to checkout this tool called GeekTool as their site states:

  GeekTool is an application for Mac OS 10.6+. It lets you display various kinds of information on your desktop via 3 default plug-ins


How to remap finder folder navigation shortcuts?

Check out Keyboard Maestro http://www.keyboardmaestro.com/, it should do what you want. I know it is not exactly cheap for a utility app, but it does a provide a huge amount power beyond simple key remapping, and it has proven to be stable across many Mac OS X versions.


Can dust build-up in Time Capsule (vertical model) be a fire risk (or other risk)?

In terms of being a fire risk, no, dust building up inside a Time Capsule is not a concern.

Depending on the hardware, dust can be a concern for other reasons. In the early days of computing when floppy disks were the main storage medium, we used to have a saying that getting dust onto the disk was like running into a brick wall - not good at all.

However, I have worked on countless computers over the past three decades and they're usually full of dust inside (well, in tower models at least). None of these machines have ever caught fire.

With regard to a Time Capsule, they do not generate a lot of heat - much less than a computer with multi-core processors doing some heavy processing tasks. So you can rest easy.


I have to set up the Show the tray menu Since in my fresh install from brew is blank https://github.com/hluk/CopyQ/issues/938

Set the short cut main window here

main window with a few items

Set the short cut tray menu

tray menu


Just my luck, VMWare Fusion 4 came out today and I was able to install Windows 8 on that. Boot Camp still has the graphics driver issues, but that's probably not going to resolve itself until Apple gets around to doing an update.

The latest Virtual Box also installs Windows 8 with no issues.


iPhone showing Connect to iTunes screen when updating to iOS 7

Yes you will. The same thing happened to mine, everything was wiped out after the restore. Make sure your stuff is backed up.


Change "ignore ownership on this volume" from the command line for Mac OS X volume

You use diskutil for that. See diskutil(1) under enableOwnership and disableOwnership. Note that this setting is specific to a particular operating system installation, since it is stored in /var/db/volinfo.database. I.e., if you copy the disk image to a new computer the setting won't persist, but it does persist across reboots, mounts, umounts, etc. all on a single computer.

Use diskutil to find the identifier, then change the option:

$ diskutil list
/dev/disk2
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:                            Disk Image             *41.0 MB    disk2
$ sudo diskutil enableOwnership disk2
File system user/group ownership enabled


⌘+UP appears to do it, although that just raises further questions ...


Adding a new contact in iOS 8 merges it with a homonymous old contact

You cannot have more than one contact with the same name in your iPhone so it sounds like your iPhone is merging them together. Try adding a last name/nick name to have them as two separate contacts.


Paste text when option not offered by the app?

With new keyboards, one option to accomplish this turned out the be Paste It!  It's a keyboard app that lets you type into the main app, and then find any one of a number of messages to paste later.  Nice!

I think there are other keyboards out there providing similar functionality, but this was the first free option I found.


Portable External USB drive can be mounted on Windows but not on macOS on the same MacBook Pro

I found the solution in another post:

External Hard Drive Won't Mount

ps aux | grep fsck to find the PID where fsck locks the drive.

Then

sudo kill -9 <PID> to kill fsck.

After that, my drive mounted normally.


What does the command `csrutil clear` do?

From System Integrity Protection – Adding another layer to Apple’s security model:

  When csrutil clear is run, SIP goes back to its factory-default settings. That means SIP is enabled if it was disabled previously and any custom configuration is cleared out.

The custom configuration consists of a list of IP addresses of allowed NetBoot sources.


Bootcamp interrupted; now stuck on Windows boot looking for startup

To bring up the Startup Manager, press and hold the option key immediately after you turn on your Mac and hear the startup sound.

For additional information see: Startup key combinations for Mac and How to choose a startup disk on your Mac.


Why the Graphics Card on my MacBook Pro is always on "High perf." status?

Are you using an external monitor? MacBook start using discrete card if external screen is connected.


You can get a colored signature by going to Preview and at the appropriate place insert your signature. Now select your signature and click on the box shown in red in the image below. It's the third box from the right.

When you click on this box outlined in red you get the color palette shown in 2nd figure shown below.

You can select the color you desire.


Different colors between Monitor -> Display

Both the LG 4K and 5K look great next to 2015 / 2016 MacBook and MacBook Pro at the angle you have photographed. You could try to set a custom color calibration curve for both displays to bring them closer, but the color shift you have photographed is very large.

Also, be sure to set the contrast and brightness levels on the external display before you attempt software calibration. Lastly, let the display run for 30 minutes before attempting color calibration.


When am I allowed to drag a space/app between displays?

After playing around with it some more, I have discovered the pattern.  (It was tricky to figure out because it changes!)

You can't drag the current desktop (of any display) off of that display.


From Apple's launchctl manual page (emphasis added):

  Note that you may see some jobs in the list whose labels are in
                the style "0xdeadbeef.anonymous.program".  These are jobs which
                are not managed by launchd, but, at one point, made a request to
                it.  launchd claims no ownership and makes no guarantees regarding these jobs. They are stored purely for bookkeeping purposes.


Mac Notes Keeps Opening Up every 5 seconds

If you previously had Twonky Media Server installed and removed it, that could be the culprit. I had the same issue, though with Lotus Notes (also conveniently called Notes.app), starting/popping up every 5 seconds.

CleanTwonkyServerData.command (in /Users/Shared) was the culprit, it might be the same for you.


OS stops receiving left (primary) mouse click

Double check that you don't have any stuck keys on your keyboard by testing all the keys, particularly the modifiers (shift, option, etc).
Make sure there aren't any wizards, alerts, or dialogs hidden behind existing windows or in other spaces (this one gets me often, especially running the odd mix of programs I use daily).


You can't run an Aperture Library from a device that's not formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled).

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3509

What can work is running a Referenced Library with the Library on an appropriately formatted disk and the Masters stored elsewhere.

Another workaround: Make a Disk Image formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and store that on your device.


Is there a truly user friendly guide on how to handle iOS Certificates and Provisioning Profiles? – Xcode 7.3 / iOS 9.3

It's hard to know what specific step you're stumped on - since an error signing development builds will cascade and cause issues when you upload. Uploading can have new issues if you don't have problems running development builds.

The outline I use is:

https://developer.apple.com/support/code-signing/

It breaks down the steps to code signing which also deals with profiles. I'll assume you are set up with a proper app / bundle ID in iTunes connect. If that needs guidance, you can refer to this diagram from https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/IDEs/Conceptual/AppDistributionGuide/Introduction/Introduction.html

The green boxes are the iTunes Connect portions you need to accomplish in the web app or iTunes Connect iOS app.

If the full process is too much, just focus on breaking up the process into smaller chunks or try reviewing the quick start guide.

Worst case, if you don't have the time to work through things - you could see about partnering with another developer or paying someone to help you set things up. If you want to focus on the coding - outsourcing the management to someone that's already done the learning and has a handful of apps through all the steps can probably save you time struggling with things that don't in the end make a better app but help you navigate the systems for submitting apps.


I cannot export highlights from Apple Book on iOS13

The desktop (Mac) Books app still worked for such a book (bought in Apple Store).

Cmd+4 opens the notes section,
Open each of the different chapters in the notes section,
Select all using Cmd+A,
Right click on an empty space in the notes section,
Hit export and send to Mail.


How to prevent uTorrent from autolaunching at startup?

If you use the web app version - see this answer - https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/394352/5472
Those still using the app, this guide will solve the problem:
Stop uTorrent from Opening at Startup with Mac OSX - wikihow Instructions
The steps from the link are:

Open uTorrent
Click on uTorrent beside the "apple" and click Preferences
Click on General
Uncheck the box. Under Program Startup there are two options. Uncheck the second one that says Start uTorrent when Mac starts up

This stops the uTorrent app launch the next startup.


How can I describe three different situations on a cell in Numbers

Let B3 be the cell you are trying to reference.

=IF(B3>35,B3×0.75,IF(B3<25,B3×0.7,B3×0.72))

More information on using IF functions can be found in the formulas reference for Numbers


Is compressed air effective to clean a 2018 MacBook Pro keyboard which displays repeated keypresses?

The 'Butterfly' keyboard Apple uses is known to be faulty and many users experience problems with it. A quick google search for 'Butterfly Keyboard Problems' will show you the scale of this issue. The solution you found may work, but I would strongly suggest taking it back to Apple, since its still under warranty it should be free and it will likely prolong the lifespan of your Macbook.


If your phone is linked to an iCloud account, try surfing to https://www.icloud.com and login with your credentials.  Once logged in there is a Contacts app which should contain your address book.

If you don't have iCloud you could use iTunes as stated above, but it won't let you access your contacts directly.  Try alternative applications such as Syncios, Appandora or iTools.

If that's not an option you could try to backup your old iPhone with iTunes and restore it to another iPhone.

Another option is to replace the screen and hope for the best.  While repairing a 4S might not make sense, there's cheap refurbished or OEM screens available.  If you don't want to use it afterwards, it till makes a great gift for any kid.  Replacing a screen on a newer iPhone (5 and above) is dirt easy, but replacing one on a 4 or 4S is absolutely not for the faint of heart.

If none of the above work out for you I'm afraid it's a lost case.


Hope this works for you it did for me!
Use Terminal

sudo chmod 755 /System/Library/CoreServices/Search.bundle/Contents/MacOS/Search

Then type in the following command:

killall SystemUIServer

After issuing these two commands, you'll notice that the Spotlight application will re-appear in the menubar of OS X.


Is there a way to not have Lion not launch apps from previous startup?

You can change this in System Preferences > General. Look for the "Restore windows when quitting and re-opening apps" check box and uncheck it.


Process was killed -- why? How can I find out?

In general there’s no limit on accumulated CPU time for processes on macOS.

It seems likely that your program stopped due to issues such as bugs in the program, lack of memory, or similar. In order to find out what happened, try starting your program in the debugger and look at the backtrace.

In addition you should replace the signal handler in the program with one, that prints out which signal it receives. You could potentially also change the program not to kill itself when receiving the signal, but instead do something - like for example freeing up memory. It depends on the signal you’re receiving whether or not it can be ignored.


How to setup Gmail SMTP server for OSX Mail with 2-step-verification and App-specific password?

The SMTP server is used to send mail.

(Note: There are two locations you must paste you app-specific password, these instructions are for the 'sending' server, not the 'receiving' server')

Go to Google and generate an app-specific password on this page.

Now open Mail and go to Preferences > Accounts and select your Google account. At the bottom of the right hand pane it will say "Outgoing Server (SMTP):" and should have "Gmail" selected/ Click on this and you get a pop up menu and select "Edit SMTP Server List".

(This accounts area is where you paste in your 'recieving' password under 'incoming mail server'. Incoming server should be: imap.gmail.com, your username should be the start of your email address without the '@gmail.com' section and your password should be the app-specific password, NOT the account password that was previoulsy used)

This will open a list of the SMTP servers you have set up for sending mail. Click on the "Gmail" one and then click on "Advanced".

Set Authentication to "Password" enter your Google user name then the app-specific password you generated in the password field.

This should now work until you revoke the password.


Apple uses the wording "Default Host" for a DMZ.

Open AirPort Utility
Select the AirPort
Click Edit
Click the Network tab
Network Options
Click "Enable default host at"
enter the local IP you wish to use and done.

I hope you have the same version and same options visible as I do...


OS X Server: Open Directory PasswordService crashes

I come bearing an unfulfilling answer (but it worked): upgrade to OS X El Capitan and Server 5. The reason for the segfault remains unclear, but it was fixed when the configuration was automatically migrated during the upgrade process. Or Apple changed the PasswordService binary - I'm not sure.


Changed iCloud password, now Messages, Facetime, and Keychain don't work

I finally went in to the Apple Store and had a "genius" go through it with me. Here's what eventually worked:

rm -rf ~/Library/Keychains ~/Library/Messages ~/Library/IdentityServices
sudo rm /var/db/crls/crlcache2.db

We did like 20 other things before that and got nowhere, I'm not excluding the possibility that resolution was a result of the compounded effect but removing the files listed above definitely was the turning point for me.


Quicktime 10 - export in original size, not 4k, 1080p, 720p etc?

There is no way to export in any other sizes other than 4K, 1080P, 720P or 480P, according to this post here (it's in Mandarin, but I translated it) You could, however, export it in a higher resolution (such as 4K or 1080P) and then use another program to save it in your preferred recording.

Why do you need these strangely sized videos, by the way?


Rolled back from Catalina back to Mojave but I had two drives one for boot and other for saved files, realised old files are still around

It's an easy task to make your old (Catalina) user folder accesible again. I don't recommend to use it as your (Mojave) user folder though.

Upgrading from Mojave to Catalina not only changes system files and apps but also may have changed some content of your user folder. After replacing iTunes and its library with the new triplicitas Music, TV and Podcast and their libraries, your old Mojave iTunes won't work anymore. Other files may have been "upgraded" too e.g. preferences files, Mail data folder etc.

You probably want to move your current user folder (Mojave) to Mac Storage again.

I assume that you didn't change your macOS shortname (=isa).

Rename the old isa (Catalina) folder:

sudo mv /Volumes/Mac\ Storage/isa /Volumes/Mac\ Storage/isa-catalina

Change file and folder permissions of isa-catalina to your current user and group id:

sudo chown -R `id -u`:`id -g` /Volumes/Mac\ Storage/isa-catalina

Move your current user folder /Users/isa to /Volumes/Mac\ Storage

You probably followed one of several how-tos (e.g. Move Your Mac's Home Folder to a New Location)
Move personal files and folders from isa-catalina to isa. As mentioned earlier I don't recommend to move content of isa-catalina/Library/... to isa/Library/... except prefs and config files of non-Apple apps.

To get your ("Catalina") music/podcast/photo/movie files back you have to dig into the respective folders and *.library files. Catalina's Photos Library.photolibrary is probably incompatible with Mojave's Photo.app.


How to set PATH for Finder-launched applications

If you are on 10.7 and not 10.8, the solution below works well:

I had the same problem with eclipse, but now I've added e.g. the following to my .bash_profile and then it worked.

export PATH=some_path:another_path
launchctl setenv PATH $PATH

In case you want to leave the original path intact use

p=$(launchctl getenv PATH)
launchctl setenv PATH /my/new/path:$p

instead (or just launchctl setenv PATH /my/new/path:$(launchctl getenv PATH)).

Note: Changing the launchctl PATH will not take effect until the Dock is "restarted".  A new Dock process will automatically start after the current one is killed with the command:

killall Dock


Can macOS display a key shortcut when the cursor hovers over a visible control?

There is nothing preventing the author of any specific app (Apple being the author of Pages in this case) from doing exactly what you ask for either by default or in a setting.

Apple doesn’t have this as a standard affordable, so there’s no global switch you can run to have this enabled across multiple apps. The closest thing I can think of is the Cheat Sheet app which shows all active key shortcuts when you hold a key. It doesn’t select a button from the UI, though.

Simplest way to capture "keystroke representation" to clipboard
Does OS X or Xcode have applications to manage cheat sheet/commands list?

The question covering Xcode also explains and demonstrates how to search for menu items by the help menu.


Set Spotify as the source for song titles instead of iTunes

What application are you interested in exactly?

One workaround could be to make Spotify scrobble to Last.fm (in preferences), and then get the song title from Last.fm. Iirc, there is a plugin for Adium that does this. Caveat: there'll be some delay in the updates when using this method.


What would cause a MacBook to restart instead of shutting down or sleeping?

Have you tried resetting the PRAM?
Do it from Open Firmware - as your Mac restarts hold ⌘ + OF
when you get to the prompt type

  reset-nvram
  Press Return
  reset-all
  Press Return

it might work


Can't find/run `configure` script on mac os 10.8

That's the typical sequence of build steps for many cross-platform Open Source projects.

The configure command should be part of your downloaded package, so assuming your package is called CsimOSS you should

open up your Terminal
change to the CsimOSS folder (e.g. cd + dropping the folder into the Terminal window)
enter ./configure

The ./ in front of configure tells the shell to look for the command in the current directory (which is usually not in the standard search PATHs for security reasons).


pmset is the terminal command to display all things sleep on OSX. man pmset shows you how to use the binary, pmset -g shows you the current settings.
It is possible to restore pmset to defaults by using the following commands (whilst sleep setting defaults differ from Mac to Mac, but apparently Apple have usefully made the numerical value that refers to the various profiles relatively the same.)
sudo pmset -c 2 -b 1 -u 1; pmset -g
[Sudo will require your password]
This last command from here: Default settings for pmset -g?
Another suggestion is to reset PRAM and SMC:

How to reset PRAM
1.Shut down your computer

Press the Power key
Immediately press Command + Option + P + R keys
Hold down the keys until your Mac reboots
Let go of the keys

To reset SMC

Turn off your Mac
Hold down Control + Shift + Option and press power
Hold the buttons for 10-15 sec
Release the keys and restart your Mac


How do I recover lost photos from iCloud. They are not in recently deleted

Did your sister try logging into iCloud.com to check whether there are some deleted pictures? Use the Apple ID and Passwords to login the website to get it.

If you can't get it from the iCloud.com and the "recently deleted", it's hard to find them back unless you've ever created an iPhone backup. You know the photos that you don't sync to iCloud can be saved to iTunes Backup or iCloud backup. Just restore your device will bring them all back.


Adding partition to disk creates unwanted third partition

Use the following steps.

Open the Disk Utility application. Highlight the appropriate drive.
Below is an example.

Click the the icon labeled Partition. The following popup pane will
appear.

Determine the size you want for the new partition. Subtract this
value from the size of the current partition. In this example, I
need a 30 GB partition, so the difference will be 69.656 GB. Replace
the current "Size:" value with this difference, then press the
return key. Below is the result.

Highlight the new partition by clicking on the pie piece.

First, select the "Format:", then enter a name in the "Partition:"
field. Finally, click on the "Apply" button.

When finished, click on the "Done" button.

The final result is shown below.


Escape sequence in terminal or iTerm to jump to absolute column?

You can use \r to return to the beginning of the line (column 1) and then \e[nC to move right n characters (column n+1). So:

$ echo 12345678901234567890; echo $'\r\e[9CA10' $'\r\e[1CB2'
12345678901234567890
 B2      A10


Delete font library without opening Font Book OR restore Font Book completely

You can use Pacifist to reinstall Font Book in your system. It will ask you if you want to replace it. You will need an image of your OS in an accessible pack.

Don't know if you can 'rm' the folder's content. Never tried, but fonts must be installed in the user's location and not in the System folder.

I think with 'setenv' we can link external folders with custom organized fonts to system/paths.

I'm working around because for years I used many fonts and tried to reorganize them with a minimal system set and no third-party apps like FontExplorer or others.


What screenshots are actually required for submission?

When you optimized you app to iPhone 6 and 6 Plus you have to add new image and icon sizes in your assets. If you select Images.xcassets in your project and then select your AppIcon and hit ⌥+⌘+0 you must see something like that:

If you have selected iOS 8.0 and Later Sized you will have to provide screenshots for iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, in other case, it won't be necessary.


AppStore Checking for updates.. consuming massive amounts of memory

I force quitted the 'softwareupdated'-helper
and immediatly tried to click the update button, before AppStore began to check for updates.
Took a few tries but managed to get pass the check and have now Succesfully updated to 10.10.4


Allow Apps won't unlock in Security & Privacy - Yosemite

You have a few options:

Temporarily set a password to change the setting.

or

Hold down Ctrl, click on the app, then click Open from the menu shown. This will allow you to temporarily bypass the checks.


Understanding which RAM chips are compatible with a Mac

You never mentioned which eMac you specifically had, but according to EveryMac.com, there are only two possibilities:

PC 133 SDRAM.  Compatible with 2002 through 2003 models.
PC-2700 SDRAM.  Compatible with 2004 through 2005 models.

Both machines require 184pin modules

CL numbers have to do with the latency of the memory (CAS Latency) or in other words, how many clock cycles before it transfers data.  Lower numbers are faster.

SDCL3 just looks like a manufacturer "smashing" together of SDRAM and CL3.

DIMM is "dual in-line memory module."  Basically, there's memory paths on both sides of the module (as opposed to SIMMs).

For more info, see this article on RAM types.

As for which memory will work in your eMac, it's impossible to say for sure because they're all (with the exception of the Transcend memory at 168 pins) missing the pin count.  If they are 184 pins, then they should work.


Proxy settings won't be saved in the Keychain

I found the solution: in fact in the proxy screen (network settings), the same IP address was stored multiple times on different lines (surprisingly the field is not limited to a single line). Since it was the same IP address, using the up and down arrow didn't show that multiple lines were entered.

I removed everything, pasted the IP a last time, and now it works :)


TouchID does not lock MacBook Pro anymore on macOS Big Sur 11.2

This is apparently a somewhat common issue after upgrading to Big Sur or even the 11.1 -> 11.2 upgrade.
You need to do a SMC and possibly a PRAM reset.
I was able to clear it by powering off the MacBook Pro, holding down the power button on the touch bar for >10 seconds, and then power back on.
Hope that works for you.


How many combinations of tags are there for a file?

There are infinite combinations since you can add your own custom tags, therefore you can have as many tags as you wish and therefore as many tag combinations as you wish.

Organising your files with tags is down to personal preference, but personally I use custom tags for projects and custom-named tags with colour for important/completed/etc.

My current main tag list is as follows:

I usually combine these with the project- or context-specific tag if it is a single file or package, or use the project/context tag on the folder and these general tags on the files themselves.


What is the best way to connect a MacBook Pro to a Samsung TV set?

Well it really depends on WHICH MacBook Pro you have as there are a number of output options available.

If you have a fairly recent one I would get the mini display port to HDMI adapter available from Apple (or Amazon, or whoever) and an HDMI cable and use that. It also has the benefit of carrying audio as well so you don't need a separate audio cable.

I use this exact setup with my Mac Mini to play videos I get from the iTunes store on my living room TV set. Works a treat!


AppleScripts to create Calendar Events not working in Catalina

OK, I've made some changes so that I can run the Script in Script Editor (by giving the variables plain text strings rather than extracting them from the email).
When I run the script I get the following error:
error "Calendar got an error: Can’t get calendar "Invoices"." number -1728 from calendar "Invoices"
That gives me a clue I guess - although the Calendar that it should be adding the event to does exist in my Calendar app. Could it be something to do with the quotes around "Calendar" and "Invoices" in the following line of the script?
tell application "Calendar" to tell calendar "Invoices"


How to get an ssh tunnel started every time my Mac boots?

OK, no sooner asked than I figured out the last few pieces.
To get ssh to do what I wanted, here is the shell script to do what I want:
#!/usr/bin/env bash

echo $0 run on $(date)
# Just chose an arbitrary 401 value range of random numbers.
randport=$(/usr/bin/python -S -c "import random; print random.randrange(5555,5955)")
remoteport=$randport # this way we always know what port we are using.  Fix other problems later...

portfile=/Users/rcook/.ssh/linode_remote_port.txt

echo $remoteport > $portfile
scp $portfile rcook@linode.richcook.net:
ssh -N -n -i /Users/rcook/.ssh/id_rsa -o ExitOnForwardFailure=yes -R $remoteport:localhost:22 rcook@linode.richcook.net &

sleep 5
while ps -Awwx -o "user pid ppid pcpu pmem comm args" |  egrep -v grep |  egrep "${remoteport}:localhost"; do
       echo found
       sleep 30
done
echo finished at $(date)

I put the launchctl script into /Library/LaunchDaemons/Tunneler.plist.
This way it loads at system launch.


New Finder windows are opening in tabs when I want them to open in a new window

To expand on ankii's comment... Have a look at Prefer tabs when opening documents: under System Preferences > Dock where the default setting is In Full Screen Only; however, it can also be set to Always or Manually.
In Finder > Preferences > General when [] Open folders in tabs instead of new windows is unchecked, and Prefer tabs when opening documents: under System Preferences > Dock is set to Always, then Finder will open a new tab instead of a new window.


Cannot connect to x11vnc server from other client

x11vnc is a server for X displays - i.e. you can only connect to the X display running on your Mac - not the ordinary Mac desktop. This means that if you're running for example an X desktop in a window with emacs, xeyes, or whatever odd program - you can connect to that.

You cannot connect to a desktop running Finder, Safari, and similar. Those are not X programs and are not displayed on an X display. In order to connect to them, you'll need a macOS native VNC server. Such a server is bundled with macOS. You'll need to open System Preferences, then Sharing and then enable Screen Sharing.


Moving from an old IPhone with faulty charge connection to android,

You have quite a few options, any of these should work, choose the one you like the most:

I see your cable isn't working properly, but you may try to connect the iPhone to a PC with iTunes for just enough time to enable the wireless (Wi-Fi) syncing feature (press apply to save and enable it). Then, you can create the backup on the PC wirelessly, transfer photos, etc.
You can try to download Google Photos and let it sync all of her photos. You will lose quality on photos and videos if using the free service, but you may transfer any amount of data this way, and the photos will automatically be on her Android phone if she uses the same Google login on it.
Use iCloud Photo Library. It's available on iOS 10.3 and later. If she has less than 5GB of photos, it's free: enable the iCloud Photo Library on Settings > [her name] > iCloud > Photos and let it sync all of them. You can then download them on any PC from iCloud.com. If she has more than 5GB of photos, you will need to purchase 1 month of the service with the amount you need (from $0.99 for 50GB to $19 if I'm not mistaken for 2TB).


Mount command can not contain Chinese characters

Try escaping the unicode

图片 translates as  %E5%9B%BE%E7%89%87 using an escape function I found online at http://www.url-encode-decode.com

The app UnicodeChecker installs a service which can convert any unicode character string into percent escapes.

See https://stackoverflow.com/questions/912811/what-is-the-proper-way-to-url-encode-unicode-characters for a reference.


Is an external keyboard with the keys from the new Macbook available for purchase?

As of now, no, it is not possible to buy one.

I must admit that I would like one too, especially if it also has a Magic Touch Bar.


This might not suit your needs, but what about adding a new space and put your fullscreen window over there. It's very fast to switch the spaces using the multitouch abilities of your trackpad. I use this feature a lot when working on multiple documents.


Moving vast distances and keeping app store purchases

First: keep your apple-id in one “Country Store”. Don’t change the country of your apple-id. Apple will screw it up, throw away your purchases or something of the kind. You can move an apple-id to a new country store (and back again), but it seems like an afterthought from Apple. You will only be able to see/access your purchases from the country store presently associated with the account.

Stick with what you have for the moment. If you really need a new apple-id / iTunes account in the USA; Make a new one. Your old apple-id and purchases can live alongside the new on the new i-device and in the same iTunes library.


Is it possible to be always connected to a VPN without prompting for a UN/PW?

You can configure the VPN setting on your ipad, iphone or ipod touch to save the User Name and Password for VPN. I don't know of a way to have it constantly connect the VPN whenever the is a connection. Given the time it takes to establish a VPN handshake, it would be kind of frustrating to wake the device then not be able to connect to any internet/network related Apps for 15+ seconds while it connects to the VPN.

Choose Settings > General > Network > VPN > then choose the VPN Configuration. Fill in in the username a password section and then you can just turn the VPN on when you need it and not have to fill out the User Name and Password.

more info:
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1424

Alternative you could look at something like Apple's Mobile Access server, to give you that secured VPN like connection all the time without the hassle of starting a VPN connection:

http://www.apple.com/server/macosx/features/mobile-access.html


Why are the same characters displayed differently in the same sentence?

It's probably because the app continues to use the Chinese font for that character, and different fonts will often have slightly different glyphs for such symbols.


MacBook Pro late 2012, want 2 external monitors

Mactracker lists a 2012 MBP as a 13 inch Retina model (MD212LL/A, MacBookPro10,2) with an Intel GPU and using up to 1 GB of shared memory.

Mactracker also says:

  Supports an HDMI-compatible device while using one Thunderbolt
  display or support for two Thunderbolt displays

If the model you put down is indeed this one, then you'll need 2 Thunderbolt displays. Or you can run one monitor through the HDMI connection and another one through the Thunderbolt connection.

What this model can't do is run two HDMI monitors which it sounds like you're trying to do.

I highly recommend both everymac.com and Mactracker as sources of info on older Macs. Both have a wealth of information which would have given you the answer(s) you've been looking for.


Thunderbolt displays require thunderbolt to work. Add a PCI card or see if it can be upgraded to USB 4 which is the same as Thunderbolt 3. Then the 3 to 2 adapters will work to operate the display.
Sorry there is no other way to make these work. Once you get thunderbolt hardware, windows can work with Apple products.
Essentially, you have a thunderbolt dock with an embedded display and not a display that uses thunderbolt.


Is it possible to get via CLI the commercial name (Lion, Mountain Lion, Mavericks, ...)

Well as you said it : it's a commercial name and it's barely present in the OS it self. It no real wonder, it has no meaning for devs (far less than a version or a build number).

AFAIK It's mentioned in some help pages, but that's almost all.

So until someone would prove me wrong, there is no CLI for that (excluding curl stuff, which would imho not be a suitable option here).


Application installer does not respond when clicked?

In system preferences

security

change the download from to anywhere.


How to open native youtube app from a video embedded in web page

The following applies to IOS 8 on iPhone:
A YouTube logo appears in the lower right corner of embedded YouTube videos.

If you click on the usual big round 'play button' in the center of the embedded video, it will play fullscreen inside Safari. However if you click on the YouTube logo, the video will open in the YouTube app.


iPhone 5 won't start after an iTunes recovery

Force it into Recovery Mode, then restore...

Switch off the device & leave it off.
Connect the USB cable to a computer with iTunes [ideally one that has been used with the device previously]
Whilst holding down the Home button, connect the device to the computer [keep holding Home until you see the 'connect to iTunes' screen.
iTunes should launch & detect the device is in Recovery Mode.
Use iTunes to restore.

Ref: If you can't update or restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch


Disabling the deep sleep seemed to have fixed the issue for me.


how to put the two fingers right click(secondary click) on macbook with Mountain Lion

System Preferences > Trackpad > Secondary Click > "Click or tap with two fingers"


How to turn on Intel VT in MacBook Pro 2011 (MC721LL/A)?

It should be turned on automatically. If you go into the settings for the Windows XP virtual image, then click advanced, you'll see a field for Preferred virtualization engine. It should be set to "Automatic" by default, but if you want to force Intel VT, you can select one of those options.

If you're lagging, something else might be to blame. Does Console say anything and how much memory do you have installed?


Mac OS X Time Machine recovery lost Data

This answer you provided in the chat above is important:

  Music, Pictures and Movie of my user account haven't restored. No, I didn't find those folders on the time machine disk.

If those folders are not present on the Time Machine disk as you indicate above, then they weren't being backed up by Time Machine. You have lost this data and there is no way to get it back.


Connection Timeout Error for WEP security

Different devices use different wireless chipsets. Although most should be compatible sometimes they don't work well together.

Did you try to update the router's firmware? A newer one might correct some glitches.


Reading PDFs on iPad without iTunes syncing

Put your PDFs in a folder structure on your computer, in DropBox, or on a computer somewhere online that you have FTP or SCP access to.

Then, in GoodReader, sync that folder. You can do it locally over WiFi and SCP or WebDav, remotely over SCP, or through DropBox.

Once the PDFs are in GoodReader, you can read them offline, mark them up, etc. If you set up bi-directional syncing, then when you are back online you can sync your notes back to your laptop.


iOS 10 Control Center does not feature Music buttons

Swipe the Control Center to the side. The media controls are on a separate page indicated by the page icons at the bottom of the screen, accessible by swiping horizontally.

You are informed of this the first time you open Control Center after upgrading to iOS 10.


Imac 2006 Snow leopard Disk Image Restore Problem

Are you trying to restore onto the partition from which you booted (it sounds like installed Snow Leopard on the internal drive, then booted that and tried to overwrite it)?

Instead try booting from the Snow Leopard CD.  The install screen has a menu, from there you can choose the disk utility.  Run that and try to do the image restore from there.


Backup apps in ipa format on iphone no PC

Techicnally, what you want isn't impossible, but is pretty hard. I'd SSH in via your work computer, and copy applications from /var/mobile/Applications/. (/var/movile/Container/Applications/ in iOS 8). And, even that doesn't restore all your data.


How to reinstall/repair OS X without losing files?

You can do an Archive & Install which will reinstall OS X but keep your files.
Don't forget to make a backup before you reinstall in case something goes wrong.

Boot with ⌘R to enter the Recovery HD.
Choose Reinstall OS X.
Follow the instructions.


How do I get rid of my encrypted iPhone backups to start from scratch?

To delete the backups, go to iTunes>Preferences>Devices. All iPhone backups will be listed here. Highlight them, then hit Delete.

But if you're using a Mac, I would first try to see if you can find the password in your Keychain (from discussions.apple.com):

  Go to the "keychain access " app.
  Under "Keychains" select "Login"
  Under "Category" select "Passwords"
  Scroll down and look for "iPhone Backup"
  Double click and a window opens
  Check the box that says "Show Password"
  A window pops up asking for your OS X account password
  Type in that password and voila!


When you upload a file from online storage to a website, does the file get stored in the Mac?

If you get prompted to download a file then it would be saved on your mac which I doubt that this is the case since these websites usually build these based on API's available from Dropbox or Google Drive etc. where you'd be prompted to logon and usually even with some sort of authorization that the website wants gain access to your personal information


Not on your Mac, but you can use and HDMI or VGA cable to a separate monitor that will then mirror the iPad2 display.


Can I use a iMac Late 2009 or Mid 2010 as a screen for regular PC

Yes an iMac will work as a screen for a regular PC, but only with 27" models of Late 2009, 2010 iMacs. If those conditions are met then the iMac supports what is called Target Display Mode, aka using your iMac as a display.

Also you will need a Display port to mini display port cable, they do exist as sold on Monoprice and at other fine online retail locations.

For more information on using your iMac in Target Display mode see Using a 27-inch iMac (Late 2009 or Mid 2010) as an external display

  To use an iMac (27-inch, Mid 2010) or iMac (27-inch, Late 2009) in Target Display mode with another computer as the source:

  Make sure both computers are turned on and awake.
  Connect a male-to-male Mini DisplayPort cable to the Mini DisplayPort on each computer. The 27-inch iMac will enter Target Display mode and display content from the source computer.
  Note: If you are connecting two 27-inch iMacs, connect a Mini DisplayPort cable to each computer and press Command + F2 on the 27-inch iMac keyboard that you will use as an external display.
  To leave Target Display mode, press Command + F2 on the keyboard of the 27-inch iMac that is in Target Display mode. To return to Target Display mode, press Command + F2 again.


Is it reasonable to assume Jar Launcher is set up to run jar files from Finder on OS X 10.5+?

The Apple supplied java implementation comes installed with Mac OS 10.5 and 10.6 and .jar files are associated with the jar launcher application. As long as the java application starts right into a swing interface it should open without any problems.

On Mac OS 10.7 Lion however the java runtime is not installed by default and users trying to launch .jar files will be greeted with a dialog asking them to install java to continue (which requires admin privileges).

Officially the apple supplied java runtime is depreciated so you can't count on it working in any future version of mac os x


Safari history disappears despite settings

This is size limit imposed by Safari.

A sqlite database can obviously be larger than 80M; it is only limited by the amount of available storage space, but technically it has an upper file size limit of about 140TB

Other developers have noted that in (older versions of) Safari, the limit is capped at 50GB.  It's reasonable to assume that this limit has been increased in subsequent releases of macOS/iOS/Safari.

It also stands to reason that this size limit is imposed by (Apple) Safari because, by default, it is configured to synchronize with iCloud to other Apple devices many of which are constrained by storage availability (iPhones and iPads, for example).

We also know that iCloud's basic (free) storage allotment is 5GB and this must account for much more than browsing history.  Things like files, settings, device backups (where applicable) keychains, notes, etc. must be allocated space.  Synchronization of these items is set by default by Apple.

It wouldn't make much sense to allow an unlimited history  where History.dbcould outstrip the capacity of iCloud/iPad/iPhone.

Even though you're not using iCloud integration, the average user does and Apple will architect it's products around this premise and design their products accordingly.

Extracting Your History

You can pull your history items out of the History.db file with this (very) simple sqlite3 script

Create a "commands.txt" file and populate it with the following commands:

.mode csv
.once history.txt
select visit_time, title, url from history_visits inner join history_items on history_items.id = history_visits.history_item;

Then issue the command

sqlite3 History.db < commands.txt

This will create a CSV file called history.txt containing the time, title and URL of the history items.  This assumes you are in the ~/Library/Safari directory.  Keep in mind that the date/time of your history item will be in epoch time (although the epoch is different in this case) and will need to be ultimately converted.


How can I Change Letter Cases in iTunes?

You asked specifically about defaulting all music files and their data to small caps. I think you mean "title case," like this:

This Is Title Case

Assuming that is what you want, and considering that you mention you already have some files that are all caps and others that are all lower case, perhaps you will get the result you want by changing the names-- automatically-- inside of iTunes. Not quite "on the way in" but easily and quickly afterward.

iTunes is very AppleScript-able and it can solve your problem. Here is a script that I wrote to do it. Note that it operates on whichever tracks are selected. I was using iTunes 12.4.1.6 to test, with "My Music" clicked at the top and "Songs" clicked in the sidebar to the left. I select multiple tracks and then ran this script in the Script Editor:

-- Uses the satimage osax
-- Get it at http://www.satimage.fr/software/en/downloads/downloads_companion_osaxen.html

tell application "iTunes"
    set the_tracks to the selection
    repeat with a_track in the_tracks
        set the_old_name to name of a_track as string
        set the_new_name to titlecase the_old_name
        set the name of a_track to the_new_name
    end repeat
end tell

Very important: you must install the Satimage OSAX as indicated in the script. Plain vanilla AppleScript does not do "titlecase" out of the box. There are ways to do it but the Satimage OSAX is the fastest and easiest.

I wrote the script to be self-explanatory and it could be sped up a little. Still, this should do the job for you. I applied the script to 100 tracks and it finished in less than three seconds. You might try it on just a couple of badly-formatted titles to see it work before selecting a large number of tracks. Test the script and be sure it does what you want before making wholesale changes to your iTunes library.

Yes you would have to run the script again if you imported more songs. But, you could make a Smart Playlist based on Date Added and run the script once a month or so on whatever new tracks you'd imported (and they would be in that Smart Playlist).

AppleScript can "get" and "set" a lot of information for an iTunes track. Title, Album, etc. Here is what you get when you run this script (with some track or tracks selected in iTunes):

tell application "iTunes"
    set the_tracks to the selection
    set my_track to item 1 of the_tracks
    set x to properties of my_track
end tell

{class:file track, id:32579, index:23, name:"Agnus Dei", persistent ID:"23958CCD4BBB2A10", database ID:11459, date added:date "Wednesday, March 16, 2011 at 10:01:56 AM", time:"6:06", duration:366.471008300781, artist:"John Rutter", album artist:"", composer:"", album:"Requiem", genre:"misc", bit rate:128, sample rate:44100, track count:0, track number:5, disc count:0, disc number:0, size:5864189, volume adjustment:0, year:0, comment:"", EQ:"", kind:"MPEG audio file", media kind:music, video kind:none, modification date:date "Thursday, June 16, 2016 at 8:28:57 AM", enabled:true, start:0.0, finish:366.471008300781, played count:0, skipped count:0, compilation:false, rating:0, bpm:0, grouping:"", bookmarkable:false, bookmark:0.0, shufflable:true, lyrics:"", category:"", description:"", show:"", season number:0, episode ID:"", episode number:0, unplayed:true, sort name:"", sort album:"", sort artist:"", sort composer:"", sort album artist:"", sort show:"", loved:false, album loved:false, cloud status:matched, location:alias "CB SSD:Users:cboyce:Music:iTunes:iTunes Music:John Rutter:Requiem:05 Agnus Dei 1.mp3"}

You can see Name, Artist, Album Artist, Album, Comment, etc. Lots of info that you could get, change the case, and set.


I erased Macintosh HD in disk utility, now I can't reinstall macOS Big Sur

If the recovery mode on your Mac won't let you install macOS, then the next trick is "Internet Recovery Mode". See this web page for a description of how to use it to reinstall your Mac's OS: https://www.macworld.co.uk/how-to/recovery-mode-internet-3636668/#internet%20recovery
The important thing to note here though, is that you need to be connected to the Internet in order to use it (the clue is in the name) and that a large download is involved, so it will take some time to start the recovery mode. I think it's about 12GB or so.


How can you get Finder to sort by name, but also sort folders before files?

There's no built in feature in the Finder to achieve that, but with the "plugin" TotalFinder you can get that. It's located under the "Tweaks" tab in the TotalFinder settings.

Edit: There was a screenshot here, but it was out of date. Look at Robsofts answer instead for an up-to-date screenshot!


Two Calendar alerts not working since iOS 9 update

I was able to duplicate this issue on iOS 9.0.2, and these steps worked for me:

Tap "Second Alert"
Set it to "None" (at the top)
Tap "Second Alert" again
Set it to the desired time.


In the MAMP application, click on "Preferences..." then go on the "Apache" tab.
There you will be able to locate the default folder. You can create a new one and set it as default there too.


How can I contact the owner of a lost iPhone who has a password lock?

1) Find the phone number, then find the owner

I think the iPhone is locked but not the SIM card. If this is the case, pop the SIM card out. Put it in another phone. Find the number. Now, use the web to do a reverse lookup, find them, find their email or alternate phone, and call them.

2) Find someone who knows the owner

When you set the password, by default the "Voice Dial" is still active. Try holding down the home button for 4 seconds. Even when locked, you might be able to say "Call so-and-so". Try some random names. If someone picks up, explain the situation. They will probably have an alternate means of contacting the owner.

3) Turn the phone on and see if there are recent callers - then use any of these names to try voice calling as in 2 above.


Is there a Mac OSX equivalent of zenity?

Check out cocoaDialog:

  cocoaDialog is an OS X application that allows the use of common GUI controls such as file selectors, text input, progress bars, yes/no confirmations and more with a command-line application. It requires no knowledge of Cocoa, and is ideal for use in shell and Perl scripts (or Ruby, or Python, or... etc).

It's a pretty simple concept — pass arguments to the executable to create a dialog, and it returns a result string. There are some good examples as well as documentation.


DIY Fusion Drive: Adding Recovery HD to a CoreStorage Volume Group

You'll need to partition the drives first, putting the Recovery partition on one of your physical drives. It can't be part of the Fusion drive as its unlikely you can boot directly into a Core Storage logical volume (you need a boot loader separately).

Take note of the partition structure in this Ars Technica article about the Fusion drive.

The best way to do this is probably to start fresh by reinstalling Mountain Lion on either the SSD or HDD, then repeat the Fusion process with just the proper partition.

Once you've done a standard install, check your partitions by running diskutil list, which should give output similar to this:

/dev/disk0
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *120.0 GB   disk0
   1:                        EFI                         209.7 MB   disk0s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS Macintosh HD            119.2 GB   disk0s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk0s3

Make note of the identifier of the Macintosh HD partition (disk0s2 in this case).

Then do the same steps you performed before, but change the diskutil corestorage create fusion_volume_group command so to specify the disk0s2 (or whatever the equivalent in your case is), and the identifier of the drive you didn't install OS X on. The resulting command should be similar to diskutil corestorage create fusion_volume_group disk0s2 disk1 but make sure you've got the identifiers correct. The key is that we want to make a volume group out of just the Macintosh HD partition, not the whole drive (so that the EFI and Recovery partitions don't get wiped out). Then follow the rest of the procedure as you did before.


How to stop downloads from being organized by date?

So, the answer should be the Glims.  Either uninstall the Glims, or config the GLims not to organize the downloading into dated folder.


How do you find a lost serial number for a stolen Mac to make a police report?

If it’s signed into iCloud, you can see it and its details under “My Devices” in your Apple ID. See here for instructions from Apple.


The Tags feature in Finder1 already has a keyboard shortcut which can be activated whilst in Quick Look. Press ⌘⇧T to set a tag on the currently selected file.

To set a custom shortcut…

Open System Preferences → Keyboard → Shortcuts → App Shortcuts.
Click the + button to add a new shortcut.
Set the Application to Finder.app, and the Menu Title to Tags….
Set your keyboard shortcut and press Add.

1 As this is a feature of Finder, not Quick Look, the modal popup may be behind the Quick Look window.


Is the T-Mobile iPhone 6s from Apple.com Unlocked?

Yes - T-Mobile phones of all versions are factory unlocked. iPhone 6s/plus will be just like the iPhone 6/plus in that regard.

This year, you can buy phones unlocked on Apple's payment plan as well if you prefer that over paying full price.


Is there some way to make Mailbox for Mac access my Mac "Contacts" for recipients?

According to the Mailbox website:

On the desktop, contacts are currently populated from emails that are synced with Mailbox. We don't have a way to import your contacts from your email accounts at this time.
We're planning multiple contact improvements down the road, including full contact integration in the future.

On a side note, you know about the ban on questions for software not publicly released, but you didn't search the relevant website for assistance before posting? Tsk, tsk. ;)


Reliable instruction on installing Ubuntu on Macbook Pro

I think the following link will help you : https://help.ubuntu.com/community/MactelSupportTeam/AppleIntelInstallation#Detailed_How-To

Here they have explained it very clearly:

http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2011/10/dual-boot-os-ubuntu

Hope this will help you.


Active Directory login takes from seconds to minutes on OSX

There are several ways to get a Mac to work on an Active Directory network. Apple has some issues with it's Samba implementation that seem to cause these sorts of issues. I have been using software from Likewise to join our Macs to our domain. Starting with version 6.1 (currently in pre-release) the issues that you describe are greatly reduced (not eliminated) -- it still takes me about 45 seconds to log in.

If you have administrative control over your Mac, then you will certainly want to read up on migrating from your current AD implementation to Likewise. If you are not a admin, then you will need to speak to your IT department. It is important to note that Likewise should be installed as a local admin, and upgrades should not be applied as a domain user (even if they are an admin), but as a local user.


How to distinguish a terminal window currently connected via SSH?

Look to the title of the window, or the title of the tab if you are using several tabs:

  That won't be enough for me to avoid making mistakes  – Benjamin

  I was thinking about something like the window changing color somewhere. Don't even know if that's technically possible, though. – Benjamin

Assuming a worst case when you are unable to change remote's prompt, edit you mac's terminal prompt in order to make most clear if the terminal is at a client of a Mac of yours.

If you use Tmux, configure non defaults status-fg status-bg so that your Mac's local terminals use a different Tmux color than what is configured at your servers.


Getting AppleScript function to pass string correctly

If you are going to call a handler from within an application's tell block, use the my reserved word in front of the handler, e.g.:
set theText to my strTest()


Can I enable Remote Disc on a computer that shipped with an optical drive?

I've had to do this on an iMac with a failed optical drive before.

From http://www.mactricksandtips.com/2009/09/enable-remote-disc-drive-sharing-on-any-mac.html:

defaults write com.apple.NetworkBrowser EnableODiskBrowsing -bool true
defaults write com.apple.NetworkBrowser ODSSupported -bool true

... then reboot, and hopefully the option will then show up in Finder > Preferences > Sidebar.


What is the correct way to prevent MacBook Pro (mid-2010) from sleeping on lid close?

In order to work with Lion, InsomaniaX has been updated to version 2.0.


After removing Bootcamp, my Hard Disk has around 80GB missing

I'm guessing that OS X probably mis-partitioned it when removing the Bootcamp partition, and the old Windows partition is either free space or corrupt. Either way, you can try to go to Disk Utility or boot into Recovery(like @klanomoath said) and check to see how the partitions are setup. You can then resize the Macintosh HD to use any free space, and erase any corrupt or unneeded partitions.


I found this site:

Other World Computing RAM upgrade for MacBook 6,1

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/memory/Apple_MacBook_MacBook_Pro/Upgrade/DDR3_White

It seems it's possible to upgrade.


All Ports in Use after High Sierra Update

Ok solved it...

Not sure which one of these fixed it, but opened Xcode and accepted the agreement (or run sudo xcodebuild -license accept). I then ran brew update then brew upgrade node and then npm rebuild node-sass --force- to rebuild.

It still wasn't working so I finally changed the order in which I was putting tasks in Gulp and it is now fixed...


Two different announcements from the same iPhone with the same iTunes connection

After restoring your device iTunes will not link it to the previous backup. Your backup whatsoever nonetheless exists. You can find a list of your backups in iTunes Preferences > Devices / If you're using iTunes for Windows, choose Edit > Devices.

By what I understood your first screenshot is before restoring and your second screenshot is after restoring, therefore it makes sense.

Nothing to worry about. Doing a new backup will not delete your old one.


How to downgrade iOS from 9.3.1 to 7.1 (default version)?

You can't install older versions of iOS (see Can I install any iOS version I wish by picking and choosing which firmware to restore? for details), but you can run the simulator in Xcode with older versions.

From within an iPad project, go to Product -- Destination -- Download Simulators...
Pick the version you want

It doesn't go further back than iOS 8.1 though.


How to disable antialiasing (smoothing) in Preview for images?

I have a different experience from what CousinCocaine reports in their answer. Using Preview Version 7.0 (826.4) on a PNG bitmap, it seems to depend on the zoomed image size rather than on whether the zoom level is a nice number.

Specifically, it anti-aliases the zoomed image if the zoomed image would occupy more than 64 megabytes (2^26 bytes), using 3 bytes (24 bit color) per pixel.  To add to the confusion, if the image has one small and one large dimension, the small dimension is increased to be 1/3 of the large dimension before doing this calculation.

For example, with a 720x720 image at a zoom level of 656%, the calculation is 720*720*6.56*6.56*3 < 2^26, so it doesn't anti-alias.  But at a zoom level of 657%, it does.

As you can see in the first screen shot, absolutely no anti-aliasing is performed. Each pixel has been zoomed to a 6x6, 7x7, or 6x7 rectangle, with no smoothing of pixels.

To see the pixels in those images clearly enough to count them, you don't need Preview -- just go to System Preferences, Accessibility, Zoom, and uncheck the box "Smooth images" (and also make sure at least one of the methods for zooming is enabled).  Then you can zoom in on pixels anywhere on your screen (and you can use the pixels in the mouse pointer to help with visually counting pixels).  But taking a screenshot while zoomed like this is buggy for me.

For PDFs, which probably doesn't apply to you, you could also try one of the following undocumented settings, which apparently also require restarting Preview:

defaults write com.apple.Preview PVPDFAntiAliasOption 0
defaults write com.apple.Preview PVPDFAntiAliasOption 1


Why does macOS Catalina install and/or update fail with "OSStatus error -37"?

I have a small internal drive in my 2018 Mac mini. So, I keep most of my data on a large external SSD. For ease-of-use, I replace most directories in the user home directories with symlinks. That way, for example, the ~/Documents dir points right over to a dir on the external SSD.
Well, I also use this symlink method for the /Users/Shared directory. It looks like:
> cd /Users
> ls -l | grep Shared
lrwxr-xr-x  1 admin    wheel  34 Jul 19 13:42 Shared -> /Volumes/ExtSSD/shared

Restoring the /Users/Shared directory back to an actual directory — the way it looks as laid down by the macOS Installer — resolves the issue. Now /Users/Shared looks like:
> cd /Users
> ls -l | grep Shared
drwxrwxrwt  25 root      wheel  800 Apr 17 14:17 Shared

With /Users/Shared no longer a symlink, the macOS Catalina install/update process works fully and successfully.


Finder displays Refresh and X symbols instead of Eject for external storage device?

I can't find a support document that directly addresses your question, but I'm pretty sure that those icons represent a disk that is in use and can't be ejected.


How to uninstall Canon IJ Network Scanner?

Additional Canon software is installed in /Library/Printers/Canon. You can use Shift-Cmd-G in Finder to open a Finder window for that folder.


Yes, open the Spotlight prefpane and under the Confidentiality tab (not sure, but on my  French system it is called "Confidentialité"), you can add folders and volumes not to be indexed.


Can one pan across a panorama photo that is longer than the screen in Keynote?

What you're looking for is similar to the "Ken Burns Effect", so named for the documentary director that made the technique famous.

Steps to complete in Keynote:

Import an image larger than your slide, and resize as necessary, but ensuring it remains larger than the slide area.
On the Build Inspector, click on the Action tab and select "Move" from the Effect drop-down.
Increase the duration of the effect as desired.
Modify the movement path (represented by the red line over the slide) so that the end point is to the left of the start point, on a straight line.


In Mavericks' Activity Monitor, what is a "Zombie?"

According to wikipedia, a zombie process is  a process that has completed executing, but still has an entry in the process table. In other words, a zombie process has finished executing, but it hasn't been cleaned up yet.

When a process finishes, its return code needs to be returned to the parent process. Normally, this happens immediately, so you don't see the zombie process. However, sometimes, the parent process doesn't cooperate, and the zombie stays in the process table indefinitely.

If you want to get rid of a zombie process, you have three options:

Wait. Hopefully it'll clear up on its own.
Send a SIGCHLD to the zombie's parent. If it's behaving correctly, it'll fetch the return code of the zombie process, and the system can then reap the zombie process.
Kill the parent process. When you kill a process, its children are adopted by init, which will clean everything up for you.


I went and bought a new keyboard and it works fine.
I had my friend plugin my broken keyboards and they have similar behavior on his Windows 10 PC (garbage on the shift keys).
I consider this solved but I am stumped that I have two keyboards with similar failure.
I would delete this question but there are other people reporting the ± on the left shift key too so I am just going to leave this question undeleted.


How to remove the sidebar in Apple Preview (presentation mode)?

While Preview is in full screen, the option is available from the View menu and toolbar button.
The app must be in full screen for these to be available.


How can I get the list of allowed users for Remote Management via Terminal?

I had a bit of a look at my Server and desktop Mac and it would seem that the permissions are stored in the local Open Directory database. The command dscl . -list /Users dsAttrTypeNative:naprivs when run by an admin will give you a list of users who have any privileges set for remote management.