How to Properly Uninstall Brother Twain Drivers in OS X 10.6

To answer both questions at once, it seems that the Brother instructions only cover system level files.  This will not remove any files that you as a user created or installed.  I would go through the instructions again, then repeat the instructions, but for every location where it says "Macintosh HD > Library > x", I would also check at "Macintosh HD >  Users > YourUsername > Library > x".

It is also possible, depending on what version of OS (I see that you are rolling back to 10.6.8 - does that mean you were on 10.7?) that they are system installed.  I wouldn't recommend removing anything from your system folder, but it may be finding the drivers under "Macintosh HD > System > Library".


Terminal and iTerm set LANG based on the region selected in System Preferences (defaults read -g AppleLocale) by default. It affects error messages and (some) help messages shown by bash, but not the language used by nano or for man pages.

$ export LANG=de_DE.UTF-8
$ ashuhuf
-bash: ashuhuf: Kommando nicht gefunden.
$ help unalias
unalias: unalias [-a] Name [Name ...]
    Entferne jeden Namen von der Aliasliste.

    Optionen:
      -a    Enferne alle Alias Definitionen.

    Gibt immer Erfolg zurück, wenn der Name existiert.

Adding something like export LANG=de_DE.UTF-8 to a configuration file like .bash_profile would have the same effect. I don't know any way to make the shell environment more localized though.

If others were searching for how to make Terminal or iTerm use English, add for example export LANG=en_US.UTF-8 to .bash_profile. Disabling setting locale variables automatically would make shells use the default C locale, which makes working with non-ASCII characters difficult at least in bash and other programs that use readline.


How can I change Keychain permissions without being physically present?

If you have ssh & admin access to the server you could use the security command line tool to manipulate keychain items. It can add & delete passwords, identities and certificates, look at the security man page for the details.

I haven't tried but it looks like sudo security dump-keychain -i <keychain> may do what you want.

I suppose that you could use the security tool from the terminal via Screen Sharing if you didn't have ssh access.


Can I keep my MBPR unplugged when not in use?

Only if the battery discharged to about 20% overnight for some reason it will count as new charge cycle.

For example if unplug at 100% and plug back in at 80% it is not counted as new charge cycle.


How come Google Maps isn't available to App Store accounts from Israel?

Your apple ID is registered in the Israeli Store. The application is not available in the Israeli Store, so you cannot switch to the U.S. store.

Two items need to happen for an App to be listed in a certain country:

The developer of the app (Google in this case) needs to register with Apple to fulfill all the legal and contractual requirements to sell in each country they choose to have a presence for any of their apps to be sold.
They need to submit and have Apple approve each specific app for each specific country. Most developers push all apps to all eligible stores, but they don't have to choose to do that even though they could opt to do that.

Let's leave the speculation on who / what / why to either company (Apple and Google) to address in particular, but we can certainly discuss the mechanics of how the app stores work without getting into opinion and conjecture.


Is it possible something got stuck or is otherwise jamming the trackpad?  Best bet may be to have genius bar take a look.

On older macbooks there was an physical adjustment you could make on the trackpack (open the case, remove some stuff, adjust screw).  And we had a problem with the battery swelling which caused the trackpad to stop working (essentially prevented the "click" action, as it was pushing the trackpad up).


How do I get BBEdit to display the error browser programmatically?

You can do it using AppleScript and BBEdit's results browser command. It isn't well documented, but there are some good examples around to help you out. For example: John Gruber's CSS Syntax Checker.

Here is a sample AppleScript.

tell application "BBEdit"
  set error_list to ¬
    {{result_kind: "Error", result_file: "/path/to/codegen.sml",¬
      result_line: 121, message: "syntax error: inserting  LPAREN"},¬
     {result_kind: "Error", result_file: "/path/to/codegen.sml",¬
      result_line: 130, message: "syntax error: inserting  EQUALOP"}}
  make new results browser with data error_list with properties ¬
    {name:"Errors"}
end tell

Of course, you will want to create the error_list variable programmatically, but this should get you started. If you change /path/to/codegen.sml to a file that exists on your system, you can see it in action.


How to stop screen from dimming when watching video?

You could use a software like Caffeine to easily achieve your need :

Caffeine is a tiny program that puts an icon in the right side of your menu bar. Click it to prevent your Mac from automatically going to sleep, dimming the screen or starting screen savers. Click it again to go back. Right-click (or ⌘-click) the icon to show the menu.


What parts are new when the logic board is replaced by an Apple-certified shop?

Typically you don't know until the repair is complete.

Apple certified shops will enter case noted explaining to Apple what was done and you can ask the shop for a list of what components were replaced.

Apple supplies the parts, so Apple could have sent the repair shop an entirely new logic board or they could have shipped one that was refurbished / repaired / tested. You can't really know unless you physically inspect the part(s) in question.

Service parts are new and/or refurbished whether you have the repair done at the genius bar, Apple Repair mail in service or third party. It's the same pool of parts.

At 500 eu  - you are likely paying for the individual service part to be exchanged, configured and tested. I would ask about a flat rate repair - that would possibly reduce your initial cost and cover any/all issues and not just the main board.

If you can, get a second quote directly from Apple in your country:

https://support.apple.com/mac-notebooks/repair/service


How can I connect to a local NAS whilst connected to a remote VPN?

The short answer is that you cannot do this. Your VPN administrator has enabled a "full tunnel," such that all traffic goes over the VPN. If your VPN administrator is willing to switch to split tunnels, it will work fine.
The longer, potentially getting you fired answer: you can use openconnect (installed via homebrew) to connect to the VPN. This will still have the full tunnel issue, but it won't continue to screw with the network routes after the initial connection - so you can forcibly enable split tunnels.
To connect, something like:
# openconnect yourvpnserver.com -u username --authgroup "your group"

Then you can fix your routing table:
# sudo route change default 1.2.3.4

where 1.2.3.4 is your normal home network default route. You will not be able to access any resources over the VPN after you do this, until you add routes for them:
# sudo route -nv add 5.6.7.8 -interface utun0

where 5.6.7.8 is the IP of the VPN resource you want to access, and utun0 is the VPN interface.
But again, risk of being fired if caught, etc, etc.


Is it possible to "deep link" to a specific email in mail.app on Mac OS X?

In OS X, you can use a URL of the format message:<MESSAGE-ID> to open the specific message in Mail.app.  So how do we find the message ID?  If the message includes a date or other "data detector", you can click the dotted line around that and add it to your calendar.  Then in Calendar.app, the newly created event will have a URL, which you can copy.
A more convenient way is to use AppleScript.  Run the following code when you have the message selected in Mail.  This will copy the URL to your clipboard.  There are various ways to set this up to run with a keyboard shortcut, etc.
tell application "Mail"
    set _sel to get selection
    set _links to {}
    repeat with _msg in _sel
        set _messageURL to "message://%3c" & _msg's message id & "%3e"
        set end of _links to _messageURL
    end repeat
    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to return
    set the clipboard to (_links as string)
end tell

Note the angle brackets in this script are written as the URL encoded %3c.
Source: https://daringfireball.net/2007/12/message_urls_leopard_mail


Sending SMS through iPad Air's iMessages

SMS's can only be sent through an iPhone, as it requires a carrier's plan and a phone number associated to it, which iPad's lacks of.
As stated by Apple:

Which Apple products support Messages using SMS and MMS?
To use Messages with SMS and MMS, you need an iPhone.


Windows key does not work on Amazon WorkSpaces Client with external USB keyboard

By default the WorkSpaces client remaps the ⌘ Cmd on the Mac to Ctrl in Windows. You can disable this behaviour with this hidden preference for the WorkSpaces client:

defaults write "com.amazon.Amazon WorkSpaces Client" remap_cmd_to_ctrl 0

After running this command, quit the WorkSpaces client then start it up again. When you log into your WorkSpace now, the ⌘ Cmd key on your Mac will map to the ⊞ Win key in your Windows VM.

One caveat: if you switch out to another Mac app using ⌘ Cmd + Tab, you'll notice that the Start menu in Windows has popped up when you return to the VM. This seems to be unavoidable.

After making this change, you'll have to use the Windows keyboard shortcuts for clipboard operations like copy Ctrl+C and paste Ctrl+V, rather than the familiar Mac shortcuts. Presumably Amazon changes the default behaviour to make it easier for Mac users to use the clipboard.

I tested with an external USB keyboard (the Apple A1243 MB110LL/B) and observed exactly the same behaviour, so it doesn't seem to be a problem with external keyboards.

Confirmed with WorkSpaces Client 3.0.5.1024.


Remove the battery from MacBook Pro and charge it

The positive (+) and negative (-) terminals on the battery are usually the outermost pins.  Knowing the specific MacBook model is helpful here.

The MagSafe 1/2 charger outputs 16.5 volts, so you are going to need a charger that supplies that amount.

Now, with all of that said.....

I highly urge caution in attempting to hack a DIY charger for your MacBook Pro battery.

If you don't have the necessary electronics diagnostic/repair skills, this is not something you should be attempting.   Besides, there is a more safe and reliable way to diagnose your problems...

You don't need a battery to test out your MacBook.

If you have a MacBook (any model - Pro, Air, etc.) that will not turn on even with the battery disconnected, the problem is with the DC-In board or the logic board itself.  And even before you begin this diagnostic journey, you need to make sure that the MagSafe charger you are using is functioning properly.  A dead AC adapter won't charge any battery regardless if it's in the laptop or not.


There are a few ways to mitigate the file limit. We ran into the same issue at our company with our platform team and were able to resolve the issue using the information below. Source

Enter the following in Terminal:

$ echo kern.maxfiles=65536 | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf
$ echo kern.maxfilesperproc=65536 | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf
$ sudo sysctl -w kern.maxfiles=65536
$ sudo sysctl -w kern.maxfilesperproc=65536
$ ulimit -n 65536 65536
In $HOME/.bash_profile set the following: ulimit -n 65535 unlimited
Reboot system and try Photoshop again


diskutil rename lets you specify the original location in ways other than by name.
I think some variation on this will work for you: diskutil rename disk1s1 "NewHDDName2"
Running diskutil list first should let you figure out the identifier for the volume.


One way to do this is via MDM policy.

https://support.apple.com/guide/mdm/siri-restrictions-mdm993369d06/web

If you don’t have an MDM, I recommend trying JAMF now for free since it is supported and free for the first few devices. You can fine tune things like the menu bar as well.

https://derflounder.wordpress.com/2016/09/20/blocking-siri-on-macos-sierra/

You might try these profiles as well but that operation can be fiddle without the MDM setup completed.


The best way (in my opinion) is to launch an application called Activity Monitor. You can do so by using spotlight (the magnifying class in the upper right hand corner), or by pressing Command+Space at the same time. Just type "Activity Monitor" and an option should pop up. This lets you see the CPU usage by process, as well at RAM being utilized, and a lot of other good metrics. This should help you get a good idea of what might be slowing down your machine.


Big boo boo on reinstalling OS X Lion. Help!

Probably the best thing would be if you have access to another Mac. (if you don't...  well...)

If you do, download the Mavericks installer from the Apple Store but when it automatically launches QUIT out of the installer.

Download Lion Diskmaker (now Disk Maker X) from here:

http://liondiskmaker.com/

This will then make a bootable Mavericks installer to an 8GB or larger flash drive from that Mavericks installer application.

Then just boot from the flash drive and you can install Mavericks.


On new Macbook Pros, there is no microphone input. What you have is a line-level input. Microphones that do not have integrated power and amplification (all cheap computer microphones/handsets) will not work when connected to the line-level input.

The connectors are exactly the same, but on the line input there is stereo input and ground, and on the microphone input there is mono input, voltage reference and ground. The input level is also different, with line level at around 1V and microphone level at 10-100mV.

To resolve the problem, you need to get one of the following:

a USB sound card which has a proper microphone input circuitry,
a powered, amplified microphone that can be used with line-level input, or
a microphone preamplifier.

See also:

http://www.hobby-hour.com/electronics/computer_microphone.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_level


This can be fixed adding/removing the device from the Network System Preference Pane.


Why does my Mac Mini (2012) lock up with a fresh Mavericks install?

I eventually found that the problem was caused by not-quite-firmly-seated RAM.


Keychain trouble after changing password

There might be a problem with the users home folder permissions.

Repairing Disk Permissions in Disk Utility, will only affect things outside your Home folder, though.

There is a home folder reset routine if you boot into Recovery (cmd+r).

Once booted, Open Terminal from the Utilities menu.

Type resetpassword and hit return. (no worry you will NOT be resetting the password)

Select your hard disk, then the user.

Click the Reset Home Folder Permissions and ACLs button.

Quit the utility and restart.


I just popped open Automator to see if any actions are available that could be strung together to do this. It looks to me like this is something that you would need to create using Apple Script.

Take a look at the this forum thread:
http://hintsforums.macworld.com/showthread.php?t=115494

The post by rccharles has example apple script that could be used to accomplish this. The other posts above this one also have some alternate suggestions that could do what you're looking for.


Reduced data usage when using YouTube in background?

No, even though you're only listening to the audio, the video will continue to be streamed to the device.


Why does Apple's website break with 2o7.net blocked?

dig metrics.apple.com gives

;; ANSWER SECTION:
metrics.apple.com.  4107    IN  CNAME   appleglobal.112.2o7.net.
appleglobal.112.2o7.net. 249    IN  A   66.235.133.14
appleglobal.112.2o7.net. 249    IN  A   66.235.138.2
...

so you could try to dynamically update your hosts file every hour or so:

grep -v metrics.apple.com /etc/hosts > /tmp/raw-hosts
echo $(dig metrics.apple.com |
       grep ^appleglobal |
       head -1 | cut -c 35-) metrics.apple.com appleglobal.112.2o7.net >> /tmp/raw-hosts
mv /tmp/raw-hosts /etc/hosts


How to exit full screen mode in textedit FORMAT WINDOW mac 10.13.3

Try pressing the Escape key. I know in Finder hitting Esc will get you out of full screen mode. But not every app supports Escape as a way to get out of full screen mode so you can try this keyboard stroke:

"Command+Control+F" to exit or enter Full Screen Mode.


How to find Hard Drive capacity in Mavericks?

You can check it via Finder. Just select the Hard Drive and press CMD + I.

Or

Click on the Apple icon on the menu bar
Select About This Mac, then click on More Info.
Select Storage


/var/vm/sleepimage is used to store the contents of the RAM during hibernation, and the hybrid hibernation and sleep mode that Mac laptops use by default. If you have 8 GiB of RAM, /var/vm/sleepimage takes about 8 GiB of disk space. I don't know why it isn't deleted after waking up from sleep though. It might be to ensure that there is enough free disk space for it or so that it won't be stored on non-contiguous blocks if disk space is low.
You can delete /var/vm/sleepimage safely, but it will be recreated when you put the Mac to sleep. If you run sudo pmset -a hibernatemode 0; sudo rm /var/vm/sleepimage, the Mac will use a normal sleep mode (like desktop Macs by default) and it won't recreate /var/vm/sleepimage.
From man pmset:

hibernatemode = 0 (binary 0000) by default on supported desktops. The system will not back memory up to persistent storage. The system must wake from the contents of memory; the system will lose context on power loss. This is, historically, plain old sleep.
hibernatemode = 3 (binary 0011) by default on supported portables. The system will store a copy of memory to persistent storage (the disk), and will power memory during sleep. The system will wake from memory, unless a power loss forces it to restore from disk image.
hibernatemode = 25 (binary 0001 1001) is only settable via pmset. The system will store a copy of memory to persistent storage (the disk), and will remove power to memory. The system will restore from disk image. If you want "hibernation" - slower sleeps, slower wakes, and better battery life, you should use this setting.

0 (traditional sleep mode) enables fast wake up and sleep, saves disk space, and reduces writing to the drive.
3 (hybrid hibernation and safe sleep mode) enables fast wake up and sleep and enables restoring state after a power loss.
25 (hibernation) saves energy and enables restoring state after a power loss.

I used hibernatemode 0 with my MacBook Air. Even if the MacBook Air went to sleep when the battery was nearly empty, the battery didn't usually drain out completely during sleep. /var/vm/sleepimage took about 4 GiB of disk space, and writing it hundreds or thousands of times might have reduced the lifespan of the SSD.


A handy related shortcut to reveal files that begin with a . (dot) in Finder dialogs that popup from a File->Open action is:

Shift + Command + "."

This toggles "." (dot) files to show/ hide without needing to restart Finder.

You can also define an alias to quickly toggle hidden files within Finder:

alias AllFilesTRUE='defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE; killall Finder'
alias AllFilesFALSE='defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles FALSE; killall Finder'


Is it possible to install Flash on a jailbroken iOS device?


How can I select preferred languages when I install applications from homebrew?

With --language:

brew cask install firefox --language=de

as pointed out here.


Should I uninstall Mail incompatible plug in which are disabled/inactive after Mountain Lion upgrade?

That always happens when a new version of Mail comes out, the Herald dev needs some time in order to get the plugin compatible.

If you still want to use Herald, just ignore it and watch @heraldapp on Twitter, to be notified when the update is available.

If you don't want Herald anymore, uninstall it by using the uninstaller in the herald.zip download file.


Ability to set even below the minimum brightness on iPad

Many people use the black on white mode to invert the color mapping for applications that will not specify more of the LCD to be grey or black and less of it white. Some blog articles call this "night mode" but it's a typical adjustment for people that have different visual abilities.

Settings App -> General –> Accessibility –> Triple-click Home -> “Toggle White on Black.”

Even though you can't reduce the illumination of the lights in the iPad further without a jailbreak, you can use this system setting to increase the amount of light that gets blocked in many cases by triple clicking the home button.

Also, many apps are being programmed to only draw in night mode where only red pixels are used. This also cuts down on the transmission of colors that our eyes use to constrict pupils and preserve night vision. This isn't a general solution, but for apps like Star Walk - this works very well in practice.


You can't run Bootcamp from an external hard drive, but you can install Windows via a virtual machine (MV Ware or Parallels are the best known). If you install Windows on the internal drive you have the option of booting from it directly or using one of the VM machines while running Mac OS.

As for the hard drive size you should consider the 768GB drive if possible. The drive space goes quickly and isn't upgradable. (Well, it is, but AFAIK nobody makes larger or faster replacement drives.)

The OSs run independently of each other, so you don't have to worry about cross-contamination. When running BootCamp you can't even see the Macintosh partition.

In my experience it works as well as can be expected considering the limitations of running software on hardware that wasn't specifically designed for it.

Good Luck.


Acceptable CPU usage for 4 core 3.4gHz i7

Zero is Ideal

Ideally, your kiosk application should use 0% CPU when not actively being used. It is unlikely you will achieve this without considerable effort but even a target of 5 – 10% use is good.

At 150% constant CPU use, the application would likely be considered faulty by Apple's Mac App Store reviewers – and by many customers.

Hints: Offload to the Right Framework

If your kiosk application is animating or showing moving content such as adverts or movies, do as much as you can with AVFoundation/QuickTime. This will typically offload the processing to the GPU and allow the CPU to idle.

For other animations be sure to adopt CoreGraphics and CoreAnimation. They will dramatically improve your application's energy impact.

Energy Efficiency Guide for Mac Apps

Study Apple's Energy Efficiency Guide for Mac Apps. The introduction sets out Apple's intentions:

  Your Obligation as a Developer

  Even small inefficiencies in apps add up across the system, significantly affecting battery life, performance, responsiveness, and temperature. As an app developer, you have an obligation to make sure your app runs as efficiently as possible. Use recommended APIs so the system can make smart decisions about how best to manage your app and the resources it uses. Whenever possible, avoid unnecessary updates to the user interface and I/O. Power-intensive operations should be under the user’s control. If a user initiates a large iMovie render, Automator batch job, Compressor conversion, or Xcode compile, for example, the user should not be surprised if the activity consumes power. Strive to make your app absolutely idle when it is not responding to user input.

Use the developer tools to profile your application's energy impact and ask away on Stack Overflow for ways to reduce CPU load. Good luck!


The problem in this case seems to be that Mountain.app is not a "proper" part of the menu bar, at least as far as "System Events" is concerned.

You can see this also when you use (fn+) ctrl+F8; this should put keyboard focus on the status menus, so that you can navigate them with the arrow keys.
Some extra menu items (e.g. iStat menus) can be selected this way, while others can not. This, I believe, translates to accessibility with AppleScript via "System Events".


“Copy URL to Clipboard.app is not available as a HTTP browser” in El Capitan

The CFBundleURLTypes tag in the Info.plist file just needed a wee bit of a change and now it works on OSX v10.11 El Capitan.

This following worked okay in previous versions but isn't recognised in El Capitan.

<key>CFBundleURLTypes</key>
<array>
    <string>http</string>
    <string>https</string>
</array>

However if you change it to the following El Capitan recognises it and offers the "Copy URL to Clipboard" application in the "Default web browser" drop-down menu in System Preferences.

<key>CFBundleURLTypes</key>
<array>
    <dict>
        <key>CFBundleURLName</key>
        <string>Web site URL</string>
        <key>CFBundleURLSchemes</key>
        <array>
            <string>http</string>
            <string>https</string>
        </array>
    </dict>
</array>

I've submitted a pull request to houbysoft but in the meantime you can download an updated binary here.


Unless you have a very good reason to choose otherwise, it is highly recommended to use a journaling file system to ensure data integrity. In the case of Lion and Mountain Lion, the default is MacOS Extended (Journaled). Case-sensitivity at the disk level can mess with certain apps, and the OS makes it look like files are indeed case-sensitive when you interact with them on the command line.


Modifying "User interface sound effects" with applescript

System Preferences and the Sounds prefpane don't have direct ways to script this. But you can use regular UI scripting in AppleScript:

tell application "System Preferences"
    reveal anchor "effects" of pane id "com.apple.preference.sound"
end tell

tell application "System Events"
    tell process "System Preferences"
        if value of theBox is not 1 then
            click checkbox 1 of tab group 1 of window 1
        end if
    end tell
end tell

Or if you want to set a certain value rather than just toggle the checkbox:

tell application "System Preferences"
    reveal anchor "effects" of pane id "com.apple.preference.sound"
end tell

tell application "System Events"
    tell process "System Preferences"
        set theBox to checkbox 1 of tab group 1 of window 1
        if value of theBox is not 1 then -- or "is 1"
            click theBox
        end if
    end tell
end tell

You can also explicitly say checkbox "Play user interface sound effects" of ... instead of just checkbox 1, but I'm not sure how this behaves with localizations.


GitHub-Style Collaborative iTunes Backup?

Sounds like you want to do the following:

Have your itunes music stored to an external hard drive on download
Have a subset of the music locally on your laptop
Have a centralized repo, where your fellow DJ(s) can access the music

There are a few problems with a simple rsync between your external drive and their drives:

m4a rights managed files won't play on your friend's laptop without you granting their laptop access
as files are played, some meta data on the files are updated to reflect plays, likes, etc.

Having said that, you can work around the issues if you are willing to forego some of the meta information and if you are ok with authenticating your friends' laptop to use your music.

Dedicated Mac Mini or Mac Laptop or Windows machine running iTunes, with the full library downloaded and shared via the normal Apple Airplay/Network share
Your laptop and your DJ friends' laptops can then view/browse/stream the music from the central box. Meta information preserved as well as no need to move a hard drive around, all music available from one central place.
You may need to authenticate your friends itunes to be able to play your rights managed music.

The external hard drive route is basically the same, except that you basically rsync from your mac mini/archive box to an external drive. Requirement to auth a DJ friend's laptop still applies.

For your laptop which has a subset, you would just choose the songs you want from your library and import them locally into your instance of iTunes.

Re: Github style, probably not the best, since leveraging git would result in massive storage magnification anytime the play counter is updated/etc. Since the files are binary, diffs can't be stored.


Ok, so after taking the MBP to the Genius Bar, they ended up replacing the optical drive. Luckily it didn't cost anything, as it was under warranty. So, I had a faulty optical drive to blame for my problems.


MacBook Pro OS corrupted while upgrading to High Sierra 10.13

I had what I think was the same problem. In the end I was able to install High Sierra from the Recovery Disk (booting with command-R), without losing any data.


iMac Time Machine HDD and Internal HDD failed at same time

Viruses or malware do not (generally) cause hard drives to fail.
This was asked some time ago - so did you solve the problem in the end and if so, how?

For the record:
Save the Console log files if this happens again. Using these files it is possible to limit the source of the problem to software or hardware issues. It is rather unlikely that two disks fail simultaneously due to independant reasons. Are you working in a hot or humid environment? Do your devices have surge protectors between them and the power outlet?


Suddenly the fan of my Mac Mini starts to run as crazy - Possible reason / elimination?

I found a solution for the problem, meanwhile.
Here's what worked for me: In the "System-Preferences" it was demanded to update the Apple-ID.

After doing so, I shutdown the machine. Then started it again.
The problem is now gone. The accountsd-process is still there in the processes-table, but the use of system-capacity is back to normal.


Follow these steps

App Store > purchased > check for any unfinished apps that didn't finish downloading, in my case it was Yosemite, then just click download on the app that didn't finish downloading and all your other apps should start to download including OSX EL CAPITAN. Cheers


It is quite possible to use different Apple IDs for iCloud and iTunes. Even the Apple Support document, Sign in with your Apple ID - Use different Apple IDs for iCloud and iTunes mentions it.

Use different Apple IDs for iCloud and iTunes
We recommend that you use the same Apple ID for all Apple services on your device—including the iTunes & App Stores and iCloud. Using multiple Apple IDs might be confusing and cause issues with accessing purchased content or using some services.
But if you already have different Apple IDs that you want to use with iCloud and the iTunes & App Stores, follow these steps.
On your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch:

If you're using iOS 10.3 or later, go to Settings and tap Sign in to your [device]. Enter the Apple ID that you want to use with iCloud. Go back to Settings, scroll down, and tap iTunes & App Stores. Tap Apple ID: [your name] > Sign Out. Then sign in with the Apple ID that you want to use with iTunes.

If you're using iOS 10.2 or earlier, go to Settings > iCloud and sign in with the Apple ID that you want to use with iCloud. Go back to Settings > iTunes & App Stores and sign in with the Apple ID that you want to use with iTunes.

On your Mac, go to System Preferences > iCloud and sign in with the Apple ID that you want to use with iCloud. Go to iTunes > Account > Sign In. Enter the Apple ID that you want to use with iTunes.
If you use multiple Apple IDs and want to restore your device from a backup, you can learn more about iCloud or iTunes backups.
If you have multiple Apple IDs, you can’t merge them.

So, it is feasible to use separate to use separate Apple IDs for iTunes and iCloud. To use the desired Apple ID for Apple Music, simply launch iTunes, and in the Menu bar go to Account → Sign Out. Now sign in with the desired Apple ID.


Since OneDrive is available on the Mac App Store, it's far preferable to get it from there going forward. Follow the uninstall instructions for the older app and enjoy a much easier update and reinstall process.

https://support.office.com/en-us/article/OneDrive-for-Mac-FAQ-3fc4062c-8051-4392-bff1-551e32840cd0

The uninstall is very easy - just install the latest version, then drag it to trash. The 2019 versions also have a nice reset tool and can show very helpful logs should you not be able to fix things from the FAQ:

  How do I uninstall the OneDrive app?
  Just drag the OneDrive app to the Trash.

  How do I reset the OneDrive app?

See the link above for the detailed reset instructions if needed.


How to upgrade from OS X El Capitan 10.11.6 to macOS Sierra 10.12.6

You have downloaded some updater files for macOS Sierra which require at least an already installed macOS Sierra 10.12.

They are useless if OS X 10.11 El Capitan is installed.

Go to the App Store, download the macOS Sierra installer and install it. If it isn't available the following trick may help:

  Mission accomplished: after installing this command-line tool ('https://github.com/mas-cli/mas'), the command
  mas install 1127487414
  purchased*, downloaded, and installed version 10.12.6 of correctly.

  * By which I mean, the program not only downloaded Sierra, it did so using the Apple-supplied App Store frameworks in /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks, resulting in an application bundle containing a properly-signed MAS receipt linked to my Apple ID.

or try bmike's answer.


Set Today View as default on Lock screen in iPhone

No. As of this writing, it is not possible to set Today View as the default view in lock screen.


sym linking iTunes Media -> Music to external thumb drive

You can actually change the location that iTunes stores its library under Preferences -> Advanced -> iTunes Media folder Location.

In that case, you could migrate your iTunes library to that external drive. You would just need to make sure you have the drive connected when wanting to use iTunes.

You may want to be careful with carrying this much on a thumb drive (if they even make them that large). As in, its easy to loose, get damaged, etc - so make sure you have a backup.

Another good way to do this would be to just use an external hard drive connected over firewire or USB.


Sounds to me like you have corruption on the drive and/or the directory information. Boot up in Recovery Mode and use Disk Utility to repair the boot disk. I strongly advise you to make a complete backup before proceeding.

Restart your Mac whilst holding Command (⌘)-R to boot into Recovery Mode
Select Disk Utility from the options presented
Select your internal system disk from the list in the left panel
Choose the Repair option (or First Aid button, depending on your version)

If all goes well, any problems encountered will be fixed. If Disk Utility is unable to fix the issues you will either need to Erase the disk and reinstall the version of OS X/macOS and then use your backup to restore your applications and personal files/settings, or you could try a third-party disk/system utility. My personal favourites are DiskWarrior by Alsoft (https://www.alsoft.com) and TechTool Pro by Micromat (https://www.micromat.com).


Is making an IPA possible to extract resources like sound files from AppStore Apps?

Install Apple Configurator 2 from the Mac App Store.
Open it and go to account at the top and sign-in using your Apple ID (the same Apple ID as on your iPhone):

Download the app on your iPhone
Connect your iPhone to your Mac and click Trust on the Trust This Computer prompt and enter your password
Let Apple Configurator 2 load your device as follows:

Go to add then app and select Photo Lab in the list
It will say the app is already installed and will display the following message, don't touch anything just leave the message open:

Go to Finder, go ⇧ + ⌘ + G and paste the following:

~/Library/Group Containers/K36BKF7T3D.group.com.apple.configurator/Library/Caches/Assets/TemporaryItems/MobileApps

Move this to your desktop
Rename the .ipa to .zip and unpack it. The .caf files are in Payload/pho.to.app.

(Alternatively, if this doesn't work you can email it to a Windows computer download 7-zip and extract it there)
Go to the .app file
Look for the relevant files, I looked through all the files and found two of particular interest:

ff7_notification.caf
beuty_notification.caf

I think these are the right files.

To save the hassle I have uploaded them to my Google Drive


No, the photo app has all all the features iPhoto has (and more) and apple has discontinued iPhoto. Not to mention the design is much better and it has iCloud photo library implemented in it.


Integral to the operating system

In Mountain Lion, the Keyboard pane of System Preferences is not well suited to viewing all keyboard shortcuts. You can view a few at a time, but critically:

there's no overview.

Side note: there should be feedback to Apple.

Third party apps

The accepted answer to View All Assigned Keyboard Shortcuts draws attention to KeyCue.

KeyCue

Whilst KeyCue does not show all keyboard shortcuts, it can present a reasonably good overview of system (and some other) shortcuts alongside application shortcuts.

With Safari 6.1 on my Mac, for example:

Whether KeyCue can be as effective with apps that use X11 (Inkscape, for example), and with your menu bar app: I don't know.

Planning to avoid conflicts

With a good enough overview, you can plan properly – for not just one new shortcut, but for a range of shortcuts in the months and years ahead. Avoid conflicts before they occur.

Observing conflicts

If a conflict does occur: Loïc Wolff's answer should be good for some but not all types.

(A shortcut set in your unnamed menu bar app might be in conflict with something, but not appear as a conflict in System Preferences … and so on.)


Why is Chrome on MacOS inconsistently not recognizing 3 finger swipes?

i believe its something to do with the ublock origin extension. try turning the extension on and off and the function should work again. same issue was happening to me and unfortunately need to do this manually as a work around until they fix it. :(


How to delete all the music from the iPad I'm planning to sell?

You should do more than just remove the music.

Settings -> General -> Reset -> Erase All content and settings.

Effectively this sets the iPad back to the out of box state, so that the new owner can fully configure.  You may be prompted for an iCloud password if you have installed the Find My Iphone app.


When the apple store replaces a battery in a 13in retina MacBook Pro, do they replace the top case and keyboard/trackpad assembly too?

Did you bring it into a Apple store? If you did and asked I'm sure they would do it. If you sent it in, they don't have to do it, but maybe if you get a lucky the technician will do it.


Preview fails to open pdf with "The file couldn't be opened because you don't have permissions to view it". but I have these permissions

This is apparently a common problem, and one that Apple's support article below often does not fix.  It also occurs trying to save a new file.

The work-around both for an existing file that Preview wouldn't itself open, as well as for a new it says it can't save [which it actually already has saved], is this: navigate to the file in Finder and open via Cmd-O.  Then, back in Preview, click 'Cancel' and it will then proceed as if nothing strange occurred.

It's Apple's version of SNL's Rosanna Rosannadanna's 'Nevermind...'

This thread. suggests it's a permissions problem, and the referenced Apple Support page gives directions to apply permissions to the user folder via Get Info, then reset permissions in Terminal.

Immediately after I did this, Preview would save a screenshot, but shortly thereafter the same problem recurred.  It doesn't always do it.

My feedback to Apple when the 'fix' did not work was to point out that they just deflected the question.  I asked they address what to do when it didn't work.

It might be one of hundreds of OS issues Apple doesn't know how to fix.   Move on - install Mojave and hope it goes away?


MacBook Pro 13" Touch bar permanently blank

Your Touch Bar has failed and you need to have it serviced.

  The TouchID fingerprint sensor is working. But my touch bar has gone completely blank.

This very statement has come up a lot, even here on Ask Different. The touch bar and the fingerprint sensor are two completely different things - a very thin display and a fingerprint sensor - covered by a single pane of glass.  It’s a very common misconception to believe that the whole thing must be working because the fingerprint sensor is functional.

Think of the Touch Bar as a display, not unlike the display on an iPhone with the fingerprint sensor (i.e. iPhone 7+).  Many times the LCD would malfunction in someway, but you were still able to unlock it with the fingerprint reader.  The same thing is happening here.

You’ve done all the proper steps to diagnose it, but unfortunately, you’ve arrived at the only conclusion left - it’s dead.


No, this is currently not possible in the app. You can notify Apple that you would like this feature implemented using their Keynote feedback page:

http://www.apple.com/feedback/keynote.html


Disable voice control on iPhone 4s, ios7.1

There is a way to make home button not to work wheb the home is lock.
First activate Siri
setting >General> Siri > ON
Then
If iphone 5s (may be it work in iphone 4a)
setting >Id&passcode> there is an option where it tell to siri off when phone is lock.
make sure you put it off.
Thats it home button wont work when phone is lock.
Preventing voice control to make stupid random call


iPad E-Mail Attachments are destroyed on the Exchange account

I have exactly the same problem and deleted the Exchange account but this did not solve the problem. The Apple Store has never heard of this problem. Their suggestion was to restore to factory defaults.


How does the technology behind iTunes Match work?

In late 2009, Apple bought LaLa.com, a site that did pretty much what present day iTunes Match does.

It analyzed tracks you already owned, and allowed you to stream the ones you already had on your hard drive.

The way the technology works is by analyzing the waveform of the music file and matching it to an existing database of known song digital audio fingerprints.

Obviously, that's way oversimplifying, but the basic idea of why you don't have to upload a lot of your library, as iTunes Match and formerly LaLa.com have an existing db of song "fingerprints."


Do third-party USB ethernet adaptors work in Macbook Pro Retinas?

As very every electronic devices, there are good ones and there crappy ones.

Apple does not forbid the use of third party USB adapters.

Most of the time if the device does't work, it isn't Apple's fault but the device/driver problem.

So yes they should work.


Making a default window size and preview size for folders on a Mac

One way of doing that is to use the "Use as Default" in the View Options after you have adjusted the size.

Go to View in Menu bar then select show View Options.

Now adjust the size to your liking then click Use as Defaults.


Install a new SSD but keep all the files and everything

You need to make a complete duplicate ("clone") of your existing internal SSD module onto the new SSD.
You can do this with Disk Utility, but the third-party apps  SuperDuper! and Carbon Copy Cloner are actually better at it.

However, the real problem is having both SSDs attached at the same time to make the transfer. You either need to buy a USB enclosure for one of them, or you need to have an additional USB drive to copy the clone to as an intermediary. You also need to have MacOS on this USB drive, because you'll need to boot up to it.

(Having a standard USB drive may be more use to you in the long-run,; or you may already have one.)

First step is to copy the clone onto the USB drive. You can either make the entire disk a clone, or copy the clone as a disk image (file) onto the USB.

Next, you need to install the new SSD in your Mac so you can copy the clone back onto it, but of course you need to be booted to another volume in order to run the cloning app!

Boot to the USB drive, and then run the cloning software in the other direction.


How can I create an installable OS X Leopard DVD from a running system?

There is no way to create an installation disc from an installed Leopard system.

You can contact Apple for replacement installation discs. If I remember correctly they charge an amount for the service and shipping, at which point you might want to consider buying a more recent version of the OS instead.


I'm working from the iPhone app so it may be different on the iPad, but try this.

Browse to the file you want to move.
Tap the ellipsis ( ... ) at the top of the screen next to the folder name, and choose 'Edit'.
Tap the checkbox next to the file you want to move.
Tap 'Move' at the bottom of the screen.
Navigate to the folder you want to move the file to.  You can use the arrow at the top left to go to the parent folder.
When you are in the desired destination folder, tap 'Choose' at the bottom right corner of the screen.


Documents where the viewer can adjust features such as size colour font easily

It sounds like you want to create something in the EPUB format using iBooks Author, Pages, or another app.  You can see how these allow the kind of flexibility regarding typeface/color/font size that you seek by just viewing one in the iBooks app.


Where can I find an explained list of emoji (emoticons) used in iOS?

First, in System Preferences, under the Keyboard tab of the Keyboard Preference Pane, be sure Show Keyboard and Character Viewers in menu bar is checked.

Then, from the Keyboard menu in the menu bar, select Show Character Viewer. In the Character viewer pane, select Emoji. When you select an Emoji, on the right side of the pane, you get a large graphic of the Emoji and a text explanation of the shape.


Mail not responding when syncing with Google Apps Gmail account in OS X Yosemite 10.10.1

I turned off all "Show in IMAP" label settings in the Gmail web console.

I then added back only "All Mail."  I restarted Mail.app and reenabled the account.
Mail started normally and my email was available.

I still would like to know the source of the issue, but for now the problem is resolved.


How does the Lightning to 3.5mm adapter DAC compare to the internal iPhone DAC?

It is imperceptibly worse than the standard iPhone DAC + amplifier + headphone jack.

Regarding the debate over whether it contains its own DAC, iFixit looked into this, in collaboration with Creative Electron, by x-raying an adapter and investigated what they saw. According to iFixit, it is likely that it contains, at minimum, “a digital-to-analog converter (DAC) and amplifier, and its counterpart, an analog-to-digital-converter (ADC).” If you’re interested in learning more about that, read their article.

Also on that page, they refer to German computer tech magazine c’t, which conducted a detailed study into the sound quality of the iPhone 7 with adapter when compared to an iPhone 6s and an iPad Air with and without the adapter. Below is their English translation of c’t’s findings:

If you compare the contents of the various columns, you can see that there is very little difference in output with and without the adapter, though dynamic range and output power are very slightly reduced—well below the threshold of human perception. From iFixit’s article:

  So, is it a difference you are likely to notice? If you sit in a quiet room with a really, really good pair of headphones … and you’re a canine, the answer is: maybe.

The numbers do show a reduced output impedance on he new models, which will improve frequency response with certain headphones. For optimal performance over the full frequency range, headphones with x impedance should be driven by an amplifier with an output impedance of no more than x/8. The iPhone 6s, with its 4.5Ω impedance, can drive headphones with impedance greater than 36Ω, which excludes many smaller in-ear models. The adapter's 0.37Ω impedance can accurately drive headphones as low as 3Ω—lower than any on the market.

In summary, if you have high-quality in-ear monitors, you may experience a small but noticeable increase in audio quality with the new adapter. Everyone else will experience an imperceptible decrease.


What is mediaremoteagent under Activity Monitor?

mediaremoteagent is /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/MediaRemote.framework/Support/mediaremoteagent

The MediaRemote framework is used for managing unified media playback across macOS, determining which app is playing media and allowing you to control the media playback using macOS. For example, supporting the Now Playing widget in Notification Center, or the play/pause/skip keys on the keyboard.

The same framework is used on iOS, for features like Control Center playback controls. http://iphonedevwiki.net/index.php/MediaRemote.framework


You need a 3rd party app like

http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/24832/ipod-access-photo

(there are others, search Macupdate)

Note that the images will have been optimised for the iOS device so they may not ne as large as the ones on your Mac.

regards


Getting warning each time i open browser using Epichrome

I've occasionally seen this myself, but I've never had it happen every time I launch an Epichrome app. The first thing I'd try is this:

Quit all your Epichrome apps.
Run the main Google Chrome and go to the About Google Chrome page. If it shows an update pending, tell it to update and relaunch.
Once you have confirmed Chrome is up to date, try relaunching your Epichrome apps. You might get the warning the first time you run them, but subsequent runs should not show the warning.

If those steps don't help, please open an issue on the Github page, and I'll try to figure out what's going on.


How to use the new iPad (3rd gen) as a second screen?

There is an app called Air Display that will allow you to do this. It also recently got retina display support for the new iPad.

Some notes:

Use your iPad, iPhone or Mac as a second (or third) monitor with no
messy cables or wires.
Use your finger to draw directly on the screen. Try it with a Mac calculator app, painting tool, or music control surface!
Air Display works in both landscape and portrait configurations. Just rotate your screen, and it automatically reconfigures.

MacRumors and 9to5mac.com discussed the upcoming retnia support update coming soon last week. They issued a press release of some sort last week, many blogs covered this upcoming feature. They also covered this on their blog and how it will work.

Update - it looks like this feature is now available in version 1.6. More on MacStories as well.


How can I use different facebook account to sign in a game on iphone?

It’s because you are also signed in on Facebook in Safari browser.
iPhone first looks for Facebook login in safari before looking for it in the Facebook app.

Log out of Facebook in Safari browser.
The game will then use your Facebook app to determine which account to use for login


Disk Utility Error "Storage system verify or repair failed"

The error is not caused by enabling FileVault 2.

Context:

FileVault 2 uses Core Storage
to verify a logical volume that is in coreStorage world, Disk Utility will run both fsck_cs and more traditional fsck_hfs.

  fsck_cs does not perform an exhaustive validation, nor is it able to fix many
  of the inconsistencies that it does detect.

That said, I should not be immediately worried about the class of error given in your question.


How can I ask for input and then pass the variable in terminal?

These lines will prompt for your username and password:

echo -n 'Username: '
read username

echo -n 'Password: '
read -s password #The -s means silent, so your password is not shown in the terminal.

You can then use the variables $username and $password in the rest of your script, like this:

osascript -e 'tell app "System Events" to keystroke "'"$username"'" & tab & "'"$password"'"'


I noticed this very problem on my Macbook. I was trying to use port 8080 for some testing and I received the error that another process was already listening on it. My invocation of nmap returned different results depending on whether I was using sudo or not. This did not make sense to me.

I was really concerned when I could not figure out what was processes were listening on these ports using sudo lsof -P -n -iTCP | grep LIST. This led me to believe that there was malicious software intentionally hiding itself.

I ended up removing files from /Library/LaunchDaemons/ until I narrowed it down to the culprit. The application responsible for all these opened ports was the Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobile Client. Unfortunately, in order for this Cisco VPN client to work, it must have all these ports opened. Apparently, it is also responsible for the firewall rule addition that you reported with ipfw show.

It still boggles my mind why it does not show which process is responsible for the open ports when using lsof. No application should be able to avoid being listed using this method. Perhaps the reason for the process not being listed will be answered in another stackexchange question.


New screenshots/files not visible in Finder in Catalina, well visible when using a file manager like Nimble Commander Pro

The problem is solved after performing the macOS 10.15.1 update.

Seems it's not solved at all!
It happens once a while, with no reasons and when this happens, only a reboot helps!


Will two external displays harm my Mid 2015 MacBook Pro's integrated graphic card?

No. Your MacBook Pro is designed to work with multiple external monitors.
Of course the graphics card needs to push more pixels, therefore getting hotter. But your MacBook will speed up its fans appropriately to ensure proper cooling, so go ahead and enjoy your monitors.


com.apple.qtkitserver CPU usage on OS X Lion

Normally this is due to unfinished/corrupted video files in your downloads folder. I am assuming this is the case for you.

This should solve the problem:

Open Finder an navigate to your downloads folder.
Right-click and select Show View Options.
Untick Show Icon Preview.


Does an iPhone Photo Stream upload store a duplicate of the photo locally?

Yes one copy is stored for each "service" (for lack of a better word). So if it exists in your Camera Roll, Photo Stream, and a shared Photo Stream, there are three physical files on your phone.


How do you get system diagnostic files from macOS?

Individual crash reports are stored in ~/Library/Logs/CrashReporter but there is a system wide log collection tool called sysdiagnose.

Once you start experiencing the issue, hold down the
4 modifier keys and then press the period "." key. shift+control+option+command+.

After about 15 seconds, a Finder window will open with a sysdiagnose file highlighted.

This keyboard shortcut simply executes the sysdiagnose command, so if you are familiar with Terminal and want to pass in a process ID, you can get enhanced debugging information about that specific program. The key shortcut calls the tool with no arguments and captures the basic report only.


I can feel the edges of the button on both my black iPhone 4 even when the button isn't depressed - so your description alone doesn't necessarily mean there is a defect (but you should be very happy with your new purchase and it could very well be a defect).

If you can go to any retail (cell carrier or Apple) store and compare your device to others (or have friends with any iPhone 4 to compare) it will be very easy for anyone to agree if your phone's button is different than the rest. No matter where you bought the phone - Apple will exchange it if the hardware is defective at no cost.

You also can return a new phone to the seller within 30 days - but getting it in the hands of an Apple tech will be the fastest way to know it's covered or a defect - or if it's just a normal variation of the manufacturing process.


How to test speeds and strengths of wifi from macOS?

The WiFi Explorer tool will show you all the wifi connections your computer is capable of seeing. I live in a high rise apartment building and I receive signals from about 50 other modems. WiFi explorer will plot the signal strength of all these or the SNR of these signals. It also gives the channel number of each one. Its an excellent diagnostic tool for WiFi.
The basic package is $20 but there is a lite version that is free. I'm not familar with the lite version so I don't know what it does. Since it's free it is probably worth a test drive. The basic version has a 3 day free trial. There is also a Pro Version for $100. It has a 7 day trial.


Pages icon is shown twice on Launchpad - One icon works, the second one loads

Apparently, the solution was just to restart the laptop


Large amount of data in backups after update to Sierra

tmutil offers a compare option which list the changes between two TM backups.

 compare [-@acdefglmnstuEUX] [-D depth] [-I name] [snapshot_path | path1 path2]
         Perform a backup diff.

         If no arguments are provided, tmutil will compare the computer to the latest
         snapshot. If a snapshot path is provided as the sole argument, tmutil will compare
         the computer to the specified snapshot. If two path arguments are provided, tmutil
         will compare those two items to each other. tmutil will attempt to inform you
         when you have asked it to do something that doesn't make sense or isn't supported.

To get a list of snapshots use tmutil listbackups.


Copying all files of specific type to a specific folder using Mac's Terminal

You should be able to just run

t=${TMPDIR:-/tmp}/target
mkdir "$t"

find . -type f -name '*.STY' -exec cp {} "$t"/ \;

mv "$t"/* ./styleFiles_chekad/
rmdir "$t"

The idea behind using a temporary directory is to prevent find from also copying the files it already moved into ./styleFiles_chekad/.


How to get input volume level value in mac?

Sorry, I got that you wanted the input volume, I just failed to word that comment a bit better. I was just looking at that code and thinking "it would push you to the right direction". Kinda like, if there is a piece of code that is like get window width... and I wanted the height instead, then the logical step is probably get window height.

I did come back to this before, but I thought someone answered this already...

Here are some examples of setting input volume.

You can find get volume settings documentation here.

Input Volume

-- Get input volume
input volume of (get volume settings)

-- Set input volume
set volume input volume 40

-- Increment input volume (+)
set volume input volume ((input volume of (get volume settings)) + 5)

Output Volume

-- Get output volume
output volume of (get volume settings)

-- Set output volume
set volume output volume 40

-- Increment output volume (+)
set volume output volume ((output volume of (get volume settings)) + 5)

You can test these in the /Applications/Utilities/Script Editor.app. If you stick this: return (get volume settings) at the very  end, after you've set volume levels, the result panel will give you the current values at the bottom of the window. Of course you could have the Sound preferences window open as well.


Why my macbook 2015 13 inch hums when working with latest Xcode?

The 2015 MacBook Pro uses a Solid State drive, so there's nothing on it that going to "hum."

In fact, the only mechanical component in the MacBook Pro (besides the keys and LCD hinge, of course) is the fan.  The fan may be spinning up due to the increased load put on the CPU.  Additionally, it may be clogged with dust or the bearing is simply defective.

Try giving it a cleaning and see if the problem goes away.  There's no need to "reset" your drive as this would have no effect.


How to watch a 1080p video on retina display with a 1:1 pixel ratio (with no scaling up)?

You can't watch any full screen video that is not in the exact native display resolution without scaling. At least in my knowledge.

The question is - is the scaling good or not. You may try different players.

If you want pixel to pixel mapping, you can only set the player size to 100% of the video, and it'll show as one of the windows on the screen, depending on the video file resolution - but only that way will you have the pixel-accurate playback.

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong.


Link information between spreadsheets in iPad using Numbers

No - there isn't an URL scheme or addressing scheme to make that sort of link.

This isn't something that even works on the Mac version of Numbers so at least there is parity across the OS in this case.


brew: how to delete outdated version of package

The command you want is cleanup -- running brew cleanup will remove packages that are on disk, but no longer installed.

> brew help cleanup
brew cleanup [--prune=days] [--dry-run] [-s] [formulae]:
    For all installed or specific formulae, remove any older versions from the
    cellar. In addition, old downloads from the Homebrew download-cache are deleted.

    If --prune=days is specified, remove all cache files older than days.

    If --dry-run or -n is passed, show what would be removed, but do not
    actually remove anything.

    If -s is passed, scrubs the cache, removing downloads for even the latest
    versions of formulae. Note downloads for any installed formulae will still not be
    deleted. If you want to delete those too: rm -rf $(brew --cache)

For example:

> brew cleanup
Removing: /usr/local/Cellar/awscli/1.10.19... (2,955 files, 22.3M)
Removing: /usr/local/Cellar/git/2.8.2... (1,418 files, 30.5M)
Removing: /usr/local/Cellar/imagemagick/6.9.3-7... (1,459 files, 17.9M)
Removing: /usr/local/Cellar/libgcrypt/1.7.0... (17 files, 1.5M)
Removing: /usr/local/Cellar/libgpg-error/1.21... (19 files, 419.4K)
Removing: /usr/local/Cellar/libksba/1.3.3... (13 files, 343K)
Removing: /usr/local/Cellar/mercurial/3.7.3... (386 files, 4.7M)
Removing: /usr/local/Cellar/node/6.0.0... (3,655 files, 38.8M)
Removing: /usr/local/Cellar/openssl/1.0.2g... (1,678 files, 12.0M)
Removing: /usr/local/Cellar/vim/7.4.1795... (1,687 files, 22.6M)
Removing: /Library/Caches/Homebrew/git-2.8.2.el_capitan.bottle.tar.gz... (11.2M)
Removing: /Library/Caches/Homebrew/imagemagick-6.9.3-7.el_capitan.bottle.tar.gz... (7M)
Removing: /Library/Caches/Homebrew/libgcrypt-1.7.0.el_capitan.bottle.tar.gz... (565.4K)
Removing: /Library/Caches/Homebrew/libgpg-error-1.21.el_capitan.bottle.tar.gz... (130.8K)
Removing: /Library/Caches/Homebrew/libksba-1.3.3.el_capitan.bottle.tar.gz... (126.6K)
Removing: /Library/Caches/Homebrew/node-6.0.0.el_capitan.bottle.tar.gz... (10.9M)
Removing: /Library/Caches/Homebrew/openssl-1.0.2g.el_capitan.bottle.tar.gz... (3.6M)
Removing: /Library/Caches/Homebrew/vim-7.4.1795.tar.gz... (12.0M)
==> This operation has freed approximately 196.4M of disk space.

I have a Monday morning regimen of:

brew update
brew upgrade
brew cleanup

That brings me up to date on Homebrew, then all of my installed brews and then it frees up disk space by removing old brews that are no longer referenced. For brews that I need to keep at a specific version, I use brew pin to hold them there so I can still run this simple, three command, chain to update everything else around the pinned packages.


Apple Private Email Relay address - can I use it to request password reset?

Yes, in general you can request a password reset using the Apple private relay address. There is a small caveat in that the sender of the the password reset mail must authenticate their emails by registering their outbound email domains and using the Sender Policy Framework (SPF). This is a requirement for app developers / companies that wish to use the private email relay service that comes with "Sign in with Apple".

The emails sent to the private relay email address are forwarded on to your real email address and are received just like any other mail.

Yes, mails sent to the private relay email address is "rerouted" to the address associated with the AppleID (one of the verified email addresses).

You can read the full details on how this works from Apple here:
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/sign_in_with_apple/sign_in_with_apple_js/communicating_using_the_private_email_relay_service


Rating or reviewing an app from the App Store on iOS always silently fails. How to fix?

Got a working solution after filing a support ticket.

Click "Write a review" to open the long-form review UI. Don't click on the stars at the top; if any number of them are already highlighted when you open the long-form review UI, click to the left of the first one (just like if you wanted to give the app an invisible 0 stars rating) to clear it.

Write the title and explanation on your review as normal, click Send, and you will be prompted to assign a number of stars. Now you can click the number of stars and save/send the review.


How to decrease the font size / zoom out in Chrome on a mobile device

Try enabling “Text Accessibility”

Type chrome://flags into a Chrome tab.
Search for "Enable text accessibility in web pages"
Select "Enable"

Force quit Chrome and restart.

Answer sourced from a Google help page about the same topic.


How to get rid of a second CrashPlan icon in the menu bar?

This happened to me when I installed CrashPlan Mac menubar app over a year ago, and when a recent version of CrashPlan included its own menubar. If that's the case for you, see if you can find the CrashPlan Menubar app (in your Applications folder?) and just delete it.


I don't know about the applescript but I know how to do it terminal.

Use open command in the Terminal to open About This Mac window.

open -a "About This Mac"


What can cause a (software) keyboard failure on a unibody macbook?

Are you able to boot into Recovery Mode and test the keyboard there?

  To start your computer from Recovery, restart your Mac and hold down the Command and R keys at startup.

If that works, consider re-installing OS X or at least booting into Safe Mode to disable errant extensions and plugins.


How to clean install OSX without formatting drive?

There is no easy way to do this. You can't clean install and keep your files because those files live as part of the OS. The OS knows where they are, what they are, the permissions etc.  Clean installing would be removing all parts of the OS and installing a the new OS and the links to those files, where it would not know it needs those files or what they are.

Alternatively you can try:

Create a New Partition (Say of 200GB)
Install a clean copy of OS X there
Copy 100GB of your files to the new partition
Delete those exact files on the old partition
Shrink old partition and expand new partition
And repeat last 3 steps till you have all files

But the best solution would be:

Buy external HD
Copy all files to external
Reinstall OS X
Copy files back


Can't open files after changing username

Make sure that all the permissions are correct on your home folder.
You can use the ACL tool on the Recovery HD to do this:

Boot into the Recovery HD using ⌘R.
Run resetpassword in Terminal (available from Utilities → Terminal).
Select your account from the drop-down list.
Click the Reset button for Reset Home Directory Permissions and ACLs.


brew doctor warning about Python config scripts

The main thing it to be sure your chosen version of python is first in the path as we transition away from python 2 on macOS.

Until you have a broken package, this is a warning and not an error, so just post your next build error with some details and we might be able to help if you have an actual problem. Also, if you have disabled SIP and changed your base OS, maybe test a clean install onto USB external drive, validate this warning doesn’t exist when you boot to the new OS and then try migrating your data over, this could just be your system isn’t “stock” enough.


I had the same problem and found the answer here: Mavericks update broke ssh key-based authentication

Basically, you can't use authorized_keys2 anymore (an old default). Rename the file to "authorized_keys" and it should work again (it did so for me).

mv ~/.ssh/authorized_keys2 ~/.ssh/authorized_keys


How can I administer my Lion Server from a Mountain Lion client

This seems to be an instance where Apple's push for the latest and greatest causes real world IT issues.

Per Apple's support article, HT1822 - OS X Server: Admin tools compatibility information, using Server Tools for mismatched client and server OS versions just isn't supported:

  To administer Lion Server from a client with a different version of OS X, connect to the server using Screen Sharing or Apple Remote Desktop. You can also use Workgroup Manager 10.8 on Mountain Lion to connect to Lion Server.

I'm not sure how useful Workgroup Manager is to you, but it may be of some value.

There's also using the command line tools over SSH, which may or may not be more desirable than Screen Sharing/Remote Desktop to you. Apple's Advanced Lion Administration guide has info on how to use the command line tools for most tasks


Removing Advanced MacCleaner Icon from Lauchpad

Pretty sure this has already been answered here. They used a terminal command to remove the application. This is the command that was listed:

sqlite3 $(sudo find /private/var/folders -name com.apple.dock.launchpad)/db/db "DELETE FROM apps WHERE title='APP_NAME_CASE_SENSITIVE';" && killall Dock


Lost folders after upgrading to Catalina. Any chance to recover them?

There is a 3rd party app called Stellar Data Recovery. There is a free trial period that can be used to recover your files. I used it about 8 months ago for some lost files and it recovered them for me. It was relatively easy to use as I did it myself and I'm not great at that type of thing. The software sells for $80 but it has a free download.


Locating the iBooks folder in iCloud Drive

I've been trying to figure out the same thing. I did discover that in terminal you can navigate to the following directory to see your iBooks:

/Users/YourUserName/Library/Mobile Documents/iCloud~com~apple~iBooks/Documents

I have not figured out how to go here in Finder other than the method that you listed.


How to pass the endless verifying status on iMessage or FaceTime activation when phone number is wrong?

I assume you changed phones/data plans and restored your iPhone from backup?

The only time I encountered quite important problems with my iPhone's setup was when I made a backup (in iTunes) sold my iPhone (3G) flew to a new country bought a new iPhone (4) with a new provider and setup the new iPhone by restoring restoring from backup. From that point my network settings went bad and I experienced numerous issues (visual voicemail, FaceTime and internet access were not working properly or at all).

To solve the problem I had to restore the iPhone and then setup the iPhone as a new iPhone. It was the only thing that worked for me. You could try that.


Friend bought Android phone, but my iPhone keeps trying to send them iMessages. Any fix?

You can ask your friend to Deregister iMessage. It can be done both on the iPhone or if they no longer have access to the iPhone, on the Web.

See the linked Apple Support article to learn more:

Deregister iMessage on your iPhone or online

Since your friend has already moved to an Android phone, it would be easier for them to deregister online. Here's the webpage that can be used to deregister iMessage:

Deregister and Turn Off iMessage - Apple Support


OS X Lion - download once and install on multiple computers

It will be, as announced on WWDC 2011 keynote.
It will be delivered via the App Store for $29, and you can use it to update your other authorized Macs as well.
I'm not to keen with the details. Sorry.

Link to the keynote:
http://events.apple.com.edgesuite.net/11piubpwiqubf06/event/


Scheduling a "sleep" event on Power Manager

Below are the steps to creating an event to run an AppleScript when the battery level drops below 30%:

Power Manager > File (menu) > New Empty Event;
Double-click new Untitled event to open in editor;
Add a trigger > Power Remaining > Battery 30% Left
Add an action > Run Script > AppleScript
AppleScript action > Cog > Edit
Copy and paste in the AppleScript below
Apply then Save

AppleScript to copy and paste into event:

#!/usr/bin/osascript
try
    with timeout of 10 seconds
        display dialog "Your battery has dropped below 30%" with icon caution buttons {"OK"} default button 1
        say "Low battery"
    end timeout
on error -- likely timeout
    tell application "Finder" to sleep
end try

I wrote Power Manager. If you need support for Power Manager, please get in touch via support@dssw.co.uk.


How can I disconnect bluetooth headphones from an Apple Watch without "forgetting device"?

You can turn off the bluetooth feature on the device itself. If you want to continue to use that device nearby your apple watch then you'll have no other choice but to unpair it, unless you can pair it with the other bluetooth device first.

If you pair with multiple devices, then you dont have to disconnect them. But if you disconnect them and unpair, then yes you'll have to re-pair them.


Stop screenshots on my macbook appearing on my ipad

This is probably universal clipboard as described in Use Universal Clipboard to copy and paste between your Apple devices:

The content is automatically added to the clipboard of your other
nearby device. It remains there briefly, or until you replace it by
copying something else on either device.

It also mentioned in last paragraph of Take a screenshot on your Mac:

To copy a screenshot to the Clipboard, press and hold the Control key
while you take the screenshot. You can then paste the screenshot
somewhere else. Or use Universal Clipboard to paste it on another
Apple device.


Is there a quick way to connect bluetooth headphones to Apple TV (4th gen) when the in-app menu doesn't support it?

When you're on the main menu or in the "TV" app you can press and hold the Play/Pause button which will bring up a simple menu for selecting your audio output from the available (powered on) devices:


ios Shortcuts: get index of selected list item

Based on the comments, this Apple Support site held the answer.  Use "Set Name" to get the value:

To set a custom name for an item that an action outputs, such as an
image in the Get Latest Photos action, place a Set Name action in
between the Get Latest Photos action and the Choose from List action.
When the shortcut is run, the custom name (rather than the default
name, such as “IMG_0365”) is applied to the image output from the Get
Latest Photos action.
If you use the Choose from List action with the Dictionary action, all
of the keys in the dictionary are displayed when you tap “Add new
item.” For each key you select, such as Number, Boolean, or Array, the
corresponding values are passed as output.


You shouldn't need to explicitly load your daemon in this situation;
  plists in /Library/LaunchDaemons/ are auto-loaded at system startup
  (provided their format, permissions etc are correct). You only need
  launchctl load if you want to load a daemon after startup, or if it's
  been explicitly disabled and you want to override that.

– Gordon Davisson


I want to show a file in an AppleScript bundle, but shell returns: file not found

The type shell builtin is used to see how it's arguments would be interpreted as a command.

Try replacing type with cat and see if that does what you expect.


How do I give a CGI script permission to access Calendar?

The nobody user is non-interactive and doesn’t have calendars anyways. You will need to have some component (maybe another custom app/process) running as you to deliver the calendar info.

You really have two options, one of which is very bad.

Firstly, you could have your CGI scripts run as you. This isn’t hard but super dangerous and not recommended.

Secondly, you can build what is essentially a calendar proxy. This could be another program (running as you) which ever five minutes reads the calendar data and writes it out to a file which nobody, the account, can read. You already seem to be familiar and working just fine with calendars so this shouldn’t be an issue, it’s just another script that you schedule with cron.

Another thing, though I’m really not sure if it will work for nobody, is that you can run sudo su nobody and then launch it. Since OSX knows that the PTTY is attached to your user session it will show the prompt there for you to accept. While you still won’t be able to access your users calendars, this trick is useful if you have to use these sorts of permissions as root whom also doesn’t a graphical session.


Go to Applications - Utilities click Boot Camp Assistant follow the step by step instructions

Format the partitioned drive first
Give the partition at least 40GBs
Make sure you have a valid copy of windows

If you need more help here are a couple of videos with step by step instructions:

How to Install windows 10
Make a Bootable USB_Drive


This means that you don't have an instance of PostgreSQL running right now.

Try to rerun your instance of PostgreSQL:

pg_ctl -D /usr/local/var/postgres start


I cannot log in due to changed keyboard layout

Method 1: Go into the Guest User(if it is there) and change the language.

Method 2: See Mac os X - locked outside my account (language!).

Method 3: Try booting into recovey mode(holding cmd+R at boot). Then you should be able to change the keyboard layout(in the menu bar).

Method 4: See https://superuser.com/q/871277.


Admin can't select user to reset password

The system won’t let you reset the password if it detects that account is currently logged in.

Obvious cause is fast user switching and the other user is logged in.
Less obvious cause, things are messed up.

In case 2, try reboot and safe mode boot or disabling automatic log in to be sure the other account(s) are clear before going deeper.


Unable to open the MacBook Pro mid-2014 lid with single hand

No, you should be able to open the machine without using two hands by simply lifting the screen, you may find the machine lifts off a little, but it should open without two hands, if not then there is something wrong, but that doesn't meant they aren't wrong, perhaps it is not fixable without replacing a fair chunk of the machine.


So I tried to clone the drive, but had an error part of the way through that I did not notice. My solution has now been to reinstall OSX onto a new Fusion drive then restore from Time Machine. The clone method should work as far as I can tell though!


Where does Safari store the homepage URL?

In older Safari versions you could set it via defaults write com.apple.Safari HomePage -string "http://example.com". Safari seems to have done away with that at least since MacOS 10.11 (and possibly earlier). From this device management thread it looks like it's stored in iCloud, but in a rather opaque way.


Apple Watch: Ring Close Notifications even on Silent and Do Not Disturb

I'm not 100% sure what you want to do can be done via the Do Not Disturb function, but the place to check is within the Watch app on your iPhone.

Do Not Disturb

On your iPhone launch the Watch app
Swipe up and tap on General
Tap on Do Not Disturb
Now make sure you enable the Workout Do Not Disturb option
If it's not already, you may also want to try disabling the Mirror iPhone option

If the above doesn't work, then try manually disabling Activity Notifications as required (see below).

Activity Notifications

Before your morning workout:

Launch the Watch app on your iPhone
Tap on Notifications
Tap on Activity
Disable the Goal Completions option
Disable anything else you may want to

I think this should work, but then you'll need to remember to enable it again after your workout. Of course, you could just keep it disabled and use one of the Activity complications to monitor the status of your rings throughout the day.


Rename a music playlist from "Purchased" to actual album name on iPhone 6, iOS 9?

You cannot rename 'Purchased' - that is where all your 'officially purchased from Apple' [whether you had to pay for it or not] music sits.

You are free to make a new playlist & copy any tracks you wish to it, exactly as you would for any playlist, on phone, pad or Mac.


What is this qemu-system-aarch64 process and why is it using almost 3 GB of RAM on my M1 Mac

This process belongs to an application you've installed yourself. To find out more, select the process in Activity Monitor and press Cmd-I to open the Process Information window. You should see the name of the process which started it at the top, and the path to the binary itself near the top of the 3rd tab (open files and ports).


Cannot mount/unmount external hard drive on Mac

I just had this happen to me. If it won't repair on Disk Utility, you can try Disk Warrior. You might get lucky, however in my experience since the drive wouldn't mount, it was impossible to get anything.
I was able to get some data back through a data recovery service, which cost around $220, but I am discovering that some if the data is corrupt and won't restore.
I would recommend that you take the drive to a professional. Anything you can do might do more harm.
And have a double-backup plan.


Can I use the iPhone 4's camera via my Mac?

I've tried this, but unfortunately it doesn't work with iChat and PhotoBooth but works perfectly with Skype and other communications tools :

iWebcamera iPhone App ($4.99)


Which version(s) of Mac OS X have Ruby installed by default?


Good question. Before browser makers figured out cmd-q was awfully dangerous without at least a prompt that the user really wants to close 60 tabs, I always changed the keyboard shortcut for the Quit command on my main browser. You can disable shortcuts via Keyboard Shortcuts.

Open System Preferences: Keyboard.
Click Keyboard Shortcuts in the top pill shaped tab.
Click the Applications Shortcuts icon in the left hand column.
Choose Safari from the drop down menu of offered applications (looks like the default list is applications which have been opened in the last  three months).

Enter the exact name of the menu item you wish to disable. In this case "Exit Full Screen".
Add an alternative keyboard shortcut (in this illustration, I added Ctrl-Opt-Cmd-c)

This is what the finished result looks like.

Test (alternative Application Shortcuts do now always work exactly as planned).

You can do the same thing with Keyboard Maestro (and much much more). Apple's feature is probably taken/adopted from Peter N. Lewis's implementation (which existed for many years before Apple came up with the feature in Snow Leopard). In Keyboard Maestro, you can also assign the same shortcut to multiple applications. In Keyboard Maestro, you can also take over keyboard commands which do not have menu items (complex applications like Photoshop come to mind: there are so many commands that many of the commands have no menu equivalent). It's also easier to move these preferences around from computer to computer if you are using Keyboard Maestro.

On the other hand the Apple version exists on all Macs past 10.6.8, including your less technical girlfriend's MacBook Pro. I use both depending on whether I want a quick fix or if I'm building permanent tools/shortcuts for an application I use professionally on multiple computers. Keyboard Maestro does far more than just substitute keyboard shortcuts: you can write sequential macros with pauses to automate what would otherwise be five or ten keypress and click type actions, i.e. redirecting, address and send email to someone else in the company with a single keyboard command.


I have had the same question and found no answer. So I myself developed a Safari extension named Tab Space which could handle this task for me. Try it if you want.


Check whether macOS host is affected by serious vulnerability that enables access to the root superuser

According to Apple's support document on Security Update 2017-001 macOS Sierra 10.12.6 and earlier are not affected by the vulnerability:

  Not impacted: macOS Sierra 10.12.6 and earlier

If you want to use terminal to find out if you're running 10.12.6 you may want to use the command

sw_vers -productVersion

or refer to the question How to find out Mac OS X version from Terminal? on superuser.


External monitor usually not working on MBP

There is probably something wrong with the adapter cable. When it's straightened out, and the monitor is connected after the system has started, everything is working okay. I've tested that for a couple of weeks now.


AppleScript do shell will not work on Application Support directory

If you are hardcoding, without testing if the file exists, then use the following example:

set foo to quoted form of "/Users/vader/someapp.app/Contents/Resources/Scripts/foobar.txt"
set bar to quoted form of "/Library/Application Support/"
try
    do shell script "cp " & foo & space & bar with administrator privileges
end try

If you are calling it from the script within the application bundle,  then use the following example:

on run
    try
        set foo to POSIX path of (path to me as string) & "Contents/Resources/Scripts/foobar.txt"
        set bar to quoted form of "/Library/Application Support/"

        tell application "System Events"
            if exists file foo then
                tell current application
                    do shell script "cp " & quoted form of foo & space & bar with administrator privileges
                end tell
            end if
        end tell
    on error eStr number eNum
        display dialog eStr & " number " & eNum buttons {"OK"} default button 1 with icon caution
        return
    end try
end run

Note: When working with the do shell script command, POSIX pathnames must be used, not aliases. Macintosh HD is not valid in a POSIX path, just in an alias. In a POSIX path of the startup disk, everything starts in the root of the volume: /

Example:

tell application "Finder" to get name of startup disk as alias
tell application "Finder" to get POSIX path of (name of startup disk as alias)

Returns:

Macintosh HD
/


Time Machine backup keeps restarting over and over again

This problem appears to have been caused by either lack of free space, Spotlight, or both.

First I had to free up space so that I had at least 30GB free. Then boot in to recovery mode (+R on start), open the Terminal and disable SIP (System Integrity Protection) through this command:

csrutil disable

Then I disabled Spotlight through this command:

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

After doing this I was able to finish my backup.


Apple or BASH script to automatically install multiple apps

Is it possible that the editor you are using to create the script is using "smartquotes" instead of regular double quotes, and so it's not treating the quoted material as a single parameter?

Try getting rid of the quotes and escaping the spaces with \ and see if that works. If it does, then make sure you're using a plain old text editor that won't mess with your quotes.


MBA 13" 2011 (with TB) as a display for PS3

You'll need to look for HDMI capture boxes. The best one for your situation would seem to be these Blackmagic products, specifically the Thunderbolt one (it says "shipping in January").

I doubt there'll be many (if any) HDMI-USB capture boxes, except maybe USB 3.0, which your Air doesn't have.

Of course, if what you want to record (and maybe watch) is HDCP protected, you won't be able to. Be aware that any digitizing solution will introduce lag so this is not at all an optimal solution for gaming where you might care about reaction speeds.


Unable to install Signal from App Store on iOS

Either the app developer is pushing out a price/code change, the App Store servers are down, or there's a problem with the app within the App Store.

When developers make a change to the app, including price, it can takes several hours for the change to propagate through the Apple servers.  You can keep trying for a few hours and see if this clears itself.

If after 24 hours you still see the same error, you can contact the developer's support (usually from their website) and let them know.  It's not uncommon for this happen when the developer hasn't made any changes at all; there's dozens of comments about this throughout the years in the Apple developer forum.

The developer is the one losing revenue so it would be in their best interest to contact Apple about the problem and work with them to resolve it.


Is it possible to turn off the Two-Factor Authentication for an Apple ID?

You are no longer able to turn off two-factor authentication beyond two weeks from enabling the feature. Previously, this was limited to accounts created in iOS 10.3 or macOS Sierra 10.12.4 and later.
Please refer to the Apple Support Document, Two-factor authentication for Apple ID for technical details regarding Two-Factor Authentication.

Can I turn off two-factor authentication after I’ve turned it on?
If you already use two-factor authentication, you can no longer turn it off. Certain features in the latest versions of iOS and macOS require this extra level of security, which is designed to protect your information. If you recently updated your account, however, you can unenroll for a period of two weeks. Just open your enrollment confirmation email and click the link to return to your previous security settings. Keep in mind, this makes your account less secure and means that you can't use features that require a higher level of security.


How to downgrade from iOS 4.3.5 to iOS 4.2.1?

Firstly, search Google for "download ios 4.2.1" and download the correct version for your device. If it's in a zip, unzip it, but you should end up with an .ipsw file.

Open iTunes and select your device on the left. Shift-Click (or Option-Click on Mac) on 'Restore' and select the file you downloaded.

This should allow you to install whichever version of ios you have the .ipsw for


Which iPhoto folders are least useful to save space?

Before any of these, I would check your iPhoto's trashcan. Most people don't realize that the iPhoto trashcan is completely separate from the systemwide trashcan. Depending on how many photos you take, this can sometimes amounts to GB of space quite easily. I would otherwise leave those individual folders alone, as iPhoto uses those to generate the pictures that are in your iPhoto library. Depending on which folder you target (such as originals), you may end up with a bunch of question marks in your iPhoto library where images used to be. The best way to get rid of pictures is to manage them from within the iPhoto application itself.


How to restore a backup to a user account?

You have software that came with your Mac that will allow you to transfer that over.

First you need to delete the new account you created for her. Delete that via users and groups under system preferences.

Once that is done log into your account, which I hope is an admin account. Under /Applications/Utilities there is an application called Migration Assistant.

With Migration Assistant you can import her Time Machine back-up onto your computer and it'll import her entire back-up into her own user account. Which is why you needed to delete the account you created for her. You need to not have an account on the machine that matches the name of the account that is on the Time Machine backup.

When importing from her back-up you can choose which parts of the back-up to pull in, Applications, Documents etc... you can avoid redudancy if you have any of the same applications on your machine.

Here is Apple's support article about Migration Assistant.


For the life of me can't find where terminal alias's are stored

bash aliases you create by running the alias command are not stored anywhere, they are gone as soon as you exit the shell.
To make persistant aliases which will be available in all newly executed bash shells add the definition to ~/.bashrc. You can then also run source ~/.bashrc after adding new definitions to have them included in a running shell.


Any ideas why Mavericks is slowing down due to BetterSnapTool?

(This answers the second question about how to automate restarting BetterSnapTool. Since I haven't experienced the issue described and have no second-hand explanations, I can't answer the question of why this is happening.)

Here is a quick and simple AppleScript I whipped up that works for restarting BetterSnapTools:

tell application "BetterSnapTool"
quit
end tell

delay 2 -- Wait for BetterSnapTool to close

tell application "BetterSnapTool" to activate

If you want to set this to automatically run every, say, 6 hours I think your best bet is to create a Launch Daemon using launchd. A quick presentation of this approach can be found here. For more information, check the entry on creating Launch Daemons in the apple developer's library.

You said "low overhead", which I took to mean using only methods native to OS X. If you're fine with third-party software, though, this GUI application for cron (the precursor to launchd) scheduling seems promising (but I haven't tried it so can't be certain).


In- order to Fix the Automatic iCloud Backup not Working issue on iPhone do the following steps ;

Step:1

Delete your iCloud profile in iPhone

Step:2

Now again reconnect the icloud profile

Step:3

Now you get message sync automatically..

Well also , check this below article to troubleshoot this issue ;

https://support.apple.com/en-in/HT203271

Hope this helps...


Mavericks - terminal change default printer paper size

The setting in System Preferences changes the DefaultPaperID key in ~/Library/Preferences/org.cups.PrintingPrefs.plist. Try to change that key instead:

defaults write org.cups.PrintingPrefs DefaultPaperID 154x216

Quit and reopen applications to apply the changes.

defaults read com.apple.print.custompapers shows the IDs of custom paper sizes.


In which file Terminal.app stores its windows?

It is stored in the user's Saved Application State folder, located at:

/Users/$USER/Library/Saved Application State/com.apple.Terminal.savedState


How to make inactive when I close application window by Command + W

I'm not sure you can really have both…

Telling Excel to close a window doesn't tell Excel to quit. It doesn't actually tell it anything other than you closed a window. It sits there waiting for you to tell it what to do next; it can't guess what your next action is going to be.

Of course, if you Quit it, then it goes away & the last-used app will be frontmost.

Clicking the desktop is the quickest way to bring the Finder to the front.


Install macOS on a MacBook with a blank HD without having another working Mac or old Mac HD?

How do I purchase and install the latest compatible OS on this new-old MacBook?

The recent versions of macOS are available for free of cost to install and download from Apple (starting with OS X Mavericks 10.9).

The easiest way to install macOS onto a blank hard disk in your MacBook Pro would be via Internet recovery.

Refer to the Apple Support article, About macOS Recovery to get instructions on how to install macOS over the Internet.

The availability of Internet recovery and the latest supported OS will depend on the make and model of your MacBook Pro.


How to force Fake.app to connect an HTML element by XPath (instead of "id" attribute)

Developer of Fake here.

First, make sure you understand the concept of "Connecting" in Fake.

Fake allows you to specify an HTML Element via one of several methods:

HTML id attribute
HTML name attribute
CSS Selector
XPath Expression
arbitrary JavaScript Expression

Connecting is an automatic way to specify an Element. Fake can only connect an Element using one of two methods:

HTML id attribute
XPath Expression

If you want to specify via one of the other methods you must do so "by hand".

When you connect an Action to an HTML Element, Fake will first try to specify the connected Element using the HTML id attribute. If that is not possible (becuase the Element has no id attribute), Fake will try to specify the connected Element using XPath.

Via id is the default because it is efficient and easily understandable.

Via XPath is the fallback because it is always possible, but less efficent and less easliy understandable.

However, there are times when you might prefer to connect an Action to an Element, but specify the Element via XPath instead of id. This is possible via the steps below:

First add a connectable Action (like Set Value of HTML Element) to your Workflow.
Before connecting, change the specifier type to for XPath.
Then connect as normal. Hold the control key (⌃) while dragging from the Action to an Element on the page.

The Element will now be specified via XPath, instead of id.


How to unlock admin locked preference panes

If your employer is locking preference panes, it is for reasons they have determined are necessary for their (and your) protection.

Most modern MDM (Mobile Device Management) systems can detect such subversions, self-repair if successfully subverted, and report back to the administrators.

Be forewarned, attempts to subvert such restrictions placed on your computer, (which I assume your employer owns, not you,) can in some cases be a firing offense.

One recourse you have is to ask if certain restrictions can be relaxed if they interfere with your job duties.


Can a visitor play their Apple Music account through my Apple TV?

To answer your second question, no they cannot login without you logging out.
They can, however, use AirPlay from their iOS device in Control Center (swipe up from the bottom of the screen) to send music from their device to the Apple TV.
The Apple support article talks about conference room mode but the important part to pay attention to is the discussion of AirPlay security settings.

To restrict access to your Apple TV through AirPlay, you can choose from two security settings. Go to Settings > AirPlay > Security and choose the setting that's right for you:
To give access only to users in the same room as your Apple TV, choose Passcode or Onscreen Code. Each time someone with an AirPlay enabled device tries to connect to your Apple TV, their device asks for the passcode shown on your TV.
To give access only to users who have your password, choose Password. Then any user who wants to use AirPlay on your Apple TV needs to ask you for your password. You might want to change your password periodically, because after someone enters it on their device, that device remembers the password forever.