Is there a way to track my look ups in the OSX dictionary?

You can't do this with the normal three-finger tap, but if you make an Automator service with some Applescript, you can trigger it on a keyboard shortcut. (Note: This shows a full dictionary window, not a nice popover. I don't think there's a way to do it like that.)

To make this service, open Automator.app, in the /Applications/ folder.

Choose Service.

Then, in the Library on the left, search for AppleScript, and drag Run Applescript over.

Here's the script to paste in.

on run {input, parameters}

    set logPath to "Desktop/words.txt"
    --You can change the path in quotes
    --to the file you want to store the
    --words you look up.

    set lookUpWord to quoted form of (input as string)
    --This sets the word to the selected text, from input.

    do shell script "cd; echo " & lookUpWord & " >> " & quoted form of logPath
    --This appends the word to the log file.

    do shell script "open dict://" & lookUpWord
    --This opens the word in Dictionary.

    return input
end run

Click the hammer to compile. It should look like this:

The last thing to do is assign a keyboard shortcut.
Save the workflow (I called mine "look up"), and open System Preferences.
Go to Keyboard > Keyboard Shortcuts > Services.

Select your service (It should be under Text), then click "add shortcut" and type the shortcut you'll be using to trigger it.

I like to use command ⌘+control ^ and a letter, because those are almost guaranteed not to be already in use by an application.

That should work! Just select a word by double-clicking, then type your keyboard shortcut to use it.


Outlook 2011: Keyboard shortcut to assign categories?

Yes, you can do this.

Open System Preferences.
Select Keyboard.
Select Keyboard Shortcuts.
Select Application Shortcuts in the left navigation pane.
Click the + button to create a new shortcut.
Choose Microsoft Outlook.app in the Application drop-down menu.
Enter the exact name of the menu command you want to add. E.g. for an Outlook category named "Project X" enter that category name, "Project X."
Click in the Keyboard Shortcut field and press a unique keyboard sequence such as Control-Option-T.
Click the Add button.

For some more ideas about how you could add keyboard shortcuts to Outlook:Mac, check out "Unleash new uses for keyboard commands in Outlook for Mac" in the Office:Mac Help Blog.


Difference between installing an application on OS X and Windows

Installing Apps
There are several ways to install applications on OS X.

The App Store: Another way to install applications is from the App Store. Apps from the App Store are first downloaded as a .dmg to a system directory, and then installed to the /Applications/ directory.
Apps downloaded from the App Store are sandboxed, which means that they can only read from and write to specific folders. They're also managed a bit better when it comes to the installation and uninstall process.

From the Web/Drag-and-Drop: OS X applications are sometimes distributed as standalone folders with a .app extension or inside of an installer with a .pkg extension. Sometime programs are distributed on a .dmg, which is a disk image containing the .app and perhaps a Readme. Apps downloaded outside of the App Store might not run unless you secondary-click on them to run, and then grant permission. This is a security feature. (It's similar in appearance to the Windows UAC, but it works differently.)
Applications are typically installed into /Applications/ but each user can have their own applications directory inside of their home folder, located at /Users/{user}/Applications/, or ~/Applications/ for short. Apps placed into the personal ~/Applications directory will show up in Launchpad and Spotlight searches.

Package Managers/The Command Line: It's fairly common (especially for developers) to install apps via the command line with homebrew, macports, or even as Ruby gems. These sometimes land in other directories, such as /usr/local/bin/ If you're not sure where a package manager is putting your files, that information is readily available on the internet.

User Data
The closest thing you have to the windows registry on OS X is the notion of a "property list." Property lists are small files saved by each application, and unlike the windows registry, they aren't centralized.  Property list files end in a .plist extension. (Interestingly enough, unlike Windows, file extensions don't define what a file is on OS X as much as they do on Windows. Finder does rely extensions for information on how to display a file, but the file meta-data is treated with more significance on OS X than on Windows.)
Sometimes they're saved in  /Users/{user}/Library/Preferences/, but they can be saved in a  variety of places, depending on the app and the kind of information being stored. For example, Safari stores your pinned tabs and last session in ~/Library/Safari/LastSession.plist
Uninstalling Apps
I had questions about uninstalling apps when I got my first Mac. The simplest answer is that you can just delete the .app bundle from the /Applications/ directory. As noted above, there may be some plist files left behind.
On older version of OS X, there were third-party uninstaller apps that tried to clean up for you. They are still available, but I don't know how well they work, because newer versions of OS X are stricter about security. (You can try AppZapper if you'd like.)
Apple has a knowledge base article that covers installing and deleting apps from outside the App Store.


What are the differences between minimizing and hiding an application?

Each has it's own benefits and weaknesses... these are the technical differences between the two.

Each attribute will be marked with an "M" for Minimizing or "H" for Hiding. While it's very subjective, I'll put the one that I think is better on top

Hiding windows:

M: Individual windows can be minimized.
H: All windows must be hidden.

Accessing windows via Expose:

M: Windows can be accessed via Expose on the bottom row.
H: There's no way to access the app's windows via Expose.

Accessing windows via Application Switcher:

H: Windows are restored exactly as they were when using the Application Switcher.
M: Windows cannot be restored via the Application Switcher.

Accessing windows via Dock:

H: Clicking the dock icon (or any window in the icon's menu) restores all of the app's windows, except those that were minimized.
M: Clicking the app's icon in the dock only opens up the last window minimized, and only if there aren't any visible windows.

Application Switcher icon location:

H: The app's icon moves to the right-hand side in the Application Switcher, moving it out of the way.
M: The app's icon stays in the same place, even if all windows are minimized.

Indication of hidden windows:

M: Minimized windows are displayed in the dock, and diamonds are displayed next to each window's title. (There's a setting is System Preferences to hide the windows from appearing in the dock.)
H: No indication that the app/windows are hidden whatsoever, not even diamonds appear next to the window's titles. (This can be changed by running the following in Terminal: defaults write com.apple.Dock showhidden -bool YES; killall Dock. You can undo this by typing: defaults delete com.apple.Dock showhidden; killall Dock.)

Switching focus to a new application:

H: After hiding an app, the focus is sent to another app.
M: Even if you minimize an app's last window, it will still remain focused.

Other Differences:

H: You cannot hide all open applications. At least one has to remain visible.
H: As @Ian pointed out, some apps will use up less resources when they are hidden.


Why does my iPod Touch automatically turn the volume all the way down?

Three things can cause this:

The down button is now physically pressed (or the electrical contact has shorted/failed)
The headphone jack is sensing a volume button press (much less likely)
software is corrupt (very very unlikely, but still possible)
bluetooth remote (also very very unlikely)

You can restore the device to rule out #3. Turning off bluetooth nixes #4. You might be able to rule out #2 by trying some different headphones, but I've seen that fail in ways that headphones in or out won't help. You'll need a repair / exchange to fix the first two issues if it's not caused by a temporary piece of debris or light cleaning with clean, dry lightly compressed air.


MacBook Air turns off whenever lid is closed after High Sierra update

The first thing I would try is resetting the System Management Controller.

Reset the SMC

On your particular Mac, the steps to follow are:

Shut down your MacBook Air
Unplug the power cable from your MacBook Air
For 10 seconds, press and hold at the same time the shiftcontroloption keys (on the left side of the built-in keyboard) and the power button
After 10 seconds let go of all keys and the power button
Plug in the power cable
Turn your MacBook Air back on with the power button.

Once you've done this, test your MBA by using it as normal to see whether this was enough to rectify it.


Why did Apple Decide not to install Command Line Tools as default?

To answer your question, not many (relative term here) OS X users will install or have any need for command line tools because it is part of a larger group of tools to download. A large majority of regular, everyday OS X users won't be using these programs. However, you do not have to install Xcode to install command line tools anymore.
Sign in to Apple's Developer Downloads Page and then search for Command Line Tools.
Download and install the latest as a .dmg.

Related Question: How to download the Command Line Tools for Xcode without the Downloads for Developers webpage?
Alternative Way
As referenced from a Stack OverFlow post, here is an unofficial link to the March 2012 Command Line Tools for Xcode.


Why not use 1080p cameras for both front and back cameras on an iPad?

It's pretty much impossible to answer this without inside information, but it's likely some combination of size, cost and part availability constraints.

Size: it's hard to tell from the iFixit photos the depth of the components, but that's almost certainly the limiting factor. That's often cited as one reason the iPod Touch doesn't have a better camera (it's simply too thin). The iPad is obviously thicker, but it's still fairly limited in depth (which seems to be the most significant dimension of the camera modules).
Cost: I'd put less stock in this one, but iSuppli's estimates put the iPad 3's cameras at around $12, and the iPad 2's around $4. If we assume most of that difference is in the upgraded back camera, we can make a rough guess that it would cost about $8 more to put in a better front camera. Apple makes ~30% margins, which is about $150 on the 16 GB WiFi iPad 3. So an extra $8 would eat 5% of their margin (less on the more expensive models). I'd say that's unlikely to stop Apple from doing it if they felt it was a good idea, but enough that they wouldn't just stick it in there on a whim either.
Parts availability: Apple ships huge quantities of iPads (17 million last quarter alone, more than 84 million to date), and new models have been supply-constrained (i.e. they can't make enough to satisfy all orders) for months after launch. Requiring twice as many of a part could have detrimental effects on production (and therefore sales and profits).

I don't think any single factor is the reason why, but if I had to put money on it, I'd say it's mostly component size and availability.

One final thought: the front camera is mostly used for FaceTime and the odd self-portrait. FaceTime quality is mostly a function of the quality of your internet connection—adding a better camera wouldn't necessarily make an appreciable difference, based on my experience with FaceTime.


finer control of Preview anti-aliasing (font smoothing)?

I have found a solution to this problem: replacing Yosemite's PDFKit with Mavericks' PDFKit. As simple as that. I replaced the contents of /System/Library/Frameworks/Quartz.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/PDFKit.framework/Versions/A and everything is working fine now.

For those who don't have a copy of Mavericks from where you can take the PDFKit files, I have uploaded a copy to: http://www.filedropper.com/pdfkit (hope there are no copyright issues with this - I will remove the link if asked to do so).

By the way, changing the Current symlink to point to the Mavericks version and keeping the original A/ directory DIDN'T fix the issue. I had to remove the Yosemite version completely and put the Mavericks version contents inside A/ (it seems Preview and Skim both are hard coded to Versions/A and do not follow the Current symlink).


The X29 Proximity Temperature sensor is used to monitor the heat that the CPU is producing, likely at different locations inside the computer, hence the word proximity.


MacBook Pro HDD in Gparted - Main partition "unknown"

It all depends on how the system you are running GPARTED from is configured.

It has been quite a while since I have used the Ultimate Boot CD but if I remember correctly it did not have built-in support for HFS+ filesystems. In other words GPARTED will work with HFS+ partitions (create, modify, delete, etc.) but I am unsure that it supports mounting an HFS+ filesystem.

The Ultimate Boot CD Wiki has no listings when searching for "HFS." Literally nothing comes up. So either their search function is completely messed up or that CD does not offer HFS+ file system support.

And if trying to mount that file system fails with an error it seems likely that there is no HFS+ support on that CD.

Depending on how Linux knowledgeable you are there are HFS+ filesystem implementations available for Linux that you may be able to install on the Ultimate Boot CD but tht would be outside my area of expertise and outside the remit of AskDifferent. Perhaps over on https://superuser.com/


How to group table and caption in Word 2011?

I had a really difficult time with this. The only thing I found that was easy to do and effective was to add another row under the table, merge the columns of that row and format colour, lines accordingly, and then write the text I wanted as though it were a caption. Good luck.


Can I delete the app that created my Passbook passes?

Deleting the app will not delete the Passbook, they are independent things.

Is the same thing that an app that create entries in you calendar, when you delete it, it won't delete the calendar entries.


App not found in App Store by some users, but found by others

Actually, there are several possible reasons:

Not available in the user's country
The AppStore take some time to deliver an app update to everyone (should be available within 24 hours)
Not available for the user's device (32bits, iPad or iPhone..)
Phased Releases option used in AppStore Connect

This list is certainly not exhaustive*

- How to browse iPhone App on iPad:

http://osxdaily.com/2017/10/18/download-iphone-apps-onto-ipad/

- 32 bits apps aren't showing up in the AppStore anymore:

https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2017/06/32-bit-apps-arent-showing-up-in-the-app-store-but-dont-panic-yet/


How to restore default iTunes media organization?

In iTunes, select File > Library > Organize Library and check the second box, 'Reorganize files in the folder "iTunes"'. This should move all of your files into the proper (previous) subfolders.


how to access system files such as network libraries?

Apple has published quite a lot of source code

Open Source: Source code for a lot of frameworks and commands
Open Source Development Resources

PS: Any detailled discussion about the code (or even where to find which functionality) is off topic on AskDifferent and should be discussed on StackOverflow.


Install MAMP (not PRO) For PHP And Mail Sending

Not sure if you solved this, but you need to make sure the PEAR Mail extension is installed. Open your Terminal and enter: pear install Mail


How can I view PowerPoint files on an iPad?

If you have only small amount of presentations, which you want to play on iPad, you can convert pptx file into jpg's or pdf's on PC and then upload it to iPad


Stopping Dell P2715Q monitor flickers with MacBook Retina 12" (2015)

This may be good or bad news deepening on how you look at it, but it’s the Dell 4K display, not your Mac. Both Dell model numbers 2715Q and 2815Q are notorious for this kind of flickering when used with MacBooks. If you search around on Amazon and other sites you will find similar complaints.

We purchased 4 of the Dell 4K P2715Q monitors where I work, and we returned ALL of them in the end because they exhibited this exact flickering behavior (as well as the inability to properly run at 60Hz).

It didn’t matter if we connected different types of Macs, or used different connectors. If we tried to drive these monitors at full resolution we saw this problem.

Dell told us the same thing when we called support (and we have the good support where I work), and we still never succeeded in making them work.

If you do find a solution with your Mac that makes this monitor work properly I will be happy to learn about it.

EDIT: For the benefit of anyone coming to this answer and wondering about other’s who’ve seen the same problem. Check out Apple’s forum posts reporting the same problems with the P2715Q.


Deleted all photos/apps on iPhone 4s but settings shows 3.1 GB of photo storage used

This may have been caused by a bug in iOS 8. I had the same problem and just now solved it by doing the following:

Go to Settings, then General, then Date & Time.

Untoggle "Set Automatically". (We'll toggle it on again in the end.)
Set the time several months back in time. I set it a year back.
Go to the Photos app. The Recently Deleted album will still say that it has 0 photos, but if you actually open it, you may see that there are actually many in there! You can then click "delete all" and you will have cleared up that space.
You can now go to Usage in settings to see that space has been cleared up. If there is still some, try setting the time back and forward and see if you discover more photos in the Recently Deleted album.

That worked for me. I cleared up 8GB of "deleted" hidden photos.


I have the following in my ~/.profile:

PATH=/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/X11/bin
PATH=$PATH:~/bin

The first PATH declaration overrides any existing PATH setting (it doesn't include $PATH). The path used is the OS X default.

The second line appends ~/bin to the PATH and it is a personal preference, not a default.

After edit, restart your session — or use command source ~/.profile to activate the changes immediately.


Why doesn't my iPad support Low Battery Mode?

'Why' is always difficult to answer.

That it doesn't appear to work on iPads would seem to be of concern to many people, but there doesn't appear to be any answer as to why.

See Where’s The Low Power Mode in iPad, iOS 9 Users Want To Know or
Low Power Mode Not Available on iPad in iOS 9: No Solution Till Now & others on Google. No-one seems to have any answers.


How do I disable Auto Switching to the first Space on opening a new app and entering a different full screen app (different Space) in OS X?

No, there is no way to disable this.

There are a couple of ways to prevent an app from automatically gaining focus when you launch it (and shifting the Space you're in) but they are not practical solutions.

You can open an app from the command line using open -g -a [app name]. The -g flag means "Do not bring the application to the foreground." This only works to keep your focus in Terminal or a similar app. Some discussion of this technique here: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3882355?tstart=0

This article by Topher Kessler describes a way to edit an app's internal properties to force it to open in the background, but I can't recommend that. Errors made while editing the app could break the app, and updates to the app could revert the change.


As with every "do it yourself" and "Apple", you have to be careful and know that it will possibly void your warranty. In any case, if you still decide to proceed with this, it is certainly possible to replace your iPhone 4's glass. There's a very nice tutorial with pictures at iFixit.

Installing iPhone 4 Front Panel Assembly

  "Replacing the display assembly will
  give you a new front glass panel,
  digitizer, and LCD. The LCD is adhered
  to the glass at the factory and the
  two parts are not separable without
  damage."


Circumvent the App Store to install Fortnite on Mac?

You can download Fortnite directly from Epic Game's Fortnite website.
You may need to sign-up and log-in before downloading. The download is a .dmg file.


Connect the iPhone to a USB socket on your computer. The iPhone should prompt you to ask whether you trust the computer, click "Trust".

Depending how Windows (I'm assuming you are running Windows) is configured on your PC you might get an AutoPlay dialog that gives you a number of options including "Import pictures and videos".

If not then open "My Computer" (or "Computer" in more recent versions of Windows), where the iPhone should be listed as a device. If you right-click it there should be an option that says "Import pictures and videos".

You can find more detailed information here: http://www.wikihow.com/Transfer-Photos-from-an-iPhone-to-a-Computer


Disk full; Terminal in Recovery mode won’t delete files; boot kernel panics

In spite this post is old, I decided to leave my solution here to help community with one more approach.

note: I wrote a medium with more description.

In my case, I din't have that extra partition available so, in recovery mode:

Run the terminal

run diskutil list

Find the identifier of "VM" volume. In the case of the previous image is "disk1s5". You'll probably have "disk2s4"
delete the volume VM:

diskutil apfs deleteVolume disk1s5

(replace the disk1s5 for your VM identifier)

You are now able to remove files on "/Volumes/Macintosh HD"

I hope it helps someone.


How to search in Safari's history on iOS?

You can't list entire search results from your history on iOS. The most you can do is as you have done by searching in Spotlight search and using the ~5 search results.

If your Safari history is synchronised with iCloud, you can search the entire history in Safari on OS X. Open Safari and press ⌥⌘2, then use the search box in the bottom-right corner.


mail and mailx fail to send emails to gmail

OS X has postfix installed by default but it's not enabled (started). You can start it with

sudo postfix start

you can check the status and eventual problems in /var/log/mail.log

The configuration is in /etc/postfix/


Looks like LrcShow may do the trick. There are full usage requirements and instructions on that page, but it seems that it supports live lyric display for lyrics with bracketed timecodes before each word (.kra), before each line (.lrc), or a static display for lyrics with no timecodes (.txt).


Calendar app changes colour of a calendar on its own

The colors would come down from the iCloud servers if you set up a new calendar, so perhaps your device has sync issues.

You could try changing the color using the web interface or perhaps conider disabling calendar sync for a bit on the problem device. Once you're sure the color is set online, you can re-enable calendar sync from iCloud and see if the local version matches the online version settings.

If you don't want this potential change, sign out of iCloud on your Mac or subscribe to the calendars as opposed to syncing them.


Updating OS to 10.7.3 with slow internet

Download the 10.7.3 combo update from here:

http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1484

Burn it to DVD (or split it and burn to 3 CDs).

Run it on the target machine.  It must already be running 10.7.0 or later for this update to install.

If you want to update other Apple software offline, this page has links to many of the common Apple updates:

http://support.apple.com/downloads


How do I give myself full read/write/admin access to Backups.backupdb on a old Time Machine HD

Time Machine is very much an "all or nothing" black box, with very little customization or control.
Files inside one dated backup folder may actually just be duplicate catalogue entries to the same data as the same 'file' in another dated backup folder. That's why unchanged files don't take up more space each backup, and why TM folders are a huge mass of interconnected trouble.
Deleting files from one snapshot probably won't save you any space at all, until you've deleted them from all of the snapshots, so that all catalog entries to the file data are removed.
Normally, the way to delete files or folders from the entire backup is to do so from within the TM application itself. Right-click on the files, and select the option to delete.
My advice is to copy one snapshot of the files that you want to keep to another disk, and then delete the whole backup (or erase the disk).
Oh, and don't forget to re-enable SIP! ;-)


"open -j" command does not work for all apps

Google Chrome uses different mechanism to display the app, so the standard -j switch does not work as expected in this case. Main process spawns the Google Chrome Helper processes for every tab. If you check the .app bundle, you'll see it resides in /Applications/Google\ Chrome.app/Contents/Versions/XX.X.XXXX.XX/Google\ Chrome\ Helper.app. You can't launch it directly, because main app has to be running.

I couldn't find the other way around than just creating osascript like this:

open -j /Applications/Google\ Chrome.app && sleep 1 && osascript -e 'tell application "System Events" to set visible of application process "Google Chrome" to false'

However this will create 1 sec. delay in your script.


Calendars and Contacts Sync after iCloud transition

You're right, iCloud requires iOS 5 or later on iOS devices and OS X 10.7 (Lion) or later on Macs.

http://www.apple.com/icloud/setup/

http://www.apple.com/support/icloud/

I'm pretty sure you can still use cable sync to update the information on your older iOS devices so they can coexist when/if you migrate your Mobile me account to iCloud.


Will I lose third party apps if I delete user 501?

Probably not. If you look at your Macintosh HD You should see...

Applications/
Library/
System/
Users/

Typically Applications are installed globally in this top level Applications directory here.

If you look in

Users/
    |_ MyUserName
        |_ Applications
        |_ Desktop
        |_ Documents
        |_ Downloads
        |_ Etc Etc.

Hardly ever are applications installed in this Applications directory.

So unless you see any there. It should be ok to remove the problematic user.


Location of Account/ Login picture on Mac OS X 10.12 Sierra

There is a terminal command that will print the path of the desktop picture on the picture itself. Using the terminal enter the following command:

defaults write com.apple.dock desktop-picture-show-debug-text -bool TRUE;killall Dock

Your desktop picture should now show the directory path to its location. When you get the location of the image you can turn this off by typing:

defaults delete com.apple.dock desktop-picture-show-debug-text;killall Dock


How to enable / troubleshoot split view?

This was driving me crazy as well. Go to System Preferences -> Mission Control and make sure that ‘Displays have separate Spaces’ is checked. You’ll have to log out and log back in for the change to take affect. That fixed it for me.


Reinstalling from Time Machine, what changes?

As a rule of thumb system files are preserved from the fresh install and your data is copied from the Time Machine.

You've mentioned file associations — I presume you're referring to file associations with your own files, and therefore a Time Machine restore would copy those associations. The main exception to this is if the application that the file is associated with is missing. Then the file would change it's association to the 'next best' app.

From the rule of thumb you can generally guess what'll be restored and what'll be left alone, but feel free to add more specific detail to your question.


How to reassign default editor for different file types from the command line?

There is a command line utility called Duti which can do this.

http://duti.sourceforge.net/

There is no easy way to do this using built-in commands.


Dropping wifi, replace bcm4331 with bcm4360, MacBook Pro Retina Early 2013

The BCM4360 is known not to work with the b43 driver. The broadcom-wl driver should work, but since the card is even newer, I would expect even more problems. I suggest to pick up a cheap usb wifi stick, that fixed all my problems.


How can I prevent my Apple ID account from being recovered using a trusted phone number?

As far as I can tell, you can’t.

Aside from the web interface, you can also manage your Apple ID in System Preferences on macOS, and Settings on iOS.

When I try to remove my trusted phone number on macOS (System Preferences > iCloud > Account Details > Security), I’m told that I have to have at least one verified trusted phone number on the Apple ID, even though I have Recovery Key turned on.


AppleScript click Ui Element with modifier keys

I do not have Pro Tools, so I can only offer some information that may help you.

First I have to say that UI Scripting can be kludgy and may not always work consistently depending on how its coded and the UI element being targeted. It's always better if one can find a way to do something without resorting to UI Scripting first.

As I originally said to you in a comment... Basic vanilla AppleScript does not have a provision to preform a key down and mouse click simultaneously. You could try using a third-party utility like cliclick wrapped in a do shell script command. You'd have to programmatically determine the position of UI element 2 to then click on it with cliclick.

Without Pro Tools, I'm going to use Safari as an example, and the Show sidebar UI element on its Toolbar in conjunction with cliclick in a do shell script command.

The purpose of following example AppleScript code is to demonstrate how to programmatically get the position and size of the target UI element, in order to calculate where to click. It also assumes that Safari is already running with a standard window opened to, e.g., this question you posted.

activate application "Safari"
delay 1

tell application "System Events" to ¬
    set ps to {position, size} ¬
        of UI element 2 ¬
        of toolbar 1 ¬
        of window 1 ¬
        of application process "Safari"

set p to item 1 of ps
set s to item 2 of ps

set x to (item 1 of p) + (item 1 of s) / 2 as integer
set y to (item 2 of p) + (item 2 of s) / 2 as integer

do shell script "$HOME/bin/cliclick c:" & x & "," & y

      • Change $HOME/bin/cliclick as appropriate to: /path/to/cliclick

When run in Script Editor, this clicked the Show sidebar UI element on the Toolbar in Safari.

Now I know you said you want to click with the option key down, however for a practical example I'm going to modify the example AppleScript code, shown above, to control-click to the right of the Show sidebar UI element on the Toolbar in Safari, which will pop-up the Customize Toolbar… menu.

Change:

set x to (item 1 of p) + (item 1 of s) / 2 as integer

To:

set x to (item 1 of p) + (item 1 of s) * 2 as integer

Instead of dividing the x axis size by two to get the center of the target UI element on its x axis , we'll multiply its x axis size by two so it will click on the Toolbar itself.

Also Change:

do shell script "$HOME/bin/cliclick c:" & x & "," & y

To:

do shell script "$HOME/bin/cliclick kd:ctrl c:" & x & "," & y & " ku:ctrl"

Now when run in Script Editor, this control-clicked to the right of the Show sidebar UI element on the Toolbar in Safari and popped-up the Customize Toolbar… menu.

With all of this in mind, maybe the following example AppleScript code will work for you, however remember it's untested as I do not have Pro Tools and may require you to rework the tell application "System Events" ... statement:

activate application "Pro Tools"
delay 1

tell application "System Events" to ¬
    set ps to {position, size} ¬
        of UI element 2 ¬
        of row 2 ¬
        of table "Group List" ¬
        of (first window whose title contains "Edit: ") ¬
        of application process "Pro Tools"

set p to item 1 of ps
set s to item 2 of ps

set x to (item 1 of p) + (item 1 of s) / 2 as integer
set y to (item 2 of p) + (item 2 of s) / 2 as integer

do shell script "$HOME/bin/cliclick -r kd:alt c:" & x & "," & y & " ku:alt"

      • Change $HOME/bin/cliclick as appropriate to: /path/to/cliclick

Note: The example AppleScript code is just that and does not contain any error handling as may be appropriate. The onus is upon the user to add any error handling as may be appropriate, needed or wanted. Have a look at the try statement and error statement in the AppleScript Language Guide. See also, Working with Errors.

Note: The example AppleScript code for use with Safari and cliclick was tested and worked as presented in macOS Catalina.

Note: I am not affiliated with the developer of cliclick, just a satisfied user of the product.


Is there a way to connect a SAS to an iMac 2011?

And this is the answer, after careful research:

There is NO possible way to do this. SAS cannot be installed on an iMac. Apple likes to surprise its users by making an aluminum shell that cannot be altered. There are SCSI to USB converters, all discontinued, expensive and unreliable. There is the ATTO ThunderLink, which uses the Thunderbolt port, but this costs over a thousand. Likewise, SCSI cannot be installed on an iMac.

The simple solution is that serious computer users who like to perform surgery should purchase a Mac Pro, which can accept SCSI/SAS installations. These computers will work with storage tape. As for iMac, external hard drives (though I would prefer something that won't crash on me after a year of operation) are the only method of huge data storage. $60-$100 will get you a few TB.

Any suggestions on a reliable brand?


My iPod Nano seems to have been lost in post! How do I contact Apple?

Any web site in the UK  has to provide contact information. Apple has a comprehensive one.

  Sales Support
  Check the status of a current Apple Online Store order. To make changes to an existing order, contact Apple Store Customer Service at 0845 600 1683 (low rate). Lines are open Monday-Friday 08:00-21:00, and Saturday-Sunday 09:00-20:00.


echo 'export PATH="/usr/local/mysql/bin:$PATH"' >> ~/.bash_profile by using this command getting permission denied?

I would use the nano editor to edit the correct file for your shell, which is zsh, not bash.
nano ~/.zshrc

Put this line in at the top of the file
typeset -U path PATH

Put this line towards the bottom and save:
path+=/usr/local/mysql/bin

Press the control key and the X key to exit (see the bottom of the nano window for more commands). If you then quit your terminal app, you can test for mysql being in your path.
You can tell your shell with echo $SHELL and if you want bash since all your instructions are in it, you can go back to that if needed with chsh /bin/bash in which case you would nano the file ~/.bash_profile since each shell reads different start up files. I recommend learning zsh and finding guides that work there, though.


Find all the PDFs with at least three characters in their name


Mail freezes when saving message as draft

Apparently this has to do with the draft email being saved to server. As a workaround, try disabling "Store draft messages on the server" in Mail.app Accounts settings.


Safari bookmark to activate an Automator action

A file:// link (with the path to your desired program) can point to a workflow, application, or AppleScript on your local drive. Clicking the link will not run the application (this lack of functionality is generally considered to be a desirable security feature), but it will open a Finder window and select the file in question, so pressing ⌘O or ⌘↓ will run the desired program.


Why do Application Shortcuts in System Preferences disappear?

it sounds like someone has deleted your shortcuts or hit a restore defaults button.

I recommend that you

setup time machine to save your preferences each hour. then you can use it to restore your preferences. that should help you identify the problem.
setup a shortcut that you will use daily (maybe ⌥, to pull up system preferences)

hope that helps
regards


Is there any global Finder setting for "Keep Arranged By"?

Right-click on the background of the folder and choose "Show View Options". Set it up how you like and click on "Use as Defaults". "Show View Options" is also in the View menu in the top menubar or even available via "Command + J" on your keyboard.

That's the theory, but honestly I've had mixed results with this.


Safari swipe gesture with a non multitouch mouse

To make this work you have to use a third party tool: Karabiner.

In the example below hitting the left alt key once generates one back command in Safari (only). An additional mouse click is not needed.

You can use the left option/alt key as usual otherwise.

Download, install and open Karabiner
Open in the menulet Karabiner -> Preferences
Open the tab Misc & Uninstall
Hit the button Open private.xml
Open the file private.xml with an appropriate editor
Enter the customized keycode

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>
    <item>
        <name>Option_L to Option_L</name>
        <appendix>(+ When you type Option_L only without other modifiers, send Command+[ in Safari)</appendix>
        <identifier>remap.altL2altL_backward_nomod</identifier>
        <only>SAFARI</only>
        <autogen>__KeyOverlaidModifier__ KeyCode::OPTION_L, KeyCode::OPTION_L, KeyCode::BRACKET_LEFT, ModifierFlag::COMMAND_R</autogen>
    </item>
</root>

Save the file
Open in the menulet Karabiner -> Preferences the tab Change Key
Hit the ReloadXML button
Enable the remapping. It should be listed at the beginning.

If you want to use the right option/alt key instead of the left one just replace OPTION_L by OPTION_R and altL by altR everywhere in the private.xml file.

The above keycode customization is only valid for the en_US input source (and probably en_GB, en_CA etc).

If you use e.g the portuguese input source (pt_PT) then you have to choose the proper KeyCodes: to get the [ you have to press alt7. Then the line:

<autogen>__KeyOverlaidModifier__ KeyCode::OPTION_L, KeyCode::OPTION_L, KeyCode::BRACKET_LEFT, ModifierFlag::COMMAND_R

has to be changed to:

<autogen>__KeyOverlaidModifier__ KeyCode::OPTION_L, KeyCode::OPTION_L, KeyCode::KEY_7, ModifierFlag::OPTION_R | ModifierFlag::COMMAND_R

If you want to add a second custom keycode (hitting left cmd key once generates one forward command) use:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>
    <item>
        <name>Option_L to Option_L</name>
        <appendix>(+ When you type Option_L only without other modifiers, send Command+[ in Safari)</appendix>
         <identifier>remap.altL2altL_backward_nomod</identifier>
         <only>SAFARI</only>
         <autogen>__KeyOverlaidModifier__ KeyCode::OPTION_L, KeyCode::OPTION_L, KeyCode::BRACKET_LEFT, ModifierFlag::COMMAND_R</autogen>
    </item>
    <item>
        <name>Command_L to Command_L</name>
        <appendix>(+ When you type Command_L only without other modifiers, send Command+] in Safari)</appendix>
        <identifier>remap.cmdL2cmdR_forward_nomod</identifier>
        <only>SAFARI</only>
        <autogen>__KeyOverlaidModifier__ KeyCode::COMMAND_L, KeyCode::VK_LAZY_COMMAND_L, KeyCode::BRACKET_RIGHT, ModifierFlag::COMMAND_R</autogen>
    </item>
</root>

The special KeyCode VK_LAZY_COMMAND_L instead of COMMAND_L doesn't break the function of cmd_left+Some_key: so you can navigate forward in Safari and print the page with cmd_leftP without going forward once more!


Does Time Machine need a "clean drive", or can I use an old hard disk

Time Machine creates a separate folder ('Backups.backupdb') at the root of the external drive in which it stores its backups, leaving all your original data intact.

Time Machine does require your external drive to be formatted as HFS+, by the way. If that is the case, you should have no problems.


Will upgranding my MBP to an internal SSD, improve also speed of reading external non SSD HDrives?

Honestly, it is a waste not to have an SSD as an internal drive in a MacBook (or any computer in general), you will understand it once you have one. Of course, the speed of your internal drive has absolutely nothing to do with that of external ones. The latter is only governed by the respective bus speed they are connected to.


Contacts from Google not downloading to MBP

Disable and Re-enable the account can work in Contacts app preferences.


Since running out of battery on my Mac, fonts are missing and apps don't open properly

I would try resetting your SMC

System Management Controller (SMC), a circuit that deals with power management, temperature monitoring and fan control, status lights, keyboard backlights, and a few other components. If your SMC becomes confused, you could experience problems like excessive fan noise, slow performance even though Activity Monitor doesn’t show the CPU being overtaxed, apps that take forever to launch, batteries that don’t charge correctly, problems with sleep or wake, and so on.

Before you can reset your SMC, you must shut down your Mac. After that, the procedure varies depending on the type of Mac you have.

Desktop Macs: Disconnect the power cord (either from the Mac or from
the AC outlet). Wait 15 seconds and plug it back in. Then wait
another 5 seconds and turn the Mac back on.
Portable Macs with non-removable batteries: Make sure the Mac is
plugged in to AC power. On the built-in keyboard, press and hold the
Shift, Option, and Control keys on the left side and press the power
button. Release all the keys at once, and then turn the Mac on
normally.
Portable Macs with removable batteries: Disconnect the AC power cord
and remove the battery. Press the power button, hold it for 5
seconds, and then let go. Put the battery back in, reconnect the
power cord, and turn the Mac on normally.

You can also try starting up in safe mode

Follow these steps to start up into safe mode.

Start or restart your Mac.
Immediately after you hear the startup sound, press and hold the
Shift key.
Release the Shift key when you see the Apple logo appear on the
screen.

After the Apple logo appears, it might take longer than usual to reach the login screen or your desktop. This is because your Mac performs a directory check of your startup disk as part of safe mode.

To leave safe mode, restart your computer without pressing any keys during startup.

If you don't hear a startup chime after pressing the power key, see what to do if your Mac won't turn on.

If you're using FileVault
If your startup disk is encrypted with FileVault, you can still hold down the Shift key immediately after powering on your Mac to start up in safe mode. You might be prompted to log in twice as part of this process – first to unlock the startup disk, and a second time to log into the Finder. You can let go of the Shift key after you see the first login screen.

If an issue doesn't happen in safe mode

If an issue doesn't happen when your Mac is started in safe mode, try restarting again without pressing any keys at startup. If the issue appears to be resolved when you start up normally, it was possibly caused by a cache or a directory issue with your startup disk that safe mode fixed.

If you restart your Mac normally and an issue comes back when you reach your desktop, try disabling any login items that automatically open when you log in.
If your Mac restarts or shuts down in safe mode

If your Mac automatically restarts in safe mode, OS X might have found an issue that it's trying to fix.

Safe mode performs a directory check of your startup disk, similar to what happens when you choose to verify or repair a disk using Disk Utility. If OS X finds an issue, the directory on your startup disk is repaired and your Mac restarts.
If your Mac turns itself off when you start up in safe mode, check the power connection on your Mac to make sure it's plugged in securely at both your Mac and the power outlet. If you're using a MagSafe power adapter, make sure the LED on your power adapter is yellow or green. Then, try starting up in safe mode again.


How to install the RHIDE C++ IDE in OS X?

I just checked out the source code. The code is not not suitable for Mac OS.

configure: error: i386-apple-darwin13.0.0 is not supported (yet). Sorry.


How to prevent Matlab from GPU switching?

Disable automatic graphics switching in the Energy Preferences Panel of System Preferences. This will force your MBP to only use the dedicated GPU, not the discrete GPU.


Any Twitter clients for iPhone with larger font size?

TweetBot allows you to choose a font size, and is generally considered a top drawer twitter client.


Your iOS device only syncs with 1 computer, if you gonna sync on a new computer, your music on your iOS device will be replaced with what's in your iTunes Library on computer.

You can't sync FROM your iOS device to computer, because of copyright reasons, eg. I buy music and sync them for all my friends' computers. That's a no-no! :P


MacBook Wifi dies, computer needs to be restarted

Solution that avoids having to restart the computer:

Go to terminal and type

sudo ifconfig en0 down

And enter your password. This will cause the WIFI card to restart and (for me) the connection to be restored.


iPhone 4 falling in water - issues after fixing

Yes, it is possible, even likely, that one or more of these issues was caused by immersing the iPhone in water. You should seek repair quotes from Apple or other repair sources, but you'll most likely find that replacing the phone is the most economical solution. Check Craigslist and similar places for people selling their iPhone 4's after upgrading to a 4s.

If you're of a DIY mindset, iFixit provides repair information, parts and tools for fixing portable electronics.


Why does 4s iphone change to vibrate when I put phone in my pocket?

On the left-hand side of your iPhone is this little switch (ring/silent). The plausible answer to your question is, that you turn the switch on/off by accidentally touching it when you put your phone in your pocket. This happens to me all the time as well.

When the switch is turned from on to off your phone will vibrate one time.


"*account* is already signed in to iCloud" in Mojave—but it's not

I had the exact same issue
It only occurred on one Mac, all the others were fine.

I even removed the device from my appleid.apple.com page as well,
then it asks me to authorise the device first, before giving the exact same error.

In my case I have removed it from iTunes, FaceTime, Messages, and Game Centre.
Im not using photos or books on here.

It started after changing my appleid password.

The fix for me was the following command in terminal:
defaults delete MobileMeAccounts

After this I was able to login again and add all my stuff back.
I have done some other steps, but as they did not help, I won't list them, unless people do have issues after this fix.
(like deleting my keychain and some terminal stuff that seems highly unlikely to help)


Apparently there was an option to "Include related messages" that I was simply overlooking.  Sorry for the bother.


OS X 10.11 El Capitan Preview's print preview different from print result

Not sure if this is the only way to go about doing things, but I have solved this problem by resetting my printers, and then adding them back.

I suspect deleting the printer and adding that specific printer back should solve the problem as well, but this has yet to be tested, so don't take my word for it.


This answer to another, more specific question explains that this directory structure quirk is a vestige of OSX's NextStep heritage.


Detect fn and function key simultaneously pressed

I found a way to do this that uses the awesome Karabiner-Elements. This has been so useful for me in many situations, and it works here too.

Karabiner can detect function keys being pressed, and tell whether it's with or without the fn key modifier.

We can make our own "Complex modification" that takes advantage of this:

Complex modifications are stored in ~/.config/karabiner/assets/complex_modifications as json files. Create a file in here with your favourite text editor:

vim ~/.config/karabiner/assets/complex_modifications/detect_fn.json

You need to fill the file with your own rules, here's what mine looks like now:

{
  "title": "The fn keys can control volume of built-in output even when a multi-output device is being used.",
  "rules": [
    {
      "description": "Map fn volume keys to execute applescript which changes volume of built-in output.",
      "manipulators": [
        {
          "type": "basic",
          "from": {
            "key_code": "f10",
            "modifiers": {
              "mandatory": [
                "fn"
              ]
            }
          },
          "to": [
            {
              "shell_command": "osascript -e 'set volume alert volume 0' && osascript -e 'set volume (alert volume of (get volume settings))*7/100'"
            }
          ]
        },
        {
          "type": "basic",
          "from": {
            "key_code": "f11",
            "modifiers": {
              "mandatory": [
                "fn"
              ]
            }
          },
          "to": [
            {
              "shell_command": "osascript -e 'set volume alert volume ((alert volume of (get volume settings)) - 100/16)' && osascript -e 'set volume (alert volume of (get volume settings))*7/100'"
            }
          ]
        },
        {
          "type": "basic",
          "from": {
            "key_code": "f12",
            "modifiers": {
              "mandatory": [
                "fn"
              ]
            }
          },
          "to": [
            {
              "shell_command": "osascript -e 'set volume alert volume ((alert volume of (get volume settings)) + 100/16)' && osascript -e 'set volume (alert volume of (get volume settings))*7/100'"
            }
          ]
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

It should be obvious how you can replace the keys with whichever ones you want, and you can also replace the shell command with any shell command.
Add the rule into karabiner-elements by

Starting it up
Choosing "Complex Modifications" from the top
Clicking "(+) Add rule"
Enabling the rule you just defined


Macbook pro checkered display, safeboot works

Those checkers are usually a Graphics RAM corruption. When you're in Safe Mode, OS X's graphics hardware acceleration is turned off as it is when you turn off Quartz in Quartz Debug.

My opinion is that there is no way to fix it except exchanging the main board.


How can I play MTS videos from my Sony camera on my Mac?

I use ClipWrap to rewrap the .mts file. then it can play without any problem.


I am using MacBook Pro 13 .current OS X El Capitan

Full macOS 10.xx updates (i.e. the Update that gets a new name) can be retrieved from the AppStore, yet instead of looking for it in Updates you need to search for them.
Usually however, you only get the newest compatible OS shown in AppStore so you'd need to visit Apples website to retrieve e.g. HighSierra.
As @davidanderson has pointed out you can find a more detailed list of Apples OS updates and installers here on AD.


How can I use an Asix AX88179 with Mac OSX 10.8 (Mountain Lion)

This is fixed in Mac OS 10.8.3.

In MacOS 10.8.2 although I faced an issue:
I have a version from Delock running driver V1.3.0 (but V1.2.0 showed exact same behaviour). Adapter runs fine on first connect. If unplugged and plugged in again it will not work unless I reboot. Best solution I found is to reload the driver by hand. That saves you at least the reboot.

sudo kextunload -b com.asix.driver.ax88179_178a
sudo kextload -b com.asix.driver.ax88179_178a

If your driver has a slightly different name (for whatever reason) you can look it up with:

kextstat |grep asix


Archival style backup software or online service

I believe you can do this with Time Machine. You could set Time Machine to do a backup hourly or daily. Then tell time machine to only backup the specific folders with the data you want to backup. Time machine saves all backups until the drive you are saving to is full. The backups should be very small so a disk will hold a lot of daily backups. You can monitor the remaining free space on your destination drive and get a new disk when the one you are using is almost full.

The real trick could be restoring a backup. I think restoring may replace current data. You could test this out using hourly backups to see how it works. After a couple of hours, try to restore and see what happens.

There is a 3rd party free app called TimeMachineEditor that will enable you to change the backup interval from every hour to different intervals in hours, days or weeks.


When booting try holding down the four chord Command-Option-P-R and keep it held down through at least three reboot cycles, there will be a chime for each one; that often helps high-level hardware issues.

Next, boot and hold down the left Shift key as it comes up.  This will bring up the system in Safe mode. Take note, this can be very slow, as the cache isn't used; this helps when something in your cache has been corrupted.

When using Disk Utility, make sure that you check both the disk (which does the structure and partitions) as well as the volumes under it (where the data is stored); do permissions as well. This should take a few minutes.

For diagnostic information, hold down Command-V (verbose), and a Unix-like log will scroll by. If it freezes, the last few lines should be useful in diagnosing.

Wanted to make sure that I understood you correctly, that you're seeing just a white screen at boot -- if so, the above should help glean some information. If you're going along and the screen turns white with a multi-lingual error message, that's the "white screen of death" and appears when there's a hardware problem. This can be an obnoxious USB device that isn't behaving, the wrong kind of memory was installed, failure on the motherboard, etc.

Most of the Mac problems I'm aware of have been when someone tries to save a few bucks in upgrading their memory. It's a complicated subject, but when RAM has to internally be refreshed on a clock cycle, it matters which part of the clock cycle that happens on. It appears that PCs and MACs do things slightly differently, and from what I've seen most marketing information the two products look identical. Carefully scrutinizing the hardware of the two products shows there is a difference.

I agree this sounds like a RAM issue. You might want to swap in some memory from a friend's machine and see if the problem goes away. Optionally, the recommended course of action is to use just the memory Apple supplied, see if this solves the problem, and if so, go to Crucial.com and use their tools to see exactly what's needed.


Copy it from a backup or another Mac.
Download an OS X installer from App Store, and use Pacifist to copy the application bundle.

Wait until 10.9 is released.
Download an OS X installer from App Store and install it on a virtual machine with VMware Fusion, Parallels Desktop, or VirtualBox.
Do an upgrade install of OS X from the recovery partition.


You want to read up on loops in bash scripts.

For example:

HOSTS="hosta
hostb
hostc"

for machine in $HOSTS
do
  PING=`ping -q -c 1 $machine`
  if [[ $? -eq 0 ]] ; then
    TIME=`echo $PING |tail -1 | cut -d/ -f 5`
    echo ${TIME}ms away from $machine
  else
    echo $machine could not be reached
  fi
done

I didn't test that, but it's close enough. Replace the HOSTS list with the list of hosts you want to report on.


Does macOS install updates when you reboot if not explicitly allowed to?

On Mac OS X High Sierra you have the choice what to do with updates.

From just checking automatically (or not) to full Install for the OS and applications.

On Mojave the menu looks different but does the same (you choose).


Installing Windows XP into Boot Camp under Lion

You state in your question that you have partitioned your "internal HD using Disk Utility".

Frankly, I do not see how this could possibly work since the hybrid MBR on your drive would not be properly configured if you partition your drive using Disk Utility. (This is just a guess, but possibly the BIOS emulation is also not correctly enabled?)

I suggest you use Disk Utility to remove the partition you created for Win XP and then restore your OS X partition to its full size. Then use Apple's Boot Camp Assistant (located in the Utilities folder) to create the Windows partition to install XP into.

Using Boot Camp Assistant to create the partition will ensure the hybrid MBR is set up correctly.

Another alternative you might want to consider if your usage of XP is going to be minimal (i.e. no graphics intensive gaming) and your Mac has enough memory (at least 4 GiB) and a processor which supports virtualization. You might want to try installing Windows XP into a virtual machine instead.

I have had good luck using a Oracle's free, open source virtual machine VirtualBox.

The advantage of using a VM is that you don't have to reboot your Mac to use Windows. You just start the virtual machine which runs under OS X.


How to increase keyboard light with Touch Bar not working

I don't think there's a way to manually adjust the keyboard backlight without the Touch Bar working, but you can set it to automatically turn on in low light:
Apple:

Adjust the brightness automatically
To set your keyboard brightness to
adjust automatically:

From the Apple menu, choose System Preferences,
then click Keyboard.
Select the "Adjust keyboard brightness in low
light" checkbox.


"Contextual Menu Items" folder missing on my Mac.

I know exactly what's going on:

...drum roll...

You don't have that folder.

If you need it, you can just create it.


How do I get my GPS working on iPhone 3GS after upgrading to iOS 5?

No. You are out of luck.

Even if you had saved the SHSH blobs for iOS 4.X (which are what you'll require to rollback), you can't revert the baseband, which is required for the unlock. So even if you did manage to install iOS 4.X, you'd still be running baseband 5.16.05.


Clipboard manager for Mac that doesn't use any cloud service

I use Copyclip. It remembers a certain amount of clips. You can also blacklist apps from which it should not clip something, for instance password managers.
It does not use any kind of cloud. It is only local.

To verify that it does not use any cloud services. You can block the app from accessing the internet. OS X Firewall or third party app. Or you can check all established internet connections with:

lsof -i | grep -E "(LISTEN|ESTABLISHED)"

Or trust the developers that they have not put any hidden cloud abilities into the app. Or use some OpenSource app and check the code. Or develop yourself.


Angry Birds scores did not transfer from iPhone to iPad

Although the developer didn't write the code to keep your progress in sync, you can manually move the save files and settings from identical versions of the App - sometimes even from iOS to a computer version of the game.

In a nutshell, you'll need software to poke into the Application's saved files - so you'll need a PC or Mac or to jailbreak both your iOS devices.

Second, you'll learn what files and check the versions and move the files.

Worst case, you crash the new empty version of the app, and delete it and try to move the scores a second time.

There are many tutorials on this. Our site and others have information on using PhoneView on the Mac, and a game site has a very well done tutorial that I will link below:

http://www.angrybirdsnest.com/how-to-transfer-angry-birds-progress-between-ios-devices/

Good luck - you'll learn more about how apps work, and hopefully not have to replay all those levels!


Can I setup a single Sparsebundle in RAID 1?

You can setup a RAID 1 mirror over FireWire and connect the internal/external drives. However, I wouldn't recommend it.

First, you'll need the same size drives to do the mirror. Second, the speed of both drives will be limited by the type of connection to the external drive, so if its USB, the computer will run at USB speeds. If you are just using this iMac for backup, that may not be an issue, but it's still going to slow everything down.

RAID mirroring is intended mostly for much faster eSATA connections, as that keeps everything at nearly native speeds. What I might recommend in your case is to buy an external RAID and use that for backup. That way you aren't locked in to the internal drive on the iMac, and you can always move it to a different computer if need be (especially in the event of a restore, as it'd be faster plugged directly in than over the network.


Mail: all accounts set to offline but still receive emails

You can define your firewall to block mail.app when activated, then toggling it on/off when needed.

You could also use another app (like Radio Silence) to only block mail.app and keep your firewall running (and I'd personnaly go with that solution). I don't believe Radio Silence has a shortcut but it's really easy to set up & use (literraly launch Radio Silence, drag Mail.app into it and toggle on/off button when needed).

If you prefer to set up an automator script to enable/disable the firewall to block mail.app
First of all set the firewall to block Mail.app:

Go to System Preferences -> Security and Privacy -> Firewall
Click on the lock on the bottom left to make change
Click on "Firewall Option..."
Click on  +  and add "Mail.app", then choose "block incoming connections" (like transmission in the picture below)

After that, you can use this script to toggle the firewall:
(this AppleScript allows a user to turn on or off the built in firewall. The script reads and then displays the current state and then presents an option for changing that status. The change happens immediately but the Systems Preference pane needs to be closed out and reopened in order to visually see that change. I found it here)
set firewallState to do shell script "defaults read /Library/Preferences/com.apple.alf globalstate"
if firewallState = "0" then
    set firewallStatus to "The firewall is currently set to off (or allow all incoming connections)"
else if firewallState = "1" then
    set firewallStatus to "The firewall is currently set to allow access for specific services and applications"
else if firewallState = "2" then
    set firewallStatus to "The firewall is currently set to allow only essential services"
end if

#change status of the firewall: 0=off 1=on for specific services and 2=on for essential services

display dialog firewallStatus & return & return & "Do you want to enable the firewall?" buttons {"Cancel", "Turn Firewall Off", "Turn Firewall On"} default button 1 with icon 2
set the userChoice to the button returned of the result

if the userChoice is "Turn Firewall Off" then
    do shell script "defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.alf globalstate -int 0" with administrator privileges
end if

if the userChoice is "Turn Firewall On" then
    do shell script "defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.alf globalstate -int 1" with administrator privileges
end if

Finally, you can save it into an .command and active it by a click or use terminal with osascript /Users/USERNAME/Desktop/YOURSCRIPT.applescript
Or set up Automator to create a Mac Application that you can double click, add to the dock, etc.:

Open Automator application
Choose "Application" type
Type "run" in the Actions search box
Double click "Run Shell Script"
Click the Run button in upper right corner to test it.
File > Save to create the Application.


Bluetooth unavailable with Yosemite 10.10.3

Try these commands on a terminal window to unload and reload the driver:

sudo kextunload -b com.apple.iokit.BroadcomBluetoothHostControllerUSBTransport

sudo kextload -b com.apple.iokit.BroadcomBluetoothHostControllerUSBTransport


Why is the top button on my iPhone 3Gs not working consistently?

I'm afraid you've busted your iPhone. There's no easy solution.

That power button is known to be a weak spot, and submitting the phone to excess humidity (or direct moisture) is never a good idea, even if you weren't planning to be in that storm.

From your description it sounds like the switch is slowly corroding. It will not get better, only worse over time. I'd suggest to have the phone serviced as long as it's otherwise still in good condition, or give up and replace it sooner than planned.

You could also try to repair it yourself by opening it up and cleaning that switch, but it might not even be possible, and worse: you risk breaking your phone. Have it serviced instead.


LSOpenURLsWithRole() failed with error -10810 - Downloaded app does not start

The LSOpenURLsWithRole is a function that is used to associate a file with a program. The file you're double clicking on is not actually an application, but a data file.

This is how, for example, when double-clicking a text document, the TextEdit program or another associated app is launched.

You need to associate it with the java runtime, assuming that you have it installed.

If you right-click on the file and select Get Info, the info pane has a section called "Open With:". That should be set to the java runtime.


rbenv global version of ruby vs Sierra ruby version

I entered this:

echo 'if which rbenv > /dev/null; then eval "$(rbenv init -)"; fi' >> ~/.bash_profile source ~/.bash_profile

but it should be:

echo 'if which rbenv > /dev/null; then eval "$(rbenv init -)"; fi' >> ~/.bash_profile
source ~/.bash_profile

...now it works fine.


I purchased an app on my iPhone and the app is also on Mac

Is your question about an iOS app which has an equivalent macOS app?

In this case, they are really two separate apps with the same name.

Purchasing or getting the iOS app on your iPhone does not automatically give you the macOS version on your Mac.

You must go to the macOS App Store and download the macOS version.

Examples of apps I use that meet this criteria:

Evernote, Google Chrome, Firefox, Google Earth, Dropbox, Kindle ... and many, many more.


The solution was to plug it into a different USB port. That made it detectable and I could proceed. I set it up with Boot Camp (including the partition), and it reset into the windows setup


Upgrade to 10.10.4 does not complete, ask to restart endlessly

This should be easy to resolve.

Power down and boot into Recovery HD (Command R) or safe boot (shift)
Once you know the OS can boot itself - check for free space. Clean up cache or temporary files or delete large databases that you have backed up (Outlook email, Photo databases, Music Libraries) to get 20 GB of free space.
Run Disk Utility to ensure the disk structure doesn't need repair
Download the combo updater from https://support.apple.com/kb/DL1820?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US
Run the update by hand and when the installer is running, open the log to watch for errors (Command L and then Command 3) if you desire or can see the log.


Why are Finder shortcuts to Ext HDD removed whenever it's not connected? Workarounds?

You don't say how you created the "shortcuts". If you used Finder to make Alias OS X creates a complex (and very large) file. These are probably OK, if you want that kind of thing, but OS X has functionality to locate files if they move, and presumably doesn't show them if not present. (I can't verify this as I don't use Alias, except for software testing, and never to external drives.)

I suggest you create symlinks, which are much smaller,and hang around, even if the target disappears. Unfortunately the only way to create symlinks is with a command, although I have created a Service to run this in Finder.

The following is an script, which I run as an Automator workflow.

for f in "$@"
do
 fileSuffix="link"
 fileExists=`ls -d "$f $fileSuffix"`
 fileNumber=0

 until [ $fileExists=="" ]; do
  let fileNumber+=1
  fileSuffix="link $fileNumber"
  fileExists=`ls -d "$f $fileSuffix"`
 done

 echo "$f $fileSuffix"
 ln -s "$f" "$f $fileSuffix"
done


How do you set custom time limits in Mac OSX?

I would use the Automator application and set it there with Calendar events.

All you have to do is crate different events (shut down times and dates).

Example:


Force Quick Look to treat .in files like .txt files

Install QLStephen:

wget https://github.com/downloads/whomwah/qlstephen/QLStephen.qlgenerator.zip
unzip QLStephen.qlgenerator.zip
mkdir -p ~/Library/QuickLook
mv QLStephen.qlgenerator ~/Library/QuickLook
qlmanage -r


Quick way to toggle between "Larger Text", "Default", and "More Space" on Macbook Retina

You can use Automator to script things like that since OS X does't include a built in command key for that option. Once it's scripted, you can then assign a key shortcut to that script/action.

Open automator and search for the "watch me do" action for scripting of the UI.

Relevant tutorials are at https://macosxautomation.com/automator/foo.html


My Mac won't connect with Ethernet but will to wireless

the IP address came back as 169.254.122.206.

The 169.254.xxx.xxx address is a "self assigned address."  It gets this address because it didn't get a DHCP lease from the DHCP server.  This could be due to either of the following:

No connection between your iMac and the router/switch
DHCP server is down

Check your cabling from the back of the iMac all the way to the router.  Make sure everything is plugged in properly.  If you look at your Network Settings, it should be "green" and say "connected".

If it's yellow, that means it's plugged into a switch (getting power), but not communicating with anything.  Check the settings on your router to be certain that the DHCP server is up and running.


Found my iPhone 6 screen separated, how to repair it?

Yes, the swollen battery could have pushed the display outwards (the battery is just beneath the display)

I would replace the battery with this guide:

https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/iPhone+6+Battery+Replacement/29363


What is the process for restoring iPhone from a backup that is NOT in iTunes?

Is the backup folder in the right location on the hard drive? iTunes only lists backups in the MobileSync/Backup folder. If you need to move the folder there, here's instructions for Mac and Windows for getting to that folder: https://deciphertools.com/blog/where-are-iphone-backups/

If it's in the right place, let's make sure it's not a version issue. iTunes won't show backups as a restore choice if they are incompatible with the version of iOS you're restoring to.

Open the iTunes Preferences (iTunes menu on Mac, and Edit menu on Windows)
Change to the "Devices" tab.

If you see the backup listed in Devices, iTunes recognizes the backup, and the issue is that the device you're restoring to is running a lower version of iOS than the device that made the backup.


How can I set Firefox to respect my custom Mac keyboard shortcuts?

Unfortunately, this is a long-running, documented bug in Firefox. https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1333781
You can add custom keyboard shortcuts which Firefox does not already use, but you cannot remap a shortcut that is built into Firefox.


How can I get MacOS to use the correct search domain from DHCP?

hostname [-s|-f] and (sudo) scutil [--set|--get] [HostName|LocalHostName|ComputerName] (name) set/get the respective names locally only.

hostname`s set operations are ephemeral only and vanish after a reboot.

With the listed options scutil writes to and reads from /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/preferences.plist only.

With the listed options both tools don't query (or feed) DNS-servers.

You probably set the hostname of your Mac locally to myhostname.home.lan with scutil in the past. To set another name locally (corresponding to your DNS-server's db) and persistently simply enter:

sudo scutil  --set HostName myhostname.lan

Your DNS-server and your search domain work perfectly well (and as expected). The search domain is meant to create a FQDN from a relative name.

If you enter a relative name the system adds the name(s) listed in the search domain list and tries to resolve them.

This is the reason why e.g. ping google (=in your case e.g. ping google.lan - assuming you don't have a host with the name google in your network/DNS-db) will fail but ping myhostname (=in your case e.g. ping myhostname.lan) will succeed.


There are XVim and xVim plugins for Xcode, they are made exactly for this.

You can also use KeyRemap4MacBook for this (from answer on stackoverflow and this blog):


With the AirPods near your iPhone (or I put them in my ears and pick up the phone).

Swipe up from the bottom of the screen to show the Control Centre.
Tap on the top right corner of the Music control to show the list of devices.
Tap on "Basil's AirPods".


How to exclude Mail messages from Finder search?

It is inconvenient, but if you add -kind:mail after your search term in the Finder, it will exclude Mail messages too.


How to make Mail.app to delete Gmail messages to trash when pressing the keyboard delete button?

It sounds like you're using Gmail, in which case, have you checked the All Mail folder? Gmail treats things a little differently, and I believe the default action for "delete" when using Mail.app with Gmail is actually what Google calls "archive".

It doesn't delete it from the server, it just removes it from all folders (labels in Gmail-speak), but the message still lives in the All Mail folder.Check there for your messages, and you may find this previous answer helpful: Set up Gmail to work properly with Apple Mail

If you're not using Gmail, or that didn't work, try this:

In Mail, open the Preferences (⌘ command-,)
In the Preferences window, click the Accounts panel and select the applicable account in the sidebar as shown here:

Select the Mailbox Behaviours tab
Make sure the Move deleted messages to the Trash Mailbox setting is checked:

If it's already checked, make sure your Trash is set up properly, by selecting the mailbox you want in the main sidebar, then goto the Mailbox Menu, and choose Use This Mailbox For ‣ Trash.

That should fix it. If not, your problem may be on the mail server, or something more obscure locally.


Restore photos from old iPhoto library backup to new Mac Photos app

I had the same problem. You've got to do:

Open PHOTOS while pressing OPTION key. Choose form a list your old
iPhoto library. Either Photos will convert the old file or will
direct you to a link on Apple where you can download an utility that
will convert the file for you.
In any case you will have to repeat and open Photos with option key pressed. Choose the converted file.
Once it is opened you have to select all photos and EXPORT them to a folder in your desktop.
Then you go through your filtering. After having all the photos you want in a folder, reopen Photos with the option key pressed. But now choose your regular Photo Library.
Then you IMPORT the photos from the folder.
In case you need the convertion utility from Apple, here is the link:
https://support.apple.com/pt-br/HT202358 . (It did not work for me. I think El capitan doesn't like these old utilities - from 2013.)

Hope you succeed.


Iphone "shortcuts" for wifi / 3g / localization

Yes, Apple has added some URL shortcuts for these functions and Jeff Broderick (blog at http://brdrck.me/ ) has assembled a nice dashboard of these shortcuts with gorgeous icons to save the web clips to the home screen of your iOS device.

Wifi toggle from http://brdrck.me/settings/wifi

Simply browse your iOS device to http://brdrck.me/settings/ and pick from the many web clips that he has assembled. These are basically the same as taking a web site in the iPhone configuration utility and adding it to your home screen with a nice icon. I don't see one set up for Localization/International or 3G but will poke around to see if I can figure out the syntax to get those sorted for you.


Have you tried the hints in the article, posted in this answer? Otherwise, as NTFS-support is experimental on OSX, I'd delete then from a Windows machine.


I don't recognise it immediately, but can perhaps suggest tools to help you find it.

As for identifying the file, the closest I could find in a short time on my computer was /Applications/Mail.app/Contents/Resources/No Mail.aiff but I think yours has a longer tone on the front. But perhaps you can find it yourself...

I'm assuming it's a file on your hard drive, somewhere... most applications store sound effects in .m4a or .aiff files. So my theory is you can find it by brute force... here's a command that'll find audio files, print their name and play them.

# find / -name "*.m4a" -or -name "*.aiff" -exec echo "Playing {}" \; -exec afplay "{}" \;

Note that this particular command plays all *.m4a and *.aiff files, so you might need to extend it with -or -name "*.mp3" or similar for other file types (e.g. .wav, not sure really what else to try!)

The two -exec arguments first print the file name, and then play the file. So you should see the name of each file appear, and then hear it played. Ctrl+C stops it if you find your match (and you can use afplay if necessary to re-play the last few if you're not sure which it was).

If you have lots of music on the computer as well, you may need to exclude your iTunes library or similar:

# find / -not -path "*/iTunes/*" \( -name "*.m4a" -or -name "*.aiff" \) -exec echo "Playing {}" \; -exec afplay "{}" \;

This excludes any files if their path includes a directory called iTunes (you can modify this to match your iTunes library folder).

That of course only tells you what the file was, not necessarily what was running it... if it's in the Resources directory within an Application package, or another helpful path, it might be clear that it's from some specific Application.

If not you could then try

# sudo opensnoop -f <filename>

and leave that running until you hear the sound effect. That should then show you what process played it...

Good luck!

(Incidentally, if you or your friend have housemates like mine, you'll probably find out its someone messing with you, SSHing into the computer and running afplay <sound> on a regular basis... or maybe they put it in the crontab...)


How to export iBooks Author .ipa file to ePub

I don't know if this will do what you want but have you tried using the app Calibre?  This is a free app for managing e-books. I use it at times to create PDF's from different formats. It manages many different formats. I'd suggest trying it and see if it will do what you want.


By using digits in file name like 1.0.0.1, the file name will be truncated and displays like this 1.0

Command-I will bring up the Info panel; can you see the entire name there? If not, then edit to see I'd you can change it.
I'm having an issue where a .app file with a 2 decimal number starts showing the extension (so instead of iMovie 2.1.3, it shows iMovie 2.1.3.app). So it's possible OS X just doesn't like the decimals


Separate mouse and trackpad settings with Karabiner

It seems that this answer along with its comments solves the problem using Karabiner. It's a bit complicated, so I'll post a full description here:

Open Karabiner > Preferences
Go to the tab "Misc & Uninstall"
Click "Launch EventViewer"
In the viewer, go to the tab "Devices"

You should see a table with several columns including "Vendor ID", "Product ID" and "Device Name".

Identify your USB mouse in the "Device Name" column, and write down the corresponding "Vendor ID" and "Product ID"
Go back to the Karabiner > Preference > Misc & Uninstall and now click the button "Open private.xml"
This will open Finder where the file private.xml is, open it with your favourite text editor

Edit that file to look like this:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>
    <devicevendordef>
        <vendorname>Apple</vendorname>
        <vendorid>0x05ac</vendorid>
    </devicevendordef>
    <deviceproductdef>
        <productname>USBMouse</productname>
        <productid>0x0304</productid>
    </deviceproductdef>
    <item>
        <name>USB Mouse Scroll Reverse</name>
        <identifier>myUsbMouseScrollReverse</identifier>
        <device_only>DeviceVendor::Apple, DeviceProduct::USBMouse</device_only>
        <autogen>__FlipScrollWheel__ Option::FLIPSCROLLWHEEL_VERTICAL, Option::FLIPSCROLLWHEEL_HORIZONTAL</autogen>
    </item>
</root>

Note that you should replace the fields vendorid and productid to the values you previously wrote down (from the EventViewer device list).

Save the file private.xml
Go back to the window Karabiner > Preferences and now select the tab "Change Keys"
Click the button on the top-right "Reload XML"
You should see a new entry in the table below with the name "USB Mouse Scroll Reverse" (or whatever name you set in the XML file)
Tick that box

That should be all!


Why is my partner's iphone safari history showing up on my macbook history?

To check and control which devices are trusted on your mac or apple ID, go to System Preferences and click iCloud

Then via the Account Details button, select the devices tab, from here you can control which devices are trusted.


.DS_Store Removal permanent way of stopping it's creation on Mojave

There's no built-in functionality in macOS to stop the creation of .DS_Store files in a specific folder and its subfolders. There's a setting to stop the creation on networked volumes (i.e. folders that really are network shares).

You can download a third party utility called "DeathToDSStore" from here:

https://github.com/snielsen/DeathToDSStore

This will stop the generation of .DS_Store files in general, but still not for a specific directory.

You mention that you are a developer - thus it might be possible for you to modify that utility to do exactly what you want. The utility is open source. You can find the specific place to override in the file source/FinderOverride.m.

In the comments you've mentioned needing to run on Mojave, which DeathToDSStore doesn't support yet. On Mojave you can run this fork of Asepsis that is compatible with Mojave:

https://github.com/JK3Y/asepsis


You could, but it's not going to be very handy. The OS as well as the hardware aren't made for this kind of thing. If you want to become a full-stack developer, you might want to invest in proper tools :-).


How do I prevent image scaling when burning an iPhoto Slideshow in iDVD?

The only way I've found to do it is to have iPhoto render the video, and then import the video file to iDVD rather than the slideshow directly through this "integration" of their apps and letting iDVD attempt to render it.

This worked fine, and actually didn't take as long to re-render from .mp4 to MPEG2 as I expected it would. I experienced no- or negligible loss of quality to the video during transcoding, although I'm sure that there was some as I was going from lossy to lossy format.


Will updating OS X Server over VNC kill my VNC connection?

VNC is one of the base OS X services, and is not provided by Server.app. You can safely update Server if VNC is the only service you need to connect. I have updated server many times in the past over VNC.

However, if you are using Server's VPN to make a secure connection and are running VNC on top of that, you may have problems. VPN is one of the services provided by Server.app, and it will be turned off when updating Server.


Cannot assign 'Open With' to a specific application using Mountain Lion

Have you tried rebuilding the Launch Services database by running /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/LaunchServices.framework/Versions/A/Support/lsregister -kill -seed?

If that doesn't work, you could also try defaults write com.apple.LaunchServices LSHandlers -array-add '{LSHandlerContentType=com.netscape.javascript-source;LSHandlerRoleAll=com.panic.Coda;}'. Applying the changes requires restarting (logging out and back in isn't enough).


How to merge "Container disk1" back into my MacintoshHD?

You did not include an image for the container holding the Macintosh HD volume. If you select Show All Devices in the View pulldown, then this container will appear. If the Physical stores for this container is disk0s2, then you can apply my answer.

Enter the following commands.

diskutil apfs deleteContainer disk0s3
diskutil eraseVolume free none disk0s3
diskutil apfs resizeContainer disk0s2 0


Installed gcc with Homebrew, now how to use that gcc instead of clang?

First, examine your $PATH variable.
echo $PATH

The gcc from homebrew should reside in /usr/local/bin and when that is listed before the Xcode version of gcc/clang, you’re done - the local compilers will be called unless a package is hard coded to the full path of a different compiler than the one you have in /usr/local
If you change the PATH variable - be sure to log out of the shell or rehash the shell as appropriate.
This answer has an elegant solution using aliases as well - so you don't even have to think or care about path if you have more than one gcc installed. It goes deeper to let you choose which version of gcc to call if you happen to install more than one version.


Boot Camp says "Windows 10 is not supported" on Windows 7 DVD

After performing a restart (which I have also tried before) the Boot Camp Assistant worked as expected.


Why does `hostname` return "dserodio" and not "dserodio.local"?

I think you need this:
    sudo scutil –-set HostName dserodio.local

The command that you are running is temporary.
Source
http://osxdaily.com/2010/09/06/change-your-mac-hostname-via-terminal/


How to install Scala on Mac OS X with MacPorts?

Try installing Scala 2.9

sudo port install scala2.9

… or Scala 2.10

sudo port install scala2.10


Why is my iPhone still listed in iCloud though I erased all content and settings on the device?

As described in this Apple support document, you should have signed out before deleting the device.  The article provides also alternative methods (in case one has no control of the device).

If you're using iCloud and Find My iPhone on the device, sign in to iCloud.com or the Find My iPhone app on another device, select the device, and click Erase. After the device has been erased, click Remove from Account.

If you can't follow either of the above steps, change your Apple ID password. This won't remove personal information that's stored on your old device, but it prevents the new owner from deleting your information from iCloud.


iCloud photo sharing limit reached -- new photo app

There are multiple absolute and rate limits on iCloud photos. See this article for details:

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202299

Currently, if I had to guess, you hit one of the 24 hour limits and need do nothing but wait for the time to pass:

Maximum combined number of photos and videos from all contributors per shared album, per hour: 1000
Maximum combined number of photos and videos from all contributors per shared album, per day: 10,000

However, if you continue to have issues or are getting multiple notifications like your screen shot indicates, there could be a fault in the waiting loop code and you'll want to reach out to AppleCare to have engineering look at your account in particular. That isn't quick, but in the end usually works well if you are patient.


How to verify if an extended attribute exist?

The following xttar command causes both the attribute names and corresponding values to be displayed, if any exist.

xattr -l file

You can also use the ls command:

ls -@ file

That said, the ... No such xattr: com.apple.quarantine message is a non-fatal message, meaning there no real need to make it conditional, and if your goal is to remove the com.apple.quarantine extended attribute from a lot of files at once in a given directory, then cd to the target directory and use the following command:

for f in *; do xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine "$f" 2>/dev/null; done

The above one-liner will delete the com.apple.quarantine extended attribute off every file that has it and act as if the entire contents of the directory recursively were also specified (so that every file in the directory tree is acted upon), thats the -r option, while not showing errors for files that don't have the target extended attribute. (That's what the 2>/dev/null does.)


I had this issue with my Girlfriends iPhone 3G, as you say the only way to resolve is to a restore in iTunes.

So are you and your wife running iOS5 or is the 3GS on another version?

Once that is done it is worth upgrading (if you haven't already) and make the iPhone sync with iCloud and store your backup there. This way if it happens again you can easily restore to an up to date version.

Hope that helps!


Yup, the system will recreate it automatically.

Actually about .Trash, it is located on every drive you will connect to your Mac and where you will delete some files. Deleted files on external drive won't show in your local .Trash.


Accessing Apple Hardware Tool on MacBook Air 2010 running Yosemite

Your AHT feature will have been lost when you upgraded to Yosemite.

You can restore it by inserting the Applications Install disc that was supplied with your computer and typing the following command, putting in the actual name of the disc where indicated...

sudo cp -R /Volumes/[name of disc]/System/Library/CoreServices/.diagnostics /System/Library/CoreServices

You will of course be able to run the diagnostics directly from the install disc.

Actually read the question properly and of course your Air doesn't have an optical drive - did it come with any re-installation media? If not you now know where the actual test file should go, if anyone can supply you with the required file


Where is downloaded adobe file stored before its extracted and installed?

Check the /Library/Application Support/Adobe and ~/Library/Application Support/Adobe folders. The installers and updaters are downloaded as .dmg files. You might also find them listed in Disk Utility in the Sources pane.


Is there a USB brick / portable battery that will work with the MacBook (2015+, USB-C) and regular USB?

If your goal is to have one charging brick, then buy Apple’s USB-C to lightning cable. The you can use your MacBook’s charging adapter to charge either the MacBook or the iPhone.


Apple Safari Mac OS X 10.10.2 will not open

Make sure no parts of Safari are still running

Open Activity Monitor and use the search box in the top right corner to search for "safari". If there are any Safari processes running, select them and quit them using the left most toolbar icon. Once they are gone, try launching Safari again. If that doesn't work...

Delete Safari's Saved Application State folder

You'll find it at /Users/YOURUSERNAME/Library/Saved Application State/com.apple.Safari.savedState and try launching Safari again. If that doesn't work...

Delete Safari's Cache folder

/Users/YOURUSERNAME/Library/Caches/com.apple.Safari and try Safari again. If that doesn't work...

UP TO THIS POINT YOU DON'T REALLY LOSE ANYTHING. FROM HERE ON, YOU COULD SO...

Rename Safari's library folder

/Users/YOURUSERNAME/Library/Safari and try Safari again. If that doesn't work delete the new folder that Safari will likely have created and rename the original back and...

Rename Safari's preference file

/Users/YOURUSERNAME/Library/Preferences/com.apple.Safari.plist and try Safari again. If that doesn't work delete the new preference file that Safari will likely have created and rename the original back.

Let us know how you get on.


Are there more capable music DJ programs for OS X than Tangerine?

Megaseg

Shareware
The 'Pro' and 'DJ' versions of this program integrate very tightly with iTunes and an iTunes managed library if you have one. It can play DRM-protected purchased songs and can synchronize playlists, playlist folders, metadata, sound check adjustments and album art with iTunes. It can also match songs with similiar BPM for smooth transitions and can easily handle thousand-song playlists.

The program is definitely designed for a production environment, rather than a live one. It cannot do automatic BPM calculation, but has a little feature where you can 'tap' out the BPM to a song with your mouse/keyboard. And of course you can sort your library or playlist by BPM, or a number of other metrics.

I'm a huge fan of Megaseg, but it suffers from small little usability quirks (the program's insistence on sorting songs with each artist in alphabetical order for instance).

Mixxx

FOSS
This program is gaining a lot of popularity lately. It features some iTunes integration but is quite usable without iTunes and has several integrated organizational devices to make custom playlists or bundles of related songs.

This program is more oriented for a live environment. It has the ability to connect to several USB MIDI controllers and turntables, has automatic BPM analysis, a more robust loop control, and the ability to handle multiple simultaneous sample playback.

Mixxx has the ability to sort songs by BPM or other metrics of your choosing, though I have found it easier to use other programs to manage music libraries. Where AutoDJ and automatic crossfading are integral components of Megaseg, feel like more of an extra feature for Mixxx.


Can I upgrade MacOS X 10.4 to 10.7 Lion?

You can buy Snow Leopard in the online Apple Store, install it and then upgrade to Lion via the Mac App Store.


How to backup Bootcamp partition via Time Machine?

This may well be too late to be helpful, but it is quite possible to back up a Boot Camp volume via Time Machine. (And the previous answerer clearly didn't even understand the question, since he appears to be talking about writing backups to an NTFS drive.)

In fact, it's really easy. Rename the 'BOOTCAMP' volume to anything other than 'BOOTCAMP' and Time Machine will recognize it as a back-up-able drive. Then go to the Time Machine preference panel and click on 'Options...'  You should now be able to select your NTFS volume and remove it from the exclusion list. Next time you run a backup, it will back up the NTFS drive.

HOWEVER: It may not be possible to restore a bootable NTFS drive from a Time Machine backup, due to permissions issues, metadata, etc. (Restoring would involve installing NTFS-3g or otherwise mounting an NTFS volume as read/write, and then restoring files to that, too, so remember there's an extra step.) Given that, though, it's a good way of saving your data files on Windows, if you have enough room on your backup drive.

If I have time, I may try a full restore from my backup to my boot camp partition. If I do, I'll record the results here.

EDIT: This may only work with 10.6, and/or may only work if you have MacFUSE and NTFS-3G installed.

EDIT: As far as I can tell, this has not worked correctly since 10.7. I have not yet tested it with 10.9, but in both 10.7 and 10.8 the boot camp partition is not backed up no matter what it is named.


Caffeine taking up 2.88GB virtual memory

So apparently I was reading it wrong. According to Thomas Franzén ( lightheadsw )

  Virtual memory size is a meaningless
  number for most uses. An application
  having a big virtual memory size
  doesn't affect you, because it's just
  a virtual memory space. The column you
  should be looking at is RSIZE. That's
  the actual amount of physical RAM an
  application is using.

I verified with ObjectAlloc and it seems like it is using only 8MB or so.


Mac often perceives left-click on Magic Mouse as right-click

Update:

I randomly noticed that a three-finger-tap on the built-in trackpad would not pull up the dictionary entry for the selected word (like it used to).

I navigated to:

System Preferences → Trackpad → Point & Click tab → and saw that the "Look up & data detectors" checkbox was not enabled.

This was very strange, because this feature has always been enabled, and I never disabled it. I enabled this checkbox, and the "look-up" feature now worked.

But, this immediately made my computer stop perceiving all right-clicks (i.e., right-clicks on my mouse were always perceived as left-clicks).

So, I navigated to:

System Preferences → Mouse → Point & Click tab → and toggled the "Secondary click" checkbox off and back on.

After doing this, my computer has not perceived a left-click as a right-click again.

I still have no clue what caused the issue, or why doing the above solved it, especially considering that, for good measure, I had already previously deleted the com.apple.AppleMultitouchTrackpad.plist and com.apple.driver.AppleBluetoothMultitouch.trackpad.plist preference files.


my Mac and my iPhone show wrong time zone

The server has nothing to do with the time zone. It supplies the time in UTC+0, and it is up to your devices to use their knowledge of your time zone to work out what the time is where you are. For your Mac, in the Date & Time preferences, check where your Mac 'thinks' it is:

The same applies for your iPhone:

If it is identifying you as being in the wrong time zone, or if the time zone is correct but the time is wrong, I suggest setting your time zone to St Petersburg manually, and seeing if that fixes the problem. I just tried setting my time to St Petersburg manually, and it appeared to be the correct time, so I don't think Apple's information about Russia's time zones is out of date.


iPad: getting back to initial screen after watching podcast

You don't specify if it's an Audio podcast or a Video podcast.

in a Video Podcast, the iPod App quits and Video app lunches with the selected Video Podcast, so when you press the DONE button you are in the Videos app

iPod-app

on tap on the Podcast, opens in Videos app

Videos app http://www.balexandre.com/temp/2010-09-22_0911_001.png

so, you can't go back because you are actually in other app... though the new iOS 4.2 makes that easy ;)