Refreshed MacBook + BootCamp unable to boot restored Windows 7 partition

Sounds like a problem establishing where the bootable partition begins.  Insert the Win7 dvd, boot up from it, and do a "startup disk repair" - which should not touch apps or data on the partition, but should restore the umm, boot-ability of said partition.


Time Capsule showing backups date in pink

Local snapshots (stored on your internal drive) are white.
Backups stored on your Time Machine disk are pink.

The pink backups are correct as they are your real backups. Local snapshots are meant as temporary, intermediate backups and will be deleted automatically.

Local Snapshots appear in the "Star Wars" display much like normal Time Machine backups.  The main difference is they're shown in white/gray in the Timeline, not the purple of a Time Machine backup on an external volume.
Like normal Time Machine backups, Local Snapshots are usually made hourly.   If your Time Machine volume is available, both are usually done at the same time, so you'll see adjacent purple and white tick marks with the same time.  If the Time Machine volume isn't available, Local snapshots will continue on the same schedule, so for that period you'll only see white ones.
Also, the "contextual menu" you get on Local Snapshots doesn't allow deleting a Snapshot, or all Snapshots of selected items, as on normal backups.


I haven't seen any difference in how OS X treats the primary group vs. a user's other groups, so I don't think it makes any real difference.  I'd be inclined to "fix" it for neatness, though.  These commands should set the primary group to 20, and then add a "secondary" membership in the old andrew group:

sudo dscl . create /Users/andrew PrimaryGroupID 20
sudo dseditgroup -o edit -a andrew -t user andrew

(Note: using dscl to add secondary group memberships doesn't quite do it right -- use dseditgroup instead.)


Unfortunately, the AirPort adapter in your iMac has failed.

Your issue is is just like the issue in the question Mac Mini frequently loses connections (both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth) where the only difference is in that question, The problem was intermittent and yours appears to be permanent.

The AirPort adapter is just the mPCIe card that has a “combo” Bluetooth and WiFi chip (usually made by Broadcom).  Dell, HP, Asus and pretty much every manufacturer uses some variant of this chip/adapter.  That means this adapter is not very expensive.

However, since the iMac computers from 2012 on have the screen glued in place, the labor could be costly to change the part.  If this is the case, upgrade your hard disk to an SSD while it’s open.


Long time for resetting procedure in iPhone 6

Try holding down the Home Button and Power button for at least 10 seconds, once you see the Apple Logo (after the 10 seconds) let go.
If this doesn't work you might have to restore in DFU mode, otherwise try contacting Apple Support (if possible, to try to save you the trouble of a restore). If not, I can give instructions on Restoring in DFU mode.


How to configure mac book pro to act as an Access Point (and not a router)?

Just replace the word router with your Mac.

  If you are living in student accommodation and you would like to use a
  router (in your case the MBP), then you must follow the below
  instructions to ensure it is correctly configured for use on our
  network. Using a router that performs the DHCP service is against our
  terms of use. Failure to disable the DHCP service of your router may
  result in your connection being suspended.

  If you are living in residential accommodation, your router does not
  need to be re-configured. Please see our FAQs for more information.

  1) Connect the power cable to your router, and connect your router to
  your PC using an Ethernet cable. This cable needs to go from one of
  the LAN ports on the router into an Ethernet port on your PC. Please
  see the diagram below.

Follow additional instructions here


iPhone EXIF/GPS Timestamp - Appears to be based on local settings?

Am I correct in this assertion that the GPS timestamp doesn't come
  from the GPS at all? Or am I missing something?

Your experiment definitely makes it look like that!

This very detailed web page Exif Schema for Exif-specific Properties says:

  GPS Time Stamp: GPS tag 29 (date), 0x1D, and, and GPS tag 7 (time), 0x07. Time stamp of GPS data, in Coordinated Universal
  Time. Note: The GPSDateStamp tag is new in EXIF 2.2. The GPS
  timestamp in EXIF 2.1 does not include a date. If not present, the
  date component for the XMP should be taken from exif:DateTimeOriginal,
  or if that is also lacking from exif:DateTimeDigitized. If no date is
  available, do not write exif:GPSTimeStamp to XMP.

It looks like what's happening is the File Modification Date/Time shows the local date & time according the phone's clock, in the phone's time zone.

This is then converted to Coordinated Universal Time ("UTC"), and saved as the GPS Time Stamp.


Plugging iPad into computer turns on Personal Hotspot with one connection

If you plug any cellular enabled iOS device with Personal Hotspot turned on to a Mac via USB, the Mac will automatically open a network connection using the Personal Hotspot.

So yes, your Macbook Air will be the 1 connection you see.

The second part of your question is a little trickier and the answer is both complex and confusing but I will try to explain as best I can.

.

Based on older knowledge with other multiple interface *nix systems is that it will be a complete toss up as to which connection your Mac will use since both active connections could possible provide the same route to the destination for any network query.

I have even seen, on both Windows and Unix networks, traffic coming in on one network connection and going out on another, which rarely works well.

To get round this, in the Network panel you could disable the "iPad USB" in your default location, but then set up a new location where your "iPad USB" is not disabled.

Finally, the order of your devices should mean that if your wifi is above the iPad USB device in your list when both are enabled, it will get priority over the hotspot, but there are still caveats and this could still use cellular data, but of a lesser amount.


Always show full URL in Safari address bar

Yes, it is possible.

Open Safari Preferences window using the keyboard shortcut Command + , or by going to Menu bar → Safari → Preferences..., and go to the Advanced tab. Check Show full website address.

Once this setting is enabled, Safari will always show the complete address for the currently open webpage, even when the Smart Search Field is not in focus.


Lync auto achieving correspondences in outlook "Conversation History" folder

Funny as it may sound, but I was manage to solve the problem just by logging in from another computer in my organization that runs windows. after the outlooks synched with Lync, I disconnected from the windows station, and re-connected to my original mac station - and it worked !


I'm having problems putting my iPhone 3G into DFU mode

To enter DFU mode:

Make sure the phone is on and iOS fully loaded, and iTunes is closed.
Plug the phone into your computer using the Apple proprietary cable.
Once plugged in, turn your phone off by holding the power button.
When the phone is completely powered down, perform the following
sequence:

Hold the power button for 3 secs.
Without letting go of the power button, press and hold the home
button for 10 secs.
Without letting go of the home button, release the power button for
another 10 secs.

Ignore what's happening on your screen, just time the sequence. If you are not succeeding, then you are not timing the sequence properly. There is only one way to enter the device into DFU mode. The one provided by Redsn0w is the correct one.


Yahoo! two-step authentication with iOS Mail and Apple Mail

When you sign in with third party apps into Yahoo Account, the password you have to give is not the account password that you use , instead you have to use a key which is provided by yahoo for that particular third party application.

ie, in Yahoo Account Security Settings you have to generate a key for each application which you use to login the Yahoo Account. Next time during login to Yahoo Account through application you have to give this key in place of your password.
More details in Yahoo Account Security Setting https://help.yahoo.com/kb/SLN15241.html
Hope this helps


The first place to look for some in-depth Time Machine information is the late James Pond's web site: pondini.org. Details about how Time Machine is aware of file changes are in http://pondini.org/TM/Works.html.

It has not been updated since August 2013, but is still the best single source for Time Machine answers.


Are there external drive enclosures yet with a Thunderbolt interface?

Taken from Apple.com

  Promise Pegasus R4 and Pegasus R6,
  LaCie Little Big Disk and 2big,
  Seagate GoFlex Thunderbolt Adapter,
  Elgato Thunderbolt SSD.


If you use the ZSH shell, this can be done easily in Terminal with zmv (included with OS X by default). Why use fancy scripts if the work is already done?

Type zsh in a terminal window if for some crazy reason you do not have it set as your default shell.

autoload zmv
zmv 'ADVANTE(*)' 'ADVANTI$1'


How to install windows on Macbook Pro having Apple File System?

Use bootcamp assistant to partition the SSD, then install windows on the new windows-supported partition.

Alternatively boot into recovery mode, use disk utility to delete the existing partition (this will wipe everything, if you have anything you need on the Macbook's SSD back it up first), then install windows and let the windows installer partition the SSD.


Name does not appear in top right corner in iCloud and incorrect time zone is set

I suspect you missed a step on the answer you were looking at - you should be doing this on the iCloud site, not in iCal.

Goto iCloud.com, log in, then you should see your name in the top right corner:

Click there, and you should get an account preferences pop-up where you can set your time zone info:


There is no way of doing that.

When the Dock is configured to appear at the bottom of your screen, it's available on whichever screen you’re working on. Just move your pointer to the bottom of either display. When the Dock is configured for the left or right position, it appears on the leftmost or rightmost display edge.
Tip: If you don't see your dock because it's set to hidden or there's a full screen app on the display, move your pointer to the location of the Dock. If the Dock still doesn't appear, swipe your pointer towards the Dock again to unhide it.

Source: OS X: Using multiple displays in Mavericks


App to run Chrome web extensions on iPad

Unfortunately, there is no such browser. The reasons are the App Store review guidelines, which forbid the execution of downloaded code (such as web extensions).

Your best bet is to download browsers with lots of features built-in like iCab or similar and hope it covers your use-case.

Otherwise, maybe you can achieve what you want by having a desktop browser running somewhere and connecting to that using screen sharing from your iPad…


Could not activate iPhone because "activation server cannot be reached"

You’ll need to either connect to iTunes to activate or take the device to another network (or perhaps both).

Hopefully it isn’t an issue with the device itself but you’ll need to work through the support links provided for sure if a second network connection fails you as well.


Boot Camp 5 drivers will not install in Windows 8

According to Apple BootCamp 5 page, you must install the BC 5 drivers before upgrading to Win 8. I think you have to go back to Win 7 and install the drivers then upgrade to Win 8.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5628


The first step in situations like this is to use the mouse to select each visible part of the drive on the left and use the info button.

It will show you things that the command tool diskutil will if you open terminal and use it:

diskutil list

That will read the volume partition map and give you details on each partition with less detail than the info pane in disk utility. Once you know if the other partitions are NTFS or ext3 or another format, you can look for software or drivers to read that content. Worst case you have to pay for a commercial solution if you can't change the disk to a format that OS X reads (or writes if that is your requirement) natively.

Since Apple supports a wide variety of filesystems in read only mode, the most logical conclusion would be your drive isn't following standards or is damaged slightly and would mount properly once repaired or reformatted to standards. It's not uncommon for vendors to implement slight variations to filesystems that break compatibility on other OS.

https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/FileManagement/Conceptual/FileSystemProgrammingGuide/FileSystemDetails/FileSystemDetails.html


Does MacOS 10.15 still have a file for the webcam inside: /Library/CoreMediaIO/Plug-Ins/DAL/?

No - there's only plugins-info.txt in /Library/CoreMediaIO/Plug-Ins/DAL on macOS Catalina ProductVersion: 10.15.4


External hard disk not showing up on finder and can't be verified in Disk Utility

If you can see your external drive in the disk utility app, there is no reason that it won't show up when you hit 'diskutil list'.

If you still can't see it after 'diskutil list', try unplugging it then 'ls /dev/disk*' then replug it and redo 'ls /dev/disk*' and see if another disk appeared. (It should be disk2s2 or disk2s1) then 'diskutil mount /dev/disk2s2'.

If this doesn't work, your drive is probably corrupted.


Create a Bootable Windows USB from a OS X to work on a PC

Bootcamp can create a USB for PC. Just only check the "Create a Windows 7 or later version install disk"  checkbox. A similar question from How to create a Windows 7 installation USB from OS X? shows that Bootcamp has the "ability to create install USBs" for Windows.


Replace HardwareGrowler for hardware and system events notifications on MacOS?

Since the BSD-licensed source for HardwareGrowler is available, the thing to do is to replace its use of the Growl API with the OS-provided notifications API. Its hardware detection code should be fine as is. I don't have the attention to give it now, but if no one else does it I will get around to it for my own use (especially since it is my only remaining use for Growl itself).
I don't currently have an active Apple Developer subscription, but I'd consider getting one to be able to release a new version on the Mac App Store if no one else gets around to it first.
Anyone have any ideas on a rename that shows its Growl origins while also showing its independence from the Growl API?


Early 2011 MBP has odd dots on external monitor

A discussion thread on forums.macrumors.com says this can be fixed by unplugging and replugging all of the video connections.


Even without posting the headers or any hyperlinks in the message, it's easy to identify a message like that as a bogus message. Note the poor use of English ("see this alerts") and the creation of the sense of urgency ("permanently disabled if"). There is also almost certainly a bogus hyperlink for iforgot.apple.com in the message which would lead to a website that was designed to scare you into supplying your credentials to the scammer.


Ensure files on finder show the icon of the default app, not the old deleted app

I think you may need to rebuild the Launch Services Database.
The simplest, non-techy way would be to use Onyx (freeware)


Apple does not delete closed iCloud (Apple ID / MobileMe / iTools) accounts without a significant effort by the documented owner of each account. It’s almost certain that the account remains active and available to log in.

You’ll have to review the options at http://iforgot.apple.com and decide to follow the normal account lock out procedure or to contact Apple support.

The accounts and storage are free so don’t assume the accounts is closed based on a long time since the last log in or that there was a quick “delete” button that got pressed “on the way out the door.”


Safari 11.1 Search Engine Preference Reverts to Google

I found a solution in this Apple Discussion thread.

It turns out that there are two places to select the search engine. Setting the search engine from Safari's URL bar overrides whatever's set in Safari > Preferences > Search. My Safari had Google set from the URL bar, and whatever I set in Safari Preferences was immediately reverted to Google.

To reset the default search engine in Safari's URL bar, click on the magnifying glass icon, which appears at the left side of the URL bar when no page is displayed. A dropdown appears. Then select which engine you'd choose. Luckily, I was content with DDG, one of the only four choices presented.


How to get which PATH is available to a GUI application?

Assuming SQLite is dynamically linked into the running application, you can find the PATH environment variable using the ps command.

Alternatively, use Activity Monitor to view the application's Open Files and Ports. You can then search the output to see if the library is being held open by the process.

Path - Use ps

PATH is part of a process's environment variables. If you can see those, you will find PATH.

Use the ps tool with the flags -wwwE on macOS to view the environment variables passed to a process:

ps -p <PID> -wwwE

See Environment variables of a running process on Unix?

Example

Below is an example output from running this command on the graphical Mac application Xcode:

ps -p 1648 -wwwE

  PID TTY           TIME CMD
 1648 ??         0:03.46 /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/MacOS/Xcode TMPDIR=/var/folders/b2/[redacted]n/T/ __CF_USER_TEXT_ENCODING=0x1F5:0x0:0x2 HOME=[redacted] SHELL=/bin/bash Apple_PubSub_Socket_Render=/private/tmp/com.apple.launchd.[redacted]/Render SSH_AUTH_SOCK=/private/tmp/com.apple.launchd.[redacted]/Listeners PATH=/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin LOGNAME=[redacted] DISPLAY=/private/tmp/com.apple.launchd.[redacted]/org.macosforge.xquartz:0 XPC_SERVICE_NAME=com.apple.dt.Xcode.64852 MallocNanoZone=0 USER=[redacted] XPC_FLAGS=0x1

As Mark mentions in a comment below, this may not show the linked library.

Linked Library Info - Use otool

As another alternative, try otool to extract the linked framework and library information. The command to run is:

otool -L <path to binary>

Using Xcode.app as an example, the command and output is:

$ otool -L /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/MacOS/Xcode
/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/MacOS/Xcode:
    /System/Library/Frameworks/Cocoa.framework/Versions/A/Cocoa (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 22.0.0)
    @rpath/DVTFoundation.framework/Versions/A/DVTFoundation (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 1.0.0)
    @rpath/DVTKit.framework/Versions/A/DVTKit (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 1.0.0)
    @rpath/IDEFoundation.framework/Versions/A/IDEFoundation (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 14154.0.0)
    @rpath/IDEKit.framework/Versions/A/IDEKit (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 14154.0.0)
    /System/Library/Frameworks/Foundation.framework/Versions/C/Foundation (compatibility version 300.0.0, current version 1452.20.0)
    /usr/lib/libobjc.A.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 228.0.0)
    /usr/lib/libSystem.B.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 1252.50.4)
    /System/Library/Frameworks/AppKit.framework/Versions/C/AppKit (compatibility version 45.0.0, current version 1561.40.104)
    /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreFoundation.framework/Versions/A/CoreFoundation (compatibility version 150.0.0, current version 1452.20.0)
    @rpath/libswiftAVFoundation.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftCore.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftCoreAudio.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftCoreFoundation.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftCoreGraphics.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftCoreImage.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftCoreMedia.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftDarwin.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftDispatch.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftFoundation.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftIOKit.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftMetal.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftObjectiveC.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftQuartzCore.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftXPC.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)
    @rpath/libswiftsimd.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 902.0.48)

Relinking

Relinking a binary is not advisable but seemingly possible. See How to copy (and relink) binaries on OSX using otool and install_name_tool for detailed instructions.


Can you disable rubber-band scrolling in OS X Lion?

This is not an answer, but a hint in the right direction.

I have a non-multi touch trackpad and I rubber band scrolling is disabled in Lion for me. So this setting is linked to the multi-touch support.


Iphone 4S screen and aux replacement costs

For price quotes it's probably best to contact an Apple Store in your country directly, because prices will vary around the globe (so a quote for UK won't help you much if you live in India for example). The people in the Stores are there to help you (and are usually quite good at that) and they will also be able explain to you the difference between having your phone repaired or getting a new one.

Alternatively there might be other repair shops in your area which offer screen replacements and other services. Their prices may be lower, OTOH if more than just the screen is broken (as it seems to be in your case) they might not be able to fix your phone.


Is there an easier way to turn wifi on and off on iOS?

You don't specify the model of iPhone you have, but the Control Centre is definitely the easiest way to toggle many functions on/off.

Typically, to access Control Centre you would swipe up from the bottom of the screen. If you have an iPhone X you need to swipe down from the top right of the screen instead.

You can configure the Control Centre by going to Settings > Control Centre. If you're on iOS 11 you have a lot more options available to you and can even select what functions you want available from the Control Centre.

Below is a screenshot of how I currently have my Control Centre configured:

As you can see, by accessing the Control Centre you can instantly tap on the Wi-Fi toggle to switch it on/off. The Control Centre also give you fast access to Bluetooth, Airplane Mode, etc.


It seems this invokes the 'App Exposé' feature, which shows all windows of a single application in the Mission Control display style.

It is by default available with a four-finger downward swipe on the trackpad; that will invoke this display for the currently active application, or, if you do it while hovering over an application icon in the Dock, for that specific application. You can change this in System Preferences → Trackpad → More Gestures:

As @user3439894 mentioned in the comments, you can also right-click an icon on the Dock and select 'Show All Windows' from the context menu:

Another option is to create a keyboard or mouse shortcut for the 'Show Application Windows' command in System Preferences → Mission Control:


I can not help you further then explained in my answer below.

You have installed a add-on with some "other" software from a 3d party.

That one is causing all your problems.

You can try to talk to the developer, or do a clean uninstall of the application and all its by products on your computer.

Well, it is a bit a spam if you want to call it that way.

When you open that web site and click on it, you will get a browser add on.

When you hover over the "Firefox version" (in my case), you will see following in the bottom left corner:

To get rid of it, open your browsers preferences and remove that add on.

PS:

in my case it shows the Firefox version (add on), since i used it to get the page.

I used the standard os x screen capture for the images in here.

EDIT:

I recommend you get rid off that add-on asap since it installs stuff you do not want!

Also remove all web screen shots taken by that POS! including in your desk top collection.


Transfer cell service from one iPhone 4 to another

Take it into a Verizon store and an employee should be able to help you.


How does Apple know which passwords never to be saved?

It saves the site for which you don't want to save the password, not the password itself.
You can see the sites at:
Safari->Preferences->Passwords


Can I install Mac OSX Sierra on USB drive?

You certainly can install macOS Sierra to a USB device. I would advise you use USB 3 or 3.1 in order to ensure a smoother experience while booted from this device.

First of all, use the Mac App Store installer for macOS Sierra, which you can get here: get macOS Sierra. Learn more about obtaining macOS Sierra here: How to download macOS Sierra

Next, it's best to format your USB device as Mac OS Extended (Journaled). With Scheme as : GUID Partition Once you do this, open the macOS Sierra installer. When you are prompted to choose an install destination, make sure to choose your USB device.


exporting LSCOLORS in .zshrc not working as expected

I'm guessing you put the LSCOLORS export at the top of the .zshrc? Move it below the zprezto stuff and it will work. The variable gets overwritten when zprezto sets up (hence why it works when you manually source the file a second time - zprezto detects it's already running so it doesn't go through its setup a second time when sourced again). This is why you should always put/source your own stuff as late in the chain as possible, it's the only way to have final say.

You can always rely on simple debugging with echo with stuff like this. Just inspect the var (both in scripts and interactively) and you can confirm what's going on.


How do I extract an ECM archive in Mac OS X Lion?

You can use the ECM tools created by Neill Corlett, the creator of ECM. Just run "unecm" on the file.

There are binaries for Mac here

If that seems intimidating, there is a youtube walkthrough here that uses a GUI and contains links to the tools used.


Problem in opening downloaded application

Without more information I'll dare another stab in the dark, since the mentioned message comes close to what one sees in the following scenario (see screenshot).
If the application downloaded is not zipped, or packed into a dmg, etc., the executable might not have its executable bit set (or better can lose it).

One can then add the "x" (executable bit) by typing the following in Terminal (found in the 'Utilities' folder) with a space at the end and dragging the executable file onto the Terminal window to fill in the path to it, then hitting 'enter' (right click the application in question, select "Show Contents" and navigate to the folder "MacOS", where the executable lives in):

chmod oga+x

i.e. "change modification for owner, group and all, adding the executable bit"


Most likely, the battery is the issue. However, there is no way a battery should last only 65 cycles before it died. Most likely you have a defective battery.

Even if you don't have a warranty, Apple will probably give you a new battery if you complain, since the current battery died way before it should have. They usually cover obvious defects even if the computer is out of warranty.

The other possibility is that the previous owner had something done to the battery at some point, and the work was done incorrectly. 65 cycles seems abnormally low for a 2012 laptop, unless the previous owner never used the computer.


Deinstalling Cisco VPN Client fixed my problem.

There seems to be a problem with updating from Windows 8 to Windows 10 when Cisco VPN Client is installed (https://superuser.com/questions/947651/no-network-connection-after-upgrading-to-windows-10).

Although my Windows 10 was a fresh install, deinstalling Cisco VPN Client helped me getting a stable internet connection.


App from USB always shows verifying app dialog

Check the box

  Don't warn me when opening applications on this disk image

and then hit open. Note that I don't know how to revert this change.


Used to be possible in Snow Leopard to move an app between `desktops` with a keyboard shortcut?

I figured out how to do this.

Open System Prefs > keyboard
On Keyboard Shortcuts tab choose Mission Control
Enable the "Switch to Desktop..." shortcuts
Now when you click on a window and perform the Switch to Desktop keyboard shortcut it'll move that window to the desktop

Guess there is a mouse component to this, so it's not pure keyboard.  But I find it way easier than dragging windows around in mission control.


Troubleshooting is a process of elimination and usually requires some patience, so taking up the Apple Store offer may be a good way to proceed. However, before doing that there's a few more troubleshooting steps you can take.

To start with I would boot your Mac into Safe Mode and determine if it still displays this behaviour.

Boot into Safe Mode

Follow these steps to boot your Mac into Safe Mode:

Fully shut down your MacBook Pro
Restart your MacBook Pro
Immediately press the Shift key and keep it down
Let go of the Shift key when you see the login window (NOTE: If you have FileVault enabled you may need to log in twice).
Take a note of what happens (i.e. does it still crash etc while in Safe Mode)
Exit Safe Mode by restarting your Mac as normal
Test again to see if it still crashes when booted normally

If you find that the problem still exists in Safe Mode, you can also try resetting the System Management Controller to see what difference, if any, that makes.

Reset the SMC

To reset the SMC, follow these steps:

Shut down your MacBook Pro
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
Turn your MacBook Pro back on with the power button

After your MBP reboots, test to see if you can still get your temps to spike over 200 degrees etc (however, see my note on temperature below).

A note on temperature

Finally, MBP models usually range from about 40ºC (104ºF) to 100ºC (212ºF) depending on whether the CPU is idle or under load. CPU temps (just like ambient temperatures) typically have a bearing on GPU temps too, especially within the extremely confined spaces of a MacBook Pro.

If you'd like, you can refer to the Intel Mac Temperature Database to see the various temperature ranges reported by users. You can also filter the list by model etc.

UPDATE

Now that you've updated your question a few times and have uploaded the YouTube video, I feel taking it into the Apple Store to look at is the best way to go. The main reasons for this are:

Having problems in both Safe Mode and while booted normally is a strong indicator to some sort of hardware issue
Likewise, having problems when booted into either macOS or Windows 10 is also indicative that this is OS independent (and therefore most likely a hardware issue)
The various display glitches apparent in your YouTube video stringly imply a GPU and/or Logic Board problem

All of the above would require a visit to Apple. Obviously, prior to doing so, make sure you have a current backup of all your data.

If you did want to try one more thing prior to visting Apple, that would be doing a full fresh installation of macOS (to the earliest version that shipped with your MBP - you can do this by using the shiftoptioncommandR keyboard shortcut to reinstall the macOS that came with your Mac) and testing to see whether you have any issues prior to installing anything else. If not, go about installing OBS and see if that runs okay. If so, then go about creating your BootCamp Windows installation to see if that causes a problem.

However, if it was me, I'd plan for the visit to Apple. That is, do your backup, make alternative arrangements for a few days, and get Apple to do a full hardware diagnostic.


From EveryMac :

RAM-Type = PC3-8500-DDR3 SDRAM @ 1066 Mhz

Supports officially max. 4GB and unofficially max. 6GB,
but indeed a total of 8GB on ROM Version MB51.007D.B03
and if running Mac OS X 10.6 or higher.

Apple released an update (including 8GB support) here.
Also check for information about it here.

And if you are unsure, which to buy: here are some on amazon.co.uk


Moving app icons on iPad home screen - dead area when dragging icons

OK, I'm somewhat embarrassed, but it looks like the problem fixed itself after a couple of days. After noticing the issue first, it was reproducible for a couple of days. I backed up the iPad to iTunes, did a factory reset as a new device, and the issue was still there.

After that, I called Apple Support and they suggested replacing the device, since it seemed to be a hardware issue. I couldn't replace the iPad at this time since I was travelling, so I told them I would wait another couple of days.

When I was back from traveling, I backed up the device again and called Apple Support to arrange the pickup of the iPad. While on the phone with them, I had to describe the issue again and while doing so, was trying to replicate the issue while talking on the phone. Guess what, it worked this time and has worked now for the last couple of days without any issues.

I'm not sure how the issue fixed itself, but there are several possible explanations - not sure how reasonable they are, though:

The iPad was with me on two atlantic flights (Europe - US and back), maybe the pressure change has fixed the issue, if it was a hardware issue. I remember that the issue was still there when I got to the US, but was gone after I got back.
Doing another backup/sync with iTunes fixed the issue, which would mean that it was a software issue.

There may be other explanations that I don't see at the moment. While it all is a bit mysterious, I'm glad that it's working now. Let's just hope that it doesn't return.

Update July 2013

The problem returned after a couple of weeks. I finally called Apple Support and they exchanged the device for a new one, since mine was still under warranty. The new one works perfectly fine. So it looks like it was a hardware problem after all.


Where can I find the "restorecount" value macOS uses to track open windows and reset it?

The end value is not the number of windows you have opened, it is a Cocoa timestamp. 570214618 corresponds to January 26, 2019 4:56:58 PM GMT. As far as I can tell, the purpose of restorecount.plist is just to track how long it takes to restore the windows.

For apps that are taking a long time to start, you can try cleaning out their saved application state and see if that helps, but there are lots of other reasons an app might take a long time to start. The most common reason an app takes a long time to start is that it needs a lot of memory and you are already using all the available RAM so some memory needs to be compressed or written to disk in order to free up memory for the app. You can get a sense of this by looking at the "memory pressure" in the Activity Monitor.

You can also look at the amount of Swap Used (also in Activity Monitor). If that number goes up when you launch an app, then not having enough free memory is definitely a source of delay.


There really isn't a good reason to run your web server as root. It opens you up to all kinds of potential abuse. OS X defaults to running the service as a severely under privileged user to protect you.

Don't make these changes unless you're absolutely certain you know what you're doing!

The httpd.conf file for the default Apache2 installation that comes with OS X can be found in /private/etc/apache2/httpd.conf. Before you make any changes to this file BACK IT UP! That way you can get back to a sane starting place if you make a catastrophically bad change.

Open the file in a text editor and look for the following lines:

# If you wish httpd to run as a different user or group, you must run
# httpd as root initially and it will switch...
#
# User/Group: The name (or #number) of the user/group to run httpd as.
# It is usually good practice to create a dedicated user and group for
# running httpd, as with most system services.
#
User _www
Group _www

The _www user/group is the default for OS X. If you want to run the server as root you'll need to change this to the appropriate user. For root:

User root
Group wheel

The plist that describes the Apache service to launchd is at /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.apache.httpd.plist -- OS X runs any launchd runs daemons described in this location as root so the server starts with sufficient privledges to change context to another user.

Once you've made the changes, restart Apache with:

sudo /usr/sbin/apachectl restart

and you should be running as root.

Again: BE CAREFUL DOING THIS!


Slow transfer between iMac and Macbook Pro

To transfer via FireWire, turn off one of the Macs, then when powering it on hold down the 'T' key. This will put the computer in Target Disk Mode and make that computer's disk available to the other computer. You can then just drag and drop between the two drives on the other computer.

If you connect the cable when both computers are powered on, your Macs will treat it like a network, assign themselves IP addresses, and use Bonjour to broadcast their sharing services. You will be able to connect via AFP/SMB/etc, but this configuration defeats the purpose of the firewire cable - you could just get a cat5e or cat6 ethernet cable and make the same connection, and it would be faster than Firewire in this case (assuming both Macs have gigabit ethernet ports)


Because you're not using iCloud Photo Library, iOS will treat your Camera Roll photos and any saved photos as part of the standard backup process.

You are storing all of those backed-up photos in a separate backup in your iCloud Storage (the dark blue part of your storage bar). This means that you are correct in suggesting you are "double-storing" your photos.

If you were to delete your backup from iCloud (I recommend backing up the photos on your physical device to external storage before you do this) and then turn on iCloud Photo Library, your photos would be uploaded to iCloud and then would not need to be backed up by the device.

Here is my current storage as an example:

You can see that my photos and videos are taking the majority of my storage while my backups are only a small part.

In short: Delete your backup from iCloud (after backing up photos), turn on iCloud Photo Library, then after the photos have been uploaded, backup your device again.


Deleted apps in iTunes. Can I transfer them from iPhone?

If you right click the iPhone in the list on the left there should be an option to transfer purchases. Click that and it should transfer all your apps to your computer.


Spotlight search on iOS not showing options to search web/maps/App Store unless it has results from other apps

Upon a little testing around, I have discovered the solution. Go to Settings > General > Spotlight Search and disable Bing Web Results. There must be some problem either on Microsoft's end or in the way the iOS software gets it, and this interferes with Spotlight from doing what it needs to do.

Hopefully Apple will fix this and it can be re-enabled with iOS 10 or a future iOS 9.x update, or it will be fixed on Microsoft's end, if the issue becomes known to them.

It's unclear to me if this affects everyone or just a small number of users. If you're not sure if you have this problem, test it out as per the original question. And please comment if this does or does not fix it for you.


How can I get Time Machine to back up the contents of a FileVault while logged in?

It is possible to backup your FileVaulted home directory with Time Machine while logged in. The files will be stored unencrypted in the Time Machine volume, just like other files. I've written a blog post explaining the whole process here.


How can I download and install macOS 10.12 SDK?

@Nimesh Neema, the SDKs are stored in /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/MacOSX.platform/Developer/SDKs/, and I got the 10.12 SDK from here.

It works.


Desktop notifications doesn't appear at all when Mirror Displays option is checked

By default, Do Not Disturb is enabled when your display is being mirrored. This is to prevent personal notifications from popping up during a presentation. :)

You can disable this in the Notifications section of System Preferences:


Driver issues Windows 8.1 Pro on Late 2011 MBP

Technically speaking this might be best asked on a Windows board but...

How did you update and reinstall the drivers?

I would download the latest BootCamp drivers and then go into device manager, find the devices in question and right-click on them and select uninstall. Simply reinstalling often doesn't fix driver issues, you gotta remove the old ones completely first.

Once the problematic drivers are uninstalled reboot.

Windows will likely detect the missing drivers and reinstall them from it's cache. If it doesn't use the drivers you downloaded from Apple


1Password sync

Syncing 1Password's stored keychain across my Macs. I use 1Password for managing passwords and, more importantly, auto-generating random passwords so that I never use the same password twice. Dropbox makes this much easier.

1Password's secure keychain file lives on my Dropbox, and each time a password is added or updated it's automatically sync'd across all my computers.


Installed new SSD on Macbook Air now won't let me reinstall OS

OK so ultimately I was able to solve the problem and here is how.

I noticed that when tried to install OSX straight away it failed but when I selected a drive that had OSX installed on it, it validated successfully. However once I had erased the drive it no longer contained a copy hence validation failed. I still had my old SSD which contained a full copy so when I plugged that in via USB and selected it in startup disk, the installer validated it and allowed me to install OSX on the new drive.


what is the filesize limit for ota ios app distribution?

According to Apple an over the air download (mobile network) is 20MB. I don't think there's any limit for a WiFi based download although it's likely more reliable to download via iTunes and sync back to the device.

Overall app size limit is 2GB.


Pip cannot install packages after upgrading to Catalina

Looks like it's a problem with SortedDict. I can pip install other packages. I commented sorteddict and sortedcollection out of my Pipfile and I can start up my pipenv. (I was only manually installing sorteddict because pipenv wasn't working.)


Macbook Pro 15, 2017 | Burned connector and no charge

It is possible to replace components on a circuit board. It is expensive to get the tools and expensive in time to train and expensive to test the boards once repaired to be sure they are in spec.

Realistically, for about 95% of repair shops (maybe 99.9% even) it’s cheaper to swap the entire logic board. Only Apple or the Factory that makes these in the first place likely get enough failed parts back to make it economical to refurbish and repair damage like that.

Also, how are you going to diagnose and fix what caused the power overload? Once you repair the connector, there’s more going on than a melted part.


It would appear that there is no solution at this point. PPTP is no longer supported by MacOS natively and is removed from the kernel. Some providers are popping up (https://www.vpntracker.com/us/download.html#vpnt365) but otherwise move to another protocol.


How can I get safari to show me the pixel dimensions of the browser window, without an extension?

You have to have the element inspector open.  So with element inspector open, then, In Safari, when you hover over an element, it shows the pixels.

And you can get it to show the pixels while you resize a window, to do that you click the crosshair icon in the inspector, then hover over the background so it shows the pixels, then move the mouse across so it still shows the pixels, and resize the window and it will update the pixel dimensions.

Note that in Chrome, if you have the inspector open, and resize, then it shows you the pixel dimensions while you resize.


What's a way to run an automator/bash/applescript command right when a laptop starts charging and right when it stops being charged?

You can do that very easily using ControlPlane, a free (open-source) application:

  ControlPlane, a fork of MarcoPolo, brings context and location sensitive awareness to OS X. With ControlPlane you can intelligently reconfigure your Mac or perform any number of actions based on input from a wide variety of evidence sources [...]

from: https://github.com/dustinrue/ControlPlane

You can very easily add a "power source rule" which then launches or quits an application or script. As you can see in the attached screenshots, it's very easy to set-up.


Getting Applications location in Automator

Add an AppleScript step which contains:

on run {input, parameters}

    set p to POSIX path of (path to me)
    return {p}

    return input
end run

From there, you can use the "p" parameter.


Which model of Macintosh has the longest battery life?

According to Apple's website, the 13" MacBook Air and all of the MacBook Pros have 7 hours of battery life. This means that there are seven laptops for you to choose from: Four 13" computers, two 15", and one 17". The possibility of getting more than 7 hours exists, because this number is determined in this manner:

  The wireless web test measures battery life by wirelessly browsing 25 popular websites with display brightness set to 50%.

—Apple (at the very bottom of the page, point number 2).


How to add a specific file to Firewall Exceptions list?

I don't have enough rep to comment, so I'll attempt an answer...

I wanted to comment since I'd like to clarify why you need to add npm - my install of npm (via homebrew) works OK, without poking a hole in the firewall. Obviously YMMV...! But be aware I've not properly tested this with npm (I tested adding npm, and it continued to work fine.)

I believe you want the application layer firewall. (It's the same firewall you can also access through System Preferences -> Security & Privacy -> Firewall).

My socketfilterfw's API appears to have changed from the one discussed in the linked article. I'd suggest caution, and that you check what the API is for your version before doing anything else:

/usr/libexec/ApplicationFirewall/socketfilterfw -h

My version of socketfilterfw doesn't have the "-t" option mentioned in the linked article so I had to use:

/usr/libexec/ApplicationFirewall/socketfilterfw --add /usr/local/bin/npm


AppleScript to compare contacts in two groups and remove duplicate from one group

Here is a  script written quickly. Should work. But I have not revised it down to be efficient.

tell application "Contacts"

    (*get the names of all groups *)
    set theGroupNames to name of groups

    (*choose you current group, the one to keep entries*)
    set text_returnedCurrent to choose from list theGroupNames with prompt "Choose Current Group" default items "Work - Current" without multiple selections allowed

    (*choose you pending group, the one to remove entries*)
    set text_returnedPending to choose from list theGroupNames with prompt "Choose Pending Group" default items "Work - Pending" without multiple selections allowed
    (*Get the people/entries of the Current group*)
    set the_peopleCurrent to people of group (text_returnedCurrent as text)

    (*Get the people/entries of the Pending group*)
    set the_peoplePending to people of group (text_returnedPending as text)

    (*iterate through the people of the Current group*)
    repeat with i from 1 to number of items in the_peopleCurrent

        (*get a person from the  Current group*)
        set thisPersonCurrent to item i of the_peopleCurrent

        (*iterate through ALL the people of the Pending group**)
        repeat with x from 1 to number of items in the_peoplePending

            (*get a person from the  Pending group*)
            set thisPersonPending to item x of the_peoplePending

            (*Check if the person from the Current group is the same person as thisPersonPending*)
            if thisPersonCurrent is equal to thisPersonPending then
                (* if they are remove them.  *)
                remove thisPersonPending from group (text_returnedPending as text)

                (*save the contacts changes*)
                save

            end if
        end repeat

    end repeat

end tell


Can you debug interactively in Workflow?

No. Since the workflow team and app are now Apple employees and Apple first party app, I would expect this to feature to come to either playgrounds or Xcode if it’s not added to whatever becomes of the app itself. Siri automations are going to need this debugging as well but I expect one to three years for this to arrive on a form we will all see and be able to use.


Privacy Issues. Are they able to recover my deleted files?

Its very hard to say with certainty.

If they really wanted to, they could probably recover your files.

However, if you've followed the recommended instructions to erase all content at https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201557 and https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201274, the chances are you're probably ok.

Although Apple goes to some effort to not say that its a secure erase, as a corporation, they are not interested in the liability and legal implications of being able to access those files. They're actually motivated to NOT be able to retrieve them. The fact that this process was slow on old devices also implies that it was a secure erase.


Parallels: Make windows can select Wi-Fi hot spot

Parallels like other virtualization software for Macs uses a virtualized hardware layer. This layer doesn't have direct access to the real hardware (Type-2 Hypervisor). This includes the Wi-Fi-interface.

Instead software ethernet bridges are used to access the hardware indirectly. That's the reason for the network interfaces of the Mac (e.g. en0: ethernet, en1: wifi) showing up as ethernet interfaces in the virtual machines.

Consequently Windows 8 or any other OS running in a VM on a Mac can't show and access any Mac internal Wi-Fi in their network settings.

There might be one exception:

USB-Wi-Fi sticks directly attached to the virtual machine. I can't verify that since i don't have such a stick. Hint


The SCTP reference implementation has an NKE version for Mavericks.

The repository is at http://code.google.com/p/sctp-refimpl/

A pre-built version can be found at https://nplab.fh-muenster.de/groups/wiki/wiki/bf935/SCTP_on_Mavericks.html


How do I copy a calendar from one iCloud account to another?

If it appeared to hang (rather than throwing an error) how long did you let it run?  I found that iCloud took rather longer to import a .ics file of only a few hundred KB than my available raw upload speed would suggest: 1-2 orders of magnitude longer!

If it really won't complete, try importing .ics file into a local Mac calendar first - it may not work any better but it's faster if your calendar is large; and just maybe iCal will be able clean up the calendar or continue past a bad entry that stops iCloud.

If that doesn't work (and you're patient!) you can try exporting & deleting, then importing to another calendar, half your events, then half the remainder, etc., til one segment fails to import. Now that you know which half contains the error, export, then import, the other half of the remaining events.  Now repeat the halving process with the events left in the source calendar.  When you get down to only a few remaining events (that must include the bad one), enter the rest by hand.
Now export that reconstructed calendar and upload it iCloud.


There are cleaning kits targeted for the iPad that might give you a better result than just a damp cloth. I personally bought the Hama Premium Cleaning Kit for iPad and I'm quite happy about it.

The second parameter in the equation are ofcourse your hands, the dryness/greasiness of your fingers will influence the comfort of the moment. Personally, I've found that just after washing my hands I feel some resistance when swiping the screen, and it works best with a more natural greasiness.


The original Install.framework used pax to deliver the payload. pax will attempt to preserve file metadata. pax was repackaged into a proprietary binary whose behavior mimics ditto which also preserves creation or birth time. I have files installed on my computer that have modification dates before my computer was manufactured.


How to enable sound on MacBook when connected to second monitor via HDMI?

macOS is outputting sound over HDMI and has decided that volume should only be changed on the device receiving the sound. If you want the audio to come out of the monitor, adjust its volume directly (or connect speakers). Otherwise, use either the Volume item in the menu bar (the speaker icon) or the Sound system preference to change your audio output device to "Internal Speakers".


Many strange issues with 2009 Macbook Pro running 10.10.5

My first guess would be a failing HD. You could try to look into the console.app, found here:

/Application/Utilities/Console.app

If the log shows IO-Errors it's time to replace the HD.

There are of course other explanation, f.e. a corrupt Kernel extension or even a defective Font, but as i said it sounds like the HD.


Export reminders from osx Reminders app programmatically

You can do this with Automator. Open Automator and:

Create a workflow
Add a “Find Calendar Items” action and add it
Change the first line from “Find events where:” to “Find reminders where:”
To grab all the reminders change the “Any Content contains ______” to “Title is not ______“ and leave the text field empty. You may need to change to fit your needs better.
Then add an “Event Summary” action underneath it.
From here you can use Automator to do whatever you like with the reminders.

To help you test it out, use a “View Results” action. You can insert it anywhere and it will show you what the output of the prior action was.

For doing this from Terminal:

Find the .workflow file you saved and copy the path to it.
Run automator and pass in the path.
Now you should see the results or errors of running the actions.

You will need to run this manually once to enable Terminal to prompt for access to your Reminders.

See also: Automator: Find Reminders by list?


I think this can happen if you're a bit premature unplugging your iPad from iTunes.  Try plugging it in and resyncing.


Adding something to your reading list

On your desired webpage, click the share icon in the top-right

When opening something from your reading list make sure you open it at the side not in the search bar.

From this Apple Discussion:

  Once you add something to your reading list you do not access it from the URL box.  You access it from the open book icon just to the right of the URL in the upper right corner of your screen.


Myth need to be solved: will the battery drain faster in places with poor wifi signals?

This is not a straightforward Yes or No answer. Consider the following points:

Cell reception - Having poor mobile (or cell) reception will drain your battery faster than if you don't. This is because all mobile phones (iPhones included) check regularly to determine signal strength. When there is no signal, your iPhone will keep trying to find and connect to a signal and this will impact your battery. If you are ever anywhere for any period of time where you know you have no cell reception, best to go into Airplane mode (or, if you have Wi-Fi, go into Airplane mode and then just enable Wi-Fi).
Wi-Fi - In the scenario you describe (i.e. your iPhone sits idly while you sleep and is not being actively used), the impact of having a poor Wi-Fi signal will depend on how many background processes you have running that require an internet connection. One example, if Mail is set to fetch data every 15 mins then it will check for new mail 32 times during that 8hr period - this obviously requires a data connection and will use more battery power than if it's set to fetch mail hourly (i.e. 32 time v 8 times). However, unless you have a lot of apps trying to use the internet in the background while you sleep, a loss of 25% battery power is not expected.
Wi-Fi Assist - The other complicating factor (especially in your scenario) is Wi-Fi Assist. Assuming you have iOS 9 or later, your iPhone can use Wi-Fi Assist to automatically switch to your mobile (or cellular) data connection when you have a poor Wi-Fi connection. Wi-Fi Assist is designed so that your iPhone can stay connected online even when you have a poor Wi-Fi connection. You can see then how this complicates your question a little - if you're sleeping for 8hrs and your iPhone has a weak Wi-Fi signal while you have a whole heap of background processes still continuing, and if Wi-Fi Assist is enabled, then your battery will drain faster still.

In summary, how much the battery will drain is affected by the above factors and your individual usage (the Apps you use, what settings you have, the health of your battery, etc).

Do your own Five Day Test

You can conduct a 5 day test to determine the answer to your question for your exact scenario. Your test would go along the following lines:

Day 1 - all on - Fully charge your iPhone and unplug it from charge and leave it as you normally do for 8 hrs while you sleep. Take note of the remaining charge afterwards.
Day 2 - Wi-Fi only - Fully charge your iPhone and unplug it from charge. Put your phone into Airplane mode. Then, enable just your Wi-Fi and leave it for 8 hrs while you sleep. Take note of the remaining charge afterwards.
Day 3 - Cellular only - Fully charge your iPhone and unplug it from charge. Switch only your Wi-Fi off (but don't put your iPhone into Airplane mode). Leave it for 8 hrs while you sleep. Take note of the remaining charge afterwards.
Day 4 - all off - Fully charge your iPhone and unplug it from charge. Put your phone into Airplane mode and leave it that way (i.e. no Wi-Fi or anything - it's totally off). Leave it for 8 hrs while you sleep. Take note of the remaining charge afterwards.
Day 5 - all on with Wi-Fi Assist settings changed - This will almost be a repeat of Day 1. Fully charge your iPhone and unplug it from charge. Go to Settings > Mobile (or maybe Cellular in your case). This is the screen where you'll see Mobile Data etc. Now keep swiping up until you get to the very bottom of the screen. If Wi-Fi Assist is on, turn it off. If Wi-Fi Assist is off, turn it on. Exit Settings and leave your iPhone for 8 hrs while you sleep. Take note of the remaining charge afterwards.

NOTE: You will need to ensure you have the exact same apps running for each night to improve the validity of your results!

After doing the above tests you'll have your answer. You'll know how much your battery drains under various conditions for your own personal circumstances.


Is it true that any external hard drive made for the PC, can be used by a Mac running Lion?

2 things:

1) They are not "made for" PCs, they may simply come pre-formatted.  If they are USB, they will almost certainly work with any OS known to man that supports USB

2) NTFS support is read only, you cannot write (without 3rd party software) but you can format as Fat 32 or EXFAT etc and have the drive be read/write by almost any OS including Windows/Mac/Linux etc/


Does half-resolution on Retina displays really look the same as native?

It depends of what you mean by "will look the same".
It looks the same only in the way that the elements on your screen are displayed in the same size as if it was a 1280x800 screen.
The aim of the retina displays is to display more details, to do that, what it does is that it displays things at the same size a half resolution screen would have done but uses all the available pixels to show you more details, nothing is better than an example to explain you what I mean :

In fact, the pixels of a retina display are designed to be small enough so that you retina won't be able to distinguish them at a standard use distance, that's why it looks as sharp as a printed page, and that's why a retina display will never look the same as a display that would be natively 1280x800 pixels, actually it should looks much better.
Now let's answer to your question ! You didn't explained if it always looks blurry or only on some applications/websites.
I will assume that it does not always looks blurry because it shouldn't.
As I explained, although they are displayed in the same size than on any other display, the elements are "constituted" of 4 times more pixels which means that an element that would have been 10x10 pixels (100 pixels) needs to be 20x20 pixels (400 pixels) to take advantage of all the available pixels ; it looks blurry if the element hasn't got a resolution that's high enough "to fill all the available pixels", in fact, this is exactly like when a picture is pixelated but here it looks more blurry because the pixels of your screen are extremely small.
There should be more and more retina ready websites/applications in the future (in think that in something like 4 years most of the websites will be).


How can a user reasonably project data usage before buying a new iPad?

Addressing your query head on - several US carriers have very nice planning tools:

Verizon Wireless Data Calculator
AT&T Wireless Data Calculator

Both are quite close to what I'm seeing for my usage patterns (one calculates 2.5 GB and the other 3.15 GB) in practice.

I would say to take these with a grain of salt since with iOS 7 - you now have exceptionally good information on exactly which app used exactly how much data. That coupled with automatic data alerts that you can configure from the carrier to alert you at whatever levels you want, you can easily shut off parts of cellular data (or all cellular data) to shape your usage without having to downgrade your cellular service.

In effect, iOS 7 makes it easy to steer your usage to fit your budget if and when you find yourself using more data than planned.

Also, in the US - you are not locked into any level of data as the service is month to month. I often have months where I tether 2 or 4 GB extra data for business reasons. I have a shared data plan between my phone and iPad so a quick online session upgrades that month to the next higher tier of data. I set an alarm to undo that change at the end of my bill cycle and there are no fees to increase and decrease - just fees for the data (and overage should you go there for a month). For me, the extra $10 for a month is far less than the overage of $15 per GB and simpler for me to manage when bursts or overages happen (I'm looking at you iTunes match streaming all night on an iPad while in my bag with the smart cover closed :/


How can I make in-app purchases with a different Apple ID than the app was purchased with?

Purchasing from one account and then using another for in-app purchase (IAP) isn't currently possible.

Since each application is digitally signed when you download it from the App Store - you are tied to using the same account for in-app purchases as for the initial purchase.

If it is a free app, you could back up the device to iCloud, delete the app, re-purchase the app under the correct account and then restore the device from the backup. If you are not worried about saving game state, you can skip the backup and the restore steps.

If the app is not free, then you are faced with deciding to buy the in-app purchase from the original account or re-buying the app on the correct account.


Can I use the same Apple ID for multiple Macs if I only need Apple ID to update macOS?

You can use a single Apple ID to log into a maximum of ten devices at a time (no more than five of them can be Mac).

For more information, you can refer to the Apple Support article, View and remove your associated devices in iTunes.


What options do we have to keeping our hard drive secure in case of theft?

OS X has supported full disk encryption since 10.7. See Apple's KB article about FileVault 2.


There is a broken Sophos entry in Keychain Access after uninstalling the program - how do I remove it?

To fix this you have to manually edit the file /Library/Preferences/com.apple.security-common.plist, as root, and delete the corresponding hardcoded <dict>...Sophos...</dict> entry in there.

Great care must be taken because you can totally screw up  your system(-keychain) if you leave any errors inside this .plist file. The section that needs to be deleted looks as follows:

...
<dict>
    <key>DbName</key>
    <string>/Library/Sophos Anti-Virus/Sophos.keychain</string>
    <key>GUID</key>
    <string>{some UUID string here}</string>
    <key>SubserviceType</key>
    <integer>6</integer>
</dict>
...

Upon save, there should no longer be any "Sophos" entry in Keychain Access or as output of security list-keychains.

I used vim and deleted the offending lines as (sudo vim /Library/Preferences/com.apple.security-common.plist) but you may use any text or plist editor you like - I frankly don't know with one is the most accessible (recommendations welcome).


So, the cause of this problem seems to be a change in behaviour of El Capitan regarding virtual events (program-generated user input events), and not allowing them to generate keychain approval. I think the BetterTouchTool program is getting in the way here. The solution is either to disable BetterTouchTool or use the keyboard to click the button.

N.B. Apple have detailed this "fix" in the SecurityAgent section of https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT205375.


Can I make a custom keyboard shortcut available to all users?

Typically when you adjust a Keyboard Shortcut, the file(s) that are actually effected are in ~/Library/Preferences/ . If you take those same files to /Library (Not the User Library) they should be accessible to All Users.

Examples might be

com.apple.systempreferences.plist

com.apple.symbolichotkeys.plist


Can you change an iPhone startup screen background from white to black?

Unless you jailbreak the phone, no...can't be done.

The startup screen even ignores the accessibility settings.


APFS: fsroot tree is invalid after Time Machine backup - how to recover and avoid in the future?

I just ran into similar issue. Likely you would have found that the problem was in one of the files for the Parallels VM - at least that was the culprit in my case. Your fsck_apfs -d /disk/<disk> check returned:

obj-id: 23267745 type: Inode

If you had opened terminal you could have gotten the path to the file (or files) using that inode using the following command:

find / -inum 23267745

From there you would have known which file(s) needed to be restored instead of doing a full restore.

In my case the VM file was only available in the snapshot as I exclude my VMs from TimeMachine. I restored just that file from an earlier snapshot and I got further through fsck_apfs - it got through the disk to checking snapshots and then bombed on same file in the 2nd snapshot. Luckily snapshots are only kept for at most 24 hours so it should clear up after that point.

Your mileage may vary however as it could be as "simple" as one file or just the tip of the iceberg.


Mavericks: Preview pane spontaneously reappears when switching spaces

I'm not sure how to fix this properly, but killing the Dock (forcing it to auto-restart) stops the quicklook pane reappearing. Just run this from a Terminal window:

killall Dock


Weird text alignment in System Information on Yosemite

As determined in comments above, it seems as though your scrollbar settings were the problem :)  I guess System Information is doing something unconventional with its window size due to the space taken up by the scrollbar when it's set to show Always...


There's no such generic method because tooltips are not "native" to the web - they're implemented by web sites using generic means. Not every web site will create them the same way, and as such there's no generic method.

In this case Stackoverflow uses a jQuery-based popup system that attaches to event handlers for the mouse (for example the mouseover event). For touch based systems web pages should take advantage of touch events or similar to provide an alternative to users on touch screen devices.


Would the battery from a 13" MacBook Pro (2010) work in a 15" MacBook Pro 2011?

Nope. They're different sizes. Compare iFixit's guide to replacing a 15" early 2011 battery to their guide for a 2010 13":

15":

13":

Both batteries are roughly proportional to their cases, and the 15" has a substantially bigger case than the 13". Additionally, they're shaped differently - see the little notch in the top left of the 15" battery, which isn't there on the 13" battery. It physically won't fit.


Time Machine backup of legacy filevault encrypted homedir?

I haven't tested this on 10.8.4, but here's how I used to work around this.

Make a second account that exists only for you to be able to log out completely of your main account.
Log into the second account only.
Start a backup so that the legacy file vault files can be backed up.

Basically, Time Machine doesn't run unless someone is logged in.


OSX 10.7.5 renaming attached Firewire drive

The problem comes from how OS X handles additional (non-startup) volumes. Say you have a volume named "FWDisk"; when OS X sees that, it mounts it at the unix path "/Volumes/FWDisk". If you put a user's home folder on it, the user's home path will be set to, say, "/Volumes/FWDisk/Users/fred". Fine so far.

But suppose fred logs in when the disk isn't connected (/mounted): the home path is still "/Volumes/FWDisk/Users/fred", which doesn't exist, so the OS creates it on the startup volume. You're working in a mostly-empty home folder without access to any of your files. So, you log out, and connect the external drive. What happens now is the mounter tries to mount it as "/Volumes/FWDisk", but discovers that that name is already in use, so it mounts it as "/Volumes/FWDisk 1" instead. This means that none of your users with home folders on that disk can find them -- they're looking for their homes at "/Volumes/FWDisk/Users/whatever", but they're actually at "/Volumes/FWDisk 1/Users/whatever". And it's going to stay that way forever unless you do something.

The solution is in 2 parts. First, to fix the immediate problem, you need to delete/rename/move that "/Volumes/FWDisk" folder that's preventing your external disk from mounting normally. You can do this logging out of all accounts with homes on that disk, logging into one with a home on your startup disk, unmounting the external disk. Then, use the Finder's Go To Folder feature (under the Go menu, or Command-Shift-G) to go to the hidden folder "/Volumes". Then rename or move the problem folder with the same name as your external disk. Remount the disk, and you should be back to normal.

The second part is figuring out what's causing the problem, or else it's just going to keep happening. This is going to be just a matter of paying attention to when the problem starts, and what leads up to it. Are you logging in when the external disk isn't attached? Is there something else triggering it? There's probably no reliable way to prevent it except for avoiding whatever event triggers it, so you need to find and avoid that trigger (/triggers).


Being asked to log into a different account to update Xcode?

This is most likely (well I presume) because you installed the application on another apple ID, the one it is asking you to enter. There is no way around it other then to enter it.


launchd startInterval shorter than time taken for the script to complete

launchd focuses on launching jobs and keeping jobs running, it does not have a mechanism to handle overlapping jobs.

Lock File

Traditionally in a UNIX environment, a lock file is used to stop processes from being run multiple times.

The core steps are:

On script launch, if the lock file already exists, stop the script.
On script launch, if the lock file does not exist, create the lock file.
On script finish, remove the lock file.

On macOS, create your lock file in /var/tmp for computer wide processes.

Sample Implementation

if ! mkdir /var/tmp/myscript.lock 2>/dev/null; then
    echo "Myscript is already running." >&2
    exit 1
fi

See Quick-and-dirty way to ensure only one instance of a shell script is running at a time and What is the best way to ensure only one instance of a Bash script is running? for sample scripts.

Potential Problems

There are edge cases.

launchd wants jobs to run for at least n seconds before finishing. When the script finds an existing lock file, consider sleeping for n seconds and then exiting.

What happens if your script is killed or exits because of an error? Can you be certain the lock file is removed?

In C, a trick to ensure a file's removal is to create, open, and delete the file – a deleted file held open on UNIX will remain until the opening process exits. The file is deleted even if the process crashes.

In a shell script, catch the terminate signal and ensure the file is removed.

Another potential problem is checking for the file existing. This check could happen factions of second before the previous script finishes. This will be rare but possible. The approach quoted above claims to overcome this.


Try ^+⌘+D while selecting a word (that's ctrl+cmd+d). If the app is well integrated into Mac OS X, it will show a little popup with the word definition.

Like so

If you click "More..", it'll open the dictionary app.

If this shortcut doesn't work, go to

System Preferences > Keyboard > Keyboard shortcuts > Services

and search Look Up in Dictionary to add the shortcut you want.


Install OSX on Macbook Air which currently only runs Windows 7

The easiest way is probably to use OS X internet recovery:

Press cmd+alt+R at startup
Open the disk utility from the opening menu
Reformat the disk to HFS+ Journaled
Close disk utility and go to install OS X

This procedure will delete all your data and Windows completely.


impossible.
the max for that macbook is Lion 10.7.5


Mail showing incorrect number of flagged emails

•   Quit Mail if it’s open.

•   In ~/Library/Mail/V7/MailData, delete any file that begins with “Envelope Index,” such as Envelope Index or Envelope Index-shm.

•   Your home Library folder is hidden by default. To display it, choose Finder > “Go to Folder” and then enter “~/Library”

•   Open Mail.

•   Mail creates new Envelope Index files. This process may take a few minutes, depending on how many messages Mail is reindexing.

•   It will fix your issue.


You can hope that you had auto-save enabled in Word. If that is the case, you should be able to start Word again, and it will ask you if you want to recover those documents. You can also check the auto recovery folder manually for files:

/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Word/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery/

If you have Time Machine enabled, try starting it up and seeing if you have got versions saved of the documents there. Even when you haven't got the external backup drive connected, Time Machine will still save backups locally. However, it can ofcourse only do so if your documents were actually saved to files before Word were closed.

In regards to your actions: The usage of RAM (for example 1 GB) has absolutely nothing to do with processor fan speed. The WindowServer manages all application windows on screen, including for example Word and any other application. Killing it essentially kills all graphical programs, and you're logged out and will have to login again and start over.


Do you have a Time Machine backup on an external (USB, FireWire) hard drive? If so, boot to Recovery (Apple + R), erase the drive and reinstall OS X, then restore your data via Migration Assistant.

Your core issue here is you do not have enough space on your hard drive for all your data. You're going to have to either:
 - Delete some of your data or
 - Clone the old hard drive to a larger drive (this is the perfect time to upgrade to a SSD, also).


Using kdiff3 as default git diff viewer on Mac OS

Don't use

git diff myfile.txt

but

git difftool myfile.txt.


It probably won't help, but you could try using a private.xml like this with KeyRemap4MacBook:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>
  <item>
    <name>test</name>
    <identifier>test</identifier>
    <autogen>__KeyToKey__ KeyCode::F1, KeyCode::FN</autogen>
  </item>
</root>

See the source for the key code values and predefined settings.


Turning Off Messages App Vibration While in a Conversation

You can make the LED flash instead of Vibrate when you have notifications.

Go to Settings > General > Accessibility and scroll down to 'Hearing' where 'LED Flash for Alerts' resides.


Does FileMaker Server 16 prevent use of the system apache in macOS?

I know that it's possible to run both the system instance of Apache in addition to the FileMaker Server instance in version 16, provided they run on different ports, so I guess that's a 'No' to your question.

For a better answer, I suggest you post the question at the community forum where FileMaker support staff also chimes in where appropriate. You can also report this as an issue there and get swift support from them.

https://community.filemaker.com

https://community.filemaker.com/community/discussions/report-an-issue


How can I edit pure text file stored in iCloud Drive from iPhone?

I use Textastic for basic coding on my iPad but it is also available for iPhone. However, it is $8.99 so you will have to judge if it is worth it. Most coding apps will work with straight text files without altering them with formatting. I also see one called Fast Keyboard on the iTunes store that is free if you just need to edit a text file once in a while and re-sync it with Dropbox or something.


How to change size of ALL icons/folders in Finder?

Open a Finder window in Icon mode (⌘1), then click Show View Options (in the View menu, or ⌘J). Make the changes you want, then click the Use as Defaults button at the bottom of the panel to make it stick for all folders.


Keynote - need individual letter graphics that can be moved/manipulated to create words on slide

Could you not just use text objects in Keynote to do what you want? Create a text object with the letter A, resize and colour it etc, create another text object with B, etc.


I haven't used the app, but WebInspector looks like it will show you the source. You might find that the servers are sniffing the user agents, and they don't even send you the link, but you can try the free version (ad supported) before spending any money on the app to be sure it does what you wish.


macOS Sierra is downloaded but can't install

Did you look in your applications folder? Usually it downloads there. If you open your Applications folder there's an app called Install macOS Sierra

Found at:  https://www.reddit.com/r/applehelp/comments/53qqnp/macos_sierra_downloaded_but_not_installed/


melted ice cream + iphone5s = my screen black & white bars

The main issue is the screen. Take it to an Apple Store and have them replace your screen. You can also do that at any third-party shop.


Complete Specs for Mid-2010 iMac & Early-2011 MacBook Pro?

iMac (21.5 and 27-inch, Mid 2010) - Technical Specifications
iMac: How to remove or install memory
MacBook Pro (13-inch, Early 2011) - Technical Specifications

AFAIK the CPU is not replaceable on any current Mac model.


Both Command keys as well as zero digit not functioning on MacBook keyboard

Your keyboard is failing and should be replaced.

The keyboard is made up of "layers" with one of them being a flexible plastic "circuit board" with conductive traces.  The photo below shows a typical example of this (Disassembled keyboards from MacBooks aren't common so I used a PC keyboard - the technology is the same).

Update:  I wrote a canonical Q/A on this topic that shows much better breakdown of the keyboard assembly and goes in depth as to what the issues could be.

The keyboard recognizes a key press when a particular circuit (or circuits for multiple key presses) is/are closed.  It's a physical connection being made.

If anything gets between the contacts or if the contacts become worn, the keyboard will begin to malfunction as yours is doing now.

This will only get worse.  Keyboards don't fix themselves and software fixes only go so far.  Your best bet is to replace the keyboard - and there's good news and bad news...

The good news:  A replacement MBA keyboard is relatively cheap; less than $20.

The bad news:  Replacing the keyboard will require you (or a tech) to completely disassemble your MBA.  This involves literally taking every single component out of your MBA.  It's not a hard process, but rather a long and detailed process.  Ifixit.com has an excellent step-by-step.

If you feel comfortable around electronics and you have done this type of thing before, I recommend that you give it a go at replacing it yourself.

If this is not something you are comfortable with, I suggest hiring a tech.


Does Apple have a warranty on their hard drives?

Since you had an Apple authorized service provider for my repair (i.e. the Genius Bar) you now have coverage under two legal agreements.

The original warranty on the machine is still in effect ( or is expired ) but it does not get extended due to the fact that you had a repair. http://www.apple.com/legal/warranty/

The AppleCare terms of service generally offer a 90 day warranty on all parts that runs concurrently with whatever other AppleCare service agreement or original warranty exist.

Since your repair was a year ago, the 90 days certainly isn't going to cover you and it would be your responsibility to pay for the repair at this point instead of apple's responsibility. http://www.apple.com/legal/sales-support/terms/repair/retailservice.html

The only out would be if you had purchased AppleCare on the original machine and if you were still within the three-year window for coverage. In that case the repaired machine and parts are covered as if they were the original machine and parts.  In that case the repaired machine and parts are covered as if they were the original machine and parts


/private/var/folders not getting empty after reboot on macOS Catalina

It's likely that unneeded files will be cleared if you perform a Safe Boot. And then restart normally.

However, a detailed account of cleaning out /var/folders can be found here,

http://www.magnusviri.com/Mac/what-is-var-folders.html

which seems to indicate that not everything gets deleted on a Safe boot.

But unless you are desperate for storage space or experiencing some issues, I wouldn't recommend wholesale deletion of the entire contents.


Moving document windows to a particular screen and location

If you're opening documents in the same app you can force that app to one screen by right-clicking on it in the dock, and under options, picking the screen you want under the "Assign to" section at the bottom.

If you use screens you can pick which screen on which monitor as well.


Is there any equivalent command for usermod?

Since my original answer got transformed in a comment due to it's brevity, here is another go.

The command that you are looking for is dscl on OSX (which works both in OS 10.6 and 10.7 in my experience).  As I mentioned this question has been asked before, and you can find the original answer (plus usage examples) on stackExcjange superUser forum at:

https://superuser.com/questions/60150/is-there-a-usermod-equivalent-in-terminal-for-os-x-10-6-1

which provides a number of examples for its use. For instance, adding a user to a group would work as:

dscl . append /Groups/the_group_you_want GroupMembership the_user

In addition, someone did provide a bash script that does what usermod does on linux, and you can find it here:

http://www.splode.com/~friedman/software/scripts/src/arch/noarch-apple-darwin/osx-usermod

(I haven't tested it, so it comes with no guarantees).

HTH


How to go level up in file select window

Click on the Path button, which shows all the levels up to the folder.

Click on a folder in this list to jump to it. The list is always reverse hierarchy so the folder containing the current folder will be one down from the top of the list.

The shortcut to go up a level is ⌘↑.


What format for my external drive allows use with Mac and Windows?

FAT32 (called MS-DOS (FAT) by Disk Utility; a filesystem originally released in 1977 and updated a few times since, lastly in 1996) really is the only cross platform filesystem that is going to work fully out of the box with Windows and Mac OS X.

Be careful though, if you are using Disk Utility to format the drive, you should make sure to choose the Master Boot Record partitioning scheme (hit the "Options..." button below the "Partition Layout" control on the Partition pane). The default GUID partitioning scheme won't be recognised by 32-bit Windows XP and earlier Windows operating systems and Mac OS X versions earlier than 10.4.

Mac OS X has had support for reading NTFS formatted disk for a few versions, but still doesn't have write support. There are a few third-party products that allow Mac OS X to read NTFS formatted drives but as far as I'm aware the free ones aren't as well maintained as the commercial ones. I'd love for someone to tell me differently. For a while I've been using http://code.google.com/p/macfuse/ but as far as I can tell it hasn't been updated since December 2008.

Tuxera (who develop one of the commercial NTFS drivers for Mac OS X) have a list of free NTFS drivers that are developed from the same NTFS-3G source used by Linux to read NTFS drives. http://www.tuxera.com/community/ntfs-3g-download/


How can I backup all my jailbroken iPhone apps saves before restoring to new firmware?

There is an insanely detailed step by step process on how to do this using the cydia app appbackup on http://applemonday.com/2011/04/jailbreak-data-apps-ios-appbackup/ which basically grabs all your app data and puts it in one folder for you to ssh into and get.


Bare in mind only footage shot with an iDevice can be edited on iMovie for iPad. That being the case, it's just a matter of finding the correct format.

Wired has dedicated a whole article to this specific matter.
Basically it comes down to convert the video to a specific MP4 with the H.264 codec. You can do this by following these easy steps.

Convert your movie to .mp4 on your Mac (if it isn't already in this format)
Convert your movie to an iMovie movie with the 264 codec
Use iTunes to transfer you movies to your iPad

Normally your files should appear in the iMovie project dashboard.


If you don't actually need the content of the file, you could link it to /dev/null which means that anything written to the file will disappear immediately. To do so

quit the application
rm /path/to/logfile
ln -s /dev/null /path/to/logfile


The best way is to go into settings/general/reset and select Erase All Content and Settings.

This will reset the phone to an out of the box state, and allow him to set it up with his account without any of your data on the phone.


MapMyRide contains erroneous points on occasion

I have observed a similar problem with RunKeeper in the past (not on my iPhone 6 as of yet) and I believe it has to do with the phone struggling to accurately locate itself at that moment. iPhone's "zero-in" on their current location, starting with a big radius and shrinking it as it gets more accurate information. With that, it always assumes that it is in the center of the circle. When the phone chokes on its location MapMyRide will record that location even if it is erroneous, I believe.

What I did with RunKeeper when that happened was simply edit the activity later on a computer. I removed the problematic point and the statistics and route returned to normal. I don't believe I almost ever had that happen more than one or two times in an activity and it occurred rarely at that.

I have not used MapMyRide so I don't know if there is a way to edit your activity. But, in short, I would suspect the phone as the the app isn't the actual source of the location information - it just asks the computer for it.


Any free way to transfer pictures from an iPhone X to any other PC via wifi

There are several ways to transfer files between an iOS device and a PC for free.

Cloud storage like iCloud, OneDrive, DropBox, etc.;  with these services, there  is a “free tier” where you have a specified amount of storage space, usually 5GB.

If it must be completely free, you can sync files 5GB a time.  Files are copied to the shared folder, sync’ed, between the cloud, the device and your PC, then moved from the  PC’s sync’ed folder to another one that’s s not synced.

If you are willing to spend $1 with Apple, you can do this at 50GB a time  For $2 with OneDrive you can do this at 100GB at a time.  Simply cancel the upgraded storage at then end of the month.

SMB file sharing.  You didn’t mention which OS you’re using on your PC, so assuming Windows, you can  use  file sharing to create a shared folder on the PC then with the native Files App, connect to that share and copy the files over.

Free file sync apps like GoodSync Explorer.  There are many different ones, I selected this particular one for the high ratings and the fact it can turn your iOS device into a “server” and you can access your files via a web browser. I’m not affiliated not have I used it personally (no need)

With a little creativity and patience, you can transfer your files via WiFi.  As for “free apps” like GoodSync, I’m not a fan because nothing is free; or more colloquially, there’s no such thing as a free lunch.   What are you giving up to in exchange for that developer creating a program?  Usually it’s your private data.  Personally, I would spend a few dollars to do this securely and conveniently.
Now all that said, how “overloaded” is this PC that iTunes won’t load but your willing to store your data on it?  I suggest attending to that PC first, then using iTunes, sync your filed via USB because it’s significantly faster and more reliable.  I say this, because it sounds like you’re not backing up your iPhone at all and you should be backing it up in some way.


Updating iPad- Error message: "Could not start session with iPad"

Several things to try:

Soft reset your iPad by holding the power button and home button at the same time for a few seconds. The iPad will reboot. You won't lose your files so don't worry. When it completely boots up, try the sync again.
If the problem persists, then you may try to use iTunes to restore the OS. Be cautious when using this method because you may lose data. Maybe you should try syncing on another PC/Mac computer before you do this restore:

Connect your iPad to your Windows 7 (cancel sync if you know it won't go through), then click your iPad in the "device" list; Press the restore button and follow the prompts.


How to get Siri to dial my contact called "voicemail"?

I know your question states: Other than changing the name of the contact, what can I do to get Siri to dial this contact?, but you don't clarify why you don't want to do it this way?

I'm not aware of another way to do this, and in my case changing the contact name works flawlessly. I just created a contact called "Company Name Voicemail" and Siri has no problems whatsoever.

I just say, "Hey Siri, call..." and she just dials the number and I go from there.


Applescript to set Track Comment to Rating

First thing is that the rating value is just stored as "rating". But iTunes stores the star rating as a value between 0 and 100, so you need to convert from that value to the number of stars.

There might be a smarter way to do this but this code seems to work.

tell application "iTunes"
    set theTrack to (item 1 of (get selection))
    set theRating to rating of theTrack
    if theRating = 100 then
        set comment of theTrack to "5 Star"
    else if theRating ≥ 80 then
        set comment of theTrack to "4 Star"
    else if theRating ≥ 60 then
        set comment of theTrack to "3 Star"
    else if theRating ≥ 40 then
        set comment of theTrack to "2 Star"
    else if theRating ≥ 20 then
        set comment of theTrack to "1 Star"
    else if theRating = 0 then
        set comment of theTrack to "0 Star"
    end if
end tell


From - How to Stop Using an iCloud Password to Login to a Mac

  Go to the  Apple menu and choose “System Preferences”
  Choose “Users & Groups” and select the primary Mac login that you want to disassociate the iCloud password and use a unique separate password for
  Click the “Change Password” button next to the user name
  At the prompt “Do you want to change your iCloud password, or stop using your iCloud password to unlock this Mac and create a separate password?” – choose “Use Separate Password…”
  Set and confirm the new password and close out of System Preferences when finished


Simply create an Index column.  1, 2, 3 etc. (As pjctec mentions in comments.). Without some ordered list or index, there is no way for Numbers to know how to use a custom sort.

There is no need to use a formula to create the list of numbers.

In A1 enter 1
In A2 enter 2
In A3 enter 3
Select cells A1 to A3
Drag the yellow dot down.

Sorting will not change the numbers as they are static.  No need to use a formula.

Then you can always sort the index column later.  If needed, the column can be hidden or shown when needed.

Apple supplies a good resource for Numbers basics on their Website. Numbers Help. Recommended for new users and anyone who wants to get the most out of using Numbers.


Is having 2 GB of memory not enough with the new Mac Mini?

If it's Safari 5.1 you're in the same boat as a lot of people. The recommended suggestion is bail out and go to Chrome, but I like Safari so I've stuck with it. I've completely removed Flash from my system (I sandbox it in Chrome), I trash Safari's cache once a week, I completely shut Safari once every 4 hours, and I never have more than 10 tabs open at once. That keeps it relatively stable, but I'm probably going to move to Chrome as it's a bit much for one app.


app to manage symbolic links and move files automatically?

IF you have a Mac that runs 10.8.3 AND has room for an extra internal drive. (Sacrifice the DVD on older MacBooks & MacMinis)  A DIY "Fusion Drive" will accomplish your "goal".

http://blog.macsales.com/17624-os-x-10-8-3-provides-fusion-drive-setup-option-for-non-fusion-drive-equipped-macs

It is not a simple or strait-forward process however,
Made DIY fusion drive.... now recovery partition won't boot


How to add printer with lpadmin and have it show up in Printers and Scanners in System Preferences?

Have you tried this?  Add an IP printer with command line. It looks like there are some options that you might be missing that will identify the printer in Printers and Scanners.


OS X Terminal: 'ls' shows program but then says command not found?

The executable is in your current working directory. Therefore you need to add ./ to your command. So try ./mongod.

See this UNIX StackExchange question for details and background:
Why do we use “./” to execute a file?


How to rotate whole table in Pages document?

Rotate an image, shape, text box, line, arrow, or video Select the
  object, then in the Format  sidebar, click the Arrange tab.

  Drag the Rotate wheel, or enter a degree value in the adjacent field
  to specify the angle at which you want to rotate the object.

  Tip: You can also press the Command key while your pointer is over a
  white square on the object, then drag to rotate.

Source: Pages for Mac: Resize, rotate, and flip objects in a Pages document


Why did the runtime on battery drop to 30-50% with a good battery, with no system updates to blame?

TL;DR:  If SystemUiServer causes about as many idle wakeups as kernel_task and you have iStatMenus, turn off all of iStat's widgets, then turn them back on. If you don't have iStatMenus, suspect other menubar widget applications. The SystemUiServer should have <10 idle wakeups.

I have another hardware-identical machine running El Capitan 10.11.6, and it doesn't suffer from excessive battery drain. When comparing the Activity Monitor CPU panes, ordered by Idle Wake Ups, the entries are similar, except that the SystemUiServer entry has very low wake-up counts on the El Capitan machine, and 100x higher counts on the problematic system - on par with kernel_task and in 300-500 range.

A search for issues related to SystemUiServer prompted investigation of widgets installed in the menu bar. On both machines, the additions over stock install are: iStatMenus 5.31, Caffeine 1.1.1 and OS X's Keychain lock.

Upon disabling all widgets from iStatMenus settings pane, the SystemUiServer became idle. Re-enabling the widgets doesn't bring the problem back. Further checks after a reboot and then after a shutdown-restart cycle show that the problem didn't come back.

The battery life is now normal. At idle, with screen at minimum brightness, and google.com open in Safari 10.0.3, coconutBattery 3.5.1 indicates a discharge rate of ~10W.


iPhone in iPod Mode in Car Switches to Different audio App Intermittently

My knee-jerk reaction is to say: This sounds to me like a possible problem with the cable or the Lightning port on the phone.  It's as if the phone is getting some kind of remote control command via the cable.  I've seen similar skipping behavior with a bad Apple earbud cord.

That being said, I have an iPhone 6s and a new Nissan NVP 3500 that I too connect to the car via USB.  If I'm not playing anything at the moment, it will start playing the first thing alphabetically in my library.  If I'm playing something already, or if the two were connected via Bluetooth before I connect the cable, it will continue as if nothing was wrong.

On a quirky note, sometimes the stereo and the phone will haggle for a bit, then the phone will play the audio through its own speaker and the car will give up trying to access the phone in iPod Out mode.  In that case, I have to reboot the phone altogether to get it to play nicely with the car.  I chalk that up to running the iOS 10 betas.