Legit email is consistently going to junk folder despite NOT being marked as junk I've had this problem for years, all the way back to Lion at least.

I consistently have various emails coming into Apple Mail, that get moved to the junk folder.  These emails are not marked as Junk, i.e. Mail does not think they are junk mail, does not highlight them in brown, etc.  They cannot be marked as "Not Junk" because Mail already thinks they aren't junk, despite moving them to the junk folder.  I can mark them as junk if I want and they highlight in brown as they should, but of course they're not junk so... don't want to do that.  I have to manually move them to my inbox every time.

This happens with many accounts coming into Mail, including multiple GMail accounts, multiple accounts using my own personal domain, and my Apple-issued me.com account.  So it's not a GMail or 3rd party server thing.

I'm using IMAP for all accounts.  Junk filtering is enabled, "trust junk headers in messages" is disabled.  This has driven me nuts for years and I'm finally sick enough of it to post a question here.  It requires me to carefully scour my junk folder constantly - rendering the whole point of junk filtering moot.

How can I get valid mail to stop going to junk without setting custom rules for every single sender?

It turns out that the solution was to log into icloud.com, find all the emails that keep being marked as junk (since they will actually appear as junk in icloud) and mark them as not junk.  Now mail.app correctly treats them as not junk and is no longer sending them (marked as not junk) to the junk folder.

I would strongly suggest looking into the app SpamSieve, which functions in tandem with Apple Mail by assigning more stringent rules for sorting and which has a more advanced learning algorithm than that which is built in to Apple Mail. I've found SpamSieve to be pretty much flawless and am really glad it exists. It's kind of expensive, though; so you might try "trusting junk headers" or adding rules for those messages consistently incorrectly sorted first. The final option would of course be to try a different email client.


How to remove or disable a default keyboard layout? Is it possible to remove or disable one of OS X Lion’s default keyboard layouts?

I’m using a custom keyboard layout, and now that I managed to set it as the system-wide default keyboard layout, I’d like to be able to uncheck or remove the built-in “U.S.” keyboard layout that came with OS X. Here’s a screenshot — note that the checkbox is disabled:

In OS X 10.9, this preference pane has been redesigned, but still there’s no way to “remove” the built-in “U.S.” keyboard layout:

Since I never use the U.S. keyboard layout, I’d love to get rid of it, i.e. remove it from the Input menu in the menu bar. How can I do this?

Update: Daniel’s answer doesn’t really answer this question, but it does offer some valuable information regarding this problem:

  Mac OS X seems to require at least one keyboard layout that the system recognizes as a “Latin character” layout to be selected.

Assuming this is accurate information (thanks, Daniel!), the question could be rephrased as follows:

  How to make OS X consider a custom keyboard to be a Latin character layout?

Update: I just came across something that might help.

For macOS 10.8 and later:

Change the current input source to your custom keyboard layout.
Open ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.HIToolbox.plist (in 10.9) or ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.HIToolbox.*.plist (in 10.8 and earlier). You can convert the plist to XML with plutil -convert xml1.
Remove the input source or input sources you want to disable from the AppleEnabledInputSources dictionary. If there is an AppleDefaultAsciiInputSource key, remove it.
Restart.

For macOS 10.7 and earlier:

Enable an input source that is not like your physical keyboard layout from System Preferences (I used Afghan Dari).
Run f=~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.HIToolbox*.plist; plutil -convert xml1 $f; open $f -e.
Remove other input sources except the temporarily enabled keyboard layout and your custom keyboard layout.
Log out and back in.
Remove the temporarily enabled keyboard layout from the property list.
Log out and back in.

It can be done easily.
First change to your custom layout (use menu bar Input menu), then deselect the U.S. layout.


How to sync 30 days of mail in the mail app? I find managing multiple browser windows on OSX a real pain with no solution, so I decided to get rid of some tabs.

I loaded up gmail into the OSX Mail client, but it wants to sync my entire account. Is it possible to sync only new stuff? Basically I want it to only sync the last 30 days and not everything...

It's trying to sync about 6gb worth of mail...

You can't do this in the OS X Mail client. Mail.app will download all your emails available on the server.

The workaround is to make the change on the server. You mention that you have Gmail, therefore you can go to Gmail's IMAP settings and restrict the amount of emails available (for example, the most recent 1000).

Also, you can exclude labels from being visible to IMAP, therefore Mail won't download the contents.

Go to Gmail.com
Click on the gear in the top right (settings)
'See All Settings'
on the top/middle 'Forwarding and POP/IMAP'
scroll down, 'Folder size limits' Limit IMAP folders to contain no more than 1000 message (or whatever you decide)

You make the change in Gmail settings but it only affects IMAP clients like Mail app. All messages will still be stored in Gmail.


What are dos and don'ts when charging an iPhone / Apple device? Can I charge the phone all day long? I usually charge my phone all day and night long. All day long, because at work I connect my phone with my laptop, and all night long because when I go sleep, the phone will be charged overnight too.

But I got worried this may reduce battery life. So I went searching online, and the best article I can come up for best practice for charging Apple device is this. In the article, it just says that the device is smart, and can automatically stop the charge once it's almost full, to prevent overcharging. Does that mean it's actually completely okay for me to charge the phone all day long? I still can't find any article that can give me the straight answer to this question.

This questions risks inviting a lot of opinion, which also explains why it seems you can't find an article that can gives you a straight answer.

However, to try and keep this to the facts, I refer you firstly to what Apple has to say about their batteries. You should also read this.

In a nutshell, the key indisputable points are:

Charge your iPhone whenever you want. Many people believe you need to let them discharge 100% before recharging. This is not true.
Apple lithium-ion batteries use fast charging to reach 80% of their capacity and then switch to slower trickle charging to complete the charge.
Ambient temperature is one of the biggest factors in battery health/life. iPhones are designed to work at their best when ambient temperatures are between 0° to 35° C (32° to 95° F).
Store your iPhone where the temperature is between -20º and 45º C (-4º to 113º F). Don’t leave it in your car, because temperatures in parked cars can exceed 45º C (113º F).

Also, the latest research confirms one of the most important determinants of what ruins a battery is time. (You could purchase a brand new iPhone battery and leave it unused in its original packaging for five years and then find its capacity is nowhere near what it should be when you start using it)

Basically, you can continue to do as you have been without fear of causing damage to your iPhone battery.

You better not charge it all day. Keeping it at high voltage increases stress for the battery.

  Lithium-ion suffers from stress when exposed to heat, so does keeping a cell at a high charge voltage. A battery dwelling above 30°C (86°F) is considered elevated temperature and for most Li-ion a voltage above 4.10V/cell is deemed as high voltage. Exposing the battery to high temperature and dwelling in a full state-of-charge for an extended time can be more stressful than cycling. Table 3 demonstrates capacity loss as a function of temperature and SoC.
  https://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries

The mentioned table notes that at room temperature a battery at 100% charge loses 20% capacity after a year, while a battery kept at 40% loses only 4%. This is why new batteries will always have a 40-50% charge.

I know that this 40% rule is only mentioned in instructions when storing a battery long term, but it is also valid for batteries in use. This is why Dell has something like Desktop Mode (When desktop mode is enabled, the battery charges between 50 percent and 100 percent while the power adapter is connected.) and Asus has Maximum Lifespan Mode (If your ZenBook operates almost exclusively on your desktop and is nearly always plugged in, the most conservative power profile limits the maximum charge to 60% and starts charging at 58%. This will ensure your battery has the longest possible lifecycle while still keeping a sufficient charge for light usage while unplugged.)

It could be that Apple caps the charge at 80% capacity, but I can't find any reference to that. On the Apple battery page they also recommend storing at 40%.


Can I make Chrome the default web browser in iOS? With Google Chrome available for iOS now I'd like to know if it's possible to make Chrome the default browser? I find "open in browser" type options from other iOS apps still take me to Safari.

Not interested in jailbreaking. Looking for a solution that works without having to do that.

No, this is not possible unless Apple allows this in a future iOS update.

Looks like they eventually did... iOS 14


How can I create a Saved Search that excludes a specific folder from the results? I'm trying to set up a Saved Search of my Mac that will exclude files in a folder called 'XYZ' from the search results. The reason is because I'm getting a ton of false positives from that folder that are difficult to sort through.

Just to be clear, I know you can add folders to a "Privacy" list in the Spotlight preferences, but I don't want to add this folder to that list --because I don't want to exclude it from all future searches, just this specific saved search. Any idea how something like this could be done?

If you hold option the (+) button to add a search criteria will become a (…) and an Any/All/None block. Set this to None.

For the criteria select Document Container. It won't be in the default list alongside Name, Kind, etc. Select Other… to select it from a list of additional criteria so long it has its own search feature:

Set this to the name of the folder that you'd like to exclude using whatever is/contains/begins with/ends with you find suitable.

The end result should look something like this:

I was too suffering the same problem, and found a way to do so.

Go to Preference system > Spotlight > Select, then select "Privacy" tab, and you can add specific location(s) to exclude in Spotlight search.

I've tried, it works.


I modified the 'com.apple.screencapture.plist' file and now my screenshots don't save In Terminal, I executed the following lines:

defaults write com.apple.screencapture location ~/Desktop/
killall SystemUIServer

But try as I might, my screenshots never save to the Desktop. In fact, I have no idea where they go!

Here's a GIF demonstrating the problem:

Here's a screenshot of my keyboard settings (to show that there are no conflicts or that I'm not accidentally copying to clipboard):

Does anyone have an idea?

Assuming that you are running the latest version of macOS, with iCloud Drive activated and the "Desktop & Documents Folders" option selected, the ~/Desktop is no longer your regular desktop folder, as it's synchronized with iCloud.

My suggestion: drag any file from your desktop to a terminal window, and it will show the full path for the file in the desktop folder.

Hope it helps.

The problem you are having is that the OS doesn't understand the ~ shortcut. That's only a shell shortcut.

Set the location to the absolute path:

defaults write com.apple.screencapture location /Users/<username>/Desktop/
(replacing <username> with your username)

This should fix your problem.


"at" symbol is not working in everyplace I have connected a Microsoft keyboard to my MacBook Pro 2019. Since doing this, the @ symbol is not appearing when pressed.
Case 1:

With the integrated keyboard, in Chrome, VSCode or another text editors, or even here typing:
Key combination: right option + q: nothing happens

Case 2:

With the external keyboard, in Chrome, VSCode or another text editors, or even here typing:
Key combination: right option + q: nothing happens

Case 3:

With the integrated keyboard, Slack, Notes:
Key combination: right option + q: @ <-- only that way works

Why I can't write at all the @ symbol with the external keyboard?
Why I just can write in some apps the @ symbol with the integrated keyboard?
This is the input source:

And this are the Modifier keys:
a) for integrated:

b) for external:

Note that I remapped the command/option in the USB keyboard, but with this keyboard there's no way I can write the @ symbol

If you look on your keyboard, you should see the @ above one the keys, probably the number 2. Try the combination Shift + that number and see if that works.


automate saving screenshot (already in clipboard) to a file in bash I work on the command line quite a bit and often have to take a screenshot a region of the screen and save it to directory I am currently working in.

(let's assume I've already taken the screenshot and clipboard has it).

This is how I have to do it right now (after have the screenshot in clipboard):

launch Preview.
in Preview, ⌘ + N (File, New from Clipboard) creates a new file with the clipboard contents.
go back to command line and copy the directory name (copy the results of pwd)
go to Preview, ⌘ + S for Save.  Type / gets me a directory navigation prompt where I can paste my directory name from step 3.
Finally, give the actual file name, this_is_where_I_get_the_error.png in my example.

I'd like to do this instead:

$savemyscreenshot ./this_is_where_I_get_the_error.png

How would I go about writing that savemyscreenshot command?  In bash?  As an Automator script (which has to be callable from the Terminal, else that defeats the purpose somewhat)?

All things being equal, would slightly prefer a javascript flavor of the Automator script over AppleScript.

env:  MacOS Sierra

screencapture is a CLI tool built into macOS for taking screenshots, in /usr/sbin/screencapture.

To take a screenshot and save it to screenshot.png:

screencapture -x screenshot.png

To screenshot a region, you can use -R, where x,y are the coordinates of the top-left and w,h is width and height of the capture.

screencapture -x -Rx,y,w,h /path/to/capture.png

To interactively choose a region, use -i

screencapture -i screenshot.png

Edit: Per comments, this answer didn’t work. Looks like the last time someone asked this someone else wrote a utility for it:
What's the quickest way to get a graphic on the clipboard saved to disk? specifically this answer

Original answer follows

There should be a terminal command "pbpaste" which you can redirect to a file. So if you have image data in your clipboard pbpaste > my_img.png should do the trick.


Send background email alert if Time Machine backup fails Curious if there is an easy way to send a background email alert if a Time Machine backup fails (or continuously fails rather than just one time)

I've found TM Error Logger however, it cannot run in the background, and also generates the email through the systems default mail client, which then needs to be manually sent.

Ideally I'd like a solution that does this in the background without any input or action from the end user - so that I can be notified if their machines aren't backing up.

The trouble is many users don't realize that Time Machine may not be working for them - they don't know to look for the "!" in the TM menu bar icon (or often what it means)

This is a great use case for a simple shell or python or ruby script and launchd.

I'll assume you can find on this site how to configure the launchd item or want to buy Lingon which is a great timesaver. (Be aware Lingon 3 is for Lion and there is another also paid version for Snow Leopard just named Lingon on the App store)

You also will need to set up an internal mail server that accepts command line mail from all your clients, so there is that large chunk of setup.

With all that "hand waving" to explain broad concepts - you now could use these core commands to get the job done:

tmutil latestbackup
date "+%Y-%m-%d"
mail -s "TimeMachine Failure Report from $HOSTNAME" "This mac needs attention"

Depending on how much fun this sounds, you can pick apart each task and work on them or look into software that is designed to do this for you like Apple Remote Desktop or Robot Cloud.

Time Machine failing - get alerted by Growl I think it already says it. But okay... I wrote a script which checks the age of the last successful time machine backup and alerts by growl if it is too old.


Why can't I send/receive files in iChat? I'm trying to send a file to someone else via iChat, but it always fails. We're both using our Gmail accounts. Is it even possible with Gmail accounts? We also tried jabber accounts as well, but no luck. We both have Lion 10.7.2 and temporarily disabled the OS X firewall. Both our routers using NAT. By the way, video chats work (bad quality though) and iChat screen sharing works sometimes.

This link is old but may help,
http://www.macobserver.com/tip/2007/02/14.1.shtml

I also noticed that it might help to just drag and drop the file you wish to send over the person you wish to send it to in the drop down chat menu and drop it there instead of on the chat box, it will then ask you if you want to send, click yes and it should work.


The volume can't be ejected because it's currently in use After working with an external USB backup disk I want to cleanly unmount the drive. When pressing the 'eject' button Finder warns me with the message:

"The volume can't be ejected because it's currently in use."

or

"The disk "Diskname" wasn't ejected because one or more programs may be using it.".

or when trying to use the Terminal: umount /Volumes/Diskname

"umount(/Volumes/Diskname): Resource busy -- try 'diskutil unmount'"

As far as I am aware, I am not using this disk but Finder says I do, so I must be wrong. I prefer a clean unmount of the drive. As I am in the middle of doing multiple tasks, logging out and logging in is not preferred as is the installation of third party software.

Terminal command lsof might be of use here, but personally I think this is too complex for such a 'simple' problem and to be honest, I do not know how to use it properly.

My question: How do I know what program is using my drive so I can properly quit that program and eject my drive?

lsof is indeed your best bet. The fastest and easiest way would be this :-

sudo lsof /Volumes/myDrive

It can take a couple minutes to run, but once it's complete, it gives you a list of open files on the disk. The output will look something like this:

COMMAND    PID  USER   FD   TYPE DEVICE SIZE/OFF  NODE NAME
mds         89  root   19r   DIR   52,3      432     2 /Volumes/Photos
mds         89  root   23r   DIR   52,3      432     2 /Volumes/Photos
Finder     681 alans   14r   DIR   52,3      432     2 /Volumes/Photos
QuickLook 2158 alans    9r   REG   52,3  1141591 78651 /Volumes/Photos/_tmp_iphone_10_backup/APC_1546.JPG

In this case, it's the QuickLook application that has a file open. Closing the application directly is the best way to fix the issue. However, that's not always possible. For example, QuickLook doesn't show up as an application you can get to in the Dock.

If you can't close the application manually, you can use the kill command to terminate it from the command line. To do that, use the PID from the second column as the ID to kill. From the above example, it would be:

kill 2158

Note that sometimes that doesn't work and a more aggressive form of kill must be used. Here's a series of escalating aggressiveness (using the example PID of 2158):

kill 2158
sudo kill 2158
sudo kill -INT 2158
sudo kill -KILL 2158

You should be able to eject the disk once the process/application has been killed.

One final note, lsof can take a minute or two. It can also hang, but you should give it at least a few minutes before you decide that's what happened.

Also, sometimes the base command sudo lsof /Volumes/myDrive won't find anything. If that happens, try adding the +D argument (i.e. sudo lsof +D /Volumes/myDrive). That will do a top down scan of the disk. It'll take longer, but it should pick up anything that's causing the disk to be un-ejectable.

(Hat tip to Alec Jacobson's post for extra details.)

I restarted my Mac and that fixed it :-)


Western Digital external hard drive is constantly ejected I have a 1TB Western Digital external hard drive that I use for Time Machine backups, and recently my iMac has started to randomly eject the hard drive, preventing backups. It tends to happen while the display goes to sleep, but I have my Energy Saver settings set to not put the hard drives to sleep, and the computer is set to never go to sleep.

To correct the issue, I pull the USB cable on the drive and then re-attach it. I'm wondering if this is just a bad drive that I need to return or if this is some kind of larger issue.

Someone reported a similar issue on an Apple discussion forum:

I tried that but the drive will still eject itself randomly at times.
I contacted Western Digital about this and they say it might be a
problem with my USB cord. So they're going to send me a new one.
Has
anyone else had this problem and found that it was due to a faulty USB
3.0 (compatible with USB 2.0) cord?

Another poster in the same thread commented:

Sounds like disk is on the way out. I would move or backup all data on
it.

You should first back up that drive before anything else. Contact WD to see if they can send you a new USB cord. It's a good idea to run some diagnostics on the drive to confirm that there are no disk errors. Testing on another computer would also be a good idea to narrow down to see if the issue is isolated to your machine or the drive.
If the drive is failing, you'll need to return/exchange it.

I had this same problem and it seems that the drive may have been underpowered. I may be wrong, but I got a powered USB hub and a new surge protector and everything worked out.


Why do our iPhones keep asking for passwords of other users? Our client's employees all have iPhone 6s. They don't share phones, and have never used each others, but strangely, as one user tries to download an app at the App store, it then asks for a completely different persons' iCloud password. The only thing these phones share is a WiFi network, and mail accounts on an Exchange server.

This has happened to two other phones within the same client employees. One of the phones actually asked for a completely different client iCloud password, even though these two people have never met before.

Why does this keep happening?

Update: I have answered this myself, and marked as the correct answer because that is exactly what were happening.

Is this an enterprise setup? How are the phones being managed? MaaS360, OS X Server, ect?

It sounds like the users are connected to the same App Store ID and all have different iCloud accounts they are logged into (or vice versa).

The answer was actually to do with the silly way Apple works when you run a backup with iTunes.

Person A backs up their iPhone which has an app called "Whatsapp".

Person B then backs up their iPhone which also has the same app. (Itunes will not backup Whatsapp as Person A already has).

Person B later restores their iPhone from their own backup.

Silly iTunes then uses Person A's backed up copy of Whatsapp to restore onto Person B's iPhone, which later causes the password prompt when performing updates.

We used the same laptop's and desktops to backup iPhones when going from iPhone 5 to 6, which caused this problem to happen all over the place.

EDIT: YES this is 100% what is happening which is why it is the answer, not sure why the down-vote, but probably from the unhappy guy in the comments that didn't like me calling his precious iTunes "silly". If you have the problem I had in the question, then this is the answer for it.


Remove "Move to Dropbox" menu from Finder context menu I want to remove the annoying "Move to Dropbox" entry in the context menu when I right click a file in macOS Finder.

I know I can disable Dropbox's Finder Extension all-together, but I do like the green check marks that display syncing status. I just don't want the clutter in the right-click context menu.

Is there a way to disable only this "Move to Dropbox" menu item while keeping Dropbox's other Finder integrations?

If you go to Preferences -> Extensions -> Finder, you will see the Finder extension that you can enable/disable and you can enable/disable the Finder extension from the Dropbox app itself.

Unfortunately I don't believe you can simply remove the one option but rather it's an all-or-nothing scenario based on the extension itself. Well, at least until Dropbox makes some improvements.

This is called a "Finder Service"
http://osxdaily.com/2013/05/14/remove-services-contextual-menu-mac-os-x/

Removing Services from the Contextual Menus
To be clear, this removes items, but does not delete the service itself, meaning you can easily go back and re-enable them again should you decide to reverse this and want a service or two back again.

Locate the precise name of the service to remove by summoning the contextual menu from the Finder, in this example we’ll right-click a file and want to remove the “Make Contact Sheet” option from the menu list

Open System Preferences, found within the  Apple menu, and choose “Keyboard” from the preference panel options

Choose the “Keyboard Shortcuts” tab, then click on the “Services” option from the left sides options

Navigate through this list to find the exact name of the service you found in the first step, then uncheck the box next to it


How can I access a remote machine via SSH from behind a proxy? I’m trying to connect to a Linux machine via SSH. The problem is that my Mac is in a different network, behind a proxy that routes HTTP and HTTPS through port 80.

How can I access the Linux machine via SSH from terminal?

Connecting with -vvv returns the following result:

OpenSSH_5.2p1, OpenSSL 0.9.8r 8 Feb 2011
debug1: Reading configuration data /etc/ssh_config
debug2: ssh_connect: needpriv 0
debug1: Connecting to _example.com_ [_ip_address_] port 22.
debug1: connect to address _ip_address_ port 22: Connection refused
ssh: connect to host _example.com_ port 22: Connection refused

You may need tunneling technique for accessing an HTTP proxy using SSH tunneling check this link: http://kimmo.suominen.com/docs/proxy-through-ssh/


Activation lock on Ipad My Ipad locked on it on I don't remember my I cloud ID or Password How do I unlock it? It came up on my Ipad Activation lock.

Provided you can remember the answers you gave to your security questions, you can reset your password at https://appleid.apple.com.


Issues with Google's apps on iOS over Cellular I recently got an iPhone 6 (iOS 8.3, Verizon), and I've been having recurring issues with Google's apps not being able to access the network when on LTE or 3G (Gmail, Google, Inbox, Play Music, etc).  The problem does not occur over Wifi, but my LTE/3G connection is perfectly reliable for non-Google apps (streaming video with Netflix works great).

I tried the following to troubleshoot this issue:

Uninstalled every Google app from my phone
Cleared the iCloud backups for all of them
Installed Gmail app.  It prompted me to sign into my account (not sure how it prepopulated my account after being uninstalled), but could not connect to the network.  I removed the account from the Gmail app, uninstalled, reinstalled, and still no network.
Turned on wifi to verify that the app was able to connect.  It was, instantly.  Turned off wifi and reloaded the app - no connection.  Verified good LTE connection in other apps.

Restarting the phone fixes the issue and the Google apps work over LTE/3G again, but the problem recurs every couple days, and the only solution is to turn the phone off and on.

Any ideas?  The fact that the problem persists across uninstallations and is only solved by a reboot of the phone seems to indicate a problem with the iPhone rather than Google apps, but the fact that the problem is isolated to Google apps would indicate otherwise.  I'd take it to the Apple store, but I have a feeling they'd just tell me to contact Google.

Update

When the issue is occurring, I can access google.com via Safari and via Ping Analyzer.

Tetsujin's answer helped me, although my problem wasn't exactly the same as his. Google and Google maps weren't yielding results, and I blamed my service provider for crappy coverage, although other apps were working. I went into Settings -> Cellular as per Tetsujin's instructions, and found that Google and Google maps were turned off under "Use cellular data for"... Turned them back on, and they now work. When setting up my phone, I had set up Google apps conservatively to keep the MoFos from snooping on me. Turns out that totally invalidates them when not on wifi....

You can go Setting > Cellular > scroll down to Gmail, turn it on


How to Fix iTunes Error -45076 macOS UpDate to High Sierra. iTunes can't open.

What is iTunes error -45076, and how might one fix the problem? I have already searched Apple and AskDifferent for the specific error code, but come up empty handed.

macOS High Sierra was install on Sept 26, 2017.
iTunes 12.6.2

iTunes starts, displays the error, as shown below, and leaves no option but to quit. It tried before and after the High Sierra update: iTunes was working before the High Sierra update today.

Starting iTunes from a terminal (/Applications/iTunes.app/Contents/MacOS/iTunes)
yields the following output: 2017-09-26 22:09:09.802 iTunes[930:14353] .sdef warning for attribute 'rawData' of class 'artwork' in suite 'iTunes Suite': 'raw data' is not a valid type name.

Here's how to fix error -45076 if you have downgraded iTunes 12.7 to 12.6.2 still under Sierra and have then upgraded your OS to High Sierra:

Re-download the iTunes 12.6.2-DMG directly from the Apple Servers.
Make a backup of ~/Music/iTunes/iTunes Library.itl (just in case).
Delete iTunes 12.6.2 from your High Sierra Mac, this time entirely (list of ingredients courtesy of macrumours.com member driveparty):sudo rm -rf
/Library/Documentation/Applications/iTunes/Acknowledgements.rtf
/Library/Documentation/iPod/Acknowledgements.rtf
/Library/Frameworks/iTunesLibrary.framework/
/Applications/iTunes.app/
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/iTunesAccess.framework/
/System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.fpsd.plist
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/CoreFP.framework/
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/CoreADI.framework/
/System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.adid.plist
/System/Library/CoreServices/UAUPlugins/ADIUserAccountUpdater.bundle/
/System/Library/CoreServices/CoreTypes.bundle/Contents/Library/MobileDevices.bundle/
/System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.usbmuxd.plist
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/AirTrafficHost.framework/
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/DeviceLink.framework/
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/MobileDevice.framework/
/System/Library/Extensions/AppleMobileDevice.kext/
/System/Library/Extensions/AppleUsbEthernetHost
Install iTunes 12.6.2 again from the DMG downloaded above.

You have to download and update iTunes to 12.7
 https://www.apple.com/itunes/download/


How I do permanently authorize an app on my mac? I use Clean My Mac to periodically clean out old log files and caches. Right before the clean, it asks me permission and I have to enter my password to authenticate. Is there any way I can authorize the app once and skip this step every time?

No, it's asking for authentication not because the app needs it but because it's altering system files and OS X will always need authentication for this.

you can find the binary in the application folder, according to view package content, and to run the binary in sudo mode


Trying to replace volume sound in OS X to what was present before. Encountering permissions problems even as root. Help? I'm trying to get the old volume feedback noise on my MacBook.

I have a copy of the sound file but the system is refusing to let me replace it, even as root. I found this article that also explained it step by step for terminal but even terminal is giving me problems.

I'm currently on a 2010 13" MBP with OS X 10.11 Beta 5 (15A262e). Any ideas?

The article[1] you have referenced will not work on OS X 10.11 El Capitan (beta versions included). This is due to the new System Integrity Protection (SIP) feature. SIP is intended to protect operating-level system files (in /System and other filesystem locations) from modification, even by a user with root-level privileges.

If you are committed to doing this task, you could try turning SIP off, following the article, then turning SIP back on. Instructions for disabling/enabling SIP are easily found online.

[1] Note that the article does not give any 'date posted' information, but appears to have been posted around Sept-Oct 2014?

Try using Disk Utility to repair did disk permissions. Open Disk Utility, select your drive, select repair and then click Repair Permissions. This may fix your issue.


Macbook Air (Mid 2013) keyboard and trackpad not detected I was holding down a key (can't remember which) and then my keyboard and trackpad were no longer responsive. Multiple restarts, PRAM, and SMC resets did not do the trick.

I can use the keyboard and trackpad perfectly in my Windows partition (which I bootcamped) but can't seem to use it in my OS X partition or the recovery partition. It can however detect external keyboard and mouses. I have Googled endlessly for hours.

Anyone else experience this issue or have any suggestions?

I am desperate. I will travel to Alaska and hit option 5 times at this point.

This sounds like the kext that controls the built in keyboard / mouse is either missing or damaged.  I believe the kext in question is something along the lines of "IOUSBFamily.kext". I doubt this would be a hardware/firmware issue though since Windows recognizes input from the built in keyboard/trackpad.

You might try repairing the disk using Disk Utility in the recovery volume and then repairing permissions using Disk Utility while booted to your Macintosh HD volume.

If those don't resolve the issue then I would attempt an archive & install of the OS...

To boot to the recovery partition you need to power it off

On start up, using the USB keyboard, press command + r or if that doesn't work press option until you see your partitions, then select recovery 10.x

Wait for the recovery tool to boot
Select "Reinstall OS X"
Follow the on screen prompts to reinstall OS X

This process SHOULD preserve your data but as always it's a good idea to have a backup of any pertinent data beforehand.  The reinstallation will go through and reinstall the base system files, which should include the missing/damage kext responsible for the problem, while leaving any files you've added  alone.

Hopefully all goes smoothly and that fixes it for you!

People are yelling thanks for this solution:

https://lbarclay.wordpress.com/2009/01/29/macbook-pro-trakpad-and-keyboard-not-working/


Why can't I add events to my calendar? After upgrading to iOS 7, the + (plus) sign on my calendar is grayed out.  I cannot add new appointments. I even tried using Siri to add an appointment and the response is "Sorry, I'm afraid I can't do that."

I had to turn on calendars and set the password in iCloud (settings/icloud/turn on calendars).  Make sure to reset your phone by holding down the power button and the select button at the same time until your phone turns off and the apple icon appears, then release.  Give it a second and it will reset.  It should work after that :)


networksetup -connectpppoeservice "VPN" does not work anymore on Yosemite I have some bash scripts to connect my VPN but since Yosemite was installed they doesn't work anymore.

I tested directly on Terminal with and without sudo:

networksetup -connectpppoeservice "VPN"
networksetup -disconnectpppoeservice "VPN"

but nothing happens

I had the some problem and a working solution like this:

Before Yosemite

networksetup -connectpppoeservice 'MY-VPN-SERVICE-NAME'

On Yosemite

scutil --nc start 'MY-VPN-SERVICE-NAME'

I found the hint on Robert's Blog http://roosbertl.blogspot.de/2014/10/auto-connect-osx-yosemite-ipsec-vpn-on.html

Works für IPSec and PPTP

I set my Wifi to DHCP instead of static IP, then it worked for me.


How to take a full page screenshot in Mac OS Safari? I'm looking for a Safari Extension that can take full page screenshots. I am aware there are various extensions, but haven't found any that would take full page images.

No plugins or anything needed - latest Safari (7, not sure from which version this works) can save to PDF. File -> Export as PDF... and you get entire page, images and all. And it's a lovely hi-res PDF.

To get a png of an open window—including Safari webpage:

Shift+Cmd+4

...which makes a crosshair appear...then...
press Space
...turning the crosshair into a camera icon. Use this to click on the window/webpage you want to screenshot. It includes the drop shadow with transparency.


iTerm text search is in reverse order I'm running iTerm2. When do a text search ⌘ F, pressing Return moves the highlighted occurrence back (the previous occurrence). Is there a way to make it move to the next (forward) occurrence?

Searching in reverse is apparently how iTerm's search works by design (see https://gitlab.com/gnachman/iterm2/issues/4491).

As a user, I also find this design decision confusing.

If you would like to make Find Next / Find Previous in iTerm behave consistently with other apps, here are the proper keybinding overrides to add in System Preferences > Keyboard.

Note that I had to restart iTerm for the keybindings to fully take effect.

Try using Shift+Enter to reach the next occurrence.


Apple Mail with Gmail Account (IMAP): Moving Mails from inbox to folders fails I have a Gmail account (gmail 1), and if I'm moving email from Inbox to an IMAP folder, the email disappears from Inbox and after changing the folder and going back to Inbox the moved mail is back in my Inbox.

I just created a new Gmail account (gmail 2) and tried it with this account. The behaviour is like expected: moved emails don't re-appear in their old folder.

Now, I don't know how to fix this. I've checked the account settings from both accounts, the new one and the old one and I can't find a settings difference to fix this problem.

I made a short 30sec movie about the problem.

The following solved the issue for me:

Gmail Settings:

Inbox → Categories:
Select only Primary
Inbox → Importance markers:
No marker
Inbox → Filtered mail:
Override filters
Forwarding and POP/IMAP → IMAP Access:
When I mark a message in IMAP as deleted: Auto-Expunge off
When a message is marked as deleted and expunged from the last visible IMAP folder: Move the message to the Trash

It may help to attempt to rebuild the mailbox that you're having problems with. You can rebuild a mailbox by selecting that mailbox from the list on the left-hand side. Then, go up to the "Mailboxes" menu -> Rebuild. You can observe the status of the rebuild by going underneath the "Window" menu -> "Activity". Here is some additional information on rebuilding mailboxes


Applescript run from menu bar? I am aware of the Script Editor menu. That is not what I'm looking for.

Is there a way to run an Applescript from the menu bar? I can save it as a file and run it from the Script Editor menu, and I can save it as an application and stick it in my dock. Is there a file format that allows it to run from the menu bar, as many applications do? Or a way to edit the code that does the same thing?

Cocoa-AppleScript as a script or AppleScript application created in Script Editor supports Menu Bar app. This script runs on macOS 10.12 (maybe runs on 10.10.x, 10.11.x). This script can be saved as application.

--AppleScript: menu bar script -- Created 2017-03-03 by Takaaki Naganoya
--2017 Piyomaru Software
use AppleScript version "2.4"
use scripting additions
use framework "Foundation"
use framework "AppKit"
--http://piyocast.com/as/archives/4502

property aStatusItem : missing value

on run
    init() of me
end run

on init()
    set aList to {"Piyomaru", "Software", "", "Takaaki", "Naganoya", "", "Quit"}
    set aStatusItem to current application's NSStatusBar's systemStatusBar()'s statusItemWithLength:(current application's NSVariableStatusItemLength)

    aStatusItem's setTitle:""
    aStatusItem's setHighlightMode:true
    aStatusItem's setMenu:(createMenu(aList) of me)
end init

on createMenu(aList)
    set aMenu to current application's NSMenu's alloc()'s init()
    set aCount to 1
    repeat with i in aList
        set j to contents of i
        if j is not equal to "" then
            set aMenuItem to (current application's NSMenuItem's alloc()'s initWithTitle:j action:"actionHandler:" keyEquivalent:"")
        else
            set aMenuItem to (current application's NSMenuItem's separatorItem())
        end if
        (aMenuItem's setTarget:me)
        (aMenuItem's setTag:aCount)
        (aMenu's addItem:aMenuItem)
        if j is not equal to "" then
            set aCount to aCount + 1
        end if
    end repeat

    return aMenu
end createMenu

on actionHandler:sender
    set aTag to tag of sender as integer
    set aTitle to title of sender as string

    if aTitle is not equal to "Quit" then
        display dialog aTag as string
    else
        current application's NSStatusBar's systemStatusBar()'s removeStatusItem:aStatusItem
    end if
end actionHandler:

I previously edited the original code, posted by Piyomaru, just to the point it would compile and wanted to add some additional information to make the example code more useful for anyone relatively new to AppleScript.

Presently in the example code, if saved as an application it has no code to quit the application, it only removes the menu bar object. So, in the actionHandler handler of the script, add the following to the else branch of the if statement, after the existing code:

        if (name of current application) is not "Script Editor" then
            tell current application to quit
        end if

It's coded so if/when run from within Script Editor it will not attempt to close Script Editor. You can use it without the if statement block and use just tell current application to quit if you're not going to run it from within Script Editor.

Because this script is using Cocoa-AppleScript, once run from within Script Editor, it must be compiled again just before saving it in order to flush the C and Objective-C pointers created by the Cocoa-Applescript code, since pointers cannot be saved in the script. Just click the hammer icon on the Toolbar, or: Script Editor > Script > Compile   ⌘K

Additionally, when saved as an application you must check the Stay open after run handler check-box when saving it, and by default the app's Dock Tile will show in the Dock when running. As this might be unwanted behavior for a menu bar app, use the following command in Terminal to add the necessary key to the app's Info.plist file so it will not show in the Dock.

defaults write /Applications/name_of_app.app/Contents/Info.plist LSUIElement -bool yes

Replace name_of_app with the actual name you saved it as, and if necessary change the path if not in /Applications.
Note that if you drag the app to the Dock, its Dock Tile will still show on the Dock, just won't have a open indicator under it when open. This added key to the Info.plist file is to keep the Dock Tile from showing on the Dock when running, when the app has not been dragged to the Dock in the first place.

In the actionHandler handler of the original example code, it just displays a dialog box with the menu item number that was clicked, which certainly fine for example code, however, I'd like to show a different example how to have separate code execute based on which menu item was clicked. The following example code could replace the entire actionHandler handler in the original script:

on actionHandler:sender
    set aTitle to title of sender as string
    if aTitle is equal to "Quit" then
        current application's NSStatusBar's systemStatusBar()'s removeStatusItem:aStatusItem
        if (name of current application) is not "Script Editor" then
            tell current application to quit
        end if
    else if aTitle is equal to "Piyomaru" then

        --  # Your code to run for this menu choice goes here:

    else if aTitle is equal to "Software" then

        --  # Your code to run for this menu choice goes here:

    else if aTitle is equal to "Takaaki" then

        --  # Your code to run for this menu choice goes here:

    else if aTitle is equal to "Naganoya" then

        --  # Your code to run for this menu choice goes here:

    end if
end actionHandler:

Now this could be written differently, i.e. "Quit" as an else or else if at the bottom, but I did it this way because I want all other menu commands to be an else if choice, even though logically any other given menu command is more likely to be clicked then "Quit". For me, I think it's easier to add/edit/remove the menu command's code when written this way. It's just a personal preference, so do it as you feel what's right for you.

A discussion note from the AppleScript Language Guide:

  An if statement can contain any number of else if clauses; AppleScript looks for the first Boolean expression contained in an if or else if clause that is true, executes the statements contained in its block (the statements between one else if and the following else if or else clause), and then exits the if statement.

  An if statement can also include a final else clause. The statements in its block are executed if no other test in the if statement passes.

For the most part of the original example code, you should only have to modify two line of code in the init handler:

set aList to {"Piyomaru", "Software", "", "Takaaki", "Naganoya", "", "Quit"}

This sets the name of the menu commands in their order, and "" is for a separator.

For a different icon:

aStatusItem's setTitle:""

Change the "" to something else you prefer, from: Script Editor > Edit > Emoji & Symbols

Hopefully it's obvious that the if statement block in the actionHandler handler will correspond to the aList in the init handler, so match the names in the aTitle is equal to  in the actionHandler handler to the names in the aList in the init handler.

The rest of the code should not need to be modified, although it certainly can if need be or wanted.

There is a little-used "Services" menu (in the menu under the application's name) and you can save scripts as services and make them available in the services menu for either a specific application .

There is also the concept of applications that are "attachable," these applications allow you to add scripts to the application's own menu commands. But applications that are attachable seem rare.

Does any of that fit what you are looking for?


Will Buying "SIM-Free" iPhone from Apple Work on Verizon I currently have verizon and I'm looking to upgrade my phone.  If I buy the phone from this page http://www.apple.com/shop/buy-iphone/iphone5s and choose the "SIM-Free" option (below), will that work for me? or do I have to click the verizon button and put my account info in?  Also, I currently have an android phone, that requires a verizon sim card.  Can I just put my old simcard into the new iPhone when it arrives? Thanks in advance.

There are two different iPhone 5s models sold in the US -- the CDMA model for Verizon or Sprint (which also supports GSM connectivity for international use) and the GSM model. The unlocked phone is the GSM model, so it won't support CDMA and won't talk to Verizon's network (except perhaps for data (not voice) on 4G/LTE, where Verizon uses GSM like the rest of the world). So you can buy an unlocked phone and put a Verizon SIM in it, but it will at best only work with Verizon for data, and only in areas where they have 4G coverage.

Just look at the bottom of the page you link to in your question, where it says:

  If you buy a SIM-free iPhone, you will need to purchase a
  GSM-compatible nano-SIM card separately. In the United States, you can
  purchase such a SIM from AT&T or T-Mobile.

I'd just call a Version representative on the phone, go to a Verizon store, or contact Apple in either of those ways if you want a definitive answer.

That being said, I'd imagine that that SIM-free iPhone would work with Verizon or the other three carriers due to you not having to specify which one you wish to you the iPhone on. I couldn't be sure, though.

Also, as long as your SIM in your old phone is a nano-SIM card, then it will fit your new iPhone perfectly. That's all you should have to do to activate your iPhone, too, is just put that SIM card in it.

P.S. If you intend on keeping your iPhone for a couple years, you'd be better off either buying a new iPhone 6S or a used iPhone 5S or iPhone 6, not a new iPhone 5S. While a 5S is certainly fine today, in a couple of years it will feel kind of dated (like using an iPhone 4S, today), this is especially bad since it costs at least $550, depending on what model you get. The same configuration iPhone 6S is $200 more, but it'd be worth it, and you'd really appreciate buying a newer model in a couple of years. If you'd don't want to spend any more than what a new 5S costs, though, you could just buy a used iPhone 5S for around $300 on eBay, and a couple hundred or so more for a used iPhone 6. I'd take a used iPhone 6 over a new iPhone 5S any day, but maybe that's just me.


Can I transfer photos that are not in my iPhone's camera roll to my computer? My iPhone was linked to my main computer and it has all my photos stored on it, but not in the camera roll. Since my husband blew the main computer up, my precious photos appear to be in limbo. It does not appear that I can import them anywhere. I could email all them one by one but that seems a little low tech. iTunes tells me that if I upgrade iOS I will lose my photos that are not in the camera roll. Also, the same would seem to be true if I deauthorize my main (now usless) PC. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Yes, you can get the photos back on your computer that you synced to your iPhone. However, they will be a lower quality as iTunes automatically resizes them when it syncs them onto your device.

One way to copy photos off an iDevice is through a program called iExplorer (previously iPhone Explorer) that lets you access some of the filesystem on the iPhone.

Install the program from the website, then open it. You will be presented with a screen where you should find your iPhone listed. Here are the locations of the photos:

Camera Roll Photos:
iPhone -> Media -> DCIM

Previously Synced Photos:
iPhone -> Media -> PhotoData - > Sync

To get the synced photos off your iPhone drag the Sync folder into a folder on your computer and wait for them to copy. The same applies to the camera roll photos if you want to grab them at the same time.

There is no change you can make photos from nothing.
You should recover them before transfer them.
Also, check iCloud to see if they were there. If you've backed once on iTunes or iCloud, you may find them there.
If you insisted, you may check this guide for further information:
How to Transfer Photos from iPhone to Computer


How to import Apple Mail archive files in Outlook 2013? I need to import Apple Mail archived files in Outlook 2013 on Windows, but every time I open the import wizard and reach the file selection step, I cannot select the archived file. It doesn't even show in the dialog box.

I don't know what the issue is. Is it the file size issue as the archive file is large (about 7 GB) or there is any other fault?

Apple mail archive are in .mbox format which is not a supported Outlook format in windows. You cannot import this file, that's why.

You might want to look for a .mbox to .pst converter.

To help you out this might help you:
Trial MBOX Converter

If both system are using the IMAP mail provider all you have to do is setup the connection to the mail server and all the emails and folders will be copied down to the windows computer. That is what IMAP is for. The mail stays on the server, and can be store on the local computer also, and when you connect to the server with another device, computer, phone or pad, all the mail with folders gets copied to the other device.

But I think some of your mail was gotten using POP so it is not longer on the server.

Or you have emails in local folder only and they would be on the server. But you can create folder on the server in one mail program, or on the mail web interface and then copy those emails into those folder on the server byt copying them in one of the email programs. Then when you log on with the other device all of them will be downloaded to the other device.

Other alternative:-
You can find various solutions on having a google search for your problem.
Or you can have a look at the following link: Apple mail to Outlook Windows


Doing a "mail merge" from Microsoft Office to send out an individualized email I have an Excel spreadsheet with the grades of my students. Every so often I'd like to email out their current grades, one email per student, that will only include their last three homework grades or so.

Ideally I'd use Thunderbird to email it out but that might be trouble. Mail.app could also work, or Outlook in a pinch.

I've tried Word's Mail Merge and got all the way to the sixth step but the "Generate e-mail messages" option there is always greyed out, whatever I seem to be trying.

I'd also be happy with another solution, like using LibreOffice or exporting as text and using some command line tool to email it out but so far I haven't been able to emailing anything via mailx...

In the end, staying within the Microsoft Office environment is probably the easiest answer. Sorry for not having researched that more thoroughly before asking the question.

"Generate e-mail messages" in the last step was greyed out because Microsoft Outlook was not the default email application. So to make it work:

(Temporarily) Make MS Outlook the default email application: This is an option within the Mail.app preferences.
Go through the usual mail merge steps. Note that the email-address does not need to be in the Word message, but I would recommend to have it as a field in the Excel sheet.
In the last step the "generate e-mail messages" option should not be greyed out anymore. Select it.
A small window pops open. Among other options (Subject, for example) the field containing the email address can be chosen here.
The format can be chosen as "Text", "HTML" and "Attachment". When sending as text, all me line breaks would disappear, so I ended up sending as HTML, even though I very much prefer "text"...
Done.
(7. Don't forget to undo your choice of default email app, if you normally use another one.)

This might help. It worked for me.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/3027171/outlook-2016-for-mac-cannot-be-set-as-the-default-application-in-mac-o


“Warning: SUID file has been modified and will not be repaired” after repairing disk permissions Warning: SUID file “System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/MacOS/ARDAgent” has been modified and will not be repaired.

I keep getting this after running Disk Utility to repair permissions.
Will this cause problems?

It's simply telling you that the file has been modified, and because it's been modified Disk Utility can't fix the permissions on it.
ARDAgent.app is the Apple Remote Desktop agent, and the file shown in the path above is the binary file contained within the app package. It's normal for the file to be shown as an error here. Simply ignore it.
Apple KB article TS1448 details which error messages you can ignore in Disk Utility.
The error that you provided is shown in the list, so it can be safely ignored.

Disk Utility's Repair Disk Permissions messages that you can safely ignore

Warning: SUID file "System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/MacOS/ARDAgent" has been modified and will not be repaired.

Note that i made a wrong action by globally changing permissions in the var folder. After reinstalling system, still had problems to open dmg files
The DiskUtility announced the following issues :

Permissions differ on "private/var/db/ConfigurationProfiles"; should be drwxr-xr-x ; they are drwsr-s--T
Warning: SUID file "private/var/db/ConfigurationProfiles" has been modified and will not be repaired
Permissions differ on "private/var/db/SystemPolicy"; should be -rw-r--r-- ; they are -rwsr-s--T
Warning: SUID file "private/var/db/SystemPolicy" has been modified and will not be repaired
Permissions differ on "private/var/db/launchd.db/com.apple.launchd"; should be drwxr-xr-x ; they are drwsr-sr-t
Warning: SUID file "private/var/db/launchd.db/com.apple.launchd" has been modified and will not be repaired
Permissions differ on "private/var/db/locationd"; should be drwxr-x--- ; they are drwsr-s--T
Warning: SUID file "private/var/db/locationd" has been modified and will not be repaired
Permissions differ on "private/var/yp/binding"; should be drwxr-xr-x ; they are drwsr-s--T
Warning: SUID file "private/var/yp/binding" has been modified and will not be repaired

After carefully reset the permissions by hand as DiskUtility would not do it by itself (why ? ), my problem was solved.

So i don't agree on what is written everywhere : those messages are important, and if you got bad permissions somewhere, you must correct them..


Yosemite and Teac A-H01 sound driver- alternatives? The Teac A-H01 requires an audio driver, otherwise the sound becomes watery. Teac hasn't released a driver since Yosemite came out.

Are there any workarounds? It seems like USB external sound is fairly standard, so perhaps there are alternative drivers available?

I have same issue, contacted Teac support and recieved the following

Thank you for contacting TEAC-Audio.
Our engineering department is currently working on this issue. Please be so kind to check our webpage periodically for further info, or a possible driver update.
Thank you for your understanding.
MfG / Sincere Regards
Jürgen
Customer Support
TEAC-AUDIO Europe
Liegnitzerstr. 6
D-82194 Groebenzell / Germany
Tel.  +49-(0)8142-4208 141

I was experimenting same issue

This work for me... just need some translation with google translate
http://teac.jp/product/ud-h01/faqs/


100GB+ of hidden space I can't delete or purge I've tried everything... went into recovery tried repairing. Went into terminal tried to list any existing snapshots. Nothing... Am I going to have to do a clean wipe of the drive because of this Catalina disaster of a release...

Here's also a screenshot of About This Mac > Storage:

Try OmniDiskSweeper which shows in a column-view:

Largest folders will sort to the top.

I often will run it via

sudo /Applications/OmniDiskSweeper.app/Contents/MacOS/OmniDiskSweeper 2>/dev/null

Also: make sure that it gets “Full Disk Access” as shown here:

Open up a terminal window and enter
cd /
sudo du -sk *
(Enter password when prompted)

In addition to printing out a bunch of “permission denied” error messages, that will print out how many 1k blocks each directory contains (although it will miss directories that start with .)

Assuming “bigdir” is a suspiciously big directory, cd into it and repeat:

cd bigdir
sudo du -sk *

Yesterday I found an old 50GB photo library backup in my Dropbox. Turning on Dropbox smart syncing fixed that.


How can I download macOS High Sierra's full installation file? I've installed the macOS Developer Beta Access Utility (.pkg file) from Apple Developer's official website. Upon completing installation, it opens the Mac App Store to the macOS High Sierra installation page automatically.

Under the 'Information' section, it's stated that the size of the installation file is 4.90 GB.

However, when I downloaded it, it didn't download the full installation file. Instead, it's only 7.8 MB large.

The installation file looks the same as a usual one.

So,

Why are some users getting the 4.90 GB file while others are getting the 7.8 MB file?
Is there any way to get the full 4.90 GB installation file?

Fyi, my Mac is currently running on macOS Sierra 10.12.3 (16D32).

Update

I appreciate the two answers that I've received and both can be reproduced. However, I'm not sure on why are some users getting the 4.90 GB file while others are getting the 7.8 MB file.

This thread from MacRumours suggests that it's something to do with the amount of disk space available on the Mac.

For what it's worth: I have encountered a similar issue: a very small download file (14,5 MB), that launched automatically after a few seconds... tried it twice (both times the installation failed giving me some error about corrupted information on the server - I'm not sure what it meant but it might have been related to the fact that I was logged onto the MAS with a different account than the one I signed up for the public beta with). Anyway I just retried again and just on a whim before clicking download I pressed alt on the keyboard... now it's downloading the full thing.
This all happened in the space of 10 minutes.

Your downloaded file seems to be corrupted or downloaded incompletely.
So, download it again see what'll happen, with opening this in Safari:

macappstores://itunes.apple.com/app/id1209167288

I downloaded it and it's 5.26 GB, although it downloaded about 4.9 GB as App Store mentions (I think download file is compressed).

Again, I mention you that a few times I stopped the downloading with removing the installation app from launchpad and again I resume the downloading without any problems and it continues with the size that downloaded before.


How do I share a post in the Facebook app for iPad? My mom uses the Facebook app for iPad and wanted to share a post, such as on the web interface:

How does one share a post within the app?

You cannot re-share posts from the iOS Facebook app.

You can re-share posts if you:

Browser to https://www.facebook.com/ in mobile Safari
Log in
Click the three bar icon in the upper left hand corner to bring up the side bar
Scroll to the very bottom of the side bar
Click the "Desktop Version" link at the very bottom of the side

This will give you the full Facebook desktop web view and from here you can re-share posts in your timeline.

Google post to facebook marklet- its a copy of the web page post to facebook JavaScript. Keep as bookmark, activate in browser when on page you'd like to post. Pop ups cannot be blocked tho. A new tab will pop up with the familiar posting window (provided u r loogged in tuo fb or have nactive cookies!)


Mac OS Catalina not Downloading I have re installed my mac to fresh El Capitan on my MacBook Pro. Now at the app store it is showing the Catalina version Updates but when I click on Download nothing is happening. I have previously used it but since after the fresh installation download is not working. How can I fix it? After clicking the download button, the download button fades like this but nothing is happening. Internet is working properly as well.

I managed to install it by first upgrading it to Mojave then able to download and install the Catalina.

From Apple:

Upgrading from macOS Mojave?
Go to Software Update in System Preferences to find the macOS Catalina upgrade. Click Upgrade Now and follow the onscreen instructions to begin your upgrade. If you don’t have broadband access, you can upgrade your Mac at any Apple Store.
Upgrading from an older version of macOS?
If you’re running High Sierra (10.13), Sierra (10.12), or El Capitan (10.11), upgrade to macOS Catalina from the App Store. If you’re running Lion (10.7) or Mountain Lion (10.8), you will need to upgrade to El Capitan (10.11) first. If you don’t have broadband access, you can upgrade your Mac at any Apple Store.


Unable to modify the volume with the keyboard Sometimes, when I connect an external set of headphones/speakers, I am unable to change the volume. When I press one the volume keys, I see the image below.

Why does this happen? Interestingly, if I am playing music using software that has a volume control (e.g. Spotify or Youtube) I can still change the volume with the mouse using the application's volume bar. However, the system's volume bar is greyed out and can't change it either.

What worked for me: open up a Terminal window and run:

sudo killall coreaudiod

You may also need to run the following two commands right after:

sudo kextunload /System/Library/Extensions/AppleHDA.kext
sudo kextload /System/Library/Extensions/AppleHDA.kext

I just rebooted and it worked for me! Been having this trouble since I did the last round of updates.


How can I tell Music for iPad to play all of an artist's songs without making a playlist? I want to play all of an artist's songs that I have, on multiple albums. Making a playlist seems overkill. This was never an issue in iOS 4, as there was a track-shaped option for shuffle play.

Please note that I want something that always works, so simply "pressing play while on an artist's page" won't do the trick as sometimes a song is currently "playing" already.

I'm running iOS 5.1.

Not obvious at all, but:

Tap My Music from bottom nav.
Tap the red filter menu selection that's located roughly upper central on the screen, just below the Recently Added section.

The filter menu should say Artists or Albums or Songs etc. Choose your desired filter option (Artists in this case).
The list items below the filter will update.

Tap the list item's avatar (tap the artist photo, in this case). Do not tap the list item's text (the artist's name), unless you want instead to navigate into sublists.
A queue will begin playing from your selection.

If you already had a queue, the old queue will be replaced with this new queue.
The first song in the queue will not be random, even if you had shuffle enabled.

An almost-too-skinny-to-tap bar will appear at the bottom of your screen.

Tap it to view the current song, to access shuffle and continuous buttons, and to preview the queue (menu icon to the right of the fast-forward button).

Complain to http://apple.com/feedback.

Select the artist of choice, then hit the play button. Selecting a song in any of the albums plays only that album.


How can I downgrade a mid-2010 21.5" iMac from Yosemite to Snow Leopard? I had Yosemite on my old iMac (21.5", mid-2010), then decided to try Snow Leopard on it. (It came installed with Lion, but this model did ship with Snow Leopard previously.)

Basically, I tried doing what's suggested in this thread:

How can I downgrade an iMac12,1 from Lion to Snow Leopard?

I put the iMac into Target Disk Mode, then connected to it with my MacBook running SL. I formatted the iMac HD, then ran the DVD install from my MacBook (an old 13" black MacBook), using the iMac HD as the target.

This is where things went awry.

I rebooted the MacBook with the Option held down, but Startup Manager would not show me the iMac target disk. My only option was the MacBook HD.

Is this because the MacBook does not have the right drivers for the iMac?

I have also tried to install the Mac OS X 10.6.8 Combo Update onto the iMac from the MacBook, but that installer will not accept the iMac HD (with the SL install started on it) as a target.

Any idea how I can complete this install of SL?

Your iMac was delivered with 10.6.6 (somewhat later with 10.6.7).
When you have the original (grey) discs that came with it you can use disc 1 to install the Snow Leopard version (not the disc of another machine). Then update it to 10.6.8

I'm not that terribly familiar with target disk mode and whether or not you can perform an installation with it, however you should be able to install OS X Snow Leopard just fine if you take the conventional approach of formatting the hard drive OS X currently resides on and installing Snow Leopard with install media.


Can't access one specific subdomain Using OSX 10.10.2 on a MBA 11" I can't access

  https://developer.worldweatheronline.com

I flushed the DNS, rebooted my machine, connected via iPhone instead of WLAN (I can access the site via iPhone directly, but not when using the iPhones Network-connection on the Mac.

Tested on all installed browsers.

The results of ping, traceroute and dig:

ping: cannot resolve developer.worldweatheronline.com: Unknown host

traceroute: unknown host developer.worldweatheronline.com

dig:
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: SERVFAIL, id: 20383
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 0, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;developer.worldweatheronline.com. IN A

;; Query time: 274 msec
;; SERVER: 212.60.61.246#53(212.60.61.246)
;; WHEN: Mon Mar 9 13:22:06 2015
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 58

So, I'm out of ideas and look forward to yours.

Just noting that whenever you use tools like PING and NSLOOKUP you should enter the hostname with a final period like this:

ping developer.worldweatheronline.com.

Otherwise, your DNS client will think that it needs to suffix that with the default domain name for you.  The ending period means "this is all, don't add a suffix".

I'm running the following on my computer:

  c:\> nslookup

> developer.worldweatheronline.com.
Server: mylocal.server.local
Address:  192.168.0.2

Non-authoritative answer:
Name: developer.worldweatheronline.com
Address:  78.137.123.255

> server 212.60.61.246
Default server: ns4.fcom.ch
Address: 212.60.61.246

> set q=ns
> set d=2
> set domain=worldweatheronline.com.
> worldweatheronline.com.
Got answer:
    HEADER:
        opcode = QUERY, id = 4, rcode = REFUSED
        header flags: response, want recursion
        questions = 0, answers = 0, authority records = 0, additional = 0
*** ns4.fcom.ch can't find worldweatheronline.com.: Query refused

I would say that the people there have either failed to setup their named.conf file properly... or they've chosen an interesting (bad) IP address for their server by using what is normally considered a broadcast address of xx.xx.xx.255.  Some computers assume that .255 is a broadcast address and some don't.  This could explain why one client behaves differently from another.

Something else to note is that DNS lookups can sometimes involve three computers:  1) your workstation makes the lookup request from your local router, 2) your router then makes the query on your behalf and uses your address, 3) the distant DNS server then attempts to respond directly to your workstation.  In some cases, this un-initiated inbound attempt for that foreign server to respond directly to you fakes out your firewall so it blocks the response.

Maybe DNS addresses that set in your Mac and iPhone differs. Try changing the DNS address on you Mac.


if iPhoto came with my Mac, can I still get free updates after Mountain Lion? Since:

I got iPhoto included with my MacBook Pro, not from the Mac App Store
Mountain Lion is replacing Software Update with the Mac App Store

Will I still be able to get free iPhoto updates with Mountain Lion?  How would that work?

Yes! When you open the App Store's Updates tab, you'll see a special dialog allowing you to accept the apps such as iPhoto that were bundled with your computer. If you accept them and enter your account info, the licenses will be automatically associated with your account. In the future you'll be able to receive updates exactly as if you had purchased the apps.

(The details probably depend on which computer you have and when you purchased it. But if your computer is a relatively recent model then you probably will have access to these apps. If you want more details you may need to contact Apple.)

Didn't you get the iLife DVD with the MBP? or did u get the iPhoto preinstalled. If you got it preinstalled then inform Apple support before you upgrade.


How are the sound effects in Final Cut Pro licensed? What kind of license do final cut pro sound effects have?

Can I put them into nonmovies?

For example, can I use them in a Flash game?

Hypothetical:

If I'm distributing my own video editor, can I include these sound effects?

There is language saying you can't resell the sounds, but you are granted license to use them royalty free for some very specific uses and not at all in broad general terms.

I am not a lawyer

See the section below from the license for the last version / now discontinued Final Cut Studio

  c) Soundtrack Pro. You may use the Apple and third party audio file
  content (including, but not limited to, the built-in sound files,
  samples and impulse responses) (collectively the “Audio Content”),
  contained in or otherwise included with the Apple Software, on a
  royalty-free basis, to create your own original soundtracks for your
  film, video and audio projects. You may broadcast and/or distribute
  your own soundtracks that were created using the Audio Content,
  however, individual audio files may not be commercially or otherwise
  distributed on a standalone basis, nor may they be repackaged in whole
  or in part as audio samples, sound files or music beds.

Pretty much anything license related from Apple gets placed here fairly quickly after launch (FCP X cough, cough)

A lawyer would be needed to tell you if embedding them in a flash game would fall under "film, video and audio projects". One would hope if your flash game embedded a movie sequence or soundtrack as part of the narrative,  everyone here might call that as "in bounds" or "in the spirit".

Just taking the whole sounds (or even samples of those sounds in isolation and not mixed down) and using it for actions or events in a flash game seems to be more like repackaging as audio samples which seems clearly "out of bounds".

I would purchase a set of sounds that are expressly marketed as for use in software rather than something intended for original soundtracks unless my lawyer gave me the explicit go-ahead.

All Final Cut sound effects are royalty free, you can use them however you wish. (as long as you legally obtained FCP)


How to disable Finder triangle reveal animation in 10.7 Lion In Finder's list view, you can click the little triangles to the left of folder icons in order to reveal the contents of the folder. In 10.7 Lion, this reveal/expansion is accompanied by a vertical sliding animation.
My problem is (a) the animation slows me down and (b) the animation will often hiccup even on my new i7 Mac Mini with external video card (especially on folders containing many files).
I've searched high and low on the googlesphere for a solution to this, but I've only come across these terminal commands, to no effect:
1
defaults write com.apple.finder AnimateInfoPanes -bool false

No effect on Finder, info panes don't seem to have reveal animation anyway
2
defaults write com.apple.finder DisableAllAnimations -bool true

No discernible effect on Finder
3
defaults write NSGlobalDomain NSAutomaticWindowAnimationsEnabled -bool NO

This does disable the zoomimg new window animation in all apps, but doesn't affect my issue
Is this an issue for anyone else? Does anyone have a solution?

I've been looking for this solution for quite some time.  What this is is an NSOutlineView.  The expanding and collapsing of an NSOutlineView now always animates the roll down and roll up of the content and makes you wait for it to finish before you can actually see and use the content.  It's infuriatingly irritating that we can not turn this unwanted "feature" off so that it functions as before.

According to a developer at Apple, there is no way to do this and I was encouraged to file a request since this is an annoying addition to the OS that you can not turn of that was not present in previous system releases.

I've reported the bug/usability regression to Apple.  It's bug# 14442959.

Have you tried "Simple Finder" hidden setting? Run the following in Terminal:

defaults write com.apple.finder InterfaceLevel simple

If that doesn't work you may try searching though Secrets, it's a database of these hidden settings.


Visualizing Data on a Mac? (MySQL db is source) I'm having difficulty finding a promising OS X app for connecting to and visualizing data which resides in a MySQL database; it seems like there are various options for Windows, but not so much for Apple?

I'm hoping however that there are some gems that I just haven't discovered yet

I would like to be able to publish these charts to the web; I have heard of people using Excel for this, but I don't own Excel for Mac and I'm not sure if the same abilities are present in the Mac version of it

OpenOffice and derivatives like LibreOffice and NeoOffice can connect to a MySQL DB using ODBC; and, once the connection is established, the spreadsheet component can use it as a data source.

You can go for Navicat for MySQL/Premium (Mac) and Sequel Pro. They can help you to connect and visualise your data.

http://www.sequelpro.com
http://www.navicat.com/products/navicat-premium


Composing messages in Apple Mail: Displaying text on screen in larger size without changing font size When composing messages in Mail.app, as I now have an HD screen on my MBP, the default Helvetica 12pt appears quite small.

I would like to be able to enlarge the text size, but only locally, without changing the font in the message, as I don't want the recipients to have jumbo-size text on their screen.

Is there a way to perform this kind of "zoom" without using the "Universal access" zoom features which are a little bit too much.

You can go ahead and set it to what you want in Mail Preferences.  These settings have no effect on what is seen at the other end.  To do that you have to change the font for each outgoing individually in the New Message pane.

When going to "Mail > Preferences > Fonts & Colors > Message Font", it changes the font of the message to be sent, and not the font that one visualizes on screen.

I cannot report the exact menu, as I am away from my Lion at the moment; it could be the menu it is not where I said it is.


Time Machine - multiple backup destinations for a "separate weekly" I have a client that I'm setting up Time Machine to backup his Macbook Pro.  He's running OSX Mountain Lion, but soon to upgrade to Mavericks.

It has been backing up using Time Machine and an external USB drive.

He wants to add a 2nd USB drive to get a weekly backup that he'll store offsite.

We've setup the 2nd drive and had Time Machine point to that 2nd drive and it is creating an initial backup now to it.

My questions:

If he unplugs the 2nd drive after the initial backup and then takes it home, when he plugs it back in next week does it backup what has been changed since today's initial backup to it?  Meaning, does Time Machine base the backup off of the destination media in conjunction with the source?  Or will it only backup what hasn't been backed up in the last hour (assuming the 1st external drive is plugged in this whole week and Time Machine has been backing up as normal to it)?
Will Time Machine treat each external backup drive as 2 independent backups, each with their own "sync" with the source hard disk?

Basically, what I want to make sure happens is:

EXTERNAL DRIVE #1 = NORMAL backups....daily/hourly/weekly/etc. always plugged in.
EXTERNAL DRIVE #2 = WEEKLY/DR backups....only plugged in once a week (or less) and backs up everything since the last time it was plugged in...regardless of what the backups for EXTERNAL DRIVE #1 have been doing.

Thank you.

Basically, I would recommend not trying to constrain time machine to only a weekly interval on the offsite drive.

That being said, you can have both drives work totally independently as that is how the software is engineered. If you really only want a weekly snapshot, only connect the weekly drive once a week and force a rotation of the destination:

 tmutil startbackup --rotation

Once you have a backup to the weekly drive, eject it and send it away. As long as all dives get reattached every 14 days or so, you won't get a warning dialog that any are out of date.

Again, you can certainly enforce a single weekly backup by the procedure you follow but two things make that practice less needed than you might expect:

The backup intervals are very low space overhead compared to the size of cheap backup disks.

On my worst Mac, the system averages 5 MB of overhead for system log files so in absence of user files changing, you have 24 daily and 31 monthly snapshots you would avoid storing 275 MB (or 0.0003 of a one TB drive) if you were on a strict one per week schedule.

Since the cleanup of old backups is so fast and the storage impact so low, most clients with offsite rotation end up just swapping disks each week and let the software cull the extra snapshots per the normal schedule, leaving weekly snapshots more than a month old.

I didn't get it.
Does Time Machine copy 2 backups on the 2 external hard disks or uses 2 hard disks to take one backup.

I set one external hard disk as the backup destination. Then again opened Time Machine Preferences and selected another one. The message appears as " if you use both hard disks, Time machine will take turn backing up to ... and ..." Does it mean one back up or two back up?


Stop prompting to unlock disk I have two hard disks on my 2012 Mac Mini. The first disk is partitioned with Mac HD and Data HD. The second drive has OS X Public Beta and Windows partitioned.

I want to prevent OS X on my main disk from auto-mounting OS X Public Beta and Windows 7. Both are encrypted (FileVault 2 and Bitlocker).

I tried to edit /etc/fstab and /private/etc/fstab which seem to be replicated but it doesn't work. I thought I was doing something wrong, so I added a line for Data HD which is not encrypted and it didn't mount.

sudo vifs

UUID=NUMBER none hfs ro,noauto

That's the line I'm issuing for Public Beta. I'm assuming its not hfs because of FV2 so is there another file system I need to enter? I also tried hfs+ and it didn't work, I still get prompted to enter passcode.

For Windows 7, I'm assuming I would use ntfs? I'm not using BootCamp so I don't think it would be fat.

Instead of using UUID try using LABEL. This will help to rule out UUID problems.

The following line in /private/etc/fstab stops the drive named SpareSSHD from mounting on OS X 10.10:

LABEL=SpareSSHD none    hfs rw,noauto

My drives are encrypted with FileVault2 and this works.

The following links provide more detail:

How can I tell OSX NOT to mount some of the drives in my computer?
fstab(5) manual

/private/etc/fstab and /etc/fstab are the same file. As @forquare confirms, they are symlinked. You can edit either.

Try 'xx' instead of rw or ro. Since a FV2 drive doesn't mount until you unlock it, the rw,ro won't do anything.


Change Mac OS X Wireless Card Country Code I have problem connecting to a wireless router using Mac OS X which is on channel 13. This is because there is some other router nearby which is broadcasting the US country code. The only way around this i have found so far, is to each time go to the router and restart the computer.

I have asked google and it seems to be a mixture of people who think that it is setting the locale changes it, or that it is fixed in the router firmware. Both i have shown to be wrong. man ifconfig also has not been too enlightening.

Does anyone know of another way to force the card to use a different country Code or channels?
I would rather not change to another channel, as there is alot of interference near by (shown with KisMAC).

Thanks

Edits

Found

  /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Apple80211.framework/Versions/Current/Resources/airport

Which appears to allow for an arbitary channel to be set on the card, but not county code. This seems to have no effect.

802.11d is the protocol that wireless access points use to broadcast (among other things) the regulatory domain (i.e. country codes) in which it is supposed to be operating. It seems that there may be no clear rule for what to do when various equipment is broadcasting conflicting regulatory domain information.

The ideal solution would be to disable/replace/reconfigure the equipment that is broadcasting the incorrect information.

I found an (oldish) Apple Discussions thread that indicates that indicates that a Mac’s AirPort hardware will use the first country code it hears after powering on or waking from sleep. Later postings in the thread (on the second page) indicate that it is sufficient to just power off/on the AirPort hardware itself and not the whole system. A couple of people reported success using a script to repeatedly turn the AirPort interface off and on (using networksetup) until it happened to acquire the desired state (as reported by system_profiler).

Based on TA25972, it seems that older equipment (presumably models that do not listen for 802.11d information) may not even be able to switch “country codes”.

All I had to do on my mid 2010 MacBook Pro is to change the kext name from AirPortBrcm4360 to AppleAirPortBrcm43224 and I finally got my location right!


Moving by word no longer working in Word for Mac 2011 In Microsoft Word for Mac 2011, previously Ctrl+arrow moved the cursor one word left/right. Recently, this function no longer works on my iMac. Is there a fix?

According to Microsoft's keyboard site for Office 2011:


How can I install a new dictionary on OS X for use with the "Word of the Day" screensaver? The reason is trivial: I am a fan of the "Word of the Day" screen saver and I would like to add dictionaries for languages other than English and Japanese (these are the two that I can select now in screen saver options).

How can I do it?

On a rather obscure comment thread, someone explained where you might find the word list that Apple uses to power the screensaver. It is at /System/Library/Graphics/Quartz\ Composer\ Plug-Ins/WOTD.plugin/Contents/Resources/NOAD_wotd_list.txt. The file looks like this:

m_en_us1282510  quinsy
m_en_us1273791  orbicular
m_en_us1220945  alimony
m_en_us1250517  genome

It is a list of tab-separated entries. On the right you have the word, and on the left, what looks like an ID. But what's it an ID for, and how would you be able to find it for another word not already on the list?

As you might expect, the ID refers to an entry in Apple's default dictionary, the "New Oxford American Dictionary". (That's what "NOAD" stands for in the word-list path above.)

How to find the IDs for other words?

A fellow named Joseph Gentle, in a series of blog posts, shows how to get at the data underlying Apple's dictionaries. In his "Apple dictionaries, part 2" post, he points to code that unpacks the relevant binary file (stored in /Library/Dictionaries) into XML. Using the dedict.c and strip.c files found here, and following Gentle's example, I used the following bash commands to get at the NOAD's XML (these commands are run from the directory where you downloaded the dedict.c and strip.c files):

clang dedict.c -Wall -lz -o dedict
clang strip.c -Wall -lz -o strip
./dedict "New Oxford American Dictionary" | ./strip > dict.xml

When I head-ed the first few lines of the dict.xml file, I saw something promising, with entries that looked like this:

<d:entry xmlns:d="http://www.apple.com/DTDs/DictionaryService-1.0.rng" id="m_en_us1219333" d:title="abode" class="entry">

Notice that id param... it's an identifier that looks exactly like the one in the screensaver word list!

I wrote the following Ruby script to parse the XML, and then, using my own word list, create a new screensaver file that maps my own words to their IDs in the dictionary:

raw = File.open("./dict.xml").read
my_words = File.open("./word_list.csv").readlines.map { |line| line.split(',')[1] }

word_id_map = {}

raw.scan(/<d:entry .*? id="(.*?)" d:title="(.*?)" class="entry">/).each do |entry|
   word_id_map[entry[1]] = entry[0]
end

my_words.each do |word|
  if id = word_id_map[word]
    puts [id, word].join('  ')
  end
end

When I replaced the original screensaver file with this new one, it worked. You can now have a "Word of the Day" screensaver that gives definitions for the words you choose.

This should solve your problem:
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/easily-expanding-apple-dictionary-–-mac-only/


iOS7 iPhone: how to make Siri-initiated calls, SMS text msgs come from Google Voice caller ID? When I ask Siri (iOS 7.0.4 on my iPhone 5S) to call or text someone, I want said call or text to come from my Google Voice caller ID.  Any way to do this now that jailbreak apps GVIntegrated & Phone GV Extension appear to no longer be available (at least for my phone, details below)?

All other Google Voice functionality seems to be handled just fine via the Google Voice "standard" app from Google.

I've jailbroken said phone searching for a way, with no success.  GVIntegrated indeed reads "not certified on this device" and Phone GV Extension doesn't even come up in the search list on Cydia.  Phone GV Extension worked well on my iPhone 4S running 5.x (and maybe 6.x), although my iPhone seemed to be a bit less stable (reboot/crashes) in jailbroken mode.

This is not possible in 2014 and neither is it possible in fall of 2019.

Unless there’s an API or other way to script this, you might need to use a mac or other python enabled tool to automate this.

How can I initiate a Google Voice phone call from the command line?

I just found Call on GV Pro (jailbreak needed) that works on iOS 7.1.2


How to exclude a sub folder from iCloud drive in macOS Sierra? I have my Documents folder synced with iCloud drive, I want to exclude some sub folders from the iCloud drive is there a way to achieve this?

Adding one empty file named .nosync to a folder will prevent that folder from syncing.

You can also use this as a file extension to specific files, but the folder treatment is quite useful.

Once you've had a folder sync, you can now also prevent it from syncing on some (or all endpoints) with a utility named Bailiff, if for some reason you don't want just to delete the files from iCloud entirely and instead want to prevent the next "initial" sync.

https://eclecticlight.co/downloads/

I just create folders directly under my user home that I want to keep only locally (separate from my iCloud folders).


Saved a file in the wrong location and I cannot retrieve it I was using ssh-keygen which at some point asked me where I wanted my public key and my identification saved. I typed \ by mistake and the result was:

  Your identification was saved in \.
  Your public key was saved in \.pub.

Now I cannot seem to find them. Can I find out what happened and delete those files? I could not find them with ls -la \. Actually it starts some type of prompt. Any help would be appreciated.

You need to use two back slashes. In the terminal using the bash shell (which it is by default) the backslash character tells bash to allow you to continue typing commands on a new line (hence the prompt you saw).

So if you do ls -la \\ that should show you the contents of "\"

Likewise mv \\ fixed should rename the folder to "fixed"

You have to enable hidden files to find it then you can search it in spotlight


Chances of getting my harddrive recovered I accidentally placed a magnetic mount antenna near my hard drive while my computer was running.

It then made horrible noises, and stopped working, and everything froze.

Now, every time I start my system up, it makes the noise, and does not recognise any hard drive what so ever.

I am going to take it into the apple store, I have apple care, but what do you think the chances are of me being able to recover files from the drive? Do you think stuff got smashed around in there when it did that?

You are likely doomed.  The store gurus will go over data recovery options and explain they don't fix damaged drives, they are simply going to ask about the status of your backup and whether you want them to test the operation and see if it needs to be exchanged under warranty / AppleCare.

Some things to try on dead and near dead drives include putting them on their end or sides rather than having them oriented flat - this is because the read/write heads that sit between the actual disc platters may respond better then they are held vertically by gravity rather than horizontally by their precision engineering which sounds like it;s been compromised.  Give it a go, see if it sounds any better (assuming you are not using an iMac where they are are already mounted this way).

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

Chance is very little, like 5%. But it would probably recover only a few bits. Try to back up data every time. Or buy a SSD, they are fast and reliable.


Keyboard Not Working in Bootcamp I just installed Bootcamp and Windows 7 on my MacBook Pro (13 inch, 2010), and booted into the OS. The keyboard and mouse worked fine, but because there were no drivers, things like multitouch and the two-finger mouse click didn't work - this is as expected.

I went back into OS X Lion and downloaded the Windows Support package to my thumb drive, rebooted, and installed the driver package and the Boot Camp Control Panel. After I had restarted, my keyboard wasn't working.

The weird thing is, the F-keys do work and function correctly (brightness, volume, etc). If I change those keys to perform the F-key functions in the control panel (ie. require holding Fn+F1 to change brightness), the F-keys work correctly.

Any of the keys below the F-key row do not work at all. They don't type anything, no matter what program I am in. The Caps Lock key does light up when I toggle it on and off.

I've tried going into the Device Manager and uninstalling the Keyboard driver and then scanning for hardware changes (which reinstalls the Apple Keyboard driver), I've uninstalled and deleted the driver (and then reinstalled it from the package in the WindowsSupport folder), and nothing is working. The keyboard appears as the Apple Keyboard in the device manager. The trackpad and everything works fine as well.

I checked the Language settings and it is set to United States (English).

Is there anything else I can try to get the keyboard working?

Windows 7 64bit (not SP1, yet)
MacBook Pro 13 inch 2010
8 GB RAM
250gb HDD, with 55gb partitioned for Windows

OS X Lion (10.7.3) is installed as well.

Before you do any of the steps mentioned below the line-break, check the bootcamp control panel first!!!

When in Windows, after everything is installed and done, do the following:

Click 'Start ' (the windows logo-button in the bottom left corner)
Type 'bootcamp'
Open the bootcamp control panel. It will ask for administrator privileges, say 'yes' or 'ok' or whatever
Configure the necessary settings for your startup disk, remote, keyboard and trackpad - these are the four tabs you should expect to see when the bootcamp control panel opens.

Your keyboard and trackpad should work (almost) perfectly. If not, read the answer that follows.

When you installed Windows the specific bootcamp drivers should have been installed automatically from your Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) DVD or 10.7 (Lion) DMG in the process. I would recommend trying to:

Remove/Delete the drivers in Windows Device Manager
Insert or mount the OSX DVD or DMG
Restart your system (booting into Windows).

The correct bootcamp drivers should then be installed automatically from the OSX DVD. If the drivers were not installed, browse for them on the OSX DVD.

If all else fails you can always try re-installing Windows, and from there should be able to determine during the process if you have keyboard functionality.

★ The key to having the correct drivers working in bootcamp is installing them specifically from the OSX DVD or DMG.

The Mac OS X 10.6 and 10.7 Boot Camp Software includes these Mac drivers for Windows:

Apple Bluetooth
Apple Keyboard Support
Apple Remote Driver
Apple Trackpad
Atheros 802.11 Wireless
ATI Graphics
Boot Camp control panel for Microsoft Windows
Boot Camp System Task Notification item (System Tray)
Broadcom Wireless
Intel Chipset Software
Intel Integrated Graphics
iSight Camera
Marvel Yukon Ethernet
nVidia Graphics
Cirrus Logic Audio
Realtek Audio
SigmaTel Audio
Startup Disk control panel for Microsoft Windows

Boot Camp 4.0, OS X Lion: Frequently asked questions
Boot Camp 3.0, Mac OS X 10.6: Frequently asked questions

Here is a guide for making an install disc for Mac OS X 10.7.3

http://lifehacker.com/5823096/how-to-burn-your-own-lion-install-dvd-or-flash-drive


How to not import duplicates from shared Photos album When I import photos from a shared library, either from my own Family album or one shared with other iOS users, they are imported as expected. I cannot reimport them again.

However, if you share a picture in a shared album yourself (e.g. originating from the Photos.app on on my Mac), you can import that photo again once in your library. Resulting in duplicate photos.

This occurs in the Mac OSX Photos app, version 1.0.1 (215.65.0).

I'm aware that 'duplicate' in the technical definition may not be accurate; the imported photo in this case will have a different filename and be of lower resolution. But from a functional perspective it IS a duplicate.

Is there any way to avoid importing these duplicates so every now and then I can safely select and import a bunch of pictures from a shared library, without having to cleanup the duplicates afterwards?

Note that I've seen a similar older question, which is only for iPhoto.

Update 11 Jan, 2016: This is still an issue with the latest version of Photos v1.3 (350.23.0)

Open Photos app in OS X as usual.
Pull down the “Photos” menu and choose “Preferences”
Under the “General” tab, look for “Importing: Copy items to the Photos library” and uncheck that box to disable image copying.
Close Preferences.

Happy snapping! :)

MacPaw Gemini duplicate finder seems to be a good app for this job


Remove an app from Notification Center preference pane My girlfriend added Facebook to my Notification Center. I tried to set the alert style to none, and you can see the check mark to show items in Notification Center is deselected.

I want it completely gone but don't know how else to configure things.

Open Safari › Preferences › Notifications
There you can remove objects permanently by selecting the notification you wish to delete and then either hitting the delete key or by using the remove button ('-') if it exists.

Finder -> Go to floder -> ~/Library/LaunchAgents/ -> Delete the plist file related to notification -> Done.