macOS and Mac Software: We still exist!

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > macOS and Mac Software: We still exist!

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Fayk posted:

I do something vaguely similar, but OS on SSD w/ just my singular user acct on a mechanical drive. I use the advanced menu in users to do this.

HOWEVER (at least unless lion fixed this) the volume path doesn't use any kind of GUID/drive identifier (I forget the term and am typing this from my phone) so if you change the name of the volume your user is on and reboot, welp. Not fun.

Now "just in case" I have another user I never log in as w/ its user dir in the normal place.

I completely forgot that option existed :doh:

That's probably a better way of doing it. You're going to run into issues if you rename the drive with symlinks in place anyway.

# ¿ Dec 14, 2011 07:21

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# ¿ May 8, 2024 14:36

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Martytoof posted:

Just be wary of apps that might want to install large chunks of data to ~/Library/Application Support. I think Reason does and a bunch of Native Instruments packages do, but I could be 110% wrong on this. Still something to look out for.

Steam in particular will install your games to this location.

# ¿ Dec 14, 2011 15:38

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

wolffenstein posted:

You want Max.app

This was recommended to me in the iTunes thread and it works great. I still need an app to fill in missing ID3 info or ideally pull it from iTunes

Albums without track numbers kind of suck.

# ¿ Dec 15, 2011 20:18

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

NESguerilla posted:

I have had an ongoing (on and off) problem for a long time with wireless being really slow on my macbook pro. I know it's not my connection because my roomates works fine and so does my PS3. Googling it seems to only suggest I change the DNS which sort of worked the first time this happened but does nothing now. Any advice would be appreciated.

Do you both get comparable results from something like speedtest.net? Also, it could still be the connection if you're in different parts of the house - depending on where the router is there might be an extra few feet of wall between you and it or something.

# ¿ Dec 20, 2011 07:09

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

KidDynamite posted:

Does sparrow not let you use POP3? Because I don't think verizon has IMAP anymore.

If this is true, it's hilarious. Even Yahoo finally decided to join the modern age and start offering IMAP email service.

# ¿ Dec 22, 2011 03:12

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Cyne posted:

Any idea why my 2011 MBP (running Snow Leopard) would choke on writing from a DVD while my old PowerBook (running Leopard) works fine? I got a book for Christmas with a large DVD attached, which I would prefer to access locally. On my MBP, if I just lasso all the folders on the DVD to a folder on my desktop it stops writing after a few seconds and the drive makes a little click-y sound. Trying to create a disk image also fails with "input/output error." Seems to be working fine on the ol' PB. Pretty weird.

Um, if it's making clicking noises and giving I/O errors I'd say it definitely has a bad optical drive. Get it replaced.

# ¿ Dec 25, 2011 23:54

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

smax posted:

You got Applecare, right? Tell me you got Applecare.

If it's a 2011 machine it'll still be under warranty

But yes, get AppleCare. Please.

# ¿ Dec 26, 2011 00:24

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

NESguerilla posted:

As much as that makes sense to me now that you explain it, I still feel like it's something worth letting consumers know. As someone who rarely plays games on PC I wouldn't have known that in a million years and it's issues like that make me not want to touch PC games with a ten foot pole.

It's a bummer cause I really wanted some nostalgic fun but I am sure Kmart will take it back if I whine hard enough.

Just be glad you're only out $30 and a computer game, unlike the many people who (for some reason) absolutely rely on QuickBooks to run their small business and found out the hard way that Intuit haven't significantly updated their software in about 6 years.

# ¿ Dec 27, 2011 16:17

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Xithyl posted:

Is there any MP3 tagging program for the Mac that even comes close to rivaling, or simply working in the same way, MP3Tag or Tag&Rename do for the PC? It seems like a real struggle to find a good, fast, comprehensive and effective tagging program for the Mac.

I mean, I could use Parallels, but I figure there has to be something somewhere.

In all honesty, TuneUp is all I ever wanted from a tagging app and more. It's pretty phenomenal from my experience so far.

# ¿ Dec 31, 2011 00:07

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Xithyl posted:

I was hoping not to have to drop $50, but it looks like maybe that's my only option. In terms of how it works, am I able to edit some tag features by myself, or is the majority of the program based on automation?

Yea, I got a free code through my work so I'm definitely biased in favour : > It's pretty much all automatic, you can choose to exclude certain fields from being changed but you can't do anything on the level of %n - %x style renaming rules that I remember from Tag&Rename. Am I right in thinking there's a demo you can try?

# ¿ Dec 31, 2011 05:52

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

MrChupon posted:

When Time Machine is backing up, I get a rotating arrow icon randomly bleeding through whatever application I'm looking at.

That's weird as balls and shouldn't be happening at all. It persists after a reboot?

All I can think of is if maybe there's an application running but not having the window drawn properly that's causing some weird graphical thing like that. Maybe try clearing your saved application state folder?

# ¿ Dec 31, 2011 05:54

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

ripburger posted:

my MacBook Pro (model 8,2)

This is a really minor nitpick, but I've noticed several people referring to models like this - why? It's no more specific than the AppleCare name (e.g. 15-inch MacBook Pro, Early 2011) and is far less human-readable.

# ¿ Jan 6, 2012 04:43

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Eight Is Legend posted:

A couple of days ago when starting up my MacBook Pro (late-2008, 15"), the shift key was suddenly stuck.

Does it do this even if you pop the keycap off? There's no crud under there or anything?

# ¿ Jan 8, 2012 08:52

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

AmbassadorTaxicab posted:

Google and Apple are being manbabies by blocking the deletion of Google Calendar events in iCal. Google is saying they're doing it deliberately, because iCal was deleting random events and saying it's working with Apple. However, there should be no way that a feature that's worked perfectly before should take this long to fix.

I didn't know it was a deliberate thing by Google, is there a link where they say that?

# ¿ Jan 17, 2012 21:54

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Xabi posted:

From Windows I'm used to just logging on to Gmail to check my email - I also get reminders on my iPhone whenever I receive a new one. Is there any point in using the native mail program on my MacBook Pro?

Smart folders, colour labels, address book integration, drag n drop attachments all come to mind. Why not just try it and see if you like it? Takes less than a minute to set up

# ¿ Jan 20, 2012 23:48

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Daddy Fantastic posted:

I just put out an update to one of my apps, WeatherMin! Here are a few promo codes for the Mac App Store if anyone's interested in a license:

All of those have now been taken, although less than half the people who used one bothered to post and say thanks

# ¿ Jan 24, 2012 10:01

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Venkmanologist posted:

I'm looking to sell both my macbook and macbook pro. The drives will be wiped and either Snow Leopard or Lion will be installed, depending on the buyer's choice.

How do I go about also installing iLife '11 without having to set up a user account? Do I need to bake the iLife install into the OS installations somehow? And how would I do that?

If you take it to a Genius Bar there's a standard 10.6.8 / iLife '11 image they can throw on there for you in 15 minutes.

# ¿ Feb 2, 2012 08:14

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

gnrk posted:

So I woke to find my computer off. Cool, the Time Machine restore is done. Except now I get a blinking folder/question icon and because my computer's restore disks are Snow Leopard, they don't know what to make of all my FileVault 2 drives. I cannot believe how hosed this whole situation is. The loving Snow Leopard installer doesn't see any installable drives and my Lion recovery partition was nuked. Or everything s there but the EFI doesn't "know" it.

There seem to be two solutions. Erase the disk in Disk Utility and reinstall Snow Leopard and work my way up or somehow get the system to realize there is poo poo there.

While this is all taking place I'm going to have to wander around campus asking people if their Mac has Lion and if I can plug a strange external hard drive into it to copy a file off. FUCCKKKK

You're sure the Recovery Partition was nuked? Try holding down command-R at boot, with FileVault2 it won't show up with option-boot. Failing that hold option-R to get into Internet Recovery.

# ¿ Feb 2, 2012 20:17

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

dexter6 posted:

(This may be better suited for the Hardware Thread, but I figured I'd start here)

I'm running an iMac connected wirelessly to a Time Capsule, and I'm seeing something weird when downloading torrents. It seems to ramp up to full speed, stay there for some length of time, then drop back down to nothing, then rinse and repeat.

I've tried fiddling with my global and per torrent number of connections but even at 10 per torrent and 50 max, I'm not seeing any change.

Anyone have any thoughts?

Isn't this normal behaviour for torrents? Starts off slow, ramps up as you connect to more peers, then slows down as the number of peers holding the last few portions of your file decreases? Or does it slow down long before your torrent is finished?

# ¿ Feb 4, 2012 18:55

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

windwaker posted:

Does anyone know if there is a way to sort different directories in Finder differently? I like my Downloads folder to order from by Date Modified but every other folder to sort by Name.

If you change the View Options in your Downloads folder it should remember it for that specific folder. I find that the saving of viewing preferences is prone to changing back at random, though

# ¿ Feb 7, 2012 22:54

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

wwb posted:

I'm trying to setup a java build agent (TeamCity to be exact) to run as a specific named user when the computer starts on OS X 10.7.3 lion. Currently I have two problems:

a) I put the plist file in ~/Library/LaunchAgents , which I have surmised means "run me when the user logs in" not "run me when the computer starts" but I don't see a way to put it into /Library/LaunchDaemons and have it run in this user's context.

b) Plist file as provided fails to start, claiming it can't find stuff. I have adjusted the paths to be pretty direct (~/build/tcbuildagent/whatever ; confirmed all of these are correct).

My general sense is I'm a windows admin doing poo poo wrong, but I'm not sure where to start or how to ask the question. Any advices?

Am I right in thinking this means you want to log in as user A, but have the application start as user B? Because I'm not sure that's possible, you'd need to enter that other user's password at login too.

Willing to be proven wrong though!

SimpleCoax posted:

This is my least favorite thing about OSX. I just don't understand why my view has to change randomly so often. It's like they built it in there on purpose, or else I am just ignorant to some way to stop it.

I went to try to create a test case and I realised that Lion is probably a bit better about this. But yea, it's super annoying when it does happen

# ¿ Feb 8, 2012 18:46

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

decypher posted:

I'm sure you're aware of iCloud's Find My Mac feature which allows you to see its rough location on a map, send it messages, or remotely wipe it.

Question: How does remote erase work, exactly? If you have FileVault2 enabled then just erase the encryption key, easy, but otherwise it takes hours to do a secure erase of a drive. Don't see how it would be possible to achieve in a way that wouldn't be trivial for somebody looking to recover the data to stop / recover from.

# ¿ Feb 9, 2012 00:43

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Olivil posted:

I had a problem with adding mp3 in iTunes today, said I didn't have the permission to write on Macintosh HD. I repaired the permissions in Disk Utility, it repaired a couple of thing, but I still had the problem.

Disk Utility actually doesn't touch your home folder permissions. For those, you need to boot off your Recovery partition (assuming you're using Lion), go to Utilities > Terminal, type 'resetpassword' and in the window that appears you can choose your user account and hit 'Reset'.

If you're using Snow Leopard you'll need the install disc.

# ¿ Feb 12, 2012 03:35

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Tutu posted:

Is there an app which tells you what's holding up things in your trash from being deleted and stops them? I seem to remember there being an app that does this but can't find it.

There's one called "What's Keeping Me?" that I use for this.

# ¿ Feb 13, 2012 21:13

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

So wait, does GameCenter integration mean iOS games are playable on the Mac? I don't see how that would work with multi-touch or motion-sensitive games.

I don't want to have to rebuy Mac ports of all my iOS stuff. But I am psyched about the changes.

Edit: The Mountain Lion icon looks pretty tame compared to Lion, gotta say. I really thought this was a joke until I loaded it on Apple's site.

TACD fucked around with this message at 18:10 on Feb 16, 2012

# ¿ Feb 16, 2012 18:06

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Hahaha they loving stole Growl and made them into Notification Center banners, hilarious.

# ¿ Feb 16, 2012 18:14

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

OK Messages had better support MSN when 10.8 is released :mad:

# ¿ Feb 16, 2012 18:28

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

If you guys haven't picked up the link from MacRumors there's a couple more interesting tidbits here:

quote:

Apple sees a fundamental difference between software for the keyboard-and-mouse-pointer Mac and that for the touchscreen iPad. Mountain Lion is not a step towards a single OS that powers both the Mac and iPad, but rather another in a series of steps toward defining a set of shared concepts, styles, and principles between two fundamentally distinct OSes.

...

iCloud document storage, and the biggest change to Open and Save dialog boxes in the 28-year history of the Mac. Mac App Store apps effectively have two modes for opening/saving documents: iCloud or the traditional local hierarchical file system. The traditional way is mostly unchanged from Lion (and, really, from all previous versions of Mac OS X). The iCloud way is visually distinctive: it looks like the iPad springboard � linen background, iOS-style one-level-only drag-one-on-top-of-another-to-create-one �folders�. It�s not a replacement of traditional Mac file management and organization. It�s a radically simplified alternative.

Apps have been renamed for cross-OS consistency. iChat is now Messages; iCal is now Calendar; Address Book is now Contacts. Missing apps have been added: Reminders and Notes look like Mac versions of their iOS counterparts. Now that these apps exist for the Mac, to-dos have been removed from Calendar and notes have been removed from Mail, leaving Calendar to simply handle calendaring and Mail to handle email.

...

The changes and additions in Mountain Lion are in a consistent vein: making things simpler and more obvious, closer to how things should be rather than simply how they always have been.

# ¿ Feb 16, 2012 18:49

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Demos posted:

Most folks I know are on Android devices of one type or another. Adium is a client, yeah. But I mean, Messages seems fairly useless unless you actually use that particular network. Which I know next to no-one who does (even the ones with iPhones/iPads).

How do you mean 'that particular network'? If they have iOS devices and are on iOS 5 then they can use iMessage.

I'm in California and right now am sending free text messages to friends back home in England. This is rad.

Google Voice, sorry but it's looking like you missed your chance to expand overseas and enjoy a worldwide monopoly on this sort of thing. (I wish Apple would offer number-forwarding and I'd be SET.)

# ¿ Feb 16, 2012 19:06

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

dexter6 posted:

If I am messaging with someone, will my iphone buzz for every incoming message even if I have the messages client open on my computer? Or is it smart enough to only push to the device that I have open?

It pushes to all devices. Was testing out Messages in bed on my Mac and my iPhone next to me was buzzing merrily with each new message. However, once the messages are read the notifications tidily vanish on the iPhone

echobucket posted:

I'm so disappointed... it looks like my early 2008 white macbook isn't going to work with Mountain Lion (it has 32-bit EFI).

*sigh* I guess this is going to be a bigger upgrade than I imagined.

Where are you getting Mountain Lion tech specs from?

Demos posted:

Yeah, I figured as much. But my question remains: what are the advantages of using this particular client over, for instance, a well-established IM application such as Adium? I mean, it can't hurt to try it out. I guess I'm just curious if anyone's actually switched to Messenger from other clients. It seems like it's main usefulness stems from making it easy to talk to folks with iOS-devices - which in itself isn't particularly useful to me.

Like I said, if it integrates MSN (and ideally Facebook chat too) then I'll use it without question; I guess I don't have that much demand for killer features and I prefer stock apps when possible. If there's no MSN then it's useless to me and I'll use it for iMessages only and keep on trucking' with Trillian (waiting for the Digbsy Mac release :v:

)

# ¿ Feb 16, 2012 19:56

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Instant Sunrise posted:

EDIT: also Facebook chat is just Jabber so all you have to do is add it as a jabber account. (<facebookusername>@chat.facebook.com or something like that)

Holy poo poo, this is good to know. I would have never expected Facebook of all things to use such an open and standardised messaging protocol.

Anyone else interested in this you can get the exact setup information from https://www.facebook.com/sitetour/chat.php (click 'other' at the bottom).

# ¿ Feb 16, 2012 20:18

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

echobucket posted:

It seems to me the big difference between iMessage and say something like Jabber or AIM, is that iMessage has no notion of a "buddy list" and there's no way to tell if someone is "online" or not.

I guess the assumption is that people will always be available with iMessage?

Press Command-1

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# ¿ Feb 16, 2012 23:35

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

echobucket posted:

That brings up the buddy list for Google Talk, or AIM.

iMessage has no such concept as a "Buddy List"

The Messages application has a Buddy List but the iMessage protocol does not support / need one since it's essentially an upgraded form of SMS. If you start a new message and click the blue + you'll see you can pick between your contacts and buddies.

The whole idea with iMessage is you don't need to know if somebody is 'online' because the message will get pushed to every Apple device they own without them needing to sign in to anything.

# ¿ Feb 17, 2012 01:46

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Zenostein posted:

After a few years of doing this, hitting ctrl+2 to get to mail, or ctrl+5 to find iTunes is second hand. And, with a laptop, I prefer to just use shortcuts, although I do have a BTT shortcut to open spaces, too. As I understand it, this isn't really possible at present.

You can do this. You can assign applications to 'All desktops' or 'This desktop' and quickly switch to them with CMD-1, CMD-2 etc (which I actually didn't know about until just now, thanks!)

The slight annoyance for me is the linearity of the arrangement. I'm used to moving right from my browser window for iTunes, or down for photos, it bugs me having to swipe past a list of other desktops I don't need right now. Maybe I'll try getting used to the keyboard shortcuts.

# ¿ Feb 17, 2012 04:50

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Manky posted:

Right on, fair enough. It's only an alt-cmd-d away, after all.

So when Mountain Lion comes out do we have to drop the first Mac in the thread title? I don't get why Apple is trying to debrand the "Mac" epithet. Right now it's a nice split between i-prefixed mobile devices and Mac-prefixed computers. I feel like iOS and Mac OS made a nice symmetry, it would have made way more sense to drop the X. It's not 2001 anymore.

Oh wait, except for the iMac. Goddammit none of this is consistent. What are you doing Apple

Yea, part of me wonders if rebranding iCal and iChat as Calendar and Messages is the start of an attempt to consolidate this mess and figure out what the i- prefix is supposed to designate, exactly.

# ¿ Feb 18, 2012 21:33

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Manky posted:

But then, Apple has always been incredibly good at establishing really nice, consistent styleguides and then disregarding them at their whim, haha.

Only registered members can see post attachments!

# ¿ Feb 19, 2012 00:28

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Boris Galerkin posted:

I wish there was a way to consolidate Skype, Facebook Chat, Google Chat, and now iMessages. Most of my friends IM me on Facebook Chat which the Skype and new Messages client support, but only Messages supports iMessages and Google Chat. I think Adium has a Skype plugin, but from what I heard it's terrible and still requires Skype to be running.

Somebody mentioned this a page or two ago but Facebook chat is just Jabber. You can find the settings on Facebook's site.

Skype will never happen because it's a closed encrypted protocol and they're fighting to keep it that way

Edit: Oh I think you already knew that and I just misread your post. Oh well!

TACD fucked around with this message at 20:41 on Feb 19, 2012

# ¿ Feb 19, 2012 20:32

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

withak posted:

Report it to the state DOT and I bet some city engineer gets a stern letter.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tipperary_Hill

# ¿ Feb 20, 2012 01:53

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Zenostein posted:

What do you mean by "quirky IMAP?"

But speaking of .mac/MobileMe/iCloud:
Apple is bugging me about making the switch. I have yet to actually upgrade to Lion (and kinda still don't want to). If I do so, I understand my iDisk'll go away. Will my email account still work in SL? And will my calendars/contacts remain in sync? Contacts isn't so important, but I actually use the cal synchronization, and google calendars and iCal (so far as I've experienced) is drat near unworkable. Constant 'disconnect errors' and the like.

One thing that comes to mind re: Google and IMAP is the labels thing - All other IMAP implementations use normal folders, but Google calls them 'labels' and lets a message have more than one label and therefore be in more than one folder. Can get confusing and if you have certain rules set up in Mail it shows duplicate unread message indications on each folder.

However, as to the GCal / iCal sync, that used to be a huge issue but they (Google) changed something a little while ago and it's been working perfectly for me for some time now. If you haven't used it in a while give it another shot.

# ¿ Mar 1, 2012 07:46

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# ¿ May 8, 2024 14:36

TACD: Oct 27, 2000

Fardels Bear posted:

Quick question about automation and desktop customization -- the setup in my bedroom includes a TV that a mac mini uses as its monitor. I'd like to set it up so, in the morning, it plays itunes automatically and pulls up some information about the day -- top headlines from RSS feeds and weather, probably. I've been experimenting with automator to do the iTunes piece of this, but the desktop widget stuff seems very out-of-the-realm of what Macs do. Any suggestions for apps to use for either piece of this project?

There's definitely dashboard widgets that will load iTunes playlists as an alarm. For the RSS thing I'd suggest setting up an iGoogle homepage or something with the feeds you want, set it as your homepage, and set the browser to open at a set time (I don't know if Automator can do this but I bet there's an easy solution for 'load x program at y time').

# ¿ Mar 2, 2012 06:11

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