Monday, April 12, 2021

Recent Questions - Ask Different

Recent Questions - Ask Different

Does deleting a game and reinstalling it over and over can harm the gameplay on IOS devices?

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 09:41 PM PDT

I'm currently playing games on my iPhone 8+ device and I deleted and reinstalled the same game few times. Now I'm wondering if each time that I'm deleting the app the performance of the game is getting worse? I'm talking about an FPS game (PUBG mobile)

Weird folder setup in Big Sur compared to Mojave. Lots of questions

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 11:46 PM PDT

I just upgraded to Big Sur from Mojave. Why are there 3 Applications folders in Big Sur?

  1. One listed on main hard drive which seems to contain everything
  2. Another in system folder: only some programs here. These are also in main folder
  3. For the third go to System/Volumes/(hard drive name)/ all apps in this folder.

In this same folder I see the all the folders and files from my previous Mojave system. Should they be there? What do I do with them? Weird place to store files.

how to search for a msg in apple messages app and read messages before and after

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 03:41 PM PDT

I frequently need to search for msgs on the apple messages app (on my mac). After I find the right message, I sometimes want to look at the messages that were sent before and after.

It's easy enough to read the messages before (I just scroll up). However, it does not let me scroll down to see the messages after. What can I do?

EvoCam (video camera software) did not capture audio for 2 weeks on Mac running Mavericks—way to find it?

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 12:39 PM PDT

I know it's a longshot.

I have an old Mac Mini running Mavericks running EvoCam 4.2.6 (old software no longer available).

The Mac Mini is connected via WiFi to an Amcrest camera. The Mac Mini is not compatible with the built in mic on the Amcrest, so I have a USB microphone running from the Mac Mini. Video comes from the Amcrest and audio from the USB mic. It usually works fine.

It records in hour long increments and outputs to .mov files.

For some reason starting two weeks ago, the audio didn't record even though I could see the system sound setting could detect audio from the microphone. Something on the software side messed up. The videos are there but with no audio. It took a restart to get it to record audio to the files again from the EvoCam app.

The audio is important.

I'm wondering if there are any ideas as to where the audio might have gone--again I know longshot. It records to an external drive connected to the computer. I tried looking at hidden files and I can see a .Trashes folder, but it says I don't have permission to open it.

Are there any other places scuttled audio could have gone?

Securely deleting data in iOS

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 12:19 PM PDT

My understanding is that resetting an iOS device by using Erase all Content and Settings is considered secure deleting, as the key for the encryption is obliterated and no data can be recovered.

Just to be sure: is that still the case if I set up the device with the same Apple ID afterwards? Will iOS generate a new key, or will the system somehow recognize my Account and use the same key all over again?

How can I clean my keyboard without turning my Macbook Air on?

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 02:53 PM PDT

I would like to turn off my Macbook Air in order to clean the keyboard and not repeatedly press buttons. However, when pressing any button, the Macbook immediately turns on again.

Is there any way to disable this behavior, so that for example only the unmarked button in the top right turns it on?

An app to click somewhere on the screen via keystrokes

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 12:13 PM PDT

I'm looking to reduce my mouse usage. (It's bad for your hands.)

If you ever used Vimium extension (e.g. for Chrome), it does this brilliant thing where once you hit F it shows you some keystroke sequences, and lets you open any link on the page for clicking (pictured below).

Vimium extension for Chrome

Now imagine I want the same, but for the whole display. Once I hit a key, a light grid is drawn onto my screen, splitting it to NxM pieces. It shows 2 or 3 key sequences. Once you press the sequence, the app clicks to the middle of that grid for you.

I need an app like this for macOS. If it doesn't exist, I suspect it's time to finally teach myself some Cocoa SDK and Swift to code it up. But if it exists, please write it down here so others can learn as well.

This would be similar to voice controls of macOS, but with keyboard.

enter image description here

Logitech Options won't let me change the "Keystroke assignment" assigned to a mouse button anymore

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 03:52 PM PDT

Logitech Options won't let me change the "Keystroke assignment" assigned to a mouse button anymore. I just get a sad error noise every time I try to set one.

Strangely, there are already keystroke assignments set for the mouse buttons on one of my Logitech mice. They appear in the Logitech Options app and those assignments still work. But I cannot change them.

This is on Catalina, and I have Logitech Options and Logitech Options Daemon enabled under Security & Privacy => Accessibility and Security & Privacy => Input Monitoring.

Any ideas?

M1 Air Big Sur 11.1 Recovery Mode Reinstall Not Working

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 09:56 PM PDT

I'm trying to reinstall macOS Big Sur on M1 Air because some of the root directories permissions got messed up and it's not booting after login screen (takes password, stuck in loading screen for a minute and then goes black. Guessing it didn't manage enough permissions.)

The OS version shows Big Sur 11.1 from the recovery mode terminal (from sw_vers command)

Recovery Mode Reinstall fails with this screen enter image description here

The installation log is here: https://pastebin.ubuntu.com/p/Tnks7Wxx27/ (I tried to clean up recurring logs a bit, so it's easy to look at)

I've already tried 4 times to reinstall. Twice it produced this screen and twice it got stuck in the middle and did nothing.

I guess the next absolute step for me would be to try to install with an external installation drive. But, could someone translate the log to understand why this is happening? (Is this in any way related to the root permission issue, that I can solve from recovery mode terminal?)

Books on Mac won't download epubs from iCloud

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 06:02 PM PDT

I use Books on Mac (Big Sur) to organize my non-Apple epub library. Books successfully syncs across devices, and when I want to read a book on my Mac, I often need to click the cloud download button in the top right corner of the book cover to download the book.

At some point recently, downloading stopped working on Mac (only). When I click the button, the title is added to the 'download manager' ("Show Downloads" next to the "All Books" link), however the progress indicator spins endlessly and the books are not downloaded.

I have 15GB free on my 512GB disk, running Big Sur 11.2.3 on a Macbook Pro 2017.

Any idea why this might be happening and what I can do about it?

Apple books not downloading

Find all my backed up photos on Time Machine drives

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 11:04 PM PDT

I have several time machine backups. I want to get all the photos out of them and upload them to Google Photos. I believe the "Backup and Sync from Google" application will do this for me, once I find (and perhaps temporarily copy) my photos.

Although I can browse my Time Machine backups in the Finder, there are, again, lots of them, and the drives being backed up changed over time. I don't see scanning through them manually being viable if there is any automatic option possible.

I'm running macOS 11.1. I can't change into the backup directory or list things from the terminal, even as root:

/V/MacBack ❯❯❯ cd Backups.backupdb/  cd: Permission denied: 'Backups.backupdb/'  /V/MacBack ❯❯❯ ls Backups.backupdb/                                                                                                  Thu 11 Mar 07:10:07 2021  ls: : Operation not permitted

When I try to see all the settings applied to the folder, I get:

/V/MacBack ❯❯❯ ls -lfde@O Backups.backupdb/  drwxr-xr-x+ 7 clinton  staff  - 238 17 Mar  2019 Backups.backupdb//   0: group:everyone deny add_file,delete,add_subdirectory,delete_child,writeattr,writeextattr,chown

I would be happy to strip the permissions (and restore them when I'm done, if possible). Supposedly chmod -a# 0 should work, but it doesn't:

/V/MacBack ❯❯❯ sudo chmod -a# 0 Backups.backupdb/  chmod: Failed to set ACL on file 'Backups.backupdb/': Operation not permitted

This answer seems close. I also tried to give myself access this way, after confirming my user id:

/V/MacBack ❯❯❯ sudo chmod +a# "clinton allow writeattr,writeextattr,chown" Backups.backupdb/   usage:  chmod [-fhv] [-R [-H | -L | -P]] [-a | +a | =a  [i][# [ n]]] mode|entry file ...      chmod [-fhv] [-R [-H | -L | -P]] [-E | -C | -N | -i | -I] file ...

Perhaps I'm barking up the wrong tree. Maybe there's a utility that does this. I can see that I could restore files, but I'd run out of space quickly (unless I could only restore photos?), and it'd take forever.

How can I find all the photos in my multitude of backups (or, even all the photos in a single TimeMachine backup?)

How do I update macOS App Store apps to the latest compatible version?

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 05:05 PM PDT

I have rather belatedly (March 2021) updated my macBook to Mojave. Because I depend on Aperture and other 32-bit apps I can't update to Catalina.

brew doctor tells me:

Warning: Your Xcode (10.1) is too outdated.  Please update to Xcode 11.3.1 (or delete it).  Xcode can be updated from the App Store.

But unfortunately trying to update Xcode or other out-of-date apps, including iMovie, using the App store:

  • The Updates tab (⌘7) says "No Updates. All your apps are up to date".
  • When I go to page for Xcode and click "update", it tells me "We could not complete your update. Xcode can't be installed on "Macintosh HD" because macOS version 10.15.4 or later is required." I get similar messages for iMovie.
  • The profile tab (⌘0) shows both Xcode and iMovie in the list of purchases, but the buttons next to each just say "Open".

    • Sometimes, if I wait a while, the button next to Xcode (but not iMovie) will change to say "update", and when I click on it I get a dialog that says "Download an older version of Xcode? The current version requires OS X 10.15.4 or later, but you can download the last compatible version"—but when I click "Download" the same dialog reappears again immediately.

      Download an older version of Xcode? The current version requires OS X 10.15.4 or later, but you can download the last compatible version.

How can I install the latest compatible version of apps originally installed through the App Store on older versions of macOS?

How do you disable opening Safari on macOS?

Posted: 12 Apr 2021 12:00 AM PDT

I would like to disable opening Safari on my Mac. I don't want to delete or modify it in any way, I only want to prevent myself from opening the application itself (If I search for it, or try to open it, it shouldn't run).

I tried using Screen Time's Content Restrictions by going to the Content and Privacy Section > Apps > and unchecking Safari.

But Safari still opens when I am distracted and look for it.

Is there any way to stop Safari from opening?

I'm using macOS Catalina. Would updating to Big Sur / higher version help?

Adding external wired NAS to Time Capsule

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 08:00 PM PDT

First, I have none of this equipment, so I can't just test it and see ..Yet. I Know I could hack a Time Capsule into a RaidBox via SATA/eSATA connector, But that's not the route I'd like to go.

If you plug in a NAS to a A1470 TC does acknowledge it's existence ? And Can you store to it? I want to get a TC A1470. replace the small drive with a larger TB unit. Use that for my Time Machine Backups. Then add a 16TB NAS (wired) to the ethernet on the TC. Like a Drobo 5-Bay DAS Storage.

Mac, Mojave, External NAS, Time Capsule,

Is it true that we could dual boot Mojave and Catalina, in the same APFS partition, and they don't have to have fixed sizes?

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 07:01 PM PDT

Is it true that if we dual boot Mojave and Catalina, or if we dual boot Catalina and Big Sur, we can go the traditional way of creating two APFS partitions, and each partition is one container and in it, just have one volume and it is Mojave or Catalina, respectively. Each OS would then have a fixed size (for example, 250GB each, on a 500GB SSD drive).

But with APFS, we could also have one single APFS partition on the physical hard drive -- and so it is one container, and then create two volumes: one for Mojave and one for Catalina, and they can dual boot this way? This actually has the benefits that each OS is not limited to a fixed size, because Mojave can be 150GB and Catalina can grow to 350GB, and if Catalina goes down to 200GB, now Mojave can grow to 300GB -- dynamic flexible sizing?

How do I filter videos by size to identify the largest in Photos app on OSX?

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 06:57 PM PDT

I need to find the largest video files, because my videos takes a lot of space

enter image description here

but I dont know how to do this:

enter image description here

It seems to not to be there any option for filtering by size

Can an Automator workflow generate an Application?

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 02:04 PM PDT

I'm building a "Wizard" of sorts that uses Automator and some Appliescript, and at the end I would like it to generate an "Automator Application" that does things when launched, that are based on the inputs from the wizard.

Is this even possible? Can one Automator workflow, actually generate an application from the results? I know software can create software, but is this possible within Automator's capabilities?

EDIT: As noted in the comments below the post, osacompile seems like it might get me where I want to go, but now I have a new problem with that.

Here's a screenshot of my automator steps:

Automator routine

Here's the code of the erroring module (Send iMessage):

on run {input, parameters}            set sms_address to item 1 of input      set email_address to item 2 of input      set sms_content to item 3 of input      set email_subject to item 4 of input      set email_body to item 5 of input            set savePath to (path to desktop as text) & "test.scpt"            set code to "osacompile -e 'tell application \"Messages\"' -e '       set imessageservice to 1st service whose service type = iMessage' -e '      set iMessageBuddy to buddy " & sms_address & " of imessageservice' -e '      send " & sms_content & " to iMessageBuddy' -e '      end tell' -o " & quoted form of POSIX path of savePath            do shell script code            return input  end run

Note that the lines are broken up that way because it was the only approach I could find where I didn't get any errors just because of adding line breaks (I can put this code all on one line and get the identical error)

Here's the error I receive:

osacompile error message

I haven't been able to figure out what the problem is here but it seems like I'm not passing the variables in the way a bash script expects. Have tried a bunch of other approaches and nothing has worked any better, but this is the one that seems the most sensible to me, knowing how I would normally pass variables into a script.

EDIT 2: To simplify further, here is the standalone code I'm current debugging in AppleScript Editor and without any line breaks to not confuse the issue:

set sms_address to "person@gmail.com"  set sms_content to "sms content"    set savePath to (path to desktop as text) & "test.scpt"    set code to "osacompile -e 'tell application \"Messages\"' -e ' set imessageservice to 1st service whose service type = iMessage' -e 'set iMessageBuddy to buddy " & sms_address & " of imessageservice' -e 'send " & sms_content & " to iMessageBuddy' -e 'end tell' -o " & quoted form of POSIX path of savePath    do shell script code

Calling AppleScript routine using osascript

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 04:04 PM PDT

Given the following AppleScript code

on myHandler()      display dialog ("I'm your Handler!")  end myHandler

How do I call myHandler from osascript (using Terminal), plain without parameters, but also with?

Drivers not working on Windows 10 installed (CLI process) on external SSD running on Macbook

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 08:05 PM PDT

I have a problem with the installation of Windows 10 (November 2019) on my MacBook Air 2018. I tried to use a virtual machine the first time, but some drivers did not work (trackpad, audio and keyboard did not work). I used this tutorial on YouTube.

So, I decided to follow this guide (using the Windows CLI) carefully, step by step, at the part "Using a Flash Drive and the Windows CLI to Install Windows 10".

My problem is at this point in step 3:

DISKPART> list volume      Volume ###  Ltr  Label        Fs     Type        Size     Status     Info    ----------  ---  -----------  -----  ----------  -------  ---------  --------    Volume 0     W   BOOTCAMP     NTFS   Partition    249 GB  Healthy    Volume 1         Recovery     NTFS   Partition    800 MB  Healthy    Volume 2     S   EFI          FAT32  Partition    200 MB  Healthy    Hidden    Volume 3     C   WINSTALL     FAT32  Removable     29 GB  Healthy

Instead of volume WINSTALL, I see a D volume, in CD-ROM format (only 2 Gb). Without that volume, I can not continue with the installation, because the prompt does not find the image .ISO of windows contained in WINSTALL.

Before start, I followed this guide (answer #1) to prepare the SSD for the installation. I formatted the SSD in the ExFAT format and then I copied the contents of the Windows 10 .ISO image (that I've opened with the Finder) inside the SSD (I did not create any partitions with the macOS Disk Utility application). I want to specify that in the guide a 500 Gb SSD was used and my SSD is 250 GB in size.

This is the content of my SSD before starting the process of installation. enter image description here

And this is the error at the command

dism /Get-ImageInfo /ImageFile:C:\sources\install.wim

enter image description here

English translation: "Error 87, parameter not correct. The image management and maintenance log file is available in X:\windows\Logs\DISM\dism.log"

Thank you so much for your time. I am available for any questions.

Edge swipe gesture for opening Notification Center on macOS stopped working

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 11:25 PM PDT

Recently the edge swipe gesture for opening Notification Center stopped working on my MacBook Pro. It happened around the same time I upgraded to Catalina, but not sure if it's related. I also confirmed the setting is still enabled (screenshot below). It works fine if I click the button on the top right. Any ideas on how to resolve? Thanks.

Trackpad settings

AppleScript: Wait for Safari page to fully load

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 04:17 PM PDT

I'm using this script for Google Chrome to pause the script until the page is fully loaded:

tell application "Google Chrome"          repeat until (loading of front window's tab 2 is false)              1 + 1 --just an arbitary line          end repeat          loading of front window's tab 2       end tell

This don't seems to work with Safari, any equivalent?

An undiagnosable screen fault (flickering/glitching)

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 05:55 PM PDT

I have been experiencing an intermittent screen flickering/glitching. The problem occurs where I use, or leave the laptop on for several hours, until I let the laptop rest (i.e. shut it down and leave it off) for several days, then promptly starts again with a couple of hours of use.

The flickering/glitching affects the whole screen. I don't think the attached image does the problem much justice. The whole image on screen appears to shake, moving up and down, ghosting between two 'screens'. The problem started with faint horizontal lines across the screen and then escalated within a matter of hours.

I have taken the Macbook Pro into an Authorised Apple Service Provider who were unable to diagnose the fault with their diagnostic systems; as a result they weren't prepared to replace any hardware. The service provider has proved fruitless. Has anyone else had a similar experience?

Terminal window is now blank [closed]

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 10:42 PM PDT

A Terminal newbie here.

I had downloaded and installed Git, but when I typed "Git --version" I would get illegal instruction. I tried to uninstall Git and now my Terminal window in blank.

How do I get Name$ as a prompt again?

Thank you!

enter image description here

Log out of Apple TV

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 07:34 PM PDT

Can you sign out of Apple TV using an iPad or phone? I logged into my exs Apple TV and now I am not sure what he can see or use in my stuff.

Why use iPhoto instead of manually saving images?

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 11:23 PM PDT

I would like to know whether there are any advantages to using iPhoto on Mac for my pictures taken on my iPhone. For the past few years I have simply exported all images via Image Capture which stores the actual file to a location on my hard drive. Recently I have had to use iPhoto to get images off an iCloud shared stream, I have noticed when importing the images it saves into one file (almost like a database) instead of individual JPEG files.

Can someone tell me whether what pros and cons are there to using iPhoto instead of manually saving images?

Maintaining Aspect Ratio while Image Cropping using Preview

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 06:30 PM PDT

I like the convenience of being able to crop jpg/png images with Preview, but I would also like to be able occasionally to restrict the aspect ratio of the cropped image. This is useful, for instance, if I want to prepare images for printing in 4x6 or 5x7, while avoiding any surprise cropping made by the photo lab.

I am hoping there is a quick and easy way to do this (i.e., without needing to invoke the behemoth of image editing for this elementary task). Are you aware of one?

What are the wireless display options for MacBook Air?

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 08:22 PM PDT

Are there any viable Wireless display solutions for MacBook Air (with Thunderbolt port). I know I can connect to HDMI-compatible TV or Monitor using cables and convertors. Is there any way I can avoid using wires?

First thing that comes to my mind is DLNA since so many TVs support DLNA. But that is just for streaming videos and not for normal laptop usage. I am curious to know any solution exists?

How can I convert JPG into PDF easily?

Posted: 11 Apr 2021 10:43 PM PDT

Is there any way to batch convert .jpg files into single .pdf files?
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