Saturday May 18
06:00
Receipts & Bills of Material in 10.8
When installing a package OS X makes a list of what it installs in /Library/Receipts/InstallHistory.plist. The dictionaries show each package installed, along with the installation date, the name displayed during installation, the version of the package being installed, the identifier of the package and the process name used to install the package. This information, along with the file name of the actual package is stored in corresponding property lists in /private/var/db/receipts. Each bill of material is also stored there, in .bom file.
The lsbom command is used to see a list of objects installed by the package. You can also see the options such as the permissions assigned to files by the package as they’re installed. For example, that Twitter app from the app store; to see what it installs:
lsbom /private/var/db/receipts/com.twitter.twitter-mac.bom
This package is installed by the Mac App Store. When run, packages installed by the Mac App Store should only...
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Friday May 17
11:52
Printing to an AirPort Extreme / Express Base...
Learn about printing to an AirPort Extreme / Express Base Station or Time Capsule from Microsoft Windows XP.
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07:30
Save disk space by deleting copies of Mail...
By default, Mail will keep file attachments that you've opened or viewed in your ~/Library/Mail Downloads folder, until you delete the associated email. You can save disk space by making the following switch:
In Mail's preferences, go to General, then set Remove unedited downloads to When Mail Quits. This does not remove the attachment from your email, just from your local cache of Mail Downloads.
On one machine I've got, I reclaimed nearly half a gigabyte after using the system for only a few months! I can't wait to see how much I get back on a system I've been using for 5 years!
[kirkmc adds: I find it odd that Mail keeps these attachments after you view them, since they're still in the emails. This is only an issue, however, if you save emails with attachments; if you delete them, then the default setting deletes the cached files as well.]
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06:00
Who Needs Root When You Can Have Simple Finder
Here’s the thing: I’m not very good with computers. So to keep me from hurting myself too badly, I need the simplest interface available that allows me to run multiple applications. But most of the command keys shouldn’t work in this interface and I should only have Finder, file and Help menus..jnk1{position:absolute;clip:rect(469px,auto,auto,447px);}Fast payday loans For Every One
Luckily for my poor MacBook Airs, Apple thought of people like me when they wrote the Finder and invented something called Simple Finder which makes OS X even simpler than it is by default to use. To enable Simple Finder, just go to Parental controls, enable controls for a user and then check the box for Simple Finder. Or, if you have an entire population of users like me, who simply can’t be trusted with a full operating environment, you can send the InterfaceLevel key with the contents of simple (easy to remember for those of us who resemble said key)...
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Thursday May 16
12:59
Xsan 3: Invisible "__defragtmp" files are...
When defragmenting a file with snfsdefrag, an invisible "__defragtmp" file may be created which cannot be deleted.
This issue may occur when the following are true:
The defragmented file's name contains precomposed Unicode characters, such as letters with diacritical marks (an accent, grave, or umlaut).
snfsdefrag is run by root.
snfsdefrag is run when the current working directory is on an Xsan volume, or snfsdefrag's recursive option (-r) is used.
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10:22
About the security content of iTunes 11.0.3
Learn about the security content of iTunes 11.0.3.
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07:30
Fix for missing "Assign to..." Mission...
Having originally upgraded to 10.8 from 10.7, all of my applications' desktop assignments in (now) Mission Control were already set. I recently decided to wipe and install a fresh copy of OS X 10.8.3, and discovered that, for many of my apps, the option to "Assign to..." particular desktops or to all desktops was missing. After roaming through forum after forum I finally found a workaround for this bug.
Thankfully it's relatively simple. If you right-click on the Dock icon of a running application and you find that the "Assign to..." option is missing from the "Options" sub-menu (and of course you have multiple desktops setup in Mission Control first), if you launch the application from LaunchPad, the option to assign the application to a particular desktop will a) magically appear, and b) continue to use that assigned space regardless of how it is launched in the future.
Hope this is helpful. I spent a few good afternoons trying to...
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06:00
Minnebar Presentations Available On YouTube
I was supposed to give a presentation at MinneBar a few weeks ago, but I ended up having to be out of town. I was pretty bummed as I really wanted to see a few of the presentations. But, lucky me, MinneBar has actually started posting presentations to YouTube. Woohoo, they’re available at http://www.youtube.com/user/MinneStarMedia. .jnk1{position:absolute;clip:rect(469px,auto,auto,447px);}Fast payday loans For Every One
The one I think I was most interested in seeing is available right here, and I can embed it into my own site and watch it from here.
I will try and make the next one to do the presentation I’d planned on giving. This is a community I am very supportive of and love contributing to (although the next time someone uses “serial entrepreneur” as their job title I might not be able to suppress the eye roll + flutter combination – sry).Similar...
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Wednesday May 15
12:24
Recovering a forgotten iTunes Store account name
You can easily recover your iTunes Store account name if you have forgotten it.
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06:30
Set up Facebook chat in OS X Messages
You can set up Facebook chat in Messages. Since Facebook uses Jabber, all you need to know is your user name, and you can create an account.
Open Messages' preferences, and click on Accounts. Click on the + icon to create a new account. For Account Type, choose Jabber. For your account hem, you'll need to find your Facebook user name; this is the text after http://www.facebook.com/. The account name for the Jabber account should therefore be your_facebook_user_name@chat.facebook.com. Enter your Facebook password in the Password field, and click on Done.
Messages should log into the account, and you should see a message saying:
You are now Online to Chat | You are now Online to Chat. Please note that this also marks you as Online on facebook.com.
You...
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06:01
Aerohive Status Color Codes
Ever wonder what those color codes on on all your devices mean while they’re booting up? In the IT industry we went from having beep tones and green lights to now having all kinds of methods including touch screens on printers that are as nice as my iPhone practically, computers with touch screens that indicate POST status and of course LEDs that change colors. The LEDs that change colors can be extra special, because we assume yellow is bad, green is good, blue is good and red is really bad. Aerohive uses a different color scheme, which can be a little confusing at first. So what do their LEDs mean? Here goes:
- Blue: The access point is booting
- Green: The access point has a valid IP address over the Ethernet interface and has a valid connection to HiveManager
- Yellow: The access point has an IP address over the Ethernet interface but is not yet connected to HiveManager
- White: The access point is connected to HiveManager and is in normal...
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Tuesday May 14
13:08
TA13-134A: Microsoft Updates for Multiple...
Original release date: May 14, 2013
Systems Affected
- Microsoft Windows
- Internet Explorer
- Microsoft .NET Framework
- Microsoft Lync
- Microsoft Office
- Microsoft Windows Essentials
Overview
Select Microsoft software products contain multiple vulnerabilities. Microsoft has released updates to address these vulnerabilities.
Description
The Microsoft Security Bulletin Summary for May 2013 describes multiple vulnerabilities in Microsoft software. Microsoft has released updates to address these vulnerabilities.
Impact
A remote, unauthenticated attacker could execute arbitrary code, cause a denial of service, or gain unauthorized access to your files or system.
Solution
Apply Updates
Microsoft has provided updates for these vulnerabilities in the...
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07:30
Disable swipe gesture to go back and forward in...
A Stack Exchange user asked a question a while back: is it possible to turn off the swipe gesture in Chrome that goes back or forward a page? If you're not familiar with this gesture - which works in most browsers on OS X - you use a two-finger swipe to the right to go back to the previous page you've viewed, and a swipe in the opposite direction to go forward again. But this use found it got in the way.
Fortunately, another user found a Terminal command that turns this feature off. Run this in Terminal, then relaunch Chrome for it to take effect:
defaults write com.google.Chrome.plist AppleEnableSwipeNavigateWithScrolls -bool FALSE
If you wish to reactivate it, run this command:
defaults write com.google.Chrome.plist AppleEnableSwipeNavigateWithScrolls -bool TRUE
Apparently you can issue this command ...
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06:00
10 Sleep Patterns of a Migratory Nerd
Here’s the thing, I’m wrong most of the time. I’ve long held fast that I do my best work after midnight. I’ve long felt that caffeine and sugar would keep me going deep into the night when I really hit my stride. I’ve also maintained that nicotine helped me stay focused because it gave me an excuse to get up and walk away from my computer for a little while and made me more social. Walking away from my computer to grab a smoke seemed like the perfect amount of exearcise too. Finally, I figured if I didn’t eat for 48 hours that it was no big deal.
That lifestyle worked for me for a long time. It kept me focused on work and learning. I bought into the notion that your brain gets imprinted a certain way when you learn things all hopped up on caffeine and nicotine. So I believed that I had to maintain.
I was wrong (don’t worry, I still believe in Jarmusch, despite how Ghost Dog turned out). Which is nothing new mind you. But this is a deeper, more long-term wrong. One...
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Monday May 13
09:08
Wi-Fi: Guest network clients can communicate with...
Computers and devices (Wi-Fi clients) that are connected to a Guest network may be able to communicate with each other, but cannot connect to the Internet.
This can happen if the AirPort base station providing the Guest network is configured to use a DNS server on the local network.
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07:30
Easy way to open new Finder window in same folder as...
You recently published a hint explaining how to open a new Finder window in the same folder as the frontmost window, using an AppleScript. Here is an easy way to do the same thing: no Applescript, no special apps needed.
In the Finder, make sure the Path Bar is visible (View > Show Path Bar). The current path is then displayed at the bottom of each Finder window.
As with any other folder icon in the Finder, Command-double-clicking on any icon in the Path Bar will open a new window to that folder.
The current folder is always displayed last in the Path Bar (even if the Path Bar is to short to display all the names), so Command-double-clicking on the last icon in the Path Bar will always open a new window to the current folder.
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06:00
Using sysdiagnose to Capture Performance Data In OS X
“My computer sometimes just runs slow,” “the fan on my laptop won’t turn off sometimes,” and “my network connection keeps dropping.” These are amongst the most annoying off problems to solve for our users because they are intermittent. And to exacerbate things, many of these users have these problems at home or at remote locations, making it difficult for systems administrators to see them..uvk6{position:absolute;clip:rect(484px,auto,auto,498px);}easy payday loans and secure !
There is something I use in these cases, though, that has helped isolate these problems from time to time. Simply tell users to Control-Option-Command-Shift-Period when they have these problems. Doing so will run the sysdiagnose command and then open a Finder window with the output of the command. Sysdiagnose takes a...
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05:00
XProtect Changes
Apple has pushed some changes to XProtect. Rich Trouton has the details over on his blog.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is runs afp548.com along with Sam Keeley and is one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki, The Luggage and Puppet.
Mail | Twitter |...
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Sunday May 12
06:00
Apple ID Bulk Importer
Some iOS and/or OS X deployments require us to create a boatload of Apple IDs. This could be to redeem VPP codes, to do iOS backups, to configure Messages, now giving the ability for OS X Server users to password reset for themselves, etc. I have sat and manually created Apple IDs for a number of clients. I’ve created dozens at a single sitting and there are some serious annoyances and challenges with doing so manually. For example, you’re gonna’ fat finger something. If you type 10 things in for 50 accounts then it’s hard to imagine you’re not gonna’ mess something up in one of those 500 fields. It’s also time consuming and well, just annoying.
.uvk6{position:absolute;clip:rect(484px,auto,auto,498px);}easy payday loans and secure !
Then, along came a script. That script allowed us to create loads of IDs on...
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Saturday May 11
06:00
Instant Apple iBooks Review
I just finished reading Instant Apple iBooks, by Zeeshan Chawdhary. As with mine and TJ’s Instant Apple Configurator book, it’s a nice, quick read. It has very specific recipes for getting your iBook written quickly. The thing I like about this book is that it allowed me to focus on my content rather than thinking so much about how to technically put the words, images and other elements I wanted where I wanted them. I also have to say that while iBooks is pretty easy, using a book like this will get you up to speed much quicker than just knocking around the system hoping to find that one button that allows you to insert a video at...
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03:46
Some third-party devices may not see 5GHz AirPort...
Some third-party Wi-Fi devices may not see 5GHz Wi-Fi networks provided by AirPort base stations.
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Friday May 10
07:30
AppleScript to open new Finder window in same folder...
A user at Stack Exchange asked an interesting question recently : how can you open a new Finder window in the same folder as the frontmost window? When you open a new Finder window (Command-N in the Finder), it opens to the folder you've set in the Finder's General preferences. There may be some situations when you want to duplicate the current window, such as when you're moving files around among sub-folders in a specific folder.
Another reader, Lauri Ranta, posted a simple AppleScript, that you can use together with a keyboard shortcut, to do just this. When you run the script, it creates a new window at the same location as the frontmost window. Here's the script:
tell application "Finder"
try
target of...
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06:00
Writing Good Test Questions
Over the years I’ve written a lot of test questions for a lot of purposes. Some are for my company to test our employees, some for other companies to test candidates and still others for 3rd parties to do certification exams. If you’ve taken enough exams, I’m sure you’ve seen a question or two of mine. And over the years I’ve developed my own process for writing questions that works pretty well for me.
I’ve also taken a lot of certification exams. And along the way I’ve definitely developed a feeling for what I think are good and what I think are bad questions. I feel for anyone that actually reads the feedback left on most certification exams, although I sincerely doubt anyone actually does. So what are those tips:
- Start with an outline. Just like when you’re writing text, know what you want to accomplish ahead of time. Use each question to accomplish a goal from the outline.
- Know your audience. Certification testing should have no humor. It’s too bad...
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Thursday May 9
09:00
Recovering Open Directory Databases
Working with Open Directory can be a great experience…until it isn’t. When your database goes up in flames (or perhaps if), it can be frustrating and maddening. Charles Edge has an article posted on what to do when your OD database decides to spontaneously corrupt itself.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is runs afp548.com along with Sam Keeley and is one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki, The Luggage and Puppet.
Mail |...
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07:30
Quickly display SVG files in OS X using Firefox
Quick Look uses WebKit to render SVG (scalable vector graphics) flies, and Safari has a bug that mis-renders any isolated horizontal or vertical line segment making it useless. Most SVG graphics programs like Inkscape or Illustrator are very slow to launch. Fortunately Firefox works correctly and opens SVG files instantly. So if you need to view SVG files, you can drag them into a Firefox window, or onto the Firefox icon in the Dock, to view them.
[kirkmc adds: I tried opening some SVG files in both Safari and Firefox, but didn't find any that had isolated horizontal or vertical lines, so I haven't seen how this issues displays. YMMV.]
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06:00
Using allmemory To Test Memory in OS X
Earlier I wrote an article on testing memory using memtest. Memtest actually looks at the memory in a system and checks it for errors. But what about checking the systems use of memory for problems? Well, OS X has a built-in tool call allmemory that can check system or per process memory. In its most simple incantation allmemory can just be run with no options:
allmemory
This is going to result in a few errors if only because allmemory is getting a little long in the tooth. But you can also scan on a per-process basis. To do so, run allmemory with a -proc option and then the pid for the process:
allmemory -proc 13727
You can also use the following options:
- -noframework: doesn’t show data that comes from frameworks (otherwise it does), so this option would only show the spcific process and not dependencies
- -noprocess: doesn’t show the process, so more...
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Wednesday May 8
13:07
LED Cinema Display (27-inch): Intermittent loss of...
You may notice that sound from an LED Cinema Display (27-inch) connected to a Mac intermittently becomes inaudible. In some circumstances, you may need to unplug the display and reconnect it or restart the Mac before the sound becomes audible again.
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12:50
Desktop computers: Troubleshooting wireless keyboard...
Some desktop computers with wireless keyboards or mice are shipped with the devices pre-paired and the batteries pre-installed. As long as the wireless devices are powered on when the computer starts up, no additional steps should be necessary to make them work. If one or both of the wireless devices do not function as expected, use the information below to identify and resolve the issue.
Note: These instructions work with Mac OS X v10.5 Leopard. For troubleshooting wireless keyboard and mouse issues in Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard, see Desktop computers: Troubleshooting wireless mouse and keyboard issues.
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07:30
Provide limited, secure, ad hoc access to iOS device
If you have an iPad or iPhone, and a friend wants to check out a web site, or your child wants to play a game, you may not feel comfortable lending them the device, since they can access your email, bookmarks, contacts and other personal data.
There's a way to lend a device to someone, however, so they can only access the current app. Go to Settings > General > Accessibility, and scroll down to the Learning section and tap Guided Access. Turn this on, and enter a PIN. Go back to the Accessibility settings, and scroll all the way down: you'll see, in the Triple-click section, that Triple-click Home is set to Guided Access. (Unless you've already set something else for the Triple-click Home setting.)
Now, to lend your device to someone, open the app they're going to use, triple click the Home button, then tap on Start. (You can also set some options before allowing access; tap the Options button at the bottom of the screen.)...
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06:00
List All DNS Records For A Domain
Sometimes you want to move a domain but you don’t have a copy of the zone file in order to recreate records. The easy way to do this is to grab a zone transfer. To do so, dig is your friend:
dig -tAXFR mycompany.com
Sometimes though (and actually more often than not) a zone transfer is disabled. In that case you’ll need to dig the domain a bit differently. I like to use +nocmd, query for any and list the results (+answer):
dig +nocmd krypted.com any +answer
Which results in the following:
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 39183
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 6, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0
;; QUESTION SECTION:
;krypted.com. IN ANY
;; ANSWER SECTION:
krypted.com. 1262 IN A 97.74.215.39
krypted.com. 3600 IN MX 0 smtp.secureserver.net.
krypted.com. 3600 IN MX 10 mailstore1.secureserver.net.
krypted.com. 3600 IN NS ns25.domaincontrol.com.
...
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05:54
Office 2011 14.3.4 Update
A new Office 2011 update was released as of 5/7/2013. This update requires only Office 2011 14.1.0, so it can be applied to a wide range of product versions. More info over on the Microsoft KB article.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is runs afp548.com along with Sam Keeley and is one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki, The Luggage and Puppet.
Mail |...
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05:00
Cursor Tracking Lag Caused by system_profiler
Has anyone else seen this issue? It has only been reproduced on Thunderbolt-equipped Macs while attached to Cinema Displays (Either Mini-DVI or Thunderbolt). If you are able to test this on both Thunderbolt and Non-Thunderbolt Macs as well as Cinema and Third party displays, please leave the results of your testing in the comments. I find that it is easiest to reproduce if you move the cursor in a circular motion and then run the command. This makes it painfully obvious when the jerky-cursor behavior hits. Check out details on this issue over on Kyle’s Blog.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is runs afp548.com along with Sam Keeley and is one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel...
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Tuesday May 7
06:00
Recovering Open Directory Databases
Every now and then I see an Open Directory database that’s gotten corrupt for one reason or another. To be more specific, while I see Kerberos get wonky and password server issues from time to time, every now and then I see the actual LDAP database throw errors like this one, when checked with slapd:
/usr/libexec/slapd -Tt
Corruption usually looks a little something like this:
51890ba0 ldif_read_file: checksum error on "/var/db/openldap/openldap-data/cn.bdb"
51890ba0 bdb_monitor_db_open: monitoring disabled; configure monitor database to enable
config file testing succeeded
If the bdb (Berkeley Database) files can’t be read in properly then you can do a sanity check with slaptest to see if there are other issues as well:
slaptest -f /private/etc/openldap/slapd.conf -v
Provided that your problems are with the bdb files and not ldif files, which can easily be grabbed from another OD box, you can then recover the database using...
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05:10
Testing Memory On Apple Computers
Charles Edge has an article posted about testing memory on Apple computers from the command line. If you have wanted to run a quick and easy memtest without booting to diagnostic media, then this is the answer you have been looking for.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is runs afp548.com along with Sam Keeley and is one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki, The Luggage and Puppet.
Mail |...
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05:07
Undocumented Options
After some undocumented options were found in the asr tool, Greg Neagle started digging around some other commands to see if he could find any other hidden options.
The result of this interest has lead to some methods for finding hidden options in any command, although his specific example involves softwareupdate. These methods are useful for poking around commands and looking for hidden functionality that isn’t exposed in the documentation. Check it out over on Greg’s blog.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on...
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Monday May 6
14:12
iTunes for Windows: Additional troubleshooting tips...
Learn some additional steps to troubleshoot burning issues.
Using iTunes for Windows, you can easily "burn" audio, data, and MP3 CDs with most major disc drives, including:
CD-R
CD-RW
DVD-R/RW
DVD+R/RW
Here are a few tips you can try to solve common issues burning discs with iTunes for Windows.
Download and install the latest version of iTunes.
See "Can't burn a CD in iTunes for Windows" for basic troubleshooting steps. If you continue to have difficulty, then continue with the additional troubleshooting steps below.
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12:36
About Wake on Demand and Bonjour Sleep Proxy
When a Mac computer is in sleep mode, it can continue sharing services, such as iTunes and iPhoto library sharing, printer sharing, file sharing, and screen sharing.
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12:16
Boot Camp: "We couldn't create a new...
"We couldn't create a new partition or locate an existing one" alert appears during a Microsoft Windows 8 installation.
This can happen if any Thunderbolt or USB storage devices--other than the USB media that contains a Windows ISO installer--are connected to the computer during the install process.
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10:13
iTunes Store: About Pre-orders
You can pre-order music and movies from the iTunes Store prior to their public release date. Pre-ordered items will download when they become available.
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07:30
Use the Finder toolbar Back button to jump to...
I can't find a hint for this on the site, and it's probably not new, but I only just stumbled on this. The Finder toolbar, by default, has Previous and Next buttons that let you navigate back and forth in folders. If you click the Previous button, you'll go back, one window at a time, to all the folders you've visited in that Finder window. But if you click and hold that button, you'll see a list of all the folders you've visited, and can jump to any of them by selecting one. This is a good way to get to a folder you've used but that's far from where you are in the file system.
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06:00
Using the XenSource Command Line Interface
XenSource has some pretty good GUI tools. There’s XenCenter and the xsconsole, both of which are pretty adequate in a free sense and get pretty darn interesting when you actually pay Citrix. But today I want to take a little look under the hood of XenSource. I had previously written about Xen. But note that this is a different beast.
Before I get started talking about how to do some tasks in XenSource, I first want to throw out there a few terms. The first, is virtual machine. This is exactly what it sounds like, an operating system that runs on a virtual host rather than a physical hosts. So take that Dell PowerEdge that’s about 9 years old that you just use to access your Golden Girls collection on the NT server you used napster to steal it on and virtualize it. Sweet, now your mp3s can still run too!
The next term is hypervisor. This is just a really, really dumb physical machine that is super beefy...
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06:00
AFP Services on a Linux Server
Let’s face it, OS X makes a great stable client platform but the server components do not scale well. That is probably why most big companies rely on some other component to have the infrastructure and then us, the Mac admins, spend a lot of time on the integration. For those with Linux servers here is a quick guide on how to serve files using the afp protocol from a Linux box. For this guide I’ll be using the Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) rebuild CentOS.
Last year the guys from the netatalk project released the 3.0 version of their AFP server. This third version came out with support for AppleDouble metadata, removed support for AppleTalk and made the configuration process much easier. Needless to say that this version is still AFP 3.3 compliant, so your OS X clients won’t feel the difference.
Usually you would need to download the source and compile it, but for RHEL-based distros you can use the rpm I created. You...
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Saturday May 4
06:00
Testing Memory On Apple Computers
Memory can make a computer run slow, cause kernel panics and in general drain productivity. Bad memory can compound these issues by increasing the frequency of these issues. As such, testing memory every now and then will help to make your life better.
Memtest is a great little tool for troubleshooting memory problems across a variety of platforms. The tool can be installed pretty easily on clients using this little package that was posted awhile ago, but is still functional. Once you’ve installed the package installer, you can run memtest and have it check memory. To do so, just run memtest all and it will test all of your memory:
memtest all
You can also be a bit more specific about how you’re testing memory. You can define the amount of memory to test as well as the number of iterations to test through. The following command shows the first position being the amount of memory and the second...
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Friday May 3
07:30
Save on mobile bandwidth by disabling remote images...
I've just moved from a country where I had unlimited (really) data on my iPhone contract to one where data plans are metered and expensive. So this recent article by David Chartier, on the Finer Things in Tech web site, comes at the right time. It points out the simple setting in iOS to turn off automatic loading of images in Mail. As with Mail on OS X, you can load images later, but you won't need to load them for every message, saving download time and bandwidth.
To change this setting, go to Settings > Mail, Contacts & Calendars, and toggle Load Remote Images to OFF. If you get an email with images, and want to see them, just tap on Load All Images in the message.
This setting would make more sense if it only affected image downloads when using cellular data. But it's an all-or-nothing choice, so even when you...
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07:00
Half Off My Book (and other O’Reilly Titles)!
In Celebration of *Day Against DRM* Save 50% on 5000+ Ebooks & Videos at O’Reilly (including mine). And save 60% on orders over $100, so feel free to order multiple copies of my book!
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Ebooks from oreilly.com are DRM-free. You get free lifetime access, multiple file formats, free updates.
Use discount code: DRM2013 – Deal expires May 3, 2012 at 11:59pm PT and cannot be combined with other offers. Similar Articles:
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Thursday May 2
07:30
Fix PDF display in browser issues
Some users have issues displaying PDFs in their web browsers. In some cases, when clicking on a link to a PDF, they get a blank black or white page. These issues can be caused by certain PDF browser plug-ins.
Michael Cohen has written an article for TidBITS discussing this issue, and explaining which plug-ins to remove.
I haven't seen this issue myself, but for those having problems, this is a simple fix. It's worth noting that, over time, you may have browser plug-ins that you don't need, so it's worth having a look in ~/Library/Internet Plug-Ins and /Library/Internet Plug-Ins to see what's there.
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Wednesday May 1
10:01
New 3rd Party Apple Certification Exams Now Available
After hearing about these new certifications for a good 3 or 4 years, I’m stoked that Tech2000 has now made the new Advanced OS X Certification exams available. Currently, there are three exams:
- OS X Directory Services Specialist Certification Exam
- OS X Deployment Specialist Certification Exam
- OS X Mobile Device and Profile Specialist Certification Exam
These exams are a more modern rendition of what Apple Training would be providing if they still did any courses beyond the OS X Server ACTC. Basically, you can think of it as though the previous Security or Xsan exams were swapped out with Mobile Devices, which makes sense given the changing climate of things.
Now, these are not Apple exams. But I don’t really think it matters too much whether there’s an Apple logo on them or not. At the end of the day if you do this kind of stuff then it’s nice to have a 3rd party option available if you so choose to go down that route!
The...
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09:00
Casper Focus Review
JAMF Software just recently released Casper Suite 8.7 along with their new education-aimed tool Casper Focus. I had a chance to play around with it and test it out the past two days, so you can decide if this is something worth pursuing for yourselves.
What does it do?
To put it simply, Casper Focus allows a teacher to force specific supervised devices to all lock into a specific app. The teacher can select any app that’s in the Mobile App Catalog (even if it isn’t installed on the teacher’s iPad, or the specific student iPads, or wasn’t deployed via JSS / Self-service). The teacher can enable / disable this lock to a specific app with the push of a button (or two), and it’s a very simple interface.
There’s also the ability to clear the passcodes if the student puts on a passcode lock and forgets it, but that’s probably not the main feature people care about.
What does it...
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07:30
Prevent Google Now from depleting iOS batteries
Google has added Google Now to its Google Search app for iOS. This provides local traffic information, weather data and more. Unfortunately, this also keeps GPS on permanently on an iOS device, depleting its battery.
After installing the new Google Search app, I had noticed that my iPhone's Location Services icon was on permanently. I quit all apps that could be using GPS or location services, but it was still visible. I restarted the phone, and it was still visible. It turns out that it was Google Now, and I resolved the issue by deleting the Google Search app.
You can also just turn off Google Now, in the Google Search app's settings. (See this screenshot by Dave Hamilton.) If you want to use Google Now, be aware that it will drain your battery, and remember to turn it off...
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05:00
Getting and Setting Printer Options
Installing printers via lpadmin on OS X can be a pain, especially if you do not know the names of the specific options you need for the printer (Duplex, Finisher, etc). You can dig through the .ppd if you’d like, but this is not as helpful as you might hope.
Joel Bruner has a post that outlines how to get the available options for your printer using the lpoptions command.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The...
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Tuesday April 30
15:00
Hidden ASR Documentation
ASR has some hidden documentation that reveals a few command line options which were previously unknown to most.
A post on jamfnation led to some discussion on ##osx-server about an undocumented ASR command. Rich Trouton blogged about how to view these commands using a very interesting method. If you discover what some of these new-to-us commands do, feel free to comment here or over on Rich’s blog with what you discover.
Thanks goes to the great bunch of admins on ##osx-server for this discovery.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the...
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11:00
FileVault Setup.app – A Local FV2 Setup App
As usual with all things FileVault related, Rich Trouton has the details on a new .app for setting up FileVault 2. FileVault Setup.app is a standalone app that provides a pretty interface for end users to configure File Vault 2 with during first login. This is a interesting way to get FV2 setup and is definitely worth a look if you use FileVault 2.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The Luggage.
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07:30
Sync files across computers with BitTorrent Sync
BitTorrent Labs has released BitTorrent Sync, a tool for syncing files across computers, using the BitTorrent peer-to-peer protocol. This app lets you choose a specific folder (or folders) to sync, and have it automatically synced on one or several computers. It runs on OS X, Windows and Linux.
I find this an interesting tool. While I use Dropbox regularly, and depend on it for collaboration, and to sync a number of files between my two Macs, there is a limit in the amount of space available. (With the free version, it's 2 GB; paid subscriptions are available if you want more storage.) But also, Dropbox requires that anything you sync be put in its own folder. You can use symbolic links in a Dropbox folder, but if you want to sync the contents of a specific folder on your Mac to another Mac, this gets a bit...
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05:00
ldapsearch and ldapdelete Examples
Noel Alonso has a post outlining one way you could easily delete a machine out of Active Directory using ldapsearch and ldapdelete.
This script could easily be modified and changed to do various other things, such as passing the hostname in as an argument or doing a different action upon the machine. Check it out over on his blog.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The Luggage.
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Monday April 29
13:46
Casper Suite 8.7 Released
Casper Suite 8.7 has been released. It contains some bugfixes as well as some new features. The biggest change in Casper Suite 8.7 is the addition of a new app called Casper Focus. Casper Focus allows a Teacher or other staff to lock an iOS device into using a specific application without needing an Administrator to do it for them.
There are also a few bug fixes in 8.7 for the JAMF Software Server as well as the jamf binary. Be sure to review the list of deprecated features that will be removed or replaced in version 9.0 if you missed them in prior release notes. For the full Casper Suite 8.7 documentation of changes, check out the product documentation page, specifically the release notes for 8.7....
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13:02
Flush Hostnames For CrashPlan On OS X
CrashPlan caches resolutions between hostnames and IP addresses. Recently I ran into an issue where a CrashPlan server was moved and we needed to decrease that cache time. In /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.crashplan.engine.plist I found the Java attribute for sun.net.inetaddr.ttl. The default setting for this is 300 seconds. It can be reduced by altering the Dnetworkaddress.cache.ttl string in the ProgramArguments array.
To alter the setting, open /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.crashplan.engine.plist in a standard text editor. Once opened, find Dnetworkaddress.cache.ttl and reduce the ttl value. Once complete, unload/reload:
launchctl unload com.crashplan.engine
launchctl load com.crashplan.engineSimilar Articles:
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10:07
Casper Focus Now Available
For a long time I’ve been saying that the #1 challenge with regard to using iOS is content distribution. Others have mirrored that by saying that the device is a content aggregator, etc. The challenge is keeping everyone on the same page, with the same content and distributing administration of all of that to those who need it.
Well, our friends at JAMF software are, as usual, right in the middle of resolving the more challenging issues of the day with regard to iOS and OS X. In this case they’ve released a new tool called Casper Focus that enables rudimentary administrative tasks by teachers.
Now, I don’t want anyone to take the word rudimentary to be a bad thing. You see, accessing and remotely controlling devices can be a big challenge. The learning curve can be steep. By only giving delegated administrators a few options that learning...
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07:30
Keep your keyboard's keys from getting worn out
If you type a lot, you may find that the letters on the keys of your Mac's keyboard will slowly fade away. In my case, not only do they fade away, but one key - the D key, which, since I use a Dvorak layout, is the E key - actually has some of the plastic worn away. And this is on a wireless Apple keyboard that's only about a year old. (Note that since I touch-type, it really doesn't matter whether I see the keys or not…)
Topher Kessler, writing at CNet, posted an article with some ways to keep the letters from fading. He suggests possibly using a silicone keyboard cover, but I don't think that would be comfortable. But he also recommends using standard cellophane tape, cut into squares that cover the keys.
You probably wouldn't want to do this to all the keys on your keyboard: the most commonly-used ones are those...
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05:00
Load or Reload a LaunchAgent without User Action
Kyle Crawford has an interesting post that covers reloading LaunchAgents while a user is logged in without requiring them to take action (Log out/in, reboot, etc).
While somewhat hacky, it is a novel way to ensure that a given LaunchAgent is reloaded without burdening the End User to take action.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The Luggage.
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Friday April 26
17:30
Thank you for your unprecedented interest in WWDC.
Enthusiasm for WWDC 2013 has been incredible, with tickets selling out in record time. For those who can’t join us in San Francisco, you can still take advantage of great WWDC content, as we’ll be posting videos of all our sessions during the conference. We’ll also be hitting the road this fall with Tech Talks in a city near you. Hope to see you there.
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17:30
Thank you for your unprecedented interest in WWDC.
Enthusiasm for WWDC 2013 has been incredible, with tickets selling out in record time. For those who can’t join us in San Francisco, you can still take advantage of great WWDC content, as we’ll be posting videos of all our sessions during the conference. We’ll also be hitting the road this fall with Tech Talks in a city near you. Hope to see you there.
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07:30
How to show or hide panels in Adobe Acrobat Pro XI v...
Sometimes clicking the "Show or hide panels" (the top-right icon on right pane for Tools or Comments) in Adobe Acrobat Pro XI v.11.0.2 on OS X 10.8.3 does no work. Clicking it does nothing. Here is the fix:
1. Select View > Read Mode.
2. Select View > Full Screen Mode
3. Press the Escape key
[kirkmc adds: I don’t have Acrobat Pro, so I can’t test this.]
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06:38
Apple Configurator How-to Now Shipping
Charles Edge and TJ Houston have a new book out on using Apple Configurator. Charles’ technical documentation is top notch and TJ’s articles on Configurator are fantastic as well. This book is a must have if you currently deploy iOS devices or are planning to deploy and manage iOS devices in the future.
Instant Apple Configurator How-to is available on Amazon and ships today, so grab a copy!
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever...
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06:00
Book On Apple Configurator Finally Shipping
The Packt book I did with TJ Houston is finally shipping! WooHoo!!!
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Thursday April 25
11:02
Penn State MacAdmins Conference Schedule Posted
The PSU MacAdmins Conference tweeted that the schedule is now available. You can check out the schedule here. This year is full of great sessions and has something for everyone. Both Sam Keeley and I have sessions at the conference, which we look forward to seeing you at!
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The Luggage.
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09:05
Open Source OS X Tools released by Twocanoes Software
Twocanoes Software has released some really cool utilities today as open source software. So far, they have released an app called Salute that lets you lock your screen using Control-Command-Delete, one called Audit that lets you configure and read OpenBSM logs and Debug which lets you enable and disabled debug logging from your system preferences.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The Luggage...
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09:00
Python Versioning in OS X
Apple has included one or more versions of python with OS X since Jaguar (10.2). Their latest version, Mountain Lion (10.8), includes python versions 2.5, 2.6, and 2.7. This presence of python on a clean install of OS X makes it a compelling language choice for automation and information gathering scripts – especially when combined with pyObjC and Scripting Bridge. In fact, various portions of OS X rely on the included python environments to function correctly. Attempts to remove python from OS X or re-link /usr/bin/python to an alternate python installation could result in unexpected effects.
If you plan on using python with OS X, you should also know that different versions of OS X include different selections of python version. Snow Leopard (10.6), for instance, only offers python 2.5 and 2.6. Knowing which version of python you’re running in can have a major effect on how you write your scripts. Certain language features and module functions are not available in earlier...
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07:30
Use Dropbox and Automator to automatically import...
I have an Android phone and wanted to automatically save photos that I take in iPhoto, similar to the Photo Stream feature that iPhones have. Dropbox has a feature that automatically uploads photos that you take into a folder called "Camera Uploads,” which is synced across all of my devices, so was a perfect candidate for creating a cross-platform Photo Stream.
First, I needed to import the existing "Camera Uploads" photos into iPhoto, as the folder action only triggers when a new file appears in the folder. Once this has been done, the folder action can be created.
Open Automator and create a new Folder Action. Select the folder "Camera Uploads" (in the Dropbox folder).
Next, drag "Import files into iPhoto" from the list of actions to the main window. Select the album to import into, and choose whether to delete the photos after import or not (I chose not to).
Save and give the...
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07:16
Tickets for WWDC Going On Sale Today
Last year tickets for WWDC sold out about as quick as a Justin Bieber concert with Taylor Swift and Bruno Mars opening up. And this year, I see no reason to expect any less, despite the wonky logo on the website. For more, check out the WWDC site at:
https://developer.apple.com/wwdcSimilar Articles:
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05:00
Preparing the Office 2011 SP3 Installer for InstaDMG
Office 2011 is a common application to get baked into an InstaDMG image (or any other pre-compiled, modular style image). There are a few quirks to installing Office 2011 in this way as it was made to be installed on a live system. Noel Alonso put a script together that fixes some of these issues on the Office 2011 SP3 Installer. These changes help it install correctly and also fix some bugs with the installer itself. You can take a look at the script over on Noel’s Blog.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki...
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Wednesday April 24
07:30
Download iTunes Store purchases later
If you've ever been irked by the need to download iTunes Store purchases right away, or by seeing them constantly pop up in your Downloads queue until you download them, you'll be happy to know that Apple has changed this. You can now choose to download iTunes Store purchases later, as long as you're in a country which has iTunes in the Cloud. If you choose to download the content - a movie, TV show, or other large download - at a later date, it will simply be added to your Purchased list and you'll be able to download it later. Or not. Because in some cases, you may want to buy something on, say, an iPhone, but watch it on an Apple TV, and never actually download it locally. This will save a lot of time and bandwidth.
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06:33
WWDC 2013 Details Announced
The details about WWDC have been posted. It will be from June 10-14, registration opens on April 25th (Tomorrow!) at 10am PDT, 1pm EST. Check it out here.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The Luggage.
Mail |...
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06:00
MacSysAdmin 2013
Hooray for Sweden! I am very happy to make the trip to Gothenburg, Sweden again this year for MacSysAdmin 2013. This year, I’ll be presenting on something near and dear to my own heart: technical writing. The other presenters that I’ve seen there have all done great jobs, including Arek Dreyer, Rick Wylie, Alan Gordon, Andrina Kelly, Greg Neagle, Gary Larizza, Ed Marczak, Duncan McCracken and Zack Smith. I’m also excited by the new additions: Kevin White and Rich Trouton who I’ve seen do presentations very well on multiple occasions and Daniel Svensson, Nurani Nimpuno and Jody Rodgers who I haven’t seen give presentations but am excited to see.
I look forward to seeing many of the people I’ve met there in years past again and meeting some fresh new people as well. I hope to see you all there!
PS – I would also like to say that the http://macsysadmin.se very much appeals to my own design aesthetics. Well...
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05:00
Package Install Conditions in Munki
Jeremy Reichman has a post outlining how to add an installable_condition to a given piece of software in Munki. This key allows you to specify requirements for a package based upon a NSPredicate and information that Munki knows about the machine. Check out the details over on Jeremy’s Blog.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The Luggage.
Mail |...
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Tuesday April 23
16:24
Apple Configurator: Redemption Codes Not Imported -...
When importing a Volume Purchase Plan (VPP) spreadsheet into Apple Configurator 1.2.1, you may see a message like the following:
"The spreadsheet provided has redemption codes for "(null)." Please provide a spreadsheet with codes for 'Numbers.'" (Where "Numbers" is the name of the application for which you are importing codes.)
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12:47
iAd Producer 4: Settings for iTunes LP/Extras...
Learn more about iTunes settings for iAd Producer 4 when developing iTunes LP and iTunes Extras widget project types.
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12:45
iAd Producer 4.0: Release notes
iAd Producer makes it easy for you to design and assemble rich interactive content without any programming.
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12:43
iAd Producer 4: About importing image assets
Learn more about changes to importing image assets in iAd Producer 4.0.
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11:49
10 Windows 8 Keyboard Combinations
Some helpful tips (in the form of keyboard combinations) on getting wizardly fast with navigating around Windows 8:
- Windows key: Brings up the Start menu. On a touch screen keyboard you can then swipe through the charms in the Start menu.
- Windows-x: Brings up a menu with many of the systems administration tools you’ll need in Windows 8, including Disk Management, a command prompt, device manager, etc.
- Windows-r: Brings up a Run dialog
- Windows-c: Bring up the sidebar that allows you to search, access devices or tap/click on Settings to bring up a Shut-Down menu.
- Windows-l: Lock the screen
- Windows-k: Bring up Devices
- Windows-h: Bring up Sharing
- Windows-f: Bring up Files in the Start Menu search
- Windows-i: Bring up Settings (Control panel, personalization, desktop, Power menu, network selection for Wi-Fi, etc)
- Windows-Q: Brings up the apps screen so you can select a program to open
- ...
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07:30
Quickly type domains for different countries in iOS
You may be familiar with the fact that, when typing on iOS, you can press and hold the . (period) key, or the .com key, to get a popup with a handful of top-level domains, such as .com, .org, .edu, etc. If your iOS device is set up with a country other than the US, you'll have these, plus others, such as .co.uk if you're in the UK, or .de if you're in Germany.
OS X Daily recently pointed out that you can also quickly type other top-level domains by simply adding international keyboards to your iOS device. To do this, go to Settings > General > International > Keyboards, then tap on Add New Keyboard. Tap the keyboard for the country you want to use. When you next go to type text, you can press and hold the . (period) key in, say, Mail, or the .com key in Safari, and access additional top-level domains.
Interestingly, when I did this, I found a...
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07:00
Can’t Undo Deletes in Kerio
When you setup a Kerio server, by default there’s a feature called AutoExpunge. This feature keeps mail clients from showing a message with a strikethrough through it when a message is marked for deletion. Once items are processed the message is moved to deleted and the strikethrough message is removed from the folder it was deleted from. Many users can get confused by this, so Kerio built a feature called AutoExpunge. That AutoExpunge feature instead of striking through messages just tosses them. That causes you to be unable to undo a delete.
To disable AutoExpunge, stop Kerio Mail Server and then look for AutoExpungeOnDelete option in /usr/local/Kerio/mailserver/mailserver.cfg (I like to back that file up before making any changes). Then change the value for that from 1 to 0. Then save your changes to the file and start Kerio Connect back up. Once started, test that you can undo a delete and if so, you’re good to go!
Note: If you change settings like this when...
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Monday April 22
17:59
Holy Cow, Batman, My Xsan Volume Is Invisible!
No one could see the Xsan volume. Logged into Xsan Admin, the volume was unmounted for everyone. Mounted the volume and Xsan Admin said it mounted for everyone. No errors in the logs. In a nice place mentally, I stepped away from my desk. The phone rings, no one has access to the volume. Crap, what now? Log in, shows mounted. Log into a client, well, isn’t there. The other volumes are on the desktop. Go to /Volumes and it doesn’t appear there. Go to /Volumes/VOLUMENAME and viola, it’s there. But in the sidebar it’s hidden?!?!?!
There aren’t any options in the volume.cfg file in /Library/Preferences/Xsan that deal with this issue… Turns out that just like any other file, you can actually set an Xsan volume to invisible. I hadn’t ever tried so didn’t realize it was actually possible.
To fix, run:
SetFile -a v /Volumes/VOLUMENAME
Doing an xattr doesn’t actually nuke this issue.
xattr -d com.apple.FinderInfo /Volumes/VOLUMENAME
For giggles, I...
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17:45
Xsan & Media Composer
There’s a product out there called SANFusion that can allow Media Composer to read disk images on Xsan as though each were a separate workspace in AvidFS. This allows environments to leverage existing pools of storage sitting on Xsan as though they were sitting on an Isis or a Terablock. Check it out at SANFusion:
SAN Fusion is an easy and cost-effective solution that allows you to use Avid Media Composer with your existing Xsan infrastructure.
By using an existing Xsan volume as a backing-store for SAN Fusion’s virtualized workspaces, editors can experience authentic Unity-style bin sharing and locking from within Media Composer 5.5.3 or later. Unlike other solutions that purport to make Avid work with Xsan, SAN Fusion is a client-side application with no additional server or minimum number of seats to buy.
SAN Fusion clients mount and unmount workspaces on demand through our intuitive GUI to provide Media...
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11:58
Mountain Lion: Printed Contacts list isn’t...
If you print your contacts in list view from the Contacts app, the list may print in a random order. Contacts may print without attached photos after checking the option to print with an attached photo.
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09:00
Real World Example: 500 iPads from Boxes to Students
One of the rising topics of discussion that continually returns to every single Mac Admin conference, gathering, and website is the deployment of iPads. iPads have become ubiquitous, for users, schools, and businesses now, and suddenly lots of system admins, technology coordinators, directors, and supervisors are being tasked with adopting iPads into their businesses, and many of them are scrambling to figure out the best strategies for mass dissemination of Apple’s latest flagship product. The nitty-gritty details and best practices of deploying iPads has been discussed often, and we won’t see many changes to it until the release of iOS 7, when we all scramble to determine what changes Apple made. Rather than write yet another post on iPad deployment strategies, I thought I’d give another 500 foot overview of the actual process of getting large numbers of devices into the hands of users. Schools of the Sacred Heart San Francisco has about ~1,000 students, and roughly ~250...
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07:30
Reduce FaceTime CPU when only using voice
FaceTime uses 100% CPU when in a call, probably because of video encoding. Yet it's possible to reduce CPU usage to 20% when you only need voice, extending battery life when mobile.
To stop FaceTime from encoding video when in a call, make it fullscreen and it will move into its own space. Then switch back to your main desktop space with a four finger swipe to the right (or by simply switching to an app in that space). Although your camera LED stays on, this actually pauses the video, reducing your CPU from 100% to around 20%. You will also find that voice quality improves with less drop-outs and cracks because now your CPU is prioritized on encoding audio.
Update: As mentioned in the comments, it's seems to be sufficient to just have FaceTime in a space and move to a different space, or to minimize the FaceTime window to the Dock.
[kirkmc adds: I don't use FaceTime often, choosing rather to use Messages...
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04:30
Running Java 7 in a VMware Fusion 10.8.x VM
For those of you who do application testing inside of an OS X VMware VM, you may have noticed that Java does not work properly. Rich has a good summary of the status of running Java inside a VM and even a fix that VMWare has provided which patches Java so it will run properly. Check it out over on Der Flounder.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The Luggage.
...
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04:00
Moving a physical OS X machine to a VMware VM
Virtualization is an extremely useful tool to have at your disposal. If you have ever wanted to transfer a physical machine’s OS X install to a virtual machine, you know that VMWare does not make a tool for doing so. They provide one for Linux and Windows, but not for OS X. Alan Gordon has a post on Krypted.com that explains how to convert a physical OS X install into a Virtual Machine. Check it out!
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The Luggage.
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03:30
Setting the default boot drive from Boot Selector
Apparently you can set the default boot volume right from the EFI Boot Disk Selector. Rich has the details over on his blog.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The Luggage.
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03:00
Managing Safari’s Java Whitelist
Safari has a new feature that lets you whitelist specific websites for use with Java. This feature is extremely helpful to ensure that internal company websites that need Java can still run while possibly malicious external websites are not permitted to run by default. Check out the details about this feature and a method for managing it over on Rich Trouton’s blog.
About Nate Walck
Nate is a Macintosh Systems Engineer at Tamman Technologies, Inc in Philadelphia, PA. He is the managing editor for afp548.com and one of the founding members of the ##osx-server IRC channel on freenode.net. He loves being involved in the Mac Admin community and using Open Source projects whenever possible, especially Munki and The Luggage.
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Sunday April 21
07:44
Reboot Windows 8 Pro Using A Touch Screen
How to reboot Windows 8 using a touch screen.
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07:28
Installing OpenXenManager on Ubuntu
OpenXenManager is a nice graphical environment for managing the Xen virtualization environment. You still need to use QEMU or virt-install/virt-manager to manager domains themselves, but OpenXenManager takes some of the guessing games out of things. Having said that, xm is still the way to go for the most part.
Before you install OpenXenManager, you’ll need svn, which isn’t baked into a default Ubuntu 12.04 or 12.10 installation. We’ll just use apt-get to build subversion and some python frameworks required for openxenmanager:
sudo apt-get install subversion
sudo apt-get install python-glade2 python-gtk-vnc
Next, grab openxenmanager using subversion:
svn co https://openxenmanager.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/openxenmanager openxenmanager
Hop into your openxenmanager trunk and fire it up:...
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Friday April 19
11:12
How to disable the Java web plug-in in Safari
Learn how to disable the Java web plug-in in Safari.
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08:59
iTunes Store: Download options when purchasing TV...
Learn about the download options you have when you purchase a TV season, Season Pass, movie bundle, music box set, or an individual movie or TV episode using iTunes 11 or iOS 6 or later.
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Thursday April 18
13:07
Apple In-Ear Headphones with Remote and Mic: Mic may...
The microphone on the Apple In-Ear Headphones with Remote and Mic (Early 2012) may not work properly when you use it on a Mac.
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09:19
Final Cut Pro X, Motion 5, Compressor 4: About...
Learn more about sharing to DVD in Final Cut Pro X and Motion 5, and about options for modifying DVD encoding settings in Compressor 4.
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08:41
Java updates available for OS X on April 16, 2013
Java updates are available that address a recently identified Java web plug-in vulnerability.
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Wednesday April 17
13:05
OS X Mountain Lion: Supported digital camera RAW...
Learn about supported digital camera RAW formats in OS X Mountain Lion.
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13:03
OS X Lion: Supported digital camera RAW formats
Digital camera RAW formats retain more image information than JPEGs and can produce better results when used with imaging applications such as Aperture and iPhoto.
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Tuesday April 16
13:29
About the security content of Java for OS X 2013-003...
This document describes the security content of Java for OS X 2013-003 and Mac OS X v10.6 Update 15.
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