Mac OS notes

Mac OS X what's been removed

What's been removed in releases of Mac OS X

SSH on Leopard

Few notes how to setup ssh on OS X here , here and here

MacOS X - fonts and other issues

Collection of various notes regarding fonts and OS X

Time Machine and backup hints

Make any Mac a NetBoot Server

Metadata madness

via Daring Fireball

If you have any interest at all in the debate and discussion regarding Snow Leopard’s abandonment of creator code metadata, this piece by John Siracusa is a must-read. It’s not about what should be done so much as it is about establishing the fundamental facts.

How to edit hosts file in Mac OS X

How to edit host file using nano instead of vi

YouTube and MPEG 4

How to get YouTube video as .mp4.

OS X Server notes

How to force Portable Homes to synchronize ~/Library. Converting local user account to mobile. Creating Windows Domain Admins and Samba Group Mapping on OS X Server. Problems when managing network printers with WGM.

Serial Communication in OS X Terminal

AppleScript to use screen as terminal emulator and Serial Printing for Mac OS X.

Automate mounting shares from Finder's Sidebar

How is Finder sidebar content stored. Hint in case one would like to store alias to server as IP address and not by DNS name in sidebar.

The State of Backup and Cloning Tools under Mac OS X

With special attention to various metadata issues.

About Skype

Unsorted notes on how Skype works, what is Skype Supernode and some security issues, comments from oreilly and Skype Admin Guide.

A Friendly Reminder from your IT Department

I think it might be time for those of you who work in the corporate environment to get a bit of a refresher on your IT departments unspoken rules. It seems a few of you have forgotten what it’s all about. This should provide as a reminder as to the inner workings of the corporate IT world.

Use iChat to log into ICQ and AIM accounts.

It is not new and it does not have lot of publicity. With iChat you can use your ICQ number for login to AOL AIM account, or you can chat with ICQ users from .mac or .aim account.

In 2002, AOL signed a contract with Apple Computer, allowing them to use it (as well as AOL's own code libraries) in their iChat program. This allows iChat users to interact with ICQ and AIM users directly. As a part of this deal, Apple's .Mac service could hook into the service by allowing .Mac members to log in using their .Mac accounts (in the form of the full e-mail address — username@mac.com) on the AIM network.

Apple's quite a secretive company.

Good point...

It's so secretive that over the years I have learned something about it. When Apple gets quiet, it's busy – really busy. I'm looking forward to Apple's product introductions in the months ahead. I don't accept that the company is obliged to ship a new Mac each week, in order to show it cares.

Everything you always NOT wanted to know about Windows Product Activation

Sometimes you need to go dark side and learn about Windows activaction and licensing problems.. and findout what is WPA

Trying to make sense of the ins and outs of Windows licensing can be difficult even for someone who makes a living as a Windows expert, so it’s understandable that a reporter trying to write a 200–word story on a tight deadline would get confused. WPA is a complex technology. By the time you finish this article, you’ll understand it a lot better.

How to pair or disable Front Row on your Mac?

Apple technote - that describes how to disable or pair Front Row with your Mac. But I am bit puzzled, do they call this device Front Row or Apple Remote? UPDATE: It is explained on Wikipedia - Front Row is software and Apple Remote is hardware.

Front Row is a software application for Apple's Macintosh computers that acts as a front-end for QuickTime, DVD Player and the iTunes and iPhoto libraries and allows for users to browse media on their computers using the Apple Remote (which is based on the interface of the iPod shuffle and contains only six buttons).

Mac OS X printing subsystem and printing to PostScript file

Good overview, how print to PostScript file works in Mac OS X and creating simple backend for CUPS.

Those applications that produce still PostScript output directly (mostly from the desktop publishing sector), will write "pictwpstops" instead in the "%%Creator: " comment.

As you see, normally you will convert PDFs from PDF to PostScript (invoked by a CUPS filter) and then after leaving the spooling system back to PDF by a postprocessing mechanism. Doesn't make always sense, except you're using applications that are able to produce "real" PostScript...

Some useful information on Spotlight

It is nice to realize, that information you provided was useful to someone. But to be honest, much of credit should go to John Siracusa for his excellent review of Mac OS X Tiger.

For those looking for more in-depth information, I would recommend to read this book written by Dominic Giampaolo - man behind current Spotlight implementation.

Enter mdutil. (And, BTW, I want to credit Ondrej Zacek from the Apple Discussions. Though the info is freely available, it was his "Finder will fall back to old behavior when searching..." comment that gave me hope. Thanks, dude, whoever you are.) Using mdutil to disable Spotlight indexing on a given volume results in Finder and Spotlight behavior I can live with.