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It is possible to move OS X widgets to the main screen. It's silly that it's a hidden feature, but it does work.

Maybe I'm paranoid. Or maybe I just really want to reign hell down on whom ever steals my laptop.

First, most thieves are dumb, they're not going to wipe it. They're going to sell it as fast as possible to get cash.

All of this is free and open source and should work on Mac and Linux, not sure how to create services in Windows.

1) Prey Project. An OSS theft recovery tool. Uses google geo location, web camera if it comes installed.
2) AutoSSH. I have an autossh run as a service that creates a link between my home router and my laptop. ssh -R 2222:127.0.0.1:22 home.example.com. So no matter where I leave my laptop, if it can get out to the internet, I can ssh into it from my home router.
3) OpenVPN. AutoSSH * 10. No matter where my laptop is, it IS no my home network. Leave it at a friend's house.
4) Keylogger. . I have a launchd (cron) set up to sftp me the log every day and then restart the log.

So now I know: 1) Where my laptop is and possibly have a photo of who is using it. 2 & 3) Can access my laptop and play fun tricks 4) Know exactly what said person is up to and when they login to gmail, facebook, etc. I have their passwords.

Sadly my laptop hasn't been stolen yet.

http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20090913140023382 Comments say that it is not very stable, though

Text files aren't 'complicated'. Writing the Javascript and CSS to make them work the way you want is.

I've written a few GreaseMoney scripts, but I know how to program. To the lay user, I doubt they even know what 'GreaseMonkey' or Javascript is.

I know people that would like to customize their 'browser experience' but would get lost at UserScripts.

Knowing Apple, its most likely a pretty GUI around some basic text files. I know it may come as a shock to the Slashdot crowd, but Linux, GUI, config files, etc are pretty intimidating to a newbie.

If it wasn't for OS X, I wouldn't have ever gotten into Linux, OpenSolaris, PHP, C, etc.

Terminal was always there, just never opened. I opened it a few times to move files around. Used some hints from Mac OS X Hints. Enabled SSH, learned PHP and C through copy and paste coding until I understood how to write it on my own. Years later I run a SheevaPlug (do you honestly think a complete newbie would figure out uBoot and such?), OpenSolaris server, XBMC. Installed Ubuntu on my Girlfriend's laptop all because of Terminal.app and some natural curiosity.

If this "Simple GUI" gets some middle/high schooler or college student going "I wonder what this Plugin builder does" opening the auto-generated text and tinkering. Good for them.

Sorry but recording all MAC addresses? Google's "Do no evil" just went out the door. There is no reason for Google to record the MAC addresses of devices.

Wow, that is evil. You know what would be even more evil? If that had been going on for years and if every Apple fanboy had been part of it.

That sure would be terrible. It's a good thing that this is a completely new development that nobody had ever thought of doing until now.

Actually, OS X supports application virtualization.

http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20100318044558156

you figure it out... http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20080119112509736

sudo ipfw pipe 1 config bw 15KByte/s
sudo ipfw add 1 pipe 1 dst-port 548

more here: http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20080119112509736

You have to throttle the port the file sharing is running on. Probably 548 or/and 427. To throttle these ports you have to go into terminal and type this:

sudo ipfw pipe 1 config bw 15KByte/s
sudo ipfw add 1 pipe 1 src-port 548

To remove the throttling just type:
sudo ipfw delete 1

Source: http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20080119112509736
http://homepage.mac.com/car1son/static_port_fwd_firewall.html

Try using the advice in this tip: http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20080119112509736 which demonstrates bandwidth throttling by port number
but add a rule that limits by ip address as well as port number
see http://developer.apple.com/mac/library/documentation/Darwin/Reference/ManPages/man8/ipfw.8.html for details of the ipfw rules
I haven't tried this combination myself but I can't see why it wouldn't work.

As a long time Mac user, I can confidently say that your friend has not learned how to use his computer efficiently. It's getting to be well known now amongst the old-school mac users that Apple is "dumbing down" their OS to make it more palatable for the masses. These include more flags and messages asking, "are you sure you want to do so-and-so?" For those of us who know what we're doing, these things get in our way as really pisses us off, just as the GP suggested. There is a whole subset of users who regularly find the command line settings or hacks to disable this irritating behavior.

Moreover, the entire article is based on a mistaken premise. The fact that Apple is favored by "creative people" has absolutely nothing to do with their company profile or habits of secrecy. The whole reason is because Apple has a design philosophy whose goal is to make the computer a tool for accomplishing what you want to do rather and having the "computing" be as transparent as possible. Microsoft just isn't good at doing this, the OS and the software interjects itself into the user experience far, far too often. This disrupts thought patterns and focus and leads to a hindering of the ability to get useful work done. Case in point, the little animated dog in XP whenever you want to search for something. When I want to search, I want to type a search string into a search field and get rapid, relevant results I do not want to look at animated images asking me cute phrases, it's distracting.

As a long time Mac user, I can confidently say that your friend has not learned how to use his computer efficiently. It's getting to be well known now amongst the old-school mac users that Apple is "dumbing down" their OS to make it more palatable for the masses. These include more flags and messages asking, "are you sure you want to do so-and-so?" For those of us who know what we're doing, these things get in our way as really pisses us off, just as the GP suggested. There is a whole subset of users who regularly find the command line settings or hacks to disable this irritating behavior.

Moreover, the entire article is based on a mistaken premise. The fact that Apple is favored by "creative people" has absolutely nothing to do with their company profile or habits of secrecy. The whole reason is because Apple has a design philosophy whose goal is to make the computer a tool for accomplishing what you want to do rather and having the "computing" be as transparent as possible. Microsoft just isn't good at doing this, the OS and the software interjects itself into the user experience far, far too often. This disrupts thought patterns and focus and leads to a hindering of the ability to get useful work done. Case in point, the little animated dog in XP whenever you want to search for something. When I want to search, I want to type a search string into a search field and get rapid, relevant results I do not want to look at animated images asking me cute phrases, it's distracting.

As a long time Mac user, I can confidently say that your friend has not learned how to use his computer efficiently. It's getting to be well known now amongst the old-school mac users that Apple is "dumbing down" their OS to make it more palatable for the masses. These include more flags and messages asking, "are you sure you want to do so-and-so?" For those of us who know what we're doing, these things get in our way as really pisses us off, just as the GP suggested. There is a whole subset of users who regularly find the command line settings or hacks to disable this irritating behavior.

Moreover, the entire article is based on a mistaken premise. The fact that Apple is favored by "creative people" has absolutely nothing to do with their company profile or habits of secrecy. The whole reason is because Apple has a design philosophy whose goal is to make the computer a tool for accomplishing what you want to do rather and having the "computing" be as transparent as possible. Microsoft just isn't good at doing this, the OS and the software interjects itself into the user experience far, far too often. This disrupts thought patterns and focus and leads to a hindering of the ability to get useful work done. Case in point, the little animated dog in XP whenever you want to search for something. When I want to search, I want to type a search string into a search field and get rapid, relevant results I do not want to look at animated images asking me cute phrases, it's distracting.

As a long time Mac user, I can confidently say that your friend has not learned how to use his computer efficiently. It's getting to be well known now amongst the old-school mac users that Apple is "dumbing down" their OS to make it more palatable for the masses. These include more flags and messages asking, "are you sure you want to do so-and-so?" For those of us who know what we're doing, these things get in our way as really pisses us off, just as the GP suggested. There is a whole subset of users who regularly find the command line settings or hacks to disable this irritating behavior.

Moreover, the entire article is based on a mistaken premise. The fact that Apple is favored by "creative people" has absolutely nothing to do with their company profile or habits of secrecy. The whole reason is because Apple has a design philosophy whose goal is to make the computer a tool for accomplishing what you want to do rather and having the "computing" be as transparent as possible. Microsoft just isn't good at doing this, the OS and the software interjects itself into the user experience far, far too often. This disrupts thought patterns and focus and leads to a hindering of the ability to get useful work done. Case in point, the little animated dog in XP whenever you want to search for something. When I want to search, I want to type a search string into a search field and get rapid, relevant results I do not want to look at animated images asking me cute phrases, it's distracting.

As a long time Mac user, I can confidently say that your friend has not learned how to use his computer efficiently. It's getting to be well known now amongst the old-school mac users that Apple is "dumbing down" their OS to make it more palatable for the masses. These include more flags and messages asking, "are you sure you want to do so-and-so?" For those of us who know what we're doing, these things get in our way as really pisses us off, just as the GP suggested. There is a whole subset of users who regularly find the command line settings or hacks to disable this irritating behavior.

Moreover, the entire article is based on a mistaken premise. The fact that Apple is favored by "creative people" has absolutely nothing to do with their company profile or habits of secrecy. The whole reason is because Apple has a design philosophy whose goal is to make the computer a tool for accomplishing what you want to do rather and having the "computing" be as transparent as possible. Microsoft just isn't good at doing this, the OS and the software interjects itself into the user experience far, far too often. This disrupts thought patterns and focus and leads to a hindering of the ability to get useful work done. Case in point, the little animated dog in XP whenever you want to search for something. When I want to search, I want to type a search string into a search field and get rapid, relevant results I do not want to look at animated images asking me cute phrases, it's distracting.

Whups, forgot some key notes for would-be OS X extension users. You'll need a dev channel build and must invoke Chrome from the command line with flags to enable various behavior: --enable-extensions is what's needed here. See this Mac OS X Hints article for other flags and a handy hack to make Chrome/Chromium start with the desired flags enabled via its app icon.

much better than Safari since you can _reattach_ tabs back into the main window

that is actually possible in safari
your welcome

OK smartie, here's what I was referring to:

"The supplied UNIX passwd command in BSD Subsystem is broken for firmware 1.1.3 and 1.1.4.
Attempting to change the password under firmware 1.1.3 or 1.1.4 will result in your device continuously rebooting.
(The reboot fix involves holding both the Power button and the 'Home' button down for at least 30 seconds, then [upon seeing a triangle icon], plugging the device into iTunes for restoration.)"

See: http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20080224231344798

For newer (current) firmwares it fixed, but some people still run the old stuff.

Also, you can change the search engine to something else if you really are that committed to using something inferior.

Blimey; you can fix anything by directly editing an executable file.

Safari isn't a Google product, so it has basically no relevance at all to what he was saying.

Also, you can change the search engine to something else if you really are that committed to using something inferior.

With OS X the best way I've tried is to store the built-in Keychain app profile on a USB drive. This can be inserted into any Mac (though most of the system passwords won't work there) and opened via the master password by importing the profile.

It is of course encrypted and you can set all kinds of policies for individual account/password credentials. It has support for Certs, accounts of all types as well as manually created entries for things like ATM/Credit cards, etc.

The downside for you of course may be that it only works on a Mac but others may find this useful - or you can look for something comparable.

You can find details about this at Mac OS X Hints.

Well that's easy enough. Just enable library sharing. If you don't have macs, and if iTunes for windows doesn't already do the trick (I don't know the answer to this), look at netatalk on linux: http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20070424081346722

If there's no way to turn this off, like their damn "you just downloaded this file, do you want to open it" dialog, [...]

Try this:

http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=2009081808315511

We're still looking for a way to transfer them, since they're not a standard rotational speed in use anymore.

Transfer them at a standard speed and use software to adjust the speed and pitch. This forum thread shows how to do it in Garage Band and mentions several alternatives.

Yeah, that was the idea. The only holdup, last I checked, was finding the hardware to play and record them with relatively little noise. I understand the post-processing, being a musician with some home recording background and an electrical engineer, but I don't have access to the record and a turntable.

We're still looking for a way to transfer them, since they're not a standard rotational speed in use anymore.

Transfer them at a standard speed and use software to adjust the speed and pitch. This forum thread shows how to do it in Garage Band and mentions several alternatives.

Yes you can: http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20030514035516436 It's just Mac & Linux users can, on occasion, manage to do something without a GUI. I'm not saying all Windows users can't, but that huge slice of market share Windows users brag about all the time includes a lot of really dumb people.

I don't think those users are merely dumb. A truly dumb person can't help it, and so I wouldn't fault them for that any more than I would blame a paraplegic for being unable to walk. What I do blame those "dumb users" for is something I call willful helplessness. That's when the information is out there, freely available, the person in question is literate and has 'Net access, and refuses to educate themselves even for simple configuration issues. It wouldn't be so bad except that these same people often complain that they don't get the results they want, and/or they think it's a terribly unreasonable thing to suggest that they can help themselves, almost like it's some kind of insult. Usually that's followed by something like "I'm not a computer expert" as though changing basic settings makes one an "expert."

Many such users are on Windows. There could probably be debates about whether that's because Windows inherently suits them or if it's merely because that's what the computer came with and this kind of user is quite unlikely to evaluate other options since that would require the learning that they so resent. The easiest way to identify such folks is that they can use the same machine for years and never know much more about it than when they started. That's what amazes me. It seems like it would take a lot more work to make sure you don't pick up some knowledge here and there that would accumulate over the years, but I suppose you could say that they are true to their passive mentality.

Yes you can:

http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20030514035516436

It's just Mac & Linux users can, on occasion, manage to do something without a GUI. I'm not saying all Windows users can't, but that huge slice of market share Windows users brag about all the time includes a lot of really dumb people.

It wasn't a bug, it was a feature request. The "feature" is explained here. Basically, if you click on a special location, like home or documents, and you are in column view, the finder roots you to that location and removes access to any directories higher level than that.

That's probably the easiest way, but you don't need that plugin. The site that is used as the search string is written as plain text in the Safari executable. The instructions are here.

You're right on the button. I created a sparse file for each machine image using diskutil so I could fix maximum size (I'd hate it to take over my entire 2.5 TB pool). The trick is to figure out the name that each machine wants, but worse comes to worse, you cancel it quick on the first sync if it's wrong and then rename the file and start it again.

Then I used the native CIFS service that comes with OpenSolaris for the connection. I started with Samba, but the native CIFS service had 1000X better throughput.

There is an option that enables mounting "foreign" disks for time machine. This may explain it better:

http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20080420211034137

I'm not sure what you mean, if CUPS is inferior or not, but the only problem I've had with it was I couldn't figure how to get my printer working right on my Linux PC using USB. I've used 3 printers on my Mac though, OS X uses CUPS too, without a problem.

I wasn't talking about "inferior" but about "lack of drivers". In this case, some printer makers compile, test, and support their CUPS drivers on Mac OS X but not Linux.

99% of what makes Linux inferior to Windows is the lack of drivers that are not written with the x86 ISA + Windows OS in mind.

In the case of machines running Windows Mobile or pre-installed Linux, the manufacturer makes sure that drivers for the included hardware are installed on the machine. Or are you talking about things like CUPS?

I'm not sure what you mean, if CUPS is inferior or not, but the only problem I've had with it was I couldn't figure how to get my printer working right on my Linux PC using USB. I've used 3 printers on my Mac though, OS X uses CUPS too, without a problem.

Falcon

Hey, thought you might be interested in how to turn that off. The hint is here. It's a two line command:

defaults write com.apple.dock no-bouncing -bool TRUE
killall Dock

It's one of the many hidden preferences of OS X.

You're forgetting the horrible "tray" dock they introduced with Leopard. Also the translucent menu bar. Both can be disabled, but not easily.
That said, the "flat" dock that you get when you turn off the 3D version in Leopard is much nicer and less obtrusive than any of the previous versions.

Because I like the Gmail interface.

That's a great point. What I really love about the g-mail interface it groups conversations into single threads and then color-codes the names of senders within the thread. I can fake something like this in Apple's Mail.app by using this hint and then I have an Apple-script assigned to a hot-key that assigns a random color to the thread(see the comments, here), but it's not quite the same though and I have to hit the hot key each time I want to change the thread's color. I've been meaning to see if I can get Thunderbird to do this automagically.

Because I like the Gmail interface.

That's a great point. What I really love about the g-mail interface it groups conversations into single threads and then color-codes the names of senders within the thread. I can fake something like this in Apple's Mail.app by using this hint and then I have an Apple-script assigned to a hot-key that assigns a random color to the thread(see the comments, here), but it's not quite the same though and I have to hit the hot key each time I want to change the thread's color. I've been meaning to see if I can get Thunderbird to do this automagically.

(stares at the Macbook touchpad)

You got two fingers? (If not, sorry, I'm an insensitive clod.)

Huh? There is one button access to the contextual menu with Firefox at least. I think it's been that way since at least Mozilla for Mac OS 9.

It's very useful because it gives you that brief 2 seconds to decide if you really want that lady; and hopefully avoid horrible mistakes. Or so I have heard.

Yes, it does - albeit new in Leopard, and only for downloaded applications (but that's the source of most new executables on most systems these days).

Here is a guide on how to disable it... http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20071029151619619

I was unimpressed with the new version of iTunes, too. Turning off links to the Music Store no longer works either, unless you use this hack.

This is false.

Go under parental in the optons

check "itunes store" under disable. No more links, no more store.

Needless to say though, I wont be buying an ipod for my next player.

I was unimpressed with the new version of iTunes, too. Turning off links to the Music Store no longer works either, unless you use this hack.

Or you could try this little tidbit if you are truly a CLI Junkie...

Try: cmd-shift-g

I thought the \ or / key also worked. Been a while.

Also,
http://macfidelity.de/2007/12/08/105-show-full-directory-path-in-finder-window-title-bars/
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20050413201826795

This post by the founder of the Mac tips website, macosxhints.com, states that Crichton was an early donor to the site. Although I didn't care for every one of his books, I was certainly a fan of his body of work and I find it very cool that he donated to a website that collects technical tips for Mac fans.

You can also remap the Expose keys to your liking if you don't mind editing a text file.

I got pretty annoyed quickly when my speakers kept buzzing after I got the iPhone so I looked it up. You could get rid of it by attaching a tin-foil hat to your iPhone, pretty literally. Here's a link to a mini-how-to. Personally, I didn't tape the aluminum foil to my iPhone or anything, but I do have a small patch of aluminum foil that I keep on my desk and put my iPhone onto when I'm at my computer. It cuts out the interference, but it's not a very pretty solution. Someone in this thread said wrapping your speaker wire around magnets will help too, so I'm gonna try it.

You've missed the whole point of my post

And you missed the whole point of my post.

Swap files which, unless the whole disk is encrypted, won't be. Files used in hibernation (Linux uses swap, not sure about Windows).

I have 2GB in my MacBook Pro, which it came with as standard more than a year ago. If I wanted to I could add another 2GB. For now at least I seriously doubt I come near maxing that. I can see doing it when I start working on multi-media. However if I wanted to I could move my swap. Windows users can also move their swap, as can Linux users.

you can't simply send a message to the operating system to say "This is now in secure mode, any user data or swapfiles must be stored in THIS location and any which are outstanding must be moved and the disk area they occupied securely wiped".

When I installed Linux, years ago, it asked me where I want the swap partition to be. I'm not positive but I'm pretty sure I also told Windows where to put swap.

This is the kind of feature corporates will demand because you can never guarantee that nobody will ever lose a key or forget their password and "your data is now toast you silly fool" is seldom an acceptable outcome to such a scenario.

Yea, I'd imagine a corporation would have a backup key.

It's also the kind of feature which is highly unlikely to be implemented in any F/OSS solution like TrueCrypt because it's a potential security risk

How is TrueCrypt riskier or potentially riskier than a closed source proprietary program? Whereas anyone can examine the source for TrueCrypt and spot possible security holes, nobody can legally see source code that's closed. And that source code can be riddled with holes. Sure some cracker may find a hole in code that's open but with thousands of others having the code the likelihood of someone else seeing is better than if the code is closed, and closing the code only stops some.

Unless the disk is heavily encrypted then any boot password can be trivially worked around

Not too long ago, last month I think, there was an article on /. about how researchers were able to recover passwords after a few minuted with the computer shutdown. A recommendation when boarding a plane was to not use a laptop at the airport.

Falcon

Pretty easy to script this, its been done and done. Well on the mac laptops anyway since they come with a cam built in. See this process: http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20080824185920426&query=laptop%2Bstolen Course it could be used unscrupulously as well, but if your in charge of the server and the machine, its as secure as you are. I use it, though I modified mine to do a little more, what not.

Apple isn't perfect. They have the occasional hardware issue with their rev A systems and a poor OS update here and there. As a whole their systems are usually pretty darn stable, but they still get major issues.

My experience with apple products:

My iMac at home- Mouse doesn't work correctly because of static problems. I had to replace mouse with a non-apple product. My iMac was also awesome because it came with a dead pixel out of the box, right in the middle of the screen. Too bad apple's return policy states you need 5 dead pixels or more to return a monitor.

Defective apple G5's - Another fun experience I've had is with apple g5 computers that are liquid cooled. Seems they're defective by design ....the liquid coolant leaks, and basically destroys the computer.

Now, I waited for the second generation iPhone to purchase one, and I have to deal with this. I was thinking about getting an apple notebook, but why bother when they have such a shitty track record ?

The conclusion I've reached is that apple hardware is at least as shitty as your average PC vendor, if not worse. The fact that they make both the software and hardware doesn't matter much, since they screw up hardware design so frequently.

Since Apple did patch the BIND server that comes with OS X client by default, but is disabled, you could work around this issue by enabling BIND and using localhost as the only DNS server.

To enable BIND, simply edit /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.isc.named.plist and change the 'Disabled' key from true to false (file is owned by root:wheel)

Generate the rndc key the default configuration is looking for and cannot start up without via 'rndc-confgen -a' with root privileges.

Follow the hint at http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20080725172011439 to configure the system to ignore all DNS settings handed out to it via DHCP, and statically configure 127.0.0.1 as a DNS source.