lion

Disable OS X Lion's resume for individual applications

Apple's "Resume" feature in OS X Lion allows the system to save the current state of a program and, in conjunction with its auto-save feature, will restore both saved and unsaved documents as they were when you quit the program. This feature is convenient because it allows you to install application and system updates, or otherwise quit applications with little interruption to your workflow; however, in some situations it may not be a desired option to have.

Resume works by saving a profile of your current application's state within your user library folder in the /username/… Read more

CheatSheet reveals keyboard shortcuts for any OS X app

Learning, keeping track, and remembering every keyboard shortcut for every OS X app is near impossible. While there are ways to figure out what keyboard shortcuts are available for some apps, those methods aren't always convenient to access.

CheatSheet is a small OS X app that runs in the background and will show you all the keyboard shortcuts for whatever app you're currently using.

Getting started with CheatSheet is easy; just make sure you're running OS X 10.7. 

Download and install CheatSheet. It's free. Unzip and move the app into your Applications folder. Double-click … Read more

Managing automatic application termination in Lion

A confusing aspect of OS X for those who regularly use other operating systems like Windows, is that quitting an application is separate from closing all of its windows. As a result, people used to Windows may simply close all windows and end up with numerous applications open at the same time, which can hog resources like RAM, use CPU time, and potentially result in slowdowns and reduced battery life.

In OS X Lion, Apple dealt with this problem in part by implementing a feature called automatic application termination, which will quit applications that are not in use. I covered application termination in a previous article, … Read more

How to reverse scroll in Windows like OS X Lion

Apple reversed scrolling in OS X Lion and called the feature "natural scrolling." Not everyone liked the change, but it could be turned off. There are some people that do like the new scrolling direction and even Google has added reverse scrolling to Chrome OS. If you're a Windows user and would like to try out reverse scrolling, here's how:

Step 1: Install AutoHotkey on your Windows PC.

Step 2: Launch AutoHotkey, and when prompted to create a sample script, click the Yes button.

Step 3: When the sample script appears in Notepad, paste the following … Read more

Garbled warning bugging Mac Pro users after OS X 10.7.4 update

If you have a Mac Pro system and have updated to Apple's recently released OS X 10.7.4 update, you may find an apparent warning window appear whenever you reboot your system. The warning looks like a standard information dialog box window that contains a picture of a Mac Pro system from the side, but the rest of the window contains no information of value.

Instead of a hint at what the warning could be about, the window simply states "keyApplicationTitle" in the area where the referenced application name might be, "keyWarningOptimalInfo" where the … Read more

Tackling SMC console errors after OS X 10.7.4 update

The OS X 10.7.4 update that Apple released yesterday has been a relatively smooth update for many people, and is a recommended update because of its fix for a password logging error and the ability to preserve users' preferences for whether to open windows when logging back in. However, a few people have found that this update causes massive number of kernel-related error messages to be displayed in the system console.

As described by Apple Discussion member "paddyiyer", after updating the following messages can be seen repeated in the Console utility:

5/9/12 7:20:… Read more

Sandboxed applications 'crashing' in OS X upon location change

An apparent bug is present in OS X 10.7 "Lion" that causes some applications to crash when the system's network location configuration is changed. However, while the system generates a crash report, the applications appear to have not crashed at all.

This issue happens because of a bug with how OS X handles both network location configurations and its process sandboxing routines.

In OS X you can set up different "locations" in the Network system preferences -- convenient configurations for the various network setups you might need for your work. For instance, a home … Read more

Bluetooth blues follow OS X 10.7.4 update

Yesterday Apple released the OS X 10.7.4 update, which addressed a number of problems and security issues in OS X, including the logging of some users' passwords in plain text and the long-standing log-out option for reopening windows always being enabled. Along with this update, however, came a security update to Bluetooth that has caused some people's Bluetooth configurations to not work properly.

The Bluetooth service in OS X 10.7 through 10.7.3 had a bug that meant a local user could potentially hack the Bluetooth daemon process and execute arbitrary code with system privileges, … Read more

OS X 10.7.4 fixes FileVault password snafu

Last week a security hole in OS X 10.7.3 was uncovered where the account passwords for Lion users who had upgraded from Snow Leopard and who were still using the legacy FileVault encryption scheme were being stored in plain text in system log files. This issue happened apparently because a debugging flag for the OS software had been left enabled in the public release. Following this finding, Apple today issued the next version of OS X Lion, which along with other fixes and tweaks, closes this security hole for these users.

The security hole was found to be … Read more