Category Archives: iMac / Macbook
Serious memory issues
Once again I have run into issues with my iMac, this time it being memory issues.
I have just found out that my iMac is running with 2GB ram when I could have sworn it was 4GB. How mistaken I was! I think it is time to actually upgrade to 4GB.
Issues currently
- apps locking up
- forever closing apps down
- force closing apps
- system becoming unresponsive
No doubt the list will continue to grow, I am forever having to do disk repairs with all the unfriendly shutdowns I am having to do.
More to follow.
Mac OS X Shortcut: Quick Hide Dock
If you are like me and you are always changing your desktop, moving icons around or just want a different look for the time you are on the computer then this may be handy for you.
This shortcut command will allow you to quickly hide/show the Mac OS X dock.
⌘-option-d
Pressing it once will hide it, pressing it for a second time will show the dock again.
It doesn’t make it go away permanently, this command only activated / disabled quick hide dock.
Customise How The Mac OS X Dock Looks
To change the appearance of your Dock just follow these very simple instructions.
Find a design you like, http://leoparddocks.net has some real beauties 
Then just follow these instructions
1. Click the ‘Download’ button above the image of the dock you want
2. Open the folder System/Library/CoreServices/
3. Control-/right-click on Dock.app and choose “Show Package Contents”
4. Navigate to Contents/Resources/
5. Make a backup of all of the “scurve” .PNG files and then get rid of them from that folder (authentication may be required)
6. Copy the contents of the downloaded file into this folder.
- Open up Terminal.app and type “killall Dock” (without quotes)
This is how mine looks at the moment, I have decided to go for old school matrix feel on my macbook : ) suits me down to the ground.
Change Mac OS X Login Window
Please note this is for Mac OS X Snow Leopard 10.6
Change the Login Screen Wallpaper Image in Snow Leopard 10.6 (also works for Leopard 10.5)
Launch the terminal and issue the following commands:
* cd /System/Library/CoreServices
* sudo mv DefaultDesktop.jpg DefaultDesktop_org.jpg
* sudo cp /path/of/image.jpg DefaultDesktop.jpg
Of course, change /path/of/image.jpg to the path of the image file you want to use. Basically what you’re doing here is moving to a folder, backing up the old “DefaultDesktop.jpg” by renaming it, and then copying in the new image and naming it “DefaultDesktop.jpg” instead.
Edit: Don’t pay for apps that do this for you, the method above works great and it’s totally free, If you are like me you will change your desktop wallpaper quite frequently and also you can now change the boring login window within OS X : ) enjoy!
Easily install Aircrack Mac OS X
If you are looking to install Aircrack on your Mac OS X installation just follow these simple instructions!
So simple and it actually works!
You will need Xcode installed to install this way, there will be no need for gmake or sqlite.
In a terminal windows run:
svn co http://trac.aircrack-ng.org/svn/trunk/ aircrack-ng
You will notice lots of files downloading, now we need to edit the common.mak file.
Browse to aircrack-ng folder by using the following command
cd aircrack-ng
Open up the file (I will be using nano to do this)
sudo nano common.mak
Enter your password to edit the file.
Look for this line:
CC = $(TOOL_PREFIX)gcc
and replace with:
CC = $(TOOL_PREFIX)gcc-4.0
Then find this line:
CFLAGS ?= -g -W -Wall -Werror -O3 -Wno-strict-aliasing
and replace with:
CFLAGS ?= -g -W -Wall -Werror -O3 -Wno-strict-aliasing -arch i386 -isysroot /Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.5.sdk
Press ctrl o to write out the file, and then ctrl x to return back to terminal
Now type: The first line may error if you are already in the folder
cd aircrack-ng
make
sudo make install
All files should have been placed in /usr/local/bin/ directory