Mac OS Setup

OS installation

Installation disk

app_path="/Applications/Install OS X El Capitan.app"
bin_path="Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia"
sudo "$app_path/$bin_path" --volume /Volumes/MyVolume --applicationpath "$app_path"

• https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211683
• Create a bootable installer for OS X
• Create macOS ISO Images
• Making a bootable High Sierra USB Installer Entirely From Scratch in Windows or Linux
• 3 Ways to Downgrade macOS Monterey to Big Sur, Catalina or Earlier
• How to Download/Create macOS Sonoma DMG File

Mac OS Mojave

app_path="/Applications/Install macOS Mojave.app"
bin_path="Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia"
sudo "$app_path/$bin_path" --volume /Volumes/Install\ macOS\ High\ Sierra --nointeraction --downloadassets

• If you would like to be asked for confirmation before erasing the drive, remove “–nointeraction” from the above command.
• The “–downloadassets” flag is new in macOS Mojave. It downloads assets which may be required during installation. This is presumably helpful for faster or offline installations, as it won’t require downloading during installation. However, the above command will still function without this flag if you prefer.
• Previous versions of macOS used an “–applicationpath” flag in this command. That flag is now deprecated and will throw an error if used. For this reason, use the above command instead of updating the command quoted in guides written for older versions of macOS.

Firmware tricks

Press during startup:

Reset SMC - System Management Controller: Left Shift-Ctrl-Option-Power press and release at the same time.

Mac OS X instalation

Boot from USB

On Macs starting in 2018 there is T2 security chip and booting from external media has to be specifically enabled. Boot from recovery system and select Startup Security Utility from Utilities menu. Under External Boot, select the second option - Allow Booting from External Media.

After installation

I answered to not use iCloud after reboot but I had problems installing application from App store so I went to iTunes and signed to iCloud and authorized the computer. After that installations go smoothly.

Links

• Startup key combinations for Mac
• Resetting SMC on your Mac

System preferences

Lock screen

Lock screen settings

• Start screen saver when inactive: For 5 minutes
• Require password after screen saver begins: 5 sec.
• Show a message when locked (TODO: Really?)

Message: Contact:

Note (TODO: Move elsewhere)

Some applications seems weird to OS X and need some extras:

• General - Allow applications download from: Anywhere

When the installation is done revert setting back to the default value: Mac App Store and identeified developers.

Keyboard

• Input Source
  • Add Czech layout
  • Show Input menu in menubar: Yes
  • Set shortcut to Option - Space (TODO: Not any more?)
• Keyboard shortcuts
  • Mission control - Mission control - Swith to desktop [1-4] - Yes (TODO: Create desktops before)
  • Modifier Keys :- Caps Lock - Control (For all connected keyboards)

Remapping keys

• Remapping Keys in macOS 10.12 Sierra
• How do I remap a key in macOS Sierra
• USB HID usage tables

Desktop & Dock

• Dock
  • Position on screen: Left
  • Show suggested and recent apps in Dock: No
• Desktop & Stage manager - Click wallpaper to reveal desktop: Only in stage manager
• Mission control - Automatically rearrange Spaces based on most recent use: Off
• Hot Corners - Right top corner: Start Screen Saver

Energy saver

• Enable power NAP - Off

Accessibility

• Display - Reduce transparency
• Trackpad options
  • Use trackpad for dragging: Yes
  • Dragging style: Three-Finger Drag

Trackpad

• Look up & data detectors: Yes (TODO: Now there is no yes option …)
• Tap on click: No

Bluetooth

• Show in menu bar: Yes

Spotlight

• Only Applications and System preferences

Well, the quality of these hints lately are not up to the standard it used to be! First of all. If you install Xcode you will have the Developer option in the normal Spotlight preference window and you can disable it the normal way.

Secondly. As someone else wrote here. TextWrangler and BBEdit are perfectly capable of taking care of binary plists so there is no need for converting.

And for those who prefer to use terminal you can add the missing dictionary and disable the Developer category with one command. This is a hint! :-)

defaults write com.apple.spotlight orderedItems -array-add “enablednameSOURCE”

App Store

• Automatically check for updates - Disable Download and Install

Safari

Preferences:

• General - Open safe files after downloading: No
• Search - Search engine: DuckDuckGo
• Advanced - Show Developer menu in menu bar: Yes

iTunes

• Advanced - Keep iTunes Media folder organized: No
• Copy Media files to iTunes folder when adding to library: No

Disable iPhone backup:

defaults write com.apple.iTunes DeviceBackupsDisable -bool YES

Install and configure applications

XCode

Install Command line tools.

xcode-select --install

This will pop up the GUI window

Command line utilities

Configure SSH when needed.

vim "${HOME}/.ssh/config"

Checkout dot files from repository.

mkdir -m 0750 .local
git clone 'ssh://server.git:/repo/name' ".local/etc"

Make necessary symbolic links.

ln -s .local/etc .config
ln -s .local/etc/zsh/.zshenv .zshenv
ln -s .local/etc/tmux/tmux.conf .tmux.conf

Close and reopen terminal. Then remove fallout.

rm -r .zsh_history .zsh_sessions

Homebrew

• Project homepage

/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"

Ensure we have something like this in profile

[ -x /opt/homebrew/bin/brew ] && eval "$(/opt/homebrew/bin/brew shellenv)"

Close and reopen terminal again.

Application list

• tmux
• alacritty
• font-sauce-code-pro-nerd-font
• pass
• nextcloud
• vlc
• libreoffice

Terminal

Import Solarized theme and mark it as default.

• Terminus font

Apple ID

Login with your existing Apple ID. System settings - Apple account

Then turn off synchronization of all data to iCloud. System settings - iCloud - Saved to iCloud - See all

• Photos - off
• iCloud drive - off
• Password & keychain - off
• Notes - off
• Messages in iCloud - off
• iCloud email
• Find my Mac - off
• Contacts - off
• iCloud callendar - off

Touch ID

System settings - Touch ID & Password - Add fingerprint

Tune it

• Use Touch ID to unlock your Mac - on
• Use Touch ID for Apple Pay - off
• Use Touch ID for purchases in iTunes Store, App Store and Apple Books - off
• Use Touch ID for autofilling passwords - on
• Use Touch ID for fast user switching - off

Applications

Mail

Composing - Automatically Bcc myself

System settings

Internet accounts - Add account - Add other account

Mail account

• Email address
• Password

Then

• Username
• Incoming mail server
• Outgoing mail server

Select the apps you want to use with this account

• Mail
• Notes

Done.

Mail client

When started window pops up - Mail privacy protection

Protect mail activity - Yes

Calendar

Internet accounts - Add account - Add other account

CalDAV account

• Account type: Manual
• Username
• Password
• Server address

Click Sign in and then enable

• Calendars
• Reminders

Contacts

Internet accounts - Add account - Add other account

• Account type: Manual
• Username
• Password
• Server address

Click Sign in and then enable

CardDAV account

Other applications

• Magnet

Notes

USB to Serial adapter

• GPL Driver
• Installer for Lion
• Comercial one

Links

• Solarized color theme.
• dotfiles
• Dash for Mac
• Open doesn’t work in Terminal
• MonitorControl
• macOS 10.15: Slow by Design
• Launching apps in Mojave: how it has changed
• Hard to discover tips and apps for making macOS pleasant
• macOS defaults list
• Mac keyboard shortcuts
• Erase your Mac and reset it to factory settings https://dortania.github.io/OpenCore-Legacy-Patcher/
• Alacritty
• Better Display

ToDo

• Setup iTunes

Dot files on USB drive

There is dot_clean buildin utility.

• How to stop OS X from writing Spotlight and Trash files to memory cards and USB sticks?
• Why are dot underscore ._ files created, and how can I avoid them?

Enable terminal full access to file system

sudo dot_clean -n /Volumes/Corsair\ 16G
Failed trying to change dir to .Spotlight-V100
Bad Pathname: Operation not permitted
sudo ls -A .Spotlight-V100
ls: .Spotlight-V100: Operation not permitted

Go to System preferences - Security & Privacy - Privacy, select Full disk access and add Terminal.app to exception list there.

Obsoleted

Time Machine backups

Applications

• Control Plane is a fork of Marco Polo which seems actively developed.
• iTerm 2
• Iterm2 color schemes
• Karabiner-Elements
• Maccy

iTerm configuration

• Create new profile (duplicate the default one?)
• Lion like fullscreen
• Bold :- Orange

Vundle

Project homepage on GitHub. Once it is configured in vimrc it is easy to install it from command line:

git clone https://github.com/VundleVim/Vundle.vim.git ~/.vim/bundle/Vundle.vim
vim +PluginInstall +qall

Brew

brew cask install osxfuse
brew install sshfs