Given an alias created by the Finder, from the Unix prompt (e.g., in Terminal) how can I get the target of the alias?
In my Finder windows I have numerous aliases that point mostly to other folders. When in the Terminal, these aliases present as regular files. How can I get the target of an alias so that I can perform some operation, e.g., "cd", on the target?
This AppleScript demonstrates how to resolve the OS X alias and return a POSIX path for it
set af to choose file
tell application "Finder"
if the kind of af is "alias" then
set origFile to the POSIX path of ((original item of af) as text)
end if
end tell
display dialog origFile
Similar Messages
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can anyone help me please get my music onto my laptop
Thank you. I did that and made sure my phone was open to the camera roll. I was able to locate the import command and the photos appeared. Thanks so much!
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How can I get iMovie to recognize the external camera?
iMAC running OSX 10.6.8 recognizes external HD Camera hardware, but iMovie fails to recognize the device. I can copy files "manually" using Finder, but cannot import them directly into iMovie. How can I get iMovie to recognize the camera? I have already re-booted all devices and tried multiple USB ports. In all cases the OS recognizes the camera, but iMovie does not.
OK This camcorder is a fine camcorder. I have an earlier model of a similar camcorder from Panasonic. However, this newer model has one problem. It is not compatible with iMovie if you shoot at the highest quality mode, (which is 60P or 50P - which might be called 28MBPS mode). If you shoot 30P or 30i (even 60i) it will import to iMovie. Also, iMovie can handle 1280x720P60 and P50.
It will definitely work on iMovie 11. It should probably work on iMovie 09. I doubt this camera will be recognized at all on iMovie 08, but it is worth a try. To see which iMovie you have, click iMovie/About and check the version. 9.04 would be iMovie 11. (9.08 is the current version, but it will not run on OSX 10.6.8). 8.06 would be iMovie 09. 7.1.4 would be iMovie 08.
OK So how to work around this limitation?
1) If you have Final Cut Pro X ($300) or can justify buying it, it will import 60P and 50P from this camera. However, if this seems a little pricey to you, keep reading.
2) If you set your camera to record in 1080P30 and shoot a short clip, then iMovie should see the camera. Then I would suggest using iMovie import screen to create a CAMERA ARCHIVE of your camera. This will copy to your Mac the entire contents of the video files on your camera. You will need them later. I am assuming you have some valuable footage on the camera that you would like to have.
3) Going forward, the simplest thing is to shoot in 1920x1080P30 and use iMovie normally. The biggest advantage of P60 or P50 is when you need really high quality slow motion effects. In other words, after you edit your movie, everything is converted to P30 or P25 anyway.
4) If you want to retrieve the 1080P50 or 1080P60 clips that you have shot, then there are a couple of apps you can buy to convert them to a form that iMovie can edit. Two such apps are ClipWrap and Voltaic HD. There are also various free apps, but I cannot vouch for them. Do a search on google and you may find some that work. -
How can I get iTunes to display the tracks from a CD in their original (album) order?
To be absolutely honest, I don't really understand what this box is for, so I shall just use it to repeat and expand on my question. (I have already sent a "Feedback" comment on the same topic).
How can I get iTunes to display the tracks from a CD in their original (album) order?
It seems to me that there is something very basic wrong with the way iTunes handles CD Tracks.
Professionally produced CD tracks are seldom if ever in a randomised order. Why then does iTunes seem unable to display the tracks in the order they appear on the original CD source - whether from a personally owned CD or from a download from the iTunes Store?
Some music demands a specific, non-alphabetic sequence in order to make sense. Why does it seem that iTunes only offers Alphabetic, or reverse alphabetic order - both of which make a nonsense of the original, often intended order of tracks?
Why not replace the so-called "cover-art" in the bottom left hand corner if the iTunes window - which, while it may look attractive to some, gives the barest of information concerning the original disc, with a list of the original CD tracks in their original order, so that the user can easily reestablish the order in which they should be played.
As I would expect legibility might be a problem with doing this, why could not the original contents, (in their original order), at least, be displayed when the "cover art" is double clicked-on - the result of which at present gives me an enlarged version of the "Cover Art". While on the subject of the contents of the source disc, what about all the album notes which someone takes trouble to write in order to increase the appreciation of the music on the CD and the listener's general background knowledge of the artists involved. Such notes, it seems to me, have considerable intrinsic value in their own account. I would, I think, normally be prepared to buy such "Sleeve notes" - so long as a "taster" was supplied (as it is for the music) - for something like the cost of a single 'Tune" on iTunes.
These two aspects let Apple iTunes down enormously, in my opinion. I think that by chopping even quite protracted sequences of music up into bits does no one any favours - except perhaps Apple's already quite substantial bank balance. People have to be aware that two and a half, to three and a half minutes is a very short time to develop a piece of worthwhile music, and that there are many, many composers, not all of whom are alive today who have written music that huge masses of mankind value for the enrichment of their lives and the human condition in general.
Please make the viewing of iTunes tracks in their correct order by default possible. By all means have the alphabetical variations available as offering a different approach to the music, but not the sole approach to it - PLEASE.
Frustratedly yours
Alan Whitaker
PS I work at my old 24" iMac Intel Core 2 machine which runs OS "Tiger" - because it is more beautiful to look at, the screen is more pleasant to work on, and because, in some ways it is more capable (it will run FreeHand MX without needing a "patch"), than my more recent 21.5" which runs "Snow Leopard". (I don't find it that much slower, either).Dear Mike
Thanks for the support. I am utterly amazed that after all the hype about how good iTunes is that it cannot play a downloaded CD in the correct order, and that what that order should be is not available directly from within one's own iTunes installation. (I know that one can go back to the iTunes Store to check what the order should be, but having downloaded the tracks surely iTunes is clever enough to retrieve this important information.
My iTunes to differ from yours in that I have also noticed that it seems unable to download copies of my "talking books" in the correct order either. But in my case it downloads them - from a CD - in order, but with the first track downloaded first - so that it appears at the bottom of the column of tracks so that it would get played last! (At least this is, while being inexplicable, a relatively "logical" bit of blundering and because of this is relatively easy to put right!).
I like many genres of music, some of which are not really programmed except perhaps by the artist performing them. I know that Frank Sinatra was very careful to programme his album songs to obtain a particular effect and in relation to the keys of the music. iTunes presumes to know better.
Film scores may be totally randomly put together, in some cases, but in others the order is vital to one's appreciation of the music as a whole and how it relates to the plot of the film.
In symphonic music most works are divided into sections and are conceived by the composer that way. Some individual sections may gain a life of their own if played separately, but they are never complete in the sense that the composer envisaged them without being placed in their proper context.
Opera and probably most choral music too, is similar except that the words may well become meaningless if the order is changed at the whim of a piece of ill-written computer code, while ballet music has to be heard totally within its sequential context or it becomes meaningless.
Finally, I would venture that iTunes, by jumbling up the order of the tracks as recorded on a CD, does an immense disservice, not only to the music on a particular CD, but to music in general, by expressing everything in terms of "Songs" - which it seems to interpret as stand-alone items of between 2 and 4 minutes whatever the genre. Even the way the iTunes publicity speaks of how many "songs" it can store instead of how many minutes or hours of recorded sound. This has to be another brick in the wall of "dumming-down" of people's expectations, and the shortening of their attention spans.
I don't know about anyone else, but I feel betrayed by Apple over this. Perhaps the look, feel and general presentation of an item are not the most desirable features of a consumer product. Maybe it should be judged more on it fitness for the purpose for which it was sold. There is one other possibility - that Apple are trying to redefine "Music" - and that everything that lasts longer than about 3.5 minutes or is in the form of what could for want of a better term be called symphonic in the broadest sense is something else - not "Music" within Apple's new definition, at all!
Well that's off my chest! now I can get down to creating some sort of order in my iTunes Libraries, knowing that I have to reconsult all the sources in order to confirm the source playing order.
Anyway thanks again. At least I know that it is not just me
alanfromthatcham -
how can I get netflix streaming audio, the video is fine but the audio coming through is from the TV(dish)
It's exactly as I stated. Whenever I try to drag these kinds of loops (ESX24 / software instrument loops? the ones marked in green with the white music note next to them) from the loop browser into the timeline a message comes up saying Audio Not Found for that loop. And a new track is created automatically when loops are dragged into the timeline, so I'm not creating some other random / synth instrument track so I'm not sure what the deal is... But perhaps I'll try creating a software instrument track first and then drag the loop into that track and see what happens - maybe there's something with the default settings that automatically creates audio tracks whenever loops are imported?
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I've just found the keyboard shortcut in Garageband for 'copy region' had changed from cmdC to ctrlC. I went to Preferences and clicked Restore Defaults for shortcuts. Now its altC . How can I get it back to the original commands.
When I use find file http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/30073/find-file (which does tend to find files that "Finder" can't), it's not coming up with any other itunes library files that have been modified in the past week, which I know it would have been - unfortunately, I don't have a very recent backup of the hard drive. It would be a few months old so it wouldn't have the complete library on it....any ideas? I'm wondering if restarting the computer might help but have been afraid to do so in case it would make it harder to recover anything...I was looking at this thread https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4211589?start=0&tstart=0 in the hopes that it might have a helpful suggestion but it's definitely a different scenario.
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My iMac does not see the new Toshiba external drive in Finder or Disk Utility. How can I get it to see the drive?
From the menu bar, select
▹ System Preferences ▹ Energy Saver ▹ Power Adapter
and uncheck the box labeled Put the hard disk(s) to sleep when possible, if it's checked.
If the drive has more than one interface (USB, FireWire, Thunderbolt, eSATA), try one of the other interfaces.
Check that the data cable is securely inserted at both ends.
Try a different cable.
If you're connecting the drive through a hub, connect it directly to a built-in port on the Mac.
If you're connecting it directly, try a different port.
Disconnect all other devices on the bus, or as many as possible.
Test the drive with another Mac. Test another drive with this Mac.
If the drive is bus-powered, but has an AC adapter, connect the adapter.
Start up in Recovery mode and launch Disk Utility. Is the drive recognized?
Start up in Safe Mode and test.
Reset the NVRAM.
Reset the System Management Controller.
If the drive doesn't work under any of the above conditions, and if another drive does work with the same Mac, then the drive is malfunctioning. -
This Safari Icon has completely disappeared from my account on Mac. I can find no record of it anywhere. The other account on my Mac still has Safari. How can I get it back onto my account? Please
On the other account, control-click its Dock icon and choose Show in Finder. If it's located in a place other than the Applications folder at the top level of the drive, move it there. If it is, go back into yours, open the Applications folder, and drag it to the Dock.
(99456) -
When upgrading my Mac from OS X Snow Leopard, to OS X Mavericks, The installer displayed my parallel and my PC applications. How can i get them back?
You either have to restore the Snow Leopard backup you made prior to installing Mavericks, or create a separate Snow Leopard partition to boot to in order to run your older PowerPC applications.
Either that, or upgrade the apps which won't run in Mavericks to newer versions that do. -
I have an iPod Classic and the latest version of iTunes. I make all my purchases on my computer, but when I try to click the "add to" option and transfer the songs to my iPod, it doesn't work. How can I get my songs from my computer to my iPod?
See this excellent user tip from another forum member turingtest2 outlining the different methods and software available to help you copy content from your iPod back to your PC and into iTunes.
Recovering your iTunes library from your iPod or iOS device
B-rock -
Hi... I bought an app from app store... It turned around to be a false app and not as per the description. App dev page is a fraud. How can I get a refund?
Welcome to the Apple community.
Select the content which is causing a problem and use the 'Report a problem' button in Your Purchase History. -
I changed my Apple ID, now I can't login to iCloud because it still has my old Apple ID and the password no longer works to log me in. How can I get back into iCloud so that I can switch off Find my iPhone so I can make these changes? Thank you. (iPhone 4s)
Well, you're gonna have to recover the password for that Apple ID:
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht5787 -
How can I get a query in the search field to open in a new tab or new window from the current window?
If you are searching via the Search Bar on the Navigation Toolbar, this preference can be changed to have searches there open in a Tab.
Type '''about:config''' in the Address Bar and hit Enter. Then answer "I'll be careful". Type this pref in the Search at the top.
'''browser.search.openintab''' = double-click to toggle to '''true''' -
I have a Iphone 3g,every now and then some of my music will disappear then reappear.I've tried to sync the music from my library on my laptop,nothing happens.How do I get my music back,without having to wait for it to reappear?
Define "I cannot transfer songs." What exactly did you do, and what exactly happened?
Did you authorized iTunes on your computer and sign into the same iTunes account as your phone (and the one the music was purchased under)? -
i upgraded from 4S to Iphone 5 but i lost all my messages how can i get them back on the new device ?i did back up using the icloud ?
having said that i have an i pad as well and when i backed up i got the contacts which are on the i pad on my new iphone 5 not the ones who were on
i phone 4s ...
any one can advise me please what to do to get my stuff from iphone 4s to iphone 5 ,rather than the stuff from my ipad ?If you made a backup using icloud, then restore your 5 to that backup. http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4859
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