Up through iOS 16 it looks like there were a couple of web sites that had some documentation about iOS API changes (e.g. http://codeworkshop.net/objc-diff/sdkdiffs/) and for IOS 11 and earlier Apple had official pages. I'm trying to figure out if there have been any public API changes between iOS 18.4 and 18.5, and Apple's release notes have not been very good for this. I prefer first party documentation, but in absence of that any documentation to review would be welcome. Is anything like that available for recent releases?

I want to provide URL links to man page content at apple.com as an authoritative source of information. Describing and quoting the local man page is awkward. Does Apple provide man pages on the web?

I do most of the "work" I do on my Mac as a Standard user (Apple parlance for an *unprivileged* user). I also frequently use the CLI (zsh mostly now) via the Terminal app. I use [MacPorts](https://www.macports.org/) as a *package manager*, and various utilities such as find, rsync, launchctl, ip, mount, log, softwareupdate, etc etc etc. As it frequently happens, something I am trying to do from the CLI requires *privilege elevation* via the sudo command. However: According to [this document](https://support.apple.com/guide/terminal/enter-administrator-commands-apd5b0b6259-a7d4-4435-947d-0dff528912ba/mac) , it seems that Apple does not support the use of sudo by Standard users: >Only administrator users can use sudo. If you’re not logged in as an administrator, you can do so by entering the following command, where **adminUsername** is the name of an administrator user: >***% su adminUsername*** This seems clumsy and inconvenient: su and then sudo. It is also at odds with the way sudo works on other platforms I use. Of course macOS requires Admin user authentication to perform some tasks in the GUI, but this is *generally* not the way that sudo operates; i.e. ***any*** user may be granted privileges to perform specified tasks by the Admin user for the system. I won't ask "why" Apple does it this way as that can only be an *opinion* here, but I will ask if there is a *work-around* - can sudo on macOS be made to work as it does on other platforms?

The man page for cp says this about the -a option: > Archive mode. Same as -RpP options. Preserves structure and attributes of files but not directory structure. FreeBSD cp's manual does not have this caveat, although the structure of the options remains very similar, if not identical. What does not preserving directory structure mean in this case?

If I want to change some Dock preferences (for example delay before appears of Dock) I should type in terminal: defaults write com.apple.dock autohide-delay -float 0.1; I tried to find all available options for Dock and find this link in Apple Developer documentation. But it doesn't contain a description of autohide-delay. I conclude that that list is not complete. Because it also doesn't contain options I know: -autohide-time-modifier -autohide-delay -tilesize -mcx-expose-disabled Where I can I find the full list Dock preferences?

The [Darwin Kernel Programming Guide](https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/Darwin/Conceptual/KernelProgramming/About/About.html) has been last updated on 2013-08-08, and the mention "Documentation archive" is in the title bar. So, my question is : How to access the latest version of the Darwin Kernel Programming Guide?

I run macOS 10.14.6, "Mojave". I've been studying man screen to make some changes to its default behavior. The 2nd & 4th paragraphs under CUSTOMIZATION read: 2nd para: > When screen is invoked, it executes initialization commands from the files "/usr/local/etc/screenrc" and ".screenrc" in the user's home directory. These are the "programmer's defaults" that can be overridden in the following ways: for the global screenrc file screen searches for the environment variable $SYS-SCREENRC (this override feature may be disabled at compile-time). The user specific screenrc file is searched in $SCREENRC, then $HOME/.screenrc. The command line option -c takes precedence over the above searched in $SCREENRC, then $HOME/.screenrc. The command line option -c takes precedence over the above user screenrc files. 4th para: > Two configuration files are shipped as examples with your screen distribution: "etc/screenrc" and "etc/etcscreenrc". They contain a number of useful examples for various commands. But it seems there are some discrepancies: - /usr/local/etc does not exist - $SYSSCREENRC is not defined (echo $SYSSCREENRC => null) - $SCREENRC is not defined - etc/screenrc does not exist (nor does private/etc/screenrc) - etc/etcscreenrc does not exist (nor does private/etc/etcscreenrc) ###Question... Is there a separate update process in macOS required to get updates for the Unix tools and system manuals? For example, according to man screen Apple packages screen ver 4.0.2 (January 2004 vintage) with macOS 10.14.6; that release was 16 years ago this month. Is there a process outside macOS for updating this part of the system that's "sanctioned" by Apple? (*By "sanctioned" I only mean a procedure designated by Apple to maintain system integrity.*) If not, has Apple acknowledged this situation? By that I'm only trying to learn if I missed something.

In Windows it is possible to print a document on the desktop by right-clicking on it and choosing **Print Document** in the contextual menu that appears. By default this option is unfortunately not given in OS X. Is it therefore possible to create this option and therefore aid the printing of documents on a Mac ?

I've got a cookie notice when launching an app for the first time on macOS, which I didn't know was a thing. Looking at the processes running, I see 3 processes spawned by the app. One looks like a regular packaged app, but one reads Pocket Casts Web Content () and its name is just the url leading to the webapp version of the app. I've only seen Web Content processes being used as browser helpers, and can't find anything in the Apple docs.

I have a company laptop and my Mac admin was able to update my application apps, remove unnecessary apps, and clear old files in my document folder. However, he was able to do all of this while my mac was offline. Only way I can think the admin would be able to do this is if he had some kind of back up system in place before my mac went offline? I didn’t notice any cloud or syncing service on my Mac.

I just bought a used iPhone 8, my first Apple product. There is an iPhone User Guide from Apple. My normal practice with user manuals in electronic form is to download them in a standard, widely supported file format (almost universally PDF), and save this permanently into my LAN fileserver (which runs Solaris and serves SMB to Windows clients). With just about any other manufacturer on the planet, for any product from an [Earth station antenna control system](https://www.radeuslabs.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/8200-8250-OM-201701025-02.pdf) to a [toaster](https://products.geappliances.com/MarketingObjectRetrieval/Dispatcher?RequestType=PDF&Name=49-9000001-2.pdf) , this would have been a dead-simple matter of vising their website using any standards-compliant web browser on a computer running any operating system, locating the manual's download link, and using the browser's "Save As" function. This is proving to be a little more complicated in this particular case. I did find a web page that tells me the document exists, but seems to be devoid of any link to it: https://books.apple.com/book/id6443146864 It seems that I must access it through the proprietary "Apple Books" portal. After reaching more Apple web pages that were devoid of anything actionable, I somewhat concluded that my only way of accessing this is through the iPhone itself. (I'm slightly curious as to whether these web pages would do anything on a Mac...) After some Apple ID rigmarole and then tapping on a "Get" button that did absolutely nothing, I finally found that if I instead opened a sample of the book, the "Get" button at the top of the sample actually worked, albeit only after setting up an iTunes account. So now, the manual is in some manner in the iPhone. I'm able to flip through its pages in the iPhone. But I still want it as a PDF, EPUB, or other standard file on my fileserver. I'm not sure how much closer this brings me. I did find this tip: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/7514400?answerId=30001597022#30001597022 It mentions that, due to DRM, books can't be read on non-Apple systems unless they're free. But this one is free, so that shouldn't be an issue. The thread also says: > To redownload actual ibooks, go to the Purchased link under Quick Links on the right-hand side of the iTunes Store homepage So I install iTunes into a Windows VM, log into it using the same Apple ID I had used on the iPhone, find "Purchased" under "Quick Links", and then select the "Books" button at top right. The main window area just displays "You do not have any purchased books available to download." Another idea was to try to get the iTunes Store in the iPhone to save it into some well-defined location in the phone's storage, from which I could copy it out. I tap "More" and there is a "Purchased" menu item, but going into that, I see only Music, Movies, and TV Shows categories. Nothing about books. This other question has some answers but they look like they apply to Macs, not iPhones: https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/296462/locating-the-ibooks-folder-in-icloud-drive#297650 I tried connecting the iPhone to a PC via USB, just to see what I could find. The Internal Storage directory exposed via MTP has a DCIM folder for the camera, but nothing else. In principle maybe I could first copy the document from wherever the Apple Books app has it cached into the Internal Storage directory, but I'd need access to the phone's underlying filesystem. There's a "Files" app, but it seems to have no meaningful access to the actual filesystem. The "On My iPhone" category is empty, but the phone is obviously not empty, or it wouldn't boot. I've even taken the unprecedented step of searching torrent sites for the official user manual of a consumer product. No luck. **Is it even possible, given just an iPhone plus non-Apple systems, to obtain the iPhone User Guide as a computer file under my control? If so, how would I go about doing this?** If the only solutions would involve jailbreaking the iPhone, I'd have to hold off on it for a little bit until it has a replacement, in case it gets bricked.

One of my favorite Mac apps, DiskWarrior, [has been waiting for the APFS format documentation](https://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/mojaveapfs.html) (also called the APFS volume specification) for a while, in order to make a new program version which can rebuild APFS disks. Recently, according their page linked above, this documentation was released and Alsoft is using it to update DiskWarrior. I would like to look at this documentation myself, as I find it interesting. However, I can't find the documentation anywhere. I've found a few documents [like this,](https://developer.apple.com/support/downloads/Apple-File-System-Reference.pdf) but I don't think that's what I'm looking for, since that document is not as comprehensive as what I would expect from a full volume format specification. Do I need a certain Apple subscription to see this documentation or am I simply failing at googling for it?

I'm looking at Apple's documentation for managing an organization's devices remotely. On the page that addresses "NotNow" responses , it says > Avoid receiving a NotNow status response on iOS devices by executing any of the following commands: This looks pretty strange to me, and I wonder if I'm not interpreting it correctly. Does it mean that any of the listed commands can be sent without risk of a 'NotNow' response? (I don't think so because my server is sending 'CertificateList', which is one of the commands in question, and it's getting a 'NotNow' response. And that's what led me to this documentation in the first place.) What is the page trying to say? And why does it address macOS in a manner so different from the way it addresses iOS? (For the former, it describes what conditions can cause a 'NotNow' response; for the latter, it just gives a list of commands which will supposedly prevent 'NotNow' responses.)

I know about , pkgutil --files, and lsbom. I know also that installer packages are really a XAR archive. What I do not know yet, is that whether running a .pkg installer packages guarantees that all the files produced as a result of running it will be tracked? For instance, when a .pkg installer package ran some arbitrary scripts, will the files be tracked by macOS? I tried searching and there does not seems to be any official documentation on this. Some unofficial guides: https://matthew-brett.github.io/docosx/flat_packages.html http://s.sudre.free.fr/Stuff/Ivanhoe/FLAT.html Although not explicitly mentioned, these guides seems to be indicating that the files won't be tracked, is this correct? Also, are there any official answer on this?

I'm using Mac OS Catalina 10.15.7 Bash GNU bash, version 3.2.57(1)-release (x86_64-apple-darwin19) My man pages blank all the options of a command like this:

I am looking for a very good documentation or tool, that help's me to make better searches in spotlight.I have found some descriptions like: "https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/CoreServices/Reference/MetadataAttributesRef/Reference/CommonAttrs.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40001694-SW1 ", there I can find e.g. kMDItemKind, but what is possible to define as Kind ? I know in I can define a search like "kind:folder", but what's possible behind kind instead of folder, how can I find out what I am able to search for ? "kind:" stands here as a example, but there are much more keywords, but I want to know what are the possible values for this keywords. Either a documentation/manual/reference about the keywords or a tool, that evaluates the possible values out of my spotlight database.

Some command line interfaces or command line utilities give some *comprehensive documentation* or help when --help is appended to the name of the command, for example git:

git --help
# shows comprehensive help docs

Some others show *only the command and its arguments* (that's all), for example grep:

grep --help
usage: grep [-abcDEFGHhIiJLlmnOoqRSsUVvwxZ] [-A num] [-B num] [-C[num]]
	[-e pattern] [-f file] [--binary-files=value] [--color=when]
	[--context[=num]] [--directories=action] [--label] [--line-buffered]
	[--null] [pattern] [file ...]

And others give some assistance, but only because --help is not recognised as a legal option, for examples ls:

ls --help
ls: illegal option -- -
usage: ls [-@ABCFGHLOPRSTUWabcdefghiklmnopqrstuwx1%] [file ...]

and netstat:

netstat --help
netstat: illegal option -- -
Usage:	netstat [-AaLlnW] [-f address_family | -p protocol]
	netstat [-gilns] [-f address_family]
	netstat -i | -I interface [-w wait] [-abdgRtS]
	netstat -s [-s] [-f address_family | -p protocol] [-w wait]
	netstat -i | -I interface -s [-f address_family | -p protocol]
	netstat -m [-m]
	netstat -r [-Aaln] [-f address_family]
	netstat -rs [-s]

### Question Are there any generally safe way(s) of getting documentation or help with a CLI or utility without having to google (i.e. from *within* the terminal)? I currently try --help or -h, but other than that I go straight to google, but would like to know if there are other things to (safely) try before going to google.

Is there a way to get Pages to automatically save documents as .docx (Word) files? How do you do it? I'm wondering because I do not have access to Microsoft Word and this is the preferred format for what I'm doing

I'm looking to write a paper on how the OS X user interface has evolved from OS X Leopard all the way through to OS X Yosemite and am seeking guidance on where to find older versions of the OS X Human Interface Guidelines documentation. The following data should aid in the search in the circumstance that navigating the [WayBack Machine](https://archive.org/web/) in the event that that is the only viable option. * OS X 10.5 Leopard Release Date: October 26, 2007 * OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard Release Date: August 28, 2009 * OS X 10.7 Lion Release Date: July 20, 2011 * OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion Release Date: July 25, 2012 * OS X 10.9 Mavericks Release Date: October 22, 2013 * OS X 10.10 Yosemite Release Date: October 16, 2014 Any help in finding these documents would be greatly appreciated. If there's not a complete link to them, perhaps several answers could point to each or one answer be maintained to point to them all.

everyone. I'm trying to remember a macOS application that I used to use. It could be opened with a keyboard command within almost any application or the Finder, and it would pop up a dialog to search reference material for different developer languages, frameworks, tools, etc. I thought it was Alfred, but looking over the website, that doesn't look familiar. Any ideas? Thanks!