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3:58 AM

@ankii - Just FYI. Making superfluous edits to a closed question will put it into the Reopen review queue.

35

Q: How to stop Catalina from contacting Apple servers when executing programs?

I'm a software developer and as such I build and run programs hundreds of times per day. I've noticed that since I started using Catalina, after compiling and linking there is a delay (which can be seconds) when the internet is slow or having problems (I have bad internet often). If I disable wif...

There's no edit in the question that I can see makes it distinct

ankii

4:22 AM

@Allan yes that’s the point. I voted to reopen. They’re separate questions, as the title says.

the -> their

Allan

4:46 AM

Ok. Both questions are about Catalina calling home and one has to literally dissect both questions to find the one line that showed the OPs intent that justified it not being a dupe.

It would have been infinitely more efficient to add a single/two lines in the answer and say "It's not possible to opt out" or "You can opt out by <follow this link> or sending an email to johhyappleseed@apple.com.whatever.

I always look for simplicity and succinctness - leaving a dupe would give two vectors to some already excellent published work and a simple one or two line edit would have improved the answer immensely. Less = More in this case.

nohillside

6:53 AM

@ankii Allan has a point here about keeping things in one place. Can you repost your answer under the first question and then flag the new Q for mod attention (or close as dupe yourself)? Your first answer will stay as it is so you won't loose any rep by this.

uhoh

7:32 AM

0

Q: Why does launching IDLE from a second terminal window eventual lead to it freezing both? What's a good work-around or fix?

I have a new macOS laptop with recent Anaconda Python 3.7 installation. I use iTerm to open two iTerm command windows; from the first one I run Python and in the second one I just type "idle" which the Anaconda installation set as a command to start its version of IDLE IDE. Yes it's for beginners...

python freeze python3 ide idle

asked in SuperUser

ankii

7:46 AM

@nohillside @Allan A signed out user is redirected to the original case even if the duplicate shows up in searches. For someone not familiar with site structure, sidebar will be ignored, particularly on mobile devices. So separate questions, linked via answers seems good to me.

.. to the original question** ..

I won't mind if mods merge them into one post.

35

Q: What is a "merged" question?

Questions can be merged into other questions. What is a merged question? When should questions be merged? Who can merge questions? How do I request it? What happens to merged posts? Anything else I should know about merged questions? Return to FAQ index

support faq merged-questions

My intent is to keep the questions discoverable.

nohillside

8:04 AM

@ankii For duplicates the link is at the top of the question, not in the sidebar.

Regarding merged questions, "A merged question is a question where a moderator has chosen to move its answers to another question, because it is an exact duplicate of another". In this case the questions aren't fully identical so merging doesn't really make sense. A well-written answer to the original question could include details on how to disable the functionality though (even if not directly asked), that would make it a dupe.

@ankii Closing as dupe does exactly that: it provides several entry points (questions) into the same answers

ankii

@nohillside But as I said: user has been redirected to the original question where there are no easily visible links to duplicates.

"
.. i.e. when its answers would make perfect sense on the other question), and its answers are high-quality and valuable enough to be included on the other question itself, so that good answers aren't forked across multiple copies of the same question.
"

ankii

8:23 AM

merging is closing as dupe with extra benefits. The answers are not duplicated, and I don't earn extra rep for merely pressing cmd+C - cmd+V.

MyWrathAcademia

12:14 PM

@nohillside I enabled ICloud on my Macbook pro notebook. It says I have only 5 gb. ICloud does not seem to have backed up any of my data to apple cloud since I enabled it on my system.

@nohillside When does ICloud back up data to the cloud, and what data does it back up?

@nohillside I'm actually looking for a way to do a full system backup of my Macbook pro notebook.

@nohillside My previous laptop ran linux which has a backup program called restic. I know I can probably use restic to back up my Macbook pro just like it did for my Linux system, but I want to know if there are MacOs backup software I should know about because I assume restoring from a first party apple backup utility will be easier and more straightforward than restoring from a third party backup program like restic?

I also want to use cloud storage as the backup location. Do you have any idea what happens to your data on apple cloud if you cancel your ICloud subscription?

nohillside

1:09 PM

@MyWrathAcademia iCloud is a syncing service, not a cloud backup. You have the possibility to backup iOS devices into iCloud, but no such facility exists for macOS (at least not as far as I know)

For macOS backups look into TIme Machine. There are also several cloud backup solutions, e.g. Backblaze or Arq

Personally I use Time Machine (for easy recovery of recent changes), weekly full disk backups to two different drives, and Arq for important data (Photos, Documents etc).

MyWrathAcademia

2:43 PM

@nohillside Thanks, now I know exactly what ICloud is for. When I saw the option to pay apple to get access to 200 GB or 2 TB storage I thought that meant I could backup my data to ICloud, guess not.

@nohillside I know a bit about Backblaze, but nothing about Arq. Which is cheaper?

@nohillside Yes, easy restoration of backed up state or data is why I wanted to use apple's first party backup software rather than a third party software.

I think I will use Time Machine, after all so far in my short ownership of apple hardware I think both their hardware and software are top notch especially where user experience is concerned. Thanks for the recommendation.

@nohillside So I'm guessing that with Time Machine you have the option of using Backblaze, Arq or any other storage location as a (backup) repository?

@nohillside Why are you not backing up the full disk to Arq, instead you use hard drives as the backup location?

MyWrathAcademia

3:10 PM

I almost felt the same way as this poster when I got a Macbook for work, haha:

68

Q: How to tell your boss that you can't work on the expensive MacBook he bought you, as you are used to Linux/Windows

The title pretty much says it all, but for some context, I started at a fullstack dev job at a new place about a month ago and before I started they ordered me a MacBook Pro to work on. Every day since I've been pulling my hair out with this PC, as I've only used Windows and Linux my whole life, ...

communication work-environment

nohillside

4:56 PM

@MyWrathAcademia TM and Backblaze are two different things

@MyWrathAcademia Arq is File-Level, not disk-level

The disk level backups are to restore the system to a state of one or two weeks ago in case something goes utterly wrong. And then I can use the files from Arq (which backups every few hours) to restore any important data. If I miss out on an OS or application update, fine, can be reinstalled

And in the worst case (house burns down, Mac gets stolen) I‘ll get a new machine anyway so all I need to restore is user data

But I don‘t need my Mac to earn my money, so the risk assessment may be different compared to people relying on their Macs for daily work.

Tetsujin

6:33 PM

Make a Windows 10 installer USB stick on a Mac…
This one crops up a lot & though this is not my field of expertise, I think the answer is usually 'make it on Windows'
Does someone far smarter than me want to see if this is a viable solution - https://alexlubbock.com/bootable-windows-usb-on-mac - I saw it referenced in a question on SU.

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