Duplicate Network Name, IP-Address already in use, slow DNS resolution, erratic Bonjour discovery, Dead-slow Safari 8, one simple solution

Update: as announced and expected, Apple has replaced DiscoveryD with mDNSResponder in 10.10.4. For those of you running 10.0.4, this article no longer applies. In case you’re stuck on 10.10.0, .1, .2 or .3, read on :)

A long long title, but accurately descriptive :P Poor English? Perhaps, but it does say what is to be said;

If you have experienced one of the following issues, then you should read on;

  • Your computer’s name is already in use, your computer has been renamed to iMac (2)
  • Your IP address is already in use (even when you’re the only one at home)
  • Opening a website in Safari takes “forever”
  • You cannot find your (other) computer on the network (even though you’re sure it’s turned on)

Continue reading “Duplicate Network Name, IP-Address already in use, slow DNS resolution, erratic Bonjour discovery, Dead-slow Safari 8, one simple solution”

USB 3.0 on Macbook Pro 2011

Lucky enough to have a Macbook Pro 17″ with an ExpressCard/34 slot? Then you’re not lucky enough to have built-in USB 3.0. We can fix that! You need to spend about 10 to 15 USD. Interested? Read on! It took me months just to find this post which gave me a 10 minute solution.

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Bluetooth 4.0LE Upgrade for MacbookPro 17″ – Enable handoff, continuity and instant hotspot

Yosemite introduces a lot of great features. I personally love Handoff where you can start a document or e-mail on one device and seamlessly continue it on a different one. I already had it working between my iPhone 5s and iPad Air but soon found that my Macbook Pro did not comply to the technical requirements.

I got it working now! If you want to know how; then read on!

[update oct 2nd, 2015]

With 10.11 El Capitan I followed the instructions to re-enable Continuity and found that my WiFi stopped working (‘No WiFi Hardware Found’). Turns out, all I needed to do was to disable kext-signing check with

Shell commandsudo nvram boot-args=kext-dev-mode=1
.
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Another Upgrade, Another Fixing session – Upgrade Development Environment – Yosemite edition

While Redmond is starting their photocopiers (the age old story of how Microsoft keeps copying instead of innovating), we Mac users start our updates. OSX 10.10 Yosemite brings Apache 2.4 and PHP 5.5 to our playground, but not everyone is happy with that. Also, not all software survives the upgrade. Here is what I had to do to fix my development environment.

Continue reading “Another Upgrade, Another Fixing session – Upgrade Development Environment – Yosemite edition”

Downgrade (or upgrade) PHP on OSX

OSX Yosemite comes with PHP 5.5. OSX Mountain Lion comes with PHP 5.3. What if you wanted to run PHP 5.4 on both? Well, you can, with a dead simple installation;

Shell commandcurl -s http://php-osx.liip.ch/install.sh | bash -s 5.4
will install PHP 5.4.

Thanks to The coolest guide on the planet.

[EDIT: nov 6 2017: fixed dead link, added troubleshooting steps below]

Still not seeing the new version?

  1. The command above should install the old PHP 5 in /usr/local/php5 (which should be user-writable) and also write a new config file in /etc/apache2/other/+php-osx.conf, so please check and see if both exist.
    If you installed PHP 7.x, the folder is /usr/local/php7, of course.
  2. Run apachectl -t -D DUMP_INCLUDES and check if the new config file is loaded (should be /etc/apache2/other/+php-osx.conf)
  3. Try apachectl configtest and see if any errors occurred

If you can’t get it to work, try alternate methods, like using the even older series of posts on How to set-up and maintain a development environment on osx, OR (even better!) use Local by Flywheel.

Restore Apache2 service after removal of Server.app

After experimenting with Apples Server.App and removing it (for not really needing it) the built-in Apache was no longer functioning and all I could get out of it was; “Websites are turned off. An administrator can turn them on using the Server application.”

The fix is simple, but finding where to fix, …

Webservices Turned Off

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OSX 10.10 Yosemite and iOS 8 announced

Last monday – everybody who cares knows – Apple announced the latest OS versions of OSX and iOS.

For a 10 minute breakdown, visit The Verge.

You can expect updates on all posts of the series ‘The Ultimate Development Webserver’ and ‘Handy Scripts’ where needed in the next few months (time permitting and if the beta will run stable enough inside VMWare Fusion)

Repair OSX WebDevelopment server after OSX Upgrade

After upgrading OSX to version 10.9 I find myself investigating why my development server no longer works. After 4 upgrades I now have a clear list of things to check and how to fix.

If you have not yet upgraded OSX, take the time to back-up your /etc/php.ini and /etc/apache2/httpd.conf. Also; OSX 10.9 Mavericks will upgrade PHP to PHP 5.4, so if you have projects incompatible with 5.4; a) don’t upgrade OSX, b) start upgrading your code or c) use a different AMP-stack.

Also; if you depend on your computer for your income, don’t rush into this!

The TODO list:

  • Backup your system
  • Upgrade OSX
  • Upgrade Xcode and run it at least once, installing the commandline tools
  • Reboot your system
  • Follow the checklist :)

The checklist (things to check and maybe fix):

  • Apache
  • PHP
  • MySQL
  • PEAR/PECL/other

Continue reading “Repair OSX WebDevelopment server after OSX Upgrade”

Development WebServer on OSX Lion – HomeBrew/MariaDB/PECL

Apache2 is already installed on any Mac and most setups (like MAMP or MacPorts) just ignore the built in Apache and install their own version. Shame. You wouldn’t ignore your own car just and get another one to pull a trailer while your own car can do the job perfectly.

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Virtual Memory Configuration

A few command lines for managing the Virtual Memory on your Mac.

Please note; if you have a regular amount of memory, like 4 GB or 8 in recent models, you might want to consider NOT turning off Virtual Memory. But if you have ample RAM, give it a try, you will notice a big speed improvement. Why? Thats because Virtual Memory is ALWAYS used, even if you don’t really need it.

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