This may not be the most advanced tip in the world, but then again, it may not be obvious to everyone who uses OS X. I know it wasn't obvious to me, and an email exchange with Michael G. today convinced me that I was not alone in my confusion. Hence, this hint...please skip ahead if you're an advanced UNIX user; this is probably a "no brainer" to most of you in that demographic.

Everyone probably knows that OS X includes SSH, a secure remote connection command-line tool. If you have more than one Mac and want to securely connect from one to the other at the command line, SSH is the program of choice. You enable this in the GUI (in the Sharing prefs panel, Application tab, Allow Remote Login), and then connect at the command line with "ssh -l username hostname".

There are a number of authentication schemes to make sure you're who you say you are, and if you implement SSH correctly on both machines, you can connect from one OS X box to another without entering a password, but still have a totally secure connection.

If you don't yet know how to do this, and would like to learn (along with a bit of a primer on SSH's security system), read the rest of the article.

This one's really handy.

First make a directory in /Volumes for the volume you wish to mount, say idisk, for example. You could mount it anywhere, but /Volumes is the logical spot for it:

sudo mkdir /Volumes/idisk

then mount the volume...

sudo mount -t afp afp://user:pass@idisk.mac.com/user /Volumes/idisk

That's it! To unmount, use the umount command:

sudo umount /Volumes/idisk

[Editor's note: This can be very useful when you connect remotely and then realize you need to put something on your iDisk.]

Once I had setup my sharepoints via the brilliant tip by 'dreness', I became somewhat irritated by the apparent inability to prevent sharing of users' Public folders.

I have a lot of user logins on my machine for various tasks. When hooking into to my OS X box from another machine, this made the volume list include 7 or 8 volumes when all I wanted to make available to guests were just two of the volumes – a technical resource and my music folder.

To disable the default sharing of public directory's you need to take a trip into NetInfo Manager (in Applications/Utilties). Read the rest of the article for the details on the exact steps.

Inspired by the work on the prefPane and App named SharePoints [editor: method one], as well as the direct route [editor: method two] explained in this forum for adding shares, I wrote an AppleScript to do the same things in the Finder, the way it used to be in Mac OS 9.

Visit www.ethan.com/source_sharing_is.html for the source script and downloadable Toolbar applet. Contact me at ethanw@aol.com with comments and ideas.

[Editor's note: I haven't tried this yet, but the source is available, so you can see for yourself what it does.]

I recently discovered that if you have a script located at /etc/ppp/ip-up then it will get called every time a PPP connection is started. Similarly, if you have a script at /etc/ppp/ip-down then it will get called every time the connection goes down. It is important that the execute bit is set on the script, and you proabably have to be root to create and save the file. Here's how to set the execute bits on the two scripts:

chmod a+x ip-up
chmod a+x ip-down

I use it to start and stop fetchmail (pop-smtp mailing software). But by using 'open', you could probably do anything. A word of caution: It may be running stuff as root so a sudo username whatevercommands might be useful.

[Editor's note: I don't have a PPP connection, so I can't test this...]

Hi! First of all thanks for this site.:)
I drop these few lines to provide some help, if needed, about a issue i've read here some weeks ago. To make a long story short, i have made a startup script to enable the network hacks you posted here to encrease the TCP receive windowsize:

sudo sysctl -w net.inet.tcp.recvspace=64960

(i've increased a little the original size...eh!). and the one that deals with the delayed ack:

sudo sysctl -w net.inet.tcp.delayed_ack=0

The problem with these commands is that they reset to default on every restart (if you have to restart a machine with OS X on it, eh eh!). So, i've made a little folder to put into your StartupItems folder (/System/Library/StartupItems) and you're set. This little script enables these tricks on every restart. Download it here. You have to su to root to copy it to the desired folder (of course!).

Hope it helps!

[Editor's note: I have not tried this on my machine.]

Living in Europe, the mobile is my daily companion and so are my needs to connect remotely to my office. All the messages I read about the support of IrDA have been negative, telling me that the IrDA is not strategic any more for Apple anyway.

What a surprise when I did a new installation with the Mac OS X 10.1.1 CD coming with the new PbTi 550MHz: IT WORKS! I can choose the infrared connection using the Network Preferences and just by copying the Nokia modem scripts from Mac OS 9 I'm able to connect remotly to my office again. One big step to MacOS X in my daily business for me.

[Editor's note: I'm not sure if this is news or not, but everything I've seen has certainly indicated that IrDA was not supported on the newer Macs in OS X.]

We've had the ability to create share points when using personal file sharing for quite some time. Simply click a folder and select File -> Sharing, set your options, and go. With OS X, that functionality seems to have disappeared. According to Apple, we need OS X Server for this, but that is not so. Here's how you can create your very own share points in Mac OS X:

1. Open NetInfo Manager and authenticate.
   
2. Create a new subdirectory in /config/SharePoints/ (click on config, then on SharePoints, then select Directory -> New Subdirectory).
   
3. Set the name value to be what you'd like the share to be called (double-click on the Value column next to name).
   
4. Add a new property (Directory -> New Properyt) and name it directory_path.
   
5. Add a new value for directory_path. The value needs to be the path of the folder or volume (for example, /Users/username/Pictures).
   
6. Save your changes in NetInfo.
   
7. In the Finder, set the privileges on the folder or volume you'll be sharing. Do Show Info, then Privileges, and pick what you like -- Drop Box, Read Only, etc.
   
8. Stop and restart the AFP Server from the Sharing preferences panel.
   
9. Connect from a client and they will see the new share.

Notes: Users with admin privledges may not see the new share point, since they can see all volumes from the top anyway. Also, if you share items with spaces anywhere in the path, do not quote or otherwise escape the spaces when you add the directory_path into netinfo. If the volume being shared is read only (a CD ROM, for example), then just skip step seven.

[Editor's note: This is probably the most useful tip I've seen in quite a while! I just tried it, and it worked exactly as described - my "Pictures" folder became available as a read-only volume to the AppleShare network - slick!. I wonder how difficult it is to wrap a GUI application around updating NetInfo?? That would be a killer OS X app!]

Since moving to OS X, I've missed Mac OS 9's File Sharing Activity Monitor. The next best thing I've found is the ability to turn on logging for file sharing. Here's how to enable it:

1. Open NetInfo Manager (found in the Applications/Utilities folder).
   
2. In NetInfo Manager, choose /config/AppleFileServer.
   
3. Choose the "activity_log" property. Change its value from "0" to "1".
   
4. Choose "Save" from the NetInfo Manager "Domain" menu.
   
5. Stop and restart File Sharing in System Prefs.
   
6. Find your log in /Library/Logs/ApplefileService/AppleFileServiceAccess.log

Although there is a "guest_access" property under AppleFileServer, it doesn't appear that you can turn guest access off using it (it's set to "0" by default). Too bad.

I was having some odd connection problems with my Apple powerbook internal v90 modem. Random connection failures and disconnections. So I started looking at the modem script (inside /library/modem scripts). I read somewhere that with modems it's better to start simple so I commented out the existing init string and replaced it.

I replaced:

write "AT&FE0W1Q0V1X4&C1&K3S95=1&D3S7=75S0=013"

with

write "AT&F13"

(Note: The exact line in the script may be different from that shown above, there are several versions of it. In the apple script it is below "label 3")

I seem to have had fewer connection problems. Although I can't say for sure that this alteration is the cause, and I'd be interested to see if this changes things for other Apple modem users. The side effect is that you cannot see the connection speed anymore.

[Editor's note: I'm unable to test this myself. You should probably make a backup of your script file before changing it.]