Forget about structured code, branching in assembly is based on GOTO with labels. Here’s how to get started, with an idiom for the switch statement in Swift. | Continue reading
Using different addressing modes and offset specifications to load and store in memory. Includes a summary of ARM64 Operand Architecture. | Continue reading
Erase your M1’s internal storage in Recovery, reinstall macOS and you could see an error in which it failed ‘to personalize the software update’. That’s not easy to fix, as … | Continue reading
Big Sur updates have far exceeded those of Mojave or Catalina, and are set to total well over 40 GB. Prospects for security updates are no better, with a high carbon footprint. | Continue reading
Types of register explained, and which are available to pass arguments of different types. Call by value and call by reference distinguished. | Continue reading
Every developer should watch the 5 videos about DocC from WWDC. But it’s really a plaintive cry for help. Until Apple squares up and addresses the problem, it can only grow worse. | Continue reading
First in a series helping you write ARM64 assembly language for M1 Macs. Provides an app within which you can call assembly routines. | Continue reading
Apple should announce macOS 12 next week, but which Mac models will support it? Look in the firmware, not the tea-leaves for this speculative list. | Continue reading
There’s 1 True Recovery, Fallback Recovery and one other recovery mode. Disambiguation, explanation and how this changed in macOS 11.4. | Continue reading
Soon after Apple started delivering M1 Macs, users found that they couldn’t boot them from external disks. Six months later, this has largely been fixed. What went wrong? | Continue reading
macOS 11.4 has finally fixed all the problems with installing current and older macOS on external disks, and booting an M1 Mac from them. | Continue reading
What are a new kernel extension and a private framework doing in macOS 11.4? Here are some details, and suggestions for further research. | Continue reading
We commonly suffer failures of the psychology of Mac performance, when system background tasks overwhelm the processor and bring the interface to a grinding halt | Continue reading
One command in Terminal which instantly disables any support, and why you can’t (yet) boot your M1 Mac in Linux. | Continue reading
By segregating macOS background tasks on Efficiency cores, M1 Macs can run user apps unfettered on their Performance cores. And that feels really fast. | Continue reading
How the M1’s asymmetric cores can run background tasks more efficiently, or deliver high performance, according to Quality of Service. | Continue reading
Has the Profiles pane recently appeared in System Preferences? Here’s why – a minor glitch in the App Store update. | Continue reading
Included in the macOS updates this week was Safari version 14.1 for Mojave and Catalina (this was also included within Big Sur 11.3 update). Apple has pulled those Safari updates today, apparently … | Continue reading
M1 Macs may be as fast as greased lightning, but how good is their numerical accuracy? Can it match that of Intel processors? | Continue reading
First there were inodes, aliases, and links. Finder aliases already use the volfs file system, but Apple wants us to switch to its opaque Bookmarks | Continue reading
An important feature for many iOS users, this has now appeared in macOS, despite not apparently being exposed to the user. Here’s what I know. | Continue reading
macOS 11.2, 11.2.1 and 11.2.2 have come in quick succession. What do they tell us about how difficult it is to update Big Sur’s sealed System volume? Is this the way to go? | Continue reading
Fast compact external SSDs are prone to thermal throttling. This is demonstrated during tests writing 96 files, when transfer rates fell from 2 GB/s to around 700 MB/s. | Continue reading
Apple has revealed the hidden Fallback Recovery OS mode available on M1 Macs. How to enter and use it, and why it’s another big plus. | Continue reading
Making an external bootable SSD for an M1 Mac has proved tricky. Has this changed in macOS 11.2? If you’ve already got 11.1 running on one, how do you update it to 11.2? | Continue reading
Not only has Apple not provided standalone updaters for macOS 11.2, or for Mojave and Catalina Security Updates 2021-001, but it has removed the Big Sur 11.1 installer. It’s just like iOS now… | Continue reading
Something wrong with the Finder or an app, and you want to trash its preferences? Don’t: macOS will defeat you. Here’s how to do that so it works. | Continue reading
Detailed account of disk, volume and folder layouts on Big Sur’s boot disks, complete with roadmaps which are downloadable as PDFs. | Continue reading
Improved tests, statistical analysis, and interface, together with a 21 page Help book detailing its range of tests in 5,000 words. Ready to use for real. | Continue reading
Processors haven’t just increased in speed and packed more transistors into a smaller space. Features such as the Neural Engine in the M1 show Apple is moving in a different direction. | Continue reading
Using 140 files of sizes 10 KB – 2 GB, the M1 read files significantly faster than a T2 Mac, but the latter wrote files slightly quicker. Highest read rate on the M1 was 10.8 GB/s, which seem… | Continue reading
Disk Utility in Big Sur can turn a 1 TB external disk into 4.5 TB or more of imaginary containers. Sadly it’s just a bug, and here’s how to work around it. | Continue reading
If you’ve been unable to create a bootable external disk to use with your M1 Mac, this explains what you need and its limitations and quirks. | Continue reading
Apple released macOS Big Sur 11.1 on 14 December. Although yesterday it finally posted standalone installers for the two concomitant security updates to Catalina and Mojave, no standalone updaters … | Continue reading
When does an M1 Mac validate its Sealed System Volume? Who designed its display interface? How soon does Find My Mac launch? So many answers found in the log. | Continue reading
It’s enough to make you and Edvard Munch scream: every QuickLook thumbnail and preview has rounded corners. They scream out the arrogance of the designer. | Continue reading
How can you tell whether your Mac’s shiny new Sealed System Volume is properly sealed? You could easily be misled into thinking it isn’t. | Continue reading
Why does it take 2 years to realise that macOS has been checking signing certificate validity online? | Continue reading
Will stripping executable code for an unwanted platform stop an app from working? What savings are to be gained? | Continue reading
If you were to strip unwanted code from a Universal App, would it still pass Big Sur’s strict security checks? | Continue reading
How macOS checks executable code before it’s loaded and run, in macOS 10.15 and 11.0. Covering integrity checks using hashes, and validity of the signing certificate, on Intel and ARM. | Continue reading
Although most were worried about Apple’s failure to deliver upgrades to Big Sur, the most serious problem left many users unable to launch any apps. | Continue reading
How your Mac’s security and privacy systems can cause duplicate copies of files to be written to your backups. | Continue reading
In an M1 Mac, all its main components are tightly integrated and interdependent. To achieve performance with versatility, they come ready-built, not kits. | Continue reading
So convenient to use – edit them in the Comments: section of Finder’s Get Info dialog. But as reliable as loose scraps of paper, and as easily lost. | Continue reading
Some articles to read before you try upgrading to Big Sur, or ordering a new Apple Silicon Mac. Insights and tips. | Continue reading
A complete guide to the structure and layout of APFS startup disks from High Sierra to Big Sur (Intel), together with tear-out PDF charts. | Continue reading
Provision of maintenance procedures and tools is at the heart of software engineering, but not in macOS. | Continue reading