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Ask TUAW: iPhone Bluetooth, transferring applications, pasting without formating, selling a Mac, and more

mat lu
Updated ·5 min read

With the hubbub of Macworld behind us it's time again for Ask TUAW! In this edition we'll be looking at questions about using an iPhone in the car, pasting without formatting, preparing a Mac for sale, transferring an application to a new install, and more.

As always, your suggestions are most welcome, and questions for next week should be left in the comments. When asking a question please include which machine you're running and which version of Mac OS X, (we'll assume you're running Leopard on an Intel Mac if you don't specify). And now, on to the questions!

Lauren asks

I listen to podcasts on my iPhone (3g) using the aux jack in my car. My parents want to get me a bluetooth headset to use as I drive. If I get one, will the iPhone know to route the call to the headset instead of the car speakers, or will I have to unplug it from the aux jack whenever I get a call?

The iPhone should behave exactly the way you want it to. If you have the Bluetooth headset paired with the iPhone it will pause the music and route audio to your headset automatically. You should not have to unplug it.


howiegroove asks

I would like to reinstall OSX completely and start from scratch again on my macbook. However, there are programs that I downloaded that I would like to reinstall with a clean slate of OSX but I do not have the original dmg files. How do I reinstall OSX while keeping only specific apps that I already have on my HD, but giving me a clean slate otherwise? I used time machine but I don't back up every day, but rather every couple weeks. One of the main programs that I have that I would like after the clean slate is Visualhub. The problem is that it is no longer in business and I can't get the original dmg file.

For many applications it's good enough just to copy them from your Applications folder. For some shareware applications, however, you're right that you'll lose registration information. For VisualHub in particular, the developer has put up instructions for backing up the applicaiton. Basically you just need to copy some files from the /Library/Application Support/Techspansion folder as well as the plist from ~/Library/Preferences/com.techspansion.visualhub.plist to the same locations on your new install.


aaron asks

[How can I] paste from the clipboard without formatting?

This is a recurring annoyance in OS X. There are different ways to do this, but what I do is use the brilliant little multiple clipboard utility Jumpcut. In addition to holding up to 40 clipboard items it also removes formatting when pasting. So I assign it to ⌥+ ⌘+V. When I need to paste without formatting I just paste with Jumpcut instead of the standard ⌘+V.


zsports asks

I was wondering what I need to do to prepare my mac for sale on ebay or to another third party? Should I reinstall the operating system? I obviously have sensitive data on my machine that I want to wipe before i put my system up for resale. What's the best way to handle this dilemma?

To some degree it depends on how sensitive your data is. If you merely erase & reinstall OS X, some of your data may be recoverable by forensic analysis. To prevent this, you'll need to use the Disk Utility to Secure Erase your hard drive. Restart your Mac with your OS X install discs (put in the disc and restart holding down the 'c' key). After your Mac boots, start the Disk Utility (look in the menubar). Select your hard drive and then the Erase tab. Select the "Security Options..." button and choose the number of times you want it to zero out your data. The more times you choose the more secure it will be, but will also take more time. The 7-pass Erase should be more than adequate (personally I'd be satisfied with one pass, but I'm not that paranoid). You might consider starting it one night before you go to bed and letting it work all night. Once that's done you can reinstall OS X as usual.


jln asks

For whatever reason, when I bring Quicklook from the files on my Desktop, the QL window appears on my second monitor. I looked at various preferences files but with no luck. Is there a way to reset Quicklook window to appear on my main monitor (just like with any other app I use QL from)?

Just drag the Quick Look window back onto your main display. It should subsequently appear there when you invoke it.


Steve asks

I take a lot of photos, and I like to cut out the worthless shots in Finder before I edit them and then import into iPhoto. That means a lot of deleting. But Finder seems to make this impossible. Let's say I have 1,000 photos, of which I want to keep about 200 in the end. The simple way to do this would be to flip on Cover Flow or use Quick View, and just keep hitting CMD-Delete as I hit file after file I do not want. But Finder makes this impossible, because instead of selecting the next file when I CMD-Delete, it instead completely deselects everything! If I hit the down arrow it starts me all the way at the top of the folder, and if I'm using Quick View the preview changes to the parent folder's contents. Is there some trick I don't know for this relatively simple file management trick?

If you put the Finder into Cover Flow view (⌘4) it should behave exactly like you want it to. On my Mac once you delete a file it automatically selects the next file and you can advance through the list with the arrow keys. The behavior you describe occurs in list and column view, but not in Cover Flow.