I was looking at "About This Mac", and found several services running at startup which I have no intention of using. Is there any way of stopping these? The ones I mean are: Apache web server, Appleshare (file sharing, I presume), Authentication service, Remote desktop, and SNMP server. Another item I found listed was IFCStart. What is IFC?
Turning off unneeded services
- Thread starter Curiosity
- Start date
DeltaMac
Tech
from the Apple Developer docs -
When you are in the System Profiler, if you select each item in Startup Items, it will display a short info section about each item. If you are not using a specific service, you can simply find the item and delete it (the location of each startup file is displayed there) Good luck on that, as you may prevent a service from starting that is required for internal use by OS X. That would leave you with the need to reinstall, or possibly erase/reinstall.
Is your question "What services can I safely turn off, and won't affect the rest of the system?
Some of those services that you mention are simply startup files, but the services themselves do not actually run, unless you manually startup, such as the Apache Web Server, which by default is just a startup file with the service turned off. I suspect some others are similar. Check in your Activity Monitor to see which services are really running. You can also turn many services off there, just as a test. Most would restart by restarting your Mac.
When you are in the System Profiler, if you select each item in Startup Items, it will display a short info section about each item. If you are not using a specific service, you can simply find the item and delete it (the location of each startup file is displayed there) Good luck on that, as you may prevent a service from starting that is required for internal use by OS X. That would leave you with the need to reinstall, or possibly erase/reinstall.
Is your question "What services can I safely turn off, and won't affect the rest of the system?
Some of those services that you mention are simply startup files, but the services themselves do not actually run, unless you manually startup, such as the Apache Web Server, which by default is just a startup file with the service turned off. I suspect some others are similar. Check in your Activity Monitor to see which services are really running. You can also turn many services off there, just as a test. Most would restart by restarting your Mac.
eric2006,
The "Sharing" pane of Sysem Preferences lists remote desktop and file sharing, but not the others. No sharing is enabled.
DeltaMac,
Thanks for the info. None of the items I listed is in the Activity Monitor list. Why have a startup for something that is not going to run?
Looking at the Activity Monitor window brings up another question: What is meant by "% Nice" under "CPU"?
The "Sharing" pane of Sysem Preferences lists remote desktop and file sharing, but not the others. No sharing is enabled.
DeltaMac,
Thanks for the info. None of the items I listed is in the Activity Monitor list. Why have a startup for something that is not going to run?
Looking at the Activity Monitor window brings up another question: What is meant by "% Nice" under "CPU"?
DeltaMac
Tech
you have remote desktop and file sharing on, so you do have sharing enabled.
You have a startup for a particular process, because it needs to start when your system starts. If that particular process is not in use, or not enabled, then it basically takes no resources from the system, unless needed, or you turn that service on by enabling it. I think you will find that some of those startups do an initialization of those services during system startup, but if the service is not enabled, the service simply switches off till needed. If you are certain that a particular service is not needed by some other service (that is, exists in the system), then try removing the startup file. In some cases, an error message may be generated into the system log as a result. There are techs here more expert the I, with the need for some services that may not normally be in use. I prefer to leave as is.
The nice command changes the priority in the kernel's scheduler for a given process. The only time you will see a value in that section of the Activity Monitor would be if the process has been re-niced, and processor uses that process at a higher, or lower priority. The figure shown will normally be 0% unless you have done some priority rescheduling. (please don't ask me to explain it, I've only copied some information from somewhere else
)You can find out some more information by reading the man nice in your terminal....