FireWolf OS X PE V7All-in-one Manual

Version 1.0

Copyright © 2015 FireWolf @ FireWolf Pl. All Rights Reserved.

https://www.firewolf.science

CatalogueChapter I. Introduction➣ What’s FireWolf OS X PE?➣ Is FireWolf OS X PE safe?➣ Where can I download the FireWolf OS X PE?➣ Which disk image should I download?

Chapter II. Prepare to use FireWolf OS X PE➣ How to restore FireWolf OS X PE into my disk?➣ How to boot FireWolf OS X PE from my disk?➣ Why can’t I boot the FireWolf OS X PE V7.0?

Chapter III. Start to use FireWolf OS X PE➣ Menu Bar Functions / Applications➣ Main Window Functions / Applications➣ System Maintenance

Appendix. Using dd command to restore a disk image to a media under OS X

Chapter IIntroduction

1. What’s FireWolf OS X PE?FireWolf OS X PE is an enhanced OS X Recovery system, aka Mac PE. It will help you maintain your OS X system. FireWolf OS X PE supports both real Macs and Hackintosh builds.

2. Is FireWolf OS X PE safe?Yes, it is safe. It does not include any virus, malicious softwares, built-in advertisements and backdoors.

3. Where can I download the FireWolf OS X PE?All downloads are hosted on my website or official mirrors. Please visit the FireWolf OS X PE V7 Download Center. Always check the MD5 value of your downloaded disk image. MD5 information can be found on here.

4. Which disk image should I download?There are two disk images available to download.

If you are a Mac user or Hackintosh user who use Clover as bootloader, please download the Boot.FireWolf.OS.X.PE.V7.0.ULT-Zlib.dmg

If you are a Hackintosh user and do not have a Clover bootloader, you can download the Boot.FireWolf.OS.X.PE.V7.0.wClover.ULT-Zlib.dmg

Chapter IIPrepare to use FireWolf OS X PE

1. How to restore FireWolf OS X PE to my disk?

(1) Restore FireWolf OS X PE under Windows.You need to download and install TransMac.After you finish installing TransMac, right click the shortcut on your desktop, choose “Run as Administrator” to open TransMac.Plug in your USB stick, right click the USB stick in the left column of TransMac, choose “Restore with Disk Image”, choose the disk image file of FireWolf OS X PE in the popup open dialog.

(2) Restore FireWolf OS X PE under OS X.• If you want to restore the disk image without Clover bootloader, double

click the disk image you have downloaded, open the Disk Utility.app, plugin your USB stick, click the volume name of the FireWolf OS X PE which is “Boot FireWolf OS X PE V7.0 Ultimate”, click the “Restore” tab, drag the partition of your USB stick into the “Destination” field, click the “Restore” button at the bottom to start.

• If you want to restore the disk image with Clover bootloader, you need to use dd command to restore it to your media.

• See Appendix: Use dd command to restore a disk image to a media.

2. How can I boot FireWolf OS X PE from my disk?If you are a real Mac user, plug in your USB stick, restart your Mac, and press the option key to enter the boot menu. Select Boot FireWolf OS X PE and press enter to boot.

If you are a hackintosh user and have restored the FireWolf OS X PE without Clover disk image, first please make sure that you have placed essential 3rd-party kernel extensions in /EFI/Clover/Kexts/10.10/ for your hackintosh build, and then plug in your USB stick, restart your computer to enter the Clover bootloader menu, use direction keys to select Boot Recovery from Boot FireWolf OS X PE V7.0 Ultimate, press the space key and select boot with injected kexts.

If you are a hackintosh user and have restored the FireWolf OS X PE with Clover disk image, first make sure that you have placed the following stuff in the EFI partition of your USB stick.

• essential 3rd-party kexts in /EFI/Clover/Kexts/10.10/.• proper Clover boot configuration file Config.plist for your build.• proper EFI drivers in /EFI/Clover/Drivers64UEFI/.• other essential stuff specific for your build.

Then restart your computer and set your USB stick as the first boot device in your BIOS settings or quick boot menu. So now you will enter the Clover installed in your USB stick and use direction key to select Boot Recovery from Boot FireWolf OS X PE V7.0 Ultimate, press the space key and select boot with injected kexts.

3. Why can’t I boot the FireWolf OS X PE V7.0 from my disk?For real Mac users, please make sure that your disk image is not damaged. To check this, verify the MD5 value of your downloaded disk image and try to restore the disk image again.

For Hackintosh users, if you get stuck during the verbose boot process such as kernel panic, try to disable the CPU power management, Nvidia discrete graphics card, etc. If you get stuck AFTER the verbose boot process and see a Apple logo with a progress bar, try to wait for a few seconds, or try to click your mouse and you will see the Language Chooser interface.

Chapter IIIStart to use FireWolf OS X PE

After choosing the preferred language, you will see the main OS X Utility window. Double click the FireWolf MultiApp Launcher to start.

You CANNOT double click a file to open it under OS X PE. You need to first open the corresponding application and then use its “File” menu to open.For instance, if you want to edit a *.plist file, you have to first launch the PlistEdit Pro.app and then click the “File” menu and select “Open” to open the *.plist file.

1. Menu bar functions / applications(1) ShutdownThis will shut down your computer immediately without any prompt. You will lose every data you haven’t saved or in the RAM disks.

(2) RebootThis will restart your computer immediately without any prompt. You will lose every data you haven’t saved or in the RAM disks.

(3) Reset PassThis will help you reset the account password on any OS X system partitions.

(4) KCPM UtilityThis will launch the KCPM Utility.More detailed information can be found in Chapter III Module 3.See System Maintenance: Rebuilding Caches, Repairing Permissions, Installing Kexts.

(5) SnipThis will launch the Snip screen capture program. ⚠ Attention: During the first launch, please (and you have to) set up where to save the screen captures. You can either store them in a RAM disk or a local physical disk.(6) TerminalThis will launch the OS X Terminal.

(7) OSI MakerThis will show a popup menu.Please read the descriptions carefully before launching the corresponding utility. Clicking the blue right arrow will launch the utility. The first two will launch the OSXIM.app while the last one will launch the DarwinSetup.app.Finder will be automatically killed for the safety before launching OSXIM.app or DarwinSetup.app.

• OSXIM.app Subsection:✏ Notes:- The OS X installer package should be downloaded from the Mac

App Store.- If you have downloaded a disk image including the OS X installer

package, please first use the Disk Utility.app to mount this image. However, it is highly recommended that you select an installer package directly stored in a local disk but not in a disk image, because it is too slow to read the installer from a disk image.

- Just in case of an error, please try to manually eject any existing InstallESD.dmg and BaseSystem.dmg BEFORE creating an installer.

Selecting the “Create a bootable installer” option will create a vanilla bootable installer. Note that this installer can ONLY be used to install OS X on a disk using GUID partition table.

Selecting the “Create a custom bootable installer” option will enable the customization menu. Click the right arrow icon to access the detailed customization menu.

Target disk path will not be required if you have selected the “Create a custom bootable installer image” option. However, you will be asked to select a place to save the installer image after you click the Execute button.

• DarwinSetup.app Subsection:

Click the El Capitan icon or binoculars icon to select an OS X El Capitan installer.

Click the disk icon or binoculars icon to select a target volume on which you want to install OS X El Capitan.

Click the eraser icon to erase the target volume with OS X Extended (Journaled) filesystem, aka HFSJ+. Note that you will lose every data on the target volume.

Known issues:

- Unattended Mode may not work properly, which means you may still be required to select a target volume after the reboot.

(8) Clover ToolsClick the blue right arrow to launch the corresponding utility.

• Clover EFI Tools for PE Subsection:You can mount ESP (EFI system partition) and install Clover (for legacy BIOS / UEFI BIOS) rev3248 in Clover EFI Tools.

Note that Clover EFI Tools will install the boot file by default. If your motherboard supports UEFI boot, you can delete the boot file in your EFI partition.

• Install Clover from official package Subsection:You will be asked to select a Clover *.pkg file. You can use Maxthon to access the Internet and download the latest Clover official package from Sourceforge.net.

Due to the limitations of OS X Recovery system, Clover will NOT be automatically installed to ESP. So you have to manually fix this by the following procedures.

Supposed that you want to install the Clover on the ESP, and basically your ESP and OS X system partition (and OS X Recovery partition) are on the same physical disk. During the installation process, you will be asked to select the disk where you want to install the Clover. And as usual you will select the OS X system partition and click continue (and Clover will be automatically installed on the ESP UNDER NORMAL OS X). After the installer shows completion message, mount your ESP, and copy the new EFI folder located at your system partition to your ESP.

(9) System InfoThis will launch the System Information.app and you can see the current information detected by OS X.

(10) Time MachineThis will launch the Restore from Time Machine.app to restore an existing Time Machine backup to your disk.

(11) RAM DiskThis will launch the Ramdisk Utility.app to help you create a RAM disk.

2. Main Window Functions / Applications(1) Wolf IconThis will show the current information of FireWolf OS X PE.

(2) Apple IconThis will show the utilities for real Macs and some advanced functions.(3) Path FinderThis will launch the Path Finder which is a powerful OS X file manager.• To show invisible files in Path FinderClick the View menu and check “Show Invisible Files”

• To delete a file in Path FinderSelect files/folders you want delete, click the Commands Menu and select delete.

(4) FinderThis will launch the OS X Finder.After you launch the Finder, you have to click the Desktop to enable Finder.

Showing Invisible Files is enabled by default.Click the “Relaunch” icon to relaunch/refresh the Finder.

(5) Hex FiendThis will launch the Hex editor.

(6) MaxthonThis will launch the internet browser Maxthon.To disable Ads on the website, click the menu icon and enable the AdHunter.

(7) Disk UtilityThis will launch the OS X’s Disk Utility.app.Showing invisible partitions is enabled by default.You can easily mount ESP, Recovery partition or other supported partition in Disk Utility.

(8) DiskWarriorThis will launch the powerful disk repair tool DiskWarrior.✏ Notes Please quit every applications except FireWolf MultiApp Launcher before launching the DiskWarrior, otherwise you cannot be back to the Launcher.

(9) MasiASLThis will launch the ACPI tables editor.Local repos such as Laptops Patches by Rehabman, Patches repo by JMike (@daxuexinsheng) will be automatically enabled.In addition, you can access some online repos such as Intel 6/7/8/9 series patches by PJALM and ALC_Injection by toleda if you have Internet access.

(10) DPCIManagerThis will launch the hardware information manager. ⚠ Attention: Some functions such as Repair Perms, Rebuild Caches, Install Kexts, P States, Extract DSDT, etc CANNOT work properly.

(11) Sublime Text 3This will launch the powerful text/code editor.

(12) Chameleon WizardThis will launch the Chameleon Configurations tool. You can easily use it to create a custom org.Chameleon.Boot.plist or a SMBios.plist. Other functions may not work properly.

(13) Clover ConfiguratorThis will launch the Clover configurations editor. You can also use it to mount ESP.

(14) IORegistryExplorerThis will launch the IOReg viewer.

(15) PlistEdit ProThis will launch the property editor.

(16) Carbon Copy ClonerThis will launch the popular backup tool.

(17) BetterZip This will launch the archive manager.You can use this application to open or build an archive.⚠ Attention: During the first launch of BetterZip, please first go to the Preference Panel of BetterZip, select the “Advanced” tab and set the “Temporary folder”.The temporary folder must be a readable/writable folder, otherwise you will not be able to create an archive in BetterZip.

(18) Help icon at the lower right cornerThis will launch a popup window where you can see the description of every applications.

3. System Maintenance

➣ Repair Permissions of a system partitionRepairing permissions of a whole system partition supports all OS X system besides OS X El Capitan.Nonetheless, you can still repair the permissions of both /Library/Extensions and /System/Library/Extensions of an El Capitan partition.

➣ Rebuild Caches of a system partition

Besides using KCPM Utility, you can also launch the RebuildCaches command line tool located in /usr/local/bin to rebuild caches of a system partition.

Use the following command to see detailed usage information.

cd /usr/local/bin ./RebuildCaches -help

➣ Installing kernel extensionsBackup options:Backup of kernel extensions are located in the /Volumes/targetVolume/FireWolf_Kexts_Backup folder.

➣ Attention1. Please be patient because rebuilding caches and repairing permissions under OS X PE may be slow.

2. Rebuilding caches of an OS X El Capitan system partition may be unstable, which means that you may encounter with no responding (after waiting for a long time). This is probably because OS X El Capitan has updated system security policy so it may take a long time to unlock the access to the OS X El Capitan system partition before starting rebuilding caches. Using FireWolf OS X PE V8.0 Beta is recommended to maintain OS X El Capitan.

3. Repairing permissions on whole OS X El Capitan disk will be supported in FireWolf OS X PE V8.0.

4. The first beta of FireWolf OS X PE V8.0 will be released soon. Please follow FireWolf Pl. for further update.

AppendixUsing dd command to restore a disk image to a media under OS X

First plug in your USB stick and launch the terminal.Type the following command to check the disk identifier of your USB stick. diskutil list

The disk identifier of your USB stick will be diskN, where N is a integer.For instance, my USB drive is disk3

Then type the following command to attach the disk image.

hdiutil attach -nomount

After finish typing the command above, drag the disk image you have downloaded into the terminal and press the Return key.(Note that there is a space right after the “-nomount”)

After OS X finish attaching the disk image, you will see the disk identifier of the attached image.For instance, mine is disk4.Then type the following command to unmount your USB stick.

diskutil unmountDisk /dev/diskN

where diskN represents the disk identifier of your USB stick.

Then type the following command to restore the disk image to your USB stick.

sudo dd if=/dev/diskN of=/dev/diskM

where diskN represents the disk identifier of your USB stick and diskM represents the disk identifier of the attached disk image.

You will be prompted to type your password as we use sudo to get the privilege.

Just grab a cup of coffee and wait.