Last Week on My Mac: Just asking for advice

How do you get good advice? The fact that you’re reading this makes it likely that you’ve come here in the past, but where else do you go?

When I’m researching for articles here, my first visits are to Apple’s support pages for users and those for developers, but I’m only too well aware of their limitations. A month ago I wrote about the Tips app that Apple has thrust to the fore in Sequoia, and wondered whether it’s destined for greater things. Last week, I thought it might be informative to check how AI is doing, so turned to one of the most wanted features coming in Sequoia 15.2 next month, ChatGPT.

To assess how reliable ChatGPT might be as a source of troubleshooting guidance, I asked it half a dozen questions I have recently asked, and answered myself, in the pages I contribute to MacFormat’s Genius Tips, and its sister publication MacLife. If you want to read my answers in full, you’ll find them in MacFormat issue 409, although most have been the subject of articles here.

How to back up all the files in my iCloud Drive?

ChatGPT detailed how to copy the entire contents of iCloud Drive to local storage, explaining that “by saving a copy locally or to an external drive, you have created a manual backup of your iCloud Drive files.” It failed to point out that Time Machine and other backup utilities will back up files that haven’t been evicted from iCloud Drive, and some third-party apps can accomplish that automatically.

That answer is spectacularly wrong, and merely creates a local copy of files, most of which are probably already downloaded to that Mac and being backed up.

How to exclude files from iCloud Drive?

ChatGPT here misunderstood the question and instructed me how to stop apps from syncing their documents and data with iCloud, in the Apps syncing to iCloud Drive setting for iCloud Drive. It also came up with the crazy tip: “Additionally, you can move files you want to exclude from iCloud Drive to another location on your Mac that is not part of the iCloud Drive directory.” Thankfully, I know of a much better way that does answer that question.

How to make bootable backups of my Mac running Sonoma?

Although ChatGPT opened with promise, responding that “macOS’s built-in Time Machine backup feature does not create bootable backups on its own,” it quickly got into trouble, and at no time advised me not to attempt this. Neither did it direct me to support information that explains the details, such as this page for Carbon Copy Cloner, where it states: “we do not support nor recommend making bootable copies of the system as part of a backup strategy.”

ChatGPT then instructed me to prepare an external drive formatted as “Mac OS Extended (Journalled)” on which to create that bootable backup. At the end, it signed off reassuringly: “by following these steps, you will create a bootable backup of your Mac running macOS Sonoma, providing peace of mind in case of system failures or data loss.”

The advice given here is again spectacularly wrong.

How to reset the NVRAM in my M2 Mac?

ChatGPT’s response opened with waffle only relevant to Intel Macs, about how resetting the NVRAM “can help resolve issues with startup, audio volume, display resolution, time zone settings, and more.”

It next proceeded to describe how to start up an Apple silicon Mac in Recovery mode, then to open Terminal and enter the command nvram -c, that it confidently asserted “will clear the NVRAM.” Not only is that known to be ineffective and normally to return an error, but as Apple explains “steps to reset NVRAM don’t apply to Mac computers with Apple silicon, and aren’t needed on those computers.”

It seems strange that ChatGPT is so unaware of Apple’s own support notes.

How to stop kernel_task taking so much CPU?

This is a well-known cardinal sign of a Mac that’s getting too hot and needs to cool down. Nevertheless, ChatGPT’s first suggestion was to “check for Resource-Heavy Applications: Open Activity Monitor and close any applications or processes that might be using excessive resources.” As it didn’t make it clear that I shouldn’t try killing kernel_task itself, that’s dangerous advice.

Only then did it mention that I should ensure my Mac has “sufficient ventilation”, as “if your Mac overheats, kernel_task may run to throttle the CPU speed to prevent damage.”

ChatGPT then moved on to recommend that I “update macOS” “as updates can fix bugs that cause inefficiencies.” A little further down, it even recommended that I should “check for Flash Content”, forgetting that Flash died four years ago.

How can I get notifications delivered reliably on both my iPhone and Apple Watch?

With this last question, ChatGPT once again failed to understand its implications, and walked through a long series of checks through settings. Only towards the end did it bother to mention the obvious issue alluded to in the question, that they’re delivered to the device you’re using and not to both at the same time. Well, in theory, at least.

My conclusion therefore has to be:

Only ask ChatGPT if you already know the correct answer

otherwise you’re likely to be sent on a wild goose chase, misunderstood, or fed stuff and nonsense. Perhaps it’s best left to writing short stories for children who will believe every word.