Tagged: kernel extension

The ‘Genius’ inside your computer

EtreCheck

EtreCheck is a simple little app to display the important details of your system configuration and allow you to copy that information to the Clipboard. It was designed by an Apple engineer, and is meant to be used with Apple Support Communities to help people help you with your Mac.

It’s a nifty little utility that will list every daemon, launch agent, kernel extension and plugin running on your system, as well as some other insightful information. It’s like having a Apple Genius living inside your Mac. The app really does nothing you can’t do with the Terminal, but it makes it much easier to read and decipher.

Troubleshooting: List installed 3rd-party kernel extensions

TerminalBack in the days prior to OS X, it was easy to find 3rd party (and Apple) system extensions on your Mac. They were all located in the System>Extensions folder. With OS X though, the task of even knowing which kernel extensions are installed isn’t quite as easy, which can be particularly frustrating when you’re troubleshooting an issue on your Mac.

For the geeks among you, it’s quite easy though. To list all 3rd party extensions, simply launch the Terminal app located in your Utilities folder and type the following:
kextstat | grep -v com.apple

You can also list all the Apple-installed kernel extensions by typing:
kextstat

I came across this little hint over at OSXDaily, a site I visit quite often because of the variety of topics covered.