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For a little project I'm working on, I had to figure out which MacOS version my computer was running from Terminal (command line).
Took a bit of searching, but I finally found this trick:
sw_vers
Which produces an output like this for macOS Sierra:
ProductName: Mac OS X
ProductVersion: 10.12.2
BuildVersion: 16C67
If you only want one of these items:
~ hans$ sw_vers -buildVersion
16C67 ~ hans$ sw_vers -productName
Mac OS X ~ hans$ sw_vers -productVersion
10.12.2
Alternatives:
defaults read "$3/System/Library/CoreServices/SystemVersion"
produces:
{
ProductBuildVersion = 16C67;
ProductCopyright = "1983-2016 Apple Inc.";
ProductName = "Mac OS X";
ProductUserVisibleVersion = "10.12.2";
ProductVersion = "10.12.2";
}
and:
defaults read loginwindow SystemVersionStampAsString
results in:
10.12.2
and:
system_profiler SPSoftwareDataType
resulteert in:
gives you:
Software:
System Software Overview:
System Version: macOS 10.12.2 (16C67)
Kernel Version: Darwin 16.3.0
Boot Volume: Macintosh HD
Boot Mode: Normal
Computer Name: Hans’s MacBook Pro
User Name: Hans Luijten (hans)
Secure Virtual Memory: Enabled
System Integrity Protection: Enabled
Time since boot: 23:40
and another one:
cat /System/Library/CoreServices/SystemVersion.plist
lists:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
<key>ProductBuildVersion</key>
<string>16C67</string>
<key>ProductCopyright</key>
<string>1983-2016 Apple Inc.</string>
<key>ProductName</key>
<string>Mac OS X</string>
<key>ProductUserVisibleVersion</key>
<string>10.12.2</string>
<key>ProductVersion</key>
<string>10.12.2</string>
</dict>
</plist>