Your Mac runs a series of maintenance scripts on it’s own to clear out various cache and log files. To see when the scripts were last run, type the following at the command line: ls -la /var/log/*.out You will then see something like this: -rw-r–r– 1 root wheel 283124 16 Jun 02:15 /var/log/daily.out -rw-r–r– 1 … Read More

The iPhone Simulator, now called iOS Simulator, will emulate an iPhone or iPad. Newer versions of Xcode want you to launch the app through Xcode first, but that’s not entirely necessary. You can access the simulators directly through the Finder as well, here’s where to look for each version of Xcode:

I use screenshots constantly to share bits of information with people, and they can be really helpful when troubleshooting as well. Here’s all you’ll need to know about taking screenshots in Mac OS X, from capturing the screen in Mac OS X Finder and within applications, to changing the default screenshot file type, to taking … Read More

Here’s an amusing comic breaking down web browsers. Thanks to Joseph B. for the submission. Is this pretty accurate? Out of all the browsers I think Firefox is really too slow to be usable anymore, and I find myself in Safari and Chrome almost exclusively now. I haven’t touched Opera in ages, and the description … Read More

So you just downloaded the awesome Xcode code completion plugin (or any other) and you need to get it working… easy. You can install any Xcode plugin by dropping the .pbplugin file into the following directory: ~/Library/Application Support/Developer/Shared/Xcode/Plug-ins If you haven’t used plugins yet, the Plug-ins directory does not exist. In this case, all you … Read More

The Mac OS X Application Switcher is a handy way to quickly cycle through open applications, but did you know you can quickly quit programs you aren’t using with the Application Switcher as well?

Every once in a while you’ll come across a video that has audio syncing problems. Sometimes it’s minor where the sound track and dialogue is off by a few milliseconds and it’s barely noticeable, other times it can be off by as much as a few seconds and this makes watching the video almost impossible. … Read More

Spyware is generally something you don’t have to worry about on the Mac, but TheLoop is reporting that a company named ‘7art-screensavers’ is releasing malware on the Mac platform with a series of free screensaver downloads. Apparently the screensavers themselves do not include the spyware, but they attempt to download and install the “OSX/OpinionSpy” app … Read More

The Google Chrome browser is an excellent choice, because not only is it fast and powerful, but it sandboxes Flash to prevent the plugin from going totally nuts, and it offers tons of customization options. If you’re an avid Chrome user, you likely would appreciate using Chrome in full screen mode, and fortunately, you can … Read More

I’m kind of annoyed when I click a web link and it happens to be an iTunes Store link… iTunes then opens and it takes me out of my browser. I searched around for an easy solution and came across a method that reliably stops iTunes from launching when an iTunes App Store or Music … Read More

Code completion is one of the more useful features when you’re developing since it allows you to write code faster. While Code completion should be activated by default in newer versions of Xcode, it’s easy to enable and use if it isn’t. You can also improve the usability of Xcode’s code completion with a great … Read More

You can instantly open anything in fullscreen Quick Look mode by selecting the item and then hitting the Command+Option+Y keys. If you select multiple files and enter into fullscreen mode, it’s easy to navigate between them by using the arrow keys. You can then exit full screen mode by hitting the escape key. As a … Read More

The ambient light sensor on the newer Unibody MacBook Pro (all models: 13″, 15″, 17″) is located directly next to the iSight camera at the top of the display. You can verify the location by holding your hand over the area to the left of the iSight camera and watch as your screen dims and … Read More

You can adjust Gmail Notifier’s mail checking frequency interval by accessing an advanced preference in the application. In this example we will change the email check interval to 3 minutes. * Click the Gmail Notifier menubar icon * Hold down Command+Option keys and click on “Preferences” in the drop down menu * Enter the following … Read More

You can watch many AVI movies without any additional software on a Mac just by playing them in the included QuickTime Player (located in the Applications folder). Just double click the file and it should work, as modern versions of QuickTime in Mac OS X support a wide variety of video files and video codecs, … Read More

“Close Firefox – A copy of Firefox is already open. Only one copy of Firefox can be open at a time.” You may have gotten this message if Firefox has recently crashed or you killed the process. The reason this error is appearing is likely because there is a lock file on your Firefox profile. … Read More

If you want to start developing for the iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad, the first thing you’ll need to do is download and install the iPhone SDK. Yes, the iPhone SDK is what you will want to download even if you have no intention on developing for the iPhone itself and only the iPad, they … Read More

If you want to save and watch many web-based movies and Flash files directly to your Mac for later offline viewing try this neat reader provided tip out. Sent in by Robert Warner, he writes this handy trick to download just about any videos directly to your Mac using only Safari and the little-used Activity … Read More