How to Show Battery Percentage on iPhone to Indicate Remaining Battery Life

Feb 12, 2015 - 15 Comments
Show battery percentage remaining in iOS

A simple trick that can help manage iPhone battery life is to set the battery percentage remaining to be visible. This battery percentage indicator is off by default in iOS, and while that adds an element of simplicity to the status bar, the lonely battery icon isn’t particularly informative – to me, anyway. We’re going … Read More

Flatten a Nested Directory & File Hierarchy from Command Line of Mac OS X

Feb 11, 2015 - 19 Comments
Nested directory structure to flatten as shown in the Finder of Mac OS X

Have you ever needed to flatten a directory structure, moving all file contents from a directories child folders into a single folder? While you can do this manually by moving around files and folders from the file system of Mac OS X or Linux, a faster option is to turn to the command line. Maybe … Read More

Change the Mac Ringtone Sound for Incoming iPhone & FaceTime Calls

Feb 10, 2015 - 9 Comments
Changing the Mac Ringtone for FaceTime and iPhone calls

Now that the Continuity feature allows the Mac to receive incoming calls from your associated iPhone, in addition to standard FaceTime video and audio chat, you may want to take a moment to customize the ringtone that sounds when a call is coming to a particular Mac. This is particularly helpful with multiple-Mac environments with … Read More

iOS 8.3 Beta 1 Released to Developers

Feb 9, 2015 - 2 Comments
iOS 8.3 Beta 1

Apple has released the first beta of iOS 8.3 to those registered with the iOS Developer program, arriving as build 12F5027d. This is somewhat unusual given that iOS 8.2 is also currently still in beta release as version 8.2b5, but it may suggest a different focus for each point version of the operating system.

iOS 9 Said to Emphasize Performance, Stability, & Bug Fixes

Feb 9, 2015 - 25 Comments

iOS 9 will primarily aim for system performance and stability improvements, according to a new report from the well-sourced 9to5mac. Furthermore, iOS 9 will have a ‘”huge” focus’ on fixing bugs and bringing under the hood improvements to the mobile experience, while the new iOS version will have less of an emphasis on bringing new … Read More

Apple Runs New “Make Music with iPad” Commercial [Video]

Feb 8, 2015 - 7 Comments
iPad

Apple has started to run a new iPad ad focused on creating noise with the device, called ‘Make Music with iPad’. The commercial follows an artist known as “Elliphant” and shows how a song is composed using various apps on the iPad to write lyrics and make a beat.

How to Check What Cellular Carrier Network an iPhone Uses (or Used)

Feb 8, 2015 - 66 Comments
Check cellular carrier on the iPhone even without a SIM card or cell service

Knowing what network an iPhone uses can be important for trying to repurpose an old device, buying a used iPhone, or simply to determine if a particular iPhone will work on a network of choice. While the iPhones top status bar will show the carrier name of an active cellular network, if the device isn’t … Read More

Show & Hide Notification Center Widgets in Today View of Mac OS X

Feb 7, 2015 - 3 Comments
iTunes Notification Center widget is here just like you wanted

The Mac Notification Center gained widgets in OS X Yosemite, which are revealed when the Notification Center is opened and the “Today” view is chosen. This looks and functions a bit like Widgets in iOS, and these widgets range from World Clock, Calculator, Weather, Reminders, Calendar, Stocks, Social, and an to an iTunes widget, but … Read More

View iPhone Cellular Signal & Battery Life from Mac OS X

Feb 6, 2015 - 9 Comments
OS X Instant Hotspot lets you view an iPhone signal and battery life

The Instant iPhone Wi-Fi Hotspot feature in Mac OS X is incredibly useful if your Mac is on the go or you need an alternate internet connection, but even if you’re not aiming to use the cellular internet sharing capability of iPhone there are some other handy uses for the feature, like checking two of … Read More

Humor: Use Comic Sans as the System Font in OS X Yosemite

Feb 6, 2015 - 33 Comments

If you’re not happy with the usage of Helvetica Neue as a system font in OS X Yosemite, why not go completely ridiculous and replace the Mac system font with Comic Sans? Yes Comic Sans, somewhere high on the list of worst fonts ever, can now be the universal system font on Mac OS X. … Read More

OS X 10.10.3 Beta 1 with Photos App Released for Testing

Feb 5, 2015 - 16 Comments
A very nice black user interface in OS X Yosemite Photos app

Apple has released the first pre-release seed version of OS X 10.10.3 to developers. This particular beta version of Mac system software arrives as build 14D72i and seems to focus primarily on a new Photos app, which aims to replace iPhoto in OS X.

Understanding Why Terminal Doesn’t Let You Type a Password

Feb 4, 2015 - 33 Comments
Typing a password into Terminal won't show up, this is intentional

Sometimes you need to enter a password into the terminal, usually for sudo or su commands, which lets users execute a command with super user privileges. This is fairly typical for allowing access to read or modify something that would otherwise not be possible with a standard user account. You’ll commonly see sudo prefixing another … Read More

Jump to a Line Number in TextEdit Documents on the Mac

Feb 3, 2015 - 9 Comments
Select a line number in TextEdit documents for Mac OS X

TextEdit is a surprisingly handy Mac app that is mostly underutilized and under appreciated, and while it’s certainly not going to compete with the abilities of pro text editors like BBEdit and TextWrangler, it can function as a simple code editor in a pinch. One of the quintessential features of any good text editor is … Read More

Set or Disable Sleep Due to Mac System Inactivity from Command Line in Mac OS X

Feb 3, 2015 - 12 Comments
Sleep Mac

Mac users can adjust the idle time to sleep their computers easily through the Energy Saver preference panel, but many advanced Mac OS X users may wish to turn to the command line to perform such a task. This allows for scripting, remote checking and changing idle sleep behavior through SSH, and you can also … Read More

How to Detach a Phone Number from iMessage if You’re Switching Away from iPhone

Feb 2, 2015 - 5 Comments

If you have ever switched from an iPhone to an Android or Windows phone, either temporarily, out of necessity, or for testing purposes, you may have noticed that a new phone will sometimes not receive inbound messages that have been sent from other iPhone users. Well, you probably didn’t notice it because you didn’t get … Read More

iOS 8.2 Beta 5 Released for Developers

Feb 2, 2015 - 1 Comment
iOS 8.2 beta 5

Those registered with the iOS Developer program will find a new beta of iOS 8.2 available. The fifth beta version build arrives as 12D5480A and continues to focus on general bug fixes and improvements. The upcoming iOS release will also include support for iPhone and iPad communicating with the Apple Watch, the Watch is set … Read More

How to Hide a Specific User Account from Login Screens of Mac OS X

Feb 1, 2015 - 15 Comments
Hide a specific user account in Mac OS X

Mac users who have multiple user accounts on a single machine may sometimes wish to hide a specific user account from appearing on the login screens of OS X. This is fairly common for systems administrators who want to hide an admin account that can be used for direct or remote troubleshooting, but it can … Read More

Watch Super Bowl Live Streams Free Online from Web, iPad, or iPhone

Jan 31, 2015 - 7 Comments

Super Bowl XLIX is here, and if you don’t want to miss any of the Seahawks vs Patriots action, you can stream the game live in any web browser, on any iPad, and even on some iPhones, all for free if you’re in the USA.

Subscribe to OSXDaily

Subscribe to RSS Subscribe to Twitter Feed Follow on Facebook Subscribe to eMail Updates

Tips & Tricks

News

iPhone / iPad

Mac

Troubleshooting

Shop on Amazon to help support this site