Tips & Tricks

Many Mac users go with the full sized Apple wired keyboard rather than a wireless keyboard so that they can have a dedicated number keypad on their keyboard. Sometimes that numeric pad seems to randomly stop working though, and suddenly numbers don’t type at all, which can be frustrating to say the least. To further … Read More

Apple Maps in iOS includes a fun feature that allows you to take a 3D tour of major cities around the world, complete with rendered landmarks, buildings, and terrain. Called 3D Flyover, you can also choose to navigate around in the three dimensional view, to zoom, rotate, and tilt the viewing angle as desired.

The Safari web browser has always included an ability to delete all web history, site data, searches, and cookies on a Mac, but the latest versions of Safari for Mac OS make this task even easier and offer a bit more control with four possible options, allowing users to perform removal of web browsing history … Read More

Many of us explored the array of new keyboard options available now that iOS supports third party keyboards, but if you’re anything like me you probably settled on one that worked for your typing needs (if not the iOS default and QuickType) and now your iPhone or iPad has multiple unused keyboards laying about. While … Read More

Many of us use our iPhones and iPads in the kitchen to assist with recipes or even entertainment while cooking, and they work wonderfully for this purpose. But electronics and turkey gravy don’t mix well, and to have a hassle free experience you’ll want to follow a few simple tips to help prevent frustrations, a … Read More

Many developers require MySQL on their Macs, but if you’ve tried to install MySQL in OS X El Capitan and Yosemite, you likely noticed that you’ll get an “installation failed” error during the process. That error sounds worse than it is, because you can avoid it entirely by choosing not to install the startup item … Read More

Messages app is generally associated with conversations, but new to Mac OS is a feature which allows Mac users to initiate screen sharing with another Mac user directly from an active iMessage window. This is great for remote collaboration, showing off something on your computer, a file transfer between remote Macs, or even for quick … Read More

Want to see the full desktop version of a website when browsing the web with Safari on iPhone? It’s easy when you learn how. Most iPhone users like to read and use websites specifically designed for mobile usage, which tend to simplify the user experience and focus attention a bit more. Since many websites detect … Read More

The iPhone has long had the excellent Personal Wi-Fi Hotspot feature, which effectively turns an iPhone or cellular iPad into a wireless router that Macs and other devices can connect to. That iPhone Hotspot feature gets even better for Mac users running modern versions of Mac OS X, because you can now enable the iPhones … Read More

While many Mac users have updated to OS X Yosemite, a notable amount have chosen to stay on OS X Mavericks or Mountain Lion for a variety of reasons, and some have even had to downgrade due to frustrations or incompatibilities that were experienced with the new version of OS X. Whatever the reason, if … Read More

If you’d rather your iTunes player take up less screen real estate, iTunes has two alternative player appearance options available, the album cover player, and the popular mini player. These are not new features to iTunes 12, but like many other things which have been switched up in the latest version, accessing them has changed … Read More

Safari in iOS has always had the ability to clear all browser history on the iPhone and iPad, but up until the latest versions of iOS, it was either delete all history or nothing. That has changed however, and if you would rather selectively delete individual pages from history instead of clearing out all browser … Read More

Some Mac users may encounter situations where they need to flush DNS cache in OS X for a name server to resolve properly, or for some DNS address change to become noticed by their individual computer. This is particularly relevant for system administrators, network admins, and web developers, but there are certainly situations where other … Read More

The Notes app in modern versions of iOS includes support for text formatting and media insertion. This is a welcome change for many reasons, as it not only improves the functionality of Notes app to serve as a scratchpad, but it also makes the Notes app and it’s iCloud syncing abilities between iOS devices and … Read More

A number of Mac users who were experiencing wi-fi connection difficulties with OS X Yosemite have found the problems continue to persist after updating to OS X 10.10.1. The reasons for this are not entirely clear given that OS X 10.10.1 has aimed specifically at improving wi-fi reliability, but some of the traditional troubleshooting steps … Read More

The iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus gained a feature called Reachability which, when activated, brings all onscreen icons and elements closer to the bottom of the display and Home button, thus making it easier for your thumb or finger to reach the desired touch points. While Reachability is proving to be a popular tool … Read More

Spotlight is the fantastic search engine built into OS X and iOS, and while most people associate Spotlight searches with finding documents on their Mac or launching applications, the feature set has expanded dramatically since OS X Yosemite. One of the more useful tricks found within the revised Spotlight search is the ability to search … Read More

The Mac Messages app has long had the ability to change the text size and font of your messages and conversations, but the adjustment functions have changed a bit in modern versions of MacOS system software, including Mojave, High Sierra, Sierra, OS X El Capitan and Yosemite. In Messages under Mac OS X, you now … Read More