Tips & Tricks

Nobody likes unwanted text messages, whether it’s one of those mass spammy texts that everyone seems to inexplicably receive at random, or the group text from a friend of a cousins sisters friend that you sort of once kind of knew on Facebook years ago. Really if you think about it, there’s a good chance … Read More

Did you know the photo screen savers in Mac OS X are interactive and can turn into slideshows? There’s really not a lot to this trick, just activate any of the Mac screen savers that rely on images and then use the left and right arrow keys to navigate forward and back between images in … Read More

We’ve all been there, part of an extraordinarily length email thread and there’s really only a small portion of it that’s necessary to respond to, but without the proper context the reply may not seem complete or even inappropriate. Rather than quoting the entire email and explaining the response, use smart quotes to reply only … Read More

Have you ever wished your MacBooks built-in trackpad could have a different acceleration curve than an external mouse? If you’re a gamer or digital artist, you probably have. Sure, Mac OS lets you control the tracking speeds separately, but the acceleration curve is a whole other beast. In you’re unfamiliar with cursor acceleration, we’ve discussed … Read More

One of the better little feature of iTunes 11 is the addition of a new ability that lets you redeem gift cards for the App Store and iTunes Store using nothing but the built-in camera of a computer. This is much better than typing in the random numbers which is fairly easy to mess up, … Read More

Have you noticed how some sites promote their own app to download when you visit their website while browsing through Safari on an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch? This is done through a little pop-up menu that appears at the top of Safari when browsing some sites with iOS 6 onward, and it’s done through … Read More

Gmail is one of the most popular email services around, and if you use the web-based email client as your primary email app too then you’ll undoubtedly benefit from these three simple tips to boost productivity. No, they won’t end the email onslaught and 100 new email messages a day that we all suffer from, … Read More

If you want to be able to transfer music to an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch wirelessly and without syncing everything on the device with iTunes, you’ll need to turn on iTunes Wi-Fi Sync. Yes, you read that correctly, in order to add a song to an iPhone (iPod, etc) wirelessly and without syncing the … Read More

Did you know you can add or edit the lyrics of any song in your iTunes library? And of course, once you sync that song to your iPhone or iPod touch, you’ll then be able to view the lyrics directly on the iOS device screen. The whole process is quite simple, though you’ll have to … Read More

The new iTunes interface can be a bit jolting at first, but whether you’re still trying to get the hang of the new iTunes 11 interface of you’ve already made the changes to bring some familiarity back to the app, you’ll find good use out of these keyboard shortcuts. We’ve split them up into three … Read More

Whether the iPhone is flipped into silent mode or not, an incoming text message or iMessage will vibrate. While that’s great for being notified of a new text, in some situations you’d rather have complete silence when texting, you know, when you’re passing time in a boring meeting, sitting a quiet classroom, or maybe you’re … Read More

Photos taken with digital cameras, including the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch, all include some level of EXIF data, which is basically metadata with information about the image. With pictures taken from the iPhone and other smartphones, that data can even include details like precise geographic coordinates where the image was taken, (though that’s easy … Read More

The command line is often considered the realm of advanced users, but that doesn’t mean every usage of Terminal has to involve rocket science. This collection of terminal tips should apply to a wide variety of Mac users, and everyone from beginners to advanced users should find something worthwhile here.

Creating a new user account in Mac OS X either for yourself or for another person who may use your Mac is often a good idea. For another computer user, a separate user account insures that your data and their data is separate, effectively sharing the same computer but not the same files. For yourself, … Read More

Have you ever wanted a globe in the palm of your hands? Well thanks to your iPhone or iPad you can have a little virtual world and digital globe, right in your hand!

The Contacts app in OS X makes sharing the contact information of anyone in your address book extremely simple, and if you have iCloud enabled you can share any address from your phone right from your Mac, without reaching for the iPhone itself:

If you upgraded to iTunes 11 you know the default view removed the sidebar with its playlist view. Sure it’s easy to show again, but if you’d rather keep with the new simplified user interface, don’t miss this simple trick to make a new playlist or add songs to a playlist, without using the standard … Read More

Advanced Mac users may have noticed that X11 is no longer bundled with OS X, and it’s also no longer available as a separate installation option through Developer Tools. Instead, to run X11 on OS X Mountain Lion (and later), you’ll want to download and install the free XQuartz system, which bundles all the necessary … Read More