Some advanced Mac users require having the root user enabled in Mac OS X for administrative or troubleshooting purposes. While many will keep the root user account password the same as their general administrator password, this is not always recommended for some situations, and thus these Mac users may wish to change the root user account password in Mac OS X.

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Using FileVault full disk encryption is one of the better ways to protect your Mac and personal documents from prying eyes and password resets, but if you’re troubleshooting a Mac with FileVault, either your own or someone else’s, it’s kind of annoying to have another layer of passwords necessary to enter before you’ll be able to get in. Additionally, for situations where you’re performing remote management or administration tasks through SSH or Remote Login, if you were to need to reboot the remote Mac to install an OS X update, you wouldn’t be able to enter the necessary FileVault password, right? Well, yes, unless you temporarily bypass FileVault with an authorized restart.

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The Apple logo is iconic and used frequently by fans, but if you’re looking to type the Apple logo () on an iPhone or iPad you won’t find it in the standard keyboard options or special characters. Indeed, for the time being anyway, the Apple logo does not have an easily accessible character option in the iOS keyboard (it probably deserves a place in the Emoji keyboard at least). That doesn’t mean you can’t type out the Apple icon from an iOS device though, you’ll just need to use one of the following tricks.

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Microsoft has released a free public preview version of the Microsoft Office 2016 Suite for Mac. The Office suite includes Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Outlook, and OneNote, which are arguably the most popular productivity apps in existence.

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If you’ve been waiting to get your hands on a larger screen iPad, you’ll need to wait a bit longer. Apple is said to be delaying the release of a larger screened 12.9″ iPad model until later in the year, according to a set of new reports from Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal.

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A notable amount of Mac users have discovered that a random Mac OS X password popup window can appear from iCloud, FaceTime, or Messages, any of each asking for the respective iCloud password. The random password request is very non-specific and just has the logo, “iCloud Password – Please enter your password for email@address” with options to cancel or ‘Log In’. This seems to happen in Mac OS X Mavericks with some regularity , but it can happen in later Mac OS releases too.

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Rarely, an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch will become completely unresponsive and errant, leading to what amounts to a frozen device that just won’t do anything. The most obvious indicator of this is when something on screen just cease up completely and the touch screen becomes unresponsive to all input, and clicking on any of the hardware buttons also does nothing. Fortunately you can almost always remedy these unusual situations by forcibly rebooting the iOS device, a low tech solution that works to remedy most of these issues, it only takes a few seconds, and which is really pretty easy.

The tutorial here will show you how to force restart any iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch with a clickable Home button.

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Apple has released the first public beta version of OS X Yosemite 10.10.3 with the new Photos app. The beta software is build 14D87p, nearly the same as the most 2nd developer beta, and can be installed by users who are opting to participate in the OS X Yosemite Public Beta testing program.

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A few Mac users that update to Mac OS X discover their sound and audio output has ceased to work, leading to a completely mute Mac that does not respond to the volume keys. Fortunately, the mysterious missing sound output issue is incredibly simple to fix, and there is nothing actually wrong with the Mac.

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Just about all Mac users know that you can add items to the Dock of Mac OS X by dragging and dropping things into it, but another option, which may even be faster for some users, is to use a keyboard shortcut. With a quick keystroke, you can instantly add any item from the file system of a Mac – be it a file, folder, or application – into the Dock of Mac OS X.

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Some Mac users have noted that MacBook Air and MacBook Pro battery life has taken a downturn with their Macs running OS X El Capitan and OS X Yosemite. While this doesn’t impact all users, and much of the perception of diminished battery is likely due to usage and various features, there are some easy settings changes that users can make to potentially increase how long their portable Macs battery lasts with the latest versions of OS X.

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The invitation for the upcoming Apple Spring Forward event features an aesthetically pleasing image as the background, which happens to make a great wallpaper for your Mac and iOS devices too.

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Apple will host a media event on March 9, 2015 at 10AM PST. The event is to be held at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco, California, but Apple is planning on livestreaming the occasion as well.

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If you’ve ever come across a file that you can’t open on your Mac, or perhaps that doesn’t open as you may expect it to in a particular OS X app, maybe rendering poorly or like a bunch of gibberish after forcing it, this quick trick can help find a more appropriate application to open a given file type. This even works to help identify file types that you aren’t sure of, making it a multi-use tip that is great to know for all Mac users.

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Safari iCloud Tabs are a great feature that allow you to visit and access any actively opened web page in Safari on one device on another iPhone, iPad, or Mac. This is really handy if you found something interesting on your iPhone but you’d rather read it on your iPad or Mac, or vice versa, and in some ways it works kind of like Handoff for Safari, except there’s even less effort involved to use it. iCloud tabs in Safari sync automatically with any Mac, iPhone, or iPad using the same iCloud account, this tutorial will show you how to use this great feature to easily share your web browsing across devices.

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Customizing the login screen appearance on a Mac is a nice way to add some personal (or corporate) flair to the OS X login experience. How exactly to change the login screen wallpaper has differed continuously in the many versions of Mac OS throughout the years, but with OS X Yosemite, the process of setting a custom wallpaper is perhaps the easiest it has been in quite some time.

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A new beta version of OS X Yosemite 10.10.3 has been released by Apple. The second beta build arrives as 14D87h and continues to emphasize the new Photos app for Mac.

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Apple has released the second beta for iOS 8.3. The new build is 12F5037c and is available now for compatible iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch devices. Separately, a new Apple TV beta version is also available.

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