Apple was recently awarded a patent for solar powered portable devices, which could pave the way for Macs, iPhones, and iPads running on a solar supplemented power source. The patent, which is Apple’s first to relate to solar powered portable devices, shows an unspecified “Portable Device” that has a standard battery which is augmented by an auxiliary power source, in this case solar power cells.

PatentlyApple says the patent “pertains to all portables from MacBooks to the iPhone” and “presents methods of adding solar power into the power mix of portables via a voltage converter”. They describe Apple’s patent and solution as follows:

Apple’s solution includes techniques for operating devices with solar power. In one aspect of the invention, apparatus for operating a portable electronic device with solar power includes, but is not limited to, a voltage converter and a controller coupled to the voltage converter. The voltage converter includes an input capable of being coupled to a solar power source and an output capable of being coupled to an electronic load, such as, for example, a portable electronic device. The voltage converter is configured to monitor or detect an amount of power drawn by the electronic load at the output of the voltage converter. In response to the monitored power drawn, the controller is configured to control the voltage converter to adjust further output power provided to the electronic load. As a result, the output voltage from the solar power source is maintained within a predetermined range.

The patent and it’s accompanying schematics were uncovered by PatentlyApple, which has a knack for digging up interesting Apple patents. You can check out their site for more technical details and additional schematics.

If you’re a fan of the retro picture apps that have invaded the iPhone, you’ll probably like this sticker which makes your iPhone look like an old Polaroid camera. Stick this on the back of your iPhone 4 and pair it with Instagram or Hipstamatic and you can pretend you’re in the 70’s while you upload pictures to Facebook all day long.

While this isn’t necessarily the funniest iPhone decal, it will certainly appeal to some.

You can get one of these on PhotoJoJo for $6 plus shipping and handling

If you can’t get enough of the Polaroid/retro picture trend, there’s also free Mac & Windows software that lets you make Polaroid pictures with a bunch of your existing images too.

Want to update Mac OS software from the Terminal? You can check for available updates, ignore packages, and install any or all Mac OS X Software Updates directly from the command line.

To see what updates are available for a Mac, or to install a software update from the Terminal of Mac OS X, amongst many other options including how to ignore particular updates, you’ll use the ‘softwareupdate’ command line tool as we’ll instruct below.

Read on to learn about using the command line software update utility on the Mac.

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iOS 4.3 beta 1 includes a software option to toggle the functionality of the iPad side switch from either a Mute button or to serve as an Orientation lock.

The adjustable option is found under “Settings” > “General” where you will find “Use Side Switch to:” which can now be set to either “Lock Rotation” or “Mute.”

This should be good news to many iPad users. The iPad orientation lock has become a heated issue for many users when they discovered that the iOS 4.2 update changed the orientation lock to a mute button, without jailbreaking there was no way to change it back until now.

The public release of iOS 4.3 is expected to arrive in March.

Apple has just released the first iOS 4.3 beta as build 8F5148b for the iPad, iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, iPod touch 3rd and 4th gen, and Apple TV. Noticeably absent from the iOS 4.3 beta IPSW list are the iPhone 3G and iPod touch 1st and 2nd gen models, suggesting that Apple will no longer support the older iOS hardware.

iOS 4.3 is confirmed to bring the wireless Personal Hotspot to iPhone, although it is still unknown whether AT&T will support this feature.

If you are in the iOS development program, you can get immediate access to the iOS 4.3 beta by going to the iOS Dev Center .

Angry Birds for Mac has just been updated to include support for older MacBooks, iMacs, and Mac Minis with the Intel GMA 950 graphics card.

Users who already bought Angry Birds from the Mac App Store will find the new version in your Updates list, otherwise new users can buy the game from the App Store (direct link). If you do not need the fix, it will not appear in the App Store Updates list.

Prior to this Angry Birds update, anyone using the older GMA950 Intel video card was unable to launch the game, which led to a series of one-star ratings on the App Store from frustrated users. Hopefully this will resolve all those complaints, because Angry Birds is really fun and makes a great desktop game, I’d recommend checking it out if you haven’t already.

Seas0nPass is a new jailbreak tool built exclusively for the AppleTV running iOS 4.1.1 (ie: iOS 4.2.1 for AppleTV). The app makes it very easy to jailbreak the AppleTV by creating custom IPSW in a similar fashion to PwnageTool, and Seas0nPass also gives a one-click tethered boot option (read: Tethered vs Untethered Jailbreak). Note that you will need a micro USB cable to perform the Apple TV jailbreak and a tethered boot.

Download Seas0nPass

Seas0nPass is currently only available for Mac OS X but a Windows version is under development.

• Download now (Mac OS X only – direct link)

If you’re familiar with the jailbreak world, using Seas0nPass on the AppleTV will come very easy to you, but even if you’re not the app has easy to follow instructions and a simple interface.

If you are using the app to jailbreak a fresh Apple TV, you do not need to download iOS 4.2.1 IPSW for Apple TV, the Seas0nPass app does this on it’s own to create the custom firmware.

The upcoming iOS 4.3 update will bring the “Personal Hotspot” feature seen on the Verizon iPhone to all iPhones including those on the AT&T network. If this rumor holds true, this means that any iPhone could become a wireless hotspot that other devices can access the internet from. (Yes, you can turn your iPhone into a Wi-Fi hotspot right now, but it requires a jailbreak which puts it out of the reach of most iPhone users.)

Assuming AT&T offers carrier support for Personal Hotspot, it would be a compelling reason for users to stay with AT&T rather than leave for the newly available Verizon iPhone. This is because AT&T customers should theoretically be able to use the wireless hotspot while talking on the phone, whereas CDMA limitations cause data transfer to pause when a phone call is taken on the Verizon CDMA network.

Thus far AT&T has been quiet on supporting the feature, but considering Verizon is openly advertising the personal hotspot on their iPhone, it may be wise for AT&T to chime in and say “us too” to stem some of the potential carrier exodus. Aside from AT&T and Verizon, a wireless hotspot feature has been long overdue in iOS, and up until now this has been a feature limited to the jailbreak world and those with Android phones. It just makes sense for Apple to bring the wireless hotspot feature to the iPhone to level the increasingly competitive playing field with Android.

Remember, this is technically still a rumor, but multiple sources have come forward with confirmations. The rumor began on a few European iPhone enthusiast sites, and finally screenshots appeared on RedmondPie (seen above) where they were given a March release date for iOS 4.3, which includes the iOS wireless Personal Hotspot feature. Let’s hope it’s true and that all carriers support the feature.

RecBoot is a great tool for Mac OS X that allows you to easily enter and exit iPhone recovery mode without manually holding down any of the buttons.

Using the app is extraordinarily simple, you just connect your iOS device to your Mac, launch RecBoot, and click on either “Exit Recovery” or “Enter Recovery” to accomplish either task.

Download RecBoot

The latest version of RecBoot is v 2.1, you can grab it from here (direct download link).

RecBoot requires Mac OS X 10.6 or later, and will work with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.

Remember that recovery mode is different from DFU mode, and RecBoot will not exit from DFU.

Verizon will begin to offer a CDMA compatible iPad that connects directly to their wireless network, according to Bloomberg. Verizon already sells the iPad, but it’s only offered in the WiFi version which is then bundled with a separate wireless access point.

The word of a direct CDMA iPad is somewhat buried in the news that the Verizon iPhone will be available on February 10. While we were given a release date for the iPhone, there is currently no word on when the CDMA iPad will be available. Likewise, there is no word on data plan pricing for either devices.

The Verizon iPhone will be available for everyone to order on February 10th, but existing Verizon customers will get the chance to pre-order the device on February 3rd. As expected, the models offered will be the 16GB iPhone 4 for $199 and the 32GB iPhone 4 for $299, both requiring a two year contract, this is the same pricing structure and contract requirements that AT&T offers.

Other than coverage, the main differences between the AT&T iPhone and Verizon iPhone are two data related features. One, Verizon’s offering will include a mobile hotspot that allows you to turn your VZW iPhone 4 into a wireless router for up to five device. And two, AT&T’s iPhone allows you to use data and voice simultaneously (meaning you can talk on the phone while using the internet), this is something the Verizon iPhone is incapable of doing due to CDMA limitations.

We will provide details on plan options and pricing when it becomes available.

If you want to quickly access the Mac OS X System Preferences, you can do so with an indirect keyboard shortcut trick by holding down the Option key and then hitting various function keys. This jumps directly to the System Preference panel corresponding to the function key.

For example, Option+Brightness pulls up the Display preference pane, Option+Expose brings up the Mission Control / Expose preferences, Option+Volume controls bring up the Sound preferences, and so on.

These are the function keys we’re talking about here, they’re across the top row of modern Mac keyboards including portable Macs and external Apple keyboards. Pressed in conjunction with the “Option” (alt) key on the keyboard will launch into the relevant system preference panel:

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The Mac App Store includes a hidden Debug menu that can be enabled with a simple defaults write command. The menu includes a variety of interesting options and tweaks that are clearly intended for internal development purposes.

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The Wall Street Journal is reporting that when Verizon announces the iPhone tomorrow, they will include an unlimited data plan as one of the service options:

Verizon Wireless, the country’s largest wireless carrier, is confident enough in its network that it will offer unlimited data-use plans when it starts selling the iPhone around the end of this month, a person familiar with the matter said.

Assuming the report holds true, this would be a significant differentiating factor between the Verizon iPhone and AT&T iPhone wireless plans. The move by Verizon is seen as an attempt to lure bandwidth hungry users away from AT&T’s network and onto Verizon. iPhone with unlimited data used to be available on AT&T’s network, but the company later scrapped the plans in favor of tiered bandwidth pricing.

Plan details and rates for the Verizon iPhone unlimited data plan are currently unavailable, but we will find out the details tomorrow during the official announcement. If you’re an existing AT&T customer, you can check your iPhone data usage to determine if an unlimited data plan would benefit you enough to make the network switch.

Redsn0w 0.9.7b6 is now available to download as the sixth beta in the iOS 4.2.1 untethered jailbreak public test program. This release fixes bugs that prevented Skype from functioning properly.

The Dev Team notes that Redsn0w 0.9.7b6 can be run on top of existing 0.9.7b5 jailbreaks, and if you’re only looking to repair Skype functionality over beta 5 then all you need to do is run redsn0w and deselect every checkbox. If you missed beta 5, then you’ll find that Bluetooth support is now included and working as intended.

Download Redsn0w 0.9.7b6

• Download now (Mac OS X)
• Download now (Windows version unavailable)

The release is currently limited to Mac users but the Dev Team reports they are actively working on improving the Windows version, although there was no timeline given.

If you’ve ever accidentally used cat on a binary file, you’ll have seen the gibberish that results and how it can totally screw up your Terminal window with loads of weird characters. Of course there are many other ways to bork up your command line prompt which seems to become unrecoverable through the typical clear command string, but there is a really easy trick to use if you happen to experience this.
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Along with the Mac App Store came Angry Birds, the wildly popular iPhone game that was then brought to the iPad, Android, Windows, and is now making waves in Mac OS X.

If you haven’t played Angry Birds before, it’s remarkably simple in concept, you just fling various birds at objects to try and destroy some green pigs. In practice, it’s a bit more complex and you have to utilize different birds capabilities to knock down objects which respond to contact and gravity. It’s surprisingly engaging (read: addicting) which explains the runaway success.
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Update: Redsn0w 0.9.7b6 is now available and includes Skype support, it can be installed over beta 5.

Redsn0w 0.9.7b5 is now available to download, this is the fifth release in the redsn0w untethered jailbreak beta test. This release is somewhat significant in that it resolves several major bugs in the prior version, most notably Bluetooth is working again.

The iPhone Dev Team has also added an ‘anti-piracy plea’ to the release, stating that unless you have legitimate access to the iOS 4.2b3 IPSW file through the iPhone Developer Program you shouldn’t use the latest untethered Jailbreak Monte release.

Download Redsn0w 0.9.7b5

As of now redsn0w 0.9.7b5 is currently for Mac, but there is a Windows version that is being worked on.

• Download now (Mac OS X)
• Download now (Windows version currently unavailable)

The Windows version is apparently extremely slow which is why it is not released to the pubic yet, the Dev Team is actively working to speed up the application and when it is in a usable state they will release it for download. This may come in a version after redsn0w 0.9.7b5, we will update when we hear word on this so follow our redsn0w or jailbreak updates for more information.

As usual, if your iOS device is currently jailbroken with a previous redsn0w beta, you should do a fresh restore prior to using this version.