Long ago in a time far far away, OK really it was just prior to Mac OS X, there used to be a Trash icon on the Desktop. Yup, earlier versions of Mac OS didn’t have a Dock at all, and the Trash was just another item on the desktop, sitting in the bottom right corner.

For the nostalgic, you can easily replicate this functionality by using the command line to create a symbolic link of the actual functioning Trash to a folder named Trash on your desktop. That may sound complex but it’s really not, you can do it with a single line entered into the Terminal application.

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Starcraft 2 is out and it’s pretty much eating all my free time at the moment. I’m still in the process of tweaking my graphics settings for optimum performance, and the easiest way to benchmark Starcraft 2 performance on machines is to check the FPS (frames per second). Here’s how to do that on both a Mac and Windows SC2 install:

Check Starcraft 2 FPS on Mac

To check the frame rate on a Mac, while you are in a game hit: Control+Option+F

Show Starcraft 2 FPS on Windows

Checking FPS in Windows is basically the same key command, in SC2 hit: Control+Alt+F

On either operating system, once you hit the command to display frame rate, the FPS counter will show in the upper left corner and look like so:

If you’re wondering how well SC2 will run on your machine, check out the Starcraft 2 system requirements for Mac. Later I will post some preliminary findings on how well the game runs on a few different Mac setups.

If you’re a fan of Blizzard and real time strategy games and you haven’t gotten this one yet, you can order Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty on Amazon.com and get free shipping. I love RTS games, and I can say it’s definitely worth it.

Apple has launched their official Safari Extensions Gallery, at this time it features 100 extensions out of the roughly 300 out in the wild. All of the extensions on Apple’s gallery have been digitally signed and sandboxed so you don’t have to worry about security problems like some of the Firefox extensions have had in the past. You will need to have Safari 5 to be able to use the extension feature.

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You can find out what the manufacturer, model number, and type of LCD panel you have in any of your Macs, including the iMac, MacBook Air, MacBook, or any model MacBook Pro by using a fairly complex looking terminal command.

If you’re unfamiliar with the command line, just copy and paste the line below into the “Terminal” app in OS X, then hit the return key. Don’t worry if this looks confusing, it kind of is, but what is reported back is easily readable.
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If your iPhone 3G is running really slow after installing iOS 4, you’re not alone. While iOS 4 is a great OS for newer iPhone models, it makes my older iPhone 3G slow down to a crawl, with everything delayed and stuttering to catch up to touch. At times it’s practically unusable. So what can you do to speed it up?

Update: The first thing you should do is grab the iOS 4.1 download since it resolves some of the speed problems. After you install iOS 4.1, combine the update with the following tips to regain your iPhone 3G speed:

Disable Spotlight on iPhone 3G

If iOS 4 has your iPhone 3G crawling, disable Spotlight search:

• Tap on “Settings”
• Tap on “General”
• Navigate to and select “Home Button”
• Scroll down to “Spotlight Search”
• Disable everything by tapping the check box next to each item
• Exit settings

You can leave some of the Spotlight search items enabled but I find that the best speed improvement comes from disabling everything.

I don’t even use Spotlight on my iPhone so I’m not missing this feature at all, but it does seem to improve the speed of the iPhone 3G in common tasks like flipping between screens, scrolling through text messages and emails, and even launching some apps.

Bottom line: if you don’t use Spotlight in iOS, disable it!

Hard reset iPhone 3G

Hard resetting your iPhone can speed it up for a while. Here’s how to do it:

• Press and hold the Home button and the Sleep/Wake button at the same time, hold both for about 5 seconds
• Ignore the typical ‘Slide to power off message’ and continue holding both buttons until the iPhone shuts itself off
• When your iPhone 3G resets itself you can stop holding the buttons, it takes about 10 seconds to hard reset the iPhone
• Let iOS boot as usual, your phone should be temporarily sped up

This works because it clears your iPhone’s memory completely, but this is less of a permanent solution than disabling Spotlight since caches and memory will inevitably be full again.

Restore factory settings and do not restore from backup

I don’t like this solution much because you lose your backups, but it does seem to help iOS 4 run a bit better on the iPhone 3G. Basically you’re just doing a clean iOS 4 install on the iPhone, but then you are left with an empty phone. You can obviously easily resync your music but you’ll lose all your iPhone text message backups, contacts, apps, and pretty much anything else that made it your phone.

Downgrade from iOS 4 to iOS 3.1.3

If you’re totally fed up with iPhone 3G and iOS 4, you can always just downgrade to the prior OS version, but it’s not a particularly fun process and you obviously lose out on all the iOS 4 features.

Thoughts on iPhone 3G and iOS 4

I know I would have been annoyed if Apple had left out the iPhone 3G from being able to upgrade to iOS 4, but I feel like the performance is just terrible. It’s no wonder they left out multitasking and background pictures, but even without those features it just doesn’t run well on the older and slower hardware of the 3G. There are some rumors (ie: wishful thinking) swirling that when iOS 4 for iPad is released and the iOS 4 versions are bridged in iOS 4.1 (or whatever the version ends up being), that the performance will improve on iPhone 3G. I’m not counting on that and here’s why: the iOS 4.1 beta is already available for download and people have put it on their iPhone 3G to practically no avail. Perhaps future versions will change and we just don’t know that yet, but for now I am not a fan of iOS4 my older iPhone 3G.

Update: the final release of iOS 4.1 make the iPhone 3G run a lot better than iOS 4, but iPhone OS 3.1.3 is still faster. It’s up to you whether or not the iOS 4 features are worth the performance hit.

Oh, and if you have an iPhone 3G, do yourself a favor and do not upgrade to iOS 4! Folders and editing playlists are not worth the huge slowdown!

RTS fans around the world are having a party today; Starcraft 2 is out for both Mac and Windows, and you can download the game now directly from Blizzard or pick it up from various retailers. The game costs $60 regardless of whether you get the digital distribution/download or if you opt for the physical box.

For a completely digital release, you can get the game directly from Battlenet and Blizzard:
Download & Buy Starcraft 2 from Blizzard

If you’d like to have a physical box, install DVD, and manual, you can get the game with free shipping from Amazon:
Buy Starcraft 2 on Amazon.com

Be sure to check the Starcraft 2 system requirements for Mac before getting the game.

Is it just me or do some of the scenes in Starcraft 2 look like they’re right out of Avatar?

Modern versions of Mac OS have a feature for MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, and MacBook that will report to you the condition of your battery, as shown through the battery menubar item. Usually charging messages are shown there, but there are two other messages you may see in that menu, and they are “Replace Now” and “Service Battery”.

Read on to learn about the Service Battery message, what it means for MacBook computers and Mac laptops, and what you can do about it. Sometimes you can even fix the issue yourself!

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Do you like iPhone humor? Of course you do! So, here’s the corniest Apple related joke you’ll see all day, and maybe even all year.

If you rename your iPhone or iPad to “The Titanic”, then guess what happens every time you connect the iOS device to a computer with iTunes and sync?

Well, every time you go to sync the device with iTunes it will say: “Syncing The Titanic” – Get it? The iPhone is named The Titanic… it’s syncing…. sinking… syncing… The iPhone is syncing…. get it? Oh dear. Tasteless, corny, cheesy, and every other adjective you’d use to describe a terrible joke.

If you want to try this yourself, rename your iPhone and then connect it to iTunes and sync. Silly and pointless. Sometimes it’s fun to be lighthearted and silly, right?

OK but in all seriousness, giving your iPhone and useful name is recommended for various reasons but if you want to give it a goofy name that’s your choice.

Thanks to Ian S. for sending this goofy thing in!

iPhone owners in the USA can now legally jailbreak and unlock their iPhone devices, according to new rules set forth by the US Government. While it’s great to have this legalized, it hardly stopped anyone from jailbreaking or unlocking phones in the past.

Though legalized, it’s worth mentioning that Jailbreaking or using a carrier unlock on an iPhone or iPad still voids your warranty per Apple’s user agreement. If you have a jailbroken device it’s probably wise to do a clean restore before bringing it in for service.

The jailbreaking exemption was part of a handful of exemptions announced Monday, including:

• allow owners of used cell phones to break access controls on their phones in order to switch wireless carriers.
• allow people to break technical protections on video games to investigate or correct security flaws.
• allow college professors, film students, documentary filmmakers and producers of noncommercial videos to break copy-protection measures on DVDs so they can embed clips for educational purposes, criticism or commentary.
• allow computer owners to bypass the need for external security devices called dongles if the dongle no longer works and cannot be replaced.
• allow blind people to break locks on electronic books so that they can use them with read-aloud software and similar aides.

You can read more from Associated Press.

Now, if only buying an iPhone without a contract would come without a carrier lock in the USA too… some day maybe!

If you’re looking to deploy the iPhone in an enterprise utility, don’t miss out on Apple’s iPhone Configuration Utility, which makes enterprise iPhone management a snap. Apple describes the tool as follows:

iPhone Configuration Utility lets you easily create, maintain, encrypt, and install configuration profiles, track and install provisioning profiles and authorized applications, and capture device information including console logs.

Configuration profiles are XML files that contain device security policies, VPN configuration information, Wi-Fi settings, APN settings, Exchange account settings, mail settings, and certificates that permit iPhone and iPod touch to work with your enterprise systems.

You can download the utility for either Mac OS or Windows:

iPhone Configuration Utility for Mac OS X

iPhone Configuration Utility for Windows

Did you accidentally ignore a Software Update in MacOS or Mac OS X and now you need to install it on a Mac? Perhaps you were putting off a specific update for one reason or another, and now it’s time to install that ignored or hidden update again onto Mac OS X.

Fortunately, getting the ignored updates back is really easy, as we will walk you through several different procedures that allow you to reset the ignored software updates list. You can do perform this task either though the Mac App Store, from the Command Line of Mac OS X with Terminal app, or for prior versions of system software, the older Software Update app. You can use whichever method is appropriate for your machine and version of Mac OS, or whichever you prefer.

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If you use FileVault and QuickLook on a Mac you may want to know that the combination of the two may leak some sensitive information from encrypted volumes.

Reader Jack R. sent in the following tip, explaining the situation further:

When FileVault and QuickLook are used concurrently, information about what files are stored on the encrypted volume becomes available and completely unencrypted on your hard drive. This is due to QuickLook’s thumbnail caching that is stored within the /var/ directory.

Run the following command to see the size of the QuickLook cache to demonstrate the potential:

find /var/folders -name "*QuickLook*" -exec du -h {} \; 2>/dev/null

The worst case scenario is the potential for exposing file names and even QuickLook thumbnails of documents and images. There’s also a sqlite file called index.sqlite within the /var/folders QuickLook cache directories that have a list of file names on the encrypted volumes.

Whether or not this is a legitimate security hole that is patchable or if it’s something I’m aimlessly worried about, I don’t know, but I am willing to bet many people don’t know about this!

Editor note: This definitely seems like a security hole. I imagine the best way to avoid this problem is to just not use QuickLook on the sensitive encrypted data, although that’s more of a workaround than a fix. Perhaps Mac OS X will eventually get a security update to resolve the problem.

Update 6/18/2018: Over 8 years later, this security bug still exists in MacOS / Mac OS X! That’s the bad news. But here’s the good news; security researcher Patrick Wardle has brought some renewed attention to this flaw and thus it will likely get patched in a future software update.

In the meantime, Wardle recommends the following command string to delete the Quick Look cache, which can be entered into the Terminal of MacOS / Mac OS X:

qlmanage -r cache

Executing that command will clear the Quick Look cache. Keep an eye out for future security updates and software updates to Mac OS as they will likely patch the bug once and for all.

CNN Money posted the results of a consumer survey that has some really interesting facts about the iPhone and AT&T. The most amazing claim is the percentage of people who are committed and loyal to the iPhone versus those who own Androids. Here are the important figures:

• 77% of iPhone owners say they’ll buy another iPhone
• Only 20% of Android customers say they’ll buy another Android phone
• 73% of iPhone users are very satisfied with AT&T’s service
• 69% of overall smartphone users say they are satisfied with their mobile provider
• Phone owners pay $12/mo more for service than the average smartphone user
• iPhone is worth $1.8 billion in sales to AT&T this year, and will generate $9 billion in revenue for the provider over the next five years

Obviously the iPhone is a cash cow for AT&T, even if it is also heavier maintenance due to it’s users increased data consumption. AT&T gets a lot of vocal complaints about their service, but the survey shows that despite the woes of the vocal minority more iPhone users are satisfied than smartphone users are overall with any mobile provider.

How’s this working out for the other providers? According to the article “Verizon has been regretting turning away Apple for the last three years” which isn’t surprising considering the huge amount of revenue and loyalty the device inspires. Now whether or not Verizon will get iPhone remains to be seen, but you can bet everyone is fighting for the chance and AT&T is fighting to renew exclusivity.

I would undoubtedly buy another iPhone and recommend them to anyone, I’ve used several Android devices and I’d even consider them the ‘next best’ smartphone, but given the choice between the two devices I will always choose an iPhone – the user experience is just so much better and the iPhone is just, well, cooler.

You can read more at CNN Money.

This setup combines two of my favorite things: a MacBook Pro and coffee. What a great little setup, all you need to be productive!

[ via MinimalMac ]

Apple has started the free iPhone 4 case or bumper program, if you’re an iPhone 4 owner it’s a simple process to claim a free case or get a refund from a past purchase.

• Download the iPhone 4 Case Program app at the iTunes App Store
• Launch the app on your iPhone and sign in using your iTunes/Apple ID
• Select your free Bumper or Case

To qualify for the free bumper or case, you must apply to the program within 30 days of buying an iPhone 4, until September 30 when the program expires.

The free iPhone 4 bumper and case program is offered in response to the antenna problems that some users have reported experiencing with iPhone 4, which has received a large amount of media attention and subsequently been parodied to death.

You can read more on Apple.com’s iPhone 4 case program information.

The release date of the White iPhone 4 model has been pushed back again, as Apple continues to face difficulties manufacturing the device. The following statement was issued today regarding the matter:

White models of Apple’s new iPhone® 4 have continued to be more challenging to manufacture than we originally expected, and as a result they will not be available until later this year. The availability of the more popular iPhone 4 black models is not affected.

There is no word on what ‘later this year’ means in terms of a definitive release date, but this is the second production delay that the White iPhone 4 model has encountered. This comes at a time when even black iPhone 4 availability is already strictly constrained due to huge demand for the device.

White iPhone 4 Popularity

Perhaps most interesting about the white iPhone delays is that the inability to get the device seems to be driving up it’s popularity. The following chart is from Google Trends, showing the search volume of ‘White iPhone 4’ vs ‘Black iPhone 4’ – as you can see the device deemed more popular by Apple (the black iPhone) is significantly less searched for than the unavailable white model.

Although it’s unlikely to be Apple’s intention, it would seem the production challenges with the white model are actually driving up the devices desirability. In the past, the Black iPhone has been more popular than the White iPhone, but perhaps that will be changing?

Using Text Substitution, you can easily write any special character or symbol like ™ or ® just by typing something like TM or (r). It can also be used to expand long phrases or particular words by typing shorter abbreviations, for example you could type “myeml” to instantly type out an email address, and it can also be used to quickly type out emoji rather than digging around in Character menus.

Everything is automated and the options are unlimited, in that you can have as many text replacement substitutes as you want setup. Getting this working is quite simple, but you’ll find that some apps in past versions of Mac OS also need the ability to use the substitutions enabled individually, not to worry, we’ll cover that as well.

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A report based on patent findings shows the continued interest of an ad supported operating system that may be in the works at Apple. AppleInsider shows several of the patents mockups demonstrating a desktop operating system that looks very much like Mac OS X, except there are advertisement features included in it. Perhaps the most interesting part of the patent filing is the idea that the ads will disable functionality of the OS while you view them:

“The operating system can disable one or more functions while the advertisement is being presented… At the end of the advertisement, the operating system can again enable the function(s). The advertisement can be visual or audible. The presentation of the advertisement(s) can be made as part of an approach where the user obtains a good or service, such as the operating system, for free or at reduced cost.”

The last part about the ads subsidizing the cost of the operating system is fascinating too. Will any of these ‘features’ be mandatory in Mac OS X 10.7? I hope not. I don’t know about anyone else but I’d much rather just pay for an OS than have ads as part of my core desktop experience. Of course, Apple has many patents filed and not every idea that is patented is actually used, so take this information with a grain of salt for now.