Did you know that you can customize the backgrounds of any Finder windows in Mac OS X? This is a nnice way to customize the appearance of your Mac a bit, and you can either choose images or colors, or go with the default setting of a simple white background.

In the screenshot above, the Finder window background is using an image as a wallpaper, and in the screenshot below, the Finder windows are set to match the color of the Finder window sidebar. Changing the window background color is a somewhat unknown feature even to frequent Mac users, but setting the Finder window background to something else is easy once you learn how, and here’s how to do it:

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You know what’s really annoying? When you go to certain websites, copy some text from them, and go to paste elsewhere and it gives you something like this:

Basically, it’s an “iPhone without a screen,” is how Engadget hears it. Oh — and it will cost only $99, supposedly.

Read more: http://techcrunch.com/2010/05/28/new-apple-tv/#ixzz0pH6qJPa4

You wanted to just paste the top single sentence, but some company thought it would be a brilliant idea to include some link spam into your clipboard buffer as well. The company responsible for this is called Tynt (affectionately called Taint around the web), and they are generating a lot of bad press for themselves with this annoying ‘technology’ if you could even call it that.

Stopping the copy/paste link spam

There’s a few ways to stop the Tynt garbage from appearing in your copy and pasted web text, the first involves editing your /etc/hosts file. You may recall that you can edit your /etc/hosts file to block access to websites on your Mac, well that is exactly what we’re going to do, block Tynt’s Javascript from working.

• Using your favorite text editor, edit /etc/hosts (you will need admin privileges)
• Add a new line to the file and type this exactly:

127.0.0.1 tcr.tynt.com

• Save /etc/hosts

For changes to take effect, you need to flush your Mac DNS, so launch the Terminal and type the following:
dscacheutil -flushcache
Done, now your web browsing experience should be significantly improved as you don’t have to deal with the Tynt garbage filling up your clipboard anytime you copy and paste text from websites that use it. I came across this method on DaringFireball, who has an excellent summary of Tynt and its general annoying and hostile nature.

Block Tynt copy/paste spam with browser extensions

If mucking around in system files is not your thing, you can also block Tynt clipboard spam by installing extensions into your web browser of choice:

• Safari 5 Extension – TyntBlocker (installs automatically) – Developer home
• Chrome Extension – Tynt blocker for Chrome

If you install one of these browser extensions, you won’t need to use the above method of editing your hosts file. Oh and yes, these techniques work on either a Mac or a PC (Windows or Linux for that matter).

Copy/paste spam problem solved!

DeskLickr is a fun little app that sits in your menubar and pulls images from Flickr to set them as your desktop picture. Basically you just specify how often you want your wallpaper changed, and a couple search tags, and DeskLickr does it’s job quietly in the background. This is great for anyone who gets tired of having the same background picture constantly.

Beware that certain search tags on Flickr might bring you unanticipated results: in testing the app I selected ‘beach’ as one of my keywords and I was given a high resolution picture of a grandpa in a speedo!

Developer home
Download now

[ via SweetMacTips ]

I’m not sure what the Mac driving the monitors is but this is a pretty nice looking setup with dual screens. I particularly like the raised shelf where you can scoot the keyboard and mouse under to immediately clear off desk space.

[ via Flickr ]

All Macs have a microphone included in them, but if you want to disable the internal microphone on your Mac, you can do so through a variety of methods. We’ll cover the two easiest approaches to turning off the microphone; reducing the input volume so that no sound is picked up by the microphone, and also by selecting a different and nonexistent audio input source so that the Mac will not detect audio whatsoever. Both methods effectively disable the microphone on a Mac

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It seems the iPhone “Other” section always takes up at least 200mb, which suggests it’s system files: the iPhone OS, database files, contacts information, settings, SMS data, core data, pre-installed apps, etc. The “Other” portion grows from there, so as you install more apps, add more contacts, send more text messages, and generally just create more data and caches for your phone to store, the system section grows just like any other operating system.

There are known flukes where the “Other” capacity starts taking up huge amounts of space, up to 8gb of this “Other” space has been reported. In this case it’s possible that the iPhone OS is misreporting files and categorizing something like a Movie as Other, this is most likely to happen after a failed sync. This is a good time to backup and sync your iPhone and then format/restore the device so that you’ll have a clean start.

The only known way to clear the “Other” iPhone/iPod Touch usage is to completely restore the iPhone through iTunes. Remember to sync and backup your iPhone otherwise you will lose your contacts, settings, music, and other data.

What if iTunes “Other” is taking up huge amounts of space?

You can fix the iTunes “Other” huge space issue by simply unchecking and re-checking “Open iTunes when this device is connected” from iTunes itself. If you’re confused, read our guide here. Thanks for the tip Mike!

Apple has issued a statement regarding the iPhone reception problem that some users are reporting with iPhone 4:

“Gripping any phone will result in some attenuation of its antenna performance with certain places being worse than others depending on the placement of the antennas. This is a fact of life for every wireless phone. If you ever experience this on your Phone 4, avoid gripping it in the lower left corner in a way that covers both sides of the black strip in the metal band, or simply use one of many available cases.”

This statement was provided to PC Magazine about the issue, and includes the following suggestions to fix the iPhone reception:

• Do not grip the iPhone 4 in the lower left corner in a way that connects the two black strip antennas
• Use a case for iPhone 4

As you’ll note in the comments below, users speculate this is due to the signals from both of the iPhone antennas being interrupted by one another. Apparently the reception difficulties are exacerbated by moist or sweaty hands, so if you have sweaty hands and you are holding the lower left corner of the iPhone in such a way that the black antenna bands are covered/connected, you are more likely to see reception problems.

Apple’s other suggestion of buying a case to remedy the problem has frustrated some iPhone owners. Many user reports indicate that Apple’s official bumper cases work wonderfully to halt all the reception difficulties, but there’s practically unlimited cases out there for iPhone’s so finding one certainly won’t be difficult.

It’s very important to note that not all iPhone 4 users are effected, as you can see in the videos posted yesterday about the iPhone 4 reception problems, many people can replicate the exact handling and have no issue at all.

Farmville for iPhone is now available as a free download on the iTunes Store. Farmville is considered the most popular game on the web, and one of the most popular games in the world, with an estimated 70 million monthly users.

The basis of the game is that you have a virtual farm that you plow, plant, and harvest farm goods, and those that play the game say it is very addictive. Bringing Farmville as an app to the iPhone will certainly serve this addiction, I have several friends who are absolutely thrilled with the fact they can now literally play the game constantly since it’ll be in their pockets and not just on Facebook.

Of course you’ll be able to run Farmville on your iPod touch or even iPad if you just can’t get enough of the game. The fact that it’s on the iPhone is pretty significant though because prior web based versions ran in Flash which made it impossible to bring to the iPhone platform.

You can get Farmville on the iPhone through the iTunes Store [iTunes Store link] if you’re interested, or just launch your iPhone/iPod touch and head into the App Store, where you’ll find it.

Need to use DFU mode with an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch? Maybe you need to restore from firmware or troubleshoot an iOS device from DFU? We’ll explain how to enter and exit DFU mode on any iPhone model with a clickable Home button, what DFU mode is, why you may want to use it, and of course, how to use it. Do note that using DFU mode requires iTunes, a USB cable, and a computer, as well as the iOS device in question.

What is iPhone DFU mode?

DFU mode is a state that you can put your iPhone into where it can interface with iTunes, but does not load the iPhone operating system or boot loader (this is what really differs DFU mode from the more simple recovery mode). DFU stands for Device Firmware Update.

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If you don’t mind the degradation that come with reducing an audio files bit rate, you can potentially save quite a bit of disk space on an iPhone/iPod/iPad by selecting an option the next time you sync the device in iTunes. Here’s what you’re looking to do:

• In the Summary tab just look near the bottom of iTunes to see: “Convert higher bit rate songs to 128kbps AAC”
• Select the checkbox
• The next time you sync your iPhone/iPod, the songs that are rated higher than 128kbps will be converted down

Depending on the quality of the speakers, many people can’t tell the difference with 128kbps audio vs higher bit rates. If you have a great car stereo or a good iPhone speaker dock, don’t be surprised if you can hear some very slight noise. The best way I can describe the difference in sound quality is that the songs play less crisp, but it’s pretty hard to notice on earbuds, cheaper headphones, and most stereo systems.

The amount of space you will save obviously depends on how much music you have and the audio files original bit rate. If you have a large library of high quality songs, it wouldn’t be unusual to save over 1GB of disk space if not more just by reducing the bit rate.

Counter-Strike Source (CSS) was released today for Mac users via the Steam client. Dubbed as the “Worlds #1 Online Action Game”, Counter-Strike features highly competitive multiplayer and team-play shoot-em-up action. Fire up the Steam app and you can download Counter Strike right now for $6.80, which is 66% off it’s standard $20 price tag.

The newer your computer the better CSS will run, but official system requirements to run Counter Strike on your Mac are as follows: OS X version Leopard 10.5.8, Snow Leopard 10.6.3, 1GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8 or higher, or ATI X1600 or higher, Mouse, Keyboard, Internet Connection.

You can see more screenshots and get more information about Counter Strike for Mac at the Steam Store.

iPhone 4 hasn’t been out long but there are already some complaints and problems regarding it’s reception. The above video shows the iPhone 4 reception degrade while held in a users hand in a pretty typical manner. The cause, apparently, is when the iPhone is held in such a way that a persons hand touches both sides of the case (aka, the antenna), causing the signal bars to drop, unable to make calls, and the phones overall reception goes out the door.

Update: there is an iPhone reception fix recommendation from Apple: hold the phone without crossing the antennas, or use a case.

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You can opt out of Apple’s new iAd location and data tracking service, which will use gathered data on you to serve targeted ads through Apple’s new iAds platform.

To opt out of iAd cookies, visit http://oo.apple.com from the device you wish to opt out with.

Note that you must be running the latest iOS 4 or you will get an error, since iAds requires iOS 4 to run. You will need to view that website directly from your iPhone, iPod, or iPad, and access the site individually per device if you want to opt each out of the service.

Without the iAds location and data tracking cookies, you will just be served generic and less targeted ads.

Personally, I don’t mind location relevant ads as long as they don’t pass on personal data, and I have even found some location based ads to be helpful in the past, so I am not opting out of the iAds cookies at this point.

With any installation of Mac OS X comes Emacs (Extensible, customizable, self-documenting real-time display editor – yes that’s what EMACS stands for, now you know!) and with Emacs, some easter eggs that let you play some good old 70’s games directly at the command line.

Yes really, there are retro video games embedded in your text editor! Here is how you can play them.

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iPhone 4 reviews are out, and you probably won’t be surprised to hear they’re overwhelming positive. Here’s a few highlights including glowing words and some amazing pictures from our favorite reviews via Engadget, Walt Mossberg, and The New York Times.
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Backing up an iPhone is important because it allows you to recover all of your personal data, apps, and stuff, if you ever need to restore the iPhone, upgrade it, or replace it with a new phone, all of which is done by restoring from the backups that are made. By default your iPhone will automatically sync and create a backup itself, and this can be done one of two ways. The first backup method is handled by iTunes each time your iPhone is connected to your computer through USB. Otherwise, newer iPhones will automatically back up through iCloud if that feature has been enabled, and those iCloud backups happen anytime the device has been plugged into a power source and is on wi-fi.

While the automatic backups are extremely useful and you should always use at least one of them, be it iTunes or iCloud, you can also initiate an instant backup of an iPhone manually. These self-started backups can be made from either iTunes or iCloud very easily, here is how to do either.
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One of the more interesting little known Dock modifications on the Mac is the ability to make hidden app icons appear as translucent and muted in the Dock to indicate their hidden status. If you look carefully at the screenshots of the Mac Dock in this article you’ll see the effect, as some of the icons are shown as translucent, and that is because they are hidden apps. It’s a subtle change, and this hidden optional setting can be enabled in Mac OS X by using the command line.

This tutorial will show you how you can make hidden apps show in the Dock as translucent icons to indicate their hidden status.

Enabling translucent icons of hidden apps is a great feature for Mac users who hide apps to clear off their desktop, as it makes it very easy to identify what apps are hidden and which aren’t, just by looking at the icons to see if they are transparent or not. If you hide apps with any regularity you will probably want to turn this on yourself, it only takes a moment.

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When you launch a new Terminal window or tab in Mac OS X (and most linux distributions) you’ll be greeted with a little message, either some “last login” details, or maybe even a message from the admin from /etc/motd. The last login details are default in a new Mac OS X terminal session, whereas the Message Of The Day is from a custom adjustment set by the sysadmin or yourself.

If you’d like to change or remove that “Last Login” message, you can do so rather easily by turning to the command line and creating a modifier file. This will override whatever the login message is in Terminal app, effectively disabling it for the user account where it’s put in place.

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