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How to Repair User Permissions in Mac OS X

Nov 15, 2011 - 72 Comments
Use Disk Utility to erase free space on a Mac hard drive

In modern versions of Mac OS X, repairing permissions from the Disk Utility app doesn’t repair the users file permissions, oddly this has to be done separately on a per-user basis. If you’re running into problems with Spotlight not finding documents or folders, or if you’re having other issues that can usually be fixed with … Read More

iPhone or iPad Running Slow After Installing iOS 5? Here’s How to Fix the Speed

Nov 15, 2011 - 41 Comments
iPhone, iPad, and iPod

If your iPad or iPhone is running slow after updating to iOS 5 you’re not alone, for many the update has made their device feel sluggish, with taps taking longer to register, stalls between swipes, and just a general noticeable decrease in performance. This seems to effect all iOS devices too, indicating it’s not necessarily … Read More

How to Make a RAM Disk Easily with TmpDisk for Mac OS X

Nov 14, 2011 - 19 Comments
Make a RAM Disk easily with TmpDisk for Mac OS X

If you want to quickly make a RAM disk for use on your Mac, you could create one manually through the command line, or you can make it even easier by downloading TmpDisk for Mac OS X. The open source application uses a menu bar item to quickly make ram disks from anywhere and of … Read More

How to Use AirDrop in Mac OS X

Nov 14, 2011 - 31 Comments
Use AirDrop in Mac OS X

Using AirDrop is the quickest way to transfer files between two Macs, even if they’re not on the same network or if there is no Wi-Fi network available to connect to. This is done by creating an instant Ad-Hoc network between the Macs, and there is practically no configuration required. For those who have never … Read More

Add or Remove Apps from Notification Center in iOS

Nov 14, 2011 - 5 Comments
Add or Remove Apps in Notification Center

You can quickly add or remove any items from showing up in Notification Center in iOS on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch by modifying your allowed apps through the central system settings. This isn’t the same method as disabling an item like the stock ticker, but it’s faster if you want to adjust several … Read More

Hold Shift Key to Use Launchpad in Slow Motion

Nov 13, 2011 - 12 Comments
Launchpad in Slow Motion

Like most of the other transition effects in Mac OS X, you can hold down the shift key to force the animation to render in slow motion. In the case with Launchpad, this will cause the app icons to slowly rise out of the background, or for the Launchpad screens to very slowly switch between … Read More

Stop Spaces from Rearranging Themselves in Mac OS X

Nov 12, 2011 - 32 Comments
Stop Spaces from Rearranging Themselves in OS X

New versions of Mac OS X have an interesting and sometimes unusual change to Mission Control’s behavior, where desktops/spaces will automatically rearrange themselves based on how recently they’ve been used or accessed. If you’ve set your spaces (virtual desktops) to be in a specific order, this is fairly annoying, but it’s also easy to stop … Read More

Find System Preferences Easier in Mac OS X by Sorting Alphabetically

Nov 12, 2011 - 8 Comments
System Preferences

Mac System Preferences are grouped by categories by default, basically into Personal / iCloud, Software, and Hardware. For most of us this is intuitive and easy enough to navigate, but with modern versions of macOS they’ve been condensed down from more category separation, from Personal, Hardware, Internet & Wireless, System, and Other, to just the … Read More

Reskin Google Reader with a Mac OS X Lion Theme

Nov 11, 2011 - 7 Comments
Google Reader Mac OS X Lion Theme

Google recently revamped their popular RSS aggregator (subscribe to our feed while you’re at it) Google Reader with a new look, if you’re not thrilled about the new appearance you can apply a theme to make G Reader look similar to a native OS X 10.7 application. You’ll need to be using a newer version … Read More

Sort Notifications in iOS by Time of Arrival

Nov 11, 2011 - 6 Comments
Sort iOS app notifications by time of arrival

If you get a ton of alerts or use the iOS Notification Center as a queuing system, sorting them by most recent event is preferential to grouping them by app. This makes it so you can quickly scan Notifications on iPad and iPhone by what came in most recently, rather than by what application the … Read More

iOS OTA Updates Not Working? Here’s How to Fix Them

Nov 10, 2011 - 10 Comments
iOS OTA update

Over-the-Air (OTA) updates are one of the better refinements to iOS as part of the whole “post-PC” thing, they bring delta software updates directly to your devices, making for quicker updates and using less bandwidth (a delta update means only the differences between the iOS versions are sent, preventing a much larger package from being … Read More

Change Siri’s Voice Accent & Gender from Female to Male or Vice Versa

Nov 10, 2011 - 14 Comments
Change Siri's voice

Siri’s gender and voice accent is different based on the region, with a female voice for USA and Australian users, and a male voice in the UK. Regardless of which location you’re in or where you bought the iPhone, you can change the gender and the accent of Siri yourself just by switching the language … Read More

Disable the Caps Lock Key on a Mac

Nov 10, 2011 - 18 Comments
Disable Caps Lock key on a Mac

Does anyone like the CAPS LOCK key? Yes, it can be useful for typing some things that happen to be all uppercase, but as many internet readers know, it can also be an obnoxious key that many Mac users accidentally press on their keyboards, leading to ALL THEIR LETTERS APPEARING UPPERCASE. If you’re a Mac … Read More

Enable a Hidden Auto-Correct & Auto-Complete Word Suggestion Bar in iOS 5

Nov 9, 2011 - 18 Comments
autocorrect suggestion bar in iOS

A hidden autocorrect suggestion bar has been uncovered in iOS, and with a bit of patience you can enable it yourself with any iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch running iOS 5+. The discovery was made by iOS developer Sonny Dickson, who provides the details on how to edit your iOS backups to turn the feature … Read More

Show Full File & Folder Names on the Mac Desktop

Nov 9, 2011 - 22 Comments
End file name truncation in Mac OS X

Have you ever noticed that some files and folders display truncated names when they’re placed on the Mac OS X Desktop? A file or folder named anything over a certain character limit will be shortened with a series of three periods, something like “Mobile Documents Sync” will display as “Mobile Do…ync” and so on. One … Read More

How to Split the iPad Keyboard For Easier Typing

Nov 9, 2011 - 12 Comments
iPad split keyboard

Typing on the iPad onscreen keyboard can be a little strange for some users who are accustomed to either an iPhone and typing with their thumbs, or even a Mac or PC and accustomed to typing on a regular touch keyboard. But one great way to improve iPad typing and make it faster is to … Read More

Delete Songs Directly on iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch

Nov 9, 2011 - 44 Comments
Delete Music from iPhone

You can now delete songs directly from the Music app on your iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch. The music removal action is achieved directly on the iOS device without having to re-sync to iTunes, allowing you to rapidly clear out music or songs you don’t want stored on the device.

Share iPhone, iPad, and Mac Calendars with Anyone Else from iCloud

Nov 8, 2011 - 13 Comments
Share Calendars with anyone else through iCloud

Using iCloud, sharing a Calendar from your iPhone, iPad, or Mac OS X iCal with anyone else is now easier than ever. This is a straight forward process that requires iCloud, set it up if you haven’t already and you can get sharing, here’s how:

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