Update: Look like someone has taken over the project. It is now call TVShows 2.

Are you one of those people who love watching TV but find it difficult to set your time to match your favorite shows? Then maybe you are also one of those who rely on the internet to catch up with the latest episodes, and watch them at your own convenient time.

Among the many available ways, torrent might be the most popular one. But, no matter what method that you choose, the effort of tracking and downloading TV torrents manually requires quite an endeavor. Luckily, there are some applications that you can use to automate the process. One of the most popular applications is java-based multi-platform TED – even though it’s a bit resource-hungry. But, if you are a Mac user, you can use a native Mac app called TV Shows.

Let The Show Begins

TVShows is a simple app that will let you “subscribe” to TV shows’ torrents. It will use a background process to periodically check the availability of the torrents, so you don’t have to open it all the time. This app will not download the actual files, so you will need a separate torrent client to do that.

When you open the app for the first time, TVShows will update its list. You can manually update the list by clicking the “Update List” button on the menu bar.

There are tons of shows on the list that you can subscribe to. But before going through the subscription process, let’s take a peek at the “Preferences“.

You can see two tabs here. The first tab is “General“. Here’s the place to enable/disable TVShows. You could also set how often the app should check for the availability of new episodes of the shows that you’ve subscribed to.

The “Torrents” tab is where you define the quality of the movies that you want to download and the location where you want to save the torrents. Please note that the higher the quality that you choose, the bigger the size of the movie files. Normal quality is the default choice which gives you good quality movies with acceptable file size.

Subscribing To The Shows

Now let’s continue to the subscribing process. To find the show that you want to subscribe, you can browse the list manually and pick few of the items. But, if you already know what show that you want, the easiest way is to use the search feature. Write down the title of the show and the result will pop up on the list pane. Next, click the “Subscribe” button to start.

The subscription window will open, and you can choose to start your subscription with the next aired episode (perfect choice if you’ve already followed the show manually) or to start from anywhere within the episode list.

If the show that you want is still in the beginning, there’s a chance that you can start from the first episode. But, if the show has gone for some time, you might still need to catch up with the early episodes manually.

Repeat the “Search and Subscribe” process for the other shows that you like.

After that, all the shows that you are subscribed to will also be listed on the main window, along with information about “the last seen episode“. You can also find the “Unsubscribe” button next to it should you want to stop following the show.

When TVShows Meets Transmission

The next step that you need to take is to integrate the subscription system with a torrent client. The most popular choice for Mac users is Transmission.

Setting up Transmission to pick up torrents from TVShows is easy. Open the “Preferences” and go to the “Transfer” tab. Check the “Auto add” box and set the location to watch torrent files to be the same as the location where you save downloaded torrents in TVShows.

After that, you can leave the system to run automatically. Every time there’s a new episode from the show that you are subscribed to, TVShows will download the torrent, and Transmission will pick up the torrent file and download the movie file. But please note that you have to keep Transmission open in order for it to download the movie files.

So far, the system work flawlessly and has saved me a lot of time. But, if you know another system that work best for you, please share them in the comment below.

But Dropbox’s biggest strength is also its weakness. While the simple concept of synchronizing everything inside one Dropbox folder is the factor that keeps it above its competitors, this simplicity also means that it’s (almost) impossible to synchronize everything else outside that folder.

Meet Symlink

If you are a Mac user who doesn’t like the idea of moving everything to Dropbox folder for the sake of synchronizing the content, there’s another way to achieve that. Basically, what we do is utilizing “symbolic link” (symlink) to create a reference to a folder and then place the symlink inside Dropbox folder. Anything that happens to the folder will be mirrored by the symlink and vice versa. So, symlink is a perfect solution to the problem of synchronizing outside folder to Dropbox.

You could create symlink via command line in Terminal, but common computer users are “allergic” to command line. So here are two free and simple tools that you can use to create symlink without having to touch any command line.

1. SymbolicLinker

SymbolicLinker is a tiny contextual menu plugin (for Puma through Leopard users) and software service (for Snow Leopard & later users) that, once installed, allows any user to create symbolic links to files inside the Finder. SymbolicLinker does this by adding a contextual menu item to the Finder that generates symbolic links to the selected files.

To use SymbolicLinker, download the compressed installer file. There are two important files there: SymbolicLinker.service for Snow Leopard (and later) users, and SymbolicLinker.plugin for Leopard (and previous version of Mac OS X) users. There’s also the installation instructions that will give you all the details.

The usage is also simple. Create a symlink of a folder (either by right clicking or by using Service), then place the symlink inside your Dropbox folder.

2. MacDropAny

MacDropAny is a tool built specifically to create symlink for Dropbox. The first time you open the application, it will ask you to choose which folder that you want to sync via Dropbox.

Then the next step is choosing where in the Dropbox folder do you want to put the symlink. This option gives you the ability to organize those symlinks into a specific folder inside Dropbox. You could name the folder “External links” or something else according to your preferences.

The last step is to assign name to the Symlink. To avoid confusion, it’s advisable to name the symlink similar to the original folder.

MacDropAny will offer you to open the newly made symlink.

Testing Time

Then it’s time to test the result. I dragged a text file into the symlink inside Dropbox folder.

The text file appears on the original folder that I placed in the Desktop. Then I made changes into the text and saved. I checked the synchronized text on another computer, and it was updated. So the conclusion: the system works fine.

Words of warning though, it’s not advisable to sync folders with too many items inside – something like the Applications and Pictures folders – since Dropbox tends to behave erroneously when it tries to sync too many files. Read more about this in the Known Issues page.

This two tools are the simplest solution that I could find to synchronized folders outside Dropbox. If you have other alternatives, please share them using the comment below.

While image editing apps are in abundance, the one that is perfect for your everyday uses are hard to find. Using Photoshop just to resize images would be an overkill. If you are a Mac user, you could try ResizeMe – an image processing application that can manipulate images in several ways, and in bulk.

The Features

When you first open ResizeMe, the first thing that you will immediately see is the file list pane on the left and the image preview pane on its right. If you select one image from the list, ResizeMe will display preview of what the processed image will look.

Adding images to be processed is easy. You can drag and drop them in the list pane, or you can add them using the “+ (plus)” button below. Deleting one from the list is also as simple as clicking the “- (minus)” button.

ResizeMe offers many quick image manipulating features that can be very useful for everyday users. The first one on the list is “Scale & Resize“. As the name suggests, this feature will help you resize the image to the pixels that you need. To avoid distortion, check “Keep Aspect Ratio” box. While “Only scale down” option will reduce the size of any image larger than the set limit but will not mess with the smaller ones. These options are very useful to keep your images within your blog layout size.

Once in a while, you will encounter un-straight photos. The second feature – “Rotate or Flip” – is your answer. You can choose free rotate or directly set the image to Landscape/Portrait. The feature also allows you to flip the image horizontally or vertically. To get maximum result, this feature is best combined with the crop feature.

The “Crop” feature itself is pretty straightforward. You set the result size that you want, and you set the area where the cropping should start. Unfortunately we couldn’t drag and move the cropping area in the preview.

“Reflection” is a neat trick that you could apply to your image. Set the “Opacity” and “Amount” of reflection to get the effect that you desire.

It’s nice to see reflections of boxes of images. But I personally think that you would get the best result from this feature if you apply the effect to images with transparent background like this one.

Another nice effect that you can apply to your images is “Drop Shadow“. You can customize the color, angle, offset, blur and opacity of the shadow.

Similar to “Reflection“, “Drop Shadow” will also give you different result if applied to boxes and partially transparent images.

Want to protect your images from image thieves? You can put your watermark there. You can, for example, put your website address on the image. So, even though people can still steal your images, they will also promote your site for free.

Aside from customizing the text, you can also set the angle, color, and opacity of the watermark.

If you need your images to be in other formats, ResizeMe also provide the easy way to do that. Just go to “Output Format” feature.

Renaming images in a bulk will not be a mundane task anymore as you can do it easily with the help of “Rename” feature in ResizeMe.

Process, Preset, Go!

After you satisfied with all the changes that you’ve made, click the “Go” button at the lower right of the window to apply them to your images.

The one thing that you should pay attention to is that ResizeMe process all the files in the list at once according to the settings. If you want to apply different settings to different pictures, you should do it in different sessions.

The good news is that you can save the settings as presets. So, repeating the same process to different images in the future would be as easy as choosing a preset and pressing “Go“.

I personally found ResizeMe to be very useful for my light image manipulation needs, especially when I have to apply similar changes to groups of images.

What about you? Have you tried ResizeMe? Do you know any alternatives? Please share your findings in the comment below.

One of the most common way to customize your blog is to use themes. If you are a WordPress user, you should be familiar in the concept of themes. But even though there are literary thousands of free themes out there, using them will not really help you to stand out – as everybody is doing the same thing. A quick calculation will tell us that in average one theme is used by more than tens of thousands blogs.

That’s why customizable themes is the solution. During my quest to find a good customized WordPress theme, I found Platform, a theme that can be easily customized by dragging and dropping the elements.

Customizing The Look

Let’s start by downloading and installing the theme. Go to the admin area of your WordPress blog and choose “Themes” from the sidebar menu, then continue with “Install New Theme” tab. Do a search and click the “Install” link.

Confirm the installation by clicking the “Install Now” button.

After you have activated the theme, you’ll see a new item appear in the sidebar menu. Clicking it will open the “Platform Theme Options” and its own list of customization items.

The first option that you can find is the access to “View Site“, “Docs” and “Forum“. Anytime you need help on using the theme, you can visit the Docs and/or Forum links.

Now let’s explore the theme’s menu. First the “Global Options.“. This is the place to customize your blog’s header image and favicon. All that you have to do is to upload the image that you want to use. While there is no restriction on the header image, the favicon that you want to use must be in “.ico” or “.png” format and the size is 16×16 pixels.

Here are where your header image and favicon will appear on your blog.

Other than the two items mentioned above, Global Settings will also give you access to set: Twitter Integration (requires Twitter for WordPress plugin), and Page Content & Body background color.

Next is the “Template Setup“. Here is the place to set what elements that you want to show in each template. You can drag and drop the items that you want to the “Displayed Page Content Area Sections” on the left, and the ones that you don’t want to the “Available/Disabled Sections” on the right.

There are many templates that you can customize. Each comes with its own elements. So take your time and go through these templates and items one by one.

Go to the “Layout Editor” to choose what kind of layout you want your blog to be. You can also set the dimension of each area of the layout simply by dragging the borders of by writing down the dimension in the available fields below the layout editor.

Further Customization

Since there are too many customizable items that you can tinker with, the best way to get familiar with Platform is to install and play with it yourself. For example, you can choose to show or hide the “News/Blog RSS Icon” from the “Header And Nav” menu.

Or to select the content layout for post pages from “Blog And Post” menu.

And also set the text for social links and choose which social network icons that you want to show/hide at your blog footer.

Or to add custom scripts to your blog, such as Google Analytics script.

The customization process could be a little bit overwhelming, but never forget to save your changes. The save buttons are available at the top and the bottom of the page.

Restore, Export And Import Settings

One of the best features of Platform theme is its ability to export the customization that you’ve made to be used in another blog. So, you only have to tweak the theme once, export the setting and import it to your other blogs if you want to.

Have you tried Platform? Or do you use other customizable WordPress themes? Please share your experience in customizing your blogs using the comment below.

Despite the controversy, Mac App is also a huge hit. If you are a Mac user but haven’t tried this app, let’s see how App Store can help you in finding great Mac apps and keeping them updated. We’ll also see on some of the alternatives.

The App Store

After updating your Mac OS X to 10.6.6, you will see a new application popping up on your dock – the App Store. Aside from the icon, you’ll also see a little red number attached to it. This number represents how many updates are available for your downloaded apps.

Unfortunately, there’s been an inconsistency on how App Store manages the updates. I found that App Store will only check and display updates for applications downloaded using App Store. Other installed applications should rely on manual method.

The interface of Mac App Store itself is similar to iOS App Store. So if you used App Store from your iTunes before, you should have no difficulties using this one. By default, “Featured” will be open every time you launch App Store.

Next to it is the “Top Chart” both for paid and free apps.

If you prefer to browse by “Categories“, go to the next menu.

And if you want to see the list of all your downloaded apps, they reside under “Purchases“. You can quickly see which apps have updates by looking at the different color in status on the right.

For those who prefer to see only the available updates, go straight to the last menu on the right. Just like in iOS App Store, you can update the apps one by one or all of them at once using “Update All” button.

Downloading individual apps is also a snap. Just click the download button (the one with the word “Free” – or the price – written on it).

You need to provide App Store with your Apple ID and password before you can download the apps.

The downloaded app(s) will appear on the dock along with the progress bar to indicate the remaining download time.

The Alternatives

The concept of providing one stop place for downloading and updating applications is not new. Even though App Store is currently the one with the most number of applications in its collection, there several applications with similar function long before App Store.

One of them is Bodega. This app is decorated similar to newspaper stand, but instead of newspapers and magazines, you’ll see a list of apps. You can browse by categories like “New Releases” and “Top Free Apps“.

Other than providing you with app downloads, Bodega also scans your hard drive for installed apps and compare their version with the latest version available. Then Bodega will list all the installed apps plus the “get” button next to the ones with available updates.

The updating process is as simple as clicking the “Get” button, waiting for the download to finish, and clicking the “Install” button.

Another alternative that you can try is AllMyMacApps. This is more like Web app instead of desktop app. The desktop app that they provide is actually a site-specific browser created by Fluid.

AllMyMacApps lets you search for applications and filter them by categories and by license (Free, Paid, or both).

So far I’m unable to find the update feature in AllMyMacApps, if there’s any. But if your need is only to update your installed apps (and more), you can try AppFresh. This is an all in one update center for everything inside your hard drive: Applications, Plugins, Widgets, Preference Panes, and even System Updates.

And then the question is: which one should you use? Given the vast collection of apps, Mac App Store should be the number one choice. But with all the limitations in App Stores update department, I guess there’s nothing wrong about using all of them simultaneously.

So, which one(s) that you prefer – and why? Share your thoughts using the comment below.

That’s why in the environment where you can’t really put a face to the name, trust is a very valuable currency. And that’s why the concept of word of mouth recommendation from friends that we know and trust is very powerful. Add some social networks to the mixture and the effect would be multiplied. That’s the idea behind TAF4Free.

Recommendation With Some Social Twist

TAF4Free (Tell A Friend For Free) is a web tool from SocialTwist which will allow you – as a web owner – to provide an easy way for your visitor to tell their friends about your site(s). TAF4Free allows your readers to contact people in their social networks as well as send emails to contacts in their address book.

But before you can use the tool, you need to sign up with SocialTwist. Signing up will allow you to change the configuration, view usage statistic, create and customize more widgets.

This sign up process also serves as the place where you can customize the aspects of your Tell A Friend campaign such as the size of TAF button, widget theme and the button usage. For example, I planned to use the TAF method for my WordPress blog, so I selected “Blog” from the drop down list.

Further customization appeared after I chose “Blog“. I selected “WordPress Engine Plugin“.

After finished with the setting up process, I clicked on the “Get Code” button. You can check or uncheck the first and third option boxes, but make sure that the second one is checked before you click the button.

Installing The WordPress Plugin

After I hit the “Get Code“, a download button appeared. I clicked this “Get It Now” button and the WordPress plugin was downloaded to my hard drive.

To install the plugin, go to the “Plugin – Install Plugins – Upload” menu from your WordPress admin area. Then click the “Choose File” button, locate the downloaded plugin, and click “Install now“.

The final step would be to activate the plugin. You can do this directly after installing it or later on from the plugin page.

Another Point Of View

So far we have seen the process from web owner point of view. Now let’s switch our perspective and see things from the visitor’s side. For example, you visit your friend’s blog and you want to share an article that you read to your other friends.

If the blog owner use TAF4Free, you will find the button at the end of the article. Hover your mouse over it and a list of available sharing methods will pop up. Click at the one that you want to use.

A pop up window will appear focusing to your choice of sharing method. Then you can continue with the sharing process. For example, if you choose “Facebook“, all you have to do is click on the “Share” button, fill in your login data, and the word is out.

Or if you choose “GMail“, you can fill in your user name and password before picking people up from your address book and sending them link to the article that you want to share.

TAF4Free makes it easy for visitors to switch between different sharing methods, so all they have left to do is finding worth sharing materials and share them.

Content Is Really The King

But everything goes back to the quality of your content. No matter how easy the sharing method is, nothing is going to work if you have no good quality content that people want to share.

If you give your reader top notch materials, the combination of your good content and TAF4Free will surely help you to spread the word about your website to the world. If one person recommends your web to some of his/her friends, and these friends do the same, you’ll have viral marketing working for you. Then you can stop worrying about getting readers to your site and focus on creating great materials.

What do you think about TAF4Free? Would you use it to help you spread the buzz about your site? Do you know other similar alternatives? Please share your thoughts using the comment below.

Image credit: See-ming Lee

There are many factors that can influence the loading speed of a website. Analyzing and fixing the problems one by one could be a nightmare for non-geeks who happens to have one or two websites. But luckily, there’s YSlow – a Firefox add-on which will help even the most common users of technology to easily track down the hogs on their websites.

Get, Install, And Set Up The Add Ons

You can install YSlow by using the search function in Firefox’s Add-ons Manager, or you could also get it straight from YSlow page.

And after installation, you can see the logo on Firefox’ lower bar. Clicking on it will activate the Add-on.

However, please note that you have to install and activate Firebug prior to using YSlow. And if you are Firefox 4 beta users, you currently can’t use YSlow because the latest version of Firebug (at the time of writing) is only compatible with Firefox 3.x.

If everything is set, click YSlow button while the website that you want to analyze is in focused. YSlow will open as one of the tabs of Firebug. You can choose the option to always run YSlow each time a web page is loaded, but ordinary users who only want to analyze one or two sites should use manual process by clicking the “Run Test” button.

There are several ruleset of test that you can use depending on what kind of website that you have. Most of us amateur blogger might want to use the “Small Site or Blog” ruleset.

You can also edit the sets by clicking the “Edit” button next to the ruleset drop down menu. Then you can include/exclude elements of the set. You can get more information about an item by hovering your mouse over it.

The Test Result

After clicking the “Run Test” button, YSlow will start analyzing your site. A short moment later, it will present you the complete result with overall grades, individual grades and short notes about each items.

You can learn more about a particular item by clicking on the “Read More” link.

You can also filter the result based on the categories.

Next to the “Grade” tab is the “Components” tab. This is the place to see the breakdown list of components that weighing down the page that you analyze.

The “Statistics” tab will show you the result in a more graphical manner. You can quickly compare the size of each components just by looking at the graph.

Tools Of The Trade

After the analyzing comes the fixing phase. YSlow provides its users with a set of tools to improve your websites’ performance. But please remember that YSlow goes only as far as giving you suggestions of the optimized elements of your websites. You still have to manually edit those components yourself – replacing the old ones with the optimized versions suggested by YSlow.

For example. you could click on the “All JS Minified” link to get more compact and smaller script. Then login to your web host and use those minified scripts to replace the ones that you use on your site.

But the tool that I think would be most useful to most of us is the Smush.it. This tool will optimized the images found on the page that you analyze so that those images will be smaller and more fit for the web.

Click the “All Smush.it” link and let Smush.it do the rest. After the process is done, you can download the smushed images and use them to replace the ones that you use on the web page.

The tool also allows you to upload images from your hard drive and optimize them. This will be very useful to compress the size of images before using them for the web.

Be warned though that Smush.it will rename the files and use plus (+) sign to replace spaces. Some sites doesn’t allow you to use non-standard characters for file name and your optimized images might not show up properly. So you might want to rename the optimized images before uploading them to the web.

There are many more aspects of YSlow that can’t be fit described here. For more information, you could visit YSlow User Guide.

WordPress blogs owners could also try 3 more methods to lighten the load and speed up their blogs.

Have you tried YSlow? Do you know other tools to analyze and fix the hogs on your websites? Share your thoughts and opinions using the comment below.

Few examples of the tons of features that Edu 2.0 offers are: massive resource of community contributed teaching and learning materials, mobile access, online quizzes, group discussion, and question banks. But the best part is: everything is accessible for free.

If the thought of building a school is too grand for you, Edu 2.0 is also fit for those who only want to manage a small class, creating a short online course about a topic, or simply as a place to host a tutorial.

So let’s take a peek at this great service.

Start Building Your School

First and foremost, some of you might want to see what is using Edu 2.0 like before you register. To do this, go to the demo school and log in with the user id “demoteacher” and password “demoteacher“.

And for those who are ready to jump into the water, Edu 2.0 offers users two ways to start: “Register” your own online school, or “Join” existing registered school.

You could use the second option if you already know the school that you want to join. You could find registered schools using the search function. This option is perfect for students who were asked to join by their teacher(s) or for parents who want to monitor their children’s academic achievement.

Educators and/or school administrators should choose the first option as it will allow them to create (and later manage) their own virtual school. All they have to do is to fill in the necessary data in the registration form and click at the “Submit” button.

Tidying Up The Front End

Even though the creating part could be done virtually in one click, the administering part is another different story. Managing a school – online or offline – is definitely not a simple job. There are many things to think about with layers of problems to consider. That’s why the first thing that you will get after signing up and logging in is tips of things that you could do to set up your school.

If you plan to create one-class only school, you might be able to manage everything on your own. But if that’s not the case, you might want to get help from others. Edu 2.0 provides you with several ways to easily add teachers and administrators. The method can also be used to invite students to you school.

Another first thing that you might want to do is setting up school policies. I personally think it’s important to draw the lines at the very beginning to avoid problems in the future.

Starting A New Class

The heart of every school is education, acquired through the process of teaching and learning, and accommodated by classrooms. So, to start a school, you’d need class(es). Let’s build some.

The process of creating a class is as easy as creating the school. Fill out a form and click a button and you are good to go.

Then after your class is created, you could view (and – as administrator – edit) many aspects of the class.

This includes configuring the features of the class.

Adding materials for online study is easy. Problems arise when the students’ knowledge has to be assessed. Creating online assignments is not always as easy as it sound. Luckily, that’s not a problem within Edu 2.0 environment. Just click the “Add” button on the assignments page.

Then pick what kind of assignment that you want to create. Edu 2.0 provide teachers with several different types of assignments to choose.

And as everything else around here, creating assignment is also a form-filling easy.

There’s a set of complete tools that you can use to create online assignments. The one displayed below are tools to create quizzes. While they are similar to common tools that you can find on many modern word processors, you could always consult the help link every time you are unclear about something.

Finding Resources

Other than a great teaching tool, Edu 2.0 is also a great place to find resources for education. The materials come from the community of Edu 2.0 users. You can find many things here, but you can not find everything. Instead of making it the only resources, I prefer to look at it as additional resources to the ones that you’ve already have. Use the search function to assist you. Seek and you shall find.

Then follow where the search results lead you.

Use your school library to store teaching and learning materials, including the ones that you found from the resources search.

And allow me to close the discussion by showing you the mobile version of the experimental school that I built. It’s generated automatically without the need to tinker with anything.

I hope this short introduction is enough to get you started. It’s impossible to discuss everything about Edu 2.0 here, so your best way to find them out is by getting your hands dirty. Build your own school, play with it, and share your finding with us using the comment below. Experience is indeed the best teacher.

W3 Total Cache is one great solution to speed up your WordPress site, but it requires plenty of technical configuration that might put new WP users off. For those who want a turnkey solution, here are some of them that can achieve the same effect without you having to do much tweaking.

1. Cheating With The Codes

One of the major problems that can hog down your page load is the code mess – especially in the absent of a plugin called WP-Minify. Once enabled, this plugin will combine and compress JS and CSS files to improve page load time.

Here’s a quote of the developer’s explanation on how the plugin works:

WP Minify grabs JS/CSS files in your generated WordPress page and passes that list to the Minify engine. The Minify engine then returns a consolidated, minified, and compressed script or style for WP Minify to reference in the WordPress header.

The more CSS codes/Java Scripts that you use, the more saving that you can get. You can also exclude some files from the process – if you really know what you are doing. But please note that this plugin is not for the faint of heart. Playing with codes always comes with some risk.

2. Cache the whole site

Another way that you can do to speed up the loading time of your pages/sites is to make the process go to a shorter route. You can do this by creating caches of your pages.

Usually, after a visitor make a page request (read: opening a page), the request will be accepted by the server, then the server will load the data from the database, and back to the server before the client finally get the data (read: the page loaded). The length of these process will result in waiting time for the visitor and bandwidth usage for the web owner.

But if you use caching plugin like WP Super Cache or Quick Cache, the route will be shortened into: visitor request – server – back to visitor, because all the data has already been cached and there’s no need to visit the database to fetch them.

Since WP Super Cache has been discussed many times before, let’s look at the alternative: Quick Cache.

The disadvantage is that visitor will not always get the latest version of the page, but that won’t be a problem unless the page is always updated each and every second (which is rarely happened). The advantage of this method is a huge saving on bandwidth and server resource, so much that this is a favorite way for blog master to survive from Digg attack.

Again, this one is also not for the faint hearted as there are so much settings that one should go through. Beginners are advised not to go beyond the “Easy” step.

3. Flirting With The Image Files

And the major bloat to every blog is images. Most blogger will just link videos from video hosting sites like YouTube, but images are commonly uploaded to the blog server. Ten images of 100 Kb on a page equals to 1 Mb of loading size.

That’s why it’s highly advisable to always reduce the size of every image that you want to upload to your blog. There are many image manipulator that you can use to achieve this such as SmushIt – part of YSlow Firefox addon, ImageOptim for Mac, and Photoshop.

But even the reduced-size images still eat up bandwidth. Here’s the part where Dropbox comes to the rescue. Instead of uploading images directly to your blog server, you could put your images in your Dropbox public folder and link the post to that image. This method means more work but worth the hassle, because it will decrease bandwidth use and improve loading time. Plus, if you have to move your blog to another host later, you will save a lot of headache as you don’t have to move your images.

As I’ve mentioned before, these are only few of the many ways that you can use to lighten the load and speed up your WordPress blog. Also check out our other article on speeding up your WordPress blog. If you know other methods, please share them using the comment below.

Image credit: Nathan Eal Photography

Aside from the practical side – that unlike digital camera, most people always have their phone at hand – camera phones also have other advantages over traditional digital camera: the availability of apps to tinker with the pictures.

If you are an iPhone users, here are two must-have free apps that will help you in your images adventure.

1. Diptic

The common way to share pictures is by treating each item as a standalone entity. But that is not the only way. You can also merge several images into one and create new and unique combinations. The reason why most common people did not take this path is because they think the process is too much of a hassle to go through just to share pictures. But Diptic is about to change that.

The app makes combining few photos into one as easy as drag and drop. I personally feel that this app is similar to Pages or iWeb in the terms that they all use pre-made template to complete a project.

The first step in using the app is choosing what frame template that you want to use from many of the available choices. Then you can continue with choosing the photos.

Tap one pane of the frame and fill it with a photo. You can take a brand new photo by using iPhone camera or use images from your photo album. Being a traditional amateur photographer that I am, I personally prefer not to use newly made photos for the project as I’d like to keep unedited photos that I take.

You can resize the photo inside the pane and move it around to focus on o specific part of it.

And after you finish with one frame, move on to the next until you fill in all the blank pane(s).

Each photo is also editable. Tap the “Effect” menu to access basic photo editing tools like brightness and color. You can also adjust the border by tapping the “Border” button at the top right corner of the interface.

Choose “Export” menu to finalize your creation.

2. Instagram

Most people share their images with family and friends. But why stop there? Why not share your masterpieces to the world? The second app that I think every iPhone amateur photographer should have is Instagram. This app is like the social side of photo sharing. Even if the world is not your goal, this app will make sharing photos to your loved ones a lot easier.

Start by registering for an Instagram account. This account is the anchor that will connect your other social network account.

Then continue by building your network of friends that you want to share your pictures to. But instead of building one from a scratch, why not using the ones that you’ve already had? Instagram makes it easy to connect your account to your Facebook and Twitter accounts.

The pictures that you want to share can come from your photo library or from the ones that you take directly from within Instagram.

If you allow it, Instagram can send you push notifications of the things that happens in your network in the form of alerts, sound and icon badges. You can also browse interesting pictures from other users, or read news about your circle of friends.

These two are my personal favorite. If you have your own nominees, you can share the list using the comment below.

Some people are fine with this, but for those who wish that they can play (almost) any kind of movie files without the trouble of converting them can use some help from iOS apps that are built just for this purpose. Here are two alternative free apps that you can use.

1. VLC

This is one of the most popular media players for all the computer platforms out there, and now it has come to iPhone.

The iPhone version does only one thing and it does it very well – play videos. You can throw in practically any kind of videos and this baby will play them without difficulties.

The interface is also simple. You will see a list of available videos along with small thumbnails, “About” and “Edit” button (to delete the files), and nothing else.

To play a video, just tap on the one that you want to watch and you are ready to go. You can slide to adjust the volume and position of the scenes. There are also other standard playback buttons like Play/Pause and Skip Backward and Forward. Tap the “Done” button to stop playing, and tap the screen to hide/unhide the tools.

To add videos, you’ll need the help from iTunes. Plug your iPhone to your computer and open iTunes. Select the phone from the left pane and go to the “Apps” tab.

Scroll down to the bottom of the page and select VLC from the list. Click the “Add” button and browse to the place where the video files are, and the rest is self-explanatory.

2. OPlayer Lite

The second alternative is OPlayer. There are two version of this app: the Pro-paid version and the Lite-free version. Both come with more bells and whistles than VLC in terms of features.

Note: I’ve tried the lite version and it crashed a couple of times. Still, it’s a viable alternative.

You can add video files to OPlayer via iTunes, similar to VLC.

And those files will be presented in explorer-style. Tap on “My Documents” and you can choose one of the available videos to watch.

The playback options are similar to VLC, with the ability to play full screen by tapping on the screen.

There’s one thing that made me excited about OPlayer. I found out at the “Settings” that this app is capable of attaching subtitle to the movie (SRT files). So I experimented by adding a movie with its SRT files along with it. It turns out that the subtitle appeared for the first several seconds and then gone.

OPlayer is also able to add files via WiFi connection. You need to point your browser to the address that OPlayer provided. This address will always change every time you start the app, so be sure to check back the “WiFi Transfer” options from “More” menu every time you want to go through the process.

Your browser will show upload/download interface. Choose file and click the “Submit” button to upload, or click one of the file to download.

Another cool ability from OPlayer is the ability to open web page and download video files directly from the web. I opened YouTube successfully but not able to find any way to download the videos. I didn’t know any direct link to download videos from web so I couldn’t try the feature.

So far, these two apps are the best alternatives of video players that I could find in iPhone. If you know other alternatives, please share using the comment below.

Internet made the sharing business a whole lot easier. You can instantly email your overseas friends about the latest and greatest song from your favorite rock band, or tweet about it to your followers. But why stop there? Why not join GetGlue – a community where people from all over the world share and discover things that they love?

Make Everything Stick

GetGlue describes itself as “a social network for entertainment“. Its goal is to add “fun” to the process of recommending things that you like (or not recommending things that you don’t like) by integrating itself to other popular social networks like Facebook and Twitter and by rewarding the users with virtual badges and freebies.

People can use GetGlue not only to recommend things to others, but also to get recommendations on things that they like. GetGlue can also be used as a place you go to every time you want to shop for specific items.

You can register for GetGlue account by simply choosing your user name and password, and writing down your email address.

Alternatively, you can use your Facebook or Twitter login info to get started quickly with GetGlue.

To enrich your GetGlue experience, expand it beyond the web interface. GetGlue is also available as extensions for major browsers (Firefox, Chrome, Safari) and apps for iDevices (iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad) and Android Phones. It means that you can access GetGlue anytime and anywhere.

To download and install the Glue extension for your favorite browser, find the item in the browser’s extensions repository. Here’s the example of Glue for Safari.

After the extension is installed, your browser will show a small recommendation bar at the bottom (or top) of your browser every time you visit sites that related to books, music, movies, or other “consumer” items.

To access GetGlue when you are away from your computer, use GetGlue app for your smart phone. Armed with the app, you can recommend the movie that you are watching at the theatre without having to wait until you get home.

The Web Interface

Now let’s explore the web interface. After logging in, you will be greeted by quick status update and recommended item(s).

There’s the “utility” bar at the right side of the page which consist of many things. For example: your personal data, link to GetGlue apps,

… To Dos, Quick Rate Button, earned stickers, etc.

Clicking the “Launch Quick Rate” button will open the quick rating window. Choose one of the items’ type to start rating things.

Your friends and relatives will appear under “My Subscriptions” and “My Subscribers” category. This is something like following and followers in Twitter. You can increase the number of your cult by inviting more people to subscribe to you.

And in the main page, there’s the update of what activities that currently happening among GetGlue users.

Bonus For Bloggers

If you happen to be a blogger, you can add GetGlue service in your blog. To do that, navigate to the bottom of the sidebar in the web interface and click on the “Install Glue on your blog or website” link.

The Glue widget window will open and you can choose your blog’s publishing platform. There are ready-to-use widgets for Blogger and Typad users, while other blogging platforms users can use the provided script instead.

Are you a GetGlue users? What do you think after using it? Would you recommend GetGlue to your friends and family? Share your thoughts in the comment below.

Image credit: GetGlue

The problem is, even with all the convenience of the net, tracking several shows simultaneously is a tedious job. For each and every show, you have to regularly visit the torrent site every week, search for the show that you want to download, acquire the torrent, and finally download the episode. Multiple that with the number of shows that you follow and you will get a major headache.

Luckily, TED‘s here to save the day.

The Torrent Episode Downloader

TED is the short for Torrent Episode Downloader. The app is a multi-platform java application that will work under Windows, Mac, and Linux. TED’s job is to help users track down and download torrents for multiple TV shows. Basically, all that you have to do is set up several shows and forget all about it. TED will do the rest.

To set TED to track a show, click “Add Show” icon from the toolbar.

TED will show you list of popular shows. Click one of them and you will get all the necessary info about the show. If you want to “follow” the particular show, you can choose to start from the next available episode, the last aired episode, or custom episode. There’s also option to download the episodes in HD quality.

If you choose Custom episode, TED will show you all the available episodes and you can choose which one(s) that you want to get.

It’s possible that the episode that you want is not on the popular list. If that’s the case, you can click the “Add a custom show” button under the show list and then add necessary data about the show. Start from the name of the show and the Season and Episode number.

Next, add the Feeds addresses. These are the places where you will get your show from.

You can use the RSS address that you already have, or let TED generate the addresses automatically for you. Click the “Plus” button and choose either “User defined” for manual address or “Generate” for automatic list of addresses.

The “Filters” tab will help you filter the episodes. You can choose the size range of the file, minimum number of seeders, and filtering keyword.

The “Schedule” tab is otional. It will add episode scheduler from Epguides and TVRage. If you choose popular shows, TED will generate this ones for you automatically.

Let TED Get The Episodes

After finishing the configuration, you can let TED get the episodes of your show(s) automatically, without the need for you to interfere. Further customization is available from the “Preferences“.

The “General” Preferences will let you set the interval between episode search, place to save the torrent, and whether you want your default torrent to pick up the file download automatically.

The “Look And Feel” tab allows you to put TED to system tray and to always start TED minimized to tray.

Since there are always many torrents available for each episode of popular show, you can choose to download the torrent with more than minimum seeders or the one with the most seeders. This option is available under “Advanced” tab. You can also choose not to download compressed episodes as some uploaders tend to compress and split the episodes to smaller chunks.

All You Have To Do Is Watch

If everything is done correctly, TED will do the tedious job of monitoring new episodes of your favorite shows from the pre-determined locations. Every time it finds new episode, it will download the torrent and send it to your chosen torrent client. So, all you have to do is wait for new episodes to pop up in your computer and watch.

Should you decide that a show is not worth watching, all you have to do is delete it.

I’ll leave the legality issue to your conscience. TED will help you minimize the trouble of tracking TV shows episodes from the net, but everything that you do on the net is your own responsibility.

When we compare that condition with what we have here today; with computers, word processors, smart phones, internet and all the modern technologies (and without the barbaric Vikings lurking in the dark); we should feel so lucky. Moreover, with the help of Simplenote, you could set up a multi platform writing environment that you can use to write, continue, and finish your book(s) anytime, anywhere and using any available devices at hand.

Step One: The Web Version

The first thing to set up is the web version. You could say that this is the bridge that connects everything else. If you haven’t got yourself an account, go to Simplenote’s site and click the green “Create An Account” button. Otherwise, “Sign In” with your account.

The web version of Simplenote gives users common features of note taking apps such as add notes (+), search notes, sort by tag, Trash and Pin, add tags, and writing the notes itself.

But the one feature that amazed me is the ability to view the older version of a note by moving the “Version History” slider more to the left. This feature allows you to see sentences from the past, maybe the ones that you’ve deleted but you want to retrieve back. If you are writing a book, keeping all versions of a text is essential.

And when you are ready to move beyond the web app, Simplenote gives you tons of options of accessing its service. You can view the complete list at the download page. Here are few of them.

Step Two: The Mobiles

Simplenote comes with free native iDevices apps. So if you are iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad users, you can go and download, install and use the apps from here.

Since these apps are from the people behind Simplenote, the apps comes with all the goodies that the web version has including viewing the older version of the note. There are also other features that I couldn’t find on the web version: the ability to share notes and publish them as web pages.

There are also other mobile apps made by others for other platforms, for example: Noted! [Palm webOS], mNote [Android], AndroNoter [Android], and SolidNote [Android]

Step Three: The Desktops

Simplenote shines in the number of desktop applications from third party developers that support the services. This means that users can use various type of desktop app to take notes, and the notes will be synchronized automatically with their account.

There are quite a few desktop apps available for Mac and Windows, such as: Notational Velocity [Mac], JustNotes [Mac], Notes [Windows] and Resoph Notes [Windows].

Unfortunately, there’s no desktop app for Linux users – yet. But…

Step Four: The Others

Support for synchronization with Simplenote account doesn’t stop at application level. There are add on for Firefox (QuickFox Notes) and Google Chrome Extensions which can help users quickly add and sync their notes from within their browsers.

This solution is perfect for Linux users who don’t have access to Mac or Windows and the Simplenote-friendly note taking desktop applications.

Step Five: The Usage

Using Simplenote and the multi platform writing environment is as simple as starting notes in one device and picking up where we left in another device. For example, you had an idea when you are on the road, then you could quickly jot down the idea via Simplenote in your iPhone. Then your note would be automatically synchronized to your account, and you could continue cooking your idea at the moment you turn on your computer at work or home.

Of course Simplenote is not the only alternative of multi platform note taking environment. We also have Evernote, Dropbox, and other similar services. But the reason I fell in love with Simplenote is – as the name suggested – because of its simplicity.

Do you use Simplenote? Or do you prefer other note taking method? Share your thoughts and opinion using the comment below.

There are many methods that you can do to download YouTube videos, but almost none is available to download directly to your mobile phone. But if you use jailbroken iPhone, there are few ways to directly download YouTube videos. One of them is by using an app called aTube.

Finding The App

The first step is obviously downloading the app. The question is, from where? In your jailbroken phone, open an app called Cydia, then go to the search bar on the bottom of the screen on the right. Then all that is left to do is do a search with “aTube” as the string, then tap at the result.

Then you will have the installation page. Tap on the “Install” button. The quick download review page will be opened, tap “Confirm” to start downloading the app. The download indicator will show you the progress, continued by the installation process. When everything is done, tap the “Return to Cydia” button to finish.

Searching And Downloading The Videos

Now we’re on to the fun part. Fire up aTube and start to rock and roll.

I think that the app was built on the premise that the users already know what videos they want to download from YouTube because the only way to find videos is by searching. There’s no way to browse around latest or popular videos. To do that you need to use the official YouTube app or visit the mobile version of the website from Safari.

With videos in mind, tap on the search tab on the toolbar below and start searching. When the search result appears, tap on the one that you want. The download summary page gives you two option; either “Download” or “Watch” the videos.

Using aTube, you can download more than one videos at once. Just make sure that your internet connection can handle the number of downloads that you have. The downloads will be located under the “Downloads” tab.

Each downloaded video will have its own download progress bar and the remaining download time under the title. I found a flaw though; the remaining download time is too small to read.

One feature that I found very useful from aTube is the ability to “Pause” and “Resume” downloads. So if your download is interrupted, you can just continue it from where it stop and not redo it from the beginning. It’s also possible to delete any download that you don’t want.

When your download is done, the result videos will be moved to “Videos” tab. The app provide you with all the information about the video such as: Title, Duration, VideoID, Size, and Download Time. Just pick the one that you want to watch and tap on the “Watch” button. And if you decide not to keep the video any longer, just tap the “Delete” button at the top right of the screen.

There’s nothing that you haven’t already know about playing the video. The interface is simple enough; aside from the control buttons, you have the progress bar and “Done” button to end the video player.

Aside from aTube, there’s also another alternative to YouTube downloader called MxTube – also from Cydia. The interface is more simple, but less featured compared to aTube.

So if you love short videos from YouTube and want to be able to enjoy them offline, aTube can help you to download them. If you know other alternatives, please share them using the comment below.

Recently, I’ve stumbled upon an app called moveAddict that will give Mac users the ability to mimic Cut and Paste feature of Windows. If you are one of the switchers from the Windows land, you might want to check this one out.

The Mac Way To Cut And Paste

But before we discuss the app, let’s look at how Mac OS X handles the cut and paste problems.

First of all, the process is called “move” in the realm of Mac. You can do this simply by selecting the files that you want to move then drag and drop them to the new location that you want them to be.

However, the process works differently according to the nature of the destination. If you move the files to another location within the same disk partition, the files will be cut and pasted. If the new location is in different partition or different drive, the files will be copied (indicated by the small green plus sign).

To override these default modes, you can hold Command button on your keyboard while dragging and dropping and the files will be cut and pasted wherever you move them.

On the other hand, holding Option button will always copy the files.

Using moveAddict

There’s nothing wrong with Mac’s move modes, but they rely so much on mouse. So if you prefer keyboard navigation over the rodent, why not trying to get your hands on moveAddict? Having other options is never bad, right?

The first time you run the app, you will be greeted by the Welcome window telling you basic things about the app.

Then the app will quietly reside on the menubar, ready to act on your command. By default, it uses similar command to cut and paste in the windows world: “Command + X” to Cut and “Command + V” to Paste. But you can change this if you want.

Using it is a matter of selecting a file and hit Command + X, then selecting the new location before hitting Command + V. However there are other settings that you can customized from the “Preferences” window, such as: Telling the app to start at login, changing the default shortcut key combination, and adding color tag to files.

From the Advanced tab you have access to enable moveAddict’s Finder toolbar for easy access to its function right from Finder. However, I personally think that this extra features beats the real purpose of the app, which is doing quick cut and paste without the need of mouse.

In general, this app is the kind of app that you would want to add to your Mac system, totally forgot about it, accept it as part of the OS, and wonder why your friend’s Mac can’t do the trick. The app comes in two version: the unlimited Pro version and the limited free version.

Do you know other similar apps? Share them using the comment below.

Luckily, others hate the problem as much as we do and many have come up with solutions. There are several download managers available out there which are specially built to overcome the hassle.

But having options is never a bad thing. Windows users can use MDownloader as an alternative to less-hassle download from file sharing service.

Start With The Options

After the usual downloading and installing routine, you can start using MDownloader. First time users will be greeted by the “Options” window, and the first item on the list is “General” options.

There are several things that can be set here, such as determining the default location of downloaded files, option to resume downloading at start up (only for servers which support resuming) and enabling color for downloaded items.

Next are “Connections” option. Here is the place where you can apply proxy servers should you want to use one.

To add a proxy server, just click on the “Add” button and enter the required data.

Still within the “Connections” options, there’s also the option to enable download accelerator and set the number of allowed simultaneous connections (between 2 to 4).

MDownloader allows users to do file searching on FilesTube and there are some adjustable settings under “Modules” options.

MDownloader also allows users to monitor items that they want to download on a regular basis by subscribing to the RSS. Just like “FilesTube Searcher“, the RSS Monitor option is located under “Modules” option too.

To add RSS Subcription, click on the “New” button and fill in the blank fields with appropriate data.

The last item on “Options” window is the list of supported file sharing services, or “Providers“. If you enable the “Priorities” option, you can arrange these providers by placing them upper or lower on the list. To do that, select one service and click the “Up” or “Down” button.

Searching And Downloading The Files

As mentioned above, MDownloader allows users to search and download files using FilesTube service. To do that, click on the white and blue “FT” icon on the main window.

After the FilesTube Searcher window open, type in your search query and choose the file extension. To search for any kind of file extension, leave the “Extension” option be.

To narrow down the search result, you can also set the published date of the file, provided that you have the information about that. Then click the “Search” button.

I must warn you that the search result will likely be contaminated by junks. So please be very careful on choosing the files to download.

Another route that you can take is by adding the download link yourself. You can do this if you are armed with the links beforehand. Click the green “plus (+)” button from the main window, and paste the list of links to the “Add links” window – one link at a line.

Click “Find links” to reveal the real download link of the files that you want, then click “Recognize all” button to confirm the download links. Depend on how many items you have on the list, and the speed of your internet connection, this process could take a while.

After all the links have been recognized, click the “Queue all” to start the downloading process.

You can also have MDownloader analyze a web page to find download links. Choose “Page” tab, paste the URL of the page that you want to be analyzed, and click the “Analyze” button. Then the next steps are similar to the “Manual” process described above.

The last step that you need to take is to wait for your files to be downloaded. You can repeat the process to add other files to the queue.

If you use Windows and you download tons of files from file sharing services, you’d find MDownloader as a valuable tool. But you might also have your own alternatives to this line of applications, why not share them using the comment below?

Image credit: bengrey

Automating the process would save you a great amount of time, and there are applications that can help you do that. The most well known name in Mac realm is Hazel, but it’s not free. Mac users who prefers free apps could try Automator’s Folder Actions or the good but less-known SmartShuno.

Let’s Set Some Rules

If you want to give Smart Shuno a try and you visit the site to download the app, you will notice that the page is in Japanese. There’s also the announcement that the app is currently in Japanese only. But no worry, after you download, extract and run the app, the interface will appear in English.

To download, go to the very bottom of the page and click the “Download” link (it’s the blue link written in Katakana). If you want to go a little bit further, you could use Google Translate.

Now, let’s get started.

The interface of the app is very simple. There are two panes called “Rule” and “Schedule“. As the name suggested, the Rule pane is where you create some housekeeping rules, and the Schedule pane is where you determine how often should those rules be executed.

There’s also the”Do now” button if you want to execute the rules right away.

To add a new rules group, click the “Add” button. A setting window will be opened.

Begin by giving the rules group a name (or description), then choose the target folder which the rules will be applied.

Let’s say we want to create a rule group to move all the downloaded movies to Movies folder, then the target folder would be the “Download” folder.

Since there are many kind of movie files, we should set the condition to be: “any” instead of “all” from the “When xxx of these rules are met” drop down choices. And then we should customize the rules with movie extensions such as: mp4, avi, flv, etc.

Click the “plus (+)” button to add new rules and “minus (-)” to delete existing rules. You can also play with the conditions to fit whatever housekeeping specifications that you need.

The last customization step that we need to take is to determine what should Smart Shuno do if the above conditions are met. Go to the “Do this:” pane and click on the little “Plus (+)” button to choose the folder where the matched files should be moved.

You can move the files to several folders if you need to. You are also able to delete the original files by moving them to trash. Another option that you can choose is whether the moved file should be renamed if there’s already another file by the same name, or should the new file replace the old. It’s also possible to cancel the action under this condition.

Click OK to save the rules.

Beyond The Simple Rules

Smart Shuno does only one simple thing: move files based on the customized rules, but users can add as many groups of rules as needed. With enough number of groups, your Mac will always be clean and tidy without the need to do manual house keeping labor. You can simply set the rules and forget them.

However, there are few wish list that I hope the developer of this app will add in the future release. The first one is the integration of the app to System Preferences so that users don’t have to open the app first before the rules are executed (even though this problem can be fixed by adding the app to Start Up list).

The second is the addition of other actions such as “open with” so that the app could do much more than only moving files.

But in general, Smart Shuno is the perfect application for those who want to clean the clutters in their Mac automatically.

Have you tried Smart Shuno? Do you know any other tips to keep your Mac tidy? Share using the comment below.

Image credit: bandita

Here are few of them. Some are oldies but goodies, others are relatively new.

1. Taking Screenshot

Let’s start with the easiest one: taking screenshots. You can capture anything on your iPhone screen by simply press the “Home” and “Sleep/Wake” buttons at the same time.

The result will be stored in the “Photos – Camera Roll” album along with other pictures that you take with the built in camera.

2. Tap and Hold icons

If you tap and hold any icon on iPhone screen, the icons will jiggle and you can do several things within this jiggling environment:

• You can re-arrange the icon by dragging and dropping them to the position that you want
• You can delete apps by tapping on the black “X” button which will appear at the top right corner of the app’s icon.
• If you do this on the multitasking bar, you can close the app by tapping on the red “minus (-)” button on the top left of the app’s icon.

3. Functions of Home button – One Click

Being a device with minimal number of available button, iPhone has to optimize the functions of its buttons. Let’s look at the “Home” button. We will start with the obvious: one click.

Clicking it once within an open application will close the application (if you use iOS below 4) or minimize it to tray (under iOS 4 – part of the new multi-tasking feature). But if you click it once without any open application, you will be brought to the Home screen.

And one click from the Home screen will open the search function. Another click will close it.

One click of Home button will also turn the jiggling icons back to normal.

4. Functions of Home button – Two Clicks and Three Clicks

Many of iPhone users are still unfamiliar with the changes of two clicks function under iOS 4. Previously, users can customize two clicks to access iPod/Camera/Favorites/Search under “Settings -> General -> Home“. Now, clicking the Home button twice will open the multitasking bar. You can use the tap and hold trick above to close several – or all – of the opened apps to conserve battery power.

Three clicks of Home button is dedicated to “Accessibility Options” and is customizable under “General -> Accessibility -> Triple-click Home” Settings. The options are: Voice Over, White on Black display, and Zoom (if you choose “Ask“)

5. Quickly jump back to top

Due to the screen size limitation, sometimes you have to scroll far down within an app – like when you browse a long page in mobile Safari. You can quickly jump back to the top of the page just by tapping the status bar (the place where you can see time, signal, battery, etc.)

Please note that this trick might not work on some non-Apple apps.

6. Insert Period, Comma, Numbers and Others, and quickly back to Letters

You might notice that iPhone keyboard layout requires users to tap “Number” button before the “Period” button appear. That’s not very practical, isn’t it?

Turns out that you can quickly insert period (followed by a space) by tapping the “Space” button twice. The keyboard will also capitalize every first letter in a sentence automatically.

While there’s no shortcut available to insert Comma, Numbers, and other common symbols like question mark, colon, quote, etc.; you can save few clicks in inserting those symbols by tapping and holding the number button on the lower left of the keyboard layout and quickly sliding your finger to the symbol that you want to insert.

When you release your finger, the symbol will be inserted to your text and the keyboard layout will go back to letter layout automatically.

7. Select, Copy, Paste and Correct

For these basic editing functions, all you have to do is to tap and hold on the text. A magnifying glass will appear to help you see the part of the text better. Without releasing your finger from the screen, slide to the position where you want the cursor be.

After that you have the option to Select part or all of the text, Copy, Paste or just simply Delete by tapping the backspace button.

These seven shortcuts are just few of the many more available. I hope they could be useful. If you know others, please share using the comment below. And don’t forget to check out our other articles about iPhone/iPod Touch.

Those who has presented in front of public knows too well that they could use any help they can get to make their presentation successful. Aside from the material and mental preparation, having a remote control will also improve the presentation quality.

But instead of buying a dedicated presentation remote control, you can turn your iPhone or iPod Touch into one. And it’s not just for presentation, but also for any other computing activity.

Meet The Hippo

To be able to do that, you need a free application called Hippo Remote LITE. This is the free version of the more featured paid app. There are two components that you’ll need: the app for your iPhone/iPod Touch and the desktop application for your computer. Hippo Remote LITE supports remote controlling Windows, Mac and also Linux machines.

The iPhone/iPod Touch app could be downloaded via iTunes then synchronized and installed; or directly from your device.

The next step would be setting up your system. Following are the steps taken in Mac machine.

Go to “Screen Sharing” under “Sharing” in System Preferences.

Enable “Screen Sharing” and write down the VNC address.

To secure the connection and prevent unwanted party from accessing the system, protect the connection with password.

Then you need to fill in the admin password to enable system change.

After finishing the setup at your system, start the iPhone/iPod Touch app, and select the available connection. Hippo Remote LITE should automatically detect the computer with the desktop app installed.

In the rare case where the computer is not detected, you can start the connection manually by clicking “Add Connection“, and filling in the IP Address (the VNC address that you get from the previous steps) and the password. You don’t want to change the port though, unless you really know what you are doing.

After the two devices are connected, you’ll have a touchpad display on your iPhone/iPod Touch screen. You can easily change the display into keyboard or split screen where keyboard and touchpad exist side by side.

If you go to settings, you can customize several things such as the tracking and scrolling speed, three and four finger gesture options, and also the background image (wallpaper). For some people, having the picture of their loved ones instead of black background will surely brightens things up.

To have bigger typing space on your iDevice, you can easily rotate the screen.

The setup for Linux system is more or less the same with Mac, while on Windows is a little bit different. To get more comprehensive walk through, you can go to the Hippo Remote Setup page.

One Other Alternative

Hippo Remote LITE is not the only free app that could turn your iDevices into remote control for your computer. Another alternative worth mentioning is Logitech Touch Mouse from the famous maker of keyboard and mouse.

The basic steps of installation is the same to Hippo Remote LITE: an app for your iDevices and a desktop software for your computer. This system also supports Windows and Mac, but unfortunately not Linux.

The first step is to pair the computer and the iDevice. Select the detected computer or enter the IP Address. The first display is the trackpad with mouse clicks on the above. Typing keyboard could be easily summoned by tapping the keyboard icon below.

Rotating the screen also works with this app, giving you bigger typing space.

Have you tried to use your iPhone/iPod Touch as a remote control for your computer? Do you know other alternatives to this two apps? Share your thoughts and opinion using the comment below.

Image credit: skpy