howto

7 cool, unadvertised Facebook features

When I wrote our Newbie's Guide for Facebook last week, there were several things worth including that just couldn't make the cut. These seven features aren't often advertised or well-known among most newbies, but can be quite helpful, and in some cases great time-wasters.

1. Feed tweaks: Dial it up. Did you know the Friends' feed you see on the Facebook home page doesn't contain every little piece of information about what people are doing on the network? While everyone can tweak what they want published to the news feed, you too have control of what … Read more

Selecting a carrier when in another country, other iPhone settings

Apple has posted three new Knowledge Base articles of interest to iPhone users.

iPhone: About Network Settings explains how to:

select a carrier for phone calls: "Any international roaming charges will be billed by the carrier of the selected network through AT&T [...] Carrier menu only appears when you have more than one carrier available" See your usage statistics and more...

iPhone: About General Settings explains how to:

Adjust screen brightness Set whether the iPhone adjusts screen brightness automatically Set Wallpaper Set whether the iPhone shows 24-hour time or 12-hour time Turn on Calendar time zone support … Read more

iPhone international data charge warning: Data access can occur involuntarily

Taking your iPhone overseas can be a costly proposition, and you may not even know that you're racking up a huge data transfer cost until you get your AT&T bill. The problem is a combination of the following two facts:

1. The iPhone is capable of using international data roaming, which is billed at $5/MB in select countries ("DataConnect Global" countries), and nearly $20/MB in other countries (you must activate a per-use international roaming data plan) 2. The iPhone will automatically download data over available data networks without notifying the user for applications … Read more

Usage tip: Create an iPhone apps bookmark folder in Safari

iPhone-optimized sites and Web apps are springing up like mad, and so are the iPhone-optimized methods for tracking them. There's mojits, which tries to replicate an application launcher, iPhone Application List, which acts as a software repository with live previews of Web apps (and can be very slow to load on an iPhone), a Mac OS X widget for tracking iPhone apps and others.

While some of these tools have merit -- especially with regard to finding new iPhone Web apps -- we've found that the best way to manage and launch iPhone-optimized sites is with the tried … Read more

Convert any YouTube video to play on the iPhone under Mac OS X

The iPhone includes a dedicated YouTube application with access to some of the site's video content. Unfortunately, much of the vast library still has not been converted by YouTube to play properly on the iPhone. That's where TubeTV comes in. Available as freeware, TubeTV can convert any YouTube video from its default Flash format to an .m4v file that can be synced to and played on the iPhone.

This nifty little app has a built in Web browser (and a built-in YouTube search mechanism) that allows you to navigate to the YouTube (or Google Video) movie page of … Read more

Workaround for no email address groups on the iPhone

The iPhone's mail client/contact scheme lacks an important feature: the ability to store groups of contacts that can be sent an email in one fell swoop. Mac OS X's Address Book and most Windows contact management solutions offer this functionality, but it is for some reason missing from the iPhone. (Groups from desktop applications synchronized to the iPhone simply show up as individual contacts).

There are two methods we've found for getting around this limitation:

Store contact list as a data URI bookmarklet Follow these steps to store an HTML link with all of your contact'… Read more

About the Apple Bluetooth headset

Apple has published a series of Knowledge Base articles detailing various usage and troubleshooting instructions for its newly shipping Bluetooth headset:

How to pair iPhone Bluetooth Headset Make it discoverable by holding the headset button for 8 seconds. How to charge iPhone Bluetooth Headset: The headset can be charged via USB 2.0 or AC and reach full capacity in about and hour and a half. Bluetooth Headset troubleshooting Solving problems with pairing, not charging, intermittent connectivity and more. Finding the serial number It will be necessary in the case of replacement. About auto-pairing Doesn't work in Airplane mode (… Read more

Another option for iPhone insurance: credit card purchase protection

We previously reported that the iPhone is covered under a standard limited one-year Apple warranty, but is not eligible for AT&T's wireless phone insurance, which (for a $5 monthly fee) will provide replacement in the case of loss or theft, accidental physical or liquid damage or mechanical and electrical failure after the manufacturer's warranty period has expired, and noted several options for protection. Among them: AppleCare, third-party warranties like those offered by SquareTrade and Homeowners'/renters' insurance.

One set of options we left out is purchase protection plans offered by credit card companies.

As noted by … Read more

How to enable a Find function for the current Web page in iPhone's browser

Filling one of the most glaring functionality gaps in the iPhone's version of Safari, a developer has created a JavaScript bookmarklet that offers the ability to find text strings on the currently displayed Web page.

What's a bookmarklet you ask? It's a piece of code that is stored as a bookmark (see our previous article on using the data: URL scheme to store iPhone Web apps locally). Basically, you can store the code in the bookmark, then simply access the bookmark from within Safari on the iPhone whenever you want to access its functionality.

The find function … Read more

Spybot Search & Destroy: Past its prime?

Spybot Search & Destroy has for years been a household standard in free antispyware protection. Originally winning respect for offering comprehensive malware-slashing features that competing software lacked, Spybot Search & Destroy has lost this advantage, as most reputable antivirus programs have added similar features. This First Look video takes you on a features tour, and hits upon the pros and cons that may have you standing by the sought-after program or searching for a spyware-busting alternative.