expose

Whether you have been using Apple's latest operating system for the Mac, OS X Mountain Lion, for a while now, or you are just installing it, you'll benefit from reading through some of the tips below. Some of them are ways to improve on the overall experience, while others will bring back past functionality. Let's get started, shall we?

Preparing your Mac When upgrading the operating system, no matter your platform of choice, it's always a great idea to not go into it blindly. Be prepared, and more importantly, make sure you computer is prepared. Some … Read more

A new setting added to OS X in Mountain Lion restores a classic Expose behavior for viewing all windows on the screen.

Apple's Missions Control feature in OS X is an evolution (or perhaps devolution, depending on your perspective) of the Expose and Spaces feature that was introduced in OS X 10.5 Leopard. While options for multiple desktops are great for organizing work, in some of Apple's decisions with the move to Mission Control it left out some of the simple approaches to Spaces that users became accustomed to.

One of these features is the ability to … Read more

Photographer Robbie Cooper explores the modern convergence of personal and social identities in a portrait series that pairs gamers with their virtual avatars.

Cooper traveled around the world for three years, visiting places like Korea, China, France, and Germany to capture the online and in-person lives of MMO participants.

His photo project evolved into a photo book called "Alter Ego" that further scrutinizes the role of absorbed fantasy in the gaming metaverse through interviews, biographies, and essays.

The book also paints a range of identities behind the avatars. It's not just a bunch of oily adolescents mashing keyboards in a basement; Cooper's subjects range from a gold farmer in China, a paraplegic in Texas, and even an octogenarian who all teach a valuable lesson to never judge a gamer by his or her avatar.

Plenty more pictures of gamers and their avatars after the page break.… Read more

Apple's preferred methods for making use of its Mission Control feature in OS X are multitouch gestures that can be set up in the trackpad system preferences. The problem with this is that without exploring the multitouch options in OS X, then people may resort to common gestures and miss some options that Mission Control has to offer.

If you watch people at Apple Stores using the trackpads on Mac systems, it becomes rather apparent that most try it out by swiping their fingers all over it in one direction or another, using varying numbers of fingers to see … Read more

Apple's Mission Control option in OS X Lion is useful for keeping track of windows and open applications, but its default view can be a bit limiting, especially if you have multiple applications and windows open.

For instance, if you open a few windows in Safari and TextEdit, then Mission Control will group both Safari's and TextEdit's windows and stack them on top of each other, making them difficult to see. If you then open a few other programs, the stacks of Safari and TextEdit windows in Mission Control will become even smaller, sometimes to the point … Read more

If you thought your typical tower speakers were heavy, wait until you get a load of the Exposed concrete speakers. As a graduation project, Israeli industrial and product design student Shmuel Linski molded a pair of floor-standing speakers based on horn loudspeaker technology. The construction of the speakers is very basic, with the driver (full-range, we presume) at the top and the bass port at the bottom. The driver and port are linked by a 38-inch pipe, which isn't lined with any sound-absorbent material. Their weight: a hefty 123 pounds a pair.

We aren't sure what sort of impact concrete would have on audio fidelity, so it may be a good thing these aren't for sale yet. The designer is also a fan of making other stuff out of concrete. A coffee maker and a canoe--yes, you read that right--count among his other notable projects.

Solid idea? We'll have to wait till some audiophiles get their hands on these for a verdict.

(Source: Crave Asia via Stereophile) … Read more

DockView is a desktop customization app that lets you take a neat trick from Windows and mimic it in Snow Leopard: with DockView running, when you mouse over an app's icon in the Dock, you can instantly see live thumbnail images for all the windows open in that app.

You can accomplish something similar without DockView, by clicking and holding a Dock icon for a few seconds, but DockView gives you a much quicker and less intrusive view, while allowing you to quickly flip between different apps in the Dock. Plus, DockView's ability extends to the Mac OS … Read more

HyperDock is a System Preferences pane (currently in free beta) that lets you add some time-saving functionality to your Dock that is similar to the Aero Peek feature found in recent versions of Windows.

With HyperDock installed, you can mouse over applications in the Dock and see thumbnail previews of all windows open in that app--which can make switching between different apps and windows faster and easier. You can accomplish a similar effect without using HyperDock (by just clicking and holding an app's Dock icon), but HyperDock shows you the preview much more quickly, and in thumbnail form, just … Read more

Once again this year, we've had it with April Fool's jokes. Except for one. You'll see. If you're more tired of iPad than you are of April Fool's, skip the first half of the show where we recap other people's reviews since Apple refuses to give us an iPad early. Also, we debunk Microsoft's claims that Chrome is fundamentally insecure, which almost ought to be a joke.

iPad reviews roll in from USA, Mossberg and … Read more