PSA: 3rd-Party Keyboards in iOS 8

Around this time every year, we all scramble to upgrade to the newest iOS. This year iOS has had some great features, many of which we have been waiting for with anticipation; the Keyboard Extensions is no exception. However, there may be an unwanted side affect to this new found typing feature.

10 Tips for the iPhone

Did you get an iPhone for Christmas? Depending on when you are reading this, you might not know yet. Regardless, here are 10 tips to get you better acquainted with your new device.

1. Using your Head Phones

The EarPods that are shipped with the newest iPhones are great for listening to music, making hands free calls, and navigating your phone. There are the obvious features as shown on the headphone remote: (+) volume up / (-) Volume down, and the centre unlabelled button is Play/Pause. But there is more than that packed into the centre button. A double-click will jump to the next track. A triple-click will go to the previous track. And a press and hold will start a conversation with Siri.

2. Take better Selfies

Does the length of your arms interfere with the quality of selfie you are able to take? Not to worry Apple has an accessibility option for that... well kind of. Your EarPods can give you a wired remote shutter button. Simply open your Camera app and with EarPods plugged in use the (+) button to activate the shutter. This can be especially useful to get the group shot selfie without having any faces cut off.

3. Shutter Button

In keeping with the camera, you do not need to use the on-screen button to snap photos. Just as the EarPods can be used as a shutter button, the iPhone's (+) volume hardware button will also activate the camera's shutter while that app is open. It's function does not stop there either, the same works with the stop/start recording of video. I particularly like this feature as it promotes proper orientation for capturing video. Together we can stop VVS, the key is awareness!

Hide Any App Icon While Keeping Full Functionality (iOS 7) - No Jailbreak

Do you have one of those apps that you don't want people looking at? Perhaps you don't like having Game Center or Compass on your home screen. There is a simple way to solve both these problems.
Allow me to explain, any app that is on your iOS device can be hidden from the home screen but will remain on your device with full functionality.
The method in which this is accomplished takes some practice to get right but once you figure it out you will be greatful.

Here's how

Create Custom Vibration Notifications for iPhone - No Jailbreak

Custom ring and text tones are great for knowing who's attempting to contact you without having to actually look at your iPhone. However, this feature is useless when your device is in silent/vibrate-only mode.

With a simple change in settings, you can unlock custom vibrations for anyone in your contact list. This way you will always know who is on the other side of communication and if it is important enough to pick up.

Hidden Apple TV Features

Apple TV is a wonderful little set top box with some powerful features. Here are four of my favorite hidden features. 

Quick Fix: iOS 6 Passbook (Eliminating App Store Error)

The recently released iOS 6 included a built-in app called Passbook. This feature for many has been a sore spot because of the lack of functionality. Upon opening the new application an introductory screen is shown with a button guiding the user to the App Store. However, the common reaction to the tap of the App Store button is a cannot connect error. 

While this feature is new and few app developers are supporting it currently, the "cannot connect" error limits the consumer market to even see what options are available. If you have encountered this error, there is a very easy fix to allow you access to the App Store through Passbook so that you may look at you option to take advantage of this new iOS feature.

This simple fix

The steps:

1. Open Settings>General>Date & Time. 
2. Turn off the "Set Automatically" feature.
3. Manually set you device's date to 2013.
4. Close the Settings app and navigate to the Passbook app.
5. Follow the link in the app to the App Store (A loading wheel should appear rather than the error).
6. Navigate back to setting and re-engage the "Set Automatically" feature for the Date & Time.
7. Hard reboot your device. This is accomplished by holding down the sleep/wake and home buttons at the same time until the screen goes black (ignoring the "Slide to power off").
8. Restart the device and open the multitasking tray.
9. Close from multitasking both the App Store and Passbook.
10. Done!

With these steps complete opening Passbook and navigating to the App Store through the provided button should be successful. At the time that I enabled this functionality there were only 6 apps supporting Passbook integration.

Let me know if this worked for you in the comments below. 

Tips: Internet Automation - ifttt.com

Social media (Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pintrest...) are all platforms to share information. Many of us have multiple accounts in order to interact with different groups of people. The difficulty is managing all these accounts while staying on top of other repetitive tasks. That's where ifttt comes in.

iPhone Repair

The iPhone 4 and 4S have raced to the top of the mobile phone market. With the popularity being so high, accidents are inevitable; luckily parts and tool providers are plentiful however repair-skills required go from Basic to Challenge Accepted.

Tips: Wallpaper

Desktop wallpaper is one of the easiest changes to make in personalizing your computing experience. Depending on your taste, the default system wallpapers may be enough to satisfy your desired theme.

But wallpaper is not just for the desktop computer anymore.

All of our mobile devices now have wallpaper options and since the aspect ratio is nearly opposite of our desktops and notebooks, the choices for using a similar wallpaper on all platforms while keeping them aesthetically pleasing on each decreases.

My favorite site for high quality wallpapers is mantia.me. Not only are the graphics beautiful and of great quality but there is an optimized version for each device that I may want to us it on. On top of that, some of the graphic even include alternate images (the "Lego" wallpaper is a perfect example of this).

Where do you normally find your device wallpaper?

Did you know you can customize your device beyond the background picture? Check out these iOS tweaks that do not required jailbreaking.

How-To: Enable iPhone/iPod Emoticons

There are plenty of third-party apps in the App Store that offer additional options (or add-ons) for text messaging. One of my favorites is TextPics (or there is a free version available here). However, did you know that there is a plethora of standard emoticons available through the iOS 5 native software?
This feature has not been widely advertised, and is buried deeply within the settings menu. To be more specific, it has been camouflaged as an "international keyboard" under the language "emoji."
For full instructions, follow this easy how-to that I posted over at WonderHowTo.com.

Enjoy your new emotion-filled text conversations.

How-To: Email

No Offense

I admit, the title for this post is slightly condescending but allow me to explain. Email is one of the cornerstones of computing both in our work and personal lives, yet most of us neglect to foster good habits to ensure our inbox remains user-friendly. Surprisingly there is very little time and energy involved in making sure your digital mail experience is both friendly and rewarding.

Inbox Analysis 

How many messages are in your inbox? And I am not referring to new or unread messages.

At the peak of my email neglect I had over 2000 messages in my inbox (the email address was less than 2 years old)! All of them were marked as "read" and all of them were in various stages of completion. Now I hope that you are not in a similar situation otherwise this comic is probably an accurate representation of you email habits.
If you can relate with any of this, or are just looking to improve your own management system, keep reading. There is hope.