Advice Articles on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

Dear Aunt TUAW: Where's my Lozenge?

by Erica Sadun (Jul 24th, 2011)

Dear Aunt TUAW, I miss the lozenge. You know what I mean? The chicklet thing that used to be at the top right of my Finder windows. Click it and it would show the sidebar. Click again, sidebar gone. How can I show and hide the sidebar in Lion? Your loving nephew, Michael N. Dear ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: Excel pooped on my desktop

by Erica Sadun (Jul 23rd, 2011)

Dear Aunt TUAW, I just started using Lion and for the first time loaded up Excel today. Much to my surprise, I ended up with a whole bunch of Excel temporary files on the desktop (see the attached screen shot) So I go ahead and try to delete them and I can't. Lion won't let me. It puts up ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: What is this "Lock" TextEdit speaks of?

by Erica Sadun (Jul 22nd, 2011)

Dear Aunt TUAW, I have a list of books that friends recommend to me. I don't update it a lot but when I do, I just want to go into the list and add new ones. Today, I was going to add M. K. Hobson's Native Star and Text Edit stopped me, saying the file was locked because I hadn't made any ...

Dev Juice: Help me set up a multiperson dev team

by Erica Sadun (Jul 8th, 2011)

Dear Dev Juice, We have a 3 man dev team with the iOS developer program (as a small company plan) and we are getting ready to move up to Xcode 4 once Lion is out to the public and the have a stable sdk. What is the best way to set all of our systems so we can each build for adhoc distribution ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: Help me read and annotate my PDFs

by Erica Sadun (Jul 7th, 2011)

Dear Aunt TUAW, I am in love with my iPad 2 and am eager to turn my upcoming trip to the beach into a working vacation. I find the that the PDF support in iBooks leaves a lot to be desired. Which is unfortunate, as I have spent a lot of time uploading a lot of PDFs into my iTunes to have them ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: Help convert my iDevice into a graphics tablet

by Erica Sadun (Jun 28th, 2011)

Dear Aunt TUAW, I am looking for an iPad app that allows it to function as a graphics tablet, similar to something like a Wacom tablet. I have not found anything; are you aware of something that would fill this need? Your loving nephew, Joe V. Dear Joe, As Auntie recently told ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: Help me convert my iPhone to an iPod touch

by Erica Sadun (Jun 27th, 2011)

Dear Auntie, Is it possible to completely convert my old iPhone 3G into an iPod touch? I don't want it to think it is still my phone and keep trying to backup and restore in iTunes. Your help would be really appreciated. Thanks and cookies! Ryan Dear Ryan, Yes, and it's really easy ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: Help me find a pointy iPad stylus

by Erica Sadun (Jun 23rd, 2011)

Dear Aunty TUAW, I just bought an iPad and I want a stylus for taking notes, but every stylus I see online has a tip that's as blunt as a piece of chalk. Why aren't there any pointy-tip capacitive styli available? Your friend, R Dear R, Pointy styluses (stylii?) are a no-go because ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: How do I make iTunes forget my apps?

by Erica Sadun (Jun 15th, 2011)

Dear Aunt TUAW, The "Purchased" area added to the iPhone "App Store" will show you every app you have ever bought, including the accidental purchase you've made. I love that I can re-download anything I have bought in the past, but there are a few apps I want to permanently remove ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: Help me switch between YouTube and iTunes

by Erica Sadun (Jun 8th, 2011)

Dear Aunt TUAW, Do you know if there exists a nice program or plug-in for safari which decreases the iTunes volume/pauses the current played song, when I am going to watch a YouTube movie? Each time I click a YouTube movie on Facebook, etc. I just find it really frustrating to go to iTunes, ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: Help me join my life, my heart, my iTunes account

by Erica Sadun (Jun 2nd, 2011)

Dear Auntie TUAW, Can you believe my wedding is in a few weeks?! That's got me thinking all of our digital goods that we now will both share. While I would like to know if it is possible to combine 2 iTunes libraries and still keep metadata (like play counts and composers), I am more ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: Help me sync the music without the video

by Erica Sadun (May 12th, 2011)

Dear Aunt TUAW, I just downloaded Hunter Hayes' Storm Warning and loved it! [Ed: It's free over at iTunes this week.] It's a video, but I want to add it to my iPhone playlist as music, and I don't wanna waste carloads of space syncing the video. Almost 50 MB!!! Is there a way? How do I sync ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: Help me find a projector for my iPhone

by Erica Sadun (May 8th, 2011)

Dear Aunt TUAW, I sometimes watch TV in my bedroom on my iPhone (3GS) via EyeTV before I go to sleep. The screen is, of course, a bit small and not ideally positioned for a relaxed posture in bed. What's your idea on pico projectors in combination with an iPhone (3GS)? Many thanks and best ...

Dear Aunt TUAW: Help me propose on the iSly

by Erica Sadun (May 7th, 2011)

Dear Aunt TUAW, You have been on at me a long time now to make an honest woman of my girlfriend... or at least ask her to be my fiancé, which might or might not be the same thing. But I can't, because I've got an iPhone. Can you help? You see, we have no secrets from each other. If ...

Ask TUAW: iPhone US visitors, RAM upgrades, iPad buying advice

by Ask TUAW (Mar 28th, 2011)

In case you didn't know, the 2011 edition of the Great American Pastime starts Thursday the 31st. I'll be watching MLB.tv on my AppleTV -- and my iPhone and my iPad. Baseball everywhere! Awesome. MLB's television broadcast rules black out home team games via MLBtv, unfortunately, so I can't ...