If you're running an online business like I am, there are times when you need to connect and log in to the server to tweak or check things. It can't be helped and while the Cpanel solution and related are often splendid, sometimes I just like to get bits all over my hands as I "go old school" on my server and use a command line. In those instances there's a nice solution on the...

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I'll admit it, I'm a fairly hardcore casual gamer. Wait, is that an oxymoron? Maybe. Anyway, I find that I often fill very short time periods during the day with a casual puzzle game on my iPhone. Nothing where I'm caught up for 20 minutes or longer, but literally just a few minutes at a time. I've gone through - and finished or burned out on - a number of games in this category, notably...

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Our son traveled to NYC with my iPod Touch. I downloaded several apps for him. I'd like to delete them from the iPod for now, but maybe put them back on later since I paid for them. I'd also like to delete kids' programs, then put back on again when I see grandchildren. Is this possible? I'm thinking not possible, because when I downloaded free apps before, then deleted them when I purchased upgrades, they...

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I listen to a lot of audio books on my train commute into Boston, buying used CDs and ripping them into iTunes, then copying them onto my iPhone. Problem is, I can end up with 80, 90, 100 or more tracks and sometimes it's crazy how they aren't played in order, driving me insane! Not good. I have heard that there's a better way to import audio books into iTunes, something about consolidating or merging...

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I've been working with windowing systems on computers, graphical user interfaces, for over twenty-five years. My first taste was the MIT X Window System back when Apple was selling the Lisa and Microsoft was trying to get people interested in something called Windows 3.1. One of the very best features of the X Window Systems (or "X Windows") was its virtual workspaces, where you could "virtually" have as many monitors as you wanted, and could...

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A lot of noise-reducing devices have passed through our offices, and I've had many in-flight opportunities to test things and see how they work, but even with that, I have to say I am astonished at how extraordinarily well the Nokia BH-905 bluetooth headphones work when the automatic noise reduction is enabled. Nokia BH-905 bluetooth stereo headphones Which isn't to say that these are perfect, because they're not. In fact, there's a design flaw that...

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I have an iPhone 4 and while I haven't seen any major problems with the reception based on how I hold the phone, what the heck, I'd like to get a free case through the program Jobs announced earlier in July. How do I score a free Apple iPhone 4 bumper or case??...

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A friend who also has an Apple iPad told me that there's a software / firmware update to the iPad, but when I go to the App Store on my iPad and check for updates, I don't see it's available. How do I update my iPad's operating system firmware?...

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I don't have one of those fancy iPod Touch units, but my recent iPod Classic appears to have the ability for me to buy and install games on it. Problem is, when I go to the App Store, it's all iPhone / iPod Touch / iPad related and there's no link of any sort to iPod games. Do they still sell these games?...

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If you ever wondered what techies did BEB -- Before eBay -- to find the coolest "used" technologies, widgets and gizmos, they simply traveled to a local Hamfest. A Hamfest, for everyone who missed this rare sub-culture gathering of the Ham amateur radio generation[s], it is a massive second hand technology fair, occurring nearly every weekend during warm weather. My father would travel for miles to attend; anything to be surrounded by the old "junk"...

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I'm freaking out: I just launched iTunes on my Mac and it popped up a window saying "This copy of iTunes will expire in 77 hours". WTH? How can my copy of iTunes expire? I'm running Mac OS X 10.6.2, if that makes a difference......

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If you follow my Twitter stream (I'm @DaveTaylor on Twitter) you already know that I'm a bit of a fanatic about the FIFA World Cup and this year it's the first time I can actually bring the World Cup with me thanks to my Apple iPhone. It's every four years and the iPhone was introduced in 2007, so I think I had a Motorola RAZR during the last Cup (e.g., a phone that was dead...

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I want to give my daughter my old iPhone so she can use it as an iPod Touch sort of device and am concerned that she'll listen to material that doesn't meet my approval as a parent. What I'd like is to put some sort of limiter or lock on the phone so that any music that is marked as having explicit lyrics is skipped or prevented from playing. Possible?...

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I travel a lot, flying to a city then driving around visiting customers. It's pretty boring. So I listen to a lot of audio books (or are they "audiobooks"?) on my iPhone. I recently finished one while in Houston and was stuck: for future reference, is there a way to buy a new audiobook directly on my iPhone, without a computer involved?...

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Dave, I have two iPods and I want to give one to my almost 9 yo son, but some of MY songs are inappropriate. I have a folder specifically for him on my iPod, but how do i sync ONLY that folder to the iPod that I want to give him?...

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I have an iPad and a MacBook Pro and it struck me that it should be possible for me to use the iPad as a second display. Can I do that? If so, what's the best solution that doesn't cost an arm and a leg?...

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This is just weird. I've been using Aperture 3 on my iMac for quite a while and it's been going great, I love this program! Problem is, I just got an iPad and want to drop some photo projects onto it from Aperture on my iMac and when I click on "Sync Photos from Aperture" I get an error about the library not being visible and previews needing to be shared? But I can't figure...

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A friend of mine was pretty psyched about an update to a game we both play on the iPad, a game that started out with some major bugs but has apparently fixed them in a subsequent release. When I start the game, however, it doesn't say "there's an update" as I would expect. How do I update my iPad apps?...

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I'm finally selling my old PowerBook in favor of a new MacBook and while I'm excited, I am also worried that I get rid of every trace of myself on the system. Most importantly, I've heard that I need to unauthorize [ed: deauthorize, actually] iTunes on my system. How do I do that?...

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This is beyond annoying: I've been using the Notes application on my iPhone 3G to keep track of different things and now that I want to get the notes of, I realize that I'm kind of trapped. I can't see any way to access them off the phone, even within iTunes, which reports that it's backing up and syncing those same notes. Frustrating!!...

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