Brian Minor

If you haven’t seen it yet woot.com has a pretty cool Apple VS. Flash shirt for sale for only 10 dollars, But sadly as I am writing this it is now sold out. But even though you can have it on a T-Shirt now, doesn’t mean that you cant have it. When I saw this I couldn’t help, but laugh and want one at the same time, but sadly I am not much of a T-shirt guy, so instead I decided to create it for something that I always have one me and of course is one of the reasons why this image was created.

So I hope you enjoy the wallpaper and I am sure it will work decently well on an iphone screen as well with little to no modification.

A couple weeks ago I set out to try and figure out, how to install the same application twice on the iPhone. The results where slim to none and there was only one site I found that had promise, but every time I tried it the app would crash before it could fully load. So I decided to take the little information I had learned and figure it out on my own. And I am happy to say I had success and have had the same application on the iPhone working for a week with no issues.

Watch the video or follow the step by step directions and if you have any issue getting it to work just let me know what app and I will see what I can do.

Directions

1. Open iTunes
2. Go into the Application section
3. Right click on the application you want to duplicate
4. Select Show in Finder (Show in Explorer on PCs)
5. Right click on the .ipa file and copy it to you desktop (or where every you’d like)
6. Replace the .ipa with .zip – An IPA files is just another type of a .Zip file
7. Un-compress the zip file
8. Open the new folder and Go into the Payload folder
9. Right click on the App and select show package contents (MAC ONLY STEP, Should just be a folder on the Windows)
10. Find the Info.plist files and open it in you favorite editor. (I prefer Plist Editor Pro)
11. Change the “Bundle display” name to whatever you’d like. This is the name that will be displayed on the iPhone (optional step)
12. Change the “Bundle identifier” (I recommend just putting a 2 at the end.)
13. Save the file
14. Open your favorite FTP software and connect into your iPhone/iPod Touch
15. Navigate to the root directory and then into the Application folder
16. Transfer the application into this folder
17. Reboot or Respiring your iPhone/iPod and the application should now be somewhere on your home-screen
18. Open the App and enjoy

If you have any issue please watch the video above.

So this article would have started out with how great this little device is for how little the cost, but since it broke on me the other day after only using it for a week my thoughts on it have taken a slight turn.

Don’t get me wrong the device is great and it will give you more then double the iPhone’s battery and all that for about $15 bucks is amazing/ Others backups hold half the capacity size and sell for almost 3 times as much.

But the flaws come into play with the design. The item is very large and connects to the phone with no support other then the connector itself, making it only safe to use when laying flat on a surface. Putting it in a pocket or other unstable surface could lead to damaging the device or worse your iPhone or iPod itself.

So I would still recommend the MonoPrice backup solution is you are wanting something that will give you the best bang for the cost, but be warned that you must me very careful with it cause it could end up costing you more then you planned.

Side Note: I am currently in talks with MonoPrice to try and get my battery replaced I will updated this page with my progress when I hear back from them.

So a couple days ago my RTM (remember the milk) pro account expired on me. Normally I would just shell out the $25 bucks and go on, but with it so close to Christmas and my NYC trip, I really don’t want to spend any more then necessary right now, even though I do use it daily and I believe it is worth the cost.

However, as I was looking for a cheaper alternative. I noticed that RTM had a mobile version of there site. But even more importantly, I noticed that the push notifications from the RTM app were still coming through everyday. Now if I open the actual app I get a pro account required screen and get booted out, but to me the popup notifications is what I use the app for.

So, for all you iPhone/iPod-Touch users out there, all you need to do is download the RTM app from the app store, setup a trial account. Get the setting just the way you want them, use the app during the trial, then switch to the mobile version once your trial runs out. I also recommend creating a shortcut to the mobile version on your iPhone/iPod-Touch home screen. If you call it the same name as the RTM app it will have the same icon (see images below). After that I just moved the RTM app icon to my last home screen page and all is well and I get to keep my $25 bucks for my trip.

click images for larger view

It seems like almost every carrier is doing a top 5 (some even 10) list. With these lists they allow you to add 5 to 10 “friends”and no matter what carrier/provider they use, you can call for free and not waste any of your minutes. They all seem to have their own little names. AT&T calls it the “A-List” and Verizon calls it “My Fave Five”. But in the end it’s all the same.

Most of you are thinking, yeah, we know this already, but as I was changing some setting in my beloved Google Voice account I noticed that they allow you to change the number that appears when you received a call from someone. You can have either their number display, which is of course the default and what most people would want. But they also allow you to always have the google voice number show up with every call.

So my workaround is why not just add your google voice number to your top 5 list and give everyone that number. Then change it so that all incoming calls come from your google voice number and never waste your minutes on incoming calls again.

But thats not all, google voice allows you to make outgoing as well, by calling your google voice number, then dialing the number you want to call. So no wasting minutes on outgoing calls either.

Okay, now I know for some of you this just wont work. A lot of us love to always know who is calling before we answer the phone, but google helps with this as well. Google Voice give you control of what numbers you want to ring straight through, but it also give you the ability to have callers announce themselves first and/or just announce their number or name (if in contacts) and then gives you the ability to answer or send to voicemail.

Also, keep in mind you can still give out your real number to the other 4 in your list and anyone else who is worth wasting your minutes on. This workaround is meant to be given out to all those that call you constantly and love to talk for hours or perfect as a business line.

If you think this is something you could really use and want to give it a shot, I have 2 Google Voice invites to give out just leave a comment below and I will pick 2 at random and send out the invites later this week. Just be sure to add the tag “I want an Invite” to the beginning or end of your comment.

So it took me 3 years and 11 months, but it has finally happened! I was actually able to talk work into buying me a Mac Mini to use as my full time computer!

The Mini is an amazing little device, not the most powerful, but more then enough for coding websites, doing some minor video editing and installing a virtual XP box so I can still troubleshoot all the annoying phone support calls I get.

Most of you know I have been working with the Hackint0sh installer and actually had a decent amount of luck with it, but no matter how much I put into it, my performance always seemed lacking. I am sure if you built your PC with just the right equipment you may actually not even notice.

I have had the Mini for 3 work days now and I just finally got everything I believe I need installed. And the thing is still running like a top. Lets just say I am one happy employee.

Anyways enough about it here is the unboxing if your interested. Sorry for the poor camera work I really need to get one of those tripod things for my iPhone.