Create an AirPlay Speaker

I love Lion. So far it is my favorite iteration of Mac OS X, but it does have some annoying features. In my internet wanderings yesterday I came across an article with instructions on how to get rid of the rubber-band effect which occurs when you scroll to the very bottom or top of a page. This effect will make the page scroll a little bit past the end point then bounce back. It’s a nice little bit of eye-candy, but not really necessary.

You can easily turn this effect off by entering a simple Terminal command (which I’ll list below) and then press “enter”. As always, do this at your own risk. Mucking about in Terminal can cause irreparable harm to your OS if you do something you shouldn’t. Make sure you have a good backup before you make any changes like this to your system. Here’s the text you need to enter:

defaults write -g NSScrollViewRubberbanding -int 0

You can revert to the original setting by entering the following and then press enter:

defaults delete -g NSScrollViewRubberbanding

You’ll need to relaunch any applications that display the rubber-banding in order for this to take effect. Unfortunately, it will not affect Safari. Should I find a way to get rid of the rubber-band in Safari, I’ll update this article.

You can read the original article here.

Working at the Service Check-in Counter, I often have customers asking me how to get out of Zoom and/or Voiceover on their iOS devices. While most people have Zoom and Voiceover disabled, it still shows up now and again.

If you have used Zoom, the image to the right may seem familiar. If this happens, you can try to enter your passcode and navigate to Settings to turn off Zoom but this can be difficult. An easier way out is a simple 3 finger tap twice which will Zoom you back out.

If you have seen the image above, then you also must have experienced Voiceover. Instead of using your finger to select individual apps, the screen is sectioned into rectangles, and you select that shape as whole. It is very hard to navigate, and the whole time a voice is instructing your movement. Voiceover is helpful for the visually impaired, but can be a hinderance if turned on. You must navigate back to Settings > Accessibility and turn Voiceover off if you do not wish to use it. If you have the shortcut enabled, you can try triple clicking the home button. This will turn off Voiceover. I would recommend turning off both Zoom and Voiceover, unless of course you need them and are familiar with their commands.

Limbo: perfect game for Halloween night (or any other night actually)! Limbo, by Playdead, is probably one of my favorite games of all…

International Data Corporation (IDC), a technology market research firm with over 1,000 analysts in 50 countries, has released its quarterly report on global…

If you’ve been reading Kibbles and Bytes over the past few months, you might have noticed I’ve written more than once about power…

Siri is great for resolving trivia disputes, setting reminders and even texting or sending email but Siri is also a talented assistant. Here’s a few of the more non-intuitive tasks Siri can accomplish:

1) Split up that restaurant bill and add a tip

Ask Siri “What’s a 20% tip on a $105 bill split among 3 people and Siri will not only tell you what the total tip would be but also how much each of the 3 owes.

2) Flip a coin

Siri will bail you out if you do not have a coin to flip if you ask her to flip a coin. Or if you are killing time and want to play dice, ask Siri to “throw the dice”.

3) Counting Calories

Siri can help! Ask Siri how many calories are in that Big Mac and Siri will tell you that you are consuming 520 calories.

4) Take a Selfie

Ready to take that selfie and find yourself looking for the camera app? Just tell Siri to take a selfie and boom!, the camera app will open. Siri isn’t smart enough, yet, to ensure you have the front facing camera active so you might have to click that first.

5) Name that Tune

Siri integrates with Shazam to listen to the music. Ask Siri “What is this song?” and with some help from Shazam, Siri will let you know and if you click on the result it will play that song if you are a subscriber to Apple Music.

6) Find your Friends

If you use the Find My Friends app you can ask Siri to find them by asking “Where’s my wife?” and assuming that your wife has agreed to share her location in the Find My Friends app, Siri will let you know where she is.

7) Convert Currency

If you are traveling out of the country you can use Siri to make those currency conversions. Asking Siri “What is 100 euros worth?” today reveals it is worth $112.49.