One of the hardest, most intimidating parts of making your own Steampunk guns from scratch is the wooden stock of the gun. To be fair, it's probably the hardest part. It requires the most artistry, and is the easiest to mess up.
Whenever your iPhone's ringer is on, you'll hear Apple's iconic "Connect Power" chime every time you connect it to a wired or wireless power source, which lets you know that charging has started. There's no way to disable the sound without turning on Silent mode, but there is a way to make Siri automatically say whatever you want after a successful connection.
Apple's Messages app has long had visual effects you could apply manually after long-pressing the send button, and there are even hidden keywords you could use to trigger full-screen effects automatically. FaceTime's latest update also gives you some full-screen effects to play around with during video calls, but the triggers are an entirely different concept — hand gestures.
If you get distracted or stressed out easily, your iPhone might be able to help you focus or calm you down. It can even help you fall asleep with white noise, and you don't have to install a third-party app or buy an audio track to turn your iPhone into a personal sound machine.
While there are many ways to see the exact battery life left on your iPhone, you can take all the work out of it by making your iPhone verbally tell you the current percentage every time you start or stop charging it. Best of all, this trick works whether you use wired or wireless chargers.
There are still and live wallpapers on your iPhone that can go dark when Dark Mode is active or light when Light Mode is on, but there's no easy way to do the same for custom backgrounds. That doesn't mean you're out of luck, though, because you can use Shortcuts to build a workaround until Apple gets us an official "Dark Mode" option for automation.
Except for the second-generation iPhone SE, all new iPhone models omit the Home button. In its place, the Side button takes charge, taking care of tasks like pulling up Siri, activating AssistiveTouch, and opening Apple Pay. If you swap your older Home button model for an iPhone 12, 12 mini, 12 Pro, or 12 Pro Max, you'll need to relearn simple actions like shutting down and restarting the device.
Smartphones are inherently bad for privacy. You've basically got a tracking device in your pocket, pinging off cell towers and locking onto GPS satellites. All the while, tracking cookies, advertising IDs, and usage stats follow you around the internet.
It's finally out. After months of testing, iOS 13 is available to install on your iPhone, which means over 200+ new features you can use right now. The update, released on Sept. 19, can be installed over the air or from a restore image using iTunes in macOS Mojave and older or Finder in macOS Catalina. Ditto for the 13.1 update issued on Sept. 24.
While keeping your iPhone out of the bedroom might help to avoid unnecessary distractions before bedtime, it could be better served right by your side to help diagnose sleeping issues you may be experiencing each night.
One could argue that, at least for the moment, software development is more important to the augmented reality experience than hardware. Since a viable augmented reality headset has yet to emerge for the broader, mainstream consumer market, currently, the same devices that make texting and selfies possible are leading the charge to enable easy-to-use AR experiences.
Whether you subscribe to Apple TV+ or not, the TV app on your iPhone is a great place to watch movies and TV shows. On the surface, it looks like a pretty straightforward app, but hidden features are lurking in the shadows that can enhance how you use it.
There is no default option on iOS 16 or iOS 17 to lock your apps behind Face ID, Touch ID, or passcode authentication. However, a clever, easy-to-implement workaround will protect your sensitive apps from nosy friends and family temporarily using or looking at something on your iPhone.
Shortcuts are meant to make your life easier, and iPhone shortcuts are no exception. They can use different triggers, manual or automated, to perform actions in the background, allowing you to do things like send a prewritten text message during a bad date or change your wallpaper at certain times of the day. However, sometimes it's not only about the shortcut itself but about how fast you can run it.
Mobile gaming has exploded in recent years, with experts predicting 2.4 billion global mobile players by the end of 2019. It already accounts for 47% of the worldwide gaming market, besting console and PC. No wonder we've seen the rise of gaming smartphones, a class of phones that specialize in mobile gaming.
Unlike the realm of virtual reality, augmented reality is less about losing yourself in some fantasy environment, and more about getting things done in the real world. So while we've seen some great games that capture the imagination on devices like the Magic Leap One and the HoloLens, when it comes to real-world usage, the biggest developments coming for AR apps that are the more practical ones.
Apple's built-in search on iPhone is an incredibly valuable tool you shouldn't ignore or underutilize, and we're here to show you why. So, buckle in because this list covers hidden and lesser-known Spotlight features that will leave you wondering how you ever lived without Spotlight Search on iOS.
There are plenty of tools that'll help you type faster and more efficiently on your iPhone or iPad, such as Slide to Type, Dictation, and even a case with a physical keyboard. But one of the best tricks will help you type frequently used words, phrases, sentences, email addresses, and more faster, and you can sync your settings with your Mac so you can type more with less effort on all your Apple devices.
While new features in Safari, Camera, Photos, Notes, Weather, Messages, and other Apple apps may steal the show on iOS 17, there are some impressive new features you need to know about when it comes to FaceTime audio and video calls.
You might have missed it, but the virtual keypad you use to enter phone numbers in your smartphone's dialer and contacts app isn't all numbers. Take a closer look, and you'll notice a few mysterious buttons you've likely been tuning out unconsciously. But it's time to stop ignoring them because each has a particular purpose that could come in handy one day.
If you're doing the same tasks on your Android phone repeatedly each day — like playing a specific playlist at the gym, viewing work documents, or watching your favorite music video — you can save some time by automating your routine, turning each task into a one-tap gesture on your home screen.
If you're tired of the default yellow link colors in your Notes app, which I find hard to look at in light mode, there's a way to change them to another color on your iPhone, iPad, and/or Mac running iOS 17, iPadOS 17, and/or macOS Sonoma 14 and earlier.
The home screen is the most important part of your iPhone when it comes to customization, and Apple just gave us even more options to personalize it.
Some iOS and iPadOS apps give you an option to lock them behind Face ID, Touch ID, or a passcode, but there aren't many.
These days, using Reddit on your iPhone is just as good, if not better, than Redditing on a desktop browser. While there's an official Reddit app for iOS, there are plenty of third-party clients that have similar features as well as custom perks to enhance the experience. But figuring out which Reddit client is best for your daily use can be a lot of work — work that we can make easier on you.
Rooting. As an Android user, I'm sure you've heard the word once or twice. According to Kaspersky, 7.6% of all Android users root — but for the 92.4% who don't, we wanted to talk to you.
Apple's Messages app already has a ton of great features, from audio message transcriptions to message editing and screen effect triggers. But some important new features and changes are included in the latest software updates for iPhone, iPad, and Mac that make Messages even better.
An invaluable button on your iPhone can do hundreds, even thousands, of amazing things, but most iPhone users don't even know it exists. You can't push it. You can't click it. You can't press it. But it's the largest button on your iPhone, more powerful than the versatile Side button, and it's hiding in plain sight.
You may prefer reading news stories, web articles, and books on your iPhone over listening to them in spoken form. Still, sometimes it's necessary when driving, walking, cycling, cleaning, working, or performing other activities requiring a little multitasking. To help you out, Apple has a text-to-speech service on your iPhone — you just need to know how to find and set it up.
Apple made significant improvements to its Shortcuts app in the latest iOS update, so you can do even more with your custom-made macros for iPhone.
When you enable Low Power Mode on your iPhone, it's not always clear what measures it's taking to reduce battery drain and conserve power. Changes to energy-hungry features you use daily may be immediately noticeable, but some things you frequently use may be disabled or reduced without any apparent indicators.
While it doesn't come with any iPad models out of the box, the Apple Pencil is perhaps the best iPad accessory you can get. It's a powerful writing and drawing tool with an intuitive design and user-friendliness that makes it easy to take notes, draw sketches, mark up documents, and more. And there's a lot you can do with it — some of which you may not have noticed yet.
With the holidays right around the corner, it's easy to miss a big software update on your iPhone, and by that, I mean iOS 15.2, which was pushed out Monday, Dec. 13. There's a surprising amount of new features and changes in the updated firmware, and there are a few big ones you need to know about.
Individually addressable LEDs, also commonly called "NeoPixels" after the popular Adafruit product, are a bright and colorful way to get started with basic Python programming. With an inexpensive ESP8266 or ESP32 microcontroller, it's easy to get started programming your own holiday lighting animations on a string of NeoPixels with beginner-friendly MicroPython!
Smartphone gaming continues to improve with ever sharper displays and raw processing power to deliver console-quality graphics right in the palm of your hands. Nonetheless, you still stand to improve the gaming experience on any phone by adding the right accessories to the mix.
So, someone on your shopping list has an iPhone. Lucky for you, Apple's line of smartphones are practically made for accessories. From AirPods to adapters, there's something for every iPhone user in your life. Are you feeling overwhelmed by the options? You've come to the right place.
Apple just seeded developers and public beta testers the GM (golden master) for iOS 14 on Tuesday, Sept 15. The update (18A373) comes just after Apple's "Time Flies" event, and six days after Apple released iOS 14 beta 8 for both developers and public testers.
Apple's iOS 14 is here. With it, you'll see over 200 new features and changes hit your iPhone, including home screen widgets, inline replies in Messages, and cycling routes in Maps. Here's how you can get your hands on the brand new update.
To take apart the controller you will need a Torx t8 screwdriver and a Philips head screw driver. There are 6 obvious screws on the back of the controller and there is one hidden and one behind the bar-code in the battery compartment on the back. Remove all of the screws, push down on the right and left triggers and pull the controller apart. Pull the board apart and don't worry you won't break anything unless you are really rough. Remove the rest of the buttons, they come out just by pulling...
Tip 1. First of all you need to maintain a diary to record how your skin has been affected on a daily basis and identify what your triggers are: for example whether it is due to spicy foods or cold weather.
