Tutorials

Get Your Gmail Contacts and Calendars in Sync on Your iPhone

Cody Lee ∙ March 8, 2011

This little trick has been around for quite some time. But if you are a new iPhone user, or plan on becoming a new iPad user soon, listen up! If you are using Google's email service, then there's a good chance you are using Google's calendar and their contact management system. This holds especially true for you, former Android users, who are forced to use the previously mentioned services by design.

Now I know you're thinking, "Cody, I already have my Gmail setup on my iPhone," and you're probably right. But if you set it up as an actual Gmail account and not under the 'Exchange' account profile, you might be missing out on some cool features. Setup as an Exchange account, your Gmail can automatically sync your contacts, your calendars, and even push your email! The best part is, it's so easy, let me show you how...

How to Jailbreak iPhone 4.3 GM with PwnageTool Bundles

Cody Lee ∙ Updated March 5, 2018

Apple's new iOS 4.3 software will launch officially March 11th. For App Store developers iOS 4.3 GM edition (final) is available now. This tutorial will show you step by step how to jailbreak your iPhone 4.3 GM Edition with PwnageTool Bundles. Unlike the plug and play ease of GreenPoison, this method will require a few extra steps, but nothing too difficult.

These instructions are for mac OS X users only, but a windows jailbreak shouldn't be too far off. This is also a tethered jailbreak, meaning that every time you restart your iPhone, you will need to be plugged into your computer. It's also important to note that although this is the final beta release, it is still a beta, so please proceed accordingly. Now on to the tutorial!

Improving Apps: How You Can Help

Guest Author ∙ March 3, 2011

There are few things more frustrating than discovering a bug or a crash in an app or tweak you just downloaded. But instead of writing a poor review or swearing off the iPhone altogether, you can actually do something to help fix the problem.

Most developers encourage feedback and would like to pinpoint the exact problem so that they can increase their sales. Here are a few steps you can take to help developers quickly fix their apps so that you can use your apps in the way they are described to work.

How to Update to iOS 4.2.1 and Preserve iPhone 4 1.59.00 Baseband

Guest Author ∙ February 3, 2011

Now that Greenpois0n RC5 finally provides the long awaited iOS 4.2.1 untethered jailbreak (without the need of SHSH Blobs), many iPhone 4 owners with unlocked iPhones' have been told to hold off upgrading to 4.2.1 as you will lose the ability to unlock (for now).

But thanks to TinyUmbrella developer @notcom, there is now a way to upgrade to iOS 4.2.1 without upgrading your baseband. Unfortunately, currently you will only be able to unlock your iPhone 4 on the older 1.59.00 baseband (modem firmware). So if you are not on the older baseband, you will not be able to unlock your iPhone 4.

For those of you with the older 1.59.00 baseband, follow the guide below to preserve your iPhone 4 baseband and unlock and jailbreak your iPhone 4 on iOS 4.2.1...

How to Use Your iPhone as a Network Drive

Guest Author ∙ Updated April 3, 2018

There are plenty of ways to access the files on your iPhone, whether through iTunes, SSH, SFTP, iFile, or a multitude of apps. However, adding automatic network sharing to your setup takes quite a few steps out of connecting to your device.

I tried these in an attempt to get my video game media center to read files on my iPhone from inside the network. If you'd like to turn your iPhone into a shared network drive for any reason, there are two particular Cydia packages that you should try today...

Troubleshooting a Painfully Slow Cydia Update

Guest Author ∙ Updated April 3, 2018

Sometimes it seems that Cydia updates can take forever. For slower devices, it may be normal. But if you see errors while downloading or if the update takes more than five minutes, there may be a solution.

Before you start this method, you will need to have APT Strict installed. If you have CyDelete installed, then you already have this. Otherwise, make sure Cydia is set to Developer mode, search for it and install...

What the %#@! is SSH?!

Guest Author ∙ Updated April 2, 2018

If you are new to jailbreaking, you are likely to hear the term SSH thrown around quite a bit. For troubleshooting it's essential; for everything else it's very useful.

So what is it? Simply put, it's an advanced way to connect to the iPhone. Also known for it's uses in SFTP, IMAPS, POP3S, etc., SSH is a protocol short for Secure Shell that gives us an encrypted and secure tunnel between two devices.

10 iPhone Tips You Should Know About

Sébastien Page ∙ October 5, 2010

Every once in a while I meet someone who has absolutely no idea the iPhone can do some very simple things such as moving icons around or even deleting applications. To most of you this will sound like basic iPhone features, however there are some really tech-challenged people out there. This article is for them!

If you're brand new to the iPhone, then read on because you're going to learn some simple and effective tricks...

How to Create Free Ringtones for Your iPhone

Guest Author ∙ August 29, 2010

You either love custom ringtones or you invariably loathe them. You can put me down in the latter category. Nevertheless there are many who love hearing a portion of their favorite jam when someone calls, or assigning certain songs that fit the personality of a specific contact in their address book. If you fit into the group that loves custom alerts, you're in luck.

How to Install Android on Your iPhone 2G or 3G with iPhoDroid

Sébastien Page ∙ August 19, 2010

Android on the iPhone is more of a "project" than anything else. It's buggy, unstable, and doesn't even bring all the features needed to fully use the iPhone. So why in the hell would you install Android on your iPhone? Just for the heck of it, of course! Thanks to Sergio McFly, this is now easily possible.

iPhoDroid 1shot is probably the easiest way to install Android on your iPhone 2G or iPhone 3G. It doesn't require any file editing or anything that might scared the least technically advanced of us. Without further ado, here are the instructions to set up Android on your iPhone. As usual, proceed at your own risks...

Step 1: Make sure your iPhone is jailbroken and Cydia is up to date. If it's not jailbroken, do so by using JailbreakMe.

Step 2: Download the latest version of iPhoDroid 1 shot from here. The download link is at the very bottom left of the page.

Step 3: Make sure your iPhone is connected to your computer via the USB cable. Launch iPhoDroid and click "shoot".

Step 4: iPhoDroid will extract the touch driver and transfer the cache/system/data folders to your iPhone.

Step 5: iPhoDroid will now place your iPhone in recovery mode.

Step 6: After that, you will get the OpeniBoot splash page with different options (Apple, Android, Install, Uninstall). Use the volume buttons to highlight the "Install" option, then tap the Home button to select it.

Step 7: Some code will then be running on your screen. Once done, your iPhone will reboot in the Android OS.

Done! You can now enjoy your crippled iPhone running Android.

If you're one of the few courageous men out there to try this hack, please let us know how it's working for you by leaving a comment below.

[iClarified]

How to Convert Old iPhone App Icons to Retina Display Icons

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated January 24, 2016

I just got tipped by an anonymous reader about a nice little trick that will convert iPhone app icons that haven't been optimized for the iPhone 4 Retina Display to high resolution icons. This will require a jailbroken iPhone and a couple applications.

Step 1: Download iFile from Cydia and Resize-Photo from the App Store.

Step 2: In iFile, navigate to the folder of the application of which you'd like to optimize the icon. The application folder is usually called appname.app.

Step 3: Save the app icon to your camera roll. The app icon size should be 512 x 512.

Step 4: Open Resize-Photo and change the application icon size from 512 x 512 to 114 x 114 and save it.

Step 5: In iFile, navigate to your photos folder and copy the new icon you just resized.

Step 6: Now go back to your app folder and look for the application icon and rename it to something like IconBackUp.png, just in case something goes wrong.

Step 7: Still in the application folder, paste the resized app icon and name it Icon.png, or whatever the app icon was called in the first place.

Step 8: Reboot your iPhone. You should now have a high resolution icon.

Apparently this doesn't work with every application icon but it should work with most of them.

Pretty nice trick, isn't it?

How to Downgrade iPhone 4.0.2 to 4.0.1

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated August 22, 2010

This step by step guide will show you how to downgrade your iPhone iOS 4.0.2 to iOS 4.0.1. These steps are pretty simple but there is one major requirement: you must have your SHSH files saved on Saurik's server. There is absolutely no way around it. If you don't have your SHSH, you won't be able to downgrade your iPhone.

In this tutorial, we will see how to downgrade the iPhone from 4.0.2 to 4.0.1 but the steps are the same if you want to downgrade to iOS 4 or even 3.1.3.

There are several methods used to downgrade the iPhone. We will learn the method that uses TinyUmbrella. No file editing will be necessary.

How to Downgrade from iOS 4.0.2 to 4.0.1

Step 1: Let's download your SHSH blobs from Saurik's server to your computer. To do so, download TinyUmbrella and plug your iPhone in. Select the "Advanced Options" box. Also select the firmware version to which you wish to downgrade. Finally, select "Cydia" under "Request From". Then hit "Save My SHSH". This will grab your SHSH files from Saurik's servers and save them on your computer.

Step 2: Download the firmware to which you wish to downgrade to from our iPhone downloads section. Save it to your desktop.

Step 3: Put your iPhone in DFU Mode. To do so, launch iTunes and plug your iPhone in. Press and hold the Home and Power button together for 10 seconds. After 10 seconds, release the Power button while still holding the Home button until iTunes pops up and says it has found an iPhone in recovery Mode.

Step 4: Run TinyUmbrellaand click the "Display SHSHs" button to make sure your SHSH blobs were downloaded to your computer. Once done, click "Start TSS Server".

Step 5: Now we're going to restore to the firmware you want. To do so, launch iTunes and plug your iPhone in. Hold to SHIFT key (Windows only) or ALT/Option key (Mac only) while clicking on Restore. Make sure you hold the key while clicking Restore. A window will open. Simply select the firmware you downloaded in step 2.

Step 6: Your iPhone will start the restore process. You will most likely get several errors (error 1011, 1013, and 1015) but that's ok, don't worry about those.

Step 7: Finally, we need to get your iPhone out of recovery mode. To do so, simply click "Kick Device Out of Recovery" in TinyUmbrella.

Done!

You should now be back on a previous iOS, giving you the ability to jailbreak and unlock.