Tip: use Messages low quality image mode to conserve precious cellular data

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 21, 2016

Apple's Messages app provides an optional iOS-only mode which cuts down your cellular data consumption to a bare minimum when sending image attachments. I don't know about you, but I worry about sharing high-resolution images when cellular data is on. In my experience, most normals are oblivious to the fact that sending a single shot-on-iPhone photograph through iMessage burns through one to five megabytes of data, sometimes even more.

In low quality mode, Messages uses only 100KB per image attachment. Another way to think about it: you can send 30 to 50 images for the same amount of data required to share a full-resolution attachment in Messages. In this brief tutorial, we'll teach you how to tell Messages to send lower quality images in order to optimize your cellular data consumption and prevent unwanted overage fees.

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How to hide Stories on Instagram

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated March 3, 2021
Marketing image with a tagline "Everyone has a story (to hide)" in white font printed on top of a colorful Instagram gradient background

Instagram recently unveiled a new feature called Stories which allows you to shoot, annotate, and share photos and short videos outside of your normal feed. By default, all of your followers can see the Stories your post. Likewise, you can see all the Stories the people you follow are posting. This is where it sometimes gets overwhelming.

I follow a lot of random people on Instagram because I appreciate the quality of the photos they share on their feeds. However, I care very little for their Stories, which are typically more about their personal lives than sharing beautiful shots. In this case, I'd rather not see their Stories at all.

There are also some people who follow me with whom I don't want to share my Stories, so I am opting to hide my Stories from these people.

In this post we will learn how you can hide your story from select people, but also how you can prevent other people's stories from filling up your screen.

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Apple seeds first beta of iOS 10.1 with new Portrait camera mode

Cody Lee ∙ Updated May 17, 2018

Apple on Wednesday issued the first beta for iOS 10.1. Registered developers can grab the new software via the over-the-air update mechanism in the iOS Settings app, or via Apple's online developer portal.

Perhaps the most significant change in this first 10.1 beta is the addition of Portrait camera mode— a software feature for the iPhone 7 Plus Apple showed off earlier this month that creates a 'bokeh' effect.

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How to set up Two-Factor Authentication for your Apple ID

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated December 25, 2018

Two-Factor Authentication strengthens the security of your Apple ID by preventing anyone from accessing or using it, even if they know your password. With Two-Factor Authentication, one of your trusted devices generates a one-time code when you make a purchase or sign in to your Apple ID, iCloud, iCloud.com, iMessage, FaceTime or Game Center account on a new device. Two-Factor Authentication is also required for Auto Unlock so you can unlock your Mac by wearing an Apple Watch.

In this tutorial we'll show you how to protect your Apple ID with Two-Factor Authentication or, if you're still using the older and less secure Two-Step Verification, upgrade to Two-Factor Authentication.

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How to save drafts of Instagram posts to work on later

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated March 18, 2021

With Instagram drafts, you can save any half-finished photo edits and work on them later, which is handy for those times you get too busy to post right away. And if you run an Instagram account for your business, letting your social media manager save a post as a draft makes it easy for you to review it in advance of publishing.

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How to use voicemail transcription on iPhone

Anthony Bouchard ∙ Updated June 19, 2018

One of the more useful features for iPhones that comes packed inside of Apple’s new iOS 10 release is voicemail transcription, which transcribes your voicemails into text so you can read them rather than listen to them.

The feature is available to users in the United States and it’s very much still in its beta stages despite the fact that iOS 10 is now a public firmware, but if you want to know how to use it, or to see if you can use it yet, then you’ll be happy to know it’s quite easy to follow.

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BetterTextSelection makes precise paragraph text selection possible on iOS

Anthony Bouchard ∙ September 21, 2016

There are a lot of people who get away with using iOS' text selection just fine, but there are others who hate the way it's implemented and find using it to be a pain in the hind quarters.

A new free jailbreak tweak release called BetterTextSelection aims to make the text selection feature in iOS a little more precise, especially in the context of selecting large excerpts of text from blocky paragraphs on a web page.

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60+ new features in macOS Sierra

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated February 17, 2017

Apple released macOS Sierra today as a free update in the Mac App Store. Aside from headlining new features such as Siri, Auto Unlock, Universal Clipboard, picture in picture video, tabs in almost every app and so forth, Sierra happens to include a lot of under-the-hood tweaks and enhancements than we originally expected. To help get you up to speed, we've created this detailed overview of everything new in macOS Sierra so give it a read while Sierra is installing on your Mac.

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How to use Picture-in-Picture for YouTube videos on your Mac

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated June 28, 2018

macOS Sierra was just released with a flurry of new features, one of them being the ability to watch videos in a new mode called Picture-in-Picture. When enabled, this allows you to detach a video from its player, and place it anywhere in a resizable window on your screen. This is particularly handy if you want to watch a video while working, for instance.

While the majority of video players you will encounter will already support Picture-in-Picture, there are a few rebels out there that still don't, and YouTube is one of them. Fortunately, there is a simple workaround for this.

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Apple updates Mac iWork apps with support for real-time collaboration

Cody Lee ∙ Updated May 17, 2018

In addition to macOS Sierra, Apple on Tuesday also released updates for its Mac iWork apps to support real-time collaboration. The feature was announced at the iPhone 7 event earlier this month, and was added to iOS apps last week.

Real-time collaboration is exactly what it sounds like. With it, users can work simultaneously in any iWork app regardless of device. A list is displayed of all current document editors, and users see the others' cursor activity in real time.

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