Utilities

iTweak: an upcoming alternative to Cydia

Since the jailbreak community formed sometime in late 2007, we've seen a number of "App Store alternatives." I can think of Icy, Cydia, Rock Your iPhone, and Installer just off the top of my head.

Now it looks like we could soon be adding another option into the mix: iTweak. The new store describes itself as a 'Cydia alternative' where jailbreakers will be available to find all of their favorite tweaks, themes and utilities...

WinZip releases new iOS app for viewing .zip files

Chances are pretty good that you've heard about WinZip at some point in your life. The compression utility, which exists on both Windows and Mac OS, has been around since 1991. Wow.

Now it looks like you'll be able to use WinZip's software while on the go, as WinZip Computing has just released an [extremely limited] iOS version of its popular app...

Picks of the Week: Activity Monitor Touch, Modern Combat 3, Katamari

It’s time for our app picks of the week! We frequently comb the far reaches of the App Store to bring you awesome apps for your downloading pleasure.

This week, we’ve got a cool app for monitoring your iPhone's system resources, and two particularly fun games for the iPhone and iPad. We hope you enjoy this week’s picks!

20 Awesome iOS 5-Compatible Jailbreak Tweaks

When Apple unveiled iOS 5 last Summer, it mentioned that the update included over 200 new features. Among the additions were several features that closely mirrored tweaks and utilities from within the jailbreak community.

In fact, there were a lot of folks that thought that iOS 5 would be the beginning of the end for jailbreakers, but we aren't too worried. Not only have we had an iOS 5 jailbreak for months, we also have tons of compatible tweaks and utilities...

RapidContact: Quickly Dial or Text a Contact

You don't have to be jailbroken very long before you hear about Activator. The popular tweak allows you to initiate frequent tasks with button taps or on-screen gestures.

What's cool about Activator is that it's compatible with hundreds of other Cydia packages, including the one we're going to be discussing here — RapidContact. The tweak allows users to quickly call or text a favorite contact...

Alphacon Jailbreak Tweak Makes Your App Icon Labels Disappear

Have you ever wondered what your iDevice's springboard would look like if your icons didn't have any labels? Think of how much less cluttered your home screen would feel without all of that text.

There are already packages in Cydia that could help you go label-free, but there's a new kid on the block. Alphacon allows you to change the transparency level of your icon labels, or make them disappear all together...

LockLyrics: Display Song Lyrics on Your LockScreen

In continuing with the lockscreen tweak trend we've been seeing lately, here's LockLyrics. This jailbreak package enables users to view song lyrics on — you guessed it — the lockscreen.

Sure, you can view lyrics for your favorite tracks in the iPod app. There are even utilities that allow you to call up song lyrics with an Activator function. But LockLyrics does have its advantages...

PowerLock: Access System Toggles From Your Lockscreen

We've seen a flurry of lockscreen tweaks over the past few weeks. There was StyleUnlock, which adds multitouch gestures to your lockscreen. And then there was FlashCam, which adds quick access to your camera.

Next up on the chopping block is a package called PowerLock. This jailbreak utility adds system toggles to your lockscreen, allowing you to do things like respring and restart your device without unlocking...

Sleipnizer Might Just be Mobile Safari’s Best Friend

We've discussed several jailbreak utilities for Safari over the last few years, but Sleipnizer could be its new best friend. The package adds two major features to the option-starved browser.

Sleipnizer borrows its peculiar title and feature-set from a Japanse browser named Sleipnir. It installs into the native Safari application in iOS, and makes surfing the web with the native browser a little bit more fun...

Double At: Insert Your Email Adress by Double Tapping the “@” Key

And the onslaught of jailbreak utilities continues, with this new release from iSam. The package will allow you to automatically insert your email address into a text field upon double tapping the "@" key.

While you could accomplish this with an app like Xpandr, Double At is much more simple. This utility is for power users who are constantly sending out their email address from their iDevice...

IconCommands: Make Your Icon Tapping More Productive

We've seen a flurry of jailbreak tweaks surface over the last few days, and it doesn't look like it's slowing down. Multiple packages turned up in Cydia today, but the one we're going to cover in this post is IconCommands.

The utility allows you to set customized actions for when you tap on an app icon. For example, you can set applications to launch on a single tap, hide once double tapped, and delete after 3 taps. I know it sounds similar to Apptivator, but it's actually very different...

Copic: Add Contact Photos to your Call Lists, Contact Lists, and Text Messages

I love jailbreak utilities that add contact photos to stock iOS apps. It makes your contacts seem more like real people, rather than pieces of data.

Cydia provides a couple of options to pull this off. SMSEnhancer adds contact photos to the Messages app, and IPicMyContacts does the same for your contact list. And then there's Copic, which actually does what the other two tweaks do, and more....