OS X Mountain Lion Theme / Transformation Pack For Windows 7 & Windows 8 Now Ready For Download

Tho' there tends to be a gap of individual age between each new process of Microsoft's Windows operative system, Apple runs a much writer fixture transport pedal, and despite emotional OS X Lion exclusive subterminal gathering, its issue Mountain Lion looks intermeshed up for a late summer give.

Amalgamating the top features of iOS and OS X, it's an electrifying soul for fans of both the respective platforms, and tho' the vexer earlier this year sure looked promising, it relic to be seen whether the harmonical matrimony of two rather contrary ecosystems complex in the Cupertino company's view.

In the meantime, Windows users are gearing up for Windows 8, and the Consumer Preview planted rearwards in Feb has received a variegate hearty recognise from PC users the world over. Combining faster boot times, better functionality and, of course, the Metro UI, it has sure helped to modify few of the establishment in the Redmond-based company which was perhaps doomed by the achievement of the alarming Windows Vista.

While many machines are functional the Windows 8 Consumer Preview and others are flying Windows 7, due to a slim, shall we say, point, neither give get to run Mountain Cat when it releases in a unify of months measure. Soothe, that hasn't stopped the modders over at SkinPacks from swing together what appears to be a Mountain Lion-esque modification feature for Microsoft's omnipresent and future OSes, and as you can see from the screenshots, they've through a pretty better job.

Of course, the fundamentals of Windows are noneffervescent current, and put out same a sore molding, but nonetheless, it's a stellar endeavour, and with Apple renowned for finesse when it comes to the UI, it certainly ads a trace of collection and elegance to transactions.

If you would like to apply your Windows 7 or 8 screen the Mountain Cat discourse, then download via the links beneath. There's an offline and online installer for each, with the latter gift automatic bug fixes, and there are 32-bit and 64-bit proper installers tailored to your primary tool typewrite.

Download the skin packs from the link below, and let us know if you like the Mountain Cat look via the wonted mediums.

• Download Mountion Lion Skin Pack for Windows 8 Consumer Preview
• Download Mountain Lion Skin Pack for Windows 7

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Download OS X Mount Lion Developer Preview 3

Meet one month after Apple released the early revise to its Developer Prevue of the upcoming OS X Mountain Lion (10.8) OS, the position Developer Advertisement has retributive been planted, and as the head reveals, it's exclusive for those remunerative subscribers of Apple's Developer program.

This latest build is 12A178q, and since it's exclusive righteous been seeded, the new features and changes have yet to be observed. Withal, Apple has, in high component, noted of both noted bugs and issues with the newest iteration of the upcoming OS.

At the present, installment OS X 10.8 over 10.7.2 (or previous) using FileVault activated may not run, piece many Apple menu items may not function right if there's a sandboxed app in the highlight. Also, iTunes is currently having effort syncing notes - it isn't, in fact, syncing them at all - piece Mail's exposure browser can't operation the iPhoto library at this show in reading.

That's conscionable a attach of the issues Apple give require to solve from this variation if the projecting latish season discharge of Mountain Lion is to hold product. It plant has its impartial distribute of bugs travel through, but after the annoyer affirm in Feb, there's plant much for Mac users to be mad some.

With iOS seemly so common in much a squabby location of period - mainly through the so-called post-PC device that is the iPad - it was near a compliance that elements of Apple's city and desktop operating grouping would statesman path over. Mountain Lion is an uniting of the two, and as is ever the occurrence with Apple products, we judge everything - and every device - to be perfectly symphonic and in sync.

The Game center, which was pushed through with iOS 4, is an effort Apple is currently working ossified to impeccable. Described as casual gamers, those gracing few of iOS's top titles are invariably anything but, and the Cupertino-based associate wants its vast arrange of titles to move the capitalist multiplayer vein seen on consoles specified as Xbox LIVE and the PlayStation Network.

As mentioned, it's set to formation previous this summer, tho' with so often to do and exclusive a few latent developer previews to come, having everything prompt by the deadline point is feat to see overmuch utilization.

As usual, you'll necessity to be a developer in prescript to download Mountain Lion, Developer Preview 3, and if you've a vested percentage into the internal workings of OS X, it's strongly advisable you sign on to the program.

Download OS X Mountain Lion 10.8 Developer Preview 3 [Developers Exclusive]

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New LuckyCat Trojan For Mac Discovered

Retributory as the Flashback Trojan for Mac was beingness dealt with by OS X users across the concern, a new type of a backdoor Trojan for Apple's operating system capitalizes on an exploit in Microsoft Statement in say to undo.

The assets firms tally been real laboring over the quondam few weeks, and the current exploit - called "LuckyCat" has been discovered by an practiced from Kaspersky Lab. Having carried out tests on simple septic tool, he initiate it could be confiscated over by a far user who began analyzing the organization as advantageously as helping him or herself to documents utter on the Mac.

Costin Raiu, the practiced down the findings, gave his interpret on proceedings:

    "We are pretty confident the operation of the bot was done manually — which means a real attacker, who manually checks the infected machines and extracts data from them."

The new Trojan, titled "Backdoor.OSX.SabPub.a,"," is only a danger to Mac users, and utilizes a Java exploit to foul a organization it has targeted. Ernst it has infiltrated the Mac, it then spreads via Microsoft documents which exploit a danger titled "CVE-2009-0563."

It managed to brace under the radar for over six weeks on the organization before it sprang into proceedings and began siphoning documents and files from the simple organization. There are thought to be two isolated strains of the "SabPub" Trojan, which is labeled as an "active attack."

New variants of the bot are supposed to surface in the coming weeks, but let's plan the position doesn't motion the state of widespread fright demonstrated in the lastly duet of weeks regarding Flashback. The Trojan putrid more than 600,000 Macs worldwide, but Apple, with the resource of a few Java updates, managed to take Flashback from the machines of those stilted. Primary disclosed way place in September, Flashback operated under the pretense of an Adobe Flash installer - gift Mac users added sanity (if a reason was flat obligatory), to emotion Flash.

Apple proudly declares its Mac OS X doesn't receive from the similar stratum of viruses and attacks as Windows, and patch this may be accurate, there are certainly a few folks out there disagreeable to hamper that estimate.

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Here’s How To Get iOS Screenshots Onto A Mac

We take a lot of iOS screenshots here at SanjeevRules. Whether we are reviewing an app or we just want a unique image to accompany a post, we are constantly taking screenshots.

What that also means is we are also on the lookout for better ways to get those screenshots off of our iPhones and iPads, and right onto our computers. Yes we can email them to ourselves, and yes we could use Dropbox if we absolutely must, but if you’ve ever tried either of those solutions for any length of time then you’ll no doubt agree that there has to be a better way.

App developer John Marshall thought the same, and having the same issue as we do he set about finding a more reasonable way of getting iOS screenshots off of devices, and onto his Mac. Thankfully, he’s come up with an absolute beauty.

A word of warning first. You’ll need to have a Mac, and have iPhoto installed. Photo Stream will need to be set up on both the Mac and the iOS device in question, but you’ve already done that, right?

The method Marshall has come up with involves searching your Mac for those telltale .PNG files that are created when you take a screenshot on an iOS device. With Photo Stream turned on, those images are automatically beamed to the cloud and in turn, get sent to your Mac. The beauty of this is that iPhoto does not need to be running for the images to be received which also means that there is a folder somewhere on your Mac that houses all of your Photo Stream images.

Head on over to IconMaster for the full skinny, but the gist of it is this: you’ll need to find your Photo Stream folder and then search it for PNG files. Save that search and voila, you’ve got a constantly updating collection of iOS screenshots that takes no effort on your part, beyond the initial set up. John explains all that in his blog post, and it takes just a couple of minutes to get up and running.

There’s not many things in life more awesome than watching images pop up in a folder when you take screenshots on your iPhone. The transfer takes a few seconds whilst the image is sent to Apple’s servers and then back down, but it sure beats emailing them!.

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Apple Releases Standalone Flashback Malware Removal Tool For Non-Java Mac Users – Download Now

While Macs have been notorious for being impervious to viruses – at least in terms of perception, while they were vulnerable, far more viruses were produced for Windows than OS X – their reputation for impeccable security is certainly being questioned now. Flashback, malware built to grab private information such as passwords entered in by users in applications, has evolved over time into a very dangerous piece of malicious software. In its beginnings, it required user interaction – through a dodgy looking Adobe Flash Installer – to lodge itself into one’s Mac.

However, the latest iterations of the Trojan no longer require user interaction to get within a Mac due to a Java exploit. With 600,000 Macs infected (1% of the Mac user base), Apple had to do something. Yesterday, they released a Java update that they hope will take care of the vulnerability, named Java for OS X 2012-003. On top of fixing the exploit used by the Flashback malware, the update also will disable the automatic execution of Java applets, further diminishing the chance of the malware silently making its way onto your Mac.

While you are technically still able to re-enable automatic execution of Java applets, the update will disable it once again if it detects that, after a period of time, no applets have been run.

Following up this, Apple today released a standalone Flashback malware removal tool outside of the update, which the company recommends that all OS X Lion users without Java should install. This utility removes most of the common variants of the Flashback malware from your machine. While the most dangerous form of this malware does in fact exploit the Java vulnerability, it’s still recommended that users run the tool as other variants may have used social engineering (and a hint of trickery and deceit) to get installed on the machine.

All in all, this entire malware incident has been quite the PR disaster for Apple, leaving a dent in its otherwise solid security reputation. Unfortunately, as Apple computers gain in popularity and use, more and more people may be more inclined to produce viruses and malware for the platform.

Nevertheless, it’s highly recommended that you use Apple’s tools and update your machine to be safe. If you do have Java installed, make sure that you install the update that was released yesterday. And if you don’t have Java installed, don’t think you’re completely impervious. Again, we recommend that you run the standalone Flashback malware removal tool just to be on the safe side.

Download Flashback malware removal tool for Mac

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Apple Releases Java Update To Officially Fix Flashback Trojan Vulnerability

Apple has today pushed out an update for OS X which it hopes will close hole that allowed the Flashback Trojan to infect over half a million Macs.

The update, named simply Java for OS X 2012-003, comes after over 600,000 Macs were infected by the Flashback Trojan at its peak, leaving third party developers to put together various apps for diagnosing and then cleaning infected systems.

With Mac owners almost never being the victims of such attacks – Windows-powered PCs have traditionally been the target of such nastiness – questions are now being asked as to whether this may signal the beginning in a shift of focus for the bad guys.

Apple’s fix is now available as a standard update via the Software Update procedure we all know and love. As well as plugging the hole exploited by Flashback, the fix also disables the automatic execution of java applets. If a user then decides to reactivate it, the system will automatically disable it once again after a set period of time when applets have not been run.

The complete change log of the update reads as follows, offering nothing more than security fixes:

This Java security update removes the most common variants of the Flashback malware.

This update also configures the Java web plug-in to disable the automatic execution of Java applets. Users may re-enable automatic execution of Java applets using the Java Preferences application. If the Java web plug-in detects that no applets have been run for an extended period of time it will again disable Java applets.

Apple was reported to be working on both a fix and its own cleaning tool last week, and with the fix now being implemented on Macs all over the world, we now await an Apple-branded cleaning tool. Until then, companies like F-Secure and Kaspersky have already offered such tools, and anyone infected would do well to give those a shot sooner rather than later.

Apple will be hoping, as will all Mac owners, that this does not signal the beginning of a new wave of Mac-targeted Trojans and viruses. Until now Apple’s machines have operated under a security method based on security via obscurity. With few people using Macs compared to those with Windows, writers of malicious apps have targeted Microsoft’s platform because it offered the largest target. Now that the Mac is growing in share and selling in record numbers, that method of protection may no-longer be as valid as it once was.

Its highly recommended, and we can’t emphasize more on the fact that you should indeed update your Mac by installing this update. it’s a big safety precaution, and will keep your Mac from being compromised and your data getting into the wrong hands.

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Find And Remove Flashback Trojan From Your Mac This Removal Tool

A new tool has been released by security firm F-Secure which will check a Mac for signs of the Flashback Trojan and, importantly, remove it. Best of all, the app is completely free, that’s right, free!

We told you very recently about a new app which would allow users to check their own Macs to see whether they had been infected by the Flashback Trojan. The app was a simple, free download which would tell users whether they had the Trojan on their system, but did not go so far as to fix the issue.

Now F-Secure has also released an app that will check a system for the Flashback Trojan, but this one has one big advantage – it can also clean your system should you need it to, which is something which we all want, instead of knowing the Trojan is sitting their or not.

The app is a free download from F-Secure’s website, and runs with barely any input needed by the user. Simply launching the app is enough for it to go off and check a system, with the results displayed almost instantaneously. The machine we tested it on was not infect, so we have been unable to test its ability to remove the Trojan, but we are assured by F-Secure that it does indeed work.

F-Secure says that it has launched the checking and cleanup tool because Apple has yet to fully face the issue at hand. With no software updates from Apple to address the potential threat to people using Mac OS X 10.5 or earlier, users are forced to either uninstall Java, disable it or upgrade to Mac OS X 10.6. None of the three options are ideal, though Apple has released updates for the newer versions of its operating system.

Apple has not provided a patch for the Java vulnerability used by Flashback for OS X v10.5 (or earlier). More than 16% of Macs still run OS X 10.5.

If you do find yourself infected, no matter which version of Mac OS X you happen to be using, then this tool from F-Secure certainly appears to be your best bet of removing the Flashback Trojan from your system.

Well done to F-Secure for offering it for free.

Download Flashback Removal Tool for Mac.

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How To Check If Your Mac Is Infected With Flashback Trojan The Easy Way With This Free App

If you are worried that you may have fallen foul of the Flashback Trojan, there is now an incredibly easy way to check your system after a new app was released for just that task.

The Flashback Trojan has already infected more than 600,000 Macs around the globe, and with Apple scrambling to release Java updates to try and alleviate the problem, many will find that the latest round of fixes have simply come too late.

If you find yourself wondering whether your own Macs are infected with the Trojan, then you can now download a free apps Called FlashbackChecker which has been made available via Github. As you would expect, the app is free.

Downloading FlashbackChecker and then testing your own system could not be any easier. Download the app and then unzip the file. You’ll be left with one app that can simply be run from any location, and can be easily deleted afterwards.

Launching the app presents users with just one big button which invites users to ‘Check for Flashback Infection’.  Hitting that button does exactly what you would expect, and FlashbackChecker will go off and work out whether your machine is indeed infected or not.

The process was extremely quick on the machines we tried it on, and thankfully none were infected. The app will not remove any infections should you be unlucky enough to have them, but F-Secure’s guide for removing an infection will see you right, should the need arise.

Assuming all goes well, and you are not infected by the Trojan, now is not the time to sit back and gloat. Make sure all OS X updates have been downloaded and installed if you want to minimize the risk of ever being infected by something like this. With the Mac believed to be almost immune to such attacks, many of us have become lax in our security methods and this should serve as a wakeup call for many. People will always seek to take control of our machines and our data, whether we are using a Mac or a PC.

It’s a dangerous world out there. Make sure you’re as protected as you can be.

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How To Check If Your Mac Is Infected By The New Flashback Trojan

There's a new Mac trojan that's been floating around, and it's terrifying everyone. It's written in an unknown language, doesn't even need your password to compromise you, and now it's apparently infected 600,000 users. Here's how to use Terminal to check if you're one of the unlucky many.

The instructions come from F-Secure, which also details how you can remove the trojan if your Mac is, in fact affected. But let's not put the cart before the virus; here's how to see if you're clean.

First, open Terminal from your Utilities folder. If you've never ever done that before, don't be scared! It's a nice way to turn your Mac into a computer you actually have some control over.

Then, once you're in, follow these easy steps to detection:

1. Run the following command in Terminal:

defaults read /Applications/Safari.app/Contents/Info LSEnvironment

2. Take note of the value, DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES
3. Proceed to step 8 if you got the following error message:

"The domain/default pair of (/Applications/Safari.app/Contents/Info, LSEnvironment) does not exist"

If you don't get that error message, well, time to head to F-Secure for your fix. If you're clean so far, you can move on to step eight:

8. Run the following command in Terminal:

defaults read ~/.MacOSX/environment DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES

9. Take note of the result. Your system is already clean of this variant if you got an error message similar to the following:

"The domain/default pair of (/Users/joe/.MacOSX/environment, DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES) does not exist"

In other words: "does not exist" means you've got a healthy rig. Anything else, just keep following F-Secure's instructions to vanquish the intruder. And even if you get the all clear for now, don't wait on downloading the security update that patches the Java vulnerability that started this whole mess

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Control Your iTunes Or Spotify Music Library Using Kinect Like Gestures On Your Mac

It would seem that controlling things using gestures is fast becoming the new thing to do. Microsoft have enjoyed great success with their Kinect motion detecting hardware that allows users to use their bodies as the controller for certain games as well as navigating through menus with gestures. An increasing number of iOS apps are starting to include gesture-based user interfaces that allow users to navigate through the various app screens using a number of different gestures including flicks and swipes.

The guys over at Bot Square Inc. have recognized the popularity of controlling things with the flick of the hand or finger, which has led them to create their Flutter app, available as an alpha download from their website for Mac OS X users. Flutter exists purely to allow a Mac user to be able to play and pause their music libraries either on iTunes or Spotify, depends on whichever you’re using.

At first glance, nothing appears to be out of the ordinary with that, after all, Mac users can already pause their tunes through the app’s buttons or by using the built-in hot keys on the keyboard.

Flutter works by taking things one step further and using the Mac’s built-in iSight camera, it allows users to play or pause music using a simple waving hand gesture. When the Flutter app is invoked, the camera springs into life and instead of displaying your rather confused face on the screen, it waits patiently in the background looking out for recognizable gestures which tells it to play or stop the music. The gesture is extremely simple and means that the user simply needs to hold his/her hand up to the camera with their palm facing forward to kick Flutter into action.

The app is extremely simple, but also rather powerful at the same time. By opting for a gesture-based control rather than a physical button press or a mouse click, a user can start or stop music or even movies up to six feet away from their Mac, ideal for those extremely lazy movies buffs amongst us.

You kind of get the feeling that apps such as Flutter are going to be the stepping stone to software that is a lot more functional, bringing a larger array of more complicated gestures that allow almost total control over our technology lives. Bringing the same style of application to my iPad would also make me extremely excited.

Flutter is available free of charge from the official website and can be downloaded now [Direct Link].

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Download iTunes 10.6.1 For Windows And Mac

Apple have responded to a number of complaints raised by users, who have been seeing their 10.6 version of iTunes crashing in random situations. It would seem that when Apple released iTunes 10.6 after the new iPad media event in San Francisco, they inadvertently introduced a number of bugs which became apparent when users were playing videos, changing artwork size whilst in grid view and synchronizing photographs to an attached iOS device.

The latest release, that should be starting to appear as an update around the world right now is mainly one that brings bug fixes and existing feature improvements rather than introducing anynew functionality. The version of the software that was made public after the Apple media event featured all of the updates for iOS 5.1, Apple TV third-generation and the new iPad, with iTunes 10.6.1 seemingly being pushed to fix any bugs that are found within.

The official Apple changelog for iTunes 10.6.1 is as follows:

• Fixes several issues that may cause iTunes to unexpectedly quit while playing videos, changing artwork size in grid view, and syncing photos to devices.
• Addresses an issue where some iTunes interface elements are incorrectly described by VoiceOver and WindowEyes.
• Fixes a problem where iTunes may become unresponsive while syncing nano or iPod Shuffle.
• Resolves an ordering problem while browsing TV episodes in  your iTunes library on Apple TV.

A number of disgruntled users have taken to the official Apple support forums over the last few weeks to make their feelings known about the embedded bugs in iTunes 10.6. In fairness to Apple, they seem to have reacted extremely quickly to the complaints and hopefully those affected users should see the problems eradicated with this update. This latest 10.6.1 offering will of course still feature all of the goodness that we have come to expect from iTunes, including support for the new iPad as well as the third-generation Apple TV that was launched just over a week ago.

Apple are also pointing users to the official security support page that will no doubt be updated in due course with all of the relevant information pertaining to the iTunes 10.6.1 release. If the update isn’t showing for you, make sure you keep checking periodically, it shouldn’t be too long until it pops up.

To update simply fire up the Software Update utility on your PC or Mac and you should be presented with the iTunes 10.6.1 update, if so, then simply hit the Install button and you’re good to go. Those downloading iTunes for the first time may head over to this link.

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Meet The MacBook Touch: The Ultimate Fusion Of An iPad With A MacBook [VIDEO]

Remember those rumors a few years back about the possibilities of Apple releasing some kind of magical and revolutionary touchscreen Mac contraption? If you do then you will no doubt remember that they were quickly squashed due to the fact that they believed using a touchscreen interface on a Mac-like machine would prove to be unnatural and offer a terrible user experience. The company quickly followed up with the launch of the original iPad, a device that has achieved phenomenal success.

That touch screen Mac idea may never have made it to the Apple brain storming sessions, but that never stops designers from creating concepts of products that they would like to see Apple make, or think would prove popular in the marketplace. We have seen iPhone and iPad concepts, and now it’s the turn of the conceptual MacBook Touch, which you can see showcased in all its entirety in the embedded video. The concept should appeal to those individuals who still crave to have a physical keyboard on their devices, but who always want the versatility that the iPad brings to the table.

Obviously this product isn’t, and never will be real, but it does go some way to envisaging just what a device would look like if ever a MacBook Pro and an iPad were fused together in some kind of bizarre experiment. I have to admit, the whole thing appeals to me, but that could be something to do with the fact that if you slap an Apple logo onto it then I would probably give it a whirl before making any sort of judgment. Although it may be aesthetically pleasing, it doesn’t take a genius to see that the Touch would never work in the real world due to that crazy hinge that seems to be the center piece of the machine.

I should imagine that the MacBook Touch concept is more a showcase of the designer’s skills rather than an attempt at actually creating a mockup that they believe could hold some relevance in the real world. The usability of such a device is pretty much non-existent, and although I actually think it looks like an attractive piece of kit, I think I’ll stick to my individual iPad and MacBook for the foreseeable future.

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Harry Potter Series In ePub Format Officially Released For iOS, Android, Mac, Kindle And More

The Harry Potter franchise is one of the most popular of all time. What started off as a few books has spanned a lengthy series of feature films and merchandise, and although the wizardry is mainly focused towards youngsters, plenty of adults count themselves a part of the Potter-manic legion.

While the audiobooks have been on sale digitally and physically for years now, it has taken a long while for the series to become available to those who turn pages with a touch of a screen as opposed to the flicking of paper.

Similarly to The Beatles’ music – which spent much time in limbo before finally selling digitally some three years ago – fans are likely to rush en masse to make their purchases. J.K. Rowling’s online Pottermore Shop is selling each title in the widely-accepted ePub format, with prices between $8-$10 per book, while the entire series can be had for a fairly reasonable for $57.54.

The ePub files come independently of any DRM, and work with pretty much any eReader or tablet you could care to name, including most iOS and Android devices. As you may expect, there’s store-level support for Amazon’s highly-successful Kindle reader, as well as the similarly popular NOOK from Barnes & Noble. Rather interestingly, however, the eBooks are not available through Apple’s iBookstore – at least not yet.

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New HiDPI Images In Mac OS X 10.7.3 Points To Future Release Of Retina Display Macs

Whenever a new product release draws nearer, we brace ourselves for the inevitable barrage of rumors surrounding the technical specification and the aesthetic appearance of the product. Post launch, we then sit in amazement as somehow people manage to perfectly predict just what is going to be announced, and laugh uncontrollably at the others who were so far off the mark. It was like they just tickled a random idea generator and printed the result.

The rumors however, aren’t always just about the potential of future hardware and on a more consistent basis the point releases of iOS and Mac OS X are starting to be stripped apart and little snippets of information being collated and pieced together. In the past we have seen logs from iOS which make reference to a possible quad-core processor being present in either the new iPad 3 or the next iPhone as well as the possibility of 4G LTE data connectivity. Each nugget of information is like a piece of a jigsaw puzzle which, when pieced together paints a rather interesting portrait.

The latest jigsaw piece has been found in the most updated version of Mac OS X Lion which was recently offered in the 10.7.3 download. John Gruber of Daring Fireball has made reference to a Twitter post from iOS developer Matt Gemmell, as well as a separate tweet from Cabel M. Sasser who both point out that a number of UI elements in the latest 10.7.3 version of Mac OS X have been replaced with new HiDPI resources which scale to a larger size.

In the blog post, Gruber outlines the different UI resources which have benefitted from changes:

Have you noticed that Safari’s hovering-over-a-link pointing-finger cursor looks a little different in Mac OS X 10.7.3? It’s not just that the finger is at a slightly different angle — it’s a new UI resource that scales gracefully to larger sizes. That’s not the only new high-DPI image resource in 10.7.3: the grabby hand in Mail, the camera cursor for selecting an individual window to take a screenshot of, and a few other UI elements got the high-DPI treatment in 10.7.3.

A possible explanation for the inclusion of these new HiDPI resources is the future release of a range of iMacs and MacBooks which contain a HiDPI display, in other words are Retina-ready. The speculation is intensified by the fact that some owners of Mac Minis have reported that after the installation of OS X 10.7.3, their machines are rebooting into HiDPI mode if they are connected via HDMI. Some of you may also remember the little check box which allowed users to enable a HiDPI display mode that was present with the release of Mac OS X Lion, which when selected, rendered everything with twice as many pixels as the standard mode.

It looks certain that we will have a Retina ready iPad 3 in the coming few months, so it makes sense that Apple would want to compliment that with a range of beautiful, super-high-resolution-Mac machines.

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Download Firefox 11 Beta For Windows, Mac & Linux

I know what you’re thinking, you only installed Firefox 10 a few days ago on your desktop and Android devices, and the beta of Firefox 11 is out already? Well yes, it does seem that Mozilla are pumping out updates faster than a steaming freight train, but worry not as the beta version of Firefox 11 may just bring some updated goodness that appeals to you if you are a fan of the foxy browser.

Considering this beta release comes right on the back of the release of version 10.0, it contains some pretty sizeable and notable changes. One the largest and probably most useful additions, is the inclusion of add-on synchronization. The new sync features offer the ability to mirror any add-on installations you may have across multiple desktop machines, whereas previously you would have to go through the whole process manually for each set up. Firefox is playing catch up a little bit, considering browsers such as Google Chrome have offered this enhanced sync ability for quite some time, but considering the implementation issues; Chrome has suffered and it will interesting to see if Firefox handles this feature in a more elegant manner.

The official Firefox beta 11 release notes contain a number of feature additions as well as fixes and updates to certain aspects of the browser and reads as follows:

• [NEW] Firefox can now migrate your Bookmarks, History and Cookies from Google Chrome.
• [NEW] With Sync Enabled, add-ons can now be synchronised across your computers.
• [NEW] The CSS text-size-adjust property is now supported.
• [HTML5] The outerHTML property is now supported on HTML elements.
• [HTML5] View source syntax highlighting now uses the HTML5 parser.
• [FIXED] Redesigned media controls for HTML5 video playback.
• [FIXED] Firefox notifications may not work properly with Growl 1.3 or later.

Users may have noted that in the Google Chrome browser, the update process occurs seamlessly in the background. This silent update feature will also now be included with Firefox on Windows. The somewhat annoying User Account Control, which seems to require permissions to do anything, will only need to be granted access one time only, meaning after the initial permission has been granted; updates will be handled seamlessly upon restart of the browser.

The latest beta version will also include support for web developers, allowing them to visualize a webpage in full three dimensional goodness using the page inspector 3D view which has been built in. If the machine being used is compatible with WebGL then viewing the page in 3D will offer a whole new perspective on web page structure and make up.

All in all, the new beta version of Firefox offers a mix of much needed features along with some important bug fixes and developer implementations. Visit the downloads page for Windows, Mac and Linux compatible versions, or, simply refer to the download links below to download Firefox 11 in standard English:

• Download Firefox 11 beta [Windows]
• Download Firefox 11 beta [Mac]
• Download Firefox 11 beta [Linux]

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How To Fix CUI Errors After Installing OS X Lion 10.7.3 Update

Only yesterday, Apple released a point update for OS X Lion dubbed as version 10.7.3, but almost immediately, the Cupertino company’s Support forums were essentially DDoS’ed by users complaining of the dreaded CUI errors.

As well as an array of minor issues, some were met with various app crashes after rebooting into the new updated version, and left to contend with the following prompt:

The application unexpectedly quit after trying to restore its windows. Do you want to try to restore its windows again?

Fortunately, there are multiple ways in which you can fix the bug and be up and running normally in no time.

Here are a couple of workarounds for issues in the new update:

Step 1: Download the combo installer from the Apple site via this link.

Step 2: Run the installer, restart into 10.7.3 and use Disk Utility to ensure there are no broken permissions or other disk-related issues.

Step 3: If you find yourself having trouble applying the combo installer, try booting into Safe Mode (hold Shift during startup until the desktop or login window appears).

Step 4: If the problem still persists, you’ll need to grab another Mac. Boot the problem system in Target Disk Mode (hold down the "T" key during startup). Using Thunderbolt or FireWire, connect said system to another Mac and run the combo installer on the other Mac against the problem machine’s boot drive.

In a few cases, the Mac has been so badly affected by the update that none of the above works. If you have a Time Machine backup saved from a time prior to the update, restore your Mac from the backup, apply the combo installer, and your troubles should cease to exist.

If you’re still not getting anywhere, as a last resort, you’ll need to boot into a Lion Recovery partition on a boot volume or USB drive:

Step 1: Boot into the Recovery partition (hold down the Option key on startup).

Step 2: Select "Disk Utility" from the Menu bar and mount the combo installer image file .

Step 3: Choose "Terminal" from the Menu bar and run "installer -pkg /Volumes/Mac\ OS\ X\ 10.7.3\ Update\ Combo/MacOSXUpdCombo10.7.3.pkg -target /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD", making sure to change the target to reflect the startup volume’s name.

Step 4: Run "reboot", and providing everything has gone smoothly, you should be running Lion 10.7.3 bug-free!

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Download OS X Lion 10.7.3 Update With Safari 5.1.3 [Final Version - Direct Links]

Apple has just released a minor update to its OS X Lion operating system for public consumption. Now at version 10.7.3, the latest update to the “world’s most advanced operating system” comes with support for new languages as well as the usual dose of bug fixes.

Since dropping last July as the very first download-only release, these minor updates have been fairly regular as part of every OS X release’s natural life cycle. Much like many other point releases for previous iterations of OS X, this one doesn’t bring much new to the table from the previous update. That’s not to say that this update should be overlooked, though, since by installing them, you are essentially performing maintenance on your Mac’s software, so we’d highly recommend you perform the update as soon as possible.

It’s easy for us to berate the likes of Apple for ignoring or being rather slow to amend security flaws, but unless we apply the updates when they’re recommended, we could leave ourselves open to breach.

Here is an excerpt from the release notes:

The OS X Lion v10.7.3 Update includes Safari 5.1.3 and fixes that:

• Add Catalan, Croatian, Greek, Hebrew, Romanian, Slovak, Thai, and Ukrainian language support
• Address issues when using smart cards to log into OS X
• Address compatibility issues with Microsoft Windows file sharing
• Address an issue printing Microsoft Word documents that use markup
• Address a graphics performance issue after sleep on some earlier iMacs that use ATI graphics
• Resolve a Wi-Fi connection issue when waking from sleep
• Address an issue that may prevent Safari from opening before joining a wireless network
• Fix a potential issue authenticating to an SMB DFS share
• Include RAW image compatibility for additional digital cameras

You can find more detailed information in the full full release notes.

In order to install it, simply head to Software Update from the Apple menu, your Mac will automatically search for updates available and install the update as shown in the screenshot above. Below, we’ve included direct links in case you wish to acquire them manually, and directly from Apple’s servers.

As we mentioned before in the post; its highly advised that you update to OS X Lion 10.7.3 to ensure stability on all of your Macs in your household or office place.

Although Safari 5.1.3 can be found as a separate download for your Mac, but we highly encourage our readers to go ahead with the full OS X Lion 10.7.3 update to get the complete stability package altogether.

Previously, Apple seeded the OS X Lion 10.7.3 beta update to developers and it hinted towards new things to come in future Macs, such Retina display support. Though we’re surprised to see that the final build hasn’t brought that much to the table apart from bug fixes and a new version of Apple’s web browser for the Mac, Safari.

Let us know if you encounter any bugs or imperfections by posting on our Facebook or Google + pages.

You will obviously need to jailbreak your iPhone to install this tweak.For jailbreaking iPhone 4S and iPad 2, you can simply follow our step by step guide posted here to jailbreak iOS 5.0.1 using Absinthe on Windows or Mac.

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Try Mac OS X Lion Online In Your Web Browser

The boot up sequence of an Apple Mac is an iconic thing. Everyone knows what that white screen and grey Apple logo means, and when that OS X wallpaper pops up you can even guess which version of the operating system you are using.

Take a look at the screenshot and you’ll immediately recognize OS X 10.7 Lion, along with the usual ‘About this Mac’ screen. But wait, there’s something different…

That’s because the entire thing, from top to bottom excluding a couple of images for icons, has been created using HTML5 and CSS3.

Put simply, the whole thing is actually a web page.

And it’s not static, either. Firing up the project will start you off with what appears to be a Mac’s power-on screen, which will eventually give way to an OS X logon screen. Entering the password of ‘admin’ will then cause the web app to launch what appears to be a Mac desktop.

HTML5 and CSS3 are two technologies that will allow web developers and designers to make more sophisticated websites, blurring the lines between the internet and ‘real’ applications. The demonstration, put together by Alessio Atzeni is there to give us all an idea of just what is possible if you know what you’re doing. There’s no doubt that Alessio Atzeni does!

You really need to give the thing a try yourself to appreciate it, but with web apps like this on the horizon, we have to wonder if Google has the right idea with its Chrome OS. If the web can really replace native applications then why would we need an operating system like we have today?

That may be some way off becoming reality, but we all know how quickly things can change in this game, don’t we?

We can’t wait to see how the web changes over the coming years.

I’m going to put it out there with a thumbs up that the developer has done a very good job at this. Although there’s not a lot you can do with it, and in no means this project is meant to give you a virtual second desktop, but, it’s a great way to get a minor feel of OS X before you go ahead with a purchase, provided that you plan to do it. Also, inspire other developers and designers to come up with ideas like these for websites.

This is something which Apple and Microsoft both should implement on their website to give new users a look and feel of their operating systems before making a switch.

You can take the project for a spin by heading over to this link. Head over here to read more about the project.

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iOS 5 Untethered Jailbreak for iPhone 4S and iPad 2: How to Use Absinthe

iPhone 4S: iOS 5.0, 5.0.1 (9A405 and 9A406)

iPad 2 Wifi/GSM/CDMA: iOS 5.0.1

Here is a step-by-step guide on jailbreaking iPhone 4S and iPad 2 using Absinthe.

Users are highly recommended to take a full back up of their devices before proceeding with the untethered jailbreak. The Absinthe program uses a new jailbreak technique. The development teams waive any responsibility if anything does go wrong.

Step 1: Download and extract Absinthe from the .zip and run the executable file. Here are the download links:

Absinthe 0.1.2-2 (Mac): absinthe-mac-0.1.2-2.zip
Absinthe 0.1.2-1 (Mac): absinthe-mac-0.1.2-1.zip

Step 2: Connect the device (iPhone 4S or iPad 2) to your Mac computer using a USB cable and launch the Absinthe tool.

Step 3: Once the device is connected, click the "Jailbreak" button. A restore will begin on your device with "Restoring in Progress" written on your screen. The process may take some time.

Step 4: Once the restore is done, unlock the device and you'll see the "Absinthe" icon on your device's Springboard.

Step 5: Tap on the "Absinthe" icon. After tapping on the icon, the GreenPois0n Web site will open for a moment and then your device will reboot again.

After the reboot is done, the "Absinthe" icon will now be replaced by a brown Cydia icon.

However, if you get an "Error establishing a database connection" message at this stage, exit to your Springboard and keep trying to launch the Absinthe app. The error occurs due to heavy increase in traffic. As an alternative, you can follow the step below.

Step 6: Tap the Settings icon on the Springboard and turn on VPN. You will get an error message, but after a while, your device will reboot with Cydia on the Springboard.

Enjoy!

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Jailbreak iPhone 4S, iPad 2 Untethered On iOS 5.0.1 Using Absinthe

The iPhone 4S and iPad 2 owners waited patiently, then they waited some more, and finally after a little more waiting welcomed the Absinthe jailbreak software to the community. Produced by the famous Chronic Development Team, Absinthe offers users the ability to jailbreak iOS 5 and 5.0.1 into an untethered state.

The supported devices and firmware for Absinthe are:

• iPhone 4S running iOS 5.0, 5.0.1 (9A405 and 9A406)
• iPad 2 Wifi/GSM/CDMA running iOS 5.0.1

A considerable amount of effort has been put into ensuring Absinthe is of the highest possible quality, but be aware that unforeseen bugs may exist due to this being the first time the development teams have used the backup / restore process within iTunes to install software, in other words; the jailbreak process is something which is alien to all. If you are an iPhone 4S owner who is ultimately looking to achieve a software based unlock, it is also worth heeding the advice given by the iPhone Dev-Team and remaining on iOS 5.0 if possible.

We can’t emphasize more on the fact for iPhone 4S users who are willing to unlock their devices on iOS 5. It’s a safe bet that you do not update to iOS 5.0.1 in any case as the unlock tool in development will not be compatible with iOS 5.0.1 upon release, hence stay on iOS 5 if possible since the original release of iOS 5 which was pushed out in October is not being signed by Apple anymore, therefore you cannot downgrade your iPhone 4S to iOS 5.0.1 along with your sacrificed baseband.

As mentioned by the Chronic Dev Team on their official blog post regarding the jailbreak itself, the tool is as ever simple to use and is a one click heaven for those yearning for a quick jailbreak.

Download Absinthe for Mac.

Windows and Linux versions of the tool will be available in a short while. Stay tuned for a complete step by step guide on how to jailbreak your iPhone 4S and iPad 2 on iOS 5.x untethered along with a video walkthrough.

Its better for our readers to wait for a complete step-by-step guide on how to jailbreak their iPhone 4S and iPad 2 on iOS 5.0.1, so they go through a smooth jailbreaking process without facing hurdles along the way.

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