Multi-Touch Gestures for Mac OS X

Finder, Mission Control, and Desktop
Push Windows Aside to Show Desktop – Four Finger Spread
Activate Mission Control – Four Finger Swipe up
Switch Desktops & Full Screen Apps – Three finger swipe left or right
Mission Control All Windows for Current Application – Four Finger swipe down
Zoom Into Window in Mission Control – Two finger swipe up over window
Open Launchpad – Four finger pinch
Drag Windows – Three finger hold and drag over window bar
Tap to Click – Tap with a single finger
Right-Click – Two finger click
Scroll – Two finger swipe in direction to scroll

Safari, Chrome, Firefox
Zoom In & Increase Font Size – Spread
Zoom Out & Decrease Font Size – Pinch
Go Back – Two Finger swipe right
Go Forward – Two Finger swipe left
Look Up Word in Dictionary – Three fingered double tap over word (Safari only)
Smart Zoom – Two finger double tap (Safari only)

Quick Look & QuickTime Player
Enter Full Screen – Spread
Exit Full Screen – Pinch
Scrub Video – Two finger swipe right or left (QuickTime only)

Preview
Rotate Image – Two finger rotate gesture
Zoom Into Image – Spread
Zoom Out Image – Pinch

Misc
Flip Calendar Pages – Two finger swipe left or right (iCal)
Refresh Tweet Stream – Two finger pull down (Twitter)

HOW-TO:Install XBMC on iPad/iPhone/iPod touch

Last month I covered how to Send AirPlay Video from an iPhone or iPad to a Mac, PC, or TV with XBMC. TIme to show how to install XBMC on your iDevice.

Unfortunately, jailbreaking is a must for this tutorial. XBMC directly competes with some of Apple’s core products and has been rejected from inclusion in the App Store. The only way to enjoy the awesomeness that is XBMC is to jailbreak your device and download it directly from the XBMC repository.

Requirements:

• To install XBMC for iOS you must have a jailbroken iDevice running iOS 4.x or higher.
• For hardware: iPad 1, iPad 2, iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPod touch 3rd gen (16GB and 32GB models only), iPod touch 4th gen.

Steps:
Step 1: Tap the Cydia icon on your homescreen.
Step 2-iPhone: Manage - > Sources -> Edit -> Add
Step 2-iPad: Sources -> Edit -> Add
Step 3: Type in  http://mirrors.xbmc.org/apt/ios/
Step 4: Tap on the teamXBMC source.
Step 5: Tap on the XBMC-iOS icon.
Step 6: Tap install, then confirm.
Step 7: Let it install, then exit Cydia. You should now have a new XBMC icon on your screen.

Links: How to Install & Configure XBMC on the iPad.

How to install MySQL 5.5 on Mac OS X 10.7 Lion

This may not be obvious, but on the new Macs that ship with Lion, you can use the MySQL 5.5 64-bit dmg installer. It works perfectly on Lion, even though the MySQL site (still, at the time of this writing) says Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard. You can use the Preference Pane to stop and start MySQL.

Now after MySQL 5.5 is running, strangely enough, you cannot simply launch terminal and type

mysql -u root

Bash will complain that it can’t find mysql. So we have to help it like so:

1. Use your favorite text editor to edit the file

/Users/%yourname%/.bash_profile

If this file doesn’t exist you can create it.

2. Add the following line to your .bash_profile

export PATH=$PATH:/usr/local/mysql/bin

and save the file. Be careful editing this file exactly as above. You can render terminal unable to find all your programs if you break your $PATH.

3. Quit and relaunch terminal, or type

source ~/.bash_profle

and hit return to reload the changes in your profile.

4. Check your $PATH by typing

echo $PATH

and pressing return. You should see something like this

/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/X11/bin:/usr/local/mysql/bin

5. Now you should be able to run

mysql -u root

which means there is no root password by default!

6. Run this next, at the mysql prompt

GRANT ALL ON *.* TO 'root'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'your_password_here' WITH GRANT OPTION;

This is how to secure your root user login.

Now, for PHP to use this connection I had to tweak my system as shown below:

1. Run phpinfo() and check out the path PHP is trying to use for mysql.sock. On my new Mac Mini, it was

/var/mysql/mysql.sock

2. From terminal, I did

sudo find / -name mysql.sock -print

3. The critical line of output shows that MySQL 5.5 installs the sock to

/private/tmp/mysql.sock

4. Now we need to create a symlink for PHP to be able to access the mysql.sock. Trouble is if you try it you’ll get an error because /var/mysql doesn’t exist. So next, do

sudo mkdir /var/mysql

5. Finally, do this

sudo ln -s /private/tmp/mysql.sock /var/mysql/mysql.sock

Good Cydia Repo's

Apart from default repositories, I would recommend following Repo's for Cydia:

• Hackulo.us - http://cydia.hackulo.us
• First source to install after iPhone/iPod/iPad Jailbreak
• Main Apps: Installous and AppSync [Must Have Cydia Apps]. You will need to install Installous ONLY; AppSync will be automatically installed.
• HackYouriPhone - http://repo.hackyouriphone.org
• Best source for cracked Cydia themes and DreamBoard themes (Cydia Store themes)
• Main Themes: Amplified HD, BoxorHD, Boxor HD – Ceramic White, blAze HD/iPad, Elite PRO HD, Glass Orb, iFlat, iFlat4 HD iPad, iNitsua Z SD/HD/iPad, inPulse for iPad, inPulse HD/SD, Kryptonite, LiveOS, Omega HD, Prestige-HD/SD, revi-krs HD+SD, Revolve HD/SD, SBHD,Snow Leopard and many more
• Good source for games DLC and cheats.
• Excellent source for cydia apps/tweaks as well.
• iHacksRepo - http://ihacksrepo.com
• Good source for cracked apps/themes
• insanelyi Repository - http://repo.insanelyi.com
• Best source for cracked Cydia apps and Cydia tweaks (Cydia Store apps).
• Main Apps: Action Menu Plus Pack, AndriodLock XT, Barrel, biteSMS, frash, Graviboard, Gridlock, iAcces, iFile, Infiniboard, Infinidock, Infinifolders, Lockinfo, Masks, Multifl0w, My Wi, SleepFX, YourTube 2 and many more.
• Excellent source for cracked Cydia themes
• Good source for games DLC and cheats
• xSellize - http://cydia.xsellize.com
• Repo hosts a good deal of ROM packs for Game Boy Advance, Nintendo 64 and NES which of course you can load on your emulators.
• Excellent source for cracked Cydia Store apps/themes: e.g. Cycorder, Cyntact, CLASSified HD, FBUploader, iBlacklist, ScrollingBoard, Speed Intensifier and many more.
• May cause Cydia loading errors
• Sara Official Repo - http://isoftjsc.com
• Repo to download Sara
• xmbc Official Repo - http://mirrors.xbmc.org/apt/ios/ 
• Repo to download xmbc

Others (decent but not necessary):

• BYA (BiteYourApple) - http://repo.biteyourapple.net
• This repo contains a wide range of apps, mods and ringtones for your iPhone. This is one of those all-in-one repos that holds some highly popular and useful Cydia apps and tweaks. It even contains some new jailbreak tweaks for the iOS 5.
• Excellent Italian source for Cydia apps/themes, e.g. Full Screen for Safari, GroupSMS,Home Page in Safari and Wifi Sync.
• P0dulo - http://p0dulo.com
• Not a very well-known repository but once you browse the content of this repo, you will find that it contains a wide range of pretty much anything. Apps, tweaks, utilities, addons, themes, ringtones, emulators, you name it. The number of content is not that high but it makes up for the quality.
• iCauseFX - http://repo.icausefx.com/
• Another repository that is rich in content. One thing that you will notice about this Cydia source is the wealthy selection of themes although there is no shortage of apps and tweaks to be found in here. We recommend that you install the iCauseFx repo icons after adding this source for easier package browsing.
• PwnCenter - http://apt.pwncenter.com
• When it comes to ringtones, themes and wallpaper, then you can't go wrong with this source. This repo specializes in hosting multimedia content rather than the usual apps and tweaks. Again this repo hardly has any tweak or app, so if those are what you are looking for, then you might want to look elsewhere.
• Sinful iPhone - http://sinfuliphonerepo.com
• Excellent source for free Cydia apps/themes: e.g. AndroidLock, Attachment Saver, FaceBreak, GameBoy emulator, iBlueNova, iRealSMS, My3G, MyWi, and NES emulator.
• May cause Cydia loading errors
• iAP Cracker Official Repo/Source - http://cydia.myrepospace.com/urus
• iAP Cracker: Great app cracks inApp Purchases and make it Free.
• Examples for free inApp Purchases: Angry Birds (Mighty Eagle), Asphalt 6: Adrenaline, Jetpack Joyride, Line Birds, Plants vs Zombies and Tiny Tower.. .
• 51iPA Source - http://cydia.51ipa.com
• Chinese source, known as the best games DLC/Cheats worldwide.
• iHackstore Repo/Source - http://ihackstore.com/repo
• Good source for cracked apps/themes
• TheiPhoneSpot Repo/Source - http://apt.theiphonespotrepo.net
• New source: Cydia apps and Cydia themes.

Blogs every Mac admin should know about

Musings of an Apple Systems Administrator
A blog about the day to day tasks of a systems administrator. A how to guide and user tell all about OSX Server systems issues and challenges.
MacAdminCorner.com
Mac Admin CornerGeneral IT and Mac administration ramblings
Krypted.com
Charles Edge has written many Mac Server Books including the Enterprise Mac Administrator’s Guide and Beginning Mac OS X Snow Leopard Server: From Solo Install to Enterprise Integration. Charles also frequently updates his blog over at Krypted.com.
SystemsBoy.com
Very interesting to read, he has a great writing style.
Managing OS X
Greg is one of the top contributors and well respected guru’s on many of the Mac lists. He has written many useful articles including MCX, dslocal, and Leopard and managing Office 2008 with MCX, and much more.
IrisInk
Intelligent posts, great to read.
AFP548.com
One of the most well known Mac IT sites, run by a couple Apple SE’s (I don’t remember their exact titles), this site is also home to a couple useful tools including InstaDMG and KeyMinder. Their forums are also pretty lively. Summarizing everything this site, and the next one on the list would require entire articles.
Unflying Object
He claims it’s not a blog, but it sure looks, smells and tastes like one to me. Useful posts too.
eWeek
Mostly IT corporate related news, their Mac section occasionally posts some interesting commentary.
ComputerWorld
Ryan Faas, the author of iPhone for Work: Increasing Productivity for Busy Professionals (Books for Professionals by Professionals) and other books is a regular columnist at ComputerWorld.
Explanatory Gap 
Nigel Kersten was a sysadmin with Google and a Mac wiz to say the least.

MacEnterprise.org
Originally macosxlabs.org, this site is the combined efforts of several businesses as well as higher education instututions to provide a central repository of collaborations. I’m not sure it’s considered a “blog” but it’s worth making the list anyway. Best known for their [usually] monthly webcasts as well as the mailing list.

Configuring RAID 1 (Mirroring) on the 2011 Mac Mini Server

1. When booting the Mac Mini for the 1st time, hold the "T" key down to force the unit into Target Disk Mode 
2. Connect a laptop via Firewire 800 cable 
3. Open Disk Utility on the laptop 
4. Select the primary Macintosh HD mounted from the Mac Mini on your laptop HD in Disk Utility 
5. Select New Image and change the type to Read Only and the save destination to your laptop's Desktop and start creating the image (approx 5-7 minutes) 
6. When finished imaging, select each of the 500GB internal HD's and Erase leaving the name as the default 
7. Select RAID and drag each of the Untitled HD's into the RAID window 
8. Press the Options button at the bottom and put a check in the "Automatically rebuild RAID mirror sets" and leave the RAID Block Size: at 32K 
9. Press Create RAID and wait till finished (~30 seconds) 
10. Select Images from the top pull-down and then Scan Image of Restore… 
11. Select the image of the Macintosh HD from step 4 on the Desktop to prepare it for the restore 
12. Press Restore at the top right and drag the new RAID volume into the Destination box 
13. Select the Browse… button to the right of the Source and select the Macintosh HD image you just scanned for restore 
14. Select Restore and press Continue at the warning box 
15. When the restore is finished, quit Disk Utility and drag the Macintosh HD Firewire mount to the trash to disconnect it from Target Disk Mode 
16. Push the power button on the Mac Mini Server to shut it off and pull off the Firewire 800 cable 
17. Restart the Mac Mini Server and begin the Setup Assistant process

Send AirPlay Video from an iPhone or iPad to a Mac, PC, or TV with XBMC

XBMC is a powerful free app that turns any Mac or PC into a full fledged media center. The newest version has been updated with a slew of improvements, but most interesting for iPhone and iPad users is the addition of AirPlay video support. This means you’ll be able to wirelessly transmit video from an iOS device to anything running XBMC, whether it’s a Mac hooked up to a TV or an old PC, here is how to set that up and get AirPlay video working.

Enable & Set Up AirPlay Server in XBMC on a Mac or PC

This will be the same for Mac OS X, Linux, or Windows:

1. Get the latest version of XBMC (free)
2. Launch XBMC and scroll over to “System”
3. Choose “Settings” from the submenu and click on “Network”
4. Scroll down and find “Allow XBMC to receive AirPlay content”, click the dot next to it so that it’s blue
5. Optionally, set an AirPlay password (this is largely unnecessary for private networks)

Export AirPlay Video to XBMC from an iPhone or iPad

Now from the iOS device:

1. Start playing a video as usual from a variety of video apps
2. Tap the video to show the control bar, then tap the AirPlay icon
3. Look for “XBMC (Computer Name)” and tap on it to begin AirPlaying the video

Unfortunately XBMC will only accept non-DRM video to be shown with AirPlay, meaning some trailers within Trailers app and a fair amount of content downloaded from iTunes won’t show up at all. You’ll know instantly if it’s working or not because the video either works or it doesn’t within XBMC.