Apple's gear is gorgeously designed, but that shouldn't stop you from personalizing your Mac, iPhone, and iPad with beautiful tweaks that make it all yours.
Sleek aluminum. Beautiful black bevels. We'll be the first to admire the loveliness that emerges from one of those ingeniously crafted boxes sold by Apple. And we'll also be the first to argue that, once you settle in with your new device, a little personalization is in order. After all, you don't want your gear to look like every other Mac or iDevice out there. We live with these things the way we live with the paintings, photos, and other doodads that adorn our homes, so why shouldn't we give our gear the same level of customization?
That's why we're showing you how to finesse everything from basics like wallpapers to more advanced tweaks like Finder windows and third-party apps that let you really monkey with the user experience that underlies OS X. Because iPhones and iPads are harder to tinker with (unless you jailbreak them), the lion's share of this story focuses on Macs, but we haven't forgotten iDevices, and this story concludes with a look at the coolest tweaks you can make to your mobile Apple gear.
Personalize Mac OS X
When you set out to make over your Mac, start with the foundation: wallpaper, icons, screen savers, and alert sounds.
Desktop Backgrounds
Wallpaper: Colorpicker-b by iuneWind (bit.ly/n9lerw). Icons: Puzzle Icons by Rich D (bit.ly/odOFU8).
While Apple includes some lovely wallpapers with OS X, swapping in a fresh Desktop background is the easiest and one of the most effective ways to reinvigorate the look of your Mac. Start by rummaging through your own photo library for something that grabs you. To avoid blurriness, you should use images at least as large as your screen's maximum resolution (found by navigating to System Preferences > Displays and clicking the Display button -- your Mac's default resolution is the highest available).
Sure, Apple provides plenty of slick background pictures. But yours are better.
Fortunately, shots in your iPhoto library probably exceed that magic number. To turn them into Desktop backgrounds, go to System Preferences > Desktop & Screen Saver. Click the Desktop button, then scroll to the contents of your iPhoto library (here you can also access the Photos folder or add others by clicking the "+" button). Click an image file inside your Events, Faces and Places, or any albums or folders you've created to show it off on your Desktop. Backgrounds can appear full-screen, tiled, or resized to fit your display's dimensions -- handy for fitting widescreen backgrounds to full-screen monitors and vice versa. You can even set a collection of images to display in sequence to make a slideshow on your Desktop.
It's a safe bet Google has the images you're looking for.
If personal snapshots aren't your thing, many websites offer professionally designed background images of any subject you can imagine. Want a trippy, nature-themed look? Desktopography has the goods. For edgier fare (of the occasionally NSFW variety), check out the wallpaper collection at Deviant Art. A wide range of cool, cartoony backgrounds for all ages can be found at The Icon Factory. But if you're still not satisfied, an old-fashioned Google search can help. Enter your subject of interest (Game of Thrones, say), then click Images in the resulting page's sidebar. In the Size section of the next page, choose an image size matching your Mac's resolution to narrow your choices to pictures that will look sharp when you use them as your Mac's wallpaper.
Desktop Icons
Wallpaper: Spring is in the Air by cdog (bit.ly/opNSoh). Icons: Informal Insects by Dominic Flask (bit.ly/pHVjUW).
Changing the Finder's default icons can make specific items on your Desktop easier to recognize in a sea of blue and gray -- or at least take the drab out of your drag-and-drop. It's also easy. For instance, changing your Macintosh HD icon from a hard drive to a folder is just a matter of copy and paste.
Changing up your icons is as easy as copy and paste.
In the Finder, select the folder, file, or volume with the icon you want to use, then select File > Get Info from the menu bar. Click the icon at the top of the resulting window to select it, then choose Edit > Copy. Next, apply Get Info to the item with the icon you want to change. Select that item's icon in the new Get Info window, then choose Edit > Paste. Boom! You just replaced its icon.
Stick with the same old icons? Highly illogical!
But thanks to hundreds of awesomely talented designers, you can go way beyond just switching OS X's default icons. Want to turn your hard drive into a Batmobile -- or your folders into martini glasses? Of course you do. The Icon Factory makes a great first stop on your icon safari, and its CandyBar utility ($29, panic.com/candybar/) can help automate the icon-switching process. InterfaceLIFT offers a dizzying array of realistically rendered gear, including many old and new Apple devices. For a more whimsical look, check out the offerings at PixelGirl, which generally fall into the categories of cool, cute, or kinda creepy. Meanwhile, the designs at IconDrawer are all business, mostly intended as re-imaginings of Apple's default designs. Many of their icons cost money, but some holiday and other themed collections are available for free.
A site like The Icon Factory is like an IKEA for your icons.
Icon sets from these sites may or may not come with instructions explaining how to use them, but the basic idea for each is the same. Downloaded sets contain folders of image files, and you select one you like, apply Get Info to it, then copy and paste its icon over one already on your Mac. Like we said, easy. And if you're inspired to create your own icons, you can find our tutorials at bit.ly/ml_icons and bit.ly/eseMUy.
Alert Sounds
Modding your Mac's alert sounds is trickier than tweaking your Desktop's appearance, but it can be done. For best results, use AIFF files -- formats like MP3 or WAV may not sound as expected or might just not work at all. To convert a sound from another format, add the file to your iTunes library, then go to iTunes > Preferences > General and change the Import Settings to AIFF Encoder. Select the sound and choose Advanced > Create AIFF Version. To install the new version (or any AIFF file), copy it to Library > Sounds in your Home folder. In System Preferences > Sound, click Sound Effects to choose the new alert. Custom alerts will also be available to applications that handle alerts through their Preferences menu item, like Mail or iChat.
Installing custom alerts isn't pretty, but the results can sound awesome.
To find new alert sounds, hit FindSounds, which lets you search by file type or resolution and sample rate (bigger is better in both cases). Simply the Best offers AIFF files organized in categories like Animals, Mechanical, and People (yes, a mighty burp is available). But long-time Mac fans should grab the Mac OS Classic Sound Pack, which brings back the alerts of yesteryear. We've missed you, Wild Eep!
The kids are into these new alert sounds, but you can't beat the classics.
Screen Savers
Admit it -- your cat pictures are too cute to keep hidden.
Screen savers may no longer be necessary to prevent burn-in on your display, but they can still add flair to your Mac -- especially if you roll your own. Go to System Preferences > Desktop & Screen Saver, then click the Screen Saver button. Scroll through the sidebar to your iPhoto library, then select a collection of pictures. They can be displayed in one of three styles: a full-screen view, a 3D view that shows pictures as virtual snapshots, and a mosaic view. Each has different options that affect how pictures appear, and in what order. Preview your screen saver by clicking the Test button.
Tiny zombies beat flying toasters any day.
Click the "+" button below the sidebar to select other image sources, including a MobileMe gallery, an RSS feed, or a folder on your Mac. Choosing Browse Screen Savers used to take you to the Downloads page on apple.com just for icons and screen savers, but it's gone now. The internet still holds lots of options, though, whether you're interested in animated holiday or nature scenes, rampaging 3D zombies, or a good-old Matrix homage, you -- and your Desktop -- can stay covered.
Fact: Matrix screen savers make Sad Keanu smile.
Give the Finder a Makeover!
We all spend tons of time in the Finder, but that doesn't mean it needs to languish in bland obscurity.
Finder windows. They're not exactly your Mac's sexiest feature -- but they are what makes a Mac a Mac, so you probably don't give much thought to their functionality or style. But with a few simple tweaks, you can make your Finder windows stylish and turbocharged.
Turning down the opacity lets you read file names over your background image.
At the top of our list of favorite Finder tweaks is one of the simplest and least known. If you're constantly navigating deep file structures to open the same file over and over, do yourself a favor and drag that file into the toolbar at the top of a Finder window. Now you can open that file with a click from any Finder window. This also works for folders and applications.
For better organization, Control-click on a Finder toolbar and choose Customize Toolbar. From there, you can rearrange file icons, add spacers to group things, and add extras like the handy Path button, which lets you quickly navigate hierarchies.
Customize your toolbar by dragging new buttons onto it.
But Finder windows are kind of like M&Ms -- there's no way to have just one. So you open another one…and another one…and another one. Before you know it, they're multiplying like mogwai at a pool party. Rather than wasting your time dragging multiple windows all around, learn to manage them. Clicking the yellow button will minimize a window to your Dock, but a third-party window manager like Divvy ($14, mizage.com) or Cinch ($7, irradiatedsoftware.com) can seriously juice your Finder productivity. Cinch lets you quickly resize and position windows to full-screen or half-size, while Divvy lets you assign custom window positions to keyboard shortcuts. If simply managing Finder windows isn't enough, you can replace the Finder entirely with Path Finder ($39.95, cocoatech.com) which adds tabbed windows and a ton of other enhancements for the Finder.
Divvy's heads-up display lets you quickly define regions of the screen for window positioning.
If spending all this time staring at bland Finder windows leaves your eyes glazing over, try jazzing them up a bit. The Appearance pane in System Preferences gives you a whopping two choices for either blue or graphite windows, but you can add your own background graphics in a few simple steps:
1. Find a graphic you like and crank the opacity down to about 30 percent using an image editor.
2. Navigate to a folder and click View > As Icons.
3. In the View menu, choose Show View Options.
4. Under Background, choose Picture and double-click the empty square to choose your background image.
That image will now appear in only that Finder window, and you can set up as many custom windows as you like, but keep in mind that backgrounds are only visible in icon view. Enjoy!
Judge a 'Book By Its Cover
Stickers and skins can make your MacBook unique…but lasers are where the real action is!
Sure, Apple's signature brushed aluminum is slick, but how do you tell your Mac apart in a sea of silvery-gray? You could go the colored-case route, but for something a little more unique, we found plenty of ways to make your Mac show more of your true colors.
The easiest (and least permanent) way to customize your hardware is with decals. Gelaskins offers a huge variety of "skins" for all kinds of devices, including Macs. At $29.95 a pop for laptops, Gelaskins aren't cheap, but they're made from durable vinyl, feature bright, full-color graphics, and fit your Mac like a glove…provided you can master the somewhat challenging installation. They're easy to remove when your tastes change, and if you're careful, you can actually reapply a Gelaskin if you change your mind again. Gelaskins can even custom-print a skin from your own artwork if you want to be absolutely sure that your MacBook is one of a kind.
Gelaskins offers an dizzying array of designs, or you can upload your own artwork.
If an all-over skin is a bit too flashy, a whole cottage industry has sprung up to sell clever and cute decals for your MacBook. Googling "MacBook decal" will bring up a bunch of options, but our favorite place for cool sticky things is Etsy.com. Everything from classic (and unlicensed) cartoon characters to abstract designs can be had for about 10 or 15 bucks.
For an even bigger impact, consider having your Mac transformed by the chromatic wizards at ColorWare. They can color your machine in a dizzying array of shades. The polymer-based color is protected by a super durable coating -- a ninja-turtle green MacBook we had colored three years ago is still glossy and bright. Prices start at $499 for a MacBook, but you can customize your color scheme, choosing from 46 options.
ColorWare gives you options you'll never find in the Apple Store.
But for an ultra high-tech case mod, skip the stickers and candy-colored coatings. We're talking laser beams -- though it's not as daunting as is sounds. Upload your artwork, ship off your MacBook, and it'll come back full of laser-y awesomeness. Hitechtattoos.com
can zap your MacBook into style for $120, and several other companies offer similar services. And best of all, shooting all those beams at your precious Mac won't void the warranty -- it'll just make it look cooler. Apple considers such services to be "cosmetic," so it won't balk at fixing your Mac if it happens to break after you've zapped it. But make sure you really like your design -- obviously the laser-etching is permanent.
Tweak Your Mac's Interface
Customize OS X with applications and Terminal tricks.
By default, Apple doesn't provide many ways to fiddle with OS X. So if you want to customize the way your Mac runs and functions, you'll need to run third-party software and use AppleScripts and Terminal tricks. We've rounded up a few of the best customization applications on the Mac, and we'll show you what you can do with each of them. If you want to start tinkering with Terminal and AppleScript, you can find some terrific how-to articles, complete with copy-and-paste-able commands, on our website at bit.ly/ml_dock and bit.ly/ml_script and bit.ly/93LLQC.
MacPilot
koingosw.com/products/macpilot.php
$19.95
MacPilot is a handy tool that supplies a complete listing of all the Terminal commands that provide user interface and functionality customizations for OS X. The application gives you the ability to apply these hacks (everything from enabling hidden features to running maintenance scripts) without bothering with the Terminal application, which can be a relief for Terminal rookies.
On the left side of the General tab, MacPilot features a listing of installed applications that can be tweaked.
Clean up old prefs
MacPilot allows you to remove unused preference files from your Mac. These files are used by applications to remember your settings; however, they can take up valuable space on your Mac.
You can adjust the scan range to scan for files older than the default of 60 days.
Open MacPilot and navigate to Tools > Maintenance. Locate Erase Unused Preference Files and click Begin Scan. After a few seconds, a new dialog will pop up, showing the files that MacPilot found. Skim through, unchecking the boxes for any you want to keep (they're all checked by default), and then click the Remove Checked button to trash the rest.
TinkerTool
bresink.com/osx/TinkerTool.html
Free
TinkerTool is much like MacPilot, but it's free and has fewer features. In addition to Terminal tricks, TinkerTool can also do things like set the default font in OS X or change the link functionality in iTunes to point to items in your library.
TinkerTool has a lot of functionality for free, but the user interface isn't the best.
Restore the old iTunes title bar
With TinkerTool, you can change the look of iTunes back to the old unified look of a standard window with title bar and horizontal close, minimize, and maximize buttons. To do this, open TinkerTool and navigate to iTunes 10. Once there, click the checkbox labeled "Use standard window with title bar and horizontal buttons," and then restart iTunes.
After enabling this feature, iTunes will change its look to match OS X's standard UI.
Cocktail
maintain.se/cocktail
$14.95
Cocktail is designed around keeping your Mac in shape. While it does have features for modifying your Mac, its primary purpose is to provide maintenance scripts and important system information.
Cocktail features a very nice user interface with functions laid out well.
Scripts on your schedule
Maintenance scripts that are built into the Mac keep your system healthy, but many are set to run only on a weekly or monthly basis. With Cocktail, you can run these scripts on your schedule. To chart your own course, open Cocktail and navigate to System > Scripts. Select one of the scripts from the drop-down menu. You will get a description of what each script does in the information section. When you're ready to run the script, click Run.
Running the daily script will clear out junk files and old system announcements.
GeekTool
projects.tynsoe.org/en/geektool
Free
GeekTool is one of the ultimate tools for customizing your Mac's Desktop. This System Preference pane allows you to write (or paste in) Unix scripts that will be run at periodic instances and output to your Desktop in the form of a formatted box. For much more on using GeekTool to make truly dramatic changes to your Desktop, visit bit.ly/ml_geektool.
GeekTool is a powerful tool that has a simple user interface located in System Preferences > GeekTool.
Put a clock on your Desktop
One of the handiest things you can do with GeekTool is to display the date and time with a Unix output command. To begin, open GeekTool and drag a Shell Geeklet onto your Desktop. Next, in the Properties window, click the ellipses next to the Command text box. This will open the Command window where you'll type the following command:
date '+%I: %M %p'
date '+%A, %B %d'
Next, close the Edit Script window, and you'll be prompted to save the script. Click Yes and return to the Properties window. Change the refresh rate to every 10 seconds and adjust the text properties (under the Style heading in the Properties window) to your liking.
Visage
keakaj.com/visage.htm
$9.95
Visage is a pref pane that allows you to customize your Mac's appearance, letting you tweak your Desktop background in impressive ways, set personal system alerts, and fiddle with your login screen.
From the main Visage pane, you can also set a screen saver as your Desktop background.
Personalize your login
One thing that Apple doesn't allow you to change on the Mac is the background presented at the login screen. However, Visage will let you do this with ease. Open System Preferences > Visage > Login Background. Once there, click the Import button and select the image you would like to use as the background. After selecting the file name from the drop-down menu, the image will be set as the login background.
To delete an image you have added to Visage, click the Delete button after you select the image in the drop-down menu.
Personalize Your iPhone & iPad
With a little finessing, you can make your iDevice undeniably yours.
One of the biggest reasons to get excited about iOS 5 is the new Notification Center -- it'll put a list of new emails, texts, Twitter mentions, and even up-to-date info like the weather and stock prices right on your iPhone's lock screen, so you can get an idea of what you missed at a glance. Android users have been enjoying this for a while, and we're big enough to admit that we're jealously gripping our iPhones muttering, "Soon, my precious."
iOS 5 will have a spiffy Notification Center on the lock screen that puts tons of info at your fingertips.
But what if you want a tricked-out lock screen now? Or you have an iPhone 3G that won't be able to run iOS 5 anyway? We'd like to say there's an app for that, but really it's more of a workaround. See, Apple lets you change your lock screen and wallpaper images easily in iOS 4's Settings app. But you have to do it manually -- an app can't do it for you. And so if you want your lock screen to display information that by its nature changes often (weather reports, to-do lists, calendar items), you'll need to manually reset the lock screen every time that info changes. As our online editor Roberto likes to say, "le sigh."
We like Weather Lock Screen Pro's look, but having to update it manually (and daily) is a pain.
Still, a few apps in the App Store do make this as easy on you as possible. Weather Lock Screen Pro ($0.99) helps you make an attractive lock screen with a four-day weather forecast for your location, plus optional text like your name and a contact number, should you lose your iPhone. But it's on you to update it every day. If you're a high school or college student with a static schedule, check out Easy Timetable Premium ($0.99), which lets you create and customize a good-looking weekly timetable that can remind you when and where your next class is happening. LockScreen Todo & Weather ($1.99) combines a to-do list that you type into the app (no syncing with other apps, unfortunately) and today's temperature forecast on your lock screen. And if you just want pretty wallpaper for your lock screen or home screen, including iBooks-like shelves for your app icons to rest upon, we like Pimp Your Screen ($0.99), which can also trick out your iPad. It's a smart idea to slap your name and contact info (say, an email address or versatile Google Voice number) on your lock screen in case someone finds your misplaced phone and wants to get it back to you -- for that, check out Wallpaper Maker Pro ($0.99).
Pimp My Screen has tons of neat backgrounds for your iPhone and iPad.
Of course, if you're willing to jailbreak your device, you can pick up some apps in the Cydia store that can do what App Store apps can't. WinterBoard lets you modify the SpringBoard, which is the standard built-in app that manages all iPhone's home screens. Think of WinterBoard like GeekTool for your iPhone's screen -- you can install themes, change app icons, even hide the Slide to Unlock slider. But it's relatively hands-on.
For the non-tinkerers in the jailbreak crowd, other apps make this home- and lock-screen customization as simple as turning plug-ins on or off and customizing their easy-to-understand settings: LockInfo ($7.99 in the Cydia store) lets you display up-to-date calendar items, new mail, Twitter updates, push notifications, and so on -- you can even create a new home screen, shoving your normal home screen of apps over one page. And Intelliscreen ($9.99 in the Cydia store) can also do calendars, mail, weather, and even RSS feeds.
Sent from my iPhone
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