You know the saying – learn as you grow – that is what we at iHeartApple subscribes to and everyday, we find something new about your favorite Apple products, operating system OS X and the numerous applications available. Here are some of the most interesting ones that we found over the last week.

For most people, there won’t be a need to ever dig into the core of OS X, nor open files that we were supposed to see. But what if you were given instructions to open or edit certain files that is hidden in Finder – usually a file that has its name prefix with a period. Previously to see these files, you will need to use the Terminal, familiar with Unix commands to view them. But with Snow Leopard, you can see those hidden files by pressing Shift-Command-Period at any Open or Save dialog windows and pressing the same combination to hide them.

For photographers, there are many applications out there to help you import, organise and edit your photos. From Apple’s own iPhoto, Aperture to Adobe’s Lightroom, to name a few. In OS X, when you plug in your digital camera, Image Capture will start and then you can import your photos. With Snow Leopard, there is an improvement in Image Capture that besides importing your photographs, but also let you choose what default application opens when you plugin your camera. This is especially useful when your Mac is being used by the family with each family member having their own software preference.

And if you happen to use Photoshop CS4 to edit your photographs, you can improve its performance on OS X with these technical article from Adobe … but if is too in-depth for you, there is always this tip.

App recommendation of the week — ClickToFlash

What it does is to keep Flash files from playing until you decide to do so – thus you click … to Flash. This also keeps irritating Flash ads from running without your permission. You have the options to choose which sites or applications to white-list so that they will play automatically – choose wisely.

The advantages of ClickToFlash are numerous. Since Flash isn’t loaded until you specifically ask for it, your CPU usage will stay at normal levels when browsing the web. This has tons of benefits: web browsing stays speedy, your Mac laptop won’t get as hot, and your Mac’s fan won’t come on as often. In fact, we guarantee* that ClickToFlash will quintuple your battery life and that it will protect those precious parts of your body on which you rest your laptop! (*note: not actually guaranteed)

Try it out – it’s free

Site of the week — Finer Things in Mac

As we stated in the beginning of this post – that we are learning more of our Macs and OS X as we use them and this site – Finer Things in Mac – digs deeper and find out all the little tidbits of information and bugs that is on our Macs. May it be a life-saver, or an irritating bug, this site is worth bookmarking just to learn more about your favorite Mac and operating system.

URL: http://finerthingsinmac.com

Share this if you liked it:

•