Tap tap tap posted a list of useful iPhone tips and tricks that we might not know. For example how when you hold on to a punctuation key, there will be an expanded window with variations you can key in. Or holding onto the Home button for at least six seconds force quit any opened application.

Some other tips that I know of and not included there:

• pressing and holding onto the text you typed, will pop a magnifying glass that allows you to scroll to any characters for easy corrections. Works the same in Safari’s URL bar
• applications that are not compatible on the iPod Touch, will not show up in the App Store when you search for the app even though the search results will show the app’s name

Do share if you have found some deep-dark secret tips and tricks for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

• another list from iPhone J.D.

If you are a heavy iPhoto user and suddenly find that your once huge hard disk is straining for space for no apparent reason, do check the Trash within iPhoto. As posted in this Mac User article by Scott McNulty, iPhoto has a knack for keeping your photos safely stored on your hard disk, even if you had trash them away.

Deleted pictures are…well…deleted, aren’t they? Aha! Not in iPhoto: You see, iPhoto is a paranoid application. It knows (or at least the programming team behind iPhoto knows) that digital pictures are very important pieces of data. Mistakenly deleting that once-in-a-lifetime shot isn’t something iPhoto wants to take the blame for. That’s why when you hit delete in iPhoto the offending picture isn’t actually deleted. Instead, it is whisked away to the iPhoto Trash (pictured to the right). This digital waste bin will hold your cast-off pictures until you go to the effort of emptying iPhoto’s Trash.

The good thing about this is that you can always look through your Trash one more time before you finally delete those photos for good. Personally, I will keep all photos taken, unless they are really bad – no focus, no subject, totally over or under exposed. But that’s just me.

Apple’s MobileMe News blog has sort of become a tip and knowledge site on using your MobileMe account as compared to being a MobileMe uptime status site when it started in August. The latest is on how easily you can upload photos from your iPhone or iPod Touch straight to a MobileMe gallery with just a few taps on buttons.

Before you can send photos from your iPhone to the web, you need to set up an album in the Gallery web application at me.com. In Gallery, select (or create) an album, click the Adjust Settings button and then check the box to allow adding of photos via email or iPhone.

With that option set, when viewing a photo from the iPhone camera roll you need only touch the Send Photos icon in the lower-left corner, then Send to MobileMe, where you can choose among the MobileMe albums you allow this for. Enter any text you want to appear with the photo in the subject line, and send it. It will then appear on your Gallery album on the web.

Plus they have a video to show you how

Here are some URLs for your fav Google sites and Google Apps that you can access which are optimized for your iPhone or iPod Touch, as compiled by Alex Chitu from http://googlesystem.blogspot.com

• Google homepage (the unified interface codenamed “Grand Prix”) – http://www.google.com/m/gp
• Google Apps homepage – http://www.google.com/m/a/YOUR_DOMAIN
• iGoogle – http://www.google.com/ig/i
• Gmail – http://mail.google.com/mail/x/gdlakb-/gp/
• Google Calendar – http://www.google.com/calendar/gp
• Google Reader – http://www.google.com/reader/i/
• Google Docs – http://docs.google.com/m?iphone=true
• Google Talk – http://talkgadget.google.com/talkgadget/m
• Google News – http://www.google.com/m/news/i

For those who have gotten their iPhones or iPod Touch, the next thing to do is to download free or purchase Apps that have been developed for those gadgets from the iTunes Store.

The Singapore Store was opened with the launch of iPhone a few months back and it allows you to get an account and easily purchase Apps with your credit card (or without for the free apps).

However, at the moment we only have access to the Apps Store but not the rest – like Music, Movies, TV Shows or even Podcasts.

Besides the lack of the full store, not every Apps that are launched in the iTunes Store is available to the Singapore market. For example, apps from Google, Last.FM or PopCap are not available to us, to name a few.

Furthermore, the Singapore Store’s pricing is based on the US dollars and not in our local currency. So don’t be surprise when you see your credit card bill.

BUT before you go hopping over to the US Store, you’d come to find that you can’t register an account there as you don’t have a valid US credit card.

BUT, before you go sign up for the SG store, do note there IS a work-around.

All you need is an iTunes Gift Card. These carries fix amounts from as low as US$15 up to US$200. Once you get a Gift Card, you can redeem these Gift Cards and use it to create an account in the US Store without having to key in a valid US credit card information during registration.

Get your iTunes Gift Card now!

The best place to get these Gift Cards at the moment is at the iTunes Gift Card Store where they offer the Gift Cards at a discount up to 35% for the US$200 value (NOTE: These is during their Xmas sale till 2 January 2009). Based on current US$ to SG$ exchange rate, it’s almost like paying for the US$200 with SG$200, much better than purchasing Apps from the SG Store and paying US$ with your credit card! All you need is a PayPal account or, as the store owner is a Singaporean, you can use bank transfers from local banks (POSB, DBS, UOB or OCBC) to purchase the cards.

All you need to do after purchasing the Gift Cards, is to set up your US Store account following these instructions and you’re all set to get all the Apps available in iTunes Store, plus the TV shows, movies and music too.

For those who had already gotten your SG account, fret not. You can still have two concurrent accounts from both the SG and the US Store. Just note a few things:

• Your iPod Touch or iPhone’s App Store will be signed on with whichever store you are login on your iTunes before you sync
• When you do an App update – you will need to sign in to the correct store to download the updates

So go forth and populate your iPod Touch and iPhone!

Dan Benjamin gives a few simple steps on preparing your Macs when you decided to sell it off. Besides ensuring that your data are properly backed up and removed, these steps will also ensure a better experience for your buyer when they receive the Mac.

bq.. It’s time to upgrade your Mac, and you’re thinking about selling your old one. Over the years, I’ve sold many Macs, and I’ve created a set of steps to follow (and learned a few tricks) along the way that I’d like to share.

Following these steps will let you sleep a bit better at night and has the added benefit of creating a great first-experience for the buyer.

So if you fancy selling off that old Mac to get the new MacBooks in the market, have a look at Dan Benjamin’s post – it will definitely help.