The OS X System Preferences app shows all of your useful tools to configure your Mac the way you want, but it also has some that I will never use. That’s why I got excited when I learned your can hide the unused preference apps quite easily. Let me show you how.

Open System Preferences using either your Dock icon or from the Apple Menu in the upper left corner.

Once it’s open, click on the View menu and then on Customize.

All your preferences will now show a check mark next to it.

Uncheck the ones you want to hide.

Why would anyone hide any of these System Preferences?

I got rid of the MobileMe icon because I already migrated to iCloud. I don’t need it any longer. I also removed the Startup Disk icon because I don’t plan to change my startup disk on my MacBook. Since my kids don’t use my Mac I got rid of the Parental Controls icons. You might want to remove the Trackpad icon if you use a desktop without one or the Mouse icon if you only use a Trackpad on your MacBook. Maybe you don’t need the Universal Access tool or never change Spotlight settings.

When you’re finished nuking the unneeded icons, click Done at the top of the window and close it.

Let’s say you discover that you need to get one of these hidden icons back. You can either turn them all back on by clicking on the View menu and choosing Customize again and recheck the hidden icons. This makes them come back.

What if you only need that System Preference app once but don’t want to restore it all the time. You can click on Show All and hold down your mouse or trackpad button until the list of System Preferences Apps shows up listing even the hidden apps. Find the one you need and open it from that menu.

How to Hide Unused System Preferences in OS X is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.

There’s another nasty Mac virus called Trojan-Download:OSX/Flashback.I or Flashback Trojan for short. This one will steal all locally stored login data on infected Macs.

A trojan malware infection disguises itself as an application, that looks like a valid program, but is a malicious tool in disguise.

Flashback searches for user names and passwords to websites stored on Macs, hoping to steal the user’s identity. Mac users who store passwords in their browser’s auto-complete feature, need to check for this infection.

If you have an infected Mac, be sure to change all of your important passwords and keep a close eye on your financial accounts.

A good Mac Antivirus tool can remove the malware, but not everyone has one installed. Many in the Mac community believe they’re immune to such infections. Malware takes advantage of this attitude and sneaks its way onto systems.

The Flashback Trojan gets its name by claiming it’s an Adobe Flash update. Users think it’s genuine and give it permission to install itself.

If you don’t have an antivirus app installed, here’s how to remove the Flashback Trojan malware.

Understand that this process involves entering commands into the Terminal app, which might scare some users. If you’re not sure what you’re doing, get a knowledgable tech savvy person to help you. Otherwise, follow the steps found at F-Secure very carefully.

F-Secure describes the malware as follows:

Trojan-Downloader:OSX/Flashback.I connects to a remote site to download its payload; on successful infection, the malware modifies targeted webpages displayed in the web browser.

One you’ve cleaned up your Mac, then check out our roundup of Antivirus tools for Mac and be sure to install one for future protection.

How to Remove the Flashback Trojan From Infected Macs is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.

If you have ever tried to empty the trash in OS X and received a messages saying that it has a locked files and folders, then you know the feeling that no matter what you do, you can’t take out the trash. The files stay behind cluttering up your drive and occupying needed space.

This happened to me when I plugged an external drive into my MacBook Pro and it contained a bunch of old Time Machine Backups. I sent them to the Trash but then I couldn’t empty them from the trash for some reason.

I discovered a solution to this problem and wanted to share it.

Dealing with Locked Files

This actually applies to any file that you can’t move, unlock, modify or copy in Mac OS X. File sin the trash may become locked keeping you from permanently deleting them.

If you’re trying to expunge a file, right-click or Control+click on the file and select Get Info.

The info window will pop-up and you will likely see a check mark next to the word Locked midway down the window.

Uncheck it and close the window.

Now you can do whatever you like with the file.

Dealing with Stubborn Folders

What if you’re trying to remove a persistent folder and get the error message that says you can’t empty the file because of a locked folder? One of the options offers to get rid of all the unlocked content. Select it and then open the Trash to see what’s left. You will likely see the locked folder or folders.

To get rid of the folder or folders, open a Terminal window. I find the easiest way is to press Command+Space to open Spotlight Search box. Type Terminal and hit Enter.

With terminal open, type the following without hitting the Enter key. Remember to NOT hit the Enter key after typing the following line into Terminal:

sudo chflags -R nouchg

Make sure the above line has a space after the last ‘g’ and then open your Trash folder. Drag the offending folder into the Terminal at the end of the line after the space after the ‘g’ and Terminal will automatically enter the text needed to identify folder’s location.

Hit enter and OS X will do its magic on the folder.

Now you can remove the folder by emptying the Trash. Either choose Finder from the menu and then click Empty Trash … . You can also use the keyboard shortcut Shift+Command+Delete which also empties your Trash folder.

If you still can’t remove the folder you have something else wrong. The Apple support page where I found the above solution has a few other possible answers you can try.

How to Empty the Trash in OS X If It Contains Locked Files and Folders is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.

If you’ve ever wanted to share a YouTube video with friends, but don’t want to keep streaming it over and over on your cell phone or over your laptop, MacTubes will work quickly and easily.

Run MacTubes and search for a video. If you already have the URL, just enter it into the search box in the upper right corner of the program. If not, search for the kinds of videos you want. I entered the URL of a video I uploaded to YouTube and it found it without difficulty. I also tried searching for video by entering a search phrase and it returned what I was looking for on YouTube.

You can preview the videos from within MacTubes to make sure you found the right one. The included player has all the controls you would expect since it’s just a wrapper for the online video.

Right-click the video you want to download and a menu pops up.

From the pop-up menu you can play, search for other videos, add to a playlist of videos you wish to download, get the video’s information or download it. If you choose the Download option, the menu expands with all the available video formats. MacTubes won’t transcode the video but will download it in the available formats. In the example above the video had three formats available – flash video (FLV) or MPEG 4 (MP4). You can also choose between the two kinds of HD content (720p or 1080p).

Choose the video format you wish to download and MacTubes saves it by default to the desktop. You can change the locations in the Settings menu accessed from the MacTubes menu.

With MacTubes you can view the list of videos it finds in a list view with details or in a grid of thumbnails.

The program works well. I occasionally wish to show videos I’ve found online in my teaching at church or graduate school. This simplifies the process.

Download MacTubes for free.

How To Download YouTube Videos To Your Mac with MacTubes is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.

Do you often find yourself accidentally hitting the wrong keys on your laptop because of poor design or just messy typing?

I know your pain. Some keys just get in the way.

The solution to this problem is simple: re-map troublesome keys so they act like different ones or turn them off all together.

You don’t need to manually edit the registry or have a lot of technical expertise to do this. There’s a program for Windows that will do it for you no matter what kind of PC you have.

Here’s how to turn off or change any key’s behavior:

Step 1: Download SharpKeys 3.5, compatible with Windows 7 on down to Windows 2000, and install.

Step 2: Make a backup of your registry just in case.

Step 3: Open SharpKeys and click Add.

The left column shows a full list of keys on your computer. Choose the key you want to change here.

You can also click the Type Key button underneath to quickly add the key in question.

Step 4: In the right column is the same list of keys. This is where you’ll choose what the key does going forward.

You can change it to a more convenient key — for example, when using the IdeaPad U400 I changed the pesky Home key to Backspace just in case I miss the real Backspace key.

If you want the key to do nothing, choose Turn Key Off (first choice in the list).

Step 5: Hit OK.

To can re-map multiple keys, start again at Step 1.

Step 6: Once you’ve added all the keys you want to re-map or turn off, click Write To Registry.

Step 7: Reboot or log off for the changes to take effect.

Now those pesky keys you don’t need will no longer trouble you. And the process is reversible. Just go back to SharpKeys again to delete or change key re-maps.

How To Turn Off Or Change Troublesome Keys In Windows is a post by K. T. Bradford from Notebooks.com.

Here are some great OS X shortcuts for cutting, copying and pasting text.

When copying or pasting text, most people select the text and then use the Edit menu and choose the Copy command or the Cut command. Then they move their cursor to the new place they want to place the text and again use the Edit menu to find Paste. You don’t have to do it that way. Let me show you some tips for turbocharging your Cut, Copy and Paste in some OS X apps.

These don’t work in every app. For example, a couple of these tips don’t work in Safari. They do work in the Text Edit program or in Microsoft Office applications.

The Basics

If you’re even a bit experienced in using OS X, then you can probably skip to the next section because this is for beginners.

These work in nearly all OS X applications. Instead of using the application’s Edit menu each time, try the toolbar buttons or use the right-click menu. Some apps have a button for cutting, copying and pasting on the toolbar, like Microsoft Word 2011 for Mac does (see below).

Click the scissor button to cut text. The button next to it copies text. The button with the clipboard behind the image of a document performs the paste function, but you knew this. You might not know about the right-click menu.

On a trackpad, click or tap with two fingers after selecting the text you want to cut or copy. If that doesn’t work you may need to set it up in Settings. Choose the Trackpad applet and then click the Point & Click tab. Put a check mark in Secondary Click to enable the two finger right-click. Now you can tap or click the trackpad with two fingers to bring up the right-click menu. If you don’t want to do this, then use the Control + Click combo.

The right-click menu pops up with the Cut or Copy commands at the top. You will also see that there are keyboard shortcuts. Command + X cuts the text. Command + C copies it. Cut will remove the text so you can place it in a new place, a new document or a different app. Copy leaves the text behind but lets you place a copy in the new place. Pasting is placing it in the new place. Use the edit menu, the brush button on the toolbar or the Paste command on the right-click menu. The keyboard shortcut for pasting is Command + V.

Selecting Non-contiguous Text

Let’s say you want to copy a sentence from three different paragraphs or maybe certain words in multiple sentences. You can just Copy and Paste over and over, but that gets monotonous if you have a bunch of text to copy. Instead use the Command + Select combo. You hold down the Command button while you select the text with your mouse or trackpad. Select the various sentences, phrases or words that you wish to copy or cut. After you select the text, then copy/cut the text and paste it wherever you wish.

You can use this to select words you wish to look up and create definitions for a study session. You can also cut sentences to make a study sheet. There are plenty of uses.

Select Contiguous Text

Selecting contiguous text by using the Shift key held down while dragging to select the text. You can also use the keyboard arrow keys. To select a whole line place the cursor before the text on the line and use Shift + Command + Right Arrow. Select text before your insertion point using the Left Arrow.

Select a Block of Text

It is possible that you want to select a block of text in the middle of a paragraph (see the image below).

To do this, hold down the Option key and the select the box of text with your mouse or trackpad. You might want to do this to quickly grab a bunch of random text from a document in Word. This doesn’t work in Safari for some reason.

Source: Cult of Mac

OS X Shortcuts for Cutting Copying and Pasting is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.

Launchpad brings an iOS style interface to your Mac, but it also brings app icon clutter to your Mac. Every app you have installed on the computer will have an icon in Launchpad, including those apps you never use. If you regularly use Launchpad, then you have probably spent a long time reorganizing the apps much like you did on your iPhone or iPad. Hooking up to iTunes makes this easier, since you can just drag and drop apps using the iTunes interface. There isn’t a really good way to do this on the Mac.

[Please read How to Get the Most Out of Lion's Launchpad]

I’ve got a tip for you that includes involves blowing away all the icons with one single Terminal command and then adding back only the ones you want by dragging them from the Applications folder in Finder to your Launchpad icon in the Dock.

To start, open the Terminal app and enter the following command by copying it and then pasting it into Terminal:

sqlite3 ~/Library/Application\ Support/Dock/*.db “DELETE from apps; DELETE from groups WHERE title<>”; DELETE from items WHERE rowid>2;”; Killall Dock

Now, all of your Launchpad icons will be gone. If this freaks you out and you want them all back, you can do so by entering the following Terminal command:

rm ~/Library/Application\ Support/Dock/*.db; killall Dock

That reverses the action and puts them all right back to their default locations.

The next step is to add back the icons you want. Open the Applications folder and then select all the apps you do want back in Launchpad.

If you want certain apps in a folder, then do this step in parts. First, select the apps you want to have grouped into one folder in Launchpad by doing a Command + Click on each app icon in the Applications folder you want in your Launchpad folder. Then drag those onto the Launchpad icon in the Dock. To create the folder in Launchpad drag one icon onto another, which creates a folder. Keep dragging the other icons onto the folder to group them all into one folder. Now repeat this step to create another folder of icons. Keep doing it till you have all the apps you want in folders. The last group of icons dragged onto the Launchpad Dock icon will be those you don’t want in folders.

You now have a nicely grouped collection of icons in Launchpad, making it cleaner and easier to find your favorite apps. Now, if only you could launch Launchpad and use it as the default OS X interface.

Source: MacWorld

Quickly Clean Out and Organize OS X’s Launchpad is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.

Two public free domain namer system (DNS) services got a speed bump this week, which could potentially speed up your home or office Internet connection. OpenDNS and Google Public DNS services allow users to substitute their Internet Service Provider’s DNS numbers with alternate DNS numbers, thus potentially speeding up your Internet connection and adding some other services. As a result, pages pop quicker, videos from YouTube cache quicker and your downloads won’t take as long.

How DNS Works

A DNS, or Domain Name System, resolves Internet addresses and helps people find web pages based on names instead of numbers. It’s like as if, on a telephone, you could pick up and say, “Call Kevin Purcell” and it would automatically route the call to my home phone number so you didn’t have to know that phone number itself. A DNS is a computer that keeps track of webpage names like Notebooks.com, and routes your web browser to that page so that you don’t have to know the IP address of the computer that services up our page. Instead of typing four numbers with up to three digits each separated by periods (like 208.67.222.222) you can type the web page name.

Faster DNS Thanks to Location Info

The change made today includes adding location data to DNS requests so that the request routes the data through a server closer to your location. Most of the time the speed bump will be minimal, but on occasion it will be noticeable. So it routes the request to a closer source of that information. Which helps, since web pages are cached or saved on computers all over the Internet. If I click a link to a video playing on Vimeo, the new Google and OpenDNS servers know I’m in North Carolina. It sends the request to a server closer to my location, like Atlanta instead of New York or Chicago.

Routing Internet Traffic Through Closer Servers Speeds Things Up

How to Set Up a New DNS Address

If you want to take advantage of this, the best way would be to change the DNS numbers of your router. I use a Netgear router so I enter the IP address of the router, enter the login information and click on Basic Settings link along the left side of the page. In the section labelled “Domain Name Server (DNS) Address” I enter the new numbers. For OpenDNS you enter the two numbers as follows:

• 208.67.222.222
• 208.67.220.200

For Google’s Public DNS use the following numbers instead:

• 8.8.8.8
• 8.8.4.4

I click Save and reboot the router. From then on my router will bypass the Charter DNS server and use either OpenDNS or Google’s Public DNS servers.

In addition to a speed boost, the OpenDNS service includes:

• Parental Controls for Filtering Objectional Content
• Filtering of sites for security reasons
• Anti-fraud and anti-fishing
• Reliability of always on servers even if your ISP has trouble with theirs

If you sign up for the OpenDNS service, you can customize the filters. Maybe you don’t like your children looking at porn but want to access other sites that some find find objectionable but you don’t.

Google’s service doesn’t offer as many features, but may be faster for some users. Try them both out and after using them both, pick the one that seems to work best for your needs.

If you don’t have router, you can change the DNS numbers of your computer’s network connection. For Windows use their steps and for Mac use Apple’s guide. You can bypass the coffee shop’s slow servers if you change the settings directly on your laptop. This might also cause problems with a coffee shop’s log in system so be sure you remember how to change it back if necessary.

Source: Lifehacker

How to Speed Up Your Internet Connection with OpenDNS or Google Public DNS is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.

The new Mac OS X 10.7 Lion is great! There are a few mildly annoying changes, though, like the fact that they’ve hidden some folders that you need access to every once in a while. One of those is the Library folder, which I had to unhide recently.

While working with a program I learned that my preferences file for that app was corrupted and needed to be deleted. So much for Macs not needing that kind of under the hood help! That file, however, is hidden in one of the hidden folders – the Preferences folder in Library.

In Lion you need to unhide Library to get to folders like Preferences

Here is how to get back your Library folder in Lion.

1. Open the Terminal app
2. Type the following (without quotes) into Terminal or just cut and paste it from here: “chflags nohidden ~/Library/“
3. Log off your system by going to the Apple Menu in the upper right corner and choose Log Out ‘User Name’ where User Name is your name
4. Log in using your password and everything will be restored as it was when you logged out

When you log back into the system, you should now be able to go to your Home folder in Finder and see the Library folder. There are a lot of different folders there that might be useful to see, like the Preferences folder or the folder where Mail stores downloads. The Preferences folder contains all the .plist files that contain preferences for programs. They occasionally get corrupted and a tech support person for a software company might tell you to delete a .plist file, like Nuance did for me when I was having trouble with Dragon Dictate 2.5 for Mac while I was reviewing it.

How to Unhide the Library Folder in Lion’s Home Folder is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.

With the launch of OS X 10.7 Lion and the new MacBook Air, you may have just bought your first Mac or upgraded the OS and would like to dig deeper to learn to use it more productively. We plan to help you with some tips and help for the new Lion features and other tools in OSX.

Here are five tips to help you work in OS X like a pro, including two new Lion features AirDrop and Smart Magnify in Preview. We saved the new stuff for last so let’s get started with three features that have been a part of OSX for a while.

1. Launch Apps with Spotlight

Even if you put a lot of apps in your OS X Dock, you still have a lot more installed than will fit at the bottom of even the largest screen. You can always click on the Applications folder and scroll or swipe up or down to find your app. If you know the name, a faster way is to use spotlight to launch the app.

Most people think of Spotlight as a way to search their system. It is also a fast way to start a program. Click on the Spotlight icon in the upper right. It looks like a magnifying glass. Start typing the name of the application and a list will drop down. Click on the app name and it will launch.

As a bonus, don’t bother with the mouse or trackpad. Just engage Spotlight with the keyboard using COMMAND + Space. Type the first few letters of the app name. If it is not the first one on the list use your arrow keys to highlight it and hit enter.

2. Open Applications Folder with Keyboard

You can also launch applications by using the keyboard shortcut COMMAND + SHIFT + A when you are viewing your desktop. This will open the Applications folder in Finder. Now use the arrows to find the file and hit Enter to open it. If the application is nested in a folder inside the Applications folder the Enter key will open that folder. Then use it again to open the application.

This keyboard shortcut might not work when an application is open. For example, I use Mars Edit to create blog posts and this keyboard shortcut does something else in that app.

3. Setup Smart Folders to Quickly Access Certain Files

Create a Smart Folder if you want to quickly access all the files of one kind, like all PDF files on my system. Use following steps:

1. Open a new Finder window and click File, then New Smart Folder or use the keyboard shortcut COMMAND + OPTION + N.
2. Enter the search terms in the search field at the upper right corner of the window if needed. You could search for all files with the word “project” in the file name. In our example for all PDF files, leave it blank.
3. Narrow the scope by using the tiny plus sign in the upper right just below the search box.
4. Use the drop down boxes left of the box for changing the file types with options like kind of file, searching by date, name or contents. Click Other to define other attributes. There are dozens.
5. Narrow the search terms: depending on what attribute you select in the previous step, there will be another dropdown box. In our example of PDF files, we chose Kind so the dropdown box has file formats listed, and we can select PDF from the menu. You can choose things like JPG files, Music files or others.
6. Click Save in the upper right below the search box.
7. Give the folder a name and it will by default save itself in the Saved Searches folder and be added to the sidebar.
8. Uncheck or check Add to Sidebar depending on your preference.

As you can see below, we now have a new item in our Favorites list in Finder called PDF Files and it contains every PDF file on the computer.

You could use smart folders make a folder of all the JPG files, MP3 or other Music files, or all the files created in a date range. You can include broad categories of files such as the above examples, or as narrow as photos with specific photographic attributes like: aperture, or shutter speed. You could also save a list of music files with a specific length, which might be useful for finding the ringtones or quick voice memos.

4. Get Close Up with Smart Magnify in Lions’s Version of Preview

Speaking of working with PDFs or JPGs, Preview is a great way to quickly take a look at a file without opening slow apps like Photoshop, iPhoto or Acrobat. If you want to get in close on your photos because you want to see how blurry or sharp they are, or find out who that person is behind Uncle Joe in the family photo taken at your last reunion, use Smart Magnify. This is a new feature in OS X Lion.

After you have opened a file in Preview by double clicking it in Finder or by using the File, Open menu items in Preview, you can now use Smart Magnify. Start it up either by using the Tools menu and clicking Show Magnifier or use the Tilde key (upper left under the ESC key and left of the 1 key). This will zoom in only where your mouse cursor sits. You can move around the document or image by moving the cursor.

5. Share Files With the Lion’s New AirDrop

The new AirDrop folder in Finder offers a quick way to send files to another computer in your network. Below you will see that my MacBook Pro, represented by the icon at the bottom, and my MacBook Air, represented by the icon at the top, are the only two OS X machines on my network. It would be nice if either Microsoft or a third-party software maker created an AirDrop tool for Windows.

To quickly send a file to my Air I find the file in Finder and drag it and hold it over the AirDrop folder, which you see above in the left hand column of Favorites. This will open after I hold the file over the AirDrop folder with my mouse or trackpad. Then I can drag the file over the computer’s icon for my Air and the pop-up box in the image below appears.

The recipient will see a box like the one below and their Finder Dock icon will start to bounce notifying them of your intention to share a file. The person can click Save and Open, which will save the file to that machine’s drive and open the file in the default program related to that file format. For example, an image file will open in Preview if Preview is the default program for that kind of file. A Pages file will open in Pages and so forth. If the person clicks decline the sending machine will notify the sender. Click Save to keep the file without opening it.

OS X Lion’s New AirDrop and 4 Other Useful Tools is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.