Spoof Your Airport MAC Address in Snow Leopard

These are instructions on how to change or spoof your wireless adapter's MAC address in Snow Leopard.

A Media Access Control address (MAC address) is a unique identifier assigned to most network adapters or network interface cards. 

Please note these instructions worked for us with a MacBook Pro running Snow Leopard 10.6.2. We cannot confirm that they will work for other operating systems or devices.

Step One
Launch Terminal from your Applications:Utilities folder.


Step Two
Enter ifconfig en1 | grep ether to find the current MAC address for your wireless network adapter.


Step Three
Make sure your Airport is turned on and input the following into the Terminal window to disassociate from all networks.

sudo /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Apple80211.framework/Versions/Current/Resources/airport -z


When asked input your administrative password, do so.


Step Four
Input the following command to change your MAC address

sudo ifconfig en1 ether 00:11:22:33:44:55

Replace 00:11:22:33:44:55 with an address of your choice. 


Step Five
To verify the change has completed successfully input ifconfig en1 | grep ether into the Terminal window.

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Setup Facebook Chat Within iChat

These are instructions on how to setup and use iChat to message your Facebook contacts

Step One
Click to launch iChat from your dock or your Applications folder.


Step Two
Select Preferences... from the iChat menu.


Step Three
Click to select the Accounts tab then click the + button at the bottom left of the window to add a new account.


Step Four
From the Account Type dropdown select Jabber. 


Enter your Account Name as username@chat.facebook.com replacing username with your own username/vanityname. For example: iclarified@chat.facebook.com. Next enter your password into thePassword field.


Expand the Server Options and set the Server to chat.facebook.com and the Port to 5222


Click the Done button to continue. Notice you will see a new account in the list on the left side of the window.


Step Five
You can now sign in and use iChat to message your Facebook contacts!

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Kill an Application When Force Quit Doesn't Work

These are instructions on how to kill a frozen application on your Mac. You may need to do this if your application has stopped responding and will not close. Make sure you attempt to Force Quit using these steps first before continuing.

Step One
Launch Terminal from your Applications:Utilities folder.


Step Two
Input the command top into the Terminal window then press the Enter key.


Step Three
You will be displayed a list of running processes on your system. Notice each process is assigned a PID. Locate the process that is not responding and take note of its PID. 


If you do not see your process on the short list drag the handle at the bottom right of the window downwards to display more of the list.


Press the q button to quit top.


Step Four
Input kill followed by the PID of the process you would like to close into the Terminal window. For example, if we wanted to close uTorrent top revealed that its PID was 38209. So we would input kill 38209 then press the Enter key.


Step Five
The application has now been forcefully killed and is no longer running.

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Fix a Locked iTunes Library File

These are instructions on how to fix a locked iTunes Library file which prevents iTunes from loading.

For one reason or another you may be shown a message on iTunes launch that reads like this, "The iTunes Library file is locked, on a locked disk, or you do not have write permission for this file".




There are several possible fixes for this error. Below we outline the simplest solution which works in most cases.
Step One
Launch Finder by clicking its icon in the dock.

Step Two
Select Music from the list of PLACES on the left side of the Finder window then double click the iTunes folder.

Step Three
Locate the iTunes Library file and drag it to your desktop.



Step Four
Launch the iTunes application by clicking its icon in the dock.


Notice that your iTunes Library will be empty. Next, quit the application by pressing the Command+q keys.

Step Five
Drag the iTunes Library file from the Desktop back to the iTunes folder you original took it from.


You will be informed that an item already exists in this location. Click the Replace button to continue.

Step Six
You can now launch iTunes as normal without receiving a locked library message.

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Setup and Configure Your Apple Magic Trackpad

These are instructions on how to setup and configure your new Apple Magic Trackpad.
Step One
Install the Magic Trackpad and Multi-Touch Trackpad Update from here.
Step Two
Ensure Bluetooth is turned on. You can enable and disable Bluetooth using the Bluetooth icon at the top right of your screen.

Step Three
Turn on your trackpad by pressing and holding the on/off button until the indicator light comes on.

Step Four
Click to select System Preferences from the Apple menu at the top left of your screen.

Step Five
Click to choose Trackpad from the System Preferences window.

Step Six
Click the Continue button once your "Apple Wireless Trackpad" is found.



Step Seven
You will now be presented with several sliders and checkboxes to configure your trackpad.

Use the sliders to increase or decrease the Tracking Speed, Double-Click Speed, and Scrolling Speed of the device.

Use the checkboxes to enable the Multi-Touch and Click options for the device including the following:
● Use one finger to point, tap to click, drag items on your screen, and secondary click.
● Drag two fingers up, down, or sideways to scroll in an active window.
● Use two-finger pinching to zoom in or out on PDFs, images, photos, and more.
● Use two-finger rotating to rotate photos, pages, and more.
● Swipe three fingers to quickly page through a document, move to the previous or next photo, and more.
● Swipe four fingers left or right to activate Application Switcher so you can cycle through open applications.
● Swipe four fingers up or down to show the desktop, or to display all open windows in Exposé.

Notice at the bottom of the window you also have a battery level for the trackpad.

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