‘VeloxTube for Velox’ adds an enhanced folder to the YouTube app

Velox is perhaps one of the most disappointing “big” tweaks to touchdown in some time. It’s a tweak that possessed tons of potential, but sadly, none of it is being tapped in the way most envisioned. In fact, we’re left with tweaks like VeloxTube for Velox instead.

That’s not necessarily a knock against VeloxTube for Velox — a jailbreak tweak that brings an enhanced folder to the official YouTube App — it’s just that I expected more. Take a look at my video overview of VeloxTube for Velox after the jump, and see what I mean.

Like virtually all of the Velox addons we’ve seen over the past few months, VeloxTube for Velox takes a very lazy approach, and essentially embeds the content of the YouTube app within an enhanced folder. That’s nice and all, but it’s not exactly noteworthy or innovative.

This addon would have been better if you could configure it to do something cool, like pull up a random video based on keywords, or bring up settings for the YouTube app, or basically anything else outside of a lazy embed.

Yes, VeloxTube for YouTube works as you might expect, and yes it works well, but I’m tired of developers maintaining the status quo with a tweak that has so much potential power. It’s sad, really.

Head over to Cydia’s BigBoss repo if you’d like to give VeloxTube a shot. Be sure to share your thoughts on this tweak, and the overall state of Velox in the comment section below.

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‘LiveWire Pro’ brings new unlock animations to iOS

It’s been a while since we’ve seen a new jailbreak tweak that brings new unlock animations to iOS, but LiveWire Pro is trying to reinvigorate the once popular trend. Not to be confused with the peer-to-peer music sharing service, LimeWire, this is a tweak that brings 7 new unlock animations to iOS. Have a look at our video walkthrough inside for more details on what makes LiveWire Pro tick.

Once you install LiveWire Pro, you’ll find a new preference panel for the tweak nestled inside of the stock Settings app. The tweak’s preferences contain all of the necessary settings used to configure the unlock animations.

There are three basic settings contained within LiveWire Pro: a kill switch, a menu to select between seven different animations, and a duration slider. All of the settings can be changed and take effect on the fly, and hence; no respring is required.

The seven included animations are as follows:

• Elevator
• Vault
• Fade Out
• Zoome & Fade
• Shrink & Fade
• Rotate 360 and Fade
• WhirlPool

The latest update to the tweak adds a new Random option as well, allowing you to receive any one of the seven animations at random anytime the device is unlocked. The included duration slider is there to adjust how long the animation takes to complete. Setting it to the furthest end of the scale results in an animation that takes longer to complete, and vice versa.

Personally I find that the Elevator and Vault animations are the best to be included with LiveWire Pro. In fact, the Elevator animation comes bundled in with the free version of LiveWire, which is also available on Cydia’s BigBoss repo.

With so many other jailbreak tweaks that accomplish a similar task, it’s a bit difficult to recommend that you spend $0.99 on LiveWire Pro. It’s not a bad purchase by any means, but I suggest you check out what else is out there before you make the move.

LiveWire Pro, like its free version, is available on Cydia’s BigBoss repo. Let me know what you think about it in the comment section below.

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Swipe to call, text or email in the Contacts app with QuickGestures

When a fan war breaks out over what the ‘best mobile platform’ is, I usually try to stay out of it. I like iOS better than Android, and believe it to be the superior of the two. But I know that’s just my personal opinion, and not a fact.

Truth be told, I actually like quite a few things about Android. The way it handles contacts, for instance, is great. You can text, email or call someone with a quick swipe or tap. It’s too bad I can’t do that in iOS. Or can I?

With this new jailbreak tweak from iLendSoft I can. Well sort of. The package allows you to quickly communicate with your friends and family in the Contacts app using 3 touch gestures: swipe left, swipe right, and long-hold.

Once installed, you’ll find these configurable options in your Settings app, as usual. You can assign 1 of 4 actions to each of the aforementioned gestures: call, message, e-mail, or FaceTime, and there’s a few other miscellaneous toggles.

In my testing, the tweak worked great. I set messaging as the left swipe, calling right swipe, and email long-hold. And sure enough, every time I swiped to the left on a person’s name in Contacts, a composition window popped up.

But as good as it is, I never found it very useful—most of the time I forgot the tweak was even installed. That doesn’t mean that others won’t find it handy though. And if you think that might be you, you can find QuickGestures in the BigBoss repo for $0.99.

Have you tried out QuickGestures yet?

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‘The Quick Brown Fox’ brings new customization options to the stock iOS keyboard

The Quick Brown Fox — it sounds like a weird name for a jailbreak tweak, but you’ll quickly realize that it makes sense due to the fact that it adds some cool new features to the iOS keyboard. The Quick Brown Fox adds new features to your keyboard like Auto Twins, which automatically inserts a closing pair of parentheses or brackets when you typing the opening symbols. There’s also Auto Space, which automatically places a space behind any configured symbol key.

Lastly, and perhaps most significant, you have Jumping Keys. Jumping Keys allows you to configure certain symbols to automatically jump you back to the alpha keyboard once typed. It works exactly like the apostrophe key works on a stock keyboard, but this allows you to configure apostrophe-like action to virtually any symbol key.

The Quick Brown Fox may sound a bit confusing, but that’s what video walkthroughs were made for. Check inside, as we go hands-on The Quick Brown Fox, and showcase how it all works.

So yes, while the Quick Brown Fox sounds like something you’d see when opening up a font, or something you’d type in Mavis Beacon, it’s actually a really cool jailbreak tweak. Due to its name, it’s easy to overlook it, but don’t. After all, it is free on Cydia’s BigBoss repo, and it does some pretty original stuff. What do you think?

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How to quickly share notes on Twitter and Facebook

ShareNotes is a new jailbreak tweak that allows you to share notes on Twitter and Facebook using iOS’ built in share sheet. The sheet is accessible via a tap on the share button in the Notes app, and it features two new buttons for Facebook and Twitter sharing once this tweak is installed.

The stock sharing options for notes are quite limited; you can only share notes via Mail or Messages. This jailbreak tweak opens things up a bit. Take a look inside for screenshots and more info…

One thing to keep in mind when using ShareNotes, is that you must stay under Twitter’s 140 character limit in order to share notes via Twitter. This means that the tweak isn’t smart enough to truncate or use a read more service.

ShareNotes is available for free on Cydia’s BigBoss repo. Let me know what you think in the comment section below.

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Peekly – an awesome new Lock screen theme featuring weather, calendar, and more

Peekly is an awesome new Lock screen theme for WinterBoard. Not only does it look wonderful, but the theme features built in functionality for current weather, forecasts, calendar, RSS feeds, and more.

Like many Lock screen WinterBoard themes, Peekly can be configured using a simple javascript file, which can be edited by means of the text editor bundled with iFile. If you’re looking for a relatively lightweight Lock screen theme that looks absurdly good, then look no further than Peekly. Take a look inside for our full hands-on video review and setup guide.

The first thing you’ll notice about Peekly is how gorgeous it looks. It features a redesigned Lock screen clock, along with a redesigned slide to unlock interface. This is all capped off by a beautiful 8-bit Lock screen wallpaper that compliments the font selections for the clock and date.

But the primary Lock screen page is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Peekly. If you swipe once to the left, you’ll reveal a weather page that displays the current weather for a specific location. Along with the location name, the current temparture, the day’s highs and lows, the current status, and a visual representation of that status — think clouds, sun, etc. — is nestled right on the screen. Again, this is all complimented by a pretty looking 8-bit wallpaper.

But Peekly does more than that, as its name hints to. If you swipe on the weather page once more to the left, you’ll reveal an extended forecast. The extended forecast doesn’t reside on its own dedicated page, meaning that you can’t actually swipe to a standalone extended forecast. What you can do, is “peek” at the forecast by means of a swipe and hold gesture. Watch the video walkthrough above to get a gist as to what I mean.

The weather location can be configured to your liking

The same “peek” action can be performed on the main Lock screen page which houses the Lock screen clock and slide to unlock functions. On an unmodified setup, peeking from the main Lock screen page reveals a simple calendar. This “left peek” page can be customized to house other items like a Twitter feed, RSS feed, Gmail calendar, and more.

While these are nice options, you have to remember that Peekly isn’t like LockInfo, meaning that you can’t interact with the theme at all. Peekly is strictly intended for viewing information, not for interaction. With that in mind, I found the Twitter options and RSS options to be nice, but not exactly functional. Hence, I generally recommend sticking with the stock calendar option.

As you might imagine, lots of configuration can be done with Peekly, but it’s a totally manual affair. You can use iFile to open up the theme’s folder, and alter the settings.js text file to configure things. You can alter the weather location, change the temperature from Celsius to Fahrenheit, replace the clock with a digital clock, add a Twitter feed, RSS feed, Gmail calendar, etc. You can use iFile to easily alter any of these settings.

This is how Peekly is customized

I do recommend that if you’re going to use Peekly, that you install a few additional jailbreak tweaks that make the experience better. For starters, there’s Clock Hide, which hides the stock iOS Lock screen Clock. Then there’s Dim Delay, which let’s you change the amount of time it takes before the Lock screen dims.

If there’s one major gripe with Peekly, it’s the fact that the learning curve might be a bit much for beginners. For starters, the theme isn’t yet available on Cydia. You have to install it directly from the developers, Studio Graphic’s, website. This means that the theme must be downloaded, moved to the var/stash/Themes/ directory, and enabled via WinterBoard. You’ll also have to configure the theme manually by means of the settings.js text file included within the theme’s main folder. Of course this is simple to us experienced jailbreakers, but newer ones may struggle a bit.

Overall, I found Peekly to be a beautiful jailbreak theme. It’s fast, efficient, and it serves a real purpose. If you’re someone who likes the idea of altering the Lock screen, but you don’t want to go all out with something like LockInfo, or IntelliScreen X, then Peekly is worthy of your consideration. Again, if you want to try Peekly, head over to the developer’s website, and download it for free today. Don’t forget to let me know what you think about it in the comments below.

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Quickly enable the Passcode on your device with TapTapPass

By default, it takes you at least 6 steps to enable your device’s Passcode from your Home screen. You have to launch the Settings app, navigate through a couple of screens to the Passcode Lock window, and set it up.

While this process is just fine for folks who keep their iOS devices Passcode-protected at all times, it’s fairly tedious for those that only enable the security feature every once in a while. Luckily, there’s TapTapPass…

TapTapPass is a jailbreak tweak that allows you to enable your device’s Passcode with a tap, gesture or any other Activator function. So if you don’t usually have it on, but need to for some reason, you can do so quickly.

The package doesn’t have a Springboard icon or a Settings pane. You configure everything from within the Activator app, which can be accessed either by its Home screen icon, or the Activator panel in your Settings app.

Once you’ve chosen an Activator function, you’re all set. Now anytime you perform that function—shake your device, double tap your Status bar, etc.—TapTapPass will activate the default iOS Passcode for your device.

Upon unlocking the device with the Passcode, the feature will be disabled. And you can either use the function to lock it again, or use the Sleep button to perform a standard, no-password lock. It’s as simple as it sounds.

I wish the tweak would allow you to use a Simple 4-digit Passcode, but other than that it’s pretty solid. I won’t be keeping it, but if you think you could benefit from something like this, I recommend checking it out.

TapTapPass is available in Cydia, in the ModMyi repo, for free.

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iOS 6.1.3 kills the jailbreak

It was fun while it lasted, but it appears that Apple has finally put an end to evasi0n. Earlier today, the company released iOS 6.1.3 to the masses, and as expected, it contains patches for multiple exploits used in the popular iOS 6.x jailbreak.

MuscleNerd confirmed our fears on Twitter just a few moments ago, pointing out that Apple has credited the evad3rs with the discovery of 4 of the 6 security flaws that were patched in today’s update. So jailbreakers should stay far away…

Here’s one of the exploits mentioned in the security briefing:

Kernel Available for: iPhone 3GS and later, iPod touch (4th generation) and later, iPad 2 and later Impact: A local user may be able to determine the address of structures in the kernel Description: An information disclosure issue existed in the ARM prefetch abort handler. This issue was addressed by panicking if the prefetch abort handler is not being called from an abort context. CVE-ID CVE-2013-0978 : evad3rs

Remember, as planetbeing explained in an interview last month, the evasi0n jailbreak relies on a number of exploits. So it’s not clear what this means exactly for the jailbreak community in the near future. But we’re guessing it’s not good news.

As for the distant future, though, the evad3rs have said that they still have several ‘major’ exploits in reserve, outside of what evasi0n used, so rest assured that we will see another jailbreak come around again. We’re just not sure when.

The evasi0n jailbreak tool was created by the evad3rs team—made up of MuscleNerd,pod2g, planetbeing, and pimskeks. It landed on February 4 of this year, and withstood two iOS software updates.

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YourTube update for iOS 6 now available in Cydia

If you’re a YouTube user, or dare we say “power user,” then you’re no doubt already acutely aware of YourTube. A jailbreak tweak from the folks over at CocoaNuts, YourTube takes the already impressive YouTube app and turns it into the app Google would no doubt like it to be, if it wasn’t for all manner of licensing issues!

Amongst other features, YourTube allows users to download their YouTube videos for playback later, with adjustable quality settings and the option to have the downloaded files added to their iPhone’s built-in media apps. Oh, and they’ll get synced back to your computer that way, too.

That’s just scratching the surface of what YourTube can do, so here’s a handy bullet point list of features for your easy perusal…

• YouTube video downloading for offline viewing
• Accelerated download speeds
• Ad-blockers for video ads, banner ads, and brandings
• Ignoring restrictions for videos
• Always enabling AirPlay
• Importing downloaded videos to the media library with Gremlin (now 20x faster)
• Import video or just audio to music library
• Reverse syncing for syncing downloaded media to iTunes
• Selecting playback quality
• Selecting download quality
• An interface built into the YouTube application

Our personal favorites? Well, there’s the obvious win of being able to avoid watching YouTube ads while waiting for that little “SKIP” button to appear, for one. Importing music into the Music app, rather than the video is also impressive. All in, the entire tweak gets our seal of approval, and we’re sure you’ll agree.

Owners of previous versions of YourTube can get a free upgrade to YourTube for iOS, or if you’re just getting on board now you’ll need to hand over $3.99. Be quick though, because that price is only valid for three days. After that, you’ll need to snag an extra dollar from the depths of your sofa cushions

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make your status bar clock fade into view

ClockFade is a new jailbreak tweak that forces your status bar clock to fade into view after unlocking to the Home screen. Normally, the status bar abruptly appears with no fade animation, which can be jarring. ClockFade brings smoother fade animations to the table, which are completely adjustable courtesy of preference sliders.

Obviously, this is a small tweak that doesn’t bring much to the table as far as features are concerned, but you might be surprised as to how well it performs, and how good it looks in motion.

 

As you can see, there are two preferences sliders included with ClockFade. The top slider adjusts the tweak’s animation delay, which specifies how long the clock should wait before fading in. The second slider is for fade duration, which specifies how long it takes the clock to fade in.

ClockFade is available for free on Cydia’s BigBoss repo.

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30 cydia tweaks for iPhone , iPod touch and iPad

The tweaks chosen are both new and old, popular and unpopular.

 

 

30 is a big number so, I hope that most of you are able to find a tweak that you will enjoy having on your iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad.

 

 

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How to stop your iPhone from vibrating on tables

 

 

Don’t you just hate it when you place your iPhone on a table, and notifications start going off? You get that annoying buzzing sound, which is the result of the vibration motor pulsating on the hard table surface. Wouldn’t it be awesome if your iPhone knew when it was laying on a flat surface, thus disabling the vibration? Well, that’s the premise behind MyVibe.

MyVibe is a relatively new jailbreak tweak that’s available for $1.99 on Cydia’s BigBoss repo. Once installed there are quite a few options that can be configured using the tweak’s preference panel. Take a look inside for a video walkthrough showcasing how to use MyVibe, and why it may be beneficial for you.

You won’t notice a bunch of settings contained within MyVibe’s preferences, but it’s a pretty complex tweak when you think about it and really start to break it down. Let’s examine each of MyVibe’s settings.

For starters, there’s the basic functionality from which the tweak’s name is derived, the Table Vibrate feature. Enabling Table Vibrate will disable vibration when your iPhone is placed on a table. It doesn’t matter if the phone is placed facing down, or facing upwards; all vibrations will be silenced once MyVibe recognizes the state of your iPhone, and the vibration suppression kicks in.

To go along with this feature, there is a handy sensitivity option that relegates how much leeway is given to the iPhone’s accelerometer. There are five sensitivity levels included: very low, low, medium, high, and very high. Very high sensitivity means that your iPhone will have to be dead-still, and placed on a flat surface in order for MyVibe to kick in. As you lower the sensitivity, MyVibe kicks in sooner, with less restrictions on slight movements. If you use the lower sensitivity levels, then MyVibe will actually start working by simply holding the iPhone perpendicular to your body in a casual manner.

 

 

From my usage with the tweak, I recommend either high or very high sensitivity. You don’t really want MyVibe activating while holding your phone, as that kind of defeats the purpose of it.

Once MyVibe kicks in and vibration suppression is enabled, you’ll notice a little vibration icon in your iPhone’s status bar. This is a handy visual indicator that MyVibe is actually working, but not all that necessary in the grand scheme of things. Fortunately, there’s an option to disable the status bar icon within the tweak’s settings.

Last but not least, comes MyVibe’s Upside Down Silencer. Enabling this mode will turn on the iPhone’s built in Do Not Disturb functionality when your iPhone is placed upside down on a table. Keep in mind that Do Not Disturb only enables when your iPhone is locked. Even if you place your iPhone upside down on a table, you’ll still continue to receive notifications until you lock your device, or when auto lock kicks in.

MyVibe is a well working jailbreak tweak. It’s especially handy if you’re someone who keeps both vibration and audible tones enabled. For a $1.99 on Cydia’s BigBoss repo, I think it’s a reasonable asking price for a tweak that works pretty much exactly as advertised

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Mix up your iPhone’s Lock screen with Vexil

Vexil is an upcoming jailbreak tweak that adds a ton of features to your iPhone’s Lock screen. If you can see it on the Lock screen, you can probably change it by means of this tweak.

Virtually nothing is off limits here, from the Lock screen clock to the Slide to Unlock nub. It’s not the prettiest, or even the most useful tweak in the world, but with a little effort you can come up with a certified original look for your device.

 

 

As I stated, nothing is off limits here. As you can see from the screenshots above, there are settings that cover virtually every aspect of the Lock screen. Everything from colors, to text, to the appearance or disappearance of certain elements, i.e. the Lock Screen clock, is included here.

 

 

For those of you who prefer a bit more visual flair, there are animations included that can impact the top or bottom half of the Lock screen interface. My primary complaint with the tweak is the amount of options. There are just too many of them, and they’re scattered about in a confusing manner. Although there is a small FAQ included with Vexil, I found myself having to guess at how some of the features worked.

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