Tips

Ever since the first iPod was released, Apple has been working on improving the experience of listening to music on mobile devices. iOS provides a few different ways of controlling the music and seeing what track is currently playing. Developer Daniel Taub has added yet another convenient option.

The jailbreak tweak is named Music HUD, and it functions to provide not only a heads-up display of the current selection, but also gestures to pause songs or mute instantly. What’s cool about Music HUD is that all of this is customizable and accessed with one touch of the volume buttons.

Every iOS device has a lock screen, regardless of whether or not the passcode is set up for security. Sliding to unlock not only reveals the home screen, but Apple has designed the transition to be a smooth and fluid motion. Only thing is that everyone’s device has the exact same zoom and fade animation.

Now with a jailbroken device and the free tweak LiveWire, the unlock animation can be changed to something more interesting. The developer HASHBANG Productions describes the new animation as a sliding doors effect.

Wake Info is a jailbreak tweak that can speak customized status reports every time you dismiss or snooze an iOS alarm. There’s nothing like a robot voice telling you how many unread emails are waiting to get you out of bed in the morning. The tweak will read up to three informational messages including real data.

Once installed, under Settings -> Wake Info different messages can be set to play depending on whether the alarm is dismissed or snoozed. Besides text, variables are entered to form the complete message, such as the date or time.

Some iPhone jailbreakers like to get as much information from their iOS devices as possible. There are statistics available under Settings, but the most interesting stuff requires tweaks that allow the user to look under the hood. One such tweak is iBatteryInfo.

iBatteryInfo does one thing, and does it well. Once installed, the tweak can be enabled from Settings -> iBatteryStatus. Every time you plug in or unplug your iOS device for charging, a list of details about the battery and connected cable will appear. The list explains the total capacity of your battery and what level of charge has been achieved.

Remind Me Later can be a useful feature of iOS, except that it’s limited to reminding you about phone calls only. Fans of the feature will be happy to know that the jailbreak tweak AnyReminder makes it possible to add these reminders to other iOS apps, such as Messages and Mail.

For example, say a text message arrives and you device is locked. With AnyReminder installed, tapping the camera grabber displays options to Dismiss, Launch or Remind Me Later for this particular alert. This menu can be enabled to work with Notifications, Safari, Mail and Messages in addition to the Phone app.