Category: Software

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Print From iOS To Any Printer or PDF For Free

While Apple has technically enabled the printer function on iPhones, iPads, and iPod Touches, printing only works currently on 18 specific models of HP printers.

AirPrint Activator

To enable printing to any printer attached to your Mac, use the free AirPrint Activator (formerly AirPrint Hactivator).

It’s a simple program. I’ve been using a beta of version 2 without problems.

PDF Printing

You can print to a PDF by downloading and installing the CUPS-PDF Installer. Share that printer for it to show up on your AirPrint Activator list.

Automator to Move the PDF / Dropbox

The CUPS-PDF Installer prints to your folder:
/Users/Shared/CUPS-PDF/[your account]
or, for iOS devices, to:
/Users/Shared/CUPS-PDF/ANONYMOUS

Those aren’t easy places to find your PDF, so we’ll automatically move those files when they arrive.

Open Automator (Applications – Automator), then select the “Folder Action” template. This will allow you to choose the CUPS-PDF folder where your printed files go by default. Then drag over the library action “Move Finder Items” and choose where you want the file moved to. You might want to move the file to your desktop. I chose to move the files to a Dropbox sub-folder called CUPS Print Jobs, automatically backing them up and making them accessible to me through the Dropbox app or GoodReader app on my iPhone and iPad.

I set up this Automator action for both my CUPS folders that are printed to, the folder from my user account (used when printing to CUPS-PDF from my Mac) and the ANONYMOUS folder (used when printing to CUPS-PDF from iOS devices).

In order to allow Automator to move files from the ANONYMOUS folder, you need to go to it in the finder (/Users/Shared/CUPS-PDF/ANONYMOUS), CTRL-click on it, select Get Info and add yourself to the permissions for that folder.

Other Options

If these instructions are too much for you and you have $19.95 burning a hole in your pocket, you can do the same thing with Printopia 2.

These features also should be appearing in updates from Apple at some point in the future.

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Recover Deleted Files

A recent client accidentally deleted several important files and removed them from the recycle bin. Another client had done a system rollback that effectively removed important files.

Happily, deleting a files does not remove them. Only the references to the files are gone. Usually some files can be recovered if you know what file type you’re looking for and if the file location on the hard drive hasn’t been overwritten by new files. This is why it’s important to not install a program to recover files. Just the act of installing something will overwrite the data you want to recover.

I like Recuva Portable, available for free here:
http://www.piriform.com/recuva/builds

The Portable version can run from a USB or CD and does not need to be installed or be copied onto the main hard drive.

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Test RAM on a Mac

If you have new RAM in your Mac or if you are trying to diagnose weird shutdowns and problems, you should consider testing your RAM. An easy way to do so is to follow these instructions from the command-tab article “How to Test RAM Under Mac OS X“.

  1. Download the memtest_422.zip file and install the program.
  2. Shut down and then restart the computer holding down Command and S keys.
  3. When at the prompt, type “memtest all 2” which will test all the memory twice.

This will take several hours to run but should diagnose the tricky problem of bad RAM.

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Access Netflix, Hulu, Pandora from outside US

A colleague working abroad wanted to get streaming Internet content (videos from Netflix and Hulu, music from Pandora). But those services only have content distribution deals for US customers so they block non-US subscribers. How can those services be tricked? By connecting through a US server. Here’s how.

VPN

A Virtual Private Network or VPN is used by many companies to secure traffic and make your computer appear as if it is on the local corporate network. Internet traffic is typically tunneled through the corporate servers making it appear as if the web browsing is originating on those corporate servers.

Finding a VPN Provider

You can set up a VPN yourself with OpenVPN, but it’s fairly complicated.

I suggest using a paid VPN service. Because all your traffic goes through these servers and your bandwidth is limited by the speed of the VPN servers, you need to chose a VPN service that you can trust. Most VPN providers that I found look a little shady. There are lots of fake review sites as well that are clearly promoting particular sites.

StrongVPN

StrongVPN is a provider that describes their corporate history, locations, and services in detail. Their corporate headquarters is in California and by all appearances, they aren’t a shady company. As of this writing, they have 94 servers in the US in 8 locations.

They have setup instruction for Windows, Mac and Linux.

They have a page explaining how to make sure that Hulu, etc. will work for you:
Unblocking Geographically Blocked Sites

My colleague used StrongVPN without any problems. There is typically additional lag by going through the extra hop of a VPN, but the bandwidth from StrongVPN was good and it worked well enough to watch streaming shows while outside the US.

Slingbox

Unrelated to VPNs, another solution for video when traveling abroad (or anywhere) is Slingbox, which allows you to access your home cable box or DVR. See my old post: Watch Your Home Team with Slingbox.