Brayton cycles

Whatever wireless Xbox controller you have—whether it’s a controller for an Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, or Xbox One—more battery life is always good. Here are our top tips for extending your controller’s battery life, both in the long and short term. Power off Your Controller to Save Battery The easiest way to make your controller’s batteries last longer is to simply turn it off when you aren’t using it. You can do this manually at any point while playing a game: Press and hold the Xbox button in the middle of the controller, then choose “Turn Off Controller.” If you don’t touch your Xbox controller for 15 minutes, it will power off automatically. Unfortunately, there’s no way to override this setting at present (as you can on Sony PlayStation consoles). Got a Play and Charge Kit? Charge Smart The Xbox controller comes with a single set of disposable batteries. The easiest way to upgrade your controller to be rechargeable is to purchase Microsoft’s official Play … [Read more...] about How to Extend Your Xbox Controller’s Battery Life

Your Mac hijacking your cursor and asking you to wait around is never welcome. People call it different things, including the spinning wheel, beachball, or pinwheel of death. The good news is a spinning wheel means macOS hasn’t crashed completely. You might be able to wrestle back control. What Is the Spinning Wheel of Death on a Mac? That rainbow spinning wheel (whatever you might call it) is a common macOS wait cursor. It’s triggered when an application doesn’t respond for a few seconds and signals that you should wait before giving the app more instructions. This isn’t to be confused with the blue spinning wheel, which is also sometimes called the “JavaScript pinwheel.” A blue wheel mostly appears in web content when running Java apps. It usually occurs when a website sends a wait command. It often appears in web apps, like Google Sheets. How to Fix the Spinning Wheel of Death A spinning wheel (or beachball) is a sign from the operating system that an app isn’t … [Read more...] about How to Stop the Spinning Wheel on Your Mac

You can’t believe everything you read—or see. Social media is rife with manipulated or “Photoshopped” images. Here are some telltale signs you’re looking at an altered image. Airbrushing Is Easy to Spot Have you ever seen an image that just doesn’t look right? Trusting your gut might not be the most scientific approach, but you’re probably better at spotting a fake than you realize. If you see an image that sounds alarm bells, you might want to look a bit closer. You’ll probably spot some telltale signs that it’s been manipulated. Airbrushed images often fall into “ uncanny valley ” territory. Even if you have perfect skin, most light sources cast small shadows on fine wrinkles, pores, and other slight imperfections. When these imperfections are digitally removed, so is the appearance of natural lighting. Professional retouchers often strike a balance between perfection and realism, but amateurs and mobile apps rarely do. Apps, in particular, depend on existing skin tones … [Read more...] about How to Tell If an Image Has Been Manipulated or Photoshopped

Although not as customizable as Android, your iPhone or iPad can change app icons and add widgets to your home screen . Complete your dynamic home screen by automatically changing your wallpaper using the Shortcuts app. If you have an iPhone or iPad running iOS 14.3, iPadOS 14.3, or higher, you have access to a new “Set Wallpaper” action in the built-in Shortcuts app . As the name suggests, it lets you set the wallpaper from any input. For example, you can create a shortcut that randomly changes the wallpaper to any photo from a selected album—and this can be triggered at any time. To make things even more interesting, you can use the Automation feature in Shortcuts to automatically change your wallpaper at any time of the day or whenever you change location. In this example, we’re going to import a ready-made shortcut that will randomly change the wallpaper from an album. Then, we will create an automation so that it happens every day at 9 a.m. This way, you’ll have a … [Read more...] about How to Automatically Change the Wallpaper on Your iPhone Using Shortcuts

Apple Maps is only officially available on Apple devices like iPhones and Macs. But, thanks to DuckDuckGo , you can browse or get directions in Apple Maps from any platform with a browser, including Windows and Android. DuckDuckGo Uses Apple Maps In 2018, Apple announced the MapKit JS, an API that allows app developers to embed Apple Maps into websites. DuckDuckGo took this framework and used it to build its own mapping tool. To access it, simply search for a place in DuckDuckGo, then click on the Maps filter at the top of the page, as you would with any other major search engine. You can also try searching for a place name and including “map” in your query. You can get directions this way by searching for a place, then clicking on the “Directions” button and choosing between walking and driving. You can also view local businesses on a map, but for this to work, you’ll need to share your precise location using the map pin icon in the top-right corner of the map. … [Read more...] about How to Use Apple Maps in a Browser on Windows and Android