iOS 6

Jailbreaking your iOS device allows you to modify your lock screen, home screen and even the appearance of your apps and how they are arranged. WinterBoard is a popular tool that allows you to alter the look of your device by downloading themes to your iPhone from Cydia. There are themes to change everything, including your lock screen slider, your iPhone keypad and even your Wi-Fi icon. WinterBoard offers so many more possibilities than just downloading drab wallpapers.

CustomSiriBackground lets you spice up Siri's boring look by giving her the background of your choice. There are also several WinterBoard themes which can change Siri's icon into something more fun. My favorite is Siri9000, which transforms Siri into HAL 9000 from the film 2001: A Space Odyssey. You can even change the Siri start up sound into a few Hal quotes with a little advanced jailbreaking know-how.

My personal favorite jailbreak tweak of 2012 was SwipeSelection, and it's compatible with the evasi0n iOS 6 jailbreak. SwipeSelection is one of those tweaks you have to use to truly appreciate. It's a simple tweak that makes texting, taking notes and writing emails on your iPhone or iPad a lot much easier.

SwipeSelection allows users to drag one or two fingers across the keyboard of an iOS device to move the typing cursor. This makes editing text much easier by eliminating the need to tap the display of your device to delete or change letters. You can use one finger for a more precise cursor drag, or two fingers to move faster across the screen. You can also easily delete or copy entire sentences by holding the shift key and dragging your finger over the text you want to highlight. This is all demonstrated in the original concept video from Daniel Hooper posted below.

The official iOS 6 jailbreak entitled "evasi0n" is now available for all iOS devices including the iPhone 5 and iPad mini. The jailbreak works with any Apple device capable of running iOS 6 or iOS 6.1, except the third-gen Apple TV. You can now download the Mac OS X, Linux or Windows versions for free from the official evasi0n website. This new jailbreak comes courtesy of an all-star jailbreaking team known as the evad3rs.

Here are three simple rules you should follow before jailbreaking your device:

- Backup your iOS device using iTunes or iCloud before using evasi0n. This way you are sure to never lose any data if something wrong happens.

- Please disable the lock passcode of your iOS device before using evasi0n. It can cause issues.

- Be patient while the jailbreaking process is running, don’t start iTunes or Xcode in the meanwhile. The best is to not touch the computer until the end of the jailbreaking process.

Unlike previous iOS releases, iOS 6 has been a tough nut to crack. However, pod2g has taken a break from developing apps to work on a solution with fellow iOS hacker planetbeing. This is great news since pod2g announced in September that he was not working on an iOS 6 jailbreak.

On Friday, planetbeing tweeted that the pair had made more progress:

Made some nice progress today with @pod2g. I think I'll try to reward myself with a nap. :)

— planetbeing (@planetbeing) January 19, 2013

Pod2g responded by announcing they had discovered two new vulnerabilities, but said they're still far away from a public release:

. @planetbeing oh yeah! 2 new vulnerabilities in a day, chance was with us. But we still miss that initial code execution for a public jb :/

— pod2g (@pod2g) January 19, 2013

If you've been having problems with the widely reported Do Not Disturb bug, rest assured it will self-fix on Monday January 7, 2013. Apple recommended a simple solution to temporarily fix the problem that has been keeping Do Not Disturb (DND) engaged past a scheduled time. iOS 6 users will have to manually toggle DND mode and disable Settings -> Notifications -> Do Not Disturb -> Scheduled until Monday.

So what caused this week of DND turmoil on iOS devices and prompted an Apple support document on the issue? Turns out that DND uses the ISO week date format, which wanted to compute the first day of the year as January 7. According to Ars Technica Apple even warns third-party developers of the problem, and steers them toward the Gregorian calendar instead.

Notice those Smart App Banners that appear when you're visiting a website in Safari on the iPhone? They can be convenient, reminding you that an app is available for download in iOS 6. If you already have the app installed, they will even prompt you to open the app.

Now it turns out a bug has been discovered, which according to AppleInsider will circumvent user-defined JavaScript settings. The strange behavior is only noticeable if you're in the habit of keeping Settings -> Safari -> JavaScript -> OFF. Once a Smart App Banner appears your JavaScript setting will automatically revert to ON.

Google has finally released a new Maps app for the iPhone after the Apple Maps fiasco.

iPhone users have been clamoring for the return of Google Maps since the release of the iPhone 5 and iOS 6, when Apple replaced the app with its own mapping software. Apple Maps has been widely ridiculed for giving inaccurate information, and has even become the butt of many jokes after Australian police claimed it was dangerous.

The new Google Maps features turn-by-turn navigation and the popular Street View and transit direction options missing from Apple Maps. David Pogue of The New York Times writes: "The brand-new, completely rethought design is slick, simple and coherent. Google admits that it’s even better than Google Maps for Android phones, which has accommodated its evolving feature set mainly by piling on menus."

A mysterious and unknown hacker calling himself (herself?) "Dream JB" is promising to release an untethered iOS 6 jailbreak for the iPad mini, latest iPad and iPhone 5 on December 22. Dream JB is not associated with any known dev team, and has said he will deliver video proof of the jailbreak via Twitter on Wednesday. If true, the new untethered jailbreak will support all current Apple devices running iOS 6.0.1. This includes the iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPhone 5, iPad 2 and beyond, iPad Mini, iPod Touch 4th generation and beyond.

Most jailbreakers only use jailbreaking tools from proven sources such as the iPhone DevTeam, or Absinthe creator pod2g. And not surprisingly, a large portion of the jailbreaking community is calling Dream JB's untethered jailbreak a scam. No one knows for sure if Dream JB will actually deliver a safe untethered iOS 6 jailbreak this December, but it will be interesting to see if his promised video actually materializes, and the jailbreaking community's reaction tomorrow.

Nokia plans to enter the Maps fray by bringing its own mapping application to iOS and Android devices. The company announced on Tuesday it is preparing to release a maps app called "Here" in the Apple App Store. The new application will be free for iPhone, iPad and iPod owners.

Nokia hopes offering the application free of charge to iPhone users will help keep the mapping platform competitive. Stephen Elop, chief executive of Nokia, said in an interview that the app needs users to help make the system smarter, but Nokia doesn't plan on giving all of its services away for free. For example, the City Lens app, which allows users to see information about a location when pointing the camera at it, will remain a Lumia phone exclusive.

“For the location platform to be at the highest quality, one needs scale, and you need as many different people contributing as possible,” Mr. Elop said. “Of course, Nokia will build apps, some of them unique to Lumia devices, that gain a competitive advantage for Nokia.”

AT&T has decided to stop charging some of its customers for using FaceTime over a cellular connection. iOS 6 customers with an LTE device on any tiered data plan will be able to use the feature at no extra charge. This also includes deaf and hard of hearing customers who qualify for "special text and data-only packages".

AT&T felt it needed to limit the amount of FaceTime calls out of fear that its network was not ready to handle the surge of video calls. The company added it will "also continue to offer FaceTime over Cellular to customers with any AT&T Mobile Share plan, as well as FaceTime over Wi-Fi, which has always been available for all customers".