iPod and iTunes Hacks

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Use the iPod’s built in Notes feature to turn your iPod into an information machine, carrying news, stock quotes, notes, and other scraps of information around with you.

The iPod is much more than a music device. With some nifty hackery, you can transfer loads of data to your iPod. If you’ve followed the manual, you’ve probably already transferred your Palm Contact and Calendar items. With this hack, we will add News, Weather, Movies, Stocks, Horoscopes, Lyrics, Text, and Directions to that list.

If you’re on a Mac, Pod2Go (http://www.kainjow.com/pod2go/; donateware) is for you. If you’re on a Windows box, check out iPodSync (http://iccnet.50megs.com/iPodSync/; $13.95; trial version available), which does many of the items covered in this hack. iPodSync works in a fashion similar to Pod2Go; we won’t discuss it directly in this hack, but the discussion of Pod2Go should give you plenty of info to get started.

When you launch Pod2Go the main window will load up, as shown in Figure 3-5. Here is where you configure Pod2Go with all the information you want to transfer to your iPod. Once you have made your selection, Pod2Go will download the data from the Internet and then transfer the data in note format to your iPod.

Figure 3-5. The Pod2Go interface

First, let’s pick some ...