Curious how to make iOS 4 multitasking on iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad behave the way you want it to? If you're Jailbroken, you have several options to choose from to help you make multitasking a little less cluttered and a lot more efficient. We'll show you how after the break!

There's a couple of things you'll need to do before we get started. First and foremost, you'll have to jailbreak your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad if you haven't alread (a very easy process). We've thrown up a few great how-to articles detailing the process using Greenpois0n, Limera1n and PwnageTool to help get you started. Once you're jailbroken you'll want to head over to Cydia and install the following packages:

• Backgrounder (free)
• SwitcherMod (free)
• Five Icon Switcher (free)

Backgrounder

Backgrounder is a system-wide extension that allows for full customization of which apps are allowed to continue running in the background after you return to the homescreen. The default way iOS 4 handles multi-tasking is completely reliant on the developer updating their app to support the different APIs Apple has made available. Unfortunately for older apps that haven't yet updated to support such features, iOS will kill the app when returning to the homescreen. Backgrounder fixes this by allowing all apps to run in the background by default. In addition, the app lets you choose which method of backgrounding to use (iOS native or Backgrounder's more traditional implementation). You can also use it to filter out apps that you don't want backgrounded.

Backgrounder will also put a small indicator badge on the bottom-right corner of any app that are backgrounded, making it easy to quickly tell which apps are multitasking. For the best results, we suggest using 'Auto Detect' across the board under the Global Settings pane.

SwitcherMod

SwitcherMod is an extension that lets you customize the app switcher in iOS, including letting you bypass the 'hold to wiggle' method for closing apps. Instead, when you bring up the app switcher with this option turned on, the close button will automatically appear over each icon, a much quicker and more efficient way of killing backgrounded apps.

In addition, SwitcherMod will let you change the behavior of how the app switcher displays apps that aren't actually running in the background. Something I personally find annoying about iOS 4 is when I see an app in the app switcher that isn't actually running in the background. Instead of thinking of the app switcher as a recently-used app launcher, I prefer using it as more of a place to go where I can see all of the apps that are actually open and running, which is a much more natural execution of the concept in general.

Five Icon Switcher

The last tweak you'll want to grab is Five Icon Switcher, which lets you set the amount of icons shown in the app switcher. You can set up to ten apps, but I prefer setting it to five in order to match the five icons in my dock.

Bonus tip: Users who want more than five apps in their app switcher can download Shrink from cydia ($0.99 cents), which does exactly what the name implies and shrinks down the icons in the app switcher with additional options to shrink icons in your dock and on the Springboard (iPhone Home Screen system) as well. This allows for a cleaner look when there's more than 4 apps in the app switcher.

Although Apple did a pretty amazing job with their multi-tasking system, we think these mods make it even better. Let us know if you have any questions or even better mods you know of in the comments below!

Tips of the day will range from beginner-level 101 to advanced-level ninjary. If you already know this tip, keep the link handy as a quick way to help a friend. If you have a tip of your own you’d like to suggest, add them to the comments or send them in to dailytips@tipb.com. (If it’s especially awesome and previously unknown to us, we’ll even give ya a reward…)

ProSwitcher [github link], the webOS "Cards"-style flickable, flick-to-close-able multitasking interface for Jailbroken iPhones running Backgrounder that we posted about last week has just gone primetime with version 1.0. You can find it in Cydia.

If you try it out, multitask us up a comment and let us know how it performs.

[via ShiekHali form the TiPb Jailbreak Forum, thanks also Wen Muenyi!]

If you're Jailbroken yet still frustrated that you can't move between iPhone apps as easily as you can web pages in Safari (or Palm webOS users can in card view), ProSwitcher [Free beta - Cydia] is something to consider.

A front end to Backgrounder, which enables multitasking on a Jailbroken iPhone or iPod touch, duplicates the "Pages" metaphor in MobileSafari, including swipe-able switching and X-icon closing, and for good measure adds in the swipe-up-to-close gesture from Palm's webOS "Cards" interface.

ProSwitcher is currently in free beta and available via Cydia at http://booleanmagic.com/repo. If you try it out, let us know how it works for you, and how badly you think Apple better add this in to iPhone 4.0!

[via JGold in the TiPb Jailbreak Forums, RedmondPie, and thanks Taimur for the pic!]

Running Backgrounder on your Jailbroken iPhone and looking for a little UI magic for your task switching? Check out MultiFl0w, free to try and $5 to buy, it's not free like Kirikae but it's fun.

If you give it a go, let us know how it works for you.

[MultiFl0w via Gizmodo, thanks Dylan for the tip!]

Today TiPb brings you round four of the Top 5 Must-Have Jailbreak Apps series, this one focused on what still makes Jailbreak compelling in a post-iPhone 3.0 world.

Now, all of the Jailbreak experts out there will (or should!) know about all these apps already. The purpose of this article is to give our readers who may not be familiar with the jailbreak community just a little taste of what is out there. So, if you’re still debating whether or not to jailbreak your iPhone, after reading this we are guessing that you will make up your mind one way or another...

All of the following applications can be downloaded via Cydia on your Jailbroken iPhone.

Read on after the jump!

GV Mobile

Is it really a shock that the first application in this article happens to be the latest and greatest app to be removed from the App Store by Apple? Right after the app's removal, developer Sean Kovacs tossed it directly into the hands of the jailbreak community. With GV Mobile and a Google Voice phone number you can do the following:

• Dial numbers via the iPhone address book or typing on the keypad
• Full SMS support (view historic, reply, send new)
• Retrieve and delete recent call history
• Playback and delete voicemails
• Take calls from different phones other than your iPhone
• Enable or disable the phones that Google Voice forwards calls to
• Add or delete phones that Google Voice forwards call to

Backgrounder

Backgrounder allows you to multitask App Store apps on your iPhone in the background. Yes, you heard me correctly, you can now listen to Pandora while you are in your favorite App Store app! This is your perfect opportunity to show Palm Pre owners how it's done.

Just press and hold the home key while running any application. After a few seconds, the "Backgrounding Enabled" pop-up appears. Release the home button, Backgrounder automatically returns you to SpringBoard. After that feel free to open any of application you see fit. To quit the background application, re-launch it from SpringBoard, then press and hold Home until the Backgrounding Disabled pop-up appears. It's as simple as that.

qTweeter

Do you find yourself on one of the million iPhone App Store Twitter clients most of the day? If you answered yes to that question you may just find this app worth a good look. qTweeter is status update application that lets you tweet messages and update your Facebook status. You launch qTweeter by sliding your finger down from the status area and can start tweeting right away. Then you simply press the update button to update your Facebook status, send your Tweet, or both.

Some features of qTweeter are as follows:

• Update Facebook and Twitter at once
• Update your status on top of any app
• TwitPic support
• TwitVid support
• Shortened URL
• Music Tweets, YouTube Tweets, Safari Tweets
• Long Tweet and TweetShrink support
• Fast shortcut to your other Twitter app

Winterboard

For those of you who really want to apply a different look to your iPhone user interface, Winterboard. is the app for you. Using Winterboard you can apply complete skins to your device or just specific parts of it. Some of the things you can customize include app icons, wallpaper, statusbar, dock, etc... You can spend hours tweaking your UI ways that will make you wonder why Apple didn't think of this.

SBSettings 3.0.2

The last app for today, SBSettings, addresses a common complaint that we hear a lot about the iPhone. Do you want a way to turn Wi-Fi on and off without going through all the settings? SBSettings can help you out. How about adjusting your screen brightness? How about the ability to toggle Bluetooth on and off with a single button on your home screen? Edge and 3G? I'm sure you get where I am going with this.

Conclusion

The jailbreak community seems to have a bright future with the way Apple has been keeping the App Store on lockdown lately. Whether you decide to jailbreak your iPhone - please remember TiPb and any and all staff and writers take no responsibility for any mishaps, mistakes, wrong doings, etc, that may occur during the jailbreak process.

For more on Jailbreaking and Jailbreak apps, see the TiPb forums!

Confession: Jeremy can't believe we're posting this, but after a bunch of forum questions, email queries, and a mini Twitter 'splosion, we figured we'd put this up as a public service message to the Jailbreak community.

First: don't panic.

Second: those strange little black icon badges that have suddenly popped up on your Phone, Email, iPod, and perhaps other apps? Yeah, that's because you installed Backgrounder, and that's how Backgrounder shows you which applications, built-in or user-enabled, are currently running background tasks (multitasking).

Third: enjoy.

A new application, Backgrounder, is now available for jailbroken phones! This allows you to run official App Store apps in the background. Yes, you can now listen to music while you are in your favorite App Store app!

With Backgrounder, you don't have to log into a secure shell session. You don't have to perform black magic. You just press and hold the home key while running any application. After a few seconds, the Backgrounding Enabled pop-up appears. Release the home button and go about your business. Backgrounder automatically returns you to SpringBoard. To quit the background application, re-launch it from SpringBoard, then press and hold Home until the Backgrounding Disabled pop-up appears.

Why Apple has not allowed apps to run in the background is beyond me. At first I thought that maybe the iPhone couldn't handle a few apps running at the same time so Apple rightfully did not allow it... well after trying this new app, which is only available to jailbreakers via Cydia, it is more than obvious that the iPhone indeed can handle apps running in the background.

So Apple when will you learn if you don't give us what we want, we eventually just take it...

So are you finally going to jailbreak your phone now? We've got step by step instructions up to Jailbreak the iPhone 3G for both Mac OS X and Windows PC users, and for the original iPhone 2G. Jailbreakers UNITE!!! Argh!!!!

[Via Ars Technica]