Top 5 Smartphone Appreciations

Top 5 Smartphone Appreciations

1. Connecting with distant family and friends.
2. Organizing life with reminders and calendars.
3. Readily available info on almost anything.
4. Instant entertainment through games and movies.
5. Ability to get work done when not in office.

Top 5 Smartphone Annoyances

1. How much we and people around us use them.
Suggestions on how to change that make making your screen black-and-white or using functions make screen time. Also thinking about other ways you can build boundaries by keeping your phone in another overnight and being mindful in general.
2. Too hard to remember all of the passwords.
Try to find a system that works well for you. BB one bass password that has a capital letter and him and letters and numbers and then change it a little bit at the end according to what it’s for.
3. Updates that mess around with our understanding of how they work or decrease performance.
Sometimes updates are our phones. But sometimes we don’t realize good performance because we haven’t updated. Pick your poison.
4. How expensive many of them they are.
If you find a trusted seller you can buy refurbished phones much more affordably and if you don’t need the newest model you can save money on new devices.
5. How available I am to others even when I don’t want to be.
I am always accessible but I am not always available.

Email Best Practices

Don’t open emails from people that you don’t know.
If you have a business and regularly receive such emails, try to assess their validity from the body copy.
Don’t open attachments unless you know you are expecting a file from the person who sent the email.
Viruses often come in the form of attachments.
Don’t click on links contained in emails. Go directly to the site using your browser.
For example, if you have an urgent email from Paypal, get out of your email and go to Paypal.com yourself rather than clicking their link.
Use a spam filter, email scanner and Anti-virus program.
Some email servers like Gmail provide satisfactory services that vet your received emails.
Use a good password for your email account.
Many email services will immediately indicate the strength of your password.

What is the Cloud?

Technology is evolving at a breakneck pace and many people feel left behind, not even understanding proper terminologies and concepts. One such subject of confusion is the cloud.

Many people, whether or not they are aware of it, have data they store on the cloud or that they stream from the cloud. It’s important to note that your data is not actually up in the clouds.

In simpler terms, the cloud is basically a group of high-storage computers elsewhere onto which you can store copies of such things as your phone contacts, documents and photos or from which you can enjoy movies through Netflix or music through Spotify.

Being able to use the cloud allows you to not have to store all of this information on your devices.

We see a increase in cloud-based services largely due to the improving technologies of high-speed internet, which allow us to send and receive this information at more convenient speeds.
Your iPhone uses the cloud for such things as off-site backups and photo storage. You can also use the cloud to manage your data on much of the Google suite including Gmail, Google Docs, and Google Drive.

Some consumers are uneasy about having their sensitive data stored somewhere else, fearing a loss of control. Those are legitimate concerns, although many of the rest of us are simply resigned to the reality that in the age we live in the genie is already out of the bottle and it often seems a lost cause to spend too much energy worrying about things we either do not fully understand nor cannot easily control.

Do You Need Your iPhone Battery Replaced?

Think you might need your iPhone’s battery replaced? You probably do! Here are some things to considering when making that decision.

Check SETTINGS / BATTERY / BATTERY HEALTH. (iOS 11.3 and up, iPhone 6 and up).
Use an app like BATTERY HEALTH (link in comments) and check the wear level.
Getting less run time than in the past? Make sure you’re comparing apples to apples.
Does the phone shut off suddenly then come back on with a arbitrary battery percentage?
Is your phone more likely to shut down in cold weather?
Is your phone getting hot or is their smoke rolling out of it?
Has your phone been in service for more than 3 years without a battery replacement?

5 New Year Resolutions for 2019

Purchase Case
Devices can still break even when in a case, but having that sort of protection greatly reduces the probability. Find a case that offers you maximum protection with minimum annoyance. For example, a bulky case that you will get frustrated with then toss aside is of no good to you in the long run.
Read a Book
Many people used to engage in more healthful activities, but find it easy now to just quickly run to their device as a pacifier. Consider turning your phone off for stretches at a time and get into the practice of reading books.
Be Mindful of Consumed Content
Most every song, website, TV program and movie is available on our devices. Some of them are harmless but others have the power to corrupt aspects of our lives and our understandings of reality. Be mindful to let entertainment have the smaller place in the budget of your time and be careful of what you choose to consume.
Activate Automatic Backups
You can replace your phone but you cannot replace your data. Nobody thinks anything will happen to their phone until it does. Turn on automatic backups and pay for extra space if necessary. It is money well spent to protect precious memories and data.
Stop Driving Distracted
Take what steps are necessary to set your vehicle up to reduce the necessity and temptation of engaging with your phone while driving.

What To Do If Your Phone is Lost or Stolen

What To Do If Your iPhone is Lost or Stolen

Hopefully you never have to experience the anxiety of having your iPhone lost or stolen, but if you do, here are a few things to consider:

– All of your lock codes, Apple ID passwords and two-factor authentications that can sometimes be so bothersome to remember now prove to be an asset, as they offer both protection for the data on your device and also ways to find if it is lost.
– Having a lock code and associated fingerprint you use to open your phone will allow someone without your code or your finger to not be able to access your sensitive data such as photos, notes and much more.
– One preventative measure you can use to reduce the probability of permanently losing your iPhone is to have Find My iPhone activated. You can check that out by going to Settings, [your name], iCloud, Find my iPhone. Nobody will be able to turn this feature off without knowing your iCloud password.
– If Find My iPhone has been activated on your lost or stolen device, find another phone or computer and log on to iCloud.com. Once you enter your Apple ID and Apple ID password, you will be shown a map with the general location of your iPhone.
– Once your device has been located, you will have the option to play a sound from it to help you find its specific location, to erase the data from it or to place it in Lost Mode, which will display a phone number and message on the device and render every other feature unavailable.
– Keep in mind that Lost Mode, Play Sound and Erase Phone will no work if the phone is not connected to either cell service or Wi-Fi, but will be activated whenever the phone is connected to either of these two.
– If your phone is stolen, don’t try to retrieve yourself. Call the police.
– Contact your cell phone carrier to report the phone as lost or stolen to block its use on another carrier’s network.