Technology

I’m always looking for faster and easier ways to do things. One of those things is searching the web for a person or term I come across but I’m not familiar with on iOS. If you want to look something up without using Siri[footnote]That is, not telling Siri, “Search the web for …”[/footnote] , which, is handy but in general quite shameful in public place, you have a couple of options. Let’s say you’re reading an article in an app that isn’t Safari–Reeder, Pocket, Instapaper, any news app–and you want to look up a person the article mentions. There are three options. And one that you’re probably not using takes the cake for fastest, but it’s a bit hidden. ...

With a newborn, our picture count is skyrocketing. A little person that looks like you is an exciting subject to photography. We want to share those picture with our friends and family, but we don’t want to go overboard on social networks and we want to have a sense of privacy as well. We’ve been using iCloud Photo Sharing, which is built into the iPhone and iPad operating system, and it feels like the perfect solution for us. ...

I’ve waxed on about eloquent systems for tracking the tasks you need to do every day. I’m still a huge fan of Omnifocus, and it’s my repository for tracking all the things I need to do and would like to do. However, sometimes I need a quick reminder to do something at a certain time. Because we live in Europe, many times that thing I need to do later is message a family member or friend in the States. because of the 6-hour time difference, I try to be a little more courteous and wait until they are awake, [footnote]Even though they should totally have Do Not Disturb enabled if they are iPhone users[/footnote] but I don’t want to forget to send the message. The reality is, if I don’t write something down or set an alert, I’ll probably forget to do it. Now that we’re in the stage of taking care of a newborn, the lack of sleep combined with slew of new tasks to keep a human alive keep me constantly disoriented. But some things, like “Take out the trash full of smelly diapers” or “Pick up batteries at the drug store” seem too miniscule to put onto a digital list or task manager like Omnifocus. Federico Viticci shares: I don’t want to save a timer for my pasta or a reminder to call my dad in the same service I use to keep track of articles and collaborative work projects. That’s where Due comes to the rescue. Due is a fancy little alarm app that allows you to set alerts to remind you when to do something. It’s essentially a glorified alarm app, with a whole lot more under the hood. So what makes Due better than your standard-fare alarm on the iPhone? I’m glad you asked. ...

Facebook is only as useful as the information it provides. Unfortunately, the default settings for the world’s largest social network intends to show posts from every person and page you follow (and a bunch that you don’t thanks to ads). That’s a nightmare. Thankfully, you’ve got options for tailoring your timeline so you don’t have to give up on it all together.[footnote]Unless you want to, and in that case, you’ve got my utmost respect.[/footnote] Facebook has an interesting dilemma–the more posts they show, the more likely you are to return. However, if they only show you crap you don’t give a hoot about, you’ll give up. So, they have to make it so you can tweak what you see, but not so much that they can’t sell ad space. This is the problem of being a product instead of buying a product. Before we start, you may be asking, “Why don’t I just unfriend or unfollow this person or page?” Well, maybe that’s what you should do, but if you’re scared of being viewed as mean, rude, or malicious, I’m helping provide a less intimidating option ...

Right now I’m writing on my iPad. But I’m not really writing. I’m dictating all of my speech to Siri, our favorite spastic iOS assistant. Everyone has had their bouts with her, going round and round between “Sorry I didn’t catch that,” blatant misunderstandings, and occasionally amazing precision. Huge improvements have been made over the years, and if you’re a long-time iOS user who was tired of taking Siri’s flack in the past and haven’t revisited her, I’d say give it another go. Now, she’s even correcting words as she sees the context changing, going back earlier sentences to make sure the words are correct, to the best of her ability. I just told her, “new paragraph” and she did the equivalent of tapping return twice. [footnote]So, yes, I had to come back and edit this line.[/footnote] You see, when I gave that new paragraph command she didn’t type the words “new paragraph”, but instead she inserted a new paragraph. The dictation has gotten pretty impressive over the years and now that you can see that the words are appearing on the screen rather than dictating a massive chunk of text and watching a spinning dotted circle for 20 seconds only to have nothing get typed because of a so-called network error. I wanted to share some of the best shortcuts Siri understands. Sure, it’s weird holding your iPad or iPhone a few inches in front of your face and speaking to a screen, but for longer messages it sure beats the socks off typing everything [footnote]like an animal![/footnote][/footnote] because I can speak a whole lot faster than I can type. ...

I follow a fair number of blogs using RSS, which is a bit uncommon in 2015. The death of Google Reader changed how we follow blogs, and I’d guess most people follow blogs or authors via Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, or email. I’m old school, so I thought I’d share how I read, follow, and share the best posts I find.  A simple workflow of following blogs and saving articles Twitter > Readability > Reader | RSS > Feedly > Reader An RSS Subscription Service I subscribe using Feedly. It’s a free service and honestly I hardly think about it because I merely use it to keep all of my subscriptions in one place. You could think of it as knowing if your credit card is VISA or MasterCard–it doesn’t make a significant difference–and you’re likely more attached to the bank or card company than the system that processes your payments. An RSS service is the (potentially unimportant) backend where everything is organized. The only time I login to Feedly is if I come across a blog I want to subscribe to while using my Mac. Otherwise, I merely sync Feedly with Reeder, the app I use to read blogs. Reeder for iOS I read the blogs I follow exclusively on iOS. I use Reeder ($5, universal iOS app) because it’s beautiful, connects with all my services,[footnote]Evernote, Pinboard, etc.[/footnote] and does more than I need to do without a clunky interface getting in the way of reading. I don’t use any apps to read on my Mac. The reading experience on an iPad is better because I can quickly navigate by tapping a screen to move between blogs instead of clicking around. When I read, I want to read a bunch of posts, all at once, and it feels cumbersome without a touch interface. Reeder has tons of gesture support and built in sharing, all while displaying blogs in a beautiful way. It makes following blogs that don’t have a great design a whole lot more enjoyable. ...

I’ve long been a fan of Kayak.com for all of my flight booking needs, but there’s a new sheriff in town. Hopper is a free iOS app that helps you find the best prices for flights. It’s a bit different from other apps and services because it uses algorithms to constantly check flight prices. You can set “Watch Trips” which alerts you the minute prices drop or if Hopper thinks prices will go up soon. Other services only do daily searches and send email digests, while Hopper is at work constantly. Here’s what makes Hopper better than Kayak. ...

Looking for the quick and dirty winner? It’s Backblaze for speed and price. Get a free month by using this link to give it a shot. No one needs a backup until they need a backup. It’s kind of like buying insurance–completely unnecessary until something goes wrong. Something most definitely broke when I spilled coffee on my laptop. Despite my best efforts to resuscitate it, [footnote]I did everything short of mouth-to-mouth, and if it would have worked, I probably would have tried that too[/footnote] my laptop was cooked. The silver lining is I was able to clean it up, disassemble the beast and sell the parts–with the disclaimer that they I baptized them in coffee–for some cash to mitigate the disaster. ...

Before you get into this post, know that it’s a 2,400+ word labor of love. This stuff is tricky for me to explain, but I cannot overemphasize how important it is, and that’s why you’re reading a preface to a blog post. The few minutes it’ll take to read this post and the 20-minute process of setting up 2-step verification is worth it. At the bottom of this post you’ll see all the links you need to get started. ...

I’m a data nerd. I love analyzing information, finding patterns, and seeing connections. But data for the sake of data isn’t valuable–it’s only meaningful if you apply that information to create change. In 2015, I’m purusing a more quantified life. If I know what I’m doing–tracking fitness, food, habits, thought patterns, sleep, spending, accomplishments–I can evaluate how I’m doing in pursuing goals and how effectively systems I’ve put into place to achieve things is working. In general, I prefer specific apps that perform a single function. Technically, I could keep track of all this information in Evernote, but after deleting hundreds of worthless notes in the past few days, I’ve opted for a different, better option. Each app does one (ok, maybe two) things exceptionally well, and I know exactly what I’m doing when I open it. [footnote]That means I don’t have the walk-up-to-the-refrigerator-and-forget-why-I’m-there feeling.[/footnote] Here are a few things I’m tracking this year and how I’m doing it. ...