… for Cardiff u3a
A category that distinguishes posts created on the Cardiff U3A – Digital Group Google+ Community 2017-2018
Fed-up with selecting the wrong contact from you address book? Time for some tidy-up. This article also shows how you can sort out duplicates held on your iOS (iPhone/iPad) device by using iCloud, Apple’s cloud storage, where you can hold your contacts, so that means that if you’re an iOS/PC user you should be able to clean your iPhone contacts as well.
https://9to5mac.com/2017/02/09/how-to-remove-merge-duplicate-contacts-macos-ios/amp/
A lot to cover here. I’ll try and make it as readable as possible.
We found a great variety in the broadband speeds being experienced by members, but not surprisingly the best performance was obtained from those using BT fibre connections to the Cabinet at the bottom of the road (provided by a lot of Internet Service Providers – ISPs), or those using VirginMedia which delivers fibre to the property. I mentioned that it’s important to record your interest in having a VirginMedia Fibre Connection to Virgin – that’s how you’ll influence their infrastructure build.
[I was asked how much my VirginMedia connection cost. It’s difficult to provide a definitive figure as it’s bundled together with TV Services which includes a HD Recording Box. So £100.22 a month includes £50-£60 of TV services, I would guess.]Follow this link to get a better idea of what you might have to pay …
http://www.virginmedia.com/shop.html
The question of whether one had a ‘n’ or an ‘ac’ router was asked. I promised to research that. Here’s a link that explains the difference between the protocols and when they’re most appropriate.
http://homenetworkadmin.com/wireless-b-vs-g-vs-n-vs-ac-difference/
It’s important to remember that the same protocol needs to be used at both ends (router and device) so it will always be the slowest and usually oldest protocol that a router-device connection defaults to. Often however a router can operate in more than one mode, so you need to look at your router to see whether you have to configure this. For instance my routers allow me to connect at 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz (these are the wireless bands,). These are different from the channels which we discussed before and which I wrote about under flaky WiFi.
I’m afraid I can’t find a definitive way of finding which of ‘b’, ‘g’, ‘n’ or ‘ac’ a router is operating in. This article and the links it has should tell you a bit more about your home network.
http://lifehacker.com/5830886/know-your-network-lesson-1-router-hardware-101
It also covers WiFi security and snooping, which is not a problem if you use the most secure protocols, eg WPA-2.
Then there was a discussion on WiFi extenders and boosters. Essentially, from what I’ve read, a booster is a device that receives your WiFi signal from the router using WiFi and amplifies it to allow you to be further away from the router. A booster will often work by using the electric power circuit of your house (as long as it’s a single fusebox) to connect Ethernet over Power devices – sometimes called PowerNet. The equipment I use is from TRENDnet, called Powerline adaptors, and I purchased from Amazon. Here’s what I purchased in June 2015 …
… it gives me WiFi in the kitchen as well as a wired connection there, if I wanted it. I could connect up to 8 Powerline devices through the electrical mains.
That’s about it. I think I need a glass of whisky!!
This called tethering. [Health warning, some of the links may not be working.]
How do you do it? Well if you’ve got an iPhone you go to Settings > Personal Hotspot and switch it on. On that screen you’ll see a Password – note it, because you’ll need to supply that on your laptop/desktop/iPad when you attempt to connect to the internet.
Next you go to your laptop/desktop/iPad Network Settings and look at the WiFi routers that are available to you. If all has worked correctly then you should see your iPhone in the list of possible network connections. Click on it, supply the password you got in the previous stage when requested, and you should be set to go.
If it doesn’t work, you may find this link (for iOS devices) of some help …
https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT203302
For Android phones, the process is very similar and is described here …
http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/how-to/mobile-phone/how-tether-google-android-phone-image-3279408/
For a general view of how to tether your laptop to your smart phone, you could look at this …
Another Christmas lunchtime chat … this time with John and Philip.
We got to talking about missing address books, contacts and calendars … as you do at Christmas with perhaps labels to be printed and menu choices to be remembered.
I started off by saying that I’d decided to store my menu list in the Notes field in my calendar event – something so obvious, but something I’d never thought of doing before. This led to a mention of losing your paper-based address book – calamity.
I described my solution to the latter, and explained how I also enhanced the calendar experience to share both with my wife.
The trick is to setup a separate shared Google account for the two of you. I’ve previously suggested this is a good idea because you can use this address when you’re asked to supply an address by any retailer or utilities’ provider. Doing this means not only is the information shared between the two of you, but potential “junk mail” is all in one place.
So having your new Google account, you import all the contacts in your personal account into the new one. On your device you then disable (depending upon the device and email service) any contact list other than the new one. You do the same on your partner’s device(s). Any changes in Contacts on one device will change the same on the others. Bingo! You don’t need to worry about losing your paper-based Address Book again, and you should be relatively confident that your Contact list is up-to-date.
A different strategy for Shared Calendars. This is a really useful feature in Google Calendars. You can create multiple Calendars within an account, and share them with whoever you might want to.
Finally, all the above is predicated on the decision NOT to use the native calendar and contacts facilities supplied with your device. None of my far too many Apple devices use anything other than Google accounts. I may use the Apple application, but they only reference Google accounts.