#techtuesdays – Sherri Ross

Tag: #techtuesdays

19
Jan
2016

Do you Periscope? You should Katch.

It’s time again for #TechTuesdays with You Got Rossed!

A friend of mine recently started broadcasting on Periscope. If you don’t know what Periscope is, it’s basically live video streaming wherever you are while you’re doing or watching whatever. Anyone with a Twitter account can Periscope. Think of it as your own personal YouTube channel without a lot of the YouTube fuss. You download the app, you press a button, and viola – you’re live streaming to the world!

The good thing about Periscope is the ability to start sharing with anyone, anywhere, doing anything. The bad thing about Periscope is it doesn’t live on the internet indefinitely for people to watch later. Well, not on its own. When you start a Periscope broadcast you can choose whether to make it accessible after you finish the broadcast or not. If you choose to save it, people can open the app after you’ve finished and still watch your broadcast for up to 24 hours. If you don’t choose to save it, it’s deleted as soon as you’re done broadcasting. Until now…

Katch is a great application that integrates with Twitter to allow you to keep and share your Periscope (or Meerkat) broadcasts as you like. This is extremely beneficial for someone who has missed your ‘scope (as they’re called) and won’t be able to watch it for some time. With the Katch app, you can provide a link to it and they can watch it any time.

You can find out more about Katch at their web site here including learn how to use it and sign up for it.

Happy ‘scoping!

03
Nov
2015

#TechTuesdays: 5 Tips for Extending Your iPhone’s Battery Life

categories: #bloglikecrazy, #techtuesdays

Courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons License — Courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons

There are many ways to help prolong the battery of your iPhone, no matter if it’s on iOS 8 or 9 (though some work better on 9 than 8). Below are a few tips & tricks to help you get the most out of your battery.

First and foremost, for iOS9 users, there is now a ‘Low Power Mode’ built in. It will prompt you to switch to Low Power mode when your battery life reaches 20% or less, but you can turn it on any time you wish by going to Settings > Battery > Low Power Mode. I use this all the time when I know I will be away from a power source for hours. I can still send and receive text messages, but mail retrieval (among other things) is disabled until I exit Low Power Mode, making the strain on my phone very little.
Turning off Location Services in Settings > Privacy > Location Services. Again, anything that doesn’t need to be running in the background (including fetching your location for no good reason, which many apps do) will help extend your power. Note: Turning this feature off does prohibit “Find My Phone” from working (located under Settings > Privacy > Location Services > System Settings) so please use this sparingly when needed.
Turn off ‘Background App Refresh’ for apps you don’t use frequently. You can find it under Settings > General > Background App Refresh. I have this turned off period, but that’s a personal choice. The setting helps apps refresh data when needed, but I’m still able to get my live plays and scores from the ESPN app with it turned off.
Turning off sounds (as in keyboard clicks), vibrations, screen brightness, and more all save power. Setting your phone to auto-lock (Settings > General > Auto-Lock) also helps, too.
Manage Notifications. If you have notifications turned on for all, or most, of your apps then your phone is constantly checking for activity in those apps, reducing its battery life. Setting notifications for only your most important (or critical) apps can help reduce drain on the battery. Go to Settings > Notifications and click through each app in there to see what notifications you have turned on. Anywhere you are able, slide the button to turn OFF all notificationsfor that app and you will save some power. Seriously, do you need to know the minute Payless has a sale or someone repinned you on Pinterest?

I hope this helps you get a bit better battery life from your phone. If you would like more information or help with any of these tips – or any other technology questions – you can reach me at sherri [at] yougotrossed dot com. Happy Teching!

29
Sep
2015

#TechTuesdays: Data Plan, Money Saving Tip (+ BONUS) for iOS9

categories: #techtuesdays

Apple’s latest mobile operating system, iOS 9, came out September 16th with a slew of new features and upgrades including improved Siri, Apple Maps, and expanded Apple Pay. Along with the upgrades came a few hidden features aimed at optimizing battery life and phone performance. One of the gems they slid into iOS 9 is the new “Wi-Fi Assist” feature designed to help stabilize your connection when on a wireless network. This option is turned on by default in the new iOS and allows your phone to silently switch over to your data plan if the wi-fi signal you’re on or near is less than stellar. If you have an unlimited data plan, this option really isn’t a problem and can be left alone. However, for the majority of us without unlimited data plans, having this feature on can quickly eat through our allocated data plan. Scroll down for instructions on how to disable “Wi-Fi Assist” on your mobile device in iOS 9.

Go to Settings
Choose the Cellular menu (usually the 4th option – see Screen Shot #1 above)
Scroll ALL THE WAY DOWN to the bottom of that menu, past the Cellular Data, Enable LTE, Roaming, SIM, etc., past all the applications listing cellular data use, to the very bottom of the page. It should look like Screen Shot #2 below. (And now you also know I’m addicted to Yatzy.)
Listed under the list of apps is the “Wi-Fi Assist” option.
Slide the button next to “Wi-Fi Assist” to turn it off – it should turn grey (from green) when you do, indicating it is off.

BONUS TIP: This is also a good place to review the apps listed above the “Wi-Fi Assist” button to see which ones are data hogs for your phone. If you consistently run out of or over your data plan, consider accessing some of those apps via their full sites on a computer (if applicable) or deleting them all together if not needed.

I hope this helps some of you and feel free to submit any #TechTuesdays question you’d like answered to sherri (at) yougotrossed (dot) com. Happy Tuesday!

13
Aug
2015

30 Things I Love Right Now

categories: 30 Things I Love Right Now

Better late than never. Javacia, of See Jane Write, recently posted the 30 things she loves right now and invited us to do the same. So here I go:

1. Flash Tatts 2. Erin Condren goodies 3. Helping 4. This Michael Kors wallet I can’t afford. 5. JSON 6. Star gazer lilies 7. Woman (Oh, Mama) by Joy Williams 8. My tribe 9. Kat Von D Tattoo Brow 10. Getting money back when I shop 11. Learning the systems and people at my new job 12. Dancing in the dark 13. Sleep 14. Listening to cicadas 15. Torrid dresses 16. Summer storms 17. Therapy 18. Growing confidence, in myself and others 19. Happiness 20. My new #TechTuesdays on the blog 21. Sidewalk Film Festival 22. My new bongos 23. Contra dancing 24. Working on the revamp of my blog in my spare time 25. Beach trip anticipation – VACATION! 26. Lemon drops 27. Watching Gilmore Girls on Netflix 28. My Spotify playlists 29. Dressing up 30. Taco truck

30 Things I Love Right Now is a blog feature created by writer TJ Bietelman.

What do you love right now?

11
Aug
2015

#TechTuesdays: Getting Alerted When You or Your Blog is on Google

categories: #techtuesdays

Time for #TechTuesdays with yours truly!

A few years ago I heard about a neat little tool that has helped me stay on top of my blog showing up anywhere online. The tool is a Google Alert and if you’re not using it yet, you likely will be the end of this post.

Alerts are online, FREE tools that Google created to allow you to get emails for any keyword(s) you like. I have Google Alerts set up for my blog name (YouGotRossed), my personal name (Sherri Ross), my organizations (Birmingham Girls Club, Birmingham Dance Walk), and many other things. I get an email in my Inbox each time those search terms show up in a result somewhere, along with the link to the source, and I can see if someone has mentioned me or is sharing my blog.

To set up your own Google Alerts:

Go to http://www.google.com/alerts in any web browser (Internet Explorer, Safari, Chrome, etc.).
In the “Create Alert About” box type in your keyword or words that you want Google to search for.
Once you’ve typed in your criteria, you will see options underneath the search box that say “Create Alert” and “Show Options”.
Click the “Show Options” arrow to customize the alert for you and then click “Create Alert.” “Show Options” is where you can set the frequency of alerts you receive, where you received them and more.
You’re all done! Now when Google finds something matching your keywords, you will get an email.

Google offers some helpful tips for setting up your searches here. Feel free to reach out to me at sherri (at) yougotrossed (dot) com if you have any questions about this or any tech queries. Happy Teching, Blogloves!