Visit Your Library for Lifelong Learning – A Lot of People are Doing It!
Libraries are amazing. For me, they have become so much more than the card catalogs and shelves of books that I remember from my youth. They have changed. Today they are support hubs for your lifelong learning.This begs three questions:Do you visit the library? Do you know that you can "visit" the library to read books without physically going to the library?And best of...
News & Nuggets Archives
Cell phones are notorious germ hosts. Scientists at the University of Arizona have found that cell phones carry 10 times more bacteria than most toilet seats. They can be nasty. And think of all of the times where an iPhone is passed around when showing photos or other information. And all of this research came before we ever heard of COVID-19 the spreading coronavirus. Clean your iPhone with Disinfectant Wipes Apple just yesterday updated their support document on cleaning your iPhone giving approval to use disinfectant wipes like Clorox Disinfecting Wipes or another 70 percent isopropyl alcohol wipe. This was a change in that previously, Apple discouraged this type of cleaning as harmful to the special coatings applied to the device. Here is the updated information found on the Apple Support Document, Cleaning your iPhone. Using a 70 percent isopropyl alcohol wipe or Clorox Disinfecting Wipes, you may gently wipe the exterior surfaces of your iPhone. Don’t use bleach. Avoid getting moisture in any openings, and don’t submerge your iPhone in any cleaning agents. So as we are vigilant about our health in the face of this global pandemic, it’s a good time to reserve a few wipes to clean our phones. And for the coming weeks, we should hesitate passing our phones around. Put it in the same category as a handshake. It’s an activity that can wait until the current virus spread begins to wane. Last week in our News and Nuggets newsletter, we discussed the ability to borrow ebooks from your library using the Libby app. As we continue our Never Stop Learning theme focusing on reading ebooks, it is good to know that there are other sources of FREE ebooks that you can read on your smartphone or tablet. Reading does not have to be expense nor does it have to require monthly payments. In this weeks featured Nugget, we feature classic books found on the Gutenberg project. The Gutenberg project is perfect for those who want to catch up on some of those classic books that you managed to avoid during your school days. What books are available? There are over 60,000 books available for download for FREE. Here is a list of the most popular books captured from a screen shot from the site on March 10, 2020. See any books on this list that you would like to catch up on? You might make your high school English teacher proud! Check our this week’s featured Nugget for information about how to read books from the Gutenberg Project. Never Stop Learning! Featured Recipe This Senior Tech Club Recipe is normally only available to paid members of the club. However in order to share across the community, we have opened it up for everyone’s learning. If you appreciate the learning opportunities we provide, consider a paid membership to support our efforts. This link will give you a 25% discount on an annual subscription with the coupon code “nuggets.” News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. Libraries are amazing. For me, they have become so much more than the card catalogs and shelves of books that I remember from my youth. They have changed. Today they are support hubs for your lifelong learning. This begs three questions: The Popularity of the Library There was a surprising information in a survey taken by the Gallup organization that reports that visiting the library is the most common cultural activity of Americans. In fact, the numbers propose that going to the library is more common than going to the movies and a dozen other recognized activities. This report leads to my question, do you visit the library to help you stay active and engaged as lifelong learners? Make the Public Library your hub for lifelong learning. Virtual Visits to the Library I consider myself an active user of the library. However I probably only physically visit the library once a month. I borrow eBooks, read magazines and take an occasionally class all without actually visiting the library. I don’t know if the Gallup report includes my type of visit. Regardless, I applaud my local library (Hennepin County Library) for adapting and providing the types of resources that allows older adults to “visit” the library with the help of their smartphone, tablets and computers. Borrow Books for FREE My favorite library resource allows me to borrow ebooks to read on my table or smartphone. Although my library offers multiple tools for borrowing and reading ebooks, my favorite app is Libby. Using Libby you can browse the library including ebooks and audio books, borrow books, place holds on books you would like to read but are currently borrowed by other readers, read books, listen to audio books, return books. It is a complete tool for “visiting” the library. In the spirit of helping older adults be lifelong learners, this week’s Nugget features the Libby app. Libby is an app that works with the OverDrive library. Rakuten OverDrive is a global distributor that works with over 43,000 libraries, schools and organization across 75 countries. Libraries contract with OverDrive to provide their communities access to the OverDrive library. What about my Local Library? This week’s Nugget includes a link from OverDrive where you can search to determine if you local library uses the Libby app for access to it’s ebook collection. Or you can browse your local library’s website for information about OverDrive and other resources for lifelong learners. Featured Recipe
This Senior Tech Club Recipe is normally only available to paid members of the club. However in order to share across the community, we have opened it up for everyone’s learning. If you appreciate the learning opportunities we provide, consider a paid membership to support our efforts. This link will give you a 25% discount on an annual subscription with the coupon code “nuggets.” News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information.
Are you a curious person? Dr. Daniel J. Levitin, cognitive psychologist and neuroscientist writes in his book, Successful Aging: A Neuroscientist Explores the Power and Potential of Our Lives (Senior Tech Club will earn a small fee if you purchase this book from this link) Openness and curiosity correlate highly with good health and long life. Curiosity is a good thing and your smartphone is a tool that can support a thirst for information. There is more good news for the curious. Today we search the Internet to search for information. Many will “Google” in order to learn about a topic. It’s a common approach for the curious. Research coming out of the Longevity Center at UCLA suggests that searching the Internet is good for the brain. Internet searches exercise the brain beyond the exercise of plain reading.
Findings indicate that Internet searching appears much more stimulating than reading. And the research report provided by Psychology Today, specifically calls out the benefit for older adults. Older adults who are curious might be helping their brains when they search for answers. And many will search using Google. Doing a Google search in your Safari browser couldn’t be simpler. You can enter your search terms directly into Safari address bar. To help you with your Google skills, this week’s featured recipes provides notes and tips for using Google on your device. The recipe includes eight tips for getting more out of your Google searches. For example, did you know that if you are expecting a package from UPS, FedEx or USPS, you can enter the tracking ID that you have received in an email directly to a Google search in order to learn delivery details. You don’t have to go to the shipper’s website! And as you use Google, smile a little at the thought that you might be helping your brain a little. See, curiosity is a good thing. Featured Recipe
This Senior Tech Club Recipe is normally only available to paid members of the club. However in order to share across the community, we have opened it up for everyone’s learning. If you appreciate the learning opportunities we provide, consider a paid membership to support our efforts. This link will give you a 25% discount on an annual subscription with the coupon code “nuggets.” News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. One of the more visible changes that came with IOS 13 is the redesigned share sheet. The share sheet is the screen that pops up when you press the Share icon in apps like Photos or Safari. We have discussed Share previously as the source of several hidden functions that you can access from Photos or Web sites. From the Share sheet you can print, copy, share and more. We identified some of these hidden functions in Nugget #N16 The Hidden Functions of Share. With IOS 13, the core functions of the Share sheet have not changed. But what has changed is the design and being able to customize the Share sheet. For example, if when you are view photos in the Photos app, you frequently want to move a photo to an album, you identify that action as a favorite so that is is presented at the top of your Share action list. It becomes available right under your fingertips at the top of your Share sheet, rather than having to scroll down a long list of options to find it. This week’s features nugget will review the new Share sheet and show you how to customize the Share sheet by adding favorites to the top of the action list. Customize your Share Sheet for quick access to your favorite share functions. Perfect for people who like to organize their photos into albums and want to put the Add to Album command at the top of the action list. Featured Nugget
News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. For a minute, I’d like you to think about how your learned how to type. For many of us that went to school in the sixties, this was a typing class. I learned to type in a year-long typing class where we not only learned how to type but also learned how to format and type letter, memos and term papers. At the time, the typing class was considered a necessary prerequisite for attending college. My typing classroom was equipped with both electric and manual typewriters with the front row occupied by the newfangled IBM Selectric typewriters. It was the latest innovation in typing. Today, I’m introducing another newfangled typing approach that comes in IOS 13. Apple calls it QuickPath but it is more commonly called swipe typing. The concept of swipe typing requires you to slide your finger across the keys of the keyboard rather than tapping each individual letter. You lift your finger only between words. As a person in one of my classes said, it is sort of the equivalent of using cursive handwriting on your keyboard where you slide and loop between the letters. It’s a typing approach that is easy to try and you can decide for yourself if it is right for you. On your iPhone with IOS 13, your test requires no setup or app installation. Just start swiping. Find more details in this week’s featured Nugget. The world record for fastest typing of a text message was done using swipe typing! Featured Nugget News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. It’s the first tip in the list of consumer recommendations from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) for stopping unwanted Rococalls and texts. (Click here for the full list) Don’t answer calls from unknown numbers. If you answer such a call, hang up immediately. Calls from telemarketers and robocalls are running rampant. We would just like it to stop. One of the best new features of IOS 13 won’t stop the calls. But it will silence them. This feature is my favorite new thing in IOS 13. This week’s featured Nugget introduces you to Silence Unknown Callers. The concept is simple. When enabled, your iPhone rings only for calls from phone numbers in your Contacts, Mail, and Messages. And even better, setup is easy. I hope it is also your favorite thing about IOS 13. You’ll won’t be answering unknown callers. Featured Nugget News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. One of the new features of IOS 13 is Dark Mode. Dark Mode is the iPhone feature that will reverse the color palate of your standard iPhone apps and essentially give you white text on a black background. Dark mode seems to be occupying the technology red carpet as one of the today’s hottest tech trends. There might be some benefits. On phones with newer OLED screens (currently iPhone X, iPhone XS, and iPhone 11 Pro,) Dark Model will save battery life. It may reduce eye strain. It is certainly less disruptive if you are reading your iPhone in bed next to your partner. But after reviewing some of the hard facts you might conclude that any benefits to health or cognition might be a little soft. That’s OK. How about if we just call it cool. And those of you who worked on green screen computers or terminals decades ago might shrug and say, “I’ve seen dark backgrounds before.” Another case of what goes around comes around. In either case, try it out yourself on your iPhone or iPad. Use the Control Center to make it easy. It is the topic of this week’s featured Nugget. Featured Recipe
News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. A couple of weeks ago, I went to see the movie Judy. The movie is about the legendary Judy Garland when she arrives in London in the winter of 1968 to perform a series of concerts. The movie brought back a lot of memories. I remember watching the Wizard of Oz on television when it was an annual television tradition in the 1960’s. Before the movie Judy, I was not aware or had simply forgotten that Liza Minnelli was Judy Garland’s daughter. And then there was Mickey Rooney. He had a small feature in the Judy movie and there were questions about his life. Those questions are a perfect opportunity to use Siri to get answers. Siri happens to be quite quite versed in movies, celebrities, sports and more. So I summoned Siri and asked, When did Judy Garland die? How many husbands did Judy Garland have? Where was Judy Garland born? How old is Micky Rooney? The curious will discover that Siri can readily answer a multitude of questions about celebrities, entertainment, sports and more. This brings us to our Smart Tip: In working with our community, I find that many seem uncomfortable using Siri. We understand. It is frankly a little strange talking to your device! Our recommendation is to just start asking questions of Siri. It’s perfect for the curious. And a great way to get comfortable using Siri to not only get answers to your questions but to also make your life easier. Start with questions and soon you will be using Siri to set alarms and timers. make grocery lists and more. Featured Recipe This recipe is normally a protected page only available to Senior Tech Club members. However, anyone can access this lesson using the button below. If you get value from our lessons, please consider a membership in the Senior Tech Club. . News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. The Senior Tech Club wants to provide information that will help keep you safe online and with your devices. One of the tips offered by the National CyberSecurity Alliance to help protect yourself and stay safe online is to make sure you secure your devices Here is the recommendation from their StaySafeOnline website. Lock your devices, like your tablet and phone: You lock the front door to your house, and you should do the same with your devices. Use strong passphrases or passcodes to lock your tablet and phone. Securing your devices keeps prying eyes out and can help protect your information in case your devices are lost or stolen. Let’s start with a Passcode Then add Biometrics All iPhones since the iPhone 5s have offered a biometric security tool. Touch ID: If your iPhone has a Home button and is an iPhone 5s or newer, you can use a fingerprint to unlock your iPhone. Using either approach is not only more secure but once you get used to the necessary action, will be faster and more convenient when you need to unlock them. For example, are have a Kodak moment that you need to capture with your iPhone, Touch ID or Face ID will allow you to capture that moment more quickly. This week, we offer two Senior Tech Club recipes to help with the setup of your security tools. Both of these recipes are normally only available to Senior Tech Club members for as our final aide in recognition of National CyberSecurity Awareness Month (October) we will make them available to all. We want you to secure your devices. It is a smart tip! Featured Recipe Passcodes and Touch ID Featured Recipe Face ID News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. It is our #1 security tip. This comes not only from the Senior Tech Club, but from the National CyberSecurity Alliance where they say, When in doubt, throw it out: Links in email, social media posts and online advertising are often how cybercriminals try to steal your personal information. Even if you know the source, if something looks suspicious, delete it. Let’s start with Email In 2018, Verizon published some staggering information that identified that 92% of malware is delivered by email. Our response? When in doubt, throw it out. If you get an email in your inbox that doesn’t seem right or perhaps seems to good to be true, delete it. Your Spam/Junk folder in your Mail app is a scary place. Most of your major email providers provide spam filtering which will hopefully prevent most of these scams and phishing emails from showing up in your inbox. However, you have to be on the lookout. Our “When in Doubt, Throw it Out” mantra also applies to text messages that you receive in the Messages app. And with the growth of mobile devices that can receive text messages, the number of bad people focusing on text messages is also growing. Here are some tips and recommendations from the Federal Trade Commission (full article) to help you with text message spam: How to Throw it Out. There are two tips when you identify an email that you need to throw out. Apps on your iPhone and iPad will consistently use the Trash icon for your delete action. Here are examples in three of the apps installed on your iPhone. You can consistently look for the Trash icon in your apps when you need to Throw it Out. In this week’s featured Tip/Nugget, we want to remind you that it is easy to delete mail, messages and more from a list by swiping left on the list item. Please continue reading below for more details and examples. Featured Nugget News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. Our community is often targeted by bad people. The bad people we are talking about include scammers, hackers, phishers, and distributors of badware. We want to fight back and we want to enlist your help. October is National Cybersecurity Awareness Month (NCSAM). Held every October, NCSAM is a collaborative effort between government and industry to raise awareness about the importance of online safety and to ensure that all Americans have the education and resources they need to be safer and more secure online. The Senior Tech Club is an NCSAM Champion. We are committed to helping you stay safe. We will use the month of October to focus our weekly News and Nuggets email on topics and conversations that will help stay safe and secure online. We will do this as you continue to build your skills and confidence with your devices. Every week in October we will share a tip, a nugget or information that will help keep you safe. Keeping your internet-connected devices free from malware and security holes makes the internet safer for you and more secure for everyone.There are several recommendations that come from the National Cyber Security Alliance on their StopThinkConnect.org site under the theme, Keep a Clean Machine. Here are two important recommendations for our community of iPhone and iPad users: 1. Keep your Software up to date. With your iPhones and iPads, this means that you should try to keep your IOS (the software that runs your phone) updated to the latest practical version. At the Senior Tech Club, we like to be practical about this. We don’t encourage our community to be among the first to update to the latest version. But after the dust settles, we encourage you to complete your updates. We dedicate a page on our website to the latest recommendation. This is our first featured nugget of this week’s email. 2. Remove Unused Apps. We recognize that with your iPhones, there is an app for everything. Sometimes you install apps that you may not use or use only temporarily, for example an app used on a vacation. It’s a good plan to keep your machine clean by removing unused app. Our second featured nugget of the week will show you how. Our Recommendations to help you Keep a Clean Machine Featured Nugget #1
Featured Nugget #2
News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. Last week I made a trip to my local USPS Post Office to mail an oversized envelope and to pick up mail that was on hold while we were out of town. The service was perfect and in a couple of minutes I had my mail in hand and had paid the charges for the envelope. The postal clerk took the receipt and circled the QR code at the bottom of the receipt and asked me to rate my experience. “Absolutely” I said as I gathered my mail to head out the door. You find QR codes pretty frequently on information signs, help wanted signs, in retail stores and more. Last spring there was even a QR code on the bottom of my property tax statement offering information about how my tax dollars would be spent. Scanning a QR code to access a website is a hidden feature of your iPhone or iPad since IOS 11. All you do is launch the Camera app, point to the QR code and tap the banner presented at the top of the page. This week’s tip features the online nugget that helps with this process. And yes, I did give this experience a five star rating. However, I was a little disappointed that I had to identify the transaction date and location on the web site after scanning the code. A QR code would have been capable of saving that typing also! QR (Quick Response) code is a barcode first used in the automotive industry in Japan. Now they are commonly used in consumer advertising as it eliminates the need to type a web address. With your iPhone, just scan the code… Featured Nugget
News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. Do you go grocery shopping with your iPhone? I’m not talking about using your phone to make calls during your shopping adventure. Although I have to say that I’ve made dozens of calls back home for clarifications on my shopping trips. I’m really asking about using your iPhone to create your shopping list using the Notes app. This week, I’d like to take it one step farther. Could you create your shopping list handsfree using Siri? Picture yourself standing in front of your refrigerator with your iPhone in hand and saying the items that you need to purchase while Siri creates the note in the Notes app. Later you read that same note as you walk the aisles in the grocery store. It’s actually pretty easy and quite efficient. In this weeks featured nugget, you will learn how to use the Notes app handsfree so that you can create your shopping list. Give it a try and pat yourself on the back for your accomplishment. There are essentially two challenges to this grocery list challenge. This week’s Featured Nugget will help with both challenges. Featured Nugget News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. There was a question in my class recently that had a very familiar answer. The question…”How do you save a picture you receive in a text message?” The solution is quite hidden and not obvious. But to make a point related to this week’s Nugget, let me ask a few more questions? This point….The solution to each of these questions is identical!! This week’s featured Nugget encourages you to explore the magic of Share and all that it can do in the apps on your iPhone and iPad. When you have a question about how to accomplish a function in an app, consider the Share icon as the gateway to many of the things you need to do. Please read more.. Your iPhone apps will have many hidden functions that are accessed using the Share icon. Given the number of options that are presented with Share it almost makes the function magical. Featured Nugget News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. This summer might be a good time for you to explore podcasts and put this world of knowledge and entertainment in your hands. Podcasts are perfect for your summer road trip or relaxing vacations. Or, on the flip side of relaxation, a podcast is a great diversion from traffic delays due to summer road construction. Or if if you already listen to podcasts, summer might be the perfect time to explore new topics and new voices. Podcasts are audio programs that are made available on the internet. They are downloaded to your computer or iPhone or iPad for playing anywhere or anytime. They are great for learning and staying engaged with all kinds of topics. Podcasts are becoming increasingly popular. Why? They are convenient and fit easily into our busy lives, especially portable using your iPhones. Even if you only have a few minutes. They are personal by providing information of interest to you. Prefer news? Documentaries? Hobbies? Politics? Comedy? You’ll find a podcast that matches your interest. Because Apple is one of the major distributors of podcasts, using the Podcasts app on your Apple device is easy and convenient. Simply launch the Podcasts app, browse or search for a podcast and play. It’s easy And the Podcasts app even works nicely with Siri. “Hey Siri, Play podcast American Life.” And best of all, podcasts are FREE and have limited commercial interruption. This week’s feature Recipe will not only get you started but will also suggest a handful of popular, award-winning podcasts to get you started. Featured Recipe
News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. Summer is the time for travel, not only for members of our community but families of all types. If your summer plans include travel, you will be joining tens of millions of other travelers heading out to every corner of our nation and the world. Your iPhone is an essential part of your travel gear. You will use it to stay connected, take photos, stay in touch with the news, read some good books and help you find the way. And losing your iPhone would put a big damper on your fun. So what can you do to keep your phone secure? The National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA) offers several tips for people traveling with phones. First and foremost is simply securing your devices. It is important to remember that any device, whether laptop, phone or tablet should never be left unattended. Try to keep your devices with you. If you are staying in a hotel, the best thing to do is lock them in a safe. Or if a safe is not available, lock them in your luggage. NCSA also recommends that you enable specific actions and functions on your iPhones and iPads. Set up the “find my phone” feature on your devices. This will allow you to find, remotely wipe data and/or disable the device if it gets into the wrong hands. This is a topic that we explore at the Senior Tech Club site and is this week’s featured tip. Here are travel scenarios where the Find iPhone function on your Apple device may save your vacation. You don’t need another Apple device with you to perform these functions. Once they function is set up, you can perform all of these actions by signing into your iCloud.com account on any hotel, coffee shop or even a borrowed computer. In this week’s Tech Tip, we will feature “Find My Phone” found in Nugget # N14 where you can learn how to activate the functions and get started. Featured Nugget
News & Events Here are news and events on the Senior Tech calendar for the coming weeks. Reply to this email if you want more information. In celebration of Older American Month, we will share and explore shortcuts. A shortcut is defined as an accelerated way of doing or achieving something. And your iPhone and iPad offers dozens of shortcuts that are not just nice to know but are fun to use and share. This ranges from keyboard shortcuts, widgets, actions and even a new Shortcuts app. Every week this month, we will share a shortcut that you can use to save time and effort. In May, the Senior Tech Club will focus on Shortcuts that you can use on your devices. These shortcuts will help you use your device to connect, create and contribute. Every May, the Administration for Community Living leads our nation’s observance of Older Americans Month. This week, we will share the idea of Keyboard Shortcuts. A Keyboard Shortcut will save time and taps as you type text messages and emails. Read more below… Featured Nugget Do you have a common phrase that you find yourself texting frequently? Or is there a common closing that you add to your emails? If you do, you can create a keyboard shortcut that saves time and typing. By creating a shortcut you can turn turning a couple of characters, e.g. “gm” into a commonly-used phrase like, “Good Morning.” This Nugget will show you how to create and use Keyboard Shortcuts. News & Events Below are the news and headlines from the Senior Tech Club. This includes events and items of note from the Club. Here are the highlights: During this month we have been looking at some functions that you can use to help with your device spring cleaning. Not only are these tips helpful to keep our device tidy and organized, but are also good for your safety and security. The National Cyber Security Alliance and the Better Business Bureau encourage us to do a digital declutter this spring. They offer a Tip Sheet to help with that effort. The National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA) and Better Business Bureau (BBB) are encouraging all consumers to freshen up their online lives by conducting a thorough cleaning of their cyber clutter. In April, the Senior Tech Club will offer tips that will help with your digital spring cleaning. Let’s make it an annual ritual to help protect your personal data. In our tips from previous News and Nuggest emails this month we have recommended: Week 1 Nugget #20 Swipe Left to Delete from a List Useful when you are cleaning up text messages, emails, notes and more. Just swipe left to remove items from list. Week 2 Nugget #35 Deleting apps from your iPhone or iPad When you have apps that you no longer use, this Nugget and demo video shows the easy steps to deleting apps. This week, we will share another storage-saving Nugget about how you can save storage by having your iPhone or iPad automatically offload unused apps while still preserving that apps data. Read more below… Featured Nugget There is a capability that started with IOS 11 that will automatically offload apps that are unused and restore the storage that they use. Best of all it is easy and will happen automatically once setup. News & Events There are multiple events on the Senior Tech Club calendar in the coming weeks. Here are some highlights: Many of us grew up with the annual tradition of spring cleaning. In many houses this is where the really deep cleaning would occur as the household was beginning to appreciate warmer spring weather. I’m sure many Senior Tech fans can tell stories of spring cleaning traditions. You can also do spring cleaning on your iPhones and iPads. In fact, the National Cyber Security Alliance and the Better Business Bureau are encouraging you to do a digital declutter this spring. They offer a Tip Sheet not unlike the checklist that you might have with your home. The tip sheet recommends that you: Clean up your email: Save only those emails you really need and unsubscribe to email you no long need/want to receive. Let’s start with a tip for cleaning up emails, notes, text messages and more. In fact, this week’s featured Nugget is a tip that you can use to delete many device elements that are presented in a list. It’s as simple as swiping left. The National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA) and Better Business Bureau (BBB) are encouraging all consumers to freshen up their online lives by conducting a thorough cleaning of their cyber clutter. In April, the Senior Tech Club will offer tips that will help with your digital spring cleaning. Let’s make it an annual ritual to help protect your personal data. Featured Nugget There is a common but hidden delete function that is often available when items are presented in lists. Simply swipe left on the item that you want to delete. Swipe left to delete a note from the Notes list Tap the button below to read more from this Nugget and where this spring cleaning tip can be used. News & Events There are multiple events on the Senior Tech Club calendar in the coming two weeks for members and fans living in the Twin Cities area. Here are some highlights: I can honestly say that I have saved hundreds of dollars by watching YouTube videos. Not a bad deal!! A recent example was when my automotive repair shop quoted me $80 to replace the cabin air filter in my Prius. After searching and watching a YouTube video (< 4 minutes), I ordered the part from Amazon (about $9) and had the replacement in place in about 15 minutes. My savings was over $70 and a scene that I have duplicated multiple times. This savings is one reason why I believe that gaining some facility with YouTube is a Senior Essential. It offers so much including News, Entertainment and of course, Learning. Even though watching a video on YouTube is FREE, I think it’s also important to understand how YouTube (owned by Google) makes money. Then there are other essential skills and knowledge. Do I really need to log in? Do I need to install the app on my iPhone or iPad to take advantage of the platform. How do I search for a video. These are all questions that we answer in this week’s featured Recipe #440 YouTube Video Basics. Featured Recipe Recipe #440 will give you the basic skills you need to understand and use YouTube for news, entertainment and learning. Click below to read the entire recipe. The Senior Tech Club has covered social media tools extensively. Here are additional Recipes and Nuggets for members that wish to pursue additional and/or advanced information on the some of your favorite social media platforms: Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets on Social Media pltforms: Spotlight Search on your iPhone or iPad is an awesome resource. And this week I learned a couple of new capabilities that I wanted to share. Spotlight Search is the search function that you access by swiping down from the middle of your home screen. See the featured nugget below for a more detailed description about accessing the search function. The most prominent element of the Spotlight Search function is the Search bar at the top of the screen. So what can you type (or dictate if you use the microphone next to the space bar on the keyboard) into the search bar? That is the surprising thing about spotlight search. You can make so many types of requests. New for me this week included: Spotlight Search Bar These search capabilities are in addition to the one search function that I use every week. That is, finding an app on the iPhone. It might be an app that is buried in a folder on some screen and you simply type the name of the app into the search bar to find and launch it. There are just a couple of apps that I use occasionally that I wouldn’t be able to find without scanning Home screens. Get more ideas about Spotlight search in our Featured Nugget below. Featured Nugget Have you ever lost an app on your iPhone. You’ve scanned all of your Home screens and just don’t see the app that you know is on your iPhone. Or you have simply lost a document, marked location, text message or something else on your iPhone or iPad. IPhone Search may be the answer. The Search function on your iPhone gets results from your apps but also from the Internet, from Maps and Contacts and more. Most of the experts and resources call this function Spotlight Search. But when you view Apple documentation, they just refer to it as iPhone Search. In this Nugget, we’ll show you what it can do and you can call it what your want!. We have affordable membership plans that will offer ongoing and affordable learning from the Senior Tech Club. However, if you have questions, the best way to get a feel for the club is to sign up for a FREE trial membership. It seems that we Seniors can sometimes be obsessed with how old someone is. Maybe we are comparing. Maybe we are applauding the accomplishments of “older” people. Regardless of the reason, when Joan and I are sitting and watching award shows like Sunday night’s Oscar awards show, you will likely hear us ask Siri about someone’s age. Last night it was Glenn Close and Bette Midler. So it goes like this, “Hey Siri (or optionally press and hold your home button.) How old is actress Glenn Close? That’s it. It’s really simple. In the process, Siri will lookup the answer and provide the answer verbally and present a little snippet of biographic information on your screen. We propose that there are two keys to success with Siri once she is summoned: Featured Recipe In Recipe #012 Getting to Know Siri, we cover the topic of Siri quite extensively. You can learn about Summoning Siri, setting up “Hey Sir” and we provide a list of the 15 most useful Siri commands. If you become addicted to SIri, we also have a catalog of over 200 Siri commands including a list of some of the new additions that accompanied IOS 12. February is National Heart Month. That makes February the perfect time to take the steps you need to help your heart. We also will start the month of February to explore the ways you can use your iPhone to support your healthy efforts. In this post, we will discuss walking and how your Health app can support your efforts. The benefits of walking as an activity for seniors are frequently stated and the praise for walking as an older-adult activity is universal. If you need convincing, consider taking the AARP Quiz: What Can Walking Do For You? No login is required and you get immediate feedback on your answer. Give it a try! You might find the answers surprising. The American Heart Association (AHA) is an enthusiastic advocate of walking and has published a pamphlet called Walking 101 where they provide 10 tips to get started with a walking plan. Of the ten, three are directly supported with the tracking capabilities of the Health app that comes standard on your iPhone. AHA Tip: Wear a step-counting pedometer. Use your iPhone’s Health app as an Activity Tracker to track your steps, distance walked and stairs climb. Yes, you do have to carry your phone but aside from that limitation, it makes a great way to get started. As the AHA proposes, “ Counting your steps will encourage you to increase your activity. “ It’s that simple. Activity Tracking in the Health App AHA Tip: Set Specific Goals. The AHA proposes setting specific goals is a good way to motivate your activity. They propose, “Start with small goals that are easy to attain, such as walking 15 minutes, and then gradually set higher goals.” With the Health app helping you track your activity, you have better insight into your success and progress. Set Goals using Activity Trends in the Health App AHA Tip: Write it down. The AHA keeps it simple. The Senior Tech Club will help make it automatic. They promote “Keep a personal walking log. Simply writing down how long you walked, how far and how you felt can help you track your progress and reach your goals.” The Health App will do all of this automatically. Check the Nugget below for more details. Health app automatically logs all activity data with more detail than you would likely need. Featured Nugget USING YOUR IPHONE TO TRACK STEPS AND EXERCISE Learn how to access the activity tracker on your iPhone with Nugget #33 Use Your iPhone to Track Steps and Exercise. Additional details about the tracker can also be found in Senior Tech Club Recipe #118 – How to Use the iPhone Health App – It Could Save your Life! (Membership Required) The Senior Tech Club has covered the Health app in other posts and recipes. Here are additional Recipes and Nuggets for members that wish to pursue additional and/or advanced information on the app: Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets on the Health app: Content here Featured Recipe The Senior Tech Club has covered the Camera and Photos apps extensively. Here are additional Recipes and Nuggets for members that wish to pursue additional and/or advanced information on the Camera and Photos apps: Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets on the Camera and Photos apps: During the winter session we are taking our St. Anthony Senior Tech Time classes down two separate tracks. In these tracks we can provide topics for all skill levels. The tracks include: The monthly sessions are independent. You can attend one or attend all as time allows. Each session includes featured topics and additional time to explore your questions and other news. Note: There are no classes scheduled during the month of February. Between sessions, you will have access to the resources found on the SeniorTechClub.com website. There you will find lessons specifically developed for Seniors. Use the online site to catch up and explore other topics. What should you bring? Your curiosity, questions and your iPhone and/or iPad. $5 per session. All proceeds goes to the St Anthony New Brighton School District 282. Call the Community Services office (612-706-1166) to register for any session. Check out this collection of iPhone photos from the iPhone Photography School if you have any doubts about whether you can take good photos with your iPhone. The photos are beautiful, stunning and downright inspiring! Thanks to the iPhone Photography School for sharing! Enjoy! The Senior Tech Club can help get you started with your camera and photo skills. Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets on the Camera and Photos apps: Apple released IOS Version 12.1.2 on December 20, 2018. However, following the release, these headlines have caught my attention. IOS is the software that runs your iPhones and iPads. As much as I like IOS updates and the new features and fixes that they bring, I do not want either of us to face issues that are not uncommon with software releases. So when I saw these headlines last week, I immediately went to check my Automatic Update settings for IOS. I wanted to confirm that Automatic Update was OFF. My second action was to update and share the following two Nuggets: These Nuggets are summarized below. Featured Nugget #1 At the Senior Tech Club, we read and follow Apple tech news so that you don’t have to. We’re happy to curate the news about updates, apps, trends and more. This allows us to give good advice about your devices. In that mission, I created a new Nugget that provides our current IOS recommendation. Nugget #032 Current IOS Version Recommendation is where I will make a Senior Tech Club recommendation about the latest IOS update. I will update this Nugget to keep it current as we get new information and updates. For IOS Version 12.1.2, I recommend that you WAIT until we get more information or a fix. You can read more about this recommendation with this Read More button. Featured Nugget #2 The Senior Tech Club does not recommend the automatic update of IOS. As tempting as it might seem, do you really want to be among the first to experience potential issues? However, after an update has been tested by the marketplace, we’re fully in favor of the new features and security of the updates. This Nugget will show you how to ensure that IOS Automatic Updates is turned off so that you have control and that you are not subject to the issues that occasionally accompany these updates. The Senior Tech Club has covered IOS upgrades and versions extensively. Here are additional Recipes and Nuggets for members that wish to pursue additional and/or advanced information: Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets on the Camera and Photos apps: I’m not a good photographer. And when it comes to iPhone photography, even though I have a pretty good understanding of what our iPhone camera can do, this doesn’t guarantee good photos. I have bad habits especially when it comes to setting up the photos I take. Most photographers think of this as composition. But this week’s tip is about one particular bad habit that many amateur photographers have, that is, centering your subject. Photography experts recommend that generally do not want to center your subject in a picture. Instead consider the Rule of Thirds where you divide your image into thirds. Imagine a grid like this. The composition idea is to place your subjects one the lines or intersections of the grid. For example, if you are photographing a person position their eyes at the blue dots. If you are photographing an outdoor scene, put the horizon at one of the horizontal lines. The basic idea is that this positioning adds balance and interest to the photo. This week’s Featured Nugget will highlight the rule of thirds and show you how your iPhone can help with your Rule of Thirds positioning. Featured Recipe In photography, the Rule of Thirds (Wikipedia) provides a tried and true guideline that photographers use to compose better photos. The rule proposes that instead of simply centering your photo subject, you divide your image into thirds and place your subject at the intersection of those divisions. Notice how the tree and horizon are aligned with the grid lines. You can have gridlines on your camera screen to assist you. (Wikipedia Photo) If you want to learn more about the rule of thirds and how your iPhone can help, click the button below to Read More. The Senior Tech Club has covered the Camera and Photos apps extensively. Here are additional Recipes and Nuggets for members that wish to pursue additional and/or advanced information on the Camera and Photos apps: Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets on the Camera and Photos apps: It’s inevitable at holiday gatherings. Phones come out of pockets or purses. Photos are taken. Photos are shared. There are questions like, “Do you have a picture of your grandchildren?” or “Have any pictures of your trip to the coast?” The Photos app has a simple feature that allows you to quickly create a photo album that is similar to the old-fashioned brag books that people used to carry. It is called the Favorites album. In 5 to 10 minutes you can mark a dozen photos and have your brag book ready for holiday gatherings. This week’s featured lesson provides the details. Featured Recipe Remember Brag Books? The Photos app has a simple feature that allows you to quickly create a photo album that is similar to the old-fashioned brag books that people used to carry. It is called the Favorites album. This Senior Tech Nugget will show the process. The Senior Tech Club has covered the Camera and Photos apps extensively. Here are additional Recipes and Nuggets for members that wish to pursue additional and/or advanced information on the Camera and Photos apps: Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets on the Camera and Photos apps: I attended a concert on Sunday and it clarified that my favorite new feature of IOS 12 is the set of improvements to Do Not Disturb. However for this concert I wanted to try out a new Do Not Disturb feature that seems perfect for concerts, movies and church services. As I was taking my seat in the theater, I pulled up the Control Center, and pressed and held on the crescent moon Do Not Disturb icon and chose Until I leave this location. This action would suppress all calls and notifications until I leave the theater. It worked perfectly with no embarrassing notifications during the concert. And as I was walking about a block away from the theater after the concert, I glanced at my iPhone and saw that Do Not Disturb was off. You can learn about all of the features of Do Not Disturb with this week’s featured recipe, Recipe #105 – Sleeping and Driving with your iPhone – Exploring Do Not Disturb. The latest version of Apple’s iPhone and iPad operating system, iOS 12, is out. At the Senior Tech Club we generally like IOS updates as the new software usually brings new features, improvements and fixes. This is true with IOS 12. The purpose of this Senior Tech Nugget is to summarize the best new features and tips for IOS 12 for Seniors. We try to identify the features that are most relevant to our community. For example, unlike many reviews of IOS 12, we don’t talk about Animojis or Memojis! I’m not seeing many in our community looking for this capability. So what are we expecting? Here is our top ten list of the best features of IOS 12 for Seniors: If you follow the Senior Tech Club or have taken any of our classes you know that we are fans of the Control Center. It is an essential control for your device. With IOS 12, the Control Center function very similar to what we saw in IOS11. However, access to the Control Center has changed for some devices. For example, devices that no longer have the home button or iPads require you to swipe down from the upper right part of the screen in order to retrieve the Control Center. There are also some new custom functions that have been added to the options including Scan QR Code and Voice Memos. Add them to the Control Center by launching the Settings app. Tap Control Center, Customize Controls to view additional icons that can be added. See Senior Tech Recipe #103 – Using the Control Center for Quick Access to Essential Functions for more details. With IOS 12 you can use the keyboard as a trackpad to move the cursor. Press and hold on the keyboard and the letters will disappear and the keyboard convert to a trackpad. Move your finger up, down, left and right on the keyboard area to position the cursor. Once the cursor is positioned you can edit existing text. Review Senior Tech Recipe #202 – iPad Typing Tips for Seniors for more tips to improve your typing. Do you get a stream of notifications from social media, News and other apps that are constantly filling your lock screen? With IOS 12, notifications are grouped into sources that will make it easier to review and manage. From your home screen, swipe down from the top of the screen to access the Notifications Center. On the Notifications groups: Do Not Disturb has been expanded to include Do Not Disturb functions that are terrifically appropriate for meetings, movies and events. Previously Do Not Disturb has been either on or off and there was a risk that you would turn on Do Not Disturb and forget to turn it off. Access the new functions from the Control Center by pressing and holding on the Do Not Disturb (crescent moon) icon. The new functions will display. They allow you to determine the length of time your device is in Do Not Disturb mode. These additions are terrific enhancements to Do Not Disturb. Review Senior Tech Recipe #105 – Sleeping and Driving with your iPhone – Exploring Do Not Disturb for this and other Do Not Disturb capabilities including Bedtime and Driving. We are big fans of Siri. And IOS 12 includes a number improvements that start with new commands and new knowledge pools. There is a deeper knowledge pool about celebrities and food. Examples: Siri Shortcuts are app functions that you associate with a custom Siri command. In the Settings app, Tap Siri & Search, All Shortcuts Browse the possible shortcuts. Add to My Shortcuts by tapping the + sign and recording a Siri command. Need more examples of using Siri? The Senior Tech Recipe #12 – Getting to Know Siri has an extensive list of Siri commands. Have fun with Siri! Your device has had Voice Memos app for some time. However, it wasn’t great. Voice Memos with IOS 12 has been redesigned. Check it out if you want to record a quick note, lecture or music snippet. Launch the Voice Memos app and simply press the record button (Red Circle) to record audio. Press the same button (Red Square) to end the recording. The recording is saved with the name asspcoated with your location (Location services must be turned on). New Recording or the name of your location, if Location Services is turned on. Change the name of the recording by tapping the recording, then tap the name and type a new one. Tap the three dots to access additional functions including: See the iPhone User Guide – Voice Memos for more instructions about using Voice Memos IOS 12 includes a new Measure app this provides two basic functions for do-it-yourselfers. Use it to measure the dimensions of an object and use it as a level when putting up pictures or shelves. It could be handy. The new Measure app (iPhone 6s and later) will provide two methods for measuring an object or distance. Apple proposes that the measurements are approximations. Open the Measure app. (On iPhone 5s, iPhone 6, and iPhone 6 Plus, open Compass instead.) Tap Level found at the bottom of the screen. (On older iPhones, swipe left in the Compass app) then hold iPhone against an object, such as a picture frame. Move the object and iPhone until you see green and 0 percent. This indicates level. The Photos app has new approaches for organizing, sharing and searching photos. Here are some key points: For more information on using the Photos app, review Senior Tech Recipe #453 – Organizing your Photos with Albums. In a new feature that may be perfect to parents with teenagers, you can get a view of how your use your device in the Screen Time reports. Launch the Settings app. Scroll down until you find Screen Time. For Seniors the report is an interesting way to review how you spend your time on your iPhone including how many times you pick up your phone and more. At the Senior Tech Club, our mission is to help Seniors with their iPhones and iPads. As such, a concern that many have when faced with a major update is about their skills. Will they be required to relearn how to perform everyday tasks? The answer is NO. When you look at everyday tasks like making phone calls, sending texts and emails and managing your devices, your existing skills will serve you well. We dislike when we have to take two steps backwards when asked to move forward. This may be the best IOS 12 feature of all! Looking for information on the upgrade process? Review the following: Senior Tech Recipe #014 – How to Perform an IOS Software Update Senior Tech Recipe #013 – What Version of IOS am I running? The Senior Tech Club proudly presents Recipes and Nuggets that have been referenced in this article: Referenced Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets It can be a scary online world out there. And I’m not talking about Halloween scary. I’m talking about scary scams, fraud, the dark web and stolen identities. In addition to being scary, this topic can be pretty geeky and technical. As such, we appreciate when we find a good resource that can help our community learn and increase awareness about online security. At the Senior Tech Club, we feel that there is no topic more important than sharing about online safety. So we wanted to share a favorite resource. The AARP Fraud Watch Network does a nice job of reminding us about online safety and help us become better online citizens. AARP membership is not required in order to use the resources of the network. On the site you will find article about current fraud trends, tips and more. Consider getting started by taking their online security quiz. It’s easy, there are only eight true and false questions. It’s non technical and you get immediate feedback on your answers. At the end you will get a final score. October is National Cyber Security Awareness Month (NCSAM) and the Senior Tech Club is proud to be a NCSAM Champion. Each week in October, the Senior Tech Club will feature Nuggets and Recipes that will help you protect your personal data and safety. How did you do? If you were a little disappointed in the results, consider taking the quiz a second time with your newly learned information about your online safety. The Senior Tech Club proudly presents Recipes and Nuggets on security and related topics: Related Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets The National Cyber Security Alliance on the StaySafeOnline.org, proposes that backup are a key element of your online safety. These days, our digital devices contain vast amounts of data, from family photos and music collections to financial/health records and personal contacts. While convenient, storing all this information on a computer or mobile phone comes with the risk of being lost. Data can be lost in several types of incidents, including computer malfunctions, theft, viruses, spyware, accidental deletion and natural disasters. So it makes sense to back up your files regularly. October is National Cyber Security Awareness Month and a great time to make sure your digital life is secure and backed up. The Senior Tech Club is proud to bring you tips and insight on how to make this easy. October is National Cyber Security Awareness Month (NCSAM) and the Senior Tech Club is proud to be a NCSAM Champion. Each week in October, the Senior Tech Club will feature Nuggets and Recipes that will help you protect your personal data and safety. In Senior Tech Recipe #404 – How to use iCloud to Expand and Optimize Storage we state this Smart Tip: The recipe goes on to provide the simple instruction to turn on your automatic backups. The Step-by-Step makes it easy, about 5 minutes. Please recognize that the default iCloud storage capacity that comes with your device for free may not be enough. Here is another Smart Tip: In summary, the tip from the Senior Tech Club is to use iCloud back ups to automatically backup your device and stay a little safer online. It can be very easy. The Senior Tech Club proudly presents Recipes and Nuggets on security and related topics: Related Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets I’ve upgraded my personal iPhone 6 to IOS 12.0.1. After I wrote, IOS 12, I’m Interested by Remind me Later, I waited only a few days for the release of 12.0.1. I let the rest of the marketplace offer their opinions about the fix and on October 15 I decided to do the update. This post will log that event. Over the next couple of weeks, I intend to log my impressions, discoveries and activities associated with the update. I do this in order to help others that may be embarking on this path. I did not see the same battery drain on morning two of my exploration. Thank goodness. One of the first discoveries was that after I uplugged my phone from its overnight charging, I went about my normal morning routine. And when I sat down in my office about 6 AM, I noticed that my battery capacity had drained to 32%. This was all without really using the phone. I decided not to panic as I had heard about initial battery drain as the IOS update causes some updates and index activity. I plugged my phone in for charging. I will monitor to see what happens on this issue tomorrow. Pleased that my everyday functions for making calls and sending text messages did not change. No new skills required for the most basic functions. Launch the Books (formerly iBooks) app to check out what was new. There is a new Library, Book Store and support for Audiobooks. I’ll be checking this out later. I was monitoring a few of the sites where the marketplace is able to review the latest discoveries. I decided that the time for the update was here. I actually followed the recommendations of the Senior Tech Club Recipe #014 How to Perform an IOS update and made sure that I had a good backup available in iCloud and was plugged in to my charger and on WiFi. The update took about 15 minutes and my phone came alive with the new version of IOS and there were no initial concerns. This was a Facebook post to the Senior Tech Club page were I linked to an article on the Forbes web site that recommended waiting before updating. This was the post that I wrote where I acknowledged the IOS update but decided to wait for a fix release before updating. Passwords are important and represent the only wall between bad people and your money and life. In my work with Seniors, I’ve also discovered that passwords can be a challenge. When I ask people to use their Apple ID’s, I see a number of responses ranging from “I don’t know” to little scraps of paper where passwords are written. I also see all kinds of common sense rules are not being applied. So I wrote Recipe #010 Strong Passwords for Safe Data which, borrowing an approach from security experts, recommended using a passphrase to create a strong password that could be adapted in order to create unique passwords for different needs. October is National Cyber Security Awareness Month (NCSAM) and the Senior Tech Club is proud to be a NCSAM Champion. Each week in October, the Senior Tech Club will feature Nuggets and Recipes that will help you protect your personal data and safety. As I explored links, tips and recommandations provided me as a Champion for the National Cyber Security Awareness Month, I came upon a tip sheet on passwords provided by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The recommendations were simple and easy to consume Good News!! Recipe #010 will allow you to check off their recommendations as DONE. It does this with a formula that uses a favorite song lyric as a passphrase. Do you have a favorite song lyric? One that you will never forget? Provided by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. (Document link) ✅ Make your password eight characters or longer. ✅ Use a long passphrase. ✅ Don’t make passwords easy to guess. ✅ Avoid using common words in your password. ✅ Get creative. ✅ Unique account, unique password. Refer to Senior Tech Recipe #010 Strong Passwords for Safe Data for complete instructions about creating easy to remember but unique and strong passwords for all of your needs. In summary, the tip from the Senior Tech Club is to pick a favorite song lyric as your base, add a handful of changes and additions and you have a strong password that is also unique and most importantly, easy to remember. The Senior Tech Club proudly presents Recipes and Nuggets on this topic: Related Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets We Seniors, unfortunately, are frequent targets to fraud and scams of all types. But we are fighting back by improving our digital citizenship and online safety. In that mission, we will take the month of October to learn and focus on online safety and good cybersecurity. October is the 15th annual National Cyber Security Awareness Month (NCSAM). The event is a month-long focus on online safety co-led by the National Cyber Security Alliance and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. As a NASCAN Champion, the Senior Tech Club believes that there is no topic more important than your online safety. To support that focus during the month of October we will share practical advice on securing your device, protecting your privacy and increasing our awareness of common scams. We will office the best practical advice from organizations like National Cyber Security Alliance, AARP Fraud Watch Network and more. To get us started, let’s share two recipes from the Senior Tech Club catalog about securing your device. Securing your device is an important step to becoming a good digital citizen. Related Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets We are getting regular notices on our phones that we can upgrade to IOS 12. You can also see this if you access General, Software Update on the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad. Software Update Reminder IOS 12 is the IOS update that was announced in June 2018 and was just released to the public on September 17, 2018. Many people are anxious to start using its new features. There are a number of benefits that I’m seeking from the update. I’m excited for better performance, more Photos features, improved Siri. Also, Apple suggests that a future IOS 12 update will also include group FaceTIme. However… I’m an old IT guy. It’s always been common practice in the computer industry that you don’t upgrade computer software on the first release of a major update. The common practice was to wait for a fix release before you do that update. I’m waiting for the next fix release before I update. As I monitor what the marketplace is saying via social media about IOS 12, I see a few small bugs and some concerns about battery life and more. Although not major flaws, these concerns are just enough for me to say, “Remind me later.” This is in reference to the option that you are presented when asked if you wish to upgrade. When you see this screen with the passcode, it is important that you do NOT enter your passcode but tap on Remind me Later on the bottom. If you enter your passcode, you are giving permission to update tonight. (I did this once by mistake and woke up the next day with an unintended update!) I’m certain that I won’t be waiting long. Maybe a couple of weeks. We can be patient. The Senior Tech Club proudly presents Recipes and Nuggets on IOS and IOS updates. Senior Tech Club Recipes and Nuggets on IOS When I was in high school, almost 50 years ago, I read a lot. But I have to confess, I didn’t always read the books I was assigned. I liked George Orwell and Upton Sinclair. I had a hard time getting into Mark Twain. There is a long list of classics like Moby Dick, Homer and dozens more that I avoided. But recently, I learned there is evidence that we should all rediscover the habit of reading. Did you know that if you read books for about 30 minutes per day you might live longer. In fact, according to a 12 year study at Yale University, the benefits of reading books are surprising. The 2016 study which was published in Social Science and Medicine was based on data from over 3,500 individuals over age 50. The most definitive quote from one the study’s authors, Becca Levy, a professor of epidemiology and psychology at Yale. She said, “Older individuals, regardless of gender, health status, wealth, or education, showed the survival advantage of reading books.” Readers who read books about 30 minutes per day could expect to leave 23 months longer than people who did not read books. Readers of books seem to be more connected and engaged. Levy indicates, “More questions need to be answered, but we know that reading books involves two cognitive processes that could confer a survival advantage: the slow, deep immersion needed to connect to content; and promotion of empathy, social perception, and emotional intelligence.” So you say, “I don’t read a lot of books but I read newspapers and magazines. Do I live longer? There was some association to longer life but the correlation was weaker. Your iPhones and iPad provide you a variety of tools to support your reading habit. At the Senior Tech Club, we have created multiple recipes to support the habit. We also have a bias toward free or affordable books and offer recipes where you can borrow ebooks from your local library or download classics from the Gutenberg Project. So maybe it’s time to start your trek to a longer life. Or perhaps you are feeling a little guilty about the books you didn’t read in school. Regardless, the Senior Tech Club is ready to help. Here is the list of the Senior Tech Club’s recipes that focus on ebooks. Now get out and enjoy some books and plan to live longer. Many people use their iPhones to make calls, send text messages, check emails, take a few photos and occasionally search the Internet for information. However, our Apple iPhones are amazing devices and offer so many useful features that are largely hidden from everyday users. And every new release of software adds to that feature list. In this series of summer classes, you will learn about hidden features that are found on your iPhones. You will get to know Siri. You will learn new strategies and shortcuts for communication and controlling your device. You will learn about the incredible capabilities of the camera that you carry in your pocket. And you will learn new about iPhone’s capabilities to improve Health and Safety and your life. Bring your iPhones, your curiosity and your iPhone questions to the class. Each two-hour session will include learning, demonstration and hands-on exploration of select hidden features and time for Q&A and sharing. It is your chance to ask those nagging questions and learn how others are using their iPhones. Each class features different topics and students can attend one or all sessions as different topics will be explored in each class. The class will also provide online access to materials on the featured topics so that you can continue to learn and explore after the class. Registration – Call the St Anthony Community Services at 612-706-1166. Online at www.isd282.org/cs This class is taught by Don Frederiksen, founder and principal of the SeniorTechClub.com, the online club that helps Seniors stay connected and engaged by learning, sharing and exploring technology. This summer class is for adult iPhone users of all ages. A recent trip that my wife, Joan, and I took got me thinking about how our Maps apps on our iPhones have transformed driving and navigation. Of course, many of us grew up using paper maps. When I think of classic maps there are several memories that I’m sure I share with many of you. Here is a short list of map memories: Today, the classic map has been replaced either with the GPS in your car or a Map app on your iPhone. Senior Tech Club Tip: Update your iPhone software to IOS version 10.x in order to take advantage of the latest Apple Maps app. It compares nicely to other maps in the market, namely other good apps like Waze and Google Maps. It is a complete map that will help you find locations, businesses, landmarks and get directions. Best of all it works with Siri as no other map app can This upgrade is an STC recommendation for iPhone 5 and later. See the Senior Tech Recipe STR-103 Finding Places with the Maps App for coaching and information on the Maps app. Safe travels, Don Hi, I’m Jimmy. How can I help you? In our opinion, Seniors are not well-served by the consulting services offered by our retail computer stores. Let’s imagine that you, as a Senior, finally gets the courage to walk into the big retail store that offers to show how how to get your pictures from your iPhone transferred to Walgreens so that you can order prints for some of your friends. The store promises to assign you to their brightest and best consultant. You register and sit at the table, patiently waiting while watching all of the young people around you exploring the store’s technology. Soon, a young man (boy) walks up and introduces himself as Jimmy. You thought the handshake was a little limp for a professional. Nevertheless, you describe what you want to learn. He says, “No problem” and in 30 seconds has taken your iPhone, enabled iCloud and hands the phone back to you. “Problem solved” he proclaims. “Just stop into your Walgreens store to pick up your prints. You can pay for the prints in the store.” He then hands you a bill for $75. Or in another situation as depicted in this ad for Ally Bank, you wait for children or grandchildren to visit. I don’t mind showing you the whole ad because it hits so close to home for many people’s situation. [embedyt] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UnYPtSnOJY[/embedyt] A core principle of the Senior Tech Club is that we will create or find help materials with the unique needs of Seniors in mind. We also will provide a community where other Seniors can respond to questions and comments. Seniors helping Seniors is a key principle of the Senior Tech Club. Check this out on any of our free content and then join us. The announcement came from Apple this week to remind us that the original iPhone was released on January 9, 2007. It caught on! Big! It set a new standard for a device called a smart phone. In a very short amount of time, millions had all converted from our single function flip phones. I joined that bandwagon in 2009 with my purchase of an iPhone 3gs where one of my first memories was using it to help this Minnesota farm boy navigate the New York City subway system. I was hooked and I haven’t ever seriously considered going in another phone direction. At the Senior Tech Club, we feel that the iPhone represents a Smart choice for Seniors due to its features, function, support and stability. While the features and functions of the iPhone continue to advance, we also like that many of the basic controls (notice the Home buttons below) have not changed across ten years. And it will keep changing. As stated by Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “iPhone set the standard for mobile computing in its first decade and we are just getting started. The best is yet to come.” Let’s celebrate a little for Apple and also recognize what Apple’s innovation has and will continue to bring to our lives. Publish Date Title Content March 10, 2020 Clean your iPhone with Disinfectant Wipes Clean your iPhone with Disinfectant Wipes
Always a Perfect Time for Reading
.February 26, 2020 Visit Your Library for Lifelong Learning – A Lot of People are Doing It! Visit Your Library for Lifelong Learning – A Lot of People are Doing It!
.February 21, 2020 Curiosity & Your Brain on Google Curiosity & Your Brain on Google
.
December 28, 2019 Customizing the new IOS 13 Share Sheet Customizing the new IOS 13 Share Sheet
.
December 15, 2019 Have Fun Swiping the Quick Brown Fox – Exploring IOS 13 Quickpath Have Fun Swiping the Quick Brown Fox – Exploring IOS 13 Quickpath
.December 5, 2019 Don’t answer calls from unknown numbers. Don’t answer calls from unknown numbers.
.
November 25, 2019 Go to the Dark Side with IOS 13 – It’s Just Cool Go to the Dark Side with IOS 13 – It’s Just Cool
.
November 9, 2019 Have a Trivia Party to Get More Comfortable with Siri Have a Trivia Party to Get More Comfortable with Siri
Smart Tip for Siri
Access Note for this Recipe.
.November 3, 2019 Secure your Devices – Biometrics are Best! Secure your Devices – Biometrics are Best!
Every iPhone should have a passcode. A passcode will prevent someone from tacking your iPhone and access your personal data.
Face ID: If you iPhone is an iPhone X or newer, you can use facial recognition to unlock your iPhone.
.
October 25, 2019 When in Doubt, Throw it Out When in Doubt, Throw it Out
Real Examples from Don’s Junk Mail Box
Text Messages
Real Examples from Don’s Messages App
Look for the Trash
Delete from a List
.October 3, 2019 There is NO Topic More Important than your Online Safety There is NO Topic More Important than your Online Safety
Keep a Clean Machine
.September 5, 2019 Scan a QR Code to Rate my Postal Experience Scan a QR Code to Rate my Postal Experience
.
August 31, 2019 Going Grocery Shopping with your iPhone Going Grocery Shopping with your iPhone
.
August 29, 2019 Sharing the Magic of Share Sharing the Magic of Share
The Magic of Share!
Tap Share
.
August 2, 2019 Summertime Listening and Learning with Podcasts Summertime Listening and Learning with Podcasts
.July 17, 2019 Summer Travel Tips for iPhone Users Summer Travel Tips for iPhone Users
Travel Situation
How the Find My Phone function can help
While shopping in several stores, you accidentally leave your phone behind in one of the stores.
Place your lost iPhone on a map so that you can return to the location.
You leave your iPhone in an Uber car
Send a message to the lock screen of the phone with return instructions.
You lost your iPad in your hotel room
Play a sound on your device to help locate it.
Your iPhone was stolen on a subway
Use Find iPhone to wipe the contents of the phone and place an activation lock on the phone to prevent it’s use.
.
May 13, 2019 May is Older Americans Month – Let’s Connect and Create with Shortcuts May is Older Americans Month – Let’s Connect and Create with Shortcuts
May is Older Americans Month – Let’s Connect, Create & Contribute
.
April 22, 2019 Digital Spring Cleaning Underway – Offload Unused Apps Automatically Digital Spring Cleaning Underway – Offload Unused Apps Automatically
Do a Digital Declutter This Spring
This Week’s Tip
If you use apps and take a lot of pictures and video, you may find the your iPhone storage becomes depleted. This will prevent you from taking pictures, installing new apps and even upgrading your IOS software..
April 4, 2019 It’s the Perfect Time for Spring Cleaning – Here is a Tip to get your started. It’s the Perfect Time for Spring Cleaning – Here is a Tip to get your started.
Do a Digital Declutter This Spring
.
March 27, 2019 Save $$$ Watching YouTube Videos Save $$$ Watching YouTube Videos
Additional Information
.
March 12, 2019 Revisiting Spotlight Search Revisiting Spotlight Search
NAMING CHALLENGE
Get Started with a FREE Trial Membership
February 25, 2019 Hey Siri…How Old is Glenn Close? Hey Siri…How Old is Glenn Close?
Smart Tip: Success with Siri
February 7, 2019 Walk for your Heart – Get Support from your iPhone Walk for your Heart – Get Support from your iPhone
The Benefits of Walking
How does my iPhone help?
Additional Information
.Walk for your Heart – Get Support from your iPhone
Additional Information
.
January 9, 2019 St Anthony Senior Tech Time Winter 2019 St Anthony Senior Tech Time Winter 2019
Winter-Spring Classes
Month
Core Topics
Advanced & App Topics
Jan
January 15: Manage your device including ringer, touchscreen, control center and calls. Learn every day routines.
January 17: Social Media including Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. What are they and how can you participate at a level that is right for you.
March
March 19: Camera and Photos. We will cover the iPhone Camera app and tools in the Photos app to manage and edit your photos.
March 21: Learning and entertainment with Youtube. Searching the web with Google and using other web resources like Wikipedia and Yelp
April
April 16: Stay connected using text messages, email, FaceTime and the contacts app.
April 18: How to listen to music (free and paid options) and podcasts. Read books and explore some popular games
January 6, 2019 Think You Can’t Take Great Photos with your iPhone Think You Can’t Take Great Photos with your iPhone
The 100 Best iPhone Photos Of 2018
Additional Information
.
January 2, 2019 Concerns About IOS 12.1.2 – I’m Waiting Concerns About IOS 12.1.2 – I’m Waiting
.December 14, 2018 Improve your iPhone Photos with the Rule of Thirds Improve your iPhone Photos with the Rule of Thirds
Additional Information
.November 29, 2018 Organize your Favorite Photos for Holiday Gatherings – A Brag Book using Favorites Organize your Favorite Photos for Holiday Gatherings – A Brag Book using Favorites
Additional Information
.
November 21, 2018 Do Not Disturb – My Favorite New Feature of IOS 12 Do Not Disturb – My Favorite New Feature of IOS 12
My normal routine if I go to a concert or movie is to use the slider switch on the left side of the iPhone to silence the ringer and put the iPhone on vibrate. In fact when the phone is in my pocket having my ringer on vibrate tends to be my normal routine. My iPhone is on vibrate mode a lot.
November 16, 2018 Top Ten IOS 12 Features and Tips for Seniors Top Ten IOS 12 Features and Tips for Seniors
1 Control Center
New Custom Functions
2 Typing – Touchpad
3 Grouped Notifications
4 Do Not Disturb
5 Siri Enhancements
New Commands
More knowledge
Create Siri Shortcuts
6 Voice Memos
7 Measure app
Measure
Level
8 Photos
9 Screen Time
10 Best Element of IOS 12 for Seniors
Additional Information
.
October 30, 2018 Are Your Smart about Online Security? Are Your Smart about Online Security?
Summary
Additional Information
.
October 26, 2018 Back It Up – It only takes 5 Minutes to Make it Automatic Back It Up – It only takes 5 Minutes to Make it Automatic
Let’s make two important points.
Why should I backup?
Why not make it automatic?
You May Need More Storage
Summary
Additional Information
.
October 16, 2018 IOS 12 Update – Log and Impressions IOS 12 Update – Log and Impressions
October 17 – Exploration
October 16 – Fast Battery Drain
October 15 – Time to Update
October 11 – Facebook Post – Forbes review of the IOS 12.0.1 update
October 1 – IOS 12 I’m Very Interested But Remind Me Later
October 12, 2018 Simple Recipe to Create Strong and Memorable Passwords Simple Recipe to Create Strong and Memorable Passwords
Simple Tips
Senior Tech Club Recipe
Summary
Additional Information
.
October 6, 2018 Be Good Digital Citizens – October is National Cybersecurity Awareness Month Be Good Digital Citizens – October is National Cybersecurity Awareness Month
.
October 1, 2018 IOS 12 – I’m Very Interested but… Remind Me Later IOS 12 – I’m Very Interested but… Remind Me Later
Additional Information
.
June 27, 2018 Live Longer by Reading Books Live Longer by Reading Books
Why? Because we might live longer!
How does the Senior Tech Club help?
June 1, 2018 Summer Class Series: Things You Didn’t Know your iPhone Could Do Summer Class Series: Things You Didn’t Know your iPhone Could Do
Class Date
Featured “Hidden” Topics
June 6 6:30 to 8:30 PM
Command and Control including Siri, Control Center and iCloud Tips
July 10 6:30 to 8:30 PM
Health, Safety, Books and News including Medical ID, SOS, Security and using your iPhone to read books and news.
August 7 6:30 to 8:30 PM
Hidden capabilities of your iPhone Camera. Includes tips for getting a photo quickly, exposure and focus and taking time-lapse, slo-mo and panoramic pictures.
March 14, 2017 Remember Maps? Remember Maps?
January 19, 2017 Seniors – A User Community not Well-Served 
Were you needs well-served?
Seniors helping Seniors stay connected and engaged with technology.
January 11, 2017 The iPhone is 10 Years Old! 
