For more than 20 years, Rick Broida has written about all manner of technology, from Amigas to business servers to PalmPilots. His credits include dozens of books, blogs, and magazines. He sleeps with an iPad under his pillow. More by Rick Broida
I don't like Gmail...I love Gmail. But I'm not wild about using it from within my Web browser, as I find the interface, well, lacking. (Unattractive and unintuitive are two words that come to mind.)
Sure, I can tolerate it if I have to, but I find that I work much better within the confines of a more traditional desktop mail program.
For more than 20 years, Rick Broida has written about all manner of technology, from Amigas to business servers to PalmPilots. His credits include dozens of books, blogs, and magazines. He sleeps with an iPad under his pillow. More by Rick Broida
You know those lengthy terms-of-service (TOS) agreements everybody ignores when installing a piece of software or registering for a new Web service?
Turns out, they're kind of important, especially for those concerned about privacy (and these days, who isn't?).
For example, you may recall that back in December, Instagram caused a huge kerfuffle when it made changes to its privacy policy, which were outlined in an updated TOS.
For more than 20 years, Rick Broida has written about all manner of technology, from Amigas to business servers to PalmPilots. His credits include dozens of books, blogs, and magazines. He sleeps with an iPad under his pillow. More by Rick Broida
Every so often I like to revisit topics I haven't covered for a few years, the idea being that new readers might have missed them the first time around.
This one skews heavily toward novice users, but it always surprises me how few people take advantage of this great time-saver.
For more than 20 years, Rick Broida has written about all manner of technology, from Amigas to business servers to PalmPilots. His credits include dozens of books, blogs, and magazines. He sleeps with an iPad under his pillow. More by Rick Broida
If you own an Android-powered smartphone or use the Google app on your iOS device, it's a good bet you've fallen in love with Google's voice-powered search. It works freakishly well.
What you may not know is that you can enjoy a similar experience on your PC. All you need is Google's Chrome browser.
For more than 20 years, Rick Broida has written about all manner of technology, from Amigas to business servers to PalmPilots. His credits include dozens of books, blogs, and magazines. He sleeps with an iPad under his pillow. More by Rick Broida
Google Chrome does a lot of things well, but it's not the greatest when it comes to mouse-wheel scrolling.
Indeed, you may have noticed that when you turn your wheel, the page lurches up or down in "steps," instead of scrolling smoothly. This isn't the end of the world, of course, but certainly the experience could be better.
For more than 20 years, Rick Broida has written about all manner of technology, from Amigas to business servers to PalmPilots. His credits include dozens of books, blogs, and magazines. He sleeps with an iPad under his pillow. More by Rick Broida
As I slowly learn my way around Windows 8, I continue to uncover a few features I didn't know existed. (You'd think Microsoft would include a live tile or something that calls out these new features—"Hey, look what we've added!"—but, no.)
One such hidden perk is File History. Like Apple's Time Machine, it archives copies of older versions of your files, and does so automatically and in the background, while you work. It is, for all intents and purposes, a real-time backup tool.
One caveat, though: It's not a full-system backup tool like Windows Backup; by default it preserves only those files in your Libraries: documents, music, photos, and other media. You can add other folders if you wish, but only by adding them to your Libraries. (You can also exclude folders if you don't want, say, your videos to be backed up.)
For more than 20 years, Rick Broida has written about all manner of technology, from Amigas to business servers to PalmPilots. His credits include dozens of books, blogs, and magazines. He sleeps with an iPad under his pillow. More by Rick Broida
Remember Ceton Companion? It let Windows Media Center users control their PCs from any Android, iOS, or Windows Phone device.
Now the app is available for Kindle Fire, Nook, and Windows 8 as well, and it has a new name: My Media Center.
Why the name-change? In part to avoid errors like the one I originally made: The app works with Windows Media Center whether you have a Ceton tuner installed or not.
