Daniel Russell has a sobering piece of advice — Be prepared: What will happen to your content when you die? that describes use of the Google’s inactive account manager.
Google’s inactive account manager
Category Archives: Desktop
Tools for Google Drive
If you’re using Google Drive, check this out – Free Google Drive tools you’re not using (but should be) in PCWorkd (June 6)
Bing in Windows 8.1
Windows 8.1 will enjoy a Bing search engine as part of the operating system – it will search the PC, the Web, and the user’s personal cloud.
Bing “Re-Imagined” For Windows 8.1: More Beautiful, Comprehensive And Integrated, Greg Sterling, Search Engine Land (May 30)
Using Evernote
There’s no end to ideas on ways to use Evernote, the all purpose note taker and clipper. These tools and suggestions will be especially helpful for people on mobile devices. Take pictures, record audio, convert audio to text, draw with SKitch and save to Evernote. MakeUseOf has the guide – 7 Tools to Improve the Way You Use Evernote (May 23)
Tip – Use Speedtest
Good tip from Rick Broida — Use SpeedTest to help diagnose Internet problems – Speedtest can help you sort out problems with speed of Internet connection to determine if it is your service or your computer.
Faceoff in note tools
Faceoff: Google Keep, Microsoft One Note, Evernote – and the winner is! You’ll know before reading the article, but the analysis is excellent for presenting the value of all of these as productivity tools.
Google Keep vs. OneNote vs. Evernote: We name the note-app winner by Tony Bradley, PCWorld (Mar 27)
- pricing
- platforms and ecosystem
- organization
- rich media
- text editing – OneNote won this round
- business features
- data management
Google Releases Keep for Notes
Google has introduced a new note keeper and named it Keep. It’s an Android App and is available on the Web and will likely integrate with everything Google in time. Casey Newton at CNet has some how-to advice here – Get started with Google Keep.
Some may remember that Google had a Notebook application that it closed in 2009 (though I guess it lingered for a while). Really odd that Google would introduce a new application right after enraging so many users by closing Google Reader.
Keep will be pushing into Evernote’s market of note taking users.
The service will feel familiar to users of Evernote, the note-taking service and self-described “external brain” that has more than 45 million registered users. (Business Insider wasted no time in labeling Keep an “Evernote killer.”) Evernote also focuses on making it easy to create and search notes; it has brought its service to an impressive number of platforms.
More articles everywhere but this one from Time magazine by Jared Newman describes the functions supported — Google Keep: Worth Trying, with Caution
Google Toolbox
This article in PCWorld introduces 20 tools (or tricks) for searching Google in privacy, and using Youtube, Gmail, Google Drive. See Ultimate Google toolbox: 20 tips, tricks, and hacks
- Startpage from Ixquick is mentioned as a way to search privately at Google – yes – but know that it’s not a Google interface.
- Of interest are tips about YouTube – there is a Chrome extension that will hide the ads!
- There’s an email game you can play with GMail — “It’s basically an alternative interface for Gmail that shows you only one message at a time and challenges you to reply in a timely fashion.”
- Do a lot more with Google Drive – including send a fax.
- Play a game with Google Maps – but you have to get the hang of the cursor.
Evernote vs OneNote
Such wealth – we have two excellent tools for taking notes, saving links, saving web clips and images, adding videos – whatever we think or want to note down – and do so with any internet-connected device we are have at hand. It’s the battle between Evernote and Microsoft’s OneNote. Both let you keep your notes “in the cloud”. Both help you format and organize your notes. They also both support sharing.You’ll probably want both.
Evernote says “remember everything”. The main site has good orientation guides and videos where you can see its many uses and benefits.
You might already have Microsoft’s OneNote as part of your Office application. See how to deploy it and make best use of it at the Microsoft OneNote site.
This comparison by function may help – Evernote vs. OneNote: Note-Taking Apps Showdown (TechHive, Jan 30, 2012) FYI, they both won -
Going category by category, Evenote wins five to four, but since note-taking and information organization are such personal tasks, any one of those categories may sway you toward one or the other.
MakeUseOf.com has several reviews of both tools:
10 Awesome OneNote Tips You Should Be Using All The Time [Windows] (Aug 21, 2012) Saikat Basu loves both:
The showdown will continue, so for the sake of productivity and peace, let’s say that both are great note-taking apps with their pros and cons. I use both, as and when the purpose dictates it. And I have come to love both because they have made me more organized with my note-taking.
Get Creative With Evernote: 10 Unique Uses You Haven’t Thought Of by Nancy Messieh (Jan 12, 2013)
Do You Need More Evernote Use Ideas? Here Are 3 Ways I Use It by Jessica Cam Wong (June 5, 2012)
There are also very good videos on both at YouTube to help you choose.
Outlook, Hotmail, and the Cloud
This is old news from August 2012 but Hotmail or Live (remember Live?) or MSN users will notice the changes in 2013. Microsoft has closed Hotmail, the webmail service it opened in 1996, and upgraded user accounts to Outlook.com. Fortunately, hotmail users keep their email address and the conversion is painless. This is part of Microsoft’s move to the cloud, something which most MS Office users will want to get used to this year, and redesign of products to work well on mobile devices and encompass all communications functions.
Panel of choices in Outlook.com
There may be a learning curve – “In the Outlook.com inbox, your personal email comes alive with photos of your friends, recent status updates and Tweets that your friend has shared with you, the ability to chat and video call – all powered by an always up-to-date contact list that is connected to your social networks. And, of course, you are in control of your experience – what you share, the networks you connect to, and your personal information. ”
A posting in the Office Outlook Blog, Introducing Outlook.com – Modern Email for the Next Billion Mailboxes (July 31, 2012), describes the changes and how to avail yourself of this service – assuming you are willing to tear yourself away from Google’s competing communications world.of Gmail and Google Drive.
Note also that there are many Office blogs with loads of tips on using Word, PowerPoint, OneNote and announcements about new webinars.