Category: App

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Ordering New iPhones

For the crazy folks who order iPhones for Day 1 arrival, this most recent ordering process was a bit of a mess. Typically, you can pre-enter your order details in the Apple Store app and then submit it order time. This time, that system failed for 15-20 minutes for many folks, pushing back many people’s ordered by a couple of weeks. This might have been compounded by supply constraints.

So if you’re ordering at that crunch time at 8am when sales start every year, you should try to order thought the Apple Store app, but also through the Apple website. If you have an iPad, try that too at the same time.

For people who were delayed in ordering or forgot this year, you can try to get the iPhones in the Apple store. This is a site that will show you what nearby stores have availability:

https://iphonechecker.herokuapp.com/q/22201/i15ProMax/unlocked

And of course, for all the normal people, you can just wait untill November, when iPhones should just be available.

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Virginians, Install the COVIDWISE App

Built with privacy potection in mind, and using technology developed by Apple and Google, the COVIDWISE app will alert you if you have encountered someone who later reported testing positive for Coronavirus. If lots of people use this or other interoperable apps from other states, it will enable easy contract tracing and allow people to more quickly quarantine, thus slowing the spread.

From the Washington Post:

The app will work outside of Virginia, but only users verified by the Virginia health department will be able to input a Covid-positive status. Per the Virginia Department of Health website, “There have been discussions regarding a federal database for positive diagnosis verification which would greatly simplify interoperability of exposure notification apps between states. It is not currently certain when this will be available.”

UPDATE: If you do every get a positive COVID test result, be sure to ask for the 6 digit pin so that you can enter your positive result into the COVIDWISE app. You need that to alert others of your result. Sadly, this isn’t given to you by default. That fact, and the lack of universal usage of the app, have limited its usefulness thus far.

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Baby Tracker App

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Have a new baby and need to track feedings, diapers, sleeping, and growth statistics? I initially thought the tried-and-true pen and paper approach would be easiest. But after reviewing most of the baby tracker apps, I found an app that is simple and easier than anything else. Most baby apps are bloated with features and ugly. Baby Tracker by nighp is an iPhone and iPad app that looks like it was designed by Apple.

One of my favorite features is the ability to use it with others. I set Baby Tracker to store its data in dropbox so my wife and I can both enter and review information. So if I do a late night bottle feeding, she can wake up and see when the feeding started and ended.

It’s the perfect app for the nervous new parent.

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Magic Plan Floorplan Creator App

The Magic Plan app for iPad and iPhone deserves to have “Magic” in it’s name.

I recently helped an Arlington, VA, customer who had a new iPad and had just moved. They wanted to build a floorplan of their place. Using Magic Plan allowed us to create a floorplan quickly by clicking on the corners of the rooms. You  align the rooms, add in windows, make a few adjustments to the estimated dimensions if needed, and you’re done. Once you get used to it, you can have a house done in under an hour.

Then you can even add in furniture to your floor plans or see what it looks like if you do a construction project and knock down a wall.

The app is free to use and requires a subscription if you want to export PDF files for use by an architect.

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Sync iPhone with Windows

Many people have an iPhone or iPad as well as a Windows computer. While there are ways to sync an iOS device with Outlook or Windows Mail for contacts and calendar, the syncing never displays things the same way as it does on the iPhone or iPad.

iCloud Web Access

The easiest way to give people access to their information is to use iCloud. Use the icloud.com website to give them access to things in the same way it look on their iOS devices.

Create Web Links on the Desktop

Then drag the the weblinks for the specific App to the desktop. (This is usually the icon to the left of the URL and can be dragged to the desktop.)  They’re formatted in the following way:

https://www.icloud.com/#contacts
https://www.icloud.com/#calendar
https://www.icloud.com/#notes
https://www.icloud.com/#reminders
https://www.icloud.com/#iwork

I like to rename the links from “iCloud Contacts” to just just “Contacts”.

Find New Icons

I also like to make the icons look like the Apple icons. You can use any icons you want, but these are my favorite. I download the Multi-Res ICO versions if available. Download them to somewhere that you won’t later delete. I put them in c:\Windows\icons\

Contacts http://findicons.com/icon/131428/address_book?id=131561
Calendar http://findicons.com/icon/19547/calendar?id=19559
Notes http://findicons.com/icon/19548/notes?id=19560
Reminders http://www.iconfinder.com/icondetails/126628/114/reminders_icon
iWork http://www.iconarchive.com/show/colorflow-icons-by-xazac/iWork-08-icon.html
Mail (for @icloud.com email) http://www.iconarchive.com/show/iphone-icons-by-judge/mail-icon.html
iCloud http://www.iconspedia.com/icon/cloud-silver-icon-38589.html

This set of icons is overall good if you want to make an iPhone user feel at home on Windows:
http://www.iconarchive.com/show/iphone-icons-by-judge.html

Change the Web Links to the New Icons

To change the icon:

  1. Right click on the link icon on your desktop
  2. Choose the Web Document tab at the top
  3. Choose Properties
  4. Click Change Icon…
  5. Click Browse… and find the .ico file that you downloaded
  6. Open
  7. OK
  8. Apply
  9. OK

Then you can have a Windows desktop that looks like this. If you check off “Keep me signed in” when you login to iCloud, then you have a quick and simple setup that will be comfortable for iPhone or iPad users.