Data Doctors Tech Tips

Staying fit can only be achieved if you can find the right workout that you can both enjoy and stay committed to. If a gym membership works for you great, but for a lot of people it just isn't cost-effective or motivating. If you're searching for a method of staying fit, maybe a simple program that doesn't require fancy equipment or an expensive annual membership is just what you need. There's a treasure chest of exercises available in a visual instruction set at a website called https://darebee.com. Whether you're looking for a short term motivator or a long-term plan that includes exercise and a diet plan, this could be your best bet. It can start with some basic daily exercises that could lead to a whole new approach to physical fitness and general health. Today's tip is for anyone that's either searching for a way to get started or just isn't that motivated by their current fitness approach, so check out all the great options at: https://darebee.com

The ongoing battle against unwanted commercial pitches in our email, also known as spam, has led to tools that don't always get the job done correctly.and#160; Simple mistakes or the use of certain words or sentences in your message can get it tagged as either a potentially unwanted message or filtered out altogether. The automated spam filters in use around the Internet run a scan of each message to generate a spam score which ultimately determines what happens. Knowing specific keywords or elements of your message that can increase the spam score will help you avoid this common problem and a web tool at http://mail-tester.com can be very informative. Any time you have someone telling you that they didn't get a specific message you sent or they tell you it ended up in their junk folder, check the spam score of that specific message. The website provides you with a special email address to send the message to, which will be processed to show you how it scored. When you click on the link to get your score, you'll get some great detail into what caused your problem so you can avoid making the same mistake in the future.

If you work in just about any industry, LinkedIn has become a valuable networking tool for business owners, professionals and recruiters.and#8232;and#8232; Because it's become so popular, it's also opened up another avenue for scammers and cyber-thieves.and#8232;and#8232; A common scam is posing as a recruiter on LinkedIn to trick new connections involved in what they think is a potential new opportunity.and#8232;and#8232; Their actual motivation is to either scam you with a fake opportunity or possibly to gather personal information from you via your resume for an ID theft scam.and#8232;and#8232; A relatively new looking profile with few connections is always a red flag, as well as subtle grammar mistakes in their text.and#8232;and#8232; The profile image itself can be a quick way to sniff out these scammers as most of them use stock photos or images that they stole from others.and#8232;and#8232; Performing an image search using their profile pic via Google's image search or the reverse lookup tool at https://tineye.com will check to see if that's the case.and#8232;and#8232; Connecting with new people on LinkedIn is a valuable thing, but take a minute to do a little PI work whenever you get one that's a little suspicious.

Speaking to a real-live human to resolve an issue is often the preferred process, but can be a bit of a challenge if the organization that you are trying to reach is very large. Your billing information may make it easy for billing issues, but it's obvious that certain industries such as the tech industry do their best to make it hard to call them. Using any of the major search engines to try to find the number can actually be very dangerous because of the scammers, so I'd suggest you turn to the GetHuman website: https://gethuman.com They've compiled contact information on over 1000 organizations that isn't limited to a single phone number, as other forms of contact are also listed when available. They try to get as many numbers as they can listed for the various departments, which can be a huge time saver, especially for larger tech companies. They also provide company-specific tips or shortcuts to help you reduce the aggravation that's become getting help from so many companies. https://gethuman.com

Technology in our children's lives is a given which means that many parents, especially new parents struggle with how they manage device usage by their kids. In the past, the experience of our elders was consistent and useful, but when it comes to the new era of technology, those traditional resources aren't an option. Everyone may have an opinion on when and where technology should be introduced to young children, but for a data-based opinion, I'd suggest you turn to the AAP. The American Academy of Pediatricians published a paper on raising kids in the digital age that reviewed all the different screens that will play a role in any child's life. They all have benefits but in moderation, as one would assume, but for really young children, it may be best to wait until they are at least 2 years of age. Limiting their screen time was a critical component of the best practices that they reviewed as well as evaluating passive vs interactive screens and media. You can read the one-pager or download the entire study from 2015 that's still very relevant today at: https://www.aappublications.org/content/36/10/54

The last quarter of the year is when most of the 'deals' start to appear for just about every type of tech item that most of us want. With this in mind, there's something you should be very aware of when it comes to tech items: the lowest price doesn't mean it's a good deal. Looking for the lowest priced item in any category is usually a bad idea, but when it comes to electronics, it's especially problematic. Cheapest around in the tech world generally means that the manufacturer left out higher quality components in order to hit a specific price point. What that means to those that buy those items is that important things like batteries or compatibility can suffer. The best approach is to stick to brands that you have heard of and purchase them from retailers that have a clear option to return the product if it's not up to your standards. Trying to find the best deal in the lowest price categories requires a lot of time spent researching them all. Looking for reviews for anything you're interested in buying is a simple first step to making a decision. Searching for an item followed by the word review should provide lots of useful feedback and if it doesn't, then you should be really suspicious.

You may have noticed on random social media profiles that some weird characters are being used for their name or title. These characters are not represented by any of the standard keys on your keyboard, but they are possible via what are known as Alt codes. To see how this works, try holding down the alt key in either Windows or Mac (aka option) and tap the number 2 to have the trademark symbol appear. These special characters go back to the old DOS days with 255 different keystroke combos that produce a plethora of symbols. If you're really into memorizing just trivial things, you can try or for a less involved way, check out a number of websites that will provide you with all of them and much more. An example would be http://www.copypastecharacter.com that makes it easy to copy and paste any character you want without having to remember all the key combinations. Whether it's a symbol or character used in a foreign language, this is a much easier way to go. This classic resource also created an iPhone app some time ago for characters on the go: http://www.copypastecharacter.com/iphone

When was the last time you stopped and thought about how many devices you need to keep charged on a regular basis? If you're like most households, it's a bunch and that also means you need power outlets and USB cables to keep things ready for use. Often times, this forces us to create a charging station where everything can get juiced up or purchase lots of extra chargers so they are in the right places all around the house. There is an option that you may not have thought about available from a company called Snap Power. They have a whole line of replacement power plates that can double as a USB charging station. They're cheaper than most smartphone charging packs at less than $20 a plate when you buy a pack of 3. They work with older rounded plugs or the newer square faceplates and are really easy to install. It's just a simple replacement of the existing wall plug to get the chargers set up all over your house. Learn about all their products atand#160;https://www.snappower.com

If you're searching for something on the Internet, the most likely place you'll start is at Google's search engine site because it's so incredibly powerful. If you use too generic of a search term, you end up with a lot of junk in the results, which is where operators can help dramatically improve the quality of your results. There's a fairly unknown option to ask Google to provide results in a range that can be extremely helpful under certain circumstances. To tell Google you want information within a certain numeric range, you simply add 2 periods with no space before or after between 2 numbers that constitute the range. An example would be if you are searching for information within a certain range of years, such as 'downtown Phoenix 1900..1960' or if you are shopping for something, you may use 'laptops $700..$1000'. Including any symbols that denote the format of the number can also help Google bring up much more relevant results which can save you lots of time!

According to researchers, just the right type and volume of ambient sounds can be very beneficial to the creative process, which I totally agree with. I generally turn to music of some form when I'm writing, but for those times that I really need to stay focused, I pop over to the https://asoftmurmur.com website for their sounds. It's a simple site with multiple types of sounds of nature that can be very soothing and lets you focus. You can pick which sounds that you'd like to be played along with the volume of each sound to find the recipe that's just right for you. I always love the sound of rain or the ocean crashing against the shore, so I always build from there. Another great use for this site is to create a more comfortable environment for going to sleep. Not only can you use their website when you're working, the apps make going to sleep a bit nicer too!