Data Doctors Tech Tips

Here's an inquiry that's been a pretty regular theme and that is where employees can get help learning how to use software programs. If you're older than 30, the obvious default is to take a class and read books to gain knowledge, but there are much more efficient options using the Internet. Today's teaching tools are visual as well as interactive with large volumes of content to learn from. A website that's leading that charge is https://lynda.com With over twenty five hundred courses that are video based, the topics include productivity software such as Word and Excel and expand to more advanced topics like 3D animation as well as important web languages. The teaching platform is presented for beginners, intermediate and advanced levels of training with close captioning included as an option. This subscription service offers unlimited use of the tools starting @25 a month. You can access the courses on computers, tablets and phones using their mobile apps which then let's you start lessons on one device and continue to learn from another as you move around. Anyone asking the "where can I learn xxx?" question should look into the resources available at https://lynda.com

Our pets are like members of our family, with one big exception: when they are sick, they have no way of telling us where it hurts or what's wrong. A visit to your trusted veterinarian is your first option, but often times that's just not possible, so in those cases the https://PetMD.com website can act as a fallback. It's our go-to resource for issues related to our pet's health including things like nutritional and dietary guidance. We rely on the symptom checker when they're sick and learn a lot from their health library which helps us understand veterinary terminology. When an unusual symptom or behavior appears, try scanning the 'emergency' link to find something similar to better understand your pet's discomfort. PetMD also has helpful info about your pet's breed, how to properly care for them and what and how often to feed them. They can even assist you when that newest member of your family needs a name. Although dogs and cats are the most popular pets for most, alternative pets such as reptiles are covered on the site as well. Take our advice and bookmark this website!

Whenever you use the Internet for research, it's common knowledge that you shouldn't assume the info you pull up on any single site will be completely accurate.and#160; Cross referencing other similar sites to help either verify or challenge the info you are looking into is one way of validating, but that approach can get time consuming.and#160; If you ever want help in finding similar websites on the Internet, checkout the tool at and#160;http://www.similarsitesearch.com.and#160; It's actually a specialized search engine that will bring up websites that are either similar or related as well as alternatives based the original websites content markers. Just type the website you want to reference into their search engine to get a list of similar websites based on their popularity.and#160; It's a much easier way of getting a comprehensive list of alternative sources for anything you are trying to research.and#160; You can pitch in and help improve their rankings by clicking on either the thumbs up or thumbs down icons when you feel it was related or not. It's another one of the websites that you'll love remembering on those rare occasions you need this type of help, so bookmark it for future use.

A vital component to navigating the Internet is something called 'DNS servers', which plays an important role in helping you to get to the websites you seek.and#160; The Domain Name System (DNS) acts as a sort of traffic cop providing your computer with the directions to the websites that you type in your browser.and#160; The DNS settings you use daily are usually provided by your ISP, but there are benefits to modifying your current settings.and#160; 3rd party DNS servers can improve reliability as well as Internet speeds and for parents, the ability to block adult content or malicious websites throughout your household.and#160; Our go-to option is called OpenDNS because it is efficient, reliable, truly easy to setup while providing you complete control over what you want to filter out from the users on your network. We highly recommend changing the DNS settings in the router on your network to improve the performance and protection: https://www.opendns.com/home-internet-security

The 4 primary cellular companies are constantly battling each other to get your business often times with what can look like a sensational offer. But, keep in mind, that whatever they're offering means nothing if the service in your specific area is less than usable. Before you make any decision to try a new carrier, doing a little homework could save you a lot of heartburn. An excellent website called "Rootmetrics" allows you to check out all the networks where you work, live and spend most of your time. You can start by reviewing the overall ratings for your city based on reliability, data speeds, call and text quality so you can get a handle on the strengths of each one. An excellent tool that gets very granular is the 'Coverage Map' which will provide you with a detailed map by cell of call quality, data speeds and whether you can expect to get the full 4G LTE signal where it matters most. There are also mobile apps available so you can generate reports wherever you go and add to their database if you want to help build more reliable information. City reports: http://www.rootmetrics.com/en-US/rootscore/map Coverage Maps: http://webcoveragemap.rootmetrics.com/en-US iOS app: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/cell-phone-coverage-map/id399701910?mt=8

Anyone that's listened to our tips knows that we are always searching for that next app or tool to enhance our digital photos.and#160; We are constantly taking pictures with our phones these days, but they're often times less than great. Finding the right tool to improve your images is helpful.and#160; One of our favs is both a website and an app called Fotorand#160;http://www.fotor.comand#160;because it's full of awesome features.and#160; Along with the list of usual editing tools is a unique feature that allows you to create HDR images.and#160; High Dynamic Range or HDR is a process of combining multiple images that vary in exposure and then combine them into a single image.and#160; The tools allow you to update pictures that were too dark and too bright and combine them to create a better image.and#160; There are also lots of tools for beauty retouching on Fotor including wrinkle reduction, blemish removal and even teeth whitening. It's also available as a mobile app for iPhone and Android devices.and#160; This could end up being the only photo editing tool you'll need.

If jogging or running is the exercise you prefer, you know how awesome music can be during your running sessions. Not only will it help to keep you motivated, it often times can encourage you to continue your run a while longer when the music actually matches the pace of your running. Some of you have probably attempted to create a playlist that matches your pace, but found it to be too time consuming of an ordeal. If you want this motivation made easier, give the RockMyRun app a try. It makes it a whole lot easier to use music that matches your running style. The app offers curated playlists that focus on a specific beats-per-minute range to give you a continuous group of songs that align with your running pace. You can search for playlists by genres, beat-per-minute, overall length of the playlist and clean lyrics if you want them. The basic service is free, but if you want more control over the exact, you can opt for their premium membership which includes the option to precisely control the tempo. It will allow you to dial in the perfect tempo for your pace with better control for the entire playlist. Whether you simply a power walker, casual jogger or serious runner, the RockMyRun app for iPhone and Android users is worth giving a try.

How many times has this happened to you: you're trying to check something on a website, but you just can't connect to it. It could be your bank's site or even your favorite online retailer and you don't know if it's the website or your connection. In general, when you try to visit a site and can't get it to come up, you likely go through the "what is happening to my computer" questions. But sometimes, it's actually not your computer's fault. Websites do actually go down, even for really big companies, So what can you do to figure out whether it's the website or your connection? Our tip: whenever you experience this issue, try using https://www.isitdownrightnow.com to see if it's down right now. This free resource can monitor the status of any website and will check to see whether it's down or not at the moment you're checking. It really easy to use their test tool, because all you have to do is type the web address you want checked and a test will begin running as you watch the screen. You can also see what service aren't available and see how long ago it was checked along with a list of the latest sites that have been checked. They keep an active list for many of the most popular websites or just type in any web address to run your real-time test.

Today's Tip is a simple, but very critical reminder to Back It Up. A distraught student posted an online plea to the person that stole their laptop and said they don't care about the laptop itself. They posted that they would pay one thousand dollars for certain files on the laptop. The student's thesis along with five years worth of their work were only saved on the laptop. Imagine losing something that important that fast! So what could they have done to avoid this major pain? Simply having a backup would have done it. Way too many users purchase an external hard drive, which they call a backup but the way they end up using it, it's nothing close to a backup. A true backup allows you to locate the file stored in more than one place. If the only place that the document exists is on the external drive, it's not a backup. It needs to be saved both in the 'Documents folder' on the laptop and a second copy needs to be stored on the external drive. For the easy backup of important documents, such as a thesis, saving a second copy to a USB flash drive will also get the job done. There are also a number of cloud services that will perform the backups automatically, like Carbonite, to make sure all your critical files are properly secured. No matter what you decide to do, it's important to start doing something to make sure you have copies of your pictures, documents and other important files backed up regularly.

No matter what you do on the Internet, it seems that most of us waste a lot of time dealing with email every day. One of the biggest ways to waste time is replying to multiple people with the same message, especially if you have to do it throughout the day.and#160; If you have a Gmail account, today's tip could help you reduce this waste. A hidden feature in Gmail that you should activate is called 'Canned Responses' and it can be a real time saver.and#160; Once you turn on the feature in the 'Settings' menu, you'll then have the ability to copy any body of text and have it as a canned response that can be pasted with the click of a mouse.and#160; The tool will eliminate the time consuming process of manually typing out any common responses, phrases or even different signatures for you various accounts, both when responding to or creating a message.and#160; Here are the instructions for turning on this awesome option: https://www.techrepublic.com/article/how-to-enable-and-use-canned-responses-in-gmail