Occasionally Brian or I are asked to fax something.  We no longer have a fax machine although some printers provide that function, I thought this was a great article on using your smartphone as a fax for the occasional fax.  The recommendations of apps are from Rick. There are also free apps.
​~ Carol Bondy

Rick's Daily Tips
Rick Rouse
Back in the days before the Internet became ubiquitous it was common to use FAX machines to send documents to distant recipients if they needed those documents right away.

Today, most “immediate” correspondence is sent via email, but believe it or not, many businesses and government agencies still make heavy use of FAX machines even though we’re well into the Internet era.

That’s why there might actually come a time when you’ll need to send and/or receive a FAX or two yourself.

You could always buy yourself a FAX machine (or a multifunction printer that has FAXing capability built into it) and connect it to a landline phone connection, but that’s a huge heap of overkill just for sending or receiving a FAX once in a blue moon.

A much better and cheaper alternative is to install a good FAX app on your iPhone or Android phone and use that to send and receive your FAXes instead.

There are several really good FAX apps to choose from. Just open your phone’s applicable app store and search for the term fax and they’ll pop right up.
​
Pick one that has great user reviews and install it and you’ll be all set the next time you need to send or receive a FAX.

There are several FAX apps available in both the Apple and Google Play app stores. While some of them are free, unfortuantely the best ones aren’t unless you want to just send an occasionaly one-page FAX.
In my humble opinion, Simple Fax is the best FAX app for Android smartphones and tablets.
Have an iPhone or iPad? I recommend that you check out SimpleFax (yep – same name, but different app).

~ Brian Bondy
 
While stumbling around the interweb, looking for some good tech tips, I found this group of 17 tips. I don’t know why they chose 17, it seems odd to me. It is odd, but why 17 and not 15 or 18? It was the first tip that made me read the rest of them. Try re-booting. Whatever electronic device it is, from a vacuum cleaner to a computer, I always try powering it off and then back on. Half the time, it’s as simple as that.

Number 14 had several keyboard shortcuts. Those are always appreciated, if only I could remember them. Still, I tried the one about using the space bar to page up or down. I didn’t understand it. Where would I use that? It turns out, in a browser. The space bar worked at paging down, and shift + space bar paged up. I didn’t know that.

Read the rest of them HERE. https://www.lutz.us/blog/17-tech-tips-and-tricks
​
Another thing: I want to thank everyone for the kind birthday wishes. I am now on Medicare. Also, I am retiring from the computer repair business. I’m still going to keep fixing up donated computers and giving them away, but for the most part, I’m out of the repair biz. I want to thank everyone for keeping that line of work going for me. It’s been frequently fun and always interesting. I gave away most of my computer stuff and found a whole other room in my house.

I’ve written about this before, but things change and it was a while ago. Before you discount Remote Desktop as something you’ll never use, remember that it may be something for a friend or relative to use to help you with your computer. I just installed the Google version on my Mom’s computer. Lately, I’ve been using Microsoft’s Quick Assist to help her remotely. That’s a great tool, but it does require some intervention on her part, to start it up and answer some prompts. That makes it quite secure as well.
 
There are several other ways to access a computer remotely, PC or Mac. A cool feature of some of these is that you can access the computer from your phone. While I can’t think of any particular reason why you would want to, I’m sure there are some. The article does offer an example, and you can read that HERE. How to control your desktop computer remotely with your phone (komando.com)
 
Google’s Remote Desktop is installed as an extension. The only real prompt is for a PIN to be used for the actual access. The computer needs to be on and connected to the internet, of course, but other than that, it’s pretty hands free after that.
 
Windows has something just like Google’s called Microsoft Remote Desktop, and it’s an App you can download. Also, Teamviewer has an option for taking control of the computer.
 
If you’re interested, give some or all of them a try to see which you like best. Let me know what you think at abiquiucomputers@gmail.com
 
Kim Komando had a blurb on streaming videos coming in June. I am always annoyed at looking for movies to watch and being told I have to pay. King Ralph should be free, not $3.99, that’s just wrong. Here’s the list:
 
What’s streaming in June?
Netflix: “Groundhog Day,” “Terminator 2,” Dunkirk,” “Spider-Man” 1 through 3, “The Breakfast Club,” “Jarhead.”
Hulu: “The Grand Budapest Hotel,” “Idiocracy,” “One Hour Photo,” “Dune,” “Bewitched.”
HBO Max (the app is just called Max now, btw): “The Hurt Locker,” “Moonlight,” Dog Day Afternoon,” “3:10 to Yuma,” “Ready Player One,” “Dumb & Dumber,” “Grease,” “Police Academy” 1 through 5.
Prime Video: “Creed,” “12 Years a Slave,” “Hot Fuzz,” “Selma,” “Interstellar,” “Crazy Rich Asians,” Laverne and Shirley” seasons 1-4, “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.”
​
* I’ve decided to stream all the Sylvester Stallone movies. Unfortunately, I’m off to a “Rocky” start.

If you are ‘serviced’ by Jemez Electric, then you’ve likely noticed the power has gone out a few times this year. Even in cities the power can go out, but rural service definitely has this issue more frequently. We have a bunch of battery backup devices, battery charging blocks, and a generator for a longer outage. It’s good to be prepared.
 
I was reading an article on how to charge your phone when the power goes out. You can read it HERE. 

It has some obvious suggestions, like battery backups, or getting in your car and charging there, which I actually had not considered. But there was also a wood burning stove that has a built in charger that gets fed from the heat. That was very cool, though a bit on the spendy side. Still, our stove is electric and Carol cannot be without coffee in the morning, so it might be a good investment.
 
There are those crank type emergency radios that generally come with a USB charging slot, so that might be an idea. It seems like it would require a lot of cranking though. I wonder if they make an exercise bike that can charge a battery? That wouldn’t be a bad idea.
 
Something to keep in mind also, generally speaking, a landline is self powered, so that phone should still work in a power outage, though you’d also need a non-electric ‘old timey’ phone to use on it, and not a cordless or powered one. 

I used to like Facebook because of all the photo sharing. I liked all the family and friend pics that helped me feel connected. I still like that aspect of Facebook. It’s the other stuff, the lies, the fake news, the hateful messages that bombarded me during the 2016 election cycle, that’s what got me to leave and delete my account.
 
That said, Carol still does a lot on Facebook, and it’s great for a lot of people, just not me. I feel that way about social media overall, which is why I no longer bother with those apps. Still, I want to stay connected and “visit” with family. I love to see pictures of family, kids, grandkids, and feel like I’m in their lives.
 
There are options for sharing, and the one I love, on my iPhone, is the Shared Albums feature. You can post to the Shared Album and everyone in that ‘share’ gets to look at those pictures, comment, and share their own pictures as well. You can do that on a PC as well, and a Mac, NOT just your iPhone.
 
You can have lots of Shared Albums with names denoting what they are and different people invited to share in them. Once the Shared Album is created, it’s easy to place a picture in it, and easy to invite someone to join in. I am including a link that will tell you how. How to use Shared Albums in Photos on your iPhone, iPad, and Mac - Apple Support