Aug 15, 2021

📱💻⌚️ #78 - App Library, Day One, Hotspot Sharing, Drafts app, Mac text zoom, and more

By Finer Tech Newsletter • Issue #78 • View online

Hey everyone, and welcome to another issue packed with little tips that I hope can be a big help in your day-to-day.

I’m writing this issue from one of my favorite Chicago cafes while listening to Tool and on vacation from Bear, my largest client. Once a year they close the company for two weeks and tell us all to go enjoy ourselves! The U.S. could learn a lot from the Italian approach to work-life balance.

I set iOS 15 aside for this issue and returned to a charcuterie board of tips for all. I also tried a longer issue of 8 tips instead of the regular 5-6. I’d love to hear your thoughts about this issue via email and Twitter.

You can also find me on Mastodon, Tumblr, and Micro.blog. If you know people who would enjoy my newsletter, I’ll owe you a beverage if you recommend it to them.

Ulysses says the reading time for this issue is about four minutes—five if you take it easy, or three if you’re ambitious.

This issue’s cover photo is from my Flickr.

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💡 Tips

📱 Pull down on App Library for a list of all apps you can scroll, search

Sure, you can pull down on any Home Screen for Spotlight, but that searches everything—contacts, the internet, inside every app Spotlight can access.

If you’re already in App Library, you can simply pull down for an alphabetized, searchable list of just your apps. Use the right letter column to scroll at super speed.

📱 Day One: Long-tap on tabs for relevant options, fun, profit

Well, I can’t guarantee you’ll actually profit from this one, but I thought it was a nice surprise. In Day One on iPhone and iPad, long-tap on the tabs for Timeline, Media, New, and Calendar for quick navigation options (Maps didn’t get the fancy treatment).

Respectively, these are quick ways to switch to recent journals, filter for entries with photos or PDFs, create a new entry in a specific Journal, and switch to entries for a recent or specific day.

📱 Hotspot supports Family Sharing, no passwords required

Want to make it easier for Family Sharingmembers to hop on your iPhone’s hotspot, regardless of device? Settings > Hotspot > Family Sharing is calling your name.

Here you can make it easier for your family to quickly join your hotspot without juggling complex passwords or worrying about who is on which devices. Simply pick a member, grant them Automatic or Ask for Approval access, and their internet leeching becomes roughly 84% easier.

📱 Three-finger tap for custom text editing menu with undo, redo options

When typing just about anywhere on an iPhone or iPad, tap with three fingers to display a unique text-editing menu at the top of the screen.

Unlike the menu that appears from single tapping, this top menu focuses entirely on text exit controls (cut, copy, paste) and includes unique options to undo and redo.

💻 Text zoom options have gotten smarter, context aware

As time unfortunately marches on, some of our eyes could use a little help from our friends to read text. In recent years, macOS has thankfully become a better friend.

In System Preferences > Accessibility > Zoom, click Enable Hover Text. By default, hold the Command key while mousing over just about any text (including in System Preferences) to view a larger, context-aware version. A box appears to display instructions or entire paragraphs of text. You can even scroll text in the box to read everything, and adjust some of these features in that panel.

⌚️ Reminder: The Drafts complication is a killer way to never forget an idea

Siri could use some help with it's/its and the ways I bend adjectives for effect

If Drafts is a top-tier app to quickly create text, then share or convert it in, like, a zillion ways (and it is), then its Watch complication is the top-tieriest of ways to save ideas before you forget them forever and ever.

Seriously, tap the complication and the app launches straight into speech-to-text dictation. It’s like using one of those personal tape recorders from the 80’s, but with at least 80 percent less douche factor; easily my favorite and fastest way to jot down ideas in the moment, then deal with them later.

⌚️ Get a cuckoo clock on your wrist, minus the giant clock

If you often get lost in the moment and forget where the time went, your Apple Watch can chime on the hour, every hour. It’s a reliable way to snap yourself out of it and get some water, take a walk, and otherwise keep yourself on track.

Enable Settings > Clock > Chimes on your Apple Watch, then pick between Birds and Bells chimes. Seriously, those are your only two options, even in the upcoming watchOS 8. Scroll down a little further, and there’s even an option to speak the time on every hour, even if Silent Mode is enabled (careful with that one).

⌚️ Always be early or at least on time by setting your Watch to the future

A trick some people use to stay on time for Important Things is setting their home or car clocks a few minutes ahead of the actual time. Now, even your wrist can live in the future.

Head to Settings > Clock, and the top feature there can set your Watch face’s clock ahead by up to 59 minutes. It is important to note that alerts and notifications will still play at the correct time—your futuristic wrist clock is only skin deep.

🔗 Good Links & Reads

Amazing Winners of the 2021 Minimalist Photography Awards

Back for its third edition, the Minimalist Photography Awards has announced its list of winners for the year 2021.

mymodernmet.com • Share

Why we don't dole out many compliments – but should

Twain was describing a meeting with the Emperor of Germany, who had praised his books. But we can all surely identify with the sentiment: receiving sincere and well-expressed praise can feel as good as an unexpected windfall.

www.bbc.com • Share

Heads up: Sad origin story for a beautiful, world-class painting

I’ve appreciated Nightkawks for quite a while, but I didn’t know about the unfortunate, abusive life of its creator.

Nighthawks by Edward Hopper: Great Art Explained

How Private Is My VPN?

VPNs promise privacy, but The Markup found their apps and websites full of trackers.

themarkup.org • Share

The Hidden Melodies of Subways Around the World

By Sophie Haigney and Denise Lu Design by Gabriel Gianordoli and Umi SyamAug. 13, 2021 Ted Green has been collecting the sounds and sights of transit systems for more than a decade.

www.nytimes.com • Share

🤩 Thanks for reading

How did you like this issue? Was it useful and bite-sized enough? Are there certain kinds of tips or apps you’d like to see here? Let me know what you think via email and Twitter.

You can also find me on Mastodon, Tumblr, and Micro.blog.

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By Finer Tech Newsletter

Get smarter with your apps and Apple devices, served with a side of humor, links, and videos across culture, science, and more.

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