Tag: CTG

App of the Week: Couch to 5K

The Good, The Bad, & How to Know if this Training Plan is Right for You.

By Heather Gannoe of Relentless Forward Commotion

If you’ve toyed with the idea of starting to run, or have a friend who has recently taken up running, chances are you’ve heard of the Couch to 5K program.   But if you haven’t: the Couch to 5k is a wildly popular training program that is designed to take a non-runner from a sedentary lifestyle to running a 5k distance race in just nine weeks. Designed by Josh Clark, and originally published on the training website Cool Running, the Couch to 5k program has claimed to help thousands of people become runners and has blossomed into a running movement of its own.  

The training plan consists of just three days of training sessions per week, for a total of nine weeks. Each session consists of running and walking intervals, measured by time or distance, progressing forward with the final goal of running either a 5k or 30 minutes, without walking. If you are thinking of using the Couch to 5k program to help get you started on your running journey, consider the following pros and cons to this plan.

The Good:

Does the thought of running for more than a minute terrify you?  Then this training program is perfect for you.  The Couch to 5k program starts off with short intervals of running combined with generous walking breaks, which is an ideal introduction to running both physically, and mentally  (for example, day # 1 includes the following:  “Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 60 seconds of jogging and 90 seconds of walking for a total of 20 minutes”).  Josh Clark states in his training program: “Too many people have been turned off of running simply by trying to start off too fast. ” Having specific, short distance or time goals prevents the participant from doing too much, too soon, which in turn prevents mental burnout and injury.

There has always been a bit of a stigma behind walking vs. running, but don’t let it bother you.   Studies show that a combination of running and walking has been shown to help prevent injuries while building physical endurance and running distance, as well as helping to prevent muscular fatigue.   So you are not any less of a ‘badass” for taking walking breaks; quite the contrary, you are a smart runner!

Further, some amazing athletes are well known for their run/walk methods.  Ultra runners (we are talking the people who run 100 + miles at once!)  are notorious for it.  And most famously, this style of training has been made very popular by former Olympic runner Jeff Galloway, who uses the run/walk method to train participants of all levels to run distances up to a marathon and beyond. The Couch to 5k program is variable in the sense that participants may choose to follow the plan by either distance or time. Each training session lists running and walking intervals by time or by distance, depending on the participant’s goal. This is helpful for those who are unable to measure the distance they run, or who may have time constraints on their training sessions.

The Bad:

Though the creators of the Couch to 5k program claim that it is for almost everyone, it might not actually be for everyone. Depending on many factors, such as health conditions, or even previous fitness experience, many beginners may find the couch to 5k training program too aggressive. Many beginning runners may find certain weeks include an increase in running distance that proves to be too difficult, and that week may need to be repeated. For example, on training day number three of week five of the program, participants are suggested to run two miles straight without a walk break. This is a significant increase from the three quarter mile interval run, with  half mile walk breaks, the session before. The Couch to 5k program encourages runners to repeat a week if necessary. However, the claim of getting participants off of the couch and onto running a 5k in only nine weeks may become frustrating to some who find they need to repeat a week.

On the other hand, some beginning runners may find the Couch to 5k program not aggressive enough. The Couch to 5k program discourages participants from skipping ahead, which can also prove to be frustrating for those who feel they are capable of doing more.

Conclusion:

Overall, the Couch to 5k training program is a very basic training guide that can be utilized by almost anyone. Even if the full nine week training program is not ideal for all participants, the Couch to 5k program may prove to be a useful starting point for someone looking to start running. The training plan can be found free on the Cool Running website and through the Facebook support page.  In addition, Couch to 5k apps are available to download to your smart phone or tablet, to help you keep track of your training.

Couchto5K is available to download for $2.99 for iOS and Android.

Do you have a favorite running app? Tell us about it in the comments below!

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How to: quickly search settings in iOS

 

 

By Charlie Sorrel of Cult of Mac

 

The iOS Settings app is more like a chaotic junk drawer that a neatly-organized filing cabinet. Back when the iPhone launched, it was tidy, with only a few items, all methodically arranged. Then, as more and more features were added to iOS, their settings were tossed in there like you toss spare keys into that kitchen drawer with the rubber bands and spare fuses. Unlike a real junk drawer, though, which will slice your fingers with hidden tools and pieces of broken teacup if you rummage too hard, the Settings app has a way to ignore the detritus and get straight to the setting you want: Search settings. This feature is essential, but very few of the folks I asked about it this week even knew it existed. This how-to is for them, and for anyone else who hates changing settings.

 

 

To use Settings search, just launch the Settings app and swipe down. That’s it! The previously-hidden search field is now ready for your queries. Type in the name of the settings screen you want, or the feature you want to tweak, and when the correct result shows up in the list, just tap it to go right to that screen. This is a timesaver for oft-used settings, but is really most useful for those settings you change so seldom that you can’t remember where they were hidden. And if you tap the wrong search result, your search remains persistent. Just hit the back arrow at the top left of the screen until you arrive back at the main settings page, where you’ll find the search box still populated with whatever you typed in there.

IT WORKS FOR THIRD-PARTY APPS TOO

As you can see from my screenshots, Settings Search works not only for the built-in Apple settings, like iCloud, Mail, Accessibility and so on, but also for the settings that third-party apps put inside the Settings app. If your search includes results from apps you have installed your device, then they’ll show up in the list, and be directly accessible with a tap.

And you might be surprised by what you find. It used to be that many apps put their settings in the Settings app, but as nobody ever looks outside the app itself when they want to tweak setting, those settings went unset, as it were. But there are still quite a few hiding in here, so you might like to poke around, just to see if there’s a neat setting for your favorite app that you never knew about.

IT WORKS ON THE MAC TOO

Settings search works on the Mac too, but is more obvious thanks to the always-visible search field, and the fact that the text cursor is already right there in search box, so you can type as soon as you launch the macOS System Preferences app.

Speaking of keyboards, the iOS Settings app has zero keyboard shortcuts for folks with a hardware keyboard attached. Zero. Even pressing and holding the ⌘ key, which brings up an overlay showing what keyboard shortcuts are available even when you’re on the Home screen, doesn’t do anything. If you’re a user who likes to keep their hands on the keyboard, then, you’re out of luck. This seems particularly short-sighted, as keyboard users tend to also be power users, and therefore more likely to be regular tweakers of settings.

Search is everywhere on iOS these days, but still not unified. You don’t see your settings in the regular Spotlight search, for example, which would be an even quicker way of accessing settings. One day this may happen, but until then, this tip will keep us going.

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How to: Fix the 5 Most Common Apple TV Problems

 

 

Previously posted by CNET

The Apple TV is a very capable streamer that has only gotten better over time with the addition of things like the Siri remote, applications and a TV guide. Still, the Apple TV is not impervious to problems. Here are five common problems with the Apple TV and how to fix them.

Just like with your smart phone, things can go awry with apps on Apple TV, they can sometimes lag or freeze up all together. If anything like this happens, the best thing to do is to force close the application. To do this, on the Siri remote Double press the Home or TV button, slide left or right on the touchpad to select that app and then swipe up to force close it.


Sometimes it’s more than just one app that’s acting funky or the Apple TV can act glitchy in general, just not right. If this is the case, then you just need to restart the Apple TV, you can do this by going into Settings > System > Restart or on the Apple TV remote You can hold Menu and the TV or Home button until the light on the front of the Apple TV begins blinking. When this happens release those buttons and the Apple TV will restart.

If the Siri remote just randomly stops working or doesn’t work at all one day it may need to be charged. You can charge it using a lightning cable in the port along the bottom edge of the remote. And you can also actually also check its charge level under remotes and devices in the Settings. You may need to use an iPhone or an iPad in the remote app to get there. If that doesn’t work, you may need to reset the remote and repair it with your Apple TV To do this, hold the remote near the Apple TV and hold the Volume Up and Menu button for a few seconds, and it should repair.

Every so often, audio on the Apple TV will cut out. Obviously this depends heavily on what your own sound system set up is, but if it happens to you, try restarting the TV and any audio hardware connected to the Apple TV such as a sound bar. That should fix the problem but if not try restarting the Apple TV. If that doesn’t work, go to settings, audio and video, and make sure you’ve selected the right speakers under audio output. And then in Audio Mode, make sure it’s set to Auto.

If you’ve installed a lot of applications and games on your Apple TV, storage space might get tight over time. The obvious solution is to remove some of those apps and games. If you do this from he home screen, it’s gonna take quite a few steps for every single application you want to remove. Highlight the application on the home screen that you want to remove. And long-press on the track pad until it starts to wiggle. Then, press the “play/pause” button. Select “delete” and then select “delete” again to confirm. If you’re trying to remove several applications at once, a faster option is to go to “settings”, “general”, and “manage storage’. There you’ll find applications sorted by file size in descending order Think the trash can to the right of any application to remove it and then click delete to confirm.

What are your favorite Apple TV hacks? Let us know in the comments below.

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WIT: Meet the female entrepreneurs using tech for good

 

By Mark Smith of BBC News

Jude Ower loved playing video games as a child, but she never dreamed that her passion would eventually become a force for good and win her accolades and honours.

After 12 years making games for education and training, she went on to create an international games platform with a social conscience – Playmob.
“After the 2010 Haiti earthquake, Zynga, the creator of Farmville, launched a campaign to raise funds for the victims by selling an in-game item, with a percentage of each purchase going to help the victims,” she explains.

“It was massively successful and raised over $1m in a matter of days. It was then I thought: ‘Maybe I could make a platform that connected games and causes?'”
Playmob pairs games developers or businesses with a charity and then sets up in-game advertising campaigns. By clicking on links within the game, players can make donations.

The campaigns have helped more than 3,000 teenagers receive counselling for cyber-bullying, provided protection for 31 pandas, and secured education for 8,500 children in Africa and Asia, the company says.

“With Playmob we can track the social impact, such as number of trees planted, number of meals provided, water wells built, and so forth,” she says.
“This allows players to see that the more they play and interact with the branded content, the more good they do.”
So far the games platform has raised more than $1m for charities over the past five years, and more than 1.5 million players have interacted with charitable in-game content.

Her success saw her awarded an MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire) in 2015 for services to entrepreneurship and she’s been voted one of the top 100 Women in Tech in Europe.

Ms Ower is just one of a growing number of entrepreneurs – many of them women – exploring how technology can be harnessed in the cause of philanthropy.
This is tech for social good, or “philtech” as it’s sometimes called.

Erin Michelson’s high-flying banking career took her to Hong Kong, Chicago, New York and San Francisco, where she rose to vice president and director of philanthropic management at Bank of America.

But despite seemingly having it all, she felt there was something missing.
“I realised that even though I had all the trappings of success, I was terribly unhappy,” she says.

“So I quit my job, sold everything I owned, set up a charitable fund, and headed out on a two-year around-the-world trip volunteering with humanitarian organisations.”
Taking only one suitcase, she spent 720 days travelling to 62 countries across all seven continents – an adventure that helped her find meaning in her life, she says.
After writing a book about her experiences, she returned to San Francisco and founded Summery, a data analytics company that has developed a piece of online software similar to the Myers-Briggs personality test.

The program combines behavioural science and analytics to give employers an idea of their staff’s social priorities and attitudes towards giving, which she says helps inform companies how to focus their charitable efforts.

“The test matches you with one of 10 ‘giving’ personalities and provides a snapshot of your giving DNA, one of 59,048 possibilities,” says Ms Michelson.
By taking the guesswork out of charitable giving, she says it can improve the relationship between employer and staff, to everyone’s benefit.

“Engaged employees lead not only to better corporate performance, but also significant cost savings through stronger retention and more targeted recruitment based on cultural appreciation,” she says.

Richard Craig, chief executive of the Technology Trust, which helps charitable organisations use tech more effectively, says: “Over the last couple of years there has been a noticeable trend in graduates specifically looking for roles in charities and non-profits who might previously have looked to careers in the City, for example.

“I am seeing the same trend with technology start-ups, with a proportion looking to deliver social good either as non-profits themselves, or commercial organisation with social purpose.”

It was while working for an advertising agency in London that Amy Williams had her “philtech epiphany”.

“I saw firsthand the huge amount of money that gets passed from one big conglomerate to another, buying and selling the cheap commodity of our attention online,” she says.

“The stark contrast between these two worlds really hit me – £4.7bn was spent on online advertising in the UK last year.”

She quit and went travelling, working as a volunteer for a small charity in Argentina called Food For Thought, which specialises in nutrition education for kids.

“I started started to see the untapped potential within online advertising to make some real positive impact.”

Inspired by her experiences, she founded Good-Loop, a company that rewards viewers of video ads with donations to their chosen charities.

Brands create a video and if the visitor watches it for 15 seconds or more, the advertiser pays 50p – with 50% of that going to the chosen charity, 40% to the content creator, and 10% to Good-Loop.

She says the process makes viewers more engaged with brands because they have opted to watch the content rather than having it forced upon them.

Playmob’s Jude Ower believes recent political events in Europe and the US have fired up younger generations to get more involved in socially responsible causes.
“We are seeing people leave well-paid jobs to take a risk and set up on their own, not just in the hope of creating a successful start-up, but to do something with purpose.”

Do you know any women in tech fighting the good fight? Let us know in the comments below.

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How to: use Apple Clips, the iOS video-editing app and why you’d want to.

 

Apple Clips is like iMovie meets Snapchat.

 

By Caitlin McGarry of Macworld

It’s easy to compare Apple’s new iOS app, Clips, to video-sharing social networks like Snapchat, Instagram, and Facebook. But that’s not exactly fair, because Apple’s Clips isn’t social at all—it’s designed simply to help you create and edit fun videos. What you do with them after that is up to you.

This approach makes Clips less anxiety-inducing. To share a video on Instagram or Snapchat, you’ll want to shoot in Instagram or Snapchat to make sure the moment you’re capturing is perfectly framed. You can shoot in Clips, too, but this feels more like an app you’ll use after the moment has passed to stitch together memories and add a soundtrack and captions. Clips is way more low-key.

But that doesn’t make it less complicated to use. In fact, it’s on par with Snapchat when it comes to unintuitive design, so be prepared to spend an exorbitant amount of time creating your first clip. (We pray it gets easier the more you use it, but time will tell.) Here’s everything you need to know about using Apple Clips.

How to use Clips

 

First thing’s first: You need photos and videos to edit, right? Right. You can import them from your Camera Roll and stitch them together, or you can shoot photos or videos in-app. Pro tip: You can swipe left on the giant red “Hold to record” button if you plan on filming for awhile to lock the camera in recording mode. Just tap the button again when you want to stop shooting. Clips defaults to the Instagram-esque square format, so if you’re importing media, make sure it’ll look good square. (Some might mind this, but I don’t.)

From there you can swap videos or photos around in the visual timeline at the bottom of the app just by pressing and moving them. You can also easily trim video clips—just tap on the clip in the timeline and then tap the scissor icon to edit the video down to just the seconds (or minutes) you want to include.

Along with a video-trimming tool, Clips has all the standard social video-editing features (filters, emojis, etc.) tucked behind icons at the top of the app. Tapping the speech bubble icon adds captions in real time (more on this in a minute). Eight filters, ranging from black and white to my favorite Comic Book, are behind the interlocking circles icon. The star is hiding the time, your location, shapes like circles and arrows, and random words you can edit after adding them to your image or video. The ‘T’ icon unlocks title cards that can help you tell your story—the text on these cards is also editable. The last option, a music note, is how you add a song from iTunes or an Apple-supplied tune to your video.

It takes awhile to get to know the various tools and tricks to make Clips work for you, but you’ve got this. And remember that creating a clip in Clips doesn’t mean that video goes anywhere but your Camera Roll. You have to take extra steps to share it with anyone or on any platform, which makes it extremely low-pressure.

The best Clips features

 

Clips has a few features that set it apart from other video-editing apps, the most notable of which is Live Titles. That’s what Apple calls its real-time captioning tool, which is designed to make your video totally watchable without sound. This is perfect for scrolling through Facebook’s auto-playing News Feed, but also improves accessibility, making videos easy to watch for viewers who are deaf or hard of hearing. Live Titles supports 36 languages at launch, which is a feat for a brand-new app.

The Live Titles feature doesn’t always nail the speech-to-text translation, though. I didn’t experience any captioning errors in my tests, but if you speak quickly and run your words together, you might confuse the algorithm parsing your sentences. Speak slowly and enunciate to avoid having to edit your captions. (I actually didn’t know this was possible, but the Wall Street Journal’s Joanna Stern discovered that you can edit a caption by tapping on the video clip, then pausing the video where the error appears on screen and tapping on the text. Yeah, it’s kind of a process.)

But basically everything you see on screen is editable, which is incredibly useful. Every bit of text can be changed and even emojis can be easily swapped out by tapping on the emoji on-screen and then tapping again to access your emoji keyboard.

In your first few hours with Clips, it’ll feel a little burdensome. But once you figure it out, creating social videos with Clips is a cinch.

Time to share

Once your masterpiece is finished, it’s time to share it. Clips uses facial recognition to figure out who’s in your video and then suggests that you use iMessage to send your video to those friends, which is really cool.

You can also share a clip via email or post it to your go-to social networks, minus Snapchat. Snapchat is not designed for sharing what’s essentially a short social movie (not to mention the fact that clips are square and snaps are vertical). But clips seem tailor-made for sharing on Facebook in particular. Imagine creating movies of your kids or making your own DIY Tasty food recipe video with Clips. Post them to your page and watch the likes roll in.

It’s a good thing Apple didn’t try to build a social network around Clips (lesson learned from Ping, perhaps). Instead, Apple is doing what it does best: giving creators the tools they need to make good work. Right now, popular media tends to be short and shareable. With Clips, maybe you too can snag 15 minutes—or more likely seconds—of viral video fame.

What do you think of Apple Clips? Let us hear from you in the comments below!

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How to Hide an IP Address on a Mac

 

 

By Xugro Xiphius of Techwalla

There are times when you might want to hide your IP (Internet Protocol) address when using your Mac. Your IP address can reveal information about your location and ISP (Internet Service Provider) that could be used by advertisers, corporations or anyone who is curious. Hiding your IP address is a great way to protect your online privacy and remain anonymous. The Tor client is one way to make your Internet use anonymous. But it is impossible to completely hide your IP address.


Step 1
Visit the Tor website and download the version of Tor appropriate for your system. There are Mac, Windows and Linux versions available.

Step 2
Install Tor and restart your computer. Launch the Vidalia application, which is part of the installation, to start running Tor.

Step 3
Configure your browser (preferably Firefox) to work with Tor. The installer will automatically install Torbutton to Firefox, which allows the user to toggle Tor “on” and “off.”

Step 4
Disable browser plug-ins, such as Java and Flash, that might bypass Tor and reveal your IP address without your knowing it. View the plug-ins you have installed by typing “about:plugins” (without quotes) in your address bar. To disable a plug-in, open the “Add-ons” list under “Tools,” and then disable the plug-in of your choice.

Step 5
Use a Web-based proxy service instead of Tor if you’re only interested in Web-based anonymity. Eat Proxy maintains a list of popular and new proxy services to make Web browsing anonymous.

Hit us up in the comments below for any questions or requests for more information on Masking your IP address.

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Tips & Tricks: 11 Roku tricks you should try right now

 

Ladies,

I love my Roku box! I mean I’ve developed an unhealthy attachment to it. It is so cool and I was a hard core AppleTV early Adopter. Aside from the Plex Server that I love, this article paints a great picture of all the bad ass things a Roku box can do. Enjoy!

by Rick Broida of CNET

Your Roku streamer can do a lot more than you might think. These are some of the coolest tips we’ve tried.

Is there a more widely beloved tech product than the Roku streamer? Whether yours is a stick or box, it delivers virtually unparalleled video goodness to your TV: Netflix, Hulu, HBO and so on.

And, yet, it could be better. That onscreen keyboard? Bleh. The default interface theme? Room for improvement. Below I’ve rounded up 11 ways to improve your Roku experience, from organizing channels to adding buttons (no, really) to your Roku remote.

USE YOUR PHONE AS YOUR ROKU KEYBOARD
Is there anything more aggravating than using a remote to operate an onscreen keyboard? Just signing in to, say, your Netflix account can be a slow, agonizing affair, to say nothing of searching for actors or movies.


Thankfully, there’s an easy fix: Use your phone instead. As you probably know, the Roku apps (Android|iOS) can take the place of your Roku remote, but they also provide a keyboard that makes data entry significantly faster and easier.

So anytime you land at your Roku’s onscreen keyboard on your TV, whether for a search or sign-in, just run the app, tap Remote and then tap the keyboard icon near the bottom of the screen. Now you can tap-type! Or, power tip, tap the keyboard’s microphone icon and “type” your entry using your voice. Speaking of which…

USE YOUR PHONE FOR VOICE SEARCH

You know what’s even faster than a keyboard? The spoken word. If you’re lucky enough to have a current-generation Roku 3 or 4, you may have discovered the joys of voice search, which you can operate via the Roku remote.

Don’t own one of those models? No problem: The Roku app now offers voice-search capabilities of its own. So instead of tapping out, say, “Leonardo DiCaprio” to find his available movies (and risk spelling it wrong), you can just tap the Search option, then Voice, and actually say, “Leonardo DiCaprio.”

STREAM MEDIA FROM YOUR PHONE OR TABLET
Want to show everyone the photos and videos you took at the recent wedding, graduation, soccer game or zombie escape room? Don’t gather them around your relatively tiny phone or tablet; gather them around the TV instead. The Roku app lets you cast photos, videos and music from your mobile device to your streamer.
Just fire up the app and tap Play On Roku. Choose the kind of media you want to stream, then the specific media. Presto! Big-screen viewing from your small(er)-screen device.

Want to take this a step further? You can also mirror your smartphone or tablet to your Roku device.

TURN YOUR ROKU REMOTE INTO A UNIVERSAL REMOTE


I really like the design of the Roku remote, especially those that have shortcut buttons to the likes of Netflix and Amazon. What I don’t like: You can’t program a Roku remote to control your TV.

But you can program a Sideclick. Available for a variety of streamers (including Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV), this clever add-on (with the best name ever) clips to the side of your Roku remote and adds a row of handy programmable buttons: power, volume up/down, channel up/down, input and A/B (these last available for whatever functions you want).

The Sideclick starter kit for Roku sells for $29.99 and comes with four adapter clips to accommodate the majority of Roku remotes. It’s a pretty nice option for anyone tired of juggling remotes.

ORGANIZE YOUR CHANNELS
The more channels you add to your Roku library, the bigger a jumbled mess they get. If you’re forever scrolling all over the place to find the handful of channels you visit most, you’ve probably wished for some way to reorganize them.


This is that way: Find a channel you want to relocate — let’s say HBO Now — and highlight it with your remote. (Don’t actually select it, just move the cursor over it so it’s highlighted.) Next, press the Option button on your remote (it looks like an asterisk), then choose Move Channel. Now use the direction pad to move the icon where you want it, noting how others move out of the way as you go.
Once you’ve found the perfect spot, press OK to complete the process. Repeat as necessary.

REORGANIZE CHANNELS IN THE ROKU APP
A recent update to the Roku app added a great feature: a Channels screen, similar to what you see on your TV. It makes for much faster access to your favorite channels.

However, it’s not immediately obvious how to organize those channels. That’s because you can’t actually do so within the app: You have to hit up your actual Roku on your TV. Then just follow the steps outlined in Organize your channels, above. Or, if you want more detail, check out How to organize your channels in the new Roku 4.0 app.

CHOOSE A NEW THEME
Not a fan of Roku’s default interface theme? That’s OK, not everyone loves purple. If you venture into the Settings menu and choose Themes, you’ll see a handful of other options.

Even better, select Get More Themes, which will bring you to the Roku Channel Store’s Themes collection. (You can also browse them online if you prefer.) Here you’ll find several dozen other options, everything from golf to Garfield to Star Trek. Alas, these add-ons aren’t free: <ost range from 99 cents to $2.99.

INSTALL A SCREENSAVER
Tired of that Roku logo bouncing around whenever your streamer sits idle for a while? Why not choose a screensaver that’s a little more interesting?
As with selecting a theme, you can head to the Settings menu and then choose Screensaver for a handful of other options. (If you’ve already chosen a different theme, you may see other screensaver options already. Nebula, for example, offers a digital clock in place of the bouncing Roku logo.)
And, again, you can head to the Channel Store to find lots of other screensavers: aquariums, animated fireplaces, headlines from “The Onion,” even a Nixie Clock. A handful are free; most will cost you a buck or two.

RENAME YOUR ROKUS
If you have more than one Roku device, it makes sense to assign each one a name — if only to simplify things when using the Roku app. It’s a lot easier to switch between, say, “Bedroom Roku” and “Living Room Roku” than it is “Roku 2” and “Roku 3.”

Curiously, however, you can’t do this from within the app. Instead, you need to sign into my.roku.com, then head to the My Account page. Scroll down a bit to see a list of your connected devices, then click Rename next to the one you want to change. Not sure which is which? You can actually refer to the app for this; tap Settings > Switch Device for a list of connected Rokus (and their convenient accompanying pictures), then look for the serial number. Match that to what you see on the Web portal.

INSTALL PRIVATE CHANNELS


Everyone knows about Roku’s Netflix, Hulu and other mainstream channels, but your streamers also support the addition of private channels.

Is that code for “adult”? Yes and no. Although adult channels do exist for Roku, you can find a variety of family-friendly options at sources like Roku-Channels.com, RokuGuide.com, StreamFree.tv and RokuChannels.tv.

One cool option: The Silent Movie Channel, which offers selections from the likes of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton and Rudolph Valentino.

To add it, head to Roku’s My Account page in your browser (as described in the previous tip), click Add a Channel, then enter the code ROLLEM.

The channel should get automatically added to your Roku device within the next 24 hours, but you should be able to force it by going to the Channel Store on your Roku, then exiting back out to the main menu.

FIND A LOST ROKU REMOTE

Much as I like the design of the Roku remote, the size can be a problem: It goes missing that much more easily. The Bermuda Triangle has nothing on my couch cushions.

Fortunately, if you own a Roku 4 or Roku Ultra , there’s a fast way to find your remote. (Assuming, of course, you can still find the Roku itself. Gotta be somewhere near the TV.) Both models have a button on top; press it and your remote will make a sound.

Want to learn how to choose what sound it makes? Check out Quickly find a lost Roku remote with this trick.
And there you go! Eleven cool ways to improve your Roku experience.

Hit the comments and share your favorite tips! ■

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How to: record live TV without a cable subscription using Plex DVR

 

 

Cord cutters, you too can record your favorite live TV shows and watch them whenever you want, thanks to Plex DVR!

Ladies,

Netflix changed the game. Hulu stepped up next and cord cutting became the next big thing. I sort of evolved my viewing habits out of scheduling necessity for my work without even realizing it. A few years ago I realized I was watching all of my favorite programs on the internet the day after it broadcast or I’d wait until the season was over and binge the entire thing. And speaking of binging, Netflix smartly releases the entire season of it’s shows at once for fuel the binge hunger of people like me. I discovered the genius of the Plex Media Server a while ago and have since cut the cord in my life. For those of you who are still on the live broadcast bandwagon, this article is for you. It could save you up to $200 a month in cable fees if you decide to make the switch, so, it’s worth the read…

 

By Lory Gil of iMore

 

I’m always looking for ways to maximize my TV watching experience. That’s why Plex DVR is a fantastic service for cord cutters like me. Combined with HDHomeRun and an HDTV antenna, I can record live broadcast television and watch it at my leisure, just like my cable subscribing friends do with their DVR. You can too. Here’s how.

  • What you need
  • How to set up Plex DVR on your Mac or PC
  • How to record your favorite live TV shows
  • How to watch your recorded live TV on Plex

What you need

Plex is a media server that you can load your movies, music, and photos onto. You can then watch, listen to, or view that content across any supported device with the Plex app. Plex DVR is a feature in the Plex Pass subscription that lets you record and watch free digital broadcast channels so you can also watch TV any time across your supported devices. You’ll need a few things before you can set up Plex DVR:

  • An HDHomeRun device with an HDTV antenna set up in your home
  • Plex Media Player on your Mac
  • A Plex Pass subscription
  • A hard drive with enough space to record your shows

Make sure you have your HDHomeRun set up and the Plex Media Server on your Mac before you try to use Plex DVR to scan for channels in your home.

 

How to set up Plex DVR on your Mac

Once you have everything you need, you’ll have to connect your HDHomeRun transmitter to your Plex so it can scan your channels and create a program guide for you.
1 Launch the Plex Media Server on your Mac.
2 Sign in to your account.
3 Click on Settings in the menu on the left.
4 Click on DVR(Beta) in the menu on the left.

 

 


5 Click on DVR Setup.
6 Select your HDHomeRun when it appears in the setup window.

 


7 Click Continue.
8 Click Continue after Plex scans your digital channels. If some channels are missing, you can scan for channels again.
9 Enter your language preference.
10 Enter your postal/zip code (for the purpose of adding a program guide).
11 Click Continue. You will be presented with a list of every channel available for you to watch live TV with.
12 De-select any channels you don’t want to add to Plex and then click Continue.

 

 

How to record your favorite live TV shows

After Plex DVR is finished creating your programming guide, you can begin scheduling and recording shows.
1 Launch the Plex Media Server on your Mac.
2 Sign in to your account.
3 Click on Program Guide in the menu on the left.
4 Click on a TV show episode or movie you want to record.

 


5 Click Record from the item’s summary page.
6 Click the red record button right on the image to record an entire season of a show. This will trigger a window to pop out.
7 Select All Episodes from the drop down menu under Record.


Continue this process until you have scheduled recordings for every movie or TV show you want to watch at your leisure.

How to watch your recorded live TV on Plex

Once a TV show or movie is finished recording, it will automatically appear in your Plex library. From the Plex app on any of your devices, you can log in and select the recorded content from your Movies or TV Shows library. It’s simple!

 

Any questions?
Do you have any questions about how to set up Plex DVR and record live TV shows and movies to watch at your leisure? Put them in the comments and I’ll help you out!

 

 

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WIT: Marissa Mayer Calls Out Media For Sexist Coverage

Ladies,

Marissa Mayer tenure as Yahoo CEO has been met with mixed reviews. I respect the fact she has the job at all and is reputed to be a genuinely nice person. I hope the higher up’s at Verizon recognize her worth because we need more Marissa Mayers in Silicon Valley.

By Emily Peck of Huffington Post

With little left to lose, Yahoo’s CEO gets real.

Sure, Marissa Mayer made it through the glass ceiling, landing the top spot at Yahoo in 2012, but waiting for her on the other side was a never-ending stream of gender-fueled criticism and commentary. 
Until Monday, she’s never really addressed it.

In interviews, Mayer ― who is one of only a handful of female CEOs in the Fortune 500 ―  would typically say gender wasn’t a problem for her, or in tech generally, an odd remark considering the industry stats that show tech to be a male-dominated place that’s often unfriendly to women.

Then, on Monday, after it was announced that Verizon was paying $4.83 billion for Yahoo and that Mayer’s future as leader of the company was a question mark, she finally cracked. In an interview with the Financial Times, she called out the media for its sexist coverage. (Verizon also owns The Huffington Post.)

“I’ve tried to be gender blind and believe tech is a gender neutral zone but do think there has been gender-charged reporting,” she told the Financial Times. “We all see the things that only plague women leaders, like articles that focus on their appearance, like Hillary Clinton sporting a new pantsuit. I think all women are aware of that, but I had hoped in 2015 and 2016 that I would see fewer articles like that. It’s a shame.”

We needn’t feel too sorry for Mayer, who stands to earn $57 million in severance if she leaves Yahoo. (Falling off the glass cliff has never looked so comfortable.) Still, other women in tech read that coverage, too ― and if tech truly wants to welcome more of them into the upper ranks, the industry needs to figure out how to deal with a female CEO.

But it wasn’t just the media that viewed Mayer through the gender lens.

Shareholders, analysts, professors, other women, pundits ― all focused on Mayer in a way we simply don’t see happen with men who are CEOs. Do you know how much time Bill Gates took off from work when his kids arrived on the scene? Has anyone ever interrupted a shareholder meeting to call Warren Buffett hot, or accused a guy of only keeping his job because he was expecting twins?

From the relentless coverage of her pregnancies and her capabilities as a mother to the constant attention to her looks, Mayer was always a woman CEO. 

“I’m a dirty old man and you look attractive,” one shareholder told Mayer at a meeting in 2013. A business school professor told Bloomberg the only reason Mayer didn’t get fired in 2015 was because she was pregnant.

One analyst dropped a 99-page presentation arguing Mayer should be fired ― just days after she gave birth to twins, an especially difficult time for her to respond to such criticism. Considering the amount of time it takes to draft such a long document, it would seem that the timing was a bit curious.

Some criticized her laugh, others called her out for micromanaging. (Sure, a few people called Steve Jobs a micromanager, but the broader story was that he was a genius who was obsessed with the details.)

And then there was an endless stream of commentary on Mayer’s decision not to take a long maternity leave. She was expected, for better or worse, to be a role model for all the women in tech. 

Monday’s comments seem to indicate that Mayer’s view on women in tech has evolved. 

Back in 2015 she told Steven Levy: “I never play the gender card. …The moment you play into that, it’s an issue.” She even said: “In technology we live at a rare, fast-moving pace. There are probably industries where gender is more of an issue, but our industry is not one where I think that’s relevant.”

Perhaps she’s feeling more emboldened to talk now that her mission to turn around Yahoo is closing out. Mayer might have more to say, and certainly we’ll be listening. With so few female CEOs in the industry, her words could have real impact. Let’s hope she keeps talking.

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How to Connect wireless headphones to any TV

Ladies,

Living in the digital age means are gadgets are smarter than we are, including our TV sets. I remember when there was only one TV in the house and it had only 3 channels. Today, it seems, you need to have an engineering degree (or a child) in order to tune into your favorite show every week. And, the way we view our shows has changed drastically too. Our shows are “on demand” and rarely watched with the entire family gathered around the set at prime time. No, these days most of us catch up on our shows when it’s most convenient but, that doesn’t always coincide with the rest of your households schedules. Luckily, our smart TVs, gaming consoles, and TV gadgets have the ability to connect a variety of headphones so you can watch your shows without disturbing the rest of the house.

by Taylor Martin of CNET

Use one of these methods to connect headphones to your TV and enjoy listening at full volume without disturbing others.

So you want to watch television at night without disturbing others trying to sleep. Or maybe you prefer to block out the noise of your surroundings — like that annoying dog next door who won’t stop barking — while catching up on The Flash.
Connecting wireless headphones to your television doesn’t have to be difficult, and there are several ways you can pull it off, regardless of what TV you have.

DEDICATED WIRELESS HEADPHONES
If you’re like most people, your TV doesn’t have built-in Bluetooth. But the workaround for connecting wireless headphones is so simple and cheap, it’s not a huge deal anyways.


One the most straightforward ways to use wireless headphones with your TV is to purchase dedicated wireless headphones. These typically come with a base station that plugs into the television via 3.5mm analog jack or optical and work over radio frequency instead of Bluetooth, which comes with one main advantage: range.

Bluetooth headphones are typically limited to 30 feet, give or take. RF headphones often have a far superior range — closer to 300 feet when unobstructed.
There is a catch, however. If you do not have another audio device connected to your television through that jack, such as a sound bar, you’ll have to swap it for the headphones when you want to go wireless.

But if your sound bar is connected through either optical or digital outputs, you can leave the wireless headphones connected without interfering with normal audio playback.

You can find wireless headphones for your television for anywhere from $20 to upwards of $300 and the audio quality will vary substantially.

BLUETOOTH HEADPHONES
A dedicated set of headphones for your TV might have its advantages, but if you already have a nice pair of headphones you’d prefer to use, you might be able to make it work with things you already own or for even less.

If your headphones are Bluetooth, all you really need is a Bluetooth transmitter. Transmitters can be found online or at your local electronics retailers for as little as $15.

Basically, it takes the 3.5mm or RCA output from your television and transmits it as a Bluetooth signal. You will need a power source — usually USB — which you might be able to tap from the USB port on the television or plug into a power strip around your entertainment system. Once you pair the transmitter with your Bluetooth headphones, setup is complete and you can begin watching shows or movies with the audio streaming through your favorite headphones.

Using a Bluetooth transmitter will leave you with the same issue as a pair of dedicated wireless headphones, though. If you’re not using another 3.5mm output device, like a sound bar, you may have to disconnect the Bluetooth transmitter from the 3.5mm or RCA jacks to restore volume to the television’s internal speakers.

MEDIA STREAMERS


Some set-top boxes — such as Roku, Apple TV and Android TV boxes — allow you to connect headphones and listen to your movies and TV shows in private. This is often one of the most hassle-free ways to connect headphones to your television.

ANDROID TV
Support for Bluetooth audio devices on Android TV boxes is hit or miss. Some support Bluetooth, but only for use with a keyboard and mouse. Others, do support Bluetooth headphones, and you pair them just as you would with any other Android device. Put the headphones into pairing mode, go to Settings > Bluetooth and select the headphones when they appear.


The Nvidia Shield Controller also has a headphone jack built-in, so you can use wired headphones with the controller if you don’t have Bluetooth headphones on hand.

APPLE TV
Apple TV will allow you to connect Bluetooth headphones. Just put the headphones into pairing mode and go to Settings > Remotes and Devices > Bluetooth. Wait for the headphones to appear and select them to pair and connect.

 

AMAZON FIRE TV
You can pair Bluetooth headphones with the Amazon Fire TV and Fire TV Stick. Just put your Bluetooth headphones in pairing mode and on the Fire TV or Fire TV Stick, go to Settings > Controllers and Bluetooth Devices > Other Bluetooth Devices. Once your headphones appear under Discovered Devices, select them to complete pairing.

 

ROKU
Depending on which model Roku and Roku remote you have, you can either use private listening through the Roku app or plug wired headphones into the jack on the remote.

To use private listening with the Roku app, download the Roku app to your Android or iOS device and make sure your phone is connected to the same wireless network as your Roku. Open the app and connect either wired or Bluetooth headphones to your phone and private listening will be enabled. Disconnect the headphones to disable private listening.

The Roku 3, Roku Premiere+, Roku 4 and Roku Ultra all come with remotes that feature headphones jacks.

GAMING CONSOLES

If you have a gaming console plugged into your television, you can use it for wireless audio. But there’s a catch. Bluetooth support is spotty and you’ll need wired headphones.

PLAYSTATION 4
The PlayStation 4 will only supports specific Bluetooth headsets. There is also a workaround which requires a USB Bluetooth adapter that circumvents the restriction, but it still doesn’t work with all Bluetooth headsets and headphones.
Your best bet is using wired headphones and plugging them into the 3.5mm headphone jack on the controller. Just make sure to select the proper audio device in settings, under Settings > Devices > Audio Devices > Output to headphones.


XBOX ONE
The Xbox One does not support Bluetooth, so your hopes of a truly wireless experience are dead. But, like with the PlayStation 4, you can plug your headphones into the 3.5mm jack on the controller.
Unfortunately, not all Xbox One controllers are created equal. Newer models have the 3.5mm jack built-in. With an older wireless controller, you will need to purchase the Stereo Headset Adapter, which plugs into the bottom of the controller and gives it a 3.5mm jack and volume and microphone controls.

 

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