How To

Do you keep the receipts for everything you buy? Like me, you've probably noticed that the ones printed on thermal paper can begin to disappear over time. Soon, you're left with only a blank piece of paper that can't act as a proof of purchase or help you at tax time.

Wednesday's update to Google Drive on Android lets you easily store all of your receipts and even search through them. Doesn't a nice digital archive sound better than piles, folders, or boxes of receipts all over your home? Here's how to … Read more

After a rough night out on the town, looking at your Foursquare history is a good way to figure out where you were (assuming you were coherent enough to use your phone). Sometimes you may not like what you see and want to delete any trace of where you were as fast as possible.

Or you could have innocently checked into the wrong venue and need to delete the error from your history.

Well, you can delete any check-ins directly from your Android or iOS device. I'm not sure when the feature was added to either app, but previously … Read more

Being able to schedule an SMS, tweet, Facebook post, or Gmail is extremely useful. An SMS can be used to wish a distant friend or relative a happy birthday. A tweet or Facebook post can help your small business, or remind friends about a local event. And lastly, scheduling a Gmail message is useful when the recipient lives in another time zone and you don't want to disturb them.

The Schemes app for Android lets you schedule all of these message types, at no cost. Furthermore, you can send these scheduled messages without needing to create any … Read more

Whether technology saves more time than it squanders is an open question. Some of us may dream of a life off the grid and out of range, but by choice or necessity, we spend much of our waking life connected to the world through some electronic device or another.

If your network device of choice is an iPhone, these tips will improve the quality and perhaps reduce the quantity of the time you spend online. (Note that many of the tips also apply to the iPad.)

Bypass the lock screen to control music or take a picture In last month'… Read more

Mixed in with all of the announcements and releases from Google I/O earlier this week, the Google Play Books service received an important update. Google Play Books users can now upload personal PDFs and e-books they currently own to the service.

To upload a document to the service, you can visit Play.Google.com and click on the My Books section heading, or you can go to the My Books section directly by using this link.

You will see a new "Uploads" option on the left-hand side; when you click on it you'll be prompted to … Read more

Years before smartphones were a thing, Nokia was one of the first manufacturers to add IR blasters to its dumbphones. The use case was pretty limited, though, as the cool factor typically ended after the fun of turning TVs off at Circuit City died off.

But IR is getting its second wind in a new wave of smartphones packing the technology, namely, the S4. This time around, the use case is much more tangible, posing a real threat to the traditional TV remote. Powered by WatchOn (and Peel), the S4 is more than just a substitute clicker -- it's … Read more

At Google I/O, the company announced some small updates to its Google Now service. One of those updates added the ability for Android users to create location- and time-based reminders.

There are a few different methods for adding a reminder to Google Now. You can use your voice or enter it manually.

To create a reminder by voice, launch Google Now and say "Google" or tap on the mic icon. Once you hear the beep to alert you that Now is listening, start the command with "Remind Me" and add in what you're afraid … Read more

Good assistants -- the kind you can't live without -- are hard to come by. For starters, they should always be on time; any lag simply won't do. They should also get things right the first time, because who has time for inaccuracies? And, last of all, the assistant should be so good, they're always a few steps ahead of their boss.

Those are pretty high expectations, but Google and Apple both think they've got the magic to meet all those requirements and more. The secret, it turns out, is to hand off the work to … Read more

Google, on Wednesday, unveiled some new and some enhanced products that Android, Chrome, Maps, and Web users are sure to love. One of the new products announced was Hangouts. Now, I know what you're thinking: Google+ has had Hangouts for a while, and you're right. But Google has taken Hangouts out of Google+ and built it into a standalone instant messaging app for mobile devices.

The app, available on iOS (iPhone and iPad) and Android devices allows users to keep a unified chat experience in sync across not only the devices listed above, but also within Chrome, Google+ … Read more