Software and applications

I can offer help getting online and website building if you need it.

Hi all, I will be taking early retirement (partial) next year and my husband is already retired. I want to start collecting ideas of places to go, things to do, travel ideas, recipes etc etc so I have ideas at my fingertips when boredom strikes! Anyway, I already use Pinterest but wondered if anyone has any other ideas for apps or platforms for collecting these ideas as I think of them, preferebly where I can save a picture or weblink to refer back to when needed? Thanks Tx

What is your favourite App to use on your iPad or tablet? What would you recommend to a newbie?

(Just intended as a possibly helpful tip. Maybe best posted here as it’s not very techy) My short term memory is shot. Someone’s name. An appointment. An entry code you just told me. A task. A temporary password. A house number. A price. A song title. A discount code. That I just saw or heard or that just popped into my head. By the time I have found a scrap of paper (So many scraps of paper!) and pencil or opened the right app and selected the right folder and a title and set a reminder and decided who to share it with - or have just walked up the stairs - I have forgotten what it was! Instead, I now tap just TWICE on my phone and instantly write it down or tap three times and dictate it. Done! Your phone won’t forget and you can, if you wish, at your leisure, later copy and it to another, slower app with more features. It’s just like an (almost) infinitely long whiteboard. Simple is good! No thought required! My memory replacement! It’s an app called Zipnote and ( strangely?) it’s almost unique in its simplicity and efficiency. I have no connection to the developer but am obviously keen for lots of people to use it so the developer keeps it updated. And I think you may well find it helpful. At the risk rambling on, I’ll also say that I use it to prepare draft copies of about everything. Before I fill in the complaints form to my energy company, I first type my words of wisdom/invective into Zipnote and then when I hit the wrong button or the site times-out, I just re-paste from my Zipnote draft. Or, to paste in a long, detailed Messenger message. (Those tiny boxes!) Or, when reading a long article, I copy and paste several key bits of text into Zipnote as I read so I don’t need to keep the whole article. Or, a place to drop the text I copied from a photo. https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/zipnote/id1603007695 .

Are there any other old folks like me who have been gaming online since NetHack came out? I'm tired of playing with bots on DOTA2, but I really would love to play with others closer to my age bracket. The rough and tumble world of 22 year olds just does not work for me anymore.

Has anyone used Zoom to connect with family, friends and colleagues during the Covid-19 lockdown? Some friends have used it successfully on their iPads, computers, laptops and android phones, so a few of us had an informal committee meeting on Friday with Zoom. I used my iPhone and since then have been inundated with what are known as Wangiri phone calls mainly from Africa. My phone rings once then cuts off. When I look at my missed calls there is the number and location of the caller. As you can imagine, getting a phone call in the middle of the night from Burkina Faso is somewhat unusual. I blocked that number but then the phone rings again from the same place but the last digits of the phone number have been changed. To date, I've had calls from Brazzaville in the Congo, Santo Domingo, Zimbabwe,Lithuania, Algeria, Guinea and Haiti as well as Burkina Faso. All the calls have been blocked but they still keep coming although thankfully not as frequently as yesterday when I had 18. So far today I've only had 4. A colleague of my neighbour has also had the same problem since using his iPhone with Zoom. I've read in the press that Zoom are saying that their security is not as good as it should be! So, although I suppose it could be a coincidence that I have suddenly started to receive these calls, it would take a lot to convince me that this is so. By the way, a Wangiri call is when the caller phones you but only lets the phone ring once. If you call them back you are immediately connected to a premium rate, high cost call which could cost you a lot of money so please be careful. Needless to say, I would not have returned the call to any of these numbers but some people might.

Hi guys. I have recently joined Snapchat app and I am trying to figure out how it works. Can anyone suggest me how to make friends on the app?

I joined a couple of years ago, not for very long, as for some reason, it would never allow me to sign in. Got email from Sally in the end I replied and she has sorted it out. I used another email address which has let me in now. The other one is Gmail and I've had this happen with so many other things over the years. Just wondered why it happens with Google or Gmail? It's happened so many times - goes astray. Anyone else had the same problem? A couple of my friends have had the same problems too.

Help not able to update manually ... any advice would be appreciated

Up until I had my stroke, (Christmas morning 2006) I used to go on eBay a great deal. Specialising in buying and selling vintage fashions and dress patterns, mainly the 1950s era, acquired from the USA. Then as my health started going south and then my ex wife passing away. eBay fell by the wayside rather. I still had a small collection of dresses that never got sold just lying in a box so a couple of weeks ago I took them all the charity shop belonging to the hospice that took care of my wife during her last days. It's rather strange, driving past their windows, as I did today and seeing one of the dresses I bought, on display.