Latest Updates on Free Tech Support, Podcasts, Zapier.com and New Windows 10 Feature

Are you experiencing a tech-related network, computer, software, Smartphone or other peripheral device related issue? If so, you may be able to obtain free technical support that could possibly resolve your problem. Both the Hudson Gateway Association of Realtors and the New York State Association of Realtors offer free technical support options to their members. I recommend that you visit the web pages below to better acquaint yourself with these services and how they may be able to help you.

I would encourage everyone to somehow record the contact information and support hours for these services in a way that you’ll be able to refer to when needed. Might this information be good to review and share at an office meeting? The following courtesy links lead to webpages where you can learn more about the free technical support services…

HGAR’s Tech Helpline webpage
www.tinyurl.com/y8ycdf64

NYSAR’s Tech Hotline
www.nysar.com/technology

Podcasts to Check Out

If you are a Realtor who is also a podcast listener, you may be interested in subscribing to some real estate-related podcasts. If that’s the case, I came across a RISMedia.com article titled “Top Podcasts for Real Estate Agents.” The article provides some information about a few podcasts that you may want to learn more about and possibly even subscribe to. To review the article, simply visit the link below…
www.tinyurl.com/yavjmwn2

Tip: Make sure to browse through the “Comments” section at the above web page as several additional podcast recommendations are mentioned.

How to Listen to a Muted TV

Have you ever gone somewhere and found yourself wanting to listen to a TV that’s muted? I’ve come across this situation in certain waiting rooms, restaurants and a variety of other places. I came across an app called “Tunity” that can help you in these situations. Once you have the app installed and set up, the basic process is: 1) make sure you have a decent Wi-Fi or other data connection on your Smartphone and probably have headphones unless you want to share the audio; 2) take and submit a photo of the show you’re watching and want to be able to hear and 3) sync the audio to the TV show. All the above is a bit easier said than done, but I got it working within a few minutes. To get things going, visit your device’s app store or visit the following web page…www.tunity.com

Explore Zapier Guides

There’s a good chance that many of you find yourself performing repetitive tasks. For example, backing up, copying or moving files between various web services. Whenever you find yourself performing a repetitive task it’s a good idea to evaluate whether the task might be able to be automated. With automating tasks in mind, I would encourage you to familiarize yourself with Zapier.com.

Zapier.com is a powerful web service that can help non-programmers to automate certain common tasks. To help you better understand how the service works, I would direct you to several guides that can help you to familiarize yourself with the service and its capabilities. The following are titles of some of the available guides that I think those of you who are interested in this topic will likely want to check out. “Getting Started with Zapier;” “Zap Templates Collection;” “The Ultimate Guide to CRM Apps;”; “The Ultimate Guide to Email Marketing Apps;” “The Ultimate Guide to Forms and Surveys;” “An Introduction to APIs;” “The Ultimate Guide to Google Sheets;” “How to Do Anything in Apps;” “The Ultimate Guide to G Suite.” You can access the above guides by visiting this link…www.zapier.com/learn

Suggestion: After visiting the web page above, I would encourage you to consider signing up for the services free plan so that you can try out some “workflows” (workflows is the name given to a series of automated tasks).

Information Regarding Windows 10 October 2018 Update

At some point this month (expected by mid to late October), Microsoft will be releasing a Windows 10 operating system update that will include some new features. If you are the type who wants to know more about the upcoming features, please visit the link below.

The link leads to a PureInfoTech.com video that’s hosted on YouTube. The video covers the more significant updates in a fair amount of detail. Tip: When you get to the YouTube web page below, click the “SHOW MORE” link that’s found below the video. When you do this, additional text is exposed and if you scroll down the text a bit you’ll come across a list that includes a list of features that the video covers as well as the time within the video that the beginning of each topic is discussed. Simply identify the features/topics that interest you and then navigate to the corresponding start time within the video. Here’s the link…www.tinyurl.com/yb2nfdvs

If you have comments, suggestions, tips, questions or just want to say “Hi,” you are invited to contact me at john@johnvrooman.com. I always enjoy hearing from you!

John Vrooman
John Vrooman keeps an eye out for cool new hardware, software, apps, gadgets; SaaS solutions; social media developments, trends as well as personal/SMB productivity and related solutions. He gathers information for his column from a diverse range of resources and he enjoys sharing his discoveries with others. He has been authoring this column since August 2000 and welcomes feedback from his readers.