This show is being relayed from the national Forest in Oregon near Hells Canyon

Notifications of new show notes and edits are tweeted at: twitter.com/ddhart.
– They’re tagged with #Zentech.
– When what’s said is unclear to me (or I’m unfamiliar with a topic) I tend to quote (” “) verbatim.
– Editor’s comments are delimited by < >

For a couple of months, the audio of today’s show will be here. Recent shows are here.

Glenn was in the studio. Paul called in from the national Forest in northeast Oregon, south of Hells Canyon near a town called Half And Half. Paul’s audio was very crappy; I did the best I could to decipher.

They were joined by Adam Brodel of Smarter Broadband, an internet service provider. A few years ago, Smarter Broadband acquired Full Spectrum, which continues doing business under that name by providing DSL, email, web hosting and dialup.

Today is Adam’s birthday, and tomorrow Paul celebrates his own.

Adam said his business of providing internet connections is growing well with over 2000 customers. It currently covers the area from 5 Mile House down to northern Auburn, and 80 <the highway, I guess> to Browns Valley. He said this is one of the worst areas for wireless broadband because of all the trees and hills blocking the signal.

Paul said he posted a photo of his current location as part of today’s show notes. Glenn went to have a look but didn’t see the picture. They’ll try to make it available before the next show. <Presumably, you’ll be able to see it at the top of this page.>

Paul has a 100-watt solar panel on his RV that runs a few things except his refrigerator. But he said propane provides the most efficient source of energy. An 8-gallon tank of propane lasts him about 10 days. He uses it to run the refrigerator, a small stove and a water heater.

Paul doesn’t have cellular service at his camp and he had to hike a couple of miles to the top of a hill before he could call in for this show. He wondered if there’s an app that will alert him when cell service becomes available <as he’s hiking>. Adam said he hasn’t heard of anything like that.

Paul mentioned augmented reality with the ability to point the phone’s camera at the landscape and to get surveying data (elevation, distance, bearing, etc.) projected on the screen overlaying the natural objects. He then asked Adam what he uses when he’s surveying the path of a wireless signal. Adam said he uses a computer app called Radio Mobile. <This might be it>

Glenn did a search for the words: virtual reality glasses, and came up with a Samsung product called Next Generation Gear VR, for $99. It’s powered by Oculus. The goggles work in conjunction with an attached Samsung phone. Headphones are included.

Adam did some traveling recently. While in England he bought a mobile hot spot with a one month service and “tied” his phone to that. The hot spot unit was about $50 and the service cost about $20 or $30. He then used a UK Skype number for his outbound calls.

Paul noted that Skype calls are encrypted but you can’t conceal who you’re calling or when you made the call.

Glenn asked Paul if having location service turned on consumes extra power. Paul said that it does because the GPS is working. If you want to conserve your battery, turn down the screen brightness and turn off unnecessary functions like location service and push notification.

The iPhone 5 & 6 have a low power mode that comes on when the battery is low, Paul said. But it returns to normal automatically when the battery is charged up over 20%, but Paul would like it to stay in low power mode all of the time. Glenn noted that you can issue a voice command to switch to low power.

Paul asked Adam if solar power is sufficient to run the wireless broadband equipment. Adam said the units used on a house draw about 7 watts and solar is able to handle that. By comparison, incandescent house lights are in the 40 to 75 watt range, the compact fluorescent bulbs are about 23 watts and LED bulbs are about 7 to 9 watts.

Glenn recalled that the compact fluorescent bulbs had a flicker to them and thought the LED bulbs don’t. But Paul said that the dimmable LEDs do flicker at about 16000 times per second. That’s how the brightness is controlled — if it’s off for longer than it’s on, it gets dimmer. However, those bulbs have to be designed to prevent radio frequency interference. Paul said you might be able to notice the flicker if you shake them while in a dark room.

Gene called to ask if there are any new batteries coming on the market. Glenn said a new lithium metal battery is expected in about a year. For a battery half the size of today’s lithium it’s supposed to have twice the energy.

The cheapest battery for off grid use is the lead acid. Paul thought they’ll give you the most bang for the buck. They have limitation about the way they’re charged, maximum current and so forth. On the plus side, they are recyclable.

Paul said the most spectacular batteries are the lithium polymer, which are used in radio controlled aircraft because they are light for a given amount of energy.

Gene asked for thoughts about an inverter. Paul said the though his RV has a 100 watt solar panel and a 20 amp charge regulator, which cost him $15 from a Chinese manufacturer, a house will require something larger. You have to consider what your maximum power consumption will be.

Gene is planning to go off grid and wanted some info about hot water solar panels. Will a special water heater be required? Paul suggested getting steel or copper radiators from a recycler, painting them black and put them inside a glass window casing. The glass will trap the heat to boost efficiency. Then run water thru the radiator to heat it up.

Kalab called. He keeps getting “kicked” off the KVMR audio stream. He uses an Apple with iTunes. All other stations work ok except for KVMR.
– Glenn suggested using the KVMR app but wasn’t sure if it was available for the Mac.
– Go to kvmr.org/player. There you’ll find some alternative streams. Try the one titled 64k AAC. The AAC and mp3 streams come from different servers.
– Make sure you have the latest updates for your machine.
– There might be a setting in iTunes to keep it from skipping to the next station on the list when KVMR drops out. That might force it to reconnect to KVMR. <Or, create a playlist with KVMR listed many times, so when it skips to the next station, it’ll still be KVMR>
– Call the KVMR office at 530-265-9073 and talk to the station engineer Buzz.

Scott called. He’s had the same problem as Kalab. He “power cycled all of my front end equipment” to fix the problem.

Scott also had a suggestion for an off grid water heater. He knows someone who took 3 water heater tanks, without the jackets, and put them in a box with a glass top. He now has 90 gallons of hot water.

The disclaimer:
The views and opinions expressed on KVMR are those of the speaker only and not necessarily those of KVMR management, staff or underwriters.

Last Updated 11:24 PM 8-31-2016

Notifications of new show notes and edits are tweeted at: twitter.com/ddhart.
– They’re tagged with #Zentech.
– When what’s said is unclear to me (or I’m unfamiliar with a topic) I tend to quote (” “) verbatim.
– Editor’s comments are delimited by < >

For a couple of months, the audio of today’s show will be here. Recent shows are here.

NOTE: There will be one more Zen Tech show this month on 8-31-16

Glenn was in the studio. Paul is on vacation and called in from just over the Oregon border in a place called Summer Lake.

Paul said he’s been encountering people coming from the north who are headed to Burning Man, which Glenn said starts this weekend and goes thru Memorial Day.

Marilyn sent in an email asking the guys about saving money on cell phone data and calling plans. Paul has a plan from H2O Wireless with unlimited talk and text (txt) with 3gig of data for $40/mo. But it lags by 72 hours in reporting how much data he’s used. So, on his phone he goes to Settings -> Cellular where it tells him “in this period” how much data he’s used and which apps used the data. But he’s not clear what is meant by “this period”.

Glenn uses the Pure Talk $45/mo plan that includes 2.5gig of data. He’s thinking of switching to their new plan for $35/mo that comes with unlimited talk & text and 2gig of data. What he likes about his current plan is that if he goes over his data limit, it just stops. It doesn’t automatically switch to a very high cost premium rate for the data.

Paul said some plans charge $10 per 100meg of additional data, if you exceed the data limit; that’s $100 per gigaByte. In Paul’s case with H2O Wireless, if he exceeds his data limit, he’s normal 4G speed of about 2 or 3 megaBytes/sec is throttled back to 2G speeds (120 KBytes/sec). He said one should be aware of throttling when shopping for plans that advertise unlimited data. The H2O Wireless plan that Paul has doesn’t allow him to buy an incremental amount of data if he goes over his data limit for the 30-day period. He speculated that MVNOs <Mobile Virtual Network Operator>, like H2O Wireless, buy large chunks of data and don’t want to spoon out small amounts to their customers. With PureTalk you’re allowed to buy small chunks of extra data, Glenn said.

Looking at an email from Marilyn, Glenn noted that she has a GoPhone and pays $25 for 90 days with 10 cents/minute for phone calls.

Dave “Buzz” Barnett joined Glenn in the studio and Paul told him that he’s getting a strong cellular signal, stronger than he expected for such a remote area. He noted that the cell service depends, more than anything, on the number of people using it. Buzz said that it might just be that the antenna is at a high elevation.

Glenn told Paul he’s phone call is coming in on iMessage thu his cellular data. He asked Paul if iMacs can handle iMessage. Paul said they could if you use an app called Messages. If you have an iMac and you only have a text plan on your cell phone, “the iMac will see those text messages because they’re relayed to you from your phone. As long as you’ve got an iMessage account it will work on a Mac”. iMessages won’t work on a PC.

There are 2 things that work on a Mac that won’t work on a PC. One is Facetime, which won’t work on Linux. The other is iMessage, Paul said.

Paul mentioned that there was a meeting at Nevada City Hall concerning the Verizon cell repeaters, but nothing came of it. Buzz said one member of the planning commission had to recuse himself because he owned property nearby. It ended up with a 2 to 2 vote. They’re supposed to try again in about a month. This was a topic in the 8-10-16 Zen Tech show.>

Glenn thanked those who support KVMR with their membership. If you’d like to become a member, you can call the station at 530-265-9073 or go to kvmr.org. If you’d like to join the conversation during the Zen Tech show, you can call the studio at 530-265-9555.

Paul said that it’s not hard to get your phone away from AT&T and use it with another phone company. But there might be some confusion about what access your new company needs at AT&T to port your phone number. In Paul’s case, H2O Wireless needed his PIN number (called the security code), not his password, to his AT&T account.

Jeff called about the ambiguity Paul found with the phrase “in this period”, earlier in this show. He said that refers to the billing period. Glenn said on the iPhone if you go to Settings -> Cellular and then scroll to the bottom, you can reset the data counters back to zero. He said he’ll be doing that every month <billing period> to see where his data is being used.

Glenn offered a tip to reduce you cellular data usage. Use wi-fi at places that offer it for free: Starbucks, McDonalds etc. Usually, you can use it even if you don’t go inside. <Coffee shops often make it available.>

Glenn went on to say that if you’re a Xfinity or Comcast internet customer, you can use Xfinity Hot Spots to get on the net over wi-fi for free. <It shows up on your list like any other wi-fi connection. On the login screen they offer 2 hours/mo for free to everyone, just to try it out.> However, Paul said that though he was able to use the hot spots when he had a business account with Comcast, his domestic account now says it “not available to your tier of service”.

Buzz says he uses the MVNO called PagePlus for his cellular provider. He pays about $31/mo with 1gig of data. To find how much data he’s used, all he has to do is send them a text message with the word: bal.

Paul said that CDMA cellular providers like Verizon will, nevertheless, use a SIM card for the data portion of their service. After the iPhone 4 the same phone can be used with either a CDMA or GSM network. Just be sure to unlock the phone before you switch providers so it won’t be tied to a particular provider.

Paul said that he might experiment with the Facebook Live Stream and stream the next Zen Tech show.

Glenn looked at the PureTalk website and noticed another plan at $24/mo with unlimited talk and text, 200meg of data and 200 MMS messages. For 1gig of data & unlimited MMS it’s $29. And there’s a plan with 4gig of data at $50/mo.

Johnny called. He has an AT&T iPhone 6 that coming to the end of the contract. He asked for tips to switch to another carrier.
– Unlock it first. Google the words: att unlock.
– If you’re unhappy with the service at AT&T and switch to a MVNO like H2O, it’s not going to work any better. <H2O uses the AT&T network.>
– See what provider people are using in your location to find which works well.
– Note what the trial period is so you have time to check out the new service.
– Though he stands to be corrected, Paul believes that the cellular providers don’t give you phones anymore. now they’re leased.
– Port your number to the new provider before your current contract ends or you’ll loose the number.
– Buzz said to google the words: mobile virtual network operator. You’ll find a Wikipedia page listing the MVNOs in the US.
<A list of MVNOs and from whom they buy access.>

Bob called from Brazil. He said he makes phone calls for free using Skype. He asked what the guys know about Republic Wireless for phone service. Glenn said he’s heard it mentioned on the Clark Howard Show, and referred Bob to the website clark.com.

Last Updated 10:16 PM 8-24-2016

Notifications of new show notes and edits are tweeted at: twitter.com/ddhart.
– They’re tagged with #Zentech.
– When what’s said is unclear to me (or I’m unfamiliar with a topic) I tend to quote (” “) verbatim.
– Editor’s comments are delimited by < >

For a couple of months, the audio of today’s show will be here. Recent shows are here.

Both Paul and Glenn broadcast from the Nevada County Fair.
– Located at the fair grounds in Grass Valley.
– The fair runs from Wednesday thru Sunday.
– Gates open at 10am every day and close at 11pm. On Sunday they’ll close at 9pm.
<Happening Each Day At the 2016 Nevada County Fair>

Phone calls could not be taken at the fair and the listeners were invited to email their questions and comments. The address is zen at kvmr dot org.

Back in 1999, when this show started, people used flip phones which, as Paul remembered, were analog and therefore subject to interference and hacking. The analog phones had a longer range than digital phones which require a stronger signal.

There was a recent show, though not a Zen Tech show that broadcast from the Nevada City city hall. One of the things discussed were the booster antennas on a local building. <From what I could tell, these transmitted the KVMR signal.> Paul noted that the radio signal is propagated horizontally, not up or down, in a donut shaped pattern.
<The subject of warnings on radio towers was briefly mentioned during the 7-13-16 show.>
<Correction: Though it sounded like Paul talked about a meeting at the city hall that already happened, in fact it was postponed until 8-18-16 when one subject will be cell phone booster antennas. It’s not clear if there will be much tech discussed or if it will be broadcast on KVMR. More info here.>

Glenn helped Paul install a refrigerator at Paul’s home recently. Glenn was fortunate in finding a manual and related material on the internet. And Paul said that such searches often turn up material that has nothing to do with what you were looking for. He said it’s because some sites that use a download manager, get an affiliate fee by displaying ads while downloading. <They take the opportunity to send you ads without giving you what you expect.>

Glenn talked about a BSR home control system that controls the lights and appliances. VSR eventually was taken over by X10. He installed the system in his home but found that it can’t handle low wattage lights (his 7 & 9 watt LED bulbs). When he turned the lights off, they would flicker because there was there was still a small amount of current flowing. The same was true with some compact fluorescent lights. The solution was to switch from using X10 lamp modules to appliance modules. Apparently, the lamp modules had the ability to be dimmed, but they leaked current. The appliance modules couldn’t be dimmed and worked fine.

Paul said the appliance modules have a relay that would be either on of off. The lamp modules use a silicon controlled rectifier that expects at least 20 to 30 watts for the load. He said the modules were made before LED lights (and possible before compact fluorescent lights) became popular.

The question then became, can you use these modules to control an air conditioner? Now you’re dealing with an inductive load that can temporarily go higher than the typical 15amps you normally get from a wall outlet. Paul looked closely at one of the modules and it was rated for a plain resistive load of 15 amps and an inductive load of 10 amps. He thought it would go up in smoke if he tried to run the air conditioner with it.

The date for controlling in the X10 system is transmitted along the house wiring at the point when the sinusoidal AC current is at zero, Paul added.

Rea Callender, the CEO for the Nevada County Fair, join the conversation. Some of the highlights follow:
– He’s been with the fair for 14 months.
– He said that of the 78 fairs in California, this one is said to have the most beautiful fair grounds. The marigolds are especially beautiful this year, he said.
– There 7400 exhibits at the fair and the exhibitors can enter using online forms.
– The land is owned by the state and is operated by a fair board that’s appointed by the governor, unlike other fair grounds that are typically owned by their respective counties.
– There are wi-fi hot spots for all of the vendors.
– Broad-spectrum wi-fi can be hard to set up. Buildings, trees and the shear number of people make it difficult.
– The fair has a presence on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter as well as conventional print media, to promote the fair.
– All of the California fairs pool together to buy insurance against bad weather as a hedge to protect their revenue.
– You can buy a ticket with your smartphone and have the phone scanned at the gate when you enter. You can also print the tickets yourself.
– The fair is in a partnership with Nevada City Film Festival to show movies. As a test, they featured 3 movies this summer on their huge screen and high tech sound system. They plan to have 6 movies next summer.
– This year the fair has charging stations for mobile devices. One is by the entrance, one by the “foundation station” and another at gate 1 by the ATM. Bring your own cable that can use a 110 volt socket.
– You can get to the fair by going to “nevada union” <a school, I think> and catch a free bus. They leave every half-hour.

Paul mentioned that the Zen Tech website runs WordPress on a virtual Linux server. In the past you could buy a domain (kvmr.org) for about $30 a month. A similar price can get you a virtual server now.

Glenn said the Flea Market show doesn’t broadcast during the fair because they can’t take phone calls at the fair. A music show will be aired tomorrow in its place.

Also, the Flea Market website is down. Paul has been working to get it going on the new virtual server. He said it’s a issue of running old software on the new system.

Glenn wonder if the free Windows upgrade offer is still available. Paul said the offer officially ended last month. If you’re getting the notification to upgrade, Microsoft might want to charge you for it, but he wasn’t sure.
<How to: Download Windows 10 Free (Extended) After Deadline
Taking the Windows 10 Express; Windows 10 Anniversary Update; even if you chose the Express Settings during setup, you can still make adjustments:>

Microsoft no longer supports the developers of software for Windows 7 but they will support your copy of Win7 itself up to 2020.

Glenn said he’s having problems with Win10 bogging down his computer. He’s thinking of backing up Win10 and switching back to Win7 and also putting Linux on his computer.

The disclaimer:
The views and opinions heard on the radio show are those of the speakers only and not necessarily those of KVMR staff, volunteers, underwriters or anyone else.

A listener named Paul wrote in with a question about his Samsung Galaxy Note 2. He’s been having trouble with the GPS while using Google Maps for driving directions.
– The phone’s GPS needs a pretty good view of the sky.
– The dash of a car is usually a good spot.
– The GPS takes maybe a minute to acquire its location after you turn it on.
– Get out in the open with at least a 90 degree view of the sky so it can acquire the signal. Once it’s done that it can cope with a weaker signal, like inside of a car.
– Trees and tall buildings can mess it up.
– Go to Settings -> About and update the firmware of the phone. Do this while on wi-fi so you’re not using up the data of your cellular plan.

Paul (the caller) also wanted to know if resetting his phone would help and if so, how to save his contact info.
– Glenn suggested he do a Google search.
– Paul said that the latest version of Android (Marshmallow) will do a complete online backup so when you restore your phone, it puts you back where you started off. He said to do the firmware upgrade first before wiping the phone.

Changelog:
Correction about a city hall meeting about booster antennas. See above.

Last Updated 4:31 PM 8-15-2016

Project FI from Google– Inexpensive mobile data && more…

Notifications of new show notes and edits are tweeted at: twitter.com/ddhart.
– They’re tagged with #Zentech.
– When what’s said is unclear to me (or I’m unfamiliar with a topic) I tend to quote (” “) verbatim.
– Editor’s comments are delimited by < >

For a couple of months, the audio of today’s show will be here. Recent shows are here.

Both Glenn and Paul were in the studio today.

Because of his fat fingers, Glenn is using voice-to-text more often. It can be pretty challenging, he said. There are many times the text comes out wrong. He admonished those using voice-to-text to check that the accuracy of the output.

Paul brought up the subject of video displays, in response to Glenn wondering whether one can save money buying a display (or TV) that isn’t ‘smart’ and using it with a streaming device like Apple TV. A plain display, unlike smart TVs, don’t have built-in apps to view content from Netflix, Amazon, CBS New, NBC Sports, etc. In addition to Apple TV plugin streaming devices include Google Chromecast, Roku and others. They’re all close in price, Paul said. Paul thinks it’s wiser to get a plain TV and then add a streaming device of your choice.

Samsung came out with a smart TV but, having a small market share, Paul doesn’t think it will get firmware updates as often as the more popular addon devices (Chromecast, Apple TV, Roku…).

The Samsung TV was also involved in some controversy when it was discovered that its voice command feature was on all of the time. Some speculated it was possible for the TV to eavesdrop on conversation and send it to the Samsung servers. But the same can be said of conversations people have with Siri on their iPhone, for instance. That conversation is sent to Apple servers. A similar situation exists with other brands of smartphones.

Paul said the Apple TV version 3 is being phased out. It didn’t allow you to add apps (for more content). Version 4 will let you add apps and, Paul believes, it has Siri. Siri will also be part of Sierra, the next Apple operating system for the Mac. It will be version 10.12 and it’s coming out in the Fall.

Paul noted that Mark Zuckerberg puts tape over the cameras on his devices to avoid being spied on.
<Mark Zuckerberg Covers His Laptop Camera. You Should Consider It, Too>

Glenn said he heard a story of a mother & daughter talking about some new shoes to buy, while the daughter’s Amazon tablet was nearby. After a few minutes the daughter noticed an ad on the tablet that was very close to what they were talking about. The suspicion was that the tablet was listening and relaying the information to Amazon. So it’s not just the camera that can be spying on you.

Paul mentioned that Amazon has a product called Echo ($179) that can listen to you from across the room, even with music playing in the background. He said the ability for computers to discriminate voice from noise keeps getting better.
<Alexa, what else can you do? Getting more from Amazon Echo>

Glenn thanked the listeners who support KVMR. If you’d like to become a supporting member please visit kvmr.org.

If you have any tech-related questions, you can call in to the studio during the show at 530-265-9555. or send an email to zen at kmvr dot org.

Paul remembered the time he was in high school and had a chance to hear one of the earliest pieces of synthesized music: Daisy Bell by Harry Dacre. In 1961 an IBM 7094 computer was made to sing the words to Daisy Bell and Paul played an excerpt. Incidentally, Hal the computer in 2001: A Space Odyssey, which came out in 1968, met his end while singing Daisy Bell. Paul thought that it’s a coincidence that letters of Hal precede the letters IBM (H-I A-B L-M).

The browsers Internet Explorer, the early Netscape, Firefox and Chrome are based on the browser called Mozilla that came out the Center For Super Computer Applications in Urbana Il.

The Chinese have taken the lead in super computers. Their machines don’t use chips made in the US, at all, Paul said. The Chinese had to develop their own because the US banned the sale of our chips to China.

Glenn talked about text shortcuts. He said the feature is built into the iPad and iPhone. You can define, for instance, two letters ‘gy’ to represent your email address. So instead of typing out your entire email address into a box, you just type ‘gy’ and the iPad replaces it with your entire address. To set it up go to Settings -> General -> Keyboard and look for an area called ‘Text Replacement’.

Paul explained a bit about the text correction feature on smartphones. When you start typing a word, the phone tries to guess what you meant and offers a word to place into your text. But there’s a little ‘x’ by the suggested word in case that word is wrong. You hit the ‘x’ to tell the phone that what you typed should be taken literally and the next time you start typing the word, the phone will remember what you meant and won’t offer the wrong word. If you don’t tell it that the suggested word is wrong and you enter a space, the suggested word is used. The more you use your phone the more it knows the words you use.

If you want to clear the dictionary where all of the words the iPhone learned from you are stored, go to Settings (the cog icon) -> General -> at the bottom find Reset (don’t touch anything there until you understand what it means). Look for ‘Reset Keyboard Dictionary’. Alternately, you can just turn of the correction feature.
<With Android go to Settings -> Language & Input -> Personal Dictionary, where you can add words and create shortcuts.>

When you sell your phone, Paul suggested you go into Settings -> General and erase all content and settings. That should delete all passwords, cache, documents and the apps you’ve installed. It will go back to the factory settings.

Neal called. He gets static on his radio whenever he turns on his PC. He said they’re not plugged into the same outlet and are about 6′ to 8′ apart.
– Computers a supposed to be made so as not to radiate interference. Paul guessed that his computer is radiating more than it should be.
– Move the computer & radio farther apart.
– Get an antenna <or better one or a directional antenna> for the radio.
– It may not be a problem with the computer but what’s connected to it. Except for “live” hard drives, unplug each item one at a time (mouse, keyboard, etc.) and see if the problem goes away.
– The cable from the monitor to the computer may be causing the problem. Better cables have an RF choke built in (noticeable as a extra fat portion of the cable). While the computer is running, unplug the monitor from the back of the computer and see if it makes a difference.
– Another Paul entered the studio and suggested moving the radio antenna around to see if the hissing changes.
– It sounds like part of the problem is that the KVMR signal comes in weakly for him. It doesn’t come in at all if his radio is set to stereo — it only comes in if set to mono.
– Try a different radio.

Saxon called from Fair Oaks. He has a 16gig iPhone 5S that’s about 2.5 years old. He’s having a problem with low available memory. When he goes into the general setting he see that 11.4 gigs are being used with 148 meg available. He’s tried clearing out his email but it doesn’t gain him any more memory. The mail is still taking up a lot of storage.

He has a Mac and Paul suggested he connect the iPhone to the Mac using a cable. The open the iPhoto or Photo application on the Mac. He should be able to see “which photographs are already in the Photo application which are still on the iPhone.” Next, transfer them to the Mac after you check the box that says ‘remove them from the iPhone’. The application is smart enough to transfer only those not already on the Mac, so you don’t get duplicates.

If you’re using Photo, not the older iPhoto, program, you should see a very small dial in the upper left when it starts the transfer. Click on it and you’ll see a more detailed progress graph.

When the transfer is complete, you should have a copy of every photo that’s on the iPhone. You can then delete all the iPhone photos — the biggest memory hog, Paul said. On the iPhone, use the app called Photos to do the deletion.

As for the mail:
– When you create an email account, IMAP should be automatically detected. Some mail providers don’t offer IMAP
– Glenn said that if you’re using IMAP and you delete the mail on your phone, the next time the mail synchs, the mail is loaded back onto the phone.

Paul had him go to Settings -> ‘Mail Contact And Calendars’ and click on the email address of the account it should say, for instance, fred@something.net. Click on that and then ‘Advanced’ and you should see the settings for that account. Under ‘Incoming Settings’, you can tell if it’s using IMAP or POP. It looked like Saxon has POP mail. Under ‘Incoming Settings’ there’s a option to ‘Delete From Server’ but Paul warned that may delete the mail forever. He said to talk to the provider about switching over to IMAP.

Paul reminded listeners that on July 29 Microsoft will stop offering Windows 10 as an upgrade. Glenn said he’s thinking about putting Linux on his ASUS touchscreen PC in place of Win10.

The disclaimer:
The views and opinions expressed on KVMR are those of the speakers only and not necessarily those of KVMR management, staff or underwriters

If you have the icon that says “Get Windows 10 Now”, now may be your last chance for the free upgrade. If you don’t want it and you just want it to all go away, Paul said to google the words: gwx control panel. Install it to make it shut up for good. <There’s more about GWX in the 5-11-16 show notes>.

Nick called. He plans to do some traveling and he wants to be able to store webpage content on his Android cell phone, for those times he doesn’t have an internet connection. Paul said there is something to do that but couldn’t remember what it is.
<Opera and UCbrowser (with a plugin) both allow you to store webpages on the phone>
<Save Page Add-on for UC Browser
Links to download: UC Browser..apk or install at Android Market here.>

Paul hurried to mention Project Fi before the hour expired. Google is partnering with some cellular providers to make buying data (no voice) plans easier. It’s $10 per gig and a rebate of penny for each meg you don’t use. Glenn said a Nexus phone, which start at $199, is required

Last Updated 11:05 PM 7-29-2016

Paul hurried to mention

Notifications of new show notes and edits are tweeted at: twitter.com/ddhart.
– They’re tagged with #Zentech.
– When what’s said is unclear to me (or I’m unfamiliar with a topic) I tend to quote (” “) verbatim.
– Editor’s comments are delimited by < >

For a couple of months, the audio of today’s show will be here. Recent shows are here.

Both Paul and Glenn were in the studio today.

Glenn thanked the listeners who support KVMR. If you’d like to become a supporting member please visit kvmr.org.

Over the years, Glenn has used many different phone services. He’s still using he got from AT&T with his landline in 1994. In about 1996 the FCC ruled that you can keep your phone number.

He then used that number with a product called Magic Jack. He was able to use his original phone number with it, but, for reasons he didn’t say, he wasn’t satisfied with Magic Jack.

Then he went to Nettalk until they stopped providing customer service.

More recently, he parked his number at RingTo for a couple of years. Initially free, RingTo eventually started to charge for their service (though the original free users were never charged.) Another service Paul mentioned is voip.ms.

At Google Voice you can sign up for a free phone number. Supposedly, you can get a number with a local prefix, but that’s getting to be harder to do. Alternately, you can port your existing phone number to Google Voice. Google will then give you various telephonic services. Google will only port a cellular number, not a landline number.

Glenn said that if you are leaving a service like AT&T, you have to port your number before you terminate your current service (at AT&T, for instance) or you’ll lose that number. Paul added, that you should port the number first, make sure the porting process completed (the new company actually has the number), then close your account at the old company.

So Glenn tried to port his number from RingTo to Google Voice. But Google rejected his attempt, saying it wasn’t a cellular number. This was because the database that Google checks was still showing it as a landline.

Glenn then went to Puretalk, a cellular company, with his phone number, and that made his number a cellular one. After that, it took less than 24hr for Google to complete the port. When porting an existing number, Google charges $20.

Paul said that Puretalk is good service to know about if you have minimal need for a phone. Their cheapest plan is $5 a month for 60 minutes.

Both of the guys have an Obihai VOIP box. A small box, about 2″ square, that provides voice over internet service.
– It can route Google Voice calls.
– You can call anywhere in the country for nothing, Paul said.
– It has 5 volt power lead to supply its power.
– It also has an ethernet port that connects to your home internet router.
– And it has a POTS (plain old telephone service) port which you use to connect a traditional dial telephone.
– The voice quality is better than a regular landline but expect lower reliability because there a more steps (or devices) the phone call goes thru.

Paul got his Obihai for $39 on a special offer. Usually they’re about $59.

<More about porting and parking can be found in the 7-30-14 show notes>

The disclaimer:
The views and opinions expressed on KVMR are those of the speaker only and not necessarily those of KVMR management, staff or underwriters.

Don called. He wanted to be sure Paul got the email he sent. The two were talking about the Hackintosh project. This is a way of getting the Mac operating system onto a PC, in this case a refurbished Dell that cost about $160.
– This is a hacking project that gets a bit involved and is not intended for the average person or especially a business that depends on reliability.
– The project is in a gray area with regard to the licensing of the Mac operating system. You’ll probably be violating “something somewhere”, Paul said.
– The operating system is normally free to those who have Apple hardware.
– Paul said he’ll update the listeners on the progress they make.

William called about upgrading to Windows 10. He wondered if he can download Win10 and install after the cutoff date for the free upgrade.
– July 29 is the last day to upgrade to Windows 10 for free (free for Win7 and Win8 users.)
– Software developers are no longer supporting Windows 7.
– Microsoft’s support for Windows 7 itself will end at the beginning of 2020.
– Paul thought that, even though you download it now, the validation will take place at the time you install it on your computer. If it’s after July 29, you’ll likely be charged for it.
– Paul is not very fond of Win10 and suggested the continued use of Win7. He said that even XP is “not unusable and not necessarily such a bad idea”.

William had another question regarding Thunderbird, an email program. He has 2 machines and wants to synchronize the Thunderbird data. He’s tried using an addon called Thundersync but it doesn’t do what he wants.
– Paul said he doesn’t have to synchronize if he uses the IMAP protocol. Most mail services, like Google, provide the protocol. Each machine is in synch with the server so both will be alike without any more effort.
– William said he already uses IMAP. The mail itself is synched but not the address book.
– Paul said he uses and addon called Address Book Synch to do that job. Use Thunderbird itself to download Address Book Synch. After installing the addon, while in Thunderbird, go to Tools -> Addons and use the search function. Look for address book synch and follow the instructions.
– After installing Address Book Synch, look under the Tools menu and you should see additional functions.

Michael called. About 2 months ago he got an old laptop and had a friend do some upgrades and he now has Linux Cinnamon 17 for his operating system. He also has an old mp3 player. When he plugs in the player, Linux says “unable to mount Sansa Clip”.
– There might be something wrong with the USB port or the cable that comes out of the computer.
– Or the flash drive (the memory storage) in the player is faulty.
– Try a different cable to connect the player, Paul said. William said he’d done that.
– The other thing that might be bad is the USB port on the computer. It’s a common problem on laptops.
– If the mp3 player is old enough it may not auto-mount. Linux may require a driver. Glenn suggested doing a search with the words: Sansa Clip Linux driver.
– In Linux look for an item called Package Manager (or maybe Installation Interface or Software Repository) somewhere in the menus. Use that facility to search for the words: Sansa Clip. Hopefully, someone has made a ‘package’ for it.
– Glenn suggested going to the Sandisk website to look for the solution. William has tried that but said their customer service website is not very user friendly.
– Since the player used to work on his Windows machine, Glenn suggested he find someone with Windows to get the music off the player so he would a least have a copy.
– Glenn also suggested he call Sandisk or webchat with them.

A self-named “disgruntled caller” noted that many cellular towers have warnings on them saying the following:
Caution: beyond this point radio frequency fields at this site may exceed FCC rules for human exposure. For your safety, obey all signs and site guidelines for working in radio frequency environments in accordance with Federal Communication Commission on radio frequency emissions 47cfr11.1307b. <The caller sounded so belligerent that Glenn disconnected him>.

Paul said that all sort of radio transmitters have that warning, including KVMR’s transmitter and satellite dishes. If you’re close enough to read it, you’re too close, he said. Paul said there will be a special show <didn’t say if it’s a Zen Tech show> that will have the warning as one of the topics.

Len called with a concern about the security of using public wi-fi while traveling. He’ll be going to Europe and has heard about using VPN for privacy. He wanted to know which VPN to use.
– Some people in Nevada County work for companies in San Jose and insure their privacy by using VPN. VPN creates a tunnel for the communication that cannot be traced. And it can make your location appear to be wherever you want it to be. You can watch BBC TV, normally for UK residents only, while in the U.S.
– Paul uses the VPN called TunnelBear. It’s $7 per month for unlimited data or free with a 500meg per month limit.
– With tablets, while not immune to viruses, the odds are low that you’ll encounter problems. Just get an inexpensive tablet to sidestep the issue.
– Open (public) wi-fi is made no more or less secure if it requires a password. It’s made more secure for only the 100 feet or so to the wireless transmitter.
– When you go to an internet site whose address begins with https:// (not http://) you have a secure, encrypted connection. You can trust that connection to the extent you trust the site you connect to (your bank or your Google account, for instance). However, beware of a website being spoofed. Someone may create a site called https://gooogle.com (3 o’s) to trick you into revealing your login/password.
– If you use Thunderbird to pick up your Gmail, it will use a secure connection. Not all webmail services are secure, but Gmail won’t allow a connection that’s not secure.

Last Updated 11:45 PM 7-13-2016