My Tech Redcap of 2015

Well, a truly interesting 2015, and it went so quickly, I cannot believe! Some tech recap;

1. I suffered iOS9-gate on my iPhone 4S (or my Mum’s iPhone 4S that is). Before I was so confident in the upgrade that I kicked it off without a thought of backing up. It bricked my phone, and I had to pay an Apple specialist £25+ to fix it. Thanks Apple.
   
   
   • TIP 1: Always do a backup before doing an iOS upgrade! (I know very obvious right)
     
     
   • TIP 2: Ignore Apple when they tell an Apple approved servicer will be free; it won’t be.
     
     
   • TIP 3: When iOS upgrade-gate hits again, and there are no Genius slots available, logon to slot booking search after midnight; that’s when new slots are released apparently.
     
     
2. The residual outcome is that I’m still holding off upgrading; and have not yet gone to iOS 9...
   
   
3. I bought an Apple Watch, and I like it; I really like it. It doesn’t do a great deal, but what it does do, it mainly does really well. And if you asked me what that was I’d tell you;
   
   
   • Turn by turn directions whilst you are driving, with a subtle tap to the wrist so you don’t miss a turning.
     
     
   • Turn by turn directions whilst walking, without getting your phone out; AMAZIN!
     
     
   • Control your music on your iPhone, without getting your phone out.
     
     
   • Apple Pay with a double click of the side button, this is the killer feature.
     
     
   • Notifications; as long as you kill most of your notifications; leaving VIPs only; then you never miss that someone has text or called you again; you can choose to ignore it, but you no longer miss it!
     
     
   • Answer a call on you watch e.g. when you can’t get your phone out in time
     
     
4. WIX.com is cool for hosting very simple websites.
   
   
5. Buying premium templates makes Wordpress awesome.
   
   
6. You can make anything look beautiful with the right designer.
   
   
7. My friend’s new site www.addressbug.com is a great solution for finding people’s up-to-date address details at christmas without having to contact them!
   
   
8. Microsoft Lens is an AMAZING tool for capturing white board drawings in a format that captures the drawing perfectly and easily shares it.
   
   
9. Yes indeed a recent generation Mac Mini can output 4K (retina) to two Ultra HD screens, and it looks AMAZING! Contact me for details of how to get this working.
   
   
10. Youtube embed does not have a flag for turning off audio. So instead of a simple flag it is 30 - 50 lines of Javascript required to get an youtube video’s audio turned off. Thanks Google ;-)