That old favorite - favorites and bookmarks

Bookmarks and favorites are the same thing but what are they and how do we manage them?

If you find a website that you use regularly or want to find again later then you can add it to your bookmarks. A bookmark saves the address of the site or page for you in a convenient location that you can find. Alternatively you could store the address as a shortcut or in a digital assistant app like Evernote, Microsoft OneNote or Google Keep.

Bookmarks are activated in different ways according to your choice of browser (Safari, Chrome, Opera, Firefox, Edge) but they work in the same way. Most use the term bookmark whilst Microsoft uses the term favorite. Bookmarks are slightly different on tablets/iPad and PC/Mac

Lets bookmark a page in Safari on the iPad.

• Find the site you wish to remember
• Tap the share symbol (square with up-arrow) on the toolbar
• From the menu select Add Bookmark
• Change the name of the bookmark if it makes no sense to you by retyping
• Tap Save

View your bookmarks

• Tap the Book icon from the toolbar to show/hide bookmarks/reading list/shared links
• Tap the book icon on the side menu to see the list of bookmarks
• Select and tap the link that you have saved to open the page

Edit or remove bookmarks

• Tap the Book icon on the toolbar to show/hide bookmarks/reading list/shared links
• Tap the book icon on the side menu to see the list of bookmarks
• Tap Edit at the bottom of the side menu
• Red minus signs appear to the left of the list
• Tap a minus sign and confirm to delete a bookmark
• Tap the bookmark to edit its name etc. then save the changes

You can organise your bookmarks into folders in edit mode and then drag and drop your bookmarks into the created folders.

For the Mac the procedure is very similar except there is a sidebar button rather than a book button on the toolbar.

Lets add a bookmark to Chrome

• Find your page to bookmark
• Look along the address bar on the toolbar for a star icon
• Click/tap this icon to open the bookmark dialogue
• Change the name of the bookmark if you wish and click/tap done

Now look at the bookmarks

• Look for the three dots options on the toolbar to the right and tap/click
• Select bookmarks from the options
• From the list tap/click to display the page that you have bookmarked

Edit or remove a bookmark

• Open any bookmark that you have saved
• Tap/click the Star icon
• Edit or remove the item from the editing panel

Add a favorite to Edge

• Find your page to favorite
• Look along the address bar on the toolbar for a star icon
• Click/tap this icon to open the favorite dialogue
• Change the name of the favorite if you wish and click/tap done

Now look at the favorites

• Look for the star with trailing lines icon on the toolbar to the right and tap/click
• Select favorites from the options
• From the list tap/click to display the page that you have Favorited

Edit or remove a favorite

• Open any bookmark that you have saved
• Tap/click the Star icon
• Edit or remove the item from the editing panel

Other browsers are pretty similar. And just like Safari you can organise you bookmarks/favorites into folders to make the list more organised

Using Keep/OneNote/Evernote to store favorites

Clipping an Internet address to one of these organisers may seem like a step too far but has great advantages if you have multiple devices and if they are not on the same system.

Copy an address (URL) and paste it into Google keep on your iPad means that it will be available on your PC/phone or mac if you install the app on them. With Evernote the whole webpage is clipped, not just the address. 

Sharing a site with Google Keep iPad/mac*

• Find the page to keep
• Tap the share icon on the toolbar, look for the light-bulb icon for Keep and tap to select
• A sub window will open and you can add some notes to go with your keepsake.
• Tap Post to add it to your keep account

*assumes that you have installed Keep on your iPad/mac

Sharing a site with OneNote on Windows Edge browser

• Find the page to keep
• Tap the share icon on the toolbar, an arrow out of a box and tap/click to select
• A sub window will open, tap/click on the OneNote icon.
• OneNote opens and you have the option to add a note to go with your keepsake
• Click/tap send to save to OneNote

Add shortcut to home screen or desktop

On Mac/pc/ipad you could save the URL as a desktop icon

Mac/IOS

• Find the page to keep
• Click/tap sharing icon on toolbar
• Look for Add to home screen

Windows

• Find the page to keep
• Copy URL to clipboard (Ctrl+c when highlighted)
• Windows+D hides everything but the desktop
• Right click the desktop to open the options menu
• Select New > Shortcut
• From the shortcut wizard click in the address bx and paste the web address (ctrl+v)
• Click next
• Type a name for the link
• Tap/click finish

Chrome on android

• Find the page to keep
• Tap the three dots menu button
• From the menu tap Add to Homescreen

Edge on windows phone/PC

• Find the page to keep
• Tap the three dots menu button
• From the menu tap pin page to the taskbar or pin page to the start

windows 10 updates keep on coming weekly but no new features this time around

I updated my PCs running windows 10 today with the June 12 update. There have been no great changes to windows 10 since the version 1803 upgrade. The updates are really bug fixes for older versions. The latest that I have (not on the developer ring) is build 17134.48.

If you want to find out which version of windows you have installed then simply press the windows key, type in the search box winver and press Enter. A box similar to the one shown here should appear. If your machine shows an earlier version don't worry but if you wish to upgrade manually then press the windows key, type in the search box updates and update the machine.

My clients and students have noticed that during upgrading the system seems to slow down. The answer unfortunately is patience and restarting. Leave the machine working for a period on its own but remember to check out whether it needs a restart ever so often. When you update or upgrade I always recommend restarting the s
ystem.

fun with colourising old photos

Everyone has a back catalogue of old photos in their possession. some cringing, others that may make you smile or cry. I looked at the one here with great nostalgia of my sister and I at school photos time. It took me back to simpler days. Of course I looked at that old photo in black and white and wondered if Affinity Photo could do the colourising that I have done in the past with Photoshop.

The answer is yes of course.

I used the techniques of guessing colours and keeping colours on separate layers for this one so it may not be the truest version of the day but none the less it was good enough for her to say OK that was us then. I may publish a colour tutorial hopefully taking more than the hour that I spent on this one with better results.

What do you think?

Affinity Photo vs Photoshop and brushes

I have used Photoshop for commercial work since it began on the Mac and became available for my PC. Undoubtedly it is a formidable piece of software that I have used for catalogues, posters and web development graphics. Teamed up with InDesign Adobe have met most of my creative/design needs.

Adobe is nowadays following a rental route for its software which I and many others find a challenge. Its not the money. If you can't get your moneys worth from Adobe software then you don't actually need it. Smart objects and content aware actions are just two features that save so much time when producing graphics or touching up photos. I was prepared to pay the annual upgrade fees to pay for the work and support of the team ,but having made the initial outlay way back to purchase, I can't help it I want something to keep.

There are other paid for and free offerings such as Paintshop Pro, Paint.net, Dx0 photo and Gimp and many of them try to emulate Photoshop to tempt me away and have failed. The Gimp is even available with a Photoshop skin as Gimpshop. Serif has always offered a budget photo editor that I didn't take them too seriously until they produced Affinity Designer and Photo. I found that Serif's UK born Affinity Photo is a great challenger to Photoshop with some great unique features. Affinity Photo is also available as a full application for iPad. Having used it for some time I found that the PC version was a little slow to load images than Photoshop but this seems to have been improved over time and I have pushed myself to do all my editing with Affinity. The blog background was created from scratch using Affinity Photo. Considering that It is so reasonable in price, UK made and supported and will soon have Affinity publisher to rival InDesign I find myself thinking this is a reboot of the 90's when I moved over to Photoshop and InDesign from Letraset Studio and QuarkXpress

One of the anchors keeping us with Photoshop was Plugin support. The alternatives didn't support plugins like Nik and other custom addins that have evolved over the years to add to Photoshop. Look here for an article by Andy Betts on the top ten plugins for Photoshop. I like the inclusion of https://www.pexels.com/ for royalty free images. Affinity supports plugins but not Photoshop actions so not all the extensions such as ZXP actions.

 Likewise many custom brushes are so useful and there is a thriving business in fonts and brushes for Photoshop.Its easy to import 'Photoshop brush' files into Affinity Photo. Follow this link or click the logo below to learn how.