Unfollow People on Facebook for a Happier Life

Facebook was more peaceful in its infancy. But times change, and so has Facebook. Grandma and Uncle Bob are on Facebook now, and they expect to be your friend. With greater numbers of people comes greater amounts of frustration. But you might’t unfriend Grandma and Uncle Bob. And you’re able to’t unfriend your co-worker John. You have to face them occasionally in real life. Messenger, group communication, and event planning are more and more often done on Facebook....

December 1, 2018 · 2 min · 280 words · Gregory Wilson

ZigBee vs. Z-Wave: Choosing Between Two Big Smarthome Standards

Related Quick Links ZigBee and Z-Wave aretwo of the main wireless protocolsused in smarthome products. Knowing what to use when is key to running a smooth smarthome. No one answer is right for everyone, because unfortunately, thesmarthome industry is a mess. Here are some differences and similarities between the two protocols to help decide which to chose. Related:The Smarthome Industry Has Reached a Plateau. One of the strengths and weaknesses of ZigBee is that it’s an open protocol and nobody owns it....

November 25, 2018 · 3 min · 481 words · Nicholas Smith

How to Turn an Echo Button into a Home Lockdown Button

Related Quick Links Echo Buttons are simple Bluetooth devices that connect to anAmazon Echo. Until now, they’ve been relegated to simple buzzer-like buttons for use in games. One simple straight-forward use is as a lockdown button for when the last person leaves the house. Creating a Button Routine You’ll need to fire up the Alexa app to create a routine. On the app’s main page, tap the hamburger button. On the list of controls, tap the “Routines” option....

November 21, 2018 · 1 min · 174 words · Katherine Glass

How to Pair Echo Buttons to Your Amazon Echo

Related Quick Links Echo Buttons are simple Bluetooth devices that connect to your Echo devices. But you could do a lot more with it than that. Everything about the Buttons is simple, from using them (just press the button!) to getting the devices paired to your Echo. And the box includes everything you need, even batteries. after you snag the batteries installed, pairing is a simple affair. Paring a Button the Simple Way Amazon made paring incredibly easy....

November 20, 2018 · 1 min · 193 words · Brenda Ruiz

What Wi-Fi Security Cameras Let You Record Locally?

Related Quick Links Wi-Fi Cameras areeasier to installand set up compared to Wired Cameras. But they often require subscriptions to get the most out of them, and that can include cloud storage. Not all Wi-Fi cameras support local storage. That said, read on for a list of Wi-Fi cameras that can store video on microSD cards. TheYi 1080p Home Cameramade our list ofgood budget cameras. Don’t let its low price fool you....

November 19, 2018 · 2 min · 372 words · Anna White

The Best IFTTT Recipes to Use with Your Wink Hub

IntroduceIf This Then That(IFTTT) to your Wink Hub to automate your home. The Wink Hubis incredibly versatile thanks to its support for everything fromfanstolocks. But it can’t talk to everything everywhere and it only has so much intelligence. Just remember: Many Wink IFTTT integrations rely onsetting up Wink shortcuts. You will need to set a shortcut in your Wink app to facilitate turning on the lights. you’ve got the option to use a similar recipe to turn the lights off when you leave....

November 5, 2018 · 1 min · 205 words · Laura Jordan

How to Set Your Smarthome Up for a Spooky Halloween

But the gadgets you may already have can be used to take your Halloween decorations to the next level. When you put up Halloween decorations, you have probably run into one of two problems. This especially leads to difficulties if you’re trying to keep everything in sync. This year consider starting from the bottom. This trick works even better with a smart light. It’s easy enough to cut a notch in the back of the pumpkin for a power cord....

October 30, 2018 · 2 min · 397 words · Tammie Forbes

How to Set Up a ZigBee Smart Ceiling Fan with a Wink Hub

However, one often overlooked, but useful, smarthome gadget is the ceiling fan. Why Use A Smart Fan? Most smart switches require a neutral wire, but many older homes do not have one available. Having an electrician bring your home up to code can quickly become expensive. In that case, you’ll have a hard time finding a smart switch that can handle both. Installing a smart fan bypasses these problems. bring up the Wink app and tap the hamburger menu in the top left corner....

October 26, 2018 · 2 min · 246 words · Tracey Myers

How to Watch Twitch on Roku

However, Amazon (Twitch’s owner) pulled the official app from theRoku Channel Storeback in 2017. There are still unofficial ways to watch Twitch on Roku TVs, though. Can You Get Twitch on Roku? As mentioned, Amazon pulled the Twitch app from the Roku Channel Store in 2017. However, that stopped working in March 2022. So, you’re left with two options if you’d like to watch Twitch on your Roku unit. Enter the channel code “C6ZVZD” and click “Add Channel....

October 12, 2018 · 1 min · 150 words · Carmen Riley

Everything You Need To Start Building Mechanical Keyboards

Here are all of the tools you will need to build your first mechanical keyboard from scratch. Why build your own? Once you’ve got all your supplies, you’ll be all ready to build your firstmechanical keyboard! UPDATE: 5/11/22 Verified content and links are still good. Updated images and added new picks for the PCB, case, and soldering kit. Mechanical Keyboard PCB: YMDK GH60 QMK PCB Don’t let the odd name fool you....

October 5, 2018 · 2 min · 377 words · Larry Fuller

Does It Matter Which Graphics Card Manufacturer You Choose?

Do the differences between them matter? Why Are There Different Manufacturers, Anyway? AMD Radeon graphics cards have a similar variety of suppliers. But within the same specific card design, almost all of them have the same capabilities. The reason is the somewhat unique business-to-business relationships in the GPU market. They also sell to third-party graphics card manufacturers like EVGA or Sapphire. There doesn’t necessarily need to be a middleman seller....

October 4, 2018 · 2 min · 326 words · John Parrish

How to Find and Replace Text in Microsoft Word

Let’s look into this in more detail. The Find tab lets you simply locate each instance of a word within the document. Here, we’ve told Word to search for “the” in our text. The Replace tab lets you swap one word for another. Having already opened the Find And Replace window (Ctrl+H), click “More.” This will show you a host of other things you’re free to do with Find And Replace....

August 29, 2018 · 2 min · 216 words · Ryan Hill

How to Keep Your Windows PC and Apps Up to Date

Quick Links We know, updating your PC is a hassle–but it’s essential. Plugging those holes, however, depends primarily upon you making sure things are appropriately updated. Though you’re able to take somemeasures to prevent updates, Windows pretty much does it automatically. So let’s get to it. This is a bit different in Windows 7 than in later versions, so we’ll cover both here. To access it, just hit Start, throw in “windows update” and then smack the result....

August 13, 2018 · 3 min · 601 words · Justin Robertson