Being Android User-II – Handling Applications

In my series of Being Android User, I wanted to share some points which I felt better on Android than Windows or vise versa.

As we all know Microsoft Store does not have all the apps those Play Store has. That is the biggest advantage of Android but at the same time you are exposed to the security risk and information theft or openly share with a specific company. Let us talk about some features than apps. We cannot compare apples with oranges. So let us start with features. 

Handling applications usage is the key area which I want to focus in this post. On Windows 10 phone you can run many applications in parallel and same is the case with Android. But basic difference is in closing apps. In windows, you need to close one app at a time. You cannot close all apps at once. But that is not the case with Android. You can go to home screen, then use option on the left side of home menu to see all running apps and then close all together to free up RAM. 

One point to note here, Android uses a lot of RAM, my android phone with 2 GB RAM never clears up RAM beyond 800 MB. But my windows phone very nice with total 1 GB RAM. 

-Ashish 

Being Android User-I

Recently I bought my first Android phone online. As usual, I evaluated many phones and finally decided one which gives me value for money. Going to Android was not my first choice. But there are some apps which have some features only on Android apps. Otherwise I am still a Windows phone fan though many people do not like it. I am planning to write a series of posts which I think good and/or bad in Android/Windows phones.

The first thing that makes you feel different is advertisements on you phone. Even when you add accessing an app, there are advertisements of promoted apps. This is very much annoying. But yes, in India, Android is the most used smart phone operating system. So you do not have much choices. Moreover, there are no new windows phone coming up as I know from internet. So I am trying to adjust with Android.

-Ashish

dictation setting in lumia

One fine day I discovered the dictation is not working on my Lumia phone. Then I started finding some information about how to activate. I found out that it had something to do with keyboard settings and speech language. When I tried to more things. My Cortana, setting was to use English language for India and location was India. Earlier, I tried many more settings, but nothing worked. My default keyboard language was USA English. The microphone was appearing but it was not accepting my dictation. Then I change my keyboard language to English, India, and tried dictation. To my surprise it started working. It had nothing to do with Phone settings. The key to solve this problem was to use same language for keyboard and for dictation which should be same as Cortana settings.

Lumia 640XL Upgraded to Windows 10

Hey…

Finally I upgraded my Lumia 640 XL OS to Windows 10 and I am loving it. Somehow I hate Android for many reason. That apart, I was eagerly waiting for this update/upgrade.

I read that it needed Update Adviser app on Lumia, hence I installed it. it checked for space and other prerequisites and started downloading update. I removed some apps, deleted maps and I was quickly ready for update.

Update went very smooth than expected. new experience is really very nice. Overall user interface, MS Apps and many more are new and exciting. I got many things which I wished for. Flashlight was one of them. Now I plan explore and write it here.

Waiting for Lumia 640 XL OS Upgrade

I am not eagerly waiting for updating my Lumia 640 XL to Windows 10. As per various reference on internet. Windows 10 Mobile is expected in December 2015. I have not tried Windows Insider options as it may hamper my day to day use. But I am very much excited to see my Phone getting updated to Windows 10.

I am already loving Cortana and some other features which Updated Windows 10 offers on desktop. My laptop upgrade was smooth and hence expecting same with my Lumia.

 

-Ashish

Upgraded to Windows 10

I was planning to upgrade my Lenovo Netbook to Dell Laptop in recent future. It had Windows 7. My needs were browsing, emails, MS Office and little bit of my experiments with various applications. There was no urgent need to move away from netbook.

Mean while, I bought Lumia 520 in 2013 and recently upgraded to Lumia 640 XL. I realized that I am on right path and very soon need devices which sync with each other to reduce data duplication. Windows OS was perfect solution and hence I decided to wait for Windows 10.

On 29th July evening, I started downloading Windows 10 Upgrade as I reserved it earlier. I could not download it overnight due to lower download speed at my home. Hence continued it on 31st. Finally, it downloaded everything and started upgrade process.

The upgrade process was very smooth and did not need technical knowledge at all. It got upgraded overnight and I logged in to my netbook early morning. I am loving the new experience. Now, I am waiting for my Lumia to get upgraded to Windows 10.

I hope, I will not change my devices now unless any hardware fails.

-Ashish

My Lumia 640 XL

Recently I bought Lumia 640 XL. I am just loving it. It has got all the features those I wished for. Bigger screen, front camera, Windows OS, flash, MS Office and Cortana.
It will be upgraded to Windows 10 by next weekend. I use it mainly for accessing my emails, reading and editing Office documents. I enjoy setting up reminders using Cortana. I use time as well as location based reminders.
Another feature I enjoy is offline maps and navigation. I use Hindi voice navigation and it is really nice.
Now I am little excited to explore Windows 10 features. Once I upgrade my phone and laptop to Windows 10. I will be just synching settings between these devices. Also want to try screen projection features on TV or monitor screens.

Posted from WordPress for Windows Phone

Skip Weekends when filling dates in Excel

While using date function in Excel we come across dragging a cell to fill the cells with dates. As per standard for formula it drags and fills the cell with all dates. Most of the times, we do not need weekends in those cells. So how to remove those weekends?

It is very simple. Select a cell which has date and drag it. While dragging, you get an icon with row an columns. Click on the icon. It gives you options to fill the cell with. In the list shown, select Weekdays. This will fill the cells with only weekdays and skip weekends.

-Ashish

SharePoint Workflows

I am trying to understand how workflows work in SharePoint. I want some functionality like routes in ENOVIA. I want selective email alerts.
Currently SharePoint either floods my inbox or no emails. My requirement is that the list item creator should get alert about changes in list item and workflow members should get alerts when they get tasks.

– Ashish

Posted from WordPress for Windows Phone

Lumia-520 upgraded to windows 8.1

Last week my Lumia 520 was upgraded to Windows 8.1. I was very happy to see better features. Though they are minor in terms of implementation, but they are very much useful from functionality point of view. Now, I am going to monitor performance.