Category Archives: Make Tech Easier

BEFORE switching to a Managed AppleID

We are [slowly] migrating to using managed AppleIDs. BEFORE you switch away from your old one:

  • Fire up Notability
  • Switch to Settings
  • Select iCloud
  • TURN IT OFF
  • Select “Keep on my iPad”
  • Switch to Autobackup.
  • Make ABSOLUTELY certain your files are backing up to Google Drive
    • If they aren’t, set that up RIGHT NOW
  • Swipe out of Notability
  • Settings –> Sign into your Managed AppleID.

This will keep you from losing all of your Notability notes when you switch.

MY NOTABILITY FILES DISAPPEARED!

If you were switching to a Managed AppleID, and forgot [or didn’t know to] turn OFF the iCloud Sync in Notability….. then all of your Notes just vanished.

No worries…. IF you followed the directions at the start of the school year and setup Google Drive sync.

MDS Tech – Notability: Backup to Drive, Retrieve from Drive (mountdesales.net)

Open the Drive app and find the Notability folder where your current Notes live.  [You very well might have more than one, and the 2nd or 3rd one might be inside another one.]

In Notability:

  • Recreate your Dividers
  • Select one of them
  • Click and HOLD on the “New note” icon, select “Import” and Google Drive
  • Navigate to the Notability folder. Once you have moved inside the folder that matches the Divider, you can either
    • click the individual files you need to download, or
    • click the “import all” button at the bottom.
  • Do this for every divider you need.

There is more the Search than Bing & Google – getting better results when searching

The original article is at https://www.techrepublic.com/article/how-to-expand-search-sources/

By exploring lesser known search engines such as WolframAlpha, Mojeek and Gigablast, you will get a wider range of results, customization and privacy options

There are a TON of search engines out there that might be MORE useful as you search!
Some are DEFINITELY more privacy focused as well.

For searches with a single specific and factual answer, your choice between Google, Bing or another search provider may not matter. For example, both search engines provide rapid and accurate results when you want to know what year the IBM PC was first manufactured (1981) or which team won the Men’s 2022 FIFA World Cup (Argentina).

However, when your intent is to glean information from a wide range of sources, it makes sense to query different search engines. For example, searching both Google and Bing for “edge computing best practices” or “use vi and tmux” provides slightly different sets of linked pages to review.

The search alternatives covered below include not only truly independent search sources but also secondary search services. These secondary search services often depend on Bing or Google results that the service then filters and sorts differently than the source search indexes.

Jump to:

Explore independent search services

Beyond Google and Bing, the most significant independent English-language search engine is Mojeek, shown in Figure B, left. An October 2022 blog post claimed that Mojeek has more than 6 billion pages indexed. As a privacy-respecting service, Mojeek also chooses not to track you.

Another truly independent search engine is Gigablast, shown in Figure B, right, which also serves as the source index for searches conducted at Private.sh. However, the two sites prioritize and present results differently, with Gigablast grouping results from notable sources and Private.sh providing a conventional list of links.

Figure B

While most search services rely on indexes and data from sources such as Google or Bing, independent search indexes do exist. Mojeek, on the left, has indexed more than 6 billion pages. Gigablast, on the right, also maintains its own independent index.

Seek a secondary search provider

Most search services rely on Bing or Google as a source for some — if not all — of their results. DuckDuckGo (Figure C, left), for example, partners with Microsoft for results from Bing, while Startpage (Figure C, right) syndicates results from Google.

Figure C

Many search providers rely on results from Bing and Google. DuckDuckGo, for example, partners with Microsoft Bing, while Startpage relies on Google.

What distinguishes DuckDuckGo and Startpage from their search data sources, however, are their respective privacy policies: Both promise greater privacy and less tracking than Google or Bing.

Qwant and Yahoo similarly source results from Bing, while Brave Search mixes in results from both Bing and Google. At least a couple start-up search engines, such as Kagi and Neeva, offer both free and paid plans that let you prioritize, filter and customize results.

Unlike the secondary search services listed above, which are all for-profit entities, MetaGer.org, shown in Figure D, is operated by a non-profit organization based in Germany. Like other secondary search services, it draws results from other sources, including Bing, Yahoo, Scopia and Infotiger. Not only may you switch any of these four sources on or off, MetaGer also lets you choose to exclude specific domains or subdomains from results.

Figure D

MetaGer.org, run by a nonprofit organization, relies on Bing, Yahoo, Scopia and Infotiger search sources. You may toggle any of these sources on or off.

Directly search a relevant site

Some answers may best be obtained directly from a relevant source. Answers historically found in an encyclopedia or an atlas, for example, might be resolved with a search of Wikipedia.org or OpenStreetMap.org. Most major search and mapping services rely on these sources.

While once commonly questioned, the general reliability of Wikipedia as a source, in particular, has been thoroughly considered and addressed. Similarly, questions you might ask a knowledgeable colleague may be answered with a query of Stack Exchange, Stack Overflow, Quora or Wikihow. Answers from these sites may need to be evaluated with appropriate caution and consideration.

WolframAlpha (Figure E) provides an interesting example of a specialized research engine. The system relies on a set of sources selected for accuracy. For example, if you ask the system to give you the human population on Mars, it returns the number zero, as you would expect. WolframAlpha excels at mathematics and science calculations and questions, along with answers that may be derived from established history and facts. Both free and paid editions of WolframAlpha are available.

Figure E 

As a specialized research engine, WolframAlpha delivers answers drawn from a highly curated set of sources to help ensure accuracy of results.