If anyone were hoping that the innovation and drive to be the best would diminish at the Apple Corporation, or that the quest for perfection  would cease to exist  and reduce itself to the status quo of  waiting and copying what everybody else is doing in the digital world,  or even thought that the Apple company’s ability to create and invent continuous high performance devices that would outdistance their competitors  had ended with the departure of its founder, found out on March 7, 2012 that they had been living in a world of make-believe.  Reality hit everyone  with the unveiling of the iPad 3, and the explosion that blasted out was loud and clear and could be heard all around the world. Apple has done it again!

Not that Apple ever gave anyone the impression that they were lost or wringing their hands for new ideas after the sad departure of its founder, but it was generally assumed, in my opinion, by many of Apple’s competitors that they now had time to catch up and  breathe and set their own distinguishable mark  in this highly competitive field.  Some of them probably saw themselves sitting in the front seat on the number one spot, taking over the number one position as the best tablet PC ever–that is until the presentation on March 7, 2012, when Apple threw many of them into a frenzy and sent many research and development people from the different companies back to the drawing board to begin again.

With the introduction of the iPad 3, Apple has shown us again, who is the King on the road among  tablet  PCs in this Post PC era.  The iPad 3 with its HD 1080p resolution, which is even better than the HD on your television, with its image stabilization and its voice dictation, is more than enough to astonish any consumer.

However,  Apple did not satisfy themselves with marginal development. No,  they  stepped out and put a power punch behind the iPad 3 that will take its competitors a little time to recover from. It was their knock out punch as they presented the iPad 3 with its Retina Display,  and threw us into the future with its next generation wireless 4G with DC-HSDPA , LTE, and HSPA+,  and let us not forget to include the fact that they kept the 3 G, so that is also 3G compatible all over the world.

The Apple family of geniuses then crowned the moment with its new A5X chip––the new quad-core powerhouse.  One can only say, “Wow!”

The iPad 3 goes on sale on 16 March in several major countries. A week later, there will be a roll out to other major countries. So please do not panic, there will be enough iPad 3′s for everyone.

I am personally looking forward to its release.  Having already  invested in the first generation iPad, I hesitated to invest in the iPad 2, because I had the feeling that the iPad 3 was going to be a bomber, which it was. The blast was felt everywhere.

As they say in the neighborhood that I grew up in, “they done done it again!”  It is not the best English in the world, because it is slang, but very appropriate for the presentation event of the iPad 3 held on March 7,2012,  ”Apple done done it again!”

So, Apple,  thanks for setting the record straight, when it comes to Post PC Era devices you are simply the best!

Ciao,

Pat Garcia

Posted on March 9, 2012 by | 6 Comments

Thank you!

Posted on May 21, 2012 by

I believe everyone meets up with people who have the capacity to change his or her life.  Whether or not we decide to let that change happen is our decision. However, it is what we do  or how we react to what confronts us that will change our lives one way or the other.  Nothing remains constant, everything changes and so today, I have been honored by another one of my peers. She has nominated me for the Beautiful Blogger Award. and so  I say to Mary Ann Blinkhorn, thank you for your recognition and your nomination.  It is truly an honor, and your recognition is a sweet balm to my soul.

In compliance with the rules, I therefore nominate the following people whose blogs I look forward to reading.  It is a pleasure for me to wake up on Saturday morning and after my meditation with the Word of God, to sit with a cup of coffee in my hand and read what they have to say through the written word. It is food for my soul and my spirit. Therefore I nominate:

http://www.brws.com/wordpress/ - the blog of Betsy

http://raaniyork.wordpress.com/2012/05/17/jakes-next-month-in-his-home/ - the blog of Raani

http://www.needyhelper.com/pick-of-the-week-development-destitution-and-death/ - the blog of Lee

http://lindayezak.com/ –  the blog of Linda

http://peggitustan.blogspot.de/2012/05/what-is-love.html -  the blog of Peggi

http://pstrack.blogspot.de/ - the blog of Peggy

http://traceba.wordpress.com/2012/02/07/blessings-of-the-heart/ – the blog of Tracy

If  you  (my seven nominees) choose to accept this award…copy and paste the award icon to your blogs, provide a link to the one who nominated you (hello), then nominate seven blogs that you would like to recognize, and let them know that you have nominated them.

Thank you to all whom I’m following. Your writing, poetry, artwork, and music is an inspiration to me.

I would like to especially thank my readers.  Because of you and your faithfulness to read my blogs, I am able to share my life, and that makes me happy. What is a song if you do not have anyone to sing it to? So, is it with my writing. It obliterate into nothing without you. My heartfelt thanks goes out to you.

Ciao,

Pat Garcia

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

Beautiful Blogger Award

Posted on May 21, 2012 by

Many thanks to all the people who are reading my blogs. Today I have found out that I  am a nominee for the Beautiful Blogger Award.

Ciao,

Pat Garcia

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Splitting Your Virtual Keyboard on the First Generation iPad

Posted on April 17, 2012 by

Recently, I was writing on my iPad. I have a first generation iPad, and wanted to split my keyboard for more flexibility and use my thumbs on my virtual keyboard.  I must admit I am a one-handed genie. I usually used the virtual keyboard as it is, holding my iPad with my left hand as I type away with my right hand.  However, thinking that typing with two hands would give me the extra quick mobility that I needed, I wanted to split the keyboard.

Of course, it may seem very easy to those techies in the tech world, but having a first generation iPad does require a little bit more thinking, in my opinion,  especially if you have not updated the operating software on your iPad  to iOS 5, and I had not updated my software.  Expecting there would be features offered on the iPad 2 and iPad 3 that my first generation iPad did not have, it never occurred to me to examine whether my first generation iPad could do such a wonderful thing as split the virtual keyboard, or  whether I could dock the keyboard in the middle etc.  It was a surprise when one of my colleagues said, “Of you can.”  So I went to my office and began to examine the internet on how to accomplish this task.

1.  The first thing I discovered was I had to update to iOS 5.  So, if you are one of those people who have not updated, please do.  In order for you to split your virtual keyboard an update to iOS 5 is a necessity.

2.  Once you have updated your software,  please go to settings.  In settings, move down the menu to  General, and tap on your General button, and look at your menu, which is displayed on the opposite side.  Towards the bottom of the screen, you will see the keyboard, tap on the keyboard and look in the middle for split keyboard.  Please slide the on button so that it is colored. My on button has a blue color.   A picture below shows the page of my settings and the menu for the General button.

3.  Because I use Pages, I opened my Pages software and tapped  to pull up my keyboard. Tapping on my page, the keyboard popped up. The key with a small typewriter and a small black arrow at the bottom is the key you want to hold down for a two or three seconds. 

4. A menu pops up offering you to dock or split. If you choose split, your keyboard will look like the following:

5.  If you choose undock, the key board will move into the middle.

6.  Tapping on the keyboard again, you will see the option offered to dock and merge. This will return your virtual keyboard back to its normal size.  A little secret for people who are disabled and cannot use their hands and are considering buying the iPad 3.  The iPad 3 virtual keyboard is also designed to be used with your mouth. In other word, a microphone appears by the keyboard, and you can dictate, and the keyboard writes it out. However, this function requires that you agree to Apple’s privacy politics.

So, try out your virtual keyboard and let me know what you think.

Ciao,

Pat Garcia

Posted in Apple Products, iPad | Tagged , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Working With Pages

Posted on March 30, 2012 by

One of the nicest pieces of software to work with if you have a MacBook, iPad or iPhone is Pages.  It is very similar to Microsoft Word, only Word offers much more variety.  However, if you are looking for a good simple working tool that offers you almost everything that you would get in Microsoft Word, and you have not yet invested in the Word or the office suite, then pages is cheaper and it has lots to offer.

Pages will take some getting used to if you have been working with Microsoft Word, but it is an excellent tool for writers writing their novels, bloggers who blog and journalist who use the iPad as the handy notebook to take notes with.   Before switching over to Pages, however, insure that your publisher or editor can receive your documents without any problems.  I say this, because the majority of the industry, regardless of which field you are writing for use Microsoft Office, respectively, Microsoft Word as their main word processor. Pages is still Word’s  little brother.

So, what is the difference? Not much.  The difference comes with the formatting and the fonts.  Pages does not come with the numerous fonts that are in Word.

  1. Both have menus that appear at the top and both have cloud space. Microsoft has SkyDrive and Pages has iWorks.com.  Also Pages menus drop down on your Pages document.
  2. Microsoft has fonts out of this world that Pages does not have.  Therefore, if you are converting a document from Word to Pages, and the font is incompatible to the Pages document, Pages will choose a font that is compatible to it, which will probably mess with your formatting.
  3. Pages has excellent templates. The designs are outstanding, but Microsoft is slowly catching up.
  4. Microsoft word remains the number one  word processor tool that can do all––and is found in most big corporations––however,  smaller firms and self-employed people are beginning to discover Pages. It fits their budgets.

Therefore, if you have a Mac, MacBook, iPad or iPhone or have just invested in  the Apple family and have not invested in a Word Processing software as of yet, you may want to look into Pages. It is cheaper and very easy to use.

Ciao,

Pat Garcia

Posted in Apple Apps, Apple Products, iPad, iPhone, Mac Air, MacBook | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Working With The Documents To Go App On Your iPad

Posted on March 2, 2012 by

The iPad 3 is on the way and speculations about it, such as, whether or not it will have a new processor, the supposedly A6, or whether it will be thicker or thinner, or whether Apple will follow the same price politics as always will finally be answered.

However, that is not my topic for today.  It is nice to speculate, but it is even better when we deal with the devices that we already have and learn how to use them.   Recently, someone asked me whether the iPad has a Microsoft Office App.  At the moment, I can say no but there are apps on the iPad that let you work with your office documents and sync them back to your computer.

Two of the apps are called Docs-to-go, short form for Documents To Go ®Premium-Office Suite and Quick office and I mentioned both in a previous blog while writing about the iPhone. However, one of my readers asked, “How do they work asked my friend?”

So today, here is a simple description of how Documents To Go works for you, if you need to work on your office documents while on the go.

First, you must buy the app from the Apple app store and let it install itself on your iPad.  With Docs-To-Go you may work on any office document regardless of whether it is word, power point, excel, as well as look at PDF documents, iWork‘s and other data.

To insure that you have the right Documents To Go App, check to see if the app is from DataViz. Also, the premium version is the version that allows you to work with all office documents including the office 2007, 2008 and 2010 document, and also to establish a new document if you require it.

I hear you asking, but how do I get them on my iPad.

After loading the docs-to-go app on your iPad, go to your Mac, or MacBook or desktop computer and download the program on your computer.  Don’t worry the desktop version is free.  After downloading your desktop version and registering, the next step is to link the desktop version of docs-to-go with the docs-to-go on your iPad.

  1. Turning on your iPad, please make sure that your Wi-Fi and is enabled. Also, make sure that Bonjour is enabled. If Bonjour is not enabled you will not be able to pair your iPad with your desktop computer.  To find out if Bonjour is able the best thing to do is to go to the Dataviz website and follow their steps on finding out whether or not your Bonjour in iTunes is enabled.  You may find the steps at the following website: http://support.dataviz.com/support.srch?docid=14351.
  2. After your desktop version has found your iPad, it will give you four numbers to tip into the iPad version of your documents to go app. Voila, your iPad is now paired with your desktop computer and you can begin the most important function of pulling the files you need to work from your computer and transferring them to your iPad.

How do I transfer the files from my computer to my iPad?

  1. Open up your desktop documents to go application.
  2. Go to add folder in your documents to go program and choose the files from your desktop that you would like to work with.
  3. Once you have added a folder, you can edit the folder and decide which documents you want to sync within that folder by adding or taking away the check mark beside it.

If you have done all of this correctly, you are ready to use documents to go.

In order to start a new word, excel or power point document from the documents to go app on your iPad, open it and go to local down at the bottom of your app on your iPad.  There is a small page button with a plus sign. Touch this symbol and it will open up and display a word document, excel document, power point document and email with attachments.  Tapping on any one of these things will give you a new document window.

You are now up and ready to use documents to go.  If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask.

Ciao,

 Pat Garcia

Posted in Airport Extreme | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

 

 

 

 

Do you have problems with spammers  trying to load your website with a lot of junk?  If you do, you are not alone.  Even though you may moderate, and I do moderate my account, it never fails, some smart guy wants to sell timberland or promote cialis or a pocketbook with your website as the target for the contact.  It doesn’t help to protest against these things because spamming is like graffiti on walls written in train stations, on houses, buildings and wherever else you may find it.  It is unwanted thrash that you just do not want to see on your website or your building or your car.

I hear you saying this has nothing to do with Apple products, but maybe it has.  Why hasn’t the industry developed an app against spamming. I am sure that  the need is there and I don’t have any doubts about the app becoming a runner. It would probably sell into the billions in two or three days.  Can you imagine it?  Anti-Spam app cause traffic jam on the internet highway!

 

 

 

 

 

 

By the way, are you looking for a way to convert your favourite song to a ring tone and use it as the ring tone  on your iPhone? If so, try one of my favourite apps, MP3 to Ring Tone.  I believe you will love it. You may find it in the Apple app store.

Getting back to the spammers, what do you do about them?

  1. Moderate your website daily.
  2. Make sure you have to approve anything that is posted.

Build up your tolerance. People who spam have been around since  people were on the earth.

Have a nice weekend everyone.

Ciao,

Pat Garcia

 

Posted on February 4, 2012 by | 3 Comments