How-To

One of the iOS 12 features I've been eagerly awaiting is Apple's new Shortcuts app. This new app allows you to instruct Siri to accomplish a task or series of tasks with native and third-party apps, all triggered by a phrase of your own choosing. In addition to creating your own Shortcut, Apple's latest help app also lets you choose from a Gallery of pre-designed shortcuts. Let's get started learning how to find the Shortcuts app on iPhone and iPad, and then use the Gallery to install a Shortcut we all need from time to time: finding directions home. Once you've installed the driving directions Shortcut, you can choose and configure as many other Gallery Shortcuts as you need. We'll go over how to create your own Shortcut in a future tip.

App Saturday: Pinterest

By Leanne Hays

Name any hobby, sport, interest, or diversion, and you'll find out more about it than you ever dreamed possible on the Pinterest app. Not so very long ago if you wanted to find guidance for your latest woodworking project, some fresh new garden ideas, inspiration for a unique vacation destination, or an exciting new craft idea, you'd have to pore over books and magazine articles or spend tons of time surfing the web to find all the most helpful links. Now, though, your search can be much more quick and rewarding; you can look to Pinterest as a clearinghouse for pictures, videos, and information about over 100 billion different topics ranging from wildly popular to extremely obscure, right on your iPhone or iPad. What's more, you can share your favorite Pinterest categories and findings with friends and family who are also using the site or app, and keep all your best pins (saved posts) for whenever you'd like to go back and refer to them. Let's get started learning about everything Pinterest now, so you can start pinning with the best of them! 

I'm on a summer road trip right now with my kids and sister; an adventure I've been planning for the last two months. My favorite booking tool for accommodations has been, by far, the Airbnb app. This free travel app has saved me not only money, but also loads of time and effort in researching and budgeting for our lodgings from Iowa to the East Coast and back again. Whether you're planning a business trip or a family vacation, going to somewhere rural or to a big city, there's an Airbnb room, apartment, or house just right for you. Let's go over what the Airbnb app is, how it works, and why you should try it out if you haven't already. 

Need iPad and iPhone help? Sign up for iPhone Life Insider and Sarah will help you with all your iPhone troubleshooting and iOS-related issues. To learn more go to iPhoneLife.com/Insider. In this Hey Sarah column, one Insider wants to know how to change the default greeting on their iPhone's voicemail. Other questions include how to view more than the current month on Apple Watch and how to sort notes in the Notes app alphabetically.

Need iPad and iPhone help? Sign up for iPhone Life Insider and Sarah will help you with all your iPhone troubleshooting and iOS-related issues. To learn more go to iPhoneLife.com/Insider. In this Hey Sarah column, one Insider wants to know how to remove everything from their old iPad so they can give it away to a friend while another wants to know if it's possible to delete photos from their iPhone without also deleting them from iCloud.

Every morning, five days a week, we publish iPhone how-tos to help you get the most out of your phone. But just as important as understanding how your Apple devices work is finding the best apps to use with them. That's why every Saturday we share one of the apps the iPhone Life Team has used and loved with our readers. 

According to AARP, only four out of ten American adults have created a will. Writing a will is an important step for every adult, particularly for those of us with children, because we don't want those we've left behind unprotected and confused about our final wishes. Since I'm one of the six out of ten who haven't made a will yet and don't want to spend the time and money to visit a lawyer, I've made it my mission to find a way to write a do-it-yourself online will, preferably for free. I've found an iPhone and iPad app called Tomorrow that not only helps users write a will, including designating heirs, executors, and guardians for children and pets, but also walks us through the process of purchasing life insurance and setting up a trust for our beneficiaries. To learn more about how the Tomorrow last will and testament app works, read on. 

App Saturday: Quartz

By Conner Carey

News doesn’t have to be overwhelming. While it’s important to stay aware and up-to-date, there is a better way to get your daily news briefing: the Quartz app. Instead of showing you a flood of articles, Quartz is focused on a single screen that looks very similar to any messaging app, except these messages give you bite-sized nuggets of news. With the Quartz app, you can get an overview of the news and choose which subjects you want more details about. Learn more on what this app does and why we love it below.


The times they are a changin’ with iOS 11. If you want to reply to notifications from Lock screen on your 3D Touch compatible iPhone, you’ll need to use 3D Touch. Older models have the good ‘ol Swipe to Reply feature in place, which we’ll also go over. However, rich notifications from Lock screen in iOS 11 allows you to do a lot more. The notification on your Lock screen can easily be responded to using either 3D Touch or by swiping left. This is one of the ways Apple is incorporating 3D Touch into more and more places on the iPhone. Here’s how to respond to notifications in iOS 11.

While it would be nice if Apple allowed us to easily select any song on our iPhone for use as a ringtone, it just doesn't work that way. There are certain ringtone apps that will allow you to use music from your iTunes, but that’s another article in itself. For around a dollar, however, you can buy a ringtone of your favorite song or melody from the iTunes Store. I recently purchased the incredibly nostalgic Sailor Moon intro melody for my iPhone. You can find popular songs, TV and movie melodies, sound effects, and more. Once you’ve made your purchase, it’s easy to set your ringtone. Here’s how to make your favorite song your iPhone ringtone.

Thanks to smartphones, a lot of us have gotten into the habit of checking email on our iPhones. But some emails we receive, we also want to print. You could open your computer and print it that way, but you can also print the email straight from your iPhone. Read on to learn how to print your emails with AirPrint and whether or not your printer is AirPrint enabled.

Have you ever asked yourself, "What is the TV Provider function on iPhone?" You've come to the right place, because we've got the answers on how you can use TV Provider feature in the Settings apps to connect to your cable provider. The TV Provider setting brings all of your TV show and movie watching experiences together under the Zero Sign-In feature. With TV Provider, you can sign in once with your cable provider or any iOS TV app like Hulu or Amazon and never have to sign in again on any other Apple device. Here’s how to watch cable on your iPhone or iPad using the TV Provider setting.

The Mail app on your iPhone can connect all of your email accounts in one place with different folders that allow you to organize and view your emails in the best way for you. One way the Mail app helps you stay on top of your communication is with the Drafts folder, where you can find messages you started and saved, but never got around to sending. You can use this tip to quickly and easily see all the drafts you’ve begun across all of your Mail app connected accounts. Here’s how to view all drafts in the Mail app on your iPhone right from your Inbox.

Here's a tip that you might not use too often, but that's useful to have if you have to get through an audiobook quickly, say, for a class or work assignment. Did you know that you can speed up the playback tempo in your Audible app on iPhone? You can also slow down the narration speed, although I've never needed to use that feature. Read on to learn how to speed up or slow down the narration speed in the Audible app on your iPhone. 

In the past, when a stranger on Facebook sent you a message, you didn't receive a notification the way you would with messages from friends. These messages used to be filtered into a section of Facebook Messages called the Other Inbox, but now Facebook has split the Other Inbox into two separate areas: Message Requests and Filtered. The Message Requests Inbox is for messages from people you've communicated with in the past, although you might not be friends with them on Facebook. The Filtered Inbox is for completely unknown senders. There’s actually an easy (though unintuitive) way to access your hidden messages. Most of the time, these messages aren't important. But every now and then, there’s a message you need or want to read. Here’s how to view your hidden Facebook messages on iPhone.

Starting with iOS 10,  when Siri got the ability to complete tasks in third-party apps, a lot of third-party app developers added Siri voice command compatibility, including Pinterest, Skype, and Uber. You can even make Siri open Google Assistant for you. But how can you know what apps can Siri use? We’ll cover some top third-party apps Siri is able to use and how to make sure those apps are enabled for use with Siri. Here’s how to use Siri with third-party apps and some top apps to try.

How to Avoid Tolls on Google Maps:

Get driving directions without tolls on Google Maps using the following directions:

  1. Download Google Maps in the App Store.
  2. Open the app and search for your destination.
  3. Tap the blue button or Route.
  4. Sidenote: you can tap the up and down arrows next to the search boxes to switch your “from” and “to” if needed.
  5. Enter your “from” address or use your current location.
  6. Tap the three vertical dots right of the search boxes.
  7. Select Route Options.
  8. Toggle on Avoid Tolls.
  9. To save your preference for avoiding tolls with Google Maps, toggle on Remember settings.
  10. Tap the back arrow to return to the map.
  11. Tap the blue circle with a white arrow pointing up to begin navigating.

How to Set Up Out of Office on iPhone: Outlook

We'll cover how to set up out of office for Outlook, Gmail, Yahoo, iCloud, and more. Here is how to set up out of office for Outlook. It's reccomended you set up your out of office reply on a computer. 

  • Sign in to Outlook.com.
  • Tap the Settings icon that looks like a gear in the top right corner.
  • Choose Automatic Replies.
  • Check the box Send Automatic Replies.
  • Choose the start and end date, then check the box Send replies only during this time period.
  • Below that is a blank body of text. Enter the message you want people to receive as your out of office reply.
  • You can check the box for sending Ooo replies to everyone or just to your contacts.
  • Click Ok at the top when you’re done.

If you set a start and end time and check the box, “Send replies only during this time period,” your out of office reply will automatically turn off. If not, you can easily turn off by revisiting settings, clicking Automatic Replies, and checking the box, “Don’t send automatic replies.”

Without a Home button, how do you shut down the iPhone X? There are a couple ways; in a previous tip, I went over how to power off your iPhone without buttons, which is more of an iOS 11 feature than an iPhone X one. You can also hard restart your iPhone X, but you only need to do that if the device is frozen or glitching. However, you can still power down your iPhone X with buttons; the process is just a bit different than you’re used to. Let's get started learning how to turn on and off your iPhone X.

Face it; kids are going to use technology as a regular part of their lives. Whether it's a home or at school, for recreation or education, or all of the above, your children and grandchildren will learn all the ins and outs of your iPhone, iPad, and whatever other devices you may have around the house. We already know it's important to limit screen time to keep our kids well rounded, but what about other parental controls? Apple has created several iPhone and iPad restriction settings that adults can put in place without ever needing to purchase a parental control app, and even more settings are coming with iOS 12! There are many reasons you might enable restrictions on your iPhone; they act like a child lock app and control major aspects of privacy, allowed content, and more. Here are two restrictions I find very helpful; preventing kids from adding or deleting apps on your devices. Let's get started learning how to use these parental control settings.

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