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Jaraneta

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Joseph Araneta Jr.

Christian husband and father, health nut, tech geek and a telecommuter

Don't Inflict Help, Provide It - Ed Batista. By Ed Batista | 10:00 AM September 16, 2013 A colleague of mine on the leadership coaching staff at Stanford had a student who was wrestling with an important personal issue.

Don't Inflict Help, Provide It - Ed Batista

I knew a dean who was well-positioned to be of assistance, and I offered to put her in touch with my colleague. I emailed the two of them and felt good that I’d been able to help. Shortly afterward, though, my colleague called me, and I was stunned to realize that she was upset and angry with me for intervening. While I had thought that she had accepted my initial offer, she had actually said she’d think about it and would let me know if and when she wanted me to take action. When I tweeted about it, Torbjörn Gyllebring responded, “I usually refer to [that] as ‘inflicting help,’” — a perfect way of describing what I’d inadvertently done to my colleague. What are the various ways we can, with the best of intentions, inflict help?

The Right Help at the Wrong Time. The Right Help, But Too Much Of It. The Wrong Help. Google acquires Bump. Google has officially acquired Bump, an app that allows the user to transfer information to another user by simply bumping their phones together.

Google acquires Bump

This technology is not used by NFC (near field communication), instead the app on your phone uses the phone’s sensors to detect the bump, and it sends that info up to the cloud and back. While the app was quite successful with over 60 million downloads in 2011, it never became anything more than a cool app to have. Box unveils new note-taking service “Notes” Box has unveiled their new Note-taking app and while it won’t be released until next year, you can be part of the beta trials if you wish to.

Box unveils new note-taking service “Notes”

There’s a plethora of note-taking apps on the Google Play store, even Google themselves has one. So one might ask, why use this one? Box is taking a different approach making it a more “social” experience for the user. What sets this app apart from other note-taking apps is that the mobile version has a “Facebook-like” chat head that appears when another person is editing the current note. This certainly gives you new possibilities and is a very interesting idea. Google is testing NFC security tokens to get rid of the password for good, could be released in 2014.

Security is the buzzword these days and passwords are one royal pain in the you know what.

Google is testing NFC security tokens to get rid of the password for good, could be released in 2014

Even locking your phone is a pain. That is why I like Apple’s implementation of the fingerprint scanner. However, Google might be headed in a completely different direction. As you know Google has embraced Near Field Communications (NFC) for a few years now, while Apple doesn’t even talk about it. Does Google know your Wi-Fi password? With everything going on surround the NSA and privacy, a lot of people are nervous about just about every form of security.

Does Google know your Wi-Fi password?

The latest is Wi-Fi passwords. Michael Horowitz of Computer World is reporting that Google knows all the Wi-Fi passwords that are stored on your Android devices. He states that in Android 2.3.4, if you go to Settings/Privacy and choose “Backup my settings” it will backup your Wi-Fi password on Google servers. Now fast forward to Android 4.2. If you go to Settings/Backup and reset, the option for “Backup my data” specifically says, “Backup application data, Wi-Fi passwords, and other settings to Google servers.” Also take a look at this snippet from the Android 2.3.4 users guide (page 374)….. Google rolling out an update to Maps. If you are looking for a place to lay your head down for some rest, the latest update to Google Maps that is rolling out is definitely geared toward you.

Google rolling out an update to Maps

The latest improvements include improved hotel search results, including “sponsored” rates and booking links. To help you get to the hotel quicker, Google has made it faster to access navigation and provides both route and traffic overview information. Sliding out the side menu will reveal a new option “Tips and Tricks” that will take you to a help page in your browser. Of course, Google includes the standard “bug fixes” as part of what is included in the update.

Android Device Manager to get remote locking and password reset. Google’s Android Device Manager already lets users track down their lost devices, or, in the worst case scenario, wipe all the data on it.

Android Device Manager to get remote locking and password reset

It seems though that in its next iteration, the service will get an additional, but less drastic capability, that of locking a device and changing it’s unlock password. Early last month, Google announced the Android Device Manager to help users recover their lost devices or secure sensitive data. This much needed functionality has previously been provided by third-party apps and services but now comes built into Android itself. This being Google, some might raise privacy concerns, but no one will probably deny the usefulness of such a feature.