6 18 Sept - 1 Oct 2019
Skype may havebeenovertaken
as a messagingtoolby
WhatsApp, Messenger and
Apple Messages, but itsowner,
Microsoft, iskeentoboost its
credentialsbyadding a host of handy
newfeatures.
For starters, you nowdon’t need
toworry about finishing amessage
you’vestarted.Providedyou don’t
deleteyourtext, you cangooff and
dosomething elsebefore returning
to completeit. Unfinished, unsent
messagesare marked “[draft]” so
you caneasilyspot themwhenyou
look downyourlist. It doesn’t even
matterif you closeSkype:those
draftswill remain.
Messagescanalsobe bookmarked,
which isveryhandy.You do this in
the desktop appbyright-clicking and
selectingAdd Bookmark orby
long-pressing if you’reona mobile
device. Tap yourprofile pictureand
you’ll see all your saved entries underphotos.google.com
Someof your photos and
screenshots are likely to contain text- many of us snapWi-Fi passwords
or recipes frombooks, for example - but such imagesare easily lost
amongyour otherpictures. With the
latest update to Google Photos, help
is at hand. You can searchfor text
within your imagesto findthe picture
you’re after and, evenbetter, copy
andpaste thosewords elsewhere.
Tostart, just tap the searchbar in
the Google Photosapp andtypethe
words featuredin the image you’re
looking for. Whenthe image appears,
openit, pressthe Google Lens
buttonat the bottomof the screen
and select the image to highlight
sometext. You’ll be able
to indicate exactlyhow muchtext
you want to copyusing the sliders, thentransfer themto
another app for pasting. It’s a brilliant use of optical
character recognition (OCR) technology.
http://www.spotify.com/uk
Spotify now lets you share music
and podcasts onFacebookStories.
The new feature allowsfor an
instant 15-secondpreview of
a singletrack onthe social
network. The listenercan then
tap if theywant to hearthe track
in its entirety within Spotify.
The functionis primarily geared
towards artists who want to
promote their own content but
it can beusedwith any songand
byanyone.You simply needto
viewthe track in Spotify andtap
Share thenselect Facebookand
customisethe Story before
posting it.
Whensomeoneviews the
Facebook story, they’ll get an
audio preview and be able to click
the relevant buttonfor the whole
track. The feature doesn’t work with more thanone songso
it’s not suitable for albums, playlists or artist profile pages.Bookmarks.
Finally,Skype nowletsyou preview
photos, filesand videosthatyou want
toshare, and it will even collate
multiple imagesand clips intoanalbum
withinthe chathistory.
All desktop versions alsobenefit
froma newsplitwindowthatputsthecontact listinone frame and
conversations inthe other.
http://www.skype.comMaster Skype’s new messaging toolsSearch for text in images
in Google Photos
Share Spotify songs toFacebook StoriesWhat’s New Online