How to install a website as a Windows 10 app for quick access.

Microsoft has a lot of apps in its store but some popular apps are missing and can only be accessed in a browser. Take Youtube for example. There is no official for it and the browser is the only way to view your videos. However, there is a feature in the Microsoft Edge browser that lets you install the website as an app that you can then pin to the Start menu or to the taskbar for quick access and I'm going to show you how to do just that.

What you will need:

• Microsoft Edge browser

How to install a website as an app.

1. Navigate to www.youtube.com .
   
2. Click the 3 horizontal dots in the top right corner.
   
3. Click Apps and select Install this site as an app.
   
4. Click Install.

The app will now show in the Start menu. Right-click on it and select Pin to Start. To pin the app to the taskbar, right-click and select More and click Pin to taskbar. Now the site will look just like any Windows 10 app just one click away.

How to send and receive WhatsApp messages on your PC without reaching for your phone.

The other day I posted an article about how to make calls from your PC without reaching for your phone and today I'll show you how to use WhatsApp on your computer while working from home. The setup process is quite straightforward.

What you will need:

• WhatsApp app for Android.
• WhatsApp for Windows.

After you download the above apps, open WhatsApp on your phone. Click the three vertical dots at the top right of the screen and tap WhatsApp Web. 

Open WhatsApp Web on your browser on your computer. On your phone, use the QR scanner within WhatsApp to scan the QR code.

Open WhatsApp Desktop and you will see your message history and you can send and receive WhatsApp messages on your computer without reaching for your phone. Unfortunately, WhatsApp video calls are not supported, only text and audio messages.

Note that Facebook Messenger for Windows supports video calls. It is available for free on Microsoft Store.

How to make and receive calls on your PC without reaching for your phone.

In these unprecedented times, many of us are working from home on computers and at times, more often than not, juggling between the computer and the phone. But it does not have to be that way. It is possible to use both without any juggling. How? With Microsoft's Your Phone App for Android. This app will get your phone and your Windows 10 computer talking to each other and will route notifications, text messages to your PC. The most exciting feature is the ability to make and receive phone calls on your PC without touching your phone. 

For the magic to work, you will need a PC running Windows 10 version 1803 or higher and a phone running Android 7 or higher. Sorry Mac and iPhone users, nothing for you here.

• Download Microsoft's Your Phone app from the Google Play Store.
• Download Your phone app for your PC from the Microsoft Store. 

You must sign in with a Microsoft account both on your PC and in the app on your phone. After you've signed in, they are ready to talk to each other. But first, make sure both devices are connected to the same network; That would be your home Wi-Fi. You will receive a notification on your phone asking that you allow the connection between your devices. Go ahead and hit allow and Android phone will appear in the Your Phone app on the PC

Open Your Phone on your PC. You will see Calls in the left column. But before you can start using it, a Bluetooth connection must be established between your phone and the computer.

Click Calls and Get Started. Your PC will ask whether you want to "Let Your Phone make phone calls?". Click Yes. From there, just follow the on-screen instructions. Enable Bluetooth on your phone and click Setup on the computer. Click Pair if both PIN matches. That's it. You're all set.

You will see the phone dialer on your PC. Start dialing or use the Search box to find contacts stored on your phone. Note that you can easily switch back to your phone during a call.

Let me know if run into problems during setup or have questions.

New Telegram's chat folder and archiving will help you unclutter your feed.

In an update published today, Telegram introduces chat folders, a feature users with a lot of activity in their feed will certainly appreciate as it will help unclutter their feed and quickly and easily sort through their messages. Users can create custom folders in the app settings or use the preset folders and these folders can appear as tabs in the app. 

Version 6.0.1 of Telegram also lets you easily transfer your chats to the archived chats folder with a simple swipe from the left. Unless you choose to mute the chat, archived chats that receive a notification will reappear in your feed.

Chat folder and archiving are, in my opinion, the most important elements in this update, but there are more features, most of them related to the folders. See the full changelog below.

• Organize chats into Chat Folders if you have too many chats.
• Create custom folders with flexible settings, or use default recommendations.
• Pin an unlimited number of chats in each folder.
• Swipe between folders to easily access all of your chats.
• View detailed statistics about the growth of your channels and the performance of their posts.
• Send :dice: to any chat to try your luck and get a random number from the animated dice.

Source: Telegram

Download: Play Store

Acrobat Reader is now accessible from Google Drive to add/reply to comments.

Adobe added a nice feature to Acrobat Reader for Android allowing users to quickly annotate files on Google Drive without leaving the app. Once annotated, any persons with access to the file will be able to reply to and see comments from other users for discussions. In addition, comments can be edited and all changed saved within the file back to Google Drive.

To add a comment, tap the new comment icon at the top of the screen. Then tap "Add new" under the pdf file. Tap an area to comment on and "add comment". Type your comment and tap "Comment" to post your comment. It's that easy.

Adobe also improved multi-identity support for Microsoft Intune users. Microsoft Intune is a cloud-based management solution for mobile devices and operating system management. This update also includes the usual improved performance and stability.

Adobe Acrobat for Android can be downloaded free on Google Play Store.

F1 2020 season calendar is now available on Android.

In 56 days, 9 hours and 40 minutes, in Melbourne, about 24 of the world’s best drivers will rev up their powerful engines for the first time this year to claim the F1 teams and drivers’ championship. Lewis Hamilton, the current world champion will try to win his sixth. Hopefully, Ferrari will put up a fight this year, unlike the years where Hamilton won the previous six. 

This year, the official app has been updated with the 2020 race calendar which starts on the 12th of March in Melbourne. Session times for each round will follow soon. The changelog also states that it will be "easier than ever to replay live timing sessions with replay buttons now placed more prominently around the app after a race weekend." Of course, there are the usual bug fixes and performance improvements.

Check out the update on Google Play Store. 

Google Translate improves offline translation by 12% and transliteration by 20%.

The language barrier is a problem when traveling, but apps like Google Translate makes it a bit easier to read road signs and even engage in short conversations with locals. Add to that offline translation and you get the perfect translation tool in case you do not have a data plan or you're in an area where the internet is spotty. Google Translate has long offered offline translation, but it was not a great experience in some cases. According to Google, the experience just got more accurate by 12% "with improved word choice, grammar, and sentence structure." Sami Iqram said in a blog post that "some languages like Japanese, Korean, Thai, Polish, and Hindi the quality is more than 20 percent." And there's more.

Enter Transliteration. This tool helps spell and pronounce words that are written in a script you do not understand. As an example, "when you translate “hello” to Hindi, you will see “नमस्ते” and “namaste” in the translation card where “namaste” is the transliteration of “नमस्ते.” Google Translate supports transliteration for the following languages: Arabic, Bengali, Gujarati, Marathi, Tamil, Telegu, and Urdu.

You can download Google Translate in the Play Store.

OnePlus announces new bug bounty program and partnership with HackerOne.

After suffering two data breaches in its history, OnePlus is today launching a new bug bounty of its own that will pay between $50 up to $7000 dollars to security professionals who discover threats to its security systems. To make this happen, OnePlus created the Global OnePlus Security Response Center, which, the company says, "will engage academics and security professionals to responsibly discover, disclose and remediate issues that could affect the security of OnePlus' systems...". Security professionals can find details about the programs by visiting this website. OnePlus said a public version of the program will be available next year.

OnePlus also announced that it is partnering with HackerOne which will start as a pilot program. Select researches will be invited "to test out OnePlus' systems against potential threats." 

It's great to see OnePlus taking the security of its systems seriously to prevent any future mishaps.

Source: OnePlus

Microsoft Launcher 5.9 brings live update to "your original calendar app icon." (Whatever that means.)

Microsoft posted an update today for their Android Launcher. The update has me confused though. The changelog says this: "Live date update is now available on your original calendar app icon, and Microsoft Launcher calendar icon is also updated with a cleaner look."

My "original calendar app" is Google calendar and the app icon is live. In case you're wondering what's a live icon, it's simply an icon that shows you today's date. In other words, this is a feature built into Google Calendar and has been there for a while, like forever. So I really don't know what Microsoft is referring to. Let me know if I'm missing something.

So there you have it. Version 5.9 of Microsoft Launcher for Android brings you live calendar app icon. And the icon has a cleaner look. 

Microsoft Launcher is available for free in Google Play store.

Microsoft Outlook for Android will soon let users RSVP from their lock screen.

Microsoft released an update today for Outlook on Android that lets users quickly RSVP to meeting requests right from the notification on the lock screen, thus circumventing the need to unlock the phone first. However, at the time I'm writing this post, only the changelog has been updated.

After installing the update on my OnePlus 6T, I decided to test the new RSVP feature. I created a test event on my iPhone and sent an invite to my Outlook.com account. The event did show up in my OnePlus notification on the lock screen but without the 'RSVP' feature. Only 'Accept', 'Decline', and 'Tentative" were there. The RSVP feature is still in the invite email.

I'm not sure why the new feature is missing after installing the update or maybe a Microsoft employee forgot to toggle that server switch. Anyway, check it out in Google Play store. The 'RSVP' button will eventually show up.

WHAT'S NEW

RSVP to meeting invites in the moment! The next time you're invited to a meeting you can RSVP right from the push notification on your lock screen.