Quick Tips for Working from Home

As someone who has worked from home (many years before this pandemic hit us), I'm kinda excited that most people are getting the opportunity to have the same experience. (Let's stay positive, people.) I thought I'd share some tips on how to go about working remotely.

• Have a schedule with a start and end time for work. Chalk up a to do list with timings on when you're going to do which task. Also, don't forget to pencil in a lunch break and 15-minute tea break. Don't discuss work in your breaks if you're going to talk to co-workers during this time.
• Put on some business casual clothes and be well groomed. This helps make the mental switch to work mode easy and conveys to family members that your work is important to you and they must respect that. 
• Consider taking breaks using the Pomodoro technique i.e. work for 25-minute intervals and take 5-minute breaks to do something non-work related.
• Listen to instrumental music while you work. Anything with lyrics will just distract you and doing this can even be dangerous. Imagine the disastrous effects typing the lyrics in your important write-up would have.
• Ensure that you have a space segregated as your workspace while working from home. I have heard working from your bed is counter-productive, but frankly, if you have no other place you can work from, your bed will do. Armed with the willpower to work and an appropriate laptop table (to avoid discomfort while working) you can do this.
• Keep everything you need nearby while you work. This usually includes your phone, a pen, a notebook and a bottle of water.

My workspace setup

• Be in touch with your team members. If you lose internet connectivity/face another issue for a good amount of time communicate this to a member of your team, who will most likely be one of your team leads. They can then take a call on what should be done next.
• If possible and time allows it, alternate between personal tasks, work tasks and breaks.
• Take a power nap if you feel lethargic but make sure it's not more than 15 minutes. Otherwise you'll wake up feeling grumpy instead of rested.
• Let your family know that you can't be disturbed from the start time to end time of your work day. Explain to them how important it is that you focus during these work hours. Put on your headphones and work if they still resist.
• Similarly, let your work mates know that they cannot reach you after or before work hours.
• Shut down your laptop when you're done for the day, if possible. This helps you shift out of work mode and makes you feel relaxed. You don't want to be burned out, so this is important.
• Finally, it's okay to feel demotivated and less productive working from home. You're not alone. Be kind to yourself when you feel such emotions. 

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5 Common Techniques Apps and Websites Use to Dupe You

Ever left a website or app with a sense of being cheated? Maybe you didn't mean to give them your email address or opt in for a service or part with your credit card info for a trial, but felt coerced into giving in. You're not imagining things. There are companies out there (not just in India, by the way) who are hiring designers to manipulate you into doing things you didn't intend to do. Here are some examples of the ways companies may be intentionally controlling your actions with their text and design.

1. ConfirmShaming
This happens when you're trying to close a pop-up asking you to whitelist their ads or subscribe to a mailing list. Such websites prey on your sense of guilt or downright insult you when you opt out.

2. Useless countdown clocks
This is a trick that most people have caught on to but there are still sites that run such clocks and manage to fool unsuspecting users. When websites and apps create a sense of urgency, it pushes customers to make a faster decision on a purchase they are considering. Amazon does this (see below image). So does Snapdeal with its clock ticking on discounts.

3. Disguised ads
Say you want to convert a Microsoft Word document to PDF through a website. You do everything right and then it's time for you to download the PDF document. But hey! There are two download buttons. Which one do you trust? One of these buttons is an advertisement and it has been cleverly placed to fool you. If you click the ad disguised as the button, you'll be persuaded into buying whatever it is the ad was created for. One way you can tell is by hovering over the link. The destination URL will tell you whether it is a genuine download link. For more information on how to spot a fake button, head on over to this link.

4. Charging your credit/debit card for unwanted services
Okay, so you've subscribed to a 30-day free trial service of some sort. You head over to the page where you have to choose your membership plan. Wait a minute, though. Why is it asking for your credit card/debit card/netbanking details? But it feels safe, right? After all, they won't charge you for a service that's obviously touted as free. They won't. Not for the 30 days but soon, you'll begin to see charges to your account on a service you didn't even mean to sign up for. Stay away from such trials that ask for your details upfront.

5. Tricky (or missing) unsubscribe buttons/Delete option
Amazon is in this hall of shame as well. Ever tried to delete your Amazon account? No? Try it. You'll have to dig deep to find this option. Tell me if you find it. I'm still searching.

Then there are the crafty unsubscribe buttons which will give your errors of various kinds when clicked upon. And some of these links are so small you won't even be able to find them. You'll have no choice but to remain subscribed. Oh, and what about those unsubscribe buttons or links that have been conveniently forgotten to be added in emails? There is a workaround to this: Mark the message as spam or block the sender. 

That's it, folks.

Let me know if you have come across other techniques websites and apps use to deceive people.

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6 Ways to Protect Your Smartphone from Data Theft

 

Confidential information on your phone – be it phone calls, notes or photos – if fallen into the wrong hands, can cause considerable financial loss. Besides being misused for making expensive calls on your behalf, your data can also be put to work by registering you for unwanted services. So, how do you prevent data theft? Let’s look at a few ways by which you can do this:

1. Use your phone’s security features
   Take the time to explore your phone’s settings, specifically its security features. Select the option to instantly lock your phone at the tap of a button – usually the power button. This will give you a step up over potential intruders used to preying on users who only set their phone to lock after 10-30 seconds, which is enough time to steal your personal data. Go to Settings > Security > Automatically lock and set it to 5 seconds. Also, as soon as you get a new phone, set a hard-to-guess pattern, PIN or password. A tool like ‘LastPass’ will help you come up with safe passwords containing just the right mix of alpha-numerics and characters.   
   

   
   
   2.    Lock everything
   Set passwords for each and every app, so that nothing can be accessed without a password. Even for an app as simple as Google Play store (Remember that it holds your profile information for all of Google's other properties such as Gmail as well). ‘App Lock’ on Android can help you manage your passwords for each app fluidly without having to exit its UI. This app lets you add a lock on each of your apps.
   
   
   3.    Install security apps (but prudently)
   Besides App Lock, a number of other apps on Google Play such as Find My Lost Phone or Find My iPhone on the Apple store get to work in the event of you losing your phone. These apps will help remotely locate, lock or erase your phone and even trigger an alarm. Being always connected to the internet will be extremely helpful in locating your phone. Warning: Be careful not to download dubious or untrustworthy apps that could actually steal your data on the pretext of protecting it. Be wary of any links embedded in text messages or emails, just as you would on a desktop.
   
   
   4.    Encrypt data
   This is important especially if you have an SD card. Once encrypted, each time you power on your phone, you’ll need a numeric PIN or password to decrypt it. Accounts, settings, downloaded apps and their data, media and other files can be encrypted. Your data is safe this way, because if you don’t have a password, the only way you can decrypt it is by performing a factory reset, which erases all your data.  Go to Settings > Security > Encrypt phone. Tap the 'Encrypt phone' button. This will take about an hour or more to do, so set aside some time to do this.
   

   

   Since encrypting your phone will take more than hour, it needs to be on a charging point

   
   

   5.   Regularly back up your data

   Make sure your valuable photos, emails, contacts, videos, etc are backed up on a USB drive, external hard drive like Western Digital's or synced on a cloud like Dropbox.

   
   

   6.   Protect your phone itself from theft

   The easiest way to sabotage your data is by being careless with your phone. Even if it’s locked, the thief could see the name on your screen and find out about you through social media platforms, which could help them guess your password/lock code. Most people use their birth years - that’s how easy it is to break into your stolen phone. It’s best to keep the phone in your pocket or bag at all times. 

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7 Existing Technologies India Needs Right Now!

Enough dreaming of the future and fantastic ways in which technology can help our country...here are a few that already exist, all we need is implementation.

The future is already here — it’s just not very evenly distributed”, said Sci-Fi author, William Gibson in the 1990 documentary, ‘Cyberpunk’.

In the documentary, he discusses the inequality in access to technological developments based on wealth and location. Countries such as Germany, China and Finland have been playing host to such developments for some time now, while India seems to be trailing behind despite being the world’s largest sourcing destination for information technology (IT), an industry that reportedly employs more than 10 million Indians. Let's look at some such developments in my article, 7 Existing Technologies India Needs Now! which talks about tech taken for granted elsewhere that could really help India.

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Is Technology Bad for Kids?

Have you met five-year-old Mumbai-based pre-schooler Moksha Jain? She can’t get through a single meal without her tablet playing cartoons in front of her. Or ten-year-old Bangalore-based Ethan D’sa, who has a cell phone, tablet and laptop and can always be seen on either one or all of these attention-seeking gadgets at any given time of the day?

Kids today are battling an addiction of sorts. Tablets, smartphones and gaming devices such as Nintendo DS, Wii and PS3 are gifted to them not only as a means of entertainment, but also to buy that little bit of momentary peace of mind for the adults. Basically, a “shut-up toy” (an actual industry term) to occupy them during daily routines such as errands, car rides and eating out. It's said that the smarter the toy, the lesser challenged the kid. Everything is done at the click of a button or rather the tap of a screen nowadays. Even easy access to information could potentially be spoiling the younger generation, with spoon-fed solutions from Google and an abundance of information of the wrong kind.

But is exposure to technology all bad? Rest assured, as always there's a flipside and in this case, an upside. For both sides of the argument, read this extensive article Is Technology Bad for Kids? and tell us whether you agree.

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Learn to Fly a Plane

Ever wondered what it was like to fly a plane? In this article, learn how to take to the skies without leaving terra firma.

So far, you’ve only experienced flying in a plane as a passenger, but what if we told you that you could actually fly a plane as well? Virtually, that is, with the help of a flight simulator. A simulator artificially re-creates various aspects of an aircraft flight environment to provide a realistic experience with high quality visuals, audio and functional controls. Its various features let you control the aircraft’s flight, its reactions to controls and external environmental factors such as air density, turbulence, cloud, precipitation, etc.

Types of simulators

Flight simulator games will give you various aircraft models to choose from. The types of simulators available range from commercial airliners such as the Boeing 737 to general aviation/light-sport aircrafts and military models such as fighter jets Sukhoi, MIG, Thunderbolt and Mirage. While many of these plane models are available as freeware, you can buy more through the software.

However, it doesn’t matter what kind of plane you’re flying, the planes share more similarities than differences. For instance, many of the modern airliners have six basic instruments in the cockpit: airspeed indicator, altimeter, attitude indicator, heading indicator/directional gyro, turn co-ordinator and vertical speed indicator. Controls like Trim and Flap are also found in most aircrafts.

Most flight simulators have a plug-in architecture using which users can extend the software’s functionality by creating their own modules and replicas of places on Earth. The ‘XSquawkBox’ plug-in, for example, enables X-Plane users to fly on a worldwide shared air traffic control simulation network. There are quite a few forums and sites such FlightSim, FlightSimWorld and FlyawaySimulation where users share their self-designed aircrafts, sceneries or modules.

Top-rated flight simulator games

• Microsoft Flight Simulator X (FSX) –  Windows 
• X-Plane –  Windows, Linux, Mac. Mobile version available for Android, iOS and webOS.
• Prepar3d – Windows
• Digital Combat Simulator (DCS World) – Windows
• IL-2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover – Windows

Minimum system requirements

Microsoft Flight Simulator X (FSX)

1. OS: Microsoft Windows XP SP2 / Vista
2. 1 GHz equivalent or higher processor
3. Display: Monitor (preferably two) with adequately large screens
4. RAM: 256 MB for Windows XP SP2 / 512 MB for Vista
5. Hard disk space: 14 GB 
6. DVD-ROM drive: The faster, the better
7. Video card: 32 MB DirectX 9 compatible 
8. Audio: Sound card, speakers, or headphones required for audio (for radio/intercom communication)
9. Speed: 56.6 Kbps or better modem for online play
10. Game controllers: Flight yokes/rudder pedals/simple joysticks/joysticks with throttle levers/game pads, and of course, your mouse and keyboard. 

Pick the controller that best suits you and refer to its documentation for button assignments. The controller will help you fly more precisely, while the buttons and controls will make it easy to change views, adjust the throttle, extract or retract the landing gear and flaps, and operate other aircraft controls.

X-Plane

1. Processor: Dual Core, 2.5 GHz or faster
2. RAM: 2 GB
3. Video card: with at least 500 MB of VRAM.
4. DVD-ROM

What you’ll learn

The sims will teach you about the systems and tools used in a typical aircraft. You’ll learn basic aviation concepts such as runway taxiing, taking off, descending, climbing and basic flight manoeuvres. Much of the focus will be on instrument landing system (ILS) system, so you’ll thoroughly understand flight deck systems and controls. You’ll soon know the procedures to follow to avoid other aircrafts, stalls, engine failures and bad weather, obtain clearance to land, understand traffic patterns and determine whether to take off, among other things. Navigational aids such as GPS satellite, radio navigation and magnetic compass will be covered as well.

Taxiing the runway is just one of the skills you will learn

To add to the challenge, you’ll be required to perform emergency manoeuvres, spins, stalls, dives, aerobatics, low flight and short/soft field take-offs in mountains in all kinds of weather. A map in the background will show you all sorts of things such as terrain elevations, roads, rivers, etc. You’ll practice landing on each of these elements, including rough strips, while travelling at high speed, in the night, in fog and snow. It has to be said here: You can’t practice landing enough.

Missions

Mission activities have one or more goals, completing which earn you rewards such as certificates, trophies, wings and badges. Each mission is ranked by order of difficulty, has in-game menus disabled and its own settings for things such as realism, weather and aircraft model. There are sounds and events that are triggered to amplify the challenge and make it seem more realistic, so if you change these settings, you won’t be able to earn rewards. However, changes to settings such as scenery and controllers won’t affect Mission rewards. You can even build your own missions.

Rewards can be accessed in the ‘Pilot Records’ screen. This screen is also where you can access logbooks, screenshots you’ve taken during the game and the logbook (which tracks your flight automatically each time you fly).

Learning to fly with the help of instructors

If you want to learn flying in real life at the pro level, say, for a career in aviation or the military or as a private/sport/ultralight pilot, you can move on to the next step, i.e. learning to fly on the ground as well as in the air with the assistance of a certificated flight instructor (CFI). Flight simulation will prepare you for this stage by helping you better understand the lessons taught here and enable you to ask better questions, thereby optimising your time with the instructor.

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9 Tips to Ensure Your Child's Safety While Using Technology

Gadgets such as tablets, mobile phones and gaming devices find their way to our kids' hands and stay there, because it helps keep the peace when you're trying to have some quiet time to yourself or finish a chore. Also, a certain section of society believes that in an increasingly computerised world, if their young'uns are deprived of gadgets at a younger age, they’ll be left behind. So, how do you walk the line between exposure to technology and restriction to it? Here are some tips that will help:

1. Turn on parental controls to prevent access to specific apps and features. These apps could be timelock apps that allow you to limit the amount of time your child spends daily on his device, apps that filter out adult content, restrict app purchases and even monitor call, SMS and Internet activity. Use security software with parental settings on. 
2. Set rules and conditions for use of these devices. For instance, you can have complete access to the device at any point of time. 
3. Different rules apply to kids of different ages. The younger they are, the less screen time you can allow them. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Canadian Society of Pediatrics, infants aged 0-2 years shouldn’t have any exposure to technology, while those between 3-5 years should be restricted to it for one hour per day, and those between 6-18 years should be allowed two hours per day. (These rules apply if gaming is the focus of the interaction. If the device is being used as a productivity tool, you can decide how much longer you’ll allow access.) 
4. Children below the age of 10 must be constantly monitored. Keep media screens in family areas so that a child’s media usage can be monitored. TVs and computers should be kept out of bedrooms. 
5. Talk to your child about the risks online. You can't always control what kids use computers for, so it’s best to teach them how to use it safely. Educate kids to critically think and they will filter out the bad for themselves. 
6. Engage with your child as s/he tries out a new app or watches television to help increase your child’s comprehension skills. “Jeannie Galindo, supervisor of instructional technology for the Manatee County School District in Florida says, “In an unsupervised environment, I wouldn't recommend a smartphone or tablet purchase for a child until at least between the ages of 11 and 13.” 
7. When making age-appropriate media choices, it’s important to focus on the content and message. 
8. Model responsible usage of technology yourself. 
9. Use the 20-20-20 rule. Every 20 minutes, have them spend 20 seconds looking at something 20 feet away. 

Read the comprehensive list of tips in this month's Fast Track to Kids Tech.

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The Future of Shopping

Let's see what shopping will be like in the years to come.

Seeing the success of stem cells in creating cattle meat, we can expect much of our food to come from this source. Animal lovers rejoice!

Another tech we can expect to see in the future is the advanced use of HUDs (heads-up displays) such as Google Glass in our daily shopping, giving you information about future sales, which celebrity is known for use of the product you're thinking of buying, showing friends tried on products. It will also prevent you from buying clothes you already have/won’t use seeing past behavior & events you frequent. You'll also get best matches for clothes you already have in your wardrobe. 

3D Printing - Future of fashion

A system at the shop location will autodetect your current outfit and state and accordingly make suggestions. There will also be an instant discreet feedback mechanism for rude and unhelpful salespeople...if there are any.

Thanks to 3D printers it will be easier to lengthen short legs of pants or sleeves of tops. 

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