Technology

4 Ways Your iPhone Can Save You Money at the Store

Posted by John Biggs
on May 16, 2012 at 5:42 PM


Clipping coupons is, arguably, quite boring. So why not spice it up with a few cool iPhone apps that help you save money in stores as you jet around town? 

Coupon apps come in two varieties -- location-based, which pick up deals depending on where you are, and deal-based, which appear daily and include well-known chains and stores in your area. All of them can save you a few bucks, and most are free.

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Technology We Tried It

What Is Google Drive and Why Should Moms Care About The Cloud?

Posted by John Biggs
on May 9, 2012 at 4:40 PM

Google Drive launched last week with quite a bit of fanfare, proving that even geeky stuff like cloud storage can make the mainstream news. But what is Google Drive and, more importantly, what can it do for you and the fam?

Think of Google Drive as a hard disk on the Internet. You can access it by dragging files into a special folder on your own personal hard drive or by visiting drive.google.com and downloading them over the web. Also any documents you write in Google Docs will appear in Drive as "links" to a web-based editor.

The best thing? You can install Drive on all of your computers and your special sync folder will be identical on every single machine. You can also drop a file into your PC's folder at work and come home and edit it on your laptop.

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Technology This Just In

New Glowing Nook Is Perfect for Late Nights With Baby

Posted by John Biggs
on Apr 30, 2012 at 4:36 PM

For most of the past month, my wife has been reading her Nook in our newborn baby's room, squinting at the e-ink screen in the near darkness. Luckily, something just came along that is going to make her life - and a lot of mommies' lives - better: the Nook Simple Touch with GlowLight.

The Simple Touch has the same screen as the Nook and the entry-level Kindle models. But when you hold down a button, the screen lights up with a bright white glow. The backlit screen is easily readable in the dark and the black text on white background is easier on the eyes than a bright tablet screen.

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Technology We Tried It

4 Ways to Kill Off Your Old Ways of Organizing

Posted by John Biggs
on Apr 25, 2012 at 6:14 PM

With tax time come and gone, this is your chance to get - and stay - organized in time for your next big paperwork project. We've tried to go as paperless as possible around our house. Here's how we did it.

Step 1 - Death to banking. Using our bank's iPhone app (we use Chase, but other banks support these features), we're able to make deposits simply by signing and taking pictures of paper checks that come into the house. I also have most of my bill-paying set up through the app.

I do, however, always like to get paper copies of my bills rather than emails. It's a bit easier to organize that way and then I simply shred the offending bill when we're done paying. I haven't been into a bank branch in years and, as a technophile, I foresee a day when many branches will be totally robotic. 

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Technology We Tried It

'Kinect Star Wars' Will Disappoint True Fans, but Their Kids Will Love It

Posted by John Biggs
on Apr 17, 2012 at 6:00 PM

Since Microsoft announced Kinect Star Wars at the video games trade show E3 last summer, the gaming world has waited with breathless anticipation for a game that combined the "you are the controller" wizardry of the Microsoft Kinect and the fun of Star Wars.

So now that Kinect Star Wars has landed in stores, how amazingly great is it? What did Microsoft do right and what did they do wrong? And more important, is it a great game for kids and kids at heart?

Sadly, the answer to the last question is probably "No."

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Technology Health Check

4 Great Techie Ways to Make Your Kids Eat Right

Posted by John Biggs
on Apr 3, 2012 at 5:04 PM


We've been thinking a lot about how to get our kids to eat more vegetables and, in the process, get more of what Michael Pollan calls "food" down our gullets in place of the cast-off chicken nuggets and pizza rinds we currently eat. Here are some changes we're going to be instituting around Gadget Dad central.

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Technology Say What!?

Newborn Parenting Lesson: Babies Need Gadgets Too

Posted by John Biggs
on Mar 28, 2012 at 1:50 PM

The latest addition to the Gadget Dad family, Guthrie, was born on March 8, and the wife and I have spent the past few weeks brushing up on our neonatal parenting skills. Aside from the obvious stuff - remembering where we put him, changing him once a day or two, and avoiding habanero jack cheese in his diet for the first four days - we've discovered that in the three years since we last had a little one, a lot has changed in the world of parental gadgets.

For example, when our first son was born six years ago, we had a the Quinny Buzz, a self-expanding pneumatic stroller that looked like something out of Wall-E. Now that stroller has been supplanted by City Minis, Bugaboos of all description, and one of the most amazing strollers I've seen to date. Read on for the gadgets that have made this birth happier and at least more gadget-rich.

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Technology We Tried It

5 iPad Apps Moms Need to Get Their Hands On

Posted by John Biggs
on Mar 6, 2012 at 10:45 PM


With the much-anticipated launch of the iPad 3, I thought it would be fun to highlight a few cool apps for busy moms. Everyone has their own favorites, but these are a few that my wife and I particularly enjoy.

Most of these apps work on iPads (including the latest model) and all of them are free or relatively inexpensive. They're a high-tech way to help your wee ones feel and act better -- and some of these tools may replace cumbersome notebooks and guides.

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Technology This Just In

Are You Really Ready for the iPad 3?

Posted by John Biggs
on Mar 1, 2012 at 7:00 PM


It seems like only last year that the iPad 2 was the hottest device on the market, with lines around the block and folks with wallets at the ready to pick up Apple's latest device. In fact it was last year and, like clockwork, Apple is about to release a brand new iPad for us all to salivate over/yell about. 

That's right: Here comes the iPad 3.

Apple will be announcing their newest iPad at an event in San Francisco next Wednesday and here's what you need to know about it. To be clear, these are mostly rumors right now, but it's better to be forewarned and forearmed before you go rocketing down to the Apple store on March 7th.

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Technology Tech Talk

4 Tools for Sharing Photos and Files Other Than Facebook

Posted by John Biggs
on Feb 21, 2012 at 4:39 PM


Sure, it's fun and easy to send every little thing to Facebook, but then it's kind of stuck on Facebook. And what if Grandma and Grandpa don't want to use all that social media stuff and what about Auntie in China who can't log in?

Sharing big files with family members has traditionally been fairly difficult. Most email servers won't take files over 25MB, and services like Facebook and Twitter are great for posting a shot of the wee ones covered in chocolate syrup after Sundae Night but aren't so great at offering a general "dump" for important files and media.

Here are some cool tricks you can use to share almost anything with anyone in a few simple steps.

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About This Column

John Biggs, trained gadgetologist, seasoned tech journalist, and father of two, test drives all the shiny, new electronic gizmos hitting the market. He'll tell you what gets a big, fat, FAIL and what's worth breaking into your kid's piggy bank to buy. And he isn't afraid to let his little ones play with the expensive stuff; especially when it's in the name of good reporting!  

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