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8 FOUR SEASONS BREEZE | NOVEMBER 2016 By Steve Benoff In the last two columns, I covered the basics of smartphone apps. Now it's time to talk about specific apps, which is the real purpose of this column. I have about 80 apps on my iPhone; some I use daily, some I use infrequently, and some I don't use at all and don't know why I haven't deleted them. It's easy to delete an app. On my iPhone, if I press and hold an app icon, the screen will change; the icons start to shake and some of them will display an X. Those are the apps that can be deleted. All I have to do is press the X and the app will be gone completely. To escape from the delete mode, press the home button. Android phones have a similar procedure. So if there is a free app you'd like to try, download it and experiment. If you don't like it, delete it. I recently had an opportunity to use two of my apps — a scanning app and a documents app. I'm a member of the Beaumont Citizen Volunteer Patrol, an adjunct of the police department. Occasionally I need to contact another member, but I don't want to enter the whole roster in my Contacts. So I used Evernote Scannable to take a picture of the roster. There are many scanning apps, and I doubt there's much difference among them. With Scannable, I hold my phone above the sheet I want to capture. That's all I have to do; I don't even have to press a button like taking a picture. The app waits until the sheet is properly positioned and captures it automatically. Then I'm given the choice to save it or send it. I choose send and email it to myself. I could save it and see it any time within the Scannable app. But I prefer to keep all documents within one app. By the way, you can indeed send emails to yourself. Sometimes I find an article while on a website that I'd rather read on my home computer. I copy the link to that article, open a new email, enter my own email address as the "to" address, paste the link in the subject line or body of the email, and send it to myself. It's in my email inbox when I get home. There are many instances when I need to turn the ringer off on my phone. I used to forget to turn the ringer back on later. I don't forget anymore because I send myself an email with "ring" in the subject line to remind myself to turn the ringer on. Once I've emailed the scanned document to myself, I use my documents app. It's called Documents 5, and its one of many such apps. When I opened the email I mailed to myself with the Citizen's Volunteer Patrol roster attached, I pressed on the attachment with my finger, and I was given choice of what I want to do with the attachment. Among the choices is to copy it to Documents. That's it. I now have the roster on my phone. Any time I need to see one of my documents, I press the Documents icon. So far I haven't found a document I couldn't save to Documents 5. Not just .pdf files; it will capture Word and Excel documents as well. The other day I was on patrol and needed to call another volunteer who was also on duty. I open the Documents app on my phone and selected the roster. Her phone number was listed, and I called her. I carry around many other documents on my phone — the membership list of my temple, the by-lays of my temple, instructions on how to arm and disarm an alarm system, and other things I occasionally use but can access quickly. All because of an app on my phone. In preparing for this column, I went to the App Store and entered "scanner." I selected scanner app. The first one listed is iScanner. I looked at the reviews and found most people liked it. But some mentioned receiving an annoying message to upgrade to the Pro version for which you must pay $4. For that you get some added features that you're unlikely to use. Personally, I don't mind paying a few bucks for an app I use. But just be aware that some free apps come with conditions. I noticed that Evernote Scannable was quite far down the list - below other apps that weren't as well reviewed. The lesson here is to explore the choices and not just take the first listing. Read the reviews; then make your selection. And there's no reason you can't install more that one app within the same category. You can try them all out and keep the one you like best. Don't have a fax machine? Some scanner apps will fax a document to a fax number. Search for "fax scanner" and read the reviews before you make your selection. Do you use an app you'd like to share with others, let me know at steve.benoff@verizon.net. There's An App For That

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