Hidden Features & Tips For Your Favourite Services
The most popular platforms
out there evolve at a rapid pace. Any user will know the basics but there are
hidden tricks too. Hitesh Raj Bhagat & Karan Bajaj put together a list of
the things that even regular users may find interesting
FACEBOOK
Regular Facebook users will
probably be aware of exactly how it works across platforms -they make it so
easy to use! You probably also know that anyone on Facebook can message you,
regardless of whether they're friends with you or not. All of these messages go
into a special inbox called `message requests'. If you choose to accept the
request, it doesn't mean that you're accepting a friend request. But did you
know that there are actually two message inboxes? There's another one called
`filtered requests' and you can access it from the Facebook Messenger app or if
you're signed in on a web browser. Look though it once in a while and you may
find something interesting.
TWITTER
There are a bunch of ways
to use Twitter better and power users will know all about lists, hashtags,
conversations, keyboard shortcuts and mentions. But there is a way to read a
lot more about your tweets, engagements, top mentions and biggest followers
-using Twitter Analytics. This is Twitter's own analytics tool and can be
accessed at http:analytics.twitter .com.This will show you a month-bymonth
account of your Twitter stats and you can use this info to grow your following.
Another cool Twitter trick is to schedule tweets, done using third-party tools
like Twuffer and Hootsuite.
WHATSAPP
WhatsApp GIF support is
currently available for iOS only . Within the app, WhatsApp has its own
collection of animated GIFs that can be used directly . In the chat window, tap
the `+' button and select photo and video library . On the lower left, you will
see a search sign with GIF next to it -tap to view and search the GIF
collection. WhatsApp also lets you individually manage storage for
friendsgroups. By default, you cannot view how much data is being consumed by a
chat. Go to Settings > Data and Storage Usage > Storage usage -you can
view your chats arranged as per the amount of storage consumed. Tap on a chat
name to view details of the type of media for each chat -you can even tap
manage to delete the media from the chat.
YOUTUBE
YouTube has a built-in
feature that automatically generates captions for uploaded videos. Once you
upload a video, YouTube takes some time (depending on the length of the video)
to generate the transcript. You can open the video, tap the `More' button and
select Transcript to view the text. All this text can also be copied to a
notepad for later use. If you have an audio file and need it transcribed, you
can use YouTube. First, you need to convert your audio file into a video file
using http:www.tunestotube.com.Then just upload to YouTube. Keep in mind that
the transcription is not 100% accurate but it does beat manually transcribing
something. Finally, YouTube has a section called TestTube where you can try out
experimental features. Currently , they're testing 4k video playback at 60 fps
-if you have a powerful enough computer and a fast-broadband connection, you
can try it out.
INSTAGRAM
A lot of people really love
the unique filters on Instagram.However, there is an easy workaround if you
really want to use one of those filters without sharing anything. This works on
both Android and iOS versions of the app. First, open the app, click on your
profile tab and settings (top right). Under Account and Story Settings, switch
on the option to `save shared photos'. Then, you can load a photo into
Instagram and apply your filter. Before you click share, switch the phone to
airplane mode. The post will fail obviously , but the edited image will be
saved to the image gallery . There's another small trick most users may not
know -the ability to reorder the filters. If you favourite filters are way down
the list, you can arrange them so that they come up first. While scrolling
through the filters, go to the end till you see `Manage'. Tap this and use the
three lines on each filter's name to rearrange their order according to your
favourites.
HYPERLAPSE & BOOMERANG
On the iPhone versions of
these apps, there is a hidden Labs menu that you can access by using a special
gesture: you have to use four fingers and tap four times on the screen when the
app is open. If this doesn't happen at first, slow down your taps, with a short
gap between the first two and last two taps.In Hyperlapse, you can switch
resolution from 720p to 1080p, adjust frame rate from 30 to 24fps and change
the speed of the video. With the looping video app Boomerang, you can also
increase video resolution to 1080p, change the video direction (forward and
back, forward only, back only) plus adjust a host of other settings like frame
count, playback frame rate etc. Experiment with these settings to get a unique
video.
ET15FEB17
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