Password Management…. what is in my toolbox?

Password Management…. what is in my toolbox?

One of the questions I often get is about password management.  How do I remember all my passwords, what is the best password manager to use, etc.  I have tried a bunch, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it depends.  Do you need it to manage accounts on your Windows computer?  Do you want it to password protect notes and photos?  I tried 1Password, one of the more popular ones, but it just missed out on a few features I really liked.  I found the interface somewhat clunky and features like photo protection was sub par.  I also tried LastPass and Dashlane, and based on ease of use, functionality and pricepoint, Onesafe won out. The main reasons I chose it over 1Password, the user interface is nicer and I can easily password protect photographs.

6.-Share-them-securely[1]To me, that means along side important usernames/passwords, I can also save other important photographic information.  In my case, I have photos of all my identification, passport details, credit card info, etc.  I have it all stored in the password protected application so that if I lose my wallet and have my phone, I have identification with me.  The app also has cloud sync, so my data is available on all my iOS devices.  There is also the ability to securely share information, so you can pass off details to friends/family.  In a previous blog I posted about Stocard, the app I use for reward cards.  This is the app I consider a great companion, for all the wallet things that need more protection than a standard reward card.

You just put a password on the application (or use your touch ID) and then you start adding information to the app.  You can enter website login information in the app and then launch the website with those credentials directly from there.  It is a great way to keep all your password information in one place.  The help is very useful and will get you what you need to get started.  You can store everything from website credentials, wifi passwords, to credit card and passport details.

The Onesafe company makes versions for iOS, Mac, Android and Windows phone.  I’m hoping some day they add Windows 10 so I can also manage/use the password information there too.  If it wasn’t for the lack of the Windows 10 application, I would recommend this over anything else.  It is just such a big feature to be missing for the Windows users.  It will still store your accounts, but you can’t use the tool to fire off the websites with the credentials you have saved, you must look them up and type them in.  If that isn’t a huge problem for you,  I still highly recommend this, and it is one of my must haves in my iOS toolkit.  The app available from the iTunes store for about $7 and is well worth a look.

 

Shaun the Sheep

Shaun the Sheep

I’m not afraid to admit from time to time we let Cole watch some TV.  I have a bunch of shows available for him to watch.  Lego movie is one of his favorites.  He likes the bad guys, he likes to shoot stuff.  It is one of the reasons I’m sooooo happy we came across Shaun the Sheep……

"First Try!"

First Try!

A few months ago, the Broadway Theatre was doing a free afternoon matinee showing of the Lego movie.  We had talked about taking Cole to his first theatre experience but hadn’t yet.  This seemed like great timing, we can take him to a free show, one he is familiar with, and give it a try.  We got there and of course wanting the full movie theatre experience, I hit the popcorn line.  It was long.  Looooooooong.  So while Cole and Erin lounged in the theatre chairs anticipating the start, I handle the popcorn/liquorice duties.  While in line, I got to chatting with the lady in front of me and her son, and we were sharing movie experiences.  She told me his first movie experience was not long ago and she had taken him to the Shaun the Sheep movie.  He loved it…. I had never heard of it.  So I figured, what the heck, I’ll give it a try.  Fast forward… popcorn, liquorice, bad cop, good cop, batman, “First Try!”, kragle, movie ends and everyone goes happy.  First movie experience went great.

Shaun the SheepLater, I go to work and locate Shaun the Sheep, the movie.  I found out a few things….. it is claymation and the movie is based off of a TV series, which is a spin off of another famous TV series, Wallace and Grommit.  Great…. more stuff to *locate*…. if we like it that is.  So we fired it up and it was a huge hit.  Cole loves it, and requests it often.  The premise is about some mischievous sheep on a farm and in the latest plan happen to get the sheep owner lost in the city with amnesia.  A rescue ensues.  It is fun, has some catchy tunes, no talking (great for a background show to occupy while visiting) and is very family friendly.  No shooting, no guns, enough inside parental humour to keep us interested.  An all around win.  We have since watched a bunch of the TV Series, and they all fall into the same realm.

So if you are looking for a fun family show that you can watch with the young ones, give Shaun the Sheep a try.  Hopefully your household will enjoy it as much as we do.  Maybe it will become the new favourite movie….. well….. until Lego Batman of course.

Batman Out.

Lighten the wallet, leave your reward cards at home

Lighten the wallet, leave your reward cards at home

Several months ago, I decided I wanted to pair down my wallet.  Did I really need to be carrying the big huge leather wad when I really was paying for most items with my one debit or credit card?  I already carry my phone everywhere, perhaps I could pare down what I was carrying.  I made it my goal to limit my wallet size to attempt to become a bit more of a minimalist.  I can tell you I haven’t found that utopia yet, there are a couple pitfalls, but I’m happy with the progress.

Doc Artisan Sport Case

Doc Artisan Sport Case

First up was to dump the old leather wallet.  I replaced my wallet with an iPhone wallet that I’m very happy with.  I bought a Sport Wallet (v4, it has recently been revised to a v5) from Doc Artisan.  It is a magnetic case/wallet that allows easily removing your phone from your wallet.  It fits ID and a few cards, and a few bills (awkwardly folded, but does the trick).    I also bought a magnetic mount for the car so I can quickly take the phone from wallet to car mount with ease.

Then I found an app called Stocard to start leaving my reward cards at home.  This nifty little app works great.  It allows you to enter your reward cards (enter the reward card number, also allows you to take a picture of the front and back) and then store it in the application for easy access.  It also has a nifty little widget for the notification screen so you can quickly access your cards by swiping down and then touching the icon for your appropriate reward card.  The app is fast and does what I need.  Now when a store asks for my air miles card, or I need my scene it card at the movies, I pull out my phone, swipe down, and touch the icon to bring up a bar code for the cashier to scan (or enter if they have trouble scanning).  Easy.  The app is free, but it does come with a bit of an annoyance (or a *feature* if you prefer) that it will show you a marketing area for cards you have entered (fliers for Canadian Tire if you have a Canadian Tire rewards number entered, etc).  It is a minor annoyance that is easily overlooked when you can keep all your rewards cards at your fingertips it one app.

Or should I say, ALMOST ALL, here is the caveat…. some stores are stupid.  They either aren’t with the times, or they want to push you in to their own app to scan a card.  Shopper’s Drug Mart recently informed me they can only scan cards in their official app, so I had to install a Shopper’s app too.  It’s a stupid policy.  Other places really want you to carry a physical card and won’t let you scan regardless.  So before you chuck all the rewards cards at home, give the store a try first.  I find I still have to carry my Costco card and library card (I shouldn’t have to for the library card but it is easier than explaining it to library staff all the time) but I have my Canadian Tire card, Air Miles, Cineplex Odeon SceneIt card in there, among others.  I will also keep trying the Shopper’s Drug Mart cart but have their stupid app installed just in case.  (Boo Shopper’s, Boooo).

So if you want to pare down your rewards cards, give this little app an install…. on iOS….. sorry Android/Microsoft, I don’t think they have it for you.  And sorry Blackberry users… because, well, you have a Blackberry.  😛

All for now – J

As another slopitch season is about to begin….

As another slopitch season is about to begin….

The other day my uncle asked me how long I have been playing slopitch. After a quick little bit of math, I realized I have been playing slopitch for 21 years this summer. WOW! I played baseball a lot as a kid, early on I was pretty decent, but when I started getting busy with other things in high school, including my first job, first car, first computer, baseball kind of fell by the wayside. When I moved to Saskatoon to go to school in 1995, our CST class put in a slopitch team in the school league, we quickly found success, and I was hooked. It was a great social outing, a way to meet some new friends, and a great excuse to have a beer.

In the early days I was pretty much living it up in the beer leagues. Playing was fun but winning the beer race was the big championship, and luckily we did both with regularity. After a few years of that, I started playing competitive slopitch, first a men’s team and then a coed team. I’ve since left the beer leagues mostly behind (I still sub on occasion), but I’m still in the thick of things in our saspa.ca league. Looking back, here is a list of the teams (best that I can remember) playing on:  Horny HounDawgs, Hustin’ Hangovers, Memory Makers, Bugsy’s Bluesox, Piston Broke, Beer Barons, Expos, The Fuze (2006 Coed ‘D’ National Champions), The Machine, Toon Town Twisters, Bombers (2010 NSA Rec Provincial Champions), Longhorns, Whitesox, Thirsty Dozen, Jays (2016 Coed ‘C’ Provincial Champs), and countless other pickup and tourney teams. I’ve travelled to Calgary, Leduc, Lethbridge, Niagra Falls, and all the way to Mazatlan just to play ball. I’ve had the chance to play in my share of championship games, and even won a couple. I’ve met countless friends along the way. This winter I was even able to go back to Mazatlan to see the friends we met during our slopitch trip and had a blast. I consider myself quite lucky for all the slopitch community has given me.

Sometime along the line I stumbled across SportsFreaksOnline, a website of slopitch players across Canada. I’m fairly active on the site (I am one of the moderators assisting the guys doing all the real work) and have met even more fantastic players across the country there. For a slopitch player I highly recommend checking out the site. You will meet great people and find some great deals on gear.

So I wanted to take the chance to reflect, post a few random photos from the few random teams I have played on, and gear up for another year on the diamond. Looking forward to seeing everyone on the diamonds and in the gardens. Play Hard, Get Dirty. – J

A Document Scanner, at your fingertips

A Document Scanner, at your fingertips

I’m horrible at organizing paperwork.  If I get a receipt for something, odds are it hits the trash vs the filing cabinet.  That can be a problem when you are talking about large purchases needing warranty, or when you are keeping records for vehicle maintenance.  So initially I just started snapping pictures using my camera phone.  The problem I quickly found was that my camera roll was now getting polluted with receipts and it was taking up a lot of extra space.

That is when I came across Scanner Pro from Readdle.  This little app turns your  camera phone into a handheld document scanner.  You can scan a document in colour, grey scale, or black and white.  Once scanned you can save as an image or a PDF document (I recommend).  It has a nice interface for picking out what areas to scan, and then an assortment of options of things to do with the scanned document once complete.  Recently they even added OCR functions.  It is a little quirky jumping in and our of scans, but take a look at the workflows, it makes it easy to set up common workflows for your scans (email this scan, file it in google drive, etc)

I now not only use this app to file receipts (I have it hooked to save them to my google drive automatically), but I also use it to quickly scan receipts that I need to submit to my insurance company for claims.  Need to send a paper recipe to a friend? Quickly scan it and email it off.

This guy won’t give you the quality of a fancy flatbed scanner at home, so I wouldn’t recommend it for scanning pictures, but if you are like me and do most of your scanning of documents, it is a must have in the toolkit.  I have it installed on my iPhone and iPad and you can get it from the itunes store for about $6.  Sorry non-iOS folks, I think this guy is only available on the iOS platform.  Luckily that is my platform of choice for mobile these days.

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