Author: Raymond

I am Raymond Oglesby, an Information Technology (IT) specialist with 30 years in the field. I have taught Microsoft Applications and troubleshot computers in 15 countries and many States. My career was focused on mainframes and desktops from application development to implementation. I have written hundreds of programs for various architectures. I decided to start a blog to share my knowledge and experiences with you. I plan on updating this blog at least twice a week about smart phone apps to Windows. Please feel free to leave a Comment or Tweet. I would love to hear from you. Do you have a computer tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the app and version that you are using. To help me out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

How to Change Your Name on Windows 10 Log-In Screen

Whenever you log-in to Windows 10, your name appears above the password entry. What if you want to change your name? This post addresses this issue.

Whether you use a local account or a Microsoft Account, it’s relative easy to change your display name.

This is for Windows 10 devices

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Changing Your Display Name for a Microsoft Account

To change you name for a Microsoft Account, you need to open your account preferences on the Microsoft website.

Opens the Settings app by pressing the Windows key+I or type in Settings in the Cortana search field, then click the Settings app at top of the screen. Then click on the Accounts option. Refer to below image:

Change Login Name 1
Selecting your Accounts option

Below your name and photo, click on Manage my Microsoft account. See following image:

Change Login Name 2
Selecting Manange my Microsoft account

Signin to your Microsoft Account if not already signed. This will open your account preferences in your browser. After your browser opens, click the More Actions drop-down box, then click on Edit Profile from the options list. See below image:

Change Login Name 3
Selecting Edit Profile

Below your name, click Edit Name. Refer to below image:

Change Login Name 4
Selecting Edit your name

Enter your first and last name, solve the CAPTCHA challenge, then click Save to update your name. See following image:

Change Login Name 5
Changing your firsr and/or last name and entering the CAPTCHA letters

When your Profile page reloads, it will update with the name change.

Note! When you change your Microsoft Account name, it changes on all devices that you use to log-in with this account.

For your new name to show on your Windows 10 log-in screen, you will have to log out of Windows 10. Be sure to save any unsaved work or applications before signing out.

Changing Your Display Name for a Local Account

A local account is a basic approach in using Windows 10. Local accounts don’t have the added features like syncing files, settings, browser history, etc. across multiple devices.

If you want to change your local account name, fire up the Control Panel. In the Cortana search box, type in Control Panel then click on the Control Panel app at the top of the screen.

Next click on the User Accounts option. Refer to below image:

Change Login Name 6
Selecting User Accounts from the Control Panel

Now click on User Accounts one more time. See below image:

Change Login Name 7
Selecting User Accounts again

Now, select Change your account name option to change your log-in name. See following image:

Change Login Name 8
Selection for changing your account name

Note: If an organization manages your device or you don’t have administrator privileges, you won’t be able to change your name.

Enter the new log-in name into the text field, then click the Change Name button to save your changes. Refer to below image:

Change Login Name 9
Changing your log-in name

You are done and may now close the Control Panel window. For your new name to show on your Windows 10 log-in screen, you will have to log out of Windows 10. Be sure to save any unsaved work or applications before signing out.

I Would Like to Hear From You

Please feel free to leave a comment. I would love hearing from you. Do you have a computer or smart device tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the device, app and version that you are using. To help me out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

The author’s Vietnam eBook on the Battle for Tra Bong: Events and Aftermath

How to Sign a PDF on Your iPhone or iPad

You’ve received or need to send a PDF through email that must be signed and sent to the other party. If you’re working with the email on your iPhone or iPad, you can sign the document directly from your mobile device. This handy capability is possible due to the Markup feature. With iOS 13, you can use a variety of tools. In this post, we will look at the Signature Markup tool.

This is for iPhone/iPad or similar devices using iOS 13 or above

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How to Add a Signature

Follow these steps when you want to email someone a PDF from your iPhone or iPad but need to sign it before sending it.

1. Make sure the PDF is stored in a convenient location, such as OneDrive, iCloud Drive or other online service accessible from your iPhone or iPad
2. Attach the file to your email
3. Tap the attachment and select Markup from the toolbar. Refer to below image:

PDF Signature 1
Selecting the Markup option

4. Swipe down to the area where you need to sign. If not, the Signature will be placed in the middle.
5. On the Markup toolbar at the bottom, tap the “+” icon and select Signature. See below image:

PDF Signature 2
Selecting the Signature option

Drawing Your Signature

6. If you’re doing this for the first time, write your Signature via your finger tip or a stylus
7. Tap Clear if you wish to start over. See following image:

PDF Signature 3
Writing your Signature

8. When you’re satisfied with your Signature, tap Done. See below image:

PDF Signature 4
Your Signature in the document

Position Your Signature

9. Move the text box for your Signature to the right spot. You can also resize the box by dragging any of the corners. Refer to below image:

PDF Signature 5
Positioning your Signature

Email Your Signed Document

10. When the Signature is sized and positioned correctly, tap Done at the upper left corner for the new Signature. Now you are ready to send your email by tapping on the Up Arrow icon. See following image:

PDF Signature 6
Email your signed document

How to Reply With Your Signature

If you receive an attachment that you need to sign and send back to the sender, the process is similar. 

1. Tap the PDF to open it and swipe down to the area that requires your Signature
2. Tap the Markup icon in the upper right (the one that resumbles a pen tip)
3. Tap the “+” icon on the Markup toolbar at bottom righ hand corner and select Signature. Your Signature will automatically appear if you already created it via Markup.
4. Tap your Signature, position and resize it accordingly
5. When finished, tap Done
6, Tap New Message or Reply All and send the signed document back to the sender. For demonstration purposes, I just placed my Signature again, this time in lower right hand corner. Refer to below image:

PDF Signature 7
Selecting the Reply All option

7. Tap the Up Arrow icon to send your return message. See below image:

PDF Signature 8
Returing your signed document back to the sender

You have successfully adding your Signature to a PDF file, emailed the attachment and replied to the other party with your Signature.

I Would Like to Hear From You

Please feel free to leave a comment. I would love hearing from you. Do you have a computer or smart device tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the device, app and version that you are using. To help us out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

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How to Use Word AutoText Feature

Creating and using custom AutoText entries for frequently used phrases is a great way to speed up your content creation in Microsoft Word. By default, Word has very few entries so you may want to add your own. The good news is you can set up these time-savers in just a few clicks!

The software does come with lots of AutoText Document fields, like Author, Company Info, Status and other built-in entries such as Headers, Footers, Tables, Watermarks, etc., that you can choose for your document. You can use these entries in addition to your own AutoText entries for your documents.

Note! Your AutoText entries maintain its formatting when inserted into a document.

This is for PCs, Macs and other platforms that support Word

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Creating an AutoText Entry

To begin, highlight the text in your Word document that you’d like to use to create your new AutoText entry. Refer to below image:

Word AutoText 1
Selecting the text for your AutoText entry

Press Alt+F3 to open the Create New Building Block window. Then, type in a name (within the 32-character limit) for your AutoText entry. Next, click OK. See following image:

Word AutoText 2
Saving your AutoText entry

Your AutoText entry will be saved. Now that was easy.

Using an AutoText Entry

To use your AutoText entry, place your cursor where you want to insert the text in your Word document. Navigate to the Insert tab and click the Explore Quick Parts icon in the Text group. See below image:

Word AutoText 3
Accessing your AutoText

A drop-down menu will be displayed. Hover your pointer over AutoText. Refer to below image:

Word AutoText 4
Selecting the AutoText feature

A list of AutoText entries will appear. Select the one you want to use. See below image:

Word AutoText 5
Inserting your custom AutoText entry

The entry you selected will be inserted into your document.

Deleting an AutoText Entry

If your AutoText list is getting crowded, or you made a mistake when you created a custom entry, you can delete them.

To do so, go back to the Insert tab and select the Text group. Then click the Explore Quick Parts icon, and then hover your pointer over AutoText.

From here, right-click the AutoText entry you want to delete. In the context pop-up menu that appears, click the option Organize and Delete. Refer to following image:

Word AutoText 6
Accessing the Delete option

The Building Blocks Organizer window will be displayed with your AutoText entry highlighted. At the bottom of this dialog box, click on Delete. See below image:

Word AutoText 7
The delete button at the end of the AutoText entries

A message box will appear asking you to confirm the deletion of your entry. To delete this entry, click Yes. Refer to below image:

Word AutoText 8
Confirming your custom AutoText deletion

Now your entry will be deleted. You have successfully adding, inserted and deleted an AutoText entry. That’s it.

I Would Like to Hear from You

Please feel free to leave a comment. I would love hearing from you. Do you have a computer or smart device tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the device, app and version that you are using. To help us out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

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How to Check Your Hard Drive Status

Your hard drive has been acting strange. It’s making clicking or screeching sounds, it’s unable to find files, crashes on boot, slow transfer speed or seems to be moving slowly. Your hard drive is dying.

Since it is a mechanical device it has moving parts unlike a Solid State Device (SSD) which has none. But even a SSD will eventually fail.

Even if your hard drive is healthy, over time, it will die. You should keep an eye on it’s health once in a while for your peace of mind. Let’s see how to do this.

This is for Windows 10 devices and Macs

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To Tweet about this post, click the Tweet icon below to launch Twitter, then click its Tweet icon to post.

Check out TechSavvy.Life for their blog posts on smartphone apps, PCs. and Macs!

The Drive’s SMART Status

Most modern drives have a feature called S.M.A.R. T. (Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology) that monitors different drive attributes in an attempt to detect a failing disk. That way, your computer will automatically notify you before data loss occurs and the drive can be replaced while it still remains functional.

Check in Windows

In Windows 10, you can manually check the S.M.A.R.T. status of your drives from the Command Prompt. Just right-click the Start button, select Run, and type “cmd“, then click OK or type “cmd” into the Cortana search bar, then click OK. In the Command Prompt pop-up box, type:

wmic diskdrive get model,status

It will return “Pred Fail” if your drive’s death is imminent; “Bad”, “Unknown” or “Caution” if its time to take care of a drive or “OK” if it thinks a drive is doing fine. Refer to below image:

Hard Drive Status
Checking your hard drives health

Check on a Mac

On a Mac, you can check S.M.A.R.T. status by opening the Disk Utility program, clicking on the drive and looking at “S.M.A.R.T. Status” in the bottom left, which will either read “Verified” or “Failing”.

SMART Status can be Misleading

However, this basic S.M.A.R.T. information can be misleading. You only know when your drive is near death, but you can start to experience problems even if the basic S.M.A.R.T. status is okay.

You can also use Defraggler program I discussed in a previous post. When you use the Analyze feature of the program, it will show your disk health. Click here for the post on using Defraggler.

Manufacture Check

If you want an even deeper, more accurate picture into your drive’s health, check its manufacturer’s website for a dedicated tool; for example, Seagate has SeaTools for its drives, Western Digital has Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for its drives and Samsung has Samsung Magician for its SSDs. These tools can sometimes take into account certain technologies specific to their hard drives and SSDs.

Note! You may find that the SeaTools (Seagate) utility is the only software you will need. In the below image, it can diagnose Samsung, Western Digital as well as Seagate using several methods:

Hard Drive Status 2
SeaTools for Windows options

Is Your Drive Almost Dead

Drives with the “Pred Fail” status won’t necessarily fail tomorrow. They could chug along for a year or be dead as a doornail in a few days if not hours.

If you’re getting warnings, it’s time to back up your files before your drive fails. Failure to act may cost you serious money to recover your data.

Now is not the time for a full backup, however: you don’t want to stress the drive with too many reads or it could fail while you’re backing up. Instead, plug in an external drive and copy your most important files onto it; family photos, work documents and anything else that can’t easily be replaced. Then, once you know those are safe, you can try doing a full drive clone with something like EaseUS Todo Backup Free.

I got a S.M.A.R.T. status of “Pred Fail” on my main hard drive. I quickly backed up my important files to an external drive. I never finished before it died. I tried the trick off turning my desktop on its side, then upside down. I got a little more life from the hard drive. Then I removed the hard drive and gently shook the device. I could hear the spindle sliding; then I knew if was totally dead. But it’s worth trying this trick.

Is Your Drive Dead

If your hard drive has already stopped working, things get a lot tougher and you’ll probably need a professional data recovery service which can cost $1,000 or more. But if you have pricelrss data on the drive, it may be worth it to you.

Prepare for Hard Drive Failure

It’s not a matter of “if” your hard drive will fail; it’s a matter of “when”. All hard drives fail eventually and if you want to avoid losing all your important files, you absolutely have to back up your computer regularly; including when the drive is healthy.

Take some time to set up an automatic, cloud based backup like Google Backup and Sync using Google Drive. It is one of the best things you can do to protect yourself from heartache later on. Or at least back up to an external drive using Windows 10 built-in File History Tool.

If your drive failed catastrophically with no warning, you can get back up and running in no time by having an up-to-date backup.

That’s it. Please feel free to share this post! One way to share is via Twitter, as mentioned below.

I hope you have found this post helpful. If so, click the Tweet icon below. This will launch Twitter where you click its icon to post the Tweet.

I have found TechSavvy.Life blog posts extremely helpful. Check them out for posts on smart phone apps, Macs and PCs!

The following is a previous Twitter feed so you can view how a Tweet will be displayed.

Display of your Tweet

I Would Like to Hear from You

Please feel free to leave a comment. I would love hearing from you. Do you have a computer or smart device tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the device, app and version that you are using. To help me out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

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How to View Excel Statistics

Microsoft Excel is getting a quick summary view of workbook statistics. This simple dialog box includes the boundaries of the sheets, tables, links, formulas and notes.

In a couple of clicks you can now view the workbook statistics.

This is for Excel in Office 365 on PCs and Macs

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First, open an existing Excel workbook. Navigate to the Review tab and click on it. In the menu bar, head to the Proofing group. You will see the icon Workbook Statistics, just click on it to view. Refer to below image:

Excel Workbook Statistics 1

There are details for current sheet and the entire workbook. It is similar to Microsoft Word’s Word Count feature.

I Would Like to Hear From You

Please feel free to leave a comment. I would love hearing from you. Do you have a computer or smart device tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the device, app and version that you are using. To help us out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

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How to Turn Off/On Notifications on iPhone or iPad

If you are not careful when starting new apps, you will find yourself immersed in annoying notifications. They take up your time and are somewhat hard to turn off via the Settings app. Let’s explore how to quickly disable these notifications on your iPhone or iPad.

This is for iPhone and iPad

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Turn Off Notifications

First, unlock your device to display your Home screen. On this screen, hold and swipe down from the top center of your screen to reveal your Notifications. Refer to below image:

iPhone Notifications 1
The Notifications screen

On a Notification you would like to disable, hold and swipe to the left. See following image for WordPress Beginner notification:

iPhone Notifications 2
Revealing your Notification actions

A sliding menu option will be displayed for three actions you may take. The actions are as follows:

Manage – allows you to manage future Notifications, and to disable it.

View – takes you to the app that initiated the Notification.

Clear – removes the Notification from your screen, but does not remove it.

In my example, I decided to choose the TV App. Simply tap Turn Off to disable the Notification. Tapping the Deliver Quietly option allows you to receive future Notifications without receiving a sound or vibration. Refer to below image:

iPhone Notifications 3
Turning off your Notification

A pop-up confirmation message will ask if you really want to turn off all Notifications for this app. Just tap Turn Off All Notifications. See following image:

iPhone Notifications 4
Confirming your Notification action

From now on you will no longer receive Notifications for the chosen app.

Turn On Notifications

Let’s say you want to enable Notifications for the app you just turned off or any other Notification. In my example, I am enabling the TV App which I just turned off. To do this:

  • Tap Settings
  • Tap Notifications
  • Scroll down until you find the app and tap it
  • Tap the Allow Notifications toggle switch. Refer to below image:
iPhone Notifications 5
Enabling your Notification for a particular app

The toggle will turn green and Settings will display other options you may want to configure. See below image:

iPhone Notifications 6
Additional Notification actions

That was fairly easy. You now know how to quickly disable and enable your apps Notification.

I Would Like to Hear from You

Please feel free to leave a comment. I would love hearing from you. Do you have a computer or smart device tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the device, app and version that you are using. To help us out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

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Twelve Run Commands for Windows 10

If you know the right keyboard shortcut and the right commands, the Windows 10 Run command can be a powerful tool. Lets explore 12 Run commands everyone should know.

With a simple keyboard shortcut and a few keystrokes, you can reach your destination before other users can click their mouse on the right icon.

The key is learning and knowing these common Run commands.

The examples are for Windows 10 operating system. Also works for Windows 7 and Windows 8.

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Open the Run Command Dialog Box

To use these commands we need to bring up the Run command dialog box. There are two comman ways of doing this as follows:

1. Right click the Start menu icon and select the Run command from a list
2. Use the keyboard shortcut by selecting and holding the Window icon button and press the “R” key. See following image:

Win 10 Run 1
The Run dialog box

You will simply enter your Run command and press the Enter key or press OK.

The Run Commands

Note! The quotation marks are for emphasis only; they are not part of the command itself and should not be included in the Run command box. Also, the Run remembers your command(s).

1.“\” – Open the default drive, usually drive “C“
This will display the contents of your default configuration to include your Quick Access library. The presumption is that this is where your documents, photos and other files can be most easily found. At times you may just want to open File Explorer to the main hard drive root folder.

2. “.” – Open the Home folder of the current user
This command will open the Home folder for the current user.

3. “..” – Open the Users folder
Typing two periods (“..”) will open File Explorer in the Users folder, giving quick access to all the user’s folders, providing you have the proper credentials. This is a good command for performing system administrative tasks.

4. “control” – Open the Control Panel
Windows 10 has placed many of the common configuration settings into an area known as Settings, which can be found as an entry in the Start menu. While this is fine for many configuration settings, there are times when you have to load the full Windows 10 Control Panel. On those occasions, type control into the Run command box. Refer to below image:

Win 10 Run 2
The Control Panel

5. “msconfig” – Open System Configuration
The System Configuration app is a holdover from previous versions of the Windows operating system, but it is still useful for Windows 10. This command will open an app that grants you access to boot variations including certain startup services during the boot sequence. Also, their are many options to view, add or change under the Tools tab. See following image:

Win 10 Run 3
System Configuration screen

6. “appwiz.cpl” – Open Programs and Features
Lets say you want to uninstall a program; you may use this command to do so. Although you can use the Control Panel command to accomplish this task, using this command is much faster. See below image:

Win 10 Run 4
Uninstall a program

7. “cleanmgr” – Open Disk Cleanup utility
Another holdover from previous versions of Windows is the Disk Cleanup utility. Most disk cleanup processes in Windows 10 are handled automatically behind the scenes, but there are occasions where you may want to perform disk cleanup manually. Refer to below image:

Win 10 Run 5
Hard disk cleanup

Related

Wise Disk Cleaner is a much better utility for cleaning your Windows device

8. “resmon” – Open Resource Monitor
A utility app that most users ignore, but really shouldn’t, is the Windows 10 Resource Monitor. If your PC starts lagging or the hard drive seems to be spinning up without cause, run this command and troubleshoot the problem. See below image:

Win 10 Run 6
The Resource Monitor

9. “calc”, “notepad”, “mspaint”, etc – Open common apps
Another good use for the Run command is to start basic Microsoft applications that you may not use every day and don’t want on your desktop or taskbar but that you still use from time to time.

10. “main.cpl” – Adjust your mouse settings
One of the first things you need to adjust on a new Windows 10 PC are the mouse settings. A mouse cursor that is too small or moves too slowly across the screen can be frustrating. This is fastest way to get to those settings. Refer to below image:

Win 10 Run 7
Settings for the mouse

11. “mstsc” – Open Remote Desktop
A modern workforce is a mobile workforce, which means many of us have to access our workstation PCs remotely using the Windows 10 Remote Desktop app. See following image:

Win 10 Run 8
Open Remote Desktop

12. “msinfo32” – Access System Information
While troubleshooting problems with help desks, it is not uncommon for the technician to ask for detailed system information. Rather than clicking through several different screens, use this Run command. Refer to below image:

Win10 Run 9
System Ongormation scree

You Don’t Have to Remember the Commands

Tip: As you try these Run commands, you will notice that your previous entry is displayed. You can scroll through all previous commands by using the up and down arrow keys or click the drop down arrow to see your entries. This allows less keystrokes, faster access and best of all, you don’t have to memorize these Run commands. They are available even if you Shutdown or Restart your device.

For more Run commands, click here

I Would Like to Hear from You

Please feel free to leave a comment. I would love hearing from you. Do you have a computer or smart device tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the device, app and version that you are using. To help us out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

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How to Clear Chrome Data

Every once in a while you should delete Chrome’s data for faster load times and to correct erratic behavior. If this is your first time to do this, be patient, it may take a minute or so.

If you’re trying to fix loading or formatting issues to improve your browsing experience on Google Chrome, clearing your data is an excellent place to start.

For example, if Chrome is slow or unresponsive or you change a document like deleting a sentence but the sentence is still there after saving the document, its time to clear your Chrome browser data. Before doing this, log out or exit your running applications. If an application’s behavior is erratic, its recommended you log out instead of just exiting the program.

This is for Google Chrome on multiple platforms

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What Happens When your Data is Deleted?

When you visit a website, it will save (or remember) certain information on your hard or SSD drive. Cookies save a user’s browsing data and cache (stored information) helps webpages load more quickly by remembering images, videos, text and other parts of the webpage from your last visit instead of reloading everything with each visit.

When you clear your data, all information gets deleted. You control how much data is deleted. The load time of previously visited sites will increase because Chrome needs to load the content of the webpage again.

Clearing Chrome’s Data

To clear your data in Chrome, you’ll need to access the browser’s Settings menu. There are three different ways to do this.

Related

How to Use Wise Disk Cleaner Program to Delete Bad Files
How to Delete Junk Files on a PC

The first way is to click the three vertical dots icon (the hamburger icon) in the top-right corner of the screen, hovering over the More Tools option and then selecting Clear Browsing Data. Refer to below image:

Clear Chrome 1
Clear your browing data option

In the above image, you may notice the shortcut key. To go straight to the page to clear your data, hold and press down on the Ctrl + Shift + Delete keys.

The third way is to enter chrome://settings/clearBrowserData in the address bar. See following image:

Alternate way to clear your browsing data

Now, the Clear Browsing Data window will be displayed.

The first thing you’ll do here is select the Time range for deleting the data. Click the drop down arrow next to Time range to expand the menu, then select the desired Time range; the default is All Time. It is recommended you use the default Time range. See below image:

Clear Chrome 3
Selecting your time range for clearing your data

Next, check the four boxes next to Browsing history, Download history, Cookies and 0ther site data and Cached images and files. If you want to clear passwords (not recommended), then checkmark Passwords and other sign-in data. Checking this box will force you to re-enter passwords you have setup before entering a website(s). Refer to below image:

Clear Chrome 4
Selecting your options for clearing data

Now click the Clear Data button to clear your data. See following image:

Clear Chrome 5
The last option for clearing your data

The process of clearing your data will take a litte while. If this is the first time, it may take several minutes, just be patient.

I Would Like to Hear from You

Please feel free to leave a comment. I would love hearing from you. Do you have a computer or smart device tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the device, app and version that you are using. To help us out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

The author’s Vietnam eBook on the Battle for Tra Bong: Events and Aftermath

How to Find Your Windows 10 Product Key

I recently read a post about finding your Microsoft Windows 10 product key. Microsoft likes to hide it but there are occasions you need to know the key. The key is a 25-characters code, making it virtually impossible to remember.

This is for Windows XP through 10 devices

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That post gave a long command to use and a complicated Visual Basic Script (vbs) from an unknown author to be saved as a text file to run. To make things even more complicated, using two methods, the author showed two different keys. But there is a pain free way to find the key that I posted about using Belarc Advisor. This free software program is among the best to provide a detailed inventory of your device’s hardware and software.

Here is the link for installing and running the free Belarc Advisor program.

Scroll down the report till you see the Software Licenses section. There you will find your Windows product key plus other software keys. See below image:

Belarc Advisor Software Keys

I Would Like to Hear from You

Please feel free to leave a comment. I would love hearing from you. Do you have a computer or smart device tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the device, app and version that you are using. To help me out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

The author’s Vietnam eBook on the Battle for Tra Bong: Events and Aftermath

How to Zip and UnZip Files for iPhone or iPad

The Files app got a huge upgrade with iOS 13 and iPadOS 13 and its support for external storage. One of the new things was the native support for Zip files. You’ll no longer need to download third-party apps and shuffle between different apps just to open a Zip file.

Note! The naming convention of zip or compressed, and unzip or uncompressed, are interchangeable. Your original files are left unchanged.

The main reason for compressing your photos or documents is to reduce the file size to send as an email attachment. Without the Zip capability, the file could be too large for emailing.

This is for iPhone/iPad running iOS 13 or higher

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Creating a Zip File

To compress files, you’ll first need to add them to the Files app. You can do this easily using the Share sheet feature.

In this example, we’ll walk you through the process of ziping and unziping photos from the Photos app, but it will work using any other type of document.

Note! Your original photos or documents are left unchanged. They are just being compressed to a different location.

Open the Photos app and navigate to the album containing your photos. From there, tap on the Select button in upper right hand corner and select the Photos you want to compress by tapping on them. Refer to below image:

iPhone Zip 1
Selecting photos from the Photos album to be compressed

Next, tap the Share button in lower left hand corner. See below image:

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Selecting the Share button in bottom left hand corner

From the Share sheet, tap on the Save to Files option. See following image:

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Selecting the Save to Files option

Choose the On My iPhone or On My iPad option. Refer to below image:

iPhone Zip 3a
Setlecting the location of your compressed photos

Here you can select an existing folder or create a new one, then tap the Save option. You will see a message at top of the screen displaying number of items, the folder name and On My iPhone or On My iPad location. See below image:

iPhone Zip 4
Selecting the folder of your compressed photos
Accessing the Files App

Navigate to the Files app and open the folder or location where you saved the photos. Then tap the Select button and select all the photos. Next, tap on the hamburger icon (the one with 3 dots) in lower right hand corner. Refer to below image:

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Selecting all your photos and tapping the hamburger icon in lower right hand corner

In the context pop-up menu, tap on the Compress button. See below image:

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Choosing the Compress option from the context pop-up menu

You will see a new file labeled Archive.zip in the same folder. Refer to below image:

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Creating the default Zip file of your compressed photos
Renaming the Zip File

To rename the Zip file, tap and hold on it until the see its Context pop-up menu. See below image:

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Selecting the Rename option

Now, tap on the Rename option and type in a new name, then tap Done. See following image:

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Renaming the default Zip file name

Your new compressed file will now be displayed. Refer to below image:

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Viewing your new Zip file

Now you are able to send the Zip file as an email attachment or to a service like Dropbox, Google Drive or OneDrive to share with others.

Choosing Another Location to Save Your Files

For future downloads, you might want to change your default storage location. The downloaded files, by default, are saved to the Downloads folder in iCloud Drive in the Files app. This is a great option if you have a paid iCloud storage plan because it allows your downloaded files to sync across all your devices. But if you’re on the free 5GB plan, you might not have space for storing large files, even if they are compressed.

Thankfully, you can change the default location to local or on-line storage. To do this on your smartdevice:

  1. Open Settings app
  2. Navigate to Safari
  3. Select Downloads
  4. Tap on the Other option to select any folder from the local storage (or from a cloud storage option). Note! The default is the Downloads folder. For our example, we are using the default location and folder. See below image:
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Selecting where to save your iPhone downloads

Unzip your File

The process of unzipping an archive in the Files app is relative easy.

Again, you’ll need the Zip file to be in the Files app. You can follow the same process we did in the previous section to add a Zip file to the Files app.

Navigate to the location where you saved the Zip file. Refer to below image:

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Location of your saved Zip file

Tap and hold on the file name. Select the Uncompress option from the context pop-up menu. See following image:

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Selecting the Uncompress option from the context pop-up menu

You will see a new folder with the same name as the Zip file. Tap on it to see the contents of the Zip file. Your photos are now unzipped. See below image:

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The unzipped files

You have successfully compressed and uncompressed your photos.

I Would Like to Hear from You

Please feel free to leave a comment. I would love hearing from you. Do you have a computer or smart device tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the device, app and version that you are using. To help us out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

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