How to find your lost iPhone.

(This story is told through the eyes and words of an iPhone)

The memories are foggy as to how my owner lost me, but that's not really what's important here.  What is important is that she found me, thanks to a really knowledgeable and awesome dude (The MacMentor), and a really smart mom (who kept her Apple ID and Password safe).

So here's what I remember...I was having a blast with my owner, down at the beach.  She was living it up, tanning and having fun with her friends, it was a great day!  A few hours go by, the sun started to set, and the next thing I know, she's gone!  Left without me.  I was so sad!  I didn't know what to do, so I waited, and waited and waited.  Thankfully I had a full battery charge.  My only hope was that my owner (who asked to remain anonymous here) remembered her Apple ID, and password.

So here's what happened next (I know because she told me).  My owner was so nervous that her mom was going to go berserk, but thankfully she has a Mac Guy who could help her, his name is The MacMentor (aka, Geoff Horwitz).  She called The MacMentor and told him of her terrible situation and asked him what to do.  The MacMentor asked her if she knew her Apple ID.  She gave him the ID she thought she used, and The MacMentor went to his trusty Mac, opened up Safari and proceeded to go to http://icloud.com.

Once there, he entered the Apple ID and Password my owner gave him (hidden for obvious reasons).  Sadly, he got a message back from iCloud that the Apple ID and password had not been set up!  The MacMentor shook his head in disbelief.  If iCloud had not been set up, how on earth would I (the iPhone) be found?  The MacMentor was sure that my owner had set up her iCloud, so he had her call her mom.  What happened next was just plain awesome!  Thankfully mom had written down the Apple ID and password my owner used for iCloud.  So, mom opened up Safari, went to iCloud.com and signed in with my owners Apple ID and password.

When mom did that she came to the screen capture above.  Next, mom pressed the Find my iPhone button which took her to a map, similar to the one below, but for security reasons, the map below is simply being used as an example.

It's a little hard to see, but on the top right of the screen capture above, there's a window with me, the iPhone, and underneath three buttons.  Play Sound, Lost Mode and Erase iPhone.  Mom was able to locate the iPhone on the beach where my owner had forgotten me, but it was dark out, and it would be really hard to find me!  So, mom called The MacMentor, and he told her to press the Play Sound button (I tell you, that MacMentor dude is a genius!).  This story keeps getting better!  You see, thankfully my battery still had plenty of charge, and I was still on.  So when mom pressed the Play Sound button on iCloud I started making a loud sonar noise.  And low and behold, a few minutes later, even though it was dark, my owner and her friends heard me calling her and she came and got me!  Yeah!  I love stories with a happy ending, and thanks to the wonderful MacMentor, and a resourceful mom,  I didn't get washed up in the tide and lost at sea!

So the moral of the story is this.  If you own an iPhone, make sure you sign in to iCloud, and make sure you remember your Apple ID and password!  And it would help if you knew The MacMentor as well...:).

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to keep your iPhone and iPad safe, using iCloud!

What is an AppleID?

Getting to know your AppleID

What a lovely spell of cold weather Mother Nature has dumped on us here in Chicago-land, or as we are now known, Chi-Beria!  Thankfully the cold hasn't stopped me from blogging!  Today's blog is inspired by my workshops.  At some of these workshops, I cover what I consider the "Basics" of your iOS Device.  I start in settings, and spend a good deal of time discussing the Apple ID.  Reason being, so many people just don't get it's importance.  So I thought I'd write about it in this edition of The MacMentor's blog, and how it ties into what I call, The Apple Ecosystem.

Apple has created quite a wonderful system for all it's device owners.  It started some 14 years ago with the introduction of the iPod and iTunes.  In order for the music you purchased to be tied to the correct device(s), Apple created the Apple ID.  Then a few years later along came iPhone and iPad,  all tied together using your Apple ID.  All part of the Apple Ecosystem.

Apple’s ecosystem consists of  your devices (Mac, iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch) as well as iTunes, iCloud, iMessage and FaceTime.  The key to the Apple ecosystem is the Apple ID.  Your Apple ID is an email address that Apple uses as a pointer to what I call "Your Apple locker".  Your locker of content within the Apple ecosystem.  Your Apple ID  is what you will use to sign in to the iTunes Store, Mac App Store, iCloud, iMessage and FaceTime.  When purchasing content through iTunes, your Apple ID tells Apple who’s “locker” the content should be assigned to, as well as what devices your content can be shared with.  It's how Apple knows not to assign my purchases to someone else's device(s).  With iCloud, your Apple ID is what Apple uses to push or sync your non entertainment content (Notes, Reminders, Calendar events, Contacts) to all your iCloud enabled devices.   

Another great part of this ecosystem, and a feature that I love is iMessage. 

I'm sure you've all texted from your iPhone.  Did you know you can text to and from your iPad, iPod Touch and your Mac using iMessage?  Oh yeah, did I mention it’s FREE!  That's right folks.  Take a quick look at your Message App on your iPhone.  Click on any message.  It's either Blue or Green.  Do you know why that is?  The green texts are texts that are not going through iMessage.  The blue texts are being sent through iMessage.  I can see you all shaking your heads going, ah that explains it!  How's this for fun.  Apple is basically giving the phone companies the "Bird" (middle finger) with iMessage.  A free way to text.  Of course it's only free to those on Apple devices, but if your whole family is on them, you can get rid of your texting on your cellular bill.  Nice.  

Now let's discuss FaceTime.  FaceTime is the video chat feature of Apple’s ecosystem, that got a great update with iOS 7 and Mavericks and now has what's called FaceTime Audio. 

FaceTime Audio let's you make voice calls through the Apple Ecosystem.  Really?!?!  Do you see what Apple is doing here?  Providing you with ways to no longer have to pay for cellular calls, or texting.  Go Apple!  So how does FaceTime work?  Simple, you sign into FaceTime with your Apple ID and you use the FaceTime App to video chat with anyone else who has a FaceTime capable device.  Real life story.  Last summer, my daughter was in Israel.  From a Kibbutz, she used her iPhone to FaceTime me.  Do you know how much it cost?  NOTHING!  It was completely FREE.  A video call from Israel to Deerfield and it was Free!  Can't beat that with a stick...

Ok, that’s a high level of what your Apple ID does for you within the ecosystem, now let’s break it down further first by iTunes, and the Mac AppStore, then iCloud and iMessage.  

iTunes is the heart of the Apple Ecosystem.  It came to life Thirteen years ago, in January of 2001.  iTunes is where you purchase entertainment for your Apple Devices.  What started out as a cool place to buy and store your music has evolved into an incredible online entertainment store, where you can not only buy music, but movies, TV shows, Apps for your iPhone/iPad/iPod touch and much more.  You can even take classes from many of the top Universities around the world through iTunes U!  Whichever device you choose to purchase entertainment content from, you are required to enter your Apple ID (and password).  This allows Apple to correctly share that content to the proper devices.  The Mac App Store works the same way as iTunes, only it’s content is specific to Mac computers, where iTunes content can be used on all Apple devices, and on PC's.

Now on to iCloud.  The iCloud service is Apple’s latest attempt at cloud storage and syncing, and it blows away its predecessor, MobileMe.  What iTunes is for entertainment content, iCloud is for your personal, non-purchased content.  The iCloud service is available on all Mac’s running at least OSX 10.7 and all iOS devices running at least iOS 5.0 (I hope you are all at iOS 7!!).  To enable iCloud on your Mac computers, you’ll go into system preferences, click the iCloud preference, and login in with, you guessed it, your Apple ID! 

On your iOS device, you’ll tap on settings, and scroll down to the iCloud setting, tap, and sign in with...your Apple ID!  Then you’ll choose which content you desire to sync and backup through iCloud.  

Now what some people don’t realize is that iCloud can and should be used to back up your iOS device(s)!  Wirelessly!  How does one go about that you ask?  Good question!  All you’ll need is the white cord and power supply that came with your device, an electrical outlet and a wireless network.  Plug the appropriate ends of the cord into the iOS device and the power supply, plug the power supply into the outlet, put your device to sleep ( or let it go to sleep on its own), and if you are connected to a wireless network, iCloud will find your device, when the last backup was initiated and if it was over 24 hours ago, it will back up your device.  Once a day, iCloud will back up your non-purchased content (mail, if you have an iCloud account, Contacts, Calendar events, Reminders, Notes).  

A couple of other great features of iCloud are Photo Stream, Documents and Data and Find my iPhone.  Photo Stream let’s you share pictures, wirelessly, between all your Apple devices.  Now, on your Macs, you be have the appropriate version of iPhoto (which comes on all Macs circa late 2011 and forward).  If you are running an older Mac with OSX 10.7 or later, and have yet to upgrade iPhoto, you will NOT have Photo Stream on your Mac.  Upgrading iPhoto is simple, go to the Mac App Store and download it for $14.99.  Photo Stream will house up to 1000 pictures at a time, for up to 30 days.  Here’s how it works.  You take pictures with your iOS device, and when you get to a wireless network, those pictures get pulled up to iCloud and will be available in your Photo Stream.  So after a day of picture taking, you can come to your Mac and see those pictures in iPhoto, without having to do anything!  Just click on the Photo Stream option in iPhoto and your pictures are virtually there.  If you use the iWork suite of tools (Pages, Keynote and Numbers), iCloud can be used to sync your content from those applications between your devices.  So you can create a Keynote presentation on your Mac, save it to iCloud, and open it on your iOS device, very, very cool!  The Find My Phone service of iCloud is indispensable.  If you’ve misplaced your iOS device, or sadly if it gets stolen, you can log into iCloud.com (with your Apple ID!), and locate it!  That is awesome for those of us who quite often forget where we leave our devices!  It works using the GPS on your device to locate and display that information to a Map on iCloud.com, very cool!  I once had a customer who had her phone stolen, and we were able to track it on iCloud.com.  We called the police, informed them of where it was, they tracked down the perpetrator and got my client her phone back!  Technology at work!

That friends, is a high level overview of your AppleID, the Apple ecosystem and it’s benefits.  For more in depth help, please contact me to set up an appointment!

Enjoy your day, and until next time...Best to you and your devices!

What to do if your iOS device (or even your Mac!) is lost or stolen…:(

We all love our iOS devices, for some of us, they have become a third hand, an extension of us!  We’ve grown accustomed  to having our iPhone in our pocket, or purse or simply in our hand, everywhere we go.  For some of us, it contains not only our contacts and calendar events, but our business notes, banking information, credit card info, Starbucks card, and a slew of other information I can run down before I even mention your pictures!  The point being, these tiny, wonderful little devices also carry around a shocking amount of personal information.

What do you do, if the unthinkable happens.  Your iPhone/iPad gets lost, or even worse stolen!  Hopefully, you’ve been following my blogs, and are backing your devices up regularly with iCloud!  Doing this will at least give you piece of mind that your data is backed up, as well as giving you the ability to either lock down your device (if it’s misplaced), or you can completely wipe the device clean if you know it’s been stolen and it’s not coming back to you…:(

Here’s how you protect yourself.  First, you’ll go to a computer, open a web browser, then navigate to www.icloud.com.

Next, you’ll log in with your iCloud account (usually it’s the AppleID you use for purchases, some of you may have a second AppleID for iCloud). 

Next, you’ll click the Find my Phone icon.  It’s not a well named icon, it should be titled “Find my device”, as it can show the location of all your iCloud connected Apple devices, as long as they are turned on.  

The next screen you come to will be a map that will pinpoint your device(s) if they are on.  If they are not turned on, they can’t be found. 

 In the event that they are off, and you fear your device is stolen, you’ll click the All Device button (top center of your screen), which will show a listing of your devices (both on and off). 

 If the device is off, click the device and you be taken to another screen.  Here you’ll have the option to Play a sound, Lock the device, or Erase the device.  Now for my purposes here, I’m not going to be able to graphically show you how to do this, because if I lock my MacBook Pro, I'm not going to be very happy with myself!  So, I’ll guide you through what to do next.  When you push Lock the Device, you’ll be prompted to add a code so whomever has the device, and tries to turn it on, will be unable.  And if they subsequently try to take the device to an Apple Store, or an Authorized Apple dealer, the minute a person from the store tries to turn it on, they will know the device is not in the hands of the rightful owner.  You’ll also be prompted to add a message and phone number, in the event that your device is lost and a kind soul actually cares enough to return it!  You can also choose the drastic, but content saving (as well as headache saving) method of Erasing the device of ALL content (every last thing!).  Again, if you’ve done your iCloud back-ups, as soon as you replace your device, you restore from your last iCloud back-up, and your headache will be over (though your wallet will be feeling it!).  

Hopefully you’ll never be in a situation that requires the services described in this blog.  But should you loose or have your device stolen, the content of this blog will at least be able to give you piece of mind that your content (which is really the most important thing here) is safe!