How To Take Screenshot On Phone

Taking screenshots on your smartphone or tablet is quite easy. If you have an iPad, iPod, iPhone, Windows Phone handset or an Android device running version 4.0 or newer, just hold the power button and then press the home button. It's the same on all three platforms, and automatically saves a shot of the entire screen, no matter what app you're running.
If you're running an older version of Android, then it might not be possible to easily take a screenshot. In case you do have an older Android, then the method varied, depending on the manufacturer. There are two tricks you can try.

1. Hold the power button for a few seconds. A message popup should appear with the options to "Power Off the device", "Restart the device" and "Take a Screenshot"

In case this does not work, try this instead:

2. Hold the power button down, and then press the Volume Down button. This was common in many Sony Ericsson Xperia and Samsung Galaxy phones.

BlackBerry 10 smartphone users can take a screenshot by pressing both volume buttons together. It doesn't matter what order you press them in, and the screenshot is taken as soon as both buttons are pressed.

In case you're using a Symbian phone and want to take a screenshot, then you can try out Screenshot for Symbian OS. This is a free open source project that has a lot of positive feedback online, and you can find the installer files here.

How To Rar File Extract On Your Smart Phone

If you've ever gotten a mail with a rar or zip file attached, and not been sure how to open it, then this guide can help clear up your doubts. These are two popular compressed file formats, which are used to reduce the amount of space files take up - very handy when you want to send a mail, or are keeping data for long term storage.

HOW TO EXTRACT RAR FILE:
Extracting compressed files is very easy on Android. Here's how you can do that quickly.

1. Install the free RAR for Android app.
2. Open the app and navigate to the folder that has your rar file. To find your SD card, tap the "three books" icon on the top-left.
3. Once you've found the rar file, simply tap on it to open it.

How to Turn On Hotspot on Android, iOS, Windows Phone, and BlackBerry

We wrote about easy ways to turn your laptop into a Wi-Fi hotspot earlier, and some readers asked us how to turn their smartphones into a hotspot. As it turns out, it's much simpler than turning your laptop into a hotspot and all mobile operating systems come with one-click methods of doing this very easily.

Here's how to turn your phone or tablet into a Wi-Fi hotspot:

Android:
Follow these steps to create a Wi-Fi hotspot on Android devices.

1. Go to Settings > More... > Tethering & portable hotspot. While this option is there in all Android phones, the wording may vary depending on the device. In some phones, this shows up under Settings > Networks > Sharing. Look for words such as Sharing or Tethering to find it in your phone.
2. Now set up the hotspot by tapping Set up Wi-Fi hotspot. This option shows up as Configure Wi-Fi hotspot on some smartphones.
3. Key in the name of the Wi-Fi network, a password and tap Save.
4. Tap Portable Wi-Fi hotspot to switch on the hotspot.

ISO:
Here's how to share your mobile Internet connection on iOS devices - will work for both iPhone and iPad.

1. Go to Settings > Personal Hotspot > On.
2. Enter a password.
3. Now you'll see a Wi-Fi network on other devices, which you can connect to easily.
4. The name of this Wi-Fi network is the name of your phone. You can change it by going to Settings > General > About > Name.
5. By default, iOS devices use the fairly secure WPA2-PSK encryption on Wi-Fi hotspots.

Windows Phone:

Check these steps to start a Wi-Fi hotspot on your Windows Phone device.

1. Go to Settings > Internet Sharing.
2. Tap the edit icon (pencil) at the bottom to configure the hotspot.
3. Tap Broadcast Name to change the name of the network and enter a password in its field below.
4. Tap the tick mark to finish configuration. 
5. Now flick the Internet Sharing slider to On.

BlackBerry:

Here's how to quickly set up a hotspot on a BlackBerry 10 smartphone.

1. Swipe down from the top of the screen. Tap Settings.
2. Tap Network Settings > Mobile Hotspot > Next
3. You'll see four warning prompts (data use, monitor users on hotspot, battery usage and inactivity timer). Tap Next each time.
4. Type a password for the Wi-Fi network you are about to create. Tap Next
5. Tap Configure. You can now change the name of the network if you want to.
6. Once that's done, tap Save to create a hotspot.

For more tutorials, visit our How To section.

How to Automatic Record Calls on Your phone

We're going to tell you how to record phone calls on your smartphone, but we strongly advise that you check whether this is legal in your region before you follow these steps. Needless to say, don't record calls if it is illegal. If you record calls, make sure that you tell the other person that the call is being recorded.

Recording phone calls can be a privacy violation, but there are several positive use cases for it. It can be very useful when conducting phone interviews, when you're receiving complicated instructions that you can't note down, or when you'd like to store an intimate moment such as the first time parents speak to their child on the phone.

We also tried a bunch of other apps on the iPhone, but none worked effectively. If you know any iPhone apps capable of recording calls that are worth checking out, please let us know via the comments.

Windows Phone 8 doesn't allow apps to use the phone's microphone during a call, which effectively stops call recording apps from doing their job. If you are running the older Windows Phone 7, you may have better luck with the Call Recorder app.

For both BlackBerry and Android however, it is relatively simple to record calls using apps. We tested these apps using a BlackBerry Q10 and a Google Nexus 5 respectively.

Here's how to go about recording calls on your smartphone:

HOW TO RECORD ANY CALLS ON YOUR SMARTPHONE:

1. Download and install Automatic Call Recorder.
2. Whenever you make or receive phone calls, the app will automatically start recording calls. You can turn this off by tapping the three dots icon on the top-right > Settings > Record calls > Off.
3. You can select the format of recordings. You can choose from AMR, 3GP and WAV. This is accessible in the app via Settings > File type.

In the app, you will see two tabs - Inbox and Saved. All recordings will appear in the Inbox tab. Old recordings get overwritten. This is how you permanently save a recording:

1. To save these recordings to your SD card, tap any recording and tap Save. These recordings show up in the Saved tab.
2. You can choose where these recordings are saved by going to Settings > Recording path. The default folder didn't show up when we connected our phone to a computer, but changing the saved folder to the Downloads folder solved this problem. You can also share the files directly from the app, via WhatsApp or any other app, by simply tapping the recording and then tapping the Share icon.

Automatic Call Recorder lets you save 200 recordings for free, but if you want to save more on your phone, you need to buy Automatic Call Recorder Pro.

Android 5.0 Lollipop: How to Download and Manually Install on Google Nexus 4, Nexus 5, and Other Devices

Google has announced the rollout of Android 5.0 Lollipop for its Nexus series of smartphones and tablets. Many Nexus users bought the devices because Google said these devices would be the first to get Android updates. While that may not have been the case with Android 5.0 Lollipop, but the Nexus series is still part of the first wave of devices to get a taste of the latest dessert. The update will show up soon and in the meantime you can refresh your memory by reading about the best new features in Android 5.0 Lollipop.

For those who can't wait, there's a quicker way to get Android 5.0 Lollipop on Google Nexus 4, Google Nexus 5, Google Nexus 7 (Wi-Fi), Google Nexus 7 (2013) Wi-Fi, Google Nexus 9 (Wi-Fi), and Google Nexus 10, amongst other devices. You can flash the latest Android OS to your Nexus device using a factory image.

Be warned though, do this at your own risk. In case something goes wrong, you don't want to lose all your data. Don't forget to back up all data on your Android smartphone. Google has a handy guide to flashing factory images to your Nexus device. This process is not without its share of problems, so we don't recommend this unless you know what you're doing here.

Android Police reports that the process gives some people a missing system.img error. Its post also describes a fix for the error, so you can head to the site and follow the instructions if you get the same error. However, this requires you to manually flash all the files in the update, and has also led to several people reporting errors such as missing back buttons and phone memory being downgraded to 16GB, with a complete system wipe being the only way to recover from the problems, so we would strongly recommend waiting for the OTA update if you get the system.img error.

As you will see from the nature of the instructions, this is a slightly technical process. So while you should be able to update your Android device to Lollipop by following these steps, for most users our recommendation is to just wait for the OTA update to pop up on their phones.

Here's how to manually download Android 5.0 Lollipop and force install it on your Google Nexus devices.

1. Download and install the latest Android SDK on your Windows computer. This installs two programs, ADB, and Fastboot, which can be accessed through the command terminal on your PC, as a part of the software development kit.

2. Add the SDK folder to the PATH by following these steps:

• Right click My Computer and click on Properties.
• Click on Advanced System Settings.
• Click on System Properties > Advanced > Environment Variables.
• In the Window, select Path, then click on Edit, and then type in the name of the directory where you installed the SDK, and remember that each entry is separated by a semi-colon.

3. Enable USB debugging on your device. First, go to Settings > About Phone > Software information.

4. Tap Build number seven times.

5. Go to Settings > Developer options. Tick USB debugging.

6. Download the correct factory image for your device.

• Android 5.0 Lollipop for Nexus 4
• Android 5.0 Lollipop for Nexus 5
• Android 5.0 Lollipop for Nexus 7 (Wi-Fi)
• Android 5.0 Lollipop for Nexus 7 (2013) Wi-Fi
• Android 5.0 Lollipop for Nexus 9 (Wi-Fi)
• Android 5.0 Lollipop for Nexus 10

7. Extract the image on your computer.

8. Connect your device to your computer over USB.

9. Start the device in fastboot mode.

The easiest way to do this is to hold a key combination while powering up the device. For Nexus 5, hold the volume up, volume down and power buttons while powering on the device. The full list of key combinations for different devices is here.

You can also boot into fastboot mode using the ADB tool: With the device powered on, go to the command terminal and execute the following: adb reboot bootloader

If needed, unlock the device's bootloader through your computer using the command terminal and executing: fastboot oem unlock

1. Open a command terminal and navigate to the unzipped system image directory.

2. Execute flash-all.bat, which was a part of the unzipped image file. This script installs the necessary bootloader, baseband firmware(s), and operating system. For this to work, you need to have added the folder where ADB and Fastboot are installed to the system's path as described in step 2.

3. When this is done, Google recommends that you lock the bootloader for security. You can do that by booting the device in fastboot mode while still connected via USB, and using the command terminal to execute: fastboot oem lock.

That's how you can install Android 5.0 Lollipop on your Nexus device. We still recommend that you just wait a while until the OTA update arrives on your device.

For more tutorials, head to our How To section.

How to Remove WhatsApp Blue Ticks (Read Receipts)

Much to the chagrin of its users, WhatsApp quietly introduced read receipts (letting people see exactly when a message is read, not just delivered) earlier this month. The app always showed one tick mark when you sent a message, which changed to two grey ticks when it was delivered. Now, the app shows two blue ticks when the recipient has read your message

(Also see: How to Use WhatsApp on PC)

This feature was rolled out without an update to the app itself. This means that there was no privacy setting to disable read receipts when the feature was rolled out. The lack of this basic feature in WhatsApp really ticked us off, and we had promised that we'd be back with a tutorial on how to disable WhatsApp blue ticks as soon as it was possible. True to our word, here we are now that WhatsApp has unveiled this feature for Android.

Here's how to get rid of those annoying blue ticks in WhatsApp - but if you do this, then you won't be able to see the receipts either. If you want to check when other people see your messages, then you need to allow them to see read receipts from you. For now, this is only possible for Android users, and only if you manually update the app via the WhatsApp website. WhatsApp typically releases updates first via its website, and then rolls out the update for Android's Google Play store, followed by updates for other platforms, so the update will be available for all devices soon.

The first step is to get the latest APK file from WhatsApp:

1. Download the latest (version 2.11.444) WhatsApp apk from the official website
2. On your Android phone, go to Settings > Security > Check Unknown sources, to enable installing apps from outside Google Play. Note that the exact path to the setting can vary depending on your device manufacturer and Android version - the important thing to note is that you enable installing apps from unknown sources.
3. Open the apk on your Android phone. This will install the latest version of the app on your device.

(Also see: How to Backup WhatsApp Messages)

Once the app is installed, here's how to disable read receipts:

1. Open WhatsApp and tap three vertical dots icon on the top right.
2. Now go to Settings > Account > Privacy.
3. Uncheck Read receipts.

(Also see: How to Hide Last Seen on WhatsApp)


That will disable the blue ticks on WhatsApp. As we noted above, feature isn't available on other platforms or on Google Play as yet, but now that this feature has appeared on the official WhatsApp apk, we can hope that an update will bring it to all platforms. We will update this article when that happens. Until then, you can head to our How To section for more tutorials.

How to Backup Your WhatsApp Messages

Every one who uses any messaging app has accidentally deleted messages at some point. Like photos, these conversations hold some valuable memories and it is indeed a tragedy when a person deletes them by mistake. The most popular messaging app in the world, WhatsApp, allows people to take a backup of their conversation history (including media). In order to avert the disaster that is losing your precious WhatsApp conversations, here's how you can create backups.

Backup For Android:

By default, WhatsApp for Android automatically creates a daily backup of your conversations and stores them in the WhatsApp folder on your phone's internal memory or microSD card. But if you wish, you can also create a backup manually. Here's how.

1. Open WhatsApp and hit the menu button (three vertical dots on the top-right) > Settings > Chat Settings > Backup conversations.
2. This file will be stored as "msgstore.db.crypt7" in your phone's /WhatsApp/Databases folder. WhatsApp recommends that you rename this file to "msgstore.db.crypt7.current", without the quotes, to make it easy to find when you want to restore the backup.
3. To restore conversations from a backup, uninstall WhatsApp and find the correct backup file from the WhatsApp folder. Slightly older backups are named "msgstore-YYYY-MM-DD.1.db.crypt7". In order to restore any of these, rename the file to "msgstore.db.crypt7".
4. Now reinstall WhatsApp. Once you verify your phone number, WhatsApp will show a prompt saying that it has found backed up messages. Tap Restore, choose the correct backup file and wait for the conversations to appear in the app.

Backup For iPhone:
WhatsApp for iPhone uses Apple'siCloud service to back up your conversations. This backs up everything except videos. Here's how to use it.

1. In your iPhone, go to Settings > iCloud > Documents & Data > On. You need to turn this on to save WhatsApp conversations.
2. Now open WhatsApp, tap the Settings button at the bottom-right. Select Chat Settings > Chat Backup > Back Up Now.
3. In the same place, you'll see an option called Auto Backup. Tap it. By default, this is set to Weekly. We suggest that you change this to Daily to avoid data loss.
4. To restore backups, uninstall the app and reinstall it. Select Restore after verifying your phone number.

Backup For BlackBerry:
Your WhatsApp conversations are backed up every day on your BlackBerry 10 smartphone. Here's how to create a backup and restore it.

1. Open WhatsApp. Swipe down from the top of the screen to access the application menu. Select Settings > Media Settings > Backup conversations.
2. This file will be saved as "messageStore-YYYY-MM-DD.1.db.crypt" in the /device/misc/whatsapp/backup folder on your BlackBerry 10 smartphone. WhatsApp recommends that you save this file as "messageStore-YYYY-MM-DD.1.db.crypt.current" so that you don't have trouble finding it.
3. Now uninstall WhatsApp. Make sure that you know the name of the correct backup file.
4. Reinstall WhatsApp. After verifying your phone number, select Restore and pick the correct backup file.
5. If you are using a BlackBerry 7 smartphone, you need a microSD card to backup chat history. This is because message history is removed from the internal storage after restarting BB7 phones. If you have a microSD card in your phone, here's how to back up conversations.
6. Open WhatsApp and select the Settings tab at the top.
7. Select Media Settings > Message History > Media Card. This ensures that all your messages are saved on the memory card.
8. If your chats have stopped showing up in the app, uninstall WhatsApp.
9. Switch off the phone, remove and replace the battery. Restart the phone.
10. Open your BlackBerry Media folder, press the BlackBerry button > Explore.
11. Open Media Card > databases > WhatsApp and look for the "messagestore.db" file.
12. Rename it to "123messagestore.db". This will ensure that WhatsApp restores the next most recent chat history that was saved.

Backup For Windows Phone:
Here's how to create a chat history backup on WhatsApp for Windows Phone.

1. Open WhatsApp and tap the three dots at the bottom-right.
2. Select settings > chat settings > backup. This will create a backup of your WhatsApp conversations.
3. If you accidentally deleted your chats, we suggest that you don't create a new backup. Instead, check the time of the previous backup, which can be found under the backup button mentioned in the previous step.
4. If this time is after you received the chats you deleted, uninstall and reinstall WhatsApp.
5. After verifying your phone number, WhatsApp will ask you if you want to restore a chat backup. Select yes.

Backup For Nokia feature phones:

If you use WhatsApp on a Nokia S60 phone, here's how to create a backup.

1. Open WhatsApp and select Options > Chat History > Backup chat history.
2. Now tap Yes to create a backup.
3. To restore backups, uninstall and reinstall WhatsApp.
4. Select Restore after verifying your phone number.
5. If you are trying to restore chat history on another Nokia S60 phone, remember to use the same microSD card that you used in the previous phone.
6. Sadly, there is no way to create a chat history backup on Nokia S40 phones. The best you can do is email conversations to your personal email account to keep a record. Even this is possible only in phones that have a memory card. Here's how to email chat backups.
7. Open WhatsApp and open the conversation you want to back up.
8. Choose Options > Chat History > Email. Your chat history will be attached as a .txt file.

That's how to backup messages on WhatsApp. If you found this article useful, we have many more tutorials in our How to section.