Sometimes, in the midst of typing a new email, you may need to view a different email. In order to do this, you’ll need to hit Cancel on your draft. You’ll be prompted to 'Save Draft’ or ‘Delete Draft’. Often, you’ll want to save it but it can be tricky to navigate to your Drafts folder to find it. There’s a much easier way to see a list of your draft emails. In the mail app, simply tap and hold the “Compose New Message” icon that looks like this:
After a few seconds, a list of all unsent, draft emails will appear. Simply tap to begin editing or swipe to delete.

We’ve all been there - typing an email in iOS and auto-correct steps in. It was rough for a few years and even has a handful of funny websites dedicated to the accidentally embarrassing auto-corrects. Over the years, it’s matured and now (for the most part), it’s spot-on. iOS 7’s auto-correct has made some big improvements including being able to group a few words together to check the context. One area that it runs afoul is with contractions when a similar non-contracted word exists. For instance: well and we’ll. shell and she’ll. hell and he’ll. The fix is simple, however. if you’re trying to type we’ll, it won’t add the apostrophe for you. All you have to do is add an extra l at the end and it will know you’re trying to type we’ll and fix it for you.

Find My iPhone is a useful app made by Apple that allows you to see where your iPhone, iPad, or MacBook is located on a map in case you lose it or it’s stolen. You can even erase all the data remotely, send an alert to it (for instance, a message about a reward for returning it), play a loud sound on it to help you locate it, among other features. It’s a free, must-have app. All you have to do to set it up is log in the first time with your iCloud account. Before iOS 7, Apple allowed you to set up Find My iPhone with your non-primary iCloud account. Let me explain: In a previous post, I explained how each person should have their own iCloud account. This is necessary to allow each family member to have their own iMessage, FaceTime, and device backup. It’s also a good idea to have a main family iCloud account if you want to share Contacts and Calendars. (In my household, it’s my iCloud account that’s the main family one.) Before iOS 7, you could use the main family iCloud account to track all devices in Find My iPhone. After iOS 7, they force you to use your individual (aka primary) iCloud account for Find My iPhone. It’s not a deal-breaker by any stretch of the imagination. It simply means that if you want to find the location of more than one iDevice, you’ll need to log out of Find My iPhone and then log into the next user’s iCloud Account to find the next device.

To set up Find My iPhone:

1. Go to Settings > iCloud
2. Flip ‘Find My iPhone’ to ON. Yep, that’s it.

Quitting apps in iOS 7 isn't obvious at first glance but, once you know how, it's much more intuitive than previous versions which sometimes made people think they were actually deleting the app from their device. To quit an app that's running, follow these steps:

1. double-click the home button to show the app-switcher (pictured)
2. swipe left or right to find the app you want to kill
3. flick the app upwards

Why would you need to quit an app?

There are a few reasons you might want to quit an app. Here are the top two:

• Even though there are conflicting reports, I'm a big believer that quitting apps you are not using can help improve battery life. There are some apps that continue to use resources (and therefore battery life) while just being open in the background. This is especially true for streaming audio apps like Pandora, VoIP apps like Skype, navigation apps, and apps that are trying to complete a task (think Facebook trying to complete that last photo upload). Every week or two, I go through and quit all the apps I'm not using.
• Once in a while, an app continuously crashes or acts oddly. The problem can often be fixed by quitting it and re-opening it.

While nothing official has been announced from Apple, it's all but guaranteed that a new iPhone will be announced in September. The real questions are what new features it will have and what other product(s) will also be announced. As you're reading this, keep in mind that absolutely nothing has been announced by Apple at this point. It is all 100% rumor and speculation.

First, the new iPhone. Apple has been on a two-year cycle for significant model changes. Think back: the iPhone 3G, then a minor spec bump to the 3GS. The following year there was a huge change to the iPhone 4 then a minor bump to the 4S. Last year was arguably the largest change ever to the iPhone 5. Most everyone agrees that this year will be a minor change year. The name is one question. Will it be the iPhone 5S, the 5C, the iPhone 6 or something else? Some believe that the iPhone will finally be offered in a variety of colors including a champagne gold color. Others believe that Apple will make a "cheap" version for developing foreign countries. Either of these rumors could be arguments for what the "C" in iPhone 5C could stand for. One rumor that I'm excited about is the addition of a fingerprint sensor. This would help eliminate a password by scanning your thumbprint and could be the precursor for a long-awaited mobile-payment system from Apple.

Many of the rumor mills agree that there will not be a refreshed iPad or iPad Mini announced at this next meeting. That will likely wait until a 2nd Apple announcement in a few months.

The two most rumored new products are an Apple-branded television set (possibly called the iPanel) and an iWatch. Apple's current set-top box, the Apple TV, has been around for a handful of years and is a nice addition to any TV set but, by no means does it change the future of the living room. Before his death, Steve Jobs told his biographer, "I'd like to create an integrated television set that is completely easy to use. It would be seamlessly synced with all of your devices and with iCloud. It will have the simplest user interface you could imagine. I finally cracked it." That was a few years ago. Rumors have been running wild about how Apple is approaching the networks for an iTunes-style pick-what-you-want television service. Others expect Apple to come out with a revamped set-top box but not an actual television set. Either way, I'm excited to see what they come up with.

The iWatch is expected to be a conduit to your iPhone that accesses data on your iPhone via bluetooth. For instance, imagine using Siri on your watch to send a text message and check the weather without ever taking your iPhone out of your pocket. Cool, right? Ok, a little dorky but still… sign me up.

The event is expected to be announced for Tuesday, September 10th with the new iPhone going on sale Friday, September 20th. At this event, they'll also review the brand new mobile operating system, iOS 7, and the new desktop operating system, OS X Mavericks which were both announced earlier this year. Apple is expected to make it available a few days after the September 10th event. I'll send a newsletter update with an update from the September 10th announcement to keep my followers up-to-date with the latest Apple news. If you're not already on the newsletter list, sign up here.

With a new iPhone right around the corner, many people are preparing to upgrade from an older iPhone. Unlike most other phones on the market, iPhones have a sizable resale value - even those that are a few years old. Before iPhones, I remember getting rid of old phones by donating them, giving them away, or even throwing them in the trash. The iPhone is a whole different ballgame. I purchased a 64gb iPhone 4S on the day it was launched for the Verizon-subsidized retail price of $399 as I qualified for an upgrade. One year later, when the iPhone 5 came out, I bought a 64gb model at the Verizon-subsidized price of $399, exactly the same as the 4S. Instead of giving away my one-year old iPhone 4S, I listed it on eBay and sold it for $401. You might be wondering why someone would pay $401 for a iPhone 4S when a new iPhone 5 is only $399. Keep in mind the $399 is a subsidized price which means I qualified for an upgrade (and signed a new two year commitment *sigh*). Had I not qualified and/or agreed to a two-year commitment, that $399 price jumps to $849. Now, imagine you are a person who had purchased a full price iPhone then lost it or damaged it beyond repair, and failed to put insurance on it, you'd have to buy a new 64gb iPhone 5 at the unsubsidized price of $849! OR you could purchase a used one on eBay (from someone like me) for $401.

It also helps tremendously that Apple chooses to support their previous model phones for quite some time unlike other manufacturers. For instance, the soon-to-be-released iOS 7 will run on the new iPhone, last year's iPhone 5, the two-year old iPhone 4S and even the iPhone 4 from the year before that.

So, bottom line, where should you sell your old iPhone? It depends if you are willing to go through a little more work to make a few more bucks. If you're like me and comfortable selling items on eBay, that is likely your best option to get the most money out of it. Of course, you'll pay eBay fees and PayPal fees but you'll still end up with a few more dollars in your pocket compared to the next best option. According to gigaom.com the next best option is trading it in to Amazon, the Apple store, gazelle.com or even Wal-Mart. This site went through the trouble of checking trade-in values at 15 different sites and shared their results. One of their notable findings is to avoid Best Buy if you are looking for the best deal.

On an unrelated note, the next iPhone is due out around September 20th. I just might know of a one-year-old 64gb iPhone 5 for sale for $401.   ;)

iCloud gives each user 5GB of free storage. Depending on your usage, that can fill up over time and you could get an email from iCloud telling you that there is not enough storage available. There's a few simple things you can do to free up some iCloud storage space:

1. If you take a lot of photos or videos, it might be time to back them up to a PC and delete them out of your Camera Roll. iCloud backs up your Camera Roll so it's a good idea to clear it out every so often or it can become very bloated. The best thing to do here is to connect your iDevice to a PC and move the photos and videos that you want to keep to your PC hard drive. Once they're on your hard drive, delete them from your Camera Roll.
2. Go to Settings - iCloud - Storage & Backup - Manage Storage. From here, delete any devices in the list that you no longer have. you could have an old iPhone or iPad backup hanging around taking up space that is of no use to you anymore.
3. While in the Manage Storage (see #2), you can see which apps have data backed up. Tap on an app to see the files that are backed up for each one and swipe-to-delete any files you don't need backed up.
4. You can purchase additional iCloud storage for a very reasonable price. While in the Manage Storage screen (see #2), tap "Change Storage Plan" to see the available options.

There are all sorts of stories floating around the web about the kid who rang up a couple thousand dollar iTunes bill. If you read it on the internet, it has to be true, right? Surprisingly, most of these stories are true. Sadly, it's easy enough to do if your child has an app that takes advantage of in-app purchases. Some games allow users to move to the level or buy extra features just by tapping a few buttons. It's a great idea to turn off these In-App purchases to prevent this from happening - especially if you have a child using your iDevice. Turning them off is easzy, here's how:

1. Go to Settings - General - Restrictions
2. Enable Restrictions (will require setting up a passcode)
3. Turn In-App Purchases to OFF
4. While in this menu, you can also change the following:
   1. restrict ability to install or delete apps
   2. restrict playing of 'explicit' music
   3. turn off ability to play multi-player games or add friends in Game Center (some games allow users to connect to anyone else in the world playing the same game and users can chat with one another in some games which, while normally just fine, can be a way for online predators to talk to kids)
   4. An important one - consider changing Require Password to Immediately instead of 15 minutes. if it's 'Immediately', you will be required to type in your iTunes password every single time you want to buy an app. If it's '15 minutes', your child can buy anything just by tapping the 'Buy Now' button within 15 minutes of you last entering your iTunes password.

Getting insurance on an iPhone or iPad is a lot like whether or not to buy a case in some respects. Or like playing the odds in Vegas. Breaking a screen isn't the end of the world - many times it can be repaired for less than $100. The thing that will really get you is if it's a total loss (lost/stolen/run over/circuit board damaged/etc). In this instance, you'd need to get a new phone but the problem is that you won't qualify for subsidized pricing (unless its been a while and you're eligible for an upgrade - but if that's the case, your warranty likely would have already expired). Depending on the size, an unsubsidized iPhone could cost up to $850. This is where the warranty would come in handy. You could probably find a used one on eBay for less but who knows where that one has been in terms of water damage, scratches, etc. according to the numbers, you'd have to cash in on a warranty claim once in 4-8 years (depending on your model of iPhone) to break even. The way I look at it, even if I don't cash in, I'm a winner for having the warranty because I didn't spend a single minute stressing out during that time period. It's hard to put a price on peace of mind.

We've all been there - in a hurry and the charging cable slips out of your hand and falls behind the desk or night stand right next to the kid's bouncy ball from 3 years ago, a few loose Cheerio's and a collection of pens and paper clips. With the help of a binder clip, you can make sure it never happens again. Simply clip the binder clip to the side of the desk or to another cable as shown on the right after you've threaded your cable through the clips.

Should I turn off my iPad every night?

No! Leave it on 24/7 and just hit the lock button on top (or close your cover if you have one) to turn off the screen. The battery draw is very minimal and it's designed to be left on. Your mail and other iCloud items will sync in the background when you're not using it so it's updated once you pick it up.

How do I quickly mute my iDevice?

Above the volume buttons, there's a on/off toggle. Flip it off (so you can see the orange) and your device will be muted. *Note that the iPad has a setting (Settings - General) that can instead use the mute switch for Rotation Lock*

Sometimes I'll see this torn paper graphic in some apps. What does it mean?

This is an app's way (Facebook and Twitter for instance) of telling you that there are some posts in between that have been cut out. The stories on the bottom part are the ones that you viewed last time you logged on. Above the cut are the newest ones. If you're offline for days or weeks, there could be a zillion posts that you missed and the app doesn't want to load all of them and overload your feed.

Which devices have Siri?

• iPad 3 and newer
• iPhone 4S and newer
• iPad Mini

The phone’s ringing and the caller ID tells you it’s that salesperson calling again. You don’t want to buy what they’re selling and you don’t want to come off sounding like a jerk so maybe it’s best for everyone if you just ignore the call, right? Wrong! As a salesperson myself, I’m telling the world – I’d much rather have a customer pick up the phone and tell me “no thanks” rather than having to attempt to call them back every so often and waste valuable time. The call might be a bit awkward because no one enjoys saying no, but in the end, the salesperson will appreciate it.

Take a screenshot in OS X

Searching your Mac with Spotlight Search

A handy shortcut to quickly access music, brightness, and lock your screen rotation is only a double-tap away.

Ever wanted to stop your screen from rotation when you turn the device? You're watching a movie or reading a book in bed and you want the screen to stop rotating. You can do this from Settings but there's a much easier way!

Show the Multi-Tasking bar

Just double-click the home button and the multi-tasking bar will appear

Swipe from left to right

You're screen should look like the one at the right.

What you can do now:

1. Tap the far left button to lock or unlock your screen rotation
2. Quickly access your music app by tapping the orange icon
3. Play, pause or switch tracks on your music app
4. On an iPad, you can also adjust the screen brightness
   

Maybe you didn't know...

On an iPhone, swipe from left to right again and you can access a volume slider control.

Ever wanted to rearrange the Favorites in your iPhone?

1. Open your Phone app and tap Favorites
2. Tap Edit
3. Tap and drag the "Drag Handle" that looks like this:  
4. Let go of the Drag Handle once you have it in the correct position. That's it!

What is Spotlight?

How do you access Spotlight?

1. Swipe the opposite way (from left to right)
2. Click the Home button once

How does it work?

My favorite uses for Spotlight

1. Quickly open an app that I forgot which folder it's in
2. Search emails & texts
3. Quickly find a song

I bet you didn't know...

Have a picture-perfect moment and want to snap a quick photo before it's gone?

Want to snap a screenshot to text to a friend or save for future reference?

The Situation

The Answer:

The In-Depth Answer:

Bonus Hint:

Ever wish you could easily type with your thumbs on the iPad?

• Method 1:
  Use the "zoom out" gesture on the keyboard. (put your fingers together on the keyboard and spread them apart. To get it back, "pinch" them together)
• Method 2:
  Tap this key and drag the keyboard up. Drag it all the way to the bottom of the screen to return it to normal.

Spotlight is one of the most common, under-utilized functions in OS X. It's primary function is to quickly search your hard drive, email, contacts, browser history and more - all from a single location. Click the magnifying glass in the upper-right to access it and type your search term.
My favorite use: Quick calculations. Click Spotlight and type 5*3 and see what happens

How do i clear my iPhone to sell it?

Whether your giving your iPad to your spouse or selling your iPhone, be sure you completely wipe all of the data and settings from it before giving it up.

Wiping the data is easy! Tap Settings > General > Reset > Erase All Contents and Settings.

How do I get Adobe Flash on my iPad?

Many people are unsure of what exactly iCloud is. Ever wish that:

• When you bought an app or song on your iPhone that it would automatically download on your iPad, spouse's iPhone, and your iMac?
• When you take a picture with your iPhone that it would automatically show up on your other iDevices?
• Your iDevices would automatically back itself up while it's not in use so you don't ever have to worry about it?
• share calendars and contacts with your spouse and other iDevices?
• You could work on a Pages doc (aka Word doc) or Numbers doc (Excel sheet) and pick up exactly where you left off but on a different device? All without having to save your work?
• You could see on a map where your iPhone-toting friends/children are?
• Be reading a book on your iPad and then bookmark a page and have that bookmark carry over to your iPhone or another iDevice?
• view a webpage from your iPhone that you left open on your iPad or iMac?
• You could view your iPhone's contacts, calendar, notes or reminders from your non-Apple work PC using just a web browser?
• you could send a text (aka iMessage) from your iPad and also see it and continue the conversation on your iPhone?

• tap Settings > iCloud
• follow the prompts to set up your iCloud account
• choose what you want to sync by flipping the "on/off" switches. I'd recommend turning on all that you can. some (mail, notes, etc) will require you to have an "iCloud.com" email address. if you need to set one up, your iPhone/iPad should walk you through the steps to do so.
• Very important: tap Storage & Backup (at the bottom of the Settings > iCloud menu) to turn on your automatic iCloud backups. Once this is turned on, your iPhone will automatically back up when it's charging and connected to wi-fi
• download other iCloud-enabled apps like "Find My Friends" (see the location of your iPhone-toting friends on a map) and "Find My iPhone" (find your iPhone if it's ever lost or stolen) from the App Store. Be sure to go into the apps and set these up once they're downloaded.

It sounds boring, I know. In the end, it will make your iLife much less frustrating. Take some time to update your contact list. It might take an hour the first time but it's well worth it in the long run. You can do this right on your iDevice or sign in to www.iCloud.com on any web browser and do it there. Follow these best practices:

• Give each contact their own record. (i.e. create a separate contact for Jason Lassen and Gayle Lassen - don't create a "Jason & Gayle Lassen" contact) Most people have their own cell phone number and their own individual email address so they need to have their own individual contact card.
• Name contacts correctly with a first and last name, not a nickname. (i.e. ditch the "Mom" contact and rename it with her full name. If you share your contacts with your spouse and/or children, this will help eliminate confusion over which 'Mom' is calling. It also makes it easier to find contacts - you won't have to remember if you used a real name or a nickname for each person)

I'm switching employers and my current Contact List is going away once I give notice. I don't want to lose all of my contacts! What should I do?

This is a great reminder for everyone to create and maintain your own personal Contact List. Don't wait until you change jobs and all of your contacts are locked up on your old employer's system. If you're an iDevice user, I recommend using iCloud contacts but you can also use Google's contact service or other services as well.

Migrating Outlook Contacts to iCloud

• Step 1. Open your iCloud Control Panel. I assume you have installed it. If not, then install it first. (Here's what it looks like)
• Step 2. Check the box which says contacts with outlook. This shows the iCloud Contact as a separate list in Outlook. Go to Contacts and check the list there in the left panel.
• Step 3. Now that you can see both your Outlook contact list, outlook and icloud in the same section you can go to the outlook contacts, right click > Move > Copy To Folder and then choose the iCloud Contacts folder. All your contacts will be copied/merged appropriately.

Wish you could just hit "Insert - Attachment" in a new mail message? You can now!

Apple wants to break your old habits and teach you new, simpler ones. For instance, when sending a photo or video to someone, it makes much more sense to have the option to "Share" it while looking at the photo rather than forcing you to exit out of the Photos app, open your email app, and open a new email, right? For that reason, they never included an "Insert - Attachment" option in Mail. Finally, after enough people requested the "Insert - Attachment" feature, Apple added it in iOS 6. Simply tap and hold anywhere in the email body to bring up a small pop-up box. Tap the right arrow until you see "Insert Photo or Video".

Ever notice how some text messages you send are green and others are blue? Or why some messages say "Read at 7:31am", others just say "Delivered" and others have nothing?

Blue Messages:
When one Apple device (iPhone, iPad, MacBook or iMac) sends a text (officially called an iMessage) to any other Apple device, it is shown in light blue so you know it's being treated as an iMessage. This means that you can continue your conversation thread on any other Apple device as long as you have the same iCloud account logged in. You also don't use up any texting minutes from your cellular carrier - these are all free courtesy of Apple!

Green Messages:
Standard, old-school text messages.

Read vs Delivered messages:
When texting from one Apple device to another (iMessaging), your iMessages are all date/time stamped. They're marked as "delivered" once they've successfully made it to the other person. If the other person has "Read Receipts" turned on, you'll get a note telling you when the other person actually read your iMessage. Standard texts (the green ones) do not allow for either delivery or read receipts.

How to Turn Read Receipts On:
If you haven't already, turn on your Read Receipts so your friends can tell if you've seen their iMessages or not. Go to Settings > Messages > Send Read Receipts

Ever been scrolled waaaay down at the bottom of a really long page and want to scroll to the top in a jiffy?

It's simple. Don't bother scrolling. Instead, just tap the very top of the screen (on the time display) and the iPhone will scroll all the way backup on it's own. This one is hard to live without once you know it's there!

My wife and I both have iPhones and share one iCloud account for Contacts. When she receives a phone call it now says “Dad” or “Richard Jones” (my dad). When she answers she has no clue who it is going to be. So in the case, she wants to ignore one over the other she is not sure what to do. Any suggestions to eliminate this?

Check your contacts to see if you have a contact named "Dad". My guess is that you each had an entry for Rich but named them differently. When he calls, the phone sees two different contacts (named 'dad' and 'Richard Jones'). One easy way to clear this up is to merge the 'dad' and 'Richard Jones' contact cards. Go to the contact card (either one) and tap 'edit' then 'link contact' at the very bottom, then choose the contact to merge it with. Another way to clear this up is for each of you to have separate contact lists but I'm guessing you would have several duplicates and this would be undesirable. If this IS what you want, I can walk you through it, just let me know. Once you have separate contact groups, it's easy enough to set up which ones you are able to see: from the contact list, hit 'groups' in the upper left corner, then only check the groups that you want to see.

My battery used to last all day long. Now it only takes me through late afternoon. Aren't there some settings that I can adjust to make the battery last longer?

Yes, there are several battery killers. Check these settings:

• Brightness - set as low as possible while still comfortable [Settings>Brightness & Wallpaper]
• Bluetooth - if you don't use it, turn it off [Settings>Bluetooth]
• GPS - go to [Settings>Privacy>Location Services] and leave [ON] the apps that really need your location (photos, maps, facebook, etc). Then, at the bottom of the page, tap [System Services] and turn everything [OFF] except Cell Network Search, Traffic, Wi-Fi Networking
• Close running apps - Having multiple apps open doesn't hurt your battery at all. However once in a while, you may have an app (such as one that streams audio) that is using system resources and it needs to be closed. To do this, double click the home button and you'll see the Multi-Tasking Bar at the bottom. tap and hold any app and you'll see them start to wiggle. tap the red and white (-) on all of the apps in the bottom Multi-Tasking bar to close them.