Have you ever wanted to find a specific post on Facebook, but didn’t feel like scrolling and scrolling through old posts to find it? Fortunately, there is an easier way.
You can easily search for a specific word or phrase on an individual’s profile or on a page or group. To begin, go to the profile, page, or group where you would like to search.
Searching a Person’s Profile
If you are searching from an individual’s profile, click on the three dots on the top header of their Facebook profile, and then click on search. If you are on the mobile app, there should also be three dots when you visit a person’s profile.
Next, a box will pop up where you can enter your search term to find posts, photos, and tags.
Once you’ve typed your phrase and hit enter or clicked search, you will see a list of results, if there are any. On the left side of the screen, there are options to filter your results. There is also a filter button on the mobile app.
Searching a Page
To search on a page rather than an individual profile, in some cases, there will be the same three dots you can click and follow the same process. If you don’t see the three dots, there should be a magnifying glass in the same area on the page. There may also be a button with a picture of a magnifying glass with the word search next to it. On the mobile app, when you visit a particular page, look for the three dots to search.
Searching a Group
You can also search for a specific post within a group you are a part of by going to the group and clicking the magnifying glass icon. On the mobile app, you can search a particular group by visiting the group and clicking the magnifying glass on the top row. When you tap on it, there will be “Search in [group name]” in the search box.
Have you tried out the search feature? Let us know in the comments!
If you have used Facebook, you have seen an ad. There’s no getting around it, and unfortunately, there is no way to completely block ads on the platform. However, you do have some control over your ad settings, including which types of ads you see and what information of yours advertisers can access.
The methods to change your Ad Settings are slightly different based on how you access Facebook.
If you are accessing Facebook via a computer, click on your profile picture in the top right corner and then click on Settings & Privacy, and then Settings. In the app, tap on the three lines in the bottom right corner (iOS) or top right (Android), then swipe down to Settings & Privacy, and then tap on Settings.
Next, on a computer click on Ads on the menu on the left side. On the mobile app, swipe down and tap on Ad preferences. From here, the settings are in similar locations.
On the Advertisers tab, you will have the option to hide ads from advertisers you have seen recently. You can also see advertisers you have hidden and advertisers whose ads you’ve clicked. On the Ad Topics tab, you can select which types of topics advertisers can use to reach you. If you click or tap on a specific category, you can choose to leave the setting as is or see less of that particular topic.
On the Ad Settings tab, you can manage whether or not you receive personalized ads. “Data about your activity from partners” allows you to choose whether Facebook shows you personalized ads on Facebook and Instagram, if you have an Instagram account. If this option is set to yes, Facebook will allow advertisers to use data from your activity on Meta products, which include Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, Facebook Marketplace, and other Meta Apps. With any options with a radio yes/no button, gray signifies don’t allow and blue signifies allow.
Under “Categories used to reach you,” you can select whether you would like an advertiser to be able to target you based on the information you have provided in your profile: Employer, Job Title, Education (any schools you have listed), and Relationship Status. You may also have an “Other categories” option depending on how much personal information you have provided in your profile. Each type of profile information (e.g. employer, education) has its own yes or no option.
The “Audience Based Advertising” setting allows you to see to which advertisers have accessed lists that contain certain information from your profile. For example, an advertiser may pay for a list containing everyone who is female, aged 25-35, and lives in the United States. The birth date field is required to join Facebook, and gender and location are in the basic info section of your profile. You can see which companies have used these lists.
If you click on the company name and then click on “they uploaded or used a list to reach you,” you can get the option to allow or not allow advertisers to use this particular list on Facebook to show you ads. You may also have the option to contact that particular company. If you would like that company to not be able to use that particular uploaded list to show you ads, click on don’t allow. If you have already chosen that, you will see an allow button.
The “Ads shown off of Facebook” setting allows you to decide whether you can be shown ads off of Facebook Company Products, such as on non-Facebook websites and apps that use Facebook advertising services.
The “social interactions” setting lets you choose whether or not your friends can see if you have liked a certain page that is being advertised. For example, if you have liked the Hannaford Facebook page, and Hannaford runs an ad, if you allow your friends to see, there will be a message next to the page name on their feed saying that you liked that particular page.
There are several different ways that you can limit what information advertisers can find out about from your Facebook profile. It’s a good idea to access your ad settings to see what information is being shown to advertisers. With any social media, it’s always a good idea not to share too much information. You may think it’s just your friends and family who are seeing it, but often times that same information is being accessed by advertisers.
Have you had the chance to go over your ad settings on Facebook? Let us know in the comments.
Canva is an easy-to-use freemium image editor that can be accessed in any modern browser, without downloading software. One of the best parts about Canva is how many features are available on the free plan, including working with a team. Pro plans offer branding, access to additional templates and stock media, more cloud storage, and a few advanced editing options. The Pro plan is currently $120 per year, which may be worth it if you want a robust feature set to generate images for a small business or club. Take a look at the Canva pricing page to find out more about the features available at different subscription levels. Hot tip: Canva offers free Pro subscriptions for educational and nonprofit institutions.
Why would I need Canva?
Whether you post regularly to social media or just want to create a pretty newsletter for your family once a year, almost everyone can find a reason to use Canva. The intuitive interface makes it easy to create memes, promotional graphics, infographics, presentation slides, invitations, flyers, signs, brochures, videos – you name it! There are plenty of ready-to-use templates, but you can also start creating something from scratch. If you already have an image you want to incorporate into a larger design, you can do that, too!
Canva is especially helpful if you’re not a graphic designer. The built-in templates are perfectly sized for any medium and can be used as-is or provide inspiration for your own design. Drag-and-drop images, fonts, borders, backgrounds, and other elements to create your perfect design. Then download the image in the format of your choice.
Where can I learn more?
Tech-Talk, a resource provided by the East Greenbush Community Library to its members, has created several resources for learning the ins and outs of Canva. Here are a few examples:
If you’ve tried Canva, let us know what you think about it! Do you have an image tool that you love? We’d love to hear about it! Let us know in the comments.
If you post to a blog or social media, it is likely you need the same image in several different sizes to maintain a consistent branding experience across platforms. Manually resizing an image can be a frustrating and time-consuming experience, especially when social media networks keep changing their optimum sizing requirements.
If you are a Canva user, you may have already seen automatic resizing in action. When it was first introduced, Canva’s tool was a breakthrough. Our library relied on it for messaging across platforms. Canva requires an account and login, though. If you are looking for a free tool you can use without creating an account, Biteable’s tool may be for you. It also contains a feature that goes one step beyond Canva’s resizer.
What Is Biteable?
Biteable is a freemium suite of tools for creating and editing videos. The free tier includes puts a Biteable watermark on your videos (but not in the image resizer) and limits the resolution of your video. It does include access to stock clips and images, as well as allowing unlimited exports. For more information about features in the paid plans, visit Biteable’s pricing page.
You will need an account to create and edit videos, even at the free level. But their offer their image resizing tool with no account needed and no strings attached.
Don’t worry about setting the width and height here unless you have a specific size in mind. The magic starts when we scroll down a bit to set our focal point. This is the extra feature that sets it apart from Canva’s tool, in my opinion.
Set the Focus Point
Drag the white circle around the most important part of your image. Canva assumes the most important part is centered, but that is not always the case. In this image, the most important thing is a bit off to the right:
Scan the Results
After setting the focus point, scroll down. First you will see all 10 different sizes Facebook requires for their image areas:
Keep scrolling and you will see standard sizes for:
Instagram (6)
Twitter (6)
YouTube (4)
Pinterest (5)
LinkedIn (9)
Google Display (8)
Email/Blog (3)
Handily, the focal point selector sticks with you as you scroll down the page, so you can adjust on the fly, if needed.
Download Some or All Images
In the focus point selector, there is a button that allows you to download all of the images for all platforms at once. These will arrive as a compressed file on your computer.
Images can also be downloaded individually by clicking on the download icon in upper right of each image:
Download icon in the upper-right
Conclusion
Have you used Biteable’s image resizer? Do you have an image resizing tool you love? Let us know in the comments.
You may have seen Wordle mentioned on Facebook or other social media websites. Wordle is a popular word game where the goal is to try and guess a five letter word in six tries. Once you have solved the day’s puzzle, you are given the option to share your results on social media. The results show which day’s puzzle (denoted with a number, the puzzle pictured below was puzzle number 204), how many attempts it took you to solve, and how many letters you got correct on each attempt, along with the total number of tries you took.
Example of Wordle Results
The rules of the game are pretty straightforward. You enter a five letter word, and the letters you chose will turn either grey, yellow, or green. They will be grey if that letter is not in the word, yellow if it’s in the word but in the wrong place, or green if it’s the correct letter in the correct place. There is an on screen keyboard that keeps track of which letters you have guessed already, and whether or not they were part of the word or in the correct place in the word.
Examples of How to Play
As of right now, there is no official Wordle app, though there are many copycats on both the App Store and the Google Play Store. According to reviews, these are poor imitations and often have bugs or don’t accept valid words.
If you’d like to try out Wordle, visit this website. There is no registration required, and you can play one puzzle per day. If you are unable to solve the day’s puzzle, you’ll have to come back again the next day to try a new puzzle (or play on a different browser).
The New York Times recently wrote a story on the creator of Wordle, Josh Wardle.
Have you played Wordle? Do you have any other word game apps you love? Let us know in the comments.
