A Quick Way To Name a Song With Your Smartphone

You’re listening to the radio or watching TV and a song comes on that you don’t know. You like the song, but how can you find out what it is? Luckily, there are built in features on your smartphone that allow you to name a song in seconds!

Apple

Screenshot of Shazam listening to identify a song

Starting with the release of iOS 14.2 in 2020, Apple devices offer built in song recognition, just by asking Siri, the built-in digital assistant. In your Siri settings, if you have “Hey Siri” enabled, simply say, “Hey Siri, what song is this?” when a song is playing. Another way to quickly activate Siri is to hold down the Home Screen button iPhones with a home button or hold down the power button on iPhone 9 and later.

You’ll get a screen that Siri is listening and then a screen will pop up with the name of the song.

Screenshot of Shazam identified song

To see a history of songs you have identified, download the Shazam app from the App Store. To see more detailed instructions, check out this helpful article from Apple.

Android

On Android phones, there is a similar method. Touch and hold the home button or say “Hey Google” and then ask, “What’s this song?”

Screenshot of Android listening for a song

Google Assistant will name the song and give you options to share the song, watch the video on YouTube, or add to a playlist on YouTube Music. Google has written a helpful article with more detailed instructions.

Use the Google App

You can also identify songs with both iOS devices and Android devices by using the Google app. The neat thing with the Google app is that in addition to identifying a song by playing it, you can also sing or hum it yourself. This is handy in case you have a certain lyric or melody stuck in your head.

Screenshot

Open the Google app and tap on identify song by listening. Another option is to tap on the microphone icon and then tap search for a song.

When I attempted to sing a song, I got a 48% match of the song I was singing.

Then again, my singing voice isn’t the greatest, so you may get better results. I only got a 34% match when I attempted to hum a song.

Have you tried identifying a song with your smartphone? Let us know in the comments!

Libby App Now Available for Kindle Fire

Recently, the OverDrive app was discontinued. In its place is the Libby App. Until recently, Kindle Fire users were unable to access the app on their devices. Luckily, this has changed!

The Kindle Fire app is now available for download in the Amazon App Store. The Kindle Fire Libby App is available for Kindle Fire models made in 2020 or newer. It is also available on the following models:

DeviceYear
Fire HD 102017
Fire HD 82018
Fire HD 102019
Fire HD 82020
Fire HD 102021
Fire HD 10 Plus2021
Fire 72022
Fire HD 82022
Fire HD 8 Plus2022

When visiting the Amazon Libby App download page, there is a box listing if your model of Kindle Fire is compatible with the app.

Screenshot showing Libby App in the Amazon app store with x marks next to the compatibility with your devices that aren't compatible.

After downloading the Libby App on your Kindle Fire, there is an option to read e-books either on the app itself or on the built in Kindle app on the Kindle Fire. For more information on how to deliver e-books to your Kindle App, check out our helpful Tech Tips article.

Discover a Unique Way to Search with Google Lens

Have you ever been out and about and wondered what kind of flower or species of bird you spotted? Now there is a way you can find out, with the help of your smartphone’s camera.

Google Lens allows you to search for an item with your camera or with an existing photo. It is available on both Android and iOS (Apple) devices.

Android Devices

On Android devices, there are a few ways you can access Lens. On most new Android devices, Lens is enabled by default and can be accessed directly from the camera app. Open the camera app, aim at the item (be it a flower, animal, type of water bottle, etc), and then tap the Lens button. Next, tap the magnifying glass icon to search for the image in your camera’s viewfinder.

Screen shot of mode options on Android devices

Depending on your device, you may need to tap the modes button to access Lens. To learn how to add more modes, check out this helpful video.

If you don’t have Lens within your camera app, you can download it from the Google Play Store.

Searching using the Google App

Alternatively, you can search a live photo view and a previously taken picture with the Google app.

Open the Google app and scroll down to Discover. Next, tap the Google Lens icon in the search bar. The Lens icon is shaped like a camera.

Screen shot of search bar in Google app

You can search for either a live view of an item in your surroundings or by using a previously taken picture. To search a live view, point to an object with your camera and tap Search Search To search with an existing image, tap Photo picker Gallery and select a photo. You’ll have the option to search the whole photo or part of a photo.

To search for a specific object in the image: If available, on the object, tap the Select icon . To search for part of an image, tap Select image area , then drag the corners of the box around your selection. Next, scroll to the bottom to see your search results. To refine your search, tap add to your search and add keywords.

Apple Devices

To use Lens on an Apple device (iPhone or iPad), download the Google app from the App Store.

Next, give permission for the app to access your device’s camera and if you would like to also photo search using pictures from your photo library, allow access to your photos as well.

Screen shot of first time open of Google app on iOS devices

Once you have granted the appropriate permissions, you can choose to search a live view or using a previously taken photo.

Screen shot on iOS devices after granting permissions

You can start your search by tapping the camera at the end of the search field . Once you have the item you want to search in view, tap the magnifying glass icon to search.

Example of Google Lens showing a blue tumbler

Next, you’ll see your search results. Scroll down to view more results.

Screen shot showing search results

The tabs (homework, shopping, places, etc.) will give you more specific types of results.

Have you used Google Lens to search? Let us know in the comments!

Learn How To Set Your Favorite Colors As Defaults

If you’ve ever worked with templates in Microsoft or Google software, you may have been less than pleased with the automatic color choices made by the software. Sure, you can change these colors while editing, but if you want to use them all the time, changing the colors for each document, spreadsheet, or presentation you start could get old very fast. Thankfully, most of the applications offered by Microsoft and Google have a method for saving your favorite colors to a default theme.

The good folks at Tech-Talk have already written a great article with a video outlining the process for setting default colors on both platforms, so I’m not going to reinvent the wheel here. When setting default colors, keep in mind that it needs to be set up in each application separately. For example, a theme set in Microsoft Word does not carry over to Microsoft PowerPower. I should note, however, if you are only interested in setting a color theme for Google Docs, the option is not currently available in that app.

Show me how

New Feature Makes for Stunning PowerPoint Slides

If you’re design-challenged like me, PowerPoint can be a painful experience for everyone. I can select a presentation template to make sure there is a cohesive theme for the slides, but I’m pretty much limited to the layouts provided in the template. Any deviation tends to look unpolished. Then, I learned about the new Designer feature. It’s a game-changer.

Designer takes the content you’ve entered in a slide and suggests different ways to lay it out and use the theme colors. The end result is a much richer variety of slides that make it look like the creator has an eye for good design. Unfortunately, Designer is only available with an Office 365 subscription, not a perpetual license version of PowerPoint.

To get design ideas, select a slide and then Design>Designer in the top menu. If Designer does not appear in the options, go to File (top menu)>Options (bottom left menu)>Scroll to PowerPoint Designer and check these two boxes:

Screenshot showing PowerPoint Designer options with "Automatically show me design ideas" and "automatically show me suggestions when I create a new presentation" checked.

The folks at Tech-Talk have created an article and short video about what Designer is and how to use it in Office 365. This is a great place to start learning about how to use Designer.

If you still have questions after visiting the Tech-Talk article, this page from Microsoft goes into a bit more detail: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/create-professional-slide-layouts-with-designer-53c77d7b-dc40-45c2-b684-81415eac0617.

Are you using the Designer feature in PowerPoint? Let us know how you like it!