Computeractive的593目录

I’m writing this 20 minutes after Boris Johnson announced the second national lockdown. I don’t know how society will respond this time, but I suspect many will turn once again to TV-streaming services for entertainment. That’s what happened earlier this year, as millions of viewers ventured beyond the BBC and ITV for the first time. Around that time I received plenty of emails from readers bewildered by the range of TV sticks available. Some had Chromecasts but wanted to know whether Amazon Fire was better. Others wondered if they should wait for Apple TV. But most had never bought one and just wanted a simple buyer’s guide that explained the differences in language they understood. I vowed then to publish such a guide. What I hadn’t expected is that it…

BT has said it’s working on a “simple solution” to make it easier for customers applying for the Universal Service Obligation (USO) to share costs among their neighbours to make installation of broadband more affordable. It follows criticism that BT is charging customers too much for installation. Digital Minister Matt Warman said some customers faced “eye-watering” costs, while Ofcom is investigating whether BT is giving quotes that are “higher than necessary”. Many customers have been charged tens of thousands of pounds, with some receiving quotes in six figures. The highest quote so far was £1.1m for installing broadband in Strathconon in the Scottish Highlands. The USO gives you the legal right to request broadband if you can’t get a “decent” broadband speed, which is defined by Ofcom as 10Mbps while…

Microsoft is planning to remove a shortcut that lets you open sections of the Control Panel that it has moved to the Settings page. The company’s long-term aim is to move all Control Panel options to Settings (press Windows key+I), which it sees as a more modern and convenient place for options you need to access regularly. Most recently, in the October 2020 Update clicking the System link in the Control Panel takes you straight to the System section in Settings. For now, there’s still a workaround that lets you bring back System to the Control Panel. You need to open the Control Panel from the Start menu or via Windows Search, then click a blank area of the address bar at the top. Next, type system (see screenshot) and…

Faster broadband is vital for post-COVID world I don’t share Hugh Collins’ shoulder-shrugging attitude towards the country’s broadband deadlines (‘Who cares if UK misses 2025 broadband target?’, Issue 592). In the past few months we’ve seen millions of people start to work from home for the first time. Some of them might return to the office when normal times return, if they ever do. But most of them won’t. For this new breed of home worker, fast broadband is essential. It’s not good enough anymore to simply say that if you can browse the web or send emails, that’s all you need. Home workers need much faster download speeds to access and work on documents and to take part in video meetings. It’s as essential now to their work as…

Because of my arthritis, keeping our lawn tidy with a hover mower became impossible, so we’ve been paying £30-£40 a time to get it done, which is quite a lump to come out of our pensions! I thought a self-propelled mower would make the job easier, so I bought one from Amazon (the Einhell Petrol Lawn Mower GC-PM 46 S, pictured). But it ran too fast – I couldn’t keep up with it! The manufacturer told me they couldn’t adjust the speed, so I explained my problem to Amazon. They were sorry the mower didn’t meet my requirements, and offered to pick up the mower for free, refunding me in full. When I mentioned that I had opened some oil that I also bought, they said that was no problem.…

Q I would like to convert HEIC image files created by my iPhone to the JPEG format. Can you recommend the best tool to do this? David Newland A Although the HEIC image format used by iOS devices is more space-saving than JPEG (reducing image sizes by around 50 per cent), it’s not as widely supported – particularly with older programs. One option is to use an online tool, such as CloudConvert (snipca.com/36490) – you’ll need to create a free account to convert more than 25 images per day. Click the red Select File button, locate the HEIC files on your PC that you want to convert, then click Convert. It’s reasonably fast, taking just 15 seconds to convert twelve HEIC files when we tested it. However, you may not…

MINI PC | £320 from Amazon www.snipca.com/36359 Adds up to a little bargain About the size of a thick paperback, the Mini PC certainly lives up to its name. It’s supplied ‘barebones’, ready to add memory and storage before installing your own copy of Windows or another operating system. Already on the motherboard is a choice of processors from AMD’s very capable Ryzen 4000 series, in our case the six-core 4500U. This is a laptop chip, but fairly powerful, and the latest 802.11ax (Wi-Fi 6) wireless networking is built in too, so you’ve got the makings of a proper general-purpose PC, whether for your study or living room. What you don’t have is room for a graphics card, but the 4500U’s integrated Radeon Graphics 384SP will get some 3D games…

Q My iPod Classic of 15 years has come to the end of its life. For the last few years I haven’t been able to add music because Apple no longer supports it. But what do I replace it with? I don’t want to throw away my Bose SoundDock. All I need is something to play music, not turn the kettle on or run the vacuum around the house or call Australia! Just something simple, if that’s possible. What do you suggest? Ron Cushing A Although it can indeed call Australia and operate smart appliances, the seventh-generation iPod touch (£199 from Apple www.snipca.com/36395, pictured) is also an excellent music player. You can stream music to it live from internet services over your home Wi-Fi, or transfer files from a Mac…

SMART SPEAKER | £90 from Google www.snipca.com/36475 Good egg Having renamed its Home Mini smart speaker the Nest Mini, Google has replaced the medium-sized Google Home with the Nest… Audio. Presumably, market research showed that Google Home users kept forgetting that it was an audio device, and would just stare at it, trying to remember why it was in their house. It was pretty odd-looking, to be fair, with a white plastic top sliced off at a jaunty angle. The Nest Audio’s shape is simpler: the base is a rounded rectangle, and it extrudes upwards before tapering off at the top. It’s covered in a durable monotone fabric (in chalk or charcoal), through which a row of four LEDs shines at the front to let you know it’s active. As…

Hello, I’d like to thank you for continuing to read Computeractive during this difficult year. It’s been an unsettling time for everyone, but I’m glad we could provide a semblance of normality. Getting to the shops has been tricky during the regional and national lockdowns, so it didn’t surprise me that we saw a rise in people subscribing to Computeractive. It must have been a comfort to know you could rely on the magazine dropping through your letterbox once a fortnight. A big thank you to everyone who signed up. As I write this, we’ve just entered a second national lockdown, with many nonessential shops closing. We’re already seeing another rise in subscriptions, so we’re putting additional effort into our deliveries to make sure you get your copy on time…

iOS Fill in forms on your iPad without typing The latest release of iPadOS runs on every iPad Pro, iPad Mini 4 (2015 and later), iPad Air 2 (2014 and later), and all standard iPads released since 2017. If you haven’t yet upgraded, we’d recommend checking whether it’s available on your device. To do so, open Settings and tap General, followed by Software Update. If an update is available, tap ‘Download and Install’. iPadOS 14 doesn’t support the iOS App Library, which lets you remove rarely used apps from the home screen and store them in the App Library, rather than deleting them (see ‘Phone and Tablet Tips’, Issue 591). We think this is a missed opportunity, but it does introduce the Scribble feature, which may revolutionise how people can…

WINDOWS 10 Change your monitor’s refresh rate The October Update adds a new feature to the Settings app, letting you change your monitor’s refresh rate. Measured in Hertz (Hz), this determines how many times your display updates (or refreshes) every second – a refresh rate of 60Hz means it updates 60 times every second. Games in particular benefit from high refresh rates, resulting in smoother action. In general, it’s best to set the refresh rate to the highest setting available (Windows will limit this depending on what your monitor is capable of). Of course, if you experience problems running a higher refresh rate – such as a flickering display (though this is only usually a problem with old CRT monitors) you can change it back to what it was. To…

What are they? Adobe’s new photo-editing technology for changing ages and expressions in images. With just a few clicks you can make someone 30 years older, change where they’re looking, or turn a sneer into a smile. It’s the standout feature in Photoshop 22, released in October. How does it work? Using machine learning – a form of artificial intelligence (AI) in which software learns from its mistakes to make better predictions and produce more accurate results. More specifically, it uses generative adversarial networks (GANs), which would take us several issues to explain fully. Its key purpose is to generate digital data from nothing. In particular, it has mastered the ability to create fake photographs of what look like real people. See that woman below, for example? Yes. What about…

Back in the early days of the internet, few browsers offered tabs. If you wanted more than one web page open you’d have to open multiple browser windows and clumsily switch from one to another. Introduced by Opera and Firefox at the turn of the 21st century, tabs allow you to switch quickly and easily between several web pages, all neatly contained within the same browser window. However, there is a downside: having too many tabs open can make it hard to find the one you’re looking for and can eat into your PC’s resources, making it run slowly. Thanks to some great new features, Edge and Chrome help you manage your tabs more efficiently – here we look at some of the best. Organise tabs into groups If you…

3G/4G/5G Technologies that deliver faster mobile broadband. 4K Video with a resolution of at least 3840x2160 pixels. 720p/1080p Common types of high-definition video of 1280x720, and 1920x1080 respectively. 802.11ax Wi-Fi standard with speeds up to 10 times faster than 802.11ac. Also called Wi-Fi 6. Add-on A program that adds extra features to your browser. Adobe RGB A wider colour space than sRGB. Ambient IQ Google technology that enhances sound depending on your environment. Augmented reality Lets you view the real world on a screen and add elements from the digital world. Bandwidth A measure of how much data can be transferred through a connection at one time. Beta A version of software that’s being tested. Binned Categorising processors and graphics cards based on their performance. Blue light Light given off…

More than a quarter of threats dealt with by the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) in the past 12 months were criminals or nation states trying to exploit the coronavirus pandemic. In one “despicable” attack in July it worked with allies to prevent Russian spies stealing details of research into a vaccine. The NCSC revealed the scale of these attacks in its annual report, covering the period from September 2019 to August 2020. There were 723 incidents of all kinds, nearly 10 per cent more than in the previous period. Almost 200 of these were related to the pandemic. The report said that protecting the NHS and health-related research has been a priority. It has scanned more than one million NHS IP addresses to look for vulnerabilities that hackers…

Microsoft’s Edge browser has had its biggest monthly jump in market share since it relaunched in January. Figures from NetMarketShare show that during October Edge’s market share rose from 8.84 to 10.22 per cent – the first time this year that it has increased by more than one per cent. This coincided with Chrome use decreasing from 69.94 to 69.25 per cent. Microsoft will see the figures as a further sign that users like the new Edge, though one reason for the sharp increase might be that the browser was promoted in a taskbar alert as part of the October 2020 Update (version 20H2). The update is also the first version of Windows 10 to come with the new Edge loaded as the default browser. The company spent 2019 rebuilding…

LEAD CASE Shouldn’t a smart TV last longer than two years? Q In November 2018 I bought a Samsung Series 7 smart TV (pictured) from Argos for £453. Over the months, dark patches developed, which now cover around 50 per cent of the screen. Neither Argos nor Samsung will help, but surely it should last longer than two years? Duncan Walker A Yes, we think it should too. We can’t say with certainty what the problem is, but it sounds like dead or stuck pixels. Sometimes one or two stuck pixels can be fixed manually, but any more than that and the whole screen usually needs replacing. But manufacturers don’t always accept that one or two stuck pixels count as inherent faults – some will help you only if there…

Computeractive reader John Drakeford got in touch to ask how he can preserve his family research – currently stored on Ancestry – for future generations to access. He’d like to create a local copy on a USB stick, and store another copy online. However, while Ancestry lets him download his research in the standard GEDCOM format, it doesn’t take photos. He wanted to know if there’s a solution. Download your Ancestry tree In John’s case, the easiest way to export his tree – including all photos – is to buy Family Tree Maker 2019 (£79.95, mackiev.com/ftm) or RootsMagic (£19.95, www.rootsmagic.co.uk). As RootsMagic is by far the cheaper option, we’ll focus on that. After installing the program, open it and create a new file. Click Tools, File Options, Ancestry and set…

I’m terrible at making wholesale changes to my daily routine. That 6am run never really took off (turns out it’s both cold and dark at that time), and the less said the better about my promise to always tidy up after myself. Instead, I’ve realised making small changes is the way to go – and in the digital world, that’s exactly what Ultimate Windows Tweaker (UWT) lets me do. Its design might be a little chaotic (lots of settings spread over multiple sections and tabs), but if you know where to look it can make a big difference to your desktop. To download it, go to www.snipca.com/36481, then scroll to near the bottom of the page and click the dark-blue Download button. I know I’m in the minority but I…

RELEVANT TO PCs, laptops, smartphones, tablets What does it do? Storage keeps information permanently, unlike memory (RAM), which only holds it while you work. The common types are hard drives and flash memory. How does it work? A hard drive consists of one or more metal platters accessed by an arm, like a record on a record player, but instead of grooves, data is stored as magnetised areas. The arm has to move to the area required. Flash memory consists of chips that are like RAM but retain data. Flash memory is built into phones and tablets and is the basis of solid-state drives (SSDs). What are the specs? The SATA III interface in PCs has a bandwidth of 6 gigabits per second (6Gbps), enabling about 600 megabytes to be…

What is it? In places that aren’t cabled for internet access, one solution is satellites for transmitting TV/communications signals. What does it do? Pioneered by companies like HughesNet, satellite internet services transmit data in radio signals to and from a satellite. SpaceX, founded by Tesla’s Elon Musk, is building an array of solar-powered low-orbit satellites called Starlink (pictured). A beta test programme uses a Sky-like dish, installed anywhere with a clear view, and promises speeds of 50 to 150Mbps, comparable to a decent UK landline. It costs $499 (£385 without VAT) up front plus $99 (£76) per month. What’s the catch? Tests put speeds at 10 to 60Mbps download and 5-18Mbps upload. Starlink must launch thousands more satellites and there are also concerns about interference. So can I do without…

Weather Widget Free* iOS www.snipca.com/36413 Apple’s iOS 14 has a weather widget built in, but we prefer the more comprehensive forecast provided by this alternative app. You can choose from a wide range of styles, and display a small square widget, which fits neatly among your app icons, a wide widget or a large square on your home screen (see screenshot), which is great for serious weather watchers. Adobe Illustrator Free* iOS www.snipca.com/36414 Adobe is gradually releasing its PC desktop programs to iPad. The latest to arrive is Illustrator, which is one of the best-known graphic-design tools for Windows and macOS. Although the app is free to download you’ll need to pay a £9.99 monthly subscription if you don’t have Adobe’s Creative Cloud membership. If that’s too pricey, check out…

LIBREOFFICE WRITER Change the background colour of documents If you find the bright white background of documents in Writer a little too dazzling, you can change them to light grey (or any colour of your choice). Within Writer, open the Tools menu, then select Options. Open the LibreOffice section in the left-hand sidebar, then select Application Colours. On the right side of the window, click the dropdown menu next to ‘Document background, then choose the colour you want and click OK (we opted for ‘Light Grey 4’ – see screenshot). The background in Writer will now refresh to display the colour you chose. This change will also be replicated across other LibreOffice tools (Calc, Draw, Base and so on). It also only applies to documents viewed with the program on…

From TV programmes and films to live sports and the latest 3D games, everything is being streamed these days. The old TV schedules are becoming less important as more people than ever get their entertainment fix via the internet. And because of Covid lockdown restrictions, even big-budget movies are getting released on streaming services rather than at your local cinema. A streaming stick lets you enjoy all this and more on your TV – and there are plenty to choose from. To satisfy this increased demand now we’re all spending more time at home, a wide choice of new sticks has hit the market over the past few weeks with prices ranging from as little as £25 right up to £199. But which device best suits your needs and streams…

Where’s my Windows update? Q My Windows 10 PC tells me it’s up to date, with version 2004 and operating system build 19041.508. However, having read the story in Issue 590’s News section (page 7) I’m wondering why I appear to be missing the mentioned KB4576754 update? How does one even find these numbers? They don’t seem to be locatable and not in any information given in the Windows 10 System page. Even though I believe I am up to date, my computer still operates relatively slowly – especially at start-up. Any advice or comments? Richard Avery A The KB4576754 update is in effect an enforced upgrade to the new Chromium-based Edge browser. As such, it affects only those who up to now have stuck with the old Edge. In…

Users running version 1903 (May 2019 Update) of Windows 10 will soon be automatically moved on to a more recent version. This process was expected to begin in the summer but was pushed back, probably because Microsoft wanted to avoid further disruption on top of the coronavirus pandemic. Microsoft will stop supporting version 1903 on 8 December, so most computers should be updated before then. This is in line with the company’s policy of supporting feature updates for 18 months. Which version of Windows 10 you’ll be updated to will depend on your computer’s specifications. Microsoft will check how smoothly your PC can run version 20H2 (October 2020 Update), or 2004 (May 2020 Update). If it thinks your computer isn’t ready, it will instead update to version 1909 (November 2019…

REMOVE LARGE FILES FASTER IN WHATSAPP WhatsApp has added new options for removing photos and videos that are taking up too much space. It now groups files into those that are larger than 5MB or have been sent to other members many times. To see these options, open WhatsApp then tap Settings at the bottom right. Tap ‘Storage and Data’, then Manage Storage. SUBSCRIBE TO APPLE SERVICES FOR £14.95 Apple has launched a monthly subscription that lets you use up to six of its services. Called Apple One, it comes in three plans: Individual, Family and Premium. Individual (£14.95) offers Apple Music, Apple TV+, Apple Arcade and 50GB iCloud storage. Family (£19.95) lets five other people use these services and increases storage to 200GB. Premium (£29.95) adds Apple News+ and…

Bank statements, legal contracts and tax returns were among 75,000 files recovered from 100 USB sticks and drives bought by security researchers on eBay. A team from Abertay University in Dundee used specialist software USB Write Blocker (www.snipca.com/36564) to retrieve files that the sellers thought they had deleted. Only 32 of the devices had been wiped properly. Partial files were recovered from 26 drives, while all the files were extracted from the remaining 42 devices. Many of the files contained usernames and passwords that criminals could have used to access accounts. None of the drives contained malware, making them safe for buyers to use. Professor Karen Renaud, from Abertay’s Division of Cybersecurity, hopes the research will remind people of the importance of erasing files fully before selling devices. “This is…

WATCH OUT FOR… Fake ‘Update Word’ malware emails What’s the threat? Hackers are trying to infect your computer with the Emotet malware by sending emails that urge you to update Microsoft Word. The email, which claims to be from Windows Update, states that you need to update Word in order to open a document that’s attached. These emails don’t mention updating Word in the subject line. Instead, they typically use more newsworthy information, particularly on COVID-19, or alerts about invoices you have to pay. When you open the email you’ll see this message: “Some apps need to be updated. These programs need to be upgrade because they aren’t compatible with this file format. * Microsoft Word. You need to click Enable Editing and then click Enable Content.” The word “upgrade”…

Computeractive reader Jim Abernethy is finally cooking again after the door fell off his AEG oven (see Issue 592), but fixing it took longer than it should have done. He couldn’t remember where he bought the cooker, so rather than asking the retailer for a refund (under the Consumer Rights Act), he had to use AEG’s five-year warranty. But he was having problems getting hold of the company. He tried ringing, but this only went to a recorded message advising him to ring another number and leave a voicemail message. He was unable to do this. We did manage to leave a message after taking on his case, but we never heard back from AEG. Instead we got in touch with AEG through their PR company and asked a customer-support…

VIDEO EDITOR Shotcut 20.10 www.snipca.com/36554 What you need: Windows 7, 8.1 or 10 DaVinci Resolve is a powerful video editor (see our Workshop on page 38), but it does involve a steep learning curve and, even on powerful computers, can run slowly at times. Shotcut is a far less demanding editor. The installation file measures just 77MB compared to Resolve’s 1.7GB, and it runs well even on low-powered PCs. To download Shotcut, go to the link above and click either of the Windows Installer links. In previous versions, if you zoomed in on the Timeline view at the bottom, you’d often lose the playhead position (the point at which you paused the clip that you’re editing), leaving you to scroll left and right to locate it. Shotcut now makes it…

WARNING: JUNK AHEAD Junk offender: Microsoft Office web apps I like to keep Windows 10 free from Microsoft junk – unwanted preinstalled apps, Start menu adverts, and so on. So, imagine my surprise when I booted up one of my test PCs (which has a clean copy of Windows 10 and nothing else), only to discover its Start menu was full of Microsoft Office programs. I’ve nothing against Office, but I’d never installed it on this PC. What was it doing there? Looking for answers, I checked under Settings, then Apps and, sure enough, I found recently installed entries for Word, Excel, Outlook and PowerPoint (see screenshot 1). However, clicking one of the new Start menu icons didn’t open the relevant program. Instead, it launched Microsoft’s Edge browser and took…

PC | £2,000 from Scan www.snipca.com/36382 Game for anything Like London house prices, when you think the performance of graphics cards has got so ridiculous that it’ll have to calm down a bit now, it goes up another 30 per cent. This is the first PC we’ve seen with the new Nvidia RTX 3080 GPU, and that’s the kind of increase in frame rates we saw with the previous top-of-the-range RTX 2080 Ti. The RTX 3080 isn’t even the highest option, sitting below the 3090. That’s reflected in the 3080’s price, with versions comparable to this one starting at a surprisingly reasonable £700, stretching upwards for binned units (selected for maximum performance) with advanced cooling. “This is an excellent all-round heavy-duty PC that’s suitable for extreme gaming” Seen through the…

SMART WATCH | From £395 Amazon www.snipca.com/36402 Round the clock On paper, the big difference between this and the Apple Watch is that it’s designed for use with Android phones. In reality, the big difference is that it looks like a watch. Rather than a rectangular screen, Samsung has started with a traditional round face and made the display to fit. Slimmer but broader than its predecessor, the Galaxy Watch 3 – only the second version, confusingly – is really quite pretty, featuring a rotating bezel to select options. At 400 quid, it’s slightly pricier than Apple’s £379 starting point (see our review, Issue 592, page 28), but options like a larger size (as tested here) and 4G data (requiring a contract with EE or Vodafone) add only small amounts…

LAPTOP Honor MagicBook 14 £550 from www.snipca.com/34688 Tested Issue 580 Using an AMD Ryzen 3500U processor, this lightweight metal laptop beat Microsoft’s Surface Laptop 3 with Intel’s i7-1065G7 in our tests. The 14in Full HD screen lacks colour accuracy but looks decent. For the money, it’s a great buy. ALTERNATIVE Dell XPS 13 New Intel CPUs and a taller screen make this a more powerful, all-round slim notebook, although prices now start at a steep £1,600 from www.snipca.com/35349 ANDROID TABLET Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite £349 from www.snipca.com/35795 Tested Issue 582 Competing with Apple’s cheapest 10.2in iPad, this slim aluminium tablet comes with an S Pen stylus and a generous 64GB of storage at a reasonable price. It’s less powerful, but a great buy if you prefer Android. ALTERNATIVE Amazon…

What you need: Microsoft Money Time required: 60 minutes (or longer if you have multiple accounts) For years, Microsoft Money (pictured right) was the world’s best personal finance software. It had an attractive interface, was easy to use, and had loads of features. First released in 1991, it steadily gained in popularity as its tools and abilities were enhanced, right through to the release of Money Plus in 2007. However, in spring 2010 Microsoft released Money Plus Sunset Deluxe which, while it maintained many of the core features, dropped some of the most attractive elements, including automatic statement downloads and online bill payments. Support was also limited to ‘online self-help’, rather than being actively supported and developed by Microsoft itself. That decision frustrated millions of users, who couldn’t understand why…

TIP OF THE FORTNIGHT See when Num, Caps and Scroll Lock are on In response to William Lyons’ query in Problems Solved in Issue 590, page 68 (‘Can I disable Num Lock?’), I wouldn’t recommend removing key tops to disable certain toggle keys. If the toggle key starts in the wrong state, it might be tricky to flip it back. I had this kind of difficulty knowing the state of Num Lock, Caps Lock and Scroll Lock on my laptop. My solution was a small program called Keyboard LEDs (https://keyboard-leds.com). It either shows you permanently whether these Lock keys are activated, or can show you when they are on but remain hidden when they are off. You can move its display anywhere on your screen, or set it so that…

Tile Free* Android www.snipca.com/36404 iOS www.snipca.com/36405 If you’ve attached a Tile fob to your keys so you can find them using your phone, you can also use the system in reverse to locate a missing phone. Pressing the button on the fob makes your phone ring. If you’ve installed the Tile app on more than one phone, you can also use it to locate a missing phone using the on-screen map. Best for Locating more than just your phone Find my Device Free Android www.snipca.com/36403 Google’s free app for locating online Android devices works with more than just phones and tablets: it can also find lost Pixel earbuds. As with all of the apps featured here, it requires an active Wi-Fi or mobile connection to display your missing gadget on…

Share your club’s Gmail account Gmail is ideal for communicating with your club members – you can access your emails from any computer, and with 15GB of free storage you’re unlikely to run out of storage space. You may also want to share your club email account with other members, allowing them to read and send emails on behalf of your organisation. One option is to simply share your club’s Gmail password, however this will also give people access to its associated Google account. This means that once they’ve logged in, there’s nothing to stop others viewing, editing and deleting anything in there. Also, their search history and any pages they visit while logged in will be recorded to the account. And if they forget they’re logged in, they may…

As a magazine editor, I really should know how to write proper. But as you just read, I sometimes fall short. All wordsmiths need a little help. Even Shakespeare struggled from time to time. A recently discovered first draft of Hamlet contains the line: “To do this thing or maybe not to do it - yeah but, no but, what was the question again?”. Thankfully he realised that sounded like a load of old Yoricks. Sadly there’s no option to ‘Avoid the kind of befuddling jargon used by Microsoft’ With no ye olde internet to help him, the Bard of Avon had to rely on his wit, erudition and inspiration. I have no such excuse. There are loads of online tools designed to polish your writing, the most famous being…