How to Move your iCloud and Apple Photos to Google Photos

A friend writes - “Any suggestions on how to combine the Google photo library with iPhoto. Which is a better platform for keeping the photos? Google seems to be very handy in sorting and searching. Would love to know your views”

I am a big fan of Google Photos for several reasons - you get unlimited storage space, Google is pretty good at visual image search and you can have collaborative photo albums where multiple people can upload to a common folder.

Transfer Photos from Apple iCloud / Mac to Google Photos

If you would like to copy your photos from iCloud / Apple Photos to Google Photos, there are no browser plugins or software that can automate this - you’ll have to manually transfer the picture library from Apple to Google Photos. Luckily, that migration process isn’t difficult either.
It is a two-step process - you download the photos from iPhoto and iPad to your computer via iCloud and then put them on to the Google Cloud. Let’s see how:

Step 1: Download Photos from iCloud

Via Web Browser

ou may directly go to the icloud.com/photos website, select your photos and then click the download button to save them from the iCloud library to your Windows PC or Mac.

On Windows PC

If you have photos on your iPhone or iPad that are getting backed up on iCloud, you can copy them to your Windows PC with iCloud for Windows.
Inside iCloud, sign-in with your Apple ID, then open the File Explorer window, click on iCloud Photos under Quick Access and then choose Download photos and videos.

On Apple Mac OS

Open the Apple Photos app on your Mac and press ^1 (Ctrl+1) to switch to the main Photo view that has a list of all pictures that are available in your iPhoto library.
Select one or more photos, then go to the File menu and choose Export to download pictures from Apple Photos to another folder on your desktop.




For the export options, you may stick to the default values but do check the “Include Location Information” option. This will help Google group your photos by location.
Also, if you aren’t seeing all your iPhone photos inside Mac, go to Preferences inside the Photos app and make sure that the Download originals to this Mac option is checked under the iCloud Photos section.

Step 2 - Upload Photos to Google Photos

Once you have saved the photos that you wish to transfer to your local drive, you need to send them to Google Photos and there are two ways to go about it.

Upload Photos via Web Browser

Open Google Chrome, or any other web browser, and go to photos.google.com. Simply drag the photos folder from your desktop to the Google Photos website and they’ll be uploaded in sequence.
The browser should remain open and your Internet connection should be working for the upload to happen in the background.

Upload Photos via Google App

If you have a large number of photos to upload from your Windows PC or Mac to the Google Photos library, it is recommended that you use Google’s Backup and Sync tool that is available for both Windows and Mac OS.

The Best Online Tools To Know Everything About a Website

How do I contact the owner of a website? Where is a particular website hosted? What other websites are hosted on that same server? Is the site using WordPress or Gatsby? Which ad networks are they using to monetize a site? Is my site accessible from China?
Here are some of the most useful online tools that will help you know every single detail of any website.

• just-ping.com — Use Just Ping to determine if a particular website is accessible from other countries. Just Ping has monitoring servers across the world including Turkey, Egypt, and China so if the ping results say 100% Packet Loss, most likely the site is inaccessible from that region.
• who.is — If you like to know the contact address, email and phone number of the website owner, this free whois lookup service will help. This is a universal lookup service meaning it can simultaneously query the whois database of all popular domain registrars.
• whoishostingthis.com — Enter the URL of any website and this online service will show you the name of the company where that website is hosted. This may come handy if you need the contact information of the web hosting provider for writing a DMCA Notice or if you are looking to switch web hosts.
• chillingeffects.org — When there’s a copyright-related complaint against a website, a copy of that letter is archived in the Chilling Effects database. Anyone can query this public database to know about all the copyright infringement complaints against a particular website.
• myip.ms — MyIP.ms offers a comprehensive report of any website or I.P. Address. You get to know about the hosting provider, the physical location of a website, the IP Address change history of a website and the DNS information. Netcraft also offers similar reports.
• reversewhois.com — The reverse whois lookup will help you determine other websites of someone. You can search the whois database by the email address or name of the domain registrant.
• builtwith.com — Use BuiltWith to know the technology stack of any website. It helps you figure out the mail service provider of a domain, the advertising partners, the tracking widgets that are installed on a website and whether the site is using any CDN like Amazon S3 or Google Cloud. See example.
• ssllabs.com - The certificate diagnostics tool will verify your site’s SSL certificate and ensure that it is correctly installed, trusted and does not show errors to any of your site visitors.
• semrush.com — If you wish to analyze your competitor’s website, this is the tool to go with. SEM Rush will help you figure what organic keywords are people using to find a website, what is the site’s traffic and which are the competing websites.
• dnsmap.io — When you buy a new domain or switch from one host to another, the DNS records for the domain changes and it may take a while to propagate these changes worldwide. The tool checks the DNS records from various geographic locations and it can check your domain’s A, CNAME, TXT and MX records. whatsmydns.net is also a good alternative.
• toolbox.googleapps.com — If email messages, including those sent via Mail Merge, from your domain are not reaching the recipient’s mailbox, use this Google tool to confirm that DMARC, DKIM and SPF records are properly configured for your domain.
• browserstack.com - Check your website’s responsive design on multiple desktops, tables, iOS and Android phones running different versions of operating systems.
• screenshot.guru - If a website is inaccessible, use Screenshot Guru, hosted on the Google Cloud, to confirm if the website is down or not.
• thinkwithgoogle.com - A mobile speed tool developed by Google that will help you determine how fast your websites will load on mobile phones on 3G and 4G network. You can also compare your mobile speed score with other websites.
• testmysite.io - A simple site testing tool from Netlify that will measure and rank your site’s loading time from different regions around the world.
• developers.google.com — Find the Page Speed score of any website on both desktop and mobile devices. The higher this number, the better. The Google tool also offers suggestions on how the score can be improved.
• httparchive.org — The HTTP Archive is a repository of all performance-related metrics for a website. It keeps a record of the size of pages, their average load time and the number of failed requests (missing resources) over time.
• Website Monitor - Use this open-source Google Sheets based website monitoring tool to get alerts when your domain goes down or is inaccessible.
• Flush DNS - Use this tool to flush the Google DNS cache for a domain. If you changed the DNS servers for your domain, by changing registrars or DNS hosting in the last few days, flush your main domain name first before you flush any subdomains. OpenDNS also has a web tool for refreshing the DNS cache.
• DomainTools - The tool monitors one or more web domains and sends email alerts when the domain is expiring, the domain gets renewed, the nameservers change or when the registrant information is updated for the domain.

Tech Courses Gone Free! Make the most of your time at home

   We are living in extraordinary times, locked down and trying to work from home. This could also be a good time to level up your tech skills and learn something new that could help in the future when things get normal again.

Learn Tech While You #StayAtHome

To help you make the most of your time, I have curated a list of premium video courses that have gone completely free temporarily during the Coronavirus crisis.

1. Pluralsight is among the world’s best online training platforms producing video screencasts around software development, machine learning and new technologies that are in demand. They have made their entire library free for the month of April and you don’t even need a credit card to register an account. Learn more.

Recommended: Python for Data Analysts

2. I am a fan of Udemy and some of the programming skills I have learned in through recent years are through Udemy. The courses are inexpensive and the teachers that have high-rating are actually very good. Udemy just made over 180 top courses for beginners free and these aren’t just limited to tech. Learn more.

Recommended: Amazon Web Services - Zero to Hero

3. Coursera helps you build tech skills with courses developed in collaboration universities and tech companies like Google and Amazon. They have made a selection of online courses free for the next few months and you can even get a certificate after course completion. Learn more.

Recommended: Machine Learning for Business Professionals

4. Udacity offers paid nanodegree programs in collaboration with Google for web and app developers. The programs are oriented towards beginners as well as advanced users. They have made all premium nanodegree programs free for one month. Learn more.

Recommended: Become an Android Developer

5. Google-owned Qwiklabs platform offers self-paced exercises for learning everything about Google Cloud, GSuite and Amazon Web Services. Unlike other video courses where you only watch screencasts , Qwiklabs offers you practical hands-on training so you can actually log into the console and follow along. Free for one month. Learn more

More Learning Resources for Stay@Home Workers

Here’s a list of other companies that are offering freebies and discounts amid the Coronavirus crisis:

• This Google Sheet curates a list of companies that are offering free or discounted products during the COVID-19 crisis.
• MOZ Academy offers free SEO training using the code wegotthis - valid until May 31.
• Nikon School is now streaming all their online photography courses for free for the entire month of April.
• Zoho offers a suite of productivity tools for remote workers and they are completely free for the next few months.
• LinkedIn Learning is offering a video course on remote working and it covers topics like time management to managing virtual teams.
• This Reddit offers a list of things you can do while you are at home.
• Audible is offering audiobooks that you can listen in the browser without having to sign-in with your Amazon account.
• Automate the Boring Stuff, the best selling video course on learning Python is free until April 7.
• Scribd has offered their entire catalog of ebooks, magazines and audiobooks free for 30 days using this special link.
• YouTube has launched a micro portal - Learn@Home - that curates the best YouTube channels for learning science and maths.

Aarogya Setu - How India's COVID-19 Contact Tracing App Works

The Government of India has developed a mobile tracker app - Aarogya Setu - as part of their efforts to contain the spread of Coronavirus in this country of 1.3 billion people. The app is available for both iPhone and Android phones.
The Aarogya Setu app has already gone viral in India with more than a million downloads in a single day.
The app has three parts:

1. It contains a chat bot that guides you through a self-assessment test if you exhibit any COVID-19 symptoms.
2. The app provides quick access to emergency phone numbers of health centers that are dealing with COVID-19 patients.
3. The app will automatically alert you if you ever come near (or have crossed paths earlier) to a person who has tested COVID-19 positive.

Contact Tracing for COVID-19 - How the app works?

The proximity alert feature in Aarogya Setu is the reason why people are so interested in this app but how does this work?
This morning, a person who returned from Dubai about two weeks ago, tested positive for Coronavirus and the authorities have taken him to the hospital. Their residence is less than a mile from our home and I was expecting some sort of alert in the tracker app but none so far.
So I dug a bit deeper into how the app works and here’s what I found:
When a user installs the app, it uses Bluetooth to detect any nearby phones that could also be running the Aaryogya Setu app. While the actual algorithm is a secret, the app likely keeps a record of all devices that have ever been near to you. If the owner of any of these nearby phones is later found to be infected, the app will alert you.
Thus more and more people have to install the app, with Bluetooth and location turned on, for the proximity alerts to really work.
I am not aware of the internal working of the app but I think it would have been even more effective if it made use of GPS data as well. Let me explain.
When the app is continuously scanning the location of its users, it has a fairly accurate overview of who has been where in recent days. If a COVID-19 positive case is detected, his path can be traced and others users who have crossed through those geographic regions can be alerted though the app.

How to Sell Digital Products Online with Google Drive and PayPal

The web has made it incredibly easy for anyone to sell digital products directly to customers through websites, social media, and email newsletters. You can sell PDF ebooks, event tickets, MP3 music, photos, gift cards, software apps, license keys, coupon codes, website templates, fonts, graphics, video courses, and many more downloadable files.
While there are quite a few e-commerce platforms that help you sell digital products - Gumroad, E-junkie, Paddle, FastSpring, Shopify, Instamojo and WooCommerce, to name a few,  here’s a do-it-yourself solution that will help you build your own online digital store in under 5 minutes using PayPal and your Google account.

Sell Digital Goods - The Workflow

Before we get into the implementation, here’s an overview of how the payment and digital delivery workflow works.

1. Embed the “Buy Now” buttons into your website or blog.
2. The buyer clicks the checkout button, enters their credit card details and completes the payment. The customer stays on your site and isn’t redirected anywhere to complete the purchase.
3. The order is delivered to the customer from your Gmail in a personalized email message. You can also attach a tax invoice in the confirmation email.

Sell Digital Downloads with PayPal and Google Drive

he workflow uses Google Drive for securely hosting files, PayPal for processing payments, Google Sheets for generating professional PDF invoices and Gmail for delivering the order to the buyer as file attachments.
There are no limitations on the size of files or the number of products that you can sell. There are no bandwidth or storage restrictions. There’s no transaction fee except for the payment processing fees that are charged directly by PayPal and Stripe.