Common Devices

 In this presentation, we'll take a look at what's known as a Thin Client which refers to a lightweight computer. Now that does not mean its physical weight. It means that it doesn't have a lot in terms of resources, nor would it have a lot in terms of software running on that system. But what you can do with these lightweight computers is to establish a remote connection to a server. [Video description begins] He points to three computer screens connected to a server. [Video description ends] And on that server, you would find an application that is running, that the clients need to use but it's the server that actually runs the application and it handles most of the processing.

 

So if for example, you have a very demanding application that the client systems really just can't handle then you can install it on the server. In most cases servers have much more robust configurations, they can handle the workload. So you allow the client systems to simply remotely connect to the server and they run the application remotely. So this is ideal for environments where maintenance of your client systems, maybe, is a little more minimal. Now that's not to suggest that they are ignored entirely. But going back to that very demanding application, the scenario typically is that the clients just aren't up to the task. They don't have the resources to run this application effectively, but the server does. So if it's running on the server, all they need to do is establish this remote connection and they don't need any additional resources because it's the server that's running it.

 

So this can help to extend the lifespan of those client systems. They don't need to be upgraded just to run this application. Not only is the application only installed on the server, it only needs to be maintained on the server. So if, for example, you get an upgrade to the application it's not installed on the client systems. So let's say you have 100 clients, you don't need to go to those 100 clients and update the application. You only need to do it on the server, then everyone's connection to that server sees the updated application. So this can actually save a lot in terms of licensing, not to mention the administrative overhead that you save because you don't have to update the application across 100 client systems. So the key characteristics of a thin client still include the hardware and usually, of course, an operating system as well. But they tend to just be a little simpler in terms of their resource configuration. Really all they need is this remote connection software.

 

Now that said, I don't think you'll find a lot of environments that are running 100% remote connections. There is probably still some kind of local software. But with respect to the more demanding applications, they just don't need to be on the client's. They can be run from the servers. So again, you just need some kind of remote connection software on the client that allows it to make the connection to the server and run the application remotely. Now if it's a Windows environment then you do need at least one system running Windows Server as its operating system and the service is known as Windows Terminal Services. Although, you'd have to go back quite a ways for it to actually be called that. I think around Windows Server 2000, maybe 2003. Ever since then it's been known as Remote Desktop Services. And this is an inherent service that is available on any Windows Server. So you don't have to purchase any specific software to configure the service, it's available by default. So then of course you install the applications on the server.

 

Now that really can be anything. It can be the standard Microsoft Office applications such as Excel, PowerPoint, and Word. It could be a shared database application, it could be any kind of custom line of business application. [Video description begins] Line Of Business is abbreviated as LOB. [Video description ends] Honestly it really doesn't matter what the application is. But there are some applications that may not support remote desktop configuration. So you would have to investigate a little bit, but just about anything would these days. So once you have the applications installed on the server, then the client simply uses its software that is actually included with the Windows operating system. And it's actually called Remote Desktop Connection. So you simply launch that, you specify the server that you want to connect to, and typically you need a set of credentials, a username and password. But once you have that, then you just launch the application on the server and you run it from the server. You see it on your desktop, but it's actually running on the server.

 

Now if it's a Linux environment, of course, you still have to install your choice of Linux operating system. And then you also have to install the terminal server software. Then install your applications, again, whatever they might be, maybe it's file-sharing software, which is Samba in Linux. OpenOffice, which is sort of a open-source version of Microsoft Office, and Rdesktop allows Linux systems to connect to Windows systems. So again, install whatever you want in terms of applications. And then, on the client side, because Linux is open source, there are many clients available. RealVNC and Team Viewer are just two examples, but there would be several clients available. But it's the same type of structure. The client just launches that software to establish a connection to the server, then they run the application from the server. And that whole architecture again just allows the servers to bear the workload of those more demanding applications so that clients really don't have to continually upgrade and continually have more resources available to them to access those more demanding applications.

 

In the first presentation of this course, we discussed the thin client. So in this presentation, we'll take a look at essentially its exact opposite, the Thick Client. And with a thick client, essentially all processing is performed locally. Meaning that you are running the applications that you need directly from your own computer. Now typically this means that you will have more features available to your users because in some cases, there may be scenarios where running an application remotely may not support a particular feature or aspect of that application. But with local installations, you typically can run everything. And you will probably still have servers, of course, but they'll be used primarily for data storage, not running the applications.

 

Now as such, the applications do need to be installed and maintained locally on all of your systems. So this does create more administrative overhead. It might involve more licensing. But you do have that application installed locally, therefore, it's always available to the client regardless of any kind of connectivity to the network. In the thin client scenario, you effectively need to be connected to the network to access the server to run the application. With a thick client, quite simply, you don't. You can be anywhere. So if for example you have a laptop and you travel a lot, you can run that application regardless of being connected to the network because you have it locally installed on that system.

 

So the key benefits, then, of thick clients include greater flexibility. Again, you can run the application whenever you want, wherever you want. Your servers may not have to be quite as robust if they are only storing data. The clients can, again, work offline. They do not need to be connected to the network. The servers might have greater capacity because, again, now they're only storing data for the most part. And again, the availability of the application is 100%. No matter where you are, as long as you have your computer, you can run the application regardless of whether or not you have connectivity to your network. And as far as the installation and configuration is concerned, you can consider this to be a fairly standard installation and configuration of the operating system and the applications that you need.

 

And you do still have to make sure that you have adequate resources available locally on that system to run those applications, but that's usually not a problem these days. Most systems have more than enough in terms of the resources to run most applications locally. So in most cases you would probably find a thick client installation in most environments. But there still might be specific situations where it's just preferable to run an application remotely from a server. So it's not uncommon at all to find both, a thick client that is also running the thin client software for those specific applications. Now you will still need network connections because, of course, you still have to get to the servers to access the data in most cases. Just the files that you are working on will generally reside on a server, but you don't need to access the servers to run the application.

 

So again, typically, you'll find a little bit of both in many environments. But ultimately, if you have a thick client, then all of the software is available locally. That is certainly easier from the user's perspective, but a little more administrative overhead from the maintenance side of things. Because again, you do have to install that software locally on all of your clients and you have to maintain it as well. So this is where sometimes the thin client and the single installation on the server might be preferable. But ultimately, that's up to the organization.

 

In this demonstration, we'll take a look at how you can set up your desktop environment and configure some of your basic devices. And of course, in this particular example I am using a Windows 10 computer. So as such, you can do most of this using what's known as the Windows Settings App. Now if you have an earlier version of Windows, such as Windows 7, then almost all of these same settings can be accessed through the Control Panel. There really isn't a whole lot that's different between the Settings app and the Control Panel, with the exception of how it's accessed and how you configure it. The Windows Settings app is a little more designed for mobile devices such as tablets or maybe even a Windows phone because in most cases you're just tapping the screen. So you tend to see larger icons, just slide bars or ON/OFF toggle switches that can be easily configured using a touch screen.

 

Now of course, your mouse still works. But again, the Settings app, just a little more designed for the mobile devices, whereas Control Panel is pretty much the same as it has always been in just about every version of Windows, at least since Windows XP. So with respect to the Settings app, you can just click on your Start button [Video description begins] The Windows Settings page displays. There's a search bar and several settings categories including System, Devices, Phone, Network & Internet, Personalization, and Gaming. [Video description ends] and just start typing in the first few characters of the word settings. So by the time you type in S-E-T, you'll see Windows Settings appear. In fact, if I just click on my Start button and type in s-e-t, there you see the Settings app. So you can simply click on it. [Video description begins] He points to Settings in the Start menu. [Video description ends]

 

And that brings you into here. Now it's divided up by categories and you can also just search. [Video description begins] He points to the Windows Settings page. [Video description ends] So if you aren't certain where to find a particular setting, then you can just click in the search bar, and again, start typing in the first few characters. So if for example I want to configure my mouse, I can just type in the first few characters and there is the option for Mouse settings. So that makes it easy to find what you're looking for. [Video description begins] He types "mou" in the search bar. A list of suggestions displays, including Mouse settings, Change your mouse settings, and Change mouse pointer size. [Video description ends]

 

Now this is essentially the home screen of the Settings app so once you go into any kind of interface such as Devices, [Video description begins] He clicks Devices and a Devices page opens. Bluetooth & other devices is selected on the navigation pane. [Video description ends] then of course you do see all of the options on the left-hand side with respect to configuring devices. [Video description begins] These options include Bluetooth & other devices, Printer & scanners, Mouse, and Touchpad. [Video description ends] But you can always click the Home button to go back to that home page. [Video description begins] He selects Home in the navigation pane and returns to Windows Settings. [Video description ends]

 

So it doesn't matter which option you choose, there's always your Home button to navigate back. [Video description begins] He clicks Accounts and the Accounts settings display. Then he clicks Home in the navigation pane. [Video description ends] Or you can also see in the upper left-hand corner, there's a back arrow that does the exact same thing. It brings you back to the previous page. [Video description begins] He clicks System and the System settings display. Then he clicks the back arrow in the top-left corner. [Video description ends] Now that's only just the previous page, so if you're several pages deep, that won't immediately bring you back to the home page.

 

But with respect to setting up your desktop environment, generally that involves such features as Personalization, devices such as your mouse or maybe your touchpad. Your Accounts, maybe the Wi-Fi and network configuration. Your Time and Language, and of course, really whatever you want. But it just takes a little bit of searching to find out which options are available. So you can click any one of them. I'll go with Network. [Video description begins] He clicks Network & Internet and the Network & Internet settings display. Status is selected in the navigation pane. [Video description ends] And you can see that in here I can configure my Wi-Fi, my Ethernet, Dial-up or VPN, set Airplane mode for a tablet or a phone, or even a laptop. [Video description begins] He points to several options in the Network & Internet navigation pane. [Video description ends]

 

But essentially just find out what options are in there and configure it appropriately. Return to the home page to go to maybe your Personalization. [Video description begins] He clicks Home and returns to the Windows Settings page. [Video description ends] So your Background, your lock screen, your themes, everything can be configured in there. [Video description begins] He clicks Personalization and the Personalization settings display. Background is selected in the navigation pane. [Video description ends] So ultimately it's just a matter of knowing what you want to set and locating that feature. [Video description begins] He points to several options in the navigation pane, including Background, Colors, Lock screen, and Themes. Then he clicks Home to return to the Windows Settings page. [Video description ends]

 

Time and Language again, fairly common, particularly for people who travel a lot and maybe go from time zone to time zone. [Video description begins] He selects Time & Language. A new page opens with Date & time selected in the navigation bar. [Video description ends] And then, of course, setting things like your Region for language preferences. [Video description begins] He selects Region in the Navigation pane. [Video description ends] And again, really any type of configuration that you want that's specific to you. But as mentioned, most of the configuration options in the Settings app can also be accessed from Control Panel. [Video description begins] He selects Home and returns to the Windows Settings page. [Video description ends]

 

So I have that open as well. I'm just going to minimize the Settings app and there's the Control Panel. And this really is exactly the same as it has been since about Windows XP. [Video description begins] He minimizes Windows Settings to display the Control Panel and the list of All Control Panel Items. These include Administrative Tools, Fonts, Sound, and Infrared. [Video description ends] You do have different view options here in the upper right. I can hit a drop-down where I can change it to a Category view which makes it a little more similar to the Settings app. [Video description begins] He expands the View by drop-down menu. Options include Category, Large icons, and Small icons. Small icons is currently selected. [Video description ends] Now it's just categories. But even with this you can see that each little section is just a hyperlink now.

 

So that's a little more difficult to access if you are on a mobile device and you're using a touch screen. So that's where the Settings app is a little easier. Almost all of the the buttons, the slide bars, almost every link or setting is much larger in the Settings app. But if you are working with a mouse, of course, it's no big deal to access those individual options a little more easily. But you do see a lot of the same categories. Network and Internet, User Accounts, Hardware and Sound, that's essentially the same as Devices. So it's up to you. But if you hit the drop-down for the View by and choose Small icons, then you see individual options for configuring each device or each feature. [Video description begins] In the View by drop-down menu, he selects Small icons. [Video description ends] But again, these are quite small so this wouldn't be all that easy to access using a touch screen.

 

So typically if you have a mouse and you are much more familiar and comfortable with Control Panel, by all means use Control Panel to set these options. There's no difference in configuring something through the Control Panel versus using the Settings app. There may be slight differences in what is available in the Control Panel versus the Settings app depending on the make and model of the device itself. But there's an awful lot of overlap. So again, if it's the same option, something like configuring the mouse, for example, something fairly simple, there will be no difference between configuring it in here, in the Control Panel, versus configuring it in the Settings app. They are just two different ways to access the same settings. [Video description begins] He clicks Mouse. A Mouse Properties dialog box opens, which he then closes by clicking Cancel. [Video description ends]

 

Now in this demonstration, we'll take a look at configuring a touchpad. Now of course, you need to be on a system that has a touchpad which these days would invariably be a laptop. Although, it wouldn't be unheard of to find a desktop computer with an external touchpad configured, but in almost every case, you'd be working with a laptop. Now when it comes to accessing the configuration interface, you would likely have two options depending on the make and model. But of course, there really aren't any custom made laptops on the market. They're almost all proprietary. So if, for example, you have a HP or a Dell or an Acer, then in many cases, there will be pre-installed software from the manufacturer that allows you to configure the built in hardware, so you could probably access the touchpad settings from there. But for the sake of consistency, I'll use the Windows settings because it really should be the same across most makes and models.

 

Now this is a Windows 10 computer and I'm using the Settings app which is largely the same as Control Panel for those of you who may be running an earlier version of Windows. But you can access the Settings app by just clicking on the Start button [Video description begins] The Windows Settings app opens. There's a search bar and several categories, including System, Devices, Phone, Privacy, Cortana, and Accounts. [Video description ends] and then just start typing in the first few characters of the word settings and you'll see it come up in your menu. And then once you are into the Window Settings, you will likely find the touchpad under Devices, where you see the mouse there. [Video description begins] He points to mouse under the Devices category. [Video description ends]

 

But if you aren't sure, you can click in Find a setting and just start typing in the first few characters of the word touch, and there we see Touchpad settings right there. So we'll choose that. [Video description begins] He types "touch" in the search bar and points to Touchpad settings in the list of suggestions that display. A Devices page opens with Touchpad selected in the navigation pane. [Video description ends] And for starters, you can generally disable it if you like. You can just turn it off or on, so if it's Off, you can see that all of the options become grayed out, so I'm clearly using an external mouse at the moment. [Video description begins] He toggles the Touchpad switch to the Off position. [Video description ends] The touchpad, I'm trying to use it right now, of course you can't see that, but it is disabled. So we can certainly just turn it back On. [Video description begins] He toggles the Touchpad switch to the On position. [Video description ends]

 

And then you have an option to leave the touchpad on if you have an extra mouse connected. [Video description begins] He points to the Leave touchpad on when a mouse is connected checkbox, which is already selected. [Video description ends] It's a little redundant, if you will, to have both but it's certainly fine to leave it on if you prefer but you can disable that if you like. You have options to change the cursor speed and then virtually everything else are really just the preferences that you like with respect to what tapping does. [Video description begins] He points to the Change the cursor speed slider. [Video description ends] What dragging two fingers does, what pinching does. What kind of three-finger gestures you like to use or four-finger gestures. So again, just go through these options, find the ones that you like. There are presets usually in terms of which options you want.

 

The sensitivity of course is obviously just how hard you have to tap it or interact with it. The scrolling and zooming option is typically dragging two fingers to scroll. [Video description begins] He expands the Touchpad sensitivity drop-down list. Options include Medium sensitivity, Most sensitive, and Low sensitive. [Video description ends] This is kind of a nice feature. I'm using the wheel on the mouse right now, and it's not the smoothest scroll. And here's the two finger scroll, it's a little smoother. [Video description begins] He points to the Drag two fingers to scroll checkbox, which is already selected. [Video description ends] And you can even change the direction as to what the down motion does. Sometimes you might prefer that this actually scroll up or down, depending on the application. [Video description begins] He expands the Scrolling direction drop-down list and two options display: Down motion scrolls up and Down motion scrolls down. [Video description ends]

 

Pinch to zoom is a nice option. We're all probably familiar with this from our smartphones. [Video description begins] He points to the Pinch to zoom checkbox, which is already selected. [Video description ends] So it's not just for looking at pictures. If you are looking at a document and you want to zoom in, then it will usually work for that as well. And you also generally have three, and even four-finger gestures, where you can use all three fingers on the touchpad at the same time, or all four. And again, what you'll typically find are these presets, where you can choose what it will do, for example, changing the audio and volume. [Video description begins] He expands the Three-finger gestures drop-down list. Four options display: Nothing, Switch apps and show desktop, Switch desktops and show desktop, and Change audio and volume. [Video description ends] So if I change the preset, you can see that these actions now have different results. [Video description begins] He points to the Three-finger gestures, which are now Volume up, Volume down, Previous track, and Next track. [Video description ends]

 

So again, really, just choose whatever option you want with respect to those gestures. [Video description begins] He selects Switch apps and show desktop from the three-finger gestures drop-down list and the gestures change back again. [Video description ends] And this would be for a three-finger tap. So again, you can choose the option there. [Video description begins] He expands the Taps drop-down menu for the Three-finger gestures. Options include Nothing, Search with Cortana, Action Center, Play/pause, and Middle mouse button. [Video description ends] And this would be a four-finger tap, you can choose the option there. [Video description begins] He expands the Taps drop-down menu for the Four-finger gestures. The same options display as the previous Taps menu. [Video description ends] Now if you make a change and you just want to reset it, you'll typically find this Reset option. So I have not made a change yet, but anything that you do change, you can undo with the Reset option.

 

And, if you scroll up to the top, depending on the version of your operating system and/or the type of touchpad you have, you may find this Touch and go feature here, where it's just a short video. And you can just click on this and it just gives you a better idea as to what those gestures actually are and what the resulting operation will be. [Video description begins] He clicks the Touch and go video to play it. [Video description ends] So this gives you just a better idea as to what to expect from those type of operations. And you can see if I just hover over this there's options to put this in to full screen and enable audio and you can close caption so, you can just watch that anytime. But in most cases, you do have these preferences, with respect to the operation that you want to result from any particular type of gesture.

 

In this demonstration, we'll take a look at configuring a touchscreen. Now the options that you have available to you will certainly vary depending on the type of device you have, and of course the operating system that you're running. Now in my case, I am working on a Windows 10 laptop that is convertible to a tablet so it folds right back on itself if you will and the keyboard is at the back so you essentially just use the screen as your input. So as such, from my Control Panel there are two configurable settings, [Video description begins] The Control Panel is open to the All Control Panel Items page. Several options display, including Administrative Tools, AutoPlay, Date and Time, System, and Mouse. [Video description ends] a calibration and some of the tapping actions. Now the tapping actions can be configured using this Pen and Touch feature so let's start with that. [Video description begins] He clicks Pen and Touch and the Pen and Touch dialog box opens on the Pen Options tab. He clicks the Touch tab. [Video description ends]

 

And on the Touch tab, you can just see that there are some settings that equate the tapping action to the equivalent mouse action. So clearly Double-tap equals Double-click, no surprise there. But you can't really right-click with a tapping action so that is Press and hold. Now there are some basic settings that you can configure for those actions by clicking the Settings button. [Video description begins] A Press and Hold Settings dialog box opens. [Video description ends] You can disable the press and hold for right-click if you choose. But if it's on, you can just set the Speed and the Duration with respect to that right-click mode activation and how long you have to press and hold. [Video description begins] He points to the Enable press and hold for right-clicking checkbox, which is already selected. [Video description ends] Now you just slide the bars to adjust. I'll leave them as they are, but you can test that down below by just pressing and holding on that little light switch.

 

So I'll go ahead and just tap on this. I know you can't see my finger, but if I press and hold, you can see that the light switch came on. So I'll press and hold again and the light switch goes off. So that's just the speed and the duration. [Video description begins] He clicks Cancel to return to the Pen and Touch dialog box. [Video description ends] Now you can also enable this visual feedback when touching the screen. And I know you can't see my finger actually touching the screen, [Video description begins] He points to the Show visual feedback when touching the screen checkbox. [Video description ends] but when I do tap it you can see that a circle appears and that's of course indicating that I am touching the screen. And if you want you can also enable this option to optimize that feedback for projection to an external monitor or a projector. So they would actually see those little circles appearing on the projector or on the other monitor. So I won't bother adjusting any of those settings but typically you can set them to whatever you prefer.

 

And then the other option that you might find is calibration. [Video description begins] He clicks Cancel on the Pen and Touch dialog box to close it and return to the All Control Panel Items page. [Video description ends] Now again in my case that is under Tablet PC Settings. [Video description begins] He clicks Tablet PC Settings and a Tablet PC Settings dialog box opens on the Display tab. [Video description ends] And there's a Calibrate button right here and unfortunately I've already tested this. The calibration itself works just fine but when I try to record it, the entire screen goes black. But the idea behind calibration is it just presents you with a bit of a grid with a crosshair and you tap the screen wherever the crosshair appears.

 

And what this does is to try to ensure that it is as accurate as possible, especially when you have a very small screen and you're trying to tap on something that is also very small. You need that tap to be as accurate as possible, otherwise you might launch the wrong thing, if you will. So if you find that happening fairly often, then it certainly wouldn't hurt to go through the calibration process. And again, it just presents you with a bunch of vertical and horizontal lines with crosshairs. And you just tap wherever the crosshair is and that does its best to ensure that wherever you are tapping is registering correctly on the screen, so that you aren't opening the incorrect interface or seeing the wrong option whenever you tap somewhere.

 

 In this demonstration, we'll take a look at an alternative method for installing applications which is probably a little more commonly done on a laptop computer, at least, when compared to a desktop computer. I'm referring to mobile apps that are purchased or downloaded from the Microsoft store. Now clearly in this case, I'm referring to specifically a Windows-based laptop. But, the reason why I say it's a little more common to do installations this way on a laptop is simply because of the nature of a laptop. With it being more mobile and in many cases just becoming smaller and lighter a lot of laptops are integrating touchscreens into them. Essentially that's what it really comes down to. When you have a touchscreen it's usually something that's a little smaller. You generally don't have a mouse or a keyboard, so you don't want to have to do a lot in terms of answering questions and specifying configuration options during an installation. And that's commonly what you have to do if it's a standard desktop application.

 

You have to launch the application. You have to maybe enter in a serial number or specify a folder to install it to and, you know, specify various other options. And it's not like that's impossible to do on a touchscreen but it's just not as easy. So the idea behind a mobile app is essentially you just tap the application that you want and that's it, it downloads and installs. So any of you out there who have a mobile phone, I'm sure you are familiar with this. If it's an iPhone or an Android, you just go to the appropriate store and you select the app that you want. And really, that's it. So that can also be done on Windows systems. So I am in the Microsoft store right now. [Video description begins] The Microsoft Store app is open, with the Apps tab selected. [Video description ends]And you can launch this, again, simply by clicking on your Start button and just typing in the word store, you'll find this available in your menu.

 

And from that point at the top we can just click on Apps and you can essentially just browse through to find the apps that you want. And they're categorized. [Video description begins] Apps include Windows DVD Player, Drawboard PDF, Sketchable, and File Viewer Plus. [Video description ends] We see Best selling apps, Top free apps, Top paid apps. And if you were to search through, you probably could find just about anything that you might want on your system. But with any of them, again, you simply choose the application that you want. You might have to sign in with an account, but really that's about it. As soon as you do, you can just select the application and it downloads and installs. So there's a lot of benefits to this. We don't need any kind of local media such as a DVD. You can easily reinstall it at any time. If it was removed, you can just go back into the store and re-download it. And again, they're usually designed for a touchscreen so that there's little to no interaction during the installation. So you quite literally just choose whichever application you want.

 

I'll just go with something in the free category here just to quickly demonstrate. Something like Messenger. And really that's it. Once you choose that application you just have to click on the Get button and it will install. [Video description begins] He clicks the Messenger app. The Messenger page opens and he points to the Get button. [Video description ends] No prompts, no folder location. There's really nothing to specify. You literary just click on Get and, again, you may have to sign in but that's it. So again, no detailed information has to be plugged in to complete the installation. So typically, with a laptop you will have this option. [Video description begins] He clicks the Apps tab to return to the Apps page. [Video description ends] Now I say typically because you can still install these on a desktop, that's perfectly fine.

 

Windows 10 introduced a new platform known as the UWP, which was the Universal Windows Platform. And that essentially says that you can run just about any type of application. We used to distinguish the standard desktop applications from mobile applications. They were really two different platforms, but UWP says it doesn't matter, either one. So you can by all means install these types of applications on a desktop computer that is running Windows 10. Now you would probably also will able to do this on a system running Windows 8 or Windows 8.1 but not Windows 7. They would require standard installations if you will. What we always use to think of as a set up installation file where you would double-click it and answer all the questions for your installation and install it that way. So with these mobile apps, again, all of that of that interaction during the installation just goes away. And you just select the apps that you want, install them from the store, and begin using the application.

 

Now in this demonstration, we'll talk about some of the options that are available for synchronizing when working with a laptop. And of course, I'm working with a Windows 10-based system here, so this is certainly not going to be applicable across all devices. But with respect to just synchronization in general, there are two main categories of what can be synchronized, and they are effectively your settings and data. Now when it comes to settings, really this just refers to the overall environment, your preferences. So if for example I have a Windows 10 laptop and let's say a Windows 10 tablet, then any kind of setting that I configure on one can be synchronized to the other. Generally it just involves using the same account, usually an online account, such as a Hotmail or an Outlook.com account. But as long as it's that same account, then any kind of change with respect to the configuration on one device can be synchronized over to the other.

 

And this of course results in just a very consistent environment. The look and feel that you like will be available regardless of the device you're using. Now data, of course, refers to actual information, so files, pictures very commonly, or really just any kind of data can also be synchronized. And a very common example of this is iCloud's service whereby if I have an iPhone, I can take a picture that can be sent up to iCloud and then downloaded it to my iPad, so it is available on both. So of course that's synchronizing. Now again, it really does depend on what it is you want to synchronize and what type of device platform you are using and of course the operating system. Android would have similar options as well. But with respect to Windows and working on a laptop, you can go to your Windows Settings app. [Video description begins] The Windows Settings page displays. A search bar displays, along with several settings categories, including System, Personalization, Gaming, Update & Security, and Privacy. [Video description ends]

 

And again, if you aren't certain where to find any kind of synchronization option, you can just go to Find a setting and just start typing in sync. And there we see there are several options. These all in fact link to the same interface, but if I just choose Sync your settings, for example, [Video description begins] He types "sync" in the search bar and points to the list of suggestions that display. Suggestions include Sync your settings, Sync your passwords on this PC, and Sync your language and keyboard settings. [Video description ends] then it brings me into a page where I can enable synchronization. [Video description begins] A Sync your settings page opens and he points to the Sync settings switch, which is set to On. [Video description ends] I can then choose whether or not I want to synchronize my individual settings. I can verify passwords across my other devices.

 

Now I don't have other devices at the moment, but I can synchronize my Language preferences, my Ease of Access configuration, and various other Windows settings. [Video description begins] He points to five switches under Individual sync settings for: Theme, Passwords, Language preferences, Ease of Access, and Other Windows settings. [Video description ends] So of course this is up to you with respect to what you want to synchronize. But do take note of the title of this page, it's Sync your settings, so there's no real data synchronization option here. This will depend on what kind of applications you have and what type of configuration you have set up with respect to synchronizing data, and there are a lot of configuration options available there. For example, you might use something like OneDrive, which is Microsoft's cloud storage. That allows you to just store data in the cloud and synchronize that data across all of your devices.

 

So you would have to set that up within OneDrive. That is essentially the same as Apple's iCloud. It's just storing data in the cloud that makes it available to be accessed across all of your devices. But you can also set up synchronization with a particular device, so I'm just going to go back to the Home screen here. [Video description begins] He clicks Home to return to the Window Settings page. [Video description ends] And you do see that, within a Windows system anyway, there is this Phone option under Windows Settings where you can link your Android or iPhone. Or of course if you have a Windows phone, then that can be set up as well. But you can just click on this and you simply have to add a phone. So right in the middle of the page, I can click Add a Phone. [Video description begins] He clicks Phone. The Your phone page opens, with an Add a phone button. [Video description ends] And you do again, of course, have to supply the information for this phone. [Video description begins] A Link your Android or iPhone to this PC dialog box opens. [Video description ends]

 

So in this case it's to link either an Android or an iPhone to this PC. And you initially plug in the phone number, choose your country code, and enter the full phone number with the area code. And they will send you a link via text message to begin the process. Once you have that set up, then this is where you can start synchronizing data. Now it's not all that immediately evident, but by the graphic on this screen, you can see that this person is taking a picture and then synchronizing that to their laptop. So it's from the phone to the laptop and that's essentially just the same thing. It's data on one device that you want available on another device, so synchronizing the two in this case would not require something like an online service. This would be a direct synchronization from phone to laptop without having to sign in to a cloud-based service. So of course that's up to you as well, you really can use either approach. [Video description begins] He closes the Link your Android or iPhone to this PC dialog box. The Your phone page displays. [Video description ends]

 

Now in a corporate environment, you might see options such as offline folders or work folders, which allow you to again take local copies of data with you when you are disconnected. Then you can synchronize that information back to those server-based folders once you are reconnected. But that's something that has to be set up in a corporate environment. Again, that's just another example of synchronizing data. [Video description begins] He clicks Home to return to the Window Settings page. [Video description ends] One way or another, it's just making sure that whatever you have on one device is made available on another device and you aren't limited to just two. In many cases, you might find a user with a laptop, a desktop, a tablet, and a phone. And you can set up synchronization between them all if you like, but I do recommend you try to keep it as simple as possible in terms of the number of devices.

 

In this demonstration, we'll take a look at setting up accounts on a laptop. But before we get to that, I do want to stress that with respect to at least a Windows computer, the types of accounts that you can use are no different on a laptop than they are on a desktop. But it's just a little more common that when you are using a laptop, you might use what's known as an online account. Now they include Microsoft accounts, which are Hotmail, Outlook.com, and Windows Live email addresses, and maybe even other online accounts such as Gmail. But the idea behind this is simply due to the fact that a laptop is much more mobile. If you are disconnected from your workplace quite a lot, if you travel a lot, even just disconnected from home, then by using an online account, you can have centralized access to the same mail, the same calendar, the same contacts, the same pictures, the same data. Because it's all stored centrally with your online account. So this way, you don't need to be connected to a server at the office or even just your desktop computer at home to be able to access the same information. It's all available in the cloud.

 

So this is typically what you find on laptops, but it's certainly not necessary. You can still configure just a local account which is only available on this computer and is not used to access any type of online data. So that, of course, is up to you. But with respect to the accounts themselves, you can configure them through your Windows Settings app for a Windows 10 computer. And from your Settings app, we have Accounts right there. [Video description begins] He switches to the Windows Settings app and clicks Accounts. An Accounts page opens, with Your info selected in the navigation pane. [Video description ends] So we can just click and it should come up to just your basic info page, which gives you some basic information about the current account that you're using right now. You can create a picture, if you like, using a camera, or you can just browse for one. And you can click Manage my Microsoft account if you are signed in with one to configure some settings there.

 

But with respect to adding accounts, over on the left-hand side, we can click Email & accounts and this is where you can add a new account. [Video description begins] He clicks Email & accounts and points to the Add an account button. [Video description ends] Now again, this is entirely dependent on how you want to configure your system, but you can add online accounts. We can see right in the middle of the window here, we can click Add a Microsoft account. Or maybe it's a work or a school account that is not using a Microsoft address. That's fine, again, it's up to you. [Video description begins] He points to two hyperlinks: Add a Microsoft account and Add a work or school account. [Video description ends] But if we go ahead and click Add an account, you can see there are several types that are supported. [Video description begins] He clicks Add an account and the Add an account dialog box opens. [Video description ends]

 

So Hotmail, Outlook.com, Exchange, if you're in a more corporate environment, or Office 365. Even Google, Yahoo, and iCloud are available. So there are a number of different types of accounts that you can use. The Advanced setup is available as well to maybe just set up a local account. But you can decide for yourself which type of account to use. [Video description begins] He clicks Close to close the dialog box and return to the Email & accounts tab of the Accounts page. [Video description ends] Once you've decided on the type of account, there are Sign-in options. [Video description begins] He clicks Sign-in-options in the navigation pane. [Video description ends] And again, this is for just signing into this local computer. But you can specify when to require a sign-in. So at the top, we see a drop-down and we can specify that we have to sign-in when the computer wakes up from sleep, or not. [Video description begins] He expands the Require sign-in drop-down list. Options are When PC wakes up from sleep and Never. [Video description ends]

 

Windows Hello is available on systems that have a webcam. So again, this is a little more common with laptops, but this allows you to use facial recognition to actually sign-in. Now it depends on the device, even with respect to having a webcam, that does not necessarily mean it supports Windows Hello. It needs to be a specific type of webcam, one that is actually capable of picking up biometric information, in this case, infrared or heat. And this is so that someone can't just show a picture of your face to try to fool the webcam into believing that this is actually your face. So it will tell you as to whether or not this is available on your device. You can typically sign-in with a PIN or a password. And there are options to Change the PIN or Remove it, or Change the password, right in here as well. And you can even set up a picture password, where you have to indicate with certain gestures on the picture to complete the sign-in process. You can also choose Family & other users so that you can add local accounts. [Video description begins] He clicks Family & other users in the navigation pane. [Video description ends]

 

Maybe someone else who is just using a non-online account to use the computer. So you can set up family members. You can just add someone else, it doesn't really matter who they are. [Video description begins] He points to two buttons: Add a family member and Add someone else to this PC. [Video description ends] But with respect to family members, you can set additional configurations with respect to online safety, time limits, or game access. If you add just another user, they are not added to your family, so they aren't affected by those restrictions. Now you do have another option with respect to setting up local accounts, and I'll show you that as well. I'm just going to minimize the Settings app. And this is the Computer Management option. In most cases, you can just right-click on the Start button and choose Manage. And that will bring you to the Computer Management interface and on the left, we have Local Users and Groups. [Video description begins] He clicks Minimize top-right of Windows Settings to close it and open the Computer Management window. In the navigation pane, under Local Users and Groups, Users is selected. Several user accounts display in the main pane. [Video description ends]

 

Then we have the Users folder and here is where you'll find all local accounts. So these are not online accounts in most cases. [Video description begins] These accounts include Aaron, Administrator, DefaultAccount, and Guest. A New User dialog box opens. Sections include User name, Full name, Description, Password, and Confirm password. [Video description ends] You can just right-click and choose New User, plug in the information here, and simply click on Create. And that will create a new local account for someone else to use. So again, that's certainly useful in a situation where you do have multiple people using the same computer. This allows you to keep everything separate. Ultimately, it's up to you with respect to which types of accounts you want to configure. [Video description begins] He clicks Close to close the New User dialog box and return to the Computer Management window. [Video description ends] But again, just a little more commonly in the laptop environment, you might find the online accounts simply because of the capabilities for them to access centralized cloud-based data. But local accounts are still certainly fine. And ultimately, whatever type of account you want to implement is up to you.

 

In this demonstration we'll take a look at configuring Wi-Fi settings for a laptop. Now again, this is something where you will likely find a wide variety of configuration options simply due to the fact that again, virtually every laptop is a proprietary system. So in many cases, the manufacturer will include built-in software to configure the devices, one of them very often being the wireless. But if you are running Windows then you can also configure these settings just using your Windows Settings app. So for the sake of consistency, that's what I'll use. Now of course, if you are running a different operating system such as a Mac, then it's going to be a different interface. But the basic configuration options are pretty consistent across any operating system, and in fact, even any type of device such as a phone. Really, you just need to know the name of the network to which you want to connect. And then the settings that are required to make that connection, most notably the passphrase, or the security settings.

 

So from my Windows Settings app here, you can find the Wi-Fi settings under the category of Network & Internet, it actually says Wi-Fi there. [Video description begins] The Windows Settings page opens and he points to Wi-Fi under the Network and Internet category. [Video description ends] But again, if you weren't certain where to find this option, you could just click in Find a setting, start typing in Wi-Fi, and there we see Wi-Fi settings. [Video description begins] He types "wifi" in the search bar and then selects Wi-Fi settings from the list of suggestions. A Network & Internet page opens and Wi-Fi is selected in the navigation pane. [Video description ends] So we can just choose that.

 

Most notably you can simply enable or disable Wi-Fi on this system entirely. If you just don't want to connect to any kind of Wi-Fi network for security reasons, then simply disable your adapter and you will not connect at all, of course. But when you want to reconnect, just remember to turn it back on again. [Video description begins] He points to the Wi-Fi switch, which is currently set to the On position. [Video description ends] It shows you any existing connections. So I am currently connected to my own home wireless network. But I could also show available networks if I'm trying to connect to a different network. [Video description begins] He points to the Show available networks hyperlink. [Video description ends] This will pick up on anything that's in range, and allow you to make a connection.

 

Of course, provided you know what the security credentials are, and any other properties. Now you can also manage the known networks [Video description begins] He points to the Manage known networks hyperlink. [Video description ends] and this retains a list of previous networks to which you have connected and that's usually good. It means that if you try to reconnect to that same network again, as long as the settings have not changed, it should reconnect automatically. So if you tend to bounce around between, let's just say the same three or four wireless networks, you don't have to continually reconnect. But if the settings have changed, then your system will try to reconnect using the old settings. And clearly, it will fail if they've changed, again, most notably the password.

 

So you can click Manage known networks [Video description begins] The Manage known networks page opens. [Video description ends] and you can simply choose any network that is listed here, and then you can click Forget. That will remove it entirely. If you are still within range of that network, it should then just show up when you select Show available networks. [Video description begins] He returns to Wi-Fi settings on the Network & Internet page. Then he clicks the Show available networks hyperlink. A list of available networks displays. [Video description ends] Then you can just select it from the list again and supply the new information, and connect. And of course, then you should be fine.

 

But once again, it will remember those settings for next time. So if you're trying to connect to a known network and it's not working, generally, just choose to forget that network and reconnect manually, then it should show up. Now there's other options in here, such as a link to change the adapter options. So if we select this, we can go directly to the Wi-Fi adapter and maybe we can right-click and choose some different properties. [Video description begins] He clicks Change adapter options and a Network Connection window opens. He points to the Wi-Fi option. [Video description ends] There's some different settings. Generally, that's not necessary to just make a connection, but it is available if you do want to change something or the adapter itself. [Video description begins] He closes the Network Connections window and returns to the Wi-Fi settings page. [Video description ends]

 

And there are also some other options with respect to using a random hardware address, which can make things a little more secure. And of course, if you are in a public environment, you may want to make sure that your Windows Firewall is on, for example. [Video description begins] He points to the Use random hardware addresses switch and a Windows Firewall hyperlink. [Video description ends] So those are all up to you, but when it comes just simply connecting to a Wi-Fi for the most part, it's just a matter of knowing the name of the network and of course, knowing the security settings for that network.