From The Tips Box: Remembering Names, Scanned Documents, Electric Toothbrushes

Readers offer their best tips for remembering people’s names, scanning documents into Google Drive and replacing electric toothbrush heads.

Every day we receive boatloads of great reader tips. From the Tips Box is where we round up some of our favourites. Got a tip of your own to share? Add it in the comments or send it using the contact tab on the right.

Use Address Book Fields to Remember Names of Acquaintances

Outofgamut discovers a handy address book feature:

The other day I ran into one of my friends at the grocery store and she was with her roommate. I had met her roommate once or twice before, but it had been such a long time since then that I had forgotten her roommate’s name. This got me to thinking; “How can I remember the names of people like this, that I hardly ever run into, but often enough to where I will be embarrassed if I forget their name?” For me, the easiest way to remember these people’s names is to connect them to the mutual friend, who I know well. Which leads me to my tip…

In iOS, you can add a field under a friend’s contact info for related people. I added a custom “Roommate” field under my friend’s contact info with her roommate’s name, so now whenever I run into them I’ll be able to quickly remind myself of her roommate’s name.

This should also work in any contact list, not just iOS — Gmail, for example, also has an entry for relationships and other custom fields.

Save Scans in Google Drive Without it Counting Against Your Storage

Jeramey Parker shares a clever little tip for putting scanned documents in Google Drive:

If you want to save scanned documents such as receipts in your Google Drive account but are worried about maxing out your 5GB of space, then try this. I scan the documents I want to save as a JPEG at 8.5 by 11 (letter) size. I then create a new text document in Google Drive, change the margins to 0″, and insert the image into my document. If I have more than one page I press enter to start a new page and insert the next image. Since I am doing this in a Google Doc, it does not count towards my data limit. I will acknowledge that a downside to this maybe that sensitive documents can not be encrypted or have a document specific password added to it and a PDF file could.

Salvage Magnets From Used Toothbrush Heads

Lucas Finger discovers a hidden prize at the bottom of his toothbrush:

I just realised the replaceable heads on my Sonicare toothbush have some pretty strong magnets. They are opposite the brush end of the head, where it attaches to the base. Remove them with a pair of pliers and stick ’em to the fridge before tossing the old head!

Compose HTML Messages in Outlook

MsCassLopez discovers you can code complex formatting in Outlook with HTML:

You can easily include tables and other webmail hard-to-do goodies on Outlook.com by clicking Options/Edit in HTML, typing your code and then clicking Options/Rich Text to see and mail the result. Alternatively you can copy and paste an existing table and edit it, even one copied from MS Word.