technology – YourDesignerDog

Caturday Art #15

yourdesignerdog — Sat, 03 Dec 2016 06:45:30 +0000

Sadie and I haven’t posted much in the last couple of weeks and you may have noticed why – our blog got a makeover. Unfortunately it was not an intentional makeover. I just signed on one afternoon to find all sorts of errors and even the dreaded white screen of death! (For those of you who aren’t familiar with WordPress, the white screen of death is when you don’t have any access to the technical side of your blog so you can’t even log in to figure out the problem.) Eventually I had to just start deleting plugins and files until I figured out that our theme had crashed. Hence the sudden and unplanned makeover. Some things are still acting a little funny at the moment, but hopefully I’ll get all the bugs worked out soon and everyone can enjoy our new look.

In the meantime I hope you enjoy the digital art piece above that represents Sadie over the past couple of weeks. I explained to Sadie that her blog was broken, and while she didn’t seem nearly as upset about it as I was, she very patiently kept me company through all of my struggles with uncooperative technology.

This post is part of the Caturday Art blog hop hosted by Athena Cat Goddess.

Technology – #52Snapshots

yourdesignerdog — Sat, 05 Sep 2015 06:30:35 +0000

This week’s #52Snapshots of Life theme is technology. For my photos today I decided to try out a new gadget I bought Sadie. It’s an attachment that hooks onto a dog’s or cat’s collar and shines a little laser point at the ground. Since Sadie acts like a cat half the time, I thought she would enjoy playing with and chasing a little laser beam all over the floor. It’s a cute concept. Since the laser is attached to the collar, the beam moves when your pet does, so your pet can basically entertain themselves by chasing around a beam that they are moving themselves. So I attached the little device to Sadie’s collar and pointed out the light to her. She looked at it for like a minute, then got bored and went to find a ball. Oh well. I’m thinking the laser can still be useful, especially since you can change it to blinking or flashing lights instead of just the one little beam. If I set it to flashing on her collar and send Sadie out to use the bathroom at night, I can keep an eye on her by following the flashing light. So technology doesn’t always work the way you want it to, but it’s always pretty useful in the end.

This post is part of The Lazy Pit Bull’s 52 Snapshots of Life Challenge.

#Cube – The Digital Picture Frame for Instagram

yourdesignerdog — Thu, 19 Feb 2015 09:00:09 +0000

Today Sadie and I are going to tell you about a really interesting new gadget we got to try out called the #Cube. It’s like a digital picture frame that uses your Instagram account. As you know, I’m constantly taking new photos of Sadie, and the #Cube is a great way to show them off. The 8 inch square screen is bright and vibrant, giving more life to the photos than a standard digital picture frame. Plus the #Cube updates over WiFi, adding new photos every time you or your friends and family add new photos to Instagram.

The #Cube is really easy to set up. You plug it in and use the touchscreen to connect to your WiFi. Then you just enter your Instagram login information and a slideshow of your feed starts right away. The #Cube uses your WiFi to automatically add any new photos your Instagram friends have uploaded, so that your feed slideshow is always up-to-date. You can also scroll through the photos on your own with the touch screen, as well as click on individual photos to read the description, comments, likes, date posted, etc. And you can find out what user posted a specific photo, along with the number of photos and followers for that Instagram user all in one place.

There are three buttons on the top of the #Cube, along with the touchscreen. The left-most button is circular in shape and functions as the power button. The middle, square shaped button is the menu button. With the menu button you have the ability to search for specific hashtags to see photos about specific topics. You can also choose to view a feed of the most popular photos currently on Instagram. There is also a settings menu, where you can adjust the brightness of the screen, control the speed of the slideshow, and read the user guide, among other things. The third button is heart-shaped and gives you the ability to easily like/favorite whichever photo is currently on the screen.

Another feature of the #Cube, which I use all the time, is the ability to search for a specific Instagram username and view just that person’s photos. It’s a great way to see what a specific friend or family member has been up to lately. I also like to use the #Cube to show off my recent Sadie photos by selecting my own username as the basis for the slideshow. And I think the #Cube would be a great gift to a less tech-savvy friend or family member. You could help them with the initial set up, and then it will continuously bring them all the newest photos from their loved ones.

The #Cube has a built in speaker to view any videos in your Instagram feed. It also has a four-hour battery, so you can enjoy your Instagram feed completely wirelessly. The software on the #Cube comes with lifetime updates to ensure seamless, easy use of the product. The #Cube comes I’m three colors: black, white, and the classic model which, as you can see from my photos, is designed to look like the Instagram app’s icon. Find out more about the #Cube and buy one of your own from hashtagcube.com and Amazon
for $149.00.

This post is part of the Thursday Barks and Bytes blog hop hosted by 2 Brown Dawgs and Heart Like A Dog.

This post is also part of the Thoughtless Thursday blog hop hosted by Ruckus the Eskie, Love Is Being Owned By a Husky, and M.K. Clinton.

YourDesignerDog did not receive any monetary compensation for this post. I was given a free product to try out and review. All opinions are my own unbiased observations about this product.