Ask HN: What tips and hacks do you have for the less tech-savy?

What? A wooden baseball bat (USN) HILERICH & BRADSBY

Tell people to write their passwords down. In a book. That they keep. Its actually possible to login to most services without doing a password reset.

Get them a Mac and iPhone - tech support is available via Apple stores, via iMessage and you can call. A before folks bring in lock in, limiting discussion to tech savy. Forget about ecosystem lockin etc, you are optimizing for your family not for you.

Get them to use OneDrive or Google drive or iCloud to back up their laptop and phone. It doesn't happen often, but unrecoverable files on a laptop are the cause of great concern when they happen. OneDrive and iCloud are sort of "opt in" and normally you'd be suspicious about it, but the cost of losing the photos and documents far outweighs the security concerns for most non-tech people and having to waste hours trying to recover a busted drive in a laptop is both frustrating and heartbreaking.

Tell them they need to stop clicking on everything in their email and to be very cautious about visiting a lot of places offering anything "free". Make them aware that their circle of friends doing "forwards from grandma" type emailing can unwittingly send you something malicious. It's nobodies fault, but stop clicking on that stuff.

Two surprising vectors of infection seem to be the ad networks on a lot of faith based websites and niche dating websites (i.e. targeting older folk), please note I do not wish to stop people visiting faith based websites or trying to find love on the internet but for some reason the people who visit these sites seem to be more trusting/click happy and the malicious ad networks know this.

Try to explain to them that "helpful" toolbars are usually malicious software.

Do your best to make sure the update system on laptops is functioning.

Try to set up some remote help for them i.e. Chrome remote desktop that doesn't require them to do much after the install other than let you manage their machine in an emergency.

On a windows machine, make sure Defender is enabled. If they have more than 1 virus blocker installed, get rid of everything else except defender, especially if it take pre-loaded on a laptop they just bought. I don't have anything particular against the other virus software companies except they all seem to lard up laptops with a pile of un-needed nonsense that generates a lot of scary dialog boxes and notifications, and this is just confusing for non-technical people.

I don't think simply telling people to buy a Mac and and iphone is terribly helpful, a lot of older folk still have some strange software they prefer to use for their word processing or an old printer they don't want to replace, and the cascade of trying to get them to switch to the apple ecosystem will be more trouble than it's worth.

Not even switching to a Mac. Get them a iPad with Touch ID. They will gradually switch from using a computer to their iPad. Touch ID is still generally 10x better for non-tech people. A single button to return to a clean state / Home Screen. ( Unfortunately this button is disappearing )

If they want to print something, get them to email it to themselves. No need for complicated file transfer or AirDrop. They understand email. And they will use email.

The absolute worst thing is WiFi. I still wish we have simple consumer solution that actually provide 99% coverage 99.99999% of the time. And that is why some of my family members prefer to use unlimited 4G / 5G. It just works. In certain ( ASUS ) WiFi router, there is an option to allow routine restart. Having it restart once every week during sleeping hours could reduce router crashed / not working issues to zero.

Set up automatic backup to something like iCloud.

A relative of mine had all her photos and writings on an old Windows laptop with no backup. She got a Mac and I set things up to make sure that a devastating loss of items of great sentimental value aren’t likely to be lost.

She had the Mac for months without using it until I visited. Part of the problem was the neighbor who helped her set it up was under the misguided assumption that the password to get on the Mac had to be a “good” password which was written on a post it note. I had her change the password to a word and toss the post it. Anyone with physical access to the machine is going to see the post it. A simple password made it easy for her arthritic hands to access her Mac, removing the temptation to just keep using the old Windows laptop.

Simple things and an easy setup make all the difference.

Encourage them to become more tech-savvy. Don't let them fall into the media propagated stereotype that there are "nerds" who get tech, and "regulars" who don't. Explain to them that anybody (assuming relatively average intelligence / mental faculties) can become tech-savvy enough to be largely self-sufficient. Let them know that you weren't born magically gifted with deep knowledge of how computers work, but rather that it was something you learned... with the implication being that they can learn to.

Not saying you should encourage everybody to switch careers to software development or network engineering or whatever... just make sure they know that this stuff isn't actually the impenetrable black magic that they might have been led to believe that it is.

Clean taskbar

Clean favorites

Show file extensions

Ad blocker

OneDrive backup

Remote control

Patience.

In my experience, people who want you to fix their PCs mainly want you to get stuff done, rarely do they want to know what you've done precisely or learn "how to". Still, teaching some basics (mouse controls, basic shortcuts and web browser basics) is essential, but make sure you can be efficient at just fixing their machine.

Good luck to everybody for the upcoming Christmas fixes.

Chromebook