On three different occasions this week I was contacted by people who were in a near panic because their technology was mis-behaving.
In each case I determined that a simple fix would solve their problem and get them back to work.
What was the simple fix you ask? It’s called rebooting! This technique needs to be in your arsenal of computing problem solving as a first course of action.
It’s long been known that Windows computers that are left on for extended periods of time often exhibit really strange behavior. Programs won’t start, or if they do, they immediately crash. Websites won’t open. Opening email cause the program or the computer to crash. And much, much more.
But, guess what? Your iPhone, iPad, and Android phones are also computers and yes, they need to be be rebooted periodically also. In the case of phones, unless you turn your phone off (power it down) and turn if back on in the morning, you are headed for some strange behavior.
I have even found the lowly reboot to be useful on my Macs.
To reboot a Windows computer, give it the three finger salute of holding down the CTRL and the ALT keys while you tap the DEL key. This will give you the option of logging off of the current user or restarting or powering it down. Select restart and let it do it’s thing. In many case it could take minutes for the machine to power down. Just let it do it’s thing.
On Macs, left click on the Apple logo in the upper left of the screen and select restart from the resulting menu and you’ll be good to go.
On your iPhone or iPads, hold down the round home button and while doing that hold down the power button at the top right of the phone (or iPad). Keep holding them down for what seems like a long time. You’ll see the power off slider eventually appear, but keep holding. Eventually you’ll see the silver Apple logo appear on your screen. When you see that, release both buttons and let it do it’s thing.
For Android users, I have no advice for you as each implementation seems to be different, but I will direct you to this Google search: https://www.google.com/search?q=rebooting&rlz=1C5MACD_enUS507US510&oq=rebooting&aqs=chrome..69i57.2475j0j7&sourceid=chrome&espv=210&es_sm=91&ie=UTF-8#q=rebooting+android&revid=1771026206
In most cases, a reboot will not cause loss of data on your iPhone, iPad or Mac. Depending on whether or not you had open programs with unsaved data at the time of the reboot, you may lose that work.
But, a reboot is first line of troubleshooting when your tech starts acting weirdly!
