Listen to the Genealogy Gems Premium Podcast on Android Devices

FOR ANDROID USERS: How to Get the Premium Feed on Your Android Mobile Device

Recommended app: Podcast Addict for Android, available in the Google Play Store.

Follow these steps to set up the Premium Podcast using the Podcast Addict app for Android. Examples shown below are on a tablet, so keep in mind that it may look slightly different on your device.

1. Download the Podcast Addict App

      Podcast Addict app

Google Play Store

On your device, go to the Google Play Store and download the Podcast Addict app.
(*Note: If you’ve never used the Google Play store you may be required to set up an account, including payment information. This is unrelated to Genealogy Gems, but necessary in order to download apps from the Google Play Store.)

Recommended app: Podcast Addict for Android, available in the Google Play Store.

Follow these steps to set up the Premium Podcast using the Podcast Addict app for Android.
NOTE: Examples shown below are on a tablet, so keep in mind that it may look slightly different on your device.

2. Add the Genealogy Gems Premium Podcast Feed

Tap the + icon to add a feed

Tap “RSS Feed, YouTube/Twitch Channel, Soundcloud URL”

In the “RSS feed URL” field, copy and paste this address to ensure it is exactly correct with no extra spaces at the end (the feed address is case sensitive):
https://lisalouisecooke.com/Premium_Feed/feed.xml

  • Check the box for “Authentication (Premium Podcast)”
  • Type in your Genealogy Gems Premium Membership username and password. You MUST use your membership username, NOT your email address.
  • Tap “Add”

Your Podcast home screen will now have the Genealogy Gems Premium Podcast.

Tap the podcast icon.  It may appear yellow like this or it may be our logo) to reveal all episodes, starting with the most recent episode at the top of the list.

3. Downloading Episodes

You can download episodes so that you can listen offline, without an internet connection or using your device’s cellular data. Download an episode by tapping the down arrow icon on the right:

Once the episode is downloaded, a play button will appear that you can click to listen. A small download icon will appear indicating that this episode is downloaded to your device:

3. Listening to Episodes & Viewing Show Notes

When you open the app, tap the Genealogy Gems Premium podcast to access episodes:

You can go straight to the episodes you’ve already downloaded through the app’s menu. Tap the three lines icon:

Then tap Downloaded episodes:

On this screen are only the episodes you have downloaded for offline listening. To return to all episodes just tap the 3 line icon in the upper left corner.

4. Deleting Downloaded Episodes

After you have listened to a downloaded episode, you can delete it to free up the space on your device. (Don’t worry, all of the episodes are still available through the main podcast feed in Podcast Addict.) To delete an episode in the Downloaded Episodes area, tap the 3 dots icon on the episode you want to delete:

(Note: If you want to delete all the episodes that you’ve already played, click the 3 dots icon at the very top of the right-hand corner, and then tap “Delete Played Episodes”)

On the page for that downloaded episode tap the trash can icon to delete it from your device:

Need More Help?

If you’re experiencing error messages or other technical difficulties, please visit our Premium eLearning FAQ page and head to the Troubleshooting section towards the bottom. You’ll find answers to the most common causes of problems and solutions and tips to fix them.

Help! My Email Doesn’t Fit in Viewer Window

screen resolution settingRecently I heard from Carol in St. Louis, Missouri, who was frustrated that she couldn’t read my entire email newsletter. “Would love to know what you are saying,” she says. But my newsletter email doesn’t fit in her email window. “I don’t want to toggle to the right to see the end of each line and then have to toggle back.”

The good news I shared with Carol is that she could fix this problem–and so can anyone else who has trouble with emails not fitting in their viewers.

Email sizing is related to your computer’s screen resolution setting, and a variety of other variables. It’s different for everyone. 98% of our readers see the email perfectly fitted to their screen.

As you can see in the screen shot here, the email Carol forwarded me appears neatly and completely in my email window in my browser. (I’m on a PC using Firefox.) In cases where it doesn’t come through to your email account that way, we provide a link at the top of the email that you can simply click to view the email on a new web browser tab fitted to the page.

sign up newsletterWant to receive our free email newsletter? Just sign up in the box in the upper right-hand corner of this webpage or on the Genealogy Gems home page. It’s free, we don’t share your email address with anyone else, and you get a free e-book of Google tips for genealogy just for signing up.

Can Google Help Me Search Digitized Newspaper Pages?

my ancestor in the newspaper newsCan Google help you search digitized newspapers you find online? Recently I heard from Garth in Ontario, Canada with a question like that. Here’s what he asked and here’s what I told him:

“A friend found a digitized newspaper article by clicking on this link and going through various years–very time consuming! I’m thinking there has to be a better way with Google, but no luck. I think I have used most of your techniques from Genealogy Gems. Would appreciate any hints.”

genealogy gems podcast mailboxFirst of all, thanks to Garth for alerting us to an online local archive of Canadian newspapers, The Clarington Local Newspapers collection. I like making people aware of collections like this. Here’s what I told him:

If the website had text transcriptions of articles then Google would have easily been able to grab the phrase “Arthur Levi Brunt” off any page. The search would be “Arthur Levi Brunt”  or, even better, would be a site search, which would be formatted like this: site:http://vitacollections.ca/claringtonnews “Arthur Levi Brunt.” In Google site searches, you start with the word “site” with a colon, followed by the home page in which to search, followed by the exact phrase you want to search in quotes.

However, the Clarington Digital News website relies on its own built-in Optical Character Recognition (OCR) to spot and retrieve search terms on the digitized newspaper images. Google doesn’t have access to their OCR, and can’t apply OCR itself to images on the web (the pages on this site are images, not pdfs). So in this case, Google would not be able to locate the same article.

I did notice in looking at the Clarington News site that there is a search box, so your friend didn’t need to browse through the years looking for article on Arthur. Simply entering his name in site’s search box instantly brought up the relevant list in seconds. Here’s a link to that search, so you can see for yourself. Perhaps a few of the other newspaper articles found in that search will be of interest to your friend as well!

Genealogists Google Toolbox 2nd edition coverLearn more about Google search strategies (Google site search is just one!) in my newly-revised, hot off the press 2nd edition of The Genealogist’s Google Toolbox, Second Edition. So many genealogy gems like these news articles are buried online: you just need to know how to harness the power of Google’s FREE tools to find them!

Old Maps of Chicago Now Online

Do you have ancestors who lived in the “Windy City” of Chicago, Illinois (USA)? You should check out Chicago in Maps, a web portal to historic, current and thematic maps.

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As the News-Gazette reports, “There are direct links to over three dozen historic maps of Chicago, from 1834 to 1921. The thematic maps include Chicago railroad maps, transit maps and geological maps.”

Of course, there are current maps, too, including a Chicago street guide for 2014. There’s a fascinating set of maps showing the effects of landfill projects. The Sources and Links page  directs users to helpful guides to street name changes and house numbers. You’ll find links to surveyors’ maps, too.

From the home page, you can also click to a sister site on Chicago streetcars that includes a 1937 map of streetcar lines. (There’s a second sister site on Chicago bridges.)

Genealogy Gems Premium members can learn more about using maps for family history research in my online video class, 5 Ways to Enhance Your Genealogy Research with Old Maps. To learn more about the benefits of Premium membership (including a year’s full access to over 2 dozen full-length video classes), click here.

 

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