WP8 Newbie Tips

[hopmedic]

Put emoticons in your contacts' names. But be careful - if you use speech recognition to text or dial a name, it may not be recognized. I got around this with my wife's name by adding a hypen to the last name, and put the emoticon after the hyphen. It recognizes her name when spoken if I do it that way.

 

[identity-x]

Its interesting seeing folks new to wp8 post tips for stuff that's been around since 7.x.

I dint mean that in a snobby hipster kind of way, but in a "YES...wp8 DOES have some awesome functions and I'm stoked to see so many folks finally recognize this!"

Welcome to the fold.

 

[racerjim]

Customize Lock Screen
While it’s been easy to customize your lock screen with static images, WP8 lets you customize the lock screen with app data and/or live tile information. Just go to Settings | Lock Screen | “Open this app to let it make changes” | click the APP button, go to your app (say the HTC app that includes newsfeeds, weather, stocks), pick the screen you’d like to have as your new lock screen and you’re done. This works for all apps enabled for this feature like music (have your artist display on your lock screen while music plays), Bing (Bing’s desktop of the day), Facebook, etc. Mine is set to HTC’s local weather conditions.

Is that an HTC thing? my lock screen settings don't have that choice on my Lumia 822.

 

[hopmedic]

Its interesting seeing folks new to wp8 post tips for stuff that's been around since 7.x.

I dint mean that in a snobby hipster kind of way, but in a "YES...wp8 DOES have some awesome functions and I'm stoked to see so many folks finally recognize this!"

Welcome to the fold.

Yeah, it is kind of funny... But some of us have been around, but posting to help those who haven't... And to them, yes, I agree... Welcome to the fold!

 

[Etyrnus]

Yeah, it is kind of funny... But some of us have been around, but posting to help those who haven't... And to them, yes, I agree... Welcome to the fold!

Exactly, trying to help those who are just joining us.

 

[lancguy]

I can't say how much I love the group feature! I knew about it, but didn't take time to set up. I just did it and wow, I really like how I can set it up and just get status updates for that group on 1 tile! It's also great to be able to just browse through the updates for that group filtering out people that i'm not interested in looking at! What a time saver.

 

[hopmedic]

I can't say how much I love the group feature! I knew about it, but didn't take time to set up. I just did it and wow, I really like how I can set it up and just get status updates for that group on 1 tile! It's also great to be able to just browse through the updates for that group filtering out people that i'm not interested in looking at! What a time saver.

I never used it in WP7, never figured I'd need it... Now I'm hearing of ways to use it, and Verizon took it away. BOO!

 

[willied]

I never used it in WP7, never figured I'd need it... Now I'm hearing of ways to use it, and Verizon took it away. BOO!

You can still make groups with the Verizon phones, it's the group text messaging that's not present.

 

[ivirsnezbit]

If you want to ad a word to the dictionary/spell checker thing... You just tap the word with the red squiggly and it will show the word with a plus sign in front of it, in the bar above the keyboard. just tap it and bam!!! In the dictionary.

I did this for some usernames and some other words that I type a lot that are not in the dictionary so I don't have to type them all out.

Thought this was need

Jon

 

[hopmedic]

You can still make groups with the Verizon phones, it's the group text messaging that's not present.

Oh - you're talking about the rooms! DOH! (I'm such an idiot sometimes)

 

[JefTek]

Rooms are not the same as groups. Groups just group content together, where rooms share content with everyone you assign in the room

 

[hopmedic]

Rooms are not the same as groups. Groups just group content together, where rooms share content with everyone you assign in the room

Ok. Then I'm totally missing something. Are we not talking about groups of people? Like in the people hub? I'm thinking in WP7 you could either add a contact or a group (never used it, though). Here, I only see a way to add a contact. Am I thinking of something totally different than what you're talking about?

 

[willied]

Ok. Then I'm totally missing something. Are we not talking about groups of people? Like in the people hub? I'm thinking in WP7 you could either add a contact or a group (never used it, though). Here, I only see a way to add a contact. Am I thinking of something totally different than what you're talking about?

I might be wrong. I was under the impression that Verizon WP8 phones didn't support just threaded group texting.

 

[cmdates2991]

You're right. VZW phones support both Groups and Rooms. But group text messages are disabled for some reason.

 

[hopmedic]

I can't believe what an idiot I can be sometimes..... Well, that and Microsoft moved it... I kept searching for "windows Phone 8" "create a group" and I'd come up with links to stuff about rooms. *head-desk-head-desk* Finally, I found this video, which explained groups, as exactly what I thought, from WP7, which I'd seen before, but never used. But it doesn't say how to add them. I would swear you just click the plus sign, and it asks if you want to add a contact or a group.

But then I pick up my phone, and for the first time since I got WP8, I suppose, I swiped the people hub to the left of the contact list instead of the right. And there it is. They moved it on me, and I hadn't ventured that far to the right, or to the left at all. DOH! It's exactly what I thought it was, and since I couldn't find it and y'all were saying it was there, I was thinking there was something else entirely different that you were saying was a group. *head-desk-head-desk...*

 

[wake6]

I loved how easily the "Transfer my data" app copied all my contacts from my old Android phone using witchcraft (Bluetooth).

 

[ksj1]

If you would like a different ringtone depending on who calls go to the people app. Choose the person and then choose edit. Tap ringtone and choose the tone you want for that person. I haven't checked to see if custom ringtones can be used here as well yet, but there are a pretty large number of choices.

 

[mmacleodbrown]

Downloading attachments from email????
I sent myself a qif file to import into a money management program on my phone. I can see the attachment, but when I select it, Im asked for what program I want to open it with and the phone wants to search the store?
I just want to download and store it on my phone?

 

[Edwincnelson]

If you want to add music to your phone you can use the new sync app or you can use Windows Media Player, Media Monkey, iTunes, or a host of other 3rd party apps. FYI if you use Windows Media Player make sure you update your album info or it is likely to improperly sync and omit album art and/or not show up in the Album view in your phone's media player.

 

[tarzanmarzan]

If you go to your app list and press search, you can also search in the Store as well