Technologies

Take Google Docs Offline to Access Your Files Anywhere

You don’t have to be connected to the internet to edit that paper for school or work.

The cold of winter is mostly behind us, so we’ll get more daylight, nice gentle breezes and plenty of walks with our friends soon. If you use Google Docs, you might think that being tethered to Wi-Fi means you can’t enjoy the warm weather. However, you can access Google Docs offline, letting you move your desk to a park, coffee shop or anywhere else you might want to work.

Here’s how to access Google Docs offline.

How to use Google Docs offline on desktop

You can make individual files or all your files available offline. Choosing individual files is helpful if you have a limited amount of storage on your computer, or you only need access to one or two files.

Here’s how to access individual Google Docs offline on desktop.

1. Open Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge.

2. Go to Google.com and sign into your Google account.

3. Click the dot grid in the top right corner of Google and click Docs.

4. Under Recent documents, click the three stacked dots next to the file you want to make available offline.

5. Click Available offline.

If space is no issue, you can make all your files available offline with a few clicks. Here’s how to access all your Google Docs offline on desktop.

1. Open Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge.

2. Go to Google.com and sign into your Google account.

3. Click the dot grid in the top right corner of Google and click Drive.

4. Click the gear icon in the top right corner.

5. Click Settings.

6. Click the box next to Create, open and edit your recent Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides…

To access your documents, you need to download the Chrome Docs Offline extension and go to docs.google.com. Your computer might load the Google Docs page slowly, but it will open.

You should see this icon next to files in Google Docs that are available offline.

Screenshot by Zach McAuliffe/CNET

Once it opens, files that are available offline will display a small icon next to them that looks like a checkmark inside a circle. If you hover over this icon it will say Available offline. When you click the offline document, you can start writing or editing. The document will automatically update the next time your computer connects to the internet.

How to use Google Docs offline on mobile

You can also access Google Docs offline on your iPhone or Android device. Here’s how to make these documents available offline on your mobile device.

1. Download the Google Docs app in either the Apple App Store or the Google Play store.

2. Open the app.

3. Tap the three dots (…) next to the document you want to access offline.

4. Tap Make available offline.

Now you can access and edit your documents on your mobile device through the Google Docs app without Wi-Fi or your mobile data. Any documents you’ve changed will automatically update the next time your phone connects to Wi-Fi.

For more Google tips, check out how to clear out your Google Drive and Gmail, nine Google Drive features you may have missed and six Google features to be more efficient.

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Technologies

Today’s NYT Strands Hints, Answers and Help for Oct. 22 #598

Here are hints and answers for the NYT Strands puzzle for Oct. 22, No. 598.

Looking for the most recent Strands answer? Click here for our daily Strands hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Today’s NYT Strands puzzle is a fun one — I definitely have at least two of these in my house. Some of the answers are a bit tough to unscramble, so if you need hints and answers, read on.

I go into depth about the rules for Strands in this story.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections and Mini Crossword answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: NYT Connections Turns 1: These Are the 5 Toughest Puzzles So Far

Hint for today’s Strands puzzle

Today’s Strands theme is: Catch all.

If that doesn’t help you, here’s a clue: A mess of items.

Clue words to unlock in-game hints

Your goal is to find hidden words that fit the puzzle’s theme. If you’re stuck, find any words you can. Every time you find three words of four letters or more, Strands will reveal one of the theme words. These are the words I used to get those hints but any words of four or more letters that you find will work:

BATE, LICE, SLUM, CAPE, HOLE, CARE, BARE, THEN, SLAM, SAMBA, BACK

Answers for today’s Strands puzzle

These are the answers that tie into the theme. The goal of the puzzle is to find them all, including the spangram, a theme word that reaches from one side of the puzzle to the other. When you have all of them (I originally thought there were always eight but learned that the number can vary), every letter on the board will be used. Here are the nonspangram answers:

TAPE, COIN, PENCIL, BATTERY, SHOELACE, THUMBTACK

Today’s Strands spangram

Today’s Strands spangram is JUNKDRAWER. To find it, look for the J that’s five letters down on the far-left row, and wind down, over and then up.

Quick tips for Strands

#1: To get more clue words, see if you can tweak the words you’ve already found, by adding an «S» or other variants. And if you find a word like WILL, see if other letters are close enough to help you make SILL, or BILL.

#2: Once you get one theme word, look at the puzzle to see if you can spot other related words.

#3: If you’ve been given the letters for a theme word, but can’t figure it out, guess three more clue words, and the puzzle will light up each letter in order, revealing the word.

Technologies

Today’s Wordle Hints, Answer and Help for Oct. 22, #1586

Here are hints and the answer for today’s Wordle for Oct. 22, No. 1,586.

Looking for the most recent Wordle answer? Click here for today’s Wordle hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Wordle puzzle features some letters I don’t often guess, but it’s not terribly difficult. If you need a new starter word, check out our list of which letters show up the most in English words. If you need hints and the answer, read on.

Today’s Wordle hints

Before we show you today’s Wordle answer, we’ll give you some hints. If you don’t want a spoiler, look away now.

Wordle hint No. 1: Repeats

Today’s Wordle answer has one repeated letter.

Wordle hint No. 2: Vowels

Today’s Wordle answer has one vowel.

Wordle hint No. 3: First letter

Today’s Wordle answer begins with S.

Wordle hint No. 4: Last letter

Today’s Wordle answer ends with T.

Wordle hint No. 5: Meaning

Today’s Wordle answer can refer to an action displaying spectacular skill and daring.

TODAY’S WORDLE ANSWER

Today’s Wordle answer is STUNT.

Yesterday’s Wordle answer

Yesterday’s Wordle answer, Oct. 21, No. 1,585 was DETOX.

Recent Wordle answers

Oct. 17, No. 1,581: GROSS
Oct. 18, No. 1,582: HAVEN
Oct. 19, No. 1,583: IDEAL
Oct. 20, No. 1,584: LIMBO

Quick tips for Wordle

#1: Check our list ranking the popularity of all the letters in the alphabet and choose your starter words accordingly. (TRAIN, STERN and AUDIO are good.)

#2: Don’t forget that letters can be used more than once.

#3: Many words are similar. You don’t want to use up multiple guesses that don’t advance your cause. So if the puzzle is STA_E, don’t guess STARE, STATE and STALE. Guess something that uses that R, T and L, like TWIRL.