Working from home and being productive can be both rewarding and a challenge at the same time. There are many ways to help with productivity when you're faced with a desk or a comfy couch. Make things a little bit easier for yourself with these 3 free tools. They're so easy to integrate into your workflow that you'll be wondering what you did without them. And did we mention they're free?
Telephone Service
Go get yourself a free Google Voice telephone number. Google Voice has been around for a while now, but it's an easy and useful addition to the home office that also happens to be free. Aside from saving buckets of money on a landline telephone service, Google Voice lets you dictate the terms of when clients can contact you. Need to run out of the house during the business day but don't want to miss any important calls? The work phone stays with you, routed to your cell phone, ready for you to screen and pick up or ignore. Don't want your phone ringing before 7am while your alarm hasn't gone off? Set "office hours" and only allow the phone to ring within your working (and waking) hours. These and other features make Google Voice indispensable for the home office.
It's not free, but an affordable service to pair with Google Voice is Magic Jack. It's a cheap replacement for your telephone land line. A small dongle plugs into your computer and runs software that routes your calls through the internet. The physical telephone port on a Magic Jack lets you plug in a fax machine and send/receive those odd faxes that we always seem to need now and again but can never find somewhere to do it.
MORE TELEPHONE SERVICE ON APARTMENT THERAPY:
• How to Keep Your Number With Google Voice Voicemail
• Would You Say Goodbye To Your Land Line?
Cloud/Sync Storage
Box's recent offering of free 50GB cloud storage for life is changing the game (the offer was sent via the Dell Advantage Loyalty Program, but anyone can signup as a "coworker or friend" via this signup page), and we can't wait for competitors like Dropbox, Microsoft Skydrive, Google Drive, Amazon Cloud Drive and the like to respond. With free 5-50GB of cloud storage (more with paid subscriptions), you can access your work from any computer, anywhere.
These cloud storage services makes collaborating with others significantly easier. In situations where you might want to share a set of files, it's as easy as sending a link by e-mail. The syncing features let you share all your work among multiple computers, with each user having a local copy so there's no network lag on a shared drive, or version control problems to worry about. It's free, easy, useful, and you should do it now.
MORE CLOUD STORAGE ON APARTMENT THERAPY:
• Pros and Cons: 5 Cloud Storage Options
• Box is Offering 50GB Cloud Storage For Life For Free!
Remote Desktop
Working from home unfortunately often means that you're always working, whether you're actually home or not. Without coworkers to pick up your load while you're on vacation or simply not at your home office desk, sometimes an emergency comes up that you just absolutely have to take care of right then and there. But you need access to your computer. And you're not home.
Remote desktop websites and applications let you connect directly to a computer, showing your desktop and giving you full access as if you were sitting right in front of it. Some versions of Microsoft Windows come with Remote Desktop Connection built right in. Apple provides Remote Desktop for their Mac OS. I'm partial to LogMeIn as a free web based service to directly access any number of computers configured to the account. VNC is also a popular choice.
It's not always as blazing fast as if you were right there at your desk with your high speed connection, but when you absolutely need access to your entire computer and workflow, there's no better way than to remotely connect and just do it on your own workstation.
MORE REMOTE DESKTOP CONNECTIONS ON APARTMENT THERAPY:
• How to Access Your Home Desktop While You're Away
• How LogMeIn Saved My Sanity From Parental Tech No-How
MORE HOME OFFICE PRODUCTIVITY ON APARTMENT THERAPY:
• Working At Home and Being Productive
• 10 Tips for Successfully Working from Home
• How To Increase Your Work Productivity at Home
• Improve Your Productivity With These 3 Easy Changes to Your Workflow
• 10 Steps to a Home Office You'll Love
• Home Office + Working From Home = More Productive? (Lifework)
• What's the Best Color For the Home Office? (Final Frame)
(Images/Videos: Adrienne Breaux/Karen's Delicious Downtown Apartment, Google, Box, LogMeIn)
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Unless there is something I missed the Box offer is incorrect. According to Box's website only the first 5 GBs are free. To get 50 GB you must pay $19/month.
AT- am I missing something? Please let me know, I'd like to take advantage of that deal if the offer stands.
Update: So the Free 50GB offer exists only to "Dell Advantage Loyalty Program" members. Not sure what that even is but looks like I don't qualify.
https://www.box.com/signup/o/dell_50gb_give_get
The offer is actually open to Dell Advantage Loyalty Program members, but also to share with "coworkers and friends". I signed up without any issue using the link above.
Awesome! It worked for me! Thank so much for the reply!
None of these things is really free when you look at all the hidden costs. For instance, syncing to the cloud consumes an awful lot of bandwidth, and since most people have capped usage with their ISPs, they could be hit with hefty bills at the end of the month. And remote desktop without a hefty security solution can open your business up to all kinds of security holes, which could cost a fortune. It's an irresponsible article if you don't point these things out.
I have heard of ISPs which will throttle your connection if you are constantly consuming HUGE amounts of bandwidth, but I haven't personally heard of any that will charge you extra for usage over a cap (I've heard of data plans for cell providers that will).
I could be wrong, though...
I signed up last week and got the 50g for free.. I am not part of any Dell program.
We got an agreement update from comcast a couple years ago explaining that bandwidth overage fees would now be in effect, even for smaller overages. We've been careful, so I don't know if they really do it or how much over you'd have to go (the letter and updated TOS agreement didn't specify).
Good ideas! I'm a big fan of Dropbox.
But more importantly, I need that chair. Is the chair free, too?
Almost no ISPs in the U.S have capped bandwidth. My average bandwidth use per month is about 45GB down.
50gb free deal is dead. Price now is $9.99/month for 25 gb and $19.99/month for 50gb.
A cheaper/better way to send/receive faxes the occasional fax is to sign up for a free number from www.efax.com to receive, and send for free (if okay with advertising on the cover page) or for a fee of $1.99 (no ads) from faxzero.com. I imagine almost everyone has a scanner at home these days (you will need to scan the docs or have it in an electronic format somehow to send the fax)
really ticked about the misinformation re the free 50gb. dell won't even let me become a loyalty member. makes me doubt the validity of the other "tips" in the blog.
Apple has a built in way to Remote Desktop to other Macs you own. If you have two macs logged in to the same iCloud account there's a "Back to my Mac" feature you can enable to file/screen share. I use it a lot when I'm on the road with my MacBook and I need to remote in to my iMac at home.
Cutting the land line, has anyone done this with multiple phone numbers? My husband runs a small family business with 3 phone lines and I am constantly appalled with what their telephone bill is.
and do any of these services allow you to port an existing number over to their service? Part of the reason I think they haven't switched is fear of losing their office number (which has been the same for 45+ years)
Hi MegW, Google Voice lets you port your number!
http://support.google.com/voice/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1065667
Vonage lets you port your number as well.... www.vonage.com
Like the ideas of house decorations and furnished...
http://loveromancephotos.blogspot.com/
I've used Magic Jack, it may be cheap but it isn't quality. It sounds like you're talking into a tin can to someone far away. It disconnects frequently, too. Also keep in mind that no internet phone service can truly replace a land line, because if your electric goes out, so does your router.
I'm a HUGE Google Voice lover! We haven't bothered with a landline in almost ten years. We use it in the following ways by forwarding our cell calls through it and texting directly from the number:
1) All of our voicemail is filtered through it. While at a PC, we can listen while people are leaving a message if we want (like an old school answering machine) and decide if we want to answer.
2) It's incredibly easy to block unwanted calls with a single click in the browser interface. Bonus: it tells the annoying caller that the number is disconnected.
3) A great dummy number for anyone you don't want to have your for-real regular number. I use it when filling out forms or listing items on Craigslist, for example. I had a stalker ex in my past, so I also chose and area code that has nothing to do with my area, on the off chance he will try to look me up again someday and finds that number. According to it, I live very far away from where I actually live.
4) With a browser plugin (Chrome) we can text from our PC keyboards and that beats the tar out of using ANY size touchscreen.
5) You can set it up to email you copies of texts/voicemail transcripts. This has been wonderful while buying a house. If I need to go back and find info, it's not buried in my phone and/or clogging up space there. I can check these emails from anywhere very easily.
6) Google to Google calls are free, but if you have anyone overseas, you can not beat the very low cost of international calls.
7) With the same browser plugin mentioned earlier, I get a nice, crisp ding sound when I have a text or voicemail. This is most excellent, since I am prone to leaving my phone in a bag or pocket. Since I'm at my PC so much, I rarely miss a call/text I want to get.
I use an obi for free calls over my "landline" phone via google voice. The box was something like 30 dollars, but after that, it's free. I have used it for about 6 months with no issues save the very occasional wonky sound when I dial out...indicating some sort of Internet misfire. I just hang up and dial again. Overall pretty awesome. And there is a version that can manage 2 physical phone lines but why would you need that when you can do all your porting via google voice?
In Canada, land of the telecom oligopoly, it's sadly commonplace.