How to Add Contact Information to iPhone Lock Screen

Some people don't like the idea of their contact information being in the hands of a stranger, but frankly, if my $600 (for replacement without new contract) iPhone is lost, I don't care if a stranger knows my phone number as long as I get my phone back!

Apparently there are apps for the iPhone that allow you to alter the lock screen to add your information, but I found a slick way that doesn't require another app download:

1. The iPhone allows you to choose what photo appears at the lock screen, so all you have to do is alter the photo a bit!  Start by choosing the picture you want on your lock screen.

Silver Strand beach, South jetty: Photo by Jared Skelton of Silverstrand Photography

2. Open the picture file on you computer and use whatever photo editing software you want to add some text.  For this post I will use Microsoft Paint because it's super easy to use and does the job just fine.  Start by using the text tool (highlighted below).

Click on the area you want your text, and type the text you want in the box.  You can change the font color to show up  better on the picture.  Then send this photo to an email account that you get on your phone, and open and save the photo to you iPhone camera roll.

On your phone, go to Settings > Wallpaper

Click on the picture of you lock screen (on the left above)

Select the location of the picture you want to set as your lock screen

Click on Set

Select Set Lock Screen

3. Lock your phone and make sure the photo shows up like you want it, and you're done!

How to Send Personal Documents and PDFs to Kindle Device

When I was playing around with my Kindle app on my iPhone I saw that you can send person documents and PDFs to your Kindle account and have them show up on your Kindle device or in the Kindle app for your iPhone, or iPad.

There are no instructions on how to do this in the app itself except that it gives you an email address to send documents to.  This only frustrated me because I was sending documents and they never showed up in the Kindle app.

So for any of you interested in this feature, here is how to get it set up.  Please note the steps below were completed to get a PDF document onto my Kindle app on my iPhone 4.

Step 1:
Go to your Amazon account to determine what email address you need to send documents to and add emails to the approved senders list.

Once logged in, click on Your Account

Under Your Account, click on Manage Your Kindle

Under Manage Your Account, click on Personal Document Settings on the left side of the page

If you want to edit the email address to which you will send personal documents you can.  Next, add to the approved email address list the email from which you want to send your personal documents.

Step 2:
Open your e-mail program (Hotmail, GMail, Outlook), start a new email and address it to the email designated for your device (see step one above).  Attach whatever document, e.g., PDF, to the email and send!

Step 3:
It takes a few minutes depending on your device connection for the document to appear in your Kindle device or app.  To view on your iPhone or iPad, open the Kindle app and use the category bar at the top to scroll from All Items to Docs

My iPhone starts here

Swipe on the word All Items to get to Docs

Enjoy your document!