How-To Geek: 6 Useful Websites to Download for Offline Access. “You’ve likely come to rely on the internet to find useful information the moment you need it, but you can’t count on always having a reliable connection. That’s why it’s a great idea to download a copy of the internet’s most useful websites so you can access them while off the grid.”
Android Police: Google Translate gets offline translation for 33 more languages. “Google has just expanded the offline translation functionality to a whopping 33 new languages, as announced by the company in a blog post.” From Basque to Zulu, full list in the post.
WIRED: How to Make Sure Your Cloud Files Are Always Synced. “Here are the ways you can make sure your most important files are stored locally, using any of the popular cloud storage services. It’ll definitely take more local disk space, but your data is easier to access, whether you’re online or not.”
The Verge: Stack Overflow wants to make it easier to code in the Arctic or prison. “Stack Overflow is trying to make sure that its repository of programming knowledge, stored in the form of millions and millions of questions and answers, is available even to people without internet access. It’s announcing an initiative called Overflow Offline, where it’ll work with developers and a wide range of organizations that deal with things like the justice and prison systems, education, and scientific endeavors.”
Review Geek: You Can Now Access iFixit’s Entire Catalog Offline. “To many people, the internet is an invasive, essential, and ever-present force. But nearly half of the world’s population lacks home or mobile internet access, and even in ‘developed’ nations, the internet is held together by superglue. That’s why iFixit has made the entirety of its guides available offline.”
SwissInfo: Swiss technology foils Russian censorship. “The Swiss software Kiwix enables the user to copy entire websites so they can be accessible offline. Now that Wikipedia risks sanction in Russia because of its content on the Ukraine war, downloads of the free online encyclopaedia using Kiwix are off the charts.”
How-To Geek: How to Download Wikipedia for Offline, At-Your-Fingertips Reading. “Have you ever wished you could download Wikipedia in its entirety, and have a copy of it for yourself? There are a handful of ways to do just that — all you need is a third-party program and about 150 gigabytes of storage.”
Mashable: Russians are downloading Wikipedia en masse as possible ban looms . “Reporting for Slate, writer Annie Rauwerda dove into Kiwix’s public stats and found that the number of downloads of the Russian-language Wikipedia have spiked in recent weeks. It’s already been downloaded 148,457 times this month so far. As Rauwerda points out, that’s more than a 4,000 percent uptick in downloads in March when compared to January of this year. Russia’s Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology, and Mass Media (abbreviated as Roskomnadzor), aka its censorship agency, threatened to block Wikipedia in the country earlier this month.”
Autoevolution: The Best 5 Google Maps Alternatives With Offline Maps Support. “One of the best things about Google Maps is offline support. With this feature, Google allows you to continue enjoying its navigation capabilities without an Internet connection. This obviously comes in handy when data coverage is not available, no matter if we’re talking about a tunnel or a limited mobile plan that makes it harder to use an online navigation app. But of course, Google Maps isn’t the only app out there with support for offline maps, so if for some reason you’re now looking for an alternative, here are the best five you can try out today.”
9to5 Google: Google Lens for Android rolling out offline translate capability. “Since last year, Google has been working on letting you perform translations in its visual search tool without an internet connection. Google Lens is now rolling out offline translate on Android.”
Lifehacker: How to Set Up Google Calendar’s ‘Offline Mode’. “Google is bringing back ‘offline mode’ to its web-based version of Google Calendar—at least, for Workspace users. Most of you shouldn’t need this, assuming you’ve previously connected your Google Calendar to one of the many smartphone or desktop apps available, but it never hurts to have a backup just in case something happens and you need to know your itinerary.”
Eurasianet: In remote, offline Kyrgyzstan, the best of the internet comes in a box. “The internet has never had a year like 2020. With the pandemic forcing people everywhere to retreat into their homes, our lives are virtual like never before. But what if you don’t have internet access? For schoolchildren in remote parts of Kyrgyzstan, that’s not a hypothetical question. For the Internet Society, it’s a challenge.”
Google Blog: Google Translate improves offline translation. “When you’re traveling somewhere without access to the internet or don’t want to use your data plan, you can still use the Google Translate app on Android and iOS when your phone is offline. Offline translation is getting better: now, in 59 languages, offline translation is 12 percent more accurate, with improved word choice, grammar and sentence structure. In some languages like Japanese, Korean, Thai, Polish, and Hindi the quality gain is more than 20 percent.”
PC Magazine: How to Download a Web Page or Article to Read Offline. “Whether you’re underground between subway stops, caught in a dead zone, or your internet is out, the most reliable way to catch up on your digital reading is to make sure it’s downloaded and accessible offline.”
Make Tech Easier: How to Download Entire Websites for Offline Use. “Wi-Fi seems to be available pretty much anywhere. In addition, mobile data plans are becoming increasingly generous and speedy. However, there are occasions where you may be caught without access to the Internet. Anyone who flies knows the pain of a flight without Wi-Fi. Fortunately, if you’re stuck in a situation that bars access to the World Wide Web, there is a way to access your favorite website. All you need to do is download it. Downloading an entire website is also handy for those who want to archive a site in case it goes down.”
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