Get ready to increase your Bluetooth speed and distance. Bluetooth 5 is coming out soon and capable of transferring data at double the speed of Bluetooth 4.2. It can also work at much further distances.

Theoretically, your Samsung Galaxy S8 paired with a Bluetooth 5 speaker can work up to 260 feet away from each other. Due to walls and general terrain, they probably won’t work that far apart. Bluetooth 4.2 devices don’t work that well even at the current 66-foot limit, where Bluetooth 5 – with a max range of around 800 feet – could replace (or act as a backup to) Wi-Fi connectivity for smart home devices, possibly including your router.

There’s a new piece of Android Malware on the loose – and it’s a doozy. Originally discovered by researchers at Check Point last week, the malware has been dubbed “Judy” and is potentially one of the most widely spread pieces of Android Malware we’ve seen to date. It’s currently believed that upwards of 36.5 million Android devices may have already been infected. Just a friendly reminder: iPhone 8 will be out in a few months, and currently there isn’t any Malware on Apple devices.

Look out you sleepy Lahainaluna High School students. Nester is the new software installed on a student’s computer to track their eye movements and facial expressions, Nestor claims to be able to figure out whether or not learners are in fact learning or dozing off.

Google will introduce an ad blocker to Chrome early next year and is telling publishers to get ready. It will strip any particularly annoying or intrusive advertisements, like videos or auto sound that take up the entire screen.

Awhile back, I mentioned that everyone should download the app HurricanePro. The weather forecasters predict up to eight tropical disturbances this year, and this app will track all of them. Another good one that you can access on the Internet or with Safari is earth.nullschool.net. This one will blow you away. If you like the site, here is a way to make it an icon on your iPhone desktop. While at the site, look for the box with the up arrow key on the bottom of your iPhone screen. Click on it, and a menu pops up that has two rows. On the bottom row, scroll to the left until you see a square with a plus (+) sign in it. It says, “add to Home Screen.” Click on it, and now you have an icon on your iPhone home screen that will automatically take you to that site.

Another site that I created an icon for is an awesome radar weather site by NOAA. You gotta check this one out and put it on your iPhone desktop. Go to www.nhc.noaa.gov/satellite.php; once it’s opened, check the second column on the right for either Central Pacific or Hawaii. Click on Visible HTML5 to see an animated radar screen. Don’t use Flash, because it won’t work. Water Vapor HTML5 is a cool one to click on.

One last app that everyone over 95 years old should use is called Find My Car Smarter FMC. So, if you forgot that you parked your car in front of the Lahiana sewage plant; it will locate it and maybe even give you a message not to light up a match.

Enjoy these new apps and be prepared for this upcoming hurricane season.

Send your computer-related questions to mauimist8669@yahoo.com.