I learned something new this weekend and wanted to share it with you. When I am writing a blog post and using various links, I test them before I publish the post. In an effort to publish a usable bit of information for the reader, it seems best that the links work as intended, right?
When I was working on my review of Lori Kennedy’s “From Doodle to Design” class on Craftsy the other day, I was trying to test my links to her class on the Craftsy website. As an affiliate of Craftsy, I receive a small payment if anyone purchases something through my blog. Naturally, I wanted the links to work properly. 😉 The problem was that when I clicked through the link, it took me to my personal Craftsy account, not the main page that I intended to link to. This was because my Chrome browser was keeping track (as it is designed to) of my browser history and taking me to the last Craftsy place I had been.
I asked Ian (my youngest son) to test the link from his laptop. He was sitting at the table with me editing photos on his laptop while I was fussing with this. He suggested I open an “incognito” window and test it myself. I never knew this was even a “thing”. Using Chrome, if you press Ctrl-Shift-N (all at the same time) it will open a new tab on your browser. This tab will be working privately, meaning it will not see your history, or cookies, that are generally available. When I tested my link while “incognito”, it worked exactly as intended because I was testing from a clean slate, so to speak. Another way to use incognito browsing on a Windows computer is to click on the 3 thin lines at the top of the screen, in the upper right corner. The drop down menu will offer ‘New Incognito Window’ as a choice. That will take you to the same thing. Again, this window will not access your history so you have the clean slate I was talking about. Browsing the web using an incognito window also means that your history isn’t saved when working with this screen.
After learning about this ability to browse Incognito, I took advantage of it and tried to search for my Facebook page. I have the privacy on my Facebook page locked down fairly tightly. I wasn’t able to access it at all. That was good to see.
Could be that this is old news to you and I am late to the party here, but I am happy to add this to my process when I am proofing a post before hitting the publish button. Hopefully it will help you too if you hadn’t already heard of this. If you have questions, leave them in the comments and I will find an answer (probably by calling Ian but still….) 🙂
Linking up with Stephanie today over at Late Night Quilter. Come take a look at her Tips & Tutorials Tuesday. There is always something to learn each week at this link up!
Good info. I do not use Chrome so I tried the other option but couldn’t get “new Incognito Window ” as a choice’ I up-dated to windows 10 a while back. Maybe that choice isn’t available?????
It appears to be a problem with Windows 10. There are all sorts of complaints listed that users with Windows 10 lost the incognito feature. 🙁 Maybe it will be fixed eventually?
Great new information! I had no idea! Thanks for sharing. XO
You’re welcome! Glad it was good information for you. 🙂
I didn’t know this! I knew there was an incognito mode-but didn’t know this easy way to get to it! Thanks!
Ha! Every once in awhile, I accidentally hit a key (don’t know which one) and then my laptop announces that I’ve gone incognito. I always giggle a bit because it makes me feel like a spy or someone engaged in some shady activity. Good to know there’s a legitimate reason to go under cover!
Haha. That is so cute. If I had to guess, I would say there are loads of people using the feature for viewing shady stuff on the web. However, I am certain you are not in that group!! 🙂 You’re so funny!
Thanks for replying.
Thanks for sharing incognito! There are so many icons that pop up on my computer screen that I have no idea about. We are going to miss our home IT support when he goes to university in September!
Well, at least when he is off in school, you can still message him with your IT questions! My boys get that from me on a regular basis. 🙂
It’s news to me ! 🙂 Interesting!
Good! I hope it is useful to you at some point ?
I had no idea you could do this! Thanks for sharing and a big thank you to your son for knowing 🙂
You’re very welcome! I will pass your thanks along to Ian. ?