New Chromebooks:

So we got our new Chromebook. It might be better hardware, but in functionality it is way worse. If you have found solutions or have recommendations to these issues, please share them.

Problem: Not sure what the point is in setting up a local account on it. Because the church provides no collaborative environment everything we do is through Google Drive. If you set up a local account you can't log into Google...at all. No Gmail, no Google Drive, no Google Docs (Sacrament Itinerary), etc... You are actually blocked from those.

Our Solution: We all use guest accounts. It's easier to log in but we can access Google accounts...though we have to authorize the login on our phone every time (since it clears the settings).

Problem: Logging in to your local account does not serve as a single sign-on to your church account even though it's tied to your church account. Seems like it would be too easy...but it's not.

Our Solution: None...so we use guest accounts accounts anyway so now we have to type in both our username and our password.

Problem: Inability to manually add scanners. Our Chromebook does not detect our scanner. Our stake technology specialist is trying to figure out why. We've tried this from established accounts and guest accounts. Doesn't work either way.

Our Solution: Our old computer (which is gone now) and my personal laptop do, so as long as I bring my personal laptop we can scan documents. Otherwise it's take pictures and email them to ourselves or scan to thumb drive.

So none of this is catastrophic but it's basically an extra step (or more) in just about everything we do. Other than portability, which I could see being a bonus if my personal laptop dies, and now having two screens, what are the positives?

tonynocchi wrote: Sun May 25, 2025 3:06 pm Problem: Inability to manually add scanners. Our Chromebook does not detect our scanner. Our stake technology specialist is trying to figure out why. We've tried this from established accounts and guest accounts. Doesn't work either way.

Not all peripherals work with Chrome. You'll have to look to see if there's any drivers for them.

Outside of MFPs, I don't think the church ever bought scanners for local units (but some units went ahead and bought some on their own).

russellhltn wrote: Sun May 25, 2025 3:35 pm

tonynocchi wrote: Sun May 25, 2025 3:06 pm Problem: Inability to manually add scanners. Our Chromebook does not detect our scanner. Our stake technology specialist is trying to figure out why. We've tried this from established accounts and guest accounts. Doesn't work either way.

Not all peripherals work with Chrome. You'll have to look to see if there's any drivers for them.

Outside of MFPs, I don't think the church ever bought scanners for local units (but some units went ahead and bought some on their own).

It's an MFP and we can add it as a printer with no issue but not as a scanner. Every ward needs scan capability. Every child baptism or simply adding them to the records has a permission slip included and then there's scanning in numerous documents for the myriad welfare requests we process.

tonynocchi wrote: Sun May 25, 2025 4:00 pm Every ward needs scan capability.

I do not disagree, but I've not seen or heard of any standard roll-out of scanners. Anything the ward or stake decides to buy may not be supported.

I did some hunting and found this link. It does suggest you can scan using the Chromebook's camera. But that link is the only evidence I'd found for supporting document scanning for a clerk (not FamilySearch).

russellhltn wrote: Sun May 25, 2025 4:26 pm

tonynocchi wrote: Sun May 25, 2025 4:00 pm Every ward needs scan capability.

I do not disagree, but I've not seen or heard of any standard roll-out of scanners. Anything the ward or stake decides to buy may not be supported.

I did some hunting and found this link. It does suggest you can scan using the Chromebook's camera. But that link is the only evidence I'd found for supporting document scanning for a clerk (not FamilySearch).

I'll give it a try, thank you!

Any smart phone with a camera will make quite a good image which can be uploaded to anything needed by LCR, membership or finance. I question the need to add additional hardware in the clerk's office, especially since sometimes one needs to upload images from home.

While I'm sure there are a number of good apps, the free Microsoft Lens will take a photo, crop/straighten, and turn it into a PDF.

Wouldn't using your phone or other personal devices to scan documents compromise the security of confidential records?

I just got a couple of Chromebooks, so I was interested in the account setup questions/issues.

elliottbergeron wrote: Thu May 29, 2025 7:58 am Wouldn't using your phone or other personal devices to scan documents compromise the security of confidential records?

I just got a couple of Chromebooks, so I was interested in the account setup questions/issues.

In theory probably. In practice, you are not going to get the Relief Society President, Elders Quorum President, Bishop, other ward leaders, as well as those receiving fast offering assistance, all of who need things done quickly, to drive and meet you at the chapel, which outside of the Mountain West may be many miles from the homes involved, so that you can scan documents.

This reply is a bit late, but if your MFP is on the network (as opposed to USB connected), it will have an IP address. You can open a browser to most of these devices by typing its IP address into the address bar. This should show you the printer's built-in web server. From there, you should be able to access the scanner.