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In many instances, popular online publications such as The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times have their articles hidden behind a paywall.
It can become very frustrating for readers who don’t have a subscription to these publications and for others who don’t want to pay a monthly or yearly fee which is constantly increasing at alarming rates.
Thankfully, we have a few workaround methods that can help you bypass the paywall on these online articles, which are quite easy to follow and does not require any additional payment.
How to Read Articles Behind a Paywall?Before we get started with the methods, there are certain things you should take into consideration.
Firstly, it is crucial to understand the different types of paywalls. It is because the method of bypassing can vary depending on this factor. So, there are mainly two types: hard and soft paywalls. The main difference is that a Soft paywall allows readers to access some content.
After that, it will require you to subscribe or pay to keep reading. In contrast, a hard paywall will immediately ask you to subscribe for you to read and access the available content.
Now, depending upon the paywall, the bypassing methods can also vary. So, let us learn about each of these methods in more detail.
Enable Reader Mode Stop the Page From Loading Open Incognito ModeBrowsing through the incognito mode on your web browser can be the best way to bypass soft paywalls. In most instances, soft paywalls use your browser’s cookies to keep track of how many articles you have read from their website.
After you reach the limit of free articles, the website will immediately send you a pop-up and will require you to make a subscription for further readings. Hence, the incognito mode can be effective since it does not save your browsing history, cache files, cookies, or other site data.
To enter incognito, you can use the shortcut Control + Shift + N. For Mac users, you will have to use the Command + Shift + N keys.
Clear Browser CookiesAlternatively, if you don’t like browsing through Incognito mode, you can delete or clear out your web browser’s cookies. Depending upon your browser, here are some step-by-step guides you can follow.
On Google Chrome
On Safari
Use Paywall Unblocker WebsitesThere are also a few websites that you can use to read the contents of the article. The process is relatively straightforward. First, open your web browser and search for the article in either Google or your preferred search engine. Simultaneously, you can also open the paywall blockers website. Here we have mentioned Archive Today.
For academic paywalls, we suggest you use Sci-Hub or Open Access button. After locating your article, head over to the address bar. Here, copy the URL link to your clipboard. Now, move back to the website mentioned, and paste the URL. It should automatically show you the full article.
However, please note that online publications are cracking down on these sites. So, these websites may not give you overtime access and should not be taken as a permanent bypass method.
Disable JavaScriptFor some particular websites, they might use JavaScript to enable their paywalls. So, another plausible solution to bypass the paywall is to disable this function from your browser.
Here are some step-by-step guides you can follow.
On Google Chrome
On Safari
Use Facebook Direct Install Browser ExtensionAnother bypass method you can try is to install a browser extension. Several online extensions can possibly help you avoid the need to pay for subscriptions.
Unpaywall is one of the most popular browser extensions to prevent the dreadful paywall pop-up. Particularly, this extension tends to work well with scholarly or journal articles.
Search for the Duplicate ArticleYou will be surprised to see that you can find numerous duplicate articles with a quick Google search. So, we suggest you try copying the title or headline of your article on Google or your preferred search engine. This method also especially works well if you are researching a journal or scholarly article.
Try scouring the first few pages of the search results. There is a high possibility that you may find the article in question. You can also add .pdf while searching to narrow your results.
Register for a Trial VersionThis method is the only legitimate way to access the online publication’s content. Usually, the trial period could last up to 30 or even 90 days. But, please ensure that you keep track of the time, as these publications tend to automatically charge you a subscription fee after the trial period has ended.
You're reading How To Read Articles Behind A Paywall
How To Get Paid Journal Articles For Free
If you’re a student, professor, or researcher, you want to surround yourself with tons of journal articles. After all, they’re very essential in class discussions, reports, case studies and theses. While there are plenty of sources available to get journal articles, they are often costly. The cheapest can cost around $30. If you’re researching your topic, it’s not really practical to pay $30 for each article. This post is going to show how to find free, yet high quality, journal articles.
It’s important that you have a clear idea of your topic. What’s your study about? What are the keywords that you might use in order to find related literature? Having the keywords ready can help you find what you need much faster.
Step 1: Go to Google Scholar.If you’re a student, you probably have come across Google Scholar. It’s an awesome tool to search for a variety of scholarly articles, including abstracts, peer-reviewed journals and physical books.
Type chúng tôi on your browser’s address bar, or simply type “google scholar” on Google search. Enter your keywords and see what comes up. For example, I’m doing a study on political discussions on Twitter. So, I simply typed “political studies twitter.”
However, on your preliminary search, I highly recommend just doing a basic search, as it gives you an idea of the type of studies done on your topic.
Step 2: Download free PDFs from Google Scholar.But our goal is to find free journal articles, so JSTOR would come in handy!
Step 3: Sign up for an account on JSTOR.Now, if the free PDFs you found on Google scholar aren’t enough for your research, you can add more literature to your to-read list through JSTOR.
JSTOR is an online research and teaching platform. Setting up an account is free, though you can only store up to three articles. It costs $19.50 a month to get unlimited access. But what’s great about JSTOR is that it allows you to get access to the full PDFs for free.
On your account, you’ll have a “Shelf” where you can store up to three articles. If you find more than three articles on JSTOR, you can simply remove it from your shelf and then add the other articles you want to view.
Use the same keywords you used on Google Scholar. Keep in mind that your search is limited to JSTOR’s database. You’ll find fewer related literature. Based on my experience, however, I always find the journal articles I’m looking for.
With the free PDFs you found on Google scholar and the articles you have on your JSTOR’s shelf, you’ll most likely end up with five to ten high-quality journal articles. It’s more than enough to get you started!
If you feel that they aren’t enough, however, one option is to contact the author(s) directly. I haven’t tried this yet, but based on what I’ve read online and my professor’s experience, authors are usually willing to give you a free digital copy. They might even be happy to know that you have an interest in their work! Of course, this is time consuming. Not to mention you’ll have to wait for a response. Only do this for those journal articles that will serve as the core foundation of your study.
With tools like Google Scholar and JSTOR, you’ll have access to tons of great literature about your study at your fingertips.
Irene Enriquez
Irene Enriquez is a freelance writer and a tech blogger. She believes that technology, like smartphones and mobile apps (and even video games!), can help people live a more productive and happier life. Visit her personal tech blog to get unique insight and practical tips about apps, video games and social media.
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How To Read Text Files Using Linecache In Python
Solution..
The linecache module implements cache which holds the contents of files, parsed into separate lines, in memory. linecache module returns line/s by indexing into a list, and saves time over repeatedly reading the file and parsing lines to find the one desired.
lincecache module is very useful when looking for multiple lines from the same file.
Prepare test data. You can get this text by just using Google and searching for sample text.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, causae apeirian ea his, duo cu congue prodesset. Ut epicuri invenire duo, novum ridens eu has, in natum meliore noluisse sea. Has ei stet explicari. No nam eirmod deterruisset, nusquam electram rationibus ad sea, interesset delicatissimi et sit. Purto molestiae cu eum, in per hinc periculis intellegam.
Id porro facete cum. No est veritus detraxit facilisis, sit ea clita decore essent. Ut eam labores fuisset menandri, ex sit brute viderer eleifend, altera argumentum vel ex. Duo at zril sensibus, eu vim ullum assentior, quando possit at his.
Te nam tempor posidonium scripserit, eam mundi reprimique dissentias ne. Vim te soleat offendit democritum. Nam an diam elaboraret, quaeque dissentias an has. Autem legendos dignissim ad vis, sea ex amet petentium reprehendunt, inermis constituam philosophia ne mel. Esse noster lobortis usu ne.
Nec reque postea urbanitas ut, mea in nulla invidunt ocurreret. Ei duo iuvaret numquam. Ferri nemore audire te est, mel et detracto noluisse. Nec eu habeo justo, id pro posse apeirian volutpat. Mea sonet quaestio ne.
Atqui quaeque alienum te vim. Graeco aliquip liberavisse pro ut. Te similique reformidans usu, te mundi aliquando ius. Meis scripta minimum quo no, meis prima fabellas eu eam, laoreet delicata forensibus ut vim. Et quo vocibus mediocritatem, atqui summo an eam.
Example import os import tempfile text = """ Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, causae apeirian ea his, duo cu congue prodesset. Ut epicuri invenire duo, novum ridens eu has, in natum meliore noluisse sea. Has ei stet explicari. No nam eirmod deterruisset, nusquam electram rationibus ad sea, interesset delicatissimi et sit. Purto molestiae cu eum, in per hinc periculis intellegam. Id porro facete cum. No est veritus detraxit facilisis, sit ea clita decore essent. Ut eam labores fuisset menandri, ex sit brute viderer eleifend, altera argumentum vel ex. Duo at zril sensibus, eu vim ullum assentior, quando possit at his. Te nam tempor posidonium scripserit, eam mundi reprimique dissentias ne. Vim te soleat offendit democritum. Nam an diam elaboraret, quaeque dissentias an has. Autem legendos dignissim ad vis, sea ex amet petentium reprehendunt, inermis constituam philosophia ne mel. Esse noster lobortis usu ne. Nec reque postea urbanitas ut, mea in nulla invidunt ocurreret. Ei duo iuvaret numquam. Ferri nemore audire te est, mel et detracto noluisse. Nec eu habeo justo, id pro posse apeirian volutpat. Mea sonet quaestio ne. Atqui quaeque alienum te vim. Graeco aliquip liberavisse pro ut. Te similique reformidans usu, te mundi aliquando ius. Meis scripta minimum quo no, meis prima fabellas eu eam, laoreet delicata forensibus ut vim. Et quo vocibus mediocritatem, atqui summo an eam. """1. Create a Function to create temporary file and delete it after usage.
def make_tempfile(): """ Function: Create a temporary file. mkstemp() and mkdtemp() to create temporary files and directories args: None return: Temp file name. """ fd, temp_file = tempfile.mkstemp() os.close(fd) with open(temp_file, 'wt') as f: f.write(text) return temp_file def cleanup(temp_file): os.unlink(temp_file)3. Read specific lines using linecache. The line numbers of files read by the linecache module start with 1, unlike lists which start indexing the array from 0. This is an important point to remember.
import os import tempfile import linecache text = """ Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, causae apeirian ea his, duo cu congue prodesset. Ut epicuri invenire duo, novum ridens eu has, in natum meliore noluisse sea. Has ei stet explicari. No nam eirmod deterruisset, nusquam electram rationibus ad sea, interesset delicatissimi et sit. Purto molestiae cu eum, in per hinc periculis intellegam. Id porro facete cum. No est veritus detraxit facilisis, sit ea clita decore essent. Ut eam labores fuisset menandri, ex sit brute viderer eleifend, altera argumentum vel ex. Duo at zril sensibus, eu vim ullum assentior, quando possit at his. Te nam tempor posidonium scripserit, eam mundi reprimique dissentias ne. Vim te soleat offendit democritum. Nam an diam elaboraret, quaeque dissentias an has. Autem legendos dignissim ad vis, sea ex amet petentium reprehendunt, inermis constituam philosophia ne mel. Esse noster lobortis usu ne. Nec reque postea urbanitas ut, mea in nulla invidunt ocurreret. Ei duo iuvaret numquam. Ferri nemore audire te est, mel et detracto noluisse. Nec eu habeo justo, id pro posse apeirian volutpat. Mea sonet quaestio ne. Atqui quaeque alienum te vim. Graeco aliquip liberavisse pro ut. Te similique reformidans usu, te mundi aliquando ius. Meis scripta minimum quo no, meis prima fabellas eu eam, laoreet delicata forensibus ut vim. Et quo vocibus mediocritatem, atqui summo an eam. """ def make_tempfile(): """ Function: Create a temporary file. mkstemp() and mkdtemp() to create temporary files and directories args: None return: Temp file name. """ directory = os.getcwd() fd, temp_file = tempfile.mkstemp(dir=directory) os.close(fd) with open(temp_file, 'wt') as f: f.write(text) return temp_file def cleanup(temp_file): os.unlink(temp_file) # Make a file with ipsum data. filename = make_tempfile() print(f"Output n {filename}") split_line = 'n' # Pick the lines from source. print(f"*** Displaying first 5 lines directly from the source n {text.split(split_line)[4]}" ) # pick out the same line from cache print(f" n *** Displaying first 5 lines from the cache n {linecache.getline(filename, 5)}" ) # cleanup the tempfile by using unlink cleanup(filename) Output C:UserssasanPycharmProjectsblogTutorialPointsUpdated_Codetmpazax_yne *** Displaying first 5 lines directly from the source Id porro facete cum. No est veritus detraxit facilisis, sit ea clita decore essent. Ut eam labores fuisset menandri, ex sit brute viderer eleifend, altera argumentum vel ex. Duo at zril sensibus, eu vim ullum assentior, quando possit at his. *** Displaying first 5 lines from the cache Id porro facete cum. No est veritus detraxit facilisis, sit ea clita decore essent. Ut eam labores fuisset menandri, ex sit brute viderer eleifend, altera argumentum vel ex. Duo at zril sensibus, eu vim ullum assentior, quando possit at his.4. Linecache always includes the newline at the end of the line. Therefore, if the line is empty, the return value is just the newline.
See below.
import linecache # Make a file with ipsum data. filename = make_tempfile() print(f"Output n {filename}") # Blank lines include the newline. print(f"n *** The number of lines in the text is 13." ) print(" n *** Displaying the lastline from Linecache which should be a new linen {!r}".format(linecache.getline(filename, 8)) ) cleanup(filename) Output C:UserssasanPycharmProjectsblogTutorialPointsUpdated_Codetmp352zirvn *** The number of lines in the text is 13. *** Displaying the lastline from Linecache which should be a new line 'n'5.Conclusion – When an application needs random access to files, linecache makes it easy to read lines by their line number. The contents of the file are maintained in a cache, so be careful of memory consumption.
A Look Inside The Optics Expertise Behind A Smartphone Born For Photography
Vivo
Note: This is part of a series of interviews about vivo’s cutting-edge technology. For more, read about the making of a vivo photography flagship.
When your strategy is “camera first,” it certainly helps to have a partner with 130 years of imaging experience in photo and cine lenses on your side. That’s how Ramona Ettig, Head of Mobile Imaging at ZEISS, described the famed camera brand’s relationship with global smartphone maker vivo.
In 2023, the two brands announced a partnership that would allow them to draw on each other’s strengths in R&D and consumer insight, with a shared vision to push the limits of mobile imaging. And these joint efforts are already paying off. The first vivo ZEISS co-engineered imaging system debuted with the vivo X60 series and has improved with each new product generation. Now, the vivo X80 series stands out for its carefully crafted lenses, premium color science, and portrait styles inspired by classic ZEISS camera lenses.
Vivo
Ramona Ettig, Head of Mobile Imaging at ZEISS
We’ve seen vivo be relentless in its pursuit of excellence when it comes to the camera system featured in the X series, a dedicated photography flagship line. If you ask Ettig, it’s one of the main factors that brought the teams together. She says: “This is a real partnership that will leverage the strengths of both teams to build something new and great together.” It’s true, ZEISS brings an extensive photographic legacy, while vivo has built its name on putting powerful all-around devices in users’ hands.
See also: vivo X80 Pro review
Placing professional-level camera capabilities in the slim body of a smartphone is not an easy feat, but vivo and ZEISS are up for the challenge.
Redefining mobile photography: two minds are better than oneWhen speaking about bringing professional-level photography experience to smartphones, one obvious challenge is the volume constraint, and the cost allowed for modules in mobile devices, Ettig points out. “To overcome these challenges, you have to accept that there are limits,” she says, and this is where the strength of this partnership really comes to light.
She cites real portrait photography as one of the best examples. “The size of sensors and optical elements in smartphones as well as the aperture size of the optical systems prevent the ability to produce typical portrait effects, like small focus depth and nice bokeh effects,” she explains. “To enable this effect, you have to utilize software approaches to overcome the limits of physics given in the smartphone imaging world.” The two companies have combined their expertise to bring a variety of brilliant portrait modes to the X series, including a range of bokeh styles.
ZEISS and vivo, working together, have also created new features that neither side could do on its own. Ettig mentions improved night mode, incredible bokeh on portraits, and some of the most natural color profiles in the industry as a few of her favorite features. Nowadays, smartphone camera images often intensify and exaggerate color brilliance and intensity so much that scenes look (intendedly) unreal. ZEISS and vivo, however, took the most natural approach possible. Relying on studies of the ZEISS ZX1, the first fully digital ZEISS camera, the team provided a thorough and structured approach to iterate the color setting to the most natural look possible.
Vivo
X80 Pro’s newest feature, ZEISS Cinematic Style Bokeh
Enhancing the consumer experience is the ultimate goal. “Having brilliant clear images even in dark scenes (night mode), having the opportunity to access legendary ZEISS lenses by applying bokeh filter to your portraits, having the most natural color setting available to capture your scene in the most natural way possible — I think all of these features are a great foundation for the customers to capture all the special moments in their lives,” Ettig explains. “These are features that bring together the capabilities of high-end professional cameras combined with the best user convenience, as they are accessible whenever you need them in your smartphone.”
A collision of two worlds: the process behind joint innovation Creating shared goalsThe most important result we’ve seen from the ZEISS and vivo partnership is continued demand among consumers. Both sides keep finding ways to lift the “camera first” aspect of the X Series to new heights.
“We help optimize existing concept ideas and support improving the most relevant issues,” Ettig notes. “But our focus for the future is to set our collaboration apart by investigating new innovative ideas and features for future phone generations. We are focusing on a real R&D partnership. But of course, it will still take a couple of years before we can first launch products incorporating our new approaches.”
Vivo
X80 in Urban Blue
That seems to be the partnership’s main goal right now, at least as far as Ramona Ettig would admit. She wouldn’t fess up to any details or previews, but she did explain that the companies are working “to establish a technology and product roadmap together.” All the steps they’ve already taken in the X60, X70, and now X80 series are just the preliminary step toward some great new ideas vivo and ZEISS want to develop and work on together.
File Permissions In Linux / Unix: How To Read, Write & Change?
Linux is a clone of UNIX, the multi-user operating system which can be accessed by many users simultaneously. Linux can also be used in mainframes and servers without any modifications. But this raises security concerns as an unsolicited or malign user can corrupt, change or remove crucial data. For effective security, Linux divides authorization into 2 levels.
Ownership
Permission
In this Linux file commands tutorial, you will learn-
The concept of Linux File permission and ownership is crucial in Linux. Here, we will explain Linux permissions and ownership and will discuss both of them. Let us start with the Ownership.
Linux File OwnershipEvery file and directory on your Unix/Linux system is assigned 3 types of owner, given below.
UserA user is the owner of the file. By default, the person who created a file becomes its owner. Hence, a user is also sometimes called an owner.
Group
A user- group can contain multiple users. All users belonging to a group will have the same Linux group permissions access to the file. Suppose you have a project where a number of people require access to a file. Instead of manually assigning permissions to each user, you could add all users to a group, and assign group permission to file such that only this group members and no one else can read or modify the files.
OtherAny other user who has access to a file. This person has neither created the file, nor he belongs to a usergroup who could own the file. Practically, it means everybody else. Hence, when you set the permission for others, it is also referred as set permissions for the world.
Now, the big question arises how does Linux distinguish between these three user types so that a user ‘A’ cannot affect a file which contains some other user ‘B’s’ vital information/data. It is like you do not want your colleague, who works on your Linux computer, to view your images. This is where Permissions set in, and they define user behavior.
Let us understand the Permission system on Linux.
Linux File PermissionsEvery file and directory in your UNIX/Linux system has following 3 permissions defined for all the 3 owners discussed above.
Read: This permission give you the authority to open and read a file. Read permission on a directory gives you the ability to lists its content.
Write: The write permission gives you the authority to modify the contents of a file. The write permission on a directory gives you the authority to add, remove and rename files stored in the directory. Consider a scenario where you have to write permission on file but do not have write permission on the directory where the file is stored. You will be able to modify the file contents. But you will not be able to rename, move or remove the file from the directory.
Execute: In Windows, an executable program usually has an extension “.exe” and which you can easily run. In Unix/Linux, you cannot run a program unless the execute permission is set. If the execute permission is not set, you might still be able to see/modify the program code(provided read & write permissions are set), but not run it.
File Permissions in Linux/Unix
Let’s see file permissions in Linux with examples:
ls – l on terminal gives
ls - lHere, we have highlighted ‘-rw-rw-r–‘and this weird looking code is the one that tells us about the Unix permissions given to the owner, user group and the world.
Else, if it were a directory, d would have been shown.
The characters are pretty easy to remember.
– = no permission
Let us look at it this way.
The first part of the code is ‘rw-‘. This suggests that the owner ‘Home’ can:
Read the file
Write or edit the file
He cannot execute the file since the execute bit is set to ‘-‘.
By design, many Linux distributions like Fedora, CentOS, Ubuntu, etc. will add users to a group of the same group name as the user name. Thus, a user ‘tom’ is added to a group named ‘tom’.
The second part is ‘rw-‘. It for the user group ‘Home’ and group-members can:
Read the file
Write or edit the file
The third part is for the world which means any user. It says ‘r–‘. This means the user can only:
Read the file
Changing file/directory permissions in Linux Using ‘chmod’ commandSay you do not want your colleague to see your personal images. This can be achieved by changing file permissions.
We can use the ‘chmod’ command which stands for ‘change mode’. Using the command, we can set permissions (read, write, execute) on a file/directory for the owner, group and the world.
Syntax:
chmod permissions filenameThere are 2 ways to use the command –
Absolute mode
Symbolic mode
Absolute(Numeric) Mode in LinuxIn this mode, file permissions are not represented as characters but a three-digit octal number.
The table below gives numbers for all for permissions types.
Number Permission Type Symbol
0
No Permission
—
1
Execute
–x
2
Write
-w-
3
Execute + Write
-wx
4
Read
r–
5
Read + Execute
r-x
6
Read +Write
rw-
7
Read + Write +Execute
rwx
Let’s see the chmod permissions command in action.
In the above-given terminal window, we have changed the permissions of the file ‘sample to ‘764’.
‘764’ absolute code says the following:
Owner can read, write and execute
Usergroup can read and write
World can only read
This is shown as ‘-rwxrw-r–
This is how you can change user permissions in Linux on file by assigning an absolute number.
Symbolic Mode in LinuxIn the Absolute mode, you change permissions for all 3 owners. In the symbolic mode, you can modify permissions of a specific owner. It makes use of mathematical symbols to modify the Unix file permissions.
Operator Description
+ Adds a permission to a file or directory
– Removes the permission
= Sets the permission and overrides the permissions set earlier.
The various owners are represented as –
User Denotations
u user/owner
g group
o other
a all
We will not be using permissions in numbers like 755 but characters like rwx. Let’s look into an example
Changing Ownership and Group in LinuxFor changing the ownership of a file/directory, you can use the following command:
chown user filenameIn case you want to change the user as well as group for a file or directory use the command
chown user:group filenameLet’s see this in action
In case you want to change group-owner only, use the command
chgrp group_name filename‘chgrp’ stands for change group.
Tip
The file /etc/group contains all the groups defined in the system
You can use the command “groups” to find all the groups you are a member of
You can use the command newgrp to work as a member a group other than your default group
You cannot have 2 groups owning the same file.
You do not have nested groups in Linux. One group cannot be sub-group of other
x- eXecuting a directory means Being allowed to “enter” a dir and gain possible access to sub-dirs
Summary:
Linux being a multi-user system uses permissions and ownership for security.
There are three user types on a Linux system viz. User, Group and Other
Linux divides the file permissions into read, write and execute denoted by r,w, and x
The permissions on a file can be changed by ‘chmod’ command which can be further divided into Absolute and Symbolic mode
The ‘chown’ command can change the ownership of a file/directory. Use the following commands: chown user file or chown user:group file
The ‘chgrp’ command can change the group ownership chrgrp group filename
What does x – eXecuting a directory mean? A: Being allowed to “enter” a dir and gain possible access to sub-dirs.
How To Leave The Sand Behind On Your Next Beach Trip
When you leave the beach, you bring sand with you. These tiny particles are part of the fun at the shore, but they get very annoying very quickly when you track them into your car or house. If you’re tired of sand clinging stubbornly to your skin and getting wedged in your rugs, we have a few tricks to keep the grains at the beach where they belong.
Why sand sticksOne of the oddities of sand as a material is how it changes when you add water. Sand is highly hydrophilic; H2O molecules can stick directly to it, and then more water molecules glom on to the ones attached to the silica. So anything wet—towels, toes, chairs, shoes, pets—will collect sand.
Once the water evaporates, which happens quickly in a car that’s been baking in a shadeless parking lot the sand may get caught in clothing, stick to the crevasses of our skin, and otherwise hang on where it’s not wanted. Or it’ll fall off, waiting for your foot to grind it into carpets or your skin to pick it back up.
This means that managing moisture is the key to keeping sand off your body and clothes, and ultimately out of your house.
Keep grit off your gear…Unless you only head to the beach for long thoughtful walks, you’re going to get wet on your trip. However, you can take steps to limit your moisture, and thus the sand you pick up.
Start with the materials your beach gear is made out of. Wear open-toed shoes that you can easily kick the sand out of, and as much as possible, carry bags, chairs, and other potentially-sandy items made out of open materials like mesh. Gravity easily gets rid of dry sand, so if these items remain dry, all you’ll need to empty them out is a good hard shake.
For items that can’t be made out of mesh, look for materials that are easy to de-sand. Metal beach chairs, for example, will certainly attract these particles, but you can easily brush them off or rinse them in a little water.
Beach towels and blankets are harder to clean on-site, so we recommend you stick with a chair alone. However, if you must bring one of these cloths, wash it beforehand with fabric softener, which is hydrophobic and will repel some moisture. Then try to use it for lounging only, rather than drying off with it and making the material damp.
For shoes and flip-flops, apply a hydrophobic spray, such as Rust-Oleum NeverWet ($15 on Amazon), to the soles and sides before you head to the beach. You can also use this treatment to coat the bottoms of chairs, coolers, and other potential moisture sources. Just check to ensure the spray you buy is non-toxic, and remember that these are temporary coatings, so you’ll eventually need to reapply them.
With drinks and other cold items, you’ll also face also the issue of condensation. There’s a surprising amount of water in the air at any given time (even the Sahara has an average of about 25 percent humidity). When you pull a soda out of the cooler, the air around the can rapidly hits the dew point, the temperature where water is cool enough to form droplets on a surface. This happens particularly frequently when the surface is a good conductor like aluminum, which removes the heat those liquid droplets need to evaporate.
Although no surface will stop condensation entirely, plastic and glass containers gather less, and double-walled bottles are ideal—they have an inner layer that insulates the drink, preventing the outer surface from reaching the dew point. If you do have to set condensation-collecting containers on sand, put them on a dry towel or other surface. For aluminum cans, use a foam koozie, which will also insulate your soda.
…And your skinIf you go swimming in the ocean, make sure to come out of the water when the tide is coming in. When the tide pulls out, it draws loose particles of sand with it, which could stick to you.
Even with the best precautions, you might get sand on your wet feet or hands. There’s an easy trick to solve this problem: Bring some talc or baby powder. This chalky material is even more hydrophilic than sand, so when you sprinkle it on hands or feet, it will slurp up the moisture that makes sand sticky. After that, the grains should easily loosen and fall away.
Sand
If you’re not careful, you’ll find this silica sitting around your house for weeks after your beach trip.
Leaving the beachYou’re unlikely to keep entirely sand-free at the beach, but you can take steps to clean up after you leave. Again, getting rid of these particles is a matter of fighting moisture.
If a beach shower is available, everyone should use it to wash off any errant grains sticking to their skin. “Everyone” includes pets, as undiscovered sand can irritate their skins.
As for your shoes, before you leave, take them off, remove the soles (if possible), and give them a good hard shake. Also bring a hard, bristly welcome mat, and have anyone getting into your car thoroughly wipe off their shoes before boarding. If all else fails, wear shoes that can survive a heavy hose-down or a cycle in the washing machine.
Before you toss your sandy stuff into the car, line its trunk with old blankets or towels, ideally material that you’ve pre-washed with a dose of fabric softener. If you have to ride with wet and potentially sandy suits, take the same precaution with car seats. For the floors, use rubber mats instead of carpeted ones.
Put anything wet in a mesh bag before stashing it in the car, so as it dries and the sand falls off, the debris will filter out of the carrier and onto the liner blanket. When you get home, shake the blanket off outside your house.
Hang up any wet items outside your home and let them dry completely. Then give them a good shake before you take them inside. If you’re in a hotel or can’t hang your suit up, try the following process instead.
Soak the item in cold water for ten minutes, which will pull sand out of fabric where it’s become embedded. Then, lay it out on a clean, dry towel. Either let the suit air-dry or blow-dry it with a hair dryer on the cool setting. Now a brisk shake (outside, of course) should remove the sand.
When all else failsEven with all this preparation, a few grains of grit might sneak their way into the house. To get them out, use dry cleaning methods like running a vacuum cleaner over the stubborn mess.
For smaller rugs, if you can remove them, then hang them up and beat them out. Fallen sand can drop between the fibers and hang on with some tenacity, so beating the rug forces them to the surface.
If you can’t beat the rug, simply remember that wet cleaning methods don’t remove sand. To pull these particles out of a material, they generally need to be floating in water—and you don’t want to flood your house. So grab a vacuum with a deep brush and run it aggressively over the carpet, going over the problem area at least three times. It’ll be hard on your rug, but no harder than sand.
Unless you plan to avoid the beach entirely, a grain or two will likely slip through, no matter how thorough you are. But a little moisture control can go a long way—and a little common sense even further—toward keeping sand on the beach where it belongs.
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