Making lost cloud photos accessible once more

Q: Several years ago, I used the Kodak website to store and share pictures. It's been so long ago that I can't remember my password, but the bigger problem is that the service no longer seems to be available. How can I access my online photos and move them to another photo website?

Fred Klietz, Brooklyn Park

A: The Kodak Gallery website that you used was shut down in 2012. But some of its assets were bought by Shutterfly. As a result, all of your photos from the Kodak website are now available on Shutterfly.com.

To view your photos, you'll need to create a free Shutterfly account if you don't already have one. Then you'll need to link your Shutterfly account to your old Kodak Gallery account by providing the e-mail address and password you used to access the Kodak website. If you've forgotten the Kodak password, you can ask Shutterfly to e-mail you a new temporary one. For detailed directions, see tinyurl.com/jv7yjmq.

But you might want to consider some alternatives. Why? Shutterfly is really in the business of printing your pictures for a fee, not providing you with unfettered access to them. Shutterfly won't let you download digital copies of your photos at full resolution (original clarity): only limited-resolution copies can be downloaded. To get full-resolution copies, you must pay Shutterfly $10 for up to 100 pictures (or $20 per 1,000 photos) and have them sent to you on a DVD disk. Shipping and handling costs add to the price. See tinyurl.com/j5y2yje.

You might be better off using a free cloud storage service that also lets you download full-resolution digital copies of your photos. Among your choices are Dropbox.com, which provides two gigabytes of free storage, and Microsoft's OneDrive (see tinyurl.com/mvbga6s), which provides five gigabytes of storage for free. To shift your photos to a new cloud storage provider, buy the DVD from Shutterfly and then upload the full-resolution pictures to the new service.

Q: Can my iPhone 6s find its location via GPS even if there is no cellphone tower nearby? And how can I make the iPhone display the latitude, longitude and altitude of my current location?

DelRoy Reiss, Colorado Springs, Colo.

A: If there are no cell towers nearby, the GPS chips in your iPhone can determine your location solely by receiving satellite signals. But your iPhone can determine your location more quickly and accurately if it can supplement the satellite data with location information from a cell tower. To display your latitude, longitude and elevation (altitude) on your iPhone, use the "compass" app that came with the phone. But first, click the iPhone's settings icon and click on "privacy." Then click "location services" and move the slider control to the right to turn it on. In the list of applications below, click on "compass" and choose "while using the app." Your latitude, longitude and elevation should appear.

For some reason, displaying latitude, longitude and elevation sometimes disables the app's traditional compass function. To reactivate it, return to where you turned on location services, click on the compass application and change the setting from "while using the app" to "never."

E-mail tech questions to steve.j.alexander@gmail.com. Include name, city and telephone number.