January 2013
Inside WINNERS meeting Remember if you do have problems January Meeting Report ...... 1 like this shut off System Restore, or Free Income Tax Preparation January 2012 you could end up with the spyware Online ...... 2 putting itself right back in. You can ABC’s of Digital Photography ..6 Meeting started with members turn it back on after you are clean. Three Gadgets for Your Digital talking about the Homeland I also commented how on one of Camera ...... 7 Security warning to uninstall my computers I knew something Marketing Fine Art Photography . 8 Java. Steve Dela told us how was wrong, but scans with VIPRE Create a Building Block in Word ...9 he had his AOL email hacked. had come clean many times. I Computer Parts and Terms ...... 11 He figured it was just after he installed Avast and it found some Device Drivers ...... 12 made an on-line purchase from items, and after that uninstall Creative Landscapes - Digital Newegg. Interestingly I checked the VIPRE program. David Photography Tips and Tricks ..13 on Google “newegg hacked”, and Perry (from Trend Micro) has Free Full Length Movies on there were 295,000 results, with commented many times when you YouTube ...... 15 many talking about how their switch from one antivirus program OnGuardOnline ...... 17 accounts had problems. He said it to another, the second one will find LPS - Free Utility from the Defense also may have been from an email something. Department to Secure Your PC ..19 he received from someone else. Steve told us how he had just got Free Utilities to Download Some of Steve’s emails went out a Western Digital VelociRaptor YouTube and Other Videos ...21 with links in them. I had gotten a hard drive which spins at 10,000 HDTV Resolutions Explained ....23 couple, but with no subject stated, rpm. He cloned the boot drive, 5 more (more!) Office features you and just a link I knew better than and started from powering up each need to know about ...... 25 to click on it. He said he got a call time. With a 4 core computer using Books for January 2013 ...... 26 from Chase asking about some Windows 7. Do you text? ...... 27 charges. Apparently the hackers • Normal 7,200 rpm drive Degunking Windows 7 (book) ....28 will charge a small item, and if booting up took 68 seconds Password Tracking ...... 29 that goes through will make a • VelociRaptor took 60 The Graphics Side of Word ...... 30 larger purchase. Steve said he was seconds Word 2010 Paste Features ...... 32 using AVG, and Malwarebytes • SSD took 37 seconds Say No Thank You to New (both free versions.) He had done There was also discussion about Toolbar...... 33 a number of scans and contacted using a digital camera to record Deleting Files ...... 34 AOL. The scans found nothing. video. General feeling is – yes Acronis True Image Home 2012 .35 He then downloaded and installed most digital cameras will record Flickr: A look inside the superantispyware (get it from video, but the quality will not be photostream ...... 37 www.superantispyware.com.) It as good as a real camcorder. You found a lot of hidden spyware. can get one of the high end digital cameras which can take excellent video, but the cost is very high. David Murphy also pointed out the size of the files will be huge. Board of Directors Free Income Tax service for completion of those President dreaded 1040 series of forms and Steve Dela Preparation Online schedules. Many others collect stevede(at)aol.com by Ira Wilsker their tax documents and use one of Vice-President the many commercially available Terry Currier WEBSITES: boxed income tax programs from winnersug(at)aol.com https://www.taxact.com the likes of H&R Block or Intuit’s Secretary http://www.hrblock.com/online- TurboTax. For those eligible, there Robin Theron tax-preparation/free-edition.html are a number of respectable rtheron(at)gmail.com http://www.taxhawk.com companies that offer free online tax Treasurer http://www.freetaxusa.com calculations and e-filing to those Max Lockie http://turbotax.intuit.com/personal- eligible. According to the IRS, “ ... mlockie(at)pobox.com taxes/online/free-edition.jsp approximately 70% of all taxpayers http://www.freefile.irs.gov have an AGI (adjusted gross Board Members http://freefilealliance.org income) of $57,000 or less ... “ Ethel Kamber https://www.techsupportalert. which makes them eligible to use ethel(at)kamber.fastmail.fm com/best-free-income-tax-filing- one of the many free online tax Ken Kamber software.htm services that are members of the kenkamber(at)mail.com IRS Free Louise McCain File LMcEnterprises(at)ol.com Alliance, the Ed Koran listings of edk246(at)aol.com which will Rebecca Feinstein be available [email protected] on the IRS Editor website at editor(at)windowsusers.org freefile.irs. gov starting WINNERS, contributors and on January editors of Notepad do not assume 22. In the liability for dameages arising from past, over 36 the publication or non-publication million of any advertisement, article, edito- individuals rial, or other item in this newsletter. took All opionions express are those of advantage of the individual authors only and do these free not necessarily represent the opion- filing ions of the WINNERS, its Board of services. Directors, the WINNERS Notepad, or its editors. According WINNERS a computer association, to the IRS is a volunteer organization provid- It is that dreaded time of year for website, “The Free File Alliance, ing a forum for sharing informa- many us, when our mailboxes start LLC is a group of industry-leading tion and experiences related to to fill with those dreaded W-2, private-sector tax preparation Windows-based software, and 1099, and other forms that indicate companies that have agreed to hardware, encouraging ethical use to us what may be taxable income. meet the IRS’ high standards for of computers and software, offering Some people simply throw all of security and privacy and provide service to our communities. the tax documents in a shoe box or tax software options for free.” gallon size plastic bag, and take Over 20 tax preparation services, them to a CPA or store front tax all members of the Free File go along. All of them will make the necessary calculations, freeing the individual up from trying to comprehend the massive IRS tax tables. Among the better known companies offering free online tax preparation and e-filing is H&R Block, with its “H&R Block At Home Free” (www. hrblock.com/online-tax- preparation/free-edition. html). This online service is intended only to complete what it calls “simple tax returns”, which is defined by H&R Block as, “A simple Alliance (freefilealliance.org), have offered free online tax return excludes tax calculation and e-filing services to those eligible. self-employment income (Schedule C), capital Generally, anyone (or couple filing jointly) with an gains and losses (Schedule D), rental and royalty adjusted gross income of $57,000 or less is eligible for income (Schedule E), farm income (Schedule F) and these free filing services. Some of the services are only shareholder/partnership income or loss (Schedule available to residents of specific states, while others K-1).” Taxpayers with any of these forms of income have other restrictions, but as previously stated, the (or losses) will have to use one of the commercial IRS claims that 70% of workers, about 100 million products or paid preparers. This free online product people, are eligible for at least one of these free online services. Some of the online services also have special arrangements for military families, military retirees, students, or retirees. Most of these services only prepare simple tax returns, which may not be appropriate for many people. All of them meet IRS requirements for safety, security, accuracy, and privacy, and will electronically file (e-file) the tax return with the IRS when completed, providing the fastest possible refunds for those receiving them. Most of these free file services do not prepare state income taxes for free, but instead charge a nominal fee from $5 to $15 to prepare and e-file (where available) state income taxes. No special tax knowledge is necessary in order to utilize these free online services as they use a question-and-answer method to solicit appropriate information from the taxpayer, providing explanations as they offers many of the same benefits and services as free edition, but later find that one of the paid its commercial (paid) counterparts, including H&R versions of TurboTax would be more advantageous, Block’s “Accurate Calculations Guarantee”, and the free edition will prompt the user if a different “Worry-free Audit Support”. The number of IRS TurboTax product would be better for them, and will forms and schedules that can be completed by this automatically fill out the upgraded (paid) version free service is arguably the most comprehensive list with the information previously entered into the free available in a free service. H&R Block’s free online version. TurboTax will check the return for accuracy, service will complete a 1040EZ, 1040A, or 1040 and then e-file it with the IRS, quickly getting the user as appropriate, along with any additional forms or a refund, if one is coming. Previous users of TurboTax schedules, as determined by a comprehensive and can import last year’s data into this year’s product, easy to understand interview process. This interview speeding up the process. State tax returns can be process is somewhat intelligent, in that it will attempt completed, if necessary, for a nominal fee. to find all lawful deductions and credits in order to maximize any refund, or minimize any taxes due.
Another extremely popular tax preparation software or online service is TurboTax, which also offers a free online service for simple returns at turbotax.intuit.com/personal-taxes/online/free-edition. jsp. As do most of the other free online tax services, One of the more unusual free online tax TurboTax uses an easy to follow interview procedure services is FreeTaxUSA (freetaxusa.com), also in order to determine the proper forms to use, and listed online as “TaxHawk”, an identical product calculates the proper taxes. According to TurboTax, and service. FreeTaxUSA differs from all of the “Easy Questions, Tailored to You — We ask questions other free online tax services in that it is explicitly in plain English and then put your answers on the right free for everyone, not just those with an AGI of forms for you, including 1040EZ, 1040A, and 1040. $57,000 or less. According the FreeTaxUSA website, TurboTax skips interview questions that don’t apply “Our free service covers a wide range of federal to you, so you can finish your return faster.” Also returns, including investment, self-employed, home as most other major services, TurboTax guarantees ownership, rental income, farm income, and other tax the largest possible refund as well as audit support, situations.” Unlike most of the other free products, if necessary. For those who start with the TurboTax this service is also available for those with other as a free download, such that it can be completed offline on the computer, rather than online in a web browser. TaxACT offers guaranteed accuracy, guaranteed largest refunds (if eligible), and audit assistance. Users of either the free online or free downloaded versions can also complete a state tax return for a fee of $14.95. For families with college age children, or adults contemplating a college education, TaxACT also offers a “College Student Financial Aid Worksheet” which enables the user to easily complete the FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid), which is a requirement to get financial aid at almost all colleges and universities. For those who may need additional services, TaxACT offers a Deluxe Federal version for online use or download for $9.95, and a bundle with both the Deluxe forms of income and expenses, including, “Capital version and state program for $17.95 Gains, Office & Business Expenses, Rental Income, (download or online). For the extra $3, those living in Investment Income or Losses, Traditional & Roth states that have a state income tax may find the Deluxe IRAs, Retirement and Pensions, Military Income, bundle advantageous over the free version plus the Charitable Contributions, Gambling income, and Farm state filing. income”. For those who may need additional priority These are but a few of the dozens of such support and services, a deluxe edition is available products available. Several of the products are in online for only $5.95. State taxes can be completed the process of being reviewed and evaluated by the and e-filed by FreeTaxUSA for $9.95, FreeTaxUSA community of users at Gizmo’s Freeware (www. claims to have processed over 8 million free tax techsupportalert.com/best-free-income-tax-filing- returns. software.htm). The online reviews and rating are Another unusual, but very popular free by necessity incomplete, as many of the 2012 free online tax service, TaxACT, also offers free online services will not be available until January 22, 2013, tax preparation for everyone, including both simple and some of the services evaluated were the 2011 and complex returns without the income restrictions versions, not the 2012 versions. Of the handful of (taxact.com). According to the TaxACT website it 2012 versions reviewed and evaluated, they were is, “The most complete free tax filing solution for early versions, and not necessarily the latest builds everyone! It’s true! FREE to prepare, FREE to available, as the publishers constantly update and print, FREE to e-file - no income or age restrictions. revise their software. Get the fastest tax refund possible with free e-file. With dozens of free online tax services available to Handles simple AND complex tax returns — the 100 million taxpayers with an AGI of $57,000 or supports 1040, 1040A, & 1040EZ, and includes all less, and at least two free services (including one with e-fileable IRS forms to handle all filing statuses & free downloadable software) available to everyone life situations. “ Another somewhat unique benefit regardless of income or family status, the old necessity offered by TaxACT is not just that it is available for of paper and pencil tax forms is now virtually free online preparation, just like all of the other free obsolete. products, but it also offers the complete program ABC’s of Digital Photography If you take an outdoor shot with an incandescent Review of a meeting presented by Gary Stanley at the setting the picture will turn out blue. If you pick the Quad Cities Computer Society, IA florescent setting in an outdoor shot the picture will www.gary.stanley.net have a purple cast. Make sure that your camera is set www.qcs.org properly. joseph85_us (at) yahoo.com
Gary Stanley returned to the QCS to share his lifelong He suggested that you take your photos at a 90 degree interest in Photography and the tips to help make our angle to the sun; this will add depth to your subject. photography more useful, and endearing. Photos tell a Also view your subject through the lens. Will it look story. He was here to help us tell ours. His first digital better in a vertical or horizontal mode? Conform to camera was a 1/3 megapixel one that used a 3.5 disk your subject and it will improve the quality of your for storage. Today he uses a wide range of digital shot. For example: get down on the same level of kids cameras on his travels around the world. and animals. Enter their world and your pictures will come to life. He has wonderfully One of the more interesting settings is the camera condensed some timer which is usually prefigured at 2 seconds and photographic 10 seconds. The 2 second mode allows for a perfect principles that shot with a tripod. Press the shutter button down we all can half way to allow the camera to calculate all of the use. First off configurations. Now you can lift your finger from the he related that trigger and walk away from the camera as the still sales people camera takes the shot a second later. The 10 second will emphasize mode allows one to take the picture and also be a part megapixels. of it. Some of today’s point and shoot On the photo walk in LeClaire, he reminded the cameras have 14 participants to always check their settings before they megapixels. A 5 began their work. Also take many pictures, unlike the megapixel camera is all you need. The large capacity old days they are free. Professional photographers megapixels cameras are needed only for large size usually get a good photo with a 200 to 1 ratio. Let blowups of your photos. Most of us will never need creativity be your guide. this resolution. We usually will print 8 x 10 prints at the most and 5 megapixels will sustain that quality. In When we are finished with our photo set we need fact, the Flixr photo web storage site highlights that to transfer them, edit them and store them. Gary the most used camera for its site is the iPhone4 which recommended that we transfer our photos by removing has a 5 megapixel lens. the memory card from the camera and placing it in a card reader or your computer. This saves the battery Point and shoot digital cameras have automatic life of your digital camera. Using a USB inadvertently settings by default. Gary explained that these settings with a low battery can risk losing your photos entirely. will give you OK pictures. But for a better outcome, it is preferable to select the program mode so that When you transfer them it is important to select them you can fine tune the camera to fit your photographic all on the memory card with a Control-A, then right perspective. click on a photo, select COPY from the menu. Next, on your computer create a folder for your images, One of the essential features of creating a good photo right click in that folder and select PASTE from the is to understand and manage the white balance in it. drop down menu. This method places your photos Note the lighting conditions before you take your shot. in three places until the process is finished: on the Is it outdoors in the sun or indoors under incandescent memory card, the computer memory clipboard and the or florescent light. Select the appropriate setting. hard drive. Always a good fail safe method. Three Gadgets for Your Digital There are many free photo editing software packages on the Internet, however Gary recommended Windows Camera Live Photo Gallery from Microsoft. Paid image By Sharon Walbran, President / Editor, Twin Cities PC editing software offers more advanced options. Good Users’ Group, MN choices in this category are: Photoshop Elements, and October 2011 issue, The Digital Viking Paint Shop Pro Photo X4. http://www.tcpc.com SQWalbran(at)yahoo.com Gary emphasized that we need to back up our precious photographic moments to an external hard drive. He As an avid photographer with a couple point-and- mentioned they are very reasonably priced, as low shoot digital cameras I am always on the lookout for as $49. There are several brands: Seagate, Western gadgets to improve the experience, but that will not Digital, and Maxtor. He has a Western Digital break your pocketbook. Here are three gadgets under MyBook external drive that has a feature that he likes. $20.00 that solve issues with digital cameras, and are It backs up your data as soon as it is created on your worth exploring. computer. For him photographic backups are essential as he has over 70,000 photos that he has taken over Delkin LCD Shade. LCD displays are great for giving the years and doesn’t want to lose them. Likewise, we you a preview of wouldn’t want to lose those memories either. the picture you are about to take Gary offered a delightful presentation filled with and then, after humor, insight and detail. An enjoyable evening and the picture is learning experience all in one. Be sure to visit his taken, showing Blog: the picture you gary-stanley.blogspot.com as it will have many of the took for review. presentation details on the internet from this meeting. Unfortunately, in Also visit his fine photo gallery online, a wonderful the bright sunshine, collection: www.pbase.com/gary_stanley the LCD display is almost impossible to see. The Delkin Popup LCD Shade 2.5”, sold through Amazon. He ended the night with a “special” Internet com, is a good solution. This simple, lightweight photographic slide show which featured creative plastic shade attaches to the body of the camera with pictures of Paula Sands holding one of his landscape adhesive. When flipped up the LCD can be read even pictures in a photo gallery as well as a Time magazine in bright sunlight. The side wings fold in and the cover featuring himself. These were created with shade folds down to neatly cover the LCD and protect three clicks on the Internet. Go to www.writeonit. it from scratches and damage. The side wings are org or www.loonapix.com. On these fake picture sites, delicate and could easily break. In the closed position you create the picture display, browse your computer the shade has a small footprint so there is no added to select your own image, then right click the finished bulk from this device. The price varies but can usually product to save it to your computer. be purchased for around $10.00.
He said: Quikpod Compod Extendable Handheld Tripod. “Birth Certificates show you were born.” If you’ve ever been on a trip and wanted to take a “Death Certificates show you died.” photo of yourself and another person but hesitated to “Photos show that you lived.” hand your camera over to a stranger, then this is the gadget for you. This device is about a foot long with a diameter of about an inch and easily fits in a purse or a backpack. On one end is a screw that attaches securely to the bottom of your digital camera. Then from the end nearest you, you can release a chrome knob that extends the Compod to as long as 38.5 inches. To take a photo Marketing Fine Art Photography of yourself or By Tanya Mattson, a member of the Computer Users yourself and of Erie, PA others, turn October 2011 issue, Horizons on the self- www.cuerie.com timer on the cuerie1 (at) verizon.net camera, strike a pose, and take When you pick up this eye-catching book with the the shot. The glorious color landscape photograph on the cover, one Compod can has a sense of anticipation about it. I could not wait to also be used delve inside...which I immediately did. to take a photo over a crowd of people. It has a solid, steady feel even at a considerable extension. Aiming I will admit I was daunted at first by the Table of the camera in the precise location takes some practice. Contents; it’s three pages long. That’s a lot of material The Compod is just one of several products in this in a book that is 313 pages. category. One of the other products is the Quikpod Convertible Tripod and more accurately called a The book is divided into six parts with a total of tripod, because the rod converts to a 3-legged tripod, 21 chapters, not to mention a Conclusion and two The Compod is available from Amazon.com for under Appendices. $20.00. The listing of the various parts is just an overview Joby Gorillapod. Taking photos in low light demands of what is found in the individual chapters...simple the use of a tripod because no one can hold a camera to read, but offering a glimpse at what is contained steady enough at such within. The six parts are: a low shutter speed. Sometimes finding a 1- Selling Fine Art Photography flat surface to place a 2- What to Sell and Where to Sell It tripod on is difficult. 3- Fundamental Aspects of Marketing, Salesmanship The Gorillapod screws and Business into the bottom of the 4- Selling Your Work at Shows camera and then, with 5- Personal Skills its flexible spidery 6- Business and Marketing Tools legs, can be twisted to secure the camera The most intriguing aspect in the detailed Table of to a fence post or the Contents was the “Skill Enhancement Exercises” at branch of a tree to hold it steady. The Gorillapod the end of various chapters. This excited me in an odd comes in different sizes to fit compact digital camera way – not only was the author interested in getting and the heavier SLR Cameras. Higher end and more his information out, but also let the reader test their expensive models now come with a level bubble so knowledge and understanding along the way. you can check that the camera is level when it takes the photo. Of course, the Gorillapod can be set up as So I began with Part 1- Selling Fine Art Photography. a conventional tripod as well. It’s lightweight and fits Part 1 was found on a double page spread of another into a purse or backpack. The Gorillapod is available beautiful landscape – already I was starting to feel from Amazon.com, Target.com, Adorama.com, and creative. Next page, another photo and a quote: numerous other sellers. The model for the compact digital camera usually sells for under $20.00. “Successful people do things that unsuccessful people are unwilling to do” – These are just a smattering of the gadgets available. In John Maxwell a future article I’ll review additional gadgets after I’ve put them through their paces. Chapter 1 was aptly named “Taking Control of Your Destiny.” waters, and to get a grasp on what sells and doesn’t out of your image library. Sound advice for those What Alain discusses in the beginning is that a starting out with a tight budget. successful photographic business is about choices, taking control and making sacrifices. That if you If you’re really serious about marketing your choose to want it bad enough to work hard enough, photography, especially to make a living (or dreams do come true. supplement your current income), be sure to check this volume out. It is worth many times the cover price in He also discloses the “best kept secret” is also the best value to you. It’s like getting a college-level marketing known secret in the advertising world, which is as class between two covers. follows: Definitely a ‘Must Have’ for the serious photographer. ‘A poor photograph that is well-marketed will always outsell a great photograph that is poorly marketed.’ Marketing Fine Art Photography is published by Rocky Nook, and is available on Amazon.com for a Better equipment, expense equipment, “pretty” price of $26.97, a discount of 40% off list price. pictures – don’t sell photographs. Marketing does. Better marketing results in better sales.
The only secret to marketing is finding what works for you, and then systematically apply the system.
The goal of marketing is to generate sales that would not otherwise be generated.
The purpose of marketing is persuasion and how to achieve it.
The key element of marketing is effectiveness.
So there is the goal, purpose and key of marketing – why read the book?
Besides the photos, inspiring quotes and exercises, there is the easy read of the book itself. Anyone interested in marketing should read it. It contains lots of good information that can be geared to not only Create a Building Block in Word the Fine Art Photographer but can also be applicable outside of that category. 2007 or 2010 By Nancy DeMarte, Columnist, Office Talk, I think the most telling section of the book was Part Sarasota PCUG, Inc., FL 5 – it’s about Skills. The fourth category is titled October 2011 issue, Sarasota PC Monitor ‘Personal Skills.’ Starting with Advice, Anger, www.spcug.org Approach, and Attitude through to Time, Validation, ndemarte (at) Verizon.net Winning, Why, and You. The author has great insight on how photographers tick, and the approaches that If you create many documents in Word, you may find leads one to the road of success. that you often include portions of text with similar content or format. For example, when preparing to Some of the best advice Briot gives the beginner is to submit SPCUG classes each month to the Monitor, I try your marketing at Art Shows, as a way to test the always include a list of the details: dates, day, time, location, instructor, and instructor’s email address. As building blocks together for easier access. I skipped I learned more about Word 2007, I realized I could Description, although if I had I added one, it would set up a skeleton format for these class postings and have become the Screen Tip for the block. I left the save it as a “building block” (aka Quick Part) in Save In and Options boxes as they were and clicked Word. When I needed to prepare a new class posting, OK to save my changes. all I had to do was insert this building block into a document after the class description and enter the Now it was time to try adding my new building specific details, saving me the hassle of recreating block to a document. I opened a blank document the format. New in Word 2007, building blocks and double-clicked about half way down the page to are related to templates except they are bits of text, position the cursor there. Then I clicked the Quick rather than a whole document. For user convenience, Parts icon on the Insert tab, which showed previews a complete set of pre-formatted building blocks is of my last three custom building blocks. I clicked OTS listed on the Insert tab in the Text group under “Quick logo and it appeared in the document where my cursor Parts.” Click the Building Block organizer to find pre- had been. Had the block not been visible as a preview, formatted text boxes, headers and footers, cover pages, I would have clicked Building Block organizer and page numbers, and more. Many of these building scrolled to Quick Parts under the Gallery column to block galleries are also available under their own locate it. icons throughout Word. The Building Block organizer, however, includes all the categories in one place. You Next I decided to change the font in the logo can insert any one of these blocks into a document heading. I knew that any building block can be or template by opening the document, placing the modified in a document without changing the version cursor where the block belongs, clicking the Insert stored in the Building Block organizer. I changed the tab, then Quick Parts, Building Block organizer, and font of oTs from Goudy Stout to Bodoni MT black. the building block you want. If that sequence seems As an experiment, I saved the modified version to the too cumbersome, you can add the Building block Quick Parts gallery with the same name and properties organizer to the Quick Access menu. Right click as the first version to see if it would overwrite the the organizer title and select “Add to Quick Access original. I was surprised to find that it did not. I ended toolbar.” up with two different versions with the same name. I decided it is necessary either to delete a first version Creating your own building blocks is easy and can before saving a second or give the second version a save you lots of repetitive typing. The first step is different name. Finally, since the logo block was only to create a piece of formatted content. Let’s use the for illustration purposes, I decided to delete it. I simply example of a logo which could be used in a letterhead, opened the Building Block organizer, scrolled to and business card, and other documents. Since building selected OTS logo, and clicked Delete. blocks may contain many types of content, such as lines, images, drawings, and tables, as well as text, I My own collection of custom building blocks includes created one using a table with text and a piece of clip a footer which includes my name, page number and art from the Word program. Here’s how it looks: current date; a copyright sign with my name; the OTS SPCUG class detail list; and a personal logo I use Oakes Tree Service Richard Oakes as a letterhead. I do, however, often select from the Phone: 941-921-8006 galleries of pre-formatted building blocks located Email: [email protected] My next step was saving the building block. I on almost every tab of Word 2007; for example, selected the logo, clicked the Insert tab, then Quick watermarks on the Page Layout tab, cover pages and Parts, and chose “Save selection to Quick Parts text boxes on the Insert tab, or Table of Contents and gallery.” This action opened the “Create New Building Bibliographies on the References tab. More building Block” dialog box, where I gave my block a Name, blocks are available at www.office.microsoft.com. OTS logo. In the Gallery area, I left it labeled ‘Quick Parts’ because it didn’t fit into any of the existing The more I customize my Word 2007 program, the galleries. Under Category, I created a new one easier tasks become. Creating custom Building Blocks called Nancy, which let me group all my custom is one more way to make Word 2007/10 my own. Computer Parts and Terms This battery also keeps the clock running while the computer is off, so if the clock time begins acting By Wil Wakely, President, Seniors Computer Group, strangely, the battery may need to be replaced; CA however, it is usually good for years. This ROM October 2011 issue, Bits and Bytes contains the BIOS (bye-ose) which stands for Basic www.scgsd.org Input Output System, and instructs the computer Wilw31 (at) gmail.com where to find more information in order to fully start up. A process called POST (Power On Self This article might be a bit “techy” for some of us, but Test) runs to test the memory and make sure the it is important to know a bit about what goes on inside rest of the computer is healthy. It gives a series of of our computer so when something bad happens, we Beep Codes to indicate the state of health. One beep have a clue as to what might be wrong, and we can means everything is okay. A Google search of Beep save time and money by not having to hire a Codes will tell you what’s wrong if you get weird high-priced technician to fix a simple problem. beeps while Booting. If you press the Del(ete) key
immediately after pressing the start switch, a screen First, let’s review the hardware. The power supply will show the BIOS settings, which can be modified if converts the house electricity, 110 Volts AC necessary. Be careful! (alternating current), to the appropriate lower DC (direct current) voltages that the rest of the computer Hard drives are so important to the computer that it requires. It contains a fan to keep it cool, which is helps to understand how they work: about Think of them like the old Juke-boxes – lots of LP the only noise you should hear. There is one large records that each can be played with a moveable tone printed circuit board inside called the “motherboard”, arm. The hard drive has hard metal platters, unlike because it contains connections, or “slots”, where old floppy disks which were flexible. They contain other smaller “daughter boards” can be installed that tiny magnetic spots which, depending upon how do specialized functions. The motherboard is they are magnetized, indicate a one or a zero, which essentially the “head” of the computer and contains is the binary language the computer understands. the major memory and connections for all of the A moveable “head”, like the tone arm, “reads” the other components. It has connectors for the keyboard, magnetic state of the spots, called magnetic domains, mouse, hard drives, modem, video, sound, fan and and “writes” to change the magnetic polarity. Rather USB devices. It also contains the CPU, Central than a spiral track like an LP, the hard drive has ever Processing Unit, a large computer chip which is the larger concentric circles called cylinder tracks. The genius that runs everything. The latest versions of the platter is also divided up into sectors like pieces of CPU can do over three billion calculations per second, a pie. So to find a file, the head moves to a specific so it is really loafing most of the time. It is truly multi- cylinder track and sector and reads the data that is tasking which means that it can do a variety of things there. A large table of contents called a Partition at the same time. Table contains the track/sector location of all the files. Obviously, if this table becomes corrupted, the So here’s what happens when you first turn on files cannot be located. Fortunately, a backup copy your computer and it “boots”. Booting comes from is automatically retained. However, if the hard drive “bootstrapping”, or lifting oneself by his bootstraps. dies, this backup copy is useless. (Backup! Backup! The computer needs to know some rudimentary Backup elsewhere!) facts about itself before it can come fully alive. This information is retained in a computer chip on the While booting, the hard drive is recognized and motherboard called a ROM (Read-only Memory), a small area at the front of it is defined as the which permanently retains certain information without MBR, Master Boot Record. This contains enough requiring any power. There is a small disk-type battery information about the hard drive to locate the OS on the motherboard which allows this ROM to be (Operating System) like Windows and load it. read. The OS has its own sub-conscious memory called the Registry which contains a wealth of information to simplify the installation when you plug in a new about the computer and files. This now loads and can printer or scanner into your computer. If Windows 7 take quite a while if it is large. If this Registry file or doesn’t have a driver for your device it asks you to the MBR gets corrupted, it is a major problem. provide one. This could be from a CD that came with your device or you can search the Internet for the right Fortunately, backup copies are automatically driver. maintained. (Backup! Backup! Backup!) So what if you can’t find a driver on the Internet? Your best bet is to check the device manufacturer’s Now we are almost home free. The next thing that web site for Windows 7 drivers. If your device is old, happens is to load the StartUp files. These are however, the manufacturer may no longer support it programs that start automatically when you turn and there may be no drivers for Windows 7. In that on your computer. If there are a lot of these it can case, try looking for drivers for Windows Vista or a drastically slow down the boot time. You can see and similar model of the device. Ultimately, you may have change these Startups by typing “run msconfig” and to buy a replacement device. The good news is many clicking on the StartUp tab. Check or uncheck the new devices are faster, do more and are less expensive programs you desire. Keep these to a minimum for than the old ones. faster booting. So what can you do if you have an old program that At this point Windows should be running and you are worked fine with Windows XP but now runs poorly a happy camper to have full control. As you can see, or maybe not at all with Windows 7? Well it turns lots of things happen before you are allowed at the out that Microsoft has thought of that and created controls, and all it takes is a minor glitch in any of something called a “Windows compatibility mode”. these booting processes for your computer to fail to Using the compatibility mode you can tell it to run boot. It’s amazing that it works at all! the program using the settings for an earlier version of Windows (like Windows XP), limit the set of Frequent backups of your hard drives are the solution colors displayed, change the screen resolution and to major computer headaches. It is not a case of ‘if’ other settings. There are two ways you can change your computer crashes, it is ‘when’. the compatibility settings. You can use the Windows Happy computing! “Program Compatibility Troubleshooter” or change them manually.
Device Drivers Discovering Windows 7 – Part 19 By Neil Stahfest, Vice President, Tacoma Area PC User Group, Washington September 2011 issue, the Data Line NCStahfest (at) msn.com www.tapcug.org Figure 1 To use the Microsoft Windows uses small files called device “Program drivers to communicate with peripheral devices Compatibility Troubleshooter”, right-click on the by like printers and scanners. For example, when program’s name or desktop shortcut and in the you use a word processing program and enter a window that appears, right-click on “Troubleshoot line feed character, the code for a line feed must be compatibility” and follow the on-screen instructions.. translated to a code your printer understands to feed If you cannot install the program, locate the program’s a new line. Drivers can be for a specific device or setup file, usually called Setup.exe or Install.exe, click a family of devices like HP LaserJet printers. Over on “Troubleshoot compatibility” and follow the the years thousands of device drivers have been instructions that appear. written. Windows 7 comes with many built-in drivers Creative Landscapes - Digital Photography Tips and Tricks By Mark Mattson, Editor, Computer Users of Erie, PA October 2011 issue, Horizons www.cuerie.com cuerie1 (at) verizon.net
Walk out your door. It can be either into your front yard, or backyard...doesn’t matter. Look around you.
Really look.
No matter where you live - city, rural area, the middle of the desert - what you see (beyond the ordinary, everyday items that fill our lives) is a rich tapestry of earth and sky that makes up the landscape around us.
Photographers that specialize in landscape photography do the same thing as you just did... they take a look around them, and work out ways of showing the world around us in a new and different way, one that can evoke emotions and feelings in Figure 2 viewers that gives you insights into the way the creator To change program compatibility settings manually, of the image sees the world. start by right-clicking on the program icon. At the bottom of the window that appears you will see As author Harold Davis puts it, “ At it’s best, “Properties”. Click on it and then click on the landscape photography should be conducted as a “Compatibility” tab (see Figure 2). In this example spiritual exercise related to finding ourselves and our Windows has already selected Windows XP (Service place in the universe.” Pack 3) for the compatible operating system but if you click on the box above it you will see a drop down list Through this book, Harold sets out to do just that: to of all the versions of Windows that you can select give you, the reader the insights on how he views his from, going back as far as Windows 95. place in the universe by capturing stunning images of the world around us. Note that under “Settings” you can change colors, screen resolution, etc. Under “Privilege Level” you Creative Landscapes gives you 239 pages of can restrict the program to use by an administrator valuable information, accumulated over many years only and you can change settings for all users. of photography experience, on how best to create landscape photos that will allow you to share your After trying different program compatibility settings vision with others. your program may still not work properly. If you have a really old program they may be a hardware Divided into four parts, there are a total of 39 chapters incompatibility with your computer. For example, I inside the covers. That may seem a lot, but they are have an address database program that was written to relatively short and sweet, and much of the page run on Microsoft DOS (pre-Windows). It ran in a space is taken up with samples of Harold’s imagery “Command Window” in Windows 98 and Windows and descriptions of how he made the photos...and his XP but it will not run on my Windows 7 64-bit thoughts behind them. operating system. Sometimes you just have to move on and get a new program. Part One opens the book by discussing why landscapes make powerful images, and how they an of this book and Harold’s lessons and advice, I’d like emotional and almost spiritual place in our lives. to think I could also improve my skills to take my landscapes to the next level. Part Two gives pointers on selecting cameras and lenses and how best to use them to create successful If you share the passion of landscape photography, be landscapes. sure to add this book to your library. It is definitely worth every penny and the time to read it cover to Part Three talks about the many varied locations and cover. types of landscape scenes a photographer can shoot - ranging from seasonal to urban, desert to seascape and Creative Landscapes is published by Wiley. It carries a more. Information on how to best capture each locale list price of $29.99, but can be found on Amazon.com is given. for $19.59, a savings of 35% (shipping is extra).
Finally, Part Four describes and illustrates how to enhance landscape images in post-processing. Topics examined include RAW file processing, enhancing your images using HDR software and procedures to increase quality and drama; enhancing in Photoshop; and using LAB color mode to sharpen and enhance your images.
Ansel Adams was a big influence on Harold in his early childhood years. Encountering “Moonrise Hernandez, New Mexico” at the age of ten in the Museum of Modern Art in New York, changed Harold and set him on the course he follows today when it comes to his photography. He attempts to impart some of the wonder and creativity this encounter inspired in him to his readers...and does an admirable job of it Funny Thoughts On Love throughout the volume. • Only decent girls keep a diary. The others don’t have the time. --Tallulah Bankhead The majority of the book is illustrated with color • Love: A temporary insanity curable by marriage. images, but he also includes black and white as well, --Ambrose Bierce noting that it doesn’t matter what the color of an • Getting divorced just because you don’t love a image is; the emotions it can evoke go beyond the man is almost as silly as getting married just be- color space it is created in when executed properly. cause you do. --Zsa Zsa Gabor • Love is only the game that is not called on account This book is one of the 30+ titles Harold Davis of darkness. --M.Hirschfield has authored on different areas of photography. I • Love is like pi - natural, irrational, and very impor- personally have several of them, notably the Digital tant. --Lisa Hoffman Darkroom I and II volumes. In every case, his writing • Moving in together with a man is like buying style is tight and concise, but also easy to read and something you have long admired in a shop understand, in order to allow you to apply his methods • window. You’re exalted when you bring it home, to your own imaging. but you soon discover that it doesn’t match the rest of the furniture. --Jean Kerr Personally, I find it highly rewarding to take images of • I don’t worry about terrorism. I was married for landscapes. Most of my photography now is centered two years. --Sam Kinison on this subject. Although I’ve been making photos • Bigamy is having one husband too many. Monoga- for going on 45 years, there is nothing wrong with my is the same. --Erica Jong learning how to make better ones. Through the use category. Moving the cursor over the movie poster for Free Full Length Movies on each movie displays a summary of the movie, its date, YouTube the stars of the movie, and a color coded rating by Ira Wilsker system. My personal favorite category of full length WEBSITES: movies is the Documentary group, since I am a fan https://www.youtube.com/movies?fl=f&pt=fm of non-fiction. YouTube has 246 full length non- FREE MOVIES fiction documentaries, including the Oscar winning https://www.youtube.com/movies ALL MOVIES “Why We Fight” series of World War II movies that were produced by the Army Signal Corps, narrated I recently found out that Google’s infinitely by some of Hollywood’s biggest stars, and produced popular YouTube video service now offers over a by some of Hollywood’s greatest producers. Dozens thousand full length movies for free. Many other full of other military history documentaries are available length movies are also available on YouTube for a fee, including the original Memphis Belle (filmed in typically about $3, but I found enough of a selection color about the B-17’s 25 missions over Europe), The of free movies to keep me well entertained for many Battle of Britain, and The Fighting Lady (1945 Oscar hours. Winner for Best Documentary, filmed in Technicolor about an aircraft carrier in the Pacific). Also in the Documentary group are dozens of biographies including Nanook of the North, Mohammed Ali, Charles Manson, Marilyn Monroe, the Dalai Lama, Jackie Robinson, Evel Knievel, Lou Gehrig, and James Dean. Other documentaries cover environmental issues, political controversies, travelogues, historical events, technological history, international affairs, and a variety of other non-fiction topics. I sent the link for Animations & Cartoons to my daughters to have a source of entertainment for my grandchildren,
The easiest way to locate the free, full length movies on YouTube is to simply go to www. youtube.com/movies, click on the “All Categories” button, and then select “Free Movies”. Once there, the movies are divided into genre’s, with some duplication if a movie falls into more than one genre’; for example “GhostBusters 2” is listed under both the “Comedy” and “Family” headings. The genre’s listed are Comedy, Nigerian Cinema, Horror, Documentary, Action & Adventure, Drama, Animation & Cartoons, Mystery & Suspense, Crime, Classics, Family, Romance, and Science Fiction. Clicking on the genre’ title will display the first 63 of the free movies in that category, with a button on the bottom of the page to move to the next page of the as there are 41 free movies available. These movies, horror movies available. Sometimes it is enjoyable obviously primarily intended for children, include for us adults to snuggle on the couch and watch a animated bible stories, Gulliver’s Travel (two different good Mystery & Suspense movie; the 226 free movies versions), Casper and Wendy’s Ghostly Adventures in that genre’ could account for a lot of couch time. (Casper, the friendly ghost, first appeared in movie While many of the Mystery & Suspense movies are theaters in the 1930’s and on TV in the 1950’s), Peter relatively recent productions, again I find that some Pan, Popeye, Superman, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, Hansel and Gretel, Swiss Family Robinson, and Tom Sawyer are but a few of the well known animated movies freely available on YouTube. For those who might like comedies, YouTube offers 335 free comedy movies, ranging from classics like Charlie Chaplin, to contemporary stand- up comedy shows. Since I prefer the classical comedy movies to many of the more modern comedies, I have found the free movies featuring W. C. Fields, Buster Keaton, Amos & Andy, Charlie Chaplin, Abbott and Costello, Danny Kaye, Laurel & Hardy, and Will Rogers often displayed more comedic skill and talent than most of today’s popular comics. For those who disagree and prefer the newer comic styles, there are over 200 of those to choose of the older classics are among the most suspenseful, from in this category. such as the several of the Boris Karloff, Bela Sometimes it is nice as a family to sit in the Lugosi, Agatha Christie, Sherlock Holmes, and John living room and watch movies suitable for the entire Barrymore features. family, and the Family category offers 94 such titles. I am cognizant that many people enjoy crime While a few are duplicated from the Animations & movies, and the 238 free crime movies available Cartoons and Comedy categories, there is still enough should satisfy most crime fans. The movies available of a unique selection of family movies to entertain a range from one of the first movies ever made, Edison’s family for several months. Some of the better known 1903 “The Great Train Robbery” (also listed under the family movies available for free include several of the Classic category), to crime movies released over the Shirley Temple series, Heidi, GhostBusters 2, Rescue past few years. from Gilligan’s island (with the original TV cast), Science Fiction has always been among the several religious movies, the original Miracle on 34th most successful movies in theaters, and YouTube Street, musicals, several classic Christmas movies, offers 138 free titles. Among the most popular Sci- Hemmingway classics, and other movies suitable for Fi movies listed are “The Lost World - Story of family viewing. Atlantis”, Boris Karloff in the Snake People, Teenage Drama enthusiasts may find some interesting Zombies, Southland Tales, Alien Uprising, Planet of dramas among the 639 free movies available, while the Dinosaurs, and enough other Sci-Fi titles to amuse horror aficionados may appreciate some the 468 fans of the genre’ for many hours. As I have already stated, I am a fan of the “fees and taxes” in order to receive unimaginable classics, and YouTube obliges with 252 classical riches from the Nigerian Oil Minister’s widow. Many movies, many of which are redundantly included people are duped into ordering merchandise from in other genre’s. Among the most interesting are crooks who take the money (or credit card data), and old westerns of the 30’s, 40’s and 50’s starring have no intention of ever delivering the purported Gene Autry, Johnny Mack Brown, John Wayne, merchandise. We constantly hear of children who Clark Gable, and Buster Crabbe. The first of the have become the victims of cyber-bullying, where Tarzan movies, from the 1930’s, are also available, social network websites or chat rooms are utilized to and have a panache’ missing on the later Tarzan engage in the cyber-bullying. Russian crooks, often movies. Also quite interesting is the 1915 version teenagers, continue to spread rogue antivirus software of Alice in Wonderland, a grainy black and white in order to extort money from victims, and then sell silent production, with the story told by a sequential the credit card information to other crooks. We plead combination of short moving images, followed by a that something ought to be done about these and the few lines of on-screen narration; despite its primitive other endemic online scams; once again, the federal nature, the production quality is quite entertaining, government has launched a website to educate us such considering the technology of a century ago. that we may become resistant to such scams and other Romantics may appreciate the 147 free movies internet threats, OnGuardOnline.gov. in the Romance category. These range from classical romantic movies such as the 1938 “Tarzan’s Revenge” and films starring heart throbs Gina Lollobrigida, Susan Hayward, Elizabeth Taylor, Carole Lombard, Spencer Tracy, Jimmy Stewart, William Powell, and Myrna Loy. Some of the more modern romance movies incorporate more “adult” content and themes than the classics, but may still meet the needs of many contemporary romantics. With over a thousand free feature length movies available on YouTube, many in DVD quality, this broad selection of movies should delight anyone, at a price that cannot be beat.
OnGuardOnline.gov - Stop, Think,
Click - Online Safety By Ira Wilsker According to the header on the opening page of OnGuardOnline.gov, “(this website) provides practical WEBSITE: tips from the federal government and the technology http://www.onguardonline.gov industry to help you be on guard against Internet fraud, secure your computer, and protect your personal The news has been overwhelmed by stories information.” The website is maintained by the about the dangers of the internet. Just in recent days, Federal Trade Commission (FTC) with the assistance we have heard of major banks losing the personal of a substantial public - private partnership. Among information of hundreds of thousands of account the federal agencies and private organizations that holders; a congressman’s indiscretions on a social contribute material to the website are the U.S. networking website; hackers accessing thousands of Department of Justice; Department of Homeland accounts at a major retailer; and many other mass Security; Internal Revenue Service (IRS); Securities data breaches that may result in wholesale identity and Exchange Commission (SEC); Naval Criminal theft. Individuals are still falling prey to the infamous Investigative Service (NCIS); Consumers Union “Nigerian 419” scams, sending money to pay the (Consumers Reports magazine); National Cyber Security Alliance; Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG); National Center for Missing & Exploited Children; Cyberbully411; The SANS Institute; The National Association of Attorneys General; Better Business Bureau (BBB); National Crime Prevention Council (McGruff the Crime Dog); and several other agencies and organizations. The extensive resources of these agencies and organizations have created and compiled some excellent online safety resources for the use of children, adults, and families. This website consists of three major sections; Topics, Games, and Videos; all of the information is presented at a level that would be appropriate for family viewing. The Topics section consists of over two dozen discreet subjects, each hyperlinked to a detailed explanation of that subject. The Topics include a child online safety section “Net Cetera”; scam avoidance; instructions on how to safely dispose of old computers, considering both personal security and environmental concerns; “An Overview of Computer Security - Stop • Think • Click”; securing your home wireless network; identity theft; internet auctions; “Kids’ Privacy”; laptop security; spyware, malware, and viruses; online investing safety; safe online shopping tips; phishing incorrect answer is picked, the reasons are given why (identity theft); hotspot safety and security; and other the answer is wrong, and the correct response is then relevant and useful topics. displayed. At the end of each game a final score is Many kids and adults like playing games, displayed along with links for additional information. and the Games section has a bakers’ dozen games. Games cover a variety of topics including P2P (Peer According to the Games page, “ Feeling up for a to Peer) file sharing, ID Theft, spyware, cybercrime, challenge? Then test your cyber smarts with one or all and other contemporary cyber safety subjects. Users of our interactive quizzes on everything from spam should play each of these games, and learn from them. and spyware to phishing and file-sharing.” I tried Each game only takes a minute or two to play, but several of the online games, and they are both cute and they are loaded with useful and beneficial information. educational. The games are colorful, utilize exciting In “Invasion of the Wireless Hackers”, the player sounds and music, and are mostly of the interactive must protect his Wi-Fi network from evil hackers by question and answer variety. If correct answers correctly answering questions about wireless security. are chosen, the game displays some congratulatory A correct answer keeps the evil hackers away from words, as well as an enhanced explanation; if an the computer, but incorrect answers, along with some creepy music, bring the hackers closer and closer to conversation with their kids about online safety, and the computer until it is taken over by the evil hackers. find resources to help them.” In the game “Invest Quest” the player spins and The three “Phishy Videos” are “60-second spots advances by successfully answering questions about [which] expose phishing scams where online online investing safety. Several times during the game fraudsters use email, pop-ups, or text messages to get a window pops up warning the player that a scammer your personal and financial information by showing is trying to steal his money, and he can be protected what phishing would look like offline.” All of these by answering the question correctly, otherwise the videos may be explicitly forwarded, posted, or linked winnings in his piggy bank may be stolen. By playing from other websites and blogs. these fun games the user can learn valuable lessons OnGuardOnline.gov is an excellent website about computing safety and security. The games are that provides a wealth of information for parents appropriate for both children and adults, and could be and children in a fun and pleasant way. It would be a healthy family activity. For those with websites or most appropriate for families to play the games and blogs, the code for each of the games can be obtained watch the videos together. While some of the subjects by clicking the “Grab this Game” button, which will are intended to help us protect our fiscal health, the display a few lines of code. This code can then be most valuable subjects can help us protect our most copied and pasted into the blog or on the website, valuable assets, our children. allowing others to play the games. LPS - Free Utility from the Defense Department to Secure Your PC By Ira Wilsker
WEBSITES: http://spi.dod.mil/lipose.htm http://spi.dod.mil/liposeUSB.htm http://spi.dod.mil/docs/lps_quick_start.pdf http://spi.dod.mil/docs/lpsmanual.pdf http://spi.dod.mil
I have written a lot of columns about computer security, and the threats that many of us face when using our computers. While we may be subject to a variety of threats at home or in our offices, including hackers, crackers, viruses, worms, Trojans, and other varieties of malware, the threat landscape can substantially increase when using a public WiFi or other network, or even allowing someone else to use our computers. With the U.S. Military using thousands of computers, and the potential security risks that
could occur if the content on these computers was compromised, the ATPSI (Anti Tamper Software The videos available on OnGuardOnline.gov cover a Protection Initiative) Technology Office at Wright variety of subjects, and are clearly geared to different Patterson Air Force Base, has developed and publicly age levels. Five of the videos are “Net Cetera Videos” released a free utility that can be used to safely allow (also available on YouTube) and are intended to be a computer to connect to the internet or other network, viewed by children (as well as parents), and cover “... including a VPN (Virtual Private Network), but also online risks, including sharing too much information, make it virtually impossible for hackers and malware scams, viruses, P2P file-sharing, and cyberbullying.” to access anything on the computer’s hard drive when Another video is intended to “... help parents start a this utility is used. computer, it is extremely easy to create the bootable This product, which is explicitly licensed for CD; insert a blank CD into the drive, and then simply free public use, is “Lightweight Portable Security right click on the downloaded ISO file (either the (LPS)”. What this product does is create a bootable basic or deluxe version), and select “Burn”. Windows CD or USB flash drive that contains a form of the 7 will then create the bootable CD. If using an older Linux operating system that will run on almost any Windows computer there are many ISO burning Intel based computer, including almost all PC’s utilities available, many of which are free, including (even if they have AMD chipsets), and many Mac’s. UltraISO, ISO Maker, K3b, CDBurnerXP, Easy CD LPS does not install anything on the computer, and Creator, ImgBurn, CDBurn, Nero Burning ROM, does not require administrative privileges. Once Roxio Creator, and others. Any of the major free the computer is booted with the LPS system, the software download websites will have a selection of internet can be accessed normally, but the hard drive free ISO burners. Note that burning and ISO file to is inaccessible, making it impossible to read any data a CD is not the same thing as burning other files to a from the hard drive, and impossible for any type CD, and the ISO option must be selected in order for of malware to infect the hard drive. According to the bootable CD to be properly created. For those who the ATPSI, “LPS-Public is a safer, general-purpose may need precise, detailed instructions on creating an solution for using web-based applications.” LPS CD, instructions are available online (as a PDF file) at spi.dod. mil/docs/lps_quick_ start.pdf. In order to create a bootable USB flash drive, first create the CD as instructed above, but then do not boot from the CD. Insert an empty USB flash drive into the computer (if you use a used flash drive, all data may be lost if it is reformatted), and then using Windows Explorer (or other file manager), open the CD, and locate the directory The basic LPS software, which is frequently “InstallToUSB”. Run updated, can be downloaded directly from the ATSPI the file “USBInstall.bat”, and then follow the on- as an ISO file which can be burned directly to a blank screen instructions to install LPS on the flash drive. If CD or installed on a bootable USB flash drive; it is a computer supports booting from a flash drive, this also available as a compressed ZIP file, which can be USB drive can now be used to boot LPS (detailed uncompressed and then installed. The basic ISO file instructions online at spi.dod.mil/liposeUSB.htm). (uncompressed) is a large 137mb file. For those who Once the PC or MAC is booted from the may desire some additional functionality, a 317mb LPS CD or flash drive, the web can be accessed deluxe version (also free), contains a fully functional as normal using the built in and fully functional version of OpenOffice (a powerful free competitor to Firefox browser. This is especially useful if the user Microsoft Office which can read and write Microsoft is accessing the internet via a public access wireless Office and other file formats), and Acrobat Reader network, such as those at coffee shops, airports, to read PDF files. If downloaded to a Windows 7 hotels, restaurants, or elsewhere; it is locations such as these that are a hacker’s paradise since it is easy Free Utilities to Download YouTube to penetrate the open access networks and then break into a connected computer. Since the computer’s hard and Other Videos drive is not mounted by LPS (making it effectively by Ira Wilsker non-functional), it is virtually impossible for malware from any source to burrow its way into the computer’s WEBSITES: hard drive and contaminate or otherwise compromise http://www.downloadhelper.net/index.php the computer. Since the hard drive is inaccessible, any https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/video- files that the user may want to intentionally save must downloadhelper/ be saved to another USB flash drive (not the one used http://www.tubekeeper.com to boot the computer into LPS), or other data storage http://www.freemake.com/free_video_downloader/ device. If the deluxe version of LPS is installed, https://www.techsupportalert.com/content/download- the OpenOffice can be used to create or read word youtube-videos-easily-and-quickly.htm processing files (docs), spreadsheets, presentations http://saveyoutube.com (including PowerPoint), and other office documents, while the Acrobat Reader can display PDF files. One One of the most frequently asked questions tip - since the hard drive is effectively isolated and that I am asked is how the user can download inaccessible when LPS is loaded, it may be better YouTube and other videos that they view on the web. to save any created files or documents to a free Luckily, there are several free utilities, websites, and online cloud storage service such as Google Docs or browser plug-ins that make the process very easy. Microsoft’s SkyDrive service. I have made it obvious in previous columns I have heard of numerous cases where a users’ that my primary browser is Firefox. There is a child, grandchildren, neighbors, friends, and others very popular free browser plug-in for Firefox, as have accessed the users’ computers, and proceeded indicated by the 6.5 million copies downloaded, that to load them with unwanted software, viruses, spyware, and other forms of malware. If instead of allowing others to boot the computer normally, the users were to boot the computer into LPS, nothing could be written to the hard drive, thus sparing the computers from the evils and threats that others could wreak on the computers. Once the LPS CD or flash drive is removed, and the computer rebooted, it will boot normally as it did before, as if LPS had never been used. There is even a “Start” button on the LPS menu that will exit LPS and boot the computer normally. Since LPS leaves nothing on the hard drive, there is nothing that it can do to influence or otherwise hamper subsequent normal use of the computer. For those who may use computers in high risk environments, or who may have less than responsible users (children and grandchildren) use can download almost all YouTube videos as well as the computer, the free Lightweight Portable Security the videos from most other websites. This Firefox (LPS) may be a good alternative to a compromised or plug-in is Video DownloadHelper and is available corrupted computer. for instant installation at addons.mozilla.org/en-US/ firefox/addon/video-downloadhelper.It is installed into Firefox by clicking on the green “+ Add To Firefox” button, which downloads the file and installs it as a plug-in. This browser plug-in could not be much more easy to use; according to the DownloadHelper website, “Just surf the Web as you are used to, when DownloadHelper detects it can do something for you, the icon gets animated and a menu allows you to download files by simply clicking an item.” The icon that is referred to is typically located on one of the menu or toolbars, and consists of three colored balls (red, yellow, blue) that rotate whenever a compatible video is detected. A second colored balls icon, this one non-rotating, also appears on the top-left of the YouTube video. Even though the rotating “colored balls” icon on the menu or toolbar is small, there is a tiny down arrow on the right edge of convert the download into one of several listed the rotating balls; left clicking on the tiny down arrow formats. A second companion plug-in (free) may be displays the different resolutions and video formats required in order to convert into some video formats, available for direct download. Standard resolutions are and DownloadHelper can download and install the indicated with a red square with a right arrow, and HD utility. An additional DownloadHelper plug-in places resolutions are indicated with an HD logo. Resolutions a single red ball adjacent to the rotating icon; clicking are also listed in pixels, such as 240p, 360p, and 720p on this red ball allows the user to screen capture (or higher), and many of the videos are also available almost any video from almost any website that is for download in multiple formats, typically FLV, not directly supported by DownloadHelper. Upon MP4, and the mobile 3GP video formats. Moving the clicking the red ball, a moveable bracket will appear, mouse cursor over one of the resolution and format and activating the utility will record whatever appears listings will display another window that displays the within the bracket. Clicking again on the red ball icon download options; my personal choice for downloaded turns this feature off. YouTube videos is to select the “Medium - MP4” and For those not using the Firefox browser (or “Quick Download” options. Most third party video those Firefox users who do not want any plug-ins) players on both PCs and MACs can play videos in MP4 format. If I want to download the video to play on my smartphone, I choose the 3GP format. Another method to downloading YouTube videos with DownloadHelper is to left click on the non-rotating colored ball icon on the top- left of the YouTube image, and select a download option. There is much more to DownloadHelper; right clicking on the rotating balls icon will open a configuration menu where the user can modify the program settings as desired, including the ability to automatically there are several good alternatives to DownloadHelper. word or prefix to the YouTube URL (web address). One web based download utility that is very easy to One of the most popular download tricks was use is Tubekeeper, at www.tubekeeper.com. All the recently published on Gizmo’s TechSupportAlert. user needs to do in order to download YouTube videos com (www.techsupportalert.com/content/download- using Tubekeeper is to copy the YouTube web address youtube-videos-easily-and-quickly.htm). This trick (URL) and paste it in the “URL - Download” blue is explained by Gizmo as a simple four step process: box, and then click the download button to download first, open the desired YouTube video in your browser; the video to the user’s computer. If using Tubekeeper, second, add the word “save” after the “www.” and I recommend that the user clicks on the “Share” button before the “youtube.com”, making the address www. on the bottom edge of the video screen, then click saveyoutube.com/watch/
An open secret among geeks is that YouTube This is especially true if you are moving into the videos can also be downloaded directly to the user’s world of HDTV for the first time. Compared to an computer using a variety of tricks, mostly adding a old standard TV, just about any HDTV will look will look better than ever. Standard DVDs, which are spectacular, no matter what the resolution. Many 480p in resolution, will be upconverted by a HDTV experts in the field will tell you that they consider and will look noticeably better on a HDTV, whether it things like contrast ratio, color saturation, and color is 720p or 1080p. accuracy to be more important than resolution. One other thing needs to be taken into consideration That said, when you choose a HDTV, the resolution when talking about resolutions. In order to see the will be the first thing you see when you start shopping. extra detail that a 1080p TV provides, the screen size The resolution is the number of pixels on the screen. must be quite large. That is why HTDVs are generally All other things being equal, more pixels will produce quite a bit larger than the old standard definition a better, sharper image. A 720p television has 1280 televisions. Also, you need to site close enough to the horizontal pixels and 720 vertical pixels. A 1080p TV for your eyes to actually be able to see the extra television has the same number of horizontal pixels details. (1280) but has 1080 vertical pixels, essentially giving you more detail in the picture. The “p” stands for This is where it gets a little confusing. Basically, progressive scanning which is superior to another unless you have a very short distance between you and scanning technique called interlaced scanning, which the TV, you will need a larger screen with 1080p than is represented by an “I”. You don’t have to worry with 720p. That’s one reason why most televisions in about the ‘I” or the “p” because most televisions sold smaller screen sizes will be 720p rather than 1080p. in the US today use progressive scanning. Even with 1080p Blu-ray disks, the 1080p quality only begins to become noticeably better as the screen size 1080p is the best resolution available today and you increases. will pay a premium to get it. Having a 1080p TV, however, is only good if you have 1080p content to You can see from these details that although 1080p is show on the TV. Unfortunately, currently there are no the premium resolution, 720p TVs are a lower-cost over-the-air television broadcasts in the United States option, and may be perfectly fine depending on your that are transmitted in 1080p. Although television needs. stations and cable and satellite providers have the ability to transmit in that resolution, few are willing Besides the options like plasma, LCD, LED, 720p and to take that step because 1080p transmissions take up 1080p, there are plenty of other specifications that you a lot of bandwidth. At this time there are only a few can look at when purchasing an HDTV. Higher end satellite provider that utilize the 1080p format and televisions will also have things like better contrast these are strictly limited to their pay-per-view movies. ratios, extra HDMI ports for attaching additional equipment, and Internet connectivity. Higher ends So most people will find that the only way to enjoy the LCD and LED TVs will also have higher refresh rates full details of a 1080p television is to purchase a Blu- and better backlighting. ray DVD player. Blu-ray disks are formatted in the full 1080p resolution and will show off the full potential of If you want the best hardware, look at the 3-D TVs. a 1080p TV. You may not want 3-D in a television. If you are like me, you may not even like it, but 3-D TVs have higher Whether you purchase a 720p or 1080p television, hardware requirements and will, in effect, be the best standard-definition content won’t necessarily look televisions, even without the 3-D. any better. Although ,depending on the television, the signal may be upconverted to make it look better. In Not everyone will want or need the best or costliest some geographic areas, you can get hi-def signals over HDTV. Fortunately there are sizes and models the air. You can also get hi-def stations through cable available to suit the needs of almost everyone. and satellite providers.
If you don’t want to purchase a Blu-ray player, you can still use your old DVD player and your old movies 5 more (more!) Office features you nice if you could preview what it’s going to look like when you plop it into your file? Why, yes it would be need to know about nice and why, now you can. Before you paste it in, you by Annik Stahl can do one of two things: 1) Move your pointer over on May 06 the different Paste options on the shortcut menu; or 2) For Wednesday’s post, I offered up five useful features On the Home tab, in the Clipboard group, click the that I feel you should know about and use. Today I arrow below the Paste button to review your choices. want to continue that list, but I want to dig a little deeper into a few programs to uncover some features • Video: Paste with live preview that, while useful and neat-o, may be underutilized #9 Save me from my download: Protected View (by you, by me, by the public at large). So let’s get New for Office 2010, crackin’ and expose some of these things so that we when you open a can start using them...pronto! document, spreadsheet, #6 Help your readers: Readability statistics or whatever from the You already know you can check your spelling and Internet, from email, or grammar either while you type in Word (and Outlook even from your company’s if Word is your editor) or afterward. But you can also own share, you simply check for the document’s or email’s “readability”— don’t know what some that is, its reading level. The readability feature in files are bringing along Office uses two tests— Flesch Reading Ease and with them (and I mean Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level—that were developed in macro viruses, malware, the 1970s for the military. These tests basically give and other nasty things). you two scores that tell you the difficulty of your Luckily for you, these files document and to what grade level it corresponds. are opened by default in Protected View. This means Most government agencies, insurance companies, that nothing is downloaded to your computer without schools, and legal and other industries require specific your permission because Protected View essentially readability levels. isolates you from any malicious, nasty, hurtful, I found this to be quite fascinating and something I insulting code (I’m thinking about middle school, can didn’t know much about. I can totally see how this you tell?) that may be contained in the file. So if you would be a useful feature in many different scenarios: want to be able to edit and work in the file, YOU make • Blog post: Can Word improve your writing? the choice by clicking the Enable Editing button. • Read about how to understand your • Safety first: Office 2010 Protected View document’s readability scores. #10
Check out what’s available now on Peachpit TV. Following the principle “if you can’t beat them, join ‘em,” I purchased a cell phone with keyboard. An Editor’s Guide to Premiere Pro: Looking to get The results have been very gratifying but there IS a up to speed in Adobe Premiere Pro? Look no further problem. than these tutorials from the bestselling book An Editor’s Guide to Premiere Pro, 2nd Edition. You’ll It is all those abbreviations my son uses. Half the time learn great tips on audio, color, camera tracking, I didn’t have a clue what he meant. Some were fairly custom presets, authoring, interactivity and more! In obvious, like LOL (“lots of love”) but wait, this video, you’ll learn how to organize your media it turns out that LOL can, and usually does, mean and create descriptive markers that will travel to “laughing out loud.” So much for a mother’s feel-good Adobe Premiere Pro. interpretation. • Markers and Metadata with Adobe Prelude
Photoshop with Matt: Check out the latest from Matt As the texting continued, the use of texting slang Kloskowski, education and curriculum developer for increased. At first I just asked my son what the the National Association of Photoshop Professionals. acronym meant. But then it occurred to me that I In this video, he shows how to use Photoshop’s was ruining my “cool” texting image by revealing my Content Aware Scale to move and stretch an image to ignorance of the language. I began Googling unknown fit a certain size for printing. “words.” Through Google I discovered that ROFL • When Your Image Size Doesn’t Match Your Print stands for “rolling on the floor laughing”; BRB stands Size for “be right back”; BTW is “by the way”; IK is “I know”; AMOF, “as a matter of fact”; HTH, “hope this Do you text? helps” to name just a few. By Claudia Horack Bristow, President, Hilton Head Computer Club, SC By far the quickest way to interpret texting slang is September 2011 issue, Island Computing to Google the word but there are also online texting www.hhicc.org “dictionaries” and articles that are fun to browse.
In what seems like a relatively short period of time, Here are a few texting slang sites. Check one or cell phones have become ubiquitous. There are no age two out: http://www.webopedia.com/quick_ref/ limits for cell phone users. Seniors and more senior textmessageabbreviations.asp seniors use them. Our children and grandchildren http://textingabbreviations.blogspot.com/ seem never to be parted from their phones, which is http://www.yourdictionary.com/dictionary-articles/texting- frequently a good thing. Not only is it fun to chat with slang.html the grandkids, calling a grandchild is sometimes the only way I can Pick out a few of the interesting ones, slip them in reach my son! your next text, and WOW your kids and grandkids. GL and HF. Some people can’t bear to be away from their phones; others only want them for emergencies or travel. Many people I know, and most of my kids, have foregone landlines in favor of cell phones. Some uses are appropriate; Degunking Windows 7 12 . Create a working, reliable and fool-proof backup By George Harding, Treasurer, Tucson Computer system. Society, AZ October 2011 issue, eJournal She realizes that not everyone can afford the time or is www.aztcs.org interested in doing every one of the steps. To address georgehardingsbd (at) earthlink.net that she has developed 10-minute, 30-minute, one- hour and half-day programs. These capture the most The book is written by Joli Ballew, an author (36 significant actions that will give the most benefit for books!), trainer the time allotted. and web site manager. She The first step is probably the most difficult and time- has written for consuming, because you pretty much have to look the McGraw- at a lot of the document, pictures and media files Hill How to Do to determine what can be trashed and what must be Everything series. saved. If you click on the Change My View button (in The book has 273 Documents or any folder) and select Details, simply pages, including click on the Date header to sort by date and see the an extensive Index oldest files. These may be the most likely ones to of 19 pages. The delete. theme of the book is how to easily If you press the Delete key or right-click and select clean up your PC Delete, the file will be moved from its current location and speed it up. to the Recycle Bin. This is just a different location on The process does your hard drive, which you can empty from time to not involve any special tools. All you need is already time. To permanently delete a file, hold down Shift contained in Windows 7. If you are running XP, Vista while you delete. or 2000, many of the tools you need are available in those programs as well. A few are only in Windows 7 Getting rid of unused and unwanted programs can be . easily done through Control Panel/Programs. Here, The author has developed a 12-step process for you can uninstall those programs you no longer need degunking your computer. Here it is: and those you didn’t know you had. While you’re 1 . Get rid of files and programs you don’t need. there, note on the left side of the frame the option to 2 . Organize the remaining files and folders. turn off Windows components. Here, you can turn off 3 . Clean up your desktop, Start menu and Task Bar. or on various Windows components. 4 . Optimize your hard drive and limit the programs that run in the background. One last thing to do to clean things up is to run Disk 5 . Clean up and secure Internet Explorer and consider Cleanup. In the Start menu Search window, type alternate web browsers. “cleanup” and click on Free up Disk Space. 6 . Reduce e-mail spam, back up e-mail and organize e-mail. When the analysis is done, you see a list of types of 7 . Install Windows updates and reconfigure anti-virus, files and the amount of space that would be freed up anti-malware and anti-adware programs. by deletion. Check or uncheck as appropriate and click 8 . Clean up your network and create a homegroup. OK . 9 . Fix problems with media, including duplicate files, files that won’t play and files that are taking up hard You can organize your files by creating folders inside drive space unnecessarily. the major system categories. For example, to organize 10 . Optimize syncing with cell phones, music players, your client letters, create folders in the My Documents iPads, iPhones, netbooks and laptops. folder for each client and save files in each for your 11 . Get rid of errors for hardware, the operating clients. Likewise, for pictures, classify your photos by system and third-party programs. creating a folder for each trip or subject. You’ll be able to find the pics you need much more easily this way. probably not all.
Lastly, defragment your hard drive to reorder and I found this book to be useful. I tried out many of reconnect the files you’ve moved and deleted. Right the ideas both to see how they worked and to see the click your drive in Windows Explorer, choose improvement that might result. Properties, then Tools . Click Analyze to see if defragmenting would be advantageous. You can also About: Degunking Windows 7 adjust the scheduled defragmentation that’s currently Author: Joli Ballew set up . Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media http://www.mhprofessional.com/category/?cat=2834 You should clean up your Desktop by deleting any ISBN-10: 0071760059 icons and shortcuts you don’t use. You can put a ISBN-13: 978-0071760058 shortcut on the Desktop for Computer or Network by Price: $25, $16.50 @ Amazon browsing to that folder and right-clicking. Choose Send To/Desktop to create a shortcut.
You can customize your Start menu by right-clicking Password Tracking – Windows and the Start icon and choosing Properties, then click on Customize. I like the Recent Items choice because Mobiles it avoids having to first launch an application, then By Merle Nicholson, Secretary, Tampa PC Users open the document I want to continue with. You can Group, FL also pin items to the Start Menu or Task Bar by right- September 2011 issue, Bits of Blue clicking and selecting Pin to Start Menu or Pin to Task www.tpcug.org Menu. merle (at) merlenicholson.com
The author points out several things you can do to Tracking passwords has always been a problem for optimize your hard drive: convert to NTFS (assuming me. Years ago I started a password Document to track you’re still on FAT), run Check Disk (under Properties everything, and, while it worked, it left a great deal of your drive), run Performance tests, run Disk to be desired. The problem was much larger than just Cleanup. username and password. I needed to save the URL to log in to websites. I needed to track expiration dates One of the most powerful enhancements is in for subscriptions. I needed key codes for software. Performance in Control Panel. Here you can adjust I have five different logins with Microsoft. Yes, I visual effects, control indexing and change system could reuse some of those, using the same login and settings. password, but not always. For instance, sometimes your login is the same as your email address, but most There’s a chapter on IE8, including how to turn on times not. Making it more complicated, different sites Compatibility View, remove toolbars and add-ins, have different login and password requirements. explore privacy and security settings. And Verizon! I have SIX different logins with Verizon: Chapter 8 deals with email, how to organize it, filter Call Assistant, Verizon Central, Verizon FIOS, Verizon it and how best to deal with spam. It also shows you Mail Account, Verizon Mail and Verizon Wireless. how to back-up email lists. So I developed some “password rules” for myself. Chapter 9 deals with the important subjects of security, I decided that if I could remember more than just a Windows Update and the use of firewalls and other couple of passwords, it was because 1) I had to reuse security packages. them (a bad thing) and 2) they were too simple. So something had to go. I decided I need really good The balance of the chapters deal with less crucial passwords and I couldn’t handle it in my head. subjects. They may be of interest to some users, but One of my sons suggested the KeePassX database in the notification strip at the top of the screen. So he’d been using for a while, and I started using it when you open the browser to the site, you just poke sparingly, slowly embracing its features as I got used the login notifier, then poke and hold on the login box to it. The program is maintained professionally and is and a paste menu appears that you poke and it’s pasted available free of charge. You can look at the program in place. Then the same for the password and I was in at http://www.keepassx.org/ to see if this will suit and out in seconds. your own needs. Of particular interest is the variety of devices that it works on. You won’t see any mobile What a deal, and it’s free. There are versions for versions at the website, but each of the mobile devices Linux, Mac OSX, Windows, iPhone, PocketPC, has a version available from its own app store. I use Blackberry and Android. And if you think you don’t the Android version on my Motorola Droid X. need one, your passwords are too simple and you’re using the same one for everything. Http://www. The program uses an encrypted database, and I keepassx.org. guess ideally there should be a way to automatically update or synchronize between devices. I own several computers and my Droid, and I need the database on all of them. I could use Microsoft Live Mesh or The Graphics Side of Word By Nancy DeMarte, Columnist, Office Talk, Sarasota Dropbox or something like that for synchronization, PCUG, Inc., Florida but I dislike the idea of my password database being in May 2011 issue, Sarasota PC Monitor the “cloud.” So for now I use a flash drive to copy the www.spcug.org database file to my computers, and I connect my Droid ndemarte (at) Verizon.net to my base computer via USB and drag and drop the file. It is natural to think that a word-processing program would deal only with words. Certainly, most I’ve found that, in practice, I don’t have to refresh commands in Microsoft Word do relate to editing or the files very often. None but the one on my main formatting text. But each new version of Word has computer is up to date at any one time, but it never introduced more ways to enhance text with graphical seems to matter. elements like clip art and photos. This article and the one next month will deal with the graphics side What is so useful about this program is that I can store of Word 2007 -- what the options are and how to any useful information along with the URL and the use them within a Word document. Many of these logon and the password. For instance, my Amazon/ techniques apply to Word 2003 as well; all apply to Kindle account logon has the names and Kindle email Word 2007 and 2010. addresses of two Kindles, two Droids (smart phones) and two PCs. It’s a logical place to keep all this stuff. This month the focus will be on the types of graphics Right now I count 82 database entries, and I’m very that may be inserted within a Word document and careful to keep it trimmed of anything not useful. It how to insert them successfully. To do this, we need to has a configurable password generator and the ability explore the Illustrations group within the Insert tab in to look at the password when you want to instead of a Word 2007. line of *******. Inserting Pictures I got an email to my Droid with a notification of an Since a picture is worth a thousand words, often event on the TPCUG forum before I would even think adding a photo to a document helps clarify its of firing up my main computer. I needed to log on meaning. To do this, open a Word document and place using a regular account on the forum. The peculiarities the cursor on the page where you want a photo to of a smart phone with just an on-screen keyboard that appear. Double-clicking in any blank space inside the needed a complex login and password should have margins will position the cursor at that spot. Click the been just too daunting. But on the Android version of Insert tab - Picture. Your Pictures folder will open, KeePassX, when you select the group (TPCUG) and allowing you to select a photo from your collection. title (User Logon), the database puts two little buttons Click the photo, then click Insert to make the photo general instructions for resizing, text wrapping, and appear in your document. Depending on its size, moving as you did for photos. A Help command at the photo may fill the screen, blocking out the text, the bottom of the Clip Art box can help you solve any or jump to the next page. Instead of panicking, find problems you encounter. You may close the clip art one of the corners of the photo and drag it toward dialog box when finished adding clips. the center to reduce its size while maintaining its proportions. When the photo reaches the desired Inserting Shapes size, right click it and select Text-wrapping - Tight or Older versions of Word had a Drawing toolbar which Square from the menu. This will allow the photo to gave access to a few shapes and tools for working with be moved around and positioned within the document them. Word 2007 has made a noticeable improvement with text surrounding it. You can experiment with in the number of available shapes and how shapes other text-wrapping choices if you want the photo are organized. On the Insert tab, click Shapes in the positioned differently, such as behind the text. Illustrations group to open the expanded gallery. Click Sometimes Text-wrapping is not visible in this menu. the shape you want, but don’t expect it to appear Choose Format Picture instead, then Layout, to get the instantly in your document the way a photo does. text-wrapping choices. Instead, you must click inside the document where you When you select the photo now, you will notice that want the shape to appear. Hold down the left mouse a new tab called Format has appeared in the ribbon button and drag any direction to make the shape at the top of the screen with the phrase Picture Tools visible. Once it’s there, it can be resized by dragging above it. Click Picture Tools to reveal commands one of the “handles” (small squares along the edge) related to editing and formatting the photo. These tools and moved the same way as clip art. Right-clicking the allow you brighten or crop the photo, add borders shape gives you a menu of options similar to those for and effects, and change its position or size. When a photo or clip art. you deselect the photo, notice that the Format tab and Picture Tools disappear. If you select the shape in your document, the Format tab appears again but with new commands. Click Inserting Clip Art Drawing Tools to see ways to enhance your object. Office 2007 has extended the definition of Clip Art to For example, you can choose fill colors, effects, and include not only the standard drawings and photos, but arrangements of multiple objects. also movies and sounds. There are thousands of these items which can be inserted into your documents. If you are designing a complex arrangement of shapes, Open your document and click the Insert tab - Clip you may wish to use the Drawing Canvas tool which Art. Fortunately, the Clip Art dialog box, which opens is found at the bottom of the shapes gallery. This tool along the right side of the screen, contains a powerful creates a large area in which to put multiple graphic search feature. Begin by entering a search term, like elements to create a complex drawing. The canvas “birthday cake.” Then, using the drop down menus, keeps objects from moving around unexpectedly, but choose whether to search just on your computer, the can be difficult to control. Microsoft Office website, the whole web or all of these (best choice). You can also choose which kind of A simpler way to work with multiple objects is to use media you want to search, such as clip art or sounds the tools found in the Arrangements group in Drawing only. With a fast Internet connection, it takes only a Tools. One command lets you move an object to the couple of seconds for the Clip Art search box to return front or back of the arrangement; another lets you items which meet your search criteria after you start rotate an object. An especially useful command is your search. Group, which is a simple way to put objects together. First arrange the objects in your document. Then, To add a clip art item to your document, merely drag it while holding down the Ctrl key, select all the shapes from the Clip Art box to your document. To add more you need. Click Drawing Tools - Group - Group to than one item at a time, hold down the Ctrl key while merge them so they are treated like one object. If you you select items, then drag the whole group together. want to split them apart, click Group - Ungroup. Once the clips are in the document, follow the same These three types of graphic items -- pictures, clip art, options: and shapes -- were part of earlier versions of Word. • Keep Source Formatting pastes the text with They were improved in Word 2007 by offering more the formatting from the source text has the choices and better organization of tools. Next month same fonts and attributes that were copied. we will continue with a look at a new graphic feature If images included they are inserted with the introduced in Word 2007 called Smart Art, plus the same vertical and horizontal spacing. improved Charts element, and some ways that text can • Merge Formatting the pastes the selection with become art as well. the formatting used in the destination Word 2010 document. • Keep Text Only pastes only the selected text as Word 2010 Paste Features plain text. This means any images, hyperlinks By Lynn Page, Newsletter Editor/Webmaster, Crystal and text formatting are lost. Only plain text River Users Group, FL will be pasted so headings, for example, will October 2011 issue, CRUG newsletter lose their size and bolding. www.crug.com [email protected] What is really great is the live preview. When you mouse over the icon in the Paste Options drop down Those of you who have taken any of my Word classes a preview of the pasted selection is shown in the or workshops know I think the Paste Special feature is document. Click on the icon to select the paste option one of Word’s most important tools. We all cut, copy for inserting the selection. Moving the mouse away and paste text, images, graphics and other items all of and moving back into the document closes the drop the time. When working within a single document that down and nothing is pasted. is not a problem but when working with documents having different formatting or worse yet web pages Another new feature is that it is not as easy. So it is important to consider how Set Default Paste is included the pasted items to be represented. For text this is in the Paste Options. I more obvious as you usually want text pasted into a personally have not felt document to conform to the format of that document. the need to change the With graphics especially from the web it can also be a default paste settings but it concern. So I have always advocated using the Paste is available through Word Special command. options. To make changes click Set Default Paste in Word 2010 has added new features to the Paste the Word Options Advanced command to make it easier to use Paste and Paste features look at the Cut, Copy Special. and Paste section. This allows you to change the default In Word 2007 a Paste button was included in the paste option depending on Ribbon but now in Word 2010 the Paste button in the where you are pasting from. It Clipboard group provides also has controls for pasting lists and images. a better preview of what happens with the paste If like me you like to cut, copy and paste by right options. clicking you can still access the new features. After making a selection right clicking on it opens a new Once a selection has drop down menu. You still have the expected copy and been copied to paste into cut options but also have the new paste options. a document on the Home tab click the down arrow The new icon based Paste tool with live preview under the Paste button makes cutting, copying and pasting much easier for to open the drop down those of us that do a lot of moving text and graphics menu. There are three between documents and even applications. •They’re “sneaking it in”. OK, this is really subjective, but you can’t help but feel like this might be an attempt to sneak the installation in, during Say No Thank You to New Toolbar - Opt Out a process where people are usually just hitting Next During the Installation Process repeatedly to get the install over with. By Leo Notenboom, Ask Leo Article Source: http://articlesbyleo.com/ This installation is not the only case. During installation of many software packages - both initial Have you ever had a new toolbar suddenly “appear” installs and updates - the option to install a toolbar in your browser? Although it might not seem like you will often be selected by default. You have to click agreed to install it, the likelihood is that you did. a box to opt out. This choice typically comes during the middle of the process when you’re conditioned One of the most frustrating strategies companies use to to hitting “next” just get it over with. If you’re not deploy more toolbars relies on your not paying close paying attention once you’re done suddenly a new attention when installing software or other programs toolbar will “appear.” A toolbar you didn’t realize you on your computer. had actually agreed to.
For example, let’s say you’re installing an update to Typically, installers include this option to earn profit. the popular Java runtime, which is software used by It’s a way for those offering free software to recoup some websites to provide rich functionality beyond some of the cost. But this habit certainly shows up in just displaying static pages. paid for software as well.
The update consists of the normal installation This tactic is a perfect example of why it is important program, and then proceeds to ask you the normal to pay attention during installations and updates. installation things, including agreeing to the software Read each step before clicking next or you might find license. you’re about to “ask” for something you didn’t really want at all. Then another screen comes up and without reading it you’re about to click Next. Get more free tech help and advice from Leo Notenboom by visiting http://ask-leo.com With over Wait! 30 years of industry experience, including an 18 year career as a software engineer with Microsoft, Leo In doing so you would have been asking to have the gives real answers to real questions from ordinary Yahoo! toolbar installed. computer users at Ask Leo! Subscribe to Leo’s weekly newsletter now and receive a free ebook: “Internet Nothing against Yahoo, Java or Sun here, but this can Safety - Keeping Your Computer Safe on the Internet”, be very annoying. It’s not that the Yahoo toolbar is a collection of steps, tools and concepts you need to bad. It’s actually a fine toolbar. The annoying part is know to keep your computer and your information this: safe. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Leo_ •The offer appears during an update- you’d already Notenboom made your selection when you initially installed the program, there’s no need to ask again. •It defaults to “Yes”. Anything optional, particularly anything totally unrelated to what is being installed, should default to off. by right-clicking on the Recycle Bin and selecting Deleting Files “Properties”. In the Recycle Bin Properties window, By Neil Stahfest, Vice President, Tacoma Area PC select the bin location for the partition you want to User Group, Washington change and then enter the amount of space you want to October 2011 issue, the Data Line reserve for the Recycle Bin (see Figure 1). NCStahfest (at) msn.com www.tapcug.org Before we move on from the Recycle Bin Properties window, note that there is option that lets you delete In the days before Microsoft Windows, when we files without sending them to the Recycle Bin. This deleted a file the file was gone and there was empty will not delete your Recycle Bin and the amount of space on the disk was increased. Accidental file disk space it uses. It just allows you to erase files from deletions could be your disk in one step (with no Recycle Bin safety net). a problem if you didn’t have copies. Enter Peter If you are annoyed by Windows asking you if you Norton who created a powerful unerase program really want to move a file to the Recycle Bin, you can followed by a number of other similar programs. click to turn off the file delete confirmation dialog. Norton Utilities was a must have software package for businesses and serious PC users. If you keep deleting files eventually you will fill up your Recycle Bin. At that point Windows will start to With the release of Microsoft Windows, Microsoft delete the oldest files in the Recycle Bin from your introduced the “Recycle Bin”. Now when you deleted hard drive. Files deleted from the Recycle Bin are a file it didn’t really disappear off your disk. Windows truly gone, creating empty space on your hard drive. simply changed the file location address from where Actually you may still be able to still restore them ever the file was located (i.e. Pictures) to the Recycle with third party file un-erase programs but that’s Bin. If you discover that you really need a file you beyond the scope of this article. just deleted, all you have to do is double-click on the Recycle Bin, select the file or files you want to restore, click on it to select and then click on the Restore button. This causes Windows to change the file address location back to what it was before you deleted the file.
Of course, you have a limited amount of space on your hard drive. By default 5% of your total hard drive space (i.e. 15 GB on a 300 GB drive) is allocated for the Recycle Bin. So how do you create empty space on your hard drive If you have by deleting files you no longer need? Well, start by more than one deleting them (sending the files to the Recycle Bin). partition on Then right click on the Recycle Bin and left click on your hard drive, “Empty Recycle Bin” (Figure 2). The files are now each partition gone and you have more space on your hard drive. will have its own Recycle This brings up the question, should I periodically Bin. You can empty my Recycle Bin? That’s really an individual change the choice but my experience has been when I accidentally size of your delete a file I discover the mistake within minutes or Recycle Bin to at minutes or at most a few days of the deletion. I make it bugger usually delete everything that has been in my Recycle or smaller Bin for more than a week. You may wonder how you know how long a file has of your computer and using flawless imaging backup been in the Recycle Bin. When you open the Recycle software, making Acronis True Image Home a must- Bin you may or may not see the date the file was have! deleted. If you do not, click on the small triangle in the upper right corner of Most of our members have already heeded this advice, the Recycle Bin window as making Acronis True Image Home their most popular shown in Figure 2 (circled choice. I can tell you unashamedly that on several hard in red). drive failure occasions over the years it has saved my life. In the pop-up window that appears (Figure 3), select Acronis True Image Home has blossomed over the “Details” (shown circled in years into a comprehensive multi-faceted utility which red) and now you should in its latest release, Acronis True Image Home 12, is see the “Date Deleted” not only the leading backup, but currently contains a column. variety of essential utility components that make it an industry leader. Here is a quick rundown on some of As you can see, the what’s new and improved in the currently available Recycle Bin is a pretty upgraded product: useful tool. You can use it as • Disk Imaging - Backup the entire system it comes, out of the box so to speak, or you can alter it on the fly with our patented disk imaging to change its size to suite the way you work. technology. It ensures the recovery of your For more information click on the Windows Start operating system and applications without button, select “Help and Support and type “Recycle reinstalling any software. Bin” in the search box. • Clone Disk - Copy your entire hard drive and Acronis True Image Home 2012 replace it with a new one without reinstalling By Herb Goldstein, Editor, Sarasota PCUG, FL operating systems and applications, saving www.spcug.org hours of effort. pcugedit (at) verizon.net • New! File Synchronization - lets you replicate In order for a computer to work it needs software, the important data between multiple computers, primary basic and necessary of which is its operating files or devices. Sync files with friends, family system (e.g. Microsoft Windows). That being satisfied, or colleagues over the Web. Or sync with local your computer becomes a storehouse of data and folders, including USB sticks or external hard information you provide to it in a moment by moment drives. basis. Unfortunately there are a multitude of pitfalls • Exclusive! Try&Decide® - lets you take a test and quagmires that can easily destroy all that vital and drive first to see if you want to keep or discard irreplaceable data in the blink of an eye. Consequently, the changes to your system. This is also very the second most vitally important item that belongs practical for browsing potentially dangerous on your computer is safe, competent, reliable software websites. capable of backing up and replacing everything on your computer. Number one and most popular in that • Improved! Ease of Use - Acronis True Image category is Acronis True Image Home that provides Home 2012 allows you to delay the start of a a bit for bit totally complete image of everything backup at computer startup so that it doesn’t residing on your computer. impact your system. It also restarts the backup if any task fails. If you have never suffered the loss, in whole or in part, • New! Enhanced NAS Support - Acronis of what resides on your hard drive, you are very lucky. True Image Home 2012 now supports Acronis’ Secondly, you can be certain that one day you will. award winning Nonstop Backup technology to Be prepared for that day by making regular backups a network share. A Network Attached Storage (NAS) device is also suggested as a backup • Image Encryption with AES - Protects your place when attached to the network. backup data with industry standard encryption • Set&Forget™ - lets you configure your security tools. backups just once and then the software does the remembering for you. And one-click • Enhanced! Extreme Media Versatility - Back protection gives you a single-click shortcut to up your files or system to almost any type of launch a pre-configured backup whenever you media imaginable, including DVDs, USB keys, feel like it. external hard drives, GPT drives or NAS. • Improved! Acronis Nonstop Backup - • Virtual Hard Disk support - Convert Automatically starts incremental backups to Acronis’ backup images (.tib) into virtual hard multiple destinations, including Acronis Secure disk files (.vhd) and vice versa, allowing users Zone®, allowing users to roll back their system, to mount an image as a virtual disk and explore files and folders to any point in time it. Windows 7 Ultimate users can also boot from .vhd images. • Acronis® True Image™ Online – provides 250 GB of secure Online Storage to save your • USB 3.0 standard - Gives you high-speed precious data. data transfer for all your critical safeguards, whether file backup or full PC backup. • Live Backups - allows you to keep on working with no interruption during backups. One of the most outstanding features of Acronis True Image Home is its automaticity. Using this feature, I have it set to make a backup automatically every day Other key features and technologies: at a given time every morning. I am never more than • Windows-style interface - The improved 24 hours behind a complete and full restoration of my sleek interface of this product works on complete hard drive or any of the individual files or Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7. folders thereon. I have elected to back up my drive • Acronis Startup Recovery Manager by the differential (vs. the incremental) method and - Boot and restore an entire PC system have it set to perform a differential backup daily and quickly without using an additional boot a complete full backup every two weeks. By whatever medium. method you select its easy and automatic unattended • Time Explorer - Add comments to any with Acronis True Image Home. Of course, using backup and take advantage of Time Acronis True Image Home 12, you can also elect to Explorer screenshots that show exactly use the continuous incremental backup feature which what your desktop looked like at the keeps you up-to-date all the time! moment of the backup. • File Backup - Back up individual files, In the event of a total hard drive failure or booting folders or file categories. problem, Acronis True Image Home has provided for • Privacy tools - Protect confidently you to create an emergency disk at the very outset that private information with a thorough you can use to get your hard drive booted and then system cleaning and reliable data restore its backed-up contents. I can also transfer the destruction of files, partitions, or entire contents of the drive on to a new drive in case I volumes. want to scrap the old. Acronis has spared no effort or ™ • Set & Forget Backups - Once function to get you operational in the event hard drive configured, backups can be performed problem or disaster. automatically. • Incremental and differential backups - True Image Home 2012 is available to user group Choose backup types, which both capture members at discount from Gene Barlow at www.ugr. the changes made since the last backup, com. and with Acronis data compression, both save disk space. To order Acronis True Image Home 2012 from Gene at a user group discount, go to his secure web site don’t see a group you like, you can even start a group at www.ugr.com/TrueImage.html and click on the of your own. You can use all manner of search criteria appropriate Buy Now button to start the purchase. to find photos in your photostream or elsewhere on He offers single or multiple copies of the products Flickr. in either download form or on a CD. A single copy of True Image 2012 can be purchased from him for When you log on to Flickr you are sent to a Home/ $25 as a download or just $5 more (for shipping) on a Welcome page. This page gives you a quick summary CD. This is less than half the normal list price of this of what has happened since your last log on. From this excellent product. Visa, MasterCard, and Discovery page you can monitor views of or comments others credit cards are accepted. If you prefer to mail him a have left on your own photos; or you can take a quick check for the products, you can place the order on his look at the new things from your contacts, friends, web site and indicate you will mail him a check. His family members, or groups. You can also upload special discount order code is UGTI2012. new photos to your own photostream or organize other aspects of your account. Flickr: A look inside the photostream Flickr can be a little By Larry Klees, member, Orange County PC Users’ overwhelming at first Group, CA but you will soon learn October issue, nibbles & bits your way around. Flickr www.orcopug.org honors copyrights, lklees (at) dslextreme.com doesn’t sell your information, lets you Once upon a time there were only a few photographers control access to your in an entire city. Today, thanks to advances in digital photos, and offers many photography, there are only a few people in an entire other security features. city who are not photographers. When you factor in Many people like the free accounts. Many more like the internet; millions of photos fly around the world the extra benefits of the pro account for about $25 per every second with the aid of numerous applications. year.
One of these applications that I personally like is called Flickr. Anyone with internet access can have These statements were found on actual products. God a free Flickr account. A Flickr account is based on help us... a thing called a “photostream.” Photographs and • On hairdryer instructions short videos can be uploaded to this photostream Do not use while sleeping. which can be used like a personal photo album. The • On a bag of Fritos: photos can be left in the order they are uploaded You could be a winner! No purchase necessary. or they can be organized into sets like “Christmas Details inside. 2010,” “fireworks,” “black sheep of the family,” etc. • On a bar of Dial soap: These can be viewed and, if you like, downloaded Directions: Use like regular soap. or commented on by contacts, friends, and family • Frozen dinner that says: members. Flickr allows you to place anybody in those Serving suggestion: Defrost. categories and you can allow each category different • On a hotel-provided shower cap in a box: access privileges to each individual photograph. Fits one head. • On Tesco’s Tirimisu dessert: You can join special interest groups like “Bugs” or Do not turn upside down. (Printed on the bottom of “Macro Photography” or “San Francisco,” etc. If you the box) Membership application or renewal Form
Annual membership is only $20.00. Each additional family member is $5.00.
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Mail to WINNERS - WINdows usERS PO Box 9804 Newport Beach, CA 92658-9804 WINNERS - WINdows usERS PO Box 9804 Newport Beach, CA 92658-9804 meets at The Fountain Valley Branch Library 17635 Los Alamos Fountain Valley Future Meeting Dates meetings on 2nd Saturday Feb 9 - TBD Mar 9 - TBD 10:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Membership Annual membership is $20 for indivduals: $5 for each additional family members.