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| Home Page | What is SeniorNet | Where are we | Application Form | Chairman's Report | Contact us | Workshops |
| Courses | Interest Groups | Workshop availability | Course availability | Photo gallery | Tutor Profiles | E-news |
Archive Newsletters
2010
February March April May June July August
October
November December
2009
March April May June July August September October November December
95th Issue
WELCOME.
Welcome to another Enews. Especially the new members receiving Enews for the first time. Where has the year gone? I think the older one gets the faster the time goes. It has been a busy year for Seniornet Canterbury but the interest in classes and workshops has gone very quiet since the earthquake. I hope that next year is a better year for all of us. We are still getting the odd quake. I wonder when they will eventually finish.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the DECEMBER meeting is Joe Bennett a writer and Columnist and the topic for his talk is “Travel and writing about travel”. Followed by a special afternoon tea. Should be an entertaining talk. Hope to see you there.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course
and Workshop News:
December 2010
Most classes and Workshops listed in the Newsletter have vacancies, except for Class No. 2, File Management for XP. This will be rescheduled as early as possible next year, so look in the February Newsletter. For all bookings please ring Malcolm and Ann, 385 0902,– not between December 22 and January 3 if you can possibly avoid it!
You also need to book a place in Workshops, either by ringing, as above, or sending an email to: am.shearer@clear.net.nz We’ll reply to let you know if there is a vacancy.
Suggestions for Workshops will be welcomed, and if you have a request for a particular course or workshop, please let us know!
Happy Christmas!
Common banking fraud and scams
A scam is a dishonest plan to make money by deceit. There are many scams around, and it's important that you keep an eye out for them. Trust your instincts – if it seems too good to be true, chances are it is. And remember that information shared over the internet may not be true and should be verified.
The internet has opened up many new ways for criminals to defraud innocent people – these are the most common scams we see.
Has anyone called you asking for your PIN number, or taken your card 'out the back' when you're paying for something?
Fraudulent use of your identity to gain access to your bank account or other financial services.
Inheritance, lottery and charity scams involve contact by email, phone or letter to try to get money from you.
If you receive any email from an unknown source and it looks suspicious delete it immediately and do not under any circumstance reply to it.
There is a scam coming from a site that looks like TradeMe at the present time. I have checked it out and they advise that they are trying to shut the site down. Delete it immediately and do not click on the site address... Also the banks do not ask for email addresses and passwords at all. Delete any emails from a bank immediately.
Please be aware that Microsoft has announced that free support has now been withdrawn for Office 2003. They will start to phase out tips and tricks for Office 2003 over the next few months.
TIPS SECTION
UPDATES TO THE OPERATING SYSTEM FILES ON A LAPTOP OR NOTEBOOKS
If you are doing updates to the operating system on a notebook or laptop run the computer on power only. If your computer shuts down due to low battery power before it finishes the update of the installation of all the files, the operating system will become corrupted and a major repair will be required to fix the computer. This has happened recently to a laptop at the help session.
Read Mail in a Larger Font in Windows Mail or Outlook Express
Monitor resolutions increase, but fonts don't. Somehow, it was easier and more comfortable to read emails gray on black in a Courier-like font on a 70-character-wide terminal.
Fortunately, the new possibilities of modern displays and operating systems bring with them — possibilities. While the default may not be perfect for your eyes, it's easy to change the display font in Windows Mail or Outlook Express to something bigger, thus better.
To read a message in a larger font in Windows Mail or Outlook Express:
An Even Faster Way to Larger Fonts
As a swift alternative, move the mouse cursor over an open message or the preview pane, hold down the Ctrl key and scroll down with the mouse wheel. To decrease the font size, scroll up.
With a little more tweaking, you can also print your emails in a larger font in Windows Mail and Outlook Express.
Why Outlook Express Prints Using Tiny Fonts
Unfortunately, printing the message that shows big and legibly on screen may lead to an unpleasant surprise: when printing, you seem to be stuck with Windows Live Mail, Windows Mail or Outlook Express' tiny fonts, no matter how much or little you increase the display font size.
Fortunately, this is only partially true. Because Windows Live Mail, Windows Mail and Outlook Express hand the email to Internet Explorer for printing, you can configure the printing's result by changing the font size used by Internet Explorer, both for display and for printing.
Print a Message in a Larger Font in Windows Live Mail, Windows Mail or Outlook Express
To use a reasonably legible and large font for printing a message in Windows Live Mail, Windows Mail or Outlook Express:
Of course, you can return the font size in Internet Explorer to its previous setting once the printing is done to your satisfaction.
How to Change the Font Size in Outlook Express
By default, Outlook Express sets the default font size for all email and newsgroup message to a 9 point font. For some, this font is too small to be read comfortably and others may want to have a smaller default font. Follow the steps below to change the font size in Outlook Express to a font that better suits your needs.
1. Open Outlook Express onto your desktop so you can make the changes to increase the font size.
3. Click on the "Compose" tab to view the font settings for Outlook Express.
4. Use your mouse to choose the "Font Settings" button, right next to "Mail:" and under "Compose Font."
5. Choose the font size that you wish to change to from the drop-down menu.
6. Click the "OK" button to close the "Options" dialog box and change the font size to your Outlook Express emails and newsgroup messages.
1. From your Start menu, go to Control Panel –> System and Security –> Action Center.
2. In the left side panel of Action Center, click the option Change Action Center settings.
3. In the following screen, you will find two sections: Security messages and Maintenance messages. Uncheck all those messages which you don’t want to get notified for.
Right click on "Computer", either on your desktop or in the Start menu
, and clicking on the Properties menu item that appears:
In the resulting window, near the bottom, will be a display of the current computer name, as well as a Change Settings link. Click that:
That'll take you to the System Properties dialog, where the name is once again displayed, along with a Change... button. Click that:
That, then, will finally take you to the "Computer Name/Domain Changes" dialog:
There you can type in your new computer name.
Click OK, and you'll need to restart your computer for the changes to take effect.
http://www.20thingsilearned.com/
20 things about the Internet.
http://www.microsoft.com/nz/business/cloud/theCloud.html
All about Cloud Computing.
http://quake3.crowe.co.nz/default.aspx
to visit the quake site for data..
JOKES SECTION
Illegal Immigrants Poem
I cross ocean, poor and broke.
Take bus, see employment folk.
Nice man treat me good in there.
Say I need to see welfare.
Welfare say, 'You come no more, we send cash right to your door.'
Welfare cheques - they make you wealthy! NHS - it keep you healthy!
By and by, I get plenty money.
Thanks to you, you British dummy!
Write to friends in motherland.
Tell them 'come fast as you can.' They come in turbans and Ford trucks and buy big house with welfare bucks!
They come here, we live together.
More welfare cheques, it gets better!
Fourteen families, they moving in, but neighbour's patience wearing thin.
Finally, British guy moves away.
Now I buy his house, then I say, 'Find more immigrants for house to rent.' And in the yard I put a tent. Everything is very good, and soon we own the neighbourhood.
We have hobby, it's called breeding. Welfare pay for baby feeding.
Kids need dentist? Wives need pills? We get free! We got no bills!
British crazy! They work all year, to keep the welfare running here.
We think UK darn good place.
Too darn good for British race!
If they no like us, they can scram. Got lots of room in Afghanistan !
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Recipe.
Rum BallsRecipe submitted by Boris on July 21st, 2006 These delicious rum balls are velvet smooth. Also they make a great gift and the no baking is a huge bonus!
Prep time:
15 minutes
Ingredients:
Directions: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |
CONCLUSION.
On behalf of the Committee of SeniorNet I wish you all a merry Christmas and a prosperous new year. It can only get better.
Remember if you have a computer problem over the holidays the help session on a Tuesday between 12 and 2 will be open except for the 27 December and will start again on the 11 January 2011. Come along and see the tutors present. They will be happy to see you. Make their day.
Til next year
Happy and safe computing.
Lester Reilly
Lester Reilly
Membership Officer
Member of the Technical Committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
94th. Issue
WELCOME.
Hi and welcome to another issue of Enews especially those members who are receiving the newsletter for the first time. If you do not wish to receive further copies please email me and your name will be removed for the mailing listing.
It is good to see the weather really improve now that show weekend is past. I hope that we can look forward to a good spring and summer ahead.
The classes at SeniorNet Canterbury are only running at half full and a number of classes have been cancelled due to lack of applications. We are due to start a class for the INTRO Course at Diamond harbour on Monday so welcome the new members from there. We are the only SeniorNet that we know of that run classes away from the main computer rooms.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the monthly meeting is Jenny Setchell an assistant to Organist, Martin Setchell and the topic of her talk is “Carbuncles, Cameras, Computers and the Continent-Life on the road with a touring concert Organist. Looks like it will be an amusing presentation. This meeting is to be held on Thursday 18 November starting at 2pm in the main hall at the Shirley Community Centre. Hope to see you there.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
November 2010
Greetings to all SeniorNet Members.
In December our classes for 2011 will be advertised - so this really is the last chance for this year!
COURSES
(Dates and Times are also in the November Newsletter, pages 4 and 5, and on the Website) Please note: Other advertised classes that don’t appear in this list have not been cancelled, they are full.
Vacancies:
Introductory (Windows 7) 108 Mon 22 Nov to 13 Dec, 12 noon
Intro Email (Outlook Express and Windows Mail): 113 Tues 7 Dec and 14 Dec, 2.15
Word 2003: 112 Fri 26 Nov to 17 Dec, 12 noon
File Management (Vista) : 105 Mon 15 Nov to 6 Dec, 9.45
File Management (Windows 7): 106 Tues 16 Nov to 7 Dec, 9.45 (You’ll need to book this weekend if you want to do File Management this year!)
WORKSHOPS: Please note that a phone booking is essential
Vacancies remain in these Workshops: (See also Newsletter or Website for details)`
CD Writer Mon 15 Nov 12 noon
Making a Christmas Card Tues 30 Nov 2.15 (This is a new listing – the one advertised on 17 Nov. filled very quickly)
Skype Fri 19 Nov 9.45
Using a Laptop with Windows XP Wed 8 Dec 12 noon
Printing Photos Wed 8 Dec 2.15
Installing / uninstalling Programs Mon 13 Dec 9.45
Transferring Music from Vinyl or Tape to CD Tues 14 Dec 9.45
Getting Started with Windows 7 Wed 15 Dec 12 noon
(This workshop is intended for members who have changed
their operating system , not for beginning computer users.)
Using a Laptop with Vista or Windows 7 Wed 15 Dec 2.15
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place,
385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm.
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
Apparently Some Of The Information Given In The Last Enews From Doug Copp Is Not Correct. It depends on the type of environment that you are in at the time of the earthquake.
http://resources.ccc.govt.nz/files/EarthquakeSafetyFactSheet-civildefence.pdf
This is the advice from nz earthquake Civil defence.
When the shaking starts, the best advice is still to Drop, Cover and Hold.
The advice from civil defence and The NZ Society for Earthquake Engineering comes in response to a widely circulated email by a self-professed rescue expert. Information in the email contradicts current advice on what to do in an earthquake.
Although the email source has been discredited in the US, where it originated, the emails have been virulent enough to create some public concern both in the US and in New Zealand.
Standard advice in New Zealand for what to do in an earthquake is to drop, take cover under a sturdy piece of furniture, and hold on, or shelter against an interior wall away from windows, bookcases etc. That advice still holds true and
has not changed says John Norton, the Director of Civil Defence Emergency Management. Mark Stirling, President of the NZ Society for Earthquake
Engineering and a scientist with Geological and Nuclear Sciences says that each year about 70 damaging earthquakes occur throughout the world.
New Zealand experiences hundreds of earthquakes every year but most of these are either very deep in the earth’s crust or centered well offshore, and cause little damage or injury. But over 100 quakes a year are big enough to be felt, and a severe one can occur at any time.
“The 1931 magnitude 7.8 Hawke’s Bay earthquake caused significant damage and resulted in the introduction of the first New Zealand earthquake resistant
Design standards.” In New Zealand we are fortunate to have sound building codes and earthquake resilient structures and can have some level of confidence in our buildings.
TIPS SECTION
Tips on how to create a strong password
Choosing a strong password is of great importance to
everyone. However, it is not always easy to know what
makes a strong and secure password which would leave
hackers empty handed and reduce the potential of being a
victim of other online threats.
Here are some simple tips on how to choose your
password.
A safe and secure password must follow the following
criteria:
Also, these are the elements that you should definitely avoid when creating your password:
Finally, it's very important to use a different password for each website you register with, the reason being that should you forget your password, you will no longer have access to your email account, chat or other services which you probably make use of on a daily basis.
Microsoft Word 2007 creates files in the .docx format by default. So, unless you save files in compatibility mode, you will not be able to open those files in previous versions of MS-Word. Microsoft Word 2003 will simply not recognize .docx files, and will throw up an error message. However, Microsoft has provided an answer for this dilemma, in the form of a “Compatibility Pack”.
The Compatibility Pack for MS-Word lets you open the .docx files without using MS-Office 2007. You can open not only .docx files, but also .xlsx (MS-Excel 2007) and .pptx (MS-PowerPoint 2007) files in older versions of Microsoft Office™, by installing the pack, which is available for download, completely free of cost, through MS-Office Online service.
Good
question that led us to this good Windows tip. Windows
gives you the power to make your cursor easier to see by
making it wider - much wider if you like. Right now, if
you're using the default Windows settings, your cursor
is one pixel wide. You can make it much easier to see by
making it wider. You can make 2, 3, 4, 5 or more pixels
wide. For most people 3 or 4 pixels should be plenty
wide enough.
Here are the instructions for making your cursor wider
and therefore easier to see. We've provided instructions
for Windows XP, as well as Windows Vista and Windows 7.
If you're using Windows XP follow these
instructions:
1. Click Start and click "Control Panel" Be sure you are
in Classic View (all Control Panel icons are showing).
If not, under Control Panel in the left pane, select
Switch to Classic View.
2. Select Accessibility Options. Select the Display tab.
3. On the Display tab in the Cursor Options area:
4. Adjust the Width option by moving the slider to the
right to make it wider.
5. Click OK to save your changes and close the dialog
box.
If you're using Windows Vista or Windows 7 follow
these instructions
1. Click Start, then Control Panel
2. Click Ease of Access Center, and then choose Optimize
Visual Display
3. Under "Make things on the screen easier to see" find
"Set the thickness of the blinking cursor" Use the arrow
next to the adjustment selector to choose the width of
your cursor. You can choose from 1 to 20 pixels. I think
you'll find that 4 or 5 pixels is plenty wide enough.
4. Click "Apply" and then "OK" to save your selection.
5. Close the Control Panel
I HAVE BEEN ASKED A QUESTION FROM ONE OF OUR MEMBERS
How often to update the program “Advanced System care “.
“Advanced system care” is a free program that cleans up some redundant files and registry values on your computer. We run the program on all the computers at SeniorNet. The program can be downloaded from this site if you do not have it installed.
http://download.cnet.com/Advanced-SystemCare-Free/3000-2086_4-10407614.html
If you are running the program you should install any updates as it runs a data base that is updated periodically. The program should do a scan of your computer say once a month and you should delete any redundant files the program finds.
This advice applies to any program that you have installed on your computer.
If you are only on a dialup connection to the internet you may have to be more selective in installing any updates. Your anti-virus program should be updated each day you go on the internet.
http://www.predictweather.com/
http://www.predictweather.com/ArticleShow.aspx?ID=306&type=home
http://www.erichkohl.homedns.org/~erichkohl/SoftwarePagehtml
Free basic games.
Videos and still photos from the past.
http://www.earthquakecountry.info/dropcoverholdon/Petal_on_Copp.pdf
|
This is an excellent video of Bruxelles Thanks Ken. |
Please send me your favourite web sites so other may also enjoy them.
JOKES SECTION
THE PERFECT MAN
A man walked out to the
street and caught a taxi just going by. He got into the
taxi, and the cabbie said, "Perfect timing. You're just
like "Brian!
Passenger: "Who?"
Cabbie: "Brian Sullivan. He's a guy who did everything
right all the time. Like my coming along when you needed
a cab, things happen like that to Brian Sullivan, every
single time."
Passenger: "There are always a few clouds over
everybody."
Cabbie: "Not Brian Sullivan. He was a terrific athlete.
He could have won the Grand Slam at tennis. He could
golf with the pros. He sang like an opera baritone and
danced like a Broadway star and you should have heard
him play the piano. He was an amazing guy."
Passenger: "Sounds like he was something really
special."
Cabbie: "There's more. He had a memory like a computer.
He remembered everybody's birthday. He knew all about
wine, which foods to order and which fork to eat them
with. He could fix anything. Not like me. I change a
fuse, and the whole street blacks out. But Brian
Sullivan, he could do everything right."
Passenger: "Wow. Some guy then."
Cabbie: "He always knew the quickest way to go in
traffic and avoid traffic jams. Not like me, I always
seem to get stuck in them. But Brian, he never made a
mistake, and he really knew how to treat a woman and
make her feel good. He would never answer her back even
if she was in the wrong; and his clothing was always
immaculate, shoes highly polished too. He was the
perfect man! He never made a mistake. No one could ever
measure up to Brian Sullivan."
Passenger: "An amazing fellow. How did you meet him?"
Cabbie: "Well, I never actually met Brian. He died. I'm
married to his widow."
RECIPE SECTION
SIMPLE FRUIT CAKE
1Kg Mixed Fruit (can be 500g, and only Sultanas if you wish)
2 cups orange or pineapple juice (or a mixture of both)
2 cups self-raising flour
Put fruit mix and juice in bowl, stir and leave overnight.
Next Day: Add the flour and mix well.
Add 1tsp each of mixed spice, rum and brandy essence to the mixture before cooking
Bake 180c for 1 hour or until cooked.
THIS CAKE IS SO MOIST AND YUMMY. ENJOY! ENJOY!
CONCLUSION.
SeniorNet Canterbury will close on the 17th December and commence classes again on 31st January 2011. The help session will still run through the holidays except for the 28th December and the 4th January. If you have a problem you will be able to come to the help session as normal. We look forward to seeing and helping members. Please be patient if a number of members are present.
Happy and safe computing till next month.
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the Technical Committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
93 issue
WELCOME.
Welcome to another Enews. No Enews last month as I was in the UK on holiday visiting my wife’s relations. We had a great time and saw a lot of the country side
I am not sorry we missed the large earthquake but have experienced some of the more recent quakes. Some members were not so lucky and have had their lives turned up-side-down. I hope that those persons lives are now returning to more or less as normal as they can be. Are thoughts are with you.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the monthly meeting to be held on Thursday 21st October starting at 2 pm in the main hall is Heather Anderson, the community relations Representative for the Inland Revenue Department and the topic for her talk is “Inland revenue – social policies and online services”. Should be an interesting talk. Hope to see you there.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
October 2010
Greetings to all SeniorNet Members.
We all naturally went to ground after the earthquake, so there are lots of vacant places in the currently advertised Classes and Workshops. Don’t forget, you can book even at the last minute into classes that have vacancies.
There are very few empty slots in the timetable, right up to the end of the year, so not many more classes can be offered this year.
COURSES
(Dates and Times are also in the October Newsletter, pages 4 and 5, and on the Website)
Vacancies:
Introductory: 103 Wed 10 Nov to 1 Dec, 12 noon
Intro Email (Windows Live Mail) :102 Wed 3 Nov and 10 Nov, 9.45
Intro Email (Outlook Express and Windows Mail): 101 Fri 29 Oct. and 5 Nov, 12 noon.
Word 2003: 107 Fri 19 Nov to 10 Dec 2.15
File Management (Vista): 105 Mon 15 Nov to 6 Dec, 9.45
File Management (Windows 7): 106 Tues 16 Nov to 7 Dec 9.45 Picasa 3: 95 Mon, 18 Oct. to 15 Nov., excl. Labour Day
Photoshop Elements 104 Wed 10 Nov to 1 Dec, 2.15
Computer Maintenance 100 Mon, 18 Oct. and 1 Nov., excl. Labour Day (2 weeks)
WORKSHOPS: Please note that a phone booking is essential
Vacancies remain in these Workshops: (See also Newsletter or Website for details) Please check dates and times: Some of these have had to be rescheduled.
` Using Your Laptop Efficiently: XP Wed 20 Oct 9.45
Making a Christmas Card Wed 20 Oct 2.15
Installing and Uninstalling Programs Wed 27 Oct 9.45
Getting started with Windows 7 Wed 27 Oct 12 noon
Photos: Removing Objects Tues 2 Nov 9.45
Buying and Selling on TradeMe Wed 3 Nov 12 noon
PhotoStory 3 Wed 3 Nov 2.15
Using a Digital Camera Mon 8 Nov 9.45
Making an Album or Collage Tues 9 Nov 9.45
CD Writer Mon 15 Nov 12 noon
Making a Christmas Card Wed 17 Nov 9.45
Skype Fri 19 Nov 9.45
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place,
385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm.
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
Surviving an earthquake.
1) Everyone who simply "ducks and covers" WHEN BUILDINGS COLLAPSE will be crushed to death - every time, without exception. People who get under objects, like desks or cars, are always crushed.
2) Cats, dogs and babies naturally curl up in the foetal position. You should, too, in an earthquake. It is a natural safety/survival instinct. You can survive in a smaller void. Get next to an object, next to a sofa, next to a large bulky object that will compress slightly but leave a void next to it.
3) Wooden buildings are the safest type of construction to be in during an earthquake. The reason is simple: the wood is flexible and moves with the force of the earthquake. If the wooden building does collapse, large survival voids are created. Also, the wooden building has less concentrated, crushing weight. Brick buildings will break into individual bricks. Bricks will cause many injuries but less squashed bodies than concrete slabs.
4) If you are in bed during the night and an earthquake occurs, simply roll off the bed. A safe void will exist around the bed. Hotels can achieve a much greater survival rate in earthquakes, simply by posting a sign on the back of the door of every room, telling occupants to lie down on the floor, next to the bottom of the bed during an earthquake.
5) If an earthquake happens while you are watching television and you cannot easily escape by getting out the door or window, then lie down and curl up in the foetal position next to a sofa, or large chair.
6) Everybody who gets under a doorway when buildings collapse is killed. Why? If you stand under a doorway and the doorjamb falls forward or backward you will be crushed by the ceiling above. If the door jam falls sideways you will be cut in half by the doorway. In either case, you will be killed.
7) Never go to the stairs. The stairs have a different "movement of frequency," (they swing separately from the main part of the building). The stairs and remainder of the building continuously bump into each other until structural failure of the stairs takes place. The people who get on stairs before they fail are chopped up by the stair treads. They are horribly mutilated. Even if the building doesn't collapse, stay away from the stairs. The stairs are a likely part of the building to be damaged. Even if the stairs are not collapsed by the earthquake, they may collapse later when overloaded by screaming, fleeing people. Maintenance should always check stairs for safety, even when the rest of the building is not damaged.
8) Get near the outer walls of buildings or outside of them. If possible it is much better to be near the outside of the building rather than the interior. The farther inside you are from the outside perimeter of the building the greater the probability that your escape route will be blocked.
9) People inside their vehicles are crushed when the road above falls in an earthquake and crushes their vehicles; which is exactly what happened with the slabs between the decks of the Nimitz Freeway. The victims of the San Francisco earthquake all stayed inside of their vehicles. They were all killed. They could have easily survived by getting out and sitting or lying next to their vehicles, says the author. Everyone killed would have survived if they had been able to get out of their cars and sit or lie next to them. All the crushed cars had voids 3 feet high next to them, except for the cars that had columns fall directly across them.
Last but not least:
10) I discovered, while crawling inside of collapsed newspaper offices and other offices with a lot of paper, that paper does not compact. Large voids are found surrounding stacks of paper.
This article comes from Doug Copp of
ARTI (American Rescue Team International), the world's
no.1 rescue team who invented the "Triangle of Life"
methodology for surviving earthquakes. The complete
article can
be found at:
http://www.amerrescue.org/arti_survivalarticle.htm
TIPS SECTION
Most common characters can be used in naming files. However, the following characters are reserved and cannot be used in a file name: < >: " / \ |? * Also, neither a space nor a period can be used at the end of a name. Further, files cannot have the following reserved device names: CON, PRN, AUX, NUL, COM1, COM2, COM3, COM4, COM5, COM6, COM7, COM8, COM9, LPT1, LPT2, LPT3, LPT4, LPT5, LPT6, LPT7, LPT8, and LPT9.
Note that the case does not matter in Windows.
A scam is a dishonest plan to make money by deceit. There are many scams around, and it's important that you keep an eye out for them. Trust your instincts – if it seems too good to be true, chances are it is. And remember that information shared over the internet may not be true and should be verified.
The internet has opened up many new ways for criminals to defraud innocent people – these are the most common scams we see.
Has anyone called you asking for your PIN number, or taken your card 'out the back' when you're paying for something?
Fraudulent use of your identity to gain access to your bank account or other financial services.
Inheritance, lottery and charity scams involve contact by email, phone or letter to try to get money from you.
If you receive any email from an unknown source and it looks suspicious delete it immediately and do not under any circumstance reply to it.
There is a scam coming from a site that looks like TradeMe at the present time. I have checked it out and they advise that they are trying to shut the site down. Delete it immediately and do not click on the site address... Also the banks do not ask for email addresses and passwords at all. Delete any from a bank immediately.
When you open Explorer in Windows 7 you’ll see a list of Favorites in the Navigation Pane. Microsoft has already put some there, but this will tell you how to remove them and add your own favorite folders including Search Connectors.
Remove Favorites
By default Microsoft has included some favorite locations for you that you may not want. The default locations are Desktop, Downloads, Recent Places, and Recorded TV if you’ve set up Live TV in Windows Media Center.
To delete the locations from Favorites, simply right-click on the location and select Remove from the context menu.
Add Favorites
Adding you favorite locations that you visit often is easy. While you’re in the folder you want to add, right-click on Favorites and select Add current location to Favorites.
You can also drag a folder over to Favorites to link it there as well.
If you want to get the default locations back just right-click Favorites and select Restore favorite links. It won’t delete the locations you added, but will just restore the originals.
No More "100_1202.jpg"
You don't have to live with the meaningless numeric
filenames your digital camera assigns to the pictures it
stores, and you don't have to rename each one by hand in My
Pictures. Instead, you can rename a whole photo shoot with a
few strokes. In Windows Explorer, highlight the range of
photos you want to rename, right-click, and choose Rename
from the pop-up menu. Type in a new filename (such as
"Holidays 2006"), and XP will apply that name to all the
photos you've selected, adding a parenthetical number after
each—"(1)," "(2)," and so on—to distinguish among them.
http://www.techsupportalert.com/
Tutorials for lots of programs.
JOKES SECTION
An Australian Love Poem
Of course I love ya darling
You're a bloody top notch bird
And when I say you're gorgeous
I mean every single word
So ya bum is on the big side
I don't mind a bit of flab
It means that when I'm ready
There's somethin there to grab
So your belly isn't flat no more
I tell ya, I don't care
So long as when I cuddle ya
I can get my arms round
there
No sheila who is your age
Has nice round perky breasts
They just gave in to gravity
But I know ya did ya best
I'm tellin ya the truth now
I never tell ya lies
I think its very sexy
That you've got dimples on ya thighs
I swear on me nanna's grave now
The moment that we met
I thought u was as good as
I Was ever gonna get
No matter wot u look like
I'll always love ya dear
Now shut up while the
footy's on
And fetch another beer!
RECIPE SECTION
SURPRISE STEAKS,
1/2 cup soft breadcrumbs
2 tbsp melted butter
1/2 cup chopped mushrooms
1 spring onion finely chopped
1 tbsp chopped parsley
1 egg
375g lean mince
Salt and pepper
1 tbsp milk
4 bacon rashers
4 slices tomato
4 slices cheese
Mix first six Ingredients together.
Mix mince salt and pepper and milk.
Add one third of the breadcrumbs mixture into the mince. Form into four equal sized patties. Make a hollow in each patty and fill with rest of crumb mixture. Mould meat around to enclose stuffing then flatten patties a, little. WM rasher of trimmed bacon around each patty secure with toothpick.
Bake at 180 C for 20‑25 minutes, top with tomato and cheese and Cook further 10‑15 minutes. Remove toothpick. Serve with vegetables.
CONCLUSION.
Have you been to a class or workshop lately? Most of the classes and workshops are only half full and could have more members attending. A number of classes have been cancelled due to no members attending. I guess that other things are on members minds at the present time. All the classes until the end of the year are now advertised so be in quick if you wish to learn something new this year.
The help sessions have been busy lately so we ask that when you attend on a Tuesday to have patience and the tutors present will get to you as soon as they can.
If you do not wish to receive further copies of this newsletter please send me an email and I will remove you from my listing. If you have a question that you would like answered please send me an email and I will find an answer and put it in the next newsletter.
Till next month
Happy and safe computing.
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
Disclaimer
Some of our Club members who have specialized computer knowledge voluntarily give help to those with computer problems and also give advice about purchasing computers, etc.
It is essential that members of SeniorNet are aware that such help and advice imposes no responsibility or liability either on those members who provide such help and assistance or on SeniorNet Canterbury Inc
92 Issue
WELCOME.
Welcome to another Enews especially those who are receiving this newsletter for the very first time. It is an electronic newsletter that is issued the Sunday before each monthly meeting and gives you the up do date news on the speaker for the forthcoming monthly meeting and the latest in classes and workshops. If you know of members who are not receiving this newsletter and who would like to receive copies please send an email to the editor and get them on the mailing listing. If you would like to see something in the newsletter please email Lester and he will include it. If you have a question please also email Lester and an answer will be in the next newsletter.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the monthly meeting Mr Grant Sidaway who is the Executive officer for the NZ federation of SeniorNets Societies and the topic of his talk is “You don’t know what you don’t know.” Should be interesting to hear this entertaining speaker. Hope to see you there.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
August 2010
Greetings to all SeniorNet Members.
For us to book you into the class that will suit you, we need to know which system you are using, and sometimes we also need to ask about which programs are installed on your computer.
Please don’t be alarmed by the need to specify these things! It can usually be sorted out over the phone if necessary. However, it will save us some time if you have looked it up yourself before ringing to book a course.
COURSES
(Dates and Times are in the August Newsletter, pages 4 and 5, and on the Website)
The classes marked * below don’t come up very often – so now is your chance! Both these classes require you to have done File Management.
Vacancies:
Introductory: 83
Introductory for Windows 7: 84
Intro Email (Windows Live Mail) :89
Intro Email (Outlook Express and Windows Mail): 88
Using Word 2003: 81
Using Word 2007: 79
File Management (XP): 80
File Management (Vista): 82
File Management (Windows 7): 86
Irfanview: 74
*Desktop Publishing: 85
*Using the Internet: 87
WORKSHOPS: Please note that a phone booking is essential
Vacancies remain in these Workshops: (See Newsletter or Website for details)
Printing Photos
Buying and Selling on TradeMe
Using Skype
Installing and Uninstalling Programs
Using Your Laptop Efficiently with Vista or Windows 7
Photos: Removing Objects or Changing Backgrounds
Music: Transferring Music from Vinyl or Tape to CD
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place,
385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm.
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
Evening classes: Let us know if you are willing to attend an evening class. We are currently running Introductory evening classes for new members.
FEDERATION NEWS
SeniorNet HP Purchase Programme
At last, we have been able to secure a nationwide hardware discount purchase programme exclusive to all members of SeniorNet Federation Learning Centres.
The attached flyer lists the products available through this initial programme including the popular HP Mini (Netbook) which I have been demonstrating in my presentations when visiting Learning Centres this year.
You will see the prices, which include GST and delivery to your home, are considerably below the Recommended Retail Price (RRP). As is the case with retailing there is no guarantee some stores, may, from time to time, have special prices to match or better these. But be careful to match like with like with these models.
We are confident the prices we have been able to negotiate are extremely competitive and the products selected will provide SeniorNet members excellent results for their computing needs.
The computers come preloaded with a Microsoft Windows 7 operating system.
The two notebook computers and the desktop computer have a Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit operating system. For many this is a departure from the more conventional 32 bit operating system. However do not be put off by this as a 64 bit system has many advantages over a 32 bit system, the greatest of which is higher speed of processing. In fact 64 bit operating systems are now becoming more the norm for many computers. Microsoft Windows 7 starter is widely accepted as the best operating system for Netbooks, hence this has been chosen for the HP Mini computer listed.
This SeniorNet Purchase Programme will only proceed if we receive at least 100 orders by 31 August when this programme will expire. If it is successful, then we are confident that we will be able to establish a permanent SeniorNet Purchase Programme from HP, enabling SeniorNet members to continue to purchase HP computer hardware at a substantial discount to RRP.
We have made the process as simple as possible for SeniorNet members to place an order.
Simply go to this site http://www.ph.co.nz/SeniorNet_Purchase_Programme, select the product(s) you wish to order and complete the form. You will then receive an email with the purchase and payment details within 24 hours of placing your order. Please note: due to the need for us to supply a bulk order, delivery of the product(s) you select could take up to two weeks.
This purchase
programme has been made possible through the generosity of:
Shane Boyle, SeniorNet president and member from the Taieri Learning Centre, is the IT Manager at Polson Higgs. Please note that the money paid to Polson Higgs will be held in a Trust account until the programme is completed. We are grateful to the partners of Polson Higgs who have kindly agreed to manage this programme on our behalf.
NEWS FROM TELSTRACLEAR
Sign up to a TelstraClear home phone line and broadband package for 24 months and for a limited time, get this incredible mobile offer going FREE to good homes.
. FREE 3G Nokia 2730 mobile phone
. FREE Access for 2 years
. 500 FREE texts a month for 2 years
. 29c per min calling rate to any network
. Keep your number
Go to www.nowsgood.co.nz or RING 0508 011 737
Don’t forget to quote SeniorNet
Terms and conditions: Offer ends 31 October or while stocks last. Rates exclude calls to special numbers. 24 month term and early termination charges apply to all services. One handset per residential account. Offer applies to new residential customers and some existing customers. TelstraClear’s Standard Residential and Residential mobile terms apply.
TIPS SECTION
Top 10 keyboard shortcuts you should know!
Are you spending too much time moving your cursor, pointing and clicking just to accomplish simple tasks on your PC? Did you know that you can use your keyboard to work more efficiently?
Below is a list of 10 keyboard shortcuts that will help you increase your productivity by eliminating the need to reach for the mouse.
CTRL + C will copy text after it has been highlighted.
CTRL + V will paste text that you have copied.
CTRL + Z will undo any change that you have done.
CTRL + ESC will bring up the Start Menu.
SHIFT + F3 will turn all capitalized text into lowercase.
SHIFT + DELETE will delete an item immediately without placing it in the Recycle Bin.
ALT + TAB will bring up a Window with a list of icons representing programs which are currently running on your computer... While holding the ALT key, press and depress the TAB button to cycle between each icon task.
ALT + ESC will switch to the next task running on your computer. Hold down the ALT before pressing and depressing the ESC key to cycle to the next task.
CTRL + ALT + DELETE will bring up Task Manager and allow you to end a process (terminate a program) if it has crashed or has stopped responding. Select the process which has stopped responding, and then press "END PROCESS''.
SHIFT + INSERT will paste any text that is in your clipboard. Your cursor must also be placed in an area that will accept keyboard input for this to work.
CTRL + P will bring up the print window.
Another Way To
Close Your Windows
Windows
All Versions
If you have multiple program Windows open you can minimize them
all at once by pressing the Windows key plus the "M" key. This
is great if you're at work and your boss is skulking around and
you've got Pinball open, a chat window open, and a Youtube video
playing - and your boss is approaching with that - "I'm gonna
catch you" look. Don't fret. Press Windows key + M and all your
Windows will instantly hide in the taskbar. We just hope your
boss doesn't scrutinize the task bar too closely - he might see
the title of the YouTube video you were watching - you know:
"Watch Bill eat 100 pickles in 1 minute and thirty seconds"
If you have multiple Windows open and you want to close them all
at once (notice we said CLOSE not MINIMIZE) do this: Hold down
the SHIFT key while you click the "X" in the top-right corner of
the last window you opened. When you do this, it will close that
window and all windows you opened before it
Set removable
drives (USB Pen drives) for "Quick Removal"
Windows
Vista, Windows 7
If you have an external hard drive or other removable drive,
such as a USB flash drive, that you use on your desktop as well
as your laptop or another computer, you'll find this tip a
time-saver. The proper way to remove a removable drive is to
click the "Safely remove hardware" icon in your system tray and
wait until Windows tells you it's safe to remove the device.
This prevents data loss caused by removing a drive when Windows
is write caching the drive. (Write caching speeds up your drive
- slightly.) Sometimes when you're in a hurry you might forget
to click the "Safely remove hardware" icon and remove the drive,
which can cause data loss. So there are two reasons to use this
tip, if you often disconnect your external hard drive or other
removable drive.
How to set your removable drives up for "Quick Removal" and avoid having to go through the "Safely remove hardware" routine:
1. Click the Start
button and type Device Manager in the start menu search
2. Open Device Manager
3. Expand the list of disk drives by clicking the "+" next to
"Disk drives"
4. Find the removable drive you want to set up for Quick Removal
5. Right click it and choose "Properties"
6. Click the "Policies" tab and choose the option "Optimize for
quick removal" and click OK.
7. Close the device manager (you'll have to contract the list of
drives first by clicking the "minus" sign before you can close
device manager).
Now you can safely remove your external hard drives or USB flash drives without going through the "Safely remove hardware" routine. Saves time and prevents possible data loss if you're in a hurry and forget about using the "Safely remove hardware" feature.
Expand the "Send To"
menu so it displays many more options
Windows 7
all versions
Most of us have learned how handy the "Send to" menu is in
Windows. It's been a feature of Windows since Windows 98. It's
gotten better over the years, and it's one of our favourite
right-click features. We use it all the time to send files by
email. It's easier than attaching a file and/or messing around
dragging the file to an email. We just right-click a file,
choose "Send to" and then "Mail recipient". An email compose
window appears with the file attached. All we have to do then is
just add the recipient's address, type in a few lines of text
(or not) and send. You can also write files to CD or DVD using
the "Send to" - as well as many other things.
Windows 7 has even more great "Send to" features, including
allowing you to display an expanded "Send to" menu that includes
all the folders in your user profile along with other items not
normally included in the "Send to" dialog. You can access an
expanded "Send to" menu in Windows 7 simply by holding down the
Shift key and when you choose the "Send to" option from the
right-click menu.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CLICKLOCK FOR LAPTOPS
CLICKLOCK. Windows 7 offers an alternative for the rather clumsy (particularly on notebooks) procedure of holding down the left mouse button and moving the mouse at the same time. With a simple setting you can tell Windows to lock the button down after you hold it for a specified period of time. In this way, you can hold the mouse button a few seconds, then move it to a new location, and click again. This would be the same as dragging and dropping but without having to hold the mouse button while you do it. To set this feature, click Start, type "mouse" (without the quotes) and press Enter. The Mouse Properties window opens and near the bottom, click Turn On ClickLock box and the Settings button. Set how long you would like to hold the mouse button before ClickLock executes, then click OK.
VISTA SNIPPING TOOL
VISTA SNIPPING TOOL. One innovative tool introduced by Windows Vista is the Snipping Tool, allowing you to capture a screen shot of any object on your screen. To use it, go to Start | All Programs | Accessories | Snipping Tool (or you can pin it to your start menu for easier future access.) Clicking the down arrow on the New button gives several options: Free Form Snip allows you to draw a line to define what you want to snip; Rectangular Snip defines a rectangular area when you draw your cursor over what you want to snip; Window Snip selects an active window to snip; and, Full-Screen Snip captures the entire screen. You can mark up the image by choosing the appropriate tool from the mark-up window, either the pen, highlighter, or eraser. When all is done, you can save the captured image by clicking on the SaveNip button (it looks like a computer disk) and designate the file name and location in the Save As dialog box.
To turn off the touch pad on a laptop when typing in a word document.
Annoyed when you are typing a document and accidentally the palm of your hand brushes the touchpad, changing the position of the cursor in your document or accidentally clicking on an option. TouchFreeze is simple utility for Windows NT/2000/XP that solves this problem. May also work with vista and windows 7. It automatically disables touchpad while you are typing text. Enter touchfreeze into Google and download the program.
(Editor: As I do not have a laptop I have not used this program. Please advise me if it works thanks.)
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-vista/Optimize-Windows-Vista-for-better-performance
JOKES SECTION
|
|
RECIPE SECTION
Coffee streusel slice
Base:
125g butter
1/4 cup sugar
1 cup flour
1/4 cup self raising flour,
Middle.
1 can condensed milk.
30g butter
2 tbs golden syrup
3 tsp instant coffee
1/3 cup chopped walnuts (optional)
Top.
1 cup flour
2 tsp cinnamon
1/3 cup brown sugar
125g butter
Combine base ingredients, melting butter, and cook in 25x30cin slice tin or equivalent. Middle: combine every thing in pan over gentle heat for about five minutes until thick and beginning to catch on pan. Add walnuts. Pour into cooked base, spread top over and cook a further 15 minutes,
Top: mix to a stuff dough, refrigerate for 30 minutes then spread over the base and filling, let stand for 12 minutes before cutting into little pieces.
CONCLUSION.
Another Enews compiled and ready for sending out. I hope the readers will find something of interest to try. If you have a tip why not send it to me so I can put it into the next newsletter and others may also enjoy it.
The next Enews will be in two months time as I will be away on holiday to the UK during September. My wife and I are visiting her relations to catch up with them and me to meet them for the first time. It should be a good and interesting trip.
Till October
Happy and safe computing.
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
91st Issue
WELCOME.
Hi and welcome for another month. Great to see the sun again. The weather has been dreadful for the last couple of weeks but the room at SeniorNet is always warm and inviting. Have you done that course or workshop yet that you said that you would do? Some of the classes are filling fast but the list below has all the latest vacancies. Ring Ann or Malcolm Shearer and make that booking now before it is too late.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the monthly meeting Jenine O’Malley the crime prevention Camera Co-Ordinator for the New Zealand Police The topic for her talk is “Christchurch City Crime Prevention cameras.” Come along and hear what she has to say about the way the police is fighting crime here in Christchurch.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
July - August 2010
Greetings to all SeniorNet Members. New Operating Systems and Programs require classes dedicated to these new needs. For us to book you into the class that will suit you, we need to know which system you are using, and which programs are installed on your computer.
The Introductory course teaches you how to identify these features on your computer. There was also an excellent section in the June Newsletter, on Page 11.
Please don’t be alarmed by the need to specify these things! It can all be sorted out over the phone if necessary. However, it will save us some time if you have looked it up yourself before ringing to book a course.
COURSES
(Dates and Times are in the July Newsletter, pages 4 and 5, and on the Website)
Vacancies:
Introductory: 70, 71
Intro Email (Windows Live Mail) : 63 (1 vacancy), 72
Intro Email (Outloook Express and Windows Mail): 75
Keyboard Skills: 77
Using Word 2003: 76
Using Word 2007: 68
File Management (XP): 62 (1 vacancy), 69
File Management (Windows 7): 73
Using PhotoShop Elements (1 vacancy) : 64
Computer Maintenance (1 vacancy): 65
Irfanview: 74
WORKSHOPS
Please note that a booking is essential
Vacancies remain in these Workshops: (See Newsletter or Website for details)
Using a Digital Camera (1 vacancy)
Using a Laptop with Vista or Windows 7
Introduction to Windows 7
Using a Scanner
All other advertised Workshops are full.
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place,
385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm.
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
Evening classes: Let us know if you are willing to attend an evening class. We are currently running Introductory evening classes for new members.
TIPS SECTION
What's the difference between a Hub, a Switch and a Router?
In a word: intelligence.
This applies to a broadband connection to the Internet or between two or more computers.
Hubs, switches, and routers are all devices that let you connect one or more computers to other computers, networked devices, or to other networks. Each has two or more connectors called ports into which you plug in the cables to make the connection. Varying degrees of magic happen inside the device, and therein lies the difference. I often see the terms misused so let's clarify what each one really means.
A hub is typically the least expensive, least intelligent, and least complicated of the three. Its job is very simple: anything that comes in one port is sent out to the others. That's it. Every computer connected to the hub "sees" everything that every other computer on the hub sees. The hub itself is blissfully ignorant of the data being transmitted. For years, simple hubs have been quick and easy ways to connect computers in small networks.
A switch does essentially what a hub does but more efficiently. By paying attention to the traffic that comes across it, it can "learn" where particular addresses are. For example, if it sees traffic from machine A coming in on port 2, it now knows that machine A is connected to that port and that traffic to machine A needs to only be sent to that port and not any of the others. The net result of using a switch over a hub is that most of the network traffic only goes where it needs to rather than to every port. On busy networks this can make the network significantly faster.
"Varying degrees of magic happen inside the device, and therein lies the difference."
A router is the smartest and most complicated of the bunch. Routers come in all shapes and sizes from the small four-port broadband routers that are very popular right now to the large industrial strength devices that drive the internet itself. A simple way to think of a router is as a computer that can be programmed to understand, possibly manipulate, and route the data it’s being asked to handle. For example, broadband routers include the ability to "hide" computers behind a type of firewall which involves slightly modifying the packets of network traffic as they traverse the device. All routers include some kind of user interface for configuring how the router will treat traffic. The really large routers include the equivalent of a full-blown programming language to describe how they should operate as well as the ability to communicate with other routers to describe or determine the best way to get network traffic from point A to point B.
A quick note on one other thing that you'll often see mentioned with these devices and that's network speed. Most devices now are capable of both 10mps (10 mega-bits, or million bits, per second) as well as 100mbs and will automatically detect the speed. If the device is labeled with only one speed then it will only be able to communicate with devices that also support that speed. 1000mbs or "gigabit" devices are starting to slowly become more common as well. Similarly many devices now also include 802.11b or 802.11g wireless transmitters that simply act like additional ports to the device.
From “ask Leo.”
Facebook Safety Tips
NZ Herald article - March 15, 2010
Facebook users have become easy prey for criminals as more and more people share personal information on the social networking site, says a computer anti-virus company.
Criminals are harvesting and selling Facebook users' information, stealing identities, sending spam and planting viruses, according to security software specialist AVG.
"People put themselves at risk every day by carelessly clicking on invitations sent by 'friends' to join groups or write on their wall," AVG marketing manager Lloyd Borrett said.
"They put all their personal information including date of birth and photos on their page. They even respond to fake Facebook requests for security details."
To help people stay safe on Facebook, AVG gave 10 tips:
1. Think about who you add: accepting a friend request provides your new mate with access to posts, photographs, messages and background information about yourself. Perhaps go through your list of friends and think about whom you really want accessing your stuff.
2. Check privacy settings: Facebook recently got a face-lift, changing default privacy settings.
It's worth going through them again -- you may be sharing more than intended.
3. Why are you on Facebook? Is it just to share photos? Keep in touch with people? Share links and updates of your activities? Ask yourself what you want to achieve with your profile. It could be better to cut down on information-sharing.
4. Be smart about your password: try not to use the same passwords for all your accounts. Think about the type of security questions you set and where you are sending your updates.
5. Be aware of where you sign in from: When signing in from a different computer, check that it doesn't store your email address and password. It's easy to accidentally choose it to "remember you".
6. Be careful what you say: once status updates and comments are posted, anyone can see, copy, and post it elsewhere. Do you really want people to know you'll be home alone tonight or away on vacation next week?
7. Watch out for phishing attacks: there have been numerous attempts to get users' login and passwords by tricking them with fake Facebook emails. Never select any email links asking you to reset your password. Always go directly to Facebook.
8. Take immediate action: If friends start receiving spam from you or status updates appear that you didn't make, your account may be compromised. Immediately change your password. If you can't log into your account, go to the Help link at the bottom of any Facebook page and click on "security" to notify Facebook.
9. Protect your mobile device: Many mobile phones have direct access to social networking sites, including Facebook. Be mindful about who has access to your cellphone and make sure you log off the sites.
10. Monitor suspicious activity: Watch out for suspicious activity on your wall, news feeds and Facebook inbox. Never click on a suspicious link. Look closely, if the link does not look authentic, don't click.
We at SeniorNet recommend that you should be very careful if you sign onto any of the social engineered type web sites and only give the minimum information and remember that anyone may see it.
What is Clickjacking?
The newest Facebook threat tricks users into “liking” a page
within Facebook, then suggests that page to your friends. The
“liked” page may contain malicious links to non-secure sites
outside of Facebook. It also damages the security of your
reputation by posting to your profile that you “liked” this
page, when in reality you never did.
Safely remove icon for USB drive is missing
One member has recently lost the icon to safely remove their USB pen drive from the notification area and wishes to replace it.
For Vista.
Right-click the notification area, and select Properties.
Under the Notification area heading on Taskbar tab, check Hide
inactive icons, then click Customize button.
Find and select Safely Remove Hardware icon and select Show
in the dropdown below the Behaviour column next to it.
Click OK and Apply.
Uncheck Hide inactive icons.
For XP
1.Right-click on My Computer
2.Select “Properties”
3.Click on the “Hardware” tab at the top
4.Click on Device Manager
5.In my case, since it’s a hard drive, I click on “Disk drives.” For other devices, you might have to hunt around.
6.Right-click on the removable drive
7.Select “Properties”
8.Click on “Policies”
9.Under the “Optimize for performance” option, there should be a link called “Safely Remove Hardware.” If you click that, you’ll bring up the good old hardware removal screen that Windows was trying so hard to hide from us.
http://www.tuxjunction.net/glennmiller.htm
Glenn Miller
http://www.funtrivia.com/quizzes/geography/new_zealand_and_pacific_islands/new_zealand.html
Quiz on New Zealand
http://www.unoriginal.co.uk/who-wants-to-be-a-millionaire.html
Who wants to be a millionaire?
http://www.dia.govt.nz/Reported_Scams
Reported SCAMS check them out.
JOKES SECTION
The computer swallowed grandpa,
yes, honestly its true!
He pressed 'control and 'enter',
and disappeared from view.
It devoured him completely,
the thought just makes me squirm.
He must have caught a virus,
or been eaten by a worm.
I've searched through the recycle bin,
and files of every kind;
I've even used the Internet,
But nothing did I find.
In desperation, I asked Jeeves,
my searches to refine.
The reply from him was negative,
not a thing was found 'online.'
So, if inside your 'Inbox,'
my Grandpa you should see,
please 'Copy, Scan' and 'Paste' him,
and send him back to me.
This is a tribute to all the Grandmas and Grandpas who have been fearless and
Learned to use the Computer .....
They are the greatest!!!
We do not stop playing because we grow old;
we grow old because we stop playing ...
NEVER Be The First To Get Old!
RECIPE SECTION
Macaroni Cheese
Ingredients
Method
1. Cook the macaroni in boiling salted water until al dente. Drain and place in a bowl.
2. Stir in the celery, spring onions, 1/2 the grated cheese, ham, parsley, Wattie’s Bacon and Cheese Potato Bake Sauce a dash of Lea & Perrins Worcestershire Sauce and milk. Season with pepper if wished.
3. Turn into an oven-proof dish and sprinkle over the remaining cheese and optional fresh breadcrumbs.
4. Bake at 190°C for 30-35 minutes until hot and golden
CONCLUSION.
I hope that you have enjoyed the read and learnt something that you did not know before. If you can learn something new each day you are doing well.
The help sessions on a Tuesday have been busy for the first hour but have slowed down to what we had a couple of months ago. If you have a problem and are using a laptop bring it along between 12 and 2 and a tutor should be able to help you. Remember that we do not know everything but hopefully we can solve your immediate problem.
If you do not wish to receive further copies of the newsletter please email me and I will remove you from the mailing listing.
If you have a question that other members may also be interested in the answer, send me an email and I will try my best to answer the question in the next newsletter.
Till Next Month
Happy and safe computing.
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
90th
Issue
WELCOME.
Welcome to you all especially the new members who are receiving this electronic newsletter for the first time. It has been a busy month for me and SeniorNet. I had a eye cataract operation so that was another experience but all is well now with every thing so bright. All the computers at SeniorNet dual boot so all students will need to watch and select the correct operating system when using the computers. A number of new workshops are also being trialled this month as well. Windows 7 and Word 2007 are giving students and tutors a few headaches along the way so a learning curve for all. In all a very busy month.
SENIORNET
MONTHLY
MEETING
The speaker for the monthly meeting is Associate professor Tim Bell Department of Computer Science University of Canterbury and the subject of his talk is “ Computing Education in New Zealand Schools” Tim is always a very interesting speaker and I am sure a lot of people will come to hear him. Hope to see you there.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
TIPS SECTION
Course and Workshop News:
June – July 2010
COURSES
(Dates and Times are in the June Newsletter, pages 4 and 5, and on the
Website)
Please Note: Advanced Email has been deferred until a later date. Using PhotoRecord to make a Collage has been cancelled.
Vacancies:
53 Intro Email (Outlook
Express & Windows Mail)
57 Using MS Word 2003
59* Using MS Word 2007
*Because
of new features in this version of MS Word, a new course will
concentrate on this program. Members with earlier versions of Word
should enrol in Using Microsoft Word 2003 classes
61 File Management
(
62 File Management
(XP)
63 Intro Email
(Windows Live Mail)
64 Using
PhotoShop Elements
65 Computer Maintenance
66 Introductory Evening Class Starting 22 June
7 pm
WORKSHOPS
Please note that a booking is essential
Vacancies remain in these Workshops: (See Newsletter or Website for details)
Using
PhotoRecord to make an Album
Introduction to Windows 7
Using a Printer
Using a Digital Camera
All other
advertised Workshops are full.
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place,
385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm.
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please
don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
Evening classes:
Let us know if you are willing to attend an evening class. We are
currently running Introductory evening
classes for new members.
Finding out which version of
Windows
you're running can help you determine which features are available on
your computer. Here's how to check.
Click the
Start
button,
type
winver
in the search box, and then press Enter. Make a note of the operating
system as you will be asked by your tutor when you attend a class.
Note
If the steps above don't work on your computer, you might be running a previous version of Windows. To check, click Start, click Run, type winver, and then press Enter.
Carol
wants her Caps Lock key and SHIFT key to beep beep again
I
was wondering if you will be able to tell me how to get the caps lock
and shift keys to make a sound when using. I had it on here before, but
somehow I have managed to lose the sounds.
One of our biggest pet peeves used to be hitting the CAPS LOCK key by
accident and forgetting it was on. While the Keyboard does have a light
to indicate the CAPS LOCK key is activated, until now there was no audio
warning. Now you can configure Windows XP to give you a BEEP when you
hit the CAPS LOCK key. It comes in real handy for us and will for you
too. Here's how to set it up, it's very easy: Go to control panel,
Accessibility Options and place a checkmark next to the "Use Toggle
Keys" option. With Toggle Keys on you'll hear a beep when your press the
CAPS LOCK, NUM LOCK or SCROLL LOCK keys.
You can turn this option on
in
As far as we know there
isn't anyway to make the SHIFT key beep - unless you want to make all
the keys beep which might be annoying.
What does "BETA" mean?
Beta when used in regard to software means test software. But that
shouldn't necessarily scare you away. Software goes through various
stages of development. Normally the first stage is "Alpha". You probably
won't see much "Alpha" stage software available unless you've signed up
to help a developer test early versions of software. If you are testing
Alpha software, you should expect it to have numerous errors and to be
somewhat unfinished. By the time software reaches Beta stage most of the
major bugs have been worked out - but you may still find some minor bugs
and Beta programs may be prone to other problems as well. But as a
general rule, Beta software is far more stable than Alpha software. So
you don't have to be brave to try a software program in Beta stage - but
don't expect it to be perfect either. Most software will have several
Beta versions before it is released as a final or "retail" version. Some
companies, like Microsoft, have additional stages called RC-1, RC-2 and
so on. RC means "Release Candidate". These are post-Beta versions that
are not quite ready for public release.
So now you
know more than you ever wanted to know about software development.
But now you know what "Beta" means.
OUTLOOK
EXPRESS SHORT CUTS.
Here's a list of handy keyboard shortcuts that will work in the main and View Message windows:
KEYSTROKE ACTION
[Ctrl]> Go to the next
message
[Ctrl]< Go to the previous message
[Ctrl]A Select all messages (also works in the Send window)
[Ctrl]D Delete the selected message
[Ctrl]F Forward the selected message
[Ctrl]G Reply to all in a newsgroup
[Ctrl]I Go to Inbox
[Ctrl]M Send and receive mail
[Ctrl]N Open or post a new message
[Ctrl]P Print the selected message
[Ctrl]R Reply to the message author
[Ctrl][Shift]R Reply to all
READ
RECEIPT
If you would like to know if the mail you're sending is actually being read by the recipient, just activate your read receipt feature. Here's how: Click on Tools, choose Options, and then click on the Receipts tab. Put a check in the box that reads;
Request a read receipt for all sent messages".
If you only require a read receipt for the odd message and not all messages use a different procedure. Write the new email message as normal but before clicking on SEND, click on TOOLS/ REQUEST READ RECEIPT and then click on SEND”. You will not notice any extra to the message but the recipient will be asked to send you a read receipt.
If the recipient chooses NOT to send a read receipt back to you there is nothing you can do about that.
NOTE: Outlook Express only supports the read receipt feature in version 5.01 and later. You can upgrade Internet Explorer to upgrade Outlook Express.
Windows Vista includes a new
feature called ReadyBoost that lets you plug in a flash memory stick or
SD card to store commonly used files for quicker access than off the
hard drive.
Turning this feature on
couldn’t be simpler. Just stick the flash drive, SD card, or whatever
flash device you want into your computer. You’ll see a dialog pop up.
Click the “Speed up my
system” link, and you’ll be taken to the ReadyBoost panel for the flash
drive.
Just select Use this device,
and set the amount of space you want to use. Windows will create what is
essentially a paging file on the disk, and will use it for faster
access.
Note that this will only
work with USB 2.0 devices or SD cards.
Service Notice windows operating systems.
The end of support dates for certain
Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Vista versions are getting closer,
and this is the time to remind customers running these versions that
there is a need to take an action.
On April 13th, 2010, Windows Vista RTM reached the end of support. If
you or someone you know is running Windows Vista with no services packs
installed (also known as Windows Vista RTM or SP0), please use Windows
Update to install the latest service pack available – Windows Vista
Service Pack 2 (note you’ll need to install Service Pack 1 first). And
on July 13th, 2010, Windows 2000 and Windows XP SP2 will also reach the
end of support.
Windows 2000 Server Extended Support also
ends on 13 July 2010, the product will no longer be publicly supported
after this date
Updating your Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 2000 PCs before the
end of mainstream support dates will ensure your PCs stay supported and
receive security updates.
To see if you have the service packs
installed go to START, right click on my computer or Computer and click
on properties.
You will see the Service Pack installed.
Come to SeniorNet and bring your pen drive and a copy of the service packs will be copied to your pen drive and you will be shown how to install them.
Important note: You will still be able to use your computer but updates will no longer be available for updating your operating system.
If you are
on a dialup connection do not try to download the service packs as
they are very large files.
Hoax emails.
From time to time we suddenly get an email
“the worst virus ever” which encourages you to alert others of this
potential damage to your computer. There are a lot of viruses out there
and you have every reason to be alert and to warn others. But some
aren't really out there at all. Virus hoaxes are more than mere
annoyances, as they may lead some users to routinely ignore all virus
warning messages, leaving them vulnerable to a genuine, destructive
virus. It is possible to check a listing of known viruses, but this
changes daily (maybe even hourly), and the best advice is to have a good
up-to-date virus protection system on your computer,
encourage ALL your friends to do the same, and delete any such messages.
And NEVER, NEVER, EVER open an attachment unless it is from someone you know and trust to have a well protected computer, and you have some idea of what the attachment contains.
Check them out by opening Internet Explorer and in a Google search window put the name of the suspect virus. Then open one of the sites that are listed. And view the comments.
http://techtalk.pcpitstop.com/2010/05/17/detecting-facebook-security-problems/
All face book users should go to this web site and read the concerns
expressed about face book.
http://ask-leo.com/how_do_i_delete_my_facebook_account.html?awt_l=J72Wh&awt_m=1bIrqYP3hJdfbL
How to delete your face book account.
http://www.turnoftheworld.com/
Interesting site from Shirley.
http://www.carjam.co.nz
Just type in your registration plate number and find out a lot of
interesting details of your car.
JOKES SECTION
A Well-Planned Retirement
From The
A Well-Planned Retirement
Outside
For 25 years, its parking fees were managed by a very pleasant
attendant.
The fees were 1 for cars ($1.40), 5
for buses (about $7).
Then, one day, after 25
solid years of never missing a
day of work, he just didn't show up;
so the Zoo Management called the City Council and asked it to send them
another parking agent...
The Council did some
research and replied that the parking lot was the Zoo's own
responsibility.
The Zoo advised the Council that the attendant was a City employee.
The City Council responded that the lot attendant had
never been on the City payroll.
Meanwhile, sitting in his
villa somewhere on the coast of Spain (or some such scenario), is a man
who'd apparently had a ticket
machine installed completely on his own;
and then had simply begun to show up every day,
commencing to collect and keep the parking fees,
estimated at about $560 per day -- for 25 years.
Assuming 7 days a week, this amounts to just
over $7 million dollars!......
And no one even knows his name.
RECIPE SECTION
Chicken &
Corn Soup
200g chicken breast (or chicken mince),
1 tsp salt,
2 egg whites,
3 cups chicken stock,
1 cup creamed corn,
1 Tb cornflour,
2 tsp soy sauce.
Wash chicken and pat dry,
place in food processor until smooth, add salt. Lightly beat egg whites
until foamy and fold into the chicken mince. Bring chicken stock to the
boil and add creamed corn. Dissolve cornflour in a little water and add
to soup, stirring until mixture thickens. Reduce heat and add the
chicken mixture, breaking it up with a whisk. Heat through for about 3
min. Season to taste and serve with sliced spring onion.
CONCLUSION.
If you do not wish to receive
further copies of this newsletter please send me an email and I will
remove your name from my mailing listing I do not wish to send it to
anyone who does not wish to receive it.
Now that winter is finally here rap up warm and only go out into the weather if you really have to. Now is a good time to really get to grips with that program on your computer or pull out your old notes and go through them again and you will be surprised what you can learn.
The help sessions on are Tuesday between 12 and 2 are really busy with problems from members. As a number of members now have laptops we are seeing more and more being brought along to this session.
Till next month
Happy and safe computing
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
lester@seniornetcanty.co.nz
| Waiver Any information included in this column or the monthly magazine and including the web site is given in good faith and is to be taken at the recipients risk and imposes no responsibility or liability of any kind either on those providing such help or advice or the newsletter editors or tutors of SeniorNet Canterbury Inc. |
89 issue
WELCOME.
Welcome to another Enews. It seems like yesterday when I sent out the last one. Let me know if you enjoy the tips and other bits within the newsletter. I do not get many emails in response. If you would like to see something different please let me know. I have to assume that no news is good news. It has been another busy month at SeniorNet Canterbury with new members joining all the time I hope that you can get something that you did not know out of the newsletter. If you no longer wish to receive Enews please let me know and I will remove you from my mailing list.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the MAY monthly meeting is Stephen Phillips the Chief Executive of Age Concern Canterbury Inc and the topic for his talk is “Age care- do we care enough” a very topically take of interest to us all. Hope to see you there next Thursday at 2 pm.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
May – June 2010
COURSES
(Dates and Times are in the May Newsletter, pages 4 and 5, and on the Website)
Please Note: Using Microsoft Excel has been deferred until a later date.
Vacancies:
44 Using Picasa 3 (one place only)
45 Using Irfanview (two places only)
47 File Management (Vista / Win 7 only)
49* Using MS Word Version 2007 (New course)
50 Advanced Email
53 Intro Email
54 File Management (XP only)
*Because of new features in this version of MS Word, a new course will concentrate on this program. Members with earlier versions of Word should enrol in the normal “Using Microsoft Word” classes. These are at present full, but new classes will be advertised soon.
WORKSHOPS
Please note that a booking is essential
Vacancies remain in these Workshops: (See Newsletter or Website for details)
Choosing a Digital Camera
Using Power Point
Using a Digital Camera
Using Skype
Printing Photos
Using PhotoRecord to make an Album
Using PhotoRecord to make a Collage
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place,
385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm.
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
Evening classes: Let us know if you are willing to attend an evening class. We are currently running an Introductory evening class for new members.
TIPS SECTION
Do you know your computer operating system?
When you attend any class or workshop at SeniorNet you will be asked what operating system your computer at home is using. At SeniorNet we have computers using Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7. To ensure that you are using a similar computer as at home it is vital that you use a computer with the same operating system. Are you one of the members who are confused when you are asked that question? If so now is a good time to check it out.
Next time your computer boots up sit and watch each screen as it goes through the process. On one of the screens it will say your operating system. Make a note and be sure of the answer when asked. It will make the life of your tutor a lot easier. It should be either XP or Vista or windows 7.
If it is not one of these you should consider upgrading your computer. Using an older computer today makes the learning to use your computer a lot more difficult.
TO CHECK THE VERSION NUMBER OF THE PROGRAMS RUNNING ON YOUR COMPUTER
These steps work for most Microsoft programs, including Microsoft Office software such as word 2003 and 2007, and Internet Explorer and Outlook Express, both components of the Windows operating system for XP and Vista.
1. Start the program.
2.
On the Help menu, click About
Program Name.
A dialog box displays program information, including the version
number. Write this name and version down so that you can advise your
tutor of the programs you have running on your home computer.
3. At SeniorNet you will be asked the version number for your WORD program. Make a note now and have the correct answer when you are asked by the tutor when you do the Using word class. Is it word 2003 or word 2007?
DEFAULT – CUSTOM – We often use the word “Default” when explaining something about a program. This means that the particular setting on your computer being discussed is how it was set when it left the factory, when you change it you “customise” it to your own personal needs. Think of it as you would a car – you customise by adding a fancy paint job, special hub caps, and other fittings.
Using web mail.
If you can not complete a full down load of all your emails from your ISP (Internet Service provider) because a large one is hanging up your computer you can use webmail to delete the large email. Note, all emails must be downloaded before the emails are deleted off your ISP. (Internet Service provider.) This can happen more often on a dialup connection. It is unlikely to happen on a broad band connection. You will need to delete the large email that is hanging up your ability to download all your emails. You may as well also delete all the emails that have been downloaded a number of times to your computer.
If you have a mailbox and you want to check your e-mails on a computer that is not at home, Webmail can make it happen. You will be able to check your emails from any computer in the world that has access to the web. It is a handy part of your hosting package. I will explain some of the basic Webmail functions such as reading and deleting mail as well as sending mail.
You should also check your web mail account on a regular basis, say once a month, for any emails that have been classed as spam by your ISP. These will be in a folder called SPAM on web mail. There could be legitimate emails in this box. You will need to move them from this folder to the inbox so that the next time you download your emails using outlook express or windows mail you will download these as well.
To Log In to web mail.
Log into webmail by going to your internet service provider (such as xtra)
https://login.yahoo.com/config/login_verify2?.partner=tnz&.intl=nz&.src=ym
for xtra customers). Look for a tab called WEBMAIL and click on this. You will be asked for a username and password to access Webmail. You do know your password, don’t you?
If you are a customer of another ISP such as paradise, clear, etc you will have to log onto the web page of your ISP. There you click on WEB MAIL. You will be required to log into web mail with your user name and password.
Your username is the part of your email address before the @ sign. Example: your email address might be smith@yourdomainname.co.nz. In this example the Webmail username would be smith.
The password is whatever the password is FOR THAT MAILBOX. You should have this written down somewhere safe or your ISP may have given this to you in a letter when you first registered your email address.
Reading Mail
Once you are logged in, you will be brought to a welcome screen where you are told how many messages are in your Inbox. Click the word "INBOX" to view your messages.
To start reading your mail, click the first message in your Inbox. If you want to delete it when you are done, click the link that says "Delete". If you want to keep this message and move onto the next one, click on the dark triangle on the right of the screen next to "Back to INBOX". Follow these steps for the rest of your messages. When you are done, click "INBOX" in the top left of the screen.
Deleting Mail
You will see after going through all your new messages that the ones you chose to delete are still there but have lines through them. To delete them outright, click "Purge Deleted". If you see a large email, delete this one and send an email to the sender advising then that it is too large for you to download. On a dialup connection it will take at least 5 minutes to download each Meg of data. So a 5 mb email will take at least 25 minutes to download.
Sending Mail
To send a new message, you need to click "Compose" from your Inbox screen. Fill in the appropriate details as you would with your normal mail program such as the recipient and the subject. Now type the body of your e-mail in the appropriate space. When you are done, click "Send Message" and you are done.
Open docx files in Word 2003
Microsoft Word
2007 creates files in the .docx format by default. So, unless you
save files in compatibility mode, you will not be able to open those
files in previous versions of MS-Word. Microsoft Word 2003 will
simply not recognize .docx files, and will throw up an error
message. However, Microsoft has provided an answer for this dilemma,
in the form of a “Compatibility Pack”.
The Compatibility Pack for MS-Word lets you open the .docx files
without using MS-Office 2007. You can open not only .docx files, but
also .xlsx (MS-Excel 2007) and .pptx (MS-PowerPoint 2007) files in
older versions of Microsoft Office™, by installing the pack, which
is
available for download, completely
free of cost, through MS-Office Online service.
The Compatibility Pack will not provide all the services provided by
Microsoft Word 2007: in fact a number of services and options are
restricted, or altered completely.
WHAT IS CLOUD COMPUTING?
Cloud computing is a general term for anything that involves delivering hosted services over the Internet. These services are broadly divided into three categories: Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS). The name cloud computing was inspired by the cloud symbol that's often used to represent the Internet in flowcharts and diagrams.
A cloud service has three distinct characteristics that differentiate it from traditional hosting. It is sold on demand, typically by the minute or the hour; it is elastic -- a user can have as much or as little of a service as they want at any given time; and the service is fully managed by the provider (the consumer needs nothing but a personal computer and Internet access). Significant innovations in virtualization and distributed computing, as well as improved access to high-speed Internet and a weak economy, have accelerated interest in cloud computing.
http://www.humorsphere.com/fun/8787/colortest.swf
Try this site out to see how good you are at following instructions!
http://thermals.ccc.govt.nz/framesetup.asp
To check out if your house in Christchurch is losing heat.
JOKES SECTION
The 10 Commandments of Email:
1 Thou shalt include a clear and specific subject line
2 Thou shalt edit any quoted text down to the minimum thou needest.
3 Thou shalt read thine own message thrice before thou sendest it.
4 Thou shalt ponder how thy recipient might react to thy message.
5 Thou shalt check thy spelling and thy grammar.
6 Thou shalt not curse, flame, spam or USE ALL CAPS.
7 Thou shalt not forward any chain letters.
8 Thou shalt not use email for any illegal or unethical purpose.
9 Thou shalt not rely on the privacy of email, especially from work.
When in doubt, save thy message overnight and re-read it in the light of dawn.
And here’s the Golden Rule of email:
10 That which thou findest hateful to receive, sendest thou not unto others.
Thanks to SeniorNet New Brighton
Senior Driving
As a senior citizen was driving down the freeway, his cell phone rang. Answering, he heard is wife’s voice urgently warning him „Herman, I just heard on the news that there’s a car going the wrong way on Interstate 77. Please be careful! ‟
Heck, said Herman. It’s not one car, there are hundreds of them! ‟
RECIPE SECTION
SURPRISE STEAKS
1/2 cup soft breadcrumbs
2 tbsp melted butter
1/2 cup chopped mushrooms
1 spring onion finely chopped
1 tbsp chopped parsley
1 egg
375g lean mince
Salt and pepper
1 tbsp milk
4 bacon rashers
4 slices tomato
4 slices cheese
Mix first six Ingredients together.
Mix mince salt and pepper and milk.
Add one third of the breadcrumbs mixture into the mince. Form into four equal sized patties. Make a hollow in each patty and fill with rest of crumb mixture. Mould meat around to enclose stuffing then flatten patties a, little. WM rasher of trimmed bacon around each patty secure with toothpick.
Bake at 180 C for 20‑25 minutes, top with tomato and cheese and Cook further 10‑15 minutes. Remove toothpick. Serve with vegetables.
CONCLUSION.
Have you read and understood all the above If so, well done, let me know if I can help you or come to a help session on a Tuesday between 12 and 2. Please be patient as the tutors there to help are inundated at times with some problems taking longer than others. We try to help all members who have problems.
Are there any classes or workshops that you would like to do to increase your knowledge of using the computer. The more you know the easier it is using your computer as you understand what you are doing. The committee is always looking for new ideas for workshops and a number have been advertised lately. Have you checked them out?
That is about enough for this month
Till next month.
So safe and happy computing
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the Technical Committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
88th Issue
WELCOME.
Welcome to all readers especially the new members receiving this electronic newsletter for the first time. I trust that you will enjoy your time with SeniorNet Canterbury and learn some new things along the way. If you would like to see something in this newsletter please email the editor with your suggestions or questions and look for a reply in the next news letter.
Remember the help session on every Tuesday between 12 noon and 2 pm for any help that you may need or any revision on a class or a tutor to help you with a class or workshop problem. If you have to miss a class this is always a good way to catch up on the class material that you missed. The help session is not intended to replace doing a full class or workshop.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
This months meeting is the Annual general meeting for the Society. Come along and vote for the persons that you would like to represent you on the committee for the coming year. The amount for the annual subscriptions is also to be discussed.
The speaker for the monthly meeting following is Simon Britten, the Senior Product manager for Tait Electronics Ltd. The subject for his presentation is “New Technologies for public safety communications”. Should be interesting to hear this speaker who has been to our meetings before.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
April – May 2010
COURSES
(Dates and Times are in the April Newsletter, pages 4 and 5, and on the Website)
Cancellations:
28 Using MS Word
33 Making a Web Page
Vacancies:
33 (New) Introductory 28 Apr – 19 May Wed 12 noon
43 Introductory
32 Desktop Publishing
36 Keyboard Skills
38 File Management (Vista / Win 7 only)
41 File Management (XP only)
40 Intro Email
42 Computer Maintenance
45 Using Irfanview
WORKSHOPS
Please note that a booking is essential
Cancellation: Photostory 3
Vacancies remain in these Workshops: (See Newsletter or Website for details) Some of these are scheduled again because the last one filled quickly.
Making Cards
Using a Scanner
Using a Printer - a new demonstration Workshop. All printers have different features, so this demonstration shows basic uses common to most printers.
Buying and Selling on Trade Me
Choosing a Digital Camera
Using Power Point
Using a Digital Camera
Printing Photos
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place,
385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm.
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
Sound advice from the Retirement Commissioner
It pays to investigate before you invest
By Diana Crossan
Retirement Commissioner
Trust and confidence are fragile commodities in the commercial world. Easily shattered, it takes time to rebuild them. Recent turbulent times in the financial world have left many wondering who to trust and where to place their confidence.
We need a trusted financial services sector so New Zealanders can manage their savings and invest with confidence. We need this sense of security because we are living longer and there are more of us. The quality of life for the over-65s will be increasingly influenced by the quality of their own retirement planning.
So there’s a high level of obligation on the financial services sector to rebuild the confidence damaged by collapsing finance companies and unreliable investment advice.
But as individuals we can also take steps to ensure we’re making decisions which give us the best chance of retirement security.
The Retirement Commission is working with groups like SeniorNet to make sure we’re getting information about investment choices to people who are in or nearing retirement.
There’s lots of information, tools and calculators on the Commission’s website sorted.org.nz to help you make informed decisions. Have a look at the following sections.
You can use the information in this section to work out your investment profile.
Try Sorted’s risk recommender to work out how much risk you can tolerate in your investments.
Then try the investment recommender to see what types of investments might suit you.
Once you've decided what sort of investments suit your plans, use this checklist to help you tick off all the important factors you need to consider to make decisions.
Most people with funds to invest seek professional advice from some quarter. However, there are no guarantees of good financial advice. You may like to shop around until you find an adviser you feel confident with. Use Sorted’s advice checklist to help you.
Before you leap into any investment decision, there are some important rules you should follow. Have a look at Sorted’s eight rules for investing.
You can order Sorted’s free booklet, “Investing – Making your money work for you” at sorted.org.nz/ordering or by calling 0800 SORT MONEY (0800 767 866).
Public Library
http://christchurchcitylibraries.com/
Have you checked out the computer section of the public library? You can do this on line once you have registered your email address with the library. They have a number of books especially written for seniors on a number of computer topics. These can be ordered on line from another library if you so desire.
See also www.ineasysteps.com for a list of good books for Seniors.
TIPS SECTION
How to Personalise Your Computer
Ever thought your computer was boring and unexciting? Now you can make it as exciting as you want.
Start with the background. Go to the desktop and right-click on a blank area (i.e. no icons). Click Properties on the menu that comes up. Now click on the 'Desktop' tab and change the image or pattern to what you want. Alternatively, you can search on the internet for pictures. Just save them in My Pictures folder and do what it says above.
Change your screensaver. Again, right-click on the desktop and click Properties. Now choose the tab labeled "Screen Saver". There will be a drop-down menu. Pick the one you want. If you want to see what your screensaver looks like, press the "Preview" button. If you want to change the settings of the screen saver click the "Settings" button. 3
Alter what the windows and text look like. Still on the Display Properties menu, click on the "Appearance" tab. You can either choose a scheme, or make one yourself. Simply click on the different parts of the window in the picture, and change the color and font, if applicable. You can also save your schemes using the "Save As" button. From the "appearance" screen, you can also change things like highlight color, and the fade color at the top bars of windows you have opened. For example, you could change the standard Windows blue (if you're using Windows) to a stylish green, or red, whatever suits you! 4
Change your mouse cursor. You can do this by going to the Control Panel, and double-clicking on "Mouse". Click on the "Pointers" tab. Double-click on the cursor you want to change. You will come up with a list of cursors. There is a variety of cursors already there, but they are not all that good, so if you have any other cursors, search for them. Select the one you want. You can also select a scheme, and like the previous Appearance box, you can save your own schemes. 5
Examine your icons. Like before, right-click on the desktop, and click "Properties". Go onto the "Effects" tab. Select one of the icons on the picture, and click the "Change Icon" button. Either choose from the icons on there, or browse for them on you computer. 6
You can also go to Stardock.com and download the free program WindowBlinds. It comes with several "skins" and you can download many others from the same website. It is free, and will allow you to select the exact style you want for your computer. Warning!--this program only works for Windows XP, if you want to run WindowBlinds on 2000 then download the 2000 version on the Stardock website
Difference between Netbooks,
notebooks, and laptops.
We've had a number of
members who are looking at purchasing a new computer these days and wish
to know the differences between netbooks, notebooks and laptops.
First, notebooks and laptops are the same. What are now called "laptops" were once called "notebooks". Regardless of the moniker you hang on them, they're the same. Laptops have come a long way since they were introduced. You can buy laptops now that equal or exceed desktops in computing power, screen resolution and features. Desktop computer sales are declining and laptop computer sales rising at the present time. Your next purchase will probably be a laptop.
Netbooks, simply put, are small, less powerful laptops. They're built for convenience - not power. They're great for surfing the web, checking email, updating your Face book pages, twittering, chatting and running small applications. They're not meant to take the place of your desktop computer or your laptop. They don't have optical drives (CD/DVD) - but they do have USB 2.0 ports. They don't have dazzling hi-def screens - in fact they have very small screens (usually less than 13"). However, netbook screens do offer good resolution so text and images look clear and sharp. Netbooks are built for portability and not power. They're small, light, and some can even fit in your purse, ladies.
Show Control Panel in My computer for XP
Control Panel is the place where all the tweaking goes on. By default Windows XP does not show the Control Panel in My Computer. There are a number of ways of opening Control Panel but the one that users mostly prefer is the one that involves clicking on its icon in My Computer. It is also possible to open it from the Start Menu. My favourite is typing control in the RUN dialog box (you can open Run by pressing Winkey+R).
How to show Control Panel in My Computer
Thanks to Eden/Roskill & Huntly SeniorNets for the following:
How do I open this file? Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7
From time to time I get asked how to open this file type or that file type. Often this
is because the computer does not have a program installed that is associated with the particular file type in question.
I've found a little downloadable (free) tool that makes opening files that don't have file associations easy. It is called “OpenWith.org Desktop Tool and can be
downloaded and installed from: www.openwith.org/download
Here’s how it works.
1. Download and install the OpenWith.org Desktop Tool on your computer
2. Right click on the file you don't know how to open, and left click on
"OpenWith.org - How do I Open This?"
3. If OpenWith.org knows about that type of file, you will see a list of compatible
programs. If you already have one of the programs installed, it will say Installed. If not, it will say Download.
http://www.greenwichmeantime.com/info/current-time.htm
to check your clocks for the exact time.
check your computer clock
(Have you checked the time /date on your digital camera?)
http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/
world clock.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/03/apple-ipad-review/
See a review on the Apple ipad.
JOKES SECTION
|
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RECIPE SECTION
By: Linda McDaniel
"This delicious, tangy relish of green tomatoes, onions, bell peppers, and spices, is perfect with sandwiches, potatoes, cheese, and lots of other entrees. A jar of this makes a great gift, too!"
Cook Time: 45 Min Ready In: 2 Hrs
1. In a grinder or food processor, coarsely grind tomatoes, red bell peppers, green bell peppers, and onions. (You may need to do this in batches.) Line a large colander with cheesecloth, place in sink or in a large bowl, and pour in tomato mixture to drain for 1 hour.
2. In a large, non-aluminium stockpot, combine tomato mixture, celery seed, mustard seed, salt, sugar, and vinegar. Bring to a boil and simmer over low heat 5 minutes, stirring frequently.
3. Sterilize enough jars and lids to hold relish (12 one-pint jars, or 6 one-quart jars). Pack relish into sterilized jars, making sure there are no spaces or air pockets. Fill jars all the way to top. Screw on lids.
4. Place a rack in the bottom of a large stockpot and fill halfway with boiling water. Carefully lower jars into pot using a holder. Leave a 2 inch space between jars. Pour in more boiling water if necessary, until tops of jars are covered by 2 inches of water. Bring water to a full boil, then cover and process for 30 minutes.
5. Remove jars from pot and place on cloth-covered or wood surface, several inches apart, until cool. Once cool, press top of each lid with finger, ensuring that seal is tight (lid does not move up or down at all). Relish can be stored for up to a year.
CONCLUSION.
Another busy month for SeniorNet Canterbury. With the Annual general meeting this coming week and new members joining up all the time, we have to schedule new intro classes to meet the demand. It is good to see that we can help people learn to use their computers more efficiently.
If you do have a problem, come to a help session on a Tuesday between 12 and 2 pm. You will be welcome to talk to one of the tutors present. We are busy at times as it seems sometimes that every one comes at the same time. So that we ask for you to have patience until your turn and then we can help you.
If you do not wish to receive this newsletter please send an email to the email address listed below and your name will be removed from the mailing listing.
Till next month
Happy and safe computing.
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the Technical Committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
WELCOME.
Hi and welcome to all my readers to another month for Enews. At SeniorNet it has been a busy month as it seems just like last week when I was sending out the last newsletter. New members joining SeniorNet Canterbury just keep coming, with new introductory classes being added all the time. This is good to see as it means we can help more people to learn and enjoy using their computers. I hope they will enjoy this newsletter.
SENIORNET
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the monthly meeting to be held in the main hall at Shirley Community centre on Thursday the 18th. March starting at 2 pm is Michael Coleman an investment advise with Forsyth Barr Ltd and the subject of his talk is “Investment on Line” Should be an interesting subject for a lot of members. Hope to see you there.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the
Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop
Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date
every two or three days. This will save your disappointing
phone calls.
www.seniornetcanty.co.nz
click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
March - April 2010
COURSES
(Dates and Times are all in the March Newsletter, pages 4 and 5, and on the
Website)
We have had to cancel the advertised course in Introductory Email No.
17
Vacancies:
30, 34
Introductory
24, 28
Using MS Word
22
Using MS Excel
23
Internet
29 Introductory Email
32 Desktop Publishing
33 Making a Web Page
35 File Management (XP
only)
WORKSHOPS
Cancellation: Using a CD Writer, Tuesday 16 March
Vacancies remain in these Workshops: (See Newsletter or Website for details)
Using a Digital Camera - demonstration
Making a Composite Photo, now renamed
Using PhotoStory 3 to make an
Album or Collage
Removing Objects from photos and Changing Backgrounds
PhotoStory 3
Using Skype
Making Cards (now newly advertised as the last
one filled)
Using a Scanner
Using a Printer - a new demonstration Workshop.
All printers have different features, so this demonstration shows basic
uses common to most printers...
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place,
385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm.
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t
send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
TIPS
SECTION
Passwords
Do:
• Mix
letters, numbers and symbols, and use case sensitivity (upper and lower case
letters)
• The longer the better. Use passwords that are
longer than 6 characters.
• Change your passwords at least every 60 days,
cycling the numeric values up or down makes the new password easy to remember.
• Try copying and pasting at least some of the
characters in your password that way keyloggers won’t be able to track your
keystrokes.
Don't:
• Don’t
use words or phrases or numbers that have personal significance. It is very easy
for someone to guess or identify your personal details like date of birth.
• Avoid writing your password down, use a reputable
password manager to manage all your passwords.
• Don’t use the same password for several logins,
especially if they involve sensitive financial or other personal information.
• Don’t tell anybody your password. And I mean
Anybody.
• When registering on websites that ask for your
email address, never use the same password as your email account.
CAN I RESET THE TOOLBARS TO THEIR DEFAULT SETTINGS in WORD?
Newer versions of Word make it easy for you to reset the toolbars. Simply click the downward pointing arrow on the far right side of a toolbar and hold the mouse over Add or Remove Buttons. A list will appear showing the active toolbars. When you click on the one you would like to customize, a list of all the features associated with that particular toolbar will pop up or you can reset the toolbar by selecting Reset toolbar at the bottom of the list.
Do
you have an icon appear instead of a thumbnail for your photos in Windows
Explorer in
Open Windows Explorer, click Organize, select Folder and search Options, then the VIEW tab. Under the Advanced settings and Files and Folders tab, make sure that “Always show icons, never thumbnails” is not ticked. If it is, untick it, then Ok to exit.
More Laptop Tips
All laptop users
If your laptop has been in a cold place, like in your car in the winter,
wait for it to get to room temperature before you boot up so that
condensation does not form inside; it could damage delicate components.
Laptops are constantly being moved around - things like setting it down on a
table, transferring to your lap, putting it in a case, etc. This puts a lot
more wear and tear on them vs a PC, so be sure EVERYTHING is always backed
up. Don't take chances on losing everything.
There is a lot of controversy on whether you really need to shut down a PC;
after all, refrigerators and other appliances run non-stop without being
turned off. But, when it comes to laptops, always shut down completely when
you are not going to be using it for an extended time.
Check air vents for dust or particles and keep it clean.
While it is nice to keep your laptop in your lap, using it on a hard surface
is really the best way to extend the life of your laptop, and helps to
control overheating or over use of the internal fan.
Never reposition your laptop from one spot to the next, or from your lap to
a table, without unplugging USB flash drives; leaving them in can bend them
and ruin not only the flash drive, but the USB port on the laptop as well.
Use a strong password on your laptop; theft is more of a concern with
portable devices. If you travel a lot, you should also password protect your
BIOS settings; the manufacturer of your computer will have instructions for
this. Find out of your BIOS password also protects your hard drive...
otherwise a thief could simply remove the hard drive from your laptop and
install secondary drive on another machine, or on a similar laptop, and
access it.
The new indexing service built into Windows Vista has been the subject of a lot of complaints, since it seems to kick in at strange times and thrash your hard drive. So what can we do to speed this up?
There are two options: You can either trim down the amount of files that Windows Search is indexing, or you can disable it entirely if you never use the search.
Trim Down Indexing Locations
The best way to trim down the amount of processor time the indexing service uses is by trimming down the amount of files being indexed. For instance, if you don’t regularly search through your C: drive, there’s really no need to be indexing it.
Type Indexing into the control panel search or the start menu search box, and you should see an item called Indexing Options.
Here you can see the current list of locations that are being indexed. For instance, I only index the start menu and Outlook. If you want to modify or remove locations, use the Modify button.
All you have to do to remove a location from being indexed is uncheck the box. You might have to click the Show All Locations button to see some of the default locations.
If you wanted to remove the start menu indexing, you’ll need to click on Start Menu in the summary list at the bottom, and it’ll automatically navigate to the item in the tree.
The start menu indexing really
doesn’t take much processing time though, so I wouldn’t bother removing
that.
Automatic image resizing is on In Internet Explorer.
In internet explorer 8 all images are resized. If you want to see the images full size you have to turn this feature off.
To do so open internet explorer and go to tools, internet options and click on the advanced tab. Scroll down until you see Multimedia and find Enable Automatic image resizing and uncheck the box next to it. You will now see the imaged full size. If you do not like that view just put the tick back in the box.
LARGER FONT SIZE.
Do you want to increase your font
size in
Right click on a blank area of your
desktop. Select personalize.
Select adjust size and then continue.
Select larger scale (DPI) and apply.
Ok to exit. Do a restart to see the different font size.
TO PUT BACK THE RUN FUNCTION.
Right click on the START button.
Select properties.
Select START MENU and CUSTOMISE.
Scroll down and tick the box alongside RUN
Apply and Ok to exit.
DO YOU CHECK YOUR SPAM FOLDER ON YOUR INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDER?
Have you been expecting an email and it has not arrived? It could be in your SPAM folder on the web site of your Internet service provider (ISP). You should check the SPAM folder monthly to ensure that your ISP is not calling legitimate messages as SPAM.
To do this log into your ISP web site. For example if you are an xtra customer go to www.webmail.xtra.co.nz and sign in with your email address and password. (You do know your password don’t you?) Web mail will now display all the folders for your email address. You will notice a new folder called SPAM. This is the folder that your ISP places any messages that it thinks as SPAM
Check all the messages in this folder, (there may be many) for any messages that should have come through to you. If you find any legitimate messages, click on it and mark it as “NOT spam” and shift it into your inbox. If you are on a dialup connection and there are any large messages located in your inbox you can also delete them while you are here. Any messages in your inbox will be downloaded to your computer when you next open your email program.
(I had 20 messages in my SPAM folder and 9 of them were legitimate messages. Editor.)
|
|
I don't understand the difference between Windows Mail, Windows Live Mail, and Outlook Express. |
Windows Mail is the mail program included in Windows Vista. Outlook Express is the mail program included in Windows XP. Windows Live Mail includes the familiar features of both Windows Mail and Outlook Express, plus other features, including the ability to automatically enter the correct settings for e‑mail servers used by many popular e‑mail services.
Windows Live Mail is not included in Windows Vista or Windows XP. You can download Windows Live Mail from the Windows Live Mail website. Windows live mail is the email program to be used with the new operating system Windows 7
http://www.jigzone.com/
for your daily fix of puzzles. (Thanks Mike.)
Please send me your web sites so others may also enjoy them.
RECIPE SECTION
Hot cross buns
Note:
These recipes use NZ measurements. 1 c = 1 cup = 250 ml. 1 T = 1 tablespoon = 15
ml. 1 D = 2 teaspoons. 1 t = 1 teaspoon = 5ml. If you're in
1 c
milk
1/2 c hot water
2 T sugar
2 T dried yeast
2 c flour
100g butter
1/2 c sugar
1 egg
1 t salt
1 1/2 T mixed spice
1 t ground nutmeg
2 t cocoa
1 t vanilla essence
1 c mixed dried fruit
2-3 c flour (warmed)
Mix
milk, hot water and 2T sugar in metal bowl. Sprinkle in yeast. Leave to stand
until bubbles appear. Add 2 c flour and leave to stand.
Cream butter and sugar, add egg, salt spices, cocoa and vanilla.
Combine two mixtures and add mixed fruit. Add warmed flour to make firm dough.
Knead cut into 20 pieces and leave to rise till doubled.
Press down, form into buns and cook 225 C for 10-12 minutes. Glaze with 2 T
sugar mixed in heated 1.5 t water.
Source: Cornell Cookbook
CONCLUSION.
It is a pity that we have had to cancel some of the classes and workshops as no members applied for a place on the class or workshop. If you would like to do a class or workshop please ring Malcolm shearer on 385-0902 and tell him of the class or workshop that you would like to attend and he will schedule it and try to fill it up with other members. The minimum number of members in a class is 3.
If you are having a problem with something, please come to a help session on a Tuesday between 12 noon and 2 pm and see one of the tutors there. If you have a laptop please bring it along together with your power supply and we will sort the problem out. Also if you need an update to your antivirus program please bring along your removable or pen drive so that the new version can be loaded onto it.
Please send me your comments on this newsletter and any suggestions that you would like to see in future issues.
If you would like to be deleted from my data base and not receive this newsletter please send me an email and I will remove your name from my listing. I do not wish to send a copy to anyone who does not wish to receive it.
Till next month
Have a safe and happy computing experience.
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
lester@seniornetcanty.co.nz
WELCOME.
Welcome to all my readers. I trust that you survived the Christmas break and are now ready to face the year ahead. Most of the courses and workshops at SeniorNet are not fully booked at the present time. The only fully booked course is the Introductory course as the number of new members joining the Society is very good. Some extra classes have had to be scheduled to cater for the influx of new members.
If you are interested in doing a course or a workshop this year please ring Malcolm Shearer now and tell him of your request. I am sure that he will be very happy to hear from you.
SENIORNET
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for
the monthly meeting is Mike Crean the senior writer for the
Should be and interesting and entertaining talk. Hope to see you there.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
February - March 2010
New Year Greetings!
COURSES
Two additional Introductory Classes have been scheduled to cater for all our new members:
26
31 March to 21 April Wednesday 12 noon
27 12 April to 3 May
Monday 9.45
There are also vacancies in these classes:
11, 17
Introductory Email
13 Keyboard Skills
16 File Management (
18 File Management (XP)
19, 24 Using MS Word
21 Advanced Email
22 Using MS Excel
23 Internet
25 Computer Maintenance
WORKSHOPS
Vacancies remain in these Workshops:
Installing Programs
CD Writers
Using a Digital Camera
Making a Composite Photo
Removing Objects from photos and Changing Backgrounds
Making Cards
Buying and Selling on Trade Me
(Details for these Courses and Workshops are in the February Newsletter or on the Website.)
For
all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place,
385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm.
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t
send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
For
Hardly used H.P.78 colour ink cartridge $50 o.n.o.H.P.compatable 12 black ink cartridge $20 o.n.o. Both bought January 2010 Printer has since died.
Phone. 359-5194
TIPS SECTION
Laptop Tips
With more members purchasing laptops it is important
that the laptop are used efficiently.
To Conserve the Laptop Battery Power
If you have an on-off switch for your WiFi on your laptop, get in the habit of
turning it off when you do not need to be online, or if you are in a location
without internet access. Your computer is always searching for connections, and
it will conserve battery power if your computer is not actively searching.
Disconnect any USB devices that you are not using as these will drain your
battery over time. (And, using a USB Flash drive on a laptop with a low battery
can actually corrupt the USB flash drive making it unusable!)
Try setting your LCD display to a dimmer setting; the brighter the display, the
more battery power it drains and it is a laptop's biggest power drain. Getting
low on power and need to squeeze a little more time out of your charge? Dim your
screen even more and you will be surprised how much extra time can stay powered
up.
Good ventilation keeps the fan from powering on as much, which in turn conserves
battery power. Setting your laptop on a desk vs. your lap will actually give
your battery more life.
NEVER put your laptop in a laptop bag unless it is completely shut down! There
is no circulation at all so it is not even safe to leave it in hibernate or
sleep mode.
Always take out all cable connections from the laptop including USB Drives., power supply, mouse and internet connections. If they are left connected a knock may damage the socket.
If there is one bloated and unnecessary service that you should immediately disable, it’s definitely the Indexing Service built into Windows XP. The idea behind it is that you can search for files more quickly if it is enabled.
To turn off indexing:
To disable the indexing service:
Windows search will still work if you perform these steps, but it will work more slowly than if indexing was enabled.
The Mouse Sonar Effect
Windows XP, Windows
Here's a great tip for those of you who have trouble locating your mouse pointer on the screen. Windows XP and Windows Vista have a feature that some refer to as "mouse sonar". This option causes your mouse pointer to pop-up in a little concentric ring around so you can easily find it. Some of you may have never lost your mouse pointer, but we have, and it’s frustrating. The mouse pointer is very difficult to find if you have trouble seeing or on certain colours. (NO! EB! I am not having trouble seeing!)
If you'd like to use the "mouse sonar effect" to
assist you in locating your mouse pointer at all times, in all conditions, on
all colours, here's how easy that is to do. This tip works on Windows XP and
Windows
1. Click Start then Control Panel
2. Click On "Mouse"
3. Choose Pointer Options
4. Select "Show location of pointer when I press the CTRL key."
With Windows ReadyBoost, you can use non-volatile flash memory, such as that on a universal serial bus (USB) pen drive, to improve performance without having to add additional memory "under the hood."
The flash memory device serves as an additional memory cache—that is, memory that the computer can access much more quickly than it can access data on the hard drive. Windows ReadyBoost relies on the intelligent memory management of Windows SuperFetch and can significantly improve system responsiveness.
It's easy to use Windows ReadyBoost. When a removable memory device such as a USB pen drive or a secure digital (SD) memory card is first inserted into a port, Windows Vista checks to see if its performance is fast enough to work with Windows ReadyBoost. If so, you are asked if you want to use this device to speed up system performance. You can choose to allocate part of a USB drive's memory to speed up performance and use the remainder to store files
How do I get
rid of MSN Messenger in Windows XP?
Microsoft decided to make MSN
Messenger a built-in default feature in XP. A nice gesture, but for some,
yet another useless feature that gets in your face.
Well, if you just remove it from your system you might run into trouble.
This is part of Microsoft's "make it an 'integrated' part of Windows to get
around the legal stuff" tactic. So just do the next best thing—disable it.
Here's what you do...
Open the Windows Messenger and go to
Tools>Options and
select the “Preferences " tab.
Un-check the boxes marked "Run
this program when Windows starts" and "Run
this program in the background". Click
OK, and then close the
program.
That should do it. No more annoying MSN Messenger coming up when you turn on
your computer or try to surf the web! Also, if you ever do decide to use the
program at a later date you still have the program on your system.
Clean out your history in Internet Explorer 8.
To clean out your history and other things saved by Internet Explorer and start a fresh. Open Internet Explorer and go to TOOLS / Internet Options and under the General tab go to Browsing History and click DELETE. In the open window put a tick in each of the boxes that you wish to clear. Click DELETE and OK to exit.
If you find that the history is not being cleared, go onto the web and go to this site http://www.filehippo.com/download_ccleaner. and download ccleaner and install the program onto your computer. This is a free program and does a very good job of cleaning out unwanted files from your computer. Try the other functions as well.
Do you get tired of seeing this error report every time a Windows program malfunctions?
If you're like me, you have better
things to do than click "Send" or "Don't Send" to tell Microsoft that their
programs are messing up. There are lots of other people that do that anyway, so
Microsoft stays well-informed of their problems without you and I volunteering
our time to help them out.
Good news! You don't have to do that any longer. Here's how to disable it:
For XP Users.
1. Click Start
2. Right-click on My Computer and choose Properties
3. Click the “Advanced” tab
4. Click the “Error Reporting” button
5. Check “Disable error reporting”, but also check “But notify me when critical errors occur”
Click OK twice, and don’t be bothered by that error message any more!
For
PROBLEM
in the Search
text box and click the Problem Reports And Solutions shortcut in the Program
list,
Unbelievable: 360 deg. photography...
This is neat,
click & drag in any direction:
Look all the way up and all the way down .Use your mouse to move around.
http://www.utah3d.net/SulpherCreek_swf.html
http://www.utah3d.net/DoubleArch1_swf.html
http://www.utah3d.net/PaysonC_swf.html
http://www.utah3d.net/NightArches_swf.html
Be sure and look at all four
To find all about ways to avoid scams.
Please send me your favourite web sites so others may also enjoy.
========================================
JOKES SECTION
Irish Password Protection!
During a recent PASSWORD AUDIT at the Bank of
Was found that Paddy O'Toole was using the following password:
MickeyMinniePlutoHueyLouieDeweyDonaldGoofyDublin
When Paddy was asked why he had such a long password: he replied
''Bejazus! Are yez stupid? Shore Oi was told me password had to be at
Least 8 characters long and include one capital''
Don't ever think you can outwit the Irish!
RECIPE SECTION
Did this a few years ago (when tried it in the microwave rather than the oven for the first time and was so nice I continued to use this method rather than traditional oven and stove top method!!!
Ingredients required:
Cake mix:
1 cup flour
1 Tsp Baking Powder
2 Tblsp Cocoa Powder
3/4 Cup sugar
1 Tsp Vanilla ess
1/2 Cup Milk
1 Tsp melted butter
Sce mix:
1 bag choc sprinkles (from supermarket)
2 Tblsp Cocoa Powder
2 Tblsp Sugar
1.5 Cup water
Mix the separate batches of ingredients together in 2 separate bowls, then pour the sauce mix into a microwave safe glass bowl (or plastic) and then add the ingredients mix on top
Place in microwave for 8 minutes on high. (Cover with lid if want to - up to you)
Once removed from microwave do NOT wait - get plate and tip over and scoop out sauce and drizzle left over on top - EAT and enjoy whilst getting millions of calories in ya!
(From the recipe section on the communities’ message board site at TradeMe)
CONCLUSION.
Have you a problem that is bugging you? Why not come to a help session on a Tuesday between 12 and 2 and see the tutors there. They may be able to solve that problem and make you life a whole lot easier. If you are bringing a laptop please also bring your power supply and a mouse if you use one. It will make it easier to fix the problem should your battery go down.
Is your antivirus up to date? If you are running AVG have you version 9.0 installed. If not you may not be fully protected. Get an updated CD from the help session and keep it up to date with daily updates. If you do not know how to install or run the antivirus software the help session is the place to find out how to do a scan correctly.
There are a lot of scams out there on the Internet. Do NOT click on anything that you have not asked for. If you have any doubts, give a committee member a ring or send me an email and ask the question before you give anyone any money at all to pay for anything on the Internet.
If I can answer your question, send me an email. I am always willing to accept any emails about ideas or anything you would like to see in this newsletter. This newsletter is here to help and entertain the readers so let me know what you would like to see in it.
Mean time, play it safe and stay cool.
Till next month
Happy and safe computing
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc
85th
WELCOME.
My goodness, where has the year
gone. The
older one gets the faster the time seems to go. Especially if you
are kept busy as most of us here at SeniorNet have. I hope that the year has
treated you kindly and My goodness, where has the year gone.
The older one gets the faster the time seems to go. Especially if you you are
looking forward to a happy Christmas.
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the monthly meeting is Frieda Looser a lecturer , community Education at the University of Canterbury and the topic for her presentation is “Fendall and Fendall Town, The man and the place”. A reminder that the meeting is being held on Thursday the 10 December 2009 at 2 pm in the main hall at Shirley Community centre. This in one week earlier than normal. Afternoon tea will be served after the talk. Hope to see you there.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit
the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will
find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three
days. This will save your disappointing phone calls.
www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring
up the web site.
December 2009
All classes listed in the Newsletter have vacancies. Please ring Malcolm and
Ann, 385 0902, to book a place – not between December 21 and January 1 if you
can possibly avoid it!
You also need to book a place in Workshops, either by ringing, as above, or
sending an email to:
am.shearer@clear.net.nz
We’ll reply to let you know if there is a vacancy.
Suggestions for Workshops will be welcomed, and if you have a request for a
particular course or workshop, please let us know!
Happy Christmas!
This gives us
something to think about with all our new electronic technology.
GPS
UNITS.
A couple of
weeks ago a friend told me that someone she knew had their car broken into while
they were at a football game. Their car was parked on the green which was
adjacent to the football stadium and specially allotted to football fans. Things
stolen from the car included a garage door remote control, some money and a GPS
which had been prominently mounted on the dashboard.
When the
victims got home, they found that their house had been ransacked and just about
everything worth anything had been stolen.
The thieves had used the GPS to guide them to the house. They then used the garage remote control to open the garage door and gain entry to the house. The thieves knew the owners were at the football game, they knew what time the game was scheduled to finish and so they knew how much time they had to clean out the house. It would appear that they had brought a truck to empty the house of its contents.
Something to consider if you have a GPS - don't put your home address in it. Put a nearby address (like a store or gas station) so you can still find your way home if you need to, but no one else would know where you live if your GPS were stolen.
MOBILE PHONES
I never thought of this.....
This lady has now changed her habit of how she lists her names on her mobile phone after her handbag was stolen. Her handbag, which contained her cell phone, credit card, wallet... Etc...was stolen.
Do not disclose the relationship between you and the people in your contact list.
I never thought about the above! As of now, I no longer have 'home' listed on my cell phone.
TIPS SECTION
TOP KEYS ON A KEYBOARD. WHAT DO THEY DO?
Escape - Esc is used to back out of situations. When you find yourself in a place where you don't want to be, try the Esc key. In PowerPoint this key will stop a running slide show. The keyboard combination Ctrl + Esc will open the Start menu.
F1 -
While working in an application, depressing this key will bring up the
applications help menu. If there is no open application F1 will open Windows
Help.
F2
-
Choose this key to rename a selected item.
Alt + Ctrl + F2 to open a new document in
MS Word
Ctrl + F2 to open print
preview in MS Word
(this is a toggle, tap the keys again to return to the edit page)
F3 -
Depressing this key will display the Find: All Files
dialog box.
Shift + F3 will change case in MS Word. Continue to press F3 (with
the Shift key depressed) to toggle through all choices.
F4 -
Holding down the Alt key while depressing F4 closes the
current active window. If there is no active window this opens the Shut Down
dialog box.
Repeat an action with F4. For example, if your last action was to format
a word as Bold, you can repeat the procedure by highlighting another word and
depressing F4. This
continues to work until your next action.
F5 -
Select this key to refresh the contents of a dialog box, such as the
Save As or Open dialog boxes, or in a window such as a Windows
Explorer window.
2 - Refresh a browser window; IE refreshes immediately,
Google Chrome, Firefox, and Safari all ask for confirmation before refreshing
3 - Open the Find and
Replace dialog box in MS Word
4 - F5 + Ctrl + Shift to insert a bookmark in
MS Word
5 - Use this key to start a slide show in MS
PowerPoint
F6 - F6 + Ctrl
to move to a previous window if you have multiple documents
open in MS Word
2 - F6 + Alt to move to a previous window if you
have multiple documents open in MS Word
F7 -
Perform Spell and Grammar check in MS Word
2 - F7 + Shift when a word is selected to access
the thesaurus in MS
10 -
Activates Menu Bar
options. Use right and left arrows to select menus and down arrows to display
pull down menus. This is especially useful on the newer versions of IE because
the menu bar is not displayed by default.
2 - F10 + Shift - Depressing this key combination will
display the selected item's shortcut window. This is the menu that is displayed
by right-clicking.
F11 -
In
Internet Explorer this key will allow you to toggle back
and forth between full screen view (all toolbars compressed into one thin line)
and normal view
2 - In Excel
this key will make a chart using data that you have highlighted
3 - F11 + Shift - in Excel this keyboard
combination will add worksheets to the workbook. Each time you tap F11 a new
worksheet is added.
F12 -
Open a new document
in MS Word
2 - F12 + Ctrl + Shift to print in MS Word
3 - F12 + Shift to
Save in
MS Word
4 - F12 to open the
Save As dialog box in
MS Word
Print Screen
-
Don't look at your printer after pressing this key.
This sends a copy of whatever is on the screen to the clipboard. One common use
of this action is to paste the clipboard into Paint to copy a portion of an
image for use in another application. As an example look at the Windows logo in
the Windows key section of this page. That was produced by copying a small
portion of the desktop image and pasting into a web page developer. If you wish
to copy only the active window, hold down the Alt key, then tap on the
Print Screen key. It will copy only that window that is active, not the
whole desktop.
Have
you ever been doing something in Windows that involved multiple files? If so,
you've probably come across a message similar to this at one time or another:
Notice how there's an option for “Yes to All”, but no button for “No to All”?
What gives? I'm not going to be sitting here rapidly clicking “No” all night,
am I?
Well, the good news is that if you find yourself in this situation, all you need
to do to get “No to All” is hold the Shift key when you click “No”.
It's that easy! Just make sure you know what you're saying no to in the first
place!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Delete Vista
hibernate if not required.
Users cannot
turn the hibernation on or off via Vista GUI interface anymore. Previously users
can enable or disable hibernation via Power Options applet in Control Panel.
This option no longer available in Windows Vista, which also enables Hibernate
ability and creates hiberfil.sys by default. Instead, users have to rely on
command line utility Powercf and Disk Cleanup Wizard to disable hibernation in
Vista. Microsoft KB920730 provides details on how to disable and turn off
hibernation on computer running Vista system. You
must log on to Vista with user account in Administrators group to perform these
action.
Click Start,
and then type cmd in the
Start Search box.
In the search results list, right-click
Command Prompt or Cmd,
and then click Run as Administrator
on the pop up contextual menu.
If you are prompted by User Account Control for permission, click
Continue.
At the command prompt, type the following command, and then press ENTER:
powercfg.exe -h off
Type exit, and then
press ENTER.
Another easier
workaround for those who’re not comfortable to work with command line is to
disable hibernation and hybrid sleep feature in Windows Vista is by using Disk
Cleanup wizard tool, the built-in Windows disk cleaner, to delete hiberfil.sys
file. The hibernation file must be enabled to access the hybrid sleep feature
and the hibernation feature in Windows Vista.
Click Start
button, then go to All Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools, and run
Disk Cleanup.
Choose which files to clean up, either
My files only or Files
from all users on this computer is fine. Click OK
On “Drive Selection”, select the Windows Vista boot drive to clean up. Note that
you must select the drive where Vista is installed, which normally is also the
boot drive (C:) as hiberfil.sys file will be located on the root folder of it.
Once Disk
Cleanup finishes scanning the system, Disk Cleanup for Vista window will open.
Select and tick the check box next to the Hibernation File Cleaner. You
can select or deselect other type files to clean or preserve from the available
items or options in the list provided.
Click OK button when done.
Hibernation will now be removed and disabled.
Show or hide
the Recycle Bin in Vista
The
Recycle Bin usually appears on the desktop. If you prefer, you can hide it.
To show or hide
the Recycle Bin on the desktop
1.
Open Personalization by clicking the
Start
button 
,
clicking Control Panel,
clicking Appearance and Personalization,
and then clicking Personalization.
2. In the
left pane, click Change desktop icons, and then do one
of the following:
o
To remove the Recycle Bin from the desktop, clear the
Recycle Bin check box.
o
To display the Recycle Bin on the desktop, select the
Recycle Bin check box
3. Click
OK.
http://www.microsoft.com/nz/digitallife/windows7/default.mspx
Windows 7
http://www.theholidayspot.com/
some
holiday fun.
http://www.jessicawatson.com.au/
Follow the round the world sailor.
Thanks Gordon.
JOKES SECTION
What
beats his chest and swings from Christmas cake to Christmas cake
Tarzipan !
Mum,
Can I have a dog for Christmas ?
No you can have turkey like everyone else
!
What
did the big cracker say to the little cracker ?
My pop is bigger than yours !
Who is
never hungry at Christmas ?
The turkey - he's always stuffed !
What
bird has wings but cannot fly ?
Roast turkey !
Whats the best thing to put into a Christmas
cake ?
Your teeth !
We had
grandma for Christmas dinner ?
Really, we had turkey !
Whats
happens if you eat the Christmas decorations ?
You get tinsel-itus !
RECIPE SECTION
Fruit mince pies
Don't want to stress you out or anything but Christmas is now just three weeks away - get ahead by making these mince pies now and putting them in the freezer.
Preparation
Time 30 minutes
Cooking Time 35 minutes
Makes 40
Ingredients
2 tbs brown sugar
2 tbs brandy
1 small Granny Smith apple, peeled, cored, coarsely grated
85g raisins, coarsely chopped
85g currants
5g sultanas
60g glace cherries, coarsely chopped
115g (1/3 cup) breakfast marmalade
1/4 tsp mixed spice
600g (4 cups) plain flour
80g (1/2 cup) icing sugar mixture
300g chilled butter, chopped
2 egg yolks
4-5 tbs water
White sugar, to sprinkle
Icing sugar, to dust
Method
Combine the brown sugar, brandy, apple, raisins, currants, sultanas, cherries, marmalade and mixed spice in a bowl. Set aside, covered, stirring occasionally, for 1-2 days to macerate.
Place the flour, icing sugar and butter in the bowl of a food processor and process until it resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add the egg yolks and water, and process until the dough just comes together.
Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth.
Preheat oven to 180°C. Roll out the pastry between 2 sheets of non-stick baking paper until 3mm thick. Use a round 6.5cm-diameter pastry cutter to cut 40 discs from the pastry. Line forty 30ml (1 1/2-tablespoon) capacity patty pans with the discs. Use a fork to prick the bases.
Re-roll leftover pastry between 2 sheets of non-stick baking paper until 3mm thick. Use a round 5cm-diameter pastry cutter to cut 40 discs from the pastry. Spoon 1 heaped teaspoon of fruit mixture into each pastry case. Top with pastry discs. Press edges to seal. Sprinkle with white sugar. Bake for 30-35 minutes. Set aside for 15 minutes to cool before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
Dust the pies with icing sugar to serve.
Notes & tips
Freezing tip: At the end of step 5, layer the fruit mince pies between sheets of freezerproof paper in an airtight container. Label, date and freeze for up to six months. Thaw overnight at room temperature.
Allow two days macerating and cooling time.
Taste.com.au has everything you need for Christmas including Christmas gift ideas like truffles and rum balls, Christmas menu plans and handy video how to tips.
Source
Good Taste - November 2007, Page 114
Recipe by Michelle Southan
On behalf of
all the committee members and the tutors of SeniorNet Canterbury I wish all the
members, friends and readers a very happy and merry Christmas and a prosperous
new year ahead and hope to see you all sometime in the year ahead.
The last help
session for this year will be Tuesday 15 December and the first help session
will be the 12 January 2010 starting at 12 noon and running through to 2 pm. If
you have a problem over the holidays this will be the time and place to sort it
out.
Happy and safe
computing
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet
Canterbury Inc.
lester@seniornetcanty.co.nz
SENIORNET
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the monthly meeting is
Frieda Looser a lecturer ,
community Education at the
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
December 2009
All classes listed in the Newsletter have vacancies. Please ring Malcolm and Ann, 385 0902, to book a place – not between December 21 and January 1 if you can possibly avoid it!
You also need to book a place in Workshops, either by ringing, as above, or sending an email to: am.shearer@clear.net.nz We’ll reply to let you know if there is a vacancy.
Suggestions for Workshops will be welcomed, and if you have a request for a particular course or workshop, please let us know!
Happy Christmas!
This gives us something to think about with all our new electronic technology.
GPS UNITS.
A couple of weeks ago a friend told me that someone she knew had their car broken into while they were at a football game. Their car was parked on the green which was adjacent to the football stadium and specially allotted to football fans. Things stolen from the car included a garage door remote control, some money and a GPS which had been prominently mounted on the dashboard.
When the victims got home, they found that their house had been ransacked and just about everything worth anything had been stolen.
The thieves had used the GPS to guide them to the house. They then used the garage remote control to open the garage door and gain entry to the house. The thieves knew the owners were at the football game, they knew what time the game was scheduled to finish and so they knew how much time they had to clean out the house. It would appear that they had brought a truck to empty the house of its contents.
Something to consider if you have a GPS - don't put your home address in it. Put a nearby address (like a store or gas station) so you can still find your way home if you need to, but no one else would know where you live if your GPS were stolen.
MOBILE PHONES
I never thought of this.....
This lady has now changed her habit of how she lists her names on her mobile phone after her handbag was stolen. Her handbag, which contained her cell phone, credit card, wallet... Etc...was stolen.
20 minutes later when she called her hubby, from a pay phone telling him what had happened, hubby says 'I received your text asking about our Pin number and I've replied a little while ago.'
When they rushed down to the bank, the bank staff told them all the money was already withdrawn. The thief had actually used the stolen cell phone to text 'hubby' in the contact list and got hold of the pin number. Within 20 minutes he had withdrawn all the money from their bank account.
Moral of the lesson:
Do not disclose the relationship between you and the people in your contact list.
Avoid using names like Home, Honey, Hubby, Sweetheart, Dad, Mom, etc....
And very importantly, when sensitive info is being asked through texts, CONFIRM by calling back.
Also, when you're being text by friends or family to meet them somewhere, be sure to call back to confirm that the message came from them. If you don't reach them, be very careful about going places to meet 'family and friends' who text you.
*PLEASE PASS THIS ON
TIPS SECTION
TOP KEYS ON A KEYBOARD. WHAT DO THEY DO?
Escape
- Esc
is used to back out of situations. When you find yourself in
a place where you don't want to be, try the
Esc key. In
PowerPoint this key will stop a running slide show. The
keyboard combination
Ctrl + Esc will open the
Start menu.
F1 - While working in an application, depressing this key will bring up the applications help menu. If there is no open application F1 will open Windows Help.
F3
-
Depressing this key will display the
Find: All Files dialog box.
2 - Shift + F3
will change case in MS
Word. Continue to press
F3 (with the
Shift key depressed) to toggle through all
choices.
F4
- Holding down the
Alt key while
depressing F4
closes the current active window. If there is no active
window this opens the
Shut Down dialog box.
2 - Repeat an action with
F4. For example,
if your last action was to format a word as Bold, you can
repeat the procedure by highlighting another word and
depressing F4.
This continues to work until your next action.
F5
- Select this key to refresh
the contents of a dialog box, such as the
Save As or
Open dialog
boxes, or in a window such as a
Windows Explorer
window.
2 - Refresh a browser window; IE refreshes immediately,
Google Chrome, Firefox, and Safari all ask for confirmation
before refreshing
3 - Open the
Find and Replace dialog box in
MS Word
4 - F5 + Ctrl
+ Shift to insert a bookmark in
MS Word
5 - Use this key to start a slide show in
MS PowerPoint
F6
- F6 + Ctrl to move to a
previous window if you have multiple documents open in
MS Word
2 - F6 + Alt
to move to a previous window if you have multiple
documents open in
MS Word
F7
- Perform Spell and Grammar
check in MS Word
2 - F7 +
Shift when a word is selected to access the
thesaurus in MS
F10
- Activates Menu Bar options.
Use right and left arrows to select menus and down arrows to
display pull down menus. This is especially useful on the
newer versions of IE because the menu bar is not displayed
by default.
2 - F10 + Shift
- Depressing this key combination will display the
selected item's shortcut window. This is the menu that is
displayed by right-clicking.
F11
- In
Internet Explorer
this key will allow you to toggle back and forth between
full screen view (all toolbars compressed into one thin
line) and normal view
2 - In Excel
this key will make a chart using data that you have
highlighted
3 - F11 +
Shift - in Excel this keyboard combination will
add worksheets to the workbook. Each time you tap F11 a new
worksheet is added.
F12
- Open a new document in
MS Word
2 - F12 +
Ctrl + Shift to print in
MS Word
3 - F12 +
Shift to
Save
in MS Word
4 - F12
to open the
Save As
dialog box in
MS Word
Print Screen - Don't look at your printer after pressing this key. This sends a copy of whatever is on the screen to the clipboard. One common use of this action is to paste the clipboard into Paint to copy a portion of an image for use in another application. As an example look at the Windows logo in the Windows key section of this page. That was produced by copying a small portion of the desktop image and pasting into a web page developer. If you wish to copy only the active window, hold down the Alt key, then tap on the Print Screen key. It will copy only that window that is active, not the whole desktop.
No
To All
Have you ever been doing
something in Windows that involved multiple files? If so,
you've probably come across a message similar to this at one
time or another:
Notice how there's an option for “Yes to All”, but no button
for “No to All”? What gives? I'm not going to be sitting
here rapidly clicking “No” all night, am I?
Well, the good news is that if you find yourself in this
situation, all you need to do to get “No to All” is hold the
Shift
key when you click “No”.
It's that easy! Just make sure you know what you're saying
no to in the first place!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Delete
Users cannot
turn the hibernation on or off via Vista GUI interface
anymore. Previously users can enable or disable hibernation
via Power Options applet in Control Panel. This option no
longer available in Windows Vista, which also enables
Hibernate ability and creates hiberfil.sys by default.
Instead, users have to rely on command line utility Powercf
and Disk Cleanup Wizard to disable hibernation in
powercfg.exe -h off
Another easier workaround for those who’re not comfortable to work with command line is to disable hibernation and hybrid sleep feature in Windows Vista is by using Disk Cleanup wizard tool, the built-in Windows disk cleaner, to delete hiberfil.sys file. The hibernation file must be enabled to access the hybrid sleep feature and the hibernation feature in Windows Vista.
The Recycle Bin usually appears on the desktop. If you prefer, you can hide it.
1.
Open Personalization by
clicking the
Start
button
,
clicking Control Panel,
clicking Appearance and Personalization,
and then clicking Personalization.
2. In the left pane, click Change desktop icons, and then do one of the following:
o To remove the Recycle Bin from the desktop, clear the Recycle Bin check box.
o To display the Recycle Bin on the desktop, select the Recycle Bin check box.
3. Click OK.
http://www.microsoft.com/nz/digitallife/windows7/default.mspx
Windows 7
http://www.theholidayspot.com/
some holiday fun.
http://www.jessicawatson.com.au/
Follow the round the world sailor.
Thanks Gordon.
JOKES SECTION
What beats his chest and swings from Christmas cake to Christmas
cake
Tarzipan
!
Mum,
Can I have a dog for Christmas ?
No you can have turkey
like everyone else !
What
did the big cracker say to the little
cracker ?
My pop is bigger than yours !
Who is never hungry at Christmas ?
The turkey - he's always stuffed !
What
bird has wings but cannot fly ?
Roast turkey !
Whats
the best thing to put into a Christmas cake
?
Your teeth !
We had grandma for Christmas dinner ?
Really, we had turkey !
Whats
happens if you eat the Christmas decorations
?
You get tinsel-itus
!
RECIPE SECTION
Don't want to stress you out or anything but Christmas is now just three weeks away - get ahead by making these mince pies now and putting them in the freezer.
Taste.com.au has everything you need for Christmas including Christmas gift ideas like truffles and rum balls, Christmas menu plans and handy video how to tips.
Recipe by Michelle Southan
CONCLUSION.
On behalf of all the committee members and the tutors of SeniorNet Canterbury I wish all the members, friends and readers a very happy and merry Christmas and a prosperous new year ahead and hope to see you all sometime in the year ahead.
The last help session for this year will be Tuesday 15 December and the first help session will be the 12 January 2010 starting at 12 noon and running through to 2 pm. If you have a problem over the holidays this will be the time and place to sort it out.
Till the next time
Happy and safe computing
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
83 rd Issue
WELCOME.
Welcome to the new members who are receiving this newsletter for the first time This society are still signing up new members on a regular basis and we hope that we can help these new and existing members to learn and enjoy their computing experience. If we can help you in any way just talk to a committee member or tutor or send me an email and we will see if we can help you. You know you only have to ask.
WE all thought that the winter was over and well past but the last few days has proved us wrong. I hope your garden has not suffered from the storm and with all the water we have received in the last few days, when we get some sun shine it should recover quickly. I am sure we were all looking forward to a long and hot summer ahead. I know I am.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the October monthly meeting is Andrew Harper the project Leader for Climate Data Acquisition for the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric research (NIWA). The topic for his talk is “The national Climate Network.”
This meeting is scheduled to be held on Thursday the 15 October starting at 2pm in the main hall at the Shirley Community Centre. Hope to see you there.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls.
www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site. Make it a favorite now and check out the web site on a regular basis.
Course and Workshop News:
October 2009
There are very few gaps in the timetable before the end of our year, so now is almost the last chance to book. The November Newsletter will contain the last few classes and workshops for 2009, including the popular Buying and Selling on TradeMe, and the December Newsletter will show the classes for the beginning of 2010.
COURSES
There are vacancies in these courses:
Introductory No. 102
Keyboarding Skills No. 108
Using Microsoft Word No.100, 107(This course is necessary before enrolling for File Management.)
Introductory Email No. 103
Advanced Email No. 106
File Management (Vista) No. 104
File Management (XP) No. 105
Desktop Publishing No. 107
Using Picasa No. 97
(Details of dates and times in the Newsletter and on the Website).
WORKSHOPS
Vacancies remain in these Workshops:
Restoring Old Photos Mon 19 October 12 noon
Installing/Uninstalling Programs Tues 20 October 9.45 am
Power Point Fri 30 October 12 noon
Using a Scanner Fri 30 October 2.15 pm
Transferring Music from Vinyl/tape to CD Fri 6 November 2.15 pm
Using Skype Mon 9 Nov 9.45 am
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place, 385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm. We appreciate it if you have your membership number ready, and if you have noted the class number rather than the date – we identify the classes by their number, shown in the first column on the list of Courses Available in the Newsletter.)
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
Do you use TelstraClear services?
TelstraClear is extremely financially supportive of SeniorNets, especially with their offer to credit the SeniorNet Federation with 3% of the billed amount of SeniorNet members’ phone accounts who register with TelstraClear. During this current year $25,000 has been received by the Federation for the benefit of all SeniorNets from this source. If your ISP is Telstra Clear, phone them (0508 888 800), say you are a member of SeniorNet Canterbury and wish to join their funding scheme. You will need your TelstraClear Account number.
HELP SESSIONS
Do you have a problem with your computer that is bugging you? Why not come along to a help session in the main computer room at Shirley on a Tuesday between 12 and 2 pm and seek the help of one of the tutors who willingly give up their time to help you. If you have a laptop bring it along and sort out the problem that has you stumped.
WE are going to try something new on Monday the 19th October at Diamond Harbour. After the class on that morning, we will be running a help session for all members residing at Diamond Harbour and who are having a problem with their computers. This will run from 12.30 to 2.30pm in the church hall where we run the classes. We hope to see members come along and avail themselves of the service. This SeniorNet is the only SeniorNet in New Zealand who have a branch teaching facility away from their main computer room. A New Zealand First. It has proved to be very popular and well worth while.
Upgrade from XP or Vista to Windows7
This month a new operating system is to be launched by Microsoft. It is called windows 7. But there are some downsides to Windows 7. First, you will only be able to directly upgrade Vista computers to the new version. People still using Windows XP will need to perform a more cumbersome multistep process. Microsoft is working on a method to help XP owners preserve all their data during this process.
Second, Windows 7 will eliminate some familiar bundled programs from Windows 7. Vista’s Mail, Calendar, Photo Gallery, Movie Maker, and Address Book programs are being removed. To get similar basic, free, programs, you’ll have to download them from Microsoft’s Windows Live service, or use alternatives from other companies. Microsoft defends this move as supporting consumer choice and better coordination with Web services, but it does remove out-of-the-box functionality from Windows.
TIPS SECTION
Set your mouse for a single click instead of a double click.
Do you wish to be able to single click items to open them as you do with Internet Explorer?
Click Start > Control Panel > (set to "Classic View) > click Folder
options > under
General tab > select the "Single-click to open an item (point to
select) also select “Underline icon titles only when I point at
them” in the radio box and click OK. If you do not like the method
reverse the instructions to return to normal.
Back to basics
If Windows Mail or Outlook Express has put the emails that have just come in on top of all others in the Received column, and you'd rather see them at the bottom so that old, undone emails get more attention, you may want to change the order of your Inbox. You could also sort emails by sender, or by subject. Do you see a small triangle symbol in one of the column titles? This is the sort function.
To change the sort order of a folder in Windows Mail or Outlook Express:
Click on the heading of the column by which you want to sort.
To reverse the order, click on the same column heading again.
You can include additional columns not shown by default. Select View | Columns... from the menu and check all desired criteria.
This tip can also be used in Windows Explorer to sort any of the columns displayed.
Keep It Speedy
Your computer may sometimes slow down or crash for no apparent reason. The following fixes may help reduce such problems, which are often related to basic file organization.
Defrag your drive. Overloaded hard drives often cause slowdowns. As you add more and more data to the drive, the data becomes increasingly scattered and your computer struggles to make things work quickly.
You can keep data better organized on your hard drive by running a defragmenter (defrag) program. Windows has a built-in defrag utility that you can access; click Start, All Programs (or Programs), Accessories, and System Tools; then click Disk Defragmenter.
This utility works a little differently in various versions of Windows, but you’ll need to select the drive you want to defragment and then start the process, which can take minutes or hours, depending on drive size. If you have a large hard drive, you should expect the process to take at least an hour; also note this utility will often run much more efficiently if you don’t use other programs during the procedure.
Reduce clutter. If the defrag process doesn’t speed things up, check your hard drive space. In My Computer, right-click the icon for the hard drive, then click Properties. Some sources indicate you should have at least 20% of the drive space free to help your processor manage things efficiently. Delete unnecessary data to create some room to breathe. Do not delete any files that you do not know their origin.
Windows can help you clear out garbage data with its Disk Cleanup utility. Click Start, All Programs (or Programs), Accessories, System Tools, and click Disk Cleanup. Point the program to the drive you want to clean and click OK, and Windows will hunt down such as Recycle Bin files, temporary Internet files, and other space wasters. When the process completes, you can examine these files and see how much space they consume. In most cases, it’s safe to let Windows remove these files for good.
Temporary Internet files that Internet Explorer creates are especially notorious for hogging hard drive space. By default, this program earmarks a huge chunk of space to store information about Web sites you’ve visited, but letting the program use more than 50MB is generally overkill. In IE, from the Tools menu, click Internet Options. In the Temporary Internet Files section, click Settings, then click and drag the Amount of Disk Space to Use slider to the left to reduce the space Explorer uses for temporary Internet Files.
Ditch old drivers and programs. It’s helpful to reduce temporary file storage but you may also benefit from removing old, unused drivers. That’s because your computer will continue to load old drivers on startup even if you’re not using the old hardware.
Those old drivers might cause device conflict problems, too, so it’s in your PC’s best interest to get rid of them. Click Start, point to Settings, and click Control Panel. Double-click the Add/Remove Programs icon and look for programs related to hardware you no longer use. Click the program, click Add/Remove, and click OK.
There are other ways to improve initial startup speeds. One is by removing unnecessary programs from the Startup menu.
To do so, click Start, Run, type Msconfig, and press ENTER. Click the Startup tab and you will see a list of programs that load every time your computer starts up. You’ll probably see programs, such as America Online or media players, which place icons in the System Tray or on the Taskbar and use system resources even if you rarely use the application.
Clear the checkboxes next to programs that you don’t want to load at startup. Take care when you do this—don’t clear a checkbox unless you’re absolutely sure of a program’s purpose because some of these programs are vital to starting the system. Once you finish removing programs from the startup routine, click OK; Windows will then prompt you to restart the computer.
Remember that if you do not understand these instructions, do not carry out the procedures but ask your tutors or come to a help session on a Tuesday for help and advice. Also any defragging should be done after you clean out the garbage and redundant programs.
Q. How do I tell what version of software I
have?
A. Click on the Help menu within the
software and then “About ... ”
Magnifier is a display utility that makes the computer screen more readable by people who have low vision by creating a separate window that displays a magnified portion of the screen. Magnifier provides a minimum level of functionality for people who have slight visual impairments. This procedure tells you how to turn on and use Magnifier.
|
|
Mouse actions |
|
||||||||
|
|
On the Start menu:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/accessibility/magnifierturnon.mspx
|
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JOKES SECTION
Rural Australian computer talk
LOG ON: Adding wood to make the barbie hotter.
LOG OFF: Not adding any more wood to the barbie.
MONITOR: Keeping an eye on the barbie.
DOWNLOAD: Getting the firewood off the Ute.
HARD DRIVE: Making the trip back home without any cold tinnies.
KEYBOARD: Where you hang the Ute keys.
WINDOW: What you shut when the weather's cold.
SCREEN: What you shut in the mozzie season.
BYTE: What mozzies do.
MEGABYTE: What Townsville mozzies do.
CHIP: A bar snack.
MICROCHIP: What's left in the bag after you've eaten the chips.
MODEM: What you did to the lawns.
LAPTOP: Where the cat sleeps.
SOFTWARE: Plastic knives & forks you get at Red Rooster.
HARDWARE: Stainless steel knives & forks - from K-Mart.
MOUSE: The small rodent that eats the grain in the shed.
MAINFRAME: What holds the shed up.
WEB: What spiders make.
WEBSITE: Usually in the shed or under the verandah.
SEARCH ENGINE: What you do when the Ute won't go.
CURSOR: What you say when the Ute won't go.
YAHOO: What you say when the Ute does go.
UPGRADE: A steep hill.
SERVER: The person at the pub who brings out the counter lunch...
MAIL SERVER: The bloke at the pub who brings out the counterlunch.
USER: The neighbour who keeps borrowing things.
NETWORK: What you do when you need to repair the fishing net.
INTERNET: Where you want the fish to go.
NETSCAPE: What the fish do when they discover the hole in the net.
ONLINE: Where you hang the washing.
OFFLINE: Where the washing ends up when the pegs aren't strong
enough.
Thanks Sheila
RECIPE SECTION
MEATBALL MEALS
500g lean beef mince
1 cup rolled oats
1 tsp made mustard
1 small onion chopped
1 tbsp tomato sauce
Salt and pepper,
1 egg
A little flour
A little Oil
2 cups frozen mixed vegetables
1 small can tomato or other soup
1 beef stock cube
1 cup‑water
1/2 tsp oregano
Mix mince, oats, mustard, sauce, seasoning and egg. Roll into, smallish balls and dust; with flour using a pan large enough to hold all ingredients, heat oil and add balls, turning gently to evenly brown. Add Vegetables, soup and stock cube mixed in water, and oregano. Combine gently simmer about 30 minutes. Serve on mashed potatoes.
CONCLUSION.
It will not be long before Christmas will be upon us and we will be at the end of another year. I hope that this year has treated you kindly and you look forward to another year ahead. Are you thinking a buying a new computer for Christmas? Come along and talk to a tutor first and they will be able to help you to make an informed selection.
If you do not wish to receive this newsletter please send me an email and I will remove your name from my listing. I do not wish to send it to anyone who does not wish to receive it. If I can include anything in the next newsletter that would be of interest to you please send me an email. Do you have a question that you would like answered? Send that email now and I will try to answer that question or find an expert who can.
Till next month
Happy and safe computing
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
82nd Issue.
WELCOME.
Welcome to you all especially the new members for this month. It is good to see the weather has improved and the winter is behind us now. Still a few frosts yet. As the help session is not very busy on a Tuesday these days I guess you are all in the garden getting ready for the growing season ahead.
SENIORNET
MONTHLY
MEETING
The
speaker for the monthly meeting to be held on Thursday 17th.
September at 2 pm in the main hall at the Shirley Community Centre is
Dana Burnett the web site officer at Environment
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls.
Course and Workshop News:
September 2009
Extra Workshop scheduled for Buying and Selling on Trade Me
The workshop advertised for 23 October filled so quickly that another
has been scheduled:
Wednesday
28th October, 9.45 am
This does not appear in your current Newsletter. Please ring to book a place – a very popular Workshop, so now’s your chance!
COURSES
Unfortunately
Desktop Publishing No. 99 has had to be cancelled. We hope that this
will be offered at a later date.
There are
vacancies in these courses:
Introductory Nos. 90, 96
Keyboarding Skills No. 98 –
only
one place,
so another will be scheduled.
Using Microsoft Word, 87, 91(This course is necessary before enrolling for File Management.)
Introductory Email No. 92
File
Management No. DH7
(Diamond Harbour members
only – only one place left.)
File
Management (
File
Management (XP) No. 93
Using
Excel No. 94
Computer
Maintenance No. 95
(2 weeks)
Using
Irfanview No. 86
(2 weeks)
Using
Picasa No. 97
(Details of dates and times in the Newsletter and on the Website).
WORKSHOPS
Vacancies remain in these Workshops:
Photo
Editing Fri 18 September 12 noon
Using
Photostory 3 Wed 23 September 12 noon
Making a
Composite Photo Fri 25 September 2.15 pm
Installing/Uninstalling Programs Tues 20 October 9.45 am
Power
Point Fri 30 October 12 noon
Buying and
Selling on Trade Me Wed 28 October 9.45
am
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place, 385 0902, 8
am to 8 pm. We appreciate it if you have your
membership
number
ready, and if you have noted the
class number
rather than the date – we identify the classes by their number, shown in
the first column on the list of Courses Available in the Newsletter.)
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please
don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
THE JEWEL OF THE HARBOUR – A CHURCH HALL
AND
SENIORNET CANTERBURY INC
By Ian
Scott
The last Annual General Meeting of SeniorNet Canterbury held at the
Shirley Community Centre saw a record turnout of members who elected
Gale Fursdon as their new Chairman and a good mix of experienced and new
Executive Committee members. SeniorNet Canterbury is now the largest
society of its type in
Most SeniorNet groups in
Members come from all walks of life and they bring with them a common
interest in computing. A profile of a typical member would perhaps be a
person whose family has gone overseas and who gave them a computer so
they could keep in touch by E-mail. “You just do this, this and this
Mum or Dad it’s so easy”. Well…..right! The Tutors at SeniorNet
Canterbury are patient, experienced and a good-natured bunch who are
very willing and skilled at explaining the uses of a computer. Members
can get extra free help at the regular weekly Help and Practice sessions
on Tuesdays between 12.00 noon and 2.00 pm. Courses are running all the
time. The Introductory course consists of four two-hour lessons that
are free when a student joins. It is a human tendency to want to run
before being able to walk and the beginners’ courses have been carefully
written so as to lead on – one to the next, so things are easily
understandable. Introductory has already been mentioned and the next
would be Keyboard Skills for those who are not familiar with a keyboard,
then Microsoft Word and File Management. Some of the other courses
are: Introductory and Advanced E-Mail, Desktop Publishing, Photoshop
Elements, Computer Maintenance, Genealogy, Picasa, Power Point, and a
new one recently started, Microsoft Excel Spreadsheet. Courses are
generally in the daytime though, if enough people prefer an evening
course, these can be arranged. Workshops are also held that may be both
Hands On or Demonstration and these cover subjects such as Digital
Cameras, Skype, Trade Me, Transferring Music from Vinyl/Tape to CD, CD
Writers, Printing Photos, and Photo Editing. Special Interest Groups
meet monthly; these cover Genealogy, Music and Video, Digital Imagery,
Flight Simulators and Technical Matters.
The Office at SeniorNet Canterbury is open week days from 10.00 am to
12.00 noon. So telephone (03) 386-2140 for an information pack. If
necessary, leave a message on the answerphone and we will get back to
you, or write to our Secretary, Kitty Milner, 41b
Carol Johannis, Assistant Tutor, SeniorNet Canterbury
with a class at
This article has been recently published in the Age Concern Newspaper "Keeping On”.
Did you see the article on SeniorNet Canterbury in THE BOX (Page 7) a paper that is part of the PRESS on Tuesday 8th September? If not, get a copy or go to the library and have a read about your SeniorNet.
TIPS SECTION
Jack
wants to know how to eliminate the text from under Windows desktop icons
A fair
number of folks who've been using Windows for years don't need the text
beneath the icons to tell them what program the icon represents. If
anyone does, then they won't want to remove the text from beneath the
icons. If you're tired of the text under the icons cluttering up the
desktop, you'll be happy to know that it's easy to remove the text.
Here's how you do it:
Note this only works with icons, it does not work with folders. So
before you go off right-clicking everything, stick with only icons and
this method will work for you:
1. Right-click on the icon from which you want to remove the text
2. Click "Rename"
3. Hold down the ALT key and use the numeric keyboard and type 255
4. Release the ALT key and press the Enter Key.
There you go, icons without text.
BACK TO
BASICS
THESE
INSTRUCTIONS ARE FOR THE XP OPERATING SYSTEM.
Backing up an important file.
Such as your ADDRESS BOOK.
This month I will show you how to back up your address book from Outlook Express to your USB removable drive. Every member should now have a USB removable drive for all the class files and onto this drive you can save your address book, in case your hard drive fails
First plug in your USB removable drive and open windows explorer by holding down the Windows key and tap the E key. Open your USB removable drive and you will see all the folders and files on it. Click FILE / NEW / FOLDER and rename the new folder ADDRESS BOOK
Close down Windows Explorer.
We will now find the address book, the file to backup.
Click on START then SEARCH and click all files and folders.
Click on Hidden Files and Folders.
In the search window put
“ *.wab”. (No quotes) The *
is a wildcat character and will find all files with any name for the *
and the extension of WAB is the extension for your address book and
stands for windows address book.
When it finds the file, Right click on the file name and then click on COPY.
Open Windows Explorer again
by holding down the Windows key and tap the E key and open your USB
removable drive. Right click on the folder
Address Book and click on
paste.
Now open the folder to make
sure the file “name.wab” is located inside.
You can
adjust the blink rate of your cursor and its width on screen. These
options can help make the cursor easier to see on screen or less
distracting for people who have vision or seizure disorder accessibility
needs. This procedure tells you how to set the cursor width and blink
rate through
Accessibility Options
in the
Control Panel.
Click On
Start
then Control
Panel
In
Control Panel
be sure you are in
Classic View
(all Control Panel icons are showing).
If not, under
Control Panel
in the left pane, select
Switch to Classic View.
Select
Accessibility
Options.
In the
Accessibility
Options dialog box, select the
Display
tab.
On the
Display
tab in the
Cursor Options
area:
Adjust the
Blink Rate
by moving the slider left for slower, right for faster.
Adjust the
Width
by moving the slider left for narrower, right for wider.
Click OK to save your
settings and close the dialog box.
Close the Control Panel.
For those
members with
Click On
Start
then Control
Panel
In
Control Panel
be sure you are in
Classic View
(all Control Panel icons are showing).
If not, under
Control Panel
in the left pane, select
Switch to Classic View.
Select
Ease Of Access
In the
Ease Of Access
dialog box, Select Make My Keyboard
Easier To Use.
Click Keyboard
Settings. (Near the bottom)
On the
Speed tab, under
cursor blink rate adjust the
Cursor
Blink Rate
by moving the slider from NONE
to Fast. Note the
blinking cursor at the left of the dialog box will change as you make
adjustments.
Click
OK to save your settings and
close the dialog box.
Close the Control Panel
JOKES SECTION
Laws Isaac Newton Forgot......
LAW OF
BREAD:
When the buttered slice of bread falls it always fall on the buttered
side.
LAW OF QUEUE: If you change queues, the one you have left
will start to move faster than the one you are in now.
LAW OF TELEPHONE: When you dial a wrong number, you never
get an engaged one.
LAW OF MECHANICAL REPAIR: After your hands become coated
with grease, your nose will begin to itch.
LAW OF THE WORKSHOP: Any tool, when dropped, will roll to
the least accessible corner.
LAW OF THE ALIBI: If you tell the boss you were late for
work because you had a flat tyre, the next morning you will have a flat
tyre.
LAW OF ENCOUNTERS: The probability of meeting someone you
know increases when you are with someone you don't want to be seen with.
LAW OF THE RESULT: When you try to prove to someone that
a machine won't work, it will!
LAW OF BIOMECHANICS: The severity of the itch is
inversely proportional to the reach.
THEATRE RULE: People with the seats at the furthest from
the aisle arrive last.
LAW OF COFFEE:
As soon as you sit down for a cup of hot coffee, your boss will ask you
to do something which will last until the coffee is cold!!
RECIPE SECTION
This is so super simple you will be thrilled. Serve in a large bowl
with salad and perhaps some bread to help mop up all the great sauce.
Olive oil for cooking
1 red onion, finely chopped or 2-3 small shallots finely sliced
3 cloves minced garlic
1-2 tsp dried thyme or 3-4 tsp fresh thyme
3 rashers lean bacon, chopped and rind removed
1 cup diced ham or Santa Rosa smoked chicken or left-over roast chicken
2-3 cups chopped mushrooms
1/2 cup or 125g lite crème fraiche
1 cup canned seasoned or chopped tomatoes (optional)
1 tsp balsamic vinegar or lemon juice
Salt and pepper to season
Generous spoonful of pesto or sun-dried tomato tapenade (optional)
250g penne pasta
Method:
Place a large pot of salted water on to boil for the pasta. In a large
fry-pan or pot sauté the onion and garlic in the olive oil for 5 minutes
on a low heat. Add the thyme and the bacon and stir and sauté for
another few minutes. Now add the ham (or cooked chicken) chopped
mushrooms and cook until the mushrooms have softened.
Cook the pasta according to the instructions on the packet, drain.
Add the lite crème fraiche, tomatoes and vinegar to the mushrooms and
when completely integrated, season the sauce and add the cooked pasta.
* Serve with a green salad and you can add extra crunch by adding
toasted pine nuts to this pasta. Also if you love Parmesan cheese, this
can be added with the crème fraiche and also when serving.
* This is an incredibly easy and flexible sauce – you can make it with
mussels and bacon or tuna and tomato, add parmesan cheese or not, add
smoked mushrooms, chutney and any other bold flavours and it will just
purr with delight in the pan – this recipe is so simple – you are only
limited by your imagination.
* For the TV session we did not add canned tomatoes but if you do it
will be less dry.
* The longer you leave the onion etc mix to cook the sweeter and better
the results will be.
TV3 John Campbell
CONCLUSION.
I hope that you found this
newsletter interesting. If not let me know what you would like to see
and I will try to oblige.
If you do not wish to receive further issues of this newsletter please
send me an email and I will remove you from my mailing listing.
I trust that you are all being careful while surfing on the internet. If a window suddenly pops up on your screen and you did not ask for it, close it down immediately. If it will not close down hold down the ALT and tap the F4 key until all windows are closed. If a popup windows tells you that you have a number of errors on your computer, check it out by doing a scan with your antivirus and antispyware program. Do not send any money oversees to pay for any program to remove any nasties without checking first with a SeniorNet committee person. There are a lot of scams out there and we do not want any members to be conned.
Happy and safe computing till
next month
Lester Reilly
Membership Officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
lester@seniornetcanty.co.nz
81st Issue
Hi and welcome to you all. I trust that you have survived the winter without getting that nasty flu. I have not heard of any of our members contacting the bad flu. I hope that this is true. The weather is starting to get a bit better now and the winter should be behind us, hopefully.
I hope that you will find something of interest in this month’s newsletter.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the monthly meeting is Ernie H Poole, a social historian and the subject of his talk is “Wandering waterways – a ramble through some of Christchurch’s social history.” Should be an interesting meeting. Hope to see you there. Come along and enjoy the company and have a cup of tea.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
August 2009
COURSES
The all-new Internet course (No.77) has been enthusiastically received but there are still two places available.
There are also vacancies in:
Introductory Nos. 79, 81
Keyboarding Skills No. 63
Using Microsoft Word, 75, 85
(This course is necessary before enrolling for File Management.)
Introductory Email No. 76
(only one place)
Advanced Email No. 84
File Management (Vista) No. 82
Using Irfanview No. 86
Genealogy No. 80
(Details of dates and times in the Newsletter and on the Website).
All members attending Introductory, Using Microsoft Word or File Management are asked to bring a USB Pen Drive to class, or to be prepared to buy one from SeniorNet. (Cost $20.00)
WORKSHOPS
Vacancies remain in these Workshops:
Restoring Old Photos Wed 19 Aug 12 noon
Scanner Fri 21 Aug 2.15
Using a Digital Camera Mon 31 Aug 12 noon
Mailwasher Wed 9 September 9.45
Photo Editing Fri 18 September 12 noon
Printing Photos Tues 22 September 9.45
Making a Composite Photo Fri 25 September 2.15
(Details for these Workshops are in the August Newsletter or on the Website.)
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place, 385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm. We appreciate it if you have your membership number ready, and if you have noted the class number rather than the date – we identify the classes by their number, shown in the first column on the list of Courses Available in the Newsletter.)
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
TIPS SECTION
A complaint from the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic, or CIPPIC, instigated the investigation, which started in May of last year.
The initial complaint was comprised of 24 allegations pertaining to 12 different subjects, including Facebook's default privacy settings, what the site does with member personal data, and the passing of this information onto third parties for advertising purposes. The latter issue was at the heart of the heated Facebook terms of service debate back in March of this year.
The investigation, which included several waves of interviews with Facebook executives, has made a few recommendations for the site. For one, it asks that Facebook developers only access the user information they need most in order to run a specific application.
Second, it requests that Facebook no longer allow developers to collect information from a user's "friends" when the user signs up for an application. (Source: azcentral.com)
Overall, the report has demanded that Facebook revise its vital policies and practices so that the user has ultimate control over the personal data being employed by the site or third parties. Up until now, Stoddart doesn't believe the site has done the best job in protecting the rights of its members.
"The central issue in CIPPIC's allegations was knowledge and consent," said Assistant Privacy Commissioner Elizabeth Denham. (Source: technewsworld.com)
Those responsible for the report have given Facebook 30 days to adjust its policies. It's unclear exactly what might happen if Facebook fails to make the changes, but it could lead to a lot of bad publicity both north and south of the 49th parallel.
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.
FINDING WHAT’S RUNNING ON YOUR COMPUTER
Sometimes you believe that some program is running on your computer that you did not start up, and you wonder what it is.
In Vista, you can track down just about any running software by pressing Ctrl+Alt+Del to open Task Manager, selecting the Processes tab, right-clicking the process in question, and selecting Properties.
This opens a window that displays the file's location on your hard drive, its security settings, its compatibility settings, and so on.
That's often enough to let you identify mystery software. Windows 7 will have this same feature.
XP do not have an easy way to identify running processes. However, a free program called Process Explorer will shows what is running any process on your computer, where the software is on your drive, and more. You can find the download site for the program through Google.
There are several ways
to select multiple files or folders.
a)
Open
the folder that contains the files or folders you want to select.
b)
Select the files or folders using any one of these methods:
c)
To
select a consecutive group of files or folders, click the first
item, hold down the SHIFT key, and then click the last item.
d)
To
select a consecutive group of files or folders without using the
keyboard, drag the mouse pointer to create a selection around the
outside of all the items you want to include.
e)
To
select non-consecutive files or folders, hold down CTRL, and then
click each item you want to select.
f)
To
select all of the files or folders, on the toolbar, click
Organize or Edit, and then click
Select All. Or hold down the CTRL key and
tap the A key.
To cancel the selection of individual items within a selected group,
hold down CTRL, and then click the items that you don't want to
include.
· If you want to clear your selection and start again, click a blank area of the folder window.
· You can perform many common tasks, such as copying, deleting, renaming, printing, and compressing files, by right-clicking the selected item and then clicking the appropriate choice.
Time Required: Cleaning a flat screen (LCD) monitor usually takes less than 5 minutes
1. Turn off the monitor. If the screen is dark, it will be easier to see the areas that are dirty or oily.
2. Use a dry, soft cloth and very gently wipe the screen. A great choice would be the microfiber type of cloth used to clean eyeglasses. See Tip #1 below for kinds of cloths to avoid.
3. If the dry cloth did not completely remove the dirt or oil, do not press harder in an attempt to scrub it off. Pushing directly on the LCD screen can often cause pixels to burn out.
4. If necessary, dampen the cloth with distilled water or with an equal ratio of distilled water to white vinegar. See Tip #2 below for products to avoid.
Many companies also sell small spray bottles of special cleaner for flat screen monitors but the vinegar mixture is usually just as effective.
5. The plastic edge that surrounds the screen can be cleaned with any multipurpose cleaner but take care to avoid contact with the screen itself.
1. Avoid using paper towels, toilet paper, tissue paper, or something like your shirt to wipe the LCD screen. These non-ultra soft materials can easily scratch the screen.
2. Avoid cleaning products that contain ammonia, ethyl alcohol, acetone, toluene, ethyl acid, or methyl chloride. These chemicals can react with the materials that the LCD screen is made of which could yellow the screen or cause other kinds of damage.
3. Never spray liquid directly on the LCD screen or it could run inside the monitor and cause damage.
With single–click in Windows XP, navigating the files and folders on your hard disk is as easy as navigating the Web. You simple click an icon to open a program or document.
To start using single–click:
|
1. |
In the Tools menu in Windows Explorer, click Folder Options. |
|
2. |
In the Click items as follows section, click Single–click to open an item (point to select). |
Note To access Windows Explorer, click Start, point to All Programs, and then click Windows Explorer or hold down the WINDOWS key and tap the E key.
To convert pdf files to a word file.
How long does food stay eatable in the frig.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/sleep/sheep/reaction_version5.swf
How fast are you Thanks robbiej
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/products/features
Read all about windows 7 the new operating system from Microsoft.
http://www.metservice.co.nz/public/trafficWebcams/home.html
Traffic cameras in Christchurch
Spinoffs to NASA
JOKES SECTION
For all of us who are seniors - for all of you who know seniors -
and for all of you who will be seniors. It pays to be able to laugh
about it when you are!
And, speaking of senior moments:
"WHERE is my SUNDAY paper?" The irate customer calling the newsagent
loudly demanded, wanting to know where her Sunday edition was.
"Madam", said the newspaper employee, "today is Saturday.
The Sunday paper is not
delivered until
tomorrow,
on
SUNDAY".
There was quite a long pause on the other end of the phone, followed
by a ray of recognition as she was heard to mutter.
"Well f**k
me dead ... that's why no one was at church today"...
RECIPE SECTION
5 MINUTE CHOCOLATE MUG CAKE
4 tablespoons flour
4 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons cocoa
1 egg
3 tablespoons milk
3 tablespoons oil
3 tablespoons chocolate chips (optional)
A small splash of vanilla extract
1 large coffee mug (Micro Safe)
Add dry ingredients to mug, and mix well. Add the egg and mix
thoroughly.
Pour in the milk and oil and mix well...
Add the chocolate chips (if using) and vanilla extract, and mix
again.
Put your mug in the microwave and cook for 3 minutes at 1000
watts.
The cake will rise over the top of the mug, but don't be
alarmed!
Allow to cool a little, and tip out onto a plate if desired.
EAT ! (This can serve 2 if you want to feel slightly more
virtuous).
And why is this the most dangerous cake recipe in the world?
Because now we are all only 5 minutes away from chocolate cake
at
any time of the day or night!
Thanks Beverley
CONCLUSION.
Another Enews ready for sending. If you know of any members who are not receiving this monthly newsletter ask them to send me an email with a request to be added to my mailing listing. Also if you do not wish to receive this monthly Enews, please send me an email and I will remove you from my listing.
Remember the help sessions on a Tuesday between 12 and 2pm. If you are having a problem, do not put up with it but come along to the help session and get a solution to that annoying problem. The tutors at that session are willing to help you with all your cell phone and computer problems.
Have you done that course or workshop yet? We have a number of vacancies in some of these listed above. Have a look now and see if any takes your fancy. If so book in before other members have a look.
If you are having a problem, send it to me and I will send you an answer or get one of our tutors to help you. Do you have a good tip that you would like to share with other members. Send it to me and I will include it in the next newsletter. All emails are welcome.
Till next month
Happy and safe computing.
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
80th. Issue
WELCOME.
Hi and Welcome to you all for another month. I trust that you are all well and keeping warm and safe from the flu.
Can you believe that half of the year is already gone? Have you done that course or workshop that you promised that you would do this year. Get onto it now as it will be Christmas before you know it. A list of the courses and workshop follows so have a look and see if there are any of interest.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
The next
MONTHLY MEETING to be held on
JULY 16 at 2.00 pm in the
main hall at the Shirley Community centre.
The speaker is
PROFESSOR
MARK BILLINGHURST Director, HITLabNZ
(Human Interface Technology Laboratory New Zealand)
The subject of his talk is “Adventures with Augmented Reality”
The HITLabNZ is revolutionising the way people interact with computers, by creating cutting-edge interfaces to enhance human capabilities, vanquish human limitations and increase the flexibility and utility of industry's existing products. They are developing and commercializing technology that improves human computer interaction and by doing so unlocks the power of human intelligence, by conducting research with new emerging technologies such as Augmented Reality, Next Generation Video Conferencing, and Immersive Visualisation. The end goal is to improve the user experience with technology. Visit www.hitlabnz.org.nz to find out more about this exciting field of research.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
July 2009
COURSES
There are vacancies in:
Introductory Nos. 59, 67 and 69
Keyboarding Skills No. 63
Using Microsoft Word, Nos 61, 68 and 75
(This course is necessary before
enrolling for File Management.)
Introductory Email Nos. 64, 71, 76 and DH6
(at Diamond Harbour)
File Management (Vista) No 70
File Management (XP) No. 72
Using Microsoft Excel No. 65
Using Irfanview No. 60
Using Photoshop Elements No 74
(Details of dates and times in the Newsletter and on the Website).
All members attending Introductory, Using Microsoft Word or File Management are asked to bring a USB Pen Drive to class, or to be prepared to buy one from SeniorNet. (Cost $20.00) Cheaper pen drives can be found at various outlets, but they are causing problems because they often have a lot of advertising on them which is difficult to delete.
WORKSHOPS
Vacancies remain in these Workshops:
Using
Skype Wed 29 July 12 noon
Transferring Music from Vinyl or Tape to CD Fri 31 July`9.45
Restoring Old Photos Wed 19 Aug 12 noon
Scanner Fri 21 Aug 2.15
(Details for these Workshops are in the June Newsletter or on the Website.)
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place, 385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm. We appreciate it if you have your membership number ready, and if you have noted the class number rather than the date – we identify the classes by their number, shown in the first column on the list of Courses Available in the Newsletter.)
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
TIPS SECTION
To always open a window in the maximised view.
If you open a window and it is not maximised you can make it maximised in a number of ways. One way is to right click on the icon of the program and then click properties. In the RUN window click on maximised and then OK to exit.
Another way is to put the mouse pointer over the blue bar at the top of the open window and holding down the left mouse button push the window into the top left corner of the screen. Then go to the bottom right corner of the window and pull that corner down to the right bottom corner of the screen. Hold down the SHIFT key and click on the close button in the top right corner of the window. When you next open that window it will open maximised.
Enable the check box for selecting multiple files
Just as we’ve almost finished highlighting several files while holding down the CTRL key our finger slips, instantly deselecting every single file. A better way. Open my computer in XP and select folder and search options from the organise pull down menu. Under the View tab, put a check mark next to “use check boxes to select items”. Now you can select multiply file by clicking on their check box. If you do not like the operation reverse the instructions.
Restore the menu bar in Vista Internet Explorer.
n XP we got accustomed to seeing File, Edit, View Tools and Help in the menu bar but in Vista Microsoft redesigned folders and windows so that resemble IE7 less than intuitive interface. One way to bring the menu bar back, is to click Organise, highlight Layout, and select Menu Bar, which makes the change permanent. For a temporary solution, press the ALT key which will bring up the menus for windows that you don’t normally have.
The message preview pane in Windows Mail or Outlook Express is really nice and useful, but it comes with the risk of catching a worm or virus by just previewing an email.
That's why it is best to disable the preview pane for security reasons in Windows Mail or Outlook Express, or at least to turn off automatic loading of remote images.
When you highlight a suspect message to delete it, with the preview pane turned on, you open the message and install any viruses attached to that message. Therefore it is wise not to have the preview pane turned on.
To turn off the message preview pane in Windows Mail or Outlook Express:
· Open Windows Mail or Outlook Express.
You can also click Apply to put the new settings into effect without closing the configuration dialog.
To open a message to read it, in its own pane, double click on that message. To view the next message click on either of the 2 arrows icons in the Tool bar to go either up or down in the listing.
CONVERTING USB FLASH DRIVES FROM FAT32TO NTFS FORMAT.
A pen drive formatted with a NTFS format will hold more data than one formatted with a Fat32 format. To change the forma, follow this procedure. You will delete any data on the USB pen drive so save the data first to your hard drive if you wish to keep it.
Insert flash drive in a USB
socket
Click on “Start”
Click on “My Computer”
Right click on USB flash drive
Click on “Properties”
Click on “Hardware”
Double click on your USB flash drive
Be careful that you have selected the correct drive.
Click on “Policies”
Select “Optimise for performance”
“OK” then “OK”
Click on “Start”
Click on “My Computer”
Right click on USB flash drive
Select “Format”
Select File system “NTFS”
Select allocation unit size “1024 bytes”
Into the Volume label panel you can name the flash drive with your name.
Click “Start” and press “Ok” in the warning panel.
When “format complete” is displayed, click “OK”
Click on “Close”
Remove your flash drive from the computer.
Thanks to Dafyd Smith.
TO ADD AN ITEM TO THE “SEND TO” MENU IN VISTA.
Tap WINDOWS key
Type "shell:sendto" no quotes and press ENTER
Right click and choose NEW then SHORTCUT and BROWSE button to browse
to the folder that you wish to add.
Click NEXT.
Give it a name.
Click FINISH.
Close window down.
That’s all. Test it to make sure that the folder is listed.
When a shortcut requires a key combination, the StickyKeys feature lets you press a modifier key, such as Shift, Ctrl, Alt, or the Windows Logo key, and have it remain active until another key is pressed.
To activate StickyKeys
|
1. |
Press the Shift key five times. A dialog box opens with instructions on how to set up the StickyKeys feature. |
|
2. |
If you click OK, an icon (a group of squares) appears in the notification area. |
To turn off StickyKeys, press the Shift key five times.
From Microsoft.
WinDirStat is a disk usage statistics viewer and cleanup tool for Microsoft Windows (all current variants).
All the games you will ever need.
http://www.yoingco.com/main_vista.htm
Free tutorials on Vista.
http://digital-photography-school.com/
Very good site for digital photographers.
I need your input. Please send me those sites that you visit so others may also enjoy them.
JOKES SECTION
Italian Tomato Garden:
An old Italian
lived alone in New Jersey. He wanted to plant his annual tomato
garden, but it was very difficult work as the ground was hard.
His only son, Vincent, who used to help him, was in prison. The old
man wrote a letter to his son and described his predicament:
Dear Vincent,
I am feeling pretty sad, because it looks like I won't be able to
plant my tomato garden this year. I'm just getting too old to be
digging up a garden plot. I know if you were here my troubles would
be over... I know you would be happy to dig the plot for me, like in
the old days.
Love, Papa
A few days later he received a letter from his son.
Dear Pop,
Don't dig up that garden. That's where the bodies are buried.
Love,
Vinnie
At 4 a.m. the next morning, FBI agents and local police arrived and
dug up the entire area without finding any bodies. They apologized
to the old man and left.
That same day the old man received another letter from his son.
Dear Pop,
Go ahead and plant the tomatoes now. That's the best I could do
under the circumstances.
Love you,
Vinnie
RECIPE SECTION
Preparation time:10 mins
Cooking time:50 mins
Serves:4-6
1. Preheat the oven to 180C. Place the chicken, mushrooms, onion, soup mix and apricots in a large casserole dish, cover and bake for about 45 minutes, or until the chicken is tender.
2. Stir in the beans or snow peas. Bake for a further 5 minutes and then serve with crusty bread and a salad.
CONCLUSION.
Have you visited a Help session with your problem recently? We get all types of questions and it makes an interesting day solving other members problems. Most are very simple requests but some times we are stumped. Come along on a Tuesday between 12 and 2pm and see the team sometime. You may learn something new.
Some Workshops are being cancelled because there are no takers. We generally only run a workshop if there are at least 3 persons or more registered. Some of the one day workshops are being extended into 2 day classes to give the members more content and to extend their knowledge of the subject. Have a look at the extensive list and see if a subject is of interest to you to learn a bit more on using your computer. You are always welcome at SeniorNet to tell the Shearers your requests for classes or workshops and hopefully we can supply your needs.
Till next month
Happy and safe commuting.
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
WELCOME.
Welcome to you all especially the new members who are receiving this electronic newsletter for the first time. If you are not receiving this newsletter it is because your Internet Service Provider is blocking it and classing it as SPAM. This applies to all yahoo/Xtra customers. This is why it is now sent as an attachment and not as the usual email. If you are not a yahoo/Xtra customer and would like the newsletter as an email please send me an email and I will send it as usual.
If you would like to see something different in this newsletter I would welcome any suggestions.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The June monthly meeting is to be held this Thursday the 18th June in the main hall at Shirley Community Centre Starting at 2pm.
The speaker for the meeting is Coen Lammers and the subject of the talk is Newspapers in the Digital Age. Coen is the Deputy Editor of the Christchurch press Ltd. Hope to see you there. These monthly talks are always very interesting.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the societies Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
June 2009
COURSES
There are vacancies in:
Introductory Nos. 53, 56, and 59
Keyboarding Skills No. 63
Using Microsoft Word, Nos. 51, 54 and 61
(This course is necessary before
enrolling for File Management.)
Introductory Email Nos. 64 and DH6
(at Diamond Harbour)
Using Microsoft Excel No. 65
Using Irfanview No. 60
(Details of dates and times in the Newsletter and on the Website).
All members attending Introductory, Using Microsoft Word or File Management are asked to bring a USB Pen Drive to class, or to be prepared to buy one from SeniorNet. (Cost $20.00) Cheaper pen drives can be found at various outlets, but they are causing problems because they often have a lot of advertising on them which is difficult to delete.
WORKSHOPS
Vacancies remain in these
Workshops:
Using a Digital Camera Tues 16 June 2.15
Photo Editing Fri 26 June 9.45
Installing and Uninstalling Programs Mon 6 July 2.15
Buying and Selling on TradeMe Tues 21 July 2.15
(Details for these Workshops are in the May Newsletter or on the Website.)
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place, 385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm. We appreciate it if you have your membership number ready, and if you have noted the class number rather than the date – we identify the classes by their number, shown in the first column on the list of Courses Available in the Newsletter.)
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
Scams
I cannot emphasise this enough. If you get an email or a request for your password, do not under any circumstance send it to anyone. There are a lot of scams that appear to come from Internet Service Providers such as Clear and Paradise and Banks such as Westpac and BNZ circulating at the present time supposedly checking data bases and requesting logins and passwords. They are ALL scams and MUST be avoided at all cost. Delete the emails immediately and do not reply to them. If you have any doubts, send the email to a committee member and ask them to check it out. They will be happy to do so.
TIPS SECTION
TO DISABLE ERROR REPORTING IN VISTA.
Some times an error occurs in the running of a program and wants to report the error to Microsoft. This can be a pain and a waste of time. To turn off this action:
Click start
Click on Control Panel and then “problem reports and error and solutions.”
Click “change settings”
Click “advanced settings”
Click “off” under advanced settings for problem reporting.
Then ok to exit.
CONSERVE YOUR LCD MONITOR'S LIFESPAN
Like all electronics, LCD monitors have a lifespan. Usually, this can be up to ten years or so, but even after only a couple of years our monitors can begin to dim; giving us a dark, eye-straining image that can make it difficult to get anything accomplished! You can tweak the brightness, fiddle with the contrast, but the damage has already been done. Your backlight is dying and you need to start shopping for a new monitor.
But wait! Say the monitor you're using still looks good at the moment. Is there any way to prolong the life of your LCD?
Why, yes, folks, there is! It's really easy, too! Notice the row of buttons on the front or side of your monitor? That's the adjustment panel. Here, you can set your monitor's brightness, contrast, horizontal and vertical positioning and a bunch of other settings to make your viewing experience better!
For now, all we're concerned with is the brightness and contrast. To make sure the backlight in your monitor lives as long as possible, turn both of these down a bit; just to tolerable levels. This takes the strain off of your monitor's backlight and will ensure that your investment sticks around for awhile!
As an added bonus: Here's a neat site that has all sorts of tests and explanations to keep your LCD monitor looking good and performing up to spec: http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/
I suggest that you only
do this if you are an experienced operator.
On–Screen Keyboard is an accessibility utility that displays a virtual keyboard on the computer screen that allows people with mobility impairments to type data by using a pointing device or joystick. Besides providing a minimum level of functionality for some people with mobility impairments, On–Screen Keyboard can also help people who do not know how to type. This procedure tells you how to turn on and use On–Screen Keyboard.
Go to start, all programs accessories, select on screen key board. Or go to RUN and type OSK. Click on each button to insert text in your document.
It is suggested to use this keyboard when using a different computer when away for home especially when at an internet café. Should there be a key logger on that computer, using this type of key boards should fool the key logger in remembering your key strokes such as bank logins and passwords.
USING A USB DRIVE TO SAVE ALL YOUR PASSWORDS.
Create a text file using Word listing all the web sites, logins and passwords for all the different web sites that you visit.
It is not a good idea to have the same password for all entries especially your Internet banking password. This must be different from all your other passwords and changed when your bank suggests.
When you go away on holiday take your USB drive with you but please do not lose it as anyone will be able to read the data if you do not password it.
There are different ways that you can protect your data. I suggest a free utility that could password protect and encrypt your USB drive. I found one called Cryptainer LE from Cypherix. I have not tried it but it has possibilities. http://www.timeatlas.com/mos/Useful_Utilities/Free/How_to_Password_Protect_Your_USB_Drive/
When you wish to insert a password, insert the USB pen drive into the computer, open your word file or document, and insert the password etc by using Copy and Paste. This will defeat any key loggers that may be located on the loan computer.
These tips thanks to Dafyd Smith when demonstrated at a recent meeting.
Remember, if you keep pressing Ctrl + Z you can undo back 256 steps!!!! But you cannot skip steps. It undoes each one in turn. Redo is the same.
You could also click on the appropriate buttons on the Toolbar
The left one is Undo and the other is Redo. You will notice a little arrow at the right hand side of each of these button. Click on this to get a history of editing you have done. Click on any entry and you will undo everything you have done right back to that point.
A very important Quick Key is Ctrl + S. This is the Save command. If you are typing a document I would recommend that you either press this keystroke, click on the Save button, or open the File Menu and click the Save option every five minutes or so. This will prevent you from losing more than five minutes worth of your hard work. It is very frustrating to type for an hour then accidentally delete it all, or if the power fails killing your computer thus losing it all.
Have you typed something in upper case and you really required the text in lower case?
The easiest way to change it is to highlight the text, hold down the SHIFT Key and tap the F3 key a number of times and watch the changes to the highlighted text. When the required format is displayed, click away from the highlighted text to remove the highlighting.
Advanced System care.
I suggest that if you wish to clean out your computer of junk files and clean up other areas of your computer that you download and install and run on a regular basis a program called Advanced system care. It can be downloaded from http://www.iobit.com/advancedwindowscareper.html
and is freeware. There is a pro version but that is paid for and is not necessary for home use. It is designed for windows 2000 and later. Else come to a help session on a Tuesday and bring your pen drive and a copy will be given to you to install on your computer.
It will keep your computer error free and running smoother than ever before.
BACKUP YOUR ADDRESS BOOK IN XP
Quit Outlook Express.
Locate the .wab file. To do so, click Start, point to Find or search, and then click Files Or Folders.
In the Named box, type *.wab, and then click Find Now.
Copy the
username.wab
file to your pen drive or a floppy disk where
username
is the name or alias of the Outlook Express user that the .wab file
belongs to.
BACKUP YOUR CONTACTS FOLDER IN
VISTA.
Find your contacts folder and copy that folder to your USB pen drive. Use windows explorer to list your “user name” folders and you will find a folder there called CONTACTS. This is the folder to copy.
PURCHASING AND RENAME YOUR USB PEN DRIVE
We have USB pen drives for purchase at SeniorNet that have the data that you require for your classes already installed. If you wish to purchase one from a local supplier please do not purchase a U3 type as they have software installed that is not required at SeniorNet. I suggest that you purchase an empty USB pen drive in preference to this type. I suggest that a 2GB size is sufficient for all your files. If you purchase a USB pen drive from a local supplier the tutor at your first lesson will copy all the class files to your USB pen drive for you.
WE suggest that you rename your pen drive using your first or last name. To do this, open Windows Explorer by holding down the windows key and tap the E key. Plug you USB pen drive into the USB slot and watch the drives. When the USB drive is recognised by the computer and finishes installing some software, an entry will show in the list of drives on your computers as E:removable drive. Right click on this name and then type in your new name for the drive ie Lester2gb. Press ENTER to attach the name. If you have trouble understanding these instructions see your tutor when you are next at SeniorNet. He will do it for you.
You
must bring you USB pen
drive with you whenever you come to SeniorNet. So many members do
not do so.
http://www.onlinecrosswords.net/
free online crossword puzzles each day or print them out if you wish.
http://www.spywarewarrior.com/rogue_anti-spyware.htm#notes
check out for scams in spyware.
http://www.internetchoice.co.nz/index.php
List of all the ISP and broadband rates.
JOKES SECTION
LINES TO MAKE YOU SMILE
1.. My husband and I divorced
over religious differences. He thought he was God and I didn't.
2.. I don't suffer from insanity; I enjoy every minute of it.
3.. Some people are alive only because it's illegal to kill them.
4.. I used to have a handle on life, but it broke.
5.. Don't take life too seriously; no one gets out alive.
6.. You're just jealous because the voices only talk to me.
7.. Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder.
8.. Earth is the insane asylum for the universe.
9.. I'm not a complete idiot -- Some parts are just missing.
10.. Out of my mind. Back in five minutes.
11.. God must love stupid people; He made so many.
12.. The gene pool could use a little chlorine.
13.. Consciousness: That annoying time between naps.
14.. Ever stop to think, and forget to start again?
15.. Being 'over the hill' is much better than being under it!
16.. Wrinkled Was Not One of the Things I Wanted to Be When I Grew up.
17.. Procrastinate Now!
18.. A hangover is the wrath of grapes.
19.. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a cash advance.
20.. Stupidity is not a handicap. Park elsewhere!
21..They call it PMS because Mad Cow Disease was already taken.
22.. He who dies with the most toys is nonetheless DEAD.
23.. A picture is worth a thousand words, but it uses up three
thousand times the memory.
24.. The trouble with life is there's no background music.
25.. I smile because I don't know what the hell is going on.
Appreciate
every single thing you have, especially your friends!
Life is too short and friends are too few.
RECIPE SECTION
Ingredients
To each pound of
meat allow 2 pounds of potato half pound of onions and
enough water to cover. The Ingredients are for 4 to 6 people
2 lbs. of lamb or Beef
4 lbs. of potatoes
1 lbs. of onions
2 bay leaves
What to Do
Add seasoning to 1
pint of water.
Cut the meat into cubes (no fat)
Cut the potatoes in half
Slice the onions thickly
Put the lot into a large saucepan and cover with lid.
Simmer for two hours stirring now and then. Watch that it doesn't get to
thick (Add more water if necessary)
A recipe for the cold weather.
CONCLUSION.
Do you have a problem that is bugging you? The help session on a Tuesday is the place to come for help between 12 and 2pm. Bring along your laptop if the problem is on that. A number of people avail themselves of the service lately and we are happy to help if at all possible. Do you wish to delete Nortons or another antivirus software and install AVG or Avast as your preferred antivirus software? The help session is the place to come. If there are lots of people you may have a bit of a wait but the tutors present will do their best to attend to you as soon as possible.
Do you have a question that you would like an answer to? If you would like to see something different in this news letter send me an email and I will look at any suggestions.
Till next month
Happy and safe computing.
Lester
Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
WELCOME.
Welcome to this issue of Enews. Especially the new members who have joined in the last month.
Did you get last months issue of Enews? Yahoo and Xtra decided that Enews is spam and blocked its delivery to all Xtra and yahoo customers. I am sending this another way and you should be able to read the attachment with Word or Wordpad. I will place a copy on SeniorNet’s web page and it can be downloaded from there if you have any trouble.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the monthly meeting is Andrew Dickerson. Andrew has been to SeniorNet meetings before and is always welcome. His talk is entitled,” Retirement villages- The lifestyle you want?” Hope to see you there. Should be an interesting talk.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop
News:
May 2009
COURSES
Two new courses are offered this month, developed from Workshops.
Picasa 3 - 22 May – 12 June
Friday 12 noon - starts next
Friday!
Computer Maintenance (2 weeks) 2 June – 10 June Wed. 9.45
There are also vacancies in our regular courses
Using Microsoft Word, Nos. 51
and 52 (This course is necessary before enrolling for File Management.)
File Management, Nos. 42 and 50
( Details of dates and times in the Newsletter and on the Website).
All members attending Introductory, Using Microsoft Word or File Management are asked to bring a USB Pen Drive to class, or to be prepared to buy one from SeniorNet. (Cost $20.00)
WORKSHOPS
Vacancies remain in these Workshops:
PhotoStory 3
Mon 18 May 9.45 – tomorrow!
Choosing a Digital Camera Mon 25 May 9.45
Using a Digital Camera Tues 16 June 2.15
Removing Objects and changing backgrounds Mon 6 July 9.45
(Details for these Workshops are in the May Newsletter or on the Website.)
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place, 385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm. We appreciate it if you have your membership number ready, and if you have noted the class number rather than the date – we identify the classes by their number, shown in the first column on the list of Courses Available in the Newsletter.)
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
April Enews.
Did you receive Enews last month? Was it tagged as SPAM? If you received it you are one of the lucky ones. Yahoo or Xtra blocked Enews to all Xtra or yahoo members and bounced a message back to my computer. I received 394 reports. Some ISP tagged Enews as spam and advised readers not to open the file.
I tried to send Enews in larger groups than I normally do and this created a problem. If you would like a copy of that Enews please send me an email and I will forward a copy to you. April Enews has now been loaded on the SeniorNet’s web page and can be downloaded from there.
Scam to Clear and Paradise customers.
Attention:Clear.net.nz Email
Users
WE are upgrading our Database Server from the old Server (Nol06717) to a new
and better Server(No221766).
We are doing our best to serve you better. You are to fill the details below
to enable us upgrade and verify your account from the old server.
FILL THE DETAILS BELOW OR ANYWHERE IN THE MAIL
Have you
received an email like this DO NOT REPLY TO IT.
It is a scam and must be ignored.
Remember the rule:
DO NOT REPLY TO ANY EMAIL MESSAGE THAT ASKS FOR YOUR USER NAME AND PASSWORD. THEY ALREADY HAVE THIS DETAIL AND WILL NOT ASK AGAIN FOR IT. This rule applies to banks, internet providers and anyone else that you deal with.
Please be a safe user and always remember this rule.
TIPS SECTION
The Windows Print Screen Key can be a powerful tool if you know how to use it to its full potential. There are some who initially think that when they press the Print Screen Key that it will literally be sent to the printer! That's okay, we've all been there, done that. Just don't tell anyone!
The key may appear differently depending on the manufacturer of your Windows keyboard. The standard position would be at the upper right hand corner of your keyboard and may appear within this sequence of keys...
F9 F10 F11 F12 Print Screen Scroll Lock Pause/Break
The sole function of this key is to take a snapshot or picture of your computer screen and copy it to the clipboard (the clipboard is an invisible holding area for content that is copied). It’s the same thing as if you copied something from a document and it is now on your clipboard waiting to be pasted in its final destination. It’s that simple.
Often abbreviated Prt Scr, the Print Screen key is a useful key supported on most PCs.
Now, how do you get to see those Screen Captures or maybe even
send them to someone? The quickest and most effective method is to have a
graphics editing program handy. If that is not an option, you can open your
favorite word processing program and create a new document. Position your
cursor
at
the beginning of the document or wherever you want the screenshot to appear.
Using your keyboard, press Ctrl + V which will Paste the screenshot in your open document. Now you can Save (Ctrl + S) the document to wherever you wish, make sure to name it appropriately so you can easily find it.
You can now send this file to anyone via email, use it in a presentation, create your own little book of screenshots showing how to perform a specific task, etc. The possibilities are endless.
If you hold down the ALT key when you hit screen capture, you'll only capture the active window. This is the smaller window in the middle of your screen and sometimes this is the window that you require. Try it now. It is very easy when you know how.
REMOVABLE DRIVE OR FLASH DRIVES OR USB PEN DRIVES.
Here at SeniorNet Canterbury we are encouraging all members to purchase a USB pen drive. We have them for sale at $20.00 each, loaded with the class files. As they do not come with instructions I will list some here. They're very easy to use and you should not have any problem copying and reading the files.
The first thing you'll want to do is go to your desktop and double click on the My Computer icon. Leave that open and then continue on with the next step. Next, you need to actually plug the USB pen drive into your computer. It will only go in one way to a USB slot on your computer. If the port is at the rear of your computer I suggest that your go to a computer store like Dick Smith and purchase a 1m. long extension cable so that you can now plug the USB Pen drive into the front of your computer.
If you use Windows XP or Vista, you don't need any drivers to get the USB pen drive up and running. Just plug it into one of your available USB ports and your computer will automatically recognize it. A "Found New Hardware" bubble will pop up in the bottom right hand corner of your desktop, so always look for that before you do anything else. On the other hand, if you use an older version of Windows, you'll need to install the driver CD that comes with your removable pen drive in order for it to work properly. If a CD did not come with the USB pen drive you will have to go on line and download a driver from the web site of the manufacturer of the USB pen drive.
Now, make sure you have your eye on the My Computer window and when you plug your USB pen drive in, look there to see where the USB pen drive goes. More than likely, it will bring up a new drive for you and it will be labeled as "Removable." On my computer, it comes up as "Removable Disk (E:)," but yours could be different, so just keep an eye on it. Once you find the correct drive letter, double click on it and you should see a list of the files on the USB drive.
You can open, copy and paste or delete the files just as if there were on your hard drive. Once you have all the files you want saved on there, you can then go and put them on another computer or whatever you need to do. USB pen drives really are awesome little devices for moving files from one computer to another such as between the computers at SeniorNet and your own home computer.
To remove the USB drive, make sure you use the Safely Remove Hardware icon located in the tray next to the clock to ensure you do not lose any data still in the buffers. You can also right click on the assigned drive and click on Eject.
I suggest that you also change the name of the USB Pendrive so that you may recognise it when you plug it in. I suggest that you change the name to your name. Right click on the old name and select RENAME. Input your name and press Enter to affix the new name.
DO YOU USE
“SEND TO “MENU
If you right-click a file in Windows Explorer or My Computer, one of the
options you'll get from the resulting menu is “Send To ". You can use
this “Send to “option to send the file in question to another
location, person, program, etc.
For example, one option is to Send To, desktop (shortcut). You can use this option to create a desktop shortcut to the file.
You can also use it to send a file to a removable pen Drive, CD-RW, an e-mail recipient and more. It's probably one of the most useful, yet unused, features of Windows.
Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) is an anti-piracy system created by Microsoft that enforces online validation of the licensing of several recent Microsoft Windows operating systems when accessing several services, such as Windows Update, and downloading Windows components from the Microsoft Download Center. WGA consists of two components; an installable component called WGA Notifications that hooks into Winlogon and validates the Windows license upon each logon and an ActiveX control that checks the validity of the Windows license when downloading certain updates from the Microsoft Download Center or Windows Update. WGA Notifications covers Windows XP, Windows Vista and current test versions of Windows 7. It does not cover other versions of the Windows NT family, such as Windows 2000 and Windows Server 2003, or the Windows 9x family. The ActiveX control however checks Windows 2000 Professional licenses as well.
Despite its name it does not directly evaluate the integrity or security of any computer.
Vista –
LARGER FONT SIZE.
Do you want to increase your font size in Vista?
Right click on a blank area of your
desktop. Select personalize.
Select adjust size and then continue.
Select larger scale (DPI) and apply.
Ok to exit. Do a restart to see the different font size.
TO PUT BACK THE RUN FUNCTION.
Right click on the START button.
Select properties.
Select START MENU and CUSTOMISE.
Scroll down and tick the box alongside RUN
Apply and Ok to exit.
Have you heard about SyncToy?
It is a free Microsoft program (currently v2.0) which helps you to copy, move, rename and delete files between folders and computers quickly and easily. The accent is on the copy. When you use this program for the first time you can copy all your files from your Documents folder (or anywhere else) onto a backup source (i.e., another disc, a flash drive, external hard drive) to provide a safe backup for all your files. The backup is remarkably quick.
When you use the program for second and subsequent times, the program merely searches your computer for those files which have been changed since your previous backup, and copies them to your backup source. These subsequent backups are of course even quicker because only the altered files are being copied.
Note that it is a free download from Microsoft Download Centre and it is easy to use. In its default downloaded state it is perfectly acceptable, but if you wish to customise any features, this is also possible. In the Google searchline type: SyncToy v2.0, and click on Download details: SyncToy v2.0 to read all about this program.
(Editor -I have not yet tried this but it looks interesting for the experts to try.)
INTERESTING WEB SITES.
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=320820
How to backup files and folders using XP.
http://www.savetube.com/tutorial.htm
Video to save a YouTube video
http://scambusters.co.nz/scams.html
Scams on TradeMe and how to avoid them.
JOKES SECTION
It's wise to remember how easily email -- this wonderful technology -- can be misused, sometimes unintentionally, with serious consequences.
Consider the case of the Illinois man who left the snow-filled streets of Chicago for a vacation in Florida. His wife was on a business trip and was planning to meet him there the next day. When he reached his hotel, he decided to send his wife a quick email.
Unfortunately, when typing her address, he missed one letter, and his note was directed instead to an elderly preacher's wife whose husband had passed away only the day before. When the grieving widow checked her email, she took one look at the monitor, let out a piercing scream, and fell to the floor in a dead faint.
At the sound, her family rushed into the room and saw this note on the screen:
"Dearest Wife, Just got checked in. Everything prepared for your arrival tomorrow. P.S. Sure is hot down here."
RECIPE SECTION
Serves 6
200 ml (7 fl oz) Milk
75g (3 oz) Cheese
2 Eggs
40g (1½ oz) Plain Flour
40g (1½ oz) Butter
Pre-heat oven to 190°C: 375°F: Gas 5
In a saucepan heat the butter, flour and milk together, bring to a boil,
whisking continuously until thickened and smooth.
Simmer for a minute or two.
Remove from the heat and add the grated cheese.
Stir until melted then beat in the egg yolks, allow to cool slightly.
Whisk the egg whites until stiff.
Carefully fold into the cheese mixture.
Pour into 6 buttered ramekins and bake for 30 minutes.
Serve immediately.
CONCLUSION.
I hope that you have enjoyed the
read and found sometime of interest. If not send me your suggestions .They
are always welcome.
If you no longer wish to receive this Enews please send me an Email and I
will remove your name from my mailing list.
If I can answer any questions about anything to do with computers please
send me an email and I will put the answer in the next newsletter.
Til next month
Enjoy safe and enjoyable computing.
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc
lester@seniornetcanty.co.nz
April 2009
77 TH. Issue
WELCOME.
Hi to you all. Where has the last month gone? It seems like yesterday when I was sending out the March Enews. SeniorNet is also very busy with new members all requiring Intro Classes. We are also doing classes at Diamond Harbour on a Monday morning so that is also keeping the tutors busy. Have you booked into that class yet? Some of the classes and workshops are being run with vacancies in the classes. Have a look below and join a class. Some of the subjects are run only twice a year.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The Monthly meeting to be held on 16 April at 2 pm is the Annual General meeting for the society. Come along and have your say in the running of the society. As there are more nominations than vacancies on the committee there will be an election this year.
The speaker following is Grant Sideway and this topic for his talk is “It’s a mobile world”. His talks are always interesting and entertaining.
Hope to see you there.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit our Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
April 2009
COURSES
The new course in Using Microsoft Excel is starting this month. (Course No. 34) This course explores the exciting possibilities of this useful and versatile program.
Also offered is Desktop Publishing*, another fascinating advanced course.
There are vacancies in these classes: (* means that it requires File Management.)
31 Introductory
38 Introductory
39 Introductory
32 File Management
34 Using Ms Excel
40 Desktop Publishing*
41 Using Ms Word
42 File Management
(Details all in the March Newsletter or on the Website)
WORKSHOPS
A few vacancies remain in these Workshops:
Restoring Old Photos (next Wednesday!)
Power Point
Mailwasher
CD Writers
PhotoStory 3
Choosing a Digital Camera
(Details for these Workshops are in the March Newsletter or on the Website.)
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place, 385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm. It saves us time if you have your Membership Number ready when you ring!
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
TIPS SECTION
IT’S A BAD IDEA TO CLICK LINKS IN AN EMAIL!
I guess most people have been told this, but it doesn't hurt to add a fresh reminder.
This came to my mind this week when I received an email with the heading:-
You've received a question from a Trade me member
It looked suspicious even before I looked at the message .
Then the message itself said:-
I'm interested to purchase your item right away. Do
you have a buy it now price?
Please respond.
To respond click here:
http://www.trademe.co.nz/Members/Login.aspx%3c/a>
Thank you.
Even more suspicious, since I don't have anything listed on TradeMe anyway – and there's a link to click – big danger signal.
The part that will fool many people with this kind of message is that the address shown in the link looks likes the genuine TradeMe web address. However, what you see in the email is just a text label attached to the link – the destination for the link is not actually shown in the displayed message.
Being curious, I did a couple of things:-
1) I started my browser and went to the TradeMe site and
logged in, the usual way.
No sign of a message for me when I logged in, as expected.
2) I had a look at the email message in raw form(you can do this in Outlook Express by right clicking the message header and selecting “Properties”, then clicking the “Details” tab and the “message source” button).
The part of the message containing the link looks like this:-
To respond click here : <a href="http://208.77.100.125/trademe/login.aspx.php">
http://www.trademe.co.nz/Members/Login.aspx%3c/a> <br>
So, clicking the link would have taken me to a site with the IP address 208.77.100.125
3) A bit of investigation showed that the site isn't TradeMe, but some company in Altamonte Springs, USA. Also that site has been reported as a “Phishing” site.
In appearance it looks identical to the TradeMe login page, complete with slots for you to enter your email address and password.
So, it appears to be a site designed to collect login details from TradeMe members, no doubt to be used for some dodgy purpose or other.
The moral to this story is to avoid clicking links contained in email messages, especially if they take you to sites where you will normally enter some security information (e.g. your internet banking site or, in this case, TradeMe).
If the supposed identity of the site is shown in the email, you can always go to it by the normal method without clicking the email link, by using your internet browser.
Or, if you can't identify the site and still feel like trying the link you could first look for the IP address as I did, then enter the IP number into a search engine such as Google to see if that brings up any useful information.
Thanks to John Selby for sending me this article
SeniorNet Napier.
Does your computer seem to be running slower than normal?
Do you have AVG installed and running all the time?
Do you have a dialup connection to the internet?
WE are receiving reports from members who have an older computer (Less than 1 GHz) and with a minimum of RAM (256 mb.) who have noticed a serious slowing down of their computer lately.
As a trial, we suggest that you uninstall the AVG antivirus and then reboot the computer. If you notice a noticeable speedup of the running of the computer, it is obvious that AVG is the culprit that is slowing down your computer.
If you are on a dialup connection to the internet and do not visit dodgy site or download music and videos from sites like limewire, you should be safe from receiving a virus. If you only download emails from a large Internet Services Provider such as Xtra, Clear and Paradise etc, you should not receive a virus as all these ISP are scanning for viruses before the emails can be downloaded by you.
If you feel that you can not run your computer without antivirus software come to SeniorNet and purchase the latest version of AVG or try the other free antivirus software AVAST that we promote. Both come on a CD at a cost of $2 each.
Windows D
So, say you're like me and have a billion and a half windows open all at once. Now, say you would like to access your desktop to open yet another program, but don't want to bother minimizing each and every window one at a time. You could click the "Show Desktop" icon, sure, but that would require moving your mouse, wouldn't it? I say forget that! Let keyboard shortcuts rule the day!
Take the work out of minimization by using the "Win-D" method. Simply hold
the Windows key (the one with the little Windows logo) on your keyboard in
conjunction with the letter D and *poof!* you're Samantha Stevens from
Bewitched! Want them to come back? Use the same key combo and everything is
back where it once was!
World start.
Question 1: When I want to correct a word in an email, I put my curser in and type a letter; it also deletes the next letter. You gave the answer when this happened one other time, but I've forgotten.
The insert key on your keyboard has two functions, one is insert the other is replace. Press it again to change the function.
Question 2: When I type in a web address in Google, the history doesn’t come and I have to type in the whole thing. Have I lost a tick?
Perhaps AutoComplete is not activated in your browser and you want to turn it on. Or maybe you'd rather not have AutoComplete remember user names and passwords that might let others access sensitive information. You can change these settings in Internet Explorer by following these steps:
|
1. |
On the Internet Explorer Tools menu, click Internet Options. |
|
2. |
In the Internet Options box, click the Content tab, and click the AutoComplete button. The AutoComplete Settings box will appear. |
|
3. |
To turn AutoComplete on, click the boxes next to
the types of information you want AutoComplete to remember.
For example, you can click the "Web addresses" box if you want AutoComplete to find quick matches for the Web sites that you type into the Internet Explorer Address Bar. When you click an empty box, a check mark will appear to let you know that you have chosen to have AutoComplete remember that type of information. |
|
4. |
If you don't want AutoComplete to remember user
names and passwords, you can uncheck the box for
User names and
passwords on forms Clicking a box that already has a check mark in it will clear the box. Tip: You can erase any user names and passwords that Internet Explorer has already remembered by clicking the Clear Passwords button.
AutoComplete
Settings box |
|
5. |
When you're done choosing your AutoComplete settings, click OK twice. |
To print out your contacts listing in Vista (called address book in XP)
1. Open windows mail. Click on contacts icon
2. Click Export -
3. In the next screen, click once on "csv (Comma Separated Values)" and click Export.
4. Under "Save exported file as", type: addresses then click the Browse button. This should take you to the folder called Documents. Click Save.
5. Now you are back to the previous window. Click Next.
6. In the list of fields, put a check in “Name” and E-Mail Address” only. Untick all other boxes. Click Finish.
After a few seconds, you will see a window that says "Address book export process has completed". Congratulations...but you're not done yet.
What you now have is a copy of your address book placed in your Documents folder. If your hard drive crashes, you would still lose that list. What you need to do is copy your entire My Documents folder to a separate media. This could be a USB flash drive, a blank CD, a separate hard drive or to a floppy disk.
TO PRINT OUT THE FILE LISTING OF ALL EMAIL ADDRESSES.
Find the file addresses.csv file in MY Documents folder and click to open.
You will now have a listing of “NAME’, “EMAIL ADDRESS” for all the people in your address book.
Edit as required, and print off a hard copy to keep for future reference.
HOW TO USE WEB MAIL
WHEN TO USE WEB MAIL
HOW TO USE WEB MAIL
I will use XTRA as this example but all Internet service providers (ISP) such as Clear, Paradise will also have a log in to your web mail. (In www.paradise.net.nz it is called mail on their home page.) (www.webmail.clear.net.nz for Clear)
For XTRA, click on the link below.
https://login.yahoo.com/config/login_verify2?.intl=nz&.src=ym
If this does not connect you to the internet, open Internet Explorer and go on line if you are using dial up connection. In the address window input
Then click on The EMAIL tab.
In the SIGN IN window input your full email address i.e. username@xtra.co.nz and your XTRA password.
On the left hand side you will see a series of boxes such as Inbox, Drafts, Sent, Spam and Trash. These are similar to the folders on you home computer except there is now a SPAM or/and Trash folder as well.
Click on INBOX.
You will now see a list of the messages in your inbox on your ISP web site.
The headings for the columns are From, Subject, Date, Size.
Any messages that you have downloaded on previous occasions put a tick in the box, left of the FROM column.
Next put a tick in the box for that large email that is stopping the completion of the email downloads.
Then click on the delete button... All the ticked emails will be deleted.
Next, go through the spam folder and check for good emails that have been classed as SPAM by XTRA. If you find one that is NOT spam, click on the message to open the message.
You will now be able to read the message. If you wish to indicate to XTRA that this sender is a legitimate sender, click the NOT SPAM button. The message will be put into your INBOX and further messages from the same sender should not be put in the spam folder from now on.
Delete all the messages in the spam folder. The easiest way to do this is the click on SELECT ALL and then DELETE.
If you find a spam message in your INBOX, put a tick in the box and click on the SPAM button. The message will now be put into the spam folder ready for deletion.
http://www.pbclibrary.org/mousing/games.htm
Play some games.
http://www.essortment.com/in/Computers.General/index.htm
All about computers.
Password generator
https://www.grc.com/passwords.htm
http://www.whisperbot.com/about/
Sending secure messages.
JOKES SECTION
A woman called the Hewlett Packard help desk with a printer problem.
The tech asked her if she was running the printer under "Windows."
The woman responded, "No, my desk is next to the door. But that's a good point. The man sitting in the cubicle next to me is under a window and his printer is working fine."
Please send me your latest joke so that others may also enjoy.
RECIPE SECTION
Ingredients
3 large onions, finely chopped
1 tablespoon olive oil
6 large carrots, peeled and chopped
1 litre chicken stock
1 bunch silver beet
2 teaspoons vegemite
salt & freshly ground pepper
cream or sour cream (optional)
Recipe Tools
Method
Place onions and oil in a saucepan and cook over a low heat until onions are
tender. Add carrots and chicken stock simmer gently until carrots cooked.
Add roughly chopped silver beet leaves
and cook for a further 5 minutes.
Add vegemite and season to taste.
Puree soup until smooth.
Serve with a swirl of cream or sour cream.
A different soup recipe to try during the winter months.
CONCLUSION.
Another Enews put to bed and ready for sending to members who have given me their email address. It is your newsletter so if you do not see something that you would like to see, send me an email. Also if you do not wish to receive further copies of Enews please send me an email and I will remove you name from my address book.
If you do not receive this Enews, please see the tip earlier at the front of this Enews and check your spam folder on your ISP. Xtra is blocking this newsletter and classing it as spam because I send it with your name in the blind carbon copy (BCC) line.
Till next month
Be safe and enjoy your computing experience.
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
12 April 2009
MARCH 2009
76 TH. Issue
WELCOME.
Welcome to you all, especially the new members who are receiving this electronic newsletter for the first time. I hope that you learn something new and are able to put an idea to good use.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The MARCH monthly meeting is to be held on Thursday the 19th March in the main hall at Shirley Community Centre start at 2 pm.
The speaker for the monthly meeting Dr Simon Pollard, Adjunct Associate Professor, School of Biological Sciences, University of Canterbury And Curator of Invertebrate Zoology, Canterbury Museum. The name of his subject is
“The Vampire Slayers of Lake Victoria and Other Stories”
Dr Pollard is a spider biologist and award-winning natural history writer and photographer. He was the 2007 recipient of the Science Communicator of the Year Award, given annually by the New Zealand Associate of Scientists. Simon will talk about his recent research on arachnids in Kenya, Borneo and Hari Hari, as well as a relative’s legacy.
Course and Workshop News:
Visit the Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
Course and Workshop News:
March 2009
Greetings to all members! We are really surprised that so few members have enrolled in class No. 18, Internet! This is not offered very often and the frequency of classes depends on a good response when it is offered.
COURSES
There are vacancies in these classes: (* means that it requires File Management.)
18 Internet *
25 Using Microsoft Word
26 Using Microsoft Word
27 Keyboard Skills
28 Introductory
30 Introductory Email
31 Introductory
(Details all in the March Newsletter or on the Website)
32 File Management 17 April – 8 May Friday 12 noon. (This is a new class which does not appear in the newsletter. It was scheduled to satisfy demand for File Management)
WORKSHOPS
A few vacancies remain in these Workshops:
Photo Editing
Trade Me
Skype
Restoring Old Photos
Power Point
(Details for these Workshops are in the March Newsletter or on the Website.)
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place, 385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm. It saves us time if you have your Membership Number ready when you ring!
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the workshop.
The new windows operating system versions proposed.
This operating system has been installed on the Vista demo computer at SeniorNet Canterbury. If you are interested come along to a help session on a Tuesday between 12 and 2 pm and have a try.
Using a computer and sitting at a desk for hours can really put a strain on your body – literally from head to toe.
Fortunately, there are some simple steps you can
take to make sure you stay comfortable and healthy while you use
your computer.
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TIPS SECTION
Remember: Save your work!
If you are working in a program, for example typing a letter or document in MSWord, or creating a graphic in Paint Shop Pro, remember to save your work from time to time! Most programs offer this as an automated feature - so be sure to look at the program's help documentation. If you have ever been in the middle of something and had a system crash or the power go off, only to find you've lost all your work, you know what we mean! Simple and basic: Remember to save your work often or use the programs automated save feature to do it for you. Someday you'll be glad you did. "Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon...."
What is the difference between CD-R and CD-RW?
Both the CD-R and CD-RW CDs look alike, but there are obviously some major differences between them. (They wouldn't have separate names if there wasn't, right?!) The main difference that comes into play is the quality you will get from each type of CD.
Most people burn CDs to either back up their data or to make a music CD. The CD-R format is a more inexpensive disk with a decent amount of quality. They usually hold between 650 and 700 MB of information. These are good for saving any type of information, but they're better used for school projects, copying games, moving data from one computer to another, etc. If you're not planning on ever erasing the information, you'll want to use a CD-R.
On the other hand, a CD-RW is a rewriteable disk. They are more flexible for the mere fact that you can write and rewrite information on them. You can usually copy over them at least 40 times as well, which is pretty impressive. CD-RWs are good for making music CDs, because if you get tired of that music, you can always copy new songs over the old data. So, if you're planning on erasing the information you put on a CD, use a CD-RW, because you can get a lot more use out of them. This also makes it less expensive in the end, because of the reuse factor.
Whichever format you use, you burn them the same way. As long as you have a CD burner and some type of burning software installed on your computer, you're good to go.
I wanted to add a recordable DVD drive to my computer. What is the difference between DVD-R and DVD+R?
As DVD recording comes of age and the prices come down, more of us will likely be adding DVD writers to our computers. But what gives with these duelling formats?
Anyone who was around twenty years ago might remember the battle between the two video tape formats: VHS (Victor Home System) and Betamax (Sony). Fast forward to the twenty-first century and we have a similar battle of the formats with DVD.
The disks are pretty much the same, but the writing process is different. DVD+R is a bit more advanced, but the disks often cost more than the older DVD-R format.
Another thing to consider is what format your DVD recording software works best in. I had a friend that couldn't get his software to work and it turned out he needed to use DVD-R.
PASSWORDS SHOULD BE...
Do you often have trouble coming up with the perfect password? Whether you're purchasing something online or you're signing up for some kind of newsletter, etc., a password is usually required. Plus, we all know (well, we should) that it's best to use a different password for each thing we do online. And with more and more services being added everyday, it can sometimes be hard to come up with new passwords to use. So, I thought I would take some time today and try to help you out. What do you say we create some passwords?!
According to security experts, there are six rules you should follow when making up your passwords. First of all, they should be random. By that, I mean you should choose a series of characters that are completely random to everyone else, but make complete sense to you. The second rule follows up with that by saying passwords should be unique. Again, just try to create a password that no one else will be able to easily guess. The third rule states that a password should be, at the very least, eight characters long, but the longer it is, the better. If you can come up with a password that's 14 characters or more, go for it!
The next rule says that a password should be a combination of upper and lowercase letters and there should be at least one number or symbol included in there somewhere. The more variety you add to your password, the better it will be. The fifth rule simply states that you should change your password regularly and frequently. The longer you leave the same password in place, the easier it will be for a hacker to grab it. And lastly, you should type your password out manually each and every time you're asked for it. Yes, the "Remember Password" feature is nice, but it's really best to enter it in each time. If you follow these six simple rules, you will have the most secure and perfect passwords in town. That's something to be proud of!
http://www.microsoft.com/protect/yourself/password/create.mspx
Sleep is a power-saving state. Sleep saves all open documents and programs, and allows the computer to quickly resume full-power operation (typically within several seconds) when you want to start working again. Putting your computer to sleep is like pausing a DVD player: the computer immediately stops what its doing and is ready to start again when you want to resume working.
To put your computer to sleep, click the Power
button on the Start menu or click the arrow next to the Lock
button.
You can typically put a mobile PC to sleep by closing its lid. Some computers also have a physical sleep button on their cases, often located near the power switch.
Depending on your computer's power management settings, you computer may also automatically go to sleep after a period of inactivity to conserve energy. To adjust these settings, see Change, create, or delete a power plan (scheme).
While your computer is asleep, its hardware lights may slowly flash or change color. This is normal.
On most computers, you can resume working by pressing the power button. However, not all computers are the same. You may be able to wake your computer by pressing keys on the keyboard, clicking your mouse button, or opening the lid on a mobile PC. Check the documentation that came with your computer, or go to the manufacturer's website.
Like sleep, hibernation is a power-saving state. But while sleep typically saves your settings in memory and draws a small amount of power, hibernation saves your open documents and programs to your hard disk and then turns off your computer. Of all the power-saving states in Windows, hibernation uses the least amount of power.
To put your computer into hibernation, click the
Start button,
click the small arrow next to the Lock button
,
and then click Hibernate.
Windows automatically puts a mobile PC into hibernation mode when the computer's battery grows critically low.
On a mobile PC, use hibernation when you know that you won’t use your mobile PC for an extended period and won't have an opportunity to charge the battery during that time.
On most computers, you can resume working by pressing the power button. However, not all computers are the same. You may be able to wake your computer by pressing any key on the keyboard, clicking a mouse button, or opening the lid on a mobile PC. Check the documentation that came with your computer, or go to the manufacturer's website.
From
Microsoft.
Shift and Right-Click Trick (For Vista users only.)
Did you know if
you right-click on a file in Windows Vista while holding down the shift
key you'll get additional options in the context menu that appears? You
will, lots of them. Try it right now, and see for yourself!
http://www.opera.com/download/
For opera another browser as an alternative to Internet explorer.
For Firefox, another browser try it as an alternative.
For cheap overseas phone calls.
Convert a photo to a pencil sketch.
Test your internet connection speed
(Mine 5720kb/s download, 133 kb/s upload)
JOKES SECTION
Customer: Can't get on the Internet.
Tech support: Are you sure you used the right password?
Customer: Yes, I'm sure. I saw my colleague do it.
Tech support: Can you tell me what the password was?
Customer: Five Stars (*****).
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Tech support: What anti-virus program do you use?
Customer: Netscape.
Tech support: That's not an anti-virus program.
Customer: Oh, sorry...Internet Explorer.
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Customer: I have a huge problem. A friend has placed a screen saver on my computer, but every time I move the mouse, it disappears.
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Tech support: How may I help you?
Customer: I'm writing my first e-mail.
Tech support: OK, and what seems to be the problem?
Customer: Well, I have the letter 'a' in the address, but how do I get the circle around it?
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A woman customer called the Canon help desk with a problem with her printer.
Tech support: Are you running it under windows?
Customer: "No, my desk is next to the door, but that is a good point. The man sitting in the cubicle next to me is under a window, and his printer is working fine."
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Tech support: "Okay Colin, let's press the control and escape keys at the same time. That brings up a task list in the middle of the screen. Now type the letter "P" to bring up the Program Manager."
Customer: I don't have a P.
Tech support: On your keyboard, Colin.
Customer: What do you mean?
Tech support: "P".....on your keyboard, Colin.
Customer: I'M NOT GOING TO DO THAT!!
Call centres.
Mujibar was trying to get a job in India
The Personnel Manager said, 'Mujibar, you have passed all the tests, except one. Unless you pass it, you cannot qualify for this job.'
Mujibar said, 'I am ready.'
The manager said, 'Make a sentence using the words Yellow, Pink and Green
.'
Mujibar thought for a few minutes and said, 'Mister Manager, I am ready'
The manager said, 'Go ahead...'
Mujibar said, 'The telephone goes green, green, and I pink it up, and say,’ Yellow' , this is Mujibar.'
Mujibar now works at a call centre.
No doubt you have spoken to him. I know I have.
RECIPE SECTION
The original
rocky road
Serving size: Serves 6
Cooking time: Less than 15 minutes
Course: Dessert
Favourite flavours: Chocolate
The original rocky road
INGREDIENTS
400g
good quality milk chocolate, chopped
200g good quality dark chocolate, chopped
½ cup shredded or desiccated coconut
½ cup finely chopped roasted peanuts
250g raw brazil nut kernels, halved
200g red glace cherries
250g marshmallows (raspberry and vanilla)
METHOD
Place
chocolates into a large heatproof bowl over a small saucepan of simmering
water, stir until smooth. Remove from heat and stand until warm.
Stir in coconut and then remaining ingredients, one at a time. Spread
mixture into a 24cm x 12cm slice pan lined with baking paper. Leave pan at
room temperature for about one hour or until set.
Serve cut into squares.
CONCLUSION.
Another busy month at SeniorNet. Have you booked into that course or workshop yet? The year is fast disappearing and there are a number of classes that require more members to fill them.
Any ideas for a new topic in this newsletter. Any ideas or topics would be appreciated.
If you wish to be deleted from my mailing listing please send me an email and I will remove your name from my listing.
Xtra is still blocking the emails that I send out. If you do not get an Enews each month on the Sunday before the monthly main meeting please send an email message to Lester and he will send another copy. Members should check their webmail spam folder on a regular basis for any legitimate messages that their ISP have classified as spam and blocked the sender. You may be surprised at the messages that have been classified as spam.
Till next month
Happy and safe computing-
Lester Reilly
Membership officer
Member of the technical committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
FEBRUARY 2009
75 TH. Issue
WELCOME.
Welcome to all readers and I hope that you have a great year. If it keeps up the way it has started at SeniorNet Canterbury, it looks like a very busy year ahead for us with a number of new members joining us.
This newsletter is sent out each month on the Sunday before the monthly meeting. If you do not receive it check your spam filter on your web mail. Xtra is blocking this news letter and putting it into a spam folder on your web mail. If it is not there, send Lester an Email. To check your web mail open Internet Explorer and go to this site
https://login.yahoo.com/config/login_verify2?.partner=tnz&.intl=nz&.src=ym
Log in with your email address and your Xtra password and check all messages in the BULK or SPAM folder. Any that are NOT spam mark them as good emails.
If you have missed any please send Lester an email with a list of the missed issues so that they can be sent to you.
SENIORNET CANTERBURY NOTICES.
MONTHLY MEETING
The speaker for the FEBRUARY monthly meeting is John Richards the manager, delivery management Office, of Jade Software Corporation Ltd and the topic for his presentation is “Software working together”. Should be an interesting meeting. Hope to see you there.
At the present time the meeting is to be held in the Masonic Lodge Hall, 9 Shirley Road opposite the Shirley Community Centre. Parking is available alongside the hall. The meeting date is 19 February and starts at 2pm.
Course and Workshop News:
February - March 2009
COURSES
There are vacancies in these classes:
12, 16 Using Microsoft Word
15 Introductory Email
18 Internet
19 Irfanview
20 Introductory
(Please Note: Genealogy is full. If you would like this course to be scheduled again reasonably early in the winter, please register a request with the Course Co-ordinators.)
WORKSHOPS
A few vacancies remain in these Workshops:
Installing Programs
CD Writers
Making Cards
Scanner
Photo Editing
Using Picasa
Printing Photos
(Details for these Courses and Workshops are in the February Newsletter or on the Website.)
For all Classes and Workshops please ring to book a place,
385 0902, 8 am to 8 pm.
Workshops are booked only over the phone, and please don’t send us any money – this is collected by the tutor at the class.
Visit the new Website! Under ‘Course Availability’ and ‘Workshop Availability’ you will find the actual number of vacancies, brought up to date every two or three days. This will save your disappointing phone calls. www.seniornetcanty.co.nz click on the name to bring up the web site.
TIPS SECTION
Don't
you just hate it when you have to restart your computer and it just takes
forever? Restarts are required sometimes when you install new software, or
when new updates are installed for a program or for Windows itself. So you
find yourself just sitting there looking at the screen, waiting for the
computer to power down and then power up again.
There's a way to shorten the restart time. When your computer is completely
powered down, part of the startup procedure is to run the BIOS. This stands
for Basic Input Output System, and it's the DOS-like screens you see at the
very beginning of the bootup. After that is done, the computer runs the
Windows operating system.
In many cases, all you need to do is restart Windows - without having to go
through the BIOS startup procedure. To do that, just hold down the Shift key
when you restart.
Windows Vista: Click the Start circle and move your mouse over to the
bottom right corner of the Start menu, where the little triangle appears.
This opens up a new submenu, and one of your options is Restart. Hold down
the Shift button while you click on Restart.
Windows XP: Click the Start button and choose Shut Down. In the new
window that appears, choose Restart from the drop down menu. Hold down the
Shift key while you click OK.
Top 10 Ways
to Keep Your Computer Safe on the Internet.
Log off. Turn your computer
off when you are not using it.
Do not click on files ending in .exe if you are not sure what they are
supposed to do. (Not even if your friend sent it.)
Use free firewall and spy detection software every week. It's like a
vaccination for your computer.
Secure your email. You wouldn't put confidential information like your
social security number or your bank account number on a postcard (we hope).
How much do you trust the servers you send your email through with your
sensitive information.
Download a program to detect malicious software and run a scan once a month.
Supervise your kids on the computer. They like to visit sites that expose
them to viruses.
Save time with anti-spam software. No more too-good-to-be-true offers. No
products proven to shrink or enlarge body parts.
Put your saved password information under digital lock and key.
Just out of curiosity, why is the hard disk drive automatically set as the c: drive?
That's a very good question and I'm sure many others have probably wondered the same thing! For anyone who is using an IBM compatible computer (that is based on such factors as the CPU and DOS system) and uses a Microsoft operating system (all versions of Windows), your default hard disk drive letter is C.
The reason for that is the letter C is the first available drive letter for all of the hard disk drives. The letters A and B are assigned to other media drives. For example, the A: was for 3.5" floppy drives, and B: was the old 5 1/4" drives (if you can remember those).
When you install other hard disk drives on your computer or make any new partitions, they are assigned a drive letter. If you have a CD ROM or a DVD drive, they are usually assigned the letter D and then so forth to E, F, etc.
Most computers today come with a hard disk drive, of course, and a CD ROM/DVD drive. Several people also get external floppy drives and many use some sort of flash or thumb drive. All of those devices are assigned a letter after C, mainly because of the removable status they hold.
The hard disk drive is pretty much the main drive on any computer, so by default, it comes first in the assignment of drive letters.
Clean up Your Desk (top)
Have too many icons on your desktop? You probably only have a few that you really use on a regular basis, so why not keep the other ones handy, but hidden?
Well, it can be done by putting a little folder on your desktop and dragging
any infrequently used shortcut icons to it. Here's how:
1. Right-click the desktop and select,
New, Folder.
2. Name the new folder “Desk Drawer” (no quotes) or something similar.
3. Now, drag any icons that aren't being used on a regular basis to the folder. Some of the icons are stubborn and refuse to live anywhere but the desktop, so you'll find you can't move them (no amount of colourful language seems to improve this situation either). Most of them will make the transition with no complaints though.
That's it. A much cleaner desktop! If you need one of those little shortcuts, open the Desk Drawer folder and there they are.
CONVERT PDF TO WORD.
HIDE READ MESSAGES IN OUTLOOK EXPRESS.
Is your inbox full and you have trouble to read any unread messages. Did you know that you can hide all you read messages.
Open outlook express and in the top right corner of the screen you will see a small window that says “Show all messages.” Click on the down arrow alongside and click on “Hide all read messages” Now will be displayed only those massages that are unread. Easy aye.
It not a good way to use outlook express with a lot of messages in your inbox. You should have a series of folders such as to be actioned, messages to be kept and messages to be forwarded on. When you read a message in your inbox you should then move it to one of the folders listed above or delete it if you do not wish to save it. This will keep your inbox with only those messages not read and downloaded today.
TOLLS DISCOUNT USING CLEAR.
|
Phone: |
0508 888 800 |
|
Exclusions: |
Does not apply to Yak Pak monthly charges or charges for service calls. (other conditions may apply) |
|
End Date: |
30 September 2009 |
SuperGold Card Members Special Offer
Members of SeniorNet Canterbury who are existing TelstraClear residential customers are eligible for a 10% discount on all toll calls for six months from the day of registering for such a discount with TelstraClear. Registration cannot be done on line, so telephone 0508 010 737 to register your SuperGold Card number.
SeniorNet members who are not yet TelstraClear residential customers can obtain the 10% discount for six months if they join TelstraClear before 31 July 2009.
How to download and convert
online videos
Windows XP and Windows Vista
This tip is in response to a number or readers who have asked how to download YouTube videos and convert them to different video formats.
There are many programs available that will allow you to download and save video files from YouTube and other sites. However, many of them are not free, and many of them are adware, spyware or worse. If you want to save your favorite Web videos on your computer (or download them and convert them to other formats) you're going to need a program that will enable you to do it.
We've found none better, safer or easier to use than YouTube Downloader. Best of all, YouTube downloader is free.
The following is a little paraphrase of the author's description - we've edited it somewhat:
YouTube Downloader is a
freeware program that allows you to download videos from YouTube, Google
Video, Yahoo Video, and many others and convert them to other video formats.
The program is very easy to use, just type or paste in the URL for the video
you want to download and click the Ok button.
YouTube Downloader allows you to convert downloaded videos for Ipod, Iphone,
PSP, Cell Phone, Windows Media, XVid and MP3. You can use YouTube
Downloader to download the videos of your choice from anywhere.
The file download size is about 5.6 MB. So, all you dialup users. keep in
mind it's going to take about 30 minutes for you to download this program.
All you broadband users - you will hardly see it download. It's free, safe,
and easy to use and it works. What more could you ask for?
http://www.download.com/YouTube-Downloader/3000-2071_4-10647340.html
Downloaded from cloudeight.
JOKES SECTION
Tech support: Click on the "my computer" icon on to the left of the screen.
Customer: You’re left or my left?
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Customer: Hi, good afternoon, this is Martha, I can't print. Every time I try, it says "Can't find printer". I’ve even lifted the printer and placed it in front of the monitor, but the computer still says he can't find it...
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Customer: I have problems printing in red..
Tech support: Do you have colour printer?
Customer: Aaaah..................................thank you.
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Tech support: What's on your monitor now, ma'am?
Customer: A teddy bear my boyfriend bought for me at Woolies.
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Customer: My keyboard is not working anymore.
Tech support: Are you sure it's plugged into the computer?
Customer: No. I can't get behind the computer.
Tech support: Pick up your keyboard and walk 10 paces back.
Customer:! OK
Tech support: Did the keyboard come with you?
Customer: Yes
Tech support: That means the keyboard is not plugged in. Is there another keyboard?
Customer: Yes, there's another one here. Ah...that one does work...
Tech support: Your password is the small letter "a" as in apple, as capital letter V as in Victor, the number 7.
Customer: Is that 7 in capital letters?
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For
all of us who are seniors - for all of you who know seniors
- and for all of you who will be seniors. It pays to be able to laugh
about it when you are!
And, speaking of senior moments:
"WHERE is my SUNDAY paper?!" The irate customer calling the newspaper
office loudly demanded, wanting to know where her Sunday edition was.
"Madam", said the newspaper employee, "today is Saturday. The
Sunday paper is not delivered until tomorrow, on SUNDAY".
There was quite a long pause on the other end of the phone, followed
by a ray of recognition as she was heard to mutter,
"Well, rats ... so that's why no one was at church today".
RECIPE SECTION
Pineapple chicken curry
4 pieces of chicken
2tsp curry powder or to taste
2 tblsp water
1 pkt onion soup mix
1 cup crushed pineapple.
Mix curry powder water onion mix and undrained pineapple into a roasting bag. Lie bag flat in a sponge roll tin and place the chicken pieces on mixture. Tie bag leaving finger sized hole for steam and air to escape. Bake for 30 minutes at 200c turn bag over and bake a further 30 to 40 minutes.
CONCLUSION.
I trust that you have enjoyed reading this newsletter. If not send me an email and tell me why not. If I can answer a question that you may have, send me an email and I will do my best to answer it in the next Enews.
If you wish to be deleted from my mailing list, send me an email and you shall be removed.
Remember that the help session held on a Tuesday between 12 and 2 pm is once again being held in the computer room. May I suggest that all who wish to attend do NOT come at 12 noon. We are very busy at that time and by the time is 1pm we do not have any customers. Due to the numbers all at one time we are not able to give as much attention to members as we would like to do. Come along a little later and see the team with your problems, you will be most welcome.
Till next month
Happy and safe computing.
Lester Reilly
Membership Officer
Member of the Technical Committee
SeniorNet Canterbury Inc.
