The AI Help Desk Archives

I've been experiencing intermittent ISP problems for the last week, but it appears that if I hurry this morning, I can beat the next downtime. Before beginning the column, I want to alert everyone to a virus that appeared in my AI email at least a dozen times recently:

Subject: new photos from my party!

Body: Hello!

My party... It was absolutely amazing!
I have attached my web page with new photos!
If you can please make color prints of my photos. Thanks!

Attachment: www.myparty.yahoo.com (29,696 byte PE file)

If you see this message in any of your email programs, delete it immediately. Do not open and DO NOT click on the attachment. For additional information on this virus, visit your preferred virus resource website. You can sign up for virus alerts from McAfee by visiting their website .

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ABC PROGRAMS (Note - you'll need IE 5.0 or better installed for this one - that should be most of you). Ever wish you could have all the program groups under the Start button, Programs menu list alphabetically? Well, save your wishes for something good, because you can! Here's how:

Click the Start button, Programs. Highlight any program group that's listed there.
Now, just right-click and select "Sort by name" from the resulting menu.

That's it. Remember that you can still drag and drop program groups around if you want to manually specify which ones sit at the top of the list.

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INTERNET STARTUPS
If you're like me, you probably have several internet related tasks you do each time you start your computer.

Wouldn't it be great to have all the web pages you frequent, and maybe your e-mail program, run when you start the computer? You guessed it - you can.

All you need to do is drop some shortcuts into your Startup Folder. Here's how:

First, open Internet Explorer (this trick can be done with Netscape too, but it works better with Explorer) and head to a page you want to see when your computer starts. Next, grab the little "e" next to the address and drag it over to the Start button. Don't let go, just hover over the button for a couple seconds. The Start menu should open. Now, (still holding the mouse button down), move up to the Programs menu. The Programs menu should open. Finally, move your mouse to the Startup folder (it will be underlined). Again, point to it for a second and it should open up. Drop the shortcut into it and you're all set. Make sure you drop the shortcut into the Startup Menu and NOT into the Programs menu by accident.

Oh, you can use this for your e-mail program too. Let's say you're using Outlook Express. This time, drag the icon with your RIGHT mouse button and follow the procedure above. When you let go of the icon to drop it into the start menu, be sure to click "copy here" from the little menu that pops up.

If you were to left-click and drag it, it would remove the icon from its current location and move it to your Startup folder. Hence, the right-click drag.

That's it. Restart your computer and your browser should launch, opening all the stuff you just put into the Startup menu.

I want to mention that this works better for those with an "always on" type internet connection. When Windows starts, you're already online so you really get the benefit of this little trick.

If you have a regular dial-up connection, that works too - just not quite as well. Ideally, you're dial up connection should be set to automatically dial, that way when you start the computer, it automatically dials and loads the pages for you.

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FAST HOMEPAGES & FAVORITES
Want a quick way to set your homepage with Internet Explorer? Head to your address bar and drag the little explorer icon next to the address to your Homepage button.

You'll get a message asking you to confirm that you want to switch your homepage. Answering "yes" will set the homepage for you.

What if you just want to save the page under your Favorites? Same procedure, just drag to your Favorites button.

Cool huh?

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EXPLORING FUN
Ever wish you could control the folder or drive that Windows Explorer opens to? Well, you can. Here's how:

Right-click the Desktop and select New, Shortcut
In the command line box, put in one of the commands below:

- To have this shortcut open Explorer with focus on the My Documents folder, use this in the command line:

explorer /e,/n,/root, c:\My Documents
- If you would like to just have focus on the C: drive, use the line below (probably a good idea to copy and paste the line):

explorer /e,/n,/root, c:\ NOTE- As you can see, you can put in any path you like where you see the "c:\" at the end of the line. You could set up Explorer shortcuts for any frequently used folders and or drives.

- If you would like the shortcut to open to a "My Computer" view, use this line: (Note - if you right-click My Computer and select Explore from the resulting menu, you'll get the same effect. This is quicker though)

explorer /n,/e,/root,,/select,C:\
Click Next and name the shortcut (something like "Explore My Stuff") and click the "Finish" button.

Source: Computer Tips & Techniques
http://www.worldstart.com
Copyright 2001, Worldstart - Reprinted with permission.

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LINKS

Donate Free Mammograms each day to underprivileged women. Click on "donating a mammogram." NO cost to you.
http://www.thebreastcancersite.com

Valentine's Day Love Coupons:
http://www2.womansday.com/valentine/0101valentine_coupons.htm

Osteoarthritis - The AGS Foundation for Health in Aging can provide you with a free brochure that discusses what type of exercise a typical exercise program includes and explains how to get started with a routine.
http://by.advertising.com/1/c/41943/42380/137535/137535

Free Prescription Medicine To Those Who Qualify -See Details
http://www.themedicineprogram.com/

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DOWNLOAD

From The Creators Of Elf Bowling - Braving The Elements

These guys are awesome! This game is like Mario Bros.
Direct download.

http://www.kewlbox.com/games/PC/game/Braving.exe

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We can do no great things, only small things with great love. - Mother Teresa

The AI Help Desk
Linda Peck

Linda@arthritisinsight.com

WHAT'S THIS?
On some programs, if you right-click a button, slider, or any other control, you'll get a little pop up menu with a "What's this?" item. If you click the What's This item, you'll get a little box that tells you exactly what the item you right-clicked is and what it does.

Here's an example.
1. Right-click your desktop, select Properties from the resulting menu. Your display properties screen will pop up. Right-click the sample display and select "What this?" from the resulting menu. Try it with some of the other buttons on the screen as well.
Not all programs support this, but many do. You'll have to experiment to find out. It's a handy trick if you stumble across something and you're not sure what it does.

Oh, one more thing. On the Display Properties box we were playing with, you may have noticed a little question mark button next to the "x" button on the title bar. If you click it, you get a "question mark" cursor. Now, just left-click on any item to see it's "What's this" information.

COLUMN SORTING
Have you ever needed to find something in a folder that had hundreds of files in it? Well, you usually know something about the file. If it's the name, then you're all set. But maybe you're not sure of the name, although you do know it was created in the last day or so. Or maybe you know what type of file it is, just not the name or the last time it was modified.

What about trying to select all the same types of files in a folder? You know, maybe you want to take all the JPEGs out and stick them in another location. Well, it would take awhile if they weren't all together.

So, what can you do? Well, sort your columns, of course! If you click the top of any column in Windows Explorer, it will list the contents of that folder in order based on that column. For example, if you click the Modified column, you'll find that it lists the files in the folder based on the last date they were modified. It will sort A-Z the first time you click, then z-A on the next click. This trick also works with other programs. For example, if you click the column headings in Outlook Express, you can sort your e-mail by the column heading (i.e. subject, date received, etc). I use this little trick all the time to help me locate e-mail.

EXPIRED PAGE
Q: Sometimes when I'm browsing the web, I hit my Back button and get an error message that the page has expired. What does that mean?

A: The page you were on was probably generated by some sort of script or dependent on some sort of outside information that you provided. So, when you hit the back button, the page was not re-loaded and you received that page expired message. This is sometimes due to the fact that your browser can't reload the page, but usually because re-loading the page re-submits the info. You wouldn't want to "accidentally" order something twice, for example. If you hit the Refresh button, that should allow you to re-post the info and re-load the page.

Source: Computer Tips & Techniques http://www.worldstart.com
Copyright 2001, Worldstart - Reprinted with permission.

RECOMMENDED LINKS

http://www.lifelines2000.org/ - Send your love and support to Deployed Military Men & Women WITH A VALENTINE! This site is a major source of info relative to Current Events, Family Assistance, Deployment, Relocation, Rights-Benefits and Personal Issues.

http://www.colorgenics.com/intro.html - Create a psychological profile based on your "colors." A just for fun!

http://208.184.24.125/EMENHome.htm - The Emergency Email Network - Get notified by email from your local, regional and national government sources.

THIS WEEK'S DOWNLOAD

http://www.risoftsystems.com/store/wilderness.asp Living Wilderness screensaver courtesy of RI Soft Systems, Inc.

Until next week,

"Happiness is a perfume you cannot pour on others without getting a few drops on yourself." -Ralph Waldo Emerson

STOPPING START-UP PROGRAMS

Don't you just hate it when you've installed a program that insists on starting itself when you boot the computer? You know the drill. You install something and it places an icon in your system tray.

Now, all those little icons you see in your system tray represent programs that are RUNNING. If a bunch of stuff loads when you start your computer, you may be maxing out your system before you launch your first regular program. So, if you find your computer getting progressively slower as you add more software, it could be that these system tray icons are, at least partially, at fault. So, how do you keep all these unwanted programs at bay?
1. Click the Start button and select Run... Next, type in: msconfig Then hit OK. The System Configuration Utility should run (please note that not all computers have it installed -see note below). Click the Startup tab. You'll see a listing of all the stuff that starts itself when your computer does. Just uncheck the programs you don't want to load and leave the rest alone.
Note - If you don't have msconfig on your system (win 95 / 2000 doesn't) then check out Startup Control Panel at:
http://www.mlin.net/StartupCPL.shtml It does basically the same thing.

Once you get msconfig or the program above running, you'll probably see more stuff than you bargained for. I would advise exercising caution while unchecking, especially if you're not sure about what program(s) you're suppressing. Stuff like "Scan Registry" and "System tray" are probably best left alone. If you see stuff that you recognize as being non-essential software, than uncheck it. This is one of those do at your own risk things - for sure.

If you're not sure which program is being referred to, look at the path. Sometimes the folder just before the ".exe" file can give you a clue as to what program you're dealing with. For example, if I see something like:

"C:\program files\real\realplayer.exe"

I can guess the program in question is the ever annoying Real Player.

In general, don't disable stuff that starts like this: "C:\Windows\"

Or stuff like this: SysTray.exe

These are more likely to be important system files and programs. You may find that your computer won't run without them and you'll have to go into Safe mode to get things working again.

Finally, note that unchecking this stuff doesn't remove it. The idea behind having these programs start when the computer does is to give you fast, easy access to them. However, having too many of these programs running at the same time can hit you hard in the system resources department. I personally make sure anything I don't need isn't running. If I need it, I'll click on the shortcut.

MUSIC CD TRICK

Do you play CDs in your computer? If so, don't you hate it when you're trying to listen to your CD and the computer is "beeping" in on top of it (you know, for error messages and such)? Here's how to fix the problem:
1. Right-click the little yellow speaker in your system tray (the system tray is located opposite your start button). Select Open Volume Controls. A screen will pop up with lots of volume controls on it (surprise), find the one for "Wave" and check the little Mute box. On my computer, the Wave volume control was the 2nd one.
That's it. No more interruptions while listing to your CD. Make sure you turn them back on after you're done with your CD though :-)

An alternative to this would be just to turn your Wave sounds down a little. Follow the procedure above, but slide the volume control for Wave files down rather than checking the Mute box.

Source: Computer Tips & Techniques
http://www.worldstart.com
Copyright 2001, Worldstart - Reprinted with permission.

LINKS

http://www.p-rposters.com/catalog/catalog.htm - Print (or order) a motivational poster.

http://www.afunzone.com/ - Have a little fun.....games, puzzles and more.

http://www.freetranslation.com/ - A nice language translation service.

DOWNLOAD

http://www.moochers.com/ - Free downloads of all types.

Until next week,
"The most wasted day of all is that during which we have not laughed." - Sebastian R. N. Chamfort

Q: How can I figure out what type of equipment I have in my computer? Stuff like CPU speed, RAM, Hard Drive space, screen resolution, etc?

A: Actually, it's not as easy as it should be. Maybe I'm missing something, but as far as I can tell, you have to go to separate areas in Windows to figure this it out.

So here's a how-to chart:

RAM & Windows Version - Right-click My Computer and select Properties. The screen that pops up will give you info on what version of Windows you're running and how much RAM is currently installed in the machine.

Hard Drive Space- Open My Computer, right-click the C: drive, and select Properties from the resulting menu. You'll get a handy little Pie chart that gives you used and available HD space.

Screen Resolution- Right-click the Windows Desktop, Properties. Hit the Settings tab on the resulting screen. You'll see your resolution and color depth listed there.

CPU Speed - XP will actually give you this if you right-click My Computer, Properties. However, older versions of Windows won't give you the slightest hint as to the CPU speed.

So, what can you do?

First place to look is towards the top of the screen when the computer first starts up. Some machines will display the type of processor and speed. If you have some sort of splash screen come up when you first turn on the computer, try hitting the Escape key. Sometimes that will remove the splash screen and let you see the "real" screen behind it.

If that doesn't work, you may need to find a third party software utility to check CPU speed. I haven't run one of these for a couple years, so I don't really have a good one to recommend. However, if you head to: http://www.hotfiles.com Type "CPU speed" into the search engine and you should be able to come up with several good (and probably free) utilities that can get you CPU speed for you.

WINDOW STARTS

Ever have a program that always starts in a "normal" state but you really want it maximized? Well, here's a little trick to help you do just that (and more) with a quick little bit of shortcut editing (note - although this seems to work on most programs, sometimes you'll run across a program that just won't cooperate)
1. First, right-click the shortcut to the program and select Properties. Under the Shortcut tab, you'll see a drop box labeled "Run". In that box you'll find options to run the program as either Normal (it starts up at it's default size), Minimized (it starts up minimized to the toolbar), or Maximized (it starts up full screen).
Select the start up state you want and you're all set.

JUST THE PICTURE PLEASE

Have you ever been on a web page with a cool picture but it was surrounded by clutter (you know, ads, text, etc)? Well, here's a trick that will let you display just the picture! I know, this tip doesn't seem all that useful. However, it's really handy if you want to print just a picture without all the excess clutter. Besides, it makes you look really cool when you do it in front of other people. And hey, we all want to look cool in front of the computer right?

Anyhow, to perform this little tidbit of internet magic, just drag the picture to Internet Explorer's address bar. As long as it isn't linked to something, a page will display with just the picture shown. (However, if the picture contains a link you'll go to that page.)

OK, that's all well and good for pictures that are not linked to some other web page, but what about pictures that are? Can you still pull this off? Yes - sort of.

Just right-click the picture and select Properties from the resulting menu. When the properties screen comes up, copy the address next to the Address (URL) section (yes, you can actually highlight it for copying purpose).

Paste that line into your address bar, hit Enter, and poof! There's your picture!

Source: Computer Tips & Techniques
http://www.worldstart.com
Copyright 2001, Worldstart - Reprinted with permission.
MY RECOMMENDED LINKS

http://www.yesterdayland.com/ - Relive your childhood.

http://www.healthtalk.com/ratalk/edition4/index.html?mid=02022619f - RA treatments: Putting them all into perspective.

http://www.beatgreets.com/ - Send someone a private, musical greeting card.

http://disney.go.com/park/homepage/today/flash/index.html - Online fun from Disney for you and your children.

DOWNLOAD

http://www.thefrugalshopper.com/printables.html - Loads of free forms and printables that you can download and/or print.

Until next week,

"The grand essentials of happiness are: something to do, something to love, and something to hope for." - Allan K. Chalmers