GREATER BOSTON SENIOR COMPUTER GROUP NEWSLETTER
Issue No.63, April 13, 2005
CHAIRPERSON:: Arline Ekman, AVE@alumni.unh.edu
EDITOR: Harriet Mandell, harrietd@rcn.com
WEB PAGE: Garry Ziffer, http://users.rcn.com/gbscg
LIAISON: Eve Welts, ewelts@rcn.com
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THOUGHTS ON SORTING E-MAIL…Rather than leaving all your e-mail in your inbox, give some thought to how you can organize it using folders. For instance, you could have a folder for your work-related e-mail or a folder for each project you're working on. You could also create folders for family e-mail, hobbies, and other categories. You can configure most (if not all) e-mail clients to display available folders on screen. The folders in Outlook are part of the Navigation pane. When displayed, the pane is at the left side of the program window. The Navigation pane (or its equivalent) is helpful when working with folders. You can drag messages from one folder and drop them into another or move entire folders. To create an e-mail folder, right-click an existing folder and choose New
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GIVING SPAM THE GATE and in reverse …It has been said that Microsoft’s Bill Gates is the most spammed person in the world receiving about 4 million pieces of e-mail daily. It takes a whole department to take care of it. Gates hopes technology will disable spam in about two years….Go Gates!
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COULD YOUR COMPUTER START FASTER??? Launch the System Configuration Utility. Click Start/Run. Type in msconfig click OK Select the Startup tab. Uncheck the boxes for programs you don’t need to have running (RealTray, Winamp or other audio utilities would probably qualify) Remember you are not deleting the program, just preventing it from automatically launching when you turn on your computer. There are a few programs that should be running including System Tray and your firewall, and anti spyware and anti virus software programs. If you are trying to figure out what something does in your startup, you can find a list of entries and explanations here http://www.sysinfo.org/startuplist.php
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GOOD FOR A LAUGH….from Garry Ziffer….guess it is no joke when it happens to anyone’s irreplaceable data….www.backuptrauma.com/video/default2.aspx
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MPEG 3…is the audio compression technology which uses audio coding to compress CD-quality sound by a factor up to 12 while providing almost the same fidelity. MP3 music files are played via software or a physical player that cables to the PC for transfer. Don’t leave home without your music! Want to download some tunes and put them on your computer or save them to a CD? An interesting site to find some diverse cultural expressions for a reasonable price (99 cents) which helps encourage local musicians and traditions around the world through international recognition, the payment of royalties, and support for regional archives. Audio samples are available to try before you buy…. www.smithsonianglobalsound.org
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BURNING DESIRE ….can be bothersome because the backup programs in XP and WIN2XP do not know how to talk directly to a CD-R in a CD drive. Because CD drives use a different file system than hard drives they cannot burn directly and have to use programs such as Roxio or Nero which are packet writing software but can be difficult to use. Although you may have purchased one of these programs or something like them, you may find it easier to first backup the program you want to write (burn) to a CD and save it in a file first. Then proceed to burn the backup file to a blank CD using the CD burning tools in the purchased software. Windows XP now comes with a built-in backup tool to create the backup file, then you can put a blank CDR into the drive and drag the newly-created backup file to the CDR. XP will burn the CD no additional software needed.
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LABELS FOR JEWEL CASES…..there are some templates which can be yours for the downloading if you have Word 7 or later. Enter the words “jewel case” In the search box at: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/templates/default.aspx
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OFFICIAL VATICAN WEB SITE….. http:// www.vatican.va was very busy recently. It has a great deal of history, etc. Supports several languages, and makes available news services, Church documents, information on the Popes and departments of the Roman Curia
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IMAGING FORMAT ADDITION…PNG stands for Portable Network Graphics and was originally designed to replace the GIF format. PNG is offers more because it supports 24 and 48 bit images while GIF supports only 8-bit images. PNG can support RGB and Grayscale, or Indexed color image modes. Have varying levels of transparency in a PNG. However, because the PNG file format has more colors than GIF and not the compression of a JPEG it is good for small images such as buttons and thumbnails with details.
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A UTILITY REVISITED….The Belarc Advisor is a supportive utility which builds a detailed profile of your installed software and hardware including Microsoft Hotfixes, and displays the results in your Web Browser. All of your profile information is kept private on your PC and is not sent to any web server. It runs on Windows 95/98/ME, NT4, Windows 2000, XP and Windows Server 2003. Browsers: requires IE3 or Netscape 3, and higher versions. Also runs on Opera, Mozilla and Firebird. http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html
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WANTED: URL's of web sites; Helpful hints for Mac users, Win 95/98/ME/XP. Software reviews, desired topics for future meetings. Send these items via email to the editor. Please sign your email with your name. We will publish your email address, but not your name, phone number or address without your permission