How to create a photo book using Shutterfly.com &#...

Digital photography allows us to take thousands of photos, but they don’t do much good if they stay on your computer and you never get to share or enjoy them. For sharing, nothing beats printing. And I highly suggest you do NOT print your own photos at home unless you have two things: 1) an enormous amount of time, 2) it’s your love and hobby and you have take some of that time to properly learn how to print at...

How to download and install CutePDF Free – V...

CutePDF has been one of my favorite computer utilities for many years. This small (free) utility lets you create a PDF (portable document format) file from anything that you can print. I use it to save web pages, online shopping receipts, and many other items that I might be tempted to print to paper. Instead, I print it using CutePDF and save the resulting PDF file in a folder for long term storage and retrieval. No paper,...

How to save money on paper and ink

Business Week published an article in 1975 touting the virtues of and dawning of the paperless office. Sadly, except for the paper industry, we still aren’t there 35+ years later! In the past 40 years, paper use has tripled. In the United States alone, we use more than 400 million ink cartridges per year. I do not consider myself an environmentalist. However, I do consider myself a practicalist (I’m coining the...

All 45 of my Gmail tips

At today’s local computer users group, I discussed the basics and more of Google’s Gmail. All of the tips and tricks I discussed at the meeting and many more are here for you at HelpMeRick.com. Start by clicking here to see all my articles and tips regarding Gmail. Leave any Gmail related questions you have in the comments! Thanks.

5 Steps to Using Online Financial Sites Safely

Every year computer users who use the Internet to check account balances, transactions, and even paying bills grows by nearly 30%. According to one Pew study, more than 50 million Americans use online banking services. 50 million sounds like a large number, but that still reflects less than 50% of online American adults. Bank web sites continue to evolve by becoming easier to use, more secure, and more helpful than ever...

10 Skills EVERY computer user should have (or lear...

I originally posted this list in January 2007. However, through my keen observation skills, I discovered that all computer users have not yet read and digested this information. For this reason, I’m posting it again because I won’t stop working to educate computer users until every computer user knows these 10 skills. Computers have become almost a main stream household appliance. Whether you have been using a...

Setting up a new computer

Prevention is the best medicine when it comes to avoiding illness in ourselves. Prevention in the computer world is no different. And like a newborn baby, a newly purchased computer is subject to many terrible diseases and problems if not properly cared from the moment it is taken from its cardboard box. I follow these steps when setting up a new computer system for my clients, and recommend this methodology for all new...

How to print labels the EASY way! – Video Tip

You can learn and start using this tip TODAY to make Christmas card or group mailings a breeze. Too many computer users have no idea what a database is, how to use it, and how to merge it with another program to create labels. Since printing mailing labels is only a once per year activity for many of you, learning how to do it again every single year requires too much time and frustration. In this week’s tip, I take all...

5 Reasons why YOU should be moving to the cloud

I have written many articles about Web 2.0 or cloud computing. Cloud computing means that you work with programs and/or data that are not installed or saved on your computer. Instead, the programs and/or data live on an Internet connected computer (server) somewhere else in the world. Among other things, these computers/services provide: Security via the password and user name that you choose. Access to the service from any...

Apple iPad – What, why, how?

Today, we talked about the iPad and what it can do, why you might want to consider an iPad, and how to understand the basics of the iPad, the app store, and connectivity. At the end of this article, you will find a handout of the short PowerPoint style presentation I put together to start the class that I created on the iPad with the amazing Keynote app ($9.99) from Apple. We talked about a lot of the features and how to use...

Create Your OWN Personalized Newspaper Online R...

In this month’s group, we talked about and demonstrated how to set up a web page that can be personalized. I like to use a customized web page (portal) as my home page (first page that shows up when I start my browser). We looked at the Yahoo portal (My Yahoo) and the newer Google customized home page. Both services require that you register and setup a user name and password. Once you register, you can customize your...

A beginner’s guide to Craig’s List ...

Craigslist.org is one of the most popular person-to-person commerce sites on the Internet. Started by Craig Newmark in 1995 as an email list, it has expanded ever since then to almost every corner of the United States and now operates in more than 50 countries. Larger cities tend to be much more active users of Craigslist and rural areas tend to get lumped together (like Western Slope Colorado). First, you need to be ever...

Fake Security Alerts & other Internet Bad Guy...

Over the past year or so, the majority of my professional time has been digging computer users (Windows users only) out of jams where they were infiltrated by fake security software or spyware. Two things to know about this type of infection: No matter what type of security software you use and how much you paid for it, IT CANNOT PROTECT YOU IF YOU INVITE THE BAD GUY INTO YOUR COMPUTER. It is preventable. Over the years,...

A beginners’ guide to Facebook

Although I am not a fan of Facebook and don’t use it much myself, I realize that many of you either do use it, want to use it, or asked to use it.  There are some great resources that give good step-by-step instructions on how to get started with and use Facebook. Since I am not an expert and didn’t want to create a fictitious account (against the rules, yeah right), I am listing the best resources I could find...

How to backup your important stuff – Video T...

Photos I’m betting that your photos top the list as your most precious data. If that is true, then you want to back that data up. First, you need to store all your photos in one easy to find (and backup) spot. My suggestion is to use the default My Pictures folder found in all versions of Windows. If you have not purposefully moved your photos to another location, then they should all reside there now. However, since we...