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Internet Tips

Internet Speed Tip

The Internet’s prowess for finding almost any type of information continues to grow. 

Today’s tip focuses on how to get back to where we have been on the Internet. There are many times that I need to get back to a web page that I was viewing earlier in my Internet session and pushing the Back button a gazillion times seems silly and slow. 

Internet Explorer (version 4.0 and greater) users note that there is a little upside down triangle next to the Back button. Click on it and viola there is a list of all the sites you have visited so far. Just scroll through the list and click on any item to be instantly transported there!

Netscape users (version 4 and greater), the method is similar. Simply click and HOLD your mouse button down on the Back button and you will see a list of all the sites you have visited in the current session and can click on any one of them to leap frog to it.

Note also that the same technique can be used for the forward button as well. Sorry AOL users, this is yet another feature not currently supported by AOL.

Internet Explorer Quick Navigation Tip

Sometimes the simple tips provide the most usefulness. Try this tip to gain a little speed when navigating to a new or favorite web site. As the title suggests, this tip only works with Internet Explorer. Do not add or subtract any steps from this tip:

  1. Click on one time in the address bar at the top of the browser

  2. Type the name of the web site in the bar (eg. for www.helpmerick.com just type helpmerick, for www.foodtv.com just type foodtv, etc)

  3. Press Ctrl+Enter on your keyboard and boom the browser automatically adds the http://www to the beginning and the .com to then end of the address and instantly transports you to the web site.

Got something to say? Tell more than 600 million people!

If you have read our newsletter, or listened to the show at any time over the past two plus years, you have heard us mention the "Castellini on Computers Blogger". Hopefully many of you’ve already benefited from our Blogger as it holds many treasures. 

Simply put, a Blogger is a diary of sorts that anyone can start on the Internet. Three years ago, if you wanted to start a web page, you had to learn HTML, FTP and find a host. That was enough to scare most people away from even attempting the task. Then came Blogger. As their tagline says, "push-button publishing for the people", truly means push-button publishing. Visit the Blogger web site for more details.

Get Home and Back Quickly!

No, the Internet has not found a way to "beam" us hither and yonder…yet!  

I’m referring to navigating around your word processing, email or other text related documents quickly.

Don’t underestimate the power of the keyboard as you create your written masterpieces.  Moving quickly from one part of your document to another saves loads of time and the keyboard can help.  Try these keyboard shortcuts:

  • Home – pressing this key will move your cursor to the beginning of a line

Geocaching

Computers, the Internet, GPS, and Hiking for Treasure

A customer of mine (Bill) introduced me to a  fast growing sport called geocaching. Geocaching makes use of Global Positioning Satellites (GPS), the Internet and hiking to find ‘treasures’ all around the world!

GPS uses a series of satellites (24 to be exact) to triangulate a GPS users position. One must use a GPS receiver to utilize the system and access the satellites. Cost for a GPS receiver starts at $90. The signal will give you (within 1-3 meters of accuracy) your latitude, longitude, altitude, speed and direction. Learn more about GPS and how it works by clicking here.

The efficient way to email your digital photos

by Adam Cochran

I often get emails from family or friends who have recently been on vacation or been involved in some other event and they want to share a handful of photos with everyone in their address book. Some of the email works out great, but other email doesn’t quite make it through the way sender intended.

Emailing photos can be one of the most troublesome things you can do with your email for several reasons.

  1. Non-resized photos can take a long time to upload to send through email on a dialup line.

  2. Non-resized photos can take a long time to download for everyone you send the email to. Nothing is more aggravating than waiting 20 minutes for a photo to download so you can read your email, only to find out that the photo is of a funny position that the cat fell asleep in.

Does your computer get stuck?

Actually, I should say, "does your web browser get stuck?" Occasionally, we may click on a link from a web page and the browser just sits there and the page never appears. Here’s the remedy… When you experience the above symptom while browsing about the Internet, simply click on the "stop" button at the top of your browser (traffic light in Netscape, circle with an ‘X’ in it for Internet Explorer and AOL). Then, immediately click on the link again and your browser should kick into gear and take you where you want to go. One caution: do NOT use this technique while shopping on the Internet.

Cookies…are they dangerous, harmless or do they just taste good?

Cookies are small (very small…hundreds of cookies will take up less than a tenth of a megabyte on your hard drive) text files that are deposited on our computer systems by some web sites. For example, the polling service I use for our listener poll will deposit a cookie on your hard drive to prevent more than
one vote per question, but that is all it does.

In the majority of cases, cookies pose no threat to you, your computer, or your privacy. Cookies contain as little data as your Internet providers identifying address or your name and preferences for a web site (like Amazon.com or a personalized Yahoo! page). There have been instances of some advertising
companies attempting to ‘track’ your whereabouts on the web, but again it is more your ‘number’ than you and the data collected is for statistical information only. And to reiterate, cookie files take up a minuscule amount of your hard drive space.

Change the Font Size of Your Browser Text

Text on certain web pages can be either too small or too big. Using either Netscape Communicator or Internet Explorer, you have control over this potential problem using the font size command.

These font adjustments don’t have to be absolute. Change them as the need arises since there is a large disparity in the way web sites are formatted.

In Internet Explorer, change the font size by:

1. Click on View from the menus
2. Click on Text Size
3. Click on any of the options listed (from smallest to largest)

In Netscape Communicator, change the font size by:

1. Click on Edit from the menus

AOL Users – Find your downloads

One common question I get from AOL users is locating files or email attachments they have downloaded. When an AOL user downloads email attachments, by default, they get buried in a sub-folder of the AOL folder. This tip will help AOL folks who have a hard time finding these files.

One easy way to quickly navigate to your AOL download folder is by creating a desktop shortcut…here’s how:

1. Double-click My Computer
2. Double-click the “C” drive (your hard drive)
3. Find your AOL folder and double-click on it (if you are using version 7.0 or greater, you may need to double-click on “Program Files” first). If you have installed the same version of AOL more than once, you will see AOL 5.0b, 5.0c, etc…click on the one with the latest letter)