Computer Tips provided by

Mike McLain

Basic Training Educational Services, LLC

Email Attachments

I am often asked how to send pictures through email.  This can easily be done with most email programs by sending the picture as an attachment.  An attachment can be any kind of file; a letter, a picture, even music or video.

The standard icon for an attachment is a paper clip.  When you are composing your email and wish to add an attachment, look for the paper clip icon in the toolbar of your email program.  Click the icon to open a dialog box.  This box allows you to navigate the file system on your computer so you can find and select the file you want to attach.  Find the picture you want to send (often found in the My Pictures subfolder of the My Documents folder) and double click on it.  

You are returned to the email you are composing.  When you have finished your email, click “Send” and a copy of the picture will be sent with your email.  The original picture remains unchanged on your computer.

Microsoft Update

One important component of safe computing is to keep your operating system, such as Windows XP, up to date.  Microsoft releases software updates, or patches, for their operating systems and Microsoft Office programs on the second Tuesday of each month.  These patches address security issues that have been found, and should be downloaded and installed to help prevent an attacker from exploiting your computer over the Internet.  

There are two ways to install patches on your system.  You can use your web browser to go directly to the Microsoft patch site at update.microsoft.com.  There you can manually select which patches to download and install on your system.  

Alternately, you can turn on Automatic Updates on your Windows XP computer to do this automatically.  This is done by going to the Start button, then Control Panel, and then double clicking the Automatic Update icon and selecting the first option, Turn on Automatic Updates.

ShrinkPictures.com

If you have ever had complaints from friends and family that the pictures you email them are too big, there is a free website that can help.  ShrinkPictures.com does just that:  you can use it to easily resize a picture for convenient emailing.  

Use your Web browser to go to www.shrinkpictures.com, and scroll down to the Resize Images box.  Click the Browse button to select a picture on your computer, and click the Resize button.  A few seconds later a new page opens with your resized picture.  Click on the Download button to save the new picture to your computer.  

When I tested the site, I used a 650 KB picture.  Using the default settings, it was reduced to a 30 KB picture in about 5 seconds.  If you need a hassle-free way to resize just one or two pictures, this site is hard to beat.

What is Spyware?

Spyware refers to a class of programs that are installed onto a computer without user knowledge or approval.  A spyware program will run in the background, monitoring user activity and sending reports on that activity to a third party though the Internet.  

Some spyware is relatively harmless.  It might only report on what web sites a person visits, so that advertising targeted to that person’s interests can be sent to them.  In the worst case scenario, however, spyware might monitor what a person types into web sites and other programs, allowing them to steal passwords, credit card numbers, and other personal information.  In either case, by running in the background spyware tends to make computers run slower and can interfere with other programs, causing the computer to malfunction.  

There are free and commercial programs designed to detect and delete spyware programs.  Two of the most popular free programs are Spybot and AdAware.  Both programs are available at a variety of freeware and shareware download sites.

TinyURL

Have you ever received an email from a friend that looks something like this:  “We’ve posted the pictures of the new baby on a photo sharing website!  To see the pictures, just go to http://www.some_picture_place.com/start/photos/free/image=sdfthkroer;tjihjropjgerpofwe"?

 The problem here is that the web address you want to go to is so long it may be difficult for you to enter into your web browser.  When web addresses are more than one line long, it may not be possible to copy more than one line at a time, depending on the program it is in.  And given a web address like this, it is impossible to enter it by hand.  

The answer?  Tell your friend about www.tinyurl.com.  TinyURL does just what its name implies.  If you enter a web address like the one above into its interface, it will generate a new web address that is guaranteed not to break on a line.  Most of the addresses generated are something like http://tinyurl.com/6, but it will still take you to the same web address as the original address.  Now isn’t that easier to enter?

Flash Drives

Flash drives have several other common names:  thumb drives, memory sticks, or USB drives, among others.  They are portable file storage devices.   You may have seen people wearing them on lanyards around their necks or on keychains.  

A flash drive plugs into a computer’s Universal Serial Bus connector.  This is a small slot on your computer, a half inch wide and a quarter inch high.  Flash drives also require Windows 98 Second Edition or later.  If you have a computer less than five years old, you can probably use a flash drive on your system.  

Why should you care?  Flash drives have made floppy disks obsolete.  A 3.5 inch floppy disk only holds 1.44 megabytes of information, as compared to 64 megabytes on a small flash drive.  As a result, few new computers include floppy drives any more.  Expect to see floppy drives become a thing of the past in just a couple more years.

Windows Vista Versions

Windows Vista is the first operating system upgrade from Microsoft since Windows XP was released in 2001.  Home users have a choice of four primary versions of Vista .  

Vista Home Basic is, as its name suggests, a bare bones version aimed at the home user who does not need television, movie, or music capabilities.  It does not have many of the Vista enhancements, such as the Aero user interface.

Vista Home Premium builds on the Home Basic version by including Windows Media Center , which offers support for television and movies on your PC.  It also supports all the enhancements offered by Vista .

Vista Business does not offer Windows Media Center support, but does support advanced administration and business tools.

Vista Ultimate is the best of all worlds.  It supports Windows Media Center and all administration and business tools.

Windows Vista Upgrades

If you are considering upgrading your current version of Windows to Vista , keep the following upgrade paths in mind.  

 Windows versions prior to XP cannot be upgraded in place to Vista.  

Windows XP Home Edition can upgrade to any version of Windows Vista.  However, Windows XP Professional can only upgrade to Vista Business or Vista Ultimate.  This means if you use XP Pro and want Media Center support, you will have to upgrade to Vista Ultimate.  

Windows XP Media Center can only upgrade to Vista Home Premium or Vista Ultimate.  It cannot upgrade to Vista Home Basic or Vista Business.  

Bottom line:  make sure you know to which version you can upgrade, and what capabilities you need, before spending your money on that Vista upgrade.