Announcements

We received some reader response to yesterday's PC cleaning tips that we wanted to pass on to everybody...

"You mentioned canned air to clean the CPU of a computer. A hair dryer switched to "cold" does the job well also, and there's no problem with propellant gumming up the works." Carol E.

"I would be scared to induce static with a vacuum unless it was static free, I feel the compressed air is a whole lot better just because of the static issue" Peter C.

"I take my shop vac hose and keep it near where I'm blowing to suck up the otherwise free floating dust that I blow out, it cuts down on the pledge bill and sneezing!" Jim D.

"When cleaning a computer I use a large soft makeup brush" Alvin R.

"I take my keyboard and open it up or take a vacuum to it. I use to go through them like crazy. Now, I've had the same one for about 2yrs. with no probs to it." Glenda S.

Thank you for your comments—keep 'em coming! We appreciate all of our readers out there in cyberspace.

~David

Computers 101

Q:
Help! I deleted a file by mistake and want it back! Is it gone for good?

A:
Don't panic...yet. Open your recycle bin to see if the file is there.

If so, just click on the file (or files) to highlight, then right mouse click and choose "restore".

You may also have a "Restore this item" choice in your Recycle Bin menu that you can just click to send the file back from whence it came.

If you already emptied your recycle bin, there might still be hope of recovery IF you have recovery software. This may be over the head of the average PC user, but I'll mention it anyway...

When you empty the recycle bin, what actually happens is that the File Allocation Table ("FAT": the table of contents where files are stored on the hard drive) replaces the first character of the file name with a (?) to show that the space is available. The file stays on the drive until another file overwrites it. If you catch it right away, you could still recover the file, but as I mentioned, you will need file recovery software.

There is a freeware download available called PC Inspector File Recovery that can recover files and restore them to your hard drive. Such programs are NOT for the novice PC user. Your hard drive must be partitioned and the program cannot be installed on the drive you want to check. You can download it here...
http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/UK/welcome.htm

~ David

Have a question for the newsletter? Submit it at the link below:
http://www.worldstart.com/submitquestion.htm

Tip of the Day

Creating a .LOG file in Notepad

I'm sure that you are familiar with Notepad—it's that "can't-even-really-call-it-a-word-processor" program that comes stock with all flavors of Windows since 3.x. It
isn't fancy, but it does have some unique features that make it look fancy. One of my favorites is the .LOG function. Try this:

Open up Notepad (Start Menu, Programs, Accessories, Notepad) and type:

.LOG

at the top of a new, blank document. You just made a log file! :-)

So what, right? Well, a log file is just like a journal in a way. From then on, every time you make an entry in that file, Notepad adds a time and date stamp for you. You'll see the stamp the next time you open the file. (Try it—save the file somewhere, then open it up again. Nifty huh?)

Some find this useful in various cases, such as keeping track of changes you made to something, how many times something happened, or even just keeping a
journal.

And you thought Notepad was just a pretty name.

~Steve

Have an original tip for the newsletter? Submit it below:
http://www.worldstart.com/writers-guidelines/index.htm

Amanda's Cool Site of the Day

Paperfolding.com

Want to learn Origami? You know, the Japanese art of paper folding. Here you can discover its history, find fun ways to use origami to teach math, and much more.

This is probably the most complete origami site on the web!

http://www.paperfolding.com

Do you have a cool, non-commercial site that you want to share?
Send it to Amanda at amanda@worldstart.com