If you have a large amount of data to summarize that you can get some kind of meaning from it. PivotTable means being able to pivot the data in PivotTable view. This will show how PivotTables work.
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ave you ever wondered what all those letters mean listed on electronic equipment? Most people unless they have been schooled in electronics couldn’t tell you what those letters mean. Much less what they are there for. This little blog is to get your familiar with those letters and in the future I will start telling you what they are there for.
Like backlighting on tv’s are for when the scene is dark or at night, it is hard to see what is going on in the scene. Well that is due to the backlighting of the television that you are watching the movies on.
This little set of Acronyms are by no means for all of them. But they will get your feet wet so to speak as to what they are talking about. In future blogs I will go further in depth to what each one means.
Acronyms
2D = Two Dimensional
3D = Three Dimensional
AMLCD = Active-Matrix Liquid Crystal Display
CCFL = Cold Cathode Fluorescent Lamp
CD = Compact Disk
CDR = Compact Disk Read
CDRW = Compact Disk Read/Write
CRT = Cathode Ray Tube
DCR = Digital Cable Ready
DLP = Digital Light Processing
DVD = Digital Video Disk
DVD/R = Digital Video Read
DVD/RW = Digital Video Read/Write
EDTV = Enhanced Definition TV
Gb = Gigabyte
HDTV = High Definition Television
HDMI = High Definition Multimedia Interface
he = High Efficiency
HQ = High Quality
LED = Light Emitting Diode
LCD = Liquid Crystal Display
LCoS = Liquid Crystal on Silicon
Mb = Megabyte
OLED = Organic Light-emitting diode
Plasma = Gas filled screen
OTA = Over-the-air
SD = Standard Definition
UHF = Ultra High Frequency
VHF = Very High Frequency
If you get these terms down and start learning about them. They will help you be informed on how to purchase your first or next HDTV. Whether or not you want a plasma or LCD or LED TV. If you want CCFL, LCD, or LED backlighting. If you want 2D or 3D options.
You probably know that putting images into a Word document. Simply copy and paste the image into the document. But once you have done this little action. Then it just sort of sits there. It’s hard to move around, then there’s the problem of manipulating text for the image. Like I said, it just sits there.
But there is a way around this and that lies in the Text Wrapping settings. The default is it is set to In-Line with Text, sometimes this is just fine if the image is an arcane rune not found in any font.
But most of the time you will want to change these settings so the text will flow along with the image. To do this, you will need to right-click on the image, and choose Text-Wrapping from teh context menu, then choose Square or Tight ( or any of the other options you want to use).
When you do this, it unlocks the image so that you can move it around because it’s no longer locked in place. It also allows you to decide how your text should have behave around it. You can also find other helpful options in the Picture Ribbon that appear when select an image.
Do you get tired of entering data into the fields of Excel? Well no fear there is an easy way to enter data that will make it not only faster but more accurate. People that use the keyboard to enter data into Excel just haven’t thought of ways to do enter it any other way.
Have you ever thought about using Excel’s fill feature? This feature will let you enter days of the week, months of the year automatically.
What To Do:
First type in the day or month then click Enter.
Then click on that field to return to it.
Then hold you mouse cursor over the bottom right-hand corner of the field. You will see the cursor turn into a plus sign.
Click and drag you mouse either down or up or sideways either left or right depending on which way you want to move it.
As you move the cursor you will see a small window with the days or months for the next field.
This will save you from having to guess the number of cells that you have moved.
Once you have the fields filled then just let go of the mouse and it will automatically fill the cells.
Once you start dragging the mouse over the cells it will fill in the next day or month. You can go as far as you need.
This will save you a lot of repetitive typing.
BASIC NUMBERS
You can fill a series of numbers in you need to also. Just type in the first two numbers. If you use a single number then
Excel will just copy that number into the next field and so on. In other words if you want to add the days of month.
What To Do:
Put a 1 in the first cell where you want it.
Then a 2 in the next cell to it.
Then select both cells.
Then place the cursor on the right-bottom corner and drag to the number of the cells that you want, then let go of the mouse and it will fill the numbers in for you.
HINT: This is an easy way to make a calendar for you and you can enlarge each cell in order to post comments. Or things to do.
HINT: You don’t have to use continous numbers. You can use 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, and so on. Excel will format the cells using that pattern for you.
HINT: You could use the number of days in the week for the calendar, or days of the month, the days of the year. It will replicate any number product that you can think of.HINT: Holding the right mouse button as you drag the fill handle, when you release the mouse button a pop-up menu appears and you can choose to fill weekdays, months, or years instead of the days.
CUSTOM LISTS
The fill list can be customized to suit your needs. To customize just click the Office button and choose Excel Options/ Popular/ Edit Custom Lists. This will display the Custom List Dialog. When you do this you can copy a list from a range on a worksheet or you can build you own new list of entries. One per line, then click Add to add the list that you created and OK twice to finish. You can now type any entry from your list in a cell and drag the fill handle to create the sequence.
MORE-COMPLEX SERIES
You can even create nonlinear series.
First click on the cell and type in the first value in the series.
Then right-click and drag on the fill handle.
A Context menu will appear, select Series, this will open the Series Dialog.
Here you can specify a Growth series.
You can test this by typing in the number 1 in a cell, right-click it and drag. Click Series/ Growth and set the step
value to 2, and click OK. This will create a sequence in which each number is followed by itself multiplied by two.
DROP-DOWN List
You can even create a drop-down list, they can be handy when you have options you want your user to choose from-and it can conveniently avert mistakes.
What To Do:
First open a new sheet.
Type a list of entries.
Select them.
Then type a name for the list in the Names Box on the left of the Formula Bar.
Then click on a new Worksheet.
select the cells in which the data is to appear.
Click the Data Tab on the Ribbon and choose Data Validation.
From the settings tab choose Allow/ List and in the Source Box type = and the name you gave to the selected list (for example, =employees). Click OK.
When you click on a cell you can select the cell entry from the drop-down list.
FORMS
Have you ever looked for the forms button in the ribbon of Excell 2007? You won’t find it. But don’t despair, because you can quickly add it to the Quick Launch Bar at the top of your Excel page.
What To Do:
Click on the Office Button at the top of the page.
At the bottom of the menu click on Excel Options.
Then click on Customize.
Then choose Commands from list pick Commands no in the Ribbon.
Locate and select the Form button, and click add. Then OK.
To display the form, click in a table of data and click the form button.
You can enter the data into your table using the form dialog, which is quicker and easier than navigating around a very large table.
These tips are not widely known in Firefox, but they can help you once you get to know them.
Firefox is fast gaining popularity in the internet search engines. It’s an open source browser that is fast becoming a favorite among internet users. It has the ability to expand the browser’s functions by using plug-in extensions and Greasemonkey scripts. The problem is that a lot of Firefox features are overlooked. Here are some of those overlooked features that are already there without having to install anything.
1. Minimizing the toolbar
If you think that the toolbar is taking up too much room on the screen, you can get rid of the big round “back” button and replacing it with a sleaker button. Just right click on the toolbar, choose “Customize” and select “use small icons”.
These controls are functional but just take up less room. This will allow the toolbar to shrink which gives more room for viewing sites.
2. Using Smart Bookmarks
There are Bookmarks that refer you to particular sites. But Firefox Smart Bookmarks will generate live lists of sites according to the parameters you define. This could be the 10 sites that you visit most, or the 20 last sites that you have visited that contains a particular keyword in their title.
Simply select Bookmarks at the top of the screen, then select Bookmarks menu in the left-hand pane.
Then click on Organize in the toolbar at the top.
Then click New Bookmark in the drop-down menu.
Then give your New Bookmark a unique or descriptive name. Such as “Most visited sites”
Then in the location field you will want to enter this code. place:queryType=1&sort=12&maxResults=10
And press enter.
You can go to Mozilla’s developer site which includes more commands that you can use to customize your bookmarks.
Here is another that you can use that will search from the keywords from search terms.
place:queryType=0&sort=8&maxResults=10&terms=keyword (replace “keyword” with desired term).
3. Duplicating tabs with drag and drop
You can duplicate tabs easily by pressing the Cntrl. button while you click on a tab and move it to an empty spot on the tab bar.
4. Sending e-mails with Yahoo Mail or Gmail by default
When you click on a e-mail address this will open up your default e-mail provider whether it is Yahoo or Gmail. Whichever is your default e-mail provider. But you can change this by simply:
Clicking on Tools Menu,
Select Options
Select the Applications tab
Scroll down to the mailto:
Click on the mailto and highlight it. A drop down menu will appear and select the e-mail provider you want.
Select Yahoo, Gmail, or Windows live and click ok.
5. Viewing passwords for any page
You can view the passwords associated with any site. Goto the log-in page and right-click anywhere on the page. Select view Page Info, and then the Security tab. Click View Saved Passwords, then another window wil pop up showing the usernames associated with that site. Click Show Passwords to see the passwords for each username.
If you want to view all of your saved usernames and passwords for each site. Open Options under the Tools Menu and select the Security tab. Click Saved Passwords to open a list of every site you have saved a password for.
This will show your usernames. If you click on the show passwords it will ask you if you really want to show the
passwords. Click OK and the passwords will show up. If you forget your password instead of having to click on the site and have them send you a new one, than having to change it again. You can find your passwords easily and faster. You can even print out the usernames and passwords if you like.
You might think that this could be a huge security problem, and yes you would be right. Knowing this little trick then someone could access your computer and get all your usernames and passwords.
In the Options menu, open the Security tab, click use a master password and enter a password. Now this password will have to be entered anytime you or anyone else tries to view your saved passwords. But then you will be asked to enter this password everytime you open Firefox. Because Firefox won’t open unless it is entered. Also Firefox won’t automatically save passwords for you so make sure you don’t forget this password.
But it is a cool feature that you might find useful.
Here are some more great tips and tricks to use with Windows 7. It can make your day go a lot smoother once you learn how to use them. I hope that you find them useful.
11. Cleaning Live Essentials
Windows Live Essentials will give you new versions of Mail, Movie Maker, Photo Gallery and more. But it will also install other components that may not be needed. But if a clean system is your cup of tea, then these can be removed easily.
One of the components is called Choice Guard, this is a tool that will set your search provider to your home page. It will prevent any programs or other browsers from changing your home page. If you decide that you don’t need or want it, you can remove it.
Click Start
type msiexec /x and pressing Enter
Another neat trick of Windows Live Essentials is that adds an activeX control that will help upload your files to Windows Live Skydrive. It will also make it easier to sign into other Windows Live accounts, by installing Windows Live Sign-in Assistant. If you decide that you don’t need or want it.
Go to Control Panel
Click on uninstall a Program applet.
12. Network Support
The default setting of Windows Live MovieMaker will not let you import files over a network, but after tweaking the Registry will change this.
Click Start
type in REGEDIT (lowercase also works)
Goto HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Windows Live\Movie Maker, add a DWORD value called AllowNetworksFiles and set it to 1 to add network support.
13. God Mode
Windows 7 has a different Control Panel than Vista or XP. But it’s still difficult to find all the applets and options that you might need. But with “God Mode” while not really “god like” does offer an easy way to access everything you could want all in a single folder.
First create a “new folder” and rename it to anything you want to. I named mine Control Panel. Then open that folder and create a new folder named (Everything {ED7BA470-8E54-465-825C-99712043E01C}.) This must be typed exactly as it is here. Be sure to include the curly brackets. When you press enter the letters and numbers will disappear. Then double click the new folder will display shortcuts to the different functions in the Action Center. The Network and Sharing Center, Power Options, Troubleshooting tools, User accounts and others and there are more than 260 options in total.
14. Right-click
Windows 7 looks a lot like Vista, but the difference is when you right-click on different things. When you right-click on the desktop just as with Vista, you will find a new menu to enter your screen resolution. You don’t even have to search the display settings. As usual you can change your desktop theme and screen saver and save under a profile.
Right-click the Explorer icon on the taskbar and get almost instant access to common system folders, Documents, Pictures, the Windows folder and more.
If you use a different browser than Internet Explorer then you might not want the IE icon on your task bar. Simple right-click on the icon, and select unpin this program from the task bar, then you can install Firefox.
15. Themes and Wallpapers
Windows 7 has some new attractive new wallpapers, which makes it hard on which one to choose. Well Windows 7 developers must have had the same problem so they made it possible to select them all in a desktop slideshow.
Just right-click an empty part of the desktop
Select Personalize
Desktop Background
Then press the CTRL key down as you select the images you like.
Then select how often you want the images to change. From 10 seconds to daily.
Select Shuffle if you’d like the backgrounds to appear in a random order.
Click Save Changes.
DESKTOP SLIDESHOW: Select multiple background images and Windows will cycle through them
16. Screen Space Recovery
Windows 7 task bar acts as one big quick launch toolbar that can hold whatever program shortcuts you like. Just right-click the icon and Select Pin to Task bar. But this might take up too much space on the taskbar. Simply right-click on the Start orb and Select Properties then Task bar, Select Use Small Icons.
17. Locking and Unlocking the Task bar
You can lock the task bar in place or you can move it to either the right or left of the screen. You can even move it to the top of the screen if you like. Once you have the task bar where you want it. Just right-click and re-lock the task bar until you are ready to move it again. You can also auto-hide the task bar when not using it. This is a great way to have more screen space available for your apps.
18. Using Sticky Notes
Windows 7 has what is known as Sticky Notes, and it is simpler and more useful.
Click Start
type in Sticky Notes
Select it in the menu. Simple
You can move the notepad to anywhere you like. You can change the color of the sticky note by right-clicking and selecting the color you want. Just click the + plus sign to add another note. By clicking the X you can delete the note. Also if you press Alt + 4 this will close all the notes and they are automatically saved. You can pin the Sticky Notes icon to the task bar by right-clicking and selecting the pin to task bar.
19. Keyboard shortcuts
Alt+P
Display/ hide the Explorer preview pane
Windows Logo+G
Display gadgets in front of other windows
Windows Logo++ (plus key)
Zoom in, where appropriate
Windows Logo+- (minus key)
Zoom out, where appropriate
Windows Logo+Up
Maximize the current window
Windows Logo+Down
Minimize the current window
Windows Logo+Left
Snap to the left hand side of the screen
Windows Logo+Right
Snap to the right hand side of the screen
Windows Logo+Home
Minimize/ restore everything except the current window
20. Schedule Media Center downloads
Windows Media Center can now be scheduled to download data on a specific date, and time. This is a great way of getting downloads done when you aren’t using the computer for something else.
Launch Media Center
Go to tasks
Go to Settings
Click General
Click on Automatic Download Options
Set the download start and stop times that you would like it to use.
Jesse Auburg Online Marketing Entrepreneur
Jesse’s Online Computer Services
Windows is known for its unique taskbar. It has changed a lot over the years. Windows 7 taskbar shows just how much it has changed. The taskbar itself can be modified to suit different users.
Windows 7 has done away with the “quick launch” toolbar on the left side of the taskbar. The main taskbar can serve as a “quick launch” toolbar. Because you can pin applications and programs to the taskbar and open them from there. So really there was no need for the “quick launch” toolbar anymore.
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The tool tray on the right side is also changed and enhanced. You can customize the tool bar quickly to suit your needs.
Using the taskbar features are easy and the casual windows users will pick up on these quickly. The basic features are easy to setup. But the more advance features will take some time getting used to. But once you start setting up the taskbar you will find it an enjoyable experience.
This little tutorial will show some of the basics of Windows 7′s taskbar, to give some pointers that should help in making Windows 7 easier and faster to use.
Basic Task bar Features
If you are now running XP or Vista OS. On the taskbar you can see all the programs and applications that you have running at the time. This taskbar shows little horizontal “bars” or “blocks” for each one running. If the taskbar gets full then you either have to expand the task bar by unlocking it and grabbing the top of the task bar and pulling it up, or you can stack the bars for the same program. Vista does this for you also when the task bar is full.
Windows 7 Taskbar
Windows 7 taskbar is changed by letting pin many of the programs and applications that you use the most to the taskbar. Then you can open them by clicking on them when you need them. In the older versions when you opened a program or application from the “quick launch” toolbar. Then that space was wasted.
To pin a program or application to the task bar, just grab the program or application and drag it to the task bar and let it go, or right click on the program or application you will see in the menu a option to pin to task bar. Just click that option and it will be pinned.
If a program or application is running it will be highlighted on the task bar. Just hoover you cursor over the icon and small windows will pop up to show you what you have opened. If you have multiple windows opened in the program or app. it will show them just above the taskbar. Then you can move your cursor to the one you want to reopen it.
If you decide that you don’t want or need the program or application pinned to the taskbar, then just right click the icon on the taskbar and click on the unpin option, or grab the icon and drag it back to the desktop and release it.
If you are downloading some data from a website in IE8, while you are downloading the Icon in the task bar will display a progress bar for the download, it will fill up as the download completes. File copies will do the same thing.
Windows Vista started with the thumbnail preview system. But it wasn’t very good. Windows 7 has added the full-screen transparency “Aero Peek” feature and puts little close buttons on each thumbnail so you can close the thumbnail without having to reopen them. The thumbnails can even have some functions as well such as Media Player. It also has the play/pause and next/previous track buttons on the bottom of its thumbnail.
Another cool feature of the taskbar is that the icons are not in a fixed position. This means that you can arrange the icons in any order that you want. Just click on the icon you want to move and drag it to its new position and drop it. It will stay there until you decide to eliminate or move it again. This also works in the system notification area also.
Jumplists and System Tray
Jumplists are a great little function that like applications can have their taskbar icons enhanced to provide rich thumbnail views or act as a progress bar. They can also take advantage of the quick-access feature that can get you to your work faster to get you working faster.
When you right-click on an icon a list will “jump up” to show the most recent items that you have opened. This also works with IE8 also. It will give the last few websites that you have visited. You can also pin you favorites by clicking the little pin icon to the right of the link. You can also right-click on the Media Player icon and it will give you the most recent play lists. Unfortunately Firefox and Itunes don’t have this feature yet.
Actually you don’t need to right-click the icon. If you want just left-click the icon and push up, this will also activate the jumplist feature. This feature is handy if you are on a mac or a touch screen device.
System Tray Area
This little block of real-estate on the task bar that became crowded with icons and shovel ware that comes pre-installed. It got to where it would take up half of the taskbar. You could just hide the inactive icons but a this usually hid the icons that you actually needed. Windows 7 also has a system tray but with a little twist. By giving the user the control that he needs to keep the icons that he wants to see in the system tray.
The notification area only shows about three icons by default. But it has a little caret to the left of the system tray area. Click on this caret and a little window will popup showing you the rest of your running applications.
You can drag the icons you want into the system tray area so that you can keep the ones you use the most in the system tray. You can also choose to customize the notification area. There is a menu to help you decide which icons you want to see and the ones you want to see when there is a notification, and the ones you want to stay hidden. You can also tweak the clock and the wi-fi icon, which is also more useful now.
Many system level notifications such as the firewall settings and applictions updates are in a single “Action Center” icon.
You may have noticed a little block on the far right of the taskbar. If you click on this bar, it will clear the desktop of any windows that you have open. This is really handy when you don’t have to minimize or close each application to get to the desktop. When you click on it a second time it will restore the open windows just as before.
Tips For Data Recovery
Anytime your hard drive crashes or you lose your data, you’ll need to turn to data recovery to properly restore your information. Data recovery is something most computer users are familiar with, as a majority of us have had to turn to data recovery at some point in time. Even though hard drives are becoming better and better, they are still mechanical and will always encounter problems.
The first thing to do, before any problems happen, is to always back up your data. If you create backups of your information, you’ll be well prepared in the event of a disaster. This way, even if your hard drive cannot be repaired and the data is lost forever, you’ll have the back ups to continue going as normal. If you didn’t make back ups, you’ll find the situation very traumatic when you discover that your data cannot be recovered.
Recommended All about Computer Databases
Welcome to Jesse’s Marketing Tips.
My name is Jesse Auburg. I have been involved with computers for more than 20 years.
It is my intention to post tips about computer maintenance, as well as other tips and tricks about computers. We also intend to post tips about Gardening, Carpentry, plus lots more. I have been gardener and done carpentry work since I was teenager. All 3 things are something that I enjoy doing and decide to share information with others about the things I have learned over the years
Come back often
Jesse Auburg